Sean Gervasi, 1992 lecture: The US Strategy to Dismantle the USSR
Related RAND Corporation documents:
Economic factors affecting Soviet foreign and defense policy: a summary outline
The Costs of the Soviet Empire
Sitting on bayonets : the Soviet defense burden and the slowdown of Soviet defense spending
Taiwan has a general election on Saturday. The international media has highlighted the election as an important geopolitical pivot – namely, if the current incumbent government party, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), wins the presidency and legislature and continues its call for formal (not just de facto) independence from mainland China, that will mean intensified attacks on Taiwan by Beijing, perhaps leading to military conflict.
Taiwan: the technology trade turn
US President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping met yesterday during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in San Francisco.
Xi meets Biden
Report: Unregulated Data Brokers Sell Military Family Info For Pennies
“It is not difficult to obtain sensitive data about active-duty members of the military, their families, and veterans, including non-public, individually identified, and sensitive data, such as health data, financial data, and information about religious practices. The team bought this and other data from U.S. data brokers via a .org and a .asia domain for as low as $0.12 per record. Location data is also available, though the team did not purchase it.”
Inside Gaza’s first Cat Cafe — a refuge for some, but unattainable for many
One week after opening of Meow Cat Café, the café announced on its Facebook page that the cats would be no longer offered for cuddling and playing with. The cats, the café wrote, were not eating, and had lost their passion for playing due to the exhaustion from humans.
😿
The Rise and Reign of the Welfare Queen
Researcher links government assistance program to much earlier origins of welfare stereotypes
How Bill Clinton’s Welfare Reform Changed America
But based on several studies of TANF and its beneficiaries, “it barely reaches even the poorest Americans, and has all but ceased doing the work of lifting people out of poverty,” according to the Atlantic. “‘Welfare reform’ didn’t fix welfare so much as destroy it, and if similar changes were applied to Medicaid and food stamps, they would likely do the same.”
Americans believe benefits fraud is common for SNAP
Experts say that deliberate SNAP fraud is uncommon because of the rigorous application process and multi-step eligibility review. In 2016, the Congressional Research Service determined that for every 10,000 households participating in SNAP, about 14 contained a recipient who was investigated and determined to have committed fraud.
Who Is Really Responsible for Welfare Fraud?
In other words, don’t take a single example or casual observation of welfare fraud and claim it represents the tens of millions of poor who receive welfare benefits.
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While welfare fraud committed by the poor appears to be low, the federal government has long recognized businesses being the true criminals.
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While these are some of the better known examples of large scale welfare fraud, they are not the only ones. The above cases alone represent over $25 Billion in welfare fraud recovery. The criminals having the greatest impact committing welfare fraud against the government are not the poor, but the privately owned businesses that take advantage of them.
Brett Favre Is The Welfare Queen Republicans Warned Us About
Updates:
Biggest Perpetrators of Welfare Fraud Are Private Companies, Not ‘Welfare Queens’
Bidenomics is gaining no voter traction. To understand why, step back from all the technical economic indicators and look at economic life for key voters — the majority is falling farther and farther behind, faster and faster than ever.
Bidenomics is an insult to millions of voters living paycheck to paycheck
Gov. Phil Scott signs bill that prohibits paramilitary training camps
“It’s difficult to see any Second Amendment issue here,” Chris Bradley, a gun rights lobbyist and president of the Vermont Federation of Sportsmen’s Clubs, told senators while testifying about the bill in February.
The law explicitly states that it does not cover law enforcement activity; lawful instruction of military science at educational institutions; and facilities and programs intended to teach the safe handling of firearms and lawful sports and activities, such as hunting, target shooting, self defense and firearms collection.
Activities that are “undertaken without knowledge of or intent to cause or further a civil disorder that is intended to teach or practice self-defense or self defense techniques, including karate clubs, self-defense clinics, and similar lawful activity” are also not affected by the law, according to its text.
Expecting more Second Amendment advocates to cover this without doing any research on the background of the case. The guy was a violent felon, with a mental disorder, who wasn’t even supposed to even own firearms.
Related:
Read More »Switzerland has a stunningly high rate of gun ownership — here’s why it doesn’t have mass shootings
Switzerland hasn’t taken part in any international armed conflict since 1815, but some Swiss soldiers help with peacekeeping missions around the world.
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Swiss authorities decide on a local level whether to give people gun permits. They also keep a log of everyone who owns a gun in their region, known as a canton, though hunting rifles and some semiautomatic long arms are exempt from the permit requirement.
But cantonal police don’t take their duty dolling out gun licenses lightly. They might consult a psychiatrist or talk with authorities in other cantons where a prospective gun buyer has lived before to vet the person.
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Gun owners who want to carry their weapon for “defensive purposes” also have to prove they can properly load, unload, and shoot their weapon and must pass a test to get a license.
Switzerland is also one of the richest, healthiest, and, by some measures, happiest countries in the world.
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The Swiss have been consistently near the top of this list. In 2017, when Switzerland was ranked fourth overall among nations, the report authors noted that the country tends to do well on “all the main factors found to support happiness: caring, freedom, generosity, honesty, health, income and good governance.”
Meanwhile, according to the report, happiness has taken a dive over the past decade in the US.
The report authors cite “declining social support and increased corruption,” as well as addiction and depression for the fall.
Related:
Fears over Chinese purchases of US cropland are vastly overblown. Lawmakers should slow down before imposing damaging new restrictions.
No, China Isn’t Gobbling Up America’s Farms
Related:
Bill Gates: America’s Top Farmland Owner
Bill Gates Finally Explains Why He’s Buying So Much U.S. Farmland
I’m more worried about ‘Farmer Bill’, who claims that he owns “less than 1/4000 of the farmland”.
Ms. Cat’s Chronicles 
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