February, 2019

Nearly a dozen members of a group of 87 Christian and other religious-minority refugees from Iran -- who were marooned in Austria for 2 ½ years -- recently began enjoying a series of joyful reunions with family and friends in Los Angeles... While the first group is celebrating the sudden breakthrough in their cases, hard questions remain about the reasons behind the U.S. government’s decision to block these refugees from entering the United States after almost all previous applicants under the same program had been accepted.

U.S. citizens and family members had sponsored the refugees’ applications for asylum in the United States under the Lautenberg Amendment, a law Congress passed three decades ago to facilitate refugee admission of Jews fleeing the former Soviet Union. Lawmakers expanded the program in 2004 to include religious minorities persecuted in Iran.

The AMO P-3 crew maintained the initial radar contact of the surface target of interest (STOI), a 35-foot long panga with two out-board engines. The vessel was visibly riding low in the water although only three individuals could be seen onboard.

A Navy alert P-8 was launched to assist the U.S. Coast Guard (USCG) with the interdiction the following day.

USCG interdicted the panga and conducted a search for contraband. Three people claiming Ecuadorian nationality were detained and 719 kgs. of cocaine were seized.

Men who fail to register with the Selective Service System at their 18th birthday can be denied public benefits such as federal employment and student loans. Women cannot register for Selective Service.

The ruling comes as an 11-member commission is studying the future of the Selective Service System, including whether women should be included or whether there should continue to be draft registration at all. The U.S. has maintained an all-volunteer military after the draft was discontinued in 1973, but the Selective Service System was reactivated in 1980 as a contingency in case military conscription becomes necessary again.

Sheriff Chris Nocco said April Rodriguez worked for the department for four years. She committed suicide over the weekend.

Rodriguez is the fifth first responder in the Tampa Bay area to take their own life in recent months.

The State Duma (the lower chamber of Russia’s parliament) is about to complete and adopt new cryptocurrency legislation in March, according to Oleg Nikolaev, a representative of the State Duma Committee on Economic Policy, as cited by local news outlet Rambler. That the entire process is currently in the final stage and, if implemented, the new regulation will pave the way for tectonic shifts in the local cryptocurrency industry and promote blockchain development.

In a tweet, Mr. Trump wrote that should progress continue, the U.S. would plan a summit with President Xi Jinping of China to “conclude an agreement” that would settle a yearlong trade fight between the two nations.

Mr. Trump’s tweets didn’t specify how long the extension of a trade truce would last or any date for a potential summit.

U.S. tariffs on $200 billion of Chinese goods had been scheduled to rise to 25% from 10% at 12:01 a.m. Saturday.

"We want Pinterest to be an inspiring place for people, and there's nothing inspiring about misinformation," a Pinterest spokesperson said. "That's why we continue to work on new ways of keeping misleading content off our platform and out of our recommendations engine."

It's a 5 day article, but it's one that needs revisiting as it seems many platforms are starting to push for censorship of this subject.

The Chinese government has been alarmed about blockchain censorship resistance. Starting in February, a new regulation of the Cyberspace Administration of China requires users to provide real names as well as national ID card numbers or mobile phones to use blockchains. Law enforcement must be able to access data posted on the blockchain when necessary. Blockchain service providers are required to keep relevant records about transactions and other relevant information and report illegal use to authorities. They also need to prevent the production, duplication, publication and dissemination of contents that are banned by Chinese laws.

Above quote is brought to you by Glorious Emperor & Co. Even technologies that was developed specifically to be censorship-resistant, must be censored. Logic be damned.

What these observations make apparent is that Bill Gates’s vaccine philanthropy indeed represents a “miracle”—but the miracle’s beneficiaries are the corporations and stockholders who are laughing all the way to the bank, and certainly not the children and adults around the world who are bearing the brunt of unsafe vaccines. Dr. Arata Kochi, the WHO’s former director of malaria research, chose to call a spade a spade in 2008 when he described the Gates Foundation as a cartel that suppresses diversity of scientific opinion and is “accountable to no one other than itself.”

“The solar system can support a trillion humans, and then we'd have 1,000 Mozarts, and 1,000 Einsteins. Think how incredible and dynamic that civilization will be.”

"Files that could have documented the terrible deeds and named those responsible were destroyed, or not even created," said Marx, beginning a list of a number of practices that survivors have documented for years but church officials have long kept under secret.

"Instead of the perpetrators, the victims were regulated and silence imposed on them," the cardinal continued. "The stipulated procedures and processes for the prosecution of offences were deliberately not complied with, but instead cancelled or overridden."

Colorado Gov. Jared Polis (D) will sign a measure to award his state’s electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote, moving a country-wide coalition one step closer to circumventing the electoral college.

In an interview Sunday, Polis called the electoral college an “undemocratic relic” of the nation’s past, one he wants to see relegated to the dustbin of history.

Sounds like blockchain tech would be the right answer.

The bill, which passed its first reading in the state House by a slim margin despite it being destined for failure moments before the vote, would require all “able-bodied” Medicaid recipients who are not disabled or are caretakers for children under six years old to work at least 20 hours a week to receive benefits, the Casper Star Tribune reported.
[...]
The legislation already passed the state Senate and has to pass two more votes in the state House before it goes to Gov. Mark Gordon’s desk for approval. Gordon, a Republican, has opposed proposals expanding Medicaid, Wyoming News reported.

Andrew McCabe, the disgraced former acting FBI director, reveals in his new book that Robert Mueller temporarily left his cell phone behind after a meeting with President Trump in the Oval Office and that the phone “later had to be retrieved.”

McCabe did not explain why he included the detail in his book.

Bank of America Corp. plans to tell employees Monday that it will phase out the name Merrill Lynch from some of the bank’s businesses. Charlotte, N.C.-based Bank of America bought the storied Wall Street firm more than a decade ago.

Bank of America plans to remove the Merrill Lynch name from its trading and investment banking operations, executives said. It will also rebrand the bulk of its wealth management business as simply Merrill. Those are the key businesses that Bank of America acquired in the deal, when Merrill Lynch sold itself in a fire sale in the heat of the 2008 financial crisis.