LAUGHINGSTOCK:

Amid a flurry of retweets commending conservative radio host Mark Levin's clash Sunday morning with Fox News's Ed Henry, President Trump retweeted a bot that substitutes the word "shark" for key words in his tweets and retweets.

THE ONLY CONSOLATION OF THE OFF-SEASON IS THAT IT'S WINTER:

You knew Madison Bumgarner was going to be involved in Bruce Bochy's final game as manager, even if the did not pitch.

This was even better.

In the fifth inning of Sunday's game against the Dodgers, Bumgarner lined out as a pinch-hitter against his longtime rival Clayton Kershaw, in a moment that surely was choreographed by the two managers.

Dodgers manager Dave Roberts brought Kershaw in to pitch the fifth inning of a game Los Angeles led 5-0. Giants pitcher Enderson Franco was due to bat third. When Bumgarner emerged from the dugout instead, the Oracle Park fans went wild.

THE BUSH-SHAPED HOLE IN THE PARTY:

Donald Trump's nomination and election in 2016 have been portrayed as the fruition of the ideological and demographic trends within the Republican Party over the last three or four decades.  In reality, though, Trump's presidency represents a rejection of both conservative ideology and the pragmatic moderation, closely associated with Lincoln and rooted in the party's historic values, with which the Ripon Society had identified.

In no sense can it be said that Donald Trump's presidency is a Republican one, and there is little evidence that it will become so during his time in office.  Trump's disdain for the rule of law, constitutional checks and balances, and limits on executive power is a far cry from both historic Republican principles and classic conservative beliefs. Under Trump, appeals to division have replaced an instinct for unity, and the exercise of personal power has replaced respect for democratic norms and institutional integrity. 

Can "Republicanism," the set of principles that brought me to the party a half-century ago, be reconciled with the personality cult that the Republican Party has become under Donald Trump? How applicable is the past to the present and the future of the party? Do the fundamental and historic principles and values of Lincoln and of the founders of the Republican Party have any meaning and application to its current circumstances? And do the history and experiences of the Ripon Society have any bearing on these questions? 

In the short run, there seems little incentive for those who hold elective or appointive public office as Republicans to assert positions and principles contrary to those identified with Trump. Most Republicans are too fearful of Trump's power to assert positions inconsistent with his.

But in the long run, if the Republican Party is to sustain a competitive position in American politics, it will have to regain influence with younger generations of voters. The generational divide, augmented by the growing diversity of the electorate, is the greatest challenge to a post-Trump Republican Party.  

The Trump strategy -- which is almost certainly instinctive rather than deliberate -- has centered on building overwhelming support among older whites (particularly men) living in exurban and rural areas, in small cities and towns, in Southern and Mountain/Plains states, and the Rust Belt, who feel culturally and/or economically threatened. This strategy obviously has been successful for him and may well lead him to a second term. 

Demographically, however, the Trump approach does not seem sustainable. Time inevitably will take its toll on a shrinking Trump coalition. This will hold significant implications -- if not for Trump in 2020, then certainly for his successors and for the Republican Party.  

The values of the majority of young Americans seem clear: They seek education, skills, and opportunities to rise and prosper.  They are attracted to the growing major metropolitan regions of the country that are centers of innovation and of the emerging (often information-related) sectors of the American economy.  They are open to international engagement, enthusiastic about diversity, tolerant of differences, and committed to justice.  

Freedom, opportunity, and equality comprised the core of Lincoln's beliefs and were the principal motivations for the establishment of the Republican Party.  Lincoln held that the role of government was to assure opportunity for all Americans and guarantee equal protection before the law: Government was to be limited, but effective, and power, to be dispersed and restrained.  For Lincoln, as for the Founding Fathers, these core principles, inherent in the birth of the United States, made its survival essential to the future of liberal democracy everywhere.  Certainly these values have resonance with younger Americans, whose connection to the future Republican Party will be essential to its survival and influence. 

One of the surprises of the Trump era for me, personally, has been the discovery of common ground between moderates, such as myself, and principled "movement conservatives" with whom I have disputed for years.  We have found a shared commitment to the historic Republican and Lincolnian values of freedom, equality, and opportunity that motivated the Ripon Society and to the conservative principles of limited government and constrained executive power, the rule of law, the dispersion of authority to the levels of government closest to the people, and a belief in strong families and communities. 

