[NewYorker] Education Secretary Betsy DeVos is being dispatched to Pyongyang in what the White House is calling a high-stakes mission to reverse North Korea’s years of progress in math and science.
DeVos, who is expected to arrive in Pyongyang later this week, plans to throw a monkey wrench in North Korea’s swiftly advancing nuclear program by replacing its current system of training scientists with a dizzying array of vouchers, sources said.
According to the White House, it is hoped that, after a few weeks in North Korea, DeVos will succeed in returning that nation’s nuclear program to pre-1970 levels.
At a press briefing announcing the mission, the White House deputy press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, called DeVos "our nation’s best bet to stop North Korea."
"If anyone can get North Korea’s missiles to start blowing up on the launchpad again, it’s Betsy," Sanders said.
As they tut tut about, perhaps they should review a standardized test from 1970 to Generation Smartie making change from a $50 bill for a $16.38 charge and count the money back.
Pre-70's, like the Mercury program? I guess they had their mac-books to figure that all out.
How about the 1940's, any math going on there, or is that back in the paleo whole number era?
Probably all for the best. Imagine what would have happened if the Romans knew about math. Crazy.
Just stepping back here, this is a top-tier publication, and this is what they come up with? Aren't they supposed to be the Diego Velazquez of whit and humor? I mean, by all means, have a night on the town with the boys drinking Manhattans, but don't toss on a towel and tell me it is The Surrender of Breda.
#6
OK, it's funny as a one-liner. But not enough for all that horse-kicking.
But if it were true, Betsy would be giving the little Nork kids vouchers to attend school in Seoul which would annoy Pudge for the same reason school vouchers annoy the Democrats - because it frees an enslaved people from totalitarian control.
[Dhaka Tribune] Since last year’s terror attack on an upscale cafe in Dhaka, the law enforcement agencies of Bangladesh has been able to take down a major part of the local militant network, but the radical ideology that drives these militants still lives on, said Deputy Inspector General Monirul Islam, chief of the Counter-Terrorism and Transnational Crimes (CTTC) unit of Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP).
Speaking at a discussion on the aftermath of the attack on Holey Artisan Bakery in Gulshan, Dhaka, on Thursday, he said police had identified a number of reasons why radical Islamist ideology has spread to such a great extent in the country.
“Marginalised, low-income people are an easy target of militant recruiters as they have no respectable space in society. But many others join the militant groups because they get a monthly allowance for hijrat [travelling from one’s home country to other countries with militant bases for training] with their families,” the CTTC chief said.
“But it is not just the impoverished people. Young people from rich families are falling into this trap as well as they have lost connection to their roots; they do not know their own country, its culture and traditions,” he explained. “They may also be enamoured by the idea of heroism.”
The discussion, titled “The lesson we learnt from the incident of Holey Artisan,” was organised by the Bangla Tribune on Thursday afternoon.
Monirul further said ideology the drives Middle East based terror group Islamic State (IS) is fuelled by the Shia-Sunni conflict in the region.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/07/2017 00:00 ||
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Link ||
[11130 views]
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[Finance.Yahoo] After North Korea's decades-old missile program on Tuesday finally bore out a nuclear-capable weapon able to reach the US, President Donald Trump vowed to confront the country "very strongly."
Addressing an audience in Warsaw, Poland, on Thursday, Trump said the US was considering "severe things" to retaliate against a nation he said was "behaving in a very, very dangerous manner."
But there's almost nothing that can be done to stop North Korea now. Whiny fatalistic ba$tards. No wonder it's so hard to deal with the Norks with your kind in the way all the time.
Shortly before North Korea's watershed launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile, Trump was briefed on a new range of military options for dealing with the country. As Business Insider has reported on extensively, military options for facing North Korea are extremely dangerous at best and unimaginably catastrophic at worst.
Because they involve WAR, which is dangerous for children and other living things. But that is precisely the point, since non-dangerous actions have not effected the desired change.
When Trump got hold of the new military options for North Korea, he again declined to act. Because we have a little time left and we have more to gain by staging our military than to lose while the Norks stage theirs.
But according to Yun Sun, a senior associate at the Stimson Center, Trump never had any good options for dealing with North Korea, and he has even worse options now.
"The ICBM test removed the false hope that we might be able to stop North Korean nuclear provocations with either sanctions or the use of military provocations," Sun said. So, unlike Sid, you choose death. Great.
North Korea has vastly accelerated the pace of its missile testing under Trump's presidency, but it had been preparing these tests for years, dating back to the Clinton administration. By the time Trump took office, North Koreans were just a few months from achieving their goal of a working ICBM.
According to Sun, nothing was going to stop them at this late stage.
