Category Archives: Media

August 27, 2020 · 02:59

Self destruct initiated

We all have within ourselves the ability to self destruct, to destroy and to inflict harm. In games we can eat people (Man Eater), we can destroy people (Destroy all humans) and we can lay waste to them (Plague Inc), yes they are merely gams, but what happens when it is no longer a game? Many have seen the man in Wisconsin (Jacob Blake), getting shot in the back of the head as he walks towards his car. I try not to judge, because a 60 second video is not a story, some say that it is and that is fine, but I wonder what set this off. I am not discussing the 7 bullets, it is overkill. I wonder why the policeman did not shoot once in the leg, it would have been directly incapacitated Jacob Blake. Why was that not done? The news on several levels are pushing emotion, but normally there is at least one newspaper giving us a minute by minute stage of what happened. This time, I did not see any of that. Yet USA Today gives us ‘Jacob Blake was shot less than 3 minutes after Wisconsin police arrived at the scene, according to dispatch audio’ with that additional quote “The shooting of Jacob Blake on Sunday by Wisconsin police happened quickly, with less than three minutes elapsing between the time the first officer arrived and shots being fired, according to dispatch audio”, three minutes was that was needed. I understand that the police really doesn’t want any kind of time line in this, but what set it all off? I need to try to stay neutral, for the simple reason that emotions will not get us anything. This is not about trivialising the events on Jacob Blake, this is not about minimising events, but to find out what happened EXACTLY. USA Today helps out (at https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2020/08/25/jacob-blake-kenosha-police-shot-black-man-minutes-after-arriving/3438802001/), yet they are one of the few that took this trouble. 

So we see that at 5:13:47 p.m. one of the officers asks for a description of Jacob Blake, and at 5:15:37 p.m. the shooting starts, 110 seconds between asking for a description and shooting Jacob Blake. Important is the fact that there was no indications that he was armed, or that there was a direct threat from him. It seems that there were more factors involved, but none of them give any level of rise that shooting him was ESSENTIAL. There might have been a cause to shoot, yet in light of him not being armed it is my personal opinion that at the most one single shot in the leg would have sufficed (if shooting could not have been prevented). 

This is not about whether shooting should or should not have happened, this is about the way it unfolded and the level of violence that the Wisconsin police had opted for. So now we see ‘Two dead as gunfire erupts at Wisconsin protests’ and all this is happening in a third night of unrest in Kenosha. It is not the first, not the only one and there is every chance that all this will escalate. We see all kinds of news and all kinds of actions, but the inaction of the Governor of Wisconsin is staggering. Apart from the fact that he declared an emergency, we are given “Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers called for protesters to be peaceful, while also saying the National Guard presence would be doubled from 125 to 250 in Kenosha after crowds destroyed dozens of buildings and set more than 30 fires on Monday night”, politico (at https://www.politico.com/news/2020/08/25/wisconsin-governor-jacob-blake-emergency-401695) also gives us ““We cannot allow the cycle of systemic racism and injustice to continue,” said Evers, who is facing mounting pressure from Republicans over his handling of the unrest that has followed the shooting. “We also cannot continue going down this path of damage and destruction.”” Yet we are not given anything regarding the actions of Governor Tony Evers regarding Jacob Blake, not even the acknowledgement, or the setting that this is an investigation that will be pursued, there is a lack of acknowledgement (or at least if we are to take the media at their word). Looking at the Wisconsin site (at https://evers.wi.gov/Pages/Newsroom/Press-Releases.aspx) we see nothing in regards of what is going on, even now, more than a day later, the governor of Wisconsin has done too little too little. Even the website of the City of Kenosha (at https://www.kenosha.org/visitors/news/police) lacks a lot of information, the police section had the option to give information, to try and diffuse the situation, yet this is not done, so for almost 24 hours people on several levels were inactive, unable to set a stage of diffusing the situation, and in all this, no one is asking questions. They are merely letting the social media flame a situation from bad to worse.

A situation that leads to self-destruction, no Shark, alien or virus was required, merely the inaction of all kinds of governmental officials. Its another nice mess they got themselves into.

 

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August 25, 2020 · 05:21

Games on two levels

The BBC set us in the light of games being played, they are played n two levels, the first one is seen (at https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-53888148) where we see ‘‘Creepy men’ message women on Scrabble Go app’, now in itself it does not raise flags, these things happen, but we see a lot more when we consider “When enabled, players will only receive chat notifications and messages from players they already know and are connected with as a Facebook friend, favourite, or via their synced contacts”, did you pick up on that little part? ‘or via their synced contacts’ is a dangerous step, some people want to play scrabble and not having to deal with the BS, so why did the game not include a mute ALL speech from the very beginning? I will hazard a guess that synching your contacts will be pleasing to the makers of the scrabble game for a few reasons, but that question is not coming from the BBC is it? And “it had also received two about the previous EA app during the first half of 2020” is perhaps a little giveaway. It is all about our contacts. Basic personal security does not see to be the stage gamers are considering when they are offered free games. So even as the BBC ends with “Lisa Forte, from Red Goat Cyber-security, said: “As individuals, we really need to start treating unsolicited online contact with people we don’t know as suspicious until it’s proven otherwise”” and in all this the questions on gathered data is not coning from the BBC, so I am asking it. ‘What data is gathered and who profits?’ It is an essential question, but it is not asked, is it? I see this as a failure to protect consumers and as such there is a failure from government and media to take it into account. The government has a pass. It is not their responsibility to protect people who blatantly install stuff at their own leisure, but in the same side, we see that Apple and Google could be held to account to make sure that NO and I mean NO data is to be gathered via apps in their store, is that the case, or is it not? It is not the app maker that worries me, it is the hacker who uses the app to gather data for their personal needs, that is the larger setting and if the uses would be kind enough to wake up and smell the data they are giving up we might have the start of something sane. Yet the larger issue still plays, the stage of muting ALL from the start would have solved the issue, so why is it not in the app? The story gives out that this is not possible, why is that?

