Ocasio-Cortez: Illegal Immigrants Are MY Constituents

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez says illegal immigrants are her constituents

Source: Wyatt T – Nworeport

Democrat Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez stunned Congress on Thursday by referring to illegal immigrants as her “constituents.” 

Ocasio-Cortez was questioning Wilbur Ross, President Donald Trump’s secretary of commerce, when she made the bombshell statement. She began by referencing remarks Republican Kris Kobach made while he was Kansas secretary of state. Kobach encouraged Trump early on in his administration to add a 2020 consensus question about citizenship.

“Kobach said, ‘I raised the issue with the president shortly after he was inaugurated’ and ‘he was absolutely interested in this,’” Ocasio-Cortez said. “Shortly thereafter, in April of 2017, Steve Bannon asked you to speak with Mr. Kobach about his ‘ideas about including a citizenship question on the 2020 decennial census.’”

Freebeacon.com reports: Ross acknowledged he did speak with Kobach early on in the administration, but he was cut off by Ocasio-Cortez before he could clarify what exactly the conversation was about.

“I’m sorry, I must reclaim my time,” Ocasio-Cortez said.

“Mr. Kobach later sent an email to you on July 14, writing that the lack of the citizenship question ‘leads to the problem that aliens who do not actually reside in the United States are still counted for congressional apportionment services,’” she said.

“Of course they do reside in the United States. They reside in my district. They’re my constituents,” she said of illegal aliens.

Ocasio-Cortez has been an outspoken critic of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), saying the agency responsible for enforcing U.S. immigration laws has “systematically violated human rights” and caused “death.”

The Best Analysis Of What Really Happened To The Boeing 737 Max From A Pilot & Software Engineer

The following tweets from Trevor Sumner, CEO of Perch Experience, of what really happened to the Boeing 737 Max, may be one of the best summaries of the events that led to the two recent airplane crashes, and also why Boeing’s “software upgrade” response is a farce.

 

And for those who are not particular fans of tweetstorms, here it is recapped:

BEST analysis of what really is happening on the #Boeing737Max issue from my brother in law @davekammeyer, who’s a pilot, software engineer & deep thinker. Bottom line don’t blame software that’s the band aid for many other engineering and economic forces in effect.

Some people are calling the 737MAX tragedies a #software failure. Here’s my response: It’s not a software problem. It was an

  • Economic problem that the 737 engines used too much fuel, so they decided to install more efficient engines with bigger fans and make the 737MAX.
  • Airframe problem. They wanted to use the 737 airframe for economic reasons, but needed more ground clearance with bigger engines.The 737 design can’t be practically modified to have taller main landing gear. The solution was to mount them higher & more forward.
  • Aerodynamic problem. The airframe with the engines mounted differently did not have adequately stable handling at high AoA to be certifiable. Boeing decided to create the MCAS system to electronically correct for the aircraft’s handling deficiencies.

During the course of developing the MCAS, there was a:

  • Systems engineering problem. Boeing wanted the simplest possible fix that fit their existing systems architecture, so that it required minimal engineering rework, and minimal new training for pilots and maintenance crews.

The easiest way to do this was to add some features to the existing Elevator Feel Shift system. Like the #EFS system, the #MCAS relies on non-redundant sensors to decide how much trim to add. Unlike the EFS system, MCAS can make huge nose down trim changes.

On both ill-fated flights, there was a:

  • Sensor problem. The AoA vane on the 737MAX appears to not be very reliable and gave wildly wrong readings. On #LionAir, this was compounded by a
  • Maintenance practices problem. The previous crew had experienced the same problem and didn’t record the problem in the maintenance logbook. This was compounded by a…
  • Pilot training problem. On LionAir, pilots were never even told about the MCAS, and by the time of the Ethiopian flight, there was an emergency AD issued, but no one had done sim training on this failure. This was compounded by an..
  • Economic problem. Boeing sells an option package that includes an extra AoA vane, and an AoA disagree light, which lets pilots know that this problem was happening. Both 737MAXes that crashed were delivered without this option. No 737MAX with this option has ever crashed.

All of this was compounded by a:

  • Pilot expertise problem. If the pilots had correctly and quickly identified the problem and run the stab trim runaway checklist, they would not have crashed.

Nowhere in here is there a software problem. The computers & software performed their jobs according to spec without error. The specification was just shitty. Now the quickest way for Boeing to solve this mess is to call up the software guys to come up with another band-aid.

I’m a software engineer, and we’re sometimes called on to fix the deficiencies of mechanical or aero or electrical engineering, because the metal has already been cut or the molds have already been made or the chip has already been fabed, and so that problem can’t be solved.

But the software can always be pushed to the update server or reflashed. When the software band-aid comes off in a 500mph wind, it’s tempting to just blame the band-aid.

SAD: De Blasio tells New Yorkers how to use their toilets: Only ‘poop, pee, puke, toilet paper’ should go in

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio is apparently concerned folks in the Big Apple don’t know how to properly use their toilets, so he’s offering a little advice.

Source: Victor Skinner 

“New York City: There are only FOUR things that should go in your toilet,” the NYC Mayor’s Office posted to Twitter, along with a series of emojis to illustrate the message. “poop, pee, puke, toilet paper

“Everything else causes FATBERGS! What are fatbergs? Well, you gotta click on FatbergFree.nyc.”

According to the site, “the word ‘fatberg’ combines the words ‘fat’ and ‘iceberg’ to describe the masses of congealed grease and personal hygiene products that have been found lingering in sewers around the world.

“They are HUGE, DISGUSTING, DESTRUCTIVE, and COSTLY!”

FatbergFree.nyc is the city’s public service campaign to fight the problem and it features videos and other information, in both English and Spanish.

It’s apparently a problem fueled in large part by “flushable” wet wipes that don’t degrade like normal toilet paper, as well as other sanitary supplies folks flush away without a thought.

Last September, public works employees in Metro Detroit discovered a massive fatberg that measured 11 feet wide, 100 feet long, and 6 feet tall. The clog had filled more than half of the 11-foot diameter Lakeshore Interceptor pipe, forcing the Macomb County Public Works Office to call in a specialist to remove the repulsive mess.

According to The Macomb Daily:

Doetsch Environmental Services, located in Warren, was brought in to break up the fatberg. Joe Schotthoefer of Doetsch said stand procedure to remove such a blockage would be to us air conveyance, or sucking up the waste through an 8-inch tube. But the fatberg was too big for that. Next, Doetsch tried to us a high-pressure stream of water to break the fatberg into pieces, but that didn’t work either. Finally, Doetsch personnel had to manually cut up the blob using handsaws. The smaller pieces were vacuumed to the surface.

