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The Russian-made jeep carrying the ashes of the late Cuban dictator Fidel Castro broke down in the middle of his funeral procession on Saturday, forcing soldiers to push the vehicle until it could be repaired. Nearly every major news website buried the news, though it was perfectly symbolic of the Cuban regime’s economic failures, and those of socialism in general.

The operator of the converted warehouse in Oakland, Calif., where a fire broke out during a dance party on Friday night, killing at least 30 people, has been widely criticized over his initial response to the tragedy. “Everything I worked so hard for is gone,” Derick Ion Almena wrote in a Facebook post early Saturday morning. “Blessed that my children and Micah were at a hotel safe and sound … it’s as if I have awoken from a dream filled with opulence and hope … to be standing now in poverty of self worth.” Almena’s post was met with immediate...

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. - When Staten Island's seat in Congress becomes vacant, Assemblywoman Nicole Malliotakis will be the first to jump at it. Passed over last year in favor of then-District Attorney Daniel Donovan as the GOP candidate in a special election, Malliotakis is just as eager now to run for the House of Representatives, she indicated in a recent interview. The May 2015 special election saw Donovan elected to fill the remainder of Michael Grimm's term -- he had resigned in disgrace after pleading guilty to tax evasion.

Donald J. Trump ‏@realDonaldTrump 30m 30 minutes ago Did China ask us if it was OK to devalue their currency (making it hard for our companies to compete), heavily tax our products going into.. Donald J. Trump ‏@realDonaldTrump 24m 24 minutes ago their country (the U.S. doesn't tax them) or to build a massive military complex in the middle of the South China Sea? I don't think so!

A radical Marxist suspected of belonging to a left-wing extremist group accused of terrorism by Turkey has been arrested in Germany, judicial sources said on Saturday. The 55-year-old citizen of the Netherlands, whose name was given as Musa A., was arrested in Hamburg, Germany’s federal prosecutor said. The man is thought to be a “leader” of the Revolutionary People’s Liberation Party/Front (DHKP-C) — a radical Marxist group outlawed by Ankara after allegedly staging several attacks and assassinations against police, the security services and US interests in Turkey. …

Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi has suffered a heavy defeat in a referendum over his plan to reform the constitution, exit polls suggest. An exit poll on state broadcaster RAI suggests 42-46% voted to back reform, compared with 54-58% voting No. Two other polls gave the No vote a similar lead of at least 10 points. Mr Renzi, who has said he would resign if he lost the vote, is due to make a statement at midnight (23:00 GMT) from his official residence in Rome. The referendum was regarded as a barometer of anti-establishment sentiment in Europe. The vote asked...

Federal officials have denied the final permits required for the Dakota Access Pipeline project in North Dakota. The Army Corps of Engineers announced Sunday it would instead conduct an environmental impact review of the 1,170-mile pipeline project to determine if there are other ways to route the pipeline to avoid a crossing on the Missouri River...

Things aren't looking good for Sears. The company is shutting down dozens of Kmart stores this month and two of its highest-ranking executives left this week in the midst of the key holiday shopping season. This comes following speculation among Sears and Kmart employees, suppliers, and several banks that the retailer will soon go bankrupt — something Sears has repeatedly dismissed. Jeff Balagna, formerly Sears' executive vice president, left the company Wednesday, "in order to focus on his other business interests and pursue other career opportunities," Sears said in an SEC filing dated November 23.

President-elect Donald Trump's victory on Election Day has put some of President Barack Obama's hallmark achievements in jeopardy. Trump has come out strongly against almost all of the top initiatives Obama spent eight years working on — the Asia pivot, the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade pact, Obamacare, and the Iran nuclear deal — and they're fragile enough that Trump could reverse course fairly easily. "You have an outsider president being replaced by the most outsider candidate ever elected," Ian Bremmer, a geopolitical analyst and president of the Eurasia Group, told Business Insider via email. "There's nothing like one upsmanship, big league,...

Dallas lawyer Brian Loncar died Sunday, two days after the funeral for his 16-year-old daughter, who killed herself on Nov. 26. How the 56-year-old died and where he was found remain a mystery, but investigators called to his downtown office examined a Rolls Royce Wraith parked outside.