The second level is a little more serious (or so I hope), it is seen in ‘Danish military intelligence head Lars Findsen suspended’ (at https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-53889612), well on one side, I was looking for a new job, so I’ll take his, but my Danish is really bad, my Swedish is fine though. But back to the reality, when we see “the Defence Intelligence Service is accused of failing to investigate allegations of espionage in the armed services. It has also been accused of obtaining and passing on information about Danish citizens”, we see the repetition of a two edged sword, the first story implies that the people (including the Danish) have no problem handing over their security and data to any app designer, so when we realise that, what are we doing inspecting the actions of Danish Intelligence? It sounds nice that they have an Intelligence Watchdog, but with data being handed over left, right and centre, the setting is a larger stage and we need to see that we are measuring events to two different standards and we need to wake up because this has been going on for years now and we need to wake up. Oh and by the way, why was Danish Intelligence doing what it was doing? Perhaps it was to keep the Danish people safe (an assumed  speculation), all this whilst I am decently certain that the apps do not have anyones safety in mind, if so the chat would have a mute button from the very beginning, not on the required need to synch contacts. 

 

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August 24, 2020 · 16:25

In Netflix we trust

Yup, as marketing titles go, it is not the worst and to be fair, Netflix has its ups (and downs), yet there is no denying, they have been offering a lot more than most and the really good series that they do not have (Billions for example) does not mean that they are not on a high. In that setting I was considering to additional titles for the Netflix barn.

Title unknown

It is a weird title to set the stage to, I saw the movie about 25 years ago and I still remember parts of the movie, this movie sticks with me like nothing I have ever known. In the movie a man basically commits a misdemeanour and unknowingly leaves the state, as he lives his live, a well respected man, engaged to a nice lady and a decent breadwinner, he is contacted about the event. He is willing to pay a fine, he is willing to make repairs (he did no damage to anyone), and he is offered a deal one months of light jail time in the state the crime was committed and the slate is wiped clean, when he gets to the town he is arrested and in court he is made an example of, nothing of his goodwill is shown and he gets a much longer jail term and not in a light jail, the system intentionally thoroughly destroys the man and after a long time, he escapes. A little later we see the man approaching his fiancé, she asks him how he will survive, his response “I’ll make it, I’m a criminal now”, the man is a psychotic shade of his former self.

I was unable to find the movie, but I would love to see it again, I also believe that this movie could be remade into a modern version, I reckon Will Smith might be a great fit, but that is not a dealbreaker, there are several really good actors, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Don Cheadle, all great choices, all established actors, because this is not a soft movie, this would be a much darker version as today is a much darker reality than the people in 1950 could dream of. 

Hiding Out

Hiding out is a 1987 comedy drama. It is not one of the best 140 movies from the 80’s, yet I still remember the movie. I believe it to be a diamond in the rough (sorry Disney). Jon Cryer made it into an above average movie. And it could be made into a serious piece of work, perhaps a 3-4 episode mini-series. The story is about 3 stockbrokers passing off bogus stock for the mob, when the issues start the mob get rid of one of them and the other two run for cover into the arms of the FBI, yet on route things happen and one more bites the dust. The one remaining (Jon Cryer) goes underground in high school. I believe that it could be a much larger story, especially if we add darkness and realism to the remake. The original was fine, especially in 1987, but in 2022, if we set the stage in episode one into a more realistic view of stock markets and how bogus junk bonds are created, the risk involved and how the US government is basically unable to stop it, merely limit the damage at best. From that we get to episode two and shed light on FBI protocols and activities. How they work (to some degree) and the options of evading the FBI (and the mob) as the protagonist ends up in a less visible state (like Arkansas, Ohio, Idaho, or Wisconsin). As such we see the stage of how the new protagonist sets up his new identity in one of these state colleges as an economics teacher. Episode three will be set in college life and how he falls for one of the other teachers, and her life (so we can use the ATM part to get the mob and FBI back on track), and in light of that we get to the final episode where we get the showdown, the arrest of some (not all) of the mob and the essential need of the protagonist to enter witness protection. The episode ends with him falling of the radar and some look on how witness protection works. I state all this in an academic approach, but it will be a drama (some comedy would be nice too), Jon Cryer is too old for the role now, but I believe it would be nice having him as the clued in FBI agent, or perhaps one of the mob bosses. Merely two ideas mixing in my mind, and it is only Monday, what will I be capable of on Wednesday? 

