Obama Authorizes Limited Air Strikes Against Militants in Iraq
August 8th, 2014So worried about a “Potential act of genocide” is it?
“Fears of a humanitarian catastrophe.”
That’s very interesting, considering that the U.S. funded and armed the ISIS group it now wants to bomb. And while we’re on to topic of funding and arming terrorists, remember that the U.S. is the primary state sponsor of the international terrorist organization known as the State of Israel.
America is coming to help (WARNING: GRAPHIC):
Via: Reuters:
President Barack Obama said on Thursday he had authorized U.S. air strikes to blunt the onslaught of Islamist militants in northern Iraq and began airdrops of supplies to besieged religious minorities to prevent a “potential act of genocide.”
Obama, in his most significant response yet to the crisis, said he approved “targeted” use of air power to protect U.S. personnel if Islamic State militants advance further toward Arbil, the capital of the Kurdish semi-autonomous region in northern Iraq, or threaten Americans anywhere in the country.
He said air strikes, which would be the first carried out by the U.S. military in Iraq since its withdrawal in 2011, could also be used if necessary in support of Iraqi and Kurdish forces trying to break the Islamists’ siege of a mountaintop where tens of thousands of civilians are trapped.
“Earlier this week, one Iraqi in the area cried to the world, ‘There is no one coming to help’,” said Obama, who had been reluctant to deepen U.S. military re-engagement in Iraq.
“Well, today America is coming to help.”
…
Obama took action amid international fears of a humanitarian catastrophe engulfing tens of thousands of members of Iraq’s minority Yazidi sect driven out of their homes and stranded on Sinjar mountain under threat from rampaging militants of Islamic State, an al Qaeda splinter group.
Many Iraqi Christians have also fled for their lives.
“We can act carefully and responsibly to prevent a potential act of genocide,” said Obama, who described the militants as “barbaric.”
Irish Senator Condemns Gaza Massacre, “Nazi Talk” by Israelis
August 7th, 2014Via: International Middle East Media Center:
Irish senator and former presidential candidate David Norris made a powerful speech on 31 July condemning Israel’s massacre in Gaza and the complicity of American, Irish and other European governments.
Russia Bans Food Imports from U.S., E.U.; Might Ban Flights Over Airspace
August 7th, 2014Via: Washington Post:
Russia on Thursday banned most imports of Western food products, a sweeping escalation in an economic war that will deal a multibillion-dollar hit to affected nations but will also unreel wide-ranging consequences at home.
The measures were a signal that Russia is not backing down from a confrontation that has sent Western-Russian tensions to heights not seen since the Cold War — and that it is willing to risk barer shelves and higher food prices at home in the name of striking a blow against countries that have tried to punish it for its alleged support of a pro-Russian insurgency in eastern Ukraine.
Russia suspended imports of meat, fish, fruit, vegetables and milk products from the United States, the 28-nation European Union, Norway, Canada and Australia for a period of a year. The move came in retaliation for sanctions those countries issued over the conflict in Ukraine, where Russia is accused of sending weaponry and other support to rebels. Russia has denied the charges.
Western officials also have accused Moscow of massing troops along the Ukraine-Russia border in a formation that appears designed for an invasion.
In another move with Cold War echoes, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev also said Thursday that Russia was considering banning U.S. and European airlines from flying over Russian airspace in transit to Asia. That could increase travel times and costs and would be a step back to an era when Western planes were enjoined from flying over the Soviet Union.
Molten Salt Nuclear Reactor Project Attracts Venture Capital Funds
August 7th, 2014Via: Gigaom:
On Tuesday, nuclear startup Transatomic Power announced that it has closed a seed round of $2 million from the Founders Fund’s newly-launched science-focused fund FF Science.
The Founders Fund is the firm behind some of the more successful Internet startups out there including Facebook, Yammer and Spotify, but also some science-focused companies such as Climate Corporation, Space-X and satellite startup Planet Labs. The fund, which was created by PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel and his partners, promotes this manifesto: “we wanted flying cars, instead we got 140 characters.”
Gamma FinFisher Hacked: 40 GB of Internal Documents and Source Code of Government Malware Published
August 6th, 2014Via: Netzpolitik (Google Cache Version):
A hacker claims to have hacked a network of the surveillance technology company Gamma International and has published 40 gigabytes of internal data. A Twitter account has published release notes, price lists – and source code. Malware researchers and human rights activists welcome the publication, Gamma itself refuses to comment.
