December 2022 - cypherpunks - lists.cpunks.org

MKULTRA: CIA Tortured 300+ Orphaned Children and Destroyed The Evidence
by grarpamp 18 May '23

18 May '23

CIA Experimented On 100s Of Orphans, Torturing Them To Reveal Psychopathic Traits https://thefreethoughtproject.com/cia-torturous-experiments-children-orphan… https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/indland/danske-boernehjemsboern-brugt-i-hemmelig-… https://rai.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1467-8322.2007.00510… https://thefreethoughtproject.com/cia-mind-control-documents-successful/ According to a new documentary out of Denmark, which interviewed former victims, the Central Intelligence Agency secretly carried out experiments on 311 orphaned children. The experiments were meant to reveal psychopathic traits and map out the link between schizophrenia and heredity. According to the report, the children were tortured in clear violation of the Nuremberg Code of 1947 that introduced ethical restrictions for experiments on humans. Hundreds of Danish orphans were unknowingly used in experiments backed by the CIA, according to Danish Radio, reporting on a new documentary called “The Search for Myself.” According to the report, the experiments began in the early 1960s and spanned the course of two decades. They were conducted to investigate the link between heredity and environment in the development of schizophrenia. However, the children were not told what research they were involved in. Not even after the experiments ended. It was also funded in part by a CIA front associated with the MK-Ultra program. Eerily, the examinations took place in a basement at the Municipal Hospital in Copenhagen. The director and producer of the documentary, Per Wennick, was actually a victim of the CIA and subjected to these experiments as a child. In the documentary, he recalled being placed in a chair, getting electrodes put on his arms, legs, and chest around the heart and having to listen to loud, shrill noises, which attempted to incite a psychological response. “It was very uncomfortable”, Wennick told Danish Radio. “And it’s not just my story, it’s the story of many children.” By his own admission, he was promised “something funny” before being taken to the hospital. “I think this is a violation of my rights as a citizen in this society. I find it so strange that some people should know more about me than I myself have been aware of.” According to historian, PhD, and museum inspector at the Danish Welfare Museum, Jacob Knage Rasmussen, this was the only known experiment in Danish history that used children under state care for research — and it was funded by the CIA in violation of the Nuremberg Code. “I do not know of similar attempts, neither in Denmark nor in Scandinavia. It is appalling information that contradicts the Nuremberg Code of 1947, which after World War II was to set some ethical restrictions for experiments on humans. Among other things, informed consent was introduced, which today is central to the world of research”, Knage Rasmussen told Danish Radio. He emphasized the vulnerability of the group in the custody of the state, who had nobody to complain to. According to Danish Radio, the idea to experiment on the vulnerable children came from American psychologist Zarnoff A. Mednick, who was then a professor at the University of Michigan. According to Wennick and the National Archives, the research project was co-financed by the US health service. In the first year alone, the project was supported with what today corresponds to DKK 4.6 million ($700,000). It also received funding from the Human Ecology Fund. The Human Ecology Fund was a CIA funded operation through the Cornell University College of Human Ecology Society for the Investigation of Human Ecology to support covert research on brainwashing. It was also connected to research under the MK-Ultra program in which social scientists, including anthropologists, were led (mostly unwittingly) to provide input into interrogation techniques still in use today. Danish psychiatrist Fini Schulsinger dedicated his doctoral dissertation to the experiments in 1977, titling it, “Studies to shed light on the connection between heredity and environment in psychiatry.” While researching for the documentary, Per Wennick managed to locate 36 boxes at the Psychiatric Centre Glostrup in Hvidovre that detailed the CIA’s unscrupulous child experiments. However, when the center got word of the documentary, they began shredding the documents. Danish Radio reports that Kent Kristensen, associate professor of Health Law at the University of Southern Denmark, pointed out that the shredding of the documents was illegal. “I think it’s a huge failure for the former orphanage children who are interested in the pieces of their own childhood to get a total story made about their own lives. That possibility is deprived of them if you shred the research material,” Knage Rasmussen told Danish Radio. Indeed. It also details the CIA’s depravity and violations of the Nuremberg code. If history is any indicator, however, no one will be held responsible for exploiting these children and it will be swept under the rug, likely escaping any scrutiny by the mainstream media.

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Cryptocurrency: Starves Out Corrupt Gensler's Pelosi's Soros's SBF's Clinton's
by grarpamp 16 May '23

16 May '23

SEC Chairman Gensler Scrubbed Evidence Of Clinton, Soros And Pelosi Meetings: FOIA Lawsuit https://www.foxnews.com/politics/biden-official-hid-info-meetings-george-so… https://fortune.com/crypto/2022/11/11/sbfs-disgrace-could-make-things-awkwa… https://www.foxnews.com/politics/judicial-watch-files-foia-suit-against-nat… https://www.foxbusiness.com/politics/sec-to-float-mandatory-disclosure-of-c… https://www.foxbusiness.com/politics/republicans-introduce-legislation-to-t… Sunlight is the best disinfectant - unless you're Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Gary Gensler - who scrubbed evidence of a meeting with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton from his calendar, along with key details of a meeting with Billionaire leftist-operative George Soros. He also concealed September 21 meetings with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and former Bill Clinton White House official-turned-DC consultant, Minyon Moore. Gensler, a former Goldman Sachs executive, Obama administration official, Clinton's 2016 campaign CFO, and FTX associate, essentially had two calendars. His public calendar showed that on Aug. 7, 2021, he only had a staff meeting, while his private calendar lists a meeting with Hillary Clinton, Fox News reports. Thirteen days later on Aug. 20, 2021, Gensler's public calendar does list a meeting with Soros, but the agenda was hidden. His private calendar reveals that the meeting was held to discuss an upcoming WSJ op-ed Soros was planning to write in which he slammed BlackRock for launching investment products for Chinese customers, while also applauding the company's ESG policies. Gensler's private calendar revealing the discrepancies was obtained by the watchdog group Energy Policy Advocates and shared with Fox News Digital. The group was only able to obtain the internal records after filing a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit against the SEC. In recent days, around the time Fox News Digital contacted the SEC, the agency updated Gensler's public calendar to include his meeting with Clinton in August 2021. As recently as Wednesday the public calendar didn't include the meeting, and archived copies of the webpage from April also list just a meeting with staff. -Fox News When contacted for comment, the SEC initially lied - saying that the Clinton meeting was visible on Gensler's public calendar. When confronted with screenshots to the contrary, the spokesperson said that the agency updates calendars "from time to time" when inaccuracies are discovered (by watchdog groups?). Gensler also concealed several September 2021 meetings with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), and Minyon Moore - both of which have been now updated on Gensler's public calendar. "That even George Soros is calling out progressive darling BlackRock for craven blundering is striking — even if it did carry the requisite, tribal praise for BlackRock's truly damaging 'ESG' (environmental, social and governance) campaigning to impose their shared 'climate' agenda on the U.S., an agenda also much to China's delight," said Chris Horner, a lawyer representing Energy Policy Advocates. "That it appears Soros received counsel from Gary Gensler on the mega-donor's call for more SEC powers as a result is truly astonishing." "This gives further credence to the widespread concern that Gensler is deeply politicizing a supposedly independent commission," he continued. "He may have been Hillary Clinton's ‘Progressive Beacon’ not long ago, but Gary Gensler is now the SEC chairman, and his calendar indicates he knew the purpose of the meeting. It seems important to know whose idea this was, why, what was said arranging it and through what channel." According to the SEC spokesperson, Gensler has never asked anyone to 'draft or submit' an op-ed, but declined to comment on the meeting with Soros. Gensler has faced heavy criticism from business groups and Republican lawmakers for pushing progressive policies, including a climate disclosure rule that would require publicly traded companies to share carbon emissions data and other climate information. Reps. Bill Huizenga, R-Mich., and Andy Barr, R-Ky., two top GOP members on the House Financial Services Committee, introduced legislation this month that would limit the SEC's ability to require such climate disclosures. -Fox News "That this and Gensler's consultation with Hillary were scrubbed from the public version of his calendar is frankly the least surprising aspect of this," Horner continued. "The SEC first told Energy Policy Advocates that the publicly posted calendars were all they would get." "Energy Policy Advocates challenged that, pointing out that these sanitized versions, typically posted months after the fact, were certainly not produced from memory and the group wanted the originals. Here you see the reason for the scrubbing these internal versions receive."

