Amnesty International has designated three prominent human rights defenders from Hong Kong and mainland China prisoners of conscience today as the organisation called for their immediate and unconditional release.
Human rights lawyers Chow Hang-tung and Ding Jiaxi, along with the free media advocate Jimmy Lai, are all currently imprisoned solely because of their peaceful human rights activism.
[Archived version](http://web.archive.org/web/20241003192102/https://www.rawstory.com/michael-steele-trump-stop-being-stupid/)
Former GOP official Michael Steele unfurled an epic rant bashing voters who would consider sending "incompetent" Donald Trump back to the White House.
[...]
"He is a fool, an incompetent individual who does not read even the briefings that he still gets as a former president on some of these things, so he'd at least have some workable knowledge of events there," Steele said. "He has to wait to be told what [Russian president Vladimir] Putin tells him to think about this affair because that's where his alliances, his allegiance is. The most galling and assaulting part of this is to minimize the traumatic injuries to our servicemen and women who took the incoming barrage from Iranian missiles and who, as has been reported, have been – were denied their Purple Hearts as a consequence of that because the Pentagon was dancing around how not to offend the president because he didn't think it was that important – these were just headaches, these were minor injuries."
[Archived version](http://web.archive.org/web/20241002184013/https://www.rawstory.com/raw-investigates/the-menstrual-police-are-coming-inside-the-gop-s-plan-for-total-control-over-women/)
[...]
The Comstock Act is an 1873 law that, if enforced, would outlaw all abortions in America by banning the shipping via mail, UPS, FedEx, etc., of any device, drug, or instrument that can be used to produce an abortion. It would even shut down hospital abortions.
It could also be used to empower new state or even federal police agencies specifically overseeing women violating its provisions. Like the menstrual police, which a Trump senior advisor just said was a very real possibility.
[...]
It’s the opinion of the Biden Administration that the Comstock Act — which is still on the books — is no longer enforceable, and the Biden DOJ (along with those of every president since Richard Nixon) refuses to enforce it.
Senator JD Vance disagrees.
He (and a few other Republican senators) sent a letter to Merrick Garland demanding that the Comstock Act be enforced by the FBI and DOJ now. He wrote:
> “It is disappointing, yet not surprising, that the Biden administration’s DOJ has not only abdicated its Constitutional responsibility to enforce the law, but also has once again twisted the plain meaning of the law in an effort to promote the taking of unborn life.”
[...]
The authors of Project 2025 agree as well, saying that the next Republican president should immediately restore enforcement of the law to end all abortion in America. They propose the next Republican president should launch:
> “[A] campaign to enforce the criminal prohibitions” of the Comstock Act, including “against providers and distributors of abortion pills.”
>
> [...]
Former NY Postmaster and anti-pornography crusader Anthony Comstock lobbied for and shepherded through Congress his law; it passed on March 3, 1873 and was titled “An Act for the Suppression of Trade in, and Circulation of, obscene Literature and Articles of immoral Use.” Today we refer to it as the Comstock Act.
Its language with regard to abortion is not at all ambiguous:
> “Every obscene, lewd, lascivious, indecent, filthy or vile article, matter, thing, device, or substance … designed, adapted, or intended for producing abortion, or for any indecent or immoral use; and
> “Every article, instrument, substance, drug, medicine, or thing which is advertised or described in a manner calculated to lead another to use or apply it for producing abortion, or for any indecent or immoral purpose; and
> “Every written or printed card, letter, circular, book, pamphlet, advertisement, or notice of any kind giving information, directly or indirectly, where, or how, or from whom, or by what means any of such mentioned matters, articles, or things may be obtained or made, or where or by whom any act or operation of any kind for the procuring or producing of abortion will be done or performed, or how or by what means abortion may be produced, whether sealed or unsealed; and
> “Every paper, writing, advertisement, or representation that any article, instrument, substance, drug, medicine, or thing may, or can, be used or applied for producing abortion, or for any indecent or immoral purpose; and
> “Every description calculated to induce or incite a person to so use or apply any such article, instrument, substance, drug, medicine, or thing—
> “Is declared to be nonmailable matter and shall not be conveyed in the mails or delivered from any post office or by any letter carrier."
The penalty is also not ambiguous. Persons mailing information about abortion, or drugs or devices to produce an abortion:
> “[S]hall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than five years, or both, for the first such offense, and shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both, for each such offense thereafter.”
[Archived version](http://web.archive.org/web/20241004153742/https://newrepublic.com/post/186764/charlatan-pro-trump-maga-clerk-prison-sentence-election-tampering)
Former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters was sentenced to nine years for allowing a man to use a security card to access her county’s election system, and deceiving investigators about who the person was. He was later determined to be working with MAGA gadfly and pillow magnate Mike Lindell, a prominent election denialist and supporter of Donald Trump.
"I am convinced you would do it all over again if you could. You’re as defiant as any defendant this court has ever seen,” District Judge Matthew Barrett told Peters in announcing the sentence. “You are no hero. You abused your position and you’re a charlatan.”
Barrett said that Peters, a Republican, didn’t take her job seriously, espousing claims about rigged voting machines even after they were disproven. During the trial, prosecutors said that Peters was seeking attention after associating with election denialists, and Peters remained unrepentant about her crimes.
[Archived version](http://web.archive.org/web/20241003165047/https://www.propublica.org/article/tim-dunn-farris-wilks-texas-christian-nationalism-dominionism-elections-voting)
Tim Dunn and Farris Wilks are billionaires who have made their fortunes in the oil industry. Over the past decade, the pair have built the most powerful political machine in Texas — a network of think tanks, media organizations, political action committees and nonprofits that work in lock step to purge the Legislature of Republicans whose votes they can’t rely on.
Cycle after cycle, their relentless maneuvering has pushed the statehouse so far to the right that consultants like to joke that [Republican lobbyist] Karl Rove couldn’t win a local race these days. Brandon Darby, the editor of Breitbart Texas, is one of several conservatives who has compared Dunn and Wilks to Russian oligarchs. “They go into other communities and unseat people unwilling to do their bidding,” he says. “You kiss the ring or you’re out.”
[...]
The duo’s ambitions extend beyond Texas. They’ve poured millions into “dark money” groups, which do not have to disclose contributors; conservative-media juggernauts (Wilks provided $4.7 million in seed capital to The Daily Wire, which hosts “The Ben Shapiro Show”); and federal races. Dunn’s $5 million gift to the Make America Great Again super PAC in December made him one of Donald Trump’s top supporters this election season, and he has quietly begun to invest in efforts to influence a possible second Trump administration, including several linked to Project 2025.
[...]
Dunn and Wilks are often described as Christian nationalists, supporters of a political movement that seeks to erode, if not eliminate, the distinction between church and state. Dunn and Wilks, however, do not describe themselves as such. (Dunn, for his part, has rejected the term as a “made-up label that conflicts with biblical teaching.”) Instead, like most Christian nationalists, the two men speak about protecting Judeo-Christian values and promoting a biblical worldview. These vague expressions often serve as a shorthand for the movement’s central mythology: that America, founded as a Christian nation, has lost touch with its religious heritage, which must now be reclaimed.