Well, that will be another story, optionally another creation whilst I wait the terms I have to wait for.

 

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August 19, 2020 · 02:09

Click bitches

Yup, that is what they are making us out to be. We can offer the thought that Facebook and Twitter are not aware what is happening, but the reality is that they do not care. It is the price of a free service. I knew that from the start, nothing comes for free, but the choice of advertisement that Twitter and Facebook Arte giving us is becoming a larger issue, in addition I received some news that some people were allegedly approached to get scammed, this happens, but one person gave me that from 2-3 times a year that there has been an attempt to scam through his phone once a day for the last three days, the scales have been altered and in all this we need to set a much larger stage. And as some advertisement is aimed to turn us into click bitches to go from picture (with a dozen advertisements) to another picture we have no way of knowing as to what the role behind it is, perhaps it is $25 on the house from +6797234009, perhaps it is allegedly winning GBP 6,500,000 from www.m65s.net with the helpline info@mobcollas.com, or even it is facing jurisprudential fines from 18000243109. The numbers start adding up and Australian law is seemingly clueless on what to do, because it is not their prerogative, merely stating the face of the Sydney Morning Herald and Rupert Murdoch through the stated news ‘Google clashes with Australia watchdog over proposed law to force it to pay for news’, so how about changing the setting to avoid more issues by also stating that newspapers and media are not allowed on social media? Would that level the playing field? When we do that, we see that ALL the remaining news on social media is fake, is that a solution? Does it fall back to the ‘News Media Bargaining Code’?, I do not belief that to be the case, I think that there are two issues and I think that they influence one another. The ACCC gives us “The Government asked that a draft mandatory code be released for public consultation before the end of July 2020, with a final code to be settled soon thereafter.” It is perhaps the first time that a law was drafted up so quickly, and in that view when we see “The development of a code of conduct is part of the Government’s response to the ACCC’s Digital Platforms Inquiry final report to promote competition, enhance consumer protection and support a sustainable Australian media landscape in the digital age”, in all this the lacking ‘enhance consumer protection’ is very much out in the open and it is failing more and more.

So when we look at ‘Protecting yourself from scams’ on the ACCC website, and the ACCC Scam watch had NOTHING on the dangers of advertisements handing over details for scamming, in the same way there is a chance that data is being gathered by games, so how far is that investigation going? It seems that some are waiting for us to become click bitches and as we consider Click Fraud with the underlying quote “Click fraud is a type of fraud that occurs on the Internet in pay-per-click online advertising. In this type of advertising, the owners of websites that post the ads are paid an amount of money determined by how many visitors to the sites click on the ads”, as such, how much investigation did the ACCC do into the danger to the consumers before running to help the media? 

The dangers to the consumers is larger than Hacking, Identity theft, Phishing and Remote access scams and seemingly too many people are unaware, perhaps they have been turned into click bitches. 

 

 

