Daily Archives: December 9, 2021

Germany Is Medically Segregating The Unvaccinated From Public Life – The Federalist

Posted: December 9, 2021 at 1:45 am

Germany enacted restrictions on Thursday prohibiting citizens who havent received a COVID-19 vaccine from entering most public venues and businesses.

According to Reuters, the decision to implement medical segregation came after [O]utgoing Chancellor Angela Merkel and her successor Olaf Scholz agreed with leaders of Germanys 16 states to bar the unvaccinated from access to all but the most essential businesses such as grocery stores, pharmacies and bakeries. Only individuals who are vaccinated or have recovered from the virus will be allowed access to restaurants, theaters, and other so-called nonessential stores.

Additional restrictions set to take effect include shutting nightclubs in places with high infection rates, strict limits on the number of spectators at large public events such as soccer games, and a nationwide ban on gatherings and fireworks at New Year.

German officials also agreed on passing legislation that would force individuals to get the COVID jab, with the lower house of parliament expected to vote on the measure soon.

Were in a very, very difficult situation, said Scholz. We have very many citizens who are vaccinated but not enough to prevent another wave of infections. Those who have not been vaccinated must do so, and thats my very urgent personal appeal. Merkel also said she would vote for the measure if she were in parliament, marking a departure from her previous stance that getting jabbed was a personal choice.

The push for greater government-based restrictions in Germany comes on the heels of the latest wave of COVID cases and COVID-related deaths in the European nation. Despite 79.3 percent of the entire adult population (18 and older) being fully vaccinated, the country has reportedly experienced a 32 percent rise in cases and 54 percent rise in deaths over the course of the past two weeks.

Other legislation expected to be taken up by the nations parliament would provide regional governments additional overreaching powers, including measures like alcohol bans and limiting gatherings or hotel occupancy.

Shawn Fleetwood is an intern at The Federalist and a student at the University of Mary Washington, where he plans to major in Political Science and minor in Journalism. He also serves as a state content writer for Convention of States Action. Follow him on Twitter @ShawnFleetwood

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Germany Is Medically Segregating The Unvaccinated From Public Life - The Federalist

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Someone is killing Republicans and Trump voters – Religion News Service

Posted: at 1:45 am

(RNS) To say that someone is killing Republicans and Trump supporters in this country sounds like a conspiracy theory gone crazy. It is the kind of conspiracy theory that should be banned by Facebook and Twitter.

But the evidence is overwhelming.

People in counties that voted for Donald Trump in 2020 are dying at much higher rates from COVID-19 than people who live in counties that voted for Joe Biden, according to a study by National Public Radio.

Since May 2021, people living in counties that voted heavily for Donald Trump during the last presidential election have been nearly three times as likely to die from COVID-19 as those who live in areas that went for now-President Biden, NPR wrote in its report.

People living in counties that went 60% or higher for Trump in November 2020 had 2.7 times the death rates of those that went for Biden. Counties with an even higher share of the vote for Trump saw higher COVID-19 mortality rates.

Could this be because Trump voters were older? No, the trend was robust even after controlling for age.

RELATED: Is Trump killing his supporters?

What makes the difference? Vaccination rates. The percentage of people vaccinated in Trump counties is much lower than the percent vaccinated in counties that voted for Biden.

Republicans have one of the lowest vaccination rates in the country. According to an October poll by KFF, of the 27% of U.S. adults who are not vaccinated, 60% identify as Republican. Of these unvaccinated Republicans, 88% think that the seriousness of the coronavirus is exaggerated.

Who is responsible for these deaths?

Ironically, it is conservative political, media and religious elites who are causing these deaths by undermining public health directives aimed at protecting people from COVID-19. Science tells us that the best way to combat COVID is through vaccination, mask wearing and social distancing. These practices have been attacked by many conservative leaders, and it is killing Republican voters.

Sadly, I predicted this in my April 2020 column, Is Trump killing his supporters?

Democrats are unsuccessfully trying to save these Republicans by encouraging vaccinations, mask wearing and social distancing. Speaking in purely political terms with morality set aside, this is a mistake. Machiavellian pragmatism would dictate that the Democrats let the Republicans suppress their voter turnout by killing themselves. But that would be wrong.

Perhaps not surprisingly, progressive attempts to persuade Trump voters to get vaccinated have failed. Liberal urban elites can be arrogant and rural Americans arent prone to listening to those who look down on them as uneducated bumpkins. Perhaps if Democrats started arguing that Trump voters should be denied the vaccine, they would line up for the shot.

But in truth it is the absence of conservative voices supporting vaccinations, mask wearing and social distancing that is killing Republicans. Republican political leaders are cynically exploiting the crisis or are afraid to alienate their base by telling the truth. Meanwhile, conservative media outlets stoke the fires of conspiracy theories to increase their ratings and their profits.

