- "The UK Has Gone Mad" – Brits' Disenchantment With Politics Is Soaring
The rest of the world is watching in disbelief…
In the New York Times Thomas L. Friedman wrote “If you can’t take a joke you shouldn’t come to London right now because there is political farce everywhere. In truth though it’s not very funny, it’s actually tragic… What we’re seeing is a country that’s determined to commit economic suicide but can’t even agree on how to kill itself.”
He went on to say we were led by “a ship of fools” unwilling to “compromise with one another and with reality… an epic failure of political leadership,” scary stuff “but you can’t fix stupid.”
In the Washington Post Fareed Zakaria wrote “Brexit will mark the end of Britain’s role as a great power. Britain famous for its prudence, propriety and punctuality is suddenly looking like a banana republic.”
He goes on to warn that the consequences of a no-deal Brexit could mean the beginning of the end of “the West as a political and strategic entity.”
Underlining the damage that the Brexit process is doing to faith in politics in the UK, Statista’s Martin Armstrong notes that the Hansard Society’s annual Audit of Political Engagement has revealed a rate of disenchantment with the system unprecedented in recent years, surpassing even the fallout from the MP expenses scandal.
You will find more infographics at Statista
When asked their opinion on the present system of governing Britain, 37 percent of respondents said they think it needs ‘a great deal of improvement’ – up from 29 percent last year and a whole 19 points higher than the first survey published in 2004.
- EU And China Sign A Mandate For Trade Heaven
Authored by Pepe Escobar via The Asia Times,
Beijing promises an investment deal by next year, to curb industrial subsidies and the need for tech transfers, while the EU promises its own transport network…
Sparks did fly in Brussels, but in the end the European Union and China managed to come up with an important joint statement at their summit this week, signed by Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker and head of the European Council, Donald Tusk.
In theory, there’s agreement on three quite sensitive fronts: a complex, wide-ranging EU-China investment deal to be signed “by the end of next year, or earlier”, according to Li; Beijing to increasingly commit to erasing industrial subsidies and the obligation of technological transfers; and a substantial opening-up of the Chinese market to EU companies.
The EU is the largest combined market in the world and China’s top partner in trade, while China is the EU’s second largest trading partner. So, the EU-China summit on Tuesday was the real deal, unlike the endless Brexit soap opera.
Departing from concentric circles of posturing, the EU did not even blast China as a “systemic rival” – following the recent report EU-China: A Strategic Outlook. And there were no accusations of “unfair” trade hurled at Beijing.
Crucially, Brussels and Beijing seem to be finally engaging in building some sort of synergy between the New Silk Roads, or Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), and something only Eurocrats know actually exists – the EU Connecting Europe and Asia project, which in theory should advance in conjunction with the Trans-European Transport Network – a rail, road and air connectivity drive.
Diplomats in Brussels said off-the-record that the run-up towards this entente cordiale was as bumpy as a trail in the Tibetan plateau. EU negotiators did try to walk away from the table without even talking to their Chinese counterparts, over Beijing’s much promised, and always delayed “market reforms”.
It’s as if the EU – in practice, the leading Franco-German duo – was trying to pull a Trump, employing hardcore pressure to extract concessions. It worked.
Before the summit, while the war of the sherpas was raging, with revision piling upon revision, Zhang Ming, China’s ambassador to the EU and its leading negotiator, did his best to dismiss the notion of China as a “systemic rival”. “In Chinese culture, rivals are bound to seek superiority over the other side,” he was quoted as saying.
Brussels demanded from the start that all rewrites to their agreement should be tacitly approved by the leadership in Beijing – which took no time to understand the powerful geoeconomic ramifications of a positive outlook, in contrast with the trade war still unresolved with the US. And that led to the breakthrough that finally made the EU swoon, a real-life timetable for those elusive Chinese “reforms”.
The joint statement reads in fact like a rose garden: “The high level of ambition will be reflected in substantially improved market access [and] the elimination of discriminatory requirements and practices affecting foreign investors.” The devil, of course, is in the details.
All the way to the 16+1
From Beijing’s perspective, this spectacular trade and diplomatic victory smoothes the path towards the China and Central and Eastern Europe 16+1 summit in Dubrovnik on Friday. Of the European 16, no less than 11 are EU member states, while five are Western Balkans members.
Even as Li emphasizes at every turn Beijing’s firm interest in EU unity, one has to marvel at the Sun Tzu maneuver at the heart of the Chinese approach. No wonder some EU players incessantly carp at China’s divide-and-rule tactics.
