Saturday, January 06, 2018
Friday, January 05, 2018
Thursday, January 04, 2018
1-3-18 La Sierra University Students Bring Holiday Cheer to Southern California Youngsters
By Darla Martin Tucker
Collett Elementary second-grader Angelina Soto, age 7, La Sierra University freshman Mindy Higa, and second-grader Alexander Mendoza, age 7, pose for a photo during the Santa’s Friends outreach event.
Photo provided by La Sierra University
During the first week of December, La Sierra University students took time out from studying for finals to bring Christmas joy to youngsters in two Southern California cities.
On Dec. 8, 2017, second graders at Riverside’s Collett Elementary School and young patients at the Loma Linda University Children’s Hospital enjoyed a bit of holiday fun courtesy of students volunteering with La Sierra’s Center for Outreach & Mission Service and members of the La Sierra Golden Eagles baseball team, respectively.
Sixteen baseball team members descended on the children’s hospital that morning, armed with a cartload of 50 toys collected over two weeks. Trucks, super hero action figures, dolls, and other items were later distributed to young patients who faced hospital stays over the holidays. That afternoon in Riverside, a group of more than 130 La Sierra University students participating in the Santa’s Friends outreach arrived at Collett Elementary for some one-on-one fun with approximately 120 second grade students. They made crafts, visited with Santa, and opened presents.
The Golden Eagles baseball team gathered in the children's hospital lobby to deliver their collected gifts, which were later dispersed by medical center personnel. They were treated to a tour of the hospital, which is in the beginning stages of a major expansion. It was the team’s first Christmas outreach activity, and head coach Gabe Gamboa vowed to return next Christmas with additional athletics teams to deliver toys to young patients.
The act of giving encourages the student-athletes to engage in charitable outreach in the future, Gamboa said. “It’s so important, especially this month. … It’s about how many lives they’re going to affect," he added.
Audrey Sanchez, age 7, received story books for Christmas from La Sierra University social work sophomore Aaron Alonso during the holiday outreach event at Collett Elementary in Riverside, California.
Photo provided by La Sierra University
Tech giant is rolling out new robots to replace workers in hotels, airports and supermarkets
South Korean tech giant LG Electronics said Thursday it will showcase three new "concept robots" at next week's consumer electronics show in Las Vegas
A McKinsey report released in November said that up to 800 million workers could be affected globally by automation and the rise of artificial intelligence
Tech companies are testing robots to carry out various tasks that could affect the services industry, which employs nearly 50 percent of the global workforce, according to the International Labour Organization
Published 9 Hours Ago Updated 1 Hour Ago CNBC.com
Source: LG
LG launches self driving robots to assist travelers at South Korean airport.
A Korean tech giant on Thursday announced new robots that take aim squarely at the jobs of many services industry workers around the globe.
There have long been predictions that advances in artificial intelligence and automation could end up eliminating millions of jobs over time, and tech companies have been testing robots to carry out a variety of tasks — from working in a pizza parlor to making deliveries that could greatly affect the services industry in the future.
For its part, South Korean giant LG Electronics is the latest company that is planning to sell robots to solve tasks currently completed by humans.
On Thursday, LG said it will showcase three new "concept robots" at the global consumer electronics show, CES, in Las Vegas next week. Those robots are designed for commercial use at hotels, airports and supermarkets, according to the company. An LG spokesman later told CNBC that the robots are still "concept" products and that they are "a long way from ready to go public."
Conservative Catholic dissidents attack Popes Francis and Benedict
Jan 3, 2018
by Thomas Reese, Religion News Service
Theology
Pope Francis, left, embraces Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI before opening the Holy Door to mark the opening of the Catholic Holy Year, or Jubilee, in St. Peter's Basilica, at the Vatican, on Dec. 8, 2015. (Osservatore Romano/Handout via Reuters)
Conservative Catholic dissidents, who have been attacking Pope Francis, showed their true colors recently by attacking retired Pope Benedict XVI, calling his writings "subversive" and "modernist." That's right, they think Benedict is a heretic.
In his new book, "Al Cuore di Ratzinger, Al Cuore del Mondo," the Italian philosopher Enrico Maria Radaelli goes after Joseph Ratzinger’s "Introduction to Christianity," one of Pope Benedict’s most popular books. Radaelli accuses him of embracing modern subjectivism by dabbling in Kant’s transcendentalism and Hegel’s "dialectical idealism."
Radaelli is joined in this attack by Monsignor Antonio Livi, dean emeritus of the faculty of philosophy of the Pontifical Lateran University. What is noteworthy is that last summer both of these academics signed a letter of correction addressed to Pope Francis asking him to change his "erroneous" views.
