March 2018

Trump doesn’t set age for guns, defers on arming teachers

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said Monday that he is “watching court cases and rulings” before taking action on raising age limits for purchasing some firearms, arguing that there is “not much political support (to put it mildly).”

Trump’s tweet came after his White House put out a plan to combat school shootings that doesn’t increase the minimum age for purchasing assault weapons to 21 — an idea Trump publicly favored just last month — and leaves the question of arming teachers to states and local communities.

Pilot in NYC crash called ‘mayday,’ cited engine failure

NEW YORK (AP) — A pilot who survived when his helicopter went down in Manhattan’s East River, killing five passengers, said in an emergency radio transmission that he had engine failure.

The pilot is heard saying “Mayday, mayday, mayday” during the crash on Sunday night. The pilot reported “an engine failure over the East River” and referenced a hotel, while the person at the other end of the transmission had trouble making out what the pilot was saying.

Plane carrying 71 people crashes, catches fire in Kathmandu

KATHMANDU, Nepal (AP) — A plane carrying 71 people from Bangladesh swerved erratically and flew dangerously low before crashing and erupting in flames as it landed Monday in Kathmandu, Nepal’s capital, killing at least 50 people, officials and witnesses said.

US officials: North Korea will face no more conditions for talks

Trump administration officials say there will be no more conditions imposed on North Korea before a first-ever meeting of the two nation’s leaders beyond the North’s promise not to resume nuclear testing and missile flights or publicly criticize U.S.-South Korean military exercises.

The officials’ comments Sunday followed the surprise announcement last week that President Donald Trump has agreed to meet the North’s Kim Jong Un by May.

Chad, a counterterror ally, still smarting over travel ban

N’DJAMENA, Chad (AP) — The United States came to central African nation of Chad on Monday seeking to strengthen a key counterterrorism partnership with a country that still can’t figure out why the Trump administration seems adamant about keeping its citizens out of the U.S.

Chadian President Idriss Deby had hoped the visit by Secretary of State Rex Tillerson would present an opportunity to put the bitter episode between the two countries behind them.

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Trump’s tariff tantrum

Of all the untrue and unhinged things President Trump has said during his time in office, this ranks as one of the most truly inane: “Trade wars are good and easy to win.”

Virtually all economists of all stripes agree that the president has it exactly wrong. Trade wars are bad, not good, and no country ever “wins” one.

Is Mom’s boyfriend too good to be true?

SenSe and SenSitivity

Kim, Trump summit preceded by other landmark meets

By stunning the world after seven decades of war and enmity, the projected face-to-face rendezvous between U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un would immediately take its place in the historic pantheon of electrifying summits between sworn foes.

From World War Two’s Yalta gathering through U.S.-Soviet summits in the Cold War, President Nixon’s trip to Chairman Mao’s China and various attempts to forge peace among Israeli, Egyptian and Palestinian leaders, the art of the summit has long been a rare and rarified moment where the world stops agape.

‘Pharma Bro’ lawyer sometimes wants to punch him in face

NEW YORK (AP) — “Pharma Bro” Martin Shkreli’s lawyer said he sometimes wants to hug his client and sometimes wants to punch him in the face, but he told a federal judge at his sentencing hearing Friday that his outspokenness shouldn’t be held against him.

Attorney Benjamin Brafman wants U.S. District Judge Kiyo Matsumoto to sentence the former pharmaceutical company CEO known for trolling critics on the internet to 18 months in prison. He was convicted of securities fraud last year for defrauding investors in two failed hedge funds.