Take for instance the Croatian angle. Croatia will sign a memorandum of understanding with Huawei, while the Croatian Railway Infrastructure and China Railway Eryuan Engineering Group will agree to set up a transportation corridor. Translation: smoother trade between Central Europe and ports in the Mediterranean, with China fast interlinking Greece, Italy and Croatia.
Slowly but surely, EU decisions are fast becoming integrated with the 16+1. Brussels Eurocrats actually examined the draft of deals that will be signed at the 16+1 summit in Dubrovnik. Unlike France, for instance, most of the 16+1 are enthusiastic participants in BRI – which, not by accident, is the star of the show, especially after Italy signed a memorandum of understanding to join New Silk Road projects last month.
Even as the EU lingers at designing what it still does not have – a comprehensive industrial policy – Beijing hits all the necessary buttons: free trade, multilateralism, globalization 2.0 – or even 3.0 or 4.0. Beijing essentially does not fear competing with EU firms.
After all, Beijing’s drive is to configure national champions in virtually every industrial and post-industrial sector, including preeminence in 5G and AI. The crux of the Chinese strategy is not the US but a close relationship with Europe, where opportunities to acquire first-class technology and first-class education are immense. Not to mention that Europe is BRI’s privileged terminal.
Perception is reality. There’s no doubt the Beijing leadership has understood that this EU-China agreement goes a long way to show, especially to its leaders, that they are dealing with a responsible emerging superpower. The contrast with the acrimony and intimidation tactics displayed throughout the US trade war could not be sharper.
Remember the deluge
At this stage, a flashback may be enlightening to put all that’s going on in perspective.
All the major religions of the book – Judaism, Christianity and Islam – share the same fable, according to which Noah, after the Deluge, divided the earth between his three sons. Shem got “Asia”, the lands considered the oldest, Ham got Africa, and Japheth got Europe.
It was only in the 18th century Europe that a noxious Christian equation went into full effect, articulating the curse of Ham, the color of a man’s skin, ethnic descent and slavery. That’s how the West justified racial slavery and the pillage of Africa – reduced to the status of a non-civilized space.
At the same time, under European (the land of Japheth) guidance, America was promoted as a land of colonization, and Asia (the land of Shem), as a land of economic exploitation. Judeo-Christian European elites had to admit the ancient brilliance of those Asian civilizations – Mesopotamia, India, China – but in the end they no more than integrated Asia in a new Orientalist narrative.
In parallel, based on the allegedly non-shameful character of Shem’s descendants, these elites forged a relatively common Semitic origin. And attributing Ham’s curse to a Muslim source, which for its part evoked Jewish sources, Christianity exonerated itself. The colonial, imperialist European project was on a roll.
But now China is back, for real, and for good, after a short historical interval. And the Chinese know all there is to know about European colonialism. Don’t expect Eurocrats fingering color-coded folders to have such long memories. But they certainly don’t need to study Admiral Zheng He’s travels to see which way the wind is blowing.
- Dutch F-16 Damaged After Own Bullet Strikes Fuselage
A Royal Netherlands Air Force F-16 Fighting Falcon was severely damaged during a live-fire training mission at Vliehors Shooting Range in the Netherlands, earlier this year, reported The Military Times.
Dutch State media released a photo of the damaged aircraft, showing at least one round ripping through the plane’s exterior skin. The fighter jet reportedly had engine damage from the debris. Although details behind the incident have been kept secret, Dutch media outlets have described the mishap as a case of the “plane shooting itself.”
The F-16’s armament includes a General Electric M61A1 Vulcan, a 6-barrel 20mm cannon. It fires standard M50 ammunition at 6,000 rounds per minute.
The reported muzzle velocity of the M61A1 Vulcan is approximately 3,450 feet per second, while the maximum speed of the F-16 is 1,500 mph or 2,200 feet per second. The Aviationist said, “that makes the likelihood of an F-16 actually catching its own bullets in flight largely impossible.” Rather it was a case of ricocheting bullets.
Nevertheless, “this is a serious incident,” Wim Bagerbos, inspector general at the Netherlands Department of Defense, told Dutch media, adding that “we, therefore, want to fully investigate what happened and how we would be able to avoid this in future.”
Some aviation blogs are comparing the Dutch incident to a 1965 incident when a Grumman F-11 Tiger was damaged when it started a 20 degrees nose-down dive firing 20mm cannons, then collided with the rounds in midflight, and shortly after crashed.
The American aerospace industry has entered into a crisis as of late. Boeing, for instance, was slammed with a new lawsuit Wednseday, as investors accused the company of defrauding shareholders by covering up safety deficiencies in its 737 MAX planes before the two deadly crashes.
On Tuesday, a Japanese Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II vanished off the radar. Japan’s defense ministry announced Wednesday that a U.S. guided-missile destroyer recovered parts of the aircraft in the Pacific Ocean near Misawa airbase.
