ROFLMAO QANON NUT

US Rep. Greene: Twitter timeout is 'Communist-style' attack

ATLANTA (AP) — Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene blasted social media companies over her temporary suspension from Twitter on Tuesday, calling it “a Communist-style attack on free speech."

© Provided by The Canadian Press

Twitter imposed the 12-hour timeout on Monday, saying some of her tweets violated its policy against spreading misinformation that could cause harm during the coronavirus pandemic.

“Twitter, Facebook, and the rest of the Silicon Valley Cartel are working hand in hand with the White House to censor Americans," the Georgia Republican said in a statement.

Twitter suspended Greene after President Joe Biden urged tech companies to take stronger action against bogus vaccine claims that are “killing people.” Twitter has defended its efforts to keep dangerous misinformation about COVID-19 off its site, saying it has removed thousands of tweets and challenged millions of accounts worldwide.

Greene appears to have been disciplined under the “strike” system Twitter launched in March, using a combination of artificial intelligence and machine learning to identify content about the coronavirus that is misleading enough to cause harm to people. Two or three strikes earn a 12-hour account lock; four strikes prompt a weeklong suspension, and five or more strikes can get someone permanently removed from Twitter.

“We took enforcement action on the account @mtgreenee for violations of the Twitter Rules, specifically the Covid-19 misleading information policy,” the company said in an email.

One of Greene's latest tweets that Twitter labeled misleading claimed that the virus “is not dangerous for non-obese people and those under 65.” According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, people under 65 account for nearly 250,000 of the U.S. deaths involving COVID-19.

U.S. cases of COVID-19 last week increased by 17,000 nationwide over a 14-day period for the first time since late fall, and an increase in death historically follows a spike in illness. Much of the worsening problem is being driven by the delta variant first identified in India, that has since spread to the United Kingdom and other countries, said U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy.

“These Big Tech companies are doing the bidding of the Biden regime to restrict our voices and prevent the spread of any message that isn’t state-approved," Greene said in the statement. “I will not back down."

The Associated Press

China fines tech giants for content exploiting children


HONG KONG (AP) — China’s internet watchdog said Wednesday it has fined platforms operated by e-commerce company Alibaba and gaming firm Tencent for spreading sexually suggestive content involving children, as regulators seek to clean up content harmful to minors.

 Provided by The Canadian Press

Platforms including Alibaba’s e-commerce marketplace Taobao, Tencent’s QQ messaging service, live-streaming site Kuaishou, microblogging platform Sina Weibo and social media and e-commerce service Xiaohongshu were fined for distributing sexually suggestive stickers or short videos of children, it said.

The companies were ordered to rectify the issue and ban accounts that use such content to attract more traffic.

The crackdown on inappropriate content involving minors comes as the government ramps up scrutiny of technology platforms in the country. Regulators are investigating Chinese technology companies over a range of issues, including anti-competitive practices and data practices.

“With regards to the infringement of the legal rights and interests of minors, a ‘zero tolerance’ attitude will be adopted and enforced to clean up the online problems that endanger the physical and mental health of minors,” the Cyberspace Administration of China said in a statement.

In recent months, some Chinese media outlets have called out sexually suggestive photos of children used by certain stores on platforms such as Taobao and Xiaohongshu to sell clothing, as well as suggestive stickers of children on messaging apps.

The internet regulator said its campaign includes the targeting of minors on live-streaming platforms, pornographic and violent content in courses on online education platforms and animations with violent or inappropriate horror themes.

Earlier this month, the regulator said it would probe ride-hailing company Didi Global Inc. over data security concerns. Alibaba in April was also fined $2.8 billion following an anti-monopoly probe, and food delivery giant Meituan is being investigated over alleged antitrust practices.

The internet watchdog also recently announced that it would require companies looking to list abroad to seek its approval first.

Globally, technology companies and governments are paying more attention to how to prevent the exploitation and abuse of children online.

Last year, a coalition of technology companies including Facebook, Google and Microsoft backed a plan to eradicate online child abuse.

The U.K. last month also issued a new guidance to companies on how they can protect children from sexual exploitation and abuse on their platforms.

Zen Soo, The Associated Press

WOKE CAPITALI$M
A year on, experts find corporate anti-racist efforts progressing slowly

TORONTO — When Dahabo Ahmed-Omer became the executive director of an organization dedicated to eliminating anti-Black racism in corporate Canada last August, it was normal for her to have up to 11 meetings a day.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

Weeks earlier George Floyd, a Black man in Minneapolis, had been killedin police custody and as fury over systemic racism erupted around the globe, companies were seeking Ahmed-Omer's and the BlackNorth Initiative's advice about allyship and promoting diversity.

