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Imperial Brands tobacco company takes hit as US cracks down on vaping

Lina Saigol
MarketWatch
Thu, 26 Sep 2019 17:49 UTC
girl vaping
© Getty Images/iStockphoto
Shares in Imperial Brands dived to their lowest level in a decade on Thursday after the British tobacco group warned over a hit to annual sales amid a regulatory crackdown against Vaping in the U.S.

The U.K. maker IMB, -12.94% of Blu e-cigarettes said profits per share will be flat this year compared with last year. It now expects revenue growth of just 2% for the year ending September 30, well short of its previous guidance of up to 4%.

The profit warning dragged shares in Imperial down by almost 10% in London on Thursday to £18.67 a share. Shares in rival British American Tobacco BATS, +0.34% fell almost 2%.
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Pirates

ISIS allegedly preparing crusade to free fighters from prison camps in Iraq and Syria


Sputnik
Thu, 26 Sep 2019 17:15 UTC
ISIS
Daesh, a terrorist organisation which became infamous when it captured large swaths of Iraq in 2014, has since been mostly driven out of its previously-held territory by Kurdish forces and the military forces of Syria and Iraq, with thousands of its former fighters detained in prisons and displacements camps in the territory of the two countries.

Daesh is preparing to free its fighters and followers currently held at prisons and displacements camps across Syria and Iraq, a report published by the Institute for the Study of War says.

On 16 September, the leader of the terrorist organisation, Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi, released a 30-minute recording titled "Do Deeds", whose authenticity has yet to be verified, where he reportedly signalled the start of the new campaign by calling upon the members of the group "to resist and lead the fight for five years" in order to liberate prisoners and women detained and currently held in jails.

"Daily operations are underway on different fronts," Al-Baghdadi allegedly said in a tape, by potentially referring to several regions such as Mali and the Levant without specific details being given.

"How can a Muslim enjoy life?" the Daesh leader then added, asking how his followers could "accept to live while Muslim women are suffering in the camps of diaspora and the prisons of humiliation under the power of the Crusaders?"

"As for the worst and most important matter, the prisons, the prisons, oh soldiers of the caliphate. Your brothers and sisters, do your utmost to free them and tear down the walls restricting them," the recording read.


Comment: The U.S. must have read Baghdadi's mind:
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Headphones

Privacy be damned! Amazon touts new products that listen to users everywhere


Sputnik
Thu, 26 Sep 2019 16:58 UTC
amazon alexa
© AmazonAmazon's Alexa is always listening
Amazon has launched a range of wearable 'digital assistants', to ensure Alexa accompanies users everywhere they go and whatever they're doing.

Unveiled at an event in Seattle 26th September, Amazon's Echo Frames smart glasses, Echo Loop ring and Echo Buds will connect Alexa with wearers' face, hands and ears.

The US$179.99 Echo Frames are equipped with directional speakers and microphones for Alexa, meaning emails, texts and other information can be read out to users, removing the need for them to do so themselves.

Comment: Why would anyone ever want to put these demonic devices in their home, let alone wear one? That goes for the entire 'internet of things'. Has humanity become that lazy and dependent?

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Light Saber

Poetic justice: Brave young man takes on gender inequality at USC by wielding Title IX

Barbara Kay
The Post Millennial
Sat, 21 Sep 2019 16:32 UTC
Kursat Christoff Pekgoz
Kursat Christoff Pekgoz
Misandry — the hatred of men — has been a staple of my polemical writing for more than fifteen years. I felt a special obligation to hammer away at gender myths such as intimate partner violence (women are about as likely as men to initiate violence against their partners as men), false sexual allegations (a disturbing percentage of such allegations) and demonstrable bias against fathers in family court, because male journalists who dared to write sympathetically about men and/or critically about women put their careers in jeopardy (no exaggeration), and most had learned to keep shtumm in this domain.

That situation has been changing slowly but steadily. Some men have decided they aren't going to spend their lives in rhetorical purdah on the subject of their own cultural dhimmitude, and have been stepping up to the plate, whatever the personal cost. The university campus is home to the feminist commissariat — and it's a brave man who dares to stick his head above that formidable parapet. Because the cost of doing so can be high.

This is the story of one such activist who paid a price, which only fueled his resistance efforts, and which in turn inspired others, in reversing a decades-long erosion of men's rights on campus.

Comment: Title IX, whatever its benign initial intentions, has been wielded as a bludgeon by radical feminists for years. It's heartening to see that same weapon being turned on them.

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NPC

Who is pulling Greta's puppet strings?

Jon Gaunt
Sputnik
Thu, 26 Sep 2019 16:03 UTC
Thunberg greta UN mad face
© Reuters/Carlo Allegri16-year-old Swedish Climate activist Greta Thunberg speaks at the 2019 United Nations Climate Action Summit at U.N. headquarters in New York City, New York, U.S., September 23, 2019
Is it just me or is Greta Thunberg getting on your nerves too? Why is this young woman getting so much attention and why are people taking her seriously? All kids worry about the end of the world then they grow up or am I being too harsh?

I posed this question on Twitter a few days ago and the overwhelming response was that instead of being too harsh I was in fact being too gentle to the 'Eco Messiah'.

Did you see her speech at the UN? It was incredible and frightening in equal measure. Not her doom-laden prediction that the world was going to end but the manner in which she delivered it. The trembling lip, the stare, the accusations and of course the tears.

