From the Trenches World Report

Yahoo News – by Michelle Conlin and Maggie Lu Yueyang

NEW YORK/SYDNEY (Reuters) – For the first time, the Chinese have become the biggest foreign buyers of apartments in Manhattan, real estate brokers estimate, taking the mantle from the Russians – whose activity has dropped off since the unrest in Ukraine and the imposition of sanctions against Russia by the United States.

Wealthy Chinese are pouring money into real estate in New York and some other major cities around the world, including London and Sydney, as they seek safe havens for their cash and also establish a base for their children to get an education in the West.   Continue reading “The Chinese take Manhattan: replace Russians as top apartment buyers”

Continue reading “They are predicting rain later today. Imagine that.”

USA Today – by Doyle Rice

Drought spread and intensified this week in seven western and central states, including California, Oregon, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas and Oklahoma, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor, a federal site that tracks drought.

This week marks the first time in the 15-year history of the Drought Monitor that 100% of California was in moderate to exceptional drought.   Continue reading “Drought worsens in western USA”

Christian Mercenary – by T.L. Davis

For most of the patriot/liberty community the Constitution is really of no importance any longer. The federal government has tossed that document over long ago. To whatever degree they bandy about the Constitution, it is always in context of violating its meaning by re-defining the words to arrive at a position where the Constitution permits the violation of rights guaranteed within the Constitution. If that sounds contradictory and vague, it is intended to be. That is the purpose of the federal government at this stage in our devolution to traditional dictatorship/monarchy/oligarchy rule of a once free nation.   Continue reading “Hostile Bureaucratic Armies”

Fox News – by Edmund DeMarche

DEVELOPING: A female student at a Connecticut high school was stabbed in the throat by a fellow student because she refused to go to Friday night’s prom with him, sources told The Connecticut Post.

Jonathan Law High School in Milford was put on lockdown Friday morning and students were sent home after the 7:14 a.m. stabbing. A former faculty member from the school told FoxNews.com that the suspect was arrested. The Post reported that the victim is at a nearby hospital and is in critical condition.   Continue reading “Student at Connecticut high school stabbed over prom date rejection, report says”

RT News

A 4,500-year-old Native American burial ground and village site was found in California, but the contents were eventually destroyed, reburied, and paved over for construction of multimillion-dollar homes, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.

Archaeologists say the 300-foot-long Coast Miwok site held 600 human burials as well as tools, rare hunting materials, musical instruments, game pieces, ritualistic stone objects, animal remains, the largest collection of bear bones found in a prehistoric site in the Bay Area, and even a ceremonial condor burial that suggested the bird was kept as a pet. The remnants were quietly examined and categorized but ultimately decimated and reburied at an undisclosed location, scientists say, ahead of construction on a $55 million home development in Larkspur, California.   Continue reading “Native American burial ground, village site destroyed for luxury California homes”

RT News

Russia’s Foreign minister Sergey Lavrov has lashed out at US Secretary of State John Kerry over his ‘prosecutorial’ remarks about RT.

“The US is trying to pervert everything that is going on in Ukraine. They accuse us of turning on – what was called by John Kerry in a prosecutorial tone – accuse us of switching on what they called the ‘Putin propaganda machine’ called RT,” said Lavrov during the press conference.   Continue reading “Lavrov: Kerry’s ‘prosecutorial’ RT assault unacceptable”

RT News

Ecuador has given a group of 20 US Defense Department employees until the end of the month to quit the country. President Rafael Correa had previously said the presence of the US military in Ecuador was “scandalous” and they had “infiltrated all sectors.”

Ecuador has officially requested that all 20 Defense Department employees in the US Embassy in Quito cease their activities and leave the country by the end of the month, embassy spokesman Jeffrey Weinshenker confirmed to AP. He said the embassy had received a formal letter dated April 7, alerting them to the imminent expulsion of the group.   Continue reading “‘Mutual distrust’: Ecuador ejects US military group”

Mail.com

BALI, Indonesia (AP) — A drunken passenger who caused a hijack scare on a Virgin Australia flight by trying to break into the cockpit was arrested Friday after the plane landed on Indonesia’s resort island of Bali, officials said.

