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2020 Vision Monday: Polls show a 17-point swing toward impeaching Trump, which could drag down his reelection bid

A rapid 17-point shift means a majority of Americans may soon support impeachment, or, taking margin of error into account, might already. And that’s terrible news for Trump.

What's causing record rates of STDs?

After decades of decline, rates of certain STDs have spiked to record levels, according to the CDC. What's causing the increase?

Pope's bodyguard resigns over new financial leaks scandal

The Vatican's latest scandal claimed its first victim Monday as Pope Francis' chief bodyguard resigned over the leak of a Vatican police flyer identifying five employees who were suspended as part of a financial investigation. The Vatican said its police chief, Domenico Giani, bore no responsibility for the leaked flyer but resigned to avoid disrupting the investigation and "out of love for the church and faithfulness" to the pope. Giani, a 20-year veteran of the Vatican's security services, has stood by Francis' side and jogged alongside his popemobile during hundreds of public appearances and foreign trips.

Booze run from behind bars: Inmates escape from Texas federal prison, return with whiskey

The men left the prison grounds and cut through a neighboring ranch before getting caught by authorities.

Woman will spend 60 years in prison for first-degree murder of boyfriend

A woman who poured gasoline on the couch where her sleeping boyfriend lay and then shut the door after seeing him jump up and yell "hot, hot" will spend 60 years in prison for first-degree murder.

India blocks SMS services in Kashmir after trucker killed

Text messaging services were blocked in Indian Kashmir just hours after being restored when a truck driver was killed by suspected militants and his vehicle set ablaze, authorities said Tuesday. Separately, Indian officials said a 24-year-old woman died in the latest exchange of artillery fire with Pakistan over their de-facto border dividing the blood-soaked Himalayan region.

Russia Begins Patrolling Area Dividing Syrian and Turkish Forces

Russia announced on Tuesday that its forces have begun patrolling the area between Syrian and Turkish troops and allied militias positioned near the Turkey-Syria border.The Russian Defense Ministry issued a statement saying its forces had established a presence in "the northwestern borders of Manbij district along the line of contact of the Syrian Arab Republic military and the Turkish military."Meanwhile, Russian military personnel appeared to take over an abandoned U.S. military base in Manbij in a video obtained by the Wall Street Journal."The Syrian government army has taken full control of the city of Manbij and nearby populated areas," the Russian Defense Ministry statement continued.Russia also moved to prevent any possible conflicts between Syrian and Turkish troops."No one is interested" in such conflict, said Russian envoy to Syria Alexander Lavrentyev in comments to Russian state media. He further emphasized that Russia "is not going to allow" fighting between Syrian and Turkish troops.President Trump on October 7 announced the withdrawal of U.S. troops from northeast Syria in anticipation of a Turkish invasion of the area. Turkey intends to resettle the conquered region with 3.6 million Syrian refugees currently residing in Turkey. The offensive is also intended to push back Kurdish militia groups it regards as terrorist organizations.The U.N. estimates roughly 130,000 people from the heavily Kurdish region in northeastern Syria have fled the Turkish assault.Trump has faced bipartisan fury for effectively abandoning the Kurds, who were instrumental in the U.S.-led fight against ISIS and played a large role in reconquering territory overrun by the group in 2014.After a report emerged of ISIS fighters escaping Kurdish-run detention camps, commentators warned of a possible ISIS resurgence after the fighting ends.

Jeep Gladiator Gets Even More Rugged as a Military-Spec Vehicle

Jeep and AM General could re-enlist with the U.S. Army as soon as next year.

'Kanye West should not be president': Chris Hayes grapples with the demise of parties

MSNBC's Chris Hayes on what he would do if a Trump-like celebrity ever ran for president as a Democrat.

The U.S. Military Has a Lot of Firepower in the Middle East to Deter Iran

In response to Iran’s actions, the U.S. has deployed 14,000 additional troops to the region since May. In addition to the most recent deployments, as Esper noted, this includes airborne early warning aircraft squadrons, maritime patrol aircraft squadrons, B-52 bombers, an amphibious transport dock, unmanned aircraft, engineering personnel, and the Lincoln Carrier Strike Group (CSG).

The Latest: 2nd crane in danger of collapse

The second of two cranes towering over the site where a New Orleans hotel construction project partially collapsed two days ago is now considered in danger of toppling. Two other workers are known dead at the project site, which sits on the edge of the historic French Quarter. The coroner's office in New Orleans has identified one of two workers known to have died when a hotel under construction partially collapsed.

Nigerian president vows crackdown on abusive Islamic schools after second raid

Nigeria's president on Tuesday ordered a crackdown on abuse at Islamic schools, after a second police raid in less than a month revealed men and boys subjected to beatings, abuse and squalid conditions. Nearly 300 had been held captive at a school in the Daura area of Katsina, the hometown of President Muhammadu Buhari, where police said they discovered "inhuman and degrading treatment" following a raid on Monday to free the remaining students. The 67 inmates who were freed by Katsina police were shackled, and many were taken to hospital for treatment, police superintendent Isah Gambo told Reuters.

We found 85,000 cops who’ve been investigated for misconduct. Now you can read their records.

USA TODAY is leading a national effort to obtain and publish disciplinary and misconduct records for thousands of police officers.

Interactive Map Shows Exactly How Much Car Emissions Have Grown Where You Live

New York Times map shows the best and worst places in the U.S. for emissions from vehicles.

