A snowstorm will wallop central USA this week, plunging temps as much as 60 degrees in one day

Winter storm watches and warnings are in effect from Idaho to Colorado to Minnesota, where heavy snow and cold temperatures are expected.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/2pWyMRC

White House tells Democrats it will not cooperate with impeachment inquiry

In a letter to House Democrats, White House counsel Pat Cipollone calls the impeachment inquiry “constitutionally invalid” and indicates the White House won’t cooperate with it.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/2oeeMtj

UN may run out of money by end of the month: Guterres

The United Nations is running a deficit of $230 million, Secretary General Antonio Guterres said on Monday, and may run out of money by the end of October. In a letter intended for the 37,000 employees at the UN secretariat and obtained by AFP, Guterres said unspecified "additional stop-gap measures" would have to be taken to ensure salaries and entitlements are paid. "Member States have paid only 70 per cent of the total amount needed for our regular budget operations in 2019.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/2nv3LDu

Pastor: I hope Supreme Court agrees LGBTQ people should be free from job discrimination

When we talk about life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for all, there should be no ambiguity in what the word "all" means.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/2VlOHo9

Diplomat's Wife Suspected in Fatal U.K. Car Crash Returned to the U.S. After Telling Authorities She Would Stay. Here's What to Know

U.K. officials are asking that diplomatic immunity be waived

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/33cwQ5E

The US blacklisted some of China's most valuable AI startups over human rights issues in a dramatic trade war escalation

The US placed 28 Chinese companies on a trade blacklist on Monday, including three AI startups valued at over $1 billion.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/35cCnLz

Minnesota Rep. Omar files for divorce from husband

U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar has filed for divorce from her husband, citing an "irretrievable breakdown" of her marriage. Omar and Hirsi have been legally married since 2018 but have been together for years. The petition, which Omar signed Friday while in Burkina Faso, does not elaborate on what caused the marriage to break down.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/2Vk6NXL

The United States Almost Bombed Iran in the 1990s

“The Pentagon drew up military plans which ranged from launching cruise missiles at Iranian targets to undertaking a full-blown ground invasion of Iran.”

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/2VljKAB

Turkey says it won't yield to U.S. threat over its Syria plans

Turkey will not bow to threats over its Syria plans, the Turkish vice president said Tuesday in an apparent response to President Trump's warning to Ankara the previous day about the scope of its planned military incursion into northeastern Syria.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/31YJZze

Jury says J&J must pay $8 billion in case over male breast growth linked to Risperdal

Johnson & Johnson must pay $8 billion in punitive damages to a man who previously won $680,000 over his claims that it failed to warn that young men using its antipsychotic drug Risperdal could grow breasts, a Philadelphia jury said on Tuesday. The Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas jury's verdict in favor of Nicholas Murray came in the first case in which a Pennsylvania jury had been able to consider awarding punitive damages in one of thousands of Risperdal cases pending in the state. "This jury, as have other juries in other litigations, once again imposed punitive damages on a corporation that valued profits over safety and profits over patients," Murray's lawyers, Tom Kline and Jason Itkin, said in a joint statement.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/31YYFOH

