All posts by Ken Cole

PALM SUNDAY EGYPT CHURCH BOMBINGS KILL AT LEAST 36

Bodies lie among blood-stained pews in images of one of the attacks – the latest on Egypt’s Christian minority.


Bomb attacks that killed at least 36 people marking Palm Sunday at two Egyptian churches have been claimed by Islamic State.

The first explosion in Tanta, about 70 miles north of Cairo, killed at least 25 worshippers at the Mar Girgis Coptic Church.

Officials said the blast happened “in the front rows, near the altar, during the mass” and that dozens more had been injured.

Video and pictures show crowds gathered around bodies and large blood stains on the pews and church walls.

Several hours later, a bombing in front of Saint Mark’s Church in the coastal city of Alexandria killed at least 11 people and injured many more, according to the health ministry.

Pope Tawadros II, head of the Coptic church, had earlier attended mass there.

Islamic State claimed responsibility for the bombings through its Amaq news agency.

Speaking to Nile TV about the Tanta blast, governor Ahmad Deif said: “Either a bomb was planted or someone blew himself up.”

A witness told the Reuters news agency: “There was a huge explosion in the hall. Fire and smoke filled the room and the injuries were extremely severe.

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Witches to cast spell on Trump … again!

New crescent moon calls for ritual with photo, tarot card, candle, feather, ashtray.

WASHINGTON – Among the angry liberals who refuse to accept the 2016 presidential election results that put Donald Trump in the Oval Office are witches who will be gathering at midnight on Sunday to cast spells.

Again.

They already tried last month to conjure up magic to remove him from office.

Witches, exorcists and occultists say they again will cast a “binding spell” designed to “bind Donald Trump and all who abet him.”

Anti-Trump occultists performed the “mass spell” against the president last month under the hashtag #BindTrump. Witches nationwide shared photos and videos on Twitter of them placing their hex on Trump.

They say they will repeat the ritual on March 26 and on every crescent moon “until Donald Trump is removed from office,” according to the group’s Facebook page.

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Press coverage of Trump in first month of office: 88 percent ‘hostile,’ says new study

There was no press honeymoon for President Trump during his first month in office. A meticulous new study by the Media Research Center finds that 88 percent of the broadcast news coverage of Mr. Trump and his team was “hostile” during the first 30 days of office.
The coverage was intense and plentiful. The study, which analyzed both tone and content for evening newscasts on ABC, NBC and CBS, found that the “Big Three” networks produced 16 hours of coverage on the new president and his staff. That is over half — 54 percent — of their total coverage for the month.
“Our measure of media tone excludes soundbites from identified partisans, focusing instead on tallying the evaluative statements made by reporters and the nonpartisan talking heads (experts and average citizens) included in their stories,” write Rich Noyes, research director for the conservative press watchdog, and fellow analyst Mike Ciandella.
“In their coverage of Trump’s first month, the networks crowded their stories with quotes from citizens angry about many of his policies, while providing relatively little airtime to Trump supporters.” the pair noted. “And the networks’ anchors and reporters often injected their own anti-Trump editorial tone into the coverage. ‘It has been a busy day for presidential statements divorced from reality,’ CBS Evening News anchor Scott Pelley snidely began his February 6 broadcast.
“A new American president is always a big story, but TV news is obsessed with the Trump administration — and not in a good way,” they observed.
The study found that Mr. Trump’s call for a temporary ban on travel from seven specific Middle Eastern nations drew the most negative coverage — over three hours. Other favorite showcases for negative coverage of Mr. Trump included the border war between the U.S. and Mexico, battle over his cabinet confirmation picks and the president’s “complicated relationship” with Russia.

“Further highlighting the hostile tone of these newscasts, nearly an hour of coverage (56 minutes) was given over to anti-Trump protests on various topics, with nearly one-fifth (82 out of 442) of the Trump stories or briefs aired during these 30 days including at least some discussion of an anti-Trump protest,” the study reported.
Mr. Trump may be accustomed to the treatment by now, however. A previous Media Research Center report found that 91 percent of the broadcast coverage about his campaign was also negative — deemed “twelve weeks of Trump bashing” by Mr. Noyes and his team.

