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It would mean war.

POSTED JANUARY 27, 2020 4:30 PM

A Fox News poll released Sunday has some good news for President Trump, but if you combine it with the poll's bad news, it's not at all clear where Trump stands with the American public or how voters are feeling about the state of the union.On the positive side, 55 percent of voters said the economy is good or excellent, the highest number since 59 percent said they felt positive about the economy in January 2001 (two months before the start of the ugly 2001 recession). A 42 percent plurality of voters credit Trump and the Republicans for the economy, and Trump's job approval rating on the economy is a record 56 percent.The bad news? A 55 percent majority of voters say the way the economy works is unfair and 56 percent say they are dissatisfied with how things are going in the country, Fox News found. Trump's overall approval rating is 45 percent, with 54 percent disapproving, and he is underwater on all non-economy issues: guns (-9 percentage points), immigration (-15 points), foreign policy (-16 points), health care (-16 points), government spending (-18 points), race relations (-19 points), the environment (-22 points), even trade deals (-1 point).Republican pollster Kristen Soltis Anderson sees the glass half full: "The president's job approval on the economy has consistently outpaced his overall job approval," and "a strong economy creates a good foundation for an incumbent seeking re-election, even if voters will also say things could always be even better or more fair." Democratic pollster Chris Anderson, whose firm conducted the Fox News poll with GOP pollster Daron Shaw, argued that Trump's approval on the economy "is tenuous ground on which to stake his re-election," because "outside the Republican base, voters think the economy under Trump doesn't work for most people."The poll was conducted Jan. 19-22 by Beacon Research (D) and Shaw & Co. (R), surveying 1,005 randomly selected registered votes over the phone. The poll's overall margin of sampling error is ±3 percentage points.More stories from theweek.com Mike Pompeo is a disgrace MSNBC's Ari Melber: 'We just watched Ken Starr punch himself in the face' All the president's turncoats

POSTED JANUARY 27, 2020 6:37 AM

A Virginia woman was sentenced to life in prison without the chance for parole Monday in the death of a West Virginia man who was decapitated. Roena Cheryl Mills, 43, of Rural Retreat, Virginia, was sentenced for her December conviction on a first-degree murder charge in the death of Bo White, 29, of Lenore, news outlets reported. A neighbor called police after seeing Mills covered in blood.

POSTED JANUARY 27, 2020 2:00 PM

Bryant's helicopter was owned by an operator called Island Express Holding Corp., which purchased it from Illinois in 2015.

POSTED JANUARY 27, 2020 2:32 PM

Images of what the Allies found when they liberated the first Nazi death camps towards the end of World War II brought the horror of the Holocaust to global attention. Many of the ghastly pictures were at first held back from the broader public, partly out of concern for those with missing relatives. The concentration and extermination camps were liberated one by one as the Allied armies advanced on Berlin in the final days of the 1939-1945 war.

POSTED JANUARY 26, 2020 11:01 PM

(Bloomberg) -- A magnitude 6.8 earthquake in Turkey’s eastern Elazig province on Friday evening killed at least 31 people and injured hundreds. By Sunday, 45 people had been rescued from the rubble of collapsed buildings.A total of 76 buildings were destroyed and 645 heavily damaged, the Disaster and Emergency Management Presidency, or AFAD, said in a statement. As many as 20 of the 640 aftershocks since the first temblor had a magnitude greater than 4 on the Richter scale, according to the agency.Speaking on Sunday in Istanbul, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan targeted “provocative” social media posts about the earthquake. “Some messages are terrible, depraved,” he said, according to the Anadolu Agency. “For example, some question what the government has done about earthquakes in the past two decades.”The earthquake occurred at 8:55 p.m. local time on Friday at a depth of 6.75 kilometers (4.2 miles) on the East Anatolia Fault Line. Tremors were felt in many cities across the region.Prosecutors have launched an investigation into social media posts found to be “provocative,” Anadolu reported. Two people in Gaziantep province have been detained.Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu, Environment & Urbanization Minister Murat Kurum and Health Minister Fahrettin Koca were in Elazig as of early Sunday to coordinate rescue efforts.Turkey is situated in a seismically active area and is among countries, including China and Iran, that can experience catastrophic earthquakes, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. In 1999, a 7.5-magnitude quake shook the western Marmara region killing thousands of people and damaging more than 300,000 buildings. The nation’s economy contracted 3.4% that year.To contact the reporters on this story: Cagan Koc in Istanbul at ckoc2@bloomberg.net;Taylan Bilgic in Istanbul at tbilgic2@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Onur Ant at oant@bloomberg.net, Lars Paulsson, Michael GunnFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.

