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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Vice President Mike Pence on Sunday denied that he is preparing for a presidential election run in 2020, saying the suggestion is "disgraceful and offensive."

Pence was responding to a New York Times report that some Republicans were moving to form a "shadow campaign" as though President Donald Trump were not involved. It said multiple advisers to Pence "have already intimated to party donors that he would plan to run if Mr. Trump did not."

The report said Pence had not only kept a full political calendar but also had created his own independent power base, including a political fund-raising group called the "Great America Committee."

But Pence called the article "fake news" and said his entire team was focused on advancing Trump's agenda and seeing him re-elected in 2020.

"The allegations in this article are categorically false and represent just the latest attempt by the media to divide this Administration," Pence said in a statement.

The Times stood by its coverage. "We are confident in the accuracy of our reporting and will let the story speak for itself," New York Times spokeswoman Danielle Rhoades Ha said in an email.

Pence has good relations with conservative political groups and some of the Republican Party's big donors, including billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch.

He is also a Trump loyalist, and there is typically little distinction between his public statements and the policies of the president.

But as investigations deepen into Russia's alleged interference in the 2016 U.S. election and possible ties to members of Trump's campaign, Pence has put some distance between himself and the president on the best way to approach Moscow.

On a trip to Eastern Europe last week, Pence condemned Russia's presence in the former Soviet republic of Georgia, with which Moscow fought a brief war in 2008. He also said ties with Russia would not improve until Moscow changed its stance on Ukraine and withdrew support for countries like Iran, Syria and North Korea.

The U.S. Congress recently passed a bill imposing new sanctions on Russia with overwhelming bipartisan support, but Trump signed it into law last week with reluctance.

"Our relationship with Russia is at an all-time & very dangerous low," Trump wrote on Twitter after signing the bill. "You can thank Congress."

Trump has described probes into his campaign's ties to Russia, including those under way in Congress and a Justice Department investigation headed by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, as a "witch hunt."

The president has also sent mixed messages on whether he agrees with U.S. intelligence agencies' conclusions that Russia tried to intervene in the 2016 election to boost his chances of beating Democratic rival Hillary Clinton.

White House senior counselor Kellyanne Conway on Sunday also dismissed the idea that Pence was looking at running for president in 2020.

"It is absolutely true that the vice president is getting ready for 2020 - for re-election as vice president," Conway told ABC's "This Week" on Sunday.

"Vice President Pence is a very loyal, very dutiful, but also incredibly effective vice president, and active vice president," said Conway, adding that she had worked for Pence for a decade as his pollster and senior adviser.

Reporting by Susan Cornwell; Additional reporting by Pete Schroeder; Writing by Amanda Becker; Editing by Kieran Murray and Lisa Von Ahn

Excerpt from:
Pence denies eyeing presidential bid amid distance with Trump over Russia - Reuters

A ban on the open-source online encyclopedia website, Wikipedia, may be lifted if the site complies with Turkey's demands, a Turkish minister said yesterday. Speaking in a televised interview, Ahmet Arslan, minister of Telecommunications, said they would to reopen the website if conditions are met.

Access to the website was blocked in Turkey in April after Wikipedia refused to cooperate with Ankara in the removal of fabricated content falsely associating the country with terror groups. Arslan's ministry said after the ban that Wikipedia was "becoming an information source acting with groups conducting a smear campaign against Turkey in the international arena."

In yesterday's interview, Arslan said the website did not "correct its mistakes" and prevented Turkish editors from inserting corrections. "We asked them to remove the content misrepresenting Turkey. We have warned them many times before. Turkey wants Wikipedia to be reopened, but they can only be given a green light if they correct their mistake," Arslan said.

Link:
Turkey looks to lift Wikipedia ban: Minister - Daily Sabah

NewsBusters (press release) (blog)

Sharpton Panel on MSNBC Frets Over Trump 'Killing the Dream' of Martin Luther King NewsBusters (press release) (blog) On Sunday's PoliticsNation on MSNBC, as Al Sharpton presided over a discussion of an upcoming march to commemorate Martin Luther King Jr.'s role in the Civil Rights Movement, the MSNBC host fretted that President Donald Trump is "killing the dream" ...

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Sharpton Panel on MSNBC Frets Over Trump 'Killing the Dream' of Martin Luther King - NewsBusters (press release) (blog)

The latest far-right march in Portland quickly staked a claim as the most violent.

The gathering of alt-right and white nationalist groups in Tom McCall Waterfront Park today immediately descended into brawling with antifascist counter-protesters that left several men bleeding and soaked in pepper spray.

Brawls at Tom McCall WAterfront Park on Aug. 6, 2017. (Daniel Stindt)

Joey Gibson, the Vancouver, Wash. video blogger who has led the far-right movement's forays into Portland, told his crew that the antifa attention showed how serious and powerful his movement remains.

"You have the right of free speech, the right of assembly," Gibson said in a speech. "When they show up beating their drums and yelling, do you know what that means? It means we're winning."

Protests at Tom McCall Waterfront Park on Aug. 6, 2017. (Daniel Stindt)

Oath Keepers, members of a militia group that often attends right-wing protests, attacked antifa with pepper spray. Left-wing counter-protesters burned flags. Several frequent participants in Patriot Prayer protests, including a man named Tusitala "Tiny" Toese, were bloodied in the fight that kicked off the march.

Tiny later offered to give a counter-protesters wounds of their own. Flashing the thick silver rings adorning his fist, he pointed to his bloody nose. "Do you want one to match?" he asked. "I can give you one."

Portland police allowed the melee to go largely unchecked, belatedly threatening over loudspeaker to arrest brawlers. By then, the fights had mostly stopped.

