Architecting The Beast System: AI Control of Food Supply

Forces are working to take total control of every drop of oil extracted from the ground, every fish caught from the sea, and every last bean harvested. It requires an immense technical infrastructure comprising 5G, blockchain, and Artificial Intelligence. This infrastructure has been built and is now being deployed, and we must understand that it is — in the very words of the Department of Defense — an AI weapons system. And that system is going live NOW. Christian breaks it down.

Dr. Deborah Birx - who helped shape the US response to Covid - doesn't understand basic epidemiology or how clinical trials work

You may still vaguely remember Deborah Birx. If not. In March 2020, Dr. Birx became the "response coordinator" for the White House task force on Covid, a job she held until Donald Trump left office. Birx has now written a book about her time at the White House, Silent Invasion. It came out in April to resounding indifference. Its biggest audience seems to be me and other lockdown skeptics, who want to understand how Birx and her public health colleagues so overreacted and mismanaged the response to Sars-Cov-2. On that front, Silent Invasion is very revealing. Birx is obsessed with asymptomatic transmission - the theory that people who are not showing symptoms of illness are very important spreaders of Covid. Before Covid, scientists agreed people who did not have symptoms of respiratory viruses like influenza did not spread illness. ("The driver of respiratory outbreaks is symptomatic people, not asymptomatic carriers," Dr. Anthony Fauci famously said on January 28, 2020.) But if...

Woman saved as her vehicle submerges into sinkhole in Central El Paso, Texas

A sinkhole was reported on Gateway South and Yandell resulting in one injury Tuesday night. The report came out at 6:42 p.m. Images show large amounts of water on the streets spewing from the sinkhole. Traffic is being redirected at Boone. According to police, one person was transported to the hospital with minor injuries. Three firefighters have been checked for minor injuries.

France battles 'monster' wildfire as heatwaves scorch Europe

A "monster" wildfire raged for a third day in southwestern France on Thursday, ravaging forests and forcing 10,000 people to evacuate their homes. With no let-up in scorching temperatures likely before the weekend, firefighters backed by water-bombing aircraft battled on many fronts, saying the massive fire could change direction at any moment. "It's an ogre, it's a monster," Gregory Allione from the French firefighters body FNSPF told RTL radio. Wildfires have broken out across Europe this summer as successive heatwaves bake the continent and renew focus on climate change risks to industry and livelihoods. Valentine Dupy took photos of her house with her phone before being evacuated from Belin-Beliet, at the heart of the Gironde region "just in case something happens".

Grocery prices increased 13.1% in July

Americans can still expect sticker shock when they head to their local grocery stories due to inflation. Despite inflation cooling down a bit in July, up 8.5%, Americans are still paying significantly more for food. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics' July Consumer Price Index (CPI), the cost of food rose 10.9% , with food in the at-home category rising 13.1%, higher than the year-over-year rise in recent months. For the overall food category, that's the highest increase since May of 1979, but for the food-at-home category, which is household groceries, it's the highest since March of 1979, according to Steve Reed, an economist at the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). Compared to June of 2022, the grocery category increased 1.4%

Man mauled to death by dog in Hampshire, UK

A man has died after he was mauled to death by a dog. The 34-year-old was attacked in broad daylight in a park area in Fareham, Hampshire. A 20-year-old man from the town has been arrested on suspicion of being in charge of a dog dangerously out of control, police have said. The breed of the animal is currently unknown.

Sierra Leone rocked by deadly violence at cost of living protests

At least 27 people have died in anti-government protests in Sierra Leone, police and other sources said on Thursday, sharply raising the death toll from the previous day's clashes as shocked citizens stayed mostly behind closed doors in the capital, Freetown. Six police officers and at least 21 civilians were killed, the sources said, as hundreds took to the streets in frustration at economic hardship and a perceived failure by the government to cushion the impact of rising prices. The unrest is highly unusual for Sierra Leone, especially in Freetown. A few people have been killed in isolated protests in other cities in recent years.

Floods and heavy rain leave 25 dead, 5,800 homes destroyed in Sudan

The rainy season continues to its toll on communities in Sudan, where over 80,000 people have now been affected and 25 have lost their lives. According to data from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), flooding or damage from heavy rainfall has occurred in around 38 localities across the states of Central Darfur, East Darfur, Kassala, North Darfur, North Kordofan, River Nile, Sennar, South Darfur, South Kordofan, West Darfur, West Kordofan and White Nile.

Ukraine shells Zaporozhye nuclear plant - local authorities

Latest attack comes as UN warns both sides to cease fighting near the facility. Ten shells launched by the Ukrainian army landed near the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant on Thursday, according to regional authorities. The facility is located in southeastern Ukraine but is currently under the control of Russian troops. Vladimir Rogov, a member of the Zaporozhye Region military-civil administration, explained that five explosives landed near the commandant's office at the plant, next to a welding site and a radioactive substance storage facility, causing grass in the area to catch fire. Another five shells landed near the fire station beside the power plant, preventing a shift change. Rogov said this was the second time the power plant had come under fire on Thursday and suggested that the strikes were being carried out by Ukrainian forces using multiple launch rocket systems and heavy artillery positioned in Dnepropetrovsk Region.

Firenado filmed tearing through wildfire in Los Angeles

Extraordinary footage shows a fire tornado ripping through Los Angeles County in Gorman on Wednesday. Firefighters were dispatched to a wildfire, dubbed the Sam Fire, at 4:07 p.m. Arriving on the scene, Los Angeles County Fire Department said an estimated four acres was ablaze, which they later categorized as a second-alarm brush fire. Video published by local news site KTLA shows large quantities of air being sucked into a vortex-like fire tornado.

Mud volcano erupts in outskirts of Azerbaijani capital

A mud volcano has erupted in Baku's Garadagh District, Azernews reports. The eruption occurred on the territory of Lokbatan settlement. Speaking about the volcano eruption, a spokesperson for the Biodiversity Protection Service Arzu Babayeva said that no settlements are located near Lokbatan mud volcano. The Ministry of Ecology and Natural Resources is currently monitoring the Lokbatan mud volcano that previously erupted in 2017. Lokbatan mud volcano is located on the oilfield site of the same name on the coast of the Caspian sea, 15 kilometers southwest of Baku. It's one of the five most active mud volcanoes in the world. Since 1810, the volcano has erupted 25 times.

BEST OF THE WEB: Alex Jones, Cass Sunstein, and "Cognitive Infiltration"

Late last week a Texas jury ordered Alex Jones to pay nearly $50 million in compensatory and punitive damages to the parents of a child killed in the Sandy Hook shootings, with two more trials still scheduled. These awards may be sharply reduced, but if they are not, the result will probably mean the destruction of Jones' media empire. For decades Jones has been one of America's most prominent conspiracy theorists, and although I've never watched his show nor scarcely ever visited his website, under ordinary circumstances I would be quite sympathetic to his plight, given the tremendous record of dishonesty by his arch-enemies in the mainstream media. From what I've read, Jones came to major national prominence in the early 2000s when he became a leading skeptic of the official 9/11 narrative, widely promoting public criticism of that official fairy tale when no one in the mainstream media and even few alternative journalists were willing to do so. I myself only became aware of...

Alastair Crooke: Winds of regional war are blowing

Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah has warned - explicitly - that if Lebanon's maritime EEZ exploration rights vis à vis "Israel" are not resolved, he would go to war. He even set a deadline: September. Just a month away. In this context, there is a potentially explosive precedent: The situation of the disputed Lebanese fields (Karish and Qana) is eerily reminiscent of the stolen gas fields in Palestine's Gaza Strip. With the naked eye, Gazans can only stand-by and watch the Israeli gas drilling platforms operate a few kilometres off their own coast -- returning in revenue to them but a few paltry percent of the extracted value. Hezbollah is determined that Lebanon's energy assets should not go the same way. To rub salt in the wound, on 15 June, a MOU was signed to export this same offshore Palestinian gas to the EU, which as all the world knows, is simply desperate for gas after its strategic error in joining with Washington in sanctioning Russia. The EU reportedly will be paying the PA in...

"Coup" Means Whatever the Regime Wants It to Mean

In the immediate aftermath of the January 6 riot at the US Capitol, many pundits and politicians were eager to describe the events of that day as a coup d'état in which the nation was "this close" to having some sort of junta void the 2020 election and take power in Washington. The headlines at the time were unambiguous in their assertions that the riot was a coup or attempted coup. For example, the riot was "A Very American Coup," according to a headline at the New Republic. "This Is a Coup," insisted a writer at Foreign Policy. The Atlantic presented photos purported to be "Scenes from an American Coup." This general tactic has not changed since then. Just this month, for example, Vanity Fair referred to the January 6 riots as "Trump's Attempted Coup" Last month, Vox called it "Trump's Cuckoo Coup." Moreover, anti-Trump politicians have repeatedly referred to the riot as a coup, and "attempted coup" has become the standard the January 6 panel's standard term of choice.

FBI's Trump raid reinforces deep-state G-Men as the bad guys

With Monday's raid of Trump's Florida home, FBI headquarters has made clear it still sees Trump and conservatives as the enemy. The FBI's unprecedented raid of former president Donald Trump's home has angered Americans much beyond his loyalists. Nonetheless, watch for the bureau to exploit the backlash to target conservative organizations and to find some isolated extremists to entrap Whitmer-style. The raid at Trump's Mar-a-Lago residence on Monday raised the volume of voices on the right who have been criticizing the politicization of the Department of Justice and the Federal Bureau of Investigations for six-plus years. But the overreach seen in the search of the former president's home proved even too great for some Trump critics and even a few Democrats who joined the choir to condemn the raid. Notwithstanding the broad base of the pushback, however, conservatives should ready themselves for further moves by FBI headquarters to target the right, using outrage over the raid of...

Netherlands to SHUT DOWN 11,200 farms to meet climate goals

If you have followed my reporting you probably know about the protests happening in the Netherlands. Tens of thousands of farmers have taken to the streets to protest against new climate goals which will force farmers to shut down their farms. They have set hay bales on fire on motorways and dumped manure and even blocked supermarket distribution centers. Around 1/5 of farms will be forced to shut down!

Fargo School Board rescinds motion, will no longer recite Pledge of Allegiance at meetings

The Fargo School Board voted 7-2 in favor of rescinding a previous approved motion to begin their bi-weekly meeting with the Pledge of Allegiance. The board ruled that the Pledge of Allegiance didn't align with the Fargo Public School District's diversity code. After passing a motion on March 22 to begin each Fargo School Board meeting by reciting the Pledge of Allegiance, the board has rescinded the motion, voting in favor of removing it. In a 7-2 decision Tuesday, Aug. 9, the board voted in favor of removing the verse that has been a part of every school board meeting since April 12. Board members Nikkie Gullickson and Robin Nelson voted in favor of keeping the Pledge of Allegiance at its bi-weekly meetings. Board member Seth Holden asked the Governance Committee during its July 28 meeting that a removal of the previously passed motion, which was proposed by former board member David Paulson , should be voted on. The board agreed to put it on the agenda Holden said the Pledge of...

"Our military has become a ruthless, toxic mélange of spineless, gas-lighting leadership" - Wife of US hero speaks out

TGP received the following letter from the wife of an American soldier and the mother of his children. This American hero, father, and husband is being attacked despite a board recommending that her husband, Brandon Budge, remain on flying status: Nearly 20 years of service and multiple combat deployments, all of it wasted! It pains me to admit that our military has become a ruthless, toxic mélange of spineless, gas-lighting leadership. A place where leaders live a different standard than the one they force on those to whom they are supposed to "guide." I use the word "guide" loosely, as my family and I currently fight a leadership team determined to destroy my husband's career, without cause. Chief Warrant Officer 3 Brandon Budge is living through the ugliest side of our current political culture and climate. His leadership has been allowed to operate outside of what is just and prudent. Colonel Shane Finison and 7th Infantry Division Commander Major General Stephen G. Smith have...

Energy costs pushing Europeans into food poverty - Bloomberg

Food producers across Europe are contending with soaring energy prices, with that increase quickly felt in the pockets of consumers grappling with a cost-of-living crisis, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday. According to the report, citing a Bank of England forecast, a third of UK households are set to spend more than 10% of incomes on energy, and now surging grocery costs are driving up food poverty. Ryan Peters, managing director of Brioche Pasquier UK, told the outlet: "It is the domino effect that has happened with us having to take a huge increase on energy. We have to try and raise our prices to retailers a little bit, and unfortunately that goes on to consumers." Kona Haque, head of research for commodities trader ED&F Man, warned: "I think the worst is still to come as energy prices rise. This winter will be a game changer and processing costs will likely go up."

Iran's morality police warn clothesmakers to avoid 'loud' colors or face closure

Iranian authorities have warned manufacturers and sellers of women's clothing that they will shut down their businesses if they keep using "loud" colors in their products. In a statement to the Roydad24 website, Majid Emami, who heads Iran's fashion and clothing organization, quoted the Ministry of Industry and Trade as saying that women's clothing manufacturers could lose the right to manufacture knee-length open cloaks -- the Iranian women's most common piece of clothing that is usually worn over a shirt and with long pants or jeans -- unless they stick with colors not deemed to be "loud." "Regarding the color: the ministry emphasized that manufacturers should not use loud colors. There is no order or regulation to clarify which colors are deemed illegal. Society does not have a problem with this kind of clothing [knee-length open cloaks in bright colors]. If the relevant institutions want to create restrictions on the type of production, they should first change the taste of...

