Horrified Moviegoers in Cannes Walk out of ‘Vomitive,’ ‘Torturous’ Serial Killer Film

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. . .This is a Lars Von Trier movie, and anything goes with this “artist,” who’s put out such wonderful films as “Antichrist” and “Nymphomaniac.”

His new movie “The House That Jack Built,” starring Matt Dillon and Uma Thurman, drew mass walkouts on Monday night when it premiered at the Cannes Film Festival . . .

The Danish director said the new movie is his most violent film to date — and he’s proud of that. Movie review site Rotten Tomatoes summed up the plot this way: “Lars von Trier’s upcoming drama follows the highly intelligent Jack (Matt Dillon) over a span of 12 years and introduces the murders that define Jack’s development as a serial killer. We experience the story from Jack’s point of view, while he postulates each murder is an artwork in itself. As the inevitable police intervention is drawing nearer, he is taking greater and greater risks in his attempt to create the ultimate artwork.”

(Read more from “Horrified Moviegoers in Cannes Walk out of ‘Vomitive,’ ‘Torturous’ Serial Killer Film” HERE)

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Experts Believe They Finally Know What Happened to Malaysian Airlines Flight 370

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Experts investigating the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines flight 370, which “vanished” into thin air in 2014 while en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, China, now say they believe the 53-year-old pilot committed suicide, taking the plane on a bizarre journey which ended with a crash in the Indian Ocean.

According to NDTV, investigators now think the plane’s captain, Capt. Zaharie Ahmad Shah, depressurized the plane within minutes of takeoff, grabbing an oxygen mask for himself while his crew members and passengers passed out and then slowly suffocated.

Zaharie, they believe, then skirted the plane along the border between Malaysia and Thailand, preventing the plane from fully appearing on either country’s flight-tracking radar. After a brief jaunt over the Malaysian state of Penang, where Zaharie was from — a “long, emotional goodbye” — Zaharie, the experts say, put the plane into a “death dive,” and drove himself and all 239 aboard into the Indian Ocean off the coast of Australia . . .

The suicide timeline is far from the first theory as to how MH370 disappeared off radar, if not entirely, but it is one of the few that explains why there was no mayday call from a co-pilot, and why several east Asian countries missed the flight’s descent entirely. Only a satellite, consulted later, showed the plane ending its journey in the southern Indian Ocean. (Read more from “Experts Believe They Finally Know What Happened to Malaysian Airlines Flight 370” HERE)

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Kellyanne Conway Reveals What Trump Is Planning to Do With ‘Traitors’

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Kellyanne Conway said Monday that President Trump would likely fire people from his administration after an embarrassing leak of a joke told about Senator John McCain (R-Ariz.). . .

“Can you tell us about that process about trying to figure out who is leaking from the communications department and what’s going to be done?” Martha MacCallum asked Conway.

“I won’t you the process so much as to tell you that there are all kinds of leaks,” Conway responded, “some leaks exist, I guess, to hurt colleagues, some leaks exist because they disagree with the policies that are being put forth.”

“None of them are helpful,” she explained. “And I will tell you there’s something else that is going on in this White House but not as badly as it was in the beginning where, it’s not so much leaking as using the media to shiv each other. And that was going on quite a bit at the beginning of this administration, and it’s less so now.”

“But I think the president is on solid ground here,” she continued, “that if you work at the pleasure of the president as we all do here and you have the privilege and the blessing of coming to work every day in this White House on behalf of the nation we all love, then you ought to be competent, you ought to be loyal and you ought to be able to reinforce the agenda that prevailed here.” (Read more from “Kellyanne Conway Hints at What Trump Is Planning to Do About ‘Traitors’” HERE)

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Defector: North Korea Will Never Give up Their Nukes

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Leading up to the much-anticipated meeting between President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Singapore next month, a former North Korean official says the country is only putting on a show about getting rid of their nuclear weapons.

Thae Yong-Ho defected from North Korea in 2016, where he was the deputy ambassador to Great Britain. He said, “In the end, North Korea will remain a nuclear power packaged as a non-nuclear power.”

He explained that the North “would oppose intrusive inspections as they would be viewed as a process of breaking down Kim Jong Un’s absolute power in front of the eyes of ordinary North Koreans and elites.”

The remarks from Yong-Hu come during the recent release of his memoir, in which he states, “More people should realize that North Korea is desperately clinging to its nuclear program more than anything.” . . .

