CURRENT USA ISSUES

Ikram Ullah Turabi, RAW & NDS Nexus Against Pakistan Exposed

noreply@blogger.com (Sehar Gul) — Tue, 18 Aug 2020 13:39:00 -0700

The enemies of Pakistan are once again uniting, the nexus of RAW and NDS against Pakistan has been exposed, RAW and NDS are also major obstacles in the way of lasting peace in Afghanistan. A heinous conspiracy was also hatched to sabotage the joint efforts of Pakistan and the United States.

Contacts with banned Taliban organizations have been revealed to target Pakistan's security agencies, efforts have been made to unite the banned Tehreek-e-Taliban and other insurgent factions against Pakistan, RAW and NDS's TTP, Hizb-ul-Ahrar and meetings with representatives of Hizb-ul-Ahrar have also been revealed.

On August 16, the two agencies held an important meeting with banned organizations in Paktika and Kunar (Afghanistan), which was attended by Noor Wali Mehsud of Tehreek-e-Taliban, Hizb-ul-Ahrar and Ikramullah Turabi (also involved in Murder of Benazir Bhutto) of Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, who was recently released on bail.

Video Footage of Meeting Held on August 16, 2020 in Paktika and Kunhar (Afghanistan)

Ikramullah Turabi was arrested by ISAF from Afghanistan in December, 2013 and handed over to Pakistan. Ikramullah Turabi was released on bail by the Peshawar High Court and returned to Afghanistan to join the banned organization.

The meeting decided to attack the Pakistan Army, Police, Rangers, FC and other law enforcement agencies, RAW and NDS are also major obstacles to lasting peace in Afghanistan and to sabotage the joint efforts of Pakistan and the United States of America.

Who Is Kamala Harris?

noreply@blogger.com (Sehar Gul) — Thu, 13 Aug 2020 00:12:00 -0700

Democratic presidential hopeful Joe Biden named California Sen. Kamala Harris as his running mate Tuesday, adding an experienced campaigner with national star power to his ticket.
“I have the great honor to announce that I’ve picked @KamalaHarris — a fearless fighter for the little guy, and one of the country’s finest public servants — as my running mate,” Biden tweeted.

Harris tweeted that Biden “can unify the American people because he’s spent his life fighting for us. And as president, he'll build an America that lives up to our ideals. I’m honored to join him as our party’s nominee for Vice President, and do what it takes to make him our Commander-in-Chief.”

Who is Kamala Devi Harris?

KamalaHarris, in full Kamala Devi Harris, (born on October 20, 1964, Oakland, California, U.S.), to a British Jamaican-born father, Donald Harris, and an Indian mother, Shyamala Gopalan Harris. She spent many of her formative years in nearby Berkeley.

She is elected as American Senator who was chosen for the U.S. Senate as a Democrat in 2016 and started her first term speaking to California in that body the next year. She was the first Indian American to fill in as a U.S. representative just as the second African American lady. Harris recently was the state's lawyer general (2011–17). After studying political science and economics (B.A., 1986) at Howard University, Kamala earned a law degree (1989) from Hastings College.

Her father, who was Jamaican, taught at Stanford University, and her mother, the daughter of an Indian diplomat, was a cancer researcher. Her mother died of cancer in 2009 at the age of 70. Her younger sister, Maya, later became a public policy advocate. On the campaign trail, Harris often speaks of the deep bond she shared with her mother, who she has called her single biggest influence.

A young Kamala Harris is seen with her mother, Shyamala, in this photo that was posted on Harris' Facebook page in March 2017.

"My mother understood very well she as raising two Black daughters," Harris wrote in a 2018 autobiography.

"She knew that her adopted homeland would see Maya and me as Black girls, and she was determined to make sure we would grow into confident Black women," she wrote. Their mother gave them Sanskrit names to carry their Indian identities.

