Qantas urges pilots to agree on pay deal for world’s longest commercial flights

Qantas selected the Airbus A350-1000 as the preferred plane for the new routes to cities including London and New York in the first half of 2023. (Reuters)

Updated 13 February 2020
REUTERS

Airline selected the Airbus A350-1000 as the preferred plane for the new routes to cities
‘Our strong preference is to reach an agreement with our pilots’

SINGAPORE: Australia’s Qantas Airways has urged its pilots to reach agreement on a pay deal for the world’s longest commercial flights or face being replaced for those routes.
The airline selected the Airbus A350-1000 as the preferred plane for the new routes to cities including London and New York in the first half of 2023, but it said that an order for up to 12 jets was contingent on reaching a deal with pilots by March.
In an internal memo seen by Reuters, Qantas International head Tino La Spina said the end of March deadline for a pilot vote on the deal was firm.
“Airbus extended the delivery slots one last time once they knew they were the preferred supplier, but they are not willing to continue their exposure beyond that point,” he said.
Qantas and the Australian and International Pilots Association (AIPA), which represents the pilots, have spent months in talks over a new pay deal.
If a deal is not reached soon, the company will put a pay deal directly to the pilots for a vote even if it does not have the union’s backing. A failure of that vote would result in Qantas forming a new lower-cost pilot group, La Spina said.
“Our strong preference is to reach an agreement with our pilots,” he said in a statement after the memo was sent.
The pay on offer for Qantas A330 pilots who would also be flying the A350 is about 5 percent more than for its Boeing 787 fleet, the memo said.
One of the biggest stumbling blocks between the airline and union has been pay rates for future second officers, the most junior pilots.
Mark Sedgwick, president of the AIPA union representing the pilots, said that the union had proven willing to negotiate with the company, citing a recent agreement for short-haul pilots.
“Unfortunately, the approach that Qantas is now showing publicly has been a characteristic of the long-haul discussions and shows how this business would apparently prefer ultimatums to building consensus at this critical juncture,” he said in a statement.

Palestinian PM: Trump’s Mideast plan ‘will be buried’

In this April 16, 2019 file photo, Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh gives an interview with The Associated Press, at his office in the West Bank city of Ramallah. The Palestinian prime minister lashed out Sunday at US President Donald Trump’s proposal to end the Mideast conflict, saying it would be “buried very soon.”(AP)

MUNICH: The Palestinian prime minister lashed out Sunday at US President Donald Trump’s proposal to end the Mideast conflict, saying it would be “buried very soon.”
Speaking at the Munich Security Conference, Mohammad Shtayyeh said the US plan was “no more than a memo of understanding between (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu and Trump.”
Shtayyeh criticized the fact that the proposal would leave a future Palestinian state fragmented and with “no sovereignty,” allowing Israel to annex large parts of the West Bank. He urged other countries to reject the Trump proposal while maintaining that Palestinians “are open to serious negotiations.”
Shtayyeh suggested the Palestinians would seek to increase pressure on Israel through international organizations, citing the recent release by the UN human rights office of a list of more than 100 companies allegedly complicit in violating Palestinian human rights by operating in Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank.
Referring to the upcoming Israeli election, Shtayyeh said the difference between Israeli opposition leader Benny Gantz and Netanyahu was “not more than the difference between Coca-Cola and Pepsi Cola.”

Africa: How Climate Climate Change Contributes to Insecurity



Photo: Pixabay
...

14 FEBRUARY 2020
allAfrica.com

By Jerry Chifamba

Cape Town — In this allAfrica explainer we delve into the relationship between climate change and conflict on the continent

Levels of poverty, economic opportunities, and unemployment are key factors increasing the likelihood of conflict, and there is strong agreement that climate change is a major driver of violent conflict, according to the Institute for Security Studies. Climate affects the risk of violence within countries, and as global temperatures climb, the risk of armed conflict is expected to increase substantially, reports IPS.

But some of the biggest uncertainties are about how and why. Whether it's because climate change may cause economic shocks in the aftermath of a disaster or leads to failure of agriculture productivity, it all comes down to three things: civil war is a lot more likely when the economy takes a downturn; the economy is more likely to take a downturn when the agricultural sector is not productive; and the agricultural sector will likely be unproductive when temperatures are high and rainfall low, according to a UN report.

Ferrial Adam, an environmental justice activist who has been in the sector for about 15 years and is presently working on her PhD that looks at how people can use science to fight their environmental struggles says there's a link between climate change and violent conflict. "It's very clear that climate change is affecting the most vulnerable communities and as vulnerable communities are forced to find more water and food, that leads to violent conflict. So they'll be localised conflict but I also think that in the future we could probably see more conflict between countries over water and food," she said.

West Africa

Nigeria is one of the countries really feeling the impact of climate change, with sea levels rising while Lake Chad is shrinking, and desertification advancing rapidly. Repeated conflicts among nationals of different countries over control of the remaining water in the drying lake contributes to insecurity in the region.

Conflict between Nigerian herdsmen and farmers dates back decades, according to the International Crisis Group, but escalated drastically in recent years as climate change is driving herders south into Nigeria's central farmland. The years-long battle over land between herdsmen from the Fulani people and farmers in the central region known as the Middle Belt has grown dramatically. The root of the conflict lies in the forced southern migration, owing to drought, of herdsmen from their traditional grazing grounds, mostly in the northeast of Nigeria.

Now the nomadic Fulani herdsmen are in constant search for water holes and grasslands for their cattle, and due to land scarcity, herders are permanently relocating to areas that are already inhabited by farmers in southern Nigeria. Fulani herdsmen and Bachama farmers must now compete over scarce fertile land, furthering tension and violence between the two groups. But this migration into the savannah and rainforest of the Middle Belt did not just increase pressure on the land and pave the way for the conflict, but also created an opening for militant groups to establish themselves in areas around the Lake Chad Basin.