But it is religious leaders who are most disappointing in their opposition or silence.

Although the Pew Research Center found only 5% of those attending religious services at least monthly say their clergy discouraged vaccination, another 54% heard nothing about vaccines from the pulpit. Theses preachers are either indifferent to COVID-19 or afraid to alienate anti-vaxxers in their congregations.

Despite Pope Francis encouragement to get the vaccine and some Catholic institutions mandates for their workers and students, 3% of Catholics said they were discouraged from being vaccinated. Another 52% had heard nothing from their priests.

Naysayers among Catholic leaders include Cardinal Raymond Burke, who was hospitalized and needed a ventilator in August after contracting COVID-19, and Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco, who made headlines by refusing to be vaccinated.

RELATED: Marcus Lamb, anti-COVID vaccine Christian broadcaster, dies at 64

Evangelical leaders have done worse than Catholics. Not only have a number of anti-vax preachers died of COVID-19; 73% of evangelical congregants saying they have heard nothing from their clergy about vaccines.

The anti-vaxxers have won by scaring faith leaders into silence.

It is too late for hundreds of thousands of COVID-19 victims who could have been saved if they had been vaccinated, but there is still time to save hundreds of thousands more if conservative leaders come to realize that they are killing their base.

Progressives cannot save Trump voters because they have no credibility with conservatives. It is up to conservative leaders to save their own.

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Someone is killing Republicans and Trump voters - Religion News Service

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Trump Keeps Beating His Republican Enemies Because Hes Willing to Break the Party – New York Magazine

Posted: at 1:45 am

In any contract or relationship, the person whos willing to walk away holds all the leverage. That dynamic is the key to understanding Donald Trumps takeover of the Republican party writ large as well as David Perdues primary challenge against Brian Kemp for the Republican nomination for governor in Georgia, which is the same phenomenon in miniature.

Go back to the time before Trump won the Republican nomination, when the Republican establishment and conservative movement elite stood opposed to him shoulder to shoulder. That opposition seemed to many of us to present an insurmountable obstacle to Trumps election in November. But the rights complaints about Trump, however loud, contained a crucial escape hatch. They were framed almost exclusively in pragmatic terms: Trump was, as National Review put it in its scathing editorial, a menace to American conservatism. But since Democrats were also menaces to conservatism, should Trump win the nomination, it was inevitable that they would fall behind him as the lesser evil.

Now the conservative establishment is objecting to Perdues primary challenge against Kemp. Perdues campaign is utterly devoid of policy content, and serves the sole function of advancing Trumps goal of liquidating internal resistance and aligning the party behind his refusal to accept electoral defeat. Unlike Trumps 2016 candidacy, Perdues has no confounding elements of populism or reality-show entertainment in the mixture. It is laboratory-pure authoritarianism.

But Perdues conservative critics register their objections at a far shallower level. The Wall Street Journal moans that Perdues campaign is a good way to turn a major state over to the progressive left, and the GOPs biggest obstacle will be party divisions. National Reviews Jim Geraghty calls Kemp a safe bet to prevail in November as the nominee, and warns, if the party doesnt unify behind whoever wins the primary, Stacey Abrams is probably going to be the next governor of Georgia. The Washington Examiner editorializes, Perdue is a good man, and it is a shame that he is no longer in the Senate, but it is at least as much a shame to see him splitting the Republican Party in the closely contested gubernatorial race.

None of these conservatives are drawing red lines, or even framing the case in any kind of moral terms. They are merely fretting that the primary will weaken the partys hand against the greater enemy of Stacey Abrams.

Is that argument even correct? Possibly so: Maybe Perdues association with Trump would alienate enough moderate voters to supply Abrams her winning margin. Alternatively, it is possible that a Kemp nomination would be hindered by opposition from Trump, who might very well prefer that she win to the reelection of a Republican who refused to help him steal the election.

Trump and Perdue no doubt grasp the imbalance here. The pro-Kemp forces are warning of division in the event Perdue wins, but ultimately they are not themselves willing to split from their party. Both factions are threatening schism, but only the Trumpian threat has credibility.

This imbalance in willpower has characterized the factional fights within the party for more than half a century. Ive recommended Rule and Ruin, Geoffrey Kabaservices history of the demise of the GOPs moderate wing, many times, though perhaps not often enough. The conservatives cared more about control of the party (rule) than the risk of losing (ruin). The moderates may have wished to rule, but were largely unwilling to threaten party unity.

Trumps long post-election purge is prevailing because of this same asymmetry of willpower. He is able to grasp that his remaining intraparty critics dont actually care about democracy. They merely want to win. His strategy is to force them to choose, knowing full well what their answer will be in the end.

Analysis and commentary on the latest political news from New York columnist Jonathan Chait.

