USA - Google's researchers aren't happy that users are migrating to platforms that don't censor "misinformation." As Big Tech platforms have increased their censorship of so-called “hate speech” and “COVID-19 misinformation,” platforms such as free speech social network Gab and the messaging app Telegram have seen a surge in new users. Now, a new post from Google’s Jigsaw unit, which “explores threats to open societies and builds technology that inspires scalable solutions”, is recommending that users of these platforms should be surveilled across platforms in real-time, so that they can be more easily be blocked from sharing links to “harmful content.” It suggests “a dynamic, internet-wide approach is necessary” to flag and censor content across multiple platforms.

BELARUS - Belarus’ authoritarian president said Friday he’s prepared to invite Russian troops into the country if such a move is necessary to ensure the security of both Belarus and Russia. But, President Alexander Lukashenko said, at the moment “there is absolutely no need” to do that. In remarks carried by the state-run Belta news agency, Lukashenko stressed that he had dealt with last year’s anti-government protests without involving other countries’ armed forces, but added that he would not hesitate to bring in Russian troops if necessary. Belarus is able to quickly deploy 500,000 of its own personnel, but “if it is not enough, all Russian armed forces will be brought in,” Lukashenko said, according to Belta. “If it is necessary, we won’t hesitate.”

USA - Ramona Bessinger is the Providence, Rhode Island, middle school teacher who blew the whistle on July 13, 2021, in a post at Legal Insurrection on pernicious and destructive implementation of a new race-oriented curriculum, I’m A Middle School Teacher And See How Critical Race Curriculum Is Creating Racial Hostility In School: This past 2020/21 school year was a sad and worrisome turning point for me as an educator. Providence K-8 teachers were introduced to one of the most racially divisive, hateful, and in large part, historically inaccurate curriculums I have ever seen in my teaching career.

USA - In a June Board of Trustee report, the American Medical Association resolved to lobby the US government to remove the sex of a child from their birth certificate. The sex of a child at birth is determined by genetic make-up, and those genes are expressed in a variety of ways both immediately and over the course of a person’s life, obviously. Genitalia, hormones, bone structure, muscle density, average height and weight, amount of body hair, reproduction, and many many other facets of human biology, brain chemistry, and lifetime are determined or affected by one’s gender. This is both medical and scientific fact. Nevertheless, the American Medical Association thinks that’s bad and mean to say and so they would rather just pretend those things aren’t so, because that’s a very medical and scientific thing to do.

UK - The UK must stand up to a growing 'precedent' of continued 'censorship' and cancel culture or risk losing all of its freedoms to those who decide what is 'offensive', according to GB News' Andrew Doyle. Speaking on his show Free Speech Nation, the GB News host issued a severe warning that free speech is under fire more than ever as it emerges the SNP [Scottish National Party, currently in power in Scotland], the police and the British Government are engaging in more and more incidents of "dangerous censorship" and cancel culture. Mr Doyle said the "precedent" being set by actions such as the SNP's Hate Crimes bill, which could see people arrested at home for "legal but harmful speech" and the police having the power to prosecute for "non hate crime incidents" as well as having a "database of offensive language" must be stood up to or he claimed the UK faces an uncertain future. An astonishing 3,000 people per year are arrested for “offensive things they have said on the internet”. Mr Doyle added: “But again, who decides what is offensive! It is just a hopelessly subjective notion.”

CHINA - China has threatened stern action against the Royal Navy’s carrier strike group (CSG) if it does not “remain restrained and obey the rules” as it sails through the South China Sea. Defence Secretary Ben Wallace set the scene earlier this month for a confrontation with Beijing when he said the deployment led by the flagship HMS Queen Elizabeth would sail on any route defined as legitimate under international law. China claims the South China Sea despite an international court ruling in 2016 that it did not belong to the nation, which has grown increasingly assertive as it builds military bases and airport runways on constructed islands in the disputed waters. An editorial in the state-run newspaper Global Times said the CSG entered the sea on Sunday as part of the “UK’s effort to show its presence in the region”.

PHILIPPINES - Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has officially retracted his decision to scrap the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA), a military pact with the US that outlines rules for US troops to be stationed in the Philippines on a rotational basis. Duterte was ready to scrap the VFA last year and kick US troops out of his country over sanctions Washington imposed on Philippine officials. But he reversed the decision over tensions with Beijing in the South China Sea. The VFA was temporarily extended several times, and now the extension is permanent. The decision was announced Friday by Philippine Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana in a joint press conference with US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, who is on a small tour of the region to shore up ties to counter China. “The president decided to recall or retract the termination letter for the VFA,” Lorenzana told reporters. “There is no termination letter pending and we are back on track.”

USA - Big Tech is out of control - and the time to save our liberties and freedoms is quickly running out. This month, White House press secretary Jen Psaki made a stunning admission: the Federal Government is directly colluding with Facebook to flag "problematic" social media content on its platform. "In terms of actions that we have taken or we’re working to take, I should say, from the federal government, we’ve increased disinformation research and tracking,” she revealed during a press conference. “Within the Surgeon General’s Office, we’re flagging posts for Facebook that spread disinformation."

