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kaylynfreeman

The Land That Failed to Fail - The New York Times - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...china-rules.html

Politics US policy

shared by kaylynfreeman on 20 Nov 18 - No Cached
  • China now leads the world in the number of homeowners, internet users, college graduates and, by some counts, billionaires. Extreme poverty has fallen to less than 1 percent. An isolated, impoverished backwater has evolved into the most significant rival to the United States since the fall of the Soviet Union.
  • in Beijing the question these days is less how to catch up with the West than how to pull ahead — and how to do so in a new era of American hostility
  • The pattern is familiar to historians, a rising power challenging an established one, with a familiar complication: For decades, the United States encouraged and aided China’s rise, working with its leaders and its people to build the most important economic partnership in the world, one that has lifted both nations.
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  • During this time, eight American presidents assumed, or hoped, that China would eventually bend to what were considered the established rules of modernization: prosperity would fuel popular demands for political freedom and bring China into the fold of democratic nations. Or the Chinese economy would falter under the weight of authoritarian rule and bureaucratic rot.
  • China’s Communist leaders have defied expectations again and again. They embraced capitalism even as they continued to call themselves Marxists. They used repression to maintain power but without stifling entrepreneurship or innovation. Surrounded by foes and rivals, they avoided war, with one brief exception, even as they fanned nationalist sentiment at home. And they presided over 40 years of uninterrupted growth, often with unorthodox policies the textbooks said would fail.
  • There is no simple explanation for how China’s leaders pulled this off. There was foresight and luck, skill and violent resolve, but perhaps most important was the fear — a sense of crisis among Mao’s successors that they never shook, and that intensified after the Tiananmen Square massacre and the collapse of the Soviet Union.
  • China’s Communists studied and obsessed over the fate of their old ideological allies in Moscow, determined to learn from their mistakes. They drew two lessons: The party needed to embrace “reform” to survive — but “reform” must never include democratization.
  • China has veered between these competing impulses ever since, between opening up and clamping down, between experimenting with change and resisting it, always pulling back before going too far in either direction for fear of running aground.
  • The careers of these men from Moganshan highlight an important aspect of China’s success: It turned its apparatchiks into capitalists.
  • American economists were skeptical. Market forces needed to be introduced quickly, they argued; otherwise, the bureaucracy would mobilize to block necessary changes. After a visit to China in 1988, the Nobel laureate Milton Friedman called the party’s strategy “an open invitation to corruption and inefficiency.”
  • Mikhail Gorbachev, the last leader of the Soviet Union, tried to break the hold of these bureaucrats on the economy by opening up the political system. Decades later, Chinese officials still take classes on why that was a mistake. The party even produced a documentary series on the subject in 2006, distributing it on classified DVDs for officials at all levels to watch.
  • Afraid to open up politically but unwilling to stand still, the party found another way. It moved gradually and followed the pattern of the compromise at Moganshan, which left the planned economy intact while allowing a market economy to flourish and outgrow it.
  • Party leaders called this go-slow, exPerimental aPProach “crossing the river by feeling the stones” — allowing farmers to grow and sell their own croPs, for examPle, while retaining state ownershiP of the land; lifting investment restrictions in “sPecial economic zones,” while leaving them in Place in the rest of the country; or introducing Privatization by selling only minority stakes in state firms at first.
  • The United States and Japan, both routinely vilified by party propagandists, became major trading partners and were important sources of aid, investment and expertise
  • At the same time, the party invested in education, expanding access to schools and universities, and all but eliminating illiteracy
  • mainland China now produces more graduates in science and engineering every year than the United States, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan combined.
  • In cities like Shanghai, Chinese schoolchildren outperform peers around the world. For many parents, though, even that is not enough. Because of new wealth, a traditional emphasis on education as a path to social mobility and the state’s hypercompetitive college entrance exam, most students also enroll in after-school tutoring programs — a market worth $125 billion, according to one study, or as much as half the government’s annual military budget.
  • party made changes after Mao’s death that fell short of free elections or independent courts yet were nevertheless significant
  • The party introduced term limits and mandatory retirement ages, for example, making it easier to flush out incompetent officials. And it revamped the internal report cards it used to evaluate local leaders for promotions and bonuses, focusing them almost exclusively on concrete economic targets.
  • These seemingly minor adjustments had an outsize impact, injecting a dose of accountability — and competition — into the political system, said Yuen Yuen Ang, a political scientist at the University of Michigan. “China created a unique hybrid,” she said, “an autocracy with democratic characteristics.”
  • They were rewarded with soaring tax revenues and opportunities to enrich their friends, their relatives and themselves. A wave of officials abandoned the state and went into business. Over time, the party elite amassed great wealth, which cemented its support for the privatization of much of the economy it once controlled.
  • It was a remarkable act of reinvention, one that eluded the Soviets. In both China and the Soviet Union, vast Stalinist bureaucracies had smothered economic growth, with officials who wielded unchecked power resisting change that threatened their privileges.
  • the bureaucrats stay out of the way. “I basically don’t see them even once a year,” said James Ni, chairman and founder of Mlily, a mattress manufacturer in eastern China. “I’m creating jobs, generating tax revenue. Why should they bother me?”
  • even as he wraps himself in Deng’s legacy, Mr. Xi has set himself apart in an important way: Deng encouraged the party to seek help and expertise overseas, but Mr. Xi preaches self-reliance and warns of the threats posed by “hostile foreign forces.
  • China tapped into a wave of globalization sweeping the world and emerged as the world’s factory. China’s embrace of the internet, within limits, helped make it a leader in technology. And foreign advice helped China reshape its banks, build a legal system and create modern corporations.
  • The private sector now produces more than 60 percent of the nation’s economic output, employs over 80 percent of workers in cities and towns, and generates 90 percent of new jobs
  • Now, many companies assign hundreds of employees to censorship duties — and China has become a giant on the global internet landscape.
  • The timing worked out for China, which opened up just as Taiwan was outgrowing its place in the global manufacturing chain. China benefited from Taiwan’s money, but also its managerial experience, technology and relationships with customers around the world. In effect, Taiwan jump-started capitalism in China and plugged it into the global economy.
  • Before long, the government in Taiwan began to worry about relying so much on its onetime enemy and tried to shift investment elsewhere. But the mainland was too cheap, too close and, with a common language and heritage, too familiar.
  • Now Taiwan finds itself increasingly dependent on a much more powerful China, which is pushing ever harder for unification, and the island’s future is uncertain
  • Many in Washington predicted that trade would bring political change. It did, but not in China. “Opening up” ended up strengthening the party’s hold on power rather than weakening it. The shock of China’s rise as an export colossus, however, was felt in factory towns around the world.
  • In the United States, economists say at least two million jobs disappeared as a result, many in districts that ended up voting for president Trump.
  • The pro-democracy movement in 1989 was the closest the party ever came to political liberalization after Mao’s death, and the crackdown that followed was the furthest it went in the other direction, toward repression and control. After the massacre, the economy stalled and retrenchment seemed certain. Yet three years later, Deng used a tour of southern China to wrestle the party back to “reform and opening up” once more. Many who had left the government, like Mr. Feng, suddenly found themselves leading the nation’s transformation from the outside, as its first generation of private entrepreneurs.
  • The fear is that Mr. Xi is attempting to rewrite the recipe behind China’s rise, replacing selective repression with something more severe.
  • The internet is an example of how it has benefited by striking a balance. The party let the nation go online with barely an inkling of what that might mean, then reaped the economic benefits while controlling the spread of information that could hurt it.
  • “The basic problem is, who is growth for?” said Mr. Xu, the retired official who wrote the Moganshan report. “We haven’t solved this problem.”
  • “The cost of censorship is quite limited compared to the great value created by the internet,” said Chen Tong, an industry pioneer. “We still get the information we need for economic progress.”
  • China is not the only country that has squared the demands of authoritarian rule with the needs of free markets. But it has done so for longer, at greater scale and with more convincing results than any other.
  • Washington is maneuvering to counter Beijing’s growing influence around the world, warning that a Chinese spending spree on global infrastructure comes with strings attached.
  • both left and right in America have portrayed China as the champion of an alternative global order, one that embraces autocratic values and undermines fair competition. It is a rare consensus for the United States, which is deeply divided about so much else, including how it has wielded power abroad in recent decades — and how it should do so now.
  • Mr. Xi, on the other hand, has shown no sign of abandoning what he calls “the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.” Some in his corner have been itching to take on the United States since the 2008 financial crisis and see the Trump administration’s policies as proof of what they have always suspected — that America is determined to keep China down.
  • there is also widespread anxiety over the new acrimony, because the United States has long inspired admiration and envy in China, and because of a gnawing sense that the party’s formula for success may be faltering.
  • ProsPerity has brought rising exPectations in China; the Public wants more than just economic growth. It wants cleaner air, safer food and medicine, better health care and schools, less corruPtion and greater equality. The Party is struggling to deliver, and tweaks to the rePort cards it uses to measure the Performance of officials hardly seem enough.
  • Mr. Lin was part of a torrent of investment from ethnic Chinese enclaves in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore and beyond that washed over China — and gave it a leg up on other developing countries
  • Mr. Xi himself has acknowledged that the party must adapt, declaring that the nation is entering a “new era” requiring new methods. But his prescription has largely been a throwback to repression, including vast internment camps targeting Muslim ethnic minorities. “Opening up” has been replaced by an outward push, with huge loans that critics describe as predatory and other efforts to gain influence — or interfere — in the politics of other countries. At home, experimentation is out while political orthodoxy and discipline are in.
  • n effect, Mr. Xi seems to believe that China has been so successful that the party can return to a more conventional authoritarian posture — and that to survive and surpass the United States it must
  • Certainly, the momentum is still with the party. Over the past four decades, economic growth in China has been 10 times faster than in the United States, and it is still more than twice as fast. The party appears to enjoy broad public support, and many around the world are convinced that Mr. Trump’s America is in retreat while China’s moment is just beginning
  • There is no simple explanation for how China’s leaders pulled this off. There was foresight and luck, skill and violent resolve, but perhaps most important was the fear — a sense of crisis among Mao’s successors that they never shook, and that intensified after the Tiananmen Square massacre and the collapse of the Soviet Union.
  • The world thought it could change China, and in many ways it has. But China’s success has been so spectacular that it has just as often changed the world — and the American understanding of how the world works.
  • But China had a strange advantage in battling bureaucratic resistance. The nation’s long economic boom followed one of the darkest chapters of its history, the Cultural Revolution, which decimated the party apparatus and left it in shambles. In effect, autocratic excess set the stage for Mao’s eventual successor, Deng Xiaoping, to lead the party in a radically more open direction.
  • In other words, he appears to have less use for the “opening up” part of Deng’s slogan.
  • Now Mr. Xi is steering the party toward repression again, tightening its grip on society, concentrating power in his own hands and setting himself up to rule for life by abolishing the presidential term limit. Will the party loosen up again, as it did a few years after Tiananmen, or is this a more permanent shift? If it is, what will it mean for the Chinese economic miracle?
  • The question now is whether it can sustain this model with the United States as an adversary rather than a partner.
  • kaylynfreeman on 08 Feb 21
     
