There are several PhDs listed here, that relate to blockchain. I've listed a few of the most relevant below. These are all UK given your English language preference. I assume you prefer the 'funded' options. Edit: note that for many of these, applications are accepted all year round. Funded: > Blockchain-enabled CBIM for life-cycle data provenance at UCL, London, UK. > To undertake industrial research with the aim of developing a strategy, architecture and prototype for an innovative service designed to securely store and monitor electronic awards using blockchain technology at University of Leicester, UK. Self-funded: > UAV-assisted Distributed Blockchain Technology to Secure the IoTs from DDoS at Kingston University, London. > A new approach to engineering secure microservices-based applications with blockchain and distributed ledger technologies at Edinburgh Napier University, UK. > The impact of Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) and cryptocurrencies on business financing. at Sheffield Hallam University, UK. > Designing interactions with digital money at Brunel University, UK. |
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Sorting by merit/post over the last year is a bit of trickster
It's quite sobering for me - I thought I was doing well, number 23 on the top recent merit list... but I'm number 970 on your merit per post list! I hope it is skewed by those with ultra low output. I'm trying to avoid coming to the conclusion that I'm only getting merit because I'm spewing out posts at an insane speed.  |
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If you could change one thing about America, what would you change?
A separate question that deserves a separate response. The US is the world power, and US decisions and activities resonate globally. The biggest problem that the world faces is inequality - not just within affluent Western societies with the fight against the 1%, but across the world - literally billions of people don't even have access to safe clean drinking water. Centrist politics is collapsing, and a wave of populist demagogues have swept to power. Modi in India is terrible, with his rampant Hindu nationalism, but we have other countries with similar situations, Duterte in the Phillippines, Bolsonaro in Brazil, Xi crushing dissent in China, we now have Boris Johnson here in the UK and of course we have Trump. With this in mind, the change I would like is Bernie as President. He can introduce reforms to curb the excesses of the elite, re-enfranchise (if that's a word) and reinvigorate working class and left-behind communities and drive down this rampant inequality. And with the US as an example, a new politics can gain traction across the world. Perhaps I'm being naive and unrealistic, but this is the change I'd like. The US leads and other countries follow. Bernie offers a huge opportunity for the US to show everyone else how countries should be run. |
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I support Bitcoin. Immutability has its uses. A public ledger makes taxation and reporting easy. I don't see why not?  From the perspective of a government, yes, absolutely. The immutability of the blockchain can have tremendous benefits. The problem with bitcoin from a government perspective is its decentralised nature. The government - any government - wants an immutable record where the government itself has complete control. You can see why they would want this, and it presents huge privacy concerns. This is the exact same problem as the Facebook coin. I believe that a large part of the purpose of any state controlled 'digital dollar' is surveillance. There are security issues, too - with a private blockchain, you have that single point of failure that is absent from a decentralised network. It's much easier for hackers or other bad actors to compromise a centralised chain. If you are going for public office and you support bitcoin, that's great! Just be wary of government demands for control, and the distinction between what bitcoin is, and what a subverted government-equivalent might look like. |
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It does appear that the crypto market took a bit of a hit due to coronavirus, similar to the normal stock markets. It may be coincidence, it may not. But what we definitely haven't seen is a flight-to-crypto from the normal markets... which does emphasise the fact that crypto is currently a long way from being seen as a safe haven during times of stock market turbulence.
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I think this is an example of a broad brush approach that can look stupid and pointless in certain cases, but is valuable in others. It's far easier for the government to say something like 'all businesses open to the public must make people use hand sanitisers' than it is for them to stipulate exact type of business and specific circumstances. So whilst it may seem over the top, it leads to less confusion and ensures it is implemented in places where it needs to be (as well as some of those where it doesn't need to be). Agree that other things can be more of a problem - regarding public toilets, having hand operated taps - faucets for US friends  - is an obvious issue. Come out of the toilet with dirty hands, touch the tap to make that dirty as well, clean your hands, touch the dirty tap again to turn it off before leaving... |
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It's getting heated; I'll just clear a few things up. The thread is about US treatment of Japanese Americans during WW2, subsequent apologies, and the question of whether those apologies are sufficient reparation. My contention is that with racially/nationally motivated acts like this, apologies and throwing money at people is not sufficient, and the best reparation is to try to prevent something like this happening again. I then suggested that lessons have not been learned, because tensions about race and national identity are rising all the time, stoked by the president. Further, I would suggest that any politicians (of either side) who don't call him out on this are complicit. That's all. I'm not going after Trump supporters. I'm saying that a lesson needs to be learned, and it's not being learned. I also notice that you didn't respond to my reply about a Muslim ban. So, straight up, was there, or was there not a Muslim ban? How about you address this one and only this one point.
Regarding the Muslim travel ban, I said I wasn't going to post a load of charts and statistics, but I did link out to some. Also I said I wasn't going after Trump supporters, and that some of the acts on the list I posted were by Trump-opponents against Trump-supporters. Saying that there are a lot of attacks on Trump supporters just reinforces my point. Trump incites hatred. He gets people fighting against each other. People from both sides. Indeed his constant banging on about Mexicans and Muslims and whoever else helps to create and reinforce those sides in the first place. If there is no racism, then there are no 'sides', people are just people irrespective of skin colour, religion, or nation of birth. If you punch someone in the face, then say sorry and give them a dollar, then punch someone else in the face a couple of minutes later, then the apology and the compensation look kind of meaningless.
^^ My whole argument can be distilled to this. |
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assets are being stripped away and transferred to the Central bankers. At the same time homeless people are defecating in the main streets of San Francisco.
people who have no health insurance or worthless health insurance that doesn't cover much.
Poverty - creates health issues, lowers education levels and increases crime.
