White House News (白宮消息) | Nov. 27, 2020

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CNN host stunned by Biden’s ‘jaw-dropping’ honesty about COVID — instead of urging Americans to ‘inject bleach’

​Nov. 26 -  CNN host Alisyn Camerota found herself pleasantly surprised this week when she saw President-elect Joe Biden giving Americans an honest assessment of the current state of the novel coronavirus pandemic in the United States.

After playing a clip of Biden talking about the stark public health crisis facing the country while also acknowledging the sacrifices Americans are making this Thanksgiving, Camerota said it was a remarkable contrast with the kinds of messages President Donald Trump has been sending about the pandemic.

“You almost have to reprogram your brain to hear the reality, to hear somebody, a leader, level with the American public, and say, we need to redouble our efforts,” she said. “We need to recommit to the fight, we need to steel our spine, as opposed to, it’s going to magically go away or we should inject bleach.”

She then contrasted Biden’s message to Trump’s, in which the president openly encouraged people to gather in large groups despite the worsening COVID-19 crisis.     continue to read

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Supporters of President Donald Trump rallying for an unreal event: the theft of an election.

The assault on Biden’s presidency has already begun​

Nov. 26 - Reality appeared to hit US President Donald Trump this week when the General Services Administration gave approval for the transfer of presidential power to President-elect Joe Biden to begin. But don't be fooled: reality will not be where Trump wages a long campaign against Biden.

The assault will be conducted in the realm of unreality, as Trump's Twitter account shows. "Our case STRONGLY continues, we will keep up the good fight, and I believe we will prevail!" "RIGGED ELECTION!" "2020 is a long way from over". He participated by phone in hearings in the Pennsylvania State Senate on the issue of "massive voter fraud".

The disconnect with the facts on the ground recalls how Trump questioned president Barack Obama's citizenship during his terms in office. Now Trump is again trying to create something – the perception of a "stolen" election, charges of illegitimate power, Biden "voter fraud" claims – from nothing.

It appears to be effective, too. While one-third of US voters believe Biden won because of voter fraud, 77 per cent of Republicans believe that's the reason for his victory, according to a Monmouth University poll.     continue to read

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Taiwan cabinet details plans to regulate pork imports from US

Nov. 27 - The Cabinet on Thursday (Nov. 26) released a five-point plan for the regulation of American pork products, in an effort to ease public concerns over residues of the livestock drug ractopamine, before Taiwan opens its market to such imports from the United States next year.

At a Cabinet meeting, Premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) said the measures will allow the government to closely supervise imported pork "from Customs to the kitchen" and to safeguard the health of the Taiwanese people.

First, American slaughterhouses and meat processing plants that are exporting to Taiwan for the first time will be required to obtain authorization from Taiwanese health authorities, pending on-site inspections, Su said     continue to read

PBS NewsHour full episode, Nov. 26, 2020
Nov. 27, 2020
Thursday on the NewsHour, the U.S. Supreme Court blocks New York's limits on religious gatherings, Americans adapt to a dramatically different Thanksgiving Day during the pandemic, essential workers' Brief But Spectacular takes on COVID-19, and an extended look back at those lost to the virus.

White House News (白宮消息) | Nov. 26, 2020

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The term has appeared on podiums and backgrounds at Mr Biden's recent speeches
Did Joe Biden create the 'office of the president-elect'? Here's what you need to know

Nov. 26 - If you've seen Joe Biden give a speech in recent days you would have likely noticed that his campaign has been using the term 'office of the president-elect' on his podiums and signage on stage.

Mr Biden is the president-elect and will be sworn in as the 46th President of the United States on January 20, 2021.

But many critics on social media have questioned if the office of the president-elect is real or assumed that Mr Biden may have invented the term.     source

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Joe Biden argued Donald Trump could not be trusted on coronavirus.

Joe Biden's first 100 days as US president — this is what he promises to do

Nov. 25 - Joe Biden will be sworn in as US president on January 20 and he already has a lot to get on with.

