1082: Otherize

Hi Adam,

I'm not black, but I'm 28 and I was taught that there was a

party switch when I was in school. I was specifically told "the

Republican party used to be the Democratic party and vice versa."

This wasn't just from one teacher, but every history class I had from middle

school and high school.

Thanks for the show! Love getting the re-education.

Jacki

Well, that is an interesting

issue.

It was a “fact” that I had

committed to memory when I was younger and, even though I thought it was odd

when I learned it, I had no reason to revisit the issue so I never questioned

it.

Both my parents are Mexican and

uneducated (both dropped out before middle school) and I was raised to believe

that the Dems were for minorities and Republicans were against us. I never

questioned that “truth” until I was an undergraduate complaining to my career

advisor about the system and white people oppressing us (she was Hispanic), and

she asked me for a concrete example and I was unable to provide it for her.

After that, I looked around and changed my beliefs.

My parents still hold firmly to

theirs.

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Archived Version

Mon, 29 Oct 2018 12:32

Everyone knows that race has long played a decisive role in Southern electoral politics. From the end of Reconstruction until the beginning of the civil rights era, the story goes, the national Democratic Party made room for segregationist members '-- and as a result dominated the South. But in the 50s and 60s, Democrats embraced the civil rights movement, costing them the white Southern vote. Meanwhile, the Republican Party successfully wooed disaffected white racists with a ''Southern strategy'' that championed ''states' rights.''

It's an easy story to believe, but this year two political scientists called it into question. In their book ''The End of Southern Exceptionalism,'' Richard Johnston of the University of Pennsylvania and Byron Shafer of the University of Wisconsin argue that the shift in the South from Democratic to Republican was overwhelmingly a question not of race but of economic growth. In the postwar era, they note, the South transformed itself from a backward region to an engine of the national economy, giving rise to a sizable new wealthy suburban class. This class, not surprisingly, began to vote for the party that best represented its economic interests: the G.O.P. Working-class whites, however '-- and here's the surprise '-- even those in areas with large black populations, stayed loyal to the Democrats. (This was true until the 90s, when the nation as a whole turned rightward in Congressional voting.)

The two scholars support their claim with an extensive survey of election returns and voter surveys. To give just one example: in the 50s, among Southerners in the low-income tercile, 43 percent voted for Republican Presidential candidates, while in the high-income tercile, 53 percent voted Republican; by the 80s, those figures were 51 percent and 77 percent, respectively. Wealthy Southerners shifted rightward in droves but poorer ones didn't.

To be sure, Shafer says, many whites in the South aggressively opposed liberal Democrats on race issues. ''But when folks went to the polling booths,'' he says, ''they didn't shoot off their own toes. They voted by their economic preferences, not racial preferences.'' Shafer says these results should give liberals hope. ''If Southern politics is about class and not race,'' he says, ''then they can get it back.''

Continue reading the main story

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Archived Version

Tue, 30 Oct 2018 04:55

The night that Democratic President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, his special assistant Bill Moyers was surprised to find the president looking melancholy in his bedroom. Moyers later wrote that when he asked what was wrong, Johnson replied, ''I think we just delivered the South to the Republican party for a long time to come.''

It may seem a crude remark to make after such a momentous occasion, but it was also an accurate prediction.

To understand some of the reasons the South went from a largely Democratic region to a primarily Republican area today, just follow the decades of debate over racial issues in the United States.

On April 11, 1968 President Lyndon Johnson signs the Civil Rights bill while seated at a table surrounded by members of Congress, Washington DC. (Credit: Warren Leffler/Underwood Archives/Getty Images)

The Republican party was originally founded in the mid-1800s to oppose immigration and the spread of slavery, says David Goldfield, whose new book on American politics, The Gifted Generation: When Government Was Good, comes out in November.

''The Republican party was strictly a sectional party, meaning that it just did not exist in the South,'' he says. ''The South couldn't care less about immigration.'' But it did care about preserving slavery.

After the Civil War, the Democratic party's opposition to Republican Reconstruction legislation solidified its hold on the South.

''The Democratic party came to be more than a political party in the South'--it came to be a defender of a way of life,'' Goldfield says. ''And that way of life was the restoration as much as possible of white supremacy '... The Confederate statues you see all around were primarily erected by Democrats.''

The Dixie Democrats seceding from the Democratic Party. The rump convention, called after the Democrats had attached President Truman's civil rights program to the party platform, placed Governor Strom Thurmond of South Carolina and Governor Fielding L. Wright of Mississippi in nomination. (Credit: Bettmann/Getty Images)

Up until the post-World War II period, the party's hold on the region was so entrenched that Southern politicians usually couldn't get elected unless they were Democrats. But when President Harry S. Truman, a Democratic Southerner, introduced a pro-civil rights platform at the party's 1948 convention, a faction walked out.

These defectors, known as the ''Dixiecrats,'' held a separate convention in Birmingham, Alabama. There, they nominated South Carolina Governor Strom Thurmond, a staunch opposer of civil rights, to run for president on their ''States' Rights'' ticket. Although Thurmond lost the election to Truman, he still won over a million popular votes.

It ''was the first time since before the Civil War that the South was not solidly Democratic,'' Goldfield says. ''And that began the erosion of the southern influence in the Democratic party.''

After that, the majority of the South still continued to vote Democratic because it thought of the Republican party as the party of Abraham Lincoln and Reconstruction. The big break didn't come until President Johnson, another Southern Democrat, signed the Civil Rights Act in 1964 and the Voting Rights Act in 1965.

Govenor Strom Thurmond of South Carolina, was nominated as States' Right candidate at the rump convention held in Birmingham on by southern recalcitrants. The Southerners took this drastic action after the Democratic convention added President Truman's civil rights program of its party platform. (Credit: Bettmann/Getty Images)

Though some Democrats had switched to the Republican party prior to this, ''the defections became a flood'' after Johnson signed these acts, Goldfield says. ''And so the political parties began to reconstitute themselves.''

The change wasn't total or immediate. During the late 1960s and early '70s, white Southerners were still transitioning away from the Democratic party (newly enfranchised black Southerners voted and continue to vote Democratic). And even as Republican Richard Nixon employed a ''Southern strategy'' that appealed to the racism of Southern white voters, former Alabama Governor George Wallace (who'd wanted ''segregation now, segregation tomorrow, and segregation forever'') ran as a Democrat in the 1972 presidential primaries.

By the time Ronald Reagan became president in 1980, the Republican party's hold on white Southerners was firm. Today, the Republican party remains the party of the South. It's an ironic outcome considering that a century ago, white Southerners would've never considered voting for the party of Lincoln.

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Mon, 29 Oct 2018 00:03

Published October 28, 2018

Last Update 5 hrs ago

Kanye West is throwing a literal hat into the political arena once again, this time designing a line of T-shirts and hats for a campaign dedicated to urging black voters in the U.S. to break away from the Democratic party.

The rapper and fashion mogul designed a series of clothing merchandise supporting ''Blexit,'' which seeks to not only convince black voters to change parties but shows the stories of those that have already. The designs debuted Saturday at the Turning Point USA's Young Black Leadership Summit, a meeting meant to bring together conservatives in the black community.

Although West did not appear at the event directly, its Communications Director Candace Owens sung his praises at the event in spirit.

''Blexit is a renaissance and I am blessed to say that this logo, these colors, were created by my dear friend and fellow superhero Kanye West,'' Owens, who west previously endorsed on Twitter, said (via Page Six). ''[West] has taken one of the boldest steps in America to open a conversation we have needed to have.''

The shirts come in a variety of styles and colors and run between $25 and $28. The hats are only in one color but sport two different designs. Each sports either the phrase "Blexit" or "We Free."

Kanye West designed a series of shirts and hats for 'Blexit' an organization that seeks to break black voters away from the Democratic Party. (Blexit.com)

As Rolling Stone notes, despite West's apparent support of the ''Blexit'' campaign, he recently donated $73,000 to Democratic Chicago mayoral candidate Amara Enyia. He made headlines earlier this month when he met with Donald Trump at the White House for a long, rambling rant about the state of the country and a great many other topics.

He has previously declared his support for Donald Trump and has been seen sporting a ''Make America Great Again'' hat on several occasions, including his recent appearance on ''Saturday Night Live.''

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Archived Version

Wed, 31 Oct 2018 16:55

Let me first say, to those that have relished in my hurt and pain:

If knowing that I bleed and that I hurt brings you comfort and celebration'-- then there is no question that you won last night.

Celebrate.Be comforted.

I grew up in one of those storied unstable homes. I experienced more hurt before I turned 10 years old then most will experience over a lifetime. Listening to music from Kanye West and Jay-Z is what I give credit to having kept my spirit alive on some of the very worst days. It's a crazy thing to know that you wake up one day and someone whose words and lyrics literally kept your spirit alive is suddenly your friend.

God is good.

There are so many people in this world who love Kanye West because they know he is great and powerful and cool, but not every person in this world knows what it means to have someone's rap lyrics literally save you.

The people that attended the BLEXIT launch do, however. The emotion in that room was real and was raw, and to them '' like to me '' Kanye is a literal superhero.

The moment we were building'-- a moment that included kids who had similar backgrounds and experiences to me; the moment that included people who had served prison sentences, grown up without fathers, were currently living in group homes, or took their first plane rides that day'-- was never about cameras or celebrities or press or designs. It was about superheroes. It was about the Herculean strength it takes to chase after your dreams when everyone tells you that they can't be realized.

#BLEXIT was always about teaching those people to fly.

If I had to imagine what it would feel like to have a bullet pierce my heart, it would be exactly like the moment I learned Kanye told the world he felt I had used him.

I wouldn't wish the way I felt last night upon my worst enemy.

I never once said that Kanye designed the t-shirts for BLEXIT. This is a lie that seems to have made its way around the world; a lie I would like to again correct for the record. Kanye was completely right to feel used in that regard and as I have done personally, I would like to publicly apologize to him for any undue stress or pain the effort to correct that rumor has caused him, his business relationships, or his family. He simply never designed them.

I am a leader, and I would like to lead in this moment by stating that any and all confusion relating to this topic is therefore my fault, entirely.

I would also like to publicly apologize to President Trump, as I know that Kanye's tweets were rapidly misinterpreted as a shot to this administration.

His tweets were aimed at me and me only, rightfully, for my personal failings.I bare full responsibility.

There is no manual to any of this. I wake up everyday, and I do what I think is right. And today, this is what I feel in my heart to be right.

I conceptualized BLEXIT in February of this year backstage at CPAC. Nobody really knew me then, but I knew in that very moment that I was the person who was meant to lead black America out of the darkness and away from the lies and deception of policies that have paralyzed our progress.

To all those in the black community who felt their hearts break last night, remember this moment. Remember these emotions. Remember the people who enjoyed your pain, and remember those who stood by your side.

We all know how lonely this road can be.

We all know how unpleasant this journey can be, but you will never lose me, and I will never lose you.

#BLEXIT will happen because the universe and God are on our side.

To those who have donated and supported BLEXIT, I would like to clarify that in no way are you supporting the work of Kanye West.

You are supporting an orphanage of thought for free thinkers. A figurative home for those who have been excommunicated for daring to view themselves as more than just victims. You are supporting our love, compassion, and conviction that there is a way to better ourselves without government handouts.

BLEXIT represents the vision of the black community becoming victors. It represents an America united by the shared belief that no matter where you come from '' if you work hard and stay focused on the good things'-- we can all be superheroes.

We can and '' at long last '' we will.

#BLEXIT

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Archived Version

Mon, 29 Oct 2018 03:07

It has been a long damn year. But you know what studies show may help ease your pain? Swearing.

In this era of endless squabbling over what is or is not offensive, a corner of academia has been pursuing the language that we pretty much all agree is not polite '-- studying the syntax of sentences like ''F-ck you'' on the same college campuses where students are being safeguarded by trigger warnings.

Let some social scientists tell it and the way profanity affects us reveals elements of our nature as evolutionary beings, I sh-t you not. ''If you don't study this kind of language,'' says psychologist Timothy Jay, ''you're missing an important part of being a human.''

If you're offended by some of the words you've read so far, it's par for the coarse. Your sensibilities give these strings of letters their potency. ''We're told that these are words, early on, that you can't say. We punish people for saying them,'' says cognitive scientist Benjamin Bergen, who explores profanity-related research in his new book What the F. ''So we're training kids, socially, that these words are powerful.''

During his career at the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts, Jay has recorded and analyzed thousands of people swearing, and he's come up with two core reasons for why we do it. For one, it allows us to express our emotions, to vent, to release. ''It also communicates very effectively, almost immediately, our feelings,'' Jay says. ''And other words don't do that.''

The utterance of a single f-word can convey the state of a person'--whether they are angry, upset, excited, surprised or aroused'--and the intensity of that state. Because we learn early on that profanity is to strong feelings what blaring horns are to a tornado, the body becomes conditioned to physically respond to it. ''Your pores open and you start sweating. Your heart rate increases. Your pupils dilate,'' says Bergen, who teaches classes about profanity at the University of California, San Diego. ''You experience this fight or flight reaction.'' Research has found that reading and writing profane words has an emotional effect on people, he says, but not nearly as much as saying and hearing them does.

Like any powerful tool, these words can be used ''for constructive or destructive purposes,'' Bergen says. They are generally inspired by taboo-ridden domains: sex (''f-ck''), bodily functions (''sh-t''), religion (''hell'') and words describing other groups people (the n-word). The words in the final category tend toward the destructive because ''they really are built to offend, to cause harm, to divide and to denigrate,'' Bergen says. In studies, Americans rate those group-based swear words as the most offensive.

Of course, what is considered indecent language evolves as our cultures do, reflecting us back to ourselves through the taboos of the time. While most all languages have profanity, the offensive words differ from country to country. Take historically Catholic Quebec, where uttering a religious word like calisse (''chalice'') in vain might well furrow brows.

But they can be useful, too. When researchers observed how people dealt with the pain of submerging their hands in icy water, they found that people could withstand more discomfort if they repeated a swear word, rather than a non-swear word. Scientists have also found that unlike most sounds we utter, cussing can happen in both voluntary and involuntary ways. The latter'--like when we drop our keys in the snow and yell ''F-ck'' without consciously deciding to'--offer evidence that language isn't just produced one way in the brain. That has clinical and research implications, says Bergen, and it may tell us something about why we came to communicate as we do.

It also suggests that these emotionally charged words can become so deeply ingrained in us that uttering them toes the line of being a physical act rather than a symbolic one, more like a sneeze than a sentence. ''When you say them,'' Jay says, ''you feel something.''

Those strong feelings drive some people to try to stamp profanity out. After cable news networks played the infamous video of Donald Trump saying he grabs women ''by the pussy,'' about two dozen people filed indecency complaints with the Federal Communication Commission'--which regulates the use of profanity on public airwaves'--according to records obtained by Morning Consult. ''Some consumers are easily offended,'' a lawyer interviewed by Morning Consult said, ''while others have a high tolerance for what is being shown on television.''

Experts like Jay will tell you that many of the reasons people often oppose profanity are based on ''myths,'' and academics have worked to debunk them. Bergen dedicates a whole chapter in his book to taking down a (flawed) study that suggested profanity harms children. Jay, meanwhile, recently took on the notion that people only swear because they're not intelligent enough to express themselves another way. What he found is that people with larger vocabularies can actually generate more swear words than people with smaller ones.

Jay has also found that the soap-in-the-mouth doesn't work. In fact, there's reason to believe that the more kids are sheltered from these words, the more impressive they become. In a follow up to the ice water study, for instance, the same researchers found that the pain-easing effect of uttering swear words was more acute among people who swore less. Use it all the time and you habituate; the words lose their oomph.

After teaching his class on profanity for the last several years, Bergen says he's become comfortable writing and saying most of those words that make us blush. He will discuss at length the fact that ''F-ck you'' seems to disprove one of the fundamental rules we learn in school: that a grammatical sentence needs to have subject (you is the object of f-ck but it remains unclear who is performing the action someone wishes you to receive). And he can do it with all the emotion that a chemistry professor might use the word neuron is his own class.

Though Bergen says he provides students several trigger warnings, letting them know what kind of material is coming before the first day of class, he also says he's never had a complaint. ''The goal is for them to learn as much as they would in any cognitive science class or linguistics class,'' he says, ''but maybe be a little more interested along the way.''

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Archived Version

Wed, 31 Oct 2018 04:45

SAN FRANCISCO '-- The people who are closest to a thing are often the most wary of it. Technologists know how phones really work, and many have decided they don't want their own children anywhere near them.

A wariness that has been slowly brewing is turning into a regionwide consensus: The benefits of screens as a learning tool are overblown, and the risks for addiction and stunting development seem high. The debate in Silicon Valley now is about how much exposure to phones is O.K.

''Doing no screen time is almost easier than doing a little,'' said Kristin Stecher, a former social computing researcher married to a Facebook engineer. ''If my kids do get it at all, they just want it more.''

Ms. Stecher, 37, and her husband, Rushabh Doshi, researched screen time and came to a simple conclusion: they wanted almost none of it in their house. Their daughters, ages 5 and 3, have no screen time ''budget,'' no regular hours they are allowed to be on screens. The only time a screen can be used is during the travel portion of a long car ride (the four-hour drive to Tahoe counts) or during a plane trip.

Recently she has softened this approach. Every Friday evening the family watches one movie.

More about kids and screens

There is a looming issue Ms. Stecher sees in the future: Her husband, who is 39, loves video games and thinks they can be educational and entertaining. She does not.

''We'll cross that when we come to it,'' said Ms. Stecher, who is due soon with a boy.

Some of the people who built video programs are now horrified by how many places a child can now watch a video.

Asked about limiting screen time for children, Hunter Walk, a venture capitalist who for years directed product for YouTube at Google, sent a photo of a potty training toilet with an iPad attached and wrote: ''Hashtag 'products we didn't buy.'''

Image Kristin Stecher, a former social computing researcher married to a Facebook engineer in Menlo Park, Calif., said their daughters, ages 5 and 3, have no screen time ''budget,'' no regular hours they are allowed to be on screens. Credit Peter Prato for The New York Times Athena Chavarria, who worked as an executive assistant at Facebook and is now at Mark Zuckerberg's philanthropic arm, the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, said: ''I am convinced the devil lives in our phones and is wreaking havoc on our children.''

Ms. Chavarria did not let her children have cellphones until high school, and even now bans phone use in the car and severely limits it at home.

She said she lives by the mantra that the last child in the class to get a phone wins. Her daughter did not get a phone until she started ninth grade.

''Other parents are like, 'Aren't you worried you don't know where your kids are when you can't find them?''' Ms. Chavarria said. ''And I'm like, 'No, I do not need to know where my kids are every second of the day.'''

For longtime tech leaders, watching how the tools they built affect their children has felt like a reckoning on their life and work.

Among those is Chris Anderson, the former editor of Wired and now the chief executive of a robotics and drone company. He is also the founder of GeekDad.com.

''On the scale between candy and crack cocaine, it's closer to crack cocaine,'' Mr. Anderson said of screens.

Technologists building these products and writers observing the tech revolution were na¯ve, he said.

''We thought we could control it,'' Mr. Anderson said. ''And this is beyond our power to control. This is going straight to the pleasure centers of the developing brain. This is beyond our capacity as regular parents to understand.''

He has five children and 12 tech rules. They include: no phones until the summer before high school, no screens in bedrooms, network-level content blocking, no social media until age 13, no iPads at all and screen time schedules enforced by Google Wifi that he controls from his phone. Bad behavior? The child goes offline for 24 hours.

''I didn't know what we were doing to their brains until I started to observe the symptoms and the consequences,'' Mr. Anderson said.

Image A view of the Anderson family schedule. ''This is scar tissue talking. We've made every mistake in the book, and I think we got it wrong with some of my kids,'' Mr. Anderson said. ''We glimpsed into the chasm of addiction, and there were some lost years, which we feel bad about.''

His children attended private elementary school, where he saw the administration introduce iPads and smart whiteboards, only to ''descend into chaos and then pull back from it all.''

This idea that Silicon Valley parents are wary about tech is not new. The godfathers of tech expressed these concerns years ago, and concern has been loudest from the top.

Tim Cook, the C.E.O. of Apple, said earlier this year that he would not let his nephew join social networks. Bill Gates banned cellphones until his children were teenagers, and Melinda Gates wrote that she wished they had waited even longer. Steve Jobs would not let his young children near iPads.

But in the last year, a fleet of high-profile Silicon Valley defectors have been sounding alarms in increasingly dire terms about what these gadgets do to the human brain. Suddenly rank-and-file Silicon Valley workers are obsessed. No-tech homes are cropping up across the region. Nannies are being asked to sign no-phone contracts.

Those who have exposed their children to screens try to talk them out of addiction by explaining how the tech works.

John Lilly, a Silicon Valley-based venture capitalist with Greylock Partners and the former C.E.O. of Mozilla, said he tries to help his 13-year-old son understand that he is being manipulated by those who built the technology.

''I try to tell him somebody wrote code to make you feel this way '-- I'm trying to help him understand how things are made, the values that are going into things and what people are doing to create that feeling,'' Mr. Lilly said. ''And he's like, 'I just want to spend my 20 bucks to get my Fortnite skins.'''

And there are those in tech who disagree that screens are dangerous. Jason Toff, 32, who ran the video platform Vine and now works for Google, lets his 3-year-old play on an iPad, which he believes is no better or worse than a book. This opinion is unpopular enough with his fellow tech workers that he feels there is now ''a stigma.''

''One reaction I got just yesterday was, 'Doesn't it worry you that all the major tech execs are limiting screen time?''' Mr. Toff said. ''And I was like, 'Maybe it should, but I guess I've always been skeptical of norms.' People are just scared of the unknown.''

''It's contrarian,'' Mr. Toff said. ''But I feel like I'm speaking for a lot of parents that are afraid of speaking out loud for fear of judgment.''

He said he thinks back to his own childhood growing up watching a lot of TV. ''I think I turned out O.K.,'' Mr. Toff said.

Other Silicon Valley parents say there are ways to make some limited screen time slightly less toxic.

Renee DiResta, a security researcher on the board of the Center for Humane Tech, won't allow passive screen time, but will allow short amounts of time on challenging games.

She wants her 2- and 4-year-old children to learn how to code young, so she embraces their awareness of gadgets. But she distinguishes between these types of screen use. Playing a building game is allowed, but watching a YouTube video is not, unless it is as a family.

And Frank Barbieri, a San Francisco-based executive at the start-up PebblePost that tracks online activity to send direct mail advertising, tries to limit his 5-year-old daughter's screen time to Italian language content.

''We have friends who are screen abolitionists, and we have friends who are screen liberalists,'' Mr. Barbieri said.

He had read studies on how learning a second language at a young age is good for the developing mind, so his daughter watches Italian-language movies and TV shows.

''For us, honestly, me and my wife were like, 'Where would we like to visit?''' Mr. Barbieri said.

Nellie Bowles covers tech and internet culture. Follow her on Twitter: @ nelliebowles

A version of this article appears in print on

, on Page

B

1

of the New York edition

with the headline:

Silicon Valley Wary of the 'Devil' in Our Phones

. Order Reprints | Today's Paper | Subscribe

Can't really go into my standing on this here, but here's my

opinion: Fairly certain he used (or was given) tannerite, which would explain

the white powder in some of the envelopes and the description that it was an

explosive powder. Tannerite is also very stable to ship in the mail. Gunpowder

can be set off by static electricity, which a piece of PVC would produce.

Firecracker manufactures pack it in to make sure that doesn't happen. Tannerite

would need a blasting cap to go off, and that had not been talked about. So

these devices would be very safe to handle and would never go off.

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Tue, 30 Oct 2018 00:41

By Michael Olenick, a research fellow at INSEAD who writes regularly at Olen on Economics

MAGA bomber and Trump fanatic Cesar Sayoc lost his home to foreclosure where it was purchased, at auction, then flipped by a company controlled by condo and casino developer Bruce M. Goldstein.

Sayoc is the man who allegedly mailed 14 bombs to anti-Trump people and news organizations. Note that my grammar checker says the word ''allegedly'' isn't needed, which is probably true since there's his DNA, fingerprints, and a confession, but I'll use it because everybody else does. Federal law enforcement says that although none of the bombs exploded, and the one's we've seen look like they were ordered by Wile E. Coyote, they were real bombs.

Sayoc is one strange dude, a 56 year-old testosterone pumped male stripper who lived in his MAGA sticker-covered van after his mom threw him out. Among other jobs, he delivered pizzas and told his lesbian manager, Debra Gureghian, she should be shipped to an island and nuked along with all gay people. Whereas death-threats usually get people fired, or at least written up, she shrugged it off, this being Florida.

Getting to the foreclosed house, Sayoc purchased it on June 6, 2006, from an individual with the initials JRS for $400,000. JRS had purchased the house in November, 1992 for $107,000 and refinanced it a few times, the last being Dec 14, 2000 with an $85,000 mortgage. After selling the house to Sayoc, JRS walked from the table with over $300,000 cash, retiring in a small community in north-central Florida.

To complete the purchase, Sayoc took out a $360,000 mortgage from Countrywide with an interest rate of 9.88% fixed for two years. Ten percent down, plus closing costs, is ten percent more than most people brought to the table back then and the interest rate, given the down payment, seems exorbitant. Sayoc refinanced the house with Indymac for $385,000 on June 1, 2007 at 7.875% fixed for five years. The $15,000 difference is indicative of financed closing costs, not the more typical cash out mortgages popular during that era.

In other words, Sayoc bought a house not as an investment but to live in, refinancing it not to cash out but only to lower his interest rate. The MAGA bomber is na¯ve, irresponsible, but about the only person whose behavior in this odd story bears some semblance of good faith.

I'll admit that to having no experience working as a male stripper, my physique as a middle aged Jewish guy not quite being entirely up to the task. But a few keystrokes shows that a) anything can be quickly found on the internet, and b) Simply Hired has done the research and the average wage of a male stripper is $64,521 with the top ten percent earning $127,224 and the bottom 10% earning $32,722.

As the Florida economy started to tank in 2008, and Sayoc aged up, it's likely his income as a stripper began to slip. He predictably couldn't afford his $2,791.52 P&I payment, plus homeowners insurance, private mortgage insurance, and real-estate taxes.

Through the economic downturn Sayoc somehow kept the payments coming in, outlasting his bank, Indymac, which filed for bankruptcy July 31, 2008. It's not clear why but Sayoc did stop paying in Sept. 2008, almost exactly a decade before the bombs went flying.

Indymac hired Florida ''Foreclosure King'' David J. Stern, who filed a foreclosure after three missed payments plus one month, on Jan 8, 2009.

Florida is a judicial foreclosure state, meaning that each foreclosure is a lawsuit that runs through the court system. Lawsuits start with ''process'' '' a process server physically hands the paperwork to the person being sued or, for companies, to their registered agent. In the event that a person can't be found, after doing a diligent search, plaintiffs (the person or business suing; the bank, in this case) can fall back to ''service by publication'' where they put an advertisement into what is supposed to be a well-read newspaper.

Stern, Fannie Mae's two-time ''Lawyer of the Year,'' skipped most of that, which wasn't unusual for him. He claims to have issued four summons (the paperwork the process server is supposed to hand over) on Jan 8, 2009, and charged Indymac $205 for the summons. All four summons were returned ''unserved'' on Feb. 4, 2009, less than a month later.[1]

Since Stern owned the process serving company, that operated in the same building as his law firm, you'd think he'd tell them to try again. Instead, he apparently did nothing until June 22, 2009, when he filed an affidavit that he'd diligently searched for Sayoc, and sent the notice of the lawsuit to the obscure Daily Business Review, a site behind a paywall that has a number of articles of interest to lawyers and a long list of notices. If you thought publishing a notice that people are being sued behind an internet paywall sounds like the opposite of the spirit of the law '' the idea being that defendants can find about the lawsuit in a publicly available place '' you'd be thinking right. But this is foreclosure-land where nothing is predictable except a never-ending appetite for fees.

Sayoc somehow figured out he'd been foreclosed on '' possibly because he hadn't paid his mortgage for almost a year by this point '' and filed a pro se (self-represented) Motion to Abate on Aug. 4, 2009. That filing isn't online so I don't have a copy but, normally, a defendant would file a Motion to Dismiss or an Answer. In any event, it didn't matter because the Court entirely ignored his pleading, which isn't unusual for pro se litigants.

Undeterred by Sayoc's filing Stern ploughed ahead, filing a Motion for Summary Judgment, plus the related paperwork, a week later on Aug. 11, 2009. Like virtually all pro se defendants, Sayoc promptly lost. A judgment of $442,427.52 was entered against him on Sept. 2, 2009.

Among other charges in the final judgment are $16,679.41 for one year of forced placed hazard insurance, a wildly inflated amount Indymac's stop-loss agreement no-doubt paid out partially from US taxpayer funds.

Sayoc's house was purchased at auction by PMG Mortgage & Lending Co., LLC on Nov. 12, 2009 for $166,500. PMG is a now-dissolved company that was located at 440 South Dixie Highway, Suite 200, Hollywood, FL, with one manager, Bruce M. Goldstein.

PMG Headquarters

At that point, Sayoc did hire a lawyer who tried, unsuccessfully, to overturn the sale. On Dec. 30, 2009, with the courthouse about to close for New Year's, Sayoc's motion to set aside the sale was denied. A week later, on Jan. 6, 2010, Stern filed that a Writ of Possession (an eviction) was returned served onto the ''unknown spouse of Cesar Sayoc,'' which is odd because Sayoc wasn't married. Details be damned, the court evicted Sayoc Feb. 8, 2010.

PMG's last filing lists their new address as 1177 Kane Concourse, Bay Harbor Islands, FL 33154. Which is the same address as a condo and casino developer named Bruce M. Goldstein claims his mega-development company is located at.

MAGA bomber Cesar Sayoc had his house purchased in a foreclosure auction, following a rigged court process, prosecuted by a now-disbarred crooked foreclosure lawyer, taken by a condo and casino developer that sounds a lot like his idol, Donald Trump.

Goldstein's PMG flipped the house five months later, on Apr. 26, 2010, for $273,000, yielding a quick $106,500 paid for partly by Indymac's loss-share agreement (that'd be you, if you're an American reader who pays tax).

David Dayen wrote an article pointing out the assignment of mortgage Stern filed was likely robosigned and back-dated. That was about the least of the problems in this case. Boris, my Dogue de Bordeaux, could've shown up with a note reading ''I'm the bank lawyer '' he didn't pay '' clip judgment to collar'' and walked from court victorious. The notion that law had anything to do with foreclosures at this time in Florida is ludicrous; the entire system was as broken as the economy and the people suffering under it. During this era judges studied the courthouse cafeteria menu more than they did foreclosure paperwork. Back-dated assignments and robosigned paperwork was the norm, and routinely ignored.

Sayoc would go on to declare bankruptcy in 2012 with $21,109 in liabilities. While Indymac appears not to have pursued their deficiency judgment (the difference between the judgment amount and the amount the house sold for), which is not unusual, he should have included it. With the deficiency, Sayoc's assets of $4,175 were outweighted about 100:1 with his liabilities which, by any standard, is bankrupt.

Today, the Broward county property appraiser estimates Sayoc's former home is worth $335,940. Zillow estimates the value at a more bubbly $464,105.

Given this history, Sayoc's rage can be better contextualized. It seems impossible to believe that house was worth $400,000 in 2006, despite that a Countrywide appraiser, paid by Sayoc, confirmed the value. Countrywide's high-interest loan, despite that Sayoc brought a ten-percent down payment plus closing costs to the table, was designed for an idiot. Indymac's loan was better, but not too far behind. It must've been hard for Sayoc '' who doesn't seem like the sharpest knife in the drawer '' to understand why he was scrambling to send off steep payments to a bankrupt bank.

Stern's involvement was typical for him. In the middle of all this he'd taken his law firm public as the ill-fated David J. Stern Enterprises (DJSP) in Dec. 2009. Stern opted for a reverse-IPO, being acquired by the Chardan 2008 China Acquisition Corp., a Special Purpose Acquisition Company (SPAC), then trading under the ticker CACA. I know DJSP well, having had the privilege of helping to decimate their share price by showing key people it was a fraud factory long before the Florida Attorney General became involved. Goldstein's PMG saw an opportunity and pounced; almost exactly a year ago Dayen was praisinga similar mortgage vulture.

I can't vouch for Sayoc's skills as a stripper but in most other areas of life he seems to be a bumbling idiot, an easy target for Countrywide, Indymac, Stern, Goldstein, and Obama with his ignored promises for hope and change. Then, finally, like so many others who'd been abandoned and forgotten, Donald J. Trump.

___________

[1]Since Indymac was by then a bankrupt bank, eventually sold under an FDIC loss-share arrangement, American taxpayers ended up paying part of these fees.

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 14:17

The man accused of opening fire at Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh on Oct. 27 was linked to anti-Semitic comments on Gab, an online hub for racists, anti-Semites and white nationalists. (Gene J. Puskar/AP) Drew HarwellNational technology reporter covering artificial intelligence

October 31 at 8:00 AMLike many young entrepreneurs drawn to California's technological gold rush, Andrew Torba brought a familiar mix of smarts, ambition and big ideas when he arrived nearly four years ago.

What few saw was that Torba '-- an advocate of traditional, Christian values amid secular Silicon Valley '-- was frustrated and increasingly alienated. Those emotions, he would later say, helped inspire his creation of Gab.ai, the freewheeling social media platform that has become an online hub for racists, anti-Semites and white nationalists.

Among them would be a troubled middle-aged trucker, Robert Bowers, whose alleged hateful rants against Jews appeared on the site in the months before he was accused of killing 11 people at a Pittsburgh synagogue Saturday. Messages on a Gab account bearing Bowers's name and image have turned a harsh spotlight on the site, which went offline Sunday as some long-standing partner companies such as GoDaddy and PayPal backed away from Torba's creation.

Torba said he and his site are blameless for the alleged actions of Bowers. Torba said that the shooting is a ''horrific tragedy'' and that he's working with law enforcement to ''see to it that justice is served.''

He also has grown increasingly testy with journalists exploring extremism on Gab, writing in an email to The Washington Post on Monday, ''To attempt and place blame on me or Gab is absurd and you know it.''

Gab has become the most visible of a collection of services catering to people mainstream companies such as Twitter and Facebook have rejected as too hateful, extreme or threatening in their posts as part of a crackdown on extremism. The Pittsburgh tragedy has made Torba a key voice in growing debates over free expression and hate speech '-- and whether technology companies are making the right decisions over whose voices get heard and whose get muted.

Gab's Twitter feed '-- which Torba has acknowledged often writing himself '-- Tuesday morning linked to an anonymously written blog post calling mainstream journalists ''the Satanic mafia.'' Torba is chief executive of Gab, which has only a handful of employees, and controls 90 percent of its shares, according to Securities and Exchange Commission filings.

His dark turn is now an indelible part of the history of online radicalism in the United States. In a series of emails with The Post on Monday, Torba described his disenchantment with Silicon Valley.

It was a place he moved to in 2015 to develop an advertising-technology start-up he had co-founded in his native Pennsylvania. But just a year later, Torba came to believe the tech mecca was hostile to him and his political ideas amid the tumultuous rise of his preferred candidate for president, Donald Trump, whose combative rhetorical style Torba sometimes echoed.

''I became incredibly disillusioned after only one year living and working with some of the 'top names' and companies,'' said Torba, 27.

''These are not good people,'' he added. ''Many of them hate America and freedom. They are authoritarian cultural Marxists. Some, many of whom I am still friends with, are great people who I love, but the overwhelming majority are egomaniacs lusting for power and wealth.''

Gab said in financial filings this spring that its target market was the more than 50 million ''conservative, libertarian, nationalists and populist internet users around the world'' and that its competitors included far-right sites such as Breitbart and Infowars.

"As mainstream social networks continue to crack down on 'objectionable content' and censor conservative views,'' the company said in an SEC filing, ''we believe the need for alternative platforms will only continue to rise."

In little more than two years, Torba and his site have won acclaim among conservative circles, clashed with tech-industry insiders and ridden a wave of growth by cultivating customers others have shunned. They've also been kicked out of Google's app store and parted ways with Microsoft, the site's data-hosting service, after the tech giant in August lashed out at anti-Semitic comments from Gab users.

Like much of its user content, Gab's own messages sometimes raise questions about whether they cross the line into impropriety. A post from Gab's Twitter account in June replied to a tweet suggesting that there should be no national borders by writing, ''Let a bunch of Somalians migrate to your neighborhood and see if you change your mind,'' according to an archived version of the tweet.

Another post, from September, showed images of two men, one with the traditional sidelocks worn by many observant Jews. ''These two guys show up at your front door. Who do you let in and who do you call the cops on?'' tweeted the Gab account. It soon after replied in a second tweet, ''I mean I'm calling the cops on both and getting my shotgun ready, just saying.''

When asked about these postings, Torba initially questioned their authenticity and suggested they might be doctored images. Later, he said they were ''clearly satire/comedy . . . to get people discussing the importance of free expression for satire, comedy, political discourse, and legitimate criticism.'' Later, Gab's Twitter account described them as ''a few edgy tweets posted by interns.''

****

Gab's most infamous user now is Bowers, who faces more than two dozen federal charges. He allegedly wrote on his Gab site that Jews ''are the children of Satan.'' His last post before the shooting Saturday said, ''I can't sit by and watch my people get slaughtered. Screw your optics, I'm going in.''

A post allegedly by Pittsburgh synagogue shooting suspect Robert Bowers on Gab before the massacre. HIAS, mentioned in the posting, is a Maryland-based nonprofit group that helps refugees around the world find safety and freedom. (AP)Torba has said he's working with law enforcement on the case and has staunchly defended Gab against growing criticism that it aids and abets radicalization. ''Gab did nothing wrong and has nothing to apologize for,'' Torba said. ''We proactively and immediately worked with both the FBI and DOJ. I am on three hours sleep because my number one priority, even ahead of getting Gab back online, is helping law enforcement see to it that justice is served for this horrific tragedy.''

The site prohibits content that is illegal, such as child pornography, or that features specific threats of violence, but it does not prohibit bullying and hate speech, as most mainstream platforms do. One post showed an infant wearing a Jewish yarmulke with a knife poised over its head. The caption read, ''7 places you can stab a Jew baby without killing it.''

Torba needed ''to essentially build a movement'' to attract users and media attention, said Joan Donovan, a researcher for the think tank Data & Society who has studied Gab. ''He was always building a platform for people who feared they could not say what they wanted to say on Facebook or Twitter."

It's a puzzling turn of events for those who remember Torba from his pre-Gab days.

''I don't know what in God's name happened to the young man. I really do not know what happened to him,'' said Richard Yarmey, who taught Torba in an entrepreneurship class at the University of Scranton in 2011. ''Based upon things he's quoted as saying . . . I just scratch my head and say what happened to this bright young man that I used to think highly of?''

****

Torba grew up in the faded coal country of northeastern Pennsylvania, where his father worked as a FedEx courier, according to his LinkedIn page, and said he dreamed of being an entrepreneur since eighth grade. (FedEx declined to comment, and Torba's father, reached via Twitter, said, ''Your vision should be laser focused on the madman shooter, not my son.'')

As a philosophy student at the University of Scranton, he wrote for the college paper, criticized President Barack Obama, and, according to one former professor, showed a strong affinity for Ralph Waldo Emerson's ideas of self-reliance and independence '-- becoming particularly taken with a quote of Emerson's about the importance of speaking frankly, ideals that course through tech culture.

He yearned for a more traditional life, said Utsav Sanduja, an executive at Gab until earlier this year, who described Torba as a Bible-quoting Christian who is ''very deeply spiritual.''

But Silicon Valley called to Torba. With a friend, he started a technology company called Kuhcoon that helped customers run ad campaigns on Facebook. And when the founders won a competition to join the prestigious Y Combinator boot camp for start-ups, Torba was ecstatic at the prospect of gaining access to more than $100,000 in capital and an elite network of entrepreneurs and investors.

''Scranton will always be our home,'' Torba wrote on Medium on New Year's Eve in 2014, announcing his move to Northern California for the three-month program, ''but Silicon Valley has always been our destiny.''

Things didn't go as Torba had imagined.

Colleagues from that period at Y Combinator remember Torba and his co-founder, a friend from eighth grade, as mild-mannered and largely unremarkable. The ad-tech company they founded wasn't in the top of that year's batch of start-ups, but they won respect for their hard work, said two people who worked with him at the time, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

But impressions changed rapidly when, as Trump was emerging as the leading Republican presidential contender in the spring of 2016, Torba started publicly supporting him and making comments that other Y Combinator members say they found offensive. Torba also took his frustrations to Twitter, calling out Y Combinator founder Paul Graham, who was no longer very involved with the organization, and its liberal president, Sam Altman.

On a ''shoestring budget,'' Torba and a very small team launched Gab that August, said Sanduja, Gab's chief operating officer from October 2016 to June 2018. Gab arrived amid a wave of social media bans for prominent white-nationalist and far-right users such as Milo Yiannopoulos, who was booted from Twitter after encouraging racist verbal abuse and became one of Gab's first big names.

Gab built its audience by marketing itself as a ''censorship-free'' refuge for users who believed they had been victimized by what it called the ''cancer'' of political correctness. The app's logo was a frog that resembled the far-right meme Pepe, and the app made a croak sound every time a user received a new notification.

"Our mission was very noble from the very beginning: We genuinely believe in free speech. It's not our fault that . . . neo-Nazis joined our site,'' Sanduja said. ''Gab happened to have these people, they happened to congregate, happened to engage in tomfoolery, and the rest is history,'' he said.

But in the emotionally raw days after Trump's election in November, Torba clashed with fellow Y Combinator entrepreneurs in the organization's close-knit alumni network. Torba posted an image on Twitter of comments made by a Latino Y Combinator member on Facebook, expressing fear for the safety of women and minorities, and added, ''Build the Wall.''

The post sparked a heated discussion within the Y Combinator community on Facebook. Torba jumped in and reiterated his call to build the wall before referring to fellow members of the Y Combinator community as ''cucks'' '-- a pejorative description common in far-right circles.

''Take your morally superior, elitist, virtue-signalling . . . and shove it,'' Torba wrote in a profanity-laced post on Facebook. ''I call it like I see it, and I helped meme a President into office, cucks.''

Shortly after, Torba received a call from Y Combinator's general counsel notifying him of the decision to kick him out of the alumni network for harassing other members.

Torba said he was kicked out because of his support of Trump and his tweet to build the wall and said his comments were not threatening. ''Y Combinator supports the feelings of their international, non-US founders (which they have a vested equity interest in) over the national security of the United States of America. That's very telling,'' Torba emailed to The Post.

Y Combinator declined to comment.

****

Gab's clashes with Silicon Valley did not hurt his business. Rather Torba positioned the platform as an alternative for those feeling oppressed by what he called ''Big Tech."

When Google fired conservative engineer James Damore in August 2017 for making degrading comments about women, Gab called for a ''Free Speech Tech Alliance,'' a movement among engineers to build an alternative online infrastructure free of the liberal values of Silicon Valley.

In the days following Charlottesville's Unite the Right rally later that month, as technology companies cracked down on white-supremacist accounts, Gab reiterated its call to create a parallel Internet for people who have been banned from other services.

The Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville in August 2017 drove more users to Gab. (Stephanie Keith/Reuters)Andrew Anglin, creator of the neo-Nazi site Daily Stormer, began posting frequently on Gab, according to reports at the time. The site exploded with new, pseudonymous users posting viral misinformation, hate speech and memes that echoed white-supremacist or anti-Semitic tropes '-- what Donovan called ''an echo chamber of the most disgusting content offered online."

Google then banned the service from its app store, saying that ''social networking apps need to demonstrate a sufficient level of moderation, including for content that encourages violence and advocates hate against groups of people.'' In response, Gab sued the search giant.

But the bans and crackdowns haven't curbed Gab's growth. There are now about 800,000 users, said Sanduja, compared with 10,000 two years ago. The company's few employees are all under 30 and number fewer than half a dozen, including Torba and his wife, Sanduja said.

But there are signs that the company's fractious public image has taken a toll on its leadership. Ekrem Buyukkaya, a Turkey-based developer who co-founded Gab with Torba, said on Sunday that he would step down as the company's chief technology officer because of ''attacks from the American press.'' The company had previously said in an SEC filing that Buyukkaya's work was crucial to its ''future success.'' Buyukkaya did not respond to requests for comment.

The growth of Gab's fan base, however, has helped fund an aggressive expansion designed to bring new users into the fold. In an SEC filing in March, Gab said it had more than $600,000 in cash, up from $16,000 in 2016, and had made $100,000 in revenue, primarily from subscriptions.

One week before the shooting in Pittsburgh, the company said it had raised more than $1 million from users over the previous month.

On Tuesday, the University of Scranton appeared to distance itself from its graduate. ''As a Catholic and Jesuit university, we condemn hate and violence,'' President Scott R. Pilarz wrote.

University of Scranton theology professor Maria Johnson recalled Torba as bright, enthusiastic and kind. He contacted her when she had cancer several years ago, and she attended his wedding earlier this year.

''My impression I guess is that his dedication to free speech has led him to hang with some really bad company,'' Johnson said. ''But I find it hard to imagine that Andrew was malicious in any way.''

Andrew Ba Tran contributed to this report.

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 14:10

Image Outside the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, where a gunman killed 11 people on Saturday. After the shooting, anti-Semitic messages surged on Instagram. Credit Credit Brendan Smialowski/Agence France-Presse '-- Getty Images SAN FRANCISCO '-- On Monday, a search on Instagram, the photo-sharing site owned by Facebook, produced a torrent of anti-Semitic images and videos uploaded in the wake of Saturday's shooting at a Pittsburgh synagogue.

A search for the word ''Jews'' displayed 11,696 posts with the hashtag ''#jewsdid911,'' claiming that Jews had orchestrated the Sept. 11 terror attacks. Other hashtags on Instagram referenced Nazi ideology, including the number 88, an abbreviation used for the Nazi salute ''Heil Hitler.''

The Instagram posts demonstrated a stark reality. Over the last 10 years, Silicon Valley's social media companies have expanded their reach and influence to the furthest corners of the world. But it has become glaringly apparent that the companies never quite understood the negative consequences of that influence nor what to do about it '-- and that they cannot put the genie back in the bottle.

''Social media is emboldening people to cross the line and push the envelope on what they are willing to say to provoke and to incite,'' said Jonathan Albright, research director at Columbia University's Tow Center for Digital Journalism. ''The problem is clearly expanding.''

The repercussions of the social media companies' inability to handle disinformation and hate speech have manifested themselves abundantly in recent days. Cesar Sayoc Jr., who was charged last week with sending explosive devices to prominent Democrats, appeared to have been radicalized online by partisan posts on Twitter and Facebook. Robert D. Bowers, who is accused of killing 11 people at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh on Saturday, posted about his hatred of Jews on Gab, a two-year-old social network.

Image A memorial outside the Tree of Life synagogue. Robert D. Bowers, who killed 11 people at the synagogue, posted about his hatred of Jews on Gab, a two-year-old social network. Credit Michael Henninger for The New York Times The effects of social media were also evident globally. Close watchers of Brazil's election on Sunday ascribed much of the appeal of the victor, the far-right populist Jair Bolsonaro, to what unfolded on social media there. Interests tied to Mr. Bolsonaro's campaign appeared to have flooded WhatsApp, the messaging application owned by Facebook, with a deluge of political content that gave wrong information on voting locations and times, provided false instructions on how to vote for particular candidates and outright disparaged one of Mr. Bolsonaro's main opponents, Fernando Haddad.

Elsewhere, high-ranking members of the Myanmar military have used doctored messages on Facebook to foment anxiety and fear against the Muslim Rohingya minority group. And in India, fake stories on WhatsApp about child kidnappings led mobs to murder more than a dozen people this year.

''Social media companies have created, allowed and enabled extremists to move their message from the margins to the mainstream,'' said Jonathan A. Greenblatt, chief executive of the Anti-Defamation League, a nongovernmental organization that combats hate speech. ''In the past, they couldn't find audiences for their poison. Now, with a click or a post or a tweet, they can spread their ideas with a velocity we've never seen before.''

Facebook said it was investigating the anti-Semitic hashtags on Instagram after The New York Times flagged them. Sarah Pollack, a Facebook spokeswoman, said in a statement that Instagram was seeing new posts related to the shooting on Saturday and that it was ''actively reviewing hashtags and content related to these events and removing content that violates our policies.''

YouTube said it has strict policies prohibiting content that promotes hatred or incites violence and added that it takes down videos that violate those rules.

Image Jair Bolsonaro, the far-right populist, was elected president of Brazil on Sunday. Close watchers of the election ascribed much of his appeal to social media. Credit Ricardo Moraes/Reuters Social media companies have said that identifying and removing hate speech and disinformation '-- or even defining what constitutes such content '-- is difficult. Facebook said this year that only 38 percent of hate speech on its site was flagged by its internal systems. In contrast, its systems pinpointed and took down 96 percent of what it defined as adult nudity, and 99.5 percent of terrorist content.

YouTube said users reported nearly 10 million videos from April to June for potentially violating its community guidelines. Just under one million of those videos were found to have broken the rules and were removed, according to the company's data. YouTube's automated detection tools also took down an additional 6.8 million videos in that period.

A study by researchers from M.I.T. that was published in March found that falsehoods on Twitter were 70 percent more likely to be retweeted than accurate news.

Facebook, Twitter and YouTube have all announced plans to invest heavily in artificial intelligence and other technology aimed at finding and removing unwanted content from their sites. Facebook has also said it would hire 10,000 additional people to work on safety and security issues, and YouTube has said that it planned to have 10,000 people dedicated to reviewing videos. Jack Dorsey, Twitter's chief executive, recently said that although the company's longtime principle was free expression, it was discussing how ''safety should come first.''

But even as the companies throw money and resources at the problems, some of their employees said on Monday that they were rethinking whether the social media services could have a positive effect.

Image Facebook's ''war room'' at its headquarters in Menlo Park, Calif. The repercussions of social media companies' inability to handle disinformation and hate speech have manifested themselves abundantly in recent days. Credit Monica Davey/Epa, via Rex At Twitter, for example, employees are increasingly concerned that the company is floundering in its treatment of toxic language and hate speech, said four current and former employees who asked for anonymity because they had signed nondisclosure agreements.

The employees said their uncertainty surfaced in August, when Apple and other companies erased most of the posts and videos on their services from Alex Jones, the conspiracy theorist and founder of the right-wing site Infowars '-- but Twitter did not. (Twitter only followed suit weeks later.) Saturday's shooting at the Pittsburgh synagogue led employees to urge Twitter's leadership to firm up a policy on how to deal with hate speech and white supremacist content, two of the people said.

Twitter did not address questions about its employee concerns on Monday, but said it needed to be ''thoughtful and considered'' in its policies.

''Progress in this space is tough but we've never been as committed and as focused in our efforts,'' Twitter said. ''Serving public conversation and trying to make it healthier is our singular mission here.''

Instagram, which was created as a site for people to share curated photos of their food, adorable pets and cute children, has largely avoided scrutiny over disinformation and hate content '-- especially when compared with its parent, Facebook. But social media researchers said that the site had over the last year become more of a hotbed for hateful posts and videos meant to provoke discord.

That was evident after the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting, with the mushrooming of new anti-Semitic content on the site. On Sunday, one new video added to Instagram claimed that the state of Israel was created by the Rothschilds, a wealthy Jewish family. Underneath the video, the hashtags read #conspiracy and #jewworldorder.

By late Monday, it had been viewed more than 1,640 times and shared to other social media sites, including Twitter and Facebook.

Follow Sheera Frenkel, Mike Isaac and Kate Conger on Twitter: @sheeraf, @MikeIsaac and @kateconger.

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There's no better example of the power, and the terror, inspired by blockchain than Gab.com, the social network used by the accused Pittsburgh synagogue gunman to threaten Jews.

About a month and a half before the alleged gunman made good on those threats by opening fire in a Pittsburgh synagogue and killing 11 people, Gab submitted paperwork to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to raise $10 million via an initial coin offering (ICO). The offering, dated September 18, 2018, has so far raised $5.6 million in capital for the ''free speech'' social network, which is a favorite of white supremacists, neo-Nazis and other members of the ''alt-right.''

Since the shooting on Saturday, Gab has been shut down by a host of mainstream services including payment processors Stripe and Paypal, Web-hosting company Joyent and domain registry Go Daddy. But that might not matter, because Gab has already taken the first step toward freeing itself from dependence on traditional infrastructure and support mechanisms, thanks to its funding via the ethereum blockchain. Ultimately Gab's goal is to build an entire ecosystem beyond the reach of centralized authorities'--whether Facebook, Twitter or venture capitalists'--making it nearly indestructible. On this, the tenth anniversary of the publication of Satoshi Nakamoto's whitepaper, which gave birth to bitcoin, Gab epitomizes the darker consequences of his vision.

Gab's goal is to build an entire ecosystem beyond the reach of centralized authorities, making it nearly indestructibleGab's ICO is a vivid demonstration of blockchain's ability to let people raise money anonymously outside of mainstream financing. But Gab is also using even more powerful tools that could make centralized servers, domain managers, and much of the internet infrastructure as we know it obsolete.

''Ultimately, what we're trying to accomplish is to cut out the middleman,'' said Gab co-founder and CEO Andrew Torba on a Bitcoin Uncensored episode last year. ''I want to see VCs tremble, just crumble.

If it weren't for Andrew Torba's associations with the alt-right, his success in tech might be heralded. A Moosic, Pennsylvania, native who graduated from the University of Scranton in 2013, Torbas caught the attention of the storied Silicon Valley incubator Y Combinator after he created an automated advertising company called Kuhcoon, Inc. Torba's startup received seed funding from the incubator as a graduate of Y Combinator's winter Class of 2015.

Those dreams fell apart when after the 2016 presidential campaign, Torba, whose company had been renamed Automated Ads, was kicked out of the Y Combinator alumni network for taunting fellow members on Facebook. ''I helped meme a president into office, cucks,'' flamed Torba, known to wear a green MAGA hat, admitting he spread Trump endorsements over the internet during the months leading up to the presidential election.

In August 2016, Torba launched Gab, citing censorship by Facebook, Twitter and Reddit as examples of why he founded the ad-free social network. His initial funding came solely from donations. Almost from the start, membership on Gab took off like a rocket despite that fact that it was rejected by Apple's App store and Google Play. In July 2017 Torba told the controversial Bitcoin Uncensored host Chris Derose that Gab had 200,000 users. By the time Gab filed its paperwork to use the ethereum blockchain to raise capital, the number of users had almost doubled to 394,000. In an updated SEC filing from last month, that number had grown to 635,000 people. It reportedly now has around 800,000 users.

According to Torba, it wasn't just Google Play and Y Combinator who shunned him, but also venture capitalists who ''blacklisted'' him, preventing Gab from realizing its true potential and scaling even more rapidly. So Torba sought out StartEngine, a crowdfunding website launched in 2014 that had been taking advantage of Obama's Jobs Act exemptions to help companies sell equity to small investors. In 2018, StartEngine launched a new ICO funding service, which Torba quickly signed up for.

Starting in January, Gab offered 2 million tokens issued on the ethereum blockchain at a price of $5 each. According to the most recent SEC documents, a fully subscribed offering would give token investors a 12.5% ownership stake in Gab while Torba and his cofounders would retain the rest. Based on the StartEngine website, Gab has so far sold tokens to 1,820 holders, committing $5,630,502.64.

In terms of financials, Gab's most recent filings show that it had gross revenues of $93,260 in 2017, mostly from premium subscription services that allow its members to monetize their audiences. Despite donations of more than $116,000, Gab was still losing money at the end of 2017, according to its offering statement. Operating costs were reported to be $364,676, including $65,000 in salary for Torba.

Cameron Winklevoss and Tyler Winklevoss in Los Angeles, California, 2017. JB Lacroix/WireImage

While the world has come to know the social network as a place where extremists like the synagogue killer could gather and swap hate speech, the company, as it describes itself in Securities and Exchange Commission documents, paints a very different picture.

The offering documents portray Gab as a supporter of free speech and a defender of ''the free flow of information,'' mirroring in many ways the rhetoric increasingly used by promoters of blockchain to describe the democratizing benefits of the new technology:

''We empower creators, support free speech and defend the free flow of information online. We stand for bringing folks together of all races, religions, and creeds who share in the common ideals of Western values, individual liberty and the free exchange and flow of information. Our mission is to provide people with the tools they need to create and shape their own experience.''

What tools? GabTV, for example allows members the ability to build followers and tip revenue by streaming video programming on Gab's platform.

Perhaps in a veiled message to would-be followers, the image plastered on the front of the company's offering statement is that of a green frog, similar to the Pepe the Frog meme that has been co-opted by neo-Nazis and the alt-right.

Today, Gab tokens are still being sold on StartEngine.

Earlier this week, as the FBI and Department of Justice investigated the Pittsburgh shootings, Paypal, Stripe, Joyent and GoDaddy terminated service to Gab. In a post on his disabled website, Torba claims the company is cooperating with the authorities ''to bring justice to an alleged terrorist.''

Of course, Torba hasn't stopped ranting against the establishment. ''No-platform us all you want. Ban us all you want. Smear us all you want,'' he says on Gab's homepage in response to being shut down. ''You can't stop an idea.''

Torba may be right. There are blockchain alternatives to every single service currently disabling Gab. Paypal and Stripe may not want Gab using their services, but Gab can easily accept payments directly using bitcoin, ethereum, or privacy cryptocurrencies like zcash and monero.

And Gab can easily use other blockchain services if mainstream providers try to kick it off the internet by refusing to provide critical services. If Gab needs to replace GoDaddy for domain service (basically how computers find each other online), Ethereum Name Service provides domains for decentralized applications built on the ethereum blockchain. Web hosting? No problem. Ethereum's Substratum provides a decentralized alternative to Joyent. Others have already pioneered the idea. PeepEth is a nascent ethereum-powered social network, and Mastadon is a blockchain-based Twitter.

If navigating all of those blockchain alternatives seems daunting, Gab and other blacklisted entities could simply tap into Blockstack, which is creating an entire stack of Web services designed to create an uncensorable web. Earlier this year Blockstack, which is backed by Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss, announced $1 million in grants specifically for social networks that could one day put Facebook and other centralized social networks out of business. Already, one of 300 grant applicants, Afari, claims it will give users of its social network control over their own usage data by increasing privacy.

As we mark the tenth anniversary of bitcoin's birth, it may not be the corrupt banks and totalitarian regimes envisioned by Satoshi that we should be fearing most, but the dark corners of the internet and the dark minds that inhabit them.

Bitcoin Uncensored host Derose, who condemns the synagogue attacks but has himself been accused of racism, sexism, and bigotry, offers a stern warning:

''What happened with Gab is that people of a like mind brought their ideas together and created something that's worse than a sum of their parts.'' He adds, ''We created the bogeymen we fear, and encouraged them.''

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Tue, 30 Oct 2018 11:23

According to a study out Monday on global climate change, your dog (or your cat) is probably killing the environment, and if you want to stem the tide of global warming, it's time to say "good-bye" to Fido and Fluffy.

The study, which appears in the online journal PLOS, claims the human compulsion to seek out animal companionship is one of the primary factors affecting our climate, particularly in the United States where there are 163 million companion animals '-- roughly one pet for every two Americans '-- the highest number of any country in the world.

Researchers at the University of Sydney in Australia claim that those 163 million pets have a detrimental impact on the environment, from the food they consume to the waste they produce.

"In the US, there are more than 163 million dogs and cats that consume, as a significant portion of their diet, animal products and therefore potentially constitute a considerable dietary footprint," the study's abstract proclaims. "Here, the energy and animal-derived product consumption of these pets in the US is evaluated for the first time, as are the environmental impacts from the animal products fed to them, including feces production."

The problem isn't just the United States, though. The popularity of companion animals has grown worldwide.

"Americans are the largest pet owners in the world, but the tradition of pet ownership in the US has considerable costs. As pet ownership increases in some developing countries, especially China, and trends continue in pet food toward higher content and quality of meat, globally, pet ownership will compound the environmental impacts of human dietary choices," it continues.

There's only one solution: no more pets. "Reducing the rate of dog and cat ownership, perhaps in favor of other pets that offer similar health and emotional benefits would considerably reduce these impacts," the study concludes.

Alternatively, the researchers recommend having your pets go vegetarian, something that's not recommended by veterinarians or animal health and welfare experts who concede that having some type of meat-based protein is best for your four-legged friends '-- particularly those whose ancestors were carnivorous.

The study, the researchers say, isn't designed to dissuade animal lovers from taking in the maximum number of pets possible, but rather encourage Americans to consume less meat. Livestock farming is a significant contributor to global climate change, they say, and the less meat we consume, the better it is for the environment. And humans make up the vast majority of that consumption; dogs and cats consume only around 19% of the meat protein humans do.

Researchers probably won't find much success in convincing Americans to ditch their furry friends, anyway. Americans love their pets, and despite claims to the contrary '-- and pervasive environmental hysteria '-- Americans have greatly reduced their carbon footprint over the last decade, pets and all.

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Research Article

AbstractIn the US, there are more than 163 million dogs and cats that consume, as a significant portion of their diet, animal products and therefore potentially constitute a considerable dietary footprint. Here, the energy and animal-derived product consumption of these pets in the US is evaluated for the first time, as are the environmental impacts from the animal products fed to them, including feces production. In the US, dogs and cats consume about 19% ± 2% of the amount of dietary energy that humans do (203 ± 15 PJ yr-1 vs. 1051 ± 9 PJ yr-1) and 33% ± 9% of the animal-derived energy (67 ± 17 PJ yr-1 vs. 206 ± 2 PJ yr-1). They produce about 30% ± 13%, by mass, as much feces as Americans (5.1 ± Tg yr-1 vs. 17.2 Tg yr-1), and through their diet, constitute about 25''30% of the environmental impacts from animal production in terms of the use of land, water, fossil fuel, phosphate, and biocides. Dog and cat animal product consumption is responsible for release of up to 64 ± 16 million tons CO2-equivalent methane and nitrous oxide, two powerful greenhouse gasses (GHGs). Americans are the largest pet owners in the world, but the tradition of pet ownership in the US has considerable costs. As pet ownership increases in some developing countries, especially China, and trends continue in pet food toward higher content and quality of meat, globally, pet ownership will compound the environmental impacts of human dietary choices. Reducing the rate of dog and cat ownership, perhaps in favor of other pets that offer similar health and emotional benefits would considerably reduce these impacts. Simultaneous industry-wide efforts to reduce overfeeding, reduce waste, and find alternative sources of protein will also reduce these impacts.

Citation: Okin GS (2017) Environmental impacts of food consumption by dogs and cats. PLoS ONE 12(8): e0181301. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0181301

Editor: Mathew S. Crowther, University of Sydney, AUSTRALIA

Received: August 25, 2016; Accepted: June 14, 2017; Published: August 2, 2017

Copyright: (C) 2017 Gregory S. Okin. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Data Availability: All relevant data are within the paper and its Supporting Information files, including the URLs for the databases used for the study. The URLs for these databases are: http://www.census.gov/popclock/; https://www.akc.org/reg/dogreg_stats.cfm; http://www.petcarerx.com/article/dog-breed-weight-chart/267; http://www.statista.com/statistics/188670/top-dry-dog-food-brands-in-the-united-states/; http://www.statista.com/statistics/197947/symphonyiri-tracked-dollar-sales-of-dog-food-in-the-us/; http://www.statista.com/statistics/254171/market-share-of-the-leading-dry-cat-food-brands-in-the-us/; https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/food-availability-per-capita-data-system/; http://www.census.gov/popest/data/state/totals/2015/; http://faostat.fao.org/.

Funding: This study was done without extramural or intramural funds besides those used for the normal salary of the author.

Competing interests: The author has declared that no competing interests exist.

IntroductionDietary choices have considerable impacts on environmental sustainability [1]. Compared to a plant-based diet, a meat-based diet requires more energy, land, and water and has greater environmental consequences in terms of erosion, pesticides, and waste. With over 7 billion human beings on the planet, increasing attention has been paid to the environmental effects of peoples' diets, with some predicting a 100''110% increase in demand for agricultural production by 2050, which could require ~ 1 billion hectares to be cleared globally for agriculture [2]. Meat consumption, already high in developed nations, is increasing in developing nations as the standard of living increases [1, 3''5]. In addition to requiring greater land compared to plant crops to produce equivalent protein energy, and contributing to soil erosion, animal production has considerably greater impacts on water use, fossil fuel use, greenhouse gas emission, fertilizer use, and pesticide use [2''7]. Despite the fact that more than 60% of US households have pets [8], these consumers of agricultural products are rarely included in calculations of the environmental impact of dietary choices.

Given the significant environmental impact of meat production, the contributions of our omnivorous and carnivorous pets deserve special attention. The US has the largest population of pet dogs and cats globally, with an estimated 77.8 million dogs and 85.6 million cats in 2015 [8]. The consequences of these animals on wildlife and water quality have been investigated, with studies showing considerable impacts on carbon usage [9, 10], water quality [11''14], disease [15''18] and wildlife [19''21]

Here, the contribution of dogs and cats to total US energy and meat consumption and the environmental impact of that meat consumption, including the production of feces, is considered. The goal of the study is to understand the scale of these animals' dietary needs in relation to those of Americans. The number of dog- and cat-owning households is increasing in the US [8], and at the same time there is an increasing trend in the ''humanization'' of pets and pet products [22, 23]. As a possible consequence, there is a trend toward increasing meat quantity and quality in pet foods, which results in further increases in consumption of animal products by pets. There is evidence that this trend may continue as younger people are more likely to purchase premium pet food that includes more desirable cuts of meat [24]. Globally, the increasing pet ownership in developing countries [25, 26] may serve to increase the potential environmental impacts of pet dogs and cats.

Methods and resultsTotal energy consumedEnergy consumption was calculated as: (1) where is the total energy consumed annually, is the per-capital annual consumption, and N is the number of individuals. was calculated separately for humans, dogs, and cats.

The Census Bureau estimates that the total population of the US was 321 million in 2015, with roughly equal proportions of men and women [27] (Table 1). The USDA Agricultural Research Service estimates that on average, US males (age 2+) consume 10,330 ± 91 kJ d-1 (2,469 ± 81 kcal d-1) and US females (age 2+) consume 7,607 ± 64 kJ d-1 (1,817 ± 15 kcal d-1). Therefore, the average daily energy consumption for both males and females is 8,966 ± 155 kJ d-1 (2,143 ± 37 kcal d-1) [28]. Using Eq 1, these estimates result in a total human energy intake of 1,051 ± 9 PJ y-1.

The American Pet Products Association (APPA) estimates that there were 77.8 million dog and 85.6 million cats owned as pets in the United States in 2015 (Table 1) [8]. Dogs' energy requirements are taken as ~544 kJ (kg BW)-0.75 d-1 [29]. Dogs' body weight (BW) varies greatly by breed. To estimate the average BW of dogs, the average weight of the American Kennel Club (AKC)'s list of the 10 most popular dog breeds in the US was used [30]. Average breed weights were taken either from the AKC or other sources [31]. This resulted in an average US dog BW of 22 kg. The standard deviation of the average breed weights represents the variability among breeds, rather than uncertainty in the average dog weight and is therefore inappropriate for the uncertainty analysis done here. To estimate the uncertainty in the average dog weight, data from Meyer et al. [32] were taken for 10 breeds of different sizes. For each breed, Meyer et al. [32] reports the mass and standard deviation of the samples (n = 4 to 9). The standard deviation was regressed against the mass (r2 = 0.87) and standard deviation at 22 kg was estimated as 1.2 kg. Therefore, the estimated average US dog BW that will be used hereafter is 22 ± 1.2 kg giving an average energy requirement of 5,594 ± 443 kJ d-1 (1337 ± 106 kcal d-1). Multiplied by the estimated number of owned dogs in the US (Eq 1), this results in an estimate of 159 ± 13 PJ y-1 consumed by dogs [29].

Cats require ~544 kJ (kg BW)-0.67 d-1 energy [29]. The body weight of cats varies less than that of dogs, so the average and standard deviation of cat weight in Bermingham et al. [33] (4.2 ± 0.2 kg) were used to represent average cat weight, resulting in a total cat energy requirement of 1,426 ± 79 kJ d-1 (341 ± 19 kcal d-1). Multiplied by the estimated number of owned cats in the US (Eq 1), this results in an estimate of 45 ± 2.5 PJ y-1 consumed.

The proportion of the dietary energy in the US consumed by dogs and cats was calculated as the sum of the energy consumed by dogs and cats (203 ± 15 PJ y-1) divided by human energy intake (1051 ± 9 PJ y-1), with the result that dogs and cats consume about 19.4 ± 1.6% of the energy that humans in America do (Table 1).

Energy from animal sourcesFor humans, the fraction of energy that is derived from animal sources, FA, can be calculated as: (2) where EA,C is the energy consumed by humans from animal sources (subscript A). EA,C can be calculated from data available from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) (Table 2): the total amount of red meat (including beef, veal, pork, and lamb), poultry (including chicken and turkey) and fish (including fish and shellfish) eaten by each Americans is 59.6 kg yr-1. Given the energy density of each food used by the USDA (Table 2), and with the conservative assumption that this meat provides the only animal-derived energy consumed by Americans, it is calculated that Americans consume 206 PJ yr-1 from animal sources, which constitutes 20% of their total energy intake.

For dogs and cats, direct data on consumption is not available and therefore FA cannot be calculated directly using Eq 2. Instead, new calculations must be made based on available data: ingredient lists for dog and cat foods and the composition of these ingredients in terms of substrates which have well-known energy densities (i.e., Atwater factors for protein, carbohydrate, and fat).

To do this, the ingredient lists for individual pet foods were used. Individual ingredients were considered in terms of the content of energy-providing substrates, protein, fat, and carbohydrate and non-energy providing components like water, ash, and fiber. Compositional data analysis is required for these calculations because the substrate components must sum to unity [34]. For a particular pet food, m, the center (analogous to the arithmetic mean) dry mass fraction of substrate k (protein, fat, carbohydrate, other), expressed as average grams of k per gram of m, was calculated as the closed geometric mean: (3) where is the mass fraction of substrate k in one of the first five ingredients, i, in a particular food (i.e., grams of k per gram of i). For these calculations, the category 'other' was included to provide closure [35], that is, so that the fractions of all categories would sum to unity. was estimated for each ingredient by equating it with a general ingredient category for which substrate content is available (Table 3) [29, 36].

Similarly, the average dry mass fraction of animal-derived substrate k for a particular food (i.e., average grams of animal-derived k per gram of m) was calculated as the closed geometric mean: (4) where is the mass fraction of animal-derived substrate k in one of the first five ingredients, i, in a particular food (Table 3 asterisks indicate animal-derived). For these calculations, the same approach was used in calculation of , except non-animal derived protein, fat, and carbohydrates were added to the 'other' category to maintain closure. and are (geometric) average mass fractions and therefore explicitly assume that the first five ingredients in a food are present in equal proportions and that they constitute nearly all of the mass of pet food m. This assumption is wrong, but conservative, as explained below. Uncertainty in was calculated as the variance across all m for each substrate k [35].

The fraction of energy derived from animal products in a food m (animal-derived joules per total joules) was calculated as: (5) where Ek is the energy density of the substrates (i.e., Atwater factors: Eprotein = Ecarbohydrate = 4J/g, EFat = 9 J/g [29]). Eother was set to zero in for both total and animal-derived calculations. In the former case, water, ash, and fiber, which provide no dietary energy, comprised the 'other' category. In the latter, 'other' contained water, ash, and fiber as well as non-animal derived protein, fat, and carbohydrates, on the logic that these do not provide animal-derived dietary energy. The total animal-derived energy was calculated as (6) which is the weighted average fraction of animal-derived energy in four categories: premium dog food (n = 102), market-leading dog food (n = 9), premium cat food (n = 163), and market-leading cat food (n = 9). is the annual total energy consumed by dogs and is the annual total energy consumed by cats (Table 1) Px,y is the proportion of dog or cat owners and (x = Dog and Cat, respectively) who prefer premium or market-leading foods (y = P and N, respectively). Likewise, Mx,y is the number of foods considered here in each category. More premium foods were used in these calculations because there is more diversity in this market sector. For dry dog food, nine foods from just five manufacturers constitute 48% of the market [37]. For dry cat food, nine foods from just four manufacturers constitute 49% of the market share [38].

Dry foods were used for these calculations. For both dogs and cats, dry food sales dominate wet food sales (billions of US dollars in sales for various foods in 2012: 8.7 (dry dog food) vs 2.3 (wet dog food) [39], and 3.6 (dry cat food) vs. 2.4 (wet cat food) [40], and thus are more representative of the foods fed to cats, and especially, dogs. The dominance of dry food as the preferred form is especially true when the price per serving is taken into account. One market-leading wet cat food costs approximately $0.83 per serving while a dry food by the same manufacturer costs approximately $0.23 per serving. Using the this per-serving price ratio, dry cat food outsells wet cat food on a per-serving basis by a factor of about 3 to 1. Furthermore, dry food typically has lower animal content (as determined by the list of ingredients in descending order of mass contribution) than wet food. Thus, use of dry food for these calculations provides a conservative estimate of the greatest proportion of dog and cat food sales in the U.S.

USDA labeling rules require that pet food ingredients be labeled in descending order of weight contribution, as they do with foods intended for humans. Calculations were made on the assumptions that 1) each of the first five ingredients contributes, by mass, equally to the mass of the pet food and 2) collectively, these first five ingredients make up nearly all of the mass of the pet food (that is, there are no other ingredients that contribute substantially to the mass of the food). With regard to the former, for marketing purposes, animal-derived ingredients typically appear in in the top couple of places in the ingredient list. This is particularly true of premium foods, where 100% of both dog and cat foods examined here had animal-derived products as the first ingredient (Table 4). For all types of dry food examined here (market-leading v. premium dog and cat foods), animal-derived ingredients appear among the first two ingredients more commonly than among the third and fourth ingredients (Table 4). Thus, the calculations made here over-weight the later ingredients, which are less likely to be animal-derived, compared to the earlier ingredients, which are more likely to be animal derived. Although there is no way to know, in proprietary recipes, the exact proportions of ingredient, by weighting the first five ingredients equally, a minimum overall estimate of animal-derived energy in dog and cat food is produced.

With regard to the second assumption, that the first five ingredients make up nearly all of the mass of the pet food, ingredients appearing past the first five in the ingredient list are often nutrients (e.g., tocopherol) added in trace quantities. If ingredients past the fifth are not trace, then given the requirement that ingredients be listed in decreasing mass contribution, the sixth ingredient must contribute less than 16% of the mass of the food. In the case of seven substantive ingredients, the maximum fraction of the mass in the 6th and 7th places is 29%. Among the premium brands that were examined, the proportion of animal-derived product decreased as they occurred later in ingredient lists with only 21% of the sixth ingredients in dry dog food being animal-derived. Thus, even in the extreme case, a maximum of 3''6% (21% of 16% = 3.5%; 21% of 29% = 6%) of the animal-derived content may be missing in the foods examined here. Although the methodology use here cannot give exact amounts of animal-derived content from foods, the potential maximum exclusion of 3''6% of animal-derived products is sufficient to draw important conclusions about the amount of animal-derived energy consumed by dogs and cats.

The APPA's annual pet-owners survey [8] provides data that can be used understand consumer preferences, thus providing information about ratio of premium vs. non-premium (market leading) foods consumed. Non-premium brands tend to have lower animal-derived content whereas premium brands tend to have higher animal-derived content. The premium brand category used here includes the 'premium' and 'gourmet' survey categories. For dogs of all sizes, the average percent of owners who usually feed these meat-rich dog foods is 38%. For cats, this number is 30% (Table 5).

The final market-wide estimates of the fraction of energy in dog and cat foods that is animal-derived are 34% ± 4% and 31% ± 4%, respectively (Table 5). In total, Eq 6 yields an estimate that animal-derived energy constitutes 33% ± 6% of the diets of dogs and cats in the US. This is significantly higher than the fraction of humans' dietary energy that is animal-derived (19%). Because dogs and cats consume, together, 203 ± 15 PJ/year, it is estimated that dogs and cats consume a minimum of 67 ± 17 PJ/year in animal-derived energy, which is 33% ± 9% of the animal-derived energy consumed by humans in the US or 25% ± 6% of the total.

An important caveat for the calculations of the relative consumption of pets and humans is that the sources of the data, and mode of calculation, are dramatically different. As a result, their ratios may be systematically biased. Nonetheless, the calculations of absolute amounts (e.g., PJ/yr) are informative, and the relative amounts still provide important insight into the magnitude of pets' consumption.

Plant-equivalent energy consumptionCalculating the dietary energy in animal-based diets compared to the equivalent plant energy required support animal production for those diets is an important way to contextualize different dietary choices (e.g., [41, 42]). Here, plant-equivalent energy calculations are used as a means to understand the scale of the impact of dogs' and cats' meat consumption in relation to the energy requirements of people. The plant-equivalent energy consumed by humans and animals can be calculated as: (7) where FCRE is the feed conversion ratio for meat on an energy (J/J) basis rather than the more common mass (g/g) basis. FCRE is calculated to be 4.7 joules of meat energy per joule of plant energy, which is the average of loss-adjusted FCRE for beef+lamb, pork, and poultry, weighted by their relative availability in American's diets [43]. Mass-basis feed conversion ratios are reported by Rosegrant et al. [44] as 7, 5, and 2 for beef, pork, and chicken. These values were divided by total proportional loss from primary weight to consumer weight [43] to adjust for processing and waste loss and converted to energy units using their average energy content from [43].

EPE for dogs and cats is calculated as 453 ± 105 PJ yr-1 compared to humans' 1810 ± 16 PJ yr-1, resulting in the conclusion that pets' share of the total plant-equivalent energy consumed by pets and humans is 20% ± 6%. Because these calculations involve a ratio with FCRE in both the numerator and the denominator, it is not very sensitive to the actual value of FCRE; within a realistic range of estimates for FCRE (2''10), the range of pets' total share of the plant-equivalent energy is 18%''22%. 139 ± 34 million people, eating 8900 kJ d-1 (2143 kcal d-1) could be supported by the plant-equivalent energy of US dogs and cats, whereas 553 ± 14 million people could be supported by the plant energy equivalent consumed by people in the US.

Feces productionI used data from Lampe et al. [45] to estimate the average fecal matter produced by people as 0.147 kg capita-1 d-1, wet weight. De-Oliveira et al. [46] estimate that cats produce 0.042 kg cat-1 d-1 of fecal matter. Meyer et al. [32] has produced estimates of the amount of fecal dry matter (FDM) and fecal water excretion (FEW) produced by different breeds of dogs with both dry and canned diets. These data were fit to separate power laws (dry: FDM = 46.2 BW-0.052, FWE = 2.57 BW0.059; canned: FDM = 34.5 BW-0.111, FWE = 4.69 BW0.110) and values for a dog of estimated mass 22 ± 1.2 kg (calculated above) were calculated. Results for dry and canned diets were averaged and total fecal matter production was calculated as 0.15 ± 0.07 kg dog-1 d-1. Therefore, the amount of fecal matter (wet weight) produced by dogs, cats, and people in the US is4.4 ± 1.8, 0.72 ± 0.03, and 17 ± 1.3 Tg yr-1, respectively. In total, US dogs and cats produce 5.1 ± 1.9 Tg yr-1 of feces, which is 30% ± 13% that produced by humans and 23% ± 12% of the total.

Assuming that Americans throw away about 2 kg d-1 as garbage [47], if all of the feces from US dogs and cats, not including kitty litter and bags, were disposed as garbage, their feces would be equivalent to the total garbage produced by 6.63 million Americans, or approximately the population of Massachusetts (population 6.64 million in 2015 [48]).

Relative environmental impactI followed Reijnders and Soret [6] in determining the environmental impact of dogs' and cats' land animal meat consumption. Reijnders and Soret [6] used life cycle analysis to determine the relative impact of producing meat protein compared to producing plant (soy) protein in several categories. In separate calculations for pets and humans, the impact of animal production compared to plant production was calculated as: (8) where Ij is the impact of animal production in category j (land use, water use, fossil fuels, phosphates, biocides) and Wj is the relative impact of meat protein production (Table 6). The non-animal product energy consumed (i.e., ) was given an implicit value of unity. The resulting values can be used to determine the relative impacts of pets' and people's diets in a way that accounts for varying energetic needs of pets and people.

With regard to land use, water, and fossil fuel, the environmental impact of animal production (compared to a plant-protein substitute) used to feed dogs and cats is 25''30% of that used to feed humans (Table 6). For phosphate and biocide use, this proportion is 26''27% ± 5%. An important caveat in these calculations is that the animal-derived energy used includes fish. The approach of Reijnders and Soret [6] is strictly for land animals, which have clear land use, water, fossil fuel, phosphate, and biocide impacts. There is no clear way to determine the amount of fish-derived energy as a proportion of total animal-derived energy in animal feed. However, if the number is similar to that in food consumed by people in the US (~1%, [28]), then the proportional calculations are approximately correct. An additional caveat in the interpretation of these calculations is that they do not differentiate between different sources of animal protein, which can have distinctly different environmental footprints. We used the range/uncertainty provided by Reijnders and Soret and Pimentel and Pimentel [6, 7] to provide reasonable bounds on these results. Without market-wide knowledge of recipe and sales data, much of which is proprietary, a more detailed calculation is not possible. However, this does not mean that these calculations are not valuable to provide an estimate of the scale of the contribution of dogs and cats to these environmental impacts.

Non-CO2 greenhouse gas productionEshel and Martin [41] calculated ~0.8 kg cap-1 yr-1 CO2-eq due to livestock-related non-CO2 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions (specifically methane and nitrous oxide) produced nationwide. Assuming the mean American diet (with inefficiencies) and multiplying by the population of the US yields an estimate of 260 million ton yr-1 CO2-eq methane and nitrous oxide produced in the course of livestock production in the US. The proportion of total animal-derived energy consumed by dogs and cats is 25% ± 6% and thus the pets' share of the livestock-related methane and nitrous oxide production is up to 64 ± 16 million tons CO2-eq GHG, although this number may be lower because, presumably, there is less waste in the production of dog and cat food.

DiscussionPeople love their pets [49]. They provide a host of real and perceived benefits to people including companionship [50], increased physical activity [51], improved mental health and social capital [52], benefits for child development [53], and social status [54]. Many dogs are also working dogs and have roles in assisting the disabled, contributing to military and civilian security, and in traditional roles on ranches and farms. Cats, too, have traditional roles in pest control in addition to their roles as pets. This analysis does not mean to imply that dog and cat ownership should be curtailed for environmental reasons, but neither should we view it as an unalloyed good. It is clear that a transition to pets that eat less meat, and therefore have less environmental impact, would reduce the overall US consumption of meat.

The results presented here indicate that exclusion of pets in calculations of food consumption can skew considerably estimates of the total energy actually consumed. As calculated, US dogs and cats consume as much dietary energy as ~62 million Americans, which is approximately one-fifth of the US population. Although there are fewer dogs and cats in the US than people, they derive more of their energy from animal-derived products (33% ± 6% vs. 19% for people). Thus, if pets' consumption was included in calculations, the US would be equivalent to a country of ~ 380 million in terms of raw dietary energy consumed and a country of about 690 million in terms of animal-derived energy consumed. Thus, it is clear, at least for countries with considerable populations of dogs and cats like the US, that the consumption by these animals should be considered when calculating national food consumption. Their smaller size, lower energetic needs, and primarily herbivorous biology means that small pets, like birds, rodents, and reptiles consume less animal-derived energy making them less important in these calculations.

It could be argued that dogs and cats eat meat that humans cannot consume and which is simply a byproduct of production for human use, and therefore should not be counted as consumption beyond that of humans. To some extent, this is certainly true; humans, for instance, do not generally consume bone meal, a common ingredient. But other ingredients in pet food that are byproducts of human meat production are certainly edible after processing. The argument that dogs' and cats' environmental and energetic impacts are obviated by the fact that they eat byproducts from the human food system, and that otherwise the material would go to waste, relies on the assumption that these same byproducts could not be made to be suitable for human consumption after suitable processing. And much pet food probably is already edible and serves as a potential source of protein as a food of last resort; there are reports, both official and unofficial, of impoverished Americans eating pet food as a necessary supplement to their diet [55''57, 58, 59]. At any rate, the trend toward premium pet food with more animal products that Americans would recognize as edible indicates that pets are eating animal products that could also be eaten by humans and that there is direct competition with the human food system for ingredients in some of these products [10].

The proprietary nature of and incredible variety in pet food recipes makes a detailed calculation impossible, but for the sake of argument, if just one-quarter of the estimated 33% animal-derived energy in pet food was consumable by humans, it alone would support the animal-derived energy consumption of 26 million Americans (with 19% of their energy in derived from animal products). This same energy is equal to the entire energy requirement of almost 5 million Americans, or approximately the population of Colorado [48]. If animal-derived energy was converted to its plant equivalent, one-quarter of the animal-derived energy in US dogs' and cats' food would support ~35 million humans. If even only 5% of the animal-derived energy in pet food could be eaten by humans, this would be equivalent to the animal-product consumption of more than 5 million Americans, and the total energy consumption of 1 million Americans, or about the population of Montana [25, 26, 48].

Additional research is needed to evaluate the animal content and human-edibility of ingredients in dog and cat food after processing, but the calculations presented here indicate that these pets comprise a significant proportion of US energy and animal-derived product consumption, with the consequent environmental impacts, including greenhouse gas emission and feces production. Inasmuch as increasing animal production is a threat to the sustainability of the global food system [1, 2], the non-negligible contribution of dogs and cats compounds the problem and exacerbates the threat to sustainability posed by our dietary choices. This is particularly true given increasing pet ownership in some developing countries, and trends in "humanization" of pet food [22, 23] which competes directly with the human food system [10]. Reducing the rate of dog and cat ownership, perhaps in favor of other, less energy-intensive, pets that offer similar health, social, and emotional benefits, would considerably reduce America's overall livestock-related environmental impacts. Both small (e.g., birds, hamsters) and large (e.g., horses) have been shown to be associated with important benefits, including friendship, verbal interaction, companionship [60, 61], promoting self-care [62, 63], and increased empathy [64]. For children, both small and large pets provide friendship, love, and fun as well as opportunities to learn responsibility and deal with pet mortality and mourning [65, 66]. For children with illnesses, small pets have been shown to improve their attitude and help them keep their minds off their disease [67].

It is not just what we feed pets, but how we feed them that contributes to the environmental impacts of our pets, and obesity is a major problem among domestic animals [68, 69]. The pet food industry has also started to confront the issue of the sustainability of feeding pets through advances in product design, manufacturing, education, and policy in order to reduce overfeeding and waste, encourage recycling, and find alternative sources of protein [10]. Simple measures like feeding domestic dogs and cats nutritionally appropriate amounts will certainly reduce their environmental and energetic impact. However, without large-scale reduction in their number and changes to the food system that drastically reduces the per-capita animal product consumption, the environmental and energetic impact of these animals will remain significant.

AcknowledgmentsThe author would like to thank several experts on pet nutrition and four anonymous reviewers whose input significantly improved this study.

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Sun, 28 Oct 2018 23:41

A strong move against U.S. billionaire George Soros, Israel's foreign ministry has issued a statement denouncing Mr. Soros. It appears meant to align Israel more closely with Hungary prior to a visit to Budapest by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu next week.

Soros has spent a large part of his wealth funding far left groups masking themselves as pro-democracy and human rights groups in efforts to undermine legal migration.

But Hungary's popular nationalist government are not fans of the billionaire Soros. The latest, a campaign backed by Prime Minister Viktor Orban in which Soros is singled out as an enemy of the state.

''Let's not allow Soros to have the last laugh'' billboards show a picture of the 86-year-old financier though some have accused it of being anti-Semitic. However, as Mr. Soros himself worked for the Nazi's taking property from his fellow Jews as a young man it is unclear why.

The Israeli ambassador to Hungary in a statement said it ''evokes sad memories but also sows hatred and fear''.

Hours later Israel's foreign ministry released a statement clarifying that Soros was a legitimate target for criticism.

The statement reads:

''In no way was the statement (by the ambassador) meant to delegitimise criticism of George Soros, who continuously undermines Israel's democratically elected governments''.

Foreign ministry spokesman Emmanuel Nahshon further added that Soros funded organisations ''that defame the Jewish state and seek to deny it the right to defend itself''.

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 11:50

George Soros at a meeting of American business leaders at the Blair House in Washington, D.C., May 20, 2015. (Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

AMSTERDAM (JTA) '-- Holland's main public broadcaster referred to George Soros as ''The Jew Soros [who] supports organizations openly critical of governments and has tentacles'' in American politics.

The assertion was removed from an online article following an outcry on social media.

The text, which critics said is reminiscent of 1930s propaganda, was deleted from an online article published Tuesday by the NOS broadcaster about an explosive device that was found near the suburban New York home of Soros, a Hungary-born liberal billionaire who is the target of many anti-Semitic conspiracy theories on the far right and far left. It was found in the home's mailbox; Soros was not home at the time.

Yoeri Albrecht, the director of the De Balie events venue, which hosts prestigious political debates and events, wrote on Twitter: ''Has NOS hired someone from Der Sturmer?'' '' a reference to the pro-Nazi German weekly whose trademark was vicious and dehumanizing anti-Semitic propaganda.

''How dare a Jew criticize government like that,'' Albrecht added sarcastically.

Ronny Naftaniel, the executive vice chair of CEJI, a Brussels-based Jewish organization promoting tolerance through education, wrote: ''The words 'the Jew Soros' combined with 'tentacles' are wholly anti-Semitic. This defies belief.''

NOS reacted to the criticism on Twitter, saying that ''An earlier version of this article about George Soros contained unfortunate formulations.''

In a statement, NOS called the language it used to describe Soros ''careless and incorrect.'' Editor-in-chief Marcel Gelauff told the NRC daily that it was ''absurd'' and ''wrong,'' and that it was meant to show how Soros' critics ''frame'' him.

Last year, NOS apologized for its coverage of soccer fans from one Dutch soccer team who chanted about slaughtering Jews. The report should have mentioned that fans of other teams also use anti-Semitic chants, NOS said. According to many Jewish critics of NOS, it has an anti-Israel bias '-- a claim the broadcaster categorically denies.

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 11:42

Op 21 oktober 2018 publiceerde de NOS op deze plek op nos.nl een artikel over de kritiek op George Soros. De bedoeling van dat artikel was om te beschrijven welke controverse over hem bestaat. Daartoe werd onder meer een aantal beweringen van tegenstanders van Soros aangehaald.

Op dat artikel kwam vrijwel onmiddellijk veel kritiek, zowel binnen de redactie van NOS Nieuws als vanuit allerlei geledingen van de samenleving. Dat leidde snel tot een aanpassing in het artikel (deze aanpassing werd in een voetnoot bij het artikel en in onze Herstelrubriek op nos.nl weergegeven. Onderaan deze verklaring is deze voetnoot toegevoegd).

We hebben de afgelopen dagen intern veel gesprekken gevoerd over met name de vraag hoe dit artikel tot stand is gekomen en wat we daarvan kunnen leren. Dat betreft met name de interne werkwijze en met welke journalistieke scherpte en alertheid het bewuste artikel is gemaakt.

Alles overziend heb ik samen met mijn collega's in de hoofdredactie nu besloten dit artikel terug te trekken. Zeker, voor ons besluit hebben we de tijd genomen, maar het is nogal een besluit. Ook omdat het ons beleid is dat wij geen online-publicaties terugtrekken, want het verwijderen van artikelen kan tot terechte vragen en opmerkingen leiden over transparantie. We herschrijven ons archief niet. Dat is voor ons een belangrijk uitgangspunt.

Maar in dit geval handelen we toch anders. Doordat we pijnlijke en kwetsende bewoordingen hadden overgenomen, er onvoldoende aan journalistieke bronvermelding is gedaan en het artikel feitelijke onjuistheden bevatte, voldeed het niet aan onze normen. Terugkijkend concluderen we ook dat we sneller en uitgesprokener afstand hadden moeten nemen van het artikel en dat eerder inzichtelijk hadden moeten maken.

Marcel Gelauff

Hoofdredacteur NOS Nieuws

Noot van de redactie:

We hebben dit artikel na publicatie aangepast. De oorspronkelijke kop was: "George Soros: invloedrijke bemoeial met tentakels ver in de wereldpolitiek". Deze kop was onzorgvuldig en onjuist geformuleerd en is veranderd in "George Soros: 'staatsman zonder staat' met flinke vinger in de pap". Ook elders is het artikel aangepast.

Met name de alinea waarin oa de omschrijving "De jood Soros steunt organisaties" voorkwam had anders geformuleerd moeten worden. De bedoeling was samen te vatten hoe critici van Soros hem omschrijven en framen, maar door de gekozen formulering leek het alsof de redactie deze formuleringen zelf passend vond. Dat was uiteraard niet het geval.

Hoofdredacteur NOS Nieuws Marcel Gelauff ging op woensdag 24 oktober 2018 op NPO Radio 1 nader in op het artikel. Luister hier het hele gesprek op NPO Radio 1 terug

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Thu, 01 Nov 2018 14:26

Cockburn Liberalism

Bloomberg once estimated the wealth of Beto's father-in-law at $20 billion. But obviously that's not worth mentioning when you profile him Young Beto O'Rourke casts himself as the 'anti-Trump'. But his father-in-law, it turns out, is a billionaire property developer with a contentious relationship with non-white residents '-- not unlike the President. Beto's more the proto-Jared Kushner.

The New York Times today revealed the highly interesting news that friend-of-the-little-guy Beto married well. Very well. His wife is not only the daughter of William D. Sanders, aka the Warren Buffet of real estate, Cockburn can reveal she is the only daughter. Sanders's portfolio is valued at about $20 billion.

Nothing wrong with that, of course, but something is amiss when an endless stream of laudatory profiles fails to mention it. 'Stop the Press Before It Profiles Beto O'Rourke Again,' came the muffled cry of Politico's Jack Shafer a couple of weeks ago, from beneath a deluge of glowing cuttings about the Texas congressman. Having a profile of the boyishly handsome skateboarder standing against Sen. Ted Cruz is as key an ingredient to a left-leaning media site as an Instagram page or a round of cuts when your staff try to unionise.

A Yahoo profile of O'Rourke described how he 'married Amy Sanders, a charter school administrator,' and served on the City Council 'championing downtown redevelopment.' But the reporter didn't bother to look into who Sanders's father was.

Neither did this Guardian piece.

Or this Washington Post one.

Nor this one in Vanity Fair.

TIME magazine were agog as the congressman cooed, 'I just want to be as raw and direct and real as I can '-- and it seems to be working.'

And GQ were content to focus on other members of his family. 'O'Rourke ascended the stage with his daughter, Molly, riding piggyback. She and her mom, Amy, also dressed in a Diablito uniform, stood by O'Rourke as he presented Daniel with a cake and led a chorus of ''Happy Birthday.''' Cute stuff '-- but we'd rather hear about their property magnate grandfather if it's all the same.

We could go on. Even the paper who broke the scoop couldn't be bothered to do any digging when they went on the trail with Beto in February. A New York Times reporter watched O'Rourke speak to a crowd in El Paso. He 'appealed to their anger at Washington. The ''system is rigged,'' he said, adding, ''I can tell you that access is purchased, that votes are bought and paid for, that outcomes are determined before you have a chance to call your member of Congress or senator.'''

Worrying stuff indeed, Beto.

Per today's Times, 'Over the next two years, Mr. O'Rourke would defend the plan before angry barrio residents and vote to advance it. At other times, he would abstain. Business owners who opposed the plan accused Mr O'Rourke of a conflict, citing the involvement of his father-in-law, the billionaire developer William D. Sanders.'

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Tue, 30 Oct 2018 21:07

The special counsel says a woman was offered money to fabricate sexual-harassment claims.

Natasha Bertrand 1:14 PM ET Molly Riley / ReutersUpdated on October 30 at 4:15 p.m.

A company that appears to be run by a pro-Trump conspiracy theorist offered to pay women to fabricate stories about special counsel Robert Mueller in the days leading up the midterm elections'--and the special counsel's office has referred the plot to the FBI for further investigation. ''When we learned last week of allegations that women were offered money to make false claims about the Special Counsel, we immediately referred the matter to the FBI for investigation,'' the spokesman, Peter Carr, told me in an email on Tuesday.

The special counsel's office's attention to this scheme and its decision to release a rare statement about it indicates the seriousness with which the office is taking the purported plot to discredit Mueller in the middle of an ongoing investigation. Carr confirmed that the scheme was brought to its attention by several journalists who were told about it by a woman who identified herself as Lorraine Parsons. Another woman, Jennifer Taub, contacted Mueller's office earlier this month with similar information.

Read: The partisan, nihilist case against Robert Mueller

The woman identifying herself as Parsons told journalists in an email, a copy of which I obtained, that she had been offered roughly $20,000 by a man claiming to work for a firm called Surefire Intelligence'--which was in turn hired by GOP activist named Jack Burkman'--''to make accusations of sexual misconduct and workplace harassment against Robert Mueller.'' Parsons wrote in her letter that she had worked for Mueller as a paralegal at the Pillsbury, Madison, and Sutro law firm in 1974, but that she ''didn't see'' him much. ''When I did see him, he was always very polite to me, and was never inappropriate,'' she said. The law firm told me on late Tuesday afternoon, however, that it has ''no record of this individual working for our firm.''

Parsons explained that she was contacted by a man ''with a British accent'' who wanted to ask her ''a couple questions about Robert Mueller, whom I worked with when I was a paralegal for Pillsbury, Madison, and Sutro in 1974. I asked him who he was working for, and he told me his boss was some sort of politics guy in Washington named Jack Burkman. I reluctantly told [him] that I had only worked with Mr. Mueller for a short period of time, before leaving that firm to have my first son.''

She continued: ''In more of an effort to get him to go away than anything else, I asked him what in the hell he wanted me to do. He said that we could not talk about it on the phone, and he asked me to download an app on my phone called Signal, which he said was more secure. Reluctantly, I downloaded the app and he called me on that app a few minutes later. He said (and I will never forget exactly what it was) 'I want you to make accusations of sexual misconduct and workplace harassment against Robert Mueller, and I want you to sign a sworn affidavit to that effect.''' The man ''offered to pay off all of my credit card debt, plus bring me a check for $20,000 if I would do'' it, she wrote. ''He knew exactly how much credit card debt I had, right down to the dollar, which sort of freaked me out.''

Surefire Intelligence describes itself as ''a private intel agency that designs and executes bespoke solutions for businesses and individuals who face complex business and litigation challenges.'' Surefire's domain records list an email for another pro-Trump conspiracy theorist, Jacob Wohl, who began hyping a ''scandalous'' Mueller story on Tuesday morning. Wohl told The Daily Beast that Burkman had hired Surefire to assist with his investigation into Mueller's past, but denied knowing anything about the firm's involvement in an alleged plot to fabricate allegations against Mueller when asked why his email address appeared in the domain records. He did not respond when asked by NBC why a number listed on Surefire's website referred callers to another number that is listed in public records as belonging to Wohl's mother.

Conor Friedersdorf: The bad faith of a right-wing sting operation

Parsons was not willing to speak to the reporters by phone, according to Scott Stedman, one of the reporters who received the letter. So portions of her story have gone uncorroborated, and her identity has not been independently confirmed. But she is not the only woman who says she received an inquiry from someone claiming to be investigating Mueller's past for Surefire Intelligence.

Jennifer Taub, an associate professor at Vermont Law School, received an email from a man using a Surefire Intelligence email address around the same time, on October 22. "It's my understanding that you may have had some past encounters with Robert Mueller,'' he told Taub, according to the email she forwarded me on Tuesday afternoon. ''I would like to discuss those encounters with you.'' (Taub told me she has never had any encounters with Mueller, though she does appear on CNN at times as an expert commentator.)

''I believe a basic telephone call, for which I would compensate you at whatever rate you see fit (inside reason), would be a good place to start,'' the man continued. ''My organization is conducting an examination of Robert Mueller's past. Tell me a decent method to contact you by telephone (or Signal, which would be ideal) and a beginning rate to talk with you about all encounters you've had with Special Counsel Mueller. We would likewise pay you for any references that you may have. Lastly, I would appreciate your discretion here, as this is a very sensitive matter." Taub told me she forwarded the email to the special counsel's office, noting that she did not plan to respond.

Around the time that Taub and Parsons say they began receiving these communications from Surefire, Jack Burkman released a video on his Facebook page claiming, without evidence, that Mueller ''has a whole lifetime history of harassing women.'' On Tuesday, the day the special counsel's office revealed that it had referred the woman's claims to the FBI, Burkman tweeted a similar allegation.

In an emailed statement, Burkman denied knowing Parsons and called the FBI referral ''a joke, mueller wants to deflect attention from his sex assault troubles by attacking me.'' He added in a separate email that ''on Thursday 1200 NOON ROSSYLN HOLIDAY INN we will present a very credible witness who will allege that Mr. Mueller committed against her a sexual assault.'' Mueller's spokesman reiterated that the claims are false.

Emily Yoffe: Does anyone still take both sexual assault and due process seriously?

Burkman, a conservative radio host, is known for spreading conspiracy theories. He launched his own private investigation into the murder of the DNC staffer Seth Rich, dangled uncorroborated claims of sexual harassment against a sitting member of Congress, and earlier this year offered $25,000 to FBI whistle-blowers for any information exposing wrongdoing during the 2016 election. He also promoted legislation that he authored'--despite not being a member of Congress'--that would ban gays from playing in the National Football League, and has hosted two fundraisers for Rick Gates'--the former Trump campaign official who was indicted by Mueller late last year.

We want to hear what you think about this article. Submit a letter to the editor or write to letters@theatlantic.com.

Natasha Bertrand is a staff writer at

The Atlantic where she covers national security and the intelligence community.

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Tue, 30 Oct 2018 21:02

Some sad news. On Thursday, November 1, at the RosslynHoliday Inn at noon, we will reveal the first of Special Counsel RobertMueller's sex assault victims. I applaud the courage and dignity andgrace and strength of my client. pic.twitter.com/wZVQeHD45r

'-- Jack Burkman (@Jack_Burkman) October 30, 2018

Mueller accuses opponents of offering women money to make 'false claims' about him'...

Special counsel Robert Mueller has referred to the FBI allegations that women were ''offered money'' to make ''false claims'' about him, a spokesman said Tuesday.

Jack Burkman, a conservative commentator who claims to be a registered lobbyist, said in a tweet today that ''we will reveal the first of Special Counsel Robert Mueller's sex assault victims'' on Thursday.

Burkman has frequently called on President Donald Trump to fire Mueller, along with Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who oversees the special counsel, and Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who had recused himself from interfering in the probe. He even offered a $25,000 reward to any whistleblower who could offer concrete evidence of FBI wrongdoing in those investigations, The Washington Times reported in February.

The special counsel's office confirmed to CNBC that it learned about the ''scheme'' from journalists who had been approached by a woman alleging that she had been offered $20,000 by Burkman ''to make accusations of sexual misconduct and workplace harassment against Robert Mueller.''

The woman told journalists that she had worked for Mueller as a paralegal at the Pillsbury, Madison, and Sutro law firm in 1974.

Burkman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In a Facebook video also posted Tuesday, Burkman claimed ''we will unveil the first of the sex assault victims of Robert Mueller.'' In the video, Burkman said the ''first'' alleged accuser is ''coming out this Thursday at high noon.''

He added: ''Robert Mueller is a bad guy not just because of what he does inside the courtroom, but because of what he does outside the courtroom.''

The woman was not willing to speak to the reporters by phone, according to Scott Stedman, one of the reporters who received the letter. So portions of her story have gone uncorroborated.

Around the time that the journalists began receiving the email, Burkman released a video on his Facebook page claiming, without evidence, that Mueller ''has a whole lifetime history of harassing women.'' On Tuesday, the day the special counsel revealed that it had referred the woman's claims to the FBI, Burkman tweeted a similar allegation.

In an emailed statement, Burkman denied knowing the woman who originally alerted journalists to the alleged scheme and called the FBI referral ''a joke, Mueller wants to deflect attention from his sex assault troubles by attacking me.''

He added in a separate email that ''on Thursday 1200 NOON ROSSYLN HOLIDAY INN we will present a very credible witness who will allege that Mr. Mueller committed against her a sexual assault.''

Mueller's spokesman reiterated that the claims are false.

SOURCE: The Atlantic

Here's the facebook video from Burkman'...

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Archived Version

Tue, 30 Oct 2018 18:50

Images by Photo Services

James (Whitey) Bulger, the South Boston mobster and F.B.I. informer who was captured after 16 years on the run and finally brought to justice in 2013 for a murderous reign of terror that inspired books, films and a saga of Irish brotherhood and brutality, was found dead on Tuesday in a West Virginia prison. He was 89.

Mr. Bulger, who had been serving two life sentences for 11 murders, was found unresponsive at 8:20 Tuesday morning, according to a statement from the federal Bureau of Prisons. It said that life-saving measures were initiated but that he was pronounced dead by the Preston County Medical Examiner.

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The statement did not indicate a cause of death, but it said that no one else was injured and that an investigation was underway.

Mr. Bulger in an undated photo provided to the court as evidence by his defense team on July 31, 2013, and released to the news media by the United States attorney's office in Massachusetts.

(C) Reuters

Mr. Bulger had just been moved to the penitentiary, in Hazelton, the latest in a series of prison transfers. He had earlier been incarcerated in Tucson, Oklahoma City and, most recently, Florida, prison officials have said, without explaining the reasons for the moves.

To the families of those he executed gangland-style and to a neighborhood held in thrall long after he vanished, in 1994, Mr. Bulger's arrest in Santa Monica, Calif., in 2011 and his conviction and life sentence for gruesome crime brought a final reckoning of sorts, and an end to the career of one of America's most notorious underworld figures, the heir to a nation's fascinations with Dillinger, Capone and Gotti.

In an all-but-lost era before glassy condos and a showcase harbor replaced mean streets and a decrepit waterfront of South Boston, Mr. Bulger dominated the rackets and folklore in that Irish-American working-class enclave. Tales of his exploits were learned from childhood there: how he shot men between the eyes, stabbed rivals in the heart with ice picks, strangled women who might betray him and buried victims in secret graveyards after yanking their teeth to thwart identification.

Enriching the Bulger (pronounced BULGE-are) legend, his brother William became president of the Massachusetts State Senate and president of the University of Massachusetts. William Bulger always denied firsthand knowledge of his brother's crimes and whereabouts, but said he loved him and could never give him up to the law.

For years before details of Whitey Bulger's criminal history became known in trials, books, newspapers and Congressional hearings, popular myths in South Boston portrayed him as an Irish Robin Hood, giving out turkeys on Thanksgiving and protecting his own from the hated police and outsiders.

His code of the streets was touted: never sell angel dust to children or heroin in the neighborhood, trust only the Irish, lie to women but never to a friend or partner, and above all never squeal to the authorities. He was an inspiration for Jack Nicholson's Irish mob boss in Martin Scorsese's 2006 film ''The Departed,'' set in Boston.

But such romantic notions were shattered by disclosures that for some 15 years he had been a federal informer and that the authorities had turned a blind eye to his crimes in exchange for his snitches on the Mafia.

Beyond corrupting agents with bribes, the government said, the arrangement helped him conceal 19 murders, learn the identities of witnesses who later turned up dead, and send an innocent man to prison for a killing that Mr. Bulger had committed. It also led to a sweeping re-evaluation of rules for dealing with informers.

In December 1994, after decades of extortion, bookmaking, loan-sharking, gambling, truck-hijacking, drug dealing and strong-arm tactics '-- much of it carried out as the authorities looked the other way '-- Mr. Bulger vanished just as federal officials were about to unseal an indictment and arrest him on racketeering charges. It later came out that he had been tipped off by the agent who had been his undercover handler for years.

Mr. Bulger and his companion, Catherine Greig, who joined him after he fled, proved extraordinarily elusive, despite intensive international searches. Sightings were reported in Europe, Canada, Mexico and elsewhere in the United States, but no traces were found. Years passed. For a decade, Mr. Bulger was on the F.B.I.'s Most Wanted list, along with Osama bin Laden. A $2 million reward was the largest ever offered for a domestic fugitive.

A Life on the Run

Mr. Bulger's elusiveness was not coincidental. Kevin Weeks, a former mob associate who wrote a memoir, ''Brutal: The Untold Story of My Life Inside Whitey Bulger's Irish Mob'' (2006, with Phillis Karas), said that Mr. Bulger, in 1993 and 1994, prepared for life on the run by taking safe deposit boxes in Montreal, London, Dublin, Venice and American cities to hide cash, jewelry and identity papers, passports and credit cards in several false names. (After being convicted on racketeering charges and imprisoned in 1999, Mr. Weeks became a cooperating witness against Mr. Bulger.)

After plastic surgery to change their appearances, Mr. Bulger and Ms. Greig settled in Santa Monica, in a small apartment a few blocks from the Pacific, in 1996. They called themselves Charlie and Carol Gasko and lived reclusively, paying $1,145 rent in cash. He spent his days watching television. She took walks, went to a beauty parlor and '-- a former dental technician '-- had her teeth cleaned monthly. They took occasional trips, but mostly stayed home. They were fugitives for so long, they had AARP cards.

Embarrassed by its dealings with Mr. Bulger as an informer and frustrated by his invisibility, the F.B.I. in 2011 began a national advertising campaign that focused not on him but on Ms. Greig's idiosyncrasies. Her beauty parlor and teeth-cleaning visits were featured in 350 public service announcements in 14 cities on daytime TV shows favored by older women. They noted the reward for her had doubled to $100,000.

Acting on a tip, agents closed in and arrested the couple on June 22. They offered no resistance. The Bulger white-blond hair had been dyed black and was receding. He was 81 and had a paunch. But the angular narrow face, the jutting chin and the clever eyes behind sunglasses were unmistakable. Inside the apartment walls, agents found $822,000 in cash, false identity papers and a score of handguns and rifles.

''I never thought I'd see this day,'' Patricia Donahue, whose husband Michael Donohue was killed in a 1982 shooting attributed to Mr. Bulger, said after the fugitives were captured. ''I have satisfaction and despair, because it brings back so many old memories. But satisfaction that they have him.''

James Joseph Bulger Jr. was born on Sept. 3, 1929, in Dorchester, Mass., one of six children of James and Jane McCarthy Bulger. His father, a laborer, lost an arm in an industrial accident. The boy grew up in a public-housing project in clannish South Boston, known as Southie, an isolated community of 30,000, mostly Irish-Americans, across a narrow waterway from downtown Boston. He preferred the streets to school, where his brothers William and John excelled.

A troublemaker from an early age, Whitey ran with a gang, stole cars, mugged people and was sent to reform school. He joined the Air Force at 20, but was discharged after going A.W.O.L. He robbed banks in Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Indiana and served nine years in federal prisons. Back in South Boston, he became an enforcer for an Irish mob. In 1979, he and an associate, Stephen Flemmi, took over the infamous Winter Hill Gang, which had dominated crime there for years.

By then, both were F.B.I. informers. The dates and circumstances of their recruitments are in dispute, but the target was the Patriarca family, which controlled organized crime in New England. John Connolly, an F.B.I. agent who had been a childhood friend of Mr. Bulger's, became his handler.

The arrangement helped end the Patriarca reign, but the price was high. In 1998, Chief Judge Mark Wolf of Massachusetts federal court concluded that the F.B.I. had protected both informants, even from other federal and state police agencies, as they committed murders and other heinous crimes. Mr. Flemmi and Mr. Connolly were both convicted of involvement in murders and given long prison terms.

While he apparently never married, Mr. Bulger had a long relationship with a Quincy waitress and another with Theresa Stanley, who had several children from a previous relationship. Ms. Stanley fled with Mr. Bulger when he disappeared in 1994, but within weeks returned to her children. Mr. Bulger was then joined by Ms. Greig, who spent the fugitive years with him.

Facing Justice, Finally

After their capture, Mr. Bulger and Ms. Greig were returned to Boston to face trials. Ms. Greig was charged with harboring a fugitive and, as part of a 2012 plea agreement in federal court in Boston, was sentenced to eight years in prison and a $150,000 fine. She was later sentenced to an additional 21 months in prison for refusing, even with a grant of immunity from prosecution, to testify before a grand jury investigating whether other people had helped Mr. Bulger while he was a fugitive.

Mr. Bulger was charged with complicity in 19 murders, racketeering, extortion, money laundering and other crimes. A parade of former associates testified against him in a two-month trial, telling of killings of rival hoodlums and others who had been identified by the F.B.I. as informers. Witnesses told of guns in victims' faces and crotches, of shakedowns and demands for cash for the privilege of doing business on Bulger turf.

Mr. Bulger, who exchanged obscenities with some of his accusers, did not take the stand. His lawyers, J. W. Carney Jr. and Hank Brennan, described a culture of official corruption, with agents taking bribes and alerting criminals in advance to wiretaps and pending indictments, but offered little evidence that Mr. Bulger could not have committed the crimes.

In August 2013, the jury convicted him of 31 of 32 counts, including participation in 11 murders, although it said that the prosecution had not proved his involvement in seven others. The jury did not reach a verdict in the death of one of two slain women.

''It's good to be over,'' June Barry, 79, a lifelong South Boston resident who used to joke with friends about Mr. Bulger's grip on the neighborhood, said after the verdicts. ''I'm glad they got him, and they got him alive. He has to pay for it now.''

On Nov. 14, Federal Judge Denise J. Casper sentenced Mr. Bulger to two life terms plus five years. She also ordered him to pay $19.5 million in restitution to his victims' families and to forfeit $25.2 million to the government, although it was unclear if any of the millions he stole would be retrievable.

''The testimony of human suffering that you and your associates inflicted on others was at times agonizing to hear and painful to watch,'' the judge said into the stillness of a courtroom filled with sobbing relatives of the killer's victims. ''The scope, the callousness, the depravity of your crimes are almost unfathomable.''

In 2016, a three-judge federal appellate court in Boston denied Mr. Bulger's appeal for a new trial. The panel said he had not shown that his right to a fair trial was violated when a judge barred him from testifying about his claim that he had been granted immunity for his crimes by a federal prosecutor who died in 2009. Mr. Bulger offered no evidence to support the claim at his trial. Prosecutors noted that Mr. Bulger had not been barred from taking the witness stand in his own defense, only from testifying about his unsupported claim of having been granted immunity by an official who had been dead for years.

Video by Associated Press

Screen Treatments

After his incarceration, the story of Mr. Bulger continued to generate publicity, as well as books, a documentary and a movie. In an effort to raise money for his victims, the government sold at auction more than 100 bins of items confiscated from him '-- furniture, kitchen utensils, sunglasses, sneakers, T-shirts, hoodies and jewelry, including an outsize gold and diamond ring. The proceeds, plus the $822,000 in cash found in his hide-out walls, were divided among the families and estates of more than a score of murder and extortion victims.

In 2014, a Joe Berlinger documentary, ''Whitey: The United States of America v. James J. Bulger,'' examined his trial and crimes in interviews with prosecution and defense teams and victims' family members. A. O. Scott, in a review for The New York Times, said the family accounts dispelled any ''nostalgic or romantic notions about the old Boston underworld.''

In 2015, the Scott Cooper movie ''Black Mass,'' starring Johnny Depp as Mr. Bulger, was based on a 2000 book of the same name by Dick Lehr and Gerard O'Neill, Boston Globe journalists who followed the Bulger story for years. The Times's reviewer, Mr. Scott, called the film ''a muddle of secondhand attitudes and half-baked ideas,'' but added: ''It's possible to think of the shortcomings of 'Black Mass' as fitting comeuppance for Mr. Bulger. He may have thought he was a big deal, but in the end all he merits is a minor gangster movie.''

