Source: Invasive mosquito linked to new malaria outbreaks in Africa – DW – 11/02/2022

Source: Joe Biden is right: America needs a windfall profits tax on big oil | Robert Weissman | The Guardian

China has banned all celebrities from endorsing a range of products and banned those with “lapsed morals” from endorsing anything, as part of an ongoing drive to align society with “core socialist values”.

The regulations, announced by state regulators this week, bar Chinese celebrities from publicly endorsing or advertising health, education and financial commodities, including e-cigarettes and baby formula.

Regulators said the push was to ensure China’s society was “guided by Xi Jinping thought on socialism with Chinese characteristics for a new era”, referring to the sweeping ideology underpinning the rule of the Xi-led Communist party.

Source: China bans celebrities with ‘lapsed morals’ from endorsing products | China | The Guardian

Europe’s most important wetland is suffocating due to a lack of water. The last freshwater lagoon in the Spanish national park of Doñana, has dried up.

It’s located in Andalusia, in southern Spain, and is world famous for its unique landscape and biodiversity. However, out of a total of 3,000 registered lagoons, 60% have been completely lost and are now covered by terrestrial vegetation.

As a result, animals are dying because they have nowhere to drink. Carmen Díaz, a researcher at theDoñana Biological Station, has been warning of this danger for a long time.

“If this long period of drying out persists, we will gradually lose these unique species. In other words, by drying out Doñana we are impoverishing its fauna and vegetation, which, as I said, is very important”.

The wetlands are an essential stop-over for birds on their migration to northern Europe or Africa, some species of which are in danger of extinction. At the last count, there were almost 88,000 wintering birds here. However usually the average 470,000.

Source: Spain’s Doñana wetlands are drying up | Euronews

Source: Lebanon cholera outbreak reaches 400 confirmed cases, Reported from all eight governorates – Outbreak News Today

It’s been a busy last few months for Georgia State University Sophomore James Wilson. While most of his classmates were stressing about their public policy midterms, Wilson and his friends at the Georgia Youth Justice Coalition have been hitting the pavements and phone banks, working to get out the vote ahead of the November elections.

“The main thing that’s motivating me is money,” says Wilson, 20, “who has it, who doesn’t have it, who needs it, and the fact that the state government just does not seem to care.”

With less than a week left before the November election, Wilson is just one of countless young Black organizers in battleground states hoping to have an impact.

Turning out young voters in battle ground states like Georgia will be key if Democrats want to win next Tuesday. In Georgia, young people of color, who favor Democrats, make-up nearly half of the young voting-age population, according to Tuft’s Center for Information on Civic Learning and Engagement.

And early voting numbers have thus far not shown the surge in young voters that Democrats in the state had hoped for this year.

Nalah Lewis, 29, a Black organizer with Planned Parenthood Votes in Atlanta, Georgia, says she is keenly aware of the stakes in this election.

“I feel like we’re under attack in a lot of different ways,” says Lewis. “Obviously, reproductive rights. But when it comes to access to health care, having affordable housing, gun control, public safety, are always the top priorities for the youth that I have [spoken to].”

Source: Young Black Organizers Are Fired-Up, With Just Days Left Until the Midterms

Paul Cobaugh, a military veteran, moved to Texas in 2005. He registered as a Republican because he considers himself a principled conservative in the mold of President Dwight D. Eisenhower.

But today, he writes, the Texas Republican Party today is a party of radical extremists who trample on the rights of those who disagree with them.

He writes:

I’m deeply ashamed of the extremists running the TX Republican Party, that control our state, destroy our American/ Texas values and built their 2022 election platform on conspiracy theories and lies. Maybe it’s because I consider myself an, “Eisenhower-Republican” or just for the simple reason that I’ve worked against extremists in combat zones and beyond. There is no difference today between the TX GOP and the Taliban. Yes, please reread and remember that last sentence.

Like most Texans, I’m proud of our state and its accomplishments. Principled conservatives and liberals built much of what we’re proud of. I frankly don’t give a damn if someone is left/ right, Republican/ Democrat or liberal/ conservative. America does better when principled and well-informed “sides” debate issues. When extremism is not only present, but dominates one side, all else fails. For the record, one of my deep, professional specialties is terrorism, extremism and counter-terrorism, that include several combat deployments prior to my retirement.

We see this in TX at every level of state responsibility. I’ve seen the same in places like Iraq, Afghanistan and other less-than-hospitable parts of the world. I refuse to stay silent when extremism rears its evil head here in my home state. The nation I’ve sworn to defend is now threatened by the soul-scorching, extremism of a party with an insatiable appetite for conspiracy theories and fascist ideals. Someone must have the courage to stand up for integrity and truth. I won’t speak for the left’s dysfunction, but I can guarantee that Abbott and his party are NOT the ones to demonstrate moral courage. We all have a citizen’s duty to be well and accurately informed. It was front and center in the minds of our founders….

In plain language, TX, like most of America, the extremists controlling today’s GOP, seek more power for their own personal gain and immorally use an anti-constitutional, social agenda, to achieve it. The opposition has little to no power in TX because they cannot agree on which individual interest has priority, but collectively ignore the big picture that clearly demonstrates the potentially lethal injury, today’s GOP is causing to the soul of our nation and worse, our national values….

Source: Paul Cobaugh: Moral Courage Is on the Ballot in Texas | Diane Ravitch’s blog

TikTok has emerged as a key platform on which footage of the invasion of Ukraine is shared.

This includes footage of missile strikes and their aftermath, damaged or destroyed military equipment, as well as visual evidence of suspected war crimes and other atrocities.

Misinformation and disinformation about the invasion can also be found on the platform. This includes posts by Russian state-backed media, posts of old or unrelated videos falsely claiming to show contemporary events and misleading or false claims about the details of a video -such as the location it was recorded.

In short, there is much for digital investigators to explore on TikTok.

But compared to other social media companies, TikTok does not currently allow researchers to access and inspect data at scale. Investigating content on TikTok is mostly a manual process that can be very time consuming. Yet there are methods, tools and shortcuts that can help.

Source: How to Investigate TikTok Like a Pro – Part II: Using TikTok for Ukraine Research – bellingcat