The ‘Tiktok ban’ law is ‘not just a Tiktok ban’ says Sacks. It could be the new Patriot Act. E170: Tech's Vibe Shift, TikTok ban debate, Vertical AI boom, Florida bans lab-grown meat & more - YouTube ‘The worst ideas are bipartisan.’ This one was 50-0. Not 47.3, not 42.8. There was hardly any debate. The may have been ‘stampeded’ into passing it.
‘My alarm bells go off when DC acts with this kind of unanimity, because the only time they do that, when they become a uniparty, is when the national security state wants some new power. Entry into Iraq War, Patriot Act.’
‘They always cite classification when they don’t want the public to know something.'
If this is about we can't have our apps in China but their are here, and we want to stop that, put it in a trade bill, said Sacks. This isn't in a trade bill, it just gives new powers to the government to define foreign adversary controlled applications and websites.
What does this app do that other apps don't do? It hasn't been shown.
There's so many AGs going after Facebook and Insta and other tech companies, making their bones, and could go after ByteDance, yet none are. Why not? and suddenly 100% support for this law.
Remedy not narrowly tailored, and law will lead to weaponization.
The Patriot Act was written with sunset provisions, but although it expired in 2020 without being reauthorized, government agencies retain most of the authorities granted by the act.
Secret Tiktok Ban Hearings / Lobbying - YouTube
Although there are political differences among people, ‘we should be able to come together on these issues like ... mass surveillance’. ‘It is a major threat to your rights.’
They want to ‘collect data that can’t be collected right now.'
The idea that TikTok is dangeous because it seeds misinformation or discontent in America. ‘No one seeds more discontent than the MSM in the US. They pit political parties against each other on a constant basis.’
‘Vague language is always alarming ... because everyone who is under this legislation is at risk.’
FOSS developers are in every country including foreign adversaries. ‘That doesn’t mean they have misaligned influence.'
Tiktok may be becoming a problem for ‘the Israeli establishiment.’ Billionaires.
The work of journalists going undercover. Those involved are ... taking money from the pro-Israel lobby.
ADL policing speech. APAC funding politiicans, who can fund and run a candidate against you if they don't like your platform or speech.
#Politics
Trudeau's new online censorship law - Problems with Bill C-63 / the Online Arms Law - YouTube
Another State Does Away w/Mandatory Bar Exam for Attorneys - YouTube
DOJ has sued Apple over iPhone monopoly.
One argument: When Apple encounters competitive threats, it doesn't lower prices, but rather imposes a ‘series of shapeshifting rules and restrictions in its App Store guidelines and dev agreements.’ ... ‘Blocks, essentially, that forces people to stay.’
‘Peak Apple’ has been said by some.
To a challenge that Android phone users couldn't send videos to people they knew, Cook responded ‘Buy your mom an iPhone.’
The issue has been talked about in terms of government wants Apple to be integrative with nonApple products. Apple has always had this policy. Consumers are paying for this product.
A sort of ‘democrat’ view is that ‘Apple will keep abusing power until they’re checked' and so they have to be checked. They want ‘the industry to stand for more interoperability’.
Point of reference is when Microsoft (which had 95% of the market at that time for PCs) tried to dominate search with a browser, and how they would have continued. 'They had substantial market power and what they were in the process of doing was the smart thing from the business standpoint. They would have killed the competing browser, then baked their own into Windows, and with that you control search. They were trying to break html and openStandards and using all kinds of funky code. They were telling computer makers that they could get Windows for cheap (or free?) with the browser bundle, or pay $150 each computer without the browser monopoly thing. Same thing Google does on phones with Android basically.
I would probably say that for that particular issue, it is fine as long as the company is small (10% of market or less). Another tactic would be for Android to deny interrelation with Apple until Apple permits it.
Reddit IPOd. How will they monetize?