This is an english adaption of two German articles. Thanks to Anna and Kilian for their help on the translation.
Yesterday, we reported that the Twitter account @GammaGroupPR is publishing internal documents of the offensive computer intrusion product suite FinFisher/FinSpy, developed by Gamma and marketed and sold to state actors around the world. A post on reddit with the same username claims:
[…] a couple days ago when I hacked in and made off with 40GB of data from Gamma’s networks. I have hard proof they knew they were selling (and still are) to people using their software to attack Bahraini activists, along with a whole lot of other stuff in that 40GB.
Here’s a torrent of all the data. Please download and seed. Here’s a twitter feed where I’m posting some of the interesting stuff I find in there, starting off slow to build up rather than just publish all the worst shit at once.
Billionaire Paid $100 Million for a Get Out of Jail Free Card
August 6th, 2014Via: The Verge:
Bernie Ecclestone is an exceptionally wealthy man who until recently will have been familiar to Formula 1 racing fans and quite unimportant to the rest of the world. Only what he did today should make him a figure of global notoriety: Ecclestone paid $100 million to have a German court dismiss corruption charges raised against him that could have resulted in a 10-year prison sentence. No wonder he’s laughing.
Why Robots Are Getting Cuter
August 6th, 2014Via: The Verge:
The tendency of people to treat minimally anthropomorphic bots as humans worries some people. We are, in a sense, falling prey to a powerful illusion. The expressions and gestures are shorthand for internal states you imagine, instinctively, are like yours, but really are only code. If a thing seems alive, if it looks cute, it’s triggering two responses evolved long before we could create simulated life.
Child Victims of Recent Israeli Atrocities
August 6th, 2014Via: Gaza’s Children:
In July 2014, an Israeli incursion into Gaza resulted in numerous casualties. Many of the victims were children. This website is dedicated to their memory.
Someone New Leaking Classified U.S. Government Information
August 6th, 2014Via: The Verge:
Almost a year since former NSA contractor Edward Snowden’s leaked information was first revealed to the world, US officials today confirmed to CNN a new leaker is responsible for providing additional secret documents to The Intercept. The Intercept is an investigative website cofounded by Glenn Greenwald, the reporter to whom Snowden entrusted the bulk of his documents, and it has recently been publishing a series on the inner workings of the US government’s terror watch list. Just today, The Intercept published a new article based on leaked information indicating that 40 percent of the 680,000 total people listed on the watch list have “no recognized terrorist group affiliation.”
The documents, which The Intercept reported were leaked by someone within the intelligence community, further show that the separate “no fly” list banning people from air travel has expanded under President Obama to include 47,000 names, the highest number since the list was created in 2001. The new information raises the question of why 280,000 names remain on the terrorist watch list if there isn’t evidence linking them to specific terror groups. Are all of these people potentially homegrown terrorists, or are they part of groups that the government hasn’t identified yet, or perhaps they have shown interest in terror groups but haven’t joined them?
The Intercept doesn’t have answers and doesn’t try to speculate, but it points out that per the leaked documents, both the terror watch list and the no-fly list are actually subsets of an even larger database known as the Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment (TIDE), which contains over a million names. Various agencies can add names to TIDE, including the CIA, NSA, and FBI. The Intercept also notes that TIDE is shared with the military and some police departments, including the NYPD.
Aspirin a Day Could Dramatically Cut Cancer Risk, Says Biggest Study Yet
August 6th, 2014There are some risks, but even considering those… It makes for an interesting read at a minimum.
Via: Guardian:
An aspirin a day could dramatically cut people’s chances of getting and dying from common cancers, according to the most detailed review yet of the cheap drug’s ability to stem disease.
More than 130,000 deaths would be avoided over a 20-year period if Britain’s 50- to 64-year-olds took a daily aspirin for 10 years, because the beneficial effects continue even when the aspirin is stopped, the authors say.
A research team led by Professor Jack Cuzick, head of the centre for cancer prevention at Queen Mary University of London, concluded that people between 50 and 65 should consider regularly taking the 75mg low-dosage tablets.
Cuzick said that taking aspirin “looks to be the most important thing we can do to reduce cancer after stopping smoking and reducing obesity, and will probably be much easier to implement”.
