Richest 26 people own same amount of wealth as poorest half of the world

The gap between the super-rich and the rest of the world has never been wider, with 26 people now owning the same amount of wealth as 3.8 billion of the less privileged, global charity Oxfam said in a new report.

The new report, titled "Public Good or Private Wealth," sheds light on the continued accumulation of wealth by the richest, as well as the reverse trend for the poorest half of the word, which grew some 11 percent poorer last year.

During the same period, the assets of those at the top of the wealth pyramid, the billionaires, have skyrocketed, increasing by $900 billion in 2018, or by a whopping $2.5 billion a day. Between 2017 and 2018, a new billionaire was created every two days, the report says.

In comparison to the previous year, when 43 people owned about the same as the poorer half of the world, in 2018 it took only 26 billionaires to match the wealth of 3.8 billion people.

All in all, the financial world has fully recuperated from the devastating economic crisis of 2008, with the number of billionaires having nearly doubled since then, the report says.

Oxfam published its annual report on Monday, ahead of the World Economic Forum in Davos, known as an invitation-only club of super rich and powerful, notorious for lavish parties occasionally thrown by the attendees.

The charity argued that the only feasible way to tackle soaring inequality is to raise taxes for the rich. It says that increasing the tax burden on the top one percent by just half a percent would cover educational costs for 262 million children and provide healthcare to save the lives of 3.3 million people.

Some billionaires engage in philanthropy and charity work – one such example is Bill Gates, who gives away money in the hope of eradicating poverty – others seem to assume little responsibility for the world's increasingly alarming future. The Oxfam report picks on Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, the world's richest man with an estimated fortune of $112 billion, who once said that he sees no better way to dispose of his tremendous wealth than to fund space travel.

While his admission might have excited space enthusiasts, it also sparked outrage, strengthening the case for more taxes for the rich.

Oxfam says the impression that the wealthiest one percent don't give back enough to the community is justified, as they are indeed paying less and less.

"In rich countries, the average top rate of personal income tax fell from 62% in 1970 to 38% in 2013," the report says, while in the developing countries it stands at 28 percent on average.

Another problem is the super-rich dodging taxes, which costs governments some $7.6 trillion. The growing income gap particularly affects women, who earn 23 percent less than men globally, according to the report.

"People across the globe are angry and frustrated. Governments must now deliver real change by ensuring corporations and wealthy individuals pay their fair share of tax and investing this money in free healthcare and education that meets the needs of everyone," Winnie Byanyima, executive director of Oxfam International, said.

"The size of your bank account should not dictate how many years your children spend in school, or how long you live – yet this is the reality in too many countries across the globe," she added.

https://www.rt.com/business/449299-inequality-gap-report-rich/

Court Rules Undercover Videos Of Planned Parenthood Selling Baby Body Parts As Authentic

The court ruling refutes Planned Parenthood’s own talking points about how the CMP videos were “highly edited."

The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the state of Texas can strip taxpayer subsidies from Planned Parenthood, primarily based on evidence found in undercover videos of the abortion provider’s involvement in harvesting and selling aborted baby body parts for profit.

The undercover videos in question were first released in 2015 by David Daleiden, founder and project lead at the Center for Medical Progress (CMP), and scrutinized by Planned Parenthood and members of the media as “deceptively edited.”

“Planned Parenthood for years has been smearing us trying to say the videos were not accurate or somehow misleading,” Daleiden said in an interview with Federalist contributor DC McAllister. “The Fifth Circuit explicitly found in their ruling last night that the Center for Medical Progress’ videos are authentic…and could be relied upon by Texas and by others as the regulatory and other enforcement proceedings.”

The court ruling directly refutes Planned Parenthood’s own talking points about how the CMP videos were “highly edited,” and “falsely portray[ing] Planned Parenthood’s participation in tissue donation programs.”

