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Root Letter fourth trailer
Discover the story of the upcoming adventure game.
Kadokawa Games has released the fourth trailer for Root Letter. The two-minute video has English subtitles and delves into the game’s story.
Root Letter is a youth mystery adventure and human drama set in Shimane Prefecture. In it, the player will engage an adventure to solve the mystery of Fumino Aya, a pen pal friend from high school who disappeared after leaving a mysterious letter. A letter delivered 15 years later. Read more about the game here.
Root Letter is due out for PlayStation 4 and PS Vita on June 16. A western release is also planned, but has not yet been dated.
Watch the trailer below. (Don’t forget to turn on English closed captions.) View a new set of screenshots at the gallery. |
Friday, December 27, 2013
Roman mosaic from the 2nd century AD of a ship displaying similar hull shape to the Madrague de Giens wreck.
Rights information: http://bit.ly/1lavRWo Image credit: via wikipedia | http://bit.ly/19mo34m,
A former science editor of Newsweek, Peter Gwynne is a freelance science writer based in Sandwich, Massachusetts.
A confrontation among ancient and modern studies is pitting particle physicists seeking concrete evidence of dark matter against marine archaeologists intent on preserving material in centuries-old shipwrecks.The source of the issue: samples of lead used for anchors and ballast in Roman ships that were sunk up to 2,000 years ago and remain underwater since then.The ancient lead's purity makes it invaluable today for shielding underground experiments designed to detect evidence of dark matter, the mysterious invisible stuff that, according to physicists, accounts for 85 percent of all the matter in the universe. But some marine archaeologists assert that, as a part of the world's cultural heritage, the lead should stay in place for detailed historical study."The use of these objects as stock for experimentation had never been an issue before," wrote Elena Perez-Alvaro, a doctoral candidate in underwater cultural heritage maritime law at England's University of Birmingham, in the university's journal Rosetta. "But now it is beginning to be deemed ethically questionable."Both sides of the affair cite strong scientific justification for their use of the lead. "Underwater archaeologists and cultural heritage protection policymakers need to evaluate the value of this underwater lead for future generations," Perez-Alvaro explained. But the lead "is an essential element of state-of-the-art dark-matter searches," added Cambridge University physicist Fernando Gonzalez Zalba, who collaborates with Perez-Alvaro on studying the issue. "These experiments could shed light some of the most fundamental properties of the universe."There's no shortage of the material. "I personally have seen dozens of lead anchor stocks during our expeditions in the Mediterranean and Aegean," recalled Brendan Foley of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution's Deep Submergence Laboratory, in Massachusetts.For archaeologists, studying those stocks has value far beyond understanding ancient metallurgical methods. The pieces of lead "are marked with indicators of where they came from," said James Delgado, director of maritime heritage at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in the United States. "That helps us to reconstruct ancient economies and global trade."Physicists have inferred the existence of dark matter by observing its gravitational influence in distant galaxies. But they don't know what it consists of. Among the most popular candidates are entities called weakly interactive massive particles, or WIMPs.Theorists believe that, although WIMPs are about the size of atomic nuclei, they scarcely interact at all with any other forms of matter. "Very occasionally one of them will bump into a nucleus and rattle it around a bit," explained Daniel Bauer, project manager of the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search, or CDMS. "Our detectors are set up to measure the recoil of the nucleus when that happens," he added.It doesn't happen often. "Nobody has yet had a completely confirmed sighting," Bauer said. Their detectors are sensitive to a rate of one incident per year.Because the bumps happen so infrequently, CDMS has designed its experimental setup to minimize false positives. To avoid cosmic rays, the team has buried its detectors half a mile deep in a mine in Minnesota. It also shields them with copper, plastics, water, and, most important, lead."Lead is the material of excellence as a shielding material in radiation-rich environments," said Gonzalez Zalba, who does not work directly on dark-matter experiments. "Its low intrinsic radioactivity, good mechanical properties, and reasonable cost make it an excellent shielding material."However, recently mined lead has one disadvantage. "Uranium and thorium that coexist with lead will leave a fair amount of the radioactive isotope lead-210 in it," Bauer noted. "In our experiments, even tiny amounts of radioactivity can lead to false signals. We want the purest possible material to shield the experiment from radioactivity."That means lead mined a long time ago and preserved under water. "There's no chance that uranium and thorium are nearby," Bauer continued. "And since its decay half life is about 23 years, its radioactivity has basically gone." The ancient lead has over 1,000 times less radioactivity than modern lead.The CDMS team bought its ancient lead from French company Lemer Pax, which had salvaged it from a Roman ship sunk off the coast of France. Later, the company "got in trouble with French customs for selling archaeological material," Perez-Alvaro reported."We assumed that this company was reputable, and I would believe that to be true," Bauer said. "They're still selling lead. That's the best evidence that everything is in order."Another underground experiment, the Cryogenic Underground Observatory for Rare Events in Italy, also uses Roman lead. A museum gave it 120 archaeological lead bricks from a ship built more than 2,000 years ago and recovered in the early 1990s off the coast of Sardinia.Marine archaeologists don't want to deny physicists the use of the ancient lead. But they fear that such use could help to commercialize the salvage of ancient shipwrecks."It's another example of something from a shipwreck that has value and will encourage an approach to shipwrecks that won't be available for careful meticulous study. Science and archaeology go out of the window in the quest for profits," Delgado said. "The issue is the salvaging and selling of the lead; that's where archaeologists say 'Wait a minute.'"The 2001 UNESCO convention for the protection of the underwater cultural heritage preserves the Roman lead and other ancient artifacts from any use that would damage them. "However," Perez-Alvaro explained, "there is no reference anywhere to the use of shipwrecks for the purpose of experimentation – new uses of underwater cultural heritage."Nevertheless, archaeologists and physicists see opportunities for agreements that would protect the ancient lead's heritage while still benefiting dark-matter searches. "It's all right if it's been documented – like taking a bit of DNA and putting it in the DNA bank," Delgado suggested. "That's a respectable scientific process that benefits all branches of science."Gonzalez Zalba agreed. "We follow the idea of 'salvage for knowledge and not for the marketplace,'" he said. "Dark-matter searches follow under the idea of research for knowledge. Therefore I believe the resources should be granted if required under the adequate regulation and archaeological supervision."Perez-Alvaro calls for a formal route to regulation. "There is a need for dialogue between the two fields," she said. "Especially there is a need for a protocol [on the acquisition and use of ancient lead] set up by archaeologists.""Archaeologists will always view as unethical the outright sale of artifacts recovered from cultural sites," Foley added. "But other creative solutions could be devised which would be win-win for physicists and archaeologists."- Peter Gwynne, Inside Science News Service |
Distraught that women are outpacing men in college enrollments, Eagle Forum founder Phyllis Schlafly took to WorldNetDaily this week to float the idea that colleges should enforce a gender quota to even out admissions to the benefit of men. Responding to a 2010 New York Times article, Schlafly wondered if colleges should set male admissions quotas to ensure that student bodies are “half women and half men.”
Another proposal Schlafly put in the mix is to “stop granting college loans, thereby forcing students to take jobs to pay for their tuition and eliminate time for parties, perhaps even wiping out time for fraternities and sororities.”
Schlafly also called for colleges to stop enforcing Title IX, which prevents sex discrimination in education, as a way to attract men, alleging that the anti-discrimination measure “removes a primary motivation for young men to go to college, many of whom want to try out for a sport even if they are not good enough to make the team.”
All of this, the right-wing activist insists, would actually benefit women because it would give them more available men to date. |
"This is the lowest point in a whole calendar of bad days in the zombie apocalypse, this is Rick's worst," the actor behind Rick Grimes tells THR.
[Warning: This story contains major spoilers from the season seven premiere of AMC's The Walking Dead, "The Day Will Come When You Won’t Be," as well as the comic book series it is based on.]
Rick Grimes is a broken man. On AMC's The Walking Dead, the group's central hero had his spirit crushed during Sunday's season seven premiere by the zombie drama's most famous villain Negan.
As if losing two huge members of the group — Steven Yeun's Glenn Rhee and Michael Cudlitz's Sgt. Abraham Ford — wasn't enough, Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) made sure to emotionally torment Rick (Andrew Lincoln) into obedience, with the group's strong leader falling in line after nearly having to cut off his son Carl's (Chandler Riggs) arm.
Below, Lincoln talks with THR about filming the jaw-dropping episode, losing Yeun and Cudlitz from the core cast and what's next in season seven.
What was filming this episode like for you?
I wanted to do justice for those two guys — two amazing friends of mine that had served the show so beautifully and I wanted to put it all on the line and leave it out on the field. It was what you saw: it was very intense and like nothing else we've ever shot. My chief concern was to tell the story of a defiant man [Rick] being turned into an obedient man through grief and trauma, which is why the chronology was in that way. You start with a man saying, "I'm going to kill you," and at the end of the episode, you get a man begging and thanking this monster who has killed two of his family for sparing his friends and family's lives — and arm. It wasn't a cake walk! If I had known — the script came quite late — I probably would have stayed on the plane if I got it before I came out to Atlanta. It was pretty hardcore.
This show has seen Lori (Sarah Wayne Callies) come back to Rick in visions. Given the trauma everyone went through here, is there a chance to see Abraham or Glenn again in flashbacks or visions this season?
The legacy they leave on the show will absolutely be there. The echoes of their deaths will haunt these characters until the show finishes. But that kind of question is above my imagination, I just say the words and show up! Both of those characters and both of those actors carved such heart, humor, love, gallantry and honor — they both embodied those characteristics. It's a devastating loss but I said the same to [showrunner] Scott M. Gimple when we lost Hershel (Scott Wilson) and I missed him terribly. I said the same thing this season and Scott said, "That's the point."
How does losing Glenn and Abraham compare to the show's other deaths?
I can only talk on a personal level because this show is so personal to me. Losing Michael, he's a soldier and leader in his own right and is a vastly experienced and talented actor that when he was on set, brought energy and professionalism and great humor. Losing him was a terrible body blow but to lose Steven, the prospect of coming back another season without my friend makes that a lot less appealing. That's how seismic losing Steven is. He's one of my best friends. Period. He's also a founding father of the show. He knows what was required to make the show and has given every ounce of sweat to the show and grew up on the show. To lose my friend and another great leader is awful and has left a shadow over the set and the story. But it's the story we're telling. We're telling a much bigger story than we have for the last few years. It feels like we've jumped into the deep end of the pool now.
What could be the glimmer of hope for Rick in coming out of this?