Inequality is rising within western societies, and this is what leads voters to feel that they are not represented, which leads them to elect populist demagogues like Trump, who then maintains his power by playing on the base fears of the populace, and sowing division and resentment by getting the disenfranchised to fight amongst themselves whilst the rich cream off the profit. It's them Muslims and them Mexicans, right? Inequality is the underlying factor, it's the thing that enabled the election of the sort of president who would get impeached. The health insurance thing has always perplexed me. There's a widespread phobia of socialism and socialist policies, it's heresy and it impinges on fundamental rights of freedom and self-determination... and yet... the rich people who hate socialism still have health insurance. But health insurance is socialism, isn't it? It's shared risk, for the benefit of those in need. |
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I also believe reparations should have been based on a case-by-case basis simply because each case was probably different in one way or another.
Ideally, yes. In practice, given the number of cases, that's too impractical: 5 years later in 1988 the Civil Liberties Act came in to force and Congress backed reparation payments of $20,000 to each living survivor (or next of kin) along with a signed apology from the then US President Ronald Reagan. A total of around 82,000 people received payments.
Governments tend to deal in cold hard numbers. They will have committed a certain amount to reparations. Any investigations into the merits of each case would likely have come out of that $20k per person. The most efficient way to deal with it is same amount per person, and then process any appeals later if there aren't too many. That is all about logistics and dollars, though. It won't bring back the dead or heal ruined lives. The best reparation that can be made is to learn the lesson about why it occurred, and prevent it from ever happening again. My last post with that huge list of racially motivated crimes influenced by Trump may not appear to be relevant to the discussion, but actually it is absolutely central. If you imprison people from a racial motivation in the 1940s, then say sorry and pay compensation in the 1980s, and then another forty years later we have a president who is actively encouraging racial division, then no lessons have been learned. If the government aren't reining Trump in, then they are complicit. If you punch someone in the face, then say sorry and give them a dollar, then punch someone else in the face a couple of minutes later, then the apology and the compensation look kind of meaningless. |
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I was not aware of the other thread. And, anyway, the subjects are different.
Yes, absolutely. I wasn't implying they should be the same thread; yours is completely different. Apologies for any misunderstanding. I don't think "people's voice" will change anything. Nor mass media, unfortunately. Look at the petition for freeing Ross Ulbricht, which was signed already by 250.000 people. This petition was supposed to convince Trump to pardon Ross, as the Justice turned its back to him. So what happened, although a quarter of a million of people asked the president to pardon the man? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Yes. Politicians too often serve themselves rather than the people they represent. This coupled with the short-termism inherent in our democracies erodes trust in both politicians and the political process itself. It is by appealing to the baser instincts of disillusioned voters that demagogues like Trump are able to sweep into power. I'm going to link out again I'm afraid Quarter of a million people is quite a number, but the anti-Iraq-war protests of 2003 are estimated at up to 10 million demonstrators globally... and although there was some impact in some countries, the protests didn't stop the war. It is so easy for politicians and the establishment to manipulate voters, that they don't need to take any notice of protests - they will justify it all afterwards, or try to direct the public gaze onto other topics. It is important to shine a bright light on the stuff that governments would prefer to remain hidden. This is why people like Julian Assange are so important - and why the implications his extradition have for the First Amendment in the US are so troubling. Democracy is already on its knees; this could be the blow that kills it. |
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no demonization
No demonization
Instead of posting all of Trump’s let’s-incite-some-racial-hatred tweets, let’s have a look at the effects of what he says. There was that ABC investigation which found 36 criminal cases where Trump was invoked in direct connection with violent acts, threats of violence or allegations of assault. By comparison, they found zero criminal cases where an act of violence or threat was made in the name of Obama or even George W Bush. I’ve highlighted the Mexican and Muslim bits, but really he doesn’t discriminate in his hatred: they’re all bad. Please note that I’m not going after Trump supporters here; some of these attacks were by Trump supporters, some were by Trump opponents. My point is that he actively encourages a general climate of hatred.
Aug. 19, 2015: In Boston, after he and his brother beat a sleeping homeless man of Mexican descent with a metal pole, Steven Leader, 30, told police "Donald Trump was right, all these illegals need to be deported." The victim, however, was not in the United States illegally. The brothers, who are white, ultimately pleaded guilty to several assault-related charges and were each sentenced to at least two years in prison.
Dec. 5, 2015: After Penn State University student Nicholas Tavella, 19, was charged with "ethnic intimidation" and other crimes for threatening to "put a bullet" in a young Indian man on campus, his attorney argued in court that Tavella was just motivated by "a love of country," not "hate." "Donald Trump is running for President of the United States saying that, 'We've got to check people out more closely,'" Tavella's attorney argued in his defense. Tavella, who is white, ultimately pleaded guilty to ethnic intimidation and was sentenced to up to two years in prison.
April 28, 2016: When FBI agents arrested 61-year-old John Martin Roos in White City, Oregon, for threatening federal officials, including then-President Barack Obama, they found several pipe bombs and guns in his home. In the three months before his arrest, Roos posted at least 34 messages to Twitter about Trump, repeatedly threatening African Americans, Muslims, Mexican immigrants and the "liberal media," and in court documents, prosecutors noted that the avowed Trump supporter posted this threatening message to Facebook a month earlier: "The establishment is trying to steal the election from Trump. ... Obama is already on a kill list ... Your [name] can be there too." Roos, who is white, has since pleaded guilty to possessing an unregistered explosive device and posting internet threats against federal officials. He was sentenced to more than five years in prison.
June 3, 2016: After 54-year-old Henry Slapnik attacked his African-American neighbors with a knife in Cleveland, he told police "Donald Trump will fix them because they are scared of Donald Trump," according to police reports. Slapnik, who is white, ultimately pleaded guilty to "ethnic intimidation" and other charges. It's unclear what sentence he received.