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‘Secret’ Obamacare Plan Leads Lawmakers on Hunt Across Capitol

House Republicans thought they were writing a bill to repeal and replace Obamacare. Instead, on Thursday, they found themselves running a traveling circus.

Following reports that a major chunk of their health-care legislation was being held for House GOP review in a secret room somewhere in the Capitol complex, Democrats and Republicans who hadn’t been invited started the hunt. Senator Rand Paul, a Kentucky Republican, was first on the scene of the supposed secret location.

“It’s the secret office of the secret bill,” Paul told a gaggle of reporters. After being denied entry by a security guard and staff aide, he quickly turned the moment into an impromptu press conference about legislation transparency.

“I suspect public pressure will make them release it,” he said.

Except, as it turned out, the bill wasn’t there. House Ways and Means Chairman Kevin Brady was in the room, but the Texas Republican said the bill wasn’t.

The audience gathered outside — including House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer of Maryland — was skeptical, so in they went to inspect. Out they came about 30 seconds afterward.

“No bill here. We cannot find the bill,” Hoyer said.

One Republican lawmaker and a committee aide had said Wednesday that House Republicans would be allowed to review the overhaul plan — but only in a dedicated reading room, and they wouldn’t be given copies to take with them. Republican leaders are trying to avoid a repeat of what happened last time. When an outdated draft leaked last week, it was quickly panned by conservatives.

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China Wants To Rip The Internet Out Of America’s Hands

(Daily Caller News Foundation) China released its first strategic report Thursday, outlining its view of how cyberspace should be governed.

The Chinese government demands that all nations should respect sovereignty and avoid conflict and asserts that no single country should control the internet, a clear message to the U.S., the China Daily introduced.

The new strategic report states that “countries should reject the Cold War mentality, zero-sum game and double standards, uphold peace through cooperation and seek one’s own security through common security on the basis of full respect for other countries’ security,” rhetoric typically reserved for criticisms of the U.S.

Beijing is a staunch advocate of shared governance of the internet and aims to “vigorously promote the reform of ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers), to make it a truly independent international institution.” Under the Obama administration, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) moved to transfer overall control of the internet’s domain name system (DNS) — the “yellow pages” of the world wide web — to a global entity.

China is eager to take advantage of that shift.

“No country should pursue cyberhegemony, interfere in other countries’ internal affairs, or engage in, condone or support cyberactivities that undermine other countries’ national security,” the Chinese report explained, adding that countries should be free to “choose their own path of cyberdevelopment.”

China has come under fire many times for engaging in state-sponsored hacking and human rights violations in the form of internet censorship. The Chinese government asserts that it is a victim of cyber crime and that instead of engaging in censorship, China practices internet management.

The U.S. has accused China of engaging in cyber espionage and stealing intellectual property. For many years, China allegedly used the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to carry out cyber crimes against the U.S., both commercial and government entities. The Chinese Ministry of State Security is believed to have carried out the infamous Office of Personnel Management (OPM) hack, when countless files containing personal data for more than 21 million former and current government employees were compromised.

China has dismissed all accusations as baseless.

Last year, for the second year in a row, China ranked last on Freedom House’s internet freedom list. Using the Great Firewall of China, the most well-known component of the Golden Shield Project, China practices a kind of systematic censorship to prevent Chinese citizens from accessing content deemed unacceptable by the state.

China promotes “cyber sovereignty,” which suggests that it can do as it pleases with its corner of the internet. Beijing focuses on national sovereignty, social order, and national security in all endeavors.

In its new report, China said it will be boosting its military capabilities in cyberspace. “China will give play to the important role of the military in safeguarding the country’s sovereignty, security and development interests in cyberspace,” which could involve targeting foreign entities while promoting its own interests; however, China asserts that its aim is to “prevent arms races and conflicts in cyberspace” and “prevent cyberspace from becoming a new battlefield.”

Chinese observers believe that China’s new strategy represents “a major contribution” to building a new order of governance for cyberspace.

