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Former President Barack Obama called NBA legend Bill Walton a champion at every level in one of many tributes to the sports commentator, who died Monday after a battle with cancer. He was 71.

Bill Walton was one of the greatest basketball players of all time a champion at every level and the embodiment of unselfish team play, Obama wrote on social media. He was also a wonderful spirit full of curiosity, humor and kindness. We are poorer for his passing.

Walton, a two-time NCAA champion, two-time NBA champion and the leagues MVP during the 1977-78 season, spent 10 years at the professional level despite a career plagued by chronic injuries. But his renaissance as a commentator brought new accolades, including an Emmy Award and a designation as one of the greatest sports broadcasters of all time.

NBA legends shared tributes to Walton on Monday night as the news spread.

From shooting jump shots to making incredible passes, he was one of the smartest basketball players to ever live, Magic Johnson wrote on X. Bill was a great ambassador for college basketball and the NBA, and he will be sorely missed.

My very close friend, fellow Bruin and NBA rival Bill Walton died today, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar wrote Monday. And the world feels so much heavier now. On the court, Bill was a fierce player, but off the court he wasnt happy unless he did everything he could to make everyone around him happy.

He was the best of us.

RIP to a legend on and off the court, Steph Curry wrote on Instagram. You might hear it all the time, but he Always brought the BEST energy and humanity to every room he walked in to.

Walton was a major acolyte of the Grateful Dead, attending upwards of 850 shows and at times announcing nationally televised games in tie-dye.

For me, the Grateful Dead, there are so many different reasons why I love it so much, but they give me strength, they give me confidence, they give me hope, and they make me believe that tomorrow is like, going to be even better, he said in a 2016 interview. And at the end of the day, when they run off the stage and get out of there, Im out in that pit just saying, Yeahhh, Im with those guys.

He grew close with the band, which paid tribute to him on Monday, calling him an irreplaceable force and spirit in our family.

Walton was inducted into the NBA Hall of Fame in 1993 after his time playing for the Portland Trail Blazers, the San Diego (now Los Angeles) Clippers and the Boston Celtics. After his professional run ended, he overcame a stutter to begin his broadcasting career.

I lived most of my life by myself. But as soon as I got on the court I was fine, Walton told The Oregonian in 2017. But in life, being so self conscious, red hair, big nose, freckles and goofy, nerdy looking face and cant talk at all. I was incredibly shy and never said a word.

Then, when I was 28 I learned how to speak, he added. Its become my greatest accomplishment of my life and everybody elses biggest nightmare.

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Obama Calls Bill Walton One Of The Greats Of All Time As Tributes Pour In For NBA Legend - Yahoo Singapore News

WASHINGTON, D.C. Today, America First Legal (AFL) released a never-before-seen secretive memo established by the Obama Administration and used through the Trump and Biden Administrations confirming the government may have already had originals of the alleged classified documents involved in Special Counsel Jack Smiths sham prosecution against President Trump through the Presidential Information Technology Committee (PITC). AFL obtained these documents through litigation against the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD).

In October 2014, Russian hackers breached the Executive Office of the President (EOP)s network. In response, President Obama created, via executive action, PITC. PITC includes representatives of the DOD and Homeland Security, among others. PITC effectively establishes that the President controls all the information he receives through the PITC network.

On April 4, 2024, AFL sued the DOD to compel the immediate release of documents requested under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) regarding the secretive Presidential Information Technology Committee (PITC) created by former President Barack Obama.

The PITC executive order was public, but it doesnt tell the whole story. Today, AFL releases a never-before-public memo from the White House confirming the DOD has been operating and maintaining the information resources and information systems provided to the President, Vice President, and Executive Office of the President (EOP). This memo reveals that the White House secretly created and apparently maintains an information technology community that enforced Obamas executive order to ensure that presidents could store their records on DOD servers without losing control.

What it means is that the federal government has preserved and retained all EOP records on its servers, and therefore, consistent with Obamas order, it likely possesses a substantial amount, if not all, of President Trumps classified documents.

Under section 2.01 of the memo, the White House Communications Agency provides core services related to unclassified records. Under section 2.06 of the memo, the National Security Council provides classified services.

Section 2.04 of the memo concedes that all records created, stored, used, or transmitted by, on, or through the information resources and information systems provided to the President were stored at DOD. Thus, the White House Communications Agency and NSC at the White House simply provide services regarding records housed at DOD.

Any Congressional committee with subpoena power can now seek to determine whether the documents that Special Counsel Jack Smith obtained and claimed Trump unlawfully retained after his presidency are actually in Bidens active possession through PITC.

This revelation cuts a knife through the entire indictment as it proves that many, if not all, of the documents President Trump is accused of unlawfully retaining were and are currently still retained by the Executive Branch and stored on DOD servers.