“The video camera doesn’t lie: CMP’s undercover video series caught Planned Parenthood’s top leaders openly admitting to selling baby body parts for profit in violation of federal law,” said the Center for Medical Progress in a statement. “Now it is time for the Department of Justice to do its job and hold Planned Parenthood accountable to the law.”

http://thefederalist.com/2019/01/18/court-rules-undercover-videos-planned-parenthood-selling-baby-body-parts-authentic/

Boy Scout Leader Gets 10 Years for Sexually Abusing Kids in His Troop

A one-time Boy Scout leader was sentenced Friday to 10 years in prison for sexually assaulting three troop members in the 1990s.

In August 2018, former scoutmaster Stephen Corcoran admitted to molesting three former Boy Scouts and pleaded guilty to four counts of sexual assault, NJ.com reported.

Corcoran is already serving a seven-year sentence after a 2017 conviction on 11 charges in a separate child pornography case, NJ.com reported. Friday’s sentence will run concurrent to Corcoran’s current sentence.

The case against Corcoran first came out in 2011, when a former troop member told police Corcoran had sexually assaulted him when he was a juvenile.

Corcoran was still active with the Boy Scouts at the time of the accusation, according to another report from NJ.com.

An investigation brought to light two other former Scouts who said Corcoran had sexually assaulted them in the late 90s. One of the victims claimed that he had been abused by Corcoran for several years.

In 2012, the former Scouts filed a lawsuit against the Boy Scouts of America, alleging that Corcoran began grooming them for sexual abuse when they were 11 and 12 years old.

They claimed that many of the assaults happened during Boy Scout-sponsored events and at Boy Scout camps, according to NJ.com.

The suit claimed that Corcoran’s leadership role in the Boy Scouts allowed him to establish himself as a trusted mentor.

“There’s two people that victimized my client. The boy scouts basically gave (Corcoran) shelter and cloaked in secrecy the abuse that was occurring,” a lawyer for the case, Victor Herlinsky Jr., told NJ.com in 2012.

The Boy Scouts have gotten coverage in recent years for their increasingly politically correct policies.

But while leaders focused on aligning the organization’s policies with the left, serious problems in the organization were allowed to continue.

One of the organization’s recent updates was allowing girls, including those who identify as boys, to join troops at all levels. The organization has also publicly stated its acceptance of gay troop leaders.

In 2018, Boy Scouts of America again made headlines when it announced that it was changing its name to the more gender-neutral Scouts BSA, a change scheduled to go into effect in February.

Scouting has received acclaim from the left for its moves away from Judeo-Christian values and toward more liberal policies emphasizing “tolerance.”

A little more emphasis on protecting its members from predators like Stephen Corcoran might make more sense than trying to appease the American left — which will never be satisfied until it has destroyed an American tradition like scouting.

http://www.madnesshub.com/2019/01/boy-scout-leader-gets-10-years-for.html

Iraq’s Hashd al-Sha’abi warns Israel against possible attacks, pledges strong response

Iraq's pro-government Popular Mobilization Units, known in Arabic as Hashd al-Sha’abi, have advised Israel against “playing with fire” after US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo hinted that Tel Aviv may attack the anti-terror volunteer fighters.

Moein al-Kazemi, a Hashd commander, told the Iraqi Kurdistan's Rudaw television network on Sunday that the force was ready to deliver a “strong” response to any aggression.

He said while Israel had yet to make a move, Israeli media were already testing the Iraqi government’s reaction to a possible attack by publishing bogus reports on the issue.

Nonetheless, any act of hostility against Hashd al-Sha'abi could backfire on Tel Aviv as thousands of missiles in southern Lebanon were already aimed at Israeli targets, al-Kazemi warned.

The commander made it clear that Hashd al-Sha’abi was an official military organization funded in part by the Iraqi government and therefore “had the right” to defend the country.

Pompeo, who paid a visit to Baghdad and Iraq’s Kurdistan region earlier this month, was reported to have made it clear to Iraqi officials that Washington would not react to possible Israeli attacks against Hashd fighters.

Citing an unnamed Iraqi official, Russia’s RT Arabic service reported Thursday that the top US diplomat had relayed the message during a meeting with Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdul-Mahdi.

Abdul-Mahdi expressed concern about the statement and warned Pompeo that such actions by Israel would have grave consequences, the report said.

