But this almost makes me believe in the conspiracy theories of puppet masters seeking to control all of us.
I was listening to one podcast where they explained why so many in both parties hate Trumpieboy as being in the way of democracy: (yes, I know: America like Rome is a republic because democracies are unstable).
The world leaders don't define democracy as the will of the people, which of course could be manipulated as the history of Athens shows, but they define democracy as a stable and prosperous world order that has been developed since WWII that allows people to be free..., and that Trump's ideas undermine their plans.
The problem: I am reminded of the saying: Who died and left you king?
one expects storm surge flooding from hurricanes (and of course typhoons here) but the heavy rains are also a danger.
Sigh.
the heavy rains can cause fast flooding in the mountains, but the real disaster is if a local dam breaks.
The Johnstown flood is a famous disaster in the USA, but a lot of folk don't remember the 1977 flood
It is the hilly terrain: rolling hills and small valleys where the water collects as it flows out of the hills to the rivers downstream. This terrain results in water pouring into the low areas between the hills mean it is an area prone to flooding...and then there are the dams, which are older and sometimes collapse when stressed by heavy rain and run off from upstream.
PennLive report from last month on trying to protect folks from floods.
But the area had it's last big flood in 1977:
And yes it was caused not just by heavy rains but because the local dams failed:
WIKIPEDIA:On July 19, a deluge of rain hit the Johnstown area during the night. Nearly 12 inches (300 millimetres) of rain fell in 24 hours when a thunderstorm stalled over the region, and six dams in the area over-topped and failed.
it wasn't just Johnstown, but several other small towns who had severe damage and deaths.
I moved to a small town near there a few years later, and bought a house in the center of town, at the bottom of a slope, and the city garage across the street from my house had a line painted on it about six feet high, saying flood level 1977.
Kuya was living in another town in the area, and he said his family was safe (their house was on high ground) but one of his high school friends father drowned.
sigh
Here in the Philippines, floods are risky, especially to those living near the river.
Usually the city orders evacuation, and the City Gym up the street is the designated evacuation center for our neighborhood...but we are on high ground so okay. And of course, people often evacuate to the homes of family or friends when there is a typhoon or flood warning.
The real worry is if the irrigation dams collapse. It is flat here, but Lolo added soil to lift the house 18 inches above street level, and the foundation is another eight inches... so the only time we flooded was when they opened the flood gates of a local dam to prevent it from overtopping.
When the warnings came out and the streets began to flood, several of our neighbors asked if they could park their cars inside our garage, so we had six cars here: not just in the garage but we opened the doors into the large meeting hall. It did flood six inches into the garage and two inches into our house, but the cars were okay... but it did make a mess of mud inside the garden and our house. And the rice storage was on palates in a back room, and the apartment for the family and the offices with their computers etc are on the second floor so no major damage.
In the video, the man is discussing how neighbors help each other. This is true after any disaster, not just in the USA but here in the Philippines.
Because most workers belong to unions, they tend to be Democrats, but the unemployment and loss of blue collar jobs make Trump's economic promises attractive. Even Fetterman, who comes from western PA knows this but of course has been forced to "correct" his remarks to this effect.
The influence, for good or ill, of a charismatic teacher can never be underestimated. Such is the theme of the 1969 film The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, starring Maggie Smith, who flourishes in every direction as the schoolmarm with the double life...
The film focuses on how certain girls are adversely affected by being brought into Jean Brodie's inner circle. Mary MacGregor is inspired by Miss Brodie's love of Franco to run off to fight in the Spanish Civil War, only to be killed. Jean tries to groom Jenny into taking her place in Mr. Lloyd's bed but it is Sandy, plain and practical, who ends up being his mistress...
Italics mine.
Groomed is a good word for it: so yes teachers can insert their opinions into teaching. Inspiring enthusiasm for the arts, or for science, or for religion/ethics/good deeds is good, but with teenage girls, some are easily over influenced by the crowd, and to make things worse is when there is often an in-crowd that echoes the teacher's/social media influencer's toxic ideas, both political and sexual, so girls wanting to be popular will chose to blindly follow them.
In other words, Miss Brody grooms some of the girls and some of them blindly follow her ideas, just like cults influence people by love bombing: if you follow me, you can have my approval.
If this doesn't sound like it might have lessons for today, then I ask you to watch some teachers on tictoc who brag about pushing their transgender agenda on kids.