Court Ruling Extends Vote Protest of Philippine Marcos’ Son

(Bloomberg) -- The Philippines’ top court on Tuesday decided to release the initial results of the vice-presidential vote recount, which the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos’ son said will delay his chance to assume the post.Former Senator Ferdinand Marcos Jr. said he is “frustrated” by the court’s decision not to resolve his election protest against Vice President Leni Robredo victory in the 2016 polls. Robredo is already halfway through her six-year term.The court instead decided to make public the result of the recount covering three provinces that will serve as basis for any further action on Marcos’ challenge. It also asked the two camps to comment on Marcos’ plea to nullify votes in three other provinces due to supposed irregularities in the 2016 elections.“The proper vice president -- myself -- is being robbed of years of service,” Marcos said in a televised interview. President Rodrigo Duterte, who has faced questions on his health, has repeatedly said Marcos is his preferred successor if he had to leave office before his single term expires in 2022.Robredo, leader of the opposition party, said she welcomes the court decision, as she urged the court to already junk Marcos’ protest. “The mere fact that this has been dragging on for so long only provides Marcos a platform for his lies,” she said in a separate televised briefing.(Updates with comments from Marcos and Robredo from fourth paragraph.)To contact the reporter on this story: Andreo Calonzo in Manila at acalonzo1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Cecilia Yap at cyap19@bloomberg.net, Muneeza NaqviFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.

Pete Buttigieg Swats Down Beto O’Rourke on Guns: ‘I Don’t Need Lessons From You on Courage’

Former Rep. Beto O’Rourke said on the debate stage Tuesday night that Americans who refuse to turn over banned semi automatic rifles under his mandatory gun buyback program would be met with unspecified “consequences,” a stance which drew major pushback from his fellow Democratic contenders.The Texas Democrat didn’t get into much more detail, but made clear that police will exercise force to confiscate weapons banned under his plan, the most sweeping gun control proposal offered by any Democratic presidential candidate.“If someone does not turn in an AR-15 or an AK-47...then that weapon will be taken from them,” O’Rourke said. “If they persist, there will be other consequences."Every candidate who addressed the issue on Tuesday evening supported additional restrictions on the sale of so-called assault weapons, but none went as far as O’Rourke. And his proposal prompted a harsh rebuke from others, especially South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg.“Congressman, you just made it clear you don’t know how this is actually going to take weapons off the streets,” he told O’Rourke. “I don’t need lessons from you on courage, political or personal. The problem is not other Democrats who don’t agree with your particular idea of how to handle this. The problem is the National Rifle Association and their enablers in Congress, and we should be united in taking the fight to them.”That drew a heated response from O’Rourke, who accused Buttigieg of minimizing the problem of gun violence and the toll it’s taken on victims of mass-casualty shootings.“When you, mayor, describe this policy as a shiny object, I don’t care what that meant to me or my candidacy,” O’Rourke shot back. “But to those who have survived gun violence, those who have lost a loved one to an AR-15 or an AK-47, marched for our lives, formed in the courage of students willing to stand up to the NRA and conventional politicians and poll-tested politicians, that was a slap in the fact to every one of those groups and every survivor of a mass casualty assault.”O’Rourke’s proposal would likely require a massive police mobilization to enforce the confiscation of millions of firearms targeted by the plan. And that raised concerns for other candidates on the stage.“In the place I grew up in, we weren't exactly looking for more reasons for cops to come show up at the door,” said Julian Castro, the former secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development. “I am not going to give these police officers another reason to go door to door in these communities.”Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

Brazil probes whether 'ghost ship' carrying Venezuelan oil involved in spill

A huge oil spill off Brazil's northeastern coast may have involved a "ghost ship" carrying Venezuelan oil in breach of US sanctions, an expert close to the probe into the disaster said Tuesday. Brazil has accused its South American neighbor of responsibility for the leakage that began in early September and affects a 2,000-kilometer (1,200-mile) stretch of the Atlantic coast -- charges Venezuela's state oil giant PDVSA denies. Describing the incident as "very complex and unprecedented," Brazil's navy says it is investigating "lots of hypotheses" for the cause of the massive spill, including a ship accident.

Trump's latest conspiracy theory is that the Kurds released ISIS prisoners to pull the US back into Syria

The Kurds bore the brunt of the US-led campaign against ISIS, and Trump is now suggesting without evidence that they released ISIS prisoners.

Meet USS Barb: The Navy's Special World War II Submarine That Terrified Japan

It sank the most Japanese vessels by tonnage.

Shooting kills 6 in Puerto Rico, leads to emergency meeting

Puerto Rico's governor called an emergency meeting Tuesday after six people were killed in a mass shooting in a San Juan housing project and gunfire left two people dead a day earlier in the island's north. A police statement said the violence left five men and one woman dead. The brazen murders led Gov. Wanda Vázquez to convene a gathering of her security team, led by public security chief Elmer Román and justice secretary Dennise Longo Quiñones.

Texas policeman faces murder charges after killing black woman in her home

Atatiana Jefferson was killed on Saturday at about 2:30 a.m. when officer Aaron Dean fired a single shot through a window into her home as she cared for her 8-year-old nephew. Dean was responding to a call from a concerned neighbor who said Jefferson's door was open. "Aaron Dean was arrested by Fort Worth Police on Oct. 14.

'It's got to stop': Superintendent condemns teacher's racist rant in school parking lot

A teacher at Drexel Hill Middle School in Pennsylvania has been placed on administrative leave after she used racial slurs in a viral Facebook video.