Jeff Baron, a web pioneer who managed millions of domain names before a judge allowed ICANN to give his registry to China without permission, previously explained to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s Eric Lieberman that “if a government or non-state actor were to obtain control of the internet’s technical infrastructure, it would be able to engage in global censorship and mass propaganda, among other transgressions.”

“In the wrong hands, ICANN could be used as a weapon to dictate who has access to the internet,” he added.

China states in its new report that it supports “formulating universally accepted international rules and norms of state behavior in cyberspace,” but China’s long-term ambitions are unclear.

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Witches Plan To Cast Mass Spell Against Donald Trump

Donald Trump’s presidency has cast a pall over the nation, so now witches are casting a spell against him.

A document making its rounds among the witch community is asking people who practice the craft to perform a monthly binding ritual until the president is removed from office.

In order to work, the mass spell must be performed at midnight EST on every waning crescent moon.

The first one is happening on Friday and will be followed by similar spell cast events on March 26, April 24 and May 23 and beyond.

Unless, of course, Trump is cast out of office before then.

Michael M. Hughes, who writes about the paranormal, posted the spell at ExtraNewsFeed last week.

He stressed that a binding spell is different than a curse or hex.

“It’s a restraint, not harm,” Hughes told The Huffington Post. “I see it as self-defense.”

Hughes said he heard that two separate witch groups were planning the spells and asked if he could take it to a wider audience.

The spell instructions have gone viral, and there is a group on Facebook dedicated to answering all the questions people may have.

Performing the spell takes a good deal of dedication, including amassing the following:

Unflattering photo of Trump
Tower tarot card
Tiny stub of an orange candle or orange carrot
A pin or small nail (to inscribe candle)
White candle (any size), representing the element of Fire
Small bowl of water, representing elemental Water
Small bowl of salt, representing elemental Earth
Feather (any), representing the element of Air
Matches or lighter
Ashtray or dish of sand

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Are You Going To Cast A Spell On Trump?

Those who don’t like Donald Trump and the current Republican administration are mobilizing in all sorts of ways. They’re speaking up in town halls and calling their representatives. They’re organizing protests and demonstrations. And, for the magically-inclined, they’re casting spells.

Starting at midnight on Friday, witches around the country are calling for a mass spell to be cast on Donald Trump every night of a waning crescent moon until he’s driven from office.

The spell was publicized by Michael M. Hughes, who told ELLE.com that it was tweaked from multiple spells he saw going around private witchcraft groups. He published it on Extra News Feed because he felt “it would be very welcome to a lot of people.” It quickly spread, with events being formed around the country and support on social media.

Hughes explained that he chose a binding spell because “we’re not wishing harm on anyone, we’re just trying to stop the harm they’re doing. It’s not the equivalent of punching a Nazi in the face, it’s the equivalent of tying him up and taking his bullhorn away.”

The ritual itself is pretty standard magic working, binding Trump from doing harm to others and to himself, rather than asking any forces to do harm to him. There are objects to represent the elements and to represent Trump himself. The tarot card of the Tower represents ambitions built on lies, which are struck down by a lightning flash of truth. For those who believe in witchcraft, it looks to be an effective spell.

However, even for those who don’t, the ritual can have meaning. Witches have gathered to create spells for social justice before, whether it was to hex convicted rapist Brock Turner or exorcise the Pentagon. “My feeling was people were feeling so helpless in the face of all this,” said Hughes, who sees the ritual, as much as anything, as a self-exorcism. “So many of us are overwhelmed by this guy’s face, this energy―it’s ever present and beating a lot of us down. I see this as a way of people reclaiming their own power…it’s not just that we can stop him, but we can expunge him from ourselves.”

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Witches target Trump with mass occult ritual

It’s not just a political battle anymore. It’s spiritual warfare now.

Exorcists, witches and occultists “in a number of magical groups” are announcing plans for a ritual designed to “bind Donald Trump and all who abet him.”

It’s to happen Friday at midnight at a variety of locations across the nation, and again every month until Donald Trump is no longer in office.

The rite, requiring a stub of a candle, a pin, salt, matches, a tarot card, a feather and other odds and ends, calls on spirits to ensure President Trump will “fail utterly.” It also includes burning a picture of the commander in chief, visualizing him “blowing apart into dust or ash.”