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1984: USA Launches Disinfo Ministry of Truth
by grarpamp 13 May '23

13 May '23

The USA Democrat Left just deployed 1984 to continue control the narrative, and program your mind... DHS Disinformation' Unit Headed by Woman Who Said Hunter Biden Laptop Story Was Disinformation https://summit.news/2022/04/28/dhs-disinformation-unit-headed-by-woman-who-… Houston, we have a problem. The Department of Homeland Security's new `disinformation' unit will be headed by a woman who says free speech makes her `shudder' and who falsely labeled the Hunter Biden laptop story disinformation. Oh dear. Just two days after it was revealed that Elon Musk had reached an agreement to buy Twitter, DHS chief Alejandro Mayorkas announced the creation of a "disinformation governance board." The new board will focus primarily on "misinformation related to homeland security, focused specifically on irregular migration and Russia." The board will be headed by Nina Jankowicz, a former advisor to the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry who oversaw related issued at the National Democratic Institute lobby group. "Cat’s out of the bag," Jankowicz tweeted. "Here's what I've been up to the past two months, and why I’ve been a bit quiet on here." Cat's out of the bag: here's what I've been up to the past two months, and why I've been a bit quiet on here. Honored to be serving in the Biden Administration [45]@DHSgov and helping shape our counter-disinformation efforts. [46]https://t.co/uN20vl7qqV [47]pic.twitter.com/JEn4FqLdck -- Nina Jankowicz <U+1F1FA><U+1F1E6><U+1F1FA><U+1F1F8> (@wiczipedia) [48]April 27, 2022 Jankowicz's view of free speech is particularly odious. Free speech apparently makes her physically shudder. "I shudder to think about if free speech absolutists were taking over more platforms, what that would look like for the marginalized communities, which are already shouldering disproportionate amounts of this abuse," she tweeted in response to Musk's Twitter takeover. NEWS: DHS is officially launching its own Ministry of Truth, or the so-called "Disinformation Governance Board." Nina Jankowicz will head the board as executive director. "Free speech absolutists" make her "shudder," so everything should be fine. [49]pic.twitter.com/wVc7hEBX11 -- Young Americans for Liberty (@YALiberty) [50]April 27, 2022 Jankowicz previously called Musk an "online abuser," while arguing for more censorship when she asserted, "The ‘free speech vs censorship’ framing is a false dichotomy." But crucially, the woman handed the role of deciding what constitutes "disinformation," previously labeled a completely truthful story "disinformation" because it was seen to be harmful to Joe Biden's presidential chances. Jankowicz promoted the actual disinformation that the New York Post Hunter Biden laptop story was a "Russian influence op." Back on the "laptop from hell," apparently- Biden notes 50 former natsec officials and 5 former CIA heads that believe the laptop is a Russian influence op. Trump says "Russia, Russia, Russia." -- Nina Jankowicz <U+1F1FA><U+1F1E6><U+1F1FA><U+1F1F8> (@wiczipedia) [51]October 23, 2020 She also wrongly asserted that it was a "Trump campaign product," while also claiming Trump supporters would show up at the polls with weapons to intimidate voters. Jankowicz's appointment once again underscores how moral panics about `disinformation' and `misinformation' are contrived frauds designed to bury legitimate information harmful to the regime's narrative. Both the Hunter Biden laptop scandal and the lab leak theory, two of the biggest news stories of 2020, were truthful yet branded "disinformation" so they could be buried by social media algorithms to prevent their viral spread. Along with `fact checkers', the new DHS disinformation unit is just another branch of the Ministry of Truth, which as in Orwell's 1984, serves a primary purpose of hiding and eliminating the truth.

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Leaks: US Supreme Court Staffer Leaks Roe v Wade... WitchHunt Protests Police Ensue
by grarpamp 13 May '23

