- Direct [link] to the mp3 file
- Experimental IPFS RSS Feed
- Executive Producers:
- Sir Ryan, Black Knight of Forgottonia
- Sir keg Baron of Southern Wake County
- Dame Hamr of the Crow Kingdome
- David Flynn - Sir FOD Father
- corey harrison -Sir Edge, knight of the Sasquatch lands
- Edward Tatnall Sir FOD Father, Baron of the Circle City
- Dame Beth, Baroness of Baja Arizona
- Steve Webb - Sir OG Godcaster
- Jeffery Burich (pronounced BEER-itch)
- Sir Kyle of Bertram and the 3 Donkeys
- Sir Bryan Tobiason, Baron of Chiefs Kingdom
- John Takaezu (pronounce like sumo wrestler)
- Associate Executive Producers:
- David Homoney [like Hominy]
- Become a member of the 1499 Club, support the show here
- Title Changes
- Sir Ben of the Apex -> Baron of the Orland Township Illinois
- Sir Yuri Meows-A-Lot -> Baron Yuri the Red of Nizhny Novgorod Oblast, a province east of Moscow
- Sir Ryan, Black Knight of Forgottonia -> Viscount of Forgottonia
- Sir Wesley Olsen -> Baron Wes of the Balderdash
- Sir Stephen Schwarz -> Baronet
- Edward Tatnall Sir FOD Father, Baron of the Circle City -> Baron
- Knights & Dames
- Layla de Grootte -> Dame Lulu of the Space Force Beach
- Kathryn Sutton -> Dame Kathryn Cryptogranny of Bangkok
- Amanda Dilsaver -> Dame Dilsaver
- Bradly Dilsaver -> Sir Dilsaver II
- Brian Henderson -> Sir Henderschnoot, Knight of the Pickles Gambit
- Ronald Lafferty -> Sir Ronald Lafferty
- Douglas MacKinnon -> Sir Ike of Lettland
- Larry Mason -> "dude named e vill larry, the master of the VA medibots"
- Greg Hoy -> Sir Earhopper
- Chris Mitzlaff -> Sir Charismatic
- Michael Janczak -> Sir Michael
- Magdaleno Gutierrez -> Sir Spicy Mexican
- Dean Desimone -> Sir Deano monkey boy with curly hair
- Joshua Faure -> Sir XeQshunR (pronounced “executioner”)
- Justin Wynn -> Sir Small Batch Bartender
- Rory Semelroth -> Sir Rory of the Duck River
- John Vincent -> Sir Wuz, Knight of the Baying Coonhound
- JD Moore -> Sir JD of JC Accounting
- Keegan Sullivan -> Sir Finnrock
- David Flynn -> Sir Carnivore is my personal pronoun
- Scott Hopper -> Sir Hopcam, Panner of the First Turn
- Carlos Areces -> Sir Ching For A Name
- Corey Harrisson -> Sir Corey Harrisson
- Mark Davies -> Sir Mark of the Mamaku Ranges
- Gabriel Chapman -> Sir Bacon is King, Surveyor of the Legendary Back Bowls
- Dan Shadix -> Sir Dan the Shady
- Matthew Couzens -> Sir Matty of Central Oregon
- James Cherf -> Sir James, Defender of the Oak Knoll, guardian of Cricket Creek, the un-woke
- Anonymous -> Sir Quirky, the Baronet On Two Wheels
- Cody Gray -> Sir Cody Gray
- David Uhrbrock -> Sir Bilgewater of the Lower Mississippi
- Kirill Osipov -> Sir Skip Logic of Ormond
- Tony -> Sir Tony, Knight of the Datamodels
- End of Show Mixes: Sir Michaelanthony - Jesse Coy Nelson - Matty J - Sir Nedwood - Tom Starkweather
- Engineering, Stream Management & Wizardry
- Mark van Dijk - Systems Master
- Ryan Bemrose - Program Director
- Clip Custodian: Neal Jones
- Big Pharma
- Adderall BOTG Jess
- A few notes about the Adderall discussion from Episode 1495. The highlighted sections are the important ones, but I’ve provided a bit of back story. Please summarize as you see fit. I worked at a generics pharma company for 6 years before jumping ship for ethical and general terrible working hour conditions to where I’m at currently.
- The Adderall shortage is completely the DEA’s fault as they alone regulate the purchase and manufacturing of all controlled substances (scheduled) products in the US. No pharmaceutical company can manufacture any additional product unless they have DEA approval. This story is all about the DEA’s Quota Process.
- A brief overview of pharmaceutical product manufacturing:
- Active Pharmaceutical Ingredient(s) (API) + excipients (everything else) à mixed in specific quantities and steps à bulk product (think pancake mix right before you place it on the pan) à manufacturing step (producing tablets, capsules, etc.) à finished product packaged in bottles/blisters ready to be distributed and sold
- Quota process in a nutshell:
- Every year, any pharmaceutical company who produces a scheduled product is required to request Quota from DEA, see links below
- DEA has a specific allotment for each step in the manufacturing process, from API, i.e., Dextroamphetamine, Amphetamine, Methamphetamine, etc., all the way to finished product
- There are 3 different types of quota, for each major step in the process; Import quota (if your API is made outside of the US), Procurement quota (permission to actual buy your API), and Manufacture quota (permission to make finished product). At my previous company, we had a whole department who dealt specifically with DEA
- It was designed to control the flow of controlled substances throughout the supply chain, the who and how much, for ‘our safety’
- These quota requests are sent to DEA in the first quarter of the year, and granted usually in April or May of that year. An API supplier can manufacture against that quota but only ship to a finished product manufacturer once the quota approval letter is received by the facility
- There’s no real rhyme or reason on how much quota is granted, very convoluted requirements (shocker) on this whole process. You can request additional quota, but DEA would have to convene and approve it across the board for those who manufacture a given product
- The crux of the problem with respect to running out before the year is up is that it takes 2 -4 months to manufacture the API. So, if you run out mid-year, you have to contact DEA, request more quota, submit all the appropriate quota requests, get approval from DEA, while your API supplier has to do the same. The API supplier cannot start the API manufacturing process until all these boxes are checked. You can imagine how long that process can take…
- Also, Teva is pronounced Teh – vah… It’s an Israeli company 😊
- Why we have the Quota system
- https://www.fdli.org/2018/08/update-the-dea-quota-system/
- https://www.deadiversion.usdoj.gov/quotas/quota_apps.htm
- General schedule ‘controlled substance’ information
- https://www.dea.gov/drug-information/drug-scheduling
- https://translate.google.com/?sl=iw&tl=en&text=teva%0A&op=translate
- P.S. How did you guys miss FUSTRATED?? We couldn’t focus on the actual deconstruction as we were so distracted by the mispronunciation of the word frustrated.
- Looking forward to the start of anniversary week!!
- CBDC
- Does Rishi Sunak look like Beto?
- Ministry of Truthiness
- Lara Logan from Nick
- During the Laura Logan clip on the last show, you mentioned her spiel being typical Christian talk. I have a very different take. She sounded EXACTLY like my mom. That's pretty concerning.
- Pre-2020, my mom was quite normal. She was brought up Catholic but hadn't really been to church regularly in about 30 years. During the last election, she started consuming alternate-alternate news online through Facebook and started dropping some weird-sounding religious stuff. When that stuff got banned, she moved to Parler and Telegram. She now spends most of her day online watching people crazy people live stream from their basements. Basically the modern-day version of the guy on the street corner standing on a crate with one eye and peg leg screaming about the end of days.
- When Laura started talking about the devil and drinking the blood of children, it immediately clicked that she was now in this same rabbit hole. My guess is that if you got Laura Logan alone in a room, she would eventually present multiple of these theories:
- The elites are cultivating children for their blood
- The organized religions have been taken over by Satan. And something about Trump being on the side of good.
- There are tunnels underground that they use for moving the kids. The tunnels go everywhere - including between continents and under the ocean. Most earthquakes are Trump's forces of good causes cave-ins.
- The weather is 100% controlled. Nothing is by accident.
- They invented new cloud names to explain the weather modification and spraying of chemicals to control people.
- Amazon and Walmart traffic children. Bezos is in on it.
- Trump has been secretly running things from behind the scenes and Biden is just a computer AI — along with several other politicians (both democrats and republicans)
- After Trump takes back over publicly, there won't be elections anymore and he'll get rid of the devil.
- There's going to be a massive food shortage any day now. (typical bullshit where it was always "just averted" and the date moved back)
- I wish I was making this stuff up. It's being preached by a bunch of these brain-damaged basement dwellers and tied up with some very powerful religious imagery. It's worth taking seriously if Laura Logan has gone this deep. It's very culty.
- BLM LGBBTQQIAAPK+ Noodle Boy
- STORIES
- GPSJam GPS/GNSS Interference Map
- Daily maps of GPS interference
- Wave of LNG tankers overwhelms Europe and hits natural gas prices
- The U.S. is exporting more LNG to Europe as a result of Russia's war in Ukraine and cuts made to natural gas supplies ahead of winter, but there has been a buildup of LNG vessels waiting to unload at ports with European infrastructure unable to handle the increased LNG shipments.
- There are 641 LNG vessels operating in the world and 60 of them are waiting to discharge their fuel in Europe. These LNG tankers have been idling or slowly sailing around northwest Europe, the Mediterranean, and the Iberian Peninsula, according to MarineTraffic. One is anchored at the Suez Canal. Eight LNG vessels that came from the U.S. are underway to Spain's Huelva port.
- "The wave of LNG tankers has overwhelmed the ability of the European regasification facilities to unload the cargoes in a timely manner," said Andrew Lipow, president of Lipow Oil Associates.
- An LNG import terminal at the Rotterdam port in February 2022.
- Federico Gambarini | Picture Alliance | Getty Images
- These delays postpone the tankers' return to the Gulf Coast of the United States to pick up the next load, according to Lipow, and as a result, natural gas inventories rise more than the market expected.
- The underlying infrastructure issue is a lack of European regasification capacity due to a shortage of regasification plants and pipelines connecting countries that have regasification facilities. As a result, the amount of LNG on the water '-- floating storage '-- increases and in turn drives down the price of natural gas .
- "European gas storage continues to rise and now exceeds 93%," said Jacques Rousseau, managing director, global oil and gas for ClearView Energy Partners LLC.
- A map showing recent LNG tanker locations from maritime analytics firm MarineTraffic.
- Rousseau said the increase in floating storage, with vessels needed to move capacity around the globe tied up for longer, has contributed to an approximate doubling in LNG tanker rates year over year.