Further, because of the PITC memos aggressive posture that all records the President receives are subject to his control, President Trump had a clear basis for believing he had the authority to possess copies of records stored at the DOD. It would, therefore, be impossible for Trump to have retained records without authorization and willfully and knowingly, as the Jack Smith indictment suggests.

This, of course, sets aside the point that the President of the United States has absolute discretion under the Presidential Records Act to determine which records are his.

Lastly, the secret document uncovered by AFL raises the question of why armed agents ever raided President Trumps personal residence. The Special Counsel should have first determined what relevant records existed on the DOD systems. The failure to do so, as the Biden administration clearly knew and enforced PITC, smacks of politicization and dangerous government overreach.

These explosive findings demand immediate action.

Statement from America First Legal Vice President Dan Epstein:

What America First Legal has uncovered after months of investigative work paints an unfortunate picture of the rule of law in Washington. A former President of the United States the most democratically accountable officer under our Constitution was subject to a politicized referral concocted by the Biden White House that led to an armed FBI raid of his home where his wife and youngest child live and is now subject to prosecution. And to now realize that the Biden Administration could have avoided an illegal referral process to recover records the government already possessed, that it could have used normal means to ensure that records the former president believed should be housed in his presidential library (not yet built because of the hordes of investigations aimed at silencing him) were subject to a temporary hold for purposes of Archives review yet didnt speaks loudly to America: the law protects only those who follow the norms of one party, said Dan Epstein.

Read the memo here.

Follow us on social media for the latest updates on America First Legals fight to protect your constitutional rights!

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To schedule an engagement with America First Legal, please email [emailprotected].

Photo Credit: Adobe Stock Images

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EXPLOSIVE Secret Department of Defense Memo Reveals the Biden Administration May Have Already Had Original ... - America First Legal

Google on Friday said that it had taken down an incorrect answer provided by a new artificial intelligence feature that stated Barack Obama was the first Muslim US president.

The answer in the AI Overview summary on the search engine showed up when users asked how many Muslim presidents has the US had?

The issue was highlighted by users on X and replicated by The National.

This particular overview violated our policies, and weve taken it down, a Google representative told The National in an email.

The new AI Overview did, however, correctly show that the US has not had a Muslim president when The National entered the same query without a question mark.

Mr Obama, the 44th US president, is not Muslim and practises Christianity. Racist right-wing conspiracy theorists have for years alleged he secretly practised Islam.

Google last week announced it would unveil its AI-generated summarised search results, AI Overview, in the US following a testing period in the UK.

The vast majority of AI Overviews provide high-quality information, with links to dig deeper on the web, the Google representative said.

We conducted extensive testing before launching this new experience, and as with other features we've launched in Search.

The summaries by generative AI are created and customised by a machine learning model that bases its information from sources already on the internet and from Google's Knowledge Graph, a collection of relevant information assigned to specific keywords and topics for its search engine results.

The incorrect AI Overview search result showing Mr Obama was the first US Muslim president used as its source an Oxford University Press-published book chapter titled Barack Hussein Obama: America's First Muslim President?

It also referenced a Wikipedia page on religious affiliations of US presidents, which mentions the conspiracy theory that Mr Obama is Muslim.

The new generative AI summaries are now showing up at the top of the page above featured snippets, sponsored advertisements and relevant web results after a user enters a query or searches keywords.

Social media users in the US posted several other shocking or incorrect AI Overview results suggesting, for example, that geologists say humans should eat a rock a day as well as articles saying that putting glue on pizza can make cheese stick better.

The Google representative said that these examples are uncommon queries and claimed some shared online were doctored experiences that it could not replicate.

We're taking swift action where appropriate under our content policies, and using these examples to develop broader improvements to our systems, some of which have already started to roll out, the representative added.

Google said it is constantly launching thousands of improvements for its search engine each year, as well as patching such inaccuracies or issues that arise.

The company also has an evaluation process and testing system to make sure that its AI Overview results meet quality and safety standards.

Updated: May 24, 2024, 9:28 PM

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Google takes down incorrect AI answer that says Obama was first Muslim US president - The National

Learn from history.

War. Natural disasters. Congressional infighting. Any of these can wreck the public perception of a presidential administration. Presidents are also often judged -- fairly or not -- by how the stock market performs during their time in office.

By examining each presidency by the numbers, we'll see what lessons investors can learn, and how it can help them become smarter, happier, and richer.

Image source: Getty Images.

