NIH Director Francis Collins Resigns After Documents Reveal He Lied About His Involvement with Gain-of-Function Research in Wuhan Lab

NIH Director Dr. Francis Collins on Tuesday resigned just a few weeks after documents exposed he lied about his involvement in gain-of-function research in the Wuhan lab.

“It has been an incredible privilege to lead this great agency for more than a decade,” Collins said in a statement.

“I love this agency and its people so deeply that the decision to step down was a difficult one, done in close counsel with my wife, Diane Baker, and my family. I am proud of all we’ve accomplished. I fundamentally believe, however, that no single person should serve in the position too long, and that it’s time to bring in a new scientist to lead the NIH into the future. I’m most grateful and proud of the NIH staff and the scientific community, whose extraordinary commitment to lifesaving research delivers hope to the American people and the world every day.”

Recall, Francis Collins over the summer said parents should wear masks at home in front of their unvaccinated children.

Collins conceded that it “may sound weird” that people should wear masks in their homes, but he advised it anyway.

“Parents of unvaccinated kids should be thoughtful about this and the recommendation is to wear masks [at home] as well,” Collins said. “I know that’s uncomfortable. I know it seems weird but it is the best way to protect your kids.”

In June, Francis Collins admitted to radio host Hugh Hewitt that the US collaborated with the Wuhan Virology Laboratory.

Dr. Collins then went on to defend the researchers and the virology lab in Wuhan, China.

“The documents make it clear that assertions by the NIH Director, Francis Collins, and the NIAID Director, Anthony Fauci, that the NIH did not support gain-of-function research or potential pandemic pathogen enhancement at WIV are untruthful,” Rutgers University chemical biology professor Richard Ebright said.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2021/10/breaking-nih-director-francis-collins-resigns-documents-expose-lied-involvement-gain-function-research-wuhan-lab/

Three More Companies Join Evergrande – Unable to Meet Debt Obligations – So Far Debt of Nearly Half a Trillion USD Facing Solvency Issues in China

The China financial crisis is here. More companies are coming out of the woodwork that are unable to pay debt obligations.

We’ve been reporting for weeks on the Evergrande debt obligations that were falling further and further behind.

Today we can report that the Evergrande situation is spreading.

A company by the name of Jumbo Fortune had a $260 million note coming due on October 3, 2021, that it says was backed by Evergrande. However, Evergrande apparently didn’t record this liability on its books. We have no word that this has yet been settled.

Earlier this morning two other companies in the China real estate business were identified in situations just like Evergrande. CNBC reports on Fantasia Holdings:

Ratings agencies have downgraded Chinese developers Fantasia Holdings and Sinic Holdings over risks from their strained cash flow situations.

Fantasia did not repay the principal amount of $206 million of a bond that matured on Monday, it said in a filing to the Hong Kong exchange…

…The fallout from Fantasia, however, would be smaller compared with Evergrande.

Evergrande is the world’s most indebted property developer with liabilities of $300 billion, while Fantasia has total liabilities of 82.9 billion yuan ($12.8 billion), according to its first-half financial statement.

Sinic is also facing solvency issues per CNBC:

The ratings agency [S&P] said that the Chinese developer is likely to default on its $246 million offshore dollar-denominated bond due Oct. 18. Sinic‘s local subsidiaries have already failed to make $38.7 million in interest payments on two onshore yuan-denominated bonds that were due Sept. 18, S&P said.

Sinic has total liabilities of $14.2 billion, its first-half financial statement showed. Shares of the Chinese real estate developer have been halted since Sept. 20.

The total debt of the companies above amounts to more than $400 billion or nearly half a trillion USD and this is just the beginning.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2021/10/three-companies-join-evergrande-unable-meet-debt-obligations-far-debt-nearly-half-trillion-usd-facing-solvency-issues-china/

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2021/10/three-companies-join-evergrande-unable-meet-debt-obligations-far-debt-nearly-half-trillion-usd-facing-solvency-issues-china/

Company that Handles Billions of Text Messages from Major Cellular Carriers Says its Database was Hacked for Years

Syniverse, a company that handles billions of text messages from cellular carriers, quietly admitted during its filing dated September 27th with the US Security and Exchange Commission that its database was hacked for 5 years.

