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Philippines Refuses to Back-Down With Beijing Over South China

The Philippines is at the epicenter of a serious territorial confrontation with Beijing in the South China Sea. China’s broad claims, which include sovereignty claims over land parcels and neighbouring waters, have infuriated rival claimants such as Vietnam, the Philippines, Taiwan, Malaysia, and Brunei.

The tribunal backed the Philippines’ lawsuit in July 2016, stating that China had infringed on the Philippines’ sovereign rights. China boycotted the proceedings, calling the decision “ill-founded. It declares that it will not be bound by it.

The Philippines is one of several countries that have opposed China’s release of a map this week that reiterates its claim to over 90% of the sea.

Manila may have previously whined subtly in response to China’s efforts to block its ships, but with the support of Washington and its allies, its voice has now grown to a roar.

“Of course, we are concerned about rising tensions,” said Jonathan E. Malaya, assistant director general of the Philippines National Security Council.

In recent months, the Philippines has granted the US access to major military sites, held the largest-ever bilateral military drills, and frequently condemned Beijing’s actions in the South China Sea. Even as Philippine and Chinese coastguards engage in a now-familiar cat-and-mouse game in the disputed waters, Manila has revealed preparations to educate fishermen to protect their territory at sea.

The message is unmistakable. “Defending and making excuses for China’s aggressive behaviour should deem you unpatriotic and a traitor to the Philippines and to our people,” Jay Tarriela, a spokesperson for the coastguard in the West Philippine Sea, wrote on social media.

China’s claims, which encompass the whole South China Sea, pit it against not only the Philippines but also Vietnam, Taiwan, Malaysia, and Brunei. These aren’t new, but they’re becoming louder and dicier.

The current episode centres around the desolate Ayungin Shoal, which is more than 620 miles (998 km) from mainland China’s southernmost shore and around 120 miles from Palawan Island.

Philippines won in the international court

In the last six months, Chinese boats have employed water cannons and lasers to keep the Philippine coastguard from approaching the shoal. The boats were transporting men onboard a decrepit cruiser named Sierra Madre, which Manila had stranded on a shoal in their waters. To maintain a presence on the shoal, it took a concerted and calculated move.

This is the region that the Philippines won in an international court in 2016, when a tribunal ruled that Beijing’s broad claim to sovereignty over the South China Sea lacked legal foundation.

These are profitable fishing grounds, and access to the shoal also implies access to the adjoining Reed Bank, which has considerable oil and natural gas potential.

Undaunted by Chinese strength, the Philippines attempted to supply supplies to its men on the Sierra Madre again, claiming success this time.

“It’s a David versus Goliath situation,” Mr. Malaya stated. “However, like David, we will continue to pound the table and double down on the need to protect the resources that are critical to the Philippines’ future.”

Beijing, though, does not view it that way. It alleges that the Sierra Madre is infringing on its sovereignty. According to a Chinese coastguard statement, the deployment of a water cannon on the Filipino vessel was “professional and restrained.”

Manila said it attempted to ease the situation by dialling a hotline established with China, but no one answered.

“We would like to resolve this issue,” Mr. Malaya added, but acknowledged that “progress is slow and there is currently no meeting of the minds.”

Spat with Beijing in the South China Sea

President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos has moved closer to Washington than his predecessor, Rodrigo Duterte, who attempted to court rather than criticise China. He has also made public every spat with Beijing in the South China Sea. It is televised if the Philippine coastguard struggles to resupply the grounded ship on Ayungin Shoal. Most importantly, the United States is not far away.

The commander of the US Navy’s Seventh Fleet stated earlier this week that China’s “aggressive behaviour” in the South China Sea must be addressed and checked.

Vice Admiral Karl Thomas promised Manila that the United States would support it in the face of “shared challenges” in the region. “My forces are out here for a reason,” he explained to Reuters. “You have to challenge people who are operating in a grey zone, in my opinion. When they start taking more and more and pressuring you, you have to push back, sail, and operate.”

