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Take 2

City of Beverly Hills votes to ban ALL tobacco sales, but exempts cigar clubs

Sonja Sharp
Los Angeles TImes
Mon, 20 May 2019 13:05 UTC
Arnold Schwarzenegger holds a cigar
© Damian Dovarganes/AP
Then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger holds a cigar as he waves to Long Beach residents after visiting the city.
Beverly Hills has long been anything but a smoker's paradise. The city was the first in California to ban smoking inside restaurants and most public places, back in 1987, and added outdoor venues to the list in 2007.

Now it is poised to enact what officials say is the most stringent tobacco ban in the country, eliminating the sale of virtually all recreational nicotine products - with one very Beverly Hills exception.

Cigarettes are out. Vapes are dead. But for an elite group of aficionados, hundreds of whom swamped committee meetings and wrote the city in protest, cigars will be spared - as long as they're smoked inside one of three dedicated lounges.

Entreaties have poured in to City Hall from top executives at real estate offices, security firms, talent agencies - and from former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. Nearly all of them are acolytes of the Grand Havana Room on North Canon Drive, a club so exclusive its members need a special key to get in.

"The Grand Havana Room, which I have been a member of since its inception, provides a treasured home away from home, " wrote Schwarzenegger. "It is unthinkable that the city might adopt a policy that would intentionally or unintentionally cause the closure of this character-defining institution."


Comment: How does one define their character at a cigar club? Smoking cigars and rubbing elbows with powerful people? Translation: Arnie loves his tobacco and wants to continue to enjoy the benefits of tobacco with his wealthy friends, without criticism from prying eyes.


Comment: See also: Smoke, Lies and the Nanny State

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Snakes in Suits

Mueller used 'qualifying, sneaky' language to insinuate Russia was behind DNC 'hack'


Sputnik
Fri, 31 May 2019 08:57 UTC
mueller
© Reuters/Jim Bourg
Special counsel Robert Mueller: accused of "scorched earth" methods and "Gestapo tactics."
In his Wednesday remarks on his report, US special counsel Robert Mueller's used careful language on the Democratic National Committee hack. His qualifying language has been overlooked by mainstream media sources stating, with certainty, that Russia was behind the hack, Aaron Maté, a journalist for The Nation, told Sputnik.

"In general, this sort of qualified, sneaky language applies to pretty much the entirety of the entire Mueller's team work from the beginning," Maté, who is also the former host and producer at Democracy Now and The Real News, told Radio Sputnik's Loud & Clear.

"If you look at the indictments that they've [the Mueller team] handed down during this Trump-Russia saga, they gave the appearance to many people, especially in cable news and politicians who wanted to build a case for this fictitious Trump-Russia conspiracy, [that Russia was behind the hack]. They use language that gave the impression there might be something there - it's sneaky," Maté told hosts John Kiriakou and Brian Becker.

"If you look at what they're actually saying, they were never charging anybody with a Trump-Russia conspiracy, and they were never accusing anyone of lying to cover up one. But the language they used gave an appearance of otherwise. That extends also to how they talk about even their core charge that Russia engaged - in Mueller's words - in a systematic interference effort."

Comment: The DNC was not 'hacked' and Mueller knows it but is still attempting to preserve the fiction:

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Attention

Maduro says sabotage is preventing ships with gasoline, food from reaching Venezuela


Maritime Herald
Fri, 31 May 2019 16:14 UTC
MaduroCrowd
© Sputnik/Stringer
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro
The president of Venezuela, Nicolas Maduro, on Monday denounced ten boats with gasoline heading to the South American country were objects of sabotage, as part of the "persecution" resulting from the sanctions imposed by the US, against the Caribbean nation.

"The boat that brought gasoline last week, ten ships sabotaged us so that it did not reach the Venezuelan coasts," Maduro said at a meeting with the political leadership of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) in Caracas .

Despite the incident, the South American president said that the problem with the ships "is in the process of being resolved".

Comment:

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Star of David

Israel twists law to dodge ICC war crime investigation

Maureen Clare Murphy
The Electronic Intifada
Thu, 30 May 2019 17:10 UTC
Injured Palestinian
© Mohammed Zaanoun/ActiveStills
More than 200 Palestinians, including 44 children, have been killed by Israeli occupation forces during Gaza’s Great March of Return.
Israel is relying on US muscle to stop the International Criminal Court investigating alleged war crimes perpetrated in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip.