[Archived version](http://web.archive.org/web/20241003101617/https://www.rawstory.com/laurence-tribe-jack-smith/)
Special counsel Jack Smith has built an airtight case against former President Donald Trump in his superseding indictment and in the new, massive filing released Wednesday, a retired Harvard Law professor argued.
Laurence Tribe told CNN's Erin Burnett on Wednesday that the case surmounts every obstacle the Supreme Court put in its way with the recent ruling that grants presidents a presumption of immunity for official acts.
"What stands out most clearly is that the Supreme Court, despite its effort to protect the former president and to erect a hurdle that was almost sky-high, made clear that it is possible to overcome that hurdle by specific proof that the former president, in his capacity as office-seeker, private capacity ... sought to overturn an election that he knew he had lost," said Tribe.
[...]
"The evidence is overwhelming and to the extent that there is any overlap between public and private, it occurs in the very limited context of communications between the president and the vice president," said Tribe. Even in that narrow slice of evidence, most of the communications were with Pence in his capacity as president of the Senate, making presidential immunity irrelevant, he argued.
[...]
"I said, 'Wow' about 25 times in a quick reading of this document. I bet there are another 25 that I will encounter," said Tribe "There are lots of jaw-dropping things. You've named some of them. You know, 'So what' if the vice president is hung, it doesn't matter whether we won or lost. That's just a sampling. It's the tip of a horribly large and scary iceberg."
Over the past year, software developer turned security researcher Jason Parker has found and reported dozens of critical vulnerabilities in no fewer than 19 commercial platforms used by hundreds of courts, government agencies, and police departments across the U.S. Most of the vulnerabilities were critical.
[...]
"These platforms are supposed to ensure transparency and fairness, but are failing at the most fundamental level of cybersecurity,” Parker wrote recently in a post he penned in an attempt to raise awareness. “If a voter’s registration can be canceled with little effort and confidential legal filings can be accessed by unauthorized users, what does it mean for the integrity of these systems?”
A cache of internal emails obtained by 404 Media using a public records request show the chaos caused by the unfounded racist conspiracy theory that Haitian immigrants are “eating the pets” of residents in Springfield, Ohio. The emails show city officials scrambling to deal with bomb threats, hateful and threatening emails and phone calls, a media bonanza, and confused residents in the immediate aftermath of the presidential debate, in which Donald Trump said “in Springfield, they’re eating the dogs, the people that came in. They’re eating the cats. They’re eating the pets of the people that live there.”
[...]
[Springfield] Mayor Rob Rue received the majority (but not all) of these types of emails. Here is a sample of them:
> - One email titled “Haitian invaders” suggested that residents should buy large dogs that would attack Haitian people: “Since it’s obvious that you and the rest of the cowards on the city council are too afraid to handle this invasion citizens will apparently need to do so themselves. Purchase of Belgian Malinois and Cane Corsos should skyrocket along with protection training. If the dog goes in its yard and invaders are there, well, I guess lunch time it is.”
> - Another said that Haitians “will NOT like the bitter cold” of winter and that Springfield should “have them quietly transferred to blue states.” Another email called Rue an “inauthentic gaslighting moron” and said that city officials “aid the DNC (Treason Party) Propaganda Media in attempting to rig any further Presidential Debates. Americand [sic] in Springfield have my sympathies because it is obviously cursed with some bureaucratic fucktards.”
> - One email repeatedly called Haitians the n-word
> Another email titled “Invasion of Illegal Haitian Immigrants” reads “why you are not doing anything to protect your citizens and remove these haitians immigrants? How much money did you receive from Biden /Harris?”
> - “Your lack of action on what is happening in Springfield and Ohio's leaders in other cities is outrageous and disgusting. You have immigrants harassing your citizens, going into parks and taking and killing animals, taking people's pets, skinning and eating them in public places, flipping over cars, taking over citizens yards, etc. Why in the world have you not called in the National Guard?”
> - “I’m a lifelong resident of Ohio And I just want to email you in regards to the illegals walking the parks and destroying property of residence who pay taxes, slaughtering livestock creating chaos!! Ultimately, this is your responsibility top down or not! You will be held accountable for what you allow to happen in your city!”
[...]
[Archived version](https://web.archive.org/web/20240930221527/https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/china-students-canada-intimidation-threats-1.7332268)
[...]
Ruohui Yang is one of those students. He said he came to Canada in 2015 when he was 15 years old because his parents wanted him to study abroad.
In Canada, he said, he began learning things about his home country — such as details of the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre — that challenged the Chinese government's version of events.
[...]
"I do already receive lots of threatening [messages], lots of swearing words, insults on my different social media accounts," he said.
[...]
In May, Amnesty International released a report on the experiences of Chinese dissidents abroad. The report said many Chinese international students attending foreign universities are living in a climate of fear.
"They feel compelled to self-censor and curtail their social and academic activities and relationships or else risk repercussions from the Chinese state," the report says.
[...]
An organization called the Chinese Students and Scholars Association (CSSA) is active on university campuses across the country.
A 2019 report by the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians (NSICOP) quotes the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) describing the CSSA as "an important support mechanism for international students studying abroad [that provides] a social and professional network for students."
But the NSICOP report also reported growing public alarm over the relationship between the CSSA and the Chinese government's embassies and consulates.
[...]
[Archived version](https://web.archive.org/web/20241002032214/https://www.propublica.org/article/have-government-employees-mentioned-climate-change-voting-or-gender-identity-the-heritage-foundation-wants-to-know)
Three investigators for the Heritage Foundation have deluged federal agencies with thousands of Freedom of Information Act requests over the past year, requesting a wide range of information on government employees, including communications that could be seen as a political liability by conservatives. Among the documents they’ve sought are lists of agency personnel and messages sent by individual government workers that mention, among other things, “climate equity,” “voting” or “SOGIE,” an acronym for sexual orientation, gender identity and expression.
The Heritage team filed these requests even as the think tank’s Project 2025 was promoting a controversial plan to remove job protections for tens of thousands of career civil servants so they could be identified and fired if Donald Trump wins the presidential election.
All three men who filed the requests — Mike Howell, Colin Aamot and Roman Jankowski — did so on behalf of the Heritage Foundation’s Oversight Project, an arm of the conservative group that uses FOIA, lawsuits and undercover videos to investigate government activities. In recent months, the group has used information gleaned from the requests to call attention to efforts by the Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency to teach staff about gender diversity, which Fox News characterized as the “Biden administration’s ‘woke’ policies within the Department of Defense.” Heritage also used material gathered from a FOIA search to claim that a listening session the Justice Department held with voting rights activists constituted an attempt to “rig” the presidential election because no Republicans were present.
[Archived version](https://web.archive.org/web/20240930221527/https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/china-students-canada-intimidation-threats-1.7332268)
[...]