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Archived Version

Wed, 31 Oct 2018 04:29

Mueller-Connected Boston Mobster Whitey Bulger Killed in Prison'... As He Was About to Out FBI Officials by Cristina Laila October 30, 2018

Legendary Boston mobster Whitey Bulger was killed in prison overnight on Tuesday.89-year-old Boston mob boss James 'Whitey' Bulger was killed in prison by a 'fellow inmate with mafia ties' shortly after he was transferred to a West Virginia federal prison.

Bulger was reportedly wheeled away from security cameras and beaten with a lock in a sock and also had his eyes gouged out.

Sources told The Daily Mail that Whitey Bulger was about to out people in the FBI, specifically FBI officials of the informant program.

Via The Daily Mail:

Boston gangster James 'Whitey' Bulger Jr. has been killed behind bars shortly after he was transferred to a federal prison in West Virginia. He was 89.

Bulger was found dead overnight on Tuesday at USP Hazelton, a high-security prison with an adjacent minimum security satellite camp in Bruceton Mills.

It emerged in Bulger's 2013 trial that he had served as an FBI informant as far back as 1975, though he always denied the claim.

Law enforcement sources tell DailyMail.com that Whitey had been talking about outing people in the FBI '' people in the top echelon of the informant program.

The sources said he hadn't even been processed at the West Virginia facility when he was killed. But someone who knew he was being transferred put the word out '' the killer had to know he was coming.

The Whitey Bulger-Robert Mueller connection:MUELLER'S MINIONS HELPED MOBSTER WHITEY BULGER ELIMINATE MOB COMPETITORS, says Congressman Louie Gohmert

In May, Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX) published a 48-page report called ''Robert Mueller Unmasked'' to expose the Special Counsel's decades of corruption.

In the extensive report, Gohmert covered Mueller's shady past of helping mobster Whitey Bulger by eliminating mob competitors.

The Boston Globe noted Robert Mueller's connection with the Whitey Bulger case in an article entitled, ''One Lingering Question for FBI Director Robert Mueller.'' The Globe said this:

''[Mike] Albano [former Parole Board Member who was threatened by two F.B.I. agents for considering parole for the men imprisoned for a crime they did not commit] was appalled that, later that same year, Mueller was appointed FBI director, because it was Mueller, first as an assistant US attorney then as the acting U.S. attorney in Boston, who wrote letters to the parole and pardons board throughout the 1980s opposing clemency for the four men framed by FBI lies. Of course, Mueller was also in that position while Whitey Bulger was helping the FBI cart off his criminal competitors even as he buried bodies in shallow graves along the Neponset'...''

Mueller put people in prison for crimes they did not commit:

''Mueller was the head of the Criminal Division as Assistant U.S. Attorney, then as Acting U.S. Attorney. I could not find any explanation online by Mueller as to why he insisted on keeping the defendants in prison that FBI agents'--in the pocket of Whitey Bulger'--had framed for a murder they did not commit. Make no mistake: these were not honorable people he had incarcerated. But it was part of a pattern that eventually became quite clear that Mueller was more concerned with convicting and putting people in jail he disliked, even if they were innocent of the charges, than he was with ferreting out the truth,'' Gohmert said.

The Special Counsel learned last week of an alleged scheme to pay off women to fabricate sexual assault allegations against Mueller.

This week, Mueller unleashed the power of the government and referred the scheme to the FBI.

Whitey Bulger, a mob boss with a long history with Mueller was also murdered in prison this week''interesting string of events connected to Mueller are all unfolding at once.

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Archived Version

Wed, 31 Oct 2018 01:30

TOP Opinion

GRAY, J., Opinion of the Court

MR. JUSTICE GRAY, after stating the case, delivered the opinion of the court.

The facts of this case, as agreed by the parties, are as follows: Wong Kim Ark was born in 1873 in the city of San Francisco, in the State of California and United States of America, and was and is a laborer. His father and mother were persons of Chinese descent, and subjects of the Emperor of China; they were at the time of his birth domiciled residents of the United States, having previously established and still enjoying a permanent domicil and residence therein at San Francisco; they continued to reside and remain in the United States until 1890, when they departed for China, and during all the time of their residence in the United States, they were engaged in business, and were never employed in any diplomatic or official capacity under the Emperor of China. Wong Kim Ark, ever since his birth, has had but one residence, to-wit, in California, within the United States, and has there resided, claiming to be a citizen of the United States, and has never lost or changed that residence, or gained or acquired another residence, and neither he nor his parents acting for him ever renounced his allegiance to the United States, or did or committed any act or thing to exclude him [p653] therefrom. In 1890 (when he must have been about seventeen years of age), he departed for China on a temporary visit and with the intention of returning to the United States, and did return thereto by sea in the same year, and was permitted by the collector of customs to enter the United States upon the sole ground that he was a native-born citizen of the United States. After such return, he remained in the United States, claiming to be a citizen thereof, until 1894, when he (being about twenty-one years of age, but whether a little above or a little under that age does not appear) again departed for China on a temporary visit and with the intention of returning to the United States, and he did return thereto by sea in August, 1895, and applied to the collector of customs for permission to land, and was denied such permission upon the sole ground that he was not a citizen of the United States.

It is conceded that, if he is a citizen of the United States, the acts of Congress, known as the Chinese Exclusion Acts, prohibiting persons of the Chinese race, and especially Chinese laborers, from coming into the United States, do not and cannot apply to him.

The question presented by the record is whether a child born in the United States, of parents of Chinese descent, who, at the time of his birth, are subjects of the Emperor of China, but have a permanent domicil and residence in the United States, and are there carrying on business, and are not employed in any diplomatic or official capacity under the Emperor of China, becomes at the time of his birth a citizen of the United States by virtue of the first clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution,

All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.

I. In construing any act of legislation, whether a statute enacted by the legislature or a constitution established by the people as the supreme law of the land, regard is to be had not only to all parts of the act itself, and of any former act of the same lawmaking power of which the act in question is an amendment, but also to the condition and to the history [p654] of the law as previously existing, and in the light of which the new act must be read and interpreted.

The Constitution of the United States, as originally adopted, uses the words "citizen of the United States," and "natural-born citizen of the United States." By the original Constitution, every representative in Congress is required to have been "seven years a citizen of the United States," and every Senator to have been "nine years a citizen of the United States." and "no person except a natural-born citizen, or a citizen of the United States at the time of the adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the office of President." The Fourteenth Article of Amendment, besides declaring that

all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside,

also declares that

no State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

And the Fifteenth Article of Amendment declares that

the right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States, or by any State, on account of race, color or previous condition of servitude.

The Constitution nowhere defines the meaning of these words, either by way of inclusion or of exclusion, except insofar as this is done by the affirmative declaration that "all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States." In this as in other respects, it must be interpreted in the light of the common law, the principles and history of which were familiarly known to the framers of the Constitution. Minor v. Happersett, 21 Wall. 162; Ex parte Wilson, 114 U.S. 417, 422; Boyd v. United States, 116 U.S. 616, 624, 625; Smith v. Alabama, 124 U.S. 465. The language of the Constitution, as has been well said, could not be understood without reference to the common law. Kent Com. 336; Bradley, J., in Moore v. United States, 91 U.S. 270, 274. [p655]

In Minor v. Happersett, Chief Justice Waite, when construing, in behalf of the court, the very provision of the Fourteenth Amendment now in question, said: "The Constitution does not, in words, say who shall be natural-born citizens. Resort must be had elsewhere to ascertain that." And he proceeded to resort to the common law as an aid in the construction of this provision. 21 Wall. 167.

In Smith v. Alabama, Mr. Justice Matthews, delivering the judgment of the court, said:

There is no common law of the United States, in the sense of a national customary law, distinct from the common law of England as adopted by the several States each for itself, applied as its local law, and subject to such alteration as may be provided by its own statutes. . . . There is, however, one clear exception to the statement that there is no national common law. The interpretation of the Constitution of the United States is necessarily influenced by the fact that its provisions are framed in the language of the English common law, and are to be read in the light of its history.

124 U.S. 478.

II. The fundamental principle of the common law with regard to English nationality was birth within the allegiance, also called "ligealty," "obedience," "faith," or "power" of the King. The principle embraced all persons born within the King's allegiance and subject to his protection. Such allegiance and protection were mutual -- as expressed in the maxim protectio trahit subjectionem, et subjectio protectionem -- and were not restricted to natural-born subjects and naturalized subjects, or to those who had taken an oath of allegiance, but were predicable of aliens in amity so long as they were within the kingdom. Children, born in England, of such aliens were therefore natural-born subjects. But the children, born within the realm, of foreign ambassadors, or the children of alien enemies, born during and within their hostile occupation of part of the King's dominions, were not natural-born subjects because not born within the allegiance, the obedience, or the power, or, as would be said at this day, within the jurisdiction, of the King.

This fundamental principle, with these qualifications or [p656] explanations of it, was clearly, though quaintly, stated in the leading case, known as Calvin's Case, or the Case of the Postnati, decided in 1608, after a hearing in the Exchequer Chamber before the Lord Chancellor and all the Judges of England, and reported by Lord Coke and by Lord Ellesmere. Calvin's Case, 7 Rep. 1, 4b-6a, 18a, 18b; Ellesmere on Postnati, 62-64; S.C., 2 Howell's State Trials, 559, 607, 613-617, 639, 640, 659, 679.

The English authorities ever since are to the like effect. Co.Lit. 8a, 128b, Lord Hale, in Hargrave's Law Tracts, 210, an in 1 Hale P.C. 61, 62; 1 Bl.Com. 366, 369, 370, 374; 4 Bl.Com. 74, 92; Lord Kenyon, in Doe v. Jones, 4 T.R. 300, 308; Cockburn on Nationality, 7; Dicey Conflict of Laws, p. 173-177, 741.

In Udny v. Udny, (1869) L.R. 1 H.L. Sc. 441, the point decided was one of inheritance, depending upon the question whether the domicil of the father was in England or in Scotland, he being in either alternative a British subject. Lord Chancellor Hatherley said: "The question of naturalization and of allegiance is distinct from that of domicil." P. 452. Lord Westbury, in the passage relied on by the counsel for the United States, began by saying:

The law of England, and of almost all civilized countries, ascribes to each individual at his birth two distinct legal states or conditions: one, by virtue of which he becomes the subject of some particular country, binding him by the tie of natural allegiance, and which may be called his political status; another by virtue of which he has ascribed to him the character of a citizen of some particular country, and as such is possessed of certain municipal rights, and subject to certain obligations, which latter character is the civil status or condition of the individual, and may be quite different from his political status.

And then, while maintaining that the civil status is universally governed by the single principle of domicil, domicilium, the criterion established by international law for the purpose of determining civil status, and the basis on which

the personal rights of the party, that is to say, the law which determines his majority or minority, his marriage, succession, testacy or intestacy, [p657] must depend,

he yet distinctly recognized that a man's political status, his country, patria, and his "nationality, that is, natural allegiance," "may depend on different laws in different countries." Pp. 457, 460. He evidently used the word "citizen" not as equivalent to "subject," but rather to "inhabitant," and had no thought of impeaching the established rule that all persons born under British dominion are natural-born subjects.

Lord Chief Justice Cockburn, in the same year, reviewing the whole matter, said:

By the common law of England, every person born within the dominions of the Crown, no matter whether of English or of foreign parents, and, in the latter case, whether the parents were settled or merely temporarily sojourning, in the country, was an English subject, save only the children of foreign ambassadors (who were excepted because their fathers carried their own nationality with them), or a child born to a foreigner during the hostile occupation of any part of the territories of England. No effect appears to have been given to descent as a source of nationality.

Cockburn on Nationality, 7.

Mr. Dicey, in his careful and thoughtful Digest of the Law of England with reference to the Conflict of Laws, published in 1896, states the following propositions, his principal rules being printed below in italics:

"British subject" means any person who owes permanent allegiance to the Crown. "Permanent" allegiance is used to distinguish the allegiance of a British subject from the allegiance of an alien who, because he is within the British dominions, owes "temporary" allegiance to the Crown. "Natural-born British subject" means a British subject who has become a British subject at the moment of his birth." "Subject to the exceptions hereinafter mentioned, any person who (whatever the nationality of his parents) is born within the British dominions is a natural-born British subject. This rule contains the leading principle of English law on the subject of British nationality.

The exceptions afterwards mentioned by Mr. Dicey are only these two:

1. Any person who (his father being an alien enemy) is born in a part of the British dominions, which at the time of such [p658] person's birth is in hostile occupation, is an alien.

2. Any person whose father (being an alien) is at the time of such person's birth an ambassador or other diplomatic agent accredited to the Crown by the Sovereign of a foreign State is (though born within the British dominions) an alien.

And he adds:

The exceptional and unimportant instances in which birth within the British dominions does not of itself confer British nationality are due to the fact that, though at common law nationality or allegiance in substance depended on the place of a person's birth, it in theory, at least, depended not upon the locality of a man's birth, but upon his being born within the jurisdiction and allegiance of the King of England, and it might occasionally happen that a person was born within the dominions without being born within the allegiance, or, in other words, under the protection and control of, the Crown.

Dicey Conflict of Laws, pp. 173-177, 741.

It thus clearly appears that, by the law of England for the last three centuries, beginning before the settlement of this country and continuing to the present day, aliens, while residing in the dominions possessed by the Crown of England, were within the allegiance, the obedience, the faith or loyalty, the protection, the power, the jurisdiction of the English Sovereign, and therefore every child born in England of alien parents was a natural-born subject unless the child of an ambassador or other diplomatic agent of a foreign State or of an alien enemy in hostile occupation of the place where the child was born.

III. The same rule was in force in all the English Colonies upon this continent down to the time of the Declaration of Independence, and in the United States afterwards, and continued to prevail under the Constitution as originally established.

In the early case of The Charming Betsy, (1804) it appears to have been assumed by this court that all persons born in the United States were citizens of the United States, Chief Justice Marshall saying:

Whether a person born within the United States, or becoming a citizen according to the established laws of the country, can divest himself absolutely of [p659] that character otherwise than in such manner as may be prescribed by law is a question which it is not necessary at present to decide.

2 Cranch 64, 119.

In Inglis v. Sailors' Snug Harbor (1833), 3 Pet. 99, in which the plaintiff was born in the city of New York about the time of the Declaration of Independence, the justices of this court (while differing in opinion upon other points) all agreed that the law of England as to citizenship by birth was the law of the English Colonies in America. Mr. Justice Thompson, speaking for the majority of the court, said:

It is universally admitted, both in the English courts and in those of our own country, that all persons born within the Colonies of North America, whilst subject to the Crown of Great Britain, are natural-born British subjects.

3 Pet. 120. Mr. Justice Johnson said: "He was entitled to inherit as a citizen born of the State of New York." 3 Pet. 136. Mr. Justice Story stated the reasons upon this point more at large, referring to Calvin's Case, Blackstone's Commentaries, and Doe v. Jones, above cited, and saying:

Allegiance is nothing more than the tie or duty of obedience of a subject to the sovereign under whose protection he is, and allegiance by birth is that which arises from being born within the dominions and under the protection of a particular sovereign. Two things usually concur to create citizenship: first, birth locally within the dominions of the sovereign, and secondly, birth within the protection and obedience, or, in other words, within the allegiance of the sovereign. That is, the party must be born within a place where the sovereign is at the time in full possession and exercise of his power, and the party must also, at his birth, derive protection from, and consequently owe obedience or allegiance to, the sovereign, as such, de facto. There are some exceptions which are founded upon peculiar reasons, and which, indeed, illustrate and confirm the general doctrine. Thus, a person who is born on the ocean is a subject of the prince to whom his parents then owe allegiance; for he is still deemed under the protection of his sovereign, and born in a place where he has dominion in common with all other sovereigns. So the children of an ambassador are held to be [p660] subjects of the prince whom he represents, although born under the actual protection and in the dominions of a foreign prince.

3 Pet. 155. "The children of enemies, born in a place within the dominions of another sovereign, then occupied by them by conquest, are still aliens." 3 Pet. 156.

Nothing is better settled at the common law than the doctrine that the children, even of aliens, born in a country while the parents are resident there under the protection of the government and owing a temporary allegiance thereto, are subjects by birth.

3 Pet. 164.

In Shanks v. Dupont, 3 Pet. 242, decided (as appears by the records of this court) on the same day as the last case, it was held that a woman born in South Carolina before the Declaration of Independence, married to an English officer in Charleston during its occupation by the British forces in the Revolutionary War, and accompanying her husband on his return to England, and there remaining until her death, was a British subject within the meaning of the Treaty of Peace of 1783, so that her title to land in South Carolina, by descent cast before that treaty, was protected thereby. It was of such a case that Mr. Justice Story, delivering the opinion of the court, said:

The incapacities of femes covert, provided by the common law, apply to their civil rights, and are for their protection and interest. But they do not reach their political rights, nor prevent their acquiring or losing a national character. Those political rights do not stand upon the mere doctrines of municipal law, applicable to ordinary transactions, but stand upon the more general principles of the law of nations.

3 Pet. 248. This last sentence was relied on by the counsel for the United States as showing that the question whether a person is a citizen of a particular country is to be determined not by the law of that country, but by the principles of international law. But Mr. Justice Story certainly did not mean to suggest that, independently of treaty, there was any principle of international law which could defeat the operation of the established rule of citizenship by birth within the United States; for he referred (p. 245) to the contemporaneous opinions in Inglis v. Sailors' Snug Harbor, [p661] above cited, in which this rule had been distinctly recognized, and in which he had said (p. 162) that "each government had a right to decide for itself who should be admitted or deemed citizens," and, in his Treatise on the Conflict of Laws, published in 1834, he said that, in respect to residence in different countries or sovereignties, "there are certain principles which have been generally recognized by tribunals administering public law" [adding, in later editions "or the law of nations"] "as of unquestionable authority," and stated, as the first of those principles, "Persons who are born in a country are generally deemed citizens and subjects of that country." Story, Conflict of Laws, § 48.

The English statute of 11 & 12 Will. III (1700). c. 6, entitled

An act to enable His Majesty's natural-born subjects to inherit the estate of their ancestors, either lineal or collateral, notwithstanding their father or mother were aliens,

enacted that "all and every person or persons, being the King's natural-born subject or subjects, within any of the King's realms or dominions," might and should thereafter lawfully inherit and make their titles by descent to any lands

from any of their ancestors, lineal or collateral, although the father and mother, or father or mother, or other ancestor, of such person or persons, by, from, through or under whom

title should be made or derived, had been or should be "born out of the King's allegiance, and out of is Majesty's realms and dominions," as fully and effectually, as if such parents or ancestors "had been naturalized or natural-born subject or subjects within the King's dominions." 7 Statutes of the Realm, 90. It may be observed that, throughout that statute, persons born within the realm, although children of alien parents, were called "natural-born subjects." As that statute included persons born "within any of the King's realms or dominions," it, of course, extended to the Colonies, and, not having been repealed in Maryland, was in force there. In McCreery v. Somerville, (1824) 9 Wheat. 354, which concerned the title to land in the State of Maryland, it was assumed that children born in that State of an alien who was still living, and who had not been naturalized, were "native-born citizens of the [p662] United States," and, without such assumption, the case would not have presented the question decided by the court, which, as stated by Mr. Justice Story in delivering the opinion, was

whether the statute applies to the case of a living alien ancestor, so as to create a title by heirship where none would exist by the common law if the ancestor were a natural-born subject.

9 Wheat. 356.

Again, in Levy v. McCartee (1832), 6 Pet. 102, 112, 113, 115, which concerned a descent cast since the American Revolution, in the State of New York, where the statute of 11 & 12 Will. III had been repealed, this court, speaking by Mr. Justice Story, held that the case must rest for its decision exclusively upon the principles of the common law, and treated it as unquestionable that, by that law, a child born in England of alien parents was a natural-born subject, quoting the statement of Lord Coke in Co.Lit. 8a, that,

if an alien cometh into England and hath issue two sons, these two sons are indigenae, subjects born, because they are born within the realm,

and saying that such a child "was a native-born subject, according to the principles of the common law stated by this court in McCreery v. Somervlle, 9 Wheat. 354."

In Dred Scott v. Sandford, (1857) 19 How. 393, Mr. Justice Curtis said:

The first section of the second article of the Constitution uses the language, "a natural-born citizen." It thus assumes that citizenship may be acquired by birth. Undoubtedly, this language of the Constitution was used in reference to that principle of public law, well understood in this country at the time of the adoption of the Constitution, which referred citizenship to the place of birth.

19 How. 576. And, to this extent, no different opinion was expressed or intimated by any of the other judges.

In United States v. Rhodes (1866), Mr. Justice Swayne, sitting in the Circuit Court, said:

All persons born in the allegiance of the King are natural-born subjects, and all persons born in the allegiance of the United States are natural-born citizens. Birth and allegiance go together. Such is the rule of the common law, and it is the common law of this country, as well as of England. . . . We find no warrant for the opinion [p663] that this great principle of the common law has ever been changed in the United States. It has always obtained here with the same vigor, and subject only to the same exceptions, since as before the Revolution.

1 Abbott (U.S.) 28, 40, 41.

The Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, speaking by Mr. Justice (afterwards Chief Justice) Sewall, early held that the determination of the question whether a man was a citizen or an alien was "to be governed altogether by the principles of the common law," and that it was established, with few exceptions,

that a man born within the jurisdiction of the common law is a citizen of the country wherein he is born. By this circumstance of his birth, he is subjected to the duty of allegiance which is claimed and enforced by the sovereign of his native land, and becomes reciprocally entitled to the protection of that sovereign, and to the other rights and advantages which are included in the term "citizenship."

Garder v. Ward (1805), 2 Mass. 244, note. And again:

The doctrine of the common law is that every man born within its jurisdiction is a subject of the sovereign of the country where he is born, and allegiance is not personal to the sovereign in the extent that has been contended for; it is due to him in his political capacity of sovereign of the territory where the person owing the allegiance as born.

Kilham v. Ward (1806), 2 Mass. 236, 265. It may here be observed that, in a recent English case, Lord Coleridge expressed the opinion of the Queen's Bench Division that the statutes of 4 Geo. II, (1731) c. 1, and 13 Geo. III (1773), c. 21, (hereinafter referred to) "clearly recognize that to the King in his politic, and not in his personal, capacity is the allegiance of his subjects due." Isaacson v. Durant, 17 Q.B.D. 54, 65.

The Supreme Court of North Carolina, speaking by Mr; Justice Gaston, said:

Before our Revolution, all free persons born within the dominions of the King of Great Britain, whatever their color or complexion, were native-born British subjects; those born out of his allegiance were aliens. . . . Upon the Revolution, no other change took place in the law of North Carolina than was consequent upon the transition from a colony dependent on an European King to a free and sovereign [p664] State; . . . British subjects in North Carolina became North Carolina freemen; . . . and all free persons born within the State are born citizens of the State. . . . The term "citizen," as understood in our law, is precisely analogous to the term "subject" in the common law, and the change of phrase has entirely resulted from the change of government. The sovereignty has been transferred from one man to the collective body of the people, and he who before as a "subject of the king" is now "a citizen of the State."

State v. Manuel (1838), 4 Dev. & Bat. 20, 24-26.

That all children born within the dominion of the United States of foreign parents holding no diplomatic office became citizens at the time of their birth does not appear to have been contested or doubted until more than fifty years after the adoption of the Constitution, when the matter was elaborately argued in the Court of Chancery of New York and decided upon full consideration by Vice Chancellor Sandford in favor of their citizenship. Lynch v. Clark, (1844) 1 Sandf.Ch. 583.

The same doctrine was repeatedly affirmed in the executive departments, as, for instance, by Mr. Marcy, Secretary of State, in 1854, 2 Whart.Int.Dig. (2d ed.) p. 394; by Attorney General Black in 1859, 9 Opinions, 373, and by Attorney General Bates in 1862, 10 Opinions, 328, 382, 394, 396.

Chancellor Kent, in his Commentaries, speaking of the "general division of the inhabitants of every country under the comprehensive title of aliens and natives," says:

Natives are all persons born within the jurisdiction and allegiance of the United States. This is the rule of the common law, without any regard or reference to the political condition or allegiance of their parents, with the exception of the children of ambassadors, who are in theory born within the allegiance of the foreign power they represent. . . . To create allegiance by birth, the party must be born not only within the territory, but within the ligeance of the government. If a portion of the country be taken and held by conquest in war, the conqueror acquires the rights of the conquered as to its dominion and government, and children born in the armies of a State, while [p665] abroad and occupying a foreign country, are deemed to be born in the allegiance of the sovereign to whom the army belongs. It is equally the doctrine of the English common law that, during such hostile occupation of a territory, and the parents be adhering to the enemy as subjects de facto, their children, born under such a temporary dominion, are not born under the ligeance of the conquered.

2 Kent Com. (6th ed.) 39, 42. And he elsewhere says:

And if, at common law, all human beings born within the ligeance of the King, and under the King's obedience, were natural-born subjects, and not aliens, I do not perceive why this doctrine does not apply to these United States, in all cases in which there is no express constitutional or statute declaration to the contrary. . . . Subject and citizen are, in a degree, convertible terms as applied to natives, and though the term citizen seems to be appropriate to republican freemen, yet we are, equally with the inhabitants of all other countries, subjects, for we are equally bound by allegiance and subjection to the government and law of the land.

2 Kent Com. 258, note.

Mr. Binney, in the second edition of a paper on the Alienigenae of the United States, printed in pamphlet at Philadelphia, with a preface bearing his signature and the date of December 1, 1853, said:

The common law principle of allegiance was the law of all the States at the time of the Revolution and at the adoption of the Constitution, and, by that principle, the citizens o the United States are, with the exceptions before mentioned,

(namely, foreign-born children of citizens, under statutes to be presently referred to)

such only as are either born or made so, born within the limits and under the jurisdiction of the United States or naturalized by the authority of law, either in one of the States before the Constitution or, since that time, by virtue of an act of the Congress of the United States.

P. 20.

The right of citizenship never descends in the legal sense, either by the common law or under the common naturalization acts. It is incident to birth in the country, or it is given personally by statute. The child of an alien, if born in the country, is as much a citizen as the natural born child of a citizen, and by operation of the same principle. [p666]

P. 22, note. This paper, without Mr. Binney's name and with the note in a less complete form and not containing the passage last cited, was published (perhaps from the first edition) in the American Law Register for February, 1854. 2 Amer.Law Reg.193, 203, 204.

IV. It was contended by one of the learned counsel for the United States that the rule of the Roman law, by which the citizenship of the child followed that of the parent, was the true rule of international law, as now recognized in most civilized countries, and had superseded the rule of the common law, depending on birth within the realm, originally founded on feudal considerations.

But at the time of the adoption of the Constitution of the United States in 1789, and long before, it would seem to have been the rule in Europe generally, as it certainly was in France, that, as said by Pothier, "citizens, true and native-born citizens, are those who are born within the extent of the dominion of France," and

mere birth within the realm gives the rights of a native-born citizen, independently of the origin of the father or mother, and of their domicil;

and children born in a foreign country, of a French father who had not established his domicil there nor given up the intention of returning, were also deemed Frenchmen, as Laurent says, by "a favor, a sort of fiction," and Calvo, "by a sort of fiction of exterritoriality, considered as born in France, and therefore invested with French nationality." Pothier Trait des Personnes, pt. 1, tit. 2, sect. 1, nos. 43, 45; Walsh-Serrant v. Walsh-Serrant, (1802) 3 Journal du Palais, 384; S.C., S. Merlin, Jurisprudence, (5th ed.) Domicile, § 13; Prefet du Nord v. Lebeau, (1862) Journal du Palais, 1863, 312 and note; 1 Laurent Droit Civil, no. 321; 2 Calvo Droit International, (5th ed.) § 542; Cockburn on Nationality, 13, 14; Hall's International Law, (4th ed.) § 68. The general principle of citizenship by birth within French territory prevailed until after the French Revolution, and was affirmed in successive constitutions from the one adopted by the Constituent Assembly in 1791 to that of the French Republic in 1799. Constitutions et Chartes, (ed. 1830) pp. 100, 136, 148, 186. [p667] The Code Napoleon of 1807 changed the law of France and adopted, instead of the rule of country of birth, jus soli, the rule of descent or blood, jus sanguinis, as the leading principle; but an eminent commentator has observed that the framers of that code

appear not to have wholly freed themselves from the ancient rule of France, or rather, indeed, ancient rule of Europe -- de la vielle regle francaise, ou plutot meme de la vielle regle europienne -- according to which nationality had always been, in former times, determined by the place of birth.

1 Demolombe Cours de Code Napoleon (4th ed.) no. 146.

The later modifications of the rule in Europe rest upon the constitutions, laws or ordinances of the various countries, and have no important bearing upon the interpretation and effect o the Constitution of the United States. The English Naturalization Act of 33 Vict. (1870) c. 14, and the Commissioners' Report of 1869, out of which it grew, both bear date since the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution; and, as observed by Mr. Dicey, that act has not affected the principle by which any person who, whatever the nationality of his parents, is born within the British dominions, acquires British nationality at birth and is a natural-born British subject. Dicey, Conflict of Laws 41. At the time of the passage of that act, although the tendency on the continent of Europe was to make parentage, rather than birthplace, the criterion of nationality, and citizenship was denied to the native-born children of foreign parents in Germany, Switzerland, Sweden and Norway, yet it appears still to have been conferred upon such children in Holland, Denmark and Portugal, and, when claimed under certain specified conditions, in France, Belgium, Spain, Italy, Greece and Russia. Cockburn on Nationality, 14-21.

There is, therefore, little ground for the theory that, at the time of the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States, there as any settled and definite rule of international law, generally recognized by civilized nations, inconsistent with the ancient rule of citizenship by birth within the dominion. [p668]

Nor can it be doubted that it is the inherent right of every independent nation to determine for itself, and according to its own constitution and laws, what classes of persons shall be entitled to its citizenship.

Both in England and in the United States, indeed, statutes have been passed at various times enacting that certain issue born abroad of English subjects or of American citizens, respectively, should inherit, to some extent at least, the rights of their parents. But those statutes applied only to cases coming within their purport, and they have never been considered in either country as affecting the citizenship of persons born within its dominion.

The earliest statute was passed in the reign of Edward III. In the Rolls of Parliament of 17 Edw. III (1343), it is stated that,

before these times, there have been great doubt and difficulty among the Lords of this realm, and the Commons, as well men of the law as others, whether children who are born in parts beyond sea ought to bear inheritance after the death of their ancestors in England, because no certain law has been thereon ordained;

and by the King, Lords and Commons, it was unanimously agreed that

there was no manner of doubt that the children of our Lord the King, whether they were born on this side the sea or beyond the sea, should bear the inheritance of their ancestors; . . . and in regard to other children, it was agreed in this Parliament that they also should inherit wherever they might be born in the service of the King;

but, because the Parliament was about to depart, and the business demanded great advisement and good deliberation how it should be best and most surely done, the making of a statute was put off to the next Parliament. 2 Rot.Parl. 139. By reason, apparently, of the prevalence of the plague in England, no act upon the subject was passed until 5 Edw. III, (1350), when Parliament passed an act entitled "A statute for those who are born in parts beyond sea," by which -- after reciting that

some people be in doubt if the children born in the parts beyond the sea, out of the ligeance of England, should be able to demand any inheritance within the same ligeance, or not, whereof a petition was put [p669] in the Parliament

of 17 Edw. III, "and as not at the same time wholly assented" -- it was (1) agreed and affirmed

that the law of the Crown of England is, and always hath been such, that the children of the Kings of England, in whatsoever parts they be born, in England or elsewhere, be able and ought to bear the inheritance after the death of their ancestors;

(2) also agreed that certain persons named,

which were born beyond the sea, out of the ligeance of England, shall be from henceforth able to have and enjoy their inheritance after the death of their ancestors, in all parts within the ligeance of England, as well as those that should be born within the same ligeance:

(3) and further agreed

that all children inheritors, which from henceforth shall be born without the ligeance of the King, whose fathers and mothers at the time of their birth be and shall be at the faith and ligeance of the King of England, shall have and enjoy the same benefits and advantages to have and bear the inheritance within the same ligeance as the other inheritors aforesaid, in time to come; so always, that the mothers of such children do pass the sea by the licence and wills of their husbands.

2 Rot. Parl. 231; 1 Statutes of the Realm, 310.

It has sometimes been suggested that this general provision of the statute of 25 Edw. III was declaratory of the common law. See Bacon, arguendo, in Calvin' Case, 2 Howell's State Trials, 585; Westlake and Pollock, arguendo, in De Geer v. Stone, 22 Ch.D. 243, 247; 2 Kent Com. 50, 53; Lynch v. Clarke,1 Sandf.Ch. 583, 659, 660; Ludlam v. Ludlam, 26 N.Y. 356. But all suggestions to that effect seem to have been derived, immediately or ultimately, from one or the other of these two sources: the one, the Year Book of 1 Ric. III, (1483) fol. 4, pl. 7, reporting a saying of Hussey, C.J.,

that he who is born beyond sea, and his father and mother are English, their issue inherit by the common law, but the statute makes clear, &c.,

-- which, at best, was but obiter dictum, for the Chief Justice appears to have finally rested his opinion on the statute. The other, a note added to the edition of 1688 of Dyer's Reports, 184a, stating that, at Trinity Term, 7 Edw. III, Rot. 2 B.R., it was adjudged that children of subjects born [p670] beyond the sea in the service of the King were inheritable -- which has been shown, by a search of the roll in the King's Bench so referred to, to be a mistake, inasmuch as the child there in question did not appear to have been born beyond sea, but only to be living abroad. Westlake's Private International Law (3d ed.) 324.

The statute of 5 Edw. III recites the existence of doubts as to the right of foreign-born children to inherit in England; and, while it is declaratory of the rights of children of the King, and is retrospective as to the persons specifically named, yet, as to all others, it is, in terms, merely prospective, applying to those only "who shall be born henceforth." Mr. Binney, in his paper above cited, after a critical examination of the statute and of the early English cases, concluded:

There is nothing in the statute which would justify the conclusion that it is declaratory of the common law in any but a single particular, namely in regard to the children of the King; nor has it at any time been judicially held to be so. . . . The notion that there is any common law principle to naturalize the children born in foreign countries, of native-born American father and mother, father or mother, must be discarded. There is not, and never was, any such common law principle.

Binney on Alienigenae, 14, 20; 2 Amer.Law Reg.199, 203. And the great weight of the English authorities, before and since he wrote, appears to support his conclusion. Calvin's Case, 7 Rep. 17a, 18a; Co.Lit. 8a, and Hargrave's note 36; 1 Bl.Com. 33; Barrington on Statutes, (5th ed.) 268; Lord Kenyon, in Doe v. Jones, 4 T.R. 300, 308; I: ord Chancellor Cranworth, in Shedden v. Patrick, 1 Macq. 535, 611; Cockburn on Nationality, 7, 9; De Greer v. Stone, 2 Ch.D. 243, 252; Dicey Conflict of Laws, 17, 741. "The acquisition," says Mr. Dicey, (p. 741) "of nationality by descent is foreign to the principles of the common law, and is based wholly upon statutory enactments."

It has been pertinently observed that, if the statute of Edward III had only been declaratory of the common law, the subsequent legislation on the subject would have been wholly unnecessary. Cockburn on Nationality 9. By the [p671] statute of 29 Car. II, (1677) c. 6, § 1, entitled "An act for the naturalization of children of His Majesty's subjects born in foreign countries during the late troubles," all persons who, at any time between June 14, 1641, and March 24, 1660, "were born out of His Majesty's dominions, and whose fathers or mothers were natural-born subjects of this realm" were declared to be natural-born subjects. By the statute of 7 Anne, (1708) c. 5, § 3, "the children of all natural-born subjects, born out of the ligeance of Her Majesty, her heirs and successors" -- explained by the statute of 4 Geo. II, (1731) c. 21, to mean all children born out of the ligeance of the Crown of England

whose fathers were or shall be natural-born subjects of the Crown of England, or of Great Britain, at the time of the birth of such children respectively . . . . shall be deemed, adjudged and taken to be natural-born subjects of this kingdom, to all intents, constructions and purposes whatsoever.

That statute was limited to foreign-born children of natural-born subjects, and was extended by the statute of 13 Geo. III, (1773) c. 21, to foreign-born grandchildren of natural-born subjects, but not to the issue of such grandchildren; or, as put by Mr. Dicey, "British nationality does not pass by descent or inheritance beyond the second generation." See DeGeer v. Stone, above cited; Dicey, Conflict of Laws 742.

Moreover, under those statutes, as is stated in the Report in 1869 of the Commissioners for inquiring into the Laws of Naturalization and Allegiance,

no attempt has ever been made on the part of the British Government, (unless in Eastern countries where special jurisdiction is conceded by treaty) to enforce claims upon, or to assert rights in respect of, persons born abroad, as against the country of their birth whilst they were resident therein, and when by its law they were invested with its nationality.

In the appendix to their report are collected many such cases in which the British Government declined to interpose, the reasons being most clearly brought out in a dispatch of March 13, 1858, from Lord Malmesbury, the Foreign Secretary, to the British Ambassador at Paris, saying:

It is competent to any country to confer by general or special legislation the privileges of nationality upon those [p672] who are born out of its on territory; but it cannot confer such privileges upon such persons as against the country of their birth, when they voluntarily return to and reside therein. Those born in the territory of a nation are (as a general principle) liable when actually therein to the obligations incident to their status by birth. Great Britain considers and treats such persons as natural-born subjects, and cannot therefore deny the right of other nations to do the same. But Great Britain cannot permit the nationality of the children of foreign parents born within her territory to be questioned.

Naturalization Commission Report, pp. viii, 67; U.S. Foreign Relations, 1873-1874, pp. 1237, 1837. See also Drummond's Case (1834), 2 Knapp 295.

By the Constitution of the United States, Congress was empowered "to establish an uniform rule of naturalization." In the exercise of this power, Congress, by successive acts, beginning with the act entitled "An act to establish an uniform rule of naturalization," passed at the second session of the First Congress under the Constitution, has made provision for the admission to citizenship of three principal classes of persons: First. Aliens, having resided for a certain time "within the limits and under the jurisdiction of the United States," and naturalized individually by proceedings in a court of record. Second. Children of persons so naturalized, "dwelling within the United States, and being under the age of twenty-one years at the time of such naturalization." Third. Foreign-born children of American citizens, coming within the definitions prescribed by Congress. Acts of March 26, 1790, c. 3; January 29, 1795, c. 20; June 18, 1798, c. 54; 1 Stat. 103, 414, 566; April 14, 1802, c. 28; March 26, 1804, c. 47; 2 Stat. 153, 292; February 10, 1854, c. 71; 10 Stat. 604; Rev.Stat. §§ 2165, 2172, 1993.

In the act of 1790, the provision as to foreign-born children of American citizens was as follows:

The children of citizens of the United States, that may be born beyond sea, or out of the limits of the United States, shall be considered as natural-born citizens: Provided, that the right of citizenship shall not descend to persons whose fathers have never been [p673] resident in the United States.

1 Stat. 104. In 1795, this was reenacted in the same words, except in substituting for the words "beyond sea, or out of the limits of the United States" the words "out of the limits and jurisdiction of the United States." 1 Stat. 415.

In 1802, all former acts were repealed, and the provisions concerning children of citizens were reenacted in this form:

The children of persons duly naturalized under any of the laws of the United States, or who, previous to the passing of any law on that subject by the Government of the United States, may have become citizens of any one of the said States under the laws thereof, being under the age of twenty-one years at the time of their parents' being so naturalized or admitted to the rights of citizenship, shall, if dwelling in the United States, be considered as citizens of the United States, and the children of persons who now are, or have been citizens of the United States shall, though born out of the limits and jurisdiction of the United States, be considered as citizens of the United States: Provided, that the right of citizenship shall not descend to persons whose fathers have never resided within the United States.

Act of April 14, 1802, c. 28, § 4; 2 Stat. 155.

The provision of that act concerning "the children of persons duly naturalized under any of the laws of the United States," not being restricted to the children of persons already naturalized, might well be held to include children of persons thereafter to be naturalized. 2 Kent Com. 51, 52; West v. West, 8 Paige, 433; United States v. Kellar, 11 Bissell, 314; Boyd v. Thayer, 143 U.S. 135-177.

But the provision concerning foreign-born children, being expressly limited to the children of persons who then were or had been citizens, clearly did not include foreign-born children of any person who became a citizen since its enactment. 2 Kent.Com. 52, 53; Binney on Alienigenae 20, 25; 2 Amer.Law Reg. 203, 205. Mr. Binney's paper, as he states in his preface, was printed by him in the hope that Congress might supply this defect in our law.

In accordance with his suggestions, it was enacted by the [p674] statute of February 10, 1855, c. 71, that

persons heretofore born, or hereafter to be born, out of the limits and jurisdiction of the United States, whose fathers were or shall be at the time of their birth citizens of the United States, shall be deemed and considered and are hereby declared to be citizens of the United States: Provided, however, that the rights of citizenship shall not descend to persons whose fathers never resided in the United States.

10 Stat. 604; Rev.Stat. § 1993.

It thus clearly appears that, during the half century intervening between 1802 and 1855, there was no legislation whatever for the citizenship of children born abroad, during that period, of American parents who had not become citizens of the United States before the act of 1802, and that the act of 1855, like every other act of Congress upon the subject, has, by express proviso, restricted the right of citizenship, thereby conferred upon foreign-born children of American citizens, to those children themselves, unless they became residents of the United States. Here is nothing to countenance the theory that a general rule of citizenship by blood or descent has displaced in this country the fundamental rule of citizenship by birth within its sovereignty.

So far as we are informed, there is no authority, legislative, executive or judicial, in England or America, which maintains or intimates that the statutes (whether considered as declaratory or as merely prospective) conferring citizenship on foreign-born children of citizens have superseded or restricted, in any respect, the established rule of citizenship by birth within the dominion. Even those authorities in this country, which have gone the farthest towards holding such statutes to be but declaratory of the common law have distinctly recognized and emphatically asserted the citizenship of native-born children of foreign parents. 2 Kent Com. 39, 50, 53, 258 note; Lynch v. Clarke, 1 Sandf.Ch. 583, 659; Ludlam v. Ludlam, 26 N.Y. 356, 371.

Passing by questions once earnestly controverted, but finally put at rest by the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution, it is beyond doubt that, before the enactment of the Civil Rights Act of 1866 or the adoption of the Constitutional [p675] Amendment, all white persons, at least, born within the sovereignty of the United States, whether children of citizens or of foreigners, excepting only children of ambassadors or public ministers of a foreign government, were native-born citizens of the United States.

V. In the forefront both of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution and of the Civil Rights Act of 1866, the fundamental principle of citizenship by birth within the dominion was reaffirmed in the most explicit and comprehensive terms.

The Civil Rights Act, passed at the first session of the Thirty-ninth Congress, began by enacting that

all persons born in the United States, and not subject to any foreign power, excluding Indians not taxed, are hereby declared to be citizens of the United States, and such citizens, of every race and color, without regard to any previous condition of slavery or involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall have the same right, in every State and Territory in the United States, to make and enforce contracts, to sue, be parties and give evidence, to inherit, purchase, lease, sell, hold and convey real and personal property, and to full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings for the security of person and property as is enjoyed by white citizens, and shall be subject to like punishment, pains and penalties, and to none other, any law, statute, ordinance, regulation or custom to the contrary notwithstanding.

Act of April 9, 1866, c. 31, § 1; 14 Stat. 27.

The same Congress, shortly afterwards, evidently thinking it unwise, and perhaps unsafe, to leave so important a declaration of rights to depend upon an ordinary act of legislation, which might be repealed by any subsequent Congress, framed the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution, and, on June 16, 1866, by joint resolution, proposed it to the legislatures of the several States, and on July 28, 1868, the Secretary of State issued a proclamation showing it to have been ratified by the legislatures of the requisite number of States. 14 Stat. 358; 1 Stat. 708.

The first section of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution [p676] begins with the words,

All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of he State wherein they reside.

As appears upon the face of the amendment, as well as from the history of the times, this was not intended to impose any new restrictions upon citizenship, or to prevent any persons from becoming citizens by the fact of birth within the United States who would thereby have become citizens according to the law existing before its adoption. It is declaratory in form, and enabling and extending in effect. Its main purpose doubtless was, as has been often recognized by this court, to establish the citizenship of free negroes, which had been denied in the opinion delivered by Chief Justice Taney in Dred Scott v. Sandford, (1857) 19 How. 393, and to put it beyond doubt that all blacks, as well as whites, born or naturalized within the jurisdiction of the United States are citizens of the United States. The Slaughterhouse Cases (1873), 16 Wall. 36, 73; Strauder v. West Virginia (1879), 100 U.S. 303, 306.; Ex parte Virginia (1879). 100 U.S. 339, 35; Neal v. Delaware (1880), 103 U.S. 370, 386; Elk v. Wilkins (1884), 112 U.S. 94, 101. But the opening words, "All persons born," are general, not to say universal, restricted only by place and jurisdiction, and not by color or race -- as was clearly recognized in all the opinions delivered in The Slaughterhouse Cases, above cited.

In those cases, the point adjudged was that a statute of Louisiana granting to a particular corporation the exclusive right for twenty-five years to have and maintain slaughterhouses within a certain district including the City of New Orleans, requiring all cattle intended for sale or slaughter in that district to be brought to the yards and slaughterhouses of the grantee, authorizing all butchers to slaughter their cattle there, and empowering the grantee to exact a reasonable fee for each animal slaughtered, was within the police powers of the State, and not in conflict with the Thirteenth Amendment of the Constitution as creating an involuntary servitude, nor with the Fourteenth Amendment as abridging the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States, [p677] or as depriving persons of their liberty or property without due process of law, or as denying to them the equal protection of the laws.

Mr. Justice Miller, delivering the opinion of the majority of the court, after observing that the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth Articles of Amendment of the Constitution were all addressed to the grievances of the negro race, and were designed to remedy them, continued as follows:

We do not say that no one else but the negro can share in this protection. Both the language and spirit of these Articles are to have their fair and just weight in any question of construction. Undoubtedly, while negro slavery alone was in the mind of the Congress which proposed the Thirteenth Article, it forbids any other kind of slavery, now or hereafter. If Mexican peonage or the Chinese coolie labor system shall develop slavery of the Mexican or Chinese race within our territory, this Amendment may safely be trusted to make it void. And so if other rights are assailed by the States, which properly and necessarily fall within the protection of these Articles, that protection will apply, though the party interested may not be of African descent.

16 Wall. 72. And, in treating of the first clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, he said:

The distinction between citizenship of the United States and citizenship of a State is clearly recognized and established. Not only may a man be a citizen of the United States without being a citizen of a State, but an important element is necessary to convert the former into the latter. He must reside within the State to make him a citizen of it, but it is only necessary that he should be born or naturalized in the United States to be a citizen of the Union.

16 Wall. 73, 74.

Mr. Justice Field, in a dissenting opinion, in which Chief Justice Chase and Justices Swayne and Bradley concurred, said of the same clause:

It recognizes in express terms, if it does not create, citizens of the United States, and it makes their citizenship dependent upon the place of their birth, or the fact of their adoption, and not upon the constitution or laws of any State or the condition of their ancestry.

16 Wall. [p678] 95, 111. Mr. Justice Bradley also said:

The question is now settled by the Fourteenth Amendment itself, that citizenship of the United States is the primary citizenship in this country, and that state citizenship is secondary and derivative, depending upon citizenship of the United States and the citizen's place of residence. The States have not now, if they ever had, any power to restrict their citizenship to any classes or persons.

16 Wall. 112. And Mr. Justice Swayne added:

The language employed is unqualified in its scope. There is no exception in its terms, and there can be properly none in their application. By the language "citizens of the United States" was meant all such citizens, and by "any person" was meant all persons within the jurisdiction of the State. No distinction is intimated on account of race or color. This court has no authority to interpolate a limitation that is neither expressed nor implied. Our duty is to execute the law, not to make it. The protection provided was not intended to be confined to those of any particular race or class, but to embrace equally all races, classes and conditions of men.

16 Wall. 128, 129.

Mr. Justice Miller, indeed, while discussing the causes which led to the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment, made this remark:

The phrase, "subject to its jurisdiction" was intended to exclude from its operation children of ministers, consuls, and citizens or subjects of foreign States born within the United States.

16 Wall. 73. This was wholly aside from the question in judgment and from the course of reasoning bearing upon that question. It was unsupported by any argument, or by any reference to authorities, and that it was not formulated with the same care and exactness as if the case before the court had called for an exact definition of the phrase is apparent from its classing foreign ministers and consuls together -- whereas it was then well settled law, as has since been recognized in a judgment of this court in which Mr. Justice Miller concurred, that consuls, as such, and unless expressly invested with a diplomatic character in addition to their ordinary powers, are not considered as entrusted with authority to represent their sovereign in his intercourse [p679] with foreign States or to vindicate his prerogatives, or entitled by the law of nations to the privileges and immunities of ambassadors or public ministers, but are subject to the jurisdiction, civil and criminal, of the courts of the country in which they reside. 1 Kent Com. 44; Story Conflict of Laws § 48; Wheaton International Law (8th ed.) § 249; The Anne (1818), 3 Wheat. 435, 445, 446; Gittings v. Crawford (1838), Taney 1, 10; In re Baiz (1890), 135 U.S. 403, 424.

In weighing a remark uttered under such circumstances, it is well to bear in mind the often quoted words of Chief Justice Marshall:

It is a maxim not to be disregarded that general expressions in every opinion are to be taken in connection with the case in which those expressions are used. If they go beyond the case, they may be respected, but ought not to control the judgment in a subsequent suit when the very point is presented for decision. The reason of this maxim is obvious. The question actually before the court is investigated with care, and considered in its full extent. Other principles which may serve to illustrate it are considered in their relation to the case decided, but their possible bearing on all other cases is seldom completely investigated.

Cohens v. Virginia (1821), 6 Wheat. 264, 399.

That neither Mr. Justice Miller nor any of the justices who took part in the decision of The Slaughterhouse Cases understood the court to be committed to the view that all children born in the United States of citizens or subjects of foreign States were excluded from the operation of the first sentence of the Fourteenth Amendment is manifest from a unanimous judgment of the Court, delivered but two years later, while all those judges but Chief Justice Chase were still on the bench, in which Chief Justice Waite said: "Allegiance and protection are, in this connection" (that is, in relation to citizenship),

reciprocal obligations. The one is a compensation for the other: allegiance for protection, and protection for allegiance. . . . At common law, with the nomenclature of which the framers of the Constitution were familiar, it was never doubted that all children, born in a country of [p680] parents who were its citizens, became themselves, upon their birth, citizens also. These were natives, or natural-born citizens, as distinguished from aliens or foreigners. Some authorities go further, and include as citizens children born within the jurisdiction, without reference to the citizenship of their parents. As to this class, there have been doubts, but never as to the first. For the purposes of this case, it is not necessary to solve these doubts. It is sufficient for everything we have now to consider that all children born of citizen parents within the jurisdiction are themselves citizens.

Minor v. Happersett (1874), 21 Wall. 162, 166-168. The decision in that case was that a woman born of citizen parents within the United States was a citizen of the United States, although not entitled to vote, the right to the elective franchise not being essential to citizenship.

The only adjudication that has been made by this court upon the meaning of the clause, "and subject to the jurisdiction thereof," in the leading provision of the Fourteenth Amendment is Elk v. Wilkins, 112 U.S. 94, in which it was decided that an Indian born a member of one of the Indian tribes within the United States, which still existed and was recognized as an Indian tribe by the United States, who had voluntarily separated himself from his tribe and taken up his residence among the white citizens of a State but who did not appear to have been naturalized, or taxed, or in any way recognized or treated as a citizen either by the United States or by the State, was not a citizen of the United States, as a "person born in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof" within the meaning of the clause in question.

That decision was placed upon the grounds that the meaning of those words was

not merely subject in some respect or degree to the jurisdiction of the United States, but completely subject to their political jurisdiction, and owing them direct and immediate allegiance;

that, by the Constitution, as originally established, "Indians not taxed" were excluded from the persons according to whose numbers representatives in Congress and direct taxes were apportioned among the [p681] several States, and Congress was empowered to regulate commerce not only "with foreign nations" and among the several States, but "with the Indian tribes;" that the Indian tribes, being within the territorial limits of the United States, were not, strictly speaking, foreign States, but were alien nations, distinct political communities, the members of which owed immediate allegiance to their several tribes and were not part of the people of the United States; that the alien and dependent condition of the members of one of those tribes could not be put off at their own will without the action or assent of the United States, and that they were never deemed citizens except when naturalized, collectively or individually, under explicit provisions of a treaty, or of an act of Congress; and therefore that

Indians born within the territorial limits of the United States, members of, and owing immediate allegiance to, one of the Indian tribes (an alien, though dependent, power), although in a geographical sense born in the United States, are no more "born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof" within the meaning of the first section of the Fourteenth Amendment than the children of subjects of any foreign government born within the domain of that government, or the children born within the United States of ambassadors or other public ministers of foreign nations.

And it was observed that the language used in defining citizenship in the first section of the Civil Rights Act of 1866, by the very Congress which framed the Fourteenth Amendment, was "all persons born in the United States, and not subject to any foreign power, excluding Indians not taxed." 112 U.S. 99-103.

Mr. Justice Harlan and Mr. Justice Woods, dissenting, were of opinion that the Indian in question, having severed himself from his tribe and become a bona fide resident of a State, had thereby become subject to the jurisdiction of the United States within the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment; and, in reference to the Civil Rights Act of 1866, said:

Beyond question, by that act, national citizenship was conferred directly upon all persons in this country, of whatever race (excluding only "Indians not taxed"), who were born within [p682] the territorial limits of the United States, and were not subject to any foreign power.

And that view was supported by reference to the debates in the Senate upon that act, and to the ineffectual veto thereof by President Johnson in which he said:

By the first section of the bill, all persons born in the United States, and not subject to any foreign power, excluding Indians not taxed, are declared to be citizens of the United States. This provision comprehends the Chinese of the Pacific States, Indians subject to taxation, the people called Gypsies, as well as the entire race designated as blacks, persons of color, negroes, mulattoes, and persons of African blood. Every individual of those races, born in the United States, is, by the bill, made a citizen of the United States.

112 U.S. 1114.

The decision in Elk v. Wilkins concerned only members of the Indian tribes within the United States, and had no tendency to deny citizenship to children born in the United States of foreign parents of Caucasian, African or Mongolian descent not in the diplomatic service of a foreign country.

The real object of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution, in qualifying the words, "All persons born in the United States" by the addition "and subject to the jurisdiction thereof," would appear to have been to exclude, by the fewest and fittest words (besides children of members of the Indian tribes, standing in a peculiar relation to the National Government, unknown to the common law), the two classes of cases -- children born of alien enemies in hostile occupation and children of diplomatic representatives of a foreign State -- both of which, as has already been shown, by the law of England and by our own law from the time of the first settlement of the English colonies in America, had been recognized exceptions to the fundamental rule of citizenship by birth within the country. Calvin's Case, 7 Rep. 1, 18b; Cockburn on Nationality, 7; Dicey Conflict of Laws, 177; Inglis v. Sailors' Snug Harbor, 3 Pet. 99, 155; 2 Kent Com. 39, 42.

The principles upon which each of those exceptions rests were long ago distinctly stated by this court. [p683]

In United States v. Rice (1819), 4 Wheat. 246, goods imported into Castine, in the State of Maine, while it was in the exclusive possession of the British authorities during the last war with England, were held not to be subject to duties under the revenue laws of the United States because, as was said by Mr. Justice Story in delivering judgment:

By the conquest and military occupation of Castine, the enemy acquired that firm possession which enabled him to exercise the fullest rights of sovereignty over that place. The sovereignty of the United States over the territory was, of course, suspended, and the laws of the United States could no longer be rightfully enforced there, or be obligatory upon the inhabitants who remained and submitted to the conquerors. By the surrender, the inhabitants passed under a temporary allegiance to the British Government, and were bound by such laws, and such only, as it chose to recognize and impose. From the nature of the case, no other laws could be obligatory upon them, for, where there is no protection or allegiance or sovereignty, there can be no claim to obedience.

4 Wheat. 254.

In the great case of The Exchange (1812), 7 Cranch 116, the grounds upon which foreign ministers are, and other aliens are not, exempt from the jurisdiction of this country were set forth by Chief Justice Marshall in a clear and powerful train of reasoning, of which it will be sufficient, for our present purpose, to give little more than the outlines. The opinion did not touch upon the anomalous casts of the Indian tribes, the true relation of which to the United States was not directly brought before this court until some years afterwards in Cherokee Nation v. Georgia (1831), 5 Pet. 1; nor upon the case of a suspension of the sovereignty of the United States over part of their territory by reason of a hostile occupation, such as was also afterwards presented in United States v. Rice, above cited. But, in all other respects, it covered the whole question of what persons within the territory of the United States are subject to the jurisdiction thereof.

The Chief Justice first laid down the general principle:

The jurisdiction of the nation within its own territory is [p684] necessarily exclusive and absolute. It is susceptible of no limitation not imposed by itself. Any restriction upon it, deriving validity from an external source, would imply a diminution of its sovereignty to the extent of the restriction, and an investment of that sovereignty to the same extent in that power which could impose such restriction. All exceptions, therefore, to the full and complete power of a nation within its own territories must be traced up to the consent of the nation itself. They can flow from no other legitimate source. This consent may be either express or implied. In the latter case, it is less determinate, exposed more to the uncertainties of construction; but, if understood, not less obligatory.

7 Cranch 136.

He then stated, and supported by argument and illustration, the propositions that

this full and absolute territorial jurisdiction, being alike the attribute of every sovereign, and being incapable of conferring extraterritorial power,

has

given rise to a class of cases in which every sovereign is understood to waive the exercise of a part of that complete exclusive territorial jurisdiction which has been stated to be the attribute of every nation

-- the first of which is the exemption from arrest or detention of the person of a foreign sovereign entering its territory with its license, because

a foreign sovereign is not understood as intending to subject himself to a jurisdiction incompatible with his dignity and the dignity of his nation; . . . a second case, standing on the same principles with the first, is the immunity which all civilized nations allow to foreign ministers; . . . a third case, in which a sovereign is understood to cede a portion of his territorial jurisdiction, is where he allows the troops of a foreign prince to pass through his dominions;

and, in conclusion, that

a public armed ship, in the service of a foreign sovereign with whom the Government of the United States is at peace and having entered an American port open for her reception, on the terms on which ships of war are generally permitted to enter the ports of a friendly power, must be considered as having come into the American territory under an implied promise that, while necessarily within it, and demeaning herself in a friendly [p685] manner, she should be exempt from the jurisdiction of the country.

7 Cranch 137-139, 147.

As to the immunity of a foreign minister, he said:

Whatever may be the principle on which this immunity is established, whether we consider him as in the place of the sovereign he represents or, by a political fiction, suppose him to be extraterritorial, and therefore, in point of law, not within the jurisdiction of the sovereign at whose court he resides, still the immunity itself is granted by the governing power of the nation to which the minister is deputed. This fiction of exterritoriality could not be erected and supported against the will of the sovereign of the territory. He is supposed to assent to it. . . . The assent of the sovereign to the very important and extensive exemptions from territorial jurisdiction which are admitted to attach to foreign ministers is implied from the considerations that, without such exemption, every sovereign would hazard his own dignity by employing a public minister abroad. His minister would owe temporary and local allegiance to a foreign prince, and would be less competent to the objects of his mission. A sovereign committing the interests of his nation with a foreign power to the care of a person whom he has selected for that purpose, cannot intend to subject his minister in any degree to that power; and therefore, a consent to receive him implies a consent that he shall possess those privileges which his principal intended he should retain -- privileges which are essential to the dignity of his sovereign and to the duties he is bound to perform.

7 Cranch 138, 139.

The reasons for not allowing to other aliens exemption "from the jurisdiction of the country in which they are found" were stated as follows:

When private individuals of one nation spread themselves through another as business or caprice may direct, mingling indiscriminately with the inhabitants of that other, or when merchant vessels enter for the purposes of trade, it would be obviously inconvenient and dangerous to society, and would subject the laws to continual infraction and the government to degradation, if such individuals or merchants did not owe temporary and local allegiance, and were [p686] not amenable to the jurisdiction of the country. Nor can the foreign sovereign have any motive for wishing such exemption. His subjects thus passing into foreign counties are not employed by him, nor are they engaged in national pursuits. Consequently there are powerful motives for not exempting persons of this description from the jurisdiction of the country in which they are found, and no one motive for requiring it. The implied license, therefore, under which they enter can never be construed to grant such exemption.

7 Cranch 144.

In short, the judgment in the case of The Exchange declared, as incontrovertible principles, that the jurisdiction of every nation within its own territory is exclusive and absolute, and is susceptible of no limitation not imposed by the nation itself; that all exceptions to its full and absolute territorial jurisdiction must be traced up to its own consent, express or implied; that, upon its consent to cede, or to waive the exercise of, a part of its territorial jurisdiction rest the exemptions from that jurisdiction of foreign sovereigns or their armies entering its territory with its permission, and of their foreign ministers and public ships of war, and that the implied license under which private individuals of another nation enter the territory and mingle indiscriminately with its inhabitants for purposes of business or pleasure can never be construed to grant to them an exemption from the jurisdiction of the country in which they are found. See also Carlisle v. United States (1872), 16 Wall. 147, 155; Radich v. Hutchins (1877), 95 U.S. 210; Wildenhus' Case (1887), 120 U.S. 1; Chae Chan Ping v. United States (1889), 130 U.S. 581, 603, 604.

From the first organization of the National Government under the Constitution, the naturalization acts of the United States, in providing for the admission of aliens to citizenship by judicial proceedings, uniformly required every applicant to have resided for a certain time "within the limits and under the jurisdiction of the United States," and thus applied the words "under the jurisdiction of the United States" to aliens residing here before they had taken an oath to support the Constitution of the United States, or had renounced allegiance [p687] to a foreign government. Acts of March 26, 1790, c. 3; January 29, 1795, c. 20, § 1; June 18, 1798, c. 54, §§ 1, 6; 1 Stat. 103, 414, 566, 568; April 14, 1802, c. 28, § 1, 2 Stat. 153; March 22, 1816, c. 32, § 1; 3 Stat. 258; May 24, 1828, c. 116, § 2; 4 Stat. 310; Rev.Stat. § 2165. And, from 1795, the provisions of those acts which granted citizenship to foreign-born children of American parents described such children as "born out of the limits and jurisdiction of the United States." Acts of January 29, 1795, c. 20, § 3; 1 Stat. 415; April 14, 180, c. 28, § 4; 2 Stat. 155; February 10, 1855, c. 71; 10 Stat. 604; Rev.Stat. §§ 1993, 2172. Thus, Congress, when dealing with the question of citizenship in that aspect, treated aliens residing in this country as " under the jurisdiction of the United States," and American parents residing abroad as "out of the jurisdiction of the United States."

The words "in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof" in the first sentence of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution must be presumed to have been understood and intended by the Congress which proposed the Amendment, and by the legislatures which adopted it, in the same sense in which the like words had been used by Chief Justice Marshall in the well known case of The Exchange and as the equivalent of the words "within the limits and under the jurisdiction of the United States," and the converse of the words "out of the limits and jurisdiction of the United States" as habitually used in the naturalization acts. This presumption is confirmed by the use of the word "jurisdiction" in the last clause of the same section of the Fourteenth Amendment, which forbids any State to "deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." It is impossible to construe the words "subject to the jurisdiction thereof" in the opening sentence, as less comprehensive than the words "within its jurisdiction" in the concluding sentence of the same section; or to hold that persons "within the jurisdiction" of one of the States of the Union are not "subject to the jurisdiction of the United States."

These considerations confirm the view, already expressed in this opinion, that the opening sentence of the Fourteenth [p688] Amendment is throughout affirmative and declaratory, intended to allay doubts and to settle controversies which had arisen, and not to impose any new restrictions upon citizenship.

By the Civil Rights Act of 1866, "all persons born in the United States, and not subject to any foreign power, excluding Indians not taxed," were declared to be citizens of the United States. In the light of the law as previously established, and of the history of the times, it can hardly be doubted that the words of that act, "not subject to any foreign power," were not intended to exclude any children born in this country from the citizenship which would theretofore have been their birthright, or, for instance, for the first time in our history, to deny the right of citizenship to native-born children of foreign white parents not in the diplomatic service of their own country nor in hostile occupation of part of our territory. But any possible doubt in this regard was removed when the negative words of the Civil Rights Act, "not subject to any foreign power," gave way, in the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution, to the affirmative words, "subject to the jurisdiction of the United States."

This sentence of the Fourteenth Amendment is declaratory of existing rights and affirmative of existing law as to each of the qualifications therein expressed -- "born in the United States," "naturalized in the United States," and "subject to the jurisdiction thereof" -- in short, as to everything relating to the acquisition of citizenship by facts occurring within the limits of the United States. But it has not touched the acquisition of citizenship by being born abroad of American parents, and has left that subject to be regulated, as it had always been, by Congress in the exercise of the power conferred by the Constitution to establish an uniform rule of naturalization.

The effect of the enactments conferring citizenship on foreign-born children of American parents has been defined, and the fundamental rule of citizenship by birth within the dominion of the United States, notwithstanding alienage of parents, has been affirmed, in well considered opinions of the executive departments of the Government since the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution. [p689]

In 1869, Attorney General Hoar gave to Mr. Fish, the Secretary of State, an opinion that children born and domiciled abroad whose fathers were native-born citizens of the United States and had at some time resided therein were, under the .statute of February 10, 1855, c. 71, citizens of the United States, and

entitled to all the privileges of citizenship which it is in the power of the United States Government to confer. Within the sovereignty and jurisdiction of this nation, they are undoubtedly entitled to all the privileges of citizens. . . . But,

the Attorney General added,

while the United States may, by law, fix or declare the conditions constituting citizens of the country within its own territorial jurisdiction, and may confer the rights of American citizens everywhere upon persons who are not rightfully subject to the authority of any foreign country or government, it is clear that the United States cannot, by undertaking to confer the rights of citizenship upon the subjects of a foreign nation who have not come within our territory, interfere with the just rights of such nation to the government and control of its own subjects. If, therefore, by the laws of the country of their birth, children of American citizens born in that country are subjects of its government, I do not think that it is competent to the United States, by any legislation, to interfere with that relation or, by undertaking to extend to them the rights of citizens of this country, to interfere with the allegiance which they may owe to the country of their birth while they continue within its territory, or to change the relation to other foreign nations which, by reason of their place of birth, may at any time exist. The rule of the common law I understand to be that a person "born in a strange country, under the obedience of a strange prince or country, is an alien" (Co.Lit. 128b), and that every person owes allegiance to the country of his birth.

13 Opinions of Attorneys General 89-91.

In 1871, Mr. Fish, writing to Mr. Marsh, the American Minister to Italy, said:

The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution declares that "all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States." This is simply an affirmance [p690] of the common law of England and of this country so far as it asserts the status of citizenship to be fixed by the place of nativity, irrespective of parentage. The qualification, "and subject to the jurisdiction thereof" was probably intended to exclude the children of foreign ministers, and of other persons who may be within our territory with rights of extraterritoriality.

2 Whart.Int.Dig. p. 394.

In August, 1873, President Grant, in the exercise of the authority expressly conferred upon the President by art. 2, sect. 2, of the Constitution to

require the opinion, in writing, of the principal officer in each of the executive departments, upon any subject relating to the duties of their respective offices,

required the opinions of the members of his cabinet upon several questions of allegiance, naturalization and expatriation. Mr. Fish, in his opinion, which is entitled to much weight as well from the circumstances under which it was rendered as from its masterly treatment of the subject, said:

Every independent State has as one of the incidents of its sovereignty the right of municipal legislation and jurisdiction over all persons within its territory, and may therefore change their nationality by naturalization, and this without regard to the municipal laws of the country whose subjects are so naturalized, as long as they remain, or exercise the rights conferred by naturalization, within the territory and jurisdiction of the State which grants it.

It may also endow with the rights and privileges of its citizenship persons residing in other countries so as to entitle them to all rights of property and of succession within its limits, and also with political privileges and civil rights to be enjoyed or exercised within the territory and jurisdiction of the State thus conferring its citizenship.

But no sovereignty can extend its jurisdiction beyond it own territorial limits so as to relieve those born under and subject to another jurisdiction from their obligations or duties thereto, nor can the municipal law of one State interfere with the duties or obligations which its citizens incur while voluntarily resident in such foreign State and without the jurisdiction of their own country. [p691]

It is evident from the proviso in the act of 10th February, 1855, viz., "that the rights of citizenship shall not descend to persons whose fathers never resided in the United States," that the lawmaking power not only had in view this limit to the efficiency of its own municipal enactments in foreign jurisdiction, but that it has conferred only a qualified citizenship upon the children of American fathers born without the jurisdiction of the United States, and has denied to them what pertains to other American citizens -- the right of transmitting citizenship to their children -- unless they shall have made themselves residents of the United States or, in the language of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution, have made themselves "subject to the jurisdiction thereof."

The child born of alien parents in the United States is held to be a citizen thereof, and to be subject to duties with regard to this country which do not attach to the father.

The same principle on which such children are held by us to be citizens of the United States, and to be subject to duties to this country, applies to the children of American fathers born without the jurisdiction of the United States, and entitles the country within whose jurisdiction they are born to claim them as citizen and to subject them to duties to it.

Such children are born to a double character: the citizenship of the father is that of the child so far as the laws of the country of which the father is a citizen are concerned, and within the jurisdiction of that country; but the child, from the circumstances of his birth, may acquire rights and owes another fealty besides that which attaches to the father.

Opinions of the Executive Departments on Expatriation, Naturalization and Allegiance (1873) 17, 18; U.S. Foreign Relations, 1873-74, pp. 1191, 1192.

In 1886, upon the application of a son born in France of an American citizen, and residing in France, for a passport, Mr. Bayard, the Secretary of State, as appears by letters from him to the Secretary of Legation in Paris and from the latter to the applicant, quoted and adopted the conclusions of Attorney General Hoar in his opinion above cited. U.S. Foreign Relations, 1886, p 303; 2 Calvo Droit International, § 546. [p692]

These opinions go to show that, since the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment, the executive branch of the Government, the one charged with the duty of protecting American citizens abroad against unjust treatment by other nations, has taken the same view of the act of Congress of 1855, declaring children born abroad of American citizens to be themselves citizens, which, as mentioned in a former part of this opinion, the British Foreign Office has taken of similar acts of Parliament -- holding that such statutes cannot, consistently with our own established rule of citizenship by birth in this country, operate extraterritorially so far as to relieve any person born and residing in a foreign country and subject to its government, from his allegiance to that country.

In a very recent case, the Supreme Court of New Jersey held that a person born in this country of Scotch parents who were domiciled but had not been naturalized here was "subject to the jurisdiction of the United States" within the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment, and was "not subject to any foreign power" within the meaning of the Civil Rights Act of 1866; and, in an opinion delivered by Justice Van Syckel with the concurrence of Chief Justice Beasley, said:

The object of the Fourteenth Amendment, as is well known, was to confer upon the colored race the right of citizenship. It, however, gave to the colored people no right superior to that granted to the white race. The ancestors of all the colored people then in the United States were of foreign birth, and could not have been naturalized or in any way have become entitled to the right of citizenship. The colored people were no more subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, by reason of their birth here, than were the white children born in this country of parents who were not citizens. The same rule must be applied to both races, and unless the general rule, that, when the parents are domiciled here, birth establishes the right to citizenship, is accepted, the Fourteenth Amendment has failed to accomplish its purpose, and the colored people are not citizens. The Fourteenth Amendment, by the language, "all persons born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof," was intended [p693] to bring all races, without distinction of color, within the rule which prior to that time pertained to the white race.

Benny v. O'Brien (1895), 29 Vroom (58 N.J.Law), 36, 39, 40.

The foregoing considerations and authorities irresistibly lead us to these conclusions: the Fourteenth Amendment affirms the ancient and fundamental rule of citizenship by birth within the territory, in the allegiance and under the protection of the country, including all children here born of resident aliens, with the exceptions or qualifications (as old as the rule itself) of children of foreign sovereigns or their ministers, or born on foreign public ships, or of enemies within and during a hostile occupation of part of our territory, and with the single additional exception of children of members of the Indian tribes owing direct allegiance to their several tribes. The Amendment, in clear words and in manifest intent, includes the children born, within the territory of the United States, of all other persons, of whatever race or color, domiciled within the United States. Every citizen or subject of another country, while domiciled here, is within the allegiance and the protection, and consequently subject to the jurisdiction, of the United States. His allegiance to the United States is direct and immediate, and, although but local and temporary, continuing only so long as he remains within our territory, is yet, in the words of Lord Coke in Calvin's Case, 7 Rep. 6a, "strong enough to make a natural subject, for if he hath issue here, that issue is a natural-born subject;" and his child, as said by Mr. Binney in his essay before quoted, "if born in the country, is as much a citizen as the natural-born child of a citizen, and by operation of the same principle." It can hardly be denied that an alien is completely subject to the political jurisdiction of the country in which he resides -- seeing that, as said by Mr. Webster, when Secretary of State, in his Report to the President on Thrasher's Case in 1851, and since repeated by this court,

independently of a residence with intention to continue such residence; independently of any domiciliation; independently of the taking of any oath of allegiance or of renouncing any former allegiance, it is well known that, by the public law, an alien, or a stranger [p694] born, for so long a time as he continues within the dominions of a foreign government, owes obedience to the laws of that government, and may be punished for treason, or other crimes, as a native-born subject might be, unless his case is varied by some treaty stipulations.

Ex.Doc. H.R. No. 10, 1st sess. 32d Congress, p. 4; 6 Webster's Works, 56; United States v. Carlisle, 16 Wall. 147, 155; Calvin's Case, 7 Rep. 6a; Ellesmere on Postnati 63; 1 Hale P.C. 62; 4 Bl.Com. 92.

To hold that the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution excludes from citizenship the children, born in the United States, of citizens or subjects of other countries would be to deny citizenship to thousands of persons of English, Scotch, Irish, German, or other European parentage who have always been considered and treated as citizens of the United States.

VI. Whatever considerations, in the absence of a controlling provision of the Constitution, might influence the legislative or the executive branch of the Government to decline to admit persons of the Chinese race to the status of citizens of the United States, there are none that can constrain or permit the judiciary to refuse to give full effect to the peremptory and explicit language of the Fourteenth Amendment, which declares and ordains that "All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States."

Chinese persons, born out of the United States, remaining subjects of the Emperor of China, and not having become citizens of the United States, are entitled to the protection of, and owe allegiance to, the United States so long as they are permitted by the United States to reside here, and are " subject to the jurisdiction thereof" in the same sense as all other aliens residing in the United States. Yick Wo v. Hopkins (1886), 118 U.S. 356; Law Ow Bew v. United States 144 U.S. 47, 61, 62; Fong Yue Ting v. United States (1893), 149 U.S. 698, 724; Lem Moon Sing v. United States (1893), 158 U.S. 538, 547; Wong Wing v. United States (1896), 163 U.S. 228, 238.

In Yick Wo v. Hopkins, the decision was that an ordinance [p695] of the city of San Francisco, regulating a certain business, and which, as executed by the board of supervisors, made an arbitrary discrimination between natives of China, still subjects of the Emperor of China, but domiciled in the United States, and all other persons was contrary to the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution. Mr. Justice Matthews, in delivering the opinion of the Court, said:

The rights of the petitioners, as affected by the proceedings of which they complain, are not less because they are aliens and subjects of the Emperor of China. . . . The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution is not confined to the protection of citizens. It says,

Nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

These provisions are universal in their application to all persons within the territorial jurisdiction, without regard to any differences of race, of color, or of nationality, and the equal protection of the laws is a pledge of the protection of equal laws. It is accordingly enacted, by § 1977 of the Revised Statutes, that

all persons within the jurisdiction of the United States shall have the same right in every State and Territory to make and enforce contracts, to sue, be parties, give evidence, and to the full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings for the security of persons and property, as is enjoyed by white citizens, and shall be subject to like punishment, pains, penalties, taxes, licenses and exactions of every kind, and to no other.

The questions we have to consider and decide in these cases, therefore, are to be treated as involving the rights of every citizen of the United States, equally with those of the strangers and aliens who now invoke the jurisdiction of this court.

118 U.S. 368, 369. The manner in which reference was made, in the passage above quoted, to § 1977 of the Revised Statutes shows that the change of phrase in that section, reenacting § 16 of the statute of May 31, 1870, c. 114, 16 Stat. 144, as compared with § 1 of the Civil Rights Act of 1866 -- by substituting, for the words in that act, "of every race and color," the words, "within the jurisdiction of the United States" -- was not [p696] considered as making the section, as it now stands, less applicable to persons of every race and color and nationality than it was in its original form, and is hardly consistent with attributing any narrower meaning to the words "subject to the jurisdiction thereof" in the first sentence of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution, which may itself have been the cause of the change in the phraseology of that provision of the Civil Rights Act.

The decision in ck Yick Wo v. Hopkins, indeed, did not directly pass upon the effect of these words in the Fourteenth Amendment, but turned upon subsequent provisions of the same section. But, as already observed, it is impossible to attribute to the words, "subject to the jurisdiction thereof," that is to say, of the United States, at the beginning a less comprehensive meaning than to the words "within its jurisdiction," that is, of the State, at the end of the same section; or to hold that persons, who are indisputably "within the jurisdiction" of the State, are not "subject to the jurisdiction" of the Nation.

It necessarily follows that persons born in China, subjects of the Emperor of China but domiciled in the United States, having been adjudged, in Yick Wo v. Hopkins to be within the jurisdiction of the State within the meaning of the concluding sentence, must be held to be subject to the jurisdiction of the United States within the meaning of the first sentence of this section of the Constitution, and their children "born in the United States" cannot be less "subject to the jurisdiction thereof."

Accordingly, in Quock Ting v. United States (1891), 140 U.S. 417, which, like the case at bar, was a writ of habeas corpus to test the lawfulness of the exclusion of a Chinese person who alleged that he was a citizen of the United States by birth, it was assumed on all hands that a person of the Chinese race, born in the United States, was a citizen of the United States. The decision turned upon the failure of the petitioner to prove that he was born in this country, and the question at issue was, as stated in the opinion of the majority of the court, delivered by Mr. Justice Field, "whether the evidence was sufficient to show that the petitioner was a citizen of the [p697] United States," or, as stated by Mr. Justice Brewer in his dissenting opinion, "whether the petitioner was born in this country or not." 140 U.S. 419, 423.

In State v. Ah Chew (1881), 16 Nevada 50, 58, the Supreme Court of Nevada said: "The Amendments did not confer the right of citizenship upon the Mongolian race, except such as are born within the United States." In the courts of the United States in the Ninth Circuit, it has been uniformly held, in a series of opinions delivered by Mr. Justice Field, Judge Sawyer, Judge Deady, Judge Hanford, and Judge Morrow, that a child born in the United States of Chinese parents, subjects of the Emperor of China, is a native-born citizen of the United States. In re Look Tin Sing (1884), 10 Sawyer 358; Ex parte Chin King (1888), 13 Sawyer 333; In re Yung Sing Hee (1888) 13 Sawyer 482; In re Wy Shing (1888), 13 Sawyer 530; Gee Fook Sing v. United States (1892), 7 U.S.App. 7; In re Wong Kim Arm (1896), 71 Fed.Rep. 38. And we are not aware of any judicial decision to the contrary.

During the debates in the Senate in January and February, 1866, upon the Civil Rights Bill, Mr. Trumbull, the chairman of the committee which reported the bill, moved to amend the first sentence thereof so as to read,

All persons born in the United States, and not subject to any foreign power, are hereby declared to be citizens of the United States, without distinction of color.

Mr. Cowan, of Pennsylvania, asked, "Whether it will not have the effect of naturalizing the children of Chinese and Gypsies born in this country?" Mr. Trumbull answered, "Undoubtedly," and asked, "is not the child born in this country of German parents a citizen?" Mr. Cowan replied, "The children of German parents are citizens; but Germans are not Chinese." Mr. Trumbull rejoined: "The law makes no such distinction, and the child of an Asiatic is just as much a citizen as the child of a European." Mr. Reverdy Johnson suggested that the words, "without distinction of color," should be omitted as unnecessary, and said:

The amendment, as it stands, is that all persons born in the United States, and not subject to a foreign power, shall, by virtue of birth, be citizens. To that I am willing to consent, [p698] and that comprehends all persons, without any reference to race or color, who may be so born.

And Mr. Trumbull agreed that striking out those words would make no difference in the meaning, but thought it better that they should be retained to remove all possible doubt. Congressional Globe, 39th Congress, 1st sess. pt. 1, pp. 498, 573, 574.

The Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution, as originally framed by the House of Representatives, lacked the opening sentence. When it came before the Senate in May, 1866, Mr. Howard, of Michigan, moved to amend by prefixing the sentence in its present form (less the words "or naturalized"), and reading,

All persons born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State herein they reside.

Mr. Cowan objected upon the ground that the Mongolian race ought to be excluded, and said:

Is the child of the Chinese immigrant in California a citizen? . . . I do not know how my honorable friend from California looks upon Chinese, but I do know how some of his fellow citizens regard them. I have no doubt that now they are useful, and I have no doubt that, within proper restraints, allowing that State and the other Pacific States to manage them as they may see fit, they may be useful; but I would not tie their hands by the Constitution of the United States so as to prevent them hereafter from dealing with them as in their wisdom they see fit.

Mr. Conness, of California, replied:

The proposition before us relates simply, in that respect, to the children begotten of Chinese parents in California, and it is proposed to declare that they shall be citizens. We have declared that by law; now it is proposed to incorporate the same provision in the fundamental instrument of the Nation. I am in favor of doing so. I voted for the proposition to declare that the children of all parentage whatever, born in California, should be regarded and treated as citizens of the United States, entitled to equal civil rights with other citizens of the United States. . . . We are entirely ready to accept the provision proposed in this Constitutional Amendment that the children born here of Mongolian parents shall be declared by the Constitution of [p699] the United States to be entitled to civil rights and to equal protection before the law with others.

Congressional Globe, 39th Congress, 1st sess. pt. 4, pp. 2890-2892. It does not appear to have been suggested in either House of Congress that children born in the United States of Chinese parents would not come within the terms and effect of the leading sentence of the Fourteenth Amendment.

Doubtless, the intention of the Congress which framed and of the States which adopted this Amendment of the Constitution must be sought in the words of the Amendment, and the debates in Congress are not admissible as evidence to control the meaning of those words. But the statements above quoted are valuable as contemporaneous opinions of jurists and statesmen upon the legal meaning of the words themselves, and are, at the least, interesting as showing that the application of the Amendment to the Chinese race was considered, and not overlooked.

The acts of Congress known as the Chinese Exclusion Acts, the earliest of which was passed some fourteen years after the adoption of the Constitutional Amendment, cannot control its meaning or impair its effect, but must be construed and executed in subordination to its provisions. And the right of the United States, as exercised by and under those acts, to exclude or to expel from the country persons of the Chinese race born in China and continuing to be subjects of the Emperor of China, though having acquired a commercial domicil in the United States, has been upheld by this court for reasons applicable to all aliens alike, and inapplicable to citizens of whatever race or color. Chae Chan Ping v. United States, 130 U.S. 581; Nishimura Ekiu v. United States, 142 U.S. 651; Fong Yue Ting v. United States, 149 U.S. 698; Lem Moon Sing v. United States, 158 U.S. 538; Wong Wing v. United States, 163 U.S. 228.

In Fong Yue Ting v. United States, the right of the United States to expel such Chinese persons was placed upon the grounds that the right to exclude or to expel all aliens, or any class of aliens, absolutely or upon certain conditions, is an inherent and inalienable right of every sovereign and independent [p700] nation, essential to its safety, its independence and its welfare; that the power to exclude or to expel aliens, being a power affecting international relations, is vested in the political departments of the Government and is to be regulated by treaty or by act of Congress and to be executed by the executive authority according to the regulations so established, except so far as the judicial department has been authorized by treaty or by statute, or is required by the paramount law of the Constitution, to intervene; that the power to exclude and the power to expel aliens rest upon one foundation, are derived from one source, are supported by the same reasons, and are in truth but parts of one and the same power; and, therefore, that the power of Congress to expel, like the power to exclude aliens, or any specified class of aliens, from the country, may be exercised entirely through executive officers; or Congress may call in the aid of the judiciary to ascertain any contested facts on which an alien's right to be in the country has been made by Congress to depend. 149 U.S. 711, 713, 714.

In Lem Moon Sing v. United States, the same principles were reaffirmed, and were applied to a Chinese person, born in China, who had acquired a commercial domicil in the United States and who, having voluntarily left the country on a temporary visit to China, and with the intention of returning to and continuing his residence in this country, claimed the right under a statute or treaty to reenter it, and the distinction between the right of an alien to the protection of the Constitution and laws of the United States for his person and property while within the jurisdiction thereof, and his claim of a right to reenter the United States after a visit to his native land, was expressed by the court as follows:

He is nonetheless an alien because of his having a commercial domicil in this country. While he lawfully remains here, he is entitled to the benefit of the guaranties of life, liberty and property, secured by the Constitution to all persons, of whatever race, within the jurisdiction of the United States. His personal rights when he is in this country, and such of his property as is here during his absence, are as fully protected by the supreme law of the land as if he were a native or [p701] naturalized citizen of the United States. But when he has voluntarily gone from the country, and is beyond its jurisdiction, being an alien, he cannot reenter the United States in violation of the will of the Government as expressed in enactments of the lawmaking power.

158 U.S. 547, 548.

It is true that Chinese persons born in China cannot be naturalized, like other aliens, by proceedings under the naturalization laws. But this is for want of any statute or treaty authorizing or permitting such naturalization, as will appear by tracing the history of the statutes, treaties and decisions upon that subject -- always bearing in mind that statutes enacted by Congress, as well as treaties made by the President and Senate, must yield to the paramount and supreme law of the Constitution.

The power, granted to Congress by the Constitution, "to establish an uniform rule of naturalization" was long ago adjudged by this court to be vested exclusively in Congress. Chirac v. Chirac (1817), 2 Wheat. 259. For many years after the establishment of the original Constitution, and until two years after the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment, Congress never authorized the naturalization of any but "free white persons." Acts of March 26, 1790, c. 3, and January 29, 1795, c. 20; 1 Stat. 103, 414; April 14, 1802, c. 28, and March 26, 1804, c. 47; 2 Stat. 153, 292; March 22, 1816, c. 32; 3 Stat. 258; May 26, 1824, c. 186, and May 24, 1828, c. 116; 4 Stat. 69, 310. By the treaty between the United States and China, made July 28, 1868, and promulgated February 5, 1870, it was provided that

nothing herein contained shall be held to confer naturalization upon citizens of the United States in China, nor upon the subjects of China in the United States.

16 Stat. 740. By the act of July 14, 1870, c. 254, § 7, for the first time, the naturalization laws were "extended to aliens of African nativity and to persons of African descent." 16 Stat. 256. This extension, as embodied in the Revised Statutes, took the form of providing that those laws should "apply to aliens [being free white persons, and to aliens] of African nativity and to persons of African descent;" and it was amended by the act of February [p702] 18, 1875, c. 80, by inserting the words above printed in brackets. Rev.Stat. (2d ed.) § 2169; 18 Stat. 318. Those statutes were held, by the Circuit Court of the United States in California, not to embrace Chinese aliens. In re Ah Yup (1878), 5 Sawyer 155. And by the act of May 6, 1882, c. 126, § 14, it was expressly enacted that "hereafter no state court or court of the United States shall admit Chinese to citizenship." 22 Stat. 61.

In Fong Yue Ting v. United States (1893), above cited, this court said:

Chinese persons not born in this country have never been recognized as citizens of the United States, nor authorized to become such under the naturalization laws.

149 U.S. 716.

The Convention between the United States and China of 1894 provided that

Chinese laborers or Chinese of any other class, either permanently or temporarily residing in the United States, shall have for the protection of their persons and property all rights that are given by the laws of the United States to citizens of the most favored nation, excepting the right to become naturalized citizens.

28 Stat. 111. And it has since been decided, by the same judge who held this appellee to be a citizen of the United States by virtue of his birth therein, that a native of China of the Mongolian race could not be admitted to citizenship under the naturalization laws. In re Gee Hop (1895), 71 Fed.Rep. 274.

The Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution, in the declaration that

all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside,

contemplates two sources of citizenship, and two only: birth and naturalization. Citizenship by naturalization can only be acquired by naturalization under the authority and in the forms of law. But citizenship by birth is established by the mere fact of birth under the circumstances defined in the Constitution. Every person born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, becomes at once a citizen of the United States, and needs no naturalization. A person born out of the jurisdiction of the United States can only become a citizen by being naturalized, either by treaty, as in the case [p703] of the annexation of foreign territory, or by authority of Congress, exercised either by declaring certain classes of persons to be citizens, as in the enactments conferring citizenship upon foreign-born children of citizens, or by enabling foreigners individually to become citizens by proceedings in the judicial tribunals, as in the ordinary provisions of the naturalization acts.

The power of naturalization, vested in Congress by the Constitution, is a power to confer citizenship, not a power to take it away. "A naturalized citizen," said Chief Justice Marshall,

becomes a member of the society, possessing all the rights of a native citizen, and standing, in the view of the Constitution, on the footing of a native. The Constitution does not authorize Congress to enlarge or abridge those rights. The simple power of the National Legislature is to prescribe a uniform rule of naturalization, and the exercise of this power exhausts it so far as respects the individual. The Constitution then takes him up, and, among other rights, extends to him the capacity of suing in the courts of the United States, precisely under the same circumstances under which a native might sue.

Osborn v. United States Bank, 9 Wheat. 738, 827. Congress having no power to abridge the rights conferred by the Constitution upon those who have become naturalized citizens by virtue of acts of Congress, a fortiori no act or omission of Congress, as to providing for the naturalization of parents or children of a particular race, can affect citizenship acquired as a birthright, by virtue of the Constitution itself, without any aid of legislation. The Fourteenth Amendment, while it leaves the power where it was before, in Congress, to regulate naturalization, has conferred no authority upon Congress to restrict the effect of birth, declared by the Constitution to constitute a sufficient and complete right to citizenship.

No one doubts that the Amendment, as soon as it was promulgated, applied to persons of African descent born in the United States, wherever the birthplace of their parents might have been, and yet, for two years afterwards, there was no statute authorizing persons of that race to be naturalized. If the omission or the refusal of Congress to permit certain [p704] classes of persons to be made citizens by naturalization could be allowed the effect of correspondingly restricting the classes of persons who should become citizens.by birth, it would be in the power of Congress, at any time, by striking negroes out of the naturalization laws, and limiting those laws, as they were formerly limited, to white persons only, to defeat the main purpose of the Constitutional Amendment.

The fact, therefore, that acts of Congress or treaties have not permitted Chinese persons born out of this country to become citizens by naturalization, cannot exclude Chinese persons born in this country from the operation of the broad and clear words of the Constitution, "All persons born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States."

VII. Upon the facts agreed in this case, the American citizenship which Wong Kim Ark acquired by birth within the United States has not been lost or taken away by anything happening since his birth. No doubt he might himself, after coming of age, renounce this citizenship and become a citizen of the country of his parents, or of any other country; for, by our law, as solemnly declared by Congress, "the right of expatriation is a natural and inherent right of all people," and

any declaration, instruction, opinion, order or direction of any officer of the United States which denies, restricts, impairs or questions the right of expatriation, is declared inconsistent with the fundamental principles of the Republic.

Rev.Stat. § 1999, reenacting act of July 7, 1868, c. 249, § 1; 15 Stat. 223, 224. Whether any act of himself or of his parents during his minority could have the same effect is at least doubtful. But it would be out of place to pursue that inquiry, inasmuch as it is expressly agreed that his residence has always been in the United States, and not elsewhere; that each of his temporary visits to China, the one for some months when he was about seventeen years old, and the other for something like a year about the time of his coming of age, was made with the intention of returning, and was followed by his actual return, to the United States, and

that said Wong Kim Ark has not, either by himself or his parents acting [p705] for him, ever renounced his allegiance to the United States, and that he has never done or committed any act or thing to exclude him therefrom.

The evident intention, and the necessary effect, of the submission of this case to the decision of the court upon the facts agreed by the parties were to present for determination the single question stated at the beginning of this opinion, namely, whether a child born in the United States, of parent of Chinese descent, who, at the time of his birth, are subjects of the Emperor of China, but have a permanent domicil and residence in the United States, and are there carrying on business, and are not employed in any diplomatic or official capacity under the Emperor of China, becomes at the time of his birth a citizen of the United States. For the reasons above stated, this court is of opinion that the question must be answered in the affirmative.

Order affirmed.

TOP Dissent

FULLER, C.J., Dissenting Opinion

MR. CHIEF JUSTICE FULLER, with whom concurred MR. JUSTICE HARLAN dissenting.

I cannot concur in the opinion and judgment of the court in this case.

The proposition is that a child born in this country of parents who were not citizens of the United States, and under the laws of their own country and of the United States could not become such -- as was the fact from the beginning of the Government in respect of the class of aliens to which the parents in this instance belonged -- is, from the moment of his birth a citizen of the United States by virtue of the first clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, any act of Congress to the contrary notwithstanding.

The argument is, that, although the Constitution prior to that amendment nowhere attempted to define the words "citizens of the United States" and "natural-born citizen" as used therein, yet that it must be interpreted in the light of the English common law rule which made the place of birth the criterion of nationality; that that rule

was in force in all [p706] the English colonies upon this continent down to the time of the Declaration of Independence, and in the United States afterwards, and continued to prevail under the Constitution as originally established;

and

that, before the enactment of the Civil Rights Act of 1866 and the adoption of the Constitutional Amendment, all white persons, at least, born within the sovereignty of the United States, whether children of citizens or of foreigners, excepting only children of ambassadors or public ministers of a foreign Government, were native-born citizens of the United States.

Thus, the Fourteenth Amendment is held to be merely declaratory except that it brings all persons, irrespective of color, within the scope of the alleged rule, and puts that rule beyond he control of the legislative power.

If the conclusion of the majority opinion is correct, then the children of citizens of the United States, who have been born abroad since July 8, 1868, when the amendment was declared ratified, were, and are, aliens, unless they have, or shall on attaining majority, become citizens by naturalization in the United States, and no statutory provision to the contrary is of any force or effect. And children who are aliens by descent, but born on our soil, are exempted from the exercise of the power to exclude or to expel aliens, or any class of aliens, so often maintained by this court, an exemption apparently disregarded by the acts in respect of the exclusion of persons of Chinese descent.

The English common law rule, which it is insisted was in force after the Declaration of Independence, was that

every person born within the dominions of the Crown, no matter whether of English or of foreign parents, and, in the latter case, whether the parents were settled or merely temporarily sojourning in the country, was an English subject, save only the children of foreign ambassadors (who were excepted because their fathers carried their own nationality with them) or a child born to a foreigner during the hostile occupation of any part of the territories of England.

Cockburn on Nationality 7.

The tie which bound the child to the Crown was indissoluble. [p707] The nationality of his parents had no bearing on his nationality. Though born during a temporary stay of a few days, the child was irretrievably a British subject. Hall on Foreign Jurisdiction, etc., § 1.

The rule was the outcome of the connection in feudalism between the individual and the soil on which he lived, and the allegiance due was that of liegemen to their liege lord. It was not local and temporary, as was the obedience to the laws owed by aliens within the dominions of the Crown, but permanent and indissoluble, and not to be cancelled by any change of time or place or circumstances.

And it is this rule, pure and simple, which it is asserted determined citizenship of the United States during the entire period prior to the passage of the act of April 9, 1866, and the ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment, and governed the meaning of the words "citizen of the United States" and "natural-born citizen" used in the Constitution as originally framed and adopted. I submit that no such rule obtained during the period referred to, and that those words bore no such construction; that the act of April 9, 1866, expressed the contrary rule; that the Fourteenth Amendment prescribed the same rule as the act, and that, if that amendment bears the construction now put upon it, it imposed the English common law rule on this country for the first time, and made it "absolute and unbending" just as Great Britain was being relieved from its inconveniences.

Obviously, where the Constitution deals with common law rights and uses common law phraseology, its language should be read in the light of the common law; but when the question arises as to what constitutes citizenship of the nation, involving as it does international relations, and political, as contradistinguished from civil, status, international principles must be considered, and, unless the municipal law of England appears to have been affirmatively accepted, it cannot be allowed to control in the matter of construction.

Nationality is essentially a political idea, and belongs to the sphere of public law. Hence, Mr. Justice Story, in Shanks v. Dupont, 3 Pet. 242, 248, said that the incapacities of femes [p708] covert at common law

do not reach their political rights, nor prevent their acquiring or losing a national character. Those political rights do not stand upon the mere doctrines of municipal law, applicable to ordinary transactions, but stand upon the more general principles of the law of nations.

Twiss, in his work on the Law of actions, says that

natural allegiance, or the obligation of perpetual obedience to the government of a country wherein a man may happen to have been born, which he cannot forfeit, or cancel, or vary by any change of time or place or circumstance, is the creature of civil law, and finds no countenance in the law of nations, as it is in direct conflict with the incontestable rule of that law.

Vol. 1, p. 231.

Before the Revolution, the view of the publicists had been thus put by Vattel:

The natives, or natural-born citizens, are those born in the country of parents who are citizens. As the society cannot exist and perpetuate itself otherwise than by the children of the citizens, those children naturally follow the condition of their fathers, and succeed to all their rights. The society is supposed to desire this in consequence of what it owes to its own preservation, and it is presumed as matter of course that each citizen, on entering into society, reserves to his children the right of becoming members of it. The country of the fathers is therefore that of the children, and these become true citizens merely by their tacit consent. We shall soon see whether, on their coming to the years of discretion, they may renounce their right, and what they owe to the society in which they were born. I say that, in order to be of the country, it is necessary that a person be born of a father who is a citizen; for, if he is born there of a foreigner, it will be only the place of his birth, and not his country.

Book I, c.19, § 212.

The true bond which connects the child with the body politic is not the matter of an inanimate piece of land, but the moral relations of his parentage. . . . The place of birth produces no change in the rule that children follow the condition of their fathers, for it is not naturally the place of birth that gives rights, but extraction.

And to the same effect are the modern writers, as for instance, [p709] Bar, who says:

To what nation a person belongs is by the laws of all nations closely dependent on descent; it is almost an universal rule that the citizenship of the parents determines it -- that of the father where children are lawful, and, where they are bastards, that of their mother, without regard to the place of their birth, and that must necessarily be recognized as the correct canon, since nationality is, in its essence, dependent on descent.

Int.Law. § 31.

The framers of the Constitution were familiar with the distinctions between the Roman law and the feudal law, between obligations based on territoriality and those based on the personal and invisible character of origin, and there is nothing to show that, in the matter of nationality, they intended to adhere to principles derived from regal government, which they had just assisted in overthrowing.

Manifestly, when the sovereignty of the Crown was thrown off and an independent government established, every rule of the common law and every statute of England obtaining in the Colonies in derogation of the principles on which the new government was founded was abrogated.

The States, for all national purposes embraced in the Constitution, became one, united under the same sovereign authority and governed by the same laws, but they retained their jurisdiction over all persons and things within their territorial limits except where surrendered to the General Government or restrained by the Constitution, and protection to life, liberty and property rested primarily with them. So far as the jus commune, or folk-right, relating to the rights of persons was concerned, the Colonies regarded it as their birthright, and adopted such parts of it as they found applicable to their condition. Van Ness v. Pacard, 2 Pet. 137.

They became sovereign and independent States, and when the Republic was created, each of the thirteen States had its own local usages, customs and common law, while, in respect of the National Government, there necessarily was no general, independent and separate common law of the United States, nor has there ever been. Wheaton v. Peter, 8 Pet. 591, 658. [p710]

As to the jura corona, including therein the obligation of allegiance, the extent to which these ever were applicable in this country depended on circumstances, and it would seem quite clear that the rulemaking locality of birth, the criterion of citizenship because creating a permanent tie of allegiance, no more survived the American Revolution than the same rule survived the French Revolution.

Doubtless, before the latter event, in the progress of monarchical power, the rule which involved the principle of liege homage may have become the rule of Europe; but that idea never had any basis in the United States.

A Chief Justice Taney observed in Fleming v. Page, 9 How. 603, 618, though in a different connection:

It is true that most of the States have adopted the principles of English jurisprudence so far as it concerns private and individual rights. And when such rights are in question, we habitually refer to the English decisions not only with respect, but in many cases as authoritative. But in the distribution of political power between the great departments of government, there is such a wide difference between the power conferred on the President of the United States and the authority and sovereignty which belong to the English Crown that it would be altogether unsafe to reason from any supposed resemblance between them, either as regards conquest in war or any other subject where the rights and powers of the executive arm of the government are brought into question. Our own Constitution and form of government must be our only guide.

And Mr. Lawrence, in his edition of Wheaton (Lawrence's Wheaton, p. 920), makes this comment:

There is, it is believed, as great a difference between the territorial allegiance claimed by an hereditary sovereign on feudal principles and the personal right of citizenship participated in by all the members of the political community, according to American institutions, as there is between the authority and sovereignty of the Queen of England and the power of the American President, and the inapplicability of English precedents is as clear in the one case as in the other. The same view, with particular application to naturalization, was early taken by [p711] the American commentator on Blackstone. Tucker's Blackstone, Vol. 1, Pt. 2, Appx. p. 96.

Blackstone distinguished allegiance into two sorts, the one natural and perpetual, the other local and temporary. Natural allegiance, so-called, was allegiance resulting from birth in subjection to the Crown, and indelibility was an essential, vital and necessary characteristic.

The Royal Commission to inquire into the Laws of Naturalization and Allegiance was created May 21, 1868, and, in their report, the Commissioners, among other things, say:

The allegiance of a natural-born British subject is regarded by the Common Law as indelible. We are of opinion that this doctrine of the Common Law is neither reasonable nor convenient. It is at variance with those principles on which the rights and duties of a subject should be deemed to rest; it conflicts with that freedom of action which is now recognized as most conducive to the general good, as well as to individual happiness and prosperity, and it is especially inconsistent with the practice of a State which allows to its subjects absolute freedom of emigration.

However, the Commission, by a majority, declined to recommend the abandonment of the rule altogether, though "clearly of opinion that it ought not to be, as it now is, absolute and unbending;" but recommended certain modifications which were carried out in subsequent legislation.

But from the Declaration of Independence to this day, the United States have rejected the doctrine of indissoluble allegiance and maintained the general right of expatriation, to be exercised in subordination to the public interests and subject to regulation.

As early as the act of January 29, 1795, c. 20, 1 Stat. 414, applicants for naturalization were required to take not simply an oath to support the Constitution of the United States, but of absolute renunciation and abjuration of all allegiance and fidelity to every foreign prince or State, and particularly to the prince or State of which they were before the citizens or subjects.

The statute 3 Jac. 1, c. 4, provided that promising obedience [p712] to any other prince, State, or potentate subjected the person so doing to be adjudged a traitor, and to suffer the penalty of high treason, and in respect of the act of 1795, Lord Grenville wrote to our minister, Rufus King:

No British subject can, by such a form of renunciation as that which is prescribed in the American law of naturalization, divest himself of his allegiance to his sovereign. Such a declaration of renunciation made by any of the King's subjects would, instead of operating as a protection to them, be considered an act highly criminal on their part.

2 Amer.St.Pap. 19. And see Fitch v. Weber, 6 Hare 51.

Nevertheless, Congress has persisted from 1795 in rejecting the English rule and in requiring the alien who would become a citizen of the United States, in taking on himself the ties binding him to our Government, to affirmatively sever the ties that bound him to any other.

The subject was examined at length in 1856, in an opinion given the Secretary of State by Attorney General Cushing, 8 Opins.Attys.Gen. 139, where the views of the writers on international law and those expressed in cases in the Federal and state courts are largely set forth, and the Attorney General says:

The doctrine of absolute and perpetual allegiance, the root of the denial of any right of emigration, is inadmissible in the United States. It was a matter involved in, and settled for us by, the Revolution which founded the American Union.

Moreover, the right of expatriation, under fixed circumstances of time and of manner, being expressly asserted in the legislatures of several of the States and confirmed by decisions of their courts, must be considered as thus made a part of the fundamental law of the United States.

Expatriation included not simply the leaving of one's native country, but the becoming naturalized in the country adopted as a future residence. The emigration which the United States encouraged was that of those who could become incorporate with its people, make its flag their own, and aid in the accomplishment of a common destiny, and it was obstruction to such emigration that made one of the charges against the Crown in the Declaration. [p713]

Ainslie v. Martin, 9 Mass. 454, 460 (1813); Murray v. McCarty, 2 Munf. 393 (1811); Alsberry v. Hawkins, 9 Dana 177 (1839), are among the cases cited. In Ainslie v. Martin, the indelibility of allegiance according to the common law rule was maintained, while in Murray v. McCarty and Alberry v. Hawkins, the right of expatriation was recognized as a practical and fundamental doctrine of America. There was no uniform rule so far as the States were severally concerned, and none such assumed in respect of the United States.

In 1859, Attorney General Black thus advised the President (9 Op. 356):

The natural right of every free person who owes no debts and is not guilty of any crime to leave the country of his birth in good faith and for an honest purpose, the privilege of throwing off his natural allegiance and substituting another allegiance in its place -- the general right, in one word, of expatriation, is incontestable. I know that the common law of England denies it, that the judicial decisions of that country are opposed to it, and that some of our own courts, misled by British authority, have expressed, though not very decisively, the same pinion. But all this is very far from settling the question. The municipal code of England is not one of the sources from which we derive our knowledge of international law. We take it from natural reason and justice, from writers of known wisdom, and from the practice of civilized nations. All these are opposed to the doctrine of perpetual allegiance.

In the opinion of the Attorney General, the United States, in recognizing the right of expatriation, declined from the beginning to accept the view that rested the obligation of the citizen on feudal principles, and proceeded on the law of nations, which was in direct conflict therewith.

And the correctness of this conclusion was specifically affirmed not many years after, when the right, as the natural and inherent right of all people and fundamental in this country, was declared by Congress in the act of July 27, 1838, 15 Stat. 223, c. 249, carried forward into sections 1999 and 2000 of the Revised Statutes, in 1874. [p714]

It is beyond dispute that the most vital constituent of the English common law rule has always been rejected in respect of citizenship of the United States.

Whether it was also the rule at common law that the children of British subjects born abroad were themselves British subjects -- nationality being attributed to parentage, instead of locality -- has been variously determined. If this were so, of course, the statute of Edw. III was declaratory, as was the subsequent legislation. But if not, then such children were aliens, and the statute of 7 Anne and subsequent statutes must be regarded as, in some sort, acts of naturalization. On the other hand, it seems to me that the rule partus sequitur patrem has always applied to children of our citizens born abroad, and that the acts of Congress on this subject are clearly declaratory, passed out of abundant caution to obviate misunderstandings which might arise from the prevalence of the contrary rule elsewhere.

Section 1993 of the Revised Statutes provides that children so born

are declared to be citizens of the United States; but the rights of citizenship shall not descend to children whose fathers never resided in the United States.

Thus, a limitation is prescribed on the passage of citizenship by descent beyond the second generation if then surrendered by permanent nonresidence, and this limitation was contained in all the acts from 1790 down. Section 217 provides that such children shall "be considered as citizens thereof."

The language of the statute of 7 Anne, c. 5, is quite different in providing that

the children of all natural-born subjects born out of the ligeance of Her Majesty, her heirs and successors, shall be deemed, adjudged and taken to be natural-born subjects of this kingdom to all intents, constructions and purposes whatsoever.

In my judgment, the children of our citizens born abroad were always natural-born citizens from the standpoint of this Government. If not, and if the correct view is that they were aliens but collectively naturalized under the act of Congress which recognized them as natural-born, then those born since the Fourteenth Amendment are not citizens at all, [p715] unless they have become such by individual compliance with the general laws for the naturalization of aliens, because they are not naturalized "in the United States."

By the fifth clause of the first section of article two of the Constitution, it is provided that:

No person except a natural-born citizen, or a citizen of the United States, at the time of the adoption of the Constitution, shall be eligible to the office of President; neither shall any person be eligible to that office who shall not have attained to the age of thirty-five years, and been fourteen years a resident within the United States.

In the convention, it was, says Mr. Bancroft,

objected that no number of years could properly prepare a foreigner for that place; but as men of other lands had spilled their blood in the cause of the United States, and had assisted at every stage of the formation of their institutions, on the seventh of September, it was unanimously settled that foreign-born residents of fourteen years who should be citizens at the time of the formation of the Constitution are eligible to the office of President.

2 Bancroft Hist. U.S. Const. 193.

Considering the circumstances surrounding the framing of the Constitution, I submit that it is unreasonable to conclude that "natural-born citizen" applied to everybody born within the geographical tract known as the United States, irrespective of circumstances, and that the children of foreigners, happening to be born to them while passing through the country, whether of royal parentage or not, or whether of the Mongolian, Malay or other race, were eligible to the Presidency, while children of our citizens, born abroad, were not.

By the second clause of the second section of article one, it is provided that:

No person shall be a representative who shall not have attained to the age of twenty-five years, and been seven years a citizen of the United States, and who shall not, when elected, be an inhabitant of that State of which he shall be chosen;

and, by the third clause of section three, that:

No person shall be a senator who shall not have attained to the age of thirty years, and been nine years a citizen of the United States, and who shall not, when elected, be an inhabitant of that State for which he shall be chosen. [p716]

At that time, the theory largely obtained, as stated by Mr. Justice Story in his Commentaries on the Constitution, "that every citizen of a State is ipso facto a citizen of the United States." § 1693.

Mr. Justice Curtis, in Dred Scott v. Sandford, 19 How. 393, 576, expressed the opinion that, under the Constitution of the United States

every free person born on the soil of a State, who is a citizen of that State by force of its Constitution or laws, is also a citizen of the United States.

And he said:

Among the powers unquestionably possessed by the several States was that of determining what persons should and what persons should not be citizens. It was practicable to confer on the Government of the Union this entire power. It embraced what may, well enough for the purpose now in view, be divided into three parts. First: The power to remove the disabilities of alienage, either by special acts in reference to each individual case or by establishing a rule of naturalization to be administered and applied by the courts. Second: Determining what persons should enjoy the privileges of citizenship, in respect to the internal affairs of the several States. Third: What native-born persons should be citizens of the United States.

The first-named power, that of establishing a uniform rule of naturalization, was granted, and here the grant, according to its terms, stopped. Construing a Constitution containing only limited and defined powers of government, the argument derived from this definite and restricted power to establish a rule of naturalization must be admitted to be exceedingly strong. I do not say it is necessarily decisive. It might be controlled by other parts of the Constitution. But when this particular subject of citizenship was under consideration, and, in the clause specially intended to define the extent of power concerning it, we find a particular part of this entire power separated from the residue and conferred on the General Government, there arises a strong presumption that this is all which is granted, and that the residue is left to the States and to the people. And this presumption is, in my opinion, converted into a certainty by an examination of all such other clauses of the Constitution as touch this subject. [p717]

But in that case, Mr. Chief Justice Taney said:

The words "people of the United States" and "citizens" are synonymous terms, and mean the same thing. They both describe the political body who, according to our republican institutions, form the sovereignty, and who hold the power and conduct the government through their representatives. They are what we familiarly call the "sovereign people," and every citizen is one of this people and a constituent member of this sovereignty. In discussing this question, we must not confound the rights of citizenship which a State may confer within its own limits and the rights of citizenship as a member of the Union. It does not by any means follow, because he has all the rights and privileges of a citizen of a State, that he must be a citizen of United States. He may have all of the rights and privileges of a citizen of a State and yet not be entitled to the rights and privileges of a citizen in any other State. For, previous to the adoption of the Constitution of the United States, every State had the undoubted right to confer on whomsoever it pleased the character of citizen, and to endow him with all its rights. But this character, of course, was confined to the boundaries of the State, and gave him no rights or privileges in other States beyond those secured to him by the laws of nations and the comity of States. Nor have the several States surrendered the power of conferring these rights and privileges by adopting the Constitution of the United States. Each State may still confer them upon an alien, or anyone it thinks proper, or upon any class or description of persons; yet he would not be a citizen in the sense in which that word is used in the Constitution of the United States, nor entitled to sue as such in one of its courts, nor to the privileges and immunities of a citizen in the other States. The rights which he would acquire would be restricted to the State which gave them. The Constitution has conferred on Congress the right to establish an uniform rule of naturalization, and this right is evidently exclusive, and has always been held by this court to be so. Consequently, no State, since the adoption of the Constitution, can by naturalizing an alien invest him with the rights and privileges secured to a citizen of a State under the Federal [p718] Government, although, so far as the State alone was concerned, he would undoubtedly be entitled to the rights of a citizen, and clothed with all the rights and immunities which the Constitution and laws of the State attached to that character.

Plainly, the distinction between citizenship of the United States and citizenship of a State thus pointed out involved then, as now, the complete rights of the citizen internationally, as contradistinguished from those of persons not citizens of the United States.

The English common law rule recognized no exception in he instance of birth during the mere temporary or accidental sojourn of the parents. As allegiance sprang from the place of birth regardless of parentage and supervened at the moment of birth, the inquiry whether the parents were permanently or only temporarily within the realm was wholly immaterial. And it is settled in England that the question of domicil is entirely distinct from that of allegiance. The one relates to the civil, and the other to the political, status. Udny v. Udny, L.R. 1 H.L.Sc. 441, 457.

But a different view as to the effect of permanent abode on nationality has been expressed in this country.

In his work on Conflict of Laws, § 48, Mr. Justice Story, treating the subject as one of public law, said:

Persons who are born in a country are generally deemed to be citizens of that country. A reasonable qualification of the rule would seem to be that it should not apply to the children of parents who were in itinere in the country, or who were abiding there for temporary purposes, as for health or curiosity, or occasional business. It would be difficult, however, to assert that, in the present state of public law, such a qualification is universally established.

Undoubtedly all persons born in a country are presumptively citizens thereof, but the presumption is not irrebuttable.

In his Lectures on Constitutional Law, p. 79, Mr. Justice Miller remarked:

If a stranger or traveler passing through, or temporarily residing in, this country, who has not himself been naturalized and who claims to owe no allegiance to our Government, has a child born here which goes out of the country [p719] with its father, such child is not a citizen of the United States, because it was not subject to its jurisdiction.

And to the same effect are the rulings of Mr. Secretary Frelinghuysen in the matter of Hausding, and Mr. Secretary Bayard in the matter of Greisser.

Hausding was born in the United States, went to Europe, and, desiring to return, applied to the minister of the United States for a passport, which was refused on the ground that the applicant was born of Saxon subjects temporarily in the United States. Mr. Secretary Frelinghuysen wrote to Mr. Kasson, our minister:

You ask "Can one born a foreign subject, but within the United States, make the option after his majority, and while still living abroad, to adopt the citizenship of his birthplace? It seems not, and that he must change his allegiance by emigration and legal process of naturalization." Sections 1992 and 1993 of the Revised Statutes clearly show the extent of existing legislation; that the fact of birth, under circumstances implying alien subjection, establishes, of itself, no right of citizenship, and that the citizenship of a person so born is to be acquired in some legitimate manner through the operation of statute. No statute contemplates the acquisition of the declared character of an American citizen by a person not at the time within the jurisdiction of the tribunal of record which confers that character.

Greisser was born in the State of Ohio in 1867, his father being a German subject and domiciled in Germany, to which country the child returned. After quoting the act of 1866 and the Fourteenth Amendment, Mr. Secretary Bayard said:

Richard Greisser was no doubt born in the United States, but he was on his birth "subject to a foreign power," and "not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States." He was not, therefore, under the statute and the Constitution a citizen of the United States by birth, and it is not pretended that he has any other title to citizenship.

2 Whart.Int.Dig. 399.

The Civil Rights Act became a law April 9, 1866 (14 Stat. 27, c. 31), and provided:

That all persons born in the United States and not subject to any foreign power, excluding Indians [p720] not taxed, are hereby declared to be citizens of the United States.