These folks are unhappy with everything that has happened in the church since the death of Pius XII in 1958 and the reforms of the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s.
Livi thinks that "neo-modernist" theology (a slur used by conservatives to describe anything they don't like) has enveloped the church, infiltrating its seminaries, bishops' conferences and even the Vatican itself. This "heretical" view has infected all the documents of Vatican II and the teachings of post-conciliar popes, Levi argues.
The problem with these philosophers is that they see the world as ideologues with rigid categories and rules. They have absolute certitude in their views and are not open to new questions. They are incapable of dialogue or learning from others.
They remind me of the joke: What is the difference between a scientist and a philosopher? If a scientist’s theory does not fit reality, he changes his theory. If a philosopher’s theory does not fit reality, reality must change.
Luckily, Pope Francis does not take these critics seriously. In a talk to the Italian Theological Association on Friday (Dec. 29), he laid out what he believes is the true vocation of a theologian. Theologians must always refer back to Vatican II, where the church recognized its responsibility to "proclaim the Gospel in a new way."
The pope spoke of “faithful creativity” in responding to a rapidly changing world. The job of a theologian is to show people what lies at the heart of the Gospel.
"There is need of a theology that helps all Christians to proclaim and to show, above all, the saving face of God, the merciful God," he said, "especially in the presence of some unheard-of challenges that involve the human today.” Among these challenges, he listed the environmental crisis, technologies that can alter human beings, social inequalities, mass migration and relativism in theory and practice.
He even calls on theologians to work together to "reimagine the church so that it may conform to the Gospel that it must proclaim."
The problem with conservatives is that they treat the great theologians of the past as a treasure chest of quotes rather than as examples of how to do theology. St. Augustine, for example, took Neoplatonism, the elite philosophical thought of his period, and used it to explain Christianity to the people of his age. St. Thomas Aquinas took the newly rediscovered writings of Aristotle — the avant-garde thinking of his time — and used it to explain Christianity to his 13th-century contemporaries.
The task of theologians is not to simply quote Augustine and Aquinas but to imitate them, to take the best secular thought of our time and use it to explain Christianity to 21st-century men and women. After all, how many Neoplatonists or Aristotelians have you met lately? Do we really expect contemporary people to master Plato and Aristotle before we can talk to them about Christ?
Sadly, the church does expect seminarians to learn Greek philosophy before studying theology, which results in them spouting unintelligible concepts like “transubstantiation” and “consubstantial.”
What theology needs today are thinkers like Augustine and Thomas who want to engage the thinkers of today, not yesteryear. Such creative thinking can get you in trouble in the church. Thomas’ books were burned by the bishop of Paris. Likewise, in the last century, creative theologians were persecuted and silenced by the hierarchy. Thankfully, Pope Francis is not afraid of theological creativity. In fact, he encourages the theological discussion and debate that are essential to the development of theology.
Catholic conservatives were brought up in a church that presented itself as unchanging because in Greek philosophy the perfect cannot change. Such an approach is not only ahistorical, it is doomed to failure. When such conservatives not only attack Pope Francis but also Benedict, they show that they are true ideologues, out of touch with reality, who should not be taken seriously.
[Jesuit Fr. Thomas Reese is a columnist for Religion News Service and author of Inside the Vatican: The Politics and Organization of the Catholic Church.]
Source
Hacking fears: Security flaws put virtually all phones, computers at risk
Jan 4 2018, 5:18 am ET
by Reuters
Security researchers on Wednesday disclosed a set of security flaws that they said could let hackers steal sensitive information from nearly every modern computing device containing chips from Intel Corp, Advanced Micro Devices Inc and ARM Holdings.
One of the bugs is specific to Intel but another affects laptops, desktop computers, smartphones, tablets and internet servers alike. Intel and ARM insisted that the issue was not a design flaw, but it will require users to download a patch and update their operating system to fix.
“Phones, PCs, everything are going to have some impact, but it’ll vary from product to product,” Intel CEO Brian Krzanich said in an interview with CNBC Wednesday afternoon.
Man holding a micro computer chip from desktop computer. KaiDunn / iStockphoto/Getty Images file
Researchers with Alphabet Inc's Google Project Zero, in conjunction with academic and industry researchers from several countries, discovered two flaws.
The first, called Meltdown, affects Intel chips and lets hackers bypass the hardware barrier between applications run by users and the computer's memory, potentially letting hackers read a computer's memory and steal passwords. The second, called Spectre, affects chips from Intel, AMD and ARM and lets hackers potentially trick otherwise error-free applications into giving up secret information.