Israel’s long record of attacking anti-Daesh forces

Last June, Hashd fighters came under attack in Syria’s border town of al-Hari, in the eastern province of Dayr al-Zawr, as they were chasing Daesh terrorists out of the area.

Both the Syrian government and Hashd al-Sha’abi declared back then that the attack near the Iraqi-Syrian border had been deliberate and could only have been carried out by either Israel or the US.

An unnamed US official denied any involvement by American forces, triggering speculation by some media sections that Israel might have been behind the attack.

“We have reasons to believe that it was an Israeli strike,” the official told Agence France-Presse (AFP) at the time.

https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2019/01/21/586367/Iraq-Hashd-Shaabi-PMU-Israel-attack-Moein-Kazemi

Israel Strikes Syria Using Immunity Provided by Some UNSC Members - Damascus

Earlier in the day, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that those who threatened Israel and vowed to destroy it would bear "full responsibility".

The Syrian Foreign Ministry has notified the United Nations that the Israeli airstrikes against Syria are possible only with US support and with immunity "silently" approved by some other members of the UN Security Council, the ministry's press service said Monday.

"Such attacks are possible only thanks to the unlimited support provided by the US administration, the immunity from investigations extended to Israel by a number of countries in the UN Security Council, as well as the complete silence regime that these countries have imposed in the UN Security Council to prevent this body from fulfilling its role in repelling these criminal attacks," the ministry said in letters sent to the UN Secretary-General and the UNSC President.

Israel has been carrying out strikes on alleged Iranian targets in Syria for two days in a row. According to the Russian military, the Syrian air defence forces destroyed over 30 cruise missiles and guided bombs for that period of time.

Following the attacks, Iranian Air Force Commander Brigadier General Aziz Nasirzadeh stated that Iran was "ready to fight against Israel and eliminate it from the Earth."

Israel has repeatedly accused Iran of having a military presence in Syria, as well as suspected attempts to build a base there. However, Tehran has strongly refuted the claims, insisting that it's military presence in the country is limited to sending military advisors at Damascus' request to help fight terrorists.

https://sputniknews.com/middleeast/201901211071684113-israel-strikes-immunity/

Foreign Ministry: Israeli aggression on Syria part of attempts to prolong crisis

Damascus, SANA – The Foreign and Expatriates Ministry said on Monday that the Israeli aggression carried out at dawn on Damascus and its Countryside is an attempt to prolong the crisis in Syria and the terrorist war on it.

In two identical letters sent to the UN Secretary General and Head of the Security Council, the Ministry said this aggression attempts to raise the morale of the remaining terrorist hotbeds that are subservient to the Israeli occupation, in addition to being an attempt by the occupation authorities to avoid their escalating internal problems.

“Syria affirms that Israel’s persistence in its dangerous aggressive behavior wouldn’t be possible without the unlimited support of the US administration and the immunity provided to it by the US and other Security Council member states,” the letter stated.

The Ministry reiterated calls for the Security Council to shoulder its responsibilities as per the UN Charter and take immediate and decisive steps to prevent Israeli attacks from reoccurring, to force Israel to respect resolutions on disengagement, and to hold it accountable for its crimes against the Syrian and Palestinian peoples.

https://sana.sy/en/?p=156195

Debate builds over making Mueller report public

Anticipation is building for special counsel Robert Mueller’s report, bringing to boil a debate over whether it will also be made public.

The report took center stage at attorney general nominee William Barr’s confirmation hearing last week, where Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee pressed him to commit to releasing it publicly.

It’s far from clear how close Mueller is to ending his investigation; the former FBI director has shown no signs of concluding his investigation.

At the same time, there is a growing sense in Washington that a probe that has captivated the political world for most of the past two years is wrapping up.

The report is expected to lay out Mueller’s findings about Russian interference in the 2016 presidential campaign and potential coordination between the Trump campaign and Moscow. It remains unclear what shape the report will take or what, if any, conclusions it will draw.

Barr told lawmakers Tuesday it was his “intent” to release as much about Mueller’s findings as he can consistent with the law, but he was careful not to pledge to release the report outright.