Brawls at Tom McCall Waterfront Park on Aug. 6, 2017. (Daniel Stindt)

Police announced that any illegal activity would get the protesters kicked out of the park. But officers didn't intervene when antifa members started throwing small projectiles at protesters wearing Make America Great Again hats.

Counterprotesters sprayed the far-right activists with silly string and threw glitter in their faces. The ultra-conservative group waved a flag of Pepe the Frog, a symbol of the national "alt-right" movement.

After more than half a year of squaring off, an air of familiarity runs between these groups. But a current of rage still feels fresh.

"Trump is burning this country to the ground," one masked antifa protester screamed at the marchers, "and you're letting it happen."

Protests at Tom McCall Waterfront Park on Aug. 6, 2017. (Daniel Stindt)

Protests at Tom McCall Waterfront Park on Aug. 6, 2017. (Daniel Stindt)

Protests at Tom McCall Waterfront Park on Aug. 6, 2017. (Daniel Stindt)

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As Portland Police Stand By, Alt-Right and Antifa Protesters Beat Each Other Bloody - Willamette Week

Rose Leadem

Online Editorial Assistant

We've said goodbye to a number of well-known products and brands this year. At the end of 2016, Twitter announced it was shutting down its video service Vine -- devastating thousands of users. YouTube personality and filmmaker Casey Neistat closed the gates of his social video app Beme too when he sold it to CNN in the fall of 2016.

Related:The 9 Things You Need to Let Go of For Success in2017

From the iPod Nano to Coke Zero, the list of now-lost products and brands goes on. Take a stroll down memory lane and check out these companies and products that have made their departure this year.

After 15 years, Apple has decided to discontinue the iPod Nano and Shuffle, leaving only the Touch left in the iPod family. "We are simplifying our iPod lineup," the company told Bloomberg in a statement.

These two items were of the least expensive among the iPod lineup -- the Shuffle cost only $49 and the Nano $149.

In July, Coca-Cola announced that it would be killing off the beloved Coke Zero. Having come to the market in 2005 as a Diet Coke alternative, the drink also boasted itself as a sugar- and calorie-free product that looked and tasted more like classic Coca-Cola, while Diet Coke has a completely different blend of flavors.

The company will replace the product with Coca-Cola Zero Sugar. "We've made the great taste of Coke Zero even better by optimizing the unique blend of flavors that gave Coke Zero its real Coca-Cola taste," the company announced in a statement.

Adios, Pepe. Cartoonist and Pepe the frog creator Matt Furie has officially killed one of the world's most popular memes, which saw a boost in its infamy as a white supremacist symbol during the U.S. election.

In Celebration of Free Comic Book Day on Saturday, May 6, Furie published a one-page piece of his "Boys' Club" series -- where Pepe ultimately got its start in 2005 -- that shows Pepe in a casket surrounded by mourning friends.

Last year, when an alt-right version of Pepe the frog went viral, Furie said Pepe's political association was just a "phase." However, after the Anti-Defamation League labeled Pepe as an anti-Semitic hate symbol, Furie made efforts to clean up Pepe's image, even launching a campaign #SavePepe to encourage people to create positive Pepe memes.

Unfortunately, Furie's efforts weren't enough and the cartoon has continued to be an alt-right meme (most recently it was "Pepe Le Pen"), so Furie has decided to bow out. Although, you'll likely see Pepe on the internet, its creator is no longer behind it.

In late April, Yik Yak, the mobile chat app that let people post anonymously -- mostly for catty gossip in schools and social circles -- announced its plans to close up shop. At one point being valued at $400 million, the app began to lose traction among young users when other apps such as Snapchat began to emerge.

"We were so lucky to have the most passionate users on the planet. It's you who made this journey possible," Yik Yak's young founders Tyler Droll and Brooks Buffington wrote in a blog post. "The time has come, however, for our paths to part ways, as we've decided to make our next moves as a company."

Although no date is set, the app will officially close down at the end of the school year.

Whether you knew it existed or not, Microsoft will shut down its social network, So.cl, on March 15. The platform, which launched in May 2012, was a content-sharing website primarily used by students and young people.

Microsoft's Fuse Labs, which spearheaded the project, wrote in a blog post: "In supporting you, Socl's unique community of creators, we have learned invaluable lessons in what it takes to establish and maintain community as well as introduce novel new ways to make, share and collect digital stuff we love."

YouTube personality, filmmaker and entrepreneur Casey Neistat closed a deal with CNN late last year, selling his video app Beme. Following the acquisition, Beme officially shut down on Jan. 31. What made Beme different than other social video apps was its ability to record short clips simply by putting your phone to your chest.

With Neistat's name attached to the app, it picked up some traction, although it was short-lived, having only launched in July 2015. And with competitors such as Snapchat and Instagram, the industry was a little too tough to crack.

People were devastated when Twitter announced it was pulling the plug on its 6-second-looping video app Vine. The company announced the news in Oct. 2016, but it wasn't until Jan. 17 that the app was officially taken down.

Initially launched in 2012, Vine had a good run. In fact, it even birthed some pretty hilarious Vine stars -- who today have found themselves distraught over the loss. The website is still up -- although just for archival purposes.

Jawbone, once a leader in fitness trackers and Bluetooth speakers, is closing up shop this year and liquidating its assets. Having once been valued at $3 billion by private market investors, the company has since struggled to keep up. In fact, late last year, it reportedly stopped sellings its fitness trackers and instead sold them to third-party retailers.

However, this isn't a final goodbye -- Jawbone CEO and founder Hosain Rahman has launched a new medical software and hardware company called Jawbone Health Hub.

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The Products and Brands We've Lost This Year - Entrepreneur