What if I just prefer Haagen-Dazs? Can I keep eating it without making a political statement?
— Megan McArdle (@asymmetricinfo) July 20, 2021
To some Cuba is a tropical socialist paradise
1619 Project writer Nikole Hannah-Jones said she believes Cuba is the most equal country in the western hemisphere. She noted how Cuba was one of the most ‘equal’ and ‘multiracial’ countries in the with ‘very little inequality’ between black and white people living there.
Cuban woes
From what I can tell Cuba is in trouble for 4 immediate reasons:
- The demise of Venezuela’s Daddy Oilbucks largesse;
- The collapse of the tourism industry;
- The pandemic;
- The lack of FX to import food and other essentials due to the abolition of their dual currency system
Together they add up to no hay nada.
Microsoft Exchange hack caused by China, US and allies say
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Biden administration and Western allies formally blamed China on Monday for a massive hack of Microsoft Exchange email server software and asserted that criminal hackers associated with the Chinese government have carried out ransomware and other illicit cyber operations.
Microsoft Exchange hack caused by China, US and allies say
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Biden administration and Western allies formally blamed China on Monday for a massive hack of Microsoft Exchange email server software and asserted that criminal hackers associated with the Chinese government have carried out ransomware and other illicit cyber operations.
How do you say ‘hi’ with a British accent
Germany knew the floods were coming, but the warnings didn’t work
The first signs of catastrophe were detected nine days ago by a satellite orbiting 500 miles above the tranquil hills around the Rhine river
How the West became East Germany
Few pause to think that their phones can be transformed into surveillance devices, with someone thousands of miles away silently extracting their messages, photos and location, activating their microphone to record them in real time… in the coming days the Guardian will be revealing the identities of many innocent people who have been identified as candidates for possible surveillance by NSO clients in a massive leak of data.
Huge data leak shatters lie that the innocent need not fear surveillance
Our investigation shows how repressive regimes can buy and use the kind of spying tools Edward Snowden warned us about
The Eden tripwire
Psaki: deniers should be everywhere banned
White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Friday that the Biden administration believes social media users who spread COVID-19 misinformation should be banned from all platforms if one platform has given them the boot. Psaki had revealed the day before that White House staff were tracking dangerous coronavirus misinformation with help from the surgeon general’s office and flagging problematic posts to Facebook.
3 Texas Democrats test positive for COVID after packing onto private jet to flee to DC
All three have been fully vaccinated, but one of the lawmakers is experiencing symptoms
Not changing lanes, a U-turn
Although officials still remain divided on whether the virus emerged from nature, passing from animals to humans, the acknowledgment marks a shift from the scorn that was heaped on former President Trump and a group of European scientists who first brought up the lab-leak theory during the height of the pandemic last year.
Biden admin says lab leak now level with natural theory
Tighter than a fast and furious movie U-turn
Senior Biden officials finding that Covid lab leak theory as credible as natural origins explanation
Senior Biden administration officials overseeing an intelligence review into the origins of the coronavirus now believe the theory that the virus accidentally escaped from a lab in Wuhan is at least as credible as the possibility that it emerged naturally in the wild — a dramatic shift from a year …
A curious factoid
No hay comida
HAVANA — Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel for the first time is offering some self-criticism while saying that government shortcomings in handling shortages and other problems played a role in this week’s protests.
Dying alone rather than infecting others
JAKARTA — Indonesia has overtaken India as Asia’s new epicenter for the coronavirus pandemic, with daily infections exceeding 40,000 for two straight days and officials warning that the delta variant is spreading outside the most populous island of Java.
Southeast Asia’s largest economy on Tuesday reported 47,899 new infections, a record high, up from 40,427 the previous day. India’s cases, meanwhile, dropped to 32,906 from 37,154.
More alarming is that despite having more daily infections, Indonesia’s population of 270 million population is just a fifth of India’s. Indonesia now has around 132 cases per million people, compared with India 26 as of Sunday, according to ourworldindata.org.
Indonesia overtakes India to become Asia’s COVID epicenter
Southeast Asia’s largest economy reports new daily record of 47,899 new cases
Was Jeffrey Epstein a Spy?
in the last 10 years of his life, Epstein bragged to various people, including journalists, that he was advising a whole assortment of foreign leaders who included Vladimir Putin, Mohammed bin Zayed, Mohammed Bin Salman, various African dictators, Israel, the British — and, of course, the Americans….
He also told several of the same people that he was making a fortune out of arms, drugs, and diamonds.
It’s not wholly surprising therefore that the same sources who say they know he was some sort of intelligence asset say that he became a liability — which is why, possibly, he lost any “protection” and was arrested.
“What could you be doing to achieve better gender balance?”
Po-Shen Loh has resurrected the United States International Mathematical Olympiad team, leading it to four first-place rankings in the last six years as the team’s head coach.
The Coach Who Led the U.S. Math Team Back to the Top
Po-Shen Loh has harnessed his competitive impulses and iconoclastic tendencies to reinvigorate the U.S. Math Olympiad program.
No foreign money, no foreign troops
What’s a sovereign nation to do?
When Moïse came to power in February 2017, he had little or no access to some of the economic levers that two of his predecessors, Joseph Michel Martelly and René Garcia Préval, had enjoyed. The latter were able to benefit from more than US$4 billion from the PetroCaribe fund, as well as from the largesse of international funding for development projects. In comparison, Moïse’s means for financing development projects for the country were limited.
After its president was assassinated, Haiti needs international help more than ever
The current chaos in Haiti can be explained by the country’s political, institutional, economic and security conditions.
Whew
This is true for the much-worried-over Delta variant. It is also true for all the other variants, and for the original strain. Most remarkably, it has been known to be true since the very earliest days of the pandemic — indeed it was among the very first things we did know about the disease. The preliminary mortality data from China was very clear: To children, COVID-19 represented only a vanishingly tiny threat of death, hospitalization, or severe disease.
The Kids Were Safe the Whole Time
Why we should rethink COVID safety protocols for children — and everyone else.
Merkel refuses to go with the Biden Nordstream 2 program
But on July 12 Merkel expressed doubt the upcoming talks with Biden would resolve the disagreement between Berlin and Washington over Nord Stream 2. … U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on June 23 reiterated warnings about Nord Stream 2 during meetings in Berlin with Merkel and Foreign Minister Heiko Maas. Blinken said he and Maas agreed that concrete steps were needed to “ensure that Russia cannot use energy as a coercive tool directed at Ukraine or anyone else in Europe.”
Merkel Says Gas Will Transit Ukraine Even After Nord Stream 2 Finished
German Chancellor Angela Merkel has sought to assure Kyiv that Ukraine will remain a transit route for natural gas even after completion of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline linking Russia to Germany.