Tuesday, August 2, 2016

Did Obama trade Cash for Hostages?

WSJ: The Obama administration secretly organized an airlift of $400 million worth of cash to Iran that coincided with the January release of four Americans detained in Tehran, according to U.S. and European officials and congressional staff briefed on the operation afterward.

Wooden pallets stacked with euros, Swiss francs and other currencies were flown into Iran on an unmarked cargo plane, according to these officials. The U.S. procured the money from the central banks of the Netherlands and Switzerland, they said.

The money represented the first installment of a $1.7 billion settlement the Obama administration reached with Iran to resolve a decades-old dispute over a failed arms deal signed just before the 1979 fall of Iran’s last monarch, Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.

What's the weirdest thing about your body?

Reddit best comments....

I have one attached and one unattached earlobe.

On the left side of my head, above my ear, I've developed a random bald spot slightly larger than the diameter of a quarter. Coincidentally, right below my right shoulder, I have a thick patch of back hair about the same size (my back is otherwise hairless). It's like a whole community of hair just said "fuck it" and moved to my body's equivalent of Florida.

My immune system thinks I'm allergic to the progesterone I naturally release.

I have a perfectly smooth mushroom shaped, skin colored mole on the side of my head and I've had it since birth. My mom says it looks like a penis, you know, nice stuff that moms say.

Brains are part of the body, right? I have Prosopagnosia (face blindness), which means that I do not recognise or remember faces. I can look at someone, turn around, turn back, and I won't recognise their face. I don't recognise my coworkers, friends, or family by face. I have a lot of funny stories related to this...

I have a congenital blood disorder called Haemochromatosis. This means that my body absorbs far too much Iron from my diet and since it can't be expelled easily, my body stores the excess Iron wherever it can and the build up of it can cause nasty complications if not treated.
I also have Anaemia. Which is very strange as I have all this Iron in my body but yet it isn't being absorbed into my blood stream. Even Specialists at the BMA (British Medical Association) are scratching their heads about this and frequently ask for samples to research.

toy gun

Yesterday in line at the grocery a boy with his parent walk by holding a plastic gun with cartoon cross-connected extension arms the type with a boxing glove on the end except his had two black suction cups at the end. It was a toy grabber with a hand grip shaped as a pistol. Aim it at something a short distance and gently grab it. Not at all useful but amusing.

I want one.

It hardly extends at all but when it does it becomes a cartoon. Similar to this. It was funny seeing him idly playing with it. Boys will be boys.

(We actually have a label for toys)

This is how Democrats bait Donald Trump

"Calling Trump ‘Unfit,’ Obama Urges G.O.P. to Abandon Him"

“The question they [GOP] have to ask themselves is: If you are repeatedly having to say in very strong terms that what he has said is unacceptable, why are you still endorsing him?” Mr. Obama said at a news conference at the White House.

Mr. Obama said that in addition to Mr. Trump’s comments about the Khan family, the Republican nominee had demonstrated that he was “woefully unprepared to do this job.” The president said Mr. Trump lacked knowledge about Europe, the Middle East and Asia.

“This isn’t a situation where you have an episodic gaffe. This is daily,” Mr. Obama added. “There has to be a point at which you say, this is not somebody I can support for president of the United States, even if he purports to be a member of my party. The fact that that has not yet happened makes some of these denunciations ring hollow.”

How Time Flies

Via Imgur.com

"Woman Robs Wyoming Bank To Go Back To Prison"

AP: FBI Special Agent Tory Smith said in court documents that Thompson entered a US Bank branch in Cheyenne and handed a teller a cardboard note that said, “I have a gun. Give me all your money.”

The teller turned over thousands of dollars.

Outside, Thompson threw money into the air and even offered some to people passing by, Smith stated. He added that Cheyenne police Lt. Nathan Busek said he found Thompson with a large sum of money when he arrived at the bank.

“Lt. Busek asked Thompson what was going on, and Thompson replied, ‘I just robbed the bank, I want to go back to prison,'” Smith wrote.

Mechanicsburg, Penn

I like the name of the place. Never heard it before. I'd expect there to be a lot of mechanical types given the name.

