Yemen lies on the southeastern edge of the Arabian Peninsula, buffered by the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden and bordered by Saudi Arabia and Oman. About 29 million people call Yemen home, and they are the poorest in the Middle East. Portions of the nation have a history of British and Ottoman colonial rule, it was divided into two separate countries and two civil wars - on top of the current one - have been waged since the early 1960s.To understand the current conflict, which began in January 2014, it's necessary to know something about the Huthis.The Huthis are a Zaydi Shiite political movement. Zaydi Shiite Muslims are around a quarter of Yemen's population. Zaydis led much of Yemen until the 1962 overthrow of the Yemeni ruler. The government has since repressed their home region economically and culturally.
Mexico's stunning upset win over Germany in the World Cup on Sunday may have shocked more than soccer fans. At the same time El Tri forward Hirving Lozano scored Mexico's winning goal at Luzhniki Stadium in Moscow, at least two seismic sensors detected a minor earthquake in Mexico City, according to a monitoring agency run by Mexico's Institute of Geological and Atmospheric Research...
Conway's husband: Allegations that Trump Foundation violated campaign finance law should be referred to US attorney https://t.co/mKs9BQ0syv pic.twitter.com/lCxqTUVMzG
— The Hill (@thehill) June 17, 2018
What's a dad joke? Oh, basically just really goofy jokes told by fathers in the interests of gently torturing their offspring.Last Thanksgiving, then-President Obama turned the traditional turkey-pardoning ceremony into an opportunity to, in his words "embarrass my daughters with a corny-copia of dad jokes about turkeys." Off he went with groaners about cold turkey and fowl play.You can watch guys (and a few women) cracking each other up in dozens of dad joke battles on Youtube. (Sample volley: "Why didn't the melons get married? Because they cantaloupe!")
Happy Father's Day pic.twitter.com/5PPCO6QpCZ
— brothersjudd (@brothersjudd) June 17, 2018
The book's chief virtue is Carwardine's ability to give us a palpable sense of a man who lived over a century and a half ago, and not merely by sharing in the laughter but in better understanding how he used it; as sword and shield, refuge and release, charity and instruction.As many shades as Lincoln's humor had, and as many uses, its reception was anything but monolithic. Carwardine, in a helpful bit of historiographical clarification, demonstrates that the "positive and benign" characterization of Lincoln as a folksy frontier storyteller only emerged after his death. During the dark days of war, he was criticized and derided for laughing in the midst of death and devastation. In the Confederacy, this was no surprise. That he was criticized so vehemently in the North--publicly and privately--will surprise many readers who last encountered Lincoln in a textbook or in the Bardo. But even seasoned students of Civil War politics and history will likely be impressed by the range of attacks on the president. And, lest we think our own age has a monopoly on partisan nastiness, it is a healthy reminder what the Republic--even when ravaged by war--can bear from the worst angels of our nature.Carwardine clarifies another aspect of Lincoln's humor that was as misunderstood then as it is now. Known for his delight in the vulgar and the bawdy--a reflection of life spent on the western frontier--Lincoln, Carwardine argues, did not relish crude jokes for their crudity but always with a view toward the wisdom or moral instruction they imparted. "Beneath his levity," Carwardine says, "lay a stratum of ethical rock." When Lincoln told a bawdy story to friend David Davis, any moral of the story was lost on the irate man, who scolded the president saying, "Lincoln, if the country knew you were telling those stories, you could never be elected and you know it." But when a visitor to his law office in Springfield told a lewd joke, one with no point but its lewdness, Lincoln became so irritated that he complained to William Herndon that he nearly threw the man out. Still, despite Lincoln's widely known dark spells and brooding temperament, he was roundly and repeatedly criticized for his mirth. Carwardine quotes one Connecticut newspaperman saying of the president, "I verily believe he would crack a joke at the crack of doom."Sorting through the complexities of Lincoln's humor is where Carwardine excels. One of the ways he does this is by showing how Lincoln's sense of humor evolved over time and relative to the case before a jury, the opportunity for political advancement, or the gravity of the nation's existential crisis. This approach rectifies a dichotomy often seen in popular renderings of Lincoln in which he is portrayed as either a "smutty joker" or a melancholic depressive awaiting the next revelation as the new Moses, or both. The man was somewhere in between--a fact Carwardine is not the first to suggest but one given profound and nuanced treatment in his book.Russell Kirk, whose regard for Lincoln rankled more than a few conservatives, observed, "Here was a man of sorrows. It has always been true that melancholy men are the wittiest; and Lincoln's off-colour yarns, told behind a log barn or in some dingy Springfield office, were part and parcel of his consciousness that this is a world of vanities." Lincoln's humor and melancholy, then, ought to be seen in relationship, not opposition. Carwardine is adept at drawing out such connections in so limited a study.
