Canada PM Trudeau pressured to tackle influx of asylum seekers over US border

Source: theguardian.com

Justin Trudeau, Canada’s prime minister, is facing growing political pressure to address the steady stream of asylum seekers who have been braving freezing temperatures, fields of waist-deep snow and icy ditches to cross into Canada from the US by foot.

Recent months have seen a growing number of people entering Canada at remote, unguarded locations along the US border. Doing so allows the migrants – many of whom are desperate to flee Trump’s crackdown on immigration – to skirt a longstanding pact that bars most refugee claimants in the US from applying for asylum in Canada.

Advocates in Manitoba say they know of some 139 refugees – including children – who have made the perilous crossing since the start of the year, while groups in Quebec, British Columbia and Ontario also report a rise in irregular crossings.

Some haul suitcases for hours across frozen fields that straddle the border, while others are dropped by taxis metres away from the Quebec border. The asylum seekers – many of whom are from Somalia, Ghana and Djibouti – say their actions are driven by fears of what a Donald Trump presidency could mean for refugees in the US.

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/feb/26/asylum-seekers-canada-trump-trudeau

An Alarmingly Early Spring is Sweeping Across the Southern United States

Spring is well ahead of schedule across much of the southern United States, in some cases by at least two to three weeks. An early spring may sound nice, but it comes with serious consequences—both to human health and the environment.

A new set of maps produced by the USGS-led US National Phenology Network (US-NPN) demonstrates just how ahead of schedule spring is across much of the continental United States. Temperature-sensitive plants have started to become active earlier than normal, sprouting leaves and flowers in coastal California and southern Nevada through to the southern Great Plains and the Atlantic Coast. In Washington, DC, spring arrived 22 days earlier than historical norms, as indicated by data on leaf-outs and flowering.

Alarmingly, this seems to be a trend. A related study published late last year showed that spring has been arriving earlier than usual in three out of four US National Parks across the US, and that half of all National Parks are experiencing early springs compared to last century. And yes, the US-NPN says this trend is likely the result of climate change:


These findings are consistent with the fact that the instrumental record shows that 2016 was the hottest year ever recorded for the globe, and that it was the third record-breaking year in a row. Researchers have noted that 16 of the 17 hottest years recorded occurred since 2000. These new maps show that 2017, at least so far, is shaping up to be another warm one, but also that different regions exhibit variable responses over time.


http://gizmodo.com/an-alarmingly-early-spring-is-sweeping-across-the-south-1792716680

US private prison program rebooted by Trump administration

Source: theguardian.com

The Trump administration has scrapped Barack Obama’s program of ending the justice department’s use of private prisons, embracing an industry that has come under sharp criticism from civil rights advocates.

Jeff Sessions, Trump’s attorney general, on Thursday rescinded a six-month-old directive for the Federal Bureau of Prisons to wind down contracts with prison companies, claiming that the measure had “impaired the bureau’s ability to meet the future needs of the federal correctional system.

“Therefore, I direct the bureau to return to its previous approach,” Sessions said in his memo to Thomas Kane, the bureau’s acting director.

The move prompted spikes in the share prices of the major for-profit prison corporations, companies which contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars to Trump’s presidential election campaign and inauguration funds.



Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/feb/23/trump-revives-private-prison-program-doj-obama-administration-end

The Kremlin and GOP Have a New Friendand Boy, Does She Love Guns

Source: thedailybeast.com

Just a few years ago, Maria Butina owned a furniture store in Siberia. Now she’s wheeling and dealing with D.C. think-tankers, Republican strategists, and a Russian bank chief with alleged mob connections.
Depending on the audience, Butina has presented herself as a Russian central bank staffer, a leading gun rights advocate, a “representative of the Russian Federation,” a Washington, D.C., graduate student, a journalist, and a connection between Team Trump and Russia. She used each role to help her gain more high-level contacts in the nation’s capital.

It’s another chapter in what’s becoming a familiar story in Washington: Kremlin-connected operators building bridges to the GOP. Ever since U.S. intelligence services concluded that Russia was meddling in the American presidential elections, Team Trump’s ties to Russia have been highly scrutinized. The president’s national security adviser, Michael Flynn, resigned because he misled his bosses about his contacts with the Russian government; and his former campaign manager, Paul Manafort, also resigned due to questions about his relationship with Russia.

Butina’s relationships, formed with Washington’s conservative society through her fierce advocacy for firearms—one conference described her as the “public face of gun rights in the Russian Federation”—provide a previously unreported link between the Russian government and the Republican Party.