The company became aware of the incident on May 1, 2021, and immediately conducted an investigation. The results of the investigation revealed that unauthorized access has been going on since May 2016.

Here’s an excerpt from its filing with the US SEC (Page 69):

For example, in May 2021, Syniverse became aware of unauthorized access to its operational and information technology systems by an unknown individual or organization (the “May 2021 Incident”). Promptly upon Syniverse’s detection of the unauthorized access, Syniverse launched an internal investigation, notified law enforcement, commenced remedial actions and engaged the services of specialized legal counsel and other incident response professionals. Syniverse has conducted a thorough investigation of the incident.

The results of the investigation revealed that the unauthorized access began in May 2016. Syniverse’s investigation revealed that the individual or organization gained unauthorized access to databases within its network on several occasions, and that login information allowing access to or from its Electronic Data Transfer (“EDT”) environment was compromised for approximately 235 of its customers. All EDT customers have been notified and have had their credentials reset or inactivated, even if their credentials were not impacted by the incident. All customers whose credentials were impacted have been notified of that circumstance.

Syniverse has notified all affected customers of this unauthorized access where contractually required, and Syniverse has concluded that no additional action, including any customer notification, is required at this time.

Syniverse is responsible for routing billions of text messages every year and has “direct connections” to hundreds of mobile operators around the world. They provide services to major wireless carriers like AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, and other international carriers. More from Motherboard:

A former Syniverse employee who worked on the EDT systems told Motherboard that those systems have information on all types of call records.

Syniverse repeatedly declined to answer specific questions from Motherboard about the scale of the breach and what specific data was affected, but according to a person who works at a telephone carrier, whoever hacked Syniverse could have had access to metadata such as length and cost, caller and receiver’s numbers, the location of the parties in the call, as well as the content of SMS text messages.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2021/10/company-handles-billions-text-messages-major-cellular-carriers-says-database-hacked-years/

'Not Supposed To Happen': US State With Highest Vaxx Rate Sees Record Surge In COVID Cases

Vermont, the state with the highest vaccination rate in the United States, is experiencing a CCP virus surge at levels not seen since the pandemic’s peak last winter.

The number of cases in Vermont is at a record level, hospitalizations are close to the records notched last winter, and the state recorded the deadliest day and the second deadliest month of the pandemic in September.

“I think it’s clearly frustrating for all of us,” Michael Pieciak, the commissioner of the Vermont Department of Financial Regulation who monitors CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus statistics for the state.

More than 69 percent of Vermont’s population has been fully vaccinated against COVID-19 as of Sept. 24, according to the CDC, far above the national rate of 56 percent.

The state recorded the highest rate of hospitalizations per 100,000 residents on Sept. 30, breaching a record set on Jan. 31 last year. Eight people died of the CCP virus in Vermont on Sept. 13, the highest grim total recorded since the outbreak of the virus.

In late August, four of ten cases of COVID-19 in Vermont were among vaccinated people, according to a letter signed by 90 employees of the Vermont Health Department, including state Epidemiologist Patsy Kelso.

Gov. Phil Scott (R) lifted the state of emergency in Vermont in June when 80 percent of the population had received at least one shot of the vaccine. He has since indicated he is wary of reimposing the state of emergency.

“We can’t be in a perpetual state of emergency,” Scott said this week.

The four states which follow Vermont in terms of the highest vaccination rates in the nation are also experiencing alarming signs.

The head of UMass Memorial Health, the largest health system in central Massachusetts, said recently that regional hospitals were seeing nearly 20 times more COVID-19 patients than in June and there isn’t an ICU bed to spare. Massachusetts has the fifth-highest vaccination rate in the nation.

In Connecticut, the second most vaccinated state in the U.S., the legislature recently extended the governor’s emergency powers to make it easier to cope with the latest wave of the pandemic.

