The Full Belmonte, 1/5/2023
McCarthy Flounders as G.O.P. Rebellion Paralyzes the House for a Second Day
The House continued a historic floor showdown — the first in a century — prompted by the Republican leader’s failure to secure a majority to become speaker.
Jan. 4, 2023
“WASHINGTON — A right-wing Republican revolt paralyzed the House for a second painful day on Wednesday, leaving Representative Kevin McCarthy of California fighting for political survival after losing a half-dozen consecutive votes for speaker and no clear path forward to allow Congress to function.
In a spectacle on the House floor not seen in 100 years, unrelenting hard-right lawmakers refused repeatedly to throw their support behind Mr. McCarthy, the party leader, who suffered another three humiliating defeats in a grim replay of the three he endured on Tuesday. The episode again put Republican divisions on vivid display, grinding the House to a standstill and extending an ignominious start to the new Republican majority, potentially foreshadowing an era of dysfunction and disarray.
Mr. McCarthy vowed to keep fighting, and he and his allies adjourned the House temporarily late Wednesday afternoon so he could huddle with his top deputies and the ringleaders of the opposition to explore a resolution. But there was little sign that the stalemate could be broken, and even an entreaty from former President Donald J. Trump for the party to unite around Mr. McCarthy fell flat.
By Wednesday night, the House had adjourned again with no resolution, agreeing to return at noon to plunge back into the fight….” Read more at New York Times
Idaho Killings Suspect Got New License Plate Days After Murders
Records show the suspect’s Hyundai Elantra got a new registration in Washington State shortly after four students at the University of Idaho were murdered.
MOSCOW, Idaho — The man accused of killing four University of Idaho college students received a new license plate for his car five days after the murders, according to records released Wednesday.
The licensing documents in Washington State show that the vehicle driven by the suspect, Bryan Kohberger, was a white Hyundai Elantra, the type of vehicle that investigators had been seeking in recent weeks.
The police in Moscow had said that a white Hyundai Elantra from between 2011 and 2013 had been seen near the scene of the crimes on the night of the killings in Moscow, Idaho, on Nov. 13. Mr. Kohberger’s car was a 2015 model and registered on Nov. 18, according to the licensing document. A vehicle history report shows the car had previously been registered in Pennsylvania, where Mr. Kohberger is from.
Mr. Kohberger, 28, had moved to Pullman, Wash., in recent months and began studying criminology in a Ph.D. program at Washington State University in August. He has said through a lawyer that he expects to be exonerated in the case. Mr. Kohberger’s new lawyer did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the license plate records….” Read more at New York Times
Rick Singer, Ringleader of College-Admissions Cheating Scheme, Sentenced to 3½ Years in Prison
Consultant at center of Varsity Blues case led a sprawling fraud conspiracy, then helped federal prosecutors bring it down
William ‘Rick’ Singer departs after being sentenced at the federal courthouse in Boston.PHOTO: BRIAN SNYDER/REUTERS
By Melissa Korn
“BOSTON—William ‘Rick’ Singer, the mastermind behind a nationwide college-admissions cheating scheme that ensnared top universities, business executives and Hollywood celebrities, was sentenced Wednesday to 42 months in prison.
He will also have to pay nearly $20 million in restitution and forfeitures of ill-gotten gains.
The hearing in U.S. District Court here marked the end to a lengthy drama for Mr. Singer that exposed the ease with which the high-stakes college-admissions process could be corrupted. The scandal, made public in March 2019 after a year-long investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Internal Revenue Service and federal prosecutors, captivated the country and inspired books and a Netflix documentary. It also raised fundamental questions about who deserves to get into the nation’s most exclusive institutions of higher education.
Mr. Singer, 62 years old, pleaded guilty in 2019 to four felonies, admitting to running a complex operation that arranged for parents to fraudulently boost their teens’ ACT and SAT scores and to bribe college coaches to flag the clients as recruited athletes, all but guaranteeing their admission to schools including Georgetown University and the University of Southern California. Payments were often funneled through Mr. Singer’s sham charity, allowing parents to take tax write-offs for the bribes.
Though he was at the head of a conspiracy that prosecutors say brought in $25 million and tainted an admissions process that was intended to be based on merit, Mr. Singer also served as a key cooperator in the federal case. The probe, dubbed Operation Varsity Blues by investigators, started with a tip from an investor involved in a stock-fraud scheme and ultimately led to criminal charges against 57 individuals.
Most of those charged pleaded guilty, with sentences ranging from probation to 2½ years in prison. All but one person who took their cases to trial were found guilty; one parent also was pardoned by former President Donald Trump and one coach entered a deferred prosecution agreement.
Mr. Singer sat in the courtroom Wednesday afternoon, flanked by his two lawyers and staring straight ahead with his shoulders hunched, as Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephen Frank summarized the scheme.
Mr. Frank said that while there were dozens of conspirators, ‘Without Rick Singer coming up with the scheme, masterminding the scheme, orchestrating the scheme, it would never have happened.’
‘I am responsible for my actions and my crimes,’ Mr. Singer told U.S. District Judge Rya W. Zobel. ‘The fraudulent testing scheme, bribing of university officials, lying on students’ applications and profiles, I did all of it.’
Mr. Singer apologized to the students he worked with, saying they were ‘deserving of more integrity than I showed them,’ and expressed regret for tarnishing the reputations of universities, tainting the experiences of families who worked with him legitimately and embarrassing his family and friends.
‘Despite my passion to help others, I lost my ethical values and have so much regret. To be frank, I’m ashamed of myself,’ Mr. Singer said.
Prosecutors called Mr. Singer’s scheme ‘staggering in scope’ and ‘breathtaking in its audacity.’ They said his cooperation with the investigation was valuable, while also beset with missteps.