These values are threatened by the Trump presidency, but seem essential to the long-term survival of the Republican Party.  The re-assertion of these shared and historic principles can allow a restored Republican Party to establish a position among new and emerging generations of Americans, rather than to rely upon those who are resistant to, and fearful of, change. However, the principles that motivate the Party must be given form and substance through realistic and relevant policies and programs that are responsive to the goals and interests of young people and to rapidly changing economic social, cultural, and environmental conditions. 

NO ONE HATES JUST MEXICANS:

Hannity guests claim George Soros' "dirty money" backed Ukraine whistleblower report: "This was a set-up" https://t.co/YjCrjG2gMA

— Newsweek (@Newsweek) September 29, 2019

NEVER BOYCOTT:

The potential for newfound influence has forced Arab citizens to confront a dilemma going back to Israel's founding: Working within the system might secure social gains for the marginalized community, but risks legitimizing a state that many feel relegates them to second-class status and oppresses their Palestinian brethren in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

"We truly want to support Gantz," said Abed Abed, a food wholesaler in the Arab town of Nazareth in northern Israel. "But at the same time we are Arabs, and the people in Gaza and the West Bank are our brothers. If Gantz goes to war in Gaza tomorrow, then we can't be part of it. So we're in big trouble."

Israel's Arab citizens make up 20% of the population of 9 million and are descended from Palestinians who remained in Israel following the 1948 war that surrounded its creation. They have citizenship and the right to vote, they speak Hebrew and attend Israeli universities, and have increased their presence in a wide array of professions, from medicine to tech startups.

But they still face widespread discrimination, particularly when it comes to housing, and accuse Israeli authorities of ignoring crime in their communities, contributing to soaring homicide rates. They also have close family ties to Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, and largely identify with the Palestinian cause.

ALL THE BATTLEGROUNDS ARE RED:

Republicans can't win the White House without carrying Texas. And the firewall within the firewall state runs through places like Montgomery County, just north of Houston. For Republicans to survive 2020, they'll need pockets of suburbia where loyalties run deep -- so deep that voters shrug at the threat of impeachment and allegations that President Donald Trump pressured Ukraine for dirt on a rival and covered up his effort.

But there are other sorts of suburbs in Texas, like parts of Collin and Denton counties where spectacular growth has overturned the old order. Many have already slipped from the GOP's grasp --once reliable deposits of white conservative votes now transformed by demographic shifts and other forces.

Donald Trump's 9% spread over Hillary Clinton in Texas was the worst showing in decades for a GOP presidential nominee. Sen. Ted Cruz survived in 2018 with less than 51% of the vote, the closest call for any statewide Republican candidate in a quarter century.

Democrats showed surprising strength in Dallas suburbs, for instance, toppling a congressman and two state lawmakers.

"People, Democrat or Republican, they think this is a solidly red area. The demographics are changing. ... I look at my high school pictures, and it was very white here. That's definitely changed," said one of the freshman Democrats, state Rep. Michelle Beckley of Carrollton. [...]

With New York and California safely in their column, Democrats could all but clinch the presidency if they can flip Texas. For the GOP, Montgomery County is critical to avert that.

Cruz survived by just 215,000 votes out of nearly 8.4 million last November. If he hadn't run up the score in Montgomery County, beating Beto O'Rourke by a 3-1 ratio and piling up 86,000 more votes, it would have been far closer.

This county alone accounted for 40% of his statewide margin of victory.

THE NATURE OF OCCUPATION:

Israel sealed off the West Bank and Gaza Strip for three days for the celebration of the Jewish new year, according to the military on Sunday.

A military statement said all crossings between the Palestinian territories and Israel will be closed and entry to Israel for all Israeli-issued permit holders will be banned, except for humanitarian and medical cases.

CULTIVATED DERANGEMENT:

The Right's bubbled ecosystem in a nutshell. https://t.co/6M4REBFjNZ

— brothersjudd (@brothersjudd) September 29, 2019

OR JUST BE DONALD:

Former Trump homeland security adviser Tom Bossert said on ABC's "This Week" that the conspiracy theory that Ukraine hacked the Democratic National Committee in 2016 has been "debunked," and he condemned Rudy Giuliani for continuing to push it with President Trump.

