"PM Modi Much Ahead Of His Time": Top Indian-Origin Doctor To NDTV

02/22/25 10:37 PM

US-based Indian-origin urologist Dr Ash Tewari, who met Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently, said the prime minister is "very much ahead of his time" when it comes to health care and policies as he "is thinking about a global scale."

"Want Musk To Be More Aggressive In Reform Push": Trump

02/22/25 7:06 PM

US President Donald Trump said Saturday he would like his billionaire advisor Elon Musk to get "more aggressive" in implementing his reform agenda to cut back the federal government.

'25th Amendment remedies' mulled as Trump Fox interview goes off the rails

02/21/25 6:21 PM

Donald Trump once again refused to criticize Russian President Vladimir Putin and instead blamed Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy for the destruction in his own country.The U.S. president appeared Friday on Fox News host Brian Kilmeade's radio program, where he lamented that important cultural sites had been destroyed since Russian troops launched a full-scale invasion on Feb. 24, 2022 – but he refused multiple opportunities to blame Putin for the devastation."You have a man who has let a country that had the more beautiful cities get demolished," Trump said, apparently referring to Zelenskyy, "had the most beautiful domes. Those domes are the most beautiful in the world."Kilmeade stepped in to gently correct him, saying "that's Russia's fault, Mr. President," but Trump was undeterred."They're all demolished, a thousand-year-old domes," Trump continued, "and everything's demolished, it looks like a demolition site. It's sort of like Gaza. In fact, it's more – at least Gaza has a couple of buildings standing. This place, you take a look at demolition of so many of those cities, also, those people are killed, never to come back again. They're all killed."ALSO READ: 'Getting out of control': Ohio Republican gives Trump a warning"But Mr. President, that's Vladimir Putin's fault, don't you agree?" Kilmeade interjected.Apparently not, and Trump then attacked Zelenskyy for complaining that his country was shut out of talks in Saudi Arabia between U.S. and Russian officials on a peace deal to end the invasion that Trump wants conditioned on giving up perpetual control of his nation's resources and infrastructure."I get tired of listening to it, I tell you what," Trump responded. "I've seen it enough, and then he complains that he's not in a meeting that we're having with Saudi Arabia trying to intermediate peace. Well, he's been at meetings for three years with a very – uh, with a president [Joe Biden] who didn't know what the hell he was doing."Critics were shocked and appalled that Trump was attacking Zelenskyy and refused to blame Putin for starting the war."He will not critize Putin," noted The Tennessee Holler account."If Brian Kilmeade had a soul left, you'd hear it leaving his body," said writer Gary Legum."At the risk of pointing out the obvious, Zelensky is negotiating with a very big card: 3 years of thwarting Putin's attempted conquest, at an immense cost to Russia which they cannot sustain," added Nicholas Grossman, international relations professor at the University of Illinois. "We can be confident Trump gets, at some level, how big that card is, because he keeps trying to weaken it.""If Biden was this detached from our shared reality, Trump and co. would be talking about 25th amendment remedies," posted conservative writer Noah Rothman. "Oh, that's right: he was and they were.""No matter how many chances he’s had, Donald Trump has never — ever — condemned Vladimir Putin," said the account Republicans Against Trump. "Putin’s puppet."“'Oh please Mr President, please say it was Putin’s fault. Please. Pretty please?'” posted former GOP congressman Joe Walsh. "Bless your heart Kilmeade." — (@)

'He picked the wrong Latina': Trump border czar warned he's stumbled into brutal fight

