Slashdot Mirror

https://www.reuters.com/articl...

"In order to sell in the Russian market, technology companies including Hewlett Packard Enterprise Co, SAP SE and McAfee have allowed a Russian defense agency to scour software source code for vulnerabilities, the Reuters investigation found last year."

Senator Jeanne Shaheen is dumb as a post. Foreign governments are purchasing American technology. It would be in their best interests to see if there are backdoors put in there by the NSA or CIA. This has happened before. Senator Biden talked about how the US put backdoors into pipeline controls sold to the Soivet Union. So this type of thing happens.

It's going to be a difficult threat to resolve indeed.

https://www.reuters.com/articl...

Now, we had heads of state meet and tensions are calming.

Maybe. We can see that NK is dismantling the engine test stand at Sohae, but it looks like they've resumed construction at the factory that assembles ICBMs. Their work at Sohae is generally complete, so they can dismantle that without losing capability, and naturally they can built it again if they need it. You keep saying that we haven't given them anything that we can't take back (which is not completely true), but the same is true for them. They have given us nothing that they can't undo (in fact, they have given us nothing). We, still, have given Kim a propaganda victory that he can use at home and that we cannot undo. They can show him as legitimate, and blame any problems on us, while he continues to built ICBMs and warheads. There is one and maybe two uranium enrichment facilities that are undeclared (one of them is here, the Kangson facility). We think that he has continued to produce fissile material, and he can enrich it at places where we can't tell. This is still true, and as Trump did not push for nor even mention any inspection regime at all, it's going to continue. So, what does that mean? That means that Kim can make a show of destroying somewhere around 20 warheads, which looks great, and makes everyone happy, and he will still have nuclear weapons and the capability to make more. So, tensions appear to be calming, but Kim is more legitimate than ever and he's on track to continue his weapon development with new missiles, new warheads, and new factories. This is going according to his plan, not ours. He has been busy for a while, that new factory will produce parts for his rockets that will go to other places to be assembled and then deployed. That construction is as recent as this month.

Yes, it would have been nice but not getting the optimal isn't the same as not getting something favorable.

Yes, you're correct. And, in this case, we have gotten nothing at all. If you disagree, let me know what we've gained in our talks, what NK has given up or done. So far they have dismantled an engine test stand that they are finished with (in the process, anyway, and again they can rebuild it if they need it), and we have 55 sets of remains from the Korean war. Maybe they're even American soldiers, so I guess that's 55 down and 5,300 or so to go, if that's important to you. Personally I think it's nothing more than a token gesture. Again, it does not change their capabilities in any way.

I would agree but everyone knows what the goals are. Both sides know what they want and know what the other-side wants.

That doesn't matter. When we say we want de-nuclearization, and Kim says he pledges to de-nuclearize, the first step is to define what that means. Because I guarantee we aren't speaking the same language. We want one thing, and he's agreeing to something else. If this is not in writing then it doesn't mean anything.

Probably none. At least not as part of any effort to reduce emissions. The population of Egypt has grown by 30% (!) in the past 15 years despite negative net immigration, and increasing capacity is the primary focus.

Also, a proposal for a new 6GW coal fired plant was just won by a Chinese company this year. https://www.reuters.com/articl...

You're going to see variations on that headline over and over from here on out.

We've been seeing it since before most of today's newspapers first printed. How many coachmen lost their jobs to a steam locomotive? How many computers lost their jobs to, ahem, computers? How many milkmen had to look for another vocation with the invention of pasteurization process and of refrigerators?

And speaking of "headlines" — you do know, that putting together the printing matrices was a manual process too, don't you? The expression "freedom of the press" and "stop the presses" is still around, even though there neither the actual presses any more — and some publications stopped wasting paper completely?

Civilization evolves, lamenting the disappearances of some professions is stupid...

"cost as part of GDP" is a silly way to compare, because the U.S. is wealthier than almost all other countries and as a result spends more on everything where you can spend more to get more, including books, restaurants, fast food, education, lawn care, cars, roads, bridges, electronics, and yes, health care. The U.S. also subsidizes a lot of medical device and drug research for other countries. All you're showing is that wealthier people tend to spend more on discretionary items (like extra doctors and a private room when you don't really "need" that) than less wealthy people.

Once Medicare/medicaid and VA health spending are comparable to OECD levels of health spending (hint, they're much higher), then you can start arguing public health care would cost similar to what the government already spends.