Soldier wounded during search for Bowe Bergdahl dies of his injuries

A US soldier shot in the head during the 2009 search for army deserter Bowe Bergdahl has died from his injuries. Army Master Sgt. Mark Allen died on Saturday at the age of 46, 10 years after being injured in the hunt for his missing comrade. He spent 21 years in the army and national guard, and retired in 2013 on receiving the Purple Heart. He had been unable to walk or speak since a sniper shot him in the head in July 2009 while he was looking for Bergdahl, who had walked off his base in Afghanistan and was held by the Taliban for five years.   At Bergdahl's trial, Allen's wife Shannon testified that it would take up to 90 minutes each morning to get her husband out of bed, showered, and dressed. She had to use a pulley system attached to the ceiling to move him. Shannon Allen, who testified during the trial of Bowe Bergdahl Mrs Allen did not learn about the circumstances surrounding her husband’s injuries until 2014, after former president Barack Obama negotiated Bergdahl’s release in a swap for five Taliban members detained at Guantanamo Bay. The Idaho-born soldier, now 33, was sentenced in January 2016 for desertion. During the trial he apologised to those injured. “I would like everyone who searched for me to know it was never my intention for anyone to be hurt, and I never expected that to happen,” he said. He was reduced in rank from sergeant to private, ordered to forfeit $1,000 in pay for 10 months, and given a dishonorable discharge. He did not serve any prison time. Mrs Allen broke the news on Facebook on Sunday. “I’m heartbroken to let you all know that my husband passed away peacefully yesterday morning, with his family by his side,” she said. “Over ten years ago, he sustained a severe head injury while serving in Afghanistan, which caused him lifelong health problems. "These past few months, he has faced some significant illnesses, and his body was finally ready to rest.”

Amazon Pledges $1 Million More in Heated Seattle Elections

(Bloomberg) -- Amazon.com Inc. is reaching into its deep pockets in an effort to make Seattle more business-friendly, pledging an additional $1 million to a corporate-backed group ahead of next month’s contentious city council elections.The contribution disclosed on Tuesday brings Amazon’s donations this election cycle to the Seattle Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce’s Civic Alliance for a Sound Economy (CASE) to $1.45 million, and likely cements the company’s status as the biggest spender in its hometown’s elections. The splurge marks a dramatic change for the e-commerce giant, which largely avoided city politics for most of its 25 years, even as it grew into Seattle’s largest employer and contributed to a boom that brought about rapidly rising housing costs, snarled traffic and a homelessness crisis.“We are contributing to this election because we care deeply about the future of Seattle,” Amazon spokesman Aaron Toso said in an emailed statement. “We believe it is critical that our hometown has a city council that is focused on pragmatic solutions to our shared challenges in transportation, homelessness, climate change and public safety.”Amazon’s relationship with city hall was a focus of heated debate last year around a proposed tax on large businesses to fund services for the homeless. The city council passed -- and then, under pressure from a business-backed repeal effort, rescinded -- the so-called head tax after Amazon paused construction planning on a piece of its corporate campus and threatened to back out of a lease for a major downtown skyscraper. Amazon would later confirm its intent to sublease that building anyway.Seven of Seattle’s nine city council seats are up for election this year.Socialist councilmember Kshama Sawant, who sought to link Amazon to the tax and has made calls to tax the company a fixture of her reelection campaign, faces a competitive race in the Nov. 5 general election. Egan Orion, a community leader from Seattle’s Capitol Hill neighborhood, is backed by CASE and individual contributions from more than a dozen Amazon executives.Amazon’s latest commitment makes the company the biggest spender so far this election cycle, according to CASE, topping the $855,000 spent by a group affiliated with the Service Employees International Union. mazon this year has also hosted and sponsored city council candidate forums, and contributed $400,000 to a campaign to defeat a ballot measure that would cut Washington state car-tab taxes at the expense of transportation projects.To contact the reporter on this story: Matt Day in Seattle at mday63@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Jillian Ward at jward56@bloomberg.net, Molly Schuetz, Robin AjelloFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.

Mayor Pete Blasts ‘No Plan’ Elizabeth Warren

GettySen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) may not be statistically the frontrunner for the Democratic presidential nomination. But on Tuesday night she was treated as such, pummeled by her competitors on a familiar front: her refusal to say whether taxes will go up on middle-income Americans as part of her plan to expand Medicare to cover every American. “Costs will go up for the wealthy and for big corporations and for hard working middle class families, costs will go down,” Warren assured.South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg, who has clashed in the past with Warren and Sen. Bernie Sanders (D-VT) over health care policy, quickly pounced on Warren’s remark. Asked about dubbing the Senator’s past comments “evasive,” Buttigieg said, “You heard it tonight: a yes or no question that didn’t get a yes or no answer.” “This is why people in the Midwest are so frustrated with Washington in general and Capitol Hill in particular,” Buttigieg said. “Your signature, senator, is to have a plan for everything, except this. No plan has been laid out to explain how a multi-trillion-dollar hole in this Medicare for All plan that Senator Warren is putting forward is supposed to get filled in.”Questions surrounding health care policy have provided the starkest divide among the Democratic presidential field since the informal start of the primary. And the same held true on Tuesday evening as the dividing lines mirrored those of past debates, with Warren and Sanders holding firm to their plans to expand Medicare to every American, and Buttigieg, former Vice President Joe Biden, and Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) staking out more moderate positions.“I appreciate Elizabeth’s work,” Klobuchar said during the exchange, echoing Buttigieg with a jab at Warren’s reputation as the candidate with a “plan” for everything. “The difference between a plan and a pipe dream is a plan is something that you can actually get done.”Questions about cost have dogged Medicare for All proposals among the Democratic presidential field. But while Warren has studiously avoided saying that her plan would result in a tax hike, Sanders has conceded the point, but argued that any increase in the middle class tax bill will be offset by lower health care costs.Though Warren doesn’t say so as explicitly, the same argument undergirds her proposal. “The problem we have got right now is the overall cost of health care,” she said on Tuesday. “You can try to spin this any way you want.”Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

China inflation surges as pork prices soar

China's consumer inflation accelerated at its fastest pace in almost six years in September as African swine fever sent pork prices soaring nearly 70 percent, official data showed Tuesday. Authorities have gone as far as tapping the nation's pork reserve to control prices of the staple meat, as the swine fever crisis could become a political and economic liability for the state. The consumer price index (CPI) -- a key gauge of retail inflation -- hit 3.0 percent last month, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said, up from 2.8 percent in August and the highest since since November 2013.

