It's Baldwin vs. Baldwin As 'O'Reilly' And 'Trump' Chat Sex Harassment 'SNL'

Alec Baldwin faced himself on “Saturday Night Live,” but it wasn’t so very hard to do because he was playing two brothers from another mother: Bill O’Reilly and Donald Trump.

When those guys get together, can the topic of sex harassment be very far away? Baldwin’s O’Reilly discovers during the skit that one of his reporters isn’t on the scene — and no longer works for Fox News — prompting O’Reilly to ask: “Did she get the check?” The reporter’s disappearing act is a dig about recent reports of payments to at least five women to settle sex harassment accusations against O’Reilly. Other disappearing acts? Some 60 Fox News sponsors who no longer want to be associated with the “O’Reilly Factor.” That leaves a room for a commercial promoting “Dog Cocaine” on the “SNL” skit.

Baldwin’s O’Reilly finally ‘fesses up that he’s been the subject of some fuzzy complaints from women involving “exciting opportunities” he has offered. Fortunately, notes Baldwin, someone who is “unimpeachable on all female issues” has stepped forward to defend him.

Cue “Hail to the Chief,” and there’s Baldwin — again — on the other side of a split screen playing Trump. “I see a lot of myself in you, Bill,” says Baldwin’s Trump.

“O’Reilly” thanks “Trump” for saying that he “did nothing wrong,” even though it appears Trump doesn’t really know the facts of the case. He had a “loose hunch,” says Baldwin’s Trump. “I’m more familiar with this case than, say … health care.”

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Wag The Dog — How Al Qaeda Played Donald Trump And The American Media

Once upon a time, Donald J. Trump, the New York City businessman-turned-president, berated then-President Barack Obama back in September 2013 about the fallacy of an American military strike against Syria.  At that time, the United States was considering the use of force against Syria in response to allegations (since largely disproven) that the regime of President Bashar al-Assad had used chemical weapons against civilians in the Damascus suburb of Ghouta. Trump, via tweet, declared “to our very foolish leader, do not attack Syria – if you do many very bad things will happen & from that fight the U.S. gets nothing!”

President Obama, despite having publicly declaring the use of chemical weapons by the Syrian regime a “red line” which, if crossed, would demand American military action, ultimately declined to order an attack, largely on the basis of warnings by James Clapper, the Director of National Intelligence, that the intelligence linking the chemical attack on Ghouta was less than definitive.

President Barack Obama, in a 2016 interview with The Atlantic, observed, “there’s a playbook in Washington that presidents are supposed to follow. It’s a playbook that comes out of the foreign-policy establishment. And the playbook prescribes responses to different events, and these responses tend to be militarized responses.” While the “Washington playbook,” Obama noted, could be useful during times of crisis, it could “also be a trap that can lead to bad decisions.”

His “red line” on chemical weapons usage, combined with heated rhetoric coming from his closest advisors, including Secretary of State John Kerry, hinting at a military response, was such a trap. Ultimately, President Obama opted to back off, observing that “dropping bombs on someone to prove that you’re willing to drop bombs on someone is just about the worst reason to use force.” The media, Republicans and even members of his own party excoriated Obama for this decision.

Yet, in November 2016, as president-elect, Donald Trump doubled down on Obama’s eschewing of the “Washington playbook.” The situation on the ground in Syria had fundamentally changed since 2013; the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) had taken over large swaths of territory in Iraq and Syria, establishing a “capital” in the Syrian city of Raqqa and declaring the creation of an Islamic “Caliphate.”  American efforts to remove Syrian President Assad from power had begun to bar fruit, forcing Russia to intervene in September 2015 in order to prop up the beleaguered Syrian president.

Trump, breaking from the mainstream positions held by most American policy makers, Republican and Democrat alike, declared that the United States should focus on fighting and defeating the Islamic State (ISIS) and not pursuing regime change in Syria. “My attitude,” Trump noted, “was you’re fighting Syria, Syria is fighting ISIS, and you have to get rid of ISIS. Russia is now totally aligned with Syria, and now you have Iran, which is becoming powerful, because of us, is aligned with Syria… Now we’re backing rebels against Syria, and we have no idea who these people are.” Moreover, Trump observed, given the robust Russian presence inside Syria, if the United States attacked Assad, “we end up fighting Russia, fighting Syria.”

For more than two months, the new Trump administration seemed to breathe life into the notion that Donald Trump had, like his predecessor before him, thrown the “Washington playbook” out the window when it came to Syrian policy.  After ordering a series of new military deployments into Syria and Iraq specifically designed to confront ISIS, the Trump administration began to give public voice to a major shift in policy vis-à-vis the Syrian President.