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August 13, 2020 · 01:03

One sided coin

When is a one-sided coin like a watchdog? That is the underlying question, and the answer is seen in this article ‘When they are shallow’. We all have needs, we all have centred targets, but what happens when that setting makes you miss the larger picture? Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against watchdogs, I have nothing against the media, or politicians, but when they give a one sided brief just to please themselves, how shallow will they be? It is not the first time, but in this case it starts with ‘US watchdog report cites civilian casualties in Saudi arms deal’, now this might be correct, might being the operative word and not towards optionally pointing fingers and not towards the setting. We see “The Saudi-UAE air raids hit farms, schools, water supplies, and energy sources, triggering what the United Nations has described as the world’s worst humanitarian crisis” now, I am not making a statement that they did not do that, but in all that, was it truly some civilian hit target or were there Houthi and/or Hezbollah fighters there? So whilst some focus on ‘precision-guided-munition components’, no one is looking what they were clearly firing on, because that too is an unknown. So whilst some focus on one side of “Tens of thousands of Yemenis, many of them civilians, have been killed by the Saudi-UAE air strikes – often with American-made weapons, targeting information and aerial refuelling support”, in a stage where should consider on ‘how many were civilians (and how many were not)’ in the sentence “Tens of thousands of Yemenis, many of them civilians”, yes we can hide behind ‘many of them’, but precision is essential, even if the weapons are not. In addition Representative Eliot Engel, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee gives us ““This obvious pre-spin of the findings reeks of an attempt to distract and mislead,” Engel said, adding that he feared the classified annex to the report would be “used to bury important or possibly incriminating information””, and I am not debating that, yet in all this, the stage where Eliot Engel is optionally helping our the Iranians, that is still up for debate, is it not? So when we check NPR and we see the question “Congress had concerns about $8 billion in arms sales to Saudi Arabia, and those concerns included how the arms might be used in the war in Yemen” and the only thing that Eliot Engel gives us is “Yeah”? By the way the interview (at https://www.npr.org/2020/08/11/901431799/engel-discusses-ig-report-on-u-s-selling-8-billion-worth-of-arms-in-middle-east) gives us nothing on ‘Iran’, ‘Houthi’ and ‘Hezbollah’, three tags that are essential in the Yemeni war, as well as the current Saudi Arabian state of affairs, so why are they missing? So whilst Engel gives us “Meaning that all the excuses that they give us, all the reasons they give us for doing what they have to do are phony and are made up. It’s just that they don’t – they want to have freedom to operate, not have the public know anything, certainly not have Congress know anything. And this is the way they’ve operated from day one. And it’s not really, you know – on the Foreign Affairs Committee, this is our jurisdiction. We’re supposed to be investigating these things, and they look at us as somehow intruding on their private purview”, a view that is his and might be valid, but the Yemeni war is larger and the three elements (Houthi, Hezbollah and Iran) are left out of it giving us an unbalanced and one sided story. Now, there is a side that accept, the US can decide on how it does business and who it does business with, and consider the hilarity we see when that $8,000,000,000 dollars goes to the Chinese or Russian treasury coffers? The US has been alienating its middle eastern partners to such an extent (all whilst ignoring to a larger degree the activities by Iran), we need to see the way that ball rolls down the hill and away from the congressional weapons sales teams. So whilst some might applaud the activity of watchdogs, the absence of the whole picture is actually rather disturbing. Not merely to the stage, but the fallout is other large. This does not reflect on Eliot Engel, but his congressional party is seemingly ignoring a much larger stage and this stage includes both Hezbollah and Iran, so why is Eliot Engel and his band of naughty congressionals ignoring that? Consider that the people for a week have been aware of ‘Saudi Arabia’s project clears 177,637 Houthi mines in Yemen’, now, we accept that some would have originated in Yemen, but not all and when we see these elements in the equation (and that is merely the beginning of that mess), we need to wonder why the US watchdog is so one sided. An investigation into the forces active in Yemen, as well as the weapons used and one side is left off the table completely. So how does your humanitarian side react to that? Oh and for desert I offer ’84.000 children in Yemen are dead, who is holding the Houthi and their methods to account?’

 

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August 11, 2020 · 01:21

The 51st State

Consider that the US just grew a little, it seems that Canada has become the 51st state, Governor of that state is Justin Trudeau, that is until President Trump decides that he is not allegiant enough. How did I get here? A few sources are giving us ‘US court issues summons for Saudi Arabia’s Mohammed bin Salman’, under normal circumstances there wouldn’t be a big thing. Yet consider the events, an exiled person moves to Canada, when we are confronted with “Mohammed bin Salman attempted to send Tiger Squad to Canada to assassinate al-Jabri, according to a lawsuit filed in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia in August 2020”, so a person went in exile in Canada and now relies on US jurisprudence? And if you are in doubt, the other element is (rephrased) “allegedly attempted to send a Tiger Squad to Canada to allegedly assassinate al-Jabri”, so in the first it was an alleged attempt, in that case where is the evidence of the alleged attempt? What evidence is there to assassinate al-Jabri? Beyond that, why is this case not heard in Canada? In the second, it is my personal belief that Saad al-Jabri needs to get evicted from Canada into America, he is so sure of their legal system. And of course there is the stage where we need to investigate on why an optional case of alleged events in another country are being heard in America, is that not a question that baffles you too?

And it does not end there, the only additional information is given by Gulf News. I am making mention of it as I cannot vouch for the information. I am not willing to use merely one source because it fits my speculation better. Gulf News (at https://gulfnews.com/world/gulf/saudi/report-fugitive-saudi-official-misspent-11b-in-government-funds-1.72662340) gives us ‘Fugitive Saudi official misspent $11b in government funds’, and lets face it, if I walked away with $11,000,000,000 I would move to Canada, buy the Edmonton Oilers, or the Calgary Flames, buy a nice mansion in either city, train to be their goalie and live the life until I die. It is a plan, not a plan everyone will embrace, but I like that plan, especially if I have that much money. Oh, and the quote gives is “Al Jabri, a 61-year-old with a doctorate in computer science, was the virtual No 2 in the Saudi Interior Ministry, which was run for years by Mohammed bin Nayef. Al Jabri ran a special ministry fund that mixed government spending on high-priority antiterrorism efforts with bonuses for himself and others, according to documents reviewed bio y the Journal and interviews with Saudi officials and Al Jabri’s confidants,” the WSJ report read”. In all this and in fact of tha accusation of corruption and through that (as well as) “spending on high-priority antiterrorism efforts with bonuses for himself and others”, who else was paid? So in this, how much investigation was done by the FBI, for did they allegedly acquire enough self-funding to be above the law? I am merely asking!

