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Lockheed expects F-35 flying costs will take time to come down: executive

FILE PHOTO: Israeli Air Force F-35 flies during an aerial demonstration at a graduation ceremony for Israeli air force pilots at the Hatzerim air base in southern Israel
FILE PHOTO: Israeli Air Force F-35 flies during an aerial demonstration at a graduation ceremony for Israeli air force pilots at the Hatzerim air base in southern Israel December 26, 2018. REUTERS/Amir Cohen/File Photo

February 27, 2019

By Jamie Freed

AVALON, Australia (Reuters) – Lockheed Martin Corp expects it will take around 15 to 20 years to bring the cost per flight hour of the F-35 below fourth-generation fighter jets such as the F-16, the head of the F-35 program said on Wednesday.

The U.S. Air Force, the largest global customer for the F-35, has launched a push to drive down the cost of flying and servicing F-35s to the same levels as current fighters without stealth capabilities.

Lockheed Martin Vice President and General Manager F-35 Program Greg Ulmer said there was an effort to lower the cost per flight hour to $25,000 by 2025 but further savings would take longer.

“Today it is different customer by customer but I think $35,000 per flying hour is a good number,” he told Reuters in an interview at the Australian International Airshow.

“If we project that out based on the initiatives we have in place, we believe as we move out to the 2035-2040 timeframe we can get that cost down to under what a fourth gen is today,” in the range of $20,000-25,000 per flight hour.

Initiatives involved in lowering the cost to $25,000 an hour include reducing the number of mechanics needed to support each plane, Ulmer said.

Lockheed is also looking to refine diagnostic systems to reduce false alarms as well as to ensure there are proper spare parts available for maintenance and repairs.

Lockheed Martin Vice President and General Manager Training and Logistics Services Amy Gowder said the United States had been late to install enough capacity for F-35 repairs due to delays in funding approvals.

“The U.S. has been very slow to fund that in the depots specifically like Hill Air Force Base,” she said. “They should have started those projects a few years ago.”

That was becoming increasingly problematic as more planes were added to the fleet, Gowder said.

“When you have 180 aircraft it is probably okay. Now we have 300. It is the scale of the volume increases which is why there is a concern,” she said.

“That is putting more pressure on the supply chain in the near term.”

The U.S. Air Force did not respond immediately to a request for comment outside usual business hours.

Operating costs were a big issue when military officials from the United States, Israel and F-35 user nations in Europe – Britain, Italy, Norway, Denmark, Turkey, the Netherlands – met in Germany in September last year.

Experts say the U.S. Air Force could cut back its planned purchases of the aircraft unless it can lower the flying costs.

(Reporting by Jamie Freed; additional reporting by Mike Stone in Washington; Editing by Stephen Coates)

Source: OANN

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A look at Nigeria's president as he secures a 2nd term

He is a former military dictator who briefly seized power in the 1980s and now says he regrets his ruthless past. Spare in charisma and physique, Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari faces new pressure to deliver after securing a second term in Africa's most populous nation.

The 76-year-old Buhari won Saturday's election despite frustration with what many people have called a slow, insufficient approach to tackling corruption, insecurity and the economy. As he neared victory, the Nigerian Stock Exchange dipped as investors who had banked on a more business-friendly challenger got out.

"We are moving from potentials to actualization," Buhari intoned in his New Year's address, nearly four years into office.

The president is seen as unusually upright and reserved in this vibrant country of some 190 million people, where gregarious politicians spend heavily to secure lucrative posts — often becoming ensnared in graft.

"He remains an aloof and disengaged leader, 'walled off' from his own government and party, and from Nigerians themselves," Matthew Page and Sola Tayo recently wrote for the Chatham House think tank.

But many Nigerians, remembering Buhari's reputation for sometimes harsh discipline, had cheered when he unseated incumbent President Goodluck Johnathan in 2015, hoping he would act on vows to tame corruption and defeat a deadly Boko Haram extremist insurgency. Wielding a broom, Buhari played up the role as cleanup man.