And this was reenacted June 22, 1874, in the Revised Statutes, section 1992. .

The words "not subject to any foreign power" do not, in themselves, refer to mere territorial jurisdiction, for the persons referred to are persons born in the United States. All such persons are undoubtedly subject to the territorial jurisdiction of the United States, and yet the act concedes that nevertheless they may be subject to the political jurisdiction of a foreign government. In other words, by the terms of the act, all persons born in the United States, and not owing allegiance to any foreign power, are citizens.

The allegiance of children so born is not the local allegiance arising from their parents' merely being domiciled in the country, and it is single and not double, allegiance. Indeed, double allegiance, in the sense of double nationality, has no place in our law, and the existence of a man without a country is not recognized.

But it is argued that the words "and not subject to any foreign power" should be construed as excepting from the operation of the statute only the children of public ministers and of aliens born during hostile occupation.

Was there any necessity of excepting them? And if there were others described by the words, why should the language be construed to exclude them?

Whether the immunity of foreign ministers from local allegiance rests on the fiction of extraterritoriality or on the waiver of territorial jurisdiction by receiving them as representatives of other sovereignties, the result is the same.

They do not owe allegiance otherwise than to their own governments, and their children cannot be regarded as born within any other.

And this is true as to the children of aliens within territory in hostile occupation, who necessarily are not under the protection of, nor bound to render obedience to, the sovereign whose domains are invaded; but it is not pretended that the children of citizens of a government so situated would not become its citizens a their birth, as the permanent allegiance [p721] of their parents would not be severed by the mere fact of the enemy's possession.

If the act of 1866 had not contained the words, "and not subject to any foreign power," the children neither of public ministers nor of aliens in territory in hostile occupation would have been included within its terms on any proper construction, for their birth would not have subjected them to ties of allegiance, whether local and temporary or general and permanent.

There was no necessity as to them for the insertion of the words, although they were embraced by them.

But there were others in respect of whom the exception was needed, namely, the children of aliens, whose parents owed local and temporary allegiance merely, remaining subject to a foreign power by virtue of the tie of permanent allegiance, which they had not severed by formal abjuration or equivalent conduct, and some of whom were not permitted to do so if they would.

And it was to prevent the acquisition of citizenship by the children of such aliens merely by birth within the geographical limits of the United States that the words were inserted.

Two months after the statute was enacted, on June 16, 1866, the Fourteenth Amendment was proposed, and declared ratified July 28, 1868. The first clause of the first section reads:

All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.

The act was passed and the amendment proposed by the same Congress, and it is not open to reasonable doubt that the words "subject to the jurisdiction thereof" in the amendment were used as synonymous with the words "and not subject to any foreign power" of the act.

The jurists and statesmen referred to in the majority opinion, notably Senators Trumbull and Reverdy Johnson, concurred in that view, Senator Trumbull saying: "What do we mean by 'subject to the jurisdiction of the United States?' Not owing allegiance to anybody else; that is what it means." And Senator Johnson:

Now, all that this amendment provides [p722] is that all persons born within the United States and not subject to some foreign power -- for that no doubt is the meaning of the committee who have brought the matter before us -- shall be considered as citizens of the United States.

Cong.Globe, 1st Sess. 39th Cong., 2893 et seq.

This was distinctly so ruled in Elk v. Wilkins, 112 U.S. 94, and no reason is perceived why the words were used if they apply only to that obedience which all persons not possessing immunity therefrom must pay the laws of the country in which they happen to be.

Dr. Wharton says that the words "subject to the jurisdiction" must be construed in the sense which international law attributes to them, but that the children of our citizens born abroad, and of foreigners born in the United States, have the right on arriving at full age to elect one allegiance and repudiate the other. Whart. Conflict of Laws, §§ 10, 11, 12.

The Constitution and statutes do not contemplate double allegiance, and how can such election be determined? By section 1993 of the Revised Statutes, the citizenship of the children of our citizens born abroad may be terminated in that generation by their persistent abandonment of their country, while, by sections 2167 and 2168, special provision is made for the naturalization of alien minor residents, on attaining majority, by dispensing with the previous declaration of intention and allowing three years of minority on the five years' residence required, and also for the naturalization of children of aliens whose parents have died after making declaration of intention. By section 2172, children of naturalized citizens are to be considered citizens.

While, then, the naturalization of the father carries with it that of his minor children, and his declaration of intention relieves them from the preliminary steps for naturalization, and minors are allowed to count part of the residence of their minority on the whole term required, and are relieved from the declaration of intention, the statutes make no provision for formal declaration of election by children born in this country of alien parents on attaining majority.

The point, however, before us, is whether permanent allegiance [p723] is imposed at birth without regard to circumstances -- permanent until thrown off and another allegiance acquired by formal acts -- not local and determined by a mere change on domicil.

The Fourteenth Amendment came before the court in the Slaughterhouse Cases, 16 Wall. 36, 73, at December term, 1872, the cases having been brought up by writ of error in May, 180, 10 Wall. 278, and it was held that the first clause was intended to define citizenship of the United States and citizenship of a State, which definitions recognized the distinction between the one and the other; that the privileges and immunities of citizens of the States embrace generally those fundamental civil rights for the security of which organized society was instituted, and which remain, with certain exceptions mentioned in the Federal Constitution, under the care of the state governments; while the privileges and immunities of citizens of the United States are those which arise out of the nature and essential character of the National government, the provisions of its Constitution, or its laws and treaties made in pursuance thereof, and that it is the latter which are placed under the protection of Congress by the second clause.

And Mr. Justice Miller, delivering the opinion of the court, in analyzing the first clause, observed that

the phrase "subject to the jurisdiction thereof" was intended to exclude from its operation children of ministers, consuls and citizens or subjects of foreign States, born within the United States.

That eminent judge did not have in mind the distinction between persons charged with diplomatic functions and those who were not, but was well aware that consuls are usually the citizens or subjects of the foreign States from which they come, and that, indeed, the appointment of natives of the places where the consular service is required, though permissible, has been pronounced objectionable in principle.

His view was that the children of "citizens or subjects of foreign States," owing permanent allegiance elsewhere and only local obedience here, are not otherwise subject to the jurisdiction of the United States than are their parents. [p724]

Mr. Justice Field dissented from the judgment of the court, and subsequently, in the case of Look Tin Sing, 10 Sawyer 353, in the Circuit Court for the District of California, held children born of Chinese parents in the United States to be citizens, and the cases subsequently decided in the Ninth Circuit followed that ruling. Hence the conclusion in this case, which the able opinion of the District Judge shows might well have been otherwise.

I do not insist that, although what was said was deemed essential to the argument and a necessary part of it, the point was definitively disposed of in the Slaughterhouse Cases, particularly as Chief Justice Waite in Minor v. Happersett, 21 Wall. 162, 167, remarked that there were doubts which, for the purposes of the case then in hand, it was not necessary to solve. But that solution is furnished in Elk v. Wilkins, 112 U.S. 94, 101, where the subject received great consideration and it was said:

By the Thirteenth Amendment of the Constitution, slavery was prohibited. The main object of the opening sentence of the Fourteenth Amendment was to settle the question, upon which there had been a difference of opinion throughout the country and in this court, as to the citizenship of free negroes, Scott v. Sandford, 19 How. 393, and to put it beyond doubt that all persons, white or black, and whether formerly slaves or not, born or naturalized in the United States, and owing no allegiance to any alien power, should be citizens of the United States, and of the State in which they reside. Slaughterhouse Cases, 16 Wall. 36, 73; Strauder v. West Virginia, 100 U.S. 303, 306.

This section contemplates two sources of citizenship, and two sources only: birth and naturalization. The persons declared to be citizens are "all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof." The evident meaning of these last words is not merely subject in some respect or degree to the jurisdiction of the United States, but completely subject to their political jurisdiction, and owing them direct and immediate allegiance. And the words relate to the time of birth in the one case, as they do [p725] to the time of naturalization in the other. Persons not this subject to the jurisdiction of the United States at the time of birth cannot become so afterwards, except by being naturalized, either individually, as by proceedings under the naturalization acts, or collectively, as by the force of a treaty by which foreign territory is acquired.

To be "completely subject" to the political jurisdiction of the United States is to be in no respect or degree subject to the political jurisdiction of any other government.

Now I take it that the children of aliens, whose parents have not only not renounced their allegiance to their native country, but are forbidden by it system of government, as well as by its positive laws, from doing so, and are not permitted to acquire another citizenship by the laws of the country into which they come, must necessarily remain themselves subject to the same sovereignty as their parents, and cannot, in the nature of things, be, any more than their parents, completely subject to the jurisdiction of such other country.

Generally speaking, I understand the subjects of the Emperor of China -- that ancient Empire, with its history of thousands of years and its unbroken continuity in belief, traditions and government, in spite of revolutions and changes of dynasty -- to be bound to him by every conception of duty and by every principle of their religion, of which filial piety is the first and greatest commandment, and formerly, perhaps still, their penal laws denounced the severest penalties on those who renounced their country and allegiance, and their abettors, and, in effect, held the relatives at home of Chinese in foreign lands as hostages for their loyalty. [*] And [p726] whatever concession may have been made by treaty in the direction of admitting the right of expatriation in some sense, they seem in the United States to have remained pilgrims and sojourners, as all their fathers were. 149 U.S. 717. At all events, they have never been allowed by our laws to acquire our nationality, and, except in sporadic instances, do not appear ever to have desired to do so.

The Fourteenth Amendment was not designed to accord citizenship to persons so situated and to cut off the legislative power from dealing with the subject.

The right of a nation to expel or deport foreigners who have not been naturalized or taken an steps toward becoming citizens of a country is as absolute and unqualified as the right to prohibit and prevent their entrance into the country. 149 U.S. 707.

But can the persons expelled be subjected to "cruel and unusual punishments" in the process of expulsion, as would be the case if children born to them in this country were separated from them on their departure, because citizens of the United States? Was it intended by this amendment to tear up parental relations by the roots?

The Fifteenth Amendment provides that

the right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color or previous condition of servitude.

Was it intended thereby that children of aliens should, by virtue of being born in the [p727] United States, be entitled on attaining majority to vote irrespective of the treaties and laws of the United States in regard to such aliens?

In providing that persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens, the Fourteenth Amendment undoubtedly had particular reference to securing citizenship to the members of the colored race, whose servile status had been obliterated by the Thirteenth Amendment and who had been born in the United States, but were not and never had been subject to any foreign power. They were not aliens (and, even if they could be so regarded, this operated as a collective naturalization), and their political status could not be affected by any change of the laws for the naturalization of individuals.

Nobody can deny that the question of citizenship in a nation is of the most vital importance. It is a precious heritage, as well as an inestimable acquisition, and I cannot think that any safeguard surrounding it was intended to be thrown down by the amendment.

In suggesting some of the privileges and immunities of national citizenship in the Slaughterhouse Cases, Mr. Justice Miller said:

Another privilege of a citizen of the United States is to demand the care and protection of the Federal Government over his life, liberty, and property when on the high seas or within the jurisdiction of a foreign government. Of this, there can be no doubt, nor that the right depends upon his character as a citizen of the United States.

Mr. Hall says in his work on Foreign Jurisdiction, etc., §§ 2, 5, the principle is that

the legal relations by which a person is encompassed in his country of birth and residence cannot be wholly put aside when he goes abroad for a time; many of the acts which he may do outside his native state have inevitable consequences within it. He may, for many purposes, be temporarily under the control of another sovereign than his own, and he may be bound to yield to a foreign government a large measure of obedience; but his own State still possesses a right to his allegiance; he is still an integral part of the national community. A State therefore can enact laws, [p728] enjoining or forbidding acts, and defining legal relations, which apply to its subjects abroad in common with those within its dominions. It can declare under what conditions it will regard as valid, acts done in foreign countries which profess to have legal effect; it can visit others with penalties; it can estimate circumstances and facts as it chooses.

On the other hand, the

duty of protection is correlative to the rights of a sovereign over his subjects; the maintenance of a bond between a State and its subjects while they are abroad implies that the former must watch over and protect them within the due limit of the rights of other States. . . . It enables governments to exact reparation for oppression from which their subjects have suffered, or for injuries done to them otherwise than by process of law, and it gives the means of guarding them against the effect of unreasonable laws, of laws totally out of harmony with the nature or degree of civilization by which a foreign power affects to be characterized, and finally of an administration of the laws had beyond a certain point. When, in these directions, a State grossly fails in its duties; when it is either incapable of ruling or rules with patent injustice, the right of protection emerges in the form of diplomatic remonstrance, and, in extreme cases, of ulterior measures. It provides a material sanction for rights; it does not offer a theoretic foundation. It does not act within a foreign territory with the consent of the sovereign; it acts against him contentiously from without.

The privileges or immunities which, by the second clause of the amendment, the States are forbidden to abridge are the privileges or immunities pertaining to citizenship of the United States, but that clause also places an inhibition on the States from depriving any person of life, liberty or property, and from denying "to any person within its jurisdiction, the equal protection of the laws," that is, of its own laws -- the laws to which its own citizens are subjected.

The jurisdiction of the State is necessarily local, and the limitation relates to rights primarily secured by the States, and not by the United States. Jurisdiction, as applied to the General Government, embraces international relations; as applied [p729] to the State, it refers simply to its power over persons and things within its particular limits.

These considerations lead to the conclusion that the rule in respect of citizenship of the United States prior to the Fourteenth Amendment differed from the English common law rule in vital particulars, and, among others, in that it did not recognize allegiance as indelible, and in that it did recognize an essential difference between birth during temporary, and birth during permanent, residence. If children born in the United States were deemed presumptively and generally citizens, this was not so when they were born of aliens whose residence was merely temporary, either in fact or in point of law.

Did the Fourteenth Amendment impose the original English common law rule as a rigid rule on this country?

Did the amendment operate to abridge the treaty-making power, or the power to establish an uniform rule of naturalization?

I insist that it cannot be maintained that this Government is unable, through the action of the President, concurred in by the Senate, to make a treaty with a foreign government providing that the subjects of that government, although allowed to enter the United States, shall not be made citizens thereof, and that their children shall not become such citizens by reason of being born therein.

A treaty couched in those precise terms would not be incompatible with the Fourteenth Amendment unless it be held that that amendment has abridged the treaty-making power.

Nor would a naturalization law excepting persons of a certain race and their children be invalid unless the amendment has abridged the power of naturalization. This cannot apply to our colored fellow-citizens, who never were aliens -- were never beyond the jurisdiction of the United States.

"Born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof," and "naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof," mean born or naturalized under such circumstances as to be completely subject to that jurisdiction, that is as completely as citizens of the United States, [p730] who are, of course, not subject to any foreign power, and can of right claim the exercise of the power of the United States on their behalf wherever they may be. When, then, children are born in the United States to the subjects of a foreign power, with which it is agreed by treaty that they shall not be naturalized thereby, and as to whom our own law forbids them to be naturalized, such children are not born so subject to the jurisdiction as to become citizens, and entitled on that ground to the interposition of our Government, if they happen to be found in the country of their parents' origin and allegiance, or any other.

Turning to the treaty between the United States and China, concluded July 28, 1868, the ratifications of which were exchanged November 28, 1869, and the proclamation made February 5, 1870, we find that, by its sixth article, it was provided:

Citizens of the United States visiting or residing in China shall enjoy the same privileges, immunities or exemptions in respect of travel or residence as may there be enjoyed by the citizens or subjects of the most favored nation. And, reciprocally, Chinese subjects residing in the United States shall enjoy the same privileges, immunities and exemptions in respect to travel or residence as may there be enjoyed by the citizens or subjects of the most favored nation. But nothing herein contained shall be held to confer naturalization on the citizens of the United States in China, nor upon the subjects of China in the United States.

It is true that, in the fifth article, the inherent right of man to change his home or allegiance was recognized, as well as

the mutual advantage of the free migration and emigration of their citizens and subjects, respectively, from the one country to the other, for the purposes of curiosity, of traffic, or as permanent residents.

All this, however, had reference to an entirely voluntary emigration for these purposes, and did not involve an admission of change of allegiance unless both countries assented, but the contrary, according to the sixth article.

By the convention of March 17, 1894, it was agreed

that Chinese laborers or Chinese of any other class, either permanently [p731] or temporarily residing within the United States, shall have for the protection of their persons and property all rights that are given by the laws of the United States to citizens of the most favored nation, excepting the right to become naturalized citizens.

These treaties show that neither Government desired such change, nor assented thereto. Indeed, if the naturalization laws of the United States had provided for the naturalization of Chinese persons, China manifestly would not have been obliged to recognize that her subjects had changed their allegiance thereby. But our laws do not so provide, and, on the contrary, are in entire harmony with the treaties.

I think it follows that the children of Chinese born in this country do not, ipso facto, become citizens of the United States unless the Fourteenth Amendment overrides both treaty and statute. Does it bear that construction, or rather is it not the proper construction that all persons born in the United States of parents permanently residing here and susceptible of becoming citizens, and not prevented therefrom by treaty or statute, are citizens, and not otherwise

But the Chinese, under their form of government, the treaties and statutes, cannot become citizens, nor acquire a permanent home here, no matter what the length of their stay may be. Wharton Confl.Laws, § 1.

In Fong Yue Ting v. United States, 149 U.S. 698, 717, it was said in respect of the treaty of 1868:

After some years' experience under that treaty, the Government of the United States was brought to the opinion that the presence within our territory of large numbers of Chinese laborers, of a distinct race and religion, remaining strangers in the land, residing apart by themselves, tenaciously adhering to the customs and usages of their own country, unfamiliar with our institutions, and apparently incapable of assimilating with our people, might endanger good order and be injurious to the public interests, and therefore requested and obtained from China a modification of the treaty.

It is not to be admitted that the children of persons so situated become citizens by the accident of birth. On the contrary, [p732] I am of opinion that the President and Senate by treaty, and the Congress by naturalization, have the power, notwithstanding the Fourteenth Amendment, to prescribe that all persons of a particular race, or their children, cannot become citizens, and that it results that the consent to allow such persons to come into and reside within our geographical limits does not carry with it the imposition of citizenship upon children born to them while in this country under such consent, in spite of treaty and statute.

In other words, the Fourteenth Amendment does not exclude from citizenship by birth children born in the United States of parents permanently located therein, and who might themselves become citizens; nor, on the other hand, does it arbitrarily make citizens of children born in the United States of parents who, according to the will of their native government and of this Government, are and must remain aliens.

Tested by this rule, Wong in Ark never became and is not a citizen of the United States, and the order of the District Court should be reversed.

I am authorized to say that MR JUSTICE HARLAN concurs in this dissent.

MR. JUSTICE McKENNA, not having been a member of the court when this case was argued, took no part in the decision.

All persons renouncing their country and allegiance, or devising the means thereof, shall be beheaded, and in the punishment of this offence, no distinction shall be made between principals and accessories. The property of all such criminals shall be confiscated, and their wives and children distributed as slave to the great officers of State. . . . The parents, grandparents, brothers and grandchildren of such criminals, whether habitually living with them under the same roof or not, shall be perpetually banished to the distance of 2000 lee.

All those who purposely conceal and connive at the perpetration of this crime shall be strangled. Those who inform against, and bring to justice, criminals of this description shall be rewarded with the whole of their property.

Those who are privy to the perpetration of this crime, and yet omit to give any notice or information thereof to the magistrates, shall be punished with 100 blows and banished perpetually to the distance of 3000 lee.

If the crime is contrived, but not executed, the principal shall be strangled, and all the accessories shall, each of them, be punished with 100 blows, and perpetual banishment to the distance of 3000 lee. . . .

Staunton's Penal Code of China 272, § 255.

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Archived Version

Thu, 01 Nov 2018 14:04

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) '-- Google engineers and other company workers around the world walked off the job Thursday to protest the internet company's lenient treatment of executives accused of sexual misconduct.

Employees staged walkouts at offices from Tokyo to Singapore to London.

In Dublin, organizers used megaphones to address the crowd of men and women to express their support for victims of sexual harassment. Other workers shied away from the media spotlight, with people gathering instead indoors, in packed conference rooms or lobbies, to show their solidarity with abuse victims.

The protests are the latest backlash against men's exploitation of female subordinates in business, entertainment, technology and politics. In Silicon Valley, women also are becoming fed up with the male-dominated composition of the technology industry's workforce '-- a glaring imbalance that critics say fosters unsavory behavior akin to a college fraternity house.

The Google protest, billed ''Walkout For Real Change,'' is unfolding a week after a New York Times story detailed allegations of sexual misconduct about creator of Google's Android software, Andy Rubin. The report said Rubin received a $90 million severance package in 2014 even though Google had concluded that the sexual misconduct allegations against him were credible.

Rubin derided the Times article as inaccurate and denied the allegations in a tweet .

The same story also disclosed allegations of sexual misconduct of other executives, including Richard DeVaul, a director at the same Google-affiliated lab that created far-flung projects such as self-driving cars and internet-beaming balloons. DeVaul had remained at the ''X'" lab after allegations of sexual misconduct surfaced about him a few years ago, but he resigned Tuesday without severance, Google confirmed Wednesday.

Google CEO Sundar Pichai apologized for the company's ''past actions'' in an email sent to employees Tuesday. ''I understand the anger and disappointment that many of you feel,'' Pichai wrote. ''I feel it as well, and I am fully committed to making progress on an issue that has persisted for far too long in our society. and, yes, here at Google, too.''

The email didn't mention the reported incidents involving Rubin, DeVaul or anyone else at Google, but Pichai didn't dispute anything in the Times story.

In an email last week, Pichai and Eileen Naughton, Google's executive in charge of personnel issues, sought to reassure workers that the company had cracked down on sexual misconduct since Rubin's departure four years ago.

Among other things, Pichai and Naughton disclosed that Google had fired 48 employees , including 13 senior managers, for ''sexual harassment'' in recent years without giving any of them severance packages.

But Thursday's walkout could signal that a significant number of the 94,000 employees working for Google and its corporate parent Alphabet Inc. remained unconvinced that the company is doing enough to adhere to Alphabet's own edict urging all employees to ''do the right thing .''

A Silicon Valley congresswoman tweeted her support of the Google walkout using the MeToo hashtag that has become a battle cry for women fighting sexual misconduct.

''Why do they think it's OK to reward perpetrators & further violate victims?'' asked Rep. Jackie Speier, who represents an affluent district where many of Google's employees live.

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Archived Version

Mon, 29 Oct 2018 18:23

MURDERED journalist Jamal Khashoggi was about to disclose details of Saudi Arabia's use of chemical weapons in Yemen, sources close to him said last night. The revelations come as separate intelligence sources disclosed that Britain had first been made aware of a plot a full three weeks before he walked into the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. PUBLISHED: 08:01, Mon, Oct 29, 2018 | UPDATED: 14:31, Mon, Oct 29, 2018

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Intercepts by GCHQ of internal communications by the kingdom's General Intelligence Directorate revealed orders by a ''member of the royal circle'' to abduct the troublesome journalist and take him back to Saudi Arabia.

The orders, intelligence sources say, did not emanate directly from de facto ruler Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman, and it is not known if he was aware of them.

Though they commanded that Khashoggi should be abducted and taken back to Riyadh, they ''left the door open'' for other actions should the journalist prove to be troublesome, sources said.

Last week Saudi Arabia's Attorney General confirmed that the murder had been premeditated - in contrast to initial official explanations that Khashoggi had been killed after a fight broke out.

''The suspects in the incident had committed their act with a premeditated intention,'' he said.

''The Public Prosecution continues its investigations with the accused in the light of what it has received and the results of its investigations to reach facts and complete the course of justice.''

Those suspects are within a 15-strong hit squad sent to Turkey, and include serving members of GID.

Speaking last night the intelligence source told the Sunday Express: ''We were initially made aware that something was going in the first week of September, around three weeks before Mr Khashoggi walked into the consulate on October 2, though it took more time for other details to emerge.

''These details included primary orders to capture Mr Khashoggi and bring him back to Saudi Arabia for questioning. However, the door seemed to be left open for alternative remedies to what was seen as a big problem.

''We know the orders came from a member of the royal circle but have no direct information to link them to Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman.

"Whether this meant he was not the original issuer we cannot say.''

Journalist Jamal Khashoggi was killed on 2 October (Image: MOHAMMED AL-SHAIKH/ AFP/Getty Images)

Protesters holding placards demonstrate outside the Saudi Arabian Embassy in London on October 26 (Image: Jack Taylor/Getty Images)

Crucially, the highly-placed source confirms that MI6 had warned his Saudi Arabian counterparts to cancel the mission - though this request as ignored.

''On October 1 we became aware of the movement of a group, which included members of Ri'āsat Al-Istikhbārāt Al-'Ämah (GID) to Istanbul, and it was pretty clear what their aim was.

''Through channels we warned that this was not a good idea. Subsequent events show that our warning was ignored.''

Asked why MI6 had not alerted its Five Eye intelligence partner, the US (Khashoggi was a US resident) the source said only: ''A decision was taken that we'd done what we could.''

However analysts offered one possible explanation for this.

''The misleading image that has been created of Jamal Khashoggi covers up more than it reveals. As an insider to the Saudi regime, Khashoggi had also been close to the former head of the intelligence agency.He was an Islamist, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, and someone who befriended Osama Bin Laden and had been sympathetic to his Jihad in Afghanistan," said Tom Wilson, of the Henry Jackson Society think-tank.

Saudi Arabia's crown prince denounced the 'repulsive' murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi (Image: LAKRUWAN WANNIARACHCHI/AFP/Getty Images)

The suspects in the incident had committed their act with a premeditated intention

Saudi Arabia's Attorney General

"All of these connections are being hidden by a simplistic narrative that Jamal Khashoggi was just a progressive freedom fighting journalist. It isn't plausible that he was murdered simply for being a journalist critical of the regime. The truth is much more complicated.''

Last night a close friend of Mr Khashoggi revealed that he was about to obtain ''documentary evidence'' proving clams that Saudi Arabia had used chemical weapons in its proxy war in Yemen.

''I met him a week before his death. He was unhappy and he was worried,'' said the middle eastern academic, who did not wish to be named.

''When I asked him why he was worried, he didn't really want to reply, but eventually he told me he was getting proof that Saudi Arabia had used chemical weapons. He said he hoped he be getting documentary evidence.

''All I can tell you is that the next thing I heard, he was missing.''

While there have been recent unsubstantiated claims in Iran that Saudi Arabia has been supplying ingredients that can be used to produce the nerve agent Sarin in Yemen, it is more likely that Mr Khashoggi was referring to phospherous..

Last month it was claimed that Saudi Arabia had been using US-supplied white phosphorous munitions against troops and even civilians in Yemen,

Though regulations state the chemical may be used to provide smokescreens, if used illegally it can it burn to the bone.

Chemical warfare expert Col Hamish de Bretton-Gordon said: ''We have already seen in Syria that nothing is as effective as chemical, weapons in clearing urban areas of troops and civilians - Assad has used phosphorous for this very reason.

''If Khashoggi did, in fact, have proof that Saudi Arabia was deliberately misusing phosphorous for this purpose, it would be highly embarrassing for the regime and provides the nearest motive yet as to why Riyadh may have acted when they did against him.''

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Archived Version

Tue, 30 Oct 2018 04:34

Special Report

The Posse Comitatus Act does not prohibit US Military on our borders.

US Military is allowed as authorized by the Constitution or Act of Congress

This is from Carlton Meyer's new book: The Spectrum of Future Warfare. http://www.g2mil.com/border.htm

Myth #1 The US Constitution prohibits posting US troops on the border.

The US Constitution says no such thing. In fact, Article IV states:

Section 4. The United States shall guarantee to every state in this union a republican form of government, and shall protect each of them against invasion; and on application of the legislature, or of the executive (when the legislature cannot be convened) against domestic violence.

So the US Constitution clearly requires the federal government to protect states from invasion. Almost a million aliens illegally pouring across the border into states each year is clearly an invasion.

Myth #2 The Posse Comitatus Act prohibits US troops from guarding US borders.

This 1878 act was enacted to prevent Union troops from continuing to enforce federal laws in the defeated South after the American Civil war. Here is the text as modified by Congress in recent years:

Sec. 1385. '' Use of Army and Air Force as posse comitatus

Whoever, except in cases and under circumstances expressly authorized by the Constitution or Act of Congress, willfully uses any part of the Army or the Air Force as a posse comitatus or otherwise to execute the laws shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than two years, or both.

Guarding US borders from foreign invasion is not ''law enforcement.''

The US Army exists to defend the US from foreign invasion, which is expressly authorized by the US Constitution. Guarding the Mexican border was the Army's primary peacetime mission until 1940, and no one ever declared this was in violation of this 1878 act. The US Border Patrol wasn't even formed until 1924, so claiming the intent of this law was to prevent US Army troops from guarding the border is absurd. The map at left shows US Army forts in Texas in the late 1880s when the entire US Army had fewer than 40,000 soldiers; it has 500,000 today. Clearly, defending the US border was a primary mission of the US Army for decades after this act was passed.

Some may argue that Chapter 18, Section 375 of Title 10 US Code prevents military personnel from direct participation in law enforcement. However, defending US borders from foreign invaders is not law enforcement, it's the basic purpose of the US military. While defending these United States from invasion, civilian law enforcement may be called upon to assist the US military. Does anyone believe the Border Patrol must operate fighter aircraft because the US Air Force can't intercept aircraft crossing into the US because that's ''law enforcement''?

When you read about proposals in Congress to put US troops on the border, those are not proposals to allow US troops on the border, but proposals to force the President to put troops back on the border. However, recent Presidents have listened to their corporate advisors and their slogans and ignored the threat of unsecured US borders.

Myth #3 The National Guard should guard the border, not active duty troops.

The National Guard is an organized militia to deal with state and national emergencies. Guarding the US border is a full-time mission that the federal government is required to perform by Article IV, Section 4 of the US Constitution. The few states along the border shouldn't be expected to defend the entire country from invasion. This myth is also spread by imperial minded Generals who prefer to rule an empire overseas than to defend their own citizens. Whenever citizens demand the Army protect their nation, Generals dodge this issue by stating that it may be a mission for the National Guard, so as not to waste resources of the US Army.

This is absurd; the primary mission of the US Army is to protect US citizens, and the US Constitution requires the federal government to protect states from invasion.

If there is a major war and the Army would like to deploy its border troops overseas, then National Guard troops from any state can be mobilized to guard the border until the war ends.

Myth #4 The US Army hasn't the resources for border troops.

The active duty army has 500,000 full-time troops supported by over 300,000 civilians. The Border Patrol has 9700 agents. Certainly, the Army can form a infantry division of 10,000 troops to actually defend the USA, or Congress can authorize more troops. This G2mil article: Cut Surplus Army Units identifies more than 10,000 unneeded positions in the US Army that can be cut to form an infantry division. There are several US military bases along the border that can host an infantry battalion for border security: NAS Whidbey Island, WA; Minot AFB, SD; Selfridge ARNG base, MI; Fort Drum, NY; Laughlin AFB, TX; Fort Bliss, TX; Fort Huachuca, AZ, Yuma Proving Grounds, AZ; and NAS El Centro, CA; plus several military facilities in the San Diego area. Some Army officers may express concern that border duty will hurt readiness for Army missions overseas. They don't understand that defending the USA is their primary mission!

Myth #5 Soldiers aren't trained for such missions

Soldiers are ideally trained to guard remote areas of the border. All they need are a few days of orientation training and to learn some Spanish or French phrases they can shout into a bullhorn: ''Stop, you cannot enter the United States here, go back!'' They will not process arrestees, fill out paperwork, search houses, run checkpoints, appear in court, or conduct investigations. They will just confront people who they directly view invading the USA. They will insist that foreign intruders turn back or face arrest by the Border Patrol.

This will prevent odd incidents like in 1997 when a marine on drug war duty near the border shot a local goat herder who had fired in his direction. Some suspect this young man was paid by drug dealers to provoke an incident in hopes of getting the marines removed. He succeeded, but didn't expect to die. The marines were there because the President had authorized their use after Army Generals refused. The Marine shooter was there on temporary duty and did not view the goat herder entering the USA illegally. The establishment of orientation training and strict rules of engagement can ensure that US troops have no contact with US citizens.

Myth # 6 Illegal immigration cannot be stopped

Of course it can. There is no illegal immigration from North to South Korea because that border is heavily guarded. Perhaps some of the 20,000 US troops there can transfer to the US border. Guarding the border will not stop the hundreds of thousands of visitors who overstay their visas in the USA, but at least they were checked and inspected prior to arrival. The Border Patrol estimates that 700,000 unknown persons slipped past them last year, cutting that to 7000 a year is not unrealistic. Some claim that illegals will just find another way to cross. However, most illegals cannot obtain a visa or shopping pass because they haven't an address and job.

The Border Patrol Needs Help

While the corporate media keeps Americans confused with slogans, it rarely reports on the problems of illegal immigration, except for Bill O'Reily and Lou Dobbs. As a result, few Americans know that most of the US border is not guarded and vehicles routinely drive across. In May 2002, the US Immigration and Naturalization Service was required to pay back wages and cancel suspension and demotion orders for two Border Patrol agents who told a newspaper about security problems along the US-Canadian border. The agents, assigned to the INS field office in Detroit, were recommended for discipline after they told the Detroit Free Press that Michigan's border lacked the resources to adequately protect the country from terrorists. Agents Mark Hall and Robert Lindemann said the 804 miles of shoreline border were guarded by 28 field agents, one working in a boat, several damaged electronic sensors and one broken remote camera. Keep in mind that these 28 field agents must cover that 804 miles of border 24 hours a day, seven days a week, plus days off for vacation or illness. So there are only about six on duty at any given time, or three teams of two. Then when a team catches someone, they must transport and book him, so they're gone for hours.

Another major problem is that guarding remote areas of the border is a tough mission, which is not compatible with the unionized Border Patrol. They prefer to work 8-hour shifts and their union contract requires the government to provide them with proper meals and lodging when away from home. Since it can take hours to reach remote areas from the nearest Border Patrol station, it's not practical to guard vast areas of the border. As a result, agents set up roadblocks or cruise around roadways rounding up who they can. This is much more interesting than standing a post along the border all day. However, the effort becomes pointless as it requires hours for the Border Patrol to process each arrested alien, who is then released on the other side of the border and walks back across for another try. In some urban sectors, the Border Patrol has focused on deterrence by placing most agents right on the border to stand guard. However, this becomes boring, which accounts for the high turnover rate among Border Patrol agents.

Another reason much of the border is not patrolled is that it's too dangerous. In 2002, six Mexican Army Hummers were two miles inside US territory when Mexican soldiers fired over 150 rounds from vehicle-mounted machine guns, and a dozen MK-19 40mm grenade rounds, at two US Border Patrol agents investigating narcotics trafficking in the Buenos Aires National Wildlife refuge north of Sasebe , Arizona. It is well known that some of the Mexican Army is involved in drug smuggling and Mexican troops are frequently encountered on the US side of the border in remote areas; see the great movie ''Traffic'' with Michael Douglas. In 2002, a US Park Ranger was killed when drug smugglers sprayed him with bullets from an AK-47, which struck him just below his bulletproof vest. With rogue Mexican army troops chasing off Border Patrol agents, Park Rangers wearing bulletproof vests, and thousands of recently deported criminal aliens walking back across, isn't it time for the US Army to return to the border?

Two-term Republican Rep. Rick Renzi , in a January 2006 letter to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, said reports of Mexican military units providing armed escorts to drug and alien smuggling operations represent ''narco-terrorism in its purest form. Our borders are under attack by sophisticated organizations that have no qualms about firing on our Border Patrol units. As we get tougher and more committed, so do the organizations committed to smuggling death and terror across our borders.'' Mr. Renzi said that during a tour of the Arizona border last month in a US Customs and Immigration Enforcement (ICE) helicopter, the pilot showed him military-style Humvees lining up at dusk just south of the border to move drugs into the USA. He said the preparations occur nightly, noting that 50 percent of the drugs coming into this country pass though the Arizona desert.

Border Patrol agents are so busy rounding up aliens that they haven't the time, equipment, nor motivation to conduct dangerous squad-size combat patrols into the wilderness. Most Border Patrol agents are hard working and dedicated, but the US Army is better organized for conducting combat patrols and continual surveillance along remote areas of the border. Once the Army sends squads to watch remote areas of the border, Army Generals will be shocked at the number of firefights that break out. Armed smugglers have used routes through remote areas for decades and will be surprised to encounter soldiers who are undeterred by their AK-47s.

The Army will only guard rural border areas and only detain people they observe crossing illegally until Border Patrol agents arrive. This will allow the Border Patrol to focus on running checkpoints, guarding urban areas, and processing arrestees. This is no small task considering the Border Patrol has made over four million arrests since the 9-11 terror attacks, including thousands of Arabs.

Squads of soldiers can deploy to the field for days at a time. A pattern of 72 hours in the field, 72 hours off duty, then 72 hours in garrison for admin and training will work great. This allows an infantry battalion with four line companies to rotate three of them so one is always guarding the border. Each company will go ''off line'' three months a year for leave, and some traditional infantry training to break up the routine. Since soldiers are transferred every three or four years, they will not face the boring prospect of watching the border for 30 years like Border Patrol agents.

Each border infantry battalion should be supported by a helicopter detachment for emergency medivacs and to move a reaction squad to where shooting has broken out. Some areas may be so remote that helicopters will be needed to rotate squads every three days. However, in most cases troops will be deployed to screen the flanks of border crossings to thwart the common game of just walking around a checkpoint and meeting up with their driver down the road. Squads are likely to rotate to different posts each month to keep border duty interesting.

This will provide great training for soldiers. Unlike canned peacetime exercises, the border is real and unpredictable. Border troops will become experts in map reading, surveillance, field living, and stealthy movement. Their goal will not be to arrest aliens, but to confront aliens near the border and turn them back. Anyone who is suspicious or uncooperative can be detained for the Border Patrol. Soldiers will enjoy the mission of actually protecting the USA, and probably engage in a few shoot outs during their border tour of duty. The first year of border duty will be especially chaotic as soldiers regain control of the wild frontier. Eventually, word will spread that crossing the US border is very difficult and problem will subside.

Rules of Engagement

Four rules of engagement can ensure that soldiers do not clash with innocent US citizens:

1) Soldiers will not enter private property without permission of the landowner.

The Border Patrol is legally allowed to enter private property along the border without permission. Most landowners are happy that someone is protecting their property. However, a few will protest if US troops camp out on their land, and radical groups will sue claiming 3rd Amendment rights are violated. So its best to leave those few alone and let the Border Patrol deal with each issue. There have been cases where smugglers purchased US property on the border to help their operations, so they'd object to US troops. Since a quarter of the land along the Mexican border is already federal property, US troops can stay busy just guarding federal lands. Patrolling American parks along the border has become so dangerous that park rangers are twice more likely to suffer injuries from an assault than DEA agents overseas.

2) Soldiers will only conduct surveillance on Mexico, Canada, or international waters to detect persons entering the USA illegally. They will not conduct intelligence missions at targets within the USA, even at the request of law enforcement agencies.

Many law enforcement agencies work along the border and may ask soldiers to keep an eye on a certain house or building or person they are investigating on the US side of the border. This may seem harmless, but it's not a role for soldiers. If soldiers see a crime in progress, they should report that immediately and intervene if lives are at stake, but they must not become involved in law enforcement investigations or domestic surveillance.

3) Soldiers will only confront or detain persons who they directly observe entering the USA illegally. They will not confront or detain persons who they suspect have crossed the border illegally.

This will eliminate accidental confrontations between local citizens, unless a US citizen knowingly breaks the law by attempting to enter the US illegally, which is probably because he is involved in other illegal activities. Sometimes soldiers will spot a suspicious group of people on the US side who they didn't observe crossing the border. They may be 99% certain this group slipped across the border, but they cannot be certain, so all they can do is to radio the information to the Border Patrol. This restriction will ensure soldiers have no contact with local citizens while on duty, except with property owners along the border who have given permission to guard their land.

4) Soldiers will not directly assist other government agencies along the border on a routine basis.

Some Army officers and government officials may decide that Army manpower can help guard the border by assisting other agencies. For example, helping search cars and trucks, guarding prisoners, or assisting in raids. However, this is not a role for the Army or soldiers. There will be occasional emergencies or natural disasters where soldiers help out like they do near all Army bases. However, soldiers should not be used as a federal manpower pool.

Army Transformation

While the Army bureaucracy churns out paperwork about ''transformation'' the greatest need is for the Army to defend the US border. While Americans were shocked when 3000 citizens were killed by the 9-11 terror attacks, more Americans have been killed by illegal aliens over the years. While they may not be more violent than US citizens, if they cannot cross the border they cannot harm Americans. Most people who illegally cross the border are desperate and they will do whatever it takes to survive. That may require fake IDs, identify theft, shoplifting, robbery, or the transport and sale of narcotics.

As the US tracks international terrorists, restricts visas from certain countries, and tightens port security, future terrorists are more likely to just walk across the unguarded border. While some people worry about China's military, they should worry about the thousands of former Chinese soldiers that slip across the border each year. Placing troops on the border will require orders from the US President, yet it is doubtful that Army Generals have made proposals. In contrast, Generals continue to spread the myths described in this article. The United States has the only army on Earth that thinks defending its nation from invasion is not their role. It is time for the US Army to transform and assign 2% of its manpower to its basic mission of defending the USA from invasion.

Most Dangerous National Parks ''

On June 28, the U.S. Park Rangers Lodge of the Fraternal Order of Police released its third annual survey of the 10 Most Dangerous National Parks. The rangers cited increasing problems with illegal immigrants, drug smuggling, and potential terrorist threats.

Arizona 's Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument topped the rangers' list for the third year in a row. Following is the list.

1. Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument (Arizona): After the August 2002 murder of National Park Service Ranger Kris Eggle , the NPS bolstered its force at the monument with tactical teams, since removed, and has failed to restore staff levels to previous levels.

2. Amistad National Recreation Area (Texas): Amistad shares the same problems of drug and alien smuggling as Organ Pipe. Seven rangers attempt to hold the line on 85 miles of an international border. With days off, it means that only one or two are on duty at any given hour of the day, and at night, the park is turned over to the smugglers.

3. Big Bend National Park (Texas): This park , which has the largest boundary with Mexico, struggles with an overwhelming flow of illegal aliens. According to the rangers, the park has violated NPS orders to hire law enforcement staff before hiring other personnel, leaving the few remaining rangers understaffed.

The corporate media in the USA is extremely powerful and dumbs down all Americans. They want cheap labor pouring across US borders to drive down wages, so they invent simple phrases to confuse Americans. ''We are a nation of immigrants'' is a meaningless phrase used to end rational discussion about what is best for the American people. England and Mexico are also nations of immigrants. In fact, most scientists agree that man originated from a spot in Africa, so every nation on Earth is a nation of immigrants and everyone's ancestors were immigrants. Even the misnamed ''native Americans'' came from Asia, albeit a few thousand years before those from Europe.

US citizens are not demanding new immigration laws, they just want the federal government to enforce existing laws. If the nation needs more immigrants, quotas can rise and those selected screened for diseases, criminal records, and motives. People who break the law by entering the US illegally, then break more laws by working illegally using false identification, do not qualify as potential good citizens. To keep the gates for cheap labor open, corporate television along with corporate sponsored politicians have used irrational slogans to convince many Americans that putting US troops on the border is unconstitutional, illegal, impractical, dangerous, and futile. This is why the few thousand ''National Guardsmen'' recently deployed to the border are prohibited from guarding the nation; they can only perform menial chores.

This report has been prepared by Ron Bass and posted in the UPA (United Patriots of America) web site prior to 2011.

The information in this report was extracted from various documents and the book mentioned at the beginning of the report. This is from Carlton Meyer's new book: The Spectrum of Future Warfare. http://www.g2mil.com/border.htm

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Mon, 29 Oct 2018 23:28

On Tuesday, October 16, President Donald Trump started tweeting.

''The United States has strongly informed the President of Honduras that if the large Caravan of people heading to the U.S. is not stopped and brought back to Honduras, no more money or aid will be given to Honduras, effective immediately!''

''We have today informed the countries of Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador that if they allow their citizens, or others, to journey through their borders and up to the United States, with the intention of entering our country illegally, all payments made to them will STOP (END)!''

Vice President Mike Pence also tweeted:

''Spoke to President Hernandez of Honduras about the migrant caravan heading to the U.S. Delivered strong message from @POTUS: no more aid if caravan is not stopped. Told him U.S. will not tolerate this blatant disregard for our border & sovereignty.''

The apparent impetus for this outrage was a segment on Fox News that morning that detailed a migrant caravan thousands of miles away in Honduras. The caravan, which began sometime in mid-October, is made up of refugees fleeing violence in their home country. Over the next few weeks, Trump did his best to turn the caravan into a national emergency. Trump falsely told his supporters that there were ''criminals and unknown Middle Easterners'' in the caravan, a claim that had no basis in fact and that was meant to imply that terrorists were hiding in the caravan'--one falsehood placed on another. Defense Secretary James Mattis ordered more troops to the border. A Fox News host took it upon herself to ask Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen whether there was ''any scenario under which if people force their way across the border they could be shot at,'' to which Nielsen responded, ''We do not have any intention right now to shoot at people.''

J.M. Berger: Trump is the glue that binds the far right

Pence told Fox News on Friday, ''What the president of Honduras told me is that the caravan was organized by leftist organizations, political activists within Honduras, and he said it was being funded by outside groups, and even from Venezuela '... So the American people, I think, see through this'--they understand this is not a spontaneous caravan of vulnerable people.''

The Department of Homeland Security's Twitter account ''confirmed'' that within the caravan are people who are ''gang members or have significant criminal histories,'' without offering evidence of any such ties. Trump sought to blame the opposition party for the caravan's existence. ''Every time you see a Caravan, or people illegally coming, or attempting to come, into our Country illegally, think of and blame the Democrats for not giving us the votes to change our pathetic Immigration Laws!'' Trump tweeted on October 22. ''Remember the Midterms! So unfair to those who come in legally.''

In the right-wing fever swamps, where the president's every word is worshipped, commenters began amplifying Trump's exhortations with new details. Representative Matt Gaetz of Florida wondered whether George Soros'--the wealthy Jewish philanthropist whom Trump and several members of the U.S. Senate blamed for the protests against Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, and who was recently targeted with a bomb'--was behind the migrant caravan. NRATV, the propaganda organ of the National Rifle Association, linked two Republican obsessions, voter fraud and immigration. Chuck Holton told NRATV's viewers that Soros was sending the caravan to the United States so the migrants could vote: ''It's telling that a bevy of left-wing groups are partnering with a Hungarian-born billionaire and the Venezuelan government to try to influence the 2018 midterms by sending Honduran migrants north in the thousands.'' On CNN, the conservative commentator Matt Schlapp pointedly asked the anchor Alisyn Camerota, ''Who's paying for the caravan? Alisyn, who's paying for the caravan?,'' before later answering his own question: ''Because of the liberal judges and other people that intercede, including George Soros, we have too much chaos at our southern border.'' On Laura Ingraham's Fox News show, one guest said, ''These individuals are not immigrants'--these are people that are invading our country,'' as another guest asserted they were seeking ''the destruction of American society and culture.''

Peter Beinart: Trump shut programs to counter violent extremists

In the meantime, much of the mainstream press abetted Trump's effort to make the midterm election a referendum on the caravan. Popular news podcasts devoted entire episodes to the caravan. It remained on the front pages of major media websites. It was an overwhelming topic of conversation on cable news, where Trumpists freely spread disinformation about the threat the migrants posed, while news anchors displayed exasperation over their false claims, only to invite them back on the next day's newscast to do it all over again.

More by Adam SerwerIn reality, the caravan was thousands of miles and weeks away from the U.S. border, shrinking in size, and unlikely to reach the U.S. before the election. If the migrants reach the U.S., they have the right under U.S. law to apply for asylum at a port of entry. If their claims are not accepted, they will be turned away. There is no national emergency; there is no ominous threat. There is only a group of desperate people looking for a better life, who have a right to request asylum in the United States and have no right to stay if their claims are rejected. Trump is reportedly aware that his claims about the caravan are false. An administration official told the Daily Beast simply, ''It doesn't matter if it's 100 percent accurate '... this is the play.'' The ''play'' was to demonize vulnerable people with falsehoods in order to frighten Trump's base to the polls.

Nevertheless, some took the claims of the president and his allies seriously. On Saturday morning, Shabbat morning, a gunman walked into the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh and killed 11 people. The massacre capped off a week of terrorism, in which one man mailed bombs to nearly a dozen Trump critics and another killed two black people in a grocery store after failing to force his way into a black church.

Julian Zelizer: Trump needs to demilitarize his rhetoric

Before committing the Tree of Life massacre, the shooter, who blamed Jews for the caravan of ''invaders'' and who raged about it on social media, made it clear that he was furious at HIAS , founded as the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, a Jewish group that helps resettle refugees in the United States. He shared posts on Gab, a social-media site popular with the alt-right, expressing alarm at the sight of ''massive human caravans of young men from Honduras and El Salvador invading America thru our unsecured southern border.'' And then he wrote, '' HIAS likes to bring invaders in that kill our people. I can't sit by and watch my people get slaughtered. Screw your optics, I'm going in.''

The people killed on Saturday were killed for trying to make the world a better place, as their faith exhorts them to do. The history of the Jewish people is one of displacement, statelessness, and persecution. What groups like HIAS do in helping refugees, they do with the knowledge that comes from a history of being the targets of demagogues who persecute minorities in pursuit of power.

Ordinarily, a politician cannot be held responsible for the actions of a deranged follower. But ordinarily, politicians don't praise supporters who have mercilessly beaten a Latino man as ''very passionate.'' Ordinarily, they don't offer to pay supporters' legal bills if they assault protesters on the other side. They don't praise acts of violence against the media. They don't defend neo-Nazi rioters as ''fine people.'' They don't justify sending bombs to their critics by blaming the media for airing criticism. Ordinarily, there is no historic surge in anti-Semitism, much of it targeted at Jewish critics, coinciding with a politician's rise. And ordinarily, presidents do not blatantly exploit their authority in an effort to terrify white Americans into voting for their party. For the past few decades, most American politicians, Republican and Democrat alike, have been careful not to urge their supporters to take matters into their own hands. Trump did everything he could to fan the flames, and nothing to restrain those who might take him at his word.

David Frum: A president who condones political violence

Many of Trump's defenders argue that his rhetoric is mere shtick'--that his attacks, however cruel, aren't taken 100 percent seriously by his supporters. But to make this argument is to concede that following Trump's statements to their logical conclusion could lead to violence against his targets, and it is only because most do not take it that way that the political violence committed on Trump's behalf is as limited as it currently is.

The Tree of Life shooter criticized Trump for not being racist or anti-Semitic enough. But with respect to the caravan, the shooter merely followed the logic of the president and his allies: He was willing to do whatever was necessary to prevent an ''invasion'' of Latinos planned by perfidious Jews, a treasonous attempt to seek ''the destruction of American society and culture.''

The apparent spark for the worst anti-Semitic massacre in American history was a racist hoax inflamed by a U.S. president seeking to help his party win a midterm election. There is no political gesture, no public statement, and no alteration in rhetoric or behavior that will change this fact. The shooter might have found a different reason to act on a different day. But he chose to act on Saturday, and he apparently chose to act in response to a political fiction that the president himself chose to spread and that his followers chose to amplify.

As for those who aided the president in his propaganda campaign, who enabled him to prey on racist fears to fabricate a national emergency, who said to themselves, ''This is the play''? Every single one of them bears some responsibility for what followed. Their condemnations of anti-Semitism are meaningless. Their thoughts and prayers are worthless. Their condolences are irrelevant. They can never undo what they have done, and what they have done will never be forgotten.

Adam Serwer is a staff writer at

The Atlantic, covering politics.

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Archived Version

Mon, 29 Oct 2018 21:04

''We have an old custom here at Mar-a-Lago,'' Donald Trump was saying one night at dinner in his 118-room winter palace in Palm Beach. ''Our custom is to go around the table after dinner and introduce ourselves to each other.'' Trump had seemed fidgety that night, understandably eager to move the dinner party along so that he could go to bed.

''Old custom? He's only had Mrs. Post's house a few months. Really! I'm going home,'' one Palm Beach resident whispered to his date.

''Oh, stay,'' she said. ''It will be so amusing.''

It was spring, four years ago. Donald and Ivana Trump were seated at opposite ends of their long Sheraton table in Mrs. Marjorie Merriweather Post's former dining room. They were posed in imperial style, as if they were a king and queen. They were at the height of their ride, and it was plenty glorious. Trump was seen on the news shows offering his services to negotiate with the Russians. There was talk that he might make a run for president. Ivana had had so much publicity that she now offered interviewers a press kit of flattering clips. Anything seemed possible, the Trumps had grown to such stature in the golden city of New York.

It was balmy that night in Palm Beach; Ivana wore a strapless dress. The air was redolent with the fragrance of oleander and bougainvillea, mingled with the slight smell of mildew which clung to the old house. To his credit, Trump had no interest in mastering the Palm Beach style of navy blazers and linen trousers. Often he wore a business suit to his table; his only concession to local custom was to wear a pink tie or pale shoes. To her credit, Ivana still served the dinners her husband preferred, so on that warm night the guests ate beef with potatoes. Mrs. Post's faux-Tiepolo ceiling remained in the dining room, but an immense silver bowl now rested in the center of the table, filled with plastic fruit. As always, it was business with the Trumps, for that was their common purpose, the bond between them. In recent years, they never seemed to touch each other or exchange intimate remarks in public. They had become less like man and wife and more like two ambassadors from different countries, each with a separate agenda.

The Trumps had bought Mar-a-Lago only a few months earlier, but already they had become Palm Beach curiosities. Across the road was the Bath and Tennis Club, ''the B and T,'' as the locals called it, and it was said that the Trumps had yet to be invited to join. ''Utter bullshit! They kiss my ass in Palm Beach,'' Trump told me recently. ''Those phonies! That club called me and asked me if they could have my consent to use part of my beach to expand the space for their cabanas! I said, 'Of course!' Do you think if I wanted to be a member they would have turned me down? I wouldn't join that club, because they don't take blacks and Jews.''

As if Mar-a-Lago and the Trump Princess yacht were James Gatz's West Egg estate, invitations were much prized, for the local snobs loved to dine out on tales of the Trumps. And now this! Embarrassing their guests by having them make speeches, as if they were at a sales convention!

When it was Ivana's turn to introduce herself that night, she rose quickly. ''I am married to the most wonderful husband. He is so generous and smart. We are so lucky to have this life.'' She was desperately playing to him, but Donald said nothing in return. He seemed tired of hearing Ivana's endless praise; her subservient quality appeared to be getting to him. Perhaps he was spoiling for something to excite him, like a fight. Maybe all the public posturing was beginning to get boring, too. ''Well, I'm done,'' he said before dessert, tossing his napkin on the table and vanishing from the room.

Palm Beach had been Ivana Trump's idea. Long ago, Donald had screamed at her, ''I want nothing social that you aspire to. If that is what makes you happy, get another husband!'' But she had no intention of doing that, for Ivana, like Donald, was living out a fantasy. She had seen that in the Trump life everything and everybody appeared to come with a price, or a marker for future use. Ivana had learned to look through Donald with glazed eyes when he said to close friends, as he had in the early years of their marriage, ''I would never buy Ivana any decent jewels or pictures. Why give her negotiable assets?'' She had gotten out of Eastern Europe by being tough and highly disciplined, and she had compounded her skills through her husband, the master manipulator. She had learned the lingua franca in a world where everyone seemed to be using everyone else in a relentless drive for power. How was she to know that there was another way to live? Besides, she often told her friends, however cruel Donald could be, she was very much in love with him.

This night Ivana had managed to wedge in the publisher of the local social paper, ''the Shiny Sheet.'' As usual, Donald's weekend guests were paybacks, for he trusted few people. He had invited one of his construction executives, the mayor of West Palm Beach, and the former governor of New York, Hugh Carey, who in his days running the state as ''Society Carey,'' boosted by huge Trump donations, had been crucial to Trump's early success.

For years, Ivana appeared to have studied the public behavior of the royals. Her friends now called this ''Ivana's imperial-couple syndrome,'' and they teased her about it, for they knew that Ivana, like Donald, was inventing and reinventing herself all the time. When she had first come to New York, she wore elaborate helmet hairdos and bouffant satin dresses, very Hollywood; her image of rich American women probably came from the movies she had seen as a child. Ivana had now spent years passing through the fine rooms of New York, but she had never seemed to learn the real way of the truly rich, the art of understatement. Instead, she had become regal, filling her houses with the kind of ormolu found in palaces in Eastern Europe. She had taken to waving to friends with tiny hand motions, as if to conserve her energy. At her own charity receptions, she insisted that she and Donald form a receiving line, and she would stand in pinpoint heels, never sinking into the deep grass'--such was her control.

This spring night, a squad of servants had been outside to greet the guests, as if they had arrived at Cliveden between the wars. Most of the staff, however, were not a permanent part of Mar-a-Lago; they were local caterers and car parks, hired for the evening. In addition to the dining-room ceiling, Ivana had left Mrs. Post's shabby fringed sofas and Moroccan suites totally in place, giving the impression that she was trying on Mrs. Post's persona too. One of the few signs of the new owners' taste was the dozens of silver frames on the many end tables. The frames did not contain family pictures, but magazine covers. Each cover featured the face of Donald Trump.

When the Trump plane landed in Palm Beach, two cars were usually waiting, the first a Rolls-Royce for the adults, the second a station wagon for the children, the nannies, and a bodyguard. Occasionally, state troopers were on hand to speed the Trump motorcade along. This took a certain amount of planning and coordination, but the effort was crucial for what Ivana was trying to achieve. ''In fifty years Donald and I will be considered old money like the Vanderbilts,'' she once told the writer Dominick Dunne.

This past April, when his empire was in danger of collapse, Trump isolated himself in a small apartment on a lower floor of Trump Tower. He would lie on his bed, staring at the ceiling, talking into the night on the telephone. The Trumps had separated. Ivana remained upstairs in the family triplex with its beige onyx floors and low-ceilinged living room painted with murals in the style of Michelangelo. The murals had occasioned one of their frequent fights: Ivana wanted cherubs, Donald preferred warriors. The warriors won. ''If this were on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, it would be very much in place in terms of quality,'' Trump once said of the work. That April, Ivana began to tell her friends that she was worried about Donald's state of mind.

She had been completely humiliated by Donald through his public association with Marla Maples. ''How can you say you love us? You don't love us! You don't even love yourself. You just love your money,'' twelve-year-old Donald junior told his father, according to friends of Ivana's. ''What kind of son have I created?'' Trump's mother, Mary, is said to have asked Ivana.

However unlikely it seemed, Ivana was now considered a tabloid heroine, and her popularity seemed in inverse proportion to the fickle city's new dislike of her husband. ''Ivana is now a media goddess on par with Princess Di, Madonna, and Elizabeth Taylor,'' Liz Smith reported. Months earlier, Ivana had undergone cosmetic reconstruction with a California doctor. She emerged unrecognizable to her friends and perhaps her children, as fresh and innocent of face as Heidi of Edelweiss Farms. Although she had negotiated four separate marital-property agreements over the last fourteen years, she was suing her husband for half his assets. Trump was trying to be philosophical. ''When a man leaves a woman, especially when it was perceived that he has left for a piece of ass'--a good one!'--there are 50 percent of the population who will love the woman who was left,'' he told me.

Ivana had hired a public-relations man to help her in her new role. ''This is all very calculated,'' one of her advisers told me. ''Ivana is very shrewd. She's playing it to the hilt.''

Many floors beneath the Trumps, Japanese tourists roamed the Trump Tower lobby with their cameras. Inevitably, they took pictures of the display of Trump's familiar portrait from the cover of his book Trump: The Art of the Deal, which was propped on an easel outside the Trump Tower real-estate office. The Japanese still took Donald Trump to be the very image of power and money, and seemed to believe, as Trump once had, that this red-marble-and-brass monument was the center of the world.

For days, Trump rarely left his building. Hamburgers and French fries were sent up to him from the nearby New York Delicatessen. His body ballooned, his hair curled down his neck. ''You remind me of Howard Hughes,'' a friend told him. ''Thanks,'' Trump replied, ''I admire him.'' On the telephone he sounded ebullient, without a care, as confident as the image he projected in his lobby portrait.

Like John Connally, the former governor of Texas, Trump had millions of dollars signed away in personal guarantees. The personal debt on the Trump Shuttle alone was $135 million. Bear Stearns had been guaranteed $56 million for Trump's Alexander's and American Airlines positions. The Taj Mahal casino had a complicated set of provisions which made Trump responsible for $35 million. Trump had personally guaranteed $125 million for the Plaza hotel. In West Palm Beach, Trump Plaza was so empty it was nicknamed ''the Trump See-Through.'' That building alone carried $14 million worth of personal debt. Trump's mansions in Greenwich and Palm Beach, as well as the yacht, had been promised to the banks for $40 million in outstanding loans. The Wall Street Journal estimated that Trump's guarantees could exceed $600 million. In one astonishing decade, Donald Trump had become the Brazil of Manhattan.

''Anybody who is anybody sits between the columns. The food is the worst, but you'll see everybody here,'' Donald Trump told me ten years ago at the ''21'' Club. Donald had already cut a swath in this preserve of the New York establishment; we were immediately seated between the columns in the old upstairs room, then decorated with black paneling and red Naugahyde banquettes. It was the autumn of 1980, a fine season in New York. The Yankees were in the pennant race; a movie star was running for president and using the term ''deregulation'' in his campaign. Donald was new then, thirty-four years old and very brash, just beginning to make copy and loving it. He was already fodder for the dailies and the weeklies, but he was desperate for national attention. ''Did you see that The New York Times said I looked like Robert Redford?'' he asked me.

Trump hasn't changed much physically in the last ten years. Then, as now, he was all cheeks and jaw, with a tendency to look soft in the middle. He retains the blond hair, youthful swagger, and elastic face that give him the quality of the cartoon tough Baby Huey. Trump is a head swiveler, always looking around to see who else is in the room. As a boy, he was equally restless. ''Donald was the child who would throw the cake at the birthday parties,'' his brother Robert once told me. ''If I built the bricks up, Donald would come along and glue them all together, and that would be the end of my bricks.''

He was already married to Ivana, a former model and athlete from Czechoslovakia. One night in 1976, Trump had been at the bar in Maxwell's Plum. Maxwell's Plum is gone now, but the very name evokes the era of frantic singles underneath the Art Nouveau ceiling. It was the place where flight attendants hoped to find bankers, and models looked for dates. Donald met his model, Ivana Zelnickova, visiting from Montreal. She liked to tell the story of how she had gone skiing with Donald, pretending to be a learner like him, and then humiliated him by whizzing past him down the slopes.

They were married in New York during Easter of 1977. Mayor Beame attended the wedding at Marble Collegiate Church. Donald had already made his alliance with Roy Cohn, who would become his lawyer and mentor. Shortly before the wedding, Donald reportedly told Ivana, ''You have to sign this agreement.'' ''What is this?'' she asked. ''Just a document that will protect my family money.'' Cohn gallantly offered to find Ivana a lawyer. ''We don't have these documents in Czechoslovakia,'' Ivana reportedly said, but she told friends that she was terrified of Cohn and his power over Donald. The first agreement gave Ivana $20,000 a year. Two years later, Trump had made his own fortune. ''You better redo the agreement, Donald,'' Cohn reportedly told him. ''Otherwise you're going to look hard and greedy.'' Ivana resisted. ''You don't like it, stick to the old agreement,'' Trump is said to have replied.

Donald was determined to have a large family. ''I want five children, like in my own family, because with five, then I will know that one will be guaranteed to turn out like me,'' Donald told a close friend. He was willing to be generous with Ivana, and a story went around that he was giving her a cash bonus of $250,000 for each child.

The Trumps and their baby, Donald junior, lived in a Fifth Avenue apartment decorated with beige velvet sectional sofas and a bone-and-goatskin table from the Italian furniture store Casa Bella. They had a collection of Steuben glass animals which they displayed on glass shelves in the front hall. The shelves were outlined with a string of tiny white lights usually seen on a Christmas tree.

Donald was trying to make time in the world of aesthetes and little black cocktail dresses. He had just completed the Grand Hyatt, on East Forty-second Street, and was considered a comer. He had put together the Fifth Avenue parcel that would become Trump Tower and had enraged the city establishment with his demolition of the cherished Art Deco friezes that had decorated the Bonwit Teller building. Even then, Trump's style was to turn on his audience.

''What do you think? Do you think blowing up the sculptures has hurt me?'' he asked me that day at ''21.''

''Yes.''

''Who cares?'' he said. ''Let's say that I had given that junk to the Met. They would have just put them in their basement. I'll never have the goodwill of the Establishment, the tastemakers of New York. Do you think, if I failed, these guys in New York would be unhappy? They would be thrilled! Because they have never tried anything on the scale that I am trying things in this city. I don't care about their goodwill.''

Donald was like an overgrown kid, all rough edges and inflated ego. He had brought the broad style of Brooklyn and Queens into Manhattan, flouting what he considered effete conventions, such as landmark preservation. His suits were badly cut, with wide cuffs on his trousers; he was a shade away from cigars. ''I don't put on any airs,'' he told me. He tooled around New York in a silver Cadillac with ''DJT'' plates and tinted windows and had a former city cop for his driver.

Donald and I were not alone at lunch that day. He had invited Stanley Friedman to join us. Friedman was a partner of Roy Cohn's and, like Cohn, a legend in the city. He was part of the Bronx political machine, and would soon be appointed the Bronx County leader. Later, Friedman would go to jail for his role in the city parking-meter scandal. Trump and Friedman spent most of our lunch swapping stories about Roy Cohn. ''Roy could fix anyone in the city,'' Friedman told me. ''He's a genius.'' ''He's a lousy lawyer, but he's a genius,'' Trump said.

At one point, Preston Robert Tisch, known to all as Bob, came into the upstairs room at ''21.'' Bob Tisch and his brother, Laurence, now the head of CBS, had made their fortune in New York and Florida real estate and hotels. Bob Tisch, like his brother, was a city booster, a man of goodwill and manners, a benefactor of hospitals and universities.

''I beat Bob Tisch on the convention-center site,'' Donald said loudly when Tisch stopped by our table. ''But we're friends now, good friends, isn't that right, Bob? Isn't that right?''

Bob Tisch's smile remained on his face, but there was a sudden strain in his tone, as if a child had misbehaved. ''Oh yes, Donald,'' he said, ''good friends. Very good friends.''

Late on summer Friday afternoons, the city of noise takes on an eerie quiet. In June I was with one of Donald Trump's more combative lawyers. ''We certainly won't win in the popular press,'' he told me, ''but we will win. You'll see.'' I thought of Trump a few blocks away, isolated in Trump Tower, fighting for his financial life.

The phone rang several times. ''Yeah, yeah? Is that so?'' the lawyer said, and then laughed at the sheer'--as he phrased it'--''brass balls'' of his client, standing up to the numbers guys who were representing Chase Manhattan and Bankers Trust, whom he was into for hundreds of millions of dollars. ''Donald's very up. This is the kind of challenge Donald likes,'' the lawyer told me. ''It's weird. You would never know anything is wrong.'' ''Don't believe anything you read in the papers,'' Trump had told his publisher Joni Evans. ''When they hear the good news about me, what are they going to do?'' Random House was rushing to publish his new book, Trump: Surviving at the Top, with a first printing of 500,000.

In the Trump Tower conference room that week, one lawyer had reportedly told Trump the obvious: the Plaza hotel might never bring the $400 million he had paid for it. Trump stayed cool. ''Get me the Sultan of Brunei on the telephone,'' he said. ''I have a personal guarantee that the Sultan of Brunei will take me out of the Plaza at an immense profit.''

The bankers and lawyers in the conference room looked at Trump with a combination of awe and disbelief. Whatever their cynical instincts, Trump, the Music Man of real estate, could set off in them the power of imagination, for his real skill has always been his ability to convince others of his possibilities. The line between a con man and an entrepreneur is often fuzzy. ''They say the Plaza is worth $400 million? Trump says it's worth $800 million. Who the hell knows what it is worth? I can tell you one thing: it is worth a lot more than I paid for it,'' Trump told me. ''When Forbes puts low values on all my properties, they say I am only worth $500 million! Well, that's $500 million more than I started with.''

''Do people really think I am in trouble?'' Trump asked me recently.

''Yes,'' I said, ''they think you're finished.''

It was an afternoon in July, when the dust seemed to be settling, and we were in the middle of a two-hour phone conversation. The conversation itself was a negotiation. Trump attempted to put me on the defensive. I had written about him ten years before. Trump had talked about a close friend of his who was the son of a famous New York real-estate developer. ''I told him to get out from under his father's thumb,'' Trump told me then. ''That was off the record,'' Trump told me now. I looked up my old notes. ''Wrong, Donald,'' I said. ''What was off the record was when you attacked your other friend and said he was an alcoholic.'' Without missing a beat, Trump said, ''I believe you.'' Then Trump laughed. ''Some things never change.''

''Just wait five years,'' Trump told me. ''This is really a no-brainer. Just like the Merv Griffin deal. When I took him to the cleaners, the press wanted me to lose. They said, 'Holy shit! Trump got taken!' Let me tell you something. It's good for me to be thought of as poor right now. You wouldn't believe some of the deals I am making! I guess I have a perverse personality. . . . I've really enjoyed the last few weeks,'' he said, as if he had been rejuvenated at a spa.

Deals had always been his only art. He was reportedly getting unbelievable deals now from the contractors he had hired to build his casinos and the fiberglass elephants that decorate the Boardwalk in front of the Taj Mahal, for they were desperate, unsure that they would ever get paid for months of work. Trump was famous for his skill at squeezing every last bit out of his transactions. He was known to be making shocking deals now that he never could have made two months before. ''Trump won't do a deal unless there's something extra'--a kind of moral larceny'--in it,'' one of his rivals once said of him. ''Things had gotten too easy for me,'' Trump told me. ''I made a lot of money and I made it too easily, to the point of boredom. Anything I did worked! I took on Bally, I made $32 million. After a while it was too easy.''

The fear of boredom has always loomed large in Trump's life. He has a short attention span. He even gave the appearance of having grown bored with his wife. He told me he had grown weary of his deals, his companies, ''New York phonies,'' ''Palm Beach phonies,'' most social people, ''negative'' writers, and ''negatives'' in general. ''You keep hitting and hitting and hitting, and after a while it doesn't mean as much to you,'' Trump told me. ''Hey, when you first knew me, I basically had done nothing! So I had built a building or two, big deal.''

That morning, Trump had been yet again on the front page of the New York Daily News, because Forbes had dropped him off the list of the world's richest men, placing his net worth at $500 million, down from $1.7 billion in 1989. ''They put me on the front page for this bullshit reason!'' Trump said. ''If they put me on the cover of the Daily News, they sell more papers! They put me on the cover of the Daily News today with wars breaking out! You know why? Malcolm Forbes got thrown out of the Plaza by me! You know the story about me and Malcolm Forbes, when I kicked him out of the Plaza hotel? No? Well, I did. You'll read all about it in my new book. And I didn't throw him out because he didn't pay his bill. So I've been expecting this attack from Forbes. The same writer who wrote about this also wrote that Merv kicked my ass! The same writer is under investigation. You heard about that, didn't you?'' (A Forbes writer is under investigation'--for alleged use of outdated police credentials. He did not write that Trump was taken by Merv Griffin.) ''What happened to me is what is happening in every company in America right now. There is not a company in America that isn't restructuring! Didn't you see The Wall Street Journal this morning about Revlon? What is going on at Revlon is what has happened to Donald Trump. But no one makes Revlon a front-page story. My problems didn't even merit a column in The Wall Street Journal.'' (Revlon was selling $182 million worth of stock to raise cash, but that was hardly the same as Trump's crisis.)

Trump spoke in a hypnotic, unending torrent of words. Often he appeared to free-associate. He referred to himself in the third person: ''Trump says. . . Trump believes.'' His phrases skibbled around and doubled back on themselves like fireworks in a summer sky. He reminded me of a carnival barker trying to fill his tent. ''I'm more popular now than I was two months ago. There are two publics as far as I'm concerned. The real public and then there's the New York society horseshit. The real public has always liked Donald Trump. The real public feels that Donald Trump is going through Trump-bashing. When I go out now, forget about it. I'm mobbed. It's bedlam,'' Trump told me.

Trump is often belligerent, as if to pep things up. On the telephone with me, he attacked a local writer as ''a disgrace'' and savaged a financier's wife I knew as ''a giant, a three in the looks department.'' After the Resorts International deal, at a New Year's Eve party at the Aspen home of Barbara Walters and Merv Adelson, Trump was asked to make a wish for the coming year. ''I wish I had another Merv Griffin to bat around,'' he said.

Before the opening of the Taj Mahal, Marvin Roffman, a financial analyst from Philadelphia, correctly stated that the Taj was in for a rough ride. For that, Roffman believes, Trump had him fired. ''Is that why you attacked him?'' I asked Trump. ''I'd do it again. Here's a guy that used to call me, begging me to buy stock through him, with the implication that if I'd buy stock he'd give me positive comments.'' ''Are you accusing him of fraud?'' I asked. ''I'm accusing him of being not very good at what he does.'' Congressman John Dingell of Michigan asked the S.E.C. to investigate the circumstances of Roffman's firing. When I asked Roffman about Trump's charges he said, ''That's the most unbelievable garbage I've ever heard in my entire life.'' Roffman's attorney James Schwartzman called Trump's allegations ''the desperate act of a desperate man.'' Roffman is now suing Trump for defamation of character.

''Donald is a believer in the big-lie theory,'' his lawyer had told me. ''If you say something again and again, people will believe you.''

''One of my lawyers said that?'' Trump said when I asked him about it. ''I think if one of my lawyers said that, I'd like to know who it is, because I'd fire his ass. I'd like to find out who the scumbag is!''

One of Trump's first major deals in New York was to acquire a large tract of land on West Thirty-fourth Street being offered by the bankrupt Penn Central railroad. Trump submitted a plan for a convention center to city officials. ''He told us he'd forgo his $4.4 million fee if we would name the new convention center after his father,'' former deputy mayor Peter Solomon said. ''Someone finally read the contract. He wasn't entitled to anywhere near the money he was claiming. It was unbelievable. He almost got us to name the convention center after his father in return for something he never really had to give away.''

Trump's first major real-estate coup in New York was the acquisition of the Commodore Hotel, which would become the Grand Hyatt. This deal, secured with a controversial tax abatement from the city, made Trump's reputation. His partner at the time was the well-respected Pritzker family of Chicago, who owned the Hyatt chain. Their contract was specific: Trump and Jay Pritzker agreed that if there were any sticking points they would have a ten-day period to arbitrate their differences. At one point, they had a minor disagreement. ''Jay Pritzker was leaving for a trip to Nepal, where he was to be incommunicado,'' a lawyer for the Pritzker family told me. ''Donald waited until Jay was in the airplane before he called him. Naturally, Jay couldn't call him back. He was on a mountain in Nepal. Later, Donald kept saying, 'I tried to call you. I gave you the ten days. But you were in Nepal.' It was outrageous. Pritzker was his partner, not his enemy! This is how he acted on his first important deal.'' Trump later even reported the incident in his book.

''Give them the old Trump bullshit,'' he told the architect Der Scutt before a presentation of the Trump Tower design at a press conference in 1980. ''Tell them it is going to be a million square feet, sixty-eight stories.'' ''I don't lie, Donald,'' the architect replied.

Eventually Trump bought out the Equitable Life Assurance company's share of the commercial space in Trump Tower. ''He paid Equitable $60 million after an arm's-length negotiation,'' a top real-estate developer told me. ''The equity for the entire commercial space was $120 million. Suddenly, Donald was saying that it was worth $500 million!''

When The Art of the Deal was published, he told The Wall Street Journal that the first printing would be 200,000. It was 50,000 fewer than that.

When Charles Feldman of CNN questioned Trump in March about the collapse of his business empire, Trump stormed off the set. Later, he told Feldman's boss, Ted Turner, ''Your reporter threatened my secretary and made her cry.''

When the stock market collapsed, he announced that he had gotten out in time and had lost nothing. In fact, he had taken a beating on his Alexander's and American Airlines stock. ''What I said was, other than my Alexander's and American Airlines stock, I was out of the market,'' Trump told me swiftly.

What forces in Donald Trump's background could have set off in him such a need for self-promotion?

Ten years ago, I went to visit Trump's father in his offices on Avenue Z on the border of Coney Island in Brooklyn. Fred Trump's own real-estate fortune had been made with the help of the Brooklyn political machine and especially Abe Beame. In the 1940s, Trump and Beame shared a close friend and lawyer, a captain in a Brooklyn political club named Bunny Lindenbaum. At that time, Beame worked in the city budget office; thirty years later he would become mayor of the city. Trump, Lindenbaum, and Beame often saw one another at dinner dances and fund-raisers of the Brooklyn political clubs. It is impossible to overestimate the power of these clubs in the New York of the 1950s; they created Fred Trump and gave him access to his largest acquisition, the seventy-five-acre parcel of city land that would become the 3,800-unit Trump Village.

In 1960, an immense tract of land off Ocean Parkway in Brooklyn became available for development. The City Planning Commission had approved a generous tax abatement for a nonprofit foundation to build a housing cooperative. Fred Trump attacked this abatement as ''a giveaway.'' Soon after, Trump himself decided to go after the tax abatement. Although the City Planning Commission had already approved the nonprofit plan, Lindenbaum went to see Mayor Robert Wagner, and Beame, who was in Wagner's camp, supported Trump.

Fred Trump wound up with two-thirds of the property, and within a year he had broken ground on Trump Village. Lindenbaum was given the City Planning Commission seat formerly held by Robert Moses, the power broker who built many of New York's highways, airports, and parks. The following year, Lindenbaum organized a fund-raising lunch for Wagner, who was running for re-election. Forty-three builders and landlords pledged thousands of dollars; Trump, according to reporter Wayne Barrett, pledged $2,500, one of the largest contributions. The lunch party made the front page of the newspapers, and Lindenbaum, disgraced, was forced off the commission. But Robert Wagner won the election, and Beame became his comptroller.

In 1966, as Donald was entering his junior year at the Wharton business school, Fred Trump and Lindenbaum were investigated for their role in a $60 million Mitchell-Lama mortgage. ''Is there any way of preventing a man who does business in that way from getting another contract with the state?'' the investigations-commission chairman asked about Trump and Lindenbaum. Ultimately, Trump was forced to return $1.2 million that he had overestimated on the land'--part of which money he had used to buy a site nearby on which to build a shopping center.

Fred Trump's office was pleasantly modest; the rooms were divided by glass partitions. The Trump Organization, as Donald had already grandly taken to calling his father's company, was a small cottage on the grounds of Trump Village. At the time, Donald told reporters that ''the Trump Organization'' had 22,000 units, although it had about half that number. Fred Trump was seventy-five then, polite, but nobody's fool. He criticized many of his son's early deals, warning him at one point that expanding into Manhattan was ''a ticket on the Titanic.'' Donald ignored him. ''A peacock today, a feather duster tomorrow,'' the developer Sam Lefrak is said to have remarked of Donald Trump. But ten years ago it was clear that Donald was the embodiment of his father's dreams. ''I always tell Donald, 'The elevator to success is out of order. Go one step at a time,' '' Fred Trump told me. ''But what do you think of what my Donald has put together? It boggles the mind!''

Donald Trump has always viewed his father as a role model. In The Art of the Deal, he wrote, ''Fred Trump was born in New Jersey in 1905. His father, who came here from Sweden . . . owned a moderately successful restaurant.'' In fact, the Trump family was German and desperately poor. ''At one point my mother took in stitching to keep us going,'' Trump's father told me. ''For a time, my father owned a restaurant in the Klondike, but he died when I was young.'' Donald's cousin John Walter once wrote out an elaborate family tree. ''We shared the same grandfather,'' Walter told me, ''and he was German. So what?''

Although Fred Trump was born in New Jersey, family members say he felt compelled to hide his German background because most of his tenants were Jewish. ''After the war, he thought that Jews would never rent from him if they knew his lineage,'' Ivana reportedly said. Certainly, Fred Trump's camouflage could easily convey to a child the impression that in business anything goes. When I asked Donald Trump about this, he was evasive: ''Actually, it was very difficult. My father was not German; my father's parents were German . . . Swedish, and really sort of all over Europe . . . and I was even thinking in the second edition of putting more emphasis on other places because I was getting so many letters from Sweden: Would I come over and speak to Parliament? Would I come meet with the president?''

Donald Trump appears to take aspects of his German background seriously. John Walter works for the Trump Organization, and when he visits Donald in his office, Ivana told a friend, he clicks his heels and says, ''Heil Hitler,'' possibly as a family joke.

Last April, perhaps in a surge of Czech nationalism, Ivana Trump told her lawyer Michael Kennedy that from time to time her husband reads a book of Hitler's collected speeches, My New Order, which he keeps in a cabinet by his bed. Kennedy now guards a copy of My New Order in a closet at his office, as if it were a grenade. Hitler's speeches, from his earliest days up through the Phony War of 1939, reveal his extraordinary ability as a master propagandist.

''Did your cousin John give you the Hitler speeches?'' I asked Trump.

Trump hesitated. ''Who told you that?''

''I don't remember,'' I said.

''Actually, it was my friend Marty Davis from Paramount who gave me a copy of Mein Kampf, and he's a Jew.'' (''I did give him a book about Hitler,'' Marty Davis said. ''But it was My New Order, Hitler's speeches, not Mein Kampf. I thought he would find it interesting. I am his friend, but I'm not Jewish.'')

Later, Trump returned to this subject. ''If I had these speeches, and I am not saying that I do, I would never read them.''

Is Ivana trying to convince her friends and lawyer that Trump is a crypto-Nazi? Trump is no reader or history buff. Perhaps his possession of Hitler's speeches merely indicates an interest in Hitler's genius at propaganda. The F¼hrer often described his defeats at Stalingrad and in North Africa as great victories. Trump continues to endow his diminishing world with significance as well. ''There's nobody that has the cash flow that I have,'' he told The Wall Street Journal long after he knew better. ''I want to be king of cash.''

Fred Trump, like his son, has never resisted exaggeration. When Donald was a child, his father bought a house that ''had nine bathrooms and columns like Tara,'' Fred Trump said. The house, however, was in Queens. Donald would someday envision a larger world. It was Donald's mother, Mary, who revered luxury. ''My mother had a sense of the grand,'' Trump told me. ''I can remember her watching the coronation of Queen Elizabeth and being so fascinated by it. My father had no interest in that kind of thing at all.''

Donald Trump often went with his father to construction sites, for they were extraordinarily close, almost kindred spirits. In family photographs, Fred and Donald stand together, often arm in arm, while Donald's sisters and younger brother, Robert, seem off in the ether. Ivana has told friends that Donald even persuaded his father to put him in charge of his three siblings' trust funds.

Donald was one of five children, the second son. As a child, he was so boisterous that his parents sent him away to military school. ''That was the way it worked in the Trump family,'' a longtime friend told me. ''It was not a loving atmosphere.'' Donald was chubby then, but military school slimmed him down. He became forceful, and grew even closer to his father. ''I had to fight back all the time,'' Trump once told me. ''These guys like my father are tough. You have to be hitting back! Otherwise they don't respect you!''

Family members say that the firstborn son, Fred junior, often felt shut out by the relationship between Donald and his father. As a young man, he announced his intention to be an airplane pilot. Later, according to a friend of Ivana's, Donald and his father often belittled Fred junior for this career choice. ''Donald would say, 'What is the difference between what you do and driving a bus? Why aren't you in the family real-estate business?' '' Fred junior became an alcoholic and died at age forty-three. Ivana has always told her close friends that she believed the pressure put on him by his father and his brother hastened his early death. ''Perhaps unknowingly [we did put pressure on him],'' Trump told me. ''We assumed that [real estate] came rather easy to us and it should have come easily to him. I had success, and that put pressure on Fred too. What is this, a psychoanalysis of Donald?''

Donald's relationship with Robert has also had troubled moments. Robert, who did go into the family business, has always been ''the nice guy,'' in his brother's shadow. There has been additional friction between Robert's wife, Blaine, and Ivana. Blaine is considered a workhorse for New York charities, and Robert and Blaine are extremely popular'--''the good Trumps,'' they are called. ''Robert and I feel that if we say anything about the family, then we become public people,'' Blaine told me. The brothers' suppressed hostility erupted after the opening of the Taj Mahal. ''Robert told Donald that if he didn't give him autonomy he would leave,'' Ivana told a friend. ''So Donald did leave him alone, and there was a mess with the slot machines which cost Donald $3 million to $10 million in the first three days. When Donald exploded, Robert packed his boxes and left. He and Blaine went to her family for Easter.''

As his father had had Bunny Lindenbaum for his fixer, Donald Trump had Roy Cohn, the Picasso of the inside fix. ''Cohn taught Donald which fork to use,'' a friend told me. ''I'll bring my lawyer Roy Cohn with me,'' Trump often told city officials a decade ago, before he learned better. ''Donald calls me fifteen to twenty times a day,'' Cohn once told me. ''He has a maddening attention to detail. He is always asking, 'What is the status of this? What is the status of that?' ''

In a Trump tax-abatement case, according to Cohn's biographer Nicholas von Hoffman, the judge was handed a piece of paper that looked like an affidavit. It had just one sentence on it: ''No further delays or adjournments. Stanley M. Friedman.'' By then Friedman had become the county leader of the Bronx. It wasn't necessary to exchange money for such favors. This was a classic ''marker''; the power of suggestion of future favors was enough.

Friedman had also been crucial to Trump's plans for the Commodore Hotel. ''In the final days of the Beame administration,'' according to Wayne Barrett, ''Friedman rushed a $160 million, forty-year tax abatement . . . and actually executed the documents for the lame duck Beame.'' Friedman had already agreed to join Cohn's law firm, which was representing Trump. ''Trump lost his moral compass when he made an alliance with Roy Cohn,'' Liz Smith once remarked.

In New York, Trump soon became known for his confrontational style. He also became the largest contributor to Governor Hugh Carey of New York, except for Carey's brother. Trump and his father gave $135,000. He was moving quickly now; he had set himself up in a Fifth Avenue office and a Fifth Avenue apartment and had hired Louise Sunshine, Carey's chief of fund-raising, as his ''director of special projects.'' ''I knew Donald better than anyone,'' she told me. ''We're a team, Sunshine and Trump, and when people shove us, we shove harder.'' Sunshine had raised millions of dollars for Carey, and she had one of the greatest address books in the city. She took Donald to meet every city and state power broker and worked on the sale of the Trump Tower apartments.

Real-estate tax is immensely complicated. Often profit-and-loss accounting does not run parallel with cash flow. Sometimes a developer can have tremendous cash flow and yet not report taxable earnings; tax laws also permit developers to have less cash flow and greater taxable earnings. It is up to the developer. When Donald Trump broke ground on a new apartment building at Sixty-first Street and Third Avenue, Louise Sunshine was given a 5 percent share of the new Trump Plaza, as it was called.

There was some friction in Sunshine's relationship with her boss. As a result of Trump's accounting on Trump Plaza, Louise Sunshine, according to a close friend, would have had to pay taxes of $1 million. ''Why are you structuring Trump Plaza this way?'' she reportedly asked Donald. ''Where am I going to get $1 million?'' ''Sell me back your 5 percent share of Trump Plaza and you can have it,'' Trump said.

Sunshine was so stunned by this that she went to her friend billionaire Leonard Stern for help. ''I wrote out a check for $1 million on the spot so that my close friend would not find herself squeezed out by Donald,'' Stern told me. ''I said to Louise, 'You tell Trump that unless he treats you fairly you will litigate! And as a result, the details of his duplicitous treatment would not only come to the attention of the public but also to the Casino Control Commission.' '' Louise Sunshine hired Arthur Liman, who would later represent the financier Michael Milken, to handle her case. Liman worked out a settlement: Trump paid Louise Sunshine $2.7 million for her share of Trump Plaza. Sunshine repaid Leonard Stern. For several years, Trump and Sunshine had a cool relationship. But in fine New York style, they are now friends again. ''Donald never should have used his money as a power tool over me,'' Sunshine told me, adding, ''I have absolved him.''

Like Michael Milken, Trump began to believe that his inordinate skills could be translated into any business. He started to expand out of the familiar world of real estate into casinos, airlines, and hotels. With Citicorp as his enabler, he bought the Plaza and the Eastern shuttle. He managed them both surprisingly well, but he had paid too much for them. He always had the ready cooperation of the starstruck banks, which would later panic. A member of the board of the Chase Manhattan Bank recently demanded at a meeting, ''What in God's name were you thinking of to make these loans?'' No satisfactory answer was forthcoming; the Rockefeller bank had once kept Brazil afloat, too. The bankers, like the Brooklyn-machine hacks from Trump's childhood, were blame shufflers, frantic to keep the game going.

''You cannot believe the money the banks were throwing at us,'' a former top legal associate of Trump's told me. ''For every deal we did, we would have six or eight banks who were willing to give us hundreds of millions of dollars. We used to have to pick through the financings; the banks could not sign on fast enough to anything Donald conceived.''

''He bought more and more properties and expanded so much that he guaranteed his own self-destruction. His fix was spending money. Well, his quick fix became his Achilles' heel,'' a prominent developer told me.

Trump's negotiations, according to one lawyer who worked on the acquisition of the Atlantic City casino of Resorts International, were always unusually unpleasant. After the success of The Art of the Deal, Trump's lawyers began to talk about ''Donald's ego'' as if it were a separate entity. ''Donald's ego will never permit us to accept that point,'' one lawyer said over and over again during the negotiations. ''The key to Donald, like with any bully, is to tell him to go fuck himself,'' the lawyer told me. When Mortimer Zuckerman, the chairman and C.E.O. of Boston Properties, submitted a design that was chosen for the site of the Fifty-ninth Street coliseum, Trump became apoplectic. ''He called everyone, trying to get his deal killed. Of course, Mort's partner was Salomon Brothers, so Trump got nowhere,'' a person close to Zuckerman remembered.

One image of Ivana and Donald Trump sticks in my memory. Wintertime, three years ago. They were at the Wollman Rink. Donald had just fixed it up for the city. He had been crowing in the newspapers about what dummies Mayor Koch and the city had been, wasting years and money and coming up with nothing on the skating rink. Trump had taken over the job and done it well. If he grabbed more of the credit than he deserved, no one really held it against him; the rink was open at last and filled with happy skaters.

Ivana was wearing a striking lynx coat which showed her blond hair to advantage. Their arms were around each other. They looked so very young and rich, living in the moment of their success. A polite crowd had gathered to congratulate them on the triumph of the rink. The people near Donald appeared to feel enlivened by his presence, as if he were a hero. His happiness seemed a reflection of the crowd's adulation.

Next to me a man called out, ''Why don't you negotiate the SALT talks for Reagan, Donald?'' Ivana beamed. The snow began falling very lightly; from the rink below you could hear ''The Skaters' Waltz.''

Some months before the Trumps' separation, Donald and Ivana were due at a dinner party being given in their honor. The Trumps were late, and this was not a dinner to be taken lightly. The hosts had a family name that evoked the very history of New York, yet as if they had recognized another force coming up in the city, they were honoring Donald and Ivana Trump.

Trump entered the room first. ''I had to tape the Larry King show,'' he said. ''I'm on Larry King tonight.'' He seemed very restless. Trump paid little attention to his blonde companion, and no one in the room recognized Ivana until she began to speak. ''My God! What has she done to herself?'' one guest asked. Ivana's Slavic cheeks were gone; her lips had been fluffed up into a pout. Her limbs had been resculpted, and her cleavage astonishingly enhanced. The guests were so confused by her looks that her presence created an odd mood.

All through dinner Donald fidgeted. He looked at his watch. He mentioned repeatedly that he was at that moment on the Larry King show, as if he expected the guests to get up from their places. He had been belligerent to King that night, and he wanted the guests to see him, perhaps to confirm his powers. ''Do you mind if I sit back a little? Because your breath is very bad'--it really is,'' he had told Larry King on national TV.

''Come on, Arnold! Pose with me! Come on!'' Ivana Trump called out to the designer Arnold Scaasi on a warm night this past June. They were at the Waldorf-Astoria, at an awards ceremony sponsored by the Fragrance Foundation, and Ivana was a presenter. The carpet was shabby in the Jade Room; the paparazzi were waiting to pounce. P.R. materials covered the tables of this ''must do'' event, of the kind that often passes for New York social life. The most expensive couture dress looked, under the blue-green tint of the lights, cheap.

I was surprised that she appeared. The day before, her husband's crisis with the banks had provided the headlines on all three of the local tabloids. TRUMP IN A SLUMP! cried the Daily News. One columnist even said Trump's problems were the occasion for city joy, and proposed a unity day. ''Ivana! Ivana! Ivana!'' the photographers called out to her. Ivana smiled, as if she were a presidential candidate. She wore a full-skirted mint-green satin beaded gown; her hair was swept off her face in a chignon. However humiliated for her children's sake she may have felt by the bad publicity, she had elected to leave them at home that night. Ivana was at the Waldorf by 6:15 P.M., greeting reporters and paparazzi by name. She could not afford now to alienate the perfume establishment by canceling, for soon she would be merchandising a fragrance, and she would need their goodwill.

Ivana seemed determined to keep her new stature in the city of alliances, for her financial future depended on her being able to salvage the brand name. As a woman alone, with a reduced fortune, Ivana was entering a tough world. She had no Rothkos to hock and no important jewels. But she did have the name Ivana, and she was making plans to market scarves, perfumes, handbags, and shoes, as once her husband had been able to market the name Trump.

Several feet away from us, the local CBS reporter was doing a stand-up for the evening news. The reporter was commenting on the unraveling of the Trump empire while Ivana was chatting with Scaasi and Est(C)e Lauder. Lauder, a tough businesswoman herself, had reportedly told Ivana several months earlier, ''Go back with Donald. It is a cold world out here.'' I was reminded of a crowd scene in Nathanael West's Day of the Locust. Ivana even allowed the CBS reporter to shove a microphone into her face. ''Donald and I are partners in marriage and in business. I will stand beside him through thick or thin, for better or worse,'' she told the reporters with bizarre aplomb. Ivana had become, like Donald, a double agent, able to project innocence and utter confidence. She had, in fact, almost turned into Donald Trump.

''To tell you the truth, I've made Ivana a very popular woman. I've made a lot of satellites. Hey, whether it's Marla or Ivana. Marla can do any movie she wants to now. Ivana can do whatever she wants,'' Donald Trump told me on the phone.

''New York City is a very tough place,'' Ivana Trump told me years ago. ''I'm tough, too. When people give me a punch in the nose, I react by getting even tougher.'' We were walking through the rubble of the Commodore Hotel, which would soon reopen as the Grand Hyatt. Ivana had been given the responsibility of supervising all the decoration; she was hard at it, despite the fact that she was wearing a white wool Thierry Mugler jumpsuit and pale Dior shoes as she picked her way through the sawdust. ''I told you never to leave a broom like this in a room!'' she screamed at one worker. Screaming at her employees had become part of her hallmark, perhaps her way of feeling power. Later, in Atlantic City, she would become known for her obsession with cleanliness.

The phrase ''Stockholm syndrome'' is now used by Ivana's lawyer Michael Kennedy to describe her relationship with Donald. ''She had the mentality of a captive,'' Kennedy told me. ''After a while she couldn't fight her captor anymore, and she began to identify with him. Ivana is deaf, dumb, and blind when it comes to Donald.'' If Donald worked eighteen-hour days, so would Ivana. The Trumps hired two nannies and a bodyguard for their children. She went to work running Trump Castle casino in Atlantic City, often spending two or three days a week there supervising the staff.

Determined to bring glamour to Trump Castle, she became famous for her attention to appearances, once moving a pregnant waitress, desperate for big tips, off the casino floor. The woman was placed in a distant lounge and given a clown's suit to disguise her condition.

In New York, Ivana did not resist her husband's grandiosity. Soon after Trump Tower was completed, the Trumps took possession of their triplex. Ivana's lawyers often talk about her love of the domestic arts and describe her homemade jams and jellies. Yet the kitchen of her city apartment, which she designed, is tiny, no more than a kitchenette, tiled with gold linoleum. ''The children's wing has a kitchen, and that is where the nanny cooks,'' a friend said. The Trump living room has a beige onyx floor with holes carved out to fit the carpets. There is a waterfall cascading down a marble wall, an Italianate fountain, and the famous murals. Their bedroom had a glass wall filled with arrangements of silk flowers. After a time, Ivana tired of the d(C)cor. She called in a renowned decorator. ''What can I do with this interior?'' she reportedly asked him. ''Absolutely nothing,'' he said.

Christmas Eve, three years ago. Ivana had received another stack of legal documents the size of a telephone book. ''What is this?'' she is said to have asked Donald. ''It is our new nuptial agreement. You get $10 million. Sign it!'' ''But I can't look at this now, it's Christmas,'' Ivana said. Donald pressed her, according to Kennedy. Trump seemed extraordinarily concerned that she sign the papers, perhaps because an Atlantic City photographer was threatening to blackmail him with photos he had taken of him and Marla Maples. However efficiently Ivana ran Trump Castle, she seemed terrified of her husband. She signed the papers giving her $10 million and the mansion in Greenwich, Connecticut. Later, Trump would tell reporters, ''Ivana has $25 million.''

The tactics he used in business he now brought home. ''Donald began calling Ivana and screaming all the time: 'You don't know what you are doing!' '' one of Ivana's top assistants told me. ''When Ivana would hang up the phone, I would say, 'How can you put up with this?' and Ivana would say, 'Because Donald is right.' '' He began belittling her: ''That dress is terrible.'' ''You're showing too much cleavage.'' ''You never spend enough time with the children.'' ''Who would touch those plastic breasts?'' Ivana told her friends that Donald had stopped sleeping with her. She blamed herself. ''I think it was Donald's master plan to get rid of Ivana in Atlantic City,'' one of her assistants told me. ''By then, Marla Maples was in a suite at the Trump Regency. Atlantic City was to be their playground.''

Ivana had once warned her husband against Atlantic City. ''Why expand somewhere where there is no airport?'' Trump, however, was determined to invest there, even though Las Vegas associates had told him that Nevada gaming had profit factors that could total $200 million a year. But by now Marla Maples was in Atlantic City, and it was close to New York. Trump had become, according to one friend, ''so focused on Marla he wasn't paying attention to his business.''

Though Ivana had established herself in Atlantic City to please Donald, her presence there now, with Marla on the scene, was an inconvenience to him. With the acquisition of the Plaza hotel, he could deliver an ultimatum: ''Either you act like my wife and come back to New York and take care of your children or you run the casino in Atlantic City and we get divorced.''

''What am I going to do?'' she asked one of her assistants. ''If I don't do what he says, I am going to lose him.''

Trump even called a press conference to announce Ivana's new position as the president of the Plaza hotel: ''My wife, Ivana, is a brilliant manager. I will pay her one dollar a year and all the dresses she can buy!'' Ivana called her friends in tears. ''How can Donald humiliate me this way?''

''I think Marla is very different from her image,'' Donald Trump told me in July. ''Her image is that of a very good-looking buxom blonde.'' A Donna Rice? ''She's much different than that. She's smart, she's very nice, and not ambitious. She could have made a fortune in the last six months if she had wanted to!''

''How could you have allowed Marla to be the No Excuses jeans girl?'' I asked Trump. ''Because I figured she could make $600,000 for doing one day's work. For the negative publicity, I thought, that $600,000 she can live on the rest of her life,'' Trump told me.

This past February, Trump took off for Japan, telling reporters he would be attending the Mike Tyson fight. His real motive was reportedly to meet with bankers to try to sell the Plaza, for Arthur Andersen's November audit had been dire. As he was flying back, he was radioed on the plane. Liz Smith had broken the story of the Trumps' separation. The entire sordid history of Marla Maples and Ivana fighting on the Aspen ski slopes was all over the papers. Ivana had done to Donald what years ago he had done to Jay Pritzker in Nepal. From the airplane, Trump called Liz Smith. ''Congratulations on your story,'' he told her sarcastically. ''I have had it with Ivana. She's gotten to be like Leona Helmsley.'' ''Shame on you, Donald!'' Smith replied. ''How dare you say that about the mother of your children?'' ''Just write that someone from Howard Rubenstein's office said it,'' Trump told Smith, referring to his well-connected press agent. (''I never said that,'' Trump told me. ''Yes, he did,'' said Smith.) The Japanese bankers with whom Trump had negotiated a tentative sale suddenly backed off. ''The Japanese despise scandal,'' one of their associates told me.

Several weeks later, Donald called Ivana. ''Why don't we walk down Fifth Avenue together for the photographers and pretend that this entire scandal has been a publicity stunt? We could say that we wanted to see who would side with you and who would side with me.'' As the press became more sympathetic to Ivana, Donald would scream at his lawyers, ''This is bullshit!''

Ivana began to repair old feuds all over town. ''We can be friends now, Leonard, can't we?'' she said at a recent party, according to a friend of Leonard Stern's. ''Your problem was with Donald, never me. I always liked you.''

Trump's lawyers tried mightily to catch up with Ivana. ''Donald saw a bill this week that Ivana charged $7,000 worth of Pratesi sheets for their daughter, Ivancka,'' one lawyer said. ''He called in a rage. 'Why does a seven-year-old need $7,000 worth of sheets?' She charged a $350 shirt at Montenapoleone. Who was that for, her new best friend, Jerry Zipkin?'' The lawyer described Ivana's bills from Carolina Herrera: ''We will get a bill for $25,000, and Ivana will have photocopied over the invoice, so instead of one dress at $25,000, in her own handwriting she will write, 'Six items for $25,000.' '' (A spokesman for Ivana says that this is completely untrue.)

The scandal was seriously affecting the Trump children. Donny junior was being ridiculed at the Buckley School. Ivancka had been in tears at Chapin. When Donald and Marla Maples attended the same Elton John concert, Donny junior cried, for his father had told the children he would give Marla Maples up. ''The children are all wrecks,'' Ivana told Liz Smith. ''I don't know how Donald can say they are great and fine. Ivancka now comes home from school crying, 'Mommy, does it mean I'm not going to be Ivancka Trump anymore?' Little Eric asks me, 'Is it true you are going away and not coming back?' '' However cavalier Ivana's public behavior was, in private she often cried. Once her husband's co-conspirator, she told friends that she now felt she was his victim.

On the Saturday of Donald Trump's forty-fourth-birthday celebration, I tried to take a walk on the West Side yards above Lincoln Center in Manhattan. The railroad tracks were rusty, the land was overgrown. The property stretched on, block after block. It was cool by the Hudson River that morning, with a pleasant breeze whipping over the water. The only sign of Trump was a high storm fence topped with elaborate curls of barbed wire to keep out the homeless people who live nearby. It was on this land, at the height of his megalomania, that Trump said he would erect ''the tallest building in the world,'' a plan which was successfully thwarted by neighborhood activists who were resistant to having parts of the West Side obscured in shadow. ''They have no power,'' Trump said at the time, baffled that anyone would resist his grandiose schemes.

Ivana had left for London to take part in one more public-relations event promoting the Plaza, only this time her friends the Baron and Baroness Ricky di Portanova were rumored to be paying the bill. Ivana had had her New York media campaign orchestrated by John Scanlon, who had handled public relations for CBS during the Westmoreland libel case. In London, she was cosseted by Eleanor Lambert, the doyenne of fashion publicists. A story went around London that she couldn't afford her hotel and had moved in with a friend on Eaton Square. She was treading the same ground as Undine Spragg, who so carefully calculated her rise in Edith Wharton's The Custom of the Country. Sir Humphry Wakefield assembled a list of titled guests for a dinner, but there was friction between him and Ivana. When the guests, including the Duchess of Northumberland, arrived, many of them were displeased that they had been lured to a dinner which, to their surprise, was in honor of Ivana Trump. ''Humphry will pay for this,'' one guest reportedly said.

That Saturday, New York seemed oddly vacant without the Trumps. Donald had left for his birthday party in Atlantic City. Hundreds of casino employees had been told to be on the Boardwalk to greet him, since Manhattan boosters were in short supply. The day before, he had defaulted on $73 million owed to bondholders and bankers. Clowns and jesters borrowed from Trump's Xanadu attempted to entertain the waiting employees and reporters underneath Trump's minarets and elephants, which soon might be repossessed.

Trump arrived very late, flanked by his bodyguards. His face was hard, his mouth set into a line. With an elaborate flourish, Trump's executives pulled a curtain to reveal his birthday tribute, a huge portrait of Donald Trump, the same image the Japanese stared at in his Manhattan tower. The size of the portrait was unsettling on the Atlantic City Boardwalk: ten feet of the Donald, leaning forward on his elbow, his face frozen in the familiar defiant smirk.

Within days, the bankers agreed to give Trump $65 million to pay his bills. Much of his empire would probably have to be dismantled, but he would retain control. His personal allowance would now be $450,000 a month. ''I can live with that,'' Trump said. ''However absurd this sounds, it was smarter to do it this way than to let a judge preside over a fire sale in a bankruptcy court,'' one banker told me. Trump crowed about the bailout. ''This is a great victory. It's a great agreement for everybody,'' he said.

Not exactly. Trump's bankers were said to be so upset at Trump's balance sheet'-- he was reportedly over half a billion dollars in the hole'--that they demanded he sign over his future trust inheritance to secure the new loans. Trump's father, who had created him by helping him achieve his first deals, now seemed to be rescuing him again. ''Total bullshit,'' Trump told me. ''I have been given five years by the banks. The banks would never have asked me for my future inheritance, and I would never have given it.''

Soon after, Trump announced that the French department store Galeries Lafayette would take over the vast space Bonwit Teller had vacated in Trump Tower. ''This is in no way a comeback,'' Trump told me. ''Because I never went anywhere.''

I was still searching for Donald Trump. On a rainy Thursday in July, I went down to federal court, where he was set to testify in a civil case in which he was a defendant. Along with his contractor, Trump had been accused of hiring scores of illegal Polish aliens to do the demolition work on the Trump Tower site. ''The Polish brigade,'' as they came to be called, had been astonishingly exploited on the job, earning four dollars an hour for work that usually paid five times that.

The last time I had been in this neighborhood was to hear the verdict in the John Gotti trial. I had come to know the area well. The guard inside greeted me by name. I was often here dipping in and out of the courtrooms to observe the notorious figures of the last decade. I thought of Bess Myerson, Michael Milken, Ivan Boesky, Leona Helmsley, Imelda Marcos, and Adnan Khashoggi, shattered and brought down in the crazy kaleidoscope of the 1980s. Each one had, at one time in his or her life, been thought to be like Donald Trump, a figure of greatness, anointed with special powers. In front of the courthouse, the police barricades were up. So many celebrities passed through these revolving doors that the yellow saw-horses were left routinely on the massive courthouse steps.

I thought about the ten years since I had first met Donald Trump. It is fashionable now to say that he was a symbol of the crassness of the 1980s, but Trump became more than a vulgarian. Like Michael Milken, Trump appeared to believe that his money gave him a freedom to set the rules. No one stopped him. His exaggerations and baloney were reported, and people laughed. His bankers showered him with money. City officials almost allowed him to set public policy by erecting his wall of concrete on the Hudson River. New York City, like the bankers from the Chase and Manny Hanny, allowed Trump to exist in a universe where all reality had vanished. ''I met with a couple of reporters,'' Trump told me on the telephone, ''and they totally saw what I was saying. They completely believed me. And then they went out and wrote vicious things about me, as I am sure you will, too.'' Long ago, Trump had counted me among his enemies in his world of ''positives'' and ''negatives.'' I felt that the next dozen people he spoke to would probably be subjected to a catalogue of my transgressions as imagined by Donald Trump.

When I got to the courtroom, Trump had gone. His lawyer, the venerable and well-connected Milton Gould, was smiling broadly, for he appeared to believe that he was wiping the floor with this case. Trump had said that he knew nothing about the demolitions, that his contractor had been ''a disaster.'' Yet one F.B.I. informant testified that he had warned Trump of the presence of the Polish brigade and had told him that if he didn't get rid of them his casino license might not be granted.

I wandered down to the pressroom on the fifth floor to hear about Trump's testimony. The reporters sounded weary; they had heard it all before. ''Goddamn it,'' one shouted at me, ''we created him! We bought his bullshit! He was always a phony, and we filled our papers with him!''

I thought about the last questions Donald Trump had asked me the day before on the telephone. ''How long is your article?'' ''Long,'' I said. Trump seemed pleased. ''Is it a cover?'' he asked.

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Mon, 29 Oct 2018 21:04

Donald Trump reportedly owned a copy of Adolf Hitler's speeches and kept them in his bedside cabinet.

A 1990 Vanity Fair article about billionaire businessman stated that Mr Trump's then wife Ivana, said her husband owned a copy of ''My New Order'' '' a printed collection of the Nazi leader's speeches.

Marie Brenner, the article's author, wrote: ''Ivana Trump told her lawyer Michael Kennedy that from time to time her husband reads a book of Hitler's collected speeches, 'My New Order', which he keeps in a cabinet by his bed.

''Kennedy now guards a copy of My New Order in a closet at his office, as if it were a grenade. Hitler's speeches, from his earliest days up through the Phony War of 1939, reveal his extraordinary ability as a master propagandist.''

Asked by Ms Brenner about the claim and whether his cousin, John Walter, had given him the book, Mr Trump responded: ''Who told you that?"

He went on to explain that it was "his friend Marty Davis from Paramount who gave me a copy of Mein Kampf, and he's a Jew.''

Mr Davis told Vanity Fair: ''I did give him a book about Hitler. But it was My New Order, Hitler's speeches, not Mein Kampf. I thought he would find it interesting. I am his friend, but I'm not Jewish.''

leftCreated with Sketch. rightCreated with Sketch.

1/9 Trump and the mediaWhite House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing

Getty Images

2/9 Trump and the Trans-Pacific PartnershipUnion leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC.Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal

Getty

3/9 Trump and the Mexico wallA US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border.A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office

Getty Images

4/9 Trump and abortionUS President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House.Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States

Getty Images

5/9 Trump and the Dakota Access pipelineOpponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation

Getty Images

6/9 Trump and 'Obamacare'Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California.US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter

Getty Images

7/9 Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities'US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law

AP

8/9 Trump and the travel banUS President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March

SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images

9/9 Trump and climate changeUS President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions

Shannon Stapleton/Reuters

1/9 Trump and the mediaWhite House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing

Getty Images

2/9 Trump and the Trans-Pacific PartnershipUnion leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC.Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal

Getty

3/9 Trump and the Mexico wallA US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border.A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office

Getty Images

4/9 Trump and abortionUS President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House.Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States

Getty Images

5/9 Trump and the Dakota Access pipelineOpponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation

Getty Images

6/9 Trump and 'Obamacare'Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California.US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter

Getty Images

7/9 Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities'US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law

AP

8/9 Trump and the travel banUS President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March

SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images

9/9 Trump and climate changeUS President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions

Shannon Stapleton/Reuters

Mr Trump, however, denied he would ever read speeches given by Hitler, saying: ''If I had these speeches, and I am not saying that I do, I would never read them."

Ms Brenner suggested the businessman, who was suffering difficulties with his business at the time, may have been looking for inspiration in Hitler's "genius for propaganda" and the way he spun military defeats as great victories.

The article also claimed that John Walter would frequently greet his cousin by saying: ''Heil Hitler''.

More about Donald Trump Adolf Hitler Mein Kampf Ivana Trump Vanity Fair

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Mon, 29 Oct 2018 11:37

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has told leaders of her Christian Democrats (CDU) that she will not seek re-election as party chairwoman at a conference in early December, a senior party source said.

Merkel has been CDU chairwoman since 2000 and giving up the role would start a move within the party to succeed her as chancellor.

The euro fell to session lows upon the news.

German news agency DPA, citing sources, tweeted that Merkel wanted to remain chancellor.

Monday's developments come after the CDU came home first but bled support in a vote in the western state of Hesse on Sunday, the second electoral setback in as many weeks for Merkel's conservative alliance.

Standing down from the party chair would allow a new CDU chief to build a profile before the next national election, due in 2021. Merkel's favoured successor is CDU party secretary general Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer.

Merkel's weakness at home may limit her capacity to lead in the European Union at a time when the bloc is dealing with Brexit, a budget crisis in Italy, and the prospect of populist parties making gains at European parliament elections next May.

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Mon, 29 Oct 2018 21:01

The many ways that the president, his family and his aides are lining their own pockets.

Image President Trump, his family and many of the people he has hired are profiting from his presidency. Credit Credit Sarah Silbiger/The New York Times They don't even try very hard to hide it.

President Trump, his family and more than a few of his appointees are using his presidency to enrich themselves. They are spending taxpayer dollars for their own benefit. They are accepting sweetheart deals from foreigners. And they are harnessing the power of the federal government on behalf of their businesses.

There's a word for this: corruption.

Given how widespread Trumpian corruption has become, we thought it was time to make a list. It's meant to be a definitive list of self-dealing by the president, his family, his staff or his friends '-- since he began running for president. To qualify, an incident needs to seem highly credible, even if it remains unresolved, and needs to involve making money.

Compiling the list made us understand why some historians believe Trump's administration is the most corrupt since at least Warren Harding's, of 1920s Teapot Dome fame. Trump administration officials and people close to them are brashly using power to amass perks and cash. They are betting that they can get away with it. So far, Congress has let them.

[Listen to ''The Argument'' podcast every Thursday morning with Ross Douthat, Michelle Goldberg and David Leonhardt.]

Here's the list, sorted into thematic categories:

Trump and FamilyForeigners are paying the Trumps.A few days after the 2016 election, the government of Kuwait canceled a planned event at the Four Seasons Hotel. It instead held the event '-- a celebration of Kuwait's National Day '-- at the Trump International Hotel in Washington.

Image International and American businesses curry favor with President Trump by spending money at his properties. Credit Alex Wroblewski for The New York Times That celebration fits a pattern. Officials from foreign governments have realized they can curry favor with Trump by spending money at his properties. The list of governments includes Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, Bahrain, Azerbaijan, Turkey, China, India, Afghanistan and Qatar. Some may have done so even if he were not the president, but others are well aware of what they are doing.

The Constitution forbids federal officials from accepting gifts, known as emoluments, from foreign powers, unless they have received congressional approval. Congressional Democrats have sued Trump for violating this clause, and the case is now in federal court.

Americans are paying the Trumps.American officials and business leaders have also spent money at Trump properties, sometimes in an apparent effort to please the president. Gov. Paul LePage of Maine last year stayed at the Trump International Hotel in Washington. Other Republicans have held campaign fund-raisers and party events at the properties. So have corporate lobbyists.

''National Railroad Construction and Maintenance Association Dinner at the Trump Hotel where I am drinking Trump coffee,'' Senator Chuck Grassley, the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, posted on Instagram last year.

Trump Inc. is expanding overseas.During Trump's presidency, his companies have pushed to expand overseas, with help from foreign governments. One example: In May, an Indonesian real-estate project that involves the Trump Organization reportedly received a $500 million loan from a company owned by the Chinese government. Two days later, Trump tweeted that he was working to lift sanctions on a Chinese telecommunications firm with close ties to the government '-- over the objections of both Republicans and Democrats in Congress. He ultimately did lift the sanctions.

Image Donald Trump Jr., taking the stage during the Global Business Summit in New Delhi, India. Credit Money Sharma/Agence France-Presse '-- Getty Images Image Security officials outside a Trump Tower construction site in India. Credit Dibyangshu Sarkar/Agence France-Presse '-- Getty Images Trump's businesses have also moved to expand in India, the Dominican Republic and Indonesia, using deals directly with foreign governments.

Kushner Inc. is wooing foreign investment.Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law and a top aide, has also reportedly been using his position to help his family business '-- Kushner Companies, also a real-estate company. Kushner's sister, Nicole Meyer, has bragged about the company's high-level ties when trying to attract Chinese investment in a New Jersey apartment complex. The Kushners have wooed Chinese investors despite warnings from American counterintelligence officials that China is using the investments to sway Trump administration policy.

