peppertree
peppertree's JournalGen. Mark Milley Warns of Fealty to Dictators, in Exit Speech Aimed at Trump
Source: Wall Street Journal
Army Gen. Mark Milley, the Pentagon's top officer, warned in his retirement speech on Friday that military officers must adhere to the Constitution and not bow to political pressures, in what appeared to be thinly-veiled comments about former President Donald Trump.
"We don't take an oath to a country, we don't take an oath to a tribe, we don't take an oath to a religion, we don't take an oath to a king, or a queen, to a tyrant or dictator or wannabe dictator," Gen. Milley bellowed across a military parade field, without mentioning his former boss by name.
"We do not take an oath to an individual, we take an oath to the Constitution, to the idea that is America and we're willing to die to protect it."
Friday's speech was Milley's last official ceremony as the Joint Chiefs chairman after years of positioning himself as a defender of democracy -- and drawing the ire of critics who have accused him of overstepping the authority of the commander in chief and pursuing what they perceive as a progressive agenda.
Read more: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/other/gen-mark-milley-warns-of-fealty-to-dictators-in-exit-speech-aimed-at-trump/ar-AA1hsA6h
Trump and others on the political hard right have repeatedly attacked Gen. Mark Milley, pushing up against norms for public behavior for politicians and elected officials in the process.
James Hoge, Sun-Times editor who oversaw era of audacious investigations and 6 Pulitzers, dies at 87
Former Sun-Times Editor James Hoge helped usher in a golden age of Chicago journalism by hiring young talent and signing off on audacious investigative projects, including the Mirage Tavern undercover sting. The newspaper would win six Pulitzer Prizes under his watch.
This all happened by the time he was 45 years old.
Hoge started at the Sun-Times in 1959 as a $68.50-a-week night police reporter while still a graduate student at the University of Chicago.
He sprinted from assistant city editor in 1965 to managing editor in 1967, to editor-in-chief in 1968 to publisher by the time he was 44.
Hoge left the Sun-Times in 1984 and was appointed president and publisher of the New York Daily News, where he remained until 1991.
Hoge died Tuesday in New York City. He was 87.
At: https://chicago.suntimes.com/obituaries/2023/9/20/23863369/james-hoge-dead-chicago-sun-times-editor-obituary
Former Sun-Times editor and New York Daily News publisher James Hoge, 1935-2023.
Hoge had the added distinction of moderating the nation's first televised vice-presidential debate in 1976.
Sparks fly in Argentina's first televised vice-presidential debate
The five vice presidential candidates for the upcoming elections met for a TV-organized debate Wednesday night to discuss their main campaign proposals.
The debate - the first of its type in Argentina - was strongly marked by accusations regarding human rights, mainly between Victoria Villarruel from the far-right Forward Liberty and Agustín Rossi, from the ruling, center-left Union for the Homeland.
Last night's debate - organized and broadcast by cable news network TN - also featured Luis Petri for the right-wing Together for Change, Nicolás del Caño for the Leftist Workers' Front, and Florencio Randazzo for the centrist Working for Our Country.
The strongest moment was arguably when Rossi accused Villarruel of “infiltrating democracy...because you don't believe in democracy” - referencing her ties to military officials who were part of the 1976-83 dictatorship and her defense of those later tried for crimes against humanity.
Del Caño also asked Villarruel about her meetings with the late, fascist dictator Jorge Videla, who died in prison in 2013.
“You need to explain why you were in [Miguel] Etchecolatz’s contacts book,” Del Caño added. She didn’t respond to his inquiries.
Etchecolatz, who died last year, was sentenced to life in prison in 2006 for his role in multiple atrocities. The star witness in the case, Jorge Julio López, later went missing.
Far right at advantage in potential runoff
Last night's event was a likely preview of presidential debates scheduled for October 1st and 8th; general elections are scheduled for October 22nd.
Recent polling suggests the Forward Liberty ticket - led by the fiery Javier Milei, who professes admiration for Donald Trump and was recently interviewed by Tucker Carlson - is headed for a runoff on November 19th with the Union for the Homeland ticket led by current Economy Minister Sergio Massa.
