Meme Scholar with Madness (PhD)

[EndtheMadnessNow]

Yesterday's news & views for today while the dB gremlins are on break.

Feb 5, 1917: the U.S. Congress passed the Immigration Act of 1917 over President Woodrow Wilson’s veto, an act that severely curtailed Asian immigration and mandated immigrant literacy testing.


Also known as the Asiatic Barred Zone Act, the law essentially banned all immigration from South and Southeast Asia. The law also banned any homosexuals, “feeble-minded people,” criminals, anarchists, and anyone “physically or mentally defective.”

People of Chinese and Japanese decent were previously banned from entering the United States with the Chinese Exclusion Act and an agreement with Japan. The law was revised to allow people from Asia with the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 and any homosexual people would be able to come to the United States with the Immigration Act of 1990.

Wilson’s administration had already used its influence to block “anti-alien land bills” in Oregon and Idaho. These bills would have prevented Japanese and Chinese immigrants from owning land and discourage them from settling permanently in the U.S. The administration was acting out of “a desire not to agitate Japan.”

In the 1920s, Idaho, Oregon and Washington would eventually pass such laws. Decades later, they would be ruled unconstitutional.



February 5, 1924: What’s the time? BBC Radio electronically generated time signals or "pips" that were broadcast from the Greenwich Observatory for the first time at precisely 9.30pm. The "pips" are the famous six short tones that mark the precise start of each hour, known as the Greenwich Time Signal. They have become a hallmark of BBC radio, especially on stations like BBC Radio 4, where they are still used to this day. The idea was proposed by Sir Frank Watson Dyson, who was the Astronomer Royal at the time. The actual implementation of the pips in broadcasting was engineered by the BBC's John Reith, with technical assistance from the Post Office, which managed the radio transmission infrastructure. While Dyson conceptualized the use for time signaling, the exact sound and method of delivery were a collective effort by engineers involved in early radio broadcasting and timekeeping at the BBC.


Greenwich Time Signal - the 'pips'

The history of the BBC pips

Greenwich time signal 'pips' broadcast by the BBC for the first time:




February 5, 1989: Sky TV News was launched at 6 PM. Penny Smith and Alastair Yates were the first two Sky News presenters seen on air. Sky News was part of Rupert Murdoch’s new viewer subscription satellite broadcaster Sky Television. And speaking of Murdoch, the Fox mogul made the pilgrimage to the White House a few days ago.



"Good evening, 10 Britons have agreed to sell their kidneys to a German count who plans to set up an organ transplant business here. Our exclusive interview at his home near Stuttgart. ... we can also reveal the count is currently under investigation over an alleged illegal immigration ring." Spooky scary story for 1989. Wow, some "alleged" things just never seem to change! Have a listen...

The first 22 mins with Alastair Yates & Penny Smith...which Sky News has blocked from playing on any website other than Youtube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9zulfogaHM

Penny Smith (Penelope Jane Smith born 21 Sept 1958) left Sky News in 1993 and went to GMTV, now legally known as ITV Breakfast Broadcasting Limited.  After 17 years of being the main face of the show she left in 2010, said to be part of a cost-cutting exercise by ITV. She is a current presenter of the weekday mid-morning show on Magic Classical, a British digital radio station and her favorite classical composer is Giacomo Puccini.

Alastair Yates (3 Sept 1952 – 26 July 2018; Obit)

In 1992 he helped to launch BBC World Service Television and stayed in his post for the re-launch to BBC World in 1995. In 1997 he was part of the launch team for BBC News 24 (now the BBC News Channel). He took a couple of years out from BBC News in 1998 to become an anchor on Deutsche Welle in Germany. He returned to the BBC in 2001, again to appear on both BBC World News and the BBC News Channel.

Got a chuckle on whom ever wrote this story...

People outside of UK might not be aware of this, but before BBC News was not the first to start its 24 hour news channel. Sky News was the very first 24 hour news channel exclusive to UK and later on in Europe.

It was a quick success, relying on filling the void that existed in UK in the 24 hour news space. The massive success of CNN had made 24 hour news channels indispensable. People all over the world wanted dedicated news channels. Sky fulfilled that need even before BBC or ITV began to.

Surprisingly, Sky wasn’t interested in profit, in fact, for its $ 40 million investment; it didn’t see profits in the first few years. Murdoch went against the wishes of many when he decided to continue Sky News, despite the suggestions that it would be better to shut down. The network continues to air for free of charge and therefore looks to gain profit from other sources.

By 1991, Sky was no longer declaring loss and was well established, providing live coverage of important events to UK round the clock. It was appreciated by many and had a major following in UK and Europe where its only competition was CNN International.

Being partially owned by 21st Century Fox did raise some concern when Fox News started to gain notoriety. Many people started to fear that Sky News would start to mimic Fox News, which was blatantly a right-wing, republican and very conservative. Sky has to operate under the strict guidelines for reporting in the UK that insisted on neutrality and unbiased coverage.

However, these fears were laid to rest when Sky continued to report news in a clean, impartial manner, taking nothing from Fox News and maintaining its neutral stance. No clear political or social agenda was apparent in Sky’s reporting and the network successfully remained untarnished by the reputation of its wayward sibling.

Sky News SuccessStory

Rupert Murdoch Joins Trump in Oval Office, Too


February 5, 2020: President Donald Trump was acquitted in his US Senate trial on both of the articles of impeachment. Trump was found not guilty of abuse of power by a 52 to 48 tally and of obstruction of Congress by 53 to 47 votes.