- The cut in vessel capacity of 10% of the overall fleet available for use comes at a time when the majority of LNG vessels are linked to long-term contracts, and has left the spot market thin with vessels. This is fueling prices to $500,000 a day.
- Energy experts tell CNBC they are keeping an eye on an EU LNG price cap. The cap was discussed last Thursday even as prices have come down. "The price cap potentially pushes traders out of the market which would impact future supply arriving in Europe," Rousseau said.
- Read more about energy from CNBC ProEuropean gas prices had soared above 340 euros ($332.6) per megawatt hour in late August, but this week dipped below $100 for the first time since Russia cut supplies. Before the war, the price had been as low as 30 euros.
- Russia, which supplies a large portion of natural gas to Europe, cut gas supplies as a response to sanctions after the country's war with Ukraine.
- New York Supreme Court reinstates all employees fired for being unvaccinated, orders backpay | Fox News
- A New York state Supreme Court ordered all New York City employees who were fired for not being vaccinated to be reinstated with back pay.
- The court found Monday that "being vaccinated does not prevent an individual from contracting or transmitting COVID-19." New York City Mayor Eric Adams claimed earlier this year that his administration would not rehire employees who had been fired over their vaccination status.
- NYC fired roughly 1,700 employees for being unvaccinated earlier this year after the city adopted a vaccine mandate under former Mayor Bill de Blasio.
- Many of those fired were police officers and firefighters.
- NYC MAYOR OFFICIAL EXEMPTS ATHLETES, PERFORMERS FROM COVID VAX MANDATE
- The New York state Supreme Court has reinstated all employees who were fired for not being vaccinated, ordering back pay and saying their rights had been violated. (Mike Coppola/Getty Images)
- FDNY-Uniformed Firefighters Association President Andrew Ansbro and FDNY-Uniformed Fire Officers Association President Lt. James McCarthy condemned Adams earlier this year after the mayor allowed an exception to the vaccine mandate for athletes and performers, even as firefighters were still being fired over their status. The pair called on the city to expand the exception to all New Yorkers.
- NYC WON'T REHIRE UNVACCINATED WORKERS, MAYOR SAYS
- "We're here to say that we support the revocation of the vaccine mandate that the mayor announced on Thursday," McCarthy said. "We think that it should be extended as well. We support the revocation of the mandate for the athletes and performers that work in New York City. We think that the people that work for New York City should also have the mandate relocated for them."
- Police officers stand guard as people gather to protest vaccine mandates for city workers at City Hall Park on Nov. 3, 2021, in New York City. (Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)
- "If you're going to remove the vaccine mandate for certain people in the city, you need to remove it for everybody in the city," Ansbro said. "If you're going to follow the science, science is going to tell you there isn't any danger right now, and putting hundreds of firefighters, police officers and other emergency workers out of work is not in the best interest of the city. It's not safe."
- CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP
- This is a developing story. Check back soon for updates.
- Anders Hagstrom is a reporter with Fox News Digital covering national politics.
- Anders worked as a White House correspondent for the Daily Caller before joining Fox News Digital in 2022. There, he covered the opening months of former President Donald Trump's response to the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as the fallout of the 2020 election.
- Since joining Fox, he has covered national politics extensively, including the 2022 midterm elections and President Biden's efforts to counter global adversaries like Russia and China.
- Anders also covers major breaking news events, such as the July 4 shooting in Highland Park, Illinois.Send tips to Anders.Hagstrom@Fox.com, or on Twitter: @Hagstrom_Anders
- Kanye West antisemitism and Trump antisemitism, explained
- It's been quite a news cycle for headline-inducing antisemitic macro-aggressions.
- The fallout from Kanye West's tweet about going ''death con 3 On JEWISH PEOPLE'' and his claims Adidas would not take action even if he ''said antisemitic s---'' (wrong, as we found out Tuesday) continues apace. A white supremacist group in Los Angeles unfurled a ''Kanye is right about the Jews'' banner on the 405 and performed Nazi salutes for motorists. Jenna Ellis, a former Trump lawyer and current adviser to Pennsylvania gubernatorial candidate Doug Mastriano, referred to Democrat Josh Shapiro as ''at best a secular Jew.'' A white nationalist raged about urinating on the Talmud, and on and on it went.
- What Trump is actually saying is slightly different from a generic dual loyalty charge. And far more dangerous.
- But no roundup of This Week In Antisemitism would be complete without a contribution from Donald J. Trump, a true thought leader, influencer and innovator in the Judeophobic space. Via a post on his own conservative media platform Truth Social, the former president counseled Jewish Americans to emulate ''our wonderful Evangelicals,'' urging Jews to follow the evangelicals in supporting and admiring him for all he has done for Israel.
- To Trump's point, amongst the Jewish electorate, support and admiration have not been abundantly forthcoming: In 2016 and 2020, roughly 70 to 75% of Jewish Americans did not cast their vote for Trump (whereas 80% of evangelicals did). Perhaps aware of those data points, Trump routinely chides the Jewish community. There was thus nothing surprising when he concluded his post with a warning: ''U.S. Jews have to get their act together and appreciate what they have in Israel '-- before it's too late.''
- Many in the media and elsewhere reasoned that the former president was playing the ''dual loyalty'' card with his comments. This well-known antisemitic slander avers that Jews are unpatriotic '-- more committed to other Jews, and/or Israel, than to the well-being of the United States.
- But what Trump is actually saying is slightly different from a generic dual loyalty charge. And far more dangerous.
- Trump is making subtle innovations in antisemitic rhetoric, all the while deploying time-tested, old school, anti-Jewish tropes. He might insinuate that all Jews are great negotiators. He might refer to them as "brutal killers" in the real estate business. Nor is he above going Full Shylock. Journalist Yair Rosenberg flagged a Trump quote from decades back: ''Black guys counting my money! I hate it. The only kind of people I want counting my money are short guys that wear yarmulkes every day.'' That's some classic antisemitism (and racism) right there.
- But lately you'll notice a tweak: Trump's now dividing Jews into two mutually exclusive categories of unequal size. First, there are the good Jews. They vote for MAGA Republicans. They unequivocally support Israel (by which Trump means hard-right Israeli governments beholden to religious-nationalist policies).
- In fact, these Jews support Israel so much that Trump speaks of them as if they are Israelis, not Americans. When he addressed the Republican Jewish Coalition in 2019, he informed his audience that ''I stood with your prime minister,'' Benjamin Netanyahu (italics mine). Elsewhere, he pointed out to celebrants at a White House Chanukah gathering that Mike Pence and his wife Karen really love ''your country'' (again, italics mine). Dual loyalties? Not a problem. As long as good Jews support Donald Trump, it's kosher by him.
- Trumpian antisemitism is equipped with a mechanism of plausible deniability. It obscures its links to classic antisemitism.
- Who might the so-called good Jews be? The Ultra-orthodox vote enthusiastically for Trump. The same might be said about citizens who back the policies of parties like Israel's Likud, and those to its right. Trump appears to be popular among Jews who emigrated from the former Soviet Union. Sprinkle in some elderly Fox News watchers, and you likely round out his Jewish base, albeit one which does not include seven out of every 10 Jews.
- This brings us to the ''Bad Jews,'' to borrow a Twitter phrase from right-wing pundit Ben Shapiro. These wayward Members of the Tribe, according to conservatives like Shapiro, have the revolting tendency to vote for Democrats and are accused of not supporting Israel (i.e., they are not supportive of the way that Trump supports Israel). For those who prescribe to the good Jew/bad Jew school of thought, this isn't ''dual loyalty'' '-- it's triple disloyalty to Israel, the good Jews, and the United States.
- As I see it, Trump has crafted a variant of antisemitism all his own, so to speak. His frustrations aren't primarily based on the idea that Jews murdered Christ (this deicide charge is often parsed as ''religious antisemitism''). They aren't centered on the idea that Jews possess distinctly inferior blood or racial characteristics (this is is known as ''racial antisemitism''). Nor on the notion that Jews are either marauding communists or rapacious capitalists (i.e., ''economic antisemitism''). No, Trump's anger is based on the fact that the overwhelming majority of Jews did not cast their ballots for Trump.
- Trumpian antisemitism is equipped with a mechanism of plausible deniability. It obscures its links to classic antisemitism by affirming that there are indeed good Jews. After all, he has Jewish grandkids! Zayde Trump has no generalized ill-will toward Jews, it's just that he must publicly excoriate roughly three quarters of them on a routine basis.
- The danger of this rhetoric to the American Jewish community is threefold. First, there are Trump's devotees whose capacity for violence is not hypothetical. Second, as we saw above, it emboldens others to chime in with their own antisemitic effusions.
- A final problem has to do with the stresses that Trump's hectoring creates within the community. Anyone familiar with Jewish America knows there are internal tensions (about Israel and its treatment of Palestinians, about assimilation, intermarriage, etc). Say what you will about Trump, but he has a unique genius for finding a crack, a seam, a fissure in the social landscape and then ripping it open into a belching canyon of digital rage.
- Jewish reactions to Trump's Truth Social tirade shadowed some of these tensions. The Anti Defamation League slammed the remarks as ''insulting and disgusting.'' The American Jewish Committee administered a relatively anodyne wrist slap on Twitter.
- Predictably, among Trump's good Jews, there has been mostly silence, or even empathy. The Republican Jewish Coalition is wordless. AIPAC, if its webpage and Twitter accounts are any indication, has no thoughts on the matter. Morton Klein, president of the right-wing Zionist Organization of America, told the Israeli newspaper Haaretz that he ''understood Trump's pain.''
- The dual loyalty slander maintains that Jews are clannish, they ''stick together.'' Trump himself made this very observation. But now he faults the Jewish majority for not sticking together with the Jewish minority who venerate Trump. What separates the good from the bad Jews is worship of Trump '-- and given the idol in question, that's what makes this strain of antisemitism so volatile and dangerous.
- CORRECTION (October 25, 6:35 p.m. ET): A previous version of this article used the wrong Yiddish word to characterize Trump as a grandfather. The correct word is ''zayde,'' not ''bubbee.''
- Ash Carter, Former Defense Secretary Under Obama, Dies at 68 - WSJ
- Harvard professor played a key role in the campaign against Islamic State militants and opened combat positions to women
- Updated Oct. 25, 2022 2:42 pm ETFormer Defense Secretary Ash Carter, a physicist who pushed for closer ties between Silicon Valley and the Pentagon, opened combat positions to women and streamlined the command that ran the war against the Islamic State terror group, died of a heart attack Monday evening, his family said. He was 68.