Aug. 16, 2016: In Olympia, Washington, 32-year-old Daniel Rowe attacked a white woman and a black man with a knife after seeing them kiss on a popular street. When police arrived on the scene, Rowe professed to being "a white supremacist" and said "he planned on heading down to the next Donald Trump rally and stomping out more of the Black Lives Matter group," according to court documents filed in the case. Rowe, who is white, ultimately pleaded guilty to charges of assault and malicious harassment, and he was sentenced to more than four years in prison.
Sept. 1, 2016: The then-chief of the Bordentown, New Jersey, police department, Frank Nucera, allegedly assaulted an African American teenager who was handcuffed. Federal prosecutors said the attack was part of Nucera's "intense racial animus," noting in federal court that "within hours" of the assault, Nucera was secretly recorded saying "Donald Trump is the last hope for white people." The 60-year-old Nucera has been indicted by a federal grand jury on three charges, including committing a federal hate crime. Nucera, who is white, has pleaded not guilty and is awaiting trial. He retired two years ago.
September 2016: After 40-year-old Mark Feigin of Los Angeles was arrested for posting anti-Muslim and allegedly threatening statements to a mosque's Facebook page, his attorney argued in court that the comments were protected by the First Amendment because Feigin was "using similar language and expressing similar views" to "campaign statements from then-candidate Donald Trump." Noting that his client "supported Donald Trump," attorney Caleb Mason added that "Mr. Feigin's comments were directed toward a pressing issue of public concern that was a central theme of the Trump campaign and the 2016 election generally: the Islamic roots of many international and U.S. terrorist acts." Feigin, who is white, ultimately pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of sending harassing communications electronically. He was sentenced to probation.
Oct. 13, 2016: After the FBI arrested three white Kansas men for plotting to bomb an apartment complex in Garden City, Kansas, where many Somali immigrants lived, one of the men's attorneys insisted to a federal judge that the plot was "self-defensive" because the three men believed "that if Donald Trump won the election, President Obama would not recognize the validity of those results, that he would declare martial law, and that at that point militias all over the country would have to step in." Then, after a federal grand jury convicted 47-year-old Patrick Stein and the two other men of conspiracy-related charges, Stein's attorney argued for a lighter sentence based on "the backdrop" of Stein's actions: Trump had become "the voice of a lost and ignored white, working-class set of voters" like Stein, and the "climate" at the time could propel someone like Stein to "go to 11," attorney Jim Pratt said in court. Stein and his two accomplices were each sentenced to at least 25 years in prison.
Nov. 3, 2016: In Tampa, Florida, David Howard threatened to burn down the house next to his "simply because" it was being purchased by a Muslim family, according to the Justice Department. He later said under oath that while he harbored a years-long dislike for Muslims, the circumstances around the home sale were "the match that lit the wick." He cited Trump's warnings about immigrants from majority-Muslim countries. "[With] the fact that the president wants these six countries vetted, everybody vetted before they come over, there's a concern about Muslims," Howard said. Howard, who is white, ultimately pleaded guilty to a federal civil rights violation, and the 59-year-old was sentenced to eight months in prison.
Nov. 10, 2016: A 23-year-old man from High Springs, Florida, allegedly assaulted an unsuspecting Hispanic man who was cleaning a parking lot outside of a local food store. "[H]e was suddenly struck in the back of the head," a police report said of the victim. "[The victim] asked the suspect why he hit him, to which the suspect replied, 'This is for Donald Trump.' The suspect then grabbed [the victim] by the jacket and proceeded to strike him several more times," according to the report. Surveillance video of the incident "completely corroborated [the victim's] account of events," police said. The suspect was arrested on battery charges, but the case was dropped after the victim decided not to pursue the matter, police said. Efforts by ABC News to reach the victim for further explanation were not successful.
Nov. 12, 2016: In Grand Rapids, Michigan, while attacking a cab driver from East Africa, 23-year-old Jacob Holtzlander shouted racial epithets and repeatedly yelled the word, "Trump," according to law enforcement records. Holtzlander, who is white, ultimately pleaded guilty to a charge of ethnic intimidation, and he was sentenced to 30 days in jail.
Jan. 3, 2017: In Chicago, four young African-Americans -- sisters Brittany and Tanishia Covington, Jordan Hill and Tesfaye Cooper -- tied up a white, mentally disabled man and assaulted him, forcing him to recite the phrases "F--k Donald Trump" and "F--k white people" while they broadcast the attack online. Each of them ultimately pleaded guilty to committing a hate crime and other charges, and three of them were sentenced to several years in prison.
Jan. 25, 2017: At JFK International Airport in New York, a female Delta employee, wearing a hijab in accordance with her Muslim faith, was "physically and verbally" attacked by 57-year-old Robin Rhodes of Worcester, Mass., "for no apparent reason," prosecutors said at the time. When the victim asked Brown what she did to him, he replied: "You did nothing, but ... [Expletive] Islam. [Expletive] ISIS. Trump is here now. He will get rid of all of you." Rhodes ultimately pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of "menacing," and he was sentenced to probation.
Feb. 19, 2017: After 35-year-old Gerald Wallace called a mosque in Miami Gardens, Florida, and threatened to "shoot all y'all," he told the FBI and police that he made the call because he "got angry" from a local TV news report about a terrorist act. At a rally in Florida the day before, Trump falsely claimed that Muslim refugees had just launched a terrorist attack in Sweden. Wallace's attorney, Katie Carmon, later tried to convince a federal judge that the threat to kill worshippers could be "protected speech" due to the "very distinctly political climate" at the time. "There are courts considering President Trump's travel ban ... and the president himself has made some very pointed statements about what he thinks about people of this descent," Carmon argued in court. Gerald Sloane Wallace's attorney cited Trump as part of his defense in a June 2017 court hearing. Wallace, who is African American, ultimately pleaded guilty to obstructing the free exercise of his victims' religious beliefs, and he was sentenced to one year in prison.
