Warren Buffett to give stamp of approval to Hillary Clinton.

Source: Las Vegas Sun

When billionaire investor Warren Buffett joins a rally Wednesday with Hillary Clinton in Omaha, Nebraska, a question humming in the background will be whether Buffett, one of the world's premier investors, will throw more of his fortune behind her candidacy than he's been comfortable spending in politics in the past. In either case, his public appearance with Clinton is aimed at offering his stamp of approval to the Democrat's economic message of inclusive capitalism and toughness against Wall Street excess. He will also join Clinton at a private fundraiser.

With Buffett by her side, Clinton planned to offer her support for the so-called "Buffett rule" pushed by the Obama administration, which has sought higher taxes on the wealthy, but would say the next administration must go even further to ensure the wealthiest Americans pay their fair share, said a Clinton aide who spoke on condition of anonymity to preview her remarks. The aide said Clinton would announce more steps next year to build upon the Buffett rule and ensure the effective tax rate paid by millionaires reflects a fair tax system.

Democrats say Buffett carries a rare dual appeal on Wall Street and Main Street. The investment guru's annual shareholder meeting is dubbed "Woodstock for Capitalists" and drew an overflow crowd of more than 40,000 people from around the globe in the spring.

The "Oracle of Omaha" has referred to Clinton as a "hero of mine" and predicted last year that she would succeed President Barack Obama, whom he also supported. "I will bet money on it," he said. "And I don't do that easily."

Read more: http://lasvegassun.com/news/2015/dec/16/famed-investor-warren-buffett-to-give-stamp-of-app/

Macri leaves ESMA concentration camp site w/o maintenance or grounds staff; fires 2,000 caretakers.

The University of Buenos Aires School of Architecture and Urban Planning (FADU) reported today that effective December 18, the Ministry of Social Development will have terminated the 2,000 employees contracted under the Kirchner administration's Argentina Works program for the refurbishment, maintenance, and groundskeeping of the ESMA Human Rights Memorial Site.

Located in Buenos Aires' upscale Núñez district near the northern end of the city and coveted by developers since the 1990s, the 37-acre site includes nearly 900,000 ft² of buildings. It was originally built in the late 1920s as the Argentine Navy Mechanics School but was used in the late 1970s as the largest of around 300 detention and concentration camps for the Dirty War; an estimated 5,000 were killed at the ESMA.

Upon being informed of the news, the cooperative employing the 2,000 affected workers demonstrated peacefully in front of the ESMA site along Libertador Avenue and with heavy police presence.

The protesters also made public the notification to that effect received from the Social Development Ministry. The letter stated that "with the change of administrations (the December 10 inaugural of right-wing President Mauricio Macri) a series of steps are being taken," without any further explanation or indications that maintenance at the ESMA site will continue.

Most of the employees at the cooperative are women. The contract resulted from an agreement between the FADU (which oversees all work), the Ministry of Human Rights, and the Ministry of Social Development. Their work, according to ESMA officials, "allowed for the successful cooperation between the community, human rights organizations, and the State to have a place for truth, memory, and justice, and for the public to know Argentina's tragic recent history that we may consolidate the rights secured under democracy."

The site, which houses museums and numerous human rights institutes, was opened to the public in 2008 and formally inaugurated by President Cristina Kirchner on May 19, 2015. It received over 225,000 visitors last year.

At: https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=es&u=http://www.telam.com.ar/notas/201512/130202-ex-esma-despidos-cooperativistas-protesta.html&prev=search
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ESMA Memorial Site: http://www.espaciomemoria.ar/mapa.php

Macri bypasses Congress to appoint two Supreme Court justices by decree (first since 1862).

Argentine President Mauricio Macri appointed "by commission" (decree) two new members to the Argentine Supreme Court. No democratically elected Argentine president had appointed a Supreme Court justice by decree since Bartolomé Mitre in 1862.

The move raised eyebrows in both Congress and judiciary, since the constitutional mechanism for the appointment of Supreme Court justices in Argentina must be done with the advice and consent of the Senate. Macri is instead making use of Article 99, paragraph 19 of the Constitution, which empowers the president to "fill vacancies for jobs requiring the consent of the Senate, if the Senate is in recess, by means of appointments on commission expiring at the end of the next Congress." While Congress in Argentina is officially in recess from December 1 to March 1, Argentine presidents can (and typically do) call recess sessions if especially significant legislation is on the table; Macri announced over the weekend that he plans to rule entirely by decree until the next Congress convenes on March 1.