Is this worse than a teacher pushing their religion onto the kids? Or inoculating kids with patriotism?
Depends.
I sent my kids to religious schools, so I did expect them to be taught Christianity as long as they didn't overdo it and turn them into blank eyed zombies.
But the religious influence did help shape their lives. So my youngest did spend a year in Kentucky repairing houses for a charity group there. Just like I spent a couple years in Africa after finishing my medical training, But it wasn't from cultlike belief, but from the inner core of our soul, to chose good over selfishness.
And that is the problem of Miss Brody: She enjoys the power to mold the girls into her image, instead of encouraging their intellectual maturity by teaching love of the good and beautiful.
discuss class
But it's been awhile since I saw the film, but right now our family tv time has decided to do a Maggie Smith marathon (last night was My House in Umbria, but I do have The Prime of Miss Brody on that list).
....
After Reading the review of the film, I think I might want to read the book. Luckily for me, the audiobook is also on Youtube:
The ferocious actress started her career in the 1950s. The younger generations know her as Professor McGonagall in the Harry Potter movie franchise and the Dowager Countess in Downton Abbey...
Smith won an Oscar for The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1969) and California Suite (1978).
The Academy nominated her for Othello, Travels With My Aunt, A Room With a View, and Gosford Park.
some of her films are on youtube.
But some of us remember her role in Downton Abbey.
when my granddaughter tried to take a plane from Manila to Thailand for a job teaching, the government stopped her, until paper work and investigation of her and her job offer could be investigated.
They explained that Thailand was a center for human trafficking.
Filipinos, especially attractive young women, are hired to be maids or workers and end up as prostitutes. There is also a lot of drug smuggling, where poor folk are enticed to become mules to deliver drugs to their destinations.
Well, everything cleared, and she flew out last week with her mother to check on the job and housing, and everything was fine.
The background of this is organized crime, and the POGOs, gambling casinos linked to organized crime that were opened 20 years ago despite the warnings by the Catholic bishops, President Arroyo allowed the POGOS as a way to get jobs for locals and money for the government.
According to the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation (PAGCOR), POGOs began operating in 2003 but it was only in 2016, after Duterte came to power, that the government began regulating online gaming hubs.
which brings us to this story I found today on twitter/X:
His company, Yatai International Holdings Group (abbreviated Yatai IHG), is registered in Hong Kong and headquartered in Thailand.[2] He became a fugitive in 2012, after fleeing Chinese authorities.[7] In 2014, a Shandong court convicted him of running an illegal lottery business in the Philippines that targeted Chinese online users, and had netted US$298 million in profits.[8]
so convicted in China 2014, but that didn't slow him down.
In 2015, he began building a business in Cambodia, involved in the illicit business of helping Chinese gamblers front-load gambling bets made in Cambodian casinos.[2]
From there, he expanded his business interests to the Philippines and acquired ownership of one of Manila's largest spa and entertainment centers.[2]
the US Institute of Peace (a US Govt think tank) in 2020 posted this report on what was going on in Myanmar.
To circumvent Chinese laws against gambling, ethnic Chinese with citizenship in other countries spearhead these projects.
Of concern to Beijing, they have co-opted Chinese government institutions and agencies to present their activities as central to China’s Belt and Road Initiative.
notice that several of these articles mention the Philippines? that is an ongoing scandal here which I have not been following.
But recently, instead of watching soap operas, everyone here is following the Senate hearings on Alice Guo, a fake citizen who became mayor of a small town in Pampanga. that has been linked to casinos and crime (and is near a military base but no spying found...yet).
n what was supposed to be the final hearing on Philippine offshore gaming operators (POGO), Guo deviated from her usual responses to assert her innocence—and to hint at a bigger boss.
“Your honor, hindi ako mastermind. Masasabi ko po is isa akong victim (Your honor, I am not a mastermind. I can say that I am a victim) ,” Guo said.
For most of her appearances in the Senate since being detained by Indonesian authorities in September, Guo has typically given one of three responses: she either claims ignorance, invokes her right against self-incrimination or cites a death threat.
Sen. JV Ejercito then asked Guo if she was a pawn of an international criminal syndicate.
Guo responded that she was not exactly used, but acknowledged that she has a reputation for being helpful.
This article from the Straits Time Singapore notes connections with organized crime there.
