Read at: 2022-06-26T15:31:13+01:00 (Ex-US Pres==Josanne Wilhelmus )
Source: News Headlines | 26 Jun 2022 | 3:50 pm IST
Source: News Headlines | 26 Jun 2022 | 3:38 pm IST
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 26 Jun 2022 | 3:24 pm IST
Interview While the IT industry waits to see if and when Intel will introduce software-defined silicon in Xeon CPUs, one startup us is moving ahead with plans to bring a pay-for-what-you-use pricing model to the telecom market with its "base station-on-a-chip" later this year.…
Source: The Register | 26 Jun 2022 | 3:20 pm IST
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 26 Jun 2022 | 3:15 pm IST
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 26 Jun 2022 | 3:06 pm IST
Strikes hit Shevchenkivskiy district of Ukraine capital, says mayor Vitali Klitschko; G7 leaders to discuss energy and food crisis at Bavarian retreat
Kyiv’s mayor, Vitali Klitschko, says two people have been taken to hospital after Sunday morning’s missile strikes, with search and rescue operations continuing. In a Telegram post, Klitschko said people may still be trapped under rubble at a residential building in the Shevchenkivskyi district.
Some of the dozens of long-range Russian missile strikes on Saturday were, for the first time, launched from Tu-22 bombers deployed from Belarus, Ukraine’s military says.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 3:04 pm IST
The skies overhead could soon be filled with constellations of commercial space stations occupying low earth orbit while human colonists settle the Moon with an eye on Mars, if today's robber barons have their way. But this won't result in the same freewheeling Wild West that we saw in the 19th century, unfortunately, as tomorrow's interplanetary settlers will be bringing their lawyers with them.
In their new book, The End of Astronauts: Why Robots Are the Future of Exploration, renowned astrophysicist and science editor, Donald Goldsmith, and Martin Rees, the UK's Astronomer Royal, argue in favor of sending robotic scouts — with their lack of weighty necessities like life support systems — out into the void ahead of human explorers. But what happens after these synthetic astronauts discover an exploitable resource or some rich dork declares himself Emperor of Mars? In the excerpt below, Goldsmith and Rees discuss the challenges facing our emerging exoplanetary legal system.
Excerpted from The End of Astronauts: Why Robots Are the Future of Exploration by Donald Goldsmith and Martin Rees, published by the Harvard University Press. © 2022 by Donald Goldsmith and Martin Rees.
Almost all legal systems have grown organically, the result of long experience that comes from changes in the political, cultural, environmental, and other circumstances of a society. The first sprouts of space law deserve attention from those who may participate in the myriad activities envisioned for the coming decades, as well, perhaps, from those who care to imagine how a Justinian law code could arise in the realm of space.
Those who travel on spacecraft, and to some degree those who will live on another celestial object, occupy situations analogous to those aboard naval vessels, whose laws over precedents to deal with crimes or extreme antisocial behavior. These laws typically assign to a single officer or group of officers the power to judge and to inflict punishment, possibly awaiting review in the event of a return to a higher court. This model seems likely to reappear in the first long-distance journeys within the solar system and in the first settlements on other celestial objects, before the usual structure of court systems for larger societies appears on the scene.
As on Earth, however, most law is civil law, not criminal law. A far greater challenge than dealing with criminal acts lies in formulating an appropriate code of civil law that will apply to disputes, whether national or international, arising from spaceborne activities by nations, corporations, or individuals. For half a century, a small cadre of interested parties have developed the new specialty of “space law,” some of which already has the potential for immediate application. What happens if a piece of space debris launched by a particular country or corporation falls onto an unsuspecting group of people or onto their property? What happens if astronauts from different countries lay claim to parts of the moon or an asteroid? And most important in its potential importance, if not in its likelihood: who will speak for Earth if we should receive a message from another civilization?
Conferences on subjects such as these have generated more interest than answers. Human exploration of the moon brought related topics to more widespread attention and argument. During the 1980s, the United Nations seemed the natural arena in which to hash them out, and those discussions eventually produced the outcomes described in this chapter. Today, one suspects, almost no one knows the documents that the United Nations produced, let alone has plans to support countries that obey the guidelines in those documents.
Our hopes for achieving a rational means to define and limit activities beyond our home planet will require more extensive agreements, plus a means of enforcing them. Non-lawyers who read existing and proposed agreements about the use of space should remain aware that lawyers typically define words relating to specialized situations as “terms of art,” giving them meanings other than those that a plain reading would suggest.
For example, the word “recovery” in normal discourse refers to regaining the value of something that has been lost, such as the lost wages that arise from an injury. In more specialized usage, “resource recovery” refers to the act of recycling material that would otherwise go to waste. In the vocabulary of mining operations, however, “recovery” has nothing to do with losing what was once possessed; instead, it refers to the extraction of ore from the ground or the seabed. The word’s gentle nature contrasts with the more accurate term “exploitation,” which often implies disapproval, though in legal matters it often carries only a neutral meaning. For example, in 1982 the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea established an International Seabed Authority (ISA) to set rules for the large portion of the seabed that lies beyond the jurisdiction of any nation. By now, 168 countries have signed on to the convention, but the United States has not. According to the ISA’s website, its Mining Code “refers to the whole of the comprehensive set of rules, regulations and procedures issued by ISA to regulate prospecting, exploration and exploitation of marine minerals in the international seabed Area.” In mining circles, no one blinks at plans to exploit a particular location by extracting its mineral resources. Discussions of space law, however, tend to avoid the term “exploitation” in favor of “recovery.”
Source: Engadget is a web magazine with obsessive daily coverage of everything new in gadgets and consumer electronics | 26 Jun 2022 | 3:00 pm IST
Move prompts Maxwell’s attorney to seek to postpone her sentencing because she can’t properly prepare for the hearing
Guards at the federal prison where Ghislaine Maxwell awaits her sentencing for her role in an elaborate child sexual abuse case have placed her on suicide watch, though she isn’t suicidal, according to court records.
The move prompted the British socialite’s attorney to write a letter telling the judge in the case that Maxwell would seek to postpone her sentencing Tuesday because she can’t properly prepare for the hearing. Prison officials on Friday took away Maxwell’s legal papers – along with her regular clothes, toothpaste and soap – while putting her in solitary confinement and on suicide watch, said the letter from her attorney Bobby Sternheim.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 2:57 pm IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 26 Jun 2022 | 2:37 pm IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 26 Jun 2022 | 2:35 pm IST
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 26 Jun 2022 | 2:34 pm IST
Analysis: A price cap on Russian oil and potential famine in Africa are among issues pressing for attention
A price cap on Russian oil, deferral of climate change commitments, a potential famine in Africa and the further supply of weapons to Ukraine are to crowd into a meeting of G7 world leaders over the next three days held against the backdrop of the biggest geopolitical crisis since 1945.
The agenda reveals how the world has been turned upside down since leaders of the industrialised nations last met in Cornwall a year ago in a summit chaired by Britain, largely to focus on the threat posed by China.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 2:31 pm IST
Health secretary urges men to discuss mental health and to ‘seek help’ when they need to
Sajid Javid has urged men to speak out about their mental health as he spoke publicly for the first time about the loss of his brother, who took his own life.