America’s Good Intentions in Syria Have Led to This Dismal Outcome

Recent U.S. policy in Syria, from the moment that former U.S. ambassador Robert Ford showed support for Syrian protesters in 2011, has been one of good intentions that were mismanaged through conflicting policies. This week it led to the decision to withdraw. A new crisis will unfold in eastern Syria, an area that, liberated from ISIS, has seen too much war and where the people are just beginning to reconstruct their lives. Many are expressing feelings that the U.S. betrayed its partners, the Syrian Democratic Forces, who are mostly Kurdish. The larger context is that the U.S. has been seen as abandoning one group after another in Syria, reducing American influence in Syria and the region.It is at least the third time that President Donald Trump has sought to leave Syria. In March 2018, he said that the U.S. was leaving “very soon.” In December 2018, he wrote that the U.S. was bringing the troops home after defeating ISIS. In fact, ISIS was not defeated on the ground until March 23, 2019, in its last pocket near the Euphrates river. ISIS sleeper cells are still active, and there are thousands of ISIS detainees in eastern Syria. However, Trump now says that Turkey or other countries will need to deal with the remnants of ISIS and the detainees in Syria.How did the U.S. get here? In 2011, Americans were outraged by scenes of Bashar al-Assad’s regime cracking down on protests. There was bipartisan support for backing the Syrian protesters and then the Syrian rebels. At the time, the Obama administration had a vast spectrum of options, from giving them anti-tank missiles to carrying out airstrikes against Assad and punishing him for using chemical weapons. But Obama walked back from his 2012 red line on the use of chemical weapons.Washington shifted from directly opposing Assad to training and equipping Syrian rebels, a program that cost up to $1 billion and was largely seen as a failure by 2015. By this time, the U.S. was working on the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or the “Iran deal,” and the overthrow of Assad, who is backed by Iran, was no longer a priority. ISIS had exploited the Syrian conflict to take over a third of Syria and Iraq, controlling the lives of 12 million people and committing genocide. The U.S. began anti-ISIS operations in Syria in September 2014 and helped the Kurdish fighters in Kobane resist ISIS. From there grew a unique partnership between the U.S. and these leftist Kurdish fighters, whom Turkey accused of being linked to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which the U.S. views as terrorists. The U.S. supported the creation of the Syrian Democratic Forces in 2015 in eastern Syria, as a way to rebrand the Kurdish fighters and distance them from the PKK, so that Washington could train and equip them without appearing to support the party.The Obama administration had moved from opposing Assad, to arming rebel fighters, to fighting ISIS and signing the Iran deal. At each juncture it narrowed its goals. By the time Trump was elected, the U.S. mission in eastern Syria, encapsulated in Operation Inherent Resolve, was to defeat ISIS on the ground and diplomatically oppose Assad through lip service in Geneva.Trump vowed during his campaign to defeat ISIS, but he also wanted to show that there was a red line with respect to Assad’s crimes. He ordered airstrikes against the regime in April 2017 and April 2018 but was reluctant to do more. He ended support for the rebels in July 2017, and a year later Damascus took back rebel areas that had previously enjoyed some U.S. support. By this time, Russia and Iran were deeply involved in Syria, supporting Assad, and Turkey had launched an operation in northern Syria to prevent the U.S.-backed SDF from expanding its areas of control.At each juncture, the U.S. found its choices narrowed in Syria, and America was isolated from having a say in the future of Syria as Russia, Turkey, and Iran excluded Washington from peace discussions they held at Astana. Nevertheless, by 2018, the U.S. and its SDF partners controlled a huge area in eastern Syria. National-security adviser John Bolton sought to push a strategy whereby America would hold on to eastern Syria until Iran left. The goal was to roll back Iranian influence and reduce Israel’s fears about Iran using Syria to attack. Bolton never got his way.Trump’s decision in December 2018 to leave Syria led to the resignation of defense secretary James Mattis and anti-ISIS envoy Brett McGurk. Bolton was gone by September 2019. Jettisoning these key officials, the White House narrowed its role in Syria even more, no longer seeing a way to use it as leverage against Iran. Since Trump didn’t want to do nation-building in Syria, and wanted Europe or the Gulf states to foot the bill to keep ISIS detainees locked up, he saw the area as a sunk cost. As for Iran, he said the U.S. would use Iraq to “watch“ it.All that was left of U.S. policy in Syria was the question of what to do about the U.S. partners, the mostly Kurdish forces that had been trained and that had done a phenomenal job defeating ISIS. The problem was that Turkey, sensing that Trump wanted to leave, kept threatening to launch an invasion of eastern Syria to attack the SDF. Turkey says it will resettle 2 million Syrians, mostly Arabs from elsewhere in Syria, in the Kurdish areas of eastern Syria.U.S. policy in Syria has been one of shutting one door after another to close off U.S. influence, at the same time that Iran, Russia, and Turkey are opening those doors to partition Syria for their own interests. The risks of U.S. withdrawal are clear. Not only will ISIS make some inroads, but Washington will lose influence in Syria, and America’s image will be tarnished for appearing to abandon friends and being bullied into leaving. Iran is already calling the US an “irrelevant occupier” and saying that it’s ready to help take over eastern Syria.Unfortunately, as the U.S. seeks to narrow its footprint and get out of the nation-building-humanitarian-intervention business that was a hallmark of the 1990s and early 2000s, Washington has chosen such a narrow goal that its allies are wondering whether there is a future for the U.S. in the Middle East. The U.S. had good intentions — the road to hell is paved with them — in Syria but badly mismanaged them. The result is that Iran, Russia, and Turkey got something and that all the U.S. got was a damaged reputation. It’s a far cry from 2011 when Syrian protesters all across the country, including Kurds and Arabs, looked to Washington for leadership and support.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/359vnim

UN chief says UN facing worst cash crisis in nearly 10 years

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned Tuesday that the United Nations is facing its "worst cash crisis" in nearly a decade because 64 of its 193 members have not paid their annual dues — including the United States, its largest contributor. According to the U.N., 129 countries had paid $1.99 billion in dues for the U.N.'s 2019 operating budget by Tuesday. Because of the U.S. government's budget calendar, Washington usually pays its dues in October.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/2Oz7DOP

