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WASHINGTON — Consumer spending was flat in May with incomes dropping for a second month as the impact of the government's pandemic stimulus payments waned. Inflation, however, posted a sizable gain with prices excluding food and energy jumping by the largest amount in nearly three decades. The flat reading for consumer spending in May represented a marked slowdown following gains of 0.9% in April and a 5% surge in March, the Commerce Department reported Friday. The spending surge in March had been fueled by distribution of payments of up to $1,400 per individual from a $1.9 trillion stimulus bill, the...

After claiming to be “personally” offended over accusations the drag queen-loving U.S. military is woke, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Army Gen. Mark Milley said, “I want to understand white rage, and I’m white.” Oh, okay, because that’s not woke at all. This happened during congressional testimony on Wednesday. Then he added this bone-chilling explanation: “What is it that caused thousands of people to assault this building and try to overturn the Constitution of the United States of America?” The implication being it was “white rage.” Okay, just for starters, only an idiot would see skin color as...

From jazz to Mozart, young Indonesian breathes new life into centuries-old stringed instrument (ni) Kongahyan 01 Jakarta-based traditional musician Seto Noviantoro showcasing the two-string bowed instrument kongahyan. (Photo: Nivell Rayda) Nivell Byline - smiling By Nivell Rayda @NivellCNA 27 Jun 2021 06:01AM (Updated: 27 Jun 2021 07:36AM) Bookmark JAKARTA: With great precision and agility, Seto Noviantoro’s fingers glided across the strings of an Indonesian musical instrument, while his right arm moved the bow back and forth. Despite its distinctive sound, not many people know the name of this two-string bowed fiddle, even in Jakarta where the instrument originated centuries ago....

At least 20 people were detained in Turkey as riot police resorted to using tear gas & rubber bullets to disrupt the annual Pride Parade in Istanbul. At least 20 people were detained in Turkey as riot police resorted to using tear gas and rubber bullets to disrupt the annual Pride Parade in Istanbul, intensifying a crackdown on the march amid increased government hostility toward LGBTQ individuals in the country. Earlier, Istanbul's Governor's office had denied granting a permit for the said parade which has been held since 2003 but banned for the last seven years. Upon consecutive rejections. hundreds...

Near the end of the video for Journey's new single "The Way We Used to Be," an animated proxy of guitarist Neal Schon appears to transform into a dung beetle. It would be an odd visual choice if not for the insect's importance in Journey lore, appearing — in various fantastical forms — on multiple album sleeves. But why a beetle to begin with? The answer involves another rock giant. "We got the job to do a Jimi Hendrix album cover," visual artist Stanley Mouse told NBC Bay Area in 2017, referencing his creative partner Alton Kelley. "And just as...

“Faithful are the wounds of a friend; but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful” (Proverbs 27:6).

BREAKING NEWS Coronavirus in IDF: 11 service members infected By JERUSALEM POST STAFF JUNE 27, 2021 09:25 Some 11 service members in the IDF were infected with the novel coronavirus as of Sunday morning, according to the IDF Spokesperson's Unit. Some 46 service members were in quarantine.

Paul tests whether a flare gun is an effective self defense tool.

Habitable Planets With Earth-Like Biospheres May Be Much Rarer Than Thought TOPICS:AstrobiologyAstronomyAstrophysicsExoplanetRoyal Astronomical SocietyBy Royal Astronomical Society June 26, 2021A new analysis of known exoplanets has revealed that Earth-like conditions on potentially habitable planets may be much rarer than previously thought. The work focuses on the conditions required for oxygen-based photosynthesis to develop on a planet, which would enable complex biospheres of the type found on Earth. The study was recently published in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.The number of confirmed planets in our own Milky Way galaxy now numbers into the thousands. However, planets that are...

“The high-profile scientist who was fired from Canada’s top infectious disease lab collaborated with Chinese government scientists on inventions registered in Beijing, but closely related to her federal job,” reports National Post reporter Tom Blackwell.Xiangguo Qiu was “a long-time federal civil servant when the patents were registered in 2017 and 2019 for innovations related to the Ebola and Marburg viruses, key focuses of her work at Winnipeg’s National Microbiology Laboratory (NML),” according to Blackwell’s article. Qiu shipped a load of the deadly pathogens from the NML to the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV), a likely source of the virus that...

Attorneys for lawyer Sidney Powell, Rudy Giuliani, and MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell argued Thursday during a federal district court in the District of Columbia that a defamation lawsuit filed by elections technology firm Dominion Voting Systems should be thrown out.They argued that Dominion acted in a government capacity during the last election by providing counties with election software. As a result, their lawyers said the firm has to prove Powell and Lindell acted with malice when they made claims against the company after the Nov. 3 election, citing previous court cases that barred public officials from filing lawsuits against individuals...