On Sept. 22, Maine, the third most-vaccinated U.S. state, had nearly 90 people in intensive care units, a pandemic peak for the state.

https://www.zerohedge.com/covid-19/not-supposed-happen-us-state-highest-vaxx-rate-sees-record-surge-covid-cases

‘Who broke the internet?!’ Major outages hit Bank of America, Southwest Airlines, Zoom, Snapchat & others after FB crash

Many of the world’s largest apps and websites, including for banks and airlines, faced a cascade of outages all in the space of a few hours, prompting panic among netizens as some demanded to know who broke the internet.

While the glitches affected a number of popular social media platforms – among them Twitter, Reddit, Facebook, Instagram and SnapChat – other more significant institutions also faced major tech issues on Monday, such as Bank of America, Southwest Airlines, the professional networking site LinkedIn and the cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase, all according to outage tracker DownDetector.

The tracking website noted that the problems at Facebook marked the “largest outage we’ve ever seen on DownDetector,” with more than “10.6 million problem reports from all over the globe.” However, the platform and Facebook-owned Instagram appear to have come back to life since, having been down for around six hours.

Chat apps such as Zoom and Telegram, as well as Gmail – among the world’s most heavily trafficked email services – were also reportedly caught up in the internet-wide meltdown. All three have seen a major surge in use amid the Covid-19 pandemic, which has driven many firms to transition to more remote-work. Monday’s glitches were sure to cause headaches for countless professionals attempting to work from home, even prompting some to demand to know “who broke the internet.”

It remains unclear exactly what caused the widespread outages on Monday, though a Facebook employee who declined to be named told NBC the company faced a DNS [Domain Name System] problem, referring to a ‘phone book’-like system used to look up individual websites. The employee added that there is “no reason at this point to suspect anything malicious,” but the outage nonetheless affected “pretty much everything” at Facebook before the issue was resolved later on Monday evening. The six-hour outage reportedly cost the platform a cool $6 billion.

https://www.rt.com/usa/536589-major-outages-bank-airlines/

FBI Raids NYPD Sergeants Union Headed By Outspoken President

The FBI raided the lower Manhattan headquarters of the NYPD's Sergeants Benevolent Association Tuesday morning as part of an "ongoing investigation" into the SBA, according to the NY Daily News, citing an agency spokeswoman.

The 11,000-member union is headed by outspoken president Ed Mullins, a member of the NYPD since January 1982 known for his frequent criticism of political opponents, including New York Mayor Bill de Blasio. Mullins took over as head of the SBA in 2002.

"No comment for now," said Mullins' lawyer Andrew Quinn regarding the AM raid.

As the Daily News notes:

He came under fire in 2020 when he posted the arrest report of de Blasio’s daughter, Chiara de Blasio, on social media following her arrest during George Floyd protests. Mullins was hit with departmental charges for the violation of NYPD rules.

In another instance during the pandemic, Mullins tweeted that the city’s health commissioner was a “b—h” who had “blood on her hands” after she sparred with the NYPD over half a million hospital-grade face masks.

https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/fbi-raids-nypd-sergeants-union-headquarters-headed-outspoken-president

Florida drama teacher accused of having sex with 14-year-old student in her car

A Florida middle school drama teacher was arrested Monday after allegedly having sex on multiple occasions with a former student in her car, a report said.

The alleged relationship between Brittiny Lopez-Murray, 31, and the 14-year-old student began after the teacher texted the teen in August about “her feelings toward” him, according to a police report obtained by the Miami Herald.

Lopez-Murray and the student — who is now in high school — exchanged texts detailing “how much they enjoyed the sex with each other,” the report said.

The teacher would sometimes pick him up after basketball practice and then the two would allegedly engage in sexual acts in her car, according to the report.

Lopez-Murray has taught at Hialeah Middle for four years and was named “rookie teacher of the year” in 2017.

The alleged relationship was uncovered Saturday after the student’s sister saw explicit texts and photos between him and the teacher, the report said.

The boy’s father also found nude photos of Lopez-Murray on his son’s phone, according to the report.

The Miami-Dade school district told the Miami Herald that Lopez-Murray will be fired in light of her arrest.

“All employees receive training and are expected to abide by the District’s Standards of Ethical Conduct policy. It is unfortunate that despite our efforts, the actions of some individuals run contrary to the behavior that is expected of them,” the district said.