So in this universe where Canada is the 51st state of the US, and as we see a quote by the Wall Street Journal, how much investigation did the US do? How much investigation did the Canadians do? The are mere questions but they matter, even as the newspapers on both countries are all about “A former top-ranking Saudi intelligence official living in exile in Canada alleged in a lawsuit filed in a U.S. court that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman sent a team to kill him in 2018 but the effort was foiled by Canadian authorities” if those are the facts, what investigation was done by the Canadians? Consider that I would be angry when someone steals $1,000,000 from me (an amount I do not own mind you), so an amount that is 11,000 times higher will get the blood boiling in many persons. So in all this, the entire matter does not make sense, Oh I get the need to add $11 billion to my bank account, that makes sense, although I would hope to use my own IP to get there, then there is the stage where I doubt that it was about ‘assassination’ I reckon the Saudi’s want their money back, so there would be a stage of alleged kidnapping, not assassination. And lastly, I reckon that the US would love Saad al-Jabri to move to the US so he can spend $11 billion (minus addition taxation) freely in the US and the US is so bankrupt, they are willing to set the legal stage in their nation, a nation of laws they will claim. 

Yes it is a brand new day as we see the optional stage of laws to whitewash money that was not the property of the person white washing it. It is my point of view and some will claim that it is not a valid one, but consider, how many papers set the stage of making the money link in all this? That is the $11 billion dollar question of the day, have a great one!

 

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August 10, 2020 · 06:51

Government driven destabilisation

That is a term you are not familiar with, is it? Yet it is more now than most other things, even as some are all about ‘donations for Beirut’ all whilst the larger groups ignore corruption there as well as the stage that Hezbollah is not in the clear for storage of explosives in the Beirut harbour.

Last month Houthi forces fired on Saudi Arabia, now there is an issue. First of all, the target was military (King Khalid Air Base) making it in my eyes a valid target, yet the western press for the most ignored it completely. The Jerusalem Post gives us “Saudi Arabia said it intercepted ballistic missiles fired from Yemen overnight between Sunday and Monday. Four missiles and seven drones were launched by the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen”, the fact that the Iranian part in all this remains largely unreported in the EU and the Commonwealth is still a massive issue, I have little faith that the Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT) starts being of use in any way (other then prolonging the war in Yemen), yet the larger issue is not the attacks, the issue as I see is that as I personally see it, governments feel happy to set a stage of destabilisation in the Middle East, so that they can feel safe, at least from their Ego driven point of view. The paper also gives us “The military of Yemen’s Houthi group said it attacked and hit a large oil facility in an industrial zone in the southern Saudi city of Jizan” and in all this the amount of goods that is required coming from Iran is still not being investigated, and the dangers that they bring can be wielded in a few directions. My personal issue in this is why we are not getting a full constant update from the Middle East, why are the papers ignoring the actions from the Iranian side and Houthi atrocities in 

Yemen? We might give rise to the article (at https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/2402186/yemeni-speaker-complains-un-over-houthi-violations), yet the western media steered clear of ‘Yemeni Speaker Complains to UN over Houthi Violations’, so when we consider this, who was aware of “Yemen’s National Alliance of Political Parties (NAPP), a group of parties loyal to the internationally recognized government, had also called on the UN and its envoy to condemn the ongoing Houthi attacks against Yemeni pro-government leaders”, how many Commonwealth and EU newspapers took notice? And when we take notice of “The parties added that the militias insist on continuing the series of their crimes against the Yemeni people, rejecting all international efforts to reach peace in the country. “Such behavior is reflected in their decision issued last March to sentence 35 Yemeni pro-government deputies to death,” after charging them with cooperating with the Saudi-led Arab coalition, the statement added”, how many newspapers took the trouble to see what the humanitarian impact is of Houthi decisions here? 

We can argue all week on what is right and what is wrong, yet consider that we cannot argue on matters that most newspapers do not publish, so when we see ‘Huawei-supplied stc wins 5G contract for Saudi mega-city’ (at https://www.capacitymedia.com/articles/3826056/huawei-supplied-stc-wins-5g-contract-for-saudi-mega-city) in here we see “NEOM’s infrastructure will utilise AI, robotics, and human-machine fusion to deliver greater predictive intelligence and enable faster decision making across all NEOM sectors. The procurement and deployment of a future-proof wireless network is a critical first for NEOM in realising our goal of driving innovation in the future digital economy”. Considering that I wrote about that part in ‘There is more beneath the sand’ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2019/11/15/there-is-more-beneath-the-sand/) almost 9 months ago, and on some matters even before than, two weeks earlier I raised ‘Change is coming’ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2019/09/01/change-is-coming/), all matters on Neom City and 5G that the western press left unattended, so what else did we not get to see?