02/20/25 4:23 PM

President Donald Trump's "border Czar" Tom Homan, who has been tasked with deporting millions of undocumented migrants from the United States, made an enemy out of "the wrong Latina" when he went after Rep. Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), argued MSNBC columnist Julio Ricardo Varela.Homan has repeatedly made a point of threatening AOC with a Justice Department investigation for hosting a webinar to teach undocumented migrants how to respond if they're confronted by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials. The webinar is titled, "Know Your Rights," but Homan has suggested its purpose is to "impede law enforcement" from doing its job.Varela wrote, "In multiple media appearances, Homan insulted her intelligence, mocked her credentials and claimed she was undermining law enforcement. And he said he was 'working with the Department of Justice' to see whether the congresswoman was 'crossing the line.'”ALSO READ: 'Gotta be kidding': Jim Jordan scrambles as he's confronted over Musk 'double standard'AOC wrote on social media Monday, “This is why you fight these cowards. The moment you stand up to them, they crumble. Homan has nothing. The Fourth Amendment is clear and I am well within my duties to educate people of their rights. He can threaten me with jail & call names all he wants. He’s got nothing else."After Homan confirmed that he did alert the DOJ to the congresswoman's activities, she wrote to Varela, "The Trump administration understands that it does not have absolute power and that it must rely on creating a false illusion of power to create a chilling effect to get everyday people to respond to fear, comply in advance, and censor their own free speech. Ultimately, in clear scenarios such as these, the best way to handle paper tigers is to call their bluff.""The country’s most prominent Latina politician is doing exactly what needs to be done," Varela wrote. "With people now impersonating ICE agents, the need for accurate information has never been greater. Politicians need to be there for immigrant communities, even if it means going toe to toe with the Trump administration. Ocasio-Cortez’s grace under pressure is what true community leadership is all about."When Homan started a fight with Cortez, Varela wrote, "he picked the wrong Latina."Read the MSNBC article here.

'Horrified': MSNBC host claims Trump has set off frantic 'whispering in the GOP cloakroom'

02/21/25 3:06 PM

A clip of Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) brutally dismantling the notion that Russian President Vladimir Putin is a man to be trusted, as Donald Trump has claimed, is indicative of how the majority of GOP lawmakers are privately appalled at Trump's Russia cheerleading.That is according to MSNBC's Joe Scarborough, who claimed GOP lawmakers are "whispering" in the GOP cloakroom about the president's seeming betrayal of the people of Ukraine.As an incensed Tillis told his Senate colleagues, “I’m a Republican. I support President Trump and I believe that most of his policies on national security are right. I believe things are pretty good. But what I’m telling you, whoever believes that there is any space for Vladimir Putin and the future of a stable globe, better go to Ukraine, they better go to Europe, they better invest the time to understand that this man is a cancer and the greatest threat to democracy in my lifetime.”ALSO READ: 'Gotta be kidding': Jim Jordan scrambles as he's confronted over Musk 'double standard'"That is Republican Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina on the Senate floor yesterday, actually saying the quiet part out loud: voicing the concerns of the Senate floor that most of his fellow Republicans are whispering in the GOP cloakroom and what America's closest allies are voicing across western democracies that stood by the United States of America in our fight against Nazism and Soviet communism," Scarborough commented.Turning to his panel, he stated, "I just think we shouldn't let what Thom Tillis said go by without a comment off the top. What Senator Tillis said publicly is what almost every Republican senator is saying privately. What almost every Republican House member is saying privately, that's on the Armed Services Committee or the Foreign Affairs Committee.""They are horrified by what they're hearing, and now we're going to be reporting that the G-7 has scrubbed their official communique to take out Russia as the aggressor in a war that Vladimir Putin clearly started," he added.You can watch below or at the link: - YouTube youtu.be