She subsequently worked as a deputy district attorney (1990–98) in Oakland, earning a reputation for toughness as she prosecuted cases of gang violence, drug trafficking, and sexual abuse. Harris rose through the ranks, becoming district attorney in 2004. In 2010 she was narrowly elected attorney general of California—winning by a margin of less than 1 percent—thus becoming the first female and the first African American to hold the post. After taking office the following year, she demonstrated political independence, rejecting, for example, pressure from the administration of Pres. Barack Obama for her to settle a nationwide lawsuit against mortgage lenders for unfair practices. Instead, she pressed California’s case and in 2012 won a judgment five times higher than that originally offered. Her refusal to defend Proposition 8 (2008), which banned same-sex marriage in the state, helped lead to it being overturned in 2013. Harris’s book, Smart on Crime (2009; cowritten with Joan O’C. Hamilton), was considered a model for dealing with the problem of criminal recidivism.

In 2012 Harris delivered a memorable address at the Democratic National Convention, raising her national profile. Two years later she married attorney Douglas Emhoff. Widely considered a rising star within the party, she was recruited to run for the U.S. Senate seat held by Barbara Boxer, who was retiring. In early 2015 Harris declared her candidacy, and on the campaign trail she called for immigration and criminal-justice reforms, increases to the minimum wage, and protection of women’s reproductive rights. She easily won the 2016 election.

After taking office in January 2017, Harris began serving on both the Select Committee on Intelligence and the Judiciary Committee, among other assignments. She became known for her prosecutorial style of questioning witnesses during hearings, which drew criticism—and occasional interruptions—from Republican senators. In June 2017 she drew particular attention for her questions to U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who was testifying before the intelligence committee on alleged Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election; she had earlier called on him to resign. Harris’s memoir, The Truths We Hold: An American Journey, was published in January 2019.

Shortly thereafter Harris announced that she was seeking the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020. From the outset she was seen as one of the leading contenders, and she drew particular attention when, during a primary debate, she had a contentious exchange with fellow candidate Joe Biden over his opposition to school busing in the 1970s and ’80s, among other race-related topics. Although Harris’s support initially increased, by September 2019 her campaign was in serious trouble, and in December she dropped out of the race. She continued to maintain a high profile, notably becoming a leading advocate for social-justice reform following the May 2020 death of George Floyd, an African American who had been in police custody. Her efforts silenced some who had criticized her tenure as attorney general, alleging that she had failed to investigate charges of police misconduct, including questionable shootings. Others, however, felt that her embrace of reform was a political maneuver to capitalize on the increasing public popularity of social change. As racial injustice became a major issue in the United States, many Democrats called on Biden, the party’s presumptive nominee, to select an African American woman—a demographic that was seen as pivotal to his election chances—as his vice presidential running mate. In August 2020 Biden chose Harris, and she thus became the first Black woman to appear on a major party’s national ticket.

Today, the senator finds herself asking her mother, spiritually, for advice or remembering one of her oft-repeated lines. Her mother's amethyst ring sparkles from her hand. She still uses pots and wooden spoons that belonged to her mother and says she thinks of her when she is home and able to cook.

"Yeah, she is Indian, she likes India but that doesn't mean anything that India says is right for her, good for her. She is also Jamaican. She is Afro-American. So, she uses her own judgement … she likes India, she likes Indian music, but she likes jazz music also," he said.

Almost immediately after the announcement of Harris's candidacy, Trump attacked Harris by reverting to stereotypes, calling her "extraordinarily nasty", "meanest", and "most horrible" during a White House news conference on Tuesday.

Karen Finney, a prominent Black strategist in the Democratic Party, pointed to immediate fundraising success as evidence that Biden's take on Harris is better than Trump's.

The Biden campaign hauled in almost $11m in the first four hours after Harris was announced as Biden's pick.

The Biden-Harris ticket "makes clear that Biden is serious about having people who like the diversity of our country and our future at the highest decision-making tables. That gives people hope," Finney told the Associated Press.

Harris's father and her mother were separated when she was five years old. She writes of seeing him on weekends and over summers after he became a professor at Stanford University.

In a piece he wrote for the Jamaica Global website, Harris says he never gave up his love for his daughters, and the senator trumpeted her father as a superhero in her children's book.

But their relationship had been on and off over the years. In February, when Harris jokingly linked her use of marijuana to her Jamaican heritage, her father labelled the comment a "travesty" and a shameful "pursuit of identity politics".