Dutch media said the investigation into the incident “is now in full swing.” It’s hard to tell exactly what happened, due to limited information released by authorities, but it could be likely that a rare event occurred where the plane shot itself – not seen in over 5 decades.
- The Day America Died
Authored by Raul Ilargi Meijer via The Automatic Earth blog,
47 years ago in American Pie, Don McLean talked about The Day The Music Died. Or of course the music didn’t really die, but at the same time it did. “The three mean I admired most, the father, son and the holy ghost, they caught the last train for the coast, the day the music died.”
Back then you could still have claimed the country merely lost its innocence. And you could have said the same in 1861 or 1914 or 1941. Today, not to take anything away from music, or the song, something much bigger died. America itself died, not just its music or innocence. America didn’t just lose its innocence, it pled guilty.
No doubt most of you would proclaim that’s a gross exaggeration, and an insane hyperbole, but you would all be wrong, sorry. There’s no way back this time.
America, the United States, with all its initial prejudice and lethal screw-ups, was founded as a place where people could direct their own lives without having to fear any other party, let alone a government, that would stand in their way while they did it. And a big part of not having to fear one’s government is not having to fear that government purposely lying to its citizens. The Founding Fathers, for all their faults, got that right. And today erases all of that in one fell swoop.
That is what died today.
Or, you know, it may have died much earlier, and a thousand times before as well, but with the arrest in London of Julian Assange, an Australian citizen wanted by the US Deep State, a myriad of strands connecting, and connected to a bloated dying corpse came together. And now we know there is no salvation possible. Today made it all terminal. America is no more. Or it is no longer what they tell you it stands for, whichever comes first.
You will find more infographics at Statista
And it’s not just America, mind you. ‘The UK is a serious country’, PM Theresa May said today when addressing Brexit. No it’s not, Theresa, it’s a banana republic hopelessly stuck in a spaghetti western and it no longer knows the rule of law. It sells people to the highest bidder in a meat market, be they Windrush, refugees from her Majesty’s wars in Libya, or just white and poor English, or Julian Assange.
The UK is a parody on a country, it’s a sordid piece of third rate slapstick. It kills people while trying to maintain the image of being a serious country. You know, whatever that is?! The British judge Assange faced today was bleeding mocking him, the arguably greatest journalist of this century and millennium. A serious country?
Julian Assange Branded ‘Narcissist’ By Judge As He Faces US Extradition
Julian Assange has been branded a “narcissist” by a judge as he faces both a UK prison sentence and being extradited to the US. The Metropolitan Police said the Australian hacker was initially detained at the Ecuadorian embassy for failing to surrender to court. He had been summoned in 2012 over an alleged rape in Sweden, where authorities are now considering reopening their investigation into those allegations.After arriving at a London police station on Thursday morning, the 47-year-old was additionally arrested on behalf of the US under an extradition warrant.
Mr Assange was taken to Westminster Magistrates’ Court and found guilty of breaching bail hours later. He faces a jail sentence of up to a year. He denied the offence, with lawyers arguing that he had a “reasonable excuse” could not expect a fair trial in the UK as its purpose was to “secure his delivery” to the US. District Judge Michael Snow described the defence as “laughable”, adding: “Mr Assange’s behaviour is that of a narcissist who cannot get beyond his own selfish interests. He hasn’t come close to establishing ‘reasonable excuse’.” He remanded Mr Assange in custody ahead of a future sentencing hearing at Southwark Crown Court.
And where was opposition Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn when this all went on? Haven’t seen him, other then in the afternoon when he was ‘discussing’ Brexit details with May in Parliament on day 1021 since the Brexit referendum, while he should have been out in the street denouncing May and protecting Assange at the loudest voice there is.
Screw you, Jeremy, you’re a pathetic loser. No matter what else you do, there are times when you have to stand up and be counted. You were nowhere to be seen, you coward. Screw you again. And all of your family. A curse on y’all. You had a chance to be counted, and you whimped out so enormously only an elephant could whimp out more. Today was your day, and you were a no-show, again.
But don‘t you mind me, I’m not British and I’m not one of those ass-hat followers of you. I’m just someone calling you a coward. So, you know, your campaign team can keep polling and intervene as soon as they see too many ass-hats become concerned about Assange. Until then, who cares, it’s all in the numbers. It’s not as if you have any principles anyway. If you can screw up Brexit there’s no reason why you couldn’t screw up Assange’s situation as well.
As for the Donald, man, it’s just 6 days ago that I issued a well-meant warning to you, to tell you that those who are after Assange are the same people who are after you.
