[Daily Beast] A Navy sailor charged with sharing classified information to Taiwan and China--allegations that carry a potential life sentence in prison--could still avoid a full military trial and end up with a shorter sentence, defense officials told The Daily Beast.
It will all depend on who fears the prospect of a trial more--the military lawyers who have to navigate painstaking administrative procedures in order to admit the very classified information that Navy Lt. Cmdr Edward Lin allegedly shared. Or Lin, himself, who faces such serious charges that he likely could only avoid a lesser sentence by cutting a guilty plea deal.
[TIME] The South Sudanese man is being held by Canadian immigration officials
A 29-year-old South Sudanese man accused of posing as a high school student in Canada after allegedly entering the country illegally claims he did not know his real age.
Jonathan Elia Nicola, who played basketball on his high school team, told officials during a recent detention hearing that he was not lying about being a teenager to attend the high school. He said he was never given a clear answer from his mother about his actual age, according to the Toronto Star.
"I always keep asking what is the specific (year) that I was born, and she has told me that she could not remember," he testified, according to the newspaper. "Over (in South Sudan) ... they do not ask your age. They do not ask you nothing."
The Canada Border Services Agency was tipped off to Nicola’s status by American authorities late last year when he applied for a U.S. visitor’s visa to play basketball with the school in the U.S., according to the Toronto Sun. He had tried at least four times to get into the U.S. but his applications were rejected, the newspaper said.
Nicola has been held by Canadian immigration since April 15 and was ordered to remain in jug, according to the Star. "I am not a liar person. I am religious. I pray to God," he added.
"Dear God, get me out of this mess!"
Posted by: Fred ||
04/28/2016 00:00 ||
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#1
Hey, he IDENTIFIES as a teenager. That's all that's important these days, not facts.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
04/28/2016 10:10 Comments ||
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#2
What tipped you guys off - the fact he's 6'8" or the double digit rebounds by halftime?
#4
A scholarship waitin' to happen:
Say, Poli Sci, minor in rappin'?
Be Big Man on Campus,
Then, why not revamp us
As President -- just throw your cap in!
#2
Well, one could have a series of '2-day' work weeks. A governmental re-designated six day work week would permit three such work weeks in one. Unless of course, you were capable of working double shifts, which might give you as many as six part-time jobs per week.
#4
The "Missouri Millennials" probably think this is the right thing.
They probably don't work more than 2 days a week now and figure that's the way of the world. They calculate their minimum wage by what they want not what they do.
#8
Thank you, AlanC. It should have been obvious, but Mr. Wife had two back to back business trips in opposite directions, and we ran back to Buffalo for his father's 80th birthday in between, so I'm a little slow at the moment.
[RFE/RL] Uzbek authorities have condemned a popular singer's "shameless" choice of clothing and warned her to avoid offending national "mentality and values," hinting that she might be tossed out of the industry for her transgressions.
The singer, Aziza Niyazmetova, was told by Uzbeknavo, the state agency overseeing the music industry, that her appearance will be a determining factor in her impending license renewal. Performers are required to obtain a license to work in Uzbekistan.
An official notification tells the singer that authorities will determine whether Niyazmetova "has adhered to ethical norms,...hasn't insulted the audience's feelings, [and] has respected the national mentality, values, and culture." The letter was signed by the head of the license-issuing body, Farhod Juraev, dubbed by some Uzbek performers the "Minister of Singers."
Niyazmetova said that she was summoned over a recent mirror selfie shared on social media that shows her in a sleeveless dress with a bouquet of flowers in front of her.
The meeting at Uzbeknavo came a week after an interview Niyazmetova gave to the press in which she defended a female Uzbek singer who had been criticized on social media for shortcomings in Uzbek language skills. In the interview, Niyazmetova said that Uzbekistan is home to many ethnic groups, including Tajiks, Jews, and Russians, and that "not everyone must speak Uzbek."
North Korea has drastically stepped up punishment for people caught trying to flee the country. According to a report by the Korea Institute for National Unification on Tuesday, the regime has sent people caught trying to flee for the first time directly to labor camps for three to five years since 2014. Until 2013, the regime only sent would-be defectors to labor camps for about six months.
The report is based on interviews with 186 North Korean defectors who arrived here from late 2014 to 2015.
Defectors account for 70 percent of the inmates in labor camps in South Pyongan and North Hamgyong Province.
In order to prevent people from escaping, the regime has tightened border controls and crackdowns on mobile phone use. In the border town Onsong, North Hamgyong Province, the regime has announced it has planted landmines along the Duman River. It also installed surveillance cameras along major escape routes in Hoeryong and Musan, North Hamgyong Province and reinforced barbed wire in Hyesan in June last year.
To keep out outside information, there are greater crackdowns on recordings of South Korean or Chinese soap operas.
"In the past, anybody could bribe their way out of punishment if they were caught watching recordings smuggled from China. But since 2015 they have been sentenced to hard labor," the report says.
North Korean workers overseas are suffering meager wages and unreasonable hours. A defector, who used to work at a building site in Russia, said, "I earned US$1,000 to 1,500 per year, the amount an ordinary Russian worker can earn in a month. Russian law stipulates working hours from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., but North Korean laborers there work from 5 a.m. until midnight."
There are five political concentration camps in the North, where between 80,000 and 120,000 political prisoners are believed to be held.
The entire country is a concentration camp.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/28/2016 00:00 ||
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#1
Which probably also explains why the Chinese deployed troops along their border with the NorKs. The question is whether it was a coordinated action, or China "dictated terms" to the NorKs.
Amid a moribund economy and reduced levels of consumer spending, the Fed on Wednesday again opted not to raise interest rates.