This is the lowest point in a whole calendar of bad days in the zombie apocalypse, this is Rick's worst. It's going to take an enormous amount for him to recover — and everybody else to recover — from this devastating double blow of grief and trauma. There's a great Nelson Mandela quote that has been bouncing around in my head the whole season: "The greatest glory in living lies not in never falling but in rising every time we fall."
Negan and Carl have a unique relationship in the comics. What might Rick's reaction to that look like?
It would make me happy as an actor. I'm very excited to see if they go down that route how Rick will react.
Maggie isn't in great condition. Can her baby survive? Can Maggie survive this ordeal?
I think her tenacity and first reaction after losing the love of her life is incredibly powerful and it reverberates: We fight. We're very fortunate in our show that we have writers that really write well for all of our characters — particularly the women, which thrills me. All of these characters have been shattered by this event and every one of them will react in their own individual and personal way. This show is about hope. It may not feel like it sometimes — it may feel like it's about grief, tragedy and trauma but it is ultimately about hope. The thing about Rick and that family is they've been through so much pain and tragedy, but they still have that connection between them. The only glimmer of light in a dark episode is when Rick says to Maggie, "He's our family too." That's a key insight into where the rest of the season is headed.
Comic book readers know the All Out War arc is coming. How would you describe the rest of the season? Is it setting the stage for the battle between Rick and Negan? Is the first half about grieving? Where do we go from here?
All I can say is this season is more Lord of the Rings than Lord of the Flies. That's the best I can do. It's kind of glib but it's the best I can do.
There are several new communities being introduced this season: The Saviors' compound, more of the Hilltop and the Kingdom. Given this experience with Negan, how might Rick approach new people?
Pride comes to fore and last season he showed a lot of hubris and made some decisions that in hindsight were incredibly irresponsible and cost lives. You're going to see the after effects of that play out with Rick in all areas of the story.
Did you think the episode was too violent?
I didn't watch it. I don't watch the show so I can't comment on it. Judging by people's reactions … we asked everybody to kneel with us in that episode. It was a very brave call storytelling-wise to ask the audience to kneel beside us.
What did you think of the season premiere? Share your thoughts in the comments section, below. For more Walking Dead coverage, bookmark THR.com/WalkingDead. |
SAN JOSE, Calif. – The San Jose Earthquakes will take on Club de Fútbol Pachuca of Liga MX at Avaya Stadium on Saturday, Sept. 3. Pachuca are the defending Liga MX Clausura champions after earning a 2-1 aggregate victory over Monterrey in May. Kickoff is scheduled for 7:30 p.m. PT.
“We have hosted some great international opponents throughout our history and we are excited to bring Pachuca back to the Bay Area,” said Earthquakes President Dave Kaval. “To host the defending Liga MX champions is a unique and special opportunity that we believe our fans and community will enjoy."
Earthquakes season ticket holders should use their Bonus Game B tickets for the match. Season ticket holders can also purchase add-on tickets beginning Wednesday, July 20 at 10 a.m. by contacting their respective STH representative. Tickets go on sale to the general public on Friday, July 22 and are available at Ticketmaster.com or by calling 800-745-3000. Individual ticket prices start at $25, with special rates available for groups of 10 or more. Group tickets can be purchased by calling the Earthquakes Front Office at 408-556-7700.
Pachuca is based in the city of Pachuca, Hidalgo in Mexico and was established in 1901 as a founding member of the Mexican Primera División. Since earning promotion back to the Primera División in 1998, Pachuca has been one of the most successful clubs in Mexico, winning six championships, four CONCACAF Champions' Cups, the 2006 Copa Sudamericana and the 2007 SuperLiga.
The Earthquakes and Pachuca previously met in 2002 in the quarterfinals of the CONCACAF Champions Cup. San Jose fell 3-0 on April 17, 2002 at Estadio Hidalgo in Pachuca before rebounding with a 1-0 victory at Spartan Stadium one week later.
San Jose owns a 10-8-8 all-time record in international exhibitions and the club has posted a 7-0-4 record in the past 11 exhibitions against international opponents, including a 2-1 win over Real Sociedad of Spain’s La Liga earlier this year. The Quakes are 2-8-4 against clubs from Mexico all-time, including a 1-5-3 record in friendlies.
About Avaya Stadium
Avaya Stadium is an 18,000-seat soccer-specific stadium located on Coleman Ave. adjacent to the San Jose International Airport. The European-inspired building is the first cloud-enabled venue in Major League Soccer and is among the most technologically advanced stadiums in the world. The stadium features a canopy roof and the steepest-raked seating in MLS to provide the best possible fan experience. Additionally, the north end zone houses the largest outdoor bar in North America, a two-acre fan zone and a double-sided video scoreboard. The suites and club seats are located at field level, giving fans a premium experience unlike any other in professional sports. The stadium hosted numerous non-Major League Soccer events during its inaugural season in 2015, including the International Champions Cup, which featured Manchester United and Club America, a Send-Off Series match for the United States Women’s National Team ahead of the FIFA Women’s World Cup, the World Rugby Pacific Nations Cup and the American Ultimate Disc League Championship Weekend. For more information about Avaya Stadium, visit sjearthquakes.com. |
Share. Follows hot on the heels of Alpha Sapphire and Omega Ruby. Follows hot on the heels of Alpha Sapphire and Omega Ruby.
Exit Theatre Mode
Nintendo has filed a trademark for Pokemon Delta Emerald in Japan, leading to speculation the old GBA title could be next in line for a remake.
Gematsu reports that the trademark was submitted earlier this month but only went public today. Seeing as we recently heard about Pokemon Alpha Sapphire and Pokemon Omega Ruby, remastered versions of the GBA classics, it would make sense that their follow-up title wouldn't be far behind.
Exit Theatre Mode
Pokemon Emerald originally came west back in 2005, and is set in the region of Hoenn. If Delta Emerald comes to pass, it'll mark a step forward in Nintendo's Poke-remake activities.
When the company decided to re-release the original two titles as Pokemon Fire Red and Pokemon Leaf Green, the decision was made not to give Pokemon Yellow the same treatment. Similarly, when the next two titles resurfaced as Pokemon HeartGold and Pokemon SoulSilver, the updated Pokemon Crystal was left out.
Will Delta Emerald be the title to buck this trend and, if so, should we expect to see it alongside Alpha Sapphire and Omega Ruby later this year, or will the customary gap between the initial two games and their solo-standing follow-up be maintained? Time will tell.
Luke Karmali is IGN's UK News Editor. You too can revel in mediocrity by following him on Twitter. |
Like much else in China, soccer has developed rapidly and attracted huge investment, but a fan culture has developed that is independent of—and sometimes a challenge to—the state.
Nike. Carlsberg. Samsung. Familiar sponsors flash past on electronic billboards. At the same time, red-letter propaganda banners line the pitch, proclaiming: “The Chinese Dream. You, I, Gather Together. You, I, Advance Together.”
Apart from its name—the “Workers’ Stadium”—and the socialist realist statue outside the entrance, Beijing Guoan’s home ground shows no signs that it was first erected at the height of the Maoist era in 1959. Today the renovated stadium is ringed with slick bars and clubs; posters advertise an upcoming Bruno Mars concert.
China may have not yet made much of an impact on to the world soccer stage. But it is not the country it once was. Along with the meteoric rise of its economy, Chinese soccer has developed rapidly over the past two decades.
Like much else in China, the sport has attracted huge investment, big international companies, and foreign players wanting to profit from the country’s wealth. The world of Chinese soccer mirrors Chinese society in other ways too. Where once all cultural activities were organized and sanctioned by arms of the government, a fan culture has flowered that is independent of—and on occasion a challenge to—the state.
Beijing Guoan, established in 1992, has the largest and most loyal fan base in China. Photo by: Ashley Feder/Getty Images
The Chinese football fandom has its idiosyncrasies—the supporters throwing paper airplanes and shouting “cow cunt” (slang for awesome) each time there’s a goal – but as I watch this match between Beijing Guoan and their old rivals Shanghai Shenhua, I am more struck by how similar this soccer culture is to the one I grew up with in England.
Come loss or win, Guoan’s supporters chant through every game. They remain on their feet despite the thick haze of pollution, all too visible under the stadium’s floodlights. Their passion and pain over their local team’s results are every bit as real as that of English fans. And they come to matches in their legions.
The average attendance at the Workers’ Stadium is around 40,000 – a figure that not only dwarves the Chinese Basketball Association’s average attendance of 4,300, but is also bigger than the average attendance for the English Premier League. Not bad, in a country where the first professional national league was founded only twenty years ago.
China is where the earliest form of football in the world was played, according to the FIFA
The history of soccer in China is both short and long. It is where the earliest form of football in the world was played, at least according to the FIFA. Many dispute this claim but we can say with certainty, thanks to images on pottery and references in ancient literature, that as early as the 3rd century BC the Chinese were playing a sport in which two opposing teams kicked a leather ball around a rectangular pitch with bamboo goal posts at either end.
Called “cuju”, literally “kick ball,” it started off as a game of the military and court elite. Pitches were fashioned in the backyards of mansions and palaces. Before it died out following the Mongol conquest in the 13th century AD, cuju was played enthusiastically for over a thousand years. It even developed official regulations and, to enforce them, referees, who were instructed to guide the game with “an honest heart and balanced thoughts.”
Beijing Workers Stadium, built in 1959 at the height of the Maoist era. Photo by: Sharon Latham/Manchester City/AP
The story of modern professional soccer in China is anything but noble. Founded in 1994, the Jia A, the first professional nationwide domestic league, started promisingly. The broadcasting of top European club matches in the 1980s had whipped up enthusiasm to see the “beautiful game” played in Chinese stadia. By its second season, the domestic Jia A league was being watched on television by 500 million viewers and average attendances hovered around 24,000.
Corruption continued, evidenced by farcical instances of defenders trying to score own goals
But off-the-pitch drama undermined this positive beginning. Bribery, betting and match-fixing made a sham of Chinese soccer. Sponsors pulled out. Calls of “fake ball” were heard from the stands. The number of people watching, both at home and in the stadiums, went into free fall.
The rebranding of the Jia A as the Chinese Super League in 2004 was meant to mark a new era. But corruption continued, evidenced by highly questionable referee decisions and farcical instances of defenders trying to score own goals.
Following a massive cleanup, launched in 2009, a dozen teams have been fined, docked points, or stripped of their titles. More than 50 high-profile figures have been jailed, including national team players and two former heads of the China Football Association. Perhaps most shockingly of all was the conviction of Lu Jun, a referee who umpired World Cup games and was previously known as the “Golden Whistle” for his supposed uprightness. He is now serving five and half years in prison for taking more than $120,000 in bribes.
