All posts by nedhamson

Activist, writer, researcher, addicted to sharing information and facts.

Chinese students ‘shouldn’t be in our schools spying’, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo says

Shades of Yellow Peril racism. All Chinese student are spies… racism pure and simple. Next? Intern Chinese-American citizens as spies? Can’t escape 100,000 dead Americans with racism spin.

8a9d5812-a167-11ea-8055-0ae12e466049_ima

US President Donald Trump is preparing to “take on” the problem of Chinese students engaging in espionage in America, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Thursday.“We’re taking seriously the threat of students who come here who have connections deeply to the Chinese state,” he said in an interview with Fox News.“They shouldn’t be here in our schools spying.”Pompeo was responding to questions about a report published by The New York Times on Thursday that the US was planning to revoke the…

UK wants US to form 10-nation 5G alliance to cut reliance on China’s Huawei

Can’t respond to Covid-19, so might as well set back 5G by 5-10 years on spin-scare.

thumbnailclean.jpg?itok=DVYkoKpr

Britain said Friday it was pushing the United States to form a club of 10 nations that could develop its own 5G technology and reduce dependence on China’s controversial technology giant Huawei.The issue is expected to feature at a G7 summit that US President Donald Trump will host next month against the backdrop of a fierce confrontation with China that has been exacerbated by a global blame game over the spread of the novel coronavirus.Britain has allowed the Chinese global leader in 5G…

US, Britain plan to raise Hong Kong national security law at UN Security Council

need to take heat off from too many Covid-19 deaths in UK and US driving increased tension?

tw.jpg?itok=uq688_Qm

The United States and Britain plan to informally raise at the United Nations Security Council on Friday China’s plan to impose new national security legislation on Hong Kong, diplomats said, a move likely to anger Beijing.China’s parliament approved on Thursday a decision to move forward with the legislation that democracy activists, diplomats and some in the business world fear will jeopardise Hong Kong’s semi-autonomous status and its role as a global financial hub.Beijing says the new…

100,000+ Milestone

Twit Trump strikes out

In Saner Thought

We have reached a milestone of 100,000 deaths…..and some are asking just how did it come to this?

I would like to give a list of 12 things that Donald the Orange did to make it worse….

  • He didn’t prepare. For the first three years of his administration, he failed to take steps to prepare for a long-expected pandemic by expanding the inventory of critical medical supplies in the Strategic National Stockpile, strengthening the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and bolstering other critical components of our national public health system.
  • He ignored warnings. For several weeks starting in early January, he ignored early warnings about the grave threat posed by the coronavirus outbreak, squandering precious time needed to implement proven measures that would have limited active community spread of the virus.
  • He falsely assured the public. After the first COVID-19 cases were confirmed in the U.S., he…

View original post 706 more words

May 29, 2020 – Latina Lista: News from the Latinx perspective – One CNN Reporter arrested

Last night, CNN reporter Omar Jimenez was arrested by State Patrol in Minneapolis as he covered the riots and chaos in response to the police killing of George Floyd. Though Jimenez showed his credentials and complied with all orders the police gave to the media, he was taken into custody. While he was carted off to jail, another CNN reporter, who is white, was treated differently, and in his own words, “politely.” This arrest underscores the frustration people of color feel with some members of law enforcement. He’s been released now, without apology but the governor apologized to CNN management. Jimenez says the only thing that gave him comfort during the arrest was knowing everything was happening live on camera, so he had a world of witnesses. Is it any wonder why people whip out their phone cameras when stopped by police these days?

Source: May 29, 2020 – Latina Lista: News from the Latinx perspective

Conservative News Site Slams Trump’s ‘Vile Slander,’ Questions His Fitness To Lead | HuffPost

“This story is not just false, but verifiably so. It is also illogical and bizarre,” the editorial states.

The site criticized the “loathsome individuals” who amplified the conspiracy theory “as part of a bad-faith, cheap-shot ad hominem argument against Scarborough,” adding that it was “far, far more unfortunate that the latest person to trumpet and repeat this vile slander is the president supposedly leading this nation through a time of crisis.”

The right-wing site, which is often friendly to Trump, also blasted the president in March for demonstrating how “deeply unsuited he is to deal with a genuine crisis that he can’t bluff his way through” in his handling of the pandemic.

Source: Conservative News Site Slams Trump’s ‘Vile Slander,’ Questions His Fitness To Lead | HuffPost

George Floyd, fired officer overlapped security shifts at south Minneapolis club | KSTP.com

A former club owner in south Minneapolis says the now-fired police officer and the black man who died in his custody this week both worked security for her club up to the end of last year. George Floyd and now-former Officer Derek Chauvin both worked security at the El Nuevo Rodeo club on Lake Street, according to Maya Santamaria. Santamaria owned the building for nearly two decades, but sold the venue within the last few months.

