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 A sea of democracy activists flooded the streets of Hong Kong Sunday under torrential rains in a peaceful demonstration to city leaders that their movement still draws wide public support, despite mounting violence and increasingly stark warnings from Beijing. Hundreds of thousands of umbrella-carrying protesters poured across the heart of Hong Kong island, defying both the downpour and a police order not to march from a park where they had gathered earlier for a rally. Weeks of demonstrations have plunged the financial hub into crisis, with images of masked, black-clad protesters engulfed by tear gas during street battles against riot police stunning a city once renowned for its stability. Warren's plans to fix America require $5 trillion in new taxes -- just for starters  Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren has churned out scores of plans to fix America, and almost all of them require cracking the federal checkbook wide open. Her campaign’s estimates of the cost of the proposals, which include free child care and overhauling election systems, total more than $5 trillion over a decade. That sum does not include other high-priced items on the liberal wish list such as “Medicare for All” government-run health care. It appears that Ms. Warren is just getting started. The Washington Times’ tally of a $5 trillion price tag did not include the cost of fully implementing a “Green New Deal” environmental makeover of the U.S. economy, estimated at between $52 trillion and $93 trillion, or Medicare for All, estimated at between $28 trillion and $32 trillion. Trump Dismisses Worries of Recession, Says Economy Is Strong President Donald Trump said Sunday the economy is "doing very well" and dismissed concerns of recession, offering an optimistic outlook after last week's steep drop in the financial markets. "I don't think we're having a recession," Trump told reporters as he returned to Washington from his New Jersey golf club. "We're doing tremendously well. Our consumers are rich. I gave a tremendous tax cut and they're loaded up with money." Larry Kudlow, Trump's top economic adviser, also played down fears of a looming recession and predicted the economy will perform well in the second half of 2019. In Sunday television interviews, he said that consumers are seeing higher wages and are able to spend and save more. TRUMP TRASHES FOXNEWS...
Love affair with network fading? Chris Wallace becomes era's equal opportunity inquisitor... President cuts off one of his closest friends... Islamic State claims bombing at Kabul wedding that killed 63 The suicide bomber stood in the middle of the dancing, clapping crowd as hundreds of Afghan children and adults celebrated a wedding in a joyous release from Kabul’s strain of war. Then, in a flash, he detonated his explosives-filled vest, killing dozens — and Afghanistan grieved again. The local Islamic State affiliate claimed responsibility for the deadliest attack in the capital this year, with 63 killed and 182 wounded, while outraged Afghans questioned just how safe they will be under an approaching deal between the United States and the Taliban to end America’s longest war. Stunned families buried the dead, some digging with their bare hands. One wounded survivor, Mohammad Aslim, still wore his bloodied clothes the day after the blast late Saturday. He and his friends had already buried 16 bodies, among them several close relatives, including a 7-year-old boy. Trump says 'very good' talks with Taliban moving toward peace, smaller U.S. presence President Trump said Sunday he wants to withdraw more U.S. troops from Afghanistan but leave behind a significant intelligence-gathering operation to prevent the nation from becoming “a laboratory for terror” again. “We’re there for one reason, we don’t want that to be a laboratory … It can’t be a laboratory for terror,” the president told reporters in New Jersey after he held meetings on a U.S.-Taliban peace plan. “We’re having very good discussions with the Taliban. We’re having very good discussions with the Afghan government. We’ll decide whether or not we’ll be staying longer or not.” Afghanistan was a base for al Qaeda’s plot to attack the U.S. on Sept. 11, 2001, leading to America’s longest-running war. The peace plan is expected to cause the U.S. to reduce its force there from about 15,000 troops to around 8,000. ROBOT BATTLESHIP US Navy to build £330m world’s largest robot warship to patrol the most dangerous seas THE US Navy wants to build a fleet of ten robot warships over the next five years. The huge ships referred to as Large Unmanned Surface Vehicles (LUSVs) would function as scouts for the main battle fleet, carrying radar and sonar as well as anti-air and cruise missiles. The vessels will mostly carry out “3D work” – dull, dirty and dangerous. A document shared with potnetial contractors, posted on the FedBizOpps website, said: “The LUSV will be a high-endurance, reconfigurable ship able to accommodate various payloads for unmanned missions to augment the Navy’s manned surface force. Joe Manchin 'encouraged' by Capitol Hill gun control talks: 'We shouldn't be living in fear' Sen. Joe Manchin III said Sunday that while President Trump hasn’t pledged support for his bill to expand background checks — or for any other gun measures — he is “encouraged” by talks on Capitol Hill in the wake of mass shootings in Texas and Ohio. “We haven’t had this before,” the West Virginia Democrat said of the dialogue. Speaking to CBS’s “Face the Nation,” Mr. Manchin said he’s hoping to overcome GOP opposition to his bill, co-written with Republican Sen. Pat Toomey, that would expand the number of gun sales subject to background checks. CNN's Clarissa Ward says intimidation effort made on Russia story CNN’s Clarissa Ward says her story this week about Russian involvement in the Central African Republic came with a price: She was trailed during her reporting and made the subject of a 15-minute propaganda video denigrating her work. Ward said she was shaken by the experience but it confirmed for her that the story made powerful people uncomfortable. “This was very clearly an attempt to discredit and intimidate us,” Ward, CNN’s chief international correspondent, said Friday. Her story about Russian involvement in gold mining and other activities in the African nation touched upon the role of Wagner, a private Russian military contractor believed to be backed by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a businessman with close ties to the Kremlin. Prigozhin was sanctioned by the U.S. for investing in organizations that tried to influence the 2016 American presidential election. Joe Biden has bigger problems than just gaffes Joe Biden, 76, has been getting heaps of attention for his verbal gaffes. Alas, voters should worry about a far bigger problem: It’s impossible to know what he stands for. Yes, some of his slip-ups can be head-scratching. Democrats choose “truth over facts,” he said. Huh? The kids from the Parkland high school shooting — which happened after he left office — “came to see me when I was vice president.” His advisers insist it’s not his age but just “Joe being Joe.” That’s hardly consolation. Still, misspeaking isn’t the worst of sins. The bigger trouble is that, even when he’s not mangling words, it can be hard to tell his true position — not just because he’s inarticulate but because some of what he says is just plain bizarre. And because he’s flip-flopped so furiously under pressure from his Democratic foes. Blame the shooter, not law-abiding gun owners It really takes uncommon depravity for someone to use a tragedy such as a shooting to score political points. It is a level of disregard for human life that the vast majority of decent people in America cannot comprehend. Yet, we seem to have a political stage full of such abjectly depraved people. It is so bad that these people may as well support live-birth abortion. Oh, wait. They do. As despicable as it was watching all the Democrats running for president scramble over dead bodies to offer the first and most depraved reactions to the recent shootings, it was a political thug in Philadelphia who proved to be the worst. Human beings aren't defined by their desires or appetites The July 27 edition of The Wall Street Journal contains a debate between David French (attorney and writer for National Review and columnist for Time) and Marci Hamilton (professor at the University of Pennsylvania and former clerk for Sandra Day O’Connor). The pro and con exchange was on the issue of religious liberty. While, Mr. French does a good job in defending religious freedom, Ms. Hamilton’s argument for curtailing it falls short. The primary error Ms. Hamilton commits can be boiled down to what Chuck Colson called getting the answer to the “first question” of human identity wrong.
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