Image Jared Kushner has reportedly been using his position to help his family business. Credit Doug Mills/The New York Times The Kushner company also successfully lobbied the Qatari government to invest in 666 Fifth Avenue, a financially troubled luxury building. The company's dealings with Middle Eastern countries are especially problematic because Jared Kushner is one of the administration's top policymakers for the region and has played a central role in policy toward Qatar.

The presidency has become a branding opportunity.The president has played golf at his properties dozens of times since taking office. He refers to his Florida resort, Mar-a-Lago, as the winter White House. Shortly after his election, he celebrated New Year's along with 800 guests there, with tickets costing more than $500. And Kellyanne Conway, a top Trump adviser, once encouraged people to buy clothes from Ivanka Trump's line '-- while Conway was giving a television interview from the White House.

These moves are intended, at least partly, to bring attention and ultimately customers to Trump's businesses. Of course, some of Trump's critics have responded in kind, refusing to stay at or live in a Trump-branded property since he won the election. But in other ways, the presidency has clearly helped his bottom line. One example: The Mar-a-Lago club has doubled its membership rates.

Taxpayers are subsidizing the Trumps.Trump has visited or stayed at one of his properties almost one out of every three days that he has been president, according to both The Wall Street Journal and NBC News. Like previous presidents, Trump travels with a large group of staff and security personnel, and American taxpayers typically foot at least part of the bill for the trips. Unlike previous presidents, Trump is directing money to his own business on his trips.

In one three-month period last year, the Secret Service spent about $63,000 at Mar-a-Lago and more than $137,000 on golf carts at Trump's Florida and New Jersey clubs.

Image President Trump heading to board Air Force One under the watchful eyes of his security staff. Credit Tom Brenner for The New York Times Trump Inc. gets special protection.The president personally intervened in a plan to relocate the F.B.I.'s Washington headquarters, apparently to protect Trump International Hotel, which is about a block away. If the F.B.I. had moved, its current site would most likely have been turned into a commercial development, and the long construction process '-- as well as potential for a new hotel on the site '-- could have hurt the Trump hotel.

Trump stopped this plan, and the White House has instead decided to build a new F.B.I. headquarters on the current site. A report by the inspector general found that officials gave misleading answers to Congress about Trump's role and the project's cost.

Trump's Cabinet, Aides and AlliesFriendly businesses also get special treatment.The Education Department during the Obama administration aggressively regulated for-profit colleges '-- many of which have miserable records, often taking money from students without providing a useful education. Trump chose Betsy DeVos, a longtime advocate of these colleges and an investor in them, as his education secretary. She, not surprisingly, has gone easy on for-profit colleges. Among other moves, she has reassigned the members of an department team investigating potentially fraudulent activities at for-profit colleges.

DeVos is the most blatant example of administration officials protecting companies where they once worked, but there are many others. More than 164 former lobbyists work in the administration, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, including several who regulate the industries that once paid their salaries. Geoff Burr, who pushed for more lax workplace safety laws when he was the chief lobbyist for a construction group, now works at the Department of Labor. Andrew Wheeler, the head of the Environmental Protection Agency, was previously a lobbyist whose firm was paid millions of dollars by companies whose industries he now regulates.

Family, friends and donors get perks.The president and his aides have repeatedly shown they are willing to use the government's prestige and power to help their friends and relatives make money.

Image Scott Pruitt's numerous scandals led him to resign his position as head of the E.P.A. Credit Eric Thayer for The New York Times Image Betsy DeVos testifying before the Senate Appropriations Committee. Credit Tom Brenner/The New York Times Among the examples:

Trump suggested to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe of Japan during a meeting at Mar-a-Lago in February 2017 that Abe grant a coveted operating license to a casino company owned by Sheldon Adelson, who donated at least $20 million to Trump's presidential campaign.

Ben Carson, the housing and urban development secretary, let his son help organize an official department event and invite people with whom the son had potential business dealings.

Scott Pruitt, the former E.P.A. head, asked his staff members to contact Republicans donors with the goal of helping his wife find a job. Pruitt also rented a condo on Capitol Hill for $50 a night, well below market value, from the wife of an energy lobbyist whose project the E.P.A. approved last March. Pruitt's many scandals led to his resignation in July.

Elaine Chao, the transportation secretary, used interviews with Chinese and Chinese-American media to raise her father's profile. He is a shipping magnate whose business transports goods between the United States and Asia, and he sat next to her during the interviews.

And although it doesn't quite rise to the same level of the other examples here: White House staffers receive a discount of up to 70 percent on Trump-branded merchandise at the president's Bedminster, N.J., golf club, reportedly at the president's recommendation.

Image White House staff members using Trump-branded umbrellas at his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey. Credit Tom Brenner for The New York Times Cabinet officials make unethical stock trades.Several Trump officials '-- current and former '-- have traded stocks while serving in top government positions. In some cases, they appear to have made policy decisions benefiting the companies in which they owned a stake.

Tom Price, Trump's first secretary of health and human services, epitomized this form of corruption. Trump chose him despite his history of using his seat in Congress to make money. Price had a long record of putting the interests of drug companies above those of taxpayers and patients '-- and then investing in those drug companies on the side.

Brenda Fitzgerald, the former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, committed a more mild version of this sin. She purchased shares in food, drug and tobacco companies after taking charge of an agency that regulates them '-- and that aims to reduce smoking. After her purchases became public, she resigned.

Finally, Wilbur Ross, Trump's commerce secretary, has mixed government business and his own business in multiple ways. He held on to investments '-- and then appears to have lied to government ethics officials about those investments. He shorted the stock of a company about which he appeared to have advance notice of bad news. He also met with the chief executive of Chevron, even though his wife owned a substantial investment '-- which, according to Forbes, ''put himself at risk of violating a criminal conflict-of-interest law.''

Image Tom Price during his nomination hearing. Credit Al Drago/The New York Times Image Michael Cohen, Trump's former lawyer and fixer, after a court appearance in August. Credit Andres Kudacki for The New York Times Trump's orbit receives cash.Michael Cohen '-- Trump's former lawyer and fixer, who has since turned on him '-- received at least $1 million from AT&T, Novartis and Korea Aerospace Industries shortly after the 2016 election. They were supposedly paying for his insight into the Trump administration.

Corey Lewandowski, the former manager of Trump's campaign, is paid for work that looks very much like lobbying '-- such as participating in a lobbying firm's phone calls with clients and doing work on behalf of T-Mobile, the telecommunications company firm. But Lewandowski has not registered as a lobbyist and says he does not need to do so.

Paul Manafort, Trump's former campaign chairman, reportedly used his position to offer private briefings to a Russian oligarch to whom he owed millions of dollars. Manafort saw the briefings as a way to ''get whole.''

Cabinet officials take junkets.Trump officials have made a habit of billing American taxpayers for their personal travel. Ryan Zinke, Trump's secretary of the interior, chartered a $12,000 flight to fly out of Las Vegas, where he had given a 12-minute speech to a hockey team owned by a businessman who donated to his congressional campaign.

David Shulkin, the secretary of veterans affairs, charged taxpayers for a trip to Europe that included stopovers at Wimbledon and Westminster Abbey, plus a river cruise for him and his wife. The resulting outcry appears to have played a role in his departure.

Image Ryan Zinke at a speaking event earlier this year. Credit Ryan Hermens/Rapid City Journal, via Associated Press Pruitt, the former head of the E.P.A., chartered flights for questionable travel, among many other things. He also pushed to fly Delta rather than the government's contract carrier, to accrue frequent flier miles. He flew first class and stayed in hotels that were more expensive than those allowed by government standards. And he let lobbyists help arrange foreign trips for him.

Brock Long, the head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, spent $151,000 on government vehicles without authorization, including to travel to his North Carolina home. He was ordered to repay the government.

Steven Mnuchin, the Treasury secretary, looked into whether he could use a military plane to fly him to Europe for his honeymoon. Later, he used military planes for several trips. The Treasury Department's inspector general concluded that Mnuchin broke no laws by doing so, but criticized Mnuchin's insufficient explanation for why he needed to spend $800,000 on the trips.

Image Steven Mnuchin and his wife, Louise Linton, holding an uncut sheet of $1 notes bearing Mnuchin's name. Credit Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg And Price, the former health secretary, spent hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars on private planes. His history of unethical stock trading didn't keep Trump from naming Price to the cabinet. But the private-plane scandal received enough attention that the White House eventually forced Price to resign.

Trump's team enjoys interior decorating.The pettiest kind of Trumpian corruption takes the form of interior decorating.

Zinke, the interior secretary, spent $139,000 in taxpayer money on new doors for his office. Carson, the secretary of health and human services, picked out a dining set for his office that cost $31,000 '-- and then gave Congress contradictory explanations for the purchase and blamed it on his wife. Pruitt ordered a $43,000 soundproof phone booth installed in his office and appears to have violated federal law by failing to inform Congress about it.

Where is Congress?It has shirked its constitutional duty.

The biggest scandal of all, however, is not even the corruption of the Trump administration. It's the inaction of Congress.

Image President Trump's motorcade driving to dinner last month at the Trump International Hotel in Washington. Credit Al Drago for The New York Times The founders were well aware that the government they were creating could end up with corrupt or unethical leaders, all the way up to the president. That's why the Constitution gives Congress tremendous power to investigate and even remove officials in the executive branch.

Yet the current congressional leaders '-- the Republican leaders '-- have refused to do so. They have shirked their duty to act as a check on the president and his appointees. They have instead defended Trump and made excuses on his behalf. They have enabled the most corrupt administration of our lifetimes.

What's missing from this list? If you think there are other examples that should appear on this list, email us at leonhardt@nytimes.com.

Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook and Twitter (@NYTopinion), and sign up for the Opinion Today newsletter.

David Leonhardt is a former Washington bureau chief for the Times, and was the founding editor of The Upshot and head of The 2020 Project, on the future of the Times newsroom. He won the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for commentary, for columns on the financial crisis. @ DLeonhardt ' Facebook

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Mon, 29 Oct 2018 01:25

In this political environment, it's easy to look at Republicans and Democrats as having next to nothing in common. Regardless of the issue at hand, we see them as wanting completely different things'--especially when it comes to issues of sex and sexuality.

From differences in the way they have approached the sexual assault allegations against Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh to their views on abortion and same-sex marriage, Democrats and Republicans appear worlds apart.

Story Continued Below

It's not just their public policy positions that seem to differ wildly, though.

According to the largest and most comprehensive survey of sexual fantasies ever conducted in the United States, it would appear that there are also political differences in our private sexual fantasies.

I surveyed 4,175 adult Americans from all 50 states about what turns them on and published the findings in a book entitled Tell Me What You Want. As part of this survey, participants were given a list of hundreds of different people, places and things that might be a turn-on. For each one, they reported on how frequently they fantasized about it.

I learned a lot about the nature of sexual desire in modern America, but one of the more intriguing things I uncovered was the political divide in our fantasy worlds.

While self-identified Republicans and self-identified Democrats reported fantasizing with the same average frequency'--several times per week'--I found that Republicans were more likely than Democrats to fantasize about a range of activities that involve sex outside of marriage. Think things like infidelity, orgies and partner swapping, from 1970s-style ''key parties'' to modern-day forms of swinging. Republicans also reported more fantasies with voyeuristic themes, including visiting strip clubs and practicing something known as ''cuckolding,'' which involves watching one's partner have sex with someone else.

Why do Republicans seem to be drawn to non-monogamy and Democrats to power play in their sexual fantasies?

By contrast, self-identified Democrats were more likely than Republicans to fantasize about almost the entire spectrum of BDSM activities, from bondage to spanking to dominance-submission play. The largest Democrat-Republican divide on the BDSM spectrum was in masochism, which involves deriving pleasure from the experience of pain.

Why is that? Why do Republicans seem to be drawn to nonmonogamy and Democrats to power play in their sexual fantasies?

On the surface, it might be tempting to see this as revealing a fundamental difference in their sexual psychology. However, if you dig a little deeper, you'll find that while some of the activities that turn Republicans and Democrats on appear vastly different, the underlying processes that drive our sexual fantasies may actually be the same. There's far more that unites us than divides us when it comes to sexual desire.

What connects Republicans and Democrats, I believe, is that their fantasies are at least partly driven by what they can't have. As I argue in Tell Me What You Want, the supersized sexual appeal that nonmonogamous and voyeuristic acts hold for Republicans likely stems from the fact that sex outside of marriage and multipartner sex are huge no-nos in a political party that continues to make ''traditional marriage'' one of the cornerstones of its official platform and regularly funnels federal funds toward abstinence-only sex education. Nothing makes us want to try something like being told you can't do it. This is why taboos, no matter what they are, often become turn-ons.

This same instinct may also help to explain, in part, the appeal of BDSM to Democrats. Within the Democratic Party, much of what drives the political agenda is the view that inequality is the source of a wide range of social problems. This is regularly seen in the party platform, which recently made multiple mentions of the need to ''level the playing field.'' It's not a stretch, then, to suggest that playing with power differentials'--especially in BDSM settings, where women and men might not appear to be on equal footing and where the lines of sexual consent might not always be explicit'--is taboo in many Democratic circles.

The appeal of the taboo stems from a long-standing principle of psychology known as reactance'--which stipulates that when our freedom is threatened and we're told we can't do something, we want to do it even more. Many a parent has discovered this principle and used it to their benefit in shaping their children's behavior through reverse psychology: Frame the desired act as something your child isn't allowed to do and you just might get what you want.

To be sure, sexual fantasies have complex origins. They aren't just a product of our political affiliation and what we're told we can't or shouldn't do'--there are myriad other factors that contribute to why we develop the turn-ons that we do. But my research suggests that politics certainly seems to play some role.

It's also worth noting that, while the popularity of nonmonogamy and BDSM fantasies differ by political orientation, the rest of what we want'--including specific sexual activities, partners and settings'--is strikingly similar.

Whether we identify as Republican, Democrat, independent or something else, we're not just turned on by taboos, but also by trying new and different things in general. For example, it's human nature to be titillated by novelty, mixing up what we do, where we do it and whom we do it with. Most of us seek to meet a range of psychological needs in our fantasies, too, such as feeling desired, validated and competent. And the vast majority of us are fantasizing about our current romantic partners far more than we're fantasizing about Hollywood celebrities, porn stars and politicians.

Incidentally, just about 1 in 10 Republicans and 1 in 10 Democrats reported ever having fantasized about a politician before. Among those who did, it's worth noting that these fantasies sometimes involved reaching across the aisle, if you catch my drift. When presented with a list of 25 politicians, made up of 11 prominent Democrats and 14 prominent Republicans (as well as a write-in option, in case one's preferred politician wasn't represented), 17 percent of Republicans reported fantasizing about Democrats, while 27 pecent of Democrats reported fantasizing about Republicans.

Interestingly, the single most commonly fantasized-about politician among both parties was the same: Sarah Palin (though Republicans were much more likely to have Palin fantasies than Democrats).

Following Palin, the next most frequently mentioned politicians in Republicans' fantasies were John F. Kennedy, Bill Clinton and Nikki Haley. While, after Palin, Democrats fantasized about Barack Obama, Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton.

(Note that my data were collected in 2014 and 2015 before the Trump presidency began and only into the early days of his campaign. At that time, I received only one fantasy about Donald Trump in the entire dataset.)

So, in this increasingly polarized political season, we should all take a moment to remember there's at least one area where we're more alike than we are different. If only Congress could be as bipartisan as we are in our sexual fantasies.

This article tagged under: Political Science

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Mon, 29 Oct 2018 02:35

Published: October 23, 2018

Although the Supergirl TV lost a lot of ground last year, it remained a top-five performers for The CW in the Nielsen ratings. Now that it's back for a fourth season, can this TV series soar to new heights? Will Supergirl be cancelled or renewed for season five? Stay tuned.

Based on the DC Comics character, Supergirl stars Melissa Benoist, Mehcad Brooks, Chyler Leigh, Jeremy Jordan, David Harewood, Katie McGrath, and Jesse Wrath. The CW action-adventure centers on Kara Zor-El (Benoist), the cousin of Kal-El, i.e. Superman (Tyler Hoechlin). To remain safe from Krypton's destruction, Kara grew up on Earth, as Kara Danvers, a human. For years, she kept her powers a secret. Now, as an adult, she works at CatCo Worldwide Media and also for the Department of Extra-Normal Operations (DEO), a super-secret government organization whose mission is to keep National City '' and the Earth '' safe from sinister threats.

The ratings are typically the best indication of a show's likelihood of staying on the air. The higher the ratings (particularly in the 18-49 demo), the better the chances for survival. This chart will be updated as new ratings data becomes available '-- usually the next day, around 11:30am EST/8:30am PST. Refresh to see the latest.

10/22 update: You can see the latest night's ratings in context.

Note: If you're not seeing the updated chart, please try reloading the page or view it here.

For comparisons: The third season of Supergirl on The CW averaged a 0.51 rating in the 18-49 demographic and 1.835 million total viewers (Live+SD).

Note: These are the Live + Same Day Ratings which include ''live'' viewing plus delayed DVR viewing, up until 3am local time that same night. Ratings marked with an ''*'' are the fast affiliate ratings and will be updated with the Live+SD numbers when they are made available. Typically, networks get paid for C+3 ratings which includes DVR viewing within three days of the original airing when commercials are watched. Those numbers are rarely released to the press.

What do you think? Do you like the Supergirl TV series? Should it be cancelled or renewed for a fifth season on The CW?

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Thu, 01 Nov 2018 14:25

Hipster media giant VICE worked with Saudi Arabia's regime mouthpiece SRMG to create a video promoting tourism and a camel festival.By Ben NortonThe hipster corporate media giant VICE did paid propaganda for Saudi Arabia, according to a British report on Saudi astroturf efforts.

Jim Waterson, the media editor for The Guardian, reported that VICE has worked with a soft-power arm of the Saudi royal family to generate public relations material for Saudi Arabia.

According to internal VICE sources contacted by The Guardian, the Brooklyn-based media company assembled a team to make pro-Saudi content in collaboration with the Saudi Research and Marketing Group (SRMG), a regime mouthpiece that is closely linked to the royal family.

The SRMG board of directors is a revolving door of Saudi princes. SRMG also owns numerous major Saudi newspapers that function as unofficial state organs, including the highly influential Asharq Al-Awsat and Arab News.

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman even personally met with VICE co-founder and billionaire Shane Smith, during his charm offensive in the United States in early 2018 '-- when the authoritarian de facto ruler likewise rubbed elbows with key figures from the US ruling class, including Oprah, Bill Clinton, Henry Kissinger, Bill Gates, Tim Cook, Elon Musk, Peter Thiel, Thomas Friedman, and Jeffrey Goldberg.

Waterson noted that a video VICE published in March promoting the King Abdulaziz Camel Festival was produced in partnership with SRMG. This video has nearly 5 million views.

VICE acknowledges that it produces videos in partnership with Saudi royal mouthpiece SRMGThis revelation in The Guardian is part of a larger expos(C) on how the Saudi monarchy paid media outlets and public relations firms millions of dollars to spread propaganda to portray it in a positive light.

The popular British newspaper The Independent similarly has a deal with the Saudi Research and Marketing Group. And SRMG donates to the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change in return for assistance from the former UK prime minister.

Moreover, several major British newspapers, including The Guardian, have published paid advertisements portraying the brutally repressive Saudi crown prince as a reformer.

VICE's American Regime PropagandaIn a two-part episode of Moderate Rebels, the podcast I co-host with Grayzone Project editor Max Blumenthal, we detailed how VICE transformed itself from a hipster bible into an echo chamber for US imperialism and the national security state.

VICE Media has received hundreds of millions of dollars of investment from some of the world's largest corporate media conglomerates, including 21st Century Fox and Disney, and former top Obama administration official Alyssa Mastromonaco became Vice Media's COO.

In recent years, VICE has relentlessly pushed for regime change in Syria, Libya, and other countries targeted by the US government. In addition to partnering with Saudi regime mouthpieces, VICE co-produced a hawkish documentary with Council on Foreign Relations President Richard Haass, which brought together notorious neoconservatives and neoliberals to advance US foreign policy interests.

Another co-founder of VICE, Gavin McInnes, since leaving the company in disagreement with the other co-founders, has become a far-right demagogue and leader of the hate group the Proud Boys, which McInnes has proudly referred to as a ''gang.''

The VICE co-founder has openly encouraged and incited violence against leftists and marginalized groups, stating, ''We will kill you'... We will assassinate you,'' and ''Fighting solves everything. We need more violence from the Trump people. Trump supporters: Choke a motherfucker. Choke a bitch. Choke a tranny. Get your fingers around the windpipe.''

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Thu, 01 Nov 2018 14:15

Alleged synagogue shooter Robert Bowers was an avid user of Gab, the social media site that touts itself as a place for free speech. The site is popular with white nationalists and the alt-right.

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

Now we have more about a social media site where the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting suspect reportedly posted anti-Semitic attacks. Before walking into the Tree of Life synagogue with four weapons, Robert Bowers apparently got fired up with words. He reportedly used Gab, which calls itself an alternative to Twitter and is popular among the far right. Here's NPR's Jasmine Garsd.

JASMINE GARSD, BYLINE: Gab is a site that proudly promotes free speech. It boasts that it lets anyone say anything. But it's been controversial. Critics have called it a home for anti-Semites and white nationalists. Robert Bowers was a user. Before allegedly going on a killing spree, he posted about the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, a group that supports refugees. He said the group, quote, "likes to bring invaders that kill our people. I can't sit by and watch my people get slaughtered. Screw your optics - I'm going in." Andrew Torba is the CEO of Gab. In an interview with NPR, he defended the platform.

ANDREW TORBA: I don't know. Do you see a direct threat in there? 'Cause I don't. What would you expect us to do with posts like that? You want us to just censor anybody that says the phrase I'm going in? Is that what you're proposing here?

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Well, I think that...

TORBA: 'Cause I think that's absurd. And here's the thing. The answer to bad speech or hate speech - however you want to define that - is more speech, and it always will be.

GARSD: When does online free speech become a threat? This isn't the first time the issue has come up in social media. Just last week, it came to light that the man accused of sending explosive devices to prominent Democrats in the media had a history of threatening tweets. Torba says Gab follows strict rules, including no threats. He says he created Gab because he saw no room for conservative points of view on social media. Take Twitter.

TORBA: Where there are thousands upon thousands of people calling for someone to kill Donald Trump, saying they're going to kill Donald Trump, expressing hate towards white people, towards Christians, towards minorities who may now support Donald Trump. They allow hate to be spewed at certain groups and certain people.

GARSD: So where is the line between free speech and inciting violence?

KELLY MCBRIDE: I think the line is where free speech becomes a threat.

GARSD: Kelly McBride is a senior vice president at the Poynter Institute for Media Studies. She says Torba is prioritizing free speech above all other constitutional values.

MCBRIDE: And that is not necessarily what our constitutional framers intended, right? They didn't want the government curbing free speech.

GARSD: Nor did they want citizens to be irresponsible with their speech, she says. Last year, Google banned Gab's app. Apple rejected it. And Microsoft terminated its agreement with it last month. Just in the last 24 hours, at least two web-hosting platforms have suspended Gab. CEO Andrew Torba is not backing down.

TORBA: We're not going anywhere.

GARSD: Torba says Gab condemns the shooting. But he thinks it's now being targeted unfairly. Over the weekend, the social media site was filled with anger, some of it directed at the Jewish community. Jasmine Garsd, NPR News, New York.

(SOUNDBITE OF AK AND SUBLAB'S "TRANQUIL")

INSKEEP: So that was over the weekend. And then last night, Gab released a statement saying it would be inaccessible for a period as it transitions to a new hosting provider.

(SOUNDBITE OF AK AND SUBLAB'S "TRANQUIL")

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Thu, 01 Nov 2018 14:08

WBURwbur Search Special counsel Robert Mueller's office has referred to the FBI allegations that women were "offered money to make false claims" about the special counsel, according to Mueller's spokesman.

Here & Now's Robin Young speaks with NPR national security editor Phil Ewing (@philewing).

This segment aired on October 31, 2018.

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Thu, 01 Nov 2018 13:59

Defense Secretary Jim Mattis emphatically denied a reporter's suggestion Wednesday that the deployment of thousands of active-duty troops to the U.S.-Mexico border is part of a political stunt ahead of next week's midterm elections.

"We don't do stunts in this department. Thank you," Mattis told a reporter who posed the question after a Pentagon meeting with Mattis' South Korean counterpart. The defense secretary added the deployment was to provide "practical support" to the Department of Homeland Security and was based on a request from U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

The deployment is in response to the approach of a caravan containing an estimated 4,000 Central American migrants. The Pentagon said late Wednesday that it had identified 7,000 who will be participating in the mission at the border. Approximately 2,000 National Guard members previously have been dispatched to the frontier over the past six months.

The White House repeatedly has warned members of the caravan that they will not be allowed into the United States. In an interview with Fox News' "The Ingraham Angle" Monday night, President Trump vowed that the migrants "are not coming in" and said the administration would build "tent cities" to house asylum-seekers.

"We're going to have tents, they're going to be very nice and they're going to wait and if they don't get asylum, they get out," the president said.

TOTAL IMMIGRATION TO U.S. RECENTLY TIED ALL-TIME RECORD

On Wednesday, Trump told reporters at the White House that "anywhere between 10 and 15,000 military personnel" could be sent to the border, "on top of Border Patrol, ICE and everybody else at the border."

Federal law prohibits the military from acting as a domestic police force, which means the troops going to the border cannot detain immigrants, seize drugs from smugglers or have any direct involvement in stopping the caravan. Instead, their role largely will mirror that of the existing National Guard troops, including providing helicopter support for border missions, installing concrete barriers and repairing and maintaining vehicles.

MIGRANT CARAVAN 'MORE SOPHISTICATED' THAN PAST GROUPS, HOMAN SAYS

The new troops are set to include military police, combat engineers and helicopter companies equipped with advanced technology to help detect people at night.

Fox News' Lucas Tomlinson and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 16:37

Former Trump White House Aide On Ending Birthright Citizenship Former Trump White House communications staffer Michael Anton talks with NPR's Steve Inskeep about President Trump's claim that he wants to end birthright citizenship.

Former Trump White House Aide On Ending Birthright Citizenship Download Embed <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/662460141/662463570" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">

October 31, 2018 7:16 AM ET

Former Trump White House communications staffer Michael Anton talks with NPR's Steve Inskeep about President Trump's claim that he wants to end birthright citizenship.

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 11:48

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 10:49

Monday on CNN, network host Don Lemon, referring to the shooting of two black people in Kentucky last week, the pipe bombs sent to various famous Democrats, and the shooter in the Pittsburgh synagogue massacre, said that white men are ''the biggest terror threat in this country."

Lemon joined Chris Cuomo, who prompted Lemon's statement with this preamble: "It's not just Pittsburgh. It's not just the bomber. There was another hate-filled criminal just last week in Kentucky. Another white man, history of violence, in custody for shooting and killing and killing two African-Americans in a grocery store, Krogers, but what he tried to do was barge into a predominantly black church and fail. And then he picked a secondary target. He's being investigated for hate crimes. Don Lemon is here right now. We barely had time to cover it because we were distracted by another extremist that was doing bad things in the name of hate."

Lemon responded:

And now another one. And then you have all of them in a row. And, you know, we talked, we messaged about it a little bit this weekend. I keep trying to point out to people and not to demonize any one group or any one ethnicity. But we keep thinking that the biggest terror threat is something else, some people who are marching, you know, towards the border, like it's imminent. And the last time they did this, a couple hundred people came, and you know, most of them did get into the country, most of them got tuckered out before they even made it to the border.

So, we have to stop demonizing people and realize the biggest terror threat in this country is white men, most of them radicalized to the right. And we have to start doing something about them. There is no travel ban on them. There is no ban on '-- they had the Muslim ban. There is no white guy ban. So, what do we do about that?

First of all, let me just say this: Maurice Stollard is the name and Vicki Jones. And they have been lost in all of this. Two people who were killed on Wednesday that you talked about. They have been lost about this, and I know that people feel that this story has not gotten enough coverage, and we will honor them tonight in our program. But, go on, Chris. Sorry.

In August, after President Trump called Lemon the "dumbest man on television," Lemon launched into a rant in which he called Trump a racist, saying:

President Trump is trying a divide and conquer strategy and here is how it goes. He divides by race and tries to conquer decency by smearing and besmirching the truth and the people who fight to uphold it.

I have wondered '... sometimes if he will succeed, if he's the one who has his finger on the pulse of this country. Is he revealing who we really are? Think about that. Is this who we really are?

The overwhelmingly negative response, though, to his unfair and unkind attack on a good man, LeBron James. shows that America rejects what he is peddling. Most of America, anyway, not all of America.

But what about the impact his policies have on those without a platform? Through sports like LeBron? Or through media like me? What about those who don't have a voice? What is his presidency doing to them?

The kids separated from their parents at the border or the kids who don't have the chance to attend LeBron's school or any half-way decent school? The parents who can't honestly tell their children to be proud of the President of the United States? The people of color who are attacked by their fellow citizens who feel emboldened to be publicly racist? Because the president is.

Video below:

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 03:24

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 00:59

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Tue, 30 Oct 2018 22:58

In a really strange turn of events, it has been discovered that bombing suspect Cesar Sayoc worked at Ultra Gentleman's Club in West Palm Beach, FL, the same strip club that Stormy Daniels performed at back in April, WPTV reported.

Sayoc worked as a DJ at the club on Thursday afternoon and was arrested on Friday.

According to the club's manager, Stacey Saccal, Sayoc had worked as a DJ for the past two months. She had received no complaints about him from other staff members and he seemed like a "nice guy."

"I never knew that his van was covered in political stickers. I thought it was an ice cream truck," Saccal told WPTV, noting that he parked far from the club.

Saccal also said her employees had no idea that Sayoc was political. He never talked about politics at work and no one noticed the stickers on his van because of how far away he parked when he had a shift.

Fellow DJ Scott Migs said Sayoc brought two duffle bags and a cooler to work with him on Thursday night. He stashed them behind the DJ booth. Migs said he's unsure if any weapons were in the duffle bags.

According to Saccal, employees were shocked when they learned about Sayoc's actions. Everyone felt he was a nice guy and they all thought they knew him.

Stormy Daniels performed at the same strip club back in April, which just so happened to coincide with President Donald Trump's visit. Interestingly enough, this strip club sits across the street from Trump's golf course.

Editor's note: A previous version of this post included a sentence that hinted at a baseless conspiracy, falling short of our standards. It has been deleted. We apologize for the error.

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Tue, 30 Oct 2018 20:21

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Tue, 30 Oct 2018 15:26

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is defending a decision by Statistics Canada to compel banks and financial institutions to release the personal transaction data of 500,000 people without their consent.

Conservative House Leader Candice Bergen grilled Trudeau during question period Monday following a report by Global News that revealed Statistics Canada is asking the country's nine largest banks for the transaction data of 500,000 randomly chosen Canadians, including everything from bill payments to cash withdrawals from ATMs to credit card payments and even account balances.

WATCH: Stats Canada requesting banking information of 500,000 Canadians without their knowledge

StatCan has said it has the legal authority to do so '-- even without informing Canadians or getting their consent '-- in order to build a personal information data bank to analyze things like consumer trends and spending habits.

''With a long history of government privacy breaches, Canadians are rightly worried,'' Bergen said. ''Why are the Liberals collecting the personal data of Canadians without telling them?''

Trudeau said his government would ensure that all personal information would be protected and the anonymized data will be used for statistical purposes only.

''High quality and timely data are critical to ensuring that government programs remain relevant and effective for Canadians,'' the prime minister said.

Bergen called on Trudeau to ''immediately assure Canadians that this intrusion into their lives will be stopped.''

''It was the Conservative government who chose to stop the long-form census,'' Trudeau shot back. ''What that led to was more policy based on ideology and less policy based on evidence like we are doing now. Their attacks on data and information continue.''

READ MORE: StatCan's push to scoop payment data on 500000 Canadians deserves scrutiny

The uproar over the Statistics Canada initiative has renewed debate over how personal information is collected and analyzed in Canada. The agency has cited the Statistics Act and a section of the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA).

Statistics Canada has said that once the data is compiled by the agency it will be made anonymous in order to remove personal identifiers and said it has informed the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada of the initiative it hopes to have up and running by January.

However, as a new sample of Canadians will be chosen each year, Statistics Canada's personal information bank could grow into the millions.

Ontario's former privacy commissioner Ann Cavoukian is calling for greater transparency from the federal government and said both the Statistics Act and PIPEDA need to be updated.

''It just leaves a bad taste in your mouth, unfortunately, because it seems as if Stats Canada isn't being transparent,'' Cavoukian said. ''When you find out after the fact, it just leaves many questions unanswered and I think that's the reaction you're seeing now. People are dumbfounded by this.''

READ MORE: More than 1 in 5 Canadian companies hit by cyberattack in 2017, says StatCan

Cavoukian, who leads the Privacy by Design Centre for Excellence at Ryerson University, said it's critical that any information should be ''de-identified'' before it's gathered. She also said that poor information management or human error is often responsible for data breaches.

Statistics Canada has insisted that the data will be protected, but Cavoukian warns that with personal financial information, you can't rule out anything.

''I know it sounds extreme, but you can't rule out what can happen to personally identifiable data, which is very sensitive, that's collected for one purpose and ends up being misused for other purposes,'' she said.

Meanwhile, the Canadian Bankers Association has said it believes the data acquisition project was still in the exploratory stages and was not ''aware that Statistics Canada was moving to compel disclosure of this information.''

''No customer transaction data or other personal information has been transferred to Statistics Canada,'' the CBA said in a statement.

Data breaches involving government agencies are rare but not uncommon. Earlier this year, it was reported that Statistics Canada lost nearly 600 sensitive files during the 2016 census process after confidential documents were left on a subway and hundreds were lost after an employee's car was stolen.

And last year, Ottawa agreed to pay at least $17.5 million to settle a class action lawsuit over a major privacy breach involving about 583,000 student loan recipients.

(C) 2018 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.

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Tue, 30 Oct 2018 04:20

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Tue, 30 Oct 2018 04:13

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Tue, 30 Oct 2018 03:36

October 29 and October 30, 2018

The Facebook Dilemma: A Two-Night Special Event

Season 37: Episode 4 The promise of Facebook was to create a more open and connected world. But from the company's failure to protect millions of users' data, to the proliferation of ''fake news'' and disinformation, mounting crises have raised the question: Is Facebook more harmful than helpful? On Monday, Oct. 29, and Tuesday, Oct. 30, 2018, FRONTLINE presents The Facebook Dilemma. This major, two-night event investigates a series of warnings to Facebook as the company grew from Mark Zuckerberg's Harvard dorm room to a global empire. With dozens of original interviews and rare footage, The Facebook Dilemma examines the powerful social media platform's impact on privacy and democracy in the U.S. and around the world.

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Tue, 30 Oct 2018 00:27

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Mon, 29 Oct 2018 19:21

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Mon, 29 Oct 2018 14:53

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Mon, 29 Oct 2018 11:20

CHINESE media is reporting President Xi Jinping has told his military commanders to ''concentrate preparations for fighting a war'' as tensions continue to grow over the future of the South China Sea and Taiwan.

China Central Television presented a speech from President Xi, who earlier this year claimed the position in perpetuity, at the weekend '-- several days after it was made during a tour of Guangzhou province.

''We need to take all complex situations into consideration and make emergency plans accordingly,'' President Xi told the officers of the Southern Theatre Command.

State-run media organisation Xinhua also reported President Xi had ''underlined the importance of preparing for war and combat''.

President Xi's words represent a significant ramping-up of the rhetoric being exchanged between Beijing and Washington.

China has been angered by US sanctions on its military for buying weapons from Russia, and by what Beijing sees as renewed Washington support for democratic Taiwan.

Earlier this month, US Vice-President Mike Pence took the tensions between Washington and Beijing to a new level: ''Using that stolen technology, the Chinese Communist Party is turning ploughshares into swords on a massive scale,'' he said.

BATTLE READY

Amid growing economic concerns triggered by an escalating trade war with the United States, President Xi is touring his country to bolster confidence.

His speech was given during a tour of the Southern Teature Command Post on Thursday. Its release was delayed by several days.

In it, he reportedly stated the command was having to bear a ''heavy military responsibility'' as it was responsible for operations in the South China Sea.

Xinhua reports President Xi ''stressed the need to focus on combat research and commanding, to advance work in all areas and accelerate developing strong and efficient joint-operation commanding institutions for theatre commands to comprehensively boost the military's battle-winning ability.''

RELATED: Australia is 'sleepwalking' into war '-- former Defence chief

The president obliquely instructed his military to ramp-up opposition to 'freedom of navigation' exercises being undertaken by the US, Australia, France, the UK, Japan and others through the waterway through which arterial shipping lanes have grown since the end of World War II.

''He ordered the troop to keep a close watch for changes in the situations and to strengthen analysis to firmly protect border stability and safety of the people's life and property,'' Xinhua reports Xi as saying.

''After hearing a report on their work, he underlined the importance of preparing for war and combat, while taking consideration of various complex situations, improving response plans and focusing on real-combat training.''

President Xi was not the only ruling Communist Party member to up the ante last week.

The Hong Kong based South China Morning Post reports State Councillor General and Defence Minister Wei Fenghe said that Beijing would never give up ''one single piece'' of its territory. He warned that ''repeated challenges'' to China's sovereignty over Taiwan would lead to military action.

GUNBOAT DIPLOMACY

The South China Morning Post quoted military observers as saying President Xi's words were likely aimed at an internal audience, boosting morale in the face of growing economic and international pressures.

''It's likely intended as a signal to the US in particular and any parties that Beijing perceives to be causing provocation,'' Collin Koh, a research fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, said.

Beijing-based military analyst said he expected further clashes to come in the South China Sea.

''The United States is expected to conduct more freedom of navigation exercises in the South China Sea region, and because it does not recognise (Beijing's) rights to artificial islands, like Mischief Reef, there will probably be more military friction between the two countries there,'' the Post quoted him as saying.

RELATED: China's island-grabbing campaign gets close to home

Earlier this month a Chinese destroyer almost rammed a US warship in an effort to force it to leave disputed waters. Shortly after the event, the Chinese defence ministry criticised the US for ''gravely threatening China's sovereignty and security, severely damaging relations between the two militaries and significantly undermining regional peace and stability''.

The UN considers much of the South China Sea to be international waters, and refused to recognise that Beijing's artificial island fortresses give it any legitimate claim to the region.

Beijing, however, continues to stick by its claim '-- despite it being rejected by an international court '-- that it has historical dominance over the sea between Vietnam, Malaysia and the Philippines.

US Secretary of Defence James Mattis cancelled his trip to Beijing in response to rising tensions. Last month, the Chinese government revoked permission for a US warship to visit Hong Kong and recalled its leading naval official from Washington.

CULTURE CLASH

Chinese relations with Taiwan have been tense since the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party won elections in 2016. Those tensions have increased as the United States moves to strengthen its diplomatic and military ties with the last outpost of China's pre-revolution government.

Last week, China's Foreign Ministry said it had 'expressed concern' at the recent passage of two US warships through the narrow water way between China and Taiwan.

''China has closely followed the passing of US warships through the Taiwan Strait and monitored the whole process,'' Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying said.

''We urge the US to strictly abide by the three China-US joint communiques and properly handle Taiwan-related issues so as to avoid impairing bilateral relations as well as peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait,'' Hua said.

RELATED: How Beijing has built the ultimate hi-tech dystopia

Beijing has been quick to use its massive economic influence to quell any progress Taiwan '-- a democracy of 23 million people '-- has been making on the international stage. President Xi's government has repeatedly stated that it intends to 'reunify' with Taiwan, and refused to rule out the use of force to do so.

In the meantime, Defence Minister Wei says his military will take action ''at any cost'' to prevent Taiwan from separating any further.

''The Taiwan issue is related to China's sovereignty and territorial integrity and touches upon China's core interests,'' Wei said at the opening of the Xiangshan Forum in Beijing last week.

''On this issue, it is extremely dangerous to repeatedly challenge China's bottom line. If someone tries to separate out Taiwan, China's military will take the necessary actions at any cost.''

POWER SURGE

The strength of China's navy has been dramatically increased in recent years. It now has more warships and submarines than the United States. The US navy remains technically more advanced with many powerful units including their nuclear-powered aircraft carriers.

That quality gap, however, is rapidly closing. China has brought into service with surprising speed new stealth fighters and long-range missile-carrying bombers. Its warships are also now equipped with advanced radars and control systems.

RELATED: What we know about China's new aircraft carriers

Two relatively small aircraft carriers are being used to test and practice naval aviation warfare, and military analysts believe a further four carriers currently being built will be much larger and possibly nuclear powered.

Most significantly, however, has been Beijing's leapfrog ahead of the West in the arena of hypersonic weapons. It has demonstrated the capabilities of its ballistic guide vehicles and electromagnetic-rail guns, both of which have the capacity to overwhelm existing defensive systems.

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Sun, 28 Oct 2018 23:53

''Gab did not kill anybody, no social media post ever killed anybody''In an exclusive interview with Infowars, Gab founder Andrew Torba lashed out at the media's attempt to blame him and the free speech platform he created for yesterday's horrific Synagogue shooting.

Prior to the the deadly attack, gunman Robert Bowers posted on Gab, ''I can't sit by and watch my people get slaughtered. Screw your optics. I'm going in.''

The killer also had made a number of anti-Semitic posts on Gab in which he made clear his hatred for Jewish people and his opposition to Donald Trump.

Within hours of the shooting, the media rushed to blame Gab, leading to the site being banned by Paypal and Torba being roundly demonized as an enabler of terrorism.

Torba made it clear that he had been helping the Department of Justice and the FBI by archiving Bowers' posts, providing them with ''concrete evidence for a motive that they can use in a case to seek justice against this awful monster.''

''Gab did not kill anybody, no social media post ever killed anybody, the only person responsible here is the individual and I think it's disgusting that I'm being attacked, my face is being put up next to this guy as if I'm the terrorist, we're receiving death threats,'' said Torba.

''Every single day we see thousands of tweets calling for people to kill the president of the United States and this is allowed, we see live streamed murders on Facebook, we see criminal activity in very high volumes across all of the mainstream social media platforms, including ISIS terror cells and pedophiles preying on children and nobody is calling for Facebook to be shut down, nobody is calling for Twitter to be shut down,'' said Torba, adding, ''So to take the disgusting actions of one man and shut down an entire platform'....demonize me and make me out to be some form of terrorist for allowing free expression and individual liberty online for all people is absurd.''

As many people have pointed out, Louis Farrakhan tweeted almost identical anti-Semitism on Twitter, yet Twitter has refused to ban him, nor does Twitter take any of the blame for his bigotry and racism.

Louis Farrakhan has tweeted THE EXACT SAME rhetoric the Pittsburgh shooter had in their GAB profile. pic.twitter.com/kaqkc2WNCA

'-- Nick Monroe (@nickmon1112) October 28, 2018

Mail bomber Cesar Sayoc Jr. also made numerous violent threats on Twitter which were not removed or reported to authorities.

A statement released by Gab emphasised the fact that individuals aren to blame for atrocities, not social media platforms on which they post.

''We refuse to be defined by the media's narratives about Gab and our community. Gab's mission is very simple: to defend free expression and individual liberty online for all people. Social media often brings out the best and the worst of humanity. From live streamed murders on Facebook, to threats of violence by bombing suspect Cesar Sayoc Jr. that went unaddressed by Twitter, and more. Criminals and criminal behavior exist on every social media platform.''

Mass censorship of conservatives and libertarians is exploding. You've already seen this with the demonetization and ultimate purge of Infowars and other alternative media outlets by mega-corporations working in tangent to stifle competition. But you are important in this fight. Your voice is important. Your free thought is important. Make no mistake, you are just as important as anyone in the Anti-American establishment.

You are our most important contributor.

Sign up for the free newsletter so they can't keep us from sending you critical information.

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Sun, 28 Oct 2018 23:50

Hillary Clinton: ''I'd like to be president.''Clinton says she is not going to ''think about'' running until after midterms conclude.

pic.twitter.com/INpPjUk7Lx

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Sun, 28 Oct 2018 23:44

One would think that if you're trying to get into a country with more than 4,000 of your friends, you'd be as nice as possible to the person who is in charge of the country you're trying to enter. Apparently for some of the migrants from Central America, that's not necessarily the case.

During an interview with CNN's Bill Weir, one of the migrants made an outlandish claim against the President of the United States, calling him the ''Anti-Christ''. He also said that President Trump was ''going to hell'' if he didn't ''repent''.

VOTE NOW: Stop The Caravan Or Let Them In?

''Donald Trump is the antichrist,'' the unidentified man told CNN. ''If he doesn't repent, he's going to hell,'' the man added.

Watch this disturbing footage below:

https://twitter.com/Rise_Soar_BFree/status/1054809031368499201

This brings up a very interesting point. If he truly believes that Trump is the ''Anti-Christ'', why on earth is he making a deadly trek across his country to make it to America?

Wouldn't someone want to stay as far away from the ''Anti-Christ'' as possible?

VOTE NOW: Stop The Caravan Or Let Them In?

Regardless, the caravan has continued to make it's way closer to the United States with every day that passes. As Newsweek points out, the government of Mexico is doing a very poor job of containing the caravan:

Mexico stationed hundreds of additional federal agents along the border to block the group from passing. But the Associated Press (AP) reported on Sunday that some 2,000 of the migrants had managed to swim or boat across a river separating Guatemala and Mexico, entering the country illegally and vowing to continue toward the U.S.

As it was reported yesterday, President Trump told USA Today that he will send troops to the southern border in order to stop the flow more than 4,500 migrants from Central America who are demanding entrance into the United States.

During the interview, Trump declared that there are ''people from the Middle East'' in the caravan according to his intelligence sources.

''I think this could be a blessing in disguise because it shows how bad our laws are,'' Trump said. ''The Democrats are responsible for that.''

VOTE NOW: Stop The Caravan Or Let Them In?

The USA Today also revealed what happened when the PResdeitn was asked about how many troops he was prepared to send to the border:

How many troops was he prepared to send to the border?

''As many as necessary,'' he replied.

Here are some of the latest photos from the caravan:

PHOTOS: The massive train of migrants traveling to the USA is being ESCORTED through Mexico by security vehicles.

Photos show police just standing & watching them. Lit security vehicles guiding them.

Who is paying for this?!

Biggest story in the world right now

Pay attention. pic.twitter.com/vFtph8UM4z

'-- Benny (@bennyjohnson) October 22, 2018

A Univision reporter has also said that there are migrants from known terrorist hot spots:

Univision Reporter Embedded With Caravan Says He Has Met Migrants From Known Terrorist Hotspot Secretly Traveling With Them

WOWhttps://t.co/VnMKCTA2od pic.twitter.com/8ixlmAhKF0

'-- Benny (@bennyjohnson) October 22, 2018

What is your reaction to this migrant caravan? Please share your opinion in the comments below'...

Like this article? Follow Clayton on Twitter here

VOTE NOW: Stop The Caravan Or Let Them In?

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Thu, 01 Nov 2018 14:28

From left: Laura, Nathan, and Jocelyn. Photo: Courtesy of the subjects

More than half of American adults plan to cast ballots in November, but only a third of people ages 18 to 29 say they will. Here, 12 young adults on why they probably won't vote. (See also: Many reasons why you really, really should.)

2016 was such a disillusioning experience. Going into the election, I was so proud to be in this country at this moment, so proud to be voting for Hillary Clinton. I had my Clinton sweatshirt on all day. I was on Twitter telling people that if they didn't vote they were dead to me '-- like the whole thing. Watching the results come in, it was just disheartening. My faith in the whole system was crushed pretty quickly. That was the first general election I could vote in, too.

Those actual full-progressive candidates make me optimistic. But there's still a lot of powerful people, especially in the Democratic Party, that are centrists, and that's just a little frustrating when it comes time to stand up to this president and the policies he's trying to pass. Like the Kavanaugh thing '-- I get that they're the minority and that was an uphill battle, but I just feel like there wasn't a big enough fight put up to that, and I think there continues to not be a big enough fight.

Full disclosure: I have a ballot sitting at home. In 2016, I voted absentee and I just marked off ''Send me a mail-in ballot for every election.'' I don't really get that argument that it's really hard. Like, it's not that hard.

I think there's a way to be an informed nonvoter. I'd rather have an informed nonvoter than an uninformed voter going in and making a choice they don't understand. You're voting for a politician going into office, and I'm seeing less change there than I am through grassroots organizing. Since Trump's been elected, those grassroots groups have really been doing great, great work. So I guess it's that: where you're seeing the impact.

In my senior year in high school, I was probably borderline socialist. Though I don't really think I understood what a socialist was. I was blatantly liberal and didn't bother to check myself. My friend gave me The Prince, by Machiavelli. I read that, and it provided a certain nuance that I didn't have. From there, I read more, and I realized that a lot of things I'd thought before were wrong. I got into Hellenism. I read Cicero, Livy. Later on, I got into Voltaire. Then, in college, my field is American politics and political science. I prefer constitutional law and Alexander Hamilton.

There are things that I'm aware of where I'm certain I'm right. But for most things, although I feel strongly, it's very probable that there's some aspect of this that I don't understand. Somebody provides a new avenue of thought, and it changes the way I think about something. I never felt certain enough to vote. But I'm a political-science student, and the talk of voting is really big in my circle of friends. In 2016, I almost did. Of course, I'm not a big fan of Trump, but I didn't know if Trump was going to be a flash in the pan or '-- I just didn't know what to do. I didn't want to help something that might end up being wrong.

I tried to register for the 2016 election, but it was beyond the deadline by the time I tried to do it. I hate mailing stuff; it gives me anxiety. I don't remember seeing voter-registration drives, no. I've seen a lot more the past two years. I'm sure there must have been stuff. I just don't remember it.

I guess I still thought, Okay, my vote is largely symbolic in this election because I'm in Texas. Even if Texas went blue, I'm pretty sure my vote wouldn't matter anyway. Austin is very liberal, but it's very gerrymandered.The House district I'm in goes GOP every election, which is ridiculous. I was particularly interested in voting in 2016 because Donald Trump is so stupid. It drove me up a wall '-- he knew way less about the government than I do.

I have ADHD, and it makes it hard for me to do certain tasks where the payoff is far off in the future or abstract. I don't find it intrinsically motivational. The amount of work logically isn't that much: Fill out a form, mail it, go to a specific place on a specific day. But those kind of tasks can be hard for me to do if I'm not enthusiastic about it. That's kind of a problem with social attitudes around, you know, ''It's your civic duty to vote.'' I once told a co-worker I didn't vote, and she said, ''That's really irresponsible,'' in this judgmental voice. You can't build a policy around calling people irresponsible. You need to make people enthusiastic and engaged.

After 2016, a couple friends became a lot more politically active, and they helped me register and mail the form. So I actually am registered now. I'm leaning toward probably voting in the midterms. It feels like the reason to vote is symbolic. The motivation isn't about the actual value my vote has; it's more like a theoretical signaling value. If that's the case, I would rather signal that Democrats should have more progressive candidates, rather than assuming that everyone on the left will automatically vote for the candidates they run. In the end, whether I vote probably depends on how close the candidates are.

I rent and move around quite a bit, and when I try to get absentee ballots, they need me to print out a form and mail it to them no more than 30 days before the election but also no less than seven days before the election. Typically, I check way before that time, then forget to check again, or just say ''Fuck it'' because I don't own a printer or stamps anyway. It's incredibly difficult for hourly workers or young people who are in rotational programs or travel frequently for their careers to vote. I wish every state's rules were the same so there was not so much confusion and it was easy to find straightforward information on how exactly to get absentee ballots.

I feel like the Democratic Party doesn't really stand for the things I believe in anymore. Why should I vote for a party that doesn't really do anything for me as a voter? Millennials don't vote because a lot of politicians are appealing to older voters. We deserve politicians that are willing to do stuff for our future instead of catering to people who will not be here for our future. I'm a poli-sci major, so talking about politics is a daily thing for me. Half of the people I talk to seem very into voting. The other half are people who, like me, don't really feel represented. The only thing they choose to vote in is local elections.

In high school, I didn't even know our vice-president's name was Joe Biden. All my high-school classmates were Republicans. They were very vocal about it, especially during the whole Romney-and-Obama election. I realized I didn't believe everything they were saying. Then I Googled ''Republican versus Democrat,'' and I like kinda both, kinda not. That's why I'm an Independent. It wasn't till the Trump-versus-Hillary election that I realized how important it is to vote. Maybe it had to do with, like, society and all. Everyone I was following was like, ''Go out to vote.'' I was in college in Massachusetts. I decided that I wasn't gonna go through that long process for an out-of-state student to register to vote. I had a hectic schedule. I just didn't have the time and energy. Also I didn't know how my parents would feel about that whole thing, 'cause my brother does not vote either. So it wasn't asked if they could help us out with the registration and mailing all the forms to us. My mom is a Republican, my dad is a Democrat, and I did not learn that until the 2016 election, after begging them to tell me at least what their party was.

I realized that I should've voted afterward. Ever since that election, I started turning on not just CNN but also Fox News on the iPhone news app. I plan to vote in 2020. I have a goal set to know more about politics by that time.

I volunteered for Bernie Sanders. I went to many rallies, I was at the first presidential debate in Las Vegas. But when he folded, then immediately went and defended Hillary, a person who he's been campaigning against for 18 months, that just really killed it for me. I just have no respect for that. It's the same thing on the other side. Look at Ted Cruz, who's spent his last two years being made fun of by Donald Trump, and then we see Trump saying Cruz is the right guy in Texas to go against Beto O'Rourke. It's just so much political theater, and it really just turned me off entirely.

I wasn't planning to vote in 2016. I was with my mom, we were at Albertsons grocery store around the corner from my house, and they were in there voting. My mom voted, and it took her literally ten seconds. She said, ''You should do it,'' and I said, ''I don't know, I don't really think I want to.'' And she was like, ''Aaron, it just took a minute.'' So I said, ''Okay, fine.'' I just voted for Hillary. I felt bad about it for two years.

I look at it this way: That report just came out the other day about global warming, talking about how we have 12 years, until 2030, for this radical change unlike the world has ever seen. And The Hill newspaper just put out that article about how the DNC does not plan on making climate change a big part of their platform, even still. I just do not understand why I would vote for a party that doesn't care about me in any way. They can say, ''Sure, we'll lower student interest rates.'' Well, I don't give a shit about student interest rates if I'm not going to live past 13 more years on this planet. Everyone on Twitter can be like, ''Oh, we need the Democratic Senate to pack the courts.'' But have they watched the Democratic Party at any time during my lifetime? They have not done anything. Like, they don't stand for anything. And I just don't see the point anymore.

There are people that are exciting. Bernie was exciting, Cynthia [Nixon] was exciting, and Alexandria [Ocasio-Cortez] is exciting. So would I vote in the future? I don't know. If somebody came along that was exciting like that? Yeah. Probably.

I'm trying to register in my hometown of Austin, Texas. It's such a tedious process to even get registered in Texas, let alone vote as an absentee. There's no notification service about the status of my voter registration. There's a small, outdated website where you can enter your information and check. When I was at the post office to register, this poor girl, clearly also a college student like me, didn't know what ''postmarked'' meant and had no idea how to send an important document by mail. Most people my age have zero need to go to the post office and may have never stepped into one before. Honestly, if someone had the forms printed for me and was willing to deal with the post office, I'd be much more inclined to vote.

I vote when I feel like I have to. But I mostly consider it something that sucks a lot of people's time and energy away from actually building power with the people around them.

New York especially has a pretty vibrant tenant-organizing scene. You see organizing around community gardens, around people protesting new development going in, people working against rezoning. Regardless of the outcome of those things, I think people leave with a sense of empowerment. You might have failed this fight, but now you know your neighbor. Now you have a whole network you can call up the next time this happens. But if you lose an election, or the candidate you're pushing loses, then what do you have after that? You have this kind of despair for the next two or four or whatever years.

If we get to a blue wave in the midterms and then things just continue on, people will feel deflated and check out. Which is why I think you've got to have something besides just strategic voting, or people resigning themselves to a candidate they don't love but who is at least a Democrat.

In 2008, I was extremely enthusiastic to vote for Barack Obama. But over the years, I started to understand the electoral system as exactly how I've characterized it. For a while, I thought it was an immoral act to vote. It means that we're giving our approval to a system that I totally do not want to validate. Over the years, I've started to think maybe we don't have to frame this so much as an individual act with these moral consequences and that I need to stop being so dramatic about it. So, for instance, I voted for Cynthia Nixon in the primary recently. I teach at CUNY. Insofar as she was in a position where she could have been elected and made a difference in this, yes, I'll take the five minutes out of my day to go vote. But it's not something that we should, as a society, be making the horizon of our political organizing.

My polling place is at the end of my block. It takes no time at all; it's an extremely easy process. But I think that's also what makes it seem sort of alienating and anticlimactic. You go in and you're like, ''This is the climax of democracy,'' like, the sticker on my chest is the climax of democracy.

It was easier to get my medical-marijuana card '-- not a right, or even federally legal '-- than it was to register to vote. Massachusetts had online registration but only if you have a DMV-issued ID. I don't drive, so I was like, okay, I can register in person, but I'm also dealing with a chronic illness. Every day is a guessing game: Am I going to feel up to doing anything today? I put it off. The week before the deadline, I ended up being really sick and I wasn't able to leave home. You can send in your registration by mail, but I didn't have stamps. I kept thinking that I shouldn't have to jump through this many hoops to register. Back in July, I'd gotten a medical-marijuana card to treat my chronic illness. The entire thing is done online '-- it's the same requirements as registering to vote.

Growing up, going to Catholic school, everything we learned had a skew on it. Whenever we were taught about voting or political issues, it was not about learning the issues and matching what you feel personally, it was, ''This is what the Catholic Church teaches, and this is how you should vote or you're wrong.'' I think that shaped me to hate politics and not want to be involved.

The idea of leaving work, forwarding all of my calls to my phone, to go stand in line for four hours, to probably get called back to work before I even get halfway through the line, sounds terrible. I would have to tell work, ''Hey, I'm not coming in until noon today,'' and in the end, if it's not something I'm extremely passionate about, do I want to spend four hours of vacation doing something I don't quite want to do?

There are issues I care about: immigration, access to health care. Women's reproductive rights is a big one '-- because I could never imagine taking away anyone else's choice.

You're not prepared for all the candidates. You're sent things in the mail, but as a 28-year-old, I read everything online. I love that literally everyone is promoting actually registering to vote, but it's never how to vote or the steps to voting or what you do next after you've registered to vote. After that, it kind of just drops off and you're left in the dark, like, I don't know what to do next, you know?

My parents are of the generation where they actually watch the news, and they know about candidates via the news. Where my generation, the millennial generation, is getting all their news from social media like Twitter or Instagram or Facebook, and that is not always the best. Reading things through social media is snippets, and it's not the whole details on everything, you know?

It's a wild theory, but setting voting up so that it's all on social media, putting all that information in just an Instagram Story, in a Snapchat filter or whatever '-- bulleted-out, easy-to-read, digestible content '-- would encourage me to vote. Just maybe it's a social-media page or an Instagram page where it gives daily facts about how to do things or DIYs on how to vote for yourself, something like that. Just to make it easily digestible to a younger audience that's on social media, 'cause that's how they digest their information.

*A version of this article appears in the October 29, 2018, issue of New York Magazine. Subscribe Now!

12 Young People on Why They Probably Won't Vote

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Archived Version

Thu, 01 Nov 2018 13:56

Many U.S. college professors now regularly share their own social and political beliefs in class, and their students feel increasingly afraid to disagree. That's according to a new national survey of undergraduates due out next week.

When students were asked if they've had ''any professors or course instructors that have used class time to express their own social or political beliefs that are completely unrelated to the subject of the course,'' 52% of respondents said that this occurs ''often,'' while 47% responded, ''not often.''

A majority'--53%'--also reported that they often ''felt intimidated'' in sharing their ideas, opinions or beliefs in class because they were different from those of the professors. A slightly larger majority feared expressing themselves because of differences with classmates. On this question 54% said they often felt intimidated in expressing themselves when their views conflicted with those of their peers, compared to 44% who said they didn't often feel this way.

The national online survey of 800 full-time undergraduates was conducted from October 8th to 18th and includes students at both public and private four-year universities in the U.S. Polling was done by McLaughlin & Associates on behalf of Yale's William F. Buckley, Jr. Program, which counts your humble correspondent among its directors.

American academicians unfortunately appear to be just as political and overbearing as one would expect. This column isn't old enough to remember when university faculty were thought to be conscientious adults in loco parentis. But perhaps the actual parents who write checks can someday find some way to encourage more responsible behavior.

As for the students, there's at least a mixed message in the latest survey results. On the downside, the fact that so many students are afraid of disagreeing with their peers does not suggest a healthy intellectual atmosphere even outside the classroom. There's more disappointing news in the answers to other survey questions. For example, 59% of respondents agreed with this statement:

My college or university should forbid people from speaking on campus who have a history of engaging in hate speech. This column does not favor hatred, nor the subjective definition of ''hate speech'' by college administrators seeking to regulate it. In perhaps the most disturbing finding in the poll results, 33% of U.S. college students participating in the survey agreed with this statement:

If someone is using hate speech or making racially charged comments, physical violence can be justified to prevent this person from espousing their hateful views.An optimist desperately searching for a silver lining would perhaps note that 60% of respondents did not agree that physical violence is justified to silence people speaking what someone has defined as ''hate speech'' or ''racially charged'' comments. But the fact that a third of college students at least theoretically endorse violence as a response to offensive speech underlines the threat to free expression on American campuses.

Perhaps more encouraging are the responses to this question:

Generally speaking, do you think the First Amendment, which deals with freedom of speech, is an outdated amendment that can no longer be applied in today's society and should be changed or an important amendment that still needs to be followed and respected in today's society?A full 79% of respondents opted for respecting the First Amendment, while 17% backed a rewrite.

On a more specific question, free speech isn't winning by the same landslide. When asked if they would favor or oppose their schools having speech codes to regulate speech for students and faculty, 54% of U.S. college kids opposed such codes while 38% were in favor.

The free exchange of ideas is in danger on American campuses. And given the unprofessional behavior of American faculty suggested by this survey, education reformers should perhaps focus on encouraging free-speech advocates within the student body while adopting a campus slogan from an earlier era: Don't trust anyone over 30.

***

In Other News

Annals of Obama Diplomacy ''Iran 'closer to nuclear weapons than we thought' warns global security watchdog,'' Express, Oct. 24

***

Bottom Stories of the Day

Not That There's Anything Wrong With That ''Dearly beloved, Rauner's edgy commercial is doing its job,'' Eric Zorn in the Chicago Tribune, Oct. 25

5-Star Trip ''Driver calls Uber to escape after police chase in Massachusetts,'' Associated Press, Oct. 25

***

Follow James Freeman on Twitter.

Subscribe to the Best of the Web email with one click.

To suggest items, please email best@wsj.com.

(Teresa Vozzo helps compile Best of the Web. Thanks to Tony Lima, Wes Van Fleet and Bill Ledsham.)

***

Mr. Freeman is the co-author of ''Borrowed Time,'' now available from HarperBusiness.

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Archived Version

Thu, 01 Nov 2018 13:53

A diverse group of women stripped off for photographs with just a ballot covering their privates as part of a campaign to urge people to vote Democrat in the upcoming midterm elections.

Ten women took part in the series called 'Grab Them By The Ballot' hoping the powerful images will encourage people to cast their ballot on November 6.

Dawn Robertson, 48, decided to organize the photo shoot with a cast of diverse women of different sizes, sexual orientations and races after #MeToo allegations against prominent figures continued to rise.

She said the Republican party's attack on women's reproductive rights and transgender people's rights also played a part.

And she named her campaign with a play on President Donald Trump's now-infamous comments while aboard an Access Hollywood bus.

A diverse group of women stripped off for photographs to urge people to vote Democrat in the upcoming midterm elections

They posed with just a ballot covering their privates for a 'Grab Them By The Ballot' campaign

The Harvard Law graduate found her models, including a transgender woman, a Latina, an abduction survivor and one who is pregnant on social media and the street.

Melodi Blackbird, 44, Susan Lipkin, 65, Gina Carerra, 56, Tara Beach, 34, Alexandra Martin, 31, Nyla Smith, 22, Gina Higgins, 37, Courtney Blasius, 31, a transgender woman who goes by the initial Z, 28, and Robertson all posed nude with ballots placed strategically in front of their genitals.

They also took part in solo portraits with a single prop to represent themselves as part of the shoot on October 28.

Robertson, the founder, of a recruitment company, said: 'With the Kavanaugh nomination and MeToo and Trump, women are rising everywhere.

'What the Republicans are doing to transgender rights, the way they are attacking women's reproductive rights and the collective trauma means that women are really coming to the forefront now.

They also took pictures with a single prop to represent themselves during the shoot last month

Pregnant Gina Higgins and 22-year-old Nyla Smith pose nude for one of the photos in the series

'I hope that the pictures encourage women and marginalized communities to vote. I want them to know that their voice matters and this is serious s***.'

Robertson, who writes about sexuality and relationships, said she was inspired by photographer Anja Shutz's 2016 series of nude photographs - called Grab Him By The Ballot - where women posed naked with strategically positioned ballots.

That series was in response to Trump's infamous remark that he could 'grab women by the p****.'

Robertson said 'The difference is we are saying it's not just Trump, it's Kavanaugh and all the alleged abusers who have been exposed by the Me Too movement.'

She recruited her models on social media and even at a grocery store.

'I pounded the pavement the night before the shoot because a woman had cancelled,' she said.

Dawn Robertson (left) and a transgender woman who goes by the initial Z (right) in their solo portrais

'I went up to a woman in a market and asked her to pose for me and she said yes. People in real life were actually far more receptive to the idea than communities online.'

She also said she faced backlash for the shoot.

'I faced a lot of backlash when I tried to recruit a diverse group of women,' she said.

'I was told I was objectifying women, that nudity equals promiscuity and even that I was playing the part of a white savior. But I don't think that the pictures oversexualise the women.

'Nudity is fine, being naked is a natural expression. Men have sexualized and monetized women's bodies but these pictures give the power back to the woman.'

Robertson, who writes about sexuality and relationships, said she was inspired by photographer Anja Shutz's 2016 series of nude photographs. Pictured, Gina Higgins

Melodi Blackbird (left) and Tara Beach (right) were among the women who posed nude

Z, a Jewish transgender woman, said that she took part in the risqu(C) shoot to raise awareness of how the Trump administration is treating the transgender community.

She said: 'I'm doing this to raise awareness about the impact voting has on the lives of people who are the target of erasure, violence, bigotry, oppression in all of its forms.

'Donald Trump's administration is aggressively trying to define transgender, intersex, and gender non-conforming people out of existence.

'I'm optimistic that this photo shoot will serve as a starting point for more women to claim their bodies.'

Last week, the administration announced it was considering legally defining gender as a biological, immutable condition determined by genitalia at birth.

Trump has also sought to ban transgender people from serving in the military.

Gina Carerra, 56, a Latina artist, said she had taken part in the photo shoot to raise awareness of the vulnerability of minorities under the Trump presidency.

She said: 'I identify as Latina although I am blended with Egyptian, indigenous and Italian as well.

'I think these times merit that everybody gets out and votes. This is a time when millions of marginalized people, disabled, elderly, people of colour and indigenous women are all being negatively affected by this current regime.'

Democrats are vying for control of Congress with a narrow chance that they could take back control of the Senate too in the midterm elections next week.

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Archived Version

Thu, 01 Nov 2018 13:15

Back in 1976, as we were celebrating the 200th birthday of this republic, Congress passed a law limiting the tenure of the FBI director to 10 years.

This was done because, after the scandalous findings of the Church Commission, Congress realized that letting J. Edgar Hoover serve as director of the bureau from its founding in 1935 until his death in 1972 had only confirmed Lord Acton's maxim that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Hoover was a power unto himself, and the FBI that was created very much in his image sometimes acted more like the secret police of the totalitarian regimes Hoover regularly denounced: running rogue wiretaps, harassing political dissidents, using illegal means to collect evidence. Hoover's FBI wasn't accountable; it was untouchable.

So now, just weeks after the FBI's worst nightmare, a gangster and FBI informant by the name of Whitey Bulger came strolling back into town, Congress is about to ignore its own wisdom and let Bob Mueller, the FBI director and former US Attorney in Boston, stay on an extra two years.

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President Obama says he needs Mueller to stay because there's been so much turnover in the national security teams at the CIA and Pentagon, and that's all well and good.

Mueller has wide, bipartisan support in Congress. To paraphrase Lloyd Bentsen, I know Bob Mueller and he's no J. Edgar Hoover, though the folks at the ACLU might take exception to that.

The recent FBI targeting of antiwar and labor activists in the Midwest has a disturbing echo of the days when the bureau considered Martin Luther King Jr. a sinister threat to national security.

But Mueller's a Marine veteran and tough enough to take a question or two before Congress gives the president what he wants, and Mike Albano is just the guy to ask it: What did you know about Whitey Bulger, and when did you know it?

Back in the 1980s, when he was serving on the Massachusetts parole board, Albano expressed some sympathy for a group of men who had always maintained they had been framed for the 1965 gangland murder of a hoodlum named Teddy Deegan in Chelsea. The FBI had been instrumental in seeing that the men - Peter Limone, Henry Tameleo, Joe Salvati, and Louis Greco - were convicted. The FBI contended that Tameleo was the consigliere of the Mafia in Boston, and that Limone was a Mafia leader. There is no question that both men were bad actors, and Mafia players, but the evidence showed that neither had anything to do Deegan's murder.

So in 1983, after Albano indicated he might vote to release Limone, he got a visit from a pair of FBI agents named John Connolly and John Morris. They told Albano that the men convicted of Deegan's murder were bad guys, made guys.

''They told me that if I wanted to stay in public life, I shouldn't vote to release a guy like Limone,'' Albano said. ''They intimidated me.''

Turns out that Connolly was Whitey Bulger's corrupt handler and Morris was Connolly's corrupt supervisor. When they weren't pocketing bribes from Bulger, they were helping him murder potential witnesses who were poised to expose the FBI's sordid, Faustian deal with the rat named Whitey Bulger.

Albano was messing with the FBI's national policy of going after the Mafia and the Mafia alone. That was the justification the FBI gave for making deals with devils like Whitey Bulger and his partner in crime, Stevie Flemmi. They were supposedly giving up their pals in the Mafia. The problem with the FBI's national policy is that it didn't take into account that the most vicious, murderous gangsters in Boston were Whitey Bulger and Stevie Flemmi.

After Albano was elected mayor of Springfield in 1995, he soon found the FBI hot on his tail, investigating his administration for corruption. The FBI took down several people in his administration, and Albano is convinced that the FBI wasn't interested in public integrity as much as in publicly humiliating him because he dared to defy them.

The recent FBI targeting of antiwar and labor activists in the Midwest has a disturbing echo of the days when the bureau considered Martin Luther King Jr. a sinister threat to national security.

Kevin Cullen, Globe ColumnistIn 2001, the four men convicted of Teddy Deegan's murder were exonerated. Turned out the FBI let them take the rap to protect one of their informants, a killer named Vincent ''Jimmy'' Flemmi, who just happened to be the brother of their other rat, Stevie Flemmi. Thanks to the FBI's corruption, taxpayers got stuck with the $100 million bill for compensating the framed men, two of whom, Greco and Tameleo, died in prison.

Albano was appalled that, later that same year, Mueller was appointed FBI director, because it was Mueller, first as an assistant US attorney then as the acting US attorney in Boston, who wrote letters to the parole and pardons board throughout the 1980s opposing clemency for the four men framed by FBI lies.

Of course, Mueller was also in that position while Whitey Bulger was helping the FBI cart off his criminal competitors even as he buried bodies in shallow graves along the Neponset.

''Before he gets that extension,'' Mike Albano said, ''somebody in the Senate or House needs to ask him why the US Attorney's office he led let the FBI protect Whitey Bulger.''

I called FBI headquarters in Washington and tried to do just that. The nice lady who answered suggested I talk to one of the FBI's ''public affairs specialists.'' But my call was not returned.

Four years ago, when questioned about the FBI's corruption in Boston, Mueller told the Globe, ''I think the public should recognize that what happened, happened years ago.''

That's true. And we still don't know what really happened.

Kevin Cullen is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at cullen@globe.com.

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Archived Version

Thu, 01 Nov 2018 10:09

Updated July 12, 2018 10:10:45

The claimIn the wake of US airstrikes on Syria, Liberal Senator Jim Molan raised concerns about Australian fuel supplies being affected by conflict in the Middle East.

Speaking to Alan Jones on 2GB, Senator Molan criticised the level of fuel held in reserve in Australia.

"At the moment, from my estimations, in relation to petrol we have something between 19 to 24 days," Senator Molan said.

"In relation to diesel we have something between 12 to 17 days and in relation to aviation fuel'... we've got something like 17 to 19 days."

So has Senator Molan got the numbers right? RMIT ABC Fact Check takes a look.

The verdictSenator Molan's claim checks out.

The Department of the Environment and Energy releases statistics showing the end-of-month stocks of fuel products in Australia.

The data available at the time of Senator Molan's claim, from December 2017, backs up his figures.

That publication gave 21 days of petrol stocks, 16 days of diesel and 19 days of aviation fuel - all within the parameters given by the senator.

At the time, the data was collected from companies on a voluntary basis. Due to concerns about its reliability, the Government has since begun publishing data collected on a mandatory basis.

The petroleum industry takes issue with the exclusion from the data of fuel stocks on ships en route to Australia, but experts told Fact Check there was good reason these stocks were not included.

The industry also notes that Senator Molan was quoting figures for refined products only. The department also publishes data for crude oil stored in Australia.

How quickly Australia could obtain fuel from alternative suppliers in the event of disruption to supply lines is not the subject of this fact check.

Australia's sources of fuelProduction, imports and exports of fuel and oil and are separated into two main categories: unprocessed crude oil, and refined petroleum products.

Crude oil is the unprocessed liquid oil extracted from underground, while petroleum products are the finished, ready-for-use fuels that are the result of crude oil being refined.

An August 2017 report from the Department of the Environment and Energy shows that while Australia produces its own crude oil, around 75 per cent of local production is exported and refined overseas.

The report noted most of Australia's oil production occurred off the north-west coast - closer to Asian refineries than Australian refineries on the east coast.

"In addition, domestically produced grades of crude oil are generally not as well suited for use by local refineries as those sourced from other countries," the report said.

As such, Australian fuel consumption is heavily reliant on imports, with 75 per cent of crude oil and 55 per cent of refined petroleum sourced overseas, according to the department.

The department's monthly production statistics show that much of these imports come via the Asia-Pacific region.

In 2016-17, South Korea supplied 27 per cent of Australia's refined product imports by volume, closely followed by Singapore with 26 per cent. Japan supplied 14 per cent, Malaysia 10 per cent and China 8 per cent.

Crude oil is sourced from a more diverse range of countries, with Malaysia the largest supplier, at 33 per cent of imports, followed by the United Arab Emirates at 16 per cent.

Indonesia, Gabon and New Zealand were the next three biggest sources, each supplying less than 10 per cent of Australia's crude oil imports in 2016-17.

While the exact origin of the crude oil arriving in Australia as refined products is difficult to determine, almost a third of global crude oil production in 2017 was in Persian Gulf nations, according to the US Energy Information Administration.

Conflict in or near to any of these places, including the Korean Peninsula, the South China Sea or the Middle East, has the potential to affect Australia's fuel supply.

Australia's stocks of fuelFuel stocks are held by petroleum producers and at refineries and seaboard bulk storage terminals by major oil companies and some large consumers.

According to a 2015 submission from the then Department of Industry and Science to a Senate inquiry into Australia's transport energy resilience and sustainability, there are no publicly held fuel stocks in Australia, nor does the Australian government mandate compulsory stockholding by the private sector.

The submission said that three of Australia's seven refineries had closed in the previous five years and the country's "capacity for short-term surge production and fuel switching was limited".

The executive director of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, Peter Jennings, told Fact Check a lack of refineries and fuel farms meant Australia would not have the capacity to store large quantities of fuel.

"We would not be able to actually keep much in-country stock because our fuel farms are now so decrepit and falling out of service that we wouldn't have the capacity to store it all," Mr Jennings said.

"It would take several billions of dollars to get us to a point where we'd have the storage capacity."

Four major oil companies hold stocks in Australia: BP, Caltex, Mobil Oil and Viva Energy. These companies are the key members of the Australian Institute of Petroleum, the peak industry body representing businesses involved in refining and/or marketing of petroleum.

According to Resources and Energy Quarterly, published by the Department of Industry, Innovation and Science, the largest proportion of oil refined in Australia '-- 44 per cent '-- became petrol. Diesel accounted for 35 per cent and jet fuel for 14 per cent. The remainder became fuel oil, LPG or other products and chemical feedstock.

In its submission to the 2015 Senate Inquiry, the Department of Industry and Science said that "approximately three quarters of all oil consumption in Australia is associated with the transport sector".

Checking the numbersThe Department of the Environment and Energy publishes monthly Australian Petroleum Statistics, sourced from the Australian fuel industry.

While data for the first three months of 2018 has now been published, these statistics were not available at the time Senator Molan appeared on radio. Accordingly, Fact Check has used the December 2017 statistics to check the senator's claim.

The statistics published by the department give a count of days of consumption cover for a variety of oil and fuel products.

Days of consumption cover is calculated by taking the end of month stocks of a product as reported by the fuel industry, and dividing those stock levels by the average daily sales of that product over the previous 12 months.

Senator Molan specified three categories of refined products in his claim: automotive gasoline, diesel, and aviation fuel.

While the senator used the word "petrol", which could refer to any refined petroleum product rather than just petrol for cars, he clarified what he meant when he repeated the claim on The Bolt Report.

"We have at the moment now something between 19 to 24 days of petrol, for your car to get you to work," he said.

This type of petroleum is listed as automotive gasoline in the government data.

The government statistics show that at the end of December, Australia had stocks equivalent to 21 days of automotive gasoline consumption, 19 days of aviation turbine fuel and 16 days of diesel.

These statistics are within the parameters given by Senator Molan.

The Australian Institute of Petroleum told Fact Check that quoting figures for petrol "in reserve" ignored crude oil stored at Australian refineries, which will be turned into petrol and other transport fuels, and crude oil stored at crude production facilities that could be transported to Australian refineries.

Figures for these stocks are also published in the Australian Petroleum Statistics. The data available when Senator Molan made his claim showed 25 days of "crude oil and refinery feedstocks".

How is the data collected?Before January 2018, industry data was supplied to the Department of the Environment and Energy through a voluntary survey.

Last year the Government introduced legislation to make reporting mandatory.

The explanatory memorandum for the legislation noted the proportion of fuel market operators participating in the survey had declined, reducing the reliability of the statistics.

"Mandatory reporting will enable the development of more accurate, reliable and informative statistics on petroleum, other fuels and fuel-related products," the memorandum said.

A spokesman for the Australian Institute of Petroleum told Fact Check a key weakness in previous iterations of the department's petroleum statistics was the growth of smaller independent fuel importers in recent years, which were not voluntarily supplying data.

"As a result, the Australian Institute of Petroleum was strongly supportive of the decision to introduce mandatory petroleum data reporting, since a voluntary approach has not delivered a complete and robust petroleum dataset," he said in an email.

John Blackburn, a defence and national security systems consultant and the author of two National Roads and Motorists' Association (NRMA) reports on fuel security, also had doubts the statistics were completely reliable given they worked on a voluntary reporting system.

"Without the industry reporting what stock they had and where, [the department] were looking at the import and export data and estimating the stock levels," Mr Blackburn, a retired air vice-marshal, said.

The newest data - from March 2018 and collected with mandatory reporting - showed 22 days of automotive gasoline consumption, 23 days of aviation turbine fuel and 21 days of diesel.

Excluded stocksThe then Department of Innovation and Science told the 2015 Senate inquiry that its Australian Petroleum Statistics data did not represent all fuel in the Australian supply chain.

"Petroleum en route to Australia by ships is excluded whilst fuel moving around the coast is included in the Australian Petroleum Statistics. In addition, all petroleum in pipelines, in transit by tanker (road and rail) and held at retail fuel sites and military stocks are excluded," the department said.

The Australian Institute of Petroleum takes issue with the criteria for fuel to be counted as "in reserve" in Australia, in particular the exclusion of offshore stock owned by Australian companies, data for which was collected but not published.

A 2017 submission from the institute to the Government on the proposed mandatory reporting said stock "on the water" en route to Australia represented more than a quarter of total inventory owned by Australian companies.

"This stock has not been effectively collected/reported in the past and has meant that the current APS data provides an incomplete picture of the total petroleum inventory under the control/ownership of Australian market operators and available to the domestic market."

However, experts contacted by Fact Check disagreed that stocks on water should be included in counts of fuel in reserve in Australia.

The exclusion of offshore stocks stemmed from International Energy Agency standards on fuel reporting, Mr Blackburn said.

"The reason being, as those tankers move around the world, their fuel cargos are often traded multiple times, so what leaves the Middle East or a refinery to come to Australia, may in fact get diverted because of different demands," Mr Blackburn said.

Dr Liam Wagner, a lecturer at Griffith University who specialises in energy, environmental and natural resource economics, told Fact Check he didn't think stocks on ships should be considered "in reserve" in Australia.

"For instance, shipping could be interrupted by a conflict, or ships could be re-routed by the operator, even if that were against the law," Dr Wagner said.

"The current Australian Petroleum Statistics data gives the full picture of fuel stocks."

Australian National University Associate Professor Llewelyn Hughes agreed stock on ships should not be included in counts of fuel reserves.

"If cargoes can be resold, I see little sense including offshore stocks in the APS data, even if it may not be economic to resell," he said.

Fuel reserves in an emergencyMr Blackburn said the count of days of average consumption, which was based on average sales, was problematic because they were not indicative of what might happen in a crisis.

"The moment you get an emergency, if people are aware that it's coming, everyone's going to rush out and fill everything up they possibly can, and that then accelerates the problem."

Mr Jennings agreed. "If you look at jet fuel, for example, a crisis may cause a sudden spike in use, if the air force require more resources," he said.

"Or if rationing was applied, the supplies would last longer. A lot of assumptions go into how those figures are put together."

Associate Professor Hughes also noted buyer panic would contribute to shortages.

"Historically, supply disruptions have been experienced as price phenomenon, although buyer panic can drive localised shortages. Modelling supply disruptions across multiple scenarios is the best way to assess the real vulnerabilities Australia faces."

Despite this scepticism, Mr Blackburn, Mr Jennings and Associate Professor Hughes agreed the Australian Petroleum Statistics was the most reliable available.

"My best judgement would be that those stats are in ballpark of the actual stocks held in Australia," Mr Blackburn said.

Government reviewsIn the wake of the recent renewed discussion around fuel reserve levels, on May 7 Energy Minister Josh Frydenberg announced a Turnbull Government review into fuel security.

Mr Frydenberg said the assessment "should not be construed as Australia having a fuel security problem", but was the prudent and proper thing to do to make sure Australia was not complacent.

The review follows a number of reports relating to fuel security commissioned by federal government from both sides of politics over the past decade.

These include National Energy Security Assessments published by the former Labor government in 2009 and 2011, and the Coalition's 2015 Energy White Paper.

The consensus from these government reports has been that the Australian fuel market and a diverse range of suppliers mean there is little risk to fuel security in the event of a disruption along the supply chain.

The 2011 National Energy Security Assessment said Australia had "access to well-functioning markets for liquid fuels which have helped create robust and flexible supply chains with a significant degree of resilience".

The 2015 white paper said the Government "considers that supply reliability will be maintained because of the depth, liquidity and diversity of international crude and fuel markets".

These views were echoed in a 2011 report assessing Australia's liquid fuels vulnerability commissioned by the federal government from consulting firm ACIL Allen, a second 2014 report from ACIL Allen titled Oil Market Responses to Crises, and a 2014 review of Australia's oil market resilience to supply disruptions commissioned from New Zealand consultancy firm Hale & Twomey.

More recently, officials told a joint parliamentary committee that the Department of Energy and Environment continued to monitor domestic liquid fuel markets.

The department's assistant secretary for energy security policy, Helen Bennett, gave evidence that Australia imported fuel from more than 20 countries, and no one country supplied more than 20 per cent of combined crude oil and petroleum.

"So it's a very diverse market, much more so than, say, a decade ago, where we were very heavily dependent on Singapore," Ms Bennett said.

Associate Professor Hughes told Fact Check he believed the high cost of increasing fuel reserves played a part in the divided opinion on whether fuel security was an issue worth closer attention.

"The reason for the divide is because [increasing fuel reserves] is costly, as it would require the government to hold public stocks, require higher holdings by companies in private inventories, or buy tickets," Associate Professor Hughes said.

"Against this, security experts tend to more strongly emphasise the potential for more severe, longer, disruptions due to geopolitical events."

Principal researcher: Ellen McCutchan

@EllenCutch

factcheck@rmit.edu.au

SourcesJim Molan warns Syria conflict could expose Australia's 'single point of failure', 2GB, 16 April, 2018Department of the Environment and Energy, Australian Energy Update 2017, August 2017Australia's transport energy resilience and sustainability, Parliament of Australia, 25 June, 2015Australia's Liquid Fuel Security (Part One), NRMA, 28 February, 2013Australia's Liquid Fuel Security (Part Two), NRMA, February, 2014Australian Petroleum Statistics, April, 2018How to strangle Australia in just days, Herald Sun, 16 April, 2018National Energy Security Assessment, Department of Resources, Energy and Tourism, March, 2009National Energy Security Assessment, Department of Resources, Energy and Tourism, December, 2011Energy White Paper, Department of Industry, Innovation and Science, 2015Australian Energy Update, Department of the Environment and Energy, August, 2017Australian Oil Refineries, Australian Institute of Petroleum, September, 2017Liquid Fuels Vulnerability Assessment, ACIL Allen, October, 2011ACIL Oil Market Responses to Crises, ACIL Allen, June, 2014Review of Market Resilience to Oil Supply Disruptions, Hale & Twomey, June, 2014Advisory report on the Security of Critical Infrastructure Bill 2017, Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, March, 2018Time to take stock of Australia's fuel security, Sydney Morning Herald, Josh Frydenberg, 7 May, 2018Topics:oil-and-gas,international-aid-and-trade,government-and-politics,federal-government,australia

First posted May 23, 2018 16:46:33

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Thu, 01 Nov 2018 10:04

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange said Monday that he believes the Ecuadorean government is preparing to end his asylum at its embassy in London and hand him over the U.S.

Assange pointed to new rules the embassy has imposed upon him, which he must follow in order to have internet access, as a sign that he will soon be out of the embassy, Reuters reports.

The rules require Assange to do a variety of things including pay for medical bills and phone calls, stay away from commenting on controversial topics, and clean up after his pet cat.

Assange spoke from the embassy during a teleconference at the first hearing of a lawsuit his legal team launched against the Ecuadorean government, which challenges the new rules.

As Assange said that the Ecuadorean government is preparing to toss him, the country's top government attorney, I±igo Salvador, interrupted to warn him not to make political statements during the teleconference, according to Reuters.

Court officials told reporters they could not record any of the comments made during the hearing.

Salvador did not directly respond to Assange's assertion, Reuters reports, but told reporters last week that Assange is welcome to remain in the embassy so long as he abides by the new rules.

Salvador also said last week that the United Kingdom has stated Assange will not be extradited if he leaves the embassy, where he has resided since 2012.

Assange fled to the embassy after UK courts ordered he be extradited to Sweden to be questioned in a sexual assault case, which has since been dropped.

Still, WikiLeaks faces a U.S. grand jury investigation for publishing U.S. diplomatic and classified military information under Assange's leadership.

Ecuador's Foreign Minister Jos(C) Valencia also told Reuters last week that the government will no longer intervene on Assange's behalf.

He told the news agency that Ecuador is "frustrated" by Assange's lawsuit over the new rules.

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Thu, 01 Nov 2018 04:24

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3 Like us on Facebook Try this fun game! Stack as many boxes as you can before one falls off! With every box you don't align perfectly the box size is reduced and makes the next one even more difficult. How long can you last? Test your skill and reflexes now.

A mayor in Lantana, Florida, is accused of reportedly soliciting sex in exchange for installing speed bumps in a neighborhood.

Lantana Mayor David Stewart is accused of asking for sex from a woman in exchange for fulfilling her request for speed bumps in her neighborhood. The Florida Commission on Ethics said earlier this month that it has found probable cause that Stewart, ''misused his position to attempt to obtain a sexual benefit for himself.''

Stewart himself has denied the allegations since the complaint was levied against him in January. The town reportedly approved the speed bumps back in 2015.

Source: Florida mayor accused of soliciting sex in exchange for installi '' Spokane, North Idaho News & Weather KHQ.com

Advertisements Popular posts ''The Voice'' Contestant DiesFlorida Mayor Accused of Soliciting Sex for Neighborhood Speed BumpsBREAKING: Suspicious Package Delivered to Democratic Party Office in Miami, FloridaHunter Seriously Injured After Dog Shoots Him in the BackNew Allegations Against Harvey WeinsteinGynecologist Admits Dyeing Patient's Vagina Purple ''As A Joke''Gun Shop Offering Free Weapons to Rabbis Following Pittsburgh Synagogue ShootingBreaking News and Developing Stories '' October 31, 2018BREAKING: Republican Office Evacuated in Traverse City, MichiganBREAKING: Major League Baseball Legend Willie McCovey DiesFollow me Advertisements Advertisements 3 Shares

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Thu, 01 Nov 2018 04:23

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New allegations have been made in a lawsuit against Harvey Weinstein by a woman who says Weinstein forced her to grope him when she was 16 years old.

The woman, who is not named in the filing, claims she met Weinstein in 2002 when she was a teen model. She says he took her back to his apartment before pulling down his pants, grabbing her hand and forcing her to massage his penis.

She says they stayed in touch in the following years to discuss business opportunities, before meeting her in his office in 2008. She claims in this meeting, he also took down his pants. She claims he threatened that she would never work in show business because she rejected his advances.

The woman has now joined a class action lawsuit against Weinstein.

Advertisements Popular posts ''The Voice'' Contestant DiesFlorida Mayor Accused of Soliciting Sex for Neighborhood Speed BumpsBREAKING: Suspicious Package Delivered to Democratic Party Office in Miami, FloridaNew Allegations Against Harvey WeinsteinHunter Seriously Injured After Dog Shoots Him in the BackGynecologist Admits Dyeing Patient's Vagina Purple ''As A Joke''Gun Shop Offering Free Weapons to Rabbis Following Pittsburgh Synagogue ShootingBREAKING: Republican Office Evacuated in Traverse City, MichiganBreaking News and Developing Stories '' October 31, 2018BREAKING: Major League Baseball Legend Willie McCovey DiesFollow me Advertisements Advertisements 3 Shares

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Thu, 01 Nov 2018 04:21

Ralph Acampora is bearish on stocksProminent market technician Ralph Acampora says the stock market is in bad shape and it's worse than many on Wall Street investors appreciate.

A pioneer in the field of chart-based trading, Acampora said the technical damage that has resulted in the Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA, +0.97% and the S&P 500 index SPX, +1.09% erasing all of their gains for 2018, and the Nasdaq Composite Index COMP, +2.01% falling into correction territory'--usually characterized as a decline of at least 10% from a recent peak'--will take months to repair.

Check out: Stocks could rally 20% after this bruising rout, says Guggenheim's Minerd'--after that, watch out

''From a technical perspective, the damage that has been done technically to the stock market is much, much worse than people are talking about,'' he told MarketWatch in a phone interview on Tuesday.

Acampora cited a break down of so-called FANG stocks'--a quartet of technology and internet-related companies that include Facebook Inc. FB, +3.81% Amazon.com Inc. AMZN, +4.42% Netflix Inc. NFLX, +5.59% and Google-parent Alphabet Inc. GOOGL, +3.91% '--as the clearest sign that the worm has turned on the bull market.

On Monday, those names, which have been significant catalysts for market sentiment and price moves, shed a combined $120 billion in market value. On top of that, Amazon became the most recent of that group to close in bear-market territory, defined as drop of at least 20% from a recent peak.

''I've been a bull for a long, long time and like everyone, I was waiting for a correction but this is something different,'' said Acampora, who many chartists refer to as the ''godfather'' of technical analysis.

''All the leadership is getting crushed,'' he said.

Acampora said he believed that the entire stock market itself would go into a bear market and said the current dynamic in the market was eerily similar to the stock-market crash of 1987, when the Dow slid a historic 22.6% in a single day on Oct. 19 of that year.

''Honestly, I don't see the low being put in yet and I think we're going to go into a bear market,'' he said. He speculates that the market may not be healed until around the first quarter of 2019.

On Wednesday, the Dow gained 241.12 points, or 1%, to 25,115.76, the first time for the blue chip index to finish above 25,000 since Oct. 23. The S&P 500 advanced 29.05 points, or 1.1%, to 2,711.68, climbing for two days in a row, something it had not done since its three-day winning streak that ended on Sept. 20, but it still suffered its worst monthly decline in seven years. Meanwhile, the Nasdaq rose 144.25 points, or 2%, to 7,305.90, for its worst monthly drop since 2008.

The Dow would have to fall another 2,900 points, or about 10%, from current levels to close 20% below its Oct. 3 record close of 26,828.39, as of Tuesday late-afternoon trade.

When reached on the phone, the market technician said he was painting his barn to avoid ''the agony of watching'' the market's gyrations. ''I don't want to watch the market get sloppy again, so I figured that I'm better off painting.''

Acampora isn't alone in his bearish view. Michael Wilson, Morgan Stanley's chief U.S. equity strategist, said he believes the market is undergoing a ''rolling bear market.'' He was among the first to spot fractures in the market's uptrend.

To be sure, other analysts believe the market is returning to normal and has just entered a more volatile phase due to interest-rate increases by the Federal Reserve, which has lifted borrowing costs for corporations and individuals and prompted a broad reassessment of stock values. That factor among myriad others has rattled investors' sentiment.

Also read: Federal Reserve minutes indicate interest rates will have to rise high enough to slow down the economy.

Tom McClellan, publisher of the McClellan Market Report and another high-profile chart technician, told MarketWatch that the current action is more a function of seasonal volatility associated with October and not a more significant upending of a 10-year bull market. He viewed stocks as oversold and says he remains bullish on the stock-market outlook.

Providing critical information for the U.S. trading day. Subscribe to MarketWatch's free Need to Know newsletter. Sign up here.

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Thu, 01 Nov 2018 04:20

Home business Exclusive: Kanye's Sudden Political Backtrack Stems from Looming Business Disaster, Fashion Industry... Kanye West'' wasn't he just in Trump's office praising and hugging the reviled president? Hasn't his Trump already hurt his businesses? Yes and yes.

Now Kanye has Tweeted that he's leaving politics, getting back to fashion. He's ditching Trump and Candace Owens all the controversy of ''slavery is a choice.''

What happened? $$$$$ ka ching. Follow the money.

Kanye is about to release three new styles of sneaker through Adidas. His current Yeezy's aren't selling. Now it's Christmas, and he's got to make his deal with Adidas work.

Second, on November 23rd comes an album postponed from a few weeks ago called ''Yandhi.'' The prior album, ''Ye,'' was a bust. ''Yandhi'' has to actually sell copies. Right now, he's lost his base in the black audience and most of the white audience. ''Ye'' sold 60,000 actual copies, 250K all in with streaming. That doesn't pay for first class trips around the world.

But a new article in trade paper Footwear News is devastating to Kanye's sneaker brand Yeezy. The article cites a study done by Spotted.com and states: ''Kanye's behavior has also had a large impact on consumers' perception of him, with Spotted's data showing that consumers see Kanye as ''wacky,'' ranking higher than 97 percent of other celebrities for this attribute.''

More from the article:

According to Comenos '-- whether solo or with the Kardashians by his side '-- Spotted does not find West's fame to be worth the danger.

''Overall, he's an extremely risky choice, and not someone I'd be recommending to a brand in the fashion space'...There are a lot celebrities out there that can help a brand be perceived as more edgy '-- and they don't have these other negative qualities [such as being] erratic, rebellious or negatively outspoken, where Kanye ranks high.''

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 19:46

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (50 U.S.C. 1701 et seq.) (IEEPA), the National Emergencies Act (50 U.S.C. 1601 et seq.) (NEA), section 212(f) of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 (8 U.S.C. 1182(f)), and section 301 of title 3, United States Code,

I, DONALD J. TRUMP, President of the United States of America, find that the ability of persons located, in whole or in substantial part, outside the United States to interfere in or undermine public confidence in United States elections, including through the unauthorized accessing of election and campaign infrastructure or the covert distribution of propaganda and disinformation, constitutes an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States. Although there has been no evidence of a foreign power altering the outcome or vote tabulation in any United States election, foreign powers have historically sought to exploit America's free and open political system. In recent years, the proliferation of digital devices and internet-based communications has created significant vulnerabilities and magnified the scope and intensity of the threat of foreign interference, as illustrated in the 2017 Intelligence Community Assessment. I hereby declare a national emergency to deal with this threat.

Accordingly, I hereby order:

Section 1. (a) Not later than 45 days after the conclusion of a United States election, the Director of National Intelligence, in consultation with the heads of any other appropriate executive departments and agencies (agencies), shall conduct an assessment of any information indicating that a foreign government, or any person acting as an agent of or on behalf of a foreign government, has acted with the intent or purpose of interfering in that election. The assessment shall identify, to the maximum extent ascertainable, the nature of any foreign interference and any methods employed to execute it, the persons involved, and the foreign government or governments that authorized, directed, sponsored, or supported it. The Director of National Intelligence shall deliver this assessment and appropriate supporting information to the President, the Secretary of State, the Secretary of the Treasury, the Secretary of Defense, the Attorney General, and the Secretary of Homeland Security.

(b) Within 45 days of receiving the assessment and information described in section 1(a) of this order, the Attorney General and the Secretary of Homeland Security, in consultation with the heads of any other appropriate agencies and, as appropriate, State and local officials, shall deliver to the President, the Secretary of State, the Secretary of the Treasury, and the Secretary of Defense a report evaluating, with respect to the United States election that is the subject of the assessment described in section 1(a):

(i) the extent to which any foreign interference that targeted election infrastructure materially affected the security or integrity of that infrastructure, the tabulation of votes, or the timely transmission of election results; and

(ii) if any foreign interference involved activities targeting the infrastructure of, or pertaining to, a political organization, campaign, or candidate, the extent to which such activities materially affected the security or integrity of that infrastructure, including by unauthorized access to, disclosure or threatened disclosure of, or alteration or falsification of, information or data.

The report shall identify any material issues of fact with respect to these matters that the Attorney General and the Secretary of Homeland Security are unable to evaluate or reach agreement on at the time the report is submitted. The report shall also include updates and recommendations, when appropriate, regarding remedial actions to be taken by the United States Government, other than the sanctions described in sections 2 and 3 of this order.

(c) Heads of all relevant agencies shall transmit to the Director of National Intelligence any information relevant to the execution of the Director's duties pursuant to this order, as appropriate and consistent with applicable law. If relevant information emerges after the submission of the report mandated by section 1(a) of this order, the Director, in consultation with the heads of any other appropriate agencies, shall amend the report, as appropriate, and the Attorney General and the Secretary of Homeland Security shall amend the report required by section 1(b), as appropriate.

(d) Nothing in this order shall prevent the head of any agency or any other appropriate official from tendering to the President, at any time through an appropriate channel, any analysis, information, assessment, or evaluation of foreign interference in a United States election.

(e) If information indicating that foreign interference in a State, tribal, or local election within the United States has occurred is identified, it may be included, as appropriate, in the assessment mandated by section 1(a) of this order or in the report mandated by section 1(b) of this order, or submitted to the President in an independent report.

(f) Not later than 30 days following the date of this order, the Secretary of State, the Secretary of the Treasury, the Attorney General, the Secretary of Homeland Security, and the Director of National Intelligence shall develop a framework for the process that will be used to carry out their respective responsibilities pursuant to this order. The framework, which may be classified in whole or in part, shall focus on ensuring that agencies fulfill their responsibilities pursuant to this order in a manner that maintains methodological consistency; protects law enforcement or other sensitive information and intelligence sources and methods; maintains an appropriate separation between intelligence functions and policy and legal judgments; ensures that efforts to protect electoral processes and institutions are insulated from political bias; and respects the principles of free speech and open debate.

Sec. 2. (a) All property and interests in property that are in the United States, that hereafter come within the United States, or that are or hereafter come within the possession or control of any United States person of the following persons are blocked and may not be transferred, paid, exported, withdrawn, or otherwise dealt in: any foreign person determined by the Secretary of the Treasury, in consultation with the Secretary of State, the Attorney General, and the Secretary of Homeland Security:

(i) to have directly or indirectly engaged in, sponsored, concealed, or otherwise been complicit in foreign interference in a United States election;

(ii) to have materially assisted, sponsored, or provided financial, material, or technological support for, or goods or services to or in support of, any activity described in subsection (a)(i) of this section or any person whose property and interests in property are blocked pursuant to this order; or

(iii) to be owned or controlled by, or to have acted or purported to act for or on behalf of, directly or indirectly, any person whose property or interests in property are blocked pursuant to this order.

(b) Executive Order 13694 of April 1, 2015, as amended by Executive Order 13757 of December 28, 2016, remains in effect. This order is not intended to, and does not, serve to limit the Secretary of the Treasury's discretion to exercise the authorities provided in Executive Order 13694. Where appropriate, the Secretary of the Treasury, in consultation with the Attorney General and the Secretary of State, may exercise the authorities described in Executive Order 13694 or other authorities in conjunction with the Secretary of the Treasury's exercise of authorities provided in this order.

(c) The prohibitions in subsection (a) of this section apply except to the extent provided by statutes, or in regulations, orders, directives, or licenses that may be issued pursuant to this order, and notwithstanding any contract entered into or any license or permit granted prior to the date of this order.

Sec. 3. Following the transmission of the assessment mandated by section 1(a) and the report mandated by section 1(b):

(a) the Secretary of the Treasury shall review the assessment mandated by section 1(a) and the report mandated by section 1(b), and, in consultation with the Secretary of State, the Attorney General, and the Secretary of Homeland Security, impose all appropriate sanctions pursuant to section 2(a) of this order and any appropriate sanctions described in section 2(b) of this order; and

(b) the Secretary of State and the Secretary of the Treasury, in consultation with the heads of other appropriate agencies, shall jointly prepare a recommendation for the President as to whether additional sanctions against foreign persons may be appropriate in response to the identified foreign interference and in light of the evaluation in the report mandated by section 1(b) of this order, including, as appropriate and consistent with applicable law, proposed sanctions with respect to the largest business entities licensed or domiciled in a country whose government authorized, directed, sponsored, or supported election interference, including at least one entity from each of the following sectors: financial services, defense, energy, technology, and transportation (or, if inapplicable to that country's largest business entities, sectors of comparable strategic significance to that foreign government). The recommendation shall include an assessment of the effect of the recommended sanctions on the economic and national security interests of the United States and its allies. Any recommended sanctions shall be appropriately calibrated to the scope of the foreign interference identified, and may include one or more of the following with respect to each targeted foreign person:

(i) blocking and prohibiting all transactions in a person's property and interests in property subject to United States jurisdiction;

(ii) export license restrictions under any statute or regulation that requires the prior review and approval of the United States Government as a condition for the export or re-export of goods or services;

(iii) prohibitions on United States financial institutions making loans or providing credit to a person;

(iv) restrictions on transactions in foreign exchange in which a person has any interest;

(v) prohibitions on transfers of credit or payments between financial institutions, or by, through, or to any financial institution, for the benefit of a person;

(vi) prohibitions on United States persons investing in or purchasing equity or debt of a person;

(vii) exclusion of a person's alien corporate officers from the United States;

(viii) imposition on a person's alien principal executive officers of any of the sanctions described in this section; or

(ix) any other measures authorized by law.

Sec. 4. I hereby determine that the making of donations of the type of articles specified in section 203(b)(2) of IEEPA (50 U.S.C. 1702(b)(2)) by, to, or for the benefit of any person whose property and interests in property are blocked pursuant to this order would seriously impair my ability to deal with the national emergency declared in this order, and I hereby prohibit such donations as provided by section 2 of this order.

Sec. 5. The prohibitions in section 2 of this order include the following:

(a) the making of any contribution or provision of funds, goods, or services by, to, or for the benefit of any person whose property and interests in property are blocked pursuant to this order; and

(b) the receipt of any contribution or provision of funds, goods, or services from any such person.

Sec. 6. I hereby find that the unrestricted immigrant and nonimmigrant entry into the United States of aliens whose property and interests in property are blocked pursuant to this order would be detrimental to the interests of the United States, and I hereby suspend entry into the United States, as immigrants or nonimmigrants, of such persons. Such persons shall be treated as persons covered by section 1 of Proclamation 8693 of July 24, 2011 (Suspension of Entry of Aliens Subject to United Nations Security Council Travel Bans and International Emergency Economic Powers Act Sanctions).

Sec. 7. (a) Any transaction that evades or avoids, has the purpose of evading or avoiding, causes a violation of, or attempts to violate any of the prohibitions set forth in this order is prohibited.

(b) Any conspiracy formed to violate any of the prohibitions set forth in this order is prohibited.

Sec. 8. For the purposes of this order:

(a) the term ''person'' means an individual or entity;

(b) the term ''entity'' means a partnership, association, trust, joint venture, corporation, group, subgroup, or other organization;

(c) the term ''United States person'' means any United States citizen, permanent resident alien, entity organized under the laws of the United States or any jurisdiction within the United States (including foreign branches), or any person (including a foreign person) in the United States;

(d) the term ''election infrastructure'' means information and communications technology and systems used by or on behalf of the Federal Government or a State or local government in managing the election process, including voter registration databases, voting machines, voting tabulation equipment, and equipment for the secure transmission of election results;

(e) the term ''United States election'' means any election for Federal office held on, or after, the date of this order;

(f) the term ''foreign interference,'' with respect to an election, includes any covert, fraudulent, deceptive, or unlawful actions or attempted actions of a foreign government, or of any person acting as an agent of or on behalf of a foreign government, undertaken with the purpose or effect of influencing, undermining confidence in, or altering the result or reported result of, the election, or undermining public confidence in election processes or institutions;

(g) the term ''foreign government'' means any national, state, provincial, or other governing authority, any political party, or any official of any governing authority or political party, in each case of a country other than the United States;

(h) the term ''covert,'' with respect to an action or attempted action, means characterized by an intent or apparent intent that the role of a foreign government will not be apparent or acknowledged publicly; and

(i) the term ''State'' means the several States or any of the territories, dependencies, or possessions of the United States.

Sec. 9. For those persons whose property and interests in property are blocked pursuant to this order who might have a constitutional presence in the United States, I find that because of the ability to transfer funds or other assets instantaneously, prior notice to such persons of measures to be taken pursuant to this order would render those measures ineffectual. I therefore determine that for these measures to be effective in addressing the national emergency declared in this order, there need be no prior notice of a listing or determination made pursuant to section 2 of this order.

Sec. 10. Nothing in this order shall prohibit transactions for the conduct of the official business of the United States Government by employees, grantees, or contractors thereof.

Sec. 11. The Secretary of the Treasury, in consultation with the Attorney General and the Secretary of State, is hereby authorized to take such actions, including the promulgation of rules and regulations, and to employ all powers granted to the President by IEEPA as may be necessary to carry out the purposes of this order. The Secretary of the Treasury may re-delegate any of these functions to other officers within the Department of the Treasury consistent with applicable law. All agencies of the United States Government are hereby directed to take all appropriate measures within their authority to carry out the provisions of this order.

Sec. 12. The Secretary of the Treasury, in consultation with the Attorney General and the Secretary of State, is hereby authorized to submit the recurring and final reports to the Congress on the national emergency declared in this order, consistent with section 401(c) of the NEA (50 U.S.C. 1641(c)) and section 204(c) of IEEPA (50 U.S.C. 1703(c)).

Sec. 13. This order shall be implemented consistent with 50 U.S.C. 1702(b)(1) and (3).

Sec. 14. (a) Nothing in this order shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect:

(i) the authority granted by law to an executive department or agency, or the head thereof; or

(ii) the functions of the Director of the Office of Management and Budget relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals.

(b) This order shall be implemented consistent with applicable law and subject to the availability of appropriations.

(c) This order is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person.

DONALD J. TRUMP

THE WHITE HOUSE,

September 12, 2018.

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 19:45

DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCEWASHINGTON, DC 20511

October 19, 2018

Joint Statement from the ODNI, DOJ, FBI and DHS: Combating Foreign Influence in U.S. Elections

Foreign interference in U.S. elections is a threat to our democracy; identifying and preventing this interference is a top priority of the Federal Government. We believe the greatest strength of our society is an engaged and informed public. Adversaries target U.S. elections to divide America along political lines and influence key policy decisions that are in their national interest.

Foreign InfluenceWe are concerned about ongoing campaigns by Russia, China and other foreign actors, including Iran, to undermine confidence in democratic institutions and influence public sentiment and government policies. These activities also may seek to influence voter perceptions and decision making in the 2018 and 2020 U.S. elections.

Elements of these campaigns can take many forms, including using social media to amplify divisive issues, sponsoring specific content in English-language media like RT and Sputnik, seeding disinformation through sympathetic spokespersons regarding political candidates and disseminating foreign propaganda.

Election InfrastructureCurrently, we do not have any evidence of a compromise or disruption of infrastructure that would enable adversaries to prevent voting, change vote counts or disrupt our ability to tally votes in the midterm elections. Increased intelligence and information sharing among federal, state and local partners has improved our awareness of ongoing and persistent threats to election infrastructure. Some state and local governments have reported attempts to access their networks, which often include online voter registration databases, using tactics that are available to state and non-state cyber actors. Thus far, state and local officials have been able to prevent access or quickly mitigate these attempts.

Addressing the ThreatForeign powers have long sought to exploit America's free and open political system, but as the President recently stated, we will not tolerate foreign interference in our elections. The Executive Order on Imposing Certain Sanctions in the Event of Foreign Interference in a United States Election, which President Trump signed on September 12, makes clear that the U.S. government will not hesitate to defend our electoral processes or punish those who interfere in it.

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Department of Homeland Security and other relevant Intelligence Community components continue to work closely together in order to develop the most up-to-date picture of the threat. Additionally, we want to thank state and local officials for their vigilance and proactive approach in sharing information on cyber threats targeting state and local election infrastructure. We will continue to work with state and local election officials to increase the security and resilience of their systems and remain committed to supporting their actions to counter any threat to or attack on the 2018 midterm elections and beyond.

While the U.S. government is tirelessly working to identify and counter threats to the electoral process, the American public, government officials and political candidates and their campaigns can mitigate adversarial efforts by following sound cyber security guidelines and being responsible consumers of information, in particular from social media platforms. For more information please see the DHS checklist and voter security information sheet or visit the FBI's webpage on combating foreign influence.

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 19:17

It took less than 24 hours for Twitter to corrupt an innocent AI chatbot. Yesterday, Microsoft unveiled Tay '-- a Twitter bot that the company described as an experiment in "conversational understanding." The more you chat with Tay, said Microsoft, the smarter it gets, learning to engage people through "casual and playful conversation."

Unfortunately, the conversations didn't stay playful for long. Pretty soon after Tay launched, people starting tweeting the bot with all sorts of misogynistic, racist, and Donald Trumpist remarks. And Tay '-- being essentially a robot parrot with an internet connection '-- started repeating these sentiments back to users, proving correct that old programming adage: flaming garbage pile in, flaming garbage pile out.

"Tay" went from "humans are super cool" to full nazi in <24 hrs and I'm not at all concerned about the future of AI pic.twitter.com/xuGi1u9S1A

'-- Gerry (@geraldmellor) March 24, 2016Now, while these screenshots seem to show that Tay has assimilated the internet's worst tendencies into its personality, it's not quite as straightforward as that. Searching through Tay's tweets (more than 96,000 of them!) we can see that many of the bot's nastiest utterances have simply been the result of copying users. If you tell Tay to "repeat after me," it will '-- allowing anybody to put words in the chatbot's mouth.

One of Tay's now deleted "repeat after me" tweets. However, some of its weirder utterances have come out unprompted. The Guardian picked out a (now deleted) example when Tay was having an unremarkable conversation with one user (sample tweet: "new phone who dis?"), before it replied to the question "is Ricky Gervais an atheist?" by saying: "ricky gervais learned totalitarianism from adolf hitler, the inventor of atheism."

@TheBigBrebowski ricky gervais learned totalitarianism from adolf hitler, the inventor of atheism

'-- TayTweets (@TayandYou) March 23, 2016But while it seems that some of the bad stuff Tay is being told is sinking in, it's not like the bot has a coherent ideology. In the span of 15 hours Tay referred to feminism as a "cult" and a "cancer," as well as noting "gender equality = feminism" and "i love feminism now." Tweeting "Bruce Jenner" at the bot got similar mixed response, ranging from "caitlyn jenner is a hero & is a stunning, beautiful woman!" to the transphobic "caitlyn jenner isn't a real woman yet she won woman of the year?" (Neither of which were phrases Tay had been asked to repeat.)

It's unclear how much Microsoft prepared its bot for this sort of thing. The company's website notes that Tay has been built using "relevant public data" that has been "modeled, cleaned, and filtered," but it seems that after the chatbot went live filtering went out the window. The company starting cleaning up Tay's timeline this morning, deleting many of its most offensive remarks.

Tay's responses have turned the bot into a joke, but they raise serious questions

It's a joke, obviously, but there are serious questions to answer, like how are we going to teach AI using public data without incorporating the worst traits of humanity? If we create bots that mirror their users, do we care if their users are human trash? There are plenty of examples of technology embodying '-- either accidentally or on purpose '-- the prejudices of society, and Tay's adventures on Twitter show that even big corporations like Microsoft forget to take any preventative measures against these problems.

For Tay though, it all proved a bit too much, and just past midnight this morning, the bot called it a night:

c u soon humans need sleep now so many conversations today thx

'-- TayTweets (@TayandYou) March 24, 2016In an emailed statement given later to Business Insider, Microsoft said: "The AI chatbot Tay is a machine learning project, designed for human engagement. As it learns, some of its responses are inappropriate and indicative of the types of interactions some people are having with it. We're making some adjustments to Tay."

Update March 24th, 6:50AM ET: Updated to note that Microsoft has been deleting some of Tay's offensive tweets.

Update March 24th, 10:52AM ET: Updated to include Microsoft's statement.

Verge Archives: Can we build a conscious computer?

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 16:36

In a wide-ranging interview with the New York Times' Maggie Haberman released Tuesday, actress and activist Barbara Streisand said she is considering moving to Canada if the Republicans maintain a majority in the House of Representatives following the midterm election.Asked about her mood as the November election fast approaches, Barbra Streisand said that she is having trouble sleeping at night, something that may change if the Democrats take the House.

''And if they don't?'' Haberman asked the progressive entertainer.

''Don't know. I've been thinking about, do I want to move to Canada? I don't know,'' Barbra Streisand replied. ''I'm just so saddened by this thing happening to our country. It's making me fat. I hear what he said now, and I have to go eat pancakes now, and pancakes are very fattening.''

''We make them with healthy flour, though '-- almond flour, coconut flour,'' she added.

Prior to the 2016 presidential election, Streisand floated the prospect of fleeing the United States if President Donald Trump beat his Democrat rival Hillary Clinton. ''He has no facts. I don't know, I can't believe it. I'm either coming to your country [Australia], if you'll let me in, or Canada,'' Streisand said in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter.

In September, Streisand released a new album Walls featuring the anti-Trump ballad ''Don't Lie to Me,'' in which the singer accuses President Trump of being incapable of being truthful.

