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Post by mhbruin on Apr 29, 2023 7:50:36 GMT -8
How did I escape Iraq? Iran.
How Much Donating Is Too Much?
A Dutch man suspected of fathering more than 550 children worldwide through sperm donations has been ordered to stop.
The man named Jonathan, aged 41, could be fined more than €100,000 (£88,000) if he tries to donate again.
He was banned from donating to fertility clinics in the Netherlands in 2017 after it emerged he had fathered more than 100 children.
But instead of stopping he carried on donating sperm abroad and online.
A court in The Hague has told him to provide a list of all the clinics he had used and to order them to destroy his sperm.
The man was said to have misled hundreds of women.
Dutch clinical guidelines state that a donor should not father more than 25 children in 12 families.
They are asked to limit the number of times they offer their services, to reduce the chance that siblings might unknowingly form a couple and have children together.
But judges said the man had helped produce between 550 and 600 children since he began donating sperm in 2007.
He was taken to court by a foundation protecting donor children's rights, and by the mother of one of the children allegedly fathered from his sperm.
"The point is that this kinship network with hundreds of half-brothers and half-sisters is much too large," a spokesman for the court, Gert-Mark Smelt, said.
Over 100 of the children fathered by the man were born in Dutch clinics and others privately, but he also donated to a Danish clinic which dispatched his semen to addresses in various countries.
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Post by mhbruin on Apr 29, 2023 7:52:51 GMT -8
Ready? Rain! Fire!
California's fire season under way weeks after heavy rain and snow
Barely five weeks after the last bout of heavy rain and snow in California's historically wet winter, firefighters on Friday battled the state's first large wildfire of the year in rugged foothills east of Los Angeles.
The Nob fire has scorched some 200 acres of brush and grass in the San Bernardino National Forest since erupting on Wednesday, with 25% of the blaze's perimeter contained by Thursday night, according to the U.S. Forest Service.
The blaze posed no immediate threat to populated areas as it burned steep terrain deep in the forest, agency spokesperson Lyn Sieliet said. Its cause was under investigation.
The fire was small compared with monster conflagrations that have become more frequent and intense in recent years, charring hundreds of thousands of acres, devastating whole communities and forcing mass evacuations.
Still, it marked the first blaze of the 2023 season measuring 100 acres or more, signaling the potential for extreme wildfire activity this summer and fall. Experts have warned that this winter's bountiful rainfall prompted heavy growth of grass and scrub that will dry out by summer, leaving a larger, thicker fuel bed for wildfires.
The glut of precipitation, however, also has increased the moisture content in shrubs and trees, making them more flame-resistant in the short term and helping forestall the onset of fire season.
By April 2022, three years into a crippling drought, California had already tallied over a dozen major wildfires, the Los Angeles Times reported, citing data from the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CalFire).
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Post by mhbruin on Apr 29, 2023 7:54:38 GMT -8
The Madness Continues
Five people were fatally shot, including an 8-year-old, in a Cleveland, Texas, home after a Friday night rampage that started with a noise complaint, according to the San Jacinto County Sheriff’s Office.
The gunman, who remains at large, was apparently shooting a rifle in a yard and neighbors asked him to stop because a baby was trying to sleep, San Jacinto County Sheriff Greg Capers said. The suspect then turned the weapon on his neighbors.
Multiple people were shot around the residence, Capers said. Two women in a bedroom were found laying over two young children who survived, he added.
The victims were shot above the neck at close range, Capers said.
There were 10 people inside the home at the time of the shooting, according to the sheriff.
The victims range in age from 8 years old to about 40, Capers told reporters early Saturday morning. The 8-year-old victim was pronounced dead at a hospital.
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Post by mhbruin on Apr 29, 2023 7:56:08 GMT -8
And Iran, Iran So Far Away
Iran and the United States have again found themselves on opposite sides as they provided contradictory accounts of events that led to Tehran’s seizure of an oil tanker in the Gulf of Oman.
Iran’s state television on Friday showed footage of the country’s navy commandos boarding the Marshall Islands-flagged tanker Advantage Sweet in a helicopter operation a day earlier.
The Turkish-operated, Chinese-owned tanker entered the Gulf of Oman after moving through the Strait of Hormuz and was reportedly bound for Houston, Texas carrying Kuwaiti crude oil for US energy firm Chevron Corp.
Iran said the tanker collided with an unidentified Iranian vessel hours before its seizure, leading to several crew members falling overboard and going missing and others getting injured. The tanker then fled the scene and ignored radio calls for eight hours before its seizure based on a court order, the Iranian army said.
“We repeatedly called on the vessel to stop so we can conduct a more comprehensive investigation, but there was no cooperation,” Mostafa Tajodini, deputy for operations at the Iranian navy, told state media.