Guo had incorporated the company behind the scam compound, Baofu Land Development, in 2019 with two convicts in Singapore’s $3 billion money laundering case, Chinese nationals Zhang Ruijin and Lin Baoying.
alas, I am not an expert on the Chinese Triad but WIKIPEDIA page discusses their long history
and the liberal Brookings Institute has a long analysis of the relationship between organized crime and the Chinese government
Indeed, these criminal networks provide a variety of services to the Chinese government, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and Chinese legal enterprises. They help build networks of corruption and influence among foreign politicians and businesses.
In interviews with Vanda Felbab-Brown, current and former law enforcement officials from the United States, Asia, Australia, and Africa stated that China-linked criminal groups monitor the Chinese diaspora and act as extralegal enforcers on behalf of Chinese authorities against those who speak and act against the Chinese government and CCP. Thus, Chinese government officials often unofficially extend the umbrella of party protection and government authority to these actors.
Hey Donald, instead of worrying about Haitians eating Garfield you need to check out some of the Chinese ethnics entering the USA illegally.
March 2024 report... Since 2011, more than 14 million Syrians have been forced to flee their homes in search of safety. More than 7.2 million Syrians remain internally displaced in their own country where 70 percent of the population is need of humanitarian assistance and 90 percent live below the poverty line.
Approximately 5.5 million Syrian refugees live in the five countries neighboring Syria—Türkiye, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq and Egypt. Germany is the largest non-neighboring host country with more than 850,000 Syrian refugees.
the complicated war with different factions who often change sides will make your head spin. (Iran is there, but so are the Russians, and the Turks, ISIS, and the Kurds).
StrategyPage has an update on how the war in Syria is changing. Syria is now starting to make nice with the (Sunni) Arab league.
Hezbollah and Iran might be slowly losing their influence, not just in Syria but in Lebanon, where the influx of Sunni refugees mean that the Shiite Hezbollah is now outnumbered....
The recent Israeli attacks on Hezbollah personnel with exploding pagers and portable radios, in addition to airstrikes, have killed or wounded thousands of Hezbollah members and left them unable to communicate effectively. The Iran-backed Shia Hezbollah is no longer a threat to Israel or the Lebanese government and people.
and of course, a lot of these Syrians are part of the Muslim refugee influx into Europe, which has inflamed xenophobia and nationalism there because unlike the USA, where immigrants tend to become Americans by embracing the culture within three generations, in Europe their nationalism is based on tribal identity.
The Hamas/Hezbollah/Iran propaganda machine vs the Israeli/CIA propaganda machines make it hard to evaluate what is going on in Lebanon since you can't believe the news.
this video discusses the background of what is going on: it is one month old so it predates the present day actions
However one clue that so far people feel safe is that, although the Philippine Government has urged our OFW to leave (an old estimate says there are 33 000 there), only 15 have left.so far,
West Philippine Sea: Warships deployed to monitor China survey vessel off Palawan
The Philippines has deployed a coast guard ship and three warships to monitor the presence of a Chinese research vessel conducting a survey off Palawan...
According to SeaLight director Ray Powell, six militia ships were escorting the Haiyang Dizhi Hao research vessel just 27 nautical miles away from the shores of Palawan on Monday. The research fleet, however, is still outside Palawan’s 12-nautical mile territorial sea, a red line that, once crossed by Beijing, could be seen as a direct threat to Manila’s sovereignty.
they aren't doing research of course: this is how they start to grab the area: Research, then block local fishermen, then send in their fishermen who are paid to work for the military, then accuse the Philippines of aggression when the Philippines tries to protect their fishermen.
Historian Tom Holland (no, not the Spiderman guy) discusses the Piltdown man hoax in this video.
This was a famous hoax of the early 20th century, where a skull of a primitive man was discovered in England and celebrated by scientists as the missing link between man and apes.
Alas, years later it was found to be a fake. A guy looking to be famous and who went around making fake fossils found the skull and presented it to the scientific world. Why? He wanted Fame.
So if humans evolved in Britain, then the Piltdown man proved the popular theory that the British race was superior to those dirty Irish/African/Italian/Jews who were filling up the slums of London.
Yes I am talking about Teilhard de Chardin S.J., beloved by modernist Catholics (PBUH..../s), and someone whose ideas made him the Patron Saint of Transhumanism
So why did he keep quiet?