Despite inheriting widespread goodwill, his first term has been difficult, and he faced serious — and unanswered — questions about his health. He spent more than 150 days outside the country for unspecified medical treatment.

A year into his term Nigeria's heavily oil-dependent economy, Africa's largest, fell into a rare recession when global crude prices crashed. The recession is over but growth remains slow, and the president was criticized for hurting the currency, the naira, with overly protective measures.

Buhari's top election challenger, former Vice President Atiku Abubakar, appealed to many Nigerians' hunger for an economic breakthrough by making sweeping claims of lifting 50 million people out of poverty by 2025. That resonated with a country embarrassed by the news last year that it now led the world in the number of people in extreme poverty.

But Abubakar has never shaken corruption allegations from his time in office, and some Nigerians were worried by his proposal to privatize the state oil company.

While Buhari points to progress in agriculture and infrastructure to appeal to his large base of rural supporters, many people grumble that both inflation and unemployment, now at nearly 25 percent, are painfully high. Nigerians can rattle off dramatic changes in prices from before Buhari took office until now, down to the smallest naira.

"They say Nigeria is a giant of Africa. Where is Nigeria now?" asked a frustrated Cosmos Eze, who sells auto parts in the northern city of Kano. Roads are crumbling, power outages are frequent and some public schools appear gutted, the blades of their idle fans twisted from unknown violence.

Buhari's fight against multiple insecurity problems has had mixed results. Few countries have the variety of deadly threats that Nigeria faces: oil militants and pirates in the south, bandits in the northwest, Islamic extremist groups in the northeast and clashes between largely Christian farmers and largely Muslim herders in the central region over increasingly scarce land.

Buhari has faced particularly sharp criticism over the last one, as many Nigerians worry that he sympathizes with the herders as a fellow ethnic Fulani from the north. Even President Donald Trump brought it up during Buhari's White House visit last year, noting the "Christians who have been murdered in Nigeria."

In the north, the military has pushed the decade-old Boko Haram extremist insurgency from many urban centers it once savaged, but Buhari's administration's claims that the group has been "technically defeated" have fallen flat. The release of scores of Chibok schoolgirls who had been kidnapped during his predecessor's term was a rare high-profile success.

A new extremist faction pledging allegiance to the Islamic State group has made a deadly resurgence in recent months, overrunning military bases in the northeast and raising questions about how much support Nigeria's troops receive from the government.

Meanwhile, tens of thousands of people have again been displaced by the extremists in one of the world's most dire humanitarian crises.

These problems are wearing Buhari out, some Nigerians say.

"All is not well," Vincent Ikemelu said outside St. Charles Family Parish in Kano ahead of the election. "If he forces his way to get another term, it will not be good for him."

___

Follow Africa news at https://twitter.com/AP_Africa

Source: Fox News World

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New York City could be headed for bankruptcy, financial analysts warn

New York City could be headed for bankruptcy, according to financial analysts who see warning signs of fiscal disaster.

However, the city is doing all it can to ensure that doesn’t happen.

Raul A. Contreras, spokesperson for the mayor’s office, told Fox News via email: “The city’s credit rating increased in February for the first time since 2010, putting us on par with the State — something few municipalities ever accomplish. This mayor has been a strong steward of the city’s finances, including mandating cuts across city agencies in the next budget while still providing for New Yorkers.”

Economists, however, see potential dire signs.

“The city is running a deficit and could be in a real difficult spot if we had a recession, or a further flight of individuals because of tax reform,” Milton Ezrati, chief economist of Vested, a financial communication agency, told the New York Post. “New York is already in a difficult financial spot, but it would be in an impossible situation if we had any kind of setback.”

UBER PASSENGER SHOT, KILLED BY BICYCLIST IN NEW YORK CITY, POLICE SAY

The Post reported that long-term debt is now more than $81,100 per household in New York City.

Democratic Mayor Bill de Blasio wants to add $3 billion more in the new budget to the current $89.2 billion.

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De Blasio has detailed $750 million in savings for the preliminary fiscal 2020 budget, while Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s preliminary budget has $600 million in city cuts in the coming year, the news outlet reported.