Trump suggested the Kurds were releasing ISIS prisoners, but US officials say Turkish-backed forces are actually doing this

Trump had no evidence to back up the suggestion the Kurds released ISIS detainees, and US officials said it was actually Turkish-backed forces.

Russian troll freed in Belarus after arrest for US election tampering

Anna Bogacheva was detained and briefly threatened with extradition to the US after being named in Mueller reportRobert Mueller alleges that Anna Bogacheva and others posed as US citizens to set up social media accounts aimed at swaying the 2016 presidential vote. Photograph: Tom Brenner/ReutersA Russian national charged with attempting to meddle in the 2016 American presidential elections was briefly threatened with extradition to the United States after being arrested in Belarus, before she was was freed by local authorities. Anna Bogacheva was detained late on Monday evening by police at a hotel in Minsk, the capital of Belarus, while on holiday with her family, according to RIA Novosti, the Russian state news agency. Her lawyer said she had been detained under an international arrest warrant issued by the United States.Bogacheva was one of 13 Russians indicted last year by the US justice department after the investigation into election interference led by the special counsel Robert Mueller. Three Russian entities, including a notorious state-backed “troll farm” called the Internet Research Agency, were also indicted. Russia’s foreign ministry confirmed on Tuesday that Bogacheva had been arrested and said that it was providing consular assistance. But shortly after the foreign ministry statement, Russia’s embassy in Minsk announced that Bogacheva had been freed. A spokesman for Belarus’ general prosecutor’s office said that there were “no grounds” for her arrest or extradition to the United States. “She has been released,” the spokesman said, adding that Minsk would apply to have the international warrant for her arrest invalidated on the territory of Belarus. Mueller alleges that the St Petersburg-based Internet Research Agency’s employees, including Bogacheva, posed as US citizens to set up social media accounts aimed at swaying the 2016 presidential vote that brought Donald Trump to power, as well as sowing “discord” in the US political system. US investigators say the Internet Research Agency is controlled by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a wealthy businessman known as “Putin’s chef” because his companies often provide catering services to the Kremlin. Prigozhin is also reported to provide mercenaries for Russia’s military operations in Syria, Ukraine and parts of Africa. Bogacheva is accused of working as a translator for the agency and overseeing its data analysis group. She and Alexander Krylova, another agency employee, travelled to the United States in June 2014 on what US investigators say was an intelligence gathering trip. Bogacheva’s arrest in Minsk briefly looked set to derail relations between Belarus and Russia. Viktor Vodolatsky, an MP from Vladimir Putin’s ruling United Russia party, accused Belarus of a “betrayal” before news of her release broke.

School suspends girls, says rape-awareness note was bullying

A 15-year-old girl was suspended for bullying after trying to draw attention to what she believed was an unaddressed problem of sexual assaults involving students at her high school. Aela Mansmann, a 15-year-old sophomore at Cape Elizabeth High School outside Portland, has been at odds with Cape Elizabeth Schools for a month after posting a note in a bathroom that said: "There's a rapist in our school and you know who it is." She and two other students who left similar notes were ordered suspended. The American Civil Liberties Union of Maine is taking on Mansmann's case and calling on federal court to stop her suspension.

Dutch police discover family locked away for years in isolated farmhouse

Dutch police acting on a tip-off discovered six young adult siblings who had apparently spent years locked away in a secret room in an isolated farmhouse "waiting for the end of time," local broadcasters reported on Tuesday.

Dropping Bombs: These Are the Best Bombers To Ever Fly

What do you think? What does history tells us?

Marianne Williamson isn't on the debate stage but reminded people she's still running

"No, they’re not the only Democratic candidates for President of the United States," she tweeted as the debate started.

Mayor Pete’s Husband to Embark on European Fundraising Tour Hosted by Elite Allies

Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg’s husband will head out on a three-day European tour to raise money for the campaign next week, according to NBC.Under U.S. campaign finance law, campaigns cannot raise money from foreign nationals, but can accept donations from American citizens or green-card holders abroad. Invitations reviewed by NBC are requiring potential donors to bring a copy of their passport or green card in order to be admitted.Chasten Buttigieg plans to make stops in London, Paris, and Geneva at events hosted by Buttigieg allies, including Hollywood screenwriters, corporate executives, and former Obama administration employees.In London, Chasten Buttigieg will attend a reception hosted by Eric Beinhocker, a professor at Oxford alumnus of consulting giant McKinsey & Company, where Pete Buttigieg also once worked. Beinhocker donated to Buttigieg’s mayoral campaign in 2010, according to records. Later that evening, Buttigieg will attend a cocktail party hosted by Dustin Lance Black, who won an Oscar for the 2008 film “Milk,” and called Buttigieg’s campaign “a message of hope” in May.Both events are being co-hosted by Kevin MacLellan, the chairman of global distribution and international at NBCUniversal, who hosted a July fundraiser for Buttigieg at his Los Angeles home with husband Brian Curran and LGBT celebrities Ellen DeGeneres and Sean Hayes.Chasten Buttigieg will then head to Paris for a reception and dinner with the national campaign’s investment chair, followed by a fundraiser a day later at the home of Charles Adams, former President Obama’s ambassador to Finland and a steady fundraiser for Buttigieg over the last few months.Buttigieg’s campaign announced a third-quarter fundraising number of $19.1 million in October, good for third overall among the Democratic field, but down from the $24.8 million raised in the second quarter.

