You’ll Never Guess What a Reporter Says John Kerry’s Response to a Nuke Deal Was

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U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry testifies at the Senate Foreign Relations Committee while on Capitol Hill in WashingtonSecretary of State John Kerry allegedly responded in a most unusual way to a reporter’s question Friday whether a nuclear arms deal could be reached with Iran before the March 31 deadline.

“Allah willing,” Kerry replied — in Arabic, according to Laura Rozen, a reporter covering the Iran nuclear talks in Lausanne, Switzerland, for the Washington, D.C.-based online publication, Al-Monitor.

As news reached the public Friday that a deal may be forthcoming, Rozen tweeted:

Friend of colleague ran into @JohnKerry at chocolate shop tdy. She said friends in #Iran are looking forward to deal. He said ‘inshallah’

— Laura Rozen (@lrozen) March 27, 2015

“Inshallah” is Arabic for “Allah willing,” according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary. (Read more from “You’ll Never Guess What a Reporter Says John Kerry’s Response to a Nuke Deal Was” HERE)

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Disgusting: New Spa-Like Abortion Clinic Is Part of a Trend to De-Stigmatize the Procedure

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Photo Credit: Life News

Photo Credit: Life News

With its natural wood floors and plush upholstery, Carafem aims to feel more like a spa than a medical clinic. But the slick ads set to go up in Metro stations across the Washington region leave nothing to doubt: “Abortion. Yeah, we do that.”

The Maryland clinic, opening this week in Montgomery County’s tony Friendship Heights area, specializes in the abortion pill. The advertising reflects its unabashed approach — and a new push to de-stigmatize the nation’s most controversial medical procedure by talking about it openly and unapologetically.

Plagued by political setbacks in recent years, abortion rights activists are seeking to normalize abortion, to put a human face on the women getting the procedure and, in some cases, even putting a positive spin on it.

In Los Angeles County, groups recently sent women door-to-door in conservative neighborhoods to talk about their abortion experiences in the hope of changing minds. A number of Democratic lawmakers have publicly acknowledged having undergone the procedure. And new online projects solicit personal testimonials, including from women who have no regrets about terminating their pregnancies.

At Carafem, staff members plan to greet clients with warm teas, comfortable robes and a matter-of-fact attitude. (Read more from “New Spa-Like Abortion Clinic Is Part of a Trend to De-Stigmatize the Procedure” HERE)

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Report Says Iran May Be Keeping Elements of Nuclear Program in Syria, North Korea

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AlgeAs world powers race to close a nuclear deal with Iran, recent reports have indicated that not all elements of Iran’s nuclear program may be domestic, but that some of it may be located in Syria and as far away as North Korea. In light of the secrecy surrounding the talks going on in Lausanne, Switzerland these reports are receiving some attention, according to The Israel Project, a Washington DC-based advocacy group.

If true, the implications of the reports are far reaching. The Israel Project said that the debate in these reports “involves how Iran has dispersed its nuclear assets to Syria and North Korea, which means that any envisioned deal would only slow a part of the Iranian nuclear program, while flooding the Iranians with cash to bolster what’s left over.”

Last November, as an earlier deadline for the talks approached, the issue came up regarding Iran moving its nuclear program’s assets to Syria, but now the debate is including North Korea. And according to the Israel project, “Even if everything goes right in slowing Iran’s nuclear work on Iranian soil…the deal wouldn’t touch all of the places and ways the Iranians are going nuclear.”

The reports indicate that Germany’s Der Spiegel revealed the existence of an undisclosed nuclear facility in Syria where as much as 50 tons of enriched uranium may have been taken, so that while it remained in Syrian territory, it was nonetheless under Iranian control. The facility is located deep in the Qalamoun region, near the town of Qusayr, territory controlled by the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps-Quds Force and Iran’s terror proxy Hezbollah. (Read more from “Report Says Iran May Be Keeping Elements of Nuclear Program in Syria, North Korea” HERE)

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Spanish Hospital Conducts World’s First Successful Complex Face Transplant

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FaceA Spanish hospital said Monday it has successfully carried out the world’s most complex face transplant, reconstructing the lower face, neck, mouth, tongue and back of the throat of a man terribly disfigured by disease.

A team of 45 physicians, nurses, anaesthesiologists and other health professionals carried out the 27-hour operation in early February at Barcelona’s Vall d’Hebron University Hospital, the hospital said in a statement.

“This is the first time that a transplant of this complexity is performed in the world,” the statement said.

