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NSO Group, which makes Pegasus spyware, keeps trying to extract information from Citizen Lab researchers — and a judge keeps swatting it down.

The post They Exposed an Israeli Spyware Firm. Now the Company Is Badgering Them in Court. appeared first on The Intercept.

When Trump took over the RNC and purged all the suspected disloyal employees they hire two new lawyers to oversee “election integrity.” That hasn’t worked out so well. Benen writes: One of the attorneys hired at the RNC was Christina Bobb, who was tapped to serve as the party’s senior counsel for election integrity. It wasn’t long, however, before an unfortunate problem emerged: Bobb was recently indicted for alleged election-related crimes. The other attorney was longtime Republican lawyer Charlie Spies, who was hired to serve as the RNC’s chief counsel. At least, that was the idea two months ago. NBC News reported over the weekend: After the news was made official, Trump turned to his social media platform to celebrate the developments. “Great news for the Republican Party. RINO lawyer Charlie Spies is out as Chief Counsel of the RNC,” the former president wrote, denouncing the experienced Republican lawyer who’d been hired by his own RNC team. What did this highly experienced GOP lawyer do to deserve such a scathing put down?

Last Sunday, Israel closed Al Jazeera’s office in occupied East Jerusalem, confiscating broadcast equipment and taking the channel off air. Israel’s targeting of journalists and their families, the closure of Al Jazeera’s Jerusalem office, the imprisonment and alleged torture of journalists, and the refusal to let foreign journalists enter Gaza amounts to a war on Continue reading »

What follows is the end of a journey by one citizen of Israel – a retired high-ranking IDF officer – who has had his view of the world vastly altered by events since October 7. With the advent of world-wide organised protests against Netanyahu’s genocidal war in Palestine, the volume of opposition to any criticism Continue reading »

Many members of the Albanese Government, including Anthony Albanese himself, recall the problem that presented itself when Julia Gillard took the reins as Prime Minister in 2010 without a credible narrative as to why she accepted the job, other than to say the government under Kevin Rudd had lost its way. It was well known Continue reading »

There are some things in our ‘shrinking nation’ that are not shrinking. There are the obvious ones that have dominated the news – petrol prices, rents, the indexation of HECS/HELP debt, the cost of living in general, and, appallingly, domestic violence. And there are the ones that have been creeping up ever since COVID – Continue reading »

Criminal justice is an area of public policy where the disconnect between evidence based solutions and political responses is depressingly wide. And it is getting worse as both the ALP and the conservative parties respond to what is fast becoming saturation media about, in particular, family or domestic violence and youth crime. Some of this Continue reading »

A sense of crisis now pervades discussion of what to do about violence against women, made obvious by recent marches demanding action, statistics suggesting that the rate of fatal attacks is increasing, and general unease after several knife attacks in Sydney, in one of which women represented five of the six victims. Anthony Albanese and Continue reading »

Promoting culturally sensitive oral health care for elderly Muslim migrants is vital to address disparities in oral health among cultural and linguistic diverse communities in Australia. Australia’s multicultural landscape is expanding, with more than seven million people born overseas, representing 28% of the overall population. Between 2016 and 2021, the number of people speaking a Continue reading »

Inches upon inches of press releases have heralded how Build to Rent (BTR) is coming to Australia to provide affordable and stable rentals. However, the draft legislation released by Minister Collins contains precious little for public interest outcomes. Millions of dollars are being gifted to the BTR industry at state and federal levels and the Continue reading »

The stars do not exactly seem to be aligning for Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi as he bids for a third term in office with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police charging three Indians living in Edmonton with the assassination of Sikh activist Hardeep Singh Nijjar in June last year. Canada’s Globe and Mail newspaper quoted Continue reading »

In an essay entitled “Australia’s Choice” published in Australian Foreign Affairs in 2022, the leading Singaporean commentator on international relations, Kishore Mahbubani, highlighted how Australia needed to choose whether to be “a bridge between East and West in the Asian Century – or the tip of a spear projecting Western power into Asia” It transpires Continue reading »