One year later, Ahmed-Omer's calendar is just as full as it was in the months after Floyd's death. She sees it as a sign of how seriously companies are finally taking on issues of racism and representation, but knows there's still plenty of work to be done.

"People are talking to us about culture. People are talking to us about governance," said Ahmed-Omer.

"That tells me that we've opened up a massive can of worms and we need to get the worms out ... and that's been great to see."

BlackNorth Initiative efforts have centred around a pledge it drew up in June 2020, when Kingsdale Advisors founder and "Dragons' Den" star Wes Hall launched the organization.

The pledge asked business leaders to commit to a series of a measures that address systemic racism, confront unconscious bias and remove barriers preventing Black employees from advancing within their companies.

It was signed by 473 companies, including the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, Air Canada, Cineplex Inc., Enbridge Inc., and Telus Corp.

The Initiative surveyed 182 of those companies between November 2020 and June 2021 and found half have a diversity, equity and inclusion plan in place. Twenty per cent are in the process of developing one.

"We're moving a lot quicker than I had anticipated, and this is coming from someone who is Black, who is Muslim, who is a woman and who understands these issues at a deep level," said Ahmed-Omer of the survey results, published Tuesday.

Half of survey respondents said they have a diversity leadership council, training on unconscious bias or racism and listening forums to encourage dialogue, while one-third have donation or sponsorship programs supporting Black advancement.

Only one in five surveyed said they engage with suppliers and partners from companies that are run by Black Canadians and about one in 10 have an internship programs focusing on Black people.

Ahmed-Omer acknowledged that action on equity, diversity and inclusion measures isn't always as straightforward as it seems at the outset.

"I can imagine our allies and other communities, who are not embedded into the issue, and how complex it may be for them."

Tomee Elizabeth Sojourner-Campbell said she is pleased with the commitments companies made after Floyd's death, but in many instances "what I have not seen is a lot of concrete plans."

"With the ones who made commitments and say that they are going to do the work, we need to now see that work," said the Toronto-based consultant focusing on advising, learning and development.

By now, Sojourner-Campbell hoped BlackNorth Initiative signatories and other companies that pledged to change would have devised plans, studied how to address racial profiling and trained staff on anti-racism and social issues.

Those steps are among the earliest companies can take to address long-standing inequalities, she said.

A 2020 study from Ryerson University’s Diversity Institute found few Black people on the boards of large companies, agencies, hospitals, educational institutions and in the voluntary sector in Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, Calgary, Halifax, Hamilton, London and Ottawa.

The study of 9,843 individuals revealed Black Canadians represented 5.6 per cent of the population across the eight cities studied, but occupied only 2 per cent of positions analyzed.

Other reports have confirmed Black Canadians are less likely to reach executive ranks and receive mentorship, and more likely to experience discrimination, in the workplace.

Even with new momentum, signatories of the Black North pledge reported a number of factors presented challenges to implementing the pledge, including hiring issues, representation at leadership levels, lack of staff engagement and questions around how to measure diversity baselines.

Making changes around equity and inclusion often faces pushback, doesn't involve enough communication with the groups it's intended to support and can be costly. That means it is often sidetracked, Sojourner-Campbell said.

"COVID has shifted the focus of some organizations away from doing the in-depth work around anti-racism, equity, diversity and inclusion because they have to now strategize and (think), 'Do we have to lay off staff?" she said.

But that doesn't mean meaningful progress hasn't happened too.

Sojourner-Campbell feels optimistic about the conversations that have taken place over the last year, while Ahmed-Omer is determined not to let the pandemic or any other factor keep her from the work that needs to be done.

"We're going to have challenges," Ahmed-Omer said. "It's part of the journey.

"But it's what makes the journey so worthwhile."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 20, 2021.

Companies in this story: (TSX:CGX, TSX:CM. TSX:ENB, TSX:AC, TSX:T)

Tara Deschamps, The Canadian Press

SoftBank's robotics ambitions short circuit as Pepper loses power

© Reuters/Tyrone Siu FILE PHOTO: FILE PHOTO: SoftBank's robot 'Pepper', is seen at First Bank branch as a concierge to welcome customers in Taipei, Taiwan

TOKYO (Reuters) - When SoftBank Group Corp's CEO Masayoshi Son unveiled the wide-eyed android Pepper in 2014, he painted a vision, once confined to science fiction, of a new era of personal robots in which his company would be the industry leader.


