Sputnik 21.04.2023

Greger Mannswerk, head of Norwegian shipyard Kimek located in the town of Kirkenes, which borders Russia, said on Friday that the shipyards employees did not find any spy equipment on board Russian trawlers, commenting on recent reports from Norwegian media.

We have a pretty good understanding of whats on board and we have never found anything to indicate that they [Russian seamen] are engaged in intelligence gathering. We cannot know if there are any [Russian] intelligence officers on board today, but no fisherman enters a Norwegian harbor without the [Norwegian] police and armed forces having a full idea of who is on board, Mannswerk was quoted as saying by the broadcaster.

This week, the media published the results of an investigation, which said that up to 50 civilian Russian ships could be involved in intelligence operations against Norway.

By Matt Robson, Green Left, April 21, 2023

Matt Robson is a former NZ cabinet minister, and served as an MP from 1996 to 2005, first as a member of the Alliance, then as a Progressive.

As Aotearoa/New Zealands Minister for Disarmament and Arms Control within the Labour-Alliance coalition government in 1999, I was mandated to promote NZs opposition to nuclear weapons and membership of aggressive military blocs such as NATO to the world. And I did.

What I did not realise at the time and should have, having read Ralph Miliband on Parliamentary Socialism was that all the top brass of the NZ military, intelligence services and the top civil servants were working overtime to assure the United States officials that NZ would eventually return to the fold (not their words of course) as a junior imperialist power in the South Pacific and supporter of US military-led alliances. And this is what is happening.

NZs anti-nuclear policy and its correlative opposition to nuclear armed military blocs was based on the 1987 Nuclear Free Zone, Disarmament and Arms Control Act, legislated by the then-Labour government, to reinforce membership of the South Pacific Nuclear Free Zone Treaty or the Treaty of Rarotonga.

These strong anti-nuclear policies, which had seen New Zealand turfed out of the ANZUS military pact by its allies with Australian PM Bob Hawke being particularly insistent were forced upon the Labour government by a vibrant mass movement that had spilled over into Labours base.

Labour leaders were to cynically state that conceding an anti-nuclear position was worth it, to distract attention from the blitzkrieg that forced through the neoliberal program of wholesale privatisation, deregulation and an end to free public healthcare and education. Indeed, in the period of the anti-nuclear campaigns success, NZ suffered the implementation of the complete neoliberal agenda and roll back of the welfare state. This betrayal of the gains of the labour movement saw Labour crash in 1990 to its worst electoral defeat.

Now, Labours successors are implementing a new b...

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The post High Court Turns Its Back on Australian Babies in Unprecedented Decision appeared first on Global Research.

On hot days, if one parks ones car in the sun for any length of time, the temperature inside can rise to values much higher than the ambient temperature, making the interior extremely hot to the touch. This is another example of the greenhouse effect, similar to what is heating up the Earth.

Its only early April, but weve already had our first report of an infant found in a hot car in Tucson.  We talk about this every Spring and Summer in Arizona: the dangers of cars heating up in the sun.

Afternoon temperatures are about 20 to 25 degrees lower now than they will be in June, but its still hot enough to raise the temperature up to 120 degrees in about 45 minutes.

The air inside the car heats up so fast because of the greenhouse effect.  Heres what it means:
Incoming solar radiation, known as shortwave radiation, shines through the windows and is absorbed in the cars interior.

The heat released from the interior is known as longwave radiation, and is much weaker than the shortwave radiation.  The heat becomes trapped inside the car.  Heat continues to enter the car, but struggles to exit.

It only takes 10 to 15 minutes for a car in direct sun light to heat up above 100 degrees when its 80 degrees outside, even if the window is cracked.  When the air temperature climbs above 100 degrees here in June, the temperature inside a car can soar above 150 degrees to 170 degrees in less than an hour.

These are dangerous temperature levels. To avoid getting back to a car whose interior is hot to the touch, most people try to find a shady spot to park but that is rarely possible.

But Michael Mechanic writes that we can turn this problem into a solution by building roofs covered with solar panels over the parking lots This would provide shade for cars while at the same time using solar energy for generating electricity rather that wasting it as thermal energy.

He has done calculations for what might be achieved with the massive parking lots at just Walmart superstores. He says that there are over 3,500 such stores in the US covering an area of 1,400 square miles. If they were all covered with solar panels, they would generate about 1.5 terawatts of energy, sufficient to power 1.25 million households. A single 1,000 space parking lot could power 100 EV charging stations and 350 nearby homes.

The transition to clean power will require massive solar expansionnot just home rooftop arrays but photovoltaic installations near population centers. Where to mount all the panels? One answer seems obvious: over parking lots, which also bake...

Introduction by Dee McLachlan

Do you remember Dr Laibow? I remember seeing the 2009 Jesse Ventura interview around 2011.

Dr Laibow talks about Covid as the beta test, that all is controlled (directed) by the Rockerfeller family, and that the Bilderberg Group are merely middlemen.

Through Injunction, Injection, and Indoctrination there will be no independent thought. (Wow) The herd (people) can be culled and they will be as ineffective as Sheep rebelling at the practice of eating mutton.

A fascinating and frightening interview.

Maybe Jesse Venturas interview with Dr Laibow was in the back of my subcons...

Guns and race have shaped the news this week. In this episode of the WhoWhatWhy podcast, I talk with Emory University professor Carol Anderson, author of the new book The Second: Race and Guns in a Fatally Unequal America, to explore the absolute connection between race, the original sin of slavery, and Americas gun culture. 

As mass shootings and gun violence continue to plague the nation, Anderson delves into the dark history of the Second Amendment and its foundation in anti-Blackness.

Anderson reveals how African Americans were historically depicted as inherently violent, criminal, and vicious, leading to the implementation of laws that restricted their access to guns and ammunition. 

She further discusses the contentious debate between James Madison and the anti-Federalists during the ratification of the Constitution, highlighting the fear of Black retribution and the belief that white control was necessary to maintain order.

When examining the role of the Second Amendment in Americas gun culture, Anderson discusses the crucial questions and offers invaluable insights into the complex relationship between race, guns, and the countrys ongoing struggle to address gun violence. 

Its a story of the hidden history behind the Second Amendment, its lasting impact on America today, and a search for an answer to the never-resolved question as to why we cant ever seem to do anything about guns in America. 

Apple Podcasts...

by Paul Cudenec

Tear gas was this week used against people in rural France protesting against the arrival of authoritarian president Emmanuel Macron.

As I witnessed for myself, the town of Ganges, in the Hrault department, was divided into two for the day in a military-style police occupation.

Combined with the states draconian use of anti-terrorist laws to ban the banging of saucepans, the overall impression is frankly alarming.

Were going straight there, into repression and dictatorship, warned trade unionist Grard, one of a thousand-strong crowd that turned out on Thursday April 20.

Macrons visit to the local middle school, ironically named after anarchist revolutionary Louise Michel, was the second stop in a national tour in which he is supposed to be making peace with the French public after months of huge protests against his pension reforms, which he ended up forcing through parliament without a vote.

But, with hundreds of tooled-up gendarmes ensuring nobody but the invited few got anywhere near him, Macrons visit to Ganges, like the previous days trip to Alsace, hardly spoke of a desire for dialogue.

He listens more to Capital than to the people, remarked Matthieu Guy, secretary-general of the CGT union in Ganges.

Australia's Solicitor-General, Dr Stephen Donaghue KC, has backed the constitutional change to give First Nations people recognition and a voice to the parliament in advice released today.

Author information

David Marler

Queensland reporter at No Fibs

David is a full time Queensland carer for his son and in quiet times contributes to NoFibs.

| Twitter |

According to Mission Australia, climate anxiety is a leading cause of mental health issues in young people.

The first two weeks of April this year were a time of pilgrimage to the Peoples Republic of China (PRC) by European politicians of various ranks, representing some of the continents leading states as well as trans-European structures. This in itself turned out to be one of the signs indicating the acceleration of the process of change that has recently been taking place both in the world as a whole and in the group of countries designated by the (increasingly conventional) term generalized West.

No less representative of the fact that the world order as a whole is already at the stage of another radical reformatting is the increasingly obvious conventionality of the terminology used, which until recently seemed to reflect certain political realities more or less adequately. In particular, several elements accompanying European trips to China involuntarily provoke the question: What, in fact, are we talking about when the word Europe is used?

The same elements superimposed on the long-standing conflicts in transatlantic relations, the outwardly strange events and circumstances that accompanied the recent visit to Ireland of the American president, make legitimate the broader formulation of this question, namely: What realities do the mentioned term generalized West reflect? Moreover, it seems that the already aggravated situation on the territory of the current leader of the latter, i.e. the United States, provokes the question: who, in fact, does the current American administration represent in the international arena?

The answer to this question must be in the exclusive competence of the American people, who will do without prompting or, all the more so, help from outside. Lets wish them success in this. If only because during their short and controversial history the Americans have created a specific culture (in the broa...

by Dee McLachlan (a supporter of justice and truth; a supporter of children being able to live free from abuse and encouraged to flourish in an environment of love and joy)

I was up at 4:00am yesterday to catch at flight to Brisbane to attend the last mention or hearing before the trial of THE KING v PATRICK FINBAR MCGARRY ODEA, WILLIAM RUSSELL MASSINGHAM PRIDGEON, ANN KATHLEEN GREER AND ORS. I was not disappointed with the theatre.

We were in another courtroom this time,...

The Solicitor General's advice makes it clear that the Voice will strengthen our democracy. pic.twitter.com/QIDUwzUXvm Anthony Albanese (@AlboMP) April 21, 2023

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The oversized proportions are tricky. Heres how to look chic and put together, rather than drowning in your jacket.

What should you wear to work? The answer is, likely, an oversized blazer.

Read Full Story

Theres a regime of logic that we can call Australia, that we can say on many fronts is also a fiction. Any poem that meets Australia within its logic, taking it at face value, will be boring and it might be competent. If you use an AI app, it will definitely be competent AND boring materially, but conceptually itll be amazing, in that it met evil (management speak/the invisible hand/terra nullius) with cunning, with another kind evilamoral, not immoral.

The post Poetry can already be free appeared first on Overland literary journal.

Just when you thought it could get no worse ... it has. Mark Speakman, an entitled and severely out of touch lawyer, has been elected NSW Opposition Leader and Leader of the Liberals. Speakman is a committed, extreme leftist. Worst than Kean. Speakman is a former Attorney General who spent...

Keeping the age of criminal responsibility as low as 12 would be a cop-out and a failure by Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews and Attorney-General Jaclyn Symes for the children locked up behind bars, and the children who will be exposed to the criminal legal system in the future.

Raising the age to 14 is the absolute bare minimum reform the Andrews Government must make. Anything less than 14 will continue to be an abject failure by the Andrews Government to uphold the human rights of children and young people in Victoria.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander, health, legal, youth, community and human rights organisations call on Premier Andrews to act on the recommendations provided from numerous parliamentary inquiries, United Nations benchmarking, medical advice, and Aboriginal experts, and raise the age of criminal responsibility to at least 14.