Beijing retaliated by accusing the United States of misrepresenting the facts and fostering conflict in order to “project power.”

Washington was initially ambiguous about Beijing’s actions in the South China Sea, and several countries in the region are still unsure if they can rely on its message of support. A change in administration might also signify a change of heart.

But, for the time being, the US is signalling that it will support its Asian allies. And it’s not just the US that’s been making an appearance in the South China Sea.

Military Posturing in South China Sea

The United States, Japan, and Australia conducted joint drills with the Philippines last week, which Tokyo’s ambassador to Manila praised as a “significant moment of defence.

Forces from Australia and the Philippines also took part in the two countries’ largest-ever military exercises, which included a simulated beach landing and air assault drills near the South China Sea.

Nowhere else do so many nations come so close to a competing force, raising concerns about a miscalculation during these sea skirmishes.

For Manila, allied assistance carries the risk of intensifying the conflict. However, that is a danger that Palawan’s fishermen may be unwilling to face.

The Philippine Army Chief of Staff, Romeo Brawner, recently stated that the army intends to recruit and train fishermen as reservists. Larry Hugo, regional officer for the Kalayaan Palawan Farmers and Fisherfolks Association, laughed when asked if he knew any fisherman willing to join such a militia.

“No, no, we don’t want to join,” he stated emphatically. “It’s doubtful that China would notice us. Local fishermen will be targeted. China is growing more aggressive. They’ve also grown in number.”

China’s Fishing Militia Fleet

According to Mr. Malaya of the Philippines National Security Council, the Chinese are also utilising hundreds of fishing vessels near the Ayungin shoal as militia vessels.

“They are instruments of Chinese power, part of China’s military apparatus.” They serve to frighten and harass our local fishermen,” he added. Beijing, on the other hand, denies the existence of such a force.

Whether it does or does not, Benjo Atay says he is not willing to risk sailing near those waters, let alone fighting in them.

He’s been fishing at Ayungin Shoal since he was 14 years old. It is named after a near-endangered fish native to the Philippines that is well-known among low-income families.

For months, he and other fishermen from the dispersed islands around Palawan sailed alongside Chinese vessels in the same waters.

Mr. Atay’s worry for the crew’s safety exceeds the allure of a large catch.

“I don’t think we’ll go back. We are terrified. They may use their water cannon. We just have a wooden boat, of course. We’re terrified of going back there.” Palawan’s crystal-clear blue seas and white sands are ideal. But, in order to exist here, you must fish.

For years, the people of this island have carved out settlements from the island’s rocky bays and sandy shores: single-room cottages with corrugated iron roofs, where babies sleep in hammocks stretched over the kitchen.

Because the majority of the boats have been grounded due to the storm, some people have gone out on foot into the shallows with nets and buckets to look for shellfish. Others are spending their time repairing boats and nets.

The kids take the day off from school to compete on a makeshift basketball court surrounded by resting, upturned boats. Some of them aspire to be professional basketball players, but when asked if they want to be fishermen, the answer is an unequivocal yes.

“It’s getting harder each year,” Mr. Atay says. “How can we work properly if we are afraid? We can’t concentrate on fishing, so we just stay on the island where Filipinos are permitted.”

During these territorial disputes, these communities are resolute to keep their heads down. However, any outcome could affect their future.

Previously, that future was dependent on wind and tide. It now depends on the determination of international leaders.

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Trudeau’s Gun Grab Could Cost Taxpayers a Whopping $7 Billion

Trudeau plans to purchase 2,063 firearm from legal gun owners in Canada - Rebel News Image

A recent report indicates that since Trudeau’s announcement of his gun buyback program four years ago, almost none of the banned firearms have been surrendered.

The federal government plans to purchase 2,063 firearm models from retailers following the enactment of Bill C-21, which amends various Acts and introduces certain consequential changes related to firearms. It was granted royal assent on December 15 of last year.