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Trump Keeps Beating His Republican Enemies Because Hes Willing to Break the Party - New York Magazine

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Pa. House Republicans just proposed the first congressional map in a high-stakes redistricting process – The Philadelphia Inquirer

Posted: at 1:45 am

Republicans in the Pennsylvania State House unveiled a newly proposed congressional map Wednesday, taking the biggest step yet toward drawing new districts that will reshape elections for the next decade.

The citizen map was drawn by Amanda Holt, a well-known redistricting advocate who successfully sued to overturn the state legislative maps drawn in 2011. It was submitted to the House State Government Committee as part of an open call for maps from the public.

Holts map favors Republicans more than the current one, according to an analysis conducted for The Inquirer by the nonpartisan Princeton Gerrymandering Project. The current map was imposed by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in 2018, after it threw out a Republican-drawn map as an unconstitutional partisan gerrymander. The Holt proposal is less skewed toward Republicans than that 2011 map.

Using results from the 2016 presidential election, when Donald Trump won Pennsylvania by less than 1% of the vote, 10 of the proposed districts would vote for Trump and seven for Hillary Clinton, according to the analysis, which looks only at votes for the two major parties. Using the 2020 election, which Joe Biden won by slightly over 1%, the same 10 districts would vote for Trump and the seven others for Biden.

Being the first map introduced doesnt mean the proposal will be enacted. Lawmakers will have many opportunities to amend it, and state senators have been working on their own map. That proposal, negotiated by Democrats and Republicans, could be released as early as next week.

READ MORE: What to watch as Pennsylvania loses a congressional seat: The stakes are really high

State Rep. Seth Grove (R., York), the chair of the House committee, said he and fellow Republicans chose the Holt map partly because it was drawn by a member of the public known for supporting nonpartisan redistricting. He said he did not know how many Democratic, Republican, and competitive districts the map has.

He also said the map may make some people unhappy.

There might be some unhappy congressmen as well, he said. But thats a citizen map process, right? You have somebody with no skin in the game draw a map, and you take it. Sometimes you gotta smooth around the edges a bit.

Overall, Grove said, the map met the criteria he was looking for.

State Rep. Scott Conklin (D., Centre), the top Democrat on the House State Government Committee, said he was disappointed in the process. As the committee held public hearings across the state, Conklin said, those who came to testify urged lawmakers not to do a one-sided map.

House Democrats had no say in the proposal, he said: I was really hoping for better.

Politicians willingly giving up power is almost unheard of, so Groves decision to not draw his own map was an unexpected turn. Historically, redistricting has been an exercise in partisan gerrymandering, the process of drawing skewed maps to favor a political party.

New maps are drawn every 10 years to reflect changes in population, and Pennsylvanias congressional map is a piece of legislation, meaning it must pass through the Republican-controlled House and Senate and be approved by Gov. Tom Wolf, a Democrat, before becoming law. Pennsylvania is losing a seat as a result of population changes, as measured in the 2020 Census, and will have 17 House members starting in 2023.

Holt, a Lehigh County piano teacher, drew widespread attention in 2012 when the state Supreme Court cited her work in its decision to throw out a Republican-drawn map of state legislative districts. A Republican, Holt served on the Lehigh County Board of Commissioners and was later appointed to Wolfs Redistricting Reform Commission.

In 2011, the Republican-drawn congressional map so favored the GOP that, in election after election, the same 13 districts picked Republicans and the same five districts elected Democrats. That happened even as the state voted for Barack Obama in 2012 and Trump in 2016, and sent Bob Casey, a Democrat, and Pat Toomey, a Republican, to the U.S. Senate.

The state Supreme Court overturned that map in 2018, saying it was skewed so strongly for Republicans that it violated the state constitutions guarantee that elections shall be free and equal.

Pennsylvania is expected to have several competitive congressional elections next year that will help determine which party controls the U.S. House. And in a large swing state with roughly equal numbers of Democrats and Republicans, that makes drawing the congressional map an important way of shaping political power.

READ MORE: Pennsylvania, gerrymandered: A guide to Pa.s 2018 congressional map redistricting fight

Determining whether a map favors one party can be complicated. There are multiple ways to measure maps, and they can sometimes disagree. Experts generally use multiple methods to get an overall sense.

And some degree of pro-Republican skew may be natural for Pennsylvanias political geography, given how Democrats cluster into deep-blue cities, including Philadelphia.

On three commonly used measures known as packed wins, mean-median difference, and partisan bias the Princeton analysis found the proposed map favors Republicans more than the current one. Looking at an average of two-party election results for statewide races in 2016, 2018, and 2020, seven districts are strongly Republican and five are strongly Democratic, in which a party received more than 55% of the vote. Of the remaining five districts, three leaned Democratic and two leaned Republican.