"It is ridiculous to think that a phone call upsets decades of anything," he said. "But I do think it is important that people understand that the President of the United States should talk to whoever he wants, if he thinks it is in the interests of the U.S. Nobody in Beijing gets to dictate who we talk to. My view has been for some time that we should be upgrading our relations with Taiwan, and I know that is going to caus heartburn in Beijing, but it is a reality." "This is a nation of over 20 million people....

President-elect Trump's brief telephone call with Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen drew a stronger reaction from the American mainstream media than it did from Beijing. The official China Daily entitled its editorial yesterday "No need to over-interpret Tsai-Trump phone call," writing: For Trump, it exposed nothing but his and his transition team's inexperience in dealing with foreign affairs. If he could make the unusual action due to lack of proper understanding of Sino-US relations and cross-Straits ties he will have to recognize the significance of prudently and appropriately addressing these sensitive issues after being inaugurated. Is Beijing just trying to put...

WASHINGTON — Secretary of State John Kerry excoriated the Israeli right, claiming that support for settlement construction stems from a desire to subvert Israeli-Palestinian peace, during a speech before the Brookings Institution’s Saban Forum on Sunday afternoon. A subdued Kerry, wearing reading glasses and referring to extensive notes, notably refrained from committing to veto any UN resolution intended to establish a Palestinian state, only promising a veto “if it is a biased, unfair resolution calculated to delegitimize Israel.” US officials last week indicated that US President Barack Obama had nearly ruled out any major last-ditch effort to put pressure on...

On this weekend’s broadcast of “Fox New Sunday,” host Chris Wallace got into a heated exchange with 2016 Green Party presidential nominee Dr. Jill Stein while discussing her attempts to initiate recounts of the presidential vote in several swing states.

WASHINGTON — It was an introspective US Secretary of State John Kerry who came to the closing session of the last Saban Forum of the Obama administration. For four years as secretary of state, the Massachusetts politician had made the short trek to the Willard Intercontinental Hotel in early December, updating an audience that leaned Democratic – and pro-Israel – about the hottest issues on the burner, whether they were peace talks or Iran nuclear negotiations. Introspective Kerry knew that this was his last time to explain before Washington’s think-tank elite why on his watch, the United States had once...

The buck roo sees the odds stacking against him and tries to get the dog with its claws one last time,” the narrator says. “Its powerful arms anchor the dog by the breastplate as Max doubles his efforts to escape. “Finally the roo switches his attention to ‘Donks’ and sizes up the human to be his next victim. “Donks gives the kangaroo his face but the cranky buck comes forward ready to attack. “To save himself he launches a right hand to the kangaroo’s snout.” And what a right hand it was. The kangaroo did not appear to be hurt...

Khalid Sheik Mohammed, one of the masterminds in the 9/11 attack, said that “the ferocity and swiftness” of former U.S. President George W. Bush’s reprisal to the Terrorst attacks on U.S. soil astonished Al Qaeda The new revelation was found in psychologist James E. Mitchell’s new memoir, “Enhanced Interrogation: Inside the Minds and Motives of the Islamic Terrorists Trying To Destroy America.” Mitchell wrote, “How was I supposed to know that cowboy George Bush would announce he wanted us ‘dead or alive’ and then invade Afghanistan to hunt us down? Khalid explained that if the United States had treated 9/11...

Do Christians have a future in the region where their religion was born? The Christian population continues to dwindle across the Middle East, due in part to persecution by extremist groups. An international conference starting Monday at Villanova University looks to bring the issue — and potential solutions — into sharp focus --SNIP-- “They openly admit and execute genocide against large groups of Christians, like the Yazidis and the Syrian Christians and the Chaldeans and others,” he tells KYW Newsradio. “But it ought to be pointed out that there are Islamic groups that try to protect Christians.

WI recount, day 4 spreadsheet: Recount of precincts w/958,453 Election Night ballots in; Trump lead extended by 39 votes. ~35% complete.

Musician and actor Nick Cannon slammed Planned Parenthood on Friday, calling its abortion practices “modern day eugenics.” Cannon was doubling down on recent comments he made saying the abortion giant was committing a “real genocide” against black Americans. “Hillary was sneaking and cheating,” Cannon said in an interview with New York’s radio show, The Breakfast Club. “Think about all the stuff they did with Planned Parenthood and all that type of stuff. That type of stuff is to take our community — and forget gentrification, it’s real genocide, and it’s been like that for years. This system is not built for us.” He...