While Massa has earned plaudits for his handling of a crippling foreign debt crisis inherited from former right-wing President Mauricio Macri - exacerbated by a record drought that has slashed Argentine exports this year by 24% - an inflation rate that has more than doubled to 124% has left Massa's coalition at a disadvantage.
Massa would, moreover, have to surmount the likelihood that Together for Change voters - led by Macri's hard-line but lackluster former Security Minister Patricia Bullrich - would largely migrate to Milei's column.
At: https://buenosairesherald.com/politics/vp-candidate-debate-rossi-accuses-villarruel-of-infiltrating-democracy
Argentine vice-presidential contenders Victoria Villaruel (far-right), Luis Petri (right-wing), Agustín Rossi (center-left), Florencio Randazzo (centrist), and Nicolás del Caño (left-wing).
Villaruel was confronted over her record as an apologist for the fascist, 1976-83 dictatorship, while Rossi was on the defensive over an inflation rate that has more than doubled to 124% during the outgoing administration - of which he's currently cabinet chief.
Both are expected to advance to a potential runoff on November 19th - in which Villaruel's far-right ticket, led by the pro-Trump Javier Milei, is at an advantage.
Prolific Argentine actor Pepe Soriano dies at 93
Argentine actor José "Pepe" Soriano, a prolific performer on stage and film in Argentina and Spain, died on Wednesday at age 93.
Soriano, who retired just two years ago after a career spanning seven decades, received international awards as recently as 2021 for his role in Gonzalo Calzada's psychological thriller “Nocturnal” - for which he earned a Best Actor nod in that year's Screamfest.
Born in Buenos Aires in 1929 to a Jewish family, Soriano left law school to join the theater in 1950. Success eluded the young actor until 1968, when he was cast as the lead in Juan José Jusid's production of Roberto Cossa's tragedy, Tute Cabrero, and in Raúl de la Torre's character study, “Mr. and Mrs. Juan Lamaglia” in 1970.
But it was his portrayal of Schultz, a German labor organizer, in Osvaldo Bayer's “Rebellion in Patagonia” in 1974 that gave him his most memorable film role.
The depiction of the brutal repression of a 1920-22 sheep ranch workers' strike resulted in serious problems for those involved in the film - including Soriano, who left for Spain shortly after a fascist military coup in 1976.
Amid an easing of repression by the dictatorship, Soriano returned in 1979. That year, he reprised his best-known stage role on film: that of a senile but ravenous grandmother in Roberto Cossa's tragicomic La nona - which in some ways mirrored the country's sudden foreign debt crisis, with its ever-growing interest obligations.
Soriano's role in “Another Hope” in 1984, a dystopian film set in a factory where energy is generated from human bodies, was likewise a timely metaphor for the targeting of union members during the 1976-83 regime. He then portrayed the late reformist Senator Lisandro de la Torre in Juan José Jusid's “An Assassination in the Senate” - a historical drama based on de la Torre's 1935 attempted murder.
Among his better-known later roles were that of a dying idealist determined to stop the sale of a historic Uruguayan steam locomotive in Diego Arsuaga's “The Last Train” (2002), and as an elderly and struggling Argentine immigrant in New York in Rodrigo Fürth's “Through Your Eyes” (2006).
At: https://euro.eseuro.com/news/1014977.html
Prolific Argentine actor and playwright Pepe Soriano, 1929-2023.
Soriano was equally at home on stage as on film. “Cinema is the great medium. It is really the possibility of showing work for posterity,” he noted recently.
“Theater is like water in your hands: It begins and ends, and remains, in memory. Cinema, on the other hand, rescues (memories) from the greats.”
Argentine monthly inflation rate hits 12.4% in August, a 32-year high
Argentina’s monthly inflation rate was 12.4% in August, according to the National Institute for Statistics and Census (INDEC).
The figure is almost double that of July and represents the highest monthly rate since February 1991, when the country was mired in a hyperinflation crisis.
Food and beverages had the greatest impact on the index - with the cost of meats, derivatives, vegetables, and legumes increasing by 15.6%.
