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Joe Rogan’s Podcast Keeps Mysteriously Disappearing From Spotify
The Joe Rogan Experience, at the center of a fierce controversy over censorship and misinformation, briefly disappeared from Spotify on Monday for unexplained reasons — the second time in days that the show has mysteriously vanished.
For a short period on Feb. 21, Spotify users were unable to access the show from the streaming platform’s website, iPhone app and Android app.
The show now appears to be available again and it is not clear why it vanished. But the disappearance is certainly noteworthy given the controversy around the podcast and its host — under fire over COVID-19 misinformation and use of racial slurs — and the removal of dozens of episodes.
U.S. Government Workers Reportedly Among Those Donating to ‘Freedom Convoy’
As Americans continue to donate money to the Canadian Freedom Convoy, some donors might have influential ties to the U.S. government.
An investigation by Canadian newspaper, The Globe and Mail, claims that some American contributors to the convoy’s funds are government workers.
Among the government agencies listed in the Globe and Mail report as having employees donate to the convoy is the U.S. Department of Justice, NASA, the Bureau of Prisons, and the Transportation Safety Authority. Due to privacy concerns and the ability to put down an alias during the donation process, many of these employees were not publicly identified by the newspaper.
U.S. Supreme Court Rejects Challenge to Maine COVID Vaccine Mandate
The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday turned away a challenge to Maine’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate for healthcare workers, rebuffing for the second time a group of plaintiffs who sought a religious exemption.
The justices rejected a request made on behalf of unnamed plaintiffs identifying themselves as Maine healthcare workers who objected to the vaccinations on religious grounds. The court in November rejected an emergency request by the same plaintiffs seeking to prevent Maine from enforcing the mandate against them. They are represented by a Christian legal advocacy group.
The court previously rejected other challenges to vaccine mandates including one focusing upon New York’s lack of religious exemptions for healthcare workers.
New York Won’t Enforce COVID Vaccine Booster Mandate for Healthcare Workers
New York on Friday announced it would not enforce the state’s COVID-19 vaccine booster mandate for healthcare workers amid concerns over possible staffing issues.
Last month, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) announced that the state would require all healthcare workers to get a COVID-19 booster as the state faced a surge of infections. That mandate was set to go into effect on Monday.
However, New York state officials acknowledged on Friday the requirement could lead to staffing shortages and said they would not enforce it, though they would reassess booster vaccination progress among healthcare workers in three months to see if new steps needed to be employed.
People’s Convoy Rakes in $300K in Donations for Truckers’ Trip to DC
As the People’s Convoy prepares to head to Washington, DC, to demand an end to all COVID-19-related mandates across the nation, the group of truckers has raised more than $300,000 in support of the protest.
The convoy is scheduled to depart from Adelanto, California, on Wednesday as part of an 11-day journey to the nation’s capital, where they’re expected to arrive on March 5. As of Tuesday morning, the People’s Convoy has raised $311,362 in donations, according to its website.
The convoy comes just days after police in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, cleared the last of anti-COVID mandate protesters of Canada’s Freedom Convoy.
Pentagon Weighs Request for DC National Guard Help Ahead of Trucker Protests
The Pentagon said Tuesday it is considering a request to deploy the National Guard to provide assistance ahead of trucker protests that could halt traffic around the nation’s capital as soon as this week.
Pentagon press secretary John Kirby said the department received a request for Guard support from the U.S. Capitol Police and the DC government, but had not yet decided to approve the request.
Several trucker convoys protesting coronavirus restrictions are slated to begin arriving in the DC area this week and continue into early March. The protests come after truckers in Canada occupied the capital city of Ottawa for three weeks to oppose vaccine mandates, which ended in widespread arrests and towing by police.
Key Organizer of Ottawa COVID Protests Denied Bail
A judge has denied bail to one of the leading organizers behind protests against COVID-19 restrictions and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Ontario Court Justice Julie Bourgeois said Tuesday she believed there was a substantial likelihood Tamara Lich would reoffend if released.
Lich has been a key organizer of the protest that paralyzed the streets around Parliament Hill for more than three weeks. The trucker protest also grew until it closed a handful of Canada-U.S. border posts. They have since ended.
Lich was arrested last Thursday and charged with counseling to commit mischief and promised during a bail hearing on Saturday to give up her advocacy of the protest and return to Alberta.
Ottawa protesters who vowed never to give up are largely gone, chased away by police in riot gear in what was the biggest police operation in the nation’s history.
