'Ohio Chernobyl': East Palestine Town Hall Scrapped After Residents Report Health Problems

Nearly two weeks after a Norfolk Southern Railway freight train with 150 cars (20 of which were carrying hazardous materials) derailed in the small town of East Palestine, Ohio, resulting in a chemical disaster, the extent of the damage to the town and surrounding communities remains unclear.

On Tuesday, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine held a press conference for the Feb. 3 derailment. He said Norfolk Southern did not classify the train as a "high hazardous material train" despite multiple cars containing toxic chemical vinyl chloride.

"This is absurd … Congress needs to take a look at how these things are handled," DeWine said.

There's already an effort by lawmakers on Capitol Hill and federal agencies to investigate the derailment. Epoch Times noted:

Key committees in the Republican-controlled House are holding their peace as investigations of the derailment and its environmental impact proceed.

A spokesperson for the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, led by Chairman Sam Graves (R-Mo.), said the committee was talking with the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), the Department of Transportation's Federal Railroad Administration, and the railroad involved, Norfolk Southern.

"We will continue to monitor the situation and NTSB's ongoing investigation," the spokesperson told The Epoch Times in a Feb. 14 email.

Investigators have uncovered security camera footage 20 miles before East Palestine of the suspected railcar that caused the derailment. Footage shows one of the cars was on fire well before the small town.

"NTSB investigators have identified and examined the rail car that initiated the derailment. Surveillance video from a residence showed what appears to be a wheel bearing in the final stage of overheat failure moments before the derailment," NTSB wrote on its website.

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/ohio-chernobyl-east-palestine-town-hall-scrapped-after-residents-report-health-problems

Biden refers to Democrat Wes Moore — Maryland's first Black governor — as "boy."

https://twitter.com/RNCResearch/status/1625943227550339089

Ukraine accuses Russia of using spy balloons

At least six of the devices were detected above Kiev, an air force spokesperson claimed

Air defense systems near Kiev allegedly detected and shot down as many as six air balloons believed to have been used by Russia, a spokesperson for the Ukrainian military claimed during a televised appearance on Wednesday.

According to Yuri Ignat, the balloons, which were detected flying above the Ukrainian capital, may have been equipped with reconnaissance equipment meant to identify and exhaust Kiev’s air defense systems.

Kiev city officials also announced on their Telegram channel that the balloons, which appear to have been propelled by the wind, may have been carrying corner reflectors and other intelligence equipment. They noted that a final determination of the intended use of these devices would be made after a study of the remains of the downed objects.

While Moscow has yet to comment on the incident, Ignat told a Ukrainian TV channel that the balloons may be a new tactic deployed by Russia to preserve its stocks of reconnaissance drones.

"Reconnaissance drones like the Orlan-10 are now being used more sparingly, and so they thought 'Why don't we use these balloons?' So now they are using them," the official said.

Earlier on Wednesday, air raid sirens were triggered throughout the Kiev region after unidentified flying objects were detected above the city. Shortly after the alert, explosions could be heard across the capital. City officials later stated that air defense systems detected several targets in the air and shot them down.

https://www.rt.com/russia/571543-ukraine-russian-baloons-kiev/

https://www.rt.com/russia/571543-ukraine-russian-baloons-kiev/

'Male,' 'female' should be replaced with 'sperm-producing,' 'egg-producing' to be 'inclusive,' scientists say

Researchers from the United States and Canada suggested that scientists should stop using "harmful" terminology and instead adopt more "inclusive and precise" language, including replacing terms such as "male" and "female" with "sperm-producing" and "egg-producing," the New York Post reported.

A group of scientists with the Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Language Project recently published a paper in the Trends in Ecology and Evolution journal recommending more "inclusive terminology in ecology and evolution" to combat the "ongoing marginalization of many groups."

The group's website lists 24 so-called "harmful terms" that should be banned from the scientific community, including "man," "woman," "mother," "father," "primitive," and "invasive."

According to the scientists, "primitive" and "invasive" are "used derogatorily towards humans or human practices, and also scientifically inaccurate as implies an evolutionary hierarchy."

The researchers claimed that the phrase "survival of the fittest" is also "harmful" because it is linked to "eugenics, ableism and social Darwinism."