Issues in Yemen, Saudi Arabia, and Iran all remain unreported. And I admit, there is a reach from unreported to Government driven destabilisation, I will admit to that part, in all this there is a larger stake, when we consider that papers are run by people adhering to the needs of Shareholders, stakeholders and advertisers, we get the first part in this, and yes it is subjective and there is space for debate and disagreement, I do not deny this. But when did you (if ever) wonder on matters not published in Western media? OK, in this, I admit that this is still a far stretch towards destabilisation, and that is a fair call, and I would be wrong if it was 1-2 items, but when we add the numbers Houthi attacks on civilian Saudi targets in 2018 and 2019, Iranian intervention in Yemen 2015-2020, with ‘US Navy intercepts ‘Iranian weapons’ bound for Houthis’ (at https://www.thenational.ae/world/mena/us-navy-intercepts-iranian-weapons-bound-for-houthis-1.978874), we get a larger stage, how many newspapers reported on this in the EU or the Commonwealth? I also have https://news.usni.org/2020/02/13/video-uss-normandy-seizes-cache-of-iranian-made-weapons-in-arabian-sea and a few more newspapers (like the Adelaide Now), yet over three pages of links, no BBC, No Guardian, no Washington Post, No Dutch, Swedish, or German Newspapers. There were Middle Eastern newspapers and the Jerusalem Post. Did you consider that part of the equation? When we see the redaction of Iran smuggling drones and weapons to Houthi forces in Yemen, what other matters are you not aware of?

#JustAsking

 

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August 9, 2020 · 19:16

This is boom, that is not

Yet, Beirut, the place where buildings get free air-conditioning through the application of 7.62mm ammunition, the place where something went boom and it enraged a whole lot of people, yet on August 5th I wrote in ‘Boom goes the dynamite’ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2020/08/05/boom-goes-the-dynamite/), we see “It is speculation, but consider the blast, according to some the blast was noticed well over 100Km away. I do have a point of reference, the Fireworks blast in the Netherlands (Enschede) had a similar effect, but nowhere near the size, the video’s I saw told a different story, one car on the highway with a distance of around 2000 meters away got its windows blown out and the rear view mirrors got blown off the car, and that is one of a few video’s that show me that this was no ordinary blast” and it was merely the toppling of issues. We get to see a better picture when we consider “Ammonium nitrate does not burn on its own” (Source: American Scientific), it is merely the foundation. When we consider “For combustion to occur, oxygen must be present. Ammonium nitrate prills provide a much more concentrated supply of oxygen than the air around us. This is why it is effective in mining explosives, where it’s mixed with oil and other fuels. At high enough temperatures, however, ammonium nitrate can violently decompose on its own. This process creates gases including nitrogen oxides and water vapour. It is this rapid release of gases that causes an explosion” we need to look any the explosion again (at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DdSHRbSZkwc), it is one of many explosions, and as you see there was a fire in the vicinity, but the explosion is violent and complete. The stage is in two fold, in the first, Ammonium nitrate doesn’t burn well and to explode oil is used. The images we see could not be done if it was merely the ammonium nitrate. It is my view and I am not the expert (I did study chemistry), yet experts tell me ‘Ammonium nitrate does not burn on its own’, all the footage I have seen give implication that this was not merely ammonium nitrate, yet Scientific American also give us “It’s stable under normal conditions, but you can do things to it that will cause it to misbehave. The main trigger is an external heat source. Depending on how you want to count it, there have been probably somewhere between 20 and 30 major catastrophic explosions with ammonium nitrate since it came on the scene as a commercial product in the 1920s. And fire is a frequent trigger. It’s the heat of the fire that warms up the ammonium nitrate that can become a problem”, it seems that everyone is willing to give Hezbollah a pass on this event. I am not willing to do so, even if they merely blew up their own city, there is a stage where we need to consider what else was there and was it meant for pro-Houthi or anti-Israel actions? In an age where we see a whole range of analytics and geometric based analyses, in this the Guardian gives us ‘The explosion that devastated the city was no accident and anger is boiling over’, and then we see “It was so huge it was heard in Cyprus. It was so huge it shattered glass and ripped doors off their hinges kilometres away. It incinerated trees, tore the red roofs off centuries-old buildings and brought the blue sea inland. It left 5,000 injured and 154 dead – so far. There are many still missing under the rubble”, which leaves us with the setting that it all went up in one big explosion, consider the fact that it required (read: used) 2,750,000 Kg of ammonium nitrate, I get that there might be an explosion, but IT ALL exploded at once is the larger issue, the facts do not support it. And the fear of some is merely strengthening my view. With “We don’t really know how this ammonium nitrate, confiscated from a ship and stored in unsafe conditions in the middle of our city for six years, ignited. Because those who are responsible are actively rejecting an international investigation”, and in this I see their fear, international experts will bare out what I expect, there were explosives there and that contributed to the much larger explosion, not a fire, and that gets us to Hezbollah, it will feel the brunt of rage from the Lebanese people. Something it cannot afford at present. My initial speculation that Iran handed out of date materials beneath cost price is still on the table, as dynamite sweats nitroglycerine and in the heat in Lebanon it would fuse the ammonium nitrate as well. Yet some media is giving us ‘it requires a combination of things and that seems to have happened’, or something to that regard. They all avoid Iran and Hezbollah in all this, true there would be some speculation linked to it, but things that go boom to this degree requires much more investigation, I do not disagree with this, but blasé painting over the stage with paint of the colour ‘that seems to have happened’ is not the way to go. 

