Day: September 2, 2023

Australia said on Sunday it would send additional police to the Solomon Islands to boost security for the Pacific Games in November, keeping them there until June to assist with a general election.

The extended Australian police presence comes after the Solomon Islands upgraded ties with China, signing a policing agreement in July. Australia, New Zealand and the United States are concerned Chinese police could dislodge a long-standing security arrangement Canberra has with the Pacific Islands nation.

The Solomon Islands said on Friday it had invited Australia to extend the police presence, originally due to end in December.

Australia was the Pacific Islands nation’s “primary security partner,” a spokesperson for Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade said in a statement on Sunday. The Australian police will work alongside officers from Fiji, New Zealand and Papua New Guinea.

“At the request of the Solomon Islands Government, Australia has extended its contribution to the Solomons International Assistance Force until June 2024 to assist with security for the national general elections,” the statement said.

The Australian police contingent arrived in December 2021 to quell anti-government riots, while Chinese police trainers arrived this year to prepare for the games.

More than 5,000 athletes from two dozen nations are expected to attend the games, for which China has donated and constructed stadiums and other venues.

China stepped up its funding for infrastructure after Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare switched diplomatic recognition from Taiwan to Beijing in 2019. The Solomon Islands last year signed a security pact with China, raising concern in Canberra and Washington about Beijing’s naval ambitions.

President Joe Biden traveled to Florida on Saturday to survey the destruction from Hurricane Idalia and comfort victims of the storm, but he did not meet with Governor Ron DeSantis, a potential presidential rival, who opted not to come.

Biden, who praised DeSantis during the visit, said he was not disappointed by the Republican governor’s absence and said DeSantis had helped plan the trip.

DeSantis’ spokesperson said on Friday the governor had no plans to meet Biden, saying “the security preparations alone that would go into setting up such a meeting would shut down ongoing recovery efforts.”

Biden, a Democrat, took an aerial tour and received a briefing from local officials and first responders in Live Oak, a town hit hard by the storm. He saw houses with fallen trees on them, and said no one “intelligent” could doubt that climate change was happening.

But politics hung over his trip. The president, who has spoken to DeSantis multiple times this week, had said on Friday they would meet in person. The governor’s decision caught the White House off guard.

Asked if he was disappointed DeSantis did not come, Biden said no.

“No, I’m not disappointed. He may have had other reasons. … But he did help us plan this,” Biden told reporters while standing in front of a damaged house. “He sat with FEMA and decided where we should go, where would be the least disruption,” the president said, referring to the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Biden said he was pleased that Senator Rick Scott, a Republican former governor of Florida, had come despite their disagreements on many issues.

Scott, a supporter of former President Donald Trump, who was the 45th U.S. president, wore a hat that said “Navy” on the front and “45” on the back. Scott later said he wore the hat as a reference to his term as Florida’s 45th governor.

DeSantis, 44, spent the day about 50 miles (80 km) south, touring small communities along Florida’s Gulf Coast, according to his official schedule.

The governor is running for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination to oust Biden from the White House, but trails Trump in opinion polls. Biden, 80, is running for re-election.

Biden and DeSantis have spoken regularly this week about the hurricane, which pummeled Florida’s Big Bend region with Category 3 winds of nearly 125 mph (200 kph). On Wednesday, the president said politics had not crept into their conversations.

It could have been politically perilous for DeSantis to be photographed with Biden overlooking storm damage now as the nominating race intensifies. Though he trails far behind Trump, DeSantis leads the other Republican candidates in the race.

When Biden visited Florida after Hurricane Ian last year, a photo of DeSantis standing awkwardly to the side as the president talked animatedly with a local couple went viral, highlighting the difference between the two politicians’ styles of public interaction.

Former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, who is also running for the 2024 Republican nomination, drew criticism for his praise of then-President Barack Obama in 2012 when the Democrat visited his state following superstorm Sandy.

During his visit to Live Oak, Biden received praise from Republican Senator Scott for declaring an official disaster early on.

The president, for his part, complemented Scott and DeSantis. “The governor was on top of it,” Biden said.

The White House said Biden, who was traveling with his wife, Jill, informed DeSantis about the visit during a conversation on Thursday, and the governor did not raise concerns.

Their failure to meet will not have any impact on recovery efforts, FEMA head Deanne Criswell said.