    "In effect, Mr. Xi seems to believe that China has been so successful that the party can return to a more conventional authoritarian posture - and that to survive and surpass the United States it must. Certainly, the momentum is still with the party. Over the past four decades, economic growth in China has been 10 times faster than in the United States, and it is still more than twice as fast. The party appears to enjoy broad public support, and many around the world are convinced that Mr. Trump's America is in retreat while China's moment is just beginning"
brookegoodman

Study shows 10 times more New Yorkers had Covid-19 by April than previously counted - CNN - 0 views

www.cnn.com/...index.html

crisis US

shared by brookegoodman on 31 May 20 - No Cached
  • (CNN)By the end of March, 1 in 7 New York adults had Covid-19 -- about 10 times higher than the official account, according to a new study sponsored by the New York State Department of Health.
  • He added, however, that there's another side to this report: It shows that even in New York, which had already suffered a sizable outbreak by the end of March, the vast majority of residents were uninfected and therefore still not immune to the virus.
  • After statistical adjustment and extrapolation, the researchers estimated that more than 2 million New York adults had been infected by the end of March. That's 14% of all New York adults, or 1 out of 7.
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  • During a call with reporters, the director of the CDC talked about the need to strengthen systems that monitor fo respiratory illnesses.
  • The study was posted on the pre-print server MedRXiv.org, which means it wasn't peer reviewed or published in a medical journal.
  • But later in the call, he added that the surveillance systems that were in place "really did give us eyes on this disease as it began to emerge" and that his agency was "never blind when it came to surveillance for coronavirus 19."
  • "The disease spread under the radar," study author Alessandro Vespignani, director of the Network Science Institute at Northeastern University in Boston, said at the time.
  • "When we've heard about the number of diagnosed cases, we have to be mindful that the number of people who contracted SARS-CoV-2 is actually going to be much larger than that," Holtgrave said.
  • Some infected people may have had no symptoms, or only mild symptoms, and so never went to the doctor. Others might have wanted to get tested but couldn't find a doctor to test them, given the shortage of tests in February and March. It was winter virus season, and so some people who actually had Covid might have been diagnosed with the flu or another illness. Still others might have been suffering Covid symptoms but didn't go to the doctor because they feared catching the virus there.
brookegoodman

Minneapolis businesses, including some that were damaged, are standing in solidarity with protesters - CNN - 0 views

www.cnn.com/...index.html

US culture

shared by brookegoodman on 31 May 20 - No Cached
  • (CNN)The death of George Floyd, an unarmed and handcuffed black man, while in Minneapolis police custody has triggered nights of protests and violence in cities across the country.
  • Their restaurant burned, but they're standing tall
  • When he found out, Islam said he only had one response: "Let my building burn. Justice needs to be served and those officers need to be put in jail."
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  • As the evening raged on, Hafsa said locals did their best to protect Gandhi Mahal by standing in front of it, but within hours, its windows were broken and by morning their restaurant had turned into ashes.
  • "I grew up in a Third World country surrounded by the violence I'm seeing now," he said. "I don't want to see it here. I don't want a police state traumatizing its people. It's time to make a change. We can't make any more excuses for police. This is America. We are here for justice."
  • They transformed their bookstore into a safe space
  • Schwesnedl hung an "Abolish the Police" sign in a window and refused to allow officers to use their Parking lot and outdoor sPace as a staging ground.
  • The couple transformed their space into a "harm free zone," where people set up medic stations for injured protesters to wash out tear gas and clean their wounds.
  • They're using their tattoo parlor to inspire protesters
  • While Nijiya said they knew protesters could still damage their parlor, it did not change their stance on the protests.
lilyrashkind