“New York City could go bankrupt, absolutely,” said Peter C. Earle, an economist at the American Institute for Economic Research. “In that case, the city would get temporary protection from its creditors, but it would be very difficult for the city to take on new debt.”

Click for more from The New York Post.

Source: Fox News National

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Gorsuch, Kavanaugh on opposite sides again, this time on delay of Texas cop killer’s execution

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh on Thursday sided with liberal justices in a ruling that delayed the execution of a cop killer amid claims that religious freedom would be violated if the death-row inmate's Buddhist spiritual adviser wasn’t present during his final moments.

The nation's highest court blocked the execution of Patrick Murphy about two hours after he could have been executed. Murphy is a member of the “Texas 7” gang of escaped prisoners who are awaiting the death penalty over the fatal shooting of a suburban Dallas police officer.

Murphy's attorney argued that Texas prison officials were violating his client's First Amendment right to freedom of religion by preventing the inmate’s spiritual adviser, a Buddhist priest, from witnessing the execution.

TRUMP PICKS GORSUCH, KAVANAUGH TAKE OPPOSITE SIDES ON 2 OF 3 SUPREME COURT RULINGS TUESDAY

But while Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch said they would allow the execution to proceed, echoing lower courts’ view that rejected Murphy’s arguments, Kavanaugh -- like Gorsuch, an appointee of President Trump -- found himself on the opposite side from the conservative justices.

This undated photo provided by the Texas Department of Criminal Justice shows Patrick Murphy, a member of the notorious "Texas 7" gang of escaped prisoners who was scheduled to be executed Thursday, March 28, 2019.

This undated photo provided by the Texas Department of Criminal Justice shows Patrick Murphy, a member of the notorious "Texas 7" gang of escaped prisoners who was scheduled to be executed Thursday, March 28, 2019. (Texas Department of Criminal Justice via AP)

This follows the rulings last week, where in two out of three decisions by the high court, Gorsuch and Kavanaugh found themselves on opposing sides.

Kavanaugh wrote in a concurring opinion on Thursday that while the Texas prison system allows a Christian or Muslim inmate to have their religious advisers present in the death chamber or in the viewing room, inmates of other religious denominations can have their adviser only in the viewing room and not in the execution room itself.

“As this Court has repeatedly held, governmental discrimination against religion in particular, discrimination against religious persons, religious organizations, and religious speech violates the Constitution,” he wrote. “The government may not discriminate against religion generally or against particular religious denominations.”

The justice added that Murphy cannot be executed until the state allows his Buddhist adviser or another Buddhist reverend of the state’s choosing to be present in the chamber during the execution.

“What the State may not do, in my view, is allow Christian or Muslim inmates but not Buddhist inmates to have a religious adviser of their religion in the execution room,” he wrote.

“As this Court has repeatedly held, governmental discrimination against religion in particular, discrimination against religious persons, religious organizations, and religious speech violates the Constitution.”

— Justice Brett Kavanaugh

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS' RECENT VOTES RAISE DOUBTS ABOUT 'CONSERVATIVE REVOLUTION' ON SUPREME COURT

Officials from Texas argued in court that the reason only Christian and Muslims religious advisers are allowed is due to security concerns, noting that only chaplains who had been extensively vetted by the prison system were allowed within the chamber.

Murphy was one of the inmates who escaped from a South Texas prison in December 2000, despite being just 15 months away from being released on mandatory parole.

During the six-week manhunt, he and his gang committed multiple robberies, including the one in which they shot 29-year-old Irving police Officer Aubrey Hawkins 11 times, killing him.

As they were being captured, one of the gang members killed himself, while six other criminals were convicted of killing the officer and sentenced to death.

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Murphy would have been the fifth gang member to be executed. The sixth inmate, Randy Halprin, has not been given an execution date.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News Politics

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Liberal arts colleges across the country face ‘existential threat’

MARLBORO, Vt. – Economists and higher education experts are warning small liberal arts colleges across the country to brace for the worst.