The two justices appointed by decree, Carlos Rosenkrantz and Horacio Rosatti, will serve until November 30, 2016, unless the Senate ratifies them.

The Supreme Court has had a vacancy for a year since Justice Raúl Zaffaroni resigned at the end of 2014 due to reaching the court's mandatory retirement age of 75. President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner's nominee to replace him, Roberto Carlés, enjoyed broad support from the Senate initially; but he never received the necessary two-thirds approval in the Senate due to a political pact among the opposition caucuses to block any Supreme Court justices until the next administration. Carlés' nomination was ultimately withdrawn in April. A second vacancy emerged when 97-year-old Carlos Fayt, the most conservative member of the Court, retired last Friday. Fayt, who was exempt from the age limit of 75 by a grandfather clause, waited until the day after Macri was sworn in to retire.

Macri's broad interpretation of his constitutional decree powers met with opposition from most Argentine constitutional lawyers interviewed regarding the controversy.

Speaking to University of Córdoba radio, constitutional lawyer Miguel Rodriguez Villafañe explained that Article 99/19 harkens back to an era when a legislator from a distant province often took weeks to reach Congress for an extraordinary session during the recess period. The president was thus empowered to fill such vacancies in those circumstances. "Today," he pointed out, "the president's office can make phone calls and gather all the senators within ten hours. Macri chose the shortcut instead."

For this reason, Villafañe Rodriguez said it is "urgent that Congress convene itself and exercise its own powers, lest by March next year the Judiciary be completely overrun and Congress itself be hamstrung by the many decrees that are already being implemented."

Former UCR Congressman Ricardo Gil Lavedra, one of the presiding judges in the historic 1985 Trial of the Juntas, condemend President Mauricio Macri’s decree. “It is a mistake and it’s a pity because we all count on institutional normality,” he told reporters today in an interview with the Radio 10 station.

“It is politically understandable why he wanted to bypass Congress; it buys him a year to negotiate other issues,” he conceded. “It is, however, a mistake and sets a very sinister precedent because future presidents will now name judges and justices during summer recess.”

Constitutional lawyer Andrés Gil Domínguez considered Macri’s decree “an exception that can only be applied in a situation of verifiable urgency. Today, we are not in such a situation.” He added that “considering the promises of consensus that he (Macri) touted during the campaign, it is important he reviews this measure."

“These decrees," Gil Domínguez concluded, "do harm to the nation's institutions.”

At: https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=es&u=http://www.cba24n.com.ar/content/macri-se-saltea-al-congreso-y-nombra-dos-jueces-de-la-corte&prev=search

And: http://buenosairesherald.com/article/205015/constitutional-lawyers-say-macris-decree-a-serious-mistake

43 Argentine Gendarmes killed in bus crash were on a political mission ordered by Security Minister.

The tragedy occurred early this morning when one of the three buses carrying a contingent of National Guard (Gendarmerie) troops from Santiago del Estero to Jujuy had a tire blowout on a bridge on National Route 34 and fell on the Seco River, 20 kilometers from the small Salta Province town of Rosario de la Frontera.

Security Minister Patricia Bullrich confirmed that the officers killed in the tragedy had been mobilized to Jujuy Province on her orders to suppress possible protests Governor Gerardo Morales (a Macri ally) feared for tomorrow as a result of what may be a highly unpopular austerity announcement.

The Governor of Salta, Juan Manuel Urtubey, confirmed the death toll of 43 (out of 51 passengers) and that only one of the wounded, transferred to a hospital in Tucumán, is in critical condition. "This is a disaster; it was inevitable. I would like to embrace the National Guard," said President Mauricio Macri, who was with the Minister of National Security, Patricia Bullrich, in the accident area.

This morning, President Macri conveyed his "sincere condolences to all the families" of the deceased after a political rally in the corn-belt city of Pergamino (Buenos Aires Province) in which he announced tax cuts for exporters.

The investigation is now being overseen by Rosario de la Frontera Chief Prosecutor Oscar López Ibarra, who worked at the scene along with volunteer firefighters and forensic investigators from the Provincial Police Corps. López ordered that the body of driver be transferred to the San Bernardo Hospital morgue, in the city of Salta, for an autopsy.

At: https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=es&u=http://www.pagina12.com.ar/diario/ultimas/20-288239-2015-12-14.html&prev=search
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At least they died for a "good cause."



