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takyon writes:

Facebook executive admits hiring firm that linked critics to Soros

Facebook's outgoing policy chief took the blame Wednesday night for hiring a consulting firm to investigate and peddle negative stories about the company's critics, including by linking them to liberal philanthropist George Soros.

The blog post by the executive, Elliot Schrage, landed on the eve of the Thanksgiving weekend, and appeared aimed at absolving CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg of responsibility for a lobbying campaign that sparked accusations that Facebook was fueling anti-Semitic conspiracy theories.

[...] The New York Times reported last week that Facebook, under pressure over reports of Russian election interference on its platform, hired the Republican-linked consulting firm, Definers Public Affairs, which among other things sought to tie anti-Facebook groups to the Soros-backed Open Society Foundations.

Facebook's Sheryl Sandberg can't remember smear firm, but 'some of their work' crossed her desk

Facebook has reposted [the Schrage blog post] with an addition by COO Sheryl Sandberg, who claimed: "I didn't remember a firm called Definers. I asked our team to look into the work Definers did for us and to double-check whether anything had crossed my desk. Some of their work was incorporated into materials presented to me and I received a small number of emails where Definers was referenced.

Soros Philanthropy President Calls for U.S. Lawmakers to Review Facebook (repost)

The president of George Soros's philanthropy called for oversight of Facebook Inc. by U.S. lawmakers after the social media company confirmed it hired a controversial public relations outfit to research the billionaire financier.

[...] In response to Facebook's memo, Patrick Gaspard, president of Mr. Soros's Open Society Foundations, said in a tweet on Wednesday: "So @facebook decides to drop a turkey on Thanksgiving eve, with admission that Definers was tasked by company leadership to target and smear George Soros because he publicly criticized their out of control business model. Sorry, but this needs independent, congressional oversight."

George Soros Sold Facebook, Netflix, and Goldman Stock Just Before They Tumbled

Soros Fund Management, which Soros founded and chairs, exited social-network giant Facebook (FB) completely in the third quarter, while also slashing positions in Netflix stock (NFLX) and Goldman Sachs Group stock (GS). Those three stocks have tumbled in the fourth quarter so far, with Facebook and Goldman setting new lows Tuesday. They are down almost 20% and 15%, respectively, so far this quarter. Highflying streaming-content giant Netflix has tumbled almost 29% since the end of September.

[...] Soros Fund Management sold all its Facebook stock before the end of the third quarter, prior to publication of the New York Times report. Following the report, the head of Soros' Open Society Foundations criticized what it called "Facebook's smear campaign" against Soros.

See also: After latest scandal, does Facebook need to be regulated?
Facebook v Soros: 'Congress must probe'

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

Free press isn't free under White House's onerous rules (Editorial)

Muzzling the press is chapter one in the authoritarian ruler's playbook. By the Founders' design, the president of the United States is not a king or dictator. He doesn't control the media, or get to decide which reporters are assigned to cover him.

A free press isn't free if the government imposes rules on what reporters can ask and how they must ask it. That violates the First Amendment. Period.

Banning reporters from asking follow-up questions or challenging the president's statements, under threat of taking away their access to the White House, hobbles the watchdog function of the media. White House reporters will be looking over their shoulders, calibrating the consequences, every time they ask tough questions. Meanwhile, the president will be able to dodge accountability and lie to the American people with even more impunity.

Original Submission

upstart writes in with a submission via IRC for SoyCow1984:

Ivanka Trump used personal email for official White House business

First daughter and presidential advisor Ivanka Trump used a personal email account dozens of times to conduct official White House business, The Washington Post reports, citing an internal White House investigation. It's an ironic revelation given her father's obsession with Hillary Clinton's own use of a private email server during the 2016 presidential campaign.

Federal law requires government officials to preserve written records of their activities—and that includes email. Government email systems are set up to comply with these laws, and federal IT guidelines require government officials to use their official email accounts for all official business. The use of official email accounts may also reduce the risk of sensitive communications being intercepted by foreign intelligence agencies.