POSTED JANUARY 26, 2020 4:12 AM

* Death of man, 39, initially attributed to hanging * UK Foreign Office said to be in touch with man’s wifeA British man has died while being held in US immigration detention in Florida, the Guardian has confirmed.The death was first reported by BuzzFeed News, which said the man was 39 years old and that the cause was initially attributed to asphyxiation due to hanging. The incident was reported to have occurred on Saturday last week.“Our staff are in contact with the US authorities following the death of a British man in Florida,” said a spokeswoman for the Foreign Office in London.Foreign Office officials are understood to have been in contact with the deceased man’s wife, as US officials investigate the circumstances of the death.Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) did not respond to multiple requests for comment from the Guardian.In a statement to BuzzFeed, the agency identified the deceased man as Ben James Owen and clarified he had died at the Baker county detention center in Macclenny, Florida. Officials said Owen had entered the US on a temporary visa in July and had been arrested on suspicion of felony aggravated stalking, felony false imprisonment, domestic assault, and violating the conditions of his pre-trial release. The agency said the case remained under investigation.The incident marks the fifth death at a detention centre in the 2020 fiscal year, which begins in October 2019. There were eight deaths in Ice detention in the 2019 fiscal year.The immigration detention population in the United States has soared under the Trump administration. Last year Ice detained 510,854 people, compared with 396,448 in 2018. The administration has also increased its use of detention facilities, mostly run by private security companies, with a new concentration of detention centres opening in the deep south.Medical provision and mental health care at detention facilities has come under increased criticism under the Trump administration after a spate of high profile deaths since 2017.At the end of last year House Democrats on the oversight and reform committee launched an inquiry to investigate a “troubling pattern of abuse and poor treatment” of migrants in custody.

POSTED JANUARY 27, 2020 8:16 PM

Nuclear chicken anyone?

POSTED JANUARY 27, 2020 4:58 AM

SEOUL, South Korea -- The aunt of North Korea's leader, Kim Jong Un, has re-emerged in Pyongyang, the capital, the country's media said Sunday, dispelling rumors that she was purged after her powerful husband was executed on charges of plotting a coup to topple Kim in 2013.North Korea's state-run media said Kim Kyong Hui, the only sister of Kim Jong Un's father, Kim Jong Il, accompanied her nephew to an orchestra performance Saturday for Lunar New Year's Day. Photos released in state media showed her dressed in black and sitting with her nephew, his wife, his sister and other top leaders in the front row at a theater in Pyongyang.The fate of Kim Kyong Hui has been a subject of intense speculation since her husband, Jang Song Thaek, once considered the second most powerful man in Pyongyang, was executed in 2013. North Korean media last mentioned her name a few days after her husband's execution when she was appointed to a committee for the state funeral of another top party official.She then disappeared from public view, triggering rumors that she may have been executed, too. South Korean intelligence officials dismissed such rumors, saying that she was hospitalized for poor health but not purged.She remains the closest blood link that Kim Jong Un has to his father and paternal grandfather, both of whom ruled North Korea before him.Kim Jong Un's grandfather, Kim Il Sung, the founder of North Korea, is still revered like a god among North Koreans. The current leader often stresses his bloodline when he needs to legitimize his rule or wants to consolidate his people around him in the face of an external crisis. The public appearance of his aunt, a daughter of Kim Il Sung, reminds North Koreans of that blood link.Kim Jong Un needs his people's loyalty more than ever. After a year and a half of largely fruitless diplomacy with President Donald Trump, Kim said late last month that his country would no longer hope for a diplomatic breakthrough with Washington. Instead, he said his country should prepare to endure international sanctions by tightening its belt and building a "self-reliant" economy.Until her husband, Jang, was executed, Kim Kyong Hui had been the pre-eminent female face of the Kim family that has ruled North Korea since its founding seven decades ago.The current leader's father, Kim Jong Il, allowed his sister to hold key jobs in his government. But the diminutive, frail and reportedly sick sister seldom appeared in public during her brother's rule.But that changed after Kim Jong Il fell ill with a stroke in 2008. She and her husband raised their public profile and acted like parent-like figures as Kim Jong Un was groomed as heir apparent. After Kim Jong Il died, the couple further strengthened their power as they helped Kim Jong Un engineer purges of top officials to establish himself as supreme leader and continue the family dynasty.Jang's power became so expansive through the military and other key branches of the government that the current leader felt threatened.Kim Jong Un had him executed on charges of corruption, sedition and numerous other charges in late 2013. He also ferreted out those close to Jang, who was accused of building a network of followers in the ruling Workers' Party of Korea, the government and the Korean People's Army.The executions of Jang and his followers were watershed moments for Kim Jong Un's efforts to establish himself as a monolithic leader. In 2017, North Korean agents plotted the assassination of Kim Jong Nam, the current leader's estranged half brother, in Malaysia. Kim Jong Un may have regarded his half brother, the eldest son of his father, as a potential threat to his throne at the family-run regime, analysts say.After Kim Kyong Hui disappeared from public view, Kim Jong Un's sister, Kim Yo Jong, and his wife, Ri Sol Ju, replaced her as the main female face of the family.It remained unclear whether, Kim Kyong Hui, 73, will resume an active public life. In North Korea, invitations to leadership gatherings -- and how close people are placed to the current leader -- are often barometers of whether an official is favored in the government.Before rumors emerged that she had been purged, her presence had been a powerful reminder to top generals of where the root of the regime lay, and she was even seen as a regent helping guide her nephew through the North's treacherous internal politics to ensure a smooth generational change. The offspring of those who fought to help Kim Il Sung, the current leader's grandfather, establish himself as top leader form the loyalist core of the elite in Pyongyang today.But her relationship with her husband had always been a subject of speculation. Even before Jang's downfall, analysts in South Korea had speculated that the couple had a troubled marriage, especially after their only child, a daughter, committed suicide in France in 2006. In a party meeting in 2013 that condemned Jang as a traitor, he was called a depraved and corrupt womanizer.This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2020 The New York Times Company

POSTED JANUARY 26, 2020 11:49 AM

Chinese people are criticizing their government's slow response to the Wuhan coronavirus online, comparing its handling of the outbreak to Chernobyl.

POSTED JANUARY 27, 2020 12:31 PM