- An experienced Pentagon official, he became President Barack Obama's last defense chief, serving from 2015-2017, a period defined by the U.S. campaign against Islamic State.
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- Former Defense Secretary Ash Carter, a physicist who pushed for closer ties between Silicon Valley and the Pentagon, opened combat positions to women and streamlined the command that ran the war against the Islamic State terror group, died of a heart attack Monday evening, his family said. He was 68.
- An experienced Pentagon official, he became President Barack Obama's last defense chief, serving from 2015-2017, a period defined by the U.S. campaign against Islamic State.
- ''President Obama and I relied on Ash's fierce intellect and wise counsel to ensure our military's readiness, technological edge, and obligation to the women and men of the greatest fighting force in the history of the world,'' said President Biden, who was vice president when Mr. Carter was defense secretary and continued to rely on his expertise as president through his Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.
- Mr. Carter, who was also a Harvard professor who had a degree in theoretical physics, spent his career in government and academia. He served as the director of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government at the time of his death.
- ''He believed that his most profound legacy would be the thousands of students he taught with the hope that they would make the world a better and safer place,'' his family said in a statement.
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- Mr. Carter played an important role in restructuring the U.S. military command that prosecuted the campaign against Islamic State militants. In a monograph published by the Belfer Center, he recounted how he concluded during a visit to the Middle East soon after becoming the Pentagon chief that ''the United States and its coalition partners lacked a comprehensive, achievable plan for success.''
- The campaign against the terror group started slowly and unexpectedly after Islamic State took control of Iraq's second-largest city, Mosul, in June 2014, less than three years after U.S. troops left.
- ''He was instrumental in creating unity of effort in the war against ISIS,'' said Sean MacFarland, a retired Army Lieutenant General who led the fight against the terrorist group from 2015-2016, using an acronym for Islamic State. ''He brought together conventional and special forces operating in multiple countries under one command.''
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- ''He also played a key role in giving the commanders the necessary resources and latitude to conduct operations successfully, like sending U.S. advisers into the field with Iraqi troops,'' he added.
- Against the objections of the Marine Corps, Mr. Carter opened combat positions to women, calling it the ''right thing to do for our people and for the force.'' That decision paved the way for women to not only be on the front lines of war but also hold the jobs that lead to becoming general officers.
- ''We're talking about talented Americans who are serving with distinction or who want the opportunity to serve. We can't allow barriers unrelated to a person's qualifications [to] prevent us from recruiting and retaining those who can best accomplish the mission,'' he said in June 2016 when announcing the decision.
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- When he was serving as deputy defense secretary, Mr. Carter also established the Pentagon's Strategic Capabilities Office in 2012, concluding that the U.S. needed to take advantage of cutting-edge technology in a renewed competition with China and Russia.
- While leading the Pentagon, Mr. Carter also repeatedly visited Silicon Valley and pushed for private industry to help the military develop better technology, particularly in cybersecurity.
- Ashton Baldwin Carter was born Sept. 24, 1954 in Philadelphia. His father was a physicist and a Navy veteran, and Mr. Carter obtained a bachelor's degree from Yale University, earning a double major in physics and medieval history. His senior thesis was titled ''Quarks, Charm and the Psi Particle.'' He then traveled to the University of Oxford as a Rhodes scholar and earned his Ph.D.
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- Mr. Carter wrote a number of books. In 2000, he co-wrote the book ''Preventive Defense'' with William Perry, who served as defense secretary in the Clinton administration. The two former officials argued that the U.S. strategy should aim at preventing the re-emergence of the sort of ''A list'' threats the U.S. had confronted during the Cold War.
- In 2019, he wrote a book titled ''Inside the Five-Sided Box: Lessons from a Lifetime of Leadership in the Pentagon'' in which he sought to demystify the department and share details about his time as defense chief.
- He is survived by his wife, Stephanie, and his children, Ava and Will. Funeral arrangements are pending, the family said.
- Credit Suisse results and strategy: Q3 2022 earnings and overhaul
- Credit Suisse shares plunged 17% on Thursday after the Swiss bank posted a quarterly loss that was significantly worse than analyst estimates, and announced a massive strategic overhaul.
- The embattled lender posted a third-quarter net loss of 4.034 billion Swiss francs ($4.09 billion), compared to analyst expectations for a loss of 567.93 million Swiss francs. The figure was also well below the 434 million Swiss franc profit posted for the same quarter last year.
- The bank noted that the loss reflected a 3.655 billion Swiss franc impairment relating to the "reassessment of deferred tax assets as a result of the comprehensive strategic review."
- Under pressure from investors, the bank revealed a major overhaul of its business in a bid to address underperformance in its investment bank and following a raft of litigation costs that have hammered earnings. New CEO Ulrich Koerner told CNBC on Thursday it represented the beginning of a "transformation into a new Credit Suisse."
- In its widely anticipated strategic shift, the bank vowed to "radically restructure" its investment bank to significantly cut its exposure to risk-weighted assets, which are used to determine a bank's capital requirements. It also aims to cut its cost base by 15%, or 2.5 billion Swiss francs, by 2025.
- The bank expects to incur restructuring charges of 2.9 billion Swiss francs by the end of 2024.
- The transformation plan will see Credit Suisse split off its investment bank into an independent business called CS First Boston, raise 4 billion Swiss franc in capital through the issuance of new shares and a rights offering, and create a capital release unit to wind down lower-return, non-strategic businesses.
- Of the planned 4 billion Swiss franc capital raise, the bank revealed that 1.5 billion Swiss francs will come from the Saudi National Bank in exchange for a shareholding of up to 9.9%.
- The aim is to reduce risk-weighted assets and leverage exposure by 40% each over the course of the restructure, while the bank also set out to allocate "almost 80% of capital to Wealth Management, Swiss Bank, Asset Management and Markets by 2025."
- Speaking to CNBC, Koerner said the bank will be "much more stable, will be sustainably profitable, much simpler in how it is set up, and for us, one of the most important things was how did we come to that solution? We started actually with the client needs and we designed everything around the client needs and ended up with what we are proposing today."
- Koerner took the helm in July following the resignation of predecessor Thomas Gottstein, after the bank booked a second-quarter net loss of 1.593 billion Swiss francs, far below consensus expectations among analysts. He said Thursday's strategic overhaul represented a "very decisive action program."
- "Number one, a radical restructure of the investment bank; number two, a significant reduction of costs; and number three, a further strengthening of our capital base, and I think with that, we have all the necessary ingredients ... to go where we want to go," he added.
- Credit Suisse has been plagued over the past year by sluggish investment banking revenues, losses from the withdrawal of its business in Russia and litigation costs relating to a host of legacy compliance and risk management failures, most notably the Archegos hedge fund scandal.
- Here are some other financial highlights for the third quarter:
- Group revenue hit 3.804 billion Swiss francs, down from 5.437 billion Swiss francs for the same period last year.CET1 capital ratio, a measure of bank solvency, was 12.6%, compared to 14.4% at the same time last year and 13.5% in the previous quarter.Return on tangible equity was -38.3%, down from -15% in the second quarter and 4.5% in the third quarter of 2021.Execution risksVitaline Yeterian, senior vice president for global financial institutions at DBRS Morningstar, said the scale of the third-quarter loss was indicative of the stress Credit Suisse had suffered in its core business.
- "Both in Q3 and 9M 2022, total revenues were below operating costs and well below peers in its core investment banking and wealth management businesses," she said.
- "The main drivers were much lower commissions and fees due to lower client activity, as well as lower trading revenues due to a drop in capital markets revenues. Meanwhile total net interest income was also down YOY (in Q3 and over 9M)."
- The bank also saw an outflow of deposits and assets under management, which it attributed in part to reputational harm resulting from the Archegos and Greensill Capital sagas, along with a spike in withdrawals earlier this month following what the bank called "negative press and social media coverage based on incorrect rumors."
- Yeterian said the rejuvenation of the CS First Boston brand could "help to disconnect the IB from the repeated negative press coverage CS has been subject to."
- "We clearly see execution risks for the restructuring '-- in particular considering the challenging economic and geopolitical backdrops," she added.
- "The CET1 ratio was 12.6% at end-Q3 2022, down 90 bps vs end-June 2022. The capital increase will clearly provide some room to execute CS's plan, although it is not fully secured."
- What is the BeReal app? -- What parents need to know | Internet Matters
- What is the BeReal app? BeReal is a French social media photo sharing app released in 2020, gaining popularity in 2022. It encourages users to post a photo of themselves and their lives without filters or editing to the images every day at a different time.
- It is similar in some ways to Wordle because of its daily cycle that promotes moderation of screen time instead of endless scrolling.
- How it works Creating an accountWhen a user downloads the BeReal app, they must add their phone number, name and age. They then create a username and password to use the app. At this point, they are asked to create their first BeReal post to start seeing others' photos too.
- Posting a photoThen every day at a different time, the app alerts users that it's time to take a photo of what they are doing in the moment. Users have 2 minutes to take a photo and submit it to BeReal for others to see. The picture features whatever the user focused on as well as an image of the user in their current state in the top corner.
- Before submitting the photo, they must choose an audience (friends only or everyone). Users can also share their location and save the image to their device. After the user posts the photo, they can add a caption. If the photo is shared outside of the standard two minute window, other users can see a note that tells them this.
- You cannot see someone else's photo if you have not yet posted your own for the day.
- Interacting with othersAfter a user posts their own image, they can see others' and react to them. To comment on someone's photo, users must be friends. However, if 'everyone' can see the photo, then anyone can react to it.
- There are six standard emojis to react with along with an option to create a RealMoji. With RealMoji, users can create their own by taking a picture of themselves. For example, instead of the thumbs up emoji, a user could send themselves give a thumbs up.
- Reporting inappropriate contentBeReal's Terms of Use encourages users to report any content that is sexual or pornographic, or related to hate speech, extremism, violence, suicide or self-harm. Photos, RealMojis and comments can all be reported if they fall into these categories or breach other items on the Terms of Use. This includes spam and advertising as well as bullying and discrimination. However, the company itself is a hosting company, which means it is not required to monitor the information others post.
- What is the age restriction? According to BeReal's Terms of Use, the app is for those aged 13 and older. The app asks for user's date of birth before allowing access.
- Email Template
- Metaverse Dreaming Remember when Meta was called Facebook, and eerie visions of VR Mark Zuckerberg didn't haunt your dreams?
- Meta's big rebrand happened almost a year ago now, and a lot has happened since Zuckerberg made ''metaverse'' the go-to buzzword-slash-meme of 2022.