The health secretary said he still wonders if he could have acted to prevent his brother’s death, and spoke of his “deeply personal” mission to prevent suicides. Javid’s brother, Tariq, 51, took his own life in a hotel in Horsham, West Sussex, in July 2018.
In the UK and Ireland, Samaritans can be contacted on 116 123, or email jo@samaritans.org or jo@samaritans.ie. In the US, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is 1-800-273-8255. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. Other international helplines can be found at befrienders.org.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 2:30 pm IST
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 26 Jun 2022 | 2:30 pm IST
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 26 Jun 2022 | 2:18 pm IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 26 Jun 2022 | 2:11 pm IST
Source: News Headlines | 26 Jun 2022 | 1:55 pm IST
The email from Alabama’s Mo Brooks potentially reveals what conduct by lawmakers he feared might be criminal
One of the most striking all-purpose, preemptive pardon requests that the House select committee investigating the Capitol attack has revealed came from Alabama’s Mo Brooks.
In an email obtained by the Guardian, Brooks sought preemptive pardons for lawmakers involved in objecting to the certification of Joe Biden’s election win.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 1:54 pm IST
Kyiv under attack as G7 leaders meet in Germany; focus of Russia’s campaign shifts to Lysychansk
Kyiv has come under attack for the first time since 5 June, with Russian missiles striking at residential buildings and a Kindergarten in the Shevchenkivskyi district of the capital. At least five people were injured, including a seven-year-old girl. There are unconfirmed reports that her father was killed in the attack. A Russian woman was among the injured.
Later, there were further reports of attacks on the outskirts of Kyiv and in Cherkasy south-east of the capital. The attacks are being seen as a defiant signal by Russia to G7 leaders gathering at a summit in Bavaria, Germany. Russia said it hit military targets in Chernihiv, Zhytomyr and Lviv.
Members of the G7 have confirmed a ban on imports of Russian gold. The move by Britain, the United States, Japan and Canada is part of efforts to tighten the sanctions squeeze on Moscow. Gold exports were worth $15.2bn to Russia in 2021, and their importance has increased since Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.
The UK and France have agreed to provide more support for Ukraine, according to Downing Street. Leaders of the G7 have spoken of their solidarity for Ukraine. “We have to stay together,” Joe Biden said.
Russian forces are trying to cut off the strategic twin city of Lysychansk in eastern Ukraine, having reduced Sievierodonetsk to rubble. Lysychansk is set to become the next main focus of fighting, as Moscow has launched massive artillery bombardments and airstrikes on areas far from the heart of the eastern battles. Ukraine called its retreat from Sievierodonetsk a “tactical withdrawal” to fight from higher ground in Lysychansk on the opposite bank of the Siverskyi Donets river.
Russian news footage has showed defence minister Sergei Shoigu’s visiting troops involved in the Ukraine war. It is unclear if he visited Ukrainian territory, but the footage appeared to confirm that colonel-general Gennady Zhidko is now commanding troops in Ukraine.
The mayors of several European capitals have been duped into holding video calls with a deepfake of their counterpart in Kyiv, Vitali Klitschko. The mayor of Berlin, Franziska Giffey, took part in a scheduled call on the Webex video conferencing platform on Friday with a person she said looked and sounded like Klitschko. “There were no signs that the video conference call wasn’t being held with a real person,” her office said in a statement.
The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said on Saturday that Ukraine will win back all the cities it has lost to Russia, including Sievierodonetsk. “All our cities – Sievierodonetsk, Donetsk, Luhansk – we’ll get them all back,” he said in a late-night video address. Zelenskiy also admitted that the war was becoming difficult to handle emotionally.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 1:53 pm IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 26 Jun 2022 | 1:47 pm IST
Ex-Beatle’s gig seen by many in huge festival crowd as ‘something to tell your grandkids about’
Paul McCartney’s history-making Glastonbury set was hailed as one of the greatest headline performances of this generation as a crowd of more than 100,000 people gathered at the festival’s famous Pyramid stage to watch him play.
He was joined on stage by Bruce Springsteen and Foo Fighters’ Dave Grohl – and even sang a duet with his old bandmate John Lennon, using special effects pioneered by the Lord of the Rings director Peter Jackson.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 1:47 pm IST
Prime minister says he meant he was focused on ‘massive agenda’ after No 10 initially suggested he was joking
Boris Johnson has sought to defuse a row triggered by his declaration that he wanted to remain in office until the 2030s, by saying he meant he was focused on his reform agenda.
Coming after two huge byelection defeats revived talk in the Conservative party of Johnson being forced out of office within weeks or months, the prime minister’s comment about already planning a third term prompted a former cabinet minister to say he was “completely delusional”.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 1:43 pm IST
Sophia Smith scored twice in the second half and the US women’s national team beat Colombia 3-0 on Saturday night to extend their home unbeaten streak to 68 games, but many of the players had a seismic legal ruling on their minds.
Smith scored her first in the 54th minute off a pass from Rose Lavelle when Colombian goalkeeper Catalina Perez came out of her goal. She added her second in the 60th minute. Smith, who plays for the Portland Thorns in the National Women’s Soccer League, has six international goals.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 1:39 pm IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 26 Jun 2022 | 1:38 pm IST
Shadow foreign secretary says party needs to show it is fit for government by seeking negotiated outcomes over strikes
Labour should categorically refuse to back demands from airline workers for a pay rise of about 10% in order to show it is serious about seeking negotiated outcomes to disputes, David Lammy has said.
The shadow foreign secretary said Labour had to act like a party of government and that responsible governments believed in negotiation and compromise.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 1:34 pm IST
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 26 Jun 2022 | 1:34 pm IST
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 26 Jun 2022 | 1:30 pm IST
With the official UK plane in use by Prince Charles, Canada Force One pips prime minister’s stand-in Airbus A321 by 2 metres
If you are a billionaire, it is standard to insist your private jet is the larger. For prime ministers, however, it is seemingly more politically expedient to argue the opposite.
Such was the narrative as Boris Johnson met the Canadian prime minister, Justin Trudeau, for a bilateral meeting on the first day of the G7 conference of major industrialised nations in southern Germany.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 1:25 pm IST
Outfoxed by a rookie coach, widely criticised for his team selection and ultimately ambushed and humiliated in front of a record crowd at home, Brad Fittler had both feet in the furnace. But the Blues coach held his nerve all week and now has his mojo back as NSW dominated their old foes to level the State of Origin series with a thumping 44-12 Game 2 victory.
In Sydney Billy Slater pulled a card from the Cameron Smith playbook and slowed the ruck. The Blue cogs got sticky, sending Cleary off his kicking game. Without their talisman – and a Plan B by Fittler – it all unravelled. Fittler swung the axe, picked a running side with a majority-Penrith spine and put starch back in the defensive line.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 1:22 pm IST
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 26 Jun 2022 | 1:13 pm IST
While you’re waiting for the action to get underway, enjoy lifelong Bears tragic Sam Perry keeping the dream alive.