No 12 year old child should grow up in prison.

12 and 13-year-olds should be finishing primary school and starting high school. They should be in our schoolyards and with their families, not locked up behind bars. Prison has devastating and lifelong impacts on childrens and young peoples health, development, mental health and wellbeing.

Evidence shows that the earlier a child is locked up in jail, the more the child is at risk of being entrenched in the justice system and re-offending later in life.

Instead of locking up kids in prison, Premier Andrews and the Victorian Government should fund community-led solutions which keep the community safe and has better outcomes for children.

Todays decision is a betrayal of Victorias children, especially those who have been victims of poverty, violence and abuse.

As a campaign made up of 100+ organisations and over 65,700 Victorians, we will not stop demanding change until the Andrews Government takes action to raise the age of criminal responsibility to at least 14 years old.

Quotes from Cheryl Axleby, Co-Chair, Change the Record:  

If the Victorian government announces an increase to the age of criminal responsibility to 12, it will not make any real difference to the already high and unacceptable rates of Aboriginal youth overrepresentation in the legal system. We advocate strongly that the Victorian government commit to raising the age to 14, particularly as the Federal government has committed $81.5 million to justice reinvestment. There is now no excuse whatsoever why all state and territory governments do not now support Aboriginal led designed and delivery of culturally responsive diversionary programs to break the intergenerational cycle of incarceration for our younger generations."

Quotes from Nerita Waight, CEO of Victorian Aboriginal Legal Service:  

The Premier said he had a responsibility to be the most......

Why Sudans Conflict Matters to the Rest of the World

Associated Press

A destroyed military vehicle is seen in southern in Khartoum, Sudan, Thursday, April 20, 2023. The latest attempt at a cease-fire between the rival Sudanese forces faltered as gunfire rattled the capital of Khartoum. Through the night and into Thursday morning, gunfire could be heard almost constantly across Khartoum. (AP Photo/Marwan Ali)

Fighting in Sudan between forces loyal to two top generals has put that nation at risk of collapse and could have consequences far beyond its borders.

Both sides have tens of thousands of fighters, foreign backers, mineral riches and other resources that could insulate them from sanctions. Its a recipe for the kind of prolonged conflict that has devastated other countries in the Middle East and Africa, from Lebanon and Syria to Libya and Ethiopia.

The fighting, which began as Sudan attempted to transition to democracy, already has killed hundreds of people and left millions trapped in urban areas, sheltering from gunfire, explosions and looters.

A look at what is happening and the impact it could have outside Sudan.

WHO IS FIGHTING?

Gen. Abdel Fattah Burhan, head of the armed forces, and Gen. Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, the leader of a paramilitary group known as the Rapid Support Forces that grew out of Darfurs notorious Janjaweed militias, are each seeking to seize control of Sudan. It comes two years after they jointly carried out a military coup and derailed a transition to democracy that had begun after protesters in 2019 helped force the ouster of longtime autocrat Omar al-Bashir. In recent months, negotiations were underway for a return to the democratic transition.

The victor of the latest fighting is likely to be Sudans next president, with the loser facing exile, arrest or death. A long-running civil war or partition of the Arab and African country into rival fiefdoms are also possible.

Alex De Waal, a Sudan expert at Tufts University, wrote in a memo to colleagues this week t...

WINYAMA Digital Solutions have put their name firmly on the map after taking home both the Business of the Year award and the Indigenous Excellence award at the 2023 Telstra Best of Business Awards ceremony in Naarm (Melbourne) last month. 

Founded by Ngarluma Traditional Owner, Andrew Dowding, the Boorloo (Perth)- based company is an Indigenous- owned business specialising in cultural mapping, heritage mapping, IT consulting and geospatial consulting services. 

The genesis of Winyama really came about from the experience I had in working on Country with Elders, as part of our Native Title Organisation, the Ngarluma Aboriginal Corporation, Mr Dowding told the Koori Mail. 

I could see at the time mapping was an important part of the work we were doing at the corporation, and so I found myself working with a lot of Elders who wanted to do

STAR Queensland Firebirds goal-shooter Donnell Wallam is making a case for Diamonds Netball World Cup selection despite her teams winless start to the Super Netball season.

The Nyoongar woman is confident that despite the Firebirds predicament it wont impact her chances of winning selection for Australia for the key tournament in South Africa. 

Netballs 16th World Cup will be held entirely at the Cape Town International Convention Centre from July 28August 6. 

Wallam, 29, has been a shining light for the Firebirds, who have struggled to put together four quarters in four games this season. 

Wallam sits third in goals scored behind Jamaican representative duo Jhaniele Fowler and Shimona Nelson and tops the Super stats for offensive rebounds. 

Diamonds coach Stacey Marinkovich will name her squad at the end of the domestic season for the July-August tournament in Cape Town, where Australia will look to wrest back the trophy from

David Ross runs Maxine's Erotic Lounge in Melbourne. He banned trashbag Sentator Lidia Thorpe for life for conduct unbecoming of a strip bar customer. To date, he's shown more leadership on Thorpe's behaviour than: Prime Minister Therapeutic Albo. Greens leader Adam Bandt Senate Leader Penny Wong David Ross understands that...

Contributed From Victoria

Despite the release of Labors own report calling on a substantial lift to Jobseeker and Youth allowance payments, the Albanese government seems to be in no mood to listen. The report calls for a boost in rental assistance, and it argues that there must be a change in thinking of the definition of full employment. It currently refers to anyone who has worker an hour in the week of the used unemployment survey.

The reason given for the assessment by the Economic Advisory Committee, which had been briefed to find ways of lifting economic participation, is that Jobseeker and youth allowance payments have fallen so far below a liveable income that they constitute a barrier to finding work and inclusion. Raising these payments to overcome these barriers requires a 40 percent increase. This would mean living on $80 a day instead of $40.

A similar argument applies to the single parent allowance and the age pension.

According to government estimates, the called for changes would cost $34 billion. Treasurer Jim Chalmers has ruled out making any commitments and goes on to say, that the priority for the government is paying the $1 trillion debt it inherited.

When the cost of the benefit increase is compared to the intended $250 billion stage three tax cuts to the highest income earners, it is put into the proper perspective. It is not so much. Add to this the whopping $368 billion price tag for the nuclear submarine the government is buying.

This difference in the treatment of the wealthiest and the poorest is in line with that of the previous Scott Morrison government. The wealthiest are looked after, even if its at the expense of the poorest. The tax...

<p><p>Welcome to <a href= "https://www.thelastamericanvagabond.com/daily-wrap-up/" rel= "nofollow noopener" style="color: #ff0000;" title= "This link will take you away from steemit.com">The Daily Wrap Up</a>, a concise show dedicated to bringing you the most relevant independent news, as we see it, from the last 24 hours (4/20/23).<br> As always, take the information discussed in the video below and research it for yourself, and come to your own conclusions. Anyone telling you what the truth is, or claiming they have the answer, is likely leading you astray, for one reason or another. Stay Vigilant.<br> (<a href= "https://www.rokfin.com/TLAVagabond">https://www.rokfin.com/TLAVagabond</a>)(<a href="https://www.bitchute.com/channel/24yVcta8zEjY/">https://www.bitchute.com/channel/24yVcta8zEjY/</a>)<br> https://rumble.com/embed/v2gw6j4/?pub=2q643<br> <br> <br> Video Source Links (In Chronological Order)<br> <br> <br> <br> <a href= "https://www.spytalk.co/p/exclusive-fbi-agents-accuse-cia-of">Exclusive: FBI Agents Accuse CIA of 9/11 Coverup</a><br> <a href= "https://www.floridabulldog.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/Canestraro-Declaration-dated-20-July-2021.pdf"> Att B. 2021-07-20 Mr. Canestraro Declaration, dated 20 July 2021</a><br> <a href= "https://thegrayzone.com/2023/04/18/9-11-hijackers-cia-recruits/">Bombshell filing: 9/11 hijackers were CIA recruits - The Grayzone</a><br> <a href= "https://www.thelastamericanvagabond.com/not-just-azov-documents-prove-cia-has-been-cultivating-fascism-ukraine-since-1948/"> Not Just Azov: Documents Prove The CIA Has Been Cultivating Fascism In Ukraine Since At Least 1948</a><br> <a href= "https://www.thelastamericanvagabond.com/january-6th-was-always-very-clear-government-operation-important-tn-bill-dioxin-follow-up/"> January 6th Was Always A Very Clear Government Operation & Important TN Bill/Dioxin Follow Up
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(26) LastAmericanVagabond on Twitter: "@macroaggressio3 https://t.co/HlN4Ws6oa3 Isn't this offensive to the non-binary crash dummies? #DummyRightsAreHumanRights" / Twitter
(26) Ghost of Gary Plauch on Twitter: "@TLAVagabond Wait. Is she claiming there are physical differences between men and women?" / Twitter</a><br> <a href= "https://twitter.com/KimIversenShow/status/1648426711535718402">(26) Kim Iversen on Twitter: "The anti-trans agenda is the new #MeToo movement. At first it made sense and many of us agreed, now it's just going way too far. Are you against kids being indoctrinated and women competing against biological males, or are you now just against ALL trans people in public?" / Twitter&l...

A law firm has issued proceedings against Optus on behalf of current and former customers whose personal information including key identity documents were compromised in the September 2022 data breach.

The statement of claim, lodged in the Federal Court by Slater and Gordon, accuses Optus of breaching privacy, telecommunication and consumer laws as well as the companys internal policies by:failing to protect or take reasonable steps to protect customers personal information from unauthorised access or disclosure; failing to destroy or de-identify former customers personal information, and; failing to ensure that only those who had a legitimate reason for having access to customers personal information could access it.

Contractual obligations to customers

Optus has also been accused in the class action of breaching contractual obligations to customers along with its duty of care to ensure customers did not suffer harm arising from the unauthorised access or disclosure of their personal information.

It is claimed such harm was reasonably foreseeable if customer data was compromised.

Group members are seeking compensation for losses the data breach caused, including time and money spent replacing identity documents in addition to other measures to protect their privacy and prevent the increased likelihood of them falling victim to scams and identity theft.

They are also seeking damages for non-economic losses such as distress, frustration and disappointment.

10 million customers compromised 

Optus announced on 22 September last year that the personal information of up to 10 million of its current and former customers had been compromised in a cyberattack. The telco revealed that information including customer names, dates of birth, phone numbers and email addresses were accessed by, and/or disclosed to, an unknown number of unauthorised persons.

For a subset of customers, their addresses, ID document numbers such as drivers license, Medicare cards and/or passport numbers had also been compromised. The personal information of more than 10,000 customers was subsequently published online when ransom demands were made.

