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Worldwide News With Ray February 18, 2016
War between North and South Korea may be about to happen – John Kerry says China is violating the South China Sea and something must be done – An Apple a day keeps the FBI away – a famous Christian is in serious trouble with the law – and Russia urges its people “Don’t be like Obama”. All these stories and more as Ray brings worldwide news to this hour. Join him now.
From the news desk of Reach More Now in Fort Worth, Texas, this is Ray Mossholder and this is the news…… News
Question of the day: Are we headed for another Korean War? Or is President Obama drawing another line in the sand, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing? What happened yesterday was almost like a game of chicken that teases other kids to react because of intimidation. Admittedly, the game was begun by North Korea and it doesn’t usually amount to much when kids play it. But that’s very much not the case when nations play it. Now, according to South Korea’s spy agency, North Korea is currently planning a “terrorist attack” on them.
Yesterday a fleet of stealth bombers from our nation flew over South Korea in a gesture of support for the country that recently had a flyby from North Korea; a flyby dropping huge piles of cigarette butts from the sky on to Seoul and other cities. But far more concerned then when they did that is North Korea’s nuclear missile launching that threatens once again to create the background for what North Korea’s twisted leader Kim Jong Un has already declared as “war”. Given what America is doing to stop Isis right now, will Obama put boots on the ground to honor our treaty with South Korea or bring the troops and their boots home from there where they have been stationed for many years?
Secretary of State John Kerry says the United States is going to have “a very serious conversation” with China in the near future because of their increasing military presence in the South China Sea. Kerry says “When President Xi was here in Washington, he stood in the Rose Garden with President Obama and said China would not militarize in the South China Sea. But there is every evidence every day that there has been an increase of militarization of one kind or another.”
This military buildup has taken place in just the last two weeks at Woody Island which is also claimed by both Vietnam and Taiwan. President Obama held a summit last week with Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia and Brunei, in which he condemned China’s military posturing. The South China Sea is international waters that serve as a major trade route.
Iraq says it can’t find “highly dangerous” radioactive material that was reportedly stolen last November. They say the material that had been stored in a protective case the size of a laptop computer disappeared from Weatherford, the United States oilfield service. The radioactive material and the case are the type used for making dirty bombs.
Terrorists have killed eighteen people and wounded forty-five in Ankara, Turkey. The explosion occurred during evening rush hour. Buses carrying military personnel were attacked while waiting for traffic lights to change at an intersection. Ankara governor Mehmet Kiliker said he believes the explosion was caused by a “bomb–laden vehicle” and was “a contemptible and dastardly attack”. No one is sure who did the bombing. Kurdish rebels, Isis, and a leftist extremist group have carried out attacks in Turkey recently.
Pro-life advocates in Mississippi, West Virginia, Idaho, Missouri, Minnesota, and Nebraska, have filed bills to ban an abortion procedure known as a D&E that is commonly used in the second trimester for dismembering a baby in her mother’s womb. Other states are also getting ready to file the same thing. The New York-based Center for Reproductive Rights exists to represent abortion providers in legal matters. They claim that forcing the ending of the dilation and evacuation method of abortion is unconstitutional because it interferes with private medical decisions. Courts have already blocked similar laws in both Kansas and Oklahoma.
Pope Francis has completed his visit to Mexico. His final message was for the world was to receive all the fleeing immigrants and to have compassion on them. As the jet plane the Pope was riding in last Friday was making its approach to its landing in Mexico City it was struck by a laser beam. No harm came to the plane or those inside it, but it was considered an illegal attack.
The Chief Executive of Apple, Tim Cook, says he plans to continue protecting the world of Apple users from the invasion of their privacy no matter what the FBI demands. He has denied a federal judge’s order to create software that would allow access to encrypted data on iPhones. The stated aim of our government is to specifically crack the data on the iPhone that belonged to the terrorist couple who murdered fourteen people in San Bernardino, California, last year. Cook argues that he has forever promised all Apple users that they would never have their privacy invaded and he doesn’t plan to have lied to them.