In addition to the prison term, Mr. Singer was sentenced to three years of supervised release, and ordered to pay $10.7 million in restitution to the IRS, forfeit more than $5.3 million in assets and pay a $3.4 million forfeiture money judgment….” Read more at Wall Street Journal
Ukraine Claims Heavy Russian Losses in Waves of Missile Strikes
Kyiv says its forces have killed or wounded more than 1,000 Russian soldiers in a series of pinpoint attacks. Russia has confirmed only one of three waves of strikes.
By Andrew E. Kramer, Anatoly Kurmanaev and Christiaan Triebert
Jan. 4, 2023
“KYIV, Ukraine — Ukraine has claimed a string of successful artillery attacks on Russian barracks in the first days of the year, asserting that it hit newly drafted men and other soldiers where they were sleeping or congregating, killing or wounding more than 1,000.
The Russian military has confirmed one of the three waves of claimed strikes, though it gave a much lower death toll than the Ukrainians estimate. Even the lower toll of 89 soldiers killed in that attack, however, represents a startling setback for the Russian military.
Social media posts, reports from local residents and Russians who blog about military affairs offered partial confirmation of the other strikes claimed by Ukraine, but not corroboration of the casualty counts.
Military analysts say the Ukrainians’ use of long-range artillery, including American-provided HIMARS precision rockets, to target barracks marks a shift for the artillery forces, which for months had concentrated on matériel like ammunition depots….” Read more at New York Times
E.U. Urges Nations to Require Negative Covid Tests for Travelers From China
In a diplomatically fraught move, the bloc advised its 27 members to put restrictions in place as Chinese tourists prepare to return to global destinations.
Jan. 4, 2023
“BRUSSELS — The European Union on Wednesday ‘strongly encouraged’ its 27 member nations to require a negative Covid-19 test for travelers boarding flights from China to the region, amid a surge in coronavirus cases in the country and Beijing’s lifting of its draconian travel restrictions.
The bloc’s recommendation, an attempt at a unified policy, came after three major European tourist destinations — France, Italy and Spain — as well as Britain, introduced testing and other requirements for travelers from China.
The E.U. move would bring back a tough pandemic-era measure for travelers that the tourist and aviation industries had hoped was a thing of the past.
Countries in the European Union ‘are strongly encouraged to introduce, for all passengers departing from China to member states, the requirement for a negative Covid-19 test taken not more than 48 hours prior to departure from China,’ the advice said….” Read more at New York Times
“Xi Jinping’s government has officially acknowledged only about a dozen Covid-19 deaths in China since he abandoned strict pandemic controls a month ago. But at one funeral home in Shanghai, 500 corpses recently arrived on one day—about 400 more than usual. Crematoriums across the country are overwhelmed, the dead are left for days before they can be picked up and families are marched through five-minute goodbyes with lost loved ones. Experts have forecast potentially millions of deaths in China by the time the current infection wave runs its course. Chinese officials meanwhile have been assailing governments across the globe, and threatening retaliation, for imposing testing requirements on travelers from the Asian country. The World Health Organization has now expressed concern about the threat to human life posed by the health crisis in China—and like the US, some European nations and others, criticized the lack of information being provided by the Chinese government.” [Bloomberg]
Mourners pay their final respects inside a memorial hall at a funeral home in Shanghai on Dec. 31. Photographer: Qilai Shen/Bloomberg
Meta Fined Over $400 Million in EU for Serving Ads Based on Online Activity
Irish regulator’s action against Facebook owner delivers a punch to digital-advertising industry
Meta said it disagrees with the ruling and plans to appeal it. PHOTO: VINCENT ISORE/ZUMA PRESS
“A top European Union privacy regulator ruled that Meta Platforms Inc. META 2.11%increase; green up pointing triangle can’t use its contracts with Facebook and Instagram users to justify sending them ads based on their online activity, delivering one of the bloc’s biggest blows yet to the digital-advertising industry.
The ruling, announced Wednesday by Ireland’s Data Protection Commission, also imposed fines of 390 million euros, or $414 million, on Meta, saying that the company violated EU privacy laws by saying such ads are necessary to execute contracts with users.
Meta, the parent of Instagram and Facebook, said it disagrees with the ruling and plans to appeal both it and the fines.
Litigation could take years, but if the decisions are upheld, they could mean that Meta will have to allow users to opt out of ads that are based on how individual users interact with its own apps—something that could hurt its core business.
Ireland’s two decisions—one for Facebook and one for Instagram—give the company three months to stop relying on their contracts with users to justify its use of so-called behavioral ads, which are targeted based on a user’s online activity. Meta could, however, seek a stay on implementing the decisions pending its appeal.
Ireland’s privacy regulator said it issued its decisions after a board representing all privacy regulators in the bloc last month ordered the Irish regulator to do so, over the Irish regulator’s objections, The Wall Street Journal earlier reported. Ireland leads the enforcement of the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation for Meta because the company’s European headquarters are in Dublin.
The Irish decisions are significant because they could end up restraining Meta’s ability to use some of the data it collects on its own apps. The decisions don’t specifically order Meta to seek users’ consent to use their activity data to target their ads, but they eliminate the contractual legal justification Meta currently uses to do so. That leaves the company few other options under EU law to justify such ads, privacy lawyers and activists say.
Meta said Wednesday that the decisions don’t prevent personalized advertising on its platforms and said it is evaluating options to continue offering users personalized services. The company said it rejects the idea that it would have to seek users’ consent as a legal justification under EU law, and cited ‘a lack of regulatory certainty in this area.’….” Read more at Wall Street Journal