January, 2020

In reaction to the charges, Greenwald told Gizmodo that "This denunciation — brought by the same prosecutor who just tried and failed to criminally prosecute the head of the Brazilian Bar Association for criticizing Minister Moro — is an obvious attempt to attack a free press in retaliation for the revelations we reported about Minister Moro and the Bolsonaro government."...

Since his marriage into the Warren family, Tyagi “has been involved in a series of curious—even troubling—business ventures around the world”... Tyagi runs Tricolor Films, and in 2008, produced a film called The Song of Sparrows, directed by Iranian filmmaker Majid Majidi...Tyagi was listed as the film’s sole producer on a New York Times page, in credits which have now been deleted. A look back at the page’s archive revealed that the film was funded by the Iranian government agency that is overseen by Iranian propagandists.

Mothers of students at Stillwater Christian School are appealing a lower court ruling that struck down a Montana state tax credit that could help students pay to attend private schools including religious ones. A 2015 Montana law provided people a tax credit of up to $150 for donations to groups that fund scholarships for private school tuition. State tax officials limited the program to non-religious schools in order to comport with the state constitution, which forbids public aid to any “church, sect or denomination.”

By rule, the trial will begin at 1 p.m. EST. Tuesday will be the first day House managers and the president's defense are physically in the Senate chamber... Once the Senate gets through the basics, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., will take the floor and formally offer his organizing resolution, which will lay out the wireframe and terms for the trial. Once McConnell introduces his proposal, the House managers and the president’s legal defense will debate the plan. Under McConnell's proposal, the prosecution will have 12 hours and the defense will have 12 hours... It will be up to Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., to offer a counterproposal...

In the nearly two decades since 19 al Qaeda terrorists crashed hijacked planes into the World Trade Center buildings, the side of the Pentagon, and a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, killing nearly 3,000 people, the five men believed to be responsible have yet to face a trial... Mohammed, dubbed “KSM" and described as “the principal architect of the 9/11 attacks” in the 9/11 Commission Report, was a close ally of al Qaeda founder Osama bin Laden and will be on trial alongside Walid bin Attash, Ramzi bin al Shibh, Ammar al Baluchi, and Mustafa al Hawsawi.

Avenatti’s attorney claimed in court papers filed Monday that he’s being held in solitary confinement in the “Special Housing Unit on the notorious 10-South of the MCC-New York.” His lawyers pleaded with a judge to release him to general population in the prison, arguing he could not prepare for his trial in those conditions.

The fate of a high-profile opposition party in Thailand will be decided on Tuesday when a court rules on whether to disband the Future Forward Party over accusations it seeks to overthrow the monarchy. The sedition complaint before the Constitutional Court also alleges that Future Forward is linked to the Illuminati...

While Pichai cited the possibility that the technology could be used for nefarious purposes as a reason for a moratorium, Smith said a ban was akin to using a meat cleaver instead of a scalpel to solve potential problems, the report said... Smith, who is also Microsoft’s chief legal officer, however cited the benefits of facial recognition technology in some instances such as NGOs using it to find missing children.
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Regulators are grappling with ways to govern AI, encouraging innovation while trying to curb potential misuse, as companies and law enforcement agencies increasingly adopt the technology. There was no question AI needs to be regulated, Pichai said, but rulemakers should tread carefully.

Clinton explained it’s not only Sanders himself, but the culture around him.

“It’s his leadership team. It’s his prominent supporters. It’s his online Bernie Bros and their relentless attacks on lots of his competitors, particularly the women,” she said in the interview. “And I really hope people are paying attention to that because it should be worrisome that he has permitted this culture — not only permitted, [he] seems to really be very much supporting it.”

In a court-filed letter on the eve of President Donald Trump's impeachment trial in the Senate, a lawyer for the indicted Soviet-born defendant cited Trump's "multiple references" to Barr in the matter at the heart of that case — the July phone call in which Trump asked Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate the family of former vice president Joe Biden, a rival for this year's presidential election.

Using a technique akin to echolocation, scientists were able to map the region around a distant black hole’s event horizon in unprecedented detail... The black hole coming into focus is parked in the middle of a galaxy called IRAS 13224-3809, which sits about a billion light-years away. The supermassive object is surrounded by a swirling disk of million-degree matter and is sheathed by an x-ray corona with a temperature exceeding a billion degrees.

The mysterious coronavirus that has killed at least four people and sickened more than 200 in China is capable of spreading from person to person, a prominent Chinese scientist said on Monday, adding to fears of a broader epidemic... Fifteen medical professionals have been affected, with one critically ill, according to a report from China’s state news agency Xinhua... Health authorities around the world have begun to step up screening of travellers arriving from China. Two cases have already been identified in Thailand, one in Japan and one in South Korea, while the Philippines reported on Tuesday its first suspected case.

The $2 billion spending number — which hasn’t been reported – comes amid various press accounts that have focused on just how much Bloomberg is spending and will spend to either snare the nomination and become president or help a fellow Democrat win in November. Last week, The New York Times reported that Bloomberg has said he could spend $1 billion, though the piece suggested that Bloomberg hasn’t ruled out spending even more.

The analysis, which is published in the Journal of Medical Ethics, claims that opt-in post-death donations could be a "morally permissible" way of increasing the stocks available... Sperm can be collected after death either through electrical stimulation of the prostate gland or surgery, and can then be frozen. Evidence suggests that sperm harvested from men who have died can still result in viable pregnancies and healthy children, even when retrieved up to 48 hours after death has occurred.

The new face of Islamic State has been unmasked by intelligence agencies, according to reports. Amir Mohammed Abdul Rahman al-Mawli al-Salbi has been leading ISIS since Abu Bakr al-Bagdhadi died last October during a raid on a Syrian hideout by US special forces. The Guardian broke the news on Tuesday, citing sources inside two intelligence services...

On January 20, 2020, her mother, Susan Bro, told CNN that she grew up with guns and is “a gun owner” now. She understands efforts to push “common-sense gun measures” but does not agree with “extreme measures.”

As for the “extreme measures,” she acknowledged those are things over which people “need to be able to talk to their representatives.”...

With the stock market at record highs, two trade deals announced and the possibility that Mr. Trump may be in office for another four years, there is an increasing sense that he will be accepted, if not embraced (although some attendees may roll their eyes behind his back) when he arrives on Tuesday, even as he faces an impeachment trial. As anathema as it may be to some participants, Mr. Trump may be the new Davos Man.