Slater and Gordon Class Actions Practice Group Leader Ben Hardwick described what occurred as an extremely serious privacy breach both in terms of the number of people affected and the nature of the information that was compromised. Very real risks were created by the disclosure of this private information that Optus customers had every right to believe was securely protected by their telecommunications and internet provider.

Information made accessible put affected customers at a higher risk

The type of information made accessible put affected customers at a higher risk of being scammed and having their identities stolen, and Optus should have had adequate measures i...

ASIA:

Singapores March non-oil domestic exports (NODX) shrank 8.3% year-on-year, official data showed on Monday, though the drop was smaller than the previous month and less than forecast. On a seasonally adjusted month-on-month basis, NODX increased 18.4%, Enterprise Singapore data showed, versus the prior months 8.2% decline. Economists had forecast 1.7% growth. The trade reliant city-state has now recorded six consecutive months of year-on-year contraction in the NODX, amid concerns over the economic outlook. The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) left its monetary policy settings unchanged last week, even though the inflation rate remains elevated, reflecting policy makers concerns about its growth outlook.

The major Asian stock markets had a mixed day today:

• NIKKEI 225 increased 50.81 points or 0.18% to 28,657.57
• Shanghai decreased 3.10 points or -0.09% to 3,367.03
• Hang Seng increased 29.21 points or 0.14% to 20,396.97
• ASX 200 decreased 3.30 points or -0.04% to 7,362.20
• Kospi decreased 11.97 points or -0.46% to 2,563.11
• SENSEX increased 64.55 points or 0.11% to 59,632.35
• Nifty50 increased 5.70 points or 0.03% to 17,624.45

The major Asian currency markets had a mixed day today:

• AUDUSD increased 0.0036 or 0.54% to 0.67490
• NZDUSD decreased 0.00104 or -0.17% to 0.61876
• USDJPY decreased 0.561 or -0.42% to 134.129
• USDCNY decreased 0.01383 or -0.20% to 6.88057

Precious Metals:

• Gold increased 13.07 USD/t oz. or 0.66% to 2,006.33
• Silver decreased 0.004 USD/t. oz or -0.01% to 25.254

Some economic news from last night:

China:

PBoC Loan Prime Rate remain the same at 3.65%

Japan:

Trade Balance (Mar) increased from -898.1B to -754.5B

Adjusted Trade Balance increased from -1.25T to -1.21T

Exports (YoY) (Mar) decreased from 6.5% to 4.3%

Australia:

NAB Quarterly Business Confidence decreased from -1 to -4

New Zealand:

CPI (YoY) (Q1) decreased from 7.2% to 6.7%

CPI (QoQ) (Q1) decreased from 1.4% to 1.2%...

This week we found out that Australias most embarrassing export, Rupert Murdoch, will pay US$787.5 million to avoid having his corporation further humiliated in court for telling lies about the US election, specifically regarding Dominion voting machines.

While this is a victory, of sorts, for Murdochs enemies, there is no accompanying ruling for Fox News to tell the truth about why they settled out of court, least of all to their own viewers, and it appears they will have some or all of Dominions costs covered by libel insurance.

The prospect of a six week trial of the key Murdoch players (from both sides of the camera), and a potential $1.6 billion settlement, has been whisked away. While Dominion and their investors have had a remarkable payday, it seems unlikely that this result will do any lasting damage to Fox News, or the wider Murdoch empire. Fox News reported $2.9 billion in pro-forma earnings last year, with the company worth upward of $16 billion. Their stock price barely wavered following the announcement.

As for reputational damage, the pre-trial evidence of internal communications from within Fox has made it clear that this is not a news organisation at...

Two GOP senators who have been investigating alleged Biden family corruption for years have stepped up their efforts. After Facebook and Twitter suppressed, to an extent, explosive revelations about Hunter Biden's laptop in October 2020, Republican Sens. Chuck Grassley of Iowa and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin want more answers. Grassley and Johnson have sent a letter to Zuckerberg noting: "In October 2020, when the New York Post published articles based on evidence from Hunter Biden's laptop, many news and social media organizations inappropriately rushed to censor and discredit the initial reporting and falsely labeled it as 'disinformation.'" Mainstream media outlets have finally admitted that the information gleaned from the laptop was not Russian disinformation but was in fact real.

Via: The Sydney Morning Herald: Tractors have ground to a halt in paddocks across Australia and New Zealand because of a signal failure in the satellite farmers use to guide their GPS-enabled machinery, stopping them from planting their winter crop.

Scientists at the University of Melbourne and Tsinghua University published pre-print research comparing the cryptocurrency market to traditional equities.

More than 260 fragments of animal bones have been found at the monument. The excavation of an enigmatic stone monument in AIUIa in Saudi Arabia is offering fresh insight into the rituals and culture of Neolithic-era peoples. Called a "mustatil," the structure is one of about 1,600 such rectangular monuments that have been recorded across northern Arabia. As part of a five-year project by the University of Western Australia and the Royal Commission for AlUla, researchers are studying one particular mustatil, dating back 7,000 years, with large slabs of sandstone encircling a long inner courtyard. Within the 140-meter (460-foot) long complex, archaeologists identified 260 fragments of animal remains, namely the skulls, horns, and teeth of domestic cattle such as goats and gazelles.

When Israel launched a war against the Gaza Strip in August 2022, it declared that its target was the Islamic Jihad only. Indeed, neither Hamas nor the other Gaza-based groups engaged directly in the fighting. Nevertheless, the war then raised more questions than answers.

Israel rarely distinguishes between one Palestinian group and another. For Tel Aviv, any Palestinian Resistance is a form of terrorism or, at best, incitement. Targeting one group and excluding other supposedly terrorist groups exposes a degree of Israeli fear in fighting all Palestinian factions in Gaza all at once.

For Israel, wars in Gaza have proved progressively harder with time. For example, Israels so-called Protective Edge in 2014 was very costly in terms of losing lives among the invading troops. In May 2021, the so-called Breaking Dawn was an even bigger flop. That war unified the Palestinians and served as a strategic blow to Israel without considerably advancing Israeli military interests.

Though the Gaza groups provided the Islamic Jihad with logistical support in August 2022, they refrained from directly engaging in the fight. For some Palestinians, this was unexpected and was interpreted by some as indicative of weakness, disunity, and even political opportunism.

Nearly a year later, another war loomed following the release of harrowing footage of Israeli police senselessly beating up peaceful Palestinian worshipers at Al-Aqsa Mosque on the 14th day of the holy month of Ramadan. Again, like in May 2021, Palestinians rose in unison. This time, resistance groups in Gaza and, eventually, Lebanon and Syria fired rockets at Israel first.

Though Israel hit back at various targets, it is evident that Tel Aviv was disinterested in a multi-front war with Palestinians to avoid a repeat of the 2021 fiasco.

The violent and repeated Israeli military raids at Al Aqsa and limited, though deadly, attacks on Jenin, Nablus, and other parts of the West Bank were meant to achieve political capital for the embattled government of Benjamin Netanyahu. But this strategy could only succeed i...

Ask Andrew Farnsworth about the origins of the BirdCast project, and he would describe it as ancient history. The year 1999, when the project was conceived, is a far cry from antiquity. But given how technology has helped transform the project since then, Farnsworths description might not be completely off the mark. BirdCast, in essence, is a project that tracks and forecasts bird migrations across the U.S. It uses weather radar data, in which birds also show up, to spot birds. Back when it was launched, scientists had the tedious task of manually poring through the chaotic radar data to differentiate between birds and meteorological phenomena like clouds. I used some statistical models and did some math that connects weather to migration intensity to make the forecast, Farnsworth, senior research associate at the Center for Avian Population Studies at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, told Mongabay in a video interview. The state of the art then was being able to use what was in the human brain to make the forecast. Since then, BirdCast has evolved to combine ornithology and advanced computer sciences to understand and predict bird migration patterns. The project now uses technology such as cloud computing and machine learning, which have helped make the work of researchers easier and more automated. The team at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology is also currently working on combining human observations with technology like machine learning and bioacoustics to identify the species of migratory birds information that has remained elusiveThis article was originally published on Mongabay

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The post Australia, US to Host Largest-Ever Bilateral Exercise appeared first on Global Research.

'Historic hair samples collected from Aboriginal people show that following an initial migration 50,000 years ago, populations spread rapidly around the east and west coasts of Australia.'

https://theconversation.com/dna-reveals-aboriginal-people-had-a-long-and-settled-connection-to-country-73958

Cometh the new platform, cometh new actions in law, the fragile litigant ever ready to dash off a writ to those with (preferably) deep pockets. And so, it transpires that artificial intelligence (AI) platforms, for all the genius behind their creation, are up for legal scrutiny and judicial redress. Certainly, some private citizens are getting rather ticked off about what such bots as ChatGPT are generating about them.

Some of this is indulgent, narcissistic craving you deserve what you get if you plug your name into an AI generator, hoping for sweet things to be said about you. Things get even comical when the search platform is itself riddled with inaccuracies.

One recent example stirring interest in the Digital Kingdom is a threatened legal suit against the OpenAI chatbot. Brian Hood, Mayor of Hepburn Shire Council in the Australian state of Victoria, was alerted to inaccurate accusations about bribery regarding a case that took place between 1999 and 2004. It involved Note Printing Australia, an entity of the Reserve Bank of Australia. Hood had worked at Note Printing Australia and blew the whistle on bribes being made to foreign authorities. He was never charged with the crime itself. However, answers generated by ChatGPT suggested otherwise, including the claim that Hood was found guilty of the said bribery allegations.

In a statement provided to Ars Technica by Gordon Legal, the firm representing Hood, more details are given. Among several false statements returned by the AI bot are claims that Hood was accused of bribing officials in Malaysia, Indonesia, and Vietnam between 1999 and 2005, that he was sentenced to 30 months in prison after pleading guilty to two counts of false accounting under the Corporations Act in 2012, and that he authorised payments to a Malaysian arms dealer acting as a middleman to secure a contract with the Malaysian Government.

James Naughton, a partner at Gordon Legal, is representing Hood. Hes an elected official, his reputation is central to his role, stated the lawyer. It would potentially be a landmark moment in the sense that its applying this defamation law to a new area of artificial intelligence and publication in the IT space.

In March, Hoods legal representatives wrote a letter of concern to OpenAI, demanding that they amend the outlined errors within 28 days, threatening a defamation action against the company in the event they refused to do so.

The question here is whether ChatGPTs supposedly defamatory imputations might fall within the realm of liability. T...

Snake Matt Kean will do and say anything to advance his power. He'd even screw over a good friend. The "friend" is Fiona Scott. She's the former member for Lindsay near Penrith. Fiona Scott is left faction through and through. She even works for the disgraced Michael Photios as a...

Photo: nswbar.asn.au

by Mary W Maxwell, LLB (Adel)

The photo shown above appears on the Professional Conduct page of the New South Wales Bar Association website, without a caption. I presume it means Stay on the Straight and Narrow.