In 38 years Donald Trump hasn't really changed...

Donald Trump - Interview with Donahue in 1987
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jxNkMkAe7F0

Donald Trump on Late Night with David Letterman in 1987
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9TXLY8hnhlo


Feb 5, 1998: Naval Institute Press author Tom Clancy confirmed that his group had signed an agreement to buy the Minnesota Vikings for $200 million. The deal fell apart due to his financial situation after a divorce. Oddly, Clancy's 1991 novel THE SUM OF ALL FEARS includes a storyline about the entire Vikings team being killed in a terrorist attack.

The fact that Clancy had once murdered the entire Vikings team was forgiven and forgotten. In The Sum of All Fears, Syrian terrorists partially detonated a nuclear bomb at a Super Bowl in Denver(!). The Chargers were winning, but the Vikings were making a furious comeback when the thing blew. "An embarrassing coincidence," Clancy said of the Vikings' fictional vaporization.

On Feb. 3, 1998, Clancy's bid was announced as the winner. The vote was 8-0 among the outgoing ownership group. Clancy took the owners out for lunch, the Pioneer Press later reported, but when the check came he told them he had lost his wallet.

The very next day, the first complication arose. Team president Roger Headrick raised his bid, claiming the franchise's bylaws gave him the right to match any offer. The matter went before the NFL, but Minnesota was solidly behind Clancy. A local columnist called him the perfect owner. A TV station's poll found that 98 percent of viewers wanted Clancy to own the team.

On March 19, commissioner Paul Tagliabue ruled in favor of Clancy. But a month later, things started going to hell. Tagliabue announced that "preliminary indications on the ownership structure and financing raise serious questions for us."

The NFL was concerned that Clancy didn't have enough money to follow through on his purchase, even after he claimed to secure $100 million worth of additional financing from Citicorp. He had also brought in as a partner Rockets owner Leslie Alexander, who many Minnesotans believed wanted to eventually buy out Clancy and move the team to Houston. Clancy moved to reassure fans. "Having witnessed the damage done in Baltimore when the Colts left," he said in a statement, "I would never inflict that on the Twin Cities."

The real problem was in a courtroom. Clancy was in the middle of an acrimonious divorce from his wife of 29 years. Not only was Wanda Clancy seeking 50 percent of the proceeds from Jack Ryan Enterprises (named after Clancy's recurring protagonist), in which she owned an equal share, but she wanted her half of future earnings from the Jack Ryan character. A Los Angeles Times article explained her reasoning, and his comeback:

Mrs. Clancy has never claimed the role of Clancy's muse. But it is noted in the divorce papers that she supported him by working as a nurse in the early years of the marriage and rearing the couple's four children. Clancy has counterclaimed that she was never supportive of his writing. His court papers state that "Mrs. Clancy contributed nothing to the development of his books, that she opposed his literary efforts, and that the value of the marital property is due solely to his efforts unaided and often opposed by Mrs. Clancy."

Clancy skipped a scheduled meeting with the NFL Finance Committee—he claimed he was on a press tour for the recently published Rainbow Six. He asked for a week's extension; the NFL gave him two days. "It appears to me quite clear that Tom Clancy does not have the resources to be the owner of the Minnesota Vikings," an outgoing co-owner told the AP. "That much has come through loud and clear in the last 24 hours."

On May 20, the deadline to present his finances to the league, Clancy announced he would withdraw his bid. The dream was dead. The rest of the ownership group quickly collapsed. San Antonio businessman Red McCombs, whose initial bid had lost to Clancy's, stepped up with a revised offer. And even better, he told the Pioneer Press, "I've got that cash in my hip pocket."

The Clancys finalized their divorce in January of 1999. Wanda retained her half of Jack Ryan Enterprises. As part of the terms, she also received half of Tom's share in the Baltimore Orioles. Her attorney told reporters that Wanda was always the baseball fan of the couple.

How Jack Ryan Kept Tom Clancy From Buying The Minnesota Vikings

Given all the recent fainting couch performances on the grants to media via USAID, remember that the guy who bankrolled Jann Wenner at first was in the Office of War Information during WWII. The whole popular information ecosystem is a Pentagon Langley foggy bottom project.
Very interestingly that the Office of Policy Coordination’s (OPC) code designation was "Project X".


The OPC was the covert operation wing of the CIA. Created as a department of the CIA in 1948, it actually operated independently until October 1950. OPC existed until August 1952, when it was merged with the Office of Special Operations (OSO) to form the Directorate of Plans (DDP).

According to the historian Gregory Mitrovich, OPC effectively "became an intelligence apparatus for the departments of state and defense". The OPC was brought under the control of the CIA on 12 October 1950.

Amongst the propaganda mission the psywar staff carried out was the funding of the 1954 Hollywood production of George Orwell's "Animal Farm", which should portray communist domination in an allegorical way.


Undermining the Kremlin: America's Strategy to Subvert the Soviet Bloc, 1947–1956
(2000) by Gregory Mitrovich


Ralph J. Gleason was an apostle of jazz and rock with few peers

CIA and the Cultural Cold War


Yesterday’s 'leak' about an unknown UFO investigation group in the FBI suggests the timing connects the two...


Agents sue FBI, DOJ amid fears of retaliation over work on Jan. 6 cases