She told reporters that search and rescue operations had wrapped up and that officials were now focused on restoring power to affected regions. Less than 1% of Floridians were without power as of Saturday, she said, though that figure was significantly higher in some areas directly affected by the hurricane.

DeSantis has been a sharp critic of Biden, and the two have clashed over COVID-19 vaccines, abortion and LGBT rights. But when they met last year during Biden’s visit to Florida to Florida to assess the devastation from Hurricane Ian, the president said they had worked together “hand in glove.”

Biden visited Hawaii just last week after deadly wildfires there. He expressed confidence on Friday that Congress would approve his administration’s request for a further $4 billion to address natural disasters.

“I’m confident because I can’t imagine Congress saying ‘We’re not going to help,’” he told reporters.

After concluding the Florida trip, he traveled to his home state of Delaware, where he planned to spend the weekend.

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Australia said on Sunday it would send additional police to the Solomon Islands to boost security for the Pacific Games in November, keeping them there until June to assist with a general election.

The extended Australian police presence comes after the Solomon Islands upgraded ties with China, signing a policing agreement in July. Australia, New Zealand and the United States are concerned Chinese police could dislodge a long-standing security arrangement Canberra has with the Pacific Islands nation.

The Solomon Islands said on Friday it had invited Australia to extend the police presence, originally due to end in December.

Australia was the Pacific Islands nation’s “primary security partner”, a spokesperson for Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade said in a statement on Sunday. The Australian police will work alongside officers from Fiji, New Zealand and Papua New Guinea.

“At the request of the Solomon Islands Government, Australia has extended its contribution to the Solomons International Assistance Force (SIAF) until June 2024 to assist with security for the national general elections,” the statement said.

The Australian police contingent arrived in December 2021 to quell anti-government riots, while Chinese police trainers arrived this year to prepare for the games.

More than 5,000 athletes from two dozen nations are expected to attend the games, for which China has donated and constructed stadiums and other venues.

China stepped up its funding for infrastructure after Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare switched diplomatic recognition from Taiwan to Beijing in 2019. The Solomon Islands last year signed a security pact with China, raising concern in Canberra and Washington about Beijing’s naval ambitions.

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Domestic flights were cancelled and almost 3,000 people were evacuated as Taiwan girded for the arrival of Typhoon Haikui on Sunday, which is expected to bring torrential rain and strong winds to the island’s south and east.

Haikui is forecast to make landfall in the mountainous and sparsely populated far southeast of Taiwan late Sunday afternoon. Counties and cities in the east and south cancelled classes and declared a day off for workers.

Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen told a meeting of disaster management officials this would be the first typhoon to make landfall on the island and cross its central mountain range in four years.

People should avoid going out and not go up mountains, to the coast, fishing or engage in water sports, a statement from Tsai’s office quoted her as saying.

Haikui is a much weaker storm than Typhoon Saola which hit Hong Kong and the southern Chinese province of Guangdong on Saturday. Haikui is expected to be only a Category 1 or 2 typhoon when it hits Taiwan, according to Tropical Storm Risk.

Taiwan’s government said that 2,868 people had already been evacuated, mainly in the south and east.

Taiwan’s two main domestic airlines, UNI Air and Mandarin Airlines, cancelled all flights on Sunday, while ferry services to surrounding islands were cancelled as well.

There was less disruption to international flights, with only 37 cancelled for Sunday, the Civil Aeronautics Administration said.

The military has mobilised soldiers and equipment to help with flood relief and evacuation efforts.

After passing across southern Taiwan, Haikui is forecast to cross the Taiwan Strait into China.

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An icebreaker is on its way from Australia to an Antarctic research station to rescue an expeditioner suffering from a medical condition, the government said on Saturday.

The expeditioner is at Australia’s Casey Research Station which is on an ice cap 3,420 kilometers south of the Australian Antarctic Division headquarters in Hobart, Tasmania state.

The division has not identified the person or specified the medical condition.

“The expeditioner requires specialist medical assessment and care in Australia for a developing medical condition,” the division said in a statement.

Australian icebreaker RSV Nuyina left Hobart last week on the rescue mission, which is taking place at the start of the Southern Hemisphere spring season, the statement said.

The ship is carrying helicopters to be used in the evacuation, the division said.

The division did not reply after The Associated Press asked when the evacuation was expected to take place.