Kamala Harris & Mindy Kaling Cooking Masala Dosa

Samsung Note 20 & Samsung Galaxy Note 20 Ultra Launched by Samsung

noreply@blogger.com (Sehar Gul) — Tue, 11 Aug 2020 02:36:00 -0700

Samsung has introduced two new android phones in its new flagship Galaxy Note 20 series.

The Samsung Note 20 and Note 20 Ultra were launched at an online event, and this year's phones have improved over every aspect, from software to hardware, compared to last year.

The S Pen is even better than before, with major updates, including Samsung's introduction of two Galaxy Note series phones last year, and this year too.

Samsung Galaxy Note 20

The Galaxy Note 20 or Standard Note 20 has a larger display than the Note 10, which is 6.7 inches, while the Note 20 is slightly smaller than the Ultra.

However, this time the Galaxy Note 20 uses a flat panel instead of a curved screen, surprisingly the 60hz refresh rate, while the 1080 Plus panel is given the old Gorilla Glass, while last year the Galaxy Note 10 was given a Gorilla Glass 6 was given.

This time to enhance the battery life there is also a bigger battery than before which is 4300 mAh while the Note 10 was given a 3500 mAh battery.

According to the company, the phone comes with a 25-watt charger that can charge the device from zero to 50 percent in 30 minutes and also supports wireless charging.

As far as the processor is concerned, consumers in Europe and Asia will be able to enjoy the Exynos 990, while in other countries the Snapdragon 865 Plus will be part of the phone.

It has 8 GB RAM and 128 to 256 GB storage while no microSD card is available, however the 5G model will also be available with 128 GB storage.

On the back of the phone is a setup of 3 cameras, the main camera is 12 megapixels with 1.8 UM pixels bigger than before, while dual pixel auto focus and OIS support is also present.

The second camera is equipped with a 64-megapixel sensor that can also be used as a telephoto camera (3x less digital zoom, 30x space zoom) and 8K video camera.

The third is a 12-megapixel ultra wide angle camera, while the 10-megapixel selfie camera on the front is given a punch hole design.

There is no headphone jack which is not supported by its audience.

The phone will be available in both 4G and 5G versions.

Samsung Galaxy Note 20 Ultra

As the name suggests, this is the premium phone of this series which has a 6.9 inch Dynamic AMOLED 2X display with 1440 plus resolution and 120Hz refresh rate, however to use 120Hz refresh rate you have to use 1080 plus resolution.

The S Pen has been improved and the company says that the user will have the experience of using it as if you were writing on a piece of paper.

Notes written on the S Pen can be converted to Microsoft Office formats while being connected to other devices.

The S Pen will also be able to be used for navigation through new software actions such as drawing different shapes in the air, backing up in the browser, opening recent apps and much more.

A major change is the use of gorilla glass wicks to protect its display, which is more resistant to scratches, while falling to a hard surface from a height of 2 meters has no effect on the phone.

An ultrasonic fingerprint reader is provided inside the display.

It will also feature the Exynos 990 for Europe and Asia, while Snapdragon 865 Plus processors in other countries will be 10% faster than the Samsung Galaxy S 20's 865 processor.

Both the Galaxy Note 20 phones are the first devices to be offered for X-Cloud service games and by mid-September it will have more than 100 Xbox games available.

The phone comes with a 4500 mAh battery with 25 watts fast charging support which is the fastest charging support ever in Samsung phones.

The phone also has 15 watt fast wireless charging and 9 watt reverse wireless charging support.

The Galaxy Note 20 Ultra comes with 12 GB RAM, 128, 256 and 512 GB storage options, while the microSD card slot will be available in dual SIM models.

The back of this phone will also have 3 cameras set up but it is much better than the Note 20.

It will have a 108-megapixel main camera that will record 8K videos at 24 frames per second, while dual-pixel autofocus has been replaced by optical stabilization, while phase detection autofocus has now been paired with laser AF. The need for a 3D flight of sensor camera is gone.