Southern Africa

Between January and April 2019, the region faced several weather-related phenomena such as tropical cyclones, Idai and Kenneth, which caused extensive flooding in countries such as Madagascar, Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania and Zimbabwe.

Cyclone Idai, recorded as one of the worst tropical storms to ever affect Africa and the southern hemisphere, claimed hundreds of lives and left a trail of destruction, including severe damage to key infrastructure such as roads, bridges, schools and clinics. There are allegations of sexual exploitation of Cyclone Idai victims by local officials in the affected areas as hunger and destruction caused by the cyclone left hundreds of thousands of women and children vulnerable to abuse.

According to Oxfam, parts of Zimbabwe had their lowest rainfall since 1981 which has helped push more than 5.5 million people into extreme food insecurity. Meanwhile, Zambia's rich maize-growing area were decimated and exports are now banned, with over 2.3 million people left food insecure. The situation is worsening including in Angola, Malawi, Mozambique, Madagascar, Namibia, and Zimbabwe.

East Africa

Climate change is taking a toll right across the Horn of Africa, with increasingly erratic weather and low rainfall common in Kenya, Somalia, Uganda and Ethiopia. According to the U.N., more than 2.5 million people in Somalia were forced from their homes by drought and insecurity in recent years and many are now at risk of starvation. Militants also exploited climate crises to win legitimacy and Al Shabaab learned to take advantage of natural disasters by helping victims and legitimizing its power, writes Thomson Reuters Foundation.

In South Sudan, frequent droughts have disrupted rural livelihoods and exacerbated local conflicts between communal groups. Historically, violent conflicts between pastoral communities have been a recurring phenomenon in the region according to the Institute for Security Studies. Living under harsh environmental conditions and being frequently exposed to droughts, the region's people often fought over livestock and the access to water and grazing land. Communal conflicts in South Sudan killed thousands and displaced more. They've also impeded trade and agriculture, causing famines and crippling the local economy. Experts are becoming increasingly attentive to the role of climate change and more erratic weather conditions as an aggravating factor in the South Sudanese context.

On October 30, the government of South Sudan declared a state of emergency across 27 flood-affected areas. Floods are a seasonal and acute problem in South Sudan but they were unusually heavy in this rainy season, according to MSF, already present in several flood-affected areas. At least 800,000 - 900,000 people are estimated to have been impacted by the floods.

Adam says climate change is already causing localised conflicts in Kenya.

"When we were in north-east of Kenya, we were doing a bit of work in that area and we were driving past a man who had been fishing and had a rifle and so we stopped and asked why he needed a rifle. He said I have a gun for protection because people want to steal my fish from me. So that's some kind of conflict where people steal food from each other. If you look at the general picture of someone who's fishing, they are not working with guns and here was a guy with a rifle and he wasn't the only one. We went to interview some fishermen at the river and it was sunset and as we got there, they were all leaving and weren't interested in answering our questions. When we asked them why they were leaving, they said that it's because there are snipers from across the river who would shoot at them and then try to steal their fish. So it's actually happening right now," Adams said.

Adams said water scarcity in East Africa is already fueling conflict between countries too.

"So one of the things is Ethiopia wants to build a dam which is upstream from Kenya and it'll affect the water that flows into Kenya so really there's some anger rising between people in Kenya and people in Ethiopia. They make it a national issue, creating conflict between countries," Adam said.

But there's opportunity to respond to the threat ...

Acknowledging this, African countries came up with mitigation and adaptation strategies, including the idea of the Great Green Wall project, an African-led movement with an epic ambition to grow an 8,000km natural wonder of the world across the entire width of Africa.

Incredibly, the Great Green Wall - or some form of it - appears to be working. Since the birth of the initiative in 2007, and roughly 15% underway, the initiative is already bringing life back to Africa's degraded landscapes at an unprecedented scale, providing food security, jobs and a reason to stay for the millions who live along its path.

The Rwanda Green Fund signed an agreement with the Global Alliance for Smart Cities and Smart Villages in Africa to develop Rwandan villages into "smart green villages" in a bid to build communities' resilience to climate change. "In the Smart Green Village, we will bring all sustainable principles including low carbon gas emissions and energy efficiency. At this stage we are bringing model houses that are affordable with components of raw materials that are sustainable and that can be sourced and manufactured locally," said Hubert Ruzibiza, the Chief Executive Officer of the Rwanda Green Fund.

Nigeria's President Muhammadu Buhari announced robust plans and initiatives by his administration to reverse the negative effects of climate change in Nigeria. The plans were revealed in his address to the United Nations Climate Action Summit with the theme, "A Race We Can Win. A Race We Must Win."

In the water sector, Buhari said that Nigeria would issue a green bond for irrigation and construct multi-purpose dams for power, irrigation and water supply. He further pledged that his administration would strengthen solid and liquid waste management systems to attract more private sector investors, adding that "we will take concrete steps to harness climate innovative ideas by including youth in the decision-making processes as part of our overall climate governance architecture. We will mobilize Nigerian youth towards planting 25 million trees to enhance the country's carbon sink".

Prioritizing climate change, particularly as a national security concern, will assist the Nigerian government in mitigating a conflict that has such deep roots in the environment. Buhari's seven-point plans reiterates commitment to concrete actions towards the Paris Agreement goals. The importance of the president's speech in front of the whole world leaves Nigeria with no other option than to lead the way, writes Mohamed Yahya, Resident Representative, UNDP Nigeria.

In Zambia, President Edgar Lungu said climate change threatens to derail Zambia's economy, and disruptions to the rainy season have already dampened its outlook. The southern African country hopes to minimize the impact of climate change by increasing its reliance on renewable energy.

In Ghana, the government plans to replace its old "trotro" buses' engines with newer versions which produce lower emissions and formalise waste collection in informal settlements as part of a new plan to help its crowded capital withstand climate change and disasters.

Adams said governments across the continent need to do more.