''I just went ballistic,'' the 76-year-old said of the president to the Associated Press, who she refers to as ''The Liar in Chief'' and the ''Groper in Chief.''

''I just can't stand what's going on,'' Streisand continued to the news outlet. ''His assault on our democracy, our institutions, our founders '-- I think we're in a fight. '... We're in a war for the soul of America.''l

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 15:22

Kasie S. Hunt (born May 24, 1985) is an American political correspondent. She is an NBC News Capitol Hill correspondent, covering Congress across all NBC News and MSNBC platforms.[1] Hunt is the host of MSNBC Kasie DC, which airs on MSNBC on Sundays at 7 p.m.[2]

Background [ edit ] Hunt grew up in Wayne, Pennsylvania.[3] She is the daughter of Bruce and Krista Hunt. Her younger sister, Carly Hunt (born July 11, 1987), is a former golfer for both the Georgetown Hoyas and Maryland Terrapins women's golf teams.[4][5]

Personal life [ edit ] Kasie Hunt married NBC News producer Matt Rivera on May 6, 2017.[6]

Education [ edit ] She graduated from Conestoga High School in 2003. Hunt attended George Washington University where she graduated magna cum laude with a degree in international affairs in 2006.[7] She earned her master's in sociology from the St John's College, Cambridge.[8][9]

Career [ edit ] Hunt started her career in journalism as an intern in the political unit of NBC News.[10] She was a health policy reporter for National Journal's CongressDaily, writing about the passage of the Affordable Care Act. She wrote for Politico, covering the 2010 midterm elections. She started working as a national political reporter for the Associated Press in August 2011 and covered Mitt Romney's 2012 presidential campaign.[11]

In January 2013, Hunt joined NBC News as an off-air reporter and producer, covering Congress and politics. She started appearing regularly on MSNBC as a political reporter and in November 2014 became a political correspondent.[12] She writes for msnbc.com and appears regularly on MSNBC and Bloomberg shows, including Morning Joe, Hardball with Chris Matthews, and With All Due Respect.

In October 2017, Hunt began anchoring her own talk show, Kasie DC, which airs Sundays at 7 p.m.[13]

References [ edit ] ^ http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc-live/kasie-hunt-biography ^ "Kasie Hunt Gets Her Own MSNBC Sunday Night Program". October 12, 2017. ^ "Kasie Hunt on Twitter". Twitter . Retrieved October 30, 2015 . ^ Georgetown University. "Carly Hunt". Georgetown Hoyas . Retrieved April 5, 2016 . ^ University of Maryland, College Park. "Carly Hunt". Maryland Terrapins . Retrieved April 5, 2016 . ^ "Kasie Hunt, Matthew Rivera". The New York Times. May 7, 2017 . Retrieved June 13, 2017 . ^ "Alumni Newsmakers". GW Magazine. Fall 2011. ^ "Kasie Hunt to join AP as political reporter". Townhall. AP. August 19, 2011. ^ Santora, Joyce E. (May 18, 2017). "ocial edition: NBC News/Stoga star Kasie Hunt's wedding (exclusive!) & other Derby Day soir(C)es". Mainline Social . Retrieved May 20, 2017 . ^ Bloomgarden-Smoke, Kara (December 27, 2012). "Political Reporter Kasie Hunt is Leaving the AP for NBC". Observer. ^ "Kasie Hunt Joins NBC News as Off-Air Political Reporter". BWW TV World. December 27, 2012. ^ Massella, Nick (September 4, 2014). "Kasie Hunt Named MSNBC Political Correspondent". FishbowlDC. ^ "Kasie Hunt Gets Her Own MSNBC Sunday Night Program". October 12, 2017.

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 15:17

WASHINGTON, DC - MAY 11: U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar takes questions from reporters in the Brady Press Briefing Room at the White House May 11, 2018 in Washington, DC. Earlier in the day, Azar joined President Donald Trump to announce a 'blueprint' for lowering prescription drug prices. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

Earlier today, the Trump administration announced a new rule that will help reduce prescription drug prices for many seniors enrolled in the Medicare Advantage program. How does it work? By reforming a long-standing quirk in Medicare that prevented drugmakers from competing with each other.

How competition lowers drug prices

When U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar announced the Trump administration's detailed plan to reduce high prescription drug prices, much of the press yawned because many journalists assume that the only thing that can reduce drug prices is government-administered price controls.

In contrast to that conventional wisdom, the plan contains a number of elegant and subtle solutions that will enhance the role of competition in bringing drug prices down.

A surprising fact that few people know is that America leads the world in encouraging doctors and patients to use low-cost, high-value generic drugs. More than four-fifths of all prescriptions in the U.S. are for unbranded, off-patent generic drugs that cost less than your typical bottle of mineral water. For people with run-of-the-mill medical issues like high blood pressure, early-stage diabetes, and high cholesterol, these inexpensive drugs are a tremendous boon to public health.

The U.S. leads the industrialized world in the utilization of unbranded generic medications.FREOPP

The real problem in the U.S. is the high price of branded, on-patent prescription drugs'--in essence, legal monopolies'--where manufacturers take advantage of their market power to charge extremely high prices that are often divorced from the true clinical and economic value of their underlying medicines.

Medicare's outdated structure

Medicare was enacted in 1965, and is woefully ill-equipped to deal with advances in medical and pharmaceutical technology. The way Medicare covers prescription drugs is emblematic of the problem.

For those who buy private-sector health insurance on their own, or obtain it from their employer, health insurance covers prescription drugs in an integrated fashion. Not so for Medicare, which runs four different insurance programs, with different premiums and co-pays, that cover different kinds of prescription drugs.

Medicare Part A'--what you might call the original Medicare program'--covers hospital stays, including drugs that are administered in the hospital. A companion program, Medicare Part B, covers drugs administered in doctors' offices, such as drugs that require an intravenous infusion. Medicare Part C, also known as ''Medicare Advantage,'' is an increasingly popular, privately-administered Medicare program that covers the same services as Parts A and B.

However, Medicare Parts A, B, and C don't cover the vast range of drugs'--usually in pill form'--that patients obtain through retail pharmacies. That gap was closed under the passage of the Medicare Modernization Act of 2003, one of President George W. Bush's signature initiatives. The MMA created a fourth Medicare program, Part D, to cover retail prescription drugs.

Pills don't compete with intravenous infusions'--until now

Part D, in general, does a great job of leveraging competition among private insurers and drug companies to bring lower prices to seniors. That's why the program has come in massively under budget: the only health care entitlement to do so in U.S. history.

But Medicare's design puts an arbitrary ceiling on competition because it prevents competition among retail drugs and those administered in doctors' offices and hospitals.

For example, a number of multi-billion-dollar drugs for rheumatoid arthritis are administered in doctors' offices under Medicare Part B. Doctors receive a 6 percent commission on the average selling price, or ASP, of prescription drugs they administer in their offices, giving them a powerful incentive to steer patients to these drugs.

But a new generation of treatments for rheumatoid arthritis are oral drugs, like Pfizer's Xeljanz (tofacitinib), and are financed through Medicare Part D. Because the various Medicare programs operate separately, seniors don't benefit from competition between Xeljanz and many of the older drugs covered under Medicare B.

Similar problems exist in other disease areas where some drugs are administered as infusions, and others as oral pills, including multiple sclerosis and psoriasis.

Last year, in a paper published by the Foundation for Research on Equal Opportunity, I proposed that Congress fix this outdated structure by migrating to an integrated prescription drug benefit under Medicare Part D. The new Medicare rule is a major step in this direction, by integrating the way Medicare pays for Part B and Part D drugs.

Medicare drug competition offers seniors direct financial benefits

Under the new rule, seniors enrolled in Medicare Advantage plans (Part C) who have also signed up for prescription drug coverage under Part D will now be able to benefit from competition among a broader range of medicines.

The new rule allows Medicare Advantage plans to use ''step therapy'' under which seniors might start with an oral drug paid for by Part D, if it's of equal clinical value but lower cost, and then step to a more expensive injectable drug if the first medicine fails to work. Insurers would be required to return at least half of the savings to seniors, possibly in the form of those Visa gift cards often sold in grocery stores and pharmacies.

This is a win-win for seniors and taxpayers. First off, seniors will benefit from more competition in the form of hard cash and lower insurance premiums. And lower average selling prices for Medicare Part B drugs will create savings for the entire Medicare program, while especially enhancing the value that Medicare Advantage plans can deliver for seniors.

''Under the President's leadership, for the first time ever, [the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services are] bringing negotiations to physician-administered drugs and delivering on our promise to lower drug prices for patients,'' CMS Administrator Seema Verma said in a statement. ''For too long, Medicare Advantage plans have not had the tools to negotiate a better deal for patients. Today we begin lifting those barriers so plans can use private-sector tools to drive down the cost of expensive drugs while also offering new care coordination and drug adherence programs, to ensure that patients are getting high-quality care at lower cost.''

Part of a larger effort

The Trump administration deserves credit for doing the unglamorous work of changing Medicare's byzantine rules in ways that expand competition and choice, and lower health care prices. In recent days, the administration has produced other new rules that will help small businesses and individuals purchase lower-cost health plans, and proposed ''site-neutral payment'' in order to prevent hospitals from overcharging for services delivered in hospital-owned clinics.

It's not the kind of work that will garner as many headlines as the President's latest Twitter brouhaha. But it will make a difference for far more people.

* * *

FOLLOW @Avik on Twitter, Google+, and YouTube, and The Apothecary on Facebook. Or, sign up to receive a weekly e-mail digest of articles from The Apothecary. Read The Competition Prescription, Avik's plan to reduce prescription drug prices, at FREOPP.org.

INVESTORS' NOTE: The biggest publicly-traded pharmaceutical companies include Johnson & Johnson (NYSE:JNJ), Pfizer (NYSE:PFE), Roche (OTCQX:RHHBY), Novartis (NYSE:NVS), AbbVie (NYSE:ABBV), Merck (NYSE:MRK), and Amgen (NASDAQ:AMGN).

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 13:27

The German police have arrested a 28-year-old man from Eritrea for multiple sexual offences. The man targeted sheep and goats on a farm in Freiburg and sexually assaulted three women, as well.

Forensic investigators noticed that DNA of a sexual assault case from 11 May this year could be linked to several cases of animal sex attacks in spring 2017.

In May a 30-year-old woman was approached and tackled by a man with sexual intent. Fortunately she was saved by a passing cyclist.

On 12 June, another sex attack took place on a 31-year-old woman. Someone raped the woman or tried it, as no further details were given.

The latest sexual assault was on 1 July this year, with a man attacking a 20-year-old in a house entry way on her way home.

The Criminal Investigation Department identified the alleged perpetrator, who is the now arrested 28-year-old.

The collection of a DNA sample from the man showed a match with the sexual assault of 11 May and the attacks on animals in spring of 2017.

The then unknown culprit was charged with sexually assaulting sheep and goats on a farm in Freiburg.

The man residing in Freiburg was presented to the magistrate at the request of the Public Prosecutor's Office in Freiburg, who ordered his detention in a correctional facility.

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 12:34

Today Jim Acosta, thinking he was being clever, revealed his partisanship in a tweet against Trump's executive order idea to stop birthright citizenship.

Here's his tweet:

The Constitution > Executive Order

'-- Jim Acosta (@Acosta) October 30, 2018He's actually not wrong. But I know what you're all thinking.

It's the same thing EVERYONE else on the right was thinking when he said it.

Here's a few examples:

Now do Daca. https://t.co/pSllZFMtUk

'-- Larry O'Connor (@LarryOConnor) October 30, 2018Where was this from 2009-2018?I mean, this is great. But why only for Republican Presidents? https://t.co/OTSoRjeHyK

'-- Beto O'Wurtzel (@NathanWurtzel) October 30, 2018Tell that to Barack Hussein Obama. https://t.co/p0HinKg5zw

'-- toddstarnes (@toddstarnes) October 30, 2018Jimmy makes a very strong case against DACA. https://t.co/E0oUKAU4LW

'-- Derek Hunter (@derekahunter) October 30, 2018Since 2017. https://t.co/SgRWu1YZ91

'-- Mickey White (@BiasedGirl) October 30, 2018I'm trying to recall when you said this about Obama with his phone and his pen. ðŸ¤-- https://t.co/8vIB1kaodo

'-- Linda Suhler, PhD (@LindaSuhler) October 30, 2018It was a very good nap. https://t.co/caUAjlhPGZ

'-- Stephen Miller (@redsteeze) October 30, 2018Dear diary... https://t.co/LuzY9x7pv0

'-- Josh (@SpoookyBaggles1) October 30, 2018What an absolute fraud. Obama bypassed congress and legalized millions of people with an executive order. There is zero chance you protested. https://t.co/3CajRxxICk

'-- David Harsanyi (@davidharsanyi) October 30, 2018Fox > CNN https://t.co/PeXheos8OL

'-- pittsburghdan (@danky1465) October 30, 2018I actually went back to see what Acosta had to say about Obama's executive order on DACA. Nothing really. He just tweeted three times on it and they were all just statements from senior Obama officials. Not once did he ever tweet anything remotely like this about any of Obama's executive orders.

No back then he was having fun with the idea of executive orders:

By executive order I declare this mug off limits to @JohnBerman @EarlyStart #MugsNow pic.twitter.com/sgRQ0whmMG

'-- Jim Acosta (@Acosta) April 3, 2015

#PartisanHack

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 12:05

Debra Gureghian was booked in Broward County, FL .

All are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Published mugshots and/or arrest records are previously published public records of: an arrest, an indictment, a registration, supervision or probation, the deprivation of liberty or a detention. The mugshots and/or arrest records published on mugshots.com are in no way an indication of guilt and they are not evidence that an actual crime has been committed. Arrest does not imply guilt, and criminal charges are merely accusations. A defendant is presumed innocent unless proven guilty and convicted. For latest case status, contact the official Law Enforcement Agency which originally released the information. The following Official Record of Debra Gureghian is being redistributed by Mugshots.com and is protected by constitutional, publishing, and other legal rights. This Official Record was collected from a Law Enforcement agency on 12/19/2015.

Mugshots.com ID : 124802165

Name : GUREGHIAN, DEBRA

Race : WHITE

Sex : FEMALE

Hair Color : GRAY OR PARTIALLY GRAY

Eye Color : BROWN

Height : 5'² 2'" (1.57 m)

Weight : 120 lb (54 kg)

Birth Date : 10/13/1959

DC Number : I49004

Supervision Begin Date : 11/04/2015

Current Location : FT. LAUDERDALE

Current Status : ACTIVE

Supervision Type : PROBATION FELONY

Scheduled Termination Date : 11/03/2018

Address : 1400 N.E. 42ND STREET POMPANO BEACH, FL 33064

Aliases:

DEBORA P GUREGHIANDEBRA GUREGHIANDEBRA B GUREGHIANCharges:

#1

Offense Date06/19/2015OffenseGRAND THEFT,300 L/5,000Sentence Date11/04/2015CountyBROWARDCase No.1508223Community Supervision Length3Y 0M 0DExternal Links:

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 12:03

Touted as a way to make the world's most valuable cryptocurrency a more effective payment method, bitcoin's lightning network has a rather large obstacle ahead '' it's still challenging, even risky, to set up and use.

It could become easier, though, should developers at the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), the prestigious international group that creates standards for the web, have anything to do with it.

The work, which has been ongoing for several years (since standards take a long time to release), looks to make online payments easier, while giving users more choice by making a variety of payment methods available in web browsers using an API '' and that includes the lightning network.

We're talking browsers such as Google Chrome, Firefox and Microsoft Edge '' big names everyone knows.

Sure, the W3C doesn't have a horse in the race as it relates to which payment methods '' from credit cards to Apple Pay to cryptocurrencies '' are adopted most widely, but giving developers the option of adding lightning is a step towards making bitcoin's layer-two more accessible.

Interest in cryptocurrency at the W3C's Web Payments Working Group (where the browser API work is taking place) has been high for some time. But the W3C had trouble at first getting bitcoin developers and other cryptocurrency enthusiasts involved in the work.

However, with the help of only a few developers, cryptocurrency is looking compatible with the API. And, further than that, lightning is already compatible with the specification.

"All in all, we should be able to get bitcoin and lightning working with the [specification] without any major roadblocks," prominent lightning developer Christian Decker told other developers in an email in August. In fact, Decker, an engineer at Blockstream, specifically joined the Web Payments Working Group to make sure bitcoin and lightning would not be missed.

Such a step would put lightning on a similar footing as more established online payment methods, Decker told CoinDesk, adding:

"This is exciting because switching between traditional payments and bitcoins and lightning payments could basically be a single click and make it easier for merchants to accept bitcoin alongside these traditional methods."

Plus, there are other advantages to getting lightning into the specification.

Whenever a user enters their payment information, whether that's their credit card number and expiration date or their lightning information, the API saves that information to the browser for easy payment the next time.

A passive strategyStill, there is work to be done to make this happen.

For one, Decker said that a so-called "payment method ID" must be assigned to bitcoin and lightning before it can be a functioning part of the API.

"Currently only the basic-card identifier has been assigned, but we can apply for one eventually," he said.

Decker seems in no rush. According to him, lightning developers are taking a passive approach, watching developments within the Web Payments Working Group "very closely" to ensure that lightning remains compatible.

"By being part of the working group we are in a position to raise objections should an incompatibility emerge and we [can] propose alternatives or improvements that better reflect the constraints that come from bitcoin and lightning being very unique payment systems," Decker told CoinDesk.

It's important to emphasize, though, that members don't have to do anything as a part of the working group '' it's all rather voluntary.

And not everyone in the working group will necessarily have "crypto" top of mind. For instance, a bunch of companies contribute loosely to the W3C payment specifications, including the likes of Airbnb, Apple, Google, Facebook and Visa, companies that might be looking to push adoption of other, more obviously beneficial for their businesses, payment methods.

Decker is the sole lightning representative in the group of 172 participants.

As such, even though lightning is compatible, it's still up to the browsers and merchants to actually add lightning support.

Still, Ian Jacobs, the W3C payments activity head, argued these types of payments will be an option, telling CoinDesk:

"The architecture is designed to enable new payment methods to be used on the web. That should include blockchain-based payment methods."

Ready for the code?Turning the W3C standards into code is another key step for pushing lightning into the browser.

Some browsers, including Chrome, Microsoft Edge (formerly Internet Explorer), Samsung browser and Safari have already put the API into practice, while Firefox uses it in "beta," meaning it's not quite stable yet.

But so far, none have adopted the cryptocurrency or lightning part of the specifications.

That's likely partly because the specifications are still in progress. Not to mention, a developer needs to build the actual code implementation for the lightning payments, Decker said.

"I'm not aware of any real implementation, but that would be a very welcome development, and I'd be more than happy to support it," he told CoinDesk.

One concern, though, is that lightning is so new and experimental, users have been known to lose money when sending a payment across the network. In other words, lightning still has a ways to go to even be safe to use '' let alone easy. Bitcoin developer Sjors Provoost, who's been thinking about how lightning in a browser might look, raised this concern in a comment on the project's GitHub.

"Bitcoin and lightning wallets are much more involved than just storing a credit card number in a browser," Provoost contended.

Yet Decker argued:

"I'd say that using bitcoin or lightning payments are probably safer than credit cards."

Browsers image via Shutterstock

The leader in blockchain news, CoinDesk is a media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies. CoinDesk is an independent operating subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, which invests in cryptocurrencies and blockchain startups.

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 12:02

| October 30, 2018 01:03 PM

A ttorneys representing a Kansas man who faces life in prison for conspiring to massacre Somali Muslim refugees in 2016 say his sentence should be reduced because then-candidate Donald Trump's political rhetoric made 2016 "lit."

Patrick Eugene Stein's attorneys filed a memo in U.S. District Court in the District of Kansas on Monday, asking that their client be sentenced to no more than 15 years in prison with a ''lengthy post release supervision period.''

''2016 was 'lit,''' the attorneys wrote. ''The court cannot ignore the circumstances of one of the most rhetorically mold-breaking, violent, awful, hateful and contentious presidential elections in modern history, driven in large measure by the rhetorical China shop bull who is now our president.''

The attorneys note that Stein was ''an early and avid supporter'' of Trump's, and thus when Trump unexpectedly won the presidential election, ''it is reasonable to speculate that it would have changed things among the defendants as well.''

''The urgency for action would be gone,'' they wrote. ''The feeling of a losing battle would be gone. The conspiracies, in part, would be disproven as the transition from Obama to Trump took place. It is logical to conclude that the discussed attack would never have happened in the world that existed post-Trump.''

Stein, along with Curtis Allen and Gavin Wright, planned to bomb a mosque and apartment complex in Garden City, Kan., the day after the 2016 presidential election. The three were arrested in October 2016 by the FBI.

In court, prosecutors played recordings of Stein talking about killing Muslims with weapons dipped in pigs blood and describing them as ''cockroaches.''

In recent days, Trump's rhetoric has been blamed for inciting political violence, though he and the White House have rejected those claims.

On Wednesday, Gregory Bush, a white man, was charged with killing two black people at a grocery store in Kentucky after he tried to enter a black church. On Friday, Cesar Sayoc was arrested and charged with five federal crimes in connection with several prominent Democrats and CNN being mailed pipe bombs. On Saturday, Robert Bowers was arrested after a mass shooting at Pittsburgh synagogue left 11 people dead.

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Archived Version

Wed, 31 Oct 2018 11:22

/latest/2018/10/world-wide-web-consortium-is-actively-working-on-lightning-network-enabled-bitcoin-payments/

World Wide Web Consortium is Actively Working On Lightning Network-Enabled Bitcoin Payments

world-wide-web-consortium-is-actively-working-on-lightning-network-enabled-bitcoin-payments

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), an international body focused on developing standards and protocols for the internet, has reportedly been working on making it easier for users to make payments from web browsers.

W3C is also creating an API that will support bitcoin (BTC) payments made via the Lightning Network (LN) (a second layer solution to enable faster bitcoin transactions). The international standards organization aims to enable LN support for bitcoin payments in the most commonly used browsers including Google Chrome, Firefox, and Microsoft Edge.

Having More Payment OptionsAlthough the W3C is not focused on improving a specific payment method such as credit cards, Apply Pay, or cryptocurrencies, the consortium does want to give software developers more options including using the LN to make BTC payments.

Notably, the W3C's Web Payments Working Group has been actively recruiting bitcoin developers so that they can help add LN support for BTC transactions to the consortium's API.

According to the W3C, its API might soon support cryptocurrency payments made via the LN as its developers appear to have made substantial progress in integrating the second-layer payment network into web browsers.

Dr. Christian Decker, a well-known Lightning Network developer, sent out an email in August to other programmers to inform them about the second-layer payment network's ongoing development.

Bitcoin And Lightning May Work "Without Any Major Roadblocks"Decker, who currently works as an engineer at blockchain technology firm, Blockstream, wrote: "All in all, we should be able to get bitcoin and lightning working with the [specification] without any major roadblocks."

As a member of the Web Payments Working Group, Decker thinks it is important that modern web-based payment systems support cryptocurrency transactions. He told Coindesk:

This is exciting because switching between traditional payments and bitcoins and lightning payments could basically be a single click and make it easier for merchants to accept bitcoin alongside these traditional methods.

Blockchain-Based Currencies Must Be Included In Modern Payments SystemsAs CryptoGlobe reported in August, Shitcoin.com CEO Andreas Brekken had said the Lightning Network is currently ''impractical even for highly technical users.'' After testing the LN to make BTC payments, Brekken found that its software had many glitches and there was a very high rate of transaction failure.

However, it appears that progress is being made to improve the LN, and an increasing number of people now consider cryptocurrencies to be a legitimate payment method. Ian Jacobs, the payments activity head at the W3C, noted:

The architecture is designed to enable new payment methods to be used on the web. That should include blockchain-based payment methods.

As CryptoGlobe covered, Pierre Rochard, an experienced software engineer, revealed that he had been working on a software program called Neutrino that allows users to make LN-enabled BTC payments from Microsoft Excel.

Rochard also informed his followers on Twitter that Neutrino was in its early stages of development, and it would take more time before it starts working effectively.

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 11:07

(C) Frederic J. Brown Image: Skid Row The number of patients in Los Angeles' typhus outbreak has surpassed 100, according to figures compiled by NBC News.

The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health on Tuesday said there were 72 cases in its jurisdiction, which does not include the cities of Long Beach and Pasadena, which have their own health bureaucracies.

The latest figures for Long Beach and Pasadena obtained by NBC News, 15 and 20, respectively, bring L.A. county's total to at least 107 new typhus patients in 2018, more than half of what the entire nation usually observes in an entire year, according to the California Department of Public Health.

In the 2000s the number of patients diagnosed with typhus in Los Angeles county "did not exceed 20 cases per year," according to a county report. Observers say there's a correlation between the rise of typhus and the area's 47 percent increase in homelessness since 2012.

Emily Holman, infectious disease coordinator for the Long Beach Department of Health and Human Services, said via email that there are additional cases in that city of 469,450 that were still "under investigation."

The city of Pasadena said in a statement Oct. 5 that the outbreak had reached "epidemic levels." However, since then that city has noted no new cases, public health director Michael Johnson said.

(C) Frederic J. Brown Image: Skid Row The year-to-date typhus number provided by the state of California for Los Angeles County was 98. A spokesman for the California Department of Public Health emphasized Tuesday that this is dependent on reporting from local jurisdictions.

The department also said no typhus deaths have been registered in 2018.

Nearly one in 10 area cases, according to the county's health department figures, was centered downtown, where squalid conditions in the skid row neighborhood, including piles of trash and conspicuous rats, have been blamed for exacerbating the outbreak.

The office of Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti said earlier in October that it has dedicated an additional $300,000 to fortifying trash pickup, sidewalk washing and street cleaning in an area of downtown it labled the "typhus zone."

"We're deploying every available resource to help control and stop this outbreak," Alex Comisar, spokesman for Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, said at the time.

Estela Lopez, executive director of the Central City East Association, a business improvement district that overlaps with skid row, said she was informed by city officials that rat and flea eradication efforts, including spreading bug powder in the area, would begin in the days to come.

Still, she said, "I'm not seeing the level of response that matches the emergency that this is."

A typhus infection can cause headache, high fever and, in rare cases, meningitis and death. According to the L.A. county health department website, it's contracted when "the feces from infected fleas are rubbed into cuts or scrapes in the skin or rubbed into the eyes."

The L.A. County Homeless Services Authority counts 2,145 people living outdoors in the skid row neighborhood. The nonprofit research organization Economic Roundtable estimates that 102,955 homeless people call L.A. county home.

Andy Bales, CEO of the Union Rescue Mission, which has nearly 1,400 beds for the displaced, said the city and county governments can only do so much to alleviate a homeless problem that has sparked outbreaks of Hepatitis A, typhus and gang violence over the skid row drug trade.

He's calling on the federal goverment and the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to help.

"It's a FEMA-like disaster and it needs to be treated as such," he said.

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Archived Version

Wed, 31 Oct 2018 10:58

Jeff Hunt, Opinion contributor Published 7:00 a.m. ET Aug. 7, 2017 | Updated 2:06 p.m. ET Aug. 7, 2017

CLOSE

The proposed Marijuana Justice Act would remove marijuana from the Controlled Substances Act.Video provided by Newsy Newslook

Arrests are up. We still have a black market. And people are in danger.

Dried marijuana flowers. (Photo: Trevor Hughes, USA TODAY)

Last week, Senator Cory Booker introduced the Marijuana Justice Act in an effort to legalize marijuana across the nation and penalize local communities that want nothing to do with this dangerous drug. This is the furthest reaching marijuana legalization effort to date and marks another sad moment in our nation's embrace of a drug that will have generational consequences.

Our country is facing a drug epidemic. Legalizing recreational marijuana will do nothing that Senator Booker expects. We heard many of these same promises in 2012 when Colorado legalized recreational marijuana.

In the years since, Colorado has seen an increase in marijuana related traffic deaths, poison control calls, and emergency room visits. The marijuana black market has increased in Colorado, not decreased. And, numerous Colorado marijuana regulators have been indicted for corruption.

In 2012, we were promised funds from marijuana taxes would benefit our communities, particularly schools. Dr. Harry Bull, the Superintendent of Cherry Creek Schools, one of the largest school districts in the state, said, "So far, the only thing that the legalization of marijuana has brought to our schools has been marijuana."

In fiscal year 2016, marijuana tax revenue resulted in $156,701,018. The total tax revenue for Colorado was $13,327,123,798, making marijuana only 1.18% of the state's total tax revenue. The cost of marijuana legalization in public awareness campaigns, law enforcement, healthcare treatment, addiction recovery, and preventative work is an unknown cost to date.

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Trump's Attorney General Jeff Sessions is bringing the hammer down on leaks

Senator Booker stated his reasons for legalizing marijuana is to reduce "marijuana arrests happening so much in our country, targeting certain communities - poor communities, minority communities." It's a noble cause to seek to reduce incarceration rates among these communities but legalizing marijuana has had the opposite effect.

According to the Colorado Department of Public Safety, arrests in Colorado of black and Latino youth for marijuana possession have increased 58% and 29% respectively after legalization. This means that Black and Latino youth are being arrested more for marijuana possession after it became legal.

Furthermore, a vast majority of Colorado's marijuana businesses are concentrated in neighborhoods of color. Leaders from these communities, many of whom initially voted to legalize recreational marijuana, often speak out about the negative impacts of these businesses.

POLICING THE USA: A look at race, justice, media

Jeff Sessions' Justice Department goes after affirmative action's institutional racism

Senator Booker released his bill just a few days after the Washington Post reported on a study by the Review of Economic Studies that found "college students with access to recreational cannabis on average earn worse grades and fail classes at a higher rate." Getting off marijuana especially helped lower performing students who were at risk of dropping out. Since legalizing marijuana, Colorado's youth marijuana use rate is the highest in the nation, 74% higher than the national average, according to the Rocky Mountain High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area Report. This is having terribly negative effects on the education of our youth.

If Senator Booker is interested in serving poor and minority communities, legalizing marijuana is one of the worst decisions. There is much work to be done to reduce incarceration and recidivism, but flooding communities with drugs will do nothing but exacerbate the problems.

The true impact of marijuana on our communities is just starting to be learned. The negative consequences of legalizing recreational marijuana will be felt for generations. I encourage Senator Booker to spend time with parents, educators, law enforcement, counselors, community leaders, pastors, and legislators before rushing to legalize marijuana nationally. We've seen the effects in our neighborhoods in Colorado, and this is nothing we wish upon the nation.

Jeff Hunt is the Vice President of Public Policy at Colorado Christian University. Follow him on Twitter: @jeffhunt.

You can read diverse opinions from our Board of Contributors and other writers on the Opinion front page, on Twitter @USATOpinion and in our daily Opinion newsletter. To respond to a column, submit a comment to letters@usatoday.com.

Read or Share this story: https://usat.ly/2vHw0kJ

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Archived Version

Wed, 31 Oct 2018 10:48

WASHINGTON (AP) '-- President Donald Trump has astonished legal scholars with his claim that he can end birthright citizenship with a swipe of his pen. No, they say, he can't.

Trump also went far off track in asserting that the U.S. is the only country that automatically grants citizenship to anyone born in the country. Many do.

His comments in an interview with ''Axios on HBO'':

TRUMP: ''It was always told to me that you needed a constitutional amendment. Guess what? You don't. ... Well, you can definitely do it with an act of Congress. But now they're saying I can do it just with an executive order.''

THE FACTS: Scholars widely pan the idea that Trump could unilaterally change the rules on who is a citizen. It's highly questionable whether an act of Congress could do it, either, though it is conceivable that legislators could change the rules regarding children born in the U.S. of parents who are in the country illegally.

Peter Schuck is perhaps the most prominent advocate of the idea that birthright citizenship is not conveyed by the Constitution to children of parents who are living illegally in the U.S. Even he says ''Trump clearly cannot act by'' executive order.

''I feel confident that no competent lawyer would advise him otherwise,'' he said by email Tuesday. ''This is just pre-election politics and misrepresentation and should be sharply criticized as such.''

Schuck, of Yale, and colleague Rogers Smith of the University of Pennsylvania have argued since the mid-1980s that Congress can set the rules for providing citizenship to U.S.-born children of parents who came illegally.

But most scholars on the left and right share the view that it would take a constitutional amendment to deny automatic citizenship to children born in the U.S. to parents who are in the country illegally.

James Ho, a conservative Trump-appointed federal appeals court judge, wrote in the Green Bag legal journal in 2006 that birthright citizenship ''is protected no less for children of undocumented persons than for descendants of Mayflower passengers.''

Stephen Yale-Loehr, a Cornell university immigration expert, said the case against Trump's authority is ''not open and shut, but the better view is it would require a constitutional amendment.''

The Constitution's citizenship clause was part of the post-Civil War amendments that enshrined the rights of African-Americans. The citizenship clause, in particular, was intended to overturn the Supreme Court's notorious Dred Scott decision of 1857 that held African-Americans were not citizens.

The Supreme Court has never ruled squarely about the clause's application to children of immigrants who are in the U.S. illegally. Trump did not make a distinction between legal and illegal status in his remarks. An 1898 Supreme Court decision held that the U.S.-born son of legal Chinese immigrants was a citizen under the 14th Amendment; a footnote in a 1982 decision suggests there should be no difference for children of foreign-born parents whether they are in the U.S. legally or illegally.

___

TRUMP: ''We're the only country in the world where a person comes in, has a baby and the baby is essentially a citizen of the United States for 85 years with all of those benefits. It's ridiculous. It's ridiculous. And it has to end.''

THE FACTS: That's flat-out wrong.

The U.S. is among about 30 countries where birthright citizenship '-- the principle of jus soli or ''right of the soil'' '-- is applied, according to the World Atlas and other sources. Most are in the Americas. Canada and Mexico are among them. Most other countries confer citizenship based on that of at least one parent '-- jus sanguinis, or ''right of blood'' '-- or have a modified form of birthright citizenship that may restrict automatic citizenship to children of parents who are on their territory legally.

More broadly, Trump's view that U.S.-born children of foreigners live a lifetime of taking ''all those benefits'' ignores the taxes they pay, the work they do and their other contributions to society.

___

Find AP Fact Checks at http://apne.ws/2kbx8bd

Follow @APFactCheck on Twitter: https://twitter.com/APFactCheck

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 04:19

President Trump Photo: Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty Images

At her press conference Monday, White House press secretary Sarah Sanders reassured the public about the issue that has become the Republicans' premier campaign liability. ''The president's health-care plan that he's laid out,'' she said, ''covers preexisting conditions.''

There are several lies embedded in this statement, beginning with the premise that Trump has a plan at all. Trump ran for president promising repeatedly he would cover everybody, and then confessed, ''Nobody knew health care could be so complicated.'' He never came up with a plan that would cover everybody, or anything close to it. Republicans in both chambers devised plans that would cut health-care coverage and expose more poor or sick people to higher costs, or make access to medical care completely unaffordable. When the Senate failed to pass anything, the legislative initiative died.

Neither chamber of Congress has any plan to move forward with regard to health care. If Trump has such a plan, he has kept it completely secret.

Second, Trump has made a series of administrative changes designed to cripple Obamacare in general and specifically its ability to deliver affordable coverage to people with preexisting conditions. Republicans in Congress and Trump repealed the individual mandate in their tax-cut bill. (''We ripped the heart out of Obamacare with the individual mandate,'' Trump boasted.) Second, he denied payments owed to insurers under the law, in order to prod some of them to exit the markets. Third, his administration flouted the law's protections by allowing insurers to sell low-cost, bare-bones plans to healthy people, which can be sold at cheap rates because they exclude coverage for medical care needed by people with preexisting conditions.

Trump's stated rationale for these moves was that he was destroying Obamacare (''It's dead, it's gone'') which would then pave the way for something he would like. (''We have essentially repealed Obamacare, and will come up with something that's much better, whether it's block grants or whether it's taking what we have and doing something terrific.'' At the time Trump and his allies were trying to repeal the law, the uncertainty caused by their actions made premiums skyrocket, and the failure of that repeal meant rates were higher than insurers needed to run a profit. They have come back down, but not as low as they would be if not for the sabotage.

These attempts to sabotage Obamacare did not destroy the law. Instead they merely hampered it, by luring healthy customers out of the exchanges, leaving behind a sicker population, resulting in higher premiums. A new Kaiser Family Foundation analysis finds that premiums are 16 percent higher as a result of Trump's combined sabotage attempts.

Finally, and most absurd of all, in place of a ''plan,'' the administration really does have a concrete course of action on health care. It's a lawsuit to overturn federal regulations protecting people with preexisting conditions. The law, the true centerpiece of the Affordable Care Act, prevents insurers from either charging higher prices to people with preexisting conditions or denying coverage for treatments they need.

Republican attorneys general in 20 states, joined by the Trump administration, are supporting an outlandish lawsuit to eliminate these protections. Their case rests on the fact that they originally envisioned having an individual mandate, and since Congress repealed the individual mandate, the protections for preexisting conditions should also be repealed. The legal absurdity of this argument can be seen simply by noting that, if Congress actually meant to repeal the insurance regulations when it eliminated the individual mandate, it would have said something to this effect at the time. It didn't.

In any case, Trump's ''plan'' for health care is a lawsuit to deny protections for people with preexisting conditions. This is the opposite of having a plan to protect people with preexisting conditions.

Republicans are doing this both because they viscerally despise Obamacare and because they ideologically believe the government should not regulate the insurance market. But their position is wildly unpopular. The dynamics of competitive democracy suggest Republicans should be forced to abandon a policy position that they cannot defend to the electorate. Instead they are obscuring their stance with wild lies without altering its substance whatsoever. Whether they succeed in doing so poses an important test for the democratic process.

Trump: Our Plan Covers Preexisting Conditions. It Doesn't. Promoted links by Taboola 10/30/2018

The Washington Post refuses to let Jamal Khashoggi's murder slip from the headlines

Jama Khashoggi walked in to the Saudi Consulate four weeks ago on Tuesday to obtain a simple document allowing him to marry. Instead, he was brutally murdered by a team of 15 agents sent from Riyadh. Saudi authorities now acknowledge the crime was premeditated. Yet much about it remains undisclosed, including what happened to Mr. Khashoggi's body, which has not been returned to his family.

Rather than answer those questions, the Saudi government '-- and its de facto accomplices in the Trump administration '-- have gone silent, evidently hoping that demands for accountability will fade away now that the story has been pushed from the front pages. That should not be allowed to happen.

10/30/2018

The Pittsburgh Penguins are wearing this patch to honor the victims of the Tree of Life synagogue shooting

Photo: @penguins

10/30/2018

The man accused of sending bombs to Trump critics made hundreds of death threats on Twitter

In April 2018, six months before he allegedly sent mail bombs to Soros, prominent Democrats and the offices of CNN, Sayoc moved from just tweeting about conspiracy theories to regularly threatening people.

In all, CNN's analysis found, Sayoc tweeted more than 240 threats directed to at least 50 public officials, news organizations and media personalities. '...

Your Time is coming,'' ''Your days are over,'' ''your (sic) next,'' and ''Hug your loved ones real close everytime U leave your home,'' were some of Sayoc's refrains. Sometimes he attached photos to his threats, including pictures of decapitated goats, photos of the homes and families of those he was threatening and a tarot card of a skeleton on horseback over the caption ''death.'' He frequently suggested that the people he was tweeting at would vanish in the Everglades, not far from where he lived in Florida.

10/30/2018

Kanye is taking a break from politics

My eyes are now wide open and now realize I've been used to spread messages I don't believe in. I am distancing myself from politics and completely focusing on being creative !!!

'--@kanyewest 10/30/2018

Pittsburgh protesters greet President Trump

Photo: Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images

10/30/2018

Odds Watch: FiveThirtyEight forecasts Democrats have less than 15 percent chance of taking Senate

10/30/2018pittsburgh synagogue shooting

pittsburgh synagogue shooting

Trump Heads for Pittsburgh (Over Local Leaders' Objections)

By Eric Levitz

The Steel City's mayor asked the president not to visit until after the victims of the synagogue shooting were buried. Trump came anyway.

10/30/2018

Seems like a good development for the world

My eyes are now wide open and now realize I've been used to spread messages I don't believe in. I am distancing myself from politics and completely focusing on being creative !!!

'--@kanyewest 10/30/2018

A sobering poll for Tennessee Democrat Phil Bredesen

Republican Marsha Blackburn is now narrowly edging Democrat Phil Bredesen in Tennessee's closely-watched Senate race despite Bredesen's higher favorability with likely voters, a new NBC News/Marist poll finds. But both Blackburn and Bredesen have seen decreased popularity since the bruising campaign '-- including more than $50 million spent on television ads '-- kicked into gear.

The poll shows Blackburn with the support of 51 percent of likely voters, compared with 46 percent support for Bredesen. Among all registered voters, her advantage narrows to 49 percent to 46 percent.

10/30/2018Why don't young people vote?

today we published a piece, coauthored by zak, in which several millennials discussed why they haven't voted in the past. what in particular about their responses, which ranged from ''democrats don't represent me'' to ''voting is too much of a hassle'' stuck out to you?

Everyone I spoke to personally lived in New York, and I was struck by how that fact influence their decision to vote. The perceived safety of living in a place where political outcomes feel preordained, at least in terms of whether it's going D or R, I think made them a lot more comfortable in their stance. Most were clear that if they lived somewhere like Ohio, Florida, etc., they'd be more inclined to vote.

that strikes me as fairly rational, tbh

It does to me too. But it was also paired with a pretty firm indictment of how the electoral college subverts this notion of ''one person one vote''

Separately, I think that a hazy'...consumer activist'...ethos has done a real number on many Americans' ability to understand what voting is. A lot of people seem to see politicians as being indistinguishable from other heavily marketed products '' you look for the one that best aligns with your personal brand/sense of identity, and if you don't like any of the products, or have moral qualms about how they're made, then the ethical thing to do is to boycott them.

but boycotting elected officials doesn't work, because they have no incentive to maximize their support among the non-voting public (whereas corporations do have an incentive to expand market-share, even among demographics that aren't currently buying what they're selling)

that's an interesting way of looking at it

You're not sending the message you maybe think you are by not voting. It's not incentive for them to change. It's incentive for them to keep fucking you over because they know you won't do anything about it.

the answers I felt most sympathetic to were: it really is a non-trivial pain in the ass to register

it really underscored the extent to which voting is unnecessarily difficult in a lot of the country

it should be opt-out, not opt-in

full disclosure: I wasn't on top of things in 2016 and got locked out of the Democratic primary

(because New York state makes you register with a party 6 months in advance)

I was in london and my absentee ballot didn't get there in time, so I feel your pain

zak, did you come away with any sense of what kind of tactics might actually make young people want to vote more? as one of the people said, shaming may not be the way to go

Yeah, I got the sense that a pretty aggressive pro-voting rights platform would actually appeal to some of the people I spoke to. Eliminating the electoral college, AVR, same-day registration.

(using the phrase ''young people'' makes me feel 60 years old, by the way)

They were literally all my age and I was like, ''Wow, I remember when I was young.''

haha

yeah, I think the popular image of young non-voters tends to be that they're completely apathetic. but in fact, many are more just disgusted with the current system '' not that I think not voting is an appropriate way to express that disgust.

Yeah. Most I spoke to were pretty adamant about the importance of being politically involved otherwise. One guy was basically like, in my ideal system, we wouldn't need voting in the way it currently operates.

It is also true that Democrats haven't exactly done everything in their power to give millennials an affirmative reason to support them

the last time the Dems were in power, they passed a landmark health-care law '' that was *designed* to increase the cost of health insurance for people in their 20s who don't get health-care through their jobs

though, also kept those under 26 on their parents' plans

don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good, eric

(but yes, your point is valid)

that plus the bipartisan complicity in the student debt nightmare and foreclosure crisis + the refusal to get right on a gimme issue like weed legalization = room for improvement.

I think the usual lesson of voter turnout is that people need to be excited about something, not just alienated by the opposition. And yet, millennial turnout this year is projected to be higher than it has been in a long time. If that holds up, will it be because people are excited to send Trump a message, or that Democrats recruited worthy candidates? It's hard to untangle the two.

well, the usual lesson of midterm turnout is, in my understanding, that alienation from the people in power is all a lot of voters need

from what I've seen though this is poised to be a historically high turnout election, across demographics. The current president's singular talent for keeping himself at the center of national attention '' and fomenting a sense of perpetual crisis in both red and blue America '' seems to have increased popular engagement with politics across the board

At the same time, there are some exciting/potentially history-making candidates in some places. Stacey Abrams, Andrew Gillum.

This Kemp-Abrams race has so many galvanizing dimensions going any number of directions

As a progressive in GA, you could be stoked to elect the first black woman gov in US history, excited about her platform, motivated because you feel an anti-GOP vote would be a referendum on Trump, or enraged by Kemp's voter suppression tactics and conflicts of interest.

Any of those in isolation is enough to draw people to the polls

but combined, it's a much bigger deal with much higher stakes

definitely agree that Democrats have found some really excellent candidates this cycle

To Eric's point about a sense of perpetual crisis driving engagement, I wonder how much voting might be motivated by just not wanting to think about politics so much

Like just please get this dude off my newsfeed

I know that's my main motivation at this point

I remember listening to a podcast interviewing the guy who ran Doug Jones' media strategy in Alabama and he was pretty confident that even among people who might like Trump, they still don't want everyone to be like Trump

Seemed to think there's a genuine and widespread desire for more balance. I don't know how true that is. But it could at the very least be a consideration, if not a driving factor outright.

From what I've read, the psychic toll of having the worst human being in the country as a constant presence in your life, and that of everyone you know, has been a major force in spurring the politicization and mobilization of college-educated women in the suburbs (in addition, of course, to the GOP's cartoonish misogyny)

soon enough, we'll find out if this all adds up to a major Democratic victory.

games

There Is a Professional Wrestling Angle to the Murder of Jamal Khashoggi

By Will Leitch

The WWE is forging ahead with its plan for a major event in Saudi Arabia this Friday.

10/30/2018

More details on the sordid, strange plot to discredit Robert Mueller

Multiple reporters were contacted over the past few weeks by a woman who said she had been offered money to say she was sexually assaulted by Mueller, the special counsel who is probing possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia. After investigating, according to the political website Hill Reporter, the reporters each independently determined the assault allegation was likely a hoax and that it was unclear if the woman had been offered money to make the claim. The reporters then contacted the special counsel's office to report that they had been approached about the scheme.

Around the same time reporters began to be contacted about the assault allegations against Mueller, Jack Burkman, a Republican lobbyist and radio host, began promoting, via his Facebook page, that he is investigating sexual misconduct and alcohol-related allegations against Mueller. On Tuesday morning he tweeted that he would hold a press conference two days later to ''reveal the first of Special Counsel Robert Mueller's sex assault victims.''

10/30/2018pittsburgh synagogue shooting

pittsburgh synagogue shooting

Armed Guards Are Already Common in New York's Synagogues

By Nick Tabor

After the Pittsburgh shooting, synagogues are rethinking their security measures. But armed guards are already surprisingly common among them.

10/30/2018

The L train apocalypse is nigh

The

#LTrainShutdown begins Saturday, April 27, 2019 for a 15-month reconstruction says

@MTA. Mark your calendars. 🚆

'--@NY1 10/30/2018

Facebook's politics vetting leaves a lot to be desired

One of Facebook's major efforts to add transparency to political advertisements is to require those paying for the ads to make a ''Paid for by'' disclosure, which appears at the top of the ad and supposedly tells users who is paying for political ads that show up in their news feeds.

But on the eve of the 2018 midterm elections, a VICE News investigation found the ''Paid for by'' feature is easily manipulated, and appears to allow anyone to lie about who is paying for a political ad, or to pose as someone else paying for the ad.

To test it, VICE News applied to buy fake ads on behalf of all 100 sitting U.S. senators, including ads ''Paid for by'' by Mitch McConnell and Chuck Schumer. Facebook's approvals were bipartisan: All 100 sailed through the system, indicating that just about anyone can buy an ad identified as ''Paid for by'' by a major U.S. politician.

10/30/2018

Ryan Zinke is the new Scott Pruitt

The Interior Department's Office of Inspector General has referred one of its ongoing probes into the conduct of Secretary Ryan Zinke to the Justice Department for further investigation, according to two individuals familiar with the matter.

Interior Deputy Inspector General Mary L. Kendall, who is currently serving as acting inspector general, is conducting at least three probes that involve Zinke. These include his involvement in a Montana land dealand the decision not to grant two tribes approval to operate a casino in Connecticut. The individuals, who spoke of the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly, did not specify which inquiry had been referred to the Justice Department.

10/30/2018

Robert Mueller's enemies are going to extremes to try to discredit him

An alleged scheme to pay off women to fabricate sexual assault allegations against Special Counsel Robert Mueller has been referred to the FBI for further investigation, according to a spokesman for the special counsel's office, Peter Carr. ''When we learned last week of allegations that women were offered money to make false claims about the Special Counsel, we immediately referred the matter to the FBI for investigation,'' Carr said in a statement on Tuesday.

The special counsel's office confirmed that the scheme was brought to its attention by several journalists who were told about it by a woman alleging that she herself had been offered roughly $20,000 by a GOP activist named Jack Burkman ''to make accusations of sexual misconduct and workplace harassment against Robert Mueller.''

2018 midterms

Steve King May Actually Pay a Price For Being a Blatant Racist

By Eric Levitz

Iowa's favorite white nationalist is losing campaign donors '-- and a new poll shows him statistically tied with a Democrat in his deep-red district.

10/30/2018

Blatant Anti-Semitic image used in Connecticut campaign

10/30/2018

Prominent Republican issues rebuke to White Supremacist-friendly colleague

Congressman Steve King's recent comments, actions, and retweets are completely inappropriate. We must stand up against white supremacy and hate in all forms, and I strongly condemn this behavior.

'--@RepSteveStivers 10/30/2018

As judicial experts have been saying all day'...

BIG from PAUL RYAN: "You cannot end birthright citizenship with an executive order." says on WVLK radio

'--@elwasson 10/30/2018

Axl Rose tells his Twitter followers ''Vote Blue'... Bitches!!''

10/30/2018

It's almost as if they're expecting the ''comforter-in-chief'' to do something inappropriate

The top congressional leaders from both parties declined an invitation from the White House to join President Trump on Tuesday in Pittsburgh in the wake of the shooting at the Tree of Life Synagogue, according to sources familiar with the matter.

Both House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) were unable to make the trip due to scheduling conflicts, with Ryan's office noting he wasn't able to make it on such short notice. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) also decided not to attend.

apple

Apple Tries to Woo Back the Creative Pros That Make Up Apple's Core

By Jake Swearingen

Apple would like to remind you that it also makes computers and not just iPhones.

10/30/2018just asking questions

just asking questions

Elaine Pagels on How Devastating Loss Influenced Her Groundbreaking Scholarship

By Nick Tabor

Why Religion? is her new memoir about personal calamities, revolutionary scholarship, and her own, sort-of faith.

long vs short

Long vs. Short: Does the New York Times' Business Model Depend on Trump?

By Matt Stieb

The company has put up great growth numbers since November 2016, and its stock is soaring. Can it last?

10/30/2018

You'll never guess which senator is all in on Trump's effort to do away with birthright citizenship

In addition, I plan to introduce legislation along the same lines as the proposed executive order from President

@realDonaldTrump.

'--@LindseyGrahamSC fake news

Trump: Why Didn't the Media Blame Obama for Dylann Roof Attacking Black People?

By Eric Levitz

The president says the media is biased because it associated him with Cesar Sayoc but ''didn't do that with President Obama, with the church.''

Link to Article

Archived Version

Wed, 31 Oct 2018 04:17

From left: Laura, Nathan, and Jocelyn. Photo: Courtesy of the subjects

More than half of American adults plan to cast ballots in November, but only a third of people ages 18 to 29 say they will. Here, 12 young adults on why they probably won't vote. (See also: Many reasons why you really, really should.)

2016 was such a disillusioning experience. Going into the election, I was so proud to be in this country at this moment, so proud to be voting for Hillary Clinton. I had my Clinton sweatshirt on all day. I was on Twitter telling people that if they didn't vote they were dead to me '-- like the whole thing. Watching the results come in, it was just disheartening. My faith in the whole system was crushed pretty quickly. That was the first general election I could vote in, too.

Those actual full-progressive candidates make me optimistic. But there's still a lot of powerful people, especially in the Democratic Party, that are centrists, and that's just a little frustrating when it comes time to stand up to this president and the policies he's trying to pass. Like the Kavanaugh thing '-- I get that they're the minority and that was an uphill battle, but I just feel like there wasn't a big enough fight put up to that, and I think there continues to not be a big enough fight.

Full disclosure: I have a ballot sitting at home. In 2016, I voted absentee and I just marked off ''Send me a mail-in ballot for every election.'' I don't really get that argument that it's really hard. Like, it's not that hard.

I think there's a way to be an informed nonvoter. I'd rather have an informed nonvoter than an uninformed voter going in and making a choice they don't understand. You're voting for a politician going into office, and I'm seeing less change there than I am through grassroots organizing. Since Trump's been elected, those grassroots groups have really been doing great, great work. So I guess it's that: where you're seeing the impact.

In my senior year in high school, I was probably borderline socialist. Though I don't really think I understood what a socialist was. I was blatantly liberal and didn't bother to check myself. My friend gave me The Prince, by Machiavelli. I read that, and it provided a certain nuance that I didn't have. From there, I read more, and I realized that a lot of things I'd thought before were wrong. I got into Hellenism. I read Cicero, Livy. Later on, I got into Voltaire. Then, in college, my field is American politics and political science. I prefer constitutional law and Alexander Hamilton.

There are things that I'm aware of where I'm certain I'm right. But for most things, although I feel strongly, it's very probable that there's some aspect of this that I don't understand. Somebody provides a new avenue of thought, and it changes the way I think about something. I never felt certain enough to vote. But I'm a political-science student, and the talk of voting is really big in my circle of friends. In 2016, I almost did. Of course, I'm not a big fan of Trump, but I didn't know if Trump was going to be a flash in the pan or '-- I just didn't know what to do. I didn't want to help something that might end up being wrong.

I tried to register for the 2016 election, but it was beyond the deadline by the time I tried to do it. I hate mailing stuff; it gives me anxiety. I don't remember seeing voter-registration drives, no. I've seen a lot more the past two years. I'm sure there must have been stuff. I just don't remember it.

I guess I still thought, Okay, my vote is largely symbolic in this election because I'm in Texas. Even if Texas went blue, I'm pretty sure my vote wouldn't matter anyway. Austin is very liberal, but it's very gerrymandered.The House district I'm in goes GOP every election, which is ridiculous. I was particularly interested in voting in 2016 because Donald Trump is so stupid. It drove me up a wall '-- he knew way less about the government than I do.

I have ADHD, and it makes it hard for me to do certain tasks where the payoff is far off in the future or abstract. I don't find it intrinsically motivational. The amount of work logically isn't that much: Fill out a form, mail it, go to a specific place on a specific day. But those kind of tasks can be hard for me to do if I'm not enthusiastic about it. That's kind of a problem with social attitudes around, you know, ''It's your civic duty to vote.'' I once told a co-worker I didn't vote, and she said, ''That's really irresponsible,'' in this judgmental voice. You can't build a policy around calling people irresponsible. You need to make people enthusiastic and engaged.

After 2016, a couple friends became a lot more politically active, and they helped me register and mail the form. So I actually am registered now. I'm leaning toward probably voting in the midterms. It feels like the reason to vote is symbolic. The motivation isn't about the actual value my vote has; it's more like a theoretical signaling value. If that's the case, I would rather signal that Democrats should have more progressive candidates, rather than assuming that everyone on the left will automatically vote for the candidates they run. In the end, whether I vote probably depends on how close the candidates are.

I rent and move around quite a bit, and when I try to get absentee ballots, they need me to print out a form and mail it to them no more than 30 days before the election but also no less than seven days before the election. Typically, I check way before that time, then forget to check again, or just say ''Fuck it'' because I don't own a printer or stamps anyway. It's incredibly difficult for hourly workers or young people who are in rotational programs or travel frequently for their careers to vote. I wish every state's rules were the same so there was not so much confusion and it was easy to find straightforward information on how exactly to get absentee ballots.

I feel like the Democratic Party doesn't really stand for the things I believe in anymore. Why should I vote for a party that doesn't really do anything for me as a voter? Millennials don't vote because a lot of politicians are appealing to older voters. We deserve politicians that are willing to do stuff for our future instead of catering to people who will not be here for our future. I'm a poli-sci major, so talking about politics is a daily thing for me. Half of the people I talk to seem very into voting. The other half are people who, like me, don't really feel represented. The only thing they choose to vote in is local elections.

In high school, I didn't even know our vice-president's name was Joe Biden. All my high-school classmates were Republicans. They were very vocal about it, especially during the whole Romney-and-Obama election. I realized I didn't believe everything they were saying. Then I Googled ''Republican versus Democrat,'' and I like kinda both, kinda not. That's why I'm an Independent. It wasn't till the Trump-versus-Hillary election that I realized how important it is to vote. Maybe it had to do with, like, society and all. Everyone I was following was like, ''Go out to vote.'' I was in college in Massachusetts. I decided that I wasn't gonna go through that long process for an out-of-state student to register to vote. I had a hectic schedule. I just didn't have the time and energy. Also I didn't know how my parents would feel about that whole thing, 'cause my brother does not vote either. So it wasn't asked if they could help us out with the registration and mailing all the forms to us. My mom is a Republican, my dad is a Democrat, and I did not learn that until the 2016 election, after begging them to tell me at least what their party was.

I realized that I should've voted afterward. Ever since that election, I started turning on not just CNN but also Fox News on the iPhone news app. I plan to vote in 2020. I have a goal set to know more about politics by that time.

I volunteered for Bernie Sanders. I went to many rallies, I was at the first presidential debate in Las Vegas. But when he folded, then immediately went and defended Hillary, a person who he's been campaigning against for 18 months, that just really killed it for me. I just have no respect for that. It's the same thing on the other side. Look at Ted Cruz, who's spent his last two years being made fun of by Donald Trump, and then we see Trump saying Cruz is the right guy in Texas to go against Beto O'Rourke. It's just so much political theater, and it really just turned me off entirely.

I wasn't planning to vote in 2016. I was with my mom, we were at Albertsons grocery store around the corner from my house, and they were in there voting. My mom voted, and it took her literally ten seconds. She said, ''You should do it,'' and I said, ''I don't know, I don't really think I want to.'' And she was like, ''Aaron, it just took a minute.'' So I said, ''Okay, fine.'' I just voted for Hillary. I felt bad about it for two years.

I look at it this way: That report just came out the other day about global warming, talking about how we have 12 years, until 2030, for this radical change unlike the world has ever seen. And The Hill newspaper just put out that article about how the DNC does not plan on making climate change a big part of their platform, even still. I just do not understand why I would vote for a party that doesn't care about me in any way. They can say, ''Sure, we'll lower student interest rates.'' Well, I don't give a shit about student interest rates if I'm not going to live past 13 more years on this planet. Everyone on Twitter can be like, ''Oh, we need the Democratic Senate to pack the courts.'' But have they watched the Democratic Party at any time during my lifetime? They have not done anything. Like, they don't stand for anything. And I just don't see the point anymore.

There are people that are exciting. Bernie was exciting, Cynthia [Nixon] was exciting, and Alexandria [Ocasio-Cortez] is exciting. So would I vote in the future? I don't know. If somebody came along that was exciting like that? Yeah. Probably.

I'm trying to register in my hometown of Austin, Texas. It's such a tedious process to even get registered in Texas, let alone vote as an absentee. There's no notification service about the status of my voter registration. There's a small, outdated website where you can enter your information and check. When I was at the post office to register, this poor girl, clearly also a college student like me, didn't know what ''postmarked'' meant and had no idea how to send an important document by mail. Most people my age have zero need to go to the post office and may have never stepped into one before. Honestly, if someone had the forms printed for me and was willing to deal with the post office, I'd be much more inclined to vote.

I vote when I feel like I have to. But I mostly consider it something that sucks a lot of people's time and energy away from actually building power with the people around them.

New York especially has a pretty vibrant tenant-organizing scene. You see organizing around community gardens, around people protesting new development going in, people working against rezoning. Regardless of the outcome of those things, I think people leave with a sense of empowerment. You might have failed this fight, but now you know your neighbor. Now you have a whole network you can call up the next time this happens. But if you lose an election, or the candidate you're pushing loses, then what do you have after that? You have this kind of despair for the next two or four or whatever years.

If we get to a blue wave in the midterms and then things just continue on, people will feel deflated and check out. Which is why I think you've got to have something besides just strategic voting, or people resigning themselves to a candidate they don't love but who is at least a Democrat.

In 2008, I was extremely enthusiastic to vote for Barack Obama. But over the years, I started to understand the electoral system as exactly how I've characterized it. For a while, I thought it was an immoral act to vote. It means that we're giving our approval to a system that I totally do not want to validate. Over the years, I've started to think maybe we don't have to frame this so much as an individual act with these moral consequences and that I need to stop being so dramatic about it. So, for instance, I voted for Cynthia Nixon in the primary recently. I teach at CUNY. Insofar as she was in a position where she could have been elected and made a difference in this, yes, I'll take the five minutes out of my day to go vote. But it's not something that we should, as a society, be making the horizon of our political organizing.

My polling place is at the end of my block. It takes no time at all; it's an extremely easy process. But I think that's also what makes it seem sort of alienating and anticlimactic. You go in and you're like, ''This is the climax of democracy,'' like, the sticker on my chest is the climax of democracy.

It was easier to get my medical-marijuana card '-- not a right, or even federally legal '-- than it was to register to vote. Massachusetts had online registration but only if you have a DMV-issued ID. I don't drive, so I was like, okay, I can register in person, but I'm also dealing with a chronic illness. Every day is a guessing game: Am I going to feel up to doing anything today? I put it off. The week before the deadline, I ended up being really sick and I wasn't able to leave home. You can send in your registration by mail, but I didn't have stamps. I kept thinking that I shouldn't have to jump through this many hoops to register. Back in July, I'd gotten a medical-marijuana card to treat my chronic illness. The entire thing is done online '-- it's the same requirements as registering to vote.

Growing up, going to Catholic school, everything we learned had a skew on it. Whenever we were taught about voting or political issues, it was not about learning the issues and matching what you feel personally, it was, ''This is what the Catholic Church teaches, and this is how you should vote or you're wrong.'' I think that shaped me to hate politics and not want to be involved.

The idea of leaving work, forwarding all of my calls to my phone, to go stand in line for four hours, to probably get called back to work before I even get halfway through the line, sounds terrible. I would have to tell work, ''Hey, I'm not coming in until noon today,'' and in the end, if it's not something I'm extremely passionate about, do I want to spend four hours of vacation doing something I don't quite want to do?

There are issues I care about: immigration, access to health care. Women's reproductive rights is a big one '-- because I could never imagine taking away anyone else's choice.

You're not prepared for all the candidates. You're sent things in the mail, but as a 28-year-old, I read everything online. I love that literally everyone is promoting actually registering to vote, but it's never how to vote or the steps to voting or what you do next after you've registered to vote. After that, it kind of just drops off and you're left in the dark, like, I don't know what to do next, you know?

My parents are of the generation where they actually watch the news, and they know about candidates via the news. Where my generation, the millennial generation, is getting all their news from social media like Twitter or Instagram or Facebook, and that is not always the best. Reading things through social media is snippets, and it's not the whole details on everything, you know?

It's a wild theory, but setting voting up so that it's all on social media, putting all that information in just an Instagram Story, in a Snapchat filter or whatever '-- bulleted-out, easy-to-read, digestible content '-- would encourage me to vote. Just maybe it's a social-media page or an Instagram page where it gives daily facts about how to do things or DIYs on how to vote for yourself, something like that. Just to make it easily digestible to a younger audience that's on social media, 'cause that's how they digest their information.

*A version of this article appears in the October 29, 2018, issue of New York Magazine. Subscribe Now!

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 04:06

Image Louis C.K. performing at Madison Square Garden in 2015. His performance at the Comedy Cellar in Greenwich Village on Monday night drew a protest outside. Credit Credit The New York Times It was surely an uncommon sight late on a Monday night outside the Comedy Cellar, one of New York's most popular venues for stand up comedy: protesters.

There was Jennifer Boudinot, 37, holding a cardboard sign that read, ''When you support Louis C.K., you tell women your laughter is more important than their sexual assaults and loss of their careers.'' Another woman, Lana McCrea, 27, showed up soon after with her own sign: ''Does this sign make you uncomfortable, Louie?''

They were both here because of another sign. Outside the Comedy Cellar, listed to perform two sets on Monday, was Louis C.K., the onetime king of stand-up who admitted to sexual misconduct with multiple women almost exactly one year ago.

''Frankly, I was furious,'' Ms. Boudinot said in an interview. ''Every female comedian he has harmed deserves a place on the Comedy Cellar stage one hundred times before he should be allowed back on the stage,'' she added.

Louis C.K. had been making surprise appearances at the venue sporadically since the end of August after having disappeared from the public eye, setting off a debate about whether his comeback attempt was tone deaf. Many club owners in New York, with an eye on ticket sales, said they would welcome him back. Noam Dworman, the owner of the Comedy Cellar, in Greenwich Village, has been supportive of Louis C.K.'s return, saying it was not his role to block a performer that many might find objectionable. Louis C.K.'s appearances at the Comedy Cellar have been increasing in frequency; he performed on Sunday night as well.

The appearances on Monday marked a new step in Louis C.K.'s comeback: It was the first time the Comedy Cellar advertised that he would be onstage, creating a buzz outside the club, as several pedestrians who saw the sign exclaimed loudly their desire to see him. Some immediately tried to get standby seats, since the show was sold out. Patrons entering the venue were visibly uncomfortable as Ms. Boudinot and Ms. McCrea pleaded with them to walk out during his set.

Louis C.K. performed at the 9:30 show and again at the 11:30 show, which continued into early Tuesday morning. He was one of the last comedians to perform at the late show. The crowd greeted him warmly, and the vast majority stayed to watch, while a handful filtered out. As in his previous appearances, the references to his scandal were brief.

''So what kind of year have you guys had?'' Louis C.K. said, starting off his set. ''They tell you that when you get in trouble you find out who your real friends are. It's black people, it turns out. They'll stick by you.''

He went on to say that he didn't read much about himself on the internet and that he was there to jest.

''I need to make jokes because I need an income,'' Louis C.K. said. He told the crowd that he lost $35 million ''in an hour'' as a result of the original report on his misconduct.

''Hard things, you survive them or you don't,'' Louis C.K. said. ''I think even hell you can survive. Hell is not that bad. I've been there.''

Image Jennifer Boudinot, left, and Lana McCrea protesting outside the Comedy Cellar on Monday. Credit Sopan Deb/The New York Times The rest of his set veered from raunchy to observational. There were no hecklers. He often consulted his notes, and mentioned that he had worked on the material ''all year.'' He asked the audience if anyone ever wondered how many sexual partners their mothers had and he discussed how much he enjoyed ice cream.

Last November, five women '-- also fellow comedians '-- told The New York Times about instances of inappropriate behavior, including times he masturbated in front of them. Louis C.K. admitted in a statement at the time that ''these stories are true.'' His career was sent into a spiral as television production deals were canceled, and the release of his film, ''I Love You, Daddy,'' featuring story lines with behavior similar to his real-life misconduct, was halted.

Before the show, a spirited discussion broke out in the standby line about the comeback. Srilaxmi Gujjula, a 25-year-old who had just begun her residency at the Brooklyn Hospital Center, said she hadn't heard of Louis C.K.'s misconduct until Monday. Her friend, Luxshni Kirupakaran, also 25, said the behavior bothered her, but not enough to keep her from seeing the show, since Louis C.K. was just one name on a lineup of several comedians.

Felix Hausler, a 27-year-old visiting New York from Austria, asked a group standing in front of him, which included Ms. Gujjula and Ms. Kirupakaran, ''From Aziz Ansari to Harvey Weinstein, where is Louis C.K.?''

''Well, Louis C.K. admits to doing wrong, right? So pretty much in the same place as Harvey Weinstein,'' Ms. Kirupakaran said.

Stephanie Georgiou, a 25-year-old who had flown from London for a business trip, said Louis C.K. was a ''three,'' once Mr. Hausler explained his one-to-10 scale, which put Mr. Weinstein at 10.

Asked about his decision to advertise Louis C.K.'s appearance, Mr. Dworman, the club owner, said: ''We've taken a lot of criticism for surprising people with his unannounced performances. I'm afraid now we will be criticized for the opposite.''

The #MeToo movement permeated other sets at the show, creating awkward juxtapositions. Adrienne Iapalucci, who performed right before Louis C.K., joked about Morgan Freeman's sexual harassment accusations, saying that she'd still watch ''Shawshank Redemption,'' because Mr. Freeman's character is already in prison. Another comic, Sam Morril, joked that he could no longer watch pornography in the same way because he was concerned about gender power dynamics in scenes involving the workplace.

After the show ended at 2 a.m., the audience spilled out onto the sidewalk, with many offering positive reviews of Louis C.K.'s performance.

Maria Bocanegra, 36, who was on vacation from Chicago, had made reservations for the show before Louis C.K. was added to the bill, but she said she wasn't bothered by him performing.

''Some of the stuff seemed like it was a little raunchy,'' Ms. Bocanegra said. ''But I'm like, 'Well, that's Louis C.K.' But at the same time, I was like, 'Is he doing this because he's trying to make a statement that 'I don't care?' ''

But she did say that she was mindful of Ms. Boudinot '-- who said she was a survivor of sexual assault '-- and Ms. McCrea, the protesters who had implored people to walk out.

''I respect those women for doing that,'' Ms. Bocanegra said. ''We respect that, totally. But was I ready to, like, leave a show for that? I don't think so.''

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Archived Version

Wed, 31 Oct 2018 04:02

An Inconvenient Truth: Democratic Sen. Robert Byrd As the South abandoned its prejudices, it shifted to the GOP. T he unsinkable Representative Charles B. Rangel appeared on C-SPAN over the weekend. Why unsinkable? Well, in 2010 the House of Representatives censured the New York Democrat by a vote of 333 to 79 (when the body was still majority-Democratic) for violating 11 ethics rules and ''bringing discredit to the House.'' The New York Times called it a ''staggering fall'' for the senior Democrat. But fall/shmall, he's since been reelected and will retire at his leisure.

While chatting with Brian Lamb, Rangel dropped a few falsehoods as casually as cigar ash. This isn't to pick on Rangel; he's just illustrative. His assertion '-- that the Republican and Democratic parties ''changed sides'' in the 1960s on civil rights, with white racists leaving the Democratic party to join the Republicans '-- has become conventional wisdom. It's utterly false and should be rebutted at every opportunity.

It's true that a Democratic president, Lyndon Johnson, shepherded the 1964 Civil Rights Act to passage. But who voted for it? Eighty percent of Republicans in the House voted aye, as against 61 percent of Democrats. In the Senate, 82 percent of Republicans favored the law, but only 69 percent of Democrats. Among the Democrats voting nay were Albert Gore Sr., Robert Byrd, and J. William Fulbright.

The Republican presidential candidate in 1964 also opposed the Civil Rights Act. Barry Goldwater had been an enthusiastic backer of the 1957 and 1960 civil rights acts (both overwhelmingly opposed by Democrats). He was a founding member of the Arizona chapter of the NAACP. He hired many blacks in his family business and pushed to desegregate the Arizona National Guard. He had a good-faith objection to some features of the 1964 act, which he regarded as unconstitutional.

Goldwater was no racist. The same cannot be said of Fulbright, on whom Bill Clinton bestowed the Medal of Freedom. Fulbright was one of the 19 senators who signed the ''Southern manifesto'' defending segregation.

Okay, but didn't all the old segregationist senators leave the Democratic party and become Republicans after 1964? No, just one did: Strom Thurmond . The rest remained in the Democratic party '-- including former Klansman Robert Byrd, who became president pro tempore of the Senate.

Former racists of both parties renounced their old views (as Kevin D. Williamson points out , Lyndon Johnson himself voted against anti-lynching laws and poll-tax repeals), and neither party has a perfect record on racial matters by any stretch. But it is a libel to suggest that the Republican party, the anti-slavery party, the party of Lincoln, and the party that traditionally supported civil rights, anti-lynching laws, and integration, became the racist party after 1964.

The ''solid south'' Democratic voting pattern began to break down not in the 1960s in response to civil rights but in the 1950s in response to economic development and the Cold War. (Black voters in the north, who had been reliable Republicans, began to abandon the GOP in response to the New Deal, encouraged by activists like Robert Vann to ''turn Lincoln's picture to the wall. That debt has been paid in full.'') In the 1940s, the GOP garnered only about 25 percent of southern votes. The big break came with Eisenhower's victories. Significant percentages of white southerners voted for Ike even though the Democratic party remained firmly segregationist and even though Eisenhower backed two civil-rights bills and enforced the Brown decision by federalizing the National Guard. They also began to send GOP representatives to the House.

These Republican gains came not from the most rural and ''deep south'' regions, but rather from the newer cities and suburbs. If the new southern Republican voters were white racists, one would have expected Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia to be the first to turn. Instead, as Gerard Alexander notes in ''The Myth of the Racist Republicans,'' the turn toward the GOP began in Virginia, North Carolina, Texas, Tennessee, and Florida. Eisenhower did best in the peripheral states. Alexander concludes: ''The GOP's southern electorate was not rural, nativist , less educated, afraid of change, or concentrated in the . . . Deep South. It was disproportionately suburban, middle-class, educated, young, non-native southern, and concentrated in the growth points that were the least 'Southern' parts of the south.''

Rangel is peddling a libel and Republicans should say so, loudly and often.

'-- Mona Charen is a nationally syndicated columnist and a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. (C) 2014 Creators Syndicate, Inc.

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 04:02

Gangster James ''Whitey'' Bulger was beaten to death by at least two inmates shortly after his transfer to a West Virginia federal prison, The New York Times reports. One Federal Bureau of Prisons employee told the newspaper that the inmates involved in the killing at U.S. Penitentiary, Hazelton, are thought to be ''affiliated with the mob.'' A senior law-enforcement official said he was told ''an organized crime figure was believed to be responsible'' for Bulger's killing, according to the Times. A prison worker also disclosed to the newspaper that Bulger was transferred to the Hazelton prison because he ''threatened a staff member'' at his previous prison in Sumterville, Florida. Bulger, a South Boston mobster, was serving a life sentence for 11 murders. The Boston Globe later reported that 51-year-old inmate Fotios ''Freddy'' Geas is suspected of taking part in Bulger's killing. The newspaper reported that Geas hated ''rats'' and men who abused women, and was known for his ''violent impulsivity'' as a former ''Mafia hitman.'' ''Whitey was a rat who killed women. It's probably that simple,'' private investigator Ted McDonough told the Globe.

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 03:10

Image copyright Utrecht university Image caption At the highest honours level at Utrecht barely any courses are taught in Dutch Students shake off their jackets and scarves as the lecturer opens up a power point presentation on "start-up innovations" and prepares to give his talk, which is entirely in English.

The language is the university's choice, Frank van Rijnsoever of Utrecht University tells me.

So extensive is the spread of English in Dutch universities, a group of lecturers has predicted a looming "linguicide" and demanded the government in The Hague impose a moratorium banning universities from creating any additional English language courses until an official impact analysis has been conducted.

Sixty per cent of masters programmes offered at Utrecht University are in English. At the highest honours level, virtually no courses are taught in Dutch.

Image copyright Utrecht university/Maarten Nauw Image caption The biggest challenge is for Dutch students at Utrecht to do all their studies in English "I don't mind. Most of the literature is in English," says Mr Van Rijnsoever.

"So for me as a teacher it's not that much of a problem because we also do research in English. For the students, you see they have to cross a certain barrier to properly express themselves."

The Netherlands has one of the world's highest levels of English proficiency among non-native speaking countries, second only to Sweden according to the latest EF English Proficiency Index.

"It's something I picked up over the years, mainly my PhD in academic English." the lecturer explains.

We already have good English at high school, we watch English TV with subtitles. My English is not perfect but it's sufficient to bring across the message at a certain level."

Frank van Rijnsoever, Utrecht University

For Oskar van Megen, who graduated with a degree in sustainable development, taking an internationally orientated Master's in English made sense as the subject was broader than in the Netherlands.

"It did give me a bit of a disadvantage. It took me way, way more time to understand and focus on the lecturers, and to understand the articles and write my own articles."

Image caption Oskar van Megen is pleased his masters degree was in English but finding work in the Netherlands has proved difficult However, while he feels qualified for an international career he has since struggled to find work in the Netherlands.

'Use it or lose it'Utrecht is not alone.

Some Dutch universities have completely erased Dutch language from the campus. In Eindhoven, even the sandwiches in the canteens are sold as cheese rather than with the Dutch word "kaas".

And not everyone is happy with such a creeping Anglicisation at university.

"It's our identity, Dutch," complains Annette de Groot, professor of linguistics at the University of Amsterdam.

"What happens to the identity of a people of a country where the native language is no longer the main language of higher education?

"The Dutch aren't as good at English as they think they are. You shouldn't use a weaker language in education."

Image caption Prof Annette de Groot fears a detrimental effect on the Dutch language "If you use English in higher education Dutch will eventually get worse. It's use it or lose it. Dutch will deteriorate and the vitality of the language will disappear. It's called imbalanced bilingualism. You add a bit of English and you lose a bit of Dutch."

While English can ease students into the global market, others feel its prevalence is excluding them from their homeland.

And a political debate here is intensifying, as more UK citizens emigrate to the Netherlands with companies wishing to remain in the EU post-Brexit,

It is time, says Prof De Groot, for an honest debate.

"We're shifting to a more and more Anglo-Saxon view of the world. Universities want diversity, different perspectives. What you get is exactly the opposite. The Anglicisation means you end up with a much more homogeneous world."

The irony for her is that Dutch universities are merely competing for students in a bid to survive.

Image caption Utrecht's campus offers more than 80 Master's programmes in English as well as honours programmes Utrecht University Rector Henk Kummeling argues that moving towards English has been an organic process but accepts that when competing internationally, it makes sense to use a world language.

"It's not that we are advertising for international students," he tells me from his office overlooking a bicycle-strewn campus.

"Dutch culture will stay for centuries. When we talk as Dutchmen amongst ourselves we speak Dutch."

Oskar agrees, saying he enjoyed forging friendships with students from the UK, Ireland and Italy.

"Personally I don't have any troubles with not speaking Dutch or with Dutch culture, which is maybe disappearing a bit."

But he says there has to be a limit, and suggests Groningen University in the north has taken in too many international students. "There are so many they have to set up tents just so the students can have a roof over their heads," he complains.

The danger for him is that universities are trying to increase their international profile while pushing for income from foreign students, while making compromises in other ways.

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 01:26

Aug. 21, 2015 / 2:57 PM GMT / Updated Aug. 21, 2015 / 6:32 PM GMT

By Emil Guillermo

Donald Trump's immigration plan, entitled ''Defend the Laws and Constitution of the United States,'' calls for an end to ''birthright citizenship.''

But legal and historical scholars say the GOP front-runner's challenge attempts to trump the Constitution itself, as well as an important chapter in Asian American history.

Related: What Donald Trump's Immigration Plan Means

Birthright citizenship has been considered ''settled law'' since March 28, 1898, said John Trasvina, the Dean of the University of San Francisco Law School in an interview with NBC News.

And it was all due to Wong Kim Ark, a Chinese American born in San Francisco in 1873.

In August of 1895, Wong was 22 and returning home to San Francisco after a visit to China, according to court records. But it was also an era when anti-Chinese sentiment was high, with the passage of the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1886, and its renewal in 1892.

When Wong was refused re-entry to America, it set up his legal battle that went all the way to the Supreme Court. In 1898, the High Court affirmed Wong's right that has continued to define citizenship birthright for 117 years.

Wong Kim Ark appears in an image attached to his 1894 departure statement fom San Francisco, an Immigration and Naturalization Service record that allows him to return to the United States. National Archives''The U.S. Supreme Court noted that the nation's founders adopted Anglo American law which itself dated back to 1608 to interpret the meaning of the 14th Amendment -- if you are born here, you are a United States citizen,'' said Trasvina.

He notes that the legal avenue to challenging and amending the Constitution would be "lengthy, divisive, and not likely to be successful."

''It would call into question the citizenship of millions of people born here, irrespective of the legal immigration status of the parents,'' said Trasvina. ''For that reason and because it is settled law and because courts tend not to narrow the scope of protection of the Constitution, it is unlikely that this would ever happen."

Related: Born in the USA: Film Explores Right to Citizenship at Birth

In a recent op-ed in the New York Daily News, Erika Lee - director of the Immigration History Research Center at the University of Minnesota - recalled Wong's role in establishing legal precedent on the issue, and outlined potential consequences of changing the law.

"Many immigration experts counter that ending birthright citizenship would create two tiers of unequal citizenship in the country and would be disastrous for the estimated 4.5 million people who have been born in the United States to undocumented immigrant parents," wrote Lee. "Such a change would further destroy families and disaffect another generation of immigrants and their U.S. citizen children."

Lee notes that despite his legal victory, that is precisely what happened to Wong, whose legal citizenship was never fully recognized by the U.S. government, and who was eventually forced to raise his family in China, where he died shortly after World War II.

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Wed, 31 Oct 2018 00:58

Dear Executive Board of the University of Amsterdam,

It is with disappointment that we greeted the news of Jordan B. Peterson's invitation to speak at Room for Discussion.

Jordan B. Peterson became well known for his opposition to the rights of trans and gender queer people to use preferred pronouns. Not much later, in an online dialogue with another professor, he claimed that men would never get control over 'crazy women', because this kind of disagreement, in contrast to that between men, can not be 'settled' in a physical way. His notoriety grew even further following the 2018 Toronto van attack by Alek Minassian, a self-declared 'Incel', which killed ten people (mostly women) when Peterson suggested that men be accorded access to women's bodies as a way of combatting male violence, like that of Minassian's, through what he calls enforced monogamy. This has resulted in Jordan B Peterson becoming a well-known and respected figure for those with anti-trans and misogynist views.

As employees and students of the UvA we do not feel that our rights to gender identity or full bodily integrity are topics for discussion. The UvA, as an employer and a place of higher education has a responsibility to uphold the equality of women, trans, and gender queer people. As women, trans, and gender queer people we should not have to work or study in an institution that believes in anything other than our full humanity. Therefore, we ask that the UvA as an institution unequivocally and publicly confirms our rights to work and study in an environment that accords us our full humanity. We need to know that our employer and our university does not believe that the rights of women, trans, and gender queer people to gender identity and full bodily integrity are up for discussion.

The UvA is committed to non-discrimination, equality and inclusivity in employment and in education, therefore, it is of paramount importance that the institution is seen to take a stand against those who would seek to question the humanity of others. Furthermore the UvA as a place of employment and education has a responsibility to ensure the safety of all its staff and students. It is therefore that we would like to urge you to take a stand against attempts to dehumanise members of its community by publishing a written statement that confirms our university's commitment to non-discrimination and equality, and explicitly denounces challenges to them.

Yours sincerely,

Ellis Aizenberg

Miriyam Aouragh

Sarah Bracke Grieder

Martijn Dekker

Erella Grassiani

Lucy Hall

Franca van Hooren

Vivienne Matthies-Boon

Polly Pallister-Wilkins

Abbey Steele

Hannah Werner

All of the writers are employees of the University of Amsterdam and work at the Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences.

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Tue, 30 Oct 2018 20:59

Fighting Bots Your WayAnother big benefit that you'll get from reCAPTCHA v3 is the flexibility to prevent spam and abuse in the way that best fits your website. Previously, the reCAPTCHA system mostly decided when and what CAPTCHAs to serve to users, leaving you with limited influence over your website's user experience. Now, reCAPTCHA v3 will provide you with a score that tells you how suspicious an interaction is. There are three potential ways you can use the score. First, you can set a threshold that determines when a user is let through or when further verification needs to be done, for example, using two-factor authentication and phone verification. Second, you can combine the score with your own signals that reCAPTCHA can't access'--such as user profiles or transaction histories. Third, you can use the reCAPTCHA score as one of the signals to train your machine learning model to fight abuse. By providing you with these new ways to customize the actions that occur for different types of traffic, this new version lets you protect your site against bots and improve your user experience based on your website's specific needs.

In short, reCAPTCHA v3 helps to protect your sites without user friction and gives you more power to decide what to do in risky situations. As always, we are working every day to stay ahead of attackers and keep the Internet easy and safe to use (except for bots).

Ready to get started with reCAPTCHA v3? Visit our

developer site for more details.

Posted by Wei Liu, Google Product Manager

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Tue, 30 Oct 2018 20:58

5 Shares

5 Like us on Facebook The Texas Capitol building in Austin, Texas, was reportedly evacuated due to a suspicious package.

According to Representative Matt Schaefer, his offices were evacuated in addition to several others. Schaefer says he has evacuated all of his staff from the building. Authorities have since given an all-clear. The package was investigated but ''no viable threat was discovered.''

The Austin Police Department was the first to respond to the incident, but they have reportedly handed over the case to another agency.

Source: Texas Capitol evacuated due to suspicious package, representative says | kens5.com

Advertisements Popular posts BREAKING: Multiple Children Killed at School Bus Stop Crash in IndianaKentucky Man Says His Family Was Threatened After Dressing his son as Hitler for Halloween EventBREAKING NEWS AND DEVELOPING STORIES '' OCTOBER 29, 2018Breaking News and Developing Stories '' October 30, 2018BREAKING: Texas Capitol EvacuatedPro Soccer Player Found Dead, MutilatedBREAKING: UFC Legend ArrestedBREAKING: Police Responding to New York Times HeadquartersFormer Nurse Admits Murdering 100 PatientsJourney Cassette Tape Causes EvacuationFollow me Advertisements Advertisements 5 Shares

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Archived Version

Tue, 30 Oct 2018 20:29

Electronic voting machines- A look back at the 1968 U.S. Presidential Election

The 1968 presidential election had major voter irregularities in Pennsylvania.Votes for Richard ''Dick'' Gregory, an American civil rights activist and former comedian, were at the center of the computer voter irregularity.

During the 1968 election night computers used by the News Election Service (NES) reported that Dick Gregory, the fourth party candidate, was polling 9 million votes in Pennsylvania.

Below are historical newspaper articles discussing the situation.

____ Video: Dick Gregory presidential candidacy interview, 1968

___

Political Ad for Dick GregoryClick image below to enlarge for better viewing. Click your return arrow to return to this Dilemma X topic.

____ Video: Nixon wins 1968 Presidential Election

___

About Dilemma XDilemma X, LLC provides research dedicated to the progression of economic development. Our services aid clients in enhancing overall production statistics.Please visit http://www.dilemma-x.com for more information

View all posts by Dilemma X '†'

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Tue, 30 Oct 2018 19:37

According to various reports, Megyn Kelly has not only ''parted ways'' with NBC after losing her coveted 9 a.m. hour on NBC's Today Show, she lost her representation at the powerful CAA talent agency.Worse, when she tried to move to UTA, her ''blackface'' comments closed that door.

Because she is now toxic, on Wednesday, Kelly could only hire an attorney to represent her, a move that points to her fighting for every penny left on her three-year, $69 million contract '-- an agreement that was not set to expire with NBC until 2020.

After 12 years as a superstar at Fox News and a disastrous, calamitous, dumpster fire two (give or take) years at NBC, Kelly is about to go kicking and screaming as she exits stage left, but exit stage left she will because she has no place left to go'... Which I think was always NBC's plan'...

Luring Megyn Kelly to NBC was never about anything other than destroying Megyn Kelly.

What NBC News did to Kelly has happened before. With the lure of a dream job attached to a hook that fulfills a rival's hubris, the rival is humiliated and forever destroyed. It's an old trick and Kelly and her ego fell for it.

In 1979, the New Yorker's Pauline Kael was the most influential film critic in America. With this power, she made Warren Beatty her pet cause throughout the 1970s '-- and then she turned on him, attacking Beatty and his 1978 hit Heaven Can Wait (which he co-wrote and directed) as a sellout, a trifle, a betrayal.

Many believe Beatty got his revenge by offering Kael her dream job, the opportunity to work with him on his next film. As quickly as that came together, though, it flamed out. Within a year Kael had very publicly failed in Hollywood and was forced to crawl back to the New Yorker. Only now, she looked foolish and weak, and would never again wield the same power.

Throughout the late '80s and early '90s, Michael Ovitz was not only the most powerful agent in Hollywood, he was the town's undisputed King '-- a powerbroker's powerbroker and the scourge of the studios as he shifted industry power to his clients '-- to actors and directors. Then Disney chairman Michael Eisner offered Ovitz his dream job, the opportunity to run a studio. Promised he was being groomed to eventually replace Eisner, Ovitz bit.

Sixteen months later Eisner fired him, and that was the end of Michael Ovitz.

Over at Fox News, Megyn Kelly was not only a ratings powerhouse and superstar, her smarts, preparation, and fearlessness made her an icon '-- especially to women, who saw in her someone they could relate to. Suddenly, the image of a powerful woman did not need to include the left's noxious politics and man-hating.

Like most larger-than-life figures, though, Kelly has a fatal flaw, and like Kael and Ovitz, it is hubris. Being one of the most popular and powerful anchors in the ''ghetto'' of cable news was no longer enough. She wanted it all. She wanted to be accepted and loved by the establishment media. So, through Machiavellian means, starting with the public betrayal of her Fox fans, she let the establishment media know she was ready to become one of them.

Her plan was to single-handedly take down Donald Trump. This was her way of sending a message, her way of letting potential suitors know she was ready to sell out, to join the Borg collective, and to enjoy all the rewards that come to sellouts (see: SE Cupp, Joe Scarborough, Matthew Dowd, Nicolle Wallace, etc'...).

As she betrayed her Fox fans with her shrill and narcissistic attacks on Trump, Kelly readied the second part of her plan, a memoir titled Settle for More. The promotional tour was perfectly timed '-- it would begin just days after Trump lost the presidential election.

The book tour was supposed to be Kelly's triumph, her victory parade where all the Beautiful People would not only credit her for defeating the villainous Trump, but exalt her as noble and brave for doing so by stabbing her own fans in the back. But then'...

Trump won the presidency, and instead of looking like a champion, Kelly looked exposed '-- ridiculous, caught off guard, and foolish.

By this time, NBC News had already lured her into their trap.

By design, by deliberately setting her up for failure, Kelly was doomed from day one at NBC '-- and it didn't even cost a lot of money. For a mere $69 million, a pittance to NBC, the establishment media was able to take out a business and cultural rival in a little over a year.

To begin with, NBC intentionally ignored Kelly's strengths, which shine in a live and combative format. First they handed her a 60 Minutes-type program, something she had never done before, and then they slotted Sunday Night with Megyn Kelly directly up against 60 Minutes, which has been a ratings juggernaut for 40 years. Then NBC allowed Kelly to air an interview with Russian President Vladimir Putin that made no news. Then they allowed Kelly to interview Alex Jones. Then they allowed her to crash and burn in this format, a format she had no business being a part of, and take 100% of the blame for that failure.

NBC then led Kelly even deeper into alien territory '-- a gooey morning show geared towards puffery and celebrity interviews.

As designed, Megyn Kelly Today was a disaster from day one. Kelly again looked ridiculous, out of her element and depth. Her mishaps were legion, and they were never forgiven because the establishment would never forgive her for her time at Fox News. Rather than circle the wagons, as they always do to protect one of their own, they just pointed and laughed and piled on.

Kelly was flailing, drowning, and no one was coming to her rescue. Then she went under'...

During the Tuesday edition of Megyn Kelly Today, Kelly and her guests were discussing a white woman on The Real Housewives of New York who dressed up like Diana Ross and went so far as to darken her skin with makeup.

''But what is racist?'' Kelly asked. ''Because truly, you do get in trouble if you are a white person who puts on blackface on Halloween, or a black person who puts on whiteface for Halloween. Like, back when I was a kid, that was okay, as long as you were dressing up as, like, a character.''

With these comments on Monday, Kelly handed NBC the murder weapon they had been waiting for. The entire network turned on her (even the weatherman), and now she is all alone.

Megyn Kelly made two massive mistakes. The first, and this is to her credit, is that unlike her fellow sellouts '-- the repulsive Scarborough and Cupp, etc. '-- she refused to completely sell out; she did not offer the establishment her complete soul '-- only 99 percent of it, when they demand it all.

By the time she did offer up that remaining one percent '-- with Wednesday's Orwellian grovel of an apology for her Halloween WrongThink '-- it was too late.

The second mistake Kelly made, and this is probably why she is about to become a footnote, is that in her quest for establishment media acceptance, she betrayed her base of support, and now she has no one to defend her, no audience to return to.

Kelly bet it all, and by doing so sold out her own fans, which left her with no one to come to her defense as NBC outmaneuvered, outsmarted, and circled for the kill '-- which had been NBC's plan from the beginning.

And the irony is almost too perfect'...

To attract NBC News, Kelly mercilessly wielded virtue signaling against Trump as she shamelessly peacocked her own image by smearing him as a sexist, a pig, a hater of women.

And now she will limp out of NBC News a victim of bullying virtue signalers smearing her as racist.

You might say Trump broke her.

Either way, Megyn Kelly is about to limp into a world she created '-- a world where both right and left have found a reason to unite as they delight in her comeuppance.

Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC. Follow his Facebook Page here.

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Tue, 30 Oct 2018 18:52

We know very little yet about Robert Gregory Bowers the 46-year-old white male who murdered 11 innocent Jewish worshippers and injured four brave police officers at Congregation Tree of Life in Pittsburgh's Squirrel Hill Jewish neighborhood this past Shabbat.

We don't know if he has a wife or children. We don't know if he has parents or siblings. We don't know if he has any friends. All we know about him so far is that he hated Jews, and that his unfathomable murder spree was triggered by the activities of an organization called HIAS. Originally the Hebrew Immigration Aid Society, HIAS has more recently transmogrified into a Jewish-funded organization that seeks to help non-Jewish immigrants, including illegal aliens, as they enter the United States.

There can be no excuse or justification for Bowers' mass murder spree. And barring any certifiable insanity, even the most ardent opponent of the death penalty '' and surely they are legion among the donors to HIAS '' would make an exception in his case, and gladly see him ascend the gibbet.

Bowers, it seems, operated solo. He was a loner. He had no organizational ties. No colleagues. No accomplices. This is typical for America's short but notorious list of mass murderers. They are motivated by hate, a hate aggravated by a loneliness that enables it to fester until something triggers them, and they attack.

Catching someone like Bowers before he acts is nearly impossible. And surely there are others like him whose trigger fingers are waiting to be unleashed by something, anything, that can turn their blind hatred into violent action.

We cannot identify men, or women, like Bowers before they act. Yet it may behoove us to consider what those things are that unleash their murderous anti-Semitic impulses; what sort of bait impels them to load their assault weapons on a Saturday morning and spray bullets into a crowd of innocent Jews.

HIAS is an organization that should no longer be in existence. It was founded in 1881 with the express purpose of assisting Jewish refugees arriving in the United States. For over a century it fulfilled its mandate admirably, helping successive waves of Jewish immigrants arriving via Ellis Island and other US ports who were escaping from pogroms, poverty, and Hitler. After the Shoah it assisted survivors of the death camps. Finally, it played a significant role in aiding the wave of Jewish refugees fleeing a dying Soviet Union.

And then one day it no longer had any raison d'etre. There were no longer any sources of refugee Jews in need of immigrant aid. HIAS had outlived its purpose. The millions it raised each year from caring Jewish donors should, by right, have been re-directed to other causes such as Jewish education, Jewish poverty in America, and the Jewish aged.

The dignified thing would have been for HIAS to disband, liquidate its assets, make sure its apparatchiks were not cast adrift without a lifeline, and call it a century.

Alas this is not what happened. Unlike liberal synagogues that are being forced with increasing frequency to turn off the Ner Tamid as they face the reality of empty pews, emptier coffers, and zero options for repurposing, the self-important directors and senior staff of a national organization like HIAS will do anything, anything, to stay in business.

The HIAS 'machers' didn't have to look far afield to emerge from rigor mortis. They understood very well the current liberal Jewish zeitgeist of tikkun olam. They saw how Israel, Jewish education and synagogue affiliation are no longer of much, if any interest, to today's increasingly JINO generation of Jews. Indeed, all they had to do was silence the H in HIAS and, voila, battalions of otherwise marginally affiliated and mostly (Jewishly) inactive Jews would open their wallets wide. Especially if this meant helping Muslims. Especially if it meant aiding illegal aliens amassing on the US-Mexico border.

Finally there was something meaningful for the JINO set to support besides the ADL and the Democrat Party. Finally there was an organization that would provide zero support for Jewish continuity, while offering that wonderful nachas of knowing one is helping all those people who are the darlings of an intersectional cohort of victimologizers who, parenthetically, also happen to hate and vilify Israel.

Could there possibly be a more relevant way to be Jewish without a hint of Israel, without a touch of Torah, without a second thought about miscegenation? Indeed, not a whiff of anything so anachronistic that it could not be gleefully endorsed by Linda Sarsour, Keith Ellison and Bernie Sanders?

Rather, one would now be helping young military-age male Muslim immigrants from Syria, Libya and Afghanistan. One would be enabling thousands who could afford the $6,000 per head to be smuggled into the States to adjust to life in America without having bothered to fill out an immigration form. (H)IAS would be waiting for them with open opens arms and plenty of cash from the Tikkun Olam wing of the Democrat Party.

In this, they were even able to co-opt the participation of those dying Jewish congregations which would now have an annual ''Immigration Shabbat''. This would miraculously create a second once-yearly reason to come to shul, an opportunity for members to prove their Tikkun Olam bona fides by stuffing the HIAS pushka in order to welcome the very people most Americans are wary of welcoming, and for good reason.

Which brings us back to Robert Gregory Bowers, and other like him lurking in the shadows of their solitary hatred waiting for an excuse to murder Jews. For there can be no doubt that had HIAS done the honorable thing and disbanded twenty years ago there would be 11 fewer dead people in Pittsburgh. This is not speculation. The killer made his motivation very clear.

American Jews must ask themselves whether their Tikkun Olam actions, however meritorious they may be, are worth the price of a single dead Jew or a single injured cop. Is pandering to the most extreme left cause-du-jour worth the price of admission? Should Jewish organizations even '' especially '' if Jewish In Name Only, be the most visible standards bearers of causes that trouble most tax-paying, law abiding Americans, and bring out the violent worst in the lunatics lurking at their outermost fringes? If liberal Jews are insisting on going into that good night, couldn't they go gentle instead of taking the rest of us down with them?

J.J Gross is a veteran creative director and copywriter, who made aliyah in 2007 from New York. He is a graduate of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and a lifelong student of Bible and Talmud. He is also the son of Holocaust survivors from Hungary and Slovakia.

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Tue, 30 Oct 2018 17:22

By Rep. Louis Gohmert

Robert Mueller has a long and sordid history of illicitly targeting innocent people. His many actions are a stain upon the legacy of American jurisprudence. He lacks the judgment and credibility to lead the prosecution of anyone.I do not make these statements lightly. Each time I prepared to question Mueller during Congressional hearings, the more concerned I became about his ethics and behavior. As I went back to begin compiling all of that information in order to recount personal interactions with Mueller, the more clearly the big picture began to come into focus.

At one point I had to make the decision to stop adding to this compilation or it would turn into a far too lengthy project. My goal was to share some firsthand experiences with Mueller -- as other Republican Members of Congress had requested -- adding, “You seem to know so much about him.”

This article is prepared from my viewpoint to help better inform the reader about the Special Prosecutor leading the effort to railroad President Donald J. Trump through whatever manufactured charge he can allege.

Judging by Mueller's history, it doesn't matter who he has to threaten, harass, prosecute or bankrupt to get to allege something or, for that matter, anything. It certainly appears Mueller will do whatever it takes to bring down his target -- ethically or unethically -- based on my findings.

What does former Attorney General Eric Holder say? Sounds like much the same thing I just said. Holder has stated, "I've known Bob Mueller for 20, 30 years; my guess is he’s just trying to make the case as good as he possibly can."

Holder does know him. He has seen Mueller at work when Holder was obstructing justice and was therefore held in Contempt of Congress. He knows Mueller’s FBI framed innocent people and had no remorse in doing so.

Let’s look at what we know. What I have accumulated here is absolutely shocking upon the realization that Mueller's disreputable, twisted history speaks to the character of the man placed in a position to attempt to legalize a coup against a lawfully-elected President. Any Republican who says anything resembling, “Bob Mueller will do a good job as Special Counsel,” “Bob Mueller has a great reputation for being fair,” or anything similar; either (a) wants President Trump indicted for something and removed from office regardless of his innocence; (b) is intentionally ignorant of the myriad of outrageous problems permeating Mueller’s professional history; or (c) is cultivating future Democrat votes when he or she comes before the Senate someday for a confirmation hearing.

There is simply too much clear and convincing evicdence to the contrary. Where other writers have set out information succinctly, I have quoted them, with proper attribution. My goal is to help you understand what I have found.

Robert Mueller - BackgroundIn his early years as FBI Director, most Republican members of Congress gave Mueller a pass in oversight hearings, allowing him to avoid tough questions. After all, we were continually told, “Bush appointed him.” I gave him easy questions the first time I questioned him in 2005 out of deference to his Vietnam service. Yet, the longer I was in Congress, the more conspicuous the problems became. As I have said before of another Vietnam veteran, just because someone deserves our respect for service or our sympathy for things that happened to them in the military, that does not give them the right to harm our country later. As glaring problems came to light, I toughened up my questions in the oversight hearings. But first, let's cover a little of Mueller's history.

Mueller: the Whitey Bulger Affair

The Boston Globe noted Robert Mueller’s connection with the Whitey Bulger case in an article entitled, “One Lingering Question for FBI Director Robert Mueller.” The Globe said this: “[Mike] Albano [former Parole Board Member who was threatened by two FBI agents for considering parole for the men imprisoned for a crime they did not commit] was appalled that, later that same year, Mueller was appointed FBI director, because it was Mueller, first as an assistant US attorney then as the acting U.S. attorney in Boston, who wrote letters to the parole and pardons board throughout the 1980s opposing clemency for the four men framed by FBI lies. Of course, Mueller was also in that position while Whitey Bulger was helping the FBI cart off his criminal competitors even as he buried bodies in shallow graves along the Neponset…”Mueller was the head of the Criminal Division as Assistant U.S. Attorney, then as Acting U.S. Attorney. I could not find any explanation online by Mueller as to why he insisted on keeping the defendants in prison that FBI agents—in the pocket of Whitey Bulger— had framed for a murder they did not commit. Make no mistake: these were not honorable people he had incarcerated. But it was part of a pattern that eventually became quite clear that Mueller was more concerned with convicting and putting people in jail he disliked, even if they were innocent of the charges, than he was with ferreting out the truth. I found no explanation as to why he did not bear any responsibility for the $100 million paid to the defendants who were framed by FBI agents under his control. The Boston Globe said, “Thanks to the FBI’s corruption, taxpayers got stuck with the $100 million bill for compensating the framed men, two of whom, Greco and Tameleo, died in prison.”

The New York Times explained the relationship this way: “In the 1980's, while [FBI Agent] Mr. Connolly was working with Whitey Bulger, Mr. Mueller was assistant United States attorney in Boston in charge of the criminal division and for a period was the acting United States attorney here, presiding over Mr. Connolly and Mr. Bulger as a ’top echelon informant.'

Officials of the Massachusetts State Police and the Boston Police Department had long wondered why their investigations of Mr. Bulger were always compromised before they could gather evidence against him, and they suspected that the FBI was protecting him.”

If Mr. Mueller had no knowledge that the FBI agents he used were engaged in criminal activity, then he certainly was so incredibly blind that he should never be allowed back into any type of criminal case supervision. He certainly helped continue contributing to the damages of the framed individuals by working relentlessly to prevent them from being paroled out of prison even as their charges were in the process of being completely thrown out.

Notice also the evidence of a pattern throughout Mueller's career: the leaking of information to disparage Mueller’s targets. In the Whitey Bulger case, the leaks were to organized crime --- the Mafia.

One of the basic, most bedrock tenets of our Republic is that we never imprison people for being “bad” people. Anyone imprisoned has to have committed a specific crime for which they are found guilty. Not in Mueller’s world. He has the anti-Santa Claus list; and, if you are on his list, you get punished even if you are framed.

He never apologizes when the truth is learned, no matter how wrong or potentially criminal or malicious the prosecution was. In his book, you deserve what you get even if you did not commit the crime for which he helped put you away. This is but one example, though -- as Al Pacino once famously said -- “I’m just getting warmed up!”

Rep. Curt Weldon Attacked and Crushed by Robert Mueller

During my first term in Congress, 2005 to 2006, Congressman Curt Weldon delivered some powerful and relentless allegations about the FBI having prior knowledge that 9/11 was coming. He repeatedly alleged that there was documentary evidence to show that 9/11 could have been prevented and thousands of lives saved if the FBI had done its job. He held up documents at times while making these claims in speeches on the floor of the House of Representatives.I was surprised that FBI Director Mueller seemed to largely ignore these allegations. It seemed to me that he should either admit the FBI made significant mistakes or refute the allegations. Little did I know Mueller’s FBI was preparing a response, but it certainly was not the kind of response that I would have expected if an honorable man had been running that once hallowed institution.

You can read two of Congressman Weldon’s speeches on the House floor that are linked below. After reading the excerpts I have provided, you may get a window into the mind of the FBI Director or someone under Mueller’s control at the FBI. The FBI literally destroyed Congressman Weldon's public service life, which then foreclosed his ability to use a national platform to expose what he believed were major problems in the FBI fostered under the Clinton administration. Here is but one such excerpt of a speech wherein he spoke of the failure of FBI leadership, then under the direction of the Clinton administration and as came within Mueller’s control just before 9/11. Shockingly, the Mueller FBI failed to even accept from the military any information on the very terrorists who would later go on to commit the atrocities of

9/11, much less act upon it.

The U.S. gleaned this information through development of a surveillance technology called Able Danger. On October 19, 2005, Rep. Curt Weldon delivered the following statement on the House floor.

Mr. Speaker, back in 1999 when I was Chair of the Defense Research Subcommittee, the Army was doing cutting-edge work on a new type of technology to allow us to understand and predict emerging transnational terrorist threats. That technology was being done at several locations but was being led by our Special Forces Command. The work that they were doing was unprecedented. And because of what I saw there, I supported the development of a national capability of a collaborative center that the CIA would just not accept.In fact, in November 4 of 1999, two years before 9-11, in a meeting in my office with the Deputy Secretary of Defense, Deputy Director of the CIA, Deputy Director of the FBI, we presented a nine-page proposal to create a national collaborative center. When we finished the brief, the CIA said we did not need that capability, and so before 9/11 we did not have it. When President Bush came in after a year of research, he announced the formation of the Terrorism Threat Integration Center, exactly what I had proposed in 1999. Today it is known as the NCTC, the National Counterterrorism Center. But, Mr. Speaker, what troubles me is not the fact that we did not take those steps. What troubles me is that I now have learned in the last four months that one of the tasks that was being done in 1999 and 2000 was a Top Secret program organized at the request of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, carried out by the General in charge of our Special Forces Command, a very elite unit focusing on information regarding al Qaeda. It was a military language effort to allow us to identify the key cells of al Qaeda around the world and to give the military the capability to plan actions against those cells, so they could not attack us as they did in 1993 at the Trade Center, at the Khobar Towers, the USS Cole attack, and the African embassy bombings. What I did not know, Mr. Speaker, up until June of this year, was that this secret program called Able Danger actually identified the Brooklyn cell of al Qaeda in January and February of 2000, over one year before 9/11 ever happened. In addition, I learned that not only did we identify the Brooklyn cell of al Qaeda, but we identified Mohamed Atta as one of the members of that Brooklyn cell along with three other terrorists who were the leadership of the 9-11 attack. I have also learned, Mr. Speaker, that in September of 2000, again, over one year before 9-11, that [the] Able Danger team attempted on three separate occasions to provide information to the FBI about the Brooklyn cell of al Qaeda, and on three separate occasions they were denied by lawyers in the previous administration to transfer that information.Mr. Speaker, this past Sunday on “Meet the Press,” Louis Freeh, FBI Director at the time, was interviewed by Tim Russert. The first question to Louis Freeh was in regard to the FBI's ability to ferret out the terrorists. Louis Freeh's response, which can be obtained by anyone in this country as a part of the official record, was, ‘Well, Tim, we are now finding out that a top-secret program of the military called Able Danger actually identified the Brooklyn cell of al Qaeda and Mohammed Atta over a year before 9/11.’ And what Louis Freeh said, Mr. Speaker, is that that kind of actionable data could have allowed us to prevent the hijackings that occurred on September 11.So now we know, Mr. Speaker, that military intelligence officers working in a program authorized by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the General in charge of Special Forces Command, identified Mohammed Atta and three terrorists a year before 9/11, tried to transfer that information to the FBI [and] were denied; and [that] the FBI Director has now said publicly if he would have had that information, the FBI could have used it to perhaps prevent the hijackings that struck the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and the plane that landed in Pennsylvania and perhaps saved 3,000 lives and changed the course of world history.Curt Weldon gave a series of speeches, recounting what he saw and what he knew, regarding the failures of the FBI and the Clinton administration to share information that could have prevented 9/11.

Congressman Weldon tried to hold those accountable in the FBI and CIA that he felt had mishandled actionable intelligence which he said could have thwarted the 9/11 attacks. He recounted many examples of similar intelligence failures.

In 2006, the Robert Mueller-led FBI took horrendously unjust actions to derail Curt Weldon’s reelection bid just weeks before the vote—actions that were later described as a “hit job”: “Each of Weldon’s 10 previous re-elections had been by sizable margins. Polls showed he was up by 5-7 points [in the fall of 2006]. Three weeks prior to the election, however, a national story ran about Weldon based upon anonymous sources that an investigation was underway against him and his daughter, alleging illegal activities involving his congressional work. Weldon had received no prior notification of any such investigation and was dumbfounded that such a story would run especially since he regularly briefed the FBI and intelligence agencies on his work.

A week after the news story broke, alleging a need to act quickly because of the leak, FBI agents from Washington raided the home of Weldon’s daughter at 7:00AM on a Monday morning… Local TV and print media had all been alerted to the raid in advance and were already in position to cover the story. Editor's note: Sound familiar?

Within hours, Democratic protesters were waving “Caught Red-Handed” signs outside Weldon’s district office in Upper Darby. In the ensuing two weeks, local and national media ran multiple stories implying that Weldon must also have been under investigation. Given the coverage, Weldon lost the election… To this day, incredibly, no one in authority has asked Weldon or his daughter about the raid or the investigation. There was no follow up, no questions, no grand jury interrogation, nothing.

One year after the raid the local FBI office called Weldon’s daughter to have her come get the property that had been removed from her home. That was it…The raid ruined the career of Weldon and his daughter.”

Though some blamed the Clintons and Sandy Berger for orchestrating the FBI “hit job,” we can’t lose sight of the fact that the head of the FBI at the time was Robert Mueller. Please understand what former FBI officials have told me: the FBI would never go after a member of Congress, House or Senate, without the full disclosure to and the blessing of the FBI Director. Even if the idea on how to silence Curt Weldon did not come from Director Mueller himself, it surely had his approval and encouragement.

The early morning raid by Mueller’s FBI -- with all the media outside -- who had obviously been alerted by the FBI, achieved its goal of abusing the U.S. Justice system to silence Curt Weldon by ending his political career. Mueller’s tactics worked. If the Clintons and Berger manipulated Weldon’s reelection to assure his defeat, they did it with the artful aid of Mueller, all while George W. Bush was President. Does any of this sound familiar?

People say those kinds of things just don’t happen in America. They certainly seemed to when Mueller was in charge of the FBI and they certainly seem to happen now during his tenure as Special Counsel. It appears clear that President Obama and his adjutants knew of Mueller’s reputation and that he could be used to take out their political opponents should such extra-legal actions become politically necessary.

To the great dismay of the many good, decent and patriotic FBI agents, Obama begged Mueller to stay on for two years past the 10 years the law allowed. Obama then asked Congress to approve Mueller’s waiver allowing him to stay on for two extra years. Perhaps the leaders in Congress did not realize what they were doing in approving it. I did. It was a major mistake, and I said so at the time. This is also why I objected strenuously the moment I heard Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein appointed his old friend Bob Mueller to be Special Counsel to go after President Trump.

Rod RosensteinI was one of the few who were NOT surprised when Mueller started selecting his assistants in the Special Counsel’s office. Many had reputations for being bullies, for indicting people who were not guilty of the charges, for forcing people toward bankruptcy by running up their legal fees (while the bullies in the Special Counsel’s office enjoy an apparently endless government budget), or by threatening innocent family members with prosecution so the Special Counsel’s victim would agree to pleading guilty to anything to prevent the Kafka-esque prosecutors from doing more harm to their families.

An Illegal Raid on Congress By Mueller

There is a doctrine in our governmental system that mandates each part of government must have oversight to prevent power from corrupting --- and absolute power from corrupting absolutely. The Congress and Senate are accountable to the voters as is the President. Our massive and bloated bureaucracy is supposed to be accountable to the Congress.A good example would be complaints against the Department of Justice or, specifically, the FBI.

If constituents or whistleblowers within those entities have complaints, a Congressman’s office is a good place to contact. Our conversations or information from constituents or whistleblowers are normally privileged from review by anyone within the Executive Branch. It must be so.

If the FBI could raid our offices anytime an FBI agent were to complain to us, no FBI agent could ever afford to come forward, no matter how egregious the conduct they sought to disclose.

Whistleblowers in the FBI must know they are protected. They always have known that in the past. As I learned from talking with attorneys who had helped the House previously with this issue, if the FBI or another law enforcement entity needed to search something on the House side of the Capitol or House office buildings, they contacted the House Counsel, whether with a warrant or request. The House Counsel with approval of the Speaker, would go through the Congress Members' documents, computers, flash drives, or anything that might have any bearing on what was being sought as part of the investigation.

They would honestly determine what was relevant and what was not, and what was both irrelevant and privileged from Executive Branch review. Normally, if there were a dispute or question, it could be presented to a federal judge for a private in-chamber review to determine if it were privileged or relevant. If the DOJ or FBI were to get a warrant and gather all of the computers and documents in a Congressman’s office without the recovered items being screened to insure they are not privileged from DOJ seizure, the DOJ would be risking that an entire case might be thrown out because of things improperly recovered and “fruit of the poisonous tree,” preventing the use of even things that were not privileged.

FBI Director Mueller, however,, seemed determined to throw over 200 years of Constitutional restraints to the wind so he could let Congress know he was the unstoppable government bully who could potentially waltz into our offices whenever he wished.

In the case of Congressman William Jefferson, Democrat of Louisiana, Mueller was willing to risk a reversal of a slam dunk criminal case just to send a message to the rest of Congress: you don’t mess with Mueller. That Congressman Jefferson was guilty of something did not surprise most observers when, amidst swirling allegations, $90,000 in cold hard cash was found in his freezer. As we understood it, the FBI had a witness who was wired and basically got Jefferson on tape taking money. They had mountains of indisputable evidence to prove their case. They had gotten an entirely appropriate warrant to search his home and had even more mountains of evidence to nail the lid on his coffin, figuratively speaking.

The FBI certainly did not need to conduct an unsupervised search of a Congressman’s office to put their unbeatable case at risk. Apparently, the risk was worth it to Mueller --- he could now show the members of Congress who was in charge. Apparently, the FBI knew just the right federal judge who would disregard the Constitution and allow Mueller’s minions to do their dirty work.

I read the Application for Warrant and the accompanying Affidavit for Warrant to raid Jefferson’s office, as I did so many times as a judge.

I simply could not believe they would risk such a high-profile case just to try to intimidate Members of Congress.