Lopez-Murray was charged with lewd and lascivious battery, molestation, and engaging in a sexual act with a child.

One of the teacher’s lawyers, Landon Ray, said his client is “presumed innocent until proven guilty.

“We hope everyone is patient, doesn’t rush to judgment and respects the family’s privacy,” the lawyer said.

https://nypost.com/2021/10/05/florida-teacher-brittiny-lopez-murray-accused-of-having-sex-with-teen-student-in-car/

UK: Conservative Minister Defends Aggressive Online Safety Bill To Fight ‘Misinformation’, Claims It’s Actually Pro Free Speech

The Online Safety Bill would ban legal speech online

Speaking at Conservative Party Conference in Manchester on Monday, Culture Secretary Nadine Dorries defended the government’s Online Safety Bill which, as National File previously reported, contains aggressive regulations that would seriously curtail freedom of speech online:

The bill creates a “duty of care” on websites to ensure that explicitly legal speech which has an “adverse psychological impact” is clamped down upon. This means that if the bill is passed, not only would there be a greater standard of what speech is acceptable online and offline, but the government themselves would pass the buck to that decision down initially to the Big Tech companies.

The regulatory powers for the bill have been granted to Ofcom, the body that handles broadcast media and other communications in the UK. If a website is deemed by Ofcom to have not clamped down on legal speech, including “misinformation” as the bill requests, then they could be fined up to £18 million, or even have access blocked to them entirely.

Matthew Lesh of the Adam Smith Institute said that the bill was an “incoherent train wreck” that represents “a frightening and historic attack” on free speech. “The Bill needs a serious rethink,” Lesh added. “There needs to be a mandate on Ofcom that prevents the issuing of guidance that infringes on legal speech, open to arbitrary interpretation under the current proposals. There also needs to be a much greater focus on the perpetrators of unlawful behaviour.”

“It’s about getting a balance,” Dorries claimed, speaking to The Telegraph’s Christopher Hope. “I want to see greater protection of children and young people, and that balance with at the same time recognizing freedom of speech… We can’t erode freedom of speech, but we also need to protect children. Trying to carve out some sort of some method, some legal way in the Online Harms Bill [sic] that protects children without harming freedom of speech is a place I’m trying to get to. It’s incredibly difficult, but we’ve got to get there.”

National File’s Jack Hadfield highlighted to Dorries many of the potential serious issues, but the Culture Secretary refused to acknowledge any flaws in the bill. “With disinformation and misinformation, I find it hard to understand how anybody would object to removing misinformation,” Dorries said. She went on to use mental health as a shield for promoting the bill, claiming that the regulation in the legislation was necessary because “some people lose their lives as a result of really unpleasant stuff online.”

Speaking exclusively to National File, Baroness Claire Fox, a free speech advocate and former Brexit Party MEP, said she feels as though Conservative ministers have not read the bill. Public polling suggests they haven’t consulted their voters.

https://nationalfile.com/uk-conservative-minister-defends-aggressive-online-safety-bill-to-fight-misinformation-claims-its-actually-pro-free-speech/

https://nationalfile.com/uk-conservative-minister-defends-aggressive-online-safety-bill-to-fight-misinformation-claims-its-actually-pro-free-speech/

6 Scandals The Media Won’t Tell You About Outgoing NIH Director Francis Collins.

Why won't they report the verified facts about this D.C. career bureaucrat's life?

Francis Collins, director of the U.S. National Institutes for Health (NIH) and one of the leading public voices during the COVID-19 pandemic will step down from his role following a number of investigative reports into Collins and his underlings.

Appointed by President Obama in 2009, Collins issued a statement this week saying: “I fundamentally believe … that no single person should serve in the position too long, and that it’s time to bring in a new scientist to lead the NIH into the future.”

But it is unlikely Collins’s belief in a revolving door at the NIH that has prompted the move. Rather, with pressure mounting on key public figures such as his minion Anthony Fauci and arms-length brother-in-arms Peter Daszak, it is worth looking at what the media won’t be saying about Collins this week.