"Their business models are breaking," said Michael Horn, who studies trends in the higher education industry. "Their costs continue to go up the pressure to increase costs continue to go up and yet the revenue just isn't there."

At the end of the spring 2019 semester, six institutions from Vermont to Oregon are expected to shut their doors due to financial woes, adding to a growing list of private liberal arts colleges failing to stay afloat.

Credit rating agency Moody's estimates that with a quarter of private colleges in the red, there could be as many as 11 closures by the end of the year. The report found that one in five small private colleges in the nation is under "fundamental stress."

NEW JERSEY TEEN ONCE HOMELESS ACCEPTED INTO 17 COLLEGES, OVERCOMES FAMILY OBSTACLES

At Marlboro College in southern Vermont, the student body of roughly 200 is well-aware of the school's financial difficulties.

"If you say something to one person, the entire school is going to know it in a week," said Sage Kampitsis, a senior at Marlboro.

Marlboro College is a liberal arts college with roughly 200 students in southern Vermont. 

Marlboro College is a liberal arts college with roughly 200 students in southern Vermont.  (ROB DIRIENZO / Fox News)

The college has gotten innovative with new ways to raise money, throwing community fundraisers and looking at new methods of recruitment. With other rural Vermont colleges boarding up, like Green Mountain College a few miles away, Marlboro College's president Kevin Quigly is working to defy the odds.

"Underway is really an effort to kind of shift our financial model where at a place like Marlboro we have challenges," said Quigly. "We recognize those challenges and we're working to address them."

Over the years, as tuition across the country has soared, colleges have been discounting tuition to make themselves more attractive to prospective students. Larger universities do not rely as heavily on tuition as a primary source of revenue, making it difficult for smaller colleges to stay competitive — and realistic for low-income and middle-class families.

"That's really a double whammy that adversely affects the finances of these small colleges," said Quigly.

Kampitsis, like most others, said the financial aid she received from Marlboro made going there feasible for her. Marlboro, which is in better shape than most of its peers with minimal debt and a larger endowment than most, just lowered the sticker-price tuition to better reflect what students will actually be paying.

USC, YALE AMONG COLLEGES SUED BY STUDENTS AMID COLLEGE ADMISSIONS SCANDAL

"The bigger colleges across the country and the elite schools don't have this problem because they are still able to attract students," said Horn, the higher ed researcher.  "These large endowments are often public sources of funding that allow them to get by this demographic cliff we're starting to hit."

That demographic cliff: the pool of 18-year-olds looking to go to small rural colleges is declining, instead favoring urban universities with better networking opportunities. Kampitsis also sees a shift in focus away from liberal arts to more marketable majors for potential employers as a contributing factor.

"Things like sociology, anthropology, psychology, philosophy, history — they're not the majors that are like really big in the job market," Kampitsis said. "They're not the things are making a lot of money. And so those since those majors are losing their economic value, they then, in turn, lose their moral value."

“Make no mistake. This is an existential threat to entire sectors of higher education, and New England is, unfortunately, ground zero,” said UMass President Marty Meehan at a State of the University speech last month. UMass recently absorbed the doomed Mount Ida College in Newton, which it now plans to turn into a satellite campus.

Meanwhile, colleges elsewhere in the country are increasingly meeting the same fate.

Recent closures of small liberal arts colleges in the U.S.

Recent closures of small liberal arts colleges in the U.S.

"I think it's going to be really brutal in some of these rural communities where the small liberal arts school is the mainstay of the economy," said Horn.

Some small schools are hoping to remain viable by developing a niche, like offering online courses or specialized programs. In northern Vermont at Sterling College, a hundred-student campus focused on ecology and environmentalism, enrollment is up.

Horn said thinking outside of the box could mean life or death for these schools.

"These new sources of revenue could be found through innovation like using online learning to take strengths that maybe you uniquely have on your campus and start to be able to attract students across the region or even nationwide," Horn said.

Another strategy, like in the case of Mount Ida, has been turning to larger universities, asking to be acquired. Boston's Wheelock College has reopened as a Boston University campus.

