U.S. thwarts plot to kill Sikh separatist, issues warning to India - FT

Reuters
Wed, November 22, 2023 

NEW DELHI (Reuters) -U.S. authorities thwarted a plot to kill a Sikh separatist in the United States and issued a warning to India over concerns the government in New Delhi was involved, the Financial Times reported on Wednesday, citing unnamed sources.

There was no immediate response from India's foreign ministry, or from the U.S. embassy in New Delhi, to requests for comment on the report.

The Financial Times said that the sources did not say if the protest to India resulted in the plot being abandoned by the plotters, or if it was foiled by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).


The protest to New Delhi was registered after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi was welcomed on a state visit by President Joe Biden in June, the report said.

The report comes two months after Canada said there were "credible" allegations linking Indian agents to the June murder of a Sikh separatist leader, Hardeep Singh Nijjar, in a Vancouver suburb.

India has rejected Canada's accusations.

Apart from the diplomatic warning to India, U.S. federal prosecutors have also filed a sealed indictment against at least one suspect in a New York district court, the FT report said.

The paper identified Gurpatwant Singh Pannun as the target of the foiled plot.

The FT report said Pannun had declined to say whether U.S. authorities had warned him about the plot, but quoted him as saying he would "let the U.S. government respond to the issue of threats to my life on American soil from the Indian operatives".

Pannun, like Nijjar, is a proponent of a decades-long, but now a fringe demand to carve out an independent Sikh homeland from India named Khalistan.

Canada worked very closely with the United States on intelligence that Indian agents had been potentially involved in Nijjar's murder, a senior Canadian government source told Reuters in September.

The Financial Times report mentioned that the U.S. shared details of the thwarted plot with a wider group of allies after Canada's public accusation.

(Reporting by Shivam Patel, Krishn Kaushik in New Delhi; Editing by Andrew Heavens and Alex Richardson)


India's anti-terror agency files case against Sikh separatist for Air India threat

Updated Tue, November 21, 2023 

Air India passenger aircraft are seen on the tarmac at Chhatrapati Shivaji International airport in Mumbai

By Shivam Patel

NEW DELHI (Reuters) -India's anti-terrorism agency has filed a case against a Sikh separatist leader for warning Air India passengers that their lives were in danger and threatening not to let the flag carrier operate anywhere in the world.

The agency said security forces were on alert after the threats by Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, who acts as general counsel of Sikhs for Justice (SFJ), a group campaigning to establish an independent Sikh homeland called Khalistan carved out of India.

The case against Pannun has been registered under provisions of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act 1967 and sections of the Indian Penal Code, the National Investigation Agency (NIA) said in a statement on Monday.

"Pannun threatened that Air India would not be allowed to operate in the world ... in his video messages, released on Nov. 4," it said, adding that he had urged Sikhs not to travel on Air India flights from Sunday, "claiming a threat to their lives".

Reuters has not independently verified the video messages, which were widely shared on social media this month.

Pannun told Reuters in an emailed response that his message was to "boycott Air India not bomb" and that the Indian government was engaging in a disinformation tactic to "crush freedom of expression".

He added that the "government can not stop SFJ from running secessionist Khalistan referendum, which is the real motive why NIA filed frivolous terror case."

Air India declined to comment on the matter. The NIA did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The demand for Khalistan has resurfaced many times, although it now has little support in India, which sees the movement as a security threat.

A violent insurgency in the 1970s and 1980s by Sikh militants paralysed the northern state of Punjab, where Sikhs are a majority, for more than a decade.

India banned the SFJ as an "unlawful association" in 2019, citing that it was involved in "anti-national and subversive" activities.

It listed Pannun as an "individual terrorist" in 2020, stating that he was issuing appeals to "Punjab-based gangsters and youth" to fight for Khalistan.

The interior ministry said that year that Pannun, originally from a village in Punjab, was residing in the United States. Media said he has citizenship of U.S. and Canada.

Interpol has rejected two requests by India to issue a red corner notice against him, The Indian Express newspaper said in October last year. The SFJ says it has offices in Britain, Canada and U.S.

The threats come as Canadian agencies investigate allegations linking India's agents to the killing of a Sikh separatist leader there, which has frayed ties between the two countries. India has rejected Canada's suspicions.

In the wake of the threats, investigations have been launched in Canada, India and some other countries where the airline owned by the Tata Group conglomerate operates, the NIA said.

Air India has previously been targeted by Sikh militants, who were blamed for a bombing in 1985 of its Boeing 747 aircraft flying from Canada to India that killed all 329 people aboard off the Irish coast.

Pannun has also previously threatened to disrupt railways and thermal power plants in India, the agency said.

(Reporting by Shivam Patel; Editing by Clarence Fernandez and David Gregorio)

'HUMANS' RESPONSIBLE FOR THE CLIMATE CRISIS 

IDENTIFIED

World's richest 1% emit as much carbon as 5 billion people, report says
Li Cohen
Tue, November 21, 2023

Dimitrios Kambouris

The "polluter elite" are disproportionately driving climate change, according to a new report — with the wealthiest 1% of people in the world putting out as much carbon pollution as the poorest two-thirds.