The researchers said Apple Inc and Microsoft Corp had patches ready for users for desktop computers affected by Meltdown. Microsoft declined to comment and Apple did not immediately return requests for comment.
Daniel Gruss, one of the researchers at Graz University of Technology who discovered Meltdown, called it "probably one of the worst CPU bugs ever found" in an interview with Reuters.
Gruss said Meltdown was the more serious problem in the short term but could be decisively stopped with software patches. Spectre, the broader bug that applies to nearly all computing devices, is harder for hackers to take advantage of but less easily patched and will be a bigger problem in the long term, he said.
Speaking on CNBC, Intel's Krzanich said Google researchers told Intel of the flaws "a while ago" and that Intel had been testing fixes that device makers who use its chips will push out next week. Before the problems became public, Google on its blog said Intel and others planned to disclose the issues on Jan. 9. Google said it informed the affected companies about the "Spectre" flaw on June 1, 2017 and reported the "Meltdown" flaw after the first flaw but before July 28, 2017.
Related: Senators Blast Equifax and Yahoo for Massive Data Breaches
The flaws were first reported by tech publication The Register. It also reported that the updates to fix the problems could causes Intel chips to operate 5 percent to 30 percent more slowly. (http://bit.ly/2CsRxkj)
Intel denied that the patches would bog down computers based on Intel chips.
"Intel has begun providing software and firmware updates to mitigate these exploits," Intel said in a statement. "Contrary to some reports, any performance impacts are workload-dependent, and, for the average computer user, should not be significant and will be mitigated over time."
ARM spokesman Phil Hughes said that patches had already been shared with the companies' partners, which include many smartphone manufacturers.
"This method only works if a certain type of malicious code is already running on a device and could at worst result in small pieces of data being accessed from privileged memory," Hughes said in an email.
AMD chips are also affected by at least one variant of a set of security flaws but that it can be patched with a software update. The company said it believes there "is near zero risk to AMD products at this time."
Google said in a blog post that Android phones running the latest security updates are protected, as are its own Nexus and Pixel phones with the latest security updates. Gmail users do not need to take any additional action to protect themselves, but users of its Chromebooks, Chrome web browser and many of its Google Cloud services will need to install updates.
Amazon Web Services, a cloud computing service used by businesses, said that most of its internet servers were already patched and the rest were in the process of being patched.
Wednesday, January 03, 2018
Firefighters Extinguish Small Fire at Clintons' Property in Chappaqua, New York
Jan. 3, 2018, at 3:49 p.m.
Police vehicles are seen outside the home of former U.S. President Bill Clinton and former Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton after firefighters were called to put out a fire at the property in Chappaqua, New York, U.S., January 3, 2018. REUTERS/Mike Segar Reuters
By Chris Kenning
(Reuters) - A small fire broke out on Wednesday at a structure used by the Secret Service behind the home of former President Bill Clinton and 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton in Chappaqua, New York, the agency said.
The Clintons were not home at the time and the fire was extinguished, the agency said in a statement provided to Reuters. It said that at about 2:40 p.m., a Secret Service employee reported that a fire was burning in the ceiling of the second floor.
There were no injuries, said Sergeant Arthur Mendoza of the New Castle Police Department. The cause of the fire was not immediately clear.
"Fire extinguishers were utilized to suppress the fire and members of the Chappaqua Fire Department responded and inspected the area above the fire to ensure it had been completely extinguished," the agency said in the statement.
The Clintons purchased the five-bedroom, 5,232-square-foot (486-square-metre) home for $1.7 million in 1999, the Journal News reported. Chappaqua is about 40 miles (64 km) north of New York City.
(Reporting by Chris Kenning in Chicago; Editing by Jonathan Oatis and Peter Cooney)
North Korea accidentally hit one of its own cities with a missile, report says
3:50 p.m. ET
STR/AFP/Getty Images
In its relentless pursuit of nuclear strength, North Korea's first land target may have actually been itself. The Diplomat reported Wednesday that an intermediate range ballistic missile launched by the regime last spring accidentally hit the city of Tokchon, which has a population of more than 200,000.
The missile was launched from an airfield just over 40 miles north of North Korea's capital city of Pyongyang. An unnamed U.S. official explained to The Diplomat that due to an engine malfunction, the projectile made it only a minute into its test flight and traveled about 25 miles northeast before hitting the ground.