During the summer, more than 150 expeditioners visit the Casey research station. But over winter, fewer than 20 remain to perform maintenance work.

The division said all other personnel at Casey were “accounted for and safe.”

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis used a flimsy excuse to avoid meeting with President Joe Biden today, when Biden visited the state to survey the damage from the latest hurricane. To be clear, DeSantis doesn’t have some strategy for refusing to meet with Biden. DeSantis is just afraid to do it. These things are tricky, and DeSantis knows he has no political savvy or social skills, so he’s hiding from the moment like a coward.

DeSantis knows he’ll take heat for dodging Biden today. It’ll drive his collapsing poll numbers even lower. And yet he’s concluded that if he did meet with Biden, he’d screw it up so badly that it would do even more damage to his numbers than dodging Biden.

DeSantis is surely afraid that if he were to meet with Biden like this, he could end up coming off like then-New Jersey Governor Chris Christie did when he had an allegedly too enthusiastic meeting with then-President Obama after Hurricane Sandy. But if Christie had dodged meeting with Obama entirely, Christie would have taken serious heat for that as well. If you keep dodging these kinds of big moments for fear you’re going to blow them, you’re never going to make it on the national stage.

Let’s not forget that this is who Ron DeSantis has been all along, from the very start of his political career: socially awkward, politically clueless, frequently resorting to going into hiding. It’s defined DeSantis’ entire tenure in Florida, even as the media (on both sides) created a fictional savvy version of him for ratings. It’s how I knew all along, and many of you knew as well, that DeSantis’ support would collapse the minute he stepped onto the national stage. He was always this much of a scared hesitant joke.

The post Ron DeSantis runs and hides appeared first on Palmer Report.

One family in central Mexico is struggling to preserve the production of cochineal dye, an intense, natural red pigment so prized that, after gold and silver, it was probably the most valuable thing the Spaniards found in Mexico after the 1521 conquest.

For centuries, red clothing — along with purple — had been a sign of power and wealth because it was rare and expensive. An indigenous Mexican process deriving the pigment from insects gave the Spanish empire a new source of red dye.

Some of Mexico’s most picturesque and imposing colonial cities, like Oaxaca, were essentially built on the wealth derived from cochineal dye, also called carmine, and known as “grana cochinilla” in Spanish. It was much prized by the Spanish nobility, and it would go on to dye, among other garments, the British empire’s Redcoat military uniforms, before it began to be replaced by synthetic dyes in the 1800s.

Obtaining the dye the old-fashioned way is slow, tedious and painstaking. It comes from the crushed bodies of tiny female insects that contain carminic acid and feed on the pads of nopal cactus plants.

It begins with bugs

Each insect, known as Dactylopius coccus, must be bred to a larvae stage and “planted” on a previously wounded cactus pad, and then left for months to feed and mature.

Then each must be harvested by hand, usually with a tiny brush, sifted, cleaned and left to dry in the sun.

The Mixtecs of Oaxaca first developed the method to obtain the precious pigment centuries before the Spaniards arrived. A symbol of status, carmine red was employed by the nobility of Mexico’s Indigenous peoples to dye garments, and widely used in the arts, to write codices, decorate ceramics and paint murals.

Mayeli Garcia and her family run a greenhouse in the village of San Francisco Tepeyacac, east of Mexico City, which specializes in the slow, traditional production process.

Process takes months

At their greenhouse, rows of hundreds of cactus pads are held on racks suspended in the air and covered by a white powder. That is the sign of the insects working beneath, drawing nourishment from the juices of the nopal and protecting themselves with the waxy powder.

“You have to wait three or four months for them to complete their life cycle, and then we harvest,” Garcia said. “You have to keep monitoring and watching every cactus pad.”

That’s essentially the way the best red was produced for three centuries.

Synthetic dyes

By the 1800s, synthetic chemical dyes, cheaper to produce and more plentiful, began to replace cochineal dyes.

But the story doesn’t end there. Artisans in Oaxaca maintained some production, because weavers of traditional clothing and rugs preferred it in handicrafts.

Some studies began suggesting that chemical dyes, and particularly some of the red ones, could have adverse health effects if consumed as food colorings or in cosmetics like lipstick. By 1990, U.S. authorities banned red dye No. 3 for use in cosmetics, though it is still allowed in food products.

