Sorted by date Results 1131 - 1155 of 3370

February 24, 2022 - Data from the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health show that last week the vaccinated were 6.3% more likely to catch Covid-19 than the unvaccinated. This is at least the second week in which numbers dipped the wrong direction for proponents of the idea that it is the unvaccinated who are the main transmitters of the virus. Here are the raw numbers: Total fully vaccinated population: 7,185,622 (71.8% of the county population) Total number of new...

I can't say if it was western sanctions or equipment failure or hacking or something else. But RT.COM is down today. When one tries to pull up the home page, one receives the following error message: "403 - Forbidden . That's an error. Client does not have access rights to the content so server is rejecting to give proper response. That's all we know." The E.U. had announced that it would block Russian government websites "that spread disinformation," such as RT.com. I am...

February 23, 2022 - Los Angeles County Health Department officials today announced they would allow establishments that verify vaccination status or require negative PCR tests of the unvaccinated to have customers and workers remove their masks indoors. Masks have been required at all indoor locations since March of 2020, except for a brief period last spring after the vaccines became available to the general public. Then vaccines proved to be less effective at preventing...

As peace talks began in Belarus, the Russian campaign to subdue Ukraine's second largest city intensified. Video emerged of Russian forces shelling the car parking lot immediately in front of a large residential building in Kharkiv. Other social media reports say dozens of civilians are dead. In some cases, their bodies are in the streets for all to see. In fairness to the Russian Army, note that many civilians have taken up arms against Russians, making them legitimate...

The Observer can't independently confirm this story, but https://www.obozrevatel.com/ is generally considered a reliable, not Ukraine government website. A mutiny among Russian soldiers or mercenaries would be major news, if true. "It seems that something has begun to be suspected in Russian Belgorod. As it became known to OBOZREVATEL, a real riot among servicemen of the Russian Federation took place in the Belgorod region, which borders Kharkiv, Lugansk, Sumy regions. About 5...

More than 100 families have applied to a pilot program that gives priority on Santa Monica's affordable housing waitlist to the households who were displaced by the Civic Auditorium or I-10 Freeway projects in the 1950s and 1960s, civic officials announced this week. The new Below Housing Market program – whose enrollment deadline ended on February 22 – will provide priority in city-funded housing and inclusionary housing for up to 100 households or descendants of hou...

You have no doubt heard the story of 13 brave border guards on Snake Island, 20 miles or so South of the Ukraine coast. When a Russian frigate captain told the border guards to surrender for their own safety, otherwise he would drop a bomb on them, they told the captain to "fuck off." He then blew them all up Not so, says RT.Com. The border guards were in a group of 83 border guards, transported by Russian navy to Sevastopol in Crimea on February 24th. The 13 are alive and...

Ukraine president Vladimir Zelensky posted a video on social media claiming that the President of Belarus promised to end access to Ukraine for Russian troops massed in Belarus, pending peace talks at the Belarus border. This according to a translation in a Russian language website based in Ukraine. This according to Obozrevatel, a Russian language website based in Ukraine. Lukashenko is a dictator closely aligned with Russian President Vladimir Putin, so the promise seems...

Making the rounds on social media is a one minute video of an interchange between 2 or 3 Russian soldiers in an armored personnel carrier, and a passing motoriston a country road. "Are you guys broken down?" the man asks the soldiers. "Out of fuel," one Russian soldier says. "Can I tow you back to Russia?" the Ukrainian jokes. The Russian soldiers laugh sarcastically in reply. The Ukranian drivers asking the soldiers if they know where they are going. One says, "to Kyiv," and...

A video of Russian President Vladimir Putin addressing the Interpreters Union discuss sanctions imposed on his country this morning Putin: "Russia becomes a part of the world economy. We are not going to hurt the system that we are part of. And we are there, and I think our partners should understand that. And to not push us outside this system. "We had no choice but to invade Ukraine. Of course some of the restrictions will happen, because of the politics of it. I want to...

I'm sure you've heard of the 13 Ukrainian border guards who were urged by the captain of a Russian warship to surrender. "Russian Warship, Go Fuck yourself," said the leader who then levelled every building on 40 acre Snake Island off Odessa. Volomy Zelensky himself posted the story on Youtube, writing "I can't believe this is real. The Ukrainians are doing better than expected, and the Russians worse than expected. Though the armies are very mismatched, the Russians are...

12: The wold watched in awe as Eastern Europe teetered on the edge of war, the kind of land war that Europe has not seen for 77 years. Pres. Vladimir Putin announced a special military operation to protect Donbas. Russia's plans do not include occupation of Ukrainian territories," which of course no one believed. Putin said he would not permit Ukraine to have nuclear weapons, which of course the Ukraine gave up in 1992, in exchange for a guarantee of peace from Russia....

