Tag: Communication

WASHINGTON—Insisting she was not culpable for the inexplicable contents of her spoken communications, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders defiantly claimed Friday that she doesn’t know where the voice comes from when she opens her mouth. “Listen, I don’t control where these words come from, okay? When I open my mouth, they just start pouring out of me automatically,” said a combative Huckabee Sanders, contending that she cannot be held responsible for the eerie, guttural rumbling that originates in her gut and slowly works its way up to her mouth, resulting in a disturbing oratory operating outside of her conscious awareness. “It’s detestable that the press would pin the words that come out of my mouth on me. Don’t you dare question my motives by blaming me for this mysterious force using my voice to communicate with the media. Is it a demon? A machine? Could it be a tiny woman living inside my vocal cords? I don’t have the answer. All I know is that when I open my mouth, the world goes dark and then I’ll come to later with no memory whatsoever of what just happened.

Special Counsel Robert Mueller on Friday claimed in a new court filing that prosecutors have evidence that former Trump adviser Roger Stone communicated with WikiLeaks, the organization that released hacked Democratic emails during the 2016 campaign. Stone -- who was indicted last month on charges of obstruction, making false statements and witness tampering -- denied to Fox News that evidence of such communications exists. “There is no such evidence,” Stone said in a text message. In a Friday motion, Mueller’s team said that “search warrants were executed on accounts that contained Stone’s communications” with an organization widely believed to be WikiLeaks. Last month’s indictment does not charge Stone with conspiring with WikiLeaks, the anti-secrecy website that published the emails, or with the Russian officers Mueller says hacked them. Instead, it accuses him of witness tampering, obstruction and false statements about his interactions related to WikiLeaks' release. The indictment says Stone spoke to Trump campaign officials during the summer of 2016 about WikiLeaks and information the organization had that might be damaging to the Clinton campaign. It also says Stone was contacted by “senior Trump campaign officials” to inquire about future WikiLeaks releases of hacked Democratic emails. Stone has pleaded not guilty to the charges. Earlier Friday, Judge Amy Berman Jackson of the federal court for the District of Columbia instituted a partial gag order, ordering that Stone “refrain from making statements to the media or in public settings that pose a substantial likelihood of material prejudice to this case.” Jackson further ordered that any participants in the case, including witnesses and counsel, “refrain” from making any statements to the media or public when they are near the courthouse that could “influence any juror, potential juror, judge, witness or court officer or interfere with the administration of justice.” Fox News’ Eben Brown, Brooke Singman and Bill Mears and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

The law describes Hebrew as the "state's language", effectively prioritising it above Arabic which has for decades been recognised as an official language alongside Hebrew. In which other countries has the choice of language proved politically controversial? This Baltic state and former Soviet republic has a sizeable Russian-speaking minority, but the government recognises only Latvian as the official state language. The authorities also have plans to promote Latvian as the language of instruction in all secondary schools, although for the moment, teaching in Russian and other minority languages will still be allowed at primary-school level. After its independence in 1991, Croatia abolished the Cyrillic script, which had been used when Croatia was part of the former Yugoslavia. Tamil Nadu - with its own ancient language and traditions - suffered riots over the issue. The central government continues to use English as well as Hindi for official purposes, and individual states have largely been left to decide their own language policy. Turkish is the only official language and there have long been restrictions on the Kurdish minority regarding the use of their language. Canada is officially bilingual, with the constitution stating that English and French have "equality of status" in all government institutions and the parliament. In 1974, Quebec made French the official language in the province.

Evan Vucci | AP FBI agent Peter Strzok’s testimony last week before the House Judiciary and Oversight Committees reminded me of that old warhorse of college freshman composition, “Politics and the English Language.” In 1946, British writer George Orwell connected the disorder of contemporary politics with the decay of clear, expressive language. The English language, Orwell said, “becomes ugly and inaccurate because our thoughts are foolish, but the slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have foolish thoughts.” In other words, imprecise language spawns imprecise thinking — and vice versa. Strzok was accused by House Republicans of “bias,” based on emails that Strzok exchanged with his mistress expressing his distaste for presidential candidate Donald Trump. Strzok’s late-night emails to his mistress were ill-advised, but there’s no reason to think that his political perspective on a potential Trump presidency was prejudiced, preconceived or unreasonable. But perspective and opinion are not bias. What Strzok is guilty of is having an opinion, and then using poor judgment in expressing his opinion to his mistress in writing. We might imagine the universe in which intelligent, informed, concerned people like Strzok could not possibly have an opinion about the wisdom of electing a man like Trump, but such a place is a fantasy. What we can expect — and demand — is that their political opinions have no impact on their commitment to the FBI’s mission. And the evidence indicates that Strzok’s opinions did not affect his investigative work. The other great enemy of clear language and good politics is the use of imprecise language to achieve a political end.