90 Miles From Tyranny

Wednesday, May 8, 2019

U.S. Government Media Network Extols “Press Freedom” After Firing Journalists Over Soros Report

It’s ironic that, just weeks after firing journalists behind a broadcast critical of leftwing billionaire George Soros, the head of the U.S. government’s international media networks is proclaiming his support for “press freedom.” U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM) Chief John F. Lansing, an Obama appointee, issued a heartfelt statement a few days ago reaffirming his “commitment to the fundamental principles of press freedom.” In the document, titled “Fighting for press freedom, today and everyday,” Lansing assures the world that his agency “will continue to report the truth,” though it recently cost USAGM journalists their jobs. The occasion was World Press Freedom Day, celebrated on May 3, and Lansing expresses deep concern that his taxpayer-funded agency “continues to witness firsthand how a free and independent media is deteriorating worldwide.”

Posted on the agency’s website and disbursed worldwide, the document goes on to say “despite some very dark moments, we have not been silenced. We will continue to report the truth. We will continue to find new ways to get independent reporting and programming to global audiences who rely on it. And we will continue to carry through our mission to inform, engage, and connect people around the world in support of freedom and democracy. Today, and every day, I am proud to be part of this organization, and call these brave men and women colleagues, as we stand together for press freedom.”

Lansing conveniently omits that he recently utilized Stalinist techniques to retaliate against USAGM journalists and producers involved in the Soros piece. The Spanish-language segment aired in May 2018 on Television Martí and was available for months online until it caught the eye of a scandal-plagued senator tried for bribery and corruption. Eight reporters and editors at the publicly funded media outlet were terminated and, at the request of the disgraced senator, New Jersey Democrat Bob Menendez, Lansing ordered a review of all content to address “patterns of unethical, unprofessional, biased, or sub-standard journalism.” An employee at the Miami, Florida-based Martí headquarters said in a local newspaper report “the environment that has been created by the upper hierarchy of the Agency for Global Media is repressive. People write with fear. Adjectives are no longer used.”

Television Martí—and its radio counterpart—operate under the Office of Cuba Broadcasting (OCB) and comprise one of the USAGM’s five international multimedia networks. The others are Voice of America (VOA), Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), Radio Free Asia and Middle East Broadcasting. The media outlets get about $685 million a year from American taxpayers and reportedly reach 345 million people worldwide in 59 languages. The global media agency was created to counter disinformation spread by oppressive regimes abroad. The USAGM website states that its mission is “to inform, engage and connect people around the world in support of freedom and democracy.” Television and Radio Martí were created to promote freedom and democracy by providing the people of Cuba with objective news and information programming.
The Soros broadcast focused on his efforts to cripple sovereign governments in Latin America. Judicial Watch was cited as a source because it investigated State Department funding of Soros groups in Colombia and published a report on Soros’ initiatives to advance a radical globalist agenda in Guatemala. Judicial Watch also released a special report documenting the financial and staffing nexus between Soros’ Open Society Foundations (OSF) and the U.S. government. In that document, Judicial Watch connects the dots between U.S.-funded entities and OSF affiliates to further the Hungarian-born philanthropist’s agenda seeking to destabilize legitimate governments, erase national borders, target conservative politicians, finance civil unrest, subvert institutions of higher education, and orchestrate refugee crises for...

FAIR WARNING:

If you are far left of center, this will trigger you.

This will upset you.

DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES CONTINUE
BEYOND THIS POINT.

Now if you have a healthy sense of humor, prepare for leftist lunacy that we will mock, laugh at, and disparage in every way possible. We will intentionally trigger leftists, and enjoy every second of it.

For all the scary talk about what nefarious deeds AI will be capable of one day, a geeky fight that tends to spark debate about whether the technology is a net positive or could eventually bring about the destruction of humanity, there’s at least one observable skill that AI is increasingly mastering right now — a skill that AI is starting to actually get so good at it may even shock you.

Play the video below to see for yourself.

What the video above depicts is a collection of humans that an AI-generated algorithm — courtesy of DataGrid, a startup based at Japan’s Kyoto University — designed. The poses, the clothes, the different hairstyles, stances, everything — the AI just came up with it all, in a stunning bit of understanding about the humans who occupy the world around it.

According to a translation of the text that accompanies the video, the researchers used what’s called a Generative Adversarial Network, or GAN, to generate the high-resolution (1024×1024) images of nonexistent humans. It goes on to suggest that this kind of thing could be useful in a variety of ways, such as by creating virtual models for industries like advertising and fashion.

The GAN involves one artificial neural network essentially trying to keep “fooling” another one, until the second one can no longer distinguish between (in this case) real human images versus computer-generated ones. Seeing this kind of thing for yourself, it’s a reminder that we’re definitely in for some strange times as deepfakes and the like begin to proliferate, with a video like this underscoring how adept AI is becoming at creating images of fake humans.

