Friday, August 24, 2018

In the news, Saturday, August 4, 2018


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AUG 03      INDEX      AUG 05
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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 Mises Institute
[Information from this site may not be reliable.]

Government Worker Napped Three Hours Per Day for Four Years
The most robust study ever conducted on the topic found that the average California state government worker earned 23 percent more in total compensation than their similarly skilled and educated private-sector counterpart. That value rose to 33 percent above their private-sector counterpart, when the value of California state government workers’ legendary job security was included. But a recent report by the California State Auditor leaves one with the impression that the study vastly underestimated the true value of job security for government workers. In February of 2014, a DMV employee was documented by her supervisors for sleeping at work. According to four separate witnesses, the employee continued to sleep at her desk for a minimum of three hours a day, for nearly 4 years straight.

Europe Needs to "Harmonize" to Ireland's Tax Level, not to France's
Whenever we talk about tax cuts and growth-oriented tax programs in Europe, many tell us that “it is not possible” and that the European Union does not allow it. However, it is false. Attractive, growth-oriented tax systems are not only possible in the European Union, but those countries that implement them have higher economic growth rates, less unemployment, and a well-funded welfare state.

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from The Spokesman-Review
Newspaper in Spokane, Washington

Sue Lani Madsen: The James Allsups of this world are not the Republican Party
There’s no question James Allsup is a white supremacist. His YouTube videos and writings are full of traditional white supremacist rhetoric that would have been found in underground newspapers a generation ago. The Spokane County Republicans denounced him in June with this statement over Cecily Wright’s signature as chairman: “His past statements, affiliations and actions are deeply out-of-step (sic) with the values of the Republican Party, as well as the values of the Spokane County GOP and our members.” The Spokane County GOP denounced him again this week, after now ex-Chairman Wright flip-flopped and applauded Allsup at a meeting of a local Republican club, without the knowledge or backing of the party. “Hate has no place here in the Republican Party, intolerance has no place in the Republican Party,” said Michael Baumgartner at a news conference on Thursday. Republicans have confronted Allsup’s rhetoric. Denouncing Republicans because Allsup and Co. use them for cover is really no different than denouncing all Muslims because of the existence of Al Qaeda, something the defenders of the left would quickly to point to as injustice, unless it looks like a good way to score points in the current political games.

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from The Washington Post
Newspaper in Washington, D.C.

Robert Martin, Tuskegee Airman who flew ‘63 and a half’ combat missions, dies at 99
Robert L. Martin, a combat pilot who said he flew “63 and a half” missions during World War II as part of the barrier-breaking Tuskegee Airmen, was shot down over German-occupied territory on the 64th and spent five weeks trying to return to Allied lines with the help of Josip Broz Tito’s anti-fascist Yugoslav partisans, died July 26 at a senior living center in Olympia Fields, Ill. He was 99.

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Sunday, August 19, 2018

In the news, Wednesday, May 26, 2010


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MAY 25      INDEX      MAY 27
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from KXLY 4 News (ABC Spokane)

Soldiers say goodbye to Mann Reserve Center
Four years after the Department of Defense recommended it be shut down the Joe Mann Army Reserve Center in Hillyard has officially ceased operations. Army Reserve units have used the Mann Center since the 1950s; beginning in 1957 reserve units trained for everything from engineering to medicine at the center.

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from The Spokesman-Review

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Wednesday, August 15, 2018

In the news, Friday, August 3, 2018


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AUG 02      INDEX      AUG 04
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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 Competitive Enterprise Institute

Debunking the (Plastic) Straw Man Arguments
Of all the consumer products one might have expected to become a flashpoint for political controversy, the humble plastic drinking straw is an unlikely contender. Leap into the headlines it has, though, with communities like Seattle and San Francisco recently enacting bans on disposable straws. The city council of Santa Barbara, California initially voted for a ban that would have punished restaurant workers with up to six months of jail time for giving out a disposable plastic straw, but city officials agreed to revisit the ordinance when it appeared to also ban the sale of straws at supermarkets.

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from Judicial Watch
Nonprofit Organization in Washington, D.C.