The first 100 days of a new presidency has become something of a benchmark for how a president will get things done in their administration, after Franklin Roosevelt set a first 100-day standard when he took office in 1933.

Like many before him, the president-elect has promised a plethora of changes.

Here are some of the key things he's promised to do once he takes office.     source

海參崴[8]，俄語名符拉迪沃斯托克[9]（俄语：Владивосток，羅馬化：Vladivostok，IPA：[vlədʲɪvɐˈstok] （ 聆聽）），简称符市[10][11]，是俄罗斯滨海边疆区的首府，也是遠東聯邦管區行政中心所在。「海參崴」是該市的中國傳統名[12]，1860年被割讓予俄羅斯帝國後改為今名「符拉迪沃斯托克」，意為「控制東方」[13]。


Vladivostok (Russian: Владивосто́к, IPA: [vlədʲɪvɐˈstok] (listen)) is the largest city and the administrative centre of Primorsky Krai, Russia. The city is located around the Golden Horn Bay on the Sea of Japan, covering an area of 331.16 square kilometres (127.86 square miles), with a population of 606,561 residents,[11] up to 812,319 residents in the urban agglomeration. Vladivostok is the second-largest city in the Far Eastern Federal District, as well as the Russian Far East, after Khabarovsk.

White House News (白宮消息) | Nov. 25, 2020

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President-elect Joe Biden looks on during an event to introduce key foreign policy and national security nominees and appointments at the Queen Theatre on November 24, 2020, in Wilmington, Delaware. On Tuesday evening, Biden appeared on NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt for his first post-election interview.
Biden Says Trump Admin Hasn't Been 'Begrudging' in the Transition Process

Nov. 24 - President-elect Joe Biden said during his first interview since winning the presidential election that the transition between his incoming administration and President Donald Trump's outgoing administration "has not been begrudging" thus far.

The interview, which aired Tuesday evening on NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt, was conducted in Wilmington, Delaware, where Biden and members of his transition team are headquartered. Though the General Services Administration (GSA) granted Biden's team access to transition funds and materials on Monday and the White House gave Biden access to daily presidential briefings on Tuesday, Trump has not yet conceded the election.

During Tuesday's interview, Holt asked Biden about whether the GSA's acknowledgment of the election results had improved communication between the two camps.

"Yes. Immediately we've gotten outreach from the National Security shop, from—just across the board," Biden said. "We're already working out meeting with the COVID team in the White House, and how to not only distribute, but get from a vaccine being distributed, to a person being able to get vaccinated. So I think we're going to not be so far behind the curve, as we thought we might be in the past."     continue to read

Richard Archuleta, Taos Pueblo, NM voting rights advocate. 

GOP Trail of Tears
Giving Thanks to Indigenous Voters

• by Greg Palast
• for Nation of Change
• November 24, 2020

For those of you who wanted to see Donald Trump skedaddled from the White House, this is the week you should be celebrating Thanksgiving giving thanks to Indigenous peoples for giving Biden the White House.  The Native People’s vote provided the margin for Biden in Wisconsin, Nevada, and Arizona.

In Arizona, for example, the Tohono O’odham nation voted 98% Democratic!

If it were up to White folk, Trump would have walked away with Arizona, but Indigenous precincts in Navajo Nation lands reported a 60% to 90% vote for Biden-Harris.

The Indigenous vote has been crucial before.  In 2004, Native Nations gave John Kerry the votes he needed to win New Mexico and the presidency, but Kerry was never inaugurated… Because those native votes were never counted.

That’s right. Never counted.     source

Biden Introduces Foreign Policy Team, Says World Is ‘Looking Forward’ To America Leading Again

Nov. 24 - President-elect Joe Biden introduced his foreign policy team to the nation Tuesday, saying numerous world leaders have called to tell him they are looking forward to the U.S. returning to “lead the world” after President Donald Trump’s administration.

Biden’s foreign policy strategy intends to stray away from Trump’s more contentious relationships with certain world leaders, which Biden’s imminent administration views as unproductive. Biden’s nominee for secretary of state, Tony Blinken, argued America “can’t solve the world’s problems alone.” Biden’s team is notably much more friendly toward China than the current administration, with the incoming president describing the communist regime as a “competitor” rather than an adversary.

