Month: August 2018

For Michael Cohen and Donald Trump, it’s always been about money and loyalty.

Those were guiding principles for Cohen when he served as more than just a lawyer for Trump during the developer’s rise from celebrity to president-elect. Cohen brokered deals for the Trump Organization, profited handsomely from a side venture into New York City’s real estate and taxi industries and worked to make unflattering stories about Trump disappear.

Money and loyalty also drove Cohen to make guilty pleas this past week in a spinoff from the swirling investigations battering the Trump White House.

Feeling abandoned by Trump and in dire financial straits, the man who once famously declared that he would “take a bullet” for Trump now is pledging loyalty to his own family and actively seeking to cooperate with special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation.

The unraveling of their relationship was laid bare Tuesday when Cohen pleaded guilty to eight criminal charges and said in federal court that he broke campaign finance laws as part of a cover-up operation that Trump had directed.

In the days after Cohen’s guilty plea, two close associates, the magazine boss who helped him squash bad stories and the top financial man at the president’s business, have been granted immunity for their cooperation. These moves could have a ripple effect on the legal fortunes of Cohen and, perhaps, Trump.

​A fixture in Trump’s orbit

Working alongside Trump and Trump’s three adult children — Don Jr., Ivanka, Eric — in Trump Tower, Cohen took on a number of roles for the developer, including emissary for projects in foreign capitals and enforcer of Trump’s will. At times a bully for a family-run business, Cohen was known for his hot temper as he strong-armed city workers, reluctant business partners and reporters.

He was there in the lobby of Trump Tower in June 2015 when his boss descended an escalator and changed history by declaring his candidacy for president. But Cohen’s place in Trump’s political life ended up being peripheral.

Cohen did become a reliable surrogate on cable TV — he created a viral moment by repeating “Says who?” when told Trump was down in the polls — and founded the candidate’s faith-based organization. But Cohen was never given a prominent spot in the campaign.

And despite telling confidants that he thought he had a shot at White House chief of staff after the election, Cohen was never given a West Wing job. He remained in New York when Trump moved to Washington.

Cohen found ways to profit from the arrangement, making millions from corporations by selling access to Trump, but felt adrift and isolated from Trump, according to two people familiar with his thinking who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss private conversations.

Federal agents arrive

But early one April morning, more than three dozen federal agents raided Cohen’s home, office and hotel room.

A chief focus for investigators was Cohen’s role in making payments during Trump’s campaign to women who claimed they had sex with Trump, and whether campaign finance laws were violated. In the fall of 2016, weeks before the election, Cohen had set up a limited liability company in Delaware to hide the deal he made to silence the pornographic film actress Stormy Daniels about an affair she said she had with Trump.

Worry grew within the White House about what had been seized. That April day, Trump berated the raid as “an attack on all we stand for.” But then, in a Fox & Friends interview, Trump began to dramatically play down his relationship with Cohen.

“I have nothing to do with his business,” Trump said, asserting that Cohen was just one of many lawyers and was responsible for “a tiny, tiny fraction” of Trump’s legal work.

Relationship frays

A dispute soon broke out between Cohen and Trump over who would pay the former fixer’s mounting legal bills. Holed up in a Park Avenue hotel after his apartment flooded, Cohen began to worry about his financial future, according to the two people.

By all appearances, Cohen’s lifestyle was lavish.

He bought a $6.7 million Manhattan apartment last fall, though the sale didn’t close until April and no one could move in until the summer. With bills piling up for his team of expensive lawyers, the suddenly unemployed Cohen began to tell confidants that he was worried about his job prospects and ability to support his family.

Meanwhile, the broadsides from the White House kept coming.

Trump and Cohen had long stopped speaking, but word would get back to the lawyer that the president was belittling him. The president’s attorney and frequent attack dog Rudy Giuliani went from calling Cohen “an honest, honorable lawyer” in May to deriding him as a “pathological liar” in July.

Cohen began wondering to friends whether loyalty with Trump had become a one-way street, the people said.