Ah, the straight and narrow.  What is that for the legal profession today?  Does it mean Do the done thing?  I hope not, as the thing that is being done in Childrens Courts today is horrible.

This series at GumshoeNews.com, entitled Everybody Knows, concerns the criminal charges 101% unwarranted leveled against Dr Russell Pridgeon. Part 1 discussed the list of professional ethics for doctors.

I chose only the items from the AMAs code of practice that bear upon Russells duties to society as a doctor. Today its barristers turn. I will quote from the New South Wales code for barristers, but I wont be so abstemious; Ill copy out ma...

Sun protection has been a topic of conversation for generations. Everyone knows that the sun, although mood-boosting, and offering some health benefits too, can really do some damage. The saying fun in the sun isnt so fun when considering the detriments of too much sun exposure including serious diagnoses like skin cancer. Read the following useful information about sun protection and what to know about how to stay safe in the sun.

Is Sunshine Healthy?

The answer to this question is a million times YES! The sun offers health benefits like boosting our levels of vitamin D which leads to a healthier immune system. The sun also aids in amping up our mood and making us feel happier. Everyone can agree on that. There are many benefits to soaking up the sun but as with anything in life, moderation is key.

The Bad Part

The bad part about staying out in the sun too long is that the sun gives off ultraviolet rays. These are called UV rays for short. These rays are extremely powerful and contain skin-damaging effects. When exposed to the strength of UV rays for too long, your skin will suffer. Sun damage comes in the form of burnt skin, blisters, fine lines, and wrinkles, and sometimes more serious consequences such as skin cancer.

Wear Sunscreen

driving a train while on a smartphone pic.twitter.com/716iOgEr6m clips that go hard (@clipsthatgohard) April 19, 2023

Further significant doubts have been cast on the accuracy of global surface temperature results following the discovery that electronic thermometers in Australia have read up to 0.7C higher than traditional mercury glass units. The Australian dataset is a major component of global compilations since it provides an important guide to one of the largest land masses in the southern hemisphere. After many years of trying, local freedom of information requests from scientists have forced the Australian Bureau of Meteorology (BoM) to release comparative information from the two measuring devices around Brisbane airport. It shows that automatic readings are higher 41% of the time, compared with 32% when the temperatures were the same. Electronic temperatures devices have been in general use in Australia since 1995. The guidance of the World Meteorological Organisation suggests averaging temperatures over a minute to remove corruptions caused by temporary effects such as a sudden gust of...

Say no to Albanese's racism.

Say no to Albanese's racism.

Link Australian Government goons killing millions of bees by pouring petrol into peoples bee hives....

How to Locate Reliable Pet Insurance

When searching for a proper insurance agent, it is quite a challenging process. Just like it is with other businesses, there are many dog insurance agencies and types to select from. However, you need to know more about insurance companies and agents are not the same. Therefore, a lot of attention is required when choosing an insurance agent that is suitable for you. To help you find a good insurance agent, there are multiple steps that you can take. The first step you should take is to contact and speak directly to your prospective agent.

To meet and discuss your needs and expectations, book an interview with the agents. To help you find a suitable insurance agent, there is no better way than having a one on one conversation now! An insurance agent that is right for you is the one that is keen to listen and inquire more about your needs. However, it might be time to find a new insurance agent if the one you are talking to is only pushing for unwanted plans and policies. If you find the advice given by a particular agent uncomfortable, you can also view here for more to get details about the agency.

Do not make the mistake of paying for an agent who is hard to get along with. When looking for the proper insurance agent, you also need to discover more and observe how quickly they respond to your needs. You probably need to find another agent if the one you are talking to does not seem interested to listen or respond to your wants. Also you should not settle for an agent who keeps on pushing you to purchase more coverage even after they are already aware of your needs. It is, however, common for good agents to sometimes provide more coverage or different policy options.

It is good to find out if you can be offered with all the different types of systems that you may want by your prospective insurance agent. If, for example, you need health, auto, and homeowners insurance, it will not make any sense if you find a suitable insurance agent that only offers one of them. The other thing you need to consider is the period that the company has been into the business of selling insurance. You should not expect perfect services in case you are the first customer to that agent. On the other hand, ensure these agents have been into business for long, you can expect to get high-quality services, knowledge, and experience.

Contributed by Ben Wilson

Embattled French President Emmanuel Macron continues to face the enmity of the French. Months of strikes and protests continue over the raising of the retirement age. This has taken the shape of a battle over what sort of nation France is going to be in the future, and it has implications for Europe and the world.

Unions have acted together in a show of unity that hasnt been seen for a long time. Students and youth in general are taking part in big numbers. The turmoil is in the big cities and tow across the country.

Forcing the change through by decree, rather than going through the process of a parliamentary vote which would have defeated it has raised an uproar. Most French see this as an act against democracy. In combination with brutal police suppression of protests the swelled, and this has included the defence of democracy.

Photo from AP: at least 1.5 million marched in Paris on 12 April

This provides evidence that the Marcon administration is running scared, and ultimately fighting for its ongoing survival.

The political crisis this has caused, is really the result of ongoing and building tensions over time. France is beset with economic troubles and the old two-party political system is in disarray. In fact, this is what was behind the rise of Macron in the first place. The former prominent member of the Socialist Party and as the party came close to extinction, he became the face of a new hope for the political elite. The conservative Republicans fell nearly as far, which provided space for the rise of new political movements.

Marcons job was to save the day for a section of the political elite. Another section turned to the Marine le Pen led and far right National Rally. Up till now, the Macron camp has had the upper hand. But it started to unravel with the rise of the Yell...

An American politician has bragged to a National Rifle Association conference that her one-year-old granddaughter, who is soon to turn two, already owns a shotgun and a rifle, and will soon need them.

Kristi Noem is the Govenor of South Dakota, in the north west of the continental United States. She was elected to the role in 2019 after an endorsement from then US president Donald Trump, but she came to national prominence during the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic by refusing to mandate mask wearing throughout her state.

At the start of the pandemic South Dakota had the lowest death rate in the country, with a single death in the month of March 2020, set against a population of almost one million people. After a year-and-a-half, South Dakotas death rate was ranked 9^th overall, with just over 2,000 actual deaths.

Earlier this month, Noem was back seeking the spotlight with a speech to a National Rifle Association leadership forum, where she claimed her granddaughter, Addy, already own guns.

Little Miss Addy who is almost two who soon will need them, I want to reassure you, she already has a shotgun and she already has a rifle.

Noem added that she also has a pony named Sparkles so the girl is set up.

Anyone 18 or older can buy a handgun from a private individual, and they dont need a permit, firearms registration or a background check. Additionally, open carry which means walking around with a firearm strapped to your hip like the old days of the wild west is also legal in South Dakota, again with no permit required.

South Dakota, despite having one of the smallest populations in the United States (its ranked 46^th), also has the 7^th highest rate of suicide by firearm.

The post My 1yo Granddaughter Already Owns A Shotgun And Rifle, Brags US Governor appeared first on New Matilda.

According to World Economic Forum, the demand for lithium is going to rise to 3 million tonnes (3.3 million tons) by 2030. Moreover, they also share that The three largest producers of lithium are Australia, Chile and China.

In a recent surprising development, a Geological Survey of India (GSI) found that there is around 5.9 million metric tons of lithium in the Reasi district in the northern union territory of Jammu and Kashmir, also known as J&K.

This survey showed that in a country where it was once believed had no deposits of lithium suddenly contains the second-largest on earth, just as much as Australia, China, Portugal, Zimbabwe, the USA, and Argentina, all put together.

Lithium is now considered one of the worlds most important and critical resources on the planet since regardless of what may seem like a lot, can be considered scarce when placed in perspective of how much the world uses up this natural resource. Thats because its used to manufacture rechargeable batteries for smartphones, computers, tablets, electric vehicles, and the like, whose number continues to increase every single year.

Media release

On 20 July 2022, the U.S. Department of Defense published a media release titled "DoD Announces the Establishment of the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office." The text of the release reads:

https://media.defense.gov/2021/Mar/03/2002592680/-1/-1/0/210212-A-BI463-0003.JPG

"On July 15, 2022, Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks, in coordination with the Director of National Intelligence [DNI], amended her original direction to the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence and Security by renaming and expanding the scope of the Airborne Object Identification and Management Synchronization Group [AOIMSG] to the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office [AARO], due to the enactment of the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal 2022, which included a provision to establish an office, in coordination with DNI, with responsibilities that were broader than those originally assigned to the AOIMSG.

Today, USD (I&S) Hon Ronald S.  Moultrie informed the department of the establishment of AARO within the office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence and Security, and named Dr. Sean M. Kirkpatrick, most recently the Chief Scientist at the Defense Intelligence Agency's Missile and Space Intelligence Center, as the Director of AARO.

The mission of the AARO will be to synchronize efforts across the Department of Defense, and with other US federal departments and agencies, to detect, identify and attribute objects of interest in, on or near military installations, operating areas, training areas, special use airspace and other areas of interest, and, as necessary, to mitigate any associated threats to safety of operations and national security. This includes anomalous, unidentified space,...

the view is making me sick to my stomach and comparing US Christians to the Taliban that is beyond repair the view needs to be Cancelled ASAP pic.twitter.com/YbCe9OXt8b (@DustinMills24) April 19, 2023 Set up the next Pride event in Helmund.

Do your passions include walks on the beach, traveling, and Wilhelms tank coordinates? Germany is warning both soldiers and politicians to be wary of Russian spies who are using dating apps, namely Tinder, to gather intel. Germanys Military Counterintelligence Service (MAD) told the newspaper Welt am Sonntag that members of other intelligence services (e.g. Russia) use social media to specifically establish contacts with members of the Bundeswehr.

Germanys Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution said Russian spy efforts are on par with the Cold War. However, trained young spies are looking to meet all of the men from unfriendly nations. Before the war began, Australias counter-espionage agency ASIO reported that spies from foreign nations were on popular dating apps such as Tinder, Hinge, and Bumble. ASIO director-general Mike Burgess claimed that spies were attempting to interfere in Australias election and said that spying efforts began at the start of the pandemic. ASIO is also tracking suspicious approaches on dating platforms such as Tinder, Bumble and Hinge. My message for any potential victims on these sites is a familiar one if it seems too good to be true, it probably is, Burgess stated.

Beautiful women are extremely effective spies and this tactic has been used throughout history. In fact, some of the gadgets used in James Bond films were inspired by the 39 female spies in Bri...

If anyone was expecting a new tilt, a shine of novelty, a flash of independence from Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wongs address to the National Press Club on April 17, they were bound to be disappointed. The anti-China hawks, talons polished, got their fill. The US State Department would not be disturbed. The Pentagon could rest easy. The toadyish musings of the Canberra establishment would continue to circulate in reliable staleness.