"The International Criminal Court in The Hague has no jurisdiction to discuss matters concerning the Israeli-Palestinian conflict," Sharon Afek, Israel's military advocate general, stated at the annual Herzliya Conference, a high-profile gathering of Israel's political and military elites, this week.

"Israel is a law-abiding country, with an independent and strong judicial system, and there is no reason for its actions to be scrutinized by the ICC," Afek added.


Comment: Afek's nose must have grown about 20 metres after saying this load of rubbish. Israel is anything but a law abiding nation. Israel is an apartheid nation that viciously and violently oppresses the Palestinian people


The military advocate general's office also recently published a report claiming that the military had conducted "lectures and workshops on the legal ramifications" of occupation forces' actions, the Tel Aviv daily Haaretz stated.

"The move was prompted by weekly clashes between soldiers and Palestinians over the past year as well as by the International Criminal Court's scrutiny of the [military's] actions in the 2014 Gaza war," Haaretz added.
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Bad Guys

Julian Assange's mother condemns UK government for 'unlawfully slowly killing my son'

Cassandra Fairbanks
The Gateway Pundit
Thu, 30 May 2019 00:00 UTC
Christine Assange, Julian Assange

“They made him very ill by refusing him ANY access to life sustaining fresh air, exercise, sun/VitD or proper medical care for 6 YEARS of illegal Embassy detention.”
Christine Assange, the mother of imprisoned WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, says that the UK government is killing her son.

Mrs. Assange's statement comes amid news that the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize nominee is so gravely ill that he has been moved to the prison's medical unit and cannot even hold a normal conversation with his lawyers.

Responding to the news of Julian's deteriorating health, Mrs. Assange tweeted that the "UK Gov is unlawfully slowly killing my son!"

"They made him very ill by refusing him ANY access to life sustaining fresh air, exercise, sun/VitD or proper medical care for 6 YEARS of illegal Embassy detention," she tweeted at the United Nations Twitter account. "Then against ALL medical advice threw him into a prison cell."

Comment: UN Expert: Assange deliberately subjected to prolonged cruel and inhuman psychological torture
Nils Melzer, a Geneva-based former Red Cross lawyer and human rights expert who is now the UN special rapporteur on torture, spent four hours with Assange in Belmarsh in early May, assessing his psychological and mental state along with two medical specialists.

In a currently confidential report submitted to the British government on Monday, along with letters to the US, Swedish and Ecuadorian governments, Melzer concluded Assange "shows all the symptoms of someone exposed to prolonged psychological ill-treatment".

"The evidence is overwhelming and clear," Melzer said. "Mr Assange has been deliberately exposed, for a period of several years, to progressively severe forms of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, the cumulative effects of which can only be described as psychological torture."


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Snakes in Suits

Dear God: Nikki Haley begins experiment in political life after Trump

Eliana Johnson
Politico
Thu, 30 May 2019 16:44 UTC
Nikki Haley
© Joe Buglewicz/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley is working to redefine herself outside the president’s shadow, emerging as a fundraiser and surrogate for 2020 Republican Senate candidates.
Of the many senior officials to leave the Trump administration over the past two years, few have exited on better terms than former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley. Before her departure last December, President Donald Trump feted Haley with an Oval Office photo-op and declared that his U.N. diplomat "has been very special to me."

And while many former Trump officials, from former White House chief of staff John Kelly to former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and former Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, have kept a low profile in the private sector, Haley is charting a different course. She is emerging as a fundraiser and surrogate for 2020 Republican Senate candidates, and next month will begin zigzagging across the country to campaign for a trio of GOP senators.

By remaining a loyal Republican soldier on good terms with the president - a forthcoming memoir is not expected to join the ranks of cutting insider tell-alls - Haley is also something of a test case for independent political life after Trump.

The former South Carolina governor's summer itinerary includes a June 15 stop in Boone, Iowa, where Haley will help Sen. Joni Ernst launch her reelection campaign at Ernst's annual Roast 'n Ride event, where Iowans are slated to grill over 2,000 pounds of pork. Given its location in a key presidential caucus state, the event is sure to spark murmurs about Haley's own political ambitions, including the prospect of a 2024 presidential bid.