Cohen strikes back

Eager to hit back and attempt to regain some hold on the story, Cohen hired Lanny Davis, a former Bill Clinton attorney, to be his public relations lawyer. Davis began striking back at the White House and lobbed a clear warning shot at the president when he released a secret recording of a conversation in which Trump appears to have knowledge about hush-money payments to former Playboy model Karen McDougal, who also alleged an affair with the developer.

Cohen was embraced by the cable news networks as an irresistible foil to Trump. Some on the left styled him as a star of the resistance. Cohen’s camp made some effort to play into the role, reaching out to Watergate whistleblower John Dean and, after Cohen’s plea, establishing an online fundraising tool that seemed to predominantly receive backing from liberals.

Cohen, who could get about four years to five years in prison, is to be sentenced Dec. 12.

Davis has strongly telegraphed that Cohen is willing to cooperate with Mueller’s investigation. But a deal has yet to be struck and there are doubts about what Cohen can prove or whether the special counsel would want to rely on an untrustworthy witness.

Cohen has stayed out of sight and has remained emotional since his plea, according to the people close to him.

The attacks from Trump have continued.

“If anyone is looking for a good lawyer, I would strongly suggest that you don’t retain the services of Michael Cohen!” Trump tweeted Wednesday.
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Arizona Senator John McCain, an American war hero has died. He was 81. The Senator’s office says he died Saturday after a long battle with glioblastoma, a form of brain cancer.
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U.S. Senator John McCain died Saturday at age 81 after a battle with brain cancer that robbed America of a revered statesman, proud patriot, and self-sacrificing warrior.

His daughter, Meghan McCain, released a statement.

Shortly after McCain’s death was announced, President Donald Trump tweeted his condolences.

Best known for having survived as a prisoner of war in North Vietnam and winning the Republican presidential nomination in 2008, John Sidney McCain remained an ardent and unapologetic believer in American exceptionalism.

“We are blessed. We are living in the land of the free, the land where anything is possible,” McCain said in October, months after his cancer diagnosis, at the National Constitution Center, where he received the Liberty Medal. “We are blessed, and we have been a blessing to humanity in turn.”

In the same speech, he also warned of the perils he saw in the era of President Donald Trump.

“To refuse the obligations of international leadership and our duty to remain the last best hope of earth for the sake of some half-baked, spurious nationalism cooked up by people who would rather find scapegoats than solve problems, is as unpatriotic as an attachment to any other tired dogma of the past that Americans consigned to the ash heap of history,” the senator said.

“John McCain represented public service,” American University political historian Allan Lichtman said. “He was a genuine American hero, not a phony, hyped-up media hero.”

In Photos: John McCain

Military family

The son of a U.S. admiral, McCain became a Navy aviator and flew bombing missions during the Vietnam War. Shot down and captured by the North Vietnamese in 1967, he endured more than five years of torture and depravation as a prisoner of war.

Decades later, as a Republican senator, McCain would return to Vietnam and champion the restoration of ties between Washington and Hanoi and, as he told VOA, leave the past behind.

“Look, there are some individuals that mistreated me in prison, and I hope I never see them again,” he said. “But, that does not change my opinion that the Vietnamese people are wonderful and dear friends, and we need them and they need us.”

After the September 11, 2001 attacks, McCain decried torture tactics against terror suspects while backing the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

“John McCain’s weakness over the years was [that] he was perhaps too willing to seek a military solution to problems,” political historian Lichtman said. “Some of his critics even called him a war monger. But it [military intervention] was something he genuinely believed in, not something he cooked up for political purposes.”

Gracious in political battle

On Capitol Hill, McCain was known for a short temper and a sharp tongue.

“Get out of here you low-life scum,” McCain once growled at anti-war protesters who were disrupting a Senate committee hearing.

The senator also displayed graciousness in the heat of political battle. McCain ran twice for president as an independent-minded Republican, securing his party’s nomination in 2008. On the campaign trail, he defended his democratic opponent, Barack Obama.

“He’s an Arab,” one woman declared of Obama at a McCain town hall campaign event one month before the election.

McCain took the microphone from her and said, “No, ma’am. He is a decent family man, a citizen that I just happen to have disagreements with.”