Feb. 23, 2017: Kevin Seymour and his partner Kevin price were riding their bicycles in Key West, Florida, when a man on a moped, 30-year-old Brandon Davis of North Carolina, hurled anti-gay slurs at them and "intentionally" ran into Seymour's bike, shouting, "You live in Trump country now," according to police reports and Davis' attorney. Davis ultimately pleaded guilty to a charge of battery evidencing prejudice, but in court, he expressed remorse and was sentenced to four years of probation.
May 3, 2017: In South Padre Island, Texas, 35-year-old Alexander Jennes Downing of Waterford, Connecticut, was captured on cellphone video taunting and aggressively approaching a Muslim family, repeatedly shouting, "Donald Trump will stop you!" and other Trump-related remarks. Police arrested downing, of Waterford, Connecticut, for public intoxication. It's unclear what came of the charge.
May 11, 2017: Authorities arrested Steven Martan of Tucson, Arizona, after he left three threatening messages at the office Rep. Martha McSally, R-Ariz. In one message, he told McSally he was going to "blow your brains out," and in another he told her that her "days are numbered." He later told FBI agents "that he was venting frustrations with Congresswoman McSally's congressional votes in support of the President of the United States," according to charging documents. Martan's attorney, Walter Goncalves Jr., later told a judge that Martan had "an alcohol problem" and left the messages "after becoming intoxicated" and "greatly upset" by news that McSally "agreed with decisions by President Donald Trump." Martan, 58, has since pleaded guilty to three counts of retaliating against a federal official and was sentenced to more than one year in prison.
Oct. 22, 2017: A 44-year-old California man threatened to kill Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., for her frequent criticism of Trump and her promise to "take out" the president. Anthony Scott Lloyd left a voicemail at the congresswoman's Washington office, declaring: "If you continue to make threats towards the president, you're going to wind up dead, Maxine. Cause we'll kill you." After pleading guilty to one count of threatening a U.S. official, Lloyd asked the judge for leniency, saying he suffered from addiction-inducing mental illness and became "far too immersed in listening to polarizing political commentators and engaging in heated political debates online." His lawyer put it this way to the judge: "Mr. Lloyd was a voracious consumer of political news online, on television and on radio … [that are] commonly viewed as 'right wing,' unconditionally supportive of President Trump, and fiercely critical of anyone who opposed President Trump's policies." The judge sentenced Lloyd to six months of house arrest and three years of probation.
April 6, 2018: The FBI arrested 38-year-old Christopher Michael McGowan of Roanoke, Virginia, for allegedly posting a series of Twitter threats against Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., over several months. In one posting in December 2017, McGowan wrote to Goodlatte: "I threatened to kill you if you help Trump violate the constitution," according to charging documents. In another alleged post, the self-described Army veteran wrote: "If Trump tries to fire [special counsel Robert] Mueller I WILL make an attempt to execute a citizens arrest against [Goodlatte] and I will kill him if he resist." In subsequent statements to police, he said he drinks too much, was "hoping to get someone's attention over his concerns about the current status of our country," and did not actually intend to harm Goodlatte, court documents recount. A federal grand jury has indicted McGowan on one count of transmitting a threat over state lines, and it's unclear if he has entered a plea as he awaits trial.
July 6, 2018: Martin Astrof, 75, approached a volunteer at the campaign office of Rep. Lee Zeldin, R-N.Y., in Suffolk County, New York, and "state[d] he was going to kill supporters of U.S. congressman Lee Zeldin and President Donald Trump," according to charging documents. Astrof was arrested and ultimately pleaded guilty to reckless endangerment. He was sentenced to one year of probation.
August 2018: After the Boston Globe called on news outlets around the country to resist what it called "Trump's assault on journalism," the Boston Globe received more than a dozen threatening phone calls. "You are the enemy of the people," the alleged caller, 68-year-old Robert Chain of Encino, California, told a Boston Globe employee on Aug. 22. "As long as you keep attacking the President, the duly elected President of the United States ... I will continue to threat[en], harass, and annoy the Boston Globe." A week later, authorities arrested Chain on threat-related charges. After a hearing in his case, he told reporters, "America was saved when Donald J. Trump was elected president." Chain has pleaded guilty to seven threat-related charges, and he is awaiting sentencing.
Oct. 4, 2018: The Polk County Sheriff's Office in Florida arrested 53-year-old James Patrick of Winter Haven, Florida, for allegedly threatening "to kill Democratic office holders, members of their families and members of both local and federal law enforcement agencies," according to a police report. In messages posted online, Patrick detailed a "plan" for his attacks, which he said he would launch if then-nominee Brett Kavanaugh was not confirmed as a Supreme Court justice, the police report said. Seeking Patrick's release from jail after his arrest, Patrick's attorney, Terri Stewart, told a judge that her client's "rantings" were akin to comments from "a certain high-ranking official" -- Trump. The president had "threatened the North Korean people -- to blow them all up. It was on Twitter," Stewart said, according to the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. Patrick has been charged with making a written threat to kill or injure, and he has pleaded not guilty. His trial is pending.