In reading (and hearing) Wongs speech, one must always assume the opposite, or something close to it. Whatever is said about strategic balance, dont believe a word of it; such views are always uttered in the shadow of US power. From that vantage point, Occams Razor becomes a delicious blessing: nothing said by any Australian official in foreign policy should ever be taken as independently relevant. Best gaze across the Pacific for confirmation.

In Wongs address, the ill-dressed clich waltzes with the scantily clad platitude. When Australians look out to the world, we see ourselves reflected in it just as the world can see itself reflected in us. (World, whatever you are, do tell.)

The basis for this strained nonsense is, at least, promising. Variety can, paradoxically, generate common ground. This is a powerful natural asset for building alignment, for articulating our determination to see the interests of all the worlds peoples upheld, alongside our own. Mightily aspirational, is Wong here, though such language seems pinched from the Non-Aligned Movement of the Cold War, one that Australia, US policing deputy of the Asia-Pacific, was never a part off. No informed listener would assume otherwise.

Like a lecture losing steam early, she finally gets to the point of her address: how we avert war and maintain peace and more than that, how we shape a region that reflects our national interests and our shared regional interests. It does not take long to realise what this entails: talk about rules, standards and norms where a larger country does not determine the fate of the smaller country, where each country can pursue its own aspirations, its own prosperity.

That the United States has determined the fate of Australia since the Second World War, manipulating, interfering and guiding its politics and its policies, makes this statement risible, but no less significant. We are on bullying terrain, and Wong is trying to pick the most preferable bully.

She cant quite put it in those terms, so speaks about the regional balance of power instead, with Australia performing the role of handmaiden. She dons the sages hat, consumes the shamans herbal potion, insisting that commentators and strategists have gotten it wrong to talk about great powers competing for primacy. They love a binary. And...

Pastor Stephen Lott known as Lotty

Donald Elley of Bellingen:

...

All our environmental problems require a radical change in how we think about resources and land. Before 1788, there was no wilderness: management for biodiversity was also management for the availability of food, fibre, wood and medicine. Harvesting these things was also a form of management.

The post Our dubious war on weeds appeared first on Overland literary journal.

THE footsteps of Indigenous leader and visionary land rights pioneer, Yunupingu, have left an indelible mark. 

A giant of the nation who walked in two worlds, Yunupingu has been remembered as a statesman, a remarkable artist and a national treasure. 

The former Australian of the Year died peacefully at his home, surrounded by his family and ceremonial adornments, in northeast Arnhem Land on Monday, aged 74. 

We remember him for his fierce leadership, and total strength for Yolu and for Aboriginal people throughout Australia, his family said. 

We are hurting, but we honour him and remember with love everything he has done. 

The Yothu Yindi Foundation he chaired said he was a giant of the nation whose contribution to public life spanned seven decades. 

He was first and foremost a leader of his people, whose welfare was his most pressing concern and responsibility, the foundation said. 

Yunupingu was born on June 30, 1948, in Gunyangara, on the northern tip of the Gulf of Carpentaria in the Northern Territory. 

In 1963 he helped draft the first Yirrkala bark petition presented to the Australian parliament. 

An accomplished painter, singer and dancer, Yunupingu met former prime minister Robert Menzies in the 1960s and dealt with every serving Australian prime minister since Gough Whitlam. 

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said Yunupingu was a great Australian, a national treasure and a leading figure in delivering the Uluru Statement from the Heart. 

The juniors are on at the SkyNews grammar desk today. Jesus Christ was not allegedly crucified. Its been backed up a few times in a reasonably well publicised and circulated book. Thankfully Christians dont go trying to behead or blow up people who cant write.

By Dave DeCamp The US and Australia will hold the largest-ever iteration of their bilateral military exercise, known as Talisman Sabre, which takes place every...

US, Australia to Hold Largest-Ever Talisman Sabre Military Exercise

WARNING: Never trust the police.

The police lie, tamper with evidence and provide false statements in court.

The police are not there for you, nor are they your 'friend'.

The best part of all this is that they are allowed to get away with this.

Where those police personnel charged with criminal offences?

You may recall I have occasionally treated my boyfriend like a cat, in moments of unconscious error.  Today I almost put cat food on my own plate.  Perhaps, rather than seeing my boyfriend as a simple animal, I see all humans as socially interchangeable with beasts myself included.

OK, that doesnt explain why, but at least it looks less like Im demoting my lovin man to domestic creachur status.

Corvide continues.  Paxlovid NyQuil and DayQuil are surely helping.  Science suggests the vaxxing helped, and as bad as its been I have to imagine Id be dead as fried chicken if not for that.  Still, no alternate universe view of me being foolish enough to antivax for comparison, so I admit room for error.

I spilled pop on my computer so this was made on a phone, slowly and painfully.  I wont post much til I get that resolved.  Also not answering comments much, but thanks for the support, really.

See yall later!

Rupert Murdoch and his companies Fox Corp and News Corp are on the ropes after agreeing to pay Dominion Voting Systems $1.17 billion ($US 787.5 million) for defamation after Fox promoted lies []

By Neenah Payne The following two key questions about the COVID era must be asked and answered now: Why and how did so much go...

Most Important Questions Now of COVID Era

The documentary film River, coming to theaters this Earth Day, opens with a view of a river flowing calmly between shadowed banks, shimmering with the liminal light of dusk or dawn. 

Thousands have lived without love, a quote from W.H. Auden appears over a reflected cloud bank. Not one without water. 

Yet the film that follows suggests that the line between love and need winds a meandering path. The next hour and a quarter is a visual, musical and poetic love letter to rivers, which the movie depicts as a source of both basic necessities and human dreams.

I dont think youd find anyone who didnt love a river, the films director Jennifer Peedom told EcoWatch in an interview. I think we just innately understand their importance to our survival, but also that contact to water is an essential part of our lived experience.

Rivers as Characters

River is the second film in a trilogy born of a unique collaboration between Peedom, co-writer and director Joseph Nizeti, the Australian Chamber Orchestra, its artistic director Richard Tognetti, producer Jo-anne McGowan, nature writer Robert Macfarlane and actor Willem Dafoe. The first, Mountain, released in 2017, became Australias highest-grossing documentary made in the country. River repeats Mountains weaving of classical and original music, stunning scenery and spare but evocative prose delivered in Dafoes steady voice. But unlike Mountain, which focused on terrains humans often venture to, River turned its lens on what flows to us. 

In choosing a theme for a second film, the team behind Mountain originally thought of water, but decided they needed something a bit more specific. At the same time, the 2018 to 2019 mass fish die offs in Australias Murray Darling Basin an event caused by a combination of drought, algae bloom and plunging temperatures that is sadly being repeated as the film opens brought the health of rivers and waterways into sharp focus.

We realized that river...

So far, Germany has been the blind spot in discussions over the Nord Stream sabotage. The economic disadvantages to the worlds fourth-largest economy from blasting the pipeline are too great. Of course, no one will seriously assume that the traffic-light coalition in Berlin stands behind the attack. However, the outwardly conspicuously indifferent and dismissive handling of the act of sabotage suggests that Berlin either has a particularly opaque approach to its MPs or has its reasons for downplaying the significance of the Nord Stream sabotage. Several observations in Germanys handling of the sabotage suggest that, though Germany was a victim of the attack, it is advancing the line that it no longer has a national interest in the Nord Stream pipelines.

Parliamentary questions from the opposition

Parliamentary groups and individual members of the opposition have addressed parliamentary questions about the sabotage to the German government. Particularly exciting are the answers some of which are verbatim identical from the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action to the members of parliament Matthias Hauer  (CDU), Leif-Erik Holm (AfD) and Zaklin Nastic (Die Linke), which state, that the federal government assumed that sabotage had taken place, but that it had no concrete insights of the facts of the case, in particular of the possible authorship. Furthermore, the German Bundesregierung, after careful consideration, has come to the conclusion that further information cannot be provided for reasons of the state interest (Staatswohl) not even in classified form because they are subject to the third-party rule. The German state, according to the letter, would jeopardize the basis of trust with other intelligence services by publishing the information that would result in a serious impairment of the participation of the intelligence services of the Federation in the international exchange of intelligence and consequently: If, as a consequence of a loss of confidence, information from foreign agencies were to be omitted or substantially reduced, significant information gaps would arise with negative consequences for the accuracy...

As a homeowner or business owner, ensuring the safety of your electrical equipment is crucial. One way to do this is by conducting Portable Appliance Testing (PAT) regularly. PAT testing is the process of inspecting electrical equipment to ensure that it is safe for use.

PAT testing frequency is a common question that many homeowners and business owners ask. How often should it be conducted? The answer to this question depends on various factors, such as the type of equipment, the environment in which it is used, and the level of risk associated with its use.

In general, the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) recommends that portable electrical appliances in a low-risk environment, such as an office, should be tested every two to four years. In contrast, equipment used in a high-risk environment, such as a construction site, should be tested every three to six months.

However, its essential to note that these recommendations are not set in stone. The frequency of PAT testing will vary depending on the specific circumstances. For example, equipment that is frequently moved or subject to wear and tear may need to be inspected more frequently.

As a homeowner or business owner, its your responsibility to ensure that your electrical equipment is safe to use. To help you determine the appropriate PAT testing frequency for your equipment, here are some factors to consider:

Type of Equipment

The type of equipment you have will play a significant role in determining how often it needs to be inspected. Some common types of equipment that require PAT testing include:

Electrical appliances

Extension cords

Power tools

Lighting equipment

Kitchen appliances

Portable heaters

Environment

The environment in which your equipment is used is also an important factor to consider. For example, equipment used in a dry, clean office environment will typically require less testing than equipment used in a wet, dusty construction site. Other environmental factors to consider include:

Temperature

Humidity

With a bit of knowledge and patience you may never have to buy a semi-hardwood or hardwood plant again.

There's been another "sighting" of strange stuff on Mars, this time once again by NASA's Curiosity rover near Gale Crater on Mars, a site

The post MORE MARS ANOMALIES: BONES, OR AT LEAST, A BONEY STRUCTURE? appeared first on The Giza Death Star.

Hard-hitting.

Asia, which includes major economies such as China, Japan, Singapore and India, hosts 355 crypto machines, representing 1% of the total crypto ATMs installed worldwide.

Drago Bosnic Global Research April 17, 2023

Electronic warfare (EW) is one of the most important aspects of modern military capabilities and is often the litmus test of how advanced the state and its armed forces are. Its part of the invisible and yet extremely intense battle that we usually cannot see directly.

However, its impact is wholly undeniable. Russia is among the world leaders in EW and its warfighting capabilities in this regard are a source of pride for the Eurasian giant, but also fear for its adversaries.

Russian dominance in EW on the frontlines of Ukraine is so comprehensive and massive that its one of the few things the mainstream propaganda machine never dared to question or ridicule. Even Russian strategic thermonuclear capabilities were subjected to propaganda attacks at times, but its EW capabilities never. And for good reason.