The Diplomat cross-referenced the failed missile's approximate landing site with Google Earth and other satellite imaging to find that the suspected landing area did indeed seem to show signs of "considerable damage to a complex of industrial or agricultural buildings." Several structures appeared damaged in satellite images, reportedly by debris from the failed launch.
While there have been no confirmed reports of deaths in Tokchon as a result of the failed missile test, the images published by The Diplomat seem to show that the missile came perilously close to exploding in more densely inhabited areas, marking the risk of test launches. North Korea has launched two ballistic missiles since August, both of which flew over Japan and landed cleanly in the Pacific Ocean — but one concerning possibility put forward by The Diplomat is that a future missile could explode prematurely over Japan, which would "spark a serious crisis in Northeast Asia."
NBC News reported Tuesday that U.S. officials believe North Korea may be preparing for another missile test "in the next week or two." Read more about the failed missile at The Diplomat. Kelly O'Meara Morales
Source
Jesuits denounce threats against outspoken Honduran priest, activists
By David Agren Catholic News Service
1.2.2018 3:22 PM ET
CNS photo/Tyler Orsburn
Jesuit Father Ismael Moreno Coto, better known as "Padre Melo," poses for a 2014 photo in Washington. The Society of Jesus has denounced threats made against the outspoken Honduran priest, who has highlighted accusations of widespread irregularities in the Central American country's recent presidential election. (CNS photo/Tyler Orsburn)
See JESUITS-HONDURAS-THREATS
Jan. 2, 2017.
MEXICO CITY (CNS) -- The Society of Jesus has denounced threats made against an outspoken Honduran Jesuit who has highlighted accusations of widespread irregularities in the Central American country's recent presidential election.
The Conference of Provincials in Latin America and the Caribbean said in Dec. 30 statement that the social media hostilities against Father Ismael Moreno Coto -- better known as "Padre Melo" -- were "reminiscent of the death threats which circulated in El Salvador before the murder of Jesuit Father Rutilio Grande," a Salvadoran Jesuit murdered in 1977. The Jesuits also defended eight other regional activists being threatened.
"All of the accusations are lies aimed at counteracting the grass-roots organizing and the peaceful and democratic resistance which the accused, along with the people of Honduras, are carrying out at a moment when the popular vote has been disrespected by John Orlando Hernandez and his allies," said the statement, referring to the incumbent president and official electoral victor.
"This is an attempt to create terror in the people as a strategy to demobilize them," said the statement, signed by Father Roberto Jaramillo, conference president. "We hold Juan Orlando Hernandez and his allies responsible for the safety and physical and moral well-being of the nine people falsely accused."
Tuesday, January 02, 2018
United Kingdom’s embrace of secularism has consequences
Wednesday, January 3, 2018
United Kingdom’s embrace of secularism has consequences
Published: 1/3/18 @ 12:00
ANGLESEY, Wales
The UK Daily Mail has again published a story about a subject that has become a recurring theme this time of year. No, not Christmas, but rather drunkenness, though the holiday is used as its primary excuse. Pictures accompanying the story show young people collapsing in gutters and vomiting on the sidewalks. It is not a pretty sight.
More than 100 years after the 1904 Welsh revival and more than 60 years after American evangelist Billy Graham preached at a London Crusade, which lasted 12 weeks, and at its height brought 120,000 people to Wembley Stadium in the rain, registering thousands of converts, the United Kingdom is a spiritual shadow of its former self.
Religious coverage
The BBC recently announced its intension to expand religion coverage on the theory that more information about faith might stem growing anti-Semitism and create understanding of various beliefs. Currently only one religion program, “Songs of Praise” is regularly shown on BBC.
The announcement brought a stinging rebuke from London Times columnist David Aaronovitch: “Given that for the first time since the Black Death a majority of Britons are not actually religious, this new emphasis seems perverse.”
A considerable amount of mocking follows: “Maybe there’ll be a sitcom called ‘The End is Nigh,’ in which a family of Jehovah’s Witnesses moves next door to a family of Seventh Day Adventists and evangelical mayhem ensues. Or the corporation will buy the rights to ‘Saudi Arabian Big Brother,’ where the all-male housemates compete to see which of them is the most pious. That one really exists, by the way.”
ANGLESEY, Wales
The UK Daily Mail has again published a story about a subject that has become a recurring theme this time of year. No, not Christmas, but rather drunkenness, though the holiday is used as its primary excuse. Pictures accompanying the story show young people collapsing in gutters and vomiting on the sidewalks. It is not a pretty sight.
