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Re: The Shining City Upon a Hill
NY Gov. Andrew Cuomo accused by third woman of unwanted sexual advances
A third woman has accused New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo of unwanted advances.
According to The New York Times, 33-year-old Anna Ruch has claimed that Cuomo asked to kiss her at a wedding in 2019. In an interview Monday, she specified that Cuomo put his hand on her bare lower back.
A spokesperson for Cuomo reportedly referred the Times to a more general statement in which Cuomo apologized for things that "have been misinterpreted as an unwanted flirtation."
Over the past week, two of Cuomo's former aides have accused him of sexual harassment -- something he has denied.
The latest allegation comes as Attorney General Letitia James announced that the governor's office sent a letter permitting her office to perform an independent investigation.Adversity temporarily visits a strong man but stays with the weak for a lifetime.Comment
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Re: The Shining City Upon a Hill
Biden administration preparing to sanction Russia over Navalny treatment this weekComment
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Re: The Shining City Upon a Hill
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Re: The Shining City Upon a Hill
U.S. Manufacturing Expands Most in Three Years (March 1, 12:00 p.m. ET)
A gauge of U.S. factory activity increased in February to 60.8 from 58.7 a month earlier — the fastest expansion in three years, according to Institute for Supply Management data released Monday.
While household and business demand is off to a solid start to the year amid lean inventories, producers are struggling with rising costs for raw materials, labor force disruptions and higher shipping rates, Bloomberg reported. The ISM’s measure of prices paid for inputs climbed nearly 4 points in February to 86, the highest since July 2008.
Orders, production and factory employment measures all expanded at faster paces last month, highlighting robust and resilience in manufacturing that’s helping power the economy. At the same time, a measure of unfilled orders surged to the highest level in nearly 17 years while another gauge showed delivery times were the second-longest since 1979.
“Labor-market difficulties at panelists’ companies and their suppliers continued to restrict manufacturing-economy expansion and will remain the primary headwind to production growth until employment levels and factory operations can return to normal across the entire supply chain,” said Timothy Fiore, chair of ISM’s Manufacturing Business Survey Committee.
The group’s gauge of order backlogs advanced to 64 last month, the highest since April 2004.Comment
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Re: The Shining City Upon a Hill
Biden’s team says it will use ‘all available tools’ to fight China’s unfair trade practices
Points
- President Joe Biden’s administration will use “all available tools” to fight China’s unfair trade practices, said a report released by the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative.
- The report outlined the new U.S. administration’s trade agenda, including how it will address challenges posed by China.
- The release of the report comes as Katherine Tai, Biden’s nominee for U.S. Trade Representative, awaits Senate confirmation. Tai is a fluent speaker of Mandarin, the official language of the Chinese Communist party.
President Joe Biden’s team will use “all available tools” to fight China’s unfair trade practices, according to a report outlining the new U.S. administration’s trade agenda.
The document released on Monday did not specify the tools that the administration will use, but it formalized statements made by Biden and members of his team in the last few months on how they will handle China and other trade priorities.
The report outlined a few “detrimental actions” from China, such as barriers to restrict market access, “government-sanctioned forced labor programs” as well as unfair subsidies.
“They also include coercive technology transfers, illicit acquisition and infringement of American intellectual property, censorship and other restrictions on the internet and digital economy, and a failure to provide treatment to American firms in numerous sectors comparable to the treatment Chinese firms receive in those sectors in the United States,” the report said.
The administration will also make it “a top priority” to address China’s alleged forced labor programs that target Uighur Muslims and other minority groups, said the report.
The release of the report comes as Katherine Tai, Biden’s nominee for U.S. Trade Representative, awaits Senate confirmation.
Tai said on Monday she would work to address a range of issues concerning Chinese trade and economic practices — including intellectual property protection, market access restrictions and censorship
She said she would explore “a wide range of options” to address those problems, including through bilateral talks but “will not hesitate to act if those talks prove ineffective,” the news agency reports.
Tai made those comments in written answers to senators’ questions following her confirmation hearing last week.
If confirmed, Tai will inherit a long list of unresolved trade and tariff disputes from former President Donald Trump’s administration.
The list includes elevated tariffs that the U.S. and China slapped on each other’s goods during Trump’s term, as well as China’s lagging purchases of U.S. goods under the “phase one” trade deal.
During her confirmation hearing last week, Tai said tariffs are a “legitimate tool” to counter China’s state-driven economic model, reported Reuters. But she did not threaten new tariffs, and said China needs to live up to its commitments under the phase one deal, the news agency reported.
The trade pact signed by the U.S. and China last year put a pause to a tariff fight that threatened the global economy. Among other things, the deal requires China to buy $200 billion more in U.S. goods and services on top of its 2017 purchases.
China has so far failed to buy the required amounts of American goods stipulated by the trade agreement, data compiled by think tank Peterson Institute of International Economics showed.
“Addressing the China challenge will require a comprehensive strategy and more systematic approach than the piecemeal approach of the recent past,” read the report.Comment
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Re: The Shining City Upon a Hill
Biden administration unveils raft of sanctions on Russia over Navalny poisoning and imprisonment
By Jennifer Hansler, CNN
Updated 9:54 PM EST, Tue March 02, 2021
Washington(CNN)The Biden administration imposed a raft of sanctions on Russian officials and entities on Tuesday in response to the poisoning and imprisonment of opposition leader Alexey Navalny.
The actions -- taken in coordination with the European Union, which also unveiled sanctions -- represent the first significant move against Moscow since Joe Biden became President.
The Treasury Department sanctioned seven senior Russian government officials: two of President Vladimir Putin's deputy chiefs of staff, two Russian defense ministers, the Russian prosecutor general, the director of the Federal Penitentiary Service and the head of Russia's security services, the FSB. In addition, the State Department sanctioned the FSB as an entity, a designation that department spokesperson Ned Price said "speaks to where we believe culpability lies."Comment
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