[...] Ivanka Trump's use of a personal email account was discovered in September 2017. Ivanka said she was simply unfamiliar with rules requiring official business to be conducted via official email accounts—despite the fact that her father had made Hillary Clinton's violation of the same rules a central theme of his campaign.

Last year Politico reported that Ivanka Trump's husband, Jared Kusher, had been conducting official business using an email address on the same ijkfamily.com domain. But at the time it wasn't known if Ivanka was doing the same thing. We learned about Ivanka's use of the ijkfamily.com domain for government business last November, but until now we didn't know the extent of Ivanka's use of this activity.

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Exclusive: After Khashoggi murder, some Saudi royals turn against king's favorite son

Amid international uproar over the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, some members of Saudi Arabia's ruling family are agitating to prevent Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman from becoming king, three sources close to the royal court said.

Dozens of princes and cousins from powerful branches of the Al Saud family want to see a change in the line of succession but would not act while King Salman - the crown prince's 82-year-old father - is still alive, the sources said. They recognize that the king is unlikely to turn against his favorite son, known in the West as MbS.

Rather, they are discussing the possibility with other family members that after the king's death, Prince Ahmed bin Abdulaziz, 76, a younger full brother of King Salman and uncle of the crown prince, could take the throne, according to the sources.

Prince Ahmed, King Salman's only surviving full brother, would have the support of family members, the security apparatus and some Western powers, one of the Saudi sources said.

Prince Ahmed returned to Riyadh in October after 2-1/2 months abroad. During the trip, he appeared to criticize the Saudi leadership while responding to protesters outside a London residence chanting for the downfall of the Al Saud dynasty. He was one of only three people on the Allegiance Council, made up of the ruling family's senior members, who opposed MbS becoming crown prince in 2017, two Saudi sources said at the time.

Meanwhile, the Trump administration's continued support of Saudi Arabia has been denounced by several U.S. Senators:

The White House's pledge to maintain its strong military and economic alliance with Saudi Arabia amid reports that U.S. intelligence has assessed that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman ordered the gruesome murder of dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi, has ignited a flurry of bipartisan condemnation in Washington.

After President Trump issued a remarkable statement on Tuesday in which he acknowledged that the heir apparent to the Saudi throne may have known about the "tragic event," but that his administration nevertheless "intended to remain a steadfast partner of Saudi Arabia," several Republican and Democratic members of Congress denounced the White House's position.

Previously: Turkey Says that a Missing Critic of the Saudi Government was Killed in Saudi Consulate in Istanbul
Saudi Arabia Reportedly Prepared to Admit Involvement in Journalist's Death
CIA Concludes That Saudi Crown Prince Ordered Khashoggi Killed

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

The Planetary Society reports:

Representative John Culberson, an 8-term Texas Republican and staunch supporter of NASA and planetary exploration, lost his re-election bid to Democrat Lizzie Fletcher last week. Many factors played into this outcome, but one bears consideration by space advocates: his support for the scientific search for life at Europa was seen as a weakness and attacked accordingly.

Over the past four years, Culberson used his chairmanship of the Commerce, Justice, Science (CJS) appropriations subcommittee to increase spending on NASA and missions to search for life on Europa. He directed hundreds of millions of dollars to this effort and played a critical role in getting the Europa Clipper mission officially adopted by NASA and the White House. And he did this without cannibalizing other NASA programs. His motivation was passion, not parochialism, as the prime benefactor of these federal dollars was California's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, located far outside his Houston-area congressional district.

Original Submission

upstart writes:

Submitted via IRC for Bytram

C.I.A. Concludes That Saudi Crown Prince Ordered Khashoggi Killed

The Central Intelligence Agency has concluded that the Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, ordered the killing of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi, according to American officials.

The C.I.A. made the assessment based on the crown prince's control of Saudi Arabia, which is such that the killing would not have taken place without his approval, and has buttressed its conclusion with two sets of crucial communications: intercepts of the crown prince's calls in the days before the killing, and calls by the kill team to a senior aide to the crown prince.

