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THE DAILY ASTORIAN • FRIDAY, JULY 20, 2018
WORLD IN BRIEF
Associated Press
Trump-Putin II:
Planning fall event in
aftermath of Helsinki
WASHINGTON — Unbowed by swirling
criticism of his summit encounter with Vlad-
imir Putin, President Donald Trump swiftly
invited the Russian leader to the White House
this fall for a second get-together. Cleanup from
the first has continued with no letup and Trump
belatedly decided Putin’s “incredible offer” of
shared U.S.-Russia investigations was no good
after all.
A White House meeting would be a dramatic
extension of legitimacy to the Russian leader,
who has long been isolated by the West for
activities in Ukraine, Syria and beyond and is
believed to have interfered in the 2016 presiden-
tial election that sent Trump to the presidency.
No Russian leader has visited the White House
in nearly a decade.
Trump asked National Security Adviser John
Bolton to invite Putin, and “those discussions
are already underway,” Press Secretary Sarah
Huckabee Sanders said Thursday. Trump earlier
had tweeted that he looked forward to “our sec-
ond meeting” as he defended his performance
at Monday’s summit, in which the two leaders
conferred on a range of issues including terror-
ism, Israeli security, nuclear proliferation and
North Korea.
“There are many answers, some easy and
some hard, to these problems … but they can
ALL be solved!” Trump tweeted.
Moscow is ready to discuss a possible visit
by Putin after a surprise invitation from Trump,
Russia’s ambassador to the U.S. said today.
With confusion still swirling around what
the two men discussed behind closed doors in
Helsinki earlier this week, Ambassador Ana-
toly Antonov said it’s important to “deal with
the results” of their first summit before jumping
too fast into a new one.
He said he hadn’t seen Trump’s invitation
himself, but that “Russia was always open to
such proposals. We are ready for discussions on
this subject.”
US, allies set to
evacuate Syrian aid
workers from southwest
WASHINGTON — U.S. officials say the
United States is finalizing plans to evacuate sev-
eral hundred Syrian civil defense workers and
their families from southwest Syria as Rus-
sian-backed government forces close in on the
area.
Two officials familiar with the plans said
Nathan Papes/The Springfield News-Leader
Emergency responders work at Table Rock Lake after a deadly boat accident in
Branson, Mo., on Thursday.
Sheriff: 17 people dead after
Missouri tourist boat accident
BRANSON, Mo. — At least 17 people, including children, died after a boat carrying tour-
ists on a Missouri lake capsized and sank Thursday night, the local sheriff said.
Stone County Sheriff Doug Rader said seven others were hospitalized after a Ride the
Ducks boat sank on Table Rock Lake in Branson.
A spokeswoman for the Cox Medical Center Branson said four adults and three children
arrived at the hospital shortly after the incident. Two adults were in critical condition and the
others were treated for minor injuries, Brandei Clifton said.
Rader said the stormy weather was believed to be the cause of the capsizing. Another duck
boat on the lake was able to safely make it back to shore.
Steve Lindenberg, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Springfield, Missouri, said
the agency issued a severe thunderstorm warning for the Branson area Thursday evening. Lin-
denberg said winds reached speeds of more than 60 mph.
Thursday that the U.S., Britain and Canada are
spearheading the evacuation that would trans-
port members of the White Helmets group to
transit camps in neighboring countries. From
there, they will be sent to third countries, includ-
ing Britain, Germany, the Netherlands and possi-
bly Canada, according to the officials who spoke
on condition of anonymity because they were
not authorized to publicly discuss the matter.
The officials, and a member of the White
Helmets who is due to be evacuated from
Quneitra province, said the operation appears
to be imminent as the Syrian army continues to
gain ground in its latest offensive. The White
Helmets, who have enjoyed backing from
the U.S. and other Western nations for years,
are likely to be targeted by Syrian forces as
they retake control of the southwest, according
to the officials.
The officials said planning for the evacuation
has been underway for some time but acceler-
ated after last week’s NATO summit in Brussels.
“These are hard hours and minutes,” the
White Helmets volunteer in Quneitra said,
speaking on condition of anonymity for fear for
his life. “This is the worst day of my life. I hope
they rescue us before it is too late.”
Democrats wrestle
with election-year
message on health care
WASHINGTON — Cheered on by a handful
of activists, liberal House Democrats announced
outside the Capitol that they were forming a
caucus to push for “Medicare for All” — short-
hand for government-financed health care.
At the same time Thursday, Democratic
senators were introducing a resolution aimed
at putting Republicans on the defensive about
Trump administration efforts to undermine for-
mer President Barack Obama’s health care law.
Neither proposal has much chance of going
anywhere in the Republican-run House or Sen-
ate. But the bigger problem for Democrats is
that the two messages — fundamentally reshap-
ing the nation’s health care system versus
defending Obama’s popular law — divide the
party as it tries grabbing control of Congress in
this fall’s elections.
All Democrats oppose President Donald
Trump’s repeated efforts to scuttle Obama’s
Affordable Care Act, and many have backed
expanding government-paid health care,
including Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi,
D-Calif. But many also think drawing cam-
paign-season attention to Democratic efforts to
reinvent the country’s $3 trillion-a-year health
care system, a costly and complex undertaking,
is a mistake.
Promoting “Medicare for All” opens the
door for Republicans to accuse Democrats of
plotting tax increases, unaffordable federal
costs and the loss of employer-provided cover-
age, these Democrats argue. They say it’s better
to play offense by focusing on controlling med-
ical costs and opposing GOP efforts to demolish
the 2010 health care law.
Translators stay in
shadows, but Dems
want Trump’s to emerge
WASHINGTON — After a week of errati-
cism by President Donald Trump about what
really went on in his private meeting with Rus-
sia’s Vladimir Putin, history could use a fly on
the wall.
There were two — their interpreters. And
some Democrats want Trump’s to talk.
One translator’s reaction: What’s Russian for
fuhgeddaboudit?
Diplomatic interpreters speak when they’re
spoken at, and that’s about it. They are inner-
most witnesses to international history, but
ultradiscreet ones, tasked with reflecting as
accurately as possible and in nearly real time the
words and context of conversations crossing the
language barrier. They otherwise do their best to
blend into the drapes.
Diplomatic experts know of no modern prec-
edent for making interpreters come forward.
The man who translated for President Ronald
Reagan in his historic first meeting with Soviet
leader Mikhail Gorbachev in 1985 — alone in
the room with them and his Soviet counterpart
— thinks it’s a bad idea.
Paint Recycling Event
Friday, July 27, 2018
8 am - 12 pm
ONE DAY ONLY. IT’S FREE!
Now’s your chance to clean out your garage. Drop off
your old leftover paint for recycling.
Elsie Fire and Rescue
42644 Loyd Lane
Highway 26, Mile Post 22
HOUSEHOLDS
Bring any amount of latex or oil-based
house paint, stains and varnishes.
No aerosols.
BUSINESSES
Bring any amount of latex paint, but
there are restrictions on oil-based paint.
Contact us for details.
Learn more about this event and find other places to recycle paint.
Visit www.paintcare.org/OR or call (855) 724-6809.