For the first time since President Obama, in August 2011, articulated regime change in Damascus as a precondition for the cessation of the civil conflict that had been raging since April 2011, American government officials articulated that this was no longer the case.  “You pick and choose your battles,” the American Ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, told reporters on March 30, 2017.  “And when we’re looking at this, it’s about changing up priorities and our priority is no longer to sit and focus on getting Assad out.”  Haley’s words were echoed by Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, who observed that same day, while on an official visit to Turkey, “I think the… longer-term status of President Assad will be decided by the Syrian people.”

This new policy direction lasted barely five days. Sometime in the early afternoon of April 4, 2017, troubling images and video clips began to be transmitted out of the Syrian province of Idlib by anti-government activists, including members of the so-called “White Helmets,” a volunteer rescue team whose work was captured in an eponymously-named Academy Award-winning documentary film. These images showed victims in various stages of symptomatic distress, including death, from what the activists said was exposure to chemical weapons dropped by the Syrian air force on the town of Khan Sheikhoun that very morning.

Images of these tragic deaths were immediately broadcast on American media outlets, with pundits decrying the horrific and heinous nature of the chemical attack, which was nearly unanimously attributed to the Syrian government, even though the only evidence provided was the imagery and testimony of the anti-Assad activists who, just days before, were decrying the shift in American policy regarding regime change in Syria. President Trump viewed these images, and was deeply troubled by what he saw, especially the depictions of dead and suffering children.

The images were used as exhibits in a passionate speech by Haley during a speech at the Security Council on April 5, 2017, where she confronted Russia and threatened unilateral American military action if the Council failed to respond to the alleged Syrian chemical attack. “Yesterday morning, we awoke to pictures, to children foaming at the mouth, suffering convulsions, being carried in the arms of desperate parents,” Haley said, holding up two examples of the images provided by the anti-Assad activists. “We saw rows of lifeless bodies, some still in diapers…we cannot close our eyes to those pictures.  We cannot close our minds of the responsibility to act.”  If the Security Council refused to take action against the Syrian government, Haley said, then “there are times in the life of states that we are compelled to take our own action.”

In 2013, President Barack Obama was confronted with images of dead and injured civilians, including numerous small children, from Syria that were every bit as heartbreaking as the ones displayed by Ambassador Haley. His Secretary of State, John Kerry, had made an impassioned speech that all but called for military force against Syria.  President Obama asked for, and received, a wide-range of military options from his national security team targeting the regime of President Assad; only the intervention of James Clapper, and the doubts that existed about the veracity of the intelligence linking the Ghouta chemical attack to the Syrian government, held Obama back from giving the green light for the bombing to begin. 

Like President Obama before him, President Trump asked for his national security team to prepare options for military action.  Unlike his predecessor, Donald Trump did not seek a pause in his decision making process to let his intelligence services investigate what had actually occurred in Khan Sheikhoun.  Like Nikki Haley, Donald Trump was driven by his visceral reaction to the imagery being disseminated by anti-Assad activists. In the afternoon of April 6, as he prepared to depart the White House for a summit meeting with a delegation led by the Chinese President Xi Jinping, Trump’s own cryptic words in response to a reporter’s question about any American response seem to hint that his mind was already made up. “You’ll see,” he said, before walking away.

Within hours, a pair of U.S. Navy destroyers launched 59 advanced Block IV Tomahawk cruise missiles (at a cost of some $1.41 million each), targeting aircraft, hardened shelters, fuel storage, munitions supply, air defense and communications facilities at the Al Shayrat air base, located in central Syria.  Al Shayrat was home to two squadrons of Russian-made SU-22 fighter-bombers operated by the Syrian air force, one of which was tracked by American radar as taking off from Al Sharyat on the morning of April 4, 2017, and was overhead Khan Sheikhoun around the time the alleged chemical attack occurred. 

The purpose of the American strike was two-fold; first, to send a message to the Syrian government and its allies that, according to Secretary of State Tillerson, “the president is willing to take decisive action when called for,” and in particular when confronted with evidence of a chemical attack from which the United States could not “turn away, turn a blind eye.”  The other purpose, according to a U.S. military spokesperson, to “reduce the Syrian government’s ability to deliver chemical weapons.” 

Moreover, the policy honeymoon the Trump administration had only recently announced about regime change in Syria was over. “It’s very, very possible, and, I will tell you, it’s already happened, that my attitude toward Syria and Assad has changed very much,” President Trump told reporters before the missile strikes had commenced.  Secretary Tillerson went further: “It would seem there would be no role for him [Assad] to govern the Syrian people.”