Background: Tonight the Santa Monica City Council will meet and consider a request from Councilmember Phil Brock to remove Leonora Camner from the Santa Monica City Housing Commission, on account of her employment by Abundant Housing Los Angeles. On Tuesday afternoon, Ms. Camner held a public event in Tongva Park, where she defended her position on the Housing Commission, which makes recommendations for development to the City Council. Update: At their meeting on 2/22/22, the...

President Joe Biden announced "strong sanctions" against Russia Thursday morning, calling it a "major hit to Putin's long terms ambitions." As expected, he said Russia would be excluded from dollar capital markets, and that there would be sanctions on Russian individuals and banks. However, he did NOT announce that Russia would be excluded from SWIFT at this time. More on that below. He said that "our forces will not be engaged in the conflict in Ukraine," but that more forces...

11 The war broke in Ukraine on American Television in real time, as CNN reporters Matthew Chance and Clarissa Ward said they heard a steady stream of strikes, explosions over the city of 2.8 million. "We don't know exactly what those strikes are hitting, but in Russia near Belgorad, we are hearing helicopters. People here are going to be waking up to a very different country than the one they went to sleep in. In Kharkiv, a city of 1.4 million, Ward said she could also...

2/18/22: Last evening I listened to a City commission zoom meeting, then tuned in 20 minutes late to the "Developer-hosted zoom meeting" regarding the large development proposed for Ocean Park and Lincoln. The meeting was recorded and was scheduled to be made part of the City's public record for presentation to our Council. This was the developers' second attempt at a meeting. The first was sparsely attended and scheduled at the same time as a City Council Meeting. There were...

For the first time since 2014, it has hailed in Santa Monica. The white pebbles bounced off Montana Avenue, in this video from our news desk shot on Feb. 15th at 4:40 pm PST. Ice fell from Westside skies as a band of cold rain passed through the region, 2 days after 80 degree temperatures during the Super Bowl. It was accompanied by the sound of thunder. Hail is a form of solid precipitation. It is distinct from ice pellets (American English "sleet"), though the two are often...

While Canadian PM Justin Trudeau has ramped up the rhetoric, not everyone in Canada feels confrontational towards the protesting truckers who have shut down the national capital, Ottawa. A video of Canadian protestors hugging RCMP police and singing "O Canada," the Canadian National Anthem, has gone a viral on Twitter. Some of the comments: Trigger warning: inside view of a Canadian emergency," tweted Dr. Jordan Peterson, retweeting TheRealKeanan, who posted the video to...

February 18, 2021 - As the Omicron surge subsides, Los Angeles County Public Health officials are trying to put the brakes on a rapid relaxation of emergency restrictions. While officials now no longer requires masks at outdoor mega-events or on school playgrounds, they will still be required indoors until an estimated mid-March date. Vaccination mandates remain in place for certain categories of workers and certain venues with no end date even mentioned. County health...

In a move that some analysts said would lead to sending in the Russian Army across the border and into Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin has recognized the break away Ukrainian areas of Donetsk and Luhansk. Separatists in those areas, supported since 2014 by the Russian Army, have declared themselves independent Russian speaking regions. The separatists however control only about a third of the territories of those provinces. They will no doubt request the urgent...

2/20/22 Bernie Madoff's sister and her husband died from gunshot wounds at their home, authorities said today. They added that the case was being investigated as a murder-suicide. The Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office announced that they would inquire into the deaths of Sondra Wiener, 87, and Marvin Wiener, 90, after their deaths at their home in Boynton Beach, Fla., "Deputies responded to a 911 call advising a male and female were unresponsive inside their residence," the sh...

Midway through the second round, it looked like the 2022 Genesis Invitational was going to turn into the Joaquin Neimann Run Away and Hide. Chile's best-known PGA tour member-and, other than Mito Pereira, its only one-opened the tournament with a record-tying first round score and promptly broke the rule that the hardest thing to do was follow up a great round with a good one. Neimann's second round was not better than his first round, but it was exactly as good. His second...

8: Some were reminded of Alfred Hitchcock's movie "The Birds," when surveillance footage captured a bizarre moment. One Tuesday afternoon, ordinary life in a neighborhood in Mexico was interrupted when a flock of birds fell from the sky mid-flight. A local veterinarian told police in the northern Mexican city of Chihuahua that the birds could have died after inhaling toxic fumes. But others believe it's more likely that they were struck by lightning mid flight. "Those...

February 10, 2022 - According to data released today by the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, the vaccinated population contracted Covid-19 at a rate more than 10% higher than the unvaccinated during the week between February 3 and February 10. Number of vaccinated individuals: 7,131,679 (71.2% of the county population) Total number of new infections this week: 52,044 Number of infections in vaccinated people: 42,651 82% of the new infections were in vaccinated...

Los Angeles County voters have "a complete lack of faith" in the city of Los Angeles and their county to address the homelessness crisis. That's the consensus of six focus groups, according to a coalition of civic leaders who released the results of a study Thursday that addressed the important issues of the upcoming local elections in June and November. "There is an absolute, total, complete, without exception, lack of faith in city and county government to address...