#and will continue to take global powers' criticism under advisement

[brutlist]

jacob heugh is a public figure!

[mariacallous]

Some of the United States’ largest civil liberties groups are urging Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer not to pursue a short-term extension of the Section 702 surveillance program slated to sunset on December 31.

The more than 20 groups—Demand Progress, the Brennan Center for Justice, American Civil Liberties Union, and Asian Americans Advancing Justice among them—oppose plans that would allow the program to continue temporarily by amending “must-pass” legislation, such as the bill needed now to avert a government shutdown by Friday, or the National Defense Authorization Act, annual legislation set to dictate $886 billion in national security spending across the Pentagon and US Department of Energy in 2024.

“In its current form, [Section 702] is dangerous to our liberties and our democracy, and it should not be renewed for any length of time without robust debate, an opportunity for amendment, and—ultimately—far-reaching reforms,” a letter from the groups to Schumer says. It adds that any attempt to prolong the program by rushed amendment “would demonstrate blatant disregard for the civil liberties and civil rights of the American people.”

The letter, which was first reported by Bloomberg Law, cited reporting by WIRED and CQ Roll Call. Schumer did not respond to a request for comment.

As WIRED has previously reported, surveillance under the 702 program may technically continue for another six months, regardless of whether Congress reauthorizes it by the end of December. The program was last certified by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court in April 2023 for a full year. “Transition procedures” codified in the statute permit surveillance orders to “continue in effect” until they expire.

The 702 program is controversial for its collection of communications of “US persons.” The program legally targets roughly a quarter million foreigners each year, gathering the content of their text messages, emails, and phone calls, but collaterally intercepts an unknown but presumably large amount of American communications as well. This interception takes place with the compelled cooperation of US telecommunications companies that handle internet traffic at stages along global networks.

The program includes procedures for intercepting, storing, and querying the information in ways that are designed to “minimize” the odds of Americans’ rights being violated, but the rules are also subject to various exemptions. A top criticism of the 702 program is that it permits the Federal Bureau of Investigation to access the calls and emails of US citizens without a warrant and without evidence they’ve committed a crime.

The 702 program was last reauthorized in 2018 following a similarly contentious debate. The program currently permits the National Security Agency to target foreigners under an array of circumstances related to counterterrorism, espionage, and nuclear proliferation, though is also prominently used today to investigate and combat cybercrime and drug trafficking.

On November 7, a bipartisan, bicameral coalition of US lawmakers introduced a comprehensive privacy bill called the Government Surveillance Reform Act, led in part by veteran Senate Intelligence Committee member Ron Wyden. Among other provisions aimed at restricting warrantless surveillance and the collection of location data by police, the bill would impose several reforms of the 702 program, ensuring the FBI obtained a warrant before querying the database using “US Person” identifiers.

The GSRA is widely supported by the civil liberties groups whose letter advises Schumer against a short-term extension of Section 702.

“I plan to vote against any continuing resolution that extends FISA Section 702 without meaningful reforms," Wyden tells WIRED. "Massive surveillance programs that violate Americans’ privacy should not be rushed through without reform or review. Congress must have a real debate about reforming warrantless government surveillance of Americans. Therefore, the administration and congressional leaders should listen to the overwhelming bipartisan coalition that supports adopting commonsense protections for Americans’ privacy and extending key national security authorities at the same time.”

[reading-writing-revolution]

Heather Cox Richardson

October 4, 2021 (Monday)

“hello literally everyone,” the official account of Twitter tweeted this afternoon, after Facebook and its affiliated platforms Instagram and WhatsApp went dark at about 11:40 this morning. The Facebook outage lasted for more than six hours and appears to have been caused by an internal error. But the void caused by the absence of the internet giant illustrated its power at a time when the use of that power has come under scrutiny.

In mid-September, the Wall Street Journal began to publish a series of investigative stories based on documents provided by a whistle-blower.

The “Facebook Files” explore how the company has “whitelisted” high-profile users, exempting them from the rules that put limits on ordinary users. Another article reveals that researchers showed Facebook executives evidence that Instagram damages teenage girls by pushing an ideal body image and that they flagged the increasing use of the site by drug smugglers, human traffickers, and other criminals; their discoveries went unaddressed.

Concerned about declining engagement with their material, Facebook allegedly privileged polarizing material that engaged people by preying on their emotions. It appeared to have encouraged the extremism that led to the January 6 insurrection, lowering restrictions against disinformation quickly after the 2020 election.

Last night, on CBS’s 60 Minutes, former Facebook employee Frances Haugen revealed herself to be the source of the documents. She is concerned, she says, that Facebook consistently looks to maximize profits even if it means ignoring disinformation. Her lawyers have filed at least eight complaints with the Securities and Exchange Commission, which oversees companies and financial markets. Facebook’s vice president of global affairs, Nick Clegg, said it was “ludicrous” to blame Facebook for the events of January 6. Chief executive officer Mark Zuckerberg and chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg have not commented.

Lawmakers have repeatedly asked Facebook to produce documents for their scrutiny and to testify about the social media platform’s public safeguards. Tomorrow, Haugen will testify before the Senate Subcommittee on Consumer Protection, Product Safety, and Data Security about the effects of social media on teenagers. Her lawyer, Andrew Bakaj, told Cat Zakrzewski and Cristiano Lima of the Washington Post that Haugen’s information is important because “Big Tech is at an inflection point…. It touches every aspect of our lives—whether it’s individuals personally or democratic institutions globally. With such far-reaching consequences, transparency is critical to oversight, and lawful whistleblowing is a critical component of oversight and holding companies accountable.”

Amidst the outrage over the Facebook revelations, technology reporter Kevin Roose at the New York Times suggested that the company’s aggressive attempts to court engagement reveal weakness, rather than strength, as younger users have fled to TikTok and other sites and Facebook has become the domain of older Americans. He notes that Facebook’s researchers foresee a drop of 45% in daily use in the next two years, suggesting that the company is desperate either to retain users or to create new ones.

While the technology Facebook represents is new, the concerns it raises echo public discussion of late nineteenth century industrialization, which was also the product of new technologies. At stake then was whether the concentration of economic power in a few hands would destroy our democracy by giving some rich men far more power than the other men in the country. How could the nation both preserve the right of individuals to build industries and preserve the concept of the common good in the face of technology that permitted unprecedented accumulations of wealth?

While money is certainly at stake in the issue of Facebook’s power today, the more pressing issue for our country is whether social media giants will destroy our democracy through their ability to spread disinformation that sows division and turns us against one another.

When we began to grapple with the excesses of industrialism, lots of people thought the whole system needed to be taken apart—by violence if necessary—while others hoped to save the benefits the technology brought without letting it destroy the country. Americans eventually solved the problems that industrialization raised for democracy by reining in the Wild West mentality of the early industrialists, protecting the basic rights of workers, and regulating business practices.

The leaked Facebook documents suggest there are places where the disinformation at Facebook could be reined in as the overreaches of industrialization were. When Zuckerberg tried to promote coronavirus vaccines on the site, anti-vaxxers undermined his efforts. But one document showed that “out of nearly 150,000 posters in Facebook Groups disabled for Covid misinformation, 5% were producing half of all posts, and around 1,400 users were responsible for inviting half the groups’ new members.” Researchers concluded: “We found, like many problems at FB, this is a head-heavy problem with a relatively few number of actors creating a large percentage of the content and growth.”

“I don’t hate Facebook,” Haugen wrote in a final message to her colleagues at the company. “I love Facebook. I want to save it.”

While most Americans were busy watching Facebook crash—the falling stock took between $5 billion and $7 billion of Zuckerberg’s net worth—drama in Washington, D.C., was an even bigger deal.

Los Angeles Times reporter Sarah D. Wire noted that the rioters who broke into the Capitol on January 6 ran more than 100 feet past 15 reinforced windows, “making a beeline” to four windows that had been left unreinforced in a renovation of the building between 2017 and 2019. They found the four windows, located in a recessed part of the building, Wire wrote, “by sheer luck, real-time trial and error, or advance knowledge by rioters.”

The Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol will likely look into this oddity.

The committee has begun to take testimony from cooperative witnesses. Observers expect fireworks on Thursday when former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, longtime Trump aide Dan Scavino, Trump adviser Steve Bannon, and Trump appointee Kash Patel must hand over documents. Trump has vowed to fight the release of any information to the committee. Chair Bennie Thompson (D-MS) says the committee will make criminal referrals for anyone ignoring a subpoena.

Finally, today, the debt ceiling fight got even hotter. While Congress passed a continuing resolution to fund the government through December 3, the issue of the debt ceiling, which stops the government from borrowing money Congress has already spent, remains unresolved. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen says the government will be unable to pay its obligations after October 18, and warns that a default, which has never before happened, would be catastrophic.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) insists the Democrats must raise the debt ceiling themselves, although the Republicans raised it three times under former president Trump and added $7.8 trillion to the debt, which now stands at $28 trillion. But when Democrats tried to pass a measure to raise the ceiling, Republicans filibustered it. As Greg Sargent points out in the Washington Post, McConnell is trying to force the Democrats to raise the debt ceiling through reconciliation, which cannot be filibustered. Since they get only one chance to pass such a bill this year, this would force them to dump their infrastructure bill.

McConnell is holding the nation hostage to keep the Democrats from passing a very popular bill, and today, Biden called him on it. McConnell complained that congressional Democrats were “sleepwalking toward significant and avoidable danger,” prompting Biden to demand that Republicans “stop playing Russian roulette with the U.S. economy.... Not only are Republicans refusing to do their job, but threatening to use their power to prevent us from doing our job—saving the economy from a catastrophic event—I think, quite frankly, is hypocritical, dangerous and disgraceful. Their obstruction and irresponsibility knows absolutely no bounds.”

When asked if he could guarantee we would not default on our debts, Biden said, “No, I can’t…. That’s up to Mitch McConnell.” If McConnell doesn’t blink and the Republicans continue to filibuster Democrats’ attempts to save the economy, there will be enormous pressure on the Democrats to break the filibuster.

Meanwhile, every day this drags on, Congress does not pass the Freedom to Vote Act.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

October 4, 2021

Heather Cox Richardson

“hello literally everyone,” the official account of Twitter tweeted this afternoon, after Facebook and its affiliated platforms Instagram and WhatsApp went dark at about 11:40 this morning. The Facebook outage lasted for more than six hours and appears to have been caused by an internal error. But the void caused by the absence of the internet giant illustrated its power at a time when the use of that power has come under scrutiny.

In mid-September, the Wall Street Journal began to publish a series of investigative stories based on documents provided by a whistle-blower.

The “Facebook Files” explore how the company has “whitelisted” high-profile users, exempting them from the rules that put limits on ordinary users. Another article reveals that researchers showed Facebook executives evidence that Instagram damages teenage girls by pushing an ideal body image and that they flagged the increasing use of the site by drug smugglers, human traffickers, and other criminals; their discoveries went unaddressed.

Concerned about declining engagement with their material, Facebook allegedly privileged polarizing material that engaged people by preying on their emotions. It appeared to have encouraged the extremism that led to the January 6 insurrection, lowering restrictions against disinformation quickly after the 2020 election.

Last night, on CBS’s 60 Minutes, former Facebook employee Frances Haugen revealed herself to be the source of the documents. She is concerned, she says, that Facebook consistently looks to maximize profits even if it means ignoring disinformation. Her lawyers have filed at least eight complaints with the Securities and Exchange Commission, which oversees companies and financial markets. Facebook’s vice president of global affairs, Nick Clegg, said it was “ludicrous” to blame Facebook for the events of January 6. Chief executive officer Mark Zuckerberg and chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg have not commented.

Lawmakers have repeatedly asked Facebook to produce documents for their scrutiny and to testify about the social media platform’s public safeguards. Tomorrow, Haugen will testify before the Senate Subcommittee on Consumer Protection, Product Safety, and Data Security about the effects of social media on teenagers. Her lawyer, Andrew Bakaj, told Cat Zakrzewski and Cristiano Lima of the Washington Post that Haugen’s information is important because “Big Tech is at an inflection point…. It touches every aspect of our lives—whether it’s individuals personally or democratic institutions globally. With such far-reaching consequences, transparency is critical to oversight, and lawful whistleblowing is a critical component of oversight and holding companies accountable.”

Amidst the outrage over the Facebook revelations, technology reporter Kevin Roose at the New York Times suggested that the company’s aggressive attempts to court engagement reveal weakness, rather than strength, as younger users have fled to TikTok and other sites and Facebook has become the domain of older Americans. He notes that Facebook’s researchers foresee a drop of 45% in daily use in the next two years, suggesting that the company is desperate either to retain users or to create new ones.

While the technology Facebook represents is new, the concerns it raises echo public discussion of late nineteenth century industrialization, which was also the product of new technologies. At stake then was whether the concentration of economic power in a few hands would destroy our democracy by giving some rich men far more power than the other men in the country. How could the nation both preserve the right of individuals to build industries and preserve the concept of the common good in the face of technology that permitted unprecedented accumulations of wealth?

While money is certainly at stake in the issue of Facebook’s power today, the more pressing issue for our country is whether social media giants will destroy our democracy through their ability to spread disinformation that sows division and turns us against one another.

When we began to grapple with the excesses of industrialism, lots of people thought the whole system needed to be taken apart—by violence if necessary—while others hoped to save the benefits the technology brought without letting it destroy the country. Americans eventually solved the problems that industrialization raised for democracy by reining in the Wild West mentality of the early industrialists, protecting the basic rights of workers, and regulating business practices.

The leaked Facebook documents suggest there are places where the disinformation at Facebook could be reined in as the overreaches of industrialization were. When Zuckerberg tried to promote coronavirus vaccines on the site, anti-vaxxers undermined his efforts. But one document showed that “out of nearly 150,000 posters in Facebook Groups disabled for Covid misinformation, 5% were producing half of all posts, and around 1,400 users were responsible for inviting half the groups’ new members.” Researchers concluded: “We found, like many problems at FB, this is a head-heavy problem with a relatively few number of actors creating a large percentage of the content and growth.”

“I don’t hate Facebook,” Haugen wrote in a final message to her colleagues at the company. “I love Facebook. I want to save it.”

While most Americans were busy watching Facebook crash—the falling stock took between $5 billion and $7 billion of Zuckerberg’s net worth—drama in Washington, D.C., was an even bigger deal.

Los Angeles Times reporter Sarah D. Wire noted that the rioters who broke into the Capitol on January 6 ran more than 100 feet past 15 reinforced windows, “making a beeline” to four windows that had been left unreinforced in a renovation of the building between 2017 and 2019. They found the four windows, located in a recessed part of the building, Wire wrote, “by sheer luck, real-time trial and error, or advance knowledge by rioters.”

The Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol will likely look into this oddity.

The committee has begun to take testimony from cooperative witnesses. Observers expect fireworks on Thursday when former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, longtime Trump aide Dan Scavino, Trump adviser Steve Bannon, and Trump appointee Kash Patel must hand over documents. Trump has vowed to fight the release of any information to the committee. Chair Bennie Thompson (D-MS) says the committee will make criminal referrals for anyone ignoring a subpoena.

Finally, today, the debt ceiling fight got even hotter. While Congress passed a continuing resolution to fund the government through December 3, the issue of the debt ceiling, which stops the government from borrowing money Congress has already spent, remains unresolved. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen says the government will be unable to pay its obligations after October 18, and warns that a default, which has never before happened, would be catastrophic.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) insists the Democrats must raise the debt ceiling themselves, although the Republicans raised it three times under former president Trump and added $7.8 trillion to the debt, which now stands at $28 trillion. But when Democrats tried to pass a measure to raise the ceiling, Republicans filibustered it. As Greg Sargent points out in the Washington Post, McConnell is trying to force the Democrats to raise the debt ceiling through reconciliation, which cannot be filibustered. Since they get only one chance to pass such a bill this year, this would force them to dump their infrastructure bill.

McConnell is holding the nation hostage to keep the Democrats from passing a very popular bill, and today, Biden called him on it. McConnell complained that congressional Democrats were “sleepwalking toward significant and avoidable danger,” prompting Biden to demand that Republicans “stop playing Russian roulette with the U.S. economy.... Not only are Republicans refusing to do their job, but threatening to use their power to prevent us from doing our job—saving the economy from a catastrophic event—I think, quite frankly, is hypocritical, dangerous and disgraceful. Their obstruction and irresponsibility knows absolutely no bounds.”

When asked if he could guarantee we would not default on our debts, Biden said, “No, I can’t…. That’s up to Mitch McConnell.” If McConnell doesn’t blink and the Republicans continue to filibuster Democrats’ attempts to save the economy, there will be enormous pressure on the Democrats to break the filibuster.