The 19-ton fatberg is the biggest Schotthoefer said he’d ever encountered in his 25 years in the business, but it pales in comparison to the world’s largest, discovered under London in 2017.

That fatberg measured more than 800 feet long and weighed in at an estimated 130 tons, or about the same as 11 double-decker buses, according to The Guardian.

Shoebox size pieces of the London fatberg are now at the Museum of London, which began a livestream of the calcified mass of feces, fat, oil, wet wipes and other items in September after a temporary display enthralled visitors.

“Curators said the fatberg had hatched flies, sweated and changed color while on display,” the Guardian reports. “Since being removed on 1 July, the fatberg has grown an unusual toxic mold in the form of visible yellow pustules.”

Samples of the Detroit fatberg, meanwhile, are now research specimens at Wayne State University and are set to go on display at the Michigan Science Center, WDIV reports.

Nobel Laureate William Nordhaus demonstrates that pursuing climate mitigation will make a nation worse off

“Using Nordhaus’s model assumptions, if the World as a whole fulfilled the Paris Climate Agreement collectively with optimal policies, then the world would be worse off than if it did nothing. That is due to most countries pursuing little or no actual climate mitigation policies. Within this context, pursuing any costly climate mitigation policies will make a country worse off than doing nothing. Assuming political leaders have the best interests of their country at heart, and regardless of whether they regard climate change a problem, the optimal policy strategy is to impose as little costly policy as possible for maximum appearance of being virtuous, whilst doing the upmost to get other countries to pursue costly mitigation policies.”

Rubio’s Gloating Betrays US Sabotage in Venezuela Power Blitz

by Finian Cunningham, Strategic Culture: US imperialists are so desperate in their regime-change predations over Venezuela, they seem to have a problem controlling their drooling mouths. The latest orgy of American gloating was triggered by the massive power outages to have hit Venezuela. No sooner had the South American country been blacked out from its […]

The post Rubio’s Gloating Betrays US Sabotage in Venezuela Power Blitz appeared first on SGT Report.

Denmark In A State Of Unreported Collapse

Authored by Ole Hasselbalch via The Gatestone Institute,

  • The official statistical definition of “descendants” includes only the first generation after the person who migrated to Denmark. So the official figures do not show the real picture.

  • If the population statistics continue to follow that pattern, ethnic Danes — whose birthrate is far lower than that of non-Western immigrants — will become a minority sometime around the year 2065. According to a 2017 report by Statistics Denmark, only about half of non-Western immigrants between the ages of 16 and 64 are employed (53% of men and 45% of women).

  • In 2017, a third of all the people provided for by Denmark’s basic social-welfare system were immigrants, which constitutes a rise of 82% in a mere seven years. These figures show that the public expenses connected to immigration will, in the long run, bring the welfare state to an end.

<!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

Contrary to misleading media reports, Denmark is not forcing suffering refugees to live on a remote island. Only foreign criminals “convicted of crimes and slated for deportation under the terms of their sentences” will be housed there. And they will even be given ferry rides to the mainland, under the excuse that this is necessary due to “international conventions”.

The media portrayal of Denmark as a country hostile and inhumane to migrants is misleading, if not completely false.

One reason for the inaccurate picture is that it is painted by journalists’ political bias. Another is that trustworthy official Danish statistics on the country’s immigration problem are both difficult to find and even harder to interpret. A further problem is a lack of reliable research, at best; and purposely distorted data, at worst.

The following breakdown illustrates that rather than being more relatively free of the consequences of mass migration than other European countries in general, and Scandinavian countries in particular, Denmark is in a state of societal collapse. In spite of Copenhagen’s many laws that govern migration and affect immigrants, the Danish people have been experiencing a major cultural and political shift in their life as they have traditionally known it.

Population Projections

In 1960, the population of Denmark was 4,580,708. Today, that number stands at 5,768,712. This growth appears to be largely due to immigration.

In 2016, Statistics Denmark projected that the country will have 507,000 “non-Western” immigrants by the year 2060, and 342,000 “non-Western descendants.”

“Descendants”, however, include only the first generation after the person who migrated. So the official figures do not show the real picture.

In 1989, a private organization, “The Danish Association”, published an alternative projection as part of a special edition of the group’s periodical Danskeren(September 1989, p. 3, not available on the internet.) The article, published anonymously — revealing the degree of political correctness and self-censorship required in Denmark even then — predicted that immigration would remain relatively static, regardless of foreseeable insufficient attempts to tighten legislation. This prediction has turned out to be almost correct up to now.

The article predicted about 1.1 million immigrants around 2020, in accordance with what can be seen in current statistics if you include the third generation of newcomers as well as the probable number of unregistered foreigners.

If the population statistics continue to follow this pattern, ethnic Danes — whose birthrate is far lower than that of non-Western immigrants – will become a minority sometime around the year 2065. This is in fact quite likely to happen, as immigrants defined as “refugees” continue to enter the country; and others, such as arrivals of family members and “walk-ins,” are rarely able to be returned to their countries of origin.

Employment and Social Welfare

According to a 2017 report by Statistics Denmark, only about half of non-Western immigrants between the ages of 16 and 64 are employed (53% of men and 45% of women). When broken down into countries of origin, however, major differences among migrants were revealed — with the employment rate being particularly low among those hailing from Iraq, Lebanon, Somalia and Syria.

Analyzing Statistics Denmark data, the Danish Employers Confederation revealed that in 2016, 41.5% of non-Western immigrants were on welfare, while only 17.5% of ethnic Danes were supported by the same benefits. In 2017, a third of all the people provided for by Denmark’s basic social-welfare system were immigrants, which constitutes a rise of 82% in a mere seven years.

These figures show that the public expenses connected to immigration will, in the long run, bring the welfare state to an end.

Education

According to the same 2017 Statistics Denmark report, 49% of male non-Western descendants, and 70% of female non-Western descendants, completed an education in an employable field, compared to 73% male ethnic Danes and 81% female ethnic Danes.

In addition, ethnic Danish children scored higher on final exams than immigrants’ children and their first-generation descendants (grades of 6.7 for boys and 7.4 for girls, compared to 5.3 respectively 5.9 for non-western first-generation descendants). Those who scored lowest were first-generation descendants of Turkish and Lebanese immigrant parents.

2018 report by the Danish Ministry of Education found a similar difference even among third-generation descendants of migrants. The study was disputed, but the factual results stand. They indicate that many of the long-term descendants of non-Western immigrants will have difficulties satisfying the demands of a modern, highly industrialized Western society.

Unfortunately, reports in Denmark increasingly end up as this one did: If officials publish something that contradicts the fairy-tales of the do-gooders, journalists will take action and scare the transgressor — so he will rephrase what he said without directly correcting it.