More than 100 years after the 1904 Welsh revival and more than 60 years after American evangelist Billy Graham preached at a London Crusade, which lasted 12 weeks, and at its height brought 120,000 people to Wembley Stadium in the rain, registering thousands of converts, the United Kingdom is a spiritual shadow of its former self.
Religious coverage
The BBC recently announced its intension to expand religion coverage on the theory that more information about faith might stem growing anti-Semitism and create understanding of various beliefs. Currently only one religion program, “Songs of Praise” is regularly shown on BBC.
The announcement brought a stinging rebuke from London Times columnist David Aaronovitch: “Given that for the first time since the Black Death a majority of Britons are not actually religious, this new emphasis seems perverse.”
A considerable amount of mocking follows: “Maybe there’ll be a sitcom called ‘The End is Nigh,’ in which a family of Jehovah’s Witnesses moves next door to a family of Seventh Day Adventists and evangelical mayhem ensues. Or the corporation will buy the rights to ‘Saudi Arabian Big Brother,’ where the all-male housemates compete to see which of them is the most pious. That one really exists, by the way.”
Monday, January 01, 2018
A Stressed And Anxious World
Volume XXXVII Issue I January 2018
Last Trumpet Ministries, PO Box 806, Beaver Dam, WI 53916
Phone: 920-887-2626 Internet: http://www.lasttrumpetministries.org
A Stressed And Anxious World
"Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment? Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they? Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature?"
Matthew 6:25-27
"There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love."
` I John 4:18
"Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of trembling unto all the people round about, when they shall be in the siege both against Judah and against Jerusalem. And in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people: all that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though all the people of the earth be gathered together against it."
Zechariah 12:2-3
In this issue of the Last Trumpet Newsletter, we will again look at today's current events and the happenings of a stressed and anxious world. There is no doubt that the people of the United States have a lot on their minds lately. There is great anxiety as the masses despair over this country's government, and there is great animosity between people due to differing political, religious, and philosophical beliefs and opinions. A Gallup poll published in December 2017 reported that 79 percent, or an astounding eight out of ten Americans who responded to the poll, are "afflicted by stress." (1) This stress is common in the United States despite the fact that reports indicate the American economy is strong, and the official rate of unemployment is only 4.1 percent. (2) In 2017 the unemployment rates in Alabama, California, Hawaii, Mississippi, Texas, Arkansas, Colorado, Idaho, Maine, North Dakota, Oregon, and Tennessee fell to their lowest points in forty years (3) while employers around the country are now having a difficult time finding enough workers to fill open positions. (4) Based on these reports, this should indicate a happy and prosperous time in the United States of America. Why are stress levels so high? Perhaps it is the sharp acrimony the American people have towards each other or the constant threat of war that dominates headlines in the United States.
Amazingly enough, researchers have found that an active prayer life and having a close connection to God is an effective method to relieve stress. "Where the perception of God is secure, warm and loving, then prayer is associated with positive mental health outcomes and coping with stressors. But when the perception of God is distant or disconnected, prayer is associated with negative outcomes," said Blake V. Kent of Baylor University in Waco, Texas. (5) In Luke 18:1 Jesus taught us that "men ought always to pray, and not to faint." Thus, we find in Scripture the necessity of an ongoing and active prayer life. My father would often say that "prayer is a heart-to-heart talk with God." As such, we have a direct connection to our God and are strengthened by that connection when we pray.
Conversely, when people do not have a strong connection to God, they are often not only stressed but fearful. This problem is further amplified by a widespread interest in occult superstitions. On December 20, 2017, USA Today published an article with a headline stating, "Dec. 21 will be the worst day of 2017, astrologers say." The article then cites an astrologer who claimed that this day, which happened to be a witches' holiday known as the Winter Solstice, was going to be especially awful because of the position of the constellation Capricorn and the planet Saturn in relation to the sun. (6) These vain superstitions often dictate what people will or will not do and cause occult-minded people to alter their plans. The aforementioned article even suggested that American President Donald Trump would not sign a new tax reform bill on this day because it would be a bad time to start something new. (7) Whether or not President Trump is prone to these occult superstitions, I cannot say. However, former First Lady, Hillary Clinton certainly is. Even the liberally-inclined fact-checking website known as Snopes admits that Clinton used to commune with the dead spirit of her hero, Eleanor Roosevelt. (8) President Ronald Reagan and his wife Nancy were also known to have a keen interest in astrology. (9) Thus, just as the ancient kings of Babylon, such as Nebuchadnezzar, had astrologers, prominent figures in Washington, D.C., also have theirs.
