#6
Some people use a chemotherapy to treat any washing of the brain. Usually involving the ingestion of various alcohol products. Like a lot of chemotherapy there are side effects.
[WashingtonPost] Computer model forecasts are advertising a bout of bitter cold to sweep over Europe over the next several days, very possibly the most extreme of the winter and perhaps in several years.
"The well anticipated most widespread #cold temperatures across northern Eurasia since #winter 2013 is imminent," tweeted Judah Cohen, a meteorologist at Atmospheric and Environmental Research, a weather risk management firm.
The European media are describing the incoming frigid air as the "beast from the east" since its source region is Siberia.
Posted by: lord garth ||
02/25/2018 04:18 ||
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#1
Computer model forecasts... - like the ones predicting 'global warming'? I'm wondering if the author said it in that manner on purpose.
[Hot Air] Well, that’s one solution. A North Texas charter school has voted in favor of putting a police substation on campus because "horrific things can happen anywhere." The plan, please note, was approved one week before the Florida mass shooting. Working in conjunction with the city council, Westlake Academy will put in a substation of the Keller Police department. It probably didn’t hurt that the president of the Westlake Academy school board is also the mayor of Westlake.
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] An Egyptian court has fined one of the leading activists behind the 2011 uprising $565 (10,000 Egyptian pounds) during his re-trial over insulting the judiciary.
Saturday’s ruling on Ahmed Douma, reported by the state-run Al Ahram newspaper, is a response to his appeal against a 2014 ruling in the case sentencing him to three years in prison plus the fine.
In 2015, Douma was sentenced to life in prison in another case dating back to December 2011, when festivities erupted between protesters and security forces outside Egypt’s Cabinet building.
Douma, who was granted a retrial in that case last October, faces accusations of illegal protesting, assaulting security personnel and attacking government buildings.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/25/2018 00:00 ||
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[All Africa] Zim-bob-we's ex-president Bob Muggsy Mugabe Nonagenarian President-for-Life of Zim-bob-we who turned the former Breadbasket of Africa into the African Basket Case. Dumped in November 2017 when the Missus decided she wanted to be president, and opposed heer might against Crocodile Mnangawa Important safety tip: If your opponent goes by the name Crocodile andf your title is Shopper in Chief let him win.... has reportedly demanded his pension and retirement benefits just less than two months after President Emmerson Mnangagwa gazetted the list of perks applicable to a retired president.
According the privately owned Zim-bob-we Independent newspaper, Mugabe told visiting African Union ...a union consisting of 53 African states, most run by dictators of one flavor or another. The only all-African state not in the AU is Morocco. Established in 2002, the AU is the successor to the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), which was even less successful... 's Moussa Faki Mahamat this week that his benefits were "being denied".
The nonagenarian said the situation in the southern African country was worrying. He said that his security was not guaranteed.
"...For instance, they told you, I was safe, but how can I be in this environment?... "We have constitutional benefits, for example, but these are being denied."
"... It's not like I am crying for those benefits. I joined the struggle to fight to free my people, not to personally benefit anything, but why deny me benefits that I am constitutionally entitled to?," Mugabe reportedly queried.
"... Anyway, just give us our benefits!," he said.
Mugabe was entitled to first class air travel on four foreign trips per year; private houses and a veritable army of aides and domestic staff which also included a $10m pension.
The benefits were laid out in an official government notice published by Mnangagwa in December.
The notice said: "There shall be employed in connection with the residence of the former President (i) three domestic employees, and (ii) two gardeners, and (iii) two cooks and two waiters and (iv) two laundry persons. The ex-president will also get security staff, office workers and aide de camp officers."He said that the country was being ruled by an illegal government that took over late last year.
Mugabe urged Mahamat to assist the country return to "democracy and normality", said the report.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/25/2018 00:00 ||
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#1
Your benefit will be a bullet if you drive that place to mayhem.
[All Africa] Seven suspects believed to have been involved in the Ngcobo police massacre were rubbed out in a shootout with police on Friday evening, after being cornered inside a church they used as a hideout.
Hawks spokesperson Brigadier Hangwani Mulaudzi said more than 10 other suspects were tossed in the slammer Keep yer hands where we can see 'em, if yez please! , while others managed to escape.
"One police officer was maimed and he is recuperating in hospital," Mulaudzi said.
This follows after a group of unknown attackers entered the Ngcobo cop shoppe on Wednesday and, without warning, randomly opened fire on officers who were on duty. Three officers were killed at the cop shoppe.