"It's not only a conspiracy theory, it is completely debunked. I don't want to be glib about this matter, but last year, retired former Sen. Judd Gregg wrote a piece in The Hill magazine saying the 3 ways or the 5 ways to impeach one's self. And the 3rd way was to hire Rudy Giuliani. And at this point, I am deeply frustrated with what he and the legal team is doing in repeating that debunked theory to the president. It sticks in his mind when he hears it over and over again. And for clarity here, George, let me just again repeat that it has no validity."

REASON ENOUGH FOR THE rIGHT TO OPPOSE UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE:

Kira Johnson's is not an isolated case. In the United States, 700 women a year die during pregnancy, in childbirth, or in the months that follow. No other industrial nation has such a high rate of maternal mortality. In Germany, the proportion is less than half this.

Black women in the United States are particularly at risk. All across the country, they are three times as likely to be affected as white women. In certain states, the color of a woman's skin has even greater influence over life and death. Washington DC comes right at the bottom of the ratings.

It is unclear why Kira Johnson was operated on too late for a second time. But there are many reasons why African-American women are disproportionately affected. One is the lack of access to health care, says Aza Nedhari. Nedhari works as a midwife and is the director of Mamatoto Village, a society that runs a birth center in the south of the city of Washington DC. There are four hospitals in Washington with maternity wards, but none are in the south, where the population is predominantly black.

Nedhari can look after only a few pregnant women in her birth center, and only if the pregnancy is without complications and the birth spontaneous, i.e. if the child is born naturally. The majority of expectant mothers, especially those with high-risk pregnancies, have to go to hospital for tests and to give birth. Nedhari explains that for most women in the south of the city, this means they have to travel for well over an hour each way. It's also often difficult for pregnant women with insecure jobs, or children, to attend all their check-ups.

Stacey D. Stewart is another who sees the lack of medical care -- and affordable care in particular -- as the reason why maternal mortality in the US as a whole is so high. Stewart, the president of the women's rights organization March of Dimes, is calling for the status of midwives and doulas to be enhanced so that mothers can receive better care in their home districts. Her organization also campaigns for treatments in the first 12 months after the birth to be covered by Medicaid and for insurance coverage not to end with the birth itself.

EVEN THE INCELS CAN'T OPPOSE IMPORTING SUPERMODELS:

IT'S A RICO PROSECUTION:

THE CULTURE WARS ARE A ROUT:

The title of the book, Schur said, was in itself a key inspiration. "The title, What We Owe to Each Other, stuck in my head and was a quietly, to me, radical idea, because it starts with this presupposition, which is: We owe things to each other. It's not, 'Do we owe things to each other?" It's 'This is what we owe to each other.'"

What We Owe to Each Other is an extended and at times technical defense of a theory Scanlon calls contractualism: in short, the idea is that to act morally is to abide by principles that no one could reasonably reject.

The meat of the theory appeals to Schur. "What he says in the book is a controversial position, but which I found to be very uncontroversial, which is that you ought to design rules that couldn't be rejected by the people that you're having to share the world with," he explains.

That seems quite immediately applicable in a show like The Good Place. The show at its root is about four people -- Eleanor, Chidi, Jason Mendoza (Manny Jacinto), and Tahani Al-Jamil (Jameela Jamil) -- who have to form a society together in an afterlife they know isn't quite fair. It's not fair because both Eleanor and Jason (a small-time drug dealer from Jacksonville, Florida, who has been mistaken for a Buddhist monk named Jianyu Li) have both been misplaced, suggesting something's terribly amiss. And it's not fair because all four of them are turned into bundles of anxiety and doubt by the first season's end.

So the four of them -- and their non-human comrades Michael and Janet (D'Arcy Carden), a supernatural personal assistant ("Not a robot!") who knows all the information there is to know in the universe -- have to build their own kind of moral system to live by, one that doesn't necessarily abide by the rules being enforced by the authorities governing the afterlife, but which is born out of a sense of duty to each other as fellow human (and superhuman) beings.

Pamela Hieronymi, a UCLA professor, one-time Scanlon student, and avowed contractualist whom Schur has consulted periodically after cold-emailing her for advice, was brought in to talk to the writers before seasons two and four. She argues the contractualist roots of The Good Place come through most vividly in flashbacks to Eleanor's life on Earth. Her behavior is at its most loathsome when she's free riding: promising to serve as a designated driver to her colleagues, then drinking anyway, for instance.