 

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August 7, 2020 · 21:24

Allegiances and Alliances

Two words at the beginning of the alphabet, both important. There is a side that I share with Dante Alighieri (and a few others). No matter is as bad as treason, you need to have a decent level of loyalty. As a person you need to have allegiance to your employer, your regent (or president) and your country. Now, we might have points of debate on any of these three levels. The soldier has them much higher towards your country and national leader then his actual employer, others have then higher to their employers, it differs per person, but faith in those above you doing the best towards the ones you support (company) seems to be in play. Within limits the people tend to have alliances towards business partners, and others we are indirectly connected to. That is the nature of things when we are not connected to ourselves, with allegiance only to self we think that we are above matters. When we compare those towards idiots like Bradley Manning, who as a private thought he had the right to make public whatever others decided to make public. No matter how others frame it, it remains treason. So when I see ‘Former Saudi intelligence official accuses crown prince of plot to kill him’ (at https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/aug/07/former-saudi-official-accuses-saudi-crown-prince-of-plot-to-kill-him) some issues come to mind. Now, I am not saying that the accused are innocent or guilty. I wonder how “A former senior Saudi intelligence official with close ties to western intelligence agencies has accused Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of plotting to kill him, claiming in a US lawsuit that one such attempt was thwarted by Canadian officials in 2018”. Consider ‘senior Saudi intelligence official’, it implies that this person requires a high level of allegiance. Now consider ‘close ties to western intelligence agencies’. We understand that one nations specialist can have ties to those of another one, yet there would be barriers. So how are ‘close ties’ defined? I am asking, not telling you. Then we get “the Saudi state launched a campaign to target the former high-ranking official in Canada because he was viewed as a threat to Prince Mohammed’s relationship with the US and his eventual ascendancy to the throne”, when we consider “target the former high-ranking official in Canada” I am left with questions. Was the (optionally former) senior intelligence official no longer in service? I remember that I had to agree a 42 year sentence of never entering an Iron curtain nation in 1981, and I was never a senior anything at that age. And when we consider “he was viewed as a threat” it might be true enough, yet the part of “relationship with the US and his eventual ascendancy to the throne”. If that is true, then the person was a whole lot higher than expected, as such we need to wonder where HIS allegiances lie. A person who is willing to betray his own country for reasons of self will only ever align to self at the expense of everything. Then we get to “The complaint includes references to two previous alleged plots – one against synagogues in Chicago and one involving a plan to blow up two cargo planes heading for the US – that were allegedly thwarted thanks to Aljabri’s assistance”, you see, I wonder who Aljabri is actually aligned to. Consider the stage, do you think that the placement of Aljabri is linked to the Crown Prince directly? Between a senior intelligence officer and the Royal family tends to be a few circles. In this there is also the consideration that the Al Said family is over 15,000 in size and the power of Saudi Arabia is set to a little over 1,500 members, as such, how easy can a senior intelligence officer get to the top of the royal family? The numbers do not add up, the station of a few circles are circumvented leaving me with a lot of questions towards Aljabri. So as we are given “praised by former colleagues in the US and UK for helping to keep westerners safe amid the threat of al-Qaida”, and not one is wondering on what HIS agenda was regarding ‘helping to keep westerners safe’? 

So when we have these elements does anyone wonder how reliable the statement “Prince Mohammed sent “explicit death threats” to Aljabri and frequently used WhatsApp, the popular messaging app” actually is? So now we see a crown prince (seemingly) relying on tools used before, on people of (for them) lower ranks, all whilst there should be a larger debate on how reliable the information is. So when we give weight to “The complaint alleges that the assassins are part of a so-called Tiger Squad of the crown prince’s own personal mercenary group and attempted to covertly enter Canada on tourist visas on or around 15 October 2018 with the “intent of killing” Aljabri”, there are a few issues with that part, but I will not bother you with that element. I will however leave you with two elements. The first is “Canadians can be confident that our security agencies have the skills and resources necessary to detect, investigate and respond to such threats. We will always take the necessary action to keep Canadians and those on Canadian soil safe and we invite people to report any such threats to law enforcement authorities.” The second part was given earlier “own personal mercenary group”, and then consider that both the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) are not to be trifled with. No matter how picturesque the RCMP is, they are a lot more able to hunt down anyone in rural Canadian regions than most of the US troops, military and police troops, the CSIS has its own success rate, I would NOT EVER rely on mercenary groups, not one that stands out all over Canada. That and the Canadian population that is 5 times more allegiant to its national needs than most Americans ever has been. That is the situation that is out there, and it makes the numbers and the setting of the situation off. I would not be at all surprised (personal speculation) that Saad Aljabri would have been quite the jewel for Al-Qaeda needs, knowing about Saudi Arabia and having the ear of Western Intelligence. Mind you! This is speculation! In the other parts, why was Saad Aljabri exiled? In all this there is another optional part “new claims comes just weeks after the Guardian reported that another Saudi living in exile in Canada was warned this his life was possibly under threat by the Saudi regime. Omar Abdulaziz, a close confidante of Khashoggi, was warned by Canadian authorities that he was a “potential target” of Saudi and had to take precautions to protect himself”, exiled people all ready to point the finger on the disappearance of Jamal Khashoggi. Now, there is no evidence, but where is the likelihood of reliability when certain people go into exile? When the money coffer dries up? They become tools for whomever needs them (if the price is right). 