- The company formerly known as Facebook not only started pouring billions of its own cash reserves into the metaverse, it jumpstarted an investment craze. Venture capital and private equity funding in metaverse-related companies leapt 823% from $13 billion in 2021 to over $120 billion in 2022, according to a report from McKinsey '-- and 2022 isn't even over yet.
- That investment spike is astonishing given nobody really seems to know what the metaverse is or whether it exists yet. To skeptics, those hundreds of billions of dollars represent a chorus of claps led by Zuckerberg, crypto bros, and Web 3.0 evangelists: ''I do believe in the metaverse, I do! I do!''
- For today's feature we'll be immersing ourselves in the metaverse: So strap on your headset, make sure there's nothing breakable in your immediate vicinity, and let's dive in.
- A Brief History Of The Metaverse The word ''metaverse'' comes from the 1992 science-fiction dystopian novel Snow Crash. Broadly it refers to a future version of the internet that you engage with primarily through immersive technology rather than through a flat screen like your phone or PC.
- Techies have been trying to make metaverse tech a reality for decades as well. In 2003, Second Life became the first metaverse-esque platform to go mainstream, with people creating virtual avatars that interacted in a digital world but spent real cash. Second Life is still going, and developer Linden Labs said in May the platform has an annual economy of $650 million GDP.
- Along Came Zuckerberg: Facebook first dipped its toe into metaverse tech in 2014 when it acquired VR technology company Oculus for $2 billion. Although Zuckerberg did not utter the word ''metaverse'' at the time, he was already planning ahead.
- ''Mobile is the platform of today, and now we're also getting ready for the platforms of tomorrow,'' Zuckerberg said in a statement.
- Shifting Facebook's strategy to be more mobile than web-based has been one of Zuckerberg's greatest coups as CEO. By 2014 the social network had also hoovered up Instagram and WhatsApp '-- the future looked bright.
- Cut To 2021: Facebook was in the throes of its latest scandal. The Wall Street Journal had begun publishing documents leaked to them by former employee Frances Haugen in September. By early October, Haugen was testifying before Congress about how she believed the company put ''profits over people.''
- On October 28, after much media buildup, Facebook revealed it was changing its name to Meta and Zuckerberg said the company would be bifurcated. One strand would focus on its traditional social media business '-- already besieged by TikTok's skyrocketing popularity '-- and the other would focus on building the metaverse.
- Where We're at Now Meta has racked up $27 billion in operating losses over the past three years building its metaverse dreams, and now a looming economic downturn has forced it to make cutbacks for the first time in its history. So at this particularly sensitive moment, what gain does it have to show for its pain?
- One week ago Meta showcased what that investment has yielded so far, unveiling a new ''mixed-reality'' headset called the ''Meta Quest Pro'' at an eye-watering price-point of $1,499. But as Zuckerberg admitted to The Verge's Alex Heath: even with that giant price tag, the machine's not turning a profit.
- Zuckerberg's vision for the moment involves marketing two types of headsets:
- The Quest 2, formerly known as the Oculus Quest, is squarely aimed at gamers. Meta bumped up the price of the headset from $299 to $399 in August citing rising manufacturing and shipping costs. The Quest 2 is the best-selling VR headset on the market, partly because it is relatively cheap '-- even after Meta whacked another $100 on it.With the Quest Pro, Zuckerberg hopes to move beyond gamers to ''high-end professionals'' touting the machine as being able to become part of your workstation by showing you footage of the real world around you '-- i.e. your keyboard and desk '-- then overlay digital images of monitors. Leaning into the reality of virtual reality.''The strategy overall is not to make money on the hardware but to make it so that it can help develop the ecosystem. And then, over time, the business model will be based on software and services,'' Zuckerberg told Heath.
- Meta's software and services aren't looking too hot though.
- Bad Press Sandwich: The reveal of the Quest Pro came shortly after two news reports from The Verge and The New York Times that Meta has trouble convincing its own employees to spend time in the metaverse. The Verge obtained a September memo from Meta's VP of Metaverse Vishal Shah saying Meta's VR Horizon Worlds social app was too buggy, and that not enough employees were using the app. In a follow-up memo, Shah said he would ''hold managers accountable'' if employee usership stayed low.
- Shortly after the Quest Pro's debut The Wall Street Journal got its hands on some internal documents that said Horizon Worlds has been bleeding users since spring 2022, falling way short of Meta's original expectations. The Journal also featured some colorful anecdotes of its own reporters trying to use Horizons. In one, an avatar fell into a pool and couldn't escape.
- Horizon Worlds has taken a beating from the public as well, especially after Zuckerberg showed off an avatar of himself that looked bizarrely simplistic (Meta swiftly went into damage control mode and produced a still image of a much more polished virtual Zuckerberg).
- Zuckerberg says he's reconciled to the metaverse losing Meta money for the next three to five years, but while Meta throws money at the concept and absorbs the bulk of public derision smaller companies are riding its slipstream to nab huge valuations and larger players are getting ready to make their own metaverse plays.
- Microsoft already has a large customer base of gamers it can access through its Xbox console, and it's done two massive deals this year. It acquired gaming studio Activision Blizzard in an all-cash deal valued at $68.7 billion in January. Microsoft announced the purchase of AB, which is behind giant franchises including Call of Duty and World of Warcraft. Microsoft said, would provide it with ''building blocks for the metaverse.'' Microsoft also announced last week it was partnering up with Meta to integrate both its suite of productivity services and the Xbox cloud gaming platform. It also already has a mixed-reality headset called the ''Hololens.''
- Apple is expected to announce augmented-reality goggles next year, but has remained characteristically quiet about the project. Zuckerberg has already singled it out as a metaverse competitor '-- although he has tried to frame the rivalry as philosophical rather than commercial.
- The Metaverse's Haters Aren't Its Only Real-Life Enemies
- Meta and other companies will ultimately face many of the same problems when the metaverse crashes into the physical world:
- As many as 40% to 70% of people can't go 15 minutes in VR without feeling nauseated, one researcher told Inside Science in 2019, and the problem hasn't disappeared. US soldiers trialing Microsoft's Hololens headset suffered headaches and nausea, according to an October Pentagon report.Zuckerberg has set his sights on the working world with his new headset, but he might find it hard to find workers, even high-end professionals, who are willing to put up with the hassle of trying to physically drink a cup of coffee while plugged into the metaverse. Even Meta's own VP of Global Policy Nick Clegg struggled when interviewed inside the metaverse by the Financial Times in December 2021. ''This wretched headset is too bulky to drink my coffee without moving the headset,'' Clegg grumbled.So it's possible billions are being poured into a technology that at scale is incompatible with both the human inner-ear and addiction to caffeine.
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- Election results can fluctuate as they come in. Here's why | AP News
- Why might live election results fluctuate?
- The short answer: People make typos sometimes.
- As local election offices across the U.S. count millions of votes on election night, they share the results with polling firms, which transmit them to viewers watching live on their TV, laptop or phone screens.
- Along the way, humans reporting these results occasionally transpose two digits, add an extra zero or swap candidate tallies, causing false vote counts to temporarily appear in news graphics and social media updates.
- Here's why that's not a big deal:
- CAUGHT! ... FIXING AN ERRORIn recent years, hawk-eyed viewers at home have noticed some of these brief election-night slip-ups and used them to falsely claim they'd caught TV networks or election offices switching or deleting votes to rig the results.
- However, these small mistakes are not a sign of anything nefarious '-- and fortunately, quality control measures in election offices and polling firms ensure they happen rarely and get fixed quickly.
- In elections offices, clerks test voting equipment before voting begins to ensure tabulators are functioning properly. On Election Day, poll workers report any issues with results, such as differences between the number of voters who cast a ballot and the number of votes recorded. After voting is complete, officials use canvass and certification processes to continue hunting for discrepancies and verify tallies.
- Companies that track down these local election results and share them with media outlets on election night also have safeguards in place to catch errors. These measures include questioning unusual data, using computer software to identify discrepancies and employing quality control analysts to check the numbers.
- HOW DOES THE AP DO IT?The Associated Press, one of several companies that does this type of real-time vote reporting, sends thousands of local stringers to county election offices on election night to call in raw vote count totals. The AP employees who take the stringers' calls ask questions to make sure the information is accurate, including asking whether there are problems in the stringer's county, and challenging details if the results seem suspect.
- Since many states and counties display their election night results on websites, some AP data entry staffers monitor those sites and enter results into the database, too, entries that are also checked and rechecked.
- Next, automated checks identify data inconsistencies and refer them to a supervisor. And the AP's team of full-time election research and quality control analysts further monitor and examine the results for anomalies.
- WHAT ABOUT THE NETWORKS?Edison Research, the firm whose data fuels live election night reports from ABC, CBS, CNN and NBC, similarly goes through a quality control process as votes are coming in and afterward, said Executive Vice President Rob Farbman.
- In addition, in key states and counties, the company employs two people to look at each vote count before it is reported.
- A few errors are inevitable, Farbman said, but ''they always get fixed.''
- Associated Press writer Meg Kinnard contributed to this report from New York.
- Check out https://apnews.com/hub/explaining-the-elections to learn more about the issues and factors at play in the 2022 midterm elections. And follow the AP's coverage of the midterms at https://apnews.com/hub/2022-midterm-elections.
- Taylor Swift's 'Anti-Hero' Music Video Removes Scale Reading 'Fat' - Variety
- Taylor Swift's music video for ''Midnights'' lead single ''Anti-Hero'' has been edited to remove a scene that shows her stepping on a bathroom scale that read ''fat.''
- Variety can confirm the music video on Apple Music no longer shows the scale, instead, Swift's anti-hero clone just looks at her with a face of disappointment. The music video on YouTube still features the scale displaying ''fat.''
- Contacted by Variety, reps for Swift and Apple Music did not immediately have a comment.
- Speculation surrounding the reasoning behind the removal of those frames comes from online debate over the scene, which has since been labeled by some as ''anti-fat'' because of the indication that being fat is a negative thing.
- In an Instagram post promoting the release of the music video (which she wrote and directed), Swift says the visual treatment was reflective of her own ''nightmare scenarios and intrusive thoughts [playing] out in real time.'' Within that context, the video matches the song's introspective and analytical lyrics, which include lines such as ''Sometimes I feel like everybody is a sexy baby / And I'm a monster on the hill.''
- From Taylor Swift's 'Anti-Hero' music video on YouTube.
