... The matter is now in the hands of the Justice Department ...

Will an investigation ensue?

More from the article ...

... When law enforcement and tech salespeople pitch ALPRs to city councils, they stick to a familiar script. They trumpet the technology, which is often provided by private companies like Flock Safety, Motorola Solutions, or Axon, as an essential tool for solving high-stakes crimes, such as car jacking, kidnapping, or murder.

But when you strip away the carefully curated talking points, the data continues to reveal a different (and frankly, ridiculous) story. An EFF analysis of ALPR search logs from Flock Safety systems shows that officers across the country are spying on drivers for completely nonsensical "reasons."

Police are routinely searching the Flock database without providing any legitimate justification, making a mockery of our civil liberties by logging reasons like "LOL" (short for "laugh out loud"), "LMAO" (short for "laughing my ass off"), "sexy," and "idk" (short for "I don't know") to access sensitive ALPR location data.

And in some cases, officers are just mashing keyboard buttons rather than articulating the nature of their searches.

Flock Safety claims it has improved its system by requiring officers to select from a dropdown list of crimes before running a search -- but that only makes it easier for officers to hide improper searches behind the veneer of uniformity.

The system does not require proof that the dropdown reason actually matches the true purpose of the search.

With no warrant requirements, limited guardrails, and deficient audit processes, ALPR databases have fostered a culture of unrestricted access to everyone's location information. This culture of abuse has allowed police to treat a mass surveillance network like their own personal search engine, permitting the tracking of the movements of everyday citizens for low-level complaints, personal whims, and sometimes, seemingly, for the lols. ...

@#3 ... Thousands of dollars. That won't even pay for a cake. ...

Inflation was the main reason for raising the interest rates. Chmn Marsh even mentioned the possibility of another increase before the end of the year.

More from the article ...

... The survey, opens new tab, commissioned by the Rockefeller Foundation and conducted in 34 countries from July 21 to August 5, reflected a grim view of economic developments and security challenges, with nearly 70% saying the world had gotten worse over the past year.

Only 38% of those surveyed felt their national economies would improve over the next five years, with optimism down sharply in two of the largest economies. Optimism fell 26 percentage points in India to 50% and 16 points in China to 56%.

Despite widespread pessimism, 57% of those surveyed said countries should cooperate to solve global challenges such as security even if it means compromising on some national interests. That's up from 55% in last year's survey.

The poll, released ahead of next week's United Nations General Assembly in New York, comes after nearly seven months of war in the Middle East that has upended global energy markets, lowered economic growth and fueled inflation. That followed a year of turmoil sparked by sweeping tariffs imposed by U.S. President Donald Trump on imports from nearly every country. ...

Canada received the highest level of comfort for taking a leading role in world affairs at 60%, followed by Japan (58%) and Australia (55%). The European Union and Britain were closely behind, with 55% and 54%, while the United Nations stood at 52%.

By contrast, just 39% were comfortable with the United States taking a leading role and 37% with China. Russia was viewed even more negatively, with just 26% comfortable. ...

More from the article ...

... "The president doesn't know who this person is. I think other members of the family don't know who this person is ... When you say am I investigating -- Am I investigating what?" Attorney General Todd Blanche told reporters Tuesday during a White House press briefing in the Rose Garden.

Donald Trump Jr. and his wife were married at Palm Beach, Florida, before departing for a wedding party on a private island in the Bahamas in late May and the oligarch -- Umar Kremlev -- footed a large portion of the bill for the events later that weekend, according to records reviewed by nonprofit investigative outlet ProPublica, as well as three people familiar with the event who spoke with the outlet.

The payments included the cost of renting a private island and a fireworks display, ProPublica reported. Payments for the expenses reportedly came from an entity affiliated with the International Boxing Association, for which Kremlev serves as president.

The IBA was suspended by the International Olympic Committee in 2019 due to financial issues and organizational problems, including concerns about corruption.

ABC News has not independently confirmed the details of the ProPublica report.

The couple has since acknowledged that Kremlev gave them an "extraordinarily generous" wedding gift. It's not clear why he paid for parts of Trump Jr.'s wedding celebration.

"The president's son has said that he's a very close friend and that he accepted a gift the weekend of his wedding," Blanche said Tuesday. "And when you say this person is a friend of Putin, I don't even know if that's true or not." ...

@#6 ... The avarage Amazon worker with benefits makes $32.00 per hour. ...

Without benefits, the hourly starting pay was just raised to $20 an hour, with average pay around $24 an hour.

Another view ...

More from the article ...

... The images were sent to CBS News by active service members on condition of anonymity because of rigid media restrictions within the military.

"This is major damage to our bases that hasn't been communicated to the American public," one deployed service member told CBS News. "We're standing there with our eyes closed getting punched in the face."

One photo, taken at Prince Sultan Air Force Base in Saudi Arabia, shows a direct hit on the back half of a Boeing E-3 Sentry four-engine aircraft, its tail severed from the charred fuselage that also supported a rotating radar that is essential for collecting midair intelligence. ...

Other photos taken from the base show hollowed-out buildings and barracks whose shells ironically stand next to unaffected cement "T-wall" structures, which were once regarded as critical fortifications against grenade and mortar attacks but proved critically ineffective against an aerial assault. ...

"These are not 'squirters' getting through," the service member added, referencing language used by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth after the deadly March 1 attack on Port of Shuaiba in Kuwait that killed six U.S. troops. "We're not defending these bases. We're just watching them get destroyed." ...

[photos in the article]

From the subsummary ...

... Trump without any evidence says the assassination attempt in Butler, PA, was a "Democrat Plot." ...

Update ...

More from the article ...