"Economic activity appears to have slowed," the Federal Open Market Committee said in a statement released after its two-day meeting this week. "Growth in household spending has moderated, although households' real income has risen at a solid rate and consumer sentiment remains high."
The statement highlighted the many conflicting signs in the U.S. economy – consistent job growth and an improving housing market against slowdowns in business investment and exports. Indeed, the Atlanta Fed has estimated that economic growth slowed to just 0.6 percent in the first quarter of 2016, a condition reflected in the Fed's lukewarm assessment of conditions.
#2
Let's see: the largest retailer Walmart had its first ever drop in revenue in 45+ years. And you can't blame the internet for walmarts reversal because Apple had its first revenue miss in 51 quarters.
#3
Audit the fed. Whats slowing the economy is the weight of the government and its dead hand of regulations. That and nearly a decade of jobless recovery under Obama. The number they use is completely misleading. And neither party seems capable of slashing away at Federal spending and federal taxes, which is what is needed.
A lot of people are wise to it and are starting to save and hunker down instead of spending like madmen.
#4
It's really hard to deal with economics when all your data has been corrupted by a bureaucracy to make their masters look good. Just ask the Soviets how that worked out.
"The U.S. economy expanded in the first quarter at the slowest pace in two years as American consumers reined in spending and companies tightened their belts in response to weak global financial conditions and a plunge in oil prices.
Gross domestic product rose at a 0.5 percent annualized rate after a 1.4 percent fourth-quarter advance, Commerce Department data showed Thursday. The increase was less than the 0.7 percent median projection in a Bloomberg survey and marked the third straight disappointing start to a year."
Thanks Obama. Hildabeest is running for a third Obama term. Good luck on that
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/28/2016 8:59 Comments ||
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#6
wanna bet that 1.4% last Quarter gets "revised downward"?
Unexpectedly™.
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/28/2016 9:00 Comments ||
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#7
wanna bet that 1.4% last Quarter gets "revised downward"? Unexpectedly™.
But the good news is....government revised 'downward reporting' appears to be following an upward trend.
#11
once the command economy mindset gets hold the downstream minds get very quickly that it is career terminal to disappoint the leaders, so fudge, and soon, 5 year plans and meaningless numbers become the norm.....
#12
A new "5 year plan", properly rolled out every 18 months, takes us all they way down to the "kicked can", so long as no one else kicks the can further...
Spain’s King Felipe VI decided April 26 that none of the country’s political parties has enough support to form a government, setting the stage for an unprecedented repeat election in June, six months after voters ended the nation’s traditional two-party system.
Spain: the new Belgium.
Felipe announced his decision in a statement after spending two days meeting with party leaders - including those in charge of the conservative Popular Party, the center-left Socialists, the far-left Podemos party and the business-friendly Ciudadanos party. His decision means that no party will be able to cobble together a minority or coalition government that would assume control of the 350-member lower house of Parliament by May 2, triggering a new election for June 26.
Spain has been politically paralyzed since its national election on Dec. 20, 2015 that saw the entry of Podemos and Ciudadanos as strong No. 3 and No. 4 parties following decades of alternating rule between the Popular Party and the Socialists.
The upstarts were voted in by Spaniards angry about years of high unemployment, seemingly endless corruption cases affecting the Popular Party and the Socialists plus unpopular austerity cuts hitting cherished national health care and public education.
Polls suggest a repeat election - a first for Spain since democracy was restored in 1978 - is unlikely to break the stalemate and could mean a political impasse stretching into the summer, possibly ending with yet another election.
Spain has never had a coalition government at the national level. The Socialists rejected Rajoy’s proposal for a grand coalition similar to those that have been negotiated in many other European countries.
Analysts predict that Rajoy’s party, known as the PP, will again take 1st place in the June election but remain incapable of getting the votes it needs to win back the parliamentary majority it enjoyed from 2011-2015.
The Socialists came in second, Podemos took third place, Cuidadanos was fourth and a handful of small parties also won seats in the 350-member lower house of Parliament. The breakdown of legislative seats made it crucial for the parties for the first time in Spain’s history to negotiate alliances for a coalition or form a minority government, but they were incapable of doing so despite months of negotiations.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/28/2016 00:00 ||
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[MIRROR.CO.UK] SpaceX is planning to be the first private company to land on Mars within the next two years.
The company said it is planning to send its Dragon spaceraft to the red planet as early as 2018.
Bosses announced their intentions in a statement on Twitter this afternoon.
A spokesperson tweeted: "Planning to send Dragon to Mars as soon as 2018. Red Dragons will inform overall Mars architecture, details to come."
Earlier this month the US aerospace company successfully landed a reusable rocket on an ocean platform, after four previous attempts failed.
Mission controllers cheered as the Falcon 9 rocket remained upright on the platform off the coast of Florida on Friday April 8.
It was returning from delivering an inflatable habitat into space for Nasa. The inflatable room will attach to the International Space Station (ISS) for a two-year test and will become the first such habitat for use by humans in orbit.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/28/2016 00:00 ||
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[11127 views]
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#1
interesting SAA contract with NASA on this..
In exchange for all data NASA will help them with JPL fully on-board.
When this is over they should know how to make an interplanetary spaceship.
#2
You need an awful lot of delta-v if you want a large payload there in a shorter amount of time. Do they have anything that can fill that role or do they plan on docking it together in orbit and go from there?
Posted by: Pearl Big Foot3043 ||
04/28/2016 19:14 Comments ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[RFE/RL] Uzbek authorities have condemned a popular singer's "shameless" choice of clothing and warned her to avoid offending national "mentality and values," hinting that she might be tossed out of the industry for her transgressions.
[MIRROR.CO.UK] SpaceX is planning to be the first private company to land on Mars within the next two years.