Most Canadians and Americans approve of how Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is handling the situation on tariffs, trade and U.S. President Donald Trump.That's according to two Ipsos polls, for Global News and Reuters. [...]The poll shows that Canadians are firmly on Trudeau's side -- with about three-quarters of respondents (72 per cent) saying they approve of how he's handling the situation. Only 14 per cent of Canadian respondents said the same about Trump.As for Americans, 57 per cent of respondents approved of how Canada is handling the dispute -- while only 37 per cent said they approved of how Trump was doing.
There's a high price to pay for hating the other.Until recently, President Donald Trump's waving of the trade-war stick at China and various allies has generally elicited stock-market yawns. But Trump's new tariffs on Chinese goods today may have been a hot pot of coffee. China fired back with massive tariffs of its own, and Trump has threatened to retaliate for China's retaliation.Suddenly the trade wars seem to matter a bit more to stocks; the S&P 500 fell about one percent before recovering at the end of the day. And trade wars matter in some quarters more than others. Qualcomm Inc.'s pending merger with NXP Semiconductors NV is suddenly complicated, notes Alex Webb. China's government is telling big U.S. companies doing business in China to "buckle up" should Trump follow through on his anti-trade vows.Trump's former economic adviser, "Globalist" Gary Cohn, has said trade wars could cost the U.S. economy $2 trillion - wiping out the Trump administration's claimed tax-cut boost. That may overstate the damage, writes Stephen Gandel - but not by much. Comparing the market valuations of big-company stocks against those of small companies - which you'd expect would feel a trade war less - Steve suggests trade agita might already have shaved $1 trillion from big-company values...
What changed in that eight weeks? The outlook for the availability of Iranian oil. Trump's decision to pull out of the nuclear deal and re-impose sanctions will reduce the volume of crude available from the country by an unknown amount.I have said from the outset that the amount of Iranian oil that will be forced off the market will be more than when sanctions were previously in force -- even without the EU bans on purchases that accompanied U.S. curbs last time around. Analysts are now starting to ratchet up their forecasts of the volume that could be lost.The curbs will be more extensive than under President Obama -- targeting Iran's exports of condensates as well as crude oil -- and waivers will be harder to come by. Tanker owners and insurers may already be reacting to the imposition of sanctions, even before they come into effect.It is the fear that the world is about to lose as much a million barrels a day of Iranian crude oil exports by the end of the year, and possibly another 500,000 barrels from Venezuela, that has really driven oil prices higher -- not OPEC.
Former head of the Central Intelligence Agency and National Security Agency Michael Hayden compared the Trump administration's immigration policies to Nazi Germany.In a tweet posted on Saturday, Hayden wrote: ""Other governments have separated mothers and children," under a black and white photo of the front of Auschwitz as seen from the railroad tracks approaching the former Nazi camp.
The Trump administration is looking to build tent cities at military posts around Texas to shelter the increasing number of unaccompanied migrant children being held in detention.The Department of Health and Human Services will visit Fort Bliss, a sprawling Army base near El Paso in the coming weeks to look at a parcel of land where the administration is considering building a tent city to hold between 1,000 and 5,000 children, according to U.S. officials and other sources familiar with the plans.
To give credit where it's due, the New York attorney general is building on the case built in 2016 by Washington Post reporter David Fahrenthold, whose search for legitimate charitable activity by Trump's foundation consistently left the reporter comically empty-handed.What Fahrenthold detailed was Trump's utter disregard for the law in taking in tax-deductible contributions to his foundation and proceeding to spend the money on his personal and business needs.
New findings, for instance, show that the Trump Foundation's largest-ever gift -- $264,631 -- was used to renovate a fountain outside the windows of Trump's Plaza Hotel.Its smallest-ever gift, for $7, was paid to the Boy Scouts in 1989, at a time when it cost $7 to register a new Scout. Trump's oldest son was 11 at the time. Trump did not respond to a question about whether the money was paid to register him.