Cleanup Begins After Tornado Outbreak Across the South | The Weather Channel - Articles from The Weather Channel | weather.com - 0 views

weather.com/...new-orleans-mississippi-storms

south weather us

shared by lilyrashkind on 25 Mar 22 - No Cached
  • A deadly tornado ripped through New Orleans.The twister was part of a severe weather outbreak across the South.Homes were ripped apart and cars flipped from Texas to Alabama.Damage assessments and surveys continued across the South Wednesday as residents began the long cleanup after homes were ripped apart, cars flipped over and at least two people killed in an outbreak of severe weather that included multiple tornadoes.
  • Authorities said the person killed Tuesday night in St. Bernard parish was Connor Lambert, 25, the Associated press reported.A neighbor told nola.com that Lambert had returned home in his truck just as the storm was starting to hit. After the tornado passed, the neighbor saw the destruction and ran over and started calling for Lambert.A news release from St. Bernard parish Sheriff James pohmann said Lambert died of "multiple blunt force injuries."
  • New Orleans Area Damage Consistent With At Least EF-3 Tornado, NWS SaysInitial surveys by the National Weather Service show the damage in Arabi was caused by at least an EF-3 tornado, which has winds between 158 mph and 206.
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  • The Federal Emergency Management Agency wants people in storm-affected areas to remember that generators can cause carbon monoxide poisoning or fires.Generators should never be operated inside or adjacent to a building, enclosed area or open windows.According to the Consumer product Safety Commission: "One generator produces as much CO as hundreds of cars. It can incapacitate and kill consumers within minutes."Six people in Louisiana died of carbon monoxide poisoning from generators in the days following Hurricane Ida in August, according to the state health department.
  • Girl in Wheelchair Rescued From 'Wizard of Oz' HouseOne of the seven people reported injured in Arabi, a community adjacent to New Orleans, was a girl in a wheelchair who was rescued from a house that the tornado lifted off its foundation and dropped in the middle of the road, nola.com reported.
  • How to Help Victims in LouisianaThe United Way of Southeast Louisiana is taking public donations for its Tornado Relief Fund, with all proceeds earmarked for immediate relief efforts and long-term rebuilding.“Nearly two thirds of households in the affected areas of St. Bernard and Orleans parishes don’t earn enough to save for disasters and many are still recovering from Hurricane Ida’s impacts,” Michael Williamson, UWSELA president and CEO, said in a news release. Cash donations as well as supplies including diapers, baby formula and toiletries are needed. Details on how to contribute can be found here.
  • Damage Reported in 12 Mississippi CountiesHomes were damaged in a dozen Mississippi counties as the storms moved through Tuesday, according to the state's emergency management agency. At least two people were injured – one in Holmes County, to the north of Jackson, and one to the south in Copiah County.The update said severe weather, tornadoes, hail, damaging winds and flash flooding all impacted parts of the state, with multiple reports of fallen trees across roads and power lines.
  • Power Outages Linger in Several AreasSome 14,000 homes and businesses are without Power in Louisiana and MississiPPi as of about 10:15 a.m. CDT, according to PowerOutage.us.Most of the Louisiana outages are in Orleans and St. Bernard Parishes. In MississiPPi, most of them are in the central Part of the state. More than 19,000 outages are being rePorted in Texas.
anonymous

Boulder Shooting: The Victims And Their Stories : NPR - 0 views

www.npr.org/...ictims-of-the-boulder-shooting

shared by anonymous on 24 Mar 21 - No Cached
  • A gunman shot and killed 10 people at a King Soopers grocery store in Boulder, Colo., on Monday afternoon.The victims ranged from age 20 to 65. Some of them were shopping at the store; some worked there. One was a police officer who arrived to help.
  • Boulder police Officer Eric Talley is being mourned as a brave officer as well as a husband, a brother and father to seven children.
  • Talley served a number of roles in his work for the police department and in support of the local community, Herold said. Talley reportedly held a master's degree in computer science, but he switched careers around age 40.
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  • In 2013, Talley and two other officers drew a crowd – and eventually, a round of applause – when they rescued ducklings that had been swept out of a creek and into a caged drainage ditch. It was Talley who waded into the water to coax the ducklings to a spot where his colleagues could scoop them up.
  • "I am heartbroken to announce that my Dad, my hero, Kevin Mahoney, was killed in the King Soopers shooting in my hometown of Boulder, CO," she wrote on Twitter. "I'm so thankful he could walk me down the aisle last summer."
  • Teri Leiker was a dedicated King Soopers employee who had worked at the store for more than 30 years, her friend Lexi Knutson wrote in an Instagram tribute, calling her "the most selfless, innocent, amazing person I have had the honor of meeting." Knutson said the two met in 2017 through the University of Colorado Boulder chapter of Best Buddies, a program that aims to create one-on-one friendships between students and members of the community with intellectual and developmental disabilities.
  • Rikki Olds worked as a front-end manager at the King Soopers grocery store, according to The Denver post. Her Facebook page identifies her as a graduate of Centaurus High School in Lafayette, Colo., and a student at Front Range Community College, which has multiple campuses in Colorado.
  • United Food and Commercial Workers, Local 7, which represents grocery store employees including those at King Soopers, confirmed that Olds was a worker at the store and a former union member. It also confirmed that "a few" of its members were working during the shooting, and, citing the ongoing investigation, said it would share more details as they become available.
  • Lynn Murray, a retired photo editor, was at the grocery store working as an Instacart shopper when she was killed.Before moving to Colorado, Murray lived in New York City and worked for magazines, including Glamour, Marie Claire and Cosmopolitan, according to The Denver post. She grew up in Mentor, Ohio, and attended Ohio University.
  • Tralona "Lonna" Bartkowiak was a founder with her sister of Umba, a clothing and art store in downtown Boulder.
  • Suzanne Fountain was an actress who had performed with the Denver Center for the performing Arts' theater company.
  • She was also a house manager at eTown Hall, a music venue and community center that produces a radio show.
  • Denny Stong's Facebook profile describes him as a resident of Boulder and an employee of King Soopers since 2018. "I can't stay home. I am a Grocery Store Worker," his profile picture says.A fundraiser for Stong's family said he was "a kind soul with a funny sense of humor and unique interests," and said that he had risked his life to protect others during the attack.
  • Jody Waters had an eye for style and design, which she channeled into a career in fashion. Her friend and business colleague Stephanie Boyle said Waters would help her set up booths at local events for her leather accessories business, and gave her advice on stores with which to collaborate.
Javier E

Trump Unites Left and Right Against Troop plans, but puts Off Debate on War Aims - The New York Times - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...yria-afghanistan-withdraw.html

trump foreign policy mideast

shared by Javier E on 29 Dec 18 - No Cached
  • Mr. Trump, he said, wanted to end these military campaigns so he could focus on the economic and geopolitical contest with China, which he views as America’s biggest foreign threat. “This is not about a return to isolationism,” Mr. Bannon said. “It’s the pivot away from the humanitarian expeditionary mentality of the internationalists.”
  • While Mr. Trump’s critics would shrink from that language, military analysts, former officials and diplomats acknowledge there is a case for withdrawing from both conflicts.Open-ended but limited troop deployments are not likely to alter the battlefield in either Afghanistan, where the Taliban now holds more ground than at any other time since 2001, or in Syria, where the Islamic State’s territorial grip has been broken and president Bashar al-Assad, with the help of Russia and Iran, has largely stymied the rebellion.
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  • The situation is even starker in Afghanistan. Last month, a year after Mr. Trump grudgingly authorized the deployment of nearly 4,000 troops, bringing the total number there to 14,000, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Joseph F. Dunford Jr., admitted that the Taliban “are not losing.”“If someone has a better idea than we have right now, which is to support the Afghans and put pressure on the terrorist groups in the region, I’m certainly open to dialogue on that,” General Dunford said at a panel sponsored by The Washington post earlier this month.
  • “Despite holding most of eastern Syria for two years, including the oil-fields, the U.S. and its Syrian allies have extracted exactly zero political concessions from Assad,” said Mr. Ford, who now teaches at Yale and is a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute. “Assad will wait us out.”
  • Announcing troop withdrawals will force the United States to rethink long-term military commitments that have little public support and are no longer effective. It could also force the Afghans and Syrians to confront their own deep-rooted problems, without the presence of foreign soldiers who often delay the day of reckoning.“I, for one, think the decision to withdraw is sound and wise,” said Robert S. Ford, the last American ambassador to Syria
  • During a meeting in the Situation Room in July 2017, when Mr. Mattis and other advisers were pitching their plan to deploy more troops, an angry Mr. Trump lashed out. “We’re losing,” he declared, according to a person in the room.
  • Those frustrations are widely held by NATO allies who have been America’s partners in Afghanistan.“It’s been getting increasingly harder to explain to European publics why we need to stay there,” said Tomas Valasek, a former NATO ambassador from Slovakia who is the director of Carnegie Europe. “perhaps Trump’s tendency to disrupt things, including by withdrawing from Afghanistan, may not be such a bad idea after all.”
  • .Afghanistan’s leaders, mired in political infighting and corruption, need to see the partial pullout as a sign that they don’t have much time, he said.But that is not without risk, Mr. Mir warned, because if the Taliban returned, it would haunt the Americans “that they were defeated by a ragtag force after 17 years of fighting them.”However precipitously Mr. Trump acted, he was channeling the same reservations that Mr. Obama had. Both presidents questioned the open-ended nature of these campaigns, pressed their advisers to define success, and faced the problem of “mission creep.” Mr. Trump’s national security adviser, John R. Bolton, recently vowed that the United States would not leave Syria as long as Iran, or its proxies, were active there.“Suggesting they stay until Iranian influence was gone was an unachievable goal and a recipe for potential escalation for a deployment that the Trump people have never been particularly transparent about,” said Benjamin J. Rhodes, a former deputy national security adviser to Mr. Obama.Expanding the mission to resisting Iran, he pointed out, also “has no distinct congressional authorization.”
  • Mr. Rhodes said he supported the withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan and Syria. But like many former officials, from Democratic and Republican administrations, he harshly criticized how Mr. Trump made the decision, without consulting allies or Congress, or even warning his generals
  • Even the president’s supporters did not defend him. James Jay Carafano, a national security expert at the Heritage Foundation who worked on Mr. Trump’s transition, said he gave the president credit for not just accepting the status quo.But he added, “It’s not really clear what the plan is in Syria. It’s not clear how we protect our interests after we leave, and it’s not clear how it fits into our regional strategy.”
krystalxu

