One of the Navy’s newest ships had to be towed more than 40 miles to port after it broke down Friday less than a month after it was commissioned into service.
The littoral combat ship USS Milwaukee, which boasts a $360 million price tag, broke down Thursday evening, days after the ship’s crew discovered “fine metallic debris in the port combining gear filter system,” the Navy said in a news release. The crew later discovered similar debris in the ship’s oil filter . . .
The ship is now undergoing a full inspection in Little Creek, Virginia. The incident was first reported by the Navy Times.
The breakdown happened as the ship was on its way to its home port of San Diego after it was commissioned in Milwaukee. The long journey took it through the Great Lakes and Halifax, Canada. It was scheduled to stop next in Florida.
Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John McCain called the ship’s “complete loss of propulsion … deeply alarming, particularly given this ship was commissioned just 20 days ago.” (Read more from “New $360 Million Navy Ship Breaks Down” HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-12-15 00:33:232016-04-11 10:55:09New $360 Million Navy Ship Breaks Down
Oil held gains after rebounding from the lowest price since February 2009 as the U.S. Congress sought to advance on a deal to allow unfettered crude exports for the first time in 40 years.
Futures were steady in New York after rising 1.9 percent Monday, the first increase in seven days. Senate leaders faced resistance from some Republicans and House Democrats, who were willing to discuss lifting trade restrictions depending on concessions they’d get in exchange, according to a Democratic leadership aide. Oil prices won’t continue at current levels, OPEC Secretary-General Abdalla El-Badri said in New Delhi on Tuesday.
Oil is trading at levels last seen during the global financial crisis after the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries effectively abandoned output limits as it sought to defend market share. Hedge funds and other large speculators raised bets on falling U.S. crude prices to a record while the International Energy Agency predicted the market will remain in surplus at least until late 2016.
“If the U.S. starts to ship its crude to Asia, this will further intensify competition with OPEC producers,” Kang Yoo Jin, a commodities analyst at NH Investment & Securities Co. in Seoul, said by phone. If oil drops to about $30 a barrel, OPEC “will find the need to protect prices as internal discord and conflicts among themselves persist.” (Read more from “Crude Falls Below $35 per Barrel in New York for First Time Since 2009” HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-12-15 00:32:502016-04-11 10:55:09Crude Falls Below $35 per Barrel in New York for First Time Since 2009
Robot doctors, virtual reality vacations and smart toothbrushes. These are just a few of the things the world can expect to see in the not-so-distant future, says Stanford and Duke researcher and lecturer Vivek Wadhwa.
Speaking to a crowd of more than 300 people in Palm Beach in December at billionaire Jeff Greene’s “Closing the Gap” conference, which addressed the growing divide between the wealthy and poor and how the rise of machines might kill white-collar jobs, Wadhwa sketched a sci-fi vision for the future that he says will soon be a reality thanks to rapid technological innovation.
“The future is going to be happening much, much faster than anyone ever imagined,” said Wadhwa, explaining that tech growth has been exponential — meaning as technology advances it does so with increasing speed.
It took more than a century to go from Alexander Graham Bell’s first telephone to Gordon Gekko’s iconic clunker in the movie Wall Street. Just two decades later we had the first iPhone. In 2010, $1,000 would buy a computer with the computational power of a mouse brain; soon it will buy you a computer as strong as the human brain.
“In about seven or eight years the iPhone 12 will have the same computing power that you do,” said Wadhwa. (Read more from “Artificial Intelligence Doctors and Virtual Reality Vacations Are on the Horizon” HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-12-15 00:32:182016-04-11 10:55:09Artificial Intelligence Doctors and Virtual Reality Vacations Are on the Horizon
Vice President Joe Biden once compared it to a “Third World country” — but LaGuardia Airport has become so riddled with homeless that it could now even make some of those nations look good.
The number of derelicts living at the airport has increased dramatically in the past year, turning the main terminal into the city’s most popular de facto flophouse, where they sleep, eat and wash up while competing for space with passengers, according to Port Authority sources.
At least 50 homeless people live inside the airport’s Terminal B, which anyone can get into without passing through security, sources said.
On one night last week, men and women were sacked out on cardboard that they had spread out over warm vents on the floor, a reporter observed. Others were curled up on chairs near Air Canada while televisions blared above their heads. A few were bunched together in couples, but most were solo and kept their distance from others.
Meanwhile, passengers tried to keep as far away as possible while they waited for their flights. (Read more from “Homeless Squatters Are Taking over LaGuardia Airport” HERE)
Buyers beware! If that drone you find under the Christmas tree weighs much more than half a pound, you’re going to have to register it with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) before you fly it outside.
The FAA and the Department of Transportation (DoT) announced new rules on Monday that will mean nearly all drone operators will have to register their drones in a national database.