The Economy

According to a February 2018 Danish Finance Ministry report, the government’s net annual expenditure on non-Western immigrants in 2015 was 36 billion Danish kroner — approximately $5 billion USD. As there are approximately 5 million ethnic Danes, the taxpayer cost borne by each individual, in effect, came to $1,000 per year, or $4,000 for a family of four.

That figure, however, only refers to public budgets directly related to immigrants. It does not include the additional indirect public funds spent on law enforcement, schools, social security administration and other ancillary matters, due to the presence of non-Western immigrants.

It will not be possible in the long run to finance these rapidly growing expenditures.

Crime

According to the Statistics Denmark report, the crime rate among in 2017 was 35% higher among non-Western male immigrants and 145% higher among male descendants of non-Western immigrants than in the Danish male general population. It should be noted that the figures are misleading, since third-generation descendants of immigrants are counted as Danes also in this context. Male descendants of immigrants from Lebanon – many of whom were, according to the report, stateless Palestinians — followed by male descendants of immigrants from Somalia, Iraq, Pakistan, Morocco and Syria — rated the highest for crime.

Polls

Polls have been taken among immigrants. Examples: In 2006 young adult Muslims in Denmark proved to be more religious that their parents; half of them even thought that freedom of speech should give way for consideration of religious rules and traditions (reported in Jyllands-Posten 21/5 2006). Only 59% of the Muslims though that the constitution alone should be the basis for Danish legislation. More than a third of the Muslims in Denmark felt more connected to their country of origin than to Denmark (Jyllands-Posten 13/5 2006). Four out of 10 boys of Turkish and Lebanese background expect their mother to be at home to take care of family and children (Jyllands-Posten 12/11 2008). About half of the Muslims polled thought that Israel has no right to exist. Other polls show the same depressing picture.

Political Fallout

Do not be fooled by the much-publicized burqa ban that went into effect in Denmark in August 2018. For one thing, it has rarely been enforced — only 13 fines in half a year. Moreover, those who wish to oppose the idea of equality between men and women are free to go to countries where such dress-codes are welcomed.

Do not trust other media stories running along the same lines, either. Suffering refugees are not forced to live on a remote island. Only foreign criminals“convicted of crimes and slated for deportation under the terms of their sentences” will be housed there. And they will even be given ferry rides to the mainland, under the excuse that this is necessary due to “international conventions”.

Refugees are not “stripped” of their valuables at the border. Jewelry and assets exceeding a value of 10,000 Danish kroner ($1,500 USD) have to be handed in to the authorities to help pay for those seeking asylum. Just as Danes do not get social welfare money if they have valuables that enable them to provide for themselves. The actions by the border-control authorities on this are subject to control by the courts.

Other examples of media disinformation on Denmark abound.

The political climate in Denmark is such that even Prime Minister Poul Schlüter (served 1982-1993), a conservative, at a time when there was a discussion in 1989 of reversing the then recently-passed catastrophic immigration legislation, was prevented by the private but heavily subsidized organization Danish Refugee Council from meeting with a representative of the most prominent anti-immigration organization.

Most of all, due largely to the left-wing media, most Danes fail to understand how serious the problem is that the country is facing from the influx of non-Westerners, whose children and grandchildren in unsettling numbers do not appear to be adopting Danish culture and values, and who seem to resist assimilation. It is thus highly unlikely that any political party that opposes immigration will find support among voters to influence legislation enough to meet the country’s urgent needs.

Denmark In A State Of Unreported Collapse

Authored by Ole Hasselbalch via The Gatestone Institute,

  • The official statistical definition of “descendants” includes only the first generation after the person who migrated to Denmark. So the official figures do not show the real picture.

  • If the population statistics continue to follow that pattern, ethnic Danes — whose birthrate is far lower than that of non-Western immigrants — will become a minority sometime around the year 2065. According to a 2017 report by Statistics Denmark, only about half of non-Western immigrants between the ages of 16 and 64 are employed (53% of men and 45% of women).

  • In 2017, a third of all the people provided for by Denmark’s basic social-welfare system were immigrants, which constitutes a rise of 82% in a mere seven years. These figures show that the public expenses connected to immigration will, in the long run, bring the welfare state to an end.

<!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

Contrary to misleading media reports, Denmark is not forcing suffering refugees to live on a remote island. Only foreign criminals “convicted of crimes and slated for deportation under the terms of their sentences” will be housed there. And they will even be given ferry rides to the mainland, under the excuse that this is necessary due to “international conventions”.

The media portrayal of Denmark as a country hostile and inhumane to migrants is misleading, if not completely false.

One reason for the inaccurate picture is that it is painted by journalists’ political bias. Another is that trustworthy official Danish statistics on the country’s immigration problem are both difficult to find and even harder to interpret. A further problem is a lack of reliable research, at best; and purposely distorted data, at worst.

The following breakdown illustrates that rather than being more relatively free of the consequences of mass migration than other European countries in general, and Scandinavian countries in particular, Denmark is in a state of societal collapse. In spite of Copenhagen’s many laws that govern migration and affect immigrants, the Danish people have been experiencing a major cultural and political shift in their life as they have traditionally known it.

Population Projections

In 1960, the population of Denmark was 4,580,708. Today, that number stands at 5,768,712. This growth appears to be largely due to immigration.

In 2016, Statistics Denmark projected that the country will have 507,000 “non-Western” immigrants by the year 2060, and 342,000 “non-Western descendants.”

“Descendants”, however, include only the first generation after the person who migrated. So the official figures do not show the real picture.

In 1989, a private organization, “The Danish Association”, published an alternative projection as part of a special edition of the group’s periodical Danskeren(September 1989, p. 3, not available on the internet.) The article, published anonymously — revealing the degree of political correctness and self-censorship required in Denmark even then — predicted that immigration would remain relatively static, regardless of foreseeable insufficient attempts to tighten legislation. This prediction has turned out to be almost correct up to now.

The article predicted about 1.1 million immigrants around 2020, in accordance with what can be seen in current statistics if you include the third generation of newcomers as well as the probable number of unregistered foreigners.

If the population statistics continue to follow this pattern, ethnic Danes — whose birthrate is far lower than that of non-Western immigrants – will become a minority sometime around the year 2065. This is in fact quite likely to happen, as immigrants defined as “refugees” continue to enter the country; and others, such as arrivals of family members and “walk-ins,” are rarely able to be returned to their countries of origin.

Employment and Social Welfare

According to a 2017 report by Statistics Denmark, only about half of non-Western immigrants between the ages of 16 and 64 are employed (53% of men and 45% of women). When broken down into countries of origin, however, major differences among migrants were revealed — with the employment rate being particularly low among those hailing from Iraq, Lebanon, Somalia and Syria.