Those numbers vary when looking at specific elections, such as in the 2018 Democratic wave. But Republicans would generally fare better than Democrats across the range of elections under the proposed map.

The House State Government Committee is scheduled to meet Thursday to review the map, and to vote Monday on amending and approving it. Grove said a full House vote wouldnt take place until January at the earliest.

Meanwhile, State Sen. David Argall (R., Schuylkill), who chairs the Senate State Government Committee, is preparing to unveil a map hes been working on with Sen. Sharif Street (D., Philadelphia), the committees ranking Democrat.

The senators plan to jointly introduce the map, making it a bipartisan proposal.

It should be, and it especially should be this year, because we have strong Republican majorities in the House and Senate, and we have a very Democratic governor, Argall said. And so if we are going to succeed in passing legislation on this very important subject, its going to require bipartisan cooperation.

Street is said to be interested in running for Congress himself, though hes also been weighing a bid for the U.S. Senate. Sources familiar with the congressional map emerging from the Senate said it may redraw Philadelphia-based seats in a way that would move U.S. Rep. Brendan Boyle into a new district potentially creating an opening for Street.

The senators plan to introduce their map as early as next week, said Brittany Crampsie, spokesperson for Senate Democrats.

Argall said he would certainly hope to announce the map next week: Weve made significant progress, but we still need some more time.

Argall said he didnt yet know whether his bipartisan map would be introduced as its own legislation; it could also amend and replace the House proposal entirely. Asked which map Holts or the Senates is more likely to look like the final product, Argall demurred.

You have to remember, there are 203 members of the House that are going to weigh in on this, there are 50 senators, theres the governor, he said. Its just impossible to predict.

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Pa. House Republicans just proposed the first congressional map in a high-stakes redistricting process - The Philadelphia Inquirer

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Firefox Monitor may remove personal information now from the Internet – Ghacks Technology News

Posted: at 1:43 am

@Thanksgiving-Man

> Niessa asked about privacy, not anonymity. Do you even know the difference Iron Heart?

Dude, Tor provides anonymity, but it also provides privacy. Privacy is a subset of anonymity, Firefox lacks certain qualities that would be required for anonymity (like shared IP addresses of nodes). I know the difference, seems like you dont realize how the two relate to each other.

> full state partitioning (networking partitioning and Total Cookie Protection) is more than the equivalent of Tor Browsers FPI

*Yawn* Its not that much better, *[editor: removed].

Also, cookies What year is it? Even Google doesnt care about that anymore, hence FLoC.

> HTTPS-Only Mode is more than the equivalent of HTTPS-Everywheres EASE

And? Every single browser has that these days, including most Chromium-based browsers.

> have you even read it Iron Heart?

No. Give me a good reason to read a website created by hobbyists who have never written a single line of code, listening to other people who are full of themselves but have also never written a single line of code!? Are these guys software engineers, do they know what they are talking about? I doubt it.

Also, just like 97% of the overall internet population, I dont want / need / like Firefox, why should I read a guide discussing it, stating things I already know and already wasnt impressed by?

> Tor Browser is no more private than Firefox with two setting changes

LOL, clueless. Read up on the subject, suffice to say that you are wrong.

> site Isolation: rollout is already at 100% for windows/mac

Wow, Chromium had this since 2018, three years ago. Welcome to the party with your immature implementation that can also be enabled in Tor btw.

> further security features in RLBox

Wow, yet another thing Chromium has had for years.

> lets not forget latency and other usability issues with Tor Browser

OK? OP asked for the most private browser, and despite slight usability issues of Tor, its not Firefox.

> you can add uBlock Origin

Yeah, have fun getting your chosen adblock lists fingerprinted no wonder Tor advises against installing it, contrary to the clueless hobbyists you listen to. Its definitely so much better than system- / network-wide blockers. Oh wait, it isnt.

*[editor: removed]

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Firefox Monitor may remove personal information now from the Internet - Ghacks Technology News

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The Real Russia. Today. Reining in an unruly Communist Party Meduza – Meduza

Posted: at 1:43 am

Wednesday, December 8, 2021

The Russian Investigative Committee is looking into the work of popular rappers Oxxxymiron and Noize MC after receiving a complaint about their lyrics. As it turns out, the basis for the probe was a satirical LiveJournal post by a left-wing opposition activist, who immediately acknowledged that he wrote it as a joke. With a pre-trial check already underway, Russian investigators now have ten days to decide whether or not to initiate a criminal case. Will they get the joke and drop the probe? Meduza asks experts to weigh in.

Russian Supreme Court upholds presidential decree on classifying NKVD employment records (Yeltsins 1995 orders will stand, thwarting historian Sergey Prudovskys research efforts)

Presidential Human Rights Council chairman asks Moscow mayor to look into upsetting subway signs written in Uzbek and Tajik (Some Muscovites see the signs as evidence that migrants arent integrating into Russian society, says Valery Fadeyev. The ubiquity of English-language text throughout the capital apparently does not trigger people, however.)