“The patient evolution after the surgery was successful, similar to any transplant patient at the hospital. Now he is already at home and only comes to the hospital to do routine checkups.”

The patient, a 45-year-old man who does not wish to be identified, had suffered a condition called arteriovenous malformation for the past 20 years, causing a massive deformation of his tissues. (Read more from “Spanish Hospital Conducts Complex Face Transplant” HERE)

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Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria from American Cattle Become Airborne, but Is It Life-Threatening?

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cattle-yardAirborne particulate matter wafting off American cattle yards contains antibiotics, bacteria, and antibiotic-resistant DNA, a new study finds. Environmental tests on the spread of antibiotics have been performed in the past, but this is the first time researchers have examined aerial dispersion. The work suggests airborne transmission may be contributing to an emerging global health problem, where doctors find it increasingly difficult to treat life-threatening infections.

For some time now, scientists have worried that we may be entering a “post-antibiotic era,” when the drugs that once defeated potentially fatal infections are no longer effective. Simply put, the bacteria causing infections in many cases are now immune to (or “resisting”) the drugs. Since antibiotic-resistant bacterial DNA, if imbibed in water or consumed in meat, can be transferred to humans, many researchers say misuse and overuse of veterinary pharmaceuticals may be responsible, in part, for this global health threat. Large, commercial food operations rely on veterinary drugs, including antibiotics, to promote bigger growth of the animals. However, after the animals excrete the drugs, these antibiotics enter the environment via runoff, leaching, and the spread of manure.

For this new study, then, environmental toxicology researchers at Texas Tech University decided to look at whether these drugs become airborne. Over a period of six months, they gathered airborne particulate matter from 10 commercial cattle yards each with a capacity of 20,000 to 50,000 head of cattle, within 200 miles of Lubbock, Texas.

“Mass of [particulate matter] collected immediately downwind of feedyards was significantly different than that collected immediately upwind of each feedyard,” the authors wrote in the study. (Read more from “Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria from American Cattle Become Airborne, but Is It Life-Threatening?” HERE)

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The Pentagon Ups the Ante in Syria Fight

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JORDAN-MILITARY-EXERCISEThe Special Forces group that ousted the Taliban from Afghanistan in 2001 is preparing to deploy to Jordan to train Syrian rebels to fight the Islamic State, but many of the U.S. military’s most elite warriors have a gnawing fear that those efforts may be too little, too late.

Four years after the start of the uprising against Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, the Army’s 5th Special Forces Group is getting ready to establish a multinational special operations task force in Jordan to train and equip Syrian rebel forces that the United States deems “moderate” — which means allied with neither the Islamic State nor al Qaeda’s local affiliate, al-Nusra Front.

But daunting challenges lie ahead for 5th Group. They include finding and vetting enough moderate rebels to make a difference on the battlefield; potential friction with the CIA, which has its own rebel training program going on in Jordan; the Obama administration’s refusal to let special operations forces fight alongside the rebel forces they have trained; and a confusing chain of command that none of the relevant American military headquarters seem willing or able to explain.

To complicate matters further, the general in charge of the training mission in Jordan is considered one of the special operations community’s most capable senior officers, but as things stand he is scheduled to rotate out of the country just as the training effort gets underway.

The stakes are enormously high for Washington and its allies. The Obama administration has publicly vowed to keep U.S. forces out of the line of fire in the campaign against the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq, in part to guard against the prospect of more American fatalities in a conflict the U.S. public had overwhelmingly turned against in recent years. The White House is instead hoping that members of some of the military’s most secretive and elite units can rebuild the shattered Iraqi army and stand up a force of tribal militias willing to fight the Islamic State, while simultaneously helping to train and equip a new rebel force in Syria. Failure in either location is likely to embolden the United States’ enemies in the region — Iran, the Assad regime, the Islamic State, and al-Nusra Front — and seriously damage American prestige. (Read more from “The Pentagon Ups the Ante in Syria Fight” HERE)

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Access Denied: Reporters Say Federal Officials, Data Increasingly off Limits

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Photo Credit: Washington Post

Photo Credit: Washington Post

Stacey Singer, a health reporter for the Palm Beach Post in Florida, was perusing a medical journal in 2012 when she came across something startling: a federal epidemiologist’s report about a tuberculosis outbreak in the Jacksonville area. Singer promptly began pursuing the story.