That vision, and the company's expectations of demand for Pepper, proved overly optimistic, two sources familiar with the matter said. Seven years later, Pepper is clinging to life, with production shuttered and units cobbled together with out-of-date components.

SoftBank will end sales of new Pepper units in 2023 at the latest as those parts become obsolete, according to the minutes of an internal meeting held in Paris in late May and reviewed by Reuters. Sales of refurbished units will continue after this point, management told staff.

The company disputed the meeting minutes, and Kazutaka Hasumi, chief marketing officer of SoftBank Robotics, told Reuters the company is committed to ensuring Pepper survives in some form, perhaps with a new design.

"We will still be selling Pepper in five years," Hasumi said.

The humanoid was custom designed for SoftBank by Aldebaran, a French robotics startup it acquired in 2012. Son hoped Pepper would transform robots from a factory tool into an everyday companion, just as computers had moved from offices into homes and pockets.

But Pepper's appeal was limited by its basic functionality: it can make rudimentary conversation, engage in simple interactions through its chest-mounted tablet and sing while gesturing. It would frequently break down, the two sources said.

"Pepper wasn't upgraded to take on real tasks. There was very little Pepper could do that you can't do with an iPad," said Morten Paulsen, head of Japan research at CLSA.

Retailing for 198,000 yen ($1,800) plus a 14,800 yen monthly fee, Pepper was out of reach for most households, and SoftBank was quickly forced to focus on businesses. Pepper was met with some early enthusiasm in that sector; shops and restaurants offered a more predictable environment where the robot could be programmed for tasks such as greeting customers.

But poor relations between Tokyo and Paris hurt Pepper's development, according to the sources familiar with the matter, and two others. All of the sources spoke on condition of anonymity as they were not permitted to speak to the media.

SoftBank propped up Pepper's sales in the early days deploying units in its mobile phone stores said two of the sources. 27,000 units were eventually produced, one of the two sources familiar with the matter said.

Now, sales of Pepper have slumped to less than 100 units in some months, according to documents reviewed by Reuters.

Production at a Foxconn factory in China was stopped last year as the number of unsold units mounted and the line has since been shut down, the documents show.

SoftBank has fewer than 2,000 Pepper units left, according to the documents. The heavy batteries that power the robot are decaying and the chest-mounted tablets run on an out-of-date Android operating system without the latest security updates, one of the sources said.

ELECTRIC DREAMS

Son, a self described "big talker", has a track record of achieving the unlikely, breaking up Japan's telecoms duopoly and securing $60 billion in Middle Eastern oil money for his Vision Fund.

The billionaire also has an eye for hits, famously bringing Apple's first iPhone to the Japanese market. But when his company launched Pepper, it had little experience designing and building products - let alone androids.

And the expected market never materialised. Even as Pepper helped spread SoftBank's name around the world, some customers were returning it when lease periods ended.

Two years ago SoftBank made a major attempt to reboot its robotics business with the launch of Whiz, an automated vacuum cleaner.

Sales staff struggled to persuade customers to pay $500 monthly for a product that could only clean open spaces and would break down, two other sources said.

Demand for Whiz has been boosted by the pandemic, with orders for 8,000 units in the April-June quarter, said Kenichi Yoshida, chief business officer at SoftBank Robotics.

SoftBank has considered other robot products, including one that makes ramen, the two sources said. It sells a food service robot, Servi, developed by California-based Bear Robotics, that can carry food to diners.

PURE INVESTING

The underperformance at SoftBank Robotics came to a head last year as the downturn forced Son to change strategy, selling assets to stabilise the group's balance sheet and pushing portfolio companies to prioritise cash generation.

SoftBank Robotics embarked on a global restructuring, reported by Reuters last month, that includes plans to cut half of its Paris-based workforce.

The business is nearing profitability and listing is a possibility, Yoshida said.

The conglomerate has been shifting to pure investing through its Vision Fund and has sold down majority stakes in firms like Boston Dynamics. It continues to take smaller stakes in robotics related businesses.

SoftBank has struck sales deals with partners such as Iris Ohyama in Japan and RobotLAB in the U.S. There is a niche market for selling Pepper to corporate clients and in education, Elad Inbar, CEO of RobotLAB, said in an interview.