And now you’ve given those very people a huge stage to execute their anti-Assange and thereby their anti-Trump messages from. Mr. Trump, you’re helping Brennan and Clapper and Comey and their ilk persecute the only person who could ever stand up to them. And who did that better than you ever did. Because he’s so much smarter.
And where are all the media? Where are all the other governments? Where is the European Union? Where is Australia? Yes, Ecuador took away Assange’s citizenship too today, like that’s a piece of candy or something. Asylum, citizenship, they can be bought and sold whenever a bell tolls.
Why do we have international law anyway if nobody abides by any of it? You can’t just grant someone asylum, and then a citizenship, and then rescind it when you like on a rainy morning when your medication runs out or they’re on to you for blatant fraud, Lenin Moreno. Do that and all international law becomes null and void. Hereby.
Pardon me, I’ve just been, like hopefully many people are, so sad and angry and despondent today, all day. The entire world watched the music die today, and never realized it, and a man much smarter and braver and real than any of us is out there paying for our sins, and we have no media left to tell us an honest story about it, and George Orwell is laughing somewhere out there.
And I am still stupid enough to think that we can do better.
- Monkeys Injected With Human Brain Genes – And It Made Them Smarter
Scientists in southern China report that after creating several “transgenic macaque monkeys” which contained extra copies of a human gene linked to brain development, the monkeys did better on a memory test, exhibited better short term memory, and had faster reaction times vs. their non-altered simian counterparts. What’s more, the monkeys’ brains took longer to develop, similar to that of a human child.
The gene, MCPH1, was successfully introduced to five out of 11 monkey embryos using “lentivirus transfection” – in which genetic material effectively hitches a ride on an injected virus. A derivation of the gene called haplogroup D appeared around 37,000 years ago across the globe except for Sub-Saharan Africa.
Anatomically modern humans and Neanderthals shared a long period of coexistence, from as early as 130,000 years ago in the Middle East to as late as 35,000 years ago in Europe, consistent with the estimated introgression time of the microcephalin D allele at or sometime before ≈37,000 years ago. Furthermore, the worldwide frequency distribution of the D allele, exceptionally high outside of Africa but low in sub-Saharan Africa, suggests, but does not necessitate, admixture with an archaic Eurasian population. -via ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
“This was the first attempt to understand the evolution of human cognition using a transgenic monkey model,” said lead geneticist Bing Su of the Kunming Institute of Zoology.
The experiments, described on March 27 in a Beijing journal, National Science Review, and first reported by Chinese media, remain far from pinpointing the secrets of the human mind or leading to an uprising of brainy primates.
Instead, several Western scientists, including one who collaborated on the effort, called the experiments reckless and said they questioned the ethics of genetically modifying primates, an area where China has seized a technological edge. –MIT Technology Review
“The use of transgenic monkeys to study human genes linked to brain evolution is a very risky road to take,” said University of Colorado geneticist James Sikela, who conducts comparative studies on primates. He is concerned that the research will open the door to more extreme modifications.
“It is a classic slippery slope issue and one that we can expect to recur as this type of research is pursued,” added Sikela.
Research using primates is increasingly difficult in Europe and the US, but China has rushed to apply the latest high-tech DNA tools to the animals. The country was first to create monkeys altered with the gene-editing tool CRISPR, and this January a Chinese institute announced it had produced a half-dozen clones of a monkey with a severe mental disturbance. –MIT Technology Review
“It is troubling that the field is steamrolling along in this manner,” says Sikela.
Scientists have long sought the genes which, according to evolutionary theory, caused human brains to become intelligent while those of chimpanzees and other simians were left behind despite our genes sharing similarities of around 98%. According to Sikela, the objective behind the experiment is to locate “the jewels of our genome,” or the DNA which makes humans unique.
One popular candidate gene known as FOXP2 – the “language gene” – has been potentially linked to human speech. The MIT Review notes that a British family whose members inherited an abnormal version had difficulty speaking.
Meanwhile, Bing Su focused on a different gene – MCPH1 – as babies borh with damaged versions of the gene typically have tiny heads.
Judging by their experiments, the Chinese team did expect that their transgenic monkeys could end up with increased intelligence and brain size. That is why they put the creatures inside MRI machines to measure their white matter and gave them computerized memory tests. According to their report, the transgenic monkeys didn’t have larger brains, but they did better on a short-term memory quiz, a finding the team considers remarkable. –MIT Technology Review
Some aren’t so convinced
Su’s research has its detractors within the scientific community. One – computer scientist Martin Styner of the University of North Carolina, who actually participated in the study by training Chinese students to extract brain volume data from MRI images (and considered removing his name from the paper), said “There are a bunch of aspects of this study that you could not do in the US,” adding “It raised issues about the type of research and whether the animals were properly cared for.”