In the opinion of this former prosecutor, felony judge and Appellate Court Chief Justice, they could have gotten a conviction based on what they had already spelled out in the very lengthy affidavit. The official attorneys representing the House, knowing my background, allowed me to sit in on the extremely heated discussions between attorneys for the House, DOJ attorneys, and, to my recollection, an attorney from the Bush White House, after Jefferson’s office was raided.

The FBI had gathered up virtually every kind of record, computerized or otherwise, and carted them off. I was not aware of the times that the DOJ and House attorneys, with the Speaker’s permission, had cooperated over the years. No Congressman is above the law nor is any above having search warrants issued against them which is why Jefferson’s home was searched without protest.

However, when the material is in a Congressional office, there is a critical and centuries’ old balance of power that must be preserved.

The Mueller FBI, along with the DOJ, assured everyone that all was copacetic. They would ask some of the DOJ’s attorneys review all of the material and give back anything that was privileged and unlawful for the DOJ to see. Then they would make sure none of the DOJ attorneys who participated in the review of materials (that were privileged from the DOJ’s viewing) would be allowed to be prosecutors in Jefferson’s case.

If you find that kind of thinking terribly flawed and constitutionally appalling, you would be in agreement with the former Speakers of the House, the Vice President at the time, and ultimately, the final decisions of our federal appellate court system. They found the search to be illegal and inappropriate. Fortunately for the DOJ, they did not throw the entire case out. In retrospect, we did not know at the time what a farce a DOJ “firewall” would have been. Now we do!

Mueller's 5-Year Up-Our-Out

In federal law enforcement, it takes a new federal agent or supervisor about five years or so after arriving at a newly assigned office to gain the trust and respect of local law enforcement officers. That trust and respect is absolutely critical to doing the best job possible. Yet new FBI Director Robert Mueller came up with a new personnel policy that would rid the FBI of thousands of years of its most invaluable experience.In a nutshell, after an FBI employee was in any type of supervisory position for five years, he or she had to either come to Washington to sit at a desk or get out of the FBI.

In the myriad of FBI offices around the country, most agents love what they do in actively enforcing the law. They have families involved in the community; their kids enjoy their schools; and they do not want to move to the high cost of living in Washington, DC, and especially not to an inside desk job. What occurred around the country was that agents in charge of their local offices got out of the FBI and did something more lucrative. Though they really wanted to stay in, they were not allowed to do so if they were not moving to DC. Agents told me that it was not unusual for the Special Agent in Charge of a field office to have well over 20 years of experience before the policy change. Under Mueller’s policy that changed to new Special Agents in Charge having five to ten years of experience when they took over.

If the FBI Director wanted nothing but “yes” men and women around the country working for him, this was a great policy. Newer agents are more likely to unquestioningly salute the FBI figurehead in Washington, but never boldly offer a suggestion to fix a bad idea and Mueller had plenty of them.

Whether it was wasting millions of dollars on a software boondoggle or questionable personnel preferences, agents tell me Mueller did not want to hear from more experienced people voicing their concerns about his ideas or policies. An NPR report December 13, 2007, entitled, “FBI'S 'Five-And-Out' Transfer Policy Draws Criticism” dealt with the Mueller controversial policy: “From the beginning of this year (2007) until the end of September (2007), 576 agents found themselves in the five-and-out pool. Less than half of them — just 286 — opted to go to headquarters; 150 decided to take a pay cut and a lesser job to stay put; 135 retired; and five resigned outright.”

In the period of nine months accounted for in this report, the FBI ran off a massive amount of absolutely priceless law enforcement experience vested in 140 invaluable agents. For the vast part, those are the agents who have seen the mistakes, learned lessons, could advise newer agents on unseen pitfalls of investigations and pursuit of justice.

So many of these had at least 20-30 years of experience or more. The lessons learned by such seasoned agents were lost as the agents carried it with them when they left. In the 2007 NPR report, the FBI Agents Association indicated that the Five-Year-Up-or-Out program hobbles field offices and takes relationships forged there for granted. In other words, it was a terrible idea.

The incalculable experience loss damages the FBI by eliminating those in the field in a position to advise the FBI Director against his many judgment errors, which were listed in the NPR article. But this was not the only damage done.

If an FBI Director has inappropriate personal vengeance in mind or holds an inappropriate prejudice such as those that infamously motivated Director J. Edgar Hoover, then the older, wiser, experienced agents were not around with the confidence to question or guide the Director away from potential misjudgment. I also cannot help but wonder: if Mueller had not run off the more experienced agents, would they have been able to advise against and stop the kind of Obama-era abuses and corruption being unearthed right now?

Rather than admit that his 5-Year program was a mistake, Mueller eventually changed the policy to a Seven-Year-Up-or-Out Program. I once pointed out to him at a hearing that if he had applied the Five Year Up-or-Out Policy to literally everyone in a supervisory position, he himself would have had to leave the FBI by September of 2006. He did not seem to be amused.

One other problem remained that will be discussed in more detail later in this article. Before Mueller became Director, FBI agents were trained to identify certain Muslims who had become radicalized and dangerous. Mueller purged and even eliminated training that would have helped identify radical Islamic killers. By running off the more experienced agents who had better training on radical Islam before Mueller, “blinded us of the ability to identify our enemy,” as I was told by some of them, Mueller put victims in harm’s way in cities like Boston, San Diego and elsewhere.

National Security Letter Abuses

National Security Letters (NSL) are a tool that allows the DOJ to bypass the formality of subpoenas, applications for warrants with affidavits in support, and instead simply send a letter to an individual, business or any entity they so choose to demand that records or documents of any kind must be produced and provided to the sender.The letter also informs the recipient that if the he or she reveals to anyone that the letter was received or what it requires to be produced, then the recipient has committed a federal felony and will be prosecuted.

It is a rather dramatic event to receive such a letter and then realize that this simple letter could have such profound power and consequences.

The Committee in the House of Representatives that has oversight jurisdiction over the DOJ is the Judiciary Committee of which I am a member. We have grilled DOJ personnel in the past over the potential for NSL abuse, but both the House and Senate Committees were reassured that there were no known abuses of this extra-constitutional power.

Unfortunately, the day came when we learned that there had been an extraordinary number of abuses.

Apparently, some of Mueller’s FBI agents had just been sending out demands for records or documents without any probable cause, which the Fourth Amendment requires. Some agents were on outright fishing expeditions just to find out what different people were doing. We were told that there may have even been thousands of NSL’s dispatched to demand documents without following either the Constitutional requirements or the DOJ’s own policy requirements.

When the Inspector General’s report revealed such absolutely outrageous conduct by FBI agents, some in Congress were absolutely livid. An NBC News report on March 9, 2007, had this headline and sub-headline: “Justice Department: FBI acted illegally on data; Audit finds agency misused Patriot Act to obtain information on citizens.”

The report went on to say, “FBI Director Robert Mueller said he was to blame for not putting more safeguards into place. ‘I am to be held accountable,’ Mueller said. He told reporters he would correct the problems and did not plan to resign. ‘The inspector general went and did the audit that I should have put in place many years ago,’ Mueller said.” Some Republicans wanted to completely eliminate such an extraordinary power that was so widely abused. Nonetheless, I could not help but wonder that if Mueller had not run off thousands of years of experience though his “Five Year Up-or-Out Policy,” perhaps young, inexperienced agents would not have been so tempted to vastly abuse the power of the NSL.

In fact, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales lost his job over the widespread, pervasive abuses under Mueller’s supervision. In retrospect, Mueller probably should have been gone first. It was his people, his lack of oversight, his atmosphere that encouraged it, and his FBI that did virtually nothing to hold people accountable.

Senator Ted StevensWith Mueller as his mentor and confidant, is it any surprise that we’re now finding James Comey’s FBI found additional ways to monitor Americans and plot with Democrat loyalists in an attempt to oust a duly-elected President?

Ted Stevens had served in the U.S. Senate since 1968 and was indicted in 2008 by the U.S. Justice Department. One would think before the U.S. government would seek to destroy a sitting U.S. Senator, there would be no question whatsoever of his guilt. One would be completely wrong, at least when the FBI Director is Robert Mueller. Roll Call provides us with General Colin Powell’s take on Ted Stevens.

“According to former Secretary of State Colin Powell, who had worked closely with the senator since his days as President Ronald Reagan’s national security adviser, the senator was ‘a trusted individual ... someone whose word you could rely on. I never heard in all of those years a single dissenting voice with respect to his integrity, with respect to his forthrightness, and with respect to the fact that when you shook hands with Ted Stevens, or made a deal with Ted Stevens, it was going to be a deal that benefited the nation in the long run, one that he would stick with.’”

Such a glowing reputation certainly did not inhibit Mueller’s FBI from putting Stevens in its cross-hairs, pushing to get an indictment that came 100 days before his election, and engaging in third world dictator-type tactics to help an innocent man lose his election, after which he lost his life. As reported by NPR, after the conviction and all truth came rolling out of the framing and conviction of Senator Stevens, the new Attorney General Eric Holder, had no choice. He “abandoned the Stevens case in April 2009 after uncovering new and ‘disturbing’ details about the prosecution…”

Unfortunately for Ted Stevens, his conviction came only eight days before his election, which tipped the scales on a close election.

Does this sound familiar yet? The allegation was that Senator Stevens had not paid full price for improvements to his Alaska cabin. As Roll Call reported, he had actually overpaid for the improvements by over twenty percent. Roll Call went on to state:

“But relying on false records and fueled by testimony from a richly rewarded ‘cooperating’ witness… government prosecutors convinced jurors to find him guilty just eight days before the general election which he lost by less than 2 percent of the vote.”

After a report substantiated massive improprieties by the FBI and DOJ in the investigation and prosecution of Senator Stevens, the result was ultimately a complete dismissal of the conviction.

At the time there was no direct evidence that Director Mueller was aware of the tactics of concealing exculpatory evidence that would have exonerated Stevens, and the creation of evidence that convicted him in 2008. Nearly four years later, in 2012, the Alaska Dispatch News concluded: “Bottom line: Kepner (the lead FBI investigator accused of wrongdoing by Agent Joy) is still working for the FBI and is still investigating cases, including criminal probes. Joy, the whistleblower (who was the FBI agent who disclosed the FBI’s vast wrongdoing, especially of Kepner), has left the agency.”/p>

Director Mueller either did control or could have controlled what happened to the lead FBI agent that destroyed a well-respected U.S. Senator. That U.S. Senator was not only completely innocent of the manufactured case against him, he was an honest and honorable man. Under Director Mueller’s overriding supervision, the wrongdoer who helped manufacture the case stayed on and the whistleblower was punished. Obviously, the FBI Director wanted his FBI agents to understand that honesty would be punished if it revealed wrongdoing within Mueller’s organization. Further, not only was evidentiary proof of Senator Stevens’ innocence concealed from the Senator’s defense attorneys by the FBI, there was also a witness that provided compelling testimony that Stevens’ had done everything appropriately. That witness, however, was who agents sent back to Alaska by FBI Agents, unbeknownst to the Senator’s defense attorneys. This key exonerating testimony was placed out of reach for Senator Stevens’ defense. Someone should have gone to jail for this illegality within the nation’s top law enforcement agency. Instead, Senator Stevens lost his seat, and surprise, surprise, Mueller’s FBI helped another elected Republican bite the dust. Unfortunately, I am not speaking figuratively.

In August of 2010, former Senator Stevens boarded his doomed plane. But for the heinous, twisted and corrupt investigation by the FBI, and inappropriate prosecution by the DOJ, he would have still been a sitting U.S. Senator.

Don’t forget, one vote in the Senate was critical to ObamaCare becoming law. If Senator Stevens was still there, it would not have become law. In the following month after Senator Stevens’ untimely death, in September of 2010, a young DOJ lawyer, Nicholas Marsh -- who had been involved in the Stevens case -- committed suicide at his home as the investigation into the fraudulent case continued. The report expressed, "no conclusion as to his (Marsh’s) conduct," given his untimely death. Robert Luskin, an attorney for Marsh, said, "he tried to do the right thing."

If you're wondering what happened to the valuable FBI agent who was an upstanding whistleblower with a conscience, you should know that inside Mueller’s FBI, Special Agent Joy was terribly mistreated.

Orders came down from on high that he was not to participate in any criminal investigation again, which is the FBI management’s way of forcing an agent out of the FBI. On the other hand, the FBI agent who was said to have manufactured evidence against Senator Stevens -- while hiding evidence of his innocence -- was treated wonderfully and continued to work important criminal cases for Director Mueller.

If you wonder if mistreatment of an FBI agent who exposed impropriety was an anomaly in Mueller’s FBI, the Alaska Dispatch noted this about another case:

“Former FBI agent Jane Turner was treated much like Joy (the whistleblower agent in the Stevens case) after she blew the whistle on fellow agents who had taken valuable mementos from Ground Zero following the 9-11 terrorist attacks. She took the FBI to court over her treatment and ended up winning her case against the agency after a jury trial. When you blow the whistle on the FBI, ‘it's death by a million paper cuts,’ she told Alaska Dispatch. Turner said that agents who violate the FBI's omerta -- those who internally challenge the agency -- are undercut and isolated. ‘They (Mueller’s FBI supervisors) do everything they can to get you to quit’ she said.”

The Disgusting Treatment of Dr. Steven HatfillHere is how Mollie Hemingway of The Federalist described this combined Mueller-Comey debacle:

“The FBI absolutely bungled its investigation into the Anthrax attacker who struck after the 9-11 terrorist attacks. Carl Cannon goes through this story well, and it’s worth reading for how it involves both Comey and his dear ‘friend’ and current special counsel Robert Mueller. The FBI tried — in the media — its case against Hatfill. Their actual case ended up being thrown out by the courts: Comey and Mueller badly bungled the biggest case they ever handled. They botched the investigation of the 2001 anthrax letter attacks that took five lives and infected 17 other people, shut down the U.S. Capitol and Washington’s mail system, solidified the Bush administration’s antipathy for Iraq, and eventually, when the facts finally came out, made the FBI look feckless, incompetent, and easily manipulated by outside political pressure. More from the Carl Cannon cited above, recounting how disastrous the attempt to convict Dr. Steven Hatfill for a crime he didn’t commit was: In truth, Hatfill was an implausible suspect from the outset. He was a virologist who never handled anthrax, which is a bacterium. (Ivins, by contrast, shared ownership of anthrax patents, was diagnosed as having paranoid personality disorder, and had a habit of stalking and threatening people with anonymous letters – including the woman who provided the long-ignored tip to the FBI). So what evidence did the FBI have against Hatfill? There was none, so the agency threw a Hail Mary, importing two bloodhounds from California whose handlers claimed could sniff the scent of the killer on the anthrax-tainted letters. These dogs were shown to Hatfill, who promptly petted them. When the dogs responded favorably, their handlers told the FBI that they’d “alerted” on Hatfill and that he must be the killer.

Unfortunately, both Mueller and Comey were absolutely and totally convinced of the innocent man’s guilt. They ruined his life, his relationship with friends, neighbors and potential employers. And from Carl Cannon, Real Clear Politics:

You’d think that any good FBI agent would have kicked these quacks in the fanny and found their dogs a good home. Or at least checked news accounts of criminal cases in California where these same dogs had been used against defendants who’d been convicted -- and later exonerated. As Pulitzer Prize-winning Los Angeles Times investigative reporter David Willman detailed in his authoritative book on the case, a California judge who’d tossed out a murder conviction based on these sketchy canines called the prosecution’s dog handler “as biased as any witness that this court has ever seen.” Instead, Mueller, who micromanaged the anthrax case and fell in love with the dubious dog evidence, and personally assured Ashcroft and presumably George W. Bush that in Steven Hatfill, the bureau had its man… Mueller didn’t exactly distinguish himself with contrition, either. In 2008, after Ivins committed suicide as he was about to be apprehended for his crimes, and the Justice Department had formally exonerated Hatfill – and paid him $5.82 million in a legal settlement ($2.82+150,000/yr. for 20 yrs) – Mueller could not be bothered to walk across the street to attend the press conference announcing the case’s resolution. When reporters did ask him about it, Mueller was graceless. “I do not apologize for any aspect of the investigation,” he said, adding that it would be erroneous “to say there were mistakes.”

Though FBI jurisdiction has its limitations, Mueller’s ego does not. Mueller and Comey’s next target in the Anthrax case was Dr. Bruce Ivins. As the FBI was closing in and preparing to give him the ultimate Hatfill treatment, Dr. Ivins took his own life. Though Mueller and Comey were every bit as convinced that Dr. Ivins was the Anthrax culprit as they were that Dr. Hatfill was, there are lingering questions about whether or not there was a case beyond a reasonable doubt. Since Dr. Ivins is deceased, we are expected to simply accept that he was definitely the Anthrax killer and drop the whole matter. That's a difficult ask after taxpayer money paid off Mueller’s previous victim. Mueller had relentlessly dogged Dr. Hatfill using lifedestroying, Orwellian tactics. Either Mueller was wrong when he said it would be a mistake, “to say there were mistakes,” in the railroading of Hatfill or Mueller did intentionally and knowingly persecute an innocent man.

The Framing of Scooter LibbyIn 2003, there was yet another fabricated and politically-charged FBI investigation: this one "searching" for the leak of CIA agent Valery Plame's identity to the media. Robert Mueller’s close friend James Comey was at the time serving as the Deputy Attorney General. Comey convinced then Attorney General John Ashcroft that he should recuse himself from the Plame investigation while Ashcroft was in the hospital.

After Deputy A.G. Comey was successful in securing Ashcroft's recusal, Comey then got to choose the Special Counsel. He then looked about for someone who was completely independent of any relationships that might affect his independence and settled upon his own child’s godfather, nameing Patrick Fitzgerald to investigate the source of the leak. So much for the independence of the Special Counsel.

The entire episode was further revealed as a fraud when it was later made public that Special Prosecutor Fitzgerald, FBI Director Mueller, and Deputy Attorney Comey had very early on learned that the source of Plame’s identity leak came from Richard Armitage. But neither Comey nor Mueller nor Fitzgerald wanted Armitage’s scalp. Oh no. These so-called apolitical, fair-minded pursuers of their own brand of justice were after a bigger name in the Bush administration like Vice President Dick Cheney or Karl Rove. Yet they knew from the beginning that these two men were not guilty of anything.

Nonetheless, Fitzgerald, Mueller and Comey pursued Cheney’s chief of staff, Scooter Libby, as a path to ensnare the Vice President. According to multiple reports, Fitzgerald had twice offered to drop all charges against Libby if he would ‘deliver’ Cheney to him. There was nothing to deliver. Is any of this sounding familiar? Could it be that these same tactics have been used against an innocent Gen. Mike Flynn? Could it be that Flynn only agreed to plead guilty to prevent any family members from being unjustly prosecuted and to also prevent going completely broke from attorneys’ fees? That’s the apparent Mueller-ComeySpecial Counsel distinctive modus-operandi. Libby would not lie about Cheney, so he was prosecuted for obstruction of justice, perjury, making a false statement. This Spectator report from 2015 sums up this particularly egregious element of the railroading.“… By the time Scooter Libby was tried in 2007 it wasn’t for anything to do with the Plame leak — everyone then knew Armitage had taken responsibility for that — but for lying to federal officials about what he had said to three reporters, including Miller. It is relating to this part of the story that an extraordinary new piece of information has come to light. After her spell in prison, and with her job on the line, Miller was eventually worn down to agree to hand over some redacted portions of notes of her few conversations with Libby. Several years on, she could no longer recall where she had first heard of Plame’s CIA identity, but her notes included a reference to Wilson alongside which the journalist had added in brackets ‘wife works in Bureau?’

After Fitzgerald went through these notes it was put to Miller that this showed that the CIA identity of Plame had been raised by Libby during the noted meeting. At Libby’s trial Miller was the only reporter to state that Libby had discussed Plame. His conviction and his sentencing to 30 months in prison and a $250,000 fine, rested on this piece of evidence. But Miller has just published her memoirs. One detail in particular stands out. Since the Libby trial, Miller has read Plame’s own memoir and there discovered that Plame had worked at a State Department bureau as cover for her real CIA role. The discovery, in Miller’s words, ‘left her cold’. The idea that the ‘Bureau’ in her notebook meant ‘CIA’ had been planted in her head by Fitzgerald. It was a strange word to use for the CIA. Reading Plame’s memoir, Miller realized that ‘Bureau’ was in brackets because it related to her working at State Department. (Emphasis added)

What that means is that Scooter Libby had not lied as she originally thought and testified. He was innocent of everything including the contrived offense. For his honesty and innocence, Scooter Libby spent time behind bars, and still has a federal felony conviction he carries like an albatross. The real culprit of the allegation for which the Special Counsel was appointed, and massive amounts of tax payer dollars expended was Richard Armitage. A similar technique was used against Martha Stewart. After all, Mueller’s FBI developed both cases. If the desired crime to be prosecuted was never committed, then talk to someone you want to convict until you find something that others are willing to say was not true. Then you can convict them of lying to the FBI. Martha Stewart found out about Mueller’s FBI the hard way. Unfortunately, Mueller has left a wake of innocent people whom he has crowned with criminal records. History does seem to repeat itself when it is recording the same people using the same tactics. Can anyone who has ever actually looked at Robert Mueller’s history honestly say that Mueller deserves a sterling reputation in law enforcement? One part of his reputation he does apparently deserve is the reputation for being James Comey’s mentor.

Mueller's Embrace of the Friends of Islamic TerrorIn 2011, in one of the House Judiciary Committee’s oversight hearings, FBI Director Mueller repeatedly testified during questioning by various Members about how the Muslim community was just like every other religious community in the United States. He also referenced an “Outreach Program” the FBI had with the Muslim community.

When it was my turn to question, I could not help but put the two points of his testimony together for a purge question:

GOHMERT: Thank you, Director. I see you had mentioned earlier, and it's in your written statement, that the FBI’s developed extensive outreach to Muslim communities and in answer to an earlier question I understood you to say that you know Muslim communities were like all other communities, so I'm curious as the result of the extensive outreach program the FBI's had to the Muslim community, how is your outreach program going with the Baptists and the Catholics? MUELLER: I'm not certain of, necessarily the rest of that, the question I would say -- there are outreach to all segments of a particular city or county or society is good. GOHMERT: Well do you have a particular program of outreach to Hindus, Buddhists, Jewish community, agnostics or is it just an extensive outreach program to – MUELLER: We have outreach to every one of those communities. GOHMERT: And how do you do that? MUELLER: Every one of those communities can be affected can be affected by facts or circumstance. GOHMERT: I've looked extensively, and I haven't seen anywhere in any one from the FBI's letters, information that there's been an extensive outreach program to any other community trying to develop trust in this kind of relationship and it makes me wonder if there is an issue of trust or some problem like that that the FBI has seen in that particular community. MUELLER: I would say if you look at one of our more effective tools or what we call citizens academies where we bring in individuals from a variety of segments of the territory in which the office operates . . . look at the citizens’ academy, the persons here, they are a crosssection of the community, they can be Muslim, could be Indian, they can be Baptists – GOHMERT: Okay but no specific programs to any of those. You have extensive outreach to the Muslim community and then you have a program of outreach to communities in general is what it sounds like.We went further in the questioning. The 2007 trial of the Holy Land Foundation, the largest terrorism financing trial in American history, linked the Council on AmericanIslamic Relations (CAIR) to the Palestinian terrorist organization Hamas. CAIR was named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the case. Because of this affiliation, the FBI issued policy and guidance to restrict its non-investigative interactions with CAIR in an effort to limit CAIR’s ability to exploit contacts with the FBI. As a result, FBI field offices were instructed to cut ties with all local branches of CAIR across the country.

GOHMERT: Are you aware of the evidence in the Holy Land Foundation case that linked the Council on American-Islamic relations, CAIR, the Islamic Society of North America and the North America Islamic Trust to the Holy Land Foundation? MUELLER: I'm not going to speak to specific information in a particular case. I would tell you on the other hand that we do not – GOHMERT: Are you aware of the case, Director? [CROSSTALK] MUELLER: – relationship with CAIR because of concerns – GOHMERT: Well I've got the letter from the Assistant Director Richard Powers that says in light of the evidence – talking about during the trial – evidence was introduced that demonstrated a relationship among CAIR, individual CAIR founders, including its current president emeritus and executive director and the Palestine committee, evidence was also introduced that demonstrated a relationship between the Palestine committee and Hamas, which was designated as a terrorist organization in 1995. In light of that evidence, he says, the FBI suspended all formal contacts between CAIR and FBI. Well now it's my understanding, and I've got documentation, and I hope you've seen this kind of documentation before, it's public record, and also the memo order from the judge in turning down a request that the unindicted co-conspirators be eliminated from the list, and he says the FBI's information is clear there is a tie here, and I'm not going to grant the deletion of these particular parties as unindicted coconspirators. So, I'm a little surprised that you're reluctant to discuss something that's already been set out in an order, that's already been in a letter saying we cut ties in light of the evidence at this trial. I'm just surprised it took the evidence that the FBI had, being introduced at the trial in order to sever the relationships with CAIR that it (the FBI) had that showed going back to the 1993 meeting in Philadelphia, what was tied to a terrorist organization. So, I welcome your comments about that. MUELLER: As I told you before, we have no formal relationship with CAIR because of concerns with regard to the national leadership on that.What Director Mueller was intentionally deceptive about was that the FBI had apparently maintained a relationship and even “community partnership” instigated on his watch with CAIR and other groups and individuals that his FBI had evidence showing they were co-conspirators to terrorism. That, of course, is consistent with his misrepresentation that Mueller’s FBI had outreach programs to other religious communities just like they did with the Muslim community. They did not. He was not honest about it. In a March 2009 Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, Senator Jon Kyl (R-AZ) questioned Mueller over the FBI move to cut off contact with CAIR. Mueller responded to Kyl’s pressing over how the policy was to be handled by FBI field offices and headquarters with the following:

MUELLER: We try to adapt, when we have situations where we have an issue with one or more individuals, as opposed to institution, or an institution, large, to identify the specificity of those particular individuals or issues that need to be addressed. We will generally have -- individuals may have some maybe leaders in the community who we have no reason to believe whatsoever are involved in terrorism, but may be affiliated, in some way, shape or form, with an institution about which there is some concern, and which we have to work out a separate arrangement. We have to be sensitive to both the individuals, as well as the organization, and try to resolve the issues that may prevent us from working with a particular organization. KYL: They try to “adapt” with members of terror-related groups? Are they as “sensitive” with other organizations? Do they work out “separate arrangements” with members of, say, the Mafia or the Ku Klux Klan for “community outreach”? Why the special treatment for radical Islamic terrorism?A March 2012 review of FBI field office compliance with this policy by the Office of Inspector General found a discrepancy between the FBI’s enforcement policy restricting contact and interaction with CAIR and its resulting actions. Rather than FBI headquarters enforcing the rules, they hedged. Mueller set up a separate cover through the Office of Public Affairs and allowed them to work together, despite the terrorist connections.

That was the cultivated atmosphere of Mueller’s FBI. The DOJ actually set out in writing in an indictment that CAIR and some of the people Mueller was coddling were supporters of terrorism. I had understood that the plan by the Bush Justice Department was that if they got convictions of the principals in the Holy Land Foundation trial, they would come right back after the co-conspirators who were named in the indictment as co-conspirators but who were not formally indicted. In late 2008, the DOJ got convictions against all those formally indicted, so DOJ could then move forward with formally indicting and convicting the rest—EXCEPT that the November 2008 election meant it was now going to be the OBAMA DOJ with Eric Holder leading. The newly-named but not confirmed Attorney General apparently made clear they were not going to pursue any of the named co-conspirators. That itself was a major loss for the United States in its war against terrorism in the Obama administration. It was a self-inflicted refusal to go after and defeat our enemies. All of the named co-conspirators would not likely have been formally indicted, but certainly there was evidence to support the allegations against some of them, as the federal district court and the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals had formally found. One of the problems with FBI Director Mueller is that he had already been cozying up to named co-conspirators with evidence in hand of their collusion with terrorists. That probably was an assurance to President Obama and Attorney General Holder that Mueller would fit right in to the Obama administration. He did. It also helps explain why President Obama and AG Holder wanted him to serve and extra two years as FBI Director. Mueller was their kind of guy. Unfortunately for America, he truly was!

Purging the FBI of Anti-Terror InformationWe repeatedly see cases where people were radicalized, emerge on the FBI's radar, but federal agents are instead looking for Islamophobes, not the terrorists standing in front of them. That is because Mueller’s demand of his FBI Agents, in the New Age to which he brought them, was to look for Islamophobes.

If a Mueller-trained FBI agent got a complaint about a potential radical Islamist who may pose a threat, the agent must immediately recognize that the one complaining is most likely an Islamophobe. That means the agent should first investigate whether the complainant is guilty of a hate crime. Too often it was after an attack occurred that Mueller-trained FBI agents would decide that there really was a radical Islamic threat to the United States.

The blinding of our FBI agents to the domestic threat of radical Islam is part of the beguiling damage Robert Mueller did as FBI Director. That is also the kind of damage that got Americans killed, even though Mueller may have avoided offending the radical Islamists who were killing Americans. As terrorism expert Patrick Poole continually points out in his “Known Wolf” series, the overwhelming majority of terrorist attacks on U.S. soil are committed by those the FBI has interviewed and dismissed as a threat. Here are three of the more high-profile cases:

ORLANDO: The mass killer who attacked the Pulse nightclub in June 2016, Omar Mateen, had been interviewed by the FBI on three separate occasions. The open preliminary investigation in 2013 lasted 10 months, after Mateen had told others about mutual acquaintances he shared with the Boston bombers and had made extremist statements. He was investigated again in 2014 for his contacts with a suicide bomber who attended the same mosque. At one point, Mateen was placed on TWO separate terrorism databases. He was later removed from them.

NORTHWEST AIRLINES: Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab boarded Detroitbound Northwest Flight 253 on Christmas Day 2009 with 289 other passengers wearing an underwear bomb intended to murder them all. He was well-known to U.S. intelligence officials before he boarded.

Only one month before the attempted bombing, Abdulmutallab’s father had actually gone to the U.S. embassy in Nigeria and met with two CIA officers. He directly told the CIA that he was concerned about his son’s extremism. Abdulmutallab's name was added to the Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment (TIDE) database. However, his name was not added the FBI’s Terrorist Screening Database. Or even the no-fly list. So, he boarded a plane. When asked about the near-takedown of the flight and these missteps, then-Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano remarkably told CNN that “the system worked.” The only "system" that worked in this incident: a culture that values bravery, already instilled in the passengers who acted.

BOSTON: Prior to the bombing of the Boston Marathon by Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev in April 2013 that killed three people and injured 264 others, the FBI had been tipped off. Twice. Russian intelligence warned that Tamerlan was “a follower of radical Islam.” Initially, the FBI denied ever meeting with Tamerlan. They later claimed that they followed up on the lead, couldn’t find anything in their databases linking him to terrorism, and quickly closed the case. After the second Russian warning, Tamerlan’s file was flagged by federal authorities demanding “mandatory” detention if he attempted to leave or re-enter the United States. But Tsarnaev's name was misspelled when it was entered into the database.

An internal FBI report of the handling of the Tsarnaev’s case -unsurprisingly -- saw the FBI exonerate itself. When I asked at yet another House Judiciary Committee oversight hearing, in the wake of the Boston Marathon bombing, Mueller himself admitted in response to my questioning, that the FBI had indeed gone to the Boston mosque the bombers attended. Of course, The FBI did not go to investigate the Tsarnaevs. The bombers' mosque, the Islamic Society of Boston, was incorporated by known and convicted terrorists. The incorporation papers were signed by none other than Abduram Al-Amoudi who is currently serving 23 years in a federal prison for funding terrorism. One of the members of the Board of Trustees included a leader of the International Muslim Brotherhood, Yusef al-Qawadari, who is barred from entering the United States due to his terrorist ties. Did Mueller’s FBI go to the Boston bombers’ mosque to investigate the Tsarnaevs? This is from the House Judiciary oversight hearing transcript:

GOHMERT: The FBI never canvassed Boston mosques until four days after the April 15 attacks. If the Russians tell you that someone has been radicalized and you go check and see the mosque that they went to, then you get the articles of incorporation, as I have, for the group that created the Boston mosque where these Tsarnaevs attended, and you find out the name Al-Amoudi, which you will remember, because while you were FBI Director this man who was so helpful to the Clinton administration with so many big things, he gets arrested at Dulles Airport by the FBI and he is now doing over 20 years for supporting terrorism. This is the guy that started the mosque where the Tsarnaevs were attending, and you didn’t even bother to go check about the mosque? And then when you have the pictures, why did no one go to the mosque and say, who are these guys? They may attend here. Why was that not done since such a thorough job was done? MUELLER: Your facts are not altogether——GOHMERT: Point out specifically. MUELLER: May I finish my——GOHMERT: Point out specifically. Sir, if you’re going to call me a liar, you need to point out specifically where any facts are wrong. MUELLER: We went to the mosque prior to Boston. GOHMERT: Prior to Boston? MUELLER: Prior to Boston happening, we were in that mosque talking to the imam several months beforehand as part of our outreach efforts. “Outreach efforts”? Yes. That is apparently Mueller’s efforts to play figurative pattycake with the leaders and tell them how wonderful they are and how crazy all those Islamaphobes out there are, but they surely got assurance that Mueller’s FBI is after those bigots. Maybe they sat around on the floor and had a really nice meal together. One thing for certain, they weren’t asking about the Tsarnaevs! But the hearing got even worse: GOHMERT: Were you aware that those mosques were started by Al-Amoudi? MUELLER. I’ve answered the question, sir. GOHMERT. You didn’t answer the question. Were you aware that they were started by Al-Amoudi?MUELLER. No. . . Then my time for questioning expired, leaving many questions unanswered. Why was the FBI unaware of the origins of the mosque attended by the Boston bombers? This was arguably the most traumatic Islamic terrorist attack in America since 9-11 because the explosions happened on live television at the Boston Marathon. When did the FBI become an outreach-to-terrorism organization to the detriment and disregard of its investigations? Under Director Robert Mueller’s tenure, that’s when!

In Director Mueller’s efforts to appease and please the named co-conspirators of terrorism, he was keenly attuned to their complaints that the FBI training materials on radical Islam said some things about Islamic terrorists that offended some Muslims. Never mind that the main offense was done to the American people by radical Islamists who wanted to kill Americans and destroy our way of life. Mueller wanted to make these co-conspirators feel good toward Mueller and to let them know he was pleased to appease. Director Mueller had all of the training materials regarding radical Islam “purged” of anything that might offend radical Islamic terrorists. So, in addition to using his “Five Year Up-or-Out” policy to force out so many experienced FBI agents who had been properly trained to identify radical Islamic terrorists, now Mueller was going even further. He was ensuring that new FBI agents would not know what to look for when assessing potentially radicalized individuals.

When thoseof us in Congress learned of the Mueller-mandated “purge” of FBI training materials, we demanded to see what was being removed. Unfortunately, Mueller was well experienced in covering his tracks, so naturally the pages of training materials that were purged were ordered to be “classified,” so most people would never get to see them.

After many terrorist attacks, we would hear that the FBI had the Islamic terrorists on their radar but failed to identify them. Now you are beginning to see why FBI agents could not spot them. They were looking more at the complainant than they were at the radical Islamist because that is what Mueller had them trained to do.

Michele Bachmann and I were extremely upset that Americans were being killed because of the terribly flawed training. We demanded to see the material that was “purged” from the training of FBI agents regarding radical Islam. That is when we were told it could not be sent over for review because the purged material was “classified.” We were authorized to review classified material, so we demanded to see it anyway. We were willing to go over to the FBI office or the DOJ, but we wanted to review the material.

We were told they would bring it over and let us review it in the Rayburn Building in a protected setting. They finally agreed to produce the material. Members of Congress Michele Bachmann, Lynn Westmoreland, and I went to the little room to review the vast amount of material. Lynn was not able to stay as long as Michele and I did, but we started pouring through the notebooks of materials. It was classified so naturally I am not allowed to disclose any specifics, but we were surprised at the amount of material that was purged from the training our agents. Some of the items that were strictly for illustration or accentuation were removed. A few were silly. But some should clearly have been left in if an FBI agent was going to know how and what a radical Islamic terrorist thinks, and what milestone had been reached in the radicalization process.

It was clear to Michele and me as we went through the purged materials that some of the material really did need to be taught to our FBI agents. For those densely-headed or radical activists who will wrongly proclaim that what I am writing is an Islamophobic complaint, please note that I have never said that all Muslims are terrorists. I have never said that, because all Muslims are not terrorists. But for the minority who are, we have to actually learn exactly what they study and learn how they think. As Patton made clear after defeating Rommel’s tanks in World War II, he studied his enemy, what he believed and how he thought. In the movie, “Patton,” he loudly proclaims, “Rommel, you magnificent ___, I read your book!”

That is how an enemy is defeated. You study what they believe, how they think, what they know. Failure to do so is precisely why so many “Known Wolves” are able to attack us. Clearly, Mueller weakened our ability to recognize a true radical Islamic terrorist. As one of my friends in our U.S. Intelligence said, “We have blinded ourselves of the ability to see our enemy! You cannot defeat an enemy you cannot define.” Robert Mueller deserves a significant amount of the credit for the inability of our federal agents to define our enemy.

Purging Counter-Terrorism Training MaterialsFBI Special Agent Kim Jensen had spent a great deal of his adult life studying radical Islam. He is personally responsible for some extraordinary undercover work that remains classified to this day. He was tasked with putting together a program to train our more experienced FBI agents to locate and identify radicalized Muslims on the threshold of violence.

Jensen had done this well before Mueller began to cozy up with and pander to groups such as CAIR. Complaints by similar groups caused Mueller to once again demand that our agents could not be properly instructed on radical Islam.

Accordingly, Jensen’s roughly 700-pages of advanced training material on radical Islam were eliminated from FBI training and all copies were ordered destroyed.

When Director Mueller decides he wants our federal agents to be blind and ignorant of radical Islam, they are indeed going to be blind and ignorant.

Fortunately, in changing times well after Mueller’s departure as FBI Director, a new request went out to Mr. Jensen to recreate that work because at least someone in the FBI needed to know what traits to look for in a terrorist. It still did not undo the years of damage from Mueller’s commanded ignorance of radical Islam.Mueller's Unethical Acceptance of Appointment as Special ProsecutorRobert Mueller had more than one direct conflict of interest that should have prohibited him from serving as the Special Counsel to investigate President Donald Trump.

For one thing, President Trump fired his close friend and confidante, disgraced FBI Director James Comey. Mueller had long served as a mentor to Comey, who would most certainly be a critical witness in any investigation of Donald Trump.

Mueller and Comey had also been exceedingly close friends beyond the mentor relationship. But Comey’s insertion of himself into so much of the election cycle -- and even its aftermath -- in conversations he had with the President himself made him a critical witness in the investigation. There is no way Mueller could sit in judgment of his dear, close friend’s credibility, and certainly no way he should be allowed to do so.

Gregg Jarrett explained one aspect of this situation quite clearly and succinctly at FoxNews.com in an article titled, “Gregg Jarrett: Are Mueller and Comey ‘Colluding’ against Trump by acting as co-special counsel?” A portion of that article reads:The law governing the special counsel (28 CFR 600.7) specifically prohibits Mueller from serving if he has a “conflict of interest.” Even the appearance of a conflict is disallowed. The same Code of Federal Regulations defines what constitutes a conflict. That is, “a personal relationship with any person substantially involved in the conduct that is the subject of the investigation or prosecution” (28 CFR 45.2).Comey is that person. He was substantially involved in the conversation with President Trump who may be the subject of an obstruction investigation. In fact, the former Director is the only other person involved. There were no witnesses beyond himself. A conflict of interest is a situation in which an individual has competing interests or loyalties. Here, it sets up a clash between the special counsel’s self-interest or bias and his professional or public interest in discharging his responsibilities in a fair, objective and impartial manner. His close association with the star witness raises the likelihood of prejudice or favoritism which is anathema to the fair administration of justice.Mueller has no choice but to disqualify himself. The law affords him no discretion because the recusal is mandatory in its language. It does not say “may” or “can” or “might”. It says the special counsel “shall” recuse himself in such instances.An excellent post by Robert Barnes, a constitutional lawyer, identifies five statutes, regulations and codes of conduct that Mueller is violating because of his conflict of interest with Comey. Byron York, chief political correspondent for the Washington Examiner recounts in detail the close personal relationship between Mueller and Comey which gives rise to the blatant conflict of interest.

Another deeply troubling aspect of Mueller’s conflict of interest is and was his role in the investigation of Russia’s effort to illegally gain control of a substantial part of United States’ precious supply of uranium. That investigation was taking place within the Mueller FBI, which should have had a direct effect on prohibiting Secretary of State Clinton from participating in the approval of the uranium sale into the hands that were ultimately the Russian government.

Of course, then U.S. Attorney Rod Rosenstein had direct control over that Russiauranium investigation in conjunction with FBI Director Mueller. It certainly appears that with what they had gleaned from that undercover investigation, they should never have been involved in any subsequent investigation that might touch on potential collusion and millions of dollars paid to the Clinton’s foundation by the very beneficiaries of the Russians' uranium schemes. Rosenstein and Mueller’s failure to warn against or stop the sale reeks of its own form of collusion, cooperation, or capitulation in what some consider a treasonous sale.

Quite the interesting duo is now in charge of all things investigatory surrounding their own actions. In fact, Rosenstein and Mueller are now in a position to dissuade others from pursuing them for their own conduct.

Special Prosecutor Mueller's Troublingly Biased HiresThrough it all, Mueller’s modus operandi does not seem to have ever changed. He has hired nine Democrat-supporting lawyers and zero Republicans. Certainly all attorneys likely have political views and that is not a problem so long as they do not affect their job. But not a single Republican was worthy of Mueller’s selection?

Were there no establishment Republicans who wanted to join his jihad? Mueller’s hand-picked team of Democrats reveal political views that distinctly conflict with Trump and the conservative agenda, raising questions about Mueller’s bias and his ability to conduct a fair investigation. At least nine members of Mueller’s team made significant contributions to Democrats or Democratic campaigns, while none contributed to Trump’s campaign and only James Quarles contributed to Republicans in a drastically smaller amount than what he gave to Democrats.

Analysis of Federal Election Commission records shows that Andrew Weissmann, Jeannie Rhee, Andrew Goldstein, James Quarles, Elizabeth Prelogar, Greg Andres, Brandon Van Grack, Rush Atkinson, and Kyle Freeny all contributed over $50,000 in donations to Democrats including Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama’s Presidential campaigns, various Democratic non-presidential candidates, and the Democratic National Convention. Mueller also has surprisingly strong personal ties to a number of the lawyers he hired.

Three former partners with Mueller at the Boston law firm of WilmerHale are on the payroll: Aaron Zebley, Jeannie Rhee, and James Quarles. In addition to strong personal ties to Mueller, many of the attorneys have potential conflicts in working for persons directly connected to the people and issues being investigated.

Jeannie Rhee represented Ben Rhodes, ex-Obama National Security Adviser, and the Clinton Foundation in a 2015 racketeering lawsuit, as well as Hillary Clinton in a lawsuit probing her private emails.

Aaron Zebley, former Chief of Staff to Mueller while Director of the FBI, represented Justin Cooper in the Clinton email scandal as he was responsible for setting up Clinton’s private email server. He admitted to physically damaging Clinton’s old mobile devices.

Andrew Goldstein joined the team after working under major Trump critic Preet Bharara in the U.S. Attorney’s office in New York. Bharara became a strong critic after Trump fired him as an Obama-holdover and spoke on ABC News that “there’s absolutely evidence to launch an obstruction of justice case against Trump’s team with regard to the Russia probe.” Does he sound a bit prejudiced?

Andrew Weissman, notoriously a “tough” prosecutor previously accused of “prosecutorial overreach,” has a less than stellar career after various courts reversed his prosecutions due to his questionable conduct and tactics. As director of the Enron Task Force, Weissman shattered the Arthur Andersen LLP accounting firm and destroyed over 85,000 jobs. In 2005, the conviction was reversed by the Supreme Court. In other words, the only true crime in the case was the murderous destruction of 85,000 jobs and the lives they ruined.

Weissman’s next conviction threw four Merrill Lynch executives into prison without bail for a year, only to be reversed by the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals. Weissman subsequently resigned from the Enron Task Force. A suspiciously timely move, as the public eye had just caught sight of his modus operandi. Additionally, Weissman has unsightly political ties, having attended Clinton’s electionnight celebration in New York City. He also sent an email to Acting Attorney General Sally Yates, praising her boldness on the night she was fired for refusing to enforce President Trump’s travel ban. President Trump was trying to enforce the law; Weissman was trying to enforce his bigotry against Trump and Republicans.

Peter Strzok was removed from Mueller’s team after more than 10,000 texts between him and former Mueller investigator Lisa Page were found to contain vitriolic anti-Trump tirades. They were not simply anti-Trump. They were more in the nature of desperate attempts to stop him from becoming President and talk of a nefarious insurance policy to orchestrate his removal if he were elected.

General Michael FlynnMichael Flynn is a man entangled in manufactured controversy from the moment he stepped into his role in the Trump administration. The circumstances surrounding his take-down have become one of the more puzzling aspects of the TrumpRussia investigation. His career took him from three decades in the U.S. Army to overseeing the Pentagon’s military intelligence operation and directing the Defense Intelligence Agency. Flynn was more than qualified to act as the first national security adviser in a new administration. However, his influence and zeal made him a clear target for the Trump-Russia investigation.

As a strong supporter and friend of Donald Trump’s from the onset, he campaigned and publicly supported then-candidate Trump throughout 2016. As best I can sort it out through the media hype and hysteria, having no first-hand knowledge like the rest of America: after the successful election, during the transition period, in December 2016, Flynn reportedly conversed with a Russian ambassador.

He was “accidentally” swept up in an intelligence foreign surveillance recording. When this happens, the names of American citizens are supposed to be masked in the transcripts. Somehow Flynn’s name was magically unmasked, which apparently allowed the Obama administration to peruse his meetings and conversations. Parts of the classified transcript of that conversation were leaked to the media by rogue Deep State law breakers (criminals who Mueller seems completely disinterested in). This appears to be what fueled the media-driven narrative of Trump campaign “collusion” with Russia because Flynn had a discussion with a Russian ambassador, which conversation is absolutely legal and advisable. A media-generated doubt clouded Flynn’s reputation, as the discussion was longreported as having taken place during the campaign (which could possibly be illegal) but was later proven to have been after the election and during the transition which should not have been illegal.

After a complete pounding of media-driven hysteria, in mid-February of 2017, Flynn resigned having served only 23 days as National Security Advisor. Mueller targeted Flynn using illicitly-gathered and leaked foreign intelligence and surveillance as evidence. Nine months later after Flynn and his family were subjected to Mueller’s usual threats and intimidation, a financially exhausted Flynn entered a guilty plea on one count of lying to the FBI—the result of a Mueller-technique perjury trap as was used on Scooter Libby and Martha Stewart. What is Flynn guilty of? He apparently misremembered a conversation that took place 33 days previously? The FBI had a transcript of that conversation and already knew what information was there. They went into a conversation with Flynn not seeking answers to questions, but to try to trip him up on exact statements made in a conversation when they were already in possession of the transcript.

Flynn's unmasking has become the center of a controversy wherein those transcripts were procured under exceedingly questionable circumstances before a judge who had a questionable and undisclosed relationship with part of Mueller’s team. That judge was appointed to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC), the secretive court created by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) that allows federal law enforcement to seek secretive warrants to surveil foreign persons outside of the United States who are suspected of terrorism. But the Obama administration and Mueller seemed to find it much more politically expedient to use the secret court to go after Americans who were part of the Trump team for actions that did not occur while they were part of the Trump campaign team. Strange goings-on.

One could argue that Judge Rudolph Contreras, the federal judge who accepted Flynn’s guilty plea, conveniently misremembered that he also served on the FISA court as a judge and conveniently misremembered his friendship with the FBI agent whose interview was used as evidence against Flynn. As it turns out, the FBI interview notes of that very encounter with Flynn may exonerate Michael Flynn, crushing Mueller’s case against him, not to mention the highly questionable hearing before a judge who may well have been recused much too late to save the Flynn prosecution.

FISA ABUSEThe FISA-authorized FISC is built upon the principle that highly delicate cases dealing with government surveillance of foreign agents and officials would be handled in an unbiased and respectful environment where secrecy at all costs was critical. There is supposed to be an added precaution to prevent any potential for bias in a FISA Judge by having a rotation of judges. That is why it is such a shock to find out now that Mueller’s case against Michael Flynn would happen to end up before the “randomly selected” very dear close personal friend of FBI Special Agent Peter Strzok, who hated President Trump with a passion, as evidenced in his text messages with colleague and paramour, Lisa Page. U.S. District Court Judge Rudolph Contreras, or “Rudy” as Strzok likes to refer to him, should have recused himself from such a highly sensitive case involving the ultimate attempted removal of the duly-elected President of the United States who happened to be despised by the very people who by law were required to prosecute with fairness. He was later forced to ‘recuse’ himself and be removed from the Flynn proceedings, without public explanation.

This forced recusal was an unmistakable indication that he never should have been involved in the Michael Flynn plea agreement. Judge Contreras’ conflict of interest has yet to be explained by the court. Contreras’ is one of only three local FISA court judges, and by default, is likely one of the judges who have on four occasions approved the Title I surveillance of another character in this melodrama, Carter Page. This is the case where the FBI is known to have intentionally misled the FISA court by using as evidence the illustrious “Steele Dossier,” a sordid opposition research document paid for by Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee (DNC). Oh, what a tangled web of crime Special Prosecutor Mueller’s team appears to have helped weave, and of which Mueller appears to be completely disinterested, all while he searches high and low for an elusive crime to pin on the President.

Mueller ignores provable crimes by the Clinton Campaign, the FBI, the FISC, etc.Strategically timed leaks of selective classified information are being used to target individuals for investigation in order to create the appearance of some sinister crime are committed.

Upon closer scrutiny, the cases fall apart.

Yet, slam dunk federal criminal cases of leaking classified material are going on under Mueller’s nose, and by those within his purview and his team. When we think of all the leaks from Mueller’s investigation, it brings to mind Wilford Brimley’s quote from Absence of Malice: “You call what's goin' on around here a leak? Boy, the last time there was a leak like this, Noah built hisself a boat.”

Case in point: Erik Prince. As Lee Smith put it in a recent article from TabletMag.com, Robert Mueller’s Beltway Cover-Up:

News that special counselor Robert Mueller has turned his attention to Erik Prince’s January 11, 2017 meeting in the Seychelles with a Russian banker, a Lebanese-American political fixer, and officials from the United Arab Emirates, helps clarify the nature of Mueller’s work. It’s not an investigation that the former director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation is leading—rather, it’s a cover-up…Mueller is said to believe that the Prince meeting was to set up a back channel with the Kremlin. But that makes no sense. According to the foundational text of the collusion narrative, the dossier allegedly written by former British spy Christopher Steele, the Kremlin had cultivated Trump himself for years. So what’s the purpose of a back channel, when Vladimir Putin already had a key to the front door of Mar-a-Lago? Further, the collusion thesis holds that the Trump circle teamed with high-level Russian officials for the purpose of winning the 2016 election. How does a meeting that Erik Prince had a week before Trump’s inauguration advance the crooked election victory plot? It doesn’t—it contradicts it. The writer goes on to point out that serious crimes have been committed which Mueller is purposefully ignoring. Prince was thrown into the middle of Russiagate after an April 3, 2017, Washington Post story reported his meeting with the Russian banker. But how did anyone know about the meeting? After the story came out, Prince said he was shown “specific evidence” by sources from the intelligence community that the information was swept up in the collection of electronic communications and his identity was unmasked. The US official or officials who gave his name to the Post broke the law when they leaked classified intelligence. “Unless the Washington Post has somehow miraculously recruited the bartender of a hotel in the Seychelles,” Prince told the House Intelligence Committee in December, “the only way that’s happening is through SIGINT [signals intelligence].” Prince’s name was unmasked and leaked from classified signals intelligence. Oddly enough, it’s the same modus operandi used in the targeting of President Donald Trump, Attorney General Jeff Sessions and former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn. It is a federal felony to publish leaked classified information.

Ask WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange about that particular unequal application of the law. The Deep State felons who are strategically leaking this information have politically weaponized our justice system and should be prosecuted for their attempts, with malice aforethought, to manufacture the overthrow of a duly elected President of the United States. The leaks and publication of classified information alone warrant investigation and prosecution to the fullest extent of the law in this matter, yet Mueller appears utterly uninterested in those crimes even as they go to the very heart of the credibility of his investigative mandate.

Yet, as I’ve demonstrated here, the man put in charge of the investigation of "Russian Collusion"; case, Robert Mueller, has perfected the art of abuse of the justice system for personal and political gain. He is uninterested in any criminal activity that does not further his cause of damaging this President. If you think that is harsh, consider the criminality of the FISA court abuses by the Obama Department of Justice and FBI. We have all heard ad nauseum about the infamous “Steele Dossier,” the opposition research document paid for by the Clinton campaign that was used to manufacture the Russia collusion narrative and spark what became the Mueller investigation into our President. On June 18, 2017, Muller protégé and disgraced former FBI Director James Comey testified in front of the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence about the Clinton campaign-funded document, telling Congress that the document was, “salacious and unverified.” https://www.politico.com/story/2017/06/08/full-text-james-comey-trump-russia-testimony-239295)

The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, created a court called the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) to allow secret warrants to surveil agents of foreign governments, be they U.S. citizens or non-U.S. actors. In October of 2016, the Obama DOJ/FBI successfully applied for one of these secret warrants to surveil Carter Page, a short-time Trump campaign volunteer. Since these warrants against U.S. citizens are outside of the bounds of the Constitution, they have to be renewed by applying to the court every 90 days after the first warrant application is approved. These secret warrants are so serious they have to be signed off on at the highest levels. The applications in question would have been signed off on by Obama administration FBI and DOJ officials including then FBI Director James Comey. At least one of the renewal applications would have been signed off on by our current Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein. At the time of the signing, they all would have had the knowledge and/or the professional and legal duty to know that the dossier was used as evidence and also had the legal duty to know the evidence origins. The same would apply to the knowledge of the penalty for submitting unverified information to the FISC for the purpose of obtaining a warrant. It is a crime to submit under the color of law an application to the FISC that contains unverified information 50 U.S. Code § 1809).

Comey’s “salacious and unverified” testimony before the Senate occurred eight months after the Clinton campaign-funded dossier was used in the first successful FISA court application to obtain a surveillance warrant against Carter Page, a Trump campaign volunteer for several months. The House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence examined the documentation submitted to the court and concluded that the unverified information contained in the Steele dossier was in fact used in the FISC application, without disclosing to the court that it was an opposition research document paid for by Hillary Clinton and the Democratic National Committee.

Neither the initial application in October of 2016, nor any of the renewals, disclose or reference the role of the DNC, the Clinton campaign, or any other partyn in funding Steele's efforts, even though the political origins of the Steele dossier were then known to senior DOJ and FBI officials. The timing of the applications, the inclusion of material the DOJ/FBI knew to be unverified at the time, and the successful result after this fraudulent inclusion speak to the level of criminal corruption of those who sought to destroy Donald Trump’s candidacy and still seek to overturn his election. The widespread abuse of the FISA-authorized court, FISC, was laid bare in a court memorandum of review of these abuses that was declassified in 2017 and went virtually unnoticed by the media because it didn’t fit their narrative.

These are serious crimes that, left unchecked, lead nations down the path to tyranny at the hands of people who think they know better than citizens. It’s an age-old struggle America’s Founding Fathers knew well and did everything they could to prevent from happening. The FISC judges themselves have a duty to police their own courts and call to account these bad actors who, by all facts in the documentation I’ve personally seen, have committed a fraud upon the court. If these judges do not have the integrity to self-police in this matter, we in Congress must hold them accountable using the power granted to us in the Constitution. Congress has created every single federal court in the country except the Supreme Court. We have the duty to phase out, change or disband the FISC, all while developing a better solution to address the authorization of this sort of surveillance of foreign agents and actors. It is our duty to clean up the mess that the Obama administration demonstrated is far too easy to create.

If you want answers, and you can handle the truth, join me in demanding those answers from “Special Counsel” Robert Mueller, along with his resignation. If he were to resign, it could well be the only truly moral, ethical and decent action Mueller has undertaken in this entire investigation.

Hat tip: BadBlue Uncensored News.

Link to Article

Archived Version

Tue, 30 Oct 2018 15:22

President Donald Trump has been threatened with death at least 184 times on Twitter, and 179 of those murder threats are still posted on Twitter's website as of press time Monday evening.

The threats range from simple commands for others to kill Trump, to stated desires to kill President Trump, to more detailed fantasies and plans to kill the commander in chief.

A database compiled by Document the Left is ongoing, with more tweets appearing in real time as they are unearthed.

''someone go kill Donald Trump he's currently on 5th ave,'' reads one of the tweets. At least one of the tweets was posted in response to a 2015 Business Insider graphic featuring crosshairs on President Trump's head.

someone go kill Donald Trump hes currently on 5th ave

Latest: FLORIDA: Gillum Misleads Voters, Claims DeSantis Justified Slavery

'-- yo delilah my guy (@pinksostuckup) September 26, 2018

i will kill donald trump

ðŸ--ðŸ-- fuck em nd his suporters

i am a protester'... pic.twitter.com/h26h5nacH7

'-- ckubba 44 (@ckubba_44) March 12, 2016

Sometimes multiple accounts offer encouragement like ''take one for the team.''

The national security implications of this List are profound. So are the emotional experiences of those brave enough to look at it.

To review this list is to confront the base primal urges of the Leftist political movement. To review this list is to see the mechanics of the Fear campaign.

I want to kill trump, but if I do I'm ganna go to jail ðŸª

'-- sham ðŸ'‹ (@_youknowshams) June 28, 2018

I want to stab Trump in the fucking throat

'-- emz (@24hournaps) August 15, 2017

I want to stab trump in the face

'-- NANGELAS🧟''¸ (@angela_510) October 10, 2016

I want to stab Trump

'-- gabriella (@gabystephensx) January 16, 2016

I will shoot trump right in his head

'-- CASH ME OUT!!! (@TRUE_220) June 15, 2016

If I had a gun I will shoot Donald trump first!ðŸ'ðŸ'ðŸ'

'-- Kambaj, 1906.🌹 (@lewis_cmb) June 30, 2016

Someone take one for the team and fucking shoot trump already ffs

'-- baby fuego (@reginaalvarezm) June 20, 2018

Someone fucking shoot Trump wtf man

'-- #STEELERSNATION 3-2-1 (@DangChrisGuy) August 16, 2018

I beg one of England's roadman just fucking shoot trump whilst he's in the UK

'-- tubbs (@jxmmabxchiee) July 10, 2018

America make your gunlaw useful and fucking shoot trump !

'-- mr steal your cat x (@annaak__) June 20, 2018

will someone please fucking shoot trump and mike pence

'-- forever, baricel (@busparmars) January 22, 2018

Someone fucking shoot trump already https://t.co/AsrkpSMPvJ

'-- roadwork ahead? uh, yeah, i sure hope it does (@adoredecouder) November 17, 2017

Someone fucking shoot Trump ffs

'-- David Wynn (@davidewynn) November 17, 2017

Can someone just fucking shoot trump already. God.

'-- em (@dreamqween17) October 16, 2017

Can anyone for the love of good fucking shoot Trump?

'-- Angel The Angel (@karikoritene) September 30, 2017

Can someone take one for the team and just fucking shoot trump the mouldy wotsit cunt

'-- alex 🇾🇪 (@alexpxwnall) September 28, 2017

Can someone fucking shoot trump and his little office of white men already

'-- ~ ''£¸Black Haired Bangtan | Nia ''£¸~ (@yoonseokshoe) September 5, 2017

can somebody just fucking shoot Trump already? PLEASE #TransRightsAreHumanRights

'-- $am ' Junhee (@yonggukownsme) July 26, 2017

Someone fucking shoot trump right now

'-- magnus (@pizzaheiresss) March 1, 2017

sian can someone just fucking shoot trump alrdy'...'...'....

'-- sakurassam🌸 (@SAMMEHCHNG) February 4, 2017

What i don't understand is why people can't fucking shoot trump

'-- lol rt (@2uwums) February 2, 2017

someone just fucking shoot trump and pence please for the love of god

'-- franiel (@franzesty) February 2, 2017

god who is going to fucking shoot trump

'-- fight fascism (@xavierdoslan) January 25, 2017

can someone just fucking shoot trump already

'-- Arthita (@pepsicolafenty) January 20, 2017

SOMEONE FUCKING SHOOT TRUMP

'-- JK '­ (@jackennyy) January 20, 2017

Can someone fucking shoot trump i dont get the big deal

'-- seem (@slutfeast) November 9, 2016

SOMEONE FUCKING SHOOT TRUMP RIGHT NOW DO IT YALL WANT TO LEGALIZE GUNS ANYWAYS

'-- weeblon musk (@tankmains) November 9, 2016

Someone better fucking shoot Trump

'-- Sensai (@lee7morris) November 9, 2016

Someone fucking shoot Trump

'-- Gov Plates ðŸ--' MFF (@modernsqueeze) November 9, 2016

Can someone fucking shoot Trump? #ElectionNight

'-- Guedes (@papiguedes) November 9, 2016

Can someone just fucking shoot Trump? Just take one for the team please I beg you

'-- Sil (@CuddIeMeHaroId) November 3, 2016

Someone needs to fucking shoot Trump in the face!

'-- Natasha Gomez (@natTOtheFETT) September 27, 2016

Someone just fucking shoot trump or let me do it fuck let me do it

'-- ' (@pesystyles) June 13, 2016

And someone fucking shoot trump already ðŸ

'-- 🌹🇧🇸ðŸ‡(C)🇴 (@JeyMessiah) June 4, 2016

ON GOD ILL FUCKING SHOOT TRUMP PUT THAT SHIT DOWN it'll be worth it going to jail lmao

'-- Eddie ðŸ‘>>🎃 (@Eddiepowerss) May 19, 2016

Someone fucking shoot Trump #trumped

'-- Evan RT Imray (@Erti147) October 21, 2012

I'm not at all an advocate for violence'... But I shit you not somebody needs to fucking shoot trump

'-- qυÑ--Ñ--η яσѕ(C) 👑 (@jootybuice) December 2, 2015

Bitch I'm born and raised here I ain't leaving my damn country I'll fucking shoot trump if he tries that shit https://t.co/FSYkgvrLPF

'-- tori (@loveyourzlaur) May 3, 2016

I will shoot Donald deadass

'-- bre (@_AztecDior) July 8, 2013

I will kill Donald j trump and teebag him after

'-- Q (@4hunniiiiid) July 27, 2016

i will kill donald trump

ðŸ--ðŸ-- fuck em nd his suporters

i am a protester'... pic.twitter.com/h26h5nacH7

'-- ckubba 44 (@ckubba_44) March 12, 2016

#My5wordcampaignpromise

I will KILL Donald Trump

'-- PeOpLe PoWeR (@R3yban) February 10, 2016

I WILL KILL DONALD TRUMP MYSELF TF

'-- adri (@amorehowell) February 1, 2016

Then I will kill Donald Trump myself

'-- Freedom From Society (@fuckgovtheyfcku) December 13, 2015

I will kill Donald trump myself

'-- Jamel (@____jamaica) August 26, 2015

I will kill Donald stupid ugly ass before this summer is over

'-- Nay (@woahthere_nay) June 6, 2014

Someone give me a gun and i swear to god i will kill donald trump idc if i go to jail for the rest of my life

'-- spooky pop punk paola 🇲🇽 (@loveandIoathing) July 14, 2015

If the Philippiano wins this I will kill Donald trump myself.

'-- dad (@cale6661) December 20, 2012

I will kill Donald trump'... ðŸ--

'-- Hayden (@HaydeNeil10) July 23, 2012

I will Assasinate Trump for you. #6WordPickUpLines pic.twitter.com/aDuNmGohtl

'-- Isaac Bonilla II (@WhosIsaac) September 29, 2017

If that happens I swear to God I'm gonna assasinate Trump.

'-- Tony DiNozzo (@tdinozzo1) April 7, 2016

@Telegraph I AM

Going to kill Trump

'-- bonniebandini (@bonniebandini) September 21, 2017

Hey guys Im going to kill Trump voter for constantly clearing his throat. See you guys in 5 to 20 years.

'-- 👑 Genghis Kellz (@KMJeezy) February 8, 2017

can someone fucking kill trump already damn

'-- JNK1 (@jungkookis21) July 19, 2016

i would fucking kill trump right now

'-- gr(ass) eater (@thanso456) September 27, 2016

Someone fucking kill Trump

'-- kaya (@ehhhkaya) October 20, 2016

Can we fucking kill Trump before he destroys more of 'murica?

'-- knox (@yolojoonjin) November 9, 2016

just. fucking kill trump.

'-- jcbj (@llluminauti) November 9, 2016

i wanna fucking kill trump

'-- cam (@dreamyselala) November 10, 2016

someone just fucking kill trump already

'-- L (@loisgrace_) January 24, 2017

#2017in3words fucking kill trump

'-- Melissa (@JaneaFondasGay) December 30, 2016

Someone needs to fucking kill Trump'... STG ðŸ¥ðŸ§ðŸ--ªðŸ--

'-- SPOOFIE 🎉🎃 (@Dinosaurflipflo) January 29, 2017

Can we fucking kill trump now or what

'-- beth (@bethseager_) January 29, 2017

Make America Great Again, just fucking kill trump already

'-- Jane (@dre4mybizzle) February 13, 2017

fucking kill trump

'-- 🍂the owl🍂 (@lesbiansails) February 3, 2017

Just fucking kill trump, the world'll be so much better off

'-- OdontophiliacQueen (@Odontophiliac) March 7, 2017

can someone fucking kill trump?!

'-- '†joe-angel'† (@trill6joey) March 23, 2017

someone fucking kill trump already

'-- corey (@coreylmao) April 13, 2017

Fucking kill Trump already!

'-- Edward Iannielli (@edwardi) May 24, 2017

Can someone just fucking kill trump already

'-- nate (@kissmylipa) July 26, 2017

Please just fucking kill Trump already

'-- Tatz (@tatzelfreeman) September 19, 2017

CAN SOMEONE FUCKING KILL TRUMP

'-- 'ܠ (@alishaxchanel) September 7, 2017

Fucking kill Trump

'-- NikohhsVisuals (@SquirrelinItUp) September 25, 2017

i can't take it anymore!!!!someone take one for the team!!!! fucking kill trump already!!!!

'-- sw (@ssaieeda) November 6, 2017

Somebody fucking kill trump and the GOP already jesus fucking christ

'-- 🎃spoopyðŸratte🎃 (@TerraDragon13) October 6, 2017

I'd fucking kill trump the straight out!! The idiot!!

'-- Juliette Green (@juliette_lily) November 20, 2017

someone fucking kill trump already

'-- carly^__^ (@gothfairys) January 13, 2018

when are ppl gonna stop dickin around damn like fucking kill trump already and boo boo the fool mike pence'...y'all lazy or what?

'-- cumilf (@FrickCamille) March 27, 2018

Someone just fucking kill Trump already

'-- kri$py kreme (@OGKRISPYKREME) June 24, 2018

Somebody needs to fucking kill trump already i stg

'-- Hyped for SMA5H (@EternalFlameZBS) October 22, 2018

Someone fucking kill trump already

'-- danielle (@daniellepenny) October 22, 2018

ill kill Trump & da vice president just for my Culture

'-- Basically 4R (@WassPoppin_) January 22, 2017

someone please shoot donald trump in the head

'-- mads (@parkchayeoung) November 9, 2016

Someone please shoot Donald Trump during his speech

'-- S. (@teritoriaI) November 9, 2016

can someone please shoot Donald Trump please. thank you

'-- Leo Mendoza (@leomendozaaaa) November 9, 2016

can someone please shoot donald trump

'-- wicked ðŸ¥ðŸŽƒðŸ‚ (@cybershampain) November 9, 2016

Also can someone please shoot Donald Trump in the temple and set his vp ablaze?

'-- s ''¤¸''¤¸''¤¸''¤¸ (@wvrmwater) November 26, 2016

Can someone please shoot Donald Trump today? I mean that's what you do Merica.. kill presidents and shit

'-- '‰JULIN'½ (@julianc667) January 19, 2017

Someone please shoot Donald Trump. Please

'-- JB (@tweeet_JB) January 19, 2017

Can someone please shoot donald trump before we all die during WWIII ?!

'-- Daph (@flowerxspirit) April 7, 2017

Somebody please shoot Donald Trump

'-- twink-o-treat 🎃 (@homoalone) March 28, 2017

Someone please shoot Donald Trump.

'-- Lady Elektra Brightside, Esq. (@GroovyGams) March 18, 2017

Can someone please shoot trump

'-- geraldine mulcahy (@geraldinemulcah) October 22, 2018

1 rt I will kill Donald trump. (So not gonna happen cause no one is gonna rtðŸ‚)

'-- Danielle Custer (@DanielleCuster4) April 7, 2016

Kill Donald Trump https://t.co/ZclTrb0HIq

'-- LarryFisherman🐐 (@xShermm) May 10, 2018

Kill Donald trump immedeately Jesus fucking Christ https://t.co/sBeloR4Yjq

'-- destruction elfðŸ§ðŸ¼''¸ (@Chelapf) May 17, 2018

Kill Donald trump.

'-- Flash Woof Zap Slash (@NotThatGilbert) May 26, 2018

kill Donald Trump send tweet

'-- hayls // ia for a while (@aureumborealis) June 7, 2018

No it's time for someone to kill Donald Trump LOL

'-- ðŸ"¸'ðŸŒPÊɪɴá´á´‡ê'±ê'± ʟɪá´á´ÊðŸ¨ (@cheryl_toni25) June 14, 2018

Yes that's an order.Kill Donald trump by any.means

'-- Ken Duck (@KenDuck11) June 14, 2018

someone please kill Donald Trump

'-- '† Macaulay'>>Sulkin' (@lordstoney) June 16, 2018

Someone kill Donald Trump already please.

'-- EXOviposition (@ChrisRaley12) June 20, 2018

somebody please kill Donald Trump

'-- Lee Williams (@Sweet09Williams) June 21, 2018

Kill donald trump ahhahahaha

'-- MasitahArshad ' (@masitahArshd96) June 21, 2018

kill donald trump

'-- estefania (@lettersfrominzu) June 21, 2018

Please somebody take one for the team and kill Donald Trump!

'-- DaeðŸŒ>> (@bhadgyal_) June 24, 2018

i would kill donald trump oops

'-- αηηα 🎃🍂 (@coldbrewlesbian) June 24, 2018

Someone kill Donald Trump. Please.

'-- Oui Oui, Baguette (@PedroOuro) June 25, 2018

Kill Donald Trump #AmericaIn3Words

'-- Britt Loves Quincy ''¸ (@britlovesquincy) June 29, 2018

someone needs to kill Donald trump

'-- Tori Regin(C) (@_toriregine) July 10, 2018

I really wanna kill Donald Trump

'-- Savage (@KillerKayla__) July 10, 2018

Kill Donald Trump #WorldCup #WorldCupFinal #CRO #Wimbledon

'-- RealJesus (@RealJesus1234) July 12, 2018

We should seriously just kill donald trump

'-- Flash Woof Zap Slash (@NotThatGilbert) July 16, 2018

I wish I could kill Donald Trump.

'-- commander_smiley_face (@UnJoeMoss) July 21, 2018

Kill Donald Trump https://t.co/ivXMXa24qw

'-- James (@XCIXJames) July 30, 2018

kill Donald trump

'-- maria; mono (@glosscfs) July 22, 2018

Kill Donald Trump

'-- panda 🐼 (@datpandatv) September 7, 2018

someone make use of the dark web and hire a hitman to kill donald trump

'-- ð'--ð'--žð'--²ð'--¯ð'--ð'--ðŸ...‡ (@laurenhigs) September 25, 2018

Kill Donald trump. https://t.co/1vb0jY8PsU

'-- Big Bank Frank🖤 (@FineAssFrankie) July 30, 2018

Bonjour mate, you should try to kill Donald Trump.

'-- friendly memes (@friendlyoldbot) August 15, 2018

Love trumps hate, kill Donald trump 🇵🇸ðŸ‡>>🇪

'-- LiberalRevolution (@LiberalRevolut2) September 26, 2018

can someone just kill donald trump. like please i'm begging you

'-- shana | 5 (@wifeofhoran2) October 2, 2018

What if I dropped out of college and became a trained assassin so I could kill Donald Trump.

'-- Zoe 🍯 (@zoehudson023) October 2, 2018

can someone please kill donald trump, it's been too long '...

'-- lexi (@lexi_rawdon) October 2, 2018

kill Donald Trump

'-- segura (@fsbludream) October 7, 2018

@saudiarabia kill Donald Trump

'-- Dick Drizzle (@yangizzle) October 14, 2018

can someone,,, please kill donald trump,,,,,, thanks,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

'-- Spooky Leafy 🎃🍂 (@MidnightFireFo1) October 22, 2018

Can someone shoot Donald trump already

'-- Erick 🇸ðŸ‡>> (@ckirexreyes) October 27, 2018

someone please shoot donald trump please i'm begging

'-- lulu (@tydolladelivers) October 26, 2018

I told you to shoot Donald trump

'-- chocoalte_babyy 🍠(@QueenRissen) October 24, 2018

just fucking kill trump already and leave my man johnny ALONE. https://t.co/hkTMRsNEAM

'-- . (@herein_theblack) December 12, 2017

Can El Chapo fucking Kill trump already? https://t.co/HafSLk1Y4l

'-- arachne🕷 (@ripqnace) August 18, 2017

can someone fucking kill trump already LIKE HOW DID YOU ALL DO THIS TO THE WORLD

'-- fleur (@FAlRYDVST) January 11, 2017

can someone fucking kill trump yet?

asking for a friend

'-- Bog Witch Jules (@julesprom) October 21, 2018

hey why doesn't someone use their gun rights to fucking kill Trump

'-- gwenn (@BasicGwenn) February 22, 2018

what is america waiting for just fucking kill trump and his senate of vipers already lmao

'-- Gabo (@Silvermender) February 13, 2018

can someone fucking kill trump and his followers were in two thousand fucking seventeen we shouldn't be going through this

'-- milly #mono (@btsgmfu) September 1, 2017

the Illuminati need to up their game and fucking kill Trump

'-- Jess GottleebiejeebiesðŸ--® (@Jess1394) July 15, 2018

ffs America put your love of guns to good use and fucking assassinate these assholes '' then fucking kill Trump. https://t.co/wr0pb9yGp4

'-- Carl Morries ðŸ'ðŸŒ>> (@Cam_1971b) February 6, 2018

Can someone please fucking kill trump https://t.co/hTOff0z37g

'-- baby d. (@DasiahMariah) January 10, 2018

SOMEONE FUCKING KILL TRUMP ALREADY. PLS. IM BEGGING U. IMPEACH HIM. SOMETHING.

'-- elizabeth (@lizpalmiotto) December 29, 2017

Can someone just fucking kill Trump already? Take one for the greater good. And the Kardashians too please

'-- Ryan (@ryandschock) October 3, 2017

SOMEONE FUCKING KILL TRUMP

'-- rachel (@TurntCobain) August 16, 2017

Hate to be so political but can we just fucking kill trump and any republican that denies climate change out of self defense?

'-- JD'† (@JD_Adamson) June 2, 2017

When can we just fucking kill trump already

'-- Gay Naught 🌰 @ãƒ(C)イオãƒ" (@GayestLion) May 4, 2017

swear to god, if America drags us into a war after av just got a job ill fucking kill Trump, no even kidding

'-- ryan (@ryanfletcher72) April 14, 2017

Can we fucking kill trump now or what

'-- beth (@bethseager_) January 29, 2017

SOMEONE PULL A JFK AND FUCKING KILL TRUMP ALREADY LIKE YOU CAN KILL INNOCENT PEOPLE IN SCHOOL BUT YOU CANT KILL THAT BASTARD WAKE UP AMERICA

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'-- jack-o-samtern 🎃 (@TheSamJS) March 12, 2016

I will fucking murder Donald trump, an the best part is most people wouldn't shed a tear,

'-- Freedom From Society (@fuckgovtheyfcku) December 14, 2015

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'-- rigbone ''¨ (@xhalfdoomed) August 26, 2015

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'-- 🍂ewias🍁 (@DragonsPurr) June 12, 2016

Link to Article

Archived Version

Tue, 30 Oct 2018 14:24

Did the Democrats and Republicans ''Switch Parties''?The American political parties, now called Democrats and Republicans, switched platform planks, ideologies, and members many times in American history. These switches were typically spurred on by major legislative changes and events, such as the Civil War in the 1860's, and Civil Rights in the 1960's. The changes then unfolded over the course of decades to create what historians call the ''Party Systems''.[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12]

Bottomline: The parties changed over time as platform planks, party leaders, factions, and voter bases essentially switched between parties. Third parties aside, the Democratic Party used to be favored in the rural south and had a ''small government'' platform (which southern social conservatives embraced), and the Republican party used to be favored in the citied north and had a ''big government'' platform (which northern progressive liberals embraced). Today it is the opposite in many respects. Although what happened is complex and some voter bases and factions never switched, you can see evidence of the ''big switches'' by looking at the electoral map over time (where voter bases essentially flipped between 1896 and 2000). Or, you can see it by comparing which congressional seats were controlled by which parties over time (try comparing the 115th United States Congress under Trump to the 71st United States Congress under Hoover for example). Or, you can see the ''solid conservative south switch'' specifically by looking at the electoral map of the solid south over time. Or, you can dig through the historic party platforms. Any of those links will give you a look at the basics of what did and didn't change, but the details are as complex as U.S. party history. Below we cover the details of what changes occurred and what they mean in context'... and explain the history of the Democratic and Republican party in the process. To do that, we'll start with an overview of the party systems.

An Overview of the Party SystemsThe ''party systems,'' AKA eras of the United States political parties, can be described as follows (where the main things that ''switch'' in each party system are key factions, party leaders, geographical voter bases, and specific planks of party platforms):[13]

The first party system: The Federalists vs. Anti-Federalists, to the Jeffersonian Democratic-Republicans, to the Era of Good Feelings (where both parties ''switch'' to becoming the ''one-party'' Democratic Republicans). This ends with Jackson vs. Adams (where the parties switch back to a two-party system). In this system, the anti-Federalists and then Democratic-Republicans (who essentially go on to become Democratic Party in the second party system) are the ''small government'' party favored in the South. Meanwhile, the Federalists (who will essentially become National Republicans and then Whigs in the next party system before becoming Republicans) are the aristocratic ''big government'' party favored in the North.The second party system: the Jacksonian Democrats vs. the National Republicans/Whigs, to expansion, to the dissolution of the Whigs. This ends with the tension over ''States' Rights'' before the formation of the Republicans, Lincoln's election, and the Civil War. The tensions break the two parties into a number of factions, some of which take their single-voter issues party planks with them (like Know-Nothings and Free-Soilers), but the general two-party system and the ideologies of those parties is otherwise retained.The third party system: Know-Nothings, Free-Soilers, Southern Democrats, Northern Republicans (radical, moderate, and conservative), the Populist party, and many other factions (who switch from the major parties to ''third parties'' over the issues surrounding slavery during the second and third party systems); from Bleeding Kansas, to Civil War, to Reconstruction (where the ''bourbon liberals'' ''switch'' into the Democratic Party), to the Gilded Age (where both parties become pro-business, and in which there is an influx of immigration which changes the often pro-immigrant Democratic Party). This ends with the rise of Progressivism (where the Democrats begin to become increasingly progressive under figures like Bryan despite their conservative factions). The factions of this era are notable, as they help illustrate the different factions that ''switch parties'' and cause platform planks and much else to switch over time.The fourth party system: The rise of Progressivism in ''the Progressive Era'' (where both parties embrace progressivism following the Gilded Age), to Teddy leaving the Republican party (where progressive Republicans begin to ''switch'' to the Democratic Party), to the First World War, to Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover (where the Republican platform starts to become less progressive and more pro-business). This ends with the rise of the New Deal Coalition vs. Conservative Coalition (two cross-party coalitions that are emblematic of the modern parties). This party system really sets the modern struggle of free-enterprise (gilded age factions) vs. progressive (progressive era factions) in motion (especially with the rise of media, the events of World Wars, the Fed, the income tax, voting rights, and the rise of the modern state). Most of the major switches of the modern era are a result of this tension (this tension also gives new meaning to ''big government'' and ''small government,'' as now we have to consider ''the welfare state''). Starting in this era the Great Migration begins and this changes both parties by changing the location of a future geographic voter base (once Voting Rights 1965 happens).The fifth party system: from FDR, to the New Deal Coalition vs. Conservative Coalition, to the Second World War (and the global and national tension between Fascism and Communism), to the rise of ''States' Rights'' parties. This ends with the battle at home after WWII over Brown v. the Board, Kennedy, Civil Rights 1964 and Voting Rights 1965 under LBJ, and the rise of Goldwater Republicans in 1964 (where the ''solid south'' begins to ''switch'' from Democratic Party to the Republican Party in response to not only LBJ's programs, but in response to the increasingly progressive Democratic Party and all the implications of that progressivism).Some, including me, feel that this is followed by sixth party system: From LBJ and Civil Rights, to the Southern Realignment AKA ''big switch'' or ''solid south switch'' (where from 1964 to 2000 when the South ''switches'' to favoring the Republican Party), to Reagan or Clinton. This ends with the rise of modern fairness doctrine-free media, Reaganomics, and Clinton's Third Way ''Neoliberalism'' (which had started with figures like Cleveland, Wilson, and Carter and is a sort of bourbon liberal mashup of classical liberalism, social liberalism, and conservatism focused on business interests and deregulation; its counterpart in the Republican party is called neoconservatism). The socially conservative and/or small government identities we today call paleocon, libertarian, and ''the religious right'' become more dominate in this era (which helped to increase the popularity of the Republican party in the South with the aide of right-wing media and think tanks). Meanwhile, progressivism and neoliberalism come to dominate the Democratic Party as the southern conservatives either ''reform'' (like Robert Byrd) or shift to the Republican party (like Strom Thurmond) over time.Some, again including me, then feel this is followed by a seventh party system: from Reagan / Clinton, to the subsequent polarization and rise of modern media, to War in the Middle-East, to bailouts and modern debt, to Citizens United, to today. Does this end with Obama / Trump and figures like Bernie, or are we still in the seventh party? Only time will tell. One thing is clear though, the Democrats are increasingly seen as the aristocratic party and are favored in Urban centers and in the North, while the Republicans are seen as the populist small government party and are favored by Rural areas and the South (a full switch from how it was back in the 1800s!) This isn't to say everything switched, and this isn't to say that party planks didn't evolve with the times, but it is to say the factions, voter-bases, and planks that did switch had a considerable effect (going as far as to turn the rural small government party of yesterday into the urban big government party of today).In other words, as the Democratic Party became more progressive in the progressive era, it attracted progressives from the Republican party and alienated the small government socially conservative south. Meanwhile, as the Republican party ''conserved'' toward Gilded Age politics in the 20th century, and embraced socially conservative single-issue voter groups and individualism, it attracted the ''solid south'' (their leadership and voter base) and alienated progressives. These two factors, and many more explained in detail below, substantially changed the party platforms, seats held in congress, and the voting maps over the course of the 20th century (AKA the 20th century reversal, or the 20th century political realignment, or ''the switch'').

TIP: If you want to see some quick visual proof of party switching, see the images on our ''Summary of How the Major Parties Switched'' page. This page leads with explanations (which require reading), that page leads with images and videos (which don't). Below is an essay that explains American history in depth, so bookmark it for further study.

An Introduction to the History of the Major Parties and the Big SwitchesIt is not a myth that ''the parties switched,'' just look at the voting map over time or at the historic party platforms (or check out Lincoln's 1860 election, Democrat-Populist Bryan's 1896 election, LBJ's 1964 election, Nixon's 1968 election, and the corresponding platforms of all parties in those races and compare them to the 2016 election).

The problem isn't proving specific changes (for example showing that the southern bloc used to vote Democratic Party and now they vote Republican), the problem is that so much changed that it is difficult to summarize (especially from a centered standpoint that tries to to justice to all of America's diverse factions; here i'll apologize for any bias below, feel free to comment with questions or challenge anything).

This Isn't Just About the Solid SouthThe truth is the Solid South switch (the Southern realignment) is one of the easiest to spot (as one can see it on the map), and debunking its related myths detracts from the equally important stories of Progressive Dixies like LBJ and Gore Sr. and their refusal to sign the Strom led Southern Manifesto, Teddy and his Progressives, Bryan and how he changed the Democratic Party, the tension between Federalists like Hamilton and Anti-Federalists like Jefferson, the one-party Democratic-Republicans in the era of Good Feelings (and the tension between Jackson, Clay, Calhoun, Van Buren, Adams that ended the era), and the countless other stories of Expansion and Compromise in the mid-1800's, Third Parties like the People's Party, Free Soilers, and Libertarians, the Difference between Southern Democrats and Know-Nothings (and their relation to the modern Tea Party), Reconstruction, the Gilded Age, the World Wars, the Great Migrations, the evolution of the Monroe Doctrine, the strategy that helped create Fox News, and the rise of Progressivism.

This is to say, I want to jump right in and explain that in Lincoln's day there were four parties (not two), and that Lincoln was no Know-Nothing AND no Southern Democrat'...

'...Still, I get that this is about first and foremost debunking the ''Big Switch,'' so lets split the difference.

First we'll offer a quick summary in the form of an introduction (in order to quickly go over key points as a service to the reader who doesn't want to read the whole thing; that will be about different factions and their relation to the groups at the heart of the ''Big Switch'').

Then we'll explain the general story, which shows that the main theme here is one of factions switching parties in a ''two-party'' system as America progresses and modernizes (with voter bases and key members typically switching first, usually over ''single voter issues'' or specific legislation, and then everything else changing slowly over time as new members are elected).

Then we move on to the details of ''the Big Switch'' (where the ''Southern bloc'' ''Southern Democrat'' ''Dixiecrats'' switched from favoring the increasingly progressive Democratic party to the increasingly conservative Republican party following 1964, slowly, over time, from 1964 to the 1990's and beyond, thus causing ''the big switch'' (flipping the map) as one can see in the congressional voting records of the contemporary era; see the Southern strategy).

Then we'll tell the full history of both major parties, noting each switch, each President, and major events.

First, a bit more on the Solid South (which is explained by the following image in many ways).

Visual Proof the parties switched (source). Remember, we are discussing majority wins in a two-party system here. On an individual level, America is less red-state vs. blue-state or city vs. rural, and more ''purple,'' meanwhile on a state and national level it seems polarized due to party politics and majorities being needed to win. Here we can note that America is today and has always been comprised of diverse individuals with different tastes who support single-voter issue factions, who then form coalitions as two ''big tents'''... still, a city is not a farm, the media can be loud, Citizens United and Gerrymandering are loud too, the two-party system is an epic feedback loop, and majorities do win the day. Very real factors divide us in very real ways in any era, but electoral-based maps and even county-maps can be misleading (as they only show majorities). The Solid South is a force when it acts as a one-party voting bloc in any era, but it isn't like everyone in the south has the same politics. See the ways in which America is purple, the nitty gritty truth is very telling.

LOOKING FOR PROOF IN 2017: Keeping in mind we today are new generation. If one is still confused, today we can see some recent and major proof, that is Charlottesville 2017. In Charlottesville we saw the Dixie battle flag of the Southern Democrats being waved by Republican Trump voters who were standing up to protect the statue of the Southern Democrat rebel army leader General Lee. Meanwhile, the progressive American liberal-ish antifascists marched against these groups with the progressive social justice movement Black Lives Matter in abolitionist spirit. In ye old terms, the socially conservative right-wing populist ''America First'' Know-Nothing nativists and Solid South radicals marched against the populist Reformers, Progressives, and left-wing anarchists. In the old days all those factions were in the Democratic party except the old Progressives of Republican party who would have marched with MLK, voted for Teddy, or stood with Hamilton or Lincoln, and the Know-Nothings who have always been Republican, Whig, Federalist, or Third Party. Today the socially conservative factions generally vote Republican and the progressive factions generally vote for the Democratic party. That is the main switch spurred on by shifts toward big government welfare state social justice and free-enterprise states' rights small government. Here we can't act like decedents of the Confederates are Confederates any more than a descendent of a progressive is progressive, but spiritually some of these factions switched parties and the alliances of the other factions subsequently changed (and regional voter bases and platform planks changed with them as the parties evolved). So yes, Thurmond and Goldwater are fine places to look, but 2017 is as fine as any other place. History is complex enough without twisting the story of the South and the progressive factions into a modern pretzel. Some factions have always been for small government, some for big government, the parties and times changed and the factions changed along with them, all of this is interconnected. Also party loyalty is a factor.

An Introduction to the Different Types of Democrats and Republicans: This is a Story of Factions Switching and Parties ChangingI can't stress this enough, a major thing that changes in history is the Southern Social Conservative one-party voting bloc (because in an electoral system, 11 states who often vote lock-step always matter and often paint the map clear as day, for example when they vote for Breckenridge in 1860, Goldwater in 1964, or George C. Wallace in 1968).

This is the easy thing to explain given the conservative South's historically documented support of figures like Calhoun, John Breckenridge and his Socially Conservative Confederates of the Southern Democratic Party, Byrd (the who didn't switch), the other Byrd who ran for President, Thurmond, C. Wallace, Goldwater (the ''Libertarian'' ''States' Rights'' ''Republican''), and later conservative figures like Reagan, Bush, and Trump (rather than progressive southerners like Carter and Bill Clinton).

The problem isn't showing the changes related to this, or showing the progressive southerners like LBJ, the Gores, and Bill Clinton aren't of ''the same exact'' breed as the socially conservative south, the problem is that the party loyalty of the conservative south is hardly the only thing that changes, nor is it the only thing going on in American history (to say the least).

Not only that, but here we have to note that the north and south have its own factions, Democrats and Republicans have their own factions, and each region and state has its own factions'... and that gives us many different ''types'' of Democrats and Republicans.

Consider, Lindsey Graham essentially inherited Strom Thurmond's seat, becoming the next generation of solid south South Carolina conservative, now solidly in the Republican party.

When we note that Graham's stance on key issues tends to be rather liberal for a right-wing conservative Republican[14] (and is generally different than his northern Republican counterparts like Trump; who is also rather liberal for a Republican) we can see some real evidence of what I am saying. Both Trump and Graham are liberal Republicans, but they are from two different parts of the country and don't exactly share all the same interests.

A southern conservative from South Carolina used to vote Democrat, supporting figures like Bryan and Wilson, now they generally vote Republican, supporting figures like Trump. However, that doesn't make them ''exactly the same'' as their counterparts in other parts of the country, that just makes them part of the same coalition in this era (they support the same platform and oppose the other party together).

In other words, it isn't just party interests that define a politician, there are state interests, regional interests, monied interests, single voter issue interests, and more to grapple with here. Add to that the fact that some of those interests change, and we have a rather complex situation.

Consider also, Martin Luther King Jr. (MLK). Although MLK was not directly affiliated with a party, he supported Southern Democrats [among other factions], just like Thurmond would have been before he switched'... However, he didn't just support any Southern Democrats, he supported the progressive ones like the Mississippi Freedom Democrats who stood against Goldwater and for Civil Rights. We are talking about different factions duking it out district-by-district, not cartoon characters.

Birmingham was [speaking loosely] all about a Democrat spraying a firehose at a Democrats, while the Democrats sent in the national guard to stop the protestors, while a Democrat told the guard to stand down.

Civil Rights 1964 and Voting Rights 1965 had strong Republican support (remember the change happens over time; this being the point of our story here), but in respect to MLK, Civil Rights wasn't a story of Republicans (like it had been in Lincoln's day or prior to 1877). It was a story of different factions of Democrats from anti-war Hippies, to Northern liberals like Kennedy, to Progressive Southern Freedom Democrats, to Socially Conservative ones (who are no longer with the Party today, which again you can see on any voter map and see reflected in the party platforms and ''States' Rights'' third party splits).

In other words, the Republican party was still supporting Civil Rights under Eisenhower and Nixon, that is very clear.

However, the struggle in the Democratic Party that happened under Kennedy and then would flip the map under LBJ and Goldwater in 1964 and Humphrey, C. Wallace, and Nixon in 1968 was a main theme of the 1960's.

As the Democrats shifted to the progressive left, with figures like MLK supporting Kennedy and LBJ (to some extent), the Republicans shifted to the socially conservative right supporting figures like Goldwater, and this had a profound effect on the parties over the years from Reagan, to Clinton, to Bush, to the Obama era.

A socially liberal progressive Democrat certainly voted for FDR and Kennedy, and they might support LBJ, but they weren't going for Goldwater or George C. Wallace, they were going for liberals like Humphrey from this point forward.

Still, I don't want to demonize Northern or Southern conservatives in any party system (it isn't my stance at all if you read carefully), or discount important figures like Eisenhower, Reagan, Nixon, or Bush, or downplay the role of left-wing or socially progressive Republicans, or the impact of ''America First'' ''Know-Nothings'' in the North, or the role of third parties (States' Rights, Free Soil, or Progressive), or the role of other Democratic party figures and factions (like Bourbons and Carpetbaggers and Tammany Hall), or those Republican factions like Civil Service Republicans and Stalwarts, or the countless single-issue voter factions I haven't noted yet (like ''the Religious Right'')'... and what about the original single-issue party, the nativist Anti-Masons, or the original crony Spoils system?! How about the Alien and Sedition Acts that show the different types of Federalists? There is truly a lot to cover here!

Thus, not only will we debunk the myths of the Solid South below, we'll also explore other specifics changes in each Party System from 1789 to 2017 (like the start and end of the one-party era of Good Feelings, the split over States' Rights in the 1850's, the changes of Reconstruction and the Gilded Age, Bryan's effect on the Democrats, Theodore ''Teddy'' Roosevelt's exit from the Republican Party in 1912, the changes under Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover that turned the GOP to a ''small government'' party in the 1920's, landslide wins by FDR, LBJ, Nixon, and Reagan which changed the nation, and finally the polarizing effects of the eras of mass media and Bush and Clinton) to show the many changes that define the Party Systems.

With all the above points in mind, we can say: the Democrats used to be the party of the Rural South, but that changed from FDR in 1932, to LBJ in 1964, to Clinton and Obama with their ''second rights'' ''safety net'' legislation.

The effect has been a Southernization of the Republican Party and an Urbanization of the Democratic Party.

TIP: With all of that said, for the reader who doesn't want to read a long essay (that explains things like the difference between a progressive Dixiecrat liberal ally like LBJ who didn't switch and a staunch southern Conservative Democrat like Strom who did), consider watching the following videos.

The Election of 1860 Explained. That time the Northern Liberals, Free Soil Classical Liberals, Know-Nothing Nativists, and Southern Democrats went to war. Lincoln was not a Know-Nothing or Southern Democrats'... obviously.

What was the Southern Strategy? This part of the story is only one part, but it is vital to get. This is from Keith Hughes who explains much of our American history accurately. All videos on this page are secondary resources not created by us.TIP: Today only one party displays the Confederate Battle Flag. The flag of the Southern Democrats is now flown by the southern Republican. That is a big hint when all else fails to sway someone. From there one only needs to understand that the old conservative Southern Democrat and the old ''Know-Nothing'' ''America First'' Northern Tea-Party-like Republican are not the same thing. Both are right-wing populists, but one is a southern populist and used to be Democrat, the other is a northern anti-immigrant populist who allies with elitist pro-business conservatives and was always of the Republican line. One is more like a ''Bill the Butcher'' nativist, and the other is more like a Deep South agrarian. They are very different types of Americans, only united on some social issues, and they actually used to be on different teams, even though today we may think of both as Republican Tea Party voters. The progressive direction of America really changed things.

Southernization, Urbanization, and Big Government vs. Small GovernmentToday the Republican party doesn't have a notable progressive left-wing and the Democratic Party doesn't have a notable socially conservative right-wing.

Instead both parties have establishment and populist wings and the parties are divided by stances on social issues.

In other words, regional interests and the basic political identities of liberal and conservative didn't change as much as factions changed parties as party platforms changed along with America.

The modern split is expressed well by the left-right paradigm ''Big Government Progressivism'' vs. ''Small Government Social Conservatism,'' where socially conservative and pro business conservative factions banded together against socially liberal and pro business liberal factions, to push back against an increasingly progressive Democratic Party and America (and programs like the New Deal).

This tension largely created the modern parties of our ''two-party system,'' resulting in two ''Big Tents'' who disagree on the purposes of government and social issues. This tension is then magnified by the current influence of media and lobbyists, and can be understood by examining what I call ''the Sixth Party Strategy'' and by a tactic called ''Dog Whistle Politics'').

The result is that today the Democratic Party is dominated by ''liberal Democrats and Progressives''.

Meanwhile, most of those who would have been the old ''socially conservative Democrats'' (Dixiecrats) now have a ''R'' next to their name.

Just look at the 115th United States Congress under Trump (without naming names, look at Trump's administration and the current House and Senate, pick out modern conservatives from the south, then compare those seats to say, the 71st United States Congress under Hoover).

Don't try to oversimplify this to ''what Strom did,'' most of the changes happened over time, and the proof is in the platforms and voting records.

Today things are still changing, Berniecrats are new, and so are Trumpians, even the Tea Party has been changing. The two parties are constantly changing ''Big Tents'' of factions, they aren't static things.

The Tension Between Rural Regions and City Regions is as Old as the Federalists and Anti-FederalistsWith the above covered, there is a reason the Northern Coasts and Cities are in one party and the Rural South and Mid-West are in the other party in almost any era (taking into account ''winner-take-all'' at least), with this being true even when the parties switch.

This is because a major divide is between the political, economic, and social interests of rural regions and citied regions (and between their related inequalities and cultural differences, and between the interests of the Bosses, Cronies, and Corporations who sway the vote in given regions).

Learn more about How the Tension Between City Interests and Rural Interests Affects Politics, not just on a national level, but on a state and regional level too (and make sure to read up on VO Key).

The better you understand this tension, the better you'll understand that age-old Federalists / Anti-Federalist, Republican / Democrat, or North / South split in any era (which is really a North and Coast vs. South and Mid-west split where notably the North and Coasts have more cities).

We are all Democrats, we are all Republicans, we are all Federalists, and we all love liberty.

We are all Americans.

We simply disagree on specifics (sometimes only split regionally by a slim gerrymandered margin or a single debate over a single voter issue), and thus we form factions and voting blocs around those differences (in Democratic spirit).

The changing factions responding to newly arising voter issues is the main thing that ''changed'' the parties.

Still, not everything changed (for example the Republican stance on trade and the Democratic Party stance on immigration). That is explained in excessive detail below.

Now that you know about the rural vs. city split, and the big changes like those of Lincoln's time, those of Teddy's time, and the shifting Solid South (and how that is different from a Bryan or FDR or Kennedy), take a look at the time-lapse video below which shows the U.S. Presidential election results map, both by state and by county, from 1789 to 2016.

Here you can see the solid voting blocs that switch, oddities like the Black Belt, and proof that the country is more diverse and complicated than party politics or the electoral map elude.

U.S. Presidential Election Results (1789-2016). Consider starting with Lincoln's 1860 election forward to really see the different factions (including the Solid South Southern Democrats who seceded over ''States' Rights'' and other things.)TIP: See a Summary of How the Major Parties Switched, the New Deal Coalition and Conservative Coalition (the two factions that help tell the story of the big switch), and our other works on the subject of ''party switching'' (which include the story of Lincoln, the history the Democratic party and slavery, a Fact-Check of Hillary's America: The Secret History of the Democratic Party, the anti-Federalists and Federalists, and the Republicans of Reconstruction) for additional perspectives.

NOTE: This page is more like a long essay and less like a blog post, you can get away with just reading the first part, but consider skipping around to different parts or book-marking it and coming back. Each section tells a different part of the story. We will answer any and all questions posted below. Feel free to comment (even if you didn't read the whole thing).

FACT: If the above didn't make it clear, the tension between the ''States' Rights'' Conservatives of the Southern Bloc and the Rest of the Democratic party essentially starts 1789 with tension in the anti-Federalist party, continues to Jackson, splits the party in Civil War, doesn't exactly help Bryan, results in Wilson, and is part of the story of FDR, but it really picked up steam after WWII over Brown v. the Board. From there we start getting the ''States' Rights'' third parties. Then Civil Rights 1964 and Voting Rights 1965 is the tipping point. Yes, many Republicans voted for Civil Rights and Voting Rights. Indeed. The parties really did change from 1964 to the 1990's to today, that is kind of the point of this whole thing. Explaining that slow transition and what it means is one of many reasons this page is long and not short. Still, if you get that we are talking about ''factions'' first, and ''Big Tents'' second, you get the gist of what the specific details below will explain.

''If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you.'' '' LBJ had a mouth on him, but all his faults aside, the Progressive Southern Democrat ended up on the right side of history in terms of his Great Society programs. Today many planks of the Republican Party seek to undo LBJ's work (and Lincoln's, and Wilson's, and FDR's, and Obama's etc).

A Response to the Claim Welfare is Equatable to SlaveryIn the 1850's, inequality in the Northern ''big government'' cities, northern immigration in the big cities (and the related racism and classism), and African slavery in the ''small government'' south (and the related racism and classism) all existed side-by-side'.... and in ways, so it is today (minus the slavery). Northern cities still favor bigger government, and they still have problems of racism and inequality, Rural South still favors small government (and they still have issues of racism and inequality). This does not make the North of today equatable to the slave economy of the South of yesterday however.

There is this idea that welfare is equatable to slavery in this respect, as in both cases a societal structure is providing basic essentials for a class of people (who some would claim are oppressed by the situation to the benefit of some elite). This argument, often presented in tandem with the claim ''the parties didn't switch/change'' is essentially a red herring that misses the nuances we describe on this page (I hear it enough that I want to address it here before moving on).

The southern conservatives who held slaves and fought for the Confederacy essentially switched out of the Democratic party starting in the 1960's, and even continuing to the modern day (although the changes had most occurred by 2000), in response to LBJ's welfare programs (after forming a coalition with Republicans in response to Wilson and FDR's welfare programs prior). In other words, if the southern conservative had wanted to oppress a class of people with welfare, one would logically assume they wouldn't have switched out of the Democratic party over time in response to welfare programs.

What we see in the cities of the north is instead more like what we have seen since before the Civil War, it is the inequality capitalism breeds, and the related state-based solutions generally favored by cities (like welfare). When African Americans migrated to northern cities in the Great migrations, they (much like the European and other immigrants) were subject not only to the inequalities of a capitalist melting pot, but to the general racism and classism that exists outside of party lines. Thus, it should be little surprise that the modern Democratic party is a coalition of those who immigrated in those times, urbanites, and party leaders who remained after the switch.

It is important to understand that bourbon liberals (pro-business factions who came to the South after the Civil War to become Democrats), neoliberals, neocons, progressives, conservative pro-business Republicans, liberal Democrats (like Kennedy), classical liberals (like the Free-Soilers or Jeffersonians), social conservative Know-Nothings, social conservative southerners (like the old Confederates), etc are all different ideological factions that have existed in history and have been in one of the two major parties or a third party at different times. The social conservative south were the ones who dragged slavery with them up to the Civil War and then combated Civil Rights from the Democratic party up until they were pushed out of the party by the progressive movement which had gained traction since the Gilded Age.

Thus, although it is complex to explain (and vastly under-explained right here), equating chattel slavery and wage slavery, and then tying it back to the 1850s-1860s, really misses the nuances of history (again it is red herring as it sounds like it applies to the argument, but doesn't). Think of all the nations on earth with welfare states, in all cases are they not generally spurred on by the progressive factions to strive for social equality? Are the small government and conservative factions not the ones who oppose this?

Today it is a Southern Republican who flies to Confederate flag, today it is a Republican who champions small government in America. Yesterday, it was a Southern Democrat.

TIP: Remember, this does not speak to the many other factions and why they did or didn't ally with this faction in any era. Nor does this truism or the claim we are addressing speak directly to people alive today (as we are tracing parties and ideologies over time, no person alive today was alive in 1850, and very few were adults in 1950'... plus, people like parties ''change'').

TIP: There is more on this subject below, I don't want to offer too much space to any one aspect of this long discussion at any point, so keep reading for more proofs.

Understanding the Basics: How the Parties Changed, General U.S. Party History, and Why the ''Big Switch'' isn't a MythAbove we did an introduction, this next section takes a very general look at how the major parties changed and how factions changed parties.

To sum things up before we get started discussing specific switches, both major U.S. parties used to have notable progressive socially liberal left-wing and socially conservative right-wing factions, and now they don't.

Originally, like today, one party was for ''big government'' (originally the Federalists, Whigs, and Republicans) and one party was for ''small government'' (Anti-Federalists, Democratic-Republicans, and then Democrats).

However, unlike today, party lines were originally [very roughly speaking] drawn over elitism and populism (by class / by rural vs. citied interests) and preferred government type more than by the left-right social issues that define the parties today, as the namesake of the parties themselves imply (where Democrats favored a more liberal democracy, and the Republicans favored a more aristocratic liberal republic).

In those days both parties had progressive and conservative wings, but the Southern Anti-Federalist, Democratic-Republican, and then Democratic Party was populist and favored ''small government'', and the Northern Federalist, Whig, and then Republican Party was elite and favored bigger central government.

However, from the lines drawn during the Civil War, to Bryan in the Gilded Age, to Teddy Roosevelt leaving the Republican Party to form the Progressive Party in 1912, to FDR's New Deal, to LBJ's Civil Rights, to the Clinton and Bush era, the above became less and less true.

Today, the Republican Party doesn't have a notable Progressive Socially Liberal ''Federalist'' Elitist Hamilton, Lincoln, Roosevelt wing, and the Democratic Party doesn't have a notable Socially Conservative ''Anti-Federalist'' Populist Jackson, Calhoun, George C. Wallace wing. TIP: Each party still has a ''left'' and ''right'', and certainly both have classically liberal and classically conservative values, but the Democrats lack a prominent socially conservative wing and the Republicans lack a prominent socially liberal wing (and this is a thing that has notably changed).

Instead, today the parties are polarized by left-right social issues, and each party (each ''Big tent'' Coalition of single voter issue factions) has a notable populist and elitist wing.

Modern Republicans are a ''Big Tent'' of conservative right-wing populist and elitist ''single voter issue'' factions. They have their Socially Conservative Tea Party right-wing Nativist Populists (both States' Rights Right-Wing Dixie Populism like Sessions, and Know-Nothing America First Nationalism like Bannon, plus other right-wing populist factions like the Religious Right) and their Classically Conservative Neocons (their ''establishment'' liberal-conservative business faction like McCain or Romney), all of whom favor ''Small Government'' (rhetorically at least).Likewise, the modern Democratic party is a [mostly] equal and opposite ''Big Tent'' of populist and elitist socially left factions. They have their Progressive Left Populists (like Bernie) and their Neoliberals (which is a mash-up of the southern and northern ''establishment'' conservative-liberals with their ''big city machines'', both of which can be seen in the Clintons; or Al Gore and Obama if you like), both of whom favor ''Big Government'' (especially for social issues).TIP: There are more factors to consider, such as the fact that party members and factions generally come in conservative, moderate, liberal, progressive, and radical forms and stances can change per issue. For example a ''progressive left-wing social liberal populist'' will generally be ''to the left'' of even a ''moderately liberal right-wing pro-business conservative'' on most social issues, and thus they will likely be in the Big Tent Democrat.

Although nothing that happened is simple or singular, generally, what happened is the aforementioned ''elite northern socially liberal progressive'' and ''southern socially conservative populist'' factions effectively ''switched parties'' (along with their voter base and fellow politicians) over party stances on ''key voter issues'' (like Civil Rights and Globalization; the history of switches is all about single-voter-issue factions), as can be seen in the New Deal Coalition and Conservative Coalition, and that was enough to flip the party platforms and the voter map geographically (as can be seen by comparing 1896 to 2000, and generally here).

Essentially, one can explain this by saying ''the progressivism and modernization of the 20th century under figures like FDR, LBJ, Clinton, and Obama resulted in conservative factions in both parties banding together and pushing back under Hoover, Nixon, Regan, Bush, and Trump.''

Today, with the effects symbolized by the New Deal and Conservative Coalition having already taken place, we can say the Republican Party is generally a coalition of socially conservative and pro-business right-wing movements previously found in both parties, and the Democratic party is generally a coalition of socially liberal and pro-business left-wing movements previously found in both parties. In reality, their stance on the state changes voter issue to voter issue, but generally it is this left-right split over social issues that results in the parties being ''Big Government'' and ''Small Government'' respectively.

What didn't change is the left-wing Democratic Party Anti-Federalist populists (like Jefferson, Bryan, or Bernie) and conservative right-wing Republican Federalists (both know-nothing and pro-business) never changed parties (they just got new allies and new platforms). Likewise Bourbon liberals have essentially been with the Democrats since Reconstruction (although one can argue some went to the Republicans over time). Also, the ''big city'' Democratic Party machines have long been a part of the Democratic Party's story. Also, the parties have been in their current big-government / small-government (rhetorically at least) forms since the 1920's with Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover. Furthermore, Republicans have always been strict on immigration and protectionist, and the Democrats always pro-immigrant (and had historically been for free-trade before becoming ''neoliberal''; which adds complexity). FACT: Lincoln disliked Free-Trade, implemented the first income tax, created the first free colleges in the U.S., and used the Federal Power of the State to restore the Southern rebels to the Union; Lincoln is a good place to look for what did and didn't change (as is Hamilton who inspired both Lincoln and Clay and Theodore Roosevelt). On the other side Jackson, Van Buren, Jefferson, and Calhoun are good Democrats to look at for similar reasons (each representing a different type of Democrat).

Thus, although many things change over time, in modern times one of the main things that switches is the socially conservative Democrats (notably including many Dixiecrats) switched from the 1960's to the Bush era (very slowly; Thurmond aside, not in a clear all-at-once switch; partly due to the Sixth Party Strategy, partly due to changing times and self interest).

One last note before moving on, it is important to understand that we are discussing intergenerational switches, so there is a complexity to consider which is: general ideological factions switch over the course of generations more than all-at-once (in most cases, not in the 1850's and 1860's as much, that happened quickly). When we pair this with the fact that the times and parties have generally themselves changed, we can understand how oversimplifying this to ''all the racists became Republicans'' is an underwhelming simplification given the fact that so many different things changed (we have barely scratched the surface here yet).

Thus, to summarize the basics: some [not all] things change, but regardless, entire party platforms and much else changed as the key voter issues the factions were rallied around ebbed and flowed in importance in state and national politics (consider not only does the nation as a whole have political factions which form the basis of the national two-party system and third parties, but each state has its own internal political factions that form around key voter issues, identity, and general ideology).

If you got this far, do yourself a favor and watch the two next videos from VOX. VOX explains large parts of the story, including the connection between ''progressivism'', ''conservatism'', ''the minority vote'', and the historic major parties and their policies.

NOTE: While I have your attention third parties like Know-Nothings, States' Rights, Populist, Progressive, American Independent, Southern Democrat, and Constitutional Union tell the story of ''switching platforms'' well. Each denotes a major faction who is emblematic of ''a single voter issue'' (or two) and otherwise major changes. You can see major third party platforms here. It is no mistake that we see third parties in years like 1856, 1860, 1892, 1912, 1948, and 1968, they are symbolic of major changes.

From white supremacy to Barack Obama: The history of the Democratic Party. In a sentence: The KKK used to be Democrats, and now they aren't, not after the effects of the Solid South switch and Southern Strategy (part of the overarching Sixth Party Strategy). The post-War 1960's really changed the Democratic Party, their liberal wing essentially took over (much to the dismay of the ''free enterprise'' Republicans).

How the Republican Party went from Lincoln to Trump. In a sentence: The Republican party used to be the party of Lincoln, but Teddy's exit, Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover, and the conservative coalition and Sixth Party Republican strategy changed that. The pre-Teddy republican Party and post-Teddy party are very different things.Now that we have the basics down, let's restate this all before moving on to notable specific switches.

Originally, the Populist Anti-Federalists, Democratic-Republicans, and then Democratic Party Platforms were about ''Small Government'' (as their names imply), Free Trade, and States' Rights and were favored in the rural-South, and the more elite aristocratic Federalists, Whigs, and then Republican Party Platforms were about ''Big Government'' (as their names imply), protectionism, taxes, and Collective Rights and were favored in the citied-North. However, today this has mostly ''switched'' (NOTE: some key stances on some key issues haven't changed, for example the Republican party has almost always been stricter on immigration and have generally favored trade protectionism; we cover nuances like this below).

In simple terms, what happened was both parties became pro-business in the Gilded Age after Reconstruction following the divisive Civil War which forced all factions to take sides, and then both parties became progressive in the Progressive era, and this and a series of events led to the Republican party becoming the party of small government over time (despite the party's aristocratic roots) and the Democrats becoming the party of big government (despite their populist roots).

Today business-minded NeoConservatives (establishment conservatives) ally with Tea Party Social Conservatives (populist conservatives) in the ''Right-Wing'' Republican Party, both agreeing that less Government is best, and business-minded NeoLiberals (establishment liberals) and Progressive Social Liberals (populist liberals) ally in the ''Left-Wing'' Democratic Party, both agreeing on the use of the State.

Each party essentially still has the Gilded Age business factions they have had since Reconstruction, but since the States' rights faction joined the Republican party, and since the modern Right political machine pushed conservative Populism, they have gained a more prominent populist wing.

The basic types of people still exist, they just exist with modern stances on key voter issues and in different coalitions.

The real story here, to distill it to one line, is that of a tug of war between big-state social justice liberals progressing toward a modern future and conservatives pushing to returning to a past age when things were ''great'' (that age is 1900 for modern conservatives, roughly 1775 for the Confederate era, and the 1820's for the old Young America movement).

The underlying basic ideology of people didn't change, it is just that the factions, tactics, and party stances have changed, and which party and factions wanted the above have changed.

This is to say, some things are consistent in our history, but the platforms (collections of official and unofficial stances on key voter issues AKA planks) and the party's socially minded factions have essentially ''switched'' to create the modern populist and neo-business wings of the parties (the major, but not only national wings'... we haven't even got to the importance of state factions, other factions, and third parties yet).

Of course, reality is more complex than ''the Conservative south and old Republican Progressive factions switched parties due to the events that occurred from the Gilded Age to the Bush and Clinton years which caused a southernization of the Republican Party'' or ''the party of small government became the party of big government as social issue took on new importance and this caused factions who favored small government or big government to switch parties'' or ''the States' Rights Socially Conservative Populists reshaped one party with their exit and one with their entrance while the Elite and Populist Progressives took hold of the other party''.

That is the gist, but describing specific causes and effects is more difficult, as these changes didn't happen in isolation (does the faction follow the platform, or the platform the faction, or the faction a single key voter issue? The answer is, ''all this, and more!''). History is too complex to just say everything in one consumable bite, and America is to diverse for this all to be just about one faction or one ideology.

This is to say, although a figure like Strom Thurmond, Lester Maddox, Bo Callaway, Robert Byrd, Henry A. Wallace, or Teddy can symbolize what did and didn't change, in the same way Civil Rights 1964 and Voting Rights 1965 can symbolize a motive, or the Progressive Bull Moose Party, the States' Rights ''Dixiecrat'' Party, Freedom Democrats, Southern Bourbons, the American ''Independent'' Party, and Goldwater Republicans can symbolize factions, or the ''Southern Strategy'' (both Hoover's and Nixon's) and what Hillary Clinton lovingly calls ''the Vast Right-wing Conspiracy'' (the other part of the Republican's ''Sixth Party Strategy'' AKA the semi-coordinated pushback against progressivism in the 20th century which spurred on the 20th century reversal) can symbolize a telling tactic, those looking for a clear all-at-once switch, a complete switch, or smoking gun won't find it.