In years past, North Korea had floated the idea of suspending its missile program in exchange for the US halting military drills with South Korea, but the US refused every time on the grounds that the regularly planned, completely legal drills did not at all compare with Kim Jong Un's nuclear threats and illegal development.
Now, faced with the possibility that North Korea has an unstoppable nuclear bomb, why would the US lay down its arms?
"The one thing we wanted to prevent North Korea from having, they already have it," Sun said. "What is the reasoning for us to suspend our military exercises at this point?"
The US and the international community can agree on sanctions for North Korea, which China may water down, but diplomatic talks are now strained, and the US's hand is undeniably weaker. Short on imagination, are we?
"How," Sun asked, "can we reward ICBM tests with engagement?"
#2
Nothing to do? Sheeeit. Last test landed in Japan's EEOC, I believe. Howsabout station a couple Aegis ballistic missile defense ships and give them a real-world test?
Moved to Page 4
[American Thinker] A news story at Breitbart.com, "Airport in Minneapolis Fails 95 Percent of Security Tests," talks about a recent security test of the TSA there and the pathetic performance of the operation. While I cannot dispute the data and conclusions, the false assumption is that the purpose of the TSA is to provide transportation security. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Certainly, if the screeners confiscate a loaded gun or jumbo-sized toothpaste tube, it's not a bad thing. But that's not the high-level purpose of the TSA.
Did you know that in 2016, the TSA screened 738,318,264 passengers, according to their year in review article? That is over twice the population of the U.S. From what figures I can find, it appears they have screened about nine billion passengers since 9/11. Those are just passengers flying in the U.S. Other countries have similar jumbo toothpaste investigative operations with even more hundreds of millions of screenings annually.
I propose that the true purpose of the TSA is to train the population of the U.S. to submit to invasive, embarrassing, and demeaning searches in exchange for the perception of increased security. It's not as though we are actually getting increased security, judging from the article ‐ just the perception thereof.
Acquaintances of mine who travel frequently just shrug off the pat-downs. "What can you do? We're safer for it." That's the desired response: resigned submission.
Through blackmail...uh, agreements with other governments, the TSA extends these "security" requirements to every airport launching flights into the U.S., and those requirements affect every passenger, not just those traveling to the U.S.
And since only the world's upper crust travels by air, we can conclude that those billions experience not just one security screening per year, but several. I know I have. And with every contact, the air traveler shrugs less and less, until he doesn't even remember being fondled.
You know the TSA drill. You have lived it: having some prison guard-looking person rub that blue glove all over your person. But I want you to think beyond that. It's obviously not about security.
What could it be about? What are they training us to endure, for the sake of security?
From the beginning, TSA has never had the slightest intention - philosophically, professionally or otherwise - of doing what actually needs to be done to insure actual security for US air passengers. If we did it the way the Israelis do it, there would be at least some realistic possibility of catching the bad guys. But we won't, because in order to do so, we have to profile, and our politicians would rather see a hundred 9/11s instead of doing what needs to be done, no matter how unpleasant.
So the theater will continue, until the next time.
And I guarantee that afterwards, we will see video of the bombers or hijackers walking serenely through the checkpoints, while some toddler or grandmother is patted down.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
07/07/2017 5:32 Comments ||
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#2
"Do something"
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
07/07/2017 6:35 Comments ||
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#3
There is also the goal to grow the bureaucracy and increase the power and prestige of the managers. Then there are all of the opportunities for graft.
Oh, btw, don't forget the unions. All of this is in line with the "resigned submission" goal.
#4
I propose that the true purpose of the TSA is to train the population of the U.S. to submit to invasive, embarrassing, and demeaning searches in exchange for the perception of increased security.
What is the end goal of the surveillance society? Is it total submission and compliance? Are we headed for some existence such as depicted on the TV fictional program "Person of Interest?"
We were warned by Benjamin Franklin long ago: Those who would give up Essential Liberty
to purchase a little Temporary Safety,
deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
07/07/2017 10:04 Comments ||
Top||
#8
TSA isn't just the pat down thugs.
The huge tracking infrastructure also serves as a reporting tool for bags and passenger seat mile monitoring of the airlines.
#19
TSA at Hartsfield-Jackson in Atlanta could be a case study in government welfare and fraud. It creeps me out to think that $ .01 cent of my money funds these endolent creatures.
[FOXNEWS] Ronald Reagan is nodding. If anyone doubted President Trump’s grasp of history, doubt no more. Today, on the site of the Warsaw Uprising, in the heart of democratic Poland, President Trump gave the most powerful speech of his presidency.