"She's failing to live by contractualist reasoning there," Hieronymi concludes. . [...]

Setiya and Thompson both work in a philosophical tradition that argues that morality comes not from duties to other people but living up to what it is to be a good human being, cultivating and reflecting deeply human virtues. You can (very, very broadly) term this tradition neo-Aristotelianism, or virtue ethics.

Lately, Schur tells me he's been feeling more affinity with this brand of philosophy, and it's been reflected on The Good Place. "Scanlon's book has been a sort of spine of the entire show, but I would say that what you might call traditional Aristotelian virtue ethics have supplanted it in terms of what the show's overarching statement about the world is," Schur says.

"The idea that Mike keeps coming back to is that you try -- you won't always succeed but you try," says Todd May, a Clemson professor who started advising The Good Place in later seasons after Schur encountered his book Death (which argues life's finitude gives it meaning). "He says we're going to try but we're going to fail and the key is trying knowing you're going to fail."

CHARACTER IS DESTINY:

The example of the Roman republic, which often was on the minds of our Founding Fathers, illustrates just how dangerous that line of thinking can become. When the chief executive is the state, when the treasury is his gift for the giving, and when opposition to him is treason, then you no longer have a republic at all. It is always worth remembering that the Latin word from which the English title "emperor" comes means "commander in chief," a term that increasingly shapes how we view the presidency -- a shift away from republican norms for which conservatives bear some responsibility.

Virtue Inc. was a very big business in the 1990s, and the basic conservative case against Clinton and Clintonism was: Character matters. But the role of character is almost always misunderstood. It begins with a preference for having men of integrity serving in positions of power, but it does not end there. Character is functional in a democratic republic -- it is an eminently practical concern. One of the problems with having a man such as Donald Trump serving in the presidency is that in cases of moral ambiguity, it is impossible to extend to him the benefit of the doubt. There is no doubt at all about what manner of man he is.

To the extent that conservative media apologists for Trump have been sincere about anything other than the pursuit of market share, their case for Trump has been one of pragmatism. "He fights!" they said. "He gets things done!" If that were true, there would be a "big, beautiful wall" stretching from Texas to California.

Trump's character is in fact a practical liability, one that has seriously impeded his ability to pursue his agenda. His egoism, laziness, arrogance, and above all his habitual dishonesty are crippling. That is why he has been most effective on ordinary Republican priorities such as taxes and judges, those areas in which he can deputize such old swamp-dwelling dinosaurs as Mitch McConnell and the ladies and gentlemen of the Federalist Society to actually get things done. Left to his own devices, he's an ordinary Twitter troll and conspiracy nut with very little in the way of direction or a coherent policy agenda.

THE MOST VALUABLE LESSON THEY TEACH YOU IN LEGAL WRITING...:

I can't tell you what's going to happen to his blockbuster complaint about the president's behavior, but I can tell you that the whistle-blower's college writing instructor would be very proud of him.

As a writing instructor myself for 20 years, I look at the complaint and see a model of clear writing that offers important lessons for aspiring writers. Here are a few:

The whistle-blower gets right to the point.

We know right away what his purpose is and why we should care. He wastes no time on background or pleasantries before stating that he is writing to report "an 'urgent' concern." And then he immediately states it:

"In the course of my official duties, I have received information from multiple U.S. Government officials that the President of the United States is using the power of his office to solicit interference from a foreign country in the 2020 U.S. election."

The whistle-blower uses subheadings to make sure we can connect the dots.

Most subheadings don't do much to enhance a document. The whistle-blower's subheadings do what the best subheadings do: They structure the complaint and provide a clear outline of what the document contains:

I. The 25 July Presidential phone call

II. Efforts to restrict access to records related to the call

III. Ongoing concerns

IV. Circumstances leading up to the 25 July Presidential phone call

The bonus of good subheadings is that they serve as a guide for writing the rest of the document. Even if you're writing something less formal, you can use subheadings to organize your document and then remove them before you share it.

The whistle-blower gets an A for his topic sentences.

Strong persuasive or expository writing features topic sentences that tell the reader what to focus on.

