Society's Child
The Gun Violence Reduction Team, which the City Council voted to disband last year amid social justice protests and criticisms that it disproportionately targeted people of color, has been reborn and rebranded as the Focused Initiative Team. The new unit aims to reduce violent crime while working with a citizen-advisory board comprised of eleven community members to "identify and dismantle institutional and systemic racism in the bureau's responses to gun violence."
Democratic Mayor Ted Wheeler unveiled the team in March, and said the community-driven committee would be responsible for overseeing its direction.
Queensland said it had detected 13 new locally acquired COVID-19 cases in the past 24 hours - the biggest one-day rise the state has recorded in a year. The lockdown of Brisbane, Australia's third-biggest city, was due to end on Tuesday but will now stay in place until late on Sunday.
"It's starting to become clear that the initial lockdown will be insufficient for the outbreak," Queensland state Deputy Premier Steven Miles told reporters in Brisbane.
Queensland has yet to establish how a school child acquired the virus, but has forced students at several schools and their families, including that of Australia's Defence Minister Peter Dutton, to stay home. Dutton said on Monday he would miss two weeks of parliament after he was told he must quarantine at home for 14 days as his two sons attend a school linked to the outbreak.
Cuomo also allegedly retaliated against some of the victims and created a "toxic" and hostile work environment in the Executive Chamber, officials said.
The blockbuster announcements came during a news conference at which state Attorney General Letitia James said an independent probe she commissioned had found that Cuomo engaged in "unwanted groping, kissing, hugging and making inappropriate comments."
James called it "a sad day for New York" and said it was up to Cuomo to decide whether to resign, as has been demanded by lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.
Comment: In a bit of irony, Biden has called for Cuomo to resign in light of the harassment allegations. It takes one to know one!
To view the Report of Investigation..., go to Scribd.
See also:
- Cuomo under fire as probe finds Covid-19 nursing-home deaths in NY were undercounted by up to 50%
- Cuomo's COVID cover-up hid nearly 1,900 NYC nursing home deaths
- AOC does something useful: Calls for 'full investigation' into Cuomo nursing home scandal
- Too late: CNN says ban reinstated on Chris Cuomo covering his brother, Gov. Cuomo
- Cuomo tries to divert attention from sex scandal by reminding everyone of nursing home scandal
- Cuomo administration's nursing home coronavirus crisis handling investigated by FBI, US Attorney: report
- Cuomo to be stripped of pandemic powers amid sex harass, nursing home scandals
- Cuomo callously addresses COVID nursing home report: 'Who cares!'
Broward County Public Schools said Monday it "intends to comply with the Governor's latest Executive Order" but that it will "strongly encourage" people in its schools to wear masks and advocate for all eligible students to get vaccinated. Children 12 years and older can get the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine.
The Broward County Public School Board voted last week to require students, staff and visitors to wear masks inside its schools.
Two days later, DeSantis signed an executive order to "protect parents' freedom to choose" if their children should wear masks at schools, a direct rebuke to districts that imposed mask mandates despite his public attitude against the measures. The order gave the Florida commissioner of education the power to withhold state funds from schools that do not comply with the new policy.
Comment: See also:
- DeSantis signs bill banning vaccine 'passports,' suspends local pandemic restrictions
- DeSantis to sign executive order allowing parents to defy school mask mandates
- Florida Gov DeSantis will ban critical race theory from state's school curriculum
- Governor Ron DeSantis lifts all COVID-19 restrictions on Florida restaurants

The Olympic Rings monument, in front of Japan Olympic Museum.
When the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC), the country's chief internet regulatory and control body, issued new regulations on live-streaming back in February this year, concerns over the protection of youth and over data security were topped by language about "enhancing mainstream value leadership" (提升主流价值引领), code for the need for platforms to enforce the values of the CCP. The rules also talked about the need for "positive energy" (正能量) to permeate livestreams and the internet generally - this being a term closely associated with the suppression of criticism of the leadership.
But while enforcing censorship guidelines may sound like a rather straight-forward business, it can actually be a messy process for the authorities and internet companies alike. In some cases, enforcement can backfire, achieving the opposite of the intended effect.