"We've been telling [governments] since 2006 that they need ... renewable energy and governments have not listened and part of the reason is, I think some of them have vested interests in coal mining. It's not just about the coal mining but the areas that they're planning to mine is the waterbed - which is very important in terms of our water resources. So governments has been short sighted in the sense that we don't have water forever and we need to protect the water that we do have. Secondly, they don't seem to understand that coal is going to bring more greenhouse gas emissions that affects climate change as a whole; and mining the coal will pollute our water. So they obviously say one thing at an international meetings but when it comes down to action, they're doing the opposite," she said.

Communities need to start a climate conversation and unite for bold climate action.

"I think people are not directly using the term climate change. They are experiencing the impact and they're putting it in different words and descriptions because they are unable to explain in detail, the impact that they are having. Whether it's a small fisher or a farmer, they'll tell you, well I used to plant on this day but now I have to change it to this month. So there's definite awareness in that regard but they have not said this is climate change. But we have a lot of work to do with regards to education and awareness on climate change," Adam said.


INTERVIEW

By Jerry Chifamba


Cape Town — Levels of poverty, economic opportunities, and unemployment are key factors increasing the likelihood of conflict, and there has been strong agreement that climate change, is a major driver of violent conflict. Climate has affected the risk of violence within countries, and as global temperatures climb, the risk of armed conflict is expected to increase substantially. But some of the biggest uncertainties are about how and why.

AllAfrica's Jerry Chifamba spoke with Ferrial Adam, an environmental justice activist who has been in the sector for about 15 years. She is presently working on her PhD that looks at how people can use science to fight their environmental struggles.


Q: In your research and experience can you draw the link - if any - between climate change and conflict?

It's very clear that climate change is affecting the most vulnerable communities and as vulnerable communities are forced to find more water and food, that leads to violent conflict. So they'll be localised conflict but I also think that in the future we could probably see conflict between countries around water and food.

One example is when we were in north-east of Kenya, we were doing a bit of work in that area and we were driving past a man who had been fishing and had a rifle and so we stopped and asked why he needed a rifle. He said I have a gun for protection because people want to steal my fish from me. So that's some kind of conflict where people steal food from each other. If you look at the general picture of someone who's fishing, they are not working with guns and here was a guy with a rifle and he wasn't the only one. We went to interview some fishermen at the river and it was sunset and as we got there, they were all leaving and weren't interested in answering our questions. When we asked them why they were leaving, they said that it's because there are snipers from across the river who would shoot at them and then try to steal their fish. So it's actually happening right now.

So one of the things is Ethiopia wants to build a dam which is upstream from Kenya and it'll affect the water that flows into Kenya so really there's some anger rising between people in Kenya and people in Ethiopia. They make it a national issue, creating conflict between countries.

If you remember the riots that happened in Mozambique some years ago, it was also because of increased bread prices, so I think that as food becomes more expensive because of the impact of climate change, whether it's drought or floods. That definitely could lead to more unrest.

Q: How do you foresee these challenges playing out in future. In terms of government's role in managing climate change and conflict?

There's no doubt that these challenges are going to get worse, we'll probably see a lot more water wars, food wars. Which is Part of the reason for the Arab Spring was related to increase to the food prices. If we look at what Trump is doing in terms of holding other countries accountable or holding them to ransom because they won't sign a particular agreement, I think we'll find more and more of that happening.

I think that in the future, citizens will start to hold their governments accountable for the decisions that they make around climate change. So government will become more mindful of the decisions that they make because the ordinary citizen is not going to vote them in depending on what their choices are regarding the impact of climate change.

The Eastern Cape is part of South Africa that's been experiencing extreme drought. And there's conflict because of the water shortages in the sense that firstly it becomes a class issue so for the middle class, they just go walk and buy bottled water but for the poor, it's harder to do that.

And also with corruption you've got government then giving tenders to people who have water tanks to go and give water to particular areas but then people are doing it according to their friends and political party alliances. Or what they are doing is when government builds infrastructure they break it down again so that they can continue getting contracts to go out and give people water via trucks.

Even if you look at the Gift of the Givers going to drill boreholes so that people can get water, there was all that kind of conflict going, where there was an element of government corruption because they want something from you and so that caused quite a bit of a stir. The good thing is Gift of the Givers don't stand for that, and they made it quite public so I gathered that the politicians backed down a bit.

We've been telling since 2006 that they needed to go to renewable energy and government have not listened and part of the reason is, I think some of them have vested interests in coal mining. It's not just about the coal mining but the areas that they're planning to mine is the waterbed which is very important in terms of our water resources. So government has been short sighted in the sense that we don't have water forever and we need to protect the water that we do have.


The second part is that they don't seem to understand that coal is going to bring more gas emission that affects climate change as a whole; and mining the coal will pollute our water. So they obviously say one thing at an international meeting but when it comes down to action, they're doing everything opposite.

Q: Is the continent aware of climate change and it's impact now and the future?

I think people are not directly using the term climate change. They are experiencing the impact and they're putting it in different words and descriptions because they are unable to explain in detail, the impact that they are having. Whether it's a small fisher or a farmer, they'll tell you, well I used to plant on this day but now I have to change it to this month. So there's definite awareness in that regard but they have not said this is climate change. But we have a lot of work to do with regards to education and awareness on climate change.

---30---

Energy Markets Need Winter, and Climate Change Is Taking It Away

SPOILER ALERT:

“It’s unfortunate that we’re making all this LNG that’s not worth very much around the world,”

 Corey Grindal, senior vice president of supply at Cheniere Energy Inc.

Bloomberg February 9, 2020


(Bloomberg) -- Even before the deadly virus struck, another menace confronted the global energy industry: the warmest winter anyone can remember.

Russia’s winter was so balmy that snow was trucked into downtown Moscow for New Year, and bears came out of hibernation. In Japan, ski competitions were canceled and the Sapporo Snow Festival had to borrow snow.
On the shores of Lake Michigan, Chicago residents watched playgrounds and beaches disappear under the waves as warm weather swelled the water level. Norwegians basked in T-shirts in January. London’s spring daffodils have already flowered.