Because he was guilty of a joke gone wrong? (the most common opinion). Or was he silent because admitting it was a hoax would lose him friends in the scientific establishment and taint his reputation as a scientist? Or maybe because he "found" a tooth that was an important part of the find, and maybe some might suspect he was involved in the hoax.
So he remained silent about this "discovery" that not just supported evolution, but was used to support racial superiority in Europe with all of the eugenic implications that were being discussed in those days.
But ideas have consequences.
He lied, people died.
Hitler was a big fan of these ideas, and unlike the scientists, actually acted on their ideas.
If the idea of scientists promoting a political agenda as science, lying about it, and ostracizing those who question it sounds familiar, it is because it resembles the coverup of where the covid virus originated. and the complicity of the Medical establishment and major medical journals in pushing this hoax and destroying the careers of those who said no.
Drawing upon his devout Christianity, the author argues for a morally idealistic understanding of human nature through which social advancement under the watchful eye of God will eventually lead to a total reconciliation of all things and a final state of absolute collective consciousness, which Chardin titled the "Omega Point".
if some of this sounds familiar, it is because it's utopian vision overlaps some of what is now being discussed as the Singularity, where man (and machines) become a unity and evolve to a higher power.
The Omega Point is the final step before “Singularity” takes place. Once we achieve (or cross into) Singularity, which will be the first and truly major evolutionary step in mankind, we cease to be humans...
In the near future, computers will surpass our collective intellect, and our only way to maintain our place in the universe will be to merge with them. When transhumanists speak about the Omega Point, they refer to the point when our use of science and technology will improve our human state, making conditions such as disability, suffering, disease, aging, and even death a thing of the past.
Granddaughter Ruby is settling into her new job teaching at an international school in Thailand. Joy went with her to fix up the aparment and check the job, and will return Monday
Mama dog had two tiny puppies (her last litter was one year ago she had six. Getting old?) I haven't checked the puppies: She is threatening to bite anyone who gets near to her nest in the hallway closet.
There has been heavy rain showers (monsoon) from the passing typhoons/tropical storms, but no wind and no flooding in our area.
And the roof is not leaking, so I guess fixing it worked this time.
The atrocities underway near here are an echo of the Darfur genocide of two decades ago, with the additional complication of famine. But there’s a crucial difference: At that time, world leaders, celebrities and university students vigorously protested the slaughter and joined forces to save hundreds of thousands of lives. Today, in contrast, the world is distracted and silent.
and it's not just the war: It is the danger of a massive famine that could kill millions.
the backstory on Jimmy Lai's actions can be found here: wikipedia.
In December 2020, Lai was awarded the "Freedom of Press Award" by Reporters Without Borders for his role in founding Apple Daily, a news outlet under Lai's pro-democracy leadership that "still dares to openly criticise the Chinese regime and which widely covered last year's pro-democracy protests."[15][16] On 29 December, Lai resigned from his roles with Next Digital as director and chairman of the board.[17][18]
In April 2021, he was sentenced to an additional 14 months in prison for organizing illegal protests
this video is from a conservative Washington think tank, from 2020:
and the communists insist he is a threat to the government and a proxy for foreign bad guys.
video from DW, a German news station, from this January
this 2022 BBC article discusses others arrested under the same law, including Cardinal Zen.
Amnesty International’s Asia-Pacific Regional Director Erwin van der Borght said in a statement that the arrests represent a “shocking escalation” even by “Hong Kong’s recent standards of worsening repression,” and demonstrates the Hong Kong authorities’ “callous disregard for the basic rights of its citizens.”
so why worry about a millionaire who buys a media site to push for freedom of speech against a government that is destroying the ability of people to be free?
well, just look at the full court press against Elon Musk in Brazil, Australia, the EU and the USA for the sins of permitting freedom of speech.
the problem? The obedience to the covid epidemic guidelines has now been recognized as an overblown response: (lasted too long, aimed at low risk people while letting nursing homes admit infectious patients, and discouraged people to see docs for routine matters, so cancer wasn't diagnosed, diabetes and blood pressure was not monitored, etc)... in other words, causing more harm and deaths. And this doesn't include problems from the economic catastrophe caused by the shut down.
