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The Power Hour

Knowledge is Power

Today's News: June 12, 2018

World News
 
Pledge to Halt Military Exercises Surprises Pentagon, Seoul
New York Times – President Trump’s pledge on Tuesday to cancel military exercises on the Korean Peninsula surprised not only allies in South Korea but also the Pentagon.
Hours after Mr. Trump’s announcement in Singapore, American troops in Seoul said they are still moving ahead with a military exercise this fall — Ulchi Freedom Guardian — until they receive guidance otherwise from the chain of command.
 
Historic summit ends with promise
Reuters – U.S. President Donald Trump said North Korean leader Kim Jong Un pledged at a historic summit on Tuesday to move toward complete denuclearisation, while the United States promised its old foe security guarantees.
The start of negotiations aimed at banishing what Trump described as North Korea’s “very substantial” nuclear arsenal could have far-reaching ramifications for the region, and in one of the biggest surprises of the day, Trump said he would stop military exercises with old ally South Korea.
But Trump and Kim gave few other specifics in a joint statement signed at the end of their summit in Singapore, and several analysts cast doubt on how effective the agreement would prove to be in the long run at getting North Korea to give up its cherished nuclear weapons.
>> Read: Full text of Trump-Kim signed statement HERE
 
DENNIS RODMAN CRYING; WEARS MAGA HAT.
The Hill – NBA Hall of Famer Dennis Rodman gave an emotional, bizarre TV interview on Tuesday reacting to the highly anticipated summit between President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
Wearing a red “Make America Great Again” hat and sunglasses, Rodman, who has visited North Korea multiple times, spoke for roughly 20 minutes about his relationship with Kim and his expectations for the historic meeting between the two leaders as it got underway in Singapore. He began to cry about halfway through the interview, periodically dabbing his nose with a tissue.
“We have really put ourselves on the line to reach out to North Korea and they have been so gracious to me, my family and the United States. So let’s make this happen. If Trump can pull this off, more power to him,” Rodman said on CNN.
 
U.S. News, Politics & Government
 
School accepts teacher’s resignation over transgender policy
Fox – A central Indiana school district has officially accepted the resignation of a teacher who disagreed with a policy compelling teachers to address transgender students by their preferred name rather than their birth name.
 
Chilling Report Shows 88% of Missing Sex Trafficked Kids Come from US Foster Care
Activist Post – America has a dark secret that no one wants to admit. Talk of this secret will get you labelled as a conspiracy theorist, fake news, and outlets who report on it will have their organic reach throttled by social media and Google alike. Despite the overwhelming evidence to the contrary, many in the mainstream media and the government refuse to see this very real epidemic of child sex trafficking in the United States. What’s more, according to the government’s own data, the vast majority of a portion of these trafficked kids are coming from the country’s own foster care system.
As TFTP reported last week, a parents’ rights organization filed a letter in federal court last Tuesday asking a federal judge strike down Minnesota’s current child protection laws for being too expansive and removing children from loving and safe homes without due process.
“Families are being abused, and in some cases, destroyed, as a result of laws that are inappropriate,” said Dwight Mitchell, the lead plaintiff in the case and founder of the parents’ association. “This is legal kidnapping.”
 
Mayors create coalition to support marijuana reform
Christian Science Monitor – Seven mayors from marijuana-friendly states recently sponsored a resolution asking the government to remove marijuana from its list of illegal drugs among other requests. The mayors argue that legalization is inevitable and should be done responsibly.
Mayors from Denver; Seattle; Portland, Ore.; San Francisco; Los Angeles; Las Vegas; and West Sacramento, Calif., – all in marijuana-friendly states – sponsored a resolution at the US Conference of Mayors in Boston that asked the US government to remove cannabis from a list of illegal drugs, among other things.
 
Sessions rules domestic, gang violence not grounds for seeking asylum
Christian Science Monitor – In a 31-page decision Attorney General Jeff Sessions has ruled that judges cannot “generally” accept victims of domestic or gang violence to be given asylum. Immigration advocates say there could be tens of thousands of domestic violence cases in court backlogs.
 
Economy & Business
 
CITI: 10,000 jobs could be lost to robots
Finextra – US bank Citi has warned that it could shed half of its 20,000 tech and ops staff in the next five years due to the rise of robotics and automation.
The prediction was made by the president and chief executive of the bank’s institutional clients group, Jamie Forese, who was interviewd by the Financial Times (FT).
The 20,000 operational staff account for more than 40% of the bank’s total employees and are “most fertile for machine processing” according to Forese.
 
Seattle to Repeal Homeless-Aid Tax After Amazon Objects
Truthdig – Amazon balked, and Seattle is backing down.
City leaders said they plan to repeal a tax on large companies such as Amazon and Starbucks as they face mounting pressure from businesses, an about-face just a month after unanimously approving the measure to help pay for efforts to combat a growing homelessness crisis.
The quick surrender showed the power of Amazon to help rally opposition and aggressively push back on taxes at all levels of government, even in its affluent home city where the income gap is ever widening and lower-income workers are being priced out of housing. It has resulted in one of the highest homelessness rates in the U.S.
 