13 May '23

Batten down the hatches... https://www.politico.com/news/2022/05/02/supreme-court-abortion-draft-opini… https://www.politico.com/f/?id=00000180-874f-dd36-a38c-c74f98520000 Who Leaked The Supreme Court Opinion? https://summit.news/2022/05/03/who-leaked-the-supreme-court-opinion/ https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2022/05/02/leaked-supreme-court-opinion-… After a draft Supreme Court opinion overruling Roe v. Wade was leaked to the press, speculation turned to who was responsible, with calls for them to be arrested. The majority of the court has decided to vote 5-4 to overturn federal constitutional protection of abortion rights, with Justice Samuel Alito writing, “Roe was egregiously wrong from the start,” in addition to asserting, “We hold that Roe and Casey must be overruled.” In an unprecedented move, the opinion was leaked to Politico, presumably in an attempt to create massive social unrest that would lead to one or more of the justices being intimidated into changing their mind. “But it is not a binding decision of the court unless at least five justices sign it, and this looks like a transparent and unprecedented betrayal by one of the 45 or so people with access to a draft Supreme Court opinion to prevent this decision from becoming law by scaring off moderate justices and attempting to whip the political left into a frenzy,” reports Breitbart. Experts say the Supreme Court will lose the trust of a generation of Americans if the decision is walked back due to political pressure, but that didn’t stop whichever irate leftist leaked the document metaphorically pulling the pin on the grenade in an attempt to interfere in democracy. “The American people’s belief in the rule of law would be shaken if they lost respect for this Court as an institution that decides important cases based on principle, not ‘social and political pressures’,” states the leaked document itself. “But we cannot exceed the scope of our authority under the Constitution, and we cannot allow our decisions to be affected by the extraneous influences such as concern about the public’s reaction to our work,” Alito responds. Leaking a draft SCOTUS ruling is worse than January 6th. The Court was the one institution where conservatives and liberals lived in peace and trust. You disagreed but the trust was sacred. This completely destroys the Court’s inner workings. Totally in shock right now. — Cernovich (@Cernovich) May 3, 2022 The only people with access to the original document were the nine justices and their 36 law clerks, meaning it’s almost certain that one of the 36 law clerks leaked the document. When you consider that each justice has four clerks working for them, that probably narrows it down to one of 16 clerks working for the four Democrat-appointed justices. “The fact that some are praising this leak shows how utterly craven we have become in our politics,” tweeted attorney Jonathan Turley. “There appears no ethical rule or institutional interest that can withstand this age of rage.” The fact that some are praising this leak shows how utterly craven we have become in our politics. There appears no ethical rule or institutional interest that can withstand this age of rage. — Jonathan Turley (@JonathanTurley) May 3, 2022 Other respondents highlighted how the leak is designed to intimidate the justices, via sparking potential mass civil unrest, into changing their mind. The perpetrator, who is already being lionized as a hero by the left, should face immediate arrest. Interference in a Supreme Court decision is a blow to democracy - like, say, stopping an electoral vote The conspirators must be rounded up and arrested and placed next to the J6 detainees — Jack Posobiec ☦️ (@JackPosobiec) May 3, 2022 Probably the greatest violation of unwritten "norms" in the history of the Supreme Court. And I absolutely guarantee you the leaker spent years railing against President Trump's undermining of norms. https://t.co/XSa9LaGb66 — Josh Hammer (@josh_hammer) May 3, 2022 This is why they leaked: "Justices can and sometimes do change their votes as draft opinions circulate and major decisions can be subject to multiple drafts and vote-trading...The court’s holding will not be final until it is published, likely in the next two months." (Politico) https://t.co/9k0JfLfYZd — Andrew "Leaked Majority Opinion" Kolvet (@AndrewKsay) May 3, 2022 Democrats are now expected to launch an attempt at court packing before they lose Congress in November, although the 5-4 decision should be rubber stamped before then. The leaking of the opinion is brazenly an attempt to subvert that process, create more chaos and violence in America, and derail the constitutional functioning of the Supreme Court. But that won’t matter at all to leftists, who think their moral right to kill babies supersedes all other concerns. 'Betrayal': Supreme Court Slams Leaked Roe Opinion, Says Does Not Represent "Final Decision" The Supreme Court issued a rare rebuttal to Monday's leaked Politico report on a draft opinion overturning abortion rights in the US. Yesterday, a news organization published a copy of a draft opinion in a pending case. Justices circulate draft opinions internally as a routine and essential part of the Court’s confidential deliberative work. Although the document described in yesterday’s reports is authentic, it does not represent a decision by the Court or the final position of any member on the issues in the case. Chief Justice John G. Roberts. Jr., provided the following statement: To the extent this betrayal of the confidences of the Court was intended to undermine the integrity of our operations, it will not succeed. The work of the Court will not be affected in any way. We at the Court are blessed to have a workforce - permanent employees and law clerks alike - intensely loyal to the institution and dedicated to the rule of law. Court employees have an exemplary and important tradition of respecting the confidentiality of the judicial process and upholding the trust of the Court. This was a singular and egregious breach of that trust that is an affront to the Court and the community of public servants who work here. I have directed the Marshal of the Court to launch an investigation into the source of the leak. Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) said on Tuesday that the leaked draft ruling by the Supreme Court overturning Roe was "completely inconsistent" with what Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh told her in private during confirmation hearings when they were Supreme Court nominees. "If this leaked draft opinion is the final decision and this reporting is accurate, it would be completely inconsistent with what Justice Gorsuch and Justice Kavanaugh said in their hearings and in our meetings in my office," said Collins. "Obviously, we won’t know each Justice’s decision and reasoning until the Supreme Court officially announces its opinion in this case." Collins defended her vote for Kavanaugh in 2018, stating that she didn't believe he would vote to overturn Roe. "I do not believe Brett Kavanaugh will overturn Roe v. Wade," she said at the time. "He noted that Roe had been reaffirmed 19 years later by Planned Parenthood vs. Casey. And that it was precedent on precedent. He said it should be extremely rare that it should be overturned." Meanwhile, the Supreme Court says yesterday's leaked report is authentic. Protests erupted outside the US Supreme Court overnight after a draft majority opinion overturning Roe v. Wade leaked to Politico. Photo: Alex Brandon / AP Barriers were erected outside the courthouse as hundreds gathered outside to protest the news, the Washington Post reports. A smaller group of pro-life protesters also showed up, chanting "Pro-choice, that’s a lie. Babies never choose to die," while the larger group of pro-abortion protesters shouted "When abortion rights are under attack, what do we do? Stand up, fight back!" Breaking: Protests are beginning to form outside the Supreme Court. This is just the beginning. #GOPHandmaidsTale pic.twitter.com/8OYnmRxZyN — MeidasTouch.com (@MeidasTouch) May 3, 2022 A couple hundred people, most in their 20s and 30s, are now outside SCOTUS. There’s still not yet any organized protest or chanting, just folks standing around talking. Guy just whipped out a can of White Claw. pic.twitter.com/PCrXisy0Ys — Natalie Allison (@natalie_allison) May 3, 2022 Really rich hearing the Left trot out this old chant after the past 2 years of them cheering on vaccine mandates. pic.twitter.com/6yhay9YWaw — The Columbia Bugle 🇺🇸 (@ColumbiaBugle) May 3, 2022 A scuffle broke out shortly after midnight, as several 'masked protesters' tried to force the pro-life protesters to clear out. Neither group budged according to the report. 2nd clip from the scuffle, looks like someone in a suit gets clocked. pic.twitter.com/BATtQmE7Ms — Doge (@IntelDoge) May 3, 2022 "The first line in the draft is that this is a moral issue. If it’s a moral issue, you shouldn’t be depriving us of our choice," said Annie McDonnell, a student at George Washington University. President Joe Biden responded to the report with a statement he undoubtedly had zero involvement crafting, saying: "We do not know whether this draft is genuine, or whether it reflects the final decision of the Court." The statement adds that Roe is based on a "long line of precedent recognizing ‘the Fourteenth Amendments concept of personal liberty... against government interference with intensely personal decisions," adding that he believes a woman's right to choose is 'fundamental,' and that Roe has been the 'law of the land for almost fifty years, and basic fairness and the stability of our law' demand that it not be overturned." Biden then said that the White House's "Gender Policy Council" has prepared options to respond to "the continued attack on abortion and reproductive rights, under a variety of possible outcomes in the cases pending before the Supreme Court. Supreme Court Set To Overturn Roe v Wade, Leaked Draft Opinion Shows A leaked draft of a US Supreme Court decision reveals that the majority of the court has decided to overturn Roe v. Wade by a vote of 5-4, according to Politico, which calls it a "full-throated, unflinching repudiation of the 1973 decision which guaranteed federal constitutional protections of abortion rights and a subsequent 1992 decision – Planned Parenthood v. Casey – that largely maintained the right." "Roe was egregiously wrong from the start," wrote Justice Samuel Alito in the draft which was circulated inside the court before someone leaked it to the news outlet. "We hold that Roe and Casey must be overruled." “No draft decision in the modern history of the court has been disclosed publicly while a case was still pending. The unprecedented revelation is bound to intensify the debate over what was already the most controversial case on the docket this term.” https://t.co/2os0uJWyUr — Eamon Javers (@EamonJavers) May 3, 2022 Politico highlighted these 10 passages from the draft opinion: “We hold that Roe and Casey must be overruled. The Constitution makes no reference to abortion, and no such right is implicitly protected by any constitutional provision....” “Roe was egregiously wrong from the start. Its reasoning was exceptionally weak, and the decision has had damaging consequences. And far from bringing about a national settlement of the abortion issue, Roe and Casey have enflamed debate and deepened division. It is time to heed the Constitution and return the issue of abortion to the people’s elected representatives.” “In the years prior to [Roe v. Wade], about a third of the States had liberalized their laws, but Roe abruptly ended that political process. It imposed the same highly restrictive regime on the entire Nation, and it effectively struck down the abortion laws of every single State. … [I]t represented the ‘exercise of raw judicial power’… and it sparked a national controversy that has embittered our political culture for a half-century.” “The inescapable conclusion is that a right to abortion is not deeply rooted in the Nation’s history and traditions. On the contrary, an unbroken tradition of prohibiting abortion on pain of criminal punishment persisted from the earliest days of the common law until 1973.” “In some States, voters may believe that the abortion right should be more even more [sic] extensive than the right Casey and Roe recognized. Voters in other States may wish to impose tight restrictions based on their belief that abortion destroys an ‘unborn human being.’ ... Our nation’s historical understanding of ordered liberty does not prevent the people’s elected representatives from deciding how abortion should be regulated.” “We have long recognized, however, that stare decisis is ‘not an inexorable command,’ and it ‘is at its weakest when we interpret the Constitution.’ It has been said that it is sometimes more important that an issue ‘be settled than that it be settled right.’ But when it comes to the interpretation of the Constitution — the ‘great charter of our liberties,’ which was meant ‘to endure through a long lapse of ages,’ we place a high value on having the matter ‘settled right.’” “On many other occasions, this Court has overruled important constitutional decisions. … Without these decisions, American constitutional law as we know it would be unrecognizable, and this would be a different country.” ”Casey described itself as calling both sides of the national controversy to resolve their debate, but in doing so, Casey necessarily declared a winning side. … The Court short-circuited the democratic process by closing it to the large number of Americans who dissented in any respect from Roe. … Together, Roe and Casey represent an error that cannot be allowed to stand.” “Roe certainly did not succeed in ending division on the issue of abortion. On the contrary, Roe ‘inflamed’ a national issue that has remained bitterly divisive for the past half-century....This Court’s inability to end debate on the issue should not have been surprising. This Court cannot bring about the permanent resolution of a rancorous national controversy simply by dictating a settlement and telling the people to move on. Whatever influence the Court may have on public attitudes must stem from the strength of our opinions, not an attempt to exercise ‘raw judicial power.’” “We do not pretend to know how our political system or society will respond to today’s decision overruling Roe and Casey. And even if we could foresee what will happen, we would have no authority to let that knowledge influence our decision. We can only do our job, which is to interpret the law, apply longstanding principles of stare decisis, and decide this case accordingly. We therefore hold that the Constitution does not confer a right to abortion. Roe and Casey must be overruled, and the authority to regulate abortion must be returned to the people and their elected representatives.” Sorry one last thing for those wondering about Court procedure: After oral argument the Justices take a tentative vote. This would have happened in December. The senior most justice in the majority gets to assign the opinion. That might have been Roberts, but doubtful since... — Neal Katyal (@neal_katyal) May 3, 2022 So there is the possibility an opinion can flip after oral argument and the tentative vote, so it's theoretically powerful the Alito opinion won't be the vote of the Court. But it would require a Justice BESIDES Chief Justice Roberts to flip. — Neal Katyal (@neal_katyal) May 3, 2022 The magnitude of this report is so serious that Politico included this editor's note vouching for the authenticity of the draft decision. Via Ben Mullin The leak has completely wiped the headlines and Twitter is exploding with hot takes. Leaking a draft SCOTUS ruling is worse than January 6th. The Court was the one institution where conservatives and liberals lived in peace and trust. You disagreed but the trust was sacred. This completely destroys the Court’s inner workings. Totally in shock right now. — Cernovich (@Cernovich) May 3, 2022 The fact that some are praising this leak shows how utterly craven we have become in our politics. There appears no ethical rule or institutional interest that can withstand this age of rage. — Jonathan Turley (@JonathanTurley) May 3, 2022 FWIW, there’s not much the GOP wants less than Roe to actually be overturned. If the Politico scoop is correct, the GOP is now the dog who caught the car. Roe was always a shiny thing to campaign on (much like repealing Obamacare) but never something they actually wanted to do. — Angry Staffer 🌻 (@Angry_Staffer) May 3, 2022 This is why they leaked: "Justices can and sometimes do change their votes as draft opinions circulate and major decisions can be subject to multiple drafts and vote-trading...The court’s holding will not be final until it is published, likely in the next two months." (Politico) https://t.co/9k0JfLfYZd — Andrew Kolvet (@AndrewKsay) May 3, 2022 Probably the greatest violation of unwritten "norms" in the history of the Supreme Court. And I absolutely guarantee you the leaker spent years railing against President Trump's undermining of norms. https://t.co/XSa9LaGb66 — Josh Hammer (@josh_hammer) May 3, 2022 Interference in a Supreme Court decision is a blow to democracy - like, say, stopping an electoral vote The conspirators must be rounded up and arrested and placed next to the J6 detainees — Jack Posobiec 🇺🇸 (@JackPosobiec) May 3, 2022 and. here. we. go. pic.twitter.com/5I9Ngxiz3U — Siraj Hashmi (@SirajAHashmi) May 3, 2022