"Cost as part of GDP" is a pretty good way to compare. It shows how much of a country's production goes towards healthcare, helps correct for different salary and cost levels etc. FWIW, Norway is a bit better off than the US in general. We spend more than the US in absolute terms, but less when seen as a part of the GDP

Administrative costs seem to be a huge part of why - 8% of GDP in the US, 3% in most other countries.

You people are so pathetic, so much the true useful idiots Lenin needed to overthrow the west. Why aren't you worried about the fact that Trump's comment was made during the time period when Obama's Intel community was told to stand down about supposed Russian meddling?

Seems to me his comment was more about pointing out how our intelligence agencies were hiding her crimes and not doing their jobs, not being more flexible to aid the Russians.

I mean, after all, weren't we told during the debate on Oct 22, 2012 that The 1980s are now calling to ask for their foreign policy back because the Cold War’s been over for 20 years?

You said "Its long been a tactic of the right to equate anyone who expresses disagreement with their extremism as extremists themselves", which was clearly the portion of the comment I was replying to

So, if that is the part you were taking issue with, then what non-extremism on the right do you think I was equating to extremism of the left? Do you think labeling liberals as fascists is not extremist?

Meanwhile, lets continue to examine how extremism has become mainstream in the right. For example, birtherism. They elected the guy who made his entry into the party by pushing birtherism. Not enough? Lets look at a "well respected" journal of mainstream conservatism - the National Review. Dinesh D'Souza, pardoned felon, and ridiculously over the top troll, is on the masthead. And the magazine's senior editor is the author of the book "liberal fascism."

But there's undeniably a tendency of the modern Left to misuse the label for dramatic effect.

No. You are just ignorant of history. People just like you were saying the same shit about germany in 1934. Its not like the nazis appeared fully-formed and gassing jews out of nowhere. We have been here before. The NYT even ran an op-ed rationalizing nazis as just having "economic anxiety."

We are stealing brown babies from aslyum seekers and then shipping the parents back to their countries without their kids. And in response trump's approval rating with republicans has soared. How much more nazi do we have to get for you?

The FBI wouldn't trust CrowdStrike to make such an image.

Of course they would. The FBI uses contractors all the time. Especially for what the president calls "the cyber".

https://www.reuters.com/articl...

The world’s biggest coal consumer used 0.4 percent more coal in absolute terms in 2017 compared to a year ago, the bureau said in its annual National Social and Economic Development communique, without giving the value of total coal consumption. However, as a portion of total energy consumption, coal usage fell 1.6 percentage points to 60.4 percent last year, while clean energy, including natural gas and renewables, rose 1.3 percentage points to 20.8 percent from 2016, the communique showed.

As reported by everyone on the planet except WindBourne and "you"...

Sort of. The actual decommissioning costs have turned out to be up to two orders of magnitude more than the cost originally estimated.

So current rate payers are basically paying the decommissioning costs while people 20-40 years ago got unrealistically cheap nuclear power.

Oh... and (at least so far), we don't have to pay $8 million dollars a year (for just one site) to protect the windmills from being stolen by terrorists to build a dirty bomb.

https://www.reuters.com/articl...

  German utility E.ONâ(TM)s breakup has led to worries that funds set aside for decommissioning reactors will not suffice, but globally the cost of unwinding nuclear is uncertain as estimates range widely.

As ageing first-generation reactors close, the true cost of decommissioning will be crucial for the future of the nuclear industry, already ailing following the 2011 Fukushima disaster and competition from cheap shale gas, falling oil prices and a flood of renewable energy from wind and solar.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) said late last year that almost 200 of the 434 reactors in operation around the globe would be retired by 2040, and estimated the cost of decommissioning them at more than $100 billion.

But many experts view this figure as way too low, because it does not include the cost of nuclear waste disposal and long-term storage and because decommissioning costs - often a decade or more away - vary hugely per reactor and by country.

âoeHalf a billion dollars per reactor for decommissioning is no doubt vastly underestimated,â said Mycle Schneider, a Paris-based nuclear energy consultant.

https://www.mercurynews.com/20...
Diablo Canyon costs warning issued while higher PG&E bills loom

https://www.reuters.com/articl...
According to Paul Genoa, director of policy development of the Nuclear Energy Institute, a trade group for the nuclear power industry, decommissioning costs typically run at $500 million per unit. But actual costs vary based on the plantâ(TM)s size and design, and some have reached over $1 billion â" between 10 percent and 25 percent of the cost of constructing a nuclear reactor today. ...
The original decommissioning cost was estimated at $719 million; the company spent nearly $1.2 billion in the end. ...

https://www.iaee.org/documents...
A series of abstracts with information on further studies.