Palestinian official assassinated in Lebanon just hours after Gaza truce

A Palestinian security official was shot dead late on Monday in a refugee camp in southern Lebanon, three Palestinian security officials said, just hours after a truce between Israel and Palestinian militants in Gaza. Saeed Alaeddine was an officer in Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah movement, in charge of liaising between the group and Lebanese security. He was killed by a gunman, who fired at him while he was praying at a friend's house in the camp, said senior Fatah official Mounir Makdah. An unknown gunman shot him several times, and Alaeddine was rushed to hospital, where he died. The perpetrator fled the scene and details on his identity and motive were not immediately clear. An AFP correspondent heard more gunshots in the camp after Alaeddine's killing.

German economy forecast to shrink

The German economy is expected to lose more than €260 billion ($265 billion) in added value by 2030 due to the conflict in Ukraine and high energy prices, Reuters reported on Tuesday, citing a study by the Institute for Employment Research (IAB). According to the study, Germany's gross domestic product (GDP) is set to be 1.7% lower in 2023, while the country will have about 240,000 fewer jobs. Employment is forecast to stay at this level until 2026, when the after-effects of the current crises are expected to end. The country's hospitality industry, already weakened by the Covid-19 pandemic, is expected to be hit the hardest as consumers' purchasing power dwindles. Other sectors which are likely to be affected are the chemical industry and metal production, as they are highly reliant on energy supplies.

China: A thousand cars smashed by severe hailstorm, huge landslide filmed and tropical storm Mulan follows on

0:00 Hail suddenly hits Qinghai, nearly a thousand cars smashed 0:42 Landslide of Changbai Mountain, tourists flee in panic 1:28 Tropical storm Mulan made landfall on the coast of Xuwen, Zhanjiang, local air and rail traffic suspended

Samarkand at the crossroads: from Timur to the BRI and SCO

From its ancient Silk Road role to China's BRI project, Uzbekistan is set to remain an important geoeconomic hub in Central Asia. SAMARKAND - The ultimate Silk Road city, set at an unrivaled Eurasian trade crossroads, is the ideal spot from which to examine where the New Silk Roads adventure is heading next. For starters, the upcoming summit of heads of state of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) will take place in Samarkand in mid-September. The ancient city dazzled Alexander the Great in 329 BC and made the Tang dynasty crazy for its golden peaches. This was a cosmopolitan hub that embraced Zoroastrian fire-worship and even flirted with Nestorian Christianity, until Arab conquerors under the banner of the Prophet arrived in 712 and changed everything forever. In the 13th century, the Mongols irrupted on the scene with the proverbial bang. But then Timur, the Turco-Mongol conqueror who founded the Timurid Dynasty in the late 14th century, set to embellish Samarkand into a...

WEF playbook: Collapse Sri Lanka today, tomorrow the West?

Unless you're reading this from Belarus or North Korea, safely outside of the WEF clutches (for now), your state is losing its sovereignty right in front of your eyes. Here's a perfect case study from Sri Lanka. You might've seen sensationalist coverage of the riots in Western media, but likely none that deeply explores the underlying cancer that's metastasized on the island. Social unrest is the symptom; technocratic social engineering is the disease.

Female vegetarians at greater risk of hip fracture

A study of more than 26,000 middle-aged UK women reveals those with a vegetarian diet had a 33% higher risk of hip fracture compared to regular meat-eaters. Research from the University, published in the journal BMC Medicine, investigated the risk of hip fracture in occasional meat-eaters, pescatarians (people who eat fish but not meat) and vegetarians - compared with regular meat-eaters. Among 26,318 women, 822 hip fracture cases were observed over roughly 20 years - that represented just over 3% of the sample population. After adjustment for factors such as smoking and age, vegetarians were the only diet group with an elevated risk of hip fracture. This new study is one of very few to compare risk of hip fracture in vegetarians and meat-eaters where the occurrence of hip fracture was confirmed from hospital records. The scientists stress the need for more research into the exact causes of why vegetarians were at a greater risk of hip fracture.

Moscow slams West's hypocrisy over Ukrainian grain

Not a single ship with Ukrainian grain has reached starving African or Asian countries, the Russian foreign ministry said Russia's Foreign Ministry has expressed doubt about the sincerity of Western countries' global food security concerns, noting that grain-loaded ships from Ukrainian Black Sea ports are mostly heading to the West, rather than to starving African or Asian countries. Speaking at a press briefing on Thursday, Ivan Nechaev, the deputy director of the ministry's information and press department, said that "so far not a single ship with grain has reached the shores of the starving countries of Africa or South Asia." "They go mainly to Western ports, and the range of exported goods is mainly not wheat, but corn grain and sunflower oil, which casts doubt on the sincerity of these voices in the West that world food security depends on the 'grain deal'," Nechaev said, referring to the recent deal between Moscow and Kiev which allowed the resumption of grain exports from...

Creative workaround: Indian companies swapping dollar for Asian currencies to buy Russian coal

Indian companies are using Asian currencies more often to pay for Russian coal imports, according to customs documents and industry sources, avoiding the U.S. dollar and cutting the risk of breaching Western sanctions against Moscow. Reuters previously reported on a large Indian coal deal involving the Chinese yuan, but the customs data underline how non-dollar settlements are becoming commonplace. India has aggressively stepped up purchases of Russian oil and coal since the war in Ukraine began, helping to cushion Moscow from the effects of sanctions and allowing New Delhi to secure raw materials at discounts compared to supplies from other countries.

Germany 'updates' vax pass rules: Requires a jab within 3 months to be 'fully vaccinated'

Along with redefining the meaning of 'fully vaccinated', the German app will feature a colour-coded system to denote whether a user can be granted an exemption from reimposed mask mandates this fall and winter. The German government will be upgrading its contact tracing and vaccine passport app to feature a colour-coded system to show whether a user has received a COVID-19 vaccine in the last three months. The app, called the Corona-Warn-App, will use one colour for users who add proof showing that they have received a COVID vaccine within the past three months and another colour for those with vaccine records older than three months.

Trump says his attorneys weren't allowed 'anywhere near' FBI raid

Former President Donald Trump on Wednesday blasted the FBI for allegedly refusing to let his attorneys watch the raid at his Mar-a-Lago estate and make sure that agents were not "planting" evidence. Trump, 76, said Wednesday in a message on his social media platform Truth Social that the FBI and other federal government officials wouldn't let anyone from his staff, including his attorneys, "anywhere near the areas" that were being examined during Monday's raid at his palatial home. "Everyone was asked to leave the premises, they wanted to be left alone, without any witnesses to see what they were doing, taking or, hopefully not, 'planting,'" the former president wrote. "Why did they STRONGLY insist on having nobody watching them, everybody out?"

IRS pulls job post detailing how new accounting agents may use 'deadly force' after backlash

The Internal Revenue Service just deleted a job posting page from its website detailing duties for prospective new agents, including using "deadly force if necessary" during tax audits. The job description states: As a Special Agent you will combine your accounting skills with law enforcement skills to investigate financial crimes. Special Agents are duly sworn law enforcement officers who are trained to "follow the money." No matter what the source, all income earned, both legal and illegal, has the potential of becoming involved in crimes which fall within the investigative jurisdiction of the IRS Criminal Investigation. Because of the expertise required to conduct these complex financial investigations, IRS Special Agents are considered the premier financial investigators for the Federal government. The "major duties" included in the IRS Special Agent (SA) job description require a willingness to "carry a firearm and be willing to use deadly force, if necessary."

Denmark ends vaccination for under-50s as it shifts to treating covid like flu

Denmark's policy towards vaccination in the autumn of 2022 will focus on the over-50s. The under-50s will only get a booster if a doctor recommends it. With respect to pregnant women getting vaccinated a decision has yet to be made. The policy is available in English here; below I have printed some selected highlights. As regards people who've had a first or second dose, there's some gentle persuasion to continue with additional doses but this is primarily targeted at the over-40s and people with pre-existing health issues. Children will not be vaccinated except with the specific approval of a doctor.

In the developing new world order, Russia's weapons will point West, and trade will flow East

The US and its top allies have destroyed trust in the international organizations created from the ashes of the Second World War Cross border institutions in Eurasia were previously tasked with diversifying economic connectivity as the emerging multipolar world demanded reduced dependence on Western-centric institutions reluctant to adapt to new realities. However, the current European crisis has destabilized the world and discredited the West's ability to facilitate economic cooperation. Subsequently, these bodies are now asserting a central role in organizing economic recovery and pragmatic cooperation.

Tavistock gender clinic 'to be sued by 1,000 families'

The Tavistock gender clinic is facing mass legal action from youngsters who claim they were rushed into taking life-altering puberty blockers. Lawyers expect about 1,000 families to join a medical negligence lawsuit alleging vulnerable children have been misdiagnosed and placed on a damaging medical pathway. They are accusing the gender identity development service [GIDS] at the Tavistock and Portman NHS Trust of multiple failures in its duty of care. This includes allegations it recklessly prescribed puberty blockers with harmful side effects and adopted an "unquestioning, affirmative approach" to children identifying as transgender.

Terrible flood drags away cars in Monteforte Irpino, Italy

Avellino, terrible flood drags everything away in Monteforte, Irpino. The videos posted on social media by local citizens testify to rivers of water coming from the upper part of the town that fill the streets of the center and take away the cars they meet along the way. "Maximum attention: go out only if it is essential! I recommend the situation is extremely delicate throughout the upper part of Monteforte, down along via Loffredo and via Nazionale. Caution!". The mayor of Monteforte Irpino, Costantino Giordano , writes on facebook . This is where the greatest damage and inconvenience are recorded due to the storm that this afternoon strongly beat a part of Irpinia and created damage and fright. On social media there are many videos posted by frightened citizens. In some videos we see rivers of water coming from the upper area and sweeping away the floating cars.

Intense European heatwave parches Loire Valley, France's 'garden'

The Loire Valley is known as "the Garden of France". But the garden is withering. France's worst drought since records began has turned lush vegetation into arid fields of brown crops, shrivelling under what is now the fourth heatwave of the year. In Vincent Favreau's vegetable farm, where he produces food for a hundred families in the area, the parched earth has stunted the growth of the cabbages. His potato plants are burnt out, producing just half the crop of a normal year.

Australia's central bank working with BIS to launch digital currency system

Australia's Reserve Bank is launching a pilot program over the course of the next year in collaboration with the Bank for International Settlements (the central bank of central banks) to test the "benefits" of a blockchain ledger based digital currency system. The central bank is added to a long list of participants in BIS efforts to introduce CBDCs (central bank digital currencies) with the target goal of launching them globally by 2025-2030. It's important to note that substantial economic changes would have to occur within the next few years in order to make CBDC a viable option for the general public. Though many people use electronic transactions as a matter of convenience, a large portion of the population still prefers cash. In the US, surveys within the last few years show that at least 37% of Americans still choose cash over other methods of payment like credit and debit cards. In Australia, the number stands at around 32%. The usage of digital payment systems also does...

Severe hailstorm results in flooded streets in Potenza, Italy

The intervention of the Fire Brigade was necessary in several streets of Potenza, flooded by a storm that struck the Lucanian capital in the afternoon. In particular, the greatest difficulties were reported in the lower part of the city, in the commercial area of ​​via del Gallittello and in the square of the central station. In addition, teams of firefighters are at work in other municipalities of the Potentino, in particular in Val d'Agri, where the strong wind has also caused the fall of some trees. Due to bad weather, in the province of Matera, inconveniences were reported in Grassano, where the fire brigade intervened on provincial road 8, near the bailey bridge, to clear the roadway from a fallen tree. (Translated by Google)

4% of monkeypox infections caused by the vaccine itself, 7,500 total cases in US, 94% linked to male gay sex

New data published in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report and gathered by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) shows 99% of monkeypox cases in the United States are in males, and 94% of cases report recent male-to-male sexual or intimate contact. These epidemiologic details should guide treatment and vaccine protocols, the authors of the study said. The characteristics were gathered from reported cases of the virus in the United States from May 17 to Jul 22. "Current findings indicate that community transmission of monkeypox is widespread and is disproportionately affecting gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men; this is consistent with data reported from other countries," the authors said. Black and Hispanic men are disproportionately represented in cases, with 54% of monkeypox cases occurring in this population. Forty-one percent of cases were in white males.