UK Police Force told: 'Women who criticise gender ideology should be treated as terrorists' - YouTube
#Terrorism
Google fined 250 million euros for using news articles to train chatbot | BBC News - YouTube
A law in US will reduce real estate agent commissions by shifting it from (current) seller pays 6% in a contract when he lists, to buyer and seller each pay 2% or 3% or so. No buyer will agree to this, it is considered. They can look on Redfin and go look at the house themselves.
The current way is considered to be a kind of a racket, which only works because the seller pays it and is sort of force to.
You buy a house for $1m and then sell it for $1.1, but have to pay $60k to an agent. A great service by an agent might get $1.2 whereas a bad one might get 800k.
They might remove half the fees in the industry this way.
Agents might start to work hourly. Or they might change a fee rather than a commission, for various homebuying services. Or a flat rate plus percentage ($1m house means $10k, plus 10% over that price ... or and 20% for the next hundred K over the price), flat fee guaranteed plus commission for performance.
Opportunity for startups, leveraging AI.
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Police Now Need a Warrant to Access Ring Footage - YouTube
Causing Someone to Stop Walking is Now a Crime in Vegas - YouTube
Blinding headlights are growing problem on US roads - YouTube
Is he for real? Destruction of evidence isn't viewed as criminal act by Trudeau government - YouTube
City Sues to Keep Its Police Chase Policy Hidden - YouTube
Because police have rules for when they will continue a police chase and when they will not pursue further becaues negatives outweigh positives.
But now a bystander was struck and killed during a chase. They want to know if the police were following their policy at the time.
They have the Freedom and Information Act in Texas.
Anna Paulina Luna Asks If Hillary Clinton Or Stacey Abrams Should Be Charged With 'Insurrection' - YouTube
#Terrorism #Politics
Ford government's wage restraint law deemed unconstitutional - YouTube
Bill 124. Workers could be eligible for $billions in backpay.
'Violated the collective bargaining rights of workers.'
‘unconstitutional bill passed in 2019.’
#Canada -
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Science?The data it's based on can't be access by us, it's not public domain data. So it can't be peer reviewed, Campbell says.
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Apple is by far the slowest to join the accelerating exodus out of the Chinese system (which began in the last year of Obama), said Zeihan"... taken every instance of trade disputes or genocide and doubled down... "
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Breivik attacks were 2011. 11 years ago.
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Example: US has tariffs on China for steel and aluminumChinese state actors were basically giving free electricity to aluminum smelters in China to undercut price in America, that took US's capicity utilization of US's aluminum smelters from high 80s to 70 in one year. And when you drop below 80% capacity utilization you end up losing money as an industry. China was acting in an uneconomic fashion to try to put the US's industry out of business so the US would have a further reliance on China's ability to produce aluminum (strategic values for military and industry).So Yellen saying "You could save 8 basis points of inflation if you took those tariffs off" is ignorant of national security. He mentioned that if wall street was making decisions we'd all be speaking Chinese immediately, because they make short term decisions for specific profits, and politicians are required to think long term and consider national security.Kyle Bass' take
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"They gotta stop manipulating long rates. They have to let the free market do that." - Dan MoreheadHe also said that while 30% of Americans are trying to buy a home, 20% of all homes sold last year were sold to institutional speculators with money borrowed from the Fed.
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Petro, first non-conservative president of Colombia in decades, won 50% to 47%Petro takes office from Duque August 7.Like 11m votes for him in a Country of 52m. The choice was between (Petro) a leftist who talks a lot about change, which many of the people want (the two main complaints of Colombians seem to be 'inequality' and 'corruption'), although at a risk of making things worse ('like Venezuela' since Petro is considered to be socialist). And on the other hand a right politician, which represented for voters stability and less risk but not the change many want.Petro has promised several things (which are not largely ideas new to him), but they would require political support beyond his office to pull off. He does not have the majority of Congress.1. Make more use of land. 1.5% of Colombians own 50% of the land. The idea is to tax land in ways that would encourage using it more, and to redistribute some land.2.a. More equality in access to health, ie a universal state system which doesn't depend on the ability of patients to pay. Payed for with 'progressive taxes' and a strong hand with corruption.2.b. Pensions. The offices that currently manage pensions Petro has accused of corruption. Critics say the country traditionally is not efficient as an administrator of money.3. Environmentalism. Colombia's oil wealth he wants to phase out to become a green economy.Because it is such a big change, and people weren't sure it would happen, I think it's fair to say people are excited to see what will happen, whether they are hopeful or dreadful.