'Just two glasses': In Turkey, lives shattered by bootleg alcohol

02/21/25 11:29 AM

by Remi Banet with Cem TaylanTaskin Erduan thought he'd got a bargain: three liters of vodka for around $15. But it took only two glasses to kill the 51-year-old hairdresser who worked at an Istanbul salon. "He came in a bit late on that Saturday saying he couldn't see properly," said Belgin, joint owner of the salon where he worked in the Ortakoy district, who didn't want to give her surname.Not long after he got there, Erduan needed to sit down because he couldn't even hold a pair of scissors, she told AFP. "He told us all he could see was whiteness so I immediately drove him to a private hospital," she said. There, he saw an ophthalmologist who quickly realized it was a case of bootleg alcohol poisoning.Erduan collapsed in late January, barely a week after the city was shaken by news that within just four days, 33 people had died and 29 were critically ill after drinking bootleg alcohol.That number has since shot up to 70, with another 63 dead in the capital Ankara, Turkish media reports say. Another 36 remain in intensive care.Erduan told the doctors he bought the vodka at a corner shop in Ortakoy, saying it was five times cheaper than the supermarket because it was imported from Bulgaria. They gave him folic acid to try and stave off the effects of methanol, a toxic substance often found in bootleg alcohol that can cause blindness, liver damage and death. "He was still perfectly conscious," his boss told AFP, her eyes red from crying. Shortly afterwards, he was rushed into intensive care and intubated. "On the fourth day, we went with his son to see him. He was totally yellow," she said, describing jaundice, another symptom of methanol poisoning. "That evening, we heard he had died."- 'Six hours to feel effects' -"Nobody should have to die like that. The alcohol seemed totally legal from the packaging and the branding when in fact it came from an illegal distillery," said Erol Isik, her partner at the salon, who was clearly angry."Taskin didn't drink to get drunk, he wasn't an alcoholic," he said.Speaking to AFP at his laboratory at Istanbul's Yeditepe University where he heads the toxicology department, professor Ahmet Aydin explained how lethal it can be. "Just one glass of fake vodka made from methylated alcohol can be deadly," he said. The difference between ethanol, which is used for making spirits, and methanol, which is used in varnishes and antifreeze, is only visible in a laboratory, he explained, showing test tubes containing the two alcohols. "No-one can tell them apart by taste, sight or smell," he said."The biggest danger with methanol poisoning is that you don't feel the effects straight away. It only manifests after about six hours. If the person goes straight to hospital, they have a chance of recovering."But it can very quickly become "too late"."People really need to be careful," he warned, saying it was a lot easier to buy methanol than ethanol, the purchase of which is highly regulated. "But who would drink alcohol without a proper label?" he wondered, following reports several people died after buying alcohol in half-litre water bottles from a business posing as a Turkmen restaurant in Istanbul.– 'Alcohol is too expensive' – Like the main opposition CHP party, Ozgur Aybas, head of the Tekel association of alcohol retailers, blames the crippling taxes imposed by the government of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who regularly rails against drinking and smoking. "Nowhere else in the world are there such high taxes on alcohol," he told AFP, saying people had no choice but to seek out alternatives. Buying a liter bottle of raki, Turkey's aniseed-flavored national liquor, from a supermarket currently costs around $35 in a country where the minimum wage is $600.Standing in front of the now-closed shop where Taskin Erduan bought the vodka that killed him, a neighbor called Levent, who didn't give his surname, also blamed taxes. "Alcohol is too expensive in Turkey. It costs about 100 Turkish lira to make a bottle of raki but with the tax, that becomes 1,200 lira," or the equivalent of 12-hours work at minimum wage, he raged. Levent said he had long known the owner of the shop, describing him as "a nice guy". But with Turkey in the grip of a severe economic crisis, he said he'd long since stopped being surprised at how far people would go to bring in a bit more cash. "People will do anything for money. They have no shame any more."© Agence France-Presse

'Rope-a-dope': Ex-White House chief of staff warns Trump just gave up winning strategy