This ban immediately criminalized the actions of federally-licensed firearms owners regarding the purchase, sale, transportation, importation, exportation, or use of hundreds of thousands of rifles and shotguns that were previously legal.

The gun ban focused on what it termed ‘assault-style weapons,’ which are, in reality, traditional semi-automatic rifles and shotguns that have enjoyed popularity among hunters and sport shooters for over a century.

In May 2020, the federal government enacted an Order-in-Council that prohibited 1,500 types of “assault-style” firearms and outlined specific components of the newly banned firearms. Property owners must adhere to the law by October 2023.

Trudeau’s Buyback Hasn’t Happened

“In the announcement regarding the ban, the prime minister stated that the government would seize the prohibited firearms, assuring that their lawful owners would be ‘grandfathered’ or compensated fairly.” “That hasn’t happened,” criminologist Gary Mauser told Rebel News.

Mauser projected expenses ranging from $2.6 billion to $6.7 billion. The figure reflects the compensation costs amounting to $756 million, as outlined by the Parliamentary Budget Office (PBO).

“The projected expenses for gathering the illegal firearms are estimated to range from $1.6 billion to $7 billion.” “This range estimate increases to between $2.647 billion and $7 billion when compensation costs to owners are factored in,” Mauser stated.

Figures requested by Conservative MP Shannon Stubbs concerning firearms prohibited due to the May 1, 2020 Order In Council reveal that $72 million has been allocated to the firearm “buyback” program, yet not a single firearm has been confiscated to date.

In a recent revelation, Public Safety Canada disclosed that the federal government allocated a staggering $41,094,556, as prompted by an order paper question from Conservative Senator Don Plett last September, yet yielded no tangible outcomes.

An internal memo from late 2019 revealed that the Liberals projected their politically motivated harassment would incur a cost of $1.8 billion.

Enforcement efforts Questioned

By December 2023, estimates from TheGunBlog.ca indicate that the Liberals and RCMP had incurred or were responsible for approximately $30 million in personnel expenses related to the enforcement efforts. The union representing the police service previously stated that the effort to confiscate firearms is a “misdirected effort” aimed at ensuring public safety.

“This action diverts crucial personnel, resources, and funding from tackling the more pressing and escalating issue of criminal use of illegal firearms,” stated the National Police Federation (NPF).

The Canadian Sporting Arms & Ammunition Association (CSAAA), representing firearms retailers, has stated it will have “zero involvement” in the confiscation of these firearms. Even Canada Post held back from providing assistance due to safety concerns.

The consultant previously assessed that retailers are sitting on almost $1 billion worth of inventory that cannot be sold or returned to suppliers because of the Order-In-Council.

“Despite the ongoing confusion surrounding the ban, after four years, we ought to be able to address one crucial question.” Has the prohibition enhanced safety for Canadians? Mauser asks.

Illegally Obtained Firearms are the Problem

Statistics Canada reports a 10% increase in firearm-related violent crime between 2020 and 2022, rising from 12,614 incidents to 13,937 incidents. In that timeframe, the incidence of firearm-related violent crime increased from 33.7 incidents per 100,000 population in 2021 to 36.7 incidents the subsequent year.

“This marks the highest rate documented since the collection of comparable data began in 2009,” the criminologist explains.

Supplementary DataData indicates that firearm homicides have risen since 2020. “The issue lies not with lawfully-held firearms,” Mauser stated.

Firearms that have been banned under the Order-in-Council continue to be securely stored in the safes of their lawful owners. The individuals underwent a thorough vetting process by the RCMP and are subject to nightly monitoring to ensure there are no infractions that could pose a risk to public safety.

“The firearms involved in homicides were seldom legally owned weapons wielded by their rightful owners,” Mauser continues. The number of offenses linked to organized crime has surged from 4,810 in 2016 to a staggering 13,056 in 2020.

“If those in power … aim to diminish crime and enhance public safety, they ought to implement strategies that effectively focus on offenders and utilize our limited tax resources judiciously to reach these objectives,” he stated.