The report, by The Guardian, the international charity Oxfam and the Stockholm Environment Institute, found that climate change and "extreme inequality" have become "interlaced, fused together and driving one another."

Researchers found that of all the carbon emissions in the world in 2019, 16% was produced by the top 1% wealthiest people worldwide — a group that includes billionaires, millionaires and those who earn more than $140,000 a year. The analysis found their contribution "is the same as the emissions of the poorest 66% of humanity" — roughly 5 billion people.


The report also found that the richest 10% percent of people worldwide made up roughly half of emissions that year.

"It would take about 1,500 years for someone in the bottom 99% to produce as much carbon as the richest billionaires do in a year," Chiara Liguori, Oxfam's senior climate justice policy adviser said. "This is fundamentally unfair."

The amount of carbon dioxide emissions the top 1% was reported to have produced in 2019 — 5.9 billion tonnes — is enough to change global temperatures enough to lead to the deaths of an estimated 1.3 million people, the report says, citing a widely-used methodology known as "mortality cost of carbon."

The report also highlighted that just 12 of the world's richest billionaires have contributed nearly 17 million tonnes of emissions from their homes, transportation, yachts and investments — an amount it said was more than 4 1/2 coal power plants over the course of a year.

At the top of that list is Carlos Slim Helu, who according to Forbes has a net worth of $94.7 billion. He was followed by Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos, Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, and luxury retail magnate Bernard Arnault.

Earth is "under siege"

Oregon State University ecology professor William Ripple, who is also the director of the Alliance of World Scientists, told CBS News that the report's methodology and findings are "broadly consistent with some recent peer-reviewed scientific literature on this topic."

"Carbon inequality and climate justice are major issues," he said. "To address climate change, we'll need to dramatically reduce inequality and provide support and climate compensation to less wealthy regions."

Last month, Ripple and a team of other scientists published a paper finding that Earth is "under siege" and "in an uncharted territory." They found several all-time high records related to climate change and "deeply concerning patterns of climate-related disasters." They also found that efforts to address these issues have had "minimal progress."

The Guardian and Oxfam report called for a number of steps to help humanity "break free from the climate and inequality trap," including a transition to renewable energy sources. It also suggested a 60% tax on the income of the worlds wealthiest 1%, which the report calculated would lead to a 700-million-ton reduction in global emissions.

U.N. report shows a dangerous "emissions canyon"

The report on the climate wealth gap came out the same day the United Nations issued its own new report on the cost of climate adaptation. The U.N. Environment Programme found that despite "clear signs" the risks from climate change are increasing, nations are falling further behind in the investments needed in response.

That "adaptation finance gap" is between $194 billion and $366 billion every year, the U.N. report found, saying there needs to be at least 50% more financial investment, and noting that developing countries have "significantly higher" costs and needs than others.

Greenhouse gas emissions — which trap heat in the atmosphere and drive warming — have increased 1.2% since last year, reaching record highs.

Sobering climate change report says we're falling short of promises made in Paris Climate Agreement

U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres told reporters Monday that "if nothing changes, in 2030 emissions will be 22 gigatons higher than the 1.5 degree limit would allow" — referencing the goal of limiting warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius higher than pre-industrial times. It's expected that the world may surpass that level within the next five years.

"All of this is a failure of leadership, a betrayal of the vulnerable and a massive missed opportunity. Renewables have never been cheaper or more accessible," Guterres said. "...The report shows that the emissions gap is more like an emissions canyon — a canyon littered with broken promises, broken lives and broken records."

CBS News correspondent Pamela Falk contributed to this report.

‘Sacrificing us at the altar of their greed’: Richest 10% in EU emit as much carbon as poorest 50%

Ian Smith
Mon, November 20, 2023 

The richest 10 per cent in the EU are responsible for as much carbon pollution as the poorest 50 per cent, a new report by Oxfam reveals.

“Their increasingly luxurious lifestyles and escalating opulence are wreaking havoc on our planet," says Oxfam EU tax expert Chiara Putaturo. “Meanwhile ordinary people are burdened with rising costs and the dire consequences of heatwaves, floods, and landslides caused by human greed.”

These outsized emissions of Europe’s richest will cause 67,800 heat-related excess deaths by 2100, the equivalent of almost 850 deaths every year.

Should Europe introduce a new wealth tax?

The charity is calling for a European wealth tax to raise nearly €250 billion a year which could be used to reduce pollution and inequality.

Through the European Green Deal the EU has set out ambitious climate targets, but question marks still remain over the financing of its implementation.

World on track for nearly 3C of warming under current climate plans, UN report warns

“We need a European wealth tax. Economists want it, multi-millionaires want it and people want it,” Putaturo says.

The report also outlines the stark global inequalities fuelling the climate crisis.

The richest 1 per cent of the world’s population, which includes billionaires, millionaires and those making above $140,000 (€128,172), produced as much carbon pollution in 2019 as the five billion people who made up the poorest two-thirds of humanity.

It argues that we need “a radical new approach if we are to stand any chance at overcoming the catastrophe unfolding before us.”

Greta Thunberg slams the greed of rich people

In a foreword to the new report Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg condemns the richest 1 per cent for “sacrificing us at the altar of their greed.”