It’s not uncommon for teams to hire and fire multiple coaches in the span of one season
Bribery is not the only woe to have blighted Chinese soccer. The game is riddled with institutional instability. Teams frequently change owners, names and stadiums. In an extreme case, one team moved from Shanghai to Xian, a city over 750 miles away, and then on to Guiyang, another 550 miles away, in the space of just six years. It’s also not uncommon for teams to hire and fire multiple coaches in the span of one season. With Chinese football in such a volatile, discredited state, it’s a wonder there’s any fans left at all.
And yet, many supporters still keep the faith.
***
Before the Beijing-Shanghai match, I go for a coffee in a nearby Starbucks and find myself surrounded by Guoan fans, their allegiances evidenced by their green jerseys. I strike up conversation with a season ticket holder called Zhang Gaoming. “I could watch it on TV but the atmosphere is much better in the stadium,” he says. “If my friends can’t make it, I’ll go alone.”
Zhang’s biggest concern right now is whether Guoan can top the table this season. They have only won the league once before and have a habit of coming in third place, but he is full of early season optimism. “We have a song about going for number one; away fans mock us, saying we always go for first, then never get it. But I keep believing,” he declares with charming sincerity.
Beijing Guoan has enjoyed a more stable history than most Chinese clubs. Photo by: Lintao Zhang/Getty Images
Zhang claims to spend fifteen hours a week watching and reading about soccer, but none of those hours are dedicated to China’s national team. “It’s not that I don’t love my country. It’s because they’re shit.” He’s not wrong. While China cleans up in other Olympics sports and boasts a strong women’s team, the men’s squad are ranked 96th in the world, sitting just ahead of Benin, a country whose entire population is half that of Beijing’s.
The national side has only qualified for the World Cup once, in 2002. Normally they fare better in the regional Asian Cup, but they only just scraped into next year’s tournament. This followed a string of humiliating defeats, including a 5-1 loss to minnows Thailand on home soil last summer, which the local press described as “a dagger deep into the heart of every Chinese football fan.”
Soccer has become a rare outlet for regionalism
Domestic club soccer remains popular. In a country where nationalism runs deep and the strong central authority emphasizes unity, the sport has become a rare outlet for regionalism. Fans chant in local dialects that are sometimes unintelligible to away fans and ridicule rivals by labeling them as their local food specialties: Tianjin are the “steamed buns,” while Shandong are insulted as the “garlics.” Because few towns have more than one professional club, support is concentrated locally. Derbies (rendered into Chinese characters as “德比”, which literally translates as “moral competitions”) between neighboring cities such as Beijing and Tianjin are so wrought with tension that away fans are sometimes banned from attending.
Wearing your team’s colors, putting their bumper sticker on your car, or buying their keychain is a way of showing pride in your hometown. Guoan’s supporters like Zhang often boast that they are “Lao Beijing Ren”, or “Old Beijingers”, whose families have resided in the capital for generations.
Looking at this black-framed-glasses-wearing, wiry 27-year-old as he checks the latest team stats on his Dell laptop and enjoys his pre-game latte, I am reminded of my brother, who is all politeness and bagels before the big match, but once inside the stadium, he’s swearing like a trooper at the ref.
***
I wanted to take my brother to see Guoan when he last visited Beijing but we were thwarted by dud tickets, bought through one of the touts that swarm the Workers’ Stadium on match days.
Fortunately, today’s tickets are not fake. Some 35,000 Beijing fans drown out the 200 or so Shanghai supporters in the away section, who have traveled five hours to watch this Monday night game. As their electrifying camaraderie washes over me, I feel a pang of guilt thinking about how my brother missed out.
Guoan dominates. Minutes before halftime they are awarded a penalty. Everyone around me whips out their smart phones to record Zhang Xizhe readying his kick, his heavily tattooed arms and mop of hair recalling Beckham. The young player, who has been linked to Celtic in Scotland, puts it away easily. As he runs to the sidelines to bask in the crowd’s adulation, the walk-ins in my stand have already turned around to take selfies against the backdrop of the pitch.
Chinese football fandom has its idiosyncrasies – the supporters throwing paper airplanes and shouting “cow cunt” (slang for awesome) each time there’s a goal. Photo by: Mark Ralston/AFP/Getty Images
The real supporters are in the north and east stands. They are the ones jumping up and down all night, beating drums, waving homemade flags. It’s from these sections that the terrace tunes originate, including “Our ultimate victory”, an adaptation of a single by a Beijing punk band. (Translated lyrics from Wild East Football.)
We don’t fear our enemies, take up every position
For our shared ideals, we’ll never give up
Put your fist in the air, my brothers
Blood, sweat, tears, and that golden cup; our ultimate victory
After the game I come across one of these diehards, Wang Wenbo. Like many in his section, he comes from Nanchang, a poor area in the south of the city where it’s easy to see that China is still a developing not a developed country. He tells me how his first ever ticket to watch Guoan in a friendly against FC Barcelona cost him his month’s salary as a busboy. Exhibition matches are expensive, but a season pass to see domestic games only costs around $100, so Wang is able to follow every home game.
“Whether Guoan are playing well or not, we go to all the games and cheer for them,” says Wang, the “we” referring to Green Wings, a group of 150 supporters to which he belongs. “We also play football together and discuss the game at dinners. Guoan is so important for us.”
David Beckham, as global soccer ambassador, visits Beijing Guoan in 2013. Photo by: Xu Kangping/AP
Soccer is known for being a tribal game. In recent years, Guoan’s supporters have splintered into several sub-tribes. During the first decade of the club’s existence there was only Green Hurricane, the official supporters organization, backed by the club. Today they still occupy most of the east stand midfield. At the end of games, they hold their green scarves above their heads, then bow in unison; their perfect synchronization won’t be surprising to anyone who has seen Chinese school children during their morning drills.
Fashioning themselves after Europe’s diehard ultras supporters, a group broke off from Green Hurricane in 2005. They colonized the north stand, understanding its symbolic importance to ultras worldwide. They called themselves the “Yulinjun,” a reference to the garrisons that guarded the capital in imperial times. In the last couple of years more splinter groups have formed, including the Green Wings, the Green Flags and the Union of Brothers. But the Yulinjun are still the most vocal. They, more than others, can lay claim to being Beijing’s Green Army.
“We don’t accept funding from the club. The flags, the t-shirts, we pay for everything out of our own pocket because we love the team,” says Li Pengzi, a green-haired Yulinjun member I met outside the stadium. He complains that Green Hurricane are entitled to purchase more than 2000 seasons tickets, while the Yulinjun are allotted only 370. “There’s a lot of limits placed on us. Even on the number and size of the banners we can bring in.”
The club has a curious relationship with the supporter groups. It wants to promote them, as long as they stay within its control. The leaders of each section are asked to meet with the club before every game, and are held to account if any of their members step out of line. “Fans are not important for them,” says Li. “They just don’t want trouble. They’re more worried about discipline and order.”
***
The Chinese state’s efforts to keep Guoan fans in check are more conspicuous than the club’s. Surveying the stadium during the match I lose count of all the uniformed personnel. Garden-variety security guards keep watch over each section. Military policemen, straight-backed and resplendent in their khakis, peaked caps and white gloves, occupy almost every seat in the front row of the entire stadium. Lest trouble kick off between the two sets of supporters, the four stands either side of the away fans are kept completely empty, save for a smattering of navy uniformed regular police.
Outside the stadium the security presence is even more overwhelming. I count four police vans and forty military police officers with riot shields at every gate. Backup, in the shape of armored trucks and coaches full of extra policemen, wait just a bottle’s throw away.
Chinese soccer has had its share of hooliganism. Brawls occasionally flare up, along with other heated incidents like the burning of scarves and even cars. In a match last season against Hangzhou, I saw Guoan fans climb atop the plastic tunnel leading to the changing rooms and throw objects at the visiting players as they left the field. Yet this extraordinary security presence seems out of proportion to the threat.
The Chinese state is deeply suspicious of youths massing together
What’s at issue is more than soccer hooliganism. The Chinese state is deeply suspicious of youths massing together, especially in the capital. Even music festivals are seen as a potential threat and are often canceled or banished to distant suburbs at the end of the metro lines.
The week before the match, Taiwanese students had broken into and occupied their parliament. Worried that their actions might inspire young people in the Chinese mainland, the state tightened its grip on the Internet and other forums of public expression. With this backdrop of state paranoia, it’s easy to see how angry football fans have come to be feared by the government.
***
Soccer culture offers an analogy for China today: an edgy government allows a certain amount of free expression (in the case of spectators, the freedom to shout “shabi,” or “stupid cunt,” at the ref) but is ready to crackdown at any moment. As in most other sectors, power in soccer is concentrated in the hands of state-owned enterprises and wealthy tycoons with political connections.
Policemen, straight-backed and resplendent in their khakis, peaked caps and white gloves, occupy almost every seat in the front row of the entire stadium. Photo by: Mark Ralston/AFP/Getty Images
Fans worldwide struggle with the problem of owners interfering in the normal functioning of their clubs. But even my brother – whose team, Leeds United, has been brought to its knees over the last decade by a series of overambitious but underfunded owners – doesn’t face the travails of the average Chinese supporter.
Imagine, for example, being a follower of Dalian Shide, a club that won the league eight out of its first twelve seasons. With tears in their eyes, fans and players endured a final match in November 2012, knowing their club would probably fold after its billionaire owner was detained following a political scandal. Brief hopes that the club might be rescued by a takeover bid by their local rivals, Dalian Aerbin, were soon snuffed out. On January 31, 2013, without pomp or ceremony, the association pronounced Shide dead.
For seven long years, Shanghai Shenhua supporters had to put up with Zhu Jun, a chairman who took meddling to a new level. He forced managers to let him play with the team in friendlies against Liverpool and Manchester United. Following disputes with other shareholders, he threatened to withhold player salaries, which led international stars Didier Drogba and Nicolas Anelka to walk away before their contracts were completed. No sooner had Zhu Jun’s absurd reign come to an end earlier this year than the new owner, a powerful state-owned real estate developer, announced that the club would be renamed from Shenhua to their company name, Greenland.
Fans had enough. In the fortnight preceding the Beijing-Shanghai match, they chose to lock horns with the club management. At Shanghai’s first home game, on March 15, the north and south terraces remained seated and silent for the first 19 minutes of the game. On the twentieth, they broke into a thunderous refrain of “Give us back Shenhua.”