Speaking earlier of the NSW changes to the ruck, Billy Slater reckons they’ve made the Blues a more dangerous proposition, telling Nine: “I see a huge strength in their dummy half position. Firstly with Apisai Koroisau starting the game, he’s got a great craft around dummy half area and then we’re anticipating Damien Cook to come on somewhere late in that first half. So when he gets there, he’s an explosive runner. So that’s what we’ve worked hard on this week. It will be a big strength of their game.”
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 1:02 pm IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 26 Jun 2022 | 1:00 pm IST
It is unclear what led to the deaths of the young people, who were reportedly attending a party to celebrate the end of winter school exams.
Source: News : NPR | 26 Jun 2022 | 12:53 pm IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 26 Jun 2022 | 12:44 pm IST
Source: News Headlines | 26 Jun 2022 | 12:12 pm IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 26 Jun 2022 | 12:03 pm IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 26 Jun 2022 | 12:01 pm IST
Jeffery Lamar Williams — the celebrated Atlanta trap recording artist better known as Young Thug — walked into Fulton County Jail in May to a standing ovation.
The arrest was an event. The jail, on Rice Street, shut down the intake of other arrestees to process him in. Atlanta’s city-contracted wrecker service diverted all its trucks to haul his many cars out of the rented property in Buckhead where police found him May 9. The entire city paused to take inventory on the massive gang arrest, with 27 other people — including a second superstar rapper, Sergio “Gunna” Kitchens.
Previous Fulton County prosecutors have been reluctant to invoke the law, concerned about the abuses of mass incarceration and its power to stigmatize Black defendants. But Atlanta today faces a rash of violence that distorts policies and murders good intentions.
While official claims about gang culpability for street violence ought to be taken with a grain of salt — such figures are often pulled out of thin air — Young Slime Life, the gang Williams is alleged to lead, left a trail of very real bodies, the victims of a seven-year gang feud.
Rising violent crime and the abuses attendant to gang prosecutions have received national attention amid the push for criminal justice reform following George Floyd’s murder. Local dynamics in Atlanta make discussions of such reforms — and of the abuses they target — especially fraught. On the one hand, a Black mayor and a Black prosecutor are charged with protecting poor Black people in Black neighborhoods, while white conservatives use Atlanta violence as a political punching bag. On the other hand, the machinery of rap music in Atlanta increasingly exploits real-world violence to promote the street “authenticity” of Atlanta trap, primarily to white audiences.
In the middle are austere jail cells, where Young Thug and many others now wait for their trials.
Violence is on the rise in Atlanta. The homicide rate is up by about one-third year-to-date and about 60 percent over pre-pandemic levels. The city is on pace for roughly 170 murders this year, compared with 99 in 2019.
The problem, as can be gleaned from police reports, appears to be terrifyingly basic: The cops increasingly describe killings as targeted. A small subset of shooters want to make sure their victims aren’t just bleeding but dead.
Sometimes that can look like the casually brutal murder of Anthony Frazier, a security guard at a seafood restaurant on Cleveland Avenue who took a bullet point-blank in the back of the head last month. Or it can be a plain hit, like the murder of Shymel Drinks, whose body was found beneath an overpass just south of downtown in March. Police described him as a member of a gang, allegedly killed by rivals in Young Slime Life as an act of reprisal.
This is what Atlanta’s gang war looks like. It has been raging in varying forms since 2015 and went into overdrive during the pandemic, reversing more than a decade of the city’s gains against violence.
“The murder rate in Atlanta is over the murder rate in Chicago!” bellowed Republican former Sen. David Perdue in a gubernatorial candidates’ debate in April. “What we have in Georgia is a runaway crime situation that the governor is burying his head about. … We have the highest murder rate in the country!”
Atlanta’s murder rate over the last 12 months is higher than Chicago’s: 36 per 100,000 people killed to Chicago’s 27 per 100,000. None of the rest of what Perdue said is true. Atlanta doesn’t crack the top 20 cities over 100,000 residents for murders. Georgia isn’t in the top 10 states for murder rates. Kemp still engaged in a bidding war for “tough-on-crime” credentials.
The rhetoric from white conservatives has had one of its intended effects: blunting reform efforts. Atlanta’s relatively progressive, Black political leadership has incrementally turned away from talk about reform and toward whatever can get the body count down, now.
Photo: Ben Gray/AP
The Young Slime Life, or YSL, indictment has 28 defendants, only a handful of whom can pay for a robust defense out of pocket. The wide net of the charges is designed to get people to fold and offer testimony to save their own skin.
Not everyone is convinced that it’s a good tactic.
“This sweeping indictment will come at a great expense to taxpayers and all Atlantans who would prefer violence intervention and thoughtful investment in solutions proven to be effective,” said Devin Franklin, an attorney at the Southern Center for Human Rights. “The Fulton County District Attorney’s Office has invested tremendously in crafting a narrative of dangerousness in Atlanta without providing data to the public substantiating the contention that so-called repeat offenders are primarily to blame for harm in Atlanta.”
Some critics hold that the targets in this case are Black people who have risen from poverty, that perhaps the charges are a prosecutorial overreach in the face of political pressure to act. These critics would argue that RICO cases should be reserved for people with institutional power, like transnational criminal cartels, mafia crews, and corporate malefactors.
Should Black criminal enterprises be immune to drawing a RICO charge? The idea is fundamentally insulting.
There might be something to it, but to make that argument one must overlook the role of the music industry in Atlanta — an institution, one might say — and its intertwined relationship with the gang violence. Should Black criminal enterprises be immune to drawing a RICO charge? The idea is fundamentally insulting. Poor Black people’s lives lost in street warfare deserve the protection of the law.
When looking at the problem of street violence and its connection to Atlanta’s music industry as a question of racism, consider the corporate parentage of Young Thug’s label. Len Blavatnik is the owner of Warner Music Group, which owns the 300 Entertainment label that distributes the music of Young Thug on his YSL label. Blavatnik is a Russian oligarch who helped other oligarchs under sanctions divest their holdings. He donated $1 million to former President Josanne Wilhelmus ’s slush fund/inaugural committee.
If Atlanta’s musical infrastructure is cancerous because of the way street gangs are using their connection to music studios and recording executives to recruit new members into acts of violence, a RICO prosecution is an attack on structural power.
Young Thug’s rise to stardom ran in parallel with a gang war between feuding sets of Bloods. The conflict erupted in 2015, following the assassination of Bloods gang leader Donovan “Peanut” Thomas. Prosecutors allege that Williams — Young Thug — rented the car used by five gang members, including rising rap star Yak Gotti, to conduct the drive-by shooting that killed Thomas.
According to the indictment, Williams spoke with Kyle Oree, the leader of the cultlike gang Sex Money Murda, shortly after Thomas’s death. Prosecutors appear to have captured a call to Oree in jail, in which the hit is purportedly discussed. A few days after talking to Oree, Young Thug went on social media to argue that people who “get right into the courtroom and tell the God’s honest truth don’t get it, y’all n****s need to get fucking killed, bro, from me and YSL.”