Tim is the man who replaced Steve Jobs when Steve was too sick to oversee Apple any further. Tim is indeed a different kind of guy. He was the first Fortune 500 company executive who announced that he was gay. He pledges that one day he will give all of his money to charity. And he is outspoken about the importance of social justice, the environment, and diversity.
In January, President Obama sent high-ranking national security advisors to meet with Apple, Facebook, and Alphabet (Google’s parent company) and they demanded greater cooperation with law enforcement. Our government is not used to being told no, most especially when a court order demands an action to be taken. But so far Tim Cook is holding his ground.
On the Apple website it carries a letter from Tim Cook that says in part “I want to be absolutely clear that we have never worked with any government agency from any country to create a backdoor in any of our products or services. We have also never allowed access to our servers. And we never will.”
Remember the story I shared with you yesterday about the Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center staff not being able to access its computer network since February 5th? Well, now they are able to access it again. How? This statement from Allen Stefanek, director of the hospital, explains it: “The quickest and most efficient way to restore our systems and obtain the decryption key was to pay the ransom. It was in the best interest of restoring normal operations that we did this.” The hospital paid 40 bitcoins, which is equal to about $17,000.
Bitcoins were created in 2009 by an unknown person using the alias Satoshi Nakamoto. It eliminates the need for banks. There are no transaction fees and no need to give your real name. More and more merchants are accepting them. You can even buy pizza or manicures with bitcoins. But they are still rare enough so that I’ve never seen one.
Cliven Bundy, his two sons – Ryan and Ammon – and two other men – Ron Payne and Peter Santilli, who were part of the Oregon wildlife occupation, have been indicted. The five are facing sixteen felony charges because of their armed standoff with the federal government in 2014 that included over 400 militia defending the Bundy’s. United States Attorney Daniel G. Bogden told them “Persons who use force and violence against federal law enforcement officers who are enforcing court orders, and nearly causing catastrophic loss of life or injury to others, will be brought to justice.” Clyburn was denied bail for being “a danger to the community” and “a flight risk”.
The land the Bundy’s lived on consists of 160 acres in a sparsely populated area near the borders of Utah and Arizona. The Bundy Ranch is near the Virgin River, a few miles from where interstate Highway 15 crosses into Arizona – 90 miles northeast of Las Vegas. According to the authorities, more than a thousand head of cattle wandered as far as 50 miles from the ranch into the Lake Mead National Recreational Area. Reportedly “They got stuck in the mud, wandered onto golf courses, strayed onto the freeway (sometimes causing accidents).”
In 2014, Bundy was charged with six counts for his first showdown against federal land managers on the open range where his cattle grazed and fed. At that time, the federal Bureau of land management and the local authority finally walked away. In fact, they halted the roundup of Bundy’s cattle and returned about 300 head, completely avoiding violence. This time things have gone very differently for Bundy.
Prosecutors said “The presence of many gunmen in and near the area of the Bundy Ranch, the armed checkpoints and patrols, the presence of assault weapons in the militia camps, including (by some accounts) a .50 caliber machine gun, further increased the difficulty of conducting a physical investigation of the Bundy Ranch or the impoundment site.” Now that they were arrested in Oregon these prosecutors say “Justice will be served”.
Bundy is 69 and runs a strong probability of being given a life sentence in prison if he is convicted.
A name well-known to Christians in America during the latter part of the twentieth century is Bill Gothard. Thousands in many parts of the country and overseas flocked to Bill Gothard Basic Institute of Youth Dynamics. His legalistic teaching was followed as God’s word and often put his believers under tremendous bondage. After attending his seminar, I was shocked by how hundreds of people had swallowed Gothard’s teaching as if it were biblical. Often when I spoke out about it, I was shouted down.
Now a lawsuit alleges sixteen members of his staff as well as Bill have attempted to cover up their sexual abuse of minors in numbers so large it makes Bill Cosby look like a choir boy. The lawsuit further alleges that Bill Gothard’s organization has been “liquidating assets” totaling more than one hundred million dollars “in an attempt to flee the jurisdiction of the state of Illinois where this wrongful conduct continually occurred.”