The airport was closed for nearly two hours because of the incident, forcing several flights to be diverted, air force base commander Col. Sugiharto Prapto said. The Australian passenger acted aggressively and began pounding on the cockpit door before being handcuffed by the crew, police said. He was arrested for creating a disturbance and investigators said they were waiting for him to sober up before questioning him.   Continue reading “Drunken passenger causes hijack scare in Bali”

Breitbart – by Bob Price

The U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Oklahoma Field Office responded to Breitbart Texas about the so-called Red River “land grab” by emphasizing that parcels in question are already held in the public domain and BLM-managed.  The Bureau claims it is not they who are declaring the ownership but that settled case law long declared it to be government land.

BLM Public Relations Specialist Paul McGuire agreed to a one-on-one telephone interview with Breitbart Texas after reading the original report published earlier this week.  In contrast with the interview with Texas General Land Office Commissioner Jerry Patterson, McGuire expressed much more confidence about the ownership of the land and indicated little, if any, ambiguity about how or why the land should be under federal control.   Continue reading “BLM on Texas Land: Not a Land Grab, It’s Already Ours”

RT News

Kiev authorities say “the second stage” of the military operation in the eastern Ukrainian city of Slavyansk has been launched, which will “completely isolate” the anti-government stronghold. Self-defense forces are preparing for an assault.

Ukrainian troops were ordered to commence the next stage of the so-called ‘anti-terrorist operation’ around 12pm local time (10:00 GMT), according to coup-appointed acting head of presidential administration Sergey Pashinsky.    Continue reading “Ukraine army launches next stage of military op ‘to isolate Slavyansk’”

Mail.com

WASHINGTON (AP) — Michelle Obama’s annual question-and-answer session with the children of Executive Office employees took a serious turn Thursday when a 10-year-old girl in the front row told the first lady that her dad had been out of work for three years. Then the girl popped up to hand the first lady his resume.

The first lady seemed a little taken aback but then explained to the other children, who might not have heard the girl’s comment, that the matter was “a little private, but she’s doing something for her dad.” Mrs. Obama promised to deal with the matter later.   Continue reading “First lady gets resume from girl with jobless dad”

Geek – by Ryan Whitwam

Chopping wood is hard, but it’s something modern society has largely freed us from as a daily activity. That’s nice, but consequently, if you ever do have to chop wood, you’re more than likely going to suck at it. Splitting a log requires a surprising amount of force, but Finnish inventor Heikki Kärnä has invented a new kind of axe that makes it much easier and safer.

Yes, axes have existed since time immemorial, but apparently there’s still room for improvement.   Continue reading “Physics-exploiting axe splits wood in record time”

The Weather Channel – by Stephen Neslage

It’s hard to image a city of 105,000 running out of water, but that’s the reality in Wichita Falls, Texas. A crippling four-year drought has taken this community to a place they’ve never been before.

“It’s been awful here. We’re entering our worst drought on record,” said Russell Schreiber, the city’s public works director, and the force behind one of the most controversial plans in Texas: The use of treated wastewater for public consumption. It’s a bold move — and a tough sell.   Continue reading “Texas Drought Forces Wichita Falls Residents to Take Desperate Measures to Keep Water Flowing”

Tech Dirt – by Tim Cushing

As we recently covered, Jim Ardis, the absurdly thin-skinned mayor of Peoria, IL, got the boys in blue to raid a house over a parody Twitter account that portrayed him as a.) a possible drug user, b.) a possible patron of the world’s oldest profession and c.) “trill as fuck.” Peoria’s Finest have never been finer, deploying seven plainclothes officers to nail a dangerous tweeter whose Ardis-mocking account had been shut down by Twitter weeks before. Bonus: drugs were discovered during the raid, which meant the cops could at least declare victory over marijuana use, if not the internet itself.    Continue reading “Mayor Ardis Defends Police Raid, Complains That Parody Twitter Account Used Up All The Free Speech”

MassPrivateI

Along with other humanitarian organizations and UN agencies, one key advocate and user of big data is the UN Global Pulse, launched in 2009 in recognition of the need for more timely information to track and monitor the impacts of global and local socio-economic crises. 

UN Global Pulse clearly identified the privacy concerns linked to their use of big data and the impact of privacy in “Big Data for Development: Challenges & Opportunities” and have adopted Privacy and Data Protection Principles. Given the increasingly complex web of actors concerned, the expanding scope of their work, the growing amount of data that can be collected on individuals, and the poor legal protections in place.   Continue reading “The U.N. is using ‘Global Pulse’ to spy on people in every country”