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Notice of Publication for U.S. Patent Application No. 17/232,016; Jim Bell
by jim bell 12 May '23

12 May '23

This includes the notification of the publication of the patent application for the isotopic hafnium dielectric patent. Instead of using ordinary hafnium in the dielectric under the gates of MOSFET transistors, Hf-177 or Hf-179 isotope hafnium can be used, to increase its dielectric constant. This will enable the thickening of the dielectric layer from 1.2 nanometers, yet maintain sufficient gate authority. This will enable the continuing shrinkage of feature sizes in cutting-edge IC's. See:. https://daltonium.com/ F Jim Bell's new patent application. ----- Forwarded Message ----- From: "Daltonium Isotopics" <daltoniumisotopics(a)gmail.com> To: "jdb10987(a)yahoo.com" <jdb10987(a)yahoo.com> Cc: Sent: Tue, Nov 9, 2021 at 1:56 PM Subject: Fwd: Notice of Publication for U.S. Patent Application No. 17/232,016; Our Ref. DAL21301 ---------- Forwarded message --------- From: (snip) Date: Mon, Nov 8, 2021, 3:36 PM Subject: Notice of Publication for U.S. Patent Application No. 17/232,016; Our Ref. DAL21301 To: daltoniumisotopics(a)gmail.com (Snip) | Re: | U.S. Utility Patent Application No. 17/232,016 Title: ISOTOPE-MODIFIED HAFNIUM AND SEMICONDUCTOR DIELECTRICS Our Ref.DAL21301 | Good afternoon, The Notice of Publication of Application has been received from the United States Patent and Trademark Office, informing us that the above-identified patent application was published on October 28, 2021, under Publication Number US-2021-0336027-A1. Copies of the Notice of Publication and the published application are attached for your records. We will be separately sending you our invoice for services rendered. Please contact us(or Doug Wells, directly at 503-866-2749) if you have any questions or if we may be of further assistance. Best regards, Chloe Mike | On Behalf of McCoy Russell LLP Legal Assistant 1410 (Snip)

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Adrienne Harris Is Crypto’s Most Powerful Regulator
by Gunnar Larson 28 Apr '23