- Swift has talked about struggling with an eating disorder in the past, most extensively in her 2020 Netflix documentary ''Miss Americana.'' In the film, Swift admits there have been times in the past (''It's only happened a few times, and I'm not in any way proud of it'') when she's seen ''a picture of me where I feel like I looked like my tummy was too big, or'... someone said that I looked pregnant '... and that'll just trigger me to just starve a little bit '-- just stop eating.''
- Swift later elaborated on what she's gone through for her Variety cover story, saying that it was difficult for her to speak up about it for the documentary.
- ''I didn't know if I was going to feel comfortable with talking about body image and talking about the stuff I've gone through in terms of how unhealthy that's been for me '-- my relationship with food and all that over the years,'' she said. ''But the way that Lana (Wilson, the film's director) tells the story, it really makes sense. I'm not as articulate as I should be about this topic because there are so many people who could talk about it in a better way. But all I know is my own experience. And my relationship with food was exactly the same psychology that I applied to everything else in my life: If I was given a pat on the head, I registered that as good. If I was given a punishment, I registered that as bad.''
- If You Liked Big Brother, Meet Google's Big MUM | ZeroHedge
- Authored by Daniel Greenfield via The Gatestone Institute,
- Forget Big Brother, Big MUM is Google's new tool for suppressing conservatives...
- MUM or Multitask Unified Model was hyped last year as the company's new machine learning algorithm. MUM had been initially described as an innovative way to allow Google's dying search service to answer natural language questions by drawing on multiple sources.
- While MUM's applications initially appeared to be apolitical, that quickly changed.
- Google first unleashed MUM to fight what it considered COVID "misinformation" by making sure that everyone saw "high quality and timely information from trusted health authorities like the World Health Organization". By reducing the number of sources to only those that agree with its agenda, Google is able to deliver fast results while getting rid of different points of view.
- A Forbes article described how MUM would "check information across multiple reliable sources" to allow "the system to come to a general consensus". Google had once built its search around the vast diversity of a bygone internet, but it has spent the last decade draining the diversity and depth of the pool and replacing it with the shallow manufactured consensus of its agenda.
- Google long ago ceased being a way to find different answers and its search results are deliberately repetitive. Search is an illusion. The user thinks that he's browsing the internet when he's actually spinning his wheels in Google's walled garden. This is most obvious in shopping and in politics: two areas where Google has strong interests and tries to manipulate users into believing that they are exploring options when they're being hand fed variations on a theme.
- Or as Pandu Nayak, VP of search at Google, wrote in a recent post, "By using our latest AI model, Multitask Unified Model (MUM), our systems can now understand the notion of consensus, which is when multiple high-quality sources on the web all agree on the same fact."
- The last thing the world needs is another centralized computer system enforcing a consensus.
- Google disagrees with many of its users about what "reliable sources" or "high-quality sources" entail. MUM helps the Big Tech search monopoly manufacture a consensus, on what it claims is a universal fact, and to promote snippets on its own site that promote that consensus.
- The monopoly doesn't see its search service as a way to rank sites. The Big Tech monopoly, like its counterparts, doesn't want users actually leaving its sites, and wants to force a "consensus" answer on them in its search engine. MUM is another tool for keeping users on its digital plantation. The underlying notion behind MUM is a continuing redefinition of search, not as browsing an array of sources, but as a way of delivering a single instantaneous answer.
- Googlers have long been obsessed with the idea of replicating Star Trek's fictional computer which would offer the answer to any question in a robotic female voice.
- MUM is the next step in this Big Sister quest.
- "The Star Trek computer is not just a metaphor that we use to explain to others what we're building. It is the ideal that we're aiming to build'--the ideal version done realistically," Amit Singhal, then the head of Google's search rankings team, boasted.
- Singhal was later forced to leave the company over sexual harassment allegations.
- "It was the perfect search engine," he gushed about the Star Trek computer. "You could ask it a question and it would tell you exactly the right answer, one right answer'--and sometimes it would tell you things you needed to know in advance, before you could ask it."
- In 2022, Google's search is hopelessly broken because the company no longer has any interest in providing the search service that made it a monopoly, giving a ranked list of diverse results, but wants everyone to speak into their phones and receive a single answer. The consensus.
- Google's snippets and knowledge panels displace links to actual sites and provide what the monopoly claims is the definitive answer. Its search assistant is similarly set up to provide a single answer. Google doesn't want you to compare answers, but to listen to MUM.
- And sometimes Google wants to give you the information before you ask it.
- If you own an advanced Android phone, you may find that Google Assistant will interrupt conversations to offer its own "insights".
- Google is also pursuing "prebunking" of what it considers "misinformation" with preemptive propaganda campaigns.
- Jigsaw, the company's most explicitly political arm, is researching what it calls "prebunking" or attacking views it opposes before they can even gain traction. Prebunking is currently being experimentally tested by Google's Jigsaw to fight "misinformation" in Poland and other Eastern European countries against Ukrainian migrants. This is only a test and Jigsaw expects there to be much wider application for the information techniques that its "researchers" are developing.
- Google's YouTube already has a broad set of bans covering everything from questioning global warming, contradicting medical experts, and debating 2020 election results. These are a window into the company's political agendas and how it seeks to enforce political conformity.
- While it seeks to narrow the sphere of acceptable information in its platforms, Google is working with the leftist Poynter Institute, one of the most notoriously biased fact check spammers, to develop "media literacy.". The company claims to have spent $75 million on efforts to fight "misinformation." And who determines what misinformation is? He who controls the algorithms.
- As the midterm elections approach, YouTube spokeswoman Ivy Choi, promised that the video site's recommendations are "continuously and prominently surfacing midterms-related content from authoritative news sources and limiting the spread of harmful midterms-related misinformation." The technical term for this is mass propaganda. That's what Big Tech does.
- The internet was revolutionary because it upended the central systems of mass propaganda which allowed a government and a handful of men to enforce their consensus on a helpless public through the mass media of newspapers, radio stations, movie theaters and television sets. Big Tech's Web 2.0 killed the revolution and restored the oligarchy. Its monopolists see the internet as only a faster way to deliver more immersive propaganda to the masses.
- The Big Tech monopolies took off by taming the web, shrinking its vast promise and diversity of content into smaller walled gardens that they could dominate and monetize. Facebook inhaled most of the social interactions on the internet and locked it up in its private platform. Google is determined to do the same thing to the bewildering parade of ideas of the entire internet.
- When Google's senior VP Prabhakar Raghavan first introduced MUM, he suggested that the goal was to "develop not only a better understanding of information on the Web, but a better understanding of the world." What happens on the internet doesn't stay on the internet.
- Conservatives are one of the cultural barriers because their existence is a marked reminder that Big Tech does not control everything. While its executives and employees are socially insulated wokes operating in major urban centers, they manage systems that extend around the country and the world. When they encounter different points of view, they seek to wipe them out.
- MUM is yet another tool for enforcing a totalitarian conformity on the diversity of the internet.
- Google doesn't want you to think differently or to think for yourself. What it wants users to do is to shut up and listen to Big MUM.
- bootlegCoinsCA - Etsy
- Etsy uses cookies and similar technologies to give you a better experience, enabling things like:
- basic site functionsensuring secure, safe transactionssecure account loginremembering account, browser, and regional preferencesremembering privacy and security settingsanalysing site traffic and usagepersonalized search, content, and recommendationshelping sellers understand their audienceshowing relevant, targeted ads on and off EtsyDetailed information can be found in Etsy's Cookies & Similar Technologies Policy and our Privacy Policy.
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- This type of data sharing may be considered a ''sale'' of information under California privacy laws. Turning off personalized advertising opts you out of these ''sales.'' Learn more in our Privacy Policy., Help Center, and Cookies & Similar Technologies Policy.
- Forget Musk's Tunnels, Early Tesla Investor Seeds First-Ever eVTOL Car | ZeroHedge
- We've come across many companies debuting futuristic designs of electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) aircraft. Some have even tested (see: here & here) and/or have begun selling eVTOLs on the market (see: here). But when it comes to a driveable eVTOL, Alef Aeronautics has a revolutionary design.
- California-based Alef is the only eVTOL with street-driving capabilities. Alef's Model A prototype was first unveiled last Wednesday.
- The Alef Model A is not a distant dream, expected to enter series production with first deliveries in 4Q25. The cost of the eVTOL that drives on roads and soars over traffic starts at around $300,000. It has a driving range of 200 miles and flies about 110 miles.
- Reuters said, "The unusual appearance'--which features a body that flips on its side to become the wing after lift-off'--is just one aspect that attracted Tim Draper, an early investor in Elon Musk's Tesla Inc and SpaceX whose Draper Associates Fund V has backed Alef with $3 million in seed money."
- Draper told Reuters via email: "The design is extraordinary. The sides of the car become the wings when the plane goes horizontal."
- In a company release, Alef's CEO, Jim Dukhovny, said the eVTOL is a "modern solution for both urban and rural transportation needs in the 21st century because it is the fastest and most convenient transport ever created from the point of origin to the final destination. By enabling consumers to choose driving or flying mode, the Alef flying car allows the optimal path depending on road conditions, weather and infrastructure."
- Dukhovny told CNET: "We can actually solve all traffic in the world for the next hundred years."
- ... and there goes Elon Musk's idea of building tunnels to reduce major cities' traffic congestion problems.
- The Counter Edit | Tiffany Steffens | Substack
- An intersection of personal style, everyday life, and commentary on culture.
- By Tiffany Steffens · Launched 25 days ago
- FBI misled judge on Beverly Hills seizure warrant - Los Angeles Times
- The privacy invasion was vast when FBI agents drilled and pried their way into 1,400 safe-deposit boxes at the U.S. Private Vaults store in Beverly Hills.
- They rummaged through personal belongings of a jazz saxophone player, an interior designer, a retired doctor, a flooring contractor, two Century City lawyers and hundreds of others.
- Agents took photos and videos of pay stubs, password lists, credit cards, a prenuptial agreement, immigration and vaccination records, bank statements, heirlooms and a will, court records show. In one box, agents found cremated human remains.
- Eighteen months later, newly unsealed court documents show that the FBI and U.S. attorney's office in Los Angeles got their warrant for that raid by misleading the judge who approved it.
- They omitted from their warrant request a central part of the FBI's plan: Permanent confiscation of everything inside every box containing at least $5,000 in cash or goods, a senior FBI agent recently testified.
- The FBI's justification for the dragnet forfeiture was its presumption that hundreds of unknown box holders were all storing assets somehow tied to unknown crimes, court records show.
- It took five days for scores of agents to fill their evidence bags with the bounty: More than $86 million in cash and a bonanza of gold, silver, rare coins, gem-studded jewelry and enough Rolex and Cartier watches to stock a boutique.