Analyzing Statistics Denmark data, the Danish Employers Confederation revealed that in 2016, 41.5% of non-Western immigrants were on welfare, while only 17.5% of ethnic Danes were supported by the same benefits. In 2017, a third of all the people provided for by Denmark’s basic social-welfare system were immigrants, which constitutes a rise of 82% in a mere seven years.

These figures show that the public expenses connected to immigration will, in the long run, bring the welfare state to an end.

Education

According to the same 2017 Statistics Denmark report, 49% of male non-Western descendants, and 70% of female non-Western descendants, completed an education in an employable field, compared to 73% male ethnic Danes and 81% female ethnic Danes.

In addition, ethnic Danish children scored higher on final exams than immigrants’ children and their first-generation descendants (grades of 6.7 for boys and 7.4 for girls, compared to 5.3 respectively 5.9 for non-western first-generation descendants). Those who scored lowest were first-generation descendants of Turkish and Lebanese immigrant parents.

2018 report by the Danish Ministry of Education found a similar difference even among third-generation descendants of migrants. The study was disputed, but the factual results stand. They indicate that many of the long-term descendants of non-Western immigrants will have difficulties satisfying the demands of a modern, highly industrialized Western society.

Unfortunately, reports in Denmark increasingly end up as this one did: If officials publish something that contradicts the fairy-tales of the do-gooders, journalists will take action and scare the transgressor — so he will rephrase what he said without directly correcting it.

The Economy

According to a February 2018 Danish Finance Ministry report, the government’s net annual expenditure on non-Western immigrants in 2015 was 36 billion Danish kroner — approximately $5 billion USD. As there are approximately 5 million ethnic Danes, the taxpayer cost borne by each individual, in effect, came to $1,000 per year, or $4,000 for a family of four.

That figure, however, only refers to public budgets directly related to immigrants. It does not include the additional indirect public funds spent on law enforcement, schools, social security administration and other ancillary matters, due to the presence of non-Western immigrants.

It will not be possible in the long run to finance these rapidly growing expenditures.

Crime

According to the Statistics Denmark report, the crime rate among in 2017 was 35% higher among non-Western male immigrants and 145% higher among male descendants of non-Western immigrants than in the Danish male general population. It should be noted that the figures are misleading, since third-generation descendants of immigrants are counted as Danes also in this context. Male descendants of immigrants from Lebanon – many of whom were, according to the report, stateless Palestinians — followed by male descendants of immigrants from Somalia, Iraq, Pakistan, Morocco and Syria — rated the highest for crime.

Polls

Polls have been taken among immigrants. Examples: In 2006 young adult Muslims in Denmark proved to be more religious that their parents; half of them even thought that freedom of speech should give way for consideration of religious rules and traditions (reported in Jyllands-Posten 21/5 2006). Only 59% of the Muslims though that the constitution alone should be the basis for Danish legislation. More than a third of the Muslims in Denmark felt more connected to their country of origin than to Denmark (Jyllands-Posten 13/5 2006). Four out of 10 boys of Turkish and Lebanese background expect their mother to be at home to take care of family and children (Jyllands-Posten 12/11 2008). About half of the Muslims polled thought that Israel has no right to exist. Other polls show the same depressing picture.

Political Fallout

Do not be fooled by the much-publicized burqa ban that went into effect in Denmark in August 2018. For one thing, it has rarely been enforced — only 13 fines in half a year. Moreover, those who wish to oppose the idea of equality between men and women are free to go to countries where such dress-codes are welcomed.

Do not trust other media stories running along the same lines, either. Suffering refugees are not forced to live on a remote island. Only foreign criminals“convicted of crimes and slated for deportation under the terms of their sentences” will be housed there. And they will even be given ferry rides to the mainland, under the excuse that this is necessary due to “international conventions”.

Refugees are not “stripped” of their valuables at the border. Jewelry and assets exceeding a value of 10,000 Danish kroner ($1,500 USD) have to be handed in to the authorities to help pay for those seeking asylum. Just as Danes do not get social welfare money if they have valuables that enable them to provide for themselves. The actions by the border-control authorities on this are subject to control by the courts.

Other examples of media disinformation on Denmark abound.

The political climate in Denmark is such that even Prime Minister Poul Schlüter (served 1982-1993), a conservative, at a time when there was a discussion in 1989 of reversing the then recently-passed catastrophic immigration legislation, was prevented by the private but heavily subsidized organization Danish Refugee Council from meeting with a representative of the most prominent anti-immigration organization.

Most of all, due largely to the left-wing media, most Danes fail to understand how serious the problem is that the country is facing from the influx of non-Westerners, whose children and grandchildren in unsettling numbers do not appear to be adopting Danish culture and values, and who seem to resist assimilation. It is thus highly unlikely that any political party that opposes immigration will find support among voters to influence legislation enough to meet the country’s urgent needs.

Russian Army Has New Body Armor and Promise Combat Exoskeletons

Russia has modernized 35 brigades (over 80,000 soldiers) active military combat personnel with new body armor and weapons. Russia calls this equipment Ratnik-2. Russia is promising to develop Ratnik-3 which would be advanced combat exoskeletons, UAVs and combat robots. The US has also been developing combat exoskeletons. Russia and the USA have had small field tests of some exoskeleton systems. Russia is displaying mockups of advanced guns, new helmets and more complete body armor. The main problem for real exoskeletons that boost the weight that a soldier can carry or provide real force multipliers is the batteries and power systems for the gear. US military research has admitted that it will still be 5-10 years or more before real combat exoskeletons will be produced and deployed. Commercial exoskeletons are being deployed in warehouses and factories. Soldiers and workers are able to load and move heavier gear and ammo. This makes supply chains more productive behind the lines. Real combat exoskeletons are research and empty promises.

SOURCES- Tass, Wikipedia Written By Brian Wang

We’re STILL haunted by DDT – new study says it causes autism

(Natural News) When the evidence that DDT was harmful could no longer be ignored, the use of the chemical was banned completely in 1972. If you thought this was a problem of the past, however, think again: New research shows that it’s still causing autism five decades later. That’s because this chemical is still in…

“Tech neck”: What is it and how can you prevent it?