28 Apr '23

THE MONEY GAME MAR. 30, 2022 Crypto’s Most Powerful Regulator Is Here Adrienne Harris, New York’s financial watchdog, has enormous sway over the industry’s future. By Kevin T. Dugan, staff writer at Intelligencer, who covers money and business Photo: Victor Llorente Thirteen years after the birth of cryptocurrency, it was supposed to be time for Washington to rein it in. Instead, the White House punted, and the Securities and Exchange Commission is still hashing out how it’s going to oversee the $2 trillion industry. State watchdogs have filled that vacuum, making Adrienne Harris, the head of the New York State Department of Financial Services, by default the most powerful crypto regulator in the country. While states such as Florida and Wyoming have adopted a laissez-faire approach to regulation, attracting a sizable chunk of the booming industry, more money and jobs are still flowing into New York than any other city, making it the de facto crypto capital of the U.S. “There’s a misconception that having rigorous regulation turns off innovative companies,” Harris tells me during an hour-long interview at her office looking out onto the Statue of Liberty last month. “That hasn’t been our experience here.” Sign up for Dinner Party A lively evening newsletter about everything that just happened. SIGN UP Harris was tapped as the first Black woman to lead DFS last year. She came into her position after a turn working in Silicon Valley and representing Wall Street banks, a résumé that critics have used to paint her as too close to the industries she is regulating. She’s eager to dispel any criticism that she’s soft as a regulator, especially when it comes to crypto. Harris says she’s looking to expand the agency’s remit, hire new regulators, and possibly watch over lending and asset management in decentralized finance, a.k.a. DeFi, one of the fastest-growing crypto industries, which has been prone to very large hacks. The agency’s power over the industry lies mostly with the BitLicense, a required if unloved permit for crypto exchanges to operate within state lines. When it was first introduced in 2014, it was meant to be a model for the country, but the crypto industry has attacked the license for being too strict, limiting what people can trade, and requiring expensive anti-money-laundering operations, which, it should be noted, most traditional financial institutions are required to maintain. For Harris, the problem isn’t that it’s too restrictive — it’s that the process of getting one, which has stretched years for some companies, is too slow. “If you think about the companies that are BitLicensees, and even the companies in the queue, having the imprimatur of ‘Have you passed regulatory muster with a stringent regulatory regime?’ — I think the good actors see that as a good thing,” she says. Created in 2011, DFS has been a regulator feared more than any of its counterparts in other states for the power it has over banks, insurance companies, and a host of other financial institutions. It brought ambitious money-laundering cases against banks like BNP Paribas (a settlement that resulted in several bankers losing their jobs), fined Deutsche Bank for its relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, and levied a $2.5 million fine on the National Rifle Association for selling its so-called murder insurance in the state. “DFS has a lot of teeth, and the sky’s the limit if the agency is exercised properly,” says state Sen. John Liu of Queens, a member of the state finance committee. “DFS compelled multinational banks to cough up $15 billion. We were able to build a couple bridges with that money. We still have much infrastructure in the state of New York that might benefit from DFS’s vigorous functions.” But part of DFS’s mandate is to keep the state’s economy healthy, a balancing act when it means protecting consumers from predatory, but also lucrative, companies. “For me, it’s an opportunity to bring my lived experience as a woman of color,” Harris says. So far, she has established the agency’s first climate division, frozen fees for check-cashing businesses that target the poor, and looked into non-bank lenders for evidence of redlining. “It’s important to me that those voices are at the table and being heard,” she says. “I bring a sort of pragmatism. It’s one thing to sit in our offices with nice views and make policy, but it’s another thing, in my mind, to really run the water through the pipes.” In 2008, Harris joined Sullivan & Cromwell, a law firm so close with Goldman Sachs that it has long sent its lawyers to work in-house at the investment bank. It was there that she worked for H. Rodgin “Rodge” Cohen, then the law firm’s chairman and the so-called trauma surgeon of Wall Street. Cohen remembers Harris working late into the night writing near-flawless memorandums so they’d be ready on his desk in the morning. “She just brought what I’d call a penetrating intelligence to the problems that were at hand,” Cohen tells me. “Many of the problems we get, you cannot just look up the answer in a book. It’s a question of judgment and trying to apply rules written often for other circumstances.” Still, it was clear that corporate law wasn’t for her. “Her heart was really in public service,” he says. From there, she went on to work for the Treasury Department, then the Obama White House, where she focused on policies around the then-upstart fintech industry. After the administration turned over, Harris took a spin through the revolving door between government and business. Her New York financial-disclosure forms show a superabundance of work with the tech and finance industries: She sat on the boards of six companies and nonprofits, including LendingClub, which had recently settled with the Federal Trade Commission over claims it had misled users on fees. She also advised 11 companies, owned two, and invested in or on behalf of two others. “I just thought, well, if you’re going to make policy about it, you should do the thing — run the company, build the company,” she says. “At the time, I felt very comfortable going to a start-up because I thought, well, coming out of government, you’re not making a ton of money. And if this start-up blows up, I’ll probably be no worse off, financially speaking.” It seems Harris did well enough. One real-estate tech company at which she worked went public last summer, and Harris appears to have cashed out. Since the disclosures were for 2020, they didn’t include her stake in Forethought, a private A.I.-based customer-service company that announced in December that it had attracted such investors as Harris, Ashton Kutcher, and Gwenyth Paltrow. When I asked her about Forethought, Harris said her investment in the company predated her time at DFS, that all her investments are now in a blind trust, and that she would recuse herself from any dealings with companies she has conflicts with. So when Hochul appointed Harris to lead DFS, she was attacked by the left. Zephyr Teachout and Cynthia Nixon both criticized Harris as being insufficiently independent, thanks to her connections in tech and finance. The American Prospect dug up a speech in which she characterized regulators as looking for “no-nos” and “icky things.” Harris has also advised the cash-advance companies Earnin, Brigit, and SmartWage (based in South Africa), according to her disclosures. In 2019, DFS led a multi-state investigation into the cash-advance industry over whether they created debt traps and state banking and anti-usury laws, since equivalent interest rates for the fees they charged would reach as high as 469 percent. A person directly familiar with the investigation told me that Harris’s predecessor was presented with multiple options for furthering the investigation, including reaching a settlement, but ultimately never made a decision. DFS wouldn’t comment. So, of all the companies to work for, why them? “My role, when I was working with those companies, was not to dictate price pricing or business model. It was more to say: Here’s how regulators would view this. Here’s why you should engage with them. Let me help you engage with them and figure out these issues and how you can also serve customers. Less pricing and business model, but, as an adviser who’s not in the day-to-day, helping to sort of guide a culture and mentality,” she says. Did she disagree with those arguing that these companies created debt traps for consumers? “I think it’s hard to paint with a broad brush,” she says. “I think we should always always be careful with any new products and services, that they are affordable and non-predatory, not creating debt traps, and that they’re solving a real problem for consumers. And I think some do that and some don’t.” Last summer, after Andrew