Who you gonna call, Governor? More National Guard?

Macri's Security Minister appoints fascist ideologue Carlos Manfroni as chief congressional liaison

Argentine President Mauricio Macri's Security Minister, Patricia Bullrich, appointed the openly fascist writer and academic Carlos Manfroni as the Ministry's new Secretary of Legislative Affairs. The appointment has not only created controversy in itself, Manfroni personally has also now been denounced by employees at the Security Ministry for creating "persecution on account of political, trade union, and ideological affiliations."

Manfroni, 62, is well-known in Argentina as a far-right Catholic ideologue. He is a vocal opponent of ongoing trials for crimes against humanity and has written numerous apologist works exalting the Dirty War. He first made news in 2012 for helping organize the right-wing cacerolazo protests against a rumored bid on President Cristina Kirchner's part for a third term (something she never sought). Manfroni also runs a tax-exempt "foundation for public ethics" and teaches a course on the subject at the Argentina Catholic University; the course is sponsored by the U.S. Embassy.

Manfroni has recently been columnist for the far-right newspaper La Nación, and during the 1976-83 military dictatorship contributed to the extremist, anti-Semitic monthly Cabildo.

Some of Manfroni's statements over the year have included:

Democracy and freedom are products of the filthy French Revolution, which, worse still, fabricated the idea of love of humanity - pure intellectual masturbation.

It is a heresy to think that authority rises from the bottom up; indeed, in the organization of the Church, power descends from the top down.

Liberalism is an infectious disease

Progressivism carries the stigma of Jewish and Masonic temporalism. The materialistic Jewish people instruct the children of Zion to seek power.

Rock is the most subversive, anti-Christian, and countercultural artistic movement of all time. The intemperate pace exacerbates passions and creates a hypnotic state of brainwashing "Satanic messages," Manfroni assured, "can be heard when you play certain songs backwards such as 'Empty Spaces' by Pink Floyd."

The 'philosophy' of Rock leads to the desperate desire for death and leads to suicide, as evidenced by the lyrics. It offers the possibility of becoming an animal or a sissy. One of the greatest exponents of Satanism is the group Kiss, whose members use make-up in a diabolical way. They, like many others, are homosexuals and drug addicts.

Artists are parasites on society, and useless to all men of goodwill. They're spoiled Marxist children.

Any distortion of culture, he concludes, "should be considered subversive and as such eradicated."

Macri signs decree rescinding compulsory high school and cutting education budget by up to half.

Argentine President Mauricio Macri signed Decree 13/2015 on Saturday, which replaces the Ministry of Education with a Ministry of Education and Sports.

The decree, however, signed without congressional approval, also includes a provision rescinding the 2005 Education Financing Law - which established that investment in education should be no less than 6% of GDP - as well as the 2006 National Education Law, which made high school compulsory to grade 12 and restructured the educational system with the goal of reducing grade retention and dropouts; both laws have met or exceeded their respective goals. The decree likewise rescinded the 2005 Technical Education Law and the 2006 Law on Sexual Education, with no congressional review.

Speaking in his first meeting with the five leading teachers' unions, Education Minister Esteban Bullrich said it was a "mistake" and assured union leaders that legal counsel had been instructed to modify it.

Eduardo López, secretary of CTERA (the largest teachers' union in Argentina), warned however that "Bullrich's word is not enough; Macri must sign the modification. We demand the president modify the decree, and stop using decrees to circumvent laws such as those governing National Education and Audiovisual Communication Services (media anti-trust law)." Congress has also expressed concern, and has announced that a panel will be formed to address the controversy if Macri does not act quickly.

Given the scope of Decree 13/2015, which Macri signed with his ministers, the only way to rectify what the Education Minister alleged to be a "mistake," would be to urgently issue a new decree remedying Decree 13; President Macri has yet to do so. "Absent these changes," said López, "we can not discuss other things with the minister. This decree would have dire implications that would cause the immediate mobilization of the entire educational community. Given the seriousness of the issue, it will be the first point we'll discuss with the minister at our meeting next week."

Former Education Minister Daniel Filmus explained that "the decree for the new Ministry of Education and Sports is based on Menem-era laws. That the laws on National Education, Technical Education, and Education Financing, which were voted in Congress almost unanimously, be substituted by decree for the very laws they replaced is incomprehensible."

