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NetHappenings News Headlines
#China #Bitcoin #Politics #Health #Tech
The temperature in China hit 126 degrees F today
Will China ever get rich? A new era of much slower growth dawns
China is entering an era of much slower economic growth, raising a daunting prospect: it may never get rich.
Burnt out or jobless – meet China’s ‘full-time children‘
Evergrande: Crisis-hit Chinese property giant reveals $81bn loss
‘My mum was a courtesan – and not ashamed of it’
Luxury tests limits of its immunity to downturns Compagnie Financiere Richemont is testing the limits of luxury’s immunity to downturns. The $93 billion Swiss luxury conglomerate dropped 10% on Monday after it reported a 2% year-on-year drop in U.S. revenue in the three months to June. Shares of other big luxury players, including $236 billion Hermes International and $502 billion LVMH , also fell 4.2% and 3.7% respectively.
#BITCOIN
THREAD Operation choke point was real, Gensler anointed himself to block crypto
Having credible custodians (+ self-custody) are the solutions to relying on failed companies like FTX. Policy makers and regulators in the USA should be welcoming these regulated firms – not standing in their way
@MattWalshInBos Jul 17
SAB 121 and how Gary Gensler, the lead henchman of Elizabeth Warren’s anti-crypto army, is turning the SEC into a merit regulator and using an obscure accounting rule to prevent major banks from touching crypto in the United States… SAB 121 is saying that a bank that offers Bitcoin custody, would need to treat the customer bitcoins as if they were the asset of the bank. This means taking a capital charge (i.e., holding more US Dollars) against the asset. To be clear, this accounting treatment would be in conflict with every other asset that custodians safekeep. For example, State Street has over $40 trillion in customer assets under custody. Imagine them having to put those on their own balance sheet? It makes zero sense. BNY is the most trusted custodian on earth. They launched digital assets in 2022 but according to their filings have ‘de minimis’ assets. They are the custodian on none of the Bitcoin ETF proposals. Why is the SEC decapitating BNY’s crypto custody business?
In a WSJ opinion piece, Hal Scott and John Gulliver of Harvard Law School point out the absurdity of a rule that would prevent some of the most trusted financial institutions in the world from participating in the crypto economy:
The beauty of #Bitcoin lies not only in its ability to revolutionize finance but also in its potential to uplift communities.
Microtransactions are opening doors for creators, entrepreneurs, and those excluded from traditional systems.
#Bitcoin fosters innovation and economic growth.
A bitcoin skeptic went on CNBC this morning. @JoeSquawk’s amazing response, “You said you did a deep dive, but it only took me 20 pages of The Bitcoin Standard to understand how this can help the unbanked
“Some ‘crypto’ assets appear to be here to stay, and they continue to cause risks for financial markets, investors, and consumers” according to President Biden’s economic report.
Archblock Founder Claims Justin Sun Was Secret TUSD Acquirer in Lawsuit
#POLITICS
How a Saudi firm tapped a gusher of water in drought-stricken Arizona
A Post investigation – based on government documents and interviews with public officials, ranchers in the valley, farmworkers, and townspeople who live near the alfalfa fields – found that Arizona’s lax regulatory environment and sophisticated lobbying by the Saudi-owned company allowed a scarce American resource to flow unchecked to a foreign corporation. To advance its interests before the state, Fondomonte hired an influential Republican lawyer as well as a former member of Congress. And it sought to win over its rural neighbors, providing a high school with donations that included Fondomonte-sponsored sports bags and face masks emblazoned with the company logo to protect students from covid.