Cuomo resigned as governor, many of his appointees went with him, including then-superintendent of DFS, Linda Lacewell. Soon Harris’s old boss, Cohen, had recommended her to Kathryn Wylde, the president and CEO of the Partnership for New York, a business-advocacy group that has advised DFS. “The folks at Sullivan & Cromwell thought that Adrienne would be a terrific candidate to field for that job given her eight years of experience in the Obama administration and the fact that she was somebody who understood industry,” Wylde says. “On the theory that a regulator should know something about the industries they’re regulating — which may be a novel concept but struck me as a valid one — I thought she sounded like a terrific candidate.” Harris sailed through her confirmation, with 63 senators voting for her and nine against. “When the regulated are complaining that the regulator is being too aggressive, that generally means the regulator is doing their job.” said Michael Gianaris, the state senator from Queens who voted against Harris’s nomination and, in 2019, tanked Amazon’s proposed HQ2 in New York. “Cuomo was a prick, and the people he appointed tended to share his bare-knuckles approach to the world. In some cases, that’s actually not a bad thing.” While the crypto industry doesn’t appear to be getting the reprieve it had been hoping for, other industries will surely lobby Harris to make similar gestures toward the business community. For instance, Wylde says that insurance companies are hoping that Harris will lower the reserves they are required to have on hold, which they claim are higher than what’s required by other states. “There are some long-standing issues that the industry has that they feel that they’ve got a fresh start on with Adrienne’s leadership,” she says. Still, crypto is going to play a major part in how Harris’s tenure is defined. “It’s clear that New York is doing well now and the companies that came and started here five to ten years ago are doing well,” says Matt Homer, a former deputy superintendent at DFS and the current executive-in-residence at the venture-capital fund NYCA Partners. “It’s not totally clear what the future will look like five to ten years from now.” New York is the home base for major exchanges such as Coinbase and Gemini, and it’s also home to shady NFT front-running scandals and alleged rapping billionaire money launderers. That such a volatile industry could implode and damage New York’s economy is apparent. “I understand that other states may have gone the opposite way of the BitLicense, but there are things we can do here in New York that will hopefully inform the federal regulators as they continue to think about this space,” Harris said. “It’s a new world with crypto, with DeFi, with NFTs.” SIGN UP FOR THE INTELLIGENCER NEWSLETTER Daily news about the politics, business, and technology shaping our world. Email SIGN UP TAGS: THE MONEY GAME CRYPTOCURRENCY LEAVE A COMMENT 12/12/2022 CRIME Sam Bankman-Fried Has Been Arrested in the Bahamas By Kevin T. Dugan The disgraced FTX founder is facing charges from both the Justice Department and the S.E.C. 12/12/2022 POLITICS Twitter’s Former Safety Head Forced From Home After Being Smeared by Elon Musk By Chas Danner Former Twitter executive Yoel Roth and his family have reportedly faced a torrent of harassment and threats after Elon Musk’s false claims. 12/12/2022 WHAT WE KNOW How Big Is the U.S. Fusion Breakthrough? By Chas Danner The Department of Energy’s Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory has reportedly achieved a historic milestone in nuclear fusion. MOST POPULAR The ‘Twitter Files’ Is What It Claims to Expose By ERIC LEVITZ Twitter’s Former Safety Head Forced From Home After Being Smeared by Elon Musk By CHAS DANNER How Big Is the U.S. Fusion Breakthrough? By CHAS DANNER Red-Pilled Elon Musk Still Loves the Chinese Communist Party By JONATHAN CHAIT Elon Musk Gets Loudly Booed at Chappelle Comedy Show By BENJAMIN HART 12/12/2022 EARLY AND OFTEN Here Come the Trump 2024 Alternatives By Ed Kilgore A crop of presidential hopefuls represent Republican fantasies of something better for them than a Trump-Biden rematch. 12/12/2022 POLITICS Scott Stringer Files Defamation Suit Against Harassment Accuser By Nia Prater The former comptroller is suing lobbyist Jean Kim, alleging that her accusations against him were defamatory. 12/12/2022 LOS ANGELES L.A. Councilman Calls Guy He Fought Last Week ‘Hostile Individual’ By Matt Stieb Kevin de León, who was caught making racist remarks on a recording earlier this year, did not apologize after a scuffle with a protester on Friday. 12/12/2022 THE MONEY GAME Now That FTX Is Toast, Is Binance Too Big To Fail? By Kevin T. Dugan The Justice Department is weighing criminal charges against the world’s biggest crypto exchange. 12/12/2022 THE NATIONAL INTEREST Red-Pilled Elon Musk Still Loves the Chinese Communist Party By Jonathan Chait The Twitter owner may hate the left, but he does admire Leninism. 12/12/2022 ELON MUSK Elon Musk Gets Loudly Booed at Chappelle Comedy Show By Benjamin Hart “It sounds like some of the people you fired are in the audience.” 12/12/2022 POLITICS Jay Jacobs Has Few Regrets and No Apologies By Nia Prater Despite a bruising midterm, the Democratic boss isn’t going anywhere, to the frustration of critics. 12/10/2022 THE MEDIA The ‘Twitter Files’ Is What It Claims to Expose By Eric Levitz The purported exposé of Twitter’s political bias is itself an attempt to weaponize control of Twitter for political purposes. 12/9/2022 BRITTNEY GRINER What’s Next for Viktor Bout, According to His Lawyer By Amos Barshad Steve Zissou predicts the notorious arms dealer will now lead a “quiet existence.” 12/9/2022 WORLD CUP The Best Team in the World Is Out of the World Cup By Benjamin Hart Another devastating quarterfinals defeat for Brazil. 12/9/2022 POLITICS What Happens to Paul Whelan Now? By Nia Prater President Biden said his administration is not giving up on securing the former marine’s release from Russia. 12/9/2022 JUST ASKING QUESTIONS A Crisis-PR Veteran on Sam Bankman-Fried’s Odd Media Strategy By Benjamin Hart Eric Dezenhall thinks the explanation for SBF’s behavior is pretty straightforward. 12/9/2022 WORLD CUP Goalkeepers Gone Wild By David Gendelman At the World Cup, netminders are increasingly going on offense. The consequences can be miraculous or disastrous. 12/9/2022 THE NATIONAL INTEREST Kyrsten Sinema Is Playing Chicken By Jonathan Chait Declaring herself an independent is a way to force the Democratic Party into embracing her. 12/9/2022 FINDINGS Why Spending Time With Kids Might Actually Help Protect You From COVID By David Zweig Two studies find an immunological downside for adults who stay away from children. 12/9/2022 FIRST PERSON I Lost My Brother Twice By Alex Brook Lynn First to schizophrenia, then forever to the city. 12/8/2022 SPORTS Brittney Griner Is Coming Home From a Russian Prison By Margaret Hartmann And Nia Prater The WNBA star is headed home after being released in a prisoner swap for the notorious international arms dealer. 12/8/2022 STOP THE PRESSES Just What Did the Times Walkout Change? By Shawn McCreesh Some employees have said they are ready to vote on a strike authorization as soon as tomorrow. Others worry this has all gone too far. 12/8/2022 TREMENDOUS CONTENT Do the Trumps Want to Crop Kimberly Guilfoyle Out of the Family? By Margaret Hartmann Eric Trump felt compelled to announce that, despite the rumors, he doesn’t hate his brother’s fiancée. Ivanka Trump’s silence may say more. 12/8/2022 SAM BANKMAN-FRIED Sam Bankman-Fried’s Parents Are No Longer Teaching Law at Stanford By Kevin T. Dugan His mother says her sudden decision to retire now has “nothing to do with anything else going on.” 12/8/2022 TREMENDOUS CONTENT Donald Trump Cost Lara Trump Her Fox News Gig By Margaret Hartmann Nepotism giveth, and nepotism taketh away. 12/8/2022 And now the House 258-169-1, House passes bill to protect same sex marriages. 39 Rs vote for it. Bill heads to Biden —@mkraju 12/8/2022 BRITTNEY GRINER The 7 Craziest Facts About Arms Trafficker Viktor Bout’s Career By Matt Stieb Getting to know the “merchant of death” the U.S. just sent to Russia in a prisoner swap for basketball star Brittney Griner. SIGN IN TO COMMENT Like Us Follow Us ABOUT INTELLIGENCER ABOUT NEW YORK MAGAZINE NEWSLETTERS HELP CONTACT PRESS MEDIA KIT WE’RE HIRING PRIVACY TERMS AD CHOICES DO NOT SELL MY INFO ACCESSIBILITY INTELLIGENCER IS A VOX MEDIA NETWORK. © 2022 VOX MEDIA, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Holiday Sale: Save up to 70% and get two exclusive gifts with any annual plan. SUBSCRIBE NOW " https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2022/03/adrienne-harris-is-cryptos-most-pow…

