U.K. Recession Now on the Economic Horizon

Wells Fargo Securities Jul 01 22, 16:06 GMT

While the U.K. economy showed some resilience at the start of 2022, there are increasing signs that a more meaningful slowdown is approaching. Elevated inflation should contribute to declining real incomes, weighing on consumer spending and overall GDP.

With the U.S. economy, in our view, now expected to fall into recession in 2023, we also expect the U.K. to experience an economic recession by early next year.

https://www.actionforex.com/contributors/fundamental-analysis/451695-u-k-recession-now-on-the-economic-horizon

An Ex-Secret Service Agent Says Trump Is Too Fat To Have Grabbed The Beast’s Steering Wheel

JENNIFER WOOD JULY 1, 2022

Insider spoke with several former Secret Service agents, many of whom questioned Trump’s physical wherewithal to actually accomplish the superhero-ish moves Hutchinson described. And while they did remain anonymous, they didn’t mince words when it came to why they weren’t so sure about Hutchinson’s testimony, with one agent—in the understatement of the year—claiming Trump is “not the most agile human being.” Then he took it even further:

“Trump’s not a little guy, right? And the space to actually be able to lunge towards the wheel is not that big. I don’t mean to sound disparaging to the former president, but just his girth would prevent him from actually getting to the steering wheel.”

https://uproxx.com/viral/donald-trump-too-fat-the-beast-steering-wheel/

(file under "How to spin a story with a headline")

20 Movies That'll Remind You the Government Can’t Be Trusted

Mother, should I trust the government? Probably not.

ByRoss Johnson 13 minutes ago

(slideshow)

The Parallax View (1974)

Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)

Shin Godzilla (2016)

A Face in the Crowd (1957)

The Manchurian Candidate (1962)

Seven Days in May (1964)

Z (1969)

The Conversation (1974)

No Way Out (1987)

Absolute Power (1997)

Wag the Dog (1997)

Enemy of the State (1998)

The X-Files (1998)

Il Divo (2008)

Fair Game (2010)

Nixon (1995)

Dick (1999)

Frost/Nixon (2008)

The Manchurian Candidate (2004)

Inside Men (2015)

https://lifehacker.com/20-movies-thatll-remind-you-the-government-can-t-be-tru-1849125096

California Sets Nation’s Toughest Plastics Reduction Rules

July 1, 2022 By Associated Press

Companies selling shampoo, food and other products wrapped in plastic have a decade to cut down on their use of the polluting material if they want their wares on California store shelves.

Major legislation passed and signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom on Thursday aims to significantly reduce single-use plastic packaging in the state and drastically boost recycling rates for what remains. It sets the nation’s most stringent requirements for the use of plastic packaging, with lawmakers saying they hope it sets a precedent for other states to follow.

https://gvwire.com/2022/07/01/california-sets-nations-toughest-plastics-reduction-rules

>>16574401

Kek. Remember when the scarves were supposed to be some type of comms?

>>16574182

You just can't get it out of neutral, can you?

>>16574392

You answered your own question. Next?

China’s new Mars images show off the country’s robust (but secretive) space program

Stefanie Waldek / 12:34 PM CDT July 1, 2022

With a $24 billion budget and dozens of active, high-profile missions, it’s not surprising that NASA is the most visible of the dozens of government space agencies in the world. But China’s space program is a rapidly developing superpower that, whether it’s due to political tensions or the government’s careful control of information, doesn’t often get its fair share of attention.

Just this week, the China National Space Administration (CNSA) released a series of high-resolution images of Mars taken by its Tianwen-1 spacecraft, which arrived at the Red Planet in February 2021 and has been orbiting it ever since. Over the course of more than 1,300 orbits, Tianwen-1 has photographed the entire planet in extreme detail, from the icy south pole to the 2,485-mile-long Valles Marineris canyon to the 59,055-foot-tall shield volcano Ascraeus Mons.

While the U.S. has the reliable Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and other spacecraft have imaged the planet over the years, the full-surface survey by China’s program will be valuable to scientists and colony planners across the world if the country releases the imagery widely. But this is just the latest success of a thriving space program that has ambitious goals over the next five years — and it might not even be its most impressive one.

The fact that Tianwen-1 even made it to Mars is remarkable, as it was China’s first solo interplanetary mission. (China participated in a failed joint mission with Russia, Phobos-Grunt/Yinghuo-1, which launched in 2011 but did not leave Earth orbit.) Overall, Mars missions, from flybys to orbiters to landers, have about a 50% success rate, according to NASA.

https://techcrunch.com/2022/07/01/chinas-new-mars-pictures-tianwen-1/

TikTok confirms that China-based employees can access US user data, but only through an 'approval process'

Travis Clark 43 minutes ago

TikTok confirmed that China-based employees of its Chinese parent company, ByteDance, have access to US user data under certain circumstances in a letter obtained by The New York Times responding to nine Republican senators' inquiries about the matter.

"Employees outside the US, including China-based employees, can have access to TikTok US user data subject to a series of robust cybersecurity controls and authorization approval protocols overseen by our US-based security team," TikTok's CEO Shou Zi Chew wrote in the letter.