Biden’s Rivals Are Utterly Perplexed at the Timing of Hunter’s Interview

Photo Illustration by The Daily Beast/GettyAfter months of staying silent amid an avalanche of attacks by President Trump and his team, Hunter Biden, son of the former vice president, made his first public comments in an interview Tuesday morning just about 12 hours before his father takes the debate stage Tuesday night.  For the majority of the Democrats running for president, and even one notable surrogate to Joe Biden himself, there is a sense of confusion as to why Hunter is choosing now to finally speak up about the extent of his business ties in Ukraine and China. “I wouldn’t have put Hunter on the air,” former Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell, a top surrogate for Biden, told The Daily Beast. “I think the more you respond, the more you’re playing into Donald Trump.” Rendell, who said was not involved in any discussions about the matter, wondered aloud about the thinking behind it, before doubling down. “There’s a danger in playing Trump’s game,” he said bluntly. For Team Biden, Hunter’s Biden’s interview, which aired on ABC News’ Good Morning America, was an opportunity to clear the air and turn the attention back to the widespread corruption running rampant in the Trump White House. It also gave the younger Biden a chance to present facts in his own words to counter Trump’s misinformation campaign. In the interview, he admitted that he had shown “poor judgment” in taking the job with a Ukrainian natural gas company but insisted that he had done nothing unethical. He also took the opportunity to fire back at the Trumps who had criticized him, comparing the president's son to the buffoonish prince in The Princess Bride. “Donald—Prince Humperdinck—Trump Jr. is not somebody that I really care about,” he said.Hunter Biden Breaks Silence: Taking Ukrainian Job Was ‘Poor Judgment’“How, when and the substance of this came directly from Hunter,” a source familiar told The Daily Beast. “The campaign did not arrange this, but Hunter has been increasingly under attack in personal and vicious terms for the past couple of weeks from the president—all based on lies—and he made the decision to speak.”Rival campaigns weren’t so sure. “This is insane that they would do it,” a senior adviser to a Democratic opponent said.Multiple aides to 2020 candidates found the timing suspect and speculated that Hunter Biden’s move to go public automatically puts the debate moderators in a position that they can’t ignore it on Tuesday night.“Everyone else had laid off of Joe Biden,” the senior adviser added. “Now that’s all gone. I would bet $100 it’s the first question. If it is, it’s a major disaster.” “Why even put it out there to answer for that?,” another rival campaign aide asked. “Now it’s fair game that a moderator can bring it up.”A third aide wondered why the whole thing was necessary at all: “When I saw that I thought, why would you do that? There was no clamor to hear from Hunter directly.”The Westerville debate will be moderated by CNN anchors Anderson Cooper and Erin Burnett and The New York Times’ National Editor Marc Lacey. Biden will assume a center-stage spot, joining Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Kamala Harris (D-CA), Cory Booker (D-NJ), Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI), South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg, former HUD Secretary Julián Castro, former Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-TX), entrepreneur Andrew Yang, and mega-donor Tom Steyer, who will join for his first debate of the 2020 cycle. Some aides speculated that if it’s not the moderators, debate wildcards Gabbard and Steyer may launch surprise attacks on the former vice president. Aides to two 2020 candidates said Biden’s team should be prepared for a possible line of attack following Hunter Biden’s interview that goes against the soft embrace he’s enjoyed by other candidates thus far, and pointed to Gabbard and Steyer as the contenders most likely to go for it. “I would be shocked if candidates lean in,” one aide said, before tweaking their thought: “Maybe Tulsi, maybe Steyer.” Biden’s son has been uncredibly accused, largely by the president and his personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani, over unsubstantiated claims of misconduct tied to business dealings in Ukraine and China. Hunter Biden stepped down from the board of a private gas firm before his father launched his presidential bid over the spring, but that didn’t stop the president from relentlessly unleashing attacks on his work. And over recent days, the narrative shifted to China. On Oct. 13, when Hunter Biden announced he would also step down from the board of the Chinese private equity company he served on, some outside observers saw the arrangement as ethically dubious.But for the majority of Biden’s fellow Democratic presidential contenders, the bigger issue was the timing behind it, just hours ahead of the debate. And while presidential contenders are highly unlikely to launch into attacks on Biden on stage, according to interviews with half a dozen aides advising their bosses for the event, questions about Hunter Biden’s decision dominated private discussions on Monday ahead of the Ohio event. For weeks, the Biden campaign was content to argue forcefully that the entire thing was a non-story—a controversy manufactured by Trump in order to appear that something was untoward when in reality the president and his children were engaged in something far worse. On Sunday night, Hunter Biden’s lawyer George Mesires released his own statement. “Hunter always understood that his father would be guided, entirely and unequivocally, by established U.S. policy, irrespective of its effects on Hunter’s professional interests,” Mesires said in a post on Medium. “This was the standard observed throughout Hunter’s professional career.”Then, Mesires detailed a new commitment on behalf of the former vice president’s son. “Under a Biden Administration, Hunter will readily comply with any and all guidelines or standards a President Biden may issue to address purported conflicts of interest, or the appearance of such conflicts, including any restrictions related to overseas business interests. In any event, Hunter will agree not to serve on boards of, or work on behalf of, foreign owned companies,” Mesires wrote. Still, not everyone was convinced the move was such a bad idea. One top aide to another presidential contender drew a parallel between what Biden’s team is grappling with and a hurdle that previously plagued another campaign. “It’s the way Elizabeth Warren did it with her DNA test,” the senior campaign aide said, referencing the Massachusetts Democrat’s decision to preemptively release the results of a DNA test to show part of her heritage after being taunted for months by Trump. The move, widely panned at the time, has not stifled Warren’s eventual assent to achieve co-frontrunner status with Biden. “Everyone was like ‘what’s she doing?’ But you know what, it worked.”Read more at The Daily Beast.Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast hereGet our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