The other is a 12-megapixel camera that will act as a periscope telephoto lens, allowing the users to enjoy 5x optical zoom and 50x hybrid zoom.

The third is a 12-megapixel ultra-wide camera that will provide 120 fields of view.

Its hard to ignore and is frankly a bit of an eyesore. Without a case, I constantly worry about dropping it and cracking the camera array, which would undoubtedly be the first thing to hit, or else laying it down and dragging or moving the device in a way that scratches the camera. This has happened to me before and ruined every ultra wide image thereafter, so trust me when I say this is no idle concern.

It also has a 10-megapixel selfie camera on the front which is given in a punch hole design, while this phone will also be available in 4G and 5G models.

Price and Availability

The 8GB RAM and 128GB 4G version of the Galaxy Note 20 will start at USD 1,000 while the 5G model will cost USD 1,023.

As far as the Samsung Galaxy Note 20 Ultra is concerned, the model with 12 GB RAM and 128 GB storage is priced at USD 1300 while the version with 12 GB RAM and 512 GB storage is priced at USD 1500.

Pre-orders for these phones will start on August 6th, 2020 and will be available to consumers in different countries on August 21, 2020. Samsung has also launched Samsung Galaxy Buds Live and Samsung Galaxy Watch 3 and Samsung Galaxy Z Fold2. Samsung is also offering Samsung Galaxy Buds with pre-orders. Users can purchase through links of Samsung Stores given by Samsung on their official website.

Apple is also going to launch iPhone 12 and iPhone 12 Pro in October, 2020

Georgian Woman’s Wig Falls Off While Diving into Swimming Pool, Video Viral

noreply@blogger.com (Sehar Gul) — Sat, 8 Aug 2020 08:23:00 -0700

Its summer time and people can’t wait to hit the pool after months of lock down due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Recently, a viral video of diving into a nearby swimming pool by a Georgian woman turned funny, when her wig falls

The video, captioned, “We told her not to do it. She didn’t listen”, has now gone viral on several social media platforms. It shows a woman standing on a diving board and preparing to jump into the pool. Moments later, as she does a somersault into the water, her wig falls off, giving bystanders a funny sight to watch.

Watch Video:

Different Comments on Video:

"At least her hair knew not to get wet," read one of the many reactions on the video, which has left netizens amused.

"Finally, a video I know that isn’t staged"

"Her wig was like miss me sis i aint getting wet for nothing"

Hiroshima Bombing Turns 75, A Look at 6 Changes to Nuclear Arms Under Trump

noreply@blogger.com (Sehar Gul) — Thu, 6 Aug 2020 01:56:00 -0700

Seventy-five years ago Thursday, the U.S. became – and remains – the only country in the world to detonate a nuclear weapon against an enemy.

At 8:15 a.m. local time on Aug. 6, 1945, an American Boeing B-29 aircraft named Enola Gay dropped a 9,700-pound uranium bomb nicknamed "Little Boy" over Hiroshima, Japan. About 70,000 people were killed instantly by the explosion, which had a radius of around a mile.

Three days later, on Aug. 9 at 11:02 a.m. local time, a second atomic bomb, named "Fat Man," was unleashed by the U.S. over Nagasaki, Japan. This time, 40,000 people died straight away – within five years, the number of deaths approached 140,000, according to archived estimates by the U.S. Department of Energy. The Hiroshima death toll reached an estimated 200,000 by 1950 as those who survived the blast succumbed to fatal burns, radiation sickness and various cancers.

On Aug. 14, 1945, Japan surrendered unconditionally, effectively bringing an end to World War II.

Three-quarters of a century later, tensions, complications and uncertainties over nuclear weapons and how to ensure they are not used again are still very much with us.