Sort of. The actual decommissioning costs have turned out to be up to two orders of magnitude more than the cost originally estimated.

So current rate payers are basically paying the decommissioning costs while people 20-40 years ago got unrealistically cheap nuclear power.

Oh... and (at least so far), we don't have to pay $8 million dollars a year (for just one site) to protect the windmills from being stolen by terrorists to build a dirty bomb.

https://www.reuters.com/articl...

  German utility E.ONâ(TM)s breakup has led to worries that funds set aside for decommissioning reactors will not suffice, but globally the cost of unwinding nuclear is uncertain as estimates range widely.

As ageing first-generation reactors close, the true cost of decommissioning will be crucial for the future of the nuclear industry, already ailing following the 2011 Fukushima disaster and competition from cheap shale gas, falling oil prices and a flood of renewable energy from wind and solar.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) said late last year that almost 200 of the 434 reactors in operation around the globe would be retired by 2040, and estimated the cost of decommissioning them at more than $100 billion.

But many experts view this figure as way too low, because it does not include the cost of nuclear waste disposal and long-term storage and because decommissioning costs - often a decade or more away - vary hugely per reactor and by country.

âoeHalf a billion dollars per reactor for decommissioning is no doubt vastly underestimated,â said Mycle Schneider, a Paris-based nuclear energy consultant.

https://www.mercurynews.com/20...
Diablo Canyon costs warning issued while higher PG&E bills loom

https://www.reuters.com/articl...
According to Paul Genoa, director of policy development of the Nuclear Energy Institute, a trade group for the nuclear power industry, decommissioning costs typically run at $500 million per unit. But actual costs vary based on the plantâ(TM)s size and design, and some have reached over $1 billion â" between 10 percent and 25 percent of the cost of constructing a nuclear reactor today. ...
The original decommissioning cost was estimated at $719 million; the company spent nearly $1.2 billion in the end. ...

https://www.iaee.org/documents...
A series of abstracts with information on further studies.

"Are you denying that Germany is dependent on Russian energy?"

In general, yes.

Fact Check - Germany Imports Gas From Russia. But Is It a 'Captive'?

TL;DR: Trump was very incorrect (or lied, take your pick) about the amount of energy Germany gets from Russia. Germany does get _some_ of their energy from Russia, but it's not the majority of their energy, and despite that Germany has been far more willing to stand up to Russia and impose sanctions against than Trump is.

So, John Kerry:

https://112.international/ukra...

https://twitter.com/EnergyAtSt...

And Joe Biden:

https://uk.reuters.com/article...

Were wrong?

The rats are an invasive species, and this is just one of many problems they cause. There are plenty of reasons to eradicate them.

We can wipe them out with a gene drive.

The Trump Administration's intentional acts to undermine Obamacare are responsible for skyrocketing costs and a massive shrinking of services.

Fixed it for you.

Because they are designed as burner phones. You wouldn't want to take your main phone into a foreign country like Russia because you will be hacked the moment your plane lands. Instead you leave your main phone at home and buy a burner phone with dual SIM so you can put your main SIM and an international roaming SIM into your phone. When you get back home you wipe the burner phone back to factory defaults.

https://www.reuters.com/articl...

yes, those are made-up figures, but they still make the point

Wtf? You don't get to just pull numbers out of your ass to make a point.

"After adjusting for severity and accounting for crashes not reported to police, the study estimated cars with drivers behind the wheel are involved in 4.2 crashes per million miles, versus 3.2 crashes per million miles for self-driving cars in autonomous mode." Source It's a bit dated though, I'm sure it wouldn't take too long to find something newer.

yes, those are made-up figures, but they still make the point

Yup, that's just about the dumbest thing I've read on the Internet today. Thank you for the laugh.

You should learn to use Google.

I don't understand the article.

The U.S. has no commitments to the Paris agreements; we withdrew from them in 2017.

Not quite. The U.S. announced the intent to withdraw from the Paris agreements in 2017, but the actual withdrawal doesn't take effect until November 2020.