“The mayor of Shanghai was there and Greenland’s big boss. It was such a loss of face. You could feel it in the air,” says Cameron Wilson, founder of wildeastfootball.net, an encyclopedic site of Chinese football. Originally from Scotland, Wilson has followed Shanghai since its first fan group, the Blue Devils, formed in 2000. “The club thought the fans would shut up. But they are as hardcore as UK fans,” he says, “and more organized.”
In a country where nationalism runs deep and the strong central authority emphasizes unity, soccer has become a rare outlet for regionalism. Photo by: Mark Ralston/AFP/Getty Images
Shenhua’s supporters couldn’t be as outright in their criticisms of their owners as Manchester United fans have been of the Glazer family. But they knew how to make their voices heard. Employing a tactic common to Chinese protesters who don’t want to risk the full wrath of the authorities, one group of Shenhua supporters held up a banner quoting from China’s president, Xi Jinping. It read, “Abandoning tradition is tantamount to severing your spiritual lifeline.”
Their protests appear to have worked. Two days before the match against Beijing, at a meeting with Shanghai’s main fan groups present, Greenland announced that it would put Shenhua back in the club name. Just as public outcry has led the Chinese government to begin to address the country’s pollution problems, Shenhua’s supporters have shown that sometimes ordinary people can effect change in China.
“The past couple of seasons have been a real eye opener for fans,” says Brandon Chemers, a Chicago-raised Guoan supporter with whom I share a drink in a bar near the Workers’ Stadium, a few days after the match. A season ticket holder since 2007, he is the only foreign member of the Yulinjun. He shows his devotion by constantly saying “we” or “us” when he refers to Guoan’s supporters. “It’s woken us up,” he says. “What would happen if Beijing moved? Or if our owners sold us?”
Beijing Guoan has the largest and most loyal fan base by a long way. Owned since its establishment in 1992 by CITIC, a state-owned investment company, it has enjoyed a more stable history than most Chinese clubs. But if the club’s fans felt the integrity of the club was being threatened, how would this army of supporters mobilize?
[Header image by: Tony Feder/Getty Images] |
CAIRO — As tensions continue between Cairo and Ethiopia over the construction of the Renaissance Dam of Ethiopia despite political efforts in both countries to overcome the dispute over sharing Nile water, the Egyptian government is involving the Egyptian Coptic Church and encouraging it to play a role of mediation and convergence of views over the issue.
On Aug. 25, the minister of water resources and irrigation, Hossam El Din Maghazi, announced at a press conference attended by Al-Monitor the signing of a cooperation agreement with Pope Tawadros II, the pope of the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria.
Maghazi said, “The church supports the efforts of President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi and the government to manage the issue of the Renaissance Dam and build confidence between the two sides,” expressing hope that the church’s efforts would resolve the crisis of the dam for the benefit of the two countries.
Khalid Wassif, spokesman for the Ministry of Water Resources and Irrigation, told Al-Monitor, “We appealed to the church to help solve the water crisis in Egypt given its important influence on Egyptians and since it has the ability to deliver a message explaining Egypt's water crisis to a broad sector of local and foreign public opinion.”
Wassif added, “The cooperation program with the church will allow training 500 pastors, servants and priests to be water ambassadors and convey messages based on religious devotion to protect the Nile River.”
He said, “The church does not have a direct role in the political or technical negotiations with Ethiopia and the Nile upstream countries, yet it has another role, that of cultural and religious influence aimed at activating soft policy through the Egyptian church’s activity in Africa.”
In another development, Tawadros is expected to travel to Ethiopia Sept. 27 to participate in a celebration of what tradition says was the fourth-century discovery of remnants of Jesus Christ’s cross. The pope had indicated in press statements that the “visit is in response to the visit of Patriarch of Ethiopia Pope Matthias I to Cairo on Jan. 10, and the Nile water issue has paramount importance in all of our dialogues.”
Regarding the pope's visit to Ethiopia, Bishop Beemen, the liaison between the Egyptian and Ethiopian churches, said in a press statement Aug. 27, “The pope did not ask for meetings with political and executive leaders of Ethiopia.” He added, “The church has soft power in terms of negotiations over the Renaissance Dam through [spreading] messages of peace and love, reassuring the Ethiopian side with regard to Egypt’s intentions. Our message is clear. We seek the development of Ethiopia, but at the same time we will not accept any damage to our country.”
The Egyptian Coptic Church is the mother church in the African continent since its inception in the first century, and has a strong and active role in Africa, which is not limited to the religious role, but also covers a range of political, cultural, educational and developmental duties.
The Coptic Orthodox Church had sent several missions to Africa, where it built its first church in Nairobi, Kenya, in 1976; there are 55 churches in Kenya alone. Egyptian Coptic churches have spread to Tanzania, Zambia, Congo and Nigeria. Abune Boulos, the general bishop of the Bishopric of African Affairs, has documented the Egyptian church’s services in Africa in the documentary “Miracles in Africa,” which presents the church as helping provide medical, social, educational and cultural as well as spiritual services.
The Egyptian and Ethiopian churches have a special historical relationship. The church of Alexandria is the mother of the church of Ethiopia, which became part of the See of St. Mark the Apostle. According to the prevailing tradition, the head of the Ethiopian church was an Egyptian bishop assigned by the pope of Alexandria. However, in 1959, Abune Basilios, an Ethiopian, was enthroned as the first patriarch of the Ethiopian church. In 1974, under communist rule and following the military coup led by Mengistu Haile Mariam against the emperor of Ethiopia, Haile Selassie I, the ties between the churches were severed. Moreover, the church in Ethiopia faced fierce attack under communist rule and lost its influence on the political administration in Ethiopia.
Despite the strong spiritual influence of the Egyptian church in Africa and its distinctive relationship with Ethiopia, experts in African affairs rule out the possibilities of potential progress to mitigate the crisis with Ethiopia over Nile water.
Hani Raslan, an expert in African affairs at Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies, told Al-Monitor, “Resorting to the church or religious institutions at the present time to resolve the ongoing dispute over the Nile waters is a waste of time and will not push negotiations toward a solution.”
Still, he believes the role of the church and the exchange of visits could improve relations between Egypt and the Nile Basin countries, especially since most of the problems between Egypt and its African neighbors are due to the bad perception African countries have about Egypt in general. “Ethiopia is a secular state and the Ethiopian church has no influence over the government’s decisions,” Raslan said.
Moreover, he did not expect the visit of Tawadros to Ethiopia to have concrete results, saying, “Sisi himself went to Ethiopia, talked with the political leadership and signed a declaration of principles, but the crisis persists.”
It should be noted that the technical negotiations between Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia, which began in August 2014, failed to reach tangible results to minimize the negative impacts of the Renaissance Dam on the Nile water’s flow to Egypt and Sudan. Despite the political momentum in these three countries on this file, Egypt expressed — in an official statement of the Ministry of Water Resources on Sept. 6 — its dissatisfaction with the slowdown in the implementation of impact studies showing the dam’s bad effects on Egypt so far. Moreover, Egypt reiterated its call for urgent consultations with Sudan and Ethiopia to rescue the negotiations on the construction of the dam in order to preserve the common interests of the three countries.
It seems that Egypt is keeping the door open to any initiatives that will strengthen its position and resolve the ongoing crisis with Ethiopia and the countries of the Nile Basin over the management of the Nile water. However, the political administration must exert more effort in the negotiations to reach technical and legal solutions guaranteeing the interests of all parties while not prejudicing any of them. |
ESL One Cologne 2015 may be a week away, but you have two ways to support your favorite teams and players right now!
Making Their Mark
Introducing the all new ESL One Cologne 2015 Player Autograph Stickers, available for purchase in-game or from the Steam Community Market. These stickers are autographed by professional CS:GO players, with 50% of the proceeds going to players and organizations.
You can also support your favorite team by purchasing ESL One Cologne 2015 Team Stickers in-game or from the Steam Community Market. Just like all previous team stickers, 50% of the proceeds from sticker sales go to the organizations.
Pick’Em Challenge
In addition to showing your support for your favorite teams, team and player autograph stickers serve as game pieces for the Team and Player Pick’Em Challenges, respectively.
In the Pick’Em Challenge, your goal is to score as many points as possible by correctly picking winning teams and top players as the tournament progresses. You’ll score points whenever you make a correct pick, and your scores for the Team and Player Pick’Em Challenges will be added together with your total score determining your reward.
What reward, you ask? You can earn a Bronze, Silver, or Gold Pick’Em Challenge Trophy by scoring 25, 50, or 75 points, respectively. Pick’Em Challenge Trophies are badges that are displayable on your CS:GO avatar and on your Steam profile. In addition to winning a trophy, you can compete with your friends on the Pick’Em Friends Leaderboard.
Stay tuned for more info as we march toward CS:GO’s biggest Major yet! |
When you hammer the gas from a stop, the Red Sport 400 immediately exhibits its throttle response. Next you'll notice the Dynamic Digital Suspension, which has two settings: Standard and Sport. The settings alter the valve-controlled dampers to make cornering flatter and feel a little firmer overall. But even set on Standard, the Red Sport 400 and its staggered setup of the Dunlop SP Sport Maxx Summer tires (245/40R19 front and big ol' 265/35R19
rubber at the rear) is no handling slouch, instead inspiring confidence in normal to fast twisty-road driving.
View 49 Photos
As in the original Q50, this model is available with the Direct Adaptive Steering that garnered so much negative attention; the steer-by-wire system links the steering wheel to motors at the front wheel electronically.
Infiniti has been at work, though, making the system work. The system is adjustable in a matrix of three modes (Sport+, Sport, and Standard) and three response settings (Dynamic+, Dynamic, and Default).
On its highest performance settings, the ratio and feedback could be called a bit twitchy. Just tooling around on legal roads, the Standard/Default setting provided the most natural feel—and importantly, it feels pretty natural. Better even than the electric power steering on non-DAS-equipped cars.
But on an autocross course set up by Infiniti, the Sport+/Dynamic+ setting turned the Q50 Red Sport 400 into a roaring, responsive funmobile.
View 49 Photos
The only bone we'd continue to pick is that Infiniti still says a DAS "benefit" is that it "filters out unwanted steering vibrations." Maybe for luxury buyers that's a benefit, but those wanting more of a sport sedan than a luxury vehicle would say very few of those vibrations are unwanted. Infiniti is also quick to point out that DAS is an important step toward autonomous driving.
