Ross Perot, the Texas businessman who ran unsuccessfully for president twice, has died at age 89 after a five-month battle with leukemia, The Dallas Morning News was first to report Tuesday.
Perot broke from the Republican Party in the early 1990s, upending the 1992 election by winning 19% of the vote as an independent candidate running against then–Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton (D) and incumbent President George H.W. Bush (R). He failed, however, to carry a single state.
He launched the Reform Party in 1995 and ran for president again the following year, that time securing a smaller percentage of votes. Perot famously treated Americans to 30-minute infomercials ― paid for with his own money ― about his plan for the economy, aided by cardboard graphs and charts that drew as many as 16.5 million viewers, according to a 1992 New York Times report. Dana Carvey played him with a whiny twang on “Saturday Night Live.” Perot blamed both parties for running up the national deficit and later, in 2008, created a website to track the debt.
U.S. President Donald Trump cannot block critics whose views he dislikes from following his Twitter account, a federal appeals court ruled on Tuesday.
In a 3-0 decision, the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan said the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment forbids Trump from using Twitter’s “blocking” function to limit access to his account, which is otherwise open to the public.
“The First Amendment does not permit a public official who utilizes a social media account for all manner of official purposes to exclude persons from an otherwise-open online dialog because they expressed views with which the official disagrees,” Circuit Judge Barrington Parker wrote.
The White House and the U.S. Department of Justice did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Twitter had no immediate comment.
The Vatican has ordered two of its own tombs to be searched — the latest twist in the mysterious disappearance of a teenager, 36 years ago.
Emanuela Orlandi was 15 when she vanished without a trace in the summer of 1983. The daughter of a prominent employee of the Institute for the Works of Religion — better known as the Vatican Bank — Orlandi was last seen at a music lesson in the grounds of Sant’Apollinare basilica in Rome.
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On Tuesday, Gian Piero Milano, the Vatican’s Promoter of Justice, authorized two exhumations in response to a petition launched by the teenager’s family, who believe that her body is buried at the Teutonic Cemetery in Vatican City.
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Demonstrators gather around Orlandi’s brother Pietro, center, during a event marking the 30th anniversary of her disappearance in St Peter’s Square in 2013.
Newly independent Rep. Justin Amash, the only congressional Republican to have publicly argued that President Donald Trump has engaged in impeachable conduct, told CNN that high-level party officials have thanked him behind closed doors for his stance on impeachment proceedings against Trump.
“I get people sending me text messages, people calling me, saying ‘thank you for what you’re doing,'” Amash told CNN’s Jake Tapper in a wide-ranging interview on “State of the Union” Sunday. “They’re not saying it publicly. And I think that’s a problem for our country, it’s a problem for the Republican Party, it’s a problem for the Democratic Party when people aren’t allowed to speak out.”
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Amash, who announced Thursday he was leaving the GOP, said that he has had problems with the Republican Party “for several years,“and that he would leave even if Trump were not president. “I don’t think there is anyone in there who could change the system,” Amash said.
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Alaska hit record-breaking temperatures on Independence Day, shattering the previous heat record by 5 degrees.
At 5 p.m. local time Thursday, Anchorage reached 90 degrees for the first time in the state’s recorded history, topping the previous record set at Anchorage International Airport of 85 degrees on June 14, 1969.
“Breaking an all-time record by this much is pretty unheard of in the climate community,” NBC News meteorologist Bill Karins said. At least three other cities and towns in Alaska also reached new record temperatures, according to Karins.
“A plethora of daily and all-time records were set across southcentral and southwestern Alaska” on Thursday, the National Weather Service said Friday.
Walter Shaub, the former head of the U.S. Office of Government Ethics, on Friday critically described President Donald Trump’s takeover of the Fourth of July celebrations in Washington as “a taxpayer-funded campaign ad.”
“Your tax dollars coopted for the benefit of a man whose idea of public service is the public serving him,” tweeted Shaub, in response to Trump posting a video summary of the event that cast the president in a glowing light.
It’s unclear exactly how much taxpayers will have to fork out for Thursday’s festivities, which saw tanks stationed on the capital’s streets and military airplanes flying overhead. Trump also gave a rain-soaked address, which itself became a viral moment.The final, total cost could soar into the tens of millions of dollars. The National Park Service reportedly diverted around $2.5 million to help pay for the bash.
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What Donald Trump’s July 4 Bash Was Really All About
In May 2018, a public meeting in a wealthy enclave of one of America’s most progressive cities devolved into a two-hour temper tantrum as longtime residents incensed about a proposed tax to fund homeless services shouted down its proponents.
“Lies!” the crowd bellowed as an attendee explained that the tax would be levied on corporations, not citizens. “Shill!” “Plant!” “Phony!” they shouted as another supporter spoke. “Coward!” a man yelled at a homeless woman as she took the microphone.
Kirsten Harris-Talley, the co-chair of Seattle’s Homelessness Task Force, had to pause to ask the increasingly unruly crowd to calm down: “Can I finish what I’m saying?”
“No!” the audience chanted back.
Seattle is not the only city where locals are losing their minds over issues related to housing, zoning and transportation. Ugly public meetings are becoming increasingly common in cities across the country as residents frustrated by worsening traffic, dwindling parking and rising homelessness take up fierce opposition.
Film and Writing Festival for Comedy. Showcasing best of comedy short films at the FEEDBACK Film Festival. Plus, showcasing best of comedy novels, short stories, poems, screenplays (TV, short, feature) at the festival performed by professional actors.
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Justin Amash
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What Donald Trump’s July 4 Bash Was Really All About
James' World 2 