[...] The increasingly definitive assessment from the spy agency creates a problem for President Trump, who has tied his administration to Prince Mohammed and proclaimed him the future of Saudi Arabia, a longtime American ally. But the new assessment by the C.I.A. is sure to harden the resolve of lawmakers on Capitol Hill to continue to investigate the killing of Mr. Khashoggi and punish Saudi Arabia.

Jared Kushner, the president's son-in-law and senior adviser, has been particularly close to Prince Mohammed. Mr. Kushner has long advocated that a strong relationship with the Saudis is in the United States' interest, and he has pushed to maintain support for the crown prince despite the death of Mr. Khashoggi, who Saudi officials now say was killed with a lethal dose of tranquilizers and dismembered. Previously, Saudi officials said that Mr. Khashoggi had been strangled.

[...] Neither administration officials nor intelligence officers believe the controversy over Mr. Khashoggi will drive Prince Mohammed from power, which is one reason White House officials believe cutting ties with the prince would not be in the interest of the United States.

takyon: The Saudis have denied the reports.

See also: Saudi media ignore US reports on Khashoggi
Top White House Official Involved in Saudi Sanctions Resigns

Previously: Turkey Says that a Missing Critic of the Saudi Government was Killed in Saudi Consulate in Istanbul
Saudi Arabia Reportedly Prepared to Admit Involvement in Journalist's Death

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

NPR is reporting that Democrat Jared Golden has been declared the winner of Maine House District 2 after ranked-choice voting (RCV) boosted his vote count over Republican Bruce Poliquin. Poliquin had received more initial votes than Golden, but did not receive the requisite 50% of the vote.

Maine's new ranked-choice system of voting allows voters to rank candidates in their order of preference and to transfer their votes if no candidate gets more than 50 percent.

Local newspaper Portland Press Herald fills in some details:

Golden captured 50.5 percent of the vote to Poliquin’s 49.5 percent to become the first challenger to defeat an incumbent in Maine’s sprawling 2nd District in a century. The Marine Corps veteran and Lewiston lawmaker also made history by winning the nation’s first congressional election to utilize ranked-choice voting, enabling him to erase an initial deficit by securing the second- and third-choice votes of people who cast their ballots for two independents.

The final vote tally was 139,231 votes for Golden versus 136,326 votes for Poliquin – a margin of 2,905 votes.

martyb writes:

Russia: We did not hack the US Democrats. But if we did, we're immune from prosecution:

The Russian government has denied having anything to do with hacking the US Democratic party in 2016, although in a court filing this week stressed that even if it did break into the DNC's servers, it is immune from prosecution.

And furthermore the Kremlin claimed America is "one of the most prolific practitioners of cyberattacks and cyber-intrusions on the planet." So, nerr!

"The [Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act] FSIA provides that foreign sovereign states enjoy absolute jurisdictional immunity from suit unless a plaintiff can demonstrate that one of the FSIA's enumerated 'exceptions' applies," argued [PDF] the Russian government this week in a New York court in response to a lawsuit from the DNC.

The DNC claims that it was subject to a "military attack" by Kremlin intelligence, causing Russia to argue back that any act of its military is a sovereign action and so therefore it can't be sued for it.

It's an amazing defense though one the DNC foresaw. It argued in its initial court paperwork [PDF] that "Russia is not entitled to sovereign immunity because the DNC's claims arise out of Russia's trespass onto the DNC's private servers - a tort allegedly committed in the United States.

"In addition, Russia committed the trespass in order to steal trade secrets and commit economic espionage, two forms of commercial activity undertaken in and directly affecting the United States."

Of course this being 2018 and Russia, the Putin administration can't leave it at that, and takes the opportunity to troll the US government by pointing out that the immunity provision is also heavily relied upon by Uncle Sam and its officials abroad.

"The United States benefits significantly from the sovereign immunity that it enjoys (and US officials enjoy) in foreign courts around the world with respect to the United States' frequency acts of cyber intrusion and political interference," Russia's response reads. "As current and former US officials have acknowledged on many occasion, the United States - acting primarily through the National Security Agency (NSA) with the US Department of Defense - is one of the most prolific practitioners of cyberattacks and cyber-intrusions on the planet."

