Today's News: February 15, 2018

World News

Ethiopia’s prime minister resigns to smooth path for political reform
Reuters – Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn suddenly resigned on Thursday in what he described as a bid to smooth reforms, following years of violent unrest that threatened the ruling party’s hold on Africa’s second most populous nation.

15 More Russians Allegedly Killed In Syria According To SOHR Report
Activist Post – Only a week after the United States killed “scores” of Russian contractors in Syria, 15 more Russians have been killed in country as a result of an alleged explosion at a weapons depot run by the private contracting company.
The reports, coming from mainstream Western press and the one-man band known as The Syrian Observatory For Human Rights (staffed by Rami Abdul Rahman in Coventry) say that the incident took place at Tabiya Jazira in southern Deir Ezzor province. SOHR claims the company was tasked with “protecting the oil and gas fields controlled by the regime.” However, SOHR is a notoriously biased anti-Syrian propaganda wing that has long invented stories to demonize the Syrian government and promote terrorists.

Top Indian firms received govt warning for illegally spreading Monsanto GM cotton – reports
RT – Authorities in the Indian cotton-growing state of Andhra Pradesh have reportedly questioned the licenses of India’s main seed producers for allegedly selling an unauthorized strain of genetically modified cotton from Monsanto.
Two seed companies, Nuziveedu Seeds Limited and Kaveri Seeds, have received show-case notices from the Andhra Pradesh government. These threatened action over alleged traces of an illegal gene linked to global seed giant Monsanto, which was found in some of their seed samples, the Hindu Business Line reported on Tuesday, citing the document.
While the firms deny any wrongdoing, Monsanto earlier accused Indian companies of profiting from “unauthorized and unapproved herbicide-tolerant technologies [in] their seeds,” according to Reuters. The notice reportedly demands that Nuziveedu Seeds Limited and Kaveri Seeds explain alleged violations, and asks why the government should not cancel their license to sell the seeds. Indian law prohibits using unapproved genetically modified strains and companies that breach the law may face criminal charges under India’s 1989 Environment Protection Act.

U.S. News, Politics & Government

Accused Florida high school gunman faces 17 murder counts
Yahoo News – The Federal Bureau of Investigation was warned last year about an ominous online comment by the 19-year-old man accused of killing 17 people in his former high school but was unable to locate him, an agent said on Thursday.
Authorities said the ex-student, identified as Nikolas Cruz, walked into the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, near Miami, on Wednesday and opened fire with an AR-15-style assault rifle in the second-deadliest shooting at a public school in U.S. history.
Senate Faces Showdown Over Immigration and ‘Dreamers’
Newsmax – The Trump administration remained insistent on hardline immigration measures on Thursday as the U.S. Senate prepared to vote on various legislative proposals to protect young “Dreamer” immigrants and to tighten border security.
In a statement overnight, the Department of Homeland Security dismissed what some thought was the bill most likely to win enough bipartisan support to pass the chamber, saying it failed to meet minimum criteria set out by President Donald Trump.

Adam Schiff Admits Democratic Memo Contains “Sources And Methods”
ZeroHedge – Well, it turns out that a) the GOP memo did not expose any “sources and methods”; and b) the Democrat rebuttal did!
As The Daily Caller’s Richard Pollock reports, White House problems with the Democrats’ “rebuttal memo” on the surveillance of Trump associates are genuine and the document could disclose “sources and methods,” California Rep. Adam Schiff, the ranking Democrat on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence confirmed.

BuzzFeed Suing DNC For Proof They Were Hacked
ZeroHedge – Three separate lawsuits have been launched against BuzzFeed in connection to the January 11, 2017 publication of the dossier, which states that Russian tech executive Aleksej Gubarev used his web hosting companies to hack into the DNC’s computer systems.
As part of their defense, BuzzFeed issued a subpoena to the DNC for information which might help them defend against Gubarev’s lawsuit by verifying claims in the dossier – including “digital remnants left by the Russian state operatives,” as well as a full version of the hacking report prepared by cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike.