Meanwhile, every day this drags on, Congress does not pass the Freedom to Vote Act.

—

Notes:

https://www.commerce.senate.gov/2021/10/protecting%20kids%20online:%20testimony%20from%20a%20facebook%20whistleblower

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/10/03/facebook-whistleblower-frances-haugen-revealed/

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-facebook-files-11631713039

https://apnews.com/article/facebook-whatsapp-instagram-outage-8b9d3862ed957029e545182a595fdce1

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/03/technology/whistle-blower-facebook-frances-haugen.html

https://www.wsj.com/articles/facebook-whistleblower-frances-haugen-says-she-wants-to-fix-the-company-not-harm-it-11633304122

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/10/04/facebook-instagram-down-outage/

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/04/technology/facebook-files.html

https://www.wsj.com/articles/facebook-mark-zuckerberg-vaccinated-11631880296

https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2021-10-04/jan-6-rioters-exploited-little-known-capitol-weak-spots-a-handful-of-unreinforced-windows

https://www.politico.com/news/2021/10/01/bennie-thompson-jan-6-panel-subpoena-514940

https://www.politico.com/news/2021/10/04/jan-6-panel-trump-collision-514979

https://www.washingtonpost.com/us-policy/2021/10/04/biden-schumer-debt-ceiling/

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[albreehyde]

You know what the coronavirus pandemic hasn't stopped? The Hong Kong protests.

In fact, the protests have ramped up bc the CCP has passed on today, May 28th 2020 (HKT), the death sentence for Hong Kong, i.e. the most sinister plan to take away Hongkongers’ freedoms while we're all busy dealing with the coronavirus. Remember the now-withdrawn extradition law amendment bill (ELAB) that sparked the anti-ELAB protests last year? This new plan not only does that, but it even unleashes a whole new range of assault power.

No, the CCP isn't gonna crack down on Hongkongers with visible violence. They've learnt from the disastrous PR management of the June 4th / Tiananmen Massacre. Also, they need a better excuse for interfering in Hong Kong, 1 of the largest international financial centres and the gateway for the CCP to gain foreign currency and break into global financial markets.

Instead, the CCP’s plan is to force a "national security law" in Hong Kong like what they've been using in mainland China, bypassing Hong Kong’s legislature. The CCP leadership has already passed this law today, May 28th (HKT) and can sign it into effect as soon as early June.

We don’t know how much longer we can continue accessing international communication sites, which are banned in mainland China but freely accessible in Hong Kong, especially Google, WhatsApp, Tumblr, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube and Facebook. If we suddenly go silent about our fight for democracy, you can assume the censorship resulting from the "national security law" has taken effect.

Who’s gonna define that "national security law"? Most likely the CCP. They have their own legal system, instead of the common law system that HK uses based on the UK system. The CCP has an abominable track record of arbitrarily defining the law to persecute dissidents, violating human rights in the process. They have various means of silencing dissidents even if they manage to escape China. Well known dissidents include:

LIU Xiaobo, a Nobel Peace Prize Laureate.

HUANG Qi and TAN Zuoren, who advocated for an investigation into corruption in school construction following the 2008 Sichuan earthquake.

LI Wangyang, who took part in Tiananmen Square protests of 1989, tortured while in jail for 22 years and even still kept under surveillance after being released from prison.

WANG Quanzhang, a human rights lawyer who defends political activists and victims of police torture.

LEE Ming-che, a Taiwanese rights activist who promotes human rights and democracy online.

HU Jia, who posted articles on social issues which criticises the CCP.

WANG Yi (pen name: WANG Shuya), a Christian pastor who founded and led one of the well known underground churches in mainland China.

Tashi WANGCHUK, a Tibetan language education activist.

Currently, Hong Kong is the only city among all technically CCP-ruled regions where your freedoms and human rights are protected in practice (though fast eroding) with judicial independence (also starting to skew) following international law. 

After the "national security law" passes, Hongkongers will lose all our fundamental freedoms and rights, including but not limited to:

Freedom of expression.

The right to peaceful assembly.

Freedom of the press.

Freedom of thought.

Rights against arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.

The right against torture; and even,

The right to life, liberty and security of person.

Our fight against the CCP will become illegal, since we'll no longer be able to monitor and speak out against the CCP and CCP-backed HK government. Our very existence as Hongkongers could be seen as a rebellion. Hong Kong today, the world tomorrow.

Everyone, no matter your nationality, will no longer be safe from the CCP. The CCP threatens international law. The proposed law plans to allow CCP agents to work in Hong Kong. Hong Kong is one of the largest international travel hubs. Whoever lives in, or simply passing through Hong Kong, could be kidnapped and transported to mainland China if the CCP thinks you’re a threat. Does that sound familiar? Yeah, bc that’s the exact potential loophole we criticised during the anti-ELAB protests. In fact, this kind of abduction already happened in 2015, in the Causeway Bay Books disappearances which include LAM Wing-kee and GUI Minhai. The booksellers were persecuted for selling books on politics, human rights, criticism of the CCP leadership, and any subject that the CCP leadership didn’t like.

After the "national security law" passes, we'll no longer have the freedom to raise the alarm to the world about new epidemics first popping up in mainland China, like the coronavirus now and SARS in 2003 (more from the WHO archive). Fun fact: Hongkongers have been managing the coronavirus relatively well precisely bc we don't trust the CCP-backed HK gov and we’ve been taking preventive measures way before it advises us to, based on previous experience with SARS.

We’ll no longer have the right to be assumed innocent until proven guilty in the court, not even the right to fair trial and equality under the law, since HK will no longer have an independent judicial system under the separation of powers. Hong Kong is run on the rule of law but the CCP runs on the rule by law, and the CCP has increasingly pressured HK’s judges. Foreign judges will be banned from national security cases, likely bc they are more likely to uphold the rule of law and independent judiciary.

We'll no longer have the freedom to talk about the truth. Instead, we’ll be forced to censor ourselves and substitute the truth with CCP approved propaganda. The CCP knows who controls the truth controls society. The coronavirus? “No, it's spread to China by the US armed forces. It's a part of their plan to frame the CCP.” Banning TikTok and Huawei? “They don't cause security or privacy issues. There's no censorship on the platforms provided through these technologies. The ‘accusations’ are a part of an international plan to frame the CCP.” (Notice a pattern here?) Just 3 days ago (May 25, 2020), the Hong Kong exam board, which is independent from the Education Bureau, was forced to cancel a public exam question about Japan’s roles in the development of China from 1900 up to WWII bc it “hurts Chinese people’s” (aka CCP’s) “esteem and feelings”.

We'll no longer have the freedom to connect with the international community (Joshua WONG, Hong Kong activist) and different cultures with open minds, as the CCP looks down on the values and impacts of non-CCP-approved-Chinese cultures. It has an insatiable need to dominate the world through homogeneity, seizing natural resources, and economic expansion. Just look at how the CCP treats Uyghurs and Tibetans. Read about the Belt and Road Initiative especially in Africa - it's practically CCP colonialism. Then look at how the CCP, by building dams in upstream Mekong River, has caused a drought in Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. The CCP keeps claiming without proof that Hongkongers who want democracy are a minority (Spoiler: We aren't. At least 2 million residents out of 7.5 million, i.e. over 1 in 4 residents, marched for democracy on June 16, 2019. Remember?) are influenced by Western chaos agents, bc the CCP can't afford citizens thinking critically, criticizing and holding them accountable for their actions. Case in point: the June 4th / Tiananmen Massacre. The CCP-backed HK gov has extended the ban on social gatherings until (you guessed it) June 4th, which is rumoured to stop people from holding vigils, even though daily new coronavirus cases are in single digits and schools are reopening a week before.

We'll no longer have the freedom to maintain our identity of being Hongkongers, since according to CCP logic, being local / Hongkongers means identifying against CCP-controlled China → challenging and rebelling against the CCP → directly threatening CCP’s authority → enemy of CCP. The most conspicuous symbols? The Hong Kong anthem, Glory to Hong Kong. And Cantonese, the native language of over 90% of Hongkongers. A similar case has already happened with Tibetan culture and language: Tashi WANGCHUK, a Tibetan language education activist, was persecuted in 2018 simply for advocating to preserve his own heritage.

(Side note: If you ask if somebody speaks Chinese, it's like asking if they speak Asian or European. “Chinese” encompasses a group of languages which include Cantonese, Taiwanese and Mandarin, which currently many people refer to as “Chinese”. If you start talking in mainland-Chinese accented Mandarin to Hongkongers without asking, you'll get responses ranging from confused / pained replies in most likely English, often Cantonese, or rarely, Mandarin; the side eye; the silent treatment; or even a glare. We’re far more welcoming if you speak Taiwanese-accented Mandarin though.)

Hongkongers will keep fighting for our rights, and we need reinforced international support in our most urgent battle. So what can you do to stand with us?

1. Chris PATTEN, the last governor of Hong Kong under British rule, has led a joint statement to protest against the CCP’s move to force the "national security law" in Hong Kong. As of writing on May 28th, the day of passing the law, the joint statement's been co-signed by over 618 political representatives and academics from 33 countries, including the UK, the US, the EU, Canada, Australia, Russia and the rest of Asia. Please write to encourage your local policymaker to cosign the letter (template linked in-text).

2. Sign petitions that support our fight for freedom, e.g. international sanctions against the CCP, the CCP-backed Hong Kong government, and the Hong Kong Police Force.

3. Continue making posts in support of Hongkongers on your regular social media sites, esp Twitter, where there's a higher chance of politicians seeing your posts.

Yeah, like Matan EVENOFF, who tricked the NBA dance cam into streaming support for Hong Kong.

4. Report content spreading pro-CCP propaganda about the Hong Kong democracy movement; report both the comment / post and the account. Some common insults pro-CCP trolls use: “cockr**ch” (dehumanizing Hong Kong protestors); “sb” (initials of “d**chebag” in Mandarin); “nmsl” (initials of “Your mum is dead” in Mandarin); “biss” (a contraction of “must d*e” in Mandarin); and insinuating in any way that anyone in support of the protests is a “servant” or a “pet” of foreign politicians. People have mentioned that on Twitter, reports on pro-CCP troll content are more thoroughly followed up on and the content more likely to be removed. I've found that on Instagram, reporting as spam has a higher removal rate than reporting to other relevant categories.

5. Stay updated with the situation on HK by following independent and/or pro-democracy journalists in HK:

Hong Kong Free Press (In English. Official website / Twitter @hongkongfp / Instagram @hongkongfp / Youtube @hongkongfp / Facebook @hongkongfp)

The Stand News (Mostly in Chinese, but you don’t need to know Chinese to understand their infographics. Official website / Twitter @standnewshk / Instagram @thestandnews / Youtube @standnewshk / Facebook @standnewshk)

RTHK News (In both English and Chinese news; publicly funded. As of May 28th 2020, it has still maintained objective reporting, but this could change for the worse quickly bc the CCP-backed HK government has plans to interfere in its editorial independence. Official website / Twitter @rthk_enews / Facebook @RTHKEnglishNews)

Guardians of Hong Kong / Be Water Hong Kong (a volunteer page that translates news from Chinese to English; it updates quickly. Official website / Twitter @BeWaterHKG / Instagram @guardiansofhk / Facebook @BeWaterHongKong)

No matter what ultimately happens to Hongkongers, you're helping us make history. And even if Hongkongers still lose in the end, promise us that you'll continue fighting for us.

Remember us for centuries.

[96thdayofrage]

How the Taliban surge exposed Pentagon's lies

Western politicians and media colluded in duping their publics into believing Afghanistan was a 'winnable war'

The real explanation for the Taliban's 'surprise' success is that western publics were being duped all along

A month ago, as the US army prepared to end the 20-year occupation of Afghanistan and hand over responsibility to local security forces it had armed and trained, maps showed small, relatively isolated pockets of Taliban control.

At the weekend, the Islamist fighters marched unchallenged into Afghanistan's capital, Kabul, bringing almost the entire country under their thumb. US intelligence assessments that it would take the Taliban up to three months to capture Afghanistan's capital proved wildly inaccurate.

It took a few days.

Foreign nationals were left scrambling to Kabul's airport while American officials were hurriedly evacuated by helicopter, echoing the fall of Saigon in 1975, when US embassy staff were chased out of South Vietnam after years of a similarly failed war.

On Sunday, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani issued a statement that he had fled the country – reportedly in a helicopter stuffed with cash – to "avoid bloodshed". But all the evidence indicates his corrupt security forces were never in a position to offer serious resistance to a Taliban takeover.

Jumping ship

The speed with which the Taliban have re-established their hold on a country that was supposedly being reconstructed as some kind of western-style liberal democracy is astonishing. Or, at least, it is to those who believed that US and British military commanders, western politicians and the mainstream media were being straight all this time.

The real explanation for the Taliban's "surprise" success is that western publics were being duped all along. The United States' longest war was doomed from the start. The corrupt, entirely unrepresentative members of the Kabul elite were always going to jump ship as soon as Washington stopped pumping in troops and treasure.

According to Forbes magazine, as much as $2 trillion was poured into Afghanistan over the past 20 years – or $300m a day. The truth is that western politicians and the media intentionally colluded in a fiction, selling yet another imperial "war" in a far-off land as a humanitarian intervention welcomed by the local population.

As Daniel Davis, a former US army lieutenant colonel and critic of the war, observed at the weekend: "Since early 2002, the war in Afghanistan never had a chance of succeeding."

Nonetheless, many politicians and commentators are still sounding the same, tired tune, castigating the Biden administration for "betraying" Afghanistan, as if the US had any right to be there in the first place – or as if more years of US meddling could turn things around.

Colonial chessboard

No one should have been shocked by the almost-instant collapse of an Afghan government and its security services that had been foisted on the country by the US. But it seems some are still credulous enough – even after the catastrophic lies that justified "interventions" in Iraq, Libya and Syria – to believe western foreign policy is driven by the desire to assist poor countries rather than use them as pawns on a global, colonial chessboard.

Afghans are no different from the rest of us. They don't like outsiders ruling over them. They don't like having political priorities imposed on them. And they don't like dying in someone else's power game.

If the fall of Kabul proves anything, it is that the US never had any allies in Afghanistan outside of a tiny elite that saw the chance to enrich itself, protected by US and British firepower and given an alibi by western liberals who assumed their own simplistic discourse about identity politics was ripe for export.

Yes, the Taliban will be bad news for Afghan women and girls, as well as men, who are concerned chiefly with maintaining personal freedom. But a tough conclusion western audiences may have to draw is that there are competing priorities for many Afghans who have suffered under decades of invasions and colonial interference.

Just as in Iraq, large segments of the population appear to be ready to forgo freedom in return for a guarantee of communal stability and personal safety. That was something a US client regime, looking to divert aid into its own pockets, was never going to guarantee. While the US was in charge, many tens of thousands of Afghans were killed. We will never know the true figure because their lives were considered cheap. Millions more Afghans were forced into exile.

Spoils of war

Nothing about western intervention in Afghanistan has been as it was portrayed. Those deceptions long predate the invasion by the US and UK in 2001, supposedly to hunt down Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaeda fighters following the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center.

Seen now, the attack on Afghanistan looks more like scene-setting, and a rationalisation, for the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq that soon followed. Both served the neoconservative agenda of increasing the US footprint in the Middle East and upping the pressure on Iran.

The West has long pursued geostrategic interests in Afghanistan, given the country's value as a trade route and its role as a buffer against enemies gaining access to the Arabian Gulf. In the 19th century, the British and Russian empires used Afghanistan as the central arena for their manoeuvring in the so-called "Great Game".

Similar intrigues drove US-led efforts to expel the Soviet army after it invaded and occupied Afghanistan through the 1980s. Washington and Britain helped to finance, arm and train Islamist fighters, the mujahideen, that forced out the Red Army in 1989. The mujahideen went on to oust the country's secular, communist government.

After their victory against the Soviet army, the mujahideen leadership split, with some becoming little more than regional warlords. The country was plunged into a bloody civil war in which the mujahideen and warlords looted their way through the areas they conquered, often treating women and girls as the spoils of war.

Despite Washington officials' constant trumpeting of their concern at Taliban violations of women's rights – in what became an additional pretext for continuing the occupation – the US had shown no desire to tackle such abuses when they were committed by its own mujahideen allies.

Rule of the warlords

The Taliban emerged in the 1990s from religious schools in neighbouring Pakistan as civil war raged in Afghanistan. They vowed to end the corruption and insecurity felt by Afghans under the rule of the warlords and mujahideen, and unify the country under Islamic law.