Russia assumes mantle of supreme power broker in Middle East as US retreats from Syria

Russia’s status as the undisputed power-broker in the Middle East was cemented as Vladimir Putin continued a triumphant tour of capitals traditionally allied to the US and Russian troops entered a hastily evacuated US base in Syria The Russian president, who spent Monday in Saudi Arabia’s crown prince Mohammed bin Salman in Riyadh, landed in the United Arab Emirates on Tuesday morning. He was met at the airport by Abu Dhabi’s powerful Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed Al-Nahyan and fighter jets coloured the sky white blue and red, the colours of the Russian tricolour, as they traveled to the Royal palace.   Mr Putin presented the crown prince with an endangered gyrfalcon bred at a Russian breeding centre in Kyrgyzstan.  It is Mr Putin’s first visit to the UAE since 2007.  Russian and Syrian forces driving near Manbij on Tuesday morning Credit: OMAR SANADIKI/ REUTERS Part of the visit is about business. Russia’s sovereign wealth fund said a dozen agreements worth more than $1.3 billion were to be signed during the visit.  But the visit also underscores an attempt by Russia to strengthen ties with traditional US allies in the Middle East following Donald Trump’s decision last week to pull troops out of Syria.  The move leaves Moscow the decisive military power in Syria, and US allies, including Saudi Arabia and the UAE, are likely to see friendship with Moscow as important if they are to contain regional rivals Iran and Turkey.  Kremlin has worked closely with Iran to prop-up Bashar Assad in Syria, leaving it with valuable diplomatic leverage on either side of the conflict between Tehran and Riyadh.  The shift in power has implications for conflicts in the wider region.  SyriaEasternEuphratesRussia|n PMC inside the US base in Manbij abandoned this morning. pic.twitter.com/II2FI68aBx— MrRevinsky (@Kyruer) October 15, 2019 Mr Putin said he and his opposite numbers were "intensively coordinating in the regional and international issues that are related to the situation in Syria, Libya, Yemen and the situation in the Arab Gulf.” A symbolic confirmation of Russia’s new role as regional power broker came when Russian forces entered a hastily abandoned US base in Syria.  The Russian take over of the base near the strategic town of Manbij was captured by Oleg Blokhin, a veteran war correspondent who has often embedded with the Russian army and private military contractors in Syria, who filmed himself exploring the base on Tuesday morning.  “Good morning everyone from Manbij!” he said in the video. “I’m standing in an American base. There were here just yesterday, and today it is us. Let’s have a look at how they lived here.” In a second video he played with raising and lowering the electronically-operated barrier at a base checkpoint. “It’s all in working order,” he remarked.  Vladimir Putin gave Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan of Abu Dhabi an endangered Gyrfalcon, from a Russian breeding centre in Kyrgyzstan Credit:  Alexei Nikolsky/TASS The American-led coalition later confirmed it had abandoned the area as part of staged a “deliberate withdrawal” from northeast Syria.  “We are out of Manbij,” it said on Twitter.  The move puts Russian troops in a buffer zone between regime forces and Turkish-backed rebels. It is speculated that they may also assume a role separating Kurdish militias from Turkish forces.  Russian and Syrian regime forces moved into strategic border cities in northern Syria after the formerly US-allied Kurdish-led administration of the region struck a deal to halt Turkey’s offensive there. Under the agreement, troops loyal to the Assad government and backed by Russian forces are to secure the border with Turkey, allowing Damascus to regain control of a region it lost nearly ten years ago.  Such an outcome may satisfy Turkey's Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who launched his offensive into Syria on Wednesday last week in a bid to crush the autonomous administration in the area run by the Kurdish YPG, which has links to the banned Turkish Kurdistan Workers Party.  However, in a sign of tensions with Turkey, Mr Putin’s Syria envoy said that Russia considered the Turkish military operation in northern Syria “unacceptable.” Asked whether the Kremlin had given Ankara a green light for the operation in advance, Alexander Lavrentiev said: "No. We had always urged Turkey to show restraint and always considered some kind of military operation on Syrian territory unacceptable."

Wildfires spread through parts of Lebanon, Syria

Wildfires spread through parts of Lebanon on Tuesday after forcing some residents to flee their homes in the middle of the night, while others were stuck inside as the flames reached villages south of Beirut, authorities said. There were no reports of fatalities from the fires — among the worst to hit Lebanon in years. Fire crews were overwhelmed by the flames in the Mount Lebanon region early Tuesday, forcing the Interior Ministry to send riot police with engines equipped with water cannons to help.

Boris Johnson is reportedly very close to agreeing a Brexit deal with the EU

EU sources told Bloomberg that a deal could be concluded as early as Tuesday, with the UK set to agree a new compromise deal.

States are cutting university budgets. Taxpayers aren't interested in funding campus kooks

University campuses have abandoned their central mission in their pursuit of utopia. The American public has had enough.

Jet Fighter Death Match: Russia's MiG-15 vs. America's F-86 Sabre (Who Wins?)

In the end, the Sabre vs. MiG duel made for great newsprint. But much like the Korean War, it ultimately counted for little.

