[FOX] Sen. Rand Paul called Monday for President Trump to revoke former CIA director John Brennan's security clearance, as he questioned whether the Obama-era spy boss was "monetizing" his access to sensitive information in his new role as a pundit.
"Is John Brennan monetizing his security clearance? Is John Brennan making millions of dollars divulging secrets to the mainstream media with his attacks on @realDonaldTrump?" Paul tweeted early Monday.
Brennan joined NBC News and MSNBC in February as a contributor and senior national security and intelligence analyst. A spokesperson for the networks did not immediately respond to Fox News’ request for comment on Paul's tweet, which did not list any specific allegations.
The Kentucky Republican, who last week jumped to Trump's defense as the president faced bipartisan criticism over his summit and press conference with Russian President Vladimir Putin, followed up the original tweet by saying:
"Today I will meet with the President and I will ask him to revoke John Brennan’s security clearance!"
#4
$Money$ Keeping these clearances up to date is expensive. Why should they get this benefit after they leave -- and it is a benefit. Tax them until their eyes bleed and see how many beg to lose theirs.
#6
Now....watch them all go get 'hired on' by some beltway think tank into positions requiring TS/SCI. Or we suddenly discover that they are STILL employed by the Intelligence Community as....part-time annuitants.
#7
...Glenn Reynolds' revolving tax surcharge on former government officials' income for working in industry/business they had dealings with looks a winner. Donks never seen a tax they don't like. Bi-partisan.
[Dhaka Tribune] In a major blow to the country's power sector, the Barapukuria thermal power plant in Dinajpur has been shut down owing to an acute shortage of coal after 142,000 tons of coal meant for the power plant disappeared.
The operations of the power plant was stopped around 10:20pm on Sunday, Power Development Board (PDB) Director Saiful Hasan Chowdhury told UNB.
Officials at the PDB, which operates the plant, said they had to completely shut down the plant because of the short supply of coal from the nearby Barapukuria Coal Mining Company Ltd (BCMCL).
Northern districts to suffer power outage
Due to this unexpected shutdown of the power plant, the northern region of Bangladesh ‐ especially comprises Rangpur, Panchagarh, Nilphamari, Lalmonirhat, Kurigram, Gaibandha, Dinajpur and Thakurgaon districts ‐ may experience unusual power cuts or low voltage problems.
The PDB chief said the authorities were trying to ensure power supply to the districts from alternative sources, such as power plants in other districts like Sirajganj, Khulna and Rajshahi.
"The PDB has urged Petrobangla [Bangladesh Oil, Gas and Mineral Corporation] to ensure adequate gas supply to the gas-fired power plants in Sirajganj and other districts so more power can be generated and supplied to the northern region," he added.
Probe committee formed
Allegations have been raised that the coal, worth around Tk227 crore, was illegally sold from Barapukuria coal mine.
BCMCL Managing Director Md Habib Uddin Ahmed has been withdrawn by Petrobangla, while the company's Secretary (GS Administration) Md Abul Quashem Pradhania has been transferred to the Pashchimanchal Gas Distribution Company Ltd.
BCMCL Mining Department General Manager ATS Nuruzzaman Chowdhury and Deputy General Manager Md Khademul have been suspended.
Md Ayub Khan Chowdhury, director (planning) of Petrobangla, has been appointed as the acting managing director of the coal mine company.
Meanwhile, ...back at the pond, the radioactive tadpoles grown into frogs. Really big frogs, in fact... State Minister for Power, Energy and Mineral Resources Nasrul Hamid Bipu told the Bangla Tribune on Sunday that a committee had been formed to probe the allegations.
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07/23/2018 00:00 ||
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#1
"Huh? It was just here"
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/23/2018 7:32 Comments ||
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[PRESSTV] Police in central Britain have made an arrest over the latest acid attack that targeted a three-year-old boy, which authorities believe was deliberate.
Police on Sunday appealed for any information about the alleged attack, which took place a day earlier in Worcester and inflicted serious injuries on the boy.
Police arrested a 39-year-old man from Wolverhampton. Images of three other men were seen in the media to whom investigators wanted to speak about the case.