Comment: See also:

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Bad Guys

US-led coalition admits killing at least 1,302 civilians in Syria and Iraq


Sputnik
Fri, 31 May 2019 16:38 UTC
Syrian refugees
© Sputnik Insight
Second group of civilians left Syria's Duma located in Eastern Ghouta via a humanitarian corridor to the Muhayam al-Wafedin checkpoint.
US-led forces have killed at least 1,302 civilians while battling the Islamic State terrorist group (banned in Russia) in Syria and Iraq, Joint Task Force-Operation Inherent Resolve (JTF-OIR) said in its monthly casualty assessment on Friday.

"The Coalition conducted 34,502 strikes between August 2014 and the end of April 2019. During this period, based on information available, CJTF-OIR assesses at least 1,302 civilians have been unintentionally killed by Coalition strikes since the beginning of Operation Inherent Resolve", the assessment said.

Last month, the coalition published similar numbers, claiming that 1,291 civilians had been unintentionally killed during the campaign against the jihadists. At the same time, however, rights watchdog Amnesty International stated that about 1,600 civilians had been killed by the coalition forces during the onslaught on Raqqa from June to October 2017.
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No Entry

US to punish anyone using EU's alternative payment system with Iran to skirt sanctions


RT
Fri, 31 May 2019 16:29 UTC
Tehran's central Horr Square
© AFP / Atta Kenare
A view of the Iranian capital Tehran's central Horr Square
Washington is ready to impose sanctions against the European financial settlement (INSTEX) mechanism, which would allow trade to continue between the EU and Iran, US Special Representative to Iran Brian Hook warned on Thursday.

The financial channel, which was announced by Germany, France and the UK in January, is aimed to enable "legitimate trade" with Iran in the wake of US sanctions against the Islamic Republic.

"If this mechanism starts working ... We are ready to impose sanctions on any activity subject to restrictions," Hook said during a telephone briefing.
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Brick Wall

Trump announces progressive tariff - up to 25% - on ALL Mexican imports 'until illegal migration solved'


RT
Fri, 31 May 2019 14:00 UTC
Mexican imports US
© Reuters / Jose Luis Gonzalez
Trucks in a long queue for border customs control to cross into the US at the Zaragoza-Ysleta border.
A five percent tariff on all goods coming from Mexico will go into effect on June 10, and will gradually increase up to 25 percent until the illegal immigration problem is resolved, US President Donald Trump has announced.

This appears to be the "big league" announcement on the border Trump had teased earlier in the day, prior to delivering a commencement speech to the US Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs.

Invoking the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, Trump said the US will start at five percent, but keep ratcheting up by another five percent every month, culminating with 25 percent beginning in October.

Comment: That's one way to get around the Democrats' block on his wall!

Mexico's President Obrador has said his country will respond with 'great prudence' and charged Mexicans to unite to deal with the challenge:
"I tell all Mexicans to have faith, we will overcome this attitude of the US government, they will make rectifications because the Mexican people do not deserve to be treated in the way being attempted", Lopez Obrador noted.

The US tariffs "won't stop" the ratification of the North American trade deal, the Mexican president stated.

"This does not stop the process that began in order to ratify the treaty. We are going to move forward", Lopez Obrador said.

The president insisted that Mexico is working to stem the flow, saying "we are doing our job, without violating human rights".

​The statement comes after Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said that an official Mexican delegation, headed by Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard, had left for the United States to settle the issue of the planned US trade tariffs.
See also:

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Star of David

Heartless thieves: Israel seizes prefab classrooms donated by EU to Palestinians, will put to auction

Oliver Holmes
The Guardian
Fri, 31 May 2019 15:13 UTC
israel steals pre-fabricated school buildings
© Aref Daraghmeh, B’Tselem
Prefabricated classrooms, funded by EU aid in Ibziq, in the northern West Bank, were dismantled and confiscated by Israeli authorities.
Calls for Israeli authorities to rebuild West Bank structures confiscated by military

Israel's defence ministry plans to hold an auction next week to sell two prefabricated classrooms that were donated to Palestinian schoolchildren by the EU.

The Civil Administration, the body tasked with running the occupation, tore down and confiscated the classrooms last October. They had been intended for 49 students, in grades one to six, in Ibziq, in the northern occupied West Bank.

An advertisement published in the Israeli newspaper Maariv said the sale would take place at Civil Administration offices in the West Bank.

Comment: One of the many ways Israel is attempting to erase the Palestinians as a people: deprive their children of education

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