Late October 2018: Over the course of a week, Florida man Cesar Sayoc allegedly mailed at least 15 potential bombs to prominent critics of Trump and members of the media. Sayoc had been living in a van plastered with pro-Trump stickers, and he had posted several pro-Trump messages on social media. Federal prosecutors have accused him of "domestic terrorism," and Sayoc has since pleaded guilty to 65 counts, including use of a weapon of mass destruction. He was sentenced to 20 years in prison. "We believe the president's rhetoric contributed to Mr. Sayoc's behavior," Sayoc's attorney told the judge at sentencing.
Dec. 4, 2018: Michael Brogan, 51, of Brooklyn, New York, left a voicemail at an unidentified U.S. Senator's office in Washington insisting, "I'm going to put a bullet in ya. … You and your constant lambasting of President Trump. Oh, reproductive rights, reproductive rights." He later told an FBI agent that before leaving the voicemail he became "very angry" by "an internet video of the Senator, including the Senator's criticism of the President of the United States as well as the Senator's views on reproductive rights." "The threats were made to discourage the Senator from criticizing the President," the Justice Department said in a later press release. Brogan has since pleaded guilty to one count of threatening a U.S. official, and he is awaiting sentencing.
Jan. 17, 2019: Stephen Taubert of Syracuse, New York, was arrested by the U.S. Capitol Police for threatening to kill Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., and for threatening to "hang" former President Barack Obama. Taubert used "overtly bigoted, hateful language" in his threats, according to federal prosecutors. On July 20, 2018, Taubert called the congresswoman's Los Angeles office to say he would find her at public events and kill her and her entire staff. In a letter to the judge just days before Taubert's trial began, his defense attorney, Courtenay McKeon, noted: "During that time period, Congresswoman Waters was embroiled in a public feud with the Trump administration. … On June 25, 2018, in response to Congresswoman Waters' public statements, President Trump tweeted: 'Congresswoman Maxine Waters, an extraordinarily low IQ person, has … just called for harm to supporters … of the Make America Great Again movement. Be careful what you wish for Max!'" As McKeon insisted to the judge: "This context is relevant to the case." A federal jury ultimately convicted Taubert on three federal charges, including retaliating against a federal official and making a threat over state lines. He was sentenced to nearly four years in prison.
Jan. 22, 2019: David Boileau of Holiday, Florida, was arrested by the Pasco County Sheriff's Office for allegedly burglarizing an Iraqi family's home and "going through" their mailbox, according to a police report. After officers arrived at the home, Boileau "made several statements of his dislike for people of Middle Eastern descent," the report said. "He also stated if he doesn't get rid of them, Trump will handle it." The police report noted that a day before, Boileau threw screws at a vehicle outside the family's house. On that day, Boileau allegedly told police, "We'll get rid of them one way or another." Boileau, 58, has since pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of trespassing, and he was sentenced to 90 days in jail.
Feb. 15, 2019: The FBI in Maryland arrested a Marine veteran and U.S. Coast Guard lieutenant, Christopher Paul Hasson, who they said was stockpiling weapons and "espoused" racist and anti-immigrant views for years as he sought to "murder innocent civilians on a scale rarely seen in this country." In court documents, prosecutors said the 49-year-old "domestic terrorist" compiled a "hit list" of prominent Democrats. Two months later, while seeking Hasson's release from jail before trial, his public defender, Elizabeth Oyer, told a federal judge: "This looks like the sort of list that our commander-in-chief might have compiled while watching Fox News in the morning. … Is it legitimately frustrating that offensive language and ideology has now become part of our national vocabulary? Yes, it is very frustrating. But … it is hard to differentiate it from the random musings of someone like Donald Trump who uses similar epithets in his everyday language and tweets." Hasson faces weapons-related charges and was being detained as he awaits trial. He has pleaded not guilty.
Feb. 15, 2019: Police in Falmouth, Massachusetts, arrested 41-year-old Rosiane Santos after she "verbally assault[ed]" a man for wearing a "Make America Great Again" hat in a Mexican restaurant and then "violently push[ed] his head down," according to police reports. Apparently intoxicated, "she stated that [the victim] was a 'motherf----r' for supporting Trump," one of the responding officers wrote. "She also stated that he shouldn't be allowed in a Mexican restaurant with that." Santos was in the United States unlawfully, federal authorities said. Police arrested her on charges of "simple assault" and disorderly conduct. She has since admitted in local court that there are "sufficient facts" to warrant charges, and she has been placed on a form of probation.
Feb. 25, 2019: An 18-year-old student at Edmond Santa Fe High School in Edmond, Oklahoma, was captured on cellphone video "confronting a younger classmate who [was] wearing a 'Make America Great Again' hat and carrying a 'Trump' flag," according to a press release from the local school system. "The [older] student then proceeds to grab the flag and knock the hat off of his classmate's head." The 18-year-old student was charged in local court with assault and battery, according to Edmond City Attorney Steve Murdock. The student has since pleaded guilty and was placed on probation, Murdock added.
March 16, 2019: Anthony Comello, 24, of Staten Island, New York, was taken into custody for allegedly killing Francesco "Franky Boy" Cali, the reputed head of the infamous Gambino crime family. It marked the first mob boss murder in New York in 30 years, law enforcement officials told ABC News the murder may have stemmed from Comello's romantic relationship with a Cali family member. Court documents since filed in state court by Comello's defense attorney, Robert Gottlieb, said Comello suffers from mental defect and was a believer in the "conspiratorial fringe right-wing political group" QAnon. In addition, Gottlieb wrote: "Beginning with the election of President Trump in November 2016, Anthony Comello's family began to notice changes to his personality. … Mr. Comello became certain that he was enjoying the protection of President Trump himself, and that he had the president's full support. Mr. Comello grew to believe that several well-known politicians and celebrities were actually members of the Deep State, and were actively trying to bring about the destruction of America." Comello has been charged with one count of murder and two counts of criminal possession of a weapon. His trial is pending, and he has pleaded not guilty.