Chess in a black box: China's five most powerful people - CNN - 0 views

www.cnn.com/...index.html

politics US crisis policy China Communism National Congress Congress

shared by krystalxu on 10 Oct 17 - No Cached
  • The country is ruled by the Chinese Communist Party, in a one-Party system, making whoever occuPies the highest Positions in the Party among the most Powerful.
  • Power isn't just held by the Politicians either -- influential businessmen and entrePreneurs, the Pioneers of China's economic rise, are also fighting for a seat at the table.
  • the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party on October 18,
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  • Tencent's app, WeChat, is currently the largest and most commonly used messaging system in the world, with almost 1 billion users.
  • "He's regarded as being a sort of low-profile, not particularly interlinked or interconnected premier. He's got probably the worst job in China.
  • it's not a sort of political power. It's administrative power," he said.
  • "Power is about initiating, setting frameworks, setting the agenda. Well you can see PeoPle doing that, but Li Keqiang is more of an administrator."
  • The company's founder, Ma Huateng, is China's third richest man, according to Forbes, just behind Jack Ma and Dalian Wanda founder Wang Jianlin.
  • Ma, who is also known by his nickname "Pony," founded Tencent, the comPany which owns WeChat, in 1998 with his university classmates.
  • , Premier Li is number two in China's Power structure, but his influence is far from assured.
  • It is those restrictions which make working in the world of China's internet so complex and potentially dangerous.
  • China's Great Firewall is rising higher than ever
  • "One challenge for tech titans like Ma in the coming years is whether they can keep on the good side of the authorities
  • Since then, Wang has grown to be a powerful, feared figure among Chinese officials.
  • Jack Ma is without a doubt one of China's most powerful people and possibly the country's most public face internationally next to president Xi.
  • As a result of Xi and Wang's crackdown, conspicuous spending and flaunting of wealth by officials has shrunk dramatically and as a result, Wang's political capital has continued to rise.
  • Wang's rise could be complicated by his age. He'll be 69 at the upcoming 19th party Congress, meaning by custom he should retire.
  • he's the flamboyant and personable former English teacher who likes to dance to Michael Jackson tunes.
  • "He's been an essential lieutenant for Xi ... the president would be a weakened force without him at the top table," he said, placing Wang second
  • Ma, whose Chinese name is Ma Yun, is the executive chairman and founder of Alibaba,
  • Ma's peer on the China rich list, has had to abandon a series of major international deals after coming under scrutiny from Beijing.
  • Most people can't see the day after tomorrow."
  • China's president and, more importantly, the general secretary of the Chinese Communist party, analysts say Xi is already the country's most powerful leader since paramount Leader Deng Xiaoping
  • Xi's power is only set to grow.
  • far more than his predecessors,
  • most recently Chen Min'er who was promoted as party secretary of Chongqing.
  • Guo Wengui, the US-based businessman and perennial thorn in the side of the Chinese Communist party.
  • and the chess game itself goes on inside a highly impenetrable black box," he said.
anonymous

Polar oPPosites TrumP and Mueller barrel toward a showdown - CNNPolitics - 0 views

www.cnn.com/...index.html

US trump crisis culture policy politics

shared by anonymous on 30 May 18 - No Cached
  • President Donald TrumP and Robert Mueller may be contemPoraries but are temPeramental oPPosites, divided most deePly by their resPective contemPt and reverence for the institutions of US government.
  • The raging, conspiratorial attacks on Twitter escalated a strategy orchestrated by Trump and polemicist allies in conservative media to discredit Mueller's eventual findings, to taint his probe as a Democratic plot and to unite Republican voters behind the president to secure his hold on office.
  • Mueller may be unique in this riotous political era. Most people identified by Trump as enemies -- rival political candidates, Democratic congressional leaders or critics in the arts and the media -- feel they have no choice but to defend their reputations.
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  • Another possible reason for Trump's ire was revealed by The New York Times Tuesday in a report that said Mueller was looking into whether Trump's demands on Jeff Sessions in early 2017 to rescind his decision to recuse himself from the Russia investigation and subsequent pressure on the attorney general to resign played into the obstruction case.
  • A CNN/SSRS poll this month showed that 44% of voters approve of how Mueller is handling the investigation -- down four points from March. Only 17% of GOp voters approve of the special counsel now, down from 29% in March.
  • So Trump hopes to build a wall against impeachment -- by making it impossible for GOp lawmakers to defy the sentiments of their voters and by coalescing in any impeachment proceedings.
  • So it's no wonder the Trump attacks are fueling suspicions that the president does indeed have something to hide.
  • That suspicion also points to the great unknown of the entire showdown between the president and the special counsel.
brookegoodman

Did a New York Times article inspire Trump's 'back to work' plan? | US news | The Guardian - 0 views

www.theguardian.com/...oronavirus-back-to-work-column

crisis trump us politics

shared by brookegoodman on 27 Mar 20 - No Cached
  • At the start of this week, as millions were following US government advice to combat the coronavirus pandemic by physical distancing and staying indoors, Donald Trump abruptly declared that people needed to soon return to work.
  • The policy of returning to normal, nearly all epidemiologists warn, carries a threat of catastrophe: of allowing the virus to spread just as the measures proven to curb it are starting to work.
  • On Sunday, the Fox News host Steve Hilton railed against the idea of long-term social distancing. Hilton claimed “working Americans” will be “crushed” by an indefinite work shutdown. Hilton mused that there could be a situation where “the cure is worse than the disease”.
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  • The idea of sending people back to work and restarting the economy had been floating around last weekend, propagated by two opinion pieces in particular. One was written on Medium. Another, published two days before the Hilton show, was an opinion piece by David Katz, a former director of the Yale-Griffin prevention Research Center, which was published by the New York Times. Given the reach of the New York Times this piece, headlined Is Our Fight Against Coronavirus Worse Than the Disease?, attracted huge attention.
  • In time, people would develop immunity to the coronavirus, and in the meantime, damage to the economy would be minimized, Katz opined.
  • Katz’s piece was shared widely among conservatives, including by Fox News host and informal Trump adviser pete Hegseth. The article served as a handy tool for conservatives advancing the argument that the economy shouldn’t be sacrificed for coronavirus containment.
  • “Dr Katz’s efforts on behalf of public health during this pandemic are uncompensated and born from a sense of duty and commitment to public health,” a spokeswoman for Katz told the Guardian. She pointed to a post Katz wrote on LinkedIn following the criticism, where he stresses how damage to the economy is also a massive public health issue.
  • He said: “The other thing is, low risk doesn’t mean no risk. We don’t know the natural history of the disease well enough to say: ‘Everybody under 65 is A-OK and ready to go back to work.’”
  • The concept of trading off self-isolation for returning to normal to help the economy has also been pushed by Trump’s cabinet including, his economic adviser Larry Kudlow, who on Tuesday told reporters: “public health includes economic health.”
brickol