“My goal will be to provide as much transparency as I can consistent with the law,” Barr told lawmakers. “I can assure you that, where judgments are to be made, I will make those judgments based solely on the law and I will not let personal, political or other improper interests influence my decision.”

Justice Department guidelines call for a special counsel to send a confidential report to the attorney general “explaining the prosecution or declination decisions reached” in the course of his or her investigation. Ultimately, it is up to the attorney general to decide whether it is in the public interest to release the report in compliance with the relevant legal restrictions, the guidelines say.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (Calif.), the committee’s top Democrat, said her vote on Barr’s nomination hinges on whether he will release the report publicly.

“My vote really depends on whether I believe that that report will come out as written,” Feinstein said. “I served for a long time on the Intelligence Committee, and I know redaction can be excessive.”

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) dismissed concerns about Barr’s answers, noting the regulations don’t call for the report to be public.

https://thehill.com/policy/national-security/426054-debate-builds-over-making-mueller-report-public

FISA like BS incoming

US Threatens to Sanction Lebanon if They Participate in Rebuilding Syria

The U.S. State Department allegedly sent a cable to the Lebanese Embassy in Washington that warned them against inviting Syria to the Arab Economic Summit in Beirut that is scheduled to take place this week, Al-Akhbar reported on Wednesday.

According to Al-Akhbar, Lebanon was not only warned against inviting Syria to the Arab Economic Summit, but Washington also threatened sanctions against Lebanon if they participate in any reconstruction efforts.

The latter (U.S.) threatened Lebanon with sanctions if it participated in the reconstruction of Al-Sham (a reference to Damascus),” Al-Akhbar claimed.

“The U.S. position was relayed to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Emigrants, in more than one way,” they continued.

The alleged confidential cable allegedly read:

“We urge Lebanon and all Arab League member states to refrain from sending an invitation to Syria. We also urge Lebanon not to take any steps that contribute to securing the financial interests of the Syrian regime. For instance, making investments or sending funds for reconstruction. Any financial or material support for the Assad regime or its supporters may be subject to American sanctions.”

The U.S. State Department has not issued a comment regarding these allegations; however, Washington has warned several nations in the past about participating in the reconstruction of Syria.

https://www.globalresearch.ca/us-threatens-to-sanction-lebanon-if-they-participate-in-rebuilding-syria/5666033

>>4848463

Saw that wtf

Dems Who Slammed GOP Over Kavanaugh Attended Puerto Rico Trip with Cardenas

Cardenas faces allegations that he drugged and molested a 16-year-old

Some of the same Democrats who accused Republicans of whitewashing sexual misconduct allegations against Justice Brett Kavanaugh left town during the shutdown to attend a weekend retreat in Puerto Rico organized by a senior Democrat being sued by a woman who claims he drugged and molested her when she was 16.

The Democrats cannot claim they don't know about the allegations. Eight months ago, now-Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) publicly called for a House Ethics Committee investigation into the molestation allegations against Rep. Tony Cardenas (D., Calif.). The panel has yet to formally launch a probe.

Cardenas is the chairman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus's BOLD PAC, which organized and hosted the winter retreat in San Juan where some 30 Democrats, including Cardenas, mingled with 109 lobbyists and corporate executives.

The weekend retreat included attendance of a performance of "Hamilton," parties with the cast, as well as meetings with key officials to discuss the Hurricane Maria cleanup, the Washington Examiner reported.

Last week, the woman suing Cardenas over the sexual misconduct allegations identified herself for the first time as 28-year-old Angela Villela Chavez and called for a House ethics inquiry. Chavez, the daughter of a longtime Cardenas aide, said she was inspired to come forward following Christine Blasey Ford's accusations against Kavanaugh.

Chavez says Cardenas molested her in 2007 while driving her to the hospital after she collapsed while playing golf with the congressman. In her lawsuit, Chavez says Cardenas gave her water that "tasted distinctly different from both tap and filtered water," and she collapsed. She says he fondled her breasts and genitals before he took her to the hospital.

Cardenas has vigorously denied the allegations, accusing the woman of seeking revenge for her father, a disgruntled former Cardenas staffer. His lawyer issued a statement arguing that the request for a House ethics investigation shows that she has a "meritless and weak case."