For global energy markets it’s a disaster—and as the world continues to get hotter it’s something producers, traders and government treasuries will have to live with long after the acute dislocation of the coronavirus has passed. The industry relies on cold weather across the northern hemisphere to drive demand for oil and gas to heat homes and workplaces in the world’s most advanced economies.

Climate activists might find a certain poetic justice in energy markets suffering from the global warming caused by fossil fuels. Burning natural gas, oil and other fuels to heat homes and businesses accounts for as much as 12% of the greenhouse-gas emissions blamed for raising the world’s temperatures.

The loss in global oil demand due to mild temperatures is probably about 800,000 barrels a day in January, according to Gary Ross, chief investment officer of Black Gold Investors LLC and founder of oil consultant PIRA Energy. That’s the equivalent of knocking out Turkey’s entire consumption. The natural gas market has taken a similar hit.

“The oversupply keeps coming and winter so far hasn’t really showed up,” said Ron Ozer, chief investment officer of Statar Capital LLC, an energy-focused hedge fund in New York.

Last month was the hottest January ever in Europe, the Copernicus Climate Change Service reported. Surface temperatures were 3.1 degrees Celsius (5.6 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than average.

Northern Europe was particularly hot, with some areas from Norway to Russia more than 6 degrees above the 1981-2010 January average. Temperatures in Tokyo took until Feb. 6 to hit freezing point, the latest date on record. Globally, the last five years have been the hottest for centuries, as greenhouse gases change the Earth’s ecosystem.

Natural gas prices have collapsed globally as the weather crimped the need for heating. U.S. futures are trading at the lowest levels for this time of the year since the 1990s. Asian spot prices for liquefied natural gas have crashed to a record as demand slumps in the world’s three biggest importers—Japan, South Korea and China.

Based on weather-driven demand data, the U.S. and Asia are having their warmest winters on record and Europe is having its second warmest, according to Joe Woznicki, a meteorologist for Commodity Weather Group LLC. A key measure of heating demand, known as heating degree days, is 12% below the 10-year average in the U.S., 14% lower in Asia and 13% in Europe.

And it’s not just markets that are reeling. It’s also an issue for government treasuries. Russia, for example, relies on its oil and gas companies for around 40% of budget revenues.

Oil exports have been holding steady, but gas exports are dropping. Sergei Kapitonov, gas analyst at Moscow-based Skolkovo Energy Center, estimates Gazprom’s exports to Europe and Turkey fell in January by about a quarter from a year earlier. Gazprom stock is down 11% this year.

The collapse in oil prices—spurred by the coronavirus but pushed along by the warm weather—prompted Saudi Arabia to press its OPEC+ allies for a production curb. Three days of wrangling in Vienna didn’t produce a clear result, but it’s a reminder that the kingdom can’t run its state finances with oil prices in freefall. From Algeria to Venezuela, similar dynamics are in play.

This year’s especially warm winter was triggered by events in the Arctic. An intense weather pattern there kept the cold locked in the Arctic region, leaving North America and Eurasia relatively mild.

“When the winds are stronger they act as a barrier to keep Arctic air focused over the pole and keeps them from spilling southward,” said Bradley Harvey, a meteorologist with Maxar in Gaithersburg, Maryland. “That is likely to continue for the balance of the month and even into March.”

Rain patterns have also been unusual—and that’s added to volatility too. In Norway, the biggest source of electricity comes from running water through turbines. The wettest January since records began turned a deficit of water in reservoirs in December to a huge surplus in January—and sent prices crashing in the Nordic power market.

The abnormal winter could hardly have come at a worse time for the U.S. gas market, which is already suffering a glut. U.S. shale drillers have delivered two years of unprecedented production growth and in the Permian Basin of West Texas and New Mexico there’s so much gas—the byproduct of drilling for oil—that producers are even paying to get rid of it.

Europe and Asia were set to become important export outlets for American gas. Then the weather changed.

“It’s unfortunate that we’re making all this LNG that’s not worth very much around the world,” Corey Grindal, senior vice president of supply at Cheniere Energy Inc., said.
\

Could a Michael Bloomberg and Hillary Clinton joint ticket actually happen? Here's what we know

In news that could only seem at home in the bizarre​ ye​ar that is 2020, former New York mayor Mike Bloomberg is reportedly considering Hillary Clinton as a possible vice presidential running mate.

A report said the 78-year-old thinks a ticket of him and the 2016 Democratic nominee would be a “formidable force”.

The Drudge Report, which was the first news organisation to reveal Bill Clinton’s affair with Monica Lewinsky more than two decades ago, said sources within the Bloomberg campaign reported he was even considering changing his official address from New York to Colorado or Florida, because the constitution said a candidate and their running mate ought not to live in the same state.

At the moment, the Democratic Party is in a bit of a mess. It’s not quite clear whether, after three years of Trump, it has a candidate who can beat him in November. The lack of clear frontrunner – as Pete Buttigieg and Bernie Sanders jostle for first place – is making people nervous.

So how likely is a Bloomberg-Clinton ticket?

Bloomberg isn’t polling hugely well right now, so the idea of him winning the Democratic nomination is a long shot. He’s come under fire for defending the “stop and frisk” policing policy which is widely considered to be racist.

Though as a billionaire he’d be rich enough to run as an independent, but it’s unlikely that Clinton – who has been a Democrat for decades – would abandon the party as it could split the vote and hand Trump an easy win. He’s gone on the record to say that he wouldn’t do this because it would split the anti-Trump vote.

Clinton and Bloomberg have been very complimentary about each other in the past, with the businessman endorsing her in 2016 and Clinton saying she “loves” him.

But Bloomberg’s camp has downplayed the reports.

Bloomberg communication director Jason Schechter said in a statement:

We are focused on the primary and the debate, not VP speculation.