The National Pulse has reported:

1. Francis Collins Advises Chinese Military Proxy-Linked Group Working Alongside COVID-19 Gene Storage Firm.

National Institutes of Health director Dr. Francis Collins serves on the advisory board of a conference sponsored by a Chinese military-linked genomics firm. The D.C.-based, health industry big-wig and boss to Anthony Fauci has even referred to the controversial company’s founder as a “friend”.

BGI Genomics has been flagged by U.S. intelligence officials for its robust efforts to “collect, store and exploit biometric information” on American citizens through COVID-19 test kits. According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the firm has deep ties to both the Chinese Communist Party and its military.

Read more.

1. Collins Admits Funding Wuhan Lab: ‘We Had No Control Over What They Were Doing.’

Dr. Francis Collins, the director of the National Institute for Health (NIH), appears to have directly contradicted his underling Dr. Anthony Fauci in a bombshell moment from an interview with Hugh Hewitt.

The revelations further implicate those who approved U.S. grants to the lab, and the EcoHealth Alliance run by the British-born Peter Dazcak – who The National Pulse first reported on back in February.

https://thenationalpulse.com/analysis/6-scandals-the-media-wont-tell-you-about-outgoing-nih-director-francis-collins/

Govt Will Brand Climate Change as a ‘Public Health Issue’ to Expand Their Power, Says Baroness Fox

The United Kingdom and governments throughout the world will try to brand climate change as a public health issue in order to expand their powers, as they did during the Chinese coronavirus crisis, Baroness Claire Fox warned.

Speaking with Breitbart London during the Reform UK party conference in Manchester, Claire Fox, Baroness Fox of Buckley said that while she is the “opposite of a conspiratorial thinker”, she believes that governments will try to retain the powers they have acquired during the pandemic by raising fears over a range of other issues, including climate change.

Fox told Breitbart:

I think you can expect to see a whole range of issues being dressed up as public health issues and I’ve even noticed that climate change has been posed as a public health risk rather than the green ideology. When you talk about crime, people will say its an issue for public health.

I get very anxious, because I think public health legislation will be used quite considerably over a range of issues by the government to simply hold on to the powers they have at the moment.

If a government realises that when public health is deployed as the spectre to frighten people, then actually they can accumulate a lot of power for themselves without too much opposition.

The former Brexit Party MEP and peer in the House of Lords said the only way to combat the draconian measures introduced during the coronavirus will be to convince the public, but she noted that liberty advocates have so fair failed to win the argument with the public.

“A substantial minority might be opposed to these type of things, but a lot of people, good people, people who believe in freedom, have gone along with this. In other words they have taken the safety over freedom argument. But I think there is never an excuse for not trying to win the arguments with our fellow citizens,” Fox said.

https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2021/10/05/claire-fox-predicts-govts-will-call-climate-change-a-public-health-issue/

Rochester Mayor Lovely Warren to resign after accepting plea deal

Rochester Mayor Lovely Warren has agreed to resign for violating state election law during her 2017 run for re-election and will leave office by Dec. 1.

Warren, 44, was readying Monday for what was expected to be a month-long trial on felony charges that she and two assistants violated campaign contribution limits, but she pleaded guilty to a single misdemeanor, admitting that she knowingly exceeded the $8,557 limit, the Democrat & Chronicle reported.

By admitting to the charge, the city’s first black woman elected as mayor avoids the likely loss of her law license and immediate removal from office.

Warren’s co-defendants, campaign treasurer Albert Jones Jr. and Rosiland Brooks-Harris, treasurer of political action committee Warren for a Strong Rochester, also pleaded guilty to accepting campaign contributions that exceeded legal limits, the newspaper reported.

Warren, who declined to comment to reporters while leaving court, is expected to be replaced by Deputy Mayor James Smith. City Councilman Malik Evans, who beat Warren in a Democratic primary earlier this year, is then expected to take office on Jan. 1, the Democrat & Chronicle reported.

Warren thanked the residents of Rochester in a Facebook post late Monday.

“Leaving the past behind and looking forward to a brighter future,” Warren wrote. “We’ve accomplished a lot together, but in the end, I thank God that I’m able to choose family over everything.”