But when she started seeking official comment about the little-reported outbreak, the doors began closing. County health officials referred her to the state health department. State officials referred her to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Even though the CDC’s own expert had written the investigative report, the agency’s press office declined to let Singer speak with him. A spokesman told her it was a local matter and sent her back to the state office in Tallahassee.

Through public records requests, Singer eventually was able to piece together the story of a contagion that had caused 13 deaths and 99 illnesses — the worst the CDC had found in 20 years.

“It’s really expensive to fight this hard” for public information, said Singer, now an editorial writer at the newspaper. She suspects that officials were slow to respond because news of the TB outbreak might have harmed Florida’s tourism industry. “They know that to delay is to deny. . . . They know we have to move on to other stories.”

The stories aren’t always as consequential or as dramatic as a TB outbreak, but Singer’s experience is shared by virtually every journalist on the government beat, from the White House on down. They can recite tales with similar outlines: An agency spokesman — frequently a political appointee — rejects the reporter’s request for interviews, offers partial or nonresponsive replies, or delays responding at all until after the journalist’s deadline has passed. (Read more from “Access Denied: Reporters Say Federal Officials, Data Increasingly off Limits” HERE)

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Obama Trying to Stop the US Army From Prosecuting Bergdahl?

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Obama and BergBy Conservative Tribune. President Barack Obama has certainly staked a lot on the fate of likely deserter Bowe Bergdahl. He sacrificed the lives of several of our men in uniform in a vain attempt to rescue him, then traded five Taliban terrorists from Guantanamo Bay for his release.

Now, it appears the president is even willing to obstruct justice for Bergdahl. Recent reports indicate that senior Department of Defense officials are doing their best to poison the well for those prosecuting Bergdahl.

During the week, two DOD sources spoke to CNN to confirm that Bergdahl had left his post to “report what he believed to be problems with ‘order and discipline’ in his unit.”

While the way this was reported indicated that they were speaking on background about DOD investigations to CNN, it turns out that they were just repeating what Bergdahl had told authorities.

“This was a kid who had leadership concerns on his mind,” CNN reported that one of the officials said. “He wasn’t fed up; he wasn’t planning to desert.” (Read more from “Obama Trying to Stop the US Army From Prosecuting Bergdahl” HERE)
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Bergdahl’s ex-Platoon Members Already Undercutting the New “Whistleblower” Defense

By Jake Tapper. U.S. troops who served alongside Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl on the day he disappeared told CNN that the emerging “whistleblower” defense being prepared for him makes no sense.

Bergdahl’s lawyer is making the case that Bergdahl left his post on foot to report his unit for troubling behavior, but his fellow troops say the platoon was already scheduled to drive back to their Forward Operating Base, or FOB, just hours after his disappearance.

“We were literally going back to the FOB Sharana the next day,” then-Sgt. Evan Buetow, Bergdahl’s team leader, told CNN. “If for whatever reason Bergdahl had complaints, he could have brought them to the attention of senior officers before our five-day mission, or easily could have waited a few more hours till we returned to the FOB.”

Then-Specialist Josh Cornelison, the platoon medic, said the base was “a lengthy drive away from” Observation Post Mest, where Bergdahl was last seen by his fellow troops.

“And he wanted to walk back? Knowing full well how many times we’d been blown up on the way there and back? Everyone knew bad dudes were around and watching us move to and from OP Mest,” Cornelison said. (Read more from this story about prosecuting Bergdahl HERE)

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GOP Puts Obama’s Bergdahl Swap on Trial

By Kristina Wong. Republicans intend to highlight the controversial trade for Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl to mount an attack on President Obama’s foreign policy.

The Army’s moves to charge the solider with desertion and misbehavior before the enemy have given Republicans a new opportunity to challenge Obama’s decision last year to secure his freedom by releasing five senior Taliban commanders from Guantánamo Bay.

Republicans say the president paid too high a price for Bergdahl’s return, especially since the five former detainees will be released from house arrest in Qatar in a few months. At least one of the former detainees is reportedly already suspected of returning to the fight.

The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee turned up the heat on Friday by sending a letter to White House chief of staff Denis McDonough that requests documents and information related to the swap.

The letter also requests documents and information related to comments by National Security Advisor Susan Rice, who days after the trade was announced said Bergdahl had served with “honor and distinction.” (Read more from this story HERE)

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Netanyahu on Iran Deal: It Confirms Israel’s Worst Fears ‘and Even More So’ [+video]

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Netanyahu-Cabinet-March-2015-APBy Sharona Schwartz. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the emerging agreement being negotiated over Iran’s nuclear program confirmed all of Israel’s worst fears and warned that Iran was trying to “conquer the entire Middle East.”

