October 12, 2020

Proud Boy interview at Trump Rally ...

October 12, 2020

The Kremlin Is Starting to Worry About Trump

The Kremlin Is Starting to Worry About Trump

https://getpocket.com/explore/item/the-soviet-union-is-gone-but-it-s-still-collapsing


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The search for a key to Trump’s mind-boggling and miscellaneous gusher of policy directives has tended to focus on his disturbingly erratic, vindictive, simplistic, narcissistic, insecure, and occasionally delusional personality, due exception being made for those conspiracy theorists who treat him as a kind of Manchurian candidate or sock puppet of the Kremlin. What most observers have been late to recognize is the extent to which, behind his mask as a showman, Trump views himself as a revolutionary insurgent with a mission to dismantle America’s “old regime.”

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Russian policymakers, obsessed as they are with the fear of “color revolutions,” may understand better than Americans and Europeans the radical nature of the political change that has descended on Washington. Indeed, when it comes to the ongoing Trump revolution, Russian policymakers are in much the same position as the German General Staff one century ago. In 1917, the German government concluded that the best hope for a German victory in World War I was for a revolution to erupt in Russia. It thus allowed some of the leaders of the Bolshevik party, Lenin among them, to pass through Germany and make their way back to Russia. The hope was that a revolution in Russia would pull the country out of the war — and the plan worked. But by the beginning of 1918, the German government started to fear that the virus of revolution that it had surreptitiously help spread to Russia might circle back calamitously to Germany itself.

-snip-

There is no way of knowing if Russian interference contributed decisively to Trump’s upset victory. But it’s fair to say that the Kremlin viewed the outcome as a divine gift. Since at least 2011-2012, when Russia witnessed widespread popular protests, and particularly after the Ukrainian Maidan uprising — events that elicited heartfelt praise and encouragement from then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton — Russia’s leadership had been convinced that her election would spell disaster for Russia and that it might even lead to war. So Russians did what they could to prevent Clinton from getting into the White House. But while they welcomed her defeat, they were wholly unprepared for the ensuing regime change in Washington.

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With Trump in the White House, moreover, Putin has lost his monopoly over geopolitical unpredictability. The Kremlin’s ability to shock the world by taking the initiative and trashing ordinary international rules and customs has allowed Russia to play an oversized international role and to punch above its weight. Putin now has to share the capacity to keep the world off balance with a new American president vastly more powerful than himself. More world leaders are watching anxiously to discover what Trump will do next than are worrying about what Putin will do next. Meanwhile, using anti-Americanism as an ideological crutch has become much more dubious now that the American electorate has chosen as their president a man publicly derided as “Putin’s puppet.”

October 12, 2020

Trump Failed the 3 A.M. Test

Trump Failed the 3 A.M. Test

Don’t let him answer another call.
October 11, 2020
Conor Friedersdorf
Staff writer at The Atlantic

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/10/trump-failed-3-am-test/616678/

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Joe Biden has never held the top job, so voters can only speculate. But a pandemic began on Donald Trump’s watch, so no speculation is needed. Trump showed us how he did perform in a crisis: He failed. Trump is obviously not responsible for all of the COVID-19 deaths in the U.S. But the U.S. has fared much worse than the median developed country. And among wealthy nations, its per capita deaths rank in the top five. Trump can’t avoid blame for America’s subpar performance, because voters can identify specific actions he took that contributed to the country’s failures. Especially damning is that Trump couldn’t even protect himself from the disease.

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Trump’s carelessness didn’t just jeopardize his own health, and that of his wife, his aides, and the Secret Service. The September 26 White House event for the Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett appears to have compromised the health of many important officials. “More than 100 people gathered,” NPR reported. “Guests mingled, hugged and kissed on the cheek, most without wearing masks. An indoor reception followed the outdoor ceremony. Seven days later, at least eight people who were at the ceremony have tested positive.” Someone may die because of the White House’s bizarre laxness at an unnecessary event. And because U.S. senators are among the infected, its consequences could conceivably delay or even derail Barrett’s nomination. Nothing like this could have happened to a president exercising good judgment.