... Californians just made it through the hottest August on record without having to endure any rolling power outages.

And, as the Southland continues to sweat its way through record-setting heat and humidity this week, there have been no widespread calls to reduce energy.

In fact, the state has not issued a Flex Alert since 2022, and it has not implemented rotating outages since 2020. ...

Could the Russian attending the wedding be the reason why Pres Trump chose not to attend?

... accusing Homeland Security officials of ordering agents to commit thousands of crimes by falsely identifying themselves in order to gain access to voting records ...

I'm sure AG Blanche will get right on this ...

/s

More from the article ...

... In a post on social media, Trump alleged without providing evidence that information on the assassination attempt "was missing, altered, corrupted or gone."

"Dirty Cop Christopher Wray should pay a price for the way he handled this assassination attempt, and certainly for the things he said," the president posted. ...

The president apparently lashed out at Wray following reporting from the New York Post about documents shared with Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) as part of his inquiry into the assassination attempt. The documents, which include the FBI's interviews with Crooks' father, suggest that Crooks has "an obsession" with guns and purchased gun parts online using a pseudonym, according to the Post.

Trump appointed Wray in 2017 to replace James Comey and ultimately replaced Wray with current FBI Director Kash Patel. Comey is currently facing federal prosecution for a social media post that the Department of Justice alleged is a threat to kill the president.

Testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday for an annual review of his agency, Patel said the FBI has provided all documents about its investigation into the Butler assassination that it is "lawfully able to release."

"We found no evidence that [Crooks] was literally even speaking to any other human being other than his parents who he resided with," Patel said.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment. ...

More from the article ...

... Covino had already filled out and submitted a pardon application form by mail to the Biden Justice Department. But his request was rejected in July by Mr. Trump, one of thousands of pardon-seekers denied clemency as part of the administration's effort to clear its backlog of applicants. ...

Mr. Trump has employed a different approach to clemency over the last 18 months. On his first day in office, he cleared more than 1,500 people charged or convicted in relation to the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot through pardons, commutations and dropped prosecutions. Dozens of clemency grants for white-collar criminals, often wealthy and well-connected, have followed.

Burkman and Wohl's pitch at the Ritz-Carlton meeting leaned into what they described as a new path to a pardon. "It's more energy and less process," Burkman said. "...And contacts."

But it would come with a price, they told Covino. For $300,000, they predicted, they could secure him a pardon by as early as October. ...

Yet there is near-unanimity among the federal prosecutors, defense attorneys and other sources who discussed the clemency process with CBS News: There has never been such a dizzying pardon economy as there is in Washington right now -- a Wild West of clemency populated by MAGA-connected brokers and influencers -- where the old norms have been largely tossed aside.

Previously, those seeking clemency typically went through the Justice Department. More than two dozen DOJ lawyers weighed factors that often included an applicant's remorse and evidence of rehabilitation, and recommended worthy recipients to the president. That process has been largely sidelined, according to sources with direct knowledge of the clemency process.

About 70% of Mr. Trump's clemency actions in his second term were not routed through the Justice Department (and that number is 92% when including the Jan. 6 cases), according to a CBS News analysis of Justice Department data.

Brokers seek out ways to influence Mr. Trump -- through contacts in the White House, by deploying MAGA influencers, or by working with others close to the president. Access is the coin of the realm, and on the promise of delivering that access, brokers now charge fees that can reach as high as $3 million, sources told CBS News. ...

More from the article ...

... Over the last few years, California has quietly but dramatically increased the resiliency of its electrical grid through a significant expansion in battery energy storage.

These batteries hold onto solar energy captured during the day, so it can be sent to the grid as demand peaks in the evening and morning, when most people are at home running air conditioners and other appliances. ...

According to Ackemann, the system seeks to add another 20,000 to 25,000 megawatts of battery storage capacity by 2045 -- the same year it has set a goal of achieving carbon neutrality. That means the state would remove as many carbon emissions from the atmosphere as it emits.

Hitting that goal will require increasing the supply of renewable energy and transitioning away from the use of natural gas, which supplies roughly a third of the state's electricity.

In recent years, California has steadily grown the share of electrical power generated by renewable sources -- such as solar, wind, geothermal and hydropower -- which bolstered the resiliency of the grid by increasing the overall amount of energy available. An uptick in people installing rooftop solar panels has provided an additional power boost, Ackemann said.

In May, California became the first known large-scale power system in the world to have relied on more than 50% solar power for an entire month. ...

@#11 ... "Both sides!!!" cry the paint huffing morons and fascist apologists. ...

It's the "false equivalency" approach that they often use because they seem to know their side of the argument is weak.

... The Defense Department's inspector general revealed Monday that the United States is facing a shortfall in ammunition as a result of its costly war in Iran. ...

But ... but ... but ...

Pres Trump said such reporting was fake news.

More from the article ...

... But as the share of wealth workers take home through wages"called labor share"is shrinking, corporate profits have exploded, with the S&P 500 index gaining 600% since the beginning of the century, while wages have increased just 12.5% over the same period, adjusted for inflation.

In other words: Corporations are raking in cash, but American workers are reaping less and less of the rewards.

The consequences associated with shrinking labor shares are now becoming tangible.

A recent Government Accountability Office (GAO) report found that across the 11 states sampled, Amazon, the country's largest company by revenue, has 12,346 workers on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and 11,338 relying on Medicaid.

That was nearly triple the number of Amazon employees in need of federal assistance compared to 2020, when GAO conducted a similar report.

During that same period, Amazon saw an increase in annual profits from $11.6 billion to $77.7 billion. Amazon's 2025 revenue soared 12% year over year, from $638 billion to a record $717 billion. ...