The authorities have been attempting to crack down on unlicensed drones amid their rising popularity – they are expected to be one of this Christmas’s biggest toys. But drones have been seen as a major menace and have disrupted firefighting efforts, been used to snoop on neighbors and to smuggle drugs into prison (not to mention regularly flying too close to manned aircraft).
The new rules cover all drones weighing more than 0.55lb (0.25kg) and take effect on 21 December. A significant number of Christmas toys may be affected – and quite a few children may need to get their parents to register for them, because licensed drone pilots must be over 13 years of age. Drone owners who began flying their quadcopter vehicles before that date will have until 19 February to comply.
New drone toys are notably light – the box containing the largest radio-controlled flying Millennium Falcon toy weighs barely 1.7lb, according to the manufacturer, Spinmaster, and that includes the remote. A spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment, and a customer service representative could only give the weight of the vehicle and its controller. (Read more from “Drone Owners Get Christmas Surprise from FAA” HERE)
The Islamic State may want Western and moderate Arab countries to send ground troops to Syria, because it believes an apocalyptic battle is necessary to fulfill an end-of-days prophecy of total Muslim conquest.
This belief is expressed in an ISIS propaganda video released last week titled “Meeting at Dabiq,” which references the future location of an epic final clash between Muslims and “crusaders.”
The video, replete with Islamic chants, depicts ISIS fighters – some in tanks and trucks – advancing toward the Colosseum in Rome. This is followed by images of the ISIS flag raised across the Middle East and North Africa. It then predicts the downfall of the West.
The Syrian city of Dabiq, near Aleppo, is central to ISIS ideology. The terrorist group named a magazine after the city, and routinely refers to a future battle at Dabiq in their propaganda. They believe a massive confrontation with Western forces must take place there in order to usher in the Islamic apocalypse and ultimate conquest.
Dabiq is mentioned in the hadith – the Islamic oral tradition that claims to quote the prophet Muhammad verbatim on numerous matters. (Read more from “Inside Islamic State’s End Times Apocalyptic Battle Plan” HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-12-14 01:43:312016-04-11 10:55:09Inside Islamic State’s End Times Apocalyptic Battle Plan
A silent persecution of Christians tantamount to genocide is ongoing in the Middle East, according to experts in Washington.
Last week, at a panel organized by The Heritage Foundation to discuss modern Christian martyrs, academic, religious, and media leaders discussed the persecution—as well as the inattention being paid to the issue by developed nations including the United States.
“I am always struck by how utterly abandoned the patriarchs and church leaders [in the Middle East] whose lives are on the line every day … how utterly abandoned they feel by the West, and particularly the United States,” said Kathryn Jean Lopez, a senior fellow with the National Review Institute and one of the event’s co-hosts.
According to recent estimates, the Christian population in Iraq has dropped to roughly 260,000, down from 1.5 million a decade ago.
The shift likely reflects continuing forced expulsions of Christians from northern Iraq and Syria, as well as abductions and murders by extremist leaders who, earlier this year, declared the coexistence of Muslims with Jews and Christians impossible according to the Quran.
“Forcing a population to leave [its homeland] is one of the five tests, and they don’t all need to be met, but it’s one of the tests for genocide,” said Patrick E. Kelly, executive director of the St. John Paul II National Shrine and a member of the Knights of Columbus. Kelly was referring to the five tenets of qualifying characteristics that constitute Article II of the 1948 United Nations Genocide Convention definition of genocide.
Those qualifying characteristics include murder, causing serious harm, imposing conditions of life that attempt to destroy, preventing births, and forcibly transferring children outside a specific national, ethnic, racial, or religious group.
“I think we have a tendency to think governments always know what’s going on on the ground,” Kelly continued. “They don’t always have the best information. But churches often do, because of the grassroots, with-the-people nature of parishes and ministries. If governments say they don’t have the evidence, they can do more to get the evidence, but they should be listening to the faith communities as well.”
As of this week, according to sources, the State Department does not plan to include Christians in a statement to be released on the status of victims of ISIS-inflicted genocide in the region. The statement will include Yazidis, the Kurdish religious minority.
Washington experts stress that any statement or widespread response must be inclusive of all religions.
“The church and all Christians must be working for the religious freedom of all people, because that freedom is rooted in the dignity of the human person,” Timothy Samuel Shah, associate director of the Religious Freedom Project at Georgetown University’s Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs, said at The Heritage Foundation panel.
“What we are fighting for is not our own tribe, not our own group. We’re fighting for religious freedom for everyone,” he added.
On Monday, the Knights of Columbus announced they had written a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry urging the inclusion of Christians in any sort of State Department finding on Middle Eastern genocide.