A Los Angeles Superior Court judge has determined there is enough merit to charges to move forward and has set a trial to begin in August.

In late August of last year, Cardenas opened up a legal defense fund to help collect donations to pay for his legal expenses in the case.

Despite the high-profile media accounts, senior Democrats who attended the Puerto Rico trip and members of the Hispanic Caucus remain silent on the charges Cardenas is facing.

https://freebeacon.com/politics/dems-who-slammed-gop-over-kavanaugh-attended-puerto-rico-trip-with-cardenas/

SERIOUSLY

How the fuck does Israel justify bombing Syria for a missile fired within Syria?

The Golan Heights is SYRIA.

Study: Pharma Dollars Led to Overdose Deaths

New research links payments to docs with prescription opioid ODs

Pharmaceutical firms' direct marketing to doctors continues to cause prescription opioid deaths, a new study argues.

The study, released Friday in the Journal of the American Medical Association, uses publicly available data from Medicare, Medicaid, and the Centers for Disease Control to match prescribing rates with prescription opioid overdose rates. Deaths from "Natural or semisynthetic opioids"—the CDC code which generally refers to deaths from prescription opioids like Vicodin or Dilaudid—totaled just under 15,000 in 2017.

The study's authors note that while prescription pills are not the primary cause of opioid-involved overdose deaths—that distinction belongs to fentanyl, as well as heroin—they are usually the first opioids encountered by subsequent users of heroin/fentanyl. There were still almost 200 million opioid prescriptions issued in 2017, which the authors claim results in a rate three times higher than 1999.

Further, they note, "Direct-to-physician marketing by pharmaceutical companies is widespread in the United States and is associated with increased prescribing of the marketed products." One in 12 doctors received opioid-related marketing between 2013 and 2015; that figure rises to one in five among family physicians.

Direct-to-physician marketing was a key component of pharmaceutical firms' strategy to push pills to patients in the lead up to the current opioid crisis. The practice involves sales representatives approaching physicians, all-expenses paid trips to pharma-sponsored seminars on the benefits of prescription opioids, and even lucrative speaking gigs for those doctors who do the best job pushing a given drug.

Purdue Pharma, the creator of OxyContin, reportedly compiled comprehensive profiles of physicians to better target them and offered enormous bonuses, up to a quarter of a million dollars, for sales representatives who sold directly to major prescribers. A Senate report released last year found that five opioid manufacturers in five years alone spent $9 million in support of "patient advocate" groups responsible for downplaying the dangers of opioids to physicians.

As such, the new JAMA study's authors wanted to test the link between marketing, prescription rates, and prescription opioid overdose deaths. The Physician Payments Sunshine Act mandates disclosure of payments—usually in the form of meals, travel costs, speaking fees, and consulting fees—from pharmaceutical firms to doctors, including information about the drug being marketed. The authors combined this data with prescribing and death data to get a county-by-county picture of the nation from 2013 to 2016.

They then built a model, controlling for a number of confounding socio-demographic variables and looking at the connection between marketing in one year and overdose deaths in the subsequent year. Three different measures of marketing—value in dollars, number of payments per doctor, and number of doctors being paid—were strongly associated with an increase in both prescription rates and subsequent prescription overdose deaths. The study's authors also performed a "mediation analysis," concluding that increases in prescribing rates significantly mediated the association between marketing and deaths.

https://freebeacon.com/issues/study-pharma-dollars-led-to-overdose-deaths/

Judiciary Committee Democrat Floats Perjury Probe Of Justice Brett Kavanaugh

Democratic U.S. Rep. Joe Neguse of Colorado, a freshman member of the House Judiciary Committee, told constituents the panel will likely investigate Justice Brett Kavanaugh for perjury.

“There’s no question [Kavanaugh] committed perjury during the confirmation hearings and so forth,” Neguse said when asked if the justice might be impeached. “I think the Judiciary Committee is likely to take that up.”

A conservative opposition research group obtained and disseminated video of Neguse’s comments.