Still, since the commitments don't take effect until 2025, five years after that, it still seems to be a non-story.

The U.S. has no commitments to the Paris agreements; we withdrew from them in 2017.

Read the Reuters article https://www.reuters.com/articl...

"Under Made in China 2025, unveiled by China’s State Council in 2015, China wants to catch up with rivals in sectors including robotics, aerospace, clean-energy cars and advanced basic materials. "

"The strategy is at the core of China’s efforts to move up the value chain and achieve Xi’s vision of turning the country into a global superpower by 2050. "

"Under the plan, Beijing wants Chinese suppliers to capture 70 percent of market share by 2025 for “basic core components and important basic materials” in strategic industries."

"Other targets endorsed by senior Chinese officials include ensuring 40 percent of smartphone chips are domestically made by 2025. "

That proves my main point - even developers, who are extremely apt with technology and computers, managed to use 4000(!) copies of Xcode downloaded from a non-Apple source to build production versions of applications.

That's why defense in depth is so important a concept to adhere to - none of the apps affected by that could affect other apps, all they could do is obtain information each application was allowed to access (and even then it seems that ever happened).

The App Store signing is just one of many layers, but a great first layer that has protected millions of apps and users from harm.

Apple noticed it and fixed it quickly... but attacks like that are way as many layers of defense as possible are important.

It never ceases to amaze me the gross sense of entitlement certain companies have. People expect to be dealt with fairly, they don't expect to be lied to, discriminated against or retaliated against.

Seriously? Fucking Uber stealing Waymo secrets. Google "Uber Waymo". Or https://www.reuters.com/articl...

About 25% of the stock is shorted (varies day-to-day, but it's a single-digit fraction of the total).

When you short a stock on margin and the price goes up, you have to add money to your margin account to cover the potential loss.

Tesla stock is up almost 100 points over the last month, roughly 35% ($370 up from $275).

Tesla short sellers are taking a bath right now, to the tune of $2 billion in the last month.

A fair number of those short sellers would be interested in throwing a pile of cash (say $100,000) at a disgruntled employee to damage the production line.

Anyone care to bet against that prediction?

(The next step will probably be to get the FBI involved.)

> There are plenty of examples of companies calling in John for an interview and not calling in Susan (or Enrique or Javon) even though they have duplicate resumes

This might be true of some industry, but there's no compelling case for it existing in software development.

> "Oh, this is all low-level device driver stuff. Not something a woman would be good at, so I won't waste my time"

If you think anyone would NOT hand this off to someone else, regardless of gender, I would love to know where you're swimming in so many candidates who understand the context that you can afford to discount anyone.

After 25 years, I've never even HEARD about gender discrimination (in hiring or tasking, within California), because finding a useful candidate is hard enough that nobody realistically cares about gender in software development. I've also never seen it, but have seen the opposite (men passed over in favor of young women) without the identical resume constraint. But sometimes it's obviously a chauvinistic preference for image, a prelude to predation, or a failure in competence.

> http://www.insyncsurveys.com.a...
This is not proof.

> https://www.reuters.com/articl...
http://www.pnas.org/content/11... - This is not proof, but it is a study.

vs

> That contradicts a 2012 study in which academics gave higher ratings to hypothetical job candidates with male names than those with female names (and identical resumes).
http://www.pnas.org/content/10... - This is not proof, but it is a study.

I mean, I don't see a lot of studies and not a lot of example companies that demonstrate anything either way.

Literally how much of the cost inflation is the effect of political activism?

Depends on what you mean by political activism. If you mean "Corporate lobbying to increase their profits at the expense of the public" then quite a lot. Billions of dollars worth to be honest. Just remember Enron for one example, that went too far, and think of how many smarter predators there are.

We have the same problem with the death penality where interference with the logistics is so heavy that they are having a hard time getting their hands on the drugs required to perform a lethal injection.

Some of the drugs have dual uses for other medical proceedures... and the shortages are so heavy that patients that need those drugs to treat them can't get access to the drugs.

Reality: Drug manufacturers don't want to sell their product to the incompetents who run the US prison system and even manage to botch executions, and instead of respecting that wish, the idiots trying to do executions instead seek to circumvent it, and thus the Drug manufacturers have to go to more lengths to keep those idiots out.

Did they ever try just not involving people in their dirty business who didn't want to be? It wouldn't be too hard. Be honest, be upfront, instead of trying to subvert the process, show your actions before the public eye and convince us of the rightness of your actions.