They found support, especially in poor, rural areas that had suffered most from the bloodletting.

The subsequent "liberation" of Afghanistan by US and British forces returned the country, outside a fortified Kabul, to an even more complex havoc. Afghans were variously exposed to violence from warlords, the Taliban, the US military and its local proxies.

To much of the population, Hamid Karzai, a former mujahideen leader who became the first Afghan president installed by the US occupation regime, was just another plundering warlord, the strongest only because he was backed by US guns and warplanes.

It was telling that five weeks ago, asked about the prospects of the Taliban returning to power, Biden stated that "the likelihood there's going to be one unified government in Afghanistan controlling the whole country is highly unlikely". Not only was he wrong, but his remarks suggested that Washington ultimately preferred to keep Afghanistan weak and divided between feuding strongmen.

That was precisely the reason most Afghans wanted the US gone.

Washington poured at least $88bn into training and arming a 300,000-strong Afghan army and police force that evaporated in Kabul, the government's supposed stronghold at the first sight of the Taliban. American taxpayers will be right to ask why such phenomenal sums were wasted on pointless military theatre rather than invested back home.

The US military, private security contractors, and arms manufacturers fed at what became a bottomless trough, and in the process were ever more deeply invested in maintaining the fiction of a winnable war. An endless, futile occupation with no clear objective swelled their budgets and ensured the military-industrial complex grew ever richer and more powerful.

Every indication is that the same war-industry juggernaut will simply change course now, playing up threats from China, Iran and Russia, to justify the continuation of budget increases that would otherwise be under threat.

Missing in action

The motive for US officials and corporations to conspire in the grand deception is clear. But what about the mainstream media, the self-declared "fourth estate" and the public's supposed watchdog on abuses of state power? Why were they missing in action all this time?

It is not as though they did not have the information needed to expose the Pentagon's lies in Afghanistan, had they cared to. The clues were there, and even reported occasionally. But the media failed to sustain attention.

As far back as 2009, as the US was preparing a pointless surge of troops to tackle the Taliban, Karl Eikenberry, then ambassador to Afghanistan, sent a cable to secretary of state Hillary Clinton that was leaked to the New York Times. He wrote that additional US forces would only "delay the day when Afghans will take over". A decade later, the Washington Post published secret documents it called the Afghan Papers that highlighted the Pentagon's systematic deceptions and lying. The subtitle was "At war with the truth".

Bob Crowley, an army colonel who had advised US military commanders in Afghanistan, observed: "Every data point was altered to present the best picture possible." The Post concluded that the US government had made every effort to "deliberately mislead the public".

John Sopko, the special inspector general for Afghan reconstruction appointed by Congress in 2012, had long detailed the waste and corruption in Afghanistan and the dismal state of the Afghan forces. But these reports were ignored or quickly disappeared without trace, leaving the Pentagon free to peddle yet more lies.

Cheerleading, not scrutinising

In the summer, as he issued yet another report, Sopko made scathing comments about claims that lessons would be learnt: "Don't believe what you're told by the generals or the ambassadors or people in the administration saying we're never going to do this again. That's exactly what we said after Vietnam... Lo and behold, we did Iraq. And we did Afghanistan. We will do this again."

A good part of the reason the Pentagon can keep recycling its lies is because neither Congress or the media is holding it to account.

The US media have performed no better. In fact, they have had their own incentives to cheerlead rather than scrutinise recent wars. Not least, they benefit from the drama of war, as more viewers tune in, allowing them to hike their advertising rates.

The handful of companies that run the biggest TV channels, newspapers and websites in the US are also part of a network of transnational corporations whose relentless economic growth has been spurred on by the "war on terror" and the channelling of trillions of dollars from the public purse into corporate hands.

The cosy ties between the US media and the military are evident too in the endless parade of former Pentagon officials and retired generals who sit in TV studios commenting as "independent experts" and analysts on US wars. Their failures in Iraq, Libya and Syria have not apparently dented their credibility.

That rotten system was proudly on display again this week as the media uncritically shared the assessments of David Petraeus, the former US commander in Afghanistan. Although Petraeus shares an outsize chunk of responsibility for the past two decades of military failure and Pentagon deception, he called for the "might of the US military" to be restored for a final push against the Taliban.  

Were it still possible to hold US officials to account, the Taliban's surge over the past few days would have silenced Petraeus and brought Washington's huge war scam crashing down.

Instead, the war industries will not even need to take a pause and regroup. They will carry on regardless, growing and prospering as though their defeat at the hands of the Taliban signifies nothing at all.

[anonymoushouseplantfan]

Submitted: PR Week article w/ strong criticisms of Harry & Meghan

PR Week article dated April 20, 2020:

Harry and Meghan’s “petulant” tabloids attack “out of step” with public mood

Excerpts:

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s decision to stoke the coals of their bitter feud with the UK’s tabloids has raised questions about the PR advice they are receiving.

…Most PR leaders warn that the timing of their move could alienate the couple to the British public.

“At this moment of an international crisis situation this appears out of step with the public mood,” said crisis communications consultant Amanda Coleman.

“The focus is on the need for everyone to work together, and that we are all in this together. Issuing a statement that is only about your situation lacks awareness and can appear distant. Given the media focus on the pandemic, I wonder whether it was necessary to take this step now.”

It’s a view shared by Borkowski PR founder Mark Borkowski, who made PRWeek’s 2020 Power Book list for risk and reputation management.

“Prince Harry once served his country, yet now, as the global pandemic dominates the global headlines, he has never seen more distanced from it. The latest swipe at the tabloids from the Sussex camp is a new high in hubristic arrogance and puts their Hollywood-based PR counsel under scrutiny,” he said.

“Perhaps this letter was an attempt at a marker before the case opens against the Mail On Sunday later this week, but it seems more likely that their denial and arrogance has just seen them solve the wrong problem really well yet again, perhaps revealing more about their true position and feelings than they would like.”

Field Consulting founder and chief executive Chris Rumfitt told PRWeek that until this moment, Harry and Meghan have had public support, “but this sort of thing risks making them look petulant and self-entitled”.

He said it’s not uncommon for clients to want to end co-operation with a specific publication.

“The question I ask is always the same – will this make the coverage better or worse? You should deal with each media enquiry on its own merits, and always remember the real audience, which is the readers of the newspaper, not the journalists or the publishers. It is those millions of readers of the tabloid press who Harry and Meghan are sending a terrible message to today.”

…Borkowski believes a better approach to influencing press coverage is to nurture stronger partnerships rather than wage a war.

When the press is running against you, he added, the partnership between PR counsel and subject is more vital than ever.

“It’s never easy to deliver bad news or a counter-perspective to a client, but it’s important that we find a way to do so, to avoid the inevitable backlash that results from bad timing, ill-advised tone and position. That “young, up-and-coming journalists” and grassroots media outlets will give them an easy time is just an assumption. Only their own more tactful communication and behaviour will begin to change attitudes.”

Borkowski warned that as long as the Sussexes continue to take “side swipes that lack any humility” against the press, they will be a long way from winning any battle against the tabloid media.

“This is a time when the world is enduring unbelievable worry, suffering and tragedy. The latest move by Meghan and Harry is a breathtaking example of their tone-deafness. And they only have themselves to blame,” he added.

[printableresumes1]

10 Powerful Resume Composing Rules

At the point when I completed school, I never needed to make a resume (educational program vitae or CV) as the organization where I went for connection was after my aptitudes. I never needed to search for an employment at this stage. I basically strolled into my first occupation without applying for it. I needed to get familiar with a quick method of making a powerful resume while under tension when a position emerged with a global combination 200 miles out of the capital. When I saw the promotion for the work, I had in a real sense 3 days to make a resume and application letter and quickly get it under the control of enrollment staff. I glance back at that resume (which I have saved for such countless years) and I ask myself "What in the world was I imparting, and why they recruited me?" The resume leaves a great deal to be wanted. Of the 5 positions I have had, I was just met once. The rest were a consequence of individuals understanding what I can convey and essentially snatching me. I might not have composed that numerous resumes yet I have perused various experiences with them as a business and departmental head. Note that your resume is the main contact that a potential boss has with you. Your resume is your minister that praises you in all the associations you might be pursuing.

1. You don't have to lie about what you have or don't have - Trustworthiness is measure upon the arrival of the meeting and the vast majority disregard what they would have lied about. Meetings just get some information about the substance or data they experienced and particularly the data they shortlisted you dependent on. Tragically individuals who lie a ton will in general fail to remember what they lied about and thus they are up to speed in their own plans. You don't need to tailor your resume to suit the ad. On the off chance that you generally need to do that, at that point chances are that you are not the individual they are searching for. In the event that it isn't on your unique resume, at that point please overlook that work and leave it to more genuine and appropriate individuals. Your own possibility will come. Card sharks or examiners are treated accordingly, their resumes are just retired or destroyed.

2. The more limited the resume the better - Individuals are not intrigued by long stories, when they need such they visit the closest library to acquire story books. Be with regards direct as conceivable in your resume. Attempt by all way to feature what you have in 3 pages all things considered. Know the things that "sell" about you and make features of those in more limited sentences. You can leave the elaboration for the day of the meeting. You won't be chosen because of your being over expound. Here and there individuals wind up having 6 to 8 page booklets with a wide range of enhancements and colorful language. Truly, picture is significant yet more critically is the thing that you have than what you are indicating to have.

3. Realize what to put accentuation on - Most bosses are not all that enthused about private matters like the number of youngsters you have, sensitivities to explicit nourishments, interests and so on Try not to squander space chipping in close to home data which is of no utilization to the possible business. Your resume should have the option to convey the basic data which is your abilities, encounters and instruction foundation. Some data that you put on the resume may neutralize you. In the event that you put down such pastimes as riding the web, conversing with companions, mingling, playing PC games and so on then enrollment specialists will get stressed that you won't work yet appear at login to the web and begin talking. Organizations have lost enough income thusly and when you feature such data, you have precluded yourself positively.

4. Lucidity is significant - It isn't accurate that you will be chosen dependent on the number of huge words you utilize yet dependent on how much the potential business becomes acquainted with about you through your resume. Large words should be left for secondary school public talking challenges. Utilize Fundamental English which is clear. Some of the time individuals who select you for a meeting are not even as specialized as you are consequently they need to determine what you are about without enlisting for your first degree to decipher your resume. List items bring clearness than sections of text. Number your headings and subheadings. Leave spaces between headings. Try not to be enticed to simply crush everything in one page when in established truth you are basically being over expand.

5. Arranging has the effect - Use textual styles that are anything but difficult to peruse. Cursive composing is to be evaded. You would prefer not to strain your possible boss. You need them to think about you in the most brief conceivable time. Resumes with textual styles that strain individuals' eyes are generally retired for "some other time" investigation or destroying. Continuously use Tab to adjust your work pleasantly than utilize the space bar. Data that isn't very much organized imparts that you don't focus on detail, you are messy and sluggish. Such perspectives can be found from the manner in which you design your archive. You can't have a resume in ALL Covers and with everything striking. Strong the subheadings and the content underneath must simply be plain content. On the off chance that you are not PC sharp (which you should be in this each propelling current culture), at that point I prescribe that you enlist a typist to type and design your resume.

6. May there be structure on your resume - Follow a coherent arrangement. As referenced before individuals are truly inspired by your abilities, perspectives, experience and instruction data more than individual issues. The succession I suggest as powerful is one that has your name on cover, straight into your aptitudes profile, at that point insight, the instructive/proficient profile, your own information and in conclusion your recognizable references. You are free to revise this as you see fit. There are various resume formats accessible on the web. Various nations endorse distinctive resume organizing procedures thus you should be touchy and significant by following the rules from the particular nation.

7. How refreshed is your resume - Consistently print a new duplicate of your resume which shows every little thing about you to date. It is irritating for questioners to then discover that you in reality went home a half year prior but your resume imparts that you are as yet utilized. It is equivalent to your resume being named as a bogus record. Continuously check with your refs in the event that they are as yet on similar numbers and email tends to you have. All the new courses joined in, all the outcomes as of late gathered, etc, should be on the resume. Keep an electronic duplicate which you can add, correct and print on interest than print many "destined to be out of date" resumes.

8. References add believability to your declarations - You references should be individuals who know you and ideally the individuals who were your bosses in the different associations. This is the motivation behind why you should leave associations appropriately and not escape like a criminal. I continue accepting calls from expected managers of my previous representatives from everywhere the world. Now and then I get messages and in a lion's share of cases I get calls. A few managers pay attention to references. They need to know why you left and what sort of individual you are. Kindly advise your references about it so they are prepared to respond to questions when reached. Try not to shock individuals by basically citing their names and not illuminating them. It is really impolite and a few references may wind up giving you an off-base proposal dependent on the disturbance they face. They may not recall you subsequently the motivation to advise them. click for more info Printable Resume Templates

9. Make snares that catch the crowd - You could have a passage which shows that sort of individual you are with books on it. Feature major or outstanding accomplishment, guarantee that you feel that they truly are or, more than likely essentially notice them as accomplishments. Under each sub heading likewise make snares by feature or summing up central questions under a similar point. Feature your differentiations where material. Two individuals who have done likewise degree with a similar degree of mastery will vary on the number of snares they decide to utilize or on the off chance that they actually will utilize them by any stretch of the imagination.

10. Innovativeness makes you stick out - By inventive I am not alluding to the way that you need a visual creator for your resume. You need to zest up the introduction through terms that you use and methods of conveying the resume. Rather than utilizing regular terms like Training, you could change that to Capabilities PROFILE similarly for instance. The most well-known methods of sending a resume are through printed design or through messages. Some inventive ways that individuals are utilizing increasingly more are: making an intelligent Cd where the business takes a visit through the representative's life and work through visuals and at times workers have sites with their resumes. While this is a chance, consistently give the alternative for a printable variant of your resume as some may even now be customary in methodology. The upside of an intelligent Cd and site is that you can "show" and not just "tell" individuals what you have done. You can catch your significant accomplishments and narrative them in a self overseeing slideshow (with an auto run office).

[phroyd]

President Trump’s inaccurate assertion that he has “total” authority to reopen a nation shuttered by the coronavirus is igniting a fresh challenge from governors scrambling to manage their states and highlighting a Republican Party reluctant to defy a president who has relished pushing the boundaries of executive power.

The president’s claim, first conveyed in a tweet Monday morning and underscored at a White House news conference and subsequent social media posts, caught his aides off guard and prompted them to study whether Trump would have such authority in a time of emergency like the ongoing pandemic.

Republicans were largely tepid in their criticism of Trump’s expansive views on his power, which he has wielded throughout his presidency as he circumvented the legislative branch on matters of spending and subpoenas, while enjoying decisions in which he maintained universal authority such as issuing pardons. Trump has also issued a multitude of executive orders while relying heavily on myriad acting administration officials rather than subjecting them to the Senate confirmation process.

At a White House briefing late Tuesday, Trump offered conflicting statements about which entity had the authority to reopen, seeming to backtrack from his claim Monday but at the same time insisting the federal government would have the final say.

“The governors are responsible. They have to take charge,” said Trump, who added that some states want to reopen now and probably can before May 1, while others aren’t there yet. He said that if a state with many cases tries to reopen early, the federal government might step in.

“If we disagree with it, we’re not going to let it open,” he said, before adding, “We’re there to help. But we’re also there to be critics.”

Earlier in the day, Trump’s comments on reopening the nation were challenged by his presumptive Democratic rival this fall, former vice president Joe Biden, and also by prominent governors overseeing the public health crisis in their states such as New York Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, who in his daily news conference Tuesday skewered at length Trump’s position as wildly off-base from the Constitution.

Cuomo said the president’s claim of total authority is “not an accurate statement,” because the basic principle of federalism is enshrined in the Constitution, in which powers not given to the federal government remain with the states.

“The statement that he has total authority over the states and the nation cannot go uncorrected,” Cuomo said. “There are many things that you can debate in the Constitution because they’re ambiguous. This is not ambiguous.”

Later Tuesday in his own remarks, California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) was less pointed toward Trump but nonetheless unequivocal, tweeting: “When it comes to reopening, SCIENCE — not politics — must be California’s guide.” Newsom outlined six factors he will consider in doing so, including protecting communities from the spread of the virus and ensuring that hospitals could handle any surge in cases.

The fresh power struggle between the federal government and state officials came as the toll of the pandemic continued to grow, with more than 25,000 people dead from the virus in the United States and more than 600,000 confirmed to be infected.