April 5, 2019: The FBI arrested a 55-year-old man from upstate New York for allegedly threatening to kill Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., one of the first two Muslim women elected to the U.S. Congress. She is an outspoken critic of Trump, and Trump has frequently launched public attacks against her and three other female lawmakers of color. Two weeks before his arrest, Patrick Carlineo Jr. allegedly called Omar's office in Washington labeling the congresswoman a "terrorist" and declaring: "I'll put a bullet in her f----ing skull." When an FBI agent then traced the call to Carlineo and interviewed him, Carlineo "stated that he was a patriot, that he loves the President, and that he hates radical Muslims in our government," according to the FBI agent's summary of the interview. Federal prosecutors charged Carlineo with threatening to assault and murder a United States official. Carlineo is awaiting trial, although his defense attorney and federal prosecutors are working on what his attorney called another "possible resolution" of the case.
April 13, 2019: 27-year-old Jovan Crawford, of Gaithersburg, Maryland, and 25-year-old Scott Roberson Washington, D.C., assaulted and robbed a black man wearing a red "Make America Great Again" hat while walking through his suburban Maryland neighborhood. Before punching and kicking him, "The two suspects harassed [the victim] about the hat and asked why he was wearing it. [The victim] told them he has his own beliefs and views," according to charging documents filed after their arrest by Montgomery County, Maryland, police. Crawford later received a text message noting that, "They jumped some trump supporter," the charging documents said. Crawford and Roberson have since pleaded guilty to assault charges and are awaiting sentencing.
April 18, 2019: The FBI arrested John Joseph Kless of Tamarac, Florida, for calling the Washington offices of three prominent Democrats and threatening to kill each of them. At his home, authorities found a loaded handgun in a backpack, an AR-15 rifle and hundreds of rounds of ammunition. In later pleading guilty to one charge of transmitting threats over state lines, Kless admitted that in a threatening voicemail targeting Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., he stated: "You won't f---ing tell Americans what to say, and you definitely don't tell our president, Donald Trump, what to say." Tlaib, a vocal critic of Trump, was scheduled to speak in Florida four days later. Kless was awaiting sentencing. In a letter to the federal judge, he said he "made a very big mistake," never meant to hurt anyone, and "was way out of line with my language and attitude."
April 24, 2019: The FBI arrested 30-year-old Matthew Haviland of North Kingstown, Rhode Island, for allegedly sending a series of violent and threatening emails to a college professor in Massachusetts who publicly expressed support for abortion rights and strongly criticized Trump. In one of 28 emails sent to the professor on March 10, 2019, Haviland allegedly called the professor "pure evil" and said "all Democrats must be eradicated," insisting the country now has "a president who's taking our country in a place of more freedom rather than less." In another email the same day, Haviland allegedly wrote the professor: "I will rip every limb from your body and … I will kill every member of your family." According to court documents, Haviland's longtime friend later told the FBI that "within the last year, Haviland's views regarding abortion and politics have become more extreme … at least in part because of the way the news media portrays President Trump." Haviland has been charged with cyberstalking and transmitting a threat in interstate commerce. His trial is pending.
June 5, 2019: The FBI arrested a Utah man for allegedly calling the U.S. Capitol more than 2,000 times over several months and threatening to kill Democratic lawmakers, whom he said were "trying to destroy Trump's presidency." "I am going to take up my second amendment right, and shoot you liberals in the head," 54-year-old Scott Brian Haven allegedly stated in one of the calls on Oct. 18, 2018, according to charging documents. When an FBI agent later interviewed Haven, he "explained the phone calls were made during periods of frustration with the way Democrats were treating President Trump," the charging documents said. The FBI visit, however, didn't stop Haven from making more threats, including: On March 21, 2019, he called an unidentified U.S. senator's office to say that if Democrats refer to Trump as Hitler again he will shoot them, and two days later he called an unidentified congressman's office to say he "was going to take [the congressman] out … because he is trying to remove a duly elected President." A federal grand jury has since charged Haven with one count of transmitting a threat over state lines. Haven pleaded not guilty and was awaiting trial.
Aug. 3, 2019: A gunman opened fire at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, killing 22 people and injuring 24 others. The FBI labeled the massacre an act of "domestic terrorism," and police determined that the alleged shooter, 21-year-old Patrick Crusius, posted a lengthy anti-immigrant diatribe online before the attack. "We attribute that manifesto directly to him," according to El Paso police chief Greg Allen. Describing the coming assault as "a response to the Hispanic invasion of Texas," the screed's writer said "the media" would "blame Trump's rhetoric" for the attack but insisted his anti-immigrant views "predate Trump" -- an apparent acknowledgement that at least some of his views align with some of Trump's public statements. The writer began his online essay by stating that he generally "supports" the previous writings of the man who killed 51 Muslim worshippers in New Zealand earlier this year. In that case, the shooter in New Zealand said he absolutely did not support Trump as "a policy maker and leader" -- but "[a]s a symbol of renewed white identity and common purpose? Sure." Crusius has been charged with capital murder by the state of Texas.
