Trump picks Mattis for secretary of defense



Donald Trump has selected the retired marine general James Mattis to be his nominee for secretary of defense. Mattis has deep wells of support on Capitol Hill and in the military, and his appointment comes with much establishment hope that he will be able to rein in Trump and bureaucratically neutralize Mike Flynn, the president-elect’s pick for national security adviser. “But Mattis has enough points of policy agreement with Trump to make his integration with the Trump hardliners as strong a possibility,” write Spencer Ackerman and Ben Jacobs. The retired general – nicknamed “Mad Dog” and known for his blunt remarks – would need a special waiver from Congress because he has not been out of uniform for the requisite seven years. Trump made the announcement at an Ohio rally on the first day of his “thank you tour” of states that he won last month. At the rally in Cincinnati, the president-elect returned to his bombastic campaign style, bashing Hillary Clinton and the media.

Donald Trump announces James Mattis as his choice for secretary of defense

Trump’s cabinet could be wealthiest ever

“Trump, a former host of reality TV show The Apprentice, is surrounding himself with the 1%: billionaires and millionaires, investment bankers and venture capitalists, Wall Street insiders and family fortune heirs, many educated at elite schools,” David Smith writes. Opponents warn that his choices won’t help fulfill Trump’s promises to working-class Americans. Meanwhile, experts are worried about the president-elect’s potential conflicts of interest. In case you missed it: the Guardian’s Nadja Popovich and Jan Diehm created a visual guide to explain them.

Trump’s rich pickings: president-elect’s team could be wealthiest ever

The ‘most practical’ way for US to drop climate change commitments

The US should completely quit the United Nations forum to tackle climate change in order to quickly exit the Paris climate agreement, according to Steven Groves, a lawyer at the conservative Heritage Foundation who is part of Donald Trump’s transition team. Groves told the Guardian that exiting the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change would be the “most practical” way for the US to drop its climate change commitments. Groves was speaking about the Heritage Foundation’s position on the issue as he was not authorized to speak on behalf of the Trump transition team. Trump has promised to “cancel” the Paris deal, and quitting the UN forum would allow the US to back out of the international climate effort within a year.

Quitting UN climate change body could be Trump’s quickest exit from Paris deal

Tyra Patterson: victim’s sister says she is innocent



Earlier this year, the Guardian examined the struggle for justice of Tyra Patterson, an Ohio woman who has been fighting for 22 years to clear herself of a life sentence for murder. Patterson has always insisted that she was an innocent bystander in the murder of Michelle Lai, a 15-year-old girl who was shot in the head in 1994 in Dayton, Ohio. Now, Holly Lai Holbrook, Michelle’s sister who was sitting in the car just feet from her when the teenager was shot at point-blank range, has come forward to say that she is now convinced of Patterson’s innocence and told police officers at the crime scene that Patterson had nothing to do with her sister’s killing. She has petitioned Ohio’s governor, John Kasich, to use his clemency powers to free Patterson.

Tyra Patterson is in prison for murder – now victim’s sister says she is innocent



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MDMA approved for final trials to treat PTSD

The US Food and Drug Administration has approved phase three trials of MDMA to treat post-traumatic stress disorder, the final phase of validation required to turn the party drug into a legal medicine. The treatment involves giving patients the drug just three times – once a month – during long talking therapy sessions, interspersed with weekly sessions without the drug. Early trials of the drug have shown encouraging results for patients with treatment-resistant PTSD.

MDMA approved for final trials to treat PTSD before possible legalization

Fake news becoming a global problem

Fake news online has been dominating discussions after the US election – but it’s also having an effect in countries around the world. Guardian correspondents examine the impact of fake news in Germany, France, Myanmar, China, Brazil, Australia and India.

Fake news: an insidious trend that’s fast becoming a global problem

François Hollande will not seek re-election

Hollande, the least popular French president since the second world war, has announced he will not run for a second term in office. The Socialist president appeared shaken and emotional as he said in a live televised address from the Élysée palace that he would not attempt to run for a second term, conscious of the “risks” to the French left if he did so. His satisfaction rating recently dropped to just 4%.

François Hollande will not seek re-election as president of France

Isis recruiters targeting refugees in Europe, experts say

Islamic State recruiters are targeting vulnerable refugees in Europe to radicalize them in an effort to further polarize the European Union population, Europol, the law enforcement agency of the European Union, has said.

Isis recruiters targeting refugees in Europe, say counter-terror experts

Former NFL player Joe McKnight killed

Former NFL running back Joe McKnight was shot and killed in suburban New Orleans on Thursday afternoon, the Jefferson Parish sheriff’s office said.

Former NFL player Joe McKnight killed in reported road rage incident

And another thing …

Struck by the legendary sniffing skills of man’s best friend, scientists fitted a dog-inspired plastic nose to an explosives detector and reported that it worked 16 times better.



Bomb detector works better with fake dog nose on the end

