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The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced the immediate suspension of fresh beef imports from the South American country on Thursday after inspections uncovered public health concerns, unsanitary conditions and animal health issues. The agency said the ban will remain in place until Brazil "takes corrective action." Brazil is the fifth biggest supplier of beef to the U.S., ranking behind only Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Mexico. It has sent nearly 50 million pounds of beef to the U.S. so far this year. "Although international trade is an important part of what we do at USDA, and Brazil has long been...

Even if you disagree with President Donald Trump and his administration, there are some positive kernels out there. Trump has put an emphasis on jobs, for example, specifically jobs for the struggling middle and lower class. Although those promised jobs might not necessarily come to fruition, it’s good to hear somebody at least talk about blue-collar struggles. One way the president is focusing on jobs is by attempting to bring back apprenticeships. Apprenticeships, of course, are on-the-job training programs that used to be quite popular but have fizzled out with time. There are still plenty of them out there, but...

Here's why Rajeev Srinivasan believes there will be nothing particularly positive about the prime minister's US visit. IMAGE: The fact that it has taken this long for the US to extend an invitation to Narendra Modi suggests that India is not on Donald Trump's event horizon. Photographs: Peter Nicholls/Getty Images and Carlos Barria/Reuters Prime Minister Narendra Modi is not naive, so he is surely approaching his fifth visit to the United States, and his first meeting with US President Donald Trump with careful preparation. He is also deliberately creating low expectations. Unlike the hoopla of his previous Madison Square Gardens...

According to author and music historian Ralph Denyer in 1982's The Guitar Handbook, Eric Clapton's 1975 solo album There's One in Every Crowd, until his record company worried that not everyone would get the joke, was originally going to be titled "The Best Guitarist in the World...There's One in Every Crowd." And sometimes there's a lot of them, when it comes to the crowd that gathers every May at the annual Dallas International Guitar Festival. As co-founder Jimmy Wallace explained to me in our 2015 podcast interview, the Dallas International Guitar Festival pioneered the modern concept of the weekend guitar...

Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon put the brakes on a sweeping plan to overhaul the health care market in California Friday, calling the bill “woefully incomplete.”

Blair Gladwin, owner of the California based Gladwin Guns and Ammo, filed three class action lawsuits last week against online payment processors PayPal, Stripe, and Square for singling out him and other firearms businesses. The payment companies required Gladwin and the other owners to reveal the nature of their dealings — after which the payment companies refused to work with them. Gladwin claims this type of discrimination is a violation of California’s Unruh Civil Rights Act Sections 51, 52(a) and 52(c), a law that protects federally-licensed gun stores from such refusals of business transactions. The class action lawsuits, according to...

Germany’s refugees — and there are many — will by and large be on the public dole for life, according to a new study provided labor officials. For the rest? Public assistance and taxpayer benefits would be their lifetime reward, he said. From the Express: “The Institute for Employment Research (IAB) found only 45 per cent of Syrian refugees in Germany have a school-leaving certificate and 23 per cent a college degree. “It said 484,000 of the refugees are looking for work, up from 322,000 last July — an increase of 50 per cent. “Of those, 178,500 are officially unemployed,...

Georgia is seeing a significant decrease in the number of people receiving food stamps as the improving economy lifts many recipients into new jobs and frees them from the fear of going hungry. The number of Georgians getting food stamps has dropped by 300,000 from 1.9 million in April 2013 to 1.6 million. That decrease of 16 percent in the federally funded program saves taxpayers tens of millions of dollars monthly.

For over two years now, environmental activists and anti-industry groups have been raging against the U.S. government, the European Union, and practically anybody else that would listen about the herbicide glyphosate. Glyphosate is a weed killer and the main ingredient in RoundUp. Weed killers are obviously a critical tool for American farmers and farmers around the world. The left-wingers are attacking weed killers despite the chemical receiving a clean bill of health from both the EPA and Europe’s main food safety and chemical authorities. PRI.org reported late last year that “in November 2015, the European Food Safety Authority, or EFSA,...

Seeking to "roll out a red-carpet welcome" to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, US President Donald Trump would host him for a working dinner at the White House on Monday, the first of its kind under this administration. "The White House is very interested in making this a special visit. We're really seeking to roll out the red carpet. In fact, the two (leaders) will have dinner, a working dinner at the White House. “This will be the first dinner for a foreign dignitary at the White House under this administration. So, we think that's very significant," a senior administration official...