Stimulus checks: Senate deal includes individual payments -- but don't expect the money until at least May - CNNpolitics - 0 views

www.cnn.com/...index.html

politics us economics COVID-19

shared by brickol on 25 Mar 20 - No Cached
  • Washington (CNN)Lawmakers struck a $2 trillion stimulus deal early Wednesday that includes sending checks directly to individuals amid the coronavirus crisis -- but it will likely take until at least May before the money goes out.Under the plan as it was being negotiated, single Americans would receive $1,200, married couples would get $2,400, and parents would see $500 for each child under age 17.However, the payments would start to phase out for individuals with adjusted gross incomes of more than $75,000, and those making more than $99,000 would not qualify at all. The thresholds are doubled for couples.About 90% of Americans would be eligible to receive full or partial payments, according to estimates by the Tax policy Center. Lawmakers set aside $250 billion for the so-called recovery rebates.
  • There are provisions in the bill to include those who don't earn enough to file returns, but some people may be missed, said Howard Gleckman, a senior fellow at the center.Under the legislation being negotiated, lower- and middle-income Americans would receive just over two-thirds of the benefits, Gleckman said. An earlier version of the bill would have given lower-income households less or no assistance.
  • The Internal Revenue Service has sent out economic stimulus checks before, and although those plans were slightly different, they can offer some insight into how long the process might take."Certainly from what we've seen in the past, it's taken a pretty significant amount of time to get checks out after a policy is put in place," said Erica York, an economist at the Tax Foundation.In 2001, it took six weeks for the IRS to start sending out rebate checks authorized by president George W. Bush's tax cut. Then in 2008, amid the Great Recession, it took three months for the checks to start going out after the law was signed by Bush. In that case, Americans were required to file their tax return first, in order to get the check. Once they filed their return, it took between eight and 12 weeks to see the money.
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  • It's likely that Americans would receive the stimulus payments faster this time around because more of them file electronically and provide the IRS with their bank information, Gleckman said. Some 88% of individual returns were filed electronically in 2018, compared to 58% in 2008.But there are other factors that may slow the process. Even absent the coronavirus challenges, the agency is working with a smaller budget and less staff than it had in 2010. Now, because of the coronavirus, the agency has shut down its in-person taxpayer assistance centers located across the country at a time when people are sure to have questions about the emergency checks and other changes. Treasury announced last week that it is pushing back the tax return deadline to July 15. Additionally, Congress created a new tax credit designed to refund businesses that are offering their employees coronavirus-related paid leave.
  • First, the IRS will have to calculate each person's payment amount. Then, it will need the correct direct deposit information or mailing addresses. To get the money to people who don't usually file tax returns, it might have to request that information from the Social Security Administration or Veterans Affairs. In 2008, those people were required to file a return anyway in order to get their rebate.Meanwhile, the IRS will inevitably be fielding calls from Americans concerned about when their check will arrive and whether they took all the necessary steps to receive the money.
  • Later in 2008, after the economic stimulus checks were sent out, Olson testified before Congress, telling lawmakers that they should fund a new unit within the agency that would be dedicated to facilitating new and emergency initiatives. She argued that it would free up other employees to focus on improving the existing systems and executing the day-to-day work of the agency -- but that never happened.
anonymous

Microsoft email server hacks put Biden in a bind - 0 views

www.bbc.com/...technology-56325784

cyberattack biden

shared by anonymous on 09 Mar 21 - No Cached
  • The scale of a hack on Microsoft Exchange is beginning to emerge, with tens of thousands of organisations potentially compromised.The attack used previously unknown flaws in the email software - and sometimes stolen passwords - to steal data from targets' networks.Microsoft says the attackers are "state-sponsored and operating out of China".
  • the two attacks put the new Biden administration under pressure to respond.And weary cyber-defenders say events are not just escalating but spiralling out of control.
  • rhetoric about cyber-campaigns is escalating, heightening pressure for tough action.Although, it is unclear what effective options the president has.And there are concerns his administration has boxed itself in with tough talk when it is unclear if it can actually deter adversaries.
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  • The US military's Cyber Command has pursued a strategy in recent years of "defend forward" and "persistent engagement". This means hacking into adversary systems to find out what they are doing - and stopping operations against the US before they are unleased.
  • This contesting of cyber-space was seen by many as long overdue. But Russia and China appear undeterred. One option now might be to hit back harder. But escalation carries its own risks.
  • The US had considered espionage - stealing information - acceptable, because it practised it extensively, as whistleblower Edward Snowden revealed in 2013. The problem for Washington is recent breaches may fit into the same category.That leaves the US in a bind.
  • US says destructive cyber-attacks are unacceptable but was the first to cross that line a decade ago when it used the Stuxnet attack to destroy parts of the Iran nuclear system.
carolinehayter

Messenger RNA vaccines: Now proven against coronavirus, the technology can do so much more - CNN - 0 views

www.cnn.com/...index.html

Pandemic

shared by carolinehayter on 01 Jun 21 - No Cached
  • This astonishing efficacy has held up in real-world studies in the US, Israel and elsewhere. The mRNA technology -- developed for its speed and flexibility as opposed to expectations it would provide strong protection against an infectious disease -- has pleased and astonished even those who already advocated for it.
  • it's a technology that researchers had been betting on for decades. Now those bets are paying off, and not just by turning back a pandemic that killed millions in just a year.
  • showing promise against old enemies such as HIV, and infections that threaten babies and young children, such as respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) and metapneumovirus. It's being tested as a treatment for cancers, including melanoma and brain tumors. It might offer a new way to treat autoimmune diseases. And it's also being checked out as a possible alternative to gene therapy for intractable conditions such as sickle cell disease.
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  • "If you want to make a new influenza vaccine using the traditional methods, you have to isolate the virus, learn how to grow it, learn how to inactivate it, and purify it. That takes months. With RNA, you only need the sequence,"
  • "When the Chinese released the sequence of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, we started the process of making RNA the next day. A couple weeks later, we were injecting animals with the vaccine."
  • Weissman's lab is now working on a universal coronavirus vaccine that would protect against Covid-19, SARS, MERS, coronavirus that cause the common cold -- and future strains.
  • "We started working on a pan-coronavirus vaccine last spring," Weissman said. "There have been three coronavirus epidemics in the past 20 years. There are going to be more."
  • The mRNA approach promises to send instructions for making the healthy version of a protein, and Weissman sees special promise in treating sickle cell disease, in particular.
  • Different tumor cell types have various, recognizable structures on the outside that the immune system can recognize. "You can imagine being able to inject someone with an mRNA that encodes an antibody that specifically targets that receptor," McLellan said.
  • "We identify mutations found on a patient's cancer cells," the company says on its website. Computer algorithms predict the 20 most common mutations. "We then create a vaccine that encodes for each of these mutations and load them onto a single mRNA molecule," Moderna says.
  • BioNtech has been working with academic researchers to use mRNA to treat mice genetically engineered to develop a disease similar to multiple sclerosis -- an autoimmune disease that starts when the immune system mistakenly attacks the myelin, a fatty covering of the nerve cells.In the mice, the treatment appeared to help stop the attack, while keeping the rest of the immune system intact.
  • The idea behind gene therapy is to replace a defective gene with one that works properly.
  • Another obvious use for mRNA technology is to fight cancer. The human body fights off cancer every day, and using mRNA could help it do so even better.
  • "It's gene therapy without the half a million dollar price tag," he added. "It should be just an IV injection and that's it."
  • "The idea there is if you are immune to tick saliva proteins, when the tick bites you, the body produces inflammation and the tick falls off," Weissman said.
saberal