Pot calling the kettle black?

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Ex-Facebook exec ousted from company sparked controversy with pro-Trump views: report

A former top executive at Facebook who was ousted from the company may have been fired over his support for Donald Trump during the 2016 campaign, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The Journal reported Sunday that Palmer Luckey has recently told people that he was fired for supporting Trump before that year's presidential election. Luckey's donation in September 2016 to NimbleAmerica, a group that funded ads attacking Hillary Clinton, reportedly sparked backlash within Facebook.

Six months after making that donation, Luckey was no longer at the company. The Journal noted that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg testified in front of Congress this year that Luckey's departure had nothing to do with his political beliefs.

According to the Journal, Luckey was first put on leave and later fired. In the fall of 2016, Zuckerberg pressured Luckey to voice support publicly for Gary Johnson, the libertarian nominee in that year's election, the Journal reported, citing internal emails and sources familiar with the conversations.

"Zuckerberg lied to Congress" could become a bipartisan statement.

Palmer Luckey.

Also at NBC.

Previously: Founder of Oculus VR, Palmer Luckey, Departs Facebook
Oculus Co-Founder Pitches Virtual Border Wall

Related: Oculus VR Founder Palmer Luckey on the Need for "Unlimited Graphics Horsepower"
Facebook/Oculus Ordered to pay $500 Million to ZeniMax
Palmer Luckey Donates to CrossVR Patreon
Oculus Co-Founder Brendan Iribe Leaves Facebook

Original Submission

takyon writes:

The outcomes of several races in the 2018 midterm elections may have an impact on the Europa Clipper mission, as well as other NASA priorities:

Perhaps the most significant loss occurred in Texas's Seventh Congressional District, home to thousands of the employees at the Johnson Space Center in Houston. A political newcomer, Lizzie Pannill Fletcher, defeated the incumbent John Culberson, who has served in the House since 2001. Culberson, an attorney, doesn't have a science background. But he grew up in the 1960s building telescopes, toying with model rockets, and reading popular science magazines. For the past four years, Culberson has pushed his colleagues in the House and the Senate to steadily grow nasa's budget, for projects including its climate-science programs—which may come as a surprise, given the congressman's party line on climate change.

Culberson has fiercely supported one mission in particular: a journey to one of Jupiter's moons, the icy Europa. As chair of the House Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, and Science, Culberson more than doubled the amount of money the space agency requested from Congress for an orbiter around Europa, from $265 million to $545 million. He also threw in $195 million to support a lander to the moon, which nasa hadn't even planned for, but would of course accept. Scientists suspect that Europa's frozen crust covers a liquid ocean that may sustain microbial life. Culberson was intent on sending something there to find it. "This will be tremendously expensive, but worth every penny," he said last year, during a visit to nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory to check its progress.

With Culberson out of the House, the funding portfolio for the Europa mission could change. "I don't see any obvious members of Congress, Republican or Democratic, who'd be taking up that mantle of leading the Europa efforts, so I imagine that those are likely to start to wane," said Casey Dreier, a senior space-policy adviser at the Planetary Society, a nonprofit space-advocacy group.

Dreier said the development of the Europa orbiter, known as Clipper, will certainly continue. Since nasa formally approved the mission in 2015, engineers and scientists have made significant progress on the design of the spacecraft. But without a steady flow of funding, its launch date could slip, he said. The lander is on shakier ground. "I don't think you're going to see money for the Europa lander to continue showing up, because that's money that nasa has not been requesting," Dreier said.

See also: Culberson's ouster could spell big problems for NASA's Orion program, experts say
NASA's Europa lander may be in jeopardy after the midterms — and some are fine with seeing it go
What the 2018 midterms mean for NASA and planetary science

Previously: House Spending Bill Offers NASA More Money Than the Agency or Administration Wanted

Original Submission