So if you’re a Clinton fan, maybe don’t get your hopes up for a political return just yet.

Still, we hope Trump at least tweets about it...

Smugglers are reportedly helping migrants scale sections of Donald Trump’s multi-billion border wall using $5 ladders.

US Border Patrol has seen a rise in camouflage “hook-and-ladders” within the far south-west region of Texas since May last year, according to The El Paso Times.


El Paso’s urban stretch of border is said to be littered with the ladders, which are engineered out of rebar and match the rust brown colours of the wall.

“Somebody is making money off those ladders,” agent Joe Romero told the newspaper. “The agents pulled it off the wall and cut it up so it can’t be used again.”

The redbar ladders began appearing in large numbers once construction of a replacement wall in El Paso was finished last May. According to Border Patrol, illegal crossings have increased ever since.

Migrants clash with authorities as they seek to cross the US border
Show all 23





“We’re starting to see a lot of evading activity,” said Agent Ramiro Cordero. “We’re starting to see the criminal organisations working hand-to-hand on either side to avoid detection. More and more we are seeing ‘failure to yields’ — they are utilising ladders to go over the fence and diversionary tactics.”

Border Patrol apprehensions of single adults — those most likely to use the ladder method — have nearly doubled in the El Paso sector.

From October 2019 through January 2020, Border Patrol apprehended 10,030 adults, compared with 5,150 in the same period a year ago.

The ladders appear to be made by hand from two poles of 3/8-inch rebar and four thinner poles, fitted with steps and bent over at the end in a ‘U’ shape to hook on the top of the wall.

The El Paso Times reports smugglers could be sourcing the rebar from a local hardware store in Ciudad Juarez, a Mexican city just south of El Paso, where six metres of the material costs roughly $5.30 (£4).

To date, almost 100 miles of border have been built under the Trump administration, mostly to replace and improve existing barriers.

Mr Trump’s campaign promised that Mexico would pay for the wall, but thus far the almost $10bn (£7.7bn) budget has come from taxpayer money.

The president has proposed spending an additional $2bn for border wall construction.

A total 450 miles of the barrier is expected to be completed by the end of this year.

Trump set to divert billions more to border wall from military budget


President hoping to make progress on signature campaign promise ahead of election in November

Donald Trump is expected to divert billions of dollars more to building the border wall that he repeatedly claimed would be paid for by Mexico.

While his 2021 budget proposals, to be unveiled this week, will request $2 billion for the anti-immigration barrier, less than in previous years, the homeland security department could take billions more from the Pentagon, according to reports.

CNN also reported a senior defence official saying a major announcement on the wall would be made this week.

A "big, beautiful" wall was one of the centerpieces of Mr Trump's 2016 campaign, one which he repeatedly promised would be paid for by Mexico – which has flatly refused to do so.

Congress is responsbile for government spending but the president's priorities will be seen as politically significant ahead of his reelection bid in November.

As well as money for the border wall, he is expected to propose up to $4.6 billion in spending cuts over the next 10 years, much of it from programmes like Medicaid, disability insurance and food stamps.

Government data seen by the Washington Post suggested the Trump administration was a long way from completing the 500 miles of new barriers the president had promised would be in place by 2021.

Most of what has been built is considered to be replacement fencing because building new sections of wall often requires the acquisition of private land.

Homeland security officials have said they will have 450 miles either finished or under construction by the end of 2020.

Last year the president took $2.5 billion from the military budget's anti-drug programme for the wall.

This year that figure could be much higher, with the Washington Post claiming as much as $7.2 billion could be diverted from the Pentagon help build the wall.

The controversial barrier has suffered a series of embarrassments, with videos showing people easily scaling the new sections and part of it being blown over in high winds last month.

Trump pushed CIA to find, kill Osama bin Laden's son over higher priority targets


WASHINGTON — When intelligence officials briefed President Donald Trump on the most worrisome terrorist threats during the first two years of his tenure, they regularly mentioned the names of the senior terror figures the CIA was working hardest to find and kill, including the leader of al Qaeda, Ayman al-Zawahri. 

© Evan Vucci Image: President Donald Trump speaks at a White House summit on Dec. 12, 2019.

Trump would ultimately greenlight successful strikes on ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and Yemeni al Qaeda chief Qasim al-Rimi — perhaps the most significant names on the CIA list of potential U.S. targets.


But he was more interested in a young and less influential figure much farther down the list, according to two people familiar with the briefings, because he recognized the name.

"He would say, 'I've never heard of any of these people. What about Hamza bin Laden?'" one former official said.

"That was the only name he knew," a Pentagon official added.

Although Osama bin Laden's youngest son was not believed to be planning attacks, the U.S. ultimately carried out an airstrike that killed him in 2018, according to current and former officials familiar with the matter. At first, officials weren't sure of his fate, but in July, NBC News was the first to report that U.S. officials believed he was dead.

An examination of the process that led to the strike against Hamza bin Laden puts a spotlight on how Trump has approached what is among the most weighty responsibilities of the U.S. president in the post 9/11 era: deciding which of America's enemies should be marked for death. 

 

© CIA via AP file Image: Hamza Bin Laden in a video released by the CIA in 2017.

Trump's recent decision to target Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani — in the face of intelligence suggesting that Iran would seek to retaliate for the Quds Force commander's death by killing Americans — illustrates the high stakes nature of such decisions. Improvements in weaponry and in the technology for finding targets have given this president lethal options his predecessors never had, but the greater freedom of action can make the decisions tougher.

Yet Trump — who doesn't read or digest detailed intelligence assessments, according to current and former officials — says he operates on instinct. "I have a gut, and my gut tells me more sometimes than anybody else's brain can ever tell me," he said in answer to a question about the economy during a November 2018 interview.