The button men then separated the female coppers from their male counterparts, before taking six pistols, two shotguns and two assault rifles. The retired soldier was rubbed out as they fled.
The bodies of two additional officers were later found, shot execution style, along the roadside near Nyanga High School, about 6km from the cop shoppe.
Ngcobo is situated between Mthatha and Queenstown.
Mulaudzi said the task team which comprises of the Hawks, Detectives, Crime Intelligence, the Task Force, National Intervention Unit and the Tactical Response Team followed information on Friday evening of a possible gang that was responsible for the tragic incident.
"The group, which uses a church as a hiding place, was cornered inside the church premises.
"A shootout between suspects and police ensued which left seven suspects dead and a task force member injured in the legs," he said.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/25/2018 00:00 ||
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South Africa has one of the most restrictive gun control laws in the world. It also has one of the world's highest homocide rate.
Posted by: lord garth ||
02/25/2018 4:06 Comments ||
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Multicultural bastion of freedom and democracy.
One unidentified 51 year old man has been imprisoned and four others are being sought in an orphanage sex abuse case in the Chelyabinsk region of Russia, according to Russian language news account.
According to the article which appears in the regnum.ru Russian language news outlet, as many as 10 unidentified children were sexually abused in a sex class taught by the 51 year old, identified with the call sign "Uncle Seryozha". The abuse was discovered in January, 2018, but local or Russian federal authorities had not been notified until February 19th.
The report said the abuse took place at an institution called Lazurnaya boarding school. Some guardians with children from the school had notified the school administrators of their suspicions, since the children had all reported the same abuse. Their suspicions were dismissed, saying that the children made it all up.
In the wake of the charges, an unidentified administrator at the school left the post. Four others were dismissed from their positions and are considered to be at large.
Originally, local journalists who had caught wind of the abuse were admonished to keep quiet, it was said, to preserve the childrens' privacy, but the story by then already had spread enough, so even the governor of Chelyabinsk, Boris Dubrovsky has commented on the case.
At the moment the ten children have been placed in other settings with the admonishment from authorities not to talk about the case with the press. The penalty suggested is to remove the children from their guardians. The Chelyabinsk representative for children, Irina Butorina, denied charges she was the one to issue the warnings.
The case has attracted notice from the Russian Federation Duma ombudsman for children, Anna Kuznetsova, who has suggested moving the case to federal investigators because, she said, that local investigators may not be able to handle such a "complex case."
According to the article, another fear of guardians of the children who were placed is that the case simply will be dropped.
Those fears were expressed when a second case last Wednesday, this time without any defendants, was opened for negligence.
[The Jamestown Foundation] The Russian Army is planning to recreate the Main Political Directorate that existed in the Soviet Army (GlavPUR), according to the Deputy Chairman of the Public Council at the Russian Ministry of Defense, Alexander Kanshin. “The role of the moral and political unity of the army and society is increasing immensely at the time of global informational and psychological confrontation. Therefore, it is necessary to fundamentally reform and significantly strengthen the armed force’s entire [political] structure, which will organize, conduct and be responsible for the moral and ideological aspect of the Russian Army,” Kanshin said (Interfax, February 5).
[Hot Air] It appears President Donald Trump hopes to do a massive increase in tariffs on steel and aluminum. Bloomberg reports the President is pondering three protectionist plans on his desk, and prefers the one he believes will boost American steel profits.
It isn’t surprising the President is considering this, after all the alleged 5G sort of nationalization plan would require whoever constructs the infrastructure to use American products, instead of foreign materials. Trump sees this as a way to increase national security (somehow) something Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross swore was an issue via Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962. Ross’ report admitted there is no real definition of "national security" in Section 232, but the government still needed to prop up the steel economy (emphasis mine).
#2
We can't be reliant on foreign sources of steel, particularly hostile governments. This is basic common sense. It provides jobs and builds our communities, and if it decreases GDP growth by 0.1%, then so be it. It's worth it.
Posted by: Herb McCoy7309 ||
02/25/2018 2:41 Comments ||
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#3
The steel producers and unions are popping open the bubbly; the average consumer will be on a beer budget. Protectionism is a disaster waiting to happen.
#6
I'm sure the Germans will reduce their car import tariffs from 10 to 2.5% (ignoring another 15% VAT). They wouldn't want to appear to be massive hypocrites.
So, just cut out the middle man and buy all our military equipment from China? Parts be parts. You better know where they come from and how they are assembled. In the end, you need certain strategic industries and the resources that feed them to be free of potential cut offs.