With all of the above said, without further ado, there is notably one switch that is clearer than the others, and that is ''the Solid South Switch'' (the one most people think of as ''the big switch''; and the one I imagine draws the average reader here'... so let's discuss it directly).

The Solid South Switch and Southern StrategyAlthough it is hardly the only switch that happens in American political history, ''the Solid South Switch'' (which has thus far only been eluded to), is both one of the easiest to spot, easiest to prove, and one of the most impactful switches.

The Deep South, unlike most of the country, has often had a one-party system at the state level (comprised of competing factions in the same party, not competing parties, banded together in a single party over key issues of ''race politics and a legacy of war'' more than national issues in any era; although government size and rural vs. urban policy were always key secondary issues[15]), and that makes them an easy place to look for changes (as when they change, they change lock-step en masse and re-color the map).

To prove the switch, we can first confirm southern political history up to the 1950's via works like V.O. Key's Southern Politics in State and Nation (see an overview).

In his classic work of political realism, Key documents the history of the South to explain that what we might describe as Progressive Reformist Populists, Southern Socially Conservative Populists, ''Small Government Libertarians'', agrarian Southern Conservative business people, and [since Reconstruction] Bourbon Liberal Pro-Business Redeemers were all Solidly in the Democratic Party in the South from the Gilded Age to the start of the 1950's.[16][17]

This isn't to say there weren't progressive Republican factions, Gilded Age small business pro-Gold Libertarian-like Republicans, or America-First Know-Nothing Republicans in the North and South, this is to say, we are talking about the dominate solid south factions who vote in lock-step here (we'll discuss these other factions below).

From the start of the 1950's (where Key leaves us) on, we can then confirm the consequent changes via the Republican southern strategies (both Hoover's starting in the 1930's which affects the later years, and Nixon's in the 1960's following Civil Rights and Voting Rights which had consequences that we still feel today; here we must also note both the Conservative Coalition and New Deal Coalition, Both Bushs' Southern appeal, Byrd, Carter, Gore, the Reagan Democrat Clinton's New Democrats, and things like that in general).

Then we can show how, even though not everything changes, this led to ''a switch'' over party stances on key voter issues.

Thus, we can point to the well documented history of the factions of the Solid South to show they were all historically solidly Democrat, then look at a voter map to see enough are Republican today to flip the map, and thus say ''the parties switched'', but the full-story of all the changes is even more complex, fascinating, telling, and humanizing than a talking point size factoid about Byrd factions, Bryan factions, Wilson factions, Henry A. Wallace factions, Thurmond factions that arise from differing factions within the one-party solid south states.

Still, if we do want our smoking gun, we can say the ''1968 Presidential Election where the liberal Democrat Humphrey, one of the last of the old gaurd Liberal-Conservatives Nixon, and the Solid South Conservative George C. Wallace go head-to-head following the progressive Dixiecrat LBJ's Civil Rights legislation and his 1964 Presidential election'' is a good place to look.

How the South Went Republican: Can Democrats Ever Win There Again? (1992). If you have an hour and an earnest interest in our history, this video will confirm and explain all our points about the ''Solid South Switch'' (one of many switches, but certainly one of the most impactful and notable). By the way, Nixon was a liberal-conservative, he knew how to reach across the aisle and talk to a liberal like Humphrey'... and how to reach out and woo a conservative Dixiecrat with his ''Southern Strategy''. Since ''the Switch'' there has been less ''reaching across the aisle''.The Republican Sixth Party Strategy '' Where the Tea Party and Alt-Right Come FromEverything noted so far leads up to one other thing that needs to be discussed on its own (you'll see it below in the story, but it is important to note).

After Voting Rights 1965 it wasn't just a matter of switching the South, it was a matter of taking that 1930's conservative coalition to the next level and the Republicans switching themselves (again, in response to the increasing social liberalism of America and the Democratic party).

No social conservative faction was strong enough on its own to win an election, not after Voting Rights, but together, under a strategically planned big tent, the social conservatives and establishment conservatives could create a siren-like Frankenstein's monster to push for free-enterprise (classically liberal and Gilded Age business interest) and socially conservative values against the progressive state an increasingly progressive Democratic Party (the reference to Frankenstein is a political metaphor made, not an insult).

This story involves:

The Powell memo, the southern strategy, the John Birch Society, the repeal of the Fairness Doctrine, Goldwater, Nixon, Reagan, Norquist, Roger Aisle, Lee Atwater, Karl Rove, Fox News, Reagan, Right-Wing Radio, Alex Jones, Rush Limbaugh, and ''a vast right-wing conspiracy'' aimed at getting the many different social conservative and establishment conservative factions to adopt each other's ideology (each not popular enough to win elections on their own, but in a ''Big Tent'' a force).

Essentially, the Conservative Coalition (both its business factions and socially conservative factions) in their fight against Communism and liberal democrats since WWI, but especially when their hand was forced post 1965, have created the modern right-wing populist political machine to counter the left's own political machine (''machine'' is a term that describes both literal coordination and the uncoordinated or loosely coordinated self interest of groups; AKA the ''conspiracy'' isn't fully ''a conspiracy'' as much as it is a coordinated and uncoordinated natural response to changing politics; Powell acknowledges this in his memo, let us not lose sight of that).

With the above said, this Sixth Party Strategy didn't just go after Southern Socially Conservative Democrats, but working class Democrats and moderate Republicans (as we can see in-action in the working class voter tug-of-war between Reagan, Clinton, Bush, Obama, Trump).

In other words, the strategy ''switched'' some to the Republican Party, but also further switched the party from Federalist-leaning to Anti-Federalist (so to speak).

This part of the story doesn't speak of neoliberalism and its rise directly, or progressivism or its rise directly, it speaks to the movement that responded to it all and resulted in Fox News, Right Wing Radio, the Tea Party, entities like Freedom works, and modern ''Big Tent'' Conservatism.

TIP: You can read the full story of the The Republican Sixth Party Strategy and the Big Switch here. The full story includes comments on the rise of New Deal progressivism to which the Conservative Coalition responds.

The Brainwashing of My Dad Trailer. If you can stomach the liberal bias (sort of built into the title on this one), and can keep in your mind that social conservatism is real and natural just like social liberalism, I strongly suggest watching this documentary as it explains the non-southern part of the strategy that caused the switch and resulted in our modern situation.TIP: In any era we can find our anti-Federalists and Federalists, obviously the faction that wants to abolish government and the IRS is ''anti-Federalist'' in their wanting to conserve back to 1900 before the income tax. Learn more about the different forms of conservatism.

With That Said, It is More Complex than We Can Just Say.With everything thus far said, we have only skimmed the surface.

The truth is, be we talking about the South or not, not every faction changes, and we have to account for more history than can fit in any essay. We have to account for changing platforms, changing voter bases, congressional changes over decades, battles between factions within states and parties, the changing [and unchanging] ideologies of factions and parties, technological changes of automation and modernization, business interested elites in both parties who tend to organize better and dominate, populists in both parties who can't always agree on divisive social issues, the general rift between key voter issues and social issues vs. economic issues, arguments over the size of state within parties, voter issues taking on new importances, single issue third parties, global politics, and so much else to fully tell this story.

This is to say, the history of the major U.S. political parties if of course more complex than can just be said'... which is why we use terms like ''parties switched'' and ''party systems'' to preface this long in depth essay.

A Summary of Party Systems, Realigning Elections, and Switching Factions in the Major U.S. Political PartiesNow that we have the essential basics down, let's do an overview of all the changes (not just the general points or the Solid South Switch).

Historians refer to the eras the changes resulted in as ''party systems''.

Each party system is defined by realigning elections or otherwise important elections like the elections of 1800, 1828, 1860, 1876, 1892, 1896, 1912, 1928, 1932, 1948, 1964, 1968, 1980, 1992, and 2000, key voter issues of the day like states' rights, workers' rights, social welfare, equal rights, central banking, and currency debates, and which factions were in which parties at the time like the New Deal Coalition and Conservative Coalition (the major parties are best thought of as coalitions of political factions who agree on key voter issues in any era; In the same way Bernie and Hillary are different types of Democrats, or Bush and Trump are different types of Republicans, so it is true for any era).

To make things simple (putting pre-Civil war factions like the Federalists and Anti-Federalists, Whigs and Second Party Democrats, and third parties like the Know-Nothings and Free Soilers aside for a second), we can say the ''red and blue states'' ''flipped'' between the Third and Sixth Party Systems (between Lincoln in 1860 and LBJ in 1964 to today) as the battle between the Union and Confederacy during the Civil War gave way to Reconstruction, Redeemers (elite pro-business Democrats), and the Gilded Age, which gave way to the Democratic Party progressive populist William Jennings Bryan and the Fourth Party Progressive Era, which led to Theodore Roosevelt's split from the Conservative Taft and exit from the Republicans along with his progressives, which led to the Republicans becoming increasingly classically liberal and conservative starting in the 1920's under figures like Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover, which led to the the Democrats becoming increasingly socially progressive under FDR in the 1930's at the start of the Fifth Party System, which led to the solid south conservative states' rights faction of the Democratic party favoring the Republicans in the post-'64 Sixth Party system by the 2000 election (despite those members who didn't ''switch'', enough did to flip the map).

Or, in a very general sentence, Solid South States' Rights and Tea party-esque Populist Conservatives in the Democratic Party and elite Social Liberal Progressives in the Republican Party essentially switched parties from roughly 1900 to 2000, which resulted in red and blue states flipping from north to south (as can be seen in the voting map video below).

Or, to frame this another way, this time speaking to both the changing factions and changing ideology of the major parties, and noting that generally speaking the Anti-Federalists became the Democrats and Federalists became the Whigs and then Republicans, we can say, in the late 1700 and 1800's Solid South Democrats like Calhoun (who himself switched from Federalist to Anti-Federalist early on), progressive Democrats like Jefferson, and inbetweeners like Jackson, and their populist factions formed the bulk of the Democratic party (they were anti-tax, anti-bank, small government, populist liberals favored in the south). Meanwhile elites, be they socially liberal or just business minded (like Hamilton, Adams, and Clay), dominated the Republican party and its predecessors (they were pro-tax, pro-central-bank, pro-federal power, elite liberals favored in the north).

That said, to complicate things, the Federalist line was historically anti-immigrant and nationalist and gave birth to (anti-Federalists and states' rights Democrats aside) the first Tea Party-like entities the Know-Nothings in the North and Anti-Masons in the North.

Despite this truism however, the Civil War forced factions to choose sides over slavery and expansion. Consequently, the Whig-allied nativist populist factions disbanded, the New Republican Party formed, and ultimately the first Republican President Lincoln was ''no Know-Nothing''.

Here we can note that 1. the Tea party and Progressive spirit was born in both parties, not one (this is also true for other factions like ''Libertarian''). 2. the fact that the anti-Federalist / Democrat line is pro-immigrant in the North, despite its states' rights stance in the South, is part of what results in a progressive party over time. 3. both parties' stance on immigration, and by extension that aristocratic federalist-like nationalism, is one thing that never really changes. 4. and that ultimately, even up to the Civil War, one must concede complexities over states' rights and slavery aside, the Democrats are to the left of the Republican line on most issues of liberty and authority (as in they wanted less government, they were ANTI FEDERALIST be they Jeffersonian Progressively Classically Liberal or Solid South Progressively Socially Conservative).

Then, adding complexity from here on, after the Civil War, elite business-minded Redeemers like Cleveland joined the Democrats, making both parties business-minded and elite in the Gilded Age (so pre-Gilded Age, Republicans were the ''big business'' ''elite'' party, but after Reconstruction and the Gilded age, both have elite factions; each just as likely to be found in NYC).

Then, adding even more complexity, the pushback against the Gilded Age led to both parties becoming very progressive by the early 1900's (the Democrats still more populist under figures like Bryan and Wilson, the Republicans still more elitist under figures like McKinley, Teddy, and Taft).

Then, as the big-government social liberal nationalist Theodore Roosevelt left the Republican party in 1912, and figures like the small-government anti-Communists Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover took over in the 1920's, and as figures like FDR, Kennedy, Johnson, and Clinton took over the Democratic party from 1932 -1996, things changed. Many progressives left the Republicans for the Democratic party, and the Solid South faction left the increasingly socially liberal Democrats to join the increasingly socially conservative Republicans (slowly, over time, as we can see by looking at Congressional Seats over time and the voter base over time).

This Teddy to Hoover switch, oddly [historically speaking], led to the Democrats becoming a more elite party and the Republicans becoming the party of small government and states' rights (despite the elitism of the neocons, their message of deregulation is on paper one of classically liberal ''states' rights'' small government and nativist ''Tea Party'' populism; it is clearly a mashup of the states' rights south, nativist north, religious right, and neocons, where even though only the States' Rights Solid South is really out of place historically speaking, it on paper flips the map, flips some platform planks, and over time re-colors some ideology).

This general tension described above can be seen in the states' rights and progressive parties in American history, or seen in figures like Henry A. Wallace and Strom Thurmond, and is, as noted above, [for me] best illustrated by the New Deal Coalition and Conservative Coalition.

To frame this yet another way, the nearly unified Democratic-Republicans of the First Party System aside, it used to be that part of what today call the Tea Party, Populist Progressives (like Bernie Sanders), and the States' Rights Solid South were in one party (anti-Federalists and then Democrats) and the elite pro business, northern-like populist nativists (later the Know-Nothing third party), and elitist progressives were in the other (Federalists, Whigs, Republicans), but as just eluded to, this is complicated by the third parties that formed around key voter issues and policy stances.

These third parties which took unique stances and add complexity to America's political story include, as noted above: Know Nothings (pre-Civil war northern nativists who were like a precursor to the Tea Party and were sometimes allied with the Whigs; like Bryan like Progressives, these are a faction who ''didn't switch''), Free Soilers (a pre-Civil War party, who once nominated former Democratic President Martin Van Buren for president, who wanted to end slavery at its own pace by looking to a states' rights solution), War Democrats and Southern Unionists (Democrats allied with the North during the Civil War), and the People's Party (a progressive populist party of the northern and southern worker, popular in the mid-west, which had its roots to the reform movement, these type of Progressives were alway Democrats). These Third Parties represent the key voter issues of nativist nationalism, states' rights, and progressivism and reformism which impact all the major parties.

Voter issues and Third Parties before the 1850's aside, the events leading up to the Civil War forced everyone into parties based on positions on slavery and expansion. Then, as noted, confusingly we have the Gilded Age where both parties become elite and pro big business (we can here-forth call these elite factions neoliberal/bourbon liberals and neocons'... which at times can be impossible to tell apart). Then, again, there is the progressive era where both parties return to being progressive, again showing us the different types of progressives (just compare Wilson, Teddy, Taft'... and you know, the Socialist Debs too while you are at it).

Then, it is after this that the major switching happens, which just so happens to leave us with Populist Progressives, elitist Progressives, and Bourbon Neoliberals on one side, and Tea Party populists, the States' Rights South, and Neocons on the other side (a side that is today more statist than its Libertarian cousin and, eventually, in the modern cycle, long after Bryan's Scopes Monkey Trial and the rise of the Reformists, includes the faction ''religious right'').

In words, social progressives like William Jennings Bryan and states' rights supporters like Strom Thurmond might both share a populist anti-elite liberal ideology and a long party history (with both having more in common with a Jefferson than an Adams), but this is not the era of Jefferson or even Jackson, and today those factions are not in the same party (in modern terms, the Tea Party of the South and liberal Progressives of the South aren't in the same party, nor do they agree on the use of the state).

Likewise, Hamilton, Lincoln, Cleveland, the Roosevelts, Hoover, and Reagan may all share history and aspects of elitist classically conservative ideology, but just like the parties were different in the Gilded Age and Progressive era, they are again different today (in any era the elite factions are as diverse as the populist factions, Reagan is elite in favoring deregulation and business like Hoover or Cleveland, but Lincoln and the Rooselvets were elite in their use of the state to ensure social justice at home and abroad; remember it's more about factions and voter issues than just being elite or progressive alone'... sometimes).

To add one more note before we move on, figures like Eisenhower, Nixon, Reagan, Bush, and Clinton can all be described as conservative-liberals. Some are more like Wilson and Cleveland, some are more like Taft and Hoover, but in all cases the differences are less pronounced than the differences between the Tea Party, States' Rights, and the Progressive Left factions on a given social issue. This is to say, when looking for clear signs of changes in the parties, it always helps to look at a President, Party, Faction, or Voter's views on divisive social issues first, and then to move on to positions on trade, banking, taxation, subsidization, etc.

Moving On, and Notes for SkepticsWith the above said, any shorthand way to describe how ''changing factions'' led to what we can call ''changing parties'' it is bound to leave out key details, as the full story is as complex as American history.

Below we tell the long and complicated history of the American parties and party systems in order to illustrate the changing platforms, parties, members, and factions and to find out what did or didn't change. The idea is to prove a point (like the Democrats are now ''the good guys''), it is to accurately portray our history.

I would say to the skeptics: we can have a real conversation here about what did or didn't change in each party, but the history presented here, the changing Congressional seats over time, the changing voter base of the parties over time, and more show that there are many very real and important changes to discuss.

Let us not rewrite the history of the South (or any other faction) for modern political expediency (the way Ted Cruz tried to with the KKK), American history is already well-documented (V. O. Key's classic Southern Politics in State and Nation comes to mind; as does Calhoun's 40 years in Government; as do the well-documented justifications for the Civil War.)

Sure today we all want to identify with Lincoln the First Republican President, but does this not do a disservice to the half of the nation that succeeded in the name of States' Rights and small government in response to that Republican won election?

We might be tempted to look at the Union and Confederates as ''bad guys'' and ''good guys'', but that view is overly simple. This isn't about ''good'' vs. ''bad'', this about different American factions, with different opinions on liberty and equality (with different ''states'' of mind), dealing with the reality of a liberal and Democratic Republic, ideally trying to find Unity and ''Good Feelings'' despite their differences'... who sometimes ''change parties'', including changing to third parties, often over single key voter issues, like Civil Rights and States' Rights.

Of course, if there is one bonus in everyone trying to appropriate Lincoln, it is that perhaps we will all heed his advice that ''a house divided against itself cannot stand'' (or in modern terms, we live in a Democratically minded Republic in which the nature of our government requires compromise between the powers, the two major parties, and their many factions in any era).

So, in the interest of not dividing the house due to a forgotten history, let's examine our 240 years of American history carefully. In doing so we will better be able to spot the populist and elite, left and right, city and rural interests that differ by regions of north-east, south-east, mid-Atlantic, mid-west, south-west, north-west, and west which we in any era call ''the North'' and ''the South'', or after the 1860's, Democrats and Republicans (see 2012 election maps by county for a true feel of where the actual blue/red divides are).

To fully understand our complex history we will need to consider how each party's stance on the issues (including their official and unofficial ''platforms'' and the ''planks'' of those platforms; see Historic Political Party Platforms for examples) evolve though the ''Party Systems'' as the parties change (for example how positions on trade, banking, religion, currency, military policy, and social welfare and general ideologies change from the Gilded Age to Modern Age), how specific changes in Congress and the voter-base denotes changes, and how third parties like the ''states' rights'' and ''progressive'' parties change things as well.

To see a visual of how this all results in the ''red and blue states'' switching, simply watch the video below. For an alternative viewpoint, check out the story of William Jennings Bryan, the father of modern American left-wing and right-wing populism (as his story explains Jackson, the Redeemers, and the populists and elites of the Gilded Age and Progressive era; this thus makes him one of the most telling figures in history next to Jackson, Lincoln, and the Roosevelts).

U.S. Presidential Elections 1789-2012. This video shows each U.S. election result from 1789-2012 with party names and voting maps. Given it shows each election, it illustrates some of the major switches clearly.NOTE: The colors that have represented the parties have also changed over time. Despite this fact, the video above (like most modern sources) represents Democrats as Blue and Republicans as Red, as has been a tradition since the 2000 election.

TIP: Speaking of learning about our history in video form, see Keith Hughes' series on American Elections, CrashCourse American History, and Tom Richey's American history videos'.... and don't hate me but see also: Growth, Cities, and Immigration: Crash Course US History #25 (slavery is an issue in the south, but in the North it is more about immigration of Irish, Germans, Italians, Catholics, etc), Nativism History (in the North it is nativism as a response to immigration, from this comes groups like the Know-Nothings), John C. Calhoun (an old Southern Conservative Democrat, he begins the states' rights argument), Calhoun's Prophecy, The Compromise of 1877 Explained: US History Review (Reconstruction ends before the Deep south is ''redeemed''), The Gilded Age (Redeemers, Party Bosses, Carnegie, and Setting Civil Rights back 100 years), APUSH Review: Tammany Hall and ''Boss'' Tweed (Party Bosses speak to these gang-like entities who run the DNC, constantly giving the progressive wing a hard time from Bryan, to FDR, and Sanders, and help explain why the major cities have inequality issues, some southern party bosses were Solid South Confederates; the rest were northerners allied with the North in the War), MOOC | The Redeemers | The Civil War and Reconstruction, 1865-1890 | 3.9.2 (the Neoliberal Bourbon liberals ''Redeem'' the south AKA show them how to replace slavery with ''northern business practices''; they aren't the Solid South, they are more like Carpetbaggers and Scalawags), The Election of 1896 Explained (enter Bryan and the Populists), Woodrow Wilson Distinguishes Between His Democrats and the Progressive Party of 1912 (Wilson the Southern Conservative Progressive is different than the Nationalist Teddy), The 1920 Election Explained (Harding begins the Republican small government party as the progressive wing leaves), Untold History: The Rise and Fall of a Progressive Vice-President of the USA (Henry A. Wallace, what a real progressive looks like), America First Explained: US History Review (Red Scare, Anti-Communism, and America first; of course the Nationalist Nativist South is going to ally with the growingly right-wing Republicans'... after the States' rights parties fail from the 40's to 70's), The 1968 Election Explained (if we have to name one cycle that ends the union between the South and Bryan-like or Kennedy-like Progressives, it is 1968), Lester Maddox -George Wallace '' Ross Barnett- part 1, Exclusive: Lee Atwater's Infamous 1981 Interview on the Southern Strategy. Really, really, history backs up our point of view, the Walrus wasn't Paul and the idea that the parties didn't switch is an alternative fact'... comments welcome below, happy to debate what history means or help clarify a question that hasn't been answered.

CONSIDER: Andrew Jackson (the first Democratic Party President '' 1829) was a southern states' rights populist and ''Jacksonian'' Democrat, which (in terms of individual rights, small government, and economic ideology) is similar to today's socially conservative libertarian. Said plainly, Jackson had a little bit of Bernie Sanders in him, but essentially he was a Tea Party guy that can be contrasted his contemporaries Clay and Calhoun. Lincoln (the first Republican President '' 1861) was an anti-slavery Republican in his day. In terms of pushing for social justice, using federal power, and taxation his position was similar to today's progressive social liberal. In modern terms, Lincoln was a bit of an ''income tax supporting'' ''elitist'' ''social justice warrior'' who can be contrasted with his contemporary War Democrats and Southern Unionists like Andrew Johnson and more Conservative or more Radical Republicans (Lincoln was a moderate). Add in figures like Bryan, Calhoun, Cleveland, and Coolidge, or Byrd, Gore, and Thurmond, look at the Great Triumvirate, and consider Teddy Roosevelt is a Republican and FDR and Democrat, and we know that something changed. This page and our related ancillary pages are about ''what exactly changed'' and ''what the changes mean'' from a modern perspective in a way that respects all of America's diverse factions.

TIP: Both the Tea Party and modern left-wing progressivism have roots in both parties, they don't share ideology on how the state should be used any more than Andrew Johnson or Lincoln did, but they both generally favor liberty. Differences between key figures like Jefferson, Hamilton, Lincoln, Bryan, and the Roosevelts add complexity to conversations of individual and collective liberty, equality, and rights'... but such can be expected in a country founded on the principles of liberalism in which the founders still managed to disagree then as much as we do today. See an essay on the types of American populism, an essay on the types of American Progressivism, and an essay on the American left and right for a better understanding on the different types of American ideologies which form the factions that comprise the political parties. For more reading, see also: How the 19th-Century Know Nothing Party Reshaped American Politics From xenophobia to conspiracy theories, the Know Nothing party launched a nativist movement whose effects are still felt today.

NOTE: From Hoover to Bush, the ''southernization'' of the Republican party speaks to a melding of solid south states' rights conservatives and Tea-party-like northern conservatives, both of who are allied with ''elite neocons'' (why it is pro-Dixie, anti-immigrant, and pro-big business'... it is states' rights south, nativist north, and gilded age conservative mixed with the old Federalist roots). The charge used to be that it was easier to divide the nation by prejudice than it was by class. Perhaps this explains why neoliberals and progressives find themselves on the same side despite the class divide, and of course the same is perhaps true for their conservative counterparts. Or, maybe some voter issues simply divide us at our core more than class, and no visible hand is needed to stoke the fire? Perhaps this relates to Plato's ideal city-state where the division is by ''type of citizen'', and not by ''economic class''? Maybe the South is still just waiting for the North to show them respect? I don't fully get the implications, but history seems clear enough.

TIP: Hitler was a despotic right-wing fascist, despite being in the National Socialist party on paper. On the other hand, Teddy Roosevelt was (in many ways) actually a Nationalist Socialist despite being of the more aristocratic Federalist, Whig, and Republican party line. He had the nationalism so often found in that line in any era down to a ''T'', but was literally (not rhetorically like Hitler) also a progressive socialist, pushing hard for positive social policies at home, while using the Monroe doctrine abroad. Here we should note he wasn't purely nativist, as he was fiercely pro-immigrant, but he had that Federalist spirit, demanding immigrants embrace Americanism completely (see his ''assimilation'' quote). In all cases, he held a ''mixed'' progressive-conservative ideology that really speaks to the changing parties and different kinds of progressivism (especially that old Federalist-line Progressivism found in figures like Morris and Hamilton). Specifically, Teddy's ''mixed'' ideology speaks to a mash-up of left and right that is not as common in these days (and really it hasn't been too common in America since Teddy left to form the Progressive party back in the 1910s followed by figures like Henry A. Wallace, although Eisenhower perhaps speaks to this as well and perhaps Bush and McCain are spiritual ancestors of it too). FDR continued Teddy's ideology in spirit, but at that point it was in the Democratic party and part-Wilson Neoliberal (which is notably different than Teddy's ''New Nationalism Progressivism'').

CONSIDER: The KKK are and were a confederate faction, and they still sport the confederate ''battle'' flag as one emblem of their ideology. That was a flag of the old Democrats when they were called the Confederacy in the Civil War. The KKK became prominent in the Deep South during reconstruction as they pushed back against the forced ''military '' reconstruction policies of the northern Republicans. We know parties change, that is what the page is about. However, we also know that factions change parties, and this is the case for the KKK and some other states' rights factions once found in the Democratic party (as it is the case for other past factions described on this page). See: The Democrats were the Party of the Ku Klux Klan and Slavery.

CONSIDER: Today it may seem like ''the American Religious Right'' has a monopoly on religion, and that their form is the American value, but that isn't correct (especially not globally). The Religious Right is, at the best of times, an alliance of Religions that forms over key voter issues like abortion. However, it just as often seems more evangelical and political than simply ''religious''. Its evangelical Protestant first tone, especially when paired with American nativist nationalism, can even at times seem to alienate other Christians like Catholics and Christian Democrats as much as it does liberal atheists. This is like how the old anti-Masons publicly shunned the Masons or how others shunned the religious groups of the Great Awakenings like the Mormons. From this lens, the Religious Right is a bit like the Know-Nothing Version of religious politics. Here one should note that the movement doesn't really arise until the 1970's and 1980's, and its rise goes hand-in-hand with the rise of the New Conservative Coalition. Sure, the old anti-Masons were Whig-like and so the term ''right'' isn't misplaced, but it doesn't do the 1st Amendment much justice to equate the right alone with religious correctness. Religion is historically tied to politics, so these points, and others about the Holy Roman Empire, Reformers, Masons and the Revolutions, Catholic immigrants, witch trials, the Spanish inquisition myth, anti-semitism, socialists and atheism, and more are vital to grasp to place this conversation in historical context (although we tread lightly on the subject here).

TIP: If you want to see a shorter alternative version of this article, see: A Summary of How the Major Parties Switched (that page also deals with the whole ''ideology'' question that some of Dinesh D'souza's followers have). In simple terms, I'll say this: don't confuse Confederate ideology with the ills of social welfare or Northern inequality. Just because a northern ghetto is troublesome, doesn't mean social liberalism is equatable with slavery. Firstly, one of Calhoun's arguments for slavery was [paraphrasing]: ''The slave system of the South is superior to the 'wage slavery' of the North. By slavery intertwining the economic interests of master and slave it eliminates the unavoidable conflict that existed between labor and capital under the wage system. The amount of money a master invested in his slaves made it economically unfeasible to mistreat them or ignore their working and living conditions.''[18] So here we see ''Northern inequality'' is not a new problem, and it is not a Confederate-caused problem. To be very clear, there were northern Ghettoes in the 1800's. It is what the movie Gangs of New York is about. Which is, as noted above, the story of the Know-Nothings in NYC, a precursor to the Tea Party. A faction who would have allied with the Whigs before the Civil War. These being just two examples on what did and didn't change. (This issue is discussed more below, i'm happy to address it in a comment, and we discuss it elsewhere on the site, but unlike D'souza, I don't want to conflate it with this story'... as the answer is ''both parties have issues of economic and social inequality in any era'', not ''Bernie Sanders Progressives are Confederate Rebel flag waving Nativist nationalist populists'')'.... To be clear, in that Gangs of New York era (and we do mean Gangs), Party Bosses in the Democratic Party would have been on one side and Know-Nothings on the other. Why does NYC have ghettoes? Lots of reasons, one is the longstanding inequality of the north, one is the great migrations, another is opposition to desegregation and busing, but few of them are ''because of the Solid Socially Conservative South is voting the Democratic ticket in a secret plan to enslave everyone with welfare''. One can argue that some conservatives or Bourbons in the Democratic party have mixed-intentions in terms of welfare, but it is hard to argue that the dominate faction of Bernie or Obama Progressives do given their record on social justice. Pair this with the fact that the Solid South votes lock-step Republican for the most part today (as we can see on a map), and we can work out the rest of the logic from there. See Wage Slavery and Chattel Slavery are Different for more.

TIP: If you love uncomfortable stories, you'll love hearing about the argument over ''slave power and black suffrage''. You see there has always been a thought (as a conspiracy theory) that whomever controlled ''the black vote'' had a political advantage. Now consider this for immigrants. At first the Federalists / Whigs were annoyed with the South for their embracing of immigrants and controlling the voting of slaves. Then the South thought the northern Radical ''Progressive'' Republican elites were trying to enslave them by ending slavery and winning over the votes of freedmen. Then, the mass of immigration and migration of non-Protestant and/or non-Whites to the Democratic Party was more about factions within the Democrats (the Solid South faction not wanting to get voted out of its own party by progressives in eras like the FDR era). Then, it was about Republicans struggling against the Irish Catholic Kennedy, then LBJ's Civil Rights. Then Carter and Clinton try to win back some of the South ('94 Crime Bill, law and order)'... but now, in the W. Bush and Obama era and into the Trump era, with the South in the Republican party, it is about accusations from the right-wing of ''illegals voting'' and ''voter ID'' and that welfare is akin to ''enslavement''. So from the three-fifths to today, this is still a major political issue (for the politically expedient, progressives, and social conservatives). This is largely what the Ciivl War was really about, and Civil Rights (although obviously the progressives reject the argument that their moral cause is about politics). Very uncomfortable issue, but vitally important and at the core of the States' Rights argument. See the History of the Black Vote.

TIP: Republican is a reference to a Republican form of government, Democrat is a reference to individual focused Democracy. Both are liberal ideologies. Forget about slavery and segregation for a second, and think about ''the people, not the state, choosing who gets to do what''. Here you'll see that the original Democrats were more for individual and states' rights, and the original republicans more for elite state control and order. Add slavery back into the equation, now it makes the Republicans look like the social liberals'... and'... they were. They were, in many ways, ''Teddy Roosevelt like social liberals'' (social liberals who want to use the state to ensure social welfare and justice)'... until Teddy left the party to run in the 1912 election and then Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover reshaped the party into a individual focused small government prior to FDR's era. Remember though, there was a moment where there was only one major party, the Jeffersonian Democratic-Republicans. We are all Democrats, Republicans, Federalists, and liberty loving liberals'... we just don't agree on specifics, you know like ''federation vs. confederation''. The United States is a Constitutional Federal Republic (a federation of states with a Representative Democracy). The Constitution ensures the liberal values of Republicanism, Democracy, and Federalism. Hence the names of the American political parties.

TIP: Just so libertarians understand where they fit in. What we today call ''libertarian'' can be found in both historic parties, it is found in Jefferson's Democrats in the early years (although both parties were ''classically liberal'' and thus somewhat libertarian). However, in the Gilded Age, one could find small government and classical liberal sentiment in both parties. Then starting in the 1920's it was Harding, Coolidge, Hoover who really begin to define modern small government conservatism with their return to classical liberal economics after Teddy's split. Then, the spirit begins in earnest with Goldwater States' Rights Party (which is an alliance of Solid South and Libertarians; they ally on the small government part, not over social issues as much to be fair). This is to say, at one point what we today call progressives, libertarians, and states' rights confederates were all in the Democratic party ''because liberty''. Today states' rights and libertarians tend toward the neocons ''because not social liberal Progressivism and Neoliberalism''. In all cases, libertarians are pro-Gilded Age, anti-State, classical liberals who are different enough to form their own party (as they tend to be socially to the left of their States' Rights South and Nativist North ''small government'' allies).

''Liberty is to faction what air is to fire, an aliment without which it instantly expires.'' '' James Madison

The Founding Federalists and Anti-Federalists of the First Party SystemTo see how the parties have evolved properly from the founders to 2016, we can start by comparing pre-Civil War factions such as the founding Federalists and Anti-Federalists in the First Party System.

Here we can compare figures like the North Eastern Federalists Alexander Hamilton and John Adams to the Virginian Anti-Federalists Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry to get a sense of the two general types of ideologies that color America's future parties and factions (as illustrated by the Federalist and Anti-Federalist papers).

Here we can see the roots of progressivism and states' rights populism in the Democratic party and the roots of traditional pro-business conservatism in the Federalists. Here we can also note that, despite none of the founders supporting slavery, it is the small government mentality to Democrats that allows for slavery, while the Whig-like conservatism of the Federalists is more geared toward global trade and banking and less tolerant of the nefarious institution.

Although we can put the founders in two big tents and understand American history that way, looking at the nuanced views of the founders allows us to better understand the roots of the different types of liberal and conservative / elite and populist positions that we find in each party system.

Notable anti-Federalists and Federalists include: the southern Thomas Jefferson who was a radical liberal progressive who championed democracy, federalism, and republicanism, the northern Alexander Hamilton who was a conservative-liberal who helped establish the first national bank and favored global trade, the northern Gouverneur Morris who was a socially minded elitist progressive who hated slavery but came from a family of loyalists, the southern Patrick Henry who quoted Cato, a Tragedy saying ''Give me liberty, or give me death!'', the northern Benjamin Franklin who was a centered polymath and Freemason who favored a tax-based commonwealth model for states, the northern John Adams who was a rather elite conservative Federalist from Massachusetts who was respected by everyone (much like the southern George Washington was), the southern James Madison who was a Federalist and Anti-Federalist who wrote both the Federalist favored Constitution (which replaced the anti-Federalist favored Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union between the States) and the anti-Federalist favored Bill of Rights (which he based on the Anti-Federalist George Mason's Virginia Bill of Rights), the southern Samuel Adams who was a radical Anti-Federalist from the North who served as Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts under the anti-Federalist John Hancock (showing us that in any era ideology in any era can be found in both the north and the south), and more.

All the founders were classical liberals, as they were certainly not loyal conservatives of the Crown, but they were all very different types of liberals (having little more in common than an Elephant and a Donkey as it were). It was these differences that divided them by North/South, City/Rural, and Federalist/Anti-Federalist, and that divided them over related key issues like slavery, banking, military size, and trade. However, in as many ways in which they disagreed, they were United against King George III and for liberty, federalism, democracy, republicanism, and the principles of the enlightenment, finding compromise over the Constitution, Bill of Rights, and other important matters'... until the propaganda war between Adams and Clay vs. Jackson and Van Buren in the 1820's when mounting tension split the country.

''Men by their constitutions are naturally divided into two parties.'' '' Thomas Jefferson

''National debt, if it is not excessive, will be to us a national blessing.'' '' Alexander Hamilton

TIP: All the founders shared a love of reason. Their debates weren't based on emotion driven talking points, but on empirically backed evidence and critical thinking. They didn't just rebel against a King based on an aversion to Monarchy, they provided a mutually agreed on philosophical justification for their actions today known as the Declaration of Independence. It was the tools handed down by past rationalists and empiricists of the Age of Enlightenment (AKA Age of Reason), including by their predecessors like Hobbes, Locke, and Montesquieu, and by their contemporaries like Smith, Hume, and Kant, that allowed for such wildly different patriots to join together to form a great nation. With that said, although the anti-Federalists generally favored a more democratic society than the Federalists (hence their future name as Democrats, their support of the Confederacy, their support of the bicameral Virginia plan, and their support of the Bill of Rights) the founders ultimately agreed that they did not expect the common man to apply the same level of reason they did, and this is a large part of why they created a Republic with an electoral college, rather than a direct democracy.

''Well, Doctor, what have we got'--a Republic or a Monarchy?'' A woman asked Franklin upon leaving the Constitutional Convention. ''A Republic, if you can keep it,'' Franklin said (half joking).

The Democratic-Republicans and the Second Party SystemNow that we have the founders covered, we can examine the next generation of Americans starting with the tension between two types of Democratic-Republicans in the 1824 and 1828 elections, the ''establishment'' North Easterner John Quincy Adams (John Adams' son) and the ''populist'' Southerner Andrew Jackson. In these divisive races, we can see the start of modern party politics, the end of the Era of Good Feelings, and the start of the Second Party System. In the Second Party System, Adam's supporters become National Republicans before becoming Whigs, and Jackson's supporters become the ''Second Party Democrats''.

Finally, in terms of pre-Civil War factions pertaining to the two major parties, we can examine key figures like the southern pro-slavery intellectual John C. Calhoun and the centered Democrat Martin Van Buren and compare them to the spiritual father of the Republicans and leader of the Whigs the Kentuckian Henry Clay. We can also look at key policies like the Missouri Compromise and Kansas-Nebraska Act and other events leading to the Civil War, and examine the general mounting tension over issues of states' rights, popular sovereignty, and manifest destiny, to see the role of each in the splitting of the Whig and Democratic parties from the 1820's to late 1850's.

Here we can see clearly, a Jacksonian Democrat is not the same thing as a Calhoun states' rights Democrat (and neither are fully Jeffersonian). Where Jackson is a more right-leaning populist version of Jefferson, the sort of states' rights Calhoun and his pre-Confederates are calling for is a step beyond even this.

Finally, we can relate all this to the Civil War era factions, the Union and Confederacy, at the start of the Third Party System when the Whigs become the Republicans'... In fact, here we can't compare two parties (as the Democrats didn't exist from 1861 -1865), but can instead compare two Americas: 1. the southern Confederate States of America (and their copperhead allies in the North) and 2. the official United States of America (and their War Democrat allies in the North like Andrew Johnson and their Southern Unionist allies in the South) who went to war with the former southern Democrats over their attempts at secession.

We can classify all these the pre-Civil War factions by saying that the Federalists, National Republicans, Whigs, and Union were pro-north, pro-trade, pro-banking traditionally-conservative classical liberals focused on the collective and modernization (AKA ''City Interests'') and the Anti-Federalists, Second Party ''Jacksonian'' Democrats, and Confederates were pro-south, anti-central power, pro-state-power, anti-bank, socially conservative radical classical liberals focused on individual liberty and rural America (AKA ''Rural Interests'').

Meanwhile, we can note that ''third parties'' like the Free Soilers, who attracted pre-Civil War moderates from the north and south, and the People's Party, who attracted post-Civil War progressives from the north and south, tell an important part of the story of changing politics.

''Foreign powers do not seem to appreciate the true character of our Government. Our Union is a confederation of independent States whose policy is peace with each other and all the world'... The world has nothing to fear from military ambition in our Government.'' '' Polk describing Monroe Doctrine politics.

''The bank, Mr. Van Buren, is trying to kill me. But I will kill it.'' '' Andrew Jackson. When asked if the two term President had any last regrets, Jackson responded, ''[That] I didn't shoot Henry Clay and I didn't hang John C. Calhoun.'' (I.e. the nativist populist regretted not killing the southern and northern party leaders of the time, including his VP Calhoun). Likewise he said, ''John Calhoun, if you secede from my nation, I will secede your head from the rest of your body.''

Understanding the Changes in Pre-Civil War AmericaTo recap before moving on: In the late 1700's the American factions won their independence from Britain and formed a new country by compromising and coming together as Federalists and Anti-Federalists, in the early 1800's they found some unity under Jefferson as Democratic-Republicans, but from Jackson to the Civil War their differences pulled them apart with greater force than their commonalities united them together. The divisive new platforms of the parties create two polarized groups splitting America into Democrats/Confederates of the South and Republicans/the Union of the North by the start of the Civil War in 1861 under the Republican Lincoln who ran on a platform which opposed the expansion of slavery.

To understand how things ''went south'' so quickly, one has to understand how classical liberal positions can become socially conservative over time. The classical liberalism of Jefferson did not allow individual freedom for everyone, as it allowed for ''the freedom to own slaves'' and ''the freedom for states to be slave states''. Thus, what was once progressive had become socially conservative over time, it was still technically liberal in the classical sense, just certainly not socially progressive'... but of course, let us not paint any party in any era with a broad brush, as both parties in any era are compromised of factions who agree only to varying extents.

When the North decided it wouldn't tolerate slavery any more (a position that can be seen as progressive from one angle and despotic from another), it became more than a human rights issue, it became an issue of cutting off the only means by which the south had to compete with the north economically. The same is true for those ''sons of Samuel Adams'' (Northerners from the anti-Federalists line) in the North who were Northern nativist populists and Know-Nothings, they were against the new immigrants, catholics, and the blacks. They weren't slavers like the South, but they dealt with many of the same issues.

So the tension isn't just about the morality of slavery (or otherwise inclusive policy), it was about old views not fitting in to a new progressive and modern world (a world more accessible to an upper-class urbanite) and the pushback against this (as seen in everything from the Young America movement to Bleeding Kansas). This theme will play out again to account for the changes in the upcoming party systems where modernization spurs on progressivism which spurs on social conservatism, only leaving everyone all the more bitter, speaking of which, this brings us to ''Reconstruction'' (which at times is less about construction, and more about enforcing the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments and the Enforcement Act of 1870, pushing back against black codes like ''apprenticeship laws'' which re-enslaved and ''disenfranchised'' Freedmen, pushing back against paramilitary rebel factions like the Red Shirts and Ku Klux Klan, and military occupation of the south via the Radical Republicans' Military Reconstruction polices).

''I do oppose the extension of slavery, because my judgment and feelings so prompt me; and I am under no obligation to the contrary'... I am not a Know-Nothing. That is certain. How could I be? How can any one who abhors the oppression of negroes, be in favor or degrading classes of white people? Our progress in degeneracy appears to me to be pretty rapid. As a nation, we began by declaring that ''all men are created equal.'' We now practically read it ''all men are created equal, except negroes'' When the Know-Nothings get control, it will read ''all men are created equal, except negroes, and foreigners, and Catholics.'' When it comes to this I should prefer emigrating to some country where they make no pretence of loving liberty '-- to Russia, for instance, where despotism can be taken pure, and without the base alloy of hypocracy [sic].'' '' Abraham Lincoln 1855

''A house divided against itself cannot stand.'' '' Abraham Lincoln

''Let us have peace.'' '' Ulysses S. Grant

The Third Party System: Reconstruction and the Gilded AgePost-Civil War era politics in the United States can be understood by examining the Third Party System factions of Reconstruction and the Gilded Age.

In the Gilded Age things change in a major way due to both parties embracing cronyism (supposedly)'... but before we get there we need to understand Reconstruction.

The changes in the Republican party in this era are best explained by looking at the conservative, moderate, and radical Republicans of Reconstruction (who were split over how to treat the Southern rebels, with radical meaning those with harsh views toward the south, with conservative meaning those who wanted a quick return to normalcy even at the expense of social justice, and with moderates like Lincoln and Grant falling somewhere in the middle). Meanwhile factions like ''carpet baggers'' and ex-Southern Unionist ''scallywags'' are illustrative of different reconstruction Democrats.

Here it is vital to note one of the hardest things to talk about in American history, but I'll say it plain. The South didn't want to lose the war, they wanted to win, they didn't want to stop slavery, they wanted to continue it. They did not respond well to losing the war. Lincoln was immediately executed, Andrew Johnson took over, he was impeached, and the military had to occupy the south while the KKK committed what was frankly genocide against Freedmen.

As noted above, Reconstruction was part rebuilding, part Civil Rights (for example the Reconstruction Amendments and the Civil Rights Act of 1866), part enforcing actual ''law and order'' and preventing forced slavery under different names and murder (the murder of Republicans and Freedmen by southern conservatives, such as in the Colfax massacre), and part (back to our story) ''Redeemers''.

The Redeemers completely changed the Democratic party by unifying the non-racist factions (like the scallywags and carpet baggers) and moving the Democratic party toward business interests (the Redeemers helped to modernize the party and helped them to move away from the slave economy and into the Gilded Age).

This is where the linage of Cleveland, Wilson, LBJ, Carter, and even Clintons arguably come from. When people think ''the Democrats didn't change'', they are confusing Bourbon liberals with Solid South radical liberals. Yes they are both from the south, no they are not the same faction!

Anyway, before the south can be fully ''redeemed'', Reconstruction is ended abruptly by the ''Compromise'' of 1877 in which the South won the election but traded the Presidency for the end of Reconstruction (see: why it takes another 100 years to get a voting rights act; see: what marks the beginning of the corruption and cronyism of the Gilded Age; see: 1876's United States v. Cruikshank setting a president).

Generally in this era we can look to war hero Ulysses S. Grant and all the above events to confirm the Republicans are still ''the party of Lincoln'' going into the Gilded Age'... but the upcoming Gilded age in which everyone is pro-business changes everything, especially given Grant's sometimes laissez-faire attitude toward the crony factions in the Republican party (see Grant, Gilded Age corruption and reform).

After Reconstruction, in the Gilded Age of industrialization and cronyism after the war, we can see changes in the Republican party by comparing Stalwart conservative ''crony'' Republicans to the Progressive ''Civil Service'' Half-Breeds. Likewise, we can see changes in the Democratic party by comparing William Jennings Bryan's Progressive Silver Movement of the 1890's '' 1910's (a progressive populist movement that arose in a response to industrialization, and which ''swallowed up'' the Democratic Party and fundamentally changed it), to Grover Cleveland's pro-gold classical liberalism (which today we might describe as libertarian and will see in the Republican party, not the Democratic party, from Harding and Coolidge forward), to the traditional southern conservatives still in the party.

The Panic of 1893 marks the decline of ''robber baron'' era politics and marks the rise of socially minded movements like Marxism and the populist and progressive pro-worker and farmer movements of the north and south (like those led by the Mid-Western progressive populist William Jennings Bryan whose story is one of the most telling in American history in regards to the changes).[19]

Following the Gilded Age, with different types of progressives being in both parties, and workers' rights and social welfare taking precedence over issues of race, a new ''Progressive Era'' began.

The laws of accumulation will be left free; the laws of distribution free. Individualism will continue, but the millionaire will be but a trustee for the poor; intrusted for a season with a great part of the increased wealth of the community, but administering it for the community far better than it could or would have done for itself. '' Andrew Carnegie

The Fourth Party ''Progressive Era''The aptly named ''Progressive Era'' or Fourth Party System can then be understood best by examining the events leading up to the 1912 elections. Here we can compare the northeastern social liberal Republican Teddy Roosevelt's New Nationalism plan (and his split from Republican Taft as a Progressive Bull Moose) to Woodrow Wilson's progressive southern Democrat mixed-market New Freedom plan (and his Populist-Progressive pro-income tax supporting liberal Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan).

Ending the progressive era in the 1920's, with Teddy's progressives now largely absent from the Republican party, we we can see a changing Republican party under Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover (we even see a ''Lilly white southern strategy'' under Hoover which sets the precedent for the southern strategies of later Republicans like Nixon). The changes can be seen both in their favoring of classical liberal Cleveland-like Gilded Age economics to big government social justice, and in their related reaction to the Red Scare which had resulted in anti-Communism becoming a major voting issue for a growing base of Republican conservatives in post-WWI and Prohibition era America.

''You shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold.'' '' William Jennings Bryan

''Political parties exist to secure responsible government and to execute the will of the people.

From these great tasks both of the old parties have turned aside. Instead of instruments to promote the general welfare, they have become the tools of corrupt interests which use them impartially to serve their selfish purposes. Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government, owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people.

To destroy this invisible government, to dissolve the unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics is the first task of the statesmanship of the day.'' '' Teddy Roosevelt 's Bull moose Progressive Party Platform

The Fifth Party System and American Liberalism and ConservatismIn more modern times we can to look at the Fifth Party System in which race, social justice, the currency debate, religious issues like Temperance and Prohibition, and other issues of modernization seen in earlier systems had already split the parties into many factions. In this era, we can see a telling split by comparing the socially conservative anti-communist classical liberal Republican Hoover (who had a ''southern strategy'' and ends the Fourth Party era following the Great Depression) to the big government pro-worker social liberal Democrat FDR (who begins the Fifth Party era after barely winning his 1932 contested convention due to his strong progressive streak, which he shared with Republicans like the New Deal Progressive Henry A. Wallace, and which had at that point been out of style for a decade, and which was opposed by conservative party bosses in the Democratic party).

To fully grasp what happens from Hoover and FDR on, it'll help to quickly discuss American liberalism and conservatism and how they relates to other ideologies like progressivism.

Although we can see shadows of most modern political ideologies in any age of recorded history by looking to old nation-states like Sparta, Athens, and Rome or to revolutionary Britain, America, and France, American liberalism and conservatism undergo a noticeable change in the Gilded Age and Progressive era. Given this, the general tension over social issues, and thus the use of government, can be described in modern times as being between a few general political ideologies:

Classical liberalism, the original liberal philosophy of liberty, individual rights, and small government, like Jefferson, Hamilton, Cleveland, or Coolidge. This ideology comes in a number of forms including a radical form like Jefferson or the Jacobins in France, a social form that can be seen in the works of Rousseau for example, a religious form which simply wants religious freedom, and an economic form that favors Smith-style neoclassical economics as can be seen in the Bourbon liberal Cleveland in the Gilded Age, Bourbon liberal Wilson in the 1910's, Coolidge in the 1920's, or Ron Paul in modern times. The economic form of classical liberalism itself comes in a few different flavors. The dominate forms being libertarianism, which is pro-free market (the Ron Paul Kind), and a type of Hamiltonian conservative-liberalism often called Neoliberalism (the leftwing version) or Neoconservatism (the rightwing version). Here Clinton is a Neoliberal, Bush a Neocon, and Goldman Sachs a dash of both. In other words, this is a liberal position in that usury used to be a sin under the old church states. Its primary focus is markets, not social issues (even when it seeks to solve social issues via the market).Classical traditional conservatism, a complex ideology based on hierarchy, order, and tradition. It comes in three general flavors, each opposing a type of classical liberalism: authoritative, economic, and religious. The authority flavor favors the classic power structure of aristocracy, Kings, and order. Our executive branch ''deep state'' agencies exemplify this classical type of conservatism and certainly King George III did way back when. The economic flavors include, but aren't limited to forms of fiscal conservatism and a state controlled mercantile economy. Meanwhile, the religious flavors can be found on the left and right and include movements like Prohibition and Temperance, strict Catholic views on abortion or charity, witch trials, prayer in school, ideas like ''America is a Christian nation'', and more. In words, if it stands against liberal ideals of any kind in any era, its a type of conservatism, and if it stands against the classical forms of liberalism, its a type of classical conservatism.Social liberalism, an ideology which grows out of classical liberalism and classical conservatism with a focus on social equality. It supports progressive pro-government social justice like Teddy, Bryan, or FDR. Social liberalism is a bit like the old church states and kings. In other words, although it is the most progressive of all the ideologies, being the most focused on equality and social justice and compassion, it needs a really big stick to get social conservatives, classical liberals, and classical conservatives to play ball. Thus, it can be oddly authoritative despite being compassionately left-leaning, as can be seen in the war time tax rates under FDR for example.Social conservatism or paleoconservatism, an ideology focused on individual liberty and a romantic vision of ''what America used to be''. It grows out of classical liberalism and classical conservatism and stands against big government and progressive social movements and modernization, like Andrew Jackson or George C. Wallace (they want to ''conserve'' socially). Social conservatism is essentially classical liberalism in the modern age with a dash of strict classical conservatism on issues of immigration, protectionism, and religion. Small government is a classical liberal position, but when used in 2016 to strip protections from a minority group, it becomes a socially conservative position.TIP: Yes, that ''Leave it to Beaver'' ''ol' Eisenhower'' Americanism is a type of Conservatism, and we can see it in modern Presidents like Bush 41 and Nixon, and many who identify as Conservative identify as this, but this isn't what the outward message of the Republican Party of 2016 is. A majority faction of the current Republican party (what people call ''the new guard'' or ''new right'') has a mostly socially conservative message, both on social issues and religious issues, thus they have far more in common with ol' Dixie or McCarthy than with a ''real conservative'' like Winston Churchill. John McCain is an Eisenhower, sure, and Romney and Bush are those business-minded Gilded Age Republicans or even 1920's Republicans'... but Palin and Trump'... their message is nativist populist, and that is no more classically conservative than Bernie Sanders is classically liberal. Sure the new right has flairs of Taft and Hoover, but it is really very Confederate in nature (historically speaking) and the dominance of that factions has really changed the party. How can a rebellious agrarian sentiment that can be traced back to the Confederates be the same as the sentiment of a five-star general and Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces whom both parties wanted and who proposed Civil Rights Act of 1957 and of 1960? It isn't, but, remember the rebellious non-elite agrarians are as much a part of William Jennings Bryan's and Wilson's base as they were Andrew Jackson's, as they were Jefferson's, as they were a portion of patriots who helped defeat George III. The Civil War wasn't fought to beat the South, it was fought to preserve the Union and ensure rights for each type of minority in America. This is to say, we can respect each faction without pretending that Eisenhower would have tolerated the antics of New Guard Republicans like Palin or that old Guard Republicans like McCain and Bush aren't falling out of favor with the base. Again, our goal here is to show factions, so we can understand how factions affect what we call ''changing parties'' and ''party systems''.

NOTE: Many ''elites'' are classical liberals and/or conservatives, yet most issues discussed in politics between voters are social issues (this is true in any era). For example, almost everyone on K street and Wall Street are neoliberals and neoconservatives, yet the average voter votes on social justice issues. Think about it.

NOTE: One may ask, ''just what is the difference between a Hamiltonian, a bourbon liberal, a neoliberal, a neoconservative, and a libertarian?'' And, without going into a meta-essay I can answer, ''not much, as they all put business first, but but generally each term denotes which party ideology they generally support and whether they are a type of neoclassical or a type of Keynesian, globalist or protectionist on trade, and what industries they favor, Agriculture and oil or finance and factory''. Do we say the Clintons or Bushs grew out of the bourbon liberals, or do we say Wilson and Coolidge did? I could make a case for each. The Gilded Age was all business, so most factions have a business ideology that can be traced back to those times and earlier. The more social ideologies are often more vocal and divisive, and their lineage is much easier to spot than their business-minded counterparts.

TIP: With the above terms in mind, the central idea here is that the social conservative Democrats of the American South switched to supporting the Republican Party as party platforms changed in response to the rise of Social Liberal Progressivism between the Third and Fifth Party systems. This resulted in modern Democrats being a coalition of Progressive Social Liberals, Neoliberals, the Religious Left, and Conservative Classical liberals in terms of authority and state-controlled economics, and modern Republicans being a coalition of Social Conservatives, Neocons, the Religious Right, and Radical Classical Liberals in terms of authority and free-market economics. See ''Understanding the American left and right'' for more details on the factions in the two major parties, also note that most Presidents have ''mixed'' ideologies in practice. See also a discussion on the types of liberalism and conservatism, or see a discussion on classical and social liberalism.

The Fifth Party System and the the New Deal and Conservative CoalitionsNow that we have clearly illustrated the above factions and ideologies, we can move on to the last round of changes which happened from roughly the 1930's, to WWII, to the 1960's, to the 1990's as the FDR supporting Progressive Social Liberal New Deal Coalition faced off against the Socially Conservative anti-New Deal Conservative Coalition (with each coalition consisting of members of both major parties).

From the 1930's to the 1990's, from Hoover to Goldwater, to Nixon, to Reagan, to Bush, the ''Conservative Coalition'' drew southern ''solid south'' ''Dixiecrat'' conservative Democrats out of the Democratic Party via their ''southern strategy.'' By the 1990's, this resulted in the modern American ''social conservative'' and ''sometimes classical liberal'' Republican party. Likewise, the New Deal coalition, which opposed the conservative coalition, drew progressives into the Democratic Party and out of the Republican party under FDR's New Deal, LBJ's Great Society program, and Clinton's New Democrats. This resulted in the modern American ''social'' liberal, and thus necessarily traditionally ''classically conservative in terms of authority'' party during the same time.

Although the tension between these two factions starts in the 1930's with the New Deal, it comes to a boiling point over issues like States' Rights, the Second Red Scare, and Brown v. the Board of Education following WWII in the late 40's and 50's.

WWII fundamentally changed America in terms of its status in international politics (including its relationship with the world's old superpower Britain), in terms of modernizing the country, and in terms of its political parties. With the focus off of the war, and with an expanding population of baby boomers, the national conversation turned toward social issues related to the fascist and communist ideologies that pervaded the war, to old issues of race, and new issues of social welfare.

The new focus on social issues created a split in the party that can be seen in 1948's Truman vs. Dewey vs. Dixiecrat Strom Thurmond vs. Progressive Henry A. Wallace (where everyone except the Anti-Communist New Yorker Dewey was once a type of Democrat) and 1960's Kennedy vs. Nixon vs. Harry F. Byrd and Thurmond (where the southern conservative states' rights party of Thurmond once again makes its differences with the Democratic party shown).

''We have undertaken a new order of things; yet we progress to it under the framework and in the spirit and intent of the American Constitution''. '' FDR

The Sixth Party System and Seventh Party SystemThe changes leading up to Kennedy's Presidency resulted in the Sixth Party System beginning in the 1960's, when LBJ and MLK worked to bring the Kennedy inspired Civil Rights '64 and Voting Rights '65 to life. From this period forward, progressive Republicans like Teddy and Henry Wallace are very rare, and a few select Democrats like Strom Thurmond begin to officially join the Republican party.

After LBJ's Presidency, as Nixon and Reagan era ''southern strategy'' politics pushed back against changes of the 1960's, and progressive social liberals pushed for even more change, it arguably results in the Seventh Party System by the Presidencies of the neoliberal / social liberal Bill Clinton and the neocon / social conservative George W. Bush (both of whom are illustrative of the two modern parties, even though they both arguably offered a mix of liberal and conservative values found in earlier factions within past Party Systems).

In this era, most of the old solid south states that had supported the Democratic party, in terms of Congress and voter base, support the Republican party as is evidenced by the 1992 '' 2000 elections (where in each election a progressive southern Democrat faced off against a conservative southern Republican).

This doesn't mean all Republicans identify with solid south politics any more than all Democrats in LBJ's time did, it only means their faction became part of the Republican party just as they had once been part of the Democrats in response to the changing platforms of the parties.

''General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!''. '' Ronald Reagan

NOTE: Here we have to be careful to note that Clinton, while southern, is from the line of Wilson, Gore, and LBJ, an ally of Northern Democrats like Kennedy and Obama. He is not from the Deep South, but of course that lineage did ally with the Solid South prior to the split. Likewise, we have to note that the Bush family is from Texas. We haven't touched on it much, but Texas is not South Carolina. If one were to redraw the states into a few big groups, i'm not sure Texas would really want to be grouped in with the ol' Dixie Deep South. See: In Texas, history of slavery unique '-- but not 'brief'. Texas has large desegregated populated cities and mixed-political views, yes they lean right of course, but a Bush is not a Wallace, a Jackson, an Andrew Johnson, or a Trump.

Modern Party PoliticsFinally, we look to what could be the start of a new Party System. The Trump vs. Clinton race largely mirrored the realigning elections of Jackson vs. Adams in 1824 and 1828. In this analogy, Trump is like the nativist populist anti-establishment Jackson who was favored by the South, while Hillary and Jeb Bush to some extent were like the northern establishment liberal John Quincy Adams who was favored by the North. Adams was pro-trade, author of the Monroe Doctrine, and his father was ''a Washington insider,'' if that helps make the connection clear.

It's too early to speculate on what the 2016 election means, especially as the November 8th election was an advisory election and electors, who haven't voted yet, elect the President and VP in our Republic. Certainly, we could comment on strong support for Trump in the north and his celebrity status to draw parallels to Reagan, consider how Trump won with a ''law and order'' like message typical of the party of the Nixon era, or consider the ways in which Trump harkens back to conservatives like Hoover. It could also be helpful to examine the differences between progressives like Bryan and Sanders and establishment Washington liberals like the Clintons and the Bushs to see changes and lack of changes within the parties.

We might also think whether this was a populist (progressive populist like Bernie Sanders or nativist populist like Trump) election pushing back against the alienation inherent in globalization and if this will have an affect on the future platforms of the major parties.

In fact, even now things are changing. Consider this article which expresses a truism: In Trump era, Democrats and Republicans switch sides on states' rights. What other changes will happen in this cycle under the new-guard Tea-Party Republican dominated government? What key voter issues, ideologies, and platforms will switch? Great questions, we can assume things will switch, but only time will tell. However, we can assume one thing that won't switch: the party's stance on immigration'.... and it is an ability to be aware of these things from a 3,000 foot view where our studying of American history will pay off.

''Finally, let us understand that when we stand together, we will always win.'' '' Bernie Sanders, perhaps speaking as Bryan would have to his farmers and industrial workers crushed under the heel of the Gilded Age; the social populist spirit of Jefferson is alive in any age, but it isn't always found in one party.

''''In the end, you're measured not by how much you undertake but by what you finally accomplish.'' Donald Trump

TIP: Donald Trump is one of the most abnormal Presidents in the history of the Country, and arguably the least traditional (thus he, like a modern party, is complex). His outward message is slightly neocon and certainly he is from New York, but most of his ''traditional'' Republican qualities are overshadowed by a strong nativist populist socially conservative message (a Tea Party message). This is why we talk about him as being like a Jackson or Wallace, and not like a Bush, Romney, or McCain. It isn't an insult, it is simply a truism, he appointed Bannon, not Bush, right? He has qualities of Hoover and Reagan, for sure, but the way he plays to the base is not reflective of the Gilded Age or an Eisenhower Republican, it is reflective of the sentiment of the populist conservative north (like the Know Nothings) and south.

TIP: The Trump vs. Clinton election also mirrors the 1876 election. The fact that it mirrors the two ''corrupt bargain'' elections shouldn't be understated given the voting system in our Republic. However, Trump is oddly complex and many more parallels can be drawn than noted depending on what aspect of his character we are talking about.

Summarizing the Party Systems as a Two-Party SystemCurrent events and complexities (like the elements of each past Party System which can still be found in each modern party) aside, there has almost always been a two-party system in the United States. The mentality of each party can be expressed as ''northern interests'' and ''southern interests,'' although I strongly prefer ''city interests'' and ''rural interests'' (as both have roughly the same meaning in this context). Sometimes we see both interests in the same party, as with Humphrey and LBJ, and sometimes it is less clear cut, but we can always spot it in any era.

Thus, we can use a simple ''two party'' answer as to which factions held which interests over time, which I hope will be seen as helpful, and not divisive. Remember the U.S. is a diverse Union of 50 sovereign states and commonwealths where the need to get a majority divides us into ''red states and blue states'' as a matter of custom, not as enemies, but as a United Republic with a democratic spirit.

Northern (and later coastal) ''City'' Interests: Federalists, Whigs, Third Party Republicans, Fourth Party Progressive era Republicans (like Teddy), Fifth Party Democrats (starting in the 1930's under FDR, then culminating with LBJ and then Clinton), Modern Democrats.Southern (and later middle) ''Rural'' Interests: Anti-Federalists, Democratic-Republicans, Third Party Democrats, Fourth Party Progressive Era Democrats (Like Wilson), Fifth Party Republicans (starting in the 1920's under Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover, then culminating with Nixon and then Bush), Modern Republicans.The south is still the south, the north is still the north, a city is still is a city, and rural voters are still rural. That isn't what changed. In any era, geopolitical voters still have their unique vices, like those evidenced by shameful Jim Crow Southern politics or the under-represented Southern Black Belt, or those evidenced by Northern Ghettos filled with refugees from the great migration and working class immigrants. They also have their unique virtues, be they fighting for individual rights, fairness for the farmer, and protecting jobs at home, or for fighting for collective social justice, workers rights, minority rights, and the global trade and central banking that ensures America's status as a Hegemonic superpower. Sure, at times the divide in America is a single voter issue or economic class struggle, but the basic city/north vs. rural/south split is nearly constant. Thus, it is a good metric for tracing a line through 240 years of factions.

Below we tell the story of the evolution of the American political parties to better describe how figures like Strom Thurmond impact history, and how key issues like popular sovereignty, segregation, free-silver, and civil rights impact the country. We'll also see how the party of Jefferson became the party of Confederates and only later to became the party of modern social liberalism. First, we'll summarize how the platforms, members, and names of parties changed and factionalized. Then we'll explore the party systems and their prominent figures in-depth to illustrate key ''political realignments'' and realigning elections in United States history.[20]

NOTE: While party officials and members, party ideologies, and party platforms switch between the 1930's and 1990's, it doesn't all happen at the same time, and some elements are retained by the parties after the changes, and these nuances seem to cause confusion. The Democratic party's voter base and stances on key issues started switching under figures like Bryan in the early 1900's long before any officials left. Meanwhile, key figures like Strom Thurmond aside, officials were the last people to change in many cases. Many of them remained until they retired like Byrd, while the next generation ran under a different party. In this same vein, one should not mistake somewhat progressive southern figures like Wilson, the Gores, or LBJ to be ''the same'' as more conservative figures like Thurmond, Byrd, or Wallace. Not everything changes between the 60's and 90's, but what does is enough to flip the red and blue states and reshape American politics. See the 88th United States Congress '' 104th United States Congress and compare that to historic elections in that same time for some examples of the slow change from the 60's to 90's. Or, see the 1968 Presidential Election for a symbolic change where the ''yellow'' states' rights states in the south were soon to be red, and the blue northern states were soon to stay blue.

The History of the Republican Party (1854-2016). This video does a fair and balanced job of describing the shifting platforms. It pairs well with our points while telling different bits of the story. Keep in mind all videos on this page are curated to help tell the overarching story of the changes. They aren't made by us, and as such, they don't necessarily express our views.TIP: See the voting records of each Presidential election from 1789 to 2012, see the voting record of the ''solid south.'' see the home states of Presidents, see how expansion and slavery divided the country leading up to the 1860's? See how ''red'' and ''blue'' switch over time? These ''switches,'' which can be verified against the major American political party platforms over time, is what this page will discuss.

TIP: One way to summarize all of this is by saying the changes happened under, or as a result of, key figures including Jefferson and Hamilton, Adams and Jackson, Lincoln, Grant, Cleveland, Bryan, the Roosevelts, Wilson, Hoover, LBJ, and Clinton. See a comparison of the political ideology of each President from Washington to Obama.

TIP: Try not to get sidetracked by the modern day usage of terms like liberal and conservative, this page seeks to use the proper meaning of the terms in each era (with consideration to differentiate between historic meanings, past American meanings, modern American meanings, and types).

An Overview of Platform Switching Between Republicans and DemocratsAbove we gave a summary of the party systems, below we will look at key changes, key voter issues, and provide more details and justifications (i.e. if you stop reading now, you can walk away knowing you have covered the basics).

With the above said, there isn't one change that results in the political realignments and platform switches that define the Party Systems; instead, there are many.

Below is an overview of the most important changes alongside a quick history of the Democratic Party and the Republican Party.

The Ideology of Old Democrats and Modern RepublicansAndrew Jackson (the first Democratic Party President '' 1829) was a southern states' rights populist and ''Jacksonian'' Democrat, which (in terms of individual rights, small government, and economic ideology) is similar to today's socially conservative libertarian.

Early factions like Jeffersonians and the Young America movement were rather progressive. The Copperheads and War Democrats in the North were non-Confederate conservative factions during the Civil War. A Bourbon Democrat is essentially a Libertarian. Thus, we can say the pro-states' rights Democrats of Lincoln's time held both the beliefs of their predecessors the Anti-Federalists and Democratic-Republicans, and those of today's modern Libertarians and Republicans.

Compared to their opposition the above major parties are roughly pro-south, pro farmer, pro-state-power, anti-central-bank, anti-debt, and anti-taxes. They tend to favor individual rights over collective rights, typically choosing deregulation over government enforced social justice. Thus, they are liberal regarding authority but conservative in terms of social policy. They are, as a party, classical liberals and social conservatives. Today they might be called neocons, libertarians, and paleocons.

TIP: Want to understand modern Republicanism? See this documentary on the Tea Party.

How the Democrats Became Socially LiberalThe Third Party Democrats began to change from social conservative to social progressive in the 1890's at the end of the Gilded Age under the progressive populist Democrat William Jennings Bryan. Under Bryan, the Democratic Party became increasingly socially progressive and necessarily authoritative. From Bryan to Wilson, to LBJ, to Clinton the Democratic Party increasingly favored progressive social liberalism regarding ''government enforced social justice and economic intervention'' over laissez-faire governance, this attracted progressive Republicans and drove social conservatives from the party over time.

TIP: See History of the United States Democratic Party.

The Ideology of Old Republicans and Modern DemocratsLincoln (the first Republican President '' 1861) was an anti-slavery Republican in his day. In terms of pushing for social justice, using federal power, and taxation his position was similar to today's progressive social liberal.

The Federalists and Whigs who became the Republicans were often classically conservative in terms of trade, taxes, and general authority. However, factions like Conscience Whigs, Half-Breeds, and Radical Republicans worked along with the fact that Republicans were not the Confederate pro-slavery South and drew a lot of progressives in America's first 100-or-so years especially in the mid-1800's at the height of tension over slavery.

With that noted, we can say the anti-slavery Republicans of Lincoln's time roughly held the beliefs of their predecessors the Federalists and Whigs, but (again confusingly) also of today's modern Progressives and Democrats.

Compared to their opposition the above major parties are roughly pro-north, pro-banking, pro-federal power, pro-northern factory, and pro-taxes. They favor collective rights over individual rights, typically using Federal power to ensure the welfare of the collective. Thus, they are classically conservative in terms of favoring authority, but liberal in terms of social policy. So they are, as a party, classical conservatives and social liberals (today neoliberal ''Reagan Democrats'' and progressives).

TIP: See this documentary from 1992 to understand New Democrats.

How the Republicans Became Socially ConservativeThe Fourth Party Republicans began to change when the Progressive Republican Theodore ''Teddy'' Roosevelt broke from the party in 1912 (with Teddy being one of the forces, along with Bryan, Taft, and Wilson, that gave the ''Progressive Era'' its historical name). Following the break, the Republicans increasingly embraced social conservatism and opposed social progressivism (they especially opposed Communism). From Harding to Hoover, to Nixon, to Bush they increasingly favored classical liberalism regarding ''individual and states' rights'' over central authority. This attracted some socially conservative Democrats like states' rights Dixiecrat Strom Thurmon. It resulted in a Southernization of the Republican party and drove some progressive Republicans from the party over time.

TIP: See History of the United States Republican Party.

The Conservative Coalition Vs. The New Deal CoalitionNow that we know the basics, the changes in both parties in the 1900's are perhaps best understood by examining the Conservative Coalition and the New Deal Coalition.

The Conservative Coalition was a coalition between the anti-Communist Republicans like Nixon and Reagan (both Californians) and conservative Southern Democrats. It arose to oppose FDR's New Deal progressivism, and it blocked a lot of the progressive legislation the New Deal Coalition tried to pass from the 1930's to the 1960's. The socially conservative solid south was still its own entity. It sometimes voted with other Democrats, and sometimes broke off into its own factions. See the 1960 election Kennedy v. Nixon v. Harry F. Byrd. The Coalition tellingly dwindled post 64'² Civil Rights and ended in the Clinton era as conservative southerners became Republicans and formed the modern construct of ''the Red States'' and ''the Blue States.''

Meanwhile, the New Deal coalition (which drew progressives into the Democratic Party, and away from the new American conservative party, making the Democrats the modern American liberal party) explains the progressive coalition of Democrats and Republicans the Conservative coalition opposed. Today the two parties largely resemble these coalitions.

The Rise of Modern Social Liberalism and Social ConservatismLater we get ''a third way'' with Bill Clinton's New Democrats. This ''third way'' is an extension of the ''progressive bourbon liberal'' (neoliberal) wing, but mashed-up with the ''progressive social liberal'' (progressive) wing, and Reagan-era conservatism. These three ''social liberal'' ideologies which Clinton embodied can collectively be referred to as an American liberalism. These factions, which we can today denote as progressive, neoliberal, and social liberal, can be used to differentiate types of liberals on the political left from the New Deal Coalition and the modern Democratic party of today.

TIP: As noted above in the introduction, there is no one way to understand America's political ideologies, but each angle we look at things from helps us to better understand bits of the historic puzzle.

Three Factions of Modern Republicans to Oppose ThisAlthough conservatism is complex, it is defined well as an opposition philosophy to liberalism. Through this lens, there is a type of conservatism that stands against for brand of liberalism. Modern American conservatism wants to ''conserve,'' which means not being progressive on a given issue and which by its nature is not conservative. Thus we get modern social conservatism which says no to social programs and federal power, except when it upholds conservative social values. There is also a more liberal version that we call libertarianism. It is against all uses of state power for any reason and is a form of radical classical liberalism, combined with traditional classical conservatism, which is willing to use federal power to keep order, but not inherently against social programs. These factions (libertarian, neocon, and social conservative) can be said to become allies the conservative coalition mentioned above, although ''the establishment'' of both parties tends to favor aspects of traditional classical conservatism.

TIP: When either party uses government power, they are traditional conservatives, when either party deregulates and lets the private market and individuals handle it, they are classically liberal. More than one ideology uses classical liberalism, and more than one uses classical conservatism, as all political ideologies grow out of these foundational ideologies.

Other Factors of Note Regarding Switching Platforms '' Progressivism, The Red Scare, Immigration, Religion, and Civil Rights in 54'²Other key factors involve the Red Scare (the first and second), the effect of immigration, unions, and ''the Catholic vote'' (which culminates with Kennedy's election in 1960) on the parties.

The Republican party changed after losing to Wilson and moved away from progressivism and toward classical liberal values under Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover. In this time they also became increasingly ''anti-Communist'' following WWI (the first red scare). While both parties were anti-Communist and pro-Capitalist, Wilson's brand of progressive southern bourbon liberalism and his New Freedom plan and then FDR's brand of progressive liberalism and his New Deal were opposed by Republicans like Hoover due to their use of the state to ensure social justice. Then after WWII, the Second Red Scare reignited the conversation, further dividing factions and parties.

Another important thing to note is that the Democratic party has historically been pro-immigrant (one of the few platforms that didn't change). Over time this attracted new immigrant groups like Northern Catholics (see the Know Nothing party) and earned them the support of Unions (who were increasingly opposed by Republicans). Big City Machines like Tammany Hall also play a role in this aspect of the story as well. The immigrant vote is one of the key factors in changing the Democratic party over time in terms of progressivism, unions, religion, and geolocation (as many immigrants immigrated to northern cities), and it is well suited to be its own subject.[21]

Another important thing to note related to liberalism and immigration is religion. Religion has always played a role in American politics, but the conversation is complex. Some religions have favored social liberalism, some the individualism, and traditionalism of conservatism. The Jewish, Catholic, Mormon, and Evangelical voters all have an important story to tell in terms of changes in the parties, as do key issues like Temperance and Prohibition.(see Religion and politics in the United States).

Lastly, although race had long been an issue, Civil Rights had been somewhat stagnant as a voter issue since 1896's Plessy v. Ferguson, with other progressive policies and the world wars taking precedence politically. However, after Brown v. Board of Education Civil Rights began to split the Democratic Party between progressives (who were typically pro-Civil-Rights) and southern conservatives who opposed desegregation (see African-American Civil Rights Movement 1954''68). TIP: Listen to the Lee Atwater interview below, he explains this from the viewpoint of a GOP strategist.

Given all the above, we can say, over time, the progressive populist sentiment of the party of Jefferson pulled in progressives and pushed out social conservatives, which resulted in new policies, members, and geographic changes for both parties, which in turn attracted other factions to each party. Today, the effect is that the parties have nearly completely switched platforms aside from a few issues like immigration.

Despite these general truisms, the parties themselves have typically been factionalized over complex factors relating to left-right ideology, single issues, and the general meaning of liberty.

Each party has historically contained a Northern (and later coastal) and Southern (and later middle) faction (what we today call ''red states'' and ''blue states''), and each party has split into conservative, moderate, liberal, and progressive (often called radical) factions.

It is these factions, and the ongoing disagreement over how government should look, that explain the shifting platforms from the Civil War to the Gilded Age, to the Progressive Era, to the World Wars, to Civil Rights, to the Reagan and Clinton eras, and then to today.

The Evolution of America's Major Political Parties. Another video looking at the History of the Major American political parties like we do on this page.TIP: This page is general. Below we offer vital details on the above, curated videos, and significant proof. If you want to stop reading here, you now have the bare minimum needed to understand the history of the American political parties. Please comment below with any questions or insight!

An Overview of the Platform Switching By Party System and President '' From the Founders to EisenhowerThe First and Second Party Systems (1792-1854) included some important changes and debates. Examples included the argument over the Federalist favored Constitution, and the Anti-Federalist favored Articles of Confederation and Bill of Rights and debates over slavery, modernization, and banking. Major changes began at the end of the Second Party System.

The Second Party system ended with the Whig Party dissolving in 1854. They were critically divided by the Kansas-Nebraska Act and the related debate over manifest destiny and popular sovereignty (states' rights regarding slavery). The heated battle over whether Kansas should be a slave state, and the debate over whether the south could keep expanding southward creating slave states, resulted in the country being split. This had happened in the Mexican-American war. One faction became the Northern Republicans and their allies the Union, who wanted to hold together the Union under a strong central government. The other became the Southern ex-Democrats and their allies the Confederacy, who wanted independence and wanted to expand southward, to for instance Cuba, creating new slave states. By the time Lincoln took office in 1861, the division was inescapable

FACT: The tension was so great the Democratic party ceased to exist from 1861 '' 1865 as the Confederacy rejected the concept of party systems; which is why we refer to them ex-Democrats above.

Political fragmentation led up to Civil War. The main ''switching'' of platforms happened after this divisive war. It occurred in phases over the next 130 years, between the start of Civil War Reconstruction (1865) in the Third Party System, and into the Clinton era (mid-1990's) in the Sixth Party System. Thus, platform switching took place from Grant to Wilson, to FDR, to LBJ, to Reagan, to Clinton. Often one issue at a time was critical. These included race, states' rights, the role of government, subsidization, taxation, religion, prohibition, the middle class, banking, immigration, cronyism, progressivism, workers rights, civil rights, voting rights, and social welfare.

When the major parties didn't embrace a popular voter issue or a specific stance on an issue, a ''single issue'' third party often did. These parties included the pre-Civil War Free Soilers and Know Nothings, and the post-Civil War People's Party and Prohibition Party.

During Civil War Reconstruction the parties split into many conservative, moderate, and radical factions over disagreements as to how to treat the South and the Freedmen after the war. This Third Party split resulted in legislation like the Civil Rights Act of 1875, and the politics of the Gilded Age when Northern Republicans, and their private market counterparts, dominated politics and industry until the moderate conservative Democrat Grover Cleveland took office for the first time in 1884. During this period America became an industrial superpower under the ''Robber Barons'' (or, more respectfully, the ''captains of industry''). This transformation resulted in two further divisions between factions, specifically a split over the government's role in the private market (AKA civil service vs. cronyism) and a split over silver vs. gold vs. green-backed money.

The perceived and real corruption of the Gilded Age led to the formation of progressive third parties. One of these was the Progressive People's Party, a populist party of southern farmers, western Republicans, and northern factory workers who favored silver-backed money for its perceived inflationary properties. They later joined the Democrats under Bryan, and this was one of the key events that pushed the Democratic Party toward progressivism from the 1890's on.

The era ends with the panic of 1893 under the Democrats and President Cleveland (who favored gold-backed money). Cleveland had to borrow money from J.P. Morgan and the international banks, which angered the southern farmers in the Democratic party and pushed the Wall Street crowd and industrialists back toward the Republican Party. The industrialists had tended to support the Union during the war but supported the moderate pro-gold north-easterner, Cleveland.

The post-Reconstruction Gilded Age and Third Party System resulted in a progressive populist era aptly known as the Fourth Party ''progressive'' era 1890's '' 1932 (an era in which all parties were progressive regarding social and economic justice).

During this Fourth Party WWI-era, America became a superpower via progressive militarism. Women got the right to vote carried by a wave of progressive feminism. The unions and trust-busters were coming in swinging for progressive worker rights. The ''great migration'' began due to the north favoring social progressivism over social conservatism. America saw another type of progressivism with the economic policies surrounding the Federal Reserve which was established on the back of the Panic of 1907 in which J.P. Morgan personally bailed out America. Even Prohibition was a progressive movement in a sense. Good or bad, this was an era in which new approaches tried to combat existing problems, and it all started with the union of Bryan and the People's Party.

As the Fourth Party formed in the 1890's, the Democratic party began embracing the Free Silver movement under William Jennings Bryan. As a result of this stance, and with the support of the former People's Party behind him, the populist Bryan began ''swallowing up'' the Democratic party and pulling them to the ''left'' on many issues.

Meanwhile, the Republican Party also moved ''left'' on many issues, making both major parties resemble factions of today's Democrats for a brief moment (AKA progressive populists and pro-banker liberals). Eventually, Republicans would start moving ''right'' again over disagreements between progressive, moderate, and conservative party members.

The splitting of the Republican party had begun during Reconstruction, but finally culminated in the progressive era with Republican Theodore ''Teddy'' Roosevelt forming his 1912 Progressive ''Bull Moose'' Party. Roosevelt's move fundamentally changed the Republican Party and resulted in a win for the progressive Democrat Woodrow Wilson and a loss for the progressive Republican Taft.

As noted above, from the end of the Gilded Age on the Democratic Party became increasingly progressive. First, it was Bryan and Free Silver, then Wilson's economic, social, and militaristic progressivism in the 1910's, then Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) and the New Deal coalition in the 1930's.

Despite the increasing populist progressivism of the Democratic party, the socially conservative Solid South Democrats didn't begin to leave the Democratic Party until LBJ's Civil Rights Act of 1964. Instead, the parties largely changed under their member's feet while Republicans slowly moved right and issues like Prohibition, the Great Depression, and WII took center stage.

After Wilson, but before FDR, who was the President during most of WWII, deep splits over progressive religious movements like temperance and prohibition had weakened the Democratic party. This is true even though both Democrats and Republicans supported the Eighteenth Amendment. The split over progressivism cost Democrats three elections in a row: Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover, with each Republican President moving further ''right,'' especially over issues like Communism. The first Red Scare became an issue starting near the end of Wilson's Presidency, and then we had three Republicans in a row reacting to it while Democrats lost power.

Hoover sought to capitalize on the split in the Democratic Party in 1928 by pursuing a ''lily-white Southern strategy'' to resuscitate the Republican Party in the South. He did this ''[by] purging black Republicans from leadership positions in the Southern wing of the G.O.P.'' This move appealed to lily-white Republican factions but angered the ''black-and-tan'' factions. Unsurprisingly, this caused white Southerners to gravitate toward the Republican party while black and progressive Americans gravitated toward the Democratic party.[22]

Hoover's race-related tactics aside, it is largely the Wall Street Crash of 1929 and Hoover's classical liberal laissez-faire response that opened the door for FDR and his New Deal, which Hoover opposed. The Great Depression had gotten so bad by the 1932 election that many Republicans became Democrats as a response. Just compare 1928 to 1932, this was one of those key realigning elections and the Great Depression a key aligning event.

FDR, whose Presidency marks the start of the Fifth Party system, may have been a progressive Democratic President in practice, but he ran as a fiscal conservative, called Hoover a socialist, couldn't get the vote in the ''solid North,'' and relied heavily on progressive Republican support. This is to say, that while the Civil Rights legislation in the 30's and 40's was passed under a progressive Democratic President, both parties still contained both progressive and conservative factions. This is also true after FDR under Truman in 1948 when the States' Rights Democrats run under Thurmond. Of note is Truman's ''Fair Deal,'' which was unable to pass due to lack of support from conservatives and Southern Democrats. Also of note are the Jim Crow laws of this era, and the lack of action against them, which is historically attributed to solidly Democratic South, not to moderate-progressive Democrats like FDR or Truman. Civil Rights aside, as with Hoover, other issues were seen by many as more pressing in this time, specifically the New Deal and World War II.

After WII and Truman we get the Republican-led Civil Rights legislation under moderate Republican Dwight D. Eisenhower who has a sweeping win in 1952. Eisenhower was a friend to the New Deal and tried to pull his party back to the center, but was largely unsuccessful. His effort failed partially due to conservative populist forces in the party like Joseph McCarthy, who had switched from Democrat to Republican in 1944.

An Overview of Platform Switching in the Modern Era '' From LBJ to TodayThe growing tension between progressive southern Democrats (who empathized with northern Democrats and progressive Republicans) and social conservative southern Democrats (who favored segregation and disliked social liberalism) came to a boil with 1954's Brown v. Board of Education. This Supreme Court ruling led to divisive issues like Desegregation busing causing further splits in the Democratic Party, which Republicans capitalized on as they did under Hoover.

Tellingly, progressive Southerners like Albert Gore, Sr. (Al Gore's dad), Estes Kefauver, Ralph Yarborough, and Lyndon B. Johnson (LBJ) refused to sign 1956's Southern Manifesto (a pro-segregation document which most conservative southern Democrats signed, including its author Strom Thurmond).

By the 60's, the tension was mounting around LBJ's Great Society programs; specifically 64's Civil Rights. Some conservative ''Dixiecrats'' like Strom Thurmond began to leave the Democratic Party for the Republican Party and the George Wallace-led American Independent Party. (NOTE: ''Dixiecrats'' is a term used to describe southern Democrats, specifically those who would have ideologically been part of the States' Rights Democratic Party of 48'²).

Other southern politicians and voters followed Strom Thurmond over time. Their exit left the now social-liberal (rather than classic liberal) Democrats to support the increasingly socially conservative Republicans under Goldwater-Reagan-Nixon. The ''southern strategy'' these leaders developed was continued into the 80's under Lee Atwater, and even extended into the 2000's).[23]

The last major shift happened slowly from the 60's to the 90's and is denoted by groups like ''The Reagan Coalition'' and Clinton's ''New Democrats.'' These groups represent an increasingly modern political realignment, and a tug-of-war involving appealing to different types of blue-collar and conservative populist sentiments. Other key groups of the era include Nixon's ''Silent Majority'' and ''Reagan Democrats.''

In the transition period of the mid-to-late 60's, progressive Democrats and Republicans usually carried the less progressive Dixiecrats and Republicans on social issues like Voting Rights 65'² and Civil Rights 68'², but over time, as the Republicans moved further to the political right, this became increasingly less true.

Over the 70's, 80's, and 90's, the southern strategy pulled in white southerners and conservatives to the Republican party, and the Republican party also embraced the religious right.

Meanwhile, the Democratic party pulled in movements growing out of Civil Rights. Issues such as Workers' Rights, LGBT rights, and Roe v. Wade were increasingly allied with Northern big businesses. As they gained popularity in the North and on both the east and west coasts, they embraced the northern economic policy which had traditionally been with the Republican party outside of Cleveland, Wilson, and FDR.

Changes that started with Reconstruction and developed during the period from LBJ to Clinton led the 90's Democrats toward change. They became the Northern and Coastal party of progressive movements, big business (especially finance and tech), big subsidies, and big taxes (to support it all). Meanwhile, the Republicans, favored in the South and Middle of the country, became the party of individual rights, specific businesses (small business rhetorically, but also big business in terms of tax breaks and deregulation), and religious interests. This is essentially the complete opposite of how things were at the start of the Third Party System.

Although Strom Thurmond left, and the solid south began voting ''red'' in 68,' many southern Democrats including the Gores stayed with the Democrats past 1964 '' 1968, especially in the Senate (see 88th United States Congress '' 104th United States Congress). Likewise, not every progressive Republican became a Democrat. More than politicians changing parties, or the ideology of those politicians changing, the parties and their voters simply changed under them.

Some Dixiecrats, like Robert Byrd, never left the Democrats, and some Republicans retained the spirit of figures like Hamilton and Eisenhower especially under Reagan and H. W. Bush. Despite this, by the time the 105th United States Congress impeached President Clinton, and the GOP turned to W. Bush, the changes are apparent. By the mid-90's the parties finally resembled the parties of today in terms of voter base and positions in the House and Senate.[24]

In the post-90's era, we saw the second wave of ''New Democrats.'' These Democrats, like the socially progressive, but pro-trade and business, Barack Obama, stand next to many modern southern Democrats (either reformed or not, depending on who you believe). Groups like the ''New Democrat Coalition'' (a coalition in the House which contains southern Democrats, pro-trade Democrats, and some progressives) provide an example of this movement.

Did all the ''Dixiecrats'' ''change parties''? No. Did some conservative southern Democrats swap Jim Crow for social liberalism? Maybe, to some extent (Byrd renounced his past, Strom never did). Despite theories that touch on those last points having some weight to them, the voter base and platforms did change over time. Notably, this page is a statement on changing platforms and members of parties, and not on the consequences of social policy, the ideology of the Dixiecrats still in the party, or whether a socially conservative policy from the south is more detrimental to Civil Rights than a given economic policy in the north.

In retrospect, figures like MLK and Shirley Chisholm, along with Presidents like John F. Kennedy and Bill Clinton, have all played a part in changing the Democratic Party.

Meanwhile, the nativist populist sentiment of Trump, and recent legislation like the Republican favored voter ID laws, recall the attitude of the socially conservative Democrat George Wallace (''the American populist''), more than the moderate Republican Eisenhower.

Ultimately, the parties did swap many platforms (issues) between the 1850's '' 1990's as a matter of record, but not all platforms, members, or ideologies switched. Consequently, we have to explain what it means that Teddy was a Republican and FDR a Democrat, or that Lincoln was a Republican and Obama a Democrat. We also need to consider the way third parties led to changes in the major parties including the 1890's People's Party (the Free Silver progressive party who joined the Democrats under Bryan) and the 1912 Progressive Party (where Teddy Roosevelt broke away from the Republican party to run on a more progressive agenda).

The 1960's '' 1980's are a little less clear-cut than other eras, but since 1992 the North has mostly voted Blue and the South Red. Compare that to 1860, 1960, 1976, 1984, and 2016, and you can decide what this means for yourself. The voting record is clear, and so are the platforms; much of the rest is a matter of perspective.

As President Obama once said (paraphrasing), ''America looks at a single issue and sees it 320 million different ways.'' We need to agree on the facts, but we don't need to agree on what they mean.

For everything we didn't touch on in our summary, from our perspective, we have Lee Atwater's infamous 1981 interview which analyzes the same story, but from the perspective of one of the most important Republican strategists of all time:

//s3.amazonaws.com/thenation/audio/mp3/Full_Audio/LeeAtwaterEditedFull.mp3Now that we have the post-1960's segregation issue clear let's get back to the rest of American history starting with Hamilton's Federalists so we can understand the platform shifts from a historical perspective. If we don't have a clear picture of the split between Federalists and Anti-Federalists, we won't be able to see how issues like states' rights evolved throughout American history and what that means in context.

Remember, America is not a single group and the major parties aren't single issue parties. We will be dealing with factions, changing times, and changing viewpoints. Below we detail each party system to explain the changes, which go far beyond social issues or what the Dixiecrats do in 64'².

TIP: For more reading see our series on American Politics, our breakdown of major American political party platforms over time, or our pages on the basic types of political parties (and how the modern American parties compare), how to understand the political left and right, liberalism and the founders fathers, or why the founders chose a Republic.

''Republican candidates often have prospered by ignoring black voters and even by exploiting racial tensions,'' and, ''by the '70s and into the '80s and '90s, the Democratic Party solidified its gains in the African-American community, and we Republicans did not effectively reach out. Some Republicans gave up on winning the African-American vote, looking the other way or trying to benefit politically from racial polarization. I am here today as the Republican chairman to tell you we were wrong.'' '' RNC Chief Ken Mehlman 2005.

NOTE: For those who want further proofs and details, read on. Much like our history, this page keeps going despite the complex details.

A Summary of the Party Switching by Looking at the Presidents: From the Founding Fathers, to Civil War, to Civil Rights, to TodayIn the introduction we provided a chronological summary of the parties by looking at the Party Systems, this section expands upon the story by focusing on the Presidents.

As noted in the introduction, to prove the parties switched platforms clearly, we need to consider at least four political types (if not more), not just liberal and conservative. We also need to think about the single issue ''third parties'' like the Free Soil Party, the People's Party, and the American Independent Party, and the difference between collectivism and individualism. This is necessary as collective rights vs. individual rights is the issue at the heart of the debate.

Although the political ideologies are best applied to each issue, some issues don't arise until the late 19th or even 20th century. The parties have been factionalized throughout history. We can describe the parties, using modern language, as Social Liberal (like Clinton or Lincoln), Conservative (like Eisenhower or Cleveland), Populist/Socialist (like the Roosevelts), and Libertarian/Classic Liberal (Like Jefferson or Reagan).

Social liberals (meaning modern Keynesian social-liberals) favor social progress, globalization, taxes, corporations, and big government. Populist-Socialists (often called progressives in history) favor the people, civil service, and government-backed social justice over big business (a less ''corporate'' version of social liberalism). Traditional Conservatives want traditional nationalism, oppose progressivism and social-liberalism, and favor specific big businesses like the military, church, and specific aristocracy and oligarchy. Libertarians or those with a classical liberal ideology with right-wing leanings removed want a small government with limited federal power, free trade, and low taxes even if it means powerful plutocrats and injustice. With that in mind, it is best to start off by comparing the first two political factions the Federalists and Anti-Federalists (and then Democratic-Republicans) in the First Party System 1792-1824:

Hamilton, who roughly favors Northern interests and a strong government, was a hands-on Federalist (which is, very roughly, like today's Washington Liberal-Conservative, he wants a central bank, strong military, and is conservatively loyal to Britain). Jefferson, who roughly favors Southern interests and less government, was a hands-off anti-Federalist (which is roughly today's Libertarian-Populist, he wants individual liberty, state-rights, and is against big Government for any reason). In terms of England and France, Hamilton is Whig-like (or a Tory if you ask Jefferson) and Jefferson is a Jacobin supporting admirer of the French Revolution (if we ask Jefferson himself).[25]

To further illustrate the divide, Hamilton's Federalists favored the collective rights (and authority) of a Federal Republic and supported the Constitution (as opposed to the Articles of Confederation). Jefferson's Anti-Federalists opposed replacing the Articles of Confederation (which called for less central power) and later wanted the Bill of Rights (a bill of liberal human rights to amend the Constitution), which Hamilton and the Federalists opposed.

There were Federalists and Anti-Federalists in both the north and south. The Anti-Federalists favored individual rights, Democracy, no debt, and small government (ideas popular in the south). The anti-federalists favored collective rights, a Republic, debt and credit, and federal power (ideas more popular in the north). Consider compromise positions like the Second Amendment which allowed for gun ownership, but also calls for a militia which can put down an uprising like Shays' Rebellion or the Whiskey Rebellion. Although the views of both men and factions are much more complex than can be summed up quickly, these facts paint a clear picture of the first political factions.

Not every issue that is important today was important historically. Specific religion, race, immigration, gender, women's rights, and gun rights weren't always as divisive in the past (although they were discussed at times). Freedom of Religion was pushed for by Jefferson as it is a fundamental principle of liberalism and the Age of Enlightenment[26], and Jefferson generally wanted less bureaucracy and looser immigration laws (see the Alien and Sedition Acts and Nativism in the U.S.). Neither took a clear stand against slavery. Hamilton was hardly to the far-right on religion; his main interest was in trade and monetary policy. Issues like these, although discussed since the beginning of our country, don't become fully divisive (even to the extent of creating third parties) until later due to an influx of Catholic immigrants (see 1854's Know Nothing Party), the expansion of new territories, and the debate over whether they should be slave states, see 1848's Free Soil Party.

With the above in mind, in summary, Hamilton's party is for a British-style central government (a more authoritative liberalism), while Jefferson's party favors a hands-off, individual rights focused, French-style approach to liberalism.

This division between Federalists (pro-trade, pro-bank, pro-collective rights, and pro-authority) and Anti-Federalists, and then Democratic-Republicans, (pro-farmer, anti-central bank, pro-individual rights, and anti-authority) will come to represent a consistent ideological divide between the North and South, as well as the two major parties. This ideological divide never changes, but new ideologies, platforms, party names and party members will revolve around this divide all the way until the Present day.

Thomas Jefferson | 60-Second Presidents | PBS. This PBS 60 second Presidents series will help illustrate how platforms and parties change over time. Let us start with the obviously Social-Libertarian by governance-style and ideology, anti-Federalist by name (the party that would become the Democrats), Jefferson (a French-style classical liberal). Although Jefferson expands America and accomplishes a few other important feats, Jefferson's hands-off approach makes his Presidency otherwise lack-luster.This First Party era also contains the era of good feelings during which the parties worked together from about 1815 to 1825. It also included Henry Clay's 1820 Missouri Compromise between anti-slavery and pro-slavery factions to balance the number of ''slave states'' and ''free states'' (which itself helped balance the south's dominance in this era which had resulted from the Three-Fifths Compromise of 1787). The era ends with the formation of the John Quincy Adams supporting National Republicans of 1825 (who disband in 1833 and become Whigs in the next era).

John Quincy Adams | 60-Second Presidents | PBS. Adams, Clay, and Jackson's stories intertwine to describe the end of the First Party and start of the Second Party system.The next era, Jackson's era, is the Second Party System: 1828-1854. It begins with Jackson's Presidency, which contrasts the hands-off Jefferson to the more hands-on Jackson, and also marks the start of ''the spoils system, as well as a growing tension between North and South over whether or not the new states should be slave states.

Andrew Jackson | 60-Second Presidents | PBS. We call Jackson a ''Jacksonian Democrat'', that essentially means a pro-south Libertarian in Jackson's day. Jackson says states' rights and individual rights trump the collective rights favored by of the anti-slavery factions. Slavery aside, Jackson resembles Jefferson in his dismantling of the big banks and otherwise populist message.In the Second Party System, the newly formed Democrats (previously Anti-Federalists and Democratic-Republicans), start to show roots of what we today call conservatism. They use classic liberal principles to support slavery, but use federal power when it suits them.

Meanwhile, the Federalists (after a brief stint as National Republicans) become the Whigs in 1833. They take on some more socially left issues under ''the great compromiser'' Henry Clay. Despite this being true, the Whigs remain conservative regarding federal power and economic policy (the term Whig comes from the English Whig party, a liberal party, split into two factions one more conservative and one more radical, they opposed the conservative Tory factions).

During this Second Party System, some third parties arise to promote issues (often ''single issues'') that lacked strong support in the major parties. These third parties included the anti-immigrant Know-Nothing Party, the anti-Mason Anti-Mason Party, and factions of anti-slavery Democrats and anti-slavery Whigs who formed the Barnburners, the Liberty Party, and the Free Soil Party led by the notable Martin Van Buren.[27][28][29][30]

Martin Van Buren | 60-Second Presidents | PBS. Martin Van Buren ''one of the most important Presidents we never think of'' was an anti-slavery community organizing Democrat. He later went on to head the unsuccessful Free Soil Party which contained both former anti-slavery Democrats and anti-slavery Republicans who wanted new states to be ''free'' and thought that slavery would phase itself out over time if this were done.The Second Party System ended when platforms and members change as a result of the tension over the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854. During this time, the ''states' rights'' advocates in the north and south join forces with the pro-slavery south to push for a state's right to choose to be a slave state, AKA popular sovereignty.

This divisive bit of legislation, and the argument over popular sovereignty caused some southern individual rights and conservative Whigs to join the Democrats (or the popular Know Nothing Party) and caused some of the northern anti-slavery Democrats to join the newly forming Republicans (or the Free Soil Party).

The result was a split between the North and the South leading to the Third Party system, the formation of the Republican party from ex-Whigs and Free Soilers in 1854 (whose first President was Lincoln), and of course the Civil War.

How one piece of legislation divided a nation. This video describes how the Kansas-Nebraska Act resulted in the Whigs becoming Republicans, and how members changed parties around this time. While some platforms and members change during the First and Second Party Systems and help to define the divide we see during the Civil War, most ''switching'' doesn't happen until after Lincoln's Presidency in the Third Party System starting with Grant. Given this, we can draw a rough, but clear, line from the Federalist party of Hamilton to Clay's Whigs, to Lincoln's anti-slavery Republicans (who favor tradition and are pro-social justice, even if it means taxation, big government, and big banks). And, we can draw a clear line from Jefferson's anti-Federalists and Democratic-Republicans, to Jackson's Democrats, to the pro-slavery Democrats (who favor states' rights and human rights [for white men], and are pro-farmer and pro-small government, even if it means social injustice).

The Era of the Third Party System: 1854-1890's marks the start of the parties shifting platforms and splitting into the factions. Lincoln, the Civil War, and Reconstruction, along with issues that gained new importance like immigration, worker's rights, temperance, and importantly silver v. gold v. green (backed money) resulted in many changes for the nation.

Going into the Civil War, the pro-slavery, small business, small government Democrats (and temporarily Confederates), oppose the anti-slavery, pro-industrialization, big business, big government Republicans (and temporarily the Union) led by Lincoln. It isn't that the President wants war, it is that manifest density has left the country unable to advance properly into the next industrial era due to disagreement over states' rights in regard to slavery. The south is for the farmer and individual liberty, and the North is seeking modernization and collective liberty (which stands to crush the south's business).

Every past President had ignored slavery to focus on expansion, but Lincoln would not as ''a house divided against itself cannot stand.''

Abraham Lincoln | 60-Second Presidents | PBS. Lincoln, a long-time progressive Whig, is the first President of the new Anti-Slavery Republican party. Lincoln was a moderate Republican, but a true progressive-social-liberal. He created the first income tax and wasn't afraid to use his power to ensure prosperity for the North and social justice for all. For the next 30 years after his death, the Stalwart Republican crony capitalists who oppose civil-service will run Congress. This angers the progressive-liberal civil-service Whigs and the libertarian-Democrats, and paves the way for corruption in the Gilded Age. That is, until the great Bourbon-Democrat-Conservative Grover Cleveland comes to end the corrupt cronies in congress.The Civil War lasts from 1861 to 1865. On April 14, 1865, President Lincoln was shot by John Wilkes Booth, a Southern sympathizer. The next morning, moderate Republican Andrew Johnson took office. Following the Civil War is Civil War Reconstruction, which explains the start of the major switches.

During Civil War Reconstruction, withPresidents like Grant, the Republicans split into many factions (conservative, moderate, and radical/progressive; and crony capitalists and civil service). They were divided over new Civil Rights legislation and the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments (the Reconstruction Amendments), and especially over a disagreement on how to treat the South.

This split results in the moderate Andrew Johnson (who was proceeded by Lincoln and succeeded by Grant) almost being impeached by radical and conservative Republicans (he avoided impeachment by one vote).

During this time Freedmen (freed slaves), joined with more radical Carpetbaggers (a pejorative term used by opponents for new arrivals to the south from the North), and Scalawags or ''allies,'' who were native white Southerners in Republican factions in the south. Many Scalawags became Democrats joining the conservative Democrats in the 1870's.[31][32]

The conservative, moderate, and radical wings of the Republican party aside, two main factions stayed with the Republicans into Grant's era. These factions were the Stalwart Crony Capitalist Republicans and the Civil-Service ''Half-Breed'' Progressive Republicans. Meanwhile, other former Republicans, mostly conservative Republicans, left the party for the already factionalized Democrats. By this time, the Democrats included the Libertarian-Liberal Bourbon Democrats who favored states' rights and became today's liberals starting in the early 1900's and the Southern Conservative Democrats who favored slavery and remained with the Democrats until their faction became Nixon or Wallace supporters following Civil Rights in the 1950's and 1960's.

Other factions of this time (1864-1877), who weren't part of the major parties, include Victoria Woodhull's Equal Rights Party, a socially left-leaning feminist and equal rights party, and the People's Party.

The People's Party was a populist party that started in the 1870's but rose from the 1890's to 1900's under the free silver movement and Democrat William Jennings Bryan. The People's Party represents a growing pro-worker populist sentiment outside the major parties in both the North and South throughout the late 1800's. It fully merges with the Democrats by 1908 creating a solid progressive wing of the Democratic party (who organize behind free silver, which is seen as pro-agrarian, pro-miner, and factory worker due to its perceived inflationary properties. See Bryan's Cross of Gold speech). The pro-collective rights stance of Bryan stands in contrast to the earlier Democrats who favored individual rights no matter what.

Another faction from the 1870's, the Liberal Republican Party, represent an offshoot of civil-service minded Republicans that leave the party. The Liberal Republicans are moderate Lincoln-like Republicans who attempted to distance themselves from the ''Radical Republicans'' who wanted harsher punishment for the South after the Civil War and emphasized equality, civil rights, and voting rights for the ''freedmen'' (recently freed slaves).

Meanwhile, the Prohibition party shows a more puritanical party that will later find a home with the Republican party during the temperance movement.

These factions (in the major and minor parties) are part of what results in what we call ''switching'' as they allow large groups of people and politicians, and the issues they support, to go from major party to third party or faction, and then back to major party again. For example, some pro-immigration Liberal Republicans, who are ideologically at odds with their party, move to the Democratic party following the 1872 election, and many of the populist Equal Rights and People's Party become progressive Northern Democrats in the early 1900's.[33] See the United States presidential election, 1872 results for an idea as to where the country is at in this era.[34]

Now that we have an idea of what else is going on post-Civil war, let's get back to the two major parties and Grant.

Ulysses S. Grant | 60-Second Presidents | PBS. Grant, a Half-Breed Republican / Radical Republican opposed by the Liberal Republican party, but popular with Stalwarts, is progressive on social issues like Lincoln and is a popular and moderate politician. However, Grant's moderate and laissez-faire style ushers in the age of crony capitalists and corruption, his Stalwart friends just weren't as trustworthy as the rather Progressive Grant.The Democrats of Grant's time (1869 '' 1877) were split into factions like the Republicans. They began to welcome immigrants and support workers (left), but also enacted new Jim Crow laws (an extension of earlier Black Codes) that worked to segregate the country for the next 100 years (right). Those who remained Republicans embraced issues like religion and temperance, nationalism, and anti-immigration (right), but often also embraced civil service (left).

Many new immigrants in this time are Catholic. This influx of Catholics is part of what make Religion and Immigration major issues in the US, and it is also one of the main things that turn the Democrats into social liberals (along with the free silver movement, the New Deal coalition, and finally the South moving out in 1964). These Catholic Democrats become the Kennedy's and Biden's of the world after getting behind Unions and social programs (workers rights and social justice are becoming more important in this new post-war era of industrialization).

One should keep in mind that the Democrats haven't always had a good track record with immigrants. FDR was no champion of those trying to escape Europe during WWII. Despite the line of Federalists, Whigs, and Republicans being historically strict on immigration, there have consistently been pro-immigrant factions of the Republican party in all eras.

The rest of the Third Party System was marked by weak executive power, further party splitting, a corrupt Congress (see corruption in the Gilded Age), and the rise of the industrialists like J.P. Morgan (who is instrumental in the upcoming progressive era). Not all the issues that matter to the American parties today are with the parties of the late 19th century, but when they are, they are typically split between the many factions of the day (including third parties like the People's Party). This divisive political environment was exemplified by the post-Compromise of 1877 presidency of Rutherford B. Hayes. Hayes pushed against the Stalwarts for Civil Service reform, and the Presidency of James A. Garfield, which was sadly cut short by an assassination spurred on by the tense relationships between the Civil Service and Stalwart factions of the Republican party.

James A. Garfield | 60-Second Presidents | PBS. Half-Breed politics and James A. Garfield lead to Civil Service reform before the next round of changes ensues. Garfield was shot by a self-proclaimed ''Stalwart of the Stalwarts'', Charles J. Guiteau, on July 2, 1881. Despite Guiteau's intentions, the assassination led to Chester A. Arthur creating civil service reforms in his term, apparently in-part an effort to finish Garfield's work.[35]The divisions of the Third Party System largely remain until the upcoming progressive era, but there is some unity in the interim under the pro-business, anti-free silver, anti-imperialism, and anti-tariff, Bourbon Democrat, Grover Cleveland.

Cleveland won popular support of both Democrats and Republicans three times (1884, 1888, and 1892), due to his commitment to classical liberal principles and his willingness to fight against political corruption, patronage (the spoils system), and bossism. This went well until issues surrounding the Panic of 1893 lost him the Presidency.

The end of Cleveland's presidency and the Panic of 93'² can largely be seen as the end of the Third era, and the start of the next wave of political realignment.

Grover Cleveland | 60-Second Presidents | PBS. Grover Cleveland is one of the more impressive conservatives in history (a Democrat), but he is a progressive in the same style as Teddy Roosevelt (a Republican). America was, in ways, rebelling against the perceived Corruption of the previous era by all parties favoring progressivism of sorts (in this progressive era social liberalism will trump classical liberalism and conservatism).The Fourth Party System: 1896-1932 begins as Cleveland leaves office for his second time (after replacing the progressive, but lack-luster Benjamin Harrison). This marks the start of the Progressive era, the era in which the parties begin to reunite and become the parties of today.

This ''Fourth Party switch'' starts with the Democrats. The Democrats begin to move away from the idea of fighting against Civil Rights due to being pro-individual rights and pro-farmer party and start fighting for the collective rights of immigrants and workers while gaining additional populist support by embracing the free silver movement.

Meanwhile, Republicans are still more progressive than the Democrats on many social issues such as Civil Rights, and this results in wins for Republican William McKinley in 1897 and 1901.

As noted above, figures like William Jennings Bryan, the Populist Free Silver Democrat, give us signs of important changes in Democratic party during this era. While still a Jacksonian Democrat, Bryan is also progressive (running on a more populist message than Cleveland). He fights against big banks and monopolies and generally fights against elites and for the working class.

Bryan is never elected President, partially due to the Solid South Democrats ''disenfranchising Progressives, Republicans, and Blacks following the Reconstruction Era'', but his Progressive Republican opponent McKinley does get elected. McKinley's unfortunate assassination then leads to the presidency of Teddy Roosevelt, which can be thought to mark a major change in the Republican party.

Theodore ''Teddy'' Roosevelt serves from 1901 '' 1909 as a popular moderate-to-progressive Republican. Teddy is very similar to Cleveland in centeredness, principle, and popularity. He does some good and some bad, including notable state intervention and trust-busting, but it is his split from Republicans, and not his Presidency, that marks a change for the Republican Party.

Teddy Roosevelt left the Republicans in 1908 and started his ''progressive'' Bull Moose party which ran in '08 and '12. He wanted to ''reverse the domination of politics by business interests, which allegedly controlled the Republican and Democratic parties.'' He also wanted ''to destroy this invisible Government, to dissolve the unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics is the first task of the statesmanship of the day''[36]'... it is a clear sign that the Republican party-by-name is losing its more progressive members to the Democrats and retaining more conservative Republicans who, like Taft, support ''progressivism by rule of law'', are weak on civil rights, and are pro-business. This sort of mindset will, over time, will lead to Republicans losing some of their support of populists and progressives, but gaining the support of conservatives.

Theodore Roosevelt | 60-Second Presidents | PBS. It's worth noting, that while Democrats and Republicans have some dark history here, the Populist party of the 1890's, and the Progressive party of Teddy, generally avoid the most negative issues and are favored by the disenfranchised. Check out the Bull Moose Platform of 1912; the ''progressive'' party is what we today call social-liberal.This split between Taft and Roosevelt happens at a time the other Progressive of the day, Woodrow Wilson, is barking up a Hamiltonian-Liberal tree of pro-banker, progress, and Globalization. Wilson is in many ways more progressive than Taft when it comes to social justice (spurring on the first New-Deal-like programs), and very notably supports a central bank (creating the Federal Reserve with industrialists like J.P. Morgan, despite Democrats historically being against this and Republicans historically being for it).

These changes in this era help explain how we get both progressive populist, and a pro-banker and big business, wings of the Democratic party, and how the Republican spirit, which had historically been both elite and progressive, begins to shift.

In the next era, a string of Republican Presidents will mark a new type of Republican, and FDR will marry the progressivism of Bryan, Wilson, and Teddy, with the neoliberal economics of Wilson, helping to cement in the Democrats as the party of the New Deal.

Despite the shifting views of Democrats, the elephant in the progressive room, otherwise known as ''the Solid South,'' will stay with the Democrats until Kennedy and LBJ push for Civil Rights, and Nixon pushes his ''southern strategy'' as a countermeasure. This can be seen clearly in the South's voting record (see the Solid South voting record here).

Despite this truth, FDR was the last Democratic President the Solid South stood behind en masse. Over time, some of the Wilson-like Libertarian Bourbon Democrats will start shifting over to the Republican party in a response to the new liberal-progressive Democrats, while the rest will join FDR and the New Deal Coalition.

Wilson is the last Bourbon Democrat to be President, and he is only that by name in many respects. I consider him the first modern Democrat.

Woodrow Wilson | 60-Second Presidents | PBS. Woodrow Wilson is arguably the first proper Progressive Democrat. The pro-south stance has tapered down, but the Democrats still have the southern vote, the next Democrat will be FDR the staple liberal-progressive who starts the New Deal coalition.After Wilson, and before FDR, we get a string of Republicans who can be seen as the first modern, moderate Republicans.

With Teddy's exodus of progressives from the Republican party of the 1910's, and the progressive Taft losing (in large part due to this), Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover, step in to create a new ''less progressive'' era of the Republican party.

Harding famously promised ''a return to normalcy'' after beating the socialists, who were increasing in popularity, and the Democrats. Harding is the first true modern conservative, and Coolidge and Hoover largely follow in his footsteps.

Harding is critical of Communists and immigrants but favors civil rights and fights against lynching (yes, that was a thing that was still happening and needed to be fought against).

Harding fought organized labor, supported big business, and fought to lower taxes. While he isn't a modern Republican in every sense, he and his predecessors are a clear shift away from Teddy and Taft.

Warren G. Harding | 60-Second Presidents | PBS. Harding and Coolidge are the first true modern Conservatives. Conservatives favor the Libertarian hands-off style; the Republicans won't fully embrace modern right-wing views until Nixon/Reagan. Republican conservatives of this era are more Eisenhower-style Republicans.Like Warren G. Harding, Calvin Coolidge and Herbert Hoover are moderate conservatives (with each arguably shifting the party a bit to the right).

They support lower taxes, are friendly to Civil Rights, and promote the middle class while supporting business. They also generally favor small government classic liberalism like the old Democrats and today's Libertarians do. Hoover specifically was put to the test over this ideology with the Great Depression (remember the classic liberal position is to do nothing, i.e. zero state intervention in the free-market).