She continues: “The people most responsible for the climate crisis – mainly white, privileged men – are also the ones who have been given a leading role in getting us out of it.

“How have we left the culprits in charge when there is so much at stake?”

How can we address global inequalities?

Oxfam is calling on governments to dramatically reduce inequality by a global redistribution of income in the form of a wealth tax.

It also calls for a quick and just transition away from fossil fuels and a change in mindset that prioritises the wellbeing of humans and the planet over endless profit and consumption.

Experts overwhelmingly blame one person for climate change confusion: ‘One of the greatest climate villains’

Leo Collis
Tue, November 21, 2023 



Rupert Murdoch announced in September that he would step down as chairman of Fox Corp and News Corp.

The Australian’s impact on the media landscape since the 1950s has had far-reaching and damaging consequences.

Speaking to the Guardian, climate scientist at Australian National University Joëlle Gergis said: “It’s hard to think of another person who has single-handedly done more to muddy the public’s understanding of climate change.”

Other scientists did not give Murdoch particularly glowing reviews upon the news of his decision to hand over control of the media empire to his son, Lachlan.

Climate scientist and University of Pennsylvania professor Michael Mann added, per the Guardian: “He has wielded his global media empire as a cudgel to sow confusion and doubt about the science and the solutions. He will go down in history as one of the greatest climate villains.”

Murdoch’s role in climate science denial is nothing new. In 2013, the Australian Centre for Independent Journalism studied 602 articles across 10 newspapers in Australia and found that 32% either dismissed or questioned whether human activity was responsible for global heating.

The findings were summarized by the Guardian, and the contribution of Murdoch’s News Corp to that figure was shocking.

The Guardian said that 97% of comment pieces in the Herald Sun, under Murdoch’s media empire, published climate-skeptic views. Syndicated columnist Andrew Bolt was responsible for a number of these articles, with similar work also published in The Advertiser, NT News, and Daily Telegraph.

Murdoch was also criticized for inaccurate statements regarding climate science in the past; a 2014 Sky News interview contained misguided comments, as reported by the Guardian.

The Conversation has detailed several troubling or inaccurate stories News Corp pushed in Australia as part of a Mission Zero 2050 campaign, which was supposed to encourage the country to move toward a net-zero future.

There were articles about how renewable sources are an unreliable source of power, while another praised Australia’s coal industry as cleaner than coal industries in most other countries.

“He’s a true villain on a global scale,” one Redditor said of Murdoch when commenting on the Guardian’s unflattering review of his climate impact during his career.

“This dude will be responsible for the deaths of millions,” added another.

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Mexican officials admit secrecy-shrouded border train project had no environmental impact study

DANIEL SHAILER
Updated Tue, November 21, 2023

FILE - Construction continues for a new train line in northern Mexico, in San Lorenzo, Sonora state, Mexico, Monday, Nov. 13, 2023. Residents in the northern state of Sonora are battling the new train line which they say threatens to displace their homes and cut up the local ecosystem. The governor of Mexico’s northern state of Sonora acknowledged Tuesday, Nov. 21, that a secrecy-shrouded train project was an army undertaking that has not yet submitted any environmental impact statement, months after construction already started. (AP Photo/Luis Castillo, File) 


MEXICO CITY (AP) — The governor of Mexico’s northern state of Sonora acknowledged Tuesday that a secrecy-shrouded train project was an army undertaking that has not yet submitted any environmental impact statement, months after construction had already started.

The rail link between the port of Guaymas and the border city of Nogales threatens to cut through and damage environmentally-sensitive conservation lands.

Sonora Gov. Alfonso Durazo justified the new rail line project saying it would solve the problem of a rail line that passed through the center of Nogales by diverting rail traffic outside the city.


But while the state is partially financing the project, Durazo said it is "being carried out by the Defense department,” adding that the state's operational role is limited to helping the Army secure the rights-of-way.

The Sonora state government is trying to convert Guaymas, on the Gulf of California, into a major container port, but the current railway connection to the United States cuts the city of Nogales in half.

The new rail line cuts a completely new path well south of Nogales that threatens to cut through the Aribabi ranch, a federally designated Natural Protected Area, and the town of Imuris, 40 miles (65 kilometers) south of the U.S.-Mexico border.

The project illustrates the power that Mexico’s president Andrés Manuel López Obrador has given to the army, which has been allowed to sidestep normal permitting and environmental standards. This has been the case of the Maya Train tourist rail line on the Yucatan peninsula, which cut a swath through the jungle.

In the face of court challenges and criticism, López Obrador in 2021 passed a law stating the projects of importance to “national security” would not have to submit impact statements until up to a year after they start construction.

Under Mexico's environmental laws, sidestepping impact assessments ought to be “completely illegal," said said Alex Olivera, a senior scientist with the Center for Biological Diversity. “But this is AMLO’s government, so probably they will say that it is ‘strategic infrastructure’” like the Maya Train, and therefore exempt.

Opponents have been unable to get even the most basic information on the train line, with no federal, local or state authority willing to take responsibility for the $350 million project to build 40 miles (63 kilometers) of train line.