Washington -- Even as the Trump administration is cosying up to the Chinese, the US will need India to counter Beijing's growing influence in the world, a top American think-tank has said. Describing India as a "key piece in the jigsaw" for the US, the Atlantic Council urged the Trump administration to prioritise its ties with New Delhi. "Given the advancements that China has made both economically and militarily, the US will need to channel considerable resources to assert its global and regional primacy," Atlantic Council, a top American think-tank said in a policy paper 'Transforming India from a Balancing...

That Louisiana is sinking into the Gulf of Mexico is not news. Rising seas and coastline erosion have been working together for decades, but this sinking may well be happening faster than previously thought—threatening billions and billions of Louisiana oil infrastructure. This is the central idea of a new study from Tulane University that set out to map the Louisiana coastline using new methods of measuring subsidence—the technical term for sinking land. The outcome of the measurements is an average 9 mm of wetlands lost to the sea every year. This compares to previous estimates of an annual subsidence rate...

Our nation’s ports are the lifelines of our economy. In 2016, foreign trades through U.S. ports were valued at $1.5 trillion—$475 billion exports and $1.0 trillion imports were moved by vessels. When goods travel through ports, it means they are traveling via ship. NOS is in the business of making sure that mariners—and the goods they are transporting—make it to their destinations safely and quickly. Just as airplane pilots need to know current weather and ground conditions, ship captains need to know exactly what's going on in the water and in the air. NOS monitoring systems supply mariners with the...

The GOP’s new health bill would mean Nevada cannot afford to maintain coverage for the 210,000 residents insured under Medicaid expansion, Gov. Brian Sandoval says. The governor and Sen. Dean Heller, R-Nev., spoke against the bill during a Friday news conference in Las Vegas. Heller said he couldn’t support the bill in its current form. . . . . “I want to make sure that we prop up Medicaid to the degree that the federal government has given in the past and that has become an expectation for the state of Nevada,” Heller said. . . . . “There isn’t...

Cowen says McDonald's will upgrade 2,500 restaurants to its "Experience of the Future" technology by year-end, which includes digital ordering kiosks. The firm raises its rating on McDonald's to outperform from market perform and price target for the shares to $180 from $142. Same store sales estimate for 2018 raised to 3 percent from 2 percent. McDonald's shares hit an all-time high on Tuesday as Wall Street expects sales to increase from new digital ordering kiosks that will replace cashiers in 2,500 restaurants. Cowen raised its rating on McDonald's shares to outperform from market perform because of the technology upgrades,...

First lady Melania Trump announced Friday that she has selected the director of rooms at Trump International Hotel to serve as White House chief usher. Timothy Harleth presently oversees more than 110 employees at the Trump hotel in Washington, D.C., the White House said Friday. "I am so pleased that Timothy will be joining our team," Melania Trump said in a statement. "He was selected because of his impressive work history and management skills. My husband and I know he will be successful in this vital role within the White House." As chief usher, Harleth will oversee the more than...

President Donald Trump has spent more taxpayer funds on White House furnishings in the first five months of his administration than his predecessor, Barack Obama, spent in the same span of time, it was reported on Friday. American Bridge PAC, an organization which is 'committed to holding Republicans accountable for their words and actions,' obtained copies of federal procurement records through May 31, according to Mic. The records show that in his first 150 days in office, Trump spent $133,053.95 on office furniture. That's more than twice the amount that Obama spent in his first five months in office -...

Up until Donald Trump’s election it looked like the trade wars were largely over. Policymakers in both parties seemed to have accepted full integration of the United States into the global economy was both a good and a goal. Trump turned that on its head. He built his Electoral College majority on the resentment of folks who believed free trade and global commerce helped create jobs for other people in other places while leaving them behind. It’s a powerful message that’s starting to resonate in Congress. Even Texas Rep. Kevin Brady, chairman of the House Committee on Ways and Means...

Columbia University economist Jeffrey Sachs claims that President Trump pulled out of the Paris Climate Accord because of the influence of the Koch brothers. "The president doesn't know what he's doing, this is obvious he's an idiot,” he said. "But what's happening behind here is real politics." "This is the victory paid and carried out for 20 years by two people: David and Charles Koch." Sachs is also a senior advisor to the UN Secretary General. These claims don’t make much since the Koch Brothers are by no means Donald Trump fans. During the 2016 campaign they refused to back...

On June 1, when he announced pulling out of the climate change agreement, President Donald Trump put his finger on the key problem, which was deliberately part of the plan. He attacked "the draconian financial and economic burdens the agreement imposes on our country" while creating a so-called Green Climate Fund which would cost the United States "a vast fortune" to be sent to the other nations of the world. In other words, Trump's pull-out from the agreement works AGAINST Russian interests and those of the global socialists. Nevertheless, the propaganda campaign continues. In July, Netflix releases the film "Chasing...