Such a reversal in policy fundamentals and direction in such a short period of time is stunning; Donald Trump didn’t simply deviate slightly off course, but rather did a complete 180-degree turn. The previous policy of avoiding entanglement in the internal affairs of Syria in favor of defeating ISIS and improving relations with Russia had been replaced by a fervent embrace of regime change, direct military engagement with the Syrian armed forces, and a confrontational stance vis-à-vis the Russian military presence in Syria.

Normally, such major policy change could only be explained by a new reality driven by verifiable facts. The alleged chemical weapons attack against Khan Sheikhoun was not a new reality; chemical attacks had been occurring inside Syria on a regular basis, despite the international effort to disarm Syria’s chemical weapons capability undertaken in 2013 that played a central role in forestalling American military action at that time. International investigations of these attacks produced mixed results, with some being attributed to the Syrian government (something the Syrian government vehemently denies), and the majority being attributed to anti-regime fighters, in particular those affiliated with Al Nusra Front, an Al Qaeda affiliate.

Moreover, there exists a mixed provenance when it comes to chemical weapons usage inside Syria that would seem to foreclose any knee-jerk reaction that placed the blame for what happened at Khan Sheikhoun solely on the Syrian government void of any official investigation. Yet this is precisely what occurred.  Some sort of chemical event took place in Khan Sheikhoun; what is very much in question is who is responsible for the release of the chemicals that caused the deaths of so many civilians.

No one disputes the fact that a Syrian air force SU-22 fighter-bomber conducted a bombing mission against a target in Khan Sheikhoun on the morning of April 4, 2017. The anti-regime activists in Khan Sheikhoun, however, have painted a narrative that has the Syrian air force dropping chemical bombs on a sleeping civilian population.

A critical piece of information that has largely escaped the reporting in the mainstream media is that Khan Sheikhoun is ground zero for the Islamic jihadists who have been at the center of the anti-Assad movement in Syria since 2011. Up until February 2017, Khan Sheikhoun was occupied by a pro-ISIS group known as Liwa al-Aqsa that was engaged in an oftentimes-violent struggle with its competitor organization, Al Nusra Front (which later morphed into Tahrir al-Sham, but under any name functioning as Al Qaeda’s arm in Syria) for resources and political influence among the local population.

The Russian Ministry of Defense has claimed that Liwa al-Aqsa was using facilities in and around Khan Sheikhoun to manufacture crude chemical shells and landmines intended for ISIS forces fighting in Iraq. According to the Russians the Khan Sheikhoun chemical weapons facility was mirrored on similar sites uncovered by Russian and Syrian forces following the reoccupation of rebel-controlled areas of Aleppo. 

In Aleppo, the Russians discovered crude weapons production laboratories that filled mortar shells and landmines with a mix of chlorine gas and white phosphorus; after a thorough forensic investigation was conducted by military specialists, the Russians turned over samples of these weapons, together with soil samples from areas struck by weapons produced in these laboratories, to investigators from the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons for further evaluation.

Al Nusra has a long history of manufacturing and employing crude chemical weapons; the 2013 chemical attack on Ghouta made use of low-grade Sarin nerve agent locally synthesized, while attacks in and around Aleppo in 2016 made use of a chlorine/white phosphorous blend.  If the Russians are correct, and the building bombed in Khan Sheikhoun on the morning of April 4, 2017 was producing and/or storing chemical weapons, the probability that viable agent and other toxic contaminants were dispersed into the surrounding neighborhood, and further disseminated by the prevailing wind, is high.

The counter-narrative offered by the Russians and Syrians, however, has been minimized, mocked and ignored by both the American media and the Trump administration. So, too, has the very illogic of the premise being put forward to answer the question of why President Assad would risk everything by using chemical weapons against a target of zero military value, at a time when the strategic balance of power had shifted strongly in his favor. Likewise, why would Russia, which had invested considerable political capital in the disarmament of Syria’s chemical weapons capability after 2013, stand by idly while the Syrian air force carried out such an attack, especially when their was such a heavy Russian military presence at the base in question at the time of the attack?

Such analysis seems beyond the scope and comprehension of the American fourth estate.  Instead, media outlets like CNN embrace at face value anything they are told by official American sources, including a particularly preposterous insinuation that Russia actually colluded in the chemical weapons attack; the aforementioned presence of Russian officers at Al Shayrat air base has been cited as evidence that Russia had to have known about Syria’s chemical warfare capability, and yet did nothing to prevent the attack.

