Hungarian lawmakers on June 13 approved controversial legislation on foreign-funded nongovernmental organizations.

The legislation will require groups receiving more than 24,000 euros ($26,000) per year in foreign funding to register as a "foreign-supported organization," or risk closure.

Nongovernmental organizations also will be required to list any foreign sponsors providing them with more than about $1,800 a year.

"What are the defenders of free speech to do? The sad fact is that this fundamental freedom is on its heels across America. Politicians of both parties want to use the power of government to silence their foes. Some in the university community seek to drive it from their campuses. And an entire generation of Americans is being taught that free speech should be curtailed as soon as it makes someone else feel uncomfortable. On the current trajectory, our nation's dynamic marketplace of ideas will soon be replaced by either disengaged intellectual silos or even a stagnant ideological conformity. Few things would be so disastrous for our nation and the well-being of our citizenry."—William Ruger, "Free Speech Is Central to Our Dignity as Humans"

My hometown of Charlottesville, Va., has become the latest poster child in a heated war of words—and actions—over racism, "sanitizing history," extremism (both right and left), political correctness, hate speech, partisan politics, and a growing fear that violent words will end in violent actions.

In Charlottesville, as in so many parts of the country right now, the conflict is over how to reconcile the nation's checkered past, particularly as it relates to slavery, with the present need to sanitize the environment of anything—words and images—that might cause offense, especially if it's a Confederate flag or monument.

In Charlottesville, that fear of offense prompted the City Council to get rid of a statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee that has graced one of its public parks for 82 years. In doing so, they have attracted the unwanted attention of the Ku Klux Klan.

Yale University actually went so far as to change the name of one of its residential colleges, which was named after John C. Calhoun, the nation's seventh vice president, a secretary of state, secretary of war, senator and Yale alum who supported slavery.

New Orleans ran up a $2 million tab in its efforts to remove its four Confederate monuments, with the majority of the funds being used for security to police the ensuing protests and demonstrations.

With more than 1,000 Confederate monuments in 31 states (in public parks, courthouse squares and state capitols), not to mention Confederate battle flags on display in military cemeteries, and countless more buildings and parks named after historic figures who were slaveholders, this isn't an issue that is going away anytime soon, no matter how much we ignore it, shout over it, criminalize it, legislate it, adjudicate or police it.

The temperature is rising all across the nation, and not just over this Confederate issue.

US President Donald Trump has hinted that he will bring his proposed travel ban all the way to the Supreme Court after his plans suffered another setback in a federal court of appeals.

In the latest in a series of defeats for Trump's travel ban, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a Hawaiian court's nationwide preliminary injunction blocking the ban Monday.

Trump's revised ban involves a 90-day suspension on nationals from six Muslim-majority countries and a 120-day suspension of the refugee program.

The United States' current strategy in Afghanistan is non-existent, and it will take a few weeks to put one together, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis admitted during a hearing about the Pentagon budget. Senators threatened to cut funding without a strategy.

Mattis and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Joseph Dunford testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday, discussing how the Pentagon's budget will be used to address a myriad of issues, from troop use in Afghanistan and Syria to media reports of cyber threats from Russia.

Dunford began his remarks by asking for more money for the military, which has been hampered since 2013 by a set of prescribed budget cuts known as sequestration.

US senators have agreed on new sanctions against Russia because of alleged Russia's 'interference' in the 2016 US election, as well as the situations in Crimea and in Syria. Russia is monitoring the situation closely, the Kremlin spokesman said.

The step would reportedly see new sanctions imposed on Russians who are allegedly "guilty of human rights abuses", "supplying weapons to Syria's government", as well as cyber attackers, Associated Press and Reuters report.

The fresh sanctions would also see Russian mining, metals, shipping and railways affected, with the Senate also planning on putting into law some previous sanctions touching Russian energy projects and debt financing.

The latest measure will be attached as an amendment to a larger bill that would see new sanctions imposed on Iran.

Prime Minister Theresa May has apologized to Tory MPs for the humiliating general election result. In order to win back support among voters, she says the Conservatives' much-hated austerity program will be scrapped.

Since being elected into government in 2010, the Conservative Party has followed a policy of fiscal belt-tightening by way of implementing cuts to welfare services, education and the National Health Service (NHS), and by imposing pay freezes on public sector workers.

