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Fire

Massive blaze erupts in French city of Versailles


Sputnik International
Tue, 23 Apr 2019 16:54 UTC
Versailles fire
© Twitter/jodorlando
A massive fire broke out at the Rue du Parc in the French city of Versailles, the city Commissariat announced.

According to videos emerging on social media, a huge column of smoke can be seen rising from the area. Police have cordoned off the perimeter and urged passersby to avoid the area.

The fire started at "a car dealership," a local fire brigade said, releasing photos of the street engulfed in thick grey smoke on Twitter.

A total of 86 firefighters and 24 vehicles have been deployed to battle the blaze, the prefecture of Yvelines department, where Versailles is located, said.


Comment: Paris' Legendary Notre Dame Cathedral Destroyed by Fire

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Attention

Famous German bodyguard: Arab street gangs are 'godfathers' now


RT
Tue, 23 Apr 2019 17:23 UTC
berlin muchael kuhr police
© REUTERS/Fabrizio Bensch; RT
Famed bodyguard, who protected the likes of Hollywood A-lister Sean Penn, took RT Deutsch on a tour of Berlin neighborhoods plagued by powerful Arab street gangs that pull off daring heists in broad daylight.

The ruthless Arab street gangs gained momentum in the 1990s, "pushing aside local German groups and taking Berlin's nightlife under control," Michael Kuhr told RT Deutsch as he strolled down a working-class neighborhood with many migrant residents.
They're godfathers now, totally controlling [crime in Berlin], including drugs, prostitution, and shadow money.
The Arab clans are extremely dangerous and, given their close-knit nature, they "can bring together 40 to 50 people in just half an hour," he stated.

A former world kickboxing champion and one of the most well-known bodyguards in Germany, Kuhr said he is a "fan" of multiculturalism. However, many migrants resorted to crime because the government failed to integrate them into society, and later made the grave mistake of underestimating the threat posed by the clans, he said.

Currently, law enforcement in Berlin has a separate investigative team that deals primarily with "organized crime among the families of Arab origin," police spokesperson Thilo Cablitz told RT.
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Stock Down

Samsung retrieves all Galaxy Fold samples after multiple reviewers report defects

Ju-min Park
Associated Press
Tue, 23 Apr 2019 16:52 UTC
samsung folding phone damage

Screen problems in Samsung's Galaxy folding phone
Samsung Electronics is retrieving all Galaxy Fold samples distributed to reviewers, a person with direct knowledge of the matter said on Tuesday, as the firm smarts from the reputational blow of postponing the launch of its first foldable smartphone.

The South Korean tech giant met with embarrassment ahead of the device's U.S. release on April 26, with a handful of technology journalists reporting breaks, bulges and blinking screens after just a day's use.

However, the setback for the $1,980 niche device is trivial compared to the Galaxy Note 7 debacle of 2016, when exploding batteries forced Samsung to scrap the flagship model at huge cost. Galaxy Fold shipments this year are likely to make up less than half a percent of Samsung's annual total, analysts and investors said.
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Black Cat

Disney heiress says CEO Bob Iger's $65 million pay package is 'insane'

Mike Murphy
Market Watch
Tue, 23 Apr 2019 17:46 UTC
Walt Disney Co. CEO Bob Iger
© Bloomberg
Walt Disney Co. CEO Bob Iger rings the opening bell on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange in November 2017.
Abigail Disney says company's lowest-paid workers should get a fat raise instead

Last year, Walt Disney Co. Chief Executive Bob Iger made $65.6 million - about 1,424 times the median Disney employee's salary, an amount that heiress Abigail Disney is calling "insane."

Disney, a philanthropist and filmmaker whose grandfather, Roy Disney, co-founded the entertainment giant, spoke against income inequality at a Fast Company event Friday, and reiterated her thoughts Sunday on Twitter, saying the company is making so much money that it has no excuse not to give its lowest-paid employees significant pay raises, as opposed to a $15 minimum wage, or one-time bonuses.
"We all know the Federal Minimum is too low to live on. So why must we, at a company that's more profitable than it's ever been, be paying anything so close to least the law allows at all???" Abigail Disney, on Twitter
"When [Iger] got his bonus last year, I did the math, and I figured out that he could have given personally, out of pocket, a 15% raise to everyone who worked at Disneyland, and still walked away with $10 million," she said Friday, according to Fast Company. "So there's a point at which there's just too much going around the top of the system into this class of people who - I'm sorry this is radical - have too much money. There is such a thing."

Comment: While its easy to agree to that guys like Eiger probably do not deserve the kind of money they're making - and employees of much lower rank should should not be living out of their cars while they're gainfully employed, the following video by James Corbett adds a much more nuanced approach to the whole debate on minimum wage that some may find pretty surprising:



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Star of David

Backlash finally has Jerusalem promising to 'fix' 18-month-old rule banning minorities from entering preschools


RT
Tue, 23 Apr 2019 16:39 UTC
jewish kindergarten
© Reuters / Ronen Zvulun /File
Jerusalem's municipality said it will "fix" racist fliers forbidding "minorities" from entering their grounds, following a wave of backlash over the exclusionary practice.

The fliers were published by the emergency and security department of the Jerusalem municipality and distributed to kindergartens and preschools in the city. They state that "as a rule, entrance is not permitted to minority groups," and that "outsiders may not enter kindergarten premises," Haaretz reported. The term 'minority' is generally used to describe Arabs or non-Jews in Israel.

The publication says that the local security officer has to be notified if minorities want to enter the school grounds.


Comment: Nothing racist here.