This newsletter by Robert Reich spoke to me. I hope he doesn’t mind if I share it with you: Friends, My students are graduating at a tremulous time. The largest campus protest movement of the 21st century. The first criminal trial of a former U.S. president. The most restrictive abortion laws in the nation. Two horrific wars. All of this coming after a pandemic that claimed the lives of a million Americans. And after the first attack on the U.S. Capitol in history, provoked by the first president who refused to accept electoral defeat. Perhaps most troubling, the nation is bitterly split. Americans are demonizing those on the other side whom they disagree with. (For two weeks in April, “Civil War,” a dystopian film about a bloody alternative reality where America is at war with itself, topped box office charts, grossing more than $50 million.) My graduating students are exhausted and anxious. They are repulsed by the slaughter in Gaza, and angry by the responses of university administrators around the country to the student protesters. They’re cynical about politics.

Former Georgia Republican Lt. Gov. Geoffrey Duncan endorsed Joe Biden in an op-ed yesterday. An excerpt follows: It’s disappointing to watch an increasing number of Republicans fall in line behind former president Donald Trump. This includes some of his fiercest detractors, such as U.S. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu and former U.S. Attorney General Bill Barr, who raised eyebrows during a recent interview by vowing to support the “Republican ticket.” This mentality is dead wrong. Yes, elections are a binary choice. Yes, serious questions linger about President Biden’s ability to serve until the age of 86. His progressive policies aren’t to conservatives’ liking. But the GOP will never rebuild until we move on from the Trump era, leaving conservative (but not angry) Republicans like me no choice but to pull the lever for Biden.

No, sweetheart. Don’t worry. They’re just pretend.

Oh dear. I left my laptop open, and you read a LinkedIn post from an “Entrepreneur, Change Agent, Futurist, Success Enabler, Innovator & Investor.” And now you can’t sleep. Let me see if I can explain this in a way that makes sense.

You know how you make up those amazing stories about dragons and flying unicorns? And you have all of these really special ideas no one has ever heard before, and we tell you that you have such a big imagination? Sometimes, grown-ups make up stories, too, and post them on LinkedIn. Except their ideas aren’t special at all. Everyone has heard them before, and instead of “imagination,” we call it “thought leadership.”

Why do grown-ups do this? That’s a good question.

Grown-ups make up stories on LinkedIn to get imaginary points. They think that whoever collects the most points has the most people who like them. And that the people who like them will then spend $399 on their online course, “Digital Engagement Optimization: Elevating Stakeholder Interaction for Organizational Growth.”

Donald Trump whines constantly about not being able to campaign around the country because he’s stuck in a New York courtroom facing trial on felony charges. Court is only convened four days a week and he has his own plane so he could certainly be out every weekend if he chose to. He did hold a couple of rallies last week in Wisconsin and Michigan since court was only in session for three days but on his days off he’s usually playing golf at and angrily tweeting rather than glad-handing the MAGA crowd out on the stump. And he’s holding a lot of fundraisers at his Mar-a-Lago beach club. This past weekend, rather than heading out to Arizona or even next door to Pennsylvania, Trump was back in Florida regaling 400 wealthy donors at a $40,000 a ticket with an extended whine about his legal problems and the stolen election of 2020, among other MAGA greatest hits. He also said that the Biden administration is “the Gestapo” and called Special Prosecutor Jack Smith a fucking asshole. He was obviously enjoying himself.

“a direct attack on the rule of law” At the Donald Trump trial in Manhattan, Judge Juan Merchan addresses Trump’s continued violations of the gag order, Harry Litman reports. Find you in contempt again for the 10th time. It appears that 2k fine not serving as a deterrent . therefore, going forward will need to consider a jail sanction “last thing I want to do is put you in jail. you are the former Pres and possibly the next Pres as well. to put you in jail would disrupt these proceedings. also secret service and others. the magnitude of the decision not lost on me.” “but at the end of the day I have a job to do. . . your continued violations threaten to disrupt processing and constitute a direct attack on the rule of law. so as much as I don’t want to impose a jail sentence, I want you to understand that I will if necessary and appropriate” So there it is — next time –> jail. The final warning. It’s in Trump’s hands now. And we’re off. ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● For The Win, 5th Edition is ready for download.