While the behavior of superstitious people is dictated by fear, it is not so among God's people. In I John 4:18 we are told, "There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love." To be truly set free from fear and superstition, we must submit our lives to God and follow our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. In so doing, we will also find the strength to overcome the stressful condition of our world. I urge every reader of this newsletter to repent of your sins if you have not already done so and dedicate your life to God.
WILDERNESS OF MIRRORS
Documents Reveal the Complex Legacy of James Angleton, CIA Counterintelligence Chief and Godfather of Mass Surveillance
Photo: Henry Burroughs/AP
Jefferson Morley
January 1 2018, 9:15 a.m.
VETERAN CIA OFFICERCleveland Cram was nearing the end of his career in 1978, when his superiors in the agency’s directorate of operations handed him a sensitive assignment: Write a history of the agency’s Counterintelligence Staff. Cram, then 61, was well qualified for the task. He had a master’s and Ph.D. in European History from Harvard. He had served two decades in the clandestine service, including nine years as deputy chief of the CIA’s station in London. He knew the senior officialdom of MI-5 and MI-6, the British equivalents of the FBI and CIA, the agency’s closest partners in countering the KGB, the Soviet Union’s effective and ruthless intelligence service.
Cram was assigned to investigate a debacle. The Counterintelligence Staff, created in 1954, had been headed for 20 years by James Jesus Angleton, a legendary spy who deployed the techniques of literary criticism learned at Yale to find deep patterns and hidden meanings in the records of KGB operations against the West. But Angleton was also a dogmatic and conspiratorial operator whose idiosyncratic theories paralyzed the agency’s operations against the Soviet Union at the height of the Cold War, and whose domestic surveillance operations targeting American dissidents had discredited the CIA in the court of public opinion.
In December 1974, CIA Director William Colby fired Angleton after the New York Timesrevealed the then-unknown counterintelligence chief had overseen a massive program to spy on Americans involved in anti-war and black nationalist movements, a violation of the CIA’s charter. Coming four months after the resignation of Richard Nixon, Angleton’s fall was the denouement of the Watergate scandal, propelling Congress to probe the CIA for the first time. A Senate investigation, headed by Sen. Frank Church, exposed a series of other abuses: assassination conspiracies, unauthorized mail opening, collaboration with human rights abusers, infiltration of news organizations, and the MKULTRA mind-control experiments to develop drugs for use in espionage.
The exposure of Angleton’s operations set off a political avalanche that engulfed the agency in 1975 and after. The post-Watergate Congress established the House and Senate intelligence committees to oversee covert operations. The passage of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act required the CIA to obtain warrants to spy on Americans. And for the first time since 1947, the agency’s annual appropriation was slashed.
January 1 2018, 9:15 a.m.
VETERAN CIA OFFICERCleveland Cram was nearing the end of his career in 1978, when his superiors in the agency’s directorate of operations handed him a sensitive assignment: Write a history of the agency’s Counterintelligence Staff. Cram, then 61, was well qualified for the task. He had a master’s and Ph.D. in European History from Harvard. He had served two decades in the clandestine service, including nine years as deputy chief of the CIA’s station in London. He knew the senior officialdom of MI-5 and MI-6, the British equivalents of the FBI and CIA, the agency’s closest partners in countering the KGB, the Soviet Union’s effective and ruthless intelligence service.
Cram was assigned to investigate a debacle. The Counterintelligence Staff, created in 1954, had been headed for 20 years by James Jesus Angleton, a legendary spy who deployed the techniques of literary criticism learned at Yale to find deep patterns and hidden meanings in the records of KGB operations against the West. But Angleton was also a dogmatic and conspiratorial operator whose idiosyncratic theories paralyzed the agency’s operations against the Soviet Union at the height of the Cold War, and whose domestic surveillance operations targeting American dissidents had discredited the CIA in the court of public opinion.
In December 1974, CIA Director William Colby fired Angleton after the New York Timesrevealed the then-unknown counterintelligence chief had overseen a massive program to spy on Americans involved in anti-war and black nationalist movements, a violation of the CIA’s charter. Coming four months after the resignation of Richard Nixon, Angleton’s fall was the denouement of the Watergate scandal, propelling Congress to probe the CIA for the first time. A Senate investigation, headed by Sen. Frank Church, exposed a series of other abuses: assassination conspiracies, unauthorized mail opening, collaboration with human rights abusers, infiltration of news organizations, and the MKULTRA mind-control experiments to develop drugs for use in espionage.