Second, when they practice 'protectionism' by restricting markets both directly and through regulation (see - GMO and the Euros), you're a fool to talk 'open markets'. Quid pro quo is a phrase used in English to mean an exchange of goods or services, in which one transfer is contingent upon the other; "a favour for a favour". Phrases with similar meanings include: "give and take", "tit for tat", and "you scratch my back, and I'll scratch yours". They don't play it, then we don't play it.
BTW, Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act gets a lot of damning for its supposed effect on the Great Depression. However, if you get beyond the usual cooked books and cooked unemployment numbers of the last 8 years, we were in a depression, without the benefit of blaming good old Smoot-Hawley for our economic ills.
Remember that President Trump is transactional, European Conservative. This is his maximalist opening bid for something, though it may not be about tariffs at all. The question is whether he needs Congress to pass a bill on the subject, and what it is that he really wants — a DACA law, for example, or keeping the unions from supporting the Democratic party in November.
#10
Buy America clauses are tied to all steel/iron products for projects with Fed/State funds. As noted above, it makes sense to maintain a strategic portion of essential item production domestically, especially when foreign interests are dumping exports at a loss to cut competition
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/25/2018 9:15 Comments ||
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#11
Recall the infrastructure initiative TW.
Any road or bridge building will require massive amounts of steel and concrete. This can bring a reboot of the US steel industry. Concrete will of course come from Mexico.
#12
A manufacturing company has three components of costs: 1. Direct material, 2. Labor, and 3. Overhead. To compete, you are going to have to affect these catagories. Usually labor costs in 3rd world countries are lower than in the U.S. Do we want to reduce the standard of living here by reducing what is paid to workers so that wages are on a par with 3rd world countries? I don't think so. Tariffs are a way of leveling the playing field. There are down sides such as product pricing wars.
P2K raises a good point; that is, do you want you want China manufacturing critical materials that go into defense?
#15
Tariffs aren't pretty, but if we want to win the Rust Belt states, they are necessary. Reagan won the allegiance of the Rust Belt states not by championing unions, but by unveiling protective measures. Tariffs are the price we pay to get the rest of our program enacted.
#16
Tariffs on steel and aluminum will just move more manufacturing overseas. Saving a few hundred ironworkers jobs will cost several thousand manufacturing jobs.
#17
I said it before and I'll say it every time the subject comes up: You damn well better do something about computers while you're at it. Computers are every bit as strategic as steel and right now they're all made in China. That is unacceptable.
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
02/25/2018 15:58 Comments ||
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#18
AMEN Silence Gweilo!
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/25/2018 17:09 Comments ||
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#19
hey....what?
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/25/2018 17:09 Comments ||
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#20
I think g(r)om hit the nail on the head. We're dealing with two separate prisoners' dilemmas now: the one with large rich foreign mercantilist nation states, and the one with the elites on the coasts who pretend to believe in the free market but don't believe anyone who actually builds anything physical should be able to make a living in this country.
#21
One item in followup: China has a twenty-five hundred year tradition of mercantilism on top of a recent experience of communist rule. They don't believe the western "liberal" sanitized account of communism, they know the state has to make a profit long-term.
#Italy: It's always more fun to watch the Italian police in their work. This afternoon in #Pisa. The left rabble of #Antifa tried to break through to an event by #matteosalvini. What follows is a proper Spanking. No STAND DOWN orders from the local politicians and allowed to do their job, BELLISSIMO!
Posted by: Herb McCoy7309 ||
02/25/2018 00:00 ||
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#1
Goodness. Another team at the far end of the street would make things even more interesting....
#4
Shields were the number one most important bit of armour for like 2,000 years because they are very, very effective. Even more so when used in formations such as shield walls, Phalanx, or the Roman Testudo. They only really went out of use when armor became so good in the 14th/15th century that they were unnecessary.
The riot police had a form of armor and they had shields and they had training. The Antifa rabble had no chance. Delightful video.
ISIS destroyed and ransacked the tomb of the prophet of Jonah in 2014
But the historic shrine was retaken by Iraqi army forces in January 2017
Archaeologists sent in to assess the damage found a palace buried underneath
They discovered stone tablets within the palace that describe King Esarhaddon
Inscriptions list the ruler as 'king of the world' and give his family history
How disappointing for ISIS, as for the Taliban before them, that their destruction turned out to reveal long-hidden archeological treasures. You no doubt recall, dear Reader, how only seven years after the Taliban smashed to pieces the two known Bamiyan Buddhas carved into a cliff in the Hazarajat region of Afghanistan, a huge reclining Buddha was discovered under the turf, as well as numerous painted caves hidden behind the carved niches.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
02/25/2018 00:00 ||
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#2
I was thinking more of the economic impact of blockading areas of dense fishing. Also, a reason for the development of China islands as intermediate catch processing stations is apparent.