To see a different version of this same thing in action, check out the website ThisPersonDoesNotExist.com, which we’ve reported on previously. It’s the same concept as the video above, except in the case of that website, you just keep hitting refresh and you’ll be greeted by the image of an insanely real looking human that was in fact created by an AI and doesn’t exist.

This technology is impressive, but at the same time it also seems to herald something that humanity still has not fully come to grips with yet. It’s only a matter of time before AI masters the creation of fake human speech and other things that, along with the images, can be integrated into a full package and really give us a hard time with separating fact from fiction. Maybe someone will develop an AI one day that masters the...

#gunrights

The Exquisite Outcome Of Unintended Consequences...

From My Cold, Dead Hands...

Wisdom For Our Time...

With Guns We Are Citizens...

Did Someone Tell You You Had Too Many Guns?

You Only Have The Rights You Are Willing To Fight For...

Gun Rights: Saving Lives..

The Dick Act Of 1902 Invalidates All So-Called Gun-Control Laws.

Banish Fear, Lived Armed..

Stand Your Ground Is The Right Of Self Defense

Self Defense Is A Human Right...

Modern Women Should Not Have Less Rights Than Her Historical Sisters...

The Right Of Self Defense...

SHOCK POLL: Nearly third of black women DEMOCRATS neutral or supportive of Trump

A new poll by VoterLabs is eroding the media narrative that minorities and women hate Donald Trump, though you likely won’t see it on CNN, MSNBC or in The Washington Post.

According to a survey posted to Medium by Walter Kawecki, VoterLabs’ CEO of data and analytics, nearly a third of black Democrat women are neutral or supportive of Donald Trump, which poses a problem for a party that relies heavily on their support.

“Interestingly, 29 percent of respondents had a favorable or neutral opinion of Donald Trump. Of those polled 16 percent responded that they ‘really liked him’ or ‘he’s okay,’ with an additional almost 13 percent undecided, a much different picture than one portrayed in most media,” according to VoterLabs.

Kawecki contends that’s a bad sign for Democrats hoping to take out Trump in 2020.

“Trump’s numbers with black Democratic women show that his populist message still resonates with many,” he said. “Given that (Socialist Sen. Bernie) Sanders also has a heavily populist message, and is currently enjoying strong support in this community, Trump’s numbers shouldn’t be that surprising.

“It’s also important to remember that Hillary Clinton badly underperformed with this group in 2016. Turnout among black Democratic women dropped from around 68 percent in 2008 and 70 percent in 2012, to about 64 percent in 2016.”

The poll of black Democrat women likely to vote in the 2020 primaries was conducted via mobile apps in late April, and included a...

As Democrats Threaten Barr, a Look Back at What Happened With Holder’s Contempt Charge

Some Democratic lawmakers threaten to handcuff and lock up Attorney General William Barr, but holding someone in contempt of Congress rarely is more than a censure vote.

The most relevant comparison: In a bipartisan vote, 17 House Democrats joined the Republican majority in 2012 to hold then-Attorney General Eric Holder in criminal contempt of Congress for not providing thousands of pages of documents regarding Operation Fast and Furious, a serious scandal for the Obama administration.

More Democrats, a total of 21, joined Republicans to find Holder in civil contempt. Two Republicans voted against the criminal contempt citation.

Fast and Furious, a Justice Department program, allowed hundreds of American guns to flow to Mexican drug trafficking organizations.

However, the Justice Department lost track of the guns. In late 2010, one was found at the scene of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry’s murder.

The House at the time was under Republican control, and the criminal and civil contempt citations originated in the Oversight and Government Reform Committee, under Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif.

Democrats now control the House, and one of Barr’s harshest critics is Judiciary Chairman Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y.

Democratic lawmakers gave Barr a deadline of Monday to provide a completely unredacted copy of special counsel Robert Mueller’s report on Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential campaign and potential ties to President Donald Trump.

Barr responded that he has provided as much of the report that he is allowed to provide by law because it contains grand jury information and material that potentially could jeopardize an ongoing investigation.

By contrast, the contempt vote on Holder was legitimate, said Hans von Spakovsky, a former Justice Department lawyer and co-author with journalist John Fund of the 2014 book “Obama’s Enforcer: Eric Holder’s Justice Department.”

“Here, [Barr] has given Congress complete access to the report except for some parts,” von Spakovsky, a senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation, told The Daily Signal. “Holder refused to provide information on Fast and Furious.”

“He was trying to cover up the most reckless Department of Justice ever, which led to the death of a Border Patrol agent,” von Spakovsky said of Holder. “The improper thing in the Barr case is that they want to hold him in contempt for following federal law.”