Biden spoke while flanked by Vice President-elect Kamala Harris, Blinken and his other nominees for foreign policy positions — Jake Sullivan as national security adviser, Linda Thomas-Greenfield as ambassador to the United Nations, and Alejandro Mayorkas as the head of the Department of Homeland Security. Biden has also selected former Sen. and Secretary of State John Kerry to lead his administration’s international efforts on climate change.   continue to read  


RELATED: GOP Reportedly Plans To Block Certain Biden Cabinet Picks, Dems May Offer ‘Sacrificial Lamb’

PBS NewsHour full episode, Nov. 24, 2020
Nov. 25, 2020
Tuesday on the NewsHour, President-elect Joe Biden moves quickly on the transition to the White House, the troubling surge continues as COVID-19 cases and deaths rise, the coronavirus exacerbates widespread food insecurity as the Thanksgiving holiday approaches, and national security professionals train the next generation of women.

White House News (白宮消息) | Nov. 24, 2020

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Antony Blinken, talking about refugees, told a Sesame Street character we ‘all have something to learn and gain from one another’. 
Antony Blinken: Biden's secretary of state nominee is sharp break with Trump era
A born internationalist, Blinken will seek to soothe the frayed nerves of western allies

Nov. 24 - After reports first emerged on Sunday night that Antony Blinken would be secretary of state in the Biden administration, one interview from his past began circulating on social media.

It was a September 2016 conversation with Grover, a character from Sesame Street, on the subject of refugees, directed at American children who might have new classmates from faraway countries. “We all have something to learn and gain from one another even when it doesn’t seem at first like we have much in common,” Blinken told the fuzzy blue puppet.

After four years of an administration that has separated migrant children from their parents and kept them in cages, Blinken’s arrival at the state department will mark a dramatic change, to say the least.

While Mike Pompeo has remained a domestic politician throughout his tenure as secretary of state, giving the lion’s share of his interviews to conservative radio stations in the midwest, for example, Blinken is very much a born internationalist.     continue to read

Antony Blinken is a longtime Biden confidant who served as No 2 at the state department and as deputy national security adviser in Barack Obama’s administration.
Joe Biden to nominate Antony Blinken as US secretary of state
Two other internationalists, Linda Thomas-Greenfield and Jake Sullivan, also tipped for top jobs

Nov. 24 - Joe Biden will nominate two veteran diplomats to the top US roles on the world stage – Antony Blinken as secretary of state and Linda Thomas-Greenfield as ambassador to the UN – in a move aimed at sending a message to Americans and allies that the new administration will mark a return to competence and experience.

Jake Sullivan, another Democratic insider, will be the new national security adviser, reflecting Biden’s approach of choosing professionals from the foreign policy establishment in preference to business executives and politicians, who were a hallmark of the Trump administration.

Blinken was Biden’s national security adviser when Biden was vice-president, and then served as the deputy secretary of state in the last two years of the Obama administration. Sullivan was an adviser to Hillary Clinton, took part in secret talks with Iran that led up to the 2015 nuclear deal, and then succeeded Blinken as Biden’s national security adviser in the Obama White House.

Thomas-Greenfield comes from the diplomatic corps, with a career stretching back to Reagan, and rose to become assistant secretary of state for African affairs in the Obama administration. The country’s most senior black diplomat was quickly fired by Donald Trump and his team, who distrusted diplomats, seeing them as part of an amorphous “deep state”.     continue to read

White House News (白宮消息) | Nov. 23, 2020

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Smercoish: Will President Trump ever concede?
Judge's devastating question for team Trump

Nov. 22, (CNN) - President Donald Trump's lawyer Rudy Giuliani made a rare appearance as an advocate in a courtroom this week in a baseless and hopeless effort to invalidate Joe Biden's victory.