"The president's highest priority is keeping Americans safe," said a senior administration official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "He and his administration have successfully targeted the most dangerous and deadly terrorists in the world in order to protect the American people, including Hamza bin Laden, al-Baghdadi, Qassem Soleimani, and Qasim al-Rimi. These and countless other measures that have removed dozens of high value targets exemplify this administration's resolve to defeat terrorism."

The successful strike on al-Rimi, the leader of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, was announced by the White House on Feb. 7. He and Baghdadi, the ISIS leader killed in a U.S. commando raid that Trump authorized in October 2019, were at or near the top of every intelligence priority list, officials say.

But former CIA official Douglas London, who led an agency unit targeting senior terrorists in 2018, says that what he called Trump's "obsession" with bin Laden's son "is one example of the president's preference for a 'celebrity' targeted killing versus prioritizing options that could prove better for U.S. security."

In a piece for the website JustSecurity.com, which London says was reviewed and deemed unclassified by the CIA, he wrote, "CIA had not overlooked the value in Hamza's name recognition, nor his musings posted by al Qaeda's media cell, but he was young, lacked battlefield experience, and had yet to develop a serious following."

https://www.justsecurity.org/68072/the-president-his-relationship-with-intelligence-and-the-soleimani-strike/

Few if any counterterrorism experts argue that Hamza bin Laden was not a lawful target. He was urging attacks on Americans on behalf of a terror group with which the U.S. is at war, and he was seen by experts as a possible future al Qaeda leader.

But the CIA assessment at the time was that he was not next in the line of succession, and was not a top threat, according to London and other U.S. intelligence officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity. 

 

© SITE via AFP - Getty Images file Image: Ayman al-Zawahri gives a eulogy for fellow al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in a video released on jihadist forums on June 8

"Despite intelligence assessments showing the greater dangers posed by Zawahiri … and the unlikelihood Hamza was in the immediate line of succession, the president thought differently," London wrote. "He regularly demanded updates on Hamza and insisted we accelerate our efforts to go after him."

Trump's wishes "necessarily influenced the alignment of the Intelligence Community's focus and resources," London wrote, in an unusual peek behind the scenes into the secret process of targeting terrorists.

London suggested that politics may have been a factor in Trump's decision-making.

"It was not lost on us working the issue that the president pressed hardest for results in the run-up to the 2018 midterm elections," he wrote.

The Pentagon, the Department of State and various intelligence agencies had input into the process of nominating Hamza bin Laden for lethal action, according to a former senior U.S. official directly familiar with the matter.

But Hamza bin Laden was not a top priority until Trump's exhortations influenced the extent to which the CIA devoted scarce manhunting resources to tracking him, according to London's account.
Exile in Iran

For a long time, Hamza bin Laden was an afterthought.

In the wake of 9/11 when the U.S. invaded Afghanistan, he was among bin Laden's family members who made their way to Iran, where he lived for a number of years, some of them in detention, intelligence officials say.

But in August 2015, al-Zawahri appeared in a video and introduced the younger bin Laden, calling him "a lion from the den of al Qaeda."

Bin Laden didn't appear in the video but said in an audio-only portion, "What America and its allies fear the most is that we take the battlefield from Kabul, Baghdad and Gaza to Washington, London, Paris and Tel Aviv, and to take it to all the American, Jewish and Western interests in the world."

 

© Ali Mohammadi Image: Protesters hold a photo of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani during a demonstration in Tehran on Jan. 3, 2020.

He quickly became a fixture in al Qaeda messages, and counterterrorism officials took notice. The news media began reporting on the possibility that he was being groomed as a future terror leader. After the death of the senior bin Laden at the hands of Navy SEALs in Pakistan, and amid the rise of the Islamic State militant group or ISIS, al Qaeda was struggling for relevance.

By the time of his father's death, officials believed Hamza bin Laden had relocated to the Afghanistan-Pakistan region.

Still, during the Obama administration, there was little focus on Hamza bin Laden, three former senior officials said. He did not figure in intelligence assessments about the terror threat.

"I don't remember a single meeting at which we focused on Hamza bin Laden," said Joshua Geltzer, who was the top counterterrorism official on the National Security Council until early in the Trump administration.

"He had the name but he didn't have a lot of working relationships with people, and he didn't have battlefield experience," a former senior counterterrorism official added.

In November 2017, the CIA released documents seized in the bin Laden operation, including a video of Hamza bin Laden's wedding to the daughter of 9/11 hijacker Mohamed Atta.
Fox News features Hamza

Trump was president by then, and the video prompted a spate of television coverage. Fox News, a favored source of information for the president, devoted significant airtime to the release of the CIA documents and the video of the younger bin Laden.

Inside the U.S. government — and among U.S. allies, according to a senior Western intelligence official — there was heightened concern that Hamza bin Laden could refresh al Qaeda's ailing brand.

But there was no evidence he was involved in attacks or even inspiring them, experts say.

"It is not clear at all that Hamza presented an actual serious threat of inspiring attacks," said Seth Jones, a counterterrorism expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies who advises the U.S. government.

But Jones said he believes Hamza bin Laden was a justifiable target.

Nonetheless, he said, "I can't remember a case where I've seen an interrogation of a terrorist who said he was inspired by Hamza bin Laden."

In March of last year, the U.S. government announced a $1 million reward for information helping to locate Hamza bin Laden. There was a consensus that such a step was warranted, officials said.

Still, the size of the reward was telling. It paled in comparison to the $10 million offered for senior al Qaeda operative Saif al-Adel, or the $25 million the U.S. had once offered for the senior bin Laden.

"Hamza bin Laden is wanted for questioning in connection with his membership in the al Qaeda organization and his public declarations threatening the security of the United States," the wanted poster said.

But by then, officials now believe, Hamza bin Laden was already dead.

Al Qaeda leader al-Zawahri and his top lieutenants are believed to be very much alive.

