"In Silicon Valley, after all, math is less important than intangibles like vision. And when $1 billion can become $1.5 billion, or even $2 billion, in a manner of weeks, you’ve entered a world of abstraction".

Said: Maya Kosoff in her column titled "[“I Want No Part In It”: The Hysterical Debate Over Silicon Valley’s Next Big Thing"] in Vanity Fair of June 14. Her comment was based on the astronomical rise in the valuation of Bird, the electric-scooter start-up, from $300 million in March this year to $1 billion at the end of May and now the startup is seeking a fresh round of $200 million funding at $2 billion valuation - double the valuation in less than one month!

Maya beautifully illustrates the arguments for and against the scooter culture that is gripping the Metros like San Francisco and Los Angeles where the sudden preponderance of Bird scooters has created a cottage industry of people who collect and charge Bird scooters, known as “Bird hunters.” 

Positive:

True believers see things differently. “It’s been [over] a decade” since the Segway, another scooter-start-up investor told me of the inevitable comparison. “Plenty of things didn’t work a decade ago that work now, due to cultural shifts.” Car- and bike-sharing services have already inaugurated a new way of thinking about public and private transportation, acclimating consumers to the idea that they don’t need their own vehicles to get around. Kevin Roose, reporting for The New York Times, grudgingly admitted that electric scooters, while “kind of dorky,” are also weirdly useful, under the right circumstances. “I wanted to hate the scooters. I really did,” he wrote, before traveling to Los Angeles for work. “Tech hubris on wheels - what’s not to loathe?” Instead, he fell in love. The scooters are ubiquitous, easily discovered and unlocked via smartphone app, and driving is simple: a throttle controls the speed, which tops out at a breezy 15 miles per hour, and a hand brake brings you to a smooth stop. When you arrive at your destination, you leave the scooter wherever you like and lock it with the app.

Negative:

Indeed, the vigor expressed by Bird enthusiasts may be matched only by the company’s detractors, who have condemned the scooters as a plague, a nuisance, and even an existential danger. “It’s wheelmageddon,” one San Francisco resident told me in April. “They are everywhere . . . People are zooming past pedestrians without a single fuck to give.” 

Read Maya's full article here.

You can also watch below how this new breed of electric scooters is invading San Francisco (Courtesy: Engadget):

"Lying is second nature to Trump... Trump has the ability to convince himself that whatever he is saying is true, or sort of true, or at least ought to be true."

Said: Tony Schwartz, Donald Trump's Ghostwriter and Trump’s Art of the Deal co-author in an interview with Ari Melber of CNBC.

Screen shots from the MSNBC interview

Watch full video 

"You can’t get in trouble for what you don’t say.”

Sean Spicer

Said Former White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer commenting on the functioning of Sarah Sanders who replaced him in July last year. The comment appears in The Washington Post story on "As a willing warrior for Trump, Sarah Sanders struggles to maintain credibility."

“Sarah has done a fantastic job of keeping in line with understanding how to effectively communicate what the president’s thoughts are at any given time, recognizing that it is a very dynamic and fluid situation in many cases,” Spicer said. “What she has done is, she has realized, you can’t get in trouble for what you don’t say.”

Read the full story here.

Watch Sarah Sanders' press briefing below:

(Courtesy: PBS - a publicly funded 

American broadcaster Wikipedia)

"Lying to federal investigators is a crime, though lying on TV is not."

Source: Wikipedia

Said: Barbara McQuade, a former federal prosecutor and Professor from Practice at University of Michigan. She was commenting on Rudolph W. Giuliani’s statement that the president paid his lawyer Michael Cohen $35,000 monthly to reimburse him the costs he incurred in the widely publicised Stormy Daniels settlement for which he paid $130,000 from his personal funds. 

Giuliani is the most recent entrant to the Trump’s legal team. “I’m sure Giuliani's strategy was damage control but I’m not sure he controlled much,” said McQuade as quoted by Washington Post's Analysis: "Giuliani’s media blitz gives investigators new leads, new evidence"

According to the Washington Post's analysis, Giuliani asserted that Trump fired James B. Comey as FBI director because Comey would not reveal publicly that the president was not under investigation. Commenting on this McQuade said “I think even Trump's asking Comey to publicly exonerate him does interfere with the investigation and could constitute obstruction of justice.” Special counsel Robert S. Mueller III is also investigating whether Trump obstructed justice by firing Comey.

McQuade said investigators are also likely to explore money-laundering issues. Giuliani’s TV interviews might have been an effort to speak to Cohen and to reassure him that the White House still has his back. “Maybe the strategy there is to try to calm him down so he’s not tempted to cooperate,” she explained.

Investigators are likely to ask witnesses about the topic and compare what Giuliani said publicly about Trump’s arrangement with Cohen with what people have told them in the past, McQuade said. Lying to federal investigators is a crime, though lying on TV is not. 

Read the full story here.

I can tell you there have been people that have been making threats privately and publicly against me for quite some time and I think they should understand by now the Department of Justice is not going to be extorted.