Authorities said they believed the incident, which occurred at about 2:15 pm pm local time at a shop in Worcester, was a deliberate attack. They said the substance that wounded the boy may be acid or some other corrosive element.
“At this time, the motive for the attack is unclear. Officers are working hard to establish exactly what happened and what the substance involved was,” Chief Supt Mark Travis from the West Mercia police said, adding, “We have used the phrase acid attack because I think that means something to the general public ... we are treating this as a deliberate attack on a three-year-old boy.”
Posted by: Fred ||
07/23/2018 00:00 ||
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#1
Per Daily Mail last night, victim had been released home. One suspect described by witness as skinny white boy; other three (130 somethings away) looked Asian-ish in video still. Headlines should probably read "Someone Wets Child with Something" or "Police in GWD Hysterics Horror."
Posted by: Jack Chaiter7913 ||
07/23/2018 13:25 Comments ||
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#7
In a lot of cases the countries China is 'investing in' are long-standing client states and the programs are meant to reinforce that status. Client as in 'Patron/Client' in Roman Republic Feudalism way back when. It's the word we have but everyone misuses.
[Townhall] Last week, Townhall reported the senseless killing of Weymouth, MA police officer Sgt. Michael Chesna on July 15th. More than 3,000 people attended a vigil held in Chesna's honor this past week, but it turns out his alleged killer, Emanuel Lopes, should have been in jail due to violating the conditions of his bail on a drug-dealing charge from October 2017.
The Boston Herald reports that Emanuel Lopes was arrested in October 2017 for dealing cocaine to minors. As part of his bail conditions, Judge Jeanmarie Carroll required that Lopes refrain from all drugs, including legal medicinal marijuana, and be subjected to pre-trial probation drug testing. The bail was set at $500 and was supposed to be revoked if Lopes failed to comply. In February 2018, Lopes failed a drug test, but claimed that he had a medicinal marijuana card at a court appearance in April. But, Lopes' prosecutors did not recommend bail revocation.
"I tested Mr. Lopes. He was positive for marijuana. He reports to me that he has a THC card," probation officer Michael Walsh informed the court Assistant Norfolk District Attorney Arthur Czugh ultimately decided against recommending his bail be revoked.
Thus, Lopes was able to roam Weymouth freely. Three months later, he was pulled over by Sgt. Chesna for driving erratically. Lopes exited his vehicle and attacked Sgt. Chesna with rocks, knocking the officer to the ground. The suspect then allegedly stole the officer's gun and fired at him, which led to the officer's death. Authorities say that Lopes then shot and killed a nearby 77-year-old neighbor, Vera Adams, who witnessed the event from her porch.
[DAWN] Zim-bob-we’s President Emmerson Mnangagwa addressed a crowd of white voters on Saturday in an attempt improve relations ahead of a July 30 election, a marked shift from his predecessor Bob Muggsy Mugabe Nonagenarian President-for-Life of Zim-bob-we who turned the former Breadbasket of Africa into the African Basket Case. Dumped in November 2017 when the Missus decided she wanted to be president, and opposed heer might against Crocodile Mnangawa Important safety tip: If your opponent goes by the name Crocodile andf your title is Shopper in Chief let him win.... whose policies became increasingly racially divisive ...politicians call things divisive when when the other side sez something they don't like. Their own statements are never divisive, they're principled... Mnangagwa, who came to power when Mugabe was removed in a de facto coup in November, is on the campaign trail ahead of what is expected to be a tight contest with his main rival, Nelson Chamisa, the 40-year-old leader of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC).
The white Zim-bob-weans who are left in the country ‐ estimated at around 30,000 ‐ would usually vote MDC or for another opposition party, given the strained relationship with Mnangagwa’s ruling ZANU-PF.
But Mnangagwa, a 75-year-old former Mugabe ally, has pledged to fix racial divisions and end the violent seizure of white-owned commercial farms, a policy that Mugabe said was intended to redress post-colonial imbalances.
Many farms ended up in the hands of powerful politicians, soldiers or local chiefs and fell into disrepair. "I know of some chiefs who have moved from one farm to another. Then they run it down. Then he leaves that farm and he is issued another one. He runs it down. That time is gone," Mnangagwa told a crowd of several hundred white Zim-bob-weans in Borrowdale, a wealthy suburb in the capital Harare.