And speaking of Sport+ mode, that brings us to the greatest addition to the Q50 outside the VR. Drivers used to have four drive modes to select from using a switch on the center console: Snow, Eco (which crudely and ridiculously pushes back against your foot during acceleration), Standard, and Sport. Now a Sport+ mode not only optimizes throttle response, steering, and suspension settings but also loosens up the stability control, which normally has a tendency to intervene early. Not in Sport+. The drivers in our group were able to get the Red Sport to rotate a bit, even at the relatively slow speeds of the test course. Being able to have some fun without turning VDC all the way off is a huge improvement.
View 49 Photos
The Q50 Red Sport 400 is available with Infiniti's new forward emergency braking tech, which joins this list of driver-assistance tech: lane departure warning/prevention, blind-spot warning/intervention, back collision intervention, and Infiniti's supremely useful Around View Monitor with moving object detection.
The lowest point of the Red Sport 400 may be its distinct lack of a powerful exhaust note. That shortcoming might be what enthusiasts decry most on the VR. Even on the initial Q50, Infiniti had so muted the sound that once was a hallmark of the G series that after numerous comments from press and owners, it released a bolt-on sport exhaust kit to augment the sound. Well, if you're asking bystanders to guess the power of the VR 400, they're likely to guess low. It's a near-silent exhaust with no rumble or gurgle whatsoever.
I asked an Infiniti engineer whether that was because they want it biased to luxury, and the response was something akin to, "Well, that can always change later."
The automaker isn't ready to announce pricing yet for the 2016 Q50 lineup, though it did say that the four-cylinder turbo will come in below the current $37,500 base price. Infiniti hinted that the Red Sport 400 will start at significantly less than $60,000, which is roughly the current going rate for most of the 400-hp luxury sedans in the market. |
'Today is a breakthrough day,' Sen. Chuck Schumer said Thursday. The border deal that almost failed
Sen. Chuck Schumer spent Tuesday privately urging President Barack Obama and the entire Democratic caucus to just be patient — a border security deal they could accept was still within reach.
But after a testy, 45-minute call that night with a lead Republican negotiator of a possible compromise, Schumer could no longer follow his own advice.
Story Continued Below
The New York Democrat began to lose hope. Rather than deliver immigration reform with the 70-plus-vote show of force that Schumer had hyped so often, Democrats and the Gang of Eight would have to scratch and scrape their way to a filibuster-proof majority.
And yet, less than 24 hours later, they had a deal.
The answer to their problem turned out to be simple: Throw money at it.
( PHOTOS: At a glance: The Senate immigration deal)
The Congressional Budget Office issued a cost analysis late Tuesday predicting that the reform bill would trim the deficit by almost $1 trillion over the next two decades. Schumer’s top immigration aide suggested senators could funnel some of those savings into border security.
And by Wednesday afternoon, Republican negotiators led by North Dakota Sen. John Hoeven and Tennessee Sen. Bob Corker had dropped their demand to make the path to citizenship for country’s 11 million undocumented immigrants contingent upon the government achieving a 90 percent apprehension rate along the border. In return, they secured a staggering $30 billion for what is now being called a “border surge.”
“Frankly they ended up having to give more,” said Hoeven, who had the contentious phone call with Schumer.
( Also on POLITICO: 70 votes now possible in immigration deal)
The Gang of Eight, the White House and Republican senators still need to resolve differences over restricting immigrant access to government benefits.
But the agreement on border security eases passage next week of the overall bill and renews hopes among the Gang of Eight that it is closing in on an improbable, overwhelmingly bipartisan victory that few would’ve predicted only six months ago.
“Today,” Schumer said from the Senate floor Thursday, “is a breakthrough day.”
Obama has had little role in the Senate debate thus far, intentionally. But at the height of the talks Tuesday, the president weighed in with Schumer from Air Force One while traveling through Europe.
( Also on POLITICO: Gang of Eight introduces 'border surge')
Over a shaky line — they had to be reconnected twice — Obama told Schumer that the 90 percent trigger was unacceptable. Schumer said they were trying to find a different benchmark, and Obama told him to keep working toward an agreement.
The fact that the deal was reached in just hours after both sides were ready to break off talks underscored the political need for passing a bill in the Senate with a strong bipartisan majority. Democrats were eager to quell the growing perception that the bill was weak on the border, in the hopes of pushing the House into action. And Republicans, struggling to right their woes with Hispanic voters, were eager to find a bill that gave them sufficient political cover on the border — while appeasing their business allies hungry for an immigration law.
Money broke the impasse — more money than Democrats, Republicans and veterans of past immigration fights could have ever imagined. The original Gang of Eight bill included $6.5 billion for border security, and they thought that was an extraordinary, even unnecessary, investment after years of infrastructure and manpower buildup along the Southwest border.
( Also on POLITICO: Bill O'Reilly backs immigration deal)
Now, the government may spend $30 billion to double the number of border agents to 40,000, guarantee the completion of a 700-mile fence along the Southern border, and bulk up the country’s arsenal of drones, sensors and other technologies.
It would dump more money and resources on the border than Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) envisioned under his tough amendment that spurred the Gang of Eight into pursuing an alternative.
“We have practically militarized the border,” Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), a member of the Gang of Eight, said proudly. “If this amendment holds together and it passes as currently constructed, border security will have been achieved at a level that nobody would have thought possible a month ago.”
( Also on POLITICO: Border security amendment delayed until Friday)
Schumer described the additional agents as a “virtual human fence.”
CORRECTION: Corrected by: Emily Howell @ 06/21/2013 10:01 AM CORRECTION: A spokesman for Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) said his office did not participate in a meeting convened last week by Sen. Bob Corker’s (R-Tenn.) office with Republicans interested in working on an alternative to the Cornyn plan. The story was also updated to reflect that the savings from the CBO analysis were estimated at almost $1 trillion. |
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Leading members of the NHS have accused Hammersmith and Fulham Council leader Stephen Cowan of peddling “inaccurate and misleading claims” about Charing Cross Hospital .
Cllr Cowan has been criticised by the chief executive of the trust which runs the hospital, and the chief officer of the North West London collaboration of clinical commissioning groups (CCG), after borough residents received a letter informing them that “NHS bosses have re-launched plans to close Charing Cross” as part of the north west London sustainability and transformation plan (STP) .
Making a formal complaint in their joint response, Dr Tracey Batten, from Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust, and Clare Parker, from the CCG, say there have never been plans to close the Fulham Palace Road hospital and that the STP actually secures the Charing Cross’s A&E department and wider services in the immediate future.
They say the letter, which was circulated with council tax updates in March, contains a number of incorrect claims “likely to cause significant, unnecessary distress to patients and staff” and demanded he publicly retracts them.
In Cllr Cowan’s message to residents, he says the NHS has plans to demolish Charing Cross and replace it with an Urgent Care Clinic which would be just 13% the size of the original hospital.
It mentions the independent public inquiry led by Michael Mansfield and adds: “They [NHS] have relaunched their flawed plan in a new report - the North West London STP - and still have the demolition of Charing Cross Hospital and the sale of much of its site as a key part of their scheme.”
(Image: UGC TMS)
Dr Batten and Ms Parker told Cllr Cowan: “As you will be fully aware, there have never been any plans to close Charing Cross Hospital.
“You will also know that, far from ‘re-launching’ proposals for changes at Charing Cross, the North West London Sustainability and Transformation Plan (STP) made a clear commitment that there will be no reduction in Charing Cross’s A&E department or wider services within the lifetime of the plan (that runs until April 2021)."
Vanessa Redgrave discusses Charing Cross Hospital
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They continue: “And we recently updated you on a £2.5 million investment in urgent and emergency care services and theatres at Charing Cross.”
The letter goes on to say that it’s more important than ever for the NHS and local authorities to work closely together, before questioning the local administration’s motives.
It says: “It is difficult to understand why the council would choose to spend significant sums of public money fighting ‘closure plans’ that do not exist and when your NHS partners have clearly set out that service changes over at least the next five years will be focused on providing better ways of helping local people stay healthy and avoid unnecessary hospital admissions or long stays.
“As such, through this letter, we are raising a formal complaint with you regarding this publicity material and its content which we believe has clearly breached the Code of Recommended Practice on Local Authority Publicity, specifically around objectivity and even-handedness.
“We request that you stop any further promotion of this leaflet and publicly retract your misleading claims.”
At a public meeting held at Hammersmith Town Hall in November, residents expressed fears that STP plans would force the closure of Ealing and Charing Cross Hospitals .
Hammersmith and Fulham Council has been asked for comment.
Keep up to date with the latest news in west London via the free getwestlondon app.
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newsheadline Obama: The Whole Untold Story
Behind the waves, smiles, teleprompters and photo ops, nobody really knows who the hell the President Of The United States really is! Why are Obama's college records still "sealed" (hidden). No one can investigate what classes he took, what subjects he studied, or what papers he wrote. Nobody knew him or even remembers him from Columbia University. Fox News contacted 400 Columbia University students from the period when Obama claims he was there, but none remembered him. None ever heard of him at the class reunion. Obama's photograph isn't in the school yearbook. Obama consistently refuses to talk about his years at Columbia, provide school records, or names of any former classmates or friends while at Columbia. Why? Because he was never there! Obama's real name is Barry Soetoro. He used the name "Barry Soetoro" to receive financial aid as a foreign student from Indonesia as an undergraduate. The OFFICIAL transcript was released by Occidental College in compliance with a court order.
OBAMA'S MENTOR In Obama's memoir, Dreams from My Father, Frank Marshall Davis is identified as Obama's "mentor". Who is Frank Davis? Frank Davis was an amateur photographer, a radical black power activist, a Communist Party member and an advocate of legalized pederasty (anal sex between an older man and young boy). Frank Davis moved to Honolulu, Hawaii from Chicago in 1948 with his second wife Helen Canfield Davis, a WHITE Chicago socialite and fellow Communist. Frank Davis had five children and divorced his communist white wife in 1970.
Suspicions were raised that Frank Davis is Obama's real father when it was learned that Davis authored a hard-core pornographic autobiography called, Sex Rebel: Black. It was published in 1968 by Greenleaf Classics under the pseudonym Bob Greene.
The Frank Davis porn book tracks Davis' life in Chicago and Hawaii. He wrote in the book’s introduction that although he “changed names and identities, all incidents I described have been taken from actual experiences.” Davis described an incident of “swinging” with a couple from Seattle, and how he and his wife had numerous encounters with an underage girl named “Anne.” Since Ann Dunham's parents lived in Seattle and knew Davis well, was the swinging couple Davis was referring to Ann's parents (Obama's grandparents)? Barack Obama’s maternal grandparents who were originally from Kansas (where they also knew Frank Davis), moved to Seattle where his mother was enrolled in Mercer Island High School.