Warren, Jones and Brooks-Harris had faced up to four years in state prison if convicted on the felony charge, according to WHAM. But a judge sentenced all three to a year-long conditional discharge, meaning they could face additional penalties if they commit additional crimes during that period, the Democrat & Chronicle reported.

see also

Rochester, New York Mayor, Lovely Warren, addresses the media Thursday May 20, 2021 after her husband was arrested on gun and drug charges

Rochester Mayor Lovely Warren says husband’s coke and gun arrest is ‘about politics’

Monroe County prosecutors did not recommend the conditional discharge, leaving the sentencing decision to Judge Thomas Leone. Attorneys for Warren had previously denied evading campaign finance rules, blaming the errors on poor bookkeeping and inadvertent errors.

Prosecutors didn’t specify the scope of the alleged fraud other than to say it was in the “hundreds of thousands of dollars.” The PAC had raised about $350,000, the Democrat & Chronicle reported.

Warren’s plea deal Monday also resolved separate gun and child endangerment charges. In July, a grand jury indicted her and her estranged husband, Timothy Granison, with criminal possession of a firearm and endangering the welfare of a child and failure to lock or secure firearms in a dwelling, the newspaper reported.

The allegations were connected to a raid of their home in May that police said led to the seizure of 2 kilos of cocaine and a rifle and a pistol at the home, where their 10-year-old daughter was found alone. Both Warren and Granison had pleaded not guilty to the gun and child endangerment charges, while she was not implicated in the alleged drug-trafficking network linked to her estranged husband.

https://nypost.com/2021/10/05/rochester-mayor-lovely-warren-to-resign-after-accepting-plea-deal/

Chart Shows How Hospitals Are Being Bribed To Use Deadly Remdesivir And Get $39,000 To Put People On Ventilators! Print This Out And Take To The Hospital!

New COVID-19 Treatments Add-On Payment (NCTAP)

CMS issued an Interim Final Rule with Comment Period that established the New COVID-19 Treatments Add-on Payment (NCTAP) under the Medicare Inpatient Prospective Payment System (IPPS). The NCTAP, designed to mitigate potential financial disincentives for hospitals to provide new COVID-19 treatments, is effective from November 2, 2020, until the end of the COVID-19 public health emergency (PHE).

Through the NCTAP, the Medicare Program will provide an enhanced payment for eligible inpatient cases that use certain new products with current FDA approval or emergency use authorization (EUA) to treat COVID-19, including the following:

On August 23, 2020, the FDA issued (reissued on November 30, 2020, and revised on March 9, 2021) an EUA for the use of COVID-19 convalescent plasma for treating COVID-19 in hospitalized patients

On October 22, 2020, the FDA approved remdesivir (Veklury) for the treatment of COVID-19 for adults and certain pediatric patients requiring hospitalization

On November 19, 2020, the FDA issued an EUA for the use of baricitinib (Olumiant), in combination with remdesivir (Veklury), for the treatment of suspected or laboratory confirmed COVID-19 in certain hospitalized patients

For eligible cases, the NCTAP is equal to the lesser of these:

65% of the operating outlier threshold for the claim

65% of the amount by which the costs of the case exceed the standard Diagnosis-Related Group (DRG) payment (including the adjustment to the relative weight under Section 3710 of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES Act)

https://www.cracknewz.com/2021/10/chart-shows-how-hospitals-are-being.html

Nuns used crucifixes to rape girls during decades of abuse carried out by clergy in France's Catholic Church that saw attacks on 330,000 children covered up 'by a veil of silence', damning report finds

Nuns used crucifixes to rape girls during decades of abuse carried out by clergy in France's Catholic Church that saw attacks on 330,000 children covered up 'by a veil of silence', a damning report has found.

The 2,500-page landmark report was released Tuesday after more than two years of investigations by an independent commission, in France's first major reckoning with the devastating phenomenon.

A victim named 'Marie' testified that she was abused as an 11-year-old and that when she complained about the abuse to her parents they refused to believe a nun could do such a thing. The abuse continued for another year.