"TikTok has an internal data classification system and approval process in place that assigns levels of access based on the data's classification and requires approvals for access to US user data," Chew added. "The level of approval required is based on the sensitivity of the data according to the classification system."

Sal Rodriguez, who is currently a reporter for The Wall Street Journal, first reported for CNBC last year that ByteDance had access to US data and was closely involved in making decisions for TikTok.

A new light was shined on the privacy and security concerns after BuzzFeed News recently reported, based on audio of internal meetings it obtained, that ByteDance employees had repeatedly accessed US user data over at least a four-month period, and that US-based employees did not have permission to access it.

In a statement to BuzzFeed News for its report, a TikTok spokesperson said, in part: "We know we're among the most scrutinized platforms from a security standpoint, and we aim to remove any doubt about the security of US user data."

On the same day BuzzFeed News published its story, TikTok announced that "100% of US user traffic is being routed to Oracle Cloud Infrastructure," rather than being stored in its own data centers in the US and Singapore.

https://www.businessinsider.com/tiktok-confirms-us-user-data-accessed-in-china-bytedance-2022-7

>>16574509

I'm thinking, how are they going to deliver lotion? In a tin? Isn't that worse?

>>16574583

Indeed. I've seen most of them, too, but there are several more that could be added with much subtler anti-gov messages. I would write the screenplay with you, anon, for your narrative.

>>16574769

Just block and ignore it, fren. Otherwise, you're feeding them.

TEA requiring schools to comply with new school safety rules by Sept. 1

By KCBD Staff Published: Jun. 30, 2022 at 3:29 PM CDT Updated: 22 hours ago

LUBBOCK, Texas (KCBD) - The Texas Education Agency (TEA) released a list of school safety requirements on Thursday, requiring Texas districts to secure doors, train staff, and review threat response plans by Sept. 1.

This is in response to Governor Greg Abbott’s directives on public school safety measures, issued June 1 and 2.

The TEA released a list of requirements for schools, including exterior door safety audits and mandatory drills.

The TEA will be collecting data from schools about changes that need to be made to facilities using money from school safety grants recently released under SB500. Funds can be used to install things like silent panic alert systems, vehicle barriers, metal detectors, security systems and fencing.

“TEA, TxSSC, and other state agency partners are working on additional actions to provide more support to improve school safety. This includes efforts to expand technical assistance for emergency operations plan development, conducting threat assessment protocols, expanding availability of school-based law enforcement, improving the efficacy of drills and incident preparedness exercises, and supporting LEA efforts in implementing multi-tiered system of supports.”

All Texas LEAs must take the following actions prior to the start of the new school year:

= Conduct a Summer Targeted Partial Safety Audit

= Conduct an Exterior Door Safety Audit

= Convene the LEA’s Safety and Security Committee to review: the multi-hazard emergency operations plan (EOP) and, as a component of the EOP, the LEA’s active threat plan

= Ensure all campus staff (including substitutes) are trained on their specific LEA and campus safety procedures

= Schedule all mandatory drills for the school year

= Ensure all threat assessment team members are trained

= Review and, if necessary, update access control procedures

= For the new school year, access control procedures must include exterior door sweeps (ensuring doors are closed and locked) at every instructional facility at least once each week while instruction is being conducted.

https://www.kltv.com/2022/06/30/tea-requiring-schools-comply-with-new-school-safety-rules-by-sept-1/

(fencing contractors please consider this opportunity, lol)

Accounts of Trump angrily demanding to go to Capitol on January 6 circulated in Secret Service over past year

Posted July 1, 2022 2:29 p.m. EDT

By Noah Gray and Zachary Cohen, CNN

The source added that agents often recounted stories of Trump's fits of anger, including the former President throwing and breaking things.

"Not just plates," the source added, a reference to how Hutchinson testified this week that she saw ketchup on the wall and a porcelain plate shattered on the floor of the White House dining room after Trump had thrown his lunch at the wall upon hearing about then-Attorney General William Barr telling a media outlet there was no widespread fraud in the 2020 election.

The other Secret Service source, who spoke to the driver and another agent who wasn't there, said he heard about Trump verbally lashing out at his detail but not about any physical altercation. Neither source told CNN they had heard about Trump trying to grab at the steering wheel.

https://www.wral.com/accounts-of-trump-angrily-demanding-to-go-to-capitol-on-january-6-circulated-in-secret-service-over-past-year/20356953/

Governor suspends Georgia gas taxes through mid-August

By Associated Press - Friday, July 1, 2022

ATLANTA — Georgia’s governor is extending the suspension of the state’s motor fuel tax through mid-August.

Gov. Brian Kemp on Friday signed an executive order extending the suspension for a second time. The order also suspends the state sales tax on locomotive fuel.

Kemp previously signed a law in March that passed with broad bipartisan support suspending the state’s gas tax through May 31. At the end of May, he extended that suspension through July 14.

Under state law, Kemp can suspend taxes by executive order as long as state lawmakers ratify the action the next time they meet. Kemp abated gas taxes in 2021 during a pipeline shutdown, and former Gov. Nathan Deal suspended gas taxes multiple times.

In announcing the extension of the suspension, Kemp blamed high gas prices on President Joe Biden.

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2022/jul/1/gov-brian-kemp-suspends-georgia-gas-taxes-through-/