To sustain this illogic, the American public and decision-makers make use of a sophisticated propaganda campaign involving video images and narratives provided by forces opposed to the regime of Bashar al-Assad, including organizations like the “White Helmets,” the Syrian-American Medical Society, the Aleppo Media Center, which have a history of providing slanted information designed to promote an anti-Assad message (Donald Trump has all but acknowledged that these images played a major role in his decision to reevaluate his opinion of Bashar al-Assad and order the cruise missile attack on Al Shayrat airbase.) 

Many of the fighters affiliated with Tahrir al-Sham are veterans of the battle for Aleppo, and as such are intimately familiar with the tools and trade of the extensive propaganda battle that was waged simultaneously with the actual fighting in an effort to sway western public opinion toward adopting a more aggressive stance in opposition to the Syrian government of Assad. These tools were brought to bear in promoting a counter-narrative about the Khan Sheikhoun chemical incident (ironically, many of the activists in question, including the “White Helmets,” were trained and equipped in social media manipulation tactics using money provided by the United States; that these techniques would end up being used to manipulate an American President into carrying out an act of war most likely never factored into the thinking of the State Department personnel who conceived and implemented the program).

Even slick media training, however, cannot gloss over basic factual inconsistencies. Early on, the anti-Assad opposition media outlets were labeling the Khan Sheikhoun incident as a “Sarin nerve agent” attack; one doctor affiliated with Al Qaeda sent out images and commentary via social media that documented symptoms, such as dilated pupils, that he diagnosed as stemming from exposure to Sarin nerve agent. Sarin, however, is an odorless, colorless material, dispersed as either a liquid or vapor; eyewitnesses speak of a “pungent odor” and “blue-yellow” clouds, more indicative of chlorine gas.

And while American media outlets, such as CNN, have spoken of munitions “filled to the brim” with Sarin nerve agent being used at Khan Sheikhoun, there is simply no evidence cited by any source that can sustain such an account.  Heartbreaking images of victims being treated by “White Helmet” rescuers have been cited as proof of Sarin-like symptoms, the medical viability of these images is in question; there are no images taken of victims at the scene of the attack. Instead, the video provided by the “White Helmets” is of decontamination and treatment carried out at a “White Helmet” base after the victims, either dead or injured, were transported there. 

The lack of viable protective clothing worn by the “White Helmet” personnel while handling victims is another indication that the chemical in question was not military grade Sarin; if it were, the rescuers would themselves have become victims (some accounts speak of just this phenomena, but this occurred at the site of the attack, where the rescuers were overcome by a “pungent smelling” chemical – again, Sarin is odorless.)

More than 20 victims of the Khan Sheikhoun incident were transported to Turkish hospitals for care; three subsequently died. According to the Turkish Justice Minister, autopsies conducted on the bodies confirm that the cause of death was exposure to chemical agents. The World Health Organization has indicated that the symptoms of the Khan Sheikhoun victims are consistent with both Sarin and Chlorine exposure. American media outlets have latched onto the Turkish and WHO statements as “proof” of Syrian government involvement; however, any exposure to the chlorine/white phosphorous blend associated with Al Nusra chemical weapons would produce similar symptoms. 

Moreover, if Al Nusra was replicating the type of low-grade Sarin it employed at Ghouta in 2013 at Khan Sheikhoun, it is highly likely that some of the victims in question would exhibit Sarin-like symptoms. Blood samples taken from the victims could provide a more precise readout of the specific chemical exposure involved; such samples have allegedly been collected by Al Nusra-affiliated personnel, and turned over to international investigators (the notion that any serious investigatory body would allow Al Nusra to provide forensic evidence in support of an investigation where it is one of only two potential culprits is mindboggling, but that is precisely what has happened). But the Trump administration chose to act before these samples could be processed, perhaps afraid that their results would not sustain the underlying allegation of the employment of Sarin by the Syrian air force.

Mainstream American media outlets have willingly and openly embraced a narrative provided by Al Qaeda affiliates whose record of using chemical weapons in Syria and distorting and manufacturing “evidence” to promote anti-Assad policies in the west, including regime change, is well documented.  These outlets have made a deliberate decision to endorse the view of Al Qaeda over a narrative provided by Russian and Syrian government authorities without any effort to fact check either position. These actions, however, do not seem to shock the conscience of the American public; when it comes to Syria, the mainstream American media and its audience has long ago ceded the narrative to Al Qaeda and other Islamist anti-regime elements.

The real culprits here are the Trump administration, and President Trump himself. The president’s record of placing more weight on what he sees on television than the intelligence briefings he may or may not be getting, and his lack of intellectual curiosity and unfamiliarity with the nuances and complexities of both foreign and national security policy, created the conditions where the imagery of the Khan Sheikhoun victims that had been disseminated by pro-Al Nusra (i.e., Al Qaeda) outlets could influence critical life-or-death decisions.

