Free Republic

Researchers say the feat moves robots one step closer to “human-level dexterity.” Solving a Rubik’s Cube is hard enough for most people. Solving a Rubik’s Cube with one hand is even harder. Harder still: designing a lone robot hand capable of solving a Rubik’s Cube all by itself. Such a machine would require unprecedented dexterity and coordinated finger joint movements, as well as the ability to learn a new task over time and independently the way a human would. This week, researchers at OpenAI — a well-known San Francisco-based research lab focused on developing benevolent artificial intelligence — announced that...

Ohio planners will move full speed ahead on a proposed hyperloop system that would carry passengers between Pittsburgh and Chicago in about 58 minutes for a one-way cost of about $93. But the full system, known as Mid-West Connect, probably wouldn’t be finished until about 2050. Thea Walsh, director of transportation and funding for the Columbus, Ohio-based Mid-Ohio Regional Planning Commission, said this week the agency is putting the finishing touches on feasibility and environmental impact studies but has concluded it should pursue the hyperloop system. The system being developed by Virgin Hyperloop One would move passengers and freight in...

A GOP Senator met with more than 100 Indian contract workers in Congress and publicly urged them to lobby U.S. Senators for passage of his legislation to give citizenship to more Indian workers who push middle-class Americans out of college-graduate jobs. Utah Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) made the request on Thursday, shortly his fourth bid to pass his S.286 green-card giveaway bill. The bill was quickly blocked by an objection from a Democratic Senator — while the other 52 GOP Senators did not speak out. “We’re now down to one objector, just one,” Lee claimed, adding:

East St. Louis is short $9.5 million between a budget deficit and back payments owed to its fire and police pensions. As a result, city leaders are closing a firehouse and laying off nine firefighters. Nine firefighters have been asked to hand in their gear and their fire station will temporarily close as East St. Louis, Illinois, faces a $5.5 million budget deficit and interception of nearly $4 million in state funding for debts owed to its police and fire pensions. Unfortunately, with 100% of the City’s state revenues being redirected to the police and fire pensions, we are faced...

PG&E Corp.’s chief executive said Friday that it could take as long as 10 years for the company to improve its electric system enough to significantly diminish the need to pull the plug on customers to reduce the risk of sparking fires. Bill Johnson, who joined the company in May, made the disclosure at a California Public Utilities Commission hearing where the panel’s president, Marybel Batjer, sharply criticized the company’s “inadequate execution” of a shut-off in which it turned off power to large portions of Northern California for more than two days last week. The commission convened an emergency meeting...

More people were working last month in Fresno County, and fewer people were out of work, than at any time in at least 30 years – a combination that drove the unemployment rate in September to its lowest point in decades. Estimates released Friday by the state Employment Development Department indicated Fresno County’s unemployment rate was 5.3%. Steven Gutierrez, an EDD labor market consultant in Fresno, said that is the lowest it’s been since current tracking methods began in 1990. The previous low-water mark was a year ago, when the county’s unemployment rate was estimated at 5.9%. “August and September...

British television host Piers Morgan earlier this week blasted a climate activism leader as a hypocrite for not reducing her "own carbon footprint" while telling others to do so. The "Good Morning Britain" host targeted Skeena Rathor, co-founder of Extinction Rebellion — a radical, left-wing outfit that's been staging demonstrations in the U.K. to force attention on climate change. What was said during the segment? Morgan began by asking Rathor how she got to the studio — to which she replied that the station sent a car to pick her up. "Do you have a TV at home?" Morgan pressed.

The state's top prosecutor believes that the go-to social media site for accused Tree of Life shooter Robert Bowers is on its last legs financially, according to a statement issued early Thursday further explaining that office's decision to close a civil probe that followed the synagogue massacre. The statement from the office of Attorney General Josh Shapiro indicates that the decision to close the probe followed indications that Pennsylvania-based Gab.com "had exhausted its already-raised money, and was no longer going to be serviced by the payment processors, cutting off all public funding to support the business." Spokeswoman Jacklin Rhoads went...

Breaking News China 3Q2019 GDP hits 27.5 year low of 6.0% as officials say 90% of downside pressure coming from trade war. There was typical bluster with news but there is no doubt China has mounting financial reasons to deal more fairly with America. The calculus is shifting. China’s economy slowed by more than expected in the third quarter, according to a report published Friday by China’s National Bureau of Statistics. The true growth rate of the Chinese economy can be hard to measure. Official statistics are suspected of often being fudged to meet central government expectations. The latest economic...

In the midst of a human rights crisis and violent pro-democracy manifestations in China, Judicial Watch has obtained records that expose a troubling partnership between a public American university and the Chinese Communists at the heart of the abuses. The records show that the University of Arizona (UA), a taxpayer-funded institution with an enrollment of about 44,000, paid $100,000 to launch a Confucius Institute on its Tucson campus more than a decade ago and subsequently dedicated nearly $2 million and other public resources to keep it going. Confucius Institutes were founded by the Chinese government and are managed by China’s...