- The U.S. attorney's office has tried to block public disclosure of court papers that laid bare the government's deception, but a judge rejected its request to keep them under seal.
- The failure to disclose the confiscation plan in the warrant request came to light in FBI documents and depositions of agents in a class-action lawsuit by box holders who say the raid violated their rights.
- FBI agents search safe-deposit boxes during at the U.S. Private Vaults store in Beverly Hills, shown in a video screen capture taken from U.S. District Court records.
- The court filings also show that federal agents defied restrictions that U.S. Magistrate Judge Steve Kim set in the warrant by searching through box holders' belongings for evidence of crimes.
- ''The government did not know what was in those boxes, who owned them, or what, if anything, those people had done,'' Robert Frommer, a lawyer who represents nearly 400 box holders in the class-action case, wrote in court papers.
- ''That's why the warrant application did not even attempt to argue there was probable cause to seize and forfeit box renters' property.''
- After a two-year investigation that opened in 2019, leaders of the FBI's Los Angeles office believed U.S. Private Vaults was a magnet for criminals hiding illicit proceeds in their boxes.
- The business was charged with conspiracy to sell drugs and launder money.
- The FBI and U.S. attorney's office denied that they misled the judge or ignored his conditions, saying they had no obligation to tell him of the plan for indiscriminate confiscations on the blanket assumption that every customer was hiding crime-tainted assets.
- FBI spokeswoman Laura Eimiller said the warrants were lawfully executed ''based on allegations of widespread criminal wrongdoing.''
- ''At no time was a magistrate misled as to the probable cause used to obtain the warrants,'' she said.
- U.S. Private Vaults has pleaded guilty to conspiracy to launder drug money, and the investigation is continuing, she said.
- The plaintiffs in the class-action suit have asked U.S. District Judge R. Gary Klausner to declare the raid unconstitutional. If he grants the request, it could force the FBI to return millions of dollars to box holders whose assets it has tried to confiscate.
- It could also spoil an unknown number of criminal investigations by blocking prosecutors from using any evidence or information acquired in the raid, including guns and drugs.
- Until the FBI shut it down, U.S. Private Vaults was an easy-to-miss store in an Olympic Boulevard strip mall with a Supercuts hair salon and kosher vegan Thai restaurant.
- Around 2015, it began attracting police attention. Local detectives and federal agents spotted drug suspects walking in and out.
- The U.S. Private Vaults store in a strip mall on Olympic Boulevard in Beverly Hills.
- (Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times)
- FBI agent Lynne Zellhart, a former Sacramento attorney, first heard about it from a Los Angeles County sheriff's deputy. Customers, who could rent boxes without identifying themselves, entered the store's vault with a biometric eye scan, the deputy told her.
- The Sheriff's Department suspected a customer was a criminal but was ''having all kinds of problems getting into the box that they had a warrant for because of the nature of the business,'' Zellhart testified in the class-action suit.
- By 2019, federal and local law enforcement had managed to search more than a dozen boxes and seized about $5 million from five drug dealers, a bookie and a debit card thief.
- The FBI opened an investigation of the business itself. Zellhart, who specializes in money laundering, said she thought it should be shut down. She joined forces with counterparts at the Drug Enforcement Administration and Postal Inspection Service.
- Through surveillance, informants and undercover work, they surmised that U.S. Private Vaults and a precious-metals store next door were helping drug dealers launder cash by converting it into gold and silver they stashed in their boxes.
- Zellhart was tasked with spelling out the government's case in an affidavit that took her more than six months to write. Prosecutors submitted it to Kim in a request for six warrants.
- Five of them were for straightforward searches of the store and the homes of its owners and managers to gather evidence for prosecution of the company.
- But the sixth '-- to seize the store's business equipment for forfeiture '-- was highly unusual. The government wanted to take not just computers, money counters, video cameras and iris scanners, but also the ''nests of safety deposit boxes and keys.''
- The only way the FBI could seize the racks of boxes would be to take possession of the contents too. Any judge reviewing the warrant request would recognize a threat to the rights of what turned out to be about 700 customers who had locked away some of their most private and valuable belongings.
- Box holders would liken the raid to police barging into a building's 700 apartments and taking every tenant's possessions when they have evidence of wrongdoing by nobody but the landlord.
- A spokesman for the U.S. attorney's office declined to say whether the government had evidence of criminal activity by any specific box holders prior to the raid.
- An FBI agent inspects the contents of a safe-deposit box during the raid of U.S. Private Vaults in this video screen-capture taken from U.S. District Court documents.
- The 4th Amendment protects people against ''unreasonable searches and seizures.'' It requires the government to get a warrant by showing in a sworn statement that it has probable cause to believe that a particular place needs to be searched and describing specific people or things to be seized.
- In her affidavit, Zellhart made sweeping allegations of criminal wrongdoing by box holders, saying it would be ''irrational'' for anyone who wasn't a lawbreaker to entrust the store with assets that a bank could better safeguard.
- ''Only those who wish to hide their wealth from the DEA, IRS, or creditors would'' rent a box anonymously at U.S. Private Vaults, she wrote.
- But the FBI's evidence against customers was thin.
- Agents had seen some of them pull up to the store in vehicles with Nevada, Ohio and Illinois license plates, Zellhart wrote.
- ''Based on my training and experience in money laundering investigations, Chicago, Illinois is a hub of both drug trafficking and money laundering,'' she said. ''I believe these patrons were using their USPV box to store drug proceeds.'' She cited no facts to back up the suspicion.
- Other customers were showing up in rental cars, and that too, she claimed, was a sign of drug dealers evading law enforcement. An owner of U.S. Private Vaults told a government witness that the store's best customers were ''bookies, prostitutes and weed guys,'' Zellhart wrote.
- Of all the box holders, Zellhart mentioned only nine, either identifying them by their initials or not at all. She said they were ''linked'' or ''associated'' with law enforcement investigations, but again provided no facts specifying criminal misconduct.
- While the majority of customers seemed to be drug dealers, she wrote, U.S. Private Vaults tried ''to attract a non-criminal clientele as well, so as not to be too obvious a haven for criminals.''
- At Zellhart's deposition, Frommer asked, ''Was it your opinion that most of the people who rented safe-deposit boxes were criminals in some way?''
- ''I was expecting a lot of criminals,'' she said. ''I don't know about most.''
- Frommer reminded her of the language in her affidavit.
- ''I don't sort of know how to answer your question as to whether it was all of them, it was most of them,'' she responded. ''I don't '-- I don't have a percentage.''
- Attorney Robert Frommer, left, with his clients Jennifer Snitko, her husband Paul Snitko, far right, and Joseph Ruiz, who are plaintiffs in a class-action lawsuit over the FBI raid of U.S. Private Vaults.
- (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)
- On the affidavit's 84th and 85th pages, Zellhart assured Kim the FBI would respect customers' rights.
- That section, she testified, was written by Andrew Brown, an assistant U.S. attorney and driving force of the investigation.
- What Brown wrote contradicts the FBI's plan for hundreds of box confiscations. He underlined the government's lack of evidence to justify any criminal search of the customers' property.
- ''The warrants authorize the seizure of the nests of the boxes themselves, not their contents,'' his section of the affidavit said. ''By seizing the nests of safety deposit boxes themselves, the government will necessarily end up with custody of what is inside those boxes initially.''
- The affidavit told Kim that agents would ''follow their written inventory policies'' and ''attempt to notify the lawful owners of the property stored in the boxes how to claim their property.''
- Under FBI policy, it said, inspection of each box would ''extend no further than necessary to determine ownership.'' But agents' inspection of the boxes went substantially further '-- just as the government planned, according to FBI records filed in court.
- By the time Kim got the warrant request, the FBI had been preparing an enormous forfeiture operation for at least six months, according to Jessie Murray, the chief of the FBI's asset forfeiture unit in Los Angeles.
- In the summer of 2020, she testified, Matthew Moon, then one of the highest-ranking FBI agents in Los Angeles, asked her if her team ''was capable of handling a possible large-scale seizure'' of safe-deposit boxes at U.S. Private Vaults.
- Murray told him yes. She recalled joining a conference call in late 2020 and another in early 2021 to plan forfeitures of the box contents with the U.S. attorney's office, other federal and local agencies, and ''maybe even our legal forfeiture unit at [FBI] headquarters in D.C.''
- Zellhart and a colleague confirmed the grand scale of the planned forfeiture in a memo to fellow agents with detailed instructions for carrying out the raid.
- The memo, approved by Moon and two other senior FBI managers, ordered agents to assign ''CATS ID'' numbers to ''all cash'' found in the boxes. The government uses the Consolidated Asset Tracking System to keep track of everything it seizes for forfeiture.
- Murray testified that once she reviewed the final draft of Zellhart's affidavit, it was clear to her that there was probable cause to seize and confiscate the contents of every box '-- as long as it met the $5,000 minimum set by the Justice Department's Asset Forfeiture Policy Manual.
- Murray offered no explanation for why the FBI believed it had legal grounds to take away the assets of hundreds of unknown box holders based on their presumed ties to unknown crimes.
- To confiscate an asset under U.S. forfeiture laws, the government must first have evidence that it was derived from criminal conduct or used to facilitate it.
- This excerpt from the FBI's plan for the raid on U.S. Private Vaults instructs agents to assign forfeiture identification numbers to ''all cash'' found in the safe-deposit boxes so the money could be permanently confiscated on the presumption it was linked to crime.
- In a court filing in the class-action case, Brown and other prosecutors claimed the FBI had no obligation to tell Kim that it was ''prepared to seek forfeiture'' of property inside the boxes.
- Agents ''owe a duty of candor to courts,'' they acknowledged, ''but that is about known facts that have already occurred.''
- They said the FBI did not need to tell Kim ''how later actions, such as criminal investigations against boxholders or forfeiture of box contents, would play out.''
- Kim was explicit in limiting the scope of the raid. ''This warrant does not authorize a criminal search or seizure of the contents of the safety deposit boxes,'' his warrant stated.
- The judge gave the FBI permission to take inventory of the box contents to protect against theft accusations. He ordered agents to identify the owners and notify them that they could claim their property.
- But by then, Zellhart and her colleague had already told agents in their memo to take notes on anything that suggests any of the cash ''may be criminal proceeds,'' such as whether it was bundled in rubber bands or smelled like marijuana.
- The FBI also had dogs sniff all the cash for any odor of marijuana or other drugs, a step that was outside the bounds of the ''written inventory policies'' that the government vowed to follow.