The vessel’s manager, a Turkish firm called Advantage Tankers, said similar experiences have shown that crew members – all 24 of whom are Indian – are in no danger.
The Middle East-based US Navy 5th Fleet had said Iran’s actions constituted a violation of international law and called on Tehran to immediately release the tanker.
“Iran’s continued harassment of vessels and interference with navigational rights in regional waters are a threat to maritime security and the global economy,” it said, adding this was at least the fifth commercial vessel taken by Iran in the past two years.
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Post by mhbruin on Apr 29, 2023 8:00:01 GMT -8
Mixed Economic News
A growing number of Americans have found themselves confronting financial hardship as the U.S. economy has slowed. On Thursday, the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis reported gross domestic product fell to 1.1% in the first quarter, the lowest reading in nine months. The GDP is the value of the final goods and services produced in the country and a strong indicator of how healthy the U.S. economy.
The slowdown is starting to show up in Americans' personal finances. According to a recent survey from Bankrate, 49% of U.S. adults have less savings compared to a year ago. Ten percent of those surveyed said they have no savings at all.
The upshot: The most disastrous outcomes for U.S. households, like auto repossessions and home foreclosures, have begun to climb.
“As a result of the expiration of government stimulus and current [economic] headwinds, we have seen delinquencies ticking up in this space over the last several months,” said Margaret Rowe, a senior director at Fitch ratings group.
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Wage growth stayed elevated to start the year and inflation remained high, likely keeping Federal Reserve policy makers on track to raise rates again next week.
Employers spent 1.2% more on wages and benefits in the first quarter from the prior three months, a slight uptick from an upwardly revised 1.1% increase in the fourth quarter, the Labor Department said Friday. The employment-cost index advanced 4.8% last quarter from a year earlier, an easing from the 5.1% gain at the end of last year.
The Fed’s preferred gauge of consumer inflation, the personal-consumption expenditures price index, cooled to 4.2% in March from a year earlier, a separate Commerce Department report said. That was down from the previous month’s 5.1% gain and a peak last June, but still well above the central bank’s 2% target.
When excluding volatile food and energy costs, prices rose 4.6% from a year earlier in March, nearly steady from the prior month. Economists see so-called core inflation as a better predictor of future inflation.
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Post by mhbruin on Apr 29, 2023 8:01:41 GMT -8
No Wonder Biden Has a Low Approval Rating
Republicans threaten to tank economy. Media blames Biden.
Under the headline “Biden Faces His First Big Choice on Debt Limit,” New York Times reporter Jim Tankersley writes today that the issue “has put President Biden on the defensive, forcing him to confront a series of potentially painful choices at a perilous economic moment.”
Sure, Biden says he won’t negotiate, but “business groups, fiscal hawks and some congressional Democrats” want him to make a deal. So Biden, Tankersley writes, “faces a cascading set of decisions as the nation, which has already bumped up against its $31.4 trillion debt limit, barrels toward default.”
But the nation is not “barreling toward default,” nor is it “careening,” or even “drifting” there. It is being pushed there by Republicans.
Washington Post reporter Jeff Stein set off Internet pundits and the Post’s own readers over the weekend with his article headlined “Biden is running out of time to avoid calamitous debt ceiling outcomes.”
Talking Points Memo editor Josh Marshall tweeted: “Has there ever been a clearer example of the ‘GOP has trained us to take their legislative terrorism as a given’ mentality so clear in so much MSM reporting?”
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Post by mhbruin on Apr 29, 2023 8:02:34 GMT -8
Has the QOP Realized This is a Losing Issue?
Probably Not.
Lindsey Graham Wants a National Abortion Ban. Here’s What He Overlooks.
A new lawsuit reveals harrowing cases of women living under Texas laws banning abortion.
Senator Lindsey Graham has been pushing since 2015 for a national ban on abortion. “It’s a human rights issue. Does it really matter where you’re conceived?” he said Sunday on CNN.
But to the South Carolina Republican, it’s a human rights issue only for the fetus: “At 15 weeks, you have a developed heart and lungs. And to dismember a child at 15 weeks is a painful experience. It’s barbaric.”
You’ll notice what’s missing from his remarks: the human rights of women. And—if you want to talk about barbaric—as a Texas lawsuit makes clear, under the abortion restrictions that Texas and other states have been rushing to impose, the rights of pregnant women are being crushed. Take it from Amanda Zurawski, who testified Wednesday on Capitol Hill that her state’s laws nearly killed her.
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Post by mhbruin on Apr 29, 2023 8:04:38 GMT -8
Is It Really News that the QOP Intentionally Spiked the Investigation?