The term "citizen science," which the researchers argued is "harmful to non-citizens," should be replaced with "participant science or community science."

"Discover" and "discovery" should be replaced with "identified" and "described" because the former "erases the longstanding, detailed ecological knowledge of Indigenous communities that have been involved with local environments and ecosystems before colonialism and western science."

"Much of western science is rooted in colonialism, white supremacy and patriarchy, and these power structures continue to permeate our scientific culture," the scientists argued. "Here, we discuss one crucial way to address this history and make EEB more inclusive for marginalized communities: our choice of scientific terminology."

Researchers involved in the project include academics from Harvard, Princeton, and the University of California.

"Our team of authors includes graduate students, staff, postdoctoral scholars, and assistant professors employed across historically white and minority-serving institutions in the USA and Canada, and several authors have personal ties to other countries," the group's journal stated.

The project's authors hold a "shared interest in calling attention to the power of language and the ways it can cause harm."

According to University of British Columbia assistant professor Dr. Kaitlyn Gaynor, the project started as a Twitter conversation among a few researchers discussing potentially harmful terminology.

"We reached out to different networks in ecology and evolution that were focused on increasing inclusion and equity in the field to rally support for one very specific action — revising terminology that might be harmful to certain people, particularly those from groups historically and currently excluded from science," Gaynor stated, according to a UBC press release.

https://www.theblaze.com/news/male-female-should-be-replaced-with-sperm-producing-egg-producing-to-be-inclusive-scientists-say

Wealth transfer

'Sit up and listen': The largest LGBTIQ+ human rights conference ever to be held in Southern Hemisphere is about to come to Sydney

If there's one thing trans activist Ymania Brown wants people to take away from the upcoming WorldPride human rights conference next month, it's that LGBTIQ people "do not have the same rights" as other citizens.

The Brisbane-based humanitarian and proud Faa'fafine woman - who has spearheaded Pacific trans activism for some 20 years - says now is the time when the 70 countries that still criminalise same-sex relationships to "sit up and listen".

Brown, who will also speak at the conference, says it's of "global importance" that countries around the world "are on the same page" when it comes to gay rights, especially the 13 who still imprison and inflict corporal punishment on queer people.

'The cornerstone of pride' 

Brown tells 9news.com.au what the human rights conference hopes to achieve, why it's so important that events such as this are held on global scale and what exactly she wants people - queer or otherwise - to take away from the experience.

"It's the cornerstone of Pride festival," Brown said.

"Every WorldPride festival that's been hosted in different cities in the past has had one… it will bring together, community leaders to politicians to human rights experts from around the globe.

"We've been very careful to make sure that this is a global conference, and not just focusing on Australia, but the issues that are of global importance to us."

What makes this conference so unique, is the fact that it was designed by the community, rather than organisers, Brown explains.

"Generally, in the conferences that I've been involved in around the world, it's the organisers that decide what the content is," Brown said.

"This conference was actually designed by the community, the LGBTIQ community.

"We did a survey and the community told us what subjects and topics they want to see… it's really, really important."

'Countries need to sit up and listen' 

Although she hopes the event will open the eyes of many to some of the lesser-known issues facing LGBTIQ+ people, Brown says she also wants it to attract the attention of the 70 countries that still criminalise sexual acts between those in same sex relationships and with transgender people.

https://www.9news.com.au/national/sydney-worldpride-update-human-rights-conference-to-tackle-key-human-rights-issues-affecting-lgbtqia-people/c3d6280a-3565-44db-8c6b-0cf7cf779279

Normalization of pedophilia continues

>>18353777

Stop whining and do something then

you'll be whining so much you'll be sick of whining

GOP lawmaker grills trans doctor over Arkansas bill to ban child sex changes, asks if doctor has a penis

"The idea that teenagers, let alone little children, are capable of making such life-altering decisions is not only brand new, but it's absurd," said bill sponsor Republican Sen. Gary Stubblefield.

An Arkansas Republican lawmaker has come under fire for asking a transgender doctor an extremely personal question. Dr. Gwendolyn Herzig was testifying against a proposed bill that would allow minors who suffer ill-effects of pharmaceutical or surgical sex changes to hold their doctor liable when Sen. Matt McKee asked Herzig "do you have a penis?"