My views should also be scrutinised, I get that and I accept that, yet the media gives us a view that does not add up, not in several ways. In a family with 15,000 members with 10% at the top, do you think that a person like the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia would be this careless? 

We seem to be looking at one side, the Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has the same elements, his alliance is his father, his allegiance is Saudi Arabia and in that setting exiled people do not add up to that much, no matter what claims they make, especially as they cannot back it up with any evidence. It does not mean that Saad Aljabri and Omar Abdulaziz are not optional targets of the Saudi government, yet it seems that they have time and people in exile tend to run out of money a lot sooner than they think. The media seems to have forgotten about that, the optional links to other places was seemingly overlooked by governments, so what is real and what is not? That remains a debate, yet the media thinks that the cover of ‘assassins sent’ is sexy, it might be for them, but for anyone in that game it is not the greatest policy and neither is the use of mercenaries in that stage, mercenaries that light up like Christmas trees even less. 

Just my view on the matter, feel free to disagree.

 

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August 5, 2020 · 23:46

EU fart bit, Google Fit Bit

Yes, we leap left, we leap right and as we see options for choice, we also see options for neglect. In Reuters we see “Google’s parent company Alphabet agreed a $2.1bn (£1.6bn) takeover of the wearable tech firm last year. However, the deal has yet to be completed”, we see that at https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-53647570, and as we see the BBC article, we wonder about a lot more. Yes we acknowledge “While the European Commission has said its main concern is the “data advantage” Google will gain to serve increasingly personalised ads via its search page”, and in the matter of investigations we see:

  • The effects of the merger on Europe’s nascent digital healthcare sector
  • Whether Google would have the means and ability to make it more difficult for rival wearables to work with its Android operating system.

From there there are two paths, for me personally the first one is Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager, to be honest, I do not trust her. I will admit right off the bat that this is personal, but her deal relying on what was requires her to get a win, any win. The setting is founded on “officials acknowledge that the EU’s competition enforcer faces hard choices after judges moved to quash her order for the US tech company to pay back €14.3bn in taxes to Ireland”, which was a juridical choice, but in all this she needs a win and I reckon she will do whatever er she can to get any of the FAANG group. For the most I would be on her side in the tax case, but on the other side the entire sweep of the Google Fitbit leaves me with questions.

The first point is on ‘effects of the merger’, so how is this in regards to the Apple Smart Watch, the Huawei smart watch (android), and a few other versions, how much investigation did Apple get? How much concern is there for Huawei? Then we see the second part ‘Whether Google would have the means and ability’, it is not a wrong position for Margrethe Vestager to take, but as he does it upfront, in light of the EU inactions regarding IBM and Microsoft, it seems weird that this happens upfront now (well to me it does). And as we see ‘difficult for rival wearables to work with its Android operating system’ I see Huawei and the solutions they have, Android solutions no less, so why is Google the problem? 

Then there are two other parts. The first one is “Analysts suggested part of the attraction for Google was the fact that Fitbit had formed partnerships with several insurers in addition to a government health programme in Singapore”, the second one is “Google has explicitly denied its motivation is to control more data”, in all this there is less investigation in regards to what data goes to Singapore, or better stated the article makes no mention towards it, and as I see it, there is no mention on it from the office of Margrethe Vestager either. The second part is how Google explicitly denies its part, yet that denial does not give us anything towards the speculated “its motivation is to have access to more data”, and when you decide on a smart watch, data will end up somewhere and the statements are precise (something that worries me), I have no issue with Google having access, but the larger issue is not Google, it is ‘partnerships with several insurers’, the idea of privacy is not seen remarked upon by Margrethe Vestager and her posse of goose feather and ink-jar wielders, the focus is Google and is seemingly absent from investigations into Fitbit pre-Google in an age where the GDPR is set to be gospel, so who are the insurers and where are they based? Issues we are unlikely to get answers on. Yet when we consider “John Hancock, the U.S. division of Canadian insurance giant Manulife, requires customers to use activity trackers for life insurance policies in their Vitality program if they want to get discounts on their premiums and other perks”, so what happens when that data can be accessed? Is the larger stage not merely ‘What we consent to’, but a stage where the insurer has a lessened risk, but we see that our insurance is not becoming cheaper, there is the second stage that those not taking that path get insurance surcharge. So what has the EU done about that? We can accept that this is not on the plate of Margrethe Vestager, but it is on someones plate and only now, when Google steps in do we see action? 

So whilst the old farts at the EU are taking a gander at what they can get, I wonder what happens to all the other parts they are not looking at. Should Google acquire my IP, with access to 440,000,000 retailers and well over 1,500,000,000 consumers, will they cry murder? Will they shout unfair? Perhaps thinking out of the box was an essential first requirement and Fitbit is merely a stage to a much larger pool that 5G gives, but as they listened to the US, they can’t tell, not until 2022, at that point it is too late for the EU, I reckon that they get to catch on in 2021 when they realise that they are losing ground to all the others, all whilst they could have been ahead of the game, lets say a Hail Mary to those too smitten by ego. 

 

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