Here is a discussion of the problem of the new guidelines being proposed by the UN etc...from 3 months ago on an Australia news station:
here is Dr. C from last year discussing the problem of trust in the UN,
....
the politicized medical journals say any opposition is fake news:
Although the process of drafting a pandemic accord has been transparently informed to global communities in 2022 and 2023, there has been a substantial amount of misinformation related to the contents of the WHO Convention, Agreement, or Other International Instrument on Pandemic Prevention, Preparedness, and Response (WHO CA+) circulated on platforms such as YouTube and X (formerly Twitter).
Negotiations of an international treaty intended to prepare for and prevent future pandemics are in danger of falling apart as misinformation fuels opposition to the initiative, senior World Health Organization officials said last week.
WHO’s 194 member states agreed in December 2021 to draw up a new international convention to ensure that the world would be prepared for future global health threats and to prevent the “catastrophic failure” seen during the covid pandemic.
WHO said that negotiations have advanced significantly in the past two years but some of the most crucial and contentious stipulations of the accord are yet to be agreed. Global health experts had hoped that the treaty would be signed off at the 2024 World Health Assembly in late May but this timeline could be unrealistic.
there is a fine line here.
is misinformation the usual exaggeration of things that are real but rare (antivax theories come to mind)?
Or is using that term just a way to silence anyone with concerns, so that you don't have to discuss the problem?
Such treaties are indeed needed, but the lack of trust in letting these self appointed experts dictating policy is justified.
the WHO has done valuable work: The fact they helped locals control the Ebola epidemics of central Africa has gotten little publicity.
However, the fact that the WHO opposed shutting down flights from China in early January claiming there was no person to person spread, and criticized Trumpieboy when he did stopped flights from China, and the fact that the WHO pretended that the source of the epidemic was not the lab in Wuhan (we checked and they said it didn't leak. And they wouldn't lie, would they?) has now blown up in their face, and then they wonder why they aren't trusted.
However, the failure does continue:
For example, pushing MPox vaccine while failing to confront the fact that MPox is an STD in most cases (so prostitution in Africa needs to be monitored, and raves should be shut down in the west) should have made a lot of people wonder:
So use vaccines on babies? Yes, it can spread to infants if caregivers have lesions on their hand. But supplying enough water for hygiene, and education might be a more important way to stop the spread.
Sigh.
and waiting in the wings: Bird flu. So far it is only causing pink eye, but give it time and the fear mongering will explode.
What do both attempts to assassinate Trump have in common?
Lack of surveilance of the peripheries. Yes, I get it: Not enough men to walk the perimeters and check such things, even when the audience is shouting shooter shooter.
What makes it worse was that in Butler PA, the USSS was offered a drone to help them check things out, but turned down the offer.
A reporter asked Rowe if the agency used a drone to enhance surveillance at the rally, specifically a drone that local law enforcement offered to loan them. Rowe said he’s aware of reports that local law enforcement had offered a drone, but the Secret Service declined.
Rowe said the Secret Service is now working to add drones and other unmanned aerial surveillance to its security protocols.
LOL. Italics mine.
maybe we need to start a "Go Fund Me" page to buy drones for the USSS so they can use them while the paper pushers are busy doing their thing.
And this action might need to be done quickly: Because the guy who tried to shoot Trump in Florida was right outside the fence. Luckily a guy on foot spotted him even though he was hidden by bushes, but in the future they might not be that lucky.
I haven't seen any MSM articles on why the USSS is lacking such basic equipment. Maybe their plan for "diversity" doesn't include any deer hunters or veterans who would be aware that they aren't using basic equipment like drones with cameras to protect America's VIPs.
Oh but he was hiding behind a bush and probably wouldn't have been spotted by a drone, I can imagine them (and the MSM) saying.
Modern hunters don't need to stalk or ambush hunting targets in one place for long periods of time, and can easily pinpoint the animal's location using a camera. A quadcopter drone with an aerial view makes it easy to determine where prey hides and moves.
Drones with night vision and thermal cameras are primarily used in enterprise-level applications such as search and rescue, power line inspection, wildlife monitoring, and hunting. If you're in Texas, you'll find that wild hogs are infested here, and hunting has become a pastime with a populace.
of course, this takes the fun out of hunting, so some states have banned their use to spy where the deer are hiding, a practice that is so common that it is banned in some states, although you can use a drone to follow the wounded deer into the bush to retrieve the body when he collapses.