The Monday hearing was for Senate Bill 199, dubbed the Protecting Minors From Medical Malpractice Act of 2023, which would give people who underwent damaging hormone treatment and sex change surgeries as minors the ability to file a malpractice lawsuit for up to 30 years after they turn 18. Currently, Arkansas allows for such lawsuits only within two years of whatever "injury" the individual may have sustained.

"The idea that teenagers, let alone little children, are capable of making such life-altering decisions is not only brand new, but it's absurd," said bill sponsor Republican Sen. Gary Stubblefield, according to the Daily Mail. "A society that allows them to do this is a deeply broken society."

Herzig, a Little Rock pharmacy owner who identifies as transgender, was highly offended when state Sen. Matt McKee asked about Herzig's genitals. Herzig's LinkedIn displays a focus on "LGBTQ+ care with an emphasis in transgender medicine."

"You said that you're a trans woman?" McKee asked. "Do you have a penis?"

In video footage from that moment, the audience can be heard gasping and jeering him.

"That's horrible," Herzig said after a few moments.

"You're the one that brought that into the discussion," the senator fired back.

https://thepostmillennial.com/gop-lawmaker-grills-trans-doctor-over-arkansas-bill-to-ban-child-sex-changes-asks-if-doctor-has-a-penis

>>18353808

He should've done what he said he would when he was pres

like arrest HRC and co but he lied about that

Trump announces he is embracing ballot harvesting

"Our path forward is to MASTER the Democrats’ own game."

Former President Donald Trump's campaign is examining ways to win over the mail-in vote after the Democrats' performance in the 2020 presidential and 2022 midterm elections. The Wall Street Journal reports that Trump's staff is examining state laws on absentee and mail-in voting, as well as ballot harvesting techniques.

Trump, who was famously critical of mail-in votes following the 2020 election, is changing his tune following comments by some GOP 2024 presidential hopefuls, like Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, who have criticized the party for not capitalizing on opportunities in recent elections by focusing too much on Election Day turnout.

The change of heart can be observed in a Trump fundraising email released earlier this week which read, "The radical Democrats have used ballot harvesting to cancel out YOUR vote and walk away with elections that they NEVER should have won. But I’m doing something HUGE to fight back.”

He continued: “Our path forward is to MASTER the Democrats’ own game of harvesting ballots in every state we can. But that also means we need to start laying the foundation for victory RIGHT NOW.”

Trump told Breitbart News in December that the GOP has to "live with the system that stinks" but maintained that "a mail-in ballot will always be corrupt," and that Republicans need to look for ways to make elections more secure.

Other Republicans have noted that the GOP simply needs to use whatever tools available to win over voters and that the Republican National Committee is looking into the issue following the midterms last November.

Roughly 60 percent of Democrats voted by mail in 2020 compared to 30 percent of Republicans.

“We simply have to beat them at this,” said Arizona GOP candidate Blake Masters who lost in a close race this past November.

https://thepostmillennial.com/breaking-trump-announces-he-is-embracing-ballot-harvesting

Microsoft's Bing AI Chatbot Starts Threatening People

Last week, Microsoft announced the new AI-powered Bing: a search interface that incorporates a language model powered chatbot that can run searches for you and summarize the results, plus do all of the other fun things that engines like GPT-3 and ChatGPT have been demonstrating over the past few months: the ability to generate poetry, and jokes, and do creative writing, and so much more.

This week, people have started gaining access to it via the waiting list. It’s increasingly looking like this may be one of the most hilariously inappropriate applications of AI that we’ve seen yet.

If you haven’t been paying attention, here’s what’s transpired so far.

The demo was full of errors

It started gaslighting people

It suffered an existential crisis

The prompt leaked

And then it started threatening people

The demo was full of errors

The demo that introduced AI Bing to the world was really compelling: they showed shopping comparison, and trip itinerary planning, and financial statement summarization.

Then Dmitri Brereton did some fact checking against the examples from the demo.

It said that the cons of the “Bissell Pet Hair Eraser Handheld Vacuum” included a “short cord length of 16 feet”, when that vacuum has no cord at all—and that “it’s noisy enough to scare pets” when online reviews note that it’s really quiet.