Trump Sparks Outrage by Quoting Emerson to Refer to Himself as 'the King'

Daniel Politi

President Donald Trump gleefully quoted a New York Times article that had a headline calling the president “stained in history.” But the important part for the president was not the headline, but the lead of the article that cited a Ralph Waldo Emerson quote about going after the “king.” Even though the piece by Peter Baker was published two weeks ago, Trump quoted it on Twitter Saturday, with some eyebrow-raising changes. 

© SAUL LOEB/Getty Images President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump board Air Force One prior to departure from Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on February 14, 2020. SAUL LOEB/Getty Images

“Ralph Waldo Emerson seemed to foresee the lesson of the Senate impeachment trial of President Trump. ‘When you strike at a king,’ Emerson famously said, ‘you must kill him,’” read the lead from Baker’s Feb. 1 piece. “Mr. Trump’s foes struck at him but did not take him down.” Writing before senators voted to acquit Trump, Baker wrote that “a triumphant Mr. Trump emerges from the biggest test of his presidency emboldened, ready to claim exoneration and take his case of grievance, persecution and resentment to the campaign trail.”© Provided by Slate

Trump quoted those opening lines but capitalized “king” and changed it from “a king” to “the King.”


Trump also capitalized the word “King” which was capitalized in the NYT story nor in the original Emerson quote.

He also changed it to “the King” from “a king.”— Michelangelo Signorile (@MSignorile) February 15, 2020

The president likening himself to a king quickly drew outrage and the phrase “you are not a king” started trending on Twitter. Many also expressed concern that Trump seemed to confirm his campaign for re-election will be pushed by “grievance, persecution and resentment.”


A few problems with your analogy:

1. YOU ARE NOT A KING

2. Murder is illegal

3. You were still IMPEACHED. That s*** lasts forever.

4. It's not "triumphant" when you hid the witnesses, threatened jurors, and half of them admitted that they knew you were guilty.— BrooklynDad_Defiant! (@mmpadellan) February 15, 2020


YOU ARE NOT A KING!

Me seeing that Trump referred to himself as king: pic.twitter.com/u6y4FCRAdr— Mychal (@mychal3ts) February 15, 2020

Legal experts were also quick to raise concerns about the president’s tweets. “This may be the most sinister tweet Trump has ever posted,” University of Michigan law professor Barbara McQuade wrote. “He is comparing himself with a king and threatening to use his powers for revenge on those who questioned his abuse of power.” The president’s quote came at the end of a week in which he said he had the “legal right” to interfere in criminal cases.

AMERIKA HAS ONLY EVER HAD ONE KING

AND HE HAS LEFT THE BUILDING

Master of false news gives right-wing Americans headlines they believe

TO THE RIGHT WING THEIR OUTRAGE POLITICS ARE ALWAYS; 'JUST A JOKE'


AFP 

Christopher Blair produces false stories he insists are easily identifiable as satire rather than news. His pages can rack up millions of views, and at least part of that audience believes the material is true. 

 

© Eric BARADAT AFP journalist looks at sites that are part of Christopher Blair's "America's Last Line of Defense" network which runs eight websites and five Facebook pages

Blair, 48, runs eight websites and five Facebook pages from his home in the northeastern US state of Maine. He says the claims his articles make are "ridiculous," such as that President Donald Trump's current term could be extended by three years.© Eric BARADAT AFP journalist looks at sites from "America's Last Line of Defense" network set up by Christopher Blair who says he knows what to write for his right-wing "target audience" through years of "being embedded in their world"

But his content is widely shared by people who take it as fact, contributing to the spread of false information online.


Blair -- a self-described "liberal troll" and political activist -- says he knows what to write for his right-wing "target audience" through years of "being embedded in their world."

He does not hold that audience in high regard.

"They live on... fear and hate and misinformation and very specific storylines that everybody knows aren't true except for them," he told AFP.

His content is rife with disclaimers: Satire. Fake news fact-check. Nothing on this page is real.

If someone clicks through to Blair's articles, instead of instantly sharing them based on a headline, the warnings are visible.

But often, it appears that people do not.

Asked why people believe and share the articles, Blair answers: "Confirmation bias."

"These people are told that they're sharing satire, and it doesn't matter," he says. "The truth is no longer important to them. All they care about is holding on to their hate and fear."

The spread of false information is a significant problem in the run-up to the 2020 US elections, but Blair says his readers' minds are already made up, and that his content is "not going to impact the vote."

- 'Hate-filled lies' -

Blair says he previously tried to debate conservatives online, with little success.

"You just get called names and told that you hate America," he says.

So he turned to his current approach. It started out as "trolling for a good laugh," but evolved into an effort to "to teach the truth to those who are otherwise unteachable."

"The people who share our content don't care about the truth. They share 500 things a day, most of which are hate-filled lies. When they share something of ours, there's a chance at accountability," he says.

According to Blair, this takes the form of "a group of a couple hundred trolls" who "patrol the pages," make sure there is "accountability for the people commenting" and tell people they are sharing satire.

"These people, they absolutely do not respond to logic and reason, but they do respond to shame if they're embarrassed by what they've done, by the fact that they've shared" it, he says.

Not everyone agrees that approach is helpful, or harmless.

"This type of content has a pervasive and eroding effect on our shared set of facts, and without that, it's hard to remain a society that can come together and make collective decisions," says Graham Brookie, director of the Atlantic Council's Digital Forensic Research Lab, which focuses on identifying and exposing disinformation.

Of Blair's tactics, Brookie says: "It is a pretty big assumption and risk when much of the audience shares based on headlines and even a highly engaged minority of his audience starts to believe him."

- 'I sleep just fine' -

Blair started "America's Last Line of Defense" -- which now has two regular contributors in addition to him -- in 2016. He was a political blogger at the time, after previously working in home remodeling.

He earns ad revenue from what has become a network of sites -- which he says had 26 million pages views in 2019 -- but declined to specify how much.

"Do I make money from it? Sure," he says. "Am I getting rich and making $300,000 a year? No."

"It's a full-time job."