Judicial Watch: FBI Records Show Dossier Author Deemed ‘Not Suitable For Use’ as Source, Show Several FBI Payments in 2016
Judicial Watch announced today the FBI turned over 70 pages of heavily redacted records about Christopher Steele, the former British spy, hired with Clinton campaign and Democratic National Committee funds, who authored the infamous Dossier targeting President Trump during last year’s presidential campaign.  The documents show that Steele was cut off as a “Confidential Human Source” (CHS) after he disclosed his relationship with the FBI to a third party.  The documents show at least 11 FBI payments to Steele in 2016 and document that he was admonished for unknown reasons in February, 2016.  The documents were turned over in response to Judicial Watch Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Justice for records of communications and payments between the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and former British intelligence officer Christopher Steele and his private firm, Orbis Business Intelligence.

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from The Spokesman-Review
Newspaper in Spokane, Washington

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In the news, Thursday, August 2, 2018


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AUG 01      INDEX      AUG 03
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from HumanProgress.org
Education Website

Columbus's 1492 voyage took over two months; today it would take 9 hours.

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from Reuters
International news agency headquartered in London, England

U.S. senators introduce Russia sanctions 'bill from hell'
Republican and Democratic U.S. senators introduced legislation on Thursday to impose stiff new sanctions on Russia and combat cyber crime, the latest effort by lawmakers to punish Moscow over interference in U.S. elections and its activities in Syria and Ukraine. The bill includes restrictions on new Russian sovereign debt transactions, energy and oil projects and Russian uranium imports, and new sanctions on Russian political figures and oligarchs. It also expresses strong support for NATO and would require that two-thirds of the Senate to vote in favor of any effort to leave the alliance.

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from The Spokesman-Review
Newspaper in Spokane, Washington

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from UPI News Agency - United Press International
upi.com

Russia trying to divide U.S. ahead of midterms, intelligence officials say
Russia is trying to "weaken and divide" the United States ahead of the 2018 midterm elections, members of President Donald Trump's national security team said Thursday, pointing to efforts to combat election interference this fall. U.S. intelligence officials including Director of National Intelligence Daniel Coats, national security adviser John Bolton, Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, FBI Director Christopher A. Wray and National Security Agency Director Paul Nakasone appeared together during the White House press briefing where they said they were working with state and local election officials to protect voting systems from threats by Russia and other foreign actors.

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In the news, Wednesday, August 1, 2018


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JUL 31      INDEX      AUG 02
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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
News & Media Website

Eurozone growth slows to slowest pace in two years
The eurozone economy grew at its slowest quarterly pace since 2016, missing modest forecasts, to rise 0.3%, according to official data released on Tuesday.

Chinese state media targets Apple
tate-owned Chinese news outlets, including China Central Television, have begun a campaign of criticism against Apple, prompting speculation that Beijing is ready to leverage public opinion in an escalating trade conflict with the US. One article, published online by CCTV, said that Apple had failed to block gambling advertisements as well as pornographic novels transmitted through its messaging app.

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from DW News (Deutsche Welle)
Broadcasting & Media Production Company in Bonn, Germany

German population with immigrant background reaches new peak in 2017
According to the latest "micro-census," the number of people in Germany with immigrant roots rose to 19.3 million last year. Although society is becoming more diverse, many have argued that it's not become more open.

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from Hoover Institution
Nonprofit Organization in Stanford, California

Rabaul, August 1943
The naval and air bases that Japan established at Rabaul on the eastern edge of New Britain Island in 1942 became the leading edge of its resistance to America’s return to the Western Pacific. Five hundred miles from the nearest Australian air base and supported by nearby Japanese naval and air power, Rabaul almost prevented America’s power, projected as it was from across the Pacific, from gaining a toehold in Guadalcanal, on the easternmost edge of the Solomon Islands. That notwithstanding, Rabaul continued to dominate the Southwest Pacific. The history of Rabaul, August 1943, reminds Americans of the military price of overcoming bases established to block our access to the Western Pacific.