Denmark bans COVID vaccine for youth under 18

Denmark has announced that people under the age of 18 are no longer allowed to get the COVID vaccine. Those wanting their first shot were cut off after July 1, and no one in the age group — aside from those who are considered "high risk" and have a doctor's note — will be allowed to get a second shot after September 1. "Children and adolescents only very rarely become seriously ill from COVID-19 with the omicron variant. Therefore, from July 1, 2022, it will no longer be possible for children and adolescents under the age of 18 to get the 1st [shot], and from September 1, 2022, it will no longer be possible to get the 2nd [shot]," reads a government statement. [translated from Danish]

Serbian farmers set up road blocks, warn of protests on the capital if demands not met

Farmers from Vojvodina, Mačva, Stig and other parts of Serbia are organizing a protest ride today in order to draw attention to the pressing problems of agricultural producers that the state does not want to solve. Farmers who gathered at the pump on the road between Stara Pazova and Indjija started a protest drive towards Batajnica. "Until now, farmers have not entered Belgrade with tractors and protested in the capital, every government has so far managed to avoid and prevent that." We are one step closer to that. If the Government of Serbia does not fulfill the demands of the farmers, the next destination is Belgrade - the Parliament", said Aleksandra Jovanović Ćuta, deputy of the coalition "Moramo Zajedno" and co-president of the Zajedno party. By the way, earlier, the farmers started a protest drive in a convoy of tractors from the pump on the road between Stara Pazova and Inđija to Batajnica.

Massive solar storm causes STEVE to reappear over North America

The scientific phenomenon known as STEVE has been spotted in the night skies above North America this week. STEVE - short for Strong Thermal Emission Velocity Enhancement - is a long, thin hot slice of gas that cuts through the sky for hundreds of miles. It's commonly mistaken for part of the Northern Lights, but is in fact something completely different. Nevertheless, STEVE appears to have been caused by the recent increase in the sun's activity and resulting solar storm currently encircling Earth. A Showing of STEVE from Alan Dyer on Vimeo.

Civil rights groups, including Al Sharpton-led organization, urge USDA to fix 'dietary racism' in school lunch programs

Twenty-eight civil rights and health care groups announced Tuesday they have requested that the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) address "dietary racism" in national school lunch programs, raising concerns to the federal agency about forcing millions of minority children to drink cow's milk without allowing them a healthier alternative. In a letter to the USDA's Equity Commission, the groups said the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) only incentivizes dairy milk, a policy they called "inherently inequitable and socially unjust" because children of color are more likely to be lactose intolerant — meaning they cannot fully digest sugars in dairy and can suffer from adverse effects after consumption. The NSLP covers 30 million children in 100,000 schools across the U.S., a program the civil rights groups said children of color are historically overrepresented in.

Africa's sole Covid vaccine plant shuts down due to lack of orders, less than a fifth of people have been injected

South Africa's Aspen Pharmacare will stop making COVID-19 vaccines from the end of this month due to a lack of orders, a senior executive said, further undermining Africa's already meager capacity to produce doses. Aspen currently produces vaccines for Johnson & Johnson. In March, it struck a deal to produce, price and sell its own-brand version of the shot for African markets. That deal was considered a game-changer for a continent frustrated by sluggish Western handouts. But while only a fifth of adults in Africa are fully vaccinated, according to the African Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, demand for shots have failed to materialize. Comment: Evidently Covid isn't considered a problem that necessitates getting an experimental injection for, and this has probably become even clearer now that 2 years have passed, and tens of thousands of deadly side effects have been reported.

Top NYC health official claims 'retaliation' after monkeypox messaging dispute

A veteran top infectious diseases expert at the New York City Health Department says he was reassigned in "retaliation" for butting heads with higher-ups regarding the city's monkeypox messaging. Dr. Don Weiss, director of surveillance, was transferred to another unit after he publicly criticized the department's advice that gay men should simply 'avoid kissing' and 'cover up their sores' - as opposed to Weiss' advice that gay men abstain from or reduce sex for a period of time, the NY Post reports. Comment: See: US government issues monkeypox 'safe sex' guide "Monkeypox in NYC is a sexually transmitted infection. Not communicating this clearly and often is a public health failure," Weiss said in a July 18 letter to Health Commissioner Dr. Ashwin Vasan, which he posted on his website.

Questions grow about Trump raid after revelation of grand jury subpoena, extensive cooperation

Trump got spring grand jury subpoena, gathered documents, turned them over and allowed agents to search storage locker the FBI later raided. Two months before his Florida home was raided by the FBI, former President Donald Trump secretly received a grand jury subpoena for classified documents belonging to the National Archives, and voluntarily cooperated by turning over responsive evidence, surrendering security surveillance footage and allowing federal agents and a senior Justice Department lawyer to tour his private storage locker, according to a half dozen people familiar with the incident. While the cooperation was mostly arranged by his lawyers, Trump personally surprised the DOJ National Security Division prosecutor and three FBI agents who came to his Mar-a-Lago compound on June 3, greeting them as they came to pick up a small number of documents compliant with the subpoena, the sources told Just the News, speaking only on condition of anonymity because the visit was covered...

Polar bear attacks woman in Norway's remote Svalbard Islands

A polar bear attacked a woman in Norway in the remote Arctic Svalbard islands. The polar bear injured the French tourist, leaving her with several wounds. The unnamed woman was part of a 25-group camping trip in the Svalbard region. The group was camping at Sveasletta, in the central part of the Svalbard archipelago, which is roughly 800 kilometers (500 miles) north of the Norwegian mainland. Authorities confirmed that the wounds were not life-threatening. Chief superintendent Stein Olav Bredli said that officials "badly injured" the bear and following "a professional assessment" officials put it to sleep. "The French woman suffered injuries to an arm. Shots were fired at the polar bear, which was scared away from the area," he said. He did not disclose further details about the injuries. A helicopter swiftly flew her to the hospital in Longyearbyen.

It's not hypocrisy, you're just powerless: A quick Public Service Announcement for Class B

Hello Friend, I saw your post on the interweb the other day about that nasty thing Team A did, even though they always completely lose their collective mind with moralistic outrage if Team B (which I understand is your team) even thoughtcrimes about doing something similar. In fact Team A seems to blatantly do things all the time that no one on Team B could ever get away with doing without being universally condemned as the absolute worst sort of immoral criminal/being openly threatened with mob violence/losing their livelihood/having their assets frozen/being rounded up by the state and shipped to a black site somewhere for some extended TLC. Maybe the latest thing was breaking some very important public health rules, or pillaging and burning down government buildings for fun, or mean tweets, or polluting the planet with a private jet, or using allegedly neutral public institutions against political opponents, or just engaging in a little tax-dodging or corruption while doing,...

Florida man with concealed firearm kills gunman who threatened to "shoot up the crowd"

Instead of waiting for the police, a law-abiding citizen with a concealed carry license (also known as a 'good guy with a gun') took matters into his own hands and acted quickly, drawing his weapon and killing a gunman who was about to "shoot up the crowd" at a party in West Palm Beach, Florida, on Sunday night. Local news CBS12 said a fight broke out between 20 people at a family gathering on Division Avenue and 4th Street in West Palm Beach. At that moment, a 22-year-old male retrieved a short-barreled shotgun from his car and threatened to "shoot up the crowd." West Palm Beach Police said the man refused to drop the weapon after yelling out mass shooting threats, and that was when a 32-year-old man with a concealed weapon license fired his pistol, hitting the armed suspect.

Biden increases IRS agents to almost 170,000—70,000 will be armed—to target middle class Americans, UPDATE: Agency releases job posting

The poorly named Inflation Reduction Act, passed over the weekend by Senate Democrats, is slated to create positions for nearly 87,000 new IRS agents, 70,000 of whom will be armed. This brings the total to nearly 170,000 under the bureau of tax collection. The cost of this new initiative will be about $80 billion, and it's all part of a bill meant to lower costs to Americans. This was noted as well by Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, who told The Post Millennial that "The bill is terrible. It's basically Joe Biden Build Back Better agenda, that a lot of Republicans called 'build that broke."

Former Twitter employee convicted of spying for Saudi Arabia

A former Twitter employee has been convicted of failing to register as an agent for Saudi Arabia and other charges after accessing private data on users critical of the kingdom's government in a spy case that spanned from Silicon Valley to the Middle East. Ahmad Abouammo, a US citizen and former media partnership manager for Twitter's Middle East region, was charged in 2019 with acting as an agent of Saudi Arabia without registering with the US government. A jury found him guilty on six counts, including conspiracy to commit wire fraud and money laundering. The jury acquitted him on another five charges involving wire fraud. The case marked the first time the kingdom, long linked to the US through its massive oil reserves and regional security arrangements, has been accused of spying in America.

Dozens of Whole Foods stores allow customers to pay with palm print biometric data

Amazon's palm-reading payment technology will expand to dozens of Whole Foods locations across California. Shoppers will be able to pay for groceries by scanning the palm of their hand at checkout devices instead of using cash or card, as this is more evidence of the emergence of a cashless society. The Verge reported that 65 Whole Foods stores in California would soon get the new payment technology. This is the most extensive rollout by the e-commerce giant since announcing the payment system in 2020.

Experts warn ArriveCAN app could be violating constitutionally protected rights

A recent glitch in the controversial ArriveCAN app that sent fully vaccinated travellers erroneous messages saying they needed to quarantine affected more than 10,000 people, according to the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA). The extent of the glitch, which was revealed in a statement sent to Global News by the CBSA, represents 0.7 per cent of the typical number of cross-border travellers each week. Global News has also learned it took the government 12 days to notify travellers of the error. This is troubling to some data and privacy experts who say the app may be violating the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which protects the right to move freely. There's also a debate among experts about whether ordering people to remain in their homes for two weeks without justification is a form of unlawful detention.

"Millions will freeze this winter; or fall into debt to avoid doing so"

Yes, today is finally inflation day! Not high unit labor cost inflation day - that was yesterday in the US, which is why markets sold off. Not house price inflation day - that's every day. I mean actual headline and core US CPI day, where increases in the price of just about everything are likely to be offset by temporary declines in gasoline prices. Yet that still opens the door for a new pre-US mid-terms phase of "sic transitory gloria mundi" back-patting in markets and politics. We also get inflation in China (CPI and PPI), which will show it is firmly under control. That's largely because they are pumping out coal and have over-supply and under-demand. However, also note this is an economy where Bloomberg notes that the huge headline trade data are NOT matched by the trade-related money flows recorded by SAFE. There are technical reasons why the two differ, but now the simple message is: "China "bought" lots of goods from abroad, but they have never arrived." It could be...

Why Hungary's Viktor Orban is hated by US Democrats but loved by Trump and Republicans

After the 1998 victory of a coalition of parties led by Fidesz, Viktor Orban formed a centre-right government in Hungary. In the same year, he visited Washington on a working visit as prime minister. However, the further centralisation of power in Hungary, the increasing power of the prime minister in the local political system and the social orientation of politics with a strong right-wing bias deterred President Bill Clinton's government from further contact. American democrats were much more sympathetic to the liberal administrations of Péter Mediész and then Ferenc Gyurcsány. The final rift with the Democrats was the updated Hungarian constitution adopted during Orban's second term in 2011, as it enshrined the dominant role of Christianity in the Hungarian state and banned same-sex marriage.

Washington steals over 80 percent of Syria's oil output per day, totaling at least $100bln

The Syrian Oil Ministry released a statement on 9 August accusing US forces occupying Syria of being responsible for the theft of most of the country's oil. "The amount of oil production during the first half of 2022 amounted to some 14.5 million barrels, with an average daily production of 80.3 thousand barrels, of which 14.2 thousand are delivered daily to refineries," the oil ministry's statement said. The statement went on to say that "US occupation forces and their mercenaries," referring to the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), "steal up to 66,000 barrels every single day from the fields occupied in the eastern region," amounting to around 83 percent of Syria's daily oil production.

Ukraine breaks promise to ship grain to Africa - NYT

None of the grain ships that have departed from Ukrainian ports as of Tuesday were headed for African countries most at risk of starvation, according to the New York Times. The first ship to leave via the "grain corridor" arrangement saw its cargo rejected by the buyers in Lebanon, who cited the delivery delay. Since the arrangement took effect on August 1, ten ships have left Ukrainian ports, mainly carrying animal feed. One is headed to England, another to Ireland, while several are on their way to Turkey, Italy and China. None of them are bound for Yemen, Somalia, or other countries facing "catastrophic levels of hunger," the Times reported on Tuesday.

Beyond genes: Individual cells found to be smarter than originally thought

The success of intelligent design predictions about codes and functions should inspire biologists to keep looking for purpose in unknown substances and processes in life. Rather than dismissing them outright, they might find good reasons for them. In some labs, that is happening. Not All Functions Are in Proteins The surprise of the non-coding RNAs is a good example. We all remember how non-coding regions seemed to confirm the "junk DNA" hypothesis in the first decade of the 21st century. But then, functions were found for some of them, and the tune began to change. In hindsight, why would molecular biologists assume that function must be restricted to a protein form? RNA molecules can fold and persist in cells. They can do more than simply carry DNA information to protein function. Molecular biologists classified unknown RNA transcripts into long and short forms at first: the short noncoding RNAs (sncRNAs) and the long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs), sometimes dubbed long intergenic...

UK to reverse 'accidental' ban on edible insect farming

Propaganda push is selling eating bugs as usual, and suggests the UK is just going back to normal. Good news guys, UK companies will soon be free to start producing and selling several species of "edible insects" again. Apparently, one effect of Brexit is that the UK no longer belonged to the European Union's "novel foods" programme, which approved many varieties of insects for human consumption. Because of this the farming and selling of insects as food has been essentially banned in the UK for years. The BBC had a report about this a few days ago, bemoaning the impact on the UK's edible insect industry, and headlined: Has Brexit squashed our edible insect industry? The blurb goes on to repeat the all-too-familiar pro-bug eating propaganda, and suggests there could a "revival": Bugs - the superfood that doesn't cost the earth. They're higher in protein than meat and release far lower CO2 emissions than livestock farming. So experts tell us that, if we want to save the planet, we...