The next genetic target of Su’s research? SRGAP2C – a DNA variant which arose over two million years ago dubbed the “humanity switch” and “missing genetic link” for its potential ties to human intelligence.
- Oregon's SB-978 Gun Control Bill Is So Hysterically Restrictive That Pepper Spray Is A Felony
Authored by Daisy Luther via The Organic Prepper blog,
A new gun control bill introduced in the Oregon State Legislature added 45 pages of draconian amendments the night before the vote. SB978 passed the Judiciary Committee yesterday and now heads to the Oregon Senate.
It’s a good thing that some parts of this state have vowed to be 2A sanctuaries because Oregonians are going to need them. If the gun owners – and even pepper spray owners – in other parts of the state hope to defend themselves, they could be facing a vast new array of felony charges.
The battle for the right to bear arms is rapidly spreading across the country. In February, the House of Representatives passed two sweeping national bills. New Mexico has passed 6 outrageous new laws that sheriffs are refusing to enforce, and sheriffs in Washington state are also rebelling. On the other stand, two states have introduced invasive laws requiring would-be gun owners to hand over access to years of personal social media.
What’s in the unconstitutional bill, you ask?
Well, let’s get started.
Raising the minimum age
They want to raise the minimum age to buy a gun to 21 in certain cases.
The following may establish a minimum age of 18,19, 20 or 21 years for the purchase of firearms, firearm accessories, firearm components, ammunition or ammunition components, or for the repair or service of a firearm:
“(a) A person transferring a firearm, a firearm accessory, a firearm component, ammunition or an ammunition component at a gun show;
“(b) A gun dealer; or
“(c) A business engaged in repairing or servicing a firearm
Keeping your gun locked up
Residents will be required to keep their guns locked up at all times that they are not being carried. These rules will render guns all but useless in the event a person needs to access them to protect themselves and their family.
A person who owns or possesses a firearm shall, at all times that the firearm is not carried by or under the control of the person or an authorized person, secure the firearm:
“(A) With an engaged trigger lock or cable lock that meets or exceeds the minimum specifications established by the Oregon Health Authority under section 10 of this 2019 Act;
“(B) In a locked container, equipped with a tamper-resistant lock, that meets or exceeds the minimum specifications established by the Oregon Health Authority under section 10 of this 2019 Act; or
“(C) In a gun room.
“(b) For purposes of paragraph (a) of this subsection, a firearm is not secured if a key, combination or other means of opening a lock or container is readily available to a person the owner or possessor has not authorized to carry or control the firearm.
Failure to follow these rules is a Class C Felony. Also, don’t get excited about the phrase “gun room” because your bedroom doesn’t count.
‘Gun room’ means an area within a building enclosed by walls, a floor and a ceiling, including a closet, that has all entrances secured by a tamper-resistant lock, that is kept locked at all times when unoccupied and that is used for:
“(a) The storage of firearms, ammunition, components of firearms or ammunition, or equipment for firearm-related activities including but not limited to reloading ammunition, gunsmithing and firearm cleaning and maintenance; or
“(b) Conducting firearm-related activities, including but not limited to reloading ammunition, gunsmithing and firearm cleaning and maintenance.
I know that the time I had to protect my daughter with a gun, if my firearm locked up, had on a trigger lock, and had to be loaded, it would have delayed my potential to do so to a horrific degree.
Gun owners are liable for the acts of gun thieves
If your gun/guns are stolen, you must report it. Failure to do so is a Class B felony per weapon. And if the thief hurts or kills someone with the stolen firearm, the owner is liable for two years.
If you have kids, look out.
Any adult who transfers a firearm to a minor is responsible for any actions taken by that minor with the firearm. And if you want to take your kids shooting or hunting, they must be “directly supervised.” And if a young person gets ahold of a parent’s gun, the parent is liable for the young person’s action. If the gun isn’t secured as per the rules above, then the adult is charged with even more crimes.
“(b) Unlawful storage of a firearm is a Class A violation if the minor who obtains possession of the firearm intentionally, by word or conduct, attempts to place another person in fear of imminent serious physical injury.
“(c) Unlawful storage of a firearm is a Class A misdemeanor if the minor who obtains possession of the firearm injures or kills a person by means of the firearm.
Oregon wants to crack down on unregistered guns.
The next section deals with “ghost guns.” Pages 11-19 offer a lengthy list of rules, restrictions, requirements, and record-keeping for the transfer of antique guns, gun parts, and much more. If you have them, you’ll be a felon upon the passage of this bill.
And as everyone knows, registration is only one step away from confiscation. Here’s an article by Selco, explaining how gun confiscation could go down.