North Korean laborers have started fighting over and stealing each other’s excrement in an attempt to meet an impossible quota collection in time to prepare fertilizer for next year’s farming season, a report revealed this week...The quota, ordered by dictator Kim Jong-un in his New Year’s address, ordered that each household should meet a quota amounting to 100 kilograms (220 pounds) per able-bodied citizen. According to local sources, the quota was intentionally unattainable because its true goal was to force citizens to pay fines and bribes for their failure to meet the necessary targets.

A company bringing U.S. teachers to China announced Thursday that China arrested two of its members running an English language school on “bogus charges.” In a post on their Facebook page, China Horizons confirmed the company would be closing down following the arrest of owner Jacob Harlan and director Alyssa Petersen in Jiangsu province last month, citing increasing political and economic problems between the U.S. and China.

Dive Brief: Illinois State Sen. Martin Sandoval has resigned from his position as chair of the State Senate's Transportation Committee amid a federal fraud and corruption investigation related to state construction work, the Associated Press reported. The Democratic senator is still listed as a member of the committee, however, as of Oct. 15. The move came after the details of a federal search warrant revealed that the FBI last month combed Sandoval's offices and home for information related to architect Cesar Santoy; Santoy's architecture firm, Studio ARQ; red-light camera program company SafeSpeed; lobbyists; construction companies; and employees of the Illinois...

Much of the discussion has seemed like an egg-centered debate: soft or hard, but it won't be over easy. A soft Brexit means staying closely aligned with the EU on trade, and is favored by Britons who oppose leaving. Hard means a clean break, and that could cost an estimated 9% of GDP cumulatively, along with 450,000 jobs. Pro tip: If a Brexit discussion gets too detailed, scare the other party off by insisting that a hard exit would "force the BOE back to the ZLB with more QE." Just in case your bluff is called, that's Bank of England,...

HARTLAND TOWNSHIP, Mich. -- It's a place where thousands of families go every year to celebrate fall. Now, Spicer Orchards northwest of Detroit, Michigan is dealing with a crime like no other in its more than 50-year history. Someone stole more than 22,000 apples off acres of trees under the cover of darkness. After running the orchard for more than 50 years, the Spicer family has learned that you only pick apples when they are perfectly ripe. As harvest time nears, they check the apples every few days. On Sunday, October 6, the apples in the farm’s supplemental orchard on...

Full title: "‘Fun Times In Beijing’: Hunter Biden Received $700,000 From Company That Held Stake In Chinese Investment Firm" * Numerous news reports have asserted Hunter Biden received $50,000 a month from the Ukrainian natural gas company Burisma, but available records do not support that claim. * But the son of former Vice President Joe Biden did receive over $700,000 in payments from a capital management company called Rosemont Seneca Bohai, which obtained a 20% equity stake in BHR Partners, a Chinese investment firm. Hunter Biden served on the board of BHR Partners, which has close ties to the Bank...

Lousiana GOP Sen. John Kennedy has blocked a bill drafted by a top Democratic Senator that would accelerate the flow of Indian visa workers and immigrants into Americans’ office jobs. “The American people deserve an immigration system that looks like somebody designed it on purpose,” Kennedy told Democrat Sen. Dick Durbin during a polite conversation on the Senate floor. He said: I am rising to object [to Durbin’s bill] because a number of my colleagues … would like a little additional time to study this bill. But equally important, if not more important, many of my colleagues’ sentiment is that...

KEY POINTS The FAA said Boeing withheld the messages between employees for months. The incident ramps up pressure on Boeing and CEO Muilenburg about the planes. Boeing and the FAA are facing several investigations about the 737 Max’s design and certification. Boeing shares slipped Friday after the Federal Aviation Administration said Boeing withheld for months messages between employees from 2016 regarding the 737 Max’s certification from the regulator. The plane has been grounded since mid-March after two fatal crashes. “The FAA is also disappointed that Boeing did not bring this document to our attention immediately upon its discovery,” the agency...

Even people and publications favorable to President Trump are urging him to cancel plans to host the June 2020 G-7 Summit at the Trump National Golf Course resort near Miami. For example, the New York Post writes: When you become leader of the Free World, there are some things you have to give up, including any hint of promoting your own properties. It’s not the obscure issue of “emoluments,� nor the folks who (as Mulvaney put it) “will never get over the fact that it’s a Trump property� that you have to think about, sir. It’s that voters expect...

We keep hearing, from the industry and from the Indian press, that denial rates in the H-1B program are rising sharply, that more and more of the dreaded questions about applications (the Request for Evidence (RFE) process) are being asked by DHS staff, and that the post-RFE approval rate in the H-1B program is falling.So there must be a smaller number of H-1B approvals, right?Well, no. The number of initial approvals of H-1B applications has risen over the last five years by more than 100,000.In FY 2015, based on a dataset used both by the Times of India and by...