June 22nd, 2019

... found guilty of carrying out a scheme where they would trade cash for food stamp benefits handed out through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) between April 2010 and May 2018... Federal investigators say that out of the 195,000 SNAP transactions completed at the store over eight years, two-thirds of them were fraudulent.

According to projections from Japan’s National Institute of Population and Social Security Research, the country’s population of about 127 million people could fall below 100 million by 2049 and reach 82 million by 2065. The Institute’s most optimistic projections put the country’s population at about 95 million by 2065... In 2017, it announced it would invest 2 trillion yen ($18.47 billion) into a package of subsidies for elderly care and for childcare and education. State-approved preschool is now free for children between three and five years old, and low-income households with children below that age get free childcare. And since 2013, municipalities have created more than 500,000 new public day care slots. Some Japanese towns and municipalities have gone to even greater lengths. According to The Economist, the Japanese town of Nagicho managed to increase its fertility rate from 1.4 to about 1.9 in 2017 by offering new moms a “gift” of 300,000 yen ($2,785), as well as subsidies for children’s care, housing, health and education.

My tests of Chrome vs. Firefox unearthed a personal data caper of absurd proportions. In a week of Web surfing on my desktop, I discovered 11,189 requests for tracker “cookies” that Chrome would have ushered right onto my computer, but were automatically blocked by Firefox. These little files are the hooks that data firms, including Google itself, use to follow what websites you visit so they can build profiles of your interests, income and personality. Chrome welcomed trackers even at websites you’d think would be private... And that’s not the half of it...

Uber and Lyft, who would each be impacted by the bill in a big way, sent emails to drivers over the weekend with the goal of getting them fired up about the effect the bill would have on their flexibility and ability to set their own schedules... In exchange for leaving drivers’ classification status the way it is, the ride-sharing companies vowed to set a minimum pay rate for drivers while they are picking up and dropping off passengers, create a fund for perks like paid time off, and create an association for drivers to advocate for additional improvements.

Quantum computers, which make calculations with entangled particles, or qubits, are poised to overtake their conventional counterparts very, very fast. And it's all captured by a new law of computing, known as Neven's Law...

So, what exactly is Neven's Law? Named after Hartmut Neven, the director of the Quantum Artificial Intelligence Lab at Google who first noticed the phenomenon, the law dictates how quickly quantum processors are improving, or getting faster at processing calculations, relative to regular computers.

And it turns out, they're gaining on ordinary computers at a spookily fast, "doubly exponential rate."...

343 respondents, mostly White (89%), males (78%), in the USA (60%) completed the survey... Although results cannot demonstrate causality, they suggest that naturalistic psychedelic use may lead to cessation or reduction in problematic alcohol use, supporting further investigation of psychedelic-assisted treatment for AUD...

In the lawsuit, Huawei said that it shipped telecommunications equipment from China, including a computer server and Ethernet switch, to a testing laboratory in California. After the testing was done, the equipment was shipped back to China. No application for a license was made because none was needed, the lawsuit claims. But the equipment was seized in Alaska by the U.S. government, and no decision has been made about whether a license is required to ship it, the filing said.

Nine people died in a plane crash in Hawaii on Friday, the Hawaii Department of Transportation said. The twin-engine King Air plane went down near Dillingham Airfield. There appeared to be no survivors, it said in a statement. The cause of the crash was not immediately clear.

NASA has released a photo taken by its Curiosity rover that shows a mysterious, unexplained white light on Mars.

At the request of Democrats, I have delayed the Illegal Immigration Removal Process (Deportation) for two weeks to see if the Democrats and Republicans can get together and work out a solution to the Asylum and Loophole problems at the Southern Border. If not, Deportations start!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 22, 2019

Back in March, a Uganda-based gold refinery was caught importing a massive 7.4 million tons of gold under questionable circumstances.

At the time, no one could prove definitively that it was Venezuelan gold from the Maduro regime, and half of it had already been lost to export.

Now, a Wall Street Journal investigation has definitively exposed the scheme,

...the $300 million in gold that landed in Uganda in March was transported to Uganda via Russian charter jets...

The El Camino Real Bell was removed from the University of California Santa Cruz after administrators had several discussions with members of the Amah Mutsun Tribal Band and other community members who felt that the bell marker glorified a period of time when Spanish missionaries dehumanized their ancestors and culture and enslaved those who converted to Christianity. Vice Chancellor of Business and Administrative Services Sarah Latham said the school moved forward with the removal "in support of efforts to be more inclusive.”

Jalal Hajizavar, who left his post in the aerospace organization nine years ago, was found guilty in the military court after Iranian investigators found incriminating documents and spying materials in his home, according to the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting news agency on Saturday. The IRIB agency said Hajizavar was executed at Rajai Shahr prison in Karaj west of Tehran, the country’s capital. Further details were not immediately provided.

• Amazon was granted a patent earlier this month for surveillance drones.
• The patent describes how the drones could be primarily used for delivery, but could be asked by customers to check up on their properties.
• Amazon unveiled its new delivery drone earlier this month, and said it expects deliveries to commence "within months."
• Amazon told Business Insider that the "patent clearly states that it would be an opt-in service available to customers who authorize monitoring of their home."

Chronic wasting disease (CWD) is similar to mad cow disease (formally known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy or BSE). It infects deer, elk, and moose and it's spread by a protein — called a prion — which has the unusual ability to spread between animals causing a deadly wasting disease...

"I will tell you, something that attacks your brain, I will never take that chance to eat an animal that can be contaminated, or maybe contaminated. I will never try that."

Health Canada recommends that people avoid eating meat from animals known to be infected with the prion protein. There are precautions for hunters, too. They're encouraged, when handling carcasses, to have those animals tested before eating the meat...

"I think the Canadian consumer should be very worried," Cashman said.

The Oregon Capitol will be closed Saturday due to a “possible militia threat” from right-wing protesters as a walkout by Republican lawmakers over landmark climate change legislation drags on. Republican state senators fled the Legislature — and some, the state — earlier this week to deny the majority Democrats enough votes to take up the climate bill, which would dramatically reduce fossil fuel emissions by 2050... Gov. Kate Brown then dispatched the state police to round up the rogue lawmakers, but none appeared in the Capitol on Friday... Right-wing groups posted their support for the GOP lawmakers Friday on social media — in one instance offering to provide escorts to them should the state police come for them. A group of local Republicans were set to protest inside the Capitol on Saturday when lawmakers were present, and anti-government groups threatened to join, prompting the statehouse shutdown.

US Cyber Command on Thursday launched an operation against an Iranian spy group, despite President Donald Trump's last-minute scrapping of a direct military strike, former intelligence officials said in a Yahoo News report. The Iranian group is believed to have supported the limpet mine attacks against two tanker ships earlier last week, which resulted in the US increasing its military posture against the country. The group reportedly tracked and targeted both military and civilian vessels sailing through the Strait of Hormuz.

While the pope has emerged as a leading champion for refugees and migrants around the world, anti-immigration politicians with a populist appeal have found increasing support among once-powerful conservative Catholic figures who have been sidelined within the church by Francis.

Cardinal Burke and his fellow ultraconservative prelates are working to extend ecclesiastical cover to nationalist politicians by hailing them as champions for Western Christianity and traditional values in the face of what they suggest is a Muslim migrant invasion...