Return to the Senate

McCain lost the presidential contest but returned to the Senate, where he continued to advocate robust U.S. engagement around the world and a strong U.S. military as chairman of the Senate Armed Service Committee.

He did not respond when then-candidate Trump questioned his war hero status.

“He is a war hero because he was captured,” Trump said on national television in July 2015. “I like people that were not captured, OK? I hate to tell you.”

McCain did, however, become a persistent critic of Trump’s governing style and policies, as well as hyper-partisanship in Washington, culminating with a decisive vote scuttling a Republican health care plan President Trump had championed. In December, he was the lone senator not to cast a vote on final passage of the Republican tax overhaul, returning Arizona to rest after cancer treatment.

Liked on both sides of aisle

McCain was revered by Democrats and Republicans alike.

“Courage and loyalty,” former vice president Joe Biden said in introductory remarks at the National Constitution Center. “I can think of no better description of the man we are honoring tonight, my friend John McCain.”

“John McCain, perhaps above all other politicians of recent years, was willing to reach across the aisle to try to do things that were good for the country, like immigration reform, like campaign finance reform,” Lichtman said.

Many will mourn his passing, but McCain remained upbeat until the end.

“I am the luckiest guy on earth. I have served America’s cause,” he said.
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The prospect of a quick deal between Mexico and the United States retreated Friday as disagreements over energy flared up and conflict over autos persisted in the renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

Since talks resumed last month, U.S. and Mexican negotiators have focused on reaching common ground, but in the past few days differing views on energy policy between the outgoing and incoming Mexican administrations have put up a fresh hurdle.

Oil and gas issues

Mexican president-elect Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador’s camp has doubts about enshrining the 2013-14 opening of the oil and gas sector enacted by current president Enrique Pena Nieto in the new pact, three sources close to the talks said.

“The energy issue is holding everything up,” said one of them Friday, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Asked this week about the energy issue, Lopez Obrador’s designated trade negotiator, Jesus Seade, sought to downplay the matter, saying that while his team wanted to check the issue’s “consistency with the constitution,” it was not “substantive.”

Lopez Obrador, a leftist, opposed Pena Nieto’s energy reform, and the issue is divisive within his own camp.

Business-friendly aides back greater private investment in the oil and gas sector, while more nationalist allies are against it.

Elected July 1, Lopez Obrador takes office Dec. 1. Another sticking point at the talks has been new rules of origin for automobile manufacturing, which U.S. negotiators hope will bring more production to the region.

US budges little

U.S. President Donald Trump prompted the NAFTA revamp over a year ago, complaining the 24-year-old trade pact has benefited Mexico to the detriment of U.S. workers and manufacturing.

Trump has threatened to withdraw from if it is not reworked to the advantage of the United States.

Industry officials have said the U.S. team had barely moved from its demands last May of a 75 percent overall regional content threshold with 40-45 percent content from high-wage zones, effectively the United States and Canada, with the only substantial change a slightly longer phase-in time.

“It seems that the issues on autos are far from being resolved,” said the industry source.

Initial optimism over an imminent deal has gradually faded.

Mexico negotiators stay over

Mexico’s Economy Minister Ildefonso Guajardo, who Wednesday said a bilateral breakthrough could be just hours away, said he and his team would stay in Washington over the weekend to keep negotiating with U.S. officials.

Asked about issues between the ingoing and outgoing governments on the energy chapter, Guajardo said: “We are working as one team, a team called Mexico, and we have to make sure that everybody feels comfortable with this agreement.”

Speaking outside the offices of U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer, Guajardo commented on the difficulty of securing a final deal: “as you know … there are always last moment things that can come between you and your goals.”

Canada waiting 

Canada has sat out the latest round of talks waiting for the Mexican and U.S. teams to work out their issues.

Asked if talks had made headway on a U.S. “sunset” proposal that could terminate NAFTA after five years, Guajardo said it was an issue that would be dealt with once Canada came back.