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[Telegraph] State auditors have told a French village near the Spanish border that it is "too rich" to continue taxing residents and should cancel council and property taxes this year.
Le Perthus, a community of 586 people, earns more than £700,000 a year from parking fees alone, equivalent to nearly £1,200 per inhabitant.
People from the surrounding region park in the village while they cross the border on foot to shop in Spain, where food, clothes and household goods are cheaper.
The village council has a surplus of well over £1 million in its coffers, while its current spending is minimal. Accordingly, the regional audit office has advised it to abandon this year’s local taxes because it has "an abundance of resources that are not being used".
André Pezziardi, head of the Occitanie Audit Office, said: "We concluded that local taxation should be reduced to zero for council and property taxes because the contributions of citizens must have a quid pro quo, and that of course is expenditure."
Last year the council spent less than £5,000 of £240,000 earmarked for public facilities because the mayor and councillors failed to reach agreement on budgets.
NENDAZ, Switzerland (Reuters) - The soft sounds of hundreds of wooden Swiss alpine horns filled the valley below Switzerland’s Mount Tracouet on Sunday, as the world’s largest festival of its kind concluded after three days.
The traditional instruments, alphorn in German or cor des Alpes in French, look like supersized smoking pipes.
Over three meters long and built in several connecting pieces to make transport manageable, they are beloved by many Swiss for whom the somber tones conjure images of snow-topped mountain peaks swirling in the clouds.
TORONTO (Reuters) - Fourteen people, including a young girl, were shot near downtown Toronto, police in Canada’s biggest city said on Sunday, with one person killed and the gunman also dead.
The young girl was in a critical condition, Toronto Police Chief Mark Saunders said. "We are looking at all possible motives... and not closing any doors," Saunders told reporters at the site of the shooting.
Paramedics, firefighters and police converged on the shooting in Toronto’s east end, which has many popular restaurants, cafes and shops.
Police said the gunman had used a handgun. Earlier reports said nine people had been shot. Reports of gunfire in the city’s Greektown neighborhood began at 10 p.m. local time (0200 GMT Monday), CityNews.com said.
Witnesses said they heard 25 gunshots, the news website reported.
A BBC investigation in Britain several years ago revealed that at least 55% of the Pakistani community in Britain was married to a first cousin. The Times of India affirmed that “this is thought to be linked to the probability that a British Pakistani family is at least 13 times more likely than the general population to have children with recessive genetic disorders.”
The BBC’s research also discovered that while British Pakistanis accounted for just 3.4% of all births in Britain, they accounted for 30% of all British children with recessive disorders and a higher rate of infant mortality. It is not a surprise, therefore, that, in response to this evidence, a Labour Party MP has called for a ban on first-cousin marriage.
[DAWN] MUZAFFARGARH: Jatoi police claimed on Saturday to have enjugged Yez got nuttin' on me, coppers! Nuttin'! the ’pir’ who gave cancer patient Fiaz Hussain and his family members some powder for treatment four days back.
Public Relations Officer Mohammad Waseem [of DPO] said Jatoi police arrested suspect Mohammad Naveed alias Qamar Abbas Shah Sahib in Lahore. He said the suspect would use half a dozen SIMs. He said DPO Faisal Shahzad formed a team, led by SP (investigation) Mustafa Pahore, that traced him. He said Qamar was living in a hotel in Lahore.
He said the suspect confessed to his crime. The PRO quoted the suspect as saying that he (Qamar) came to the house of Fiaz Hussain and gave powder, advising him and his family to mix it in milk and drink at night for recovery. The suspect in his statement said when all [25] family members fell unconscious, he raped a woman and made off with gold ornaments.
Reports said out of 16 family members admitted to Nishtar Hospital, Multan Home of the Multan Sultans... , four are under treatment while others have been discharged.
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Clearly many Israelis aren't terribly concerned about the not-war with Gaza.
[IsraelTimes] Nationwide rallies and strikes demanding equal surrogacy rights for gay men culminate in mass rally where anger focuses on Netanyahu.