"Our job in this ecosystem is to show that there is market demand," he said.

($1 = 109.7900 yen)

(Reporting by Sam Nussey. Editing by Gerry Doyle)

Monster wildfire tests years of forest management efforts

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Ecologists in a vast region of wetlands and forest in remote Oregon have spent the past decade thinning young trees and using planned fires to try to restore the thick stands of ponderosa to a less fire-prone state.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

This week, the nation's biggest burning wildfire provided them with an unexpected, real-world experiment. As the massive inferno half the size of Rhode Island roared into the Sycan Marsh Preserve, firefighters said the flames jumped less from treetop to treetop and instead returned to the ground, where they were easier to fight, moved more slowly and did less damage to the overall forest.

The initial assessment suggests that the many years of forest treatments worked, said Pete Caligiuri, Oregon forest program director for The Nature Conservancy, which runs the research at the preserve.

“Generally speaking, what firefighters were reporting on the ground is that when the fire came into those areas that had been thinned ... it had significantly less impact.”

The reports were bittersweet for researchers, who still saw nearly 20 square miles of the preserve burn, but the findings add to a growing body of research about how to make wildfires less explosive by thinning undergrowth and allowing forests to burn periodically — as they naturally would do — instead of snuffing out every flame.

The Bootleg Fire, now 606 square miles (1,569 square kilometers) in size, has ravaged southern Oregon and is the fourth-largest fire in the state's modern history. It's been expanding by up to 4 miles (6 kilometers) a day, pushed by gusting winds and critically dry weather that's turned trees and undergrowth into a tinderbox.

Fire crews have had to retreat from the flames for 10 consecutive days as fireballs jump from treetop to treetop, trees explode, embers fly ahead of the fire to start new blazes and, in some cases, the inferno's heat creates its own weather of shifting winds and dry lightning. Monstrous clouds of smoke and ash have risen up to 6 miles into the sky and are visible for more than 100 air miles.

The fire in the Fremont-Winema National Forest merged with a smaller nearby blaze Tuesday, and it has repeatedly breached a perimeter of treeless dirt and fire retardant meant to stop its advance.

More evacuations were ordered Monday night, and a red flag weather warning signifying dangerous fire conditions was in effect through Tuesday. The fire is 30% contained.

“We’re in this for as long as it takes to safely confine this monster," Incident Commander Rob Allen said Tuesday.

At least 2,000 homes have been evacuated at some point during the fire and another 5,000 threatened. At least 70 homes and more than 100 outbuildings have gone up in flames. Thick smoke chokes the area where residents and wildlife alike have already been dealing with months of drought and extreme heat. No one has died.

The Bootleg Fire was one of many fires burning in a dozen states, most of them in the West. Sixteen large uncontained fires burned in Oregon and Washington state alone on Monday.

On Tuesday, officials temporarily closed all recreational and public access to state-managed lands in eastern Washington due to fire danger, starting Friday.

Historically, wildfires in Oregon and elsewhere in the West burned an area as big or bigger than the current blaze more frequently but much less explosively. Periodic, naturally occurring fire cleared out the undergrowth and smaller trees that cause today's fires to burn so dangerously.

Those fires have not been allowed to burn for the past 120 years, said James Johnston, a researcher with Oregon State University’s College of Forestry who studies historical wildfires.

The area on the northeastern flank of the Bootleg Fire is in the ancestral homeland of the Klamath Tribes, which have used intentional, managed fire to keep the fuel load low and prevent such explosive blazes. Scientists at the Sycan Marsh research station now work with the tribe and draw on that knowledge.

Climate change is the catalyst for the worsening wildfire seasons in the West, Johnston said, but poor forest management and a policy of decades of fire suppression have made a bad situation even worse.

“My colleagues and I have been predicting a massive fire in that area for years. It’s an area that’s exceptionally prone to catastrophic fire," said Johnston, who is not affiliated with Sycan Marsh. “It’s dry. It’s fire-prone and always has been. But what’s changed over the past 100 years is an extraordinary amount of fuel buildup."

Elsewhere, fire crews were engaged in other daunting battles.

In Northern California, authorities expanded evacuations for the Tamarack Fire in Alpine County in the Sierra Nevada to include the mountain town of Mesa Vista late Monday. That fire, which exploded over the weekend was 61 square miles (158 square kilometers) with no containment.

Tony Galvez fled with his daughter at the last minute and found out the family's home is gone.