(Courtesy: C-Span)

Said: Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein responding to a question from the CNN reporter Laura Jarrett about possible articles of impeachment by the House Freedom Caucus over his handling of document requests.

Her question was "As you think about the importance of separation of powers on the day, any reaction on the news that certain members of the House Caucus have drafted articles of impeachment?" 

Answering the question, Rosenstein said: “I saw that draft. I don't know who wrote it. It illustrates the important principle of the rule of law. We make mistakes. That is not to say we are flawless. But the way we operate is if we can accuse someone of wrongdoing, we have to have admissible evidence, credible witnesses and be able to prove our case in court and fix our signature to the charging documents. There is a lot talk about FISA applications and many people I see talking about it seem not to recognize what a FISA application is. It is like a search warrant. In order to get a FISA search warrant, you need an affidavit signed by a career federal law enforcement agent. If it is wrong, that person is going to face consequences - you can face discipline or even prosecution. That is the way we operate. We have people who are accountable. I just don't have anything to say about documents like that nobody has the courage to put their name on an State leakage that way, but I can tell you there have been people that have been making threats privately and publicly against me for quite some time and I think they should understand by now the Department of Justice is not going to be extorted. We are going to do what is required by the rule of law and any kind of threats will not affect the way we do our job. We have a responsibility. We take an oath. You raise your right hand and swearing of to defend the United States - swear in an oath to defend the United States from all enemies, foreign and domestic. That is your responsibility. Everybody in the department takes that oath. If they violate it, they know they will be held accountable.”

Rosenstein was speaking on the rule of law, the first amendment, and the mission of the justice department at the Newseum in Washington. 

Watch full speech of Rod J. Rosenstein here.

I can tell you there have been people that have been making threats privately and publicly against me for quite some time and I think they should understand by now the Department of Justice is not going to be extorted.

(Courtesy: C-Span)

Said: Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein responding to a question from the CNN reporter Laura Jarrett about possible articles of impeachment by the House Freedom Caucus over his handling of document requests.

Her question was "As you think about the importance of separation of powers on the day, any reaction on the news that certain members of the House Caucus have drafted articles of impeachment?" 

Answering the question, Rosenstein said: “I saw that draft. I don't know who wrote it. It illustrates the important principle of the rule of law. We make mistakes. That is not to say we are flawless. But the way we operate is if we can accuse someone of wrongdoing, we have to have admissible evidence, credible witnesses and be able to prove our case in court and fix our signature to the charging documents. There is a lot talk about FISA applications and many people I see talking about it seem not to recognize what a FISA application is. It is like a search warrant. In order to get a FISA search warrant, you need an affidavit signed by a career federal law enforcement agent. If it is wrong, that person is going to face consequences - you can face discipline or even prosecution. That is the way we operate. We have people who are accountable. I just don't have anything to say about documents like that nobody has the courage to put their name on an State leakage that way, but I can tell you there have been people that have been making threats privately and publicly against me for quite some time and I think they should understand by now the Department of Justice is not going to be extorted. We are going to do what is required by the rule of law and any kind of threats will not affect the way we do our job. We have a responsibility. We take an oath. You raise your right hand and swearing of to defend the United States - swear in an oath to defend the United States from all enemies, foreign and domestic. That is your responsibility. Everybody in the department takes that oath. If they violate it, they know they will be held accountable.”

Rosenstein was speaking on the rule of law, the first amendment, and the mission of the justice department at the Newseum in Washington. 

Watch full speech of Rod J. Rosenstein here.

"The prime minister (Narendra Modi) has a duty to safeguard and fight for all of the people of India, not just those who are allied with him politically."

IMAGE: Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressing 

a rally in Kangra, Himachal Pradesh

Photograph: @BJP4India/Twitter

Said: The editorial board of The New York Times in its 'Opinion' editorial titled "Modi’s Long Silence as Women in India Are Attacked" published today. "The editorial board represents the opinions of the board, its editor and the publisher. It is separate from the newsroom and the Op-Ed section," informs the NYT website.

The editorial board writes on Mr. Modi's silence on the recent "horrifying rape and murder of an 8-year-old girl" at Kathua, in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir, and also on another case of a rape in Unnao in Uttar Pradesh, in which a state lawmaker from his party is the main accused: "Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India tweets frequently and considers himself a talented orator. Yet he loses his voice when it comes to speaking out about the dangers faced by women and minorities who are frequent targets of the nationalist and communal forces that are part of the base of his Bharatiya Janata Party."

The editorial board observes that "Mr. Modi’s silence is as perplexing as it is distressing." Referring to the 2012 Nirbhaya gangrape case in Delhi, the editorial says: "He (Mr. Modi) seems to have failed to learn the lesson of his predecessors." The then government led by the Congress party, lost the 2014 parliamentary elections for its heartlessness. "The B.J.P. won the elections in large part because Mr. Modi promised to make the government more responsive to the needs of Indians who were left behind by a government dogged by corruption scandals and widely considered rudderless," the board noted. "Instead, he (Mr. Modi) has exhibited a pattern of silence and deflection that is deeply worrying to anybody who cares about the health of the world’s largest democracy," the NYT board members conclude.

Read full editorial here.