NRA sues Florida over gun bill same day Gov. Scott signed it into action

March 10, 2018 / JR / Leave a comment

The law was enacted in the wake of the Valentine’s Day shooting death of 17 students and teachers at Stoneman Douglas, allegedly by a 19-year-old former male student who authorities said legally bought the AR-15-style rifle used in the attack.

The lawsuit names Attorney General Pam Bondi and Rick Swearingen, Commissioner of the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. Scott’s office said he was reviewing the lawsuit.

More about the school safety law

Read the NRA lawsuit aiming to shut down gun control law

Florida Governor Rick Scott signs gun control bill, arms some teachers

The complaint says the new law prohibits law-abiding citizens between the ages of 18 and 21 from lawfully purchasing a firearm of any kind.

FOLLOW THE LINK FOR THE FULL REPORT – JR

https://www.tallahassee.com/story/news/2018/03/09/nra-sues-florida-over-gun-bill-same-day-gov-scott-signed-law/412365002/

China’s Long Arm Reaches Into American Campuses

March 8, 2018 / JR / Leave a comment

When Chinese President Xi Jinping visited Washington on Sept. 24, 2015 on a state visit, hundreds of Chinese students lined the streets for hours, carrying banners and flags to welcome him. It was a remarkable display of seemingly spontaneous patriotism.

Except it wasn’t entirely spontaneous. The Chinese Embassy paid students to attend and helped organize the event. Working with Chinese Students and Scholars Associations (CSSAs) at local universities — a Chinese student organization with branches at dozens of schools around the country — government officials from the office of educational affairs at the Chinese Embassy in Washington collected the contact information of about 700 students who had signed up to attend. Embassy officials communicated with students via WeChat, a Chinese messaging app, during the event and into the night, responding to messages as late as 3 a.m.

According to a Chinese student at George Washington University who attended the event, participants each received about $20 for their effort, distributed through the CSSA a few months later.

This wasn’t an isolated example of paid political mobilization. A similar arrangement had occurred in February 2012, when Xi visited Washington as vice chairman. In that case, it took almost a year for the embassy to transfer the promised funds to the George Washington CSSA. In January 2013, the student group sent a message, recently reviewed by Foreign Policy, to its members saying the compensation from Xi’s welcome the previous year was finally available, and they could come pick up the cash at the campus community center if they brought a photo ID. The George Washington CSSA did not respond to a request for comment.

FOLLOW THE LINK FOR THE FULL REPORT – JR

http://foreignpolicy.com/2018/03/07/chinas-long-arm-reaches-into-american-campuses-chinese-students-scholars-association-university-communist-party/

Pentagon’s mysterious project breathes new life into UFO research

March 5, 2018 / JR / Leave a comment

Kean co-authored a stunning article in The New York Times late last year that revealed the existence of the Pentagon’s secret project to investigate unidentified flying objects — the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program (AATIP).

Months later, this is still earth-shaking news to those eager for the truth.

That’s because the last known government program to investigate UFO encounters — the Air Force’s Project Blue Book — officially ended almost 50 years ago in 1969.

“The researchers in this area have always speculated and wondered what is going on behind the scenes. Is there a government investigation into this? And now we know that the answer is yes,” Kean said. “It just establishes a credibility for the topic for people to know that our government takes it seriously enough to have put financial resources into it and to have studied it for all these years.”

According to the Times, $22 million was spent on AATIP from 2007 through the end of 2011. And although the funding stopped, Kean says the project did not.

“We know that this program existed, it still exists, and it investigated military cases and very significant cases of pilot encounters with these objects,” said Kean, who authored the 2010 New York Times best-selling book “UFOs: Generals, Pilots, and Government Officials Go on The Record.”

FOLLOW THE LINK FOR THE FULL REPORT – JR

https://wtop.com/government/2018/03/pentagons-mysterious-project-breathes-new-life-into-ufo-research/

Plane crashes into mountain in Iran killing all 66 passengers

February 18, 2018 / JR / Leave a comment

An Aseman Airlines plane carrying 66 passengers and crew has crashed into a mountain in central Iran, killing everyone on board.

The airline confirmed there were no survivors after the ATR 72 aircraft went down and vanished from radar on Sunday morning.

One child was said to be among those on board.

The plane was flying from the capital Tehran to Yasuj when it crashed into the Desa mountain in Isfahan province about 50 minutes after take-off.

Victims’ families were given the devastating news as they waited to greet their loved ones at the airport in Yasuj.

A passenger on board the doomed plane was reported to have sent a chilling final photo to his girlfriend just before take-off.

The young man snapped an image of the plane’s wings and propellers, and wrote: “May God protect us to arrive safe.”

FOLLOW THE LINK FOR THE FULL REPORT – JR

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/iran-plane-crash-live-updates-12045694

Twitter Followers Vanish Amid Inquiries Into Fake Accounts

January 31, 2018 / JR / Leave a comment

The Times found evidence that the information of Twitter users in every state — including thousands of people in Florida and New York — had been copied onto bots sold by Devumi or rival companies.

The Distribution of Deception

At least 55,000 fake accounts use the names, profile pictures, hometowns and other personal details of real Twitter users, including minors, according to a Times data analysis. The original accounts list locations in all 50 U.S. states.

FOLLOW THE LINK FOR THE FULL REPORT – JR

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/01/31/technology/social-media-bots-investigations.html