China Knows It Can't Protect Every Island It Builds (Think South China Sea)

But Beijing is building them anyway.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/310f8ki

Judge Tammy Kemp: 'I could not refuse' ex-Dallas cop Amber Guyger a hug after sentencing

Judge Tammy Kemp, who hugged and gave Amber Guyger a Bible after she was sentenced to prison, said her actions were appropriate.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/35pu9Qm

House Democrats are so afraid Trump allies will expose the whistleblower that they might mask the person's voice and face during testimony

The debate comes as President Donald Trump's allies amplify his claims that the whistleblower broke the law and is guilty of espionage.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/31Xqqam

Amnesty calls for release of leading Cuban dissident

Amnesty International on Tuesday demanded the Cuban government explain the charges against the head of the country's largest opposition group, whom Havana arrested a week ago, or release him from jail.

from Reuters: World News https://ift.tt/2pSSXjb

White House 'surprised that anyone would be blindsided' by U.S. withdrawal from northern Syria

A senior White House official suggested that the “blindsided” comment originated from disgruntled government employees.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/2MpIbsf

Supreme Court, trying to remain above the partisan fray, opens 2019 term with a debate about insanity

The justices also focused their attention on new guidelines encouraging them to wait two minutes before asking questions, which they barely managed.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/31XkPkr

U.S. Confirms Killing of Al-Qaeda’s South Asia Chief

U.S. officials confirmed Tuesday that a joint U.S.-Afghanistan commando raid on Sept. 23 killed Asim Omar, the head of Al-Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS), along with six other Al-Qaeda members in the southern Helmand province. News of the raid was first reported by Afghanistan’s intelligence agency.Special forces struck a compound in the Musa Qala district, a Taliban stronghold, and took out Omar and six other Al-Qaeda fighters, including a courier for Al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri. Umar, a Pakistani, headed AQIS from its inception in September 2014. Along with the initial statement, the Afghan National Directorate of Security (NDS) shared pictures showing Umar both alive and dead. > 1/2: BREAKING: NDS can now confirm the death of Asim Omar, leader of Al_Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS), in a joint US-Afghan raid on a Taliban compound in Musa Qala district of Helmand province on Sep. 23. pic.twitter.com/sFKi38M6MC> > -- NDS Afghanistan (@NDSAfghanistan) October 8, 2019U.S. air strikes from an Air Force AC-130 gunship followed the raid to level the compound, but resulted in collateral damage, with Afghan officials telling the Associated Press that 40 people attending a wedding party in the area were killed. The operation also killed 22 Taliban fighters, the ADF reported. 14 people were arrested, including five Pakistani nationals and one Bangladeshi. The statement said a large warehouse of supplies and equipment was also destroyed.News of Omar’s death comes on the 18th anniversary of the first American airstrikes in Afghanistan, and several weeks after President Trump confirmed the death of Osama bin Laden’s son Hamza in September. U.S.-Taliban peace talks are currently tabled.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/2OC3tWi

Kurdish forces in Syria fear Turkey will launch attacks rapidly to take advantage of 'confusion' caused by Trump's US troop withdrawal plan

Uncertainty caused by Trump's decision to withdraw US troops from Syria is likely to lead to Turkish aggression in the short term, sources say.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/2AR9BC6

Hong Kong 'won't rule out' Chinese help over protests: leader

Hong Kong's under-fire leader Carrie Lam on Tuesday said China intervening to end months of pro-democracy protests is an option following a particularly violent week of unrest that paralysed the city. Hong Kong was virtually locked down over the three-day holiday weekend, with the majority of subway stops closed. It is also the position of the central government (in Beijing) that Hong Kong should tackle the problem on her own.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/2ATIrL2

Elon Musk paid convicted fraudster to spread false paedophile claims about British cave rescue hero, court documents allege

Elon Musk paid a convicted fraudster to smear a British diving hero who he baselessly called a paedophile, according to court documents.The billionaire technology entrepreneur allegedly orchestrated a “malicious, false, and anonymous leak campaign” in a bid to trash the reputation of Vernon Unsworth, who helped to rescue a schoolboy football team trapped in a cave in Thailand last year.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/2LY6UoU

Sexual abuse of slaves by students at Founding Father’s university revealed by historians

The two young, white University of Virginia students had a secret.It was September 1826, and the men, both scions of wealthy southern slaveholding families, were suffering from the same sexually transmitted disease.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/30ULI7k