[VOA] The public identification this week of more than 300 suspected agents of Russia’s military intelligence service, the GRU, is being dubbed by security analysts the largest intelligence blunder in Russian post-Cold War history.
And the cause for the bungling comes down, they say, to the simple "human factor" of wanting to avoid traffic fines, including for drunken driving.
Prompted by the midweek disclosure by Dutch and British authorities of the identities of four Russian GRU operators accused of trying to hack the headquarters of the world's chemical weapons watchdog, the investigative journalism consortium Bellingcat subsequently trawled through a publicly available Russian traffic-records database to unearth the names and details of 305 other individuals thought to be working for the Russian intelligence agency.
Passport numbers and, in many cases, mobile telephone numbers were included in the vehicle registrations.
Bellingcat scrutinized the traffic database after one of the four GRU operatives named Thursday by the British and Dutch was found to have registered his Lada car in 2011 using the Moscow address of the GRU barracks housing his cyberespionage unit 26165.
The unit has been accused by Western authorities, including the U.S., of being responsible for a series of cyberattacks and the hacking of computer networks of international anti-doping agencies as well as organizations investigating Russia's use of chemical agents, including the alleged nerve-agent poisoning in the English town of Salisbury earlier this year of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia.
By searching for other vehicles registered to the same address Bellingcat came up with a list of 305 other individuals ranging in age from 27 to 53-years-old.
[BBC] They seem to be almost everywhere, in places old and new, no age spared. Sleeping on cardboard or bare ground, the homeless come together under bridges and trees, their belongings in plastic bags symbolising lives on the move.
Many have arrived on the streets just recently, victims of the same prosperity that has transformed cities across the US West Coast. As officials struggle to respond to this growing crisis, some say things are likely to get worse.
Vibrant Portland, Oregon's largest city, has long lured many. It is the City of Roses, of pleasant climate, rich culture and progressive thinking. It is also an innovation hub, part of what is called Silicon Forest, and new residents have moved here in these post-recession years attracted by its high-tech companies and their well-paid jobs.
But the bonanza, unsurprisingly, has not come to everyone.
#4
With jobs going wanting especially in construction, there are few excuses to not be working. I work in construction and with the Davis-Bacon Rates, we have to pay people $20.00 an hour plus fringes to lean on a broom and pick up scrap lumber.
#5
But the bonanza, unsurprisingly, has not come to everyone.
Does the BBC Guy somehow expect the 'bonanza' to just miraculously float down from the sky and land in everybody's lap? Because that's how that sentence reads.
#6
The BBC guys comment reads as snark against America. Either Americans are lazy or our racism or something is a factor in not everybody having a job despite opportunity.
#9
Mayor Ted Wheeler, a Democrat, said, "inequality [is] growing at an alarming rate and the benefits from a [growing] economy are increasingly concentrated in fewer and fewer hands
I had to read the Trotskyist newspaper "Solidarity" to discover that income inequality increased during the Clinton and Obama years. The Democrats are not liberals. They are FASCISTS concerned only with helping a small group of fantastically rich and connected colleagues.
Posted by: Frozen Al ||
10/08/2018 11:49 Comments ||
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#10
The globalist elitists are neo-Feudalists and their rent-seeking is largely enabled by "progressivism".
#12
This is the Left's vision for the future of America. Themselves who are well-off and price everyone out of housing, and the deplorables.
Posted by: Herb McCoy ||
10/08/2018 13:18 Comments ||
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#13
I had to read the Trotskyist newspaper "Solidarity" to discover that income inequality increased during the Clinton and Obama years. The Democrats are not liberals. They are FASCISTS concerned only with helping a small group of fantastically rich and connected colleagues.
They're all Ostensibly Good Marxists except their policies seem designed to explicitly hurt any proletariat that are actually employed or seeking employment. Hence why they have to scream about race and/or sex for sixteen hours a day (assuming they ever go off shift, as the Oddfather used to do).
#14
income inequality increased during the Clinton and Obama years
Democrats were expanding their base in both directions. They are the party of the poor and the rich and the blue collar Dems were just slow to realize it and jump ship.
[NYT] The 2018 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Science was awarded on Monday to the American economists William D. Nordhaus and Paul M. Romer for reshaping the understanding of the long-term determinants of economic growth.
Mr. Nordhaus was cited for his work on the implications of environmental factors, including climate change. Mr. Romer was cited for his work on the importance of technological change.
#3
But I do have to say--in 1968 I took a Macroeconomic Theory course that was team taught by James Tobin (Nobel 1981) and William Nordhaus (Nobel 2018.) I am sort of impressed.
Posted by: Tom ||
10/08/2018 12:10 Comments ||
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[The characteristically disgusting NYT] CAIRO ‐ Back home, Washington was in turmoil, but the first lady had something on her mind.
On one of the most consequential days of her husband’s embattled presidency, as the Senate approved his controversial choice for the Supreme Court, Melania Trump traveled to the edge of this sand-colored city and posed before the Great Sphinx, one hand in the pocket of her men’s-wear-inspired ensemble. Standing with her back against the enigmatic monument, the equally enigmatic first lady did something unusual: She spoke up for herself.
"I wish people would focus on what I do," an exasperated Mrs. Trump said in rare comments to reporters, "not what I wear."
Then came the fashion show.
Dressed in a tan blazer, a white shirt and black tie, and palazzo pants, Mrs. Trump stood in the wind against the desertscape. As dancers performed and music played, she adjusted her jacket (Ralph Lauren), pulled her hat (Chanel) down over her eyes, and ensured that every angle was captured as her tour through Ghana, Malawi, Kenya and Egypt came to a close on Saturday.
It was a striking moment for a first lady who, perhaps more than any other in modern times, has been happy to be a walking contradiction. It also felt like a message to old acquaintances who have boxed her out of her glamorous past life because of their opposition to her husband. Stormy Daniels may get an embrace from Anna Wintour, but Mrs. Trump still has the Great Pyramid of Giza.
#2
Bet if she wore a dumpy Nehru jacket they'd cover her, which would be delicious because the left loves the Nehru jacket but couldn't say anything nice about a "Trump".
#3
Why more women don't win Nobel prizes in science
Why don't more women major in science in college? It's simple numbers, if you have fewer women scientists fewer are likely to win the Nobel prize in science.
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.
[The characteristically disgusting NYT] CAIRO ‐ Back home, Washington was in turmoil, but the first lady had something on her mind.