(Natural News) If you use a computer or a mobile device for extended periods of time every day, you might end up developing a painful condition called “tech neck.” Fortunately, this returning pain in the neck can be fully avoided by making a habit to improve your posture as regularly as possible. Also called “text neck,” this problem is a…

Microplastics are invading our farm lands, and researchers say the problem is even bigger than they first believed

(Natural News) You’ve probably heard a lot about microplastics in the oceans in recent years, and while this remains a very serious problem, researchers say there could be an even bigger threat right here on land. Microplastics are tiny pieces of plastic that range from the size of a grain of rice all the way…

How Not to Go to War

By David Swanson, Director, World BEYOND War

If you saw a book in Barnes and Noble called “How Not to Go to War,” wouldn’t you assume it was a guide to the proper equipment every good warrior should have when they head off to do a little killing, or perhaps something like this U.S. news article on “How Not to Go to War Against ISIS” which is all about what law you should pretend authorizes a violation of the UN Charter and the Kellogg-Briand Pact?

In fact, the new book, How Not to Go to War by Vijay Mehta, comes to us from Britain where the author is a leading peace activist, and it is actually a set of recommendations for how to not go to war at all ever. While many books spend their larger first section on a problem and a shorter concluding part on solutions, the first two-thirds of Mehta’s book is about solutions, the last third about the problem of war. If this confuses you, or if you’re unaware that war is a problem, you can always read the book in reverse order. Even if you are aware of war as a problem, you still may benefit from Mehta’s description of how technology, including artificial intelligence, is creating horrific new possibilities for wars worse than we’ve seen or even imagined.

Then I recommend that the reader jump to Chapter Five, toward the end of the book’s first part, because it presents a solution for how we might think and speak better about economics and government spending, a solution that simultaneously illuminates what is wrong with our current way of thinking.

Imagine there’s a billionaire who “earns” a lot of money each year and spends a lot. Now, imagine that this billionaire hires a super-expert accountant who figures out a way to add to the positive side of the ledger whatever amount the billionaire spends on fences and alarm systems and guard dogs and bullet-proof SUVs and private guards with tasers and handguns. This billionaire brings in $100 million and spends $150 million, but $25 million is on “security” expenses, so that moves over to the income side of things. Not he’s bringing in $125 million and spending $125 million. Make sense?

Of course, it doesn’t make sense! You can’t get paid $100 million, spend $100 million on guns, and now have $200 million. You haven’t doubled your money; you’re broke, buddy. But this is exactly how an economist calculates a nation’s gross (and I mean gross) domestic product (GDP). Mehta proposes a change, namely that weapons-making, war industries, not be counted in GDP.

This would reduce the U.S. GDP from some $19 trillion to $17 trillion, and help visitors from Europe understand why the place looks so much poorer than the high priests of economics tell us it is. It might even help politicians from Washington D.C. understand why voters they believe to be doing so well are so amazingly angry and outraged.

While military spending actually reduces jobs and economic benefit in comparison with not taxing money in the first place or with spending it in other ways, military spending equals economic “growth” on paper because it’s added into GDP. So, you get to be poor while living in a “rich” country, something that the U.S. government has figured out how to get a lot of people to put up with and even take pride in.

Chapters 1-4 address ways to develop systems of promoting and maintaining peace, exactly what we’re trying to do at World BEYOND War. One of Mehta’s focuses is on creating governmental departments of peace. I’ve always favored this and always thought it would fall far short, that a government would have to turn toward peace in its entirety, not just in one department. Currently, the U.S. military and the CIA sometimes, as in Syria, have troops they’ve armed and trained fighting each other. If a U.S. Department of Peace were sending people into Venezuela right now to help avoid war, they’d be up against the U.S. agencies that are trying to start a war. The U.S. Institute of Peace doesn’t oppose, and sometimes supports, the wars engaged in by the government of which it is part.

For the same reason, I have always been dubious about the idea espoused by Mehta of transforming militaries into institutions that do useful nonviolent things. There is a long history of the U.S. military pretending to act for humanitarian reasons. But anything we can do to develop peace departments within governments, or peace centers outside of them, I’m in favor of.

Mehta believes there is major funding out there in the pockets of wealthy individuals and organizations ready to invest it in peace groups. He believes some compromises to get it are worth making. This is no doubt true, but the devil is in the details. Is the compromise an avoidance of blaming the world’s biggest war makers, a focusing on poor countries as the supposed sources of war. Is economic aid to places at war going to do as much good as might be done by advocating peace in the distant imperial capitals engaged in the wars?

“Serious violence is generally perpetrated by young males.” Thus opens chapter 4. But is it true? Isn’t it actually perpetrated by old politicians who manage to get younger people, mostly male, to obey them? Surely it’s at the very least the combination of these two. But establishing peace centers that educate young people about peace and provide them options other than war is certainly to be desired.

So is developing the understanding that it really is possible to not go to war ever again.

Learn more about ‘selfie wrist’ – and why it’s a real problem

(Natural News) Doctors are now warning that taking selfies can result in injury due to people becoming unaware of their surroundings. A review of four case studies conducted by researchers at University Hospital Galway highlights the risk of self-induced trauma caused by inattentiveness when taking a selfie. These injuries mostly occurred in the upper extremities, particularly…

What Is The Lightning Network?

Authored by Shaan Ray via HackerNoon.com,

Bitcoin’s blockchain suffers from a scalability problem.

While Visa handles 2000 transactions per second on average, Bitcoin can only handle only 7 transactions per second with a block capacity of 1 MB.

Bitcoin’s Lightning Network is an effort to tackle this scalability problem.

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A Layer on top of the Bitcoin Blockchain

The idea behind the Lightning Network is that smaller, everyday transactions need not be stored on the main Bitcoin blockchain.

The Lightning Network is a second layer built on top of the main blockchain. It enables faster micro-transactions using ‘off-chain payment channels’. Using this off-chain approach, transactions deemed less important or peripheral are conducted off of the main chain.

Off-chain transactions using the Lightening Network only involve 2 entries on the main bitcoin blockchain — one to open a private ‘payment channel’ between two parties, and the other to close it out. A payment channel is a private channel between two users which allows them to transact with each other off-chain. Since the latest balance sheet signed by both parties is used to close out the private channel through a main chain transaction, the integrity of payments is maintained.

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Bitcoin’s Lightning Network visualized by https://graph.lndexplorer.com.

Lightning Network Example — Two Parties

To better understand the Lightning Network, let’s assume you purchase lunch from the same cafeteria at work every day.

These routine daily transactions between you and the cafeteria (two parties that trust each other) need not be recorded on the main Bitcoin blockchain. Instead, you and the cafeteria deposit a certain amount of Bitcoin into a ‘Multi-Signature Account’ (aka ‘Multi-Sig Account’).

You — 1 BTC

Cafeteria — 0 BTC

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This transaction is recorded on the main Bitcoin blockchain. However, now you have a private off-chain channel to transact with the cafeteria. Transactions using funds from the Multi-Sig account can only occur when both parties agree.

