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Post by mhbruin on Dec 10, 2022 10:55:51 GMT -8
If you have speeding tickets, raise your right foot.
Meet the New Taliban. Same as the Old Taliban
The Taliban have been inviting large crowds to public grounds and stadiums to hold public spectacles of punishments such as flogging. On Wednesday, a man was publicly executed in Farah province.
“I estimate that up to 80 people have been whipped since we took over Afghanistan,” Abdul Rahim Rashid, head of press relations at the Afghan Supreme Court, told Al Jazeera.
“Men and women have been whipped for different crimes in Kabul, Logar, Laghman, Bamyan, Takhar and some other provinces,” he added.
The reports of public punishments in recent weeks have brought back memories of the Taliban’s harsh rule in the 1990s when convicts were publicly stoned and beheaded.
The Taliban initially promised women’s rights and media freedom but more than 15 months on, Afghanistan’s new rulers have gone back on these promises. High schools for girls remain shut, women have been squeezed out of public places, and free media is almost non-existent.
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Post by mhbruin on Dec 10, 2022 11:00:08 GMT -8
Morrocco Celebrates
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Post by mhbruin on Dec 10, 2022 11:02:25 GMT -8
Is There a Special Place in Hell For Those Who Steal From the Neediest?
A growing number of low-income households have been robbed of the funds they use to purchase food, and with no federal fraud protections for them, most have little hope of ever getting reimbursed.
Thieves using hidden “skimming” devices are increasingly targeting benefit cards used by participants of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP. The electronic thefts have risen so much in recent months that the U.S. Agriculture Department, which funds the program, issued a warning about SNAP skimming in late October.
States have instituted some prevention measures, such as asking participants to change their PINs. But the majority have not committed to reinstating benefits.
Federal dollars are also not an option for reimbursement because regulations prohibit federal funds from being used to replace stolen SNAP funds. A bill to change those regulations received bipartisan support this week, but hearings on it are not expected until the new year.
SNAP participants say they cannot wait that long after a month or more of stolen benefits plunged them into financial turmoil.
“There’s definitely a domino effect. You can’t make up for last month,” said Phoenix Richardson, a divorced mom in the Boston area whose four kids are ages 5 to 17. Last month, more than $900 was skimmed from Richardson’s account, leaving her with less than $3 on the electronic benefit transfer, or EBT, card where she receives her SNAP benefits.
James Hafner, a Tennessee father, had been saving money to buy a hoverboard that his 7-year-old wanted for Christmas. He was caring for his girlfriend after she had surgery when the couple’s card got skimmed, leaving him with no choice but to use the money he had hoped to allot for his son’s gift.
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Post by mhbruin on Dec 10, 2022 11:05:51 GMT -8
The Mistake By Lake
Kari Lake, the GOP candidate who lost Arizona's governor race in November, filed a lawsuit Friday challenging certification of the state's election results and seeking a court order that declares her the winner.
The 70-page lawsuit from Lake, a prominent election denier and Trump ally, contains numerous inaccuracies about the election won by Democratic Gov.-elect Katie Hobbs, Arizona's secretary of state.
The suit names Hobbs and Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer as defendants, along with other election officials in Maricopa, claiming their alleged misconduct “nullifies” the results of the election in the state’s most populous county and that their actions “wrongfully” led to the state naming Hobbs as the winner.
“Lake received the greatest number of votes and is entitled to be named the winner,” the lawsuit states. “Alternately, the election must be re-done in Maricopa County to eliminate the effects of maladminstration and illegal votes on the vote tallies reported by Maricopa County.”
The suit claims that ballot printer and tabulator failures, which Lake said were intentional, “created chaos” on Election Day with "oppressively long lines" that depressed voter turnout and disproportionately deterred Republican voters who were more likely to cast a ballot in her favor.
Maricopa County issued a report on the voting glitches late last month after the state’s Republican attorney general’s office demanded answers on widespread voting machine glitches. Election officials had urged voters at polling sites where machines malfunctioned to exercise other options, including either dropping their ballots in a secure box to be counted later in the day or going to another location to vote.
Lake's lawsuit seeks a series of court orders, including “setting aside the certified result of the 2022 Arizona gubernatorial election and declaring that Kari Lake is the winner of the 2022 Arizona gubernatorial election.”
Kari, There's This Thing Called Evidence. Kari's Lawyers: Did You See What Happened to Previous Guy's Lawyers?
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Post by mhbruin on Dec 10, 2022 11:07:26 GMT -8
Did They Give Out Toy Guns, Too?