George W. Bush was sworn into office at noon on Saturday, Jan. 20, 2001 -- the day and time set by the Constitution -- with the S&P 500 having slipped about 12% from its all-time high as the dot-com bubble began to burst. Over the next several months, financial conditions continued to deteriorate, spurred on by a series of financial scandals, the start of a formal recession, and the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. All told, the S&P 500 would bottom out in late 2002, down nearly 50%.

The gray bars in the charts in this article indicate U.S. recessions.

^SPX data by YCharts

Despite this rocky period, the economy bounced back and the market reclaimed all its losses and more. By the start of 2007, the S&P 500 had increased more than 25% since the start of Bush's presidency.

Yet, storm clouds were gathering. The stock market peaked in mid-2007 and investment banks Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers collapsed the following year, leading to the Great Recession.

Bush left office near the bottom of the downturn. Overall, the stock market as measured by the S&P 500 dropped almost 31% during his term. So buying on Day 1 of his administration and selling on the last day, would not have turned out to be a money-making move. However, investors who bought shares of the S&P 500 on his first day as president and held until today would have been handsomely rewarded.

A $10,000 investment would now be worth about $60,000, representing a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 8%.

Barack Obama was sworn in as the 44th president on Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2009. The stock market was in the middle of a prolonged bear market, and the country was mired in a deep recession due to the financial crisis of 2008.

^SPX data by YCharts

However, those initial disadvantages would become positives over the long run. The 2007-2009 bear market bottomed in March 2009, and a long bull market began, which would last for more than a decade.

Sure, there were stock market corrections along the way, brought on by numerous events, including several Greek debt crises, the U.S. debt ceiling crisis of 2011, and the Brexit referendum vote.

Nevertheless, by the end of Obama's term in 2017, the S&P 500 had generated a total return of 235%, equating to an annualized rate of 16%. A $10,000 investment in the S&P 500 on Day 1 of his presidency would have been worth $33,500 on the final day, and it would now be worth $89,000.

Indeed, among presidents dating back to 1900, Obama's stock market record ranks near the top of the list. Only Calvin Coolidge (1923-1929) and Bill Clinton (1993-2001) can claim a larger percentage gain in the stock market during their terms.

Donald Trump was sworn in as president on Friday, Jan. 20, 2017. During his time in office, the stock market experienced enormous highs and lows. However, the timing of the downturns might surprise some investors.

^SPX data by YCharts

For example, during Trump's presidency, the stock market experienced three fantastic years and one bad year -- assuming you start the years on Jan. 20 (to line up with Inauguration Day). The up years were 2017, 2019, and, surprisingly, 2020 -- despite the steep sell-off at the start of the COVID pandemic. It was 2018 -- when the Federal Reserve began tightening monetary policy -- that was the worst year during the Trump presidency. That 12-month period year saw the S&P 500 decline by 3.1%.

All told, the stock market returned 83.3% over Trump's four years, working out to a 16.4% CAGR -- the highest annualized rate out of the four most recent presidents.

President Joe Biden assumed office on Wednesday, Jan. 20, 2021. During his roughly three and a half years in office, the stock market has performed something like a three-act play. It went up; it went down; then it recovered.

^SPX data by YCharts

When you tally it all up, you find that the result is above average -- an annualized return of 12% and an overall return of 45%. A $10,000 investment made on Day 1 of his presidency would now be worth $14,500.

Yet, the big economic story of the Biden administration is something you won't see in the stock market returns: inflation. Unlike the other administrations mentioned above, the Biden presidency has seen persistently high inflation. In response, the Federal Reserve has quickly raised interest rates in a bid to stabilize prices.

In other words, the stock market is up under the Biden administration. But, for many investors, it may not feel that way, and inflation, combined with higher interest rates, are the biggest reasons why.

When you zoom out to the big picture, one thing becomes clear: It's never a bad time to invest -- no matter who the president may be.

*Term not complete.

As the table above shows (top results are in bold), Day 1 investors in the S&P 500 would have made money in three of the last four administrations if they'd sold on the last day of the administration. In all cases, buying on Day 1 and continuing to hold, would have resulted in positive returns.

Clearly, there's a lesson: The longer you stay invested in the stock market, the better your chances of success. And that's a lesson investors can take to the bank -- no matter who is in the White House.

Link:
Bush, Obama, Trump, or Biden: Here's How Much Money You Would Have if You Had Invested $10,000 in the S&P 500 ... - The Motley Fool

After Barack Obamas decisive victory in 2008, Democratic Party strategists fell under the sway of the notion that the future of their partys dominance was ensured because, as they put it, demographics are destiny.

Mr Obama had performed well among a wide range of groups, but what captured the strategists attention was that he had won decisively among young voters, black, Latino and Asian-American voters, and university-educated women. Because these groups were growing in their percentage of the overall electorate, the strategists decided that Democrats would continue to win elections well into the future if they focused on the issues that they determined would most appeal to these voters. Hence the phrase demographics are destiny.