In an echo of Reagan’s "tear down this wall" speech given 30 years ago last month, President Trump declared Poland’s defense of freedom and Western values an enduring "symbol of hope." He honored the Polish people, their character and their patriots in a time of shared threats.
Then, he did more. As Reagan challenged the Soviet communist ideology, predicting it would end on the "ash heap of history," Trump extended his Middle East call to unity. He declared "radical Islamic terror" an "oppressive ideology" doomed by its own inherent evil and "violence against innocents."
President Trump traced Poland’s recurring defense of liberty, its own and ours. He reflected on Polish heroes, like Tadeusz Kosciuszko, who fought in the American Revolution, beside George Washington.
He chronicled Poland’s unbowed faith, perseverance, and reverence for liberty that kept them unified as borders were erased and redrawn in successive wars.
He spoke with passion about the Warsaw Uprising, Nazi and Soviet inhumanities, faith in family, and devotion to universal values. He spoke of the quest for truth and giving one’s life for something higher.
Of Polish and American patriots, he said: "We can still hear their voices; they echo down through history."
President Trump focused on what Ronald Reagan did 30 years ago: the human spirit, and how a free and faithful people will never to be broken ‐ by anything.
Poland had showed us all how to stand "in solidarity against oppression," he said, from Jewish resistance in Warsaw to Pope John Paul II’s and Lech Walesa’s fight against the Soviets.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/07/2017 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[11125 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
I wonder how much Melania has influenced DJTs thinking on/about Eastern Europe.
I'm not talking about a Rasputin figure, but, she is very intelligent and must have assimilated a fair amount of the prevailing mood in her youth. How much of her general conversation imprinted her husband??
#2
Melania is not President Trump's first Eastern Europe model wife; he went back to the well for Number 3. From Wikipedia:
Ivana Marie Trump (née Zelníčková, Czech pronunciation: [ˈɪvana ˈmarɪjɛ ˈzɛlɲiːt͡ʃkovaː]; February 20, 1949) is a Czech-American businesswoman and former fashion model. She was the first wife of Donald Trump from 1977 until 1991.
[Politico] National security officials across the federal government say they are seeing new restrictions on who can access sensitive information, fueling fears in the intelligence and security community that the Trump administration has stepped up a stealthy operation to smoke out leakers.
Officials at various national security agencies also say they are becoming more concerned that the administration is carefully tracking what they’re doing and who they’re talking to -- then plotting to use them as a scapegoat or accuse them of leaks.
One U.S. official voiced concern over even talking to their superiors about a benign call from a reporter. The agency this official works for had started limiting staff’s access to information, they said, and it would make it far easier to figure out who was talking to people in the media.
There was suspicion, the official said, that the agency was even tracking what they printed, to keep tabs on what information they were accessing.
"I’m just trying to keep my head down," another U.S. intelligence official recently told POLITICO.
A half dozen officials across the national security community described to POLITICO a series of subtle and no-so-subtle changes that have led to an increasingly tense and paranoid working environment rooted in the White House’s obsession with leaks.
President Donald Trump has regularly vented about his intense frustration with anonymously sourced stories, and has specifically targeted federal government entities, including intelligence agencies like the CIA and FBI and the State Department.
#5
If they talked to politico, they are ready suspect. Cross walking phone call records with access and leaked data will out those too dumb in tradecraft or too lazy to at least buy a burner.
Nice to see some tangible actions to remind the community this isn't a game.
#8
Oughtn't they be concerned the stealthy operation began as soon as President Trump's people were in place in a few of the agencies, and only now has become palpable? That lady who'd sold out to China wasn't arrested yesterday, after all.
Z Man
Here’s an anecdote to consider. In my most recent travels, I was told by friends about a woman we know. She is about to leave her husband, who we also know. The two of them are in their mid-to-late-40’s and their children are teenagers. The man is just a normie, who was happy to live his live as a conventional man. His wife, in contrast, had sampled the narcotic of feminism in college. In marriage, she went from being a college feminist to being a petite bourgeoisie feminist, living in a comfortable suburb.
The women who never move past college feminism tend toward a strange hypocrisy in married life. They adopt the lifestyle of June Cleaver, but rant and rave about women’s issue to anyone unfortunate enough to be within earshot. During elections, for example, they are sure that some candidate is plotting to stuff their uterus with Bibles and sew their legs shut. They also over-indulge in the artsy lifestyle. The women in question was into local theater and visual arts, aping the modern carny aesthetic.
Continued on Page 49
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[Finance.Yahoo] After North Korea's decades-old missile program on Tuesday finally bore out a nuclear-capable weapon able to reach the US, President Donald Trump vowed to confront the country "very strongly."
