News Which Makes One Wonder The media has been covering the Khashoggi death by the Saudis non-stop. It is being covered much more than any death of an American reporter, and it makes one wonder. Khashoggi did some reporting for an American newspaper, but was not a U.S. citizen. I saw on television the other day, the body of Khashoggi was discovered hacked into pieces in the garden of the Saudi Ambassador. This leads me to wonder how anyone could be stupid enough to bury a body in their own garden. Could it be someone is being framed? If they are not I have to assume the assassins are the stupidest people on the face of the earth. Let’s talk conspiracy. Could it be the opposition to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman wants him out of power? He has been supporting some ideas which run contrary to some popular Muslim beliefs. As most of us know by now the Power Ball lottery just had a winner at $1.537 Billion Dollars. At the time of this article all we knew was it was someone who lived in South Carolina. That amount of money was for taking the annuity over 29 years. A lump sum payment would come to $878,000,000. I have always wondered why there wasn’t more protests against the governments, both federal and local taking taxes out of this money. There are so many other countries which don’t take anything from lottery winnings. The governments win every time a person wins. This seems highly unfair to me. This is right up there with having to pay tax on your social security payments. Taxes are estimated to be about 40%. Are you tired of getting your personal information hacked by sites which do little or nothing to protect that information? What about sites you never gave permission to get your personal data who lose it, because it was not protected properly or at all? This may change in the future, because of the largest consumer settlements in a class action. Yahoo has agreed to pay fifty million dollars to those who were part of the class action which was formed by those or lost personal information. It is said there were up to three billion email accounts affected and two hundred million people. The company is also paying 35 million dollars in lawyer fees. Also, small business and individuals who claim compensation for losses and hacks may receive reimbursement. We needed this. Maybe it will give an incentive to others to protect our data with much stronger protections. When you think about it 200,000,000 people getting $50,000,000 only works out to about 25 cents each so it doesn’t do anything for any individual. The caravan coming through Mexico and the second one forming in Central America are a big problem for the United States. People do not suddenly decide to form these things without help from organizers. I guess this will be a test for our resolve. One thing is for sure, it is going to be interesting to see if President Trump does cut aid to the countries that allowed this to happen. I have to wonder how countries like El Salvador would like it if we formed a huge caravan and marched into their country. One of the most ridiculous things I read in the news was the Russian president Vladimir Putin saying the U.S. is no longer a superpower. I think this is sour grapes, and he said it for a few different reasons. I believe one of the reasons is the number of arms the U.S. is selling all over the world which is making Russia nervous. The U.S. is having a banner arms sales year which means the Russians have to be losing out. Another reason Russia is bitter, is the fact the U.S. is rebuilding their military. The Russians would like nothing better than seeing the U.S. become weaker which would give them more inroads into other countries. One thing no one has mentioned is the sanctions against South and Central American countries for allowing the caravans to form and not doing anything about them might make these countries friendlier toward Russia and China. I had to laugh at a lady who was over one hundred years old, when she replied to a question which is usually asked of very old people. The question was how did you live so long. Her reply was she stayed away from men. Another replied she consumed food and drink which most of us would classify as unhealthy. Do people who live very long lives really know why? I think maybe not. There are plenty of cases of people doing everything right, yet they die at a young age, and there are a lot of other cases of people who don’t exercise, eat junk food and smoke, and they are still alive. It seems the crazies have been affected by the political turmoil. A bomb was sent to the home of George Soros and another to the Clinton’s home. Neither exploded thank goodness. First, we had the shooting of Republicans and now bombs sent to famous Democrats. It seems like it is time for the parties to try and resolve some of these hate issues before something even more terrible happens. The explosion of the Soyuz rocket launching a crew to the International Space Station was a terrible thing, but it could have been a lot worse if the crew hadn’t escaped. Originally, we were told it would be many months before another launch could take place, but now we hear it will happen in December 2018. The Soyuz has had a great record of successful launches and has demonstrated its escape capsule works. Soon the United States will turn to private companies to send crews to the space station. One of the most amazing things to me is how we are able to sell the F-35 fighter. It has more things wrong with it than anyone could ever believe and yet other countries are buying some of them. There have been some cancellations, but all in all they are selling, and sales are picking up. Belgium has just chosen to buy 34 of these planes which are the most expensive in history for what they are. The choice was between this plane and the Eurofighter. The sale will cost Belgium $4.14 billion dollars. While these planes are said to be very good at stealth, they are far slower and less maneuverable than some of the newer Russian planes which are also far cheaper. The last thing I want to mention is the oldest shipwreck which is still in tact has been found in the Mediterranean Sea. It is a mile down and about 2100 years old and complete. The reason for the preservation is the fact there is no oxygen in that area. Researchers believe there are many other ancient ships down there.
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