The next day, you order lunch for 0.01 BTC

Both you and the cafeteria sign this transaction with your private keys. This transaction is recorded on the private channel and the Multi-Sig account now shows the following balance:

You — 0.99 BTC

Cafeteria 0.01 BTC

The off-chain payment channel can be closed at any time by either you or the cafeteria. All you have to do is present the latest balance sheet signed by both parties and broadcast it to the main Bitcoin network. The private channel is closed out through a transaction that distributes funds your respective accounts on the main Bitcoin blockchain.

Network Effects with Multiple Parties

In addition to allowing off-chain transactions between two trusted parties, the Lightning Network enables network effects. Using the previous example, let’s say you have two separate private off-chain channels open: one between you and the cafeteria, and another between you and a close co-worker.

One day, the co-worker accompanies you to the cafeteria for lunch. She wants to buy lunch from the cafeteria as well. Rather than open her own off-chain private channel, she can transfer money to the cafeteria by using your Multi-Sig account as a go-between between her and the cafeteria (with all the appropriate balance sheets becoming updated along the way).

Thanks to network effects, everyone in this network can purchase items from the Cafe as long as they have a positive BTC balance in their accounts.

If there are multiple people with Multi-Sig accounts between her and the cafeteria, the payment tries to get from your co-worker (the origin) to the cafeteria (the recipient) using the path with the fewest intermediaries and the least fees (as long as the intermediates have enough money in their individual accounts). A transaction can thus jump through connected payment channels.

Conclusion

Scalability has been a major problem facing leading public blockchains. Facing competition from EOS, Qtum, Ethereum and others, the Lightning Network is Bitcoin’s effort to tackle scalability by conducting large numbers of transactions off chain, thereby reducing the load on the main Bitcoin blockchain. The Lightning Network is a much-needed initiative to tackle scalability on the oldest, most established and best known public blockchain.

What If Politics Can’t Fix What’s Broken?

The unspoken assumption of the modern era is that politics can fix whatever is broken: whatever is broken in society or the economy can be fixed by some political policy or political process– becoming more inclusionary, seeking non-partisan middle ground, etc.

What if this assumption is flat-out wrong? What is politics is incapable of fixing what’s broken? What if politics merely fosters an illusion of solutions, a paper-thin veneer of faux progress? What if politics isn’t a tool that’s capable of fixing what’s broken? What if all politics is able to do is generate delusions of grandeur and unresolvable conflicts? What if politics is ultimately little more than a fatal distraction?

This is of course heresy of the highest order, for a belief in the supremacy of politics is the secular religion of our era. The orthodoxy is: there is no problem that can’t be solved with a political policy: a tax cut, a new tax, a new incentive, a broader definition of criminality, and so on.

What if the status quo is failing for reasons that are beyond the reach of politics? Politics assumes that tweaking incentives and disincentives via rewards and punishments, centralizing control of assets and income streams and manipulating the issuance of currency and interest rates can fix any and every problem.

The limits of politics are the limits of government. In the present era, all government seeks to further centralize power and capital because the era’s quasi-religious belief is that centralization is the solution to everything.

This is of course false. Centralization works until it becomes the problem, at which point further centralization of power and capital only speeds system-wide failure.

Government can force certain things but it can’t force everything. Government can encourage borrowing but it can’t force its citizens to borrow. Government can force the expansion of currency, but it can’t force the valuation of that currency.

Government can mandate this and that, but it can’t force a negative return on investment (ROI) to magically become positive. Government can prohibit and tax and force outward compliance, but it can’t force people to agree with policies that run counter to their beliefs.

Government can’t rescue a status quo which is failing due to negative return on investment (ROI), gross inefficiencies, the loss of trust in corrupt institutions , and all the other ills that are intrinsic to centralization of power and capital.

As a result, the greater the government’s power, the greater the polarization as the self-serving elites seek to protect their share of the pie as the pie shrinks. Each camp becomes increasingly extreme, and compromise is recognized as a process that erodes every camp’s power and income.

The political solution is take-no-prisoners domination and the eradication of rivals’ power to veto or contest the domination of the winner. This drive to polarization is the result of centralized elites attempting to distribute the system’s increasing failure to their competing elites.

This is the politics of decline and collapse. This is the only possible output of centralized power grabs by self-serving elites, i.e. the status quo.

 

Pathfinding our Destiny: Preventing the Final Fall of Our Democratic Republic ($6.95 ebook, $12 print, $13.08 audiobook): Read the first section for free in PDF format.

My new mystery The Adventures of the Consulting Philosopher: The Disappearance of Drake is a ridiculously affordable $1.29 (Kindle) or $8.95 (print); read the first chapters for free (PDF)

My book Money and Work Unchained is now $6.95 for the Kindle ebook and $15 for the print edition. Read the first section for free in PDF format. 

If you found value in this content, please join me in seeking solutions by becoming a $1/month patron of my work via patreon.com.

Britain’s Asda supermarkets to stop selling single kitchen knives

March 9, 2019

LONDON (Reuters) – Walmart-owned British supermarket chain Asda said it will remove single kitchen knives from sale in all its stores by the end of April.

Britain’s knife-crime rate is soaring and, following a wave of fatal stabbings in recent weeks, many involving teenagers, Prime Minister Theresa May has convened a meeting of ministers and community leaders to discuss ways of tackling the problem.

“We know single knives are the most common knife products to be stolen and that is why we have chosen to remove these items from our stores,” Asda Senior Vice President Nick Jones said in a statement.

It is illegal to sell knives to under-18s in Britain.

(Reporting by John Stonestreet; Editing by Ros Russell)

Lack of sleep alters adolescent behavior: Study finds it reduces brain activity, compromises judgement leading to increased risk of addiction, depression

(Natural News) Teenagers are often highly susceptible to chronic sleep deprivation. Their busy schedules at school and sometimes at home can often lead to many nights of staying up late, while still needing to wake up early the next morning. This is a huge problem for a number of reasons, but the biggest one of all…

Social Justice Warriors Causing Havoc – When The Raving Lunatics Get Their Way And The Victims End Up Being Those They Claimed They Wanted To Help

by Susan Duclos, All News Pipeline: Social justice warriors never seem to understand that many of their positions lead to contradictory statements, hypocritical actions, an inability to “explain” their positions because many do not even know enough about the topic and are simply mimicking talking points, and a very serious problem of resulting hardships for […]

The post Social Justice Warriors Causing Havoc – When The Raving Lunatics Get Their Way And The Victims End Up Being Those They Claimed They Wanted To Help appeared first on SGT Report.

Brexit Ultimatums Fly Freely Betraying Bad Faith

Authored by Tom Luongo,

So the EU has given the U.K. a 48 hour ultimatum to come up with an acceptable change to the Irish Backstop. But, the problem is, and Brussels knows this, there is no acceptable change to the Irish Backstop.