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Do you mean DNC or the voters? DNC would "support" him in the general election
I meant the DNC, and specifically the distinction between support and "support". Yes the electorate are lemmings, but I think that's a separate issue. I'm going to shut up about the UK in a minute, because I don't want to derail a fascinating thread, but over on this side of the Atlantic we have seen over the last few decades that politicians have become more centrist. Of course centrism is relative, and the movement has largely been the left moving rightwards, because socialism was invalidated in the eyes of the electorate with the fall of the Berlin Wall. But the two main parties have become more alike, and on occasion indistinguishable. Now at the same time, inequality has been rising and a lot of voters feel disenfranchised and unrepresented. Many voters have abandoned the centre to support radical outsider candidates from both the far-left and the far-right. The result of this is that the representatives of both parties are more similar to one another than they are to their respective voters. It is against this backdrop that we saw a huge body of Labour MPs preferring to sabotage their own electoral prospects in order to bring down their outsider leader. They saw having a Conservative government for a few years as a small price to pay in exchange for rooting out the socialism in their own party. This is what I worry about in the US. I know the systems are somewhat different, but beneath it all people are people and the same everywhere. Support and "support" can produce profoundly different outcomes. |
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whichever candidate wins this party will yet be divided and therefore is doomed to fail in the upcoming elections, and do mark my words that Trump will win with a very big margin because of their infighting and inability to stick together.
Exactly what happened in the UK. Jeremy Corbyn won the leadership of the Labour party back in 2015 on a radical leftist platform (or what passes for radical these days - would have been mainstream a few decades back). He secured 60% of the vote of party members and affiliated supporters... but prior to this he only just got on the ballot in the first place, barely scraping past the minimum threshold of votes from Labour MPs, who were mostly centrist Blairites. Once elected leader, he faced a constant barrage of attacks from his own MPs, a series of carefully orchestrated resignations and even a leadership challenge that was absurd to the point of pantomime, with the challenger desperately trying to win votes by claiming to support all of Corbyn's own policies (in which case why challenge?). Finally, after losing the 2019 election - which was all about Brexit rather than domestic policy, Corbyn resigned. Really don't want this to happen with Bernie, but the parallels are striking. There is this huge disconnect between the elected representatives and the voters who they supposedly represent. If Bernie gets past the party, and wins, and then goes up against Trump, will his own party support him, or will they prefer Trump to win because it would mean that next time around Bernie is out and they can pick one of their own instead of this impertinent upstart outsider? Genuine question, because that's what happened here in the UK. |
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I don't know if you noticed, but in your first link is stated the following: On 23 February 2020, the Dunn family urged the UK government to refuse the extradition request of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange which was made by the US government until they returned Anne Sacoolas back to the UK. They accused the US government of hypocrisy and said that the US had launched an attack on the Special Relationship between both countries. So the second reason for which your example is outstanding is because this case is connected to the OP, to Assange!!! What were the odds?! Did you notice that in the link? Yes, I did know about that, sorry, I should have pointed it out. The accusation of hypocrisy is an interesting one. It may be a technicality, but I don't think the US is being hypocritical, because that implies some level of concealment of their true motivations and actions. No, the US are quite blatant about all this, it comes from being a global superpower. The UK used to behave the same way a hundred and more years ago, back when we ruled the world. If you are bigger and stronger than everyone else, then there is no need for secrecy or subterfuge; your brute strength already affords you all the advantage that you need. You can be as much of a blunt instrument as you desire. The term 'special relationship' always makes me wince. I mentioned it in another Assange thread yesterday: The family of Harry Dunn and various parts of the media in the UK are against extraditing Assange simply on the basis of what many are calling a one-sided extradition treaty
Any interaction between the US and the UK will be one-sided, be it an extradition treaty or a trade deal. This is inevitable given the disparities in power and influence between the two countries. The US is a global superpower. The UK is not. Simply, the UK does as it is told. If we look at the 'Special Relationship' that exists between the two countries, then the US benefits as the UK is in a strategically important location as the gateway to Europe, in both trade and defence, and the UK is also useful as a military ally so that any US adventurism in say the middle-east seems a tiny bit less unilateral. As for how the UK benefits, well, that's a little more difficult to determine. Perhaps we are first in the queue for any scraps that fall from the US table, perhaps not. This is one reason why Brexit was a bad idea. The UK outside Europe is stripped of much of its negotiating power, and absolutely at the mercy of US interests. |
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Stop it. There is no demonization of Muslims nor of Mexicans. There was no Muslim travel ban. How can any thinking person think that it was a "Muslim" travel ban.
I was going to reply with a list of Trump's tweets about Mexican rapists, and some stats from here about the Muslim travel ban... but I really can't be bothered. No demonization? Seriously? You've heard he's building a wall to keep the Mexicans out, right? |
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some are more equal than others.
The US does as it pleases, and everyone else is expected to toe the line. That 2004 case is revealing, but here in the UK we have one from just a few months ago: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Harry_DunnIn this instance, Anne Sacoolas, the (US) wife of a US intelligence officer stationed in the UK, crashed into and killed a motorcyclist. The officer's wife admitted that she was responsible and was driving on the wrong side of the road. She fled the UK under diplomatic immunity, and the US rejected the UK's subsequent extradition request. The UK was "disappointed in this decision which appears to be a denial of justice"... |
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It's hard to say what will happen to him. But nullius pointed out something very important: " By what right does the United States presume jurisdiction over Assange? He is a not an American citizen, and is thus not generally subject to the personal jurisdiction of American laws. He is not alleged to have committed any acts within American territorial jurisdiction."
I really wonder how this will be explained during the trial.