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from HumanProgress.org  Education Website

Compassion, Self-Interest and Envy Shape Redistribution
In a new paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), Professors Leda Cosmides and John Tooby from the University of California, Santa Barbara, and their coauthors take an evolutionary look at the issue of income inequality and redistribution. As the authors note, "Markets have lifted millions out of poverty, but considerable inequality remains and there is a large worldwide demand for redistribution. Although economists, philosophers, and public policy analysts debate the merits and demerits of various redistributive programs, a parallel debate has focused on voters' motives for supporting redistribution. Understanding these motives is crucial, for the performance of a policy cannot be meaningfully evaluated except in the light of intended ends."

Ridley: EU's Anti-GMO Crusade Is Unscientific and Harmful
The European Court of Justice has just delivered a scientifically absurd ruling, in defiance of advice from its advocate general, but egged on by Jean-Claude Juncker’s allies. It will ensure that more pesticides are used in Britain, our farmers will be less competitive and researchers will leave for North America. Thanks a bunch, your honours. By saying that genome-edited crops must be treated to expensive and uncertain regulation, it has pandered to the views of a handful of misguided extremists, who no longer have popular support in this country. GMOs used elsewhere in the world have reduced pesticide use by 36.9 percent, while increasing yields by 21.6 percent.

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from New York Times
Newspaper in New York

Losing Earth: The Decade We Almost Stopped Climate Change
This narrative by Nathaniel Rich is a work of history, addressing the 10-year period from 1979 to 1989: the decisive decade when humankind first came to a broad understanding of the causes and dangers of climate change. Complementing the text is a series of aerial photographs and videos, all shot over the past year by George Steinmetz. With support from the Pulitzer Center, this two-part article is based on 18 months of reporting and well over a hundred interviews. It tracks the efforts of a small group of American scientists, activists and politicians to raise the alarm and stave off catastrophe. It will come as a revelation to many readers — an agonizing revelation — to understand how thoroughly they grasped the problem and how close they came to solving it.

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from The Spokesman-Review
Newspaper in Spokane, Washington

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In the news, Tuesday, July 31, 2018


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JUL 30      INDEX      AUG 01
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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 ABC News (& affiliates)
TV Network in New York, New York

When historians try to appraise Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, which historical artifacts will they use? Then-candidate Donald Trump’s speech imploring Russia to find Hillary Clinton’s emails, perhaps. The soccer ball Vladimir Putin gave President Trump at their summit in Helsinki probably merits inclusion. And then there are the tweets — millions of them.

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from AGDAILY
Media/News Company in Troy, Michigan

6 farming myths we wish the public would stop clinging to
Most people don’t know a real commercial farmer, and it can be easy to fall victim to myths if you don’t get to fact check. Here are six of the biggest myths spread on social media and in the mainstream media, and some stuff we as farmers are frankly really sick of hearing. 1. GMOs are bad. 2. “Factory farms” wreck the environment. 3. Farmers all love Donald Trump. 4. Farmers are rich and get government subsidies. 5. Agriculture is run on illegal immigrants who aren’t treated fairly. 6. Food safety concerns.

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from Asia Times Online
News & Media Website

US, China begin testing waters for restarting trade talks
Officials in the Trump administration and counterparts in Beijing have finally reopened a line of communication for talks on an escalating trade conflict, according to a report on Tuesday, though plans for formal negotiations have not been finalized. US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin has already begun speaking with Chinese Vice-Premier Liu He, Bloomberg reported, adding that high-level talks are taking place this week. At various points in recent rounds of trade negotiations, Mnuchin and He were tapped as point men for the two sides. US stocks and offshore yuan both gained following the news.

Muzzling the media: How Pakistan’s army helped Khan win
Major media outlets, military critics and pro-democracy activists were all pressured and intimidated before the election.

US ‘could end up doing projects with China’, analyst tips
The Trump administration’s decision to get into infrastructure projects in the Indo-Pacific region – similar to China’s massive Belt and Road Initiative but on a smaller scale – could end up with the US and China working together on some projects, an analyst in Hong Kong has said.