Revealed: Senate investigation into Brett Kavanaugh assault claims contained serious omissions
The 2018 investigation into the then supreme court nominee claimed there was ‘no evidence’ behind claims of sexual assault
The revelation raises new questions about apparent efforts to downplay and discredit accusations of sexual misconduct by Kavanaugh and exclude evidence that supported an alleged victim’s claims.
A new documentary – an early version of which premiered at Sundance in January, but is being updated before its release – contains a never-before-heard recording of another Yale graduate, Max Stier, describing a separate alleged incident in which he said he witnessed Kavanaugh expose himself at a party at Yale.
It has previously been reported that Stier wanted to tell the FBI anonymously during the confirmation process that he had allegedly witnessed Kavanaugh’s friends push the future judge’s penis into the hand of a female classmate at a party. While Republicans on the Senate committee were reportedly made aware of his desire to submit information to the FBI, he was not interviewed by the committee’s Republican investigators.
The committee’s final report claimed there was “no verifiable evidence to support” Ramirez’s claim.
It is not clear how the film’s director, Doug Liman, obtained the recording, or whom Stier was speaking to when it was recorded.
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Post by mhbruin on Apr 29, 2023 8:06:41 GMT -8
Didn't Other Candidates Try This in 2016?
DeSantis allies go to war with an unlikely foe: Nikki Haley
When the super PAC supporting Ron DeSantis turned its fire on Nikki Haley, it said volumes about the shifting dynamics of the 2024 campaign.
Never Back Down, the pro-DeSantis group, is now running an ad online attacking Haley, has polled Twitter users on a new nickname for her, and accused her in a tweet of “trying really hard to audition” to be Trump’s vice presidential pick.
The move suggested a shifting dynamic in the contest: With DeSantis falling further behind Trump in national and early-state surveys, his allied super PAC is trying to ensure that the primary remains a two-way race and that other candidates vying to be the Trump alternative do not gain traction.
“This is the DeSantis team acknowledging that he is closer to the field than he is to President Trump,” said Justin Clark, a Republican strategist who was Trump’s 2020 deputy campaign manager but who isn’t involved in a 2024 presidential campaign.
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Post by mhbruin on Apr 29, 2023 8:09:15 GMT -8
Meet the New QOP Hero
The Massachusetts Air National guardsman accused of leaking highly classified military documents kept an arsenal of guns and said on social media that he would like to kill a “ton of people,” prosecutors said in arguing Thursday that 21-year-old Jack Teixeira should remain in jail for his trial.
But the judge at Teixeira’s detention hearing put off an immediate decision on whether he should be kept in custody until his trial or released to home confinement or under other conditions. Teixeira was led away from the court in handcuffs, black rosary beads around his neck, pending that ruling.
The court filings raise new questions about why Teixeira had such a high security clearance and access to some of the nation’s most classified secrets. They said he may still have material that hasn’t been released, which could be of “tremendous value to hostile nation states that could offer him safe harbor and attempt to facilitate his escape from the United States.”
In Teixeira’s detention hearing, Magistrate Judge David Hennessy expressed skepticism of defense arguments that the government hasn’t alleged Teixeira intended leaked information to be widely disseminated.
“Somebody under the age of 30 has no idea that when they put something on the internet that it could end up anywhere in this world?” the judge asked. “Seriously?”
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Post by mhbruin on Apr 29, 2023 8:12:28 GMT -8
Confusing Headline #1
"Biden admin seeks to pause order blocking Obamacare preventive care mandate"
Confusing Headline #2
"Judge declines to block Colorado from banning medication abortion reversal"
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Post by mhbruin on Apr 29, 2023 8:14:57 GMT -8
California Leads the Way. Hopefully Other States Will Follow.
California regulators on Friday approved new rules requiring all medium- and heavy-duty vehicles sold in the state in 2036 be zero-emission, a day after the California Air Resources Board (CARB) adopted reduced emission regulations for locomotives.
"With these actions requiring all new heavy-duty truck sales to be zero emission and tackling train pollution in our state, we’re one step closer to achieving healthier neighborhoods and cleaner air for all Californians," said Governor Gavin Newsom.
The rule also require transitioning existing fleets to zero-emission vehicles. Big rigs, local delivery and government fleets must transition to zero emission by 2035, garbage trucks and local buses by 2039, and sleeper cab tractors and specialty vehicles by 2042.
The board estimates the reduced pollution from the truck rules would result in $26.6 billion in health savings from fewer asthma attacks, emergency room visits and respiratory illnesses, and save $48 billion in trucking operating costs.
Of Course, Truckers Are Used to Driving Long Distances. How Far Will They Go to Buy a Vehicle Outside California?
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