"The framework of the decree, hidden in Article 23.c, is the 1992 Federal Educational Pact and the Federal Law of Education, which effectively shifted the educational budgetary burden to the provinces. The Federal Education Law, for example, did not contemplate primary, secondary and technical schools (only grade levels); nor did it require pre-school education at age 5, Filmus pointed out. "The decree would also abrogate the requirement that the educational budgets be at least 6% of GDP, which would inevitably halve the budget to 3% of GDP," Filmus added, in reference to the budget levels prevailing until the 2005 Education Financing Act.

CTERA Secretary López recalled that "even before taking office, Macri had made the questionable decision of allowing Bullrich to designate television producer Juan Cruz Ávila as Secretary of University Policy; but the widespread repudiation this caused in academia led him to retrace his steps. This new setback, which has the new president as the protagonist, is vastly more serious."

At: https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=es&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.politicargentina.com%2Fnotas%2F201512%2F10424-criticas-de-la-comunidad-educativa-al-decreto-que-modifico-el-ministerio-de-educacion.html

Macri to rule by decree in Argentina, bypassing Congress, until March 1.

Argentine President Mauricio Macri announced just two days after taking office that he will not convene any 'extraordinary' (recess) sessions of Congress during the roughly 80 days remaining until the Argentine Congress inaugurates its next regular session on March 1, 2016. This announcement, made in a meeting with the nation's 23 governors, would allow Macri to use the seldom-exercised constitutional loophole to rule by decree until then.

Macri's principal motivation in choosing to rule by decree instead of calling recess sessions as his predecessors have done in most years, is that his right-wing PRO caucus simply has no majority in either of the two chambers of Congress (it has 41 out of 257 congressmen, and 4 out of 72 senators). His PRO caucus has a loose alliance currently with the centrist UCR - which can add another 50 congressmen and 11 senators - but would find it very difficult to pass any legislation opposed by the center-left FpV and its left-wing allies.

Accordingly, Macri is maneuvering to avoid what could be an embarrassing political defeat if the first bill he submits to Congress is rejected. Instead, he hopes that the nearly three months of rule by decree would give him enough time to negotiate his agenda with the different congressional caucuses and in effect test the waters before introducing future legislation.

This decision has provoked differing reactions within the opposition. Congressman Sergio Massa, leader of centrist Renewal Front (non-Kirchnerist Peronists), defended Macri's decision to govern through 'Decrees of Necessity and Urgency' (DNU) for the next three months.

Congressman Jorge Altamira of the Leftist Workers' Front condemned the decision, however, and warned that "we will have 100 days of rule by decree which will be used to take on more debt and eliminate grain export taxes" (the grain export lobby, which pays around $10 billion in export taxes annually, were leading contributors to the Macri campaign). Altamira urged President Macri to instead "convene Congress, and waive the use of decrees."

"Taking on debt without going through Congress," Altamira reminded the president, "is unconstitutional."

At:https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=es&u=http://www.politicargentina.com/notas/201512/10415-como-seran-y-por-que-macri-decidio-llevar-a-cabo-los-100-dias-de-gobierno-por-decreto.html&prev=search

Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo announce resumption of iconic Thursday marches after 10-year hiatus.

The Association of Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, the organization created in 1977 to seek justice for the state-sponsored murders of their loved ones during Argentina's Dirty War, has announced that their Thursday marches around Buenos Aires' May Obelisk will now resume.

The announcement, made by the association's longtime president, 87 year-old Hebe de Bonafini, marks the end of a 10-year hiatus from the Thursday marches because, as Bonafini stated, "one does not negotiate with the enemy."

The association's first march was actually held on a Saturday, April 30, 1977, by the 14 original members of the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo as a means of "having General Videla (the dictator) receive us." Their founder, Azucena Villaflor de Vicenti, and two others were instead killed later that year in retaliation. Hebe de Bonafini, who lost two sons and a daughter-in-law to the Dirty War in 1978, came to lead the Mothers the following year and established the Thursday Marches of Resistance in 1981.

Joined on different occasions by renowned human rights leaders such as Nobel Peace Prize laureate Adolfo Pérez Esquivel, Spanish Judge Baltasar Garzón, and Swedish actress and UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador Liv Ullmann, the iconic marches continued until, on January 14, 2006, Bonafini announced their discontinuation because "the enemy is no longer in the Casa Rosada."