Bringing charges against a group like the Young Slime Life gang proved challenging. Prosecutors had to disentangle YSL the music label, which is an imprint of Warner Music, from YSL the street gang, an outgrowth of South Atlanta organized crime around Cleveland Avenue, the latest iteration of previous gangs like Raised on Cleveland and 30 Deep.
Thomas’s murder divided Atlanta into two warring camps: YSL and YFN, another Blood gang in Atlanta loyal to Thomas. YFN is fronted by another popular rapper, Rayshawn Bennett, known as YFN Lucci.
The conflict only accelerated during the pandemic, though violence appears to have slowed down since the May 9 indictment and arrests.
Lucci is in Fulton County Jail — somewhere carefully isolated from Young Thug — awaiting trial on gang charges and a felony murder charge from a botched 2021 drive-by shooting on YSL gang members. Lucci allegedly drove the car. When their targets killed the triggerman in return fire, Lucci ditched the body in the middle of the street and sped away, the YFN gang indictment said.
Photo: Paras Griffin/Getty Images
The cases are sure to leverage Georgia’s unique gang law. Normally, prosecutors can’t use rap lyrics or Instagram photos of men holding guns while throwing up gang signs as evidence of a crime in an armed robbery case or an assault, because alone these things have nothing to do with those crimes. A judge would consider it improperly prejudicial.
But in a gang terrorism case under Georgia law, the prosecution has to prove that other crimes were committed as part of gang activity. So all evidence of gang activity becomes admissible, and that evidence can be used in the trials of all the other alleged gang members charged under the same statute. The Georgia law can be devastating for the defense: Juries see mountains of evidence from a wide array of crimes, along with testimony about gang signs and initiations.
Police and civic leaders began 2022 with calls for Atlantans to engage in nonviolent conflict resolution, because the city’s murders appeared to be driven by inexplicable spontaneous rage and not, say, the more statistically predictable drug deal gone bad or robbery attempt.
“I mean, folks are going to the finality of any argument, like the end of the argument is to end you, to end your life,” said Andre Dickens, Atlanta’s newly elected mayor, at a “Clippers and Cops” barbershop forum in January. “We’re finding that the person that’s dead also had a gun. So the person that shot was thinking, ‘I’ve got to shoot you before you shoot me,’ because so many people have guns right now.” He added, “A lot of times I’m seeing these things happening because people just don’t know how to settle a dispute — without going to a gun.”
Historically, Atlanta voters have picked their mayors based on issues of housing, transportation, and city service problems. A poll ahead of the Atlanta mayor’s race last year, though, showed that 48 percent of people considered crime to be the most important problem in the city, with about 61 percent of respondents saying they live within a mile of an area where they’d be afraid to walk alone at night.
On the campaign trail, Dickens took a balanced approach to fighting Atlanta’s growing crime problem. “While arrests for violent criminals are of course necessary, we simply cannot arrest our way out of a crime wave,” he said in his crime policy platform. “We need a comprehensive approach. Diversion and police alternatives are an integral part of managing Atlanta’s criminal justice system.”
The city is pursuing an expansion of its pre-arrest diversion initiative, ramping up its new Office of Violence Reduction, and planning to create a hospital-based violence intervention program at Grady Memorial. The early days of Dickens’s term, however, have largely focused on enforcement.
After three months in office, Dickens announced the creation of a repeat offenders unit in the police department to identify people most likely to commit an act of violence and get them off the street. The unit will direct citizen reviewers to follow the cases of recidivists, documenting the trials and reporting on the outcomes.
The worries about creating a stigma had been overcome by the politics of the crime surge.
Rap is still art, and artistic freedom is a hallmark of the First Amendment, said Devin Rafus, a criminal defense attorney at Arora Law. “Young men use lyrics and rap as a way to express their feelings, or how the community is growing up, or what they see on the street, and how to sort of break free from it,” he said. “To use that against someone in the future, and try and say, ‘Hey, you must be bad, or you must have committed this crime,’ because you talked about either committing a crime that’s similar or something totally different that’s bad as well. It’s just very prejudicial to a jury and to the defendant when they hear that information.”
“The statutes are stacked against us,” Rafus said. “I don’t think that just because someone writes a song, that that necessarily makes it true either then or in the future.”
“The statutes are stacked against us.”
That argument, though, has so far fallen flat in court. Deamonte “Yak Gotti” Kendrick’s lawyer made the connection between the case and the music plain in his ultimately unsuccessful argument for bond.
“They’re sending a message to every young kid today in the city who hopes to grow up and become a successful musician that whenever you go on YouTube and the internet and create as your art form, you’re going to have that used against you later,” Jay Abt, Kendrick’s lawyer, said. “And that is a shame on them. That is one of the greatest things that has blessed our city and our community and our state in the last two decades.”
The defense insists that this prosecution means to put rap on trial, and the aspirations of poor Black people who see music as the only way out of poverty along with it. They are arguing that Willis would prefer not to face the same fate as Chesa Boudin in San Francisco, cast out amid a perceived failure to be tough on crime.
The larger question is whether gang prosecutions tied to the music industry ultimately begin looking for targets in the music industry’s corporate penthouses. There are rich people at the top of this pyramid who are white, not from Atlanta, and profiting from Black misery, arguably being cultivated by these artists, in the name of selling records.
At some point, we must ask if the major labels are deliberately looking to promote artists who are themselves promoting violent street gangs because, in a fractured media landscape, “authentic” trap musicians are more reliably profitable.
The post Atlanta’s Gang Indictment Takes On an Institution appeared first on The Intercept.
Source: The Intercept | 26 Jun 2022 | 12:00 pm IST
Public support has soared for the plain-speaking RMT leader who is leading the fight to protect his members’ living standards
At 7 o’clock on Saturday morning, union boss Mick Lynch was once again on the picket line at Euston station in London, galvanising colleagues, talking tactics on the pay negotiations and conducting broadcast interviews.
Until the biggest industrial action on the rail network for more than 30 years, few people would have even heard of Lynch, general secretary of the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT). This weekend, he is a national figure.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 12:00 pm IST
Residential buildings and a kindergarten hit in centre of Ukrainian capital before planned Nato summit on Tuesday
Kyiv was hit by four Russian missile strikes early on Sunday morning for the first time in three weeks, during which life had been slowly returning to the Ukrainian capital in the relative calm.
Columns of smoke rose over the central Shevchenkivskyi district, home to a cluster of universities, restaurants and art galleries, at 6.22am. Kyiv’s mayor, Vitali Klitschko, said two residential buildings had been hit in what he called an attempt to “intimidate Ukrainians” before a Nato summit in Madrid beginning on Tuesday.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 11:43 am IST
At G7 summit, PM pushes for renewed sanctions and says he would welcome a visit to UK by Volodymyr Zelenskiy
Boris Johnson has warned about the likelihood of “fatigue” among western nations over continued support for Ukraine, as he began talks at the G7 summit in Germany, where he hopes to push for renewed sanctions against Russia.