THE CULTURE WARS ARE A ROUT:

"Just as the Bishop of Oxford refused to consider that he might be descended from an ape," Tom Holland writes cleverly in the introduction to his enormous new book Dominion, "So now are many in the West reluctant to contemplate that their values, and even their very lack of religious belief, might be traceable back to Christian origins." Holland's book is an attempt to argue that modern European civilization has its roots in Christianity, and that European culture is still "saturated by Christian concepts and assumptions."

Holland is a novelist and historian, whose elegant prose, good humor, and keen sense for an arresting image has been matched by a instinct for scholarly adventure. In his In the Shadow of the Sword, for example, Holland argued, in the face of some amount of Islamist intimidation, that the evidence for the historical truth of the origin stories of Islam is lacking. In Dominion he takes on the cheerful prejudices of secular liberalism. [...]

Christianity came not with a triumphant warrior wielding his sword, but with a traveling carpenter nailed to a cross; it came not with God as a distant and unimaginable force but with God as man, walking among his followers; it came not with promises of tribal dominance but with the hope of salvation across classes and races. [...]

Holland's stylistic talents add a great deal to the book. His portraits of Boniface, Luther, and Calvin are vivid, evocative, and free of romanticization or its opposite. Some of his accounts of episodes in religious history are a little superficial--he could have read Helen Andrews for a more complicated portrait of Bartolomé de las Casas, for example--but a sweeping historical narrative without superficial aspects would be like an orchard with no bruising on the fruit. It is only natural.

Some secularists write as if everything good about the modern world is the result of the Enlightenment and its promotion of the natural sciences, liberalism, and secularism. Holland has no time for this. Was the idea of the preeminent significance of the individual not rooted in the idea that each man is equal before God? Did the idea of the separation of church and state not go back to Augustine? Had Aquinas not said the Holy Scripture "naturally leads men to contemplate the celestial bodies"? One could mention previous Christian achievements on which liberalism depended, such as the promotion of monogamous unions and the prohibition of cousin marriage.

Holland is right about this, and does not neglect the dark corners of the Enlightenment: the graves of Frenchmen massacred by revolutionaries, the morbid fantasies and secular hubris that led to communism.

80-20 NATION:

Not coincidentally, 80% of Americans support a path to citizenship for immigrants. Donald's base is just the Nativists. https://t.co/iWapKExP2e

— brothersjudd (@brothersjudd) September 29, 2019

ALONG THE ANGLOSPHERE:

HANOVER -- Lord Dartmouth arrived by Dartmouth Coach to visit Dartmouth College last week.

The British businessman and former politician confessed his eyes "misted over" when he first glimpsed his hereditary title emblazoned on the side of the bus when he boarded it in Boston for the ride. He was taken aback again when he arrived in Hanover.

Back home in the county of Devon in southwest England, where Lord Dartmouth lives about 15 miles from the town of Dartmouth, "You only see the word 'Dartmouth' on road signs," he told an audience who had come to hear him deliver a public lecture on Brexit at the college Tuesday night.

"By contrast, you see 'Dartmouth' here everywhere," the British peer marveled.

Lord Dartmouth, the 10th Earl of Dartmouth -- known by his family name, William Legge -- made his fourth visit last week to the American college named after his ancestor, the 2nd Earl of Dartmouth, who helped raise money for Eleazar Wheelock's plan to found a college to educate native Americans before falling out with Wheelock after the clergyman's plans changed to cater to the sons of colonists.

Even as a boy growing up, Legge was aware his family had a link to something far away in America: a copy of the Dartmouth Alumni Magazine every month would plop through the mail slot in the door addressed to his father, the 9th Earl of Dartmouth, Legge recalled over a breakfast of corned beef hash, poached eggs, black beans and a side of mustard Wednesday morning at Lou's Restaurant & Bakery in Hanover.

SILLY GOOSE...:

Since the day he took office, Donald Trump has blamed a "deep state" for trying to undermine his Presidency. This morning, the American people have an opportunity to judge the so-called deep state themselves. A meticulous nine-page whistle-blower complaint was released this morning by the House Intelligence Committee. In the document, an unnamed U.S. intelligence official describes an apparent effort by President Trump to use the powers of his office to pressure Ukraine to launch a criminal inquiry into a political rival, Joe Biden. Furthermore, the whistle-blower alleges that White House officials then covered up the President's actions. The White House and the Department of Justice then delayed Congress from seeing the whistle-blower complaint. In all, the actions taken by the President, White House officials, and the Justice Department surrounding the complaint threaten the checks and balances between the President and Congress, which define and protect American democracy.