It only confirmed my long-held belief that this young girl is being used and abused by the environmental 'nut jobs' who are seem to be drafting her scripts.

Comment:

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Clipboard

Gallup poll: Just 13% of Americans trust the media 'a great deal'

Megan Brenan
Gallup News
Thu, 26 Sep 2019 15:49 UTC
People reading news
© Gallup
Americans remain largely mistrustful of the mass media as 41% currently have "a great deal" or "fair amount" of trust in newspapers, television and radio to report the news "fully, accurately and fairly." This latest reading represents a four-percentage-point dip since last year and marks the end of improvements in back-to-back years after hitting an all-time low.

Although trust in the media has edged down this year, it is well above the record low of 32% in 2016 when Republicans' trust dropped precipitously and drove the overall trust reading down during the divisive presidential campaign. Republicans' trust is still at a very low level and a wide gap in views of the media among partisans persists as 69% of Democrats say they have trust and confidence in it, while 15% of Republicans and 36% of independents agree.

Trust in the Mass Media Remains Low

After hitting the low point three years ago, U.S. adults' trust in the accuracy of the mass media appeared to be rebounding -- increasing 13 points over two years. Yet, the latest reading from a Sept. 3-15 Gallup poll found levels matching those in 2017.
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Eye 2

Russian priest with '70 adopted children in family' is accused of raping girl in his care


RT
Thu, 26 Sep 2019 15:22 UTC
Father Nikolay
© Sputnik / Yury KaverFather Nikolay
A Russian priest who is credited with heading the largest family in the country after fathering and adopting over 70 kids, has been arrested on a charge of sexually abusing his dependants.

A court in Orenburg, a city about 1,200 km southeast of Moscow, has ordered the pre-trial arrest of Nikolay Stremsky.

Stremsky, or father Nikolay as he is usually called, is a sort of local celebrity in the Orenburg region.

A veteran of the Afghan war who was ordained a Russian Orthodox priest, he and his wife run a Christian foster home, except the wards there are also his adopted children. Investigators say he is a sexual predator, who has abused at least seven children in his care.
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Bulb

Story of 5 major pipelines explains Europe's love-hate relationship with Russian energy


RT
Thu, 26 Sep 2019 15:15 UTC
oil refinery
© Nord Stream 2 / Axel Schmidt
This year, Russia provided record supplies of gas to the European market to meet the region's growing demand. But some nations, particularly the US, Poland and the Baltic states, still insist Europe can do without Russian energy.

Here are the key Russian pipelines supplying oil and gas to Europe, which Washington and allies are trying to obstruct.

The Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline

This project, which is almost complete, aims to deliver more natural gas from Russia to the EU. It involves the construction of two pipelines with a total capacity of 55 billion cubic meters of gas per year, spanning from the Russian coast to Germany and further on to other European customers through the Baltic Sea.

This week, Washington and Warsaw called the Russian gas pipeline a "threat" to European energy security. While the pipeline does not cross the territory of either country, they have discussed the possibility of hindering the implementation of the Nord Stream 2. US President Donald Trump has been promoting American LNG to edge Russia out of the EU gas market, while Poland has ambitions of becoming a major European LNG hub.
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NPC

Social justice warrior and hypocrite Megan Rapinoe under fire for saying footballer should win player of the year 'just for how cute he is'


RT
Thu, 26 Sep 2019 15:11 UTC
rapinoe
© Global Look Press / Imago-images
US women's football star Megan Rapinoe has been accused of hypocrisy after stating Virgil van Dijk should win the FIFA Best Men's Player award "just for how cute he is."

Rapinoe was named Best Women's Player at the glitzy awards bash in Milan on Monday night, where Liverpool defender van Dijk was in the running for the men's accolade.

The Dutchman ultimately missed out, being pipped to the award by Barcelona legend Lionel Messi - but if Rapinoe had had her way, van Dijk would have cleaned up based on looks alone.

When asked ahead of the ceremony who she thought should win the men's title, Rapinoe replied: "Ooo, I think Virgil, just for how cute he is."
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Bullseye

Gender identity and why no one is born in 'the wrong body'

William J. Malone, Colin M. Wright, and Julia D. Robertson
Quillette
Tue, 24 Sep 2019 14:59 UTC
child in makeup
© Sharon McCutcheon on Unsplash
The idea that all people have an innate "gender identity" recently has been endorsed by many health-care professionals and mainstream medical organizations. This term commonly is defined to mean the "internal, deeply held" sense of whether one is a man or a woman (or, in the case of children, a boy or a girl), both, or neither. It also has become common to claim that this sense of identity may be reliably articulated by children as young as three years old.

While these claims about gender identity did not attract systematic scrutiny at first, they now have become the subject of criticism from a growing number of scientists, philosophers and health workers. Developmental studies show that young children have only a superficial understanding of sex and gender (at best). For instance, up until age 7, many children often believe that if a boy puts on a dress, he becomes a girl. This gives us reason to doubt whether a coherent concept of gender identity exists at all in young children. To such extent as any such identity may exist, the concept relies on stereotypes that encourage the conflation of gender with sex.

However, starting at a young age, children do tend to exhibit preferences and behaviors that we associate with sex (as distinct from gender). For example, male children display more aggressive behavior than female children. In addition, "cross-sex" behavior — or, more accurately, cross-sex stereotypical behavior — often is predictive of later same-sex attraction.
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