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There can be no re-implementation of a hard border between Ireland and Northern Ireland and the EU will not accept an open border because then it will negate its entire legal structure as a customs union.

Rock meet hard place, but this isn’t the U.K.’s problem. It is the EU’s. And Theresa May has been avoiding the issue the entire time allowing Brussels to set the terms of the surrender negotiations rather than say, “Ball’s in your court. We’re happy to leave the border open.”

That arrangement is anathema to the other 27 countries in the EU. But, again, that is their problem. And it shouldn’t be Theresa May’s responsibility.

Brussels’ bullying on this is pure theatre. There is a solution but they don’t want to admit it. They don’t want to admit it because they don’t have to… yet.

Why? Because they still believe they can get the British people to stand down and allow Parliament to deliver BRINO (Brexit-in-Name-Only) using the Irish border as the stalking horse.

Because that’s what the majority of Parliament wants. What they don’t want is to be on the hook for it, so they can go back to their voters and claim they fought the good fight.

Blame shifting thy name is politician.

Time is running short for these kinds of games. Bot May and the EU are playing hardball with a British people who are beyond tired of the shenanigans. Leave means Leave and the reality is that many of the important Labour Remainers are in very vulnerable seats if there is a betrayal of Brexit, regardless of how the media and the Twitterati try to spin this.

Because if the public opinion was so in favor of Remain, we wouldn’t be where we are today. There would already have been a second referendum called or Parliament would have voted for Mrs. May’s deal which is the closest thing there could be to BRINO.

The Yvette Coopers and Anna Soubry’s are grandstanding for their paymasters behind the scenes but the backbenchers all know what the political fallout from this will be if they don’t just get on with this business.

And that’s why May hasn’t stepped down as Prime Minister. She knows what the political fallout would be and is trying to stay in power long enough to deliver BRINO or hang her opposition with an unwanted delay.

The Remainers have made their case ad nauseum, ad infinitum and it is time to admit defeat. Gods know Mario Draghi at the ECB just did.

Every day the economic data coming out of the EU gets worse and the data coming out of the U.K. is better than advertised by the Europhiles. That’s why the fear-mongering isn’t working.

People can see through that, they can see the obnoxiousness coming from Brussels and their own government and they simply aren’t buying it.

Another few months of this will only make it worse, not better.

Finance Minister Philip Hammond has now issued his ultimatum, again, out of weakness. Either vote for Mrs. May’s deal (which is what he wants anyway) or face another three to six months of torture.

But it’s people like Hammond who will have to face reality that betraying Brexit will be the real shock. The next general election in the U.K. is 2022 but the EU in its current form may not last that long.

And the British people can sense this as well. What’s so great sticking around in a political union that is sinking into an abyss financially?

The institutions that make up the EU are fraying. Political unity is not a guarantee at this point.

Viktor Orban in Hungary is warning the EU that if they are intent on forcing political integration much further, it will not hold together.

“If we are left alone and they do not force islamisation on us, Europe can continue to live as the club of free nations,” Orban said, but added that if Brussels forces Hungary “to accept the UN migration pact or the European Commission’s decisions so as to make us fit their own Western concessive policies, a breakup [of the EU] cannot be ruled out.”

We are now a step closer to harnessing nuclear fusion

(Natural News) A fusion reactor built out of unsafe and unreliable parts might as well be called a thermonuclear bomb. Aware of this problem, European researchers paired together different imaging techniques to make a dual-imaging system that can accurately determine the quality of the reactor components before final assembly. Practical nuclear fusion is not just about replicating…

We are now a step closer to harnessing nuclear fusion

(Natural News) A fusion reactor built out of unsafe and unreliable parts might as well be called a thermonuclear bomb. Aware of this problem, European researchers paired together different imaging techniques to make a dual-imaging system that can accurately determine the quality of the reactor components before final assembly. Practical nuclear fusion is not just about replicating…

Shale Companies In Turmoil As Newer Wells “Drink Their Milkshake”

US shale companies’ decision to drill thousands of new wells closely together – and close to already existing wells – is turning out to be a bust; worse, this approach is hurting the performance of wells already in existence, posing an even greater threat to the already struggling industry. In order to keep the United States as an energy supplying powerhouse, shale companies have pitched bunching wells in close proximity, hoping they would produce as much as older ones, allowing companies to extract more oil overall while maintaining good results from each well.

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These types of predictions helped fuel investor interest in shale companies, who raised nearly $57 billion from equity and debt financing in 2016 – up from $34 billion five years earlier, when oil was over $110 per barrel. In 2016, oil prices dipped below $30 a barrel at one point.

And now – surprise – the actual results from these wells are finally coming in and they are quite disappointing.

Newer wells that have been set up near older wells were found to pump less oil and gas, and engineers warn that these new wells could produce as much as 50% less in some circumstances. This is not what investors – who contributed to the billions in capital used by these companies back in 2016 – want to hear.

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Making matters worse, newer wells often interfere with the output of older wells because creating too many holes in dense rock formations can damage nearby wells and make it harder for oil to seep out. The “child” wells could also cause permanent damage to older “parent” wells. This is known in the industry as the “parent-child” well problem.  Billionaire Harold Hamm, who founded shale driller Continental Resources, said last year: “Shale producers across the country are finding you can get a lot of interference, one well to the other. Laying out a whole lot of wells can get you in trouble.”

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Some of the biggest names in shale, including Devon Energy, EOG Resources and Concho Resources, have already disclosed that they are suffering from this problem. As a result, they and many others could be forced to take massive write-downs if they have to downsize their already optimistic estimates from drill sites.

Companies continue to try and find the perfect balance between using single wells that are operating at peak productivity and multiple wells that can provide better returns. 

Laredo Petroleum is a great example. Two years ago, it was valued at more than $3 billion and was a strong advocate for packing wells into the Permian Basin. Its CEO Randy Foutch said a year ago that the company could drill 32 wells per drilling unit, with each producing an average of 1.3 million barrels of oil and gas. In November, the company announced that wells it had fracked in 2018 were producing 11% less than projected, in part due to “parent-child” issues. 

Laredo spokesman Ron Hagood told the WSJ: “We tightened spacing during 2017 and 2018 to increase location inventory and resource recovery in our highest-return formations, and we achieved this goal.”

The company’s market value has fallen about 75% to $800 million since the end of 2016. Goal achieved? 

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Incidentally, we first reported  that shale companies may be facing “catastrophic failure ahead” back in October of 2018. Days before that report, we said that shale companies had a “glaring problem”. We concluded that the glaring problem with 2018’s poor financial results was that 2018 was supposed to be the year that the shale industry finally turned a corner. 