Even though parts are already under construction and government contractors have begun felling trees and bulldozing the path for the railroad toward the Aribabi ranch — home to a rare combination of black bears and jaguars — no environmental impact statement has ever been filed.

“Because it is a strategic project, it is the responsibility of the Environment Department and we have a year to submit the environmental impact, and that is well under way,” Durazo said.

Durazo stressed the line was part of an “integrated plan” for transporting freight from Guaymas to the U.S., but that plan appears to have neglected existing train lines north of the border, where Omaha, Nebraska-based Union Pacific operates the line running into Nogales.

“Union Pacific has no plans (for) moving the track in Nogales,” a company spokesperson told The Associated Press.

Local residents also feel left out of Durazo's plan saying there has been no official communication or consultation. The project is not mentioned on any state or federal government websites, or in Sonora state’s development plans.

Omar del Valle Colosio, Sonora state's chief development officer, said all rights-of-way were being negotiated with residents.

“The project being carried out is only being done with the authorization of the public,” Del Valle Colosio said Tuesday.

But local residents say the state’s infrastructure and urban development department has offered to buy portions of some properties for as little as 1.80 pesos (10 U.S. cents) per square meter.

According to a map leaked by a local official in the spring, the project will create a second rail line for a portion of the existing route between Nogales and the port of Guaymas, this time following the Cocospera river south before cutting through the west perimeter of the Aribabi ranch and then pulling west, into Imuris.

Locals say the route rides roughshod over their farms’ irrigation canals and threatens the reservoir that provides water for the township’s 12,500 residents.

In addition to disrupting wildlife that rely on the river, construction will also cut up an important migration corridor over the Azul and El Pinito mountains for ocelots, black bears and jaguars, according to the Center for Biological Diversity.

____

Follow AP’s coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america

Sam Altman is back as OpenAI CEO just days after being removed, along with a new board

The Canadian Press
Wed, November 22, 2023 



The ousted leader of ChatGPT-maker OpenAI is returning to the company that fired him late last week, culminating a days-long power struggle that shocked the tech industry and brought attention to the conflicts around how to safely build artificial intelligence.

San Francisco-based OpenAI said in a statement late Tuesday: “We have reached an agreement in principle for Sam Altman to return to OpenAI as CEO with a new initial board."

The board, which replaces the one that fired Altman on Friday, will be led by former Salesforce co-CEO Bret Taylor, who also chaired Twitter's board before its takeover by Elon Musk last year. The other members will be former U.S. Treasury Secretary Larry Summers and Quora CEO Adam D’Angelo.

OpenAI’s previous board of directors, which included D'Angelo, had refused to give specific reasons for why it fired Altman, leading to a weekend of internal conflict at the company and growing outside pressure from the startup's investors.

The chaos also accentuated the differences between Altman — who's become the face of generative AI's rapid commercialization since ChatGPT's arrival a year ago — and members of the company's board who have expressed deep reservations about the safety risks posed by AI as it gets more advanced.

Microsoft, which has invested billions of dollars in OpenAI and has rights to its current technology, quickly moved to hire Altman on Monday, as well as another co-founder and former president, Greg Brockman, who had quit in protest after Altman's removal. That emboldened a threatened exodus of nearly all of the startup's 770 employees who signed a letter calling for the board's resignation and Altman's return.

One of the four board members who participated in Altman's ouster, OpenAI co-founder and chief scientist Ilya Sutskever, later expressed regret and joined the call for the board's resignation.

Microsoft in recent days had pledged to welcome all employees who wanted to follow Altman and Brockman to a new AI research unit at the software giant. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella also made clear in a series of interviews Monday that he was still open to the possibility of Altman returning to OpenAI, so long as the startup's governance problems are solved.

“We are encouraged by the changes to the OpenAI board,” Nadella posted on X late Tuesday. “We believe this is a first essential step on a path to more stable, well-informed, and effective governance.”

In his own post, Altman said that “with the new board and (with) Satya's support, I'm looking forward to returning to OpenAI, and building on our strong partnership with (Microsoft)."

Co-founded by Altman as a nonprofit with a mission to safely build so-called artificial general intelligence that outperforms humans and benefits humanity, OpenAI later became a for-profit business but one still run by its nonprofit board of directors. It's not clear yet if the board's structure will change with its newly appointed members.

“We are collaborating to figure out the details,” OpenAI posted on X. “Thank you so much for your patience through this.”

Nadella said Brockman, who was OpenAI's board chairman until Altman's firing, will also have a key role to play in ensuring the group “continues to thrive and build on its mission.”

Hours earlier, Brockman returned to social media as if it were business as usual, touting a feature called ChatGPT Voice that was rolling out to users.

“Give it a try — totally changes the ChatGPT experience,” Brockman wrote, flagging a post from OpenAI's main X account that featured a demonstration of the technology and playfully winking at recent turmoil.

“It’s been a long night for the team and we’re hungry. How many 16-inch pizzas should I order for 778 people,” the person asks, using the number of people who work at OpenAI. ChatGPT's synthetic voice responded by recommending around 195 pizzas, ensuring everyone gets three slices.

As for OpenAI's short-lived interim CEO Emmett Shear, the second interim CEO in the days since Altman's ouster, he posted on X that he was “deeply pleased by this result, after (tilde)72 very intense hours of work.”

