May 5th, 2019

The fire aboard the Sukhoi SSJ100 regional jet flown by Russia’s flagship carrier Aeroflot broke out after the plane made a hard emergency landing. Video on Russian television shows fire bursting from the plane’s underside as it landed. The plane had taken off from the airport bound for Murmansk, but turned back after encountering unspecified problems in the air.

Biden, who would be 78 on Inauguration Day, told a small group of donors in Columbia, South Carolina on Saturday that “14 heads of state” have contacted him, and “voiced concerns about Trump.”

Bloomberg reports:

That list included Margaret Thatcher, he said, before correcting what he called a “Freudian slip,” that he was actually referring to current British Prime Minister Theresa May.

Cicilline said the representative of the special counsel has agreed to the date but "obviously, until the day comes, we never have an absolute guarantee."...

Labour’s Mr Khan was left off the guest list by the Monarch, despite announcing he would be happy to meet the American. Mr Khan’s spokesman, Jonathan Weisgard, told Newsweek: “The mayor has not been invited to the state banquet.”...

Trump cited the expense of keeping up the US nuclear arsenal as a motivating factor behind wanting to limit how many weapons are deployed. "We're talking about a nuclear agreement where we make less and they make less and maybe where we get rid of some of the tremendous firepower that we have right now," he said. Mr Trump said China during trade talks had "felt very strongly" about joining the United States and Russia in limiting nuclear weapons...

“I really believe that we are in a crisis, a constitutional crisis,” Hillary Clinton opined during the 90-minute performance, presented as an interview of her and her husband by actor Bradley Whitford. “This is a test for our country.”...

The lawyer who paid off porn stars on the president’s behalf is to begin a three-year sentence in upstate New York...

Trump’s face-to-face meetings with Kim are “the right thing to do,” Sanders told ABC News, even given North Korea’s recent launch of short range missiles over the Sea of Japan. “You know, this is one area, actually, where I do not fault Trump,” the 2020 presidential candidate told ABC’s Jonathan Karl. “I think the idea of sitting down with Kim Jong Un is the right thing to do. It is very, very difficult, but clearly they are a threat to the planet,” Sanders...

Ankara is preparing to send its ”Fatih” vessel to the area to conduct drilling for oil and gas with plans to conduct the drilling not inside Cyprus’ actual EEZ, but in an area Greece claims for its own, it said citing Greek and Cypriot media...

Turkey isn't playing nice. Instead it's aggressiveness is only causing instability in the region, and with their new insistence on moving towards Russian weaponry - away from American - this move is bound to further isolate them from their current neighborly relations.

In response to a number of troubling and escalatory indications and warnings, the United States is deploying the USS Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group and a bomber task force to the U.S. Central Command region to send a clear and unmistakable message to the Iranian regime that any attack on United States interests or on those of our allies will be met with unrelenting force. The United States is not seeking war with the Iranian regime, but we are fully prepared to respond to any attack, whether by proxy, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, or regular Iranian forces.

What kind of impact would this have on other nations that are buying Iranian oil? ⠀

It's not a coincidence that Iran was threatening to sell their oil on the "grey market" earlier today.

From aljazeera:

Minister says Tehran is mobilising all resources to sell oil on grey market to bypass US sanctions on Iranian crude...

In a statement, the EU and the foreign ministers of France, Germany and Britain - the three EU powers that led the initial nuclear negotiations with Iran - said they took note "with regret and concern of the decision by the United States not to extend waivers with regards to trade in oil with Iran".

Turkey and China are the only two countries so far to have expressed a desire to continue large purchases of Iranian crude. Other major buyers, such as India, Japan and South Korea, have signalled they would bow to US pressure.

“Erik was weaponizing a group that had close ties to the Trump White House,” said the former White House official familiar with Prince’s relationship with O’Keefe and Project Veritas.

This is a long article but 3/4 way down they start talking about Erik Prince and his involvement with Project Veritas. There is no way to validate these claims, but it is an interesting read.

Starbucks responded, saying it will look into the incident and that it has suspended the farm from its supplier list because of the charges. The company, which boasts the world’s largest chain of coffee shops, says the farm’s practices previously complied with the C.A.F.E. certification seal, which follows “ethical and sustainable standards” developed in partnership with Conservation International and overseen by SCS Global Services. The next evaluation of the farm included in the Dirty List is expected to take place in September 2019...

So much for months and months of constant leaks, headlines, tweets, and press reports that US-China trade talks are going great, and are imminent amid an ocean of "optimism" (meant solely to sucker in amateurs into the most obvious bull headfake since 1987).

Just after noon on Sunday, President Trump tweeted that 10% tariffs paid by China on $200 billion in goods will rise to 25% on Friday, and that - contrary to what he himself and his chief economist, Larry Kudlow has said for months, talks on a trade deal have been going too slowly.

It's exactly as we said. No trade agreement with China will happen this soon. All this optimism is for boosting the stock market - not that it's a bad thing though. A trade deal with China will take a few years as this is much bigger than people realize.

The court should be careful, the DOJ added, noting its concerns that a punishment could affect fifth generation mobile phone development. “There is a plausible prospect that an overly broad remedy in this case could reduce competition and innovation in markets for 5G technology and downstream applications that rely on that technology,” the DOJ wrote...

American monopoly or Chinese monopoly worldwide? Pick your poison. There are ways to manage the American monopoly.

ANON COMMENTOR SAYS: "Whatever it takes to keep 5G Chinese tech out of Western nations. Monopolies are dangerous, but a tyrannical shithole like China in control of powerful tech like 5G is exponentially worse."

President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping will decide after negotiations this week in Washington whether they’ll meet to sign off on a pact...

We don't expect any deal to happen so soon. Maybe a memorandum of cooperation might be signed, but this is too big for it to happen so soon as China is engaging in high-level aggressiveness globally with their belt-road-initiative, not to mention their military buildup around the South China sea and other places (arctic). This type of news is most likely used to give artificial boosts in the stock markets.

The Cougar helicopter hurtled into a mountain outside Caracas in the early hours of an overcast day in the capital. An investigation was underway... On board the helicopter were two lieutenant colonels as well as five lower-ranking officers. The statement didn't say if the chopper was part of the presidential delegation...

Mostafa Waziri, secretary general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, says the cemetery houses burial shafts and tombs of top officials and a fine limestone statue from the Old Kingdom's Fifth Dynasty (2465-2323 BC)...

According to a communiqué from the Vatican Press Office, the meeting will be attended by the archbishop mayor, members of the permanent synod and metropolitans of the Greek-Catholic Church of the European nation, as well as the superiors of the departments of the Roman Curia interested...

Tlaib’s father Harbi Elabed made the accusation during a March 2010 interview with The Detroit News. The newspaper article was scrubbed from the internet when The Detroit News migrated to a new website but was available in a subscription-based digital archive...