02/21/25 9:20 PM

President Donald Trump is destroying generations of U.S. relationships to hand wins to Russia and China, according to Barack Obama's former chief of staff. Rahm Emanuel penned a column in the Washington Post comparing the United States and Russia to prizefighter Muhammad Ali's “rope-a-dope” strategy. During a 1974 fight between Ali and George Foreman, Emanuel said Ali "tilted the boxing ring to his advantage.""He could defeat a younger and stronger man like George Foreman because Foreman was compelled to fight on Ali’s terms. This is a tactic the United States has adopted in its approach to international affairs. Playing to our strengths, we defeated the Soviet Union during the Cold War and, more recently, pursued a strategy to isolate an imperious China," said Emanuel.ALSO READ: Trump intel advisor Devin Nunes still dismisses Russian election meddling as a 'hoax'Trump, he said, has tried the opposite approach: "Helping Moscow’s and Beijing’s explicit intentions to replace the U.S.-led international order."However, according to Emanuel, Trump's approach offers "nothing" to gain; there is "a lot to lose." He explained that many of Trump's plots, including buying Greenland, taking back the Panama Canal, and occupying Canada, will never happen. And he's "eliminating the credibility and durability of our alliances to achieve goals that aren’t even worth pursuing," said Emanuel.He said Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping "must be delighted" watching as Trump "squanders 80 years of international credibility.""Trump is helping Russia and China achieve their explicit mission of replacing the United States as the world’s preeminent superpower," he continued. "Moscow’s goal has long been to break up the North Atlantic alliance. Who would have thought that an American president would do its dirty work?"Read the full column here.

'Sign the deal': Trump security adviser puts new pressure on Zelensky

02/20/25 4:12 PM

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and U.S. diplomat Gen. Keith Kellogg were meeting in Kyiv on Thursday to discuss ending the three-year-long war over Russia's territorial ambitions. The meeting comes amid growing tensions between Zelensky and President Donald Trump, who traded verbal barbs Wednesday and after Secretary of State Marco Rubio met with his Russian counterpart in Riyadh — without a Ukrainian representative present. CNN's Alayna Treene caught up with Trump national security advisor Michael Waltz outside the White House Thursday to ask, "What do you think is the main message Kellogg needs to deliver to Zelenskyy today after all of the back and forth yesterday?" Waltz answered, ""Let's tone down the rhetoric and sign the economic opportunity — sign the deal." "Is that Kellogg's directive today, to get him to sign the deal?" Treene sought to clarify. ALSO READ: 'Gotta be kidding': Jim Jordan scrambles as he's confronted over Musk 'double standard' "Well, he's out there talking to him about a number of things, but I think that would be a tremendous step forward," Waltz said. The United States has been trying to convince Zelensky to give it a percentage of the nation's rare earth minerals that could include lithium, graphite and uranium. Treene told anchor Kate Bolduan, "We actually know that the Treasury Secretary, Scott Bessent, went to Kyiv recently to meet with Zelensky and tried to convince him to sign this deal. Zelensky said yesterday that he had rejected that deal because it was asking for 50% of the rare earth minerals, the proceeds from that. He said that was a nonstarter and not in Ukraine's best interest, but that he would continue talking about this." She continued, "The reason that deal is so important, though...is because one of the key issues and complaints that the president has had even before he took office was that he has been very skeptical of the aid that the United States has been sending to Ukraine. We've heard him even yesterday when he gave that speech and gave those remarks in Miami yesterday evening, Trump brought this up saying that he wants to continue pushing for this. He wants to essentially get something out of this deal that the United States has had in providing Ukraine with funding." Watch the clip below via CNN.

'South African chainsaw massacre': CNN's Tapper slams 'heartlessness' in DOGE's job cuts