Enough sites steal and repost Blair's articles without the original satire disclaimers that he now has a system set up with a fact-checker to identify and report them -- another opportunity for accountability, he says.

The process can eventually lead to those copying the content losing their ability to go viral.

Despite the contentious nature of the product, he says there are lines he will not cross, such as saying that the day of an election was changed.

Blair -- who has been dubbed the "godfather of fake news" -- has pulled several articles, including one that said the brother of Democratic congresswoman Ilhan Omar, who is Muslim, was a "9/11 terrorist, or something like that."

"That was a bridge too far," he says.

But other fake claims -- including Omar walking out of a 9/11 memorial service, or former president Barack Obama fleeing to Kenya to avoid prosecution -- are fair game.

Blair's message to critics of his work appears in the "About US" section on his websites.

"If you can seriously read this stuff and think it can be passed off as real to reasonable people, you need to go out, right now, and buy a sense of humor and a clue," it says.

"Keep your poutrage to yourself," it adds, employing a portmanteau of "pouting" and "outrage."

"I sleep just fine."

Why aren’t more Americans working? Fed Chair Powell says blame education and drugs, not welfare. PLAWIUK SAY'S BLAME CAPITALISM

The United States has a problem: The share of American adults who work is low, compared to other developed nations. Economists say this holds the nation back — the economy and wages should grow faster when more people are working.

Experts have been trying to figure out why so many adults remain on the sidelines, especially in a good economy. According to the latest Labor Department data, about 83 percent of American adults in their prime worker years (ages 25-54) are participating in the labor force, meaning they have a job or are actively looking for one. That’s up from a few years ago, but still below the levels of the late 1990s, and way below the rates of Germany, Japan, Canada, France and the United Kingdom.

So what the heck is going on? U.S. senators asked Federal Reserve Chair Jerome H. Powell about labor force participation this week, especially after Powell said getting more people in the labor force is a “national priority.”

In response, Powell told senators to blame the education system and the opioids epidemic, not welfare.

“It isn’t better or more comfortable to be poor and on public benefits now, it’s actually worse than it was,” Powell said.

When Sen. John Neely Kennedy, a Republican from Louisiana, asked Powell if “the richness of our social programs” makes people less inclined to look for work because they can get a government check for not working, Powell dismissed that idea. The vast majority of economists agree with the Fed chair, a Republican who worked for President George H.W. Bush before embarking on a career in private equity and later at the central bank.

“It’s very hard to make that connection, and I’ll tell you why,” Powell told Kennedy. “If you look in real terms, adjusted for inflation, at the benefits that people get, they’ve actually declined, during this period of declining labor force participation.”

Economists across the political spectrum agree with Powell. Since the major bipartisan effort to revamp welfare in 1996, it’s become much harder to receive money from the government unless you are either working or disabled.

“The spirit of what the Fed chair was saying is you can’t blame lagging or declining labor force participation on the welfare benefit system,” said Matt Weidinger, the Rowe fellow in poverty studies at the right-leaning American Enterprise Institute. “Benefits really haven’t been growing. What we have been doing is subsidizing people who go to work.”

Since the 1990s, the United States has focused on expanding tax credits to help the working poor. The catch? People have to be working at least a bit to get the benefits. The Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) only kicks in after your first dollar of pay. Similarly, it has become harder in most states to receive government payments or food stamps (SNAP) for more than a few weeks unless you’re an unemployed adult who is actively looking for work.

A 2018 analysis by economists Hilary Hoynes (University of California at Berkeley) and Diane Whitmore Schanzenbach (Northwestern University) found that “virtually all gains in spending on the social safety net for children since 1990 have gone to families with earnings, and to families with income above the poverty line.”

“The dollars are no longer going to the very bottom,” Hoynes told us. “They’re going higher up the income distribution.”

The benefit that most people think of as welfare is now known as Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, or TANF. The typical recipient of that program now gets far less than they did in 1996, especially after adjusting for the rising cost of living.

Danilo Trisi, a senior research analyst focusing on child poverty at the left-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, pointed out that U.S. labor force participation has been falling since 2000, but many European nations that have more generous safety nets have seen labor-force participation rise over that same time period.

“International data suggest being more generous when people have a rough time does not decrease labor force participation,” Trisi said. “The fact the U.S. has weak support for people falling on hard times should not be celebrated. It’s a key reason the U.S. has higher child poverty than many of our competitors.”

Johns Hopkins University economist Robert Moffitt said he agrees with Powell that safety net programs do not discourage people from finding work, according to research. He said the one exception might be programs for the elderly or disabled. Moffitt pointed to his 2015 analysis in the journal Demography, which shows that the elderly and disabled receive much higher benefits. His study also found that low earners have seen their benefits decline.

“The U.S. has gotten very stingy on giving support to people who aren’t working,” Moffitt said.

So what is actually keeping U.S. labor force participation rates so low? Many economists say they expected labor participation to fall as baby boomers retire, but that’s a problem many nations face — and U.S. participation remains relatively low even in prime working ages (ages 25 to 54), when retirement shouldn’t be a factor. Others have pointed out it’s really a different problem for men and women. Female labor force participation has edged down since 2000 (although it’s come back a bit lately), but male labor force participation has been falling since the 1950s.

Here’s Powell’s explanation: “It’s a combination of things, no doubt. It is that educational attainment in the United States, which was once the highest, has really fallen relative to our peers. And particularly among lower- and middle-income people, the level of educational attainment has really plateaued. And that’s the key thing for keeping in the labor market these days.”

“I would say the opioid crisis isn’t helping,” he added.

Top economists in the Obama administration put out a big report focusing specifically on this issue in June 2016. They concluded that jobs for men without college degrees are declining and pay has also been falling, making work less attractive.

In many ways, this problem was at the heart of President Trump’s 2016 campaign pitch to aid the “forgotten man.” It’s likely to be a key issue again on the 2020 presidential campaign trail.