“Coming into OpenAI, I wasn't sure what the right path would be,” wrote Shear, the former head of Twitch. “This was the pathway that maximized safety alongside doing right by all stakeholders involved. I'm glad to have been a part of the solution.”

Matt O'brien, The Associated Press

SEE

https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/2023/11/wowzers-chatgpt-maker-openai-ousts-sam.html

https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/2023/11/workers-power-nearly-all-of-openai.html

Who is Banksy? Everything we know about his identity

The full name of the renowned Bristol street artist has finally been revealed after years of uncertainty about his identity.


Connor Parker, Emily Cleary and Ellen Manning
Updated Tue, November 21, 2023 

Banksy has been linked The Crown pub in Somerset. (Getty and SWNS)

Renowned graffiti artist Banksy revealed his real name in a newly unearthed BBC interview from 2003.

Former BBC reporter Nigel Wrench interviewed the renowned street artist ahead of the 2003 Turf War show in East London, where he was heard confirming his first name.

Wrench asked Banksy if he could include his real name in the interview, asking the artist if he is called Robert Banks, in which he replied “ It’s Robbie.”

Over the years, speculation has risen about the Bristol-based artist - who had remained anonymous for decades - but his identity has never been confirmed.

In July, the BBC released an edited version of the recording where Banksy describes his approach to art as “quick,” adding “I want to get it done and dusted.”

The elusive artist’s real identity has never been officially revealed but a 2008 interview sheds light on who the real Bansky is.

After listening to the podcast, Wrench was inspired to revisit the recording where he discovered information about the artist that was never used- this was then included in a special bonus episode of the BBC podcast series.

Banksy who was in his 20s at the time of the interview, was also heard defending his art, which is considered by some to be vandalism.

"I'm not here to apologise for it," he told Wrench. "It's a quicker way of making your point, right?"

Read more: Banksy migrant ship detained in Italy for 'breaking rules'

Banksy's has become famous for his distinctive street art. (Getty) (Mondadori Portfolio via Getty Images)
Has Banksy's identity ever been revealed?

Over the years, there have been various theories and claims about Banksy's identity, but none have been confirmed.

Banksy's intentional anonymity allowed him to operate without facing legal repercussions for his often unauthorised street art, which can be considered vandalism in some jurisdictions.

It also allowed him to operate however he pleases without fear of being followed by fans or the media.

Read more: Banksy artwork sold at auction for three times estimate by band who changed name for piece

Banksy does not support the sale of his art. 

(Getty) (Mondadori Portfolio via Getty Images)

Many have tried to guess who the artist is and the general assumption is he lives in or near Bristol, but other than that very little was known about him.

In the recording of The Banksy Story (available on BBC Radio 4), he described himself as a “painter and decorator” and explaining why he likes to glue works of art to buildings like the Louvre, saying: “You don’t want to get stuck in the same line of work your whole life long, do you?”

The podcast was the latest clue as to the identity of the elusive artist, after a village pub near Glastonbury was rumoured to have been bought by him and refurbished to the tune of £1m.

At the time Owain Powell, who runs the The Crown in Pilton, Somerset, with partner Rowena Draper, denied Banksy's involvement.

What is Banksy's real name and how has he remained anonymous?

According to the recording his real name is Robert Banks, but since emerging to the scene in the early 1990s, he has always chosen to keep his identity a mystery- often wearing masks in the rare interviews he does.

He also never reveals the place he will be doing his next artwork, which is often only noticed after members of the public circulate them on social media.
How does Banksy make money?

Banksy generates income through various means, despite his anonymous persona and unconventional approach.

Part of his persona even rejects the concept of "commercial success" and has in the past encouraged people not to buy his work.

Speaking to Village Voice in 2013, the artist said: "Graffiti art has a hard enough life as it is, before you add hedge-fund managers wanting to chop it out and hang it over the fireplace.

"For the sake of keeping all street art where it belongs, I’d encourage people not to buy anything by anybody, unless it was created for sale in the first place."

Despite this, he has still likely made a significant sum of money from his work.

Read more: Art fan who pushed Banksy to make a piece in Herne Bay 'heartbroken' after work destroyed by builders

Banky's satirical graffiti has become famous across the world. (Getty) (Mondadori Portfolio via Getty Images)

He has published several books in his time, including best-seller Wall and Piece and likely generates royalties from that.

Banksy has also directed an award-winning documentary called Exit Through The Gift Shop, exploring modern and underground art, which generated more than £3m in profit.

On occasion, Banksy has offered the purchase of some of his art through Pest Control, which is the only way he approves of its sale.

His recent Cut & Run exhibition in Glasgow, attracted about 180,000 visitors, during its 10-week show – his first solo show in 14 years.
Where is Banksy from and how much is he worth?

Although it is hard to know where an anonymous artist is from he rose to fame in the early 1990s with spray-painted murals on walls in Bristol and has stayed connected to it ever since.

The latest Mail report suggests that Banksy is Bristol-born, 53-year-old and public school-educated.

Banksy's art is all over the world in London, New York City, Paris, Bethlehem and elsewhere.