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NJ passes law mandating civics class for all middle schoolers(This happened several months ago. Supposed to be mandatory in 2022/2023 school year)"The insurrection was alarming to many people and served as a wakeup call that we need to prepare future generations about civics and government." - Sen Shirley Turner (D)"So maybe 30 years of not having civics, this is what you get." - Arlene Gardner, President of NJ Center for Civic Education, who is developing the curriculum"One of the areas that we've really started working on is those skills for having a CIVIL discourse when you disagree with people."
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"Note that [the US] cannot simultaneously embargo these three places," Samo Burja said about the US going to try to get Venezuela to produce some oil. The US can't embargo Venezuela, China, and Russia all at the same time.
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US tech giants info-actions against RussiaWithout being forced to, they've taken actions against Russia, Russians, and Russian information sources.Facebook reportedly will allow posts calling for violence against Russia and its president.Wion asked, "Isn't this criminal? Won't this promote hate? Won't this incite hostility against all Russians?"Google barred the Russian government from monetizing content. Apple stopped sales in Russia and cut Russia off from the ApplePlay, and has blocked RT and Sputnik outside Russia. Twitter is labeling all posts that are pro-Russian and adding a label on pro-Russian stories.Wion said that Facebook, Google, Microsoft and Amazon were awarded $44.5b from the DHS and DoD. For aiding the US military, providing them with digital tools that can be used in wars. Including access to databases, cloud computing, surveillance, drone tech and pushing narratives.Wion also pointed out the revolving door for professionals that work in big tech and then in government. And former government who now are controlling big tech companies.
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Pfizer documents have been made public (UPDATE: This research paper has been withdrawn and reports have it that the report is 'flawed,' so the following is not solid information. Keeping it here and we'll see what happens with this later.)... although some parts seem to be redacted (removed from the document).It was made public finally now, it seems, by court order, after a FOI request by a group called the Public Health and Medical Professionals for Transparency.The data covered a 3-month (at most) period, early on in the vaccine between Dec 1 2020 and Feb 28 2021.In that time, there was 42k cases of adverse affects (25k medically confirmed and 16k not). 42k out of how many doses given we don't know, because that figure seems to be redacted. The document says, "It is estimated that approximately (b) (4) doses of BNT162b2 were shipped worldwide" in that 3 month period. So without that number, we can't figure out a percentage of people who had adverse affects to vaccines.There were 1200 fatalities in that period resulting form the vaccine, according to the document.The documents are not new. The last data in it is form like Feb 2021. The report was published on Aug 2021 (but the people in the company would have had access to the data from the time it was complete, like Feb 21).Campbell asked why this information wasn't published before. It is health information, he noted. We weren't able to weigh the effectiveness of the vaccine when we were considering it, but could have done so better if these documents had been available, he said.If we had been aware of the long (several pages) list of medical conditions resulting from the vaccine, hospital staff could have kept an eye for them to better treat them, Campbell noted.Currently, many people (and MSM) are preoccupied with the war in Ukraine). Doesn't seem MSM is going to make much of this story.Campbell referenced Hippocrates, "First do no wrong." He said he thinks this has destroyed the people's trust in authorities.
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"What bothers me is how superficial and ill-informed the whole Senate debate was. I was particularly bothered by the references to Russia as a country dying to attack Western Europe."George Kennan, architect of US's successful containment policy of Soviet Union, in 1998, after the senate after under Clinton US started to talk about expanding NATO, contrary to agreements made to the Soviets in 1990 as part of the talks to unify Germany."I think it is the beginning of a new Cold War. I think the Russians will gradually react quite adversely, and it will affect their policies. I think it was a tragic mistake. There was no reason for this whatsoever. No one was threatening anybody else. ...""... Of course, there is going to be a bad reaction from Russia, and then the NATO expanders will say that 'We always told you that is how the Russians are ...'""NATO expansion was simply a lighthearted action by a Senate that has no real interest in foreign affairs."