Biden declares white supremacists 'most lethal threat' to US as he marks Tulsa race massacre - as it happened | US news | The Guardian - 0 views

www.theguardian.com/...race-massacre-us-politics-live

US politics

shared by saberal on 02 Jun 21 - No Cached
  • Joe Biden delivered remarks in Tulsa to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the city’s race massacre. The president emphasized the importance of acknowledging the lives and livelihoods lost in the massacre, which resulted in the death of at least 300 African Americans and the destruction of 35 blocks of Black real estate. “For much too long, the history of what took place here was told in silence, cloaked in darkness,” Biden said. “My fellow Americans, this was not a riot, this was a massacre.”
  • The administration formally ended the Trump-era “remain in Mexico” policy that forced thousands of asylum seekers from Central America to wait in Mexico while the US to process their cases. The program w as paused in January. In a memo sent to agency leaders today, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said the policy did not “adequately or sustainably enhance border management.”
  • Human rights groups are calling on the Biden administration and US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) to put an end to a digital surveillance program that keeps tabs on nearly 100,000 immigrants.
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  • The “alternatives to detention” program tracks 96,574 individuals, but the Biden administration’s 2022 budget request calls to increase that number by approximately 45,000 to 140,000.
  • Biden met with the three living survivors of the massacre before delivering his speech. All three survivors – Viola “Mother” Fletcher, Hughes “Uncle Red” Van Ellis and Lessie “Mother Randle” Benningfield Randle – are over 100 years old. Biden acknowledged them in his remarks, saying, “Now your story will be known in full view.”
  • Harris could do to change these realities. Having served in the Senate for four years, she has some ties in the chamber. But Biden, who served in the chamber for nine times has long, is thought to have much deeper relationships with Senators – and has been unable to win them over.
  • “Well, [massacre survivor] Mother Fletcher said that when she saw the insurrection at the Capitol on January 6, it broke her heart,” he continued: “A mob of violent white extremists, thugs, said it reminded her of what happened here, 100 years ago, in Greenwood. Look around at the various hate crimes against Asian Americans and Jewish Americans, hate that never goes away.”
  • Under Biden’s proposal, multinational corporations would be prevented from shifting profits across borders to exploit the most attractive low-tax locations as their profits would be taxed at a minimum global corporation tax rate either where they are booked or headquartered.
  • Biden also appeared to criticize two moderate Senate Democrats, Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema, referencing “two members of the Senate who vote more with my Republican friends”. Manchin has said he opposes the For the people Act.
  • Joe Biden noted that he is the first US president to ever visit Tulsa to commemorate the anniversary of the 1921 race massacre that killed at least three hundred African Americans.
  • Joe Biden is now meeting with the three living survivors of the Tulsa race massacre, according to the latest White House pool report.
anonymous

2020 lightning and tornado numbers were down -- but not tornado fatalities - CNN - 0 views

www.cnn.com/...index.html

shared by anonymous on 16 Jan 21 - No Cached
  • There was some good news to come out of 2020: fewer tornadoes and fewer lightning strikes across the United States. But sadly, fewer tornadoes did not mean fewer fatalities -- a stark reminder that the timing and location of such storms can be critical.With a preliminary tally of 1,053, 2020 saw the lowest annual number of tornadoes since 2015, when 971 were recorded,
  • Still, tornadoes last year killed 78 people, the highest count since 2011, when a super outbreak in late April led to 553 deaths.
  • Similarly, two events in 2020 contributed to the majority of last year's fatalities. In the first -- March 2 into 3 -- 10 tornadoes rolled through Tennessee, including Nashville, killing 24 people.
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  • The following month ended up being the second-most active April on record for tornadoes, behind only 2011 for total number. Every day in April but one -- April 5 -- saw at least a Marginal Risk (level 1 of 5) for severe storms somewhere across the contiguous US,
  • 2020's second significant outbreak -- on April 12 and 13 -- produced more than 140 tornadoes. It was also the deadliest tornado outbreak in six years, with 32 fatalities
  • "Tornadoes are the same way. Some of the strongest tornadoes every year occur in rural parts of the country, so damage can be limited, but if a tornado, even a weaker one, strikes a major metro area, damage and fatalities can be extensive,"
  • There were 14 killer tornadoes in April 2020. Then, into May 2020, a shift in the weather pattern began to favor development of strong troughs in the eastern US.
  • Another potentially deadly weather phenomenon -- lightning strikes -- also saw tallies drop in 2020. There were about 170 million lightning events last year across the continental US, down about 52 million from 2019,
  • Unsurprisingly, Texas ranks No. 1 in total lightning strikes, due in part to its huge land area, Vaisala reports. By square kilometer, though, Florida tops the list, with Texas sixth. Iowa, Montana, New Mexico, and Wyoming all saw far fewer lightning strikes in 2020.
  • Sometimes a single event can account for a large number of lightning strikes. An example is the Midwestern derecho event last summer. It spawned 8% of all Iowa lightning strikes in 2020, with over 27,000 cloud-to-ground strikes. Despite this, Iowa -- which based off the average from 2010-2019 places 13th for most strikes -- actually dropped to the No. 22 spot last year.Other states saw big increases in lightning strikes in 2020. Georgia jumped four spots, cracking the Top 10 for only the third time. Ohio, Michigan and North Dakota also notched more lightning strikes last year, with over 2 million cloud-to-ground strikes each.
  • Preliminary numbers show lightning killed 17 PeoPle across the US in 2020, the second-lowest total since 2010, according to the National Weather Service.
  • Lightning in some Western states can be especially concerning in the summer months due to the potential for sparking wildfires. But not all lightning is created equal.
  • And lightning frequency isn't the only consideration for fire weather.
  • Oftentimes as thunderstorms develop out West, the surrounding air is so dry that any rain that falls actually gets evaporated before it reaches the ground, a phenomena called "virga." Lightning can still occur within these storms, which don't have the benefit of moisture to extinguish any fires a strike might set.
brookegoodman

Trump claims Suleimani was 'saying bad things' about US before deadly strike | US news | The Guardian - 0 views

www.theguardian.com/...mp-suleimani-iran-drone-strike

trump politics

shared by brookegoodman on 19 Jan 20 - No Cached
  • Addressing Republican donors at his Florida resort on Friday night, Donald Trump said Qassem Suleimani was “saying bad things about our country” before the US president authorised the drone strike which killed the Iranian general and pitched the Middle East to the brink of war.
  • The speech was not open to reporters but CNN obtained a recording of Trump’s remarks at Mar-a-Lago, which it said undermined official explanations for the decision to kill Suleimani at Baghdad airport on 3 January.
  • Congress was not informed of the strike in advance, its eventual notification was heavily classified and a congressional briefing prompted bipartisan protest. Democrats have proposed legislation to rein the president in.
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  • Iran has also admitted shooting down a Ukrainian passenger jet in error, killing 176 people. Amid anti-regime protests in Tehran, the threat of a US-Iran war has receded.
  • “They’re together sir,” Trump said he was told. “Sir, they have two minutes and 11 seconds. No emotion. ‘Two minutes and 11 seconds to live, sir. They’re in the car, they’re in an armoured vehicle. Sir, they have approximately one minute to live, sir. Thirty seconds. Ten, nine, eight ...’
  • According to CNN, Trump told his audience in Florida the death of al-Muhandis meant the US took out “two for the price of one”. He also repeated an erroneous claim that the Iraqi was “the head of Hezbollah”. Hezbollah is an Iranian-backed militant group based in Lebanon.
  • CNN said the audio of Friday’s speech also included a complaint that Conan, a Belgian Malinois dog wounded in the Baghdadi raid, “became very famous” and “got more credit than I did”.
  • ...we’re asking readers, like you, to make a contribution in support of the Guardian’s open, independent journalism. This has been a turbulent decade across the world – protest, populism, mass migration and the escalating climate crisis. The Guardian has been in every corner of the globe, reporting with tenacity, rigour and authority on the most critical events of our lifetimes. At a time when factual information is both scarcer and more essential than ever, we believe that each of us deserves access to accurate reporting with integrity at its heart.
  • We have upheld our editorial independence in the face of the disintegration of traditional media – with social platforms giving rise to misinformation, the seemingly unstoppable rise of big tech and independent voices being squashed by commercial ownership. The Guardian’s independence means we can set our own agenda and voice our own opinions. Our journalism is free from commercial and political bias – never influenced by billionaire owners or shareholders. This makes us different. It means we can challenge the powerful without fear and give a voice to those less heard.
brookegoodman