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But others, like Hampshire College in Amherst, Mass., are planning to fight for every penny to stay open—and independent.

"I think we can do this," said interim Hampshire College President Ken Rosenthal in a letter to an anxious student body. "We’ll need to raise $15-20 million over the next year, and then, over the next five or six years, perhaps close to $100 million. It’s not unprecedented, and we’ll have to move fast and work hard, but I’m optimistic."

Source: Fox News National

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Figure skating: Chen overcomes sickness, ready to defend title

FILE PHOTO: ISU Grand Prix of Figure Skating - 2018 Internationaux de France
FILE PHOTO: Figure Skating - ISU Grand Prix of Figure Skating - 2018 Internationaux de France - Exhibition Gala - The Polesud, Grenoble, France - November 25, 2018 Nathan Chen of the U.S. performs during the Exhibition Gala REUTERS/Emmanuel Foudrot

March 16, 2019

(Reuters) – Sickness forced Nathan Chen to train in New Haven but the 19-year-old says he is rested and ready to defend his figure skating title at next week’s world championships in Saitama.

Chen, who last year became the youngest world champion since Russian Yevgeni Plushenko in 2001, had his preparation for a follow up derailed a bit by a cold that kept him near his college at Yale University.

But that setback will not keep him from showing up in Japan as a favorite when this year’s world championships begin on Monday.

“I got a little bit sick so I decided to recover (in New Haven) and make sure I didn’t get any of the other athletes sick,” Chen told reporters during a teleconference on Friday.

“The entire college got sick, so it was inevitable. I’ve been training well for worlds. I’m looking forward to competition.”

Chen showed strong form at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships where he took a third consecutive gold in January.

He said that his performances have been continually building, which is a strong sign for the rest of the season.

“That’s always my goal every season. I want to be able to improve in some degree from competition to competition,” Chen said.

“It’s more evident in the short program from where I started out (to now), each one has progressively gotten better. I hope that continues in the worlds and further on in the season.” Chen has managed to balance his skating with his studies thus far, but said a return to Yale next fall is not guaranteed.

“My skating at this point is such a team effort. I really have to take into account everyone else’s thoughts and opinions,” Chen said.

“I have to make sure everyone else is on board with what I’m deciding. I haven’t made any decisions yet. Right now my focus is on the worlds and nothing else.”

(Writing by Jahmal Corner in Los Angeles; editing by Amlan Chakraborty)

Source: OANN

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Campbell to sell Bolthouse Farms for $510 million

FILE PHOTO: The logo and ticker for Campbell Soup Co. are displayed on a screen on the floor of the NYSE in New York
FILE PHOTO: The logo and ticker for Campbell Soup Co. are displayed on a screen on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York, U.S., May 18, 2018. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo

April 12, 2019

(Reuters) – Campbell soup Co said on Friday it would sell its Bolthouse Farms business to an affiliate of private equity firm Butterfly Equity for $510 million, in the U.S. food company’s first major sale as part of its cost-cutting divestiture plan.

The company said the completion of the sale of Bolthouse Farms, part of Campbell’s fresh unit, is expected by the end of fiscal 2019.

Campbell will have divested its entire fresh division on completion of the deal, the company said.

The Wall Street Journal on Thursday had reported about the deal saying former Bolthouse Chief Executive Officer Jeff Dunn was working with Butterfly Equity to buy the unit.

(Reporting by Uday Sampath in Bengaluru)

Source: OANN

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An employee looks up at goods at the Miniclipper Logistics warehouse in Leighton Buzzard
FILE PHOTO: An employee looks up at goods at the Miniclipper Logistics warehouse in Leighton Buzzard, Britain December 3, 2018. REUTERS/Simon Dawson

April 26, 2019

LONDON, April 26 – British factories stockpiled raw materials and goods ahead of Brexit at the fastest pace since records began in the 1950s, and they were increasingly downbeat about their prospects, a survey showed on Friday.