- Lyndon Versoza, a postal inspector who often has dogs check mail for drug investigations, testified that Zellhart or a DEA agent '-- he could not remember which '-- asked him to round up K-9 teams. He got dogs from the Glendale, El Monte, Chino and Los Angeles police departments to smell the money.
- At his deposition, Versoza was asked whether a drug dog can help identify the owner of a pile of cash.
- What about protecting agents against accusations of theft? Frommer asked.
- Could a dog help justify forfeiture of the cash?
- ''It could,'' Versoza replied.
- Prosecutors have made extensive use of the dog alerts on cash '-- notoriously unreliable evidence in a state where marijuana is legal '-- to convince judges to approve confiscation of box holders' money.
- In the raid's aftermath, the criminal case against U.S. Private Vaults sputtered to an end with nobody sent to prison.
- The company went out of business. It was sentenced to pay a $1.1-million fine for laundering drug money, but prosecutors conceded it lacked the means to pay it.
- Under a plea deal, the U.S. attorney's office agreed not to prosecute the company's owners, despite a Justice Department policy under Atty. Gen. Merrick Garland to hold individuals accountable for corporate wrongdoing '-- and despite Zellhart telling Kim it was ''owned and managed by criminals.''
- The FBI and U.S. attorney's office rebuffed repeated Times requests for a full accounting of what was seized. They divulged neither how much the government has kept, nor how much it has returned.
- Records from dozens of lawsuits stemming from the raid make clear, though, that it produced a windfall of tens of millions of dollars for the Justice Department. Local police departments that assisted in the raid have sought shares of the money, according to Murray.
- Some of the government's gains came from customers who abandoned their boxes. ''There's a good number of people who just said, 'I don't want it,' '' Zellhart testified. ''I think there was 20 or 30 of those.''
- When the FBI vacated U.S. Private Vaults, it posted a notice in the store window inviting customers to claim their property. The FBI went on to investigate anyone who stepped forward, checking their bank records, state tax returns, DMV files and criminal histories, agents testified.
- A sign taped on the window of U.S. Private Vaults in Beverly Hills advises people whose valuables were seized by federal agents to contact the FBI to retrieve them.
- (Joel Rubin / Los Angeles Times)
- Lawyers for box holders denounced the process as a ploy to gather evidence for forfeitures and criminal investigations.
- Zellhart testified that the FBI was just making sure it was returning things to rightful owners.
- In all, the FBI ultimately returned at least some of the contents of about 430 of the 700 boxes, according to the government.
- Many box holders have agreed to give up a portion of their cash and property after deciding it was not worth spending tens of thousands of dollars in legal fees '-- or more '-- to recover the rest. Some of those, and many others, have faced baseless FBI accusations of criminal wrongdoing. In May 2021, the FBI claimed the contents of 369 boxes '-- including the $86 million in cash '-- were linked to crime and filed papers for confiscation through forfeiture.
- It went on to return everything in about 180 of those boxes after failing to produce evidence to support the allegations, court documents show. Those box holders retrieved more than $27 million. Attorneys for other customers say they recovered close to $25 million more through private negotiations with the U.S. attorney's office.
- ''This entire episode is a stain on the U.S. attorney's office and on everyone who played a part in it,'' said Benjamin Gluck, a lawyer for box holders.
- Prosecutors have pressed ahead, filing more than 40 court complaints to confiscate millions of dollars from box holders who challenged the seizures.
- In some of those cases, prosecutors cited no evidence that the money was tied to any specific crime, alleging simply that a dog smelled drug residue on the cash, or that it was bagged or wrapped in a way that aroused suspicion of drug trafficking.
- In a few other cases, prosecutors and the FBI accused box holders by name of committing multiple felonies, offered no evidence to back up the allegations, and then gave back everything.
- One of those customers was a glassware maker who kept more than $340,000 in cash and gold in his box.
- In a court declaration, he said he rented the box in 2020 because it was a ''disturbing and scary'' time of social upheaval, and he distrusted banks.
- The U.S. Private Vaults store in Beverly Hills.
- (Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times)
- ''Protests and riots were the normal news, banks had been boarding up their windows, and emergency alerts were prompting people to stay indoors after curfew,'' he wrote.
- Prosecutors falsely accused the man of fraud, racketeering, conspiracy, drug trafficking and money laundering. FBI agent Madison MacDonald '-- who co-authored the raid plan '-- filed a sworn statement saying the allegations were true.
- The complaint included no evidence the glassware maker had committed any of those crimes, but alleged he had ''an extensive history of narcotic trafficking arrests and convictions.''
- The man's lawyer, Yael Tobi, castigated the prosecutors for exaggerating expunged misdemeanors, saying they intentionally omitted that he'd been arrested 16 years ago and was never convicted of a felony.
- She called it ''an egregious abuse of power.''
- Spokespersons for both the FBI and U.S. attorney's office declined to comment on the case.
- Prosecutors demanded that the glassmaker provide a sworn statement on when, why and from whom he received every dollar of the $340,000; the names of everyone who'd given him gifts since 2017; five years of tax returns for him and his wife, a doctor; and all of their bank and investment account numbers.
- ''Before proceeding too far down the road on this case, do you have a settlement offer to resolve this matter?'' Assistant U.S. Atty. Victor Rodgers asked Tobi in an email six days later. ''The government is prepared to be reasonable in connection with a resolution, and I think that an early settlement of this case would probably be beneficial to both parties.''
- Tobi refused to cut a deal. She asked U.S. District Judge Mark C. Scarsi to ''put a stop to the government's abuse and overreach'' by dismissing the complaint.
- On March 9, nearly a year after the FBI seized the man's cash and gold, Scarsi ordered the government to give it back.
- Non-Stimulant ADHD Medication - Qelbree' For ADHD
- IMPORTANT SAFETY INFORMATION ABOUT QELBREE INDICATION
- Qelbree® (viloxazine extended-release capsules) is a prescription medicine used to treat ADHD in adults and children 6 years and older.
- IMPORTANT SAFETY INFORMATION ABOUT QELBREEQelbree may increase suicidal thoughts and actions, in adults and children with ADHD, especially within the first few months of treatment [read more] or when the dose is changed. Tell your doctor if you have (or if there is a family history of) suicidal thoughts or actions before starting Qelbree. Monitor your moods, behaviors, thoughts, and feelings during treatment with Qelbree. Report any new or sudden changes in these symptoms right away.
- IMPORTANT SAFETY INFORMATION ABOUT QELBREEQelbree may increase suicidal thoughts and actions, in adults and children with ADHD, especially within the first few months of treatment or when the dose is changed. [read more] Tell your doctor if you have (or if there is a family history of) suicidal thoughts or actions before starting Qelbree. Monitor your moods, behaviors, thoughts, and feelings during treatment with Qelbree. Report any new or sudden changes in these symptoms right away.
- You should not take Qelbree if you: Take a medicine for depression called monoamine oxidase inhibitor (MAOI) or have stopped taking an MAOI in the past 14 days. Also, you should avoid alosetron, duloxetine, ramelteon, tasimelteon, tizanidine, and theophylline.
- Qelbree can increase blood pressure and heart rate. Your doctor will monitor these vital signs.
- Qelbree may cause manic episodes in patients with bipolar disorder. Tell your doctor if you show any signs of mania.
- Do not drive or operate heavy machinery until you know how Qelbree will affect you. Qelbree may cause you to feel sleepy or tired.
- The most common side effects of Qelbree in patients 6 to 17 years are sleepiness, not feeling hungry, feeling tired, nausea, vomiting, trouble sleeping, and irritability, and in adults, insomnia, headache, sleepiness, tiredness, nausea, decreased appetite, dry mouth, and constipation. These are not all the possible side effects of Qelbree.
- You may report negative side effects to the FDA at 1-800-FDA-1088 or visit www.fda.gov/medwatch.
- Please see Medication Guide including Boxed Warning.
- IMPORTANT SAFETY INFORMATION ABOUT QELBREE INDICATION
- Qelbree® (viloxazine extended-release capsules) is a prescription medicine used to treat ADHD in adults and children 6 years and older.
- IMPORTANT SAFETY INFORMATION ABOUT QELBREEQelbree may increase suicidal thoughts and actions, in adults and children with ADHD, especially within the first few months of treatment [read more] or when the dose is changed. Tell your doctor if you have (or if there is a family history of) suicidal thoughts or actions before starting Qelbree. Monitor your moods, behaviors, thoughts, and feelings during treatment with Qelbree. Report any new or sudden changes in these symptoms right away.
- IMPORTANT SAFETY INFORMATION ABOUT QELBREEQelbree may increase suicidal thoughts and actions, in adults and children with ADHD, especially within the first few months of treatment or when the dose is changed. [read more] Tell your doctor if you have (or if there is a family history of) suicidal thoughts or actions before starting Qelbree. Monitor your moods, behaviors, thoughts, and feelings during treatment with Qelbree. Report any new or sudden changes in these symptoms right away.
- You should not take Qelbree if you: Take a medicine for depression called monoamine oxidase inhibitor (MAOI) or have stopped taking an MAOI in the past 14 days. Also, you should avoid alosetron, duloxetine, ramelteon, tasimelteon, tizanidine, and theophylline.
- Qelbree can increase blood pressure and heart rate. Your doctor will monitor these vital signs.
- Qelbree may cause manic episodes in patients with bipolar disorder. Tell your doctor if you show any signs of mania.
- Do not drive or operate heavy machinery until you know how Qelbree will affect you. Qelbree may cause you to feel sleepy or tired.
- The most common side effects of Qelbree in patients 6 to 17 years are sleepiness, not feeling hungry, feeling tired, nausea, vomiting, trouble sleeping, and irritability, and in adults, insomnia, headache, sleepiness, tiredness, nausea, decreased appetite, dry mouth, and constipation. These are not all the possible side effects of Qelbree.
- You may report negative side effects to the FDA at 1-800-FDA-1088 or visit www.fda.gov/medwatch.
- Please see Medication Guide including Boxed Warning.
- Climate protesters glue themselves to Porsche museum but needed to go potty
- Climate change activists protesting industries and governments had a busy summer in Europe. A relentless outfit called Just Stop Oil in the UK has created disruptions everywhere from major highways to the British Formula 1 Grand Prix, and more recently, they threw tomato soup on a Van Gogh painting at the National Gallery in London. Across the Channel, the Tour de France cycling race was forced to pause during several stages by climate activists who'd glued themselves to the road. Over the western border, a group called Scientist Rebellion took the sticky route when nine members glued their hands to the floor of the Porsche pavilion at Volkswagen's Autostadt museum in Wolfsburg on Thursday.