Upon graduating from high school, Ann Dunham was known as a “full-fledged radical leftist”. Classmate Susan Blake described her as someone who “never dated white boys.” After graduation, Ann Dunham followed her parents to Hawaii in 1960 where they renewed ties with Frank Davis. Ann's father, Stanley Dunham, and Frank Davis were close personal friends. They drank whiskey together, smoked pot and chased women in Honolulu’s red-light district. Stanley Dunham raised Barry Soetoro (Obama) and sometimes left him alone with Frank. This has led to speculation that Obama was sexually molested by Frank Davis who openly supported pederasty. Frank Davis was a journalist and an amateur photographer who proclaimed himself to be bisexual, a voyeur, exhibitionist, mildly interested in sadomasochism, and deriving sexual gratification from “bondage, simulated rape and being flogged and urinated on.” His racy nude pictures of Obama’s mother were allegedly taken at Frank Davis’ apartment around 1960 which is when Obama was conceived. The photos were found in Davis' photo album. Filmmaker Joel Gilbert has photographic evidence that Frank Davis is the man who took the nude photographs of what looks like Barack Obama’s white mother. Pictures show Frank Davis sitting on the same sofa that Ann posed naked in front off. ARRANGED MARRIAGE According to Barack Obama’s official biography, his mother became impregnated by Barack Obama Sr. in November 1960, and married him in February 1961. But Andy Martin, known as the man who “gave birth to the birthers movement,” claims Frank Marshall Davis sired Ann Dunham’s child. Frank Davis was already married to a wealthy white socialite, so he paid a Hawaii University student named Barack Obama to take responsibility. By agreeing to an arranged marriage and marrying Dunham, Barack Obama Sr. could legally stay in the United States. He would not have taken his new family back to Kenya because he already had a wife and two other children there. Plus, his father disapproved of his marriage to Dunham. The marriage of Dunham and Obama Sr. was clearly an arranged marriage. They never once lived together after their marriage and never shared the same address. In fact, almost immediately after Obama’s birth, Dunham moved to Washington state and Obama Sr. relocated to Harvard a year later. OBAMA CALLED FRANK DAVIS - "POP" In his autobiography, Dreams From My Father, Barack Obama describes Frank Davis as a “father figure” and mentor. Prior to his enrollment in college, he penned a poem about Davis entitled “Pop.” Whenever Obama needed counseling during his teen years, the grandparents invariably went to Davis to provide advice. OBAMA'S ADOPTION RECORDS? Obama spent much of his youth apart from his mother who married Lolo Soetoro in 1966. Soetoro was a colonel in the Indonesian armed forces and worked for the CIA-installed dictator, General Suharto during the Indonesian coup d’etat that killed 250,000 to 1 million Indonesians. Lolo Soetoro, was rewarded with a top job at Exxon. Did Lolo Soetoro adopt Barack Obama? If so, why has Obama refused to release his adoption records? FROM SLEAZE TO VIP'S Little is known about Obama's white mother and grandmother besides the details provided by Obama and his handlers. Obama's white granny, Madelyn Dunham, became vice president of the Bank of Hawaii soon after her arrival there. Investigative journalist Wayne Madsen reports that she supervised escrow accounts (money laundering) that the U.S. government used to funnel money to its "gray" and "black" drug activities throughout Asia. Granny was clearly more than a small cog in the machine. Obama's mother worked for Timothy Geithner's father - Peter Geitner, as Program Officer for the Ford Foundation. She developed the Ford Foundation's microfinance program in Indonesia. Her son who is now President of the United States, hired Timothy Geitner as his U.S. Secretary of the Treasury! Timothy Geithner had earlier worked for Henry Kissingner. President Obama’s National Security Adviser, Jim Jones, states that Henry Kissinger sets Obama's national security and foreign policy by giving daily orders. "I take my daily orders from Dr. Kissinger...We have a chain of command in the National Security Council...", says Jones. (see White House website speech).
OBAMA'S BLOOD TYPE Officially, Stanley Anne Dunham gave birth to Barrack Obama in Honolulu on August 4th, 1961...but the OFFICIAL University of Washingtom records prove that she was 2680 MILES AWAY in Seattle attending classes that same month. Why has President Obama persistently refused to release documents that would provide answers? Because an authentic birth certificate and medical records would reveal his blood type and his blood type might prove that Barack Obama Senior is not his real father.
ROAD TO THE WHITE HOUSE Here are the events that led to Obama's meteoric rise to the White House which point to Frank Marshall Davis as the man who sired Obama: Obama's road to the white house was paved by Frank Marshall Davis and Bill Ayers. The birth certificate debate has diverted attention away from the identity of Obama's real father. Niall Kilkenny of Reformation Online reports that, “Sometime between 1927 and 1948, Frank Marshall Davis was recruited as a special agent or informer for the FBI. As a newspaperman, Davis had the perfect opportunity to know what was happening in Chicago. As a black left-wing ‘Communist’ sympathizer, no one would ever suspect him of associating with the ultra right wing FBI.” OBAMA'S TRAVELS At Occidental College in Los Angeles, Obama hung out with “Marxist philosophers” and attended “socialist conferences.” In the meantime, his mother found employment with USAID and the Ford Foundation, both of which served as fronts for the CIA and Rockefeller Foundation. In 1981, Obama, supposedly a poor college student from a broken home, traveled to Indonesia, Karachi, Pakistan and Hyderabad, India. Numerous research investigators postulate that the CIA funded these trips. Don Frederick’s well-researched timeline shows that, while in Pakistan, Obama’s host, Muhammadian Soomro, was linked to the notorious Bank of Credit and Commerce (BCCI), which was involved in “money laundering, bribery, terrorist support, tax evasion, smuggling and illegal immigration.” They also worked very closely with the CIA. Upon returning to the U.S. in 1981, Obama’s next destination was New York City and Columbia University. Where did Obama get the money to attend an Ivy League college? According to his official biography, Obama graduated from Columbia in 1983...but something strange arises from this time period. When questioned by the New York Times about his undergraduate studies, Obama “declined repeated requests to talk about his New York years, release his Columbia transcripts, or identify even a single fellow student, co-worker, roommate or friend from those years.” Obama’s college records and transcripts from Occidental, Columbia, and Harvard have all been sealed and not released—just like his “official” birth certificate has been sealed and not released by Hawaii’s governor. OBAMA'S TERRORIST BUDDY - BILL AYERS What we do know about Obama’s tenure at Columbia is that he lived only a few blocks away from Weather Underground terrorist William Ayers, and that both attended socialist meetings at Cooper Union during the early 1980s. More importantly, Frank Marshall Davis was a close friend of Ayers’s father, Thomas, in Chicago, and purportedly arranged for Obama to meet Bill Ayers upon his arrival in New York City. Even wilder is the fact that Obama also met and was tutored by Zbigniew Brzezinski during this time. Brzezinski is a CFR member and co-founder of the Trilateral Commission with David Rockefeller. Now, how often does a poor college kid from a broken family get to be mentored by one of the most powerful men in the world? Brzezinski was one of the first people to endorse Obama’s candidacy, then served as his foreign policy advisor during the campaign. Between Columbia and his pilgrimage to Chicago, Obama worked for the Business International Corporation, a CIA front that specialized in recruiting left-wing organizers to use as assets. In a recent book entitled Barack and Michelle, best-selling author Christopher Andersen contends that Ayers is the author of Obama’s Dreams From My Father. “The book’s language, oddly specific references, literary devices and themes bear a jarring similarity to Ayers’s own writing.”
Obama's political career was launched with a fundraiser at the home of Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn. There, Illinois Senator Alice Palmer announced that she was stepping down from her post and that she was hand-selecting Obama as her successor. In "The Case Against Barack Obama", researcher David Freddoso alleges that Senator Alice Palmer “was identified by the FBI as being on the Soviet payroll in the 1980s" and attended of the 27th Congress of the Communist Party. Valerie Jarrett is described as Barack Obama’s “eyes and ears.” Her great-uncle is longtime Bilderberg member Vernon Jordan and her mother, Barbara Taylor Bowman, appointed Tom Ayers—William Ayers father—to the Erickson Group’s board of trustees. Valerie Jarrett's father-in-law—Vernon Jarrett—worked for the same Communist-leaning newspaper—the Chicago Defender— as Frank Marshall Davis. Vernon Jarrett became the Chicago Tribune’s first black writer and landed an assignment at the Chicago Sun-Times where he used his columns to promote up-and-coming superstar - Barack Obama. OBAMA'S ARRANGED MARRIAGE TO MICHELE Obama met his wife, Michele, at the Chicago law firm of Sidley Austin, where Valerie Jarrett hired her. One of this firm’s major clients was Tom Ayers (father of Bill Ayers), while Michelle’s mentor was Bernadine Dohrn - the wife of Bill Ayers. Subsequently, Jarrett hired Michelle Robinson (now Michele Obama) to work for Mayor Daley’s political machine, and is also cited as the reason why Barack moved to Chicago. In this sense, one of Davis’ associates—William Ayers—drew Obama to Chicago from one end, while another Davis connection— Valerie Jarrett—drew Michelle in from the other. Again, the similarities between Bill and Hillary Clinton’s “prearranged relationship” cannot be denied. Jarrett also had close ties with fellow slumlord Tony Rezko (Obama’s bagman), and was the person first mentioned to fill Obama’s vacant Senate seat (leading to the Blago pay-to-play scandal). Judicial Watch lists her as one of the nation’s top 10 most corrupt politicians, and it is she who traveled to Copenhagen with Michelle Obama to make a final bid for Chicago to be the Olympic host city in 2016. Lastly, Jarrett brought self-avowed Communist Van Jones in as the green jobs “czar,” while also completing Obama’s inner circle with David Axelrod, Rahm Emanuel and company. This article does not prove that Frank Marshall Davis is Barack Obama’s father, any more than other stories which maintain Malcolm “X” sired him. Without an original birth certificate, speculation will continue. However, Frank Marshall Davis cultivated all of the above-mentioned Chicago roots back in the early 1920s. He was a pivotal figure in the Communist Party’s inception and his deep-seated connections catapulted Barack Obama to the presidency in 2008. |
Bandai Namco Games has released the first batch of screenshots for Tailed Beast Minato, known officially in Naruto Storm Revolution as Kurama Link Mode Minato! This is Minato with the power of the Nine Tails in a similar fashion to his son, Naruto! Anime-only viewers are being hit with major spoilers here as the Naruto Shippuden series has not yet shown the man known as the Yellow Flash in this true awakening form, but with the game’s official box art making rounds and fans around the world talking about content from the manga, at this point it’s hard to avoid!
Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm Revolution is the latest game in Bandai Namco and CyberConnect2’s acclaimed Naruto Storm series. It will be for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and PC. The game will contain stories never before seen in the Naruto anime/manga, including the Creation of Akatsuki, Shisui’s back-story, and Kushina’s interaction with Minato’s and his team. In addition, there will be new combination team jutsus, over 100 playable characters, and 50 minutes of exclusive anime footage. Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm Revolution will be released worldwide in September 2014. |
An internet bride who made her fortune in the UK after marrying a cash-strapped Briton is now battling him over her money in the divorce courts.
Ukranian Marina Ivleva left her home in the Crimea in 1999 after meeting and marrying tow-truck driver John Yates through a dating site.
The average annual wage in the Crimea is not much more than £2,000, but the 49-year-old rose to be a senior administrator at Leicester's de Montford University and became a much bigger earner than her British husband during their 12-year relationship.
Before they split in 2012, she had amassed assets which Mr Yates values at close to £300,000.
But 59-year-old Mr Yates, who now lives in a council house and says he has been left almost penniless, claims he is entitled to half of everything.
After the couple's "limping" relationship broke down acrimoniously two years ago, Mrs Ivleva stayed on in the matrimonial home in Leicester.
She now lives there with 26-year-old Robert, her son from a previous marriage who Mr Yates adopted as his own while they were together.
Meanwhile, Mr Yates says he is languishing with "nothing" in council accommodation and insists he is due a "fair share" of the fruits of the marriage.
Lady Justice King heard that Mrs Ivleva struck the first legal blow when she argued - without success - that her union with Mr Yates was "a nullity".
Her disgruntled husband responded in April last year when he lodged a county court divorce petition.
But in December, Mrs Ivleva - who holds joint Ukrainian, Russian and British nationality - retorted by emailing her husband, announcing that she had already divorced him in Ukraine.
She tried to get her foreign divorce recognised in England, but High Court judge Mr Justice Peter Jackson refused her request in March.
He said that Mrs Ivleva had "trailed her coat" by keeping her husband in the dark about the details of the Ukrainian proceedings until it was too late for him to do anything about them.
Describing their relationship as a "limping marriage", he said "basic fairness" to Mr Yates demanded that he be given the opportunity to divorce his wife in England.
In his "emphatic" ruling, the judge said that, although the divorce had been advertised in a Ukrainian newspaper, Mr Yates spoke very little of his wife's native tongue.
With her son speaking on her behalf, Mrs Ivleva challenged the judge's decision at the Court of Appeal.
She claimed to have suffered discrimination as a foreign wife and that the ruling amounted to an "attack on the integrity" of the Ukrainian courts.
However, Lady Justice King described the judge's refusal to recognise her Ukrainian divorce as "exemplary" and "unimpeachable".
The ruling opened the way for Mr Yates to pursue his county court divorce petition and seek financial orders against his wife, whose wealth he estimated at about £300,000.
He said outside court after the ruling: "She's got everything; I've got nothing and I'm entitled to a fair share.
"I'm living in council accommodation from day-to-day...she can afford to go on holiday; I can't".
He added that he expected his decree nisi to go through on January 5, finally ending his marriage. |
MariaDB, the open-source database management system (DBMS) and MySQL fork, may soon be replacing MySQL in the Fedora Linux distribution. Since Fedora is also the test bed for Red Hat's market-leading Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL), this move may lead to major changes in the Linux DBMS world.
Jaroslav Reznik, who is Red Hat's Fedora project manager, proposed the change. Reznik explained that he was suggesting this move because, "The original company behind MySQL, MySQL AB, were bought out by Sun which was then bought by Oracle. Recent changes made by Oracle indicate they are moving the MySQL project to be more closed. They are no longer publishing any useful information about security issues (CVEs), and they are not providing complete regression tests anymore, and a very large fraction of the MySQL bug database is now not public."
Red Hat and Oracle have also long been squabbling on other grounds. Oracle's house brand of Linux, Oracle Linux, is little more than an RHEL clone.
Reznik continued, "MariaDB, which was founded by some of the original MySQL developers, has a more open-source attitude and an active community. We have found them to be much easier to work with, especially in regards to security matters."
Fedora isn't the only one to find MariaDB more attractive in recent months; Wikipedia began moving to MariaDB in late 2012 .
Therefore, Reznik declared, "We would like to replace MySQL with MariaDB in early development cycle for Fedora 19." That would mean Fedora might switch over as early as May 2013. In any case, "MySQL will continue to be available for at least one release, but MariaDB will become the default. Also, we do not intend to support concurrent installation of both packages on the same machine; pick one or the other."
A final decision hasn't been made yet. The Fedora Engineering Steering Committee (FESCo) has to vote on the issue.
Robyn Bergeron, the Fedora Project Leader told me that "A vote by FESCo is the next step." She believes that it's possible they may vote as early as January 23, but for a variety of reasons the vote on the shift from MySQL to MariaDB will be more likely no earlier than January 30.
If I were a betting man, I'd bet Fedora will make the switch. And, if Fedora does, I expect the other Linux distributions will follow them. This in turn may mean that we'll need to switch the acronym Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP/Perl/Python (LAMP) to Linux, Apache, MariaDB, PHP/Perl/Python (LAMP).
Related stories: |
KDE was one of about 50 exhibitors at the LISA (Large Installation System Administration) Conference November 12th and 13th in Seattle. The expo was part of the week-long conference for system administrators that has been held annually since 1986. Expo participants included big name tech companies and smaller niche organizations offering products and services to this audience of professional technical people. As we discovered, KDE is well known among this audience.
Visitors included people who have been "using KDE since version 1.0" and other long time users and supporters. Several people said that they have been contributing code and money for many years. We encouraged visitors to check out the year-end fundraising campaign.
The big KDE logo attracted people to the exhibit space where we covered KDE mentoring programs, answered questions and shared information about current KDE activities. The Krita demonstrations by Oscar Baechler generated a lot of fascinated attention too. It is obvious that Krita offers much more to real artists than GIMP or Inkscape. The large artwork of an Emperor Penguin done in Coast Salish style also drew admiring comments; people liked the tie-in between the Pacific Northwest aboriginal art and free/open technology.
We had intended to have a slide show featuring various aspects of KDE. It didn't work out as planned...fortunately. Instead, people had the opportunity to experiment with the latest KDE goodies—KDE Frameworks 5 and Plasma 5 running on a high performance machine. The system performed well. Several attendees were amazed at the story behind the story: a near complete re-do of the KDE Development Environment and the up-to-date Plasma Workspace. This was an audience that appreciated the effort, the professionalism and the results of KDE's innovations.
Andrew Lake of the KDE Visual Design Group put together a slide show for his big screen, featuring design principles and examples, along with a visual explanation of the technical structure of Frameworks and Plasma.
KDE excitement
photo by ogbog KDE excitement
Some members of the Seattle KDE group discussed possibilities of more regional KDE outreach. Valorie Zimmerman and Andrew Lake are part of this group; the Meetup organizer, Aaron Peterson, was also in the booth space.
The LISA conference has long served as the annual vendor-neutral meeting place for the wider system administration community. Recognizing the overlap and differences between traditional and modern IT operations and engineering, the highly-curated 6-day program offers training, workshops, invited talks, panels, paper presentations, and networking opportunities around 5 key topics: Systems Engineering, Security, Culture, DevOps, and Monitoring/Metrics.
LISA was an excellent opportunity to connect with people who know KDE well, as well as people who appreciate KDE software and what the Community stands for.
Many thanks to USENIX for the generous support of KDE. |
In the previous article on auditd, I showed how to use aureport to check stuff monitored by the auditd daemon. And, I showed how you could, for example, check whether a user had experienced trouble logging in, which could be interpreted as a malicious attempt to access a system.
As I said before, aureport is part of a larger toolset that comes with auditd. Using auditd to monitor some preset events is already quite useful, but where it comes into its own is when you customize it to monitor whatever you want.
Customized Monitoring Rules
To push your rules into auditd on the fly you use auditctl. But, before you insert any of your own rules, let's check to see if any defaults are already in place. Become root (or use sudo) and try this:
auditctl -l -a never,task
The -l option lists all current active rules and, if you see the -a never,task line shown above, none of the rules following it will log anything. This rule, which is often a default in new auditd installations, is telling the daemon to append (-a) a rule to the task list (as in the list of tasks the kernel is running -- don't worry about this just yet), which will stop auditd from ever recording anything.
Because we're not specifying which task, auditd assumes the rule applies to all of them. In plain English, this would read: "Never record anything from any of the tasks the kernel is running." And, because auditd gives precedence from top to bottom (i.e., the first rule takes precedence over the ones following it in case of a conflict), this means nothing will be recorded despite what any of the other rules say.
You don't want that, so the first thing to do is get rid of this rule. To delete all rules from a running auditd daemon, you can use:
auditctl -D
If you already have more than one rule and don't want to zap them all, you can also selectively delete only this rule with
auditctl -d never,task
Now the coast is clear, so I’ll show how to build your own first rule. The typical use for auditd is to have it monitor files or directories. For example: As a regular user, create a directory in your /home directory, say…
mkdir test_dir
Now become root and set up a watch on the directory you just made:
auditctl -w /home/[ your_user_name ]/test_dir/ -k test_watch
The -w option tells auditd to watch the test_dir/ directory for any changes. The -k option tells auditd to append the string test_watch (called a key) to the log entries it creates. The key can be anything you want, although it is a good idea to make it something memorable and related to what the rule does. As you will see, this will be useful to filter out unrelated records when you revise auditd's logs later on.
Now, as a regular user, do some stuff in test_dir/ -- make some subdirectories, create or copy some files, remove some files, or list the contents.
When you're done, take a look at what auditd logged with
ausearch -k test_watch
See the use of -k test_watch here? Even if you have a dozen more rules logging different things, by using a key string, you can tell ausearch to only list what you're interested in (Figure 1).
fig01_ausearch_output.png
Figure 1: Output of ausearch command. Used with permission
Even with this filter, the amount of information ausearch throws at you is a bit overwhelming. However, you will also notice that the information is very structured. The output is actually made up of three records per event.