The next section makes it more complicated to transport a gun.
If this passes, gun owners who are not concealed-carry permit holders will have to jump through all sorts of hoops to transport a firearm in a vehicle, including locking it in a box in a “secure” are of the vehicle.
Concealed carry permit fees will go up.
The next section deals with CC permits and the related fees, increasing them in another effort to put an undue burden on law-abiding citizens.
And then there’s the stuff about “public buildings.”
In this bill can find a massive list of restrictions regarding having a gun on the premises of or “near” public buildings. To me, this is the scariest part because it’s so incredibly arbitrary.
In section 25, Local Authority to Regulate Firearms in Public Buildings,” airports, ports, hospitals, schools, colleges, universities probate courts, city halls, homes of officials, and other “public buildings” – and even their grounds – can restrict not only guns but also the following:
“(10) ‘Weapon’ means:
“(a) A firearm;
“(b) Any dirk, dagger, ice pick, slingshot, metal knuckles or any similar instrument or a knife, other than an ordinary pocketknife with a blade less than four inches in length, the use of which could inflict injury upon a person or property;
“(c) Mace, tear gas, pepper mace or any similar deleterious agent as defined in ORS 163.211;
“(d) An electrical stun gun or any similar instrument;
“(e) A tear gas weapon as defined in ORS 163.211;
“(f) A club, bat, baton, billy club, bludgeon, knobkerrie, nunchaku, nightstick, truncheon or any similar instrument, the use of which could inflict injury upon a person or property; or
“(g) A dangerous or deadly weapon as those terms are defined in ORS
161.015.Public places as defined in the bill need only to “post a sign, visible to the public, identifying all locations where
the affirmative defense described in ORS 166.370 (3)(g) is limited or precluded.”And if you ignore the sign and get caught?
You’re guilty of a Class C felony. Even if your gun is unloaded.
Any person who intentionally possesses a loaded or unloaded firearm or any other instrument used as a dangerous weapon, while in or on a public building, shall upon conviction be guilty of a Class C felony.
Go here to read the insanity in detail.
Gun grabbers are overjoyed
Congresswoman Gabrielle Gifford’s anti-gun foundation was delighted with the bill even before the super-secret amendments were added. In a statement, spokeswoman Robin Lloyd said:
“Gun violence hurts hundreds of Oregon families each year. The proposed provisions in the bills heard today are the critical next steps that Oregon should take to save lives. For example, homemade, untraceable ghost guns pose serious threats to law enforcement and communities impacted by gun violence. A commitment from lawmakers to stem the flow of these firearms will ensure criminals aren’t able to easily get their hands on an undetectable weapon. Today’s hearings highlight a serious commitment by the legislature to reduce the epidemic of gun violence in Oregon. I applaud Attorney General Rosemblum [sic] and the Oregon legislature for prioritizing these lifesaving measures.”
SB 978-1 includes commonsense efforts to reduce gun violence like requiring safe storage of firearms, holding gun owners accountable to make sure kids don’t get their hands on a gun, requiring gun owners to report lost or stolen firearms, and providing increased regulation of 3D-printed guns and unfinished frames or receivers, parts used to produce ghost guns. (source)
If it passes, it will spread.
Gun control laws are like a virus – if they pass in one place they’ll spread to other places. And there’s little reason to believe that in this era of anti-gun hysteria, the legislature will strike down this unconstitutional bill. Thankfully, 13 of 36 Oregon sheriffs have already vowed to make their counties Second Amendment sanctuaries.
But heaven forbid an Oregonian gets caught driving out of their 2A sanctuary county with a usable firearm.
Hat tip: Kris
- New Class Of Hypersonic Engines Passes Critical Test, Could Power Commercial Flight In Decade
Reaction Engines says it successfully tested an integral component of its Synergetic Air-Breathing Rocket Engine (SABRE) that could clear the path for commercial hypersonic flight in the next decade, read the press release.
SABRE’s pre-cooler heat exchanger met all objectives in the first phase of high-temperature testing designed to replicate hypersonic flight. At very high speeds, Mach 5 or greater, hypersonic vehicles transition into dense atmospheric layers which causes a significant temperature increase. The biggest dilemma for any aerospace company testing hypersonic engines has been how to reduce heat above Mach 5.
The release said additional tests would be planned throughout 2019, will test the heat exchanger with even hotter temperatures replicating Mach 5 or higher. The pre-cooler is an essential part of the engine and has the potential for reducing heat at high speeds.
In the latest tests, the pre-cooler performed exceptionally well, achieved a 1.5 MW of heat transfer, the equivalent to the energy demand of 1,000 American homes; successfully cooling incoming air that was in excess of the 1,000°C (~1800°F).