That President Trump could be susceptible to such obvious manipulation is not surprising, given his predilection for counter-punching on Twitter for any perceived slight; that his national security team allowed him to be manipulated thus, and did nothing to sway Trump’s opinion or forestall action pending a thorough review of the facts, is scandalous. History will show that Donald Trump, his advisors and the American media were little more than willing dupes for Al Qaeda and its affiliates, whose manipulation of the Syrian narrative resulted in a major policy shift that furthers their objectives. 

The other winner in this sorry story is ISIS, which took advantage of the American strike against Al Shayrat to launch a major offensive against Syrian government forces around the city of Palmyra (Al Shayrat had served as the principal air base for operations in the Palmyra region). The breakdown in relations between Russia and the United States means that, for the foreseeable future at least, the kind of coordination that had been taking place in the fight against ISIS is a thing of the past, a fact that can only bode well for the fighters of ISIS. For a man who placed so much emphasis on defeating ISIS, President Trump’s actions can only be viewed as a self-inflicted wound, a kind of circular firing squad that marks the actions of a Keystone Cop, and not the Commander in Chief of the most powerful nation in the world. 

But the person who might get the last laugh is President Assad himself. While the Pentagon has claimed that it significantly degraded the Al Shayrat air base, with 58 of 59 cruise missile hitting their targets, Russia has stated that only 23 cruise missiles impacted the facility, and these did only limited damage.  The runway was undamaged; indeed, in the afternoon of April 7, 2017, a Syrian air force fighter-bomber took off from Al Shayrat, flew to Idlib Province, where it attacked Al Nusra positions near Khan Sheikhoun.

 

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Allies Of Syria's Assad Say U.S. Attack Crosses 'Red Lines'

AMMAN (Reuters) – A joint command center made up of the forces of Russian, Iran and allied militia alliance supporting Syrian President Bashar al Assad said the U.S. strike on a Syrian air base crossed “red lines” and it would now respond to any new aggression and increase their level of support to their ally.

“What America waged in an aggression on Syria is a crossing of red lines. From now on we will respond with force to any aggressor or any breach of red lines from whoever it is and America knows our ability to respond well,” said the statement published by the group on media outlet Ilam al Harbi.

 

(Reporting by Suleiman Al-Khalidi. Editing by Jane Merriman)

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Police Say Uzbek Suspect In Swedish Truck Attack Had Expressed Sympathy For Islamic State

By Simon Johnson, Niklas Pollard and Johan Ahlander

STOCKHOLM (Reuters) – An Uzbek man suspected of ramming a truck into a crowd in Stockholm, killing four people, had expressed sympathy for Islamic State and was wanted for failing to comply with a deportation order, Swedish police said on Sunday.

Another 15 people were injured on Friday when a hijacked beer delivery truck barreled down a busy shopping street before crashing into a department store and catching fire. The Uzbek was arrested several hours later.

“We know that the suspect had expressed sympathy for extremist organizations, among them IS,” Jonas Hysing, chief of national police operations, told a news conference, using an acronym for the ultra-hardline militant group.

In Europe, vehicles have also been used as deadly weapons in attacks in Nice, Berlin and London over the past year and were claimed by Islamic State. There has been as yet no claim of responsibility for the Stockholm assault.

The Stockholm suspect, aged 39 and from the Central Asian republic of Uzbekistan, applied for permanent residence in Sweden in 2014. But his bid was rejected and he was wanted for disregarding an order for his deportation, Hysing said.

Police had been looking for him since the Nordic country’s Migration Agency in December gave him four weeks to leave the country. He had not been known as a militant threat by the security services before Friday’s attack.

Two of the dead were Swedes, one was a British citizen and the other from Belgium, Hysing said.

Sweden’s prosecution authority said a second person had been arrested in connection with the attack on suspicion of having committed a terrorist offense through murder.

But police said they were more convinced than ever that the Uzbek man was the driver of the commandeered truck.

They said another five people were being held for questioning after raids during the weekend, and that they had conducted about 500 interviews as part of the inquiry.

Of the injured, 10 remained in hospital, two of them in intensive care.

In neighboring Norway early on Sunday, police set off a controlled explosion of a “bomb-like device” in central Oslo and took a suspect into custody. Police across the Nordic region went on heightened alert after the Stockholm attack.

Stockholm was returning to normality on Sunday with police barricades taken down along the Drottninggatan street where the attack took place.

Hundreds of flower bouquets covered steps leading down to the square next to where the truck ploughed into the Ahlens department store, with more piled up under boarded-up windows.

A memorial service was being held in Sergels torg, the central square next to Drottninggatan, at 2 p.m. (1200 GMT).