Among the recent developments:

The Trump administration has withdrawn from a 2015 nuclear accord with Iran and world powers designed to limit Tehran's nuclear capabilities.
President Donald Trump-led talks with North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un aimed at denuclearization on the Korean Peninsula have stalled.
The Trump administration has suspended compliance with the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, a Reagan administration-era initiative that slashed the number of midrange missiles held by the U.S. and Russia.
Trump has abandoned the Open Skies Treaty – negotiated by President George H.W. Bush after the collapse of the Soviet Union and designed to be a check on nuclear weapons by allowing surveillance flights over signatories' territories.
Trump has signaled he may not renew New START, the last major U.S.-Russia nuclear arms control treaty, unless China also agrees to be bound by its constraints. Beijing has not committed either way. New START expires in February, just weeks after there's a new, or renewed, U.S. president in the White House.
Marshall Billingslea, the top U.S. envoy for nuclear negotiations, has confirmed the Trump administration has discussed holding the first nuclear test since 1992. "I won't shut the door on it, because why would we," Billingslea said in late June in Vienna, Austria, although he said there is no reason to carry out a test "at this time."
Fred Carriere, who teaches international relations at Syracuse University, said that one of the major impediments to getting countries to denuclearize, whether the U.S., North Korea or Iran, is that "everybody always wants everything up front, with the promise that good things will follow later on, but few will ever be able to accept this strategy."

In the case of North Korea, for example, negotiations broke down over Pyongyang's insistence that Washington immediately halt economic sanctions.

"North Korea is not going to give up its nuclear weapons unless it can be absolutely confident that it has turned over a new leaf with the U.S," said Carriere.

'My God, what have we done?'

Meanwhile, the stories of atomic bomb survivors, a dwindling number, have shaped the way we think about the consequences of using nuclear weapons.

"Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds."

Koko Tanimoto Kondo, 75, is one person whose world was destroyed on Aug. 6, 1945.

Kondo was 8 months old and with her mother when the house in Hiroshima they were in, a parsonage of the church where her father was a minister, caved in and buried them under mounds of twisted metal and rubble as Japan's most industrialized city was consumed by the searing heat of the world's first nuclear attack.

They escaped after her mother, who flitted in and out of consciousness, saw a tiny crack of light through the wreckage and, working the hole bigger bit by bit, was eventually able to make an opening large enough to push her baby out and then crawl out herself.

In a recent Zoom call, Kondo described how a medical student told her parents that he did not think that their baby, racked with fever and injuries, would survive.

"But here I am today, 75 years later," she said.

For years, Kondo underwent annual examinations so doctors and scientists could study the impact of radiation on the human body, a process she described as "humiliating."

In 1946, Kondo’s father, Kiyoshi Tanimoto, made an appearance in "Hiroshima," a book about survivors by American journalist John Hersey. In Hersey's account, Tanimoto is described in the wake of the blast as frantically running around trying to help the wounded and dying and encountering "rank on rank of the burned and bleeding."

Tanimoto later started a program called Hiroshima Maidens that enabled Japanese girls physically altered by the bombing to travel to the U.S. to have corrective plastic surgery.

In the Zoom call, Kondo, who has devoted her life to campaigning for peace with various organizations and civil society groups, said that one of her earliest memories of Hiroshima was being comforted by a group of teenage girls – Hiroshima Maidens.

"I could not see their faces. Their lips were seared to their chins. Their eyes would not close because of the burns. One girl, I recall, was trying to comb my hair but when I turned to look at her hand I saw that all her fingers had been melted away," she said.

Kondo said she vowed that day to find the person who dropped the bomb on Hiroshima.

"I wanted to kick or bite or punch this person," she said.

Some years later, in 1955, Kondo would get her chance when, on a trip to the U.S. with her family, she appeared on an NBC show called "This Is Your Life."

Also appearing on the show that day was Capt. Robert Lewis, co-pilot of the Enola Gay, the American Boeing B-29 that dropped the bomb on Hiroshima.

Kondo changed her mind about revenge as she watched the show's host ask Lewis how he felt after dropping the bomb. With tears welling up in his eyes, the pilot said that he had written in his flight log on Aug. 6, 1945: "My God, what have we done?"

On the Zoom call, her voice cracking and tears welling up in her own eyes, Kondo said her encounter with Lewis made her realize she "shouldn't hate this person. If I should hate anything, I should hate the war itself."

In a follow-up email, Kondo said: "I constantly remind young people that they need to learn from history, that what happened in Hiroshima must never happen again."