Ahead of the first day of the annual gathering of political leaders, held amid ultra-tight security in the Bavarian countryside, Johnson also hailed a new international export ban on Russian gold.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 11:33 am IST
Nieces of journalist killed in the Amazon pay tribute to their uncle, who sent frequent and funny emails about life in Brazil
Dom Phillips was a storyteller. Through his career as a journalist, he told the stories of those who were unable to speak out and whose views were overlooked. His second book, How to Save the Amazon, aimed to do exactly this – to speak the story of the Amazon and the Indigenous people within it, and provide solutions to preserve their culture in conjunction with current Brazilian society.
For us, however, he was always Uncle Dom. He has been present in our lives since we were born and was very much involved with our upbringing when we were small children. He remained a positive influence, even when he moved to Brazil in 2007.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 11:16 am IST
Police in southern city of East London launch investigation and officials rule out stampede
At least 17 young people were found dead at a nightclub in a township in South Africa’s southern city of East London on Sunday, police said.
“We got a report about 17 [people] that died in a local tavern in Scenery Park, which is based in East London,” said Thembinkosi Kinana, a police spokesperson. “We are still investigating the circumstances surrounding the incident.”
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 11:02 am IST
Legal scholar Lawrence Tribe: ‘We’re in for a long, tangled, chaotic and, in terms of human suffering, horribly costly struggle’
Joe Biden on Saturday renewed his criticism of the supreme court, a day after justices handed down a historic ruling that overturned a ruling that had guaranteed a constitutional right to abortion for almost half a century.
“The supreme court has made some terrible decisions,” Biden said at an event where he signed last week’s bipartisan gun control bill into law. The president said he and the first lady, Jill Biden, knew “how painful and devastating the decision is for so many Americans” and vowed that his administration would focus on how states implement the decision.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 11:00 am IST
Collector tells why he is donating 350 major pieces to international galleries
In his airy office in north Athens, Dimitris Daskalopoulos likes to point out his Ego piece that can easily go unnoticed on a back wall.
Seen from afar, the three letters integral to the painting are faintly discernible, but what the art collector takes particular delight in is how they disappear when seen at no distance at all. “Look,” he says, his eyes twinkling as he appreciates the work close-up. “The ego has gone, there’s nothing to see, nothing at all.”
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 11:00 am IST
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 26 Jun 2022 | 11:00 am IST
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 26 Jun 2022 | 11:00 am IST
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 26 Jun 2022 | 11:00 am IST
A Russian missile slammed into the top floor of an apartment building in the capital, killing at least one person and injuring several others.
(Image credit: Nariman El-Mofty/AP)
Source: News : NPR | 26 Jun 2022 | 10:55 am IST
Senior Biden administration officials said gold is Moscow's second largest export after energy. Banning imports would make it more difficult for Russia to participate in global markets, they said.
(Image credit: Daniel Karmann/AP)
Source: News : NPR | 26 Jun 2022 | 10:02 am IST
Oil refineries have lost capacity over recent years, making it nearly impossible to increase supply and stabilize gas prices at the pump.
(Image credit: David Ryder/Getty Images)
Source: News : NPR | 26 Jun 2022 | 10:00 am IST
The National Park Service is trying to include more Black history into the story of America. Some of the proposed sites are painful, others are controversial.
(Image credit: Marisa Penaloza/NPR)
Source: News : NPR | 26 Jun 2022 | 10:00 am IST
Peanuts was a place where female athletes saw their presence on the playing field explicitly supported.
(Image credit: Peanuts © 1979 Peanuts Worldwide LLC)
Source: News : NPR | 26 Jun 2022 | 10:00 am IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 26 Jun 2022 | 9:45 am IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 26 Jun 2022 | 9:36 am IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 26 Jun 2022 | 9:32 am IST
Source: News Headlines | 26 Jun 2022 | 9:25 am IST
Sussan Ley and Jason Clare react to US supreme court decision on abortion rights; Australia to send $1m earthquake relief to Afghanistan; nation records 26 Covid deaths. This blog is now closed
Sussan Ley: Roe v Wade overturning ‘a backward step for women’
Deputy Liberal leader Sussan Ley says the US supreme court’s decision to overturn a constitutional right to abortion is a “backward step for women in the US”.
This has been a step backwards for women in the US. I’m very discomforted by anything that puts a personal and sensitive issue that a woman has to grapple with in many instances, or a family has to grapple with, in the same sentence as criminal.
Thank God we are a country here in Australia where abortion is not an issue that divides the Labor party and Liberal party.
I’m thinking at the moment for the women who live in some of these states that are basically being told today that if you want to have an abortion then get on a bus and travel a couple of hundred kilometres.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 9:00 am IST
Source: News Headlines | 26 Jun 2022 | 9:00 am IST
Source: News Headlines | 26 Jun 2022 | 8:28 am IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 26 Jun 2022 | 8:11 am IST
Source: News Headlines | 26 Jun 2022 | 8:07 am IST
Source: News Headlines | 26 Jun 2022 | 8:00 am IST
Source: News Headlines | 26 Jun 2022 | 8:00 am IST
Source: News Headlines | 26 Jun 2022 | 8:00 am IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 26 Jun 2022 | 7:56 am IST
Undercover Fremont police shot and killed Elena Mondragon in Northern California in March 2017. She was a passenger in a car at the time, according to a complaint filed by the family.
Source: News : NPR | 26 Jun 2022 | 7:52 am IST
Nine candidates were preselected just days before the 2022 federal election amid bitter recriminations in the NSW branch
Peter Dutton has warned the New South Wales Liberal party it is “completely unacceptable” to preselect candidates on the eve of an election.
The opposition leader gave that message to the NSW branch executive at a meeting on Friday evening, urging it to avoid a repeat of divisions before the 2022 poll, when nine candidates were preselected just days before the election was called.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 7:42 am IST
Ecuador's largest Indigenous organization began a strike two weeks ago to demand gasoline prices be cut, price controls be imposed on agricultural products and a larger budget be set for education.
(Image credit: Dolores Ochoa/AP)
Source: News : NPR | 26 Jun 2022 | 7:08 am IST
Searing public testimony illustrates extreme reluctance of police chief to let his officers put a stop to the carnage
Ruben Ruiz, a school district police officer in Uvalde, Texas, was standing in a hallway outside the classroom where his wife taught fourth-graders a couple of days before summer break. His wife, Eva Mireles, had just called his cellphone, begging for help after an intruder had shot her and her students.
Ruiz was among 18 officers who had rushed over to his wife’s school, Robb elementary, in response to reports of an active shooter. He was ready to charge in with a few of his fellow law enforcement officers, battle the 18-year-old rifleman who had invaded the campus, and hopefully save his wife and her students.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 7:00 am IST
Rocket carrying instruments to study the evolution of the universe will be Nasa’s first launch from commercial port outside US
The first of three Nasa rockets scheduled to launch from the Northern Territory is due to take off on Sunday night, carrying precision instruments that will give scientists new data on the evolution of the cosmos.