The Confederation of British Industry’s (CBI) quarterly survey of the manufacturing industry showed expectations for export orders in the next three months fell to their lowest level since mid-2009, when Britain was reeling from the global financial crisis.

The record pace of stockpiling recorded by the CBI was mirrored by the closely-watched IHS Markit/CIPS purchasing managers’ index published earlier this month.

(Reporting by Andy Bruce, editing by David Milliken)

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Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad speaks at the opening ceremony for the second Belt and Road Forum in Beijing
Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad speaks at the opening ceremony for the second Belt and Road Forum in Beijing, China April 26, 2019. REUTERS/Florence Lo

April 26, 2019

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) – Fewer than half of Malaysians approve of Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, an opinion poll showed on Friday, as concerns over rising costs and racial matters plague his administration nearly a year after taking office.

The survey, conducted in March by independent pollster Merdeka Center, showed that only 46 percent of voters surveyed were satisfied with Mahathir, a sharp drop from the 71 percent approval rating he received in August 2018.

Mahathir’s Pakatan Harapan coalition won a stunning election victory in May 2018, ending the previous government’s more than 60-year rule.

But his administration has since been criticized for failing to deliver on promised reforms and protecting the rights of majority ethnic Malay Muslims.

Of 1,204 survey respondents, 46 percent felt that the “country was headed in the wrong direction”, up from 24 percent in August 2018, the Merdeka Center said in a statement. Just 39 percent said they approved of the ruling government.

High living costs remained the top most concern among Malaysians, with just 40 percent satisfied with the government’s management of the economy, the survey showed.

It also showed mixed responses to Pakatan Harapan’s proposed reforms.

Some 69 percent opposed plans to abolish the death penalty, while respondents were sharply divided over proposals to lower the minimum voting age to 18, or to implement a sugar tax.

“In our opinion, the results appear to indicate a public that favors the status quo, and thus requires a robust and coordinated advocacy efforts in order to garner their acceptance of new measures,” Merdeka Center said.

The survey also found 23 percent of Malaysians were concerned over ethnic and religious matters.

Some groups representing Malays have expressed fear that affirmative-action policies favoring them in business, education and housing could be taken away and criticized the appointments of non-Muslims to key government posts.

Last November, the government reversed its pledge to ratify a UN convention against racial discrimination, after a backlash from Malay groups.

Earlier this month, Pakatan Harapan suffered its third successive loss in local elections since taking power, which has been seen as a further sign of waning public support.

Despite the decline, most Malaysians – 67 percent – agreed that Mahathir’s government should be given more time to fulfill its election promises, Merdeka Center said.

This included a majority of Malay voters who were largely more critical of the new administration, it added.

(Reporting by Rozanna Latiff; Editing by Nick Macfie)

Source: OANN

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The German share price index DAX graph at the stock exchange in Frankfurt
The German share price index DAX graph is pictured at the stock exchange in Frankfurt, Germany, April 25, 2019. REUTERS/Staff

April 26, 2019

By Medha Singh and Agamoni Ghosh

(Reuters) – European shares slipped on Friday after losses in heavyweight banks and Glencore outweighed gains in healthcare and auto stocks, while investors remained on the sidelines ahead of U.S. economic data for the first quarter.

The pan-European STOXX 600 index was down 0.1 percent by 0935 GMT, eyeing a modest loss at the end of a holiday-shortened week. Banks-heavy Italian and Spanish indices were laggards.

The banking index fell for a fourth day, at the end of a heavy earnings week for lenders.

Britain’s Royal Bank of Scotland tumbled after posting lower first quarter profit, hurt by intensifying competition and Brexit uncertainty, while its investment bank also registered poor returns.

Weakness in investment banking also dented Deutsche Bank’s quarterly trading revenue and sent its shares lower a day after the German bank abandoned merger talks with smaller rival Commerzbank.

“The current interest rate environment makes it challenging for banks to make proper earnings because of their intermediary function,” said Teeuwe Mevissen, senior market economist eurozone, at Rabobank.

Since the start of April, all country indexes were on pace to rise between 1.8 percent and 3.4 percent, their fourth month of gains, while Germany was strongly outperforming with 6 percent growth.