Earlier in 2018, the International Energy Agency had painted a rosy portrait of U.S. shale, arguing in a report that “higher prices and operational improvements are putting the US shale sector on track to achieve positive free cash flow in 2018 for the first time ever.”

Now, it all appears to have been a “pipe” – or rather “milkshake” – dream. 

Another climate scare fades away: Warmist Michael Mann criticizes fellow activists for promoting the ‘pseudo-science’ of the Arctic ‘methane bomb’

Mann:  “The science doesn’t support this the best carbon cycle scientists who have studied this problem say ‘yeah there’s a certain amount of methane that we it could be mobilized and it will add to the warming, but it’s a small contribution compared to the warming we are causing by the burning of fossil fuels.'”

Poisoning The Public: Toxic Agrochemicals And Regulators’ Collusion With Industry

Authored by Colin Todhunter via Off-Guardian.org,

In January 2019, campaigner Dr Rosemary Mason lodged a complaint with the European Ombudsman accusing European regulatory agencies of collusion with the agrochemicals industry. This was in the wake of an important paper by Charles Benbrook on the genotoxicity of glyphosate-based herbicides that appeared in the journal ‘Environmental Sciences Europe’.

In an unusual step, the editor-in-chief of that journal, Prof Henner Hollert, and his co-author, Prof Thomas Backhaus, issued a strong statement in support of the acceptance of Dr Benbrook’s article for publication. In a commentary published in the same issue of the journal, they write:

“We are convinced that the article provides new insights on why different conclusions regarding the carcinogenicity of glyphosate and GBHs [glyphosate-based herbicides] were reached by the US EPA and IARC. It is an important contribution to the discussion on the genotoxicity of GBHs.”

The IARC’s (International Agency for Research on Cancer) evaluation relied heavily on studies capable of shedding light on the distribution of real-world exposures and genotoxicity risk in exposed human populations, while the EPA’s (Environmental Protection Agency) evaluation placed little or no weight on such evidence.

Up to that point, Dr Mason had been writing to the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA), the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) and the EU Commission for an 18-month period, challenging them about ECHA’s positive assessment of glyphosate. Many people around the world had struggled to understand how and why the US EPA and the EFSA concluded that glyphosate is not genotoxic (damaging to DNA) or carcinogenic, whereas the World Health Organisation’s cancer agency, the IARC, came to the opposite conclusion.

The IARC stated that the evidence for glyphosate’s genotoxic potential is “strong” and that glyphosate is a probable human carcinogen. While IARC referenced only peer-reviewed studies and reports available in the public literature, the EPA relied heavily on unpublished regulatory studies commissioned by pesticide manufacturers.

In fact, 95 of the 151 genotoxicity assays cited in the EPA’s evaluation were from industry studies (63%), while IARC cited 100% public literature sources. Another important difference is that the EPA focused its analysis on glyphosate in its pure chemical form, or ‘glyphosate technical’. The problem with that is that almost no one is exposed to glyphosate alone. Applicators and the public are exposed to complete herbicide formulations consisting of glyphosate plus added ingredients (adjuvants). The formulations have repeatedly been shown to be more toxic than glyphosate in isolation.

REJECTION OF DR MASON’S COMPLAINT

The European Ombudsman has now rejected Rosemary Mason’s complaint who has in turn written a 25-page response documenting the wide-ranging impacts of glyphosate-based Roundup and other agrochemicals on human health and the environment. She also outlines the various levels of duplicity that have allowed many of these chemicals to remain on the commercial market.

Mason is led to conclude that, due to the rejection of her complaint (as with others lodged by her to the Ombudsman), the European Ombudsman Office is also part of the problem and is essentially colluding with European pesticide regulatory authorities. Mason has addressed this concern directly to Emily O’Reilly, who currently holds the post of European Ombudsman:

In your rejection of all my complaints over the last few years, it is clear that The Ombudsman’s Office is protecting the European pesticides regulatory authorities, who are in turn being controlled by the European Glyphosate Task Force…. You have turned a blind eye to the authorisation of many of the toxic pesticides that are on the market today because industry is being allowed to self-regulate.”

Some of the key points, claims and issues raised in Mason’s new report ‘The European Ombudsman is colluding with the European Pesticide Regulatory Authorities’ include:

  • The European pesticide regulatory authorities and the European Ombudsman is colluding with industry, resulting in the poisoning of humans and the environment

  • Cancer Research UK is not addressing the impact of agrochemicals because it is heavily compromised by industry interests and therefore claims, “there is little evidence that pesticides cause cancer”

  • The UK Science Media Centre is an industry lobby organisation, which feeds the wider media and its journalists with misleading and false information about agrochemicals

  • Industry group the European Glyphosate Task Force (GTF) has been instrumental in ensuring the re-licensing of glyphosate in the EU

  • Maladministration and criminal collusion with the agrochemicals industry resulted in the renewal of glyphosate registration in the EU

  • The report touches on the condemnation of the ECHA’s positive classification of glyphosate by the judges of the International Monsanto Tribunal

  • The global insect apocalypse and the impact of intensive agriculture and pesticides is catastrophic

  • Children and adults have diminished mental acuity and exhibit increasing levels of mental health disorders, depression, suicides and anxiety as a result of exposure to agrochemicals

  • Monsanto’s sealed secret studies shows the company knew about impact of its product on cancers and eye damage

  • The report mentions UN expert on Toxins Baskut Tuncak’s call to put children’s health before pesticides

  • Mason outlines the poisoning of British food: breakfast cereals have shockingly high levels of glyphosate

  • She notes that 30,000 doctors and health professionals in Argentina have demanded a ban on glyphosate

  • Brazil’s National Cancer Institute statement that genetically modified crops are causing of massive pesticide use

  • The independence of regulatory decisions made by the Australian Pesticides and Veterinary Medicines Authority (APVMA) has been marred by political donations to Labor and the Coalition. In the 2017-18 financial year, Bayer donated $40,600 to Labor and $42,540 to the Coalition, with CropLife donating $34,271 to Labor and $22,300 to the Coalition

  • As a result, APVMA is allowing clothianidin and Roundup to be applied to crops in low lying areas which drains into The Great Barrier Reef

  • In turn, the poisoning of The Great Barrier Reef is taking place due to the impact of herbicides and long-acting insecticides

There are numerous other important points and issues tackled in the report, which readers are urged to read in full. Mason names key individuals and provides all relevant links to research, reports and papers. You can access the report below. You can also access Dr Mason’s many other documents here.

Read Rosemary Mason’s new report The European Ombudsman is colluding with the European Pesticide Regulatory Authorities here.

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