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Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

Phone intercepts show rebels accused of shooting down the plane had 'close ties' with Russia before the 2014 attack.

A series of phone intercepts released by a team investigating the 2014 downing of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 over Ukraine show ties between Moscow and the pro-Russian rebels accused of shooting down the aircraft were "much closer" than originally believed, investigators said.

The Dutch-lead Joint Investigation Team (JIT) said calls between officials in Moscow and pro-Russian rebel leaders in eastern Ukraine, who are facing trial over the incident, intensified before the crash in July of 2014, raising questions over Russia's involvement in providing the missile used to down the plane.

"There was almost daily telephone contact between the leadership of the DPR and their contacts in the Russian Federation," JIT said in a statement on Thursday, using the acronym of the Donetsk People's Republic rebels. The calls mostly took place over secure phones provided by Russian security forces, it said.

All 298 people on board died when MH17 was shot out of the sky over the territory held by pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine as it flew from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur.

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

The view among the national security officials was unanimous: Military aid to Ukraine should not be stopped. But the White House's acting chief of staff thought otherwise.

That was the testimony of Laura Cooper, a Defense Department official, whose deposition was released Monday in the House impeachment inquiry of President Donald Trump.

"My sense is that all of the senior leaders of the US national security departments and agencies were all unified in their - in their view that this assistance was essential," she said. "And they were trying to find ways to engage the president on this."

Cooper's testimony was among several hundred pages of transcripts released Monday, along with those of State Department officials Catherine Croft and Christopher Anderson.

Cooper told investigators that, in a series of July meetings at the White House, she came to understand that Trump's acting chief of staff, Mick Mulvaney, was holding up the military aid for the US ally.

[...] When she and others tried to get an explanation, they found none.

[...] She said it was "unusual" to have congressional funds suddenly halted that way, and aides raised concerns about the legality of it. The Pentagon was "concerned" about the hold-up of funds and "any signal that we would send to Ukraine about a wavering in our commitment", she said.

Cooper told investigators that she was visited in August by Kurt Volker, the US special envoy to Ukraine, who explained there was a "statement" that the Ukraine government could make to get the security money flowing.

[...] "Somehow, an effort that he was engaged in to see if there was a statement that the government of Ukraine would make," said Cooper, an assistant defence secretary, "that would somehow disavow any interference in US elections and would commit to the prosecution of any individuals involved in election interference."

For a handy reference to the documents that have been released concerning this, npr has posted Trump Impeachment Inquiry: A Guide To Key People, Facts And Documents:

DeathMonkey writes:

Ranked-choice voting adopted in New York City, along with other ballot measures

New York City will move to a system of ranked-choice voting, shaking up the way its elections are run after voters approved a ballot question to make the change.

The city will be by far the biggest place in the U.S. to put the new way of voting to the test, tripling the number of people around the country who use it.

A ballot question proposing the shift for New York primaries and special elections was approved Tuesday by a margin of nearly 3-1. It's now set to be in effect for New York's elections for mayor, City Council and other offices in 2021.

Under the system, voters will rank up to five candidates in order of preference, instead of casting a ballot for just one. If no candidate gets a majority of the vote, the last place candidate is eliminated and their votes are parceled out to the voter's second choice, a computerized process that continues until one candidate has a majority and is declared the winner.

Ranked-choice voting is now in use or approved in 18 other cities around the country, including San Francisco, Minneapolis and Cambridge. The state of Maine also uses it. Backers say the system discourages negative campaigning, and forces candidates to reach out to more voters rather than relying on a narrow base. It's also designed to allow voters to pick their true favorite, without worrying about throwing away a vote on someone who can't win.

Previously: Maine Supreme Court Approves Ranked-Choice Voting for 2018 Elections
Maine Debuts Ranked-Choice Voting

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

Chinese state media has urged authorities to take a "tougher line" against protesters in Hong Kong who vandalised state-run Xinhua news agency and other buildings at the weekend, saying the violence damaged the city's rule of law.

[...] In an editorial, state-backed China Daily newspaper criticised the "wanton" attacks by "naive" demonstrators, adding, "They are doomed to fail simply because their violence will encounter the full weight of the law."

Police fired tear gas at black-clad protesters on Saturday and Sunday in some of the worst violence in the Asian financial hub in weeks, with metro stations set ablaze and buildings vandalised.

Violence also erupted on Sunday after a man with a knife attacked several people and bit off part of the ear of a pro-democracy politician. Two of the victims are reportedly in critical condition, according to reports.

The past five months of anti-government protests in the former British colony represent the biggest popular challenge to President Xi Jinping's government since he took over China's leadership in late 2012.

Protesters are angry at China's perceived meddling with Hong Kong's freedoms, including its legal system, since the Asian financial hub returned to Chinese rule in 1997. China denies the accusation.

An Anonymous Coward writes:

— The United States House of Representatives passed a bill tonight that would put America's small business owners' personally identifiable information at unprecedented risk and cost them billions of dollars and millions of hours in paperwork. The Corporate Transparency Act of 2019 (H.R. 2513), which passed the House 249-173 attempts to shift a responsibility from big banks to America's smallest businesses, saddling them with an additional 131.7 million hours of paperwork at a cost of $5.7 billion over the first 10 years.

"The House today not only shouldered millions of small business owners with a tremendous compliance burden but put their personally identifiable information at serious risk," said NFIB President & CEO Juanita D. Duggan. "The reporting requirements and devastating financial penalties will affect only small businesses, from farmers to franchisees to the mom-and-pop retail shop down the street. It is a big-government solution in search of a small-business problem, and we will not cease our efforts to stand up for small businesses against this serious threat."

