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An investigation by U.S. Central Command has determined that an Aug. 29 drone strike in Kabul killed an innocent aid worker and nine members of his family, not a member of the ISIS-K terrorist group, a top general announced Friday.

Politico

‘Tragic mistake’: U.S. determines Kabul drone strike killed innocent aid worker, nine family members

The revelation comes one week after a New York Times investigation determined the target actually worked for an American aid organization.

WASHINGTON—France has recalled its ambassadors to Washington and Canberra in response to a new deal among the U.S., U.K. and Australia to provide Australia with nuclear-powered submarine technology, the French foreign minister said, in an unprecedented diplomatic rift among close allies.

WSJ

France Recalls Ambassadors to U.S., Australia Over Submarine Deal

France has recalled its ambassadors to Washington and Canberra in response to a new deal among the U.S., U.K. and Australia to provide Australia with nuclear-powered submarine technology.

The trilateral security cooperation aims to ensure peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific, US President Joe Biden said in a press conference, and its first initiative is to deliver a nuclear-powered submarine fleet for Australia. This new arrangement has resulted in Australia scrapping a $90 billion contract signed with France in 2016. On Thursday, France’s Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian called the decision a “stab in the back,” while a Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson said the AUKUS deal “seriously damages regional peace and stability” and “intensifies the arms race.”

AP

The new military alliance between the US, UK and Australia generates backlash from France and China / Twitter

The new military alliance between the US, UK and Australia generates backlash from France and China

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights is calling for a moratorium on the use of artificial intelligence technology that poses a serious risk to human rights, voicing concerns that it “enables discrimination, invades our privacy and undermines our rights.”

UN calls for moratorium on use of AI technology / Twitter

Don’t miss what’s happening

The media mostly reports stories about the new anglo military alliance against China, the forthcoming Quad summit in Washington, the coming new cold war with Beijing without pointing out the single most important thing: it represents the total collapse of the 21st century dream of a ‘rule based global world order’ and a reversion to the old competitive rivalry between civilizations and nations.

The indictment, returned by a Washington, D.C., grand jury on Thursday, charges attorney Michael Sussmann, of Perkins Coie, a law firm tied to the Democratic party, with making a false statement during a meeting with officials of the Federal Bureau of Investigation shortly before the 2016 election.

WSJ

Lawyer Michael Sussmann Indicted on Charges of Lying to FBI

A grand jury indicted lawyer Michael Sussmann in connection with John Durham’s investigation into the origins of the Russia probe on charges that he lied to the FBI during the 2016 presidential campaign.

New at the Belmont Club. Australia, the UK and the US form the AUKUS alliance to contain China as the Aussies acquire nuclear subs for the first time. Inside the Quad is an anglophone alliance.

The Grand Alliance to Contain China

The line in the ocean

New at the Belmont Club. China just voted to recall Obama’s Third Term.

Joe’s Mandates vs Xi’s Mandate of Heaven

The Global World meets the Chinese Communist Party

Under the scheme, people would have been required to show proof – whether of double vaccination, a negative Covid test or finishing self-isolating after a positive PCR test – in order to gain entry to clubs and other crowded events.

BBC

England vaccine passport plans ditched, Sajid Javid says

The health secretary rules out the scheme for nightclubs and large events, following much criticism.

‘Home suddenly feels like such a long way away’ …

Julia’s hopes of temporarily returning to the UK to live and work close to family before her son started secondary school have been thwarted. And like thousands of others, the inability to see close relatives for almost two years has been agonizing.

BBC

Covid: UK expats struggle with Australia lockdowns

People who left the UK to settle in Australia tell what life has been like during six lockdowns.

House Democrats also are considering raising the minimum tax on U.S. companies’ foreign income to 16.5% from 10.5% and increasing the top capital-gains tax rate to 28.8% from 23.8%. Lawmakers are also expected to raise money by expanding Internal Revenue Service enforcement and might include other tax increases on corporations and high-income individuals.