One often wonders if the BLM actually cares about black lives because their focus is so much on driving everything further left, and they don’t seem to care about the black lives that may be taken in the process of their actions.For example, they don’t seem to have cared much about former police captain, David Dorn, 77, killed during the rioting in St. Louis, who died trying to protect his friend’s shop. Then, there was little, 8-year-old Secoriea Turner, who was shot and killed in a parking lot ‘autonomous zone’ by BLM ‘protesters.’ The city had previously failed to shut...

U.K. Health Secretary Matt Hancock, who has led the country's response to the coronavirus, resigned Saturday, a day after apologizing for breaching social distancing rules with an aide with whom he was allegedly having an affair. Hancock had been under growing pressure since the tabloid Sun newspaper published images showing him and senior aide Gina Coladangelo kissing in an office at the Department of Health. The Sun said the closed circuit television images were taken May 6 — 11 days before lockdown rules were eased to allow hugs and other physical contact with people outside one's own household. In a...

Earlier this week, Joe Biden joined hands with the likes of Mitt Romney and Lisa Murkowski to announce a ‘bipartisan’ infrastructure deal. The $1.2 trillion package was meant to be a compromise between the original monstrosity proposed by Democrats and simply not passing anything at all.Yet, no sooner than the jubilant photo op ended, Biden had blown up the deal by saying the quiet part out loud in regards to what the Democrats planned to do. Whereas the Republicans saw the deal as a substitute for the original proposal, Biden, Nancy Pelosi, and Chuck Schumer all wanted to tie passage...

Two inexorable energy trends are underway in California: soaring electricity prices and ever-worsening reliability – and both trends bode ill for the state’s low- and middle-income consumers.Last week, the state’s grid operator, the California Independent System Operator, issued a “flex alert” that asked the state’s consumers to reduce their power use “to reduce stress on the grid and avoid power outages.” CAISO’s warning of impending electricity shortages heralds another blackout-riddled summer at the same time California’s electricity prices are skyrocketing.In 2020, California’s electricity prices jumped by 7.5%, making it the biggest price increase of any state in the country last...

As the UEFA Euros are underway across Europe, showcasing the return of spectator sports on the world stage, Japan is preparing to host an even bigger event in less than a month. With COVID cases down and the state of emergency freshly lifted in most of the country, it may look like the timing could hardly be better for the Olympics to come to Tokyo, at least under the given circumstances. However, as Statista's Feliz Richter notes, for many people in Japan the thought of hosting thousands of athletes, trainers, and media workers from all over the world in the...

On December 31st of last year, an 80 year-old Buffalo-area woman named Judith Smentkiewicz fell ill with Covid-19. She was rushed by ambulance to Millard Fillmore Suburban Hospital in Williamsville, New York, where she was put on a ventilator. Her son Michael and his wife flew up from Georgia, and were given grim news. Judith, doctors said, had a 20% chance at survival, and even if she made it, she’d be on a ventilator for a month.As December passed into the New Year, Judith’s health declined. Her family members, increasingly desperate, had been doing what people in the Internet age...

As Julio and Katie have covered, Vice President Kamala Harris' trip to the southern border has certainly had its fair share of pitfalls. The administration must not only deal with that, but the news that two of the vice president's travel officials are quitting, as Annie Karni and Katie Rogers reported for The New York Times.The news came out on June 24, the day before Harris' highly anticipated trip. Not only was she criticized for how long it took--almost 100 days after Biden put her in charge of stemming the surge of migrants--but because she went to El Paso, many...

A Canadian pastor seen in viral videos documenting his encounters with law enforcement over COVID-19 restrictions says authorities abide by a double standard when it comes to enforcing restrictions and they've been targeting him as the result of a “personal vendetta.”In an interview with The Christian Post, Artur Pawlowski, who serves as pastor of Street Church and Cave of Adullam Church in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, spoke about his interactions with authorities over the past year and doubled down on his characterization of local law enforcement as Nazis and communists.Pawlowski has compared the measures taken by law enforcement officials to enforce...

The UK, Canadian and US embassies have flown the Pride flag in Russia, defying the country’s “gay propaganda” law. On Friday (25 June), which marks 43 years since the rainbow flag was first used as a symbol of LGBT+ Pride at the 1978 Pride parade in San Francisco, the embassies of Canada, the UK and the US raised the flag in Russia.