After 30 days, GM-UAW talks suddenly face a deadline. Here's why the clock is ticking

GM's executives have until Thursday to draft a provisional plan that UAW leaders will accept and turn into a tentative agreement for its members.

Ukraine Policy and the ‘Three Amigos’: Impeachment Update

(Bloomberg) -- Investigators in the House impeachment probe of President Donald Trump are questioning George Kent, a State Department official who tried to defend then-U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch against accusations from Rudy Giuliani and others.Here are the latest developments:Top Diplomat Testifies of ‘Three Amigos’ (9:35 p.m.)Read the letter from Jon SaleGeorge Kent, a senior State Department official, told House impeachment investigators on Tuesday that acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney organized a meeting in May after which a team of “three amigos” were designated to bypass formal U.S.-Ukraine policy.Kent did not personally attend that meeting on May 23, but department officials were informed afterward that then-Special Envoy to Ukraine Kurt Volker, Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland, and Energy Secretary Rick Perry, would be in charge of the policy.Neither Secretary of State Michael Pompeo nor other officials who would normally form the diplomatic channels of American foreign policy in Ukraine were to be involved, according to a recounting of Kent’s testimony by Representative Gerald Connolly of Virginia, a senior Democrat on the Oversight and Reform Committee.Connolly added that Kent, a deputy assistant secretary of State, referred to the trio as the “three amigos.”Obstruction Case is Building, Democrat Says (7:15 p.m.)House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff told reporters, “the case for obstruction of Congress continues to build” as three House panels pursue their impeachment investigation.He cited a “complete effort by the administration to stonewall” the probe.Schiff said he expects the committees to release transcripts at some point and to call some witnesses back for open hearings.House Speaker Nancy Pelosi confirmed that the full House won’t vote to formalize the impeachment inquiry at this point, repeating her argument that there is “no requirement” for there to be a floor vote for the investigation to continue.Ex-Lawmaker Cooperating With Giuliani Probe (7:03 p.m.)Former Representative Pete Sessions is cooperating with the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan in its investigation of Giuliani and his associates, his spokesman said Tuesday night.Sessions, a Texas Republican who was defeated for re-election last November, “will be providing documents to their office related to this matter over the next couple of weeks as requested,” according to the spokesman, Matt Mackowiak.Mackowiak said he could not confirm or deny a report in the Wall Street Journal that Sessions, who has been trying to revive his political career, had been subpoenaed for documents relating to the inquiry into the activities in Ukraine of Giuliani, the former New York mayor and Trump’s personal lawyer, and his associates.No Vote Planned Yet on Inquiry, Democrats Say (6:48 p.m.)House Democrats haven’t decided whether to hold a vote on formally authorizing an impeachment investigation, lawmakers said after a closed-door caucus meeting on Tuesday.Representatives Steve Cohen and Alcee Hastings said lawmakers aren’t ruling out such a vote at some later time.Asked whether House Speaker Nancy Pelosi had foreclosed the possibility of ever holding such a vote, Representative Joe Kennedy said: “Certainly not forever.” -- Billy House, Erik WassonPence Rebuffs House Document Requests (5:58 p.m.)Mike Pence’s counsel told House lawmakers in a letter Tuesday that the vice president’s office isn’t cooperating with a request for documents related to the probe of Trump’s relations with Ukraine.“The Office of the Vice President encourages the committees to forgo their request to the Office of the Vice President, or hold it in abeyance, pending your discussion with the White House Counsel’s Office concerning compliance with constitutionally mandated procedures,” Pence’s counsel Matthew Morgan wrote to Democratic Representatives Elijah Cummings, Adam Schiff and Eliot Engel.In the letter, Morgan repeated claims the White House has already made, including that the investigation isn’t legitimate because there hasn’t been a full vote to authorize an impeachment inquiry. -- Billy HouseBudget Office Won’t Provide Ukraine Records (5 p.m.)The White House Office of Management and Budget won’t turn over documents about withholding military aid to Ukraine, said a senior administration official. The House Intelligence, Foreign Affairs and Oversight committees asked the budget office on Oct. 7 to provide the documents by Tuesday.The official also indicated that acting budget director Russell Vought won’t comply with the committees’ request that he testify on Oct. 25. The official said OMB won’t participate in a process the White House views as a sham.The House is looking into whether Trump ordered a delay in military aid to Ukraine to pressure the country to investigate Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden and his son.Earlier Tuesday, Giuliani’s lawyer told the House that the president’s personal attorney will defy a subpoena issued as part of the inquiry.Democrats could go to court to enforce the subpoenas and are talking about re-activating a dormant congressional power to directly impose fines and punishments to enforce subpoenas. -- Billy HouseGiuliani Defies House Subpoena for Documents (3:54 p.m.)Giuliani will not turn over the documents demanded by the House committees leading the impeachment inquiry, according to a letter from Jon Sale, the attorney who represented Giuliani until Tuesday. Sale wrote that the subpoena Giuliani received was “overbroad, unduly burdensome and seeks documents beyond the scope of legitimate inquiry.”“Mr. Giuliani will not participate because this appears to be an unconstitutional, baseless and illegitimate ‘impeachment inquiry,’” Sale’s letter says. “Moreover, documents sought in the subpoena are protected by attorney-client, attorney work-product, and executive privileges.”The letter follows a pattern of stonewalling from the White House, as Trump continues to denounce the impeachment inquiry as a “witch hunt” against him. House committees have, however, secured the testimony of former and current officials by issuing subpoenas to compel them to appear. -- Jordan FabianGiuliani Parts Ways With His Own Attorney (3:16 p.m.)Attorney Jon Sale says he is no longer representing President Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, on impeachment-related matters.Sale said in a brief phone interview that he was hired by Giuliani solely to respond to the Democrats’ subpoena and the task has been completed.