The new governor is Democrat Katie Hobbs Only after the state threatened to cancel Fondomonte’s leases last month did the company disclose how much it pumps annually in the Butler Valley, according to communications released as part of a public-records request. Its consumption is equivalent to that of a city of more than 50,000 people, experts said. The governor’s aides are now preparing plans not to renew Fondomonte’s leases in the Butler Valley when they expire next year
Harlan Crow claimed his yacht company was a profit-seeking business so he could claim a huge tax write-off for renovating his own superyacht. (Clarence Thomas’ favorite.) ProPublica finds zero evidence that’s true, and significant evidence that it’s false.
https://www.propublica.org/article/harlan-crow-slashed-tax-bill-clarence-thomas-superyacht
Read This: “Kennedy Clan Comes Out Against RFK Jr.’s Latest Outrage”
https://www.thedailybeast.com/robert-f-kennedy-jrs-own-relatives-slam-his-comments-about-jews-chinese-people
No Labels’ own polling has shown: a third-party candidate would pull more from Biden than Trump in 2024. There’s not a scenario where their spoiler doesn’t secure a second term for Trump.
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2023/07/no-labels-is-setting-up-state-parties-2024/
Kerry Kennedy @KerryKennedyRFK
I STRONGLY condemn my brother’s deplorable and untruthful remarks last week about Covid being engineered for ethnic targeting.
https://rfkhumanrights.org/press/statement-by-kerry-kennedy-on-robert-f-kennedy-jr-recent-remarks
Young labor organizers are meeting with Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders at the White House today. Workers from Starbucks, SEGA, Minor League Baseball and more will talk union organizing, strikes, and supporting labor across the country.
BREAKING: Republican presidential candidate Chris Christie continues to dig deep under Donald Trump’s thin skin as his PAC releases a brutal new attack ad hitting Trump for being to afraid to debate in the primary. The ad is already infuriating MAGA world. Entitled “Trump’s Choice” it attempts to bait Trump into getting on stage for the debate by asking him: “Are you a chicken or just a loser?”
The answer, of course, is that Donald Trump is both. He’s terrified of being humiliated and he is in fact a historic loser, having been crushed by Joe Biden in 2020 despite being the incumbent. The attack warns Trump that if he shows up to the debate his opponents “will bring up the impeachments, the indictments” and “how you lost to Joe Biden, lost the House, lost the Senate.” It also warns that if he doesn’t go he’ll be “called a coward, a chicken” and be “reduced to throwing spitballs from the sidelines.”
“So, Donald, you need to decide: Are you a chicken or just a loser?” it concludes.
This is exactly the kind of thing that drives Donald Trump and his fragile ego insane with fury. Chris Christie would make an absolutely terrible president, but it’s great having him in the race for moments like this alone.
Who really runs Canada? @JustinTrudeau
“We penetrate the cabinets. Yesterday I was at a reception for Prime Minister Trudeau, and I know that half of this cabinet or even more than half are actually our young global leaders of the World Economic Forum.”
#HEALTH
US approves first over-the-counter birth control pill
#BirthControl #WomensReproductiveHealth
The US government has approved the first-ever over-the-counter birth control pill. The Food and Drug Administration announced on Thursday birth control pill Opill will be available without a prescription for women of all ages. In a statement, the agency said the move would help reduce women’s barriers to accessing contraception. The manufacturer of Opill has said it will most likely be available over the counter in early 2024. Doctors say that the progestin-only pill – often known as the “minipill” – is a particularly safe form of contraception because it does not contain oestrogen, meaning it has fewer side effects and health risks.
Fed-up Teacher SILENCES GOP crowd during school board hearing
Eli Lilly study shows Alzheimer’s drug slows disease
Drug donanemab seen as turning point in dementia fight
United Airlines grapples with pilots avoiding the captain’s chair
They don’t want want the unpredictable schedule that comes with the bigger paycheck.
LEAD POISONING AT&T and Verizon’s ancient lead cables have US lawmakers demanding action. “Corporate irresponsibility”: Telcos accused of failing to act on health risks.
Newly raised concerns about lead-covered telephone cables installed across the US many decades ago are putting pressure on companies like AT&T and Verizon to identify the locations of all the cables and account for any health problems potentially caused by the toxic metal.
US Sen. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) wrote a letter to the USTelecom industry trade group this week after a Wall Street Journal investigative report titled, “America Is Wrapped in Miles of Toxic Lead Cables.” The WSJ said it found evidence of more than 2,000 lead-covered cables and that there “are likely far more throughout the country.”