Russian Supreme Court sends murder conviction of Nikita Tikhonov and Yevgenia Khasis for appellate review, following ECHR decision in February (The two were convicted of killing lawyer Stanislav Markelov and Novaya Gazeta journalist Anastasia Baburova in 2009. Novaya Gazeta editor-in-chief Dmitry Muratov has vowed to help uphold the conviction, which the ECHR says was the result of an unfair trial.)

Lawmakers adopt legislation expanding police powers (Officers will get more search-and-seizure authority, but the State Duma stopped short of formalizing something akin to qualified immunity. Officers will now be permitted to withhold their name and rank if they feel it might endanger them or impede their work. The legislation sanctions practices that are already commonplace, says Mediazona.)

TikTok vlogger sentenced to two years and eight months in prison for attacking FSB squad car during January protests against Navalnys arrest (Konstantin Lakeyev has been in jail since the start of the year)

Federal Investigative Committee director chides generals for allowing Russias acquittal rate to rise though its still less than 1 percent (Alexander Bastrykin expressed concerns about jury trials and instructed staff to work with prosecutors to challenge unjudicial rulings. In 2020, Russian courts acquitted 2,256 people 0.36 percent of all verdicts.)

In 2021, Russias Communist Party managed to become a headache again for the Kremlin, reemerging as a genuine threat to the countrys ruling political party. The Communists staged protests, nominated unruly candidates for the State Duma, and opposed the governments unpopular introduction of COVID-19 vaccine passports. In return, the partys members have found themselves under felony investigation and at the center of attack pieces in the pro-government media. Meduza special correspondent Andrey Pertsev examines how the Kremlin and Russias security apparatus have targeted the Communist Party, and he explores what we know about President Putins thoughts on the campaign.

A methane blast at the Listvyazhnaya coal mine in Siberias Kemerovo region killed 51 people on November 25. It was the deadliest mining accident Russia had seen since 2010. The explosion sent toxic smoke through the mines ventilation system, suffocating miners and rescue workers who came to their aid. But as miners at the Listvyazhnaya told Meduza, the mines methane levels had been critical for about two weeks beforehand, ever since a rock collapse completely crushed a ventilation shaft. The Listvyazhnayas management, however, opted against shutting down operations. According to the miners Meduza spoke to, their bosses were afraid they wouldnt fulfill the production plan.

Former Arkhangelsk mayor wants to rename the city Putingrad (Alexander Donskoi says the change would lift peoples spirits and possibly draw more federal funding)

Krasnodar Krai district council boots out Yabloko deputy, following governors demands (Alexander Korovainy lost the seat for supposed corruption, but colleagues say he doesnt even own a car and gets around town on a bicycle. Before entering politics, he taught history. Korovainy lost his job in 2017 for attending a pro-Navalny demonstration.)

Research shows that Yandex search results return highest share of conspiracy-promoting content (four scholars found that Yandex was less likely than Google, Bing, Yahoo, or DuckDuckGo to return hyperlinks to scientific sources debunking conspiracy theories)

(Opinion) Andrei Soldatov says Russia blocking the Tor browser shifts the balance between technically advanced democracies and technically backward authoritarian regimes (the technology itself, political from the beginning with its U.S. military origins, has been blurry thanks to its criminal uses and susceptibility to DPI filtration)

(Opinion) Alexey Kovalev says the Kremlins mismanagement of the pandemic and premature triumphalism have cost lives and complicated the states vital work (vaccine skepticism is rampant, thanks in part to Russias own misfired state propaganda, and a lack of leadership from Putin has undermined federal efforts)

Three-quarters of Russians oppose QR-code vaccine passport requirements for accessing public transport (only 54 percent of respondents opposed mandatory vaccination against COVID-19, however)

U.S. Justice Department will explore possible regulatory modifications to FARA (The agency is soliciting public comments on how the U.S. government administers and enforces disclosure and labeling requirements for foreign agents. The Kremlin claims that Russias foreign agent laws mirror American regulations.)

Nobel laureate and Novaya Gazeta editor-in-chief tells U.S. democracy summit that all nations, America included, should ditch foreign agent laws (Dmitry Muratov points out that the Kremlin cites FARA in the United States when justifying Russias foreign agent policies)

(Opinion) Russian deployments, force posture, and possible intentions along the border with Ukraine (writing for the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service, analyst Andrew Bowen summarizes in just three pages! the leading speculation about what Russias military is doing you-know-where)

Germanys new leadership would consider halting Nord Stream 2, if Russia expands invasion of Ukraine (Chancellor Olaf Scholz is broadly supportive of the infrastructure project, but hes reportedly flexible about responding to a broader war in Ukraine)

Biden signals wish to convene meetings between NATO allies and Russia to discuss Moscows grievances with the pact (eastern states are reportedly spooked that any talk of compromise with Moscow means Washington will abandon them to Russian aggression)

(Opinion) International Crisis Group briefing breaks down Russian military buildup near Ukraine and proposes mutual de-escalatory measures (The researchers endorse Washingtons approach to signal the repercussions of escalation by Moscow, acknowledging Europes broken security system and the limits of deterrence alone. This necessitates deals with Russia to prevent military buildups, using Minsk II, warts and all, as a basis.)