“I lost my whole life, everything I’ve ever had. The kids are what’s going to matter,” he said as he fielded calls from relatives. “I got three teenagers. They’re going to go home to a moonscape.”

On the western side of the Sierra, the Dixie Fire has scorched more than 90 square miles (163 square kilometers), threatening tiny communities in the Feather River Valley region.

Meteorologist Julia Ruthford told a briefing that a surge of monsoonal moisture from the Southwest had created plumes topping 6 miles — so big that the fire generated a thunderstorm over itself with lightning and gusty winds.

For the past two days in Oregon, the fire has danced around Sycan Marsh, where researchers raced to protect buildings with sprinklers and fire lines. The 47-square-mile habitat attracts migrating and nesting birds and offers a unique location to research forest and fire ecology.

The nonprofit operates its own fire engines and now has three engines and seven firefighters on the blaze and more people are arriving.

“It’s an amazing place,” Caligiuri said. “It’s very hard to watch it all happening, and seeing all of that work being threatened by this fire is a lot to process.”

___

Associated Press Writer John Antczak in Los Angeles and AP Video Journalist Haven Daley in Alpine County, California, contributed to this report.

___

Follow Flaccus on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/gflaccus

Liberals add $1.4 billion to climate change mitigation fund: McKenna


OTTAWA — Infrastructure Minister Catherine McKenna says the federal government is adding almost $1.4 billion to the disaster mitigation and adaptation fund this year to help communities across Canada facing climate change and environmental disasters

.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

Speaking to reporters in Toronto Tuesday, McKenna says the funding will support communities in conducting projects to face the risks of wildfires and floods, rehabilitate storm water systems and restore wetlands and shorelines.

Her department says in a news release $670 million of the funding will be dedicated to small-scale projects between $1 million and $20 million while remaining funding will be allocated to large-scale projects above $20 million.

British Columbia's government has said accommodations for wildfire evacuees are filling up as the flames and smoke from numerous blazes spread, forcing more people from their homes and contributing to an acrid haze that's blanketing cities in neighbouring Alberta.

Smoke from the fires in B.C., as well as others in northern Saskatchewan, Manitoba and northwest Ontario, has resulted in special air quality advisories across the country.

The disaster mitigation and adaptation fund started in 2018 as a $2 billion program over 10 years to support communities in establishing the infrastructure they need to better handle natural disasters including floods, wildfires, earthquakes and droughts.

The new $1.4 billion fund will be spent over 12-year period, the department says.

McKenna says at least 10 per cent of the funding will go to Indigenous recipients.

"Climate change is having a devastating impact on Indigenous communities and a disproportionate impact," she says.

She says dealing with climate change should be through the same approach that the government has been taking in dealing with COVID-19 pandemic.

"We need to listen to science and scientists. We need to work with partners from municipalities to provinces to the private sector," she says.

"We all need to work together because, really, we have no choice."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 20, 2021.

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This story was produced with the financial assistance of the Facebook and Canadian Press News Fellowship.

Maan Alhmidi, The Canadian Press

ALBERTA

First Nations and Rocky Mountain House leaders investigate accusations of racism

(ANNews) – Earlier this month, an Indigenous man from O’Chiese First Nation was denied medical service for his mother who was believed to be having a heart attack.

In a video posted to Facebook, Sonni Strawberrii is seen being denied medical attention from an EMS ambulance while his mother is unconscious in the passenger seat of his car.

The paramedics in the ambulance can be heard saying that the vehicle was “out of service.”

Luckily, Strawberrii found an ambulance that did help and his mother recovered the next day in hospital.

The Lakeside EMS released a statement trying to explain the incident, “The paramedic in the first encounter was returning an ambulance following repairs. The ambulance was not equipped with all of its medical equipment or medications and was due to be restocked. When the paramedic referenced the ambulance as ‘out of service,’ that is what was being referred to.”

However, despite the explanation, this incident sparked a huge reaction from nearby First Nations with many believing it to be a blatant example of Indigenous discrimination.

The Chiefs and Councils of O’Chiese First Nation and Sunchild First Nation met with the Town of Rocky Mountain House to discuss the systemic racism being face by the Nations from the Healthcare system and to seek accountability.

The three communities have even called for a meeting with Minister of Health Tyler Shandro and Alberta Health Services to respond to the incident.

“We recognize our important role as allies in working with and for our First Nation partners in eradicating racism at all levels,” said Rocky Mountain House Mayor, Tammy Burke.