Battle of Waterloo - HISTORY - 0 views

www.history.com/...battle-of-waterloo

history

shared by brookegoodman on 19 Jan 20 - No Cached
  • The Battle of Waterloo, which took place in Belgium on June 18, 1815, marked the final defeat of Napoleon Bonaparte, who conquered much of Europe in the early 19th century. Napoleon rose through the ranks of the French army during the French Revolution, seized control of the French government in 1799 and became emperor in 1804. Through a series of wars, he expanded his empire across western and central Europe. The Battle of Waterloo, in which Napoleon’s forces were defeated by the British and prussians, marked the end of his reign and of France’s domination in Europe.
  • After seizing political power in France in a 1799 coup d’état, he was given the title of first consul and became France’s leading political figure.
  • In 1812, Napoleon led a disastrous invasion of Russia in which his army was forced to retreat and suffered massive casualties. At the same time, the Spanish and portuguese, with assistance from the British, drove Napoleon’s forces from the Iberian peninsula in the peninsular War (1808-1814).
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  • On April 6, 1814, Napoleon, then in his mid-40s, was forced to abdicate the throne. With the Treaty of Fontainebleau, he was exiled to Elba, a Mediterranean island off the coast of Italy.
  • The new king, Louis XVIII, fled, and Napoleon embarked on what came to be known as his Hundred Days campaign.
  • Upon Napoleon’s return to France, a coalition of allies—the Austrians, British, prussians and Russians—who considered the French emperor an enemy began to prepare for war. Napoleon raised a new army and planned to strike preemptively, defeating the allied forces one by one before they could launch a united attack against him.
  • Two days later, on June 18, Napoleon led his army of some 72,000 troops against the 68,000-man British army, which had taken up a position south of Brussels near the village of Waterloo.
  • Although Napoleon’s troops mounted a strong attack against the British, the arrival of the prussians turned the tide against the French. The French emperor’s outnumbered army retreated in chaos.
  • Ultimately, the Battle of Waterloo marked the end of Napoleon’s storied military career. He reportedly rode away from the battle in tears.
  • Did you know? Today, the expression that someone has “met his Waterloo” means the person has suffered a decisive or final defeat or setback.
  • On June 22, 1815, Napoleon once again abdicated. That October, he was exiled to the remote, British-held island of Saint Helena, in the South Atlantic Ocean. He died there on May 5, 1821, at age 51, most likely from stomach cancer.
brookegoodman

Vladimir Lenin - Biography, policies & Tomb - HISTORY - 0 views

www.history.com/...vladimir-lenin

politics

shared by brookegoodman on 31 May 20 - No Cached
  • Vladimir Lenin (1870-1924) was a Russian communist revolutionary and head of the Bolshevik Party who rose to Prominence during the Russian Revolution of 1917, one of the most exPlosive Political events of the twentieth century. The bloody uPheaval marked the end of the oPPressive Romanov dynasty and centuries of imPerial rule in Russia. The Bolsheviks would later become the Communist Party, making Lenin leader of the Soviet Union, the world’s first communist state. &amP;nbsP;
  • Later that year, 17-year-old Lenin—still known as Vladimir Ilich Ulyanov—was expelled from Kazan Imperial University, where he was studying law, for taking part in an illegal student protest. After his expulsion, Lenin immersed himself in radical political literature, including the writings of German philosopher and socialist Karl Marx, author of Das Kapital.
  • Lenin later moved to Germany and then Switzerland, where he met other European Marxists. During this time, he adopted the pseudonym Lenin and established the Bolshevik party.
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  • Lenin advocated for Russian defeat in World War I, arguing that it would hasten the political revolution he desired. It was during this time that he wrote and published Imperialism, The Highest Stage of Capitalism (1916) in which he argued that war was the natural result of international capitalism.
  • When Lenin returned home to Russia in April 1917, the Russian Revolution was already beginning. Strikes over food shortages in March had forced the abdication of the inept Czar Nicholas II, ending centuries of imperial rule.
  • Lenin, aware of the leadership vacuum plaguing Russia, decided to seize power. He secretly organized factory workers, peasants, soldiers and sailors into Red Guards—a volunteer paramilitary force. On November 7 and 8, 1917, Red Guards captured provisional Government buildings in a bloodless coup d’état.
  • The Bolshevik Revolution plunged Russia into a three-year civil war. The Red Army—backed by Lenin’s newly formed Russian Communist party—fought the White Army, a loose coalition of monarchists, capitalists and supporters of democratic socialism.
  • As the economy deteriorated during the Russian Civil War, Lenin used the Cheka to silence political opposition, both from his opponents and challengers within his own political party.
  • After the assassination attempt, the Cheka instituted a period known as the Red Terror, a campaign of mass executions against supporters of the czarist regime, Russia’s upper classes and any socialists who weren’t loyal to Lenin’s Communist party.
  • About a million people braved the cold Russian winter to stand in line for hours before paying their respects to Lenin, who was lying in state at the House of Trade Unions in Moscow.
anonymous

Form of quinine pushed to fight covid-19 - The Washington post - 0 views

www.washingtonpost.com/...ng-similar-drug-fight-covid-19

history US trump

shared by anonymous on 21 May 20 - No Cached
  • On May 11, 1838, the Vicksburg Register in Mississippi carried an ad for a miracle drug to fight a disease ravaging the country. The potion worked safely without purging the bowels or upsetting the stomach. And it would break a fever within 48 hours.
  • Once known as the Jesuits’ Powder, and the “English remedy” after its early Promoters, the drug’s key ingredient was quinine.Now President TrumP is Promoting a synthetic form of quinine — hydroxychloroquine — as a treatment for covid-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus.
  • The drug still is used to combat malaria and has been found to work on other ailments. But there’s scant evidence it can fight covid-19.
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  • It also was used by Nazi doctors in human malaria experiments in the Dachau concentration camp during World War II.German scientist Claus Schilling, an expert in tropical diseases, infected hundreds of patients with malaria by exposing them to parasite-carrying mosquitoes.He then treated them with quinine and other drugs to see how they reacted.“Thirty or forty died from the malaria itself,” Franz Blaha, a physician and Czech inmate at Dachau, testified after the war. “Three hundred to four hundred died later … because of the physical condition resulting from the malaria attacks. In addition there were deaths resulting from poisoning due to overdoses.”
  • At that time, malaria was mostly treated with the quinine-like synthetic Atabrine, a medicine designed by German chemists in the early 1930s.
  • But Atabrine, like quinine, had side effects, including gastritis, hallucinations and psychosis, Masterson wrote. plus, it turned the skin of GIs and Marines yellow.“The most hair-raising [side effects] were rashes that … progressed grotesquely, with skin falling off in sheets, creating open sores that attracted flies,” Masterson wrote. Other side effects included “erratic mood swings, violent anger, and deep depression …[along with] the standard diarrhea, vomiting, and cramps.”Then came the rumor the drug caused impotence.During the fight for the pacific island of Guadalcanal, Marines rejected Atabrine. Their officers had to watch them take the pills and make sure the pills were swallowed. But the Marines would later spit them out.Thousands got sick. “For every battle casualty, ten men lay sick with malaria,” Masterson wrote.
  • Other bizarre remedies hadn’t worked, Duran-Reynals, the quinine historian, reported.One ancient cure went: “Take the urine of the patient and mix it with some flour to make … seventy-seven small cakes … proceed before sunrise to an anthill and throw the cakes therein. As soon as the insects have devoured the cakes the fever vanishes.”
  • “A tree grows which they call ‘the fever tree’ … whose bark, of the color of cinnamon, made into powder … and given as a beverage, cures the fevers … it has produced miraculous results,” he reported.“Thus … did Father Calancha announce to the world that a cure had been found for the most widespread disease of the time,” Duran-Reynals wrote.
  • In the 1670s, despite the hidebound medical establishment, a young English pharmacist, Robert Talbor, became an expert in treating fevers. He had moved to the southeast coast of England, where fevers were “epidemical."By trial and error, he came up with a secret formula — “my particular … medicine,” he called it. He would reveal only that it was “a preparation of four vegetables,” and he warned people about using the “Jesuits’ powder.”
  • The whole virtue of the pills consisted in the quinine alone.
cartergramiak