(Opinion) Samuel Greene and Graeme Robertson say invading Ukraine wouldnt help Putin (They argue that Putins overriding interest is in maintaining and cultivating his own power, he relies on popular support, his ability to shape public opinion has limits, and he minimizes the costs at home of any adventures abroad. In other words, Putin wont pursue goals of conquest that cost him power domestically. With an invasion of Ukraine unlikely, albeit possible, the West should strap in for a long period of confrontation and relearn strategic patience.)

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The Real Russia. Today. Reining in an unruly Communist Party Meduza - Meduza

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See the stunning mansion Josh Duggar is calling home during his child pornography trial ahead of possible… – The US Sun

Posted: at 1:43 am

JOSH Duggar is living in a massive Arkansas mansion during his child pornography home confinement after he stayed in his dads warehouse with his wife, Anna, and their young children.

The 33-year-old was arrested and charged with receiving and possessing child pornography in April.

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Jim Bob and Michelles troubled son is currently on home confinement and is living with third party custodians LaCount and Maria Reber who are longtime friends of the patriarch.

The Sun can exclusively reveal Josh is residing in a massive mansion in Elkins, Arkansas with the Reber family.

According to Arkansas property records obtained by The Sun, LaCount, 49, and Maria, 53, bought nine acres of land in 2005 for $68,000.

In 2007, the couple built a one-story house on one-acre of the property.

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The abode features four bedrooms and three bathrooms.

The exterior of the home has brick and slab, and the interior has tile and carpeting throughout.

The house also boasts a fireplace and porch.

Josh will have privacy with the Reber family, as a long gravel driveway leads from the main road to the home.

Follow our Josh Duggar trial live blog for the very latest news and updates...

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The home is an upgrade from his previous living conditions, as he resided on the Duggar family compound in a renovated warehouse with his wife and children.

Anna recently welcomed their seventh child together.

The warehouse was featured on Counting On as a wedding dress pop-up shop for John Davids wife Abbie.

The photos from the episode match all of the photos of Annas Instagram inside the home.

LaCount is an MRI tech with the US Department of Veterans Affairs.

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He previously volunteered as a chaplain at the Washington County Jail, where Duggar remained for a week.

Maria is a homemaker, and shares a son and daughter with her husband.

Their daughter, Hannah, 22, teaches piano lessons from the family home.

LaCount and Maria are church friends of Jim Bob and Michelle.

They admitted at the hearing that they did not know Josh well.

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At Joshs detention hearing, parole officer Diem Nguyen said Maria had reservations of Josh living with her family.

Diem explained: "Her concern was she was a woman and Josh was a man and that she felt, she didnt know how she felt about being alone with him for a long period of time.

The officer then explained how minors come in and out of the home for piano lessons, but that they are always supervised by an adult.

The family also owns firearms, which caused concern for the judge.

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Josh would stay in an add-on bedroom in the home. The Internet is password protected.

The parole officer said: "Based on his job and hes a pastor, volunteers, they could be suitable third party custodians. However, the minors coming into the home and the pistols cause the probation office some concern.

When Joshs lawyer spoke, he said they would provide a suitable residence.

She agreed, however, to remove the firearms from the home and not have the lessons there as well.

On Hannahs piano Instagram page, she told a follower on Friday: Currently, Im doing lessons via Zoom or FaceTime.

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According to conditions of release obtained by The Sun, he is restricted to the residence of LaCount and MariaReber at all times except for employment, education, religious services, medical or mental health treatment, attorney visits, court-ordered obligations, court hearings or other activities approved by a parole officer.

Travel is restricted to Western District of Arkansas, Fayetteville Division unless given approval from the U.S. Probation Office. That includes Benton, Washington and Madison counties.

The Arkansas judge ordered Josh to wear a GPS ankle monitor.

Other terms include maintaining employment, no possession of firearms, no excessive alcohol use, no possession of pornography and more.

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Josh has unlimited access to his children with his wife Anna, 33, as long as she is present.

He is unable to have contact with other minors, including his siblings, nieces and nephews.

Thejudge said of her decision to releaseJim Bob and Michelles oldest son: "The court views these charges as very serious. It is a concern to have an agent testify that the file download found on a computer is some of the worst child abuse pornography in 1,000 cases, that concerns the court.