WSJ

House Democrats Consider 26.5% Corporate Tax Rate

Lawmakers are expected to propose a smaller capital-gains tax increase than President Biden wants.

Six employees at the Lewis County Health System have resigned, and seven more are unwilling to get vaccinated, meaning Lewis County General Hospital will stop delivering babies for the time being.

NY Post

New York hospital to stop delivering babies as staffers quit over vaccine mandate

A hospital in rural New York is pausing its maternity services as employees quit instead of getting the vaccine.

Ten years after the 9/11 attacks, Americans were reasonably positive about the state of their rights and liberties. Today, after 20 years, not as much…

That attitude has eroded in the years since, with far fewer people now saying the government is doing a good job protecting rights including the freedom of speech, the right to vote, the right to bear arms and others.

Americans less positive about civil liberties, poll shows

Ten years after the 9/11 attacks, Americans were reasonably positive about the state of their rights and liberties. Today, after 20 years, not as much.

A chilling video showed a group of Taliban fighters beheading an Afghan soldier before celebrating and singing while holding the several of the victim by his hair. …They then start shouting praise for the Taliban’s supreme leader Hibatullah Akhundzada. The video ends with the group stating they must shoot the Afghan soldiers because ‘he has to look shot’.

Daily Mail

Taliban BEHEAD Afghan soldier and celebrate holding severed head

WARNING: GRAPHIC CONTENT A group of Taliban fighters filmed themselves chanting praise to their supreme leader after beheading an Afghan soldier and parading around his head.

Dr Hans Kluge said new strains of Covid will continue to emerge and the virus will remain with us like the flu. Earlier this year, he said the pandemic would be over once 70 per cent of people were fully immunized. But he admitted today that the situation had now changed, so leaders need to adapt their vaccination strategy. 

Covid vaccines won’t end pandemic, WHO Europe chief warns

Dr Hans Kluge, the WHO’s Europe director, said new strains of Covid will continue to emerge and the virus will remain with us like the flu, so vaccination strategies need to be adapted.

Mr Heappey, speaking to Christopher Hope, the Daily Telegraph’s chief politics correspondent during his weekly politics podcast, said: “There’s a wobble. “But it’s not an institutional wobble. It’s a wobble in confidence

Britain’s special relationship with US has ‘wobble in confidence’, says defence minister

James Heappey tells Chopper’s Politics podcast that criticism over Afghanistan has left Washington unsure about its role in the world

“You will hear from [Biden] in the form of a video in advance—or if that will be available that day, I should say,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Thursday.

Free Beacon

Biden Will Not Deliver Live Remarks on 9/11 Anniversary – Washington Free Beacon

President Joe Biden will not give a live speech to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks. He will instead release a prerecorded video of his remarks.

When climate envoy John Kerry visited China last week, senior Chinese officials emphatically rejected Biden’s proposal to deal with climate cooperation as a freestanding issue, apart from other, more contentious matters.

Axios

Inside Biden’s latest call with China’s Xi Jinping

Biden’s testing personal diplomacy after a frosty start to U.S.-China relations.

Trying to follow US politics from a distance can be challenging because there are so many questions and so few answers.

• Is California a national bellwether?
• Is the full court press in CA a sign of strength or weakness?
• Can the progressives buy their way to victory with the infrastructure bill?
• At what point does the economy rival the pandemic as an issue? When does the clamor for freedom break even with the desire to feel safe?
• Can Biden use the pandemic to beat down the states?

Having done away with term limits in 2018, China’s most powerful leader since Mao Zedong is pushing what some observers describe as a mini “revolution”, curbing the excesses of capitalism and shedding negative cultural influences of the West.

Reuters

Analysis: Unleashing reforms, Xi returns to China’s socialist roots

When Xi Jinping took command of the Communist Party in late 2012 and proclaimed “only socialism can save China”, it was largely ignored as the perfunctory mention of an antiquated slogan – not to be taken literally in a modern-day, market-powered economy.