'I was truly [a gift] for this nun… because she knew full well that she did not risk anything,' Marie said.

Eighty per cent of victims were young boys between the ages of 10 and 13, however many girls also suffered abuse, not only by priests but also by nuns.

Nuns used crucifixes to rape little girls or forced boys to have sex with them, according to the report.

Pope Francis today expressed to the victims his 'great sorrow, for their wounds', adding that he was grateful for the courage they had shown in denouncing what they had been through.

The investigation found that an estimated 330,000 children were victims of sex abuse within France's Catholic Church between 1950 to 2020, with an estimated 216,000 people abused by priests and other clerics.

Olivier Savignac, who was sexually abused by a priest in 1993, at the age of 13, has contributed to the report as a victims' representative.

'I perceived this priest as someone who was good, a caring person who would not harm me,' said Savignac. 'But it was when I found myself on that bed half-naked and he was touching me that I realised something was wrong.'

He says the abuse, which carried on for years, damaged him for life: 'It's like a growing cyst, it's like gangrene inside the victim's body and the victim's psyche.'

'We can see how systemic it was … with an estimated number of 216,000 victims,' Savignac told Reuters, adding that the Church could not have ignored something of that magnitude.

'It's an earthquake, a hurricane, a tsunami … when you see these numbers, it's so damning that no one can stay in denial, whether the Catholic Church or society as a whole,' he added.

A statement from the Vatican said: 'First of all [the Pope's] thoughts go to the victims, with great sorrow, for their wounds.'

http://www.womensystems.com/2021/10/nuns-used-crucifixes-to-rape-girls.html

Biden’s FBI Goes Rogue — House Republican Being Investigated

A top Republican lawmaker on the House Appropriations Committee’s agriculture panel announced that he is being investigated by federal authorities.

On a fundraising page for a new legal expense fund — which was later taken off-line — Nebraska GOP Rep. Jeff Fortenberry wrote: “Biden’s FBI is using its unlimited power to prosecute me on a bogus charge.”

“The investigation in question, the spokesperson said, had to do with illegal campaign contributions by a Lebanese-Nigerian billionaire to a number of congressional Republicans,” Axios reported.

https://www.investmentwatchblog.com/bidens-fbi-goes-rogue-house-republican-being-investigated/

Biden Admin Calls For Gov’t To Regulate Facebook To Shut Down Independent Media

According to the Biden administration, now is the time for the government to step in and control Facebook in order to eliminate independent media for good.

In response to Facebook’s worldwide outage and testimony from a whistleblower on Monday, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said that social media corporations need to be nannied by the government in order to more effectively eliminate “hate speech” and “misinformation.”

“This is just the latest in a series of revelations about social media platforms,” Psaki told reporters on Monday when asked about Zuckerberg’s whistleblower troubles.

These “revelations,” Psaki added, “make clear that self-regulation is not working. That’s long been the president’s view and been the view of the administration.”

Psaki said the administration will continue to support efforts by Congress to pass “fundamental reforms” in the Big Tech field.

Rt.com reports: Numerous Democrat lawmakers have called for more oversight over companies like Facebook, as well as more stringent rules about what can be posted, while Republicans have blasted most major tech companies of using campaigns against hate and ‘misinformation’ as ways to ban conservative opinions and users, especially ones that criticize government health officials on Covid-19 data and regulations.

https://en-volve.com/2021/10/05/biden-admin-calls-for-govt-to-regulate-facebook-to-shut-down-independent-media/

Navy Officer Turns Witness in Bribery Case That Echoes 'Fat Leonard' Scandal

A Navy officer has become a cooperating witness in a case of alleged bribery involving a contractor and port services in Bahrain resembling the years-long "Fat Leonard" scandal that snared senior sailors and others, according to unsealed court documents.

Military investigators allege that Frank Rafaraci, the chief executive of Multinational Logistics Services, or MLS, defrauded the Navy out of at least $50 million by inflating invoices for ship services between 2011 and 2018, the documents show.

Agents from the Defense Criminal Investigative Service told a U.S. district court that the scheme was made possible by not only a web of shell companies and coded emails but also bribes to the unnamed Navy official, who the documents say is still an officer in the service.