"The victims of your crime, if you committed it, concern the court. Children are involuntary victims of pornography. Theyre subject to human trafficking. This weighs against your release into the community.

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She said the molestation scandal that was made public concerns her, because of the age of the victims and the children in the videos and photos.

The judge added: "I am concerned images and ages are very close to the ages of your children and nephews and nieces and siblings' children.I don't know if you're a danger.

Special Agent Gerald Faulkner from Homeland Security was the first to take the stand at the hearing, as he was questioned by the prosecutor.

He said: In May of 2019, [an Arkansas police officer] identified a computer participating in the known sharing of photos and videos of child pornography.

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He claimed Josh had one two-minute video that contained graphic images.

Also found were 65 images of an underage female consistent with child pornography.

The victims were ages 5 to 10.

It was also allegedJosh accessed the dark webin order to get a hold of the images.

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Joshadmitted he had a TOR browser on his computer, which gave him access to the dark web anonymously.

The Homeland Security special agent explained how the child pornography could be found on the dark web.

The special agent said downloads from a specific file were made which were "in the top five of the worst that I've ever had to examine.

The specific file has been known to include children as young as 18 months old.He did not say if Josh downloaded the photos involving an 18-month-old.

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The Sun previously broke Josh wasarrested for the federal charges in Washington County.

The arrest is related to the 2019 Homeland Security raid on Josh'snow-closed used car dealership in Springdale, Arkansas.

In November 2019, Homeland Security conducted an ongoing federal investigation at the lot.

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According to the indictment, Joshknowingly received child pornographybetween or about May 14, 2019 and on or about May 16, 2019.

For the second count, Josh knowingly possessed material that contained images of child pornography, including images of minors under the age of 12.

According the Department of Justice, Josh allegedly used the internet to download child sexual abuse material. Duggar allegedly possessed this material, some of which depicts the sexual abuse of children under the age of 12, in May 2019.

If convicted, he could receive 20 years in prison with fines up to $250,000 for each count.

Joshpleaded not guilty to the chargesat his arraignment.

His trial began on December 1, while Anna has stood by his side by attending each hearing.

Josh's other family members, including sisters Jessa and Joy-Anna and brother-in-laws Austin Forsyth and Derick Dillard, have also been spotted at the courthouse.

A number of shocking allegations have been made throughout the hearings.

The former reality star's ex-girlfriend's mother, Bobye, testified in court on Monday and made disturbing claims aboutpast accusations that he once molested several young girls, according to an onsite reporter for The Sun.

Bobye told the jury that she visited the Duggar's home when Josh was 15, and at that time he confessed to touching a 5-year-old girl inappropriately.

If you or someone you know is affected by any of the issues raised in this story, call RAINN (Rape, Abuse, & Incest National Network) at 800-656-HOPE (4673).

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Whats the Difference Between the Deep Web and the Dark Web? – How-To Geek

Posted: at 1:43 am

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The Deep Web and Dark Web both sound intimidating, but that doesnt mean theyre the same thing. While theyre related, knowing the difference can keep you safe from dangerous places on the internet and make you a hit at parties.

Before we get to the distinction between deep and dark, another common conflation has to be cleared up first. We tend to use internet and web interchangeably, but they are very different.

The internet is the network infrastructure we use to communicate globally. That includes the network card in your computer, your router, the fiber line from your house, undersea cables, and all the other bits and bobs that shoot electrical (or optical) impulses all over the planet. You can also include Internet Protocol as a defining feature of the internet. Its the language of the internet and describes exactly how information is encoded and routed over the internet.

The World Wide Web is a service that runs on internet infrastructure. Specifically, its the network of websites hosted on web servers, connected to the internet. The internet plays host to many other services, such as streaming video, FTP (file transfer protocol), email, etc.

The concept of the internet as a network that can host many different types of network applications is important to grasp if you want to understand the difference between deep, dark, and surface webs.

RELATED: The Foundation of the Internet: TCP/IP Turns 40

The surface web is the public face of the internet. When you go to a companys website, youre visiting the surface web. Definitions may vary a little, but the surface web is essentially all of the websites and resources connected to the internet that can be freely discovered and visited. The Google search engine, for example, crawls the web looking for websites that are open for anyone to visit. When you visit our website here at How-To-Geek, youre on the surface web!

The deep web then, is all of the stuff connected to the internet but hidden away behind some form of security. When you log into your webmail service, youre on the deep web. All the stuff you can see unless you log into Facebook? Thats the deep web too.

Rather than being some scary part of the internet. the deep web is the meat and bones of our daily internet experience. Its the basement of the amusement park where all the real work happens so that you can have a good time.

Unsurprisingly then, most of the web is the deep web. At this point, theres usually an analogy involving icebergs and how most of their bulk is under the water.