Tens of thousands of Israelis packed into Tel Aviv’s Rabin Square on Sunday night to protest the exclusion of gay couples from a recently passed surrogacy law that has drawn accusations of LGBT discrimination in the Jewish state.
Gay rights advocates and their supporters observed an unprecedented one-day strike earlier on Sunday, and large demonstrations were held in major cites across Israel, where hundreds were seen waving rainbow flags, blocking traffic, and shouting "shame."
Many focused their anger at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who last week pledged to pass legislation supporting surrogacy for gay fathers, but then voted against it, reportedly under pressure from ultra-Orthodox coalition partners.
"It’s very important, I’m not from the community, but I believe in equality," a protester named Eti told the Times of Israel. "It’s just not right that some people can’t have kids."
Sunday’s protests were announced last Wednesday by Agudah ‐ Israel’s umbrella organization for the LGBTQ community ‐ shortly after the Knesset voted on a surrogacy bill which extended eligibility to single women, but not to men, effectively preventing homosexual couples from having a child via a surrogate.
Netanyahu had initially expressed support for a clause to be added to the legislation that would extend surrogacy rights to gay couples, but at the last-minute voted against it, apparently to appease ultra-Orthodox cabinet members who oppose giving gay men the right to father children through surrogacy.
Channel 10 reported at the time that in return for Netanyahu’s vote, the Haredi parties agreed to support the Likud-backed Jewish nation-state bill, another controversial piece of legislation that was up for its final votes later that week.
Amid mounting criticism, Netanyahu later denied that he changed his mind his position on surrogate parenthood for same-sex couples, saying he voted against the measure to ensure the bill would pass. He vowed to support a separate bill legalizing surrogacy for gay couples at a later Knesset session.
#2
There's a general law of human performace called Fitt's Law that comes out of WWII. It states that performance follows an inverted U-shaped curve. There is an optimal level of performance at the top of the U-shaped curve. Performance falls off on either side of this optimum. Too little stimulation and performance suffers because of a loss of vigilance; too much stimulation and performance suffers because processing overload.
So, the research makes quite a bit of sense. It has implications for pilots, radar observers and drone missile operators as well as others where long vigils of monitoring are required.
From a late posting last evening by Skid.
[FOX] The acting watchdog at the CIA, who has been accused of retaliating against whistleblowers, is resigning, the agency confirmed Friday.
Christopher Sharpley, whose nomination for the agency’s inspector general post had stalled in the Senate, said in a memo to employees that he is stepping down within 30 days.
"After three decades of public service, he has decided to continue his career outside the agency, and we wish him the best in this new chapter," CIA spokesman Ryan Trapani said in a statement. "CIA's commitment to rigorous, independent oversight is unwavering, and the Office of Inspector General will carry on that important mission through the transition."
Sharpley is also withdrawing his inspector general nomination, CNN reported.
His reason for resigning from the agency and withdrawing his nomination was not immediately clear. Spend more time with the family, philately, memoirs ?
The Senate wasn't prepared to advance Sharpley's nomination until a resolution to complaints from two former CIA employees-turned-whistleblowers who alleged retaliation, according to a congressional aide who wasn't authorized to discuss the matter publicly and spoke only on condition of anonymity.
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.
[FOX] Sen. Rand Paul called Monday for President Trump to revoke former CIA director John Brennan's security clearance, as he questioned whether the Obama-era spy boss was "monetizing" his access to sensitive information in his new role as a pundit. 
[PRESSTV] Police in central Britain have made an arrest over the latest acid attack that targeted a three-year-old boy, which authorities believe was deliberate.
[Townhall] Last week, Townhall reported the senseless killing of Weymouth, MA police officer Sgt. Michael Chesna on July 15th. More than 3,000 people attended a vigil held in Chesna's honor this past week, but it turns out his alleged killer, Emanuel Lopes, should have been in jail due to violating the conditions of his bail on a drug-dealing charge from October 2017. 
[Telegraph] State auditors have told a French village near the Spanish border that it is "too rich" to continue taxing residents and should cancel council and property taxes this year.
NENDAZ, Switzerland (Reuters) - The soft sounds of hundreds of wooden Swiss alpine horns filled the valley below Switzerland’s Mount Tracouet on Sunday, as the world’s largest festival of its kind concluded after three days.