Comment: But will 'fixing the language' actually change the policy? Don't hold your breath. There is what Israel says, and then there is what it does.

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Briefcase

Scandal plagued Facebook hires controversial State Department lawyer who helped draft Patriot Act as general counsel

Ari Levy
CNBC
Tue, 23 Apr 2019 01:55 UTC
Jennifer G Newstead
© Jerry Lampen | AFP | Getty Images
Jennifer G Newstead (C), lawyer of lawyer for the United States is pictured during the opening of case between Iran and the United States at the The International Court of Justice (ICJ) in the Hague, August 27, 2018.
Facebook announced on Monday that it's bringing in a new general counsel and vice president of communications as it tries to rebuild its image following a year filled with scandals.

The company said Jennifer Newstead, the legal adviser to the U.S. State Department, is joining the company as its general counsel, replacing Colin Stretch, who said last year that he would be departing. Facebook also named John Pinette as vice president of global communications, succeeding Caryn Marooney, who announced her plans to leave in February.

Newstead, who was confirmed by the Senate in December 2017, is a government veteran, having previously worked at the Office of Management and Budget, the Department of Justice and as an associate White House counsel. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo thanked Newstead for her service in a statement, without addressing where she was going.

Comment: Further solidifying the cozy relationship between Facebook and the US government:

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Biohazard

Starbucks forced to install needle-disposal boxes in locations across America following OSHA penalties and worker concerns about drug use in bathrooms

Kate Taylor
Business Insider
Mon, 22 Apr 2019 00:00 UTC
Starbucks
© AP Photo/Charles Krupa
Starbucks' efforts to address opioid use and improperly disposed needles in its bathrooms are expanding.

Starbucks stores in at least 25 US markets have installed needle-disposal boxes in bathrooms in recent months. By this summer, the chain aims to have installed sharps boxes in bathrooms in all regions where such action has been deemed necessary.

The coffee giant also allows local district managers or store managers to put in requests to have sharps-disposal boxes installed in their locations' bathrooms.

"We are always working and listening to our partners on ways we can better support them when it comes to issues like these," Reggie Borges, a Starbucks representative, said in an email to Business Insider.

Starbucks has been testing solutions in recent months as workers' safety concerns have mounted, with thousands of employees signing a petition calling for Starbucks to place needle-disposal boxes in high-risk bathrooms.

Comment: If the above story doesn't drive home how far gone the opioid epidemic is in the US (among other types of drug use) then nothing can.

See also:

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Bell

What Jordan Peterson did for me

Rob Henderson
The New York Times
Mon, 22 Apr 2019 00:00 UTC
Jordan Peterson
© Mark Sommerfeld for The New York Times
Jordan Peterson at home in Toronto last year.
He's the reason I'm at Cambridge, which is why the university's decision to revoke his invitation to do research there is so disconcerting.

When people learn that I study psychology, they often ask, "What do you think of Jordan Peterson?" It's a tough question to respond to.

Dr. Peterson, a professor at the University of Toronto, rose to infamy in the wake of his protests against a Canadian human rights law he believed could result in jail time if he did not use a person's preferred pronouns. His star rose further as a result of his popular YouTube videos in which he rejects notions of political correctness and rails against what he calls left-wing bullying. As a result, he isn't always a popular figure.

Comment: A heartfelt reply from the other side - those affected by the outrage mob and their trigger-happy ban hammer.

See also:

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Eye 1

'So overboard it should be illegal': Facial recognition in airports begins to draws righteous anger from travelers

Eoin Higgins
Common Dreams
Mon, 22 Apr 2019 00:00 UTC
Passengers at LAX using biometric boarding
© Finnair Twitter
Passengers at LAX using biometric boarding.
"It's actually the U.S. government that's implementing the biometric matching system that does all the hard analysis and crunching of the data."

A boarding technology for travelers using JetBlue is causing controversy due to a social media thread on the airline's use of facial recognition.

Last week, traveler MacKenzie Fegan described her experience with the biometric technology in a social media post that got the attention of JetBlue's official Twitter account.


Comment: The world-wide surveillance juggernaut is unstoppable. No matter how much a reasonable, sane, lawful and righteous voice we may raise in protest, the military/intelligence apparatus that is taking tabs on the movement and lives of every man, woman and child that eats and breathes - wants to know exactly how easy or how difficult we will be to take control of. But despite how sophisticated their systems are, and no matter how many ways they try to contain us - their Trillion dollar efforts will, ultimately, come crashing down on them; much like a space rock falling on the Pentagon.

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Biohazard

Deadly swine fever spreads throughout China threatening massive pork shortage


RT
Mon, 22 Apr 2019 21:32 UTC
Hebei swine flu
© Reuters / Hallie Gu
Workers in protective suits are seen at a checkpoint near a farm where African swine fever was detected in Hebei province, China on February 26, 2019.
African swine fever has spread all across China's mainland, threatening the country's entire sprawling hog industry and the global supply of pork. The epidemic broke out nine months ago but still appears to be uncontained.

It has now reached China's southernmost province of Hainan - which had thus far been spared from swine fever. Over 140 pigs have already died from the disease at six farms in the province, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs said on Sunday.

The outbreak of the virus began last August and has now spread to all 31 provinces of mainland China, with more than 100 cases reported over the past few months across the country. The virus is highly contagious and deadly for pigs, it causes high fever, massive hemorrhaging in internal organs and, ultimately, death. While, fortunately, the African swine fever does not affect humans as such, it has heavily affected the massive pork industry of the country.

Comment: Food prices across the planet are already rising because of the increasingly erratic seasons and extreme weather events, animal pandemics could result in a catastrophe for our food supply:

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