The exposure of Angleton’s operations set off a political avalanche that engulfed the agency in 1975 and after. The post-Watergate Congress established the House and Senate intelligence committees to oversee covert operations. The passage of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act required the CIA to obtain warrants to spy on Americans. And for the first time since 1947, the agency’s annual appropriation was slashed.
Pope on New Year’s Day: Devotion to Mary is a must
Pope Francis preaches in St. Peter's Basilica for the Feast of Mary, Mother of God Jan. 1, 2018. Credit: Daniel Ibanez/CNA.
ByHannah Brockhaus
Vatican City, Jan 1, 2018 / 03:55 am (CNA/EWTN News).- At the start of the new year, Pope Francis said that having a devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary isn’t just something that is nice or good to do, but is an obligation in the life of a Christian.
“Devotion to Mary is not spiritual etiquette; it is a requirement of the Christian life,” the Pope said Jan. 1. “The gift of the Mother, the gift of every mother and every woman, is most precious for the Church, for she too is mother and woman.”
“If our faith is not to be reduced merely to an idea or a doctrine, all of us need a mother’s heart, one which knows how to keep the tender love of God and to feel the heartbeat of all around us.”
Pope Francis celebrated Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica for the Solemnity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, reflecting on the line in Luke’s Gospel that says, “And Mary kept all these things, reflecting on them in her heart.”
Vatican City, Jan 1, 2018 / 03:55 am (CNA/EWTN News).- At the start of the new year, Pope Francis said that having a devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary isn’t just something that is nice or good to do, but is an obligation in the life of a Christian.
“Devotion to Mary is not spiritual etiquette; it is a requirement of the Christian life,” the Pope said Jan. 1. “The gift of the Mother, the gift of every mother and every woman, is most precious for the Church, for she too is mother and woman.”
“If our faith is not to be reduced merely to an idea or a doctrine, all of us need a mother’s heart, one which knows how to keep the tender love of God and to feel the heartbeat of all around us.”
Pope Francis celebrated Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica for the Solemnity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, reflecting on the line in Luke’s Gospel that says, “And Mary kept all these things, reflecting on them in her heart.”
A miracle at Hiroshima -- four Jesuits survived the atomic bomb thanks to the rosary
Priests suffered no ill effects despite being close to devastating wartime bomb
By - Catholic News Agency - Sunday, August 9, 2015
HIROSHIMA, Japan - Seventy years ago, the only wartime use of nuclear weapons took place in the Aug. 6 attack on Hiroshima and the Aug. 9 attack on Nagasaki by the United States. The Hiroshima attack killed around 80,000 people instantly and may have caused about 130,000 deaths, mostly civilians. The attack on the port city…
Read more
By - Catholic News Agency - Sunday, August 9, 2015
HIROSHIMA, Japan - Seventy years ago, the only wartime use of nuclear weapons took place in the Aug. 6 attack on Hiroshima and the Aug. 9 attack on Nagasaki by the United States. The Hiroshima attack killed around 80,000 people instantly and may have caused about 130,000 deaths, mostly civilians. The attack on the port city…
Read more
In his year-end message, Pope Francis says 2017 was marred by war and lies
Steve Scherer, Reuters
Pope Francis arrives to lead the First Vespers and Te Deum prayer in Saint Peter's Basilica at the Vatican Thomson Reuters
- Pope Francis was more outspoken than ever in 2017.
- His criticism included chiding President Donald Trump for pulling the US out of the global Paris agreement to combat climate change.
- In his year-end message on Sunday, he said humanity had "wasted and wounded" the year with "lies and injustices."
VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Pope Francis in his year-end message said that 2017 had been marred by war, lies and injustice, and he urged people to take responsibility for their actions.
At his last public event of the year, an evening vespers service in St. Peter's Basilica, the pontiff said that humanity had "wasted and wounded" the year "in many ways with works of death, with lies and injustices".
While war was the most obvious sign of "unrepentant and absurd pride", many other transgressions had caused "human, social and environmental degradation".
"We must take responsibility for everything before God, our brothers and our creation," he said.
Pope Francis arrives to lead the First Vespers and Te Deum prayer in Saint Peter's Basilica at the Vatican on December 31, 2017. REUTERS/Tony Gentile
While the pope did not mention any specific events from 2017, he had made his voice heard on many of the world's biggest issues over the course of the year.
In April, Francis condemned the "unacceptable massacre" of innocent civilians in a chemical weapons attack in Syria. Just a month ago, he visited Myanmar, where more than 600,000 Muslim Rohingya people have been forced from their homes and into neighboring Bangladesh, speaking with authorities in an attempt to mitigate the crisis.