It is difficult to guess how much the artist is worth, but his creations are estimated to be worth nearly £40m.

Read more: Banksy giant seagull mural ‘worth millions’ removed from house

'The Armed Dove' street art by Banksy near the Israeli separation West Bank Wall in Bethlehem. (Getty) (NurPhoto via Getty Images)

However, this valuation is based on the sale of his art which he has not condoned, and the profits usually go to the people who owned the site where the art was located.

Some of the profits of Banksy's art may have made its way back to him but no one knows for sure.
Is Banksy married?

Although never revealed publicly, Banksy fans have identified Joy Millward, who runs a lobby group that campaigns on behalf of charities, as a potential candidate for his wife.

She is married to Robin Gunningham, who has several times been named as the most likely person to be Banksy, including the latest report.

Millward and Gunningham maintain an extremely private life and very little is known about them.

Whether this is a personal choice, or because they are sick of the speculation around supposedly being Banksy and Banksy's wife or if Gunningham is in fact Banksy, we may never know.

Rosalynn Carter Hired a Wrongfully Convicted Murderer to Serve as White House Nanny. They Remained Lifelong Friends

Kathy Ehrich Dowd
Mon, November 20, 2023

Amy Carter playing on the White House grounds with Mary Prince. 

Credit - National Archives and Records Administration/Wiki Commons

Mary Prince, a Black woman who had been convicted of murder, was already a controversial figure at Jimmy Carter’s 1977 Presidential Inauguration.

Although she was incarcerated, Prince was given permission to travel to Washington, D.C. for the event and arrived in a dress made of material given to her by her fellow inmates at the Fulton County Jail and the Atlanta Work Release Center. At the end of the celebration, Prince remembers newly minted First Lady Rosalynn Carter pulling her aside. "Before I left, Mrs. Carter said, 'How would you like to work in this big old place?'" Prince told People that year.

Rosalynn Carter and Prince had known each other for years at that point, and had developed a close bond. Prince had been young Amy Carter's nanny when the family lived at the Georgia governor's mansion, not long after Prince was accused of—and subsequently sentenced to life for—murder. When the Carters arrived at the White House, most political operatives would have advised the family to keep their distance from Prince. But the first couple did the opposite.

After the inauguration, Prince told Rosalynn that she would indeed be interested in working at the White House. And Rosalynn pulled out all the stops: She secured a reprieve for Prince, helped make President Carter her parole officer and officially hired her to serve as Amy Carter's nanny at the White House.

Rosalynn Carter, who died on Sunday at the age of 96, and her husband remained lifelong friends with Prince, and were both staunchly convinced she was wrongly convicted in the 1970 shooting death of a man outside a bar in Lumpkin, Ga., after an argument involving Prince’s cousin.

Read more: Rosalynn Carter, Transformative First Lady and Mental Health Advocate, Dies

“She was totally innocent,” Rosalynn Carter told Kate Anderson Brower for her 2015 book, The Residence: Inside the Private World of the White House, bristling at the slightest hint of wrongdoing. “She had nothing to do with it.”

Both Rosalynn and Jimmy Carter earned a reputation for decency over the decades, and their relationship with Prince, who grew up in poverty in Georgia and dropped out of school in the seventh grade to care for her younger sister, gives more credence to their interest in helping the most vulnerable members of society.

The Carters first met Prince in late 1970 when Jimmy Carter was serving as Georgia governor, and Prince applied for a job as part of a program to put prisoners to work. Prince quickly made a positive impression on Rosalynn Carter, who asked the young woman if she would be interested in taking care of a then-3-year-old Amy Carter. It was a match made in heaven: the toddler bonded so much with her new nanny that she reportedly cried every time Prince left.

In his 2006 book, Our Endangered Values, Jimmy Carter wrote about how Prince was unfairly victimized by the criminal justice system because of her race. He noted that Prince only met her court-appointed lawyer on the first day of her trial, and that the lawyer convinced her to plead guilty after incorrectly promising a light sentence instead of the life sentence that was ultimately handed down.

“She was fortunate and could just as easily have been executed,” Carter wrote. “If the victim had been white, we would never have known Mary Prince.” (Prince, who was also known by the name Mary Fitzpatrick before her formal separation from her husband, was eventually pardoned after a reexamination of her case.)

The Carters raised eyebrows with their decision to move Prince into the White House, both from other members of the White House staff, who were skeptical of her innocence, and from the public at large. Saturday Night Live even spoofed the Carters' relationship with Prince, with Sissy Spacek playing a young Amy Carter and Garrett Morris, in drag, as Prince. The cringe-worthy skit includes dialogue that calls Prince’s innocence into question and hints that the Carters hired her for publicity.

After Carter's one term in the White House, Prince moved just a few blocks from the former first couple in Plains, Ga., where she continued to babysit for their grandchildren. President Carter went on to dedicate his 2004 book Sharing Good Times to “Mary Prince, whom we love and cherish.”

Anderson Brower interviewed both Rosalynn Carter and Prince for her book, and told C-SPAN in 2015 that the two women’s bond remained ironclad. "She's still a huge part of the Carter family," she said at the time. "They consier her one of their own, and they just love her."