Those concerns have begun to spur the demand for natural colorings — and there was Mexico’s cochineal dye all along.

No mass production

Companies that might want it on an industrial scale are out of luck. It isn’t available in such quantities.

“We have tried to automate a little bit to make it less manual work, with machinery we ourselves invented, to try some brushes” for brushing the insects off the cactus pads, Garcia said. The motor of their prototype burned out, she noted ruefully.

Garcia struggles to make a living off the 100 kilograms (220 pounds) of cochineal dye she produces each year, though she is trying to diversify into soaps, creams, cosmetics and other products derived from the nopal, such as jam.

Her family still grows fresh vegetables to make ends meet. Selling the dye for less isn’t an option.

“It is a lot of work, very labor intensive. It costs too much to produce in terms of labor, so the cost is difficult,” she said.

But she still has plenty of reasons for keeping on with the cochineal farm and its whole ecosystem designed to keep the tiny bugs happy, well fed, and safe from predators.

“We are having problems with synthetics and chemicals,” she said. “So I think that there is a revolution going on, of returning to what once was, what was once produced, because it kept us much healthier.”

Donald Trump’s Truth Social is reportedly less than a week away from a major corporate deadline that could trigger the site’s financial collapse. This is one of those things where it’s easy to predict that the deadline will likely be missed, but tricky to predict the precise fallout from missing it. The site could fold up and shut down immediately, or it could limp along while it gets gutted financially. We’ll see.

Here’s the interesting part to me. Donald Trump’s online meltdowns are reaching a peak right now in terms of exposing his mental incompetence. Ever since his most recent arrest, mugshot, and early 2024 federal criminal trial date, he’s been posting up to a hundred times a day and sounding like he’s completely senile.

Trump would surely love nothing more than to be back on Twitter, where his ramblings would have a much more direct and broad impact. But his handlers have found some way to convince him not to tweet. They clearly don’t want him back on Twitter, presumably because if everyone sees how far gone he is, the whole “2024” charade will collapse more quickly.

But if Truth Social dies, Trump’s babysitters may not have a choice. They’re going to have to let him rant incoherently somewhere, and that would probably have to be Twitter. I’m almost tempted to say that at this point we’d all be better off if Trump did return to Twitter.

The only reason Trump is still the Republican “frontrunner” is that the mainstream media (on both sides) keeps insisting he’ll be the nominee no matter what. That’s prompting Republican primary voters outside his base to keep picking him in polls, because they’re being told he’s their party’s frontrunner.

Even with the entire mainstream media serving as Trump’s full time publicist by insisting he’ll be the nominee no matter what, Trump is still only polling at around 50% among Republican primary voters. If the media stops insisting that he’s inevitable, his numbers will drop.

If Trump comes back to Twitter and everyone sees he’s now a senile imitation of his former self, and people (outside his base) start saying “wait a minute this guy is going to prison and he’s senile, why is he even being discussed in political terms?”

And if that forces the media to save face and stop hyping the “Trump is inevitable” thing, that will cause Trump to fall below 50% in Republican primary polling – opening the door for someone else to gain momentum and take the lead.

Or maybe we’d rather the Republicans nominate a senile and bound for prison Donald Trump. They’re going to nominate someone, and that someone is going to be awful no matter who it is.

But the point is that if Truth Social collapses and Trump comes back to Twitter, it can’t possibly help Trump in any way, it can only hurt him. It’ll only help the general public see that he’s mentally incompetent, which will help make him even more non-viable. So if Truth Social does collapse and Trump does come back to Twitter, that’s fine with me. I’d rather not have to deal with his abhorrent tweets. But tweeting would likely finish him off more quickly.

The post Donald Trump’s Truth Social is a week from potential financial collapse, and that can only mean one thing appeared first on Palmer Report.

Tens of thousands of revelers attending the Burning Man festival in the Nevada desert have been asked to shelter in place and conserve food and water on Saturday after a rainstorm turned the site into mud.

Access to and from Black Rock City, the event’s site, was closed “for the remainder of the event,” organizers said in a statement on social media.

“Rain over the last 24 hours has created a situation that required a full stop of vehicle movement on the playa. More rain is expected over the next few days and conditions are not expected to improve enough to allow vehicles to enter the playa,” the U.S. Bureau of Land Management said, according to local media reports.