“We understand we will not be able to move our community forward as long as our Indigenous residents and neighbours are discriminated against.”

Furthermore, the Big Horn First Nation, members from Rocky Mountain House, Sunchild and O’Chiese First Nations have created an anti-racism task force to spread racism education and cultural awareness.

“It’s time we open our eyes and deal with racism in Rocky,” said O’Chiese First Nation Chief Douglas Beaverbones. “The three Nations and Town of Rocky leadership are teaming up to deal with the issues the nations are facing.”

The incident has also generated a response from Assembly of First Nations Alberta Regional Chief Marlene Poitras, “There is grave concern for the policies and practices of EMS regarding Indigenous Peoples in Alberta. These incidents are unacceptable and unbecoming of healthcare professionals.”

“First Nations peoples still face stigma and embarrassment when trying to access healthcare at hospitals due to the ongoing and historical ways they have been treated by those who are supposed to help… This sadly, will not be the last experience of racism in Alberta’s healthcare facilities, but it does shine a light on the steps that can be taken to correct long standing issues and ensure that the next time a similar situation occurs, it doest not end in tragedy, as this one almost did.”

The Regional Chief announced that she would be requesting a meeting with Minister Shandro on behalf of the Nations. “We look forward to our meeting with him in the coming weeks and hope that this discussion can lead towards positive healthcare reform for First Nations in Alberta.”

Jacob Cardinal, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Alberta Native News

Edmonton Journal 

Tuesday's letters: Unjust to target health support workers' pay

Our premier and ministers should visit a hospital and observe how cleaning staff wear layers of PPE, push the cleaning carts, change gloves every 10 minutes or so, and clean the premises without interrupting other health professionals. It is those health staff who kept the virus away. And how dare you cut the wage of the lowest-paid health staff.

© Provided by Edmonton Journal Health-care workers stage a wildcat strike at University of Alberta Hospital on Oct. 26, 2020, to protest job cuts announced by the Alberta government.

People who work as supportive staff in health choose to work in such jobs not by choice, but by chance. They may have wanted to have well-paid jobs or run their own business, but may not have had the facilities and support.

Most cleaning staff, as well as many supportive staff in health services, are new immigrants. They are working hard, most often in more than one low-paid job, to put food on their table and raise their children.

Newcomers start from zero financial assets, with all challenges of starting afresh. Many newcomers are underemployed, given the challenges of credential equivalency, language, and different work environments.

We can find former engineers, school principals and doctors in the cleaning staff. And while they strive to find life here, the government is taking a portion of their incomes now. It is totally unjust, unfair, and inhumane. Government needs to look at the historical and social context of the affected people, inter alia, while taking such decisions.

Baiju Vareed, Edmonton

UCP has a problem with women

The pay cut for nurses is sadly, not about fixing the mess the UCP created, but another dogfight with those that the UCP think they can beat down. Mostly likely, because we are weary and proportionally women.

The UCP gave $9 billion to male dominated industries and is attempting a five-per-cent pay cut to a female-dominated profession.

It goes much deeper than this recent brawl. We had a cabinet minister fired because she spoke out. A male MLA was booted out of caucus for failure to do his constituency work and speaking out against Kenney. In a glaring double standard, this MLA has been brought back into the UCP fold with arms wide open.

The UCP is dragging its feet on an opportunity to assist families with much needed daycare support. A Sky Palace meeting with the inner circle of men. Even the ministry of energy was not at the table. The MLA responsible for women’s issues is so far removed from what women need and aspire to, he may just need to reach out to a “higher authority” to assist him and Kenney.

The UCP performance on women’s issues is dismal. My only question for the premier is, what is your deal with women?

Shelley O’Neill, Whitecourt

ROARING TWENTIES SPECULATORS

Inside the ‘Wild West’ of cryptocurrencies and social media influencers

Bianca Britton 

In early June, when Brayden LeBlanc saw four influencers from the popular esports team FaZe Clan promote a cryptocurrency project, he thought he was about to make a safe and worthwhile investment.

© Provided by NBC News

The project, a charity cryptocurrency token called Save the Kids, launched on June 5, and its creators promoted it as a way to make the world a better place. The members of FaZe Clan, who each have millions of social media followers, gave it the feeling of something new and exciting. LeBlanc, 21, from Saint John in New Brunswick, Canada, initially invested $94.

But hours after the cryptocurrency token’s launch, its value crashed. LeBlanc’s investment is now worth around $5.