Whale that mysteriously vanished 30 years ago is found off Canada. It didn’t end well

Mark Price
Tue, November 21, 2023 

Facebook screengrab

A live humpback whale was found beached on a remote Canada island and closer inspection revealed it was a documented whale not seen in 30 years, according to the Marine Animal Response Society.

The rediscovery ended tragically when the whale suffered a slow, painful death, the society reported in a Nov. 20 Facebook post.

The cause — like so many other things about the whale — is a mystery.

“Some live animal incidents are really difficult to deal with due to safety concerns, location, logistics and the size of the animal. When all these things collide, response can be nearly impossible, much to the heartbreak of all involved,” the society reported.

“Such was the case on November 2nd when a live, adult male humpback whale was reported ashore on Sable Island National Park Reserve. ... Given the size of the humpback and its location on the south side in dangerous surf conditions, there wasn’t much that could be done to help.”

So dire were conditions on the beach that the whale could not even be “humanely euthanized.”

The whale died “after several days,” officials said, and a necropsy of the carcass was not possible.

A photo of taken by Parks Canada helped the Center for Coastal Studies and Allied Whale at the College of the Atlantic identify the massive creature. They discovered it was one “sighted in 1982 on Silver Bank off the Dominican Republic,” which is nearly 1,900 miles south of the island.

That means the whale was at least 43 years old, officials said.

“Interestingly, the animal hadn’t been seen again since the early 1990s leaving us to wonder where this animal spent the last three decades. Our understanding from CCS is that this animal did not have a name,” the society said.

“From what was able to be observed of the animal, there were no external signs of injury or trauma. As such, we do not know why this animal died.”

Sable Island National Park Refuge is in the northwest Atlantic, about 150 miles southeast of Nova Scotia.

Iowa official’s wife found guilty on all 52 counts of voter fraud charges

SHE IS A REPULICAN!

Nick Robertson
Tue, November 21, 2023 

Iowa official’s wife found guilty on all 52 counts of voter fraud charges


Kim Taylor, the wife of an Iowa county supervisor, was found guilty of 52 counts of voter fraud Tuesday, concluding a months-long case into her interference in the 2020 election.

Federal prosecutors said Taylor attempted to “generate votes” in the 2020 primary and general elections in Iowa in order to help her husband, Woodbury County Supervisor Jeremy Taylor, win the primary for Rep. Steve King’s (R-Iowa) former seat.

Jeremy Taylor lost that primary, receiving only 8 percent of the vote, but prosecutors said Kim Taylor again broke the law in assisting her husband to seek reelection as a supervisor that fall, which he did win.

According to prosecutors, Taylor applied for and submitted false absentee ballots, signed ballots on voters’ behalf without their permission and encouraged others to do the same.

She was arrested in January.

The 52 counts carry a maximum sentence of five years each. A sentencing date has not yet been scheduled.

U.S. Attorney Timothy Duax denounced Taylor’s actions in a statement to local outlet KCAU.

“The right to vote is one of our most important constitutional rights. Ms. Taylor deprived citizens of their right to vote in order to benefit her husband’s campaign,” Duax said. “The guilty verdict is an example of how the justice system works to protect the voting rights of citizens, and ensure fair and honest elections.”

Jeremy Taylor, still serving as a county supervisor, defended his wife in a statement.

“While this was certainly not the outcome we were hoping for, we respect our court system that allowed the jury to hear my wife’s side of the story,” he told KCAU. “While I plan to continue making decisions that are best for our county’s families, my first priority right now is to deal with today’s results as a private matter in order to be there for my own family, my wife and our children.”

Could newly released Jan. 6 footage backfire for Mike Johnson and the GOP?

Rafi Schwartz, The Week US
Mon, November 20, 2023 

Mike Johnson, the QAnon Shaman and CCTV cameras.

When Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) finally convinced his fellow Republicans to elect him speaker of the house nearly one year ago, he did so only by agreeing to a Faustian bargain of sorts: empowering any one member of his barely-there majority with the ability to remove him from the role. This, of course, inevitably led to his own ignominious ousting last month. So far, his successor, Rep. Mike Johnson (R-La.), has been granted a measure of leeway and patience from his raucous GOP conference and now grapples with the consequences of his own promise made to secure the speaker's gavel: a vow to make public thousands of hours of footage from the Jan. 6 insurrection on the United States Capitol.

"When I ran for Speaker, I promised to make accessible to the American people the 44,000 hours of video from Capitol Hill security taken on January 6, 2021," Johnson wrote on X, formerly Twitter, insisting that now "millions of Americans, criminal defendants, public interest organizations, and the media" will have access to footage themselves, instead of relying on "the interpretation of a small group of government officials."

While Johnson's promise is not the procedural threat to his speakership that McCarthy's motion-to-vacate agreement was, it nevertheless represents a potential risk for the arch-ultraconservative's relatively untested leadership. Like McCarthy before him, Johnson's decision to revisit the events of, and antecedents to, the attack on the Capitol forces his own party to address both the violence of the day itself, as well as the broader effort by former President Donald Trump to subvert the 2020 elections — an area which many Republicans see as a "terrible political strategy" no matter how often they violate their own instincts on the subject, Politico reported this past spring.
What the commentators said

Already, allies of the former president are using the first tranche of newly public footage to "further a debunked narrative" that the insurrection was engineered and orchestrated by federal law enforcement "in order to distract from election fraud," Forbes reported. In particular, "far-right social media users" as well as Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) have zeroed in on footage of a man they claim is an undercover police officer flashing a badge during the riot.