Canada’s foreign minister Chrystia Freeland dodged questions on when she would return to talks when speaking at a steel manufacturing facility in Vancouver, but said she had been encouraged by optimistic reports from Canada’s NAFTA partners.

“As I’ve said, it really depends on how quickly the U.S. and Mexico are able to resolve those bilateral issues,” she said. “The U.S. and Mexico issues inside NAFTA are really complicated.”
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The top U.S. envoy on Iran criticized a European Union decision to give $20.7 million in aid to Tehran on Friday, saying it sent “the wrong message at the wrong time,” and he urged Brussels to help Washington end the Iranian threat to global stability.

“Foreign aid from European taxpayers perpetuates the regime’s ability to neglect the needs of its people and stifles meaningful policy changes,” Brian Hook, the U.S. special representative for Iran, said in a statement.

“The Iranian people face very real economic pressures caused by their government’s corruption, mismanagement, and deep investment in terrorism and foreign conflicts,” he added. “The United States and the European Union should be working together instead to find lasting solutions that truly support Iran’s people and end the regime’s threats to regional and global stability.”

The EU decision on Thursday to provide 18 million euros ($20.7 million) in aid to Iran was aimed at offsetting the impact of U.S. sanctions as European countries try to salvage the 2015 agreement that saw Tehran limit its nuclear ambitions.

President Donald Trump pulled the United States out of the nuclear deal in May and is reimposing sanctions on Tehran, even as other parties to the accord are trying to find ways to save the agreement.

The EU funding is part of a wider package of 50 million euros earmarked in the EU budget for Iran, which has threatened to stop complying with the nuclear accord if it fails to see the economic benefit of relief from sanctions.

The United States is pressing other countries to comply with its sanctions.

“More money in the hands of the ayatollah means more money to conduct assassinations in those very European countries,” Hook said in his statement.

U.S. national security adviser John Bolton told Reuters during a visit to Israel earlier this week that the return of U.S. sanctions was having a strong effect on Iran’s economy and popular opinion.

The U.S. sanctions dusted off this month targeted Iran’s car industry, trade in gold and other precious metals, and purchases of U.S. dollars crucial to international financing and investment and trade relations. Farther-reaching sanctions are to follow in November on Iran’s banking sector and oil exports.
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Verizon rolled out changes Friday as state lawmakers said they were outraged to learn the telecommunications company had slowed firefighters’ internet service while they battled what became the largest wildfire on record in California.

Verizon said it removed all speed cap restrictions for emergency workers fighting wildfires on the West Coast and for those in Hawaii, where emergency crews were rescuing people from areas flooded by Hurricane Lane.

The company promised to lift restrictions on public safety customers and provide full network access when other disasters arise.

Lawmakers review incident

The announcement came hours before the state Assembly Select Committee on Natural Disaster, Response, Recovery and Rebuilding held an informational hearing on the incident.

The goal is to determine “how we ensure that all public safety has the tools they need in some of our hardest moments in California’s history battling these natural disasters,” said Democratic Assemblywoman Monique Limon of Santa Barbara.

The Santa Clara County Fire Department has said Verizon slowed its internet communications at a wildfire command center three weeks ago, crippling an emergency communications truck’s data speeds and forcing firefighters to use other agencies’ internet connections and their personal cellphones.

Net neutrality

The county disclosed the problem last week in a lawsuit brought by 22 state attorneys general seeking to restore net neutrality rules repealed by the Federal Communications Commission. The court filing alleges that the slowdown was caused by the FCC’s action, which allows telecommunications to slow internet speed to selected customers.

California lawmakers are considering a bill that would require internet companies to restore net neutrality in California, requiring equal data access to all customers.

Meanwhile, U.S. House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi, U.S. Rep. Anna Eshoo, a senior member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, and 11 other Democratic members of Congress sent a letter to the Federal Trade Commission calling Verizon’s action unacceptable and demanding an investigation into whether it amounted to “unfair or deceptive” practices.

Dave Hickey, Verizon’s vice president of business and government sales, told lawmakers the error by the company had nothing to do with net neutrality.