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Re: FOIL DHSES-22-06-028
by Gunnar Larson 29 Mar '23

29 Mar '23

Mr. Callahan: There is an and/or argument to each definition. You are lieing about Sonic Weapons here and using Brody as a scape goat. For example, your office would have records on sonic weapons. How the FOIL was written is not a good enough defense because we are operating under and/or connotation. For these reasons, we seek to receive any and all records your department has concerning obstruction of justice. The same FOIL file can be used for organizing. Gunnar Larson On Tue, Jul 26, 2022, 5:01 PM Callahan, James (DHSES) < James.Callahan(a)dhses.ny.gov> wrote: > Dear Mr. Larson, > > > > The response to your appeal is attached. Your appeal has been denied. A > copy of your appeal and this determination is being sent to the Committee > on Open Government. > > > > Sincerely, > > > > *Jim Callahan* > > Senior Attorney > > *Division of Homeland Security & Emergency Services* > > 1220 Washington Avenue, Building 7A, Albany NY 12226 > > (518) 292-2849 | james.callahan(a)dhses.ny.gov > > www.dhses.ny.gov > > > > CONFIDENTIALITY NOTICE: This e-mail, including any attachments, may be > confidential, privileged or otherwise legally protected. It is intended > only for the addressee. If you received this e-mail in error or from > someone who was not authorized to send it to you, do not disseminate, copy > or otherwise use this e-mail or its attachments. Please notify the sender > immediately by reply e-mail and delete the e-mail from your system. Thank > you. > > > > *From:* Gunnar Larson <g(a)xny.io> > *Sent:* Tuesday, July 12, 2022 9:43 AM > *To:* DHSES, FOIL (DHSES) <FOIL.DHSES(a)dhses.ny.gov> > *Cc:* cypherpunks <cypherpunks(a)lists.cpunks.org> > *Subject:* Re: FOIL DHSES-22-06-028 > > > > *ATTENTION: This email came from an external source. Do not open > attachments or click on links from unknown senders or unexpected emails.* > > > > We would like to appeal this decision. > > > > On Tue, Jul 12, 2022, 9:41 AM DHSES, FOIL (DHSES) <FOIL.DHSES(a)dhses.ny.gov> > wrote: > > Attached please find correspondence regarding the above Freedom of > Information Law request. Thank you. > >

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[ot][spam][crazy] karl has stopped eating food
by Karl Semich 21 Mar '23

21 Mar '23

some time ago i posted to this list i was having trouble eating. i think it was during the crazy posts around my interaction with cecilia. after that post, i began eating again. i was using eating this past couple months to help me with other tasks. i didn't want to eat quite as much as i was, but i found a way to make it so incredibly helpful. i have now stopped eating again, and the other tasks these were basic tasks, like making a todo list, or taking a shower. thank you for your aid these past months and years. i have had nothing but 1 meal in the last three or four days. i know humans are fine for a week without food. due to my dissociation and historic experience with fasting, this isn't very uncomfortable for me. hunger is a small feeling compared to other things. i'll try to write here when i eat until i resume.