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Post by mhbruin on Dec 10, 2022 11:09:06 GMT -8
It's a Bakhmut Point
However, if there is one phrase that you’re likely to see if you go skimming through the media for mention of Bakhmut this morning, it’s either that “Ukrainian forces have suffered a heavy loss.” That’s being reported because the Institute for the Study of War passed it along apparently unaltered and unsupported from Russian propagandists. That. combined with AP’s morning headline of “Russia grinds on in eastern Ukraine; Bakhmut 'destroyed'” has resulted in a flood of articles this morning written as if Bakhmut is already history; as if it’s already fallen.
This is not the case.
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Post by mhbruin on Dec 10, 2022 11:10:34 GMT -8
Everybody Hates Chris Krysten
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Post by mhbruin on Dec 10, 2022 11:16:03 GMT -8
It's BAAACCKK! (It Never Went Away.)
COVID KILLED 1,500 AMERICANS THURSDAY AS CASES SKYROCKETED IN THE WAKE OF A POORLY-MASKED AND UNDER-VACCINATED THANKSGIVING TRAVEL SEASON.
According to The New York Times Coronavirus Tracker, on Thursday, Dec. 8, covid deaths cannonballed from 184 on Monday Dec. 5, to 481 on Tuesday, to 937 on Wednesday, and to 1,500 on Thursday, Dec. 8, exactly two weeks after Thanksgiving.
CASES ROUGHLY TRIPLE IN FOUR DAYS
Reported coronavirus cases jumped from 53,999 on Monday, Dec. 5 to 149,322 on Thursday, Dec. 8, and that number does not include a vastly larger number of unreported at-home positive tests.
The Question of the Day
Immunity’s down. Infection rates are up. And what happened to everyone’s masks?
Over recent weeks, since before Thanksgiving, there has been a significant and steep rise in COVID-19-related hospitalizations for Americans 70 and older. Nationally, that rate now exceeds the peak of the BA.5 summer wave and the Delta wave in the summer of 2021 — and this surge is still in sharp ascent. This is a signal that we are in for some trouble.
The new wave is largely being missed, with scant media coverage. The case numbers, of about 50,000 per day, represent a gross underestimate because home rapid antigen tests are not centrally reported and because some people with symptoms or exposure are not getting tested. Nevertheless, tests of wastewater are finding levels of SARS-CoV-2 quickly rising, which tracks with the increase in hospitalizations among seniors. So does the rate of COVID test positivity, which has risen 35% in the past two weeks.
So what can impede this growing wave? First, more people need to get the bivalent booster that is effective against Omicron variants. Only one in three seniors has had a booster over the past six months or longer; less than 15% of all Americans eligible have had the bivalent shot. In many peer countries the rate of recent boosters for seniors is 80% or higher. We are doing a pathetic job of protecting our elders here.
Newly posted data from the CDC show an 80% reduction of hospitalizations for people of all ages who had two booster shots compared with the unvaccinated. The bivalent booster, available since the first week in September, has shown a fivefold to tenfold increase in antibodies to BQ.1.1. This is fortunate; while we expected the booster would broaden the immune response to other variants, it was unknown whether it would help against BQ.1.1.
Second, mitigation factors — such as high-quality masks, distancing, testing and attention to air quality — should be used in places that pose a high risk of transmission. Anyone who doesn’t take seriously the risk of COVID infection is in denial about the risk of long COVID and its potentially disabling effects. And people should be taking precautions not only for their own sake but also out of respect for the immunocompromised and aged among us.
13.5% of Americans Have Had the Bi-Valent Booster
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Post by mhbruin on Dec 10, 2022 11:19:05 GMT -8
Whelan's Brother Has Some Words for Previous Guy: "You Did NOTHING!"
David Whelan was clear that he supported Brittney Griner's release and that Trump did not earn the right to disparage Biden, given he never tried to get Paul released.
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Post by mhbruin on Dec 10, 2022 11:21:21 GMT -8
Why Don't QOP Voters Vote Early or By Mail? I Wonder ....
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Post by mhbruin on Dec 10, 2022 11:22:28 GMT -8
Blow Ye Winds of the Morning. Blow Ye Winds, Hi Ho
The first-ever federal auction of floating offshore wind power sites off the Pacific coast ended Wednesday with bids totaling $757 million. When fully developed, the sites could power 1.5 million homes.
The turbines will float in water as much as half a mile deep more than 20 miles off the California coast and send electricity ashore via cables along the seabed. The money paid by the five winning companies will go to the U.S. Treasury.
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