Classes move to Vienna as Hungary makes rare decision to oust university

CEU opens Austria campus as Orbán’s government strips it of ability to issue US degrees

A trumpet fanfare, a wine reception and celebratory speeches, but alongside it all, an undertone of melancholy: the opening of Central European University’s Vienna campus on Friday also marked the first time for decades that a university has been forced out of a European country.

CEU, founded by the billionaire financier and philanthropist George Soros in 1991, has provided free or cheap English-language graduate education in Budapest to thousands of students from eastern Europe and beyond, and is regarded as one of the best universities in the region.

But the Hungarian government has revoked CEU’s ability to issue US-accredited degrees in the country, leading to the exodus to Vienna. The university fell victim to a sustained campaign against Soros by Hungary’s far-right prime minister, Viktor Orbán, who has painted the Hungarian-born Soros as the mastermind of a plan to destroy Europe with liberal values and increased migration.

“There’s no other university in Europe or the US that has been forced out on the political whim of a leader,” said CEU’s rector, Michael Ignatieff, in an interview prior to the ceremony. He said the lack of support from Donald Trump’s administration for a US institution under attack abroad could have serious consequences for US universities across the globe.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/nov/16/ceu-classes-move-to-vienna-orban-hungary-ousts-university

And then the country has a trump appointed ambassador that shouldn't be in charge of toothpaste sitting over there....................


And I just wonder what the Hungarians think that not to far back in there collective past they had communists doing the same thing as this Orban character now running the country and he is a fan favorite of Putin.................

The great American tax haven: why the super-rich love South Dakota

It’s known for being the home of Mount Rushmore – and not much else. But thanks to its relish for deregulation, the state is fast becoming the most profitable place for the mega-wealthy to park their billions.

By Oliver Bullough

Late last year, as the Chinese government prepared to enact tough new tax rules, the billionaire Sun Hongbin quietly transferred $4.5bn worth of shares in his Chinese real estate firm to a company on a street corner in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, one of the least populated and least known states in the US. Sioux Falls is a pleasant city of 180,000 people, situated where the Big Sioux River tumbles off a red granite cliff. It has some decent bars downtown, and a charming array of sculptures dotting the streets, but there doesn’t seem to be much to attract a Chinese multi-billionaire. It’s a town that even few Americans have been to.

The money of the world’s mega-wealthy, though, is heading there in ever-larger volumes. In the past decade, hundreds of billions of dollars have poured out of traditional offshore jurisdictions such as Switzerland and Jersey, and into a small number of American states: Delaware, Nevada, Wyoming – and, above all, South Dakota. “To some, South Dakota is a ‘fly-over’ state,” the chief justice of the state’s supreme court said in a speech to the legislature in January. “While many people may find a way to ‘fly over’ South Dakota, somehow their dollars find a way to land here.”

Super-rich people choose between jurisdictions in the same way that middle-class people choose between ISAs: they want the best security, the best income and the lowest costs. That is why so many super-rich people are choosing South Dakota, which has created the most potent force-field money can buy – a South Dakotan trust. If an ordinary person puts money in the bank, the government taxes what little interest it earns. Even if that money is protected from taxes by an ISA, you can still lose it through divorce or legal proceedings. A South Dakotan trust changes all that: it protects assets from claims from ex-spouses, disgruntled business partners, creditors, litigious clients and pretty much anyone else. It won’t protect you from criminal prosecution, but it does prevent information on your assets from leaking out in a way that might spark interest from the police. And it shields your wealth from the government, since South Dakota has no income tax, no inheritance tax and no capital gains tax.

A decade ago, South Dakotan trust companies held $57.3bn in assets. By the end of 2020, that total will have risen to $355.2bn. Those hundreds of billions of dollars are being regulated by a state with a population smaller than Norfolk, a part-time legislature heavily lobbied by trust lawyers, and an administration committed to welcoming as much of the world’s money as it can. US politicians like to boast that their country is the best place in the world to get rich, but South Dakota has become something else: the best place in the world to stay rich.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/nov/14/the-great-american-tax-haven-why-the-super-rich-love-south-dakota-trust-laws
-snip-


Wismer is the only person I met in South Dakota who seemed to understand this. “Ever since I’ve been in the legislature, the trust taskforce has come to us with an updating bill, every year or every other year, and we just let it pass because none of us know what it is. They’re monster bills. As Democrats, we’re such a small caucus, we’re the ones who ought to be the natural opponents of this, but we don’t have the technical expertise and don’t really even understand what we’re doing,” she confessed, while we ate pancakes and drank coffee in a truck stop outside Sioux Falls. “We don’t have a clue what the consequences are to just regular people from what we’re doing.”