Now, you notice I am not talking about sophisticated drone, but those available to the average good old boy hunter.
yet as the Ukraine war revealed: Even those drones can be used by the military to spy on who is coming for you.
StrategyPage has a long essay here on how drone warfare has changed the way war is fought: not just by the big expensive ones, but by the civilian ones that Ukrainians are upgrading in their garages to find where the bad guys and their weapons were, but also using them as small flying bombs to take the bad guys out.
More about the use of drones in modern warfare can be found via the SmallWarJournal does a book review on the recently published De Gruyter Handbook of Drone Warfare.
all of this is not new technology. So what if the technology behind this display is used to attack important politicians?
Tom Clancy, call your office. Washington DC needs Jack Ryan to help them protect the president.
Aside from rain, (causing floods in Manila) the typhoons missed us.
Never mind: two more aiming at Luzon in the near future.
Lots of family stuff going on.
Ruby has a teaching job in Thailand, but was stopped from going there by the government, who needed to investigate her for health problems (e.g. tuberculosis) and check that the job offer is for a real job. There is a lot of human trafficking to Thailand so they are being safe.
However, lots of bureaucratic overkill: After she submitted the completed papers twice, she was told they had to be checked two more times, plus an interview in Manila (three hour drive from here) before approval, and this would take a week or two.
So Joy got on the phone to someone she knew, and the paperwork was expedited. No money changed hands (she is a Christian and unlike Lolo refuses to give gifts to speed things along).
Voila, approved.
So they left today. Joy went with her to help her settle into her apartment and check out the school, which is an international school using American teaching methods and standards.
Ruby has been teaching the classes on line for the last three weeks while waiting for this so she has sort of met her pupils (middle school level).
In other news, Joy got an award from the government of Bulacan for her work building up the agricultural sector. They had a big celebration giving awards to people who are leaders working to improve the area.
She does training and marketing for a local organic rice and vegetable coop there. Organic food is more expensive to grow, and must be certified, but does bring a bigger profit to the farmers. And since this is a coop, they get more profit without a middle man..
.
She was running our farm when she was chosen to get trained by the Goldman Sachs 10000 women project to get advanced training in business and marketing; and now that Kuya instead of Lolo is running our own farm business, she started working nearby in the next province where her family has a farm, and got involved teaching locals how to grow rice organically and with government funding, helped them start a business (essentially a coop) to market the product, and now ten years later, it is thriving.
This is not just Haitians: There are reports of this being done in the Hispanic communities including by the drug cartel types. And I remember when my son's Christian school (and a local Russian Orthodox church) found dismembered animals on their doorstop: Placed there by local kids who were playing with Satanic rituals.
as for eating cats: I am old enough to remember the jokes about cats disappearing after a tens of thousands of Vietnamese refugees were settled in the USA.
It is ironic that the meme seems to upset the so called cat ladies who support Harris and seem to love her abortion policies. So killing cats bad, killing the child of my womb, good?
Sigh.
This is not the first time huge numbers of migrants arrived in the USA: this happened after Viet Nam, and also in the Mariel boat lift.
The difference might be sponsors trying to help them resettle: Church and families sponsored those from Vietnam, and many from Cuba had families or friends to help them assimilate.
I suspect most of the present group of migrants, like the Mariel group, will contact friends or family, settle down and get jobs. True, many will get jobs that could be filled by unemployed Americans, (but that is another story for another day) but in 20 to 30 years they will just be another 'merican.
Of course, the urban legends about eating cats is not purely racism, but a symbol of protest about placing huge numbers of migrants from different cultures and who don't speak English into cities unprepared to help them integrate into US society.
The tale, however, hints at much larger concerns about the recent influx of migrants into Springfield — a city of 60,000 people about 45 minutes west of Columbus. Officials say up to 20,000 Haitian immigrants have flowed into the city in the last several years, putting a huge strain on city services.
So what is to be done?
Presumably there are stories about who is helping these migrants settle into a different culture, but they are few on the internet. Maybe these stories are in local papers (example this one ) and get little national publicity.
I know the Catholic church is one of the major groups helping, But most of these stories on line are press releases, and most stories are several years old and out of date.
Resettling people into a new country is a bit complicated: We are talking about not just emergency food and shelter, but helping them to understand American society.
Many will eventually settle into communities where they have established families or friends to help them assimilate.