Ruohui Yang is one of those students. He said he came to Canada in 2015 when he was 15 years old because his parents wanted him to study abroad.
In Canada, he said, he began learning things about his home country — such as details of the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre — that challenged the Chinese government's version of events.
[...]
"I do already receive lots of threatening [messages], lots of swearing words, insults on my different social media accounts," he said.
[...]
In May, Amnesty International released a report on the experiences of Chinese dissidents abroad. The report said many Chinese international students attending foreign universities are living in a climate of fear.
"They feel compelled to self-censor and curtail their social and academic activities and relationships or else risk repercussions from the Chinese state," the report says.
[...]
An organization called the Chinese Students and Scholars Association (CSSA) is active on university campuses across the country.
A 2019 report by the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians (NSICOP) quotes the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) describing the CSSA as "an important support mechanism for international students studying abroad [that provides] a social and professional network for students."
But the NSICOP report also reported growing public alarm over the relationship between the CSSA and the Chinese government's embassies and consulates.
[...]
Last week on MSNBC, the “Morning Joe” pundits were talking about Donald Trump’s latest scheme to con the rubes, his sale of Trump Watches.
Elisabeth Bumiller, the New York Times’ Washington bureau chief, told her fellow panelists: “He’s entertaining. Let’s not forget.”
But he’s not entertaining, Elisabeth. He’s frightening.
[...]
Time after time, the New York Times sands off the sharp edges of Trumpism:
- The Times described JD Vance’s denunciation of “childless cat ladies” and his lie about Haitian immigrants eating dogs and cats as “combative conservatism” when it’s really sexism and racism.
- When Trump posted “I HATE TAYLOR SWIFT,” the Times toned that down with a headline saying he “expressed disdain” for her.
- When top Republicans lied about Haitian immigrants, the Times’ headline said “Republicans Seize on False Theories” as if those theories came out of the ether instead of originating and being spread by the pro-Trump right wing.
- Early in the pet-eating hoax, the Times wrote this headline: “JD Vance Appears to Backtrack on False Claim About Haitian Migrants in Ohio.” But that was an embarrassing misreading of what Vance did. The correct headline would have been: “Vance Says Claim About Haitian Migrants May Be Hoax, but Urges People to Spread It Anyway.” That’s what he did. Three weeks later, Vance still hasn’t disavowed the lie and apologized.
- This past weekend, the Times wrote a ridiculously warm-and-fuzzy mentor-protege story about Trump and Vance, making them seem like Dumbledore and Harry Potter when they’re more like Dr. Evil and Mini-me. (Or not fictional characters at all, but real-life fascists.)
These people are heroes if something like that exists. China must not only be called out more on that, Beijings ignorance of universal human rights must also have direct real-world consequences. Trade and investment agreements (such as WTO rules and China’s infamous Belt and Road Initiative) make only sense if and when rights issues are part of these international rule sets. China’s policies are manifestly unjust as its government permanently makes decisions in complete disregard of anyone else - its own people, its Asian neighbours, and the wider global community. There appears to be a slight, timid change in this respect, but much more must be done to adequately address the crimes against humanity committed by China.
[Archived link](http://web.archive.org/web/20240929144347/https://www.defensenews.com/opinion/2024/09/29/ukraine-needs-long-range-firepower-in-its-fight-against-russia/)
Sentiment in NATO is growing to give Ukraine more scope for action. This month the European Parliament asked European Union members to “immediately” lift deep strike restrictions, and so have top U.S. House Republicans and several leading congressional Democrats. Nonetheless, the U.S. approach remains hesitant.
The Tor Project, a global non-profit developing tools for online privacy and anonymity, and Tails, a portable operating system that uses Tor to protect users from digital surveillance, have joined forces and merged operations.
Incorporating Tails into the Tor Project's structure allows for easier collaboration, better sustainability, reduced overhead, and expanded training and outreach programs to counter a larger number of digital threats, Tor says in a blog post. In short, coming together will strengthen both organizations' ability to protect people worldwide from surveillance and censorship.
[Archived version](http://web.archive.org/web/20240929121228/https://campaignforuyghurs.org/cfu-exposes-volkswagens-sham-audit-leaked-document-reveals-misleading-claims-and-forced-labor-risks/)
**Campaign for Uyghurs (CFU) has unveiled a leaked audit report, sent to their Washington, D.C., address, that exposes Volkswagen’s (VW) blatant attempts to whitewash its complicity in the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) genocidal policies in Urumchi. The audit, conducted by Guangdong Liangma Law and overseen by Berlin-based consultancy Löning, failed to meet the most basic international social accountability standards. Volkswagen’s claims of being cleared of forced labor allegations are not just misleading–they are part of a deliberate cover-up that implicates VW in one of the world’s worst human rights atrocities.**
VW’s December 2023 assertion that their audit found “no indication of forced labor” in their Urumchi factory has now been thoroughly discredited by this leaked audit report, which CFU exclusively received in August 2024.
[...]
**The leaked audit shows that interviews were live-streamed to law offices in Shenzhen, directly enabling Chinese state surveillance.** In addition, the report showed that only managers were asked questions related to forced labor. Volkswagen’s Urumchi plant, which operates in partnership with state-owned SAIC Motor Corporation, employs 197 staff, nearly a quarter of whom are Uyghur. However, the audit’s failure to directly question workers about forced labor practices undermines the integrity of the findings, further implicating VW in the region’s human rights abuses.
[...]
Volkswagen has yet to provide a detailed response to these allegations, citing “contractual confidentiality obligations.”
[...]
Bibi Nazdana [have been granted divorce] after a two-year court battle to free herself from life as a child bride [which] a Taliban court has invalidated.
Nazdana is a victim of the group’s hardline interpretation on Sharia (religious law) which has seen women effectively silenced in Afghanistan’s legal system.
Nazdana’s divorce is one of tens of thousands of court rulings revoked since the Taliban took control of the country three years ago this month.
It took just 10 days from them sweeping into the capital, Kabul, for the man she was promised to at seven to ask the courts to overturn the divorce ruling she had fought so hard for.
[...]
The Taliban have also systematically removed all judges – both male and female – and replaced them with people who supported their hardline views.
Women were also declared unfit to participate in the judicial system.
"Women aren't qualified or able to judge because in our Sharia principles the judiciary work requires people with high intelligence," says Abdulrahim Rashid, director of foreign relations and communications at Taliban's Supreme Court.
[...]
Former Supreme Court judge Fawzia Amini - who fled the country after the Taliban returned - says there is little hope for women’s protections to improve under the law if there are no women in the courts.
"We played an important role," she says. "For example, the Elimination of Violence against Women law in 2009 was one of our achievements. We also worked on the regulation of shelters for women, orphan guardianship and the anti-human trafficking law, to name a few."
She also rubbishes the Taliban overturning previous rulings, like Nazdana's.
"If a woman divorces her husband and the court documents are available as evidence then that's final. Legal verdicts can't change because a regime changes," says Ms Amini.
