Rumors are spreading that the U.S. Supreme Court will vote 5-4 to rule that a U.S. president cannot be prosecuted for anything he does while he is president. Some Democrats are suggesting that Joe Biden bring a gun to his first debate with Donald Trump. If he shoots Trump, he would be immune, but if Trump shoots Biden he would be prosecuted because he is not a sitting president.   read more

China and other countries will stay committed to the Paris Agreement on climate change, irrespective of what the next U.S. administration does. “Of course they are going to move forward,” said U.S. climate envoy Pershing. “I’m hearing the same from the Europeans...the Brazilians. I’m hearing the same from Mexico...Canada...Costa Rica and from Colombia.” Trump has called global warming a “hoax” on social media and promised during his campaign to “cancel” the Paris deal adopted last year.   read more

Just like college freshmen, newly elected members of the House descended on Washington Monday for a week of orientation, a class photo and a lottery to determine their offices for the next two years. The new Congress includes the first Latina senator, three House members moving across the Capitol to the Senate and a few former lawmakers who seized their old jobs back. While Congress will include a record number of minority women, Congress will remain overwhelmingly white, male and middle-aged.   read more

If Obama can't close it, his successor likely won't. Donald Trump has not only pledged to keep Guantanamo open, in April he said that "we're gonna load it up with some bad dudes, believe me. We're gonna load it up." He also said he'd try U.S. citizens accused of terrorism at the base, though that would require Congress to change federal law. Obama "knows what's at stake and he knows he can't leave the door to Guantanamo open for Donald Trump," said Amnesty Intl's Naureen Shah.   read more

There is no doubt that as he rose in the ranks of a special police force in Tajikistan, a former Soviet republic, Khalimov received extensive taxpayer-funded military training from the U.S. to help counter drug-running and extremism along the border with Afghanistan. Now, Khalimov appears to have become the second senior commander of the Islamic State, the terrorist group he defected to last year, to have benefited from American military training provided to former Soviet states.   read more

Critics say Trump's pledged U.S. Muslim ban has contributed to anti-Muslim sentiment. "We've seen how words from public figures like Donald Trump translate into violence," said SPLC's Mark Potok. Last year, there were 257 reported incidents of anti-Muslim bias compared to 154 the year before, a 67% increase. "That spike has...accelerated after the election of President-elect Trump," Hooper said, referring to reports of racist incidents around the country since the Nov. 8 election.   read more

U.S. military and CIA may have committed war crimes by torturing detainees in Afghanistan, the Court's chief prosecutor said, suggesting that American citizens could be indicted. "Members of US armed forces appear to have subjected at least 61 detained persons to torture, cruel treatment, outrages upon personal dignity..." said the report. And that CIA operatives may have subjected 27 detainees in Afghanistan, Poland, Romania and Lithuania to the same, as well as rape.   read more

During the past week, two of the world’s biggest internet companies have faced mounting criticism over how fake news on their sites may have influenced the presidential election’s outcome. Facebook was accused of swinging some voters in favor of Donald Trump through misleading and outright wrong stories that spread quickly via the social network. Google did not escape the glare: the top result on a Google search wrongly stated that Trump was ahead of Hillary Clinton in the popular vote.   read more

Among the changes found in the new study: multivitamin/mineral use declined to 31% from 37%, “and the rates of vitamin C, vitamin E and selenium use decreased, perhaps in response to research findings showing no benefit,” Cohen wrote. Sometimes people do act sensibly when faced with solid evidence. However, he added, “other products continued to be used at the same rate despite major studies demonstrating no benefit over placebo.”   read more

Stretching the rules to take pets into grocery stores, amusement parks and restaurants has become so commonplace that online merchants are selling official-looking service animal certificates and vests for as little as $50. The growing practice is insulting and harmful to those who genuinely require a service animal, said Karen Shirk. "Faking service dogs is one of the worst things anybody can do...[to] take advantage of something that was supposed to make a disabled person's life easier."   read more

The bombing has exacerbated a humanitarian crisis in the Arab world’s poorest country. Publicly, the U.S. has kept its distance from the war, but its alliance with Saudi Arabia, underpinned by tens of billions of dollars in weapons sales, has left U.S. fingerprints on the air campaign. Many strikes are carried out by pilots trained by the U.S. who fly U.S.-made jets. And Yemenis often find the remains of U.S.-made munitions. Graffiti on walls reads: “America is killing the Yemeni people.”   read more

Trump can now open the throttle on policies Obama set as limited but lawful for sparing use, like targeted killings in drone strikes and the use of indefinite detention for terrorism suspects. Even in areas where Obama tried to terminate policies from the Bush era — such as torture and detention of Americans — he fought in court to prevent any ruling that they had been illegal. The absence of a definitive repudiation could make it easier for Trump lawyers to revive the policies.   read more

The price, which is expected to grow, compares with $1 million for a cruise missile. For now, there are no plans to buy projectiles beyond the initial purchase of 90. It's stunning news for a program plagued by growing costs. "Congress is going to want to know how the Navy could get so far down the road without realizing that the price tag on these projectiles is so high," said Loren Thompson, defense analyst at the Lexington Institute.   read more

Donald Trump’s victory in the presidential race has presented some companies with a new challenge: how to find the right balance in their post-election messages to employees and customers. Ben & Jerry's open letter to Trump said: "While we recognize that this is the outcome that many wanted, this is also an outcome that leaves half of our country feeling sadness and shock.” It reached 350,000 people on the company’s Facebook page and feedback has been “overwhelmingly positive.”   read more

Dozens of men who underwent agonizing treatment in secret CIA prisons or at Guantanamo were left with psychological problems that persisted for years, despite U.S. lawyers’ assurances there would be no lasting harm. The shadow of interrogation and mutual suspicion tainted the mission of those treating prisoners. That limited their effectiveness for years to come. Meanwhile, Trump said he will bring back banned interrogation tactics and authorize others that are “much worse.”   read more

The trend reflects growing public demand for independent reviews of misconduct claims after deadly police encounters across the U.S. "Once the consciousness of people has been awakened, their horror and outrage have manifested, as well as their desire to do something about it," said CPA's Grinage. "There's a recognition that to help fix the issues in policing, we need not only to be focused on the few bad apples but to identify problems with the barrel itself," said Nicholas Mitchell.   read more

Trump's talk of a "law and order" approach to crime fighting and his praise for stop-and-frisk police tactics are out of step with a Justice Dept that has advocated community policing and decried strategies it considers unconstitutional or discriminatory. Trump said "we need more stop and frisk, that the Black Lives Matter movement has placed police officers at risk, in ways that are really concerning," said former Justice Dept civil rights official Jonathon Smith.   read more