Former US President Donald Trump tours the Global Center for Combatting Extremist Ideology in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, May 21, 2017
Wallowing in schadenfreude as it describes the purported IS (formerly ISIS) terrorist organization's sympathizers who've supposedly found a home on the pro-Trump social network that recently sprung up following the ex-president's exile from Twitter, Politico notes that Gettr's "'free speech' policy" will "purportedly... allow users to fully express themselves without the censorship of tech giants."
Which sounds great until the "MAGA exodus to fringe social networks that champion unfettered speech" catches the "attention of supporters of Islamic State and other jihadist groups," the outlet continues, citing "extremism experts."
Comment: The Deep State-approved platforms lost no time in trying to squelch the latest effort to give conservatives and Donald Trump a voice.
Pro-Trump social media app briefly hacked hours after launch

Protesters take part in a demonstration to show their support for Palestinian residents of Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood facing eviction during a court hearing, outside the Israeli Supreme Court, in Jerusalem August 2, 2021
On Monday, the Israeli Supreme Court postponed its ruling on an appeal to a lower court's decision to allow four Palestinian families to be evicted from their homes in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah, saying it had not sufficiently heard arguments from both sides of the case.
Comment: The residents of Sheik Jarrah have decades of evidence that Israel has no intentions of sticking to any deal they might "agree" to. Here, for instance, is Benjamin Netanyahu boasting about how he will exploit loopholes in the 1993 Oslo Agreement to continue to push Palestinians off their land. Why would today's Palestinians expect anything different?
At the time of writing, I'm at an altitude of exactly 11,277m, 5,230km away from Vancouver, Canada, and 3,159km from my stopover in Munich, Germany, en route back to Paris, France. Where I really should be is relaxing on the backyard patio or in the jacuzzi at my home near Vancouver with a cold drink on a hot summer day. Instead, I'm on a Lufthansa flight heading back to Paris - just a few hours after arriving across the ocean on a 10-hour flight - because my own country's officials kicked me out. All because I committed the apparent violation of trying to re-enter my own country with proof of naturally acquired Covid-19 antibodies made by my own immune system post-recovery rather than those generated by the manmade Covid-19 vaccine about which much is still to be learned.
Daily life for a Covid-19 survivor with natural immunity from the disease is not for the faint of heart. As someone with a high level of laboratory tested antibodies whose levels have yet to drop even after several months post-illness, my doctor has advised against vaccination. Much is obviously still to be learned about the Covid jabs, still in stage 3 of clinical trials and considered experimental by health authorities - particularly with reports abounding of breakthrough cases of vaccinated people catching and spreading Covid.
A rare breed of radical woke one-upmanship has emerged among big brands and global media who seem hell-bent on destroying their own reputations and relationships with loyal customers to posture as the most politically correct.
Toiletries giant Dove's lack of social media tact sparked fury among female customers when celebrating born-male athlete Laurel Hubbard's inclusion at Tokyo 2020 and promoting further repeats of women's sport being obliterated in favor of a physically stronger athlete with an unfair advantage.
Comment: The wallet-vote will wake them up soon enough. The next financial quarter for these companies may be an eye-opener.
"I had something of an epiphany in a nightmare that Darwinism could not be true," he said. "I decided to read around a bit to see if this subconscious flash of insight could be true, and my research (which was diligent) confirmed the theory to be absurd."
"I realized I had been conned," he said. "I felt there was something dishonest about the huge claims made by Darwinism compared with the negligible evidence to support the thesis."
He was so alarmed by this conclusion that he felt impelled to write a book as a sort of warning call to humanity: "Beware! You have been fooled!"
That book has just been released by Discovery Institute Press: Taking Leave of Darwin: A Longtime Agnostic Discovers the Case for Design.












Comment: A six-week military deployment has been initiated to knock on thousands of doors, to babysit the populace, contact trace and assure maximum vaccination compliance. Those in charge predict: "The public will be grateful."