Prime Minister Stefan Lofven, addressing a Social Democratic party conference in the western city of Gothenburg, said Sweden would never be broken by acts of terror.

“We will hunt down these murderers with the full power of Sweden’s democracy. There will be no compromises,” he said.

Sweden has long taken pride in its tolerant liberal society and been among the world’s most welcoming nations to immigrants.

But some Swedes are having second thoughts after more than 160,000 people, many from Syria, applied for asylum in 2015 in a nation of just 10 million.

The Ahlens store canceled a planned half-price sale of smoke-damaged goods on Sunday and apologized to customers after a storm of protest on social media that such a step would be disrespectful to the attack victims.

 

(Additional reporting by Johan Sennero, Johannes Hellstrom, Helena Soderpalm, Olof Swahnberg and Daniel Dickson in Stockholm, and Julia Fioretti in Brussels; writing by Simon Johnson, Alister Doyle and Niklas Pollard; editing by Mark Heinrich)

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Poll: 51 Percent Support Airstrikes In Syria, But Most Don't Think They'll Be Effective

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Half of Americans support President Donald Trump’s airstrikes against Syria in retaliation for the Syrian government’s reported use of chemicals weapons on its citizens, according to a new HuffPost/YouGov survey. The poll also found some Americans concerned about Trump’s preparation for the attack and his failure to seek congressional authorization.

Fifty-one percent of Americans say they support Trump’s decision to order airstrikes, with 32 percent opposed, and 17 percent uncertain.

Four in 10 view the strikes as an appropriate response, with 25 percent considering them too aggressive, and 10 percent not aggressive enough.

Still, the poll found pessimistic views of the attack’s efficacy. Just one-third of the public thinks the airstrikes will be even somewhat likely to deter the use of chemical weapons, with 46 percent believing they’re somewhat unlikely or very unlikely to have any such effect.

There was little support for further U.S. response. Only 20 percent of Americans want Trump to take additional military action, while 36 percent say he should not. A plurality, 45 percent, was unsure.

Trump’s actions have drawn criticism from many typically sympathetic right-wing media figures who back a more isolationist approach to foreign policy. But voters who supported Trump in last year’s election are overall deeply supportive. Eighty-three percent say they support the airstrikes, with the majority, 62 percent, strongly in favor. Just 11 percent say they’re opposed.

Voters who supported Hillary Clinton lean toward disapproval of the strikes, but with far less unanimity than they’ve displayed against many of Trump’s previous actions: 40 percent approve, and 47 percent disapprove. Fewer than a quarter are strongly opposed.

There’s also a significant split by age, with older Americans far more likely to favor the strikes. Adults aged 65 and older are nearly twice as likely as those under age 30 to support the attack. Forty percent of respondents in the youngest age group, but just 8 percent in the oldest group, believe the response was too aggressive.

Many Americans Aren’t Paying Close Attention To Syria

The HuffPost/YouGov survey is one of the first sets of data available on Americans’ reaction to the strikes. As always, the results of one poll shouldn’t be taken as gospel truth. That’s especially true on issues like foreign policy, where only a relatively small share of the public is likely to have substantive background knowledge or strongly held preexisting opinions, and where the framing of survey questions can have a potentially significant effect. Additionally, views will continue to be shaped by whatever follows in Syria, and the tenor of media coverage.

Although about two-thirds of the public say they are following the events in Syria at least somewhat closely, barely more than one-fourth report paying close attention to the news. Underscoring this point, respondents were asked near the beginning of the survey whether they knew if the U.S. had conducted airstrikes in Syria in the past six months. While 57 percent said that it had, 19 percent said there hadn’t been any such airstrikes, and 24 percent that they weren’t sure.

Plurality Say Trump Should’ve Sought Congressional Approval

Overall, the public approves of Trump’s handling of Syria by a modest 4-point margin, 41 percent to 37 percent ― significantly better than his overall approval rating.

But other questions reveal wariness about the president’s decision-making process. Americans say, 42 percent to 32 percent, that Trump did not plan carefully enough before ordering the airstrikes. They also say, 44 percent to 22 percent, that his actions were not consistent with his previous statements about Syria.

A plurality, 46 percent, say Trump should have gotten authorization from Congress before authorizing the airstrikes, and 31 percent that he should not have done so. Forty percent say Congress should have the final authority on such actions, while 35 percent say Trump should. (In 2013, a Pew Research survey found that, by a nearly 2-to-1 margin, Americans believed that Congress should have the final say over then-president Barack Obama.)

Opinions are largely divided along political lines, with most Trump voters saying he planned carefully enough and did not need congressional approval, and Clinton voters disagreeing on both fronts. Just 12 percent of Clinton voters, and slightly less than half of Trump voters, say his decision was consistent with his past statements.