Now sources tell the Times that May

"accepted that voters' patience with austerity was at an end."

"There's a conversation I particularly remember with a teacher who had voted for me in 2010 and 2015 and said: 'I understand the need for a pay freeze for a few years to deal with the deficit but you're now asking for that to go on potentially for 10 or 11 years and that's too much.' That is something that Jeremy Corbyn was able to tap into,"

May's newly appointed chief of staff, Gavin Barwell, told the BBC.

Labour backbenchers think Jeremy Corbyn should reappoint his shadow cabinet in the wake of the party's stellar election performance. But with many former critics now wanting a job, will the zero-to-hero Labour leader be forgiving and look to them instead?

In unprecedented Westminster scenes, former Labour big hitters like Yvette Cooper, Chuka Umunna and Angela Eagle have suggested they could return to the front benches, if their former nemesis agreed to take them back.

The Parliamentary Labour Party (PLP) is meeting on Tuesday evening for the first time since the June 8 election, in which far-left outsider Corbyn received a stunning and unexpected 40 percent of the vote.

Crude oil prices were lower on Tuesday on a report of production growth by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).

Brent crude was trading 24 cents lower at $48.08 per barrel, while US West Texas Intermediate (WTI) slipped 38 cents to $45.70.

Both Brent and US crude are about 10 percent below their open on May 25, when OPEC, Russia, and other producers agreed to extend oil output cuts to the first quarter of 2018.

OPEC's monthly report said the cartel's production in May rose by 336,000 barrels per day (bpd) to 32.14 million bpd. The increase was led by a recovery in Nigeria and Libya, which are exempt from supply cuts. OPEC claimed the market was rebalancing at a "slower pace."

What's the best way to deal with a bully? Punch him (or her) in the nose. It appears that President Trump just punched the G-7 climate bully in the nose... From Der Spiegel :

Isolating Trump
Merkel's G-20 Climate Alliance Is Crumbling
By Christiane Hoffmann, Peter Müller and Gerald Traufetter

The German chancellor had been hoping to isolate Donald Trump on climate issues at the upcoming G-20 summit in Hamburg. But Merkel's hoped-for alliance is crumbling, underscoring Germany's relative political weakness globally. Many countries are wary of angering the United States.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel had actually thought that Canada's young, charismatic prime minister, Justin Trudeau, could be counted among her reliable partners. Particularly when it came to climate policy. Just two weeks ago, at the G-7 summit in Sicily, he had thrown his support behind Germany. When Merkel took a confrontational approach to U.S. President Donald Trump, Trudeau was at her side.

But by Tuesday evening, things had changed. At 8 p.m., Merkel called Trudeau to talk about how to proceed following Trump's announced withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement. To her surprise, the Canadian prime minister was no longer on the attack. He had switched to appeasement instead.

What would be wrong with simply striking all mentions of the Paris Agreement from the planned G-20 statement on climate, Trudeau asked. He suggested simply limiting the statement to energy issues, something that Trump would likely support as well. Trudeau had apparently changed his approach to Trump and seemed concerned about further provoking his powerful neighbor to the south.

The telephone call made it clear to Merkel that her strategy for the G-20 summit in early July might fail. The chancellor had intended to clearly isolate the United States. at the Hamburg meeting, hoping that 19 G-20 countries would underline their commitment to the Paris Agreement and make Trump a bogeyman of world history. A score of 19:1. [...]

According to a senior US official speaking to the New York Times, the classified information that President Donald Trump revealed to Russian officials in May related to an Israeli cyber attack against a Daesh cell of bomb-makers.

The officials told the Times that in the first weeks of 2017, Israeli "cyberoperators" hacked a small cell of Syrian militants skilled in bomb-making. They found that the team intended to create small explosives that closely resemble computer batteries. The "batteries" would then be placed inside a laptop and smuggled into airports, where it would be able fool X-ray detectors.

Allegedly, President Trump spoke to Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Russian Ambassador to the United States Sergey Kislyak about this classified piece of intelligence during a May 10 meeting with the two officials. At the time, sources claimed that the "Middle Eastern ally" that gathered the intelligence had requested it not be shared. On May 15, national security adviser Herbert McMaster said that Trump couldn't have identified the Israelis as the source, because Trump himself was not told.