“This agreement as it appears confirms all of our concerns and even more so,” Netanyahu said at the opening of his weekly cabinet meeting on Sunday.

Netanyahu accused Iran of trying to control the entire Middle East and blasted what he termed a “Beirut-Damascus-Baghdad axis,” referring to Iran’s regional allies of Hezbollah, Syrian President Bashar Assad and Iraq’s Shiites.

“Even as meetings proceed on this dangerous agreement, Iran’s proxies in Yemen are overrunning large sections of that country and are attempting to seize control of the strategic Bab-el-Mandeb straits which change the naval balance and the global oil supply,” Netanyahu said. “Iran is carrying out a pincer maneuver in the south as well in order to take over and conquer the entire Middle East.” (Read more from “Netanyahu on Iran Deal: It Confirms Israel’s Worst Fears ‘and Even More So’ [+video]” HERE)

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What to Worry About in an Iran Nuclear Deal

By Jeffrey Goldberg. I’m in Berlin, not Lausanne, and I haven’t spoken to anyone associated with the Iran nuclear negotiations in more than a week. Though there is a lot of good journalism being produced out of the talks, it is still difficult to discern what is actually happening at this moment. Those predisposed to believe that these negotiations will bring about a non-violent solution to the Iranian challenge, and also quite possibly encourage the Iranians to be more moderate in their approach to their neighbors, seem somewhat optimistic that the West will make the necessary compromises to win Iranian approval. Those who believe that the West is about to capitulate to Ayatollah Khamenei, the Iranian supreme leader, and set him on a path to the nuclear threshold seem to be praying that Iranian shortsightedness, or dumb luck on the part of the West, subvert these talks.

The more extreme positions on both sides are distasteful. The Pollyannas who not only seem to believe that Iran should be allowed to maintain an advanced nuclear infrastructure if it promises to behave nicely, but who also believe that this nuclear accord will somehow serve to convince the Iranians to moderate their approach to their neighbors and, for instance, stop sponsoring terrorism and murdering large numbers of people in Syria (among other places), are dangerous and naïve. On the other side, those who argue that no negotiated settlement will ever be good enough to keep Iran from the nuclear threshold—that only military action would guarantee an end to the Iranian nuclear program—believe that it is wise to start an actual war now in order to prevent a theoretical one later. If you believe that we are living in 1938, and that Israel, and the United Arab Emirates, and Saudi Arabia are playing the role of Czechoslovakia, then I suppose this position makes sense. I don’t think we are there, however.

I’ve been making lists of questions I have about the parameters of a framework deal, and a list of experts whose judgment I would trust to evaluate the technical aspects of a deal.

Here are a few questions that have, helped by various news stories about the talks, repeatedly crossed my mind in recent days. I would prefer to see a nuclear deal struck, of course, but unsatisfactory answers to these issues would be cause for real worry:

1) What will Saudi Arabia do in response to a deal? If the Saudis—who are already battling the Iranians on several fronts—actually head down the path toward nuclearization, then these negotiations will not have served the underlying purpose President Obama ascribed to them. The president has warned, in interviews with me and others, that a nuclear Iran would trigger a nuclear arms race across the Middle East, the world’s most volatile region. One goal of these talks is to assure the rest of the Middle East that Iran cannot achieve nuclear status. If Saudi Arabia (and Egypt and Turkey and the U.A.E.) does not believe that a deal will achieve this, then it will move on its own to counter the Persian nuclear threat. (Read more from this story HERE)

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RNC on Clinton: ‘Even Nixon Didn’t Destroy the Tapes’

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CRepublican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus blasted Hillary Clinton on Saturday for wiping her server and permanently deleting all emails.

“Even Nixon didn’t destroy the tapes,” Priebus said in a statement.

Clinton’s lawyer informed the House Select Committee investigating Benghazi on Friday that Clinton no longer had copies of any emails from her four-year tenure as secretary of State, ending in 2013.

Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.), the chairman of the committee, said in a statement Friday that “Clinton unilaterally decided to wipe her server clean and permanently delete all emails from her personal server.”

Gowdy, whose committee had subpoenaed the server earlier this month, charged that Clinton apparently decided to delete her emails after Oct. 28, 2014, when the State Department first asked her to turn over public records. (Read more from “RNC on Clinton: ‘Even Nixon Didn’t Destroy the Tapes'” HERE)

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