Bonafini referred at the time to President Néstor Kirchner's policies supporting justice, notably his 2003 rescission of numerous amnesty laws passed between 1986 and 2001 to shield the over 1,000 officers implicated in the Dirty War from prosecution (to date nearly 600 have been convicted). The recent election of President Mauricio Macri, who as Mayor of Buenos Aires had vetoed a law granting witness protection to those testifying in Dirty War abuse trials and had recently referred to human rights as a "scam" during the campaign, led Bonafini to conclude that "the enemy has returned," however.

"From day one," Bonafini said before a gathering at the Plaza de Mayo, "we've described Macri as what we thought he was. We were heavily criticized when we said he was 'our enemy because he was an enemy of the people'. The Grandmothers and Founding Mothers associations criticized us as well because they seem to think that Macri is a smart guy who will receive them. We would not think to ask for an interview, because one does not negotiate with the enemy."

"During these 10 years we did not hold the Resistance Marches because the enemy was not in the Government House. But the enemy has returned. We have therefore returned to our marches on the square just as we did against the dictatorship. We can't walk the way we did then; but here we are, with all of you as always," Bonafini told the crowd.

At: https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=es&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Facontramano2007.blogspot.com%2F2015%2F12%2Fvuelven-las-marchas-de-la-resistencia.html

Pro-Macri cartoonist Nik tweets about "this historic day" but posts dictatorship-era photo from 1982

Argentine political cartoonist Nik (Cristian Dzwonik), best known for the satirical Gaturro series published in the right-wing newspaper La Nación since 1997, tweeted a panoramic photo of a jubilant crowd on Buenos Aires' Plaza de Mayo square that he referred to as a "postcard from this historic day" (Macri's inaugural yesterday).

Except the photo was taken in 1982.

The photo, originally published in Gente ("People&quot magazine in its April 10, 1982, issue, was taken during a rally held on April 2 on news of the invasion of the Falklands/Malvinas Islands. The ill-fated invasion was ordered by the dictator at the time, General Leopoldo Galtieri, who also had a leading role in the infamous Dirty War. Nik, who refers to Macri as "Argentina's Kennedy," has made statements opposing Dirty War-related human rights trials as recently as last year.

The tweet likewise implied that he took the "photo" from a vantage position on one of the Casa Rosada's second-floor balconies, when in reality he was not among those invited to the Casa Rosada (Argentina's presidential office building) for the inaugural.

The mischaracterization was first mentioned on Nik's Twitter timeline by a reader, Franco Ghiglione, and triggered a series of sarcastic replies and spoofs that led Nik to later take the Tweet down.

This was not the first time that the star La Nación satirist has come under scrutiny for the unethical use of work by others. Nik has also been accused of plagiarizing work from numerous well-known Argentine cartoonists over the last decade, including Caloi, Quino, Roberto Fontanarrosa, Daniel Paz-Rudy, and Fernando Sendra, as well as a number of foreign cartoonists.

At: https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=es&u=http://www.infonews.com/nota/269640/el-nuevo-papelon-de-nik-por-un-chiste&prev=search

And: https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=es&tl=en&u=https%3A%2F%2Fmalditoentusiasta.wordpress.com%2F2011%2F07%2F26%2Fplagio-de-nik-a-quino%2F
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Perhaps Niky isn't as nostalgic for this:



As much as he is for this:

Macri operatives accost Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo during International Human Rights Day march.

Victoria Montenegro, head of the National Coordination Unit for the Prevention and Eradication of Violence Against Women, captured an incident on video this afternoon in which Macri militants wearing his trademark yellow "Let's Change" and "Macri for President" T-shirts accosted the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo.

The verbal epithets launched against the women, many of them in the 80s and 90s, included references to "guerrillas" and calls to "kick them out" of the historic Plaza de Mayo square.

The human rights organization headed by Montenegro repudiated the attack, declaring on Twitter that "perhaps the "revolution of joy" militants (in reference to Macri's campaign slogan) do not know that today is International Human Rights Day. The Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo have been marching for justice for almost 40 years, and are a symbol around the world for that struggle. If you live in a democracy, it is thanks to these women."

At: https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=es&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.politicargentina.com%2Fnotas%2F201512%2F10362-denuncian-que-militantes-de-cambiemos-agredieron-a-madres-de-plaza-de-mayo.html
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They didn't let nightsticks stop them during the dictatorship:


They're certainly not going to let anyone to stop them with insults.