Millennials in Canada Have Turned their Backs on Justin Trudeau

Millennials in Canada Have Turned their Backs on Justin Trudeau

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Google’s Search Dominance Is Unwinding, But Still Accounting 48% Search Revenue

Google is so closely associated with its key product that its name is a verb that signifies “search.” However, Google’s dominance in that sector is dwindling.

According to eMarketer, Google will lose control of the US search industry for the first time in decades next year.

Google will remain the dominant search player, accounting for 48% of American search advertising revenue. And, remarkably, Google is still increasing its sales in the field, despite being the dominating player in search since the early days of the George W. Bush administration. However, Amazon is growing at a quicker rate.

Google’s Search Dominance Is Unwinding

Amazon will hold over a quarter of US search ad dollars next year, rising to 27% by 2026, while Google will fall even more, according to eMarketer.

The Wall Street Journal was first to report on the forecast.

Lest you think you’ll have to switch to Bing or Yahoo, this isn’t the end of Google or anything really near.

Google is the fourth-most valued public firm in the world. Its market worth is $2.1 trillion, trailing just Apple, Microsoft, and the AI chip darling Nvidia. It also maintains its dominance in other industries, such as display advertisements, where it dominates alongside Facebook’s parent firm Meta, and video ads on YouTube.

To put those “other” firms in context, each is worth more than Delta Air Lines’ total market value. So, yeah, Google is not going anywhere.

Nonetheless, Google faces numerous dangers to its operations, particularly from antitrust regulators.

On Monday, a federal judge in San Francisco ruled that Google must open up its Google Play Store to competitors, dealing a significant blow to the firm in its long-running battle with Fortnite creator Epic Games. Google announced that it would appeal the verdict.

In August, a federal judge ruled that Google has an illegal monopoly on search. That verdict could lead to the dissolution of the company’s search operation. Another antitrust lawsuit filed last month accuses Google of abusing its dominance in the online advertising business.

Meanwhile, European regulators have compelled Google to follow tough new standards, which have resulted in multiple $1 billion-plus fines.

Pixa Bay

Google’s Search Dominance Is Unwinding

On top of that, the marketplace is becoming more difficult on its own.

TikTok, the fastest-growing social network, is expanding into the search market. And Amazon has accomplished something few other digital titans have done to date: it has established a habit.

When you want to buy anything, you usually go to Amazon, not Google. Amazon then buys adverts to push companies’ products to the top of your search results, increasing sales and earning Amazon a greater portion of the revenue. According to eMarketer, it is expected to generate $27.8 billion in search revenue in the United States next year, trailing only Google’s $62.9 billion total.

And then there’s AI, the technology that (supposedly) will change everything.

Why search in stilted language for “kendall jenner why bad bunny breakup” or “police moving violation driver rights no stop sign” when you can just ask OpenAI’s ChatGPT, “What’s going on with Kendall Jenner and Bad Bunny?” in “I need help fighting a moving violation involving a stop sign that wasn’t visible.” Google is working on exactly this technology with its Gemini product, but its success is far from guaranteed, especially with Apple collaborating with OpenAI and other businesses rapidly joining the market.

A Google spokeswoman referred to a blog post from last week in which the company unveiled ads in its AI overviews (the AI-generated text that appears at the top of search results). It’s Google’s way of expressing its ability to profit on a changing marketplace while retaining its business, even as its consumers steadily transition to ask-and-answer AI and away from search.

google

Google has long used a single catchphrase to defend itself against opponents who claim it is a monopoly abusing its power: competition is only a click away. Until recently, that seemed comically obtuse. Really? We are going to switch to Bing? Or Duck Duck Go? Give me a break.

But today, it feels more like reality.