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"For the first time ever, the EU will finance the purchase and delivery of weapons and other equipment to a country that is under attack." - EU Commission President Ursula von der LeyenGermany is transferring a bunch of weapons. So is Sweden, the first time its broken its historically neutral stance in 80 years. Other countries also.Challenge in delivery as Ukraine's airports were early Russian targets.
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Israeli study makes mainstream the already-known correlation between vitamin D and infection severity14x risk of a severe infection if a person has deficient vitamin D level. According to another study from April 2020, risk of death from Covid 10x when the person has deficient vitamin D.Yet not talked about by governments. Only vaccines.Ivor Cummins comments that high vitamin D levels (or even adequate) is not just about taking lots of vitamin D pills, but rather is about eating an actually healthy diet of good foods, and also getting sun (up to a light pinkness not burning skin). But vitamin D pills are helpful in raising vitamin D levels, obviously.Cummins says a comfortable level of vitamin D that makes for a decent immune system function is around at least 30ng/ml.People used to have better vitamin D levels than now, according to Cummins. The percentage of vitaminD-deficient white people basically halved to 30% and black people went form like 10% to like 2% (melanin versus sun to produce vitamin D) between like 1991 and like 2002. Mexicans and other tawny people are in between whites and blacks.D3 half-life (from vitamin D pills or from sun) is a day or two. Ie daily routine is important for vitamin D (you can't just superboost it one per week or something and expect results that will work every day in between these superboosts). When you eat the pills, it goes to your liver to be converted to the active metabolite 25-OHD. For a vitamin D-deficient person, they might need 5000 - 10,000 IU of the vitamin pills per day.
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"You can't legislate, judges can't solve these problems, you can't get FOIA requests to get the documents. You need whistle blowers." - James O'Keefe of Project Veritas"You need people on the inside who are brave enough to jump on a metaphorical grenade."
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We didn't have a discussion that says 'Where is the threshold?'... 'We all agree, right? that there are circumstances so dangerous that your normal instincts should be put on hold. That if the ship is sinking, then that is the priority.'What we have not discussed is, OK, at least the initial variants of Covid were worse than the flu. How much worse than the flu does something have to be before you turn society upside down? Before you allow small businesses to be destroyed and all of that wealth transferred to their gigantic competitors?' - Bret Weinstean
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Omer Barlev, Israel's minister of public security, says he fears Israeli threats... and is receiving 24/7 protection.He spoke against settler violence by Israelis, and received threats. He blamed another political party for making him the enemy of settlers.
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Kyle Rittenhouse found not guiltyKenosha, WI shooting. Shot 3 men, of which 2 died, at a protest against police brutality. Rittenhouse was 17, armed with an AR-15 style rifle, on the location to protect a car dealership.This has been a massive news story for the past month, quite political between Dems and Republicans. The other day, a Dem news org issued a sort of personal correction where the host said they earlier thought Rittenhouse did the agressing, but now said it looked to them like he was aggressed against.I only bothered to look at one or two videos on this, just to see what it was, at the start of the trial, and the video the news org showed made it look this way to me also. Unclear about events, but that Rittenhouse was agressing. And I'm not a Democrat news org. Some questions then about how the news presents unresolved legal accusations.
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Reportedly, Iraq PM subject of attempted assassinationBy drone attack / 'cowardly rocket'. In the Green Zone.No one claimed responsibility, but militants are one of the main suspects.
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The Hill and others are talking still about the problem of labeling 'half of America' 'domestic terrorists'About 3 homicides per year in the US are possibly motivated by racial hatred. There are 15-20k homicides in the US per year.Below is a chart the Hill shared, which shows attacks and deaths for each year.