Oh wait, when you're acting not to disclose your bad deeds, you have trouble.

Here is another point on that, look at countries outside of the US regulatory system... say in China etc... they're clearly highly econonical absent anti nuclear activism inflating costs. We can see that very clearly in nations where it is not politically relevant.

You can look at those countries and see MASSIVE expenses, HORRIBLE CORRUPTION, and INCREDIBLE amounts of pollution. In fact, I remember that you personally declared that China was building more coal plants. Yes, you personally.

You can also talk to nuclear engineers that have designed newer reactor designs and they'll validate this position.

Nope. Turns out nuclear engineers that have designed newer reactor designs have been lying to us. How do I know? Their complete failure to build their recent designs without extensive problems.

Here is what we need to fix the situation:

Here's what you need:

An understanding of the situation. You don't have one. Especially not its problems. So you can't fix anything.

1. We need a reasonable place to store spent fuel.

You've had 50 years. I'm not banking on your ability to do that.

2. Life time of reactor regulations that don't change after the fact.

I did not think you could make such a stupid argument, but apparently I was wrong. Apparently you can argue that "We shouldn't change a thing" without realizing how monumentally stupid an idea it is.

Reality: We need to be able to make changes, and yes, tell people to stop what they're doing, and yes, sometimes even hold them accountable for the injury they caused even when they didn't break an official declared rule. The lack of understanding that some people will see no reason not to cause monumental harm because you can't punish them or hold them accountable is an issue for a person like yourself.

And of course, you're wrong in principle. Everything suffers from that pattern. Which is why it's necessary to have the response available to slap it down.

Of course, the fact is, even what little of your proposal is reasonable in some nuance, is actually already the reality.

In France. See here and here. Evidence for cheats in PSA engines also came forward in other studies.

The bulk of “Dieselgate” lawsuits are being handled by prosecutors in Braunschweig where four separate sets of criminal proceedings are being conducted against current and former managers of VW, headquartered in nearby Wolfsburg.
Some 39 individuals including Winterkorn are being investigated over suspected emissions fraud, with the former CEO also being probed for suspected market manipulation together with Hans Dieter Poetsch, the group’s former finance chief who is now supervisory board chairman, and Herbert Diess, now group CEO who joined the firm in July 2015 as head of the VW brand.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/articl...

Then we have one of the major German newspapers noting that Winterkorn stands to lose his entire financial existence.
Source: http://www.faz.net/aktuell/wir... (you may need a translator)

https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/index.php?page=electricity_in_the_united_states

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_electricity_consumption

Reuters, Forbes, CNBC and others report that the US solar industry lost about 10,000 jobs in 2017. And that's after an initial increase of jobs in 2017 that promised to be about 17 times faster than the total US economy.

Yeah, I think Trump has curtailed the adoption of renewable energy. But it's just my opinion. I could be wrong. Wouldn't surprise me. Often am.

Initial report of job growth:

http://money.cnn.com/2017/05/24/news/economy/solar-jobs-us-coal/index.html

Reports of job loss:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/joshuarhodes/2018/01/23/solar-tariff-a-direct-hit-to-fastest-growing-job-market-in-us/

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/07/us-solar-industry-lost-nearly-10000-jobs-in-2017.html

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-solar-jobs/u-s-solar-industry-lost-nearly-10000-jobs-in-2017-idUSKBN1FR15O

The proper link is here: https://www.reuters.com/articl...

but these laws only affect the little people. If someone has sufficient resources and connection, they can track anyone. All *privacy* laws do is prevent the little people from tracking big people. I dont want this to be true, but wishing doesnt make it so.

WTF did /. link the Axios summary?

Why stop there? Link the reddit link.

"The kingdom has proven reserves of 266 billion barrels according to government estimates submitted to the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (“Annual Statistical Bulletin”, OPEC, 2015). If these numbers are correct, Saudi Arabia’s reserves will last for another 70 years at the average production rate of 10.2 million barrels per day reported for 2015." https://www.reuters.com/articl... That's JUST Saudi Arabia. We are not even close to peak oil.

"How does it not make sense?"

The fact that the technology has existed for over half a century and so far, what do you have to show for it? In the same amount of time we had jet engines, can you see the difference?

PS: We don't even have Concorde anymore, but you think a way to get NOWHERE will have a market? Beyond novelty?