China caught off guard as US trade war highlights Beijing’s dilemma
For more than two decades, China was the poster child of economic development and during the past 10 years a major driver of global growth during the Great Recession in the West after the financial crisis in 2008. But as Europe and the United States gradually recovered, cracks in Beijing’s progressive image started to appear. The program of reforms, which had turned the country into the world’s second-largest economy, started to slow, and government subsidies for key industries and state-owned enterprises gathered pace, despite a cosmetic headline-grabbing approach to shrink the bloated SOE sector.

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from CBN News
[Information from this site may not be reliable.]

One day after Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced the Justice Department is creating a "religious liberty task force," some are concerned after the FBI admitted to working with the controversial Southern Poverty Law Center.

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from Hoover Institution
Nonprofit Organization in Stanford, California

Erdogan’s Turkey And NATO
The phrase “the struggle for Turkey’s soul” once served as shorthand for the perceived conflict between the country’s secular democratic values and Muslim religious values. With the July 8, 2018 inauguration of Recep Tayyip Erdogan as Turkey’s President, democratic values and Muslim values now struggle with hyper-empowered Erdogan’s personal political goals and his devilish acquisition of authoritarian power. Pity Turkey’s soul and its citizens. Pity NATO. The political torque Erdogan’s power grab generates could crack the NATO alliance.

Is Turkey No Longer Part Of The West?
Almost a century has passed since the Ottoman Empire was dismembered and Mustafa Kemal set out to build the modern Turkish state on its ruins. Twenty years ago, no one in the West would have called into question the achievement of the man who eventually, with considerable justice, styled himself Atatürk (“Father of the Turks”). But many now fear that the political and cultural revolution he instigated in the 1920s will be overturned and that Turkey will cease to function as normal nation state, turn on the West, and try to upend the existing order in the eastern Mediterranean, the Balkans, and the Middle East.

The New Sultan And The Crisis Of Modern Turkey
The failed coup of July 15, 2016 has irreversibly transformed Turkish politics. Although the coup attempt was thankfully thwarted, the path that Erdogan chose to take after the coup—using the state of emergency powers he was given to go specifically after coup plotters, to embark instead on a much broader campaign against all dissidents, many of whom possessed no ties to the coup in any form—highlights an unfortunate truth about the country: Turkey is in a deep crisis.

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from Nerdist
Media/News Company

Dune is one of the world's most beloved books, but also one of its most cursed projects when it comes to the matter of film adaptation. Nevertheless, a new version of the hit sci-fi story is on its way, and it looks like this time, all the stars are aligning to get it just right.

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from Patrick Wood (Technocracy News)
Journalist in Mesa, Arizona  [Information from this site may not be reliable]

Trilateral Commission: 5G Technology Will Be The Backbone Of Smart Cities
Former NATO Supreme Allied Commander James L. Jones and retired Air Force Major General Robert Wheeler were both optimistic that the next wave of wireless technology will be the safest. The fifth generation of wireless technology has the potential to upend the way cities work, but it’ll all be for naught if 5G networks can’t be properly secured, James L. Jones, a former U.S. national security adviser, said Thursday.

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from Psephizo  (Blog)

What does it mean to be human?
What do you think is the biggest question facing our culture? Is it to do with Brexit, and questions of national identity? Is it about social media, and questions of truth? Is it to do with sex and gender identity? Or are you facing personal questions and challenges that dwarf these? My conviction is that, underlying all these questions is one, much bigger one: What does it mean to be human? All the questions we currently face can be trace to this, larger, underlying question. And this question, in turn, has two parts to it: who counts as human? What really sets us apart and makes us distinctive?

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from Reuters
International news agency headquartered in London, England

Iran rejects Trump offer of talks as a dream, without value
Senior Iranian officials and military commanders on Tuesday rejected U.S. President Donald Trump’s offer of talks without preconditions as worthless and “a dream”, saying his words contradicted his action of reimposing sanctions on Tehran. Separately, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said Trump’s repudiation of an international nuclear deal reached in 2015 was “illegal” and Iran would not easily yield to Washington’s renewed campaign to strangle Iran’s vital oil exports.