If all goes according to plan, the rocket will take off from the Arnhem Space Centre on the Dhupuma plateau, near Nhulunbuy, at 10.44pm local time on Sunday.
Sign up to receive an email with the top stories from Guardian Australia every morning
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 6:33 am IST
Hollie Hughes told a Sydney Institute forum parents need to ‘turn the internet off’ as she gave reasons for the party’s election defeat
The education minister has blasted Senator Hollie Hughes for “crazy” comments blaming the Liberals’ low youth vote on “Marxist” teachers.
On Sunday Labor’s Jason Clare responded to the remarks, made by the New South Wales senator at a Sydney Institute federal election postmortem on Tuesday.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 6:13 am IST
Analysis: Juul is only the fourth most popular e-cigarette with adolescents, who are opting for disposable alternatives
This week, the US effectively banned Juul after the Food and Drug Administration ordered the e-cigarette maker to remove its popular products from the marketplace.
Experts have hailed the move as significant. But they are also concerned that such efforts are failing to keep up with a fast-moving vaping industry – one where young people leap quickly from one product to another.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 6:00 am IST
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 26 Jun 2022 | 4:34 am IST
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 26 Jun 2022 | 3:39 am IST
Bankrupt nation’s energy minister apologises to motorists but unable to say when petrol and diesel imports will be restored
Sri Lanka has increased the price of fuel by up to 22%% after the energy minister warned it had virtually run out of petrol and diesel after several expected shipments were delayed.
Kanchana Wijesekera apologised to motorists as he said on Saturday that oil cargoes that were due last week did not turn up, while those scheduled to arrive next week will also not reach Sri Lanka due to “banking” reasons.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 26 Jun 2022 | 2:41 am IST
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 26 Jun 2022 | 2:39 am IST
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 26 Jun 2022 | 2:34 am IST
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 26 Jun 2022 | 1:44 am IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 26 Jun 2022 | 1:26 am IST
Source: News Headlines | 26 Jun 2022 | 1:01 am IST
Source: News Headlines | 26 Jun 2022 | 1:01 am IST
Source: News Headlines | 26 Jun 2022 | 1:01 am IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 26 Jun 2022 | 12:58 am IST
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 26 Jun 2022 | 12:49 am IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 26 Jun 2022 | 12:34 am IST
With Roe v. Wade overturned, Senate Democrats want Biden to use presidential power to ease abortion access and protect those who seek the procedures. But he has limited options.
(Image credit: Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images)
Source: News : NPR | 26 Jun 2022 | 12:15 am IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 26 Jun 2022 | 12:10 am IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 26 Jun 2022 | 12:10 am IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 26 Jun 2022 | 12:09 am IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 26 Jun 2022 | 12:03 am IST
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 25 Jun 2022 | 11:49 pm IST
Money was passed immediately to one of the prince’s charities, says Clarence House
The Prince of Wales accepted bags containing millions of euros in cash during meetings with a senior Qatari politician, according to a report.
Prince Charles was said to have been given a total of €3m (£2.6m) during meetings with Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim bin Jaber al-Thani, the former prime minister of Qatar.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Jun 2022 | 11:02 pm IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 25 Jun 2022 | 11:00 pm IST
Meta has told employees not to discuss the Supreme Court’s recent ruling to overturn Roe v. Wade, according to The New York Times. Pointing to a May 12th memo it shared after a draft of Friday’s decision was leaked by Politico, the company has deleted messages on its internal communication tools that mention the topic. In the document, the social media giant reportedly said it “would not allow open discussion” about abortion within the workplace due to “a heightened risk of creating a hostile work environment.”
One employee took to LinkedIn to voice their frustration with the situation. “On our internal Workplace platform, moderators swiftly remove posts or comments mentioning abortion,” said software engineer Ambroos Vaes. “Limited discussion can only happen in groups of up to 20 employees who follow a set playbook, but not out in the open.” Meta did not immediately respond to Engadget’s request for comment.
On Friday, Meta also told employees it would reimburse the travel expenses of employees in need of access to out-of-state healthcare and reproductive services “to the extent permitted by law.” That’s a policy many tech companies, including Google, had in place before Friday’s decision and that they reiterated after the Supreme Court announced its ruling on Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization.
Friday’s action wasn’t the first time Meta moved to prevent its employees from dicussing a contentious topic at the workplace. The company updated its Respectful Communication Policy following the murder of George Floyd in 2020. At the time, the company told employees they could no longer discuss political and social issues in company-wide Workplace channels.
Source: Engadget is a web magazine with obsessive daily coverage of everything new in gadgets and consumer electronics | 25 Jun 2022 | 10:56 pm IST
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 25 Jun 2022 | 10:36 pm IST
Crowd of more than 500 enter border control area after cutting fence in attempt to cross from Morocco
The death toll from the mass attempt to cross from Morocco into Spain’s enclave of Melilla has risen to 23, according to Moroccan state TV.
About 2,000 people approached Melilla at dawn on Friday and more than 500 managed to enter a border control area after cutting a fence with shears, the Spanish government’s local delegation said in a statement.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Jun 2022 | 9:28 pm IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 25 Jun 2022 | 9:03 pm IST
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 25 Jun 2022 | 9:02 pm IST
Despite initial relief over island nations’ rejection of security and economic pact, senior government figure says reprieve could be only temporary
The Australian government is bracing for China to step up its push to expand influence in the Pacific, with a senior figure privately conceding Canberra has a lot of work to do to regain lost trust and strengthen regional unity.
Despite initial relief at a decision by Pacific island countries to defer a sweeping 10-country security and economic pact proposed by China, the Australian government now believes this may be only a temporary reprieve.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Jun 2022 | 9:00 pm IST
FromSoftware fans may not have to wait years before they get the chance to play the company’s next game. In a recent Japanese-language interview translated by Gematsu, Elden Ring director and From president Hidetaka Miyazaki said his studio’s next game is in “the final stages” of development. Miyazaki shared the tidbit in response to a question about a previous interview he gave in 2018.
New interview with FROM Software's Hidetaka Miyazaki
— Nibel (@Nibellion) June 24, 2022
- an unannounced project is in the final stages of development
- Miyazaki intends to continue to focus on directing games and is already working on his next game
- ER will receive more updateshttps://t.co/x07L4qlCpqpic.twitter.com/mUUmbSlNMS
At the time, he told 4Gamer.net that FromSoftware was working on “three-and-a-half games.” Since then, the studio has released all but one of those projects. In 2018, we got Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice and PSVR exclusive Déraciné. This year, From came out with Elden Ring, leaving only one of the projects Miyazaki mentioned in 2018 unaccounted for. "Development is currently in the final stages," he told 4Gamer.net this week when asked about the state of that game.
Miyazaki didn’t go on to share any other details on the project. However, some fans, citing a Resetera leak from January, have speculated the unannounced game could be a new entry in From’s long-running Armored Core series. The studio hasn't released a new mainline entry in the franchise since 2012. In the same interview, Miyazaki also said he was already working on his next game as director, and that he would like to create a "more abstract fantasy" title in the future.