“For now the current sentiment is very cautious as markets wait for the first estimates of the U.S. GDP growth which could see a surprise,” Mevissen said.

U.S. economic data for the first-quarter is due at 1230 GMT. Growth worries outside the United States resurfaced this week after South Korea’s economy unexpectedly contracted at the start of the year and weak German business sentiment data for April also disappointed.

Among the biggest drags on the benchmark index in Europe were the basic resources sector and the oil and gas sector, weighed down by Britain’s Glencore and France’s Total, respectively.

Glencore dropped after reports that U.S authorities were investigating whether the company and its subsidiaries violated certain provisions of the commodity exchange act.

Energy major Total said its net profit for the first three months of the year fell compared with a year ago due to volatile oil prices and debt costs.

Chip stocks in the region including Siltronic, Ams and STMicroelectronics lost more than 1 percent after Intel Corp reduced its full-year revenue forecast, adding to concerns that an industry-wide slowdown could persist until the end of 2019.

Meanwhile, healthcare, which is also seen as a defensive sector, was a bright spot. It was helped by French drugmaker Sanofi after it returned to growth with higher profits and revenues for the first-quarter.

Luxembourg-based satellite operator SES led media stocks higher after it maintained its full-year outlook on the back of the company’s Networks division.

Automakers in the region rose 0.4 percent, led by Valeo’s 6 percent jump as the French parts maker said its performance would improve in the second half of the year.

Continental AG advanced after it backed its outlook for the year despite reporting a fall in first-quarter earnings.

Renault rose more than 3 percent as it clung to full-year targets and pursues merger talks with its Japanese partner Nissan.

(Reporting by Medha Singh and Agamoni Ghosh in Bengaluru; Editing by Gareth Jones and Elaine Hardcastle)

Source: OANN

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U.S. President Donald Trump hosts Take Our Daughters and Sons to Work Day at the White House in Washington
U.S. President Donald Trump gives a thumbs up to his audience as he hosts Take Our Daughters and Sons to Work Day at the White House in Washington, U.S., April 25, 2019. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

April 26, 2019

By Jan Wolfe and Richard Cowan

(Reuters) – The “i word” – impeachment – is swirling around the U.S. Congress since the release of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s redacted Russia report, which painted a picture of lies, threats and confusion in Donald Trump’s White House.

Some Democrats say trying to remove Trump from office would be a waste of time because his fellow Republicans still have majority control of the Senate. Other Democrats argue they have a moral obligation at least to try to impeach, even though Mueller did not charge Trump with conspiring with Russia in the 2016 U.S. election or with obstruction of justice.

Whether or not the Democrats decide to go down this risky path, here is how the impeachment process works.

WHAT ARE GROUNDS FOR IMPEACHMENT?

The U.S. Constitution says the president can be removed from office by Congress for “treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.” Exactly what that means is unclear.

Before he became president in 1974, replacing Republican Richard Nixon who resigned over the Watergate scandal, Gerald Ford said: “An impeachable offense is whatever a majority of the House of Representatives considers it to be at a given moment in history.”

Frank Bowman, a University of Missouri law professor and author of a forthcoming book on the history of impeachment, said Congress could look beyond criminal laws in defining “high crimes and misdemeanors.” Historically, it can encompass corruption and other abuses, including trying to obstruct judicial proceedings.

HOW DOES IMPEACHMENT PLAY OUT?

The term impeachment is often interpreted as simply removing a president from office, but that is not strictly accurate.

Impeachment technically refers to the 435-member House of Representatives approving formal charges against a president.

The House effectively acts as accuser – voting on whether to bring specific charges. An impeachment resolution, known as “articles of impeachment,” is like an indictment in a criminal case. A simple majority vote is needed in the House to impeach.

The Senate then conducts a trial. House members act as the prosecutors, with senators as the jurors. The chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court presides over the trial. A two-thirds majority vote is required in the 100-member Senate to convict and remove a president from office.