More than 60,000 participants travel to and from the remote area in northwest Nevada every year, according to the event’s website, gathering in the temporary city to make art, dance, and enjoy community.

The festival gets its name from its culminating event, the burning of a large wooden structure called the Man on the penultimate night.

The gathering, which originated as a small function in 1986 on a San Francisco beach and is now also attended by celebrities and social media influencers, was scheduled to run from Aug. 27 until Sept. 4.

Billionaires, burner phones, alleged bribes: The impeachment trial of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is going to test the will of Republicans senators to oust not only one of their own, but a firebrand who has helped drive the state’s hard turn to the right for years. 

The historic proceedings set to start in the state Senate Tuesday are the most serious threat yet to one of Texas’ most powerful figures after nine years engulfed by criminal charges, scandal and accusations of corruption. If convicted, Paxton — just the third official in Texas’ nearly 200-year history to be impeached — could be removed from office. 

Witnesses called to testify could include Paxton and a woman with whom he has acknowledged having an extramarital affair. Members of the public hoping to watch from the gallery will have to line up for passes. And conservative activists have already bought up TV airtime and billboards, pressuring senators to acquit one of former President Donald Trump’s biggest defenders. 

“It’s a very serious event but it’s a big-time show,” said Bill Miller, a longtime Austin lobbyist and a friend of Paxton. “Any way you cut it, it’s going to have the attention of anyone and everyone.” 

Deepens division in party

The build-up to the trial has widened divisions among Texas Republicans that reflect the wider fissures roiling the party nationally heading into the 2024 election. 

At the fore of recent Texas policies are hardline measures to stop migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border, battles over what is taught in public schools, and restrictions on LGBTQ+ rights — many of which are championed loudest in the Senate, where Republicans hold a dominant 19-12 majority and have Paxton’s fate in their hands. 

The Senate has long been a welcoming place for Paxton. His wife, Angela, is a state senator, although she is barred from voting in the trial. Paxton also was a state senator before becoming attorney general in 2015 and still has entanglements in the chamber, including with Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick, who will preside over the trial and loaned $125,000 to Paxton’s reelection campaign. 

If all 12 Democrats vote to convict Paxton, they would still need at least nine Republicans on their side. Or the Senate could vote by a simple majority to dismiss the charges altogether. It was a GOP-dominated House that decided by an overwhelming majority that Paxton should be impeached. 

“You’re seeing a fracture within the party right now,” said Matt Langston, a Republican political consultant in Texas. “This is going to impact the leadership and the party for a long time.” 

The trial also appears to have heightened Paxton’s legal risks. The case against him largely centers on his relationship with Nate Paul, an Austin real estate developer who was indicted this summer after being accused of making false statements to banks to secure $170 million in loans. 

Last month, federal prosecutors in Washington kicked a long-running investigation of Paxton into a higher gear when they began using a grand jury in San Antonio to examine his dealings with Paul, according to two people with knowledge of the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of secrecy rules around grand jury proceedings. The grand jury’s role was first reported by the Austin American-Statesman. 

Chris Toth, the former executive director of the National Association of Attorneys General, said Paxton has for years weathered scandals unique among top state lawyers. He said the outcome of the trial will send a message about what is acceptable to elected officials across the country. 

Impeachment managers in the GOP-controlled Texas House filed nearly 4,000 pages of exhibits ahead of the trial, including accusations that Paxton hid the use of multiple cellphones and reveled in other perks of office. 

“There’s very much a vile and insidious level of influence that Ken Paxton exerts through continuing to get away with his conduct,” Toth said. 

Comparison to Trump

Part of Paxton’s political durability is his alignment with Trump, and this was never more apparent than when Paxton joined efforts to overturn the 2020 election. Like Trump, Paxton says he is a victim of politically motivated investigations. 

But James Dickey, a former chairman of the Republican Party of Texas, said the base of the GOP sees Paxton’s impeachment as different from legal troubles facing Trump. 

“Exclusively, the actions against President Trump are from Democrat elected officials and so it can’t avoid having more of a partisan tone,” he said. “Therefore, Republican voters have more concern and frustration with it.” 

Patrick, in a rare television interview last month, was explicit in what the trial is and is not. 

“It’s not a criminal trial. It’s not a civil trial,” he told Houston television station KRIV. “It’s a political trial.”