Energy & Environment
 
Hurricane Bud grows into Category 4 storm as it eyes Mexico’s Baja California
CBS – Hurricane Bud grew into a Category 4 storm with winds of 130 mph off Mexico’s Pacific coast on Tuesday. Forecasters said they expect cooler waters to rob most of its punch before a potential collision with resorts of the southern Baja California peninsula.
The U.S. National Hurricane Center said Bud was centered about 350 miles south-southeast of Cabo San Lucas at the tip of the Baja peninsula and it was moving northwest at 7 mph.
The hurricane center said the storm was about 230 miles southwest of Cabo Corrientes, near Puerto Vallarta.
 
Digging to China: Russia’s mega gas pipeline nears completion
RT – One of the world’s longest gas pipelines, the Power of Siberia, which aims to deliver Russian natural gas to China, is nearly 85 percent complete.
According to the Russian energy giant Gazprom, the section from the Chayandinskoye field (Yakutia) to the border with China is already built. The second tunnel of the underwater crossing of the pipeline through the Amur River is also complete, it said.
The Power of Siberia pipeline which is also called the “Eastern Route” is one of the major projects between Russia and China. Analysts say it could help Russia become one of China’s main providers of natural gas as demand in the country increases.
 
San Juan National Forest to close Tuesday because of fire danger
Coloradoan – Extreme drought in southwestern Colorado has caused San Juan National Forest officials to close many parks and trails in an effort to resolve ongoing wildfires and prevent more from starting, a move that has already been made in both Arizona and New Mexico.
 
Science & Technology
 
Machine learning algorithm predicts GERMANY will win World Cup
MIT – Researchers have predicted the outcome after simulating the entire soccer tournament 100,000 times.
 
Pentagon Seeks to Store Data in Human DNA
Nextgov – The U.S. intelligence community wants to unlock more efficient ways to store the trove of data humans generate every day, and it believes our DNA holds the key.
The Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity last month issued a broad agency announcement seeking research teams for the agency’s Molecular Information Storage program, which aims to create a system for storing vast quantities of data on sequence-controlled polymers, like human DNA.
Selected teams would have two primary tasks over the four-year initiative: build a table-top device that writes data onto polymers and another that reads the information once it’s stored. Teams must also develop an operating system to index, access and search data within the network.
 
Breathalyzer Aims to Predict Cancer
Bloomberg – The ReCIVA (as in “respiration collector for in vitro analysis”) breath sampler can detect the kinds of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in people’s breath that are early indicators of lung cancer, colon cancer, and other diseases. It’s meant to substitute for costlier, more invasive CT scans and biopsies.
 
Strange News
 
Deformed carp with a bird-shaped head is caught by Chinese anglers
Daily Mail – A bizarre-looking fish has made waves on the internet in China because of its unusual ‘bird’ head.
Some said the fish’s head looks like a pigeon’s or a parrot’s head; while others argued it bears more resemblance to that of a dolphin.
A local fishery expert said the strange creature is a deformed carp.
 
Health News
 
Beat Depression and Anxiety Without Drugs
Newsmax – In light of the shocking suicides of fashion icon Kate Spade at 55 and Anthony Bourdain at 61, experts encourage us to take anxiety disorders and depression seriously.
Anxiety disorders are the most common mental illness in the U.S., affecting 40 million adults aged 18 and over according to the Anxiety and Depression Association of America. The ADAA points out that is it not uncommon for those who suffer from these disorders to also suffer from depression. And the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) states that 16 million adults in America suffer from at least one major depressive episode every year.
“Depression can be a dangerous health condition which can lead to severe consequences, including suicide, if not addressed correctly,” Dr. Ellen Kamhi, Ph. D, RN and author of Cycles of Life, Herbs for Women, tells Newsmax Health.
Kamhi says that aromatherapy or the use of essential oils as inhalants can actually interact with the olfactory system that connects the nasal cavity to the brain. The natural constituents of the oil can help bring the brain back into balance and relieve stress and mild depression, she adds.
 
Good News
 
Woman who took illegal cannabis oil to battle cancer recovers
Daily Mail  – 52-year-old mother who took cannabis oil to battle her terminal cancer has been given the all-clear by doctors.
Joy Smith was told she would only have six weeks to live when she was diagnosed with incurable stomach and bowel cancer in August 2016.
In a desperate attempt to defy expectations, she began taking a cannabis oil that contained THC, which is illegal in the UK. She is believed to have bought it online.
And after a rollercoaster two years, she found out on Monday morning that she was cancer-free and would no longer have to have chemotherapy.

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