This brings us to the dark web. The dark web is a part of the deep web, but only a very tiny part of it. These are websites and servers that have been deliberately hidden. The people running the site dont want anyone to know who they are and they certainly dont want just anyone visiting their sites.

This anonymity can be achieved in various ways, but most of the sites on the dark web are onion sites. They can only be accessed using Tor Browser, which gives users access to the Tor network. The Tor network was created to allow completely anonymous (with some additional precautions ) communication over the internet. When a user and a website send data to each other over Tor, the data packets are randomly routed through a massive network of volunteer computers. Each of these nodes only knows where the packet just came from and where its going next, as each layer of an encryption onion is stripped from the packet contents. Its only when the packet reaches the final destination that the last layer of encryption is removed and the intended recipient gets the original data.

While the dark web isnt illegal in most countries.its quickly been adopted by criminals to shuffle illegal content and communication around the world. In combination with the rise of cryptocurrencies, the dark web has enabled billions of dollars in illegal trade.

There are plenty of legitimate websites on the dark web too, but in general, most users should avoid it since it comes with serious cybersecurity risks and any site could be compromised tomorrow, even if it isnt today.

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Sidney Manix Obituary (1934 – 2021) – Waveland, MS – The Sun Herald – Legacy.com

Posted: at 1:42 am

Sidney Louis Manix January 27, 1934 - November 20, 2021 Waveland, Mississippi - Sidney Louis Manix, 87, went to be with the Lord November 20, 2021. Sid was born on January 27, 1934 in New Orleans, LA and was raised in the Irish Channel. He lived directly across the street from Kingsley House where he learned great skills in carpentry and became an avid swimmer and a member of the Semi-Pro basketball team, the Whiz-Kids. At 18, he joined the United States Army and served honorably. Following the Army, he was a salvage diver with Taylor diving in New Orleans. He also worked as a member of the local 53 Asbestos Workers Union. He later worked for Brown and Root and Borg-Warner when he and his wife moved to South Mississippi. After retirement, he dabbled in real estate and light remodeling. Sid was an avid gardener, loved fishing and camping, but his greatest passion was serving the Lord with gladness! Through the years he served in ministry to the little ones in the nursery, Royal Rangers, Awana, and Sunday School. He also served as Trustee, Deacon, and in Mens ministries as well. The toughest one, yet the one he was so passionate about was the prison ministry, both in South Mississippi and Tennessee following hurricane Katrina. Sidney was preceded in death by his parents Elvin and Mary Elizabeth Manix and four sibling, Elvin "Pat", Elizabeth, Rita and Maurice "Mo". He is survived by his loving wife Barbara; and his four children, Randy Manix, Krisste Polisher, Erin Manix, and Matthew Manix (Kelly). Also, his grandchildren Shannon, Elijah, Bethany, Benjamin, and Luci, and one great-granddaughter Camdyn (doodle-bug). Sidney will have a private interment at the Biloxi National Cemetery. A celebration of a life well lived will be at Church of The Good Shepherd in Long Beach Mississippi on Saturday, December 11, 2021, at 2 pm with an open reception to follow in the fellowship hall. Riemann Family Funeral Home, 141 Hwy 90, Waveland is serving the family. An online guestbook may be signed at http://www.riemannfamily.com. The family wishes to extend their gratitude to St. Joseph Hospice for such loving care and compassion and to Reimann Family Funeral Home. In lieu of flowers, Sidney requested donations to be made to: Adult and Teen Challenge in New Orleans, PO Box 73681, Metairie, LA 70033.

Published by The Sun Herald on Dec. 8, 2021.

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Wrigleyville Transforms Into Winter Wonderland With 19 Holiday-Themed Pop-Ups – Block Club Chicago

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WRIGLEYVILLE Bars and other Wrigleyville businesses are coming together for the citys largest district of holiday-themed pop-ups.

The Wrigleyville Wonderland, which features 19 local businesses that have transformed into holiday-themed destinations, kicked off last week and runs through the end of February for some locations.

All of Chicagoland is invited to Wrigleyville for this holiday-inspired, interactive and fun experience, Maureen Martino, executive director of the Lakeview East Chamber of Commerce, said in a statement. Wrigleyville Wonderland is Chicagos largest holiday pop-up district that is sure to inspire and amaze all those experiencing it while sharing the holiday spirit.

The pop-ups will feature things like map projections showcasing holiday movies and other content, themed drinks, Instagrammable moments like face cutouts where people can pose with iconic holiday movie characters, actors dressed up as famous holiday characters, decorations and more.

Participating businesses:

RELATED: 20 Holiday-Themed Pop-Up Bars Around Chicago That Will Put You In A Festive Mood

Jake Wittich is aReport for Americacorps member covering Lakeview, Lincoln Park and LGBTQ communities across the city for Block Club Chicago.

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