I'm no expert, but my naive understanding is: Assange is accused of hacking into US databases and publishing sensitive security information, thereby 'endangering lives', i.e. a crime against the US and US citizens, so answerable in the US. The UK has an extradition treaty with the US, and for the hearing to go ahead, the judge in the UK just needs to be convinced that the alleged crime is one that might have led to trial here, had it occurred in the UK. There is no consideration of guilt here, merely an assessment of the nature of the alleged crime. The US just needs to convince the UK that there is a case that needs answering. I believe there is something in there whereby the UK won't allow extradition where the accused could face the death penalty, but I don't think the US want the death penalty anyway in this instance... It may be a flimsy pretext, but in practice that doesn't matter. The UK will perform as instructed. |
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a number of new tokens that appeared on the market whose prices were far from the initial price they sold (ICO / IEO) even projects that raised funds around 50 million USD the price went up for a moment (flash pump) after that fell to the bottom
Price is an indicator, but it needs to be considered alongside volume, particularly for new coins. This is why marketcap can be so misleading. Scenario: There is a new coin that raises $10m at ICO, and there are 10m coins in circulation. There is zero trading volume on the coin. I buy 1 coin for $10. The coin instantly has a marketcap (latest trading price*number of coins) of $10*10m coins =$100m ... which is absurd, and clearly misleading. There's no way their project has suddenly become worth x10 what it was a moment ago, purely on the basis of one person putting $10 into it. If you see huge price volatility, it can mean that a large number of people are buying up large quantities of the coin, but equally it can mean that one person has made one small order. Always always look at volume. |
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Why skin is black because they have high melanin content on their skin which protects them from UV radiation effects but it doesn't mean that skin colour decides the immune of a human body and corona virus is not spreading through skins it more likely due to respiratory so that chinese doctor lied. Exactly. It's absurd and racist to suggest that superficial differences such as skin colour are relevant. "African immunity" has been discussed before, and (I believe) is due largely to a lack of direct air travel from China: The Chineese govt. says uptil date there has been no report of an nCov victims in Africa except for those in foreign countries. The report further stated that this could be to the hot weather. rendering these enviroment completely nCov attack-free zone. nCov started in China. Cases in other countries have spread from China. If there are zero cases in Africa, the most obvious explanation surely is that there are relatively few people (and therefore relatively few infected people) moving from China to Africa. Look at the distribution by country (first chart below, as of today). What you see is a lot of cases in countries close to China, and some cases in countries that have a lot of international travellers. The USA has over 50 cases, Mexico has none. Both countries have over 100m inhabitants. Are Mexicans somehow immune? Or is there more travel between China-US than between China-Mexico? Compare the nCov cases chart (first below) with the list of China Air international destinations (second below). The parallels are striking.  https://www.ecdc.europa.eu/en/geographical-distribution-2019-ncov-cases https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_China_Airlines_destinations |
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Although I myself do not agree with Assange about everything, I highly respect for his stand on principle. It is why he is so hated by the U.S. government: He cannot be bought, he cannot be terrorized, he cannot be persuaded. Not unless they can get him bodily under their control.
I feel the same. He's hugely important, both for what's he's done so far and as a figurehead, but - whether from arrogance or from the unremitting psychological pressure - he has made some stupid decisions. Interesting to compare with Snowden, for example. He cannot be bought or terrorized, yes. 'Persuaded' is a sub-category of both, and a euphemism. the American so-called “prosecution” of Assange raises an issue of world-historical import that I have not seen many others discuss: By what right does the United States presume jurisdiction over Assange? He is a not an American citizen, and is thus not generally subject to the personal jurisdiction of American laws. He is not alleged to have committed any acts within American territorial jurisdiction. It is only yet another instance of America enforcing international reach for its diktat, on the basis of: “We have the most guns, we have nukes—and most of all, we have the global poison power of the dollar.”
Bought or terrorized. Arguably 'bought' in the context of the US and any international resistance is a sub-category of terrorized. The threat can be implicit or explicit, but is there. Sanctions are only the start of it. What does the US want? Wealth or power? Money is nothing but a manifestation of power... with this in mind, looking at a US reeling from the reputational damage caused by Assange and the Wikileaks exposures is very much like looking at a wounded predator. Is the US more annoyed by the actual damage or by the affront, by the fact that someone has the temerity to stand up to their global hegemony? If one man is willing to stand against them, then others will do so. Opposition is a threat and must be suppressed. I think the fact that the US is demanding extradition is quite revealing here; they are not calmly sitting in the background awaiting an impartial outcome, it's a show trial with the outcome predetermined due to US pressure. The US is flexing its muscles very publicly: no, we're not damaged, we're still strong, we're still in control. Bluster and posturing is often indicative of underlying insecurity. Assange has them rattled. Quoting from one of the links in OP: “Assange impeded Moreno’s ability to seek technical assistance, international loans, and greater security and commercial cooperation with the United States,” says Polga-Hecimovich. All of that was badly needed if Ecuador was going to rebound from Correa’s economic mess. To remedy the problem, [Lenin] Moreno tacked more to the political center as a way to attract foreign investment. Those efforts were noticed by the United States. “Prior to your election, our nations had experienced 10 difficult years where our people always felt close but our governments drifted apart,” Vice President Mike Pence said alongside Moreno in Quito, Ecuador’s capital, last June. “But over the past year, Mr. President, thanks to your leadership and the actions that you’ve taken have brought us closer together once again.” Likely helped, at least in part, by the thawing in relations with the US, Ecuador in March received a $4.2 billion loan from the International Monetary Fund to help rebuild the nation’s economy. Otherwise stated: The aptly-named Lenin Moreno sold his country, and sold Julian Assange. $$$“Prior to your election, our nations had experienced 10 difficult years where you people didn't do exactly what you were god-damned told,” Vice President Mike Pence implied. Assange was a fool for coming to the UK. I'm from the UK; we're a vassal state of the US. We are the ally who like a good little puppy eagerly does what we're told; we're the country who can be relied upon to send in a few token tanks so that US unilateral intervention in the middle-east can be painted with a veneer of multilateralism. The Ecuadorian embassy stuff was only ever a delay of the inevitable. Ecuador was bound to buckle eventually under US pressure; they aren't Cuba bolstered by the might of a Soviet Union. I really hope he gets out of this, but I'm not optimistic. There is quite vocal opposition from a First Amendment perspective, but I can't see this having much sway over a president who sees laws as an irritating inconvenience. |
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