“That was the extent of it,” Sale said, adding that the parting was not acrimonious. He said parting at this point was the plan all along.Sale said he sent a letter to Capitol Hill earlier Tuesday responding to the subpoena, but he declined to reveal its contents. Tuesday is the deadline set by the three committees leading the impeachment inquiry for Giuliani to provide documents and records demanded in a subpoena.Giuliani did not immediately respond to a request for comment.ABC News reported that Giuliani said he won’t comply with a congressional subpoena and said “we will see what happens” if Congress tries to enforce it. -- Jordan FabianHouse Democrats Meet Tuesday on Inquiry Plan (2:48 p.m.)Speaker Nancy Pelosi will meet with House Democrats at 6 p.m. Tuesday behind closed doors to discuss their plan for the impeachment inquiry, according to a congressional aide.Congress has been in recess for two weeks and returns to Washington for votes Tuesday evening. Republicans have dismissed the impeachment process as invalid until the full House votes to open the inquiry, although Democrats say that step is unnecessary. -- Erik WassonWhite House Budget Director Asked to Testify (11:23 a.m.)House impeachment investigators asked acting White House budget director Russell Vought to testify on Oct. 25 about the withholding of military assistance to Ukraine and any possible efforts to cover up those actions.Vought, who runs the Office of Management and Budget, was given the request in a letter dated Friday from the chairmen of the House Intelligence, Oversight and Reform, and Foreign Affairs committees.“The committees are investigating the extent to which President Trump jeopardized U.S. national security by pressing Ukraine to interfere with our 2020 election and by withholding a White House meeting with the president of Ukraine and military assistance provided by Congress to help Ukraine counter Russian aggression, as well as any effort to cover up these matters,” states the letter.The chairmen wrote to Vought, “Based upon public reporting and evidence gathered as part of the impeachment inquiry, we believe you may have information relevant to these matters.”The House is investigating whether Trump ordered the aid to be withheld to pressure Ukraine to investigate Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden and his son.The three committees on Oct. 7 had asked OMB for information related to the withholding of military assistance and gave the office a deadline of Tuesday to respond.The budget office on Oct. 3 turned over some documents related to the Ukraine aid to the Appropriations and Budget committees, according to two House Democratic aides. The committees are still reviewing the partial disclosure. -- Billy HouseState Official Kent Arrives for Testimony (19:03 a.m.)Kent arrived Tuesday morning to give testimony behind closed doors to the three House committees conducting the impeachment investigation.The deputy assistant secretary in the European and Eurasian bureau overseeing policy toward Ukraine had warned in emails to colleagues in March that Yovanovitch was the target of a disinformation operation.That message and other documents were turned over to Congress by State Department Inspector General Steve Linick early this month. Copies were obtained by Bloomberg.Yovanovitch was recalled from her post in in May, earlier than expected, after being accused by Giuliani, Trump’s personal lawyer, of trying to undermine the president and blocking efforts to spur an investigation by Ukrainian authorities into Democrats, including former Vice President Joe Biden.In a March 27 email to colleagues, Kent pointed to what he said were holes in one theory against her outlined in a Capitol Hill newspaper column. The column focused on an alleged list of people she gave to Ukraine officials to not prosecute, in order to protect Biden and others.Kent wrote that it was “a totally manufactured/fake list of alleged untouchables.” He said “one key sign of it being fake is that most of the names are misspelled in English -- we would never spell most that way.” -- Billy HouseKey EventsInvestigators heard on Monday from former National Security Council Russia expert Fiona Hill, who left the administration last summer, before the controversial July 25 phone call between Trump and Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy. Republicans objected that she shouldn’t be testifying behind closed doors.This could be a pivotal week in the probe, with at least three other witnesses scheduled to appear before the House Intelligence, Foreign Affairs and Oversight and Reform committees.Trump said on Twitter that the whistle-blower who raised concerns about his July 25 call with Ukraine’s president “must testify” to explain why his interpretation of the conversation was “sooo wrong, not even close.”\--With assistance from Jack Fitzpatrick, Billy House and Jordan Fabian.To contact the reporters on this story: Billy House in Washington at bhouse5@bloomberg.net;Erik Wasson in Washington at ewasson@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Joe Sobczyk at jsobczyk@bloomberg.net, Laurie AsséoFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.

For Moscow, a win in Syria but fraught with risks

The withdrawal of US forces from northern Syria was a win for President Vladimir Putin, strengthening Russia's role as the key foreign player in the war-torn country. Russian officials said Tuesday they were working with Turkey to avoid confrontation with pro-regime forces in northern Syria, where Turkish troops have moved in against Kurdish fighters. Syrian government troops -- backed by Russian forces since Moscow launched an intervention in 2015 -- have also moved into the north under a deal reached with the Kurds.

Funeral prank by deceased grandfather leaves mourners laughing

A funeral prank that had a deceased grandfather talking from beyond the grave left mourners laughing.

British paedophile who operated in Malaysia, Cambodia found dead in prison

One of Britain's most prolific child sex offenders, Richard Huckle, has died three years into a life sentence for abusing Malaysian and Cambodian children, Britain's Ministry of Justice said on Monday, with media saying he had been stabbed to death. Huckle, 33, who abused children and babies during a nine year period, was sentenced to life in prison in 2016 after pleading guilty to 71 offences. Dubbed the country's worst paedophile by Britain's media, he was found stabbed to death in prison on Sunday after being attacked with a makeshift knife, the BBC reported.