“Perhaps in anticipation of taxpayer sticker shock, the Air Force also said ‘the engineering required to design, manufacture, conduct environmental testing and obtain Federal Aviation Administration certification’ were all included in the cost.”
“These local governments are basically extortion rackets. And the targets are usually the less fortunate.”
Read more: https://fee.org/articles/the-latest-in-local-government-pettiness/
“Of course Titanic was suspended. They tweaked a legislator in Germany, a country that bans ‘hate speech’ without defining the term, and it’s clear from the examples of Britain and France that the speech politicians hate most is that directed at them.”
Read more: https://reason.com/archives/2018/01/23/government-will-protect-us-from-bad-spee/print
“In order to sell in the Russian market, the tech companies let a Russian defense agency scour the inner workings, or source code, of some of their products. Russian authorities say the reviews are necessary to detect flaws that could be exploited by hackers. But those same products protect some of the most sensitive areas of the U.S government, including the Pentagon, NASA, the State Department, the FBI and the intelligence community, against hacking by sophisticated cyber adversaries like Russia.”
“The preachers sued, arguing they were deprived of their right to free expression. They also claimed they were discriminated against on the basis of religion. But true to form, the New Jersey government closed ranks and doubled down on their position. As a state agency, New Jersey Transit argued that they have immunity from civil claims of rights violations. And the worst part is, a U.S. circuit court of appeals agreed with the state of New Jersey. They said state permitting laws trump basic rights like free speech.”
Read more: http://www.thedailybell.com/news-analysis/this-state-requires-a-free-speech-permit/
“If a citizen speaks at a public meeting and says something a politician doesn’t like, can the citizen be arrested, cuffed, and carted off to the hoosegow? Suppose that, during this fraught encounter, the citizen violates some law—even by accident, even one no one has ever heard of, even one dug up after the fact—does that make her arrest constitutional? Deyshia Hargrave, meet Fane Lozman. You need to follow his case.”
“The Labor Department has granted Deutsche Bank a waiver from punishment allowing it to continue to manage retirement accounts for another three years, according to an announcement in the Federal Registry last month. Four other banks convicted in the case were also granted waivers. Deutsche Bank has been a big lender to Trump over the years, and the president still has loans with the bank that were originally worth $300 million.”
“Thailand’s prime minister Prayuth Chan-ocha found a novel way to dodge tricky questions from journalists by referring them to his cardboard cutout. Mr Prayuth took power in a military coup in 2014 and was named PM later that year.”
Read more: http://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-asia-42621180/thai-pm-uses-cardboard-cutout-to-avoid-questions
“As recently as late October, Mugabe said black owners who invited whites back to rent and work seized fields would lose their farms. But the Zimbabwe Independent reports that the former first family was doing exactly that: leasing out part of Mazowe Citrus Estate to a company in which some of the main shareholders were white.”
“Riyadh seems to have found the way to curb the budget deficit caused by lower oil prices. As the Financial Times report, Saudi officials are offering the arrested royals a deal – pay up to 70 percent of your wealth and go free. The Saudi government could appropriate hundreds of billions of dollars from the arrested to refill depleted state reserves, according to the media.”
Read more: https://www.rt.com/business/410153-saudi-arabia-ransom-purge-salman/