Each record contains some keyword/value pairs separated by a "=" sign; some of the values are strings, others are lists enclosed in parenthesis, and so on. You can read up on what each snippet of information means in the official manual, but the important thing to take away is that the structured nature of ausearch's output makes processing it using scripts relatively easy. In fact, aureport, the tool I showed in the previous article, does a very good job of sorting things out.
To prove it, let's pipe our ausearch output through aureport and see what's what:
ausearch -k test_watch | aureport -f -i File Report =============================================== # date time file syscall success exe auid event =============================================== 1. 05/06/16 13:04:54 sub_dir mkdir yes /usr/bin/mkdir paul 193 2. 05/06/16 13:04:54 /home/paul/test_dir/sub_dir getxattr no /usr/bin/baloo_file paul 194 3. 05/06/16 13:04:54 /home/paul/test_dir/sub_dir getxattr no /usr/bin/baloo_file paul 195 4. 05/06/16 13:04:54 /home/paul/test_dir/sub_dir getxattr no /usr/bin/baloo_file paul 196 5. 05/06/16 13:05:06 /home/paul/test_dir/testfile.txt getxattr no /usr/bin/baloo_file paul 198 . . .
This is starting to make sense! You can check who is doing what to which file and when.
One thing you can see in the listing above is that, because I am using the Plasma desktop, Baloo, KDE's indexing service, is cluttering the list with irrelevant results. That's because every time you create or destroy a file, Baloo has to come along and index the fact. This makes parsing what is going on and checking whether the user is up to no good, annoyingly hard. So, let's filter Baloo's actions out with a strategically placed grep:
ausearch -k test_watch | aureport -f -i | grep -v baloo File Report =============================================== # date time file syscall success exe auid event =============================================== 1. 05/06/16 13:04:54 sub_dir mkdir yes /usr/bin/mkdir paul 193 9. 05/06/16 13:05:06 testfile.txt open yes /usr/bin/touch paul 197 17. 05/06/16 13:05:29 ./be03316b71184fefba5cfbf59c21e6d5.jpg open yes /usr/bin/cp paul 210 18. 05/06/16 13:05:29 ./big_city.jpg open yes /usr/bin/cp paul 211 19. 05/06/16 13:05:29 ./blendertracking.jpg open yes /usr/bin/cp paul 212 20. 05/06/16 13:05:29 ./Cover27_Draft01.jpg open yes /usr/bin/cp paul 213 37. 05/06/16 13:05:50 blendertracking.jpg unlinkat yes /usr/bin/rm paul 330 38. 05/06/16 13:05:50 be03316b71184fefba5cfbf59c21e6d5.jpg unlinkat yes /usr/bin/rm paul 328 . . .
That's much better. You can now clearly see what the users have been up to. You can follow how they create some directories and files and copy others from elsewhere. You can also check what files are being removed, and so on.
When you have no more use for it, you can remove the above watch with
auditctl -W /home/[ your_user ]/test_dir/ -k test_watch
One File at a Time
Monitoring whole directories makes for a lot of logged data. Sometimes it is better to just monitor strategic individual files to make sure no one is tampering with them. A classic example is to use
auditctl -w /etc/passwd -p wa -k passwd_watch
to make sure nobody is messing with your passwd file.
The -p parameter tells auditd which permissions to monitor. The available permissions are:
r to monitor for read accesses to a file or a directory,
w to monitor for write accesses,
x to monitor for execute accesses,
and a to check for changes of the file's or directory's attributes.
Because there are legitimate reasons for an application to read from /etc/passwd, you're not going to monitor for that to avoid false positives. It is also a bit silly to monitor for the execution of a non-executable file; hence, we tell auditd to only monitor for changes to passwd's content (i.e., writes) and its attributes.
If you don't specify what permissions to monitor, auditd will assume it has to monitor all of them. That's why, when you were monitoring the test_dir/ directory in the first examples, even a simple ls command triggered auditd.
Permanent Rules
To make your rules permanent, you can include them into /etc/audit/audit.rules or create a new rules file in the /etc/audit/rules.d/ directory. If you have been experimenting with rules using auditctl and you are happy with your current set up, you could do:
echo "-D" > /etc/audit/rules.d/my.rules auditctl -l >> /etc/audit/rules.d/my.rules
to dump your current rules into a rules file called my.rules and save yourself some typing. If you've been following this tutorial and used the example rules you saw above, my.rules would end up looking like this:
-D -w /home/[ your_user ]/test_dir/ -k test_watch -w /etc/passwd -p wa -k passwd_watch
To avoid interference and conflicts, move any pre-existing rules files in /etc/audit/ and /etc/audit/rules.d to backups:
mv /etc/audit/audit.rules /etc/audit/audit.rules.bak mv /etc/audit/rules.d/audit.rules /etc/audit/rules.d/audit.rules.bak
Then, restart the daemon with
systemctl restart auditd.service
to have auditd pick up your rules straight away.
Now, every time your system is rebooted, auditd will start monitoring whatever you told it to.
There’s More
I had time to cover only a small portion of auditd’s capabilities here. But, as you can see, auditd is very powerful, and it can be used monitor much more than just files and directories, with an insane level of detail. I plan to visit the more advanced topics in a future article. |
ATHENS (Reuters) - Greece’s Left Coalition party will get an historic chance on Tuesday to form a government opposed to the country’s EU/IMF bailout, after the mainstream conservatives failed to cobble together a coalition following a shock inconclusive election.
Alexis Tsipras, whose party was catapulted into second place by voters angry with austerity, will take on the tough task of wooing small groups into forming the first leftist government in Greece’s modern history.
Greeks plunged their country into political limbo in Sunday’s election, angry with the harsh cuts dictated by the bailout deal which is keeping Greece afloat but has also brought the worst unemployment and recession in decades.
By spurning the two main parties, voters shrugged off the risk of bankruptcy and the threat to Greece’s future in the euro as officials warned that cash was running out fast.
On Monday, President Karolos Papoulias gave a three-day mandate to form a coalition to Antonis Samaras, whose conservative New Democracy party won the biggest share of the vote. But Samaras admitted defeat within the day after rejections from several party leaders.
Tsipras, who believes the bailout is leading Greece to bankruptcy rather than averting it, is next in line and will receive the presidential mandate on Tuesday to try to rally the fragmented groups of the left.
“We want to create a government of leftist forces in order to escape the bailout leading us to bankruptcy,” said Tsipras, the country’s youngest political leader at 37, after rejecting an offer to cooperate from Samaras. “We’re not going to let in through the window what Greek people kicked out the door.”
A splinter group from the traditional Communist Party, the Left Coalition wants Greece to stay in the euro but rejects the 130 billion euro bailout, saying the country can survive without it.
The Communists have already rejected any proposal to cooperate and the other anti-bailout parties of the left cannot bring enough parliamentary seats to produce a majority with the Left Coalition. This means Tsipras has a very slim chance of clinching a deal unless major parties offer support.
Time is running out for Greece, which must come up next month with over 11 billion euros in extra spending cuts for 2013 and 2014 in exchange for more aid. Officials told Reuters Greece could run out of cash by the end of June if there was no government to negotiate a new aid tranche with the EU and IMF.
HOPES PINNED ON LEFT
“I voted for Tsipras. If he renegotiates with the Europeans maybe our lives will get a little better. We have reached our limits. We are barely scraping by,” said Ioannis Giannakopoulos, 47, an unemployed electrician.
File photo of Greek conservative party leader Samaras greeting supporters during a pre-election rally in the town of Heraklion. REUTERS/Image Services/Stefanos Rapanis
If Tsipras fails to cobble together a coalition, the mainstream Socialist PASOK party is next in line to give it a go. PASOK and New Democracy, which have ruled Greece for decades, suffered huge losses in the polls, punished by voters for chronic mismanagement and corruption.
With counting from Sunday’s vote complete, New Democracy and PASOK had won just over 32 percent of the vote and only 149 out of 300 parliament seats. PASOK won a landslide victory in the last election in 2009 with 44 percent of the vote.
A total of seven parties made it into parliament, including the extreme nationalist Golden Dawn for the first time.
Fotis Kouvelis, leader of the moderate Democratic Left party that had looked like a possible ally for Samaras, told Reuters he would not cooperate with New Democracy and PASOK but only left-wing groups.
Another group, the splinter conservative party Independent Greeks, refused to enter talks with Samaras.
Even PASOK leader Evangelos Venizelos, who as finance minister arranged Greece’s second bailout, said the deal should be renegotiated to lessen the burden on Greeks by spreading the cuts over three years instead of two.
In the face of what looks like an intractable impasse, another election in a few weeks could be the only way out, deepening doubts about Greece’s future.
Slideshow (8 Images)
Many Greeks seemed shocked at what they had done in an election that increased fears of a return to the euro zone debt crisis first sparked by Greece in 2009.
“I’m more angry today than I was yesterday. They voted against the big parties as a reaction without thinking of the consequences. What is Tsipras going to do? Make the debt disappear? He is just a kid,” said Thanasis Economou, 43, a mechanic, who voted for one of the big parties. |
Pink Floyd veteran Roger Waters appeared on last night’s episode of The Daily Show, where he discussed his philanthropic work and the upcoming European leg of his Wall tour.
Host Jon Stewart specifically asked Waters how he continues to keep the tour “fresh” after two long years on the road. Waters explained that “the version of the Wall I’m doing now is different from the one I did with Pink Floyd in 1980. It’s far more universal in its message. It’s no longer about that miserable, self-serving, sniveling, nasty little Roger we hated all those years ago. It’s more about… the rebellion that is trying to understand the world and, if possible, help people occasionally.”
Stewart also poked fun at Waters, referring to his band as “the remaining members of Pink Floyd,” for which Waters smiled and responded, “This is how he makes his living. That is funny!” Replay the full segment below. |
__________
ABNA
Al-Qaeda removed from Canada & U.S. terror watch-list
The Syrian branch of al-Qaeda changed its name to Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), and is now officially removed from the U.S. and Canadian terror watchlists.
Now, the U.S. and Canada can donate money and weapons to the terrorists, and can even go fight with them against the Syrian government and spread their propaganda.
It turns out that getting off the U.S.’ and Canada’s terror watchlist is as simple as changing your name. While the terror watchlist in the U.S. has long been both secretive and controversial – as “reasonable suspicion” is enough to label any individual a “terrorist” – terrorist groups tied to al-Qaeda have found that getting off the watchlist only requires minor rebranding, reported Mint Press News.
The terror group, formerly known as Jabhat al-Nusra or the al-Nusra Front, has operated as al-