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Russian State-Sponsored TV Network's Attempt to Dismiss Copyright Lawsuit On Fair Use Grounds Denied
by Gunnar Larson 21 Mar '23

21 Mar '23

https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=ff9f1af5-cc8a-473a-822b-8890… March 18, 2022 TV-Novosti, a non-profit operating the Russian state-controlled RT(formerly Russia Today) television networks and 38 associated RT YouTube channels, has been sued for copyright infringement by Business Casual, an American media company that creates documentary content, based on its use of translated clips of Business Casual's documentaries in its own videos posted to YouTube. Business Casual creates short original historical documentaries which it posts to its YouTube channel. Its documentaries frequently feature photographs of historical figures, using a process called “parallax” which “transforms century-old low-resolution photographs into dramatically restored high-resolution photographs” and “turn[s] two-dimensional images into three-dimensional models . . . simulating a depth-of-field. This optical illusion provides Business Casual’s videos with an immersive three-dimensional look and feel.” The lawsuit relates to two of Business Casual’s documentaries—“How Rockefeller Built His Trillion Dollar Oil Empire” and “J.P. Morgan Documentary: How One Man Financed America”—clips of which Business Casual alleges TV-Novosti incorporated into three separate videos on its "RT-Arabic" YouTube channel, including portions featuring parallax-enhanced images, altering the brightness and saturation of the copied content and replacing Business Casual's watermark with TV-Novosti's own in order to hide from YouTube's algorithms. TV-Novosti moved to dismiss the copyright claims, arguing that it's use of the clips is protected as fair use. However, after considering each of the four statutory factors, Judge Koeltl of the Southern District of New York denied TV-Novosti's motion, holding that while three of the four factors weighed against finding fair use, "[t]he fourth factor, which the Supreme Court has described as 'the single most important element of fair use,' cannot be determined without further factual development." Specifically, regarding the first factor, concerning the transformation of the use, Judge Koeltl found that while TV-Novosti's videos take portions of the plaintiff’s videos, re-arrange them, and add new commentary to them, TV-Novosti had not made any meaningful changes to the visual clips themselves, and "[m]erely overlaying new audio does not effect a sufficient transformation . . . to find fair use as a matter of law." The Court further noted that TV-Novosti had "not changed the purpose of the parallax-enhanced images," i.e., to provide visual illustration for the overlain audio commentary, but had instead "simply lifted the copyrighted depictions . .. for the purpose of illustrating [TV-Novosti's] own video." In addition, the Court found that the fact that TV-Novosti could have sought to pay for the clips, but didn't, and tried to hide its use of the excerpts from YouTube's algorithms, also weighed against a finding a fair use under the first factor. Regarding the second factor, concerning the nature of the copyrighted work, the Court initially noted that factual material such as that at issue, "cuts less closely to the core of copyright." Nevertheless, the Court held that the fact that source material for Business Casual's videos was in the public domain weighed against finding fair use, because TV Novosti could have simply used public domain photos of the historical figures, rather than the modified clips, to create its videos. Regarding the third factor, concerning the amount of use in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole, the Court noted that while only "small portions of the entire copyrighted works were used"—excerpts of 7 seconds, 1 minute and 28 seconds, and 8 minutes and 50 seconds in length—the portions were "not so trivial as to warrant dismissal under the de minimis doctrine." Lastly, regarding the fourth factor, concerning the effect of the use on the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work, the Court noted that this factor “ask[s] not whether the second work would *damage* the market for the first (by, for example, devaluing it through parody or criticism), but whether it *usurps* the market for the first by offering a competing substitute.” With this framing, the Court thus found that while one the one hand, TV-Novosti's "videos are alternative ways of learning about the lives of J.P. Morgan and John D. Rockefeller," on the other hand, they "have a broader focus and are in a different language, meaning that they cater to a different audience." These differences, the Court held, were significant enough to preclude the Court from "determining the effect of [TV-Novosti's] videos on the market for [Business Casual's] videos at this time." The Court's recognition of the weight of the fourth factor in determining fair use means that there may still be hope for TV-Novosti—time (and fact discovery) will tell. For now, the takeaway may very well be that parties seeking to raise a fair use defense should take care to emphasize any characteristics of their use that distinguish not just their work, but its target audience, including the scope of the work and the language (if any) which communicates it. *** *Business Casual Holdings, LLC v. TV-Novosti*, No. 21-CV-2007 (JGK), 2022 WL 784049 (S.D.N.Y. Mar. 14, 2022)

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RNC Funding of Trump's Legal Campaign Undermines GOP State AGs' Attack on Litigation Funding - Litigation Finance Journal
by Gunnar Larson 21 Mar '23

21 Mar '23

Check out my new article: https://litigationfinancejournal.com/rnc-funding-of-trumps-legal-campaign-u… Litigation Finance Journal recently reported on a group of 14 state attorneys general that have called for action from the Department of Justice to review potential threats to U.S. national security from foreign adversaries’ engagement of litigation investment. Litigation funders and industry advocates have new ammo in response to the AGs’ claims, given recent news of the RNC funding former President Donald Trump’s various legal entanglements. According to ABC News, RNC leaders earmarked $1.6M in legal funding to support President Donald Trump’s defense over lawsuits brought by New York Attorney General Letitia James. Meanwhile, the United States Chamber of Commerce Institute for Legal Reform’s research has prompted 14 state attorneys general to ask for the Justice Department to assess national security risks of adversaries ‘undermining’ the United States by engaging litigation funding and third party investment vehicles. The group of 14 state attorneys general are concerned about foreign adversaries ‘weaponizing’ United States legal frameworks via litigation investment, to attack critical national industry and infrastructure, such as energy sectors. The group of 14 seeks the Department of Justice to detail how a network of federal agencies could engage a blueprint for defending United States independence from international litigation investors, hostile groups, agencies or governments such as Russia and China. This latest attack on the industry, prompted by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, is simply another attempt to undermine the nascent and growing litigation funding sector. It is ironic, given that in the case of Consumer Legal Funding–which the Chamber specifically targets–the funding in question does not go to support legal fees, but rather to finance claimants’ livelihoods while they remain injured and unable to work. While the RNC’s funding of Trump’s legal battles does not constitute foreign investment, it illustrates the acceptance of third party legal funding across political lines, and should be noted by industry advocates looking to respond to the negative publicity put forth by the U.S. Chamber.

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