“I feel like I’ve been played,” LeBlanc said. “These FaZe members are people that myself and millions of others look up to. We want to be like them.”

While the FaZe Clan members who promoted the token have since been removed or suspended by the team for their involvement, the episode has become one of the most high-profile examples of what industry watchers and an emerging group of online watchdogs say is a problematic dynamic in which influencers promote cryptocurrencies — with young people particularly susceptible to the hype.

The cryptocurrency boom of 2020 and early 2021 attracted a new wave of mainstream investor interest, particularly from younger people like LeBlanc, as more established cryptocurrencies like bitcoin and ethereum, along with alternative coins like dogecoin, skyrocketed in value.

That helped inspire a wave of new cryptocurrencies to enter the market, some of which turned to celebrities and internet influencers to become ambassadors and help gain traction. Kim Kardashian, Floyd Mayweather and Logan Paul are just a few of the personalities to have promoted altcoins — a catchall term for cryptocurrencies other than bitcoin.

But some have gone wrong. LeBlanc alleged the Save the Kids token was a pump and dump — a well-known scheme to boost the price of an asset. At least one of the FaZe Clan members has said he also lost money and believes a “con man” who abused the influencers’ trust is to blame.

“It just feels like me and the other investors were used as a way to get easy money,” LeBlanc said.

In the past year, the number of cryptocurrencies have doubled to 10,000 according to the tracking website CoinMarketCap. And while it appears the market is booming, more than $80 million has been lost in crypto-related scams since October 2020, according to a report this year by the Federal Trade Commission.

“With bitcoin’s value soaring in recent months, new investors may be eager to get in on the action,” said Emma Fletcher, an analyst with the FTC. “All of this plays right into the hands of scammers.”

The report found that people aged 20 to 49 were five times more likely to lose money in cryptocurrency investment scams than older age groups. The United Kingdom’s Financial Conduct Authority also revealed in a report this year that new and younger audiences were engaging in high-risk investments like crypto and were often driven by emotions and feelings.

It found that the reasons for investing were often based on competition and novelty, rather than “conventional, more functional reasons” such as saving for retirement.

New cryptocurrency technology has created opportunities for scams to take place, according to Rachel Siegel, who provides crypto-related educational content to more than 150,000 followers on Twitter.

“The Save the Kids scam was very similar to a lot of other scams we see in the crypto space,” Siegel alleged. “I think that there is a lot of good ways this technology can be utilized. It just hasn’t been around long enough to clearly decipher legitimate projects from disingenuous ones.”

The FTC declined to comment on whether it was investigating the Save the Kids matter.

The allure of overnight wealth generated by cryptocurrencies combined with the sway of widely followed social media stars is seen by some in the cryptocurrency industry as a recipe for disaster. Lucas Dimos, 20, is one of a group of social media influencers trying to counter this problem. On his TikTok account, he tries to offer a reality check to his almost 300,000 followers on the exuberance of the crypto market and warn people away from expecting overnight success.

“People just go beyond the pale and gamble way more than they should have,” he said, adding that a number of people have contacted him claiming they had lost half their college tuition investing in crypto.

“These people are not investors, they’re gambling addicts. We need to stop treating it like a casino,” Dimos said. “Do your own research, invest in good, fundamentally sound projects and never invest more than you can afford to lose. … Those three things are everything I keep hammering home in people’s heads because it can get really exciting really quickly.”

He also said there’s little stopping influencers from profiting off their clout with little oversight.

“We’re in the Wild West right now,” he said. “The sheriff is not in town. Nobody’s going to come knocking at your door.”

Other social media personalities have gone further, forming something of an informal watchdog subculture to try to identify scams and warn people about them. One YouTube creator who goes by Coffeezilla (his real name is Stephen but he withholds his last name online due to the video content he creates) made a video on June 24 highlighting alleged issues with the Save the Kids cryptocurrency. He alleged the token’s developers had secretly changed its code at the last minute to allow early investors to dump their tokens and run off with the money.

“That to me solidified it as an ultimate scam,” he claimed. “It is a premeditated scam. That to me makes it even more egregious, and then you combine the fact that it’s about kids, and you have the holy grail of shady influencers crypto scams.”

A few days after Stephen posted his first video about Save the Kids, Frazier “Kay” Khattri, one of the FaZe Clan influencers who promoted the projected, issued an apology to his fans saying it was “irresponsible” for him to promote cryptocurrencies “without knowing more, & knowing now that they can do more harm than good.”