The Corporate Transparency Act of 2019 is legislation that would require only those small corporations and limited liability companies with 20 or fewer employees to complete and submit annual paperwork which includes the personally identifiable information of each business owner to the Treasury Department's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network upon the creation of the business and periodically for the life of the business. Failure to comply is a federal crime with civil penalties up to $10,000 and criminal penalties of up to three years in prison.

https://www.nfib.com/content/press-release/homepage/house-deals-blow-to-millions-of-small-businesses-by-passing-corporate-transparency-act/

While everyone is distracted by "impeachment", this is what the government is doing.

https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/2513
https://www.natlawreview.com/article/proposed-corporate-transparency-act-2019-would-require-corporations-and-limited

Original Submission

upstart writes:

Submitted via IRC for Runaway1956

Google exec suggests Elizabeth Warren is misguided and only big tech can prevent "the next Trump situation"

A new Project Veritas report includes an undercover video, leaked documents, and statements from a whistleblower that all paint a grim picture of Google's apparent lack of fairness, and its bias.

Google's now a very powerful company, and that's upsetting both sides in the US political divide.

As a consequence, many politicians are looking for ways to contain that power – either by applying antitrust or some other type of legislation against the company.

In the comments recorded in an undercover video, Google's Head of Responsible Innovation, Jen Gennai, cheerfully and not without a hint of hubris acknowledges that Google has been called to appear before Congress many times – but simply chose to ignore those invitations.

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-50246324

"The US House of Representatives has passed a resolution to formally proceed with the impeachment inquiry against President Donald Trump.

The measure details how the inquiry will move into a more public phase. It was not a vote on whether the president should be removed from office.

This was the first test of support in the Democratic-controlled House for the impeachment process.

The White House condemned the vote, which passed along party lines.

Only two Democrats - representing districts that Mr Trump won handily in 2016 - voted against the resolution, along with all Republicans, for a total count of 232 in favour and 196 against."

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Twitter to ban all political advertising

Twitter is to ban all political advertising worldwide, saying that the reach of such messages "should be earned, not bought". "While internet advertising is incredibly powerful and very effective for commercial advertisers, that power brings significant risks to politics," company CEO Jack Dorsey tweeted.

Social media rival Facebook recently ruled out a ban on political ads.

News of the ban divided America's political camps for the 2020 election. Brad Parscale, manager of President Donald Trump's re-election campaign, said the ban was "yet another attempt by the left to silence Trump and conservatives". But Bill Russo, spokesman for the campaign to elect Democratic front-runner Joe Biden, said: "When faced with a choice between ad dollars and the integrity of our democracy, it is encouraging that, for once, revenue did not win out."

Original Submission

Mojibake Tengu writes:

Craig Murray of Information Clearing House writes about his observation at Westminster Magistrates Court:

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/52433.htm

Before I get on to the blatant lack of fair process, the first thing I must note was Julian's condition. I was badly shocked by just how much weight my friend has lost, by the speed his hair has receded and by the appearance of premature and vastly accelerated ageing. He has a pronounced limp I have never seen before. Since his arrest he has lost over 15 kg in weight.

But his physical appearance was not as shocking as his mental deterioration. When asked to give his name and date of birth, he struggled visibly over several seconds to recall both. I will come to the important content of his statement at the end of proceedings in due course, but his difficulty in making it was very evident; it was a real struggle for him to articulate the words and focus his train of thought.

Until yesterday I had always been quietly sceptical of those who claimed that Julian's treatment amounted to torture – even of Nils Melzer, the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture – and sceptical of those who suggested he may be subject to debilitating drug treatments. But having attended the trials in Uzbekistan of several victims of extreme torture, and having worked with survivors from Sierra Leone and elsewhere, I can tell you that yesterday changed my mind entirely and Julian exhibited exactly the symptoms of a torture victim brought blinking into the light, particularly in terms of disorientation, confusion, and the real struggle to assert free will through the fog of learned helplessness.

I had been even more sceptical of those who claimed, as a senior member of his legal team did to me on Sunday night, that they were worried that Julian might not live to the end of the extradition process. I now find myself not only believing it, but haunted by the thought. Everybody in that court yesterday saw that one of the greatest journalists and most important dissidents of our times is being tortured to death by the state, before our eyes. To see my friend, the most articulate man, the fastest thinker, I have ever known, reduced to that shambling and incoherent wreck, was unbearable. Yet the agents of the state, particularly the callous magistrate Vanessa Baraitser, were not just prepared but eager to be a part of this bloodsport. She actually told him that if he were incapable of following proceedings, then his lawyers could explain what had happened to him later. The question of why a man who, by the very charges against him, was acknowledged to be highly intelligent and competent, had been reduced by the state to somebody incapable of following court proceedings, gave her not a millisecond of concern.

Now tell me some fine arguments justifying the legality and justness of such person destruction methodics, I wish to hear them.
 

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

Left-leaning Fernandez hails government of people, but central bank currency move shows no quick fix to economic woes.

Fernandez's win unleashed euphoria in parts of Buenos Aires, as supporters cruised the streets honking their car horns, and a wave of people surged towards the neighbourhood of Chacarita, where the official victory party was being held. 

Speaking to supporters at his party's headquarters, Fernandez thanked voters for showing a commitment to building a more equal Argentina. 

"We're going to be the Argentina that we deserve because it's not true that we're condemned to this Argentina," he said.

Original Submission