Good morning, on this first day of June.
Tennis
Naomi Osaka, a 23 yr old super star in tennis left the French Open after being fined 15,000 dollars for refusing to appear at a news conference. It should have been handled differently. She cited depression as a reason for the departure, and that means the sport didn’t rise to the occasion and help her over come a difficult moment.
But, she also earned 55 million dollars last year for public appearances paid for by fans and media exposure, so the demands of tennis include speaking to fans and press and the living with the pay cheque means taking the pressure that comes with it.
And, French Open officials say they tried to speak to Osaka behind the scenes, but she refused to explain her boycott of news conferences. But mental health is a sensitive issue, and people struggling with it require our understanding and patience. There must have been a better way of finding a compromise for sports fans and media and a young lady who couldn’t cope with questions.
As Serena Williams was sympathetic after her first-round victory in Paris on Monday.
“I feel for Naomi,” she said. “I feel like I wish I could give her a hug because I know what it’s like. I’ve been in those positions. We have different personalities, and people are different.”
“I’m thick,” Williams said, possibly referring to being thick-skinned. “Other people are thin. Everyone is different, and everyone handles things differently. You just have to let her handle it the way she wants to, in the best way she thinks she can.”
Democracy and Memorial Day
U.S. President Biden rightfully centred a Memorial Day speech at Arlington Cemetery Monday on freedom and democracy. Hard fought struggles for freedom have costs the lives of millions in wars, and Biden warned U.S. democracy is in peril.
“The mission falls to each of us, each and every day. Democracy itself is in peril, here at home and around the world,” he said, adding: “What we do now, how we honor the memory of the fallen, will determine whether democracy will long endure.”
Biden’s speech played out against one of the most dramatic and disturbing election years in America in 2020, and today the Republican Party continues to undermine the vote and legitimacy of election results and even block crucial inquiries into what led to the storming of the Capitol building.
One of the great freedoms and defenders of Liberal thought and freedoms,taken away by leaders in Russia and Belarus, is a free press. And now in America too.
A word about that; Press freedoms are best guarded by educated and mission driven journalists who place duty to truth and the honor of being a reporter, above a pay cheque and network/newspaper owners self interests. It’s up to us to tell political influencers their influence peddling stops at the newsroom door. We guard that door to make sure we are balanced and deserving of public confidence.
In America journalism has always been one of the best in the world, but in recent years many cable news stations have swung right or left and been highjacked by one political party or another. And now the internet peddles mountains of disinformation readily available for the misguided, misinformed and those easily manipulated.
Unfortunately regulation of misinformation is only as good as the regulator who inevitably is a political appointee. So the best guardians of free press are really journalists themselves who need to be educated very early on to stand up for truth above all. We have lost that ground to highly paid disturbing disoriented news “hosts” who peddle the ridiculous to gain ratings.
In this age, ‘tune out and turn off’ are critical tools in consuming news. For freedom and democracy our future depends on navigating the absurd, but I fear most people are simply not up to it. So real journalist’s need to hold the line.
Arrest Open Russia Party
Last week Open Russia, an opposition movement established by former oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky, said it was closing down to avoid jail for supporters ahead of parliamentary elections in Russia this fall.
Now this - the former executive director of Open Russia, has reportedly been removed from a plane in St. Petersburg and detained. His name is Andrei Pivovarov.
"I have just been removed from the plane from Pulkovo (airport)...The plane was about to take off." He wrote on his Twitter account on Monday evening.
Putin, who strangled press freedoms in Russia shortly after coming to power in 2000, has now targeted opposition leaders, ahead of the DUMA elections. Much of this demonstrates the Russian Presidents falling popularity in the wake of Covid-19, and includes the jailing of the main opposition leader Alexei Navalny.
Operation Dunhammer
Denmark's Defence Intelligence Service (FE) collaborated with the US National Security Agency (NSA) to gather information from 2012 to 2014.
Spy agencies spy, but this operation went far beyond the norm.
The Americans tapped into the the phones and data of allied leaders such as Germans Angela Merkel. Now European leaders are demanding more detail and answers from Denmark and the U.S.
"This is not acceptable between allies, and even less between allies and European partners," said French President Emmanuel Macron, after speaking with Ms Merkel.
Other News…
-Belarus is moving to restrict its citizens from leaving. Dictator Alexander Lukashenko’s harsh rule includes stripping residency abroad permits to stem the exodus of professionals who want to move to Europe
-China wants more children: After decades of strict birth control, each Chinese family is now allowed to have three offspring.
-A report by IAEA chief Rafael Grossi says Tehran has failed to provide a proper explanation for the discovery of uranium particles at three sites across the country.
-Chinese authorities have been “exporting their authoritarianism overseas” by infiltrating democratic institutions in Canada and elsewhere as a way to stifle criticism of the Communist state, one expert told Canadian parliamentarians on Monday.
-The high-security Canadian National Microbiology Laboratory in Winnipeg was conducting research into deadly pathogens, in partnership with the now-notorious Wuhan lab. And President Biden’s intelligence probe of the origins of Covid will potentially reveal more on the Canadian link.
Have a good day everyone. Be good to yourself. Can you pease share this newsletter with one other person?
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https://financialpost.com/diane-francis/diane-francis-canada-must-be-transparent-about-wuhan-lab-ties
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/may/31/joe-biden-memorial-day-speech-warns-democracy-in-peril
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/31/sports/tennis/french-open-naomi-osaka-quits.html
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-57311441
https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2021/05/31/former-head-of-opposition-group-open-russia-reportedly-removed-from-flight-detained-a74062