Khattri also announced on YouTube that he had uncovered “significant evidence that a dishonest person abused his trust with me to scam everybody,” and that he and his lawyers were building a case to hold the “con man” accountable.

According to Stephen, Khattri’s lawyers have issued him a cease and desist letter for “false and defamatory public statements.”

The other FaZe Clan influencers involved have not issued public statements, and they did not respond to an NBC News request for comment. However, on Sunday another FaZe Clan member, Teeqo, posted on Twitter that “life’s been an absolute nightmare the past month,” and that he’s “not sure when or if I’ll be back”

Stephen said he sees his videos as a chance to put pressure on people who may be trying to take advantage of young and impressionable people.

“If nobody’s holding anyone accountable, there is no fear,” he said. “It’s just sort of like you’re operating underground.”

But he also said he sees the need for authorities to step in.

“I can report on this till I’m blue in the face but … until somebody gets in real trouble for this, I think there’s a danger of this continuing,” he said, adding, “I think that law enforcement needs to get involved at some level before people start really paying attention.”

THIRD WORLD USA

US life expectancy in 2020 saw biggest drop since WWII


NEW YORK — U.S. life expectancy fell by a year and a half in 2020, the largest one-year decline since World War II, public health officials said Wednesday. The decrease for both Black Americans and Hispanic Americans was even worse: three years.

The drop spelled out by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is due mainly to the COVID-19 pandemic, which health officials said is responsible for close to 74% of the overall life expectancy decline. More than 3.3 million Americans died last year, far more than any other year in U.S. history, with COVID-19 accounting for about 11% of those deaths.


Black life expectancy has not fallen so much in one year since the mid-1930s, during the Great Depression. Health officials have not tracked Hispanic life expectancy for nearly as long, but the 2020 decline was the largest recorded one-year drop.

The abrupt fall is “basically catastrophic,” said Mark Hayward, a University of Texas sociology professor who studies changes in U.S. mortality.

Killers other than COVID-19 played a role. Drug overdoses pushed life expectancy down, particularly for whites. And rising homicides were a small but significant reason for the decline for Black Americans, said Elizabeth Arias, the report's lead author.

Other problems affected Black and Hispanic people, including lack of access to quality health care, more crowded living conditions, and a greater share of the population in lower-paying jobs that required them to keep working when the pandemic was at its worst, experts said.

Life expectancy is an estimate of the average number of years a baby born in a given year might expect to live. It’s an important statistical snapshot of a country’s health that can be influenced both by sustained trends such as obesity as well as more temporary threats like pandemics or war that might not endanger those newborns in their lifetimes.

For decades, U.S. life expectancy was on the upswing. But that trend stalled in 2015, for several years, before hitting 78 years, 10 months in 2019. Last year, the CDC said, it dropped to about 77 years, 4 months.

Other findings in the new CDC report:

—Hispanic Americans have longer life expectancy than white or Black Americans, but had the largest decline in 2020. The three-year drop was the largest since the CDC started tracking Hispanic life expectancy 15 years ago.

—Black life expectancy dropped nearly three years, to 71 years, 10 months. It has not been that low since 2000.

—White life expectancy fell by roughly 14 months to about 77 years, 7 months. That was the lowest the lowest life expectancy for that population since 2002.

—COVID-19's role varied by race and ethnicity. The coronavirus was responsible for 90% of the decline in life expectancy among Hispanics, 68% among white people and 59% among Black Americans.

—Life expectancy fell nearly two years for men, but about one year for women, widening a longstanding gap. The CDC estimated life expectancy of 74 years, 6 months for boys vs. 80 years, 2 months for girls.

More than 80% of last year's COVID deaths were people 65 and older, CDC data shows. That actually diminished the pandemic's toll on life expectancy at birth, which is swayed more by deaths of younger adults and children than those among seniors.

That's why last year's decline was just half as much as the three-year drop between 1942 and 1943, when young soldiers were dying in World War II. And it was just a fraction of the drop between 1917 and 1918, when World War I and a Spanish flu pandemic devastated younger generations.

Life expectancy bounced back after those drops, and experts believe it will this time, too. But some said it could take years.

Too many people have already died from COVID-19 this year, while variants of the coronavirus are spreading among unvaccinated Americans — many of them younger adults, some experts said.

"We can't. In 2021, we can't get back to pre-pandemic” life expectancy, said Noreen Goldman, a Princeton University researcher.

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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

Mike Stobbe, The Associated Press