WHAT ABOUT HER EMAILS!:

Donald Trump's administration is amping up an investigation into Hillary Clinton's emails, The Washington Post reported Saturday, breathing new life into a pet issue used by the president to rail against his opponent during the 2016 elections.

GOOD NEWS FOR MODERN MAN:

The film version of The Fellowship of the Ring culminates with the death of Boromir, differing from Tolkien's book in which Boromir's death comes at the beginning of The Two Towers. It's a scene that has great sacramental significance in Tolkien's original work, the final exchange of words between Boromir and Aragorn reflecting the formal aspects of the sacrament of penance, in which the repentant sinner must have contrition for the sins he has committed, confessing them, and making satisfaction in terms of an act of penance. Boromir's final words contain all three of these prerequisites for a good and holy confession: "I tried to take the Ring from Frodo [confession]. I am sorry [contrition]. I have paid [satisfaction]." Aragorn's role is that of the priest, acting in persona Christi, who forgives the sin and bestows "peace" upon the penitent. Mr. Jackson deviates radically from Tolkien in this scene, replacing the sacramental "confession" with Boromir's fraternal "confession" that he would have followed Aragorn, proclaiming him to be "my brother, my captain, my king." Thus the allusive allegorical confession to God in Tolkien's original story is replaced with an explicit literal confession in Jackson's adaptation, expressive of Boromir's final reconciliation with the man (and king) whom he had wronged. The effect lacks the nuanced subtlety and the depth of theological applicability of Tolkien's original, but it has great power nonetheless in terms of its cathartic effect upon the viewer. Had Mr. Jackson chosen merely to reiterate Tolkien's words, it is very unlikely that the literary subtlety of the original text would have been grasped by the viewer, the allegorical significance being lost in the fast-paced medium of film, weakening the scene and depriving it of the catharsis that Mr. Jackson's reworking of it provides. As I pondered the artistic license that Mr. Jackson had granted himself in this most important of scenes from Tolkien's book, I realized that a film adaptation of a literary work should not be expected to follow the literal letter of the original but should seek faithfully to encapsulate and project its true and essential spirit because, and to co-opt the words of St. Paul, "the letter killeth but the spirit giveth life."

RUBEY:

By his own account, Giuliani's fixation with the country began last November when, he told Fox News, he was approached by a "very significant distinguished investigator". He has not named the investigator, though the whistleblower's complaint and other sources have illuminated close ties between the former mayor, Yuriy Lutsenko, who until last month was Ukraine's chief prosecutor, and Lutsenko's predecessor, Viktor Shokin.

As the complaint sets out, Giuliani met Lutsenko at least twice: in New York in January and in Warsaw the following month. The timing of those encounters could be important in the rapidly unfolding impeachment inquiry in Washington, as they came at a key moment for Lutsenko.

The prosecutor was facing growing criticism in Kyiv over stalled investigations into corruption. In November 2018, when Giuliani says he began to focus on the country, Lutsenko offered to resign after a young anti-corruption activist, Kateryna Handziuk, died from a sulphuric acid attack.

Lutsenko stayed in office. But the Guardian has learned that he began seeking a lifeline to the US, in the hope it might save him as difficulties back home intensified.

That lifeline was Giuliani.

"[Lutsenko] strongly needed some political ally, he believed that Giuliani could convey specific messages to Trump, and he created this message to become more interesting to the American establishment," said a law enforcement source familiar with the Giuliani-Lutsenko connection.

That Giuliani might have been fed information by Ukraine's then-top prosecutor that was adulterated to make it more appealing to Trump is a startling potential twist in the developing scandal.

According to the Guardian's source, Lutsenko appeared in conversation with Giuliani to have invented a "don't prosecute" list he claimed was given to him by the then US ambassador to Kyiv, Marie Yovanovitch - news of which apparently made its way up to Trump.

Yovanovitch was abruptly removed in May after Giuliani pressed for changes in the embassy. Giuliani has since claimed without evidence that the "don't prosecute" list was part of a liberal anti-Trump conspiracy that included Yovanovitch and was bankrolled by the philanthropist George Soros.

The US state department has dismissed the claim as an "outright fabrication".