Energy & Environment

Lawsuit Challenges Trump Administration’s Refusal to Release Records on Pesticide Harms to Endangered Wildlife
Global Research – The Center for Biological Diversity sued the Trump administration today for illegally withholding public records documenting the widespread harm to endangered species posed by chlorpyrifos and two other pesticides, diazinon and malathion.
In response to the Center’s June 2017 request for the public records, the Environmental Protection Agency and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service have failed to release any of the likely thousands of pages of crucial analysis conducted by the two agencies.
“The public has every right to know how these pesticides put wildlife in danger, and it’s disturbing to see the Trump administration stonewalling the release of that information,” said Stephanie Parent, a senior attorney at the Center. “We’ll fight every step of their efforts to cover their tracks.”

Russia inks huge energy deals with Saudi Arabia, challenging US dominance in Gulf region
RT – Hidden by the fog of the ongoing oil market volatility and the Turkish adventures in Syria, OPEC leader Saudi Arabia has been cementing its geopolitical position for years.
In Riyadh meetings this week between Saudi and Russian officials, major energy deals were sealed, changing the regional constellation dramatically. At the same time, the geopolitical shift of the century now starts to bear fruit.
Russia has directly offered to invest in the upcoming Aramco IPO, supporting the efforts of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) to diversify the economy of the kingdom. During the meetings, not only new Saudi investment deals in Russia were sealed, but also the commitment of several Russian investment parties in the Aramco IPO.

Science & Technology

Senate Bill Would Create National Broadband Access Standard – Bipartisan legislation would charge FCC with task
Orrazz – The FCC is being asked to set a national standard to determine whether mobile and broadband in rural areas is “reasonably comparable” to service in urban areas.
That request came in a bipartisan bill, the Rural Reasonable and Comparable Wireless Act of 2018, introduced Tuesday (Feb. 13) by Sens. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) and Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.).
“While progress has been made, too many rural areas continue to fall behind,” said Capito, chair of the Senate Broadband Caucus.
“The Rural Reasonable and Comparable Wireless Act will help bridge this digital divide by helping to ensure that rural areas — like those in West Virginia — have the access to high-speed internet that many of our urban communities do.”
FCC chair Ajit Pai has made rural broadband access a key policy priority.

Health

Report: Opioid Manufacturers Paid $9 Million to Groups Promoting Opioids
Washington Free Beacon – Five major opioid manufacturers paid a combined $9 million over five years to groups that deemphasized the dangerous risks of opioid prescription, according to a new report released Monday by the ranking minority member’s office of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs committee.
The manufacturers—Purdue Pharma L.P.; Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Inc.; Mylan N.V.; Depomed, Inc.; and Insys Therapeutics, Inc.—paid an additional $1.6 million between 2013 and 2017 to individuals, including licensed physicians, affiliated with the advocacy groups, totaling more than $10 million in payments from 2012 onwards.

McDonald’s to cut cheeseburgers and chocolate milk from Happy Meal menu
The Guardian – McDonald’s will soon banish cheeseburgers and chocolate milk from its Happy Meal menu in an effort to cut down on the calories, sodium, saturated fat and sugar that kids consume at its restaurants.

12 Health Documentaries You Need to See
Care 2 – Knowledge is power. If you have a Netflix or Amazon Prime membership, you have hundreds of health documentaries literally at your fingertips. Expand your thinking and learn more about how health, diet and lifestyle intertwine with these 11 that are absolutely worth a watch:
Hungry for Change (2012)
Fed Up (2014)
Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead (2010)
King Corn (2007)
Forks Over Knives (2011)
What the Health (2017)
Cooked (2016)
Rotten (2018)
Sugar Coated (2015)
Music On the Brain (2016)
Food, Inc. (2008)
In Defense of Food (2015)