Mar-a-Lago raid - It was a trap

Alright, now that we have waited just about 48 hours to let the details surface about the FBI raid on Mar-a-Lago, let's analyze the situation from 40,000 feet. Let's look at the facts as of now. The FBI raided Mar-a-Lago, looking for alleged classified documents, while Donald Trump was not present. The FBI reportedly did not find the alleged "classified" documents they were looking for, but they did take 15 boxes of documents from Trump's home. The FBI did not reveal the reasonable cause to Trump's legal team, Trump must sue for the right to see that apparently. Most importantly, Eric Trump was present on the property and facilitated the situation. He reported that the Mar-a-Lago staff did NOT turn off security cameras, despite instructions from FBI. So for those who are concerned about the FBI planting anything, Trump had that base covered. And for those who are concerned they will "plant evidence" back at FBI HQ, thats not how that works, they have to take photos and document...

'Punish the bastard Russians': Mayor of Madrid caught out on prank call saying Ukrainian refugees should be deported so that they're forced to fight

Since the outbreak of war in Ukraine, prank calls in which anonymous individuals have impersonated Ukrainian politicians and gained access to leaders at the highest level have proliferated around the world. In Spain, one of the victims, it transpires, has been the mayor of Madrid, José Luís Martínez-Almeida. As can be seen from a video circulating on social media this Wednesday, the municipal leader from the People's Party (PP) was completely taken in by two Russian comedians, one of whom claimed to be the mayor of Kyiv, Vitali Klitschko, in a video which captures some compromising statements about Russia. It seems that the video prank now doing the rounds on social media (in English, with Spanish subtitles) is the same one that was revealed by German media a month ago, which the Madrid city council itself ended up recognizing, although it is suspected that the authors are the comic duo Vovan and Lexus, who also managed to completely bamboozle another PP politician, María Dolores...

Russia summons UN over Ukraine's attacks on Zaporozhye nuclear power plant

Russia has summoned an emergency session of the UN Security Council to discuss the situation at Ukraine's Zaporozhye nuclear power plant, which has been the subject of regular shelling attacks. Moscow wants the chief of the UN nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), to brief the council on the situation. The move, which was reported by Russian media on Tuesday, was confirmed by the deputy head of Russia's mission to the UN, Dmitry Polyansky, who said the public needed to learn about "Ukrainian provocations." The meeting is expected to take place on Thursday. Russia says Ukraine has been responsible for a series of drone attacks and artillery strikes at the nuclear site. The latest shelling was reported last weekend.

Republicans blast Mar-a-Largo raid, vow investigation

Republican candidates are slamming the Federal Bureau of Investigation's unprecedented raid of former President Donald J. Trump's Mar-a-Largo estate in Palm Beach, Florida. Former Fox 10 Phoenix anchor Kari Lake, the GOP gubernatorial nominee in Arizona, called the raid an "incredibly horrendous abuse of power." In a statement, she wrote in part: This is one of the darkest days in American history: the day our Government, originally created by the people, turned against us. This illegitimate, corrupt Regime hates America and has weaponized the entirety of the Federal Government to take down President Donald Trump. Our Government is rotten to the core. These tyrants will stop at nothing to silence the Patriots who are working hard to save America. This is an incredibly horrendous abuse of power.

The Masque of Pandora

What happens when people awake to the deceit of Totalitarian-Lite posing as liberty and individualism (let alone democracy)? Well, this piece is from the leading Establishment journal from the Deep-State-linked, Anglosphere, the Daily Telegraph: "This is the summer before the storm. Make no mistake, with energy prices set to rise to unprecedented highs, we are approaching one of the biggest geopolitical earthquake in decades. The ensuing convulsions are likely to be of a far greater order of magnitude than those that followed the 2008 financial crash, which sparked protests culminating in the Occupy Movement and the Arab Spring ... "Carnage has already arrived in the developing world, with power outages from Cuba to South Africa. Sri Lanka is just one of a cascade of low-income countries where leaders face being driven out of power in an ignominious blaze of petrol droughts and loan defaults. "But the West is not going to escape this Armageddon. In fact, in many ways, it looks set...

Ukraine and its Western backers should be held accountable for the 'suicidal' attack on Europe's largest nuclear power plant

Even as UN Secretary-General António Guterres addressed survivors of the World War Two US atomic bomb attack on Hiroshima, halfway around the world, the armed forces of Ukraine seemed hellbent on unleashing a modern-day nuclear holocaust on Europe by firing artillery rockets at the Zaporozhye power plant. This week's assault, which damaged safety equipment and disrupted power to the facility, the continent's largest, was characterized by Guterres as "suicidal." Kiev was quick to blame Russia for the attacks, accusing Moscow of conducting "nuclear terrorism," and calling for the international community to send in a delegation of "international peacekeepers" to "completely demilitarize the territory." The Zaporozhye nuclear facility has been under the physical control of Russia since its forces occupied the site back in March. Since then, the plant has been operated by Ukrainian technicians working under the supervision of Russian atomic energy experts. The facility contains six...

Welcome to the Third World

The FBI really better have something "pulverizing" on Trump, because otherwise we've just witnessed one of the dumbest moves in the history of politics [The Justice Department] must immediately explain the reason for its raid and it must be more than a search for inconsequential archives, or it will be viewed as a political tactic and undermine any future credible investigation and legitimacy of January 6 investigations. — Former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo Headline from Politics Insider this morning: Feds likely obtained 'pulverizing' amount of evidence ahead of searching Trump's Mar-a-Lago home, legal experts say. Pulverizing! Hold that thought. We've reached the stage of American history where everything we see on the news must first be understood as political theater. In other words, the messaging layer of news now almost always dominates the factual narrative, with the latter often reported so unreliably as to be meaningless anyway. Yesterday's sensational tale of the FBI...

Russian military comments on blasts in Crimea

Russia's Defense Ministry has released an official statement on the explosions at the Saki military airfield on the Crimean Peninsula, explaining that the incident was caused by the detonation of aviation munitions stored at the site. The blasts occurred near the city of Novofedorovka on Tuesday afternoon, with locals reporting hearing several explosions coming from the airfield and sharing videos online showing smoke coming from the area. According to eyewitnesses, the blasts had knocked out the windows in houses near the airfield. Moscow has stated that no one has been injured in the explosion and that none of the aviation equipment at the airfield was damaged by the blasts. "Measures are being taken to extinguish the fire and find out the causes of the explosion. According to a report from the site, there was no fire impact on the bunded ammunition storage area at the airfield," the Defense Ministry said. Local authorities have said that all necessary measures have been...

UK mom dies in her sleep on flight with husband and two kids

A mother of two traveling back to the UK to see her parents died in her sleep on a flight with her husband and two children, according to a grieving friend. Helen Rhodes and her family were flying from Hong Kong to the UK on Aug. 5 when she "passed away in her sleep," friends said. "We are still in disbelief and shock about the sudden passing of our dearest friend whose life has touched many people in Hong Kong and the UK," wrote friend Jayne Jeje on a GoFundMe post. "Helen was found unresponsive a few hours into the flight. Despite all efforts, Helen was not able to be resuscitated." Jeje added: "This all unfolded in front of her children. For the remaining 8 hours of the flight, Helen lay in a breathless

Zoonotic Langya virus found in China, CDC says

The Langya henipavirus, which can be transmitted from animals to humans, has been discovered in China, with 35 human infections reported so far, Taiwan's Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said, adding that the nation would establish a nucleic acid testing method to identify the virus. A study titled "A Zoonotic Henipavirus in Febrile Patients in China" that was published in the New England Journal of Medicine on Thursday said that a new henipavirus associated with a fever-causing human illness was identified in China. The study said an investigation identified 35 patients with acute infection of the Langya henipavirus in China's Shandong and Henan provinces, and that 26 of them were infected with the Langya virus only, with no other pathogens. The 26 patients developed symptoms including fever (100 percent), fatigue (54 percent), a cough (50 percent), loss of appetite (50 percent), muscle pain (46 percent), nausea (38 percent), headache (35 percent) and vomiting (35 percent). They...

100,000 tons of Nazi chemical weapons at bottom of Baltic Sea: Reports

The corrosion of the materials will eventually trigger an environmental disaster. Polish newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza reported on Tuesday that up to 100,000 tons of chemical weapons of Nazi Germany left after World War II could be resting at the bottom of the Baltic Sea ready to trigger an environmental disaster as they corrode over time. Gazeta Wyborcza wrote that between 40,000 to 100,000 tons of war-era weaponry lie at the bottom of various parts of the Baltic Sea. "The exact quantity is difficult to estimate today. It is similarly difficult to precisely define all the dumping sites. After the Potsdam conference, soldiers of the Soviet Union who disarmed ammunition depots in Poland and Germany were responsible for 'neutralising' German chemical weapons." According to the newspaper, the chemical weapons in question are mainly barrels of mustard gas, aviation bombs, and mines containing chemical warfare agents, mainly mustard and arsenic.

Polar Bear Attacks Woman In Norway's Remote Svalbard Islands

A polar bear attacked a woman in Norway in the remote Arctic Svalbard islands. The polar bear injured the French tourist, leaving her with several wounds. The unnamed woman was part of a 25-group camping trip in the Svalbard region. The group was camping at Sveasletta, in the central part of the Svalbard archipelago, which is roughly 800 kilometers (500 miles) north of the Norwegian mainland. Authorities confirmed that the wounds were not life-threatening. Chief superintendent Stein Olav Bredli said that officials "badly injured" the bear and following "a professional assessment" officials put it to sleep. "The French woman suffered injuries to an arm. Shots were fired at the polar bear, which was scared away from the area," he said. He did not disclose further details about the injuries. A helicopter swiftly flew her to the hospital in Longyearbyen.

SOTT FOCUS: SOTT Earth Changes Summary - July 2022: Extreme Weather, Planetary Upheaval, Meteor Fireballs

As the solar minimum deepens, we feel the impact down here in the form of record rainfall, huge hail, raging floods, localized heat waves, and unseasonable snow. The diminished solar activity has also contributed to the weakening of the magnetosphere, meaning that (among other things) more cosmic rays pass unimpeded through the upper layers of our atmosphere, seeding clouds. But that's not all, we need to remember that the accumulation of volcanic and cometary ash and dust particles contributes to clouds formation and promotes precipitation, so we have a perfect mix for record-breaking rains and floods. When we add in decreasing temperatures in higher layers of the atmosphere, huge hail and unseasonable snow make a lot of sense. Furthermore, the jet stream continues with its unusual 'meandering' including creating a 'double flow' that has been causing pockets of heat. As we have been repeating for some time, we are reaching a global weather pattern that points to an eventual global...

FBI Trump raid exposes Washington's secrecy shams

FBI agents raided Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago home Monday reportedly looking for boxes of classified material that Trump allegedly removed from the White House when his presidency ended in January 2021. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said the raid showed the Justice Department's "intolerable state of weaponized politicization." Trump is accused of violating the Presidential Records Act. Congress enacted this law in 1978 after former President Richard Nixon claimed his secret Oval Office tapes and other records were his personal property. The law asserted, "The United States shall reserve and retain complete ownership, possession, and control of Presidential records." "The Presidential Records Act is critical to our democracy, in which the government is held accountable by the people," Archivist of the United States David Ferriero declared earlier this year. In reality, the Presidential Records Act is the Presidential Damn-Near-Perpetual-Secrecy Act. Former presidents pocket...

Individual cells found to be smarter than originally thought

Humans make decisions based on various sensory information, which is integrated into a holistic percept by the brain. But how do single cells make decisions? Much more autonomously than previously thought, as researchers from the University of Zurich have now shown in a study published in Science. Cells base their decisions not only on outside signals like growth factors, but also on information they receive from inside the cell. This can even lead to treatment-resistant cancer cells. Individual humans make decisions all the time. These decisions often involve integrating a variety of contextual cues to ensure a decision is made that is adequate to the circumstances. The wealth of information required to make decisions is provided by our senses. They perceive unique aspects of our environment, such as visual and auditory information, which our brain subsequently integrates into a holistic percept. This is called multisensory — or multimodal — perception.

Amnesty Sweden co-founder resigns after org releases report documenting Ukraine military's use of citizen areas for deployment

Per Wastberg, who co-founded the Swedish branch of Amnesty International, resigned from the organization on Wednesday. The Swedish activist said his departure was due to Amnesty's report about the conflict in Ukraine, and that the organization has gone beyond its original mandate to advocate for political prisoners. "I have been a member for over 60 years. It is with a heavy heart that, due to Amnesty's statements regarding the war in Ukraine, I am ending a long and fruitful engagement," Wastberg told the newspaper Svenska Dagbladet, where he is an occasional columnist. "From its inception, Amnesty worked for the freedom of political prisoners everywhere in the world," said Wastberg, who co-founded the Swedish branch in 1964. "It has since gradually, sometimes debatably, expanded its mandate" and become a different kind of organization, he added.