Rafaraci was arrested in Malta after an international manhunt, and the Justice Department is working to extradite him, according to The Washington Post, which first reported the case. He faces four charges in federal court that include bribery, and conspiracy charges for fraud and money laundering, court records show.

The U.S. Navy and other federal agencies have awarded about $1.3 billion in contracts to MLS for port services since 2010.

The sailor in the case pleaded guilty to "one count of conspiracy to commit bribery and is cooperating with the government's investigation in the hope of obtaining favorable consideration regarding a potential sentence," according to the documents.

The sailor was a Marine Liaison Officer for the Navy in Manama, Bahrain, starting in 2006 until the present, with a several-year break when it appears the unnamed individual went to work for the U.S. Army.

The arrest warrant alleges that Rafaraci paid the sailor two bribes – one in 2015 and another in 2018.

The first bribe occurred during a meeting at the Diplomat Hotel in Manama when Rafaraci handed over an envelope filled with $20,000 in cash and told the sailor "that he would be in touch, and to 'keep up the good work,'" court documents allege.

Three years later, Rafaraci met that sailor again, this time at a Miami hotel, and gave him an envelope with $13,500, according to the arrest warrant.

The sailor in question has since been arrested and pleaded guilty in June to a bribery charge in the U.S. District Court in Washington, agreeing to become a cooperating witness for the government, the court documents say. The person's identity and his criminal case file, however, remain under seal.

https://www.military.com/daily-news/2021/10/04/navy-officer-turns-witness-bribery-case-echoes-fat-leonard-scandal.html

Russian media watchdog to impose turnover-based fine on Facebook for the first time

Roskomnadzor drew up an administrative protocol for a repeated violation of the procedure for restricting access to files containing banned information in Facebook and Instagram social networks

MOSCOW, October 5. /TASS/. Russia’s media watchdog will use a turnover-based fine against Facebook for the first time due to the company’s refusal to delete banned content, the watchdog’s press service reported on Tuesday.

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"Roskomnadzor (Russia’s Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology, and Mass Media - TASS), in the presence of a representative of Facebook Inc, drew up an administrative protocol for a repeated violation of the procedure for restricting access to files containing banned information in Facebook and Instagram social networks (owned by Facebook)," the press service said.

"The watchdog will submit the protocol to the court, which will determine the date of the hearing. For such an offense committed repeatedly, the American IT giant faces a fine in the amount of one-twentieth to one-tenth of its annual revenue. The exact amount of the fine will also be determined by the court," the press service added.

In order to prove the guilt of Facebook, the protocol provides links to nine pieces of content. The regulator noted that since 2019 it had sent more than 110 notifications to the IT giant (60 notifications regarding four pieces of content on Facebook and 53 notifications regarding five publications on Instagram).

After the company was summoned to the department to draw up a protocol providing for the imposition of a turnover-based fine, the moderators of Facebook and Instagram deleted the nine publications indicated in the protocol.

"However, according to Russian law, the company is obliged to do this within 24 hours after receiving a notification from Roskomnadzor. Repeated violation of the access restriction procedure can be met with turnover-based fines," the regulator’s press service said.

Over 1,000 dangerous publications yet to be removed

The regulator said that the publications contained in the protocol are a small part of the social media content that violates Russian law.

"Currently, 1,043 publications are still to be deleted on Facebook (7,600 notifications sent) and 973 - on Instagram (3,500 notifications sent)," the press service noted.

Among the publications Facebook and Instagram have not limited access to the posts that incite religious discord, offend the feelings of believers or are aimed at splitting the state, publications about the use of drugs, places where homemade weapons are sold, about a dangerous attitude to the life and health of minors, as well as about extremist and terrorist organizations.

In total, in 2021, the Russian media watchdog has already drawn up 20 protocols against Facebook for violating the procedure for removing malicious content. The court imposed fines in the total amount of about 70 million rubles ($967,992). The court decisions for 43 million rubles ($636,109) of this amount have already come into force. The Facebook administration has not paid those fines.

https://tass.com/economy/1346013