And yet, as with everything concerning the mainstream propaganda machine, we must tread carefully. This is especially true when it comes to the media citing the Pentagon leaks as their primary source of information. Needless to say, an actual leak would require an inadvertent release of classified information and most intelligence experts agree its extremely unlikely there was anything inadvertent about it. However, this is not to say that all information connected to the leak is false. On the contrary, its relatively elaborate nature implies that much of it is indeed true, but it can be difficult to discern what exactly. One of the few leaked facts we can surely believe concerns precisely Russian EW capabilities. Still, this begs the question why?

JDAM (Joint Direct Attack Munition)

To answer that, we should first dissect and specify the claims of the mainstream propaganda machine. The leaks include a massive amount of information, including the claim that US-made JDAM (Joint Direct Attack Munition) bombs are failing in Ukraine due to successful R...

More Unanswered Red Flags Regarding Jack Texeira and the Pentagon Leaks

By Larry Johnson, April 18, 2023

Several former military and intelligence professionals have contacted me and voiced similar doubts about the pat story being circulated regarding National Guard

The post Selected Articles: More Unanswered Red Flags Regarding Jack Texeira and the Pentagon Leaks appeared first on Global Research.

Great work from the team at Advance Australia.

Tom Graham, founder of Metaphysic.ai, on how generative AI will upend the film industry and change our understanding of whats real.

Tom Graham was a couple of hours away from his keynote conversation with Chris Anderson on stage at TED 2023 in Vancouver when I Zoomed him in search of some definitive answers about AI. Drowning in artificial generative quicksand, buried in amazing news week after week, I needed to grab his hand and come up for air before sinking back into the mud of the next generative artificial intelligence update.

Read Full Story

by Mary W Maxwell, LLB

Dr William Russell Pridgeon, a GP in Grafton NSW, has come out with a major, major, major book on the subject of pedophilia in Australia. It particularly discusses the capture of the police profession.  You already know of Dr Pridgeon from the fact the APF arrested him 4 years ago. Gumshoe has covered his case and the Operation Noetic that was used to hunt him down.

He was made to look like a criminal and Ill bet many members of the Australian Federal Police have come to believe their own rhetoric. Tomorrow in a Brisbane Court he faces another hearing. We all need to be there, at least in spirit.

I now demand that ALL DOCTORS IN AUSTRALIA BE THERE,...

1.00 AUD = 0.00002 BTC
0.00010 BTC = 4.35 AUD
Converter

The kind of person who will be infiltrating Anthony Albanese's race-based Voice. pic.twitter.com/IH4idg9EpI Pauline Hanson (@PaulineHansonOz) April 19, 2023

Sudan Hospitals Struggle with Casualties, Damage in Fighting

By SAMY MAGDY

A patient is being carried into a hospital in Khartoum, Sudan, Monday, April 17, 2023. Hospitals in the Sudanese capital are overwhelmed as the city turns into a war zone in fighting between the countrys two top generals. At least six of the around 20 hospitals in Khartoum and its neighboring city Omdurman have shut down, the Doctors Syndicate says. (AP Photo)

CAIRO (AP) At the Khartoum Teaching Hospital, people wounded during street battles flowed into the wards. Supplies were running low, with doctors, nurses, patients and their relatives trapped inside for days as the Sudanese capital turned into a war zone.

Then early Monday, one of the wards was heavily damaged by shelling.

We are running out of everything, Dr. Amin Saad told The Associated Press. We are working with the least possible capabilities. Were all exhausted, but there is a shortage of physicians.

Not long afterward, the hospital shut down completely with staff, patients and relatives stuck inside as clashes raged throughout the neighborhood. It was one of at least 12 hospitals shuttered in the capital area because they were damaged in fighting, were inaccessible because of clashes or had run out of fuel, according to the Doctors Syndicate.

Khartoums hospitals have been thrown into chaos by the explosion of violence between Sudans two top generals. People have been unable to leave their homes since Saturday as the two sides engaged in gun battles and bombarded each other with artillery and airstrikes. More than 180 people have been killed and over 1,800 wounded since the fighting erupted, U.N. envoy Volker Perthes said.

There are some 20 hospitals in the capital and the neighboring city of Omdurman. Those that still managed to operate were understaffed and overwhelmed, running low on supplies and struggling with power or water cuts, doctors said.

The sudden outbreak of fighting caught everyone off guard, trapping doctors and nurses inside hospitals, and preventing other staff from reaching the facil...

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-04-19/jim-chalmers-very-busy-before-first-may-budget-2023/102236258 The federal budget is less than three weeks away. Treasurer Jim Chalmers still has a lot to do between now and then, including releasing a number of important reports. He wants his budget to provide cost-of-living relief for households, and to support employment and wages for workers, in line...

Disability justice is linked to prison and police abolitionism, to racial justice, to poverty, to employment and opportunities, to all kinds of social equity issues. We need so much more than awareness, acceptance and appreciation alone.

The post Toxic positivity and exclusion in the autistic community appeared first on Overland literary journal.

The Human Rights Law Centre welcomes the long overdue publication of Witness Js sentencing remarks by ACT Chief Justice Lucy McCallum after years of secrecy.  

In deciding to publish the partially-redacted remarks today, the Chief Justice acknowledged that secrecy is anathema to the rule of law. 

A public trial is recognised by law as a crucial element to the right to a fair trial, and open justice is a central democratic safeguard. The level of secrecy in the prosecution of an intelligence officer known as Alan Johns, or Witness J, should never have happened and can never be repeated. 

Between 2018 and 2019, strict secrecy orders were applied to all aspects of Witness Js case, with the entire prosecution taking place behind closed doors. The federal government invoked the National Security Information (Criminal and Civil Proceedings) Act 2004 (Cth) (NSI Act) to require this secrecy. 

Quotes attributed to Kieran Pender, Senior Lawyer at the Human Rights Law Centre: 

Secret trials have a long history in authoritarian states; they have no place in democracies like Australia, where open justice is a fundamental protection of our human rights.  

Todays publication of the Witness J sentencing remarks brings an end to an alarming five year long saga that should never have happened. It is testament to the media, civil society and the Independent National Security Legislation Monitor that this secret trial was identified, called out and now addressed.  

The government must change the law, in line with the Monitors recommendations, to ensure this can never happen again. 

The right to a fair trial is protected in the ACT under the Human Rights Act, but this level of secrecy was permitted by federal law underscoring the importance of a federal Charter of Human Rights. 

Image by Riley Boughton

Media Contact:
Thomas Feng
Human Rights Law Centre
Media and Communications Manager 0431 285 275
thomas.feng@hrlc.org.au

The left will do and say anything to get their way. The yes campaign is touting an opinion poll allegedly of Aboriginal Australians' attitudes - no surprise the YES campaign says they found 80% in support of The Voice. Warren Mundine has drilled down and figured that the headline comes...

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-04-18/indigenous-frontier-war-tactics-revealed-in-how-they-fought/102230578

BY CHRIS MORRISON | THE DAILY SCEPTIC | APRIL 17, 2023

Further significant doubts have been cast on the accuracy of global surface temperature results following the discovery that electronic thermometers in Australia have read up to 0.7C higher than traditional mercury glass units. The Australian dataset is a major component of global compilations since it provides an important guide to one of the largest land masses in the southern hemisphere. After many years of trying, local freedom of information requests from scientists have forced the Australian Bureau of Meteorology (BoM) to release comparative information from the two measuring devices around Brisbane airport. It shows that automatic readings are higher 41% of the time, compared with 32% when the temperatures were the same.

Electronic temperatures devices have been in general use in Australia since 1995. The guidance of the World Meteorological Organisation suggests averaging temperatures over a minute to remove corruptions caused by temporary effects such as a sudden gust of hot air. But the BoM records highs for just a second, something that basic mercury thermometers cannot do. For years, the BoM has refused to release comparative instrument data.

The Australian journalist Jo Nova takes a sceptical view as to why the BoM has been so stubborn. Potentially, the electronic sensors offer a bonanza of propaganda headlines for the Green Blob to pick from, especially when coldest ever days get ignored by the media. The sensors are offering many more headlines of records for heat, heatwaves, hottest nights, more days over 35C, she continued, adding, there are many cherries to be picked here.

The use of highly sensitive measuring equipment to produce temperature records and hence whip up climate emergency fears is common throughout the world. Last year In the U.K., the Met Office promoted a record high of 40.3C halfway down the runway at RAF Coningsby on the afternoon of July 19th. Admittedly, the record was declared to have stood for longer than a second 60 seconds to be precise. To this day, the Met Office has refused to answer a number of Daily Sceptic enquiries about possible non-climatic causes of this widely promoted record. In the light of the Australian disclosures, we wonder if the Met Office should re-examine the way it declares heat records and compare the results of its measuring devices with t...

By the undersigned, April 18, 2023

Security in the Indo-Pacific Region including New Zealands Relationships with the AUKUS Alliance

TO: Rt Hon Chris Hipkins, Hon Nanaia Mahuta and Hon Andrew Little
Parliament Buildings
Wellington

Dear Prime Minister and Ministers,

The International Affairs and Disarmament Committee supports the values-based approach to foreign policy adopted by the current government and expressed in Hon Minister Nanaia Mahutas Inaugural Foreign Policy Speech (Feb 4, 2021) which emphasizes an international rules-based order, global action on sustainability issues where solutions depend on international cooperation, and principles of manaaki, whanaunga, kaitiaki, mahi tahi and kotahitanga.

We would appreciate your response to comments and concerns we have about AUKUS, New Zealands relationship to this new alliance and recent government comments by Minister Little and others about New Zealands involvement with it. Many aspects of AUKUS appear at odds with the values-based approach of New Zealand. In addition, we have specific concerns about AUKUS potentially undermining important non-proliferation and disarmament treaties. We share concerns about AUKUS and New Zealand being involved in it that have been expressed by former New Zealand Prime Ministers Helen Clark and Jim Bolger, former Australian Prime Ministers Paul Keating and Malcolm Fraser, and former National Party leader Don Brash.

AUKUS involves the supply of highly enriched nuclear fissile material, which means it is usable as nuclear bomb fuel, to a non-nuclear weapons state. As has been asserted by a number of independent experts, and also by the Indonesian and Chinese governments, this threatens the objectives and purposes of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. This is particularly the case as this fissile material will not be subject to inspections and monitoring by the International Atomic Energy Agency.  Insisting on such inspections and monitoring has been crucial in endeavouring to ensure Iran does not develop the means to secure highly enriched uranium that could be used in nuclear weapons, and suggestions of a double standard ha...

On Monday, we wrote to the Chair of the Senate Committee of Privileges to ask that it take action on Lidia Thorpe's vile, drunken and publicly abusive behaviour outside a Melbourne strip club in the early hours of Sunday morning. My report to the Senate Committee of Privileges re Lidia...