Addressing the former New York City mayor, who was parroting Trump's lie about massive voter fraud, US District Court Judge Matthew Brann posed a devastating question at the hearing on Tuesday.

"You're alleging that the two individual plaintiffs were denied the right to vote. But at bottom, you're asking this court to invalidate more than 6.8 million votes, thereby disenfranchising every single voter in the Commonwealth. Could you tell me how this result could possibly be justified?"On Saturday, the judge effectively answered his own question by dismissing the lawsuit and saying, "this Court has been presented with strained legal arguments without merit and speculative accusations...and unsupported by evidence."     continue to read

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Photo by: Mary Altaffer
FILE - In this Nov. 6, 2020, photo, a canvas observer photographs Lehigh County provisional ballots as vote counting in the general election continues in Allentown, Pa. President Donald Trumps campaign filed a number of lawsuits across six battleground states this month as he tried to upend the 2020 election. Judges uniformly rejected his claims of vote fraud. The latest case ended Saturday, Nov. 21, when a federal judge in Pennsylvania said Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani presented only speculative accusations that brought to mind Frankensteins Monster.' (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer, File)

'One kind of fraud': Biden won thousands of illegal votes by noncitizens, study shows

Nov. 22 - A new study estimates that presumptive President-elect Joseph R. Biden benefited from thousands of illegal votes by noncitizens, providing President Trump’s backers another potential argument for a fraud-tainted election.

The study comes from the nonprofit research institute Just Facts, and its president, James D. Agresti, who looked at election returns from seven battleground states: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

He compared U.S. Census numbers on noncitizens (a total of 21.7 million) with each battleground state’s demographics and election results. He then applied previous election polling of noncitizens.

The 2008-13 surveys show that a significant number of noncitizens register to vote and cast ballots, despite a federal law against it, and overwhelmingly vote for Democrats.

Based in New Jersey, Just Facts concluded that thousands of “extra” noncitizen votes went to Mr. Biden, enough to flip Arizona (plus 51,081) and Georgia (plus 54,950), but not sufficient to flip the election.    

“This is just one kind of fraud,” Mr. Agresti told The Washington Times. “It’s a sizable number, which is the point. It also decimates the predominant narrative that there is no evidence of large-scale fraud in U.S. elections.”

Mr. Trump is contesting the election in court on two major contentions: invalid mailed ballots because of fake signatures or other flaws, and a computer voting system that, his legal team says, switched Trump votes to Biden votes. The latter claim remains unproven.     source

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Nevada: “Judge rejects ‘shocking ask’ of new election over voter fraud claims brought by Sharron Angle and affiliated group”

Nov. 21 - A Clark County District Court judge has rejected what she called a “shocking ask” to nullify Nevada’s election results and order a new election on scant evidence of voter fraud brought by a group tied to former U.S. Senate candidate and conservative activist Sharron Angle.

Judge Gloria Sturman rejected the request by Election Integrity Project and Angle after a lengthy hearing Friday afternoon, saying that the group’s claims of potential voter fraud fell far short of the required level of evidence needed for a judgment in their favor — throwing out a state law allowing mail-in ballots to be sent to all active registered voters, declaring the 2020 election null and ordering a new election to take place.

Sturman said she didn’t want to outright dismiss concerns that people may have fraudulently voted in the 2020 election, but said there were other remedies available and that ordering a new election days before the statewide certification of vote totals would create a “very serious harm to the public.”

“I’m not saying that there might not be problems, and your client might not have found really serious problems, and there is an administrative remedy for people who do this kind of thing. They should be investigated by the secretary of state, and they should be prosecuted if found to have done something illegal,” she said. “But the civil remedy of throwing out an election is just, to me, a shocking ask.”     source

PBS NewsHour Weekend Full Episode November 22, 2020
Nov 23, 2020
On this edition for Sunday, November 22nd, another setback for the Trump administration as more states move to certify the election results, COVID-19 cases surge ahead of the Thanksgiving holiday as experts warn against travel, and, reckoning with history, a Maryland college unveils a memorial to enslaved peoples. Hari Sreenivasan anchors from New York.