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from The Spokesman-Review
Newspaper in Spokane, Washington

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from Washington Examiner

Mismanaged, overcrowded forests provide fuel to historic California wildfires, experts say
Neglect and mismanagement have left western U.S. forests overcrowded, firefighting experts say, leaving them more susceptible to the kinds of major wildfires that are currently ravaging California. California state and federal officials have responded to about 4,500 fires this year that have burned nearly 400,000 acres of land, easily outpacing last year's record burns.

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In the news, Monday, July 30, 2018


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JUL 29      INDEX      JUL 31
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from Faith & Freedom
blog.faithandfreedom.us

NPR: "Jesus Was A Socialist"
The taxpayer-funded, left-wing National Public Radio has joined the chorus of "news" outlets that are promoting the "Democratic Socialists of America" movement that is exploding within the Democratic Party. Former evangelicals are giving testimony to how they have "seen the light" and joined the socialist movement, because "Jesus was a socialist."

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from FEE (Foundation for Economic Education)
RIGHT-CENTER BIAS, HIGH, non-profit organization

Two Protectionist Wrongs Don't Make a Right
Trump is right, China is more protectionist. But bad policy by China doesn’t justify bad policy by the United States, especially when the main victims of Trump’s tariffs will include American consumers, workers, manufacturers, taxpayers, and exporters. The United States is far from perfect on trade, after all, and the same is true of most of our allies.

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from Forbes

California is once again on fire. Northern California’s Carr Fire has killed six people, two of them firefighters, and continues to burn out of control, claiming more than 700 homes and about 100,000 acres.

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from HumanProgress.org  Education Website

How Big of a Problem Is Overpopulation?
In 1968, Stanford University biologist Paul Ehrlich published The Population Bomb, which began: “The battle to feed all of humanity is over. In the 1970s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now.”

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from INFOWARS
CONSPIRACY-PSEUDOSCIENCE,  LOW,  radio program and website run by Alex Jones

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán declared "anti-communist Christians" are the future of Europe as the globalist elite lose their grip on power. Speaking to an assembly at a Hungarian political rally in Transylvania, Orbán championed the rejuvenation of Central Europe as a bastion for "Christian democracy," one in which the nation-state serves as the model for individual countries who also work together to protect European culture, people and values.

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from The Spokesman-Review
Newspaper in Spokane, Washington

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In the news, Sunday, July 29, 2018


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JUL 28      INDEX      JUL 30
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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 American Thinker
[Information from this site may not be reliable.]

Meanwhile, the Chinese think Trump is a genius
Has anyone ever called the Chinese 'stupid'? Not those guys. So now they're reading President Trump, and unlike the childish Eurotrash of western Europe, they see a shrewd, wily, chess-playing, Sun Tzu-grade genius, who could easily checkmate them, and they've got a lot of reasons for thinking so. That's the report from a European policy-domo, who actually went to Beijing and asked the local leaders what they were seeing. "They see Trump as breaking up the multilateral institutions of the post-war order that so stiff the Americans, and then holding out for a better deal for the U.S. on them, which does kind of make sense. After all, Trump is saying that's his idea in the trade war back and forths, over tariffs and pacts."


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from The Inquisitr
LEFT-CENTER BIAS,  MIXED, aggregate news and media website

Noam Chomsky: ‘Israeli Intervention In U.S. Elections Vastly Overwhelms Anything The Russians May Have Done’
While Noam Chomsky may not be a proponent of what's been dubbed Russiagate - although he does not deny vehemently Russia interfered in the 2016 U.S. election - most of the American public disagrees with him. The mainstream media, Chomsky argued, keeps missing the real stories amid Russiagate hysteria. The most destructive of all Trump’s policies are his policies on climate change, which Chomsky considers to be an existential threat humanity has to face instead of ignoring. Yet, the media chooses to focus on Russian election meddling. According to the famous intellectual, in most of the world, Russian election meddling is “almost a joke.”

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from Quora

Nicholas Emanuel Wheeler's answer: I am tired of hearing that the history of slavery and institutional racism are why black Americans and minorities can't get ahead. That might have worked 50+ years ago, but today when you’ve black American success in almost every field of society, I begin to beg to differ.

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from The Spokesman-Review
Newspaper in Spokane, Washington

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