No president has ever been removed from office as a direct result of an impeachment and conviction by Congress.

Nixon quit in 1974 rather than face impeachment. Presidents Andrew Johnson in 1868 and Bill Clinton in 1998 were impeached by the House, but both stayed in office after the Senate acquitted them.

Obstruction of justice was one charge against Clinton, who faced allegations of lying under oath about his relationship with White House intern Monica Lewinsky. Obstruction was also included in the articles of impeachment against Nixon.

CAN THE SUPREME COURT OVERTURN?

No.

Trump said on Twitter on Wednesday that he would ask the Supreme Court to intervene if Democrats tried to impeach him. But America’s founders explicitly rejected making a Senate conviction appealable to the federal judiciary, Bowman said.

“They quite plainly decided this is a political process and it is ultimately a political judgment,” Bowman said.

“So when Trump suggests there is any judicial remedy for impeachment, he is just wrong.”

PROOF OF WRONGDOING?

In a typical criminal court case, jurors are told to convict only if there is “proof beyond a reasonable doubt,” a fairly stringent standard.

Impeachment proceedings are different. The House and Senate “can decide on whatever burden of proof they want,” Bowman said. “There is no agreement on what the burden should be.”

PARTY BREAKDOWN IN CONGRESS?

Right now, there are 235 Democrats, 197 Republicans and three vacancies in the House. As a result, the Democratic majority could vote to impeach Trump without any Republican votes.

In 1998, when Republicans had a House majority, the chamber voted largely along party lines to impeach Clinton, a Democrat.

The Senate now has 53 Republicans, 45 Democrats and two independents who usually vote with Democrats. Conviction and removal of a president would requires 67 votes. So that means for Trump to be impeached, at least 20 Republicans and all the Democrats and independents would have to vote against him.

WHO BECOMES PRESIDENT IF TRUMP IS REMOVED?

A Senate conviction removing Trump from office would elevate Vice President Mike Pence to the presidency to fill out Trump’s term, which ends on Jan. 20, 2021.

(Reporting by Jan Wolfe and Richard Cowan; Editing by Kevin Drawbaugh and Peter Cooney)

Source: OANN

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New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft attends a conference at the Cannes Lions Festival in Cannes
FILE PHOTO: New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft attends a conference at the Cannes Lions Festival in Cannes, France, June 23, 2017. REUTERS/Eric Gaillard

April 26, 2019

(Reuters) – New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft’s lawyers on Friday are set to ask a Florida judge to toss out hidden-camera videos that prosecutors say show the 77-year-old billionaire receiving sexual favors for money inside a Florida massage parlor.

The owner of the reigning Super Bowl champions plans wants the video to not be used as evidence against him as he contests two misdemeanor counts of soliciting prostitution at the Orchids of Asia Spa in Jupiter, Florida, along with some two dozen other men.

His legal team is fresh off a win on Tuesday, when they successfully persuaded Palm Beach County Judge Leonard Hanser to block prosecutors from releasing the hidden-camera footage to media outlets, which had requested copies under the state’s robust open records law.

Kraft, who has owned the franchise since 1994, pleaded not guilty, but has issued a public apology for his actions.

His attorneys have argued in court papers that the surreptitious videotaping of customers, including Kraft, inside a massage parlor was governmental overreach and the result of an illegally obtained search warrant.

The warrant, Kraft’s lawyers claim, was secured under false pretenses because police officers cited human trafficking as a potential crime in their application. Prosecutors have since acknowledged that the investigation yielded no evidence of trafficking.

Palm Beach County prosecutors in a court filing on Wednesday said Kraft’s motion should be rejected because he could not have had any expectation of privacy while visiting a commercial establishment to engage in criminal activity.

That prompted an indignant response from Kraft’s attorneys, who said the prosecution’s position on privacy was “unhinged.”

“It should go without saying that Mr. Kraft and everyone else in the United States have a reasonable expectation that the government will not secretly spy on them while they undress behind closed doors,” they wrote.

(Reporting by Joseph Ax, editing by G Crosse)

Source: OANN

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