-snip-

Mendacity was his most avoidable failure. Presidents in a public-health crisis should tell the truth. Trump lied to Americans from the outset of this life-threatening emergency. In early February, he privately told Bob Woodward that COVID-19 spread through the air and was more dangerous than the flu, even as he downplayed the seriousness of the disease in public. “I wanted to always play it down,” he later told Woodward. “I still like playing it down, because I don’t want to create a panic.” The false impression he gave was echoed by his allies through the conservative media. Millions would have taken COVID-19 more seriously if Trump hadn’t repeatedly downplayed it. But instead of leveling with Americans, Trump kept lying month after month.

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A better president would have shored up America’s public-health infrastructure prior to the pandemic rather than letting it continue to decay. A better president would’ve seen the earliest failures of the regulatory state and used the powers of his office to correct them as quickly as possible. But rather than constantly insisting that the regulatory state treat COVID-19 more like an emergency and emphasizing that brief bureaucratic delays could cost thousands or tens of thousands of lives, Trump repeatedly focused on downplaying the challenge that America faced. As Ronald Klain, who served as chief of staff to two different Democratic vice presidents, told my Atlantic colleague Ed Yong, “In the best circumstances, it’s hard to make the bureaucracy move quickly. It moves if the president stands on a table and says, ‘Move quickly.’ But it really doesn’t move if he’s sitting at his desk saying it’s not a big deal.”

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October 11, 2020

There Will Be No Trump Coup

There Will Be No Trump Coup

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/10/opinion/sunday/trump-election-authoritarianism.html

A final pre-election case for understanding the president as a noisy weakling, not a budding autocrat.


By Ross Douthat

Opinion Columnist

Oct. 10, 2020



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Across the last four years, the Trump administration has indeed displayed hallmarks of authoritarianism. It features egregious internal sycophancy and hacks in high positions, abusive presidential rhetoric and mendacity on an unusual scale. The president’s attempts to delegitimize the 2020 vote aren’t novel; they’re an extension of the way he’s talked since his birther days, paranoid and demagogic.

These are all very bad things, and good reasons to favor his defeat. But it’s also important to recognize all the elements of authoritarianism he lacks. He lacks popularity and political skill, unlike most of the global strongmen who are supposed to be his peers. He lacks power over the media: Outside of Fox’s prime time, he faces an unremittingly hostile press whose major outlets have thrived throughout his presidency. He is plainly despised by his own military leadership, and notwithstanding his courtship of Mark Zuckerberg, Silicon Valley is more likely to censor him than to support him in a constitutional crisis.

His own Supreme Court appointees have already ruled against him; his attempts to turn his voter-fraud hype into litigation have been repeatedly defeated in the courts; he has been constantly at war with his own C.I.A. and F.B.I. And there is no mass movement behind him: The threat of far-right violence is certainly real, but America’s streets belong to the anti-Trump left.

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Meanwhile, the scenarios that have been spun out in reputable publications — where Trump induces Republican state legislatures to overrule the clear outcome in their states or militia violence intimidates the Supreme Court into vacating a Biden victory — bear no relationship to the Trump presidency we’ve actually experienced. Our weak, ranting, infected-by-Covid chief executive is not plotting a coup, because a term like “plotting” implies capabilities that he conspicuously lacks.

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October 9, 2020

The treatment that Trump touted as a 'cure' for Covid-19 was developed using cells derived from feta

The treatment that Trump touted as a ‘cure’ for Covid-19 was developed using cells derived from fetal tissue.

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2020/10/08/world/covid-coronavirus

SNIP!

“Promoting the dignity of human life from conception to natural death is one of the very top priorities of President Trump’s administration,” the Department of Health and Human Services said in a statement in 2019, around the time of the ban.

SNIP!

Mr. Trump last week received Regeneron’s cocktail of monoclonal antibodies — essentially, antibodies synthesized in living cells and administered to help the body fight off the infection.

To develop the antibodies, Regeneron relied on 293T, a cell line derived from the kidney tissue of an aborted fetus in the 1970s. At least two companies racing to produce vaccines against the coronavirus, Moderna and AstraZeneca, also are using the cell line.