Von Spakovsky said he doubts a contempt citation for Barr would have the same bipartisan backing that the Holder citation drew.

The unredacted Mueller report already is available in a...

HUMAN TRAFFICKERS, CORRUPT CLERGY TARGET PAKISTANI CHRISTIAN GIRLS FOR CHINESE GROOMS

Illegal marriage brokers began targeting Pakistani Christian girls to sell into marriages with older Chinese men in late 2018 in order to meet the rising demand for foreign brides in China, human rights groups said.
Christian activists, pastors, and government officials claim the brokers pay corrupt clergy to find brides from among poor Christian families.
They also said Chinese immigration officials ignore the practice by indiscriminately issuing visas.

Human traffickers are paying corrupt clergy to lure impoverished Christian girls from Pakistan to China in order to sell them into marriages with older Chinese men, human rights groups said.

Pastors, Pakistani government officials, and brides who escaped their Chinese husbands said “marriage brokers” began targeting girls from poor Christian families in Pakistan in late 2018 in response to a mounting demand for foreign brides in China, according to The Associated Press.

Traffickers have sold up to 1,000 Pakistani girls into sexual slavery thinly veiled as marriage since October of 2018, aided by what activists claim is the apathy of immigration officials and the greed of corrupt priests.

“This is human smuggling,” Ijaz Alam Augustine, human rights and minorities minister for the Punjab province of Pakistan, told the AP. “Greed is really responsible for these marriages … I have met with some of these girls and they are very poor.”

Human traffickers have enlisted the help of corrupt clerics who offer poor Christian families thousands of dollars in exchange for allowing their daughters to be sold into marriage to Chinese men who, they are told, are wealthy converts to Christianity. The lure is especially enticing to Pakistani Christian families, as Christians in Pakistan have little political support and are among the poorest people in the country.

Pakistani custom holds that a bride’s family must pay a dowry to the groom. The husband and his family will often mistreat the bride if her family is unable to pay what they believe to be an adequate dowry. Daughters, therefore, are often seen as burdens to Pakistani families, especially those in poverty. The offer from a rich, Christian, foreign national to pay for all wedding expenses, along with the recommendation of a local priest or pastor, appears too promising for poor Pakistani Christian families to deny.

Muqadas Ashraf, who said she was 16 years old when her family sold her into marriage, said the offers aren’t true.

“It is all fraud and cheating. All the promises they make are fake,” Muqadas told the AP.

Her mother, Nasreen, said she has yet to see a penny of the approximately $5,000 she was offered to allow Muqadas to be married to a Chinese groom.

Local Christian activist and journalist Saleem Iqbal claimed human traffickers have sold an estimated 750 to 1,000 Pakistani girls into marriages with older, often abusive Chinese grooms since October 2018. Iqbal also runs a refuge that provides shelter to brides who escape their...

Boy-oh-boy is the damn now breaking on much of the Obama-Clinton Spygate scandal.

Read on to learn the latest which in this case directly implicates both the Clinton campaign and Obama administration (including but not limited to the Obama FBI) in not only weaponizing federal agencies to harm a political opponent, but also working with foreign government operatives to do so—two VERY BIG crimes.
The Hill:

If ever there were an admission that taints the FBI’s secret warrant to surveil Donald Trump’s campaign, it sat buried for more than 2 1/2 years in the files of a high-ranking State Department official.

Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Kathleen Kavalec’s written account of her Oct. 11, 2016, meeting with FBI informant Christopher Steele shows the Hillary Clinton campaign-funded British intelligence operative admitted that his research was political and facing an Election Day deadline.

And that confession occurred 10 days before the FBI used Steele’s now-discredited dossier to justify securing a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant to surveil former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page and the campaign’s ties to Russia.

Steele’s client “is keen to see this information come to light prior to November 8,” the date of the 2016 election, Kavalec wrote in a typed summary of her meeting with Steele and Tatyana Duran, a colleague from Steele’s Orbis Security firm. The memos were unearthed a few days ago through open-records litigation by the conservative group Citizens United.

Kavalec’s notes do not appear to have been provided to the House Intelligence Committee during its Russia probe, according to former Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.). “They tried to hide a lot of documents from us during our investigation, and it usually turns out there’s a reason for it,” Nunes told me. Senate and House Judiciary investigators told me they did not know about them, even though they investigated Steele’s behavior in 2017-18.

One member of Congress transmitted the memos this week to the Department of Justice’s inspector general, fearing its investigation of FISA abuses may not have had access to them.

Nonetheless, the FBI is doing its best to keep much of Kavalec’s information secret by retroactively claiming it is classified, even though it was originally marked unclassified in...