Progressive Gestapo: Hard-left academics 'plotted gender ID witch-hunt' on colleagues

A group of hard-left academics has been accused of stifling free speech on university campuses by plotting a witch-hunt against colleagues on gender identity. University and College Union (UCU) members pledged to compile a list of university backroom staff suspected of holding gender-critical beliefs, the minutes from a meeting leaked to The Times reveal. The plan was to use this information to "inform" UCU university branches of their colleagues' views, accusing them of being "transphobes" and "gender-critical activists". Academics said members of UCU, the lecturers' union that represents more than 120,000 academics on UK campuses, were amplifying attacks on gender-critical feminists, with those speaking about sex-based rights compared to Holocaust deniers. The findings come amid concern that British universities are damaging their reputations by restricting free speech on campuses.

But there's no apartheid: Palestinians forced off Israeli bus to make way for Jewish passengers

A man pretending to be a transport ministry official manipulated the driver into removing around 50 Palestinian workers from the bus Three Jewish passengers, one impersonating a transport ministry official, have forced dozens of Palestinians off a bus heading to the occupied West Bank, according to Haaretz. The incident happened last Thursday, when about 50 Palestinians workers left the bus in the city of Bnei Brak, after the Jewish passengers demanded that the driver tell them to disembark. Tnufa Transportation Solutions, the bus owner, operates routes between Tel Aviv and the West Bank settlement of Ariel, taking Palestinian workers with work permits from Israel back to the occupied West Bank.

GOP says Hunter Biden double standard on display in wake of Trump FBI raid

Senior members of the Republican Party believe a double standard is on display with the Justice Department's handling of its investigation into Hunter Biden compared to the FBI raid of former President Donald Trump's home in Mar-a-Lago. President Joe Biden's son revea led he was under federal investigation for his taxes shortly after the 2020 election, and he is reportedly being scrutinized for potential money laundering, as well as for possible foreign lobbying violations under the Foreign Agents Registration Act, tied to his overseas business dealings in China, Ukraine, and elsewhere. Several Republicans believe Monday night's raid is evidence Trump is being targeted while Hunter Biden is being let off the hook. "The raid of MAL [Mar-a-Lago] is another escalation in the weaponization of federal agencies against the Regime's political opponents, while people like Hunter Biden get treated with kid gloves," Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, widely seen as Trump's strongest...

Eric Trump reveals what REALLY happened in the FBI's Mar-a-Lago raid

Eric Trump revealed FBI agents refused to hand over the search warrant for their raid on Mar-a-Lago and kicked an attorney off the property in a new, incisive account of the Monday operation at the Florida estate. Speaking exclusively to DailyMail.com, the former president's son said the 30 agents who arrived at the property asked staff to turn security cameras off - but they refused. He also said that the attorney was forced to stand at the end of the Mar-a-Lago driveway while the team searched inside - and allegedly used safe crackers to break into his father's safe. He called the raid another 'coordinated attack' on his father Donald Trump and insisted there is no way President Joe Biden was kept in the dark about the search.

BEST OF THE WEB: The Six Degrees of Evil Kevin Bacon

One of the biggest stumbling blocks to understanding the nature of human evil is the tendency to think everyone is the same: like you. Reading some of the socialist philosophers of past centuries, one can't help but smile at their quaint oversimplifications of human nature and naive utopianism.1 If only we could eliminate all private property, break the parent-child bond, and (in many socialist utopias) just share each other's wives (or better, get rid of "oppressive" marriage and just make women communal sexual property),2 well, then everything would be golden. All the world's evils would disappear (or at least be easily dealt with). Everyone would live in harmony, thinking the right thoughts (because parents and priests would have no influence on the children) and sharing all in a brotherhood of man (well, there might be a few holdovers who refuse to give up the old ways, but there's always slavery or death for them). Treat everyone the same, and everyone will turn out the same —...

Not serious people: US senators battle over who can get pregnant

All Democrats voted in unison against an amendment defining pregnancy as occurring only in biological women US Senate Republicans were fighting a losing battle in trying to block passage of President Joe Biden's $740 billion climate, tax and health care bill, but they tried to score some ideological points by introducing an amendment acknowledging that only biological women can get pregnant. It turns out the GOP lost that fight, too, as every Senate Democrat voted in unison on Sunday to reject the provision limiting the federal government's pregnancy programs to women. The party-line vote in the evenly divided Senate was 50-50, and Vice President Kamala Harris broke the tie by voting to reject the amendment, refusing to define pregnancy as a biologically female phenomenon.

Beyond genes: Biologists seek purpose in unknown substances, processes

The success of intelligent design predictions about codes and functions should inspire biologists to keep looking for purpose in unknown substances and processes in life. Rather than dismissing them outright, they might find good reasons for them. In some labs, that is happening. Not All Functions Are in Proteins The surprise of the non-coding RNAs is a good example. We all remember how non-coding regions seemed to confirm the "junk DNA" hypothesis in the first decade of the 21st century. But then, functions were found for some of them, and the tune began to change. In hindsight, why would molecular biologists assume that function must be restricted to a protein form? RNA molecules can fold and persist in cells. They can do more than simply carry DNA information to protein function. Molecular biologists classified unknown RNA transcripts into long and short forms at first: the short noncoding RNAs (sncRNAs) and the long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs), sometimes dubbed long intergenic...

Drought in Europe threatens major shipping river

The Rhine is an important shipping route for raw materials such as grain, chemicals, minerals, coal and oil products including fuel oil. Companies are keeping a close eye on its water levels and the potential impact on their operations. The water levels on the Rhine have recently continued to drop due to soaring hot temperatures and lack of rainfall in the region.

Neil Oliver: '...they are trying to make us forget what is ours....'

'...governments and the would be powerful want us to think Magna Carta and the truths it contains do not matter anymore...'

Elderly woman mauled to death by family pit bull terrier in Las Vegas

A woman was killed in an apparent dog mauling in Las Vegas on Tuesday, the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department says. Officers were called to the 4100 block of Penwood Avenue, in a residential neighborhood near Clark High School. Police say the woman, whom they described as "an elderly female," was pronounced dead at the scene. "Officers located the dog at a nearby residence and took it into custody without incident and turned over to animal control," Metro officials stated. Patrol detectives are investigating. This is a developing story.

Severe hailstorm turns Pietermaritzburg in South Africa into a winter wonderland

A hail storm in Pietermaritzburg turned parts of the capital of KwaZulu-Natal into a winter wonderland on Monday afternoon. According to residents, the storm which hit around 1pm, was very strong with heavy winds and hail that made it dangerous on the roads too. Colette van Loggerenberg said the hail caused a lot of garden damage. On the plus side, according to the Jacaranda Lodge - Retirement Facility: "What a storm with hail. Now we live in a winter wonderland."

Djokovic wife slams magazine as vaccine row swirls

Jelena Djokovic, the wife of 21-time Grand Slam winner Novak, has hit out at Racquet Magazine for penning an editorial piece critical of her husband's vaccine stance as the Serbian star looks increasingly likely to miss out on this month's US Open. Djokovic appears almost certain to be absent for what would be a second Grand Slam event of the year, this time due to US rules forbidding unvaccinated non-citizens from entering the country. In January, Djokovic was deported from Australia in a row over vaccine rules, in an incident which sparked a mini international incident between Australia and Serbia.

Ottawa police detective faces misconduct charges for allegedly seeking links between COVID vaccine and child deaths

Between June 2020 and January 2022, Grus allegedly accessed nine child or infant death cases in which she had no investigative role. An Ottawa police officer is facing misconduct charges for allegedly inserting herself into child death investigations looking for connections to the COVID-19 vaccine. Investigators with the Ottawa Police Service's professional standards unit allege Const. Helen Grus committed discreditable conduct when she took on a private investigative project to find the vaccination status of parents whose infants or children had died.

Meteor fireball over California on August 8

We received 12 reports about a fireball seen over CA on Monday, August 8th 2022 around 05:44 UT. For this event, we received one video and one photo.

Rainwater everywhere on Earth unsafe to drink due to 'forever chemicals', study finds

Rainwater almost everywhere on Earth has unsafe levels of 'forever chemicals', according to new research. Per- and poly-fluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are a large family of human-made chemicals that don't occur in nature. They are known as 'forever chemicals' because they don't break down in the environment. They have non-stick or stain repellent properties so can be found in household items like food packaging, electronics, cosmetics and cookware.

Ban all Russians from the West - Zelensky

Ukrainian leader wants a year-long prohibition on travelers and energy imports. Calling the current anti-Russian sanctions "weak," Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky told the Washington Post on Monday that the West must impose a full embargo on all energy imports from Russia and a travel ban on all Russians for at least a year. Interviewed inside his fortified office in Kiev, Zelensky told the Post that "the most important sanctions are to close the borders - because the Russians are taking away someone else's land." Russians should "live in their own world until they change their philosophy."

President Biden's new weapons package for Ukraine is the largest one yet, Pentagon says

President Biden has sent $9.8 billion in security aid to Ukraine since entering office. The Pentagon unveiled its latest $1 billion weapons package to support Ukraine against Russia's invasion on Monday. The Department of Defense says the massive delivery is the largest weapons package the U.S. has sent to Ukraine under President Joe Biden's administration. The U.S. has sent a total of $9.8 billion in security assistance for Ukraine since Biden gained office, far eclipsing the $2 billion the U.S. sent between 2014 and 2021.

Exclusive photos: Trump's telltale toilet

Remember our toilet scoop in Axios AM earlier this year? Maggie Haberman's forthcoming book about former President Trump will report that White House residence staff periodically found wads of paper clogging a toilet — and believed the former president, a notorious destroyer of Oval Office documents, was the flusher. Destroying records that should be preserved is potentially illegal. Trump denied it and called Haberman, whose New York Times coverage he follows compulsively, a "maggot."

Beyond Genes: Biologists Seek Purpose in Unknown Substances, Processes

The success of intelligent design predictions about codes and functions should inspire biologists to keep looking for purpose in unknown substances and processes in life. Rather than dismissing them outright, they might find good reasons for them. In some labs, that is happening. Not All Functions Are in Proteins The surprise of the non-coding RNAs is a good example. We all remember how non-coding regions seemed to confirm the "junk DNA" hypothesis in the first decade of the 21st century. But then, functions were found for some of them, and the tune began to change. In hindsight, why would molecular biologists assume that function must be restricted to a protein form? RNA molecules can fold and persist in cells. They can do more than simply carry DNA information to protein function. Molecular biologists classified unknown RNA transcripts into long and short forms at first: the short noncoding RNAs (sncRNAs) and the long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs), sometimes dubbed long intergenic...

SOTT FOCUS: Objective:Health - Is the Low Serotonin Model of Depression Finally Dying?

Last week, University College London researchers did a landmark review "The serotonin theory of depression: a systematic umbrella review of the evidence." The authors said they found 'no convincing evidence' of a link between low serotonin levels and depression. The popularity of the "chemical imbalance" theory has coincided with a huge increase in the use of antidepressants, one of the pharmaceutical industry's biggest cash cows. But for 30 years there have been many doctors and researchers calling bullshit on the theory; it was a myth created to find a profitable use for SSRIs after they were invented. 'Thousands suffer from side effects of antidepressants, including severe withdrawal effects that can occur when people try to stop them, yet prescription rates continue to rise,' said lead author of the study, Professor Joanna Moncrieff. 'We believe this situation has been driven partly by the false belief that depression is due to a chemical imbalance.' On this episode of...

China gives America a taste of its own geopolitics

Under the US' own one China policy, Washington recognizes there is only one China, that Taiwan is a part of China, and that there is only one government of China, the People's Republic of China (PRC) in Beijing. Despite this, the US undermines Chinese sovereignty over Taiwan by treating the island as a de facto nation and the Republic of China in Taipei as its de facto legitimate government. This culminated most recently in the visit by US Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi to Taiwan against Beijing's warnings and has predictably triggered what many analysts in the West are considering the "Fourth Strait Crisis" in which tensions between the US-backed regime in Taipei and the legitimate government of China have escalated to near-conflict levels. Also as predicted, with the continual rise of Chinese economic and military power, the US' own maxim of "might makes right" has boomeranged around and now threatens the very status quo Washington was abusing to incrementally infringe on...

Repression, Terror, Fear: The government wants to silence the opposition

"Once a government is committed to the principle of silencing the voice of opposition, it has only one way to go, and that is down the path of increasingly repressive measures, until it becomes a source of terror to all its citizens and creates a country where everyone lives in fear." — President Harry S. Truman Militarized police. Riot squads. Camouflage gear. Black uniforms. Armored vehicles. Mass arrests. Pepper spray. Tear gas. Batons. Strip searches. Surveillance cameras. Kevlar vests. Drones. Lethal weapons. Less-than-lethal weapons unleashed with deadly force. Rubber bullets. Water cannons. Stun grenades. Arrests of journalists. Crowd control tactics. Intimidation tactics. Brutality. Lockdowns. This is not the language of freedom. This is not even the language of law and order. This is the language of force. This is how the government at all levels — federal, state and local — now responds to those who speak out against government corruption, misconduct and abuse. These...