The International Monetary Fund said Tuesday that the pandemic is causing the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression of the 1930s. It is also inflicting acute pain in the medical sector, which continues to struggle with supplies and personnel becoming sick, with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention saying Tuesday that 9,000 health care workers have tested positive.

In another assertion of authority, Trump said he would halt funding to World Health Organization while a review was conducted. He has criticized the organization for its slow response in the early days of the outbreak, but by Jan. 30, the organization declared a global health emergency, after which the president continued to play down the outbreak and compared it with seasonal flu.

Governors also began outlining their strategy for reopening their states in the coming weeks and months, while a consortium of seven East Coast states continued a plan to explore how and when to lift restrictions in their geographically aligned states.

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine (R) was among the state leaders who made clear Tuesday that the facts on the ground must dictate when the current restrictions can begin to ease.

“This monster is still going to be with us at least until we get a vaccine,” DeWine, who has said his state has had a good working relationship with federal officials so far, said at a Tuesday news conference. “It’s not going away, and that’s the sad news. . . . We are 12-18 months away from this going away. We’re going to have to live with it..”

Two White House officials said there was no broader planning for Trump’s comments that he had “total” authority and that they were both surprised by his tweets to that effect Monday. There was no legal underpinning for the remarks in advance, said the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to talk frankly, and “it is widely viewed with skepticism in the building that we should be doing this.

The White House Counsel’s Office is studying what authority the president actually does have during a national emergency, according to the officials. But the operating plan in the White House is not to try to force any state to reopen, although one senior White House official said they had been in contact with some states — such as Texas, Mississippi and Tennessee — about reopening sooner rather than later.

“I am almost positive James Madison fell off a cloud somewhere today when Trump said that,” said Dan Eberhart, a Republican donor. “The founders of the republic stitched together a complicated game of chess to ensure our president was a very weak king who could be simultaneously slowed down by the legislature, judiciary and federalism. His authority is far from total.”

Another prominent GOP donor, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss private deliberations, said there was an effort “to talk him into a better place.”

One official said Trump is frustrated that the governors are getting so much credit and no blame while he gets all the blame and none of the credit. He particularly complains about Cuomo, this official said.

“Cuomo’s been calling daily, even hourly, begging for everything, most of which should have been the state’s responsibility, such as new hospitals, beds, ventilators, etc.,” Trump tweeted earlier Tuesday. “I got it all done for him, and everyone else, and now he seems to want Independence! That won’t happen!”

Trump has said repeatedly that the federal government is merely a backup to the states and that the onus is on the governors to deal with the pandemic.

Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) said in a recent interview that “at the end of the day, it will be the governors that make these decisions.”

Combative in public, Trump administration and congressional leaders negotiate behind the scenes on coronavirus relief

One Republican ally close to the president said Trump did not initially want to be associated with decisions to close down the government because “closing is bad news, and opening is good news.” And he spoke with governors such as Florida’s Ron DeSantis (R) who were skeptical, said this person, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe private conversations.

Trump was happy to accept the argument from some advisers that he should invoke federalism, and the president repeatedly emphasized states’ rights when questioned by reporters in recent weeks why he was not instituting a national stay-at-home order. But he sees a political triumph in reopening the economy and wants credit for it, this person said.

In a tweet Monday, Biden said that he is “not running for office to be King of America.”

“I respect the Constitution,” Biden said. “I’ve read the Constitution. I’ve sworn an oath to it many times. I respect the great job so many of this country’s governors — Democratic and Republican — are doing under these horrific circumstances.”

Within the GOP, Trump’s biggest challenge to his exertion of executive power came last year, when a dozen GOP senators voted to reject an emergency declaration the president issued to take taxpayer dollars from the military and other accounts for a border wall that Congress had denied.

Of that dozen, two — Sens. Rand Paul (Ky.) and Marco Rubio (Fla.) — issued comments Tuesday, both stressing that states should retain the power to regulate their own activities. Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) said in a statement: “I respect the authorities of the office of the presidency. I also recognize that it will take all of us — elected leaders and citizens — to effectively stop the spread of this virus.”

A spokeswoman for Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) pointed to his remarks from a Fox Business interview earlier Tuesday in which he said the matter was not just up to elected officials “deciding when it’s time and coming up with some arbitrary deadline,” but the science and whether people feel safe leaving their homes.

Aides to two others — Utah Sens. Mitt Romney and Mike Lee — said the senators would have no response. None of the other six responded to requests for comment. They were Sens. Lamar Alexander (Tenn.), Roy Blunt (Mo.), Susan Collins (Maine), Jerry Moran (Kan.), Patrick J. Toomey (Pa.) and Roger Wicker (Miss.).

At least two other prominent elected GOP lawmakers, past and present — Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), the third-ranking leader among House Republicans, and Republican-turned independent Rep. Justin Amash (Mich.) — challenged Trump’s notion.

Cheney, whose father, Richard B. Cheney, had pushed for broad executive authority as vice president in George W. Bush’s administration, cited the text of the 10th Amendment in a tweet: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

But other GOP lawmakers questioned about Trump’s bold claim, an assertion refuted by constitutional experts, were reluctant to challenge the president.

Rep. Steve Scalise (R-La.), the No. 2 House Republican, argued in a Fox News interview Tuesday that states had largely taken their cue from Trump and the federal government over the past two months, particularly when it comes to social distancing guidelines.

“When the president said that, you saw almost every governor in the country take that cue and say, ‘Okay, we’re going to institute a new set of policies,’ ” Scalise said. “And so, while the president hasn’t said every state has to do this, he’s been setting the guidance using the experts from CDC and other agencies, and then you see states following suit.”

A spokesman for Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R) on Tuesday declined to comment beyond the governor’s remarks to CNN on Monday in which he said governors were best positioned to make the ultimate decision on when their states can safely resume everyday activities.

“It’s not my understanding of the Constitution,” Hogan said in the CNN interview of Trump’s interpretation of his own powers.

Devlin Barrett, Ovetta Wiggins, Felicia Sonmez, Mike DeBonis, Samantha Pell and Brittany Shammas contributed to this report.

Phroyd

[berniesrevolution]

IN THESE TIMES

The threat of a U.S. attack on Iran is all too real. Led by John Bolton, the Trump administration is spinning tales of Iranian misdeeds. It is easy to concoct pretexts for aggression. History provides many examples.

The assault against Iran is one element of the international program of flaunting overwhelming U.S. power to put an end to “successful defiance” of the master of the globe: the primary reason for the U.S. torture of Cuba for 60 years.

The reasoning would easily be understood by any Mafia Don. Successful defiance can inspire others to pursue the same course. The “virus” can “spread contagion,” as Kissinger put it when laboring to overthrow Salvador Allende in Chile. The need to destroy such viruses and inoculate victims against contagion—commonly by imposing harsh dictatorships—is a leading principle of world affairs.

Iran has been guilty of the crime of successful defiance since the 1979 uprising that deposed the tyrant the U.S. had installed in the 1953 coup that, with help from the British, destroyed the parliamentary system and restored ­obedience. The achievement was welcomed by liberal opinion. As the New York Times explained in 1954, thanks to the subsequent agreement between Iran and foreign oil companies, “Underdeveloped countries with rich resources now have an object lesson in the heavy cost that must be paid by one of their number which goes berserk with fanatical nationalism.” The article goes on to state, “It is perhaps too much to hope that Iran’s experience will prevent the rise of Mossadeghs in other countries, but that experience may at least strengthen the hands of more reasonable and more far-seeing leaders.”

Little has changed since. To take another more recent example, Hugo Chávez changed from tolerated bad boy to dangerous criminal when he encouraged OPEC to raise oil prices for the benefit of the global south, the wrong people. Soon after, his government was overthrown by a military coup, welcomed by the leading voice of liberal journalism. The Times editors exulted that “Venezuelan democracy is no longer threatened by a would-be dictator,” the “ruinous demagogue” Hugo Chávez, “after the military intervened and handed power to a respected business leader, Pedro Carmona”—who quickly dissolved the National Assembly, suspended the constitution and disbanded the Supreme Court, but, unfortunately, was overthrown within days by a popular uprising, compelling Washington to resort to other means to kill the virus.

The quest for dominance

Once Iranian “successful defiance” was terminated, and the “clear-eyed” Shah was safely installed in power, Iran became a pillar of U.S. control of the Middle East, along with Saudi Arabia and post-1967 Israel, which was closely allied with the Shah’s Iran, though not formally. Israel also had shared interests with Saudi Arabia, a relationship now becoming more overt as the Trump administration oversees an alliance of reactionary Middle East states as a base for U.S. power in the region.

Control of the strategically significant Middle East, with its huge and easily accessible oil reserves, has been a centerpiece of policy since the U.S. gained the position of global hegemon after World War II. The reasons are not obscure. The State Department recognized that Saudi Arabia is “a stupendous source of strategic power” and “one of the greatest material prizes in world history.” Eisenhower described it as the most “strategically important part of the world.” That control of Middle East oil yields “substantial control of the world” and “critical leverage” over industrial rivals has been understood by influential statesmen from Roosevelt adviser A. A. Berle to Zbigniew Brzezinski.

These principles hold quite independently of U.S. access to the region’s resources, which, in fact, has not been of primary concern. Through much of this period the U.S. was a major producer of fossil fuels, as it is again today. But the principles remain the same, and are reinforced by other factors, among them the insatiable demand of the oil dictatorships for military equipment and the Saudi agreement to support the dollar as global currency, affording the U.S. major advantages.

Middle East correspondent Tom Stevenson does not exaggerate when he writes that, “The U.S.’s inherited mastery of the Gulf has given it a degree of leverage over both rivals and allies probably unparalleled in the history of empire… It is difficult to overstate the role of the Gulf in the way the world is currently run.”

It is, then, understandable why successful defiance in the region cannot be tolerated.

After the overthrow of its Iranian client, the U.S. turned to direct support for Saddam’s invasion of Iran, tacitly condoning his use of chemical weapons and finally intervening directly by protecting Iraqi shipping in the Gulf from Iranian interdiction to ensure Iran’s submission. The extent of Reagan’s commitment to his friend Saddam was illustrated graphically when Iraqi missiles struck the USS Stark, killing 37 crew, eliciting a tap on the wrist in response. Only Israel has been able to get away with something like that (USS Liberty, 1967).

When the war ended, under President George H.W. Bush, the Pentagon and Department of Energy invited Iraqi engineers to the U.S. for advanced training in weapons production, an existential threat to Iran. Since then, harsh sanctions and cyber attacks—an act of aggression according to Pentagon doctrine—have been employed to punish the miscreants.

(Continue Reading)

[bountyofbeads]

‘Angels’ in Hell: The Culture of Misogyny Inside Victoria’s Secret https://nyti.ms/31fz0BT

‘Angels’ in Hell: The Culture of Misogyny Inside Victoria’s Secret

A Times investigation found widespread bullying and harassment of employees and models. The company expresses “regret.”

By Jessica Silver-Greenberg, Katherine Rosman, Sapna Maheshwari and James B. Stewart | Published Feb. 1, 2020, 10:58 a.m. ET | New York Times | Posted February 1, 2020 |

Victoria’s Secret defined femininity for millions of women. Its catalog and fashion shows were popular touchstones. For models, landing a spot as an “Angel” all but guaranteed international stardom.

But inside the company, two powerful men presided over an entrenched culture of misogyny, bullying and harassment, according to interviews with more than 30 current and former executives, employees, contractors and models, as well as court filings and other documents.

Ed Razek, for decades one of the top executives at L Brands, the parent company of Victoria’s Secret, was the subject of repeated complaints about inappropriate conduct. He tried to kiss models. He asked them to sit on his lap. He touched one’s crotch ahead of the 2018 Victoria’s Secret fashion show.

Executives said they had alerted Leslie Wexner, the billionaire founder and chief executive of L Brands, about his deputy’s pattern of behavior. Some women who complained faced retaliation. One model, Andi Muise, said Victoria’s Secret had stopped hiring her for its fashion shows after she rebuffed Mr. Razek’s advances.

A number of the brand’s models agreed to pose nude, often without being paid, for a prominent Victoria’s Secret photographer who later used some pictures in an expensive coffee-table book — an arrangement that made L Brands executives uncomfortable about women feeling pressured to take their clothes off.

The atmosphere was set at the top. Mr. Razek, the chief marketing officer, was perceived as Mr. Wexner’s proxy, leaving many employees with the impression he was invincible, according to current and former employees. On multiple occasions, Mr. Wexner himself was heard demeaning women.

“What was most alarming to me, as someone who was always raised as an independent woman, was just how ingrained this behavior was,” said Casey Crowe Taylor, a former public relations employee at Victoria’s Secret who said she had witnessed Mr. Razek’s conduct. “This abuse was just laughed off and accepted as normal. It was almost like brainwashing. And anyone who tried to do anything about it wasn’t just ignored. They were punished.”

The interviews with the models and employees add to a picture of Victoria’s Secret as a troubled organization, an image that was already coming into focus last year when Mr. Wexner’s ties to the sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein became public. Mr. Epstein, who managed Mr. Wexner’s multibillion-dollar fortune, lured some young women by posing as a recruiter for Victoria’s Secret models.

L Brands, the publicly traded company that also owns Bath & Body Works, is on the brink of a high-stakes transition. The annual Victoria’s Secret fashion show has been canceled after nearly two decades on network TV. Mr. Razek, 71, stepped down from L Brands in August. And Mr. Wexner, 82, is exploring plans to retire and to sell the lingerie company, people familiar with the matter said.

As those plans progress, L Brands’ treatment of women is likely to come under even closer scrutiny.

In response to detailed questions from The New York Times, Tammy Roberts Myers, a spokeswoman for L Brands, provided a statement on behalf of the board’s independent directors. She said that the company “is intensely focused” on corporate governance, workplace and compliance practices and that it had “made significant strides.”

“We regret any instance where we did not achieve this objective and are fully committed to continuous improvement and complete accountability,” she said. The statement did not dispute any of The Times’s reporting.

Mr. Razek said in an email: “The accusations in this reporting are categorically untrue, misconstrued or taken out of context. I’ve been fortunate to work with countless, world-class models and gifted professionals and take great pride in the mutual respect we have for each other.” He declined to comment on a detailed list of allegations.

Thomas Davies, a spokesman for Mr. Wexner, declined to comment.

Fiery Explosions

Victoria’s Secret, which Mr. Wexner bought for $1 million in 1982 and turned into a lingerie powerhouse, is struggling.

The societal norms defining beauty and sexiness have been changing for years, with a greater value on a wide range of body types, skin colors and gender identities. Victoria’s Secret hasn’t kept pace. Some of its ad campaigns, for example, seem more like a stereotypical male fantasy — the director Michael Bay filmed a TV spot in which scantily clad models strutted in front of helicopters, motorcycles and fiery explosions — than a realistic encapsulation of what women want.

With its sales declining, Victoria’s Secret has been closing stores. Shares of L Brands have fallen more than 75 percent from their 2015 peak.

Six current and former executives said in interviews that when they tried to steer the company away from what one called its “porny” image, they were rebuffed. Three said they had been driven out of the company.

Criticism of Victoria’s Secret’s anachronistic marketing went viral in 2018 when Mr. Razek expressed no interest in casting plus-size and “transsexual” models in the fashion show.

Then, last summer, Mr. Epstein was charged with sex trafficking, and the festering business problems at Victoria’s Secret escalated into a public crisis.

Mr. Wexner and Mr. Epstein had been tight. The retail tycoon gave the financier carte blanche to manage his billions, elevating Mr. Epstein’s stature and affording him an opulent lifestyle. Mr. Wexner has said he and Mr. Epstein parted ways around 2007, the year after Florida prosecutors charged him with a sex crime.

On multiple occasions from 1995 through 2006, Mr. Epstein lied to aspiring models that he worked for Victoria’s Secret and could help them land gigs. He invited them for auditions, which at least twice ended with Mr. Epstein assaulting them, according to the women and court filings.

“I had spent all of my savings getting Victoria’s Secret lingerie to prepare for what I thought would be my audition,” a woman identified as Jane Doe said in a statement read aloud last summer in a federal court hearing in the Epstein case. “But instead it seemed like a casting call for prostitution. I felt like I was in hell.”

Three L Brands executives said Mr. Wexner was alerted in the mid-1990s about Mr. Epstein’s attempts to recruit women. The executives said there was no sign that Mr. Wexner had acted on the complaints.