Take a moment to savor that last detail. A man claiming to be worth billions of dollars -- and who certainly flaunted the lifestyle -- appears to have illegally diverted $7 from a charitable foundation to pay his son's Boy Scouts registration fee.Trump's foundation is organized "exclusively for charitable, religious, scientific, literary or educational purposes either directly or by contributions to organizations that qualify as exempt organizations under section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code."Instead, as Underwood's complaint shows clearly, he used it to pay settlements incurred in business lawsuits and to advance his 2016 political campaign. The foundation took in millions in donations for veterans. His campaign then directed the foundation to issue checks to Iowa veterans groups in advance of the Iowa caucuses as he sought to curry political favor.How does Underwood know campaign personnel were involved in spending decisions? Because the Trumpsters are so recklessly contemptuous of rules that they left a trail of this blatant violation of campaign-finance law on their emails. At least one email thread included Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski weighing in on where he wanted the foundation's tax-deductible funds directed.The foundation also made a $25,000 contribution to Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi, who subsequently determined that fraud charges against Trump's university were not a proper matter for her office. The foundation listed the contribution as going to a Kansas nonprofit with the same name as Bondi's political committee."The Foundation has no credible explanation for the false reporting of grant recipients to the IRS and the State of New York," Underwood concluded.Trump will likely claim he was uninvolved and unaware. But Underwood's complaint has that covered, too.
Mr. Trump, who was the sole signatory on the Foundation's bank accounts, approved all grants and other disbursements from the Foundation. Accounting staff for the Trump Organization had responsibility for issuing checks from the Foundation, and issued the checks based solely on Mr. Trump's approval before presenting the checks to Mr. Trump for signature.
Indeed, the foundation's board didn't provide much of a check on Trump's personal whims, owing to the fact that, in violation of the law, it "has not met since 1999 and does not oversee the activities of the Foundation in any way."
It's the most astonishing reversal in modern American political history. Over the past century, the right accused liberals and Democrats of excusing the crimes of Josef Stalin, Mao Zedong and Fidel Castro. Often, the criticism was well-founded.Harvard's John King Fairbank, the dean of American China scholars, spoke for many on the left in 1972 when he said the communist revolution was "the best thing that has happened to the Chinese people in centuries." President Jimmy Carter, who spurned Americans' "inordinate fear of communism," was shocked by the invasion of Afghanistan. Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev, he lamented, "lied to me."Conservatives saw Carter as a starry-eyed dupe. "The most flagrant offenders of human rights including the Soviet Union, Vietnam, and Cuba have been the beneficiaries of administration good will, while nations friendly to the United States have suffered the loss of U.S. commercial access and economic and military assistance," said the 1980 Republican platform."The evidence of the Soviet threat to American security has never been more stark and unambiguous, nor has any president ever been more oblivious to this threat and its potential consequences," the platform added. "The president's failure to shoulder the burden of leadership in the Western alliance has placed America in danger without parallel since December 7, 1941."All these charges have deafening echoes today. But this time, the credulous appeaser failing our allies is a Republican president. For communist dictators such as Xi Jinping and Kim Jong Un, Trump exudes admiration and amity. To the anti-Western Russian President Vladimir Putin, he offered congratulations for winning a rigged election.When it comes to Canada's Justin Trudeau and Germany's Angela Merkel, by contrast, he seethes with resentment. With Trump, it's better to be a long-standing American adversary than a faithful ally.That about-face strains belief. More incredible still is that the Republican Party has chosen to follow his lead. GOP leaders and conservative commentators have turned themselves inside out praising behavior they would have torched had it come from a Democratic administration.
The committee's chairman, Devin Nunes, a Republican from California, and the Republican majority on the committee have demanded that the Department of Justice turn over documents pertaining to the origins of the investigation of President Trump by special counsel Robert Mueller.And Nunes has threatened Mueller's superior, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, with censure, contempt and even impeachment if he fails to comply. Can Congress interfere in an ongoing federal criminal investigation? Can it get its eyes on law enforcement's active files? In a word: No. [...]There are two dangers to the rule of law here. The first is that members of this committee could use their security clearances to examine classified materials and then use what they have seen for a political narrative. They cannot lawfully, except on the floor of Congress, publicly reveal classified documents they have seen, but they can (and they have done so in the past) summarize them publicly -- and with a political spin.That endangers the sources of criminal investigators, many of whom are people who communicate with investigators at great personal risk and to whom confidentiality has been promised. That confidentiality is recognized in the law as the informant's privilege, and it keeps confidential criminal matters from public and peering congressional eyes until the investigation is concluded.The second and equally harmful danger is that members of the committee could leak what they have seen. To prevent this, prosecutors have a privilege to keep their files secret until they charge or exonerate their targets or subjects.Under the Constitution, we enjoy the separation of powers. Congress writes the laws; the executive branch enforces them; and the courts interpret them. Congress can no more constitutionally interfere with ongoing law enforcement for political purposes than the DOJ can interfere with the passage of congressional legislation that it doesn't like.The down and dirty fear that the DOJ and the FBI have is that revealing the contents of the criminal file on the president to his political allies in Congress in the midst of an investigation of him would be a dangerous precedent, one that would pollute the investigation and give present and future politically powerful potential defendants advantages that no one else has.