Concerns about the virus spurred the Trump administration to declare a public health emergency and bar entry to the United States for foreign nationals who have recently visited China.

In addition, U.S. citizens who have traveled within the past two weeks to Hubei will be subject to a mandatory quarantine of 14 days, believed to be the incubation period of the virus, officials said. Americans who visited other parts of mainland China will undergo special health screening upon their return, followed by up to 14 days of “monitored self-quarantine,” under the temporary restrictions. In a statement on Saturday, the Pentagon said Defense Secretary Mark Esper approved a request for assistance from the Department of Health and Human Services for housing support for 1,000 people who may be subject to quarantine on arrival from overseas.Health officials had asked the Defense Department to provide several facilities capable of housing at least 250 people in individual rooms through Feb. 29. The Pentagon said four military installations have been selected: two in California, one in Colorado, and one in Texas. It said Defense Department personnel would only provide housing support and HHS would be responsible for all care and transportation. “DOD personnel will not be directly in contact with the evacuees and evacuees will not have access to any base location other than their assigned housing,” the Pentagon said. The first quarantines of U.S. citizens potentially exposed to coronavirus in China began hours before the White House announcement on Friday. Nearly 200 Americans evacuated earlier this week from Wuhan and voluntarily confined to a California military air base for 72 hours of health screenings were placed under a mandatory 14-day quarantine on Friday. By Saturday afternoon, none of those quarantined showed any symptoms of having the virus, said Jose Arballo, a spokesman for the public health department in Riverside County, where the air base is located. He said test results were still pending. The order to keep the Americans on the base marked the CDC’s first mandatory quarantine for decades. “Since this hasn’t been done in 51 years there’s quite the scramble to work through all the procedures,” a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) official said, adding that the last mandatory quarantine was ordered to fight smallpox. The official, who requested anonymity because they are not authorized to speak publicly about the matter, said DHS personnel would take over running medical screenings at airports this weekend to free up their CDC counterparts for other tasks. A DHS spokeswoman denied the department was scrambling and said it has been working on these plans since last summer, when it began contracting medical professionals and readying quarantine and health screening plans in case it had to ramp up for the Ebola outbreak. Nearly 12,000 people have been infected globally by the virus, according to the WHO, with all but just over 130 of those cases occurring in China.

After making a idiot of himself by saying the president CANNOT be removed for a quid pro quo to aid his re-election then claims the defense ‘begged him to stay’

• Most famous member of Trump’s defense team was absent from the Senate floor Thursday – then turned up on TV from Miami
• Dershowitz, who also defended Jeffrey Epstein, said he had a family commitment which he could not change and team had begged him to stay
• He is at war with critics after telling the impeachment trial that a president could not be impeached for a quid pro quo to aid his re-election 
• Harvard professor said that because the president believes his re-election is in the public interest, he cannot be impeached 
• Other academics and lawyers criticized the theory saying it gave presidents’ extraordinary powers – and would have cleared Richard Nixon 

‘If a president does something which he believes will help him get elected, in the public interest, that cannot be the kind of quid pro quo that results in impeachment,’ Dershowitz said Wednesday as senators put questions to Democratic House lawmakers who are prosecuting the case against Trump in the Senate and to Trump’s defense team.

Barbara Perry, director of presidential studies at the University of Virginia’s Miller Center, said Dershowitz had it backwards in suggesting that the public interest is whatever serves the president’s reelection campaign. ‘What we hope is that they at least think in terms of the nation’s interests and then align their personal interest with the public interest, the country´s interest,’ Perry said. What’s more, she said, Dershowitz’s formulation could serve as a dangerous precedent for future presidents who might think they can do anything they want in the political arena, except for violation of a criminal statute. ‘Then there´s nothing to be done about a president who can make the case that I did it in my self-interest,’ she said. She reached back to Richard Nixon’s presidency and the ‘dirty tricks’ carried out to undermine the campaigns of Democratic rivals in 1972. ‘Nixon was trying to get reelected. Every single thing that happened in Watergate, all of those things would not be impeachable?’ Perry said. Both Perry and Dallek said the closest similar invocation of presidential power was Nixon’s statement, made after he resigned the presidency: ‘Well, when the president does it … that means that it is not illegal,’ Nixon told interviewer David Frost in 1977. Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., alluded to Nixon in Thursday’s Senate session. ‘We are right back to where we were a half century ago, and I would argue that we may be in a worse place, because this time, this time, that argument may succeed,’ Schiff said. Nick Note: It is amazing and sad to see how Trump has the ability to corrupt people and destroy their lives and reputations making assholes our of themselves for the president… How sad!