Unlimited data, up to a point

Rather, the county had used up its monthly data capacity under an internet plan that allows Verizon to significantly slow service. The department bought a government high-speed wireless data plan that provides an unlimited amount of data at a set monthly cost, but the company reduces speeds if the buyer exceeds certain levels of use during that billing cycle.

Santa Clara County Fire Chief Anthony Bowden called unlimited data flow critical to public safety but said public agencies do not have unlimited funds and try to find an affordable plan that will meet their needs.

He also called for increasing protections to cell towers in fire-damaged or fire-prone areas to maintain critical communications and warnings to area residents as well as first responders in emergencies.

Bowden said Verizon restored full speeds only after the department subscribed to a more expensive plan.

That shouldn’t have been necessary, Hickey said, because the company’s policy is to immediately remove data speed restrictions when contacted in emergency situations.

He blamed an “operational error” for the company’s failure to lift the data cap as soon as firefighters called. Instead, a Verizon representative told the county to upgrade to a more expensive package.

New Verizon plan

Verizon is rolling out a new plan next week for first responders nationwide that will have no such restrictions and data priority access, at no additional cost.

Rudolph Reyes, Verizon’s west region vice president and associate general counsel, read a statement saying the company “didn’t live up to our own promise of service and performance excellence when our process failed some first responders on the line, battling a massive California wildfire. For that, we are truly sorry. And we’re making every effort to ensure that it never happens again.”

Meanwhile, a bipartisan conference committee could advance compromise legislation to reduce the threat posed by wildfires.

After weeks of negotiations, lawmakers have ruled out a controversial proposal backed by California Gov. Jerry Brown to reduce liability for electric utilities when their equipment causes wildfires, but their plan could include cash to remove dead trees or other measures to make fires less frequent and less severe.
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Mired in financial woes, Michael Cohen is sticking his hand out and asking the public for help paying for his legal defense, and one anonymous donor already has ponied up $50,000.

Through his lawyer, Donald Trump’s former “fixer” says collecting contributions through a GoFundMe page set up after his guilty plea this week is the only way to ensure the truth comes out about the president.

It’s also the latest sign that Cohen is broke.

Trump’s former personal lawyer owes at least $1.4 million to the IRS after pleading guilty Tuesday to tax evasion, campaign finance violations and bank fraud, and has racked up millions of dollars in debt. Because of his plea, he’s being forced to give up his New York City taxi medallions, which have shrunk in value as Uber and Lyft shake up the industry.

“He’s without resources and owes a lot of money,” Cohen’s lawyer, Lanny Davis, said in a battery of television interviews on Wednesday.

Cohen, who once said he would “take a bullet” for Trump, commented in court on Tuesday that Trump directed him to arrange payments of $130,000 to porn star Stormy Daniels and $150,000 to former Playboy model Karen McDougal to buy their silence about alleged affairs before the election.

While Trump denies the affairs, his account of his knowledge of the payments has shifted. In April, Trump denied he knew anything about the Daniels payment. He told Fox News in an interview aired Thursday that he knew about payments “later on.”

By Thursday afternoon, the GoFundMe page dubbed the “Michael Cohen Truth Fund” had raised more than $145,000 from about 2,600 donations. Most reaction on social media was incredulous and unsympathetic, but one $5 donor was encouraging, writing: “The USA would love you for your honesty.”

Confusion over the web address for the fundraising page, michaelcohentruthfund.com, led someone on Wednesday to anonymously register a shorter version, michaelcohentruth.com, that redirects to Trump’s re-election campaign website.

Cohen’s crowdfunding campaign, which has a goal of raising $500,000, could be a way for Cohen to bolster his whistleblower status by appealing to Democrats and others who want to see Trump taken down.

It’s not the first time someone who felt wronged by Trump has asked the public to pony up. Fired former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe raked in more than $500,000 in just five days of his legal defense campaign, and Daniels funded her lawsuit against the president with about $500,000 raised from nearly 17,000 donors.

​Loans, debt

Cohen could ultimately need much more to wipe his books clean.

Court papers filed in connection with Cohen’s guilty plea detailed his precarious financial state, as well as his side gigs as a taxicab magnate, high-interest lender, and broker of real estate and handbag deals.