They referred to their winning cohort as the Obama coalition and in the years that followed, the issues they elevated and their extensive voter outreach efforts were directed largely at cultivating and keeping that coalition together. In the process, they appeared to abandon outreach to a substantial number of other constituencies, especially white working-class voters, leaving the field wide open to their Republican opponents.

Back in 2008-2009, the US was reeling from the trauma of the Great Recession. Republicans, in an effort to deflect from their responsibility for the economic collapse, sought instead to exploit many white voters feelings of unease and abandonment. Republican candidates preyed on their resentment and fears, often using racism and xenophobia as their weapons of choice. This strategy was embodied in the birther movement (claiming Mr Obama was foreign-born) and the Tea Party (claiming Democrats ideas about government dont work for most Americans, but instead only black people, the poor and immigrants).

Democrats fell into the trap that Republicans set for them by focusing on fighting the intolerant Republican messages

In the next three elections, Democrats, relying on their new strategy of mobilising their Obama coalition base, lost more than 1,400 state and federal seats, giving Republicans control of both houses of Congress and the majority of governorships and state legislatures. One might have thought that Democrats would have learnt from this comeuppance. Sadly, they did not.

Shortly after the 2014 midterms, I was at a meeting of the Democratic Partys executive committee when the partys pollster gave an upbeat presentation of what had been a stunning number of nationwide defeats. He claimed that there was good news from 2014: Democrats had kept their coalition together, winning the youth, black, Latino, Asian and university-educated womens votes. Adding, We just didnt win enough of them, he recommended that the party commit more resources to getting more of these groups out to vote in future elections.

At one point I objected, saying that he was ignoring white ethnic voters in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan and Wisconsin. These working-class voters had always been Democrats, and their rights, prosperity and futures were being damaged by Republicans. Because Democrats had always had their interests at heart and they had been central to our victories, I argued that we needed to pay attention to their needs. His response startled me: Were not going to throw money away on people who are never going to vote for us.

I replied that its not either/or. We can be both attentive to the concerns of our new coalition, while also keeping in mind the needs of our old coalition partners. When that both/and approach was dismissed, I countered that if that was how we would operate then the Democrats would never be a majoritarian party and we were going to be handing these voters to Republicans on a silver platter. Enter Donald Trump in 2016.

When he was a candidate, President Joe Biden understood the idea of both/and, directing his efforts to winning back these voters. But the apparatus of the party and its paid consultants have not followed suit, with little or no resources being devoted to outreach to white working-class voters and even less to understanding their values and needs.

We have polled these communities, and in 2001 my brother John and I published a book based on our findings: What Ethnic Americans Really Think. We found that white ethnic voters were largely progressive in their attitudes towards government and economic policy but had more nuanced feelings about what are called social issues. They supported federal funding for education, health care and job creation; these were their priority issues. And they were pro-union and for racial equality. They were, however, conflicted about abortion and gay rights. A generation earlier, then president Bill Clinton had captured the general values of these white working-class voters with his slogan family, community and opportunity.

Because the interests of white working-class voters are more aligned with the economic and governmental policies espoused by Democrats, the party never should have lost their support. But it did. Democrats fell into the trap that Republicans set for them by focusing their electioneering almost exclusively on fighting the bigoted and intolerant Republican messages and ignoring the economic angst and feelings of abandonment of white voters. When Democrats should be attending to both.

Now polls are showing that Democrats may be at risk of losing even some components of the Obama coalition. By viewing black, Latino and Asian-American voters as monoliths, Democrats may be ignoring the complex composition of these groups. For example, studies show that upwards of 15 per cent of black voters are African immigrants and a large number of Latino voters are more recent immigrants as well. Most of the recent arrivals from these groups are from Nigeria, East Africa, Venezuela, Nicaragua and the Dominican Republican. Their attitudes and values are more in line with those of the ethnic immigrants who came from Europe in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Democratic strategists need to adjust their focus or else risk losing these communities support.

One more thought: my generation grew up with a strong attachment to party identity. Political parties were organisations to which you belonged. Today, given the weaknesses of the party organisations, being a Democrat or a Republican means nothing more than being on an email or phone-banking list. And the only time one hears from either party is when they call or write for money or urge you to vote. As a result, party identity has suffered and this is especially true for young voters and recent immigrants.

Thats why the numbers of independents and swing voters have increased. Its why Mr Trump found it so easy to topple the Republican Party leadership and why Democrats may have trouble winning elections holding on to their demographics are destiny mantra.

Published: May 27, 2024, 2:00 PM

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How the 'Obama coalition' cost the Democrats the working class - The National