According to 38 North, “Between April 20 and May 7, 2018, the probable engineering office building and a possible instrumental shed located just outside the North Portal (where the last five underground nuclear tests have been conducted) were razed along with at least two smaller building or sheds.” (Read more from “Defector: North Korea Will Never Give up Their Nukes” HERE)

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Avenatti Docs Leak: Got $8 Million out of Thin Air When Stormy Arrived

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Lawyer and/or media gadabout Michael Avenatti has thus far provided a great deal of the comic relief in l’affaire Stormy Daniels, but there are a surprising number of serious questions about him that remain unanswered. . .

In spite of the fact that Avenatti’s appearances on cable news seem more frequent than takeoffs at LaGuardia, we don’t have any answers to these questions — nor indeed does anyone on CNN or MSNBC feel particularly inclined to ask them. They just assume that it’s none of their business and move along their merry way.

As humorously Biff Tanner-like as that terse statement may be, there are several problems with it. First, while he’s busy banging journalists’ heads against the wall so that they’ll read what he had to say, he probably should instruct his own client to read it, since her own statements in the matter directly contradict this. And second, it doesn’t explain why he seems to have come into $8 million as the Daniels case began to explode earlier this year . . .

Barnes looked up some tax information on Avenatti’s law firm and found he hadn’t paid any taxes for the years 2014, 2015 and 2016, even though filings in a bankruptcy court said that during that period the firm earned a whopping $30 million.

“In January 2018, (Michael Avenatti) got an unidentified source of income that allowed him to pay $4.85M to his law firm employees he defrauded, close to $2M in back taxes for payroll taxes on his law firm, and near another $1M to other creditors,” Barnes tweeted.

(Read more from “Avenatti Docs Leak: Got $8 Million out of Thin Air When Stormy Arrived” HERE)

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Russian Business Entity Rips Mueller’s Charges as ‘Make-Believe’

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Lawyers for a business entity charged in the special counsel’s investigation of Russian interference in the presidential election on Monday derided the alleged crime as “make-believe” and said the prosecution has “absolutely nothing to do” with probing any coordination between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin.

The Russian business entity, Concord Management and Consulting LLC, represented by a Washington-area team from Reed Smith, suggested in a court filing that Special Counsel Robert Mueller III had overstepped his authority to investigate any conspiracy between Donald Trump’s campaign and Russian actors who meddled in the presidential race. Concord Management and other Russian entities and individuals were charged in February in Washington federal district court for alleged roles in “sowing discord” in the presidential campaign.

Mueller’s team alleged Concord Management funded the Internet Research Agency, a Russian outfit also charged in the indictment. Prosecutors in charging documents identified the Internet Research Agency as the “organization.”

The reason for bringing the case, Reed Smith partners Eric Dubelier and Katherine Seikaly said in a court filing Monday, “is obvious, and is political: to justify his own existence the Special Counsel has to indict a Russian—any Russian.” The two lawyers describe Mueller’s case as based on allegations that Concord Management “engaged in the make-believe crime of conspiring to ‘interfere’ in a United States election.” . . .

Concord Management’s attorneys asked U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich to review the legal instructions prosecutors provided to the grand jury that charged the Internet Research Agency, Concord Management and other Russian entities and individuals.

(Story appeared at Yahoo.com but read more about it HERE)

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Famous “Humanitarian” Charged with Pedophilia, Raping Boy in Nepal

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. . .But over several years, Mr. Dalglish, a Canadian, endeared himself to many in the community, greeting villagers in Nepali, offering chocolates from Thailand to children playing in the forest and helping people rebuild their homes destroyed by devastating earthquakes in 2015.

The good will was shattered last month when the police swarmed around Mr. Dalglish’s home, placed a gun to his head and arrested him on charges of raping at least two boys, 12 and 14. . .

Mr. Dalglish’s downfall has been a shock partly because his work aiding street children around the world was so widely admired. In 2016, he was awarded the Order of Canada, one of the country’s highest civilian honors.

