British Columbia man flees to China after being charged for scam impersonating Canada Revenue Agency
Russia: Bourdain’s Field Notes
It’s February 2014, and the Sochi Olympics are just coming up when I arrive in Moscow. It’s a different Moscow every time I come here. The ’80s-style go-go capitalist, conspicuous consumption, see-who-can-spend-the-most-money, disco-techno thing that I encountered when I first came here back in 2001 is still going strong. In fact, these days, Moscow has one of the highest concentrations of billionaires in the world. But as never before, it’s imperial Russia now, a one-man rule. All power emanates from, every decision must consider [Vladimir Putin].
Whatever you think of this guy—his dead, affectless eyes, his smooth pulled-tight-like-a-snare-drum face—he ain’t going anywhere. Look at him. He’s the Russian Superman, the KGB middle manager desk jockey turned expression of Greater Russia’s hopes and dreams.
MICHAEL WALSH: The FBI is made of snitches, often trapping Americans into committing crimes.
UPDATE: FBI Delenda Est-But No Cato or Scipio Are In Sight.
After all, the FBI had advanced warnings about the Pulse nightclub shooter, the Parkland HS shooter, the Fort Hood shooter, and the San Bernardino shooters. Yet they all blazed away unmolested by our vigilant Federal dicks. (I also wonder about the Las Vegas shooter, whom the FBI cannot even figure out ex post. Or supposedly can’t. Maybe their ex post befuddlement is an attempt to conceal ex ante knowledge.)” . . .
Global phone hacks expose darker side of Israel's 'startup nation' image
Confessions of a New York Times Washington Correspondent – Bob Smith Pt 1/2
The New York Times is impartial when convenient…which wasn’t during Watergate, My Lai, the Iraq War, and the Trump era, for instance
Medium: “Google is telling anybody who will listen that the APIs and functionalities built into its Google Cloud platform will remain stable over time and will not fall victim to arbitrary decisions by the company, a fiction designed to avoid discussion of the company’s longstanding disregard for its users, which has led it, over the years, to ruthlessly eliminate countless services that had large user bases. Google’s infamous Spring Cleanings have long spread alarm among users, who feared seeing a product they had often invested time and effort disappear with little explanation. Over the years, Google has accumulated more than two hundred deleted products, carefully buried in the Google Graveyard, and the body count grows. What happened to the people who used those products? They went looking for alternatives provided by other companies…”
The details of how the delta variant works, better than I was expecting.