Participants apparently have the option of using a baby carrot instead of an orange candle.

Among the various spirits invoked are the “demons of the infernal realms.”

There is even a Facebook page networking those who want to participate in the ritual. Some media outlets are also looking to film whatever happens.

It’s not the first time anti-Trump occultists have tried to use black magic against the president.

The far-left feminist blog Jezebel, named after the biblical queen who mandated the worship of Baal and Asherah instead of God, published a gushing story in September 2015 about “Brooklyn Witches” of immigrant descent cursing Trump because they “wholeheartedly believe that Trump and the rest of the GOP are garbage.”

Trump evidently overcame the curse, along with everything else in his way, to win the presidency a year later.

Still, Christian leaders believe these kinds of spiritual threats should be taken seriously, condemned and countered.

Jan Markell of Olive Tree Ministries said the left’s open embrace of demonic imagery is revealing.

“It shows that the level of hatred against Donald Trump is generated by Satan himself,” she said. “Donald Trump is not a perfect man. But he is trying to stop the runaway freight train of evil that has existed for eight years emanating out of Washington and the Democratic Party.

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BRZEZINSKI: ‘OUR JOB’ IS TO CONTROL ‘EXACTLY WHAT PEOPLE THINK’

Controlling “exactly what people think” is the job of the media, MSNBC’s Mika Brzezinski boldly declared Wednesday morning.

While discussing President Trump’s entreaties to the American people to remain skeptical of the press, Bzezinski worried that if the economy turns south, Americans may end up trusting him over the media.

“And it could be that while unemployment and the economy worsens, he could have undermined the messaging so much that he can actually control exactly what people think,” Brzezinski said. “And that, that is our job.”

SCARBOROUGH: “Exactly. That is exactly what I hear. What Yamiche said is what I hear from all the Trump supporters that I talk to who were Trump voters and are still Trump supporters. They go, ‘Yeah you guys are going crazy. He’s doing — what are you so surprised about? He is doing exactly what he said he is going to do.'”

BRZEZINSKI: “Well, I think that the dangerous, you know, edges here are that he is trying to undermine the media and trying to make up his own facts. And it could be that while unemployment and the economy worsens, he could have undermined the messaging so much that he can actually control exactly what people think. And that, that is our job.”

The comment failed to raise any eyebrows from her co-panelists. Instead, her co-host, Joe Scarborough, said that Trump’s media antagonism puts him on par with Mussolini and Lenin.
SCARBOROUGH: “It’s the — it’s the ground noise that he is throwing out there also, whether he is questioning, Mark, the legitimacy of federal judges to do what they have done since Marbury v. Madison. It’s when he says the media is the, quote –”

BRZEZINSKI: “Enemy.”
SCARBOROUGH: “– ‘enemy of the people’, where he sounds like Mussolini or Lenin which obviously causes concern that phrase right there makes him sound more like a dictator in training, when he sends Stephen Miller out and says, basically the president has absolute power, he shall not be questioned.”

Scarborough also accused Trump’s base of having a “blind spot” on the issue of illegal immigration.

“We have an economy, let’s face it, we have an economy that is built on illegal immigration,” Scarborough said. “We have an economy that is built on that. That is why I say why don’t you just legalize it?”

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Gillibrand, Schumer oppose Elaine Chao’s confirmation as transportation secretary

New York’s U.S. senators were among the handful of votes against Elaine Chao for transportation secretary.

The U.S. Senate confirmed Chao to lead the Department of Transportation by a 93-6 vote. U.S. Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand and Chuck Schumer opposed Chao’s confirmation.

Joining the New York pair were Sens. Cory Booker, Jeff Merkley, Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren.

Chao is one of Trump’s least controversial picks for a Cabinet position. She served as labor secretary in President George W. Bush’s administration and was deputy transportation secretary under President George H.W. Bush.

Her husband is Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican.

With the latest vote, Gillibrand, D-N.Y., has now voted against four of five nominees for key administration positions. She opposed James Mattis for defense secretary, John Kelly for homeland security secretary and Mike Pompeo for CIA director.

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