Split On U.S. Role In World Affairs, Responsibility To Act In Syria

Americans are evenly split between saying it’s best for the future of the U.S. to be active in world affairs, and saying we should pay less attention to problems overseas and concentrate on problems here.

That represents a shift away from isolationism since last year. In a June 2016 HuffPost/YouGov survey, Americans said 49 percent to 38 percent that the U.S. should pay less attention to problems overseas.

In the most recent survey, Americans say by a 7-point margin, 40 percent to 33 percent, that problems in the world would be even worse without U.S. involvement.

Thirty-six percent say that the U.S. has a responsibility to do something about the fighting in Syria, with an equal percentage saying it has a responsibility to accept Syrian refugees; 36 percent and 43 percent, respectively, don’t think the U.S. has those responsibilities.

Clinton voters are likelier than Trump voters to support taking an active role in world affairs, and to feel a responsibility to take in refugees. But Clinton voters are less likely to say that world problems would be worse without U.S. involvement. Roughly similar shares of both groups say the U.S. has a responsibility to do something about the fighting in Syria.

Opinions again divided along generational lines, with younger Americans more likely to take isolationist views. Sixty percent of Americans ages 65 and older say it’s best for the future of the country to be active in world affairs, and 59 percent that problems in the world would be worse without U.S. involvement; among adults under age 30, those numbers are just 36 percent and 27 percent, respectively.

Use the widget below to further explore the results of HuffPost/YouGov’s survey,using the menu at the top to select survey questions and the buttons at the bottom to filter the data by subgroups:

The HuffPost/YouGov poll consisted of 1,000 completed interviews conducted April 7 and April 8 among U.S. adults, using a sample selected from YouGov’s opt-in online panel to match the demographics and other characteristics of the adult U.S. population.

The Huffington Post has teamed up with YouGov to conduct daily opinion polls.You can learn more about this project and take part in YouGov’s nationally representative opinion polling. Data from all HuffPost/YouGov polls can be found here. More details on the polls’ methodology are available here.

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Ben Heck's mini pinball game

As the team works on bringing their projects into production, it’s time to turn our attention to the Super Space Shuttle mini pinball game. This was definitely an element14 community favorite, and the first thing the team needs is some critical a…

Jeep unveils 2018 Grand Cherokee Trackhawk with 707hp Hellcat engine

The most powerful SUV from Jeep has finally been announced in the form of the 2018 Grand Cherokee Trackhawk. The all-wheel-drive monster is powered by none other than Dodge’s SRT Challenger Hellcat engine, meaning it sports the same 707 horsepower as the sedan, along with 645 pound-feet of torque. The Trackhawk will be presented at this week’s New York auto … Continue reading

Dalai Lama Hints At Rebirth As A Woman Outside China's Influence

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The Dalai Lama traveled to the Himalayan Indian town of Tawang this week to begin days of important teachings that some observers see as a message to China that he may not be reborn within China’s satellite of influence, diluting its control over the next Dalai Lama.

Under Tibetan beliefs, the spiritual leader of Tibet’s Buddhist religion is always the Dalai Lama, who is reincarnated in the body of child on his death. This Dalai Lama is the 14th in his line.

Tibetans fear that the Chinese will attempt to choose who the next Dalai Lama is so that they can control him through any political and land disputes with Tibet. China has insisted that the Dalai Lama be reborn where China has control and be approved by Chinese leaders.

The trip this weekend by the Dalia Lama, 81, is a “message on reincarnation,” China and Tibet expert Jayadeva Ranade told The Wall Street Journal. Tawang is a place that the monk, who resides in exile in India, could be reincarnated, but not a location supported by China.

Aging lamas sometimes travel late in life to locations where they expect or hope to be reincarnated, The New York Times reported.

Traveling to Tawang now “is a way of getting under the skin of the Chinese, of probing them, and reminding them that they have no control over where the next reincarnation occurs,” historian Robert Barnett of Columbia University told the Times.

The place of the Dalai Lama’s reincarnation might not be the only surprise in his rebirth. He may return as a female, he said.

He said in Tawang that he had no indication where his successor might be born. The Associated Press reported that when asked if he could be succeeded by a woman, he responded: “That might also happen.” (He said in 2015 that a female successor would have to be “attractive,” which ignited a firestorm of controversy. It wasn’t entirely clear then, however, if he was being serious that he could be succeeded by a woman.)

He said in Tawang that it’s up to the people to decide whether to preserve the reincarnation tradition for their leader.