That means legislators are nodding through bills that they do not understand, at the behest of an industry that is sucking in ever-greater volumes of money from all over the world. If this was happening on a Caribbean island, or a European micro-principality, it would not be surprising, but this is the US. Aren’t ordinary South Dakotans concerned about what their state is enabling?

“The voters don’t have a clue what this means. They’ve never seen a feudal society, they don’t have a clue what they’re enabling,” Wismer said. “I don’t think there are 100 people in this state who understand the ramifications of what we’ve done.”



While over at the Pineridge and Rosebud Reservations,

Football brings some peace to Sioux family after suicide

By STEPHEN GROVES today

VERMILLION, S.D. (AP) — Teenagers Jashawn and Jayton Pease embraced in the end zone while celebrating the 74-39 victory that made their Crow Creek Chieftains the champions of South Dakota’s tribal school league. But as they hugged, tears streamed down their faces.

Jashawn, 15, pounded his fist against his chest and pointed toward the sky.

“I’m playing for my brother because he left for the spirit world,” he said.

In July 2018, J’von Justice Shields, who was 17 and who had played wide receiver for the Chieftains, killed himself. Left behind were his girlfriend, Brianne Saul, their young son, J’von’s seven brothers, and a team and community that are still trying to make sense of his loss.

https://apnews.com/63580716a97742bd9444cdc9b9dba062

-snip-

After the final whistle but before leaving the field, the Crow Creek players huddled and ended their season with a shout: “Family!”

Warren pushes back on critics of her health care plan

By ALEXANDRA JAFFE 44 minutes ago

WAVERLY, Iowa (AP) — Elizabeth Warren pushed back against critics of her newly-released plan to phase in implementation of a single-payer health care system, insisting Saturday that she is “fully committed” to Medicare for All and that she plans to first build on existing health care programs because “people need help right now.”

“My commitment to Medicare for All is all the way,” Warren told reporters, responding to critics who’ve questioned the timing behind the release of her implementation plan.

On Friday, the Massachusetts Democrat released a plan outlining how she would transition to a full Medicare for All program, first by using executive action to bring down drug and health care prices and by pushing Congress to pass a bill giving Americans the option to buy in to an expanded government-run Medicare plan. Warren says she’ll then work with Congress to pass pieces of a universal coverage proposal more gradually, with the whole thing being ready “no later than” her third year in office.

The transition plan drew criticism from opposing campaigns, with a spokeswoman for Joe Biden accusing Warren of “muddying the waters” on health care and South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg’s campaign calling it “transparently political.”

https://apnews.com/1fa53c065f6b428a9b7faa39b2ab2ce7

Rush-Dreamline Live from Frankfurt

And while at a Federalist Society dinner we have a whiner about subpoenas......................

The Latest: Ousted Ukraine ambassador has her say in hearing
today

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Latest on President Donald Trump and House impeachment hearings (all times local):

7:10 p.m.

Attorney General William Barr says congressional Democrats are drowning government agencies with an “avalanche of subpoenas” in order to “incapacitate” the executive branch.

Barr spoke Friday at the Federalist Society’s dinner in Washington. His comments came as Congress held a second public hearing in the House impeachment inquiry.

Barr says the “cost of this constant harassment is real.”

https://apnews.com/2f420045618b4106b6fa7419a3d75b8e

Hey Barr, did you and others from your right wing gathering of fucking tory gathering hear the chants about the main speaker you know Brett, and how fucking "Facebook" sponsored the event............and has for drowning with the cost of constant harassment..........................I got an answer for your Federalist Society ass........................fucking resign, and enforce the contempt citations if you can't do your job while your gallivanting all over the world trying to make up some sham conspiracy theory with you and your attorney guy in Connecticut, trying to cut the rule of law at its knees, but I forget you have a contempt of Congress doing there duty to defend and protect the Constitution which you use as toilet paper..........and you fucking whine...........

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/nov/14/facebook-federalist-society-brett-kavanaugh-gala

Photo breakdown of Myles Garrett using helmet as a weapon

By The Associated Press 23 minutes ago

Myles Garrett used an opponent’s helmet as a weapon to hit Pittsburgh quarterback Mason Rudolph in the head, an attack played over and over on TV and social media. He was swiftly suspended by the NFL.