Google is in no danger of disappearing. However, every highly dominating company faces some type of reckoning over time. GE, a Dow mainstay for more than a century, was broken up last year and is now a shell of its previous dominance. Sears declared bankruptcy in 2022 and is virtually out of business. US Steel, long the foundation of American manufacturing, is attempting to sell itself to a Japanese corporation.

Could we remember Google in the same way that we remember Yahoo or Ask Jeeves in decades? These next few years could be significant.

SOURCE | CNN

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The Supreme Court Turns Down Biden’s Government Appeal in a Texas Emergency Abortion Matter.

(VOR News) – A ruling that prohibits emergency abortions that contravene the Supreme Court law in the state of Texas, which has one of the most stringent abortion restrictions in the country, has been upheld by the Supreme Court of the United States. The United States Supreme Court upheld this decision.

The justices did not provide any specifics regarding the underlying reasons for their decision to uphold an order from a lower court that declared hospitals cannot be legally obligated to administer abortions if doing so would violate the law in the state of Texas.

Institutions are not required to perform abortions, as stipulated in the decree. The common populace did not investigate any opposing viewpoints. The decision was made just weeks before a presidential election that brought abortion to the forefront of the political agenda.

This decision follows the 2022 Supreme Court ruling that ended abortion nationwide.

In response to a request from the administration of Vice President Joe Biden to overturn the lower court’s decision, the justices expressed their disapproval.

The government contends that hospitals are obligated to perform abortions in compliance with federal legislation when the health or life of an expectant patient is in an exceedingly precarious condition.

This is the case in regions where the procedure is prohibited. The difficulty hospitals in Texas and other states are experiencing in determining whether or not routine care could be in violation of stringent state laws that prohibit abortion has resulted in an increase in the number of complaints concerning pregnant women who are experiencing medical distress being turned away from emergency rooms.

The administration cited the Supreme Court’s ruling in a case that bore a striking resemblance to the one that was presented to it in Idaho at the beginning of the year. The justices took a limited decision in that case to allow the continuation of emergency abortions without interruption while a lawsuit was still being heard.

In contrast, Texas has been a vocal proponent of the injunction’s continued enforcement. Texas has argued that its circumstances are distinct from those of Idaho, as the state does have an exemption for situations that pose a significant hazard to the health of an expectant patient.

According to the state, the discrepancy is the result of this exemption. The state of Idaho had a provision that safeguarded a woman’s life when the issue was first broached; however, it did not include protection for her health.

Certified medical practitioners are not obligated to wait until a woman’s life is in imminent peril before they are legally permitted to perform an abortion, as determined by the state supreme court.

The state of Texas highlighted this to the Supreme Court.

Nevertheless, medical professionals have criticized the Texas statute as being perilously ambiguous, and a medical board has declined to provide a list of all the disorders that are eligible for an exception. Furthermore, the statute has been criticized for its hazardous ambiguity.

For an extended period, termination of pregnancies has been a standard procedure in medical treatment for individuals who have been experiencing significant issues. It is implemented in this manner to prevent catastrophic outcomes, such as sepsis, organ failure, and other severe scenarios.

Nevertheless, medical professionals and hospitals in Texas and other states with strict abortion laws have noted that it is uncertain whether or not these terminations could be in violation of abortion prohibitions that include the possibility of a prison sentence. This is the case in regions where abortion prohibitions are exceedingly restrictive.

Following the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, which resulted in restrictions on the rights of women to have abortions in several Republican-ruled states, the Texas case was revisited in 2022.

As per the orders that were disclosed by the administration of Vice President Joe Biden, hospitals are still required to provide abortions in cases that are classified as dire emergency.

As stipulated in a piece of health care legislation, the majority of hospitals are obligated to provide medical assistance to patients who are experiencing medical distress. This is in accordance with the law.

The state of Texas maintained that hospitals should not be obligated to provide abortions throughout the litigation, as doing so would violate the state’s constitutional prohibition on abortions. In its January judgment, the 5th United States Circuit Court of Appeals concurred with the state and acknowledged that the administration had exceeded its authority.

SOURCE: AP