The pope also sought to encourage peace in Colombia during a trip in September and lobbied U.S. President Donald Trump to address climate change issues in May. Amid heightening tensions between North Korea and the West, Francis expressed concern about nuclear arsenals.
At the end of the service, Francis walked across St. Peter's Square, stopping to shake hands and pose for pictures, as he paid a brief visit to the life-size nativity set up outside.
On Jan. 1, the leader of the world's 1.2 billion Catholics will say a Mass to mark the Church's World Day of Peace.
SEE ALSO: Pope, on Christmas Eve, says faith demands respect of immigrants
DON'T MISS: The Pope just criticized the US for abandoning the Paris climate agreement
The TSA is waiting a little bit longer
The TSA is waiting a little bit longer before it forces some Americans to use a passport to fly domestically
David Slotnick
Dec. 28, 2017, 12:05 PM
28,804
AP
ID requirements for air travel were set to change in January 2018.
Nine states' IDs were not in compliance with the Real ID Act requirements, which meant that travelers from those states would be required to use their passport to fly domestically.
The TSA told Business Insider Thursday that the requirements for people traveling from those states have now been postponed until October 2018.
If you've flown at all in the past year or so, you've probably noticed conspicuous signs at every security checkpoint warning that "ID requirements are changing." According to the signs, beginning January 22, 2018, driver's licenses from nine states will no longer be considered "valid" identification for air travel starting early in 2018.
But on Thursday the TSA confirmed to Business Insider that the new requirements are being postponed until October 2018. That means that drivers licenses from the nine states - Kentucky, Maine, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, and Washington - will remain valid for air travel until next fall. At that point, unless there's another extension, travelers from those states will need to carry their passports even on domestic flights.
The new ID requirements are detailed by the REAL ID Act. Among other things, the 2005 law outlines new federal requirements that must be met in order for state-issued IDs to be considered valid for federal purposes, such as entering secure federal buildings or traveling by air.
Via Department of Homeland SecurityDHS
In particular, the requirements pertain to what information states collect before issuing identification.
For a driver's license to be REAL ID-compliant, a state must require applicants to present either a photo ID or an ID which includes a full name and birth date, proof of birth date (generally a birth certificate), proof of resident status and social security number, and proof of address.
REAL IDs are also required to have the holder's signature, gender, a unique identifying number, and certain anti-tampering or counterfeiting measures.
A TSA spokesman told Business Insider the reason that the new requirements will not be put into effect next month is that the nine states which were going to become non compliant have all been granted extensions.
Implementation of the law for air travel has been postponed a few times previously as individual states have filed for extensions as they build the infrastructure necessary to meet the requirements of the law. The latest postponement gives states more time to change their ID-issuing process. Some states, likeMassachusetts, have outlined plans to begin issuing REAL ID-compliant licenses.
While a TSA webpage still shows January 2018 as the deadline; the TSA spokesman confirmed to Business Insider that drivers licenses from the nine listed states will continue to be valid for air travel until later next year. Travelers from other states which have begun issuing REAL ID-compliant IDs, can continue to use their current driver's licenses - even if they're not compliant with the act's requirements - until October 2020.
Correction: An earlier version of this story stated that the nine states had until 2020 to use their drivers license to travel domestically.
In particular, the requirements pertain to what information states collect before issuing identification.
For a driver's license to be REAL ID-compliant, a state must require applicants to present either a photo ID or an ID which includes a full name and birth date, proof of birth date (generally a birth certificate), proof of resident status and social security number, and proof of address.
REAL IDs are also required to have the holder's signature, gender, a unique identifying number, and certain anti-tampering or counterfeiting measures.
A TSA spokesman told Business Insider the reason that the new requirements will not be put into effect next month is that the nine states which were going to become non compliant have all been granted extensions.
Implementation of the law for air travel has been postponed a few times previously as individual states have filed for extensions as they build the infrastructure necessary to meet the requirements of the law. The latest postponement gives states more time to change their ID-issuing process. Some states, likeMassachusetts, have outlined plans to begin issuing REAL ID-compliant licenses.
While a TSA webpage still shows January 2018 as the deadline; the TSA spokesman confirmed to Business Insider that drivers licenses from the nine listed states will continue to be valid for air travel until later next year. Travelers from other states which have begun issuing REAL ID-compliant IDs, can continue to use their current driver's licenses - even if they're not compliant with the act's requirements - until October 2020.
Correction: An earlier version of this story stated that the nine states had until 2020 to use their drivers license to travel domestically.
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