Trump brushes off accusations of Russian sabotage against NATO allies
www.politico.com

... President Donald Trump dodged a chance Friday to condemn President Vladimir Putin over allegations that Russia has conducted espionage attacks on NATO nations.

Trump, speaking to reporters at the White House, brushed off a question about one such apparent incident -- the discovery of explosive-laden drones Aug. 4 at the Leipzig airport in Germany that officials have linked to Russia.

"I speak to him," Trump said of the Russian leader. "I know him very well. Putin is not looking to attack NATO territory."

Trump did not elaborate further on the attack or why he would be so quick to dismiss an apparent attack on a fellow member of NATO, an alliance rooted in the concept of a shared defense against Moscow. ...

Trump Admits Real Reason He's Building Monuments to Himself
www.thedailybeast.com

... President Donald Trump has made a stunning admission while revealing why he's obsessed with remodeling Washington.

Trump, 80, has candidly told New York magazine that he is building monuments for himself and slapping his name everywhere because he knows that nobody else will do so when he is gone. ...

The Venezuelan billionaire the US investigated for money laundering now has a Pentagon oil deal
www.reuters.com

... Florida prosecutors earlier this year paused a money-laundering investigation into Alejandro Betancourt, say eight people familiar with the matter. Switzerland withdrew UK extradition request in May but Zurich prosecutor says criminal case still proceeds. U.S. official said most of Betancourt's legal challenges are nearly a decade old - and that he is the best partner to boost Venezuela's oil output.

Ken Paxton Accused of New Ethical Violations: 'Significant' Misrepresentations on His Financial Disclosures
www.mediaite.com

... Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) is facing a new crop of accusations of ethical violations after a Friday report by The Texas Tribune with ProPublica.

Yes, different allegations; these are new additions to the already stunning series of scandals, lawsuits, controversies, and a messy divorce that have plagued Paxton for years and are widely credited with dragging him down in the polls in his U.S. Senate race against the Democratic nominee, State Rep. James Talarico (D).

Paxton scored President Donald Trump's endorsement over the incumbent Cornyn and won the GOP primary, but that victory required a runoff, burned through campaign funds, and left the warnings from Cornyn and his allies looking prescient that Paxton would be a weaker candidate in the general election.

The article by Zach Despart, Kayla Guo, and Alexandra Glorioso reported that Paxton "appears to have violated federal ethics law in significant ways when filing recent disclosures of his assets and liabilities, creating confusion about his net worth and holding," based on the reporters' review of the records and consultation with ethics law experts.

Among the discrepancies in Paxton's filings were his reports that he owned seven homes -- six of which were listed for rent -- but claimed to have earned zero income from all these properties.

The Tribune's reporters found "some current residents and neighbors at those addresses [who] confirmed that the properties were rented," and cited three experts who said not reporting income violates federal disclosure laws. ...

Why are European countries moving their gold out of North America?
www.bbc.com

... When the central bank of the Netherlands confirmed this week that it had moved tonnes of the country's gold out of North America, it said the relocation would make it "better prepared for severe crises".

Some 86 tonnes from the combined total of about 313 tonnes held in the US and Canada were relocated to London "in view of increasing geopolitical unrest", it said, so the shiny stuff could be "readily available for use in a crisis situation".

Questions were bound to follow. Why were the Dutch doing this? Were they anticipating some major economic shock on the horizon?

It seems not, but the move was clearly in response to the unstable and uncertain state the world finds itself in, with trade and military wars prompting countries to take precautions and hold their gold closer to home.

Earlier this year, France announced it had removed its gold reserves from the US to home shores. Meanwhile, Germany's Bundesbank transferred more than 216 tonnes of the metal from storage locations abroad - 111 tonnes from New York and 105 tonnes from Paris - over a few years ending in 2016.

It is a strategy which has played out before in times of global instability. "Some European central banks moved part of their gold holdings to New York during the Cold War," said research analysts Lina Thomas and Daan Struyven of Goldman Sachs.

Joseph Cavatoni, senior market strategist at the World Gold Council, told the BBC while wars and trade tensions were "playing into some of these decisions", it didn't "top the list" of motivating factors.

Inflation, interest rates and just having gold in a place where it can be traded quickly also played a role.

"I don't get a sense that there's an impending doom," Cavatoni said, "but what I do think is people are being better educated around how to manage their reserve assets, growing their reserve assets, and actually thinking more effectively around how to make the most of those assets." ...

What different world maps get right -- and what they get wrong
www.bbc.com

... The UN has just called for the predominant world map to be replaced with one that more accurately reflects the true size of continents such as Africa.

The "Correct the Map" resolution adopted by the General Assembly aims to fix the discrepancy on the Mercator map, in which the African continent is shown as being of similar size to Greenland -- even though it is in reality about 14 times larger. ...

The now widely used Mercator map was created in 1569 by Flemish cartographer Gerardus Mercator.

Its main purpose was to help European sailors navigate the oceans, as cartography Professor James Cheshire at University College London explained.

"He wanted a straight line to be drawn on a map to look like a straight line in reality if you followed a compass bearing," he told the BBC. "That was what it was intended to do, and that's what it does brilliantly well."

To keep those angles correct on a flat map, Mercator had to stretch the grid lines wider as they moved away from the equator toward the poles.

His map accommodates for the curvature of the Earth by making countries near the equator seem much smaller than they are, with countries nearer the poles appearing stretched. ...

The Equal Earth map aims to address this problem with the Mercator projection.

It was developed by a team of cartographers in 2018 to present the size and shape of landmasses more accurately. It was inspired by the 1963 Robinson projection -- a map that shows the entire globe's surface at once.

The Equal Earth map was adopted by African Union members in February.

But it sacrifices the straight lines that made the Mercator projection perfect for navigating with -- and it cannot be used for measuring the true distance between different places.

"You can preserve area, or you can preserve shape, or you can preserve distance and direction, but not everything at once perfectly, because otherwise you'd be back to a sphere," Cheshire said. ...

18 U.S. Code 1702 - Obstruction of correspondence
www.law.cornell.edu

... Whoever takes any letter, postal card, or package out of any post office or any authorized depository for mail matter, or from any letter or mail carrier, or which has been in any post office or authorized depository, or in the custody of any letter or mail carrier, before it has been delivered to the person to whom it was directed, with design to obstruct the correspondence, or to pry into the business or secrets of another, or opens, secretes, embezzles, or destroys the same, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than five years, or both. ...

18 U.S. Code 1708 - Theft or receipt of stolen mail matter generally
www.law.cornell.edu

... Whoever steals, takes, or abstracts, or by fraud or deception obtains, or attempts so to obtain, from or out of any mail, post office, or station thereof, letter box, mail receptacle, or any mail route or other authorized depository for mail matter, or from a letter or mail carrier, any letter, postal card, package, bag, or mail, or abstracts or removes from any such letter, package, bag, or mail, any article or thing contained therein, or secretes, embezzles, or destroys any such letter, postal card, package, bag, or mail, or any article or thing contained therein; or

Whoever steals, takes, or abstracts, or by fraud or deception obtains any letter, postal card, package, bag, or mail, or any article or thing contained therein which has been left for collection upon or adjacent to a collection box or other authorized depository of mail matter; or

Whoever buys, receives, or conceals, or unlawfully has in his possession, any letter, postal card, package, bag, or mail, or any article or thing contained therein, which has been so stolen, taken, embezzled, or abstracted, as herein described, knowing the same to have been stolen, taken, embezzled, or abstracted --

Shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than five years, or both. ...