After Mr. Epstein’s arrest last summer, L Brands said, it hired the law firm Davis Polk & Wardwell to conduct “a thorough review” of the matter at the request of its board of directors. The exact focus of the review is unclear. Mr. Epstein committed suicide in jail in August while he awaited trial on federal sex-trafficking charges.

Davis Polk has worked for L Brands for years. Mr. Wexner’s wife, Abigail, previously worked at the firm. Dennis S. Hersch, a former L Brands board member and a financial adviser to the Wexners, was a longtime partner at Davis Polk. The law firm also has contributed money to Ohio State University’s Wexner Center for the Arts.

Employees interviewed for this article said Davis Polk had not contacted them.

A Davis Polk spokeswoman didn’t respond to requests for comment.

‘Someplace Sexy to Take You’

“With the exception of Les, I’ve been with L Brands longer than anyone,” Mr. Razek wrote to employees in August when he announced he was leaving the company he had joined in 1983.

Mr. Razek was instrumental in selecting the brand’s supermodels — known as “Angels” and bestowed with enormous, feathery wings — and in creating the company’s macho TV ads.

But his biggest legacy was the annual fashion show, which became a global cultural phenomenon.

“That’s really where he sunk his teeth into the business,” said Cynthia Fedus-Fields, the former chief executive of the Victoria’s Secret division responsible for its catalog. By 2000, she said, Mr. Razek had grown so powerful that “he spoke for Les.”

Sometimes Mr. Wexner spoke for himself.

In March, at a meeting at Victoria’s Secret headquarters in Columbus, Ohio, an employee asked Mr. Wexner what he thought about the retail industry’s embrace of different body types. He was dismissive.

“Nobody goes to a plastic surgeon and says, ‘Make me fat,’” Mr. Wexner replied, according to two attendees.

Mr. Razek often reminded models that their careers were in his hands, according to models and current and former executives who heard his remarks.

Alyssa Miller, who had been an occasional Victoria’s Secret model, described Mr. Razek as someone who exuded “toxic masculinity.” She summed up his attitude as: “I am the holder of the power. I can make you or break you.”

At castings, Mr. Razek sometimes asked models in their bras and underwear for their phone numbers, according to three people who witnessed his advances. He urged others to sit on his lap. Two models said he had asked them to have private dinners with him.

One was Ms. Muise. In 2007, after two years of wearing the coveted angel wings in the Victoria’s Secret runway show, the 19-year-old was invited to dinner with Mr. Razek. She was excited to cultivate a professional relationship with one of the fashion industry’s most powerful men, she said.

Mr. Razek picked her up in a chauffeured car. On the way to the restaurant, he tried to kiss her, she said. Ms. Muise rebuffed him; Mr. Razek persisted.

For months, he sent her intimate emails, which The Times reviewed. At one point he suggested they move in together in his house in Turks and Caicos. Another time, he urged Ms. Muise to help him find a home in the Dominican Republic for them to share.

“I need someplace sexy to take you!” he wrote.

Ms. Muise maintained a polite tone in her emails, trying to protect her career. When Mr. Razek asked her to come to his New York home for dinner, Ms. Muise said the prospect of dining alone with Mr. Razek made her uneasy; she skipped the dinner.

She soon learned that for the first time in four years, Victoria’s Secret had not picked her for its 2008 fashion show.

‘Forget the Panties’

In 2018, at a fitting ahead of the fashion show, the supermodel Bella Hadid was being measured for underwear that would meet broadcast standards. Mr. Razek sat on a couch, watching.

“Forget the panties,” he declared, according to three people who were there and a fourth who was told about it. The bigger question, he said, was whether the TV network would let Ms. Hadid walk “down the runway with those perfect titties.” (One witness remembered Mr. Razek using the word “breasts,” not “titties.”)

At the same fitting, Mr. Razek placed his hand on another model’s underwear-clad crotch, three people said.

An employee complained to the human resources department about Mr. Razek’s behavior, according to three people. The employee presented H.R. with a document last summer listing more than a dozen allegations about Mr. Razek, including his demeaning comments and inappropriate touching of women, according to a copy of the document reviewed by The Times.

It wasn’t the first H.R. complaint about him

At a photo shoot in June 2015, the company put out a buffet lunch for staff. Ms. Crowe Taylor, the public relations employee, went to get seconds. Mr. Razek intercepted her, she said. He blocked her path and looked her up and down. Then, with dozens of people watching and Ms. Crowe Taylor holding her empty plate, he tore into her, berating her about her weight and telling her to lay off the pasta and bread.

Ms. Crowe Taylor, who was 5-foot-10 and 140 pounds, fled to a bathroom and burst into tears. She said that she had complained to H.R. but that as far as she could tell, nothing happened. She quit weeks later.

In October, shortly after Mr. Razek had left the company, Monica Mitro, a top public-relations executive at Victoria’s Secret, lodged a harassment complaint against him with a former member of the L Brands board of directors, according to five people familiar with the matter. She told colleagues that she had gone to the former director because she didn’t trust the H.R. department.

The next day, the head of H.R. told Ms. Mitro that she was being placed on administrative leave, the people said. She recently reached a financial settlement with the company, they said.

Mr. Razek’s son, Scott, also worked at Victoria’s Secret. Sometime after the H.R. department was told about his mistreatment of a female colleague, he was transferred to Bath & Body Works, according to four people familiar with the matter. He didn’t respond to requests for comment.

The woman he mistreated later received a settlement from Victoria’s Secret, according to several current and former employees.

Mr. Wexner was seldom in New York, where much of the fashion show’s staff was based, leaving employees with the impression that Mr. Razek was his proxy. Mr. Razek flaunted that power, invoking Mr. Wexner’s name to get his way.

Even as complaints piled up, the elder Mr. Razek maintained Mr. Wexner’s support. In 2013, Mr. Wexner helped raise a $1.2 million fund in Mr. Razek’s name at Ohio State University’s cancer center.

‘A Voyeuristic Journey’

Russell James was one of Victoria’s Secret’s go-to photographers. The company at times paid him tens of thousands of dollars a day, according to draft contracts reviewed by The Times.

At the end of sessions with models, Mr. James sometimes asked if they would be photographed nude, according to models and L Brands executives. Mr. James was popular; he had a knack for making women feel comfortable. He also had a close relationship with Mr. Razek. The women often consented.

The nude photo shoots weren’t covered under the models’ contracts with Victoria’s Secret, which meant they weren’t paid for the extra work.

In the industry, “everyone is using their influence to get something,” said Ms. Miller, the model. “With Russell, it was getting girls to pose for his books or portrait series nude.”

In 2014, Mr. James published a glossy collectors’ book, “Angels,” which featured some of the nude photos. The women agreed to have their photos included in the book, according to Martin Singer, a lawyer for Mr. James.

Two versions of the books currently sell on Mr. James’s website for $1,800 and $3,600. Victoria’s Secret hosted a launch event for “Angels” during New York fashion week in 2014. Attendees included supermodels and the company’s chief executive at the time, Sharen Turney.

“This ample volume offers an unprecedented and personal view into James’s most intimate portrait sittings,” the book’s jacket says, noting that Mr. James met many of the women during his 15 years working for Victoria’s Secret. “Readers will be taken on a voyeuristic journey into a world of subtle provocation.”

At one point, a poster-size version of one of the book’s photos was displayed in a Victoria’s Secret store in Las Vegas. The model’s agent complained to Victoria’s Secret that his client’s photo was being used in the store without her consent. Mr. James also complained about it and asked for it to be removed, according to Mr. Singer. The company took down the photo.

In 2010, Alison Nix, a 22-year-old model who had worked occasionally with Victoria’s Secret, was invited to attend a weekend event to raise money for the nonprofit foundation run by Richard Branson’s Virgin Group. The venue was Mr. Branson’s private Necker Island in the Caribbean.

The live-streamed event, hosted by Mr. Branson and Mr. James, was billed as featuring “some of the world’s most stunning supermodels.”

Ms. Nix said her agent had told her that if she chose to go on the all-expenses-paid trip, she’d be expected to pose for nude beach photos shot by Mr. James. She said that was fine. She was left with the impression, she said, that “if Russell likes you, you could start working with Victoria’s Secret.”

Mr. Singer, the lawyer for Mr. James, said his client had no influence over whom Victoria’s Secret selected as models. He said models were not required to pose for photos, nude or otherwise. He said Mr. James had agreed to shoot the nude photos at Necker Island at the request of the models and their agents “as a favor and professional courtesy.”

Ms. Nix called Mr. Singer’s comments “absurd.”

She said that she and other models who attended the event were provided with copious amounts of alcohol and were expected to mingle with men, including Mr. Branson.

“We were shipped out there, and all these rich men were flirting with us,” she recalled. She said the models were asking themselves, “Are we here as high-end prostitutes or for charity?”

The last day on the island, Ms. Nix said, she and at least three other models lined up to have their nude photos shot by Mr. James.

A spokeswoman for Mr. Branson said he had “no knowledge of anyone being invited to the event for any reason” beside the charity fund-raiser.

Two photos of Ms. Nix from that weekend — one, in profile, with her breasts obscured but her bare bottom exposed — appeared near the middle of Mr. James’s “Angels” book, with her consent.

Ms. Nix never landed another modeling gig with Victoria’s Secret. Was she disappointed?

“To be honest, I didn’t expect much after the trip,” she said. “I could tell I wasn’t right for the brand.”

______

Emily Steel and Mike Baker contributed reporting. Susan Beachy contributed research.

*********

[shantanuyadav]

Covid-19: The Role of Discontent of the World Health Organization: International Organization

The role of the World Health Organization (WHO) on the Covid-19 epidemic that has arisen from the corona virus has also come under suspicion. The organization has also been openly criticized by the US president.

The questions are :-

Did the WHO take enough steps to show seriousness?

Did he ask the right questions to China so that there would be some clue about the possible risk of the disease?

Should he be held responsible for failing to give timely advice to the world about this disease?

The WHO was established in 1948 as an inter-governmental organization.The aim was to improve international cooperation in all aspects of human health and prevention of diseases. It was created with the aim of working as an impartial technical organization but now like many international organizations, it also seems to be affected by the pressures of rich and powerful countries. Apart from pharmaceutical companies, the lobby of many other industries that affect human health also has an impact on this. The functioning of the WHO runs from a secretariat. It has knowledge of technical and administrative advisors. They work under the Director General. The Director-General is elected by the member countries on the recommendation of the Executive Board.

In any type of health disaster, the WHO is expected to take effective steps without any bias. The role of Director General is very important in this. It should not matter to him what his personal preference is or what his country of origin stands for. The current Director-General, Tedros Ghebreyesus, was elected in 2017. Prior to this he was the Foreign Minister of Ethiopia and before that the Health Minister. His academic background is related to public health issues and he also has experience in disaster control. In view of this, they should have been very cautious when China reported the outbreak of Corona virus on 7 January. A week earlier, China had told the WHO that it could not find out the cause of the deaths in the city of Wuhan. Ghebreyesus was still not careful. Was he under the influence of China that overwhelmingly supported his election?

Corona had knocked in Thailand, Japan, South Korea by the time the WHO released the first report on Covid-19 on 20 January. The WHO claimed that it had activated itself in view of the changing developments but did not feel that it was showing necessary readiness. On 23 January, China locked up its Huiben Province. Wuhan is the capital of this province. When China did not think of any other way to prevent infection, it decided to lockdown. This should have alarmed the WHO and in a way, but it did not happen. However, some countries have started screening people coming from China. Tedros arrived in China on 27 January to inspect the situation. During this time he met President Xi Jinping and Chinese health experts. He then bridged the praises of Xi and praised China's stern steps, saying that if it had not done so, it would have spread the virus and dangerously around the world. By then, Corona had spread to 15 countries. Nevertheless, Tedros said that China deserves the world's gratitude and respect for controlling the corona infection.

China's cooperation at this stage was very important, because one virus was born there and the other, only he knew about it, but it did not happen. Tedros also did not have the attitude of head of any international institution. Their attitude became even more suspicious when they agreed to a WHO-China joint team, while the WHO team should have acted independently. Finally, on 30 January, WHO called Covid-19 a health disaster of international concern. This announcement should have been done already. The process of negligence did not end here. The WHO Executive Board met from 4 to 8 February. There Covid-19 was not even included in the 52 point agenda. Tedros made only two brief briefings. By the time of the second briefing on 7 February, Corona had spread to 24 countries. For this, all the members of the executive board, including its Japanese chief, will also be considered irresponsible who could not activate the WHO by realizing this threat. A joint team of experts from WHO-China analyzed the medical and technical aspects of Covid-19 from 14 to 29 February. Instead of focusing on its prevention suggestions, these experts advised the international fraternity to reestablish contact with China, so that economic activities could resume there. He strongly supported China's move. Since the Chinese members involved could not criticize their own government, this report could not be considered independent.

The Covid-19 outbreak continued, yet the WHO shied away from declaring it a global pandemic. He announced this on 11 March. Generally, the WHO's stance in this case was contrary to its objectives. It is expected from him to independently assess any risk, not by being representative of any country. Here he was seen working as a representative of China. At the moment, the international community should be focused on cooperation and solidarity in dealing with the Corona crisis, but it cannot ignore that the WHO that was supposed to play the role of the watchdog is failing.

[idyoma]

The 10 Most Useful Languages for The Global Marketplace

Most Useful Languages

The world is a big place and there’s way more languages about than you can hope to learn.

So how do you decide what to start with?

Sometimes you fall in love with a language; something about it just eats into your bones and buries itself deep inside you.

For some, though, which language to add to their bow can be a much more calculated and logical decision.

If that sounds like you, then keep on reading.

In this Idyoma article, Pauline Farris is looking at which languages are most useful in the global marketplace, for business and travel.

It’s a small world after all

In 1964, Disney featured a ride at the New York World’s Fair. That ride was titled, “It’s a Small World,” and a singing group, the Sherman Brothers, wrote a song of the same title to be played during the ride. Visitors got into boats and traveled through scenes of children from all over the world, animated and in native dress.

That was 1964, and the world was really not such a small place. Certainly, there was international trade and travel, but businesses remained headquartered in their native countries.

The world has indeed become “small,” as the song stated. Today, international business is as commonplace as white bread. Consider just the following:

American retail enterprises have factories all over the world that produce their products (e.g. Nike in China)

American car manufacturers have plants in several foreign countries, and Japan has assembly plants in the U.S.

Consumers use Internet shopping to purchase products from all over the planet. And companies that want to reach foreign consumer markets must market their products and services in those markets.

Large enterprises have staff placed in strategic locations/offices ion countries in which they have business interests.

Companies are involved in importing and exporting raw materials and products among any number of nations and must communicate and collaborate with suppliers, customers, and partners in those other countries.

Job seekers often look for positions in foreign countries and then take up residency or even apply for citizenship in those countries.

With all of these international associations and the need for clear and understandable communication, language obviously becomes a critical factor in business success.

With that in mind, it might be important to take a look at the most important languages that will dominate international business now and in the near future.

Our list of the most useful languages:

Mandarin

Russian

German

Hindi

Arabic

Spanish

Japanese

Portuguese

French

Korean

Most useful languages: 1. Mandarin

While there are many variations of the Chinese language, Mandarin is the most widely spoken (about a billion speakers).

And here is the important thing to remember about China: It has the second-largest economy in the world. Predictions are that it will surpass that of the U.S. in the not too distant future.

The Chinese have expanded their business reach throughout the world, and it will be a rare country that does not feel that reach.

Learning Mandarin would be a wise choice for those who wish to work within the Chinese market place. And as pointed out by The Word Point, a major translation agency, the demand for Chinese translators is growing at a far more rapid rate than for other language experts.

Many companies are now hiring full-time Chinese businessmen and women in key positions, in order to have a better and more productive relationship with Chinese companies with which they do or intend to do business.

The challenge, of course, is that Mandarin is one of the hardest languages to learn for those who are native to the romance languages. On the other hand, Western business-people who are able to speak it will certainly impress their Chinese counterparts.

Most useful languages: 2. Russian

Russia, and its earlier counterpart, The Soviet Union, has wielded great political and economic power throughout the world for a long time. And as the world’s largest producer of oil, it is a force to be reckoned with.

Beyond oil, Russia has economic and political interests all over the world and has business relationships with many major Western enterprises.

It is estimated that about 260 million people in the world speak Russian, including many in countries that became independent when the Soviet Union was broken up. And within these former parts of the Soviet Union (mainly Eastern Europe), there are a large number of business opportunities in the engineering and IT industries.

Russia is also a major market for the U.S. and other Western countries’ goods. Because trade and business dealings will only increase with Russia and other Russian-speaking countries, having good translators or key staff who are fluent in the language is important.