Seems to me, the market has spoken.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

You had your chance. More than one.

http://www.cnn.com/TECH/9705/2...

Nope. Not that either.

https://www.reuters.com/articl...

Oops. So sorry.

Even your much Space Nutted "space based solar power"? Not a picowatt beamed down, not a single bolt in orbit.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Z92t...

Keep Nutting though, it entertains me.

Overall, are you aware that some things that seem perfectly normal and sensible today will inevitably become unpardonable moral sins in a generation, but there's no telling which things. What do you want in your permanent record, to be used by a government or employer that does not have your best interests in mind, 20 years from now?

So true. I know that /. is full of left wing types but the reality is that for decades the biggest abusers of these *has* been the left. SJWs embrace the following concepts:

Hounding people over their politics is acceptable

https://www.reuters.com/articl... https://www.catholicnewsagency...

Violence is OK as long as you're right and "they" are wrong

http://thehill.com/policy/nati...

No, they can't just all get along if they don't follow the correct politics

https://www.theodysseyonline.c... https://www.washingtonpost.com...

Seriously, it's amazing that the left hasn't pushed for re-education camps (yet). Despite this they have the gall to say that the real danger is from the right. Amazing.

Unless someone has their machine connected directly to the internet (in which case you've got a whole lot of bigger problems), what's the likelyhood that this would actually be exploited?

Depending on whether anybody malicious was aware of this exploit, the likelihood is quite high.

I just don't see the point here. There's already a bunch of plant-based alternatives that don't involved roaches (rice, soy, almond, quinoa, coconut, ect.).

Rice: Not nutrient dense, and getting less dense due to CO2 increase.
Soy: I can't digest soy. If I eat a burrito with TVP in it, for example, it destroys my digestion. If my lady (who worked as a chef for Christina on Orcas Island, among her other culinary chops) puts tofu into a meal I won't taste it, but it will make me urpy and pukey (yes, those are technical terms) before I even finish the meal. Eating large amounts of soy may increase cancer risk in men due to phytoestrogen. Most soy produced is now GMO, which I have mixed feelings about scientifically, and specifically Monsanto's IP, which I have very clear feelings about politically. Their competition is Dupont and BASF. Dupont has a long history of being shit (They and BP together have a company which has an obvious, partially-paid-for-by-tax-money patent on efficiently producing Butanol, a 1:1 carbon-neutral replacement for gasoline, and have been suing GE to prevent them from selling the stuff, which THE WORLD NEEDS) and BASF is a major polluter (So's Dupont, and always has been) so even if Monsanto's dominance wanes, the slack will only be taken up by other shitlords.
Almonds: It takes about a gallon of water to grow a single almond. They consume literally ten percent of California's water every year, and water is becoming scarcer. Avocados have been removed from southern Caifornia en masse because there is simply not enough water to irrigate them. Almonds are next.
Quinoa: We're eating so much of it that the people who historically ate it are going hungry, because as usual only a small percentage of the population profits from exporting what the majority of people used to eat. Yay capitalism! Isn't it just the best?
Coconut: Coconut shortage!
Insects: Many of them can literally be raised on compost and most require little water. At least some can be raised in almost any climate.
Yeast: Can be raised anywhere on very little, and this is what they're actually trying to do.

I'm not actually in a rush to eat bugs or bug products, but there are clear and compelling reasons why one might want to.

Why did Moon Jae-in say that Trump is the one to credit with getting Kim to agree to talks in the first place?

https://www.reuters.com/articl...

Reuters world news is about as relevant and impartial as it gets.

Ahhh, yes. The outfit that reported about China sending a probe to the Dark Side of the Moon.

Would you like to have another guess?

And, in a labor camp, you don't get a choice....I"ve yet to see any area of work in the US where they hold a gun to your head, and force you to stay as an employee against your will and not allowing you to quit and seek out alternative employment.

Being poor is effectively illegal. If you don't have money, you wind up having to do illegal things to exist. Some of these things are only mildly illegal, but they can lead in various ways to loss of possessions. Penalties for a lot of typical homeless behavior include fines... against people who don't have money. If you get into enough of this trouble long enough, they'll lock you up for long intervals — either in a prison rape factory, or an insanity-inducing facility for the criminally insane.