Source: George Floyd, fired officer overlapped security shifts at south Minneapolis club | KSTP.com

Patients share beds as coronavirus cases overwhelm Mumbai’s hospitals

5568.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=8

As India’s pandemic continues, in some areas the healthcare system is close to collapse

In Mumbai’s Sion hospital emergency ward there are two people to a bed. Patients, many with coronavirus symptoms and strapped two to a single oxygen tank, were captured lying almost on top of each other, top-to-toe on shared stretchers or just lying on the floor, in footage shared on social media in India this week.

Mumbai, a city of more than 20 million people, is weeks into the pandemic, but with new cases showing no sign of slowing down the city’s already weak healthcare system appears to be on the brink of collapse. State hospitals such as Sion, overcrowded in normal times, are overrun. With frontline doctors and nurses falling sick with the virus in their droves, it is also leading to a shortage of medical staff.

Continue reading…

Coronavirus misinformation fuels panic in Asia

HONG KONG (AFP) – False alerts about a man shot dead at a coronavirus checkpoint, old footage of a supermarket stampede in reports of panic buying, and a 2015 video of a police raid on a brothel recirculated with a misleading claim.

A deluge of online misinformation and hoaxes during the coronavirus crisis is stoking fear and confusion across Asia, where violators of lockdown rules can face jail and hefty fines in some countries.

AFP has produced more than 150 lockdown-related misinformation reports across the region since February, when governments beyond China began introducing restrictions to curb the spread of Covid-19.

The hoaxes are created by a wide array of people with varying motives – from those looking to discredit governments and deepen religious divides, to pranksters – and then shared widely as fact.

In April, a hoax was shared on Facebook in the Philippines post its lockdown suggesting a motorcyclist had been shot dead for ignoring a virus checkpoint.

In fact, the footage – which was viewed tens of thousands of times in multiple posts – was of a police training drill.

Some users were outraged, and questioned the purportedly fatal use of force by the police, which has long been accused of human rights abuses and led President Rodrigo Duterte’s controversial war on drugs.

But others suggested the man had been “hard-headed” and was justly punished for stubbornly ignoring the checkpoint, echoing the types of sentiments from Duterte’s supporters who have cheered on the thousands of drug war deaths.

Other misinformation circulated in the Philippines has included doctored advisories about lockdown extensions and false posts about anti-government protesters flouting gathering bans.

Elsewhere in Asia, a Facebook post in Thailand included a video purporting to show panicked buyers scrambling for goods in Malaysia after it implemented a strict lockdown.

Thai Facebook users – who viewed the video hundreds of thousands of times – shared it with comments expressing worry there would be similar scenes in Thailand.

The clip, in fact, showed shoppers in Brazil on Black Friday, an annual day of sales, in November 2019.

“(Misinformation) has fuelled a lot of uncertainty and anxiety among people,” said Yvonne Chua, an associate professor of journalism at the University of the Philippines.

The online mayhem has taken a greater hold when governments have communicated poorly, according to Axel Bruns, a media professor at the Queensland University of Technology in Australia.

“It seems to me the more effective government communication has been about lockdowns, but really about all aspects of their coronavirus response, the less foothold there has been for mis- and disinformation,” Bruns said.

In Thailand, where movement restrictions were imposed in March, anxiety spread over misleading messages saying people who did not wear face masks in public would be fined 200 Thai baht (S$8.50).

The misinformation quickly spread on Facebook, Twitter and the messaging app Line, and Thai police were forced to refute the claim in a press conference.

But less than a month later, however, some provinces did introduce much harsher fines for those who failed to wear face masks, further fuelling confusion.

In Pakistan, where coronavirus restrictions were recently relaxed, one hoax video suggested shoppers had attempted to flee a store after police discovered it had ignored the lockdown.

But that video was actually of a police raid on a brothel in 2015.


Passengers arrive at the railway station as authorities resume the train operations, in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, on May 20, 2020. PHOTO: EPA-EFE

Many Pakistani users pointed out that the clip was old, but not before it was viewed tens of thousands of times on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and WhatsApp.

In neighbouring India, misinformation has also been rife after a nationwide lockdown was imposed in March.

Prominent misleading posts have included political smears, rumours about extreme lockdown measures and misinformation intended to stoke religious tensions.

One graphic video of an axe attack was viewed tens of thousands of times in false posts on Facebook and Twitter, with claims it showed Islamist extremists killing a Hindu man during the lockdown.

In reality, the video showed an attack in Pakistan.

While some social media users identified the clip as from abroad, others appeared misled by it, suggesting it was evidence that India needed “army rule”.

Bruns said the deluge of misinformation was partly due to governments’ inabilities to adequately reassure their citizens.

“The circulation of misinformation is increased during such times because people are desperately looking for answers to their questions about what’s happening, why, and what they can do to protect themselves,” said Bruns.

“And if they can’t find enough satisfactory answers from official sources, they’ll start to look elsewhere.”

Related Stories: 

Let’s block ads! (Why?)