Monday, August 30, 2021

Quick notes: Bagram airbase | Delete Chrome...

  • Who Abandoned Bagram Air Base? Biden essentially blamed his generals. “They concluded—the military—that Bagram was not much value added, that it was much wiser to focus on Kabul. And so, I followed that recommendation.”

    - Black Hawks and Humvees - Taliban's military gains. . Biometric devices containing fingerprints, eye scans and personal details of Afghan allies.


  • Can China tap Afghanistan’s lithium treasure? An internal U.S Department of Defense memo in 2010 described Afghanistan as "the Saudi Arabia of lithium" .


  • Delete Chrome: “Chrome is the only major browser that does not offer meaningful protection against cross-site tracking... and will continue to leave users unprotected.” Having promised to ditch tracking cookies, Google changed its mind. “If you use Chrome, you give up your privacy”.

    Google “has trackers installed on 75% of the top million websites,” several times as many as Facebook. Similarly, just look at the recent reports suggesting Google will pay Apple some $15 billion this year to be the default search engine on its devices.


  • Light pollution from street lamps linked to insect loss: Artificial street lights disrupt the behaviour of nocturnal moths, reducing caterpillars numbers by half. Modern LED streetlights appeared to have the biggest impact.


  • Online gaming: China restricts kids’ online gaming to three hours a week

    - Exhausted: Youth in China, Japan and South Korea are 'lying flat' because they're exhausted and without hope

    - China blasts '996' excessive work culture: Chinese labor law already prohibits employees from working that long. Jack Ma called 996 culture a "huge blessing."


  • ब्रह्मज्ञानावलीमाला: Sung by Swami Brahmananda, Chinmaya Mission



  • Taliban 2.0: Swapped Kalashnikovs for Twitter, cricket gear and selfies with children. But they never bothered addressing human rights or women’s rights concerns. When pushed, the Taliban adopted a “women’s rights within an Islamic framework” fudge.


  • Sharia hasn't changed:


  • India gets the refugees: While Pakistan gets celebrating Jihadis


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