In one arrangement, according to the papers, Cohen used a line of credit he obtained at 5 percent interest to float a $6 million loan to a Chicago taxi operator at 12 percent interest.

Later, when applying for the $500,000 home equity credit line used to finance the Daniels payment, the papers say Cohen failed to disclose $14 million in medallion-related debt. Cohen and his wife claimed on the loan paperwork that they had a positive net worth of more than $40 million.

In April, transaction records show, Cohen put up his multimillion-dollar Trump Park Avenue home — valued at $9 million — as collateral on some of his taxi-related loans.

The value of medallions, the physical plates affixed to cabs that owners are required to display, have dropped precipitously in recent years from highs of over $1 million apiece in New York just a few years ago to nearly a quarter of that amount today.

Cohen has been involved in the gritty New York City yellow cab industry since the 1990s. He’s owned about 30 medallions with his wife and father-in-law, as well as a fleet of 22 cabs in Chicago, records show. Some of them are held through companies with names such as Love Bug Cab Corp. and Tailgater Cab Corp.

In addition to his Trump and taxi work, the court papers say Cohen made $100,000 in 2014 for brokering the sale of a piece of property in a Florida aviation community and $30,000 in 2015 for brokering the sale of a Birkin bag, a highly coveted French handbag.

Davis, who is listed as the creator of Cohen’s fundraising page, told The Associated Press last month that Cohen was footing the bill for his defense after pivoting from loyalty to Trump to looking out for himself, but was “thinking of trying to get some help.”

Ethical issues

A description on the GoFundMe page describes it as a “transparent trust account, with all donations going to help Michael Cohen and his family” as he goes forward with telling the truth about Trump.

Loyola Law School professor Jessica Levinson said crowdfunding campaigns raise ethical concerns because they allow people to contribute to a political cause similarly to a campaign contribution, but without the same transparency and regulation.

“Who does the lawyer and client feel grateful to?” Levinson said. “Right now, there is no clear way of finding out.”

GoFundMe no longer allows fundraisers to download a list of donor’s information such as email addresses, citing new data protection regulations. Fundraisers can communicate with donors through the GoFundMe site. And although there is an option to make donations appear anonymously on the public-facing part of the website, it appears that the fundraiser can still view the name of these donors.

GoFundMe did not immediately reply to a request for comment.

The money also could add to Cohen’s already sizeable tax bill.

Robert Rizzi, a lawyer specializing in tax and government ethics, said the law is unclear whether Cohen would have to pay taxes on the fundraising proceeds. Taxes would apply if the money counts as income, but not if it’s a gift — but gifts must be given “out of detached and disinterested generosity,” Rizzi said.

“There would be an irony in being taxed on money he raised to defend himself for tax evasion,” Rizzi said.
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Since the 1990s, annual numbers of U.S. coal miners with new, confirmed cases of an advanced form of so-called black lung disease known as progressive massive fibrosis have been steadily rising, according to a new study.

The resurgence is particularly strong among central Appalachian miners in Kentucky, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia, the study authors note.

“It’s an entirely preventable disease, and every case is an important representation of a failure to prevent this disease,” said lead study author Kirsten Almberg of the University of Illinois at Chicago and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) in Morgantown, West Virginia.

Progressive massive fibrosis is the most severe form of pneumoconiosis, which is also known as black lung disease and is caused by overexposure to coal mine dust. The symptoms are debilitating and can lead to respiratory distress.

“Many people think black lung is a relic of the past,” she told Reuters Health in a phone interview. “But it shouldn’t fade from our attention.”

Almberg and colleagues looked at the number of progressive massive fibrosis cases among former U.S. coal miners applying for Federal Black Lung Program benefits between 1970 and 2016.Miners can apply for financial help and medical coverage if facing disabling lung impairment, and claims are accepted when medical tests and imaging verify the presence of disabling pulmonary impairment.

Progressive massive fibrosis is “by definition” considered totally disabling, the authors note in the Annals of the American Thoracic Society.