But in an interview in March with comedian John Oliver, he said: “As far as my own rebirth is concerned, the final authority is my say, no one else’s — and obviously not Chinese communists.”

The Dalai Lama could turn to a less traditional method of choosing his successor, and pick a child — or an adult — before his death.

The Dalai Lama and his followers have been living in India in Dharamsala since fleeing Tibet after a failed 1959 uprising against the Chinese.

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U.S. Sends Navy Strike Group Toward Korean Peninsula, Says Official

By Idrees Ali

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A U.S. Navy strike group will be moving toward the western Pacific Ocean near the Korean peninsula as a show of force, a U.S. official told Reuters on Saturday, as concerns grow about North Korea’s advancing weapons program.

Earlier this month North Korea tested a liquid-fueled Scud missile which only traveled a fraction of its range.

The strike group, called Carl Vinson, includes an aircraft carrier and will make its way from Singapore toward the Korean peninsula, according to the official, who was not authorized to speak to the media and requested anonymity.

“We feel the increased presence is necessary,” the official said, citing North Korea’s worrisome behavior.

The news was first reported by Reuters.

In a statement late Saturday, the U.S. Navy’s Third Fleet said the strike group had been directed to sail north, but it did not specify the destination. The military vessels will operate in the Western Pacific rather than making previously planned port visits to Australia, it added.

This year North Korean officials, including leader Kim Jong Un, have repeatedly indicated an intercontinental ballistic missile test or something similar could be coming, possibly as soon as April 15, the 105th birthday of North Korea’s founding president and celebrated annually as “the Day of the Sun.”

Earlier this week U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping met in Florida, where Trump pressed his counterpart to do more to curb North Korea’s nuclear program.

Trump’s national security aides have completed a review of U.S. options to try to curb North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs. These include economic and military measures but lean more toward sanctions and increased pressure on Beijing to rein in its reclusive neighbor.

Although the option of pre-emptive military strikes on North Korea is not off the table, the review prioritizes less-risky steps and de-emphasizes direct military action.

Trump spoke with South Korea’s acting President Hwang Kyo-ahn on Friday, the White House said on Saturday in a statement which did not mention the strike group.

 

(Reporting by Idrees Ali; Editing by Richard Chang)

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Explosion At Egypt Nile Delta Church Kills At Least 25, Injures 60

By Ahmed Tolba and Mohamed Abdellah

CAIRO (Reuters) – At least 25 people were killed and 60 injured on Sunday when an explosion rocked a Coptic church in Egypt’s Nile Delta, state television reported, the latest assault on a religious minority that has increasingly been targeted by Islamist militants.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility and the cause of the blast, just one week before Coptic Easter and the same month that Pope Francis is scheduled to visit Egypt, was not known.

The bombing in Tanta, a Nile Delta city less than 100 kilometers outside Cairo, comes as Islamic State’s branch in Egypt appears to be stepping up attacks on Christians and threatening them in messages blasted out to followers.

In February, Christian families and students fled Egypt’s North Sinai province in droves after Islamic State began a spate of targeted killings there.

Those attacks came after one the deadliest on Egypt’s Christian minority in years – before today – when a suicide bomber hit its largest Coptic cathedral, killing at least 25. Islamic State later claimed responsibility for the attack.

Eyewitnesses to Sunday’s blast described a scene of carnage.

“There was a huge explosion in the hall. Fire and smoke filled the room and the injuries were extremely severe. I saw the intestines of those injured and legs severed entirely from their bodies,” Vivian Fareeg told Reuters by phone.

“There was blood all over the floor and body parts scattered,” said another Christian woman who was inside the church.

President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi and Prime Minister Sherif Ismail are set to visit the site on Sunday and Sisi has ordered an emergency national defense council meeting, state news reported.

A shift in Islamic State’s tactics, which has waged a low-level conflict for years in the Sinai peninsula against soldiers and police, to targeting Christian civilians and broadening its reach intoEgypt’s mainland is a potential turning point in a country trying to prevent a provincial insurgency from spiraling into wider sectarian bloodshed.

Egypt’s Christian community has felt increasingly insecure since Islamic State spread through Iraq and Syria in 2014, ruthlessly targeting religious minorities. In 2015, 21 Egyptian Christians working in Libya were killed by Islamic State.

Copts face regular attacks by Muslim neighbors, who burn their homes and churches in poor rural areas, usually in anger over an inter-faith romance or the construction of church.

Tanta was also the site of another attack earlier this month, when a policeman was killed and 15 were injured after a bomb exploded near a police training center.

 

(Additional reporting by Ahmed Mohamed Hassan and Arwa Gaballa; Writing by Eric Knecht and Amina Ismail; editing by Alexander Smith, Larry King)

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