August, 2019

The United States Catholic bishops issued a new statement Sunday after the latest shooting incident in Dayton, Ohio, denouncing an “epidemic against life” and extending their condolences to victims’ families and friends...

“The Conference has long advocated for responsible gun laws and increased resources for addressing the root causes of violence,” it reads. “We also call upon the President and Congress to set aside political interests and find ways to better protect innocent life.”...

The Turkish Petroleum Corporation (TPAO) has extensive and long-term plans in the Eastern Mediterranean that do not only include Cyprus’ exclusive economic zone (EEZ), but also areas on the edge of the Greek continental shelf...

A 23-year-old woman had to receive stitches after she was bitten on her left hand and wrist at New Smyrna Beach, on Florida's Atlantic coast, according to authorities. Then, as the woman was leaving the scene in the ambulance, a 21-year-old male surfer reported being bitten on one of his feet, suffering several minor cuts...

Tip: Don't go into a the ocean where sharks are known to breed - especially when it is dubbed shark attack capital of the world...

The Ohio gunman described himself on social media as a pro-Satan “leftist” who wanted Joe Biden’s generation to die off, hated President Trump and law enforcement, and hoped to vote for Sen. Elizabeth Warren for president... I want socialism, and i’ll not wait for the idiots to finally come round to understanding,” he wrote in one tweet, according to Heavy.com...

8chan is among the more than 19 million Internet properties that use Cloudflare's service. We just sent notice that we are terminating 8chan as a customer effective at midnight tonight Pacific Time. The rationale is simple: they have proven themselves to be lawless and that lawlessness has caused multiple tragic deaths. Even if 8chan may not have violated the letter of the law in refusing to moderate their hate-filled community, they have created an environment that revels in violating its spirit...

I have little doubt we'll see the same happen with 8chan. While removing 8chan from our network takes heat off of us, it does nothing to address why hateful sites fester online. It does nothing to address why mass shootings occur. It does nothing to address why portions of the population feel so disenchanted they turn to hate. In taking this action we've solved our own problem, but we haven't solved the Internet's.

8Chans response:

All our domains have been removed from cloudflare, so we will be moving to another service asap. Please excuse any downtime as we migrate to the new service.

— Ron (@CodeMonkeyZ) August 5, 2019

"The FBI says they're 'going dark.' Well yeah, because they've been staring at the sun."

Proposals from interested vendors are due later this month...

The inquiry centers on two political action committees founded by Saikat Chakrabarti, the top aide who quit along with Ocasio-Cortez spokesman Corbin Trent, the sources said. Trent left to join the congresswoman’s 2020 re-election campaign... The two PACs being probed, Brand New Congress and Justice Democrats, were both set up by Chakrabarti to support progressive candidates across the country. But they funneled more than $1 million in political donations into two private companies that Chakrabarti also incorporated and controlled, according to Federal Election Commission filings...

The number of people employed in the United States hit a record 157,288,000 in July, according to the employment report released today by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

That was up 283,000 from the 157,005,000 employed in June...

...prison officials said the nervousness displayed by Clauvino da Silva, also known as "Shorty," as he tried to leave the prison in the western part of Rio de Janeiro dressed as a woman gave him away...

Egypt is restoring one of King Tutankhamen’s coffins for the first time since its discovery in 1922, part of the preparations for next year’s opening of the country’s lavish new museum overlooking the Pyramids of Giza, where the relics from the boy king’s tomb are expected to be the biggest draw.
Restorers at the laboratory for wooden objects at the Grand Egyptian Museum have begun fumigating the gilded coffin, after it was carefully moved from Tutankhamen’s tomb in Luxor’s Valley of the Kings in southern Egypt amid tight security last month.

The suspect, identified as Wayne Lee Padgett, 31, allegedly called and threatened to “shoot up” the Gibsonton store Sunday afternoon, the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office said in confirming the arrest... Within an hour, law enforcement determined the threat was not credible and the store was reopened at 3:30 p.m. Hillsborough County Sheriff Chad Chronister said police were able to trace the threatening call hours later to Padgett, whose mother reportedly worked at the Walmart location... Padgett was charged with false report of using a firearm in a violent manner, which is a felony offense.

In recent months, 8chan has become a go-to resource for violent extremists. At least three mass shootings this year... Mr. Brennan started the online message board as a free speech utopia. But now, 8chan is known as something else: a megaphone for mass shooters, and a recruiting platform for violent white nationalists.
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“Anonymity should not be taken away from everyone just because of a few bad apples,” he told Ars Technica, the technology website, in a 2015 interview. But more recently, Mr. Brennan, who has begun attending a Baptist church, has tried to persuade Mr. Watkins to shut down the site. He and Mr. Watkins live near each other in the Philippines... Mr. Brennan is hopeful that sustained pressure on Mr. Watkins and his son will get them to change their minds eventually, and take down 8chan for good. “How long are they just going to allow this to go on?” he asked...

Despite The FBI having not publicly released the names or nationalities of the 20 people killed Saturday at a shopping complex in El Paso, Mexican officials have claimed that nine Mexicans were wounded in the shooting, prompting Mexico’s ambassador to Washington, Martha Bárcena, to tweet:

The intentionality of the attack against the Mexicans and the Latino community in El Paso is frightening. NO to hate speech. NO to xenophobic discourse. @ADL

— Martha Bárcena. (@Martha_Barcena) August 4, 2019

This was followed by Mexico President Andrés Manuel López Obrador commenting that the number of Mexicans killed in the shooting in the border city of El Paso, Texas, has risen to seven, proclaiming that says that:

...the events in Texas reaffirm his conviction that "social problems shouldn't be confronted with the use of force and by inciting hate."

If they are really concerned, something surely can be arranged to send them all back to safety in Mexico...

...the president ignored shouted questions about whether the El Paso shooter's anti-immigrant manifesto shared similarities with his rhetoric and said the shootings are part of “a mental illness problem.”... He added that "perhaps" more needs to be done with respect to gun control...

In March, the Food and Drug Administration approved esketamine, a drug that produces psychedelic effects, to treat depression—the first psychedelic ever to clear that bar. Meanwhile the FDA has granted "breakthrough therapy" status—a designation that enables fast-tracked research—to study MDMA (also called "ecstasy") as a treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder and psilocybin as a treatment for major depression.

While these and other psychedelic drugs show promise as treatments for specific illnesses, FDA approval means doctors could also prescribe them for other, "off-label" purposes—including enhancing the quality of life of people who do not suffer from any disorder.
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Similarly, while psilocybin has shown potential as a treatment for depression and anxiety, physicians could also prescribe the drug to promote the well-being of healthy individuals...