It's better than a literal labor camp, but there's definitely a similar mechanism at work. As it turns out, people work harder if they think they're getting a good deal. Most people are pretty easy to fool, so you fool 'em. The remainder you either lock up as a warning to others, or scare into working (by locking up that middle group.) Of course, it's a lot more complicated than that; there are various shades of tricked and scared. Foundation of society, anxiety, suppress it if you can.

Or, have I missed something these past few decades?

If you have a roof over your head and know where your next paycheck is coming from, you are one of the 8%... worldwide. The rates are much better here; The current U-6 unemployment rate is 7.8%, but even that fails to account for at least 7.5 additional million workers who are unemployed. The U-2 is based on a claim of 6,346,000 unemployed workers, and it is little more than half of the U-6; This puts the total actual number of unemployed at somewhere in the vicinity of twenty million, with a rate of around 10 or 11 percent.

So uh, congrats on being part of the 90%, I guess. But that percentage is headed downwards. Young people are choosing to stay in school longer; I know for my part, when I did that it was because I didn't know what else I was going to do with myself, and there was grant and loan money available to me as a student. Others are no doubt working on more advanced degrees, in the hope that will differentiate them from other applicants, and it will; but in this economy, most of them are taking on massive student loan debt for that purpose which may never pay off.

Another Tesla battery fire is making its way into the US news cycle. This one was fatal. The photos are astonishing; the whole car was slagged right down to the pavement with the driver is inside. Not a good look.

Wait for the trade war, it is brewing.

77,000 Chinese workers learned about this last week (ZTE, who attempted to purchase Qualcomm).
http://money.cnn.com/2018/05/0...

A 7 year ban on using US technologies, consider that. China will fund development of replacements, thus resolving the dependency (they probably already are/were).

And Europe is leaning against unilateral sanctions on Iran (this is as interesting as the Chinese stuff, Europe is a different beast):
https://www.reuters.com/articl...

Avocado's are an interesting view as well:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/0...

The world is being pushed towards protectionism, through tariffs and/or sanctions.

This is very dangerous territory.

Russians and Arabs (amongst many others) have attempted to influence the voters in the US for many decades.

Over the decades, many American politicians have sought such external influences. At the height of the cold war, Democrat Senator Ted Kennedy sought the help of the Russian government in his attempt to defeat Reagan in the 1984 campaign. In 2016, Hillary Clinton not only used illegal aliens in her campaign (foreign influence, by definition) but she also funneled millions of dollars through the law firm Perkins Coie to the American journalist outfit Fusion GPS that hired Christopher Steele (a British spy, thus foreign influence) who in turn bought dirt from Russian spies which was then placed in a document (now referred to as "the Steele Dossier") that was used to start the whole Trump-Russia meme.

This foreign influence in our elections may well be disgusting, but it's hardly new. Hell, in Democrat-run states the politicians are working overtime to allow illegal aliens to actually cast votes. AFAIK nobody has found any evidence that Trump was working to allow Russian citizens to cast actual votes in the USA. There's currently still no evidence that anything in that Steele Dossier is true or that there was any Trump-Putin collusion at all.

In 2018, however, carbon dioxide emissions from transportation, power plants, homes and businesses should climb about 2.2 percent, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said. That increase would be due to forecasts for a colder winter, higher economic growth and rising gas prices, the EIA said.

South Korea President Says Trump Deserves Nobel Peace Prize.

The point of the deal is you didn't have to trust Iran because they're subjected to rigorous inspections.

So rigorous that if IAEA would want to inspect a military site - they'd need to ask Iran for permission in advance, tell it the location and possibly wait two weeks.

I think that's fine.

Remember that as much as the US distrusts Iran and considers it an enemy Iran distrusts the US and considers it an enemy too, the difference being Iran actually has some damn good reasons. During WWII the Allies invaded and occupied a neutral Iran installing a pro-West ruler, the current Iranian government is around only because the Western influence eventually led to the overthrow of that ruler.

The US then supported Iraq as they invaded Iran in a war that killed hundreds of thousands of Iranians. This war included the US assisting Iraq in their deployment of Chemical weapons (ie, WMDs) against Iran.

Not to mention how loudly the Neocons were trying to drum up support for an Iranian invasion during Bush II's term.

If you were Iran would you really allow Western inspectors to wander into any military site they wanted to without notice? You'd have a very valid suspicion that the US inspectors were gathering intel for an invasion.