INDEC’s price report, the first since the nationwide primary (PASO) elections on August 13, is the first to reflect the 22% devaluation that raised the official exchange rate for the U.S. dollar from 300 to 366 pesos.
The parallel, "blue" rate jumped within days from 605 pesos before the primaries to 720, as worried Argentines rushed to buy dollars; exchange rates have since stabilized however.
Year-over-year inflation hit 124.4% - the highest since August 1991 - and for the first eight months of 2023 reached 80.2%.
Median wages as of June had risen 108.7% annually - but among unregistered workers (around a third of the total), only 82.4%.
Economy Minister Sergio Massa, who's running for president on the ruling, center-left Union for the Homeland ticket, enacted a 36% raise in pensions for September in response - among other measures including wide-reaching tax cuts.
At: https://buenosairesherald.com/economics/monthly-inflation-rate-hits-12-4-a-32-year-high
Argentine Economy Minister Sergio Massa announces a stimulus package in response to inflation numbers for August - the highest for the country in 32 years.
Massa, who's running for president on the ruling, center-left Union for the Homeland ticket, enacted a 36% raise in pensions and a 152% jump in income tax standard deductions among other measures.
The pragmatic Massa faces a stiff challenge from far-right candidate Javier Milei - who has tapped into popular discontent by pledging to "dynamite" the central bank and other institutions.
Biden, Modi, other leaders launch the Global Biofuels Alliance in clean energy effort
Source: The Hill
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a new biofuels initiative at the G-20 summit in New Delhi, India on Saturday, signaling a push for more green energy globally.
India will lead the Global Biofuels Alliance alongside the U.S. and Brazil, a move which is aimed to accelerate the shift to net zero emission targets by promoting plant and animal waste biofuels.
“The Alliance is focused on securing the supply of biofuels, ensuring these biofuels remain affordable and are produced sustainably,” the White House said in a statement.
Argentina, Italy, Mauritius, and the UAE also joined as members of the group, with Bangladesh and Singapore as observers.
“President Biden has made turning the tide towards a clean energy transition one of his Administration’s top priorities,” the White House said.
Read more: https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/4195694-biden-modi-other-leaders-launch-the-global-biofuels-alliance-in-clean-energy-effort/
President Joe Biden joins Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other heads of state in the launching of the Global Biofuels Alliance, during today's G-20 summit in New Delhi.
The nine founding nations total over 2.2 billion people, a third of the world's GDP, and two-thirds of biofuels output.
America and China's $574 billion chip war has already scored 'extraordinary success' for Joe Biden
Last October was the starting gun in a whole new race between the U.S. and China, and this summer marked a midway point of sorts. From the vantage point of Kevin Klyman, a technology policy researcher at Harvard University, “it has gone quite well for the Biden administration in terms of getting foreign partners on board.”
He was talking, of course, about semiconductor chips, the magical tiny structures that power everything from computers to computerized cars and are becoming something like the oil of the 21st century.
President Joe Biden set the clock racing on Oct. 7 with a set of export controls that sought to restrict China’s procurement of highly advanced chips and the computers containing them. Also, they didn’t just target the cutting-edge chips but the tools that could be used to make them, such as Netherlands-based ASML’s state-of-the-art lithography machine.
That’s a serious barrier preventing China from developing its own models of the most advanced chips. And America’s Dutch and Japanese allies have come on board, stunning experts like Klyman.
“It has been an extraordinary success beyond anyone's wildest dreams that the Netherlands and Japan have joined U.S. export controls to the hilt.” Klyman told Fortune. “That was not what outside analysts expected.”
At: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/america-and-china-s-574-billion-chip-war-has-already-scored-an-extraordinary-success-beyond-anyone-s-wild-dreams-for-joe-biden/ar-AA1gaAxv
President Joe Biden signs the CHIPS and Science Act in August 2022.
The policy has been credited with reversing a longstanding trend toward growing U.S. dependence on Chinese-made chips and semiconductors.
Export controls, moreover, have impeded China's access to cutting-edge Western technology.
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