WORLD CLOUD SECURITY DAY UPDATES
Reminder: Change Your Passwords Every Six Months (I know, I know ...)
-As Ex-President Trump prepares to be arraigned in connection with the Stormy Daniels payoff case, he has made it known to aides that his wish is to treat this case like most of the dozens of civil cases brought (and currently active) against him: full-bore public personal attacks on the prosecutor (Alvin Bragg) and judge (Juan Merchan, who also presided over the fraud case of Trump Organization CFO Alan Weisselberg) - and numerous legal experts warn that if Trump does that, he will all but undoubtedly trigger the imposition of a gag order on Trump, which "if" broken (haha) and enforced could result in fines and, in extreme cases, jail time (don't get your hopes up, but daydream if you wish).
-Arraignment is tomorrow, and as Trump allies and GOP party members collectively attack Bragg, Democrats writ large, and George Soros (which has apparently no purpose other than to drum up anti-semitic sentiment into the situation) (Soros, by the way, has said he has never met Bragg, much less support him with campaign donations), it is helpful to be reminded that NOBODY KNOWS WHAT THE CHARGES ARE, which could make for some interesting juxtapositions when they are revealed tomorrow (Tuesday) afternoon. Stay tuned and pop that popcorn!
-A Russian blogger who spent most of the last year in stringently vocal support of Vladimir Putin and the invasion of Ukraine was assassinated yesterday in St. Petersburg. The BBC reports that the blogger, Vladen Tatarsky, was given a trophy at a cafe where Tatarsky was giving a speech to pro-Putin supporters, not knowing that the trophy was actually a bomb that went off, killed Tatarsky, and injured 12 others. A 26-year old Ukrainian woman has been detained for allegedly delivering the device, and Russia has called the act an assassination ordered by Ukraine.
-Meanwhile, more unintended fallout from the Russian invasion becomes official tomorrow when Finland becomes an official member of NATO. The move was finalized when Turkey, despite Turkish President Erdogan being a one-time ally of Putin, approved of Finland's application. The move also means another Scandinavian country, Sweden, is likely to be admitted as well, and again shows that yet another one of Putin's presumptions about his invasion - that it would fracture NATO irreparably - has instead made NATO stronger than it ever has been since the end of the Cold War and collapse of the former Soviet Union.
-SLAVA UKRAINI!
-In dumb tech and inept business news, Twitter's slow-motion evolution into 240-character MySpace continued this week when Twitter's owner, billionaire weirdo Elon Musk, decided to remove the coveted "blue check" on the account of the New York Times after the Times announced they will not pay Musk for the right to the check, which had been a symbol of a Twitter feed that was heavily used yet contained reliable and true information. Musk announced the blue checks can now be purchased and in fact need to be by April 15, and the announcement has spurred a new flow of refugees away from the once-essential site to several Twitter-replacement-wannabe sites that include Mastodon, Post .com, and Spoutible. (You can find this author on all three sites with the handle @jafedorko, and if you have a blue check, Spoutible is allowing you to 'bring' that to their site).
-In lighter news, depending on how big a traditionalist you are, the first weekend of the 2023 baseball season has occurred with fans embracing new rules that have succeeded in making games move considerably faster than they have been in the last 15-20+ years. The major changes to the game are in the form of a pitch clock that gives pitchers 15 seconds to throw to the plate (20 seconds if there are baserunners) and batters 8 seconds to get into the batter's box and be ready to hit. (Failure to do so results in extra balls and strikes being assessed against the miscreant). Add to that the banning of shifting infielders to one side of the field or the other and larger bases to encourage base stealing, and the length of games has declined by almost 40 minutes, making the game itself faster and forcing some teams to open their parks 30 minutes earlier out of fear that the faster games may result in a decline in concession sales. PLAY BALL!
-And in one more bit of sportsball news, quietly the NBA and the union representing its players announced a tentative agreement on a new Collective Bargaining Agreement last week, which will mean seven years of labor peace while creating a new series of rules designed to help some of the smaller-market teams and the transformation of the first two months of the 82-game regular season to an in-season tournament modeled after European soccer club cup and trophy competitions. While specific details have yet to be announced, the idea is to use regular season games as part of that tournament to lead to an 8-team single-elimination tourney in December. The winning team would get a sure-to-be-sponsored trophy and $500,000 per player - no biggie to your LeBrons or Gianni, but not unsubstantial to the guys at the end of the bench.
-On this date in 1865, Union troops captured the Confederate capital of Richmond, VA - the last battle of the Civil War, which the North won. On this date in 1948, Harry Truman signed the bill that established the Marshall Plan to help rebuild Europe in the wake of World War II. On this date in 1968, Martin Luther King delivered his Mountaintop speech the day before he was assassinated. On this date in 1973, the first cellular call was made. On this date in 1996, Theodore Kaczynski was arrested after his brother helped the FBI figure out that Kaczynski was "The Unabomber" - an anti-technology zealot who killed three people and injured 23 via low-tech mail bombs over an 18-year period. And on this date in 2016, over 11 million documents exposing the financial records of some of the world's richest people - known as the Panama Papers - were made public.
-Happy Birthday to Washington Irving, Dooley Wilson, George Jessel, Henry Luce, Sally Rand, Doris Day, Marlon Brando, Gus Grissom, Jennifer Paterson, Helmut Kohl, Jane Goodall, Marsha Mason, Wayne Newton, Richard Manuel, Tony Orlando, Dee Murray, Lyle Alzado, Richard Thompson, Alec Baldwin, David Hyde Pierce, Eddie Murphy, Mike Ness, Sebastian Bach, Mellody Hobson, Picabo Street, Cobie Smulders, Amanda Bynes, and Rachel Bloom.
-Rest in Peace/Rest in Power to Johannes Brahms, Richard D'Oyly Carte, Conrad Veidt, Kurt Weill, Warren Oates, Sarah Vaughan, Graham Greene, Pinky Lee, Betty Furness, Carl Stokes, Ron Brown, Rob Pilatus, Lionel Bart, Big Daddy Kinsey, Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, Tom Dempsey, and Gene Shue.
-Feed the Worms: mega-corrupt New York politician William "Boss" Tweed and dweeby Brexit liar Nigel Farange entered Earth on this date. Jesse James and gangster Joseph Valachi bought it on this date.