**Diplomats and other officials walked out of the United Nations General Assembly in New York City on Friday as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prepared to defend his nation's slaughter of more than 41,000 people in the Gaza Strip during the past year and over 700 in Lebanon this week.**
Journalists and critics of the "global pariah" shared photos and videos of people filing out of the hall before Netanyahu's address—which came just a day after 25 anti-genocide protesters were arrested for blocking his motorcade in Manhattan.
While there was some audience applause from the sparsely populated room on Friday, Al Jazeera Arabic's Rami Ayari explained that "the people you hear cheering the PM during the speech are in the gallery who he brought for that purpose.".
[...]
Slovenia Prime Minister Robert Golob: "I want to say this out loud and clear to the Israeli Government: Stop the bloodshed. Stop the suffering. Bring the hostages home and end the occupation. Mr. Netanyahu, stop this war now!"
[...]
Israel faces a South Africa-led genocide case at the International Court of Justice, and the International Criminal Court prosecutor has sought arrest warrants for Netanyahu, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, and three Hamas leaders—one of whom Israel recently assassinated in Iran. Israel also claims to have killed a second Hamas leader, which the group has denied.
[Archived version](http://web.archive.org/web/20240928162354/https://www.wonkette.com/p/jd-vance-to-do-town-hall-with-christian)
In what we can only assume is an effort to prove he’s not weird by standing next to people who may be even weirder than he is, JD Vance will be doing a town hall today with Christian extremist Lance Wallnau during a Monroeville stop on Wallnau’s “Courage Tour.”
[...]
Wallnau is a leader in the dominionist New Apostolic Reformation (NAR) movement and one of the authors of Invading Babylon: The 7 Mountain Mandate — a deeply disturbing Christian movement centered on them taking over the “seven spheres” of society — family, religion, education, media/entertainment, business, government, and science/technology (the science and technology mountain was added after COVID; media and entertainment used to be separate mountains). Once they do that, not only will they be in control of all of us … Jesus will come back!
[...]
Wallnau sees himself not just as a guy trying to practice his own religion in peace, but as engaging in “spiritual warfare” against the rest of us. Why? Because of how we are all demonic.
“The Left is loaded with demons,” Wallnau has said. “I don’t think it’s people anymore. I think you’re dealing with demons talking through people.”
[...]
Project 2025 intends to use U.S. foreign assistance programs to push conservative culture wars worldwide, conditioning aid on restricting abortion and pulling all funding for climate change.
Jeremy Konyndyk, who worked in the U.S. Agency for International Development under President Biden & Obama, says the culture war obsessions in this chapter would ally the U.S. with authoritarian countries around the world.
[Archived version](http://web.archive.org/web/20240928223931/https://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/jimmy-couldve-fled-hong-kong-hes-being-punished-for-staying/oqxsssl2y)
[...]
Over the past three decades, Jimmy Lai’s name has become synonymous with Hong Kong’s struggle for democracy: his newspaper Apple Daily, which was launched in the mid-90s, morphed from a local tabloid to what was widely considered a bold pro-democracy voice and critic of Beijing — until it was shut down by authorities in 2021.
Hong Kong, a former British colony, was handed back to China in 1997. The civil liberties and freedoms enjoyed in the special administrative region were to be preserved for at least 50 years under the "one country, two systems" framework, however, Beijing has made increasing efforts to control Hong Kong’s political system and silence dissent in the less than 30 years since.
Lai has experienced China's encroachment first-hand.
He was first arrested during the Umbrella Movement of 2014 when tens of thousands of people took to the streets and staged a months-long sit-in in protest against the Chinese government's plan to restrict elections.
[...]
Jimmy Lai was arrested in August 2020 and has since been held in a maximum-security prison in Hong Kong on a number of charges under the national security law.
"They’re drawing out his trial and it’s inhumane because, at almost 77, he is being kept in a cell in solitary confinement for more than 1300 days; he doesn’t get any natural light," Sebastien [Lai, who is Jimmy Lai's son] says.
[...]
The Seoul Metropolitan Government said on Sept 27 it has conducted secret inspections into recent allegations of forced shopping, with findings confirming that such practices exist on some level among tourism packages there.
The city hired several foreign nationals to pose as tourists in seven low-priced package tours – three that were sold in China and four sold in Vietnam – to check the programmes’ quality.
Most of the packages focused more on shopping than tourism, which the city government’s agents said hindered them from enjoying Seoul’s history and culture.
Microsoft says it has “listened to feedback” following a privacy row over a new tool which takes regular screenshots of users’ activity.
It was labelled a potential “privacy nightmare” by critics when it was unveiled in May 2024 - prompting the tech giant to postpone its release.
It now plans to relaunch the artificial intelligence (AI) powered tool in November on its new CoPilot+ computers.
[...]
When it initially announced the tool at its developer conference in May, Microsoft said it used AI "to make it possible to access virtually anything you have ever seen on your PC", and likened it to having photographic memory.
It said Recall could search through a users' past activity, including their files, photos, emails and browsing history.
[...]
But critics quickly raised concerns, given the quantity of sensitive data the system would harvest, with one expert labelling it a potential “privacy nightmare."
[...]
[Pavan Davuluri, Microsoft's corporate vice president of Windows and devices says] that "Windows offers tools to help you control your privacy and customise what gets saved for you to find later".
However a technical blog about it states that “diagnostic data” from the tool may be shared with the firm depending on individual privacy settings.
[Microsoft says in a [blog post ](https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2024/09/27/update-on-recall-security-and-privacy-architecture/)that users can remove Recall entirely by using the optional features settings in Windows.]
[Archived version](http://web.archive.org/web/20240927121603/https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2024/09/microsoft-ai-oil-contracts/679804/)
[...] as Microsoft attempts to buoy its reputation as an AI leader in climate innovation, the company is also selling its AI to fossil-fuel companies. [...] the tech giant has sought to market the technology to companies such as ExxonMobil and Chevron as a powerful tool for finding and developing new oil and gas reserves and maximizing their production—all while publicly committing to dramatically reduce emissions.
Although tech companies have long done business with the fossil-fuel industry, Microsoft’s case is notable. It demonstrates how the AI boom contributes to one of the most pressing issues facing our planet today—despite the fact that the technology is often lauded for its supposed potential to improve our world, as when Sam Altman testified to Congress that it could address issues such as “climate change and curing cancer.”
[...]
For years, Microsoft routinely promoted its work with companies such as Schlumberger, Chevron, Halliburton, ExxonMobil, Baker Hughes, and Shell. Around 2020, the same year Microsoft made ambitious climate commitments that included a goal to reach carbon negativity by 2030, the tech firm grew quieter about such partnerships and focused on messaging about the transition to net zero. Behind the scenes, Microsoft has continued to seek business from the fossil-fuel industry; documents related to its overall pitch strategy show that it has sought energy-industry business in part by marketing the abilities to optimize and automate drilling and to maximize oil and gas production. Over the past year, it has leaned into the generative-AI rush in an effort to clinch more deals—each of which can be worth more than hundreds of millions of dollars. Microsoft employees have noted that the oil and gas industries could represent a market opportunity of $35 billion to $75 billion annually, according to documents I viewed.