Contributed by Joe Montero

Like Australia and many other countries, Spain is experiencing a surge in homelessness, and the cost of housing is forcing many younger citizens to remain in the home of their parents. Only 16 percent of young people live independently. The average for Europe is 32 percent.

The government there is not ignoring the problem. A decision has just been made to make 50,000 foreclosed homes held by Serab, a mostly government owned bank, available for affordable rent. A further 15,000 homes will be added to social housing. And there is an intention to pass a bill through the parliament to introduce rent caps of 3 percent per year, in areas where rents are rising significantly. These rises were sometimes more than 20 percent last year.

Photo by J. M. Cadenas: The Madrid headquarters of the Banko de Espana, the national central bank and majority owner of Serab

Serab was created in 2012 to take over 50 billion Euros worth of real estate resulting from the housing market crash of 2009.

Economy Minister Nadia Calvino said the government was trying to increase the supply of public housing which at 300,000 homes is just 3 per cent of total housing, The aim is to boost the 209,000 public homes by 17 percent.

Industry organisations are attacking these reforms and accuse the government of playing to win votes at the coming regional elections.

There is still a long way to go to resolve the housing situation. But at least the Spanish government has taken some important steps, and the pressure coming from society is to do much more.

Transport for trains, buses, and trams, have already been cut by 30 percent. country trains fares are to be cut. There has been a crackdown on heating and air conditioner costs by placing limits on what energy suppliers can charge. Tax on this has been reduced. A financial package, including a 17.5 rise in pensions has ben provided.

Prime minister Pedro Sanchez said: Housing in Spain is a constitutional right, but not a real right. Young people have to wait an unacceptably long time to access housing and become independent. He was referring to the need to align the reality to the constitution.

The special report on IBACs Operation Daintree found that in October 2018, the then Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) entered into a $1.2 million contract with the Health Education Federation (HEF) a recently established entity linked to the Health Workers Union (HWU) to provide occupational violence...

By Adam Dick | Ron Paul Institute | April 18, 2023

Like every American state government, the Mississippi government pressures parents to ensure their children take a slew of vaccination shots as a condition for the children to attend school. But, unlike most states, Mississippi law does not recognize the right of parents to refuse, based upon philosophical or religious objections, to follow the state-imposed childhood vaccination schedule.

Instead, the only exemption Mississippi parents have had available is a medical exemption that has turned out for almost all parents to be the same as having no exemption at all. I wrote about this in an April of 2015 article:

The New York Times  reported in February how extremely restricting vaccination mandate exemptions causes a significant increase in vaccination rates, pointing to Mississippi as an example. Mississippi has among the strictest vaccination requirements in America barring philosophical and religious exemptions and allowing only a medical exemption for students in both public and private schools. In the 2013-14 school year the Times reports that only 17 out of 45,179 kindergarten students in the state were exempt from the states vaccination mandate.

The medical exemption could more accurately be called the mirage exemption. In contrast, philosophical and religious exemptions can allow much greater ability for parents to refuse government pressure to have their children subjected to each and every state-mandated shot at each and every state-mandated time in a childs life.

Since I wrote that article in 2015, California and New York, two of the largest population states, have joined Mississippi by eliminating all exemptions other than the medical exemption. Three additional states  Connecticut, Maine, and West Virginia  also recognize only the medical exemption.

Some good news came for Mississippi parents this week. The Informed Consent Action Network (ICAN) has announced that on Monday a federal court ruled that the First Amendment requires that, by July 15, 2023, the State of Mississippi afford its residents a religious exemption for their children to attend school without one or more state....

Indirect identification, individuation, disambiguation, distinguishing from all others, or singling out. call it what you want, but the statutory definition of personal information needs to clearly state that it includes when individuals can be singled out and acted upon, even if their identity is not known.

Yet as they now stand, the proposals to amend the Privacy Act do not include this critical reform.

We wrote previously about some of the themes arising from the Final Report into the review of the Privacy Act.

One of the surprises, but not of the happy-surprise-birthday-party kind, was the way in which personal information has been treated.

The definition of personal information is a critical threshold definition, because the privacy principles only apply to personal information.  If a business can successfully argue that some data is not personal information, they can collect, use, disclose and trade the data with impunity.

Right now, the definition of personal information includes if someone is reasonably identifiable.  But that phrase is foggy, to the detriment of businesses and consumers alike, who may ask:

Can someone be identifiable if a business doesnt know their name?

The OAIC says yes.

In guidance dating back to 2017, and in a string of case law determinations, the OAIC has maintained that identifiability in law does not necessarily require that a persons name or legal identity can be established from the information.  Instead, it implies uniqueness in a dataset: (g)enerally speaking, an individual is identified when, within a group of persons, he or she is distinguished from all other members of a group This may not necessarily involve identifying the individual by name.

The Attorney-Generals Department says yes.

The Final Report quotes without challenge the OAIC position, and states that The test does not require that an individuals legal identity be known provided the information could be linked back to the specific person that it relates to.

Based on the European and Californian privacy laws and others, our global trading partners say yes.

Each has either explicitly expanded on the meaning of identifiability, or has introduced alternatives to identifiability as a threshold element of their definitions.  The GDPR calls it singling out.  The California law (CCPA) includes, within its definition of personal information, data which is capable of being associated with, or could reasonab...

By Ramesh Thakur | Brownstone Institute | April 18, 2023

The pandemic has been an extended three-year teachable moment for many of us who previously had been content to go along with the public health messages from our nearly universally trusted medical experts, drug regulators and public health institutions.

Safety Signals

In a peer-reviewed recent article, David Bell and colleagues concluded that based on costs, disease burden and intervention effectiveness, mass Covid-19 vaccination campaigns did not meet standard public health requirements for clear expected benefit. Several eminent experts warned about the likelihood of such a conclusion from the start and opinion has gradually been shifting towards this view, as I tried to summarize earlier.

In this article I want to look specifically at the concept of safety signals because I dont believe the significance of this concept in medical science and public health interventions is widely understood in the general public.

I first became interested in this after watching Dr Peter McCullough in a TV interview with France Soir in June 2021. He pointed out that the CDCs Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System (VAERS) normally records about 25 deaths per year from all vaccines. During the Covid pandemic, by 11 June 2021 it had verified 5,993 deaths, 20,737 hospitalizations, 47,837 urgent care visits, 1,538 anaphylaxis cases, and 1,868 cases of Bells palsy.

Because VAERS is a passive-surveillance system, he said, the general consensus is that the numbers are vastly underreported. He warned that this is a major safety signal that has exceeded all boundaries of acceptability. Quizzed on the causal link to vaccines, he answered: its biologically plausible, temporally associated, internally consistent month by month and also externally consistent with data from the US, Europe and England. The vaccine is in the causal pathway to death The majority of these 6,000 Americans, they were healthy enough to walk into a vaccine center and within 2-4 days theyre dead.

That was almost two years ago.

The European Medicines Agency defines safety signal as:

Information on a new or known adverse event that is potentially caused by a medicine and that warrants further investigation. Signal...

A human disaster is unfolding right now in Chicago pic.twitter.com/itC1yfiYgE Luke Rudkowski (@Lukewearechange) April 18, 2023

 The native title claim group is the Waanyi People.

A person is a Waanyi person if and only if:

1. the other Waanyi people recognise that he or she is descended (which may include by adoption) from a person who they recognise as having been Waanyi; and

2. the person identifies himself or herself as a Waanyi person.

It is accepted that adoption may take place and that where adoption has occurred it confers upon the adoptee the right to identify as being a Waanyi person.

The following deceased persons are recognised as having been Waanyi people from whom living Waanyi people may be descended:

1. King George (Gundawarinya), Mary Starr (Namura), Marrandu

2. Johnny Rockland (Guyanda)

3. Wuragaga (including his sons Toby Daly and Charlie Walden)

4. Wirduga (including her sons King Pedro and Fred Mangala), Yurumburinya, Gudurju, Jagijagi (including her children Left-hand Dick, King Darby, Violet Darby), Lagayi, and Brenda Munara (including her children Duncan Hogan, Julie Darby, Dan Darby, Clara Darby, Frank Hogan, Arthur Peterson) 

5. Jack Riversleigh (including his children Doris Aplin and Vera Johnny, Annie King and Elaine Cairns)

6. Diana (Dina) Jackson

7. Fred Mangala (including his children Jimmy Doolan, Tommy Doolan, Oscar Gregory and Queenie Bell) and King Pedro (including his children Dinny, Jock and Cubby Pedro)

8. Janggali (including his son Yarribijas children: Duncan Hogan, Julie Darby, Dan Darby, Clara Darby, Frank Hogan, Arthur Peterson; and his daughter Muranjis daughters: Jamuyu and Lidi Wayawarrinya)

9. King Darby, Left Hand Dick and Violet Darby

10. Ruby Lilwayi (including her daughter Elsie Foster), Polly Nganduyu (including her children: Nancy Carlton, Ned George, Sally OKeefe, Bubi Dick, Netty Malbow and Nuts Logan), May Black Nijirijbina (including her children Nancy Wilson, Nora Black, Dora Doolan nee Black and Archie Black), Ruby Gijaya (including her children Mavis Carlton, Junie Clay, Maurice Carlton, Marina Dick, Mick Miller, Murray Donaldson), and Mailman Dick Gungayamaji (including his child Ivy George Ngayaya)

11. Smiler Diamond (including his children: Mick Diamond Nguyjbirri and Jack Diamond Bandangala and Sydney Punjaub and Ruby)

12. Mailman Jack Libaninji (including his son Fred Carlton Gajangga, daughter Rosie and her daughter Betty Lloyd Jayinbalina, and son Ned Ngaragulanji and his children Bessie Holt and Colin Holt)

Welcome to The Daily Wrap Up, a concise show dedicated to bringing you the most relevant independent news, as we see it, from the last 24 hours (4/18/23).
As always, take the information discussed in the video below and research it for yourself, and come to your own conclusions. Anyone telling you what the truth is, or claiming they have the answer, is likely leading you astray, for one reason or another. Stay Vigilant.
(https://www.rokfin.com/TLAVagabond)(https://www.bitchute.com/channel/24yVcta8zEjY/)

https://rumble.com/embed/v2gg2du/?pub=2q643

Video Source Links (In Chronological Order)



(19) ABC News (@abcnews) / Twitter
(10) Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (@RFERL) / Twitter
(10) NPR (@NPR) / Twitter
(10) ABC News on Twitter: "'No launch today': Elon Musk's SpaceX postpones debut flight of Starship rocket system https://t.co/ylYuymiz4n" / Twitter
(10) CNN Breaking News (@cnnbrk) / Twitter
(10) Fox News (@FoxNews) / Twitter
(10) CBS News (@CBSNews) / Twitter
(8) CBC (@CBC) / Twitter
(5) NBC news - Twitter Search / Twitter
Apple icalendar appointments disappearing - Brave Search
Events disappear from the calendar : ipad
signal-2023-04-18-072630_002.jpeg (16001200)
The growing myth of the independent voter - The Washington Post
Nearly four-in-ten U.S. adults (38%) self-identify as politically independent - Brave Search
Party Affiliation | Gallup Historical Trends
(20) An0maly on Twitter: "Trump hopped...

