In an attempt to end the war caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, U.S. President Donald Trump has offered to return Alaska to Russia in exchange for Russia pulling its troops from Eastern Ukraine. Russian dictator Vladimir Putin said he would agree to the proposal if Trump also returned Fort Ross and the Russian River in California, Russia sold Fort Ross to Mexican citizen John Sutter in 1841.   read more

This drop in the number of professionals who migrate to the U.S. may, to some degree, be the result of many immigrants choosing an Asian country as their new home. One bright spot in the research, they said, was “a recent rebound in the percentage of international students who choose the United States as their destination.” Additionally, the study “confirms that the United States is, in absolute terms, the top destination for international migrants.”   read more

Navy investigators began investigating O’Neill after he told Fox News in November that he was the commando who fired the fatal shot at the al Qaeda leader. The Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) is not saying whether the alleged disclosure of government secrets is related to the 2011 mission. If the NCIS determines there is sufficient evidence against O’Neill, he could be recalled back into the service for the purpose of facing a court-martial trial.   read more

During the week of December 22, arrests were down 66% and traffic and parking tickets and summons for minor offenses were down more than 90% from the same week in 2013. Instead of concern, many are grateful for the diminished police presence. Tickets and summons have been issued disproportionally to those in the working class, forcing them to bear much of the city’s revenue burden.   read more

Officials in the Department of Commerce have quietly changed the rules for companies seeking to export U.S. oil, which has been banned since 1975. The new regulations, adopted by the agency’s Bureau of Industry and Security, apply only to condensate, a form of light crude oil. Citigroup wrote that the rules could “open the floodgates to substantial increases in exports.”   read more

Although the number of immigrants picked up by U.S. Border Patrol agents has increased, the number of assaults against the officers has dropped, according to figures from the agency. There were 373 assaults of Border Patrol officers in the fiscal year ending September 30. That figure is down 20% from the previous year and is the sixth year in a row that the number of assaults has fallen. All but seven of those assaults occurred along the southwest border of the United States with Mexico.   read more

A Freedom of Information Act request was filed with DHS for documents on Operation Aurora, which was a cyberattack on Google. The department responded with 800 pages of documents. However the documents weren’t about Operation Aurora, but were instead on the Aurora Project, which in 2007 demonstrated how easy it would be to disable the nation’s electric and water supply grids.   read more

In January 2014, Githae was defeated in his bid to be elected governor of Kirinyaga County, losing in the TNA party’s primary to eventual winner Joseph Ndathi. Since taking up the Washington post, Githae has defended a controversial security law that was enacted in December, but some sections of which were suspended by Kenya’s High Court on January 2, 2015.   read more

Cars carrying U.S. diplomats investigating whether Israeli settlers on the West Bank had destroyed a Palestinian olive grove were hit with rocks by the settlers on Friday. Israeli officials acknowledged the attack on the U.S. officials. “Rocks were thrown at them by residents of Adei Ad. We are investigating. Arrests have yet to be made,” a spokeswoman said, according to Haaretz. She also said the U.S. visit was made without coordinating with Israeli authorities.   read more

Bloomberg’s annual listing of the 400 richest people in the world found that they’ve increased their wealth by $92 billion to $4.4 trillion. Others aren’t as lucky. The Global Wealth Report (pdf) put out by Credit Suisse bank shows that 3.3 billion people, more than 70% of the world’s population, have a net worth of less than $10,000 each.   read more

A century ago, American soldiers attacked nothing more than sacks tied to a string before fighting in World War I. During the Cold War, U.S. troops took aim at human-shaped targets dressed in green, but wearing a red star on their helmets to represent Soviet soldiers. Now that the Red Menace has been replaced by a Middle-Eastern one, American military training uses targets dressed in “eastern-looking clothing” and sporting dark skin.   read more

In December 2012, as Mali was about to have an election, Coulibaly was demoted to economy minister because he wouldn’t sign off on loan agreements with a Chinese bank favored by President Dioncounda Traoré. The International Monetary Fund praised Coulibaly’s stewardship, saying he was “enforcing strict spending discipline.”   read more

Despite his government position, Mutembwa might have a lower profile in his country than his wife, Priscilla, who’s the chief financial officer of Cargill Cotton Zimbabwe. The couple has two daughters, one of whom, Mutsa, attended college on a field hockey scholarship at Indiana University and went on to win a Rhodes Scholarship in 2009.   read more

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, spending by state and local governments rose 18.2% between 2007 and 2012. The increases in spending have resulted in teachers who lost jobs during the cutbacks getting some positions back, although there are still 300,000 fewer of them than before.   read more

Much to the consternation of statisticians and economists, the U.S. Census Bureau is planning to stop asking whether a person was married or divorced in the previous year. Justin Wolfers, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics and professor of economics and public policy at the University of Michigan, characterized the proposed change as a serious impediment for experts to learn and study about the American family.   read more

Wayne County Circuit Judge Deborah A. Thomas has ordered many of those who come before her to finish school or earn a GED. She even papers the wall behind her bench with the documents to encourage the offenders, usually young men ages 19-22, get their lives on a more positive track.   read more

Dahinden was appointed to lead the Directorate of Corporate Management of the Swiss Department of Foreign Affairs in 2004. Dahinden was made director of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation in 2008. There he managed his country’s humanitarian aid contributions around the world. He held this position until being posted to Washington.   read more