GERMANY - Germany has warned about the respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) that is rapidly spreading and is “more dangerous than Covid”. Germany’s largest children’s clinic, the Olgahospital at the Stuttgart Clinic, has reported an increase in respiratory diseases and RSV infections over the past two weeks. The number of children who have attended the hospital because of an infection has now almost doubled, compared to the usual seasonal rate. Hmm, kids suffering from respiratory problems. That’d be nothing to do with them being forced to wear masks for the last year would it?

USA - CNN is warning Americans that it is “about to get much harder not to be vaccinated” — a caution which follows the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) expressing the need to ramp up its messaging as the American people question its motives and science behind its latest edicts. This week, President Biden blamed unvaccinated Americans for the CDC’s updated guidance, requiring vaccinated people to wear masks in indoor areas “of substantial or high transmission.” “We have a pandemic, because of the unvaccinated and they’re sowing enormous confusion,” Biden said. “If those other 100 million got vaccinated, we’d be in a very different world.” Millions of Americans have expressed concerns over the vaccines, all of which have yet to be approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

USA - For most of the first half of 2021, the vast majority of Americans believed that the COVID pandemic was nearly over. But now the Delta variant has changed everything. We are being told that the number of confirmed cases is absolutely skyrocketing, and new mandates and restrictions are now being instituted all over the nation. If the number of newly confirmed cases each day continues to rise, could we also see a return of widespread lockdowns and school closings?

USA - A new study has found that diversity staff now outnumber history academics at many American universities. This is the inevitable consequence when erasing cultural heritage to promote inclusivity becomes non-negotiable. In higher education, diversity first emerged as a desirable value. It then became a dogma. On campuses, it has finally turned into a veritable industry. A new report on the promotion of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI), titled ‘Diversity University: DEI Bloat in the Academy’ provides compelling evidence that the advocacy of diversity has become a central concern of higher education. Diversity is not simply promoted as a point of view. It is a value that is beyond debate. Members of the academic community who question diversity risk being ostracised or even expelled. It is precisely because diversity has assumed the character of a non-negotiable dogma that many universities literally force their students to participate in some form of diversity training.

USA - The push to drain China’s influence from the US economy has reached America’s farm country, as congressional lawmakers from both parties are looking at measures to crack down on foreign purchases of prime agricultural real estate. House lawmakers recently advanced legislation to that effect, warning that China’s presence in the American food system poses a national security risk. And key Senate lawmakers have already shown interest in efforts to keep American farms in American hands. The debate over farm ownership comes amid broader efforts by Congress and the Biden administration to curb the nation’s economic reliance on China, especially in key industries like food, semiconductors and minerals deemed crucial to the supply chain. The call for tighter limits on who owns America’s farms has come from a wide range of political leaders, from former Vice President Mike Pence to Senator Elizabeth Warren (Democrat for Massachusetts), after gaining momentum seeded in farm states.

USA - The US military “failed miserably” in an October wargame scenario reportedly involving a battle for Taiwan, and now military leaders are looking at how to change the US joint warfighting strategy, a top US general revealed for the first time this week. During a Monday speech before the National Defense Industrial Association’s (NDIA) newly-formed Emerging Technologies Institute (ETI), Joint Chiefs of Staff Vice Chairman and US Air Force General John Hyten said, the US tested out its joint warfighting strategy in a wargame scenario in October of last year. “Without overstating the issue, it failed miserably,” Hyten said of the US joint warfighting strategy. “An aggressive red team that had been studying the United States for the last 20 years just ran rings around us. They knew exactly what we’re going to do before we did it.” A defense official told Defense One on Monday that one of the wargame’s scenarios centered around a battle for Taiwan. China has increasingly practised for an invasion of the island and has frequently described “reunification” with Taiwan in recent months.

IRAN - Iran is now facing the most significant domestic protests in 18 months, with demonstrations moving from the parched southwest of the country where they began two weeks ago over water shortages, to Tehran, where they are taking on a distinctly anti-regime character. Among the chants heard at Monday’s protests were “Death to the dictator,” “Shame on Khamenei, let go of the country,” and “Neither for Gaza nor Lebanon, I sacrifice my life only for Iran.” And the US response? Take the foot off the gas. America’s lead Iran negotiator, Rob Malley, revealed that since March, the US has agreed to remove all sanctions on the Islamic Republic in exchange for Iran coming back into compliance with the 2015 deal. In the meantime, Tehran is moving ahead with its nuclear ambitions during this “limbo” period, enriching uranium to its highest-ever levels, using more advanced centrifuges and producing uranium metal. Israeli officials have expressed concern that the Iranians are using the lull in the talks – the last round broke off at the end of June – to inch perilously close to a nuclear weapon.