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Information from some sites may not be reliable, or may not be vetted.
Some sources may require subscription.
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from Asia Times Online
An instance of such monumental patience is extremely rare, if not unprecedented, in Russian diplomacy: Moscow took 179 days to retaliate against former US President Barack Obama’s expulsion of 35 Russian diplomats on December 30, 2016, ostensibly to show rancour at alleged Russian efforts to interfere with the US presidential election. Putin preferred to start Russia’s discourse with the Trump administration on a creative note. Trump had raised high expectations in Moscow that a brave new world of partnership between Russia and the US might be approaching. Congress is reducing Trump to a subaltern role. Russia has no means to leverage influence in the US Congress.
Though it is one of Pyongyang’s last remaining fellow communist regimes, Vietnam may be of less help diffusing tensions than some would hope.
Russian sanctions could damage US and play havoc with European relations. Not the supposed protectionist Donald Trump, but the “free trade” wing of the Republican Party has taken the United States into a trade war that it can only lose. New sanctions against Russia passed by the House and Senate last week force Europe into a de facto alliance with Russia against the United States, and by extension with China as well. It is the dumbest and most self-destructive act of economic self-harm since the United States de-linked the dollar from gold on August 15, 1971, and it will have devastating consequences.
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from CNET
Defcon hackers find it’s very easy to break voting machines
Voting is at the foundation of every democracy. Hackers find it's on shaky ground thanks to shoddy technology. But opportunities to test how secure our voting machines are from hackers have been rare. Manufacturers like to keep the details of voting machines secret. And they don't often provide machines for people to test. That's why hackers swarmed to the Voter Hacking Village at Defcon in Las Vegas. The massive hacker convention is split into "villages" based on themes such as lock picking, encryption, social engineering and, for the first time, voter machine hacking.
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from FEE (Foundation for Economic Education)
[Information from this site may not be reliable.]
The More We Know, the Less We Know
The growth of human knowledge is a wonderful thing that can bring great happiness as it advances. We know more now than we did a hundred years ago, and this knowledge has allowed for countless improvements in the standard of living all over the world. But while everyone recognizes the benefits of knowledge, there are those who misinterpret our collective advancement as an invitation to exert control over society, and to impose a centralized structure onto the masses of people doing their own things, working, living, and pursuing happiness in their own ways.
Intelligence and Wisdom Are Not the Same
Intelligence, many are led to believe, is a resource which must be exploited by acquiring advanced degrees at prestigious universities followed by lucrative careers. The jobs and the income are, of course, only enigmatic predictions of what lay ahead for the college graduate, especially for one with a degree in the humanities.
Parental Paranoia Is Bad for Both Children and Parents
In the latest sign that America has gone stark-raving nuts at the expense of its parents and children, the Rochester, New York Democrat & Chronicle reports that a “mother faces child endangerment charges for letting her 10-year-old hang out in a Lego Store while she shopped elsewhere” in the same mall. These days, allowing a kid to leave the house alone if he or she isn’t old enough to drive is treated as a bad idea at best and, at worst, as criminal neglect. That kind of fear-mongering is bad for kids, bad for parents, and bad for society. Let’s stop encouraging, even demanding, parental paranoia.
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from The Guardian (UK)
[Information from this site may be unreliable.]
Amtrak's $630m Trump budget cut could derail service in 220 US cities
Long-distance services could be devastated by budget cuts, and the blow will be especially painful in rural areas that bought the president’s infrastructure pitch
Amtrak's $630m Trump budget cut could derail service in 220 US cities
Long-distance services could be devastated by budget cuts, and the blow will be especially painful in rural areas that bought the president’s infrastructure pitch
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from The Heritage Foundation
[Information from this site may be unreliable.]
Congress Needs to Go Right Back to Work on Health Care Reform
It is amazing that even the “skinny repeal” measure could not garner 50 Senate votes. That measure was in itself light years away from anything even remotely resembling a coherent and consequential health policy. It boggles the imagination: The Senate could not even muster support for the repeal of Obamacare’s profoundly unpopular individual and employer mandate penalties, a watered-down version of a state waiver program, and a medical device tax that previously secured strong bipartisan opposition. Note also that in the course of the Senate debate, senators junked serious provisions to reduce or eliminate Obamacare’s massive taxation, reform the Medicaid federal payment system (a reform, incidentally, initially proposed by the Clinton administration), or restore to the people of the states the freedom to decide the kind and degree of health insurance market regulation that would best comport with their needs to reduce health care costs and expand coverage. Meanwhile, Obamacare is wrecking the individual and small group markets. Americans in these health insurance markets are facing skyrocketing premiums and explosive deductibles. Reform of the huge, complex $3.2 trillion health care sector of the American economy is not going to be achieved in a single bill, or even a set of bills. It will be an ongoing process.
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Congress Needs to Go Right Back to Work on Health Care Reform
It is amazing that even the “skinny repeal” measure could not garner 50 Senate votes. That measure was in itself light years away from anything even remotely resembling a coherent and consequential health policy. It boggles the imagination: The Senate could not even muster support for the repeal of Obamacare’s profoundly unpopular individual and employer mandate penalties, a watered-down version of a state waiver program, and a medical device tax that previously secured strong bipartisan opposition. Note also that in the course of the Senate debate, senators junked serious provisions to reduce or eliminate Obamacare’s massive taxation, reform the Medicaid federal payment system (a reform, incidentally, initially proposed by the Clinton administration), or restore to the people of the states the freedom to decide the kind and degree of health insurance market regulation that would best comport with their needs to reduce health care costs and expand coverage. Meanwhile, Obamacare is wrecking the individual and small group markets. Americans in these health insurance markets are facing skyrocketing premiums and explosive deductibles. Reform of the huge, complex $3.2 trillion health care sector of the American economy is not going to be achieved in a single bill, or even a set of bills. It will be an ongoing process.
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from Reason Magazine
[Information from this site may not be reliable.]
What the Left Should Like about Public Choice
People are people whether they are acting in the marketplace or in the political arena. Lord Acton said, "Power tends to corrupt," but it also tends to attract the already corrupt. The left stands to gain by taking this insight seriously.
What the Left Should Like about Public Choice
People are people whether they are acting in the marketplace or in the political arena. Lord Acton said, "Power tends to corrupt," but it also tends to attract the already corrupt. The left stands to gain by taking this insight seriously.
from The Spokesman-Review
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from Sputnik
(Russian government-supported propaganda channel)
Venezuela will hold on Sunday an election of the members of the Constituent Assembly, a new 545-strong legislative body with the power to amend the constitution, despite the vote against the decision to hold such election in the opposition’s so-called popular referendum on July 16. Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro announced his decision to convene the National Constituent Assembly in a bid to amend the acting constitution in early May, claiming it would bring peace to the South American country. But his opponents feared it would allow him to bypass the opposition-controlled parliament and regarded the president's decision as an attempted coup.
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from The Telegraph (UK)
Why living in an old rectory remains the ultimate dream for house hunters
Few homes have been so romanticised as the rectory. Also known as the parsonage or the vicarage, the fine house in the village once lived in by the local clergyman has starred in many novels; estate agents selling such properties in the country might thank Jane Austen for their great fortune.
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