The congressman was not specific as to which of Kavanaugh’s statements might rise to the level of perjury. Democrats have put forward various theories as to how Kavanaugh misled the Senate Judiciary Committee during his confirmation hearings: One theory, which NBC News advanced, held that he lied concerning when he first learned about the allegations of Deborah Ramirez, a Yale classmate who accused Kavanaugh of drunkenly exposing himself to her at a party.

In response to questions from lawmakers during his second confirmation hearing, Kavanaugh said he first learned of Ramirez’s claims from The New Yorker, the venue in which her story appeared. NBC subsequently recovered text messages revealing the justice and his allies were discussing Ramirez’s allegations before the story’s publication, prompting charges of perjury.

However, Kavanaugh told Senate investigators before the hearing that he learned Ramirez was searching for witnesses to corroborate her story well in advance of The New Yorker story’s publication, thereby belying the perjury charges. The NBC report was stealth-edited, and a correction was never issued.

Other theories suppose the justice lied about the contents of his high school yearbook or hid his complicity with a White House staffer who stole strategy memos from Senate Democrats during his service in the George W. Bush administration. Neither of those propositions has been substantiated.

Requests for comment from the congressman’s office went unanswered.

Kavanaugh has kept a low profile since joining the high court in October 2018. Though the justices often teach in law schools or speak to various professional groups when the Court is not hearing cases, Kavanaugh’s schedule of public engagements appears rather thin. Similarly, his maneuvers on the Court reflect a sense of caution: He joined Chief Justice John Roberts and the liberal bloc to keep the Court out of controversies relating to abortion and the census, while his style at oral argument is deferential and inconspicuous.

Democratic U.S. Rep. Jerry Nadler of New York, the new chair of the Judiciary Committee, was overheard discussing a prospective Kavanaugh impeachment at some length on board the Acela train to Washington, D.C., just days after the midterm elections.

https://dailycaller.com/2019/01/20/kavanaugh-perjury-impeachment/

>>4848620

Well (((they))) like to think so

Measles VACCINE linked to 127 deaths in last 15 years; only two deaths linked to humans who contracted measles naturally in that same period

It was the year 1900, and out of every 100,000 humans, only 13 died from the Measles. Forty years later, that number of deaths went down significantly to less than one person in every 100,000, and on down to barely anyone (0.2 in 100,000) dying from Measles twenty years later in 1960. Just three years after that, in 1963, the so-called Measles vaccine was invented, and “miraculously” it was declared that the immunization wiped out this huge threat to mankind. Amazing.

Besides the lies and propaganda that were spread about this “holy grail” of preventative medicine, nobody knew the real horror story that was about to unfold – more people would soon start dying from the Measles vaccine than would ever pass from contracting the disease naturally. To this day, the mass media, the CDC, and the vaccine industry science shills all hide these facts from the public, in order to sell millions of dangerous vaccines and keep people in the dark about the hazards of Western medicine. It’s time for everyone to learn the risk – the real risk.

The risk of death from Measles vaccine much greater than from simply catching the Measles

Not sure how many Americans still know how to do arithmetic, but 127 deaths seems exorbitantly more severe than 2 deaths, so which risk is greater, getting Measles or getting the Measles virus injected with a needle, along with known neurotoxins, into your muscle tissue?

In the following short video, a university-affiliated M.D. named Dr. Moss explains how the vaccine for Measles is much more deadly and much more of a risk than simply contracting the disease – a disease that a normal-functioning human immune system beats down rather easily.

Just take a look at the numbers and make an informed decision yourself, instead of doing everything the CDC tells you to do, especially since the CDC is a for-profit company that’s in the vaccine business.

https://www.naturalnews.com/2019-01-21-measles-vaccine-linked-to-127-deaths-in-last-15-years.html

>>4848716

10 years pretty light but posting his pic here should enable prison justice to take it's natural course

>>4848734

That's just fear mongering on your part, go do some research on the origins of those diseases you mentioned

>>4848740

I think it should be a straight death sentence

>>4848769

You're right but seriously just leave the ME send all their people back and let them sort it out.

All this other shit is for Israel's benefit only

>>4848804

Could not agree more about Mueller lifelong shitbag. If the report is delayed redacted or contains fuckery it really destory's so much of what we are doing