[RT] Beijing is forecast to triple its nuclear capacity in the next 20 years, ousting the US as number one nuclear-power producer, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA).
“China is coming back strong. Today there are about 60 nuclear power plants under construction and more than one-third of them are in China. China is growing and as a result of that we’ll soon see China overtaking the United States as the Number 1 nuclear power in the world,” the IEA CEO Fatih Birol said, as quoted by Marketwatch.
Nuclear power? What does that have to do with power production? China has four times the population of the U.S., and while they are #1 in electrical production and consumption to our #2, on a per capita basis China has a long way to go to catch up. Even in terms of nuclear power plants, we get 9.2% of our electricity from that source (18th in the world), though apparently we have the most plants, while China gets 2% (28th in the world). I only hope they will not apply the same mindset to maintenance as they have thus far to debt or preventing pollution.
[SpaceNews] Secretary Wilson: “This budget changes the way in which we intend to execute battle management command and control."
In the budget request that was submitted to Congress last week, the U.S. Air Force made investment decisions that just a few years ago would have been jaw-dropping.
A $7 billion surveillance aircraft program is being jettisoned in favor of an information network that connects sensors from across the battlefield and in outer space. And billion-dollar satellites known to be engineering marvels are being replaced by simpler, less costly platforms.
In programs like SBIRS and the Advanced EHF classified communications constellation, the analysis of alternatives each took two or three years. “And we still ended up not making a decision,” said LaPlante. “A lot of people focus on the development cycle. But what we often forget is all the time we spend before we even do a request for proposals.”
“DoD and its contractors are still probably 10 to 15 years behind modern commercial software developers.” If the goal is an advanced battle management system, the “challenge is going to be to execute the software architectures needed to do that. That’s the only caution I would raise.”
If the idea is to not use a prime contractor, the Air Force will have to play the integrator role. “I’ll be honest, the record of the government being an integrator is not great. I certainly endorse the concept of not having a contractor integrator. But the devil is going to be in the details.”
After what they did to the F-35 do you really think the Air Farce needs a multi-billion dollar information system...heaven help us...they've got the flying iPhone, what do they need with another data system? Seems the techies don't seem to understand what the role of the Air Farce is.
I would think they need new surveillance aircraft more than this. After all, the danged E-3's are almost as old as I am. A danged B-707 airframe that was first rolled out in the 50's and they think they can patch that thing up some more?
I bet a little digging will show a multi-billion dollar program to replace wings and engines on the E-3s...or is this information system a red herring for something really black that they want to talk about in eupharysms?
[Daily Caller] The Russian government has downplayed the recent strikes on Russian mercenaries in Syria, however, recordings from fighters on the ground reveal just how hard U.S. forces hit them.
"One squadron fucking lost 200 people ... right away, another one lost 10 people ... and I don’t know about the third squadron but it got torn up pretty badly, too ... So three squadrons took a beating," a man believed to be a Russian contract soldier said in the first of three audio recordings obtained from a source close to the Kremlin by Polygraph.info, a fact-checking website affiliated with Voice of America.
"They beat our asses like we were little pieces of shit," the man said, Newsweek introduced.
A U.S.-led strike following a raid on a Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) base where U.S. troops were stationed is believed to have killed hundreds of Russian military contractors fighting alongside pro-Syrian irregular forces. The U.S. forces hammered the attackers with heavy artillery and air strikes.
#1
The video is better.
The C&C was calm and effective. Handed the static line off readily because they planned for every vehicle before it got across the bridge.
#2
I know this is totally off topic but Germany has a chance to win Olympic gold in ice hockey against Russia. 3-3 right now and going into overtime.
This would be our Lake Placid moment.
Posted by: European Conservative ||
02/25/2018 1:35 Comments ||
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#3
Why the hell are US troops even in Syria in the first place? What's there that's so damn important?