"That's a law enforcement badge in his hand while disguised as a Trump supporter in a MAGA hat," Rep. Greene wrote in a since-edited post on X, which no longer includes that line but continues to assert that "MAGA did not do this."

Releasing the footage is "part of a larger effort by Republicans to redefine the narrative around the deadly insurrection" after a bipartisan House Select Committee report blamed Trump for instigating the attack, according to The Associated Press. Mindful of his party's extreme right flank, Johnson is working to "curry favor with the group after using a stop-gap bill to keep the government open," CNN reported — a similar move to that which prompted McCarthy's ousting this fall.

By releasing these tapes, Johnson has not only exacerbated a "serious security concern" regarding how rioters were able to enter the U.S. Capitol Complex but has confirmed "his allegiance, like Kevin McCarthy’s before him, is to Donald Trump and the ultra-right-wing faction of the House," former January 6 committee spokesperson Hannah Muldavin told Roll Call. As former Republican Rep. Vin Weber explained to The Hill during last month's speaker turmoil, "Republicans in marginal districts are worried about Democrat opponents running ads that say Congress person-X voted to make Jim Jordan Speaker, and he was involved in the Jan. 6 insurrection." While Jordan did not succeed at grabbing the gavel, vulnerable Republicans remain keenly concerned over their party's associations with the insurrection itself.

Evidence suggests that the insurrection "alienates and could mobilize independent voters in particular," The Washington Post's Aaron Blake concurred this past spring.
What next?

While Rep. Greene has used the latest released footage to call for a new congressional committee to investigate Jan. 6, her demand is a "political stunt to delay resolution and to muddy public opinion on the matter," Northeastern University Professor of Political Science Costas Panagopoulos told Newsweek, which noted that much of the social media response to Greene's call suggested that a "new committee would backfire on Republicans."

TOXIC WORKPLACE
Tesla factory workers reportedly say they're getting in shouting matches — and sometimes even fights break out

Grace Kay
Tue, November 21, 2023

Robots during the production of the Tesla Model Y in the Tesla Gigafactory in Grünheide, Germany. In Tesla's gigafactory plant in Texas, the atmosphere is tense — with near daily verbal fights, The Information reported.

Patrick Pleul/picture alliance via Getty Images

Tesla's Texas gigafactory is home to near-daily worker outbursts, The Information reported.


The police have also responded to multiple calls regarding physical altercations, the report said.


Elon Musk has been known to push workers through "production hell."

Workers at Tesla's Austin gigafactory may be feeling the pressure from Elon Musk's deadlines.

Some workers from the Texas factory told The Information that verbal fights occur at the facility on a near-daily basis — and even some physical fights have taken place, they said.

Local police were called on some occasions, the report said. Police received multiple phone calls about physical altercations, including with a weapon — and some that were categorized as "terroristic threats," the report said.

In one instance, Tesla emailed employees at the site in July regarding an "active attacker" at the gigafcatory, but the Travis County (Texas) sheriff told The Information that they didn't find an attacker or any victims after they searched the location.

The Information's report also analyzed workplace injuries at the factory and found that about one in every 21 workers dealt with some kind of injury at the factory last year, according to data the publication cited from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, or OSHA. For comparison, the median for an automotive factory of a similar size is about one in 30, the publication said.

Tesla employs about 20,000 workers at the Austin factory, and plans to triple the number in the ramp-up for its Cybertruck, a company spokesperson told the San Antonio Express-News in September.

A spokesperson for Tesla did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

The Information's report comes after Reuters published an investigation into workplace injuries at SpaceX earlier this month. Some workers told the publication that employees were taking Adderall and sleeping at the factory in order to keep up with Elon Musk's deadlines. The news agency looked at 600 work injuries at SpaceX over the past 9 years.

SpaceX didn't respond to a detailed request for comment from Reuters on its article.

Musk has been known to run his companies with high intensity, sometimes calling for work sprints and even sleeping on the factory floor at Tesla.

At the Austin gigafactory, the electric-car maker is working to deliver its first electric pickup truck. Musk has warned that scaling production of the Cybertruck will be "extremely difficult."

Ahead of the 2017 release of the Model 3, Musk famously pushed workers at Tesla's Fremont factory through "production hell."

And in 2018, Bloomberg reported on safety complaints from workers related to the production ramp, including an instance where workers allegedly walked through raw sewage to keep a factory line moving.

A Tesla spokesperson denied the accusations at the time.

"Nothing is more important to us than the safety of our employees," A Tesla representative told Insider in 2018. "This is not to say that there aren't real issues that need to be dealt with at Tesla or that we've made no mistakes with any of the 40,000 people who work at our company. However, there should be absolutely no question that we care deeply about the well-being of our employees and that we try our absolute hardest to do the right thing and to fail less often. With each passing month, we improve safety further and will keep doing so until we have the safest factory in the world by far."