[...]
From a business perspective, of course, Microsoft’s pursuit of massive deals with fossil-fuel companies makes sense. And such partnerships do not necessarily mean that the company is contradicting its climate commitments. Microsoft executives have made the case that AI can also help fossil-fuel companies improve their environmental footprint.
[...]
The idea that AI’s climate benefits will outpace its environmental costs is largely speculative, however, especially given that generative-AI tools are themselves tremendously resource-hungry. Within the next six years, the data centers required to develop and run the kinds of next-generation AI models that Microsoft is investing in may use more power than all of India. They will be cooled by millions upon millions of gallons of water. All the while, scientists agree, the world will get warmer, its climate more extreme.
[...]
Microsoft isn’t a company that exists to fight climate change, and it doesn’t have to assume responsibility for saving our planet. Yet the company is trying to convince the public that by investing in a technology that is also being used to enrich fossil-fuel companies, society will be better equipped to resolve the environmental crisis. Some of the company’s own employees described this idea to me as ridiculous. To these workers, Microsoft’s energy contracts demonstrate only the unsavory reality of how the company’s AI investments are actually used.
[...]
[Archived link](http://web.archive.org/web/20240928064009/https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/374275/openai-just-sold-you-out)
Since its founding in 2015, its leaders have said their top priority is making sure artificial intelligence is developed safely and beneficially. They’ve touted the company’s unusual corporate structure as a way of proving the purity of its motives. OpenAI was a nonprofit controlled not by its CEO or by its shareholders, but by a board with a single mission: keep humanity safe.
But this week, the news broke that OpenAI will no longer be controlled by the nonprofit board. OpenAI is turning into a full-fledged for-profit benefit corporation. Oh, and CEO Sam Altman, who had previously emphasized that he didn’t have any equity in the company, will now get equity worth billions, in addition to ultimate control over OpenAI.
In an announcement that hardly seems coincidental, chief technology officer Mira Murati said shortly before that news broke that she was leaving the company. Employees were so blindsided that many of them reportedly reacted to her abrupt departure with a “WTF” emoji in Slack.
WTF indeed.
Hurricane Helene continues to unleash its fury across the Southeast after leaving 49 people dead in multiple states, leveling communities and stranding many in floodwaters after the historic storm made landfall in Florida’s Big Bend region Thursday night as a monstrous Category 4 hurricane with roaring 140 mph winds.
[Archived version](http://web.archive.org/web/20240927145132/https://www.poynter.org/fact-checking/2024/project-2025-get-rid-noaa-national-weather-service/)
As Florida braced for Hurricane Helene, some weather and politics observers were mad about Project 2025.
“Reminder that Project 2025 would dismantle the National Weather Service and NOAA,” wrote the League of Conservation Voters on X.
NOAA is the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, founded in 1970.
[...]
“Project 2025 wants to get rid of NOAA, wants to get rid of the National Weather Service — the people that tell you the weather and help you prepare for hurricanes,” said Moskowitz, a past Florida emergency management director under Gov. Ron DeSantis, R-Fla.
Moskowitz quipped about how hurricane forecasting would function under Project 2025 and a Trump administration.
“**Maybe we will just do it with a Magic 8 ball or maybe with a Ouija board. Or maybe we will do hurricane cones like President Trump did, right where he just circled in another state that wasn’t in the cones**,” Moskowitz said.
[...]
[Archived version](http://web.archive.org/web/20240928080141/https://democracywatch.ca/hogue-inquiry-largely-ignoring-dirty-dozen-loopholes-that-allow-for-secret-foreign-interference/)
Democracy Watch released the submission it has filed with the Hogue Inquiry into Foreign Interference in Canadian politics responding to both the Stage 2 Factual Phase hearings, and also the initial Policy Phase consultation documents.
DWatch’s 32-page submission calls on the Inquiry to broaden the scope of its examination this fall of whether Canada’s anti-foreign interference system is effective, and its witness list, to address all the loopholes and flaws in federal laws, and weak enforcement systems, that allow for secret, undemocratic and unethical foreign interference activities. Democracy Watch is an intervener in the Inquiry and is represented at the Inquiry by Wade Poziomka and Nick Papageorge of Ross & McBride LLP.
Out of the 67 witnesses scheduled so far for the Inquiry’s hearings this fall, 52 are Cabinet ministers or government representatives, and 12 come from other federal parties or Parliament, none of whom are likely to point out loopholes or flaws that benefit themselves, their lobbyist friends or party supporters. Last March, Democracy Watch submitted to the Hogue Inquiry a list of 10 key witnesses and about 140 key questions to ask them, but the Inquiry has not, so far, scheduled 5 of the 10 witnesses to testify.
[Archived version](http://web.archive.org/web/20240926200940/https://www.nbcnews.com/business/consumer/meta-misinformation-problem-local-election-officials-worried-rcna172842)
**Election misinformation about the U.S. presidential election is going viral on Facebook while Zuckerberg makes amends with the GOP - a false claim recently went viral “and there wasn’t anything happening to stop it," one official said.**
Derek Bowens has never had such an important job. He’s the director of elections in Durham County, North Carolina, one of the most-populous areas of a state that’s increasingly viewed as crucial to the 2024 presidential contest.
So when a former precinct official emailed Bowens in July to warn him of a post containing voting misinformation that was spreading virally on Facebook, Bowens quickly recognized that he may be facing a crisis.
The post, written as if from an authority on the subject, said voters should request new ballots if a poll worker, or anyone else, writes anything on their form, because it would be invalidated. The same incorrect message was spread on Facebook during the 2020 election, but the platform flagged the content at the time as “false information” and linked to a story that debunked the rumor by Facebook’s fact-checking partner, USA Today.
Bowens said no such tag appeared on the post, which was widespread enough that the North Carolina State Board of Elections had to issue a press release on Aug. 2, informing voters that false “posts have been circulating for years and have resurfaced recently in many N.C. counties.”
“It was spreading and there wasn’t anything happening to stop it until our state put out a press release and we started engaging with our constituency on it,” Bowens told CNBC in an interview.
The elections board wrote a post on Facebook, telling voters to “steer clear of false and misleading information about elections,” with a link to its website. As of Wednesday, the post had eight comments and 50 shares. Meanwhile, multiple Facebook users in states like North Carolina, Mississippi and New Jersey continue to share the ballot misinformation without any notification that it’s false.
[Archived version](http://web.archive.org/web/20240927175452/https://www.thetimes.com/world/russia-ukraine-war/article/china-supplied-weapons-to-russia-ukraine-war-lk7j2jb8v)
**A new report obtained by Ukraine's allies points to a Chinese company sending a range of purpose-built military drones to Russia for testing, with the ultimate destination being Ukraine.**
The deal occurred last year, according to a western official, who was unable to disclose the name of the company. However, they said there was “clear evidence now that Chinese companies are supplying Russia with deadly weapons for use in Ukraine”.