SNIP!

In a video released Wednesday, Mr. Trump praised Regeneron’s treatment, calling it a “cure” for Covid-19 and promising to provide it free to any patient who needed it. The company said on Wednesday that it had applied to the Food and Drug Administration for emergency use authorization.

SNIP!

October 8, 2020

McConnell says he's been avoiding the White House for months because of lack of virus precautions th

McConnell says he’s been avoiding the White House for months because of lack of virus precautions there.

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2020/10/08/us/harris-pence-trump-biden#mcconnell-says-hes-been-avoiding-the-white-house-for-months-because-of-lack-of-virus-precautions-there


"Well, I’ve been following, following the advice of the C.D.C. and the Capitol physician. I can tell you, I haven’t been to the White House since Aug. 6. And I personally didn’t feel that they were approaching protection from this illness in the same way that I thought was appropriate for the Senate. And the Senate has been operating in a way that I think has largely prevented contraction of this disease."



SNIP!

“My impression was that their approach to how to handle this was different from mine and what I insisted that we do in the Senate, which is to wear a mask and practice social distancing,” Mr. McConnell told reporters in Hebron, Ky.

He said he had not visited the White House since Aug. 6, when he met with President Trump to discuss negotiations over additional stimulus legislation.

The decision appears to have been a prudent one now that the White House has become a virus hot spot, with Mr. Trump the most prominent to contract the disease.

SNIP!




In an understatement McConnell said this: “This is not over. We are going to have to work through it.”

October 8, 2020

Feds say they thwarted militia plot to kidnap Whitmer - NON TWEET VERSION.

Feds say they thwarted militia plot to kidnap Whitmer

Robert Snell
The Detroit News

https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/michigan/2020/10/08/feds-thwart-militia-plot-kidnap-michigan-gov-gretchen-whitmer/5922301002/

SNIP!

The court filing also alleges the conspirators twice conducted surveillance at Whitmer's vacation home and discussed kidnapping her to a remote location in Wisconsin to stand "trial" for treason prior to the Nov. 3 election.

"Several members talked about murdering 'tyrants' or 'taking' a sitting governor," an FBI agent wrote in the affidavit. "The group decided they needed to increase their numbers and encouraged each other to talk to their neighbors and spread their message."

The affidavit was filed hours after a team of FBI agents raided a Hartland Township home Wednesday and comes amid an ongoing investigation into the death of a Metro Detroit man killed during a shootout with FBI agents.

SNIP!

“They discussed different ways of achieving this goal from peaceful endeavors to violent actions. At one point, several members talked about state governments they believed were violating the U.S. Constitution, including the government of Michigan and Governor Gretchen Whitmer.

SNIP!

October 8, 2020

A friend's Album just dropped: here's a cut or two ...

October 8, 2020

Excuse me Mike Pence, but ...

https://twitter.com/AvatarDomy/status/1312983680630038528

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
@AOC
·
12h
US House candidate, NY-14
For the record @Mike_Pence, it’s Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez to you.

October 5, 2020

Solving the 1,000-year-old mystery of Druze origin with a genetic sat nav

Solving the 1,000-year-old mystery of Druze origin with a genetic sat nav
November 16, 2016 5.40am EST •Updated November 29, 2016 9.48am EST
Author

https://theconversation.com/solving-the-1-000-year-old-mystery-of-druze-origin-with-a-genetic-sat-nav-68550

Eran Elhaik

Lecturer in population, medical and evolutionary genomics, University of Sheffield


Solving the 1,000-year-old mystery of Druze origin with a genetic sat nav
November 16, 2016 5.40am EST •Updated November 29, 2016 9.48am EST
Author

Eran Elhaik

Lecturer in population, medical and evolutionary genomics, University of Sheffield

Disclosure statement

Eran Elhaik consults to the DNA Diagnostics Center. The study was partially funded by The Royal Society, MRC, and the NSF
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There are more than a million Druze worldwide, with the vast majority residing in the Middle East. shutterstock