Indeed, under new policies, some are allowed into the US with proper papers if they have family here. These countries include Colombia, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras, Cuba and Haiti and more recently Ecuador.
Reuniting families should be a priority, as should allowing people in danger to enter the US, as long as they have been screened for criminal or medical problems
Dirty little secret: many are young men, and young men from any society who are away from the restrictions of family and neighborhood restraints, tend to get into mischief, including violence and crime. Not just migrants but the kids of migrants who are having adjustment problems in their teenage years.
Somali Bantu parents call for end to youth violence, form group to make neighborhoods safer...
Michael Yon is one of the few ''on site" reporters of the migration and discusses a lot of the geopolitical background. and DW has a report here on the Darien Gap, the most dangerous part of the route.
In the last year-and-a-half, almost 700,000 people crossed the Darién Gap, a swampy jungle at the Colombia-Panama border, on their journey north, often to the United States. During their journey across this difficult terrain, Venezuelans, Haitians, and Ecuadorians, as well as people from countries in Asia and Africa, have experienced serious abuses, including sexual violence. Dozens, if not hundreds, have lost their lives or gone missing trying to cross. Many have never been found.
The situation in the Darién Gap is the result of a range of failed policies across the Americas.
italics mine.
one way that the Biden administration is trying to protect the real refugees (as opposed to smugglers, drug gangs, or adventerous young men looking to get rich in the USA by finding a job) is their Safe Mobility Initiative.
The Safe Mobility Initiative, launched in June 2023, is part of the U.S. government’s holistic approach to promote safe, orderly, and humane migration management. The Safe Mobility Offices (SMOs) help individuals find support and access a wide range of services in Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, and Guatemala.
US ‘Safe Mobility’ resettlement programme is working but too narrow: Report https://t.co/o5dCq4X5vO
hmm... maybe I should tell him to sell DimSum in his Panderia there.
Unchecked immigration of unscreened migrants who are often being trafficked by criminal gangs is a huge problem, and although as I noted there are some policies trying to limit the influx, they are inadequate.
And as long as the border stays open, more people will risk their lives to find job opportunities and freedom.
Many are coming right now, worrying that Trumpieboy will shut down the migrant pipeline and the border. Sort of like Clinton did to stop the dangerous Haitian migrations of the 1990s.
But you know, if Trump does build a wall and start to deport those without papers, I suspect he will just export only a few people, mainly those with criminal records, or those addicted to drugs, or who otherwise refuse to fit into US society. I say this because of what happened under President Reagan: Like Regan, he will slow down new illegal migration while arranging an amnesty to those living and working in the USA.
so why did America's cobalt mine get shut down? NPR:
Closed before it opens
But then, something rather shocking happened. The price of cobalt–around $40 a pound in early 2022–started to drop. The price fell from $40 a pound to $35. It was at $25 a pound by the time everyone was gathered in the mountains of Idaho for the ribbon-cutting.
of course, since this, like other minerals or industries, are vital to America's economy, there is an argument that the government should subsidize these industries.
Billionaire Jared Isaacman has taken off in a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket for what he hopes will be the first ever privately funded spacewalk...
A vanity project, some might say, but in addition to experiments and trying out new designs for space suits, it has long term goals.
Ms Gillis said that it was a necessary part of Space X’s plans to send people to other worlds....“ Space X has huge ambitions to get to Mars and make life multiplanetary. In order to get there, we need to start somewhere. And the first step is testing out the first iteration of the EVA spacesuit ...
and the billionaire funding the project is one of those going into space:
“Isaacman is actually the most experienced astronaut of the crew – he alone has been to space before, on another self-funded mission with SpaceX, where he also took the position of Commander. In the context of the mission, he is the natural choice,” he told BBC News.
This short film discusses the program (and uses the word space cowboys to describe these astronaut businessfolk)
Lolo loved to take me dancing, but alas I am two left feet and not good at it. I remember one time we went to a hospital party and he ended up dancing with all the nurses and I was happy sitting with their husbands talking about football instead.
I took a dance class in college so was able to dance, but I wonder how many people take dance classes nowadays?
Step One: Get a tutor
Step two: Practice.