“We write as American citizens concerned about the vulnerable Christian and Yazidi minorities of Iraq and Syria who are being targeted for eradication in their ancient homelands solely because of their religious beliefs,” the letter begins.
The letter goes on to request a meeting with a “small delegation” to debrief Kerry on the crises confronting Christians including forcible conversion, mass murder, enslavement, rape, destruction of churches, and theft of lands and wealth, adding that Pope Francis has himself used the word “genocide” to describe the aforementioned persecution.
“All faiths are under attack when one faith tries to kill others because they do not believe,” said Roger Severino, director of The Heritage Foundation’s DeVos Center for Religion and Civil Society, at The Heritage Foundation panel last week. “It is as simple as that.” (Read more from “Obama Admin. Ignoring Widespread Christian Genocide in the Middle East” HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-12-14 01:38:252016-04-11 10:55:10Obama Admin. Ignoring Widespread Christian Genocide in the Middle East
The men in the U.S. military’s most dangerous jobs have a message for their political leadership: women have no place on their teams.
In a survey conducted by the Rand Corporation, more than 7,000 members of America’s Special Operations Forces unanimously objected to having women do their jobs. . .
Lack of physical strength and mental toughness were the main reasons given.
“I weigh 225 pounds, and 280 pounds in full kit, as did most of the members of my ODA (a 12-man Army Green Beret unit),” one respondent said. “I expect every person on my team to be able to drag any member of my team out of a firefight. A 130-pound female could not do it, I don’t care how much time she spends in the gym. Do we expect wounded men to bleed out because a female soldier could not drag him to cover?”
Another said, “. . .Most males in the area of the world I work in would rather back hand a female than listen to her speak. There is a reason we send men to do these jobs,” he said. (Read more from “The 7000+ Men in the US Special Forces UNANIMOUSLY Oppose Women in Their Ranks” HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-12-14 01:37:392016-04-11 10:55:10The 7000+ Men in the US Special Forces UNANIMOUSLY Oppose Women in Their Ranks
Rupert Murdoch, according to Brietbart, has been a foe of Donald Trump, and for quite some time has defied Trump on numerous occasions. For example, when the Donald came out against illegal immigration, Murdoch was pushing for amnesty for illegals. He even tried to debunk Trump’s argument that the presence of illegals actually created a rise in the crime rate in the U.S. . . .
And Murdoch’s support of amnesty coincides with his desire for corporations to have an unlimited supply of work visas for workers from outside of the U.S. Murdoch, according to Breitbart, said that action on allowing for the corporate visas couldn’t wait and needed to be acted upon as soon as possible . . .
For his part, Donald Trump called for a temporary ban on Muslims entering the United States, a stance for which he has drawn an enormous amount of criticism. Murdoch, on the other hand, believes that a total ban on refugees to the U.S. is what is necessary.
Murdoch tweeted on Tuesday, “Has Trump gone too far? Regardless, public is obsessed on radical Muslim dangers, Complete refugee pause to fix vetting makes sense.” (Read more from “The Last Person You’d Expect Just Stepped up and Defended Trump” HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-12-14 01:37:142016-04-11 10:55:10The Last Person You’d Expect Just Stepped up and Defended Trump
In January of 2015, a handful of Senators quietly introduced new legislation in Congress that would allow for virtually unlimited Muslim immigration into the United States – lifting caps entirely on several categories of visas favored by immigrants from Muslim countries.
The Mark Zuckerberg-backed legislation, S.153, is called the Immigration Innovation Act (or I-Squared), and it has taken on new significance following the terrorist attacks in San Bernardino. Those attacks were only possible due to Muslim immigration: Syed Farook is reportedly the child of Pakistani immigrants, and his jihadi bride, Tashfeen Malik, was reportedly born in Pakistan.
The I-Squared bill is significant for a second reason. One of the Senators who introduced the bill is also running for President: Sen. Marco Rubio. And several of Rubio’s most prominent financial backers are among the bill’s boosters.
I-Squared would expand five major visa categories used by Muslim migrants: the F-1 foreign student visa, green cards for foreign students, green cards for their family members, the H-1B foreign worker visa, and the H-4 spousal visa . . .
Under current law, the F-1 student visa operates under the assumption that foreign students have no intention of abandoning their home countries. It is intended to operate similar to a foreign exchange program, where the students return home after their studies are concluded. Current statute reads that an F-1 visa holder is “an alien having a residence in a foreign country which he has no intention of abandoning…” 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(15)(F)(i). (Read more from “Mark Zuckerberg Backed Immigration Bill Would Allow Unlimited Muslim Immigration” HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-12-14 01:35:142016-04-11 10:55:10Mark Zuckerberg Backed Immigration Bill Would Allow Unlimited Muslim Immigration