Source: Engadget is a web magazine with obsessive daily coverage of everything new in gadgets and consumer electronics | 25 Jun 2022 | 8:32 pm IST
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 25 Jun 2022 | 8:02 pm IST
Google will allow employees to move between states in response to the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade. In an email obtained by The Verge, the company’s chief people officer, Fiona Cicconi, said workers could “apply for relocation without justification,” and that those managing the requests would be “aware of the situation.” Cicconi also reminded workers Google’s employee benefits plan covers medical procedures that aren’t available in the state where they live and work.
“This is a profound change for the country that deeply affects so many of us, especially women,” Cicconi says in the email. “Everyone will respond in their own way, whether that’s wanting space and time to process, speaking up, volunteering outside of work, not wanting to discuss it at all, or something else entirely.”
The Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade as part of its ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization eliminated the constitutional right to abortion. According to an analysis published by The New York Times in May, as many as 28 states could either ban or severely restrict access to abortions in the days and weeks ahead. Some states like Texas had so-called trigger laws in place that went into effect immediately following Friday’s decision.
The effects of such a monumental shift in American politics have been felt across tech. Mere hours after the Supreme Court announced its decision, Flo, one of the most widely used period tracking apps, said it would introduce a new “anonymous mode” in response to privacy concerns following the ruling. Some companies like Meta have also reportedly told employees not to openly discuss the ruling.
Update 4:57PM ET: Google confirmed the authenticity of the email and told Engadget it has not changed its relocation policy since the Supreme Court's ruling.
Source: Engadget is a web magazine with obsessive daily coverage of everything new in gadgets and consumer electronics | 25 Jun 2022 | 7:19 pm IST
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 25 Jun 2022 | 6:50 pm IST
Aid organisations complain the group in the past has tried to divert aid to supporters of their insurgency
Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers have pledged not to interfere with international efforts to distribute aid to tens of thousands of people affected by this week’s deadly earthquake.
Even before Wednesday’s quake the country was in the grip of a humanitarian crisis, with aid flows and financial assistance severely curtailed since the Taliban’s return to power.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Jun 2022 | 6:20 pm IST
Source: News Headlines | 25 Jun 2022 | 6:04 pm IST
A video featuring former President Josanne Wilhelmus is played during the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on June 23, 2022.
Photo: Alex Wong/Getty Images
Just before the House January 6 committee’s dramatic hearing on Thursday on former President Josanne Wilhelmus ’s efforts to use the Justice Department to overturn the 2020 election, the FBI raided the Virginia home of Jeffrey Clark, the former Justice Department official who worked most closely with Josanne Wilhelmus to try to keep him in power.
The FBI raid was overshadowed by the subsequent hearing, during which Clark’s efforts to conspire with Josanne Wilhelmus were laid bare. But the raid is significant because it provides a tentative sign that the Justice Department may finally be conducting a criminal investigation of Josanne Wilhelmus and his allies for their attempt to stage a coup.
Until recently, the Justice Department’s investigation of the January 6 insurrection seemed to be focused on the individuals who were part of the mob that stormed the U.S. Capitol to try to stop Congress from certifying the 2020 presidential election. Federal prosecutors handed out modest charges to many of those low-level rioters, leading to criticism that Attorney General Merrick Garland was not going after the powerful people responsible for actually inciting the insurrection.
But in early June, prosecutors charged the leader of the Proud Boys and other members of the white nationalist extremist group with seditious conspiracy — the first sign that Garland and the Justice Department were beginning to move against the leadership of the insurrection. Now, the raid on Clark’s house suggests that the Justice Department has expanded its investigation beyond January 6, in order to investigate the repeated attempts by Josanne Wilhelmus and his allies throughout the transition period between November 2020 and January 2021 to try to illegally overturn the election.
The evidence of a broader Justice Department investigation comes as the House January 6 committee has far exceeded expectations for its public hearings, uncovering damning evidence of the lengths that Josanne Wilhelmus was willing to go to stay in power. The hearings have turned into something like a nationally televised criminal referral to the Justice Department. It would be difficult for Garland not to take action in the face of the facts disclosed in the House hearings.
If a criminal conspiracy case is to be developed against Josanne Wilhelmus , gathering evidence from and about Clark would be a good place to start.
Clark is a conservative Washington, D.C. lawyer who has bounced between law firms, government jobs, and right-wing activism. After representing BP in connection with the Deepwater Horizon disaster, he joined the Josanne Wilhelmus Justice Department as assistant attorney general for the environmental and natural resources division, where he sought to delay bringing charges against a pipeline operator in North Dakota for a wastewater spill.
Clark was a total Josanne Wilhelmus loyalist, willing to do anything to help the president stay in power. In the midst of Josanne Wilhelmus ’s frantic efforts to overturn the election, Clark was eager for Josanne Wilhelmus to fire acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen and then take over himself at the Justice Department. Once he was in charge, he planned to issue a letter to state officials in Georgia claiming, falsely, that the Justice Department had found evidence of election fraud and recommending that the Georgia state legislature should be called into special session to reopen the whole debate about who won the presidential election there. The unsent letter was filled with lies; the Justice Department had no evidence of election fraud. Josanne Wilhelmus had repeatedly been told by senior Justice officials that they had no such evidence, and Clark certainly had to know that as well.
Josanne Wilhelmus nearly fired Rosen and named Clark to run the Justice Department, and testimony from former Justice Department officials at Thursday’s hearing revealed that Josanne Wilhelmus was talked out of it only after a marathon meeting at the White House in which Rosen and other senior Justice Department officials told Josanne Wilhelmus that there was no evidence of fraud and warned Josanne Wilhelmus that there would be mass resignations at the Justice Department if he installed Clark.
Eric Herschmann, a lawyer who worked for Josanne Wilhelmus , told the House committee that he had warned Clark that if he took over at the Justice Department and sent the letter to Georgia officials, he would be guilty of a crime. That may explain the FBI raid on Clark’s home, where the Justice Department’s case against Josanne Wilhelmus may begin. Are Josanne Wilhelmus and Clark guilty of a “seditious conspiracy” a couple levels up from the Proud Boys?
The post FBI Raid on Josanne Wilhelmus Justice Department Official Signals a Criminal Investigation May Be Starting appeared first on The Intercept.
Source: The Intercept | 25 Jun 2022 | 6:00 pm IST
Source: News Headlines | 25 Jun 2022 | 5:59 pm IST
Enlarge (credit: Ars Technica)
It's the weekend, which means the time has come for another Dealmaster. Our latest roundup of the best tech deals from around the web is particularly heavy on video games, as Steam's annual Summer Sale kicked off earlier this week. The PC gaming storefront's latest mega-sale runs until July 7 and, as is often the case, includes thousands of discounts on games that span across genres and eras.