Trump had disputes with a city's fire marshal limiting his crowd to 1,000 even in a space that can easily hold double that number seated at tables, the space sectioned in half with a curtain for Trump and still plenty of room to mill around while more people than that are left outside in the heat after waiting for hours. Trump suspects and accuses dirty politics while the fire marshal is constrained by regulation. The capacity limitation might have to do with egress capability as much as area capacity. The facts are not clear. [trump, fire marshal]

His campaign must get in the habit of booking venues with clearly stated capacity. While his point is made that more people are disappointed than satisfied, this is a losing argument.

But not so at Mechanicsburg.

These Trump crowds are contrasted with Hillary crowds that number far fewer. She is seen speaking to about a hundred or so people gathered intimately compared to this.

For comparison This video shows her supporters, some 200 or so with professionally printed signs and herself onstage with helpers. The video gives a glimpse of the crowd in Columbus Ohio July 31, 2016 and the rest is her speech.

Hillary's campaign is not grassroots, not one bit, it is top down, it is corporate. Trump's campaign is truly grassroots running against GOP as well as DNC and most of corporate media.

CNN Chris Cuomo, "We're the biggest ones supporting her campaign"

This is old but still quite relevant, June 2014, Chris Cuomo is explaining that by delaying announcing her run for the presidency that Hillary was "freezing pockets" meaning donors would be holding back for her announcement making their money unavailable to other candidates. Then in a giddy moment of unchecked honesty Cuomo admits that they have been giving Hillary a free ride all along and that they are Hillary's biggest supporters.

Hillary Clinton cought lying again

Link

Politifact: We rate her claim Pants on Fire.

Monday, August 1, 2016

Texas allows guns in college classrooms

Bloomberg: The so-called state "campus carry" law allows people 21 and older with a concealed handgun license to carry pistols in classrooms and buildings throughout public colleges, including the University of Texas system, one of the nation's largest with an enrollment of more than 214,000 students.

The law took effect on the 50th anniversary of one of the deadliest U.S. gun incidents on a college campus, when a student named Charles Whitman killed 16 people by firing from a perch atop the clock tower at the University of Texas at Austin, the state's flagship public university.

At the University of Texas Austin campus, third-year student Courtney Dang said the idea of campus carry was scary.

"There are so many students battling the stress of campus. Some are unstable and we don't know who has a gun," said Dang.

Gold Star Parents are radical Muslims who support the Muslim Brotherhood and are agents of Saudi Arabia

Clinton Cash: Khizr Khan’s Deep Legal, Financial Connections to Saudi Arabia, Hillary’s Clinton Foundation Tie Terror, Immigration, Email Scandals Together

Breibart News by Matthew Boyle August 1, 2016

Khizr Khan, the Muslim Gold Star father that the mainstream media and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton have been using to criticize Donald J. Trump, has deep ties to the government of Saudi Arabia—and to international Islamist investors through his own law firm. In addition to those ties to the wealthy Islamist nation, Khan also has ties to controversial immigration programs that wealthy foreigners can use to essentially buy their way into the United States—and has deep ties to the “Clinton Cash” narrative through the Clinton Foundation.

Consider Skolkovo, an “innovation city” of 30,000 people on the outskirts of Moscow, billed as Russia’s version of Silicon Valley—and a core piece of Mrs. Clinton’s quarterbacking of the Russian reset.

Following his 2009 visit to Moscow, President Obama announced the creation of the U.S.-Russia Bilateral Presidential Commission. Mrs. Clinton as secretary of state directed the American side, and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov represented the Russians. The stated goal at the time: “identifying areas of cooperation and pursuing joint projects and actions that strengthen strategic stability, international security, economic well-being, and the development of ties between the Russian and American people.”

The Kremlin committed $5 billion over three years to fund Skolkovo. Mrs. Clinton’s State Department worked aggressively to attract U.S. investment partners and helped the Russian State Investment Fund, Rusnano, identify American tech companies worthy of Russian investment. Rusnano, which a scientific adviser to President Vladimir Putin called “Putin’s child,” was created in 2007 and relies entirely on Russian state funding.

What could possibly go wrong?

Lem's Levity