Two of Butina’s friendships in particular have raised eyebrows. She started a business with Paul Erickson, a decades-long Republican Party activist. And she served as a special assistant to the deputy governor of Russia’s central bank, Alexander Torshin, a former Russian senator belonging to Vladimir Putin’s political party with alleged ties to the Russian mob world.

Read more: http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2017/02/23/the-kremlin-and-gop-share-a-new-friend-and-boy-does-she-love-guns.html

PBS INDEPENDENT LENS TOWER The Mass Shooting as an Animated Documentary

Germans outraged as U.S. plays wrong version of their anthem

German tennis has responded with outrage after the United States Tennis Association (USTA) made the embarrassing error of playing the Nazi-era version of Germany's national anthem during a Fed Cup tie in Hawaii.

The version played included the first stanza, beginning "Deutschland, Deutschland uber alles," which was used as Nazi propaganda. It was dropped after World War Two.

She later said her first comments had been somewhat emotional but that was because the incident happened before her game and she was left stunned.

"We were left shocked and did not know how to react," Petkovic said.
German team coach Barbara Ritter said the mistake was "an absolute scandal, a disrespectful incident and inexcusable".

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-tennis-fedcup-anthem-idUSKBN15R0OL?utm_campaign=trueAnthem:+Trending+Content&utm_content=58a09cc704d30168e63a7845&utm_medium=trueAnthem&utm_source=twitter

Donald Trump has 'fascinating parallels' with Caligula, says historian

He has not yet made a horse his running mate, but Donald Trump can be compared to one of the most notorious of all Roman emperors, Caligula, according to best-selling historian Tom Holland.

Holland told the Hay festival there were fascinating parallels between the actions and success of Trump and what was going on in Rome 2,000 years ago.
Caligula has gone down in history as one of the maddest and baddest of all Roman emperors, a name synonymous with the worst excesses of absolute power.

But there was more to the story of Caligula, Holland said. He is not quite the psychopath of popular imagination and we can see similarities between what is happening now and then. What is known for sure about Caligula, Holland said, is that he had a great love of spectacle and dressing up; and he enjoyed hurting and humiliating people.

The young Caligula spent six years on the island of Capri, where he often directed and appeared in spectacular pornographic tableaux for his great uncle, the emperor Tiberius – a man it was said, who enjoyed having swimming boys nibble at his private parts.
When Tiberius died Caligua left for Rome where his excessive tastes “were translated on to the most public stage of all – the imperial capital.”

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/jun/01/donald-trump-has-fascinating-parallels-with-caligula-says-historian

84 Lumber Super Bowl Commercial 2017 - The Full Journey

U.S. Navy deploys guided missile destroyer USS Cole off coast of Yemen

Source: CBS News

The Navy has sent the guided missile destroyer Cole to the Gulf of Aden in response to the attack on the Saudi frigate.
The destroyer is the same warship that suffered heavy damage in an al Qaeda bombing attack in Yemen in 2000 that killed 17 sailors.

Al Qaeda in Yemen, long seen by Washington as of the most dangerous of the group’s offshoots, has exploited the chaos of Yemen’s civil war to seize territory in the country’s south and east, and the Islamic State group has also claimed attacks.

The two-year-old civil war began after Shiite Houthis rebels seized the capital, Sanaa, and forced the president, Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi, to flee the country. In March 2015, a Saudi-led military coalition launched an extensive air campaign aimed at restoring Hadi and his government to power. The northern region remains under Houthi control.

Fighting and U.S. involvement has appeared to pick up since President Trump took office, with drone strikes and a surprise commando raid on al Qaeda militants. The Houthis also attacked a Saudi frigate in the Red Sea, killing two crew members and wounding three.



Read more: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/u-s-navy-deploys-guided-missile-destroyer-off-coast-of-yemen/

Candidate Trump Called Jobs Report 'Fake' But Now Loves It? by crooksandliars.com

CNN's Chief Business Correspondent,Christine Romans called out the Trump administration for "accepting" the "jobs report" today as they are after months of calling them a “hoax, phony, fake, and a fraud.”

You may recall that Trump called the labor statistics a hoax many times during the campaign.

A new jobs report was released today and the U.S. economy added 227K new jobs.
Since he took office two weeks ago, Trump is now taking credit for President Obama's jobs creation and jobs reports, as if nothing ever happened.

CNN's Chief Business Correspondent Christine Romans, hasn't forgotten and called out the Trump administration today.
She said, "He called the Labor Department statistics on jobs a “hoax,” he's called them “phony,” he's called them “fake,” a “fraud.” Now he seems to be accepting them. They were good. He seems to be accepting them."

http://crooksandliars.com/2017/02/cnns-christine-romans-trump-called-jobs