Here is the famous scene from the King and I:
You probably know about the American movie with Richard Geer,
but have you seen the original Japanese film it was based on? The elderly lady who runs the dance studio says that she got interested in ballroom dancing by watching the King and I...
a bit far from here, but I did see a flash in the sky NE of here about that time, without thunder. But since we are having thunderstorms on and off, I just figure it was distant lightning.
The bad news: My step son is into all of the conspiracy theories.
The good news: My granddaughter said if I actually went on tictok, instead of just reading what the "ain't it awful" clickbait right wing sites post about it, I would find that the kids are returning to old fashioned values.
True, it might mean stable same sex marriages and families without marriage papers instead of traditional values of the past, but it also means that the social influencers of the kids are rejecting the open hedonism and nihilism seen in Hollywood and Netflix etc. films, which no longer mirror societal values of the youth, but continue to promote the nihilism of the aging boomer ideas of the sixties.
more correctly this is Dr. C's soon to be deleted video discussing an article that found nano crystal like structures being formed spontaneously and associated with the mRNA covid vaccines.
I included links to the article in question and to the debunkers of the article, who mainly point out that the writers lack expertise in medicine etc.
663 people who euthanized sick chickens were screened if they were sick, 109 who were sick were checked for bird flu, but only 9 tested positive and they weren't very sick, and mainly suffered from pink eye/conjunctivits.
I commented that maybe the high mortality reported in Asia might be because mild cases were not reported, and the ones who died might have had malnutrition related poor immune systems.
Yup. chemicals probably induce metabolic syndrome/obesity and diabetes in vulnerable populations. But you know, it also means they have enough to eat. Get rid of these chemicals, and voila, malnutrition related deaths because chemicals mean more food grown, and less food spoilage...and you get fat people because now there is enough food to eat instead.
as for Autism: Uh, up to 50 years ago these kids were called retarded and institutionalized and often died at a young age from infectious diseases.
and left out of these dicsussion: measles does kill children and can cause retardation via measles encephalitis.
💉 95%+ Gazans are immunized against polio 💉 Israel is working with @WHO & @UNICEF to get 1.3m more vaccines into Gaza 💉 UNICEF campaign will cover 600,000 children under 10 for new mutation 》》》 pic.twitter.com/j1RsS1ZSyo
not just problems in having to treat infants for narcotic withdrawal, but a syndrome, that is a cluster of problems associated with mom's use of Fenanyl
not clear if it is from the fruit or spices used being contaminated, or if it is in the plastic pouches Nor anything about where the pouches were manufactured... hmm...someone needs to do a better study.
I remember past epidemics of this disease in the 1960s and early 1970s, but now it is getting weaker: it seems the spike protein of the virus is losing it's ability to latch onto human cells.
the Laptop from hell. Supposed to be only about his drug and sex addiction, but the censorship of the story is more than being about a man's psychological problems and how the press hid the story to help Biden win the election: It's about money. Bribes from the Ukraine and China... Who wudda thot?
The left used to care about politicians who got rich, often at the expense of public welfare, by being bribed by capitalists and big business or even foreign governments paying them as "lobbyists", but when you hear about people getting rich from bribes to spy on the US from foreign countries, you wonder what is going on.
Craig Singleton, senior China fellow at the Washington-based Foundation for Defense of Democracies think tank, said the case illustrated how China tries to use covert actors to shape political decisions at all levels of government in the United States.
“Just as TikTok has raised concerns about data collection and influence operations, this situation underscores the lengths to which China is willing to go to infiltrate and manipulate American institutions from within,” Singleton said.
“The charges against Linda Sun illustrate a broader strategy by China to infiltrate and exert influence at all levels of U.S. governance, from local to federal, by exploiting trust and access within political circles,” he said.
A lot of this is about trying to stop Taiwan from doing it's own propaganda to keep the US informed about what is going on there.
But it's not just Taiwan: Remember all the push back and censorship of the lab origin of the Wuhan virus?
Sigh
and this doesn't even point to the money from the Ukraine or Israel or Iran.
No wonder the powers that be are trying to censor twitter. And when I check on old blog posts, I notice a lot of the youtube videos have been taken down. WTF?
in the meanwhile, China is increasingly trying to steal resources in the West Philippine sea by "colliding" with Philippine coast guard ships, (i.e. deliberately ramming these ships) even within the economic zone of the Philippine islands.
and of course China hacked my Federal OPM file along with a 22 million others who served in the federal government, so I am probably on a list somewhere in China.