Among 314,000 miners who applied for benefits during the 46-year period, the research team found 4,679 cases of confirmed progressive massive fibrosis, with 2,474 of these representing claims filed since 1996.

The yearly number of cases fell from 404 in 1978 to 18 in 1988 but then began increasing each year, with 383 confirmed cases in 2014, the study found. At the same time, employment has declined from 250,000 miners in 1979 to 81,000 in 2016, the authors note.

“It’s pretty staggering that more than half of the cases were in the more recent period since 1996,” Almberg said. “These are our first snapshots of how big this problem really is.”

The increase has most dramatically impacted the Appalachian region. About 84 percent of miners with confirmed cases of progressive massive fibrosis last mined in Kentucky, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia, although only 62 percent of claims originated in these states.

“Put simply, we still do not know exactly why severe disease has increased so much among miners in central Appalachia or when this trend may reverse,” said Emily Sarver, a mining and minerals engineer at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, who wasn’t involved in the study.

Future research should look at the different factors that may affect this ongoing increase in diagnoses, such as changes in the types of dust in mining environments, said Sarver, who works with mine partners to sample dust in active operations and characterize what’s in it and the size of particles.

“This is a real and very complex problem. Unlike safety issues, which are oftentimes apparent or can be identified and mitigated quickly, the exposure-response time with many health issues is quite long,” she said. “If I am exposed to hazardous dust today, for example, it may not impact my lungs for a decade or more, and I may experience a different outcome than another person exposed to the same dust.”

Similarly, Almberg and study co-author Robert Cohen of NIOSH and National Jewish Health and University of Colorado in Denver are working with mining engineers and pathologists to study coal mine dust in lung tissue samples to understand what causes progressive massive fibrosis to develop.

They’re comparing lung tissue samples from current cases to samples collected from autopsies of former miners, and want to understand whether new mining techniques may create smaller dust particles that drive the disease deeper into the lungs or whether more toxic carbon or coal dust is being expelled from mines.

“Like any person, you should expect to be able to work for a full career and leave the workforce and still have your health and life ahead of you,” Almberg said. “Coal miners aren’t the only ones exposed to hazardous materials on the job, and we should be able to catch this early and prevent it from progressing to the severe stages of the disease.”
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Vice President Mike Pence is in Houston, Texas, to reaffirm the Trump administration’s plans to establish an American Space Force by 2020, return Americans to the moon, and set its sight on Mars and beyond.

During a speech Thursday at NASA’s Johnson Space Center, Pence said that recent Pentagon reports have shown that China is “aggressively weaponizing space” and that Russia is developing weapons to “counter America’s space capabilities.”

Pence said the Department of Defense is moving forward to “strengthen American security in space” and that the administration will work with Congress to secure funding and authorization to establish Space Force as a new and separate branch of the armed forces.

Pence also highlighted efforts to move the Lunar Orbital Platform, formerly known as the Deep Space Gateway, from proposal phase to production. NASA, the main U.S. agency for space exploration, and several of its partners, have been developing plans for this lunar-orbit space station that would be used as a staging point for lunar exploration and would have several gateway-to-space features, including a propulsion system, a habitat for the crew, and docking capability.

In its 2019 budget, NASA has requested $504 million in funding for this project, which has yet to be approved by Congress.

There was little new detail in Pence’s speech other than reiterating the administration’s vision for “American dominance in space.” Space Force has been mentioned by Pence on several occasions, and a theme that President Donald Trump often returns to, including during his rally in Charleston, West Virginia, on Tuesday.

Trump first announced the creation of Space Force at the White House in June. He pledged to reclaim U.S. leadership in space, framing it as a national security issue, and saying he does not want “China and Russia and other countries leading us.”

Trump’s Space Force has triggered debate in military space exploration, as well as legal circles, including whether it may violate international law. The U.S. is a signatory and ratifier of the United Nations Outer Space Treaty of 1967.

The treaty prevents any nation from declaring sovereignty over space or heavenly bodies, and prohibits space-faring countries from blocking other nations from exploring space. There are further restrictions over military presence on heavenly bodies such as the moon, which according to the treaty “shall be used exclusively for peaceful purposes.”