KABUL, Afghanistan – A U.S. military aircraft crashed in eastern Afghanistan on Monday, a Taliban spokesman and Afghan journalist affiliated with the militant group said. Tariq Ghazniwal, a journalist in the area, said that he saw the burning aircraft. In an exchange on Twitter, he told The Associated Press that he saw two bodies and the front of the aircraft was badly burned. He added that the aircraft’s body and tail were hardly damaged. His information could not be independently verified. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said a U.S. airforce plane crashed in the Ghazni province. He claimed the crash killed “lots” of U.S. service members. The militant group often exaggerates casualty figures. Ghazniwal said the crash site was about 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) from a U.S. military base. Local Taliban have deployed to protect the crash site, he said, and several other militants were combing the nearby village for two people they say survived the crash. The Taliban control much of the Ghazni province and have total control over the local area of the crash. Ghazniwal said the site was near a village called Sado Khelo, in the Deh Yak district. He also said the crash occurred soon after 1 p.m. local time, but residents in the area did not report a loud crashing noise. He couldn’t say whether the aircraft had been shot down but “the crash was not loud.” U.S. Army Maj. Beth Riordan, a spokeswoman for U.S. Central Command, declined to comment when told about the Taliban claim. She earlier acknowledged American military officials were investigating reports of a crash in Afghanistan. She said that it remained unclear whose aircraft was involved in the crash. Riordan declined to immediately comment further. However, pictures on social media purportedly from the crash site showed what could be the remains of a Bombardier E-11A aircraft, which the U.S. military uses for electronic surveillance over Afghanistan. Images on social media purportedly of the crashed plane showed an aircraft bearing U.S. Air Force markings similar to other E-11A surveillance aircraft photographed by aviation enthusiasts. Visible registration numbers on the plane also appeared to match those aircraft. The so-called Battlefield Airborne Communications Node can be carried on unmanned or crewed aircraft like the E-11A. It is used by the military to extend the range of radio signals and can be used to convert the output of one device to another, such as connecting a radio to a telephone. Colloquially referred to by the U.S. military as “Wi-Fi in the sky,” the BACN system is used in areas where communications are otherwise difficult, elevating signals above obstacles like mountains. The system is in regular use in Afghanistan. Arif Noori, spokesman for the provincial governor, said the plane went down around 1:10 p.m. local time (8:40 a.m. GMT) in Deh Yak district, some 130 kilometers (80 miles) southwest of the capital Kabul. He said the crash site is in territory controlled by the Taliban. Two provincial council members also confirmed the crash. The mountainous Ghazni province sits in the foothills of the Hindu Kush mountains and is bitterly cold in winter. The Taliban currently control or hold sway over around half the country. Nick Note:  I say the US is having a bad hair day. When you turn tail and run people ain’t afraid of you any more and they get embolden. Notice how the Russian embassy  is fine… They would not dare Fuck with the Russians… they know how to be the worlds policeman!e Russian.

The Dow Jones faces a disastrous open as the coronavirus spreads across America and the U.S. embassy in Iraq is hit with a rocket strike.

• Dow futures plunged in early trade as geopolitical threats mount for the U.S. economy.
• Alongside a fifth confirmed case of Wuhan coronavirus in the United States there was also an attack on the U.S. embassy in Iraq on Sunday.
• Bulls are now nervously awaiting what could be sizable dip in the Dow Jones when it opens on Monday morning in New York.

The Dow looks set for an extremely rough start to the week as a multitude of geopolitical risks converge on a shaky stock-market. After a weak close on Friday, investors in the Dow Jones are now faced with missile strikes against the U.S. embassy in Iraq, as well as a rapidly escalating coronavirus epidemic in China, with multiple new cases reported in the United States as well. With many economists predicting that the U.S. economy’s historic run would only be halted by an “external shock,” almost on cue, we have not one but two highly significant threats to the Dow Jones’ quest for 30,000. Most recently, health officials confirmed the fifth case of Wuhan coronavirus in the domestic United States, this time in Arizona. Over the weekend, medics also acknowledged two cases in California, one in Orange County and the other in Los Angeles County. That’s a highly unwanted occurrence for an area already in mourning over the loss of its most beloved athlete, NBA superstar Kobe Bryant and his daughter Gianna in a helicopter crash. For investors paying close attention to the spread, California is of particular significance for three reasons. Firstly, California is the most populous U.S. state, with Southern California (mostly L.A. and Orange County) the most densely populated region. Secondly, California is comfortably the largest state economy in the United States, a little under double second place Texas. Finally, it has the largest Chinese-American community (estimated at more than 1.2 million), some of whom visit their country of origin for the Lunar new-year (January 25), making the threat of contamination more probable moving forward. Given the previous impact that virus epidemics have had on the stock market, major global indexes like the Dow Jones cannot ignore the spread of coronavirus within China.Fears are escalating that Beijing has been massively downplaying the rate of infections, and the crisis has hit during the most significant economic event of the year.

A huge hit to Chinese productivity is expected, with knock-on effects in the global economy inevitable. In Hong Kong, protests remain fierce, this time against state administered quarantine, as protesters set fire to the buildings designated for infected parties. Nick Note: The stock market balloon has found it pin.