“While the Chinese government might not admit it, they are going to struggle to keep their increasing support under wraps,” added the official, appearing to accuse Beijing of being involved or aware of the delivery.
They also confirmed a Reuters report from earlier in the week that Russia is believed to have established a weapons programme in China to develop and produce long-range attack drones for use in the war against Ukraine.
[...]
This is just another blatant propaganda campaign by China. The government in Beijing obscures its domestic supply chains, and there is much evidence for grave human rights violations and crimes against humanity in China, particularly in Xinjiang and Tibet.
[Archived version](http://web.archive.org/web/20240926072730/https://thehackernews.com/2024/09/chinese-hackers-infiltrate-us-internet.html)
Nation-state threat actors backed by Beijing broke into a "handful" of U.S. internet service providers (ISPs) as part of a cyber espionage campaign orchestrated to glean sensitive information, The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday.
The activity has been attributed to a threat actor that Microsoft tracks as Salt Typhoon, which is also known as FamousSparrow and GhostEmperor.
"Investigators are exploring whether the intruders gained access to Cisco Systems routers, core network components that route much of the traffic on the internet," the publication was quoted as saying, citing people familiar with the matter.
The end goal of the attacks is to gain a persistent foothold within target networks, allowing the threat actors to harvest sensitive data or launch a damaging cyber attack.
Many Americans still don't know about Project 2025, the plans Republicans will implement if Trump becomes president. There's a hilarious but scary **'Schoolhouse Rock' video (4 min)** about Trump's Project 2025 that's worth watching and sharing. Just like the original Schoolhouse Rock videos, the simple song explains the horrible details of Trump's plan in a way that gets the point across.
In another must-watch video on Trump's Project 2025, **Mehdi Hassan summarizes all 30 chapters of Project 2025 in just two minutes**. Watch this video and share it with people who haven't heard about Trump's plan to turn America into a theocracy.
[Archived version](http://web.archive.org/web/20240926143548/https://www.democratsabroad.org/dems_abroad_dismisses_trump_rant_on_overseas_voting)
If you are a U.S. citizen living overseas, for more information about voting from abroad you may go to: https://www.fvap.gov
With his "absurd and baseless rant on 'Truth' Social, Americans abroad join a host of other groups of US citizens Donald Trump has threatened and feels shouldn’t be allowed to participate in our elections," the organization says in a statement.
"This represents yet another assault by Trump on the 'suckers and losers' he believes make up the US military; the Department of Defense is the agency entrusted with administering the entire overseas voter program."
[...]
Democrats Abroad International Chair Martha McDevitt-Pugh had this to say in response to Trump's un-’Truth’:
> “Trump’s Project 2025 campaign is premised on stripping away the rights and freedoms that Americans enjoy. Now this election denying, two-time popular vote loser is attempting to preemptive delegitimize the votes of deployed military and civilian voters abroad. That we’re in Trump's head, and he perceives us as a threat to his scraping a win, is yet more evidence of the critical importance of overseas voters and Democrats Abroad, which mobilizes them. We expect many Americans abroad to use votefromabroad.org and help finally turn the page on this MAGA-maniac. As Vice President Harris says ‘when we vote, we win!”
[Archived version](http://web.archive.org/web/20240925223157/https://www.americanfreakshow.news/p/meet-the-real-red-hats)
Yesterday we learned that Kevin Roberts, the cosplaying Yall Qaeda coal roller truck driving, Lucchese cowboy boot-wearing president of the Heritage Foundation whose Project 2025 preaches the centrality of “the family” as the foundation of American society, a foundation to be achieved in part by forcing impregnated incest and rape victims to give birth, is so far astray from the teachings of Jesus that he reportedly once bragged about killing a neighbors’ dog with a shovel.
[...]
Today [...] Opus Dei [a Catholic organization that exists today at the red-hot center of the judicial and right-wing donor world in Washington D.C.] has achieved influence at the highest echelon of American power. The organization has been increasingly active in Washington since at least the early 1990s when it set up shop at 15th and K — the heart of the capital lobbying industry. From there, one of its priests (wearing a spiked garter under his robes to restrict his bodily urges) converted at least a half dozen of the top right-wingers in Washington to the Opus Dei brand of regressive Catholicism. Among his converts — future Trump administration National Economic Advisor Larry Kudlow, and other men in the highest echelons of American law and government — future House Speaker Newt Gingrich, former Senator Sam Brownback, failed Supreme Court nominee Robert Bork, and many other leaders who found themselves in need to priestly guidance.
Some of the most powerful figures in American politics and political finance today have Opus Dei connections. One of the most effective Opus Dei-affiliated Catholics in DC today is Leonard Leo, bagman for rightist billionaires, who spent decades working to capture the federal judiciary for the anti-choice movement. Five of the six members of the right side of the Supreme Court are right-wing Catholic — Chief Justice Roberts, Amy Coney Barrett, Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Brett Kavanaugh who replaced Opus Dei adjacent Antonin Scalia after Mitch McConnell refused to let Obama fill his vacancy for almost a year. These modern-day priest-kings have been working to force American law into line with a creed most Americans — including the vast majority of Catholics — reject — all under the guise of “religious freedom.”
[...]
[Archived version](http://web.archive.org/web/20240926082334/https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/democratic-legal-fund-secretaries-state-election-lawsuits-rcna172009)
Democratic group launches legal fund to help secretaries of state in key U.S. states defend against an anticipated post-election deluge of lawsuits.
In plans shared first with NBC News, the Democratic Association of Secretaries of State plans to spend at $5 million to support top election officials in Maine, Michigan, North Carolina and Nevada. Officials with the group said they may expand their reach to other states as needed and could spend more if fundraising is strong.
The group began aggressively raising money and campaigning to elect Democratic secretaries of state, who oversee elections in many states, in the wake of former President Donald Trump's false claims of voter fraud in 2020. It first funneled money to deal with postelection litigation to then-Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs in 2022 to deal with postelection litigation.
“This is us trying to help our people but also help democracy,” said Travis Brimm, the group’s executive director.
A Hong Kong Court has jailed two journalists who led a pro-democracy newspaper after they were found guilty in a landmark sedition case last month.
Chung Pui-kuen and Patrick Lam, editors at the now-defunct Stand News media outlet, had published articles about the crackdown on civil liberties in the city under China.
Chung was sentenced to 21 months, while Lam was given 11 months, but was released on medical grounds. The publisher behind Stand News - Best Pencil - has been fined HK$5,000 (US$643; £480).
It is the first sedition case against journalists in Hong Kong since the territory's handover from Britain to China in 1997.
After a lengthy trial, which began in October 2022 and was originally scheduled to last just 20 days, district court judge Kwok Wai-kin Kwok found that 11 articles published by Stand News were seditious and that Stand News had become a "danger to national security".
Their newspaper's editorial line supported "Hong Kong local autonomy", Mr Kwok said in a written statement.
"It even became a tool to smear and vilify the Central Authorities [in Beijing] and the [Hong Kong] SAR Government," he added.