Last December, Trump signed Space Policy Directive 1, a national space policy directing a government-private partnership with the goal of returning Americans to the moon, followed by missions to Mars and beyond.

The policy calls for the NASA administrator to “lead an innovative and sustainable program of exploration with commercial and international partners to enable human expansion across the solar system and to bring back to Earth new knowledge and opportunities.”

Pence has been the leading spokesperson for the U.S. space program, delivering remarks about the country’s space ambitions on behalf of the president.
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The commander of U.S. and international forces in Afghanistan says the Trump administration’s strategy for the war-torn country is yielding progress, despite no significant changes on the battlefield and several deadly Taliban attacks.

“I believe the strategy is working,” U.S. Army Gen. John Nicholson told reporters at the Pentagon via telephone.

Last year, the Trump administration called for a conditions-based deployment of U.S. troops in support for Afghan forces.

Nicholson said this approach on the battlefield “has affected the enemy’s calculus” and pushed them toward reconciliation.

He said the Taliban now has the incentive to negotiate because the coalition has “clearly communicated” that they are not leaving, pointing to two peace offers and a cease-fire as evidence of the progress.

Michael O’Hanlon, senior fellow in defense and foreign policy at the Brookings Institution, called Nicholson’s comments “the most optimistic interpretation of what’s possible” in Afghanistan.

“I don’t think it’s proven or established,” O’Hanlon told VOA on Wednesday. “I’m not saying he’s wrong, but I would not bet my house on it.”

From 2017 to 2018, Taliban control of the Afghan population has grown slightly from 9 percent to 12 percent, with about a quarter of the population living in areas contested by the Taliban and the Afghan government, according to the latest data from the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction.

Nicholson said the lack of change with respect to the Afghan government’s population control has been predicated on what he called the Afghan military’s “works in progress,” namely the growth in the number of Afghan commandos and the growth in the Afghan air force.

Once those two forces are strengthened in the next year or two, Nicholson said he believes the Afghans will be able to “expand control.”

But the general also admitted that “traditional metrics of fighting are not explaining why the Taliban are willing to talk now,” suggesting instead that social and religious pressure is advancing the peace process.

O’Hanlon cautioned that it will take many years before results from the new strategy could be measured.

“I think stalemate is far and away the simplest, safest way to interpret the dynamics in Afghanistan,” he said.
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The U.S. Navy has begun moving its ship and submarines away from Hawaii as Hurricane Lane bears down on the state. 

Rear Adm. Brian Fort, commander of the Naval Surface Group Middle Pacific, said Wednesday that all ships not currently undergoing maintenance are being moved out of Pearl Harbor and will be positioned to help respond after the storm, if needed.

The hurricane was about 490 kilometers (304 miles) south of Kailua-Kona and moving northwest toward other islands.

Lane’s winds had slowed overnight from 259 to 250 kilometers per hour, prompting a downgrade from a Category 5 to a Category 4 hurricane.

The National Weather Service warned Hawaiians to expect flash flooding and landslides, with total rain accumulation of around 40 centimeters (16 inches). “Large and potentially damaging surf” will affect exposed shorelines facing the west, south and east, the NWS said.

It added that regardless of the exact track of the storm, the state should brace for the potentially life-threatening impacts.

Governor David Ige has signed an emergency proclamation to “provide relief for disaster damages, losses and suffering” caused by the hurricane. The proclamation declares the counties of “Hawaii, Maui, Kalawao, Kauai and the City and County of Honolulu disaster areas for the purpose of implementing emergency management functions,” his office said.

Public schools on the Big Island and in Maui County, which includes the island of Maui and several smaller islands, closed Wednesday until further notice.

The central Pacific gets fewer hurricanes than other regions, with about four or five named storms a year. Hawaii rarely gets hit.

But longtime Hawaii residents were reminded of the destruction caused by Hurricane Iniki in 1992 that made landfall on Kauai island as a Category 4 storm. It killed six people and caused $1.8 billion in damage.
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