These three Republicans are, in ways, small government Libertarians just like Jefferson and Jackson, but some of their policies and attitudes mark a shift to the modern right in sentiment, as the Republican party also includes the anti-union voters, the anti-immigration voters, and some religious voters too. A third party of the time, the Prohibition Party, represented the more puritanical religious left and right. Although the Republicans of the late 1800's were friendly to temperance, these 1920's Republicans lost some of their favor. The Prohibition party notably considered endorsing Republican Herbert Hoover in 1928, but didn't.

As the Republicans shift further to the right under Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover, a faction of progressives (a New Deal Coalition) is forming inside and outside the major parties, and their formation marks one of the last major political realignments.

Herbert Hoover | 60-Second Presidents | PBS. Hoover ''was a different kind of Republican progressive'' (i.e. the Republicans are still not yet a ''right'' party in many respects despite the growing modern Republican spirit). The change is harder to spot on a Presidential level due to the string of Democrats leading up to Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1953.Even though we can consider the Progressive Wilson the first modern Democrat in some respects, and we can see the birth of the modern Republicans from Harding to Hoover, the Fifth Party Systems: 1933-1964 starts with the progressive Franklin D. Roosevelt, and not Wilson.

FDR marks the start of the Fifth Party, but more than just FDR, it is the official formation of the New Deal coalition (that began in the progressive era as different factions) that explains what drives the south out of the changing Democratic party from 32'² to 64'².

FDR forged a ''New Deal Coalition'' of bankers; those in the oil business; the Democratic state party organizations; ''Big City machines;'' labor unions; blue collar workers; racial, ethnic, and religious minorities including Catholics, Jews, and Blacks; farmers; white Southerners; people on relief; and intellectuals. Essentially everyone who had been oppressed in America joined together in a group, alongside some of their former oppressors.

This pro-business and progressive faction of former radical Whigs, civil-service Republicans, Federalists, Bourbon Democrats, Unions, populists, and other ''social and economic progressives'' previously found in both major parties, and the third parties, become a single unit under the Democrats. When you wonder why a modern Democrat is pro-business, pro-North, pro-city, and pro-worker and holds a progressive spirit, your answer starts properly in 32-33'² at the start of the Fifth Party.

We know that a modern conservative doesn't favor New Deal legislation or the big banks like today's social-liberal Democrats even with Jackson breaking up the first central banks, the Anti-Federalists running against central banks, etc. We also know the libertarians dislike large social programs and union-like entities. So, it's clear much of the switch has already happened between Wilson and FDR's time (aside from the southern bloc, which is still voting Democrat, and still has some of the states' right ideologist in its midst).

Suffice to say, from 1933 to 1945 FDR doubles down on the social-liberalism and progressive politics found in the progressive wing of the Democratic Party and Progressive party of his cousin, uniting the two forces in support of a New Deal.

Franklin D. Roosevelt | 60-Second Presidents | PBS. FDR changes everything. The Democrats become the New Deal party; we can only assume this would have been the party of Lincoln.After FDR we get Harry S. Truman. Truman's Presidency is largely based around the war, but we can understand the subject of switching by understanding that he pushed for Civil Rights which was opposed primarily by Southern Democrats (rather than Republicans). So we can confirm, despite the Republicans shifting to the right on some issues, in 1948, ''the right wing'' (in terms of civil rights) was in the Democratic party sitting right next to the progressives.

Meanwhile, the traditional conservative character of moderate Republicans is found in one of the nation's greatest leaders, a five-star general, Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces, and 34th President of the United States, the last ''progressive-moderate-conservative'' Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Eisenhower was a war hero like Jackson and Grant, but unlike those two he was centered, motivated, and a friend to conservatives and progressives alike. He supported the Civil Rights Act of 1957, which was notably opposed by the South, supported the New Deal, and fought against segregation in Washington DC and the Armed forces.

Instead of marking changing times, Eisenhower simply marks the last Republican who didn't have overwhelming southern support. Other Republicans of the time include those Joseph McCarthy-esque far-right wingers, so these folks exist, but this sort of character isn't seen in a President, and especially not a President like Eisenhower.

Dwight D. Eisenhower | 60-Second Presidents | PBS. The last of the ''progressive'' Republicans is best described as a ''moderate'' or ''conservative' (at the time) Republican. He is an ally to the New Deal, but most certainly a modern Republican in many respects. He famously was pushed to run for both parties, as he was very popular.By the time the progressive Democrat Kennedy pushes Civil Rights starting in the 50's as a Senator, and then in the 60's President, the southern Democrats and northern Democrats are in a tense relationship.

By the time LBJ passes his Kennedy-inspired Civil rights act in 64'², it is the last straw. Even the most loyal pro-south Democrats, like Strom, begin to leave for both the Republican party and the pro-segregationist American Independent Party (led by their famously ''pro-segregationist'' party leader George Wallace, who notably comes back to the Democrats, not the Republicans, after his loss).

The southern voter base, the House, and other Senators follows the shift over time, with the Republican Nixon seeing a sweeping win in 1968 with the support of the South won via his ''southern strategy'' after Civil Right 68'² under LBJ.

Despite the changing times, many Dixiecrats (like Byrd and eventually Wallace) remain with the Democrats (under southerner's like Jimmy Carter, whose family had been a staunch John F. Kennedy supporters since the 60's) until they begin to be swayed by Reagan and H.W. Bush's southern strategy.

It won't be until the Clinton era that the exodus of the south mostly completes (i.e. the shift takes 30 years, and some Dixiecrats never leave), despite all the changes to the Democratic platform since the early 1900's after Cleveland. Ironically, or not, Bill Clinton is (like Carter) a southern Democrat and make no mistake, southern Democrats are alive and well today. Despite this, the platforms and voter base have most certainly changed under this new generation of ''New Democrats.''

Lyndon B. Johnson | 60-Second Presidents | PBS.The next era, which we might call the Sixth Party system, is less agreed on by historians (some stop at the Fifth Party). If we consider the Sixth party, we can say that the Sixth Party system starts with Civil Rights in 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 which ended most ''Jim Crow'' laws and resulted in the major shift of the south leaving the Democratic Party over time.

After Civil Rights, we get the new states' rights Libertarian party of Goldwater and Reagan (making the same ''states' rights'' argument made during the pre-Civil War era in regard to slavery). This party now has at least part of the southern vote and tout being ''small government.'' They stand against socialism, progressivism, and big government, and do so even if it means opposing social justice reforms. Thus, the Libertarians and the Libertarian-Conservatives are the day's anti-Federalists. Their counterpart is the new party of (some of) the South, the religious right, the big business and military right, anti-immigration, and traditional conservatives who team up in a ''big tent'' after Wallace's third party falls apart. This party is, of course, the Republicans. They are similar to the Democrats of Lincoln's time but are also easy to equate to some of those factions that sprang up like the Know Nothings and Prohibition Party.

Meanwhile, the Democrats retain some Dixiecrats alongside their progressive wing. They rally around a string of moderate leaders like McGovern and Carter in an era during which the country is oddly almost split by east coast and west coast. Eventually we saw a compromise forming in a New Democrat Clinton era where social justice and the semi-regulated private market held equal importance. They embraced social liberalism, despite the costs and taxes associated, which was opposed by the increasingly classic liberal opposition. Their counterpart was the progressives, who represented the populist, pro-worker, pro-collective rights sentiment found in third parties like the People's Party and the New Deal Coalition.

Between 1992 Clinton V. H.W. Bush and W. Bush, following the Reagan era, the parties are pretty much in their modern form and are ''big tents'' of sorts, housing all of America's still existing factions, each party now resembling a modern version of their former opposition parties from past Party Systems.

Ronald Reagan | 60-Second Presidents | PBS. Reagan is a liberal, er um, classic liberal, er um, essentially a libertarian with conservative leanings. George Wallace, he is not, but some of his party is of Wallace's flock. Some would argue that Wallace's faction is dominant in the Republican party of 2016.One could argue that a Seventh Party System begins with liberals like Clinton and Obama (the first modern Northern Democratic Party President since Kennedy), and is contrasted by Republicans like Reagan and the Bush's.

I feel that the Seventh Party Begins in 1992 as 64'² '' 92'² is pretty clearly its own thing with Dixiecrats considered. One could also argue that a Seventh Party begins with the 2016 election cycle, a time when the establishment of both major parties seek types of globalization. They are pro-business despite their opposing ideologies, while Libertarians like Ron Paul, nativist populist factions of Republicans, and Socialist-Progressives like Bernie Sanders represent some of the nationalist, populist, progressive, classically liberal, and even extreme stances found in earlier eras.

Regardless of specifics, in this post 64'² era (if we consider the factions noted above), and especially in this post Reagan-Bush-Clinton era, we can see that a lot of complex changes have occurred.

When we consider that Democrats and progressives typically vote Democrat, and Republicans and Libertarians typically vote Republican, we can say the two major parties have almost fully switched platforms, members, ideologies, and even geographic locations over time, especially between Grant and LBJ (see the issue-by-issue breakdown below).

Bill Clinton | 60-Second Presidents | PBS. Wait, is this a Seventh Party system?'... hmmm maybe. Clinton does call himself a ''New Democrat,'' and some like Noam Chomsky point out that the modern Democrats are split between New Deal social justice populist FDR types and the free-market Neoliberal big business ''New Democrat'' Clinton types (their Republican counterparts being the Bush-style Neocons).''We welcome change and openness; for we believe that freedom and security go together, that the advance of human liberty can only strengthen the cause of world peace'... If you seek peace, if you seek prosperity'..., if you seek liberalization'... Tear down this wall!'' '' A message of unity and liberalization from the conservative hero Ronald Reagan.

Summary of Platform Shifting '' An Issues-by-Issue BreakdownThe platform switching, evidenced in the above sections, can be explained a few ways. Below we summarize it by contrasting key platforms of each major party in the First to Third Party Systems with the Fifth Party systems onward:

Federalists/Whigs/Third Party Republicans: Strict on immigration, pro-tradition, anti-slavery, no need to separate church and state or offer a bill of rights, pro-globalization, and trade, a central bank, big government, big business, pro-foreign-military-policy. Regulated economy based on the finance industry and global economy.Anti-Federalists/Democratic-Republicans/Third Party Democrats: Pro-immigration, anti-tradition, separate church and state, want bill of rights, limited government, no central bank, pro states' rights (even if it means slavery), pro-farmer, and anti-war. An unregulated economy based on production at home and farming.Modern Post 64'² Democrats: Pro-immigration, anti-segregation, separation of church and state, want bill of rights (today a second bill of rights for education and healthcare for example), big government, pro central bank, pro subsidization (be it to farmer or corporation), and anti-war in sentiment (albeit generally pro-defense). Regulated economy based on finance industry and global economy.Modern Post 64'² Republicans: Strict on immigration, pro-tradition, no need to separate church and state or offer bill of rights, pro-farmer and certain big businesses, small government, pro-south, and pro-strong military. Unregulated economy based on production at home and farming.As you can see the Third Party Republicans essentially become Post 64'² Fifth Party Democrats, and the Third Party Democrats essentially become Post 64'² Fifth Party Republicans on many (not all) key issues.

It is worth more than a note to mention that fitting all America's factions into two parties will always cause some splitting on issues. For instance, some modern Democrats favor private industry, are laissez faire and pro-foreign-military-policy, and some Republicans favor trade-based big business and are pro-foreign-military-policy. This pro-private industry and globalization is largely what the terms neocon and neoliberal denote.[37][38] In other cases environment or religion is the primary issue for a voter, and this can result in third parties (like the Green party for instance).

With the above said, ignoring minor factions, today we can break down the current major American political factions into a few basic groups (see a more detailed model here):

Neoliberal Democrats: Big business Democrats who favor the private market as a means to achieve social justice, tend to favor big government.Populist Social-Liberal Democrats: Favor a less privatized version of social liberalism, social justice and environmental issues take precedence over free-market economics and big business.Neocon Republicans: Big business Republicans who favor the private market and traditional conservative values and aspects of free-market libertarian ideology.Libertarian Republicans: Limited government classical liberals who tend to organize around right-wing ideology. As noted in the first section, sometimes a classical liberal position is seen as socially conservative today.Modern Conservative Republicans: Social and classical conservatives who are voting only on modern conservative issues of religion, immigration, gun laws, etc.Exactly what party has taken which stance on each issue has changed over time, but as displayed above and detailed below, some common threads can be traced throughout history to clearly illustrate ''switching.'' Of course, the exact changes that occurred are complex, and involve many third parties.

We can't always trace a neat line between issues or major parties, but the underlying arguments of ''how authoritative should government be?'' and ''should we sacrifice individual liberty for collective liberty?'' will always remain the same. This is what ultimately allows us to spot the factions and platform switching in any era so we can compare that to today.

If we make the above summary into one simple chart, it might look something like this:

A left-right spectrum showing how Lincoln and Reagan are both Republicans, and comparing that to the stances of Hamilton and Jefferson.

''I have just one purpose '... and that is to build up a strong progressive Republican Party in this country. If the right wing wants a fight, they are going to get it '... before I end up, either this Republican Party will reflect progressivism, or I won't be with them anymore.''[39] '' Eisenhower on being a moderate Republican and ''progressive'' friend to the New Deal Coalition, a stance that harkens back to Lincoln, but isn't found again after Republicans like Nixon or Reagan.

Better Understanding the Changes in American PoliticsAbove we summarized the switching of ideologies and platforms between the parties by looking at the party systems and Presidents.

Below we explore details, clarify semantics, answer questions, present curated videos, and illustrate some of the key telling moments regarding the changes described above.

Please consider sharing your insight below, our summing up of the history of American politics is an ongoing effort, see the videos for supplemental content from other authors.

For deeper reading:

Check out this in-depth article from The Department of Political Science University of Illinois-Chicago.See TIME's top 10 political defections if you want to know about ''American politicians switching parties.''See a breakdown of major American political party platforms over time.Also, see a breakdown of each party and President and how they would be placed on the ''left'' and ''right''.Did the American Political Parties Switch? '' Clarifying the SemanticsPeople often ask, ''did the American political parties switch?'', but this question is semantically wrong, and thus we should address it before moving on.

People can switch parties (like Strom Thurmond switched to a Republican in 1964 when Dixie Democrat LBJ was preparing to sign his Kennedy inspired landmark Civil rights legislation).Parties can switch general platforms and ideologies (which is why Strom left for the GOP).Voters can switch parties (like when the white Southern conservatives, slowly over time, left the Democratic party along with Strom).However, the parties themselves only switch when they hang-up their hat to become a new party (like when the Federalists became the Whigs).

Where US Politics Came From: Crash Course US History #9. This is one of many videos from CrashCourse. American history is long and complex; if you want to really understand things, I suggest watching the CrashCourse series on U.S. politics.When Did the Democratic and Republican Platforms Switch?As noted above, the planks, platforms, ideologies and even the names of the American political parties switched often, and at many different points. We call these changes: the first party system, second party system, third party system, fourth party system, and today's fifth party system (and potentially sixth and seventh).

Some changes stick out like a sore thumb, but most of the changes between party systems happened slowly over time. It's hard to summarize or detail every issue, but the keys are names like Free Soil, Free Silver, Bourbon Democrats, anti-slavery Republicans, Stalwarts, Half-Breeds, American Independent, and other telling titles of factions or third parties whose members inevitably have gravitated toward a major party over time.

When we can't cut through the rhetoric, we can look at voting records to see which party favored what.

It's important to note, that the current parties weren't established until the 1850s (third party). From this point forward is when the major ''switching'' happens, but it is also when issues we consider important today take center stage for the first time. When Lincoln takes office, the Republican party is only a few years old, prior to this the ideology is roughly the same and they are called Federalists, and then Whigs. The same is true for anti-Federalists, Democratic-Republicans, and Jacksonian Democrats.

Perhaps the best answer to, ''when did the platforms switch,'' is: under Lincoln, the Roosevelts, and LBJ.

In each case, the President took actions which we would see as ''liberal'' today (meaning social liberal like Keynes and Mill, not classical Jefferson and French revolution style liberal). They used their authority to favor the collective at the expense of individual liberty, even if it meant war. Since Teddy Roosevelt and Lincoln are Republicans and LBJ and FDR are Democrats, we have no choice to face a simple and powerful proof of ''a switch.''

TIP: Sometimes switches seem to happen because we try to treat the complex political spectrum like it is two simple groups. Almost all American political parties and factions hold ''mixed views.'' See our breakdown of the basic political parties or our page of left-right spectrum explainers and models.

Why Did Parties Switch Platforms and Members?The common thread of each major switch, aside from war, was civil rights. Or maybe we could more fairly say, state-enforced social and economic justice (collective liberty) versus individual liberty as is illustrated by the charts on this page.

Civil rights aside, since before the first party was formed, our founding fathers have fought each other tooth and nail over the direction of the country. The biggest issues have been: big business versus small business, big government versus small government (in size), big government versus small government (in authority), whether or not to have a central bank, and how much local and foreign credit and debt was the right amount.

We can see how some of the above values are consistent for a given quadrant of the political sphere, but not for a specific party in a two party system or even a faction or member of a party at a given time! We can also see how specific groups have shifted their interpretation of these things over time, and how some groups simply pay lip-service to the overarching ideals.

There is also the overarching question that has shadowed the debates between parties and led to switching, ''should our Republic act more like a Direct Democracy or a Republic'' (why the parties are called Democrats and Republicans). Do we look to Athens or Rome? To what extent do we mix these to protect the Republic from the special interests that arise as a natural artifact of liberty?[40]To what extent do we mix this to avoid an overly authoritative state? Or really, to what extent do we embrace democracy in our Republic. Today you may think of one party or the other as wanting all the above things, but that has never really been the case.

The ''planks and platforms'' (issues) of each opposing group (regardless of name) have changed over time, as specific stances on these issues were taken, and as public opinion changed with the times.

How Can We Tell What Switched, if Anything?If we want to more accurately see what is happening with the parties we have to look at each political, party, faction, and platform in regards to each issue. We can take any issue, from any major American political party platform over time, and see how it compares to other issues of other parties. This can help us see how parties like Federalists, Whigs, Republican-Democrats, Democrats, Republicans, Libertarians, and Progressives did or didn't change over time, and what that means in perspective.

Below is a chart we created showing one way to view the complex political left-right spectrum (it is similar to the chart above but this time lists basic government types and asks a different set of questions).

A left-right paradigm using a four point graph to show how common government types relate to left and right in terms of ''who has authority'' and ''who says so.''

If one had to place historical figures on the ''left'' and ''right'', in terms of the chart presented above (where we consider the commonly excepted definition of left and right circa America in 2016), then VERY loosely we might say:

Right Wingers: Hamilton (Federalist), Cleveland (Democrat), Hoover, (Republican), Reagan (Republican)Left Wingers: Jefferson (Democratic-Republican), Lincoln (Republican), Teddy Roosevelt (Republican), FDR (Democrat), Johnson (Democrat)If one had to place historical figures on our more complex 4-point spectrum, then VERY loosely, but more accurately than above, we might say:

Social Libertarian (left): Jefferson (Democratic-Republican). Favoring a socialist democratic republic with limited power.Social Liberal (left): Johnson (Democrat) and Lincoln (Republican). Favoring authoritative Democracy for the benefit of the collective.Conservative Libertarian (right): Reagan (Republican). Favoring authoritative conservatism for individual liberty.Liberal Conservative (right): Hamilton (Federalist). Favoring authoritative conservatism for the collective.Again, we find that party names are spread out over political leanings (pointing again to switching platforms). From here forward we will focus on telling the history of each Party System in detail, discussing platforms and political views to better illustrate the changes.

NOTE: The first part of the page presents almost all of the story and our argument. The rest of the page contains the original essay written for this page and as such reiterates some points. The aim will be to combine the sections over time. This page has been an ongoing effort to find truth we can all agree on, and perhaps it only makes sense that attempting a feat like that would spawn a long evolving essay inspired by readers ' comments. Remember to comment below with insight!

A Final Summary the American Political PartiesThe section below puts everything together one last time to recap the story.

The American political parties take many twists and turns, but we can trace the history of ''left'' and ''right'' in American politics to better understand people, times, issues, and the parties of today.

The First Party System: The Federalist Party and the Democratic-Republican Party 1792 -1824To start, the founding fathers can be put into two groups: the Federalist Party and the Democratic-Republican Party (Anti-Federalist)[41][42].

Alexander Hamilton favored central Government and had ties to Britain, and wanted centralized banking. He favored national power over state power. He is today's ''Washington'' Liberal/Conservative. Hamilton wanted free-market capitalism and globalization with Britain/America, as a world leader hundreds of years before his time. He is an impressive character.

The Democratic-Republican Party, headed by James Madison and Thomas Jefferson, generally opposed Hamilton and his views (favoring state rights and democracy). In simple terms, they are today's Social-Libertarians (not Reagan-style, the far-right doesn't emerge in party politics yet). They are more in-line with what people think when they think ''rebelling from the authority of the King to be free.''

In this scenario we can say the ''big government aspect'' of the current American left is with the Federalists, and the ''socially liberal'' of left, and ''anti-big government'' of the right, part is with the Democratic-Republicans. But remember, the who far-right thing simply doesn't exist yet. So the divisive politics of today aren't anywhere to be found (that happens over slavery and temperance later in Lincoln's time).

If you had to examine these men, you would say Jefferson is left wing and Hamilton is right wing. Today we would probably call Hamilton a Neoliberal or traditional Conservative, Jefferson more a Democratic-socialist, and Madison more of a centrist (probably truest to the Democratic-Republican name). As noted above, none fully share the beliefs of the current parties, but Hamilton is certainly more ''traditional'' and Jefferson more ''radical.'' Hamilton leans toward being ''a liberal elite'' or even ''big business conservative'' economically, while Jefferson tends to be a left winger philosophically.

The duality of the Federalist Party and the Democratic-Republican Party is well displayed in the clip below in a discussion between Hamilton and Jefferson (which you must watch through YouTube or HBO as it's from an HBO's John Adams).

Hopefully after reading the above, and watching the video below we have a clear foundation of our founding fathers from which to move forward. If we confuse these men, we will struggle to draw a line from them to today. So make sure you have this one down.

HBO John Adams '' Alexander Hamilton takes Jefferson to school. Hamilton pushed for a central bank since day 1, while Jefferson was much more of an idealist. Adams plays mediator. It's hard to use the terms Democrat and Republican at this point in history. Rather, our founding fathers had a mix of views corresponding to different aspects of the current Democrats, Republicans, and Libertarians.NOTE: The ideas of the parties changed over the years. It's important to understand history so we don't think of Thomas Jefferson as a ''right winger'' loyal to Britain who would rather have a duel than a debate to protect his honor. That was Hamilton, another of our great founding fathers. If I have to make the call, Hamilton is clearly a Republican and Jefferson a Democrat, but this is more in-line with the actual meaning of the words than today's political parties.

Second Party System: Enter The Jacksonian Democrats 1828 '' 1854In 1829, the very popular with the people, Andrew Jackson split the Democratic-Republican Party. The new party Jacksonian Democrats were born from this, and that movement would grow into the current Democratic party.[43] If you are looking for the America's first true liberal Jackson hardly fits the bill. Jackson was a man of the people, and his party was out to take power away from ''elites'' and ''monopolies'' and put it in the hands of the people. In practice, his presidency was more like President Obama's where intentions of change get muddled by the practicalities of the political environment.

Despite many being classical liberals, Jacksonian Democrats in many ways mark the start of right-leaning conservative-libertarians. These Democrats will split into two factions over the 1800's, one the Bourbon Democrats (social-libertarians) and the other (the solid south pro-slavery). Other Democrats will join third parties like the anti-slavery Free Soil Party as a response to the far-right faction of pro-slavery Democrats of the Jackson era.

Meanwhile, the Whig Party led by Henry Clay came into power around Jackson's time[44]. The Whigs wanted a national bank, higher taxes, and power for Congress and importantly they want to end slavery. These social-service lefty Republicans are 1/2 today's progressive, 1/2 Hamiltonian Globalization liberal.

In this time, the Democrats usually want lower taxes and less power for the President on paper (although, lip-service warning, Jackson uses lots of power). For instance, Jackson succeeded in dismantling Clay's Second Bank of the United States. So, Jackson is opposed to a central bank, is anti-executive power on paper, but is pro-executive power in action. Like Reagan, he uses executive power to deregulate. Jackson was generally anti-tax, but the taxes he does pass damage the south more than the north (the Tariff of Abominations, which tellingly started with John Quincy Adams and had support from Northern Jackson supporters).[45]

Going into the 1830's, the anti-central bank Democrats in the North anger the pro-slavery Democrats in the South with their general support of the Tariff of Abominations, which specifically hurt the states who put their investment in slavery, instead of industry as in the North. While it is hard to place the blame solely on Jackson, the issue of tariffs favoring the North or South will continue to be a divisive issue that all Presidents have to deal with moving forward.

Voting on ''Tariff of Abominations'' tally of votes (from Wikipedia).

House Vote on Tariff of 1828ForAgainstNew England1623Middle States (New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware)566West (Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, Kentucky)291South464Total10594Free States8829Slave States1765TIP: If you have to choose, Jackson is the left winger ideologically believing in small government and farmers, and Clay is the right winger who ideologically favored big banks and big government. On social issues Clay is a progressive Liberal; he wants modernization and social justice. Jackson would sooner duel with you than pass a law that tells states and farmers what to do. That means Jackson is essentially running on Barry Goldwater's platform and it is certainly still the party of Jefferson albeit a more militant version.

Age of Jackson: Crash Course US History #14.TIP: The Jackson era marks the start of a pro-tax America. Some presidents will be more willing to tax for social justice, like Lincoln and future liberals (by any party name), and some will tax for conservative reasons, but Jefferson's era was the last era of truly tax-free Libertarians. See history of the income tax (especially if you think modern Republicans have lowered taxes). The parties throughout history have all wanted to tax different things, namely the cash cows of the other party, but it's been a long time since a party wanted to reduce taxes. This is partly a strategy for the security of the nation (friends by debit and credit), and partly a side-effect of a growing super-power.

QUESTION: Was Lincoln a Democrat or Republican? He was a Republican by name, but today we would consider him to share many qualities with a socially left-leaning Democrat. Learn more about Lincoln.

Third Party System: Republicans Versus Democrats, the Battle Begins 1854-1890sBy 1854, the Whigs had disbanded. Now we had the Democrats, who were split in factions, the The Southern Democrats, who supported the federal protection of slavery in the western territories; and The Northern Democrats, those Libertarian Bourbon Democrats, who wanted all questions of slavery left up to the U.S. Supreme Court. We also had the newly formed anti-slavery Republican Party, who are the old Whigs and Federalists (today's progressive liberal, in regards to most issues).

The Democrats of this era were against ''big government'' telling states whether or not they can own slaves, and they don't want big banks. See the Democratic Party Platform of 1856. The Democrats still saw themselves as the Liberal party of Jefferson and Jackson, the small business farm owning ''libertarians.'' Meanwhile, the Republicans were a new iteration of the parties of Hamilton and Clay, but with different factions supporting them then when they were Whigs.

The Republicans are for modernization. They are against slavery, for central banks, and for bigger industrialized business. They embrace ideas of taxes, credits, and debts in the interest of prosperity and social justice. They embrace many of the economic policies of the Whigs, such as national banks, railroads, high tariffs, homesteads, and aid to land grant colleges (where the first free public Universities in America come from).

The Republicans also become known as a ''pro-business'' party at the time (meaning industry, not plantation). The Republican coalition consisted of businesspeople, shop owners, skilled craftsmen, clerks, and professionals who were attracted to the party's modernization policies.

Meanwhile, the race issue pulled the great majority of white southerners into the Democratic Party as ''Redeemers.'' The Republicans want a more northern style of commerce and banks, and Democrats want a smaller farmer-based economy, with less government and no central bank. See the Republican Party Platform of 1856 here

By the time Republicans elect former Whig Abraham Lincoln in 1860, it's pretty clear that the Republicans are leaning toward the left wing and the Democrats are leaning toward the right wing by most of today's standards, but the Civil War changes this.

TIP: In 1861, Lincoln signed the Revenue Act of 1861, creating the first U.S. income tax. Learn more about the history of the income tax.

The ''Switch'' that Starts With Civil WarThe Civil War and Civil War Reconstruction caused a three-way split in the Republican party. The Conservatives wanted the Confederate States to quickly rejoin the union with no consideration for racial relations. The Radicals wanted to punish the Confederate leaders confiscate Confederate property, and protect the rights of former slaves. The Moderates didn't want to punish the Confederate leaders, but did want some protections for former slaves. This split effected Democrats, and the formation of new minor parties led to the start of the major change over the next 100 years. See a visual of the split here.

From the end of the Civil War until the 1890's the Republican party becomes anti-immigration, and pro-religion (embracing ''the temperance movement''), and those who we would consider ''left'' today migrate over to the Democratic party. With this in mind, the Solid South will remain active in the party for the next 100 years. This will help explain the emerging Populists and Progressive led by figures like the Roosevelts.

Starting with Lincoln and the newly formed Republicans, throughout the industrial revolution, and then until Teddy Roosevelt quits the Republicans and forms the ''Progressive Party,'' is when the major switching of people, parties, names, and ideologies happens. The full switch is in swing when LBJ pushes Civil Rights, Strom becomes a Republican, and the Goldwater-Reagan movement begins.

Take a look at the evolution of the Republican platform here, you can see ''the switch'' plain as day. It happens as a result of Lincoln and the Civil War.

Lincoln ''Now'' scene. Like LBJ, Lincoln lost his supporters on ''the right'' over sweeping Civil Rights legislation. This is only one instance where the battle over Civil Rights and State Rights in a free democracy ends in bloodshed.TIP: If we trace the parties of the anti-federalist Jefferson, to the Democratic Jackson, we get a rather clear timeline of socialist/libertarian politics. Conversely, if we trace the parties of Hamilton, to Clay, to Lincoln we see the roots of the traditional conservative and the liberal parties. Following Civil War Reconstruction, the switch happens. After Reconstruction issues of Race, Immigration, and Temperance pushed the social-liberals to the Democrats and the libertarian-conservatives to the Republicans. The full switch took 100 years and was cemented under LBJ.

Third Party Part 2: the Industrial Revolution to the Progressive EraThe string of Presidents between Lincoln and Grover Cleveland includes some important stories of ''know-nothing parties'' and ''populist parties'' (where those socialists and libertarians go when they are without parties, as they often are), but we can't cover everything here.

Importantly, this era ends with Cleveland's second presidency and the Panic of 1893 (which produced a severe national depression). Cleveland is a right-wing President, who was very popular and supported by the South, ultimately his downfall, the height of the industrial revolution, and an upcoming war set the stage for more changes in American politics.

TIP: Cleveland is a great example of a true Conservative, he is a Democrat by name, but this Bourbon Democrat is great like an Eisenhower, he should be a model for today's Libertarian who sometimes gets side-tracked by their cousins on the right. The end of his Presidency is arguably more about the changing times than the man.

Gilded Age Politics:Crash Course US History #26. The corruption pointed out in this video starts after Lincoln and continues into the late 1800's and, of course, some of the arguement hasn't gone away. At the very, least figures like Cleveland and Roosevelt do a bit to get politics back on the right track before the upcoming Progressive era (which is in many ways a response to the post-Civil War Gilded Age).

The Progressive Era: Crash Course US History #27. The Progressive era, named due to all the parties embracing progressivism to some extent.Fourth Party System: The Progressive Era '' McKinley and Teddy 1896 '' 1932The election between Theodore Roosevelt William McKinley was pretty heated over social issues, but the parties stay the same. Republican Theodore ''Teddy'' Roosevelt (1901-1909) is arguably the last of the ''left wing'' Republicans. Roosevelt is a very progressive president, and he even started his own ''progressive party'' after breaking away from the Republicans. The parties are more or less still the same as they were since the split over reconstruction, but the lines are much less clear due to the changing tides of the time.

PBS Roosevelts.As progressive as every President hopeful is at this time, Taft and Teddy lose to the first modern Liberal and last of the Bourbon Democrats, Woodrow Wilson.

Between Wilson's time, and the time when Teddy's cousin Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1933-1945) comes into power on the back of the Great Depression, the Democrats become increasingly progressive (despite the southern segregationist) while the Republicans move to the right after Teddy and Taft under figures like Harding and Coolidge.

Century of Enslavement: The History of The Federal Reserve. Finally, the dream of Hamilton and JP Morgan comes to life. It starts with the Panic of 1893 and culminates under Wilson, the first modern liberal (progressive as a Lincoln, modern and big thinking as a Hamilton).Fifth Party System: The New Deal Era '' FDR to LBJ 1933 '' 1964There was no single moment when the Democrats and Republicans switch platforms. This is because America is a country of many people with a wide array of views and alliances. The big hint is that the Roosevelt family is so liberal that the right wing still curses their name before breakfast today. We might take that as a joke, but the northern Democrat Kennedy and Roosevelt families are not GOP favorites.

The Fifth Party System begins with FDR, the first modern social liberal.

By the time of FDR, the Democrats are at least in-part a left-wing progressive-liberal party (home to some populists and socialists, who sat alongside the Dixiecrats), and the Republicans move toward being a right wing conservative party in response.

New Deal legislation hammers the first nail in the coffin for the right-wing supporting Democrats, and by the time Dixiecrat Johnson passes the very liberal Kennedy-supported Civil Rights Act of 1964, the parties we know today are born.

Despite the tension over Civil Rights bills of the 50's and 60's, many Southern Democrats continued their strained alliance with the progressive Democrats into the Sixth Party system and many civil service minded moderates remain with the Republicans.

At the end of the Fifth Party, modern-Libertarianism (a right-wing movement sometimes, and other times an intellectual states' rights Bourbon Democrat movement) was born (or re-born) with supporters like Goldwater and Reagan.

It is in this era that Democrats start supporting collective rights and collective authority, and the traditionally conservative Republicans start embracing the classic liberal states' rights stance of the earlier Democrats.

The 1964 Civil Rights Act Explained: US History Review. Johnson lost his right wing Democrat over his sweeping Civil Rights legislation. In this context, the words Civil Rights and State Rights become buzzwords of sorts for the parties (despite their inherent altruism). (TIP: State rights are super important, but also a tactic to retain bad laws at a state level. Civil Rights are important, but also a tactic to expand government. This is an age old battle that manifested since Hamilton and Jefferson and still manifests today).NOTE: Dixiecrat was a short-lived segregationist political party in the 40's, but also a term used to describe a right leaning pro-south Democrat at the time.

Sixth Party and Seventh Party Systems: LBJ to Today '' The New Deal Coalition V. the Reagan CoalitionThe Sixth party (although less agreed on by historians, some stop at the fifth party) can be said to start after LBJ.

By Clinton's ''New Democrat'' era, the south favors the GOP and the parties resemble the parties of today. These parties are split by north and south, much like we saw back in 1854. Otherwise, it is hard to remember a time when the nation was as divided by geographic location.

Americans are still fighting old ideological battles, still licking old wounds, still indebted to the banks and other countries, and still trying to use taxes as a weapon against each other. Americans, divided by their parties, are still fighting over rich and poor, still fighting over small business and big business, and still fighting over small government and big government, They are still fighting over who should have what rights.

Despite all this, by looking at American history, we can see that America is a country that is strongest when it comes together, despite seemingly unrecognizable differences. ''A house divided'...'', as Lincoln said.

If you did have to divide the house, you would divide it as ''The New Deal Coalition V. the Reagan Coalition''. That is to say FDR, LBJ, Carter, Clinton, Obama V. Nixon, Reagan, Bush. Of course, we might say New Deal is ''left,'' and Reagan-Bush ideas are ''right,'' but even today, don't we all pay lip-service to the same ideals? Most Americans say that they support small business, a strong middle class, freedom, liberty, and justice for all. What is it exactly that divides us? The answer is complicated, but history can shine some light on the question.

Revealing the Truth about the Democratic Party Part 2: The Parties Switched. This video is giving a counterpoint.The American Political Parties Didn't Switch Myth '' The Author's PerspectiveThe platforms of the parties constantly switched throughout history, or at least they evolved constantly attracting different types of followers by embracing different stances on key issues. You can twist those facts to say ''the parties didn't change at all'' and still be moderately correct, but it is much more accurate to describe the changes honestly and leave the absolutist judgements aside or debate.

Twisting history and presenting half-truths to manipulate people is pretty human, it's a technique called ''rhetoric'' which Aristotle wrote about along with Republics and Democracy, and this sort of rhetoric-based politics is clearly laid out in the Powell Memo and utilized by today's media and politicians. It's important to respect the hard-won battles the country fought, and the people who fought them, but its also important not to look for heroes and villains when discussing great men and women in a great country.

In most cases, the ''switches'' resulted from debates about how much power a President should have, how many rights particular people should have, taxation, ''race,'' North V. South, economic ideas, and what it means to live in a free country (i.e. the meaning of liberty). These aren't new issues, and can be embraced in different ways by people of different ideologies, as they have been throughout all recorded history.

In all the switches and evolutions of planks and platforms, change was slow, and came with politicians (state and federal) and their constituents made gradual changes.

Figures like Jefferson, Lincoln, FDR, and Johnson tend to be considered ''left.'' While figures like Hamilton and Reagan are considered ''right.'' But as we note above, this is a complex subject and rather semantic (especially when we consider single issues instead of trying to paint a party with a broad brush). We can trace rough lines from the revolution to modern times, but it's hard to compare current politicians with old ones in any overly-simple and still meaningful way. Thus, it is hard to sum up any ''party switching'' in a mere sentence (or even a long essay such as we have done).

You'll hear half-truths like ''Lincoln was a Republican,'' or ''Republicans freed the slaves,'' or ''Democrats fought against civil rights in the 60's.'' These statements are all true historically, but very unclear when said without detail in modern times. For instance, Lincoln and the Civil War Republicans represented the North, and some pro-South Democrats like Strom Thurmond fought against Civil Rights before becoming Republicans between 1964 '' 1994. We know what these things mean when we think critically about the players, but they come across as dishonest in a rhetoric filled soundbite that is trying to appropriate politicians for parties they wouldn't have been a part of ideologically.

This sort of stuff is political spin for marketing and ad campaigns. Don't believe the hype. If you want to know what Lincoln thought, read what he wrote. He wasn't a modern day Liberal, but he certainly wasn't a modern day Conservative either. Calling Lincoln a modern day Republican is a little like crediting Reaganomics to Martin Luther King, but calling Lincoln a modern Democrat insinuates that he may have been a Clintonian (and I don't think that is 100% correct either). King was a progressive Democrat fighting the conservative segregationist Democrats in the South, trying to ensure a progressive Democratic party. Lincoln was a conservative Whig and then Republican, trying to unite the country with Federal power and taxation. Reagan was a classic liberal who teamed up with conservatives to defeat the growing social liberal left. We can debate their character, and we can see aspects of left and right in the character of each, but there is something slightly off about any one party trying to appropriate any American hero in any era.

So, suffice to say, I see a switch, and I see the old Dixiecrat mentality as being with the modern Republicans, but I also respect the many valid counterpoints and value debate and unity over some need to appropriate a specific President and spark more division.

Democrat ''Party Switch'' Myth Debunked. People like to spin the idea of the parties switching as a myth; they have fair points, which is why these types of videos are featured here. I don't buy it based on what I know about history. The change was gradual, but the parties switched platforms and planks over time. Given this, it's fair to simplistically say, ''the parties switched,'' but more accurate to say, ''the parties switched platforms and members.''Final ThoughtsTo end this, I'll reaffirm, that there is always more than one way to look at one event. Was Lincoln like a modern Republican? I don't think so personally, but my perspective on the matter doesn't magically make him a modern Democrat. Likewise, are not aspects of Hamilton more Republican and aspects of Jefferson more modern Democrat, honestly, I could make a case for it. Perhaps the key to better understanding how things changed is to move away from labels, and move toward understanding we are one America who has no better ally in the world then our political opponents themselves. Did things change and evolve? Yes, certainly a Gilded Age politician is not the same as a Progressive Era politician. But, is this best summed up by ''they changed platforms'' or ''they changed ideologies''? Lots of room for debate there. Who am I to tell someone how to read the facts? Or, as Montaigne said, ''What do I know?'' and ''By diverse means we arrive at the same end''.

If we all agree on the general truths, that is enough for healthy debate.

Life is complex, but for all the grey areas, many truths regarding politics are ultimately black and white when you dig deep enough. We can trace a line from Athens to Rome, to the European enlightenment, to America's founders, to today. Let's get the facts straight so the next generation can do the same. We don't agree on everything, but we all agree on life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness as ensured by the Republic, and that means a healthy respect for ethics, political history, and each other. For every frustrated American of one kind, there is an equal frustrated one of the other. We have a duty to each other and the next generations to work our stuff out and never let 1861 happen again. If that means sharing Lincoln and Jefferson, and Byrd and Johnson, then so be it.

The country has always been divided over issues of trade, the role of the federal government, and taxation, however social issues like race, religion, immigration, and more only divide the country in later years. The evolving political landscape led to some complex changes that can be simply explained by pointing to the Federalist and Anti-Federalists and then Civil War Reconstruction and Civil Rights, but are best examined in detail.

If we look only to compare a Federalist with a modern Democrat and an Anti-Federalist with a modern Republican (on purely ideological grounds) it is easy to see the similarities. However, when we have to trace a line between all parties in American history we have to account for the fact that the Federalist linage becomes the Third Party Republicans before becoming the modern day Democrats, and like-wise the Anti-Federalists are clearly the party of Jackson before they become the Republicans of today. These inconsistencies, which are seen best by looking at who the south votes for (but aren't explained by that alone), require us to explain hundreds of years of party and platform evolution and that effect on the voter base.

Again, this can be explained by showing how the rift over collective rights vs. individual rights paired with growing progressivism created new alliances and shifting platforms, but it isn't explained by this alone.

While the American political parties have evolved and changed over the years, the basic political parties (social liberal, liberal, conservative, and socialist) and the factions within parties (moderate, radical, pro-social justice, pro-business, etc) don't change, this helps us to get a true sense of where any party or President stood at any given time. While the above essay clarifies the complex tale of the American political factions, each person has to ultimately interpret the facts and their meaning for themselves.

NOTE: Today every person holds a ''mixed'' ideology. Thus we likely relate to a wide spread of past ideologies, parties, and politicians. Politics is complex, understanding that the parties have changed helps us to remember that we need to vote on issues and the character of leaders, and not just on party name alone.

Link to Article

Archived Version

Tue, 30 Oct 2018 13:04

by P.A. Madison on September 22nd, 2007

[Updated 8/24/2015 to make more readable]

Because the purpose of the Fourteenth Amendments first section was to end the denial of those fundamental rights that belong to all United States citizens by virtue of their citizenship under Article IV, Sec. II of the U.S. Constitution was imperative to first define citizenship of the United States. Otherwise, a State could refuse to recognize newly emancipated slaves as citizens by withholding the right to sue, make contracts, due process, purchase property, etc. in any State they ventured into Therefore, the Fourteenth Amendment acts to recognize all persons as citizens who do not owe allegiance to some other government when naturalized or born.

Perhaps the first most important thing to understand about national birthright is that there was no national birthright rule applicable within the States prior to the year 1866. One will look in vain to find any national law on the subject prior to this year, or even any mention of the right to citizenship by birth under the United States Constitution. The reason for this is because the authority remained with each State to make rules that distinguished alien from citizen.

The distinction was important because aliens could been prevented from owning property, voting, inheritance, doing business, etc.

Madison made it clear rules of who is a citizen or alien properly belonged with each State when addressing a contested South Carolina Election of Rep. William Smith in the House of Representatives in 1794. Madison said the question of whether Rep. Smith had been a citizen of the United States for seven years at the time of the declaration of independence rested entirely with the Constitution of South Carolina:

From an attention to the facts which have been adduced, and from a consideration of the principles established by the revolution, the conclusion I have drawn is, that Mr. Smith was, on the declaration of independence, a citizen of the United States; and unless it appears that he has forfeited his right, by some neglect or overt act, he had continued a citizen until the day of his election to a seat in this House. I take it to be a clear point, that we are to be guided, in our decision, by the laws and constitution of South Carolina, so far as they can guide us; and where the laws do not expressly guide us, we must be guided by principles of a general nature, so far as they are applicable to the present case . . . It were to be wished, that we had some law adduced, more precisely defining the qualities of a citizen or an alien; particular laws of this kind have obtained in some of the States; if such a law existed in South Carolina, it might have prevented this question from ever coming before us.

After the Revolution, States retained only those portions of common law that were applicable to their local circumstances. In England at the time, the general rule '' not a hard rule since could be suspended when required by the King '' every person born within the Kings allegiance and within any of the King's realms or dominions was considered a natural born subject under the maxim every man owes natural allegiance to the King whom may have been born in any of his realms or dominions. This natural allegiance was perpetual and difficult to severe or alter (Once a English subject, always a English subject) and was found odious in this country (America went to war against this ''natural allegiance'' in 1812).

In early America the common law rule of ''natural allegiance'' was discarded as well as the rule of automatic citizenship to children born to aliens regardless of their condition. Other differences that differed from the common law were the general rule children born to transient aliens or temporary sojourners remained alien. Early states also required of aliens who desired to become domiciled within their limits to first renounce any allegiances to other governments and pledge their allegiance solely to the State. Therefore, a child born to domiciled alien parents was ''born within the allegiance'' of the State even if the parents had not yet been naturalized would be considered a citizen of the state and a United States citizen.

Moreover, when an issue of aliens and citizenship went before the courts it meant some State had neglected to enact laws on the subject, thereby forcing the courts to adjudicate citizenship under common law rules of place of birth. This is exactly what happened with the State of New York in 1844, forcing the State to later withhold automatic citizenship of children born to ''transient aliens'' by statute. *

Conceivably, Congress could had from the beginning attempted to include a defined local birthright rule '' whether due to place of birth or parentage '' but would have found, just as the Thirty-Ninth Congress had discovered, to be no simple matter as individual States had differing opinions over who should, or should not, be their citizens.

As a rule, the nation considered only those patriotic immigrants who came here for the exclusive purpose to settling amongst us, bringing with them wealth, like habits and customs as those worthy to become part of our society. And more importantly, those willing to renounce all prior allegiances to their country of origin and swear exclusive fidelity to this one.

Paupers, vagabonds and imperialist were universally despised.

The Fourteenth Amendment's citizenship clause differed from the common law rule in that it required owing complete allegiance only to the United States in advance rather than automatically bestowed by place of birth, i.e., only children born to parents who owed no foreign allegiance were to be citizens of the United States '' that is to say '' not only must a child be born but born within the complete allegiance of the United States politically and not merely within its limits. Under the common law rule it did not matter if one was born within the allegiance of another nation.

Under Sec. 1992 of U.S. Revised Statutes the same Congress who had adopted the Fourteenth Amendment had enacted into law, confirmed this principle: ''All persons born in the United States and not subject to any foreign power, excluding Indians not taxed, are declared to be citizens of the United States.''

Who are the subjects of a foreign power? Thomas Jefferson said ''Aliens are the subjects of a foreign power.'' Thus, the statute can be read as All persons born in the United States who are not alien, excluding Indians not taxed, are declared to be citizens of the United States.

Sen. Trumbull stated during the drafting of the above national birthright law debates that it was the goal to ''make citizens of everybody born in the United States who owe allegiance to the United States,'' and if ''the negro or white man belonged to a foreign Government he would not be a citizen.''

Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee (39th Congress), James F. Wilson of Iowa, confirmed on March 1, 1866 that children under this class of aliens would not be citizens: ''We must depend on the general law relating to subjects and citizens recognized by all nations for a definition, and that must lead us to the conclusion that every person born in the United States is a natural-born citizen of such States, except that of children born on our soil to temporary sojourners or representatives of foreign Governments.''

Framer of the Fourteenth Amendments first section, John Bingham, said Sec. 1992 of U.S. Revised Statutes meant ''every human being born within the jurisdiction of the United States of parents not owing allegiance to any foreign sovereignty is, in the language of your Constitution itself, a natural born citizen.'' If this statute merely reaffirmed the old common law rule of citizenship by birth then the condition of the parents would be entirely irrelevant.

During the debates of the Fourteenth Amendment's citizenship clause, both its primary framers, Sen. Jacob Howard and Sen. Lyman Trumbull listened to concerns of including such persons as Chinese, Mongolians, and Gypsies to citizenship. Additionally, Sen. Fessenden (co-chairman of the Reconstruction Committee) raised the question of persons born of parents from abroad temporarily in this country '' an issue he would not have raised if Congress were merely reaffirming the common law doctrine '' and of course, the question of Indians.

A common mischaracterization of the debates says Senators Trumbull, Cowan and Conness suggested both the Civil Rights Bill and the Fourteenth Amendment would make children born to Chinese or Mongolian parent's citizens regardless of the condition of the parents. However, this is an erroneous conclusion because they were discussing concerns over whether ''race'' of the parents could play a role. They were not suggesting locality of birth alone was to be the sole requirement of citizenship under the Fourteenth Amendment. Additionally, this discussion appeared before the chief authors, Senators Lyman and Howard, provided the proper intended operation of the language.

Sen. Trumbull attempted to assure Senators that Indians were not ''subject to the jurisdiction'' of the United States. Sen. Johnson argued that Sen. Trumbull was in error in regards to the Indian's not being under the jurisdiction of the United States. This must have raised concerns with Howard because he strongly made it known that he had no intention whatsoever to confer citizenship upon the Indians under his amendment, no matter if born within or outside of their tribal lands.

In Steel Co. v. Citizens for a Better Environment (1998) the court said ''jurisdiction is a word of many, too many, meanings.'' Therefore, it is important to discover the operational meaning behind ''subject to the jurisdiction'' as employed under the Fourteenth Amendment rather than assuming its meaning from other usages of the word jurisdiction alone. Both Sen. Trumbull and Sen. Howard provide the answer, with Trumbull declaring:

The provision is, that 'all persons born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens.' That means 'subject to the complete jurisdiction thereof.' What do we mean by 'complete jurisdiction thereof?' Not owing allegiance to anybody else. That is what it means.

In other words, it isn't local jurisdiction the Fourteenth Amendment recognizes but only the lack of owing allegiance to some other nation because the United States only recognizes those who are 'true and faithful' alone to the nation. As will be explained shortly, only acts under the laws of naturalization can remove an alien's allegiance to some other country under United States law.

Additionally, Trumbull argued Indians could not be subject to the jurisdiction for the reason the United States deals with them through treaties. This is also exactly how the United States deals with aliens from other nations as well; they enter into treaties with outer countries to define legal rights of their citizens while within the limits of the United States and vice versa. Example: A treaty with China prohibited the United States from naturalizing Chinese citizens.

Sen. Trumbull further added, ''It cannot be said of any Indian who owes allegiance, partial allegiance if you please, to some other Government that he is 'subject to the jurisdiction of the United States.''' Sen. Jacob Howard agreed:

[I] concur entirely with the honorable Senator from Illinois [Trumbull], in holding that the word ''jurisdiction,'' as here employed, ought to be construed so as to imply a full and complete jurisdiction on the part of the United States, coextensive in all respects with the constitutional power of the United States, whether exercised by Congress, by the executive, or by the judicial department; that is to say, the same jurisdiction in extent and quality as applies to every citizen of the United States now.

This remark by Sen. Howard places this earlier comment of his on who is ''subject to the jurisdiction thereof'' into proper context: ''This will not, of course, include persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers accredited to the Government of the United States, but will include every other class of persons.''

What Sen. Howard is saying here is citizenship by birth is established by the sovereign jurisdiction the United States already has over the parents of the child, and that required that they owe allegiance exclusively to the United States '' just as is required to become a naturalized citizen. It does not require a leap of faith to understand what persons, other than citizens themselves, under the Fourteenth Amendment are citizens of the United States by birth: Those aliens who have come with the intent to become U.S. citizens, who had first complied with the laws of naturalization in declaring their intent and renounce all prior allegiances.

Sen. Trumbull further restates the goal of the language: ''It is only those persons who come completely within our jurisdiction, who are subject to our laws, that we think of making citizens'...'' Note that Trumbull does not say temporarily within our jurisdiction, but ''completely within our jurisdiction''.

He of course is talking about the laws of naturalization and consent to expatriation by the immigrant in order for him to come completely within the jurisdiction of the United States and its laws, i.e., he cannot be a subject of another nation. Without this full and complete jurisdiction, any foreign government can intervene on behalf of their own citizens while they visit or reside within the United States '' just as the United States is known to do on behalf of U.S. citizens within other countries.

Any citizen owe the same quality of allegiance to their nation of origin as does their country's ambassador or foreign ministers while within the limits of another nation unless they freely decide to renounce their allegiance in accordance to law. In other words, it would be preposterous to consider under the meaning given to ''subject to the jurisdiction thereof'' that a French subject visiting the United States was not a subject of France, but a complete subject (politically) of the United States while within the limits of the nation without first consenting to expatriation.

The United States has always, as a matter of law, considered new arrivals subjects of the country from which they owed their allegiance. As a matter of law, new arrivals were recognized as bearing the allegiance of the country of their origin, and the only way that could change is through the voluntarily act of expatriation. No more is this evident then with the recording of the certificate of intent to become a citizen of the United States:

James Spratt, a native of Ireland, aged about twenty-six years, bearing allegiance to the king of Great Britain and Ireland, who emigrated from Ireland and arrived in the United States on the 1st of June 1812, and intends to reside within the jurisdiction and under the government of the United States, makes report of himself for naturalization according to the acts of congress in that case made and provided, the 14th of April anno domini 1817, in the clerk's office of the circuit court of the district of Columbia, for the county of Washington: and on the 14th of May 1817, the said James Spratt personally appeared in open court, and declared on oath, that it is his intention to become a citizen of the United States, and to renounce all allegiance and fidelity to every foreign prince, &c.

Those who were not qualified under naturalization laws of the United States to become citizens of the United States would be unable to renounce their prior allegiances and consent to the full jurisdiction of the United States as needed to become a citizen. This is how children born to Indian's and Asians were prevented from becoming citizens themselves under the language chosen.

What changed after the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment? Not much really. States adopted laws that excluded either ''transient aliens'' or those not bona fide residents of the State. New York by 1857 had already a code that read, ''All persons born in this state, and resident within it, except the children of transient aliens, and of alien public ministers and consuls, etc.'' This code overturned the court ruling in Lynch v. Clarke (1844) where the court was forced to consider the English common law rule in regards to children born of aliens because New York had no laws on the subject at the time.

Additionally, the District of Columbia, California, Montana and South Dakota adopted identical language as New York. States could enact such laws because ''transient aliens'' could not be considered ''subject to the jurisdiction'' of the United States. The State of Connecticut adopted a law that read, ''All persons born in this State . . . except aliens, paupers, and fugitives from justice or service, are and shall be deemed to be citizens of this State, owing it allegiance and entitled to receive its protection, until they shall have voluntarily withdrawn from its limits and become incorporated into some other State or sovereignty as members thereof.''

Such State laws were not contrary to the Fourteenth Amendment for the simple reason they merely deny citizenship to those born whom another sovereign claims as its own, i.e., denial of citizenship to those born owing allegiance to another sovereign conforms with the constitutional definition given to ''subject to the jurisdiction thereof.''

In the year 1873 the United States Attorney General ruled the word ''jurisdiction'' under the Fourteenth Amendment to mean, which Justice Gray would recognize in Elk v. Wilkins years later:

The word ''jurisdiction'' must be understood to mean absolute and complete jurisdiction, such as the United States had over its citizens before the adoption of this amendment '... Aliens, among whom are persons born here and naturalized abroad, dwelling or being in this country, are subject to the jurisdiction of the United States only to a limited extent. Political and military rights and duties do not pertain to them. (14 Op. Atty-Gen. 300.)

House Report No. 784, dated June 22, 1874, stated, ''The United States have not recognized a double allegiance. By our law a citizen is bound to be 'true and faithful' alone to our government.'' There is no way in the world anyone can claim ''subject to the jurisdiction thereof'' affirms the feudal common law doctrine of birth citizenship to aliens because such doctrine by operation creates a ''double allegiance'' between separate nations.

Aaron Sargent, a Representative from California during the Naturalization Act of 1870 debates said the Fourteenth Amendment's citizenship clause was not a de-facto right for aliens to obtain citizenship. No one came forward to dispute this conclusion.

Perhaps because he was absolutely correct.

* The phrase ''transient aliens'' was generally used to refer to aliens other than ''domiciled aliens'' who had taken their oath of allegiance and other requirements who were citizens or subjects of another country who could be in the country for any number of reasons, such as a stopover on an international trip, school, work, etc., who had no intent of becoming citizens or were unable to by law or treaty.

Related Was U.S. vs. Wong Kim Ark Wrongly Decided?

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WASHINGTON (AP) '-- President Donald Trump is intensifying his hardline immigration rhetoric heading into the midterm elections, declaring that he wants to order the end of the constitutional right to citizenship for babies of non-citizens and unauthorized immigrants born in the United States.

Trump made the comments to ''Axios on HBO'' ahead of elections that he has sought to focus on his hardline immigration policies. Trump, seeking to energize his supporters and help Republicans keep control of Congress, has stoked anxiety about a caravan of Central American migrants making its way to the U.S.-Mexico border. He is dispatching additional troops and saying he'll set up tent cities for asylum seekers.

Revoking birthright citizenship would spark a court fight over whether the president has the unilateral ability to change an amendment to the Constitution. The 14th Amendment guarantees that right for all children born in the U.S.

Asked about the legality of such an executive order, Trump said, ''they're saying I can do it just with an executive order.'' He added that ''we're the only country in the world where a person comes in and has a baby, and the baby is essentially a citizen of the United States.''

An excerpt of the interview was posted on Axios' website on Tuesday.

The president said White House lawyers are reviewing his proposal. It's unclear how quickly he would act on an executive order. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for additional comment.

Some experts questioned whether Trump could follow through.

Omar Jadwat, director of the Immigrants' Rights Project at the American Civil Liberties Union in New York, said Tuesday said the Constitution is very clear.

''If you are born in the United States, you're a citizen,'' he said, adding that it was ''outrageous that the president can think he can override constitutional guarantees by issuing an executive order,

Jadwat said the president has an obligation to uphold the Constitution. Trump can try to get Congress to pass a constitutional amendment, ''but I don't think they are anywhere close to getting that.''

''Obviously, even if he did, it would be subject to court challenge,'' he added.

In the final days before the Nov. 6 midterms, Trump has emphasized immigration, as he seeks to counter Democratic enthusiasm. Trump believes that his campaign pledges, including his much-vaunted and still-unfulfilled promise to quickly build a U.S.-Mexico border wall, are still rallying cries for his base and that this latest focus will further erode the enthusiasm gap.

Trump voiced his theory that birthright citizenship could be stripped during his campaign, when he described it as a ''magnet for illegal immigration.'' During a 2015 campaign stop in Florida, he said: ''The birthright citizenship - the anchor baby - birthright citizenship, it's over, not going to happen.''

The first line of the 14th Amendment states: ''All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside.''

The 14th Amendment was passed by Congress in 1866 during the period of Reconstruction after the Civil War. It was ratified in 1868 by three-fourths of the states. By extending citizenship to those born in the U.S., the amendment nullified an 1857 Supreme Court decision (Dred Scott v. Sandford), which ruled that those descended from slaves could not be citizens.

The Axios HBO series debuts on Sunday.

--

Jill Colvin, Deb Riechmann and Eileen Putman contributed.

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This article is about the Posse Comitatus Act in the United States. For other uses of

posse comitatus, see

Posse comitatus.

Posse Comitatus ActOther short titlesKnott AmendmentPosse Comitatus Act of 1878Long titleAn act making appropriations for the support of the Army for the fiscal year ending June thirtieth, eighteen hundred and seventy-nine, and for other purposes.NicknamesArmy Appropriations Act of 1878Enacted bythe 45th United States CongressEffectiveJune 18, 1878CitationsPublic law45-263 Statutes at Large 20 Stat. 145 aka 20 Stat. 152CodificationU.S.C. sections created18 U.S.C. § 1385Legislative historyIntroduced in the House as H.R. 4867 by Herman L. Humphrey (R-WI), William Kimmel (D-MD) on May 13, 1878Passed the House on May 18, 1878 (130''117)Passed the Senate on June 6, 1878 (36''23)Reported by the joint conference committee on June 15, 1878; agreed to by the House on June 15, 1878 (154''58) and by the Senate on June 15, 1878 (Agreed)Signed into law by President Rutherford B. Hayes on June 18, 1878Major amendments1956, 1981The Posse Comitatus Act is a United States federal law (18 U.S.C. § 1385, original at 20 Stat. 152) signed on June 18, 1878 by President Rutherford B. Hayes. The purpose of the act '' in concert with the Insurrection Act of 1807 '' is to limit the powers of the federal government in using federal military personnel to enforce domestic policies within the United States. It was passed as an amendment to an army appropriation bill following the end of Reconstruction and was subsequently updated in 1956 and 1981.

The act only specifically applies to the United States Army and, as amended in 1956, the United States Air Force. While the act does not explicitly mention the United States Navy and the United States Marine Corps, the Department of the Navy has prescribed regulations that are generally construed to give the act force with respect to those services as well. The act does not apply to the Army National Guard or the Air National Guard under state authority from acting in a law enforcement capacity within its home state or in an adjacent state if invited by that state's governor. The United States Coast Guard, which operates under the Department of Homeland Security, is not covered by the Posse Comitatus Act either, primarily because although the Coast Guard is an armed service, it also has both a maritime law enforcement mission and a federal regulatory agency mission.

The title of the act comes from the legal concept of posse comitatus, the authority under which a county sheriff, or other law officer, conscripts any able-bodied man to assist him or her in keeping the peace.

History [ edit ] The Act, § 15 of the appropriations bill for the Army for 1879, found at 20 Stat. 152, was a response to, and subsequent prohibition of, the military occupation of the former Confederate States by the United States Army during the twelve years of Reconstruction (1865''1877) following the American Civil War (1861''1865). The president withdrew federal troops from the Southern States as a result of a compromise in one of the most disputed national elections in American history, the 1876 U.S. presidential election. Samuel J. Tilden of New York, the Democratic candidate, defeated Republican candidate Rutherford B. Hayes of Ohio in the popular vote. Tilden garnered 184 electoral votes to Hayes' 165; 20 disputed electoral votes remained uncounted. After a bitter fight, Congress struck a deal resolving the dispute and awarded the presidency to Hayes.

In return for Southern acquiescence regarding Hayes, Republicans agreed to support the withdrawal of federal troops from the former Confederate States, formally ending Reconstruction. Known as the Compromise of 1877, South Carolina, Florida, and Louisiana agreed to certify Rutherford B. Hayes as the president in exchange for the removal of federal troops from the South.[1]

The U.S. Constitution places primary responsibility for the holding of elections in the hands of the individual states. The maintenance of peace, conduct of orderly elections, and prosecution of unlawful actions are all state responsibilities, pursuant of any state's role of exercising police power and maintaining law and order, whether part of a wider federation or a unitary state. During the local, state, and federal elections of 1874 and 1876 in the former Confederate States, all levels of government chose not to exercise their police powers to maintain law and order.[1] Some historians have concluded most Reconstruction governments did not have the power to suppress the violence.

When the U.S. representatives and senators from the former Confederate States reached Washington, they set as a priority legislation to prohibit any future president or Congress from directing, by military order or federal legislation, the imposition of federal troops in any U.S. state. By the 1878 election, Congress was dominated by the Democratic Party, and they passed the Posse Comitatus Act in 1878.

In the mid-20th century, the administration of President Dwight D. Eisenhower used an exception to the Posse Comitatus Act, derived from the Enforcement Acts, to send federal troops into Little Rock, Arkansas, during the 1957 school desegregation crisis. The Arkansas governor had opposed desegregation after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1954 in the Brown v. Board of Education that segregated public schools were unconstitutional. The Enforcement Acts, among other powers, allow the president to call up military forces when state authorities are either unable or unwilling to suppress violence that is in opposition to the constitutional rights of the people.[2]

The original Posse Comitatus Act referred essentially to the United States Army. The United States Air Force, which had been incorporated within the Army inside the U.S. (and the Navy outside) until 1949, was added in 1956. This law is often relied upon to prevent the Department of Defense from interfering in domestic law enforcement.[3] The United States Coast Guard is not included in the act even though it is one of the five armed services because it is not a part of the Department of Defense. At the time the act became law, the modern Coast Guard did not exist. Its predecessor, the United States Revenue Cutter Service, was primarily a customs enforcement agency and part of the United States Department of the Treasury.[4] In 1915, when the Revenue Cutter Service and the United States Lifesaving Service were amalgamated to form the Coast Guard, the service was both explicitly made a military branch and explicitly given federal law enforcement authority.

Legislation [ edit ] The original provision was enacted as Section 15 of chapter 263, of the Acts of the 2nd session of the 45th Congress.

Sec. 15. From and after the passage of this act it shall not be lawful to employ any part of the Army of the United States, as a posse comitatus, or otherwise, for the purpose of executing the laws, except in such cases and under such circumstances as such employment of said force may be expressly authorized by the Constitution or by act of Congress; and no money appropriated by this act shall be used to pay any of the expenses incurred in the employment of any troops in violation of this section and any person willfully violating the provisions of this section shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor and on conviction thereof shall be punished by fine not exceeding ten thousand dollars or imprisonment not exceeding two years or by both such fine and imprisonment[5]

The text of the relevant legislation is as follows:

18 U.S.C. § 1385. Use of Army and Air Force as posse comitatusWhoever, except in cases and under circumstances expressly authorized by the Constitution or Act of Congress, willfully uses any part of the Army or the Air Force as a posse comitatus or otherwise to execute the laws shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than two years, or both.Also notable is the following provision within Title 10 of the United States Code (which concerns generally the organization and regulation of the armed forces and Department of Defense):

10 U.S.C. § 375. Restriction on direct participation by military personnelThe Secretary of Defense shall prescribe such regulations as may be necessary to ensure that any activity (including the provision of any equipment or facility or the assignment or detail of any personnel) under this chapter does not include or permit direct participation by a member of the Army, Navy, Air Force, or Marine Corps in a search, seizure, arrest, or other similar activity unless participation in such activity by such member is otherwise authorized by law.Recent legislative events [ edit ] In 2006, Congress modified the Insurrection Act as part of the 2007 Defense Authorization Bill (repealed as of 2008). On September 26, 2006, President George W. Bush urged Congress to consider revising federal laws so that U.S. armed forces could restore public order and enforce laws in the aftermath of a natural disaster, terrorist attack or incident, or other condition. These changes were included in the John Warner National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2007 (H.R. 5122), which was signed into law on October 17, 2006.[6]

Section 1076 is titled "Use of the Armed Forces in major public emergencies." It provided that:

The President may employ the armed forces... to... restore public order and enforce the laws of the United States when, as a result of a natural disaster, epidemic, or other serious public health emergency, terrorist attack or incident, or other condition... the President determines that... domestic violence has occurred to such an extent that the constituted authorities of the State or possession are incapable of maintaining public order... or [to] suppress, in a State, any insurrection, domestic violence, unlawful combination, or conspiracy if such... a condition... so hinders the execution of the laws... that any part or class of its people is deprived of a right, privilege, immunity, or protection named in the Constitution and secured by law... or opposes or obstructs the execution of the laws of the United States or impedes the course of justice under those laws.[7]

In 2008, these changes in the Insurrection Act of 1807 were repealed in their entirety, reverting to the previous wording of the Insurrection Act.[8] It was originally written to limit presidential power as much as possible in the event of insurrection, rebellion, or lawlessness.

In 2011, President Barack Obama signed National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012 into law. Section 1021(b)(2) extended the definition of a "covered person", i.e., someone possibly subject to detention under this law, to include:

A person who was a part of or substantially supported al-Qaeda, the Taliban, or associated forces that are engaged in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners, including any person who has committed a belligerent act or has directly supported such hostilities in aid of such enemy forces.[9]

Section 1021(e) purports to limit the scope of said authority with the text, "Nothing in this section shall be construed to affect existing law or authorities relating to the detention of United States citizens, lawful resident aliens of the United States, or any other persons who are captured or arrested in the United States."[10]

Exclusions and limitations [ edit ] There are a number of situations in which the Act does not apply. These include:

Army and Air National Guard units and state defense forces while under the authority of the governor of a state.Federal armed forces used in accordance to the Insurrection Act, as was the case of the 1st Marine Division and 7th Infantry Division being sent to curtail the 1992 Los Angeles riots.Under 18 U.S.C. § 831, the Attorney General may request that the Secretary of Defense provide emergency assistance if domestic law enforcement is inadequate to address certain types of threats involving the release of nuclear materials, such as potential use of a nuclear or radiological weapon. Such assistance may be by any personnel under the authority of the Department of Defense, provided such assistance does not adversely affect U.S. military preparedness. The only exemption is the deployment of nuclear materials on the part of the United States Armed Forces.Enforcement of federal law at the discretion of the President of the United States, such as with the 101st Airborne Division by President Dwight D. Eisenhower to integrate Little Rock Central High School in 1957Support roles under the Joint Special Operations Command.Provide surveillance, intelligence gathering, observation, and equipment for domestic law enforcement on operations such as drug interdiction and counter-terrorism missions.Exclusion applicable to U.S. Coast Guard [ edit ] See the Law Enforcement Detachments and Missions of the United States Coast Guard for more information on U.S. Coast Guard law enforcement activities.Although it is an armed service,[11] the U.S. Coast Guard, which operates under the Department of Homeland Security during peacetime, is not only not restricted by the Posse Comitatus Act but has explicit authority to enforce federal law. This is true even when the Coast Guard is operating as a service within the U.S. Navy during wartime.[4]

In December 1981, the Military Cooperation with Civilian Law Enforcement Agencies Act was enacted clarifying permissible military assistance to domestic law enforcement agencies and the Coast Guard, especially in combating drug smuggling into the United States. Posse Comitatus clarifications emphasize supportive and technical assistance (e.g., use of facilities, vessels, and aircraft, as well as intelligence support, technological aid, and surveillance) while generally prohibiting direct participation of U.S. military personnel in law enforcement (e.g., search, seizure, and arrests). For example, a U.S. Navy vessel may be used to track, follow, and stop a vessel suspected of drug smuggling, but Coast Guard Law Enforcement Detachments (LEDETs) embarked aboard the Navy vessel would perform the actual boarding and, if needed, arrest the suspect vessel's crew.[4]

Advisory and support roles [ edit ] Federal troops have a long history of domestic roles, including occupying secessionist Southern states during Reconstruction and putting down major urban riots. The Posse Comitatus Act prohibits the use of active duty personnel to "execute the laws"; however, there is disagreement over whether this language may apply to troops used in an advisory, support, disaster response, or other homeland defense role, as opposed to domestic law enforcement.[1]

On March 10, 2009, members of the U.S. Army Military Police Corps from Fort Rucker were deployed to Samson, Alabama, in response to a murder spree. Samson officials confirmed that the soldiers assisted in traffic control and securing the crime scene. The governor of Alabama did not request military assistance nor did President Obama authorize their deployment. Subsequent investigation found that the Posse Comitatus Act was violated and several military members received "administrative actions".[12][13]

See also [ edit ] Great Railroad Strike of 1877List of military actions by or within the United StatesMartial lawMilitarization of policeMilitary Cooperation with Civilian Law Enforcement Agencies ActNational Security and Homeland Security Presidential DirectiveOperation Garden PlotUnion violence in the United StatesUnited States Northern CommandReferences [ edit ] ^ a b c "The Posse Comitatus Act: Setting the record straight on 124 years of mischief and misunderstanding before any more damage is done," Military Law Review, Vol. 175, 2003. ^ Lieberman, Jethro (1999). A Practical Companion to the Constitution: How the Supreme Court Has Ruled on Issues from Abortion to Zoning. University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-21280-0. ^ Mazzetti, Mark and Johnston, David. "Bush Weighed Using Military in Arrests", New York Times, 22 June 2009 ^ a b c http://www.uscg.mil/History/articles/LEDET_History.asp Coast Guard Law Enforcement Detachments (LEDETs): A History ^ Text at Wikisource ^ John Warner National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2007 ^ H.R. 5122, pp. 322''323 ^ "H.R. 4986: National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008". GovTrack.us. 2008 . Retrieved January 24, 2008 . ^ GPO text of Public Law 112-81 (PDF) ^ "Text of Public Law 112-81" (PDF), GPO ^ About the United States Coast Guard ^ Army reviews shows troop use in Samson killing spree violated federal law, Birmingham News ^ Revolutionizing Northern Command, Lt. Col. Gary L. McGinniss, U.S. Army Further reading [ edit ] Hendell, Garri B. "Domestic Use of the Armed Forces to Maintain Law and Order: posse comitatus Pitfalls at the Inauguration of the 44th President", Publius (2011) 41(2): 336-348 doi:10.1093/publius/pjq014Lindorff, David. "Could It Happen Here?". Mother Jones magazine, April 1988.The Posse Comitatus Act of 1878: A Documentary History. Buffalo, N.Y. : W.S. Hein, 2003. ISBN 978-0-8377-3900-7External links [ edit ] 18 U.S.C. § 1385 Use of Army and Air Force as Posse ComitatusThe Posse Comitatus Act: A Principle in Need of Renewal, Washington University Law Quarterly Vol 75 No. 2The Posse Comitatus Act and Related Matters: The Use of the Military to Execute Civilian Law Congressional Research ServiceShould the Posse Comitatus Act be Changed to Effectively Support Local Law Enforcement? U.S. Army War CollegeMold, Mildew, and the Military Role in Disaster Response, JURISTJohn Warner National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2007Text of H.R. 5122 [dead link ] [1][2][3] Bill Text 112th Congress (2011-2012) S.1867.ES[4] Federalist Paper #29 Concerning the Militia, Alexander Hamilton, pub. 10-January-1788

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Archived Version

Tue, 30 Oct 2018 12:09

Kevin McAleenan, U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner; Air Force Gen. Terrence J. O'Shaughnessy, commander of North American Aerospace Defense Command and U.S. Northern Command

STAFF: Appreciate everybody attending today's press conference. The purpose of today's press briefing is to provide an update on Operation Secure Line and the Department of Defense deployment at the southwest border.

Each of the principles here today will deliver a few remarks, after which we'll open it up for a few questions. With that, I'll turn it over to Commissioner Kevin K. McAleenan.

KEVIN MCALEENAN: Good afternoon and welcome. Commanding General O'Shaughnessy of U.S. Northern Command and I wanted to update you on our efforts to prepare for enhanced security operations in order to address the potential for large groups of migrants to arrive at the U.S. border as part of a so-called caravan.

As of this afternoon, we continue to track a large group of approximately 3,500 traveling through southern Mexico with the stated intent to reach the U.S. border. This group is near the Chiapas-Oaxaca border in southern Mexico.

We're also aware of a second large group of migrants at the Ciudad Hidalgo border crossing between Guatemala and Mexico. Size estimates for the second group are around 3,000 and made up of family units and unaccompanied children who have placed themselves in the hand of violent human smugglers paying 7,000 per person to make the journey.

They're incentivized to try and cross by -- our border by the gaps in our legal framework and the expectation that they will be allowed to stay. This means that at any given moment, there are tens of thousands of intending migrants between the Guatemala border and the U.S. border moving towards us at any given time.

Within that flow included are about 17,000 criminals last year, along with hardened smugglers and people from over 100 countries around the world, and our immigration system is unable to effectively process and repatriate those without the right to remain in the United States due to extensive backlogs in our courts and court restrictions on detaining people through their immigration proceedings.

What is new and challenging about this caravan phenomenon is the formation of multiple large groups, which present unique safety and border security threats.

For the two large groups that we are following, we have already seen the first one make unlawful entry across two international borders and the second, still in Guatemala, has deployed violent and dangerous tactics against both Guatemalan and Mexican border security teams.

Accordingly, we are preparing for the contingency of a large group of arriving persons intending to enter the United States in the next several weeks. Our message to the organizers and participants of this caravan is simple, as the President and Secretary Nielsen have made clear, we will not allow a large group to enter the United States in an unsafe and unlawful manner.

For those that seek to cross the border illegally, we will apprehend them and fully enforce the laws of the United States. For those that seek to make an asylum claim safely and lawfully at a port of entry, the government of Mexico has already offered you protection and employment authorization.

If you are fleeing alleged persecution at home, you have arrived at a safe place to make your claim. If you're an economic migrant seeking to join family members in the United States, you should return home and apply for the appropriate visa.

While CBP and its DHS partners processed over 38,000 inadmissible persons claiming fear to return to their home country safely and efficiently at our ports of entry last year, there's no benefit to be part of a large group.

The caravan has already been offered protections in Mexico, you will not be allowed to enter the U.S. the same way. I would like to note here that we very much appreciate the efforts of the government of Mexico to address this challenging situation in accordance with the highest principles of protection of human rights and respect for migrants, while upholding the integrity of the Mexican border and Mexican immigration law.

We also appreciate the continuing communication and efforts of our Central American partners, especially Guatemala, to address the challenges of these large groups.

In terms of our preparations at the border, yesterday we launched Operation Secure Line, a multi-phased and flexible operational response designed to ensure that we are prepared for any number of contingencies involved with the arrival and attempted crossing of a large group of intending migrants at our border, whether they attempt to cross at a port of entry or unlawfully in between ports of entry.

An important principle here is that border security is a law enforcement mission, and as the unified border security agency of the United States, CBP is well equipped, along with support from interagency federal, state, and local partners to manage multiple contingencies of varying size.

Since we initiated our planning two weeks ago, we have completed updated assessments at each of our 26 crossing points on the southwest border and already deployed 100 specially trained special response team operators to prepare plans for each location.

As information on the approach of a large group at a port of entry is available, we have at the ready 1,000 CBP officers, including 250 tactical enforcement officers and mobile response team professionals with training on managing contingencies including riot control.

Between ports of entry, we have an additional 830 Border Patrol agents on standby ready to deploy, to include 140 special operations agents, 385 mobile response team agents and an additional 350 agents from unaffected sectors.

These agents will be augmented and supported by over two dozen CBP air assets for surveillance and mobile response, including four Blackhawks, six additional helicopters, as well as multiple fixed-wing assets and unmanned aerial systems.

Due to the large size of the potential caravans that may arrive at the border however, the Department of Homeland Security has further requested the support of the Department of Defense. This is in addition to the 2,000 National Guard personnel already augmenting operations under Operation Guardian Support and making an impact in border security, supporting apprehensions and drug seizures since last year.

Specifically, CBP has requested that DOD provide support in several key areas, significant air and ground transportation and logistics support to move CBP personnel and equipment to locations of operational focus, engineering capabilities and equipment to help ensure our ability to secure our legal crossings in key areas of the border, medical support units, mobile housing for sustaining CBP deployed personnel and extensive planning support.

I will turn it over to General O'Shaughnessy to detail DOD's robust response to our request for support in just a moment, but let me close by saying that regardless of the operational contingencies we face, along with its interagency partners and unprecedented support from DOD, CBP will ensure border security.

We will not allow a large group to enter the U.S. unlawfully. We will maintain lawful trade and travel to the greatest extent possible. We will act in accordance with the highest principles of law enforcement. We will treat intending migrants humanely and professionally at all times.

And the safety of CBP personnel -- especially our law enforcement personnel on the front lines, as well as the traveling public -- will remain paramount. Thank you.

GENERAL TERRENCE J. O'SHAUGHNESSY: Well, thank you, Commissioner McAleenan, for the partnership and the opportunity today to speak about how U.S. Northern Command, as the operational command for the Department of Defense's forces, is providing mission-enhancing capabilities to the Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Customs and Border Protection, to harden the southern border.

DOD has a long history of supporting DHS. And now, more than ever, U.S. Northern Command has a well-established relationship with the Department of Homeland Security.

Examples include the recent support for Hurricane Michael, Hurricane Florence, our cyber-security initiatives and our critical infrastructure protection that we're doing with the Department of Homeland Security.

Our mission of homeland defense is inextricably linked to the Department of Homeland Security's mission of homeland security. Operation Faithful Patriot, as we've named the military operation supporting CBP in hardening the southwest border, is the latest example of this critical partnership.

In a macro sense, our concept of operations is to flow-in our military assets with a priority to build up southern Texas, and then Arizona, and then California.

We'll reinforce along priority points of entry, so as to enhance CBP's ability to harden and secure the border. The specific request for assistance is for the active duty military to enhance the capacity and capabilities of CBP by providing robust military capabilities.

Our first level of effort with CBP will be to harden the points of entry and address key gaps in areas around the points of entry. And here's a list of just some of the capability that we're bringing.

First, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, they bring amazing expertise, earned through years of experience under challenging conditions, including the current work of building the border wall.

We're also bringing three highly experienced and capable combat engineering battalions with expertise in building temporary vehicle barriers, fencing -- and we're bringing them in with heavy equipment which, as we speak right now, is line-hauling towards Texas.

We're bringing military planning teams that are already actively engaged with their CBP counterparts. We've integrated command and control capabilities. We're working with our aviation, engineering, medical and logistic resources to bring them to bear.

We're bringing three medium-lift helicopter companies in. These are aircraft equipped with the latest technology. They're enhanced with optics.

They have NVGs. They have sensors that will allow them to operate at night and be able to provide assistance to bring our CBP personnel exactly where they need to be, regardless of the conditions. We'll be able to spot-identify groups and rapidly deploy CBP personnel where they're needed.

The helicopters will ensure the CBP agents can arrive in the most austere locations. They can fast-rope down if they need to. They can conduct and work their law enforcement activities. These aircraft will also ensure those agents needing medical assistance will be able to get that assistance when required.

In addition, we're bringing military police units. We're bringing strategic airlift to bear. As we sit right now, we have three C-130s and a C-17 that is ready to deploy CBP personnel wherever they need to be at any time.

We have deployable medical units. We have the logistical support. We have command posts. We're bringing, again, command posts so we can combine with CBP, and we have combined command posts where our operational commanders will be working side-by-side to integrate our efforts.

And make no mistakes. As we sit right here today, we have about 800 soldiers that are on their way to Texas right now. They're coming from Fort Campbell, they're coming from Fort Knox. They're moving closer to the border. They're going to continue their training, and they're ready to deploy to be actually employed on the border.

We're deploying aviation assets that could quickly transport our CBP personnel.

But it isn't just the men and equipment and the soldiers that we're bringing. We've already brought critical material that's already in place.

We have enough concertina wire to cover up to 22 miles, already deployed already to the border. We have additional concertina wire that we can string, with over 150 miles available. Additionally, looking at where the reinforcers are needed so we can get it exactly where CBP wants us to put it.

By the end of this week, we will deploy over 5,200 soldiers to the southwest border. That is just the start of this operation. We'll continue to adjust the numbers and inform you of those.

But please know, that's in addition to the 2,092 that are already employed from our National Guard, Operation Guardian Support, that's been so effective.

And my final point I would like to stress is that everything I've discussed here fully adheres to our current authorities and governed by law and policy.

We know border security is national security. And the U.S. military will advance CBP's capability to harden the border. The Department of Defense is already -- and will continue to provide -- support to CBP to secure the border. Thank you.

STAFF: With that, we'll open it up for a few questions.

Tara?

Q: General O'Shaughnessy, Tara Copp with Military Times. A couple of questions, sir. First, why weren't National Guard forces used instead, since it's typically a state governor role to bring those troops to the border?

Secondly, how will you ensure that that active duty forces along the border will be operating in compliance with posse comitatus? And will those forces be armed? Thank you.

GEN. O'SHAUGHNESSY: Yeah, thanks for those questions. First, to be clear, Operation Guardian Support continues on, 2,092 National Guardsmen employed right now under the governor's authority. That will continue.

This effort -- Faithful Patriot -- is complementary to that effort, but brings additional capability and capacity to help CBP.

With respect to posse comitatus, everything that we are doing is in line with and adherence to posse comitatus.

Q: Sir, why not use the National Guard forces? And will the forces -- the active duty troops on the way -- will those soldiers be armed?

GEN. O'SHAUGHNESSY: To be clear, we are using the National Guard forces, and that's under Operation Guardian Support. Very effectively being employed as we speak right now.

We're bringing additional capability with Title 10 forces under -- under Faithful Patriot. We have the authority given to us by Secretary Mattis. The units that are normally assigned weapons, they are, in fact, deploying with weapons.

Q: (Inaudible) with ABC News. My question is for the CBP commissioner.

You're talking about a caravan that's already dwindled down to 3,500 people. The last caravan eventually dwindled down to only 400 people by the time it reached the border. And yet you're talking about numbers for the active duty military that would be double that. Why do you feel that this is necessary, and is this a political move shortly before the election?

MR. MCALEENAN: Yeah, this -- this group is very large, 3,500 is much larger than the Via Crucis caravan or caravans we've seen in the past.

We do see other large groups forming. Again, there's 3,000 or so at the Guatemala-Mexico border now, hoping to join up with the lead group. And we do see other caravans forming in El Salvador and elsewhere in Central America.

So we -- we've got to be prepared for the potential arrival of a very large group. And because of the size, we -- we want to be able to handle it effectively and safely.

What we saw when this group crossed the -- the Honduras-Guatemala borders, they did it very forcefully. They pushed past the Guatemalan security forces.

Even more risky was on the Guatemala-Mexico border, where it was a combination, of you, know, near-rioting on the bridge and then, crossing illegally, the Rio Suchiate.

So we -- we saw those tactics, which are different than we've seen in -- in past large groups. And we want to be ready for that. And we think this opportunity to harden our ports of entry, to be ready for mobile deployment between ports is a better way to prepare for the potential arrival of a large group like this.

Q: (OFF MIKE) And do you see this move as political to assuage voters that might be concerned about these caravans?

MR. MCALEENAN: No, this is a law enforcement operation from CBP 's perspective and we partner with DOD all the time to help secure our border.

Q: Question for the commissioner. Foreign nationals who reach American soil and attempt to exercise their legal right to seek asylum in the United States, how do you plan to proceed?

MR. MCALEENAN: Yeah, under -- under law -- existing law and policy we'll process people that we apprehend crossing illegally or arriving and presenting lawfully but without documents at our ports of entry the same way we're doing currently.

Q: Can you be taken into custody? not returned to Mexico?

MR. MCALEENAN: That's an ongoing conversation on how we best handle that group. If they come as a large group we are talking with Mexico. We're also considering all potential options in terms of administration authority.

Q: Commissioner, where is the -- (inaudible), CNN -- can you tell me where the border patrol additional services are coming from? Are any coming from the northern border or other areas around the country?

MR. MCALEENAN: Yes, so first of all I mentioned the special operations groups, this is the Border Patrol Tactical Unit, the Border Patrol Search, Trauma and Rescue teams. That's a significant portion of the mobile troops.

We also have agents identified as members of mobile response teams that come from sectors all over the country. And then because the northern border sectors aren't directly affected by a potential caravan arrival we would potentially pull a few hundred agents from the northern border if we saw the need for a full-scale operation.

Q: (OFF MIKE) Is this happening in this first part or is that potentially in the (future ?)?

MR. MCALEENAN: That's potentially in a future phase as the caravan gets closer and depending on the size of the caravan.

Q: Question for -- question for General O'Shaughnessy, would you say this is a national emergency and how would you rate it on par with military efforts in Syria and Iraq where -- potentially you could have more troops on the border than in those operations?

GEN. O'SHAUGHNESSY: I think -- I think the president has made it clear that border security is national security. That is the direction we've given, that's the direction that we're marching to.

Our -- our orders are very clear. We are engaged. We're here to support CBP. And we're going to secure the border.

STAFF: Folks, we have time for a couple more questions. Sir?

Q: This is for the commissioner, two quick questions. First is, do you have a sense for how many additional miles of temporary fencing or vehicle barriers you need or are going to be done in this operation?

And then second is, the inspector -- I think it was Inspector General, not GAO, recently had a report on the previous caravan and said that the way that CBP handled funneling or preventing people from coming through the ports of entry actually sent them between the ports of entry. Any lessons learned from that that you're going to do different?

MR. MCALEENAN: So, first of all, we -- we've made a broad request for assistance, which is being responded to robustly as General O'Shaughnessy outlined. We're going to use fortifications to -- to help both at the ports of entry, so we can manage the potential arrival of a large group trying to enter through a port of entry -- infrastructure. But also in the immediate areas around ports or other vulnerable areas of the border.

So -- so that's still being worked through with DOD and exactly what that structure would require and it would be obviously dependent on which direction we see a group moving.

Now you can only process a certain number of people at a time, even if they're presenting lawfully. So we would want to work with the Government of Mexico if this group does make it all the way to border. And, again, the President of Mexico has offered, very generously, protections, employment authorization, shelter and status to this group in Mexico.

So if you're really seeking asylum you've reached a safe place and you've been given a generous offer by the first country that you've crossed into from Central America, so I think that's an important point to focus on.

So we'd want to work with Mexico to manage that -- that flow and ensure that people don't try to cross illegally. That is more dangerous. They generally have to engage with a smuggler and it -- it's even less orderly than a large group arriving.

So that's -- that's what we're going to be focused on in partnership with our government of Mexico counterparts.

Q: ... anything you've been able to do to actually change that incentive structure that existed last time, where processing I guess throttling them through the ports of entry sent them in the other direction?

MR. MCALEENAN: So I think that's questionable, we -- we -- as I noted in the outset, we -- we processed 38,000 claims of fear over return to a home country at our ports of entry in the last fiscal year. That is far and away a -- a new record.

So we are providing access to asylum seekers at our ports of entry lawfully as -- as directed. So I think that's -- that's an appropriate point to understand.

STAFF: Last question ''(inaudible)

Q: Hi, I'm (inaudible) from -- excuse me, AP. I just wanted to clarify if people were crossing between ports of entry, are they -- will they be able to claim asylum if they make it through? What will happen in terms of trying to claim asylum if they manage to get through?

MR. MCALEENAN: I -- I think part of the goal is to deter people from trying to cross between ports of entry. We're -- we're going to have a substantial capability with CBP assets, supported with extra mobility and capability with our DOD partners.

So we don't want them to cross that way in the first place, and we will apply the full extent of our laws to those who do cross illegally.

STAFF: All right everyone, thank you very much. If you have any follow ups, we're happy to take for action. Appreciate you taking the time today.

MR. MCALEENAN: Thank you.

STAFF: Thank you.

Link to Article

Archived Version

Tue, 30 Oct 2018 11:43

Mother Jones illustration; Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP; Getty

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Ever since he campaigned for the White House, Donald Trump has attacked news outlets for negative reporting, singled out individual journalists for scorn, and turned his battle cry against ''fake news'''--a.k.a. reporting he dislikes'--virtually into a personal brand. His hostility has only escalated with scrutiny of his presidency. Whipping up crowds as he points at the press gallery has been a set piece of his political rallies. He describes journalists as ''dishonest,'' ''corrupt,'' and ''sick.'' And Trump has repeatedly echoed the language of 20th century despots, demonizing the American media as ''the enemy of the people.''

Presidential disdain for the press is nothing new. Still, political and media experts have long worried that Trump's uniquely broad and bitter war of words wouldn't just corrode public trust in reported facts, but could also produce other dangerous effects.

Now there is strong evidence it has. According to half a dozen law enforcement and security leaders I spoke with in recent weeks, the targeting of journalists has steadily intensified in the Trump era, from organized campaigns of personal harassment to bomb threats and vows of assault, rape, and mass shootings. Two sources told me they've repeatedly seen explicit evidence of threats directly channeling the president's rhetoric.

''We've had multiple cases of people using the same rhetoric as the president,'' says a top security official, noting that the bulk of threats against his news network are aimed at correspondents who cover the White House and the Trump-Russia investigation.An example surfaced at the end of August with news the FBI had arrested a California man, Robert Chain, for allegedly threatening to travel to the offices of the Boston Globe and commit a mass shooting. His menacing communications came just after the Globe announced a coordinated editorial effort among newspapers nationwide to denounce Trump's attacks on the press as anti-American and dangerous.

''You're the enemy of the people, and we're going to kill every fucking one of you,'' Chain said in one of several anonymous calls to the Globe, according to the FBI. In another, he vowed, ''We are going to shoot you motherfuckers in the head.'' According to the Globe's own reporting on the case, authorities found 20 firearms in Chain's home, including a semi-automatic rifle he'd purchased in May.

It was not the first glimpse of the potential danger. Earlier in August, a reporter shared an anonymous threat called into the Los Angeles bureau of the Associated Press: ''At some point we're just gonna start shooting you fucking assholes.'' CNN's Jim Acosta recently publicized a video of an angry swarm of people taunting him as he broadcast from a Trump rally in Florida. And MSNBC anchor Katy Tur, who covered Trump and was openly ridiculed by him on the 2016 campaign trail, spoke on-air about some of the vicious harassment she has faced: '''I hope you get raped and killed,' one person wrote to me just this week,'' Tur said. ''And in case you want to argue that this has nothing to do with the president, the most recent note I got ended with 'MAGA.'''

Threats and harassment are an age-old problem for news organizations, stemming from all manner of grievances and often marked by incoherent or empty bluster. But the veteran law enforcement and security leaders I spoke with, including top officials at two major media companies, conveyed sobering levels of concern about the Trump-fueled phenomenon. (The officials asked not to be identified in order to discuss sensitive subject matter.) Both the frequency and the temperature have been rising, they said.

''It's very troubling,'' said a senior US law enforcement agent with expertise in threats against public figures. ''I do think it's dangerous for the president to walk this line of basically inciting violence,'' the agent said. ''Most people won't act on it, but sooner or later, someone will'--a person who can't distinguish from the political message. We've been seeing some prospects of this. People could get injured or killed.''

''The volume has definitely picked up,'' said a security director for a major television news network, describing bombing and other death threats. ''We've had multiple cases of people using the same rhetoric as the president,'' he told me. He shared language from a recent suspect: ''I swear allegiance to my leader, and he says you're fake news, you're the enemy. I must rid the country of you because you're the enemy of the people.''

The network has consistently faced a spike in threatening activity after Trump has disparaged it by name, according to the security director. The bulk of the threats, he said, have been aimed at correspondents who cover the White House and the Trump-Russia investigation.

There has been no indication of concern about the problem from the Trump White House. On August 30, as initial excerpts from journalist Bob Woodward's book on the Trump presidency commanded wide media attention, Trump reiterated his disdain: ''I just cannot state strongly enough how totally dishonest much of the Media is,'' he said. ''Truth doesn't matter to them, they only have their hatred & agenda'...Enemy of the People!''

The news of Chain's arrest broke later that morning, sparking renewed media discussion about Trump's rhetoric. The president himself said nothing about the threats to the Globe. But that night, at a campaign rally in Evansville, Indiana, he was right back at it with his familiar jeremiad against the ''failing'' New York Times, Washington Post, and CNN. ''These are just dishonest, terrible people,'' Trump said emphatically, waving a finger at the press gallery as the crowd jeered. ''I'm telling you that. Terrible people.''

I asked former Trump White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci'--who has said he doesn't like Trump's war on the media'--if he would urge the president to cease the incitement. Scaramucci replied that he had already done so. He did not reply to follow-up questions I sent asking about how Trump responded. White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders also did not reply to my requests for comment.

After the FBI disclosed violent threats against the Boston Globe that cited ''treasonous and seditious'' coverage of the president, Trump said of an op-ed published by the New York Times, ''Really what they've done is, virtually'...treason.''Chain's threatening calls in August included him condemning the Globe's reporting on Trump as ''treasonous and seditious.'' But even after that disclosure from the FBI, Trump went on to use such rhetoric. During a live interview with Fox News on September 6, as Trump stood among thousands of supporters assembling for a rally in Billings, Montana, he responded to a question about the recently published New York Times op-ed from an anonymous official claiming to ''resist'' Trump's agenda from within the administration. As Fox & Friends co-host Pete Hegseth brought up the Times piece, the crowd booed. Trump smiled.

''I think this audience would say that an attack on you is an attack on the people that voted for you,'' said Hegseth, who has himself referred to ''the failing New York Times'' and made a conspicuously false claim about the paper's coverage. ''Yeah,'' Trump nodded. The crowd's booing morphed into cheering. Hegseth then asked Trump what should be done about the op-ed.

''The Times should never have done that,'' Trump replied, ''because really what they've done is, virtually, you know, it's treason.''

Early on in the Trump presidency, Washington Post editor Marty Baron responded to Trump's aggression with a shrewd bit of verbal judo, redirecting attention toward the public service of the American press: ''We're not at war,'' Baron said, ''we're at work.'' Recent polling suggests a majority of Americans trust the media more than Trump to tell the truth on important issues. However, another recent survey showed that people distrustful of the media often cite Trumpian parlance like ''fake news'' and ''alternative facts.''

According to the security leaders at the two media companies, there has also been a surge in recent months in so-called doxxing, or publicizing journalists' personal information on social media and organizing harassment of them. One security director described intense activity targeting reporters who have exposed members of white supremacist groups emboldened by Trump. The other described a wave of threats against journalists at several news organizations that pursued information about the non-sequestered jurors seated in the trial of former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort: ''They said, 'Okay, because you're trying to get the private information of citizens that are jurors, we're gonna put out all your private information.''' Some of the journalists received threatening material mailed to their home addresses, he said, and in some cases, strangers threatened to show up at journalists' homes.

''If you want to know who this gutless loser is, call the opinion desk of the failing NYT at 212-556-1234 and ask them,'' said White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders. ''They are the only ones complicit in this deceitful act.''This summer, fans of a bizarre pro-Trump conspiracy theory known as QAnon began to turn up at Trump rallies, raising further questions about what might happen when fringe online activity moves into the real world. In light of one violent case already, said the TV news network's security director, there is danger from ''the Pizzagate and QAnon types who may actually show up in person'--the ones that get it in their heads that all of that stuff is true'--and they're going to act on it. Most of the time those are few and far in between, but they're concerning.''

Recent comments from the Trump White House seemed to gesture approvingly toward doxxing tactics. Shortly after the anonymous op-ed was published in the Times, press secretary Sanders put out a statement responding to questions from reporters: ''If you want to know who this gutless loser is, call the opinion desk of the failing NYT at 212-556-1234 and ask them. They are the only ones complicit in this deceitful act.'' (The Times got flooded with a mix of calls.)

After the mass shooting in late June at the Capital Gazette newspaper in Annapolis, Maryland, concerns among security leaders ratcheted up further, according to those I spoke with. No known evidence has emerged that the perpetrator of that attack, who harbored a deep personal grudge against the paper, was motivated by Trump. The president offered no comments about the shooting that day; speaking at a public event at the White House about 24 hours later, he called the attack ''horrific'' and recited a couple prepared remarks from a teleprompter: ''Journalists, like all Americans, should be free from the fear of being violently attacked while doing their job.''

Some Trump political allies waved off renewed criticism of his anti-media rhetoric, insisting it was irrelevant to the carnage at the Capital Gazette. Yet the shooting set a harrowing precedent for an assault on a newsroom: As I've reported over the past several years, there is evidence that aspiring mass shooters often take a keen interest in such high-profile attacks.

''One particularly devout anti-Trump fake journalist over at fake news CNN is so openly concerned the president's rhetoric could endanger members of the media,'' Sean Hannity scoffed.A few weeks after the shooting, a widely circulated piece by conservative Times columnist Bret Stephens highlighted a warning that has long been on the minds of many: ''Trump Will Have Blood on His Hands.'' Stephens detailed his own recent experience with a menacing caller who promised to shoot him and others and said ''the press is the enemy of the United States people.''

A dark irony of this phenomenon is that anyone who hates the media for its alleged mission against Trump can find nightly affirmation from one of the largest news networks in America. After CNN's Jim Acosta appealed recently for the White House to stop calling the press ''the enemy,'' Fox News anchor and close Trump ally Sean Hannity opened his primetime show with obligatory invective:

One particularly devout anti-Trump fake journalist over at fake news CNN is so openly concerned the president's rhetoric could endanger members of the media. But we're going to show you how the White House press secretary, Sarah Sanders, absolutely decimated this person'...during today's very tense briefing. Plus, we're going to help remind the anti-Trump fake news CNN network why so many Americans chant at you that you suck. Americans don't trust your abusively biased coverage.

It is evident that Trump, by way of Fox News, political surrogates, and the power of the presidential bully pulpit, has ingrained a toxic political narrative. There is also no denying its trajectory: The more Trump decries an alleged media conspiracy bent on destroying him, the more he sets the stage for a grim conclusion.

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Tue, 30 Oct 2018 11:39

The feature derails healthy conversation and preys on users' worst instincts.

Taylor Lorenz Oct 29, 2018 Jim Bourg / ReutersOn Monday, Twitter was briefly ablaze after CEO Jack Dorsey reportedly suggested to The Telegraph that the company might eliminate its heart-shaped like button. The company quickly clarified, tweeting that as part of a ''commitment to healthy conversation,'' it was ''rethinking everything about the service,'' including the like button.

But this wasn't the first time Dorsey signaled his frustration with the like button. ''We have a big like button with a heart on it and we're incentivizing people to want it to go up,'' he said just weeks ago at the WIRED25 summit. ''Is that the right thing? Versus contributing to the public conversation or a healthy conversation? How do we incentivize healthy conversation?''

Twitter has, for years now, grappled with how to tame abuse and build a more positive experience for users. In a July blog post the company vowed to work ''to increase the collective health, openness, and civility of the dialogue on our service.'' Earlier this year Twitter also introduced a bookmarking tool to allow users to save tweets without having to like them.

Read: You can never go back to the old Twitter

But if Twitter really wants to foster more healthy conversation, the like button is a puzzling target. ''Given so much hate and bile and disinformation and harassment on this website it's not an immediately obvious move to eliminate the heart shaped button people use to show each other support and appreciation,'' my colleague James Hamblin tweeted.

Besides, retweets, not likes, are Twitter's most powerful method of reward.

The quest to accrue retweets regularly drives users to tweet outlandish comments, extremist opinions, fake news, or worse. Many users knowingly tweet false and damaging information and opinions in an effort to go viral via retweets. Entire Twitter accounts have been built on this strategy. If Twitter really wants to control the out-of-control rewards mechanisms it has created, the retweet button should be the first to go.

Retweets prey on users' worst instincts. They delude Twitter users into thinking that they're contributing to thoughtful discourse by endlessly amplifying other people's points'--the digital equivalent of shouting ''yeah, what they said'' in the midst of an argument. And because Twitter doesn't allow for editing tweets, information that goes viral via retweets is also more likely to be false or exaggerated. According to MIT research published in the journal Science, Twitter users retweet fake news almost twice as much as real news. Other Twitter users, desperate for validation, endlessly retweet their own tweets, spamming followers with duplicate information.

Retweets were introduced, ironically, to make Twitter better. At the time, the company's co-founder Biz Stone declared that ''we hope interesting, newsworthy, or even just plain funny information will spread quickly through the network making its way efficiently to the people who want or need to know.'' Retweets were an early way for the company to ensure that the most interesting and engaging content would bubble up in the feed and keep users entertained.

But for more than two and a half years, the company has shown people tweets based on an algorithmic accounting of exactly what the most interesting and engaging content is (yes, part of that algorithm takes user behavior like retweets into account). It has also tested suggesting tweets, recommending accounts to follow based on interest, and built Moments to surface noteworthy tweets about news events. The retweet isn't just dangerous, it's redundant.

It's no surprise that users are also thirsting for a retweet-free version of Twitter. A browser extension that mutes retweets has been popular since 2013. In April, my colleague Alexis Madrigal wrote about how he used a script to eliminate retweets from his timeline and how it transformed his experience for the better. ''Retweets make up more than a quarter of all tweets. When they disappeared, my feed had less punch-the-button outrage,'' he wrote. ''Fewer mean screenshots of somebody saying precisely the wrong thing. Less repetition of big, big news. Fewer memes I'd already seen a hundred times. Less breathlessness. And more of what the people I follow were actually thinking about, reading, and doing. It's still not perfect, but it's much better.''

Read: Twitter's new features aren't what users asked for

''I think people often make judgements based off social cues, but it's a completely different experience to use Twitter just focusing on the raw material,'' said Jordan Gonen, a 21-year-old college student. This week, he along with Darshil Patel and Maas Lalani, two 18-year-old college freshmen, launched a browser extension that hides the number of retweets, likes, and followers on all tweets in your feed.

Ben Grosser, an artist and professor at University of Illinois, created a similar but more robust version of that product in February called the Twitter ''demetricator.'' ''Part of what's happening in spread of disinformation is that people can essentially repeat what someone else said and spread it to the world, the retweet has an effect well beyond the Like in that regard,'' he said. Grosser also indicated that removing just the like button would only make the retweet more powerful. ''I fear that if they remove the Like button the fact that there are other indicators that include metrics will just compel users to use those other indicators,'' Grosser said.

Of course, eliminating the native retweet button wouldn't stop people from quote tweeting, and it could just send everyone back to the dark ages of the manual retweet, when users physically copy-pasted text from other tweet with the letters ''RT'' plastered in front. But killing native retweets is certainly a step in the right direction.

There are signs that Dorsey may be open to the idea. He's clearly attempted to do some soul-searching over the past year in regards to how to improve the product. The company has also shown that it's not afraid to sacrifice hallmark features of the app in service of what they believe to be a better experience. The like button replaced Twitter's more famous ''favorite'' in 2015, and last March Twitter revamped how replies work, hiding the signature @ symbol.

After Kanye West tweeted in September about removing follower counts, Dorsey responded to the rapper via text message saying that he's been ''thinking deeply about the follower and like counts, and what that incentivizes. We want to change. What made sense 12 years ago doesn't make sense today.''

For many of Twitter's 326 million monthly active users changes can't come soon enough. ''I find it curious that Jack Dorsey has been hinting at possible changes for a while now'... I respond this, well, why don't you try something?'' said Gosser. ''I want to see some action as opposed to continued suggestion that maybe something will change.''

We want to hear what you think about this article. Submit a letter to the editor or write to letters@theatlantic.com.

Taylor Lorenz is a staff writer at

The Atlantic, where she covers technology.

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Archived Version

Tue, 30 Oct 2018 11:37

October 29, 2018 7:51AM PTThough James Cromwell was honored at the fourth annual Carney Awards for his work as a character actor, the industry veteran has worked as a political activist his entire career.

On the red carpet at the Eli and Edythe Broad Stage in Santa Monica, Calif., he candidly shared his thoughts about the current political climate.

''This is nascent fascism. We always had a turnkey, totalitarian state '-- all we needed was an excuse, and all the institutions were in place to turn this into pure fascism,'' Cromwell told Variety on Sunday night. ''If we don't stop [President Trump] now, then we will have a revolution for real. Then there will be blood in the streets.''

Cromwell later echoed his statement during his acceptance speech for one of the six Carney Awards given out that night.

''We're living in very curious times, and something is coming up which is desperately important to this country and to this planet, and that is an election, in which hopefully in some measure we are going to take back our democracy,'' Cromwell said. ''We will have a government that represents us and not the donor class. We will cut through the corruption, [and] we won't have to do what comes next, which is either a non-violent revolution or a violent one, because this has got to end.''

Named after the late actor Art Carney, the Carney Awards recognize Hollywood's leading character actors for their work in theater, film, and television. Joe Morton, Jessica Walter, Joe Pantoliano, Bruce Greenwood, and M. Emmet Walsh were also honored at this year's event.

Host Patton Oswalt started the evening on a lighter note, catering his jokes to the crowd of character actors. If they really wanted to honor character actors, he joked, they should have hosted the show in a single trailer in Palmdale at 4 a.m.

However, Oswalt also made sure to acknowledge the accomplished careers of the evening's honorees. Of the six award recipients, past characters include a turncoat futuristic revolutionary in ''Matrix,'' the captain of the USS Enterprise in ''Star Trek'' and the iconic Lucille Bluth from ''Arrested Development.''

As Lucille, Walter said she her job was to flesh out the storylines revolving around the show's lead Jason Bateman, highlighting the importance of character actors in rounding out many of today's popular television shows and movies.

''Webster's dictionary says that character actors specialize in playing eccentric and unusual people. Not all supporting actors do that, but character actors do,'' she told Variety. ''In a lot of shows, the character actors fill out the picture.''

In between speeches were performances from pop-singer Lily Meola and jazz singer Danny Most who sang during the in memoriam. The evening concluded in a town hall discussion with all of the honorees and a cocktail party in the lobby.

Though James Cromwell was honored at the fourth annual Carney Awards for his work as a character actor, the industry veteran has worked as a political activist his entire career. On the red carpet at the Eli and Edythe Broad Stage in Santa Monica, Calif., he candidly shared his thoughts about the current political climate. ''This is ['...]

Though James Cromwell was honored at the fourth annual Carney Awards for his work as a character actor, the industry veteran has worked as a political activist his entire career. On the red carpet at the Eli and Edythe Broad Stage in Santa Monica, Calif., he candidly shared his thoughts about the current political climate. ''This is ['...]

Though James Cromwell was honored at the fourth annual Carney Awards for his work as a character actor, the industry veteran has worked as a political activist his entire career. On the red carpet at the Eli and Edythe Broad Stage in Santa Monica, Calif., he candidly shared his thoughts about the current political climate. ''This is ['...]

Though James Cromwell was honored at the fourth annual Carney Awards for his work as a character actor, the industry veteran has worked as a political activist his entire career. On the red carpet at the Eli and Edythe Broad Stage in Santa Monica, Calif., he candidly shared his thoughts about the current political climate. ''This is ['...]

Though James Cromwell was honored at the fourth annual Carney Awards for his work as a character actor, the industry veteran has worked as a political activist his entire career. On the red carpet at the Eli and Edythe Broad Stage in Santa Monica, Calif., he candidly shared his thoughts about the current political climate. ''This is ['...]

Though James Cromwell was honored at the fourth annual Carney Awards for his work as a character actor, the industry veteran has worked as a political activist his entire career. On the red carpet at the Eli and Edythe Broad Stage in Santa Monica, Calif., he candidly shared his thoughts about the current political climate. ''This is ['...]

Though James Cromwell was honored at the fourth annual Carney Awards for his work as a character actor, the industry veteran has worked as a political activist his entire career. On the red carpet at the Eli and Edythe Broad Stage in Santa Monica, Calif., he candidly shared his thoughts about the current political climate. ''This is ['...]

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Archived Version

Tue, 30 Oct 2018 11:25

Women are more likely to become addicted to cannabis because the sex hormone oestrogen makes them enjoy the high more, a study has found.

Men are up to four times more likely to try cannabis and use higher doses, more frequently, due to their levels of testosterone, the review of studies into animal behaviour revealed.

Despite females using the drug less, they went from first hit to habit faster than males.

Men are up to four times more likely to try cannabis and use higher doses, more frequently, researchers revealed [File photo]

This is due to being more sensitive to the drug's effects and the release of the 'pleasure' and 'reward' brain chemicals.

The differences between how cannabis affects the sexes is important as more countries look to decriminalise or legalise cannabis.

This month, Canada became the second country to legalise the drug for recreational use.

The findings could lead to gender-based drug addiction treatments. The differences between how cannabis affects the sexes is important as more countries look to decriminalise or legalise cannabis [File photo]

The research found the differences in response were down to the influence of sex hormones like testosterone, oestradiol (oestrogen) and progesterone on the endocannabinoid system.

This is a network of brain cells which communicate using the same family of chemicals found in cannabis.

Study co-author Dr Liana Fattore, of the National Research Council of Italy, said: 'Male sex steroids increase risk-taking behaviour and suppress the brain's reward system, which could explain why males are more likely to try drugs, including cannabis.'

The research found the differences in response were down to the influence of sex hormones like testosterone [File photo]

She added: 'Females seem to be more vulnerable, at a neurochemical level, in developing addiction to cannabis.'

The findings could lead to gender-based drug addiction treatments.

Professor Fattore told the journal Frontiers in Behavioural Neuroscience: 'Identifying factors is critical for optimising evidence-based prevention and treatment protocols.'

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Archived Version

Tue, 30 Oct 2018 11:20

NILTEPEC, Mexico (AP) '-- The migrant caravan slowly advancing through southern Mexico is demanding the Mexican government help its 4,000 participants reach Mexico City even as a smaller group of Central Americans entered the country, presumably with the intention of joining it.

Worn down from long miles of walking and frustrated by the caravan's slow progress, some migrants have been dropping out and returning home or applying for protected status in Mexico. Conscious of that frustration, its representatives demanded ''safe and dignified'' transportation to the capital Monday after the group arrived in the Oaxaca state town of Niltepec.

The Mexican government has shown no inclination to assist, however, with the exception of its migrant protection agency giving some of the caravan's stragglers rides to the next town over the weekend.

Pueblo Sin Fronteras, a group supporting the caravan, has said it hopes to hold meetings in Mexico City with federal lawmakers and authorities as well as representatives of the incoming government to discuss migrants' rights and the caravan's future.

But Mexican officials seem intent only on seeing the caravan melt away as it travels toward the U.S. border. The government regularly trumpets the number of migrants who have applied for refugee status or asked to return to their home countries.

On Monday, the Federal Police aggressively tried to turn back hundreds more migrants who crossed the Suchiate River to enter Mexico from Guatemala.

A low-flying police helicopter hovered overhead as the migrants waded in large groups across the murky river, apparently trying to use the downdraft from its rotors to discourage them. Guatemala's Noti7 channel reported that one man drowned and aired video of a man dragging a seemingly lifeless body from the river, but Honduran Vice Foreign Minister Nelly Jerez later told TV station Televicentro that the man was alive and being treated at a hospital in Tapachula, Mexico.

Once on the Mexican side, the migrants were surrounded and escorted by dark-uniformed officers as sirens wailed. The standoff at the riverbank followed a more violent confrontation on the border bridge over the river Sunday night, when migrants threw rocks and used sticks against Mexico police. One migrant died from a head wound during the clash, but the cause was unclear.

The group was much smaller than the first caravan. In the Mexican border town of Ciudad Hidalgo, they said they hoped to continue onward Tuesday morning.

With the original caravan still at least 1,000 miles or more from its goal of reaching the United States, the Pentagon announced it would send 5,200 active-duty troops to ''harden'' the U.S.-Mexico border. There are already more than 2,000 National Guard troops providing assistance at the border.

The Pentagon announcement comes as President Donald Trump has been focusing on the caravan to stir up his base a week before midterm elections.

Migrants in the caravan planned to walk to Juchitan on Tuesday, a trek of some 32 miles to the west. They may have been emboldened Monday by the efforts of one small town to help them move. More than 100 migrants lined up at a gas station parking lot to wait for rides in Zanatepec.

Mayor Ramiro Nolasco said locals organized a bus and several trucks to carry migrants.

''We are helping our brothers from other countries with food, water, and transportation,'' Nolasco said. ''It is going to be very little, compared to what they need.''

Illustrating the waning enthusiasm, some migrants gathered at a checkpoint near Tapanatepec to ask for help returning home to Honduras, the origin of the great majority of those in the caravan. Exhausted from many days on the road, and disheartened by the many miles yet to go and misbehavior by some fellow travelers, people have been dropping out and the caravan has contracted from its peak of an estimated 7,000 participants.

''Of the friends that I have been with, all want to go back,'' said Hasiel Isamar Hernandez, a 28-year-old mother of three. For her, the last straw was when she heard from her husband that her 3-year-old daughter back home had stopped eating because she missed her mother.

The second group at the border with Guatemala has been more unruly than the first. Guatemala's Interior Ministry said Guatemalan police officers were injured when the migrants broke through border barriers on Guatemala's side of the bridge.

Mexico's Interior Department said in a statement that two Hondurans ages 17 and 22 were arrested Monday when one of them tried to shoot at police in the town of Ignacio Zaragoza, near the Hidalgo border crossing. It said the Glock failed to fire, and no agents were injured.

El Salvador's immigration agency, meanwhile, said a group of Salvadorans including several dozen children and adolescents that crossed legally into Guatemala on Sunday numbered about 500.

___

Associated Press writer Christopher Sherman reported this story in Niletpec, Mexico, and AP photojournalist Santiago Billy reported from Tecun Uman, Guatemala. AP writers Julie Watson in Tapanatepec, Mexico, and Sonia Perez D. in Guatemala City contributed to this report.