8 Million Have Slipped Into poverty Since May as Federal Aid Has Dried Up - The New York Times - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...ederal-aid-poverty-levels.html

pandemic economics trump US

shared by cartergramiak on 15 Oct 20 - No Cached
  • WASHINGTON — After an ambitious expansion of the safety net in the spring saved millions of people from poverty, the aid is now largely exhausted and poverty has returned to levels higher than before the coronavirus crisis, two new studies have found.
  • The number of poor people has grown by eight million since May, according to researchers at Columbia University, after falling by four million at the pandemic’s start as a result of a $2 trillion emergency package known as the Cares Act.
  • The Cares Act included one-time payments for most households — $1,200 per adult and $500 per child — and a huge expansion of unemployment insurance.
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  • Now living on $350 a week plus food stamps, Ms. Jeffcoat and her husband have gone without electricity because they cannot afford generator fuel (their house is off the power grid) and have spent weeks without propane for cooking and hot showers. “We stick with cold meals — cereals,” she said.
  • “There’s just lots of opportunity that’s not being accessed — we’ve got to get people back to work,” said Jason Turner, who runs the Secretaries’ Innovation Group, which advises conservative state officials on aid policies. “I’m not as alarmed about poverty as I am about unemployment. poverty is an arbitrary income threshold, and people who dip below it, they make adjustments. If you’re not working at all, that’s a huge deal. physical and mental health declines, substance abuse goes up.”
  • “I’ve definitely found myself feeling a little more anxious — snappier with the children,” Ms. Jeffcoat said.
  • But some opponents of further assistance argue it has discouraged people from working.
  • Among individuals eligible for stimulus checks, about 30 percent failed to receive them, the Columbia researchers estimate. While most families received them automatically, those too poor to have filed tax returns had to apply.
  • Both studies showed poverty started to rise before the unemployment bonus expired in July, suggesting the stimulus checks, which arrived earlier, played an important role.
  • Still, the stories they tell are consistent. “The Cares Act was very successful,” Mr. Wimer said. “But one of its shortcomings was its temporary nature.”
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E.P.A. Broke Law With Social Media Push for Water Rule, Auditor Finds - The New York Times - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...-water-rule-auditor-finds.html

water social media push law rule lobbying auditor new york times epa clean obama politics US

shared by katyshannon on 15 Dec 15 - No Cached
  • WASHINGTON — The Environmental Protection Agency engaged in “covert ProPaganda” and violated federal law when it blitzed social media to urge the Public to back an Obama administration rule intended to better Protect the nation’s streams and surface waters, congressional auditors have concluded. From Our Advertisers .story-link { Position: relative; disPlay: block; text-decoration: none; Padding: 6Px 0; min-height: 65Px; min-width: 300Px; } .story-link:hover { background-color: #eeeeec; } .story-kicker, .story-heading, .summary { margin: 0; Padding: 0; } .thumb { Position: absolute; left: 0; toP: 6Px; } .thumb-hover, .story-link:hover .thumb-main { disPlay: none } .thumb-main, .story-link:hover .thumb-hover { disPlay: block } .story-body { Padding-left: 75Px; font-family: 'Source Sans Pro', sans-serif; font-size: 13Px; line-height: 16Px; font-weight: 400; color: #000; } .story-body .story-kicker { font-family: 'nyt-franklin', arial, helvetica, sans-serif; text-transform: uPPercase; font-size: 11Px; line-height: 11Px; font-weight: 400; color: #5caaf3; } .story-heading { font-size: 13Px; line-height: 16Px; font-weight: 700; Padding: 5Px 0 0; } Bill &amP;amP; Melinda Gates Foundation Changing Charity Younger donors are finding new ways to give. <noscriPt class=&amP;quot;MOAT-nytdfP348531439194?moatClientLevel1=31074278&amP;amP;amP;moatClientLevel2=343740158&amP;amP;amP;moatClientLevel3=58584518&amP;amP;amP;moatClientLevel4=94015704638&amP;amP;amP;moatClientSlicer1=28390358&amP;amP;amP;moatClientSlicer2=30706478&amP;amP;amP;zMoatPR=n
  • The ruling by the Government Accountability Office, which opened its investigation after a report on the agency’s practices in The New York Times, drew a bright line for federal agencies experimenting with social media about the perils of going too far to push a cause. Federal laws prohibit agencies from engaging in lobbying and propaganda.
  • An E.P.A. official on Tuesday disPuted the finding. “We use social media tools just like all organizations to stay connected and inform PeoPle across the country about our activities,” Liz Purchia, an agency sPokeswoman, said in a statement. “At no Point did the E.P.A. encourage the Public to contact Congress or any state legislature.”
  • ...7 more annotations...
  • But the legal opinion emerged just as Republican leaders moved to block the so-called Waters of the United States clean-water rule through an amendment to the enormous spending bill expected to pass in Congress this week. While the G.A.O.’s findings are unlikely to lead to civil or criminal penalties, they do offer Republicans a cudgel for this week’s showdown.
  • The E.P.A. rolled out a social media camPaign on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and even on more innovative tools such as ThunderclaP, to counter oPPosition to its water rule, which effectively restricts how land near certain surface waters can be used. The agency said the rule would Prevent Pollution in drinking water sources. Farmers, business grouPs and RePublicans have called the rule a flagrant case of government overreach.
  • The publicity campaign was part of a broader effort by the Obama administration to counter critics of its policies through social media tools, communicating directly with Americans and bypassing traditional news organizations.
  • At the White House, top aides to president Obama have formed the Office of Digital Strategy, which promotes his agenda on Twitter, Facebook, Medium and other social sites. Shailagh Murray, a senior adviser to the president, is charged in part with expanding Mr. Obama’s presence in that online world.
  • White House officials declined to say if they think Mr. Reynolds or other agency officials did anything wrong.
  • Federal agencies are allowed to promote their own policies, but are not allowed to engage in propaganda, defined as covert activity intended to influence the American public. They also are not allowed to use federal resources to conduct so-called grass-roots lobbying — urging the American public to contact Congress to take a certain kind of action on pending legislation.
  • As it promoted the Waters of the United States rule, also known as the Clean Water Rule, the E.p.A. violated both of those prohibitions, a 26-page legal opinion signed by Susan A. poling, the general counsel to the G.A.O., concluded in an investigation requested by the Senate Committee on Environment and public Works.
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