Ukraine-US bioweapons labs were researching African swine fever, Covid, monkeypox, Russian General reveals

The Labyrinth Ukraine company, a contractor of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), was involved in US projects studying African swine fever, Chief of Russia's Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Protection Troops Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov said on Thursday. "Labyrinth Ukraine took part in the UP-9 and UP-10 projects aimed at studying the spread of African swine fever in Ukraine and eastern European countries," he pointed out. According to the general, documents seized during Russia's special military operation in Ukraine prove that since 2019, USAID and its key contractor, the Labyrinth Ukraine company, have been involved in the United States' military biological program. Kirillov mentioned a letter that the chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces' sanitary and epidemiological department had sent to the director of Labyrinth Ukraine, highlighting the Ukrainian military's readiness to interact with USAID in terms of injecting troops with vaccines, as well...

Supply chain problems will persist because the system is being sabotaged

In a recent interview with Bloomberg, the executive vice president of UPS asserted that "regionalization" of the supply chain is critical to economic stability as geopolitcal conflicts expand. The word "regionalization" is basically a code word to describe decentralization, a concept which the UPS representative obviously did not want to dive into directly. Almost every trade expert and industry insider is admitting that supply chain problems are going to persist into the foreseeable future, and some are starting to also admit (in a roundabout way) that localized production and trade models are the key to survival. This is something that I and many other alternative economists have been talking about for a decade or more. The globalist dynamic of interdependency is a disaster waiting to happen, and now it's happening. Without decentralized mining of raw materials, local manufacturing, locally sourced goods, local food production and locally integrated trade networks there can be no...

UK gov't plans for blackouts, gas cuts, doubling of energy costs, come January

The UK is planning for several days over the winter when cold weather may combine with gas shortages, leading to organized blackouts for industry and even households. Under the government's latest "reasonable worst-case scenario," Britain could face an electricity capacity shortfall totaling about a sixth of peak demand, even after emergency coal plants have been fired up, according to people familiar with the government's planning. Under that outlook, below-average temperatures and reduced electricity imports from Norway and France could expose four days in January when the UK may need to trigger emergency measures to conserve gas, they said. The government Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.

'Banana Republic': Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis slams FBI Mar-a-Lago raid

Gov. Ron DeSantis slammed the FBI's raid on former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida. The Florida Republican sent a tweet Monday evening as it was reported the raid was related to Trump's handling of presidential records, including classified documents, after leaving office. "The raid of MAL is another escalation in the weaponization of federal agencies against the Regime's political opponents, while people like Hunter Biden get treated with kid gloves. Now the Regime is getting another 87k IRS agents to wield against its adversaries? Banana Republic," DeSantis tweeted.

Great reset: Amsterdam's Airport becomes world's first to cap flights in its bid to cut pollution

The Netherlands' Schiphol airport has become the first in the world to cut the number of flights by 12 per cent in its bid to reduce pollution and make the industry and aviation more sustainable. The decision has been taken by the country's government cabinet and the same has been made known to the House of Representatives through a letter signed by the Dutch Minister of Infrastructure and Water Management Mark Harbers, SchengenVisaInfo.com reports. "Minister Harbers informs the House of Representatives about the cabinet's decision to reduce the maximum number of permitted aircraft movements to and from Schiphol to 440,000 per year. This instead of the 500,000 aircraft movements from the draft Airport Traffic Decree (LVB)," the government notes in a statement published alongside the letter sent to the House of Representatives.

Too much truth? CBS partially retracts documentary about Ukraine war and missing military weapons

CBS issued a partial retraction Monday after a documentary aired suggesting the bulk of weapons sent to Ukraine fails to reach the front lines. "We removed a tweet promoting our recent doc, 'Arming Ukraine,' which quoted the founder of the nonprofit Blue-Yellow, Jonas Ohman's assessment in late April that only around 30% of aid reached the front lines in Ukraine," CBS stated in a tweet. The news outlet added a similarly worded "editor's note" to the top of its written coverage of the documentary. Ohman cited numerous logistical challenges in the delivery of needed equipment, CBS noted. Quotes from other figures in the documentary who are involved in the provision of Ukraine-bound supplies alluded to corruption and a lack of accountability of U.S. aid, CBS reported.

Judge who approved FBI raid on Mar-a-Lago once linked to Jeffrey Epstein

The Florida federal magistrate judge who signed off on a search warrant authorizing the FBI raid of former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort left the local US Attorney's office more than a decade ago to rep employees of convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein who had received immunity in the long-running sex-trafficking investigation of the financier. Sources tell The Post that Judge Bruce Reinhart approved the warrant that enabled federal agents to converge on the palatial South Florida estate on Monday in what Trump called an "unannounced raid on my home." Reinhart was elevated to magistrate judge in March 2018 after 10 years in private practice. That November, the Miami Herald reported that he had represented several of Epstein's employees — including, by Reinhart's own admission to the outlet, Epstein's pilots; his scheduler, Sarah Kellen; and Nadia Marcinkova, who Epstein once reportedly described as his "Yugoslavian sex slave."

Erdogan and Assad may hold Putin-brokered talks - Turkish media

The leaders of Turkey and Syria - Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Bashar al-Assad - could hold telephone talks after it was suggested by Russian President Vladimir Putin, Turkish state media reported on Tuesday citing sources within the Ankara government. The news comes after Erdogan's visit to the southern Russian city of Sochi last week, where he discussed the issue of Syria with President Putin. The Turkiye newspaper reports that after the meeting, Putin recommended that Ankara work as much as possible with the Assad government to combat terrorism as such an approach would be "much more accurate." The Russian leader also reportedly suggested to Erdogan that Turkey and Syria should hold a meeting, but, as reported by Turkiye, Ankara said it was "too early" for something like that. However, it was stated that a telephone conversation between Erdogan and Assad was likely to take place. Erdogan and Putin reaffirmed their commitment to the political process in Syria and agreed it was...

The 2008 Georgian conflict was the US' template for the 2022 Ukrainian one

There's no doubt that the American grand strategy is to contain Russia through the proxy war means that were described in this analysis as proven by a comparison between the Georgian and Ukrainian Conflicts. Today marks the 14th anniversary of Russia's five-day-long peace enforcement mission against Georgia that began on 8 August 2008 following former President Saakashvili's decision to have his forces attack Russian peacekeepers in Abkhazia and South Ossetia during the middle of the night on the same day as the start of the Beijing Summer Olympics. Those two regions used to be autonomous parts of Georgia but were subsequently recognized as independent by Moscow after the end of the conflict that Washington provoked Tbilisi to initiate. Despite having happened almost a decade and a half ago, its lessons are still relevant in the present, especially in the context of the Ukrainian Conflict. The first thing to learn is that both conflicts are part of the same American grand strategy...

Russia-imposed leader of Ukraine's Zaporizhzhya region orders referendum on joining Russia

Yevgeny Balitsky, the Moscow-appointed head of Ukraine's southeastern Zaporizhzhya region, has officially ordered a local referendum on the possibility of the province joining the Russian Federation. Balitsky signed the order at an event held by the We Are Together With Russia movement in the city of Melitopol on August 8. The move comes hours after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said that if referendums on joining Russia proceed in Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine, there can be no peace talks on ending the war launched by Russia against Ukraine nearly six months ago. Zelenskiy, in his nightly address on August 7, said: "Our country's position remains what it always has been. We will give up nothing of what is ours. If the occupiers proceed along the path of pseudo-referendums they will close for themselves any chance of talks with Ukraine and the free world, which the Russian side will clearly need at some point." On August 8, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that...

Russia takes out 45,000 tons of NATO ammo - MoD

The Russian military has taken out a depot in southern Ukraine that stored NATO-supplied ammunition, the Defense Ministry claimed on Sunday. "In the Voznesensk area of the Nikolaev region an arsenal that stored 45,000 tons of ammunition recently supplied to the Ukrainian Armed Forces by NATO countries has been destroyed." The ministry added that Russian forces eliminated five other ammo depots. Meanwhile, the Russian army conducted strikes on the deployment point of units of Ukraine's 72nd mechanized brigade at an agricultural facility in the Donetsk People's Republic city of Artemovsk, wiping out up to 130 soldiers and eight transport and armored vehicles, the ministry's statement read. Moscow's forces, the ministry continued, also used high-precision air-based missiles to attack a howitzer battery of Ukraine's 95th Air Assault Brigade in the village of Dzerzhinsk in the DPR. According to the statement, the strike killed up to 70 service members, destroyed three 2S1 Gvozdika...

Methods US army uses to hide Ukraine involvement revealed

Ukrainian forces have "had the American military at their side" from the start of the conflict with Russia, the magazine Causeur cited a "well-placed analyst" in French intelligence as saying. Pentagon-hired contractors are allegedly "everywhere on the battlefield." The claim was published by the right-leaning outlet last week in an analysis of the five-month-long Russia-Ukraine conflict, which, it stated, "is not the fight of David against Goliath," contrary to what many people believe. "In Ukraine, the Pentagon for the first time subcontracted large-scale warfare," the magazine cited its source as saying. These "mercenaries" come in addition to the "gigantic" military aid provided to Kiev by Washington, and are not necessarily frontline fighters, according to Causeur. As an example of 'subcontracted' warfare, it cited the widely-publicized supply of SpaceX satellite internet access for Ukrainian military officials. CEO Elon Musk initially framed this as an act of charitable...

Russia warns of Polish plans for Ukraine

Warsaw continues to carry out an apparent attempt to "reclaim" parts of Ukraine in accordance with its "far-reaching plans" for the country, Russia's Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) said in a statement posted on Monday. According to Moscow, Poland is not only setting up a scenario to deploy its "peacekeeping" forces to the western parts of Ukraine, but is also trying to establish control over promising sectors of the Ukrainian economy, first and foremost - agriculture. The SVR claims that Polish companies have taken advantage of the difficult condition facing Ukrainian farmers by arranging to purchase their goods at reduced prices, which is allegedly pushing some Ukrainian agriculture enterprises toward bankruptcy. The agency claims that Polish entities will then buy up these assets at bargain prices.

The Navy wants to help pay off student debt to get new recruits

Money talks. In a time of inflation and a competitive job market, the military has been trying to entice people to enlist or reenlist in the armed forces to meet service goals. The latest to get into the mix is the Navy. According to a service memo released on Thursday, Aug. 4, the service branch is offering an enlistment bonus of $50,000 to future sailors and any Navy veteran or other service veteran who signs up for the Navy. After all, what's more enticing than money upfront? Well it's 2022 and student loan debt is a major issue weighing on people. The Navy's other new incentive is a loan repayment program, with a maximum of $65,000. There's a catch. In fact there are several. Anyone interested in qualifying must be ready to ship out by the end of September. For any veterans of the Navy or other service branch, they must also reenter active duty at a pay grade at or below E-4, and also must not have received an enlistment bonus in their first time serving. So it's a limited...

Copium: Zelensky's aide calls counterattack claims part of Kiev's 'information warfare'

All public statements by Ukrainian officials are in some way meant to deceive Russia, an aide to President Zelensky said All public remarks by Ukrainian officials are part of information warfare against Russia, Mikhail Podolyak, an aide to Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelenksy, claimed in an interview on Tuesday. The comment came as Podolyak was discussing Kiev's plans to take back the city of Kherson from Russia with the BBC. Ukrainian officials have repeatedly claimed that a major counterattack was looming and that Russia was concentrating its forces in return, suggesting that a major battle in southern Ukraine was about to break out.

Not just the Dutch: Farmers everywhere fight for survival against climate change activism

The most efficient system in history of growing food and getting it to consumers, modern farming, is under attack, blamed for causing climate change. Dutch Government to Farmers: Reduce Your Operations by Up to 95 Percent The world has watched as Dutch farmers fight for their economic survival against demands that they shrink their operations to suit the government's climate change agenda. The Dutch government has told farmers to cut ammonia emissions by 50 percent, and those near protected areas must reduce their operations by as much as 95 percent, or they must sell their land to the government and face a lifetime ban from farming. Dutch Farmers have responded by spraying government buildings with manure while Dutch police shot at a 16-year-old boy at a demonstration. Jos Ubels, Vice President of the Farmer's Defense Force in the Netherlands, says negotiations are not going anywhere and a bad situation is continuing to escalate. "We are fighting for our right to produce and to...

The climate cult is eager to take advantage of Europe's energy crisis

The climate cult never sleeps, and when they see nations in crisis they are always quick to try to exploit the situation by misrepresenting the root problem. A heat wave is currently hitting Europe along with wild fires and the mainstream media is beating the global warming drum hard. This is nothing new; every time the weather gets hot they cry "climate change!" Every time the weather is extra cold they once again cry "climate change!" The evidence? What about the "record heat" in parts of UK, Spain and Portugal? This is surely proof that the weather is being ruined by that terrible menace known as man-made carbon? Of course, what they don't tell you is that the official record for weather and temperatures used by climate scientists only goes back about 140 years (it started in the 1880s). So, millions upon millions of years of Earth weather, and they only count 140 years of it to determine "record temps?" They tend to ignore ice core and tree ring data from centuries ago that...