To replicate intense heat, engineers used a General Electric J79 turbojet engine to provide high-temperature airflow.
The test was completed at Test Facility 2 located at the Colorado Air and Space Port. Reaction Engines constructed a facility that has conducted ground-based ‘hot’ testing of its pre-cooler technology. The release said the engine component has already passed a series of tests in the U.K.
Commenting on the success, Mark Thomas, Chief Executive, Reaction Engines, said:
“This is a hugely significant milestone which has seen Reaction Engines’ proprietary precooler technology achieve unparalleled heat transfer performance. The HTX test article met all test objectives and the successful initial tests highlight how our precooler delivers world-leading heat transfer capabilities at low weight and compact size. This provides an important validation of our heat exchanger and thermal management technology portfolio which has application across emerging areas such as very high-speed flight, hybrid electric aviation and integrated vehicle thermal management.”
The release ends by saying additional testing of the SABRE engine core will be conducted this year. The company has received over $131 million in public financing from BAE Systems, Rolls-Royce and Boeing HorizonX. If all goes well, the SABRE could be the next hypersonic engine that powers commercial flights in the next decade.
Video: Reaction Engines explains the ‘breakthrough’ technology
- "I'm Going Back To Selling Drugs": Backpage Seizure Forces Sex Traffickers Back To "Legitimate" Work
In the year after US authorities shut down sex ad website Backpage.com, the online prostitution market has scattered across the internet with several players still trying to -ahem, literally – fill the void.
The breakdown of this quasi monopoly, and the resulting scattering of websites, means that the landmark package of sex trafficking laws passed by Congress, known collectively as SESTA-FOSTA, has made it difficult for these types of websites to operate according to a Reuters report. Sex trafficking and prostitution has now, instead, drifted towards so-called hobby boards and “sugar daddy” pages. Rob Spectre, CEO of Childsafe.AI said that ad demand levels remain low as sex trafficking has become more difficult and less profitable on the Internet.
“Basically the ads are back but the buyers aren’t,” he said.
Recent looks at sex web ad sites showed men complaining about the difficulty in finding “legitimate” providers, with some openly lamenting the absence of Backpage.com. That website was seized almost a year ago to the day on April 6, 2018 in a United States Justice Department sex trafficking and child prostitution investigation. Seven people, including the founders of the website, were charged in a 93 count indictment with facilitating prostitution, money laundering and fraud.
Days after the seizure, President Trump signed the SESTA-FOSTA laws, which amended the “safe harbors” provisions of the Communications Decency Act that had protected websites from criminal liability over third-party or user generated content.
Naturally, advocates for sex workers have criticized the set of laws, arguing that taking down Backpage would drive prostitution even further underground or into the streets. Free-speech activists also said that the laws burden website owners with policing content. The study showed that the website’s closure resulted in demand for prostitutes dropping 67% and search volume plunging 90% immediately after the site went off-line. While many states have tried to “fill the void” left by Backpage, they each only draw about 5% to 8% of the unique visitors Backpage was earning at its height in 2016.
Senator Claire McCaskill had previously described Backpage as “a $600 million company built on selling sex and, importantly, on selling sex with children.”
Spectre said: “I don’t think we had any understanding of how dominant Backpage was at the time. They were a full monopoly on (internet-based) commercial sex in the United States. The competition is so fierce, and it’s really dirty, to the degree that I’m not sure there’s ever going to be a single dominant player ever again.”
A sampling of current ads shows that nearly 3/4 of them are duplicates, spam or scams. Meanwhile, website operators struggle to process credit card transactions or obtain outside financing. The costs associated with running these illicit businesses are on the rise, causing more and more owners to abandon them.
Backpage CEO Carl Ferrer Spectre continued: “We’re seeing a greater number of victims saying they have been abandoned by their trafficker and traffickers saying, ‘I’m getting out of the game, I’m going back to selling drugs.'”
Others have turned to Twitter or Instagram using the #backpage hashtag to signal their intentions. There has also been a shift towards hobby boards, where clients of prostitutes share graphic reviews of women and sugar daddy pages, that attempt to emulate dating sites.
Anaheim Police Sergeant Juan Reveles of the Orange County Human Trafficking Task Force in Southern California said the closure of Backpage represented a double edged sword for law-enforcement. He stated: “If we spend the time and effort to shut down one website, another one will pop up, and our resources are finite.”
- A Dummies' Guide To What Dems Will Say When Mueller Report Is Released
Authored by Tom Donner via Liberty Nation,
Now that Attorney General William Barr has promised to release the Mueller report in all its glory within the next few days, we thought it considerate to save you time you’ll never get back watching the establishment media’s reaction by informing you in advance of just how the Democrats are going to respond.