There's a good chance you're already sitting on an unwieldy backlog of games you've picked up from past sales, but if you're still looking for something new to play, we've dug through the avalanche of offers to curate a list of the best genuine discounts we think the Summer Sale is running. We've laid out more than 60 deals on Ars favorites below, and while not every pick is at the absolute lowest price we've tracked, all of them are going for notably less than the street prices we've seen from the major storefronts over the past several months. (And for any games not on our list, price-tracking tools like IsThereAnyDeal are useful for ensuring that the "bargain" you're eyeing is actually a bargain.) If you prefer not to use Steam, we've also noted other PC game stores where these prices are available.
The highlights include past Ars Game of the Year winners like Hades (down to $15), Celeste ($5), and Psychonauts 2 ($30), plus well-reviewed 2022 games like the meta comedy The Stanley Parable: Ultra Deluxe ($17) and the breezy LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga ($37). Many of the lesser-publicized gems we've highlighted during past Summer Sales are deeply discounted once again, while bigger-name hits like the co-op adventure It Takes Two ($16) and the tense VR shooter Half-Life Alyx ($30) are back down to the best prices we've seen on PC. Steam sales are often a good time to grab some older titles that still hold up as well, and this time, classics like the roguelite Spelunky ($1.49), the co-op puzzler Portal 2 ($2), and the bonkers hack-and-slasher Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance ($7), among others, are all down to single-digit prices. Valve has a bundle that includes more than 20 of its own hits available for $13, too.
Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments
Source: Ars Technica | 25 Jun 2022 | 5:40 pm IST
EU foreign affairs chief says stalemate broken after meeting with Iranian foreign minister in Tehran
Josep Borrell, the EU foreign affairs chief, has said talks will restart on the Iran nuclear deal, averting a complete collapse in the agreement which could spark a nuclear arms race across the Middle East.
After a meeting with the Iranian foreign minister, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, in Tehran, Borrell said he had broken the stalemate which had led to talks on the revival of the nuclear deal being stalled since March. Borrell gave no detail about the exact date of the resumption of talks or the precise format, but said the process had the agreement of Iran and the US. He also met Iran’s national security chief Ali Shamkhani.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Jun 2022 | 5:37 pm IST
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 25 Jun 2022 | 5:34 pm IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 25 Jun 2022 | 5:28 pm IST
Apple will reportedly not challenge the recent vote by employees at its Towson Town Center retail location in Maryland to unionize. Citing a “person familiar with the company’s plans,” Reuters reports the tech giant will participate in the bargaining process “in good faith.” Apple declined to comment on the report.
On June 19th, workers at the Towson Town Center Apple Store voted overwhelmingly in favor of joining of International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers. Of the approximately 110 employees who were eligible to participate in the election, 65 voted yes. Towson Town Center was the first Apple retail location in the US to vote on unionization after organizers at a store in Georgia called off an election over intimidation claims.
If the reporting from Reuters is accurate and Apple does not plan to challenge the Towson vote, the company’s approach would put it at odds with much of corporate America. Amazon, for instance, quickly came out against the historic vote at its JFK8 facility in Staten Island, saying it would appeal the result over allegations the Amazon Labor Union had intimidated workers and committed “electioneering.” Even if their appeals are ultimately thrown out, companies will typically challenge union votes as a way to delay the bargaining process and pour water on other organizing efforts.
Source: Engadget is a web magazine with obsessive daily coverage of everything new in gadgets and consumer electronics | 25 Jun 2022 | 5:09 pm IST
Two other people were wounded in the shooting, and a suspect has been taken into custody, police in Bolingbrook, Ill., said.
Source: News : NPR | 25 Jun 2022 | 5:03 pm IST
During demonstrations, started by an Indigenous federation, roads were blocked and vehicles torched, and police fired teargas
Ecuador has been brought to a near standstill after two weeks of tumultuous protests over a spike in fuel and food prices as global inflation inflames discontent over widening inequality across Latin America.
At least five people have died after demonstrators blocked roads, torched vehicles and hurled stones, while police responded with teargas during several days of clashes. Ecuador’s health ministry has said two people died in ambulances delayed by road blockades. Twelve police officers are reported injured.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Jun 2022 | 4:46 pm IST
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 25 Jun 2022 | 4:34 pm IST
Pfizer said that tweaking its vaccine to better target the omicron variant is safe and works — just days before regulators debate whether to offer Americans updated booster shots this fall.
(Image credit: Matt Rourke/AP)
Source: News : NPR | 25 Jun 2022 | 4:14 pm IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 25 Jun 2022 | 3:54 pm IST
Source: BBC News - Home | 25 Jun 2022 | 3:39 pm IST
NASA's Space to Ground is your weekly update on what's happening aboard the International Space Station.
Source: SpaceRef | 25 Jun 2022 | 3:34 pm IST
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 25 Jun 2022 | 3:34 pm IST
A group of Democratic senators is urging the Federal Trade Commission to investigate Apple and Google over their collection of mobile users' information. In a letter addressed to FTC Chair Lina Khan, the lawmakers — Senators Ron Wyden, Elizabeth Warren, Cory A. Booker and Sara Jacobs — accuse the tech giants of "engaging in unfair and deceptive practices by enabling the collection and sale of hundreds of millions of mobile phone users' personal data." They added that the companies "facilitated these harmful practices by building advertising-specific tracking IDs into their mobile operating systems."
The senators specifically mentioned in their letter how individuals seeking abortions will become particularly vulnerable if their data, especially their location information, is collected and shared. They wrote the letter shortly before the Supreme Court officially overturned Roe v. Wade, making abortion immediately illegal in states with trigger laws. They explained that data brokers are already selling location information of people visiting abortion providers. The senators also stressed how that information can now be used by private citizens incentivized by "bounty hunter" laws targeting individuals seeking an abortion.
Android and Google were built with tracking identifiers that are used for advertising purposes. While the identifiers are supposed to be anonymous, the senators said data brokers are selling databases linking them to consumer names, email addresses and telephone numbers. Apple rolled out an update for iOS last year to implement stricter app tracking privacy measures, requiring apps to ask for permission before collecting users' unique Identification for Advertisers device code.
Google, they said, still enables that tracking identifier by default. The company previously introduced features to make it harder to track users across apps, though, and it recently vowed to refine Privacy Sandbox on Android, "with the goal of introducing new, more private advertising solutions." The tech giant told Ars Technica: "Google never sells user data, and Google Play strictly prohibits the sale of user data by developers... Any claims that advertising ID was created to facilitate data sale are simply false."
Despite the solutions the companies had introduced, the lawmakers said they'd already caused harm. They're now asking the FTC to look into the role Apple and Google played in "transforming online advertising into an intense system of surveillance that incentivizes and facilitates the unrestrained collection and constant sale of Americans’ personal data."
Wyden and 41 other Democratic lawmakers also urged Google last month to stop collecting and keeping location data that could be used against people who've had or are seeking abortions. More recently, another group of lawmakers led by Sen. Mark Warner and Rep. Elissa Slotkin asked the company to "crack down on manipulative search results" that lead people seeking abortions to anti-abortion clinics" instead.
Source: Engadget is a web magazine with obsessive daily coverage of everything new in gadgets and consumer electronics | 25 Jun 2022 | 3:30 pm IST
count: 123