[Archived version](http://web.archive.org/web/20240926122338/https://www.lrt.lt/en/news-in-english/19/2369912/putin-s-rhetoric-shows-he-fears-long-range-strikes-from-ukraine-lithuanian-minister)
Vladimir Putin’s statements about the Kremlin’s updated nuclear doctrine reveal his fear that Ukraine might be allowed to use long-range missiles to strike targets inside Russia, Lithuanian Defence Minister Laurynas Kasčiūnas has said.
“We have all heard Putin’s words; I believe the key message is not what he said, but that when he talks about the new concept, he clearly signals that granting long-range strike capabilities to Ukraine is a really important issue he fears,” Kasčiūnas told a press conference on Thursday.
German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius, who is visiting Lithuania on Thursday, said the West is not intimidated by Putin’s “nuclear rhetoric”.
“I can reiterate that this is Putin’s rhetoric; he speaks loudly and spreads his threats, and we should not be intimidated by that. We will do what we consider right. He can spread this through his channels, but it will not scare us,” Pistorius said.
[...]
Putin said later on Wednesday that the changes [in the political situation] would allow Russia to launch a nuclear response to a “massive air attack”.
Last week, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he had not yet received permission from the United States or the United Kingdom to use long-range missiles to strike targets on Russian territory.
[Ukrainian President Volodymyr] Zelensky is urging the West to allow this, but Washington is seeking more detailed information on how Kyiv would use these weapons and how their use would fit into a broader war strategy
[...]
Loopholes in election financing rules could allow money from foreign countries to influence Canadian elections, the chief electoral officer told the inquiry probing foreign interference Tuesday.
Stéphane Perrault noted that, under the law, only citizens and permanent residents are allowed to donate to a party or candidate and that those donations are supposed to be made from personal funds. Foreign nationals, groups and governments aren't allowed to donate.
However, Perrault said that can be hard to police and no system is airtight.
Elections Canada audits candidate filings and publishes the names of those who contribute more than $200, he said, and that someone outside Canada would have to use proxies to funnel money to a candidate.
[...]
A former House GOP lawmaker says Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas should be removed from the bench over his “unethical” behavior and taunted people to challenge him.
“Come at me. I got receipts,” Denver Riggleman posted to X, calling Thomas’ wife, Ginni Thomas, “disturbed.”
Riggleman posted in response to a clip of Donald Trump saying at a rally that “people should be put in jail for the way they talk about our judges and justices.”
“Clarence Thomas is, at the least, unethical. Should be removed from the bench. His wife, Ginni Thomas, is disturbed. Come at me. I got receipts.” Riggleman said.
[Archived version](http://web.archive.org/web/20240924102114/https://www.propublica.org/article/judge-aileen-cannon-trump-documents-case-travel-disclosures)
Cannon went to an event in Arlington, Virginia, honoring the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, according to documents obtained from the Law and Economics Center at George Mason University. At a lecture and private dinner, she sat among members of Scalia’s family, fellow Federalist Society members and more than 30 conservative federal judges. Organizers billed the event as “an excellent opportunity to connect with judicial colleagues.”
A 2006 rule, intended to shine a light on judges’ attendance at paid seminars that could pose conflicts or influence decisions, requires them to file disclosure forms for such trips within 30 days and make them public on the court’s website.
It’s not the first time she has failed to fully comply with the rule.
In 2021 and 2022, Cannon took weeklong trips to the luxurious Sage Lodge in Pray, Montana, for legal colloquiums sponsored by George Mason, which named its law school for Scalia thanks to $30 million in gifts that conservative judicial kingmaker Leonard Leo helped organize.
Current rates for standard rooms at Sage Lodge can exceed $1,000 per night, depending on the season. With both Montana trips, Cannon’s required seminar disclosures were not posted until NPR reporters asked about the omissions this year as part of a broader national investigation of gaps in judicial disclosures.
Cannon did not respond to repeated requests for comment.
[...]
Speaking on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, the actress pointed out that even animals had more rights now in Afghanistan following increased restrictions on women.
In response, a Taliban spokesman said they "highly respected" women and would "never compare them to cats".
Streep's comments come after the Taliban government last month introduced a new set of "morality laws".
Among other things, these rules state that women's voices can no longer be heard in public and that they are not allowed to look directly at men they are not related to by blood or marriage.
The measures add to a litany of restrictions that the regime has imposed on Afghan women and girls since returning to power three years ago.
Women have to completely cover their faces and bodies when leaving their homes. Women and girls are also prevented from going to schools, parks, gyms and sport clubs. There are restrictions on the type of work that they are allowed to do.
"Today in Kabul a female cat has more freedom than a woman. A cat may go sit on her front stoop and feel the sun on her face, she may chase a squirrel in the park," Streep said on Monday at an event to raise awareness of Afghan women's rights at the UN headquarters in New York.
**Countries seeking alternatives to Ukraine's peace formula are playing into the hands of Russian President Vladimir Putin, particularly China and Brazil, stated Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy during his speech at the UN General Assembly.**
"When some propose alternatives, half-hearted settlement plans, so-called sets of principles, it not only ignores the interests and suffering of the Ukrainians, who are affected by the war the most, it not only ignores reality, but it also gives Putin the political space to continue the war," Zelenskyy said.
He emphasized that any alternative peace initiatives are attempts to achieve a ceasefire rather than an end to the war.
The President suggested that perhaps someone hopes to win a Nobel Prize for a frozen truce, but the only prizes Putin will offer in return are "more sufferings and disasters."
Zelenskyy noted that if any country seeks alternatives or ignores any aspect of the peace formula, then it wants to do part of what Putin is doing.
“When the Chinese-Brazilian duo tries to grow into a choir of voices – with someone in Europe, with someone in Africa – saying something alternative to a full and just peace, the question arises: What is the true interest? Everyone must understand - you will not boost your power at Ukraine's expense," the President noted.
According to him, the world has already gone through colonial wars and conspiracies by great powers at the expense of the smaller ones. And all countries understand why this must remain in the past.
[Archived version](http://web.archive.org/web/20240924061038/https://www.ituc-csi.org/corporate-underminers-of-democracy-en)
Technology companies Amazon, Meta, and Tesla are among seven firms being named the worst corporate underminers of democracy by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC).
In its report, the ITUC published a list of seven companies it said were "emblematic" of the ways large international corporations have begun tossing their weight around to influence global affairs.
The list of corporate underminers of democracy for 2024 is:
- Amazon.com, Inc.
- Blackstone Group
- ExxonMobil
- Glencore
- Meta
- Tesla
- The Vanguard Group
Those businesses, ITUC noted, violate trade union and alleged human rights, monopolize media and technology, exacerbate the climate catastrophe and try to privatize public services in a way that "protects and expands [their] own profits by undermining democracy."
"These companies deploy complex lobbying operations to undermine popular will and disrupt existing or nascent global policy that could hold them accountable," the report says.