It is another language that is very challenging to learn.

Most useful languages: 3. German

This is, without doubt, a major language of business in Western Europe. Unlike American students, most who grow up in European schools learn a few languages. While English is certainly one of them, German is as well.

Germany also enjoys the best and largest economy among European nations, and it looks as if it will remain in that position for years to come. Any company that is or has plans to enter the German and, indeed, the European market would do well to have its own people fluent in the language. On the other hand, German is not that difficult a language to learn.

Most useful languages: 4. Hindi

If you’re based in America, it is probable that you do not know one student who is studying Hindi, or a high school that is offering it.

Hindi is now the fourth most spoken language in the world, a result of the huge and growing population in India.

While it is still considered a “developing” nation, it is still considered one of the world’s fastest developing economies, and recently surpassed the United Kingdom and France in terms of raw GDP. The numbers of young people earning degrees and entering the global workforce are rapidly growing, and these will be the business leaders of the near future in the country.

Learning Hindi is one thing. Understanding the cultural segments and nuances is quite another. For this reason, companies that do business in India will need not just fluent Hindi speakers but, as well, natives to the culture.

Most useful languages: 5. Arabic

With about 300 million speakers of this language, spanning 27 countries, this language is an obviously important one.

There are plenty of areas in which the U.S. and other Western enterprises have major holdings, business interests, and collaborations across the Middle East and, as such, there are many opportunities for native English speakers to work in the area.

Equally many wealthy Arabic-speaking businessmen have holdings and business interests in Western countries; buying up real estate and investing in major Western corporations.

The Middle East has become a major importer of Western goods as well. As those populations get younger and more modern, and as some of the more traditional cultural standards are being relaxed, the demand is increasing exponentially.

While Arabic is a difficult language with many dialects, companies who do business or who wish to do business either with Arabic language-based businesses or consumers, are well-advised to get great intermediaries or employ Arabic-speaking natives, if they intend to collaborate and/or market effectively.

Most useful languages: 6. Spanish

Not only is the Spanish-speaking population of Latin America growing, but increasingly Spanish-speaking consumers and businesses are moving throughout the Americas.

This language is so prolific in the United States, for example, that now most phone calls taken by American businesses provide the option for English or Spanish.

And there is an increasing Spanish-speaking population throughout Europe as well. Some predict that Spanish-speakers will make up a full 30% of the U.S. population by 2050, and it is currently the official language of some 20 countries.

The business potential in Central and South America has long been realized by any number of American and other Western businesses. It has been an area for manufacturing of goods sold by American companies. But as Latin America continues to develop, there are far more collaborative business opportunities on the horizon.

And Spanish is such an easy language to learn, for those whose native languages are romance. It just makes sense for business leaders to take the time to learn the language, or, barring that, employ a strong staff of native speakers.

If you want to read more on learning Spanish you can read our articles:

Best Way to Learn Spanish: A 6 Month Process That Works for You

The Best 12 Spanish Movies to Immerse Yourself in the Language

Most useful languages: 7. Japanese

Japan continues to be a key player on the international business stage.

Its prowess in the electronics and gaming sectors are almost unmatchable. But more recently, robotics has become a major economic sector. And given that robotics is virtually impacting every major industry worldwide, being a leader in this niche puts Japan at the top for international business. Wikipedia says that Japan currently employs well over a quarter of a million robotics workers and that figure is expected to rise to well over a million by 2025, with revenues upwards to $70 billion.

Japan is one of the world’s largest economies and though Abenomics has come under strain post-crash, the economy continues to increase in productivity and grow in size. Japan are a major world player and their cultural impact globally has increased significantly in recent decades.

While many Japanese business leaders do speak English to some extent, companies would do well to employ Japanese-speaking pros on their teams. It’s a difficult language to learn, but a very popular one at the moment as a surge of Western youth take up the challenge.

Most useful languages: 8. Portuguese

Most people think of Portuguese as a language spoken only in Portugal and Brazil.

Actually, there are about 250 million native speakers in these two countries, and it is the official language in seven more.

But by far the most opportune area of international business is in Brazil, with its population closing in on about 225 million alone. And because over 60% of Brazilians are under 30 and increasingly educated and establishing and/or taking over businesses, the potential for investments, collaborations, and partnerships with foreign enterprises is significant.

Given that Brazil is now by certain metrics the 7th largest economy in the world, a source for significant raw materials, as well as a country coming into its own in industrial sectors, it will greatly help foreign companies to be prepared to deal in the language.

Portuguese is very close to Spanish and is not a difficult language to learn, but getting native-speakers on board now will enhance a company’s ability to get a foothold in this growing economy.

Most useful languages: 9. French

At one point, French was considered the international language of business, but that time has long since passed.

Still, given its colonial history, French is spoken all over the world, on every continent. It is second only to German within the European mainland languages. In all, there are about 350 million French speakers throughout the world, and many businesses, especially in Africa, the Mediterranean and the former Indochina prefer to use it.

As a romance language, French is not terribly difficult for English-speakers to learn, and it is taught throughout high schools and colleges in the English-speaking world. Any business hoping to move into markets that are heavily French-speaking would be advised to get some French-speakers in key positions.

Most useful languages: 10. Korean

The Kia and the Hyundai – both manufactured in Korea. Samsung – another multinational enterprise based in Korea. Within the technology and automobile sectors, Korea is a major player. And it is continually seeking collaborations and partnerships with enterprises all over the world – as distributors, assemblers, etc.

The need for business cooperation between South Korea and enterprises in other countries is significant. And Korean cultural mores demand a personal relationship with any business partners. Having Korean-speaking natives on your team will go a long way to establishing those trustful relationships that are such a priority.

It doesn’t have as many Western learners as Japanese or Chinese languages, but interest is higher now than at any point before.

Isn’t English the most useful language?

While English is still the most widely-used language of business in large parts of the world (there are well over 300 million people who speak English as either their native or second language), things are evolving.

The good news is that businesses will be able to find English-speakers in almost any country into which they wish to expand. But speaking only English can result in disadvantages too. There are cultural relationships to build too, and having speakers of the target business language can break down lots of barriers.

English is incredibly useful and that bodes well for those of us who are native speakers, but we have a great deal to gain from being able to effectively communicate in another major world language.

The global marketplace is becoming increasingly competitive. Businesses that want to move or continue to move into foreign markets would do well to provide some manner to communicate with businesses in their native languages. It breaks the ice, fosters better relationships, and indicates that those organizations are valuable and respected.

What languages do you believe are most valuable in the global marketplace? What’s your plan for learning them? Let us know in the comments below!

This guest post was from Pauline Farris. Pauline speaks Portuguese, English, Spanish and Italian. She travelled the world to immerse herself in new cultures and learn languages. Today she is proud to be a voting member of the American Translators Association and an active participant of the Leadership Council of its Portuguese Language Division.

Check out some more of our articles:

The 14 Best Language Learning Apps for Fluency in 2019

The 7 Best Language Learning Software of 2018: The Awards!

The Best 12 Spanish Movies to Immerse Yourself in the Language

Best Way to Learn Spanish: A 6 Month Process That Works for You

Or download Idyoma, the number 1 app for local language exchange, on the AppStore or Playstore today:

Idyoma on the AppStore

Idyoma on the Playstore

[newstfionline]

Thursday, September 23, 2021

Racism, climate and divisions top UN agenda as leaders meet (AP) Racism, the climate crisis and the world’s worsening divisions will take center stage at the United Nations on Wednesday. China’s President Xi Jinping warned that “the world has entered a period of new turbulence and transformation.” Finland’s President Sauli Niinistö said: “We are indeed at a critical juncture.” And Costa Rica’s President Carlos Alvarado Quesada declared: “The future is raising its voice at us: Less military weaponry, more investment in peace!” Speaker after speaker at Tuesday’s opening of the nearly week-long meeting decried the inequalities and deep divisions that have prevented united global action to end the COVID-19 pandemic, which has claimed nearly 4.6 million lives and is still raging, and the failure to sufficiently tackle the climate crisis threatening the planet. Perhaps the harshest assessment of the current global crisis came from U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, who opened his state of the world address sounding an “alarm” that “the world must wake up.” “Our world has never been more threatened or more divided,” he said. “We face the greatest cascade of crises in our lifetimes.” “We are on the edge of an abyss—and moving in the wrong direction,” the secretary-general warned.

Shutdowns and Showdowns (1440) Lawmakers on Capitol Hill are gearing up for a pair of legislative showdowns over the next week and a half, set in motion by two decisions over the past two days. The first focuses on government funding and the debt ceiling. If Congress does not provide funding for fiscal year 2022 by midnight Sept. 30, the federal government will face a shutdown. Similarly, the Treasury Department has said Congress must raise the debt ceiling by mid-October to avoid default. House Democrats passed yesterday a bill pairing short-term funding through Dec. 3 with a debt ceiling increase—a move requiring the support of at least 10 Republican senators. Separately, House Democrats said they planned to bring a $1.2T bipartisan infrastructure deal up for a vote, separate from a $3.5T social spending budget bill. The move pits moderates against progressives, with the latter previously saying they would only support the infrastructure deal if a vote on the budget bill came at the same time. It’s unclear how many House Republicans will support the $1.2T bill.

Haiti Deportations (Foreign Policy) The United States will continue deportation flights to Haiti today as it seeks to repatriate nearly 15,000 migrants who have crossed into U.S. territory in recent days. Videos of federal authorities mistreating the mostly Haitian migrants at a camp in Del Rio, Texas—a town on the U.S. side of the U.S.-Mexico border—has led to fierce criticism from Democratic lawmakers and adds to a warning from the head of the U.N. refugee agency UNHCR that the deportations may violate international law. The move could also be seen as hypocritical; just over 7 weeks ago, on Aug. 3, the Biden administration extended protected status to Haitian migrants in the United States, in light of what the Department of Homeland Security called a “deteriorating political crisis, violence, and a staggering increase in human rights abuses” in their home country. The legal authority under which Biden has carried out the expulsion has also been called into question. Title 42, a Trump-era authorization implemented at the outset of the coronavirus pandemic to expel asylum seekers immediately on the grounds that they could spread disease, has been maintained by the Biden administration. Last week, a federal judge blocked the Biden administration from enforcing the policy, a decision that is now being appealed by the U.S. government. Amid a surge of migrants crossing into the United States this year, Title 42 has been applied regularly; figures from U.S. customs authorities show roughly 700,000 expulsions took place under the Biden administration to date, nearly twice the amount that took place under President Donald Trump.

Lithuania says throw away Chinese phones due to censorship concerns (Reuters) Lithuania’s Defense Ministry recommended that consumers avoid buying Chinese mobile phones and advised people to throw away the ones they have now after a government report found the devices had built-in censorship capabilities. Flagship phones sold in Europe by China’s smartphone giant Xiaomi have a built-in ability to detect and censor terms such as “Free Tibet”, “Long live Taiwan independence” or “democracy movement”, Lithuania’s state-run cybersecurity body said on Tuesday. The capability in Xiaomi’s Mi 10T 5G phone software had been turned off for the “European Union region”, but can be turned on remotely at any time, the Defence Ministry’s National Cyber Security Centre said in the report.

Toxic gas, new rivers of molten lava endanger Spanish island (AP) As a new volcanic vent blew open and unstoppable rivers of molten rock flowed toward the sea, authorities on a Spanish island warned Tuesday that more dangers lie ahead for residents, including earthquakes, lava flows, toxic gases, volcanic ash and acid rain. Several small earthquakes shook the island of La Palma in the Atlantic Ocean off northwest Africa on Tuesday, keeping nerves on edge after a volcanic eruption on Sunday. The rivers of lava, up to six meters (nearly 20 feet) high, rolled down hillsides, burning and crushing everything in their path, as they gradually closed in on the island’s more densely populated coast. Canary Islands government chief Ángel Víctor Torres said “when (the lava) reaches the sea, it will be a critical moment.” The meeting of the lava, whose temperature exceeds 1,000 degrees Celsius (more than 1,800 F), with a body of water could cause explosions and produce clouds of toxic gas. A change in the wind direction blew the ashes from the volcano across a vast area on the western side of the island, with the black particles blanketing everything. Volcanic ash is an irritant for the eyes and lungs. The volcano has also been spewing out between 8,000 and 10,500 tons of sulfur dioxide—which also affects the lungs—every day, the Volcanology Institute said.

Germany’s diversity shows as immigrants run for parliament (AP) Ana-Maria Trasnea was 13 when she emigrated from Romania because her single, working mother believed she would have a better future in Germany. Now 27, she is running for a seat in parliament. “It was hard in Germany in the beginning,” Trasnea said in an interview with The Associated Press. “But I was ambitious and realized that this was an opportunity for me, so I decided to do whatever I can to get respect and integrate.” Trasnea, who is running for the center-left Social Democrats in Sunday’s election, is one of hundreds of candidates with immigrant roots who are seeking a seat in Germany’s lower house of parliament, or Bundestag. While the number in office still doesn’t reflect their overall percentage of the population, the country’s growing ethnic diversity is increasingly visible in politics. There are about 21.3 million people with migrant backgrounds in Germany, or about 26% of the population of 83 million.

Europe’s defense (Foreign Policy) EU leaders will discuss plans for a more coordinated defense posture in an upcoming summit in October, European Commission vice president Maros Sefcovic told reporters on Tuesday. “I think that after Kabul, after AUKUS, this was, I would say the natural conclusion, that we need to focus more on the strategic autonomy,” Sefcovic said, referring to the recent trilateral defense pact between Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States.

Kremlin’s party gets 324 of 450 seats in Russian parliament (AP) Russia’s ruling party will get 324 of the 450 seats in the next national parliament, election authorities announced Tuesday. The number is less than the pro-Kremlin party, United Russia, won in the previous election but still an overwhelming majority. Retaining the party’s dominance in the State Duma was widely seen as crucial for the Kremlin ahead of Russia’s presidential election in 2024. President Vladimir Putin’s current term expires that year, and he is expected either to seek reelection or to choose another strategy to stay in power. A parliament the Kremlin can control could be key to both scenarios, analysts and Kremlin critics say. Most opposition politicians were excluded from the parliamentary election that concluded Sunday, which was tainted by numerous reports of violations and voter fraud.

Queued (WSJ) As of Sunday, there were 73 ships waiting to unload cargo at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, a brutal logjam just as holiday cargo hits U.S. shores. There are few options around it, given that last year the ports handled 8.8 million containers, more than double the runner-up port of New York and New Jersey which handled 3.9 million. Oakland and Seattle aren’t big enough to handle the hundreds of thousands of boxes handled in L.A. and Long Beach every week, and while some shippers had been heading to East Coast ports for a while, word about that hack got around rather quickly, and so it’s getting just as bad on the Atlantic, with 20 ships queued at Savannah.

Wednesday’s autumnal equinox (Washington Post) Summer often seems to last deep into September these days. However, the autumnal equinox—which arrives Wednesday at 3:21 p.m. Eastern time—is a reminder from Mother Nature that fall is finally on our doorstep. We are now seeing just over 12 hours of daylight, having reached the halfway point between our longest and shortest days of the year. The autumnal (or fall) equinox, which usually falls on Sept. 22 or 23, is technically not a day-long astronomical event. It’s a brief moment in time when the sun appears directly over the Earth’s equator before crossing into the Southern Hemisphere. Like the spring equinox in March, the fall equinox is one of only two days each year when most of the Earth experiences about 12 hours of daylight and 12 hours of darkness. Day and night are nearly equal because we are at a point in our orbit when neither hemisphere is tilted away from or toward the sun. In the Northern Hemisphere, the autumnal equinox means we are entering the dark season and inching closer toward winter.

[classyfoxdestiny]

Afghanistan Live News Updates: Indian envoy to Qatar meets Taliban leader S M Abbas Stanekzai

Afghanistan Live News Updates: Indian envoy to Qatar meets Taliban leader S M Abbas Stanekzai

Talks between the two focused on safety, early return of Indians from Afghanistan, says India’s Ministry of External Affairs. The meeting between the Indian envoy and Taliban leader took place at the Embassy of India in Doha on the request of Taliban side, the ministry added.

!1 New UpdateClick here for latest updates

Jharkhand reports 12 fresh COVID-19 cases, zero deaths

25 injured in stampede at Bengal vaccination centre

The incident at Jalpaiguri happened in the afternoon when people standing outside the vaccination centre rushed inside. “As soon as the main gate of Dhupguri Health Centre was opened, several people tried to get inside the facility pushing each other. A stampede-like situation arose there. Several women were injured. We are probing the matter,” an official said.