The second image shows PayPal Park in San Jose, which has a capacity of 18k. So that many people are murdered per year (is that accurate?). Three of those guys on that bleacher over on the other side were possibly motivated by hate, ie possibly 'racial supremacists.'When they talk about the current attempt to create a political cause for 'domestic terrorism' critics talk about 'the war on terror' which they see as doing the same thing for the past 20 years.According to AP, this many people died in America's 'Longest War' in Afghanistan:American service members killed in Afghanistan through April: 2,448.
U.S. contractors: 3,846.
Afghan national military and police: 66,000.
Other allied service members, including from other NATO member states: 1,144.
Afghan civilians: 47,245.
Taliban and other opposition fighters: 51,191.
Aid workers: 444.
Journalists: 72In the Iraq War (2003-2011), between 151k and 1m Iraqis died, estimated, and 4500 US troop deaths.
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"We do know that the immunity after vaccination is better than the immunity after natural infection"... is what the FDA has been saying, which seems to contradict evidence and the opinion of experts. Unless 'better' in this sentence means something other than 'more effective.'They say 'it appears ... that natural infection provides immunity, but that immunity is seemingly not as strong and may not be as long lasting as that provided by the vaccine.'They say that 'generally the immunity after natural infection tends to wane after about 90 days.' Also contradicts science.It also contradicts the position of the UK and Israeli data.
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China repositions government philosophyBefore, China was allowing some individuals to 'get rich first' with big companies, but now is shifting to 'proserity for all.'It's expected the CCP will have more say in companies and companies will have to fall in line.Xi recently said people should shun 'unreasonable' or 'excessive' income, and that the rich should 'give back to society more.'This means lower education costs, caps on the commission ride share companies can take (done through transport ministry) to keep transportation costs lower, and higher wages for workers.China is also going to do a 'consumer data' data privacy internet bill.
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China '3 mountains'Education, health care, and property. These are burdens for the common Chinese person.China has announced some new areas for new regulations: Education tech, internet, property, and food delivery. Those four.Also e-cigs, growth hormones, liquor and online insurance.It's the first time any of these sectors have been regulated in China.Next year is an election year, and commenters say China sees the big companies that are profiting in these sectors as being in the way of the government reaching its goal of common prosperity and elimination of social unrest.
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Assange case: Bit of progress for US gov sideMany are heartbroken.Last January a London court (Judge Baraitser) ruled he couldn't be extradited to the US over concerns of 'risk of suicide' (and some mental health concerns) while not opposing the US gov on the more central political issue.In the US's appeal, now Britain's High Court has granted permission to the US to expand their grounds for appealing the decision to not send Assange to the US.Next trail date is Oct 29.APnews: US granted more grounds to appeal on Assange extradition
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China economics, summer 2021We have got more info from the CCP on which sectors they really want to promote, as opposed to those whose recent growth has been seen to cause them problems (as usual for closed, authoritarian governments, this includes industries that control information).EV, clean energy, and industrial upgrading have policy tailwinds, according to JPM's Julia Wang.
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Venezuela: opposing parties to meet... Maduro and Guaido will meet in Mexico, they say, to try to resolve things.Guiado's power has waned over the past years, and his popularity has sunk, and international governments are starting to turn away from their recognition of him as leader. It didn't happen that they were able to get Maduro out of power. The US and some other countries want 'free and fair elections' in Venezuela, which would give a winner validity in international eyes.Maybe Guiado wants to meet just to ensure his party's survival, some have commented.All parties are unpopular with the people in Venezuela.
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British Muslim politician's car... reportedly firebombed (she was not in the car) amid a reported 'hate campaign' calling to stop 'an enclave of a new Muslim nation within our nation.' Arooj Shah (elected to lead the Oldham Council in May of this year after service as a councillor since 2012) had previously spoken about facing hate, abuse and racism throughout her political career.A 23-year-old man was arrested in connection.
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