“Nobody is disputing that the town of Springfield, Ohio, needs help. But, you’re not just a bystander,” [CNN’s Dana] Bash said. “You’re the senator from Ohio, so instead of saying things that are wrong, and actually causing the hospitals, the schools, the government buildings to be evacuated because of bomb threats, because of the cats and dogs thing, why not actually be constructive, in helping to better integrate them into the community? Because there are a lot of employers there who say that the Haitians workers are helping fill jobs that they need desperately filled.”
Rather than take any ownership of his role in spreading false claims and incendiary rhetoric, Vance recoiled, saying that any suggestion that he’d been responsible for inciting the bomb threats in Springfield was “disgusting.” The Ohio senator scolded Bash for sounding like a “Democratic propagandist” as she called him out on his reckless lying.
I’m not a lawyer, but one reason could be that there’s not (yet?) a clear criminal case that would convince a judge. It’s not clear whether a crime is committed, maybe?
For example, Mr. McCabe says, ““I don’t know that I would characterize it as [an] active, recruited, knowing asset in the way that people in the intelligence community think of that term” (and similar comments), but ‘don’t know’ could mean there’s nit enough for prosecution? This is not China or Russia, where people are sentenced to.prison in closed-door trials and often not even their lawyers know what exactly their clients are accused of. Maybe we could call it another ‘weakness’ of democracy (which non-democratic state actors try to exploit)?
But I say ‘could’ and conclude I don’t know either.
Women’s accessories sold by some of the world’s most popular online shopping firms contained toxic substances sometimes hundreds of times above acceptable levels, authorities in Seoul said yesterday.
Chinese giants including Shein, Temu and AliExpress have skyrocketed in popularity around the world in the past few years, offering a vast selection of trendy clothes and accessories at low prices.
Shoes from Shein were found to contain significantly high levels of phthalates — chemicals used to make plastics more flexible — with one pair 229 times above the legal limit.
“Phthalate-based plasticisers affect reproductive functions such as sperm count reduction, and can cause infertility and even premature birth,” an official from Seoul’s environmental health team told reporters.
One such chemical “is classified as a human carcinogen by the International Cancer Institute, so special care should be taken to avoid long-term contact with the human body,” the official said.
The article is longer, very interesting.
Did someone say we need supply chain transparency?
Whatever we understand by a ‘free market’, China must really not complain about a ‘non-free’ market policy not in the U.S. nor in most othrr countries. That would really be hypocritical.
The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) has released a report stating that leading fast fashion brands, Shein and Temu, are powered by “slave labor.” The author of the report, Adam Savit, who is also the director of AFPI’s China Policy Initiative, said that Uyghur Muslims and other ethnic minorities are subjected to forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region, benefitting the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
This is just one of many similar reports. I think we should always asking ourselves when buying cheap whether there are others who who pay the price, especially in.countries like China where there is no supply chain transparency.
ABC took a big hit last night," Trump told Fox News. “I mean, to be honest, they are a news organization, they have to be licensed to do it. They ought to take away their license for the way they did that.”
Predatory Sparrow is distinguished most of all by its apparent interest in sending a specific geopolitical message with its attacks, says Juan Andres Guerrero-Saade, an analyst at cybersecurity firm SentinelOne who has tracked the group for years. Those messages are all variations on a theme: If you attack Israel or its allies, we have the ability to deeply disrupt your civilization.
I am not sure if this ‘specific geopitical message’ is so unique to Israel. This is what countries like China , Russia, and others are doing as well, aren’t they?
Our new Toolkit for Community Organizers is designed to help answer that question and support community organizers and stakeholders to facilitate community conversations about Project 2025’s impact. The toolkit consists of 13 modules on core topics of Project 2025’s plan and focuses on local impacts, but covers its global reach. […] It will soon be available in Spanish and French.
I get your point, but we shouldn’t forget that cheap products are often cheap because people elsewhere pay the price through low salaries, and sometimes no salaries at all. Not that I think that Trump would care about these people (or any people), but tariffs are a bit more complex than what Trump describes here as we know.
@ulkesh
I would just add that he is supporting the NRA (their lobbying might be one reason for this ‘opinion’), but I fully agree with what you’ve said.
They have now, if and when they coordinate and cooperate between themselves, according to the researcher:
Africa’s voice is minimal in the agenda-setting, due mostly to the multiplicity of African states, African Union weakness and competing needs among African countries.
Why the company chose to hire human cosplayers for last week’s World Robot Conference remains unclear. Were they hired as “booth babes,” an outdated and sexist form of promotion? Or were they purposefully there to trick attendees into thinking they were robots?
Given the reception of the videos on social media, it’s possible it’s a mix of both.
When China’s prodigious tech influencer, Naomi Wu, found herself silenced, it wasn’t just the machinery of a surveillance state at play. Instead, it was a confluence of state repression and the sometimes capricious attention of a Western audience that, as she asserts, often views Chinese activists more as ideological tokens than as genuine human beings.
[…]
Naomi Wu’s devastating July 7th [2023] tweet alluded to a pressure that had long been feared by many, yet optimistically hoped she could manage to avoid indefinitely.
Ok for those of you that haven’t figured it out I got my wings clipped and they weren’t gentle about it- so there’s not going to be much posting on social media anymore and only on very specific subjects. I can leave but Kaidi can’t so we’re just going to follow the new rules and…
If we want to know whether or not digital devices should be allowed in schools, why don’t we ask the folks in the Silicon Valley. They must know it, and have been telling us for years:
In the heart of Silicon Valley is a nine-classroom school where employees of tech giants Google, Apple and Yahoo send their children. But despite its location in America’s digital centre, there is not an iPad, smartphone or screen in sight.
Reid Hoffman & Co have been heavily lobbying against Linda Khan, recently also with donations to Kamala Harris’ campaign. I also hope Ms. Khan keeps her job after Ms. Harris became president …
The Georgia Democratic Party claims Trump’s allies are trying to “establish a new power of not certifying an election result should their preferred candidate lose.”
The Logan Act (1 Stat. 613, 18 U.S.C. § 953, enacted January 30, 1799) is a United States federal law that criminalizes the negotiation of a dispute between the United States and a foreign government by an unauthorized American citizen. The intent behind the Act is to prevent unauthorized negotiations from undermining the government’s position.
As I wrote in tbe other comment in this thread: That’s just a fraction aimed at specific children-related projects. Canada’s total support is much higher as we know.
‘The Insider’ is an independent media outlet originally from Russia. It is banned there, though, labelled by the Kremlin as ‘foreign agent’, which is why it’s headquatered in Latvia now.
These people are heroes if something like that exists. China must not only be called out more on that, Beijings ignorance of universal human rights must also have direct real-world consequences. Trade and investment agreements (such as WTO rules and China’s infamous Belt and Road Initiative) make only sense if and when rights issues are part of these international rule sets. China’s policies are manifestly unjust as its government permanently makes decisions in complete disregard of anyone else - its own people, its Asian neighbours, and the wider global community. There appears to be a slight, timid change in this respect, but much more must be done to adequately address the crimes against humanity committed by China.