DU approves implementation of NEP from 2022-23 session

The Delhi University on Tuesday approved the implementation of the National Education Policy (NEP), and four-year undergraduate programme at its executive council meeting, according to a senior official. Registrar Vikas Gupta said that NEP will be implemented from the 2022-23 academic session. He said three members dissented against the implementation.

Schools have been asked to keep timings separate for different classes so that there is no crowding. PTM will be held to build confidence. Will take action for flouting norms

– Sourabh Swami, Director, Secondary Education, Rajasthan

Brazilian viper venom may become tool in fight against coronavirus

A study published in the scientific journal Molecules this month found that the molecule produced by the jararacussu pit viper inhibited the virus’s ability to multiply in monkey cells by 75%. “We were able to show this component of snake venom was able to inhibit a very important protein from the virus,” said Rafael Guido, a University of Sao Paulo professor and an author of the study.

EU backs helping Afghanistan’s neighbors cope with refugees

In a closing statement following a meeting in Brussels, the ministers said the EU and its 27 nations “stand determined to act jointly to prevent the recurrence of uncontrolled large-scale illegal migration movements faced in the past, by preparing a coordinated and orderly response.” European Commissioner for Home Affairs Ylva Johansson said “the best way to prevent a migratory crisis is to prevent a humanitarian crisis.”

Khattar congratulates shooter Adhana, announces reward, job

Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar on Tuesday congratulated Singhraj Adhana for winning a bronze medal in shooting at the Paralympic Games in Tokyo, and announced a cash reward of Rs 2.5 crore and a government job for him. Adhana claimed the bronze medal in the P1 men’s 10m air pistol SH1 event of the Paralympics.

CBI sentences eight in Vyapam Scam

A Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) court on Tuesday sentenced eight people to seven years of imprisonment each for rigging a Police recruitment test conducted by Madhya Pradesh Professional Examination Board in 2013, better known by its Hindi acronym Vyapam. The convicts have been penalized with Rs 10,000 each. The Vyapam scam involved fraud in Madhya Pradesh Professional Examination Board that was unearthed in 2013.

New IT Rules prevent fake news, misuse of freedom of press: Centre

The Centre, in its counter affidavit filed on a challenge to the constitutional validity of the new IT Rules, has submitted that although the right to freedom of speech and expression, including the freedom of press, is critical for a vibrant democracy like India, citizens “cannot be treated as passive consumers.” While submitting that there have been “past incidents of disinformation on digital media leading to disturbance of public order”, the Centre has asserted that digital media “allows sensational content being re-circulated in a different context leading to misinterpretation by the audience”, making it susceptible to being used as fake news.

Paralympians are doing a great job. They are playing well and creating world records. They need a lot of support and motivation from the countrymen. I am training for next year’s Commonwealth Games, Asian Games, and World Championships

– Neeraj Chopra, Tokyo Olympics Gold medalist

Modi talks Afghan and India with European Council

Spoke with @eucopresident Charles Michel, President of the European Council, about the evolving situation in Afghan… https://t.co/hnEI3jSJbV

— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) 1630422599000

Video surfaces of Taliban flying US chopper with man dangling

Shocking footage has surfaced on social media from reportedly Afghanistan’s Kandhar in which an American Black Hawk chopper is seen flying with what seems to be a body dangling from it. The video that has been shared widely on social media appears to show the Taliban flying seized US Black Hawk helicopters over Afghanistan, including one in which someone is seen hanging below one from a rope, The New York Post reported.

LPU rewards 13 Olympic medalists with Rs 1.75 crore

While Neeraj Chopra was awarded Rs 50 lakh and a ‘gold javelin’ for winning the only gold for India in Tokyo, Manpreet Singh and nine other members of the hockey team received Rs 85 lakh. The university also announced a reward of Rs 10 lakh for bronze medal winner Bajrang Punia and Rs 25 lakh for paralympics high jump silver medal winner Nishad Kumar. Both are students of the university. A ceremony was held on LPU campus to celebrate the return of its Olympic champions to their alma mater with NITI Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant as the chief guest.

US says mission to get Americans out of Afghanistan will continue

Jake Sullivan, the U.S. national security adviser, says it’s just that the evacuation effort “has shifted from a military mission to a diplomatic mission.” He cited “considerable leverage” the U.S. has over the Taliban to get out any remaining Americans — a number that U.S. official have said is under 200.

Renault to partly halt production in Spain until December 31

French car maker Renault plans to idle its three assembly plants in Spain for as many as 61 days between now and the end of the year as a protective measure due to the global shortage of semiconductors, a spokeswoman for Renault Spain said on Tuesday.

Tokyo Olympics organisers discard $45,500 worth of medical gear

Organisers of the Tokyo Olympics discarded 5 million yen ($45,508) worth of surgical masks, gowns, and disinfectant after the Games, held practically with no fans amid the pandemic, left much of that medical equipment unused, media said on Tuesday. The Asahi daily quoted an organising committee official as saying 33,000 masks, 3,420 gowns and 380 bottles of disinfectant were discarded when they closed down operations at some of the venues used for the Olympics, which ran from July 23 to Aug. 8.

Coal India ramps up supplies to address shortage at utilities

Government data showed over half of the 135 coal-fired power plants had less than a week’s stock of coal left, of which 50 plants had less than three days of coal left. Six plants had run out of coal, data from the Central Electricity Authority showed.

India says Afghan soil should not be used for terror activities

According to a release issued by MEA, “Today, Ambassador of India to Qatar, Deepak Mittal, met Sher Mohammad Abbas Stanekzai, the head of Taliban’s Political Office in Doha. The meeting took place at the Embassy of India, Doha, at the request of the Taliban side.”

Meeting between Indian envoy and Taliban leader took place at Embassy of India in Doha on the request of Taliban side

– Ministry of External Affairs

I have conducted survey of flood-affected Kusheshwar Asthan area of Darbhanga district. Financial aid of Rs 6000 being provided to affected families. Some areas badly affected by floods

– Nitish Kumar, Chief Minister, Bihar

India’s GDP grows 20.1% in April-June

The gross domestic product (GDP) had contracted by 24.4 per cent in the corresponding April-June quarter of 2020-21, according to data released by the National Statistical Office (NSO).

France aims to give third vaccine shot to 18 million by early 2022

Government data shows nearly 72% of the total French population had received one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine as of Aug 30. A little more than 65% had received two doses or one dose after having been diagnosed with COVID-19.

Tokyo Paralympics: Sharad Kumar wins bronze

Tokyo Paralympics: Mariyappan Thangavelu wins silver

During May last year, in one of my statements, I had noted that COVID-19 has crippled the global economy….It has been more than a year since. While there are signs of recovery, we are not yet out of the woods

– Shaktikanta Das, Governor, RBI

Johnson & Johnson’s HIV vaccine fails mid-stage Africa study

Johnson & Johnson said on Tuesday its experimental vaccine failed to provide sufficient protection against HIV in sub-Saharan Africa to young women who accounted for a large number of infections last year. The results from the mid-stage study are the latest setback to efforts to develop a vaccine to prevent HIV or human immunodeficiency virus, which causes AIDS that had infected over 37 million people globally as of 2020.

Considering possibility of spread, the risk is quite negligible at this moment unless something very catastrophic events taking place. It’s the right time when govt should come forward & take a calculated risk and open the schools in an appropriate way

– Dr Jayalal, President, Indian Medical Association

Dale Steyn announces retirement from all forms of cricket

He took 699 international wickets, including a South African record 439 in tests, and is regarded as one of the best fast bowlers of his generation with extreme pace in his prime and the ability to swing the ball in both directions.

Sensex rallies 663 points to close above 57K-mark

Extending their record-setting streak, the Sensex rallied 663 points to close above 57,000 for the first time while the Nifty scaled the 17,000-mark on Tuesday, driven by gains in Bharti Airtel, Bajaj Finance and TCS amid positive global cues.

Sixth accused in Mysuru rape case held

The sixth accused allegedly involved in the rape of a medical student in Mysuru, who was at large, has been arrested in Tamil Nadu, police sources said. Without divulging the name, the sources said he was also arrested from Tirupur on a tip-off.

Himachal gives all eligible adults in state first vaccine dose

“Himachal Pradesh becomes the first state to administer the first dose of the COVID vaccine to every adult citizen. I congratulate the people and the government of Himachal Pradesh,” tweeted BJP National President JP Nadda

Ayush Ministry prepares 5-minute yoga protocol for professionals

The five-minute protocol encompassing asanas, pranayama and dhyana will be available through an app, which will be launched by Ayush Minister Sarbananda Sonowal on Wednesday.

EU says it has reached goal of vaccinating 70% of adults

The announcement marks a milestone in the EU vaccination strategy after a slow start, but it also masks big differences among EU countries, with some nations exceeding the 70% goal, while others in the poorer eastern region of the bloc are far behind. “70% of adults in EU are fully vaccinated. I want to thank the many people making this great achievement possible,” the President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen said on Twitter.

Confident that our Comprehensive Strategic Partnership will grow from strength to strength.

Tweeted EAM Dr S Jaishankar in response to Foreign Minister of Vietnam Bui Thanh Son

Some people want to take out yatras. This is so unfortunate. People are organizing events and putting the life of the common man in danger.

– Maharashtra CM Uddhav Thackeray

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will release a special commemorative coin of Rs 125 and will also address the gathering, on the occasion of the 125th birth anniversary of Srila Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada tomorrow, via video conferencing

Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has been keeping a watch on the Assam flood situation. 10 NDRF teams were deployed in the state by Sunday: MHA officials

Video of police facing attacks has surfaced. You won’t welcome anyone with garland if they try to attack you, they had to lathi-charge. Police’s job is to maintain law & order. We’ve made sure there’s no use of excessive force in last 9 months.

– Haryana Deputy CM Dushyant Chautala

We have noticed that these fraudsters have increased the usage of technology in the recent past. Earlier, they used to call victims randomly & ask for bank details. They no longer use this method. They make temporary websites & send bulk messages containing short URLs

– Anyesh Roy

Despite objections from revenue, finance departments, Goa govt went ahead with land ownership bill: RTI

We have decided that the ‘BRAHMOS’ missile will be built in Lucknow. CM has estimated that it will provide jobs to 5,000 people… A target has been set to provide PNG gas to every household in Lucknow

– Defence Minister Rajnath Singh

Delhi: Eleven live cartridges recovered in the parking area of Ajmeri Gate, New Delhi Railway station

“It is possible that the patrolling team of RPF might have dropped it inadvertently. Investigation is underway,” says DCP Railway

Manchester United confirm the signing of Cristiano Ronaldo on a two-year contract with the option to extend for a further year, subject to international clearance, the club says.

@Cristiano is back! #MUFC | #RonaldoReturns

— Manchester United (@ManUtd) 1630398617000

In Pics: Sanjay Arora takes charge as new DG of ITBP

Delhi: Sanjay Arora (on left in pics) takes charge as new DG of Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP). Outgoing ITBP D… https://t.co/6CyEfEUkZK

— ANI (@ANI) 1630398980000

We, politicians, are the target (of terrorists). Those who stand with the nation will have to face those crises… India is a diverse nation. Then what unites us? It is our will to make a diverse nation that unites us. We need to protect our diversity

– National Conference chief Farooq Abdullah

Watch: Afghans in Kabul queue outside banks on Tuesday morning

VIDEO: Afghans in Kabul queue outside banks on Tuesday morning. The last US troops that oversaw a desperate evacua… https://t.co/Pt32Fp48uj

— AFP News Agency (@AFP) 1630396285000

I want to dedicate this medal to my coaches & family. I feel lucky to have many good people around me. Three coaches stayed with me like ‘Brahma, Vishnu & Mahesh’. They motivated me & I’m thankful to them

– Paralympics bronze medalist Singhraj Adana

The group has also been monitoring the ground situation in Afghanistan and international reactions, including the Resolution passed this morning by the UN Security Council: Sources

This group has been meeting regularly over last few days. It’s seized of issues pertaining to safe return of stranded Indians, travel of Afghans (especially minorities) to India&assuring that Afghan territory is not used in any manner for terrorism directed against India: Sources

In view of the evolving situation in Afghanistan, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had recently directed that a high-level group comprising of EAM, NSA & senior officials focus on the immediate priorities of India: Sources

All flat owners in the twin towers in Noida to be reimbursed along with 12% interest, Supreme Court orders Supertech

In its verdict, Supreme Court says construction of the twin towers containing around 1,000 flats in Supertech Emerald Court in Noida were done in violation of the rules & must be razed within a period of two months by Supertech at its own cost

Supreme Court orders demolition of two 40-floor towers built by real estate company Supertech in one of its housing projects in Noida; says construction was a result of the collusion between the officials of the Noida authority and Supertech

Soon a government will come in J&K and officials will be answerable to people

– NC president Farooq Abdullah

PM Narendra Modi has approved an ex-gratia of Rs 2 lakhs each from PMNRF for the next of kin of those who lost their lives due to the accident at Nagaur, Rajasthan. The injured would be given Rs 50,000: PMO

Telangana High Court stays state government order to reopen educational institutions from September 1.

Reports ANI

Taliban in talks with Qatar, Turkey about Kabul airport management, says France

The Taliban are in talks with Qatar and Turkey about the management of Kabul airport and should secure the airport as soon as possible so that people who want to leave Afghanistan can do so using commercial flights, French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said on Tuesday.

“The Security Council resolution about securing the airport must be implemented. There are talks under way with the Qataris and Turks about management of the airport. We must demand that access to the airport is safe,” Le Drian said on France 2 television.

Le Drian also said that France must continue to put pressure on the Taliban but is not negotiating with them.

BJP MP Ananda Bhaskar Rapolu writes to PM Narendra Modi

Telangana: BJP MP Ananda Bhaskar Rapolu writes to PM Narendra Modi, seeing his "expeditious attention" for the cond… https://t.co/7VgSDJqsX5

— ANI (@ANI) 1630390045000

Tokyo Paralympics: Indian shooter Singhraj Adana wins bronze medal in P1 – Men’s 10m Air Pistol SH1 event

Madhya Pradesh CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan announces ex-gratia assistance of Rs 2 lakhs each to kin of 11 persons from Ujjain who died in a road accident in Nagaur. The state govt will bear the entire cost of treatment for the injured, CM says.

. Source link

[xtruss]

Biden Poised to Repeat Mistakes that Led to COVID Pandemic, Biosecurity Experts Say

— By Fred Guterl | 08/18/21 | Newsweek

PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY NEWSWEEK; SOURCE IMAGES BY GETTY

The COVID-19 pandemic may have made a future pandemic more likely. In a terrible irony, nations eager to get a handle on the virus and its variants are building high-containment laboratories at a brisk pace, ensuring that more scientists continue to experiment on dangerous pathogens even after the current threat fades—increasing the likelihood of future lab accidents that could release dangerous pathogens. Regardless of whether the current pandemic got its start in a laboratory in Wuhan or in animals—a mystery that may never be resolved—the mere fact that it's possible is reason enough to take precautions against any future occurrence, biosecurity experts say.

"Without a doubt, COVID-19 has changed the threat landscape," says Peggy Hamburg, former FDA commissioner and now vice president of the Nuclear Threat Initiative, a nonpartisan think tank on global security.

Yet despite the rising risk of a new, future pandemic caused by a lab leak—or one that emerges from a bioterrorist attack or even natural causes, for that matter—the U.S. government, under the leadership of Joe Biden and Congress, seems on course to repeat the mistake made by nearly every one of its predecessors for the past several decades: failing to take all possible steps to strengthen America's response to a future pandemic or prevent one from happening in the first place.

One year ago, as SARS-CoV-2 raged through an unprotected population and vaccines were still months away from authorization, workers were wondering how they'd protect themselves through the long winter months and parents were fretting over how they'd hold down a job while their kids stayed home all day learning in front of a laptop. Now, despite the widespread availability of vaccines, the surge in COVID cases due to the Delta variant is raising fears and uncertainties about the prospects of a second pandemic winter among a war-weary public.

The upside of a nation of people bummed out about new mask mandates and public health restrictions for another school year is a rising understanding of how much pandemics suck and how important it is to prevent them. With the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic still in full swing, public awareness should be at a historic high. One poll, by the progressive group Data for Progress, shows that 71 percent of the public—including 60 percent of Republicans—supports a $30 billion pandemic-prevention plan recently floated by President Biden.

Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris met with senators earlier this year to discuss the infrastructure bill, which did not contain funding for the president’s pandemic prevention plan. DOUG MILLS/POOL/GETTY

The White House's plan hits the right notes. It would improve response time to develop therapeutics and vaccines, beef up the national stockpile and tighten regulations on risky lab research. But just because Biden proposed it doesn't mean Washington politicians are tripping over themselves to implement it. The bipartisan infrastructure package did not include funding for the plan, and it's not clear the $3.5 trillion spending bill that Democrats hope to pass without Republican support will include that money, either—Democrats are reportedly considering paring down funding to 20 percent of the original proposal. On this omission, Biden has so far been silent.

Having resources to regulate hazardous research may be critical. "The discussions about the Wuhan lab underscore that this is a theoretically plausible risk—that there could be a global pandemic that emerges because of work going on in a laboratory," says Dr. Hamburg. "We may never know the origins of this particular virus, but it shines a very bright light on the need to address some broader, very critical biosecurity concerns."

Former FDA Commissioner Peggy Hamburg, who says, “COVID-19 has changed the threat landscape.” ANDREW HARRER/BLOOMBERG/GETTY

Slow Learners

Keeping the world safe from deadly pathogens isn't something the U.S. can do alone. But the top levels of the executive branch need to ride herd on the disparate departments and agencies of the federal government to prevent a crisis and respond when one occurs.

Past presidents have learned and unlearned this lesson many times. President Bill Clinton appointed a team headed by Kenneth Bernard, a medical doctor and rear admiral, to the National Security Council in 1998. Bernard's office helped coordinate the response to the HIV/AIDS crisis and was instrumental in establishing a national stockpile of vaccines against smallpox, neutralizing the smallpox virus as a potential bioweapon. But George W. Bush eliminated the office early on, only to reverse course after the 9/11 attacks in 2001, when anthrax-laden envelopes started arriving in the mailboxes of prominent politicians and media organizations. A year or so later, Tom Ridge, head of the newly formed Department of Homeland Security, brought Bernard back as part of a five-person White House biosecurity team.

The H1N1 influenza pandemic arrived in the early days of the Obama administration, before Kathleen Sebelius could be confirmed as head of HHS. As a result, it was criticized for being slow in developing a vaccine and for its public health messaging. The mildness of the H1N1 virus let the Obama administration off the hook.

Still, when the Ebola crisis arrived in 2014, the Obama White House was caught flat-footed. After being criticized for a slow response, Obama tapped Ron Klain, former chief of staff to vice-presidents Biden and Al Gore—and now to President Biden—to take a high-profile role coordinating the U.S. Ebola response.

A plan is vitally needed to stave off another epidemic, like Ebola (pictured), experts say. JOHN MOORE/GETTY

Klain coordinated the disparate departments and agencies of the federal government. The White House ultimately sent thousands of troops to the front line of the epidemic in West Africa to help contain the outbreak. "I was brought in not because I knew about public health or pandemics but because I had experience in making the different arms of the government work together and making them work effectively and quickly," Klain told Wired in 2015. "That really was the challenge—coordinating between the different agencies.

That lesson was codified after the crisis was over by a junior member of the White House staff named Beth Cameron, who helped draft the Obama playbook for use in future pandemics. Among its recommendations: Create a permanent pandemic office in the White House's National Security Council—a pandemic czar who would sound the alarm about a biological threat long before most White House officials, distracted by myriad day-to-day problems, would typically notice, and then wield the enormous power of the office of the president to force the vast federal bureaucracy to focus on an invisible threat and take swift action.

Obama followed this advice, appointing Admiral Timothy Ziemer, a veteran of AIDS and malaria programs in Africa. Ziemer stayed through the first half of the Trump administration only to be fired in 2018 by John Bolton, the new national security adviser. Bolton disbanded the staff and shifted responsibility for coordinating pandemic response to HSS.

When news of COVID-19 started coming in from China in early 2020, there was no pandemic czar on the White House staff to galvanize the pandemic response or point out how important it was to push China to be more forthcoming with information on the outbreak's origins. "The problem with Bolton eliminating the office was not so much that he disbanded the team but that he fired the pandemic czar," says Bernard. "If you can't advocate for an issue with the boss with a walk-in-the-office mandate, then you are, by definition, lower priority."

Ziemer insists that Bolton's reorganization made sense but allows that a pandemic czar would have helped. "Had I been there," he says, "I'd have been pounding on [chief of staff] Mick Mulvaney's desk saying I needed $8 million to fund this team."

Biden acted quickly upon taking office to correct this omission. He appointed Cameron, the author of the pandemic playbook that Bolton ignored, as head of the National Security Council Directorate on Global Health Security and Biodefense. Cameron is charged with establishing a U.S. center that will act as an early-warning system for disease outbreaks, reduce the time that it takes the government to respond to new biological threats and to review "the existing state of our biodefense enterprise and [determine] where gaps remain," according to a senior government official at the White House. "We must urgently prepare for and ultimately try to prevent the next pandemic by strengthening biopreparedness at home, bolstering health security in every country, and building the international pandemic architecture we need to prevent, detect and rapidly respond to emerging biological threats." (Cameron declined to be interviewed for this article.)

Biden gets high marks for his appointment of Cameron from Bernard and Ziemer. "It shows that the Biden administration gets it," Ziemer says. Gerald Epstein, a physicist who worked in national security in the Clinton administration, says "the White House has hit the ground running and has great people." He calls the Biden plan "ambitious."

The pandemic czar now faces a daunting task. She will have to find a way to effectively regulate the most risky research performed in the U.S. labs and those financed by the U.S. government, many of which take place abroad. And she will have to push to get the commitment of other nations to follow suit and to agree on international mechanisms to monitor for outbreaks and investigate them once they occur.

What to Do About Risky Lab Research

Scientists and policymakers have been issuing warnings of the risk of a pandemic starting with a lab accident for many years. The history of accidents in U.S. labs that perform research with dangerous pathogens, with poor safety practices and minimal oversight, has been well documented.

Cracking down on this research will be tricky, not least because the federal government is not in the habit of policing the work of research virologists, who in turn are understandably reluctant to be policed. For the vast majority of research, this is not a problem. For a tiny portion of research, it is—and all it takes is one incident to start a pandemic.

In recent months, the argument over whether the pandemic started with a lab leak or arose naturally from animals has taken on the characteristics of a schoolyard shouting match—two sides each insisting they're right on the basis of little or no evidence. We may never have clear evidence either way.

Settling the matter would require the discovery of compelling new information—either a genetic trail from bats to humans via some intermediate mammal—a so-called zoonotic origin—or lab notes and interviews with researchers and other employees of the Wuhan laboratories, which could happen only in the event that those records have been retained and that China chooses to cooperate, or copies of those records exist at the Wuhan lab's U.S. collaborators, funders or publishers and that the U.S. chooses to investigate. The 90-day intelligence report that President Biden has requested is not expected to reveal a smoking gun or even anything profoundly new.

A security guard stands by as WHO officials visit the Wuhan lab earlier this year. HECTOR RETAMAL/AFP/GETTY

What's needed are standards of biosafety for the research on pandemic viruses that could result in trouble if a lab leak occurred—not so much a ban on risky research as an effective system of regulation that would require a consideration of benefits versus risks at the outset of research, says Richard Ebright, a molecular biologist at Rutgers and an expert in biosafety. "This would be put in place for high-consequence research—research that increases the transmissibility, or pathogenicity, or ability to overcome immune response, or ability to overcome drugs or vaccines of a pathogen," he says.

The current structure of oversight is inadequate, says Ebright, mainly because the funding agencies police themselves. After a moratorium on research that involves increasing the infectiousness or virulence of potential pandemic pathogens, in 2017 the federal government required the HHS to establish a committee to review proposals for such "gain-of-function" research to determine whether the benefits outweigh the risks. It also required the NIH and other funding agencies to flag such proposals to the committee. The committee cleared three proposals, says Ebright, after which no further proposals were flagged for review, essentially nullifying the policy.

Instead, analysts say, oversight should fall to an independent group that can assess the benefits and risks objectively. "It has to be carried out by a federal entity that does not perform research and does not fund research, with expertise in national security issues, biomedical research and formal quantitative risk-benefit assessment," says Ebright. "And it has to be carried out by an entity that is open and transparent in its membership and its proceedings."

The process would be similar to what now occurs with research involving human test subjects. If risks are found to outweigh the benefits, the research is not simply denied funding. It isn't allowed to proceed at all.

Processes are also needed to deal with the pandemic threats posed by bioterrorism—and by nature, which has shown itself perfectly capable of delivering diseases even nastier than COVID-19. For proof, one need look no farther than smallpox, which kills 30 percent of its victims. Inexpensive genetic tools have made it relatively easy and cheap to manipulate viruses like smallpox to resist vaccines, and even manufacture new viruses from scratch.

An International Response

To prevent an accidental pandemic, it's not enough to get a grip on U.S. research. The Biden administration will have to use its leadership abroad to establish international biosafety standards. It will also have to get other nations to agree to standards of behavior in a crisis, including sharing information about outbreaks and agreeing to allow international inspectors to gather information in the early days of an outbreak.

A COVID-19 patient on a ventilator in a Minneapolis hospital. AARON LAVINSKY/STAR TRIBUNE/GETTY

Cameron is well aware of the need for such agreements. Prior to her appointment in the White House, she was an organizer of an exercise held in 2019 in Munich designed to identify shortcomings in the world's biosecurity. For a few days, she and a broad range of experts from several nations held war games that focused on "deliberate high-consequence events"—in a word, biowarfare. The group wanted to assess how well the U.S. and the rest of the world would fare if, say, a terrorist group were to release a dangerous pathogen on an unprotected population.

The group started with an outbreak of a respiratory ailment in the fictional country of Vestia, riven by civil war. Medicines turn out to be ineffective against the pathogen, Yersinia pestis, a plague bacteria engineered by a terrorist group to resist known antibiotics. The outbreak spreads to Europe and the U.S. The director-general of the World Health Organization declares a public health emergency.

It's not exactly how the COVID-19 pandemic transpired a year and a half ago, but it's similar in many respects. It makes little difference whether or not SARS-CoV-2 was natural or engineered or whether it was deliberately or accidentally released. In both the tabletop scenario and the real event, the pathogen was novel, meaning the nearly 8 billion people on Earth had no immune resistance to it, and there were no known treatments or vaccines against it.

The other similarity between the game and the reality is that the world was woefully unprepared and cumbersome in its response. Having lived through the current pandemic, it's not hard to understand the reasons why: Nations are unwilling to share information and forced to cobble together an ad hoc response and governments lacked transparency and consistent messaging. One prominent obstacle the tabletop exercise didn't foresee was the hyper-politicized environment of public health measures, but two out of three ain't bad.

When the pandemic struck in late 2019 and early 2020, the international scenario played out as poorly in real life as it did on the tabletop. China snapped shut like a trap, silencing clinicians who sounded the public health alarm and destroying early samples that could have helped trace the origin of the virus. The World Health Organization, which the Trump administration had recently abandoned, was left to deal with a situation that was beyond its capacities and its mission.

What the world needed at that moment was a "joint assessment mechanism to investigate high-consequence biological events of unknown origin," says Jaime Yassif, a senior fellow for global biological policy and programs at NTI, who worked for Cameron at the time. That would be an independent agency of the United Nations similar to the International Atomic Energy Commission, which oversees agreements on nuclear proliferation, including supplying inspectors to police the nuclear agreement with Iran.

Had China, the U.S. and other nations put such a group in place prior to early 2020, a team of investigators with the ability to explore the "naturally emerging" and "lab accident" hypotheses would have been at the ready, along with international agreements and protocols to smooth their way in gathering information, working with a network of labs to evaluate samples and conduct a thorough investigation. They might have explored, in a scientific, evidence-based way, all the open questions about origins. The U.S. would have had a way of rapidly deploying an investigative team to get more reliable information about the origins and try to understand the cause.

As it was, the void was filled by the WHO, whose mission is to investigate natural outbreaks. Any notion that the WHO was equipped to investigate the possibility of a lab leak is belied by the fact that it took a year to send a team of investigators, who came to the dubious conclusion that no further investigation into the lab-leak theory was warranted—a claim later contradicted by the U.N. Secretary-General.

Had the outbreak clearly been a biological attack or other deliberate misuse of biological agents, the responsibility for investigating could have fallen to the Secretary-General, under the auspices of the bioweapons convention. Because the origin of the outbreak was ambiguous, it fell through the cracks.

With no responsible organization in place to take action at the moment of crisis, a yawning information gap opened up. It was quickly filled with finger pointing, racism and conspiracy mongering, particularly in public exchanges between the U.S. and China. "If we had had a mechanism in place," says Yassif, "perhaps we could have avoided a lot of the uncertainty and politicization of this question, and perhaps we could have gotten a higher confidence assessment of the origins early on."

That assessment, of course, is hypothetical: There's no guarantee China, even were it to sign on to such a mechanism, would honor it at the moment of crisis. But even so, it would have had to commit a clear violation of a standard of behavior that it had agreed to. The fact of noncompliance would itself have been useful information.

Now that the world has seen what havoc can result from a nasty bug, says Yassif, "they may be more interested now than they were in the past of exploring the prospect of using biological weapons to advance their strategic or tactical aims. It's getting easier and easier for malicious actors to theoretically carry out a biological attack deliberately. COVID has highlighted these risks and may even have exacerbated them."

A Question of Leadership

To have a chance at getting all this done, the pandemic czar has to have a laser-focus on the issue of pandemic preparedness as well as the full support of the president of the United States. The key question is, will Cameron get the support she needs to shake up the administration?

The role of a pandemic czar is as much about national security and policy as it is about science. Questions about closing schools and airports, implementing mask mandates and closing businesses are political decisions that can only be made by somebody who has the ear of the president, as Ron Klain did during the Ebola crisis. It's not clear, says Bernard, that Cameron has that kind of authority.

"Before they named Klain during Ebola, it was a disaster," recalls Bernard. "Our response was disjointed and stovepiped. Defense wasn't talking to Health and Human Services. USAID was arguing with CDC. It was a mess—and then Ron came in and pulled everybody together. That's what's needed. That's what's missing even today at the White House."

Biden Chief of Staff Ron Klain, who won high marks for overseeing the Obama administration response to the Ebola crisis in 2014. RICKY CARIOTI/THE WASHINGTON POST/GETTY

The task requires a leader who can act in the president's name and get senior people from all departments of governing to come to the table. The lack of clear authority has hampered pandemic responses not just during COVID-19 but in other outbreaks as well. A pandemic response requires high-level-policy meetings with the Defense Department, State Department, Health and Human Services, USAID, the Treasury and Commerce.

"They all have to be in the room because if they're not, you miss something because they're all interrelated when it comes to a global pandemic," says Bernard.

Cameron's rank in the White House is Special Assistant to the President. This sounds impressive, but it's lower in the hierarchy than Press Secretary or National Security Adviser, who are Assistants, and lower than Deputy Assistants. Bernard says it is "not senior enough for running a U.S. government-wide process."

The highest ranking science adviser in the White House is not Cameron but Eric Lander, the first science adviser to hold cabinet rank. Lander has a reputation as a brilliant scientist and administrator and has assembled a highly-regarded staff. As the former head of the Broad Institute in Boston, Lander knows as much as anybody about the science and is known to be pushing for better oversight of research on risky pathogens. But as head of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, his responsibility is far broader than preparing for the next pandemic, which means he lacks the single-minded focus a pandemic czar needs.

Eric Lander, being sworn in last June as director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, making him the administration’s highest ranking science adviser. ANNA MONEYMAKER/GETTY

Even if Cameron gets the full backing of Biden, Ziemer worries that COVID-19 has been so politicized that it will be difficult for the Biden administration to get anything done. "The current government bureaucracy, the inability to move money quickly in response to a changing landscape, will keep the government handicapped on where we need to go in the next five years," he says. "We need to depoliticize COVID and have an adult discussion about how to plan, fund and remain agile in preparation for the next pandemic."

So far, Biden has taken few steps to address the next pandemic. He made public statements calling China to task for its lack of transparency over the origins of the virus. He signed an executive order to create a center for epidemic forecasting and outbreak analytics that would track viruses and watch for early signs of an outbreak in the U.S. And Cameron is reaching out to other governments to talk about cooperation.

If history is any guide, now is the moment of maximum political will to prevent and prepare for the next pandemic.

The failure of the U.S. government, and those of other nations, to prepare for the possibility of a sudden, catastrophic pandemic—something scientists had warned about for years before the coronavirus struck—arguably cost millions of lives, trillions of dollars in lost wages and ruined livelihoods, and immense human suffering. It would be unthinkable to allow that to happen again.