At the same time, it takes big-ass centrifuges to enrich Uranium, centrifuges you can't sneak away in 2 weeks. The 24 day period doesn't give Iran time to cover up a bomb program.

They literally set up a clock dedicating to counting the days until said country's destruction, based on comments from the _current_ supreme leader.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/iran-al-quds-day-protest-clock-president-hassan-rouhani-a7806056.html

(Note that this isn't Fox News, The Independent is very left-leaning)

Whom do you mean by "they"? Protesters set up the clock, not "Iran" or the Iranian goverment.

Whether or not that's true is irrelevant. The deal was about Nukes, not missiles, Hezbollah support, or anything else.

But it has had the effect of increasing or enabling these activities while preventing pushback since it prevented use of sanctions.

It gives them more money sure, but it doesn't prevent the use of sanctions for their other activities, hell, Trump has literally implemented sanctions against Iran for their missile program.

And one of the bigger benefits of the deal isn't even Nukes, it's laying the groundwork to turning Iran into a regular non-renegade nation. A lot of that has already been achieved, Rhouani is talking about staying in the deal even with Trump dropping out.

Yeah, good for Trump. He's destroyed a perfectly good non-proliferation deal and risked a Nuclear arms race in the Middle East

Note that every other country likely to engage in said arms race opposed the deal. The deal made a Nuclear arms-race *more* likely since it strengthened Iran so much that other countries were tempted to turn to non-conventional weapons.

The Saudi's and Israeli's are regional rivals for influence and they'd much prefer Iran as a marginalized pariah nation than an economic and political rival for influence. Their best case if a collapse of the Iran deal and a US invasion to prevent a nuke, hell Bibi was practically begging for that.

I'm not actually certain they're all the concerned about Iran getting Nukes. For one, it's unclear that Iran actually wanted to build Nukes. They definitely wanted the ability to build Nukes, ie highly enriched Uranium and the know how to make a bomb on fairly short notice, but they probably didn't want to

This is bad news among good news. In general, CO2 output levels have been flat or going down in both the US and some other countries for a few years. 2018 is actually the first year in the last 4 where the total CO2 production of the US are going up, while they declined for the previous few years https://www.reuters.com/article/usa-natgas-eia-steo/update-1-u-s-carbon-emissions-seen-at-25-year-low-in-2017-idUSL1N1J311B. But we need to do a lot more. So what can you do to help?

There are three main aspects, personal, political and charitable:

In terms of personal lifestyle differences, the biggest options are to eat less meat and to use a personal car less. If you live somewhere where public transit is an option, you can massively cut down on your carbon footprint by simply using public transit. Not everyone has that option, since you may live somewhere where public transit isn't available or may have a job or family that necessitates getting a car, in which case, if you get a new car, make sure to buy an electric or hybrid. Also in terms of personal activity, one can keep the air conditioning or heating in one's house at not as extreme temperatures or one can better insulate one's house. If one is somewhere installing solar on one's home either for electricity or just for water heating then do it. All these personal changes are also things which overall cause one to save money so there's good reason to do it..

Political change is also important. Much of Europe is taking sensible approaches to these issues (although Germany's anti-nuclear kick isn't helping) but the US is very much not so. In general, the Democrats have a much better record on climate issues and other environmental issues than the current Republicans. This means voting for Democratic candidates and donating to them is important.

In terms of charity, this is a really good way of effecting direct change. Two good options for solar are donating to Everybody Solar https://www.everybodysolar.org/ which gets solar panels for non-profits like museums and homeless shelters, and the Solar Electric Light Fund https://www.self.org/ who helps get solar panels for locations in the developing world. SELF's work is especially important because it helps to cut off the potential of rising carbon dioxide in the developing world even as it helps increase their economies. For wind power, I recommend donating to The New England Wind Fund https://www.massenergy.org/the-wind-fund. Also, helping buy carbon offsets is important. The most efficient way of offsetting carbon in terms of tons offset per a dollar spent is Cool Earth https://www.coolearth.org/. Every little bit helps.

Unfortunately, they can still *vote* in many areas, legally or not, and many proposals to require ID have been rejected.

Yeah, except no. It doesn't happen. In fact, Trump disbanded his "election fraud" commission because after a year of work they couldn't find election fraud at any level higher than infinitesimal number of instances where some Republican in Texas tried to vote twice. That, and because the guy who Trump picked to head his "election fraud" commission has his own legal troubles.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/0...

https://www.reuters.com/articl...