Schools Say They’re Caught ‘Between a Rock and a Hard Place’ as Anti-Mask Protests Grow
The San Diego Union-Tribune reported:
Some San Diego County school district leaders are pleading for help as they bear the brunt of families’ discontent over the state’s indoor school mask mandate, which at this point has no expiration date.
Scores of San Diego County students, many who are not yet teenagers, are protesting the mandate by refusing to wear masks in class. The protests have garnered more attention in the past few days, ever since state officials announced at a press conference last Monday that they are not lifting the state’s indoor school mask mandate yet.
State leaders say they will reassess state COVID data on Feb. 28 but have suggested they won’t lift the school mask mandate until sometime after that date.
Oregon Says Nike’s Vaccine Mandate Is ‘Reasonable’ for Remote Workers, Denies Jobless Aid
The Oregon Employment Department says workers who don’t comply with their employers’ vaccine mandates aren’t eligible for jobless aid, even if they work remotely.
The department denied unemployment benefits this month to Nike software engineer Alex Burkoff, 41, who lost his job in January because he refused to document his vaccination status. Burkoff is appealing the state’s decision, arguing that Nike’s vaccine mandate isn’t reasonable because there’s no chance that employees like him who don’t come to the office could expose colleagues to COVID-19.
Federal courts have struck down most government vaccine mandates, with the notable exception of requirements applying to most healthcare workers. But companies are generally free to implement their own mandates, if they choose.
Six Major U.S. Cities Still Have Proof-of-Vaccination Requirements
As coronavirus cases drop across the United States, six major cities continue to require proof of vaccination to access certain public venues.
Many cities relaxed their rules in recent weeks due to the decreasing number of cases, reversing course after cases exploded in the winter due to the Omicron variant.
But people in Chicago, Los Angeles, New Orleans, New York, San Francisco and Seattle are still required to show they are vaccinated before going out to some places, including restaurants and gyms. Since the vaccines became widely available, municipal leaders used the requirements to limit the virus’ spread but received backlash from some residents over the policy.
Uganda’s Proposed New Law Will See Anti-Vaxxers Face Fines or Six Months in Jail
Uganda has proposed steep penalties for anti-vaxxers in a new bill being studied by parliament, as the country doubles down on its COVID-19 vaccine mandate.
A parliamentary health committee said Tuesday it was considering proposed legislation to fine or imprison unvaccinated people in the East African country of around 45 million people.
The parliament said in a statement on its website, “According to the proposal, those who do not get vaccinated against COVID-19 will be fined Shs 4 million (around $1,137) or a jail term of six months.”
Israel to Open Borders to Unvaccinated Tourists March 1
Israel plans to open its borders to all tourists, no matter their COVID-19 vaccination status, starting March 1.
While all incoming tourists will need negative PCR test results before takeoff and after landing in Israel, this will be the first time unvaccinated visitors will be allowed into the country since March 2020.
Israeli nationals returning to the country will only need to take a PCR test upon arrival. The previous requirement for an antigen test before boarding will be lifted effective March 1.
Unvaccinated Israeli nationals will no longer have to quarantine as long as their PCR test results are negative.
Behind the Stalkerware Network Spilling the Private Phone Data of Hundreds of Thousands
Much of the spyware you hear of today are the powerful nation-state-backed exploits that can quietly and remotely hack into iPhones anywhere in the world. These powerful hacking tools are bought and operated by governments, often targeting their most vocal critics — journalists, activists and human rights defenders.
There is another kind of spyware that is more prevalent and much more likely to affect the average person: the consumer-grade spyware apps that are controlled by everyday people.
Consumer-grade spyware is often sold under the guise of child monitoring software, but also goes by the term “stalkerware” for its ability to track and monitor other people or spouses without their consent.
Last October, TechCrunch revealed a consumer-grade spyware security issue that’s putting the private phone data, messages and locations of hundreds of thousands of people, including Americans, at risk. But in this case it’s not just one spyware app exposing people’s phone data. It’s an entire fleet of Android spyware apps that share the same security vulnerability.
What’s Worth More: Unicorns or the Biggest U.S. Tech Companies?
New data collected by Crunchbase News indicates that the value of global unicorns has crested the $4 trillion mark. The valuation milestone is notable not merely for its scale, but its relative size.
Compared to what? The value of the major tech companies of the West, namely the U.S. Big Five. Once they were known as Google, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon and Facebook. Today the group is known as Alphabet, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon and Meta, with the younger two of the five-company group undergoing name changes in recent years.
The five companies actually managed to double their worth to over $8 trillion when stocks crested in late 2021; since then, the total has fallen to $7.2 trillion as of last Friday’s close, Wolfram Alpha data showed.