Body found near scene of bison attack in Bushton, Kansas

A body has been found near the site where an Ellsworth County Sheriffs deputy was attacked by a bison. A woman called Ellsworth County 911 to report she found her nephew dead in a pen, and that she thought a bison had killed him. The location of the body was 1/4 of a mile from where the deputy was injured by a charging bison Sunday night. The Ellsworth County Sheriff identified the deceased man as Scott Schroeder, 56, of rural Bushton. He was the owner of nearly two dozen bison he kept at that location. A preliminary cause of death is that Schroeder had been gored by an animal. The deputy remains in a Salina hospital after undergoing surgery. The bison was put down when it appeared it was preparing to charge the injured deputy again.

Secrets of most powerful 'gigantic jet' ever observed revealed in new study

A detailed 3D study of a massive electrical discharge that rose 50 miles into space above an Oklahoma thunderstorm has provided new information about an elusive atmospheric phenomenon known as gigantic jets. The Oklahoma discharge was the most powerful gigantic jet studied so far, carrying 100 times as much electrical charge as a typical thunderstorm lightning bolt. The gigantic jet moved an estimated 300 coulombs of electrical charge into the ionosphere — the lower edge of space — from the thunderstorm. Typical lightning bolts carry less than five coulombs between the cloud and ground or within clouds. The upward discharge included relatively cool (approximately 400 degrees Fahrenheit) streamers of plasma, as well as structures called leaders that are very hot — more than 8,000 degrees Fahrenheit.

Boy, 7, attacked by cougar in central Alberta

A seven-year-old boy is recovering in hospital after being attacked by a cougar north of Rocky Mountain House on the weekend. Chay Feuser, Cason Feuser's mom, said her son was staying with his two sisters and a family friend, Alishea, at a campsite near Buster Creek, Alta., Sunday morning when the animal attacked. She said the kids were heading back to the trailer when the cougar latched onto Cason's head and neck, sending the other children screaming. "Alishea jumps - flies - out of her lawn chair and runs down there and just grabs a big rock off the beach and just closes her eyes and throws it and prays to God she doesn't hit Cason," Chay said. "And thank God she hit the cougar right in the head and it startled him and he dropped Cason from his death grip." STARS flew Cason to the Stollery Children's Hospital in Edmonton in stable condition, where he underwent surgery.

Poland refuses to share gas in rejection of EU agreement, Germany will refuse certification of Nord Stream II even if energy crisis worsens

The European Commission will not be able to force Poland to adhere to the EU's new plan to cut gas consumption, nor will Poland share its gas reserves with other members of the bloc, the country's climate and environment minister, Anna Moskwa, has told the news outlet Sieci. "Energy security is the exclusive competence of each state, and we will never agree cede it to the European Union. No one can force us to regulate gas or introduce other restrictive measures. Moreover, we do not want to make decisions about restrictions in other states," the minister was cited as saying. Her comments refer to the EU's plan to cut gas consumption across the bloc by 15%, which, it is hoped, will help member states fill storages amid concerns of a possible halt of Russian gas supplies. In the interview, Moskwa noted that the plan was not made mandatory and thus should be seen as guidance rather than law.

Man killed after being attacked by his dog in Castaic, California

A Castaic man was attacked and killed by his dog Friday afternoon. Around 4:10 p.m. Friday, first responders received reports of a dog attack on Gelding Road in Castaic, said Sgt. Clark, with the Santa Clarita Valley Sheriff's Station. "The family dog attacked a male in his house," Clark said. "He did not survive from his wounds." The man was identified as Robert Stevens, 62, from Castaic, according to officials with the Los Angeles County Coroner's Office. As of the publication of this article, it is unknown what type of dog attacked the man.

Siren sounds as tornado spotted in Dumas, Texas

Crazy tornado in Dumas, TX! Siren sounds as landspout spotted in Dumas! Texas, US (Aug.08, 2022).

Severe weather in Delaware sends beach umbrellas flying

Storms on Friday (5 August) have hit beachgoers in Delaware, with gusts that sent umbrellas flying out into the ocean. Rain and wind hit the southern Delaware shore, with video of the scene coming out of Bethany Beach. The Delaware coast got nearly an inch of rain with wind gusts up to 44 miles per hour (71 kilometres per hour), according to the National Weather Service.

Biden increases IRS agents to almost 170,000—70,000 will be armed—to target middle class Americans

The poorly named Inflation Reduction Act, passed over the weekend by Senate Democrats, is slated to create positions for nearly 87,000 new IRS agents, 70,000 of whom will be armed. This brings the total to nearly 170,000 under the bureau of tax collection. The cost of this new initiative will be about $80 billion, and it's all part of a bill meant to lower costs to Americans. This was noted as well by Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, who told The Post Millennial that "The bill is terrible. It's basically Joe Biden Build Back Better agenda, that a lot of Republicans called 'build that broke."

Record-breaking rainfall floods train stations, submerges vehicles in Seoul, South Korea - 5 inches of rain in an hour - at least 8 killed (UPDATE)

Several areas in Seoul were left flooded on Monday (Aug 8) as heavy rain battered South Korea's capital, submerging vehicles and prompting evacuations. Photos and videos circulating on social media showed flooded roads with commuters braving the rain, as well as water cascading down the steps of an underground train station. Twitter user @evh5150 also said that there was a power outage in the Gangnam area. According to Yonhap news agency, up to 170mm of rain fell over the country's central region on Monday, including the capital area. Seoul received 90.5mm of rain as of 8pm local time. The Dongjak district in southern Seoul also recorded 137mm of rain per hour, the worst rainfall in decades, added the report.

Senate passes Inflation Reduction Act—Kamala casts tie-breaking vote

The Inflation Reduction Act passed the United States Senate on Sunday along party lines with Vice President Kamala Harris having to cast the tie breaking vote. "On this vote the yeas are 50, the nays are 50, the Senate being equally divided, the Vice President votes in the affirmative. And the bill as amended, is passed," Harris announced.

Entertainment companies start dumping woke content as viewership tumbles

They'll never admit to it openly, but getting woke makes companies broke. Hollywood has been overtly progressive for decades, but this is nothing compared to the social justice invasion since 2016. After around five years of an unprecedented leftist onslaught on the entertainment industry we are finally starting to see the rampage lose oxygen. There's a weakness within woke productions that the alternative media has been pointing out for a long time - They don't make a profit because they are designed to appease a minority of leftist zennials that don't have any money. This is the wrong crowd to rely on for cash flow. It is fair to say that the entertainment industry was partially conned. First, there are those tantalizing ESG loans that can be easily had as long a company loudly declares their fealty to the social justice agenda. Then, of course, there is the fact that many corporate CEOs and marketing people track Twitter trends with the ignorant assumption that Twitter is...

Every single Senate Democrat just voted against defining pregnancy as a biologically female process

The party of science! During the passage of Joe Biden's 'Inflation Increasing Reduction Act' in the Senate Sunday, all 50 Democrats voted against an amendment that sought to define pregnancy as a uniquely biologically female process. The amendment was introduced by GOP Senator Marco Rubio, who noted "The only people capable of being pregnant are biological females, and therefore, I think federal pregnancy programs should be limited to biological females, and that's what this would do." "A few minutes ago, I looked back across 5,500 years of human history, and so far, every single human pregnancy has been biological female," Rubio continued.

Outrage as Australian women's cricketer who tested positive for virus HUGS teammates after winning Commonwealth Games gold

Australia's decision to field a cricketer with Covid-19 at the Commonwealth Games has sparked controversy and claims of hypocrisy given the country's hard line on lockdowns during the pandemic - and their decision to deport Novak Djokovic over his vaccination status. Tahlia McGrath was permitted to play at Edgbaston in Birmingham yesterday despite testing positive. She bowled and batted in the match and also took the catch that dismissed India's star opener Shafali Verma as the Southern Stars took gold. She batted at No4 without a mask before she was dismissed after scoring just two runs off four balls. McGrath then bowled two overs for 24 runs and also took a catch, when she held up her hands to warn her fellow players not to come and celebrate with her.

Trump says Mar-a-Lago home in Florida 'under siege' by FBI agents

Trump said the FBI's search warrant execution at his Palm Beach, Florida resort resembles something from a 'third-world country'. Former President Trump on Monday said that his Mar-a-Lago home in Florida was "under siege" by a "large group" of FBI agents conducting a search warrant. "Nothing like this has ever happened to a President of the United States before. After working and cooperating with the relevant Government agencies, this unannounced raid on my home was not necessary or appropriate," Trump said. "It is prosecutorial misconduct, the weaponization of the Justice System, and an attack by Radical Left Democrats who desperately don't want me to run for President in 2024, especially based on recent polls, and who will likewise do anything to stop Republicans and Conservatives in the upcoming Midterm Elections."

The West is silent as Ukraine targets civilians in Donetsk using banned 'butterfly' mines

On Saturday, July 30, just after 9pm, thunderous explosions rocked central Donetsk. Shortly after, there were announcements that air defense had shot down Ukrainian-fired missiles containing 'butterfly' (or 'petal') mines. Given that over 300 of these explosives are packed into each of the Ukrainian-fired rockets, central Donetsk could literally become a minefield if they successfully landed. Social media and Telegram warnings urged residents to stay inside and wait for Emergency Services to clear the streets and sidewalks - which they began doing during the night. But come daylight, untold numbers of these tiny devices still remained. More warnings were issued to stay at home - better to be late for work than lose a leg. Residents that absolutely have to go out are advised to keep their eyes down to watch where they step, avoid grassy areas, and walk extremely carefully.

Russia suspends US inspections of nuclear military sites

Western sanctions are preventing Russian inspectors from doing their jobs under the START treaty, Moscow says. Moscow has informed Washington of a "temporary withdrawal" from the inspection regime under the START nuclear disarmament treaty, the Russian Foreign Ministry announced on Monday. Citing provisions in the document for "exceptional circumstances," Russia claims Western sanctions have prevented its inspectors from performing their duties, thus giving their US counterparts an unfair advantage. Once the principle of parity and equality is restored, the previous arrangements will resume, the statement added. Moscow cited "anti-Russian unilateral restrictive measures" imposed by the US and its allies, such as visa restrictions on Russian inspectors and a ban on Russian aircraft in US and EU airspace. These restrictions effectively make Russian inspections under the treaty impossible, while the Americans "do not experience such difficulties."

End of the USA as we have known it - FBI raids Trump's home - DOJ planning indictment

The Democrats are desperate to win in November and they are taking the United States down the drain in order to forcefully impose their will, or should I say the Great Reset. On the approaching 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, The Democrats are toying with what will most likely end in a civil war and the destruction of the United States. Never in the entire history of the United States has a former president been indicted for any criminal conduct. This has not been because there was never such an incident. Most importantly, the historic precedent is that post-term indictment is NOT legally allowed. Americans don't like the idea of criminalizing politics. Just look at Ukraine. In January 2022, Ukraine's former president, Petro Poroshenko, landed in Kyiv and was charged with Treason by Zelensky in a case that illustrates the danger of criminalizing politics. So many other banana republics do the same. Once one party gets a hold of power, they try...

Russia suspends bilateral inspections in nuclear weapons treaty

Huge developments on the nuclear front. Russia have suspended nuclear inspections recognized by the New START Treaty. START is the nuclear arms reduction treaty between the US and the Russian Federation. Limiting the amount of strategic warheads each country are allowed to posses, the mark currently set at a max of 1,550 nuclear warheads. In addition to the limit of nuclear arms, the treaty requires each side to share biannual data exchanges with breakdowns of all nuclear delivery vehicles/launchers, their whereabouts, everything. Complete transparency about all production, movement, testing, etc. Anything and everything Russia and the US do with nuclear warheads, they are supposed to tell each other about. The treaty allows for up to 18 on-site inspections per year for US and Russian inspection teams. Which Russia have now expressed they are suspending. Today the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs stated that they have been forced to: "resort to this measure as a result of...

Spain's king Felipe VI jeered during swearing in of new Colombian president Petro

The king of Spain, Felipe VI, was booed and whistled during Sunday's swearing in ceremony for the new president of Colombia, Gustavo Petro. When the Colombian president read the list of dignitaries present and pronounced the name of the Spanish monarch, the audience gave an energetic jeering to the Bourbon. Felipe's facial expression suggested his discomfort in the face of a situation that had been anticipated, since Petro is the first left-wing president to govern the Latin American country. The new head of the Colombian executive, moreover, was a guerrilla in Colombia's April 19th Movement (M-19), which claimed the ideas of Simón Bolívar, the nineteenth century liberator who brought to an end the Spanish colonial era in much of Latin America. Thus, in the 1970s and 80s, the M-19 vigorously opposed Spanish power in Colombia and took the lead in episodes such as the theft of Bolívar's famous sword in 1974, as well as actions such as the 1985 assault on the Palace of Justice, that...

The branding of America - Putting lipstick on a pig

One of the greatest frauds ever perpetrated on consumers is the branding of consumer products, a practice created almost entirely in the US, achieving significance only from an overwhelming flood of abusive psychological propaganda and advertising. In probably no other place did American corporations and ad agencies apply Bernays' psychiatric propaganda methods of public manipulation with more bloodthirsty determination than in their creation of the fiction of branding, and in no other country are brands treated with the reverence they are in the US. In real life, a brand is nothing. It is only a name that has no value other than for product identification. Any value is in the product itself, but the large firms have spent literally tens of billions of dollars to convince Americans and the world otherwise. Everything we have been told and taught about brands is a lie, what someone called "meticulous landscaping" of the consumer environment. To a consumer, there is no value in a...