WSJ reporters had researchers collect samples as part of their investigation. They “found that where lead contamination was present, the amount measured in the soil was highest directly under or next to the cables, and dropped within a few feet—a sign the lead was coming from the cable,” the article said.
Markey wrote to USTelecom, “According to the Wall Street Journal’s investigation, ‘AT&T, Verizon and other telecom giants have left behind a sprawling network of cables covered in toxic lead that stretches across the US, under the water, in the soil and on poles overhead… As the lead degrades, it is ending up in places where Americans live, work and play.'”
Markey wants answers
Politicians want to put LNG facility in tiny Chester, Pennsylvania
ENERGY COMPANY PLOTTED GAS PLANT IN SMALL PENNSYLVANIA TOWN — BUT NO ONE TOLD RESIDENTS
Lawmakers helped with a plan to put the natural gas export facility in already-polluted Chester, Pennsylvania.
https://theintercept.com/2023/07/17/chester-pennsylvania-liquefied-natural-gas/
Pennsylvania budget switches $100M in mental health funding from adults to schools
#TECH
“Do not go to law school. The legal field is in big trouble. That’s going to be one of the first disrupted by AI,” Geoff Lewis has said.. “I talk to folks who spend thousands of dollars a week on legal bills; they’re already using ChatGPT to generate complex contracts.”
New Lawsuit Against Bing Based on Allegedly AI-Hallucinated Libelous Statements “ But it turns out that this combines facts about two separate people with similar names: (1) Jeffery Battle, who is indeed apparently a veteran, businessman, and adjunct professor, and (2) Jeffrey Leon Battle, who was convicted of trying to join the Taliban shortly after 9/11. The two have nothing in common other than their similar names. The Aerospace Professor did not plead guilty to seditious conspiracy.”
How 2013 film The Congress predicted Hollywood’s current AI crisis With US actors striking in part because of the threat of AI to their livelihoods, a 10-year-old, little-seen movie starring Robin Wright now seems eerily prescient, writes Caryn James. Green is in fact a fictional character portrayed by Danny Huston in the little-known film The Congress. Released in 2013, it predicted the current crisis about the use of artificial intelligence in the industry, one of the most contentious issues in both strikes, with astonishing clarity and detail. I
If the WGA’s proposed wage increase was implemented, it would cost Disney $75 million annually.
Disney made $4.1 BILLION in revenue last year.
Writers are asking for 0.01% of that revenue.
0.01%
TV producers wanted AI rights of extras forever, says union
Producers allegedly sought rights to replicate extras using AI, forever, for just $200
Union prez Fran Drescher thinks Hollywood’s digital desires have no style or flair
An iPhone’s viewfinder can see through tinted windows. If an officer uses his iPhone to see through a suspect’s tinted car window, is that a 4A “search”? No, D.Conn rules, as iPhones are in “general public use” under Kyllo. (op by Meyer, J.)
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1tFS1wmG8LtYdpvz_w-qnwYwa9Rac8DsZ/view
Woopsie!
Common typo causes millions of emails intended for members of the US military to be sent to accounts in Mali
Oh wow. Millions of emails intended for Pentagon employees were inadvertently sent to email accounts in Mali because of typos caused by the similarity of the US military’s email address (.mil) and the domain for the West African country (.ml).
The personal information in the emails — which included details like travel itineraries and hotel numbers — “could be used to conduct targeted cyberattacks or to track the movements of Pentagon personnel…”
https://www.cnn.com/2023/07/17/politics/email-typos-mali-military-emails/index.html
Typo sends millions of US military emails to Russian ally Mali
Charity wants AI summit to address child sexual abuse imagery
U.S. Department of Justice, Federal Trade Commission, Federal Communications Commission and Other Federal and State Law Enforcement Agencies Announce Results of Nationwide Initiative to Curtail Illegal Telemarketing Operations