02/21/25 10:09 PM

CNN's Jake Tapper slammed Elon Musk's latest stunt surrounding the massive federal job cuts perpetuated by his Department of Government Efficiency and claimed some Republicans have started to feel "uncomfortable" with the administration's tactics. Tapper said DOGE's goal of cutting 10% of the federal workforce was being handled, "with very little transparency, not much compassion, questionable planning, and very little apparent attention to detail, at least according to critics." So far, entire agencies like the U.S. Agency for International Development have been shut down, while government leaders have been told to start firing "probationary" workers in a move that "could affect more than 200,000 federal employees," The Hill reported. The carnage isn't expected to end anytime soon, with employees at the Pentagon, the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of Health, and even the Internal Revenue Service on the chopping block. ALSO READ: 'Gotta be kidding': Jim Jordan scrambles as he's confronted over Musk 'double standard' "A couple of weeks ago, when this all started, we described the DOGE cuts as, quote, 'An ax being brandished and swung recklessly,' unquote. We apparently didn't go heavy duty enough, as Elon Musk yesterday on stage at CPAC wielded an actual chainsaw," Tapper said while playing a video of Musk waving around what he called, "the chainsaw for bureaucracy." Tapper continued, "The 'South African chainsaw massacre' reveals something more serious: a lack of empathy for the thousands of Americans whose jobs are being slashed and lives are being upended. This same sense of callousness, minus the chainsaw, was also on display yesterday from another top Trump official, Kevin Hassett." Video of Hassett showed him snickering while quipping about employees laid off for "poor performance." "Kind of a heartless thing to say about thousands of your fellow Americans, many of whom are not being fired for poor performance," Tapper remarked. He then spoke about Rep. Rich McCormick (R-GA) facing backlash from constituents who packed a town hall to demand answers, and Sen. John Curtis (R-UT) who told a local newspaper that DOGE was "not really factoring in the human element that these are real lives, real people." "Beyond the recklessness, there's a heartlessness, a glee, and that glee has not gone unnoticed by one of the people whose Department of Education job is now gone. She's a disabled veteran," Tapper said before rolling tape of the heart-wrenching testimonial. "That veteran's tears, all while the world's richest man waves a chainsaw in the air and giggles," Tapper said with disgust. Watch the clip below via CNN.

'Ukraine has to eat it': White House trash talks Zelenskyy for not taking lopsided deal

02/21/25 5:50 PM

Donald Trump was close to withdrawing American military support from Ukraine after its president Volodymyr Zelenskyy refused to sign a peace agreement that even administration officials admit is intolerable.Six administration officials told Axios that five incidents over the last five days angered Trump and his top officials, and he and vice president J.D. Vance have warned Zelenskyy to keep his criticism to himself after U.S. officials pushed him to hand over perpetual control of half of Ukraine's natural resources and selected infrastructure – in a deal that's been compared to a "mafia shakedown.""It's a sh*t sandwich," a Trump administration official agreed. "But Ukraine is going to have to eat it because [Trump] has made clear this is no longer our problem."Trump claims the Ukraine president was "rude" and delayed a Feb. 12 meeting in Kyiv with treasury secretary Scott Bessent, who first presented the proposal, and Zelenskyy surprised Vance and secretary of state Marco Rubio two days later by saying he couldn't approve the deal without parliament.ALSO READ: 'Getting out of control': Ohio Republican gives Trump a warning"Zelenskyy is an actor who committed a common mistake of theater kids: He started to think he's the character he plays on TV," said one White House official involved in the talks. "Yes, he has been brave and stood up to Russia. But he would be six feet under if it wasn't for the millions we spent, and he needs to exit stage right with all the drama."Zelenskyy publicly rejected and criticized the offer Feb. 15 at the Munich Security Conference after making positive remarks about it on X, and Trump became furious after he complained that Ukraine representatives had not been invited to discuss a peace agreement in Saudi Arabia with high-ranking Russian and U.S. officials."In the course of a week, Zelensky rebuffed president Trump's treasury secretary, his secretary of state and his vice president, all before moving on to personally insulting president Trump in the press," another administration official said. "What did Zelenskyy think was going to happen?"The Ukraine president further angered Trump by claiming he "lives in a disinformation space," and the U.S. president called Zelenskyy a dictator and demanded new elections, which parliament had agreed to cancel next year due to the ongoing Russian invasion."We created a monster with Zelenskyy," said another official involved in the negotiations, "and these Trump-deranged Europeans who won't send troops are giving him terrible advice."