As Europe melts, southern Africa enjoys some rare snow nearly 8 inches deep

In sharp contrast to the heatwaves across Europe, people are skiing in Africa. The tiny mountain kingdom of Lesotho, completely surrounded by South Africa, is the only country on earth where nowhere is fewer than a thousand metres above sea level. While cold winters are not rare in much of southern Africa, snow is. Inevitably, ski resorts are even rarer and at an altitude of 3,000 metres, Afriski in Lesotho's Maluti Mountains is Africa's only operating ski resort south of the equator. Meka Lebohang Ejindu is a snowboard instructor there.

Rare blue jet atmospheric phenomenon photographed over Texas, several sighted in one night

Seeing one blue jet is rare. Photographer Matthew Griffiths just caught several of them over the Big Bend National Park in Texas. "This is by far the best," he says: Griffiths is an amateur photographer, primarily interested in wildlife and the Milky Way. "On July 28th, I was starting a five night West Texas road trip to capture the Milky Way," he says. "But with thunderstorms in the distance I decided to try for red sprites instead." He ended up photographing the sprite's elusive cousin, the blue jet. First recorded by cameras on the space shuttle in 1989, blue jets are part of a growing menagerie of cloudtop "transient luminous events" such as sprites, ELVES and green ghosts. They are all elusive, but blue jets may be the hardest of all to catch. Comment: Taking into account the recency of the discoveries, along with the various other phenomena that have been occurring with an increasing frequency, some which were only just documented in the last decade or so - such as STEVE, the...

Zero Covid has cost New Zealand dearly

Throughout much of the pandemic, proponents of Zero Covid and lockdown have promoted the island nation of New Zealand as a success story. Since the beginning of March 2022, however, this success has turned sour. Covid cases in New Zealand have exploded, with cumulative cases per capita now exceeding US levels. If New Zealand case rates continue to grow as they have in the recent past, cumulative per-capita cases will exceed those in the UK and the EU in the coming months. Early Zero Covid success On 28 February 2020, New Zealand's public-health authorities identified the nation's first Covid patient - a traveller from Iran, where a large outbreak of Covid cases was then proceeding. New Zealanders panicked, stocking up on food, toilet paper and other necessities. Rumours surfaced that the New Zealand government planned to impose lockdowns, including mandatory stay-at-home orders. On 19 March 2020, Jacinda Ardern, New Zealand's prime minister, swatted away the rumours, telling people...

Suspended Florida prosecutor: "I'm not going down without a fight"

Florida state attorney Andrew Warren vowed he is "not going down without a fight," after Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis suspended him on Thursday. The big picture: Warren, the twice-elected state attorney for Hillsborough County, refused to enforce the state's 15-week abortion ban and condemned laws criminalizing gender-affirming health care. DeSantis responded with an executive order suspending Warren for "incompetence and willful defiance." What he's saying: "Ron DeSantis is trying to overthrow democracy in Florida. His plot to suspend me blatantly violates the most fundamental basis of our democracy — your vote." "DeSantis is trying to take away my job for doing my job. He came down to Tampa, to Hillsboro County, to illegally remove me as part of some political circus." "Ron DeSantis doesn't get to hand-pick Flordia's state attorneys. You, the people do. We've all seen the consequences of politicians who think they're above the law and can do whatever they want. That's why DeSantis...

Israel blames Gaza rocket misfire for child deaths

The IDF has accused Palestinian militants of using civilians as "human shields" The death toll in Gaza amid Israel's Operation Breaking Dawn has grown to 24, including six children, with over 200 people wounded as of Saturday night, according to Palestinian health officials. The Israeli military accuses Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) militants of using civilians as "human shields" and killing their own people in botched rocket attacks. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) confirmed that it struck multiple "terrorist targets" across Gaza on Saturday, but denied any responsibility for a deadly blast in the Jabalia refugee camp in the north of the enclave that reportedly killed at least six people, including three children. The IDF in a tweet on Saturday night, said: "Following the reports of the tragic events in Jabaliya, the IDF concluded an in-depth debrief. Based on all the IDF systems data, it appears that this event is the outcome of an Islamic Jihad rocket misfire. It did not...

Fourteen young Canadian docs die after getting the shot. Normally would be ~0 over 30 years

This is a list of just the docs my doctor friend in Canada heard about passively. In the past 30 years, he's never heard of a single death like this. Not one. Now there are 14. Executive summary A doctor friend in Canada heard about 14 deaths of Canadian doctors over the last 9 months. He's been in practice for 30 years. He's never heard of any such deaths before. Zero. Why is he now all of a sudden hearing of so many deaths, and these deaths are all happening very soon after vaccination. The fact checkers assure us all that this is simply coincidence. The Canadian doctors continue to believe what they are told to believe. I predict the next shots will be even worse. Sadly, I don't think the Canadian doctors are ever going to figure this out.

Russia, Turkey launch new economic 'roadmap'

The Putin-Erdogan meeting in Sochi has rapidly accelerated Russian-Turkish economic initiatives and financial ties. These include bypassing western sanctions, integrating money transfers, and trading outside the dollar. In inter-state relations, the question is always one of balance and political opportunity. Statesmanship lies in striking the balance and seizing the opportunity thereof. Russian President Vladimir Putin's 4-hour meeting with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Sochi on Friday becomes an outstanding example of how two powers who have rivaled each other in history can still craft a common destiny by balancing their interests and create new opportunities to navigate their way forward in an uncertain world. It is seldom that the outcome of a high-level working visit can be foretold with absolute certainty. Yet, that was what Erdogan did as he headed for Sochi. He said, "I believe that (today's meeting) will open a whole different page in Turkish-Russian...

As English Goes, So Goes the U.S.

By undermining the Western canon in the 1990s, leftist academics paved the way for today's 'woke' hurricane. When I finished graduate school at UCLA in 1988, I believed that English sat at the top of the academic heap. The department claimed nearly 1,700 majors; the nonmajor survey courses I taught during the year after I filed my thesis had more than 400 students each; and professors and administrators across the quad were eager to know what this thing called "deconstruction" was. The department required of every major a yearlong survey course, from Beowulf to W. H. Auden, with a syllabus that proclaimed, "This is English, the full sweep!" Earlier, in 11th-grade English, I got the same thing for American literature, a grand patrimony from Hawthorne to Hemingway, implying the country's own grandness. English was where you found the meaning of the past. Without a flagship English department, a university could not be a tier-one institution.

German media lifts lid on Zelensky's 'secret deals'

Die Welt published an excerpt from a new biography which describes alleged cases of corruption involving Ukraine's president German newspaper Die Welt has put Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky's "secret deals" under the microscope, publishing an extract from a new book which suggests the head of state may have evaded taxes at home. Published last Wednesday, the excerpt comes from a new book released this month, Zelensky: A Biography. The paper cited parts of the book that deal with alleged cases of corruption involving the Ukrainian president.

Flash flooding after 2 inches of rain in less than 30 minutes hits Denver, Colorado as Kentucky faces possibility of further floods

Firefighters rescued at least 19 people in Denver after flash floods turned roadways into rivers Sunday night as already flood-ravaged Kentucky faced the possibility of further storms this week. In videos and photos shared on social media, cars in Denver could be seen partially submerged, with one video appearing to show a firefighter rescuing two children from a vehicle caught up in the flooding. The Denver Fire Department told NBC News its crews rescued at least 19 people from flooding. Eight people were rescued from heavy flooding in an underpass at 38th Avenue under Blake Street in an incident that appeared to align with the video of the children being rescued, Lt. J.D. Chism, a public information officer with the fire department, said. The department confirmed to KUSA, an NBC affiliate based in Denver, that multiple children were rescued at the location. Another 11 people were rescued from their vehicles on Interstate 70 at York Street, Chism said.

70% of Western weapons sent to Ukraine don't reach troops - CBS

With the US and its allies pledging unprecedented levels of military support to Ukraine, a recent CBS News report suggested that only around 30% of the weapons sent by the West actually make it to the front lines. The report adds to ongoing rumors of waste, corruption, and black market profiteering. The US has approved more than $54 billion of economic and military aid to Ukraine since February, while the UK has committed nearly $3 billion in military aid alone, and the EU has spent another $2.5 billion on arms for Kiev. An entire spectrum of equipment, from rifles and grenades to anti-tank missiles and multiple launch rocket systems have left the West's armories for Ukraine, with most entering the country through Poland. However, this rarely goes smoothly, CBS News revealed this week. "All of this stuff goes across the border, and then something happens, kind of like 30% of it reaches its final destination," Jonas Ohman, the founder of a Lithuania-based organization supplying the...

Chris Pratt smashes the 'woke critics' of his new show 'The Terminal List' with Instagram troll

Chris Pratt took to Instagram to remind his critics that The Terminal List boasted '1.6 billion minutes of streams' Chris Pratt had the last laugh after "woke critics" on "Rotten Tomatoes" certified his new Amazon Prime show, The Terminal List, as "rotten." The show follows Pratt's character, Navy SEAL commander James Reece, who is determined to find out who killed his platoon and get revenge. While critics were not pleased with the production, many fans immediately came to Pratt's rescue, with the audience score on the review site coming in as 94% "fresh." In a brazen move, the Wanted star took to his Instagram story, sharing a report that suggested the actor defied "woke critics."

Sorry for telling the truth: Amnesty 'regrets' distress caused by report about Ukraine deliberately endangering civilians, using human shields

Amnesty International said on August 7 it "deeply regrets the distress and anger" caused by a report accusing Ukraine of exposing civilians to Russian fire. The August 4 report said the Ukrainian military is endangering civilians by basing themselves in residential buildings, schools, and hospitals and launching counterattacks from heavily populated areas. The head of Amnesty's Ukraine office resigned in protest, accusing the rights organization of parroting Kremlin propaganda. Comment: "Kremlin propaganda" is newspeak for "telling the truth." President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said the rights group had tried to "amnesty the terrorist state and shift the responsibility from the aggressor to the victim." "We fully stand by our findings," the rights group said, but it stressed that "nothing we documented Ukrainian forces doing in any way justifies Russian violations." "This does not mean that Amnesty International holds Ukrainian forces responsible for violations committed by Russian...

Two dead, several rescued after flash floods in Sonora, Mexico

Heavy rain over the last few days has caused flash flooding in parts of Sonora State, Mexico, where at least two people have lost their lives. Sonora State Civil Protection reported 2 people died and one was rescued after a vehicle was swept away by flood waters from an overflowing stream near Hermosillo. Flooded streets in the city left several vehicles stranded. Flooding has also affected other areas of the state. Four people were rescued from flood waters in Nogales. Five people were rescued from the overflowing Cabullona River in the municipality of Agua Prieta. Civil Protection said 250 vehicles in the Cabullona Park were unable to leave due to flooding from the river. No injuries were reported and all occupants were safe.

Islamic Jihad head issues warning: Fighting will resume if Israel breaks Gaza ceasefire

The movement's head said there was unity between all the Palestinian factions despite the fact that Hamas was not taking part in the current conflict. Palestinian Islamic Jihad Secretary-General Ziyad al-Nakhala warned that his terrorist movement would resume fighting with Israel if its demands for the release of Islamic Jihad prisoners were not met, during a speech delivered as a ceasefire took effect between Israel and Islamic Jihad on Sunday night. The movement's leader claimed that Israel had agreed to release Islamic Jihad official Bassam al-Saadi and hunger-striking prisoner Khalil al-Awawda in return for the ceasefire agreement. He additionally claimed that Israel was the one who "strongly sought to reach a ceasefire."

NYPD officers leaving in record-breaking exodus even before full pensions set in

Over 1,000 New York City police officers have filed to leave the department in 2022, raising doubts about the city's ability to maintain a substantive police force and maintain safety and security. Former NYPD detective Jason Caputo and Blue Lives Matter NYC founder Joe Imperatrice weighed in on the law enforcement exodus on Fox & Friends First Monday, arguing that incentives for working with The Big Apple's police force no longer exist. "You're losing qualified [people], you're losing experience, you're losing so much when it comes to that kind of stuff," Caputo told guest host Ashley Strohmier. The former detective's comments come a month after he left his 18-year service and as others partaking in the exodus leave before receiving full pensions.

Deadly flash floods in Dakar, Senegal - 5 inches of rain in a few hours

At least one person died and another was severely injured after flooding caused by heavy rain in Dakar, capital city of Senegal. Heavy rainfall struck on 05 August 2022, with around 127 mm falling in the space of a few hours. City streets were inundated in flood water over 1 metres deep, causing widespread traffic disruption. Senegal's Ministry of the Interior said in a statement that the heavy rainfall caused the death of a man who died after losing control of his vehicle in a flooded tunnel in Mermoz. According to police, another person was rescued in serious condition and taken to hospital. Senegal's rainy season normally runs from July to October. On 20 July this year heavy rain of over 80 mm in 24 hours caused flooding in Dakar and surrounding areas in Senegal, causing damage to roads and buildings.