It recommended a “rustic and charming” bar in Mexico City without noting that it’s also one of the oldest gay bars in Mexico City.

Best of all, it provided a summary of Gap’s financials and compared them to those of Lululemon… while entirely making up many of the figures. Dmitri observes that “Lululemon’s diluted earnings per share is $2.00 not $1.65.” These are not small mistakes!

The fact that these mistakes made it into the big launch demo is baffling to me. Did no-one think to fact check the examples in advance?

I absolutely love the idea of an AI-assisted search engine that can run searches and use them for summaries and to help answer my questions for me. But large language models have no concept of “truth”—they just know how to best complete a sentence in a way that’s statistically probable based on their inputs and training set. So they make things up, and then state them with extreme confidence.

A search engine that invents financial figures when answering queries to compare companies is pretty much a worst-case scenario for applying this technology.

More

https://www.zerohedge.com/technology/microsofts-bing-ai-chatbot-starts-threatening-people

https://simonwillison.net/2023/Feb/15/bing/

Court Docs Released Show Biden Crime Family Involved in $140 Million Dollar Transaction with Saudis

Another deal involving the Biden crime family was reported today that has to date gone unnoticed. Another day another Biden crime family scandal involving millions for the Bidens.

Breitbart reported on a deal with the Saudis where Jim Biden was brought in and a secret $140 million settlement was negotiated:

James Biden secretly negotiated a $140 million settlement deal in 2012 between a U.S. company and the Saudi Arabian government due to his relationship with then-Vice President Joe Biden, court documents reveal.

The revelation represents one more instance of the Biden family business peddling influence while President Joe Biden was an elected official. House Oversight Committee James Comer (R-KY) reportedly already has copies of the court documents and is investigating the scandal as a part of his probe into the Biden family for nine violations, including wire fraud, tax evasion, and money laundering.

In 2011, upon the Saudi’s refusal to pay $140 million to a U.S. construction company Hill International, James Biden was brought in to negotiate the settlement deal between the U.S. company and the Saudi government because the Saudis “would not dare stiff the brother of the Vice-President who would be instrumental to the deal,” affidavits reported by the Daily Mail show.

Notably, James Biden had a prior business relationship with the U.S. company’s subsidiary as executive vice president with a minority stake.

Former U.S. Treasury official Thomas Sullivan, who was working to settle the deal as a private consultant, twice stated in an affidavit that James Biden was hired to negotiate with the Saudis “because of his position and relationship” with then-Vice President Biden. The business negotiation ultimately resulted in a $132 million settlement, court documents reveal.

“[James Biden] stated that he was often sent to meetings to represent Hill because ‘of course, the name didn’t hurt,’” court documents recount Sullivan’s written statement about a sit-down interview with James Biden.

In January, Breitbart reported on the Biden crime family’s crooked deals with China. The Biden crime family made $31 million from deals with China. This is the tip of the iceberg.

None of this comes as a surprise to Americans anymore. The Biden crime family was knee-deep in China. Hunter received $1 billion from China when Joe as VP right after Joe gave China easy access to US markets.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2023/02/court-docs-released-show-biden-crime-family-involved-140-million-dollar-transaction-saudis/

‘This Has To Be A Joke’: JD Vance Confronts Biden Official Over FAA’s ‘Inclusive Language’ Guidance

Ohio Republican Sen. J.D. Vance on Wednesday confronted acting Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) commissioner Billy Nolen over “inclusive language” guidance.

The FAA’s 2023 budget includes focuses on “racial equity” while an advisory group for the agency proposed back in 2021 that the agency replace works like “airman” and “cockpit” with gender-neutral terms like “aviator” and “flight deck.”

Vance grilled Nolen about the potential changes. “Did the FAA issue 176 page guidance document changing notices to airmen to notices of air mission in December of 2021?” Vance asked.

“We did,” Nolen said.

“This was in part to avoid using the gendered term ‘Airmen’ correct?” Vance asked.

“Yes sir.”

https://dailycaller.com/2023/02/15/jd-vance-billy-nolen-faa-inclusive-language/