The violence unfolded with shocking clarity with seconds remaining in Cleveland’s 21-7 win over the Steelers on Thursday night.

After Garrett wrapped up Rudolph and took him down with a late, hard tackle, the players tussled on the ground, with Rudolph tugging at Garrett’s helmet.

Garrett, the massive defensive end, then grabbed Rudolph’s black helmet by the facemask and yanked it off while lifting the rookie quarterback off the turf.

https://apnews.com/afaeed28c6294813af1732fa9dbce901

Marie Yovanovitch bashes The Hill's faulty reporting that led to Trump's smear campaign --

— and impeachment

Published 6 hours ago
on November 15, 2019

By Travis Gettys

Marie Yovanovitch knocked down the false claims peddled by The Hill’s John Solomon that underpinned President Donald Trump’s smear campaign against her.

The website published a Solomon interview in March with Yuriy Vitaliyovych, now the former prosecutor general in Ukraine, who said the then-ambassador had given him a “do not prosecute” list — a claim pushed by the president, Donald Trump Jr., Rudy Giuliani and Fox News broadcasters.

Yovanovitch and the State Department denied the allegation at the time, and she flatly — and repeatedly — denied The Hill’s reporting as inaccurate during her testimony before the House impeachment inquiry, and told lawmakers why they were so damaging.

“I was worried,” she said. “These attacks were, you know, being repeated by the president himself and his son.”

https://www.rawstory.com/2019/11/marie-yovanovitch-bashes-the-hills-faulty-reporting-that-led-to-trumps-smear-campaign-and-impeachment/

FAA administrator tells team to 'take whatever time needed' on 737 MAX: memo

Source: Reuters

Business News
November 15, 2019 / 1:43 PM / Updated an hour ago

David Shepardson, Eric M. Johnson

3 Min Read

WASHINGTON/SEATTLE (Reuters) - U.S. Federal Aviation Administrator Steve Dickson told his team to “take whatever time is needed” in their review of Boeing Co’s (BA.N) 737 MAX, reiterating that the path to approval is “not guided by a calendar or schedule,” according to a Nov. 14 memo and video message reviewed by Reuters.

The comments came days after Boeing said it expected the FAA certify the 737 MAX, issue an airworthiness directive and unground the plane in mid-December - a timetable that sent the planemaker’s stock price soaring on Monday.

Boeing also acknowledged on Monday that it would not win approval for training changes until January, pushing back the return of flights. Just three days earlier, Boeing abruptly scrapped the announcement it had planned on the MAX.

U.S. officials have privately said this week that Boeing’s timetable was aggressive - if not unrealistic - and was not cleared in advance by regulators.

Read more: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-boeing-737max/faa-administrator-tells-team-to-take-whatever-time-needed-on-737-max-memo-idUSKBN1XP22U?il=0

Man arrested for slashing Baby Trump balloon said it was matter of 'good versus evil'

By
Associated Press -
November 12, 2019

The man was charged with criminal mischief for slashing the baby Trump blimp protesters were holding outside of the University of Alabama football game.

An Alabama man charged with criminal mischief in the slashing of a towering "Baby Trump" balloon has defended his actions, saying it was a matter of good versus evil.

Al.com reports Hoyt Deau Hutchinson called the syndicated radio show "Rick & Bubba Show" on Monday to describe what happened.

Hutchinson said he was shaking in anger when he drove past the balloon and its handlers Saturday during Donald Trump's visit to see Louisiana State play against the University of Alabama.

He yelled at the protesters, but then realized they might have seen him, so he bought a University of Alabama shirt to better blend into the crowd and get close to the balloon, he said. Pretending he wanted a picture with the balloon, Hutchinson said he used a material cutter with a sharp razor to slice the symbol open.

https://shareblue.com/donald-trump-baby-blimp-balloon-slashed-alabama-good-versus-evil-hoyt-deau-hutchinson-arrested/

So in other words......................he has no respect for someone else's property..................................his logic is to do violence against those that don't see things his way...............................and this guy is walking around, driving around on the streets of America calling in to Rick and Bubba, oh fucking boy...............admitting to "criminal intent" to do harm personnel property........................I guess that's not a felony in that state...........................go fucking figure............