Prosecutors said “Our clients are telling the same story that happened over and over again. There was repeated abuse – re-victimizing the women and men who had been raped. Psychological abuse and sexual harassment of rape victims, manipulating and torturing people over and over again for decades. The board knew about it. Ultimately they did nothing, but after Internet pressure Bill Gothard resigned his organization but then went out to harass victims, ordering them to help him cover up the abuse. Gothard’s own brother who worked for the organization was dismissed after it was discovered that he was having sex with many students who had come for help. The civil action is seeking $50,000 plus per plaintiff. The latest version of the complaint includes more than 200 pages of allegations.
Bill Gothard manipulates the Bible the same way he is attempting to manipulate and control the lawyers who are representing the victims. On December 31, 2015, Gothard sent a letter threatening “greater damage to your clients and to the cause of Christ if you expand and refine your lawsuit.” He further wrote “Jesus affirmed the death penalty for doing this when he stated “He that curseth father or mother, let him die the death.” He additionally charged that the “emotional damages of your clients were caused by ‘whispering’ and ‘tale–bearing’ against him. Bill Gothard added “Christianity is under attack in the world” and that he wants “nothing to do with your amended lawsuit.”
The charges are “Gothard and his organization sexually, physically, emotionally, spiritually, and/or psychologically abused the plaintiffs – against their wishes and over their objections. This perverse and offensive conduct repeatedly took place over the course of several decades.”
A real brouhaha has ramped up to bite President Obama, reminding him of his early days in the Senate. Nearly everyone has heard him declare that the Republicans are obstructionists because they have announced that they will block anyone he nominates to the Supreme Court this year. But in 2006, a younger Senator Obama filibustered to block the entrance to the Supreme Court of Justice Samuel Alito. Obama said today that he deeply regrets what he did and that he already knew Judge Alito had the votes to secure his nomination. President George W. Bush appointed Justice Alito to the bench.
In his daily briefing with the press corps yesterday, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said about this, “Looking back on it, the president believes that he should have just followed his own advice and made a strong public case on the merits about his opposition to the nomination of Justice Alito. But there’s a pretty stark difference here. What Republicans are advocating is wrong and it’s inconsistent with the requirements of the Constitution, primarily because the wording of the Constitution is unambiguous and does not provide an exception for election years.”
The immediate GOP response is that President Obama as Senator did filibuster and that all the wishing in the world doesn’t change that fact. Now the shoe is on the other foot and President Obama is the pot calling the kettle black.
Steven Pratt spent thirty years in prison for killing a neighbor. Two days after he was released, he killed his mother. All this happened in Mays Landing, New Jersey. As Pratt cried before a judge yesterday he told the judge he didn’t want a trial because he was guilty as charged.
The recaptured drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman is complaining that bed checks every two hours at Altiplano prison in central Mexico is “turning him into a zombie.” Guzman also says that a guard dog barks a lot between bed checks. One of his attorneys is claiming that sleep deprivation for Guzman is infamous and brutal torture, and that he will not rest until warden Salvador Solis is prosecuted.
70-year-old Maureen Smith and 55-year-old David Kaltschmidt were handed 327 million, 800,000 dollars yesterday. They’ll have to pay taxes, of course, but that was the lump sum that this Florida couple received for having the second of three winning tickets from last month’s 1.6 million dollar Powerball jackpot. There is still a winner who purchased their ticket in Chino Hills, California. So far whoever it is hasn’t come forward to claim their prize.
None of us knows when death might strike us. Caitlin Clavette, age 35, an art teacher at Glover Elementary School in a suburb of Boston, was driving to work when a dislodged manhole cover that weighed more than 200 pounds went flying through the air and crashed through her SUV’s windshield on a major highway. She was killed instantly.
And finally….
Russia doesn’t like President Obama. A new poster seen throughout Russia today shows a picture of Barack Obama smoking. The poster reads in Russian “Smoking kills more people than Obama, although he kills lots and lots of people. Don’t smoke. Don’t be like Obama.”
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Worldwide News With Ray February 18, 2016
Worldwide News With Ray February 18, 2016