For 1,000 years, the mysterious origin of the Druze people – who live almost exclusively in the mountains of Syria, Lebanon and Israel – has captivated linguists, historians, and sociologists. There has been much dispute over whether the Druze are of Arabian, Turkish, Caucasus or Persian origin. But thanks to our new research that mystery may now have been solved, with the use of a genetic GPS system – that works in a similar way to the sat nav in your car.
The Druze are an Arabic-speaking minority who live throughout the Middle East. shutterstock

There are thought to be around 1m Druze people in the world today, whose secretive religion was developed in 986 AD as a movement within Islam. While the spiritual elements of their religion are highly guarded and known only to the elders, the known practices are made up of various religions which include Hinduism, Christianity, Islam and Judaism. This variety is most likely based on historical gatherings that are typical of nomadic tribes.

Previous research has always placed the origins of the Druze in the the Near East region. And by zooming in on the area, our genetic GPS traced most Druze to the region that overlaps northeast Turkey, southwest Armenia and northern Iraq. This area borders the Zagros and the Ararat mountains and is the tallest region in Turkey.

This was discovered by applying our GPS tool to the genomes of over 150 Druze, along with Palestinians, Bedouins, Syrians and Lebanese to compare their ancestral origins.
Mountain dwelling warriors

Throughout history, the Caucasus region – which borders Europe and Asia – was subjected to political, military, religious and cultural conflict, which prompted many tribes to seek refuge in remote regions. The Druze were no different.

It is thought that the first Druze worshippers probably lived in Cairo, where Druzism was adopted by Al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah who ruled in Egypt and the eastern Mediterranean – known as the Levant – between 996 and 1021. But after his sudden disappearance, his successor prosecuted the Druze ruthlessly and abolished the faith in Egypt. By that time, however, the faith had already spread outside Egypt and become accepted among several Levantine groups.
Divers recently found gold coins from this period at an ancient port in Caesarea, that were produced in Egypt and elsewhere in North Africa. Most of the coins carry the name of Al-Hakim. Carla Amit, Israel Antiques Authority

The Druze were first recorded by the 12th century Jewish traveller Benjamin of Tudela who described them as fearless, mountain-dwelling warriors who favoured the Jews. And by that time, because of earlier persecutions, their faith was closed to new followers and they opposed marriage outside of the Druze faith.

The remote mountainous regions provided the Druze with protection and allowed them to maintain the close societal structure that is integral to their religious practices. Like other Caucasus populations, the Druze may even be genetically adapted to cope with the thinner mountain air allowing them to live comfortably in these remote parts.
Druze meet the Jews

Though the Druze have previously been considered to have little genetic mixing – known as a “population isolate” by some geneticists – this is actually incorrect. And in fact by exchanging their diverse Near Eastern genes with Middle Eastern populations – such as Syrians and Palestinians – the Druze people created a more mixed genome than their ancestors, or other Middle Eastern populations.
The Druze flag. Shutterstock

Genetic evidence also suggests that over the years non-Druze tribes and individuals have contributed and enriched the Druze gene pool.

Previous research has also shown that Ashkenazic Jews and Druze are genetically closer to one another than Middle Eastern populations – but until now, it was not clear why. Combined with our earlier research showing the northeastern Turkish origins of Ashkenazic Jews, we can explain that genetic similarity via the shared origin of Ashkenazic Jews and Druze. Medieval Ashkenazic Jews lived in ancient villages in northeast Turkey known as “ancient Ashkenaz” – which was close to the mountainous homeland of the Druze.
Druze women in Isfiya, one of the largest Druze villages in Israel. Shutterstock

Our findings explain a 1,000-year saga of two people living side by side in these lands. And as the Ashkenazic Jews moved northward into the Khazarian Empire, the Druze moved southwards to Palestine – only for both people to reunite hundreds of years later. And although by that time, neither one recalled their common roots, both retained the evidence in their genes.


Journalists and researchers have one thing in common: we seek the truth. I work with academics and scientists every day to communicate knowledge, discovery, and facts to readers like you who also care about evidence over opinion. If you think this is important – and I’m confident you do – please help The Conversation grow with a gift in whatever amount you can afford. Thank you.

Martin LaMonica

Deputy Editor