18 u.s.c. § 371

Former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort pled guilty on counts of conspiracy against the United States for failing to register his work on behalf of a foreign agent and obstruction of justice insofar as he tried to convince potential witnesses to not take part in ongoing investigations into wrongdoing and agrees to participate in the probe of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.
Manafort entered his disposition ahead of a second trial that was scheduled for Monday and curries leniency for his decision and willingness to accept responsibility for what he’s enabled in exchange for full, truthful, complete and forthright cooperation though his sentence may mean ten years in prison. Pretending to be pre-occupied with other matters, Trump has so far been silent on the developments.

new style

This day for those subjects of the British Empire in 1752 was proceeded by the second of September due to the calendar reforms of the Chesterfield Act, ratified by Parliament two years prior.
The law synchronised the empire with most of the rest of the Western Europe that had adopted the Gregorian calendar in the late sixteenth century and also decreed that the new year began on the first of January instead of on Lady Day (the Feast of the Annunciation). Possibly exaggerated accounts of rioting with angry mobs demanding, “Give us our eleven days!” inspired cartoonist William Hogarth to satirise the partisan process with the lengthy and heated dispute between Whig and Tory members that prefaced passage.

liner notes

Can our government be competent? Jimmy Carter says yes! More here.

game of domes

The Russian armed forces are soliciting donations to build (in record time—to be completed by the 2020 seventy-fifth anniversary of the end of World War II) a massive cathedral in Patriot Park. Meant to unite and inspire the Russian people, this planned symbol of the role of the Orthodox Church in the army reminds some of the establishing shots of Westeros in the Game of Thrones or an anti-flak battery. Learn more and find more reporting from foreign bureaus at the BBC’s News from Elsewhere at the link above.