Posted by: Herb McCoy7309 ||
02/25/2018 2:07 Comments ||
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#4
Well it didn't happen... but anyway
Posted by: European Conservative ||
02/25/2018 2:08 Comments ||
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#5
The US called to ask if the midnight assault by the mercenaries was their people. Of course, the Russians said no. What followed was C130 gun ships, Apaches, Marine Corp artillery, USAF jets attacking the group. As one Russian Wagner widow said after hearing about how her mercenary husband had died, "The US Military shot them like they were dogs."
In WWII a German soldier who had fought on the eastern front and then later was at Normandy beach and survived D-Day said when it came to the Americans assault, he had never seen anything like it on the eastern front.
#14
#3 Why the hell are US troops even in Syria in the first place? What's there that's so damn important? Posted by Herb McCoy
I agree - if they are not AQ or ISIS our AUMF doesn't support it anyway. The Russians and Syrians are enemies of both AQ and ISIS so WTF why in the hell are we attacking them?
#15
Why the hell are US troops even in Syria in the first place? What's there that's so damn important?
That's what I don't get. ISIS is effectively done. If we're not there to get the Kurds their own nation-state, what the heck are we doing there? And if we're there to keep ISIS down, how do we do that without having Kurds as our allies within their own nation-state controlling the territory that ISIS wants to establish as the core of its caliphate?
What I hear from Al-Monitor is that Pentagon has sided with the Kurds while the White House has sided with the Turks. Who knows what to believe?
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] The employers of a Filipina maid found dead in a freezer in Kuwait were both tossed in the clink Drop the gat, Rocky, or you're a dead 'un! in the Syrian capital Damascus, a Lebanese judicial official said on Saturday.
Syrian authorities surrendered Nader Essam Assaf to Beirut on Friday because of his Lebanese citizenship but his Syrian wife Mona remains in jug in Damascus, the official said.
Lebanese security and judicial officials say authorities in Beirut are interrogating a man who is suspected in the death of the Filipina maid.
A bigwig with Leb's General Security Directorate refused to provide details other than that the man is being held by the agency and undergoing questioning.
The discovery of Demafelis’s body on Feb. 6 in the apartment in Kuwait City, where it had reportedly been kept for more than a year, sparked outrage and refocused attention on the tragic plight of poor Filipinos toiling mostly as maids abroad. It prompted Duterte to ban the deployment of new Filipino workers to Kuwait, where many abuses have been reported.
The 29-year-old’s body, which allegedly showed signs of torture, was found earlier this month inside a freezer in the abandoned apartment unit of the detained couple.
The couple have been the subject of an Interpol manhunt since Demafelis’s body was found more than a year after her family reported her missing.
Arrested in Damascus
"The couple were arrested in Damascus. They were the subject of an Interpol red notice and the Syrian authorities handed the husband over to Lebanese custody on Friday morning," the official said.
"Syria kept custody of the wife because she is a Syrian national," he added.
"Leb has asked Kuwait to pass on the husband’s police record."
The official said that after leaving Kuwait, the couple had made a very brief stopover in Leb before traveling on to neighboring Syria.
Duterte has vowed to bring justice to Demafelis’s family, lashing out at the Gulf state and alleging employers routinely rape Filipina workers, force them to work 21 hours a day and feed them scraps.
Kuwait has said it is investigating reported deaths and abuses, and insisted there were only a small number considering that there are more than 250,000 Filipinos working in the emirate.
Duterte this week sent a team of labor officials to Kuwait to seek greater protection for migrant workers.
On Friday, the Philippine foreign secretary had announced that the male suspect had been arrested. Alan Peter Cayetano said he has told President Rodrigo Duterte about the arrest in Leb of Nader Essam Assaf but added that Assaf’s Syrian wife, who was also a suspect in the death of Joanna Demafelis, remains on the lam.
With the latest update from Leb, it is clear that both the suspects are now under custody.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/25/2018 00:00 ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[WashingtonPost] Computer model forecasts are advertising a bout of bitter cold to sweep over Europe over the next several days, very possibly the most extreme of the winter and perhaps in several years.
[All Africa] Seven suspects believed to have been involved in the Ngcobo police massacre were 
[The Jamestown Foundation] The Russian Army is planning to recreate the Main Political Directorate that existed in the Soviet Army (GlavPUR), according to the Deputy Chairman of the Public Council at the Russian Ministry of Defense, Alexander Kanshin. “The role of the moral and political unity of the army and society is increasing immensely at the time of global informational and psychological confrontation. Therefore, it is necessary to fundamentally reform and significantly strengthen the armed force’s entire [political] structure, which will organize, conduct and be responsible for the moral and ideological aspect of the Russian Army,” Kanshin said (Interfax, February 5).
