US Politics Mega-thread - Page 5868

Barack Obama has suggested the Dakota Access pipeline could be rerouted around sacred Native American lands in comments that are the president’s first on the controversial oil project since police arrested hundreds of indigenous protesters during violent clashes.

After months of pleas from activists in North Dakota to stop construction of a pipeline that the Standing Rock tribe says could contaminate its water supply and threaten its cultural heritage, Obama said in an interview released on Tuesday night that the government was “going to let it play out for several more weeks and determine whether or not this can be resolved in a way that I think is properly attentive to the traditions of the first Americans”.

Asked about the high-profile demonstrations against the $3.8bn pipeline, Obama told news website NowThis: “We’re monitoring this closely and I think as a general rule, my view is that there is a way for us to accommodate sacred lands of Native Americans, and I think that right now the army corps is examining whether there are ways to reroute this pipeline.”

In the wake of a demonstration that began in April and has grown into an international symbol of indigenous rights and climate change activism, the US army corps of engineers announced in September that it would temporarily halt permits to dig on federal land near or under the Missouri river.

Obama had been silent since the army corp’s announcement, and Energy Transfer Partners, the company operating the pipeline, has rapidly moved forward with construction, in recent days approaching the massive protest camps and river where Native American leaders fear significant damage.

The pipeline is scheduled to transport 470,000 barrels of crude oil from the Bakken oil field in North Dakota to a refinery near Chicago. Native American leaders said the construction had already disrupted sacred burial grounds.

A judge recently denied a request from tribal leadership to block construction and the resulting protests have led local police to make more than 400 arrests, with law enforcement officials accusing Native American activists, journalists and film-makers of rioting, criminal trespass, resisting arrest and other serious felony charges.

The law enforcement response has sparked significant backlash. Videos and live streams over the last two weeks have shown a highly militarized police force surrounding unarmed activists with army tanks.

On November 02 2016 21:16 bo1b wrote:
How does Trump possibly seems honest at all?

In California, the city of Oakland was the first to regulate and tax medical marijuana dispensaries. Now, some city leaders see the industry's profits and are proposing to take a bigger piece of the action. The Oakland City Council is voting later this month on a pot profit-taking plan.

Harborside Health Center in Oakland is the largest medical marijuana dispensary in the nation.

Its executive director, Steve DeAngelo, says his dispensary brings in about $30 million in annual revenues.

"We've created over a 150 well-paying jobs and we're the second largest retail taxpayer in the city," he says.

DeAngelo says Harborside pays about $1.5 million in taxes every year.

His operation is one of eight licensed dispensaries in Oakland. But there are scores of other pot businesses that operate semi-legally, meaning they pay taxes but they are not fully licensed. And now the city wants to license them, too, but at a price.

The exploding cannabis industry has the city rethinking how much the dispensaries should pay the city to operate and who gets those licenses. City Councilwoman Desley Brooks is leading that effort.

"When you look at this industry across the United States and in Oakland, the vast majority of people who are making money in this industry are white males," she said during a recent city hearing.

Harborside's DeAngelo says he's sympathetic with effort to diversify the industry. But he has problems with Brooks' other plan to charge dispensaries 25 percent of their profits.

"And the courts have really been very, very consistent in ruling that a government agency is not allowed to take private property in that fashion," he says.

The debate over whether they city should demand medical marijuana profits comes as it is still grappling with how to promote diversity in the industry.

On November 02 2016 21:16 bo1b wrote:
How does Trump possibly seems honest at all?

On November 02 2016 22:32 TheTenthDoc wrote:


If we define honest as always saying what he believes to be true I think you could make a legitimate case for it, because he's that delusional.

On November 02 2016 23:28 Nyan wrote:
I wonder how much the world politics will change once we have Trump as US president. China and Russia will have a field day with this.

On November 02 2016 21:50 Plansix wrote:
It is important to remember that Clinton has been dipping in national polls, but Trump has been fairing poorly in the state polls that matter. That specific poll was nationwide, allowed for cell phones and does not appear to be limited to likely voters. The race is now about turn out in battle ground states, rather than changing minds.

On November 02 2016 23:37 zeo wrote:

Clinton presidency would have been a dream for Russia/China, day after the inauguration both ambassadors come to the white house with copies of the deleted emails and a note saying 'guess who's calling the shots now Hillary '

On November 02 2016 21:16 bo1b wrote:
How does Trump possibly seems honest at all?

On November 02 2016 23:38 KwarK wrote:

Thus explaining the close cooperation and support between Trump and Putin.

On November 02 2016 23:41 zeo wrote:

You're two days late with your conspiracy theories:

Investigating Donald Trump, F.B.I. Sees No Clear Link to Russia

On November 02 2016 23:42 KwarK wrote:

And yet here we are with Putin backed wikileaks attacking Hillary day after day.

On November 02 2016 21:16 m4ini wrote:
Kept away for a long time from this thread an teamliquid in general, coming back for a rather simple question that was asked in the pub last weekend. Between two pints, a couple of mates raised the point that the election is rigged, ironically, considering the US is the self proclaimed "democracy spreader" of the world.

My opinion is/was, that there won't be any rigging at the voting ballots. That's just a retarded idea. But the argument that the election is rigged came from the behaviour of the DNC and ("connected") media.

Would "very one-sided media" and a party that actively denounces/undermines efforts of certain candidates make the election "rigged"? Since i took a break, roughly 1500 pages were added to this thread, if it was discussed already, my bad - friendly pointer to roughly the right point would be nice then.



That's not surprising to me, honestly. Although "more trustworthy" is relative. Less than 0 trustworthiness is still 0 trustworthiness.

On November 02 2016 23:42 KwarK wrote:

And yet here we are with Putin backed wikileaks attacking Hillary day after day.