- The protesters have several requests for VW Group CEO Oliver Blume as listed in a Twitter thread about the event, among them: support for capping the maximum speed on German highways to 100 kilometers per hour (62 mph); hastening VW's moves to lower its carbon emissions; canceling the debt and interest payments "owed to VW by the Global South"; and "pressure the [government] to comply with our demands."
- Such protests are happening so often that there's now a standard back-and-forth. A group disrupts traffic or makes a scene. Authorities are called in almost immediately. The media follow, capturing the ruckus as protesters are unglued or unchained or coaxed down. The Autostadt is a VW gem among the Wolfsburg factory complex, with the immense glass storage tower shuffling completed vehicles awaiting delivery and pavilions for Audi, Seat, Lamborghini, and Porsche. This should have made it the perfect place for the back-and-forth, a magnet for police intervention and media.
- Instead, staff at the VW museum ignored the playbook. Instead of calling Wolfsburg police immediately, staff "recognized the right to protest," then closed the pavilion for the evening and left '-- turning off the light and heat as they walked out.
- The UK outlet Express, likely sick of this happening on its own shores and not inclined to be charitable, wrote that the protestors "pleaded for medical treatment because their hands were sore and moaned that they couldn't go to the toilet." The paper interviewed one protester who said of staff, "They refused our request to provide us with a bowl to urinate and defecate in a decent manner while we are glued," and, "We can't order our food, we must use the one provided by Volkswagen. Lights off. Random unannounced checks by security guards with bright torches."
- What Express left out is that the reason it could interview a protester was because he'd been removed over a potential medical issue and was being held by police. The remaining eight protesters, along with six Scientist Rebellion members who weren't glued, stayed in place through the night to Friday morning. The most recent post on the outfit's Twitter page at the time of writing said police had arrived in the morning to arrest everyone. According to German outlet Welt, "The police then took action against the other activists on Friday. Criminal proceedings were initiated for trespassing, coercion and property damage."
- Seems CEO Blume didn't get a chance to swing by before then. And stay tuned for protesters to start showing up with backpacks of food and toiletries and pails full of kitty litter.
- Climate protesters glue themselves to Porsche museum but needed to go potty originally appeared on Autoblog on Fri, 21 Oct 2022 13:46:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
- Diabetes-related weight loss drugs facing supply issues amid viral trend | Fox Business
- Novo Nordisk '-- the maker of diabetes-related drugs Ozempic and Wegovy '-- says its facing supply constraints after the medications rose to popularity on social media amid reports that celebrities were using them to shed excess weight.
- "We are currently experiencing intermittent supply disruptions on various doses of Ozempic due to the combination of incredible demand coupled with overall global supply constraints," the pharmaceutical company told FOX Business.
- Meanwhile, the Danish multinational pharmaceutical company says it's also trying to resolve "supply constraints following unprecedented product demand and short-term manufacturing issues" with Wegovy.
- ELON MUSK JUMPS ON NEW WEIGHT-LOSS TREND: DIABETIC MEDICATIONS
- Recently, both medicines have exploded on TikTok after patients started benefiting from their weight loss effects. Certain hashtags such as #wegovyweightloss and #myozempicjourney have gained over 40 million views each on the platform. Even business magnate Elon Musk admitted on Twitter to using Wegovy as part of his diet after a user commented on his "fit, ripped & healthy" bod.
- TikTok users have also speculated that Kim Kardashian may have even taken Wegovy or similar drugs such as Ozempic, to cut inches off her waist.
- WALMART LAUNCHES LOW-COST PRIVATE INSULIN FOR DIABETES PATIENTS
- While these drugs are the same medication, semaglutide, they have different dosages and FDA-approved intended uses.
- Not a lifestyle medicationDr. Robert Glatter, an emergency physician at Lenox Hill Hospital in Manhattan, told FOX Business earlier this month that Ozempic was approved by federal health officials in 2017 and marketed for medical use in the treatment of type 2 diabetes "with weight loss as a secondary effect of the drug's effects and mechanism of action."
- Meanwhile, Wegovy was approved in 2021 specifically for chronic weight management in adults who are obese or overweight and that have at least one weight-related condition such as high blood pressure, Type 2 diabetes, or high cholesterol, according to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
- GET FOX BUSINESS ON THE GO BY CLICKING HERE
- It became the first approved drug for chronic weight management in adults with general obesity or overweight since 2014, according to federal health officials.
- Neither drug is "intended to be used as a lifestyle medication," according to Novo Nordisk.
- Still, Glatter said social media, especially TikTok, has become full of videos "of people who have used the medication as a shortcut to avoid exercise and a healthy diet to help lose weight."
- "Many obese people now see Wegovy as a way to 'jump start' their weight loss when other attempts have been unsuccessful," he said, adding that even non-obese people "seek to obtain the medication 'off label' to get leaner or 'cut' and achieve a slimmer or more toned appearance."
- However, Glatter warned that drugs such as Wegovy are not "designed to be a quick fix to lose a few extra pounds."
- Dr. Christopher McGowan, a gastroenterologist and obesity medicine specialist, agreed, telling his twitter followers that Wegovy and Ozempic are "safe, effective tools for patients who need them (those with diabetes & obesity, respectively). They're NOT for short-term/off-label use, which contributes to ongoing shortages."
- Wegovy sales jumpTicker Security Last Change Change % NVO NOVO NORDISK A/S 104.22 +0.16 +0.15% CLICK HERE TO READ MORE ON FOX BUSINESS
- For the patients that do need it, the pharmaceutical company said Ozempic still continues to be shipped out, although certain areas will experience delays.
- "We are making both short and long-term investments to solve for these temporary challenges," Novo Nordisk said.
- Additionally, the company says it plans to "make all dose strengths of Wegovy available in the U.S. towards the end of the year."
- The company said it's making plans for additional production capacity to come on-line in 2023.
- Novo Nordisk said sales within Diabetes and Obesity care increased by 28% to 72.7 billion Danish kroner ($9.6 billion) in the six months ended June 30. Wegovy sales alone were 2.6 billion Danish kroner, up from 85 million in the prior year half.
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- VIDEO - Poland, Spain & the Netherlands Join Italy in Junking Europe's Energy Treaty | Public Content Network - The Peoples News Network
- Amid Energy Crisis, Poland, Spain and the Netherlands Join Italy in Junking Europe's Energy Treaty. Several European countries have begun abandoning the Energy Charter Treaty (ECT), which for long has been under fire for protecting investments in the oil and gas sector. The Energy Charter Treaty was intended to protect international energy investments by foreign companies or individuals. It was brought after the Cold War to encourage investment across Europe. Watch to know more.
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- VIDEO - About | Indivisible
- Action by action, day by day, group by group, Indivisibles are remaking our democracy.
- Brought together by a practical guide to resist the Trump agenda, Indivisible is a movement of thousands of group leaders and more than a million members taking regular, iterative, and increasingly complex actions to resist the GOPs agenda, elect local champions, and fight for progressive policies.
- They make calls. They show up. They speak with their neighbors. They organize. And through that work, they've built hundreds of mini-movements in support of their local values. And now, after practice, training, and repetition, they've built lasting power on their home turf and a massive, collective political muscle ready to be exercised each and every day in every corner of the country.
- Our VisionA real democracy -- of, by, and for the people.
- Why we're hereIndivisible was founded in response to Trump's election - but we know that Trump is a symptom of a sick democracy, not its cause. We face two fundamental problems: first, our democracy was rigged from the start in favor of the white and wealthy. Second, in the last few decades, an alliance of white nationalists and the ultra-rich have been actively working to further undermine democracy and cement their hold on power permanently. That's how we ended up with Trump.
- We have to build a democracy that reflects a broad, multiracial ''we the people,'' one that works for all of us and is sustained by all of us. Only then will we be able to achieve a progressive vision for our future.
- How we winDefeating a multi-decade right-wing takeover of American government ain't easy. But we're here to win, and we have a plan. Here's how we're doing it:
- We Are Indivisible. Our opponents depend on a divide and conquer strategy, so we treat an attack on one like an attack on all. We show up for each other, and particularly for those facing the brunt of rightwing ideologues' attacks - often immigrants, people of color, and low-income people. We share a vision: a real democracy, of, by, and for everyone.
- Strong Leaders, Strong Groups, Strong Movement. We build and sustain our movement's power by helping individuals take leadership. They grow and lead local Indivisible groups, take independent action, and coordinate with their fellow local leaders. As a movement, our power comes from coordinated national campaigns where we act together, indivisible.
- Inside/Outside Strategy. We understand systems of power - like how Congress operates - and we work inside them to get results. That complements our outside strategy of locally-based constituent pressure to demand elected leaders, regardless of political party, work for our democracy.
- A Virtuous Cycle of Advocacy and Elections. We show up to advocate for policy wins in off-years and get out the vote in election years. These efforts reinforce each other to ensure our democracy works for all of us and that the people in power do too - or we will replace them with electeds who will.
- Who we areIndivisible started as the Indivisible Guide, a Google Doc guide to organizing locally to pressure your elected officials to resist Trump's agenda. It caught fire as millions of people picked up the guide and its name - Indivisible - and organized their own local Indivisible groups to put the guide into action. These new Indivisible activists formed a nationwide movement of people taking matters into their own hands to build their own power through collective action.
- Indivisible national is a social movement organization that grew as the Indivisible movement grew, building out a professional team of organizers, wonks, campaigners, digital and data specialists, and other experts to support the movement and fight for progressive values. Like other social movement organizations, Indivisible's staff both supports and works independently of the movement itself - just as local Indivisible groups both take autonomous action and also coordinate with each other and with our national team.
- Today, the Indivisible movement is a progressive grassroots movement of millions of activists across every state, fueled by a partnership between thousands of autonomous local Indivisible groups and a national staff. Indivisible's national team offers strategic leadership, movement coordination, and support to Indivisible activists, and also directly lobbies congress, builds partnerships, runs media campaigns, and develops advocacy strategies. Together we fight to defeat the rightwing takeover of American government and build an inclusive democracy.
- Organizational MissionsIndivisible Project (501c4) drives coordinated campaigns, powering the grassroots Indivisible movement to defeat the rightwing takeover of American government and win an inclusive democracy and bold progressive policies.
- Indivisible Civics (501c3) provides movement coordination, resources, training, and tools to fuel a powerful and aligned national movement of Indivisible groups and activists to organize for change.
- Indivisible Action (PAC) channels grassroots energy into electing progressive candidates who will work towards an inclusive democracy that provides for the needs of all people, and to defeat politicians who will stand in its way.
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