But, you say, the report has not even been released, so how could you know what the Democrats will say? Well, they have been at this collusion delusion for more than two years now, we have witnessed the lengths to which they are willing to go in an effort to take down President Trump, and they have only a few bullets left in their chamber. We can state with overwhelming confidence that they will fire all of them.
But let’s start by reaffirming something as certain as the sun rising in the east: The Democrats will not accept the validity of the report in whatever form they receive it. That would, after all, require them to stop spinning their conspiracy theories, and we can’t have that.
From there, we move seamlessly to a preview of the four prefabricated talking points that will launch the Democrats’ spin cycle. We call them the Mueller final four, because this is the last chance to demagogue the issue of Trump-Russia collusion. You need only to fill in the blanks using yet-to-be-determined passages from the report.
So without further ado, we present the talking points Democrats will provide for the elite media to dutifully repeat and amplify:
Talking Point 1 (mildest of the four): While we thank and commend Mr. Mueller for his work, the scope of his investigation was necessarily limited by his specific mandate and the special counsel law itself. There are just so many areas Mueller was not able to probe, thus at least six, and perhaps as many as nine, of our congressional committees must take the baton and continue running down the track. It is undoubtedly the highest and best use of our time, because as legislators we are elected to investigate (LINOs – legislators in name only?). After all, even though the financial disclosure forms Trump filed during the presidential campaign are far more revealing than any tax return, we must do everything possible to force the release of Trump’s tax returns anyway. He is the first presidential candidate in 40 years not to release his tax returns, so he must be hiding something. And, of course, we need to dig into the entire history of the Trump organization, because we have deep suspicions all manner of crookedness is hidden in there.
Talking Point 2: While the conduct outlined does not quite rise to the level of criminality, the report details events and conversations that are deeply disturbing, primarily (fill in most easy-to-spin passages of report). Remember that not all improper, shameful, and traitorous conduct is felonious. Though the special counsel falls just short of uncovering collusion, he also refused to issue a recommendation on obstruction of justice. We all know that the attorney general is little more than a bootlicking hack taking orders from Trump, ipso facto his finding of no obstruction is likely some sort of coverup. And even though we lauded Rod Rosenstein for his stewardship of the special counsel investigation, even Rosenstein, in concurring with Barr’s judgment on obstruction, has evidently fallen under the spell of the president and, like Barr, cannot be trusted.
Talking Point 3: Yes, the report contains no direct evidence of anything other than process and financial crimes that occurred either during the special counsel investigation itself or before Trump ran for president, and those have already been litigated. But there is ample circumstantial evidence of conspiracy between Trump operatives and the Russians to interfere in the election. For example, (fill in name of alleged conspirator) and (fill in name of another alleged conspirator) spoke to (fill in name of alleged Russian conspirator) less than two weeks apart. Mueller is by nature conservative in his judgments, no matter that an overwhelming majority of the lawyers he hired are politically active, anti-Trump Democrats who contributed to Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, or both. And regardless of whether he felt it appropriate to launch military-style raids on Michael Flynn and Roger Stone. So we must investigate this circumstantial evidence and connect the dots ourselves.
Talking Point 4: The redactions in this report are clear evidence that someone is trying to hide the parts that likely reveal actual collusion. The crooked attorney general and deplorable president used the cover of (choose one: grand jury testimony/classified information/interviews with completely innocent subjects) to redact the truth. Yes, all of that testimony and information must be redacted by law or by long-standing department regulations and precedent, but we nevertheless repeat our demand that the entire report, unredacted, be released, or we will launch yet more investigations on the cover-up by Barr and, of course, Trump. What are you hiding with these redactions, Mr. Barr?
The Dems, of course, will cherry-pick passages from the report that can most effectively be spun together into a fantastic web of collusion. And like most conspiracy theorists, they will allege things that can never be proven or disproven. That basic fact alone will allow them to keep expressing outrage and carry on with their accusations about collusion and obstruction for as long as they choose.
Different Democrats will parrot one or more of these, depending on whether they are in a safe or vulnerable district. For example, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), in the heart of an overwhelmingly Democratic region, will likely employ all four points, while a newly elected Democrat in a district won by Trump might focus only on the first.
Oh, one last thing. Here is what the Democrats will not say: We appreciate all the work that went into this report. This counterintelligence investigation was very thorough, there is no evidence of collusion or obstruction of justice, so we look forward to going back to the job we were elected to do: legislating for the benefit of the American people.
So there you go. Everything you need to know about the Democrats’ response to the Mueller report before it is even released.
You’re welcome.
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