Transgender basketballer Lexi Rodgers has lashed Basketball Australia for its decision to block her application to join the Kilsyth Cobras women's side in the WNBL1 South basketball league. The decision came after a three-person panel assembled by Basketball Australia concluded that Rodgers was ineligible to play elite-level basketball. However Rodgers has slammed the decision and vowed to continue to fight to pursue her basketball career. 'I sought a different outcome from Basketball Australia. I participated fully and in good faith with the process and eligibility criteria. Consistent with the views expressed by so many, I firmly believe I have a place as an athlete in women's basketball,' she wrote on Instagram.

By Kelley Beaucar Vlahos | Responsible Statecraft | April 18, 2023

Congressman Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), who has flooded the docket in recent months with resolutions designed to get U.S. troops out of overseas missions he believes have not been approved by Congress, is now demanding that Biden tell the American people just how many American military personnel are operating in Ukraine today.

His new Privileged Resolution of Inquiry, which forcing Biden to notify the House of  the exact number of U.S. military inside Ukraine and to hand over copies of any and all documents outlining plans for military assistance to Ukraine, comes a week after leaked Pentagon documents showing previously unreported U.S. Special Forces inside the war zone.

According to the document there were 97 special forces from NATO countries operating in Ukraine as of March, including 14 U.S. special forces. When asked by the Guardian newspaper for confirmation/clarification, the Department of Defense said,  We are not going to discuss or confirm classified information due to the potential impact on national security as well as the safety and security of our personnel and those of our allies and our partners. The Pentagon has not denied the authenticity of the documents, however.

While 14 special forces sounds like a drop in the bucket, these revelations are a drip-drip of other pieces of information over the last year that, when added up, leave more questions than answers, and the bottom line is that the American people have a right to know, says (Ret.) Lt. Col. Daniel Davis.

It is entirely appropriate that the American people know, authoritatively, whether any U.S. troops are engaged in military operations within Ukraine and to demand a change if we dont like the answer, Davis told me yesterday when I asked him about the Gaetz resolution.

American history is rife with too many examples...

By Lucas Leiroz | April 18, 2023

Lulas trip to China was marked by several signals about what may be his foreign policy in his third term. In his speeches, Lula suggested that he will continue to bet on partnerships with the global south and emphasized his criticism of organizations linked to or controlled by the US. Lulas trip was well received by Chinese partners and brought new hope to bilateral and intra-BRICS relations.

Undoubtedly, the most prominent point in his pronouncements was his support for the de-dollarization of international economic relations. Lula questioned the need to use the dollar as a global commercial currency and expressed his support for the idea of creating a currency for the BRICS or starting to trade in national currencies.

Why cant we do trade based on our own currencies? () Who was it that decided that the dollar was the currency after the disappearance of the gold standard? () Why cant a bank like that of the BRICS have a currency to finance trade relations between Brazil and China, between Brazil and other countries? Its difficult because we are unaccustomed [to the idea]. Everyone depends on just one currency, he said during a press conference.

With this, Lula reiterated what he had mentioned previously, during a trip to Argentina, in which he proposed the creation of a currency for Mercosur and another for the BRICS, both with the aim of advancing economic de-dollarization. To his supporters, this sounds like a big sign that Lula is distancing himself from the US and turning towards greater participation in building a multipolar world. However, this seems like an overly optimistic analysis.

De-dollarization is part of the multipolar world, but it is not its essence. Many countries, even US allies, have been seeking to de-dollarize their international transactions in recent years. Japan, for example, has traded with Beijing without the dollar since 2011, as well as Australia since 2013. Also, the EU has traded with Iran without the dollar since 2020. France recently started its de-dollarization process and Switzerland will certainly start this process soon, as it began to get rid of some of its dollar reserves.

In fact, economic de-dollarization is a technical and pragmatic measure, whose purpose is much more to generate economic benefits than to operate any geopolitical transition. In Brazil, the measure has even been supported on a large scale by businessmen and parliamentarians linked to the agribusiness sector, which is the main segment of the Brazilian economy and whose biggest partner is precisely China. Recognizing the Chinese interest in de-dollarization, there is internal pressure from the Brazilian business community for Lula to de-dollarize the economy. Therefore, it is a technical and pragmatic issue that does...

A month has passed since CAMERA UK, Campaign Against Antisemitism and other concerned organisations complained to the Guardian about their legitimisation of Mohammed el-Kurds blood libel, and the outlet still refuses to amend the article to make it clear they reject his antisemitic accusation.

The Guardian piece in question, written by Sian Cain (Adelaide Writers Week: rare moments of empathy and nuance found amid a storm of controversy, March 12) noted the following about a row at a Writers Week in Australia involving el-Kurd the extremist Palestinian activist.

A storm brewed. Attention turned to the other Palestinian writers on the bill, including Mohammed El-Kurd, a Palestinian poet whose debut collection Rifqa narrates his experience of dispossession in the Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood of East Jerusalem. [ADL] has criticised some of his social media comments as antisemitic, as well as a line in one of his poems: They harvest organs of the martyred, feed their warriors our own.

Kurds accusation of Israel harvest[ing] the organs ofmartyred Palestinians and feeding medieval antisemitic blood libel  variations of which...

By Drago Bosnic | April 18, 2023

Electronic warfare (EW) is one of the most important aspects of modern military capabilities and is often the litmus test of how advanced the state and its armed forces are. Its part of the invisible and yet extremely intense battle that we usually cannot see directly. However, its impact is wholly undeniable. Russia is among the world leaders in EW and its warfighting capabilities in this regard are a source of pride for the Eurasian giant, but also fear for its adversaries. Russian dominance in EW on the frontlines of Ukraine is so comprehensive and massive that its one of the few things the mainstream propaganda machine never dared to question or ridicule. Even Russian strategic thermonuclear capabilities were subjected to propaganda attacks at times, but its EW capabilities never. And for good reason.

And yet, as with everything concerning the mainstream propaganda machine, we must tread carefully. This is especially true when it comes to the media citing the Pentagon leaks as their primary source of information. Needless to say, an actual leak would require an inadvertent release of classified information and most intelligence experts agree its extremely unlikely there was anything inadvertent about it. However, this is not to say that all information connected to the leak is false. On the contrary, its relatively elaborate nature implies that much of it is indeed true, but it can be difficult to discern what exactly. One of the few leaked facts we can surely believe concerns precisely Russian EW capabilities. Still, this begs the question why?

To answer that, we should first dissect and specify the claims of the mainstream propaganda machine. The leaks include a massive amount of information, including the claim that US-made JDAM (Joint Direct Attack Munition) bombs are failing in Ukraine due to successful Russian EW measures. The leak documents not only review the use of Russian countermeasures to make JDAMs ineffective, but also indicate that in some cases this results in failure to even detonate. It seems this includes the JDAM-ER (Extended Range) bombs that the troubled Biden administration sent to the Kiev regime in order to provide certain battlefield advantages to its forces. A futile effort, it would seem now, although the documents suggest that at least a thousand JDAM kits have been sent so far.

Politico claims th...

04-18-2023    Dr. Jason Dean joined the Team to talk about parasites and answer any questions from both staff and attendees. This was one of the best and SIMPLE explanations []

If increasing global warming and deforestation were to transform Amazonia into an irreversibly degraded dry savanna, what could happen to the approximately 300 species of mammals that live there? These include jaguars, tapirs and deer. This is the question that biologists Daniel Rocha and Rahel Sollmann tried to answer in a recently published article in Animal Conservation journal. Their study involved the analysis of images taken by 400 photo traps installed in four natural enclaves of the Cerrado biome located in Amazonia, which were formed thousands of years ago: in the state of Amazonas, Campos Amaznicos National Park and Mapinguari National Park; and in the state of Rondnia, the Guapor Biological Reserve and Corumbiara State Park.Their goal was to understand how medium- and large-sized land mammals behave in these isolated patches of savanna in the middle of the rainforest. In doing so, they were able to project what may happen if, some years from now, the climate and vegetation of the planets largest tropical forest were to change. Location of the photo traps (blue) inside the four protected areas included in the study, which lie in the states of Amazonas and Rondnia: Campos Amaznicos National Park, Mapinguari National Park, the Guapor Biological Reserve and Corumbiara State Park. The orange spots indicate natural savanna. Image by Rocha & Sollmann. Researchers have been warning of that the savannization of Amazonia is a risk. This is the tipping point when the forest, after suffering from a combination of deforestation and climate change, turnsThis article was originally published on Mongabay

QUESTION: Marty, You are the only worthwhile analyst. You were alerting us a year ago that the IMF was creating its own digital currency. We have all these people claiming this will kill the dollar just as they proclaimed the euro when that was created. It is also well known that you were called in about revising the world monetary system numerous times. I heard that you were called in on this one and refused to assist them. You warned back in May of 2021 that the IMF was creating a new reserve digital currency.

Is this all part of the rise of the United Nations, World Bank, and IMF all becoming this one world government? I that why you declined to get involved?

LW

ANSWER: I am not at liberty to speak to issues where I am solicited. Suffice it to say, I took no part in creating this currency. This is part of what I have been warning about digital currency. They can restrict its use and anyone who thinks that somehow Bitcoin will be some independent white knight rushing in to save the day, they have drank too much of the cool aid.

Look, try depositing $10,000 in cash. Watch what happens. I have a friend who owns a bar in a college town. He takes in a lot of cash because the customers often do not have credit cards. Some banks did not even want to accept an account from him. Others required inspection and monitoring because cash CAN BE a way to launder money. Europe has been restricting cash to transactions capped at 1,000.

...

The mRNA vaccines were released globally in early 2021 with the slogan 'safe and effective'. Unusually for a new class of medicine, they were soon recommended by public health authorities for pregnant women. By late 2021, working age women, including those who were pregnant, were being thrown out of employment for not agreeing to be injected. Those who took the mRNA vaccines did so based on trust in health authorities - the assumption being that they would not have been approved if the evidence was not absolutely clear. The role of regulatory agencies was to protect the public and, therefore, if they were approved, the drugs were safe. Recently, a lengthy vaccine evaluation report sponsored by Pfizer and submitted to the Australian regulator, the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) dated January 2021 was released under a Freedom of Information request. The report contains significant new information that had been supressed by the TGA and by Pfizer itself. Much of this relates...

Sussex Police's failure to record over 20,000 reports of crime, including violent offences, rape, domestic abuse, and anti-social behavior, is a serious concern for the public. The fact that more than a quarter of people calling the non-emergency switchboard abandoned their call while waiting for a call handler to answer over a two-month period last year only adds to the frustration and anxiety of residents in the area.

According to the...