Nepal is one of Asia’s poorest countries, and thousands of nongovernmental organizations operate with limited government oversight. The absence of strict regulations means aid groups can be used as a cover for human traffickers and predatory behavior by humanitarian workers, said Pushkar Karki, the head of Nepal’s Chief Investigation Bureau, the agency overseeing the case against Mr. Dalglish. (Read more from “Famous “Humanitarian” Charged with Pedophilia, Raping Boy in Nepal” HERE)

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Why One-Third of American Working-Age Men Could Be Displaced by Robots

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One third of able-bodied American men between 25 and 54 could be out of job by 2050, contends the author of “The Future of Work: Robots, AI and Automation.”

“We’re already at 12% of prime-aged men without jobs,” said Darrell West, vice president of the Brookings Institution think tank, at a forum in Washington, D.C. on Monday. That number has grown steadily over the past 60 years, but it could triple in the next 30 years because of new technology such as artificial intelligence and automation. . .

Molly Kinder, senior adviser at progressive think tank New America, said the current state of manufacturing tells a story that will be seen see across many occupations. Jobs that don’t require advanced education will be replaced by automation, displacing low-wage, low-skilled workers. . .

Many are already hurt by the technology shift. Some 6% of all adults say they lost a job or had their pay or hours reduced because of automation, according to a Pew Research study published in October. And 65% of adults believe most stores will be fully automated in 20 years and require little human interaction.

West’s new book focused a lot of his attention on use of robotics in the service industry. In the book he quotes Andrew Puzder, former CEO of Hardee’s parent company CKE, as saying that digital devices are “always polite, they always upsell, they never take a vacation, they never show up late, there’s never a slip-and-fall, or an age, sex or race discrimination case.” (Read more from “Why One-Third of American Working-Age Men Could Be Displaced by Robots” HERE)

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Police Returned a Missing Boy to His Parents’ Home – Then Arrested Them When They Looked Inside

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Police say that they returned a boy to his California home after he was reported missing, but then arrested the parents when they discovered the conditions he was living in . . .

30-year-old Ina Rogers called the police in March after she discovered that her 12-year-old son was missing. She and 29-year-old Jonathan Allen, live in the city of Fairfield, just north of San Francisco.

After police found the child and returned them to his parents’ home, they discovered that the couple were forcing their ten children to live in horrible conditions.

Ina Rogers was arrested and charged with neglect, while Jonathan Allen was arrested and charged with nine counts of felony torture and six counts of child abuse . . .

“The children described incidents of intentional abuse resulting in puncture wounds, burns, bruising, and injuries consistent with being shot with a pellet gun or BB gun,” said Lieutenant Greg Hurlbut of the Fairfield Police.

(Read more from “Police Returned a Missing Boy to His Parents’ Home – Then Arrested Them When They Looked Inside” HERE)

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Who Lives in a ‘Constitution-Free’ Zone? Well over Half the U.S. Population

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Arivaca is a small, unincorporated community in Pima County, Arizona, around 11 miles north of the Mexican border. The closest big city is Tucson, 60 miles northeast. The town itself is barebones—a smattering of old buildings, some dating back to the 1800s. It is surrounded by swathes of yellow grassland.

To get groceries or cash a check at the bank, residents often have to drive north to Green Valley, or even further, to Tucson. And to do that, they have to pass by a Customs and Border Protection (CBP) checkpoint, where they’re inevitably asked if they’re U.S. citizens. . .

While the weight of border patrol’s operations is felt heaviest along the southwest border of the U.S., the “no man’s land” Ragan is talking about actually extends much further into the country. In the “border zone,” different legal standards apply. Agents can enter private property, set up highway checkpoints, have wide discretion to stop, question, and detain individuals they suspect to have committed immigration violations—and can even use race and ethnicity as factors to do so.

That’s striking because the border zone is home to 65.3 percent of the entire U.S. population, and around 75 percent of the U.S. Hispanic population, according to a CityLab analysis based on data from location intelligence company ESRI. This zone, which hugs the entire edge of the United States and runs 100 air miles inside, includes some of the densest cities—New York, Philadelphia, and Chicago. It also includes all of Michigan and Florida, and half of Ohio and Pennsylvania, according to a prior rough analysis by Will Lowe, a data scientist at MIT.

“It really is kind of a constitution-free zone,”says Patrick Eddington, a policy analyst who has been compiling data on border patrol’s internal checkpoints at the CATO Institute, a libertarian think tank. “I guess the best way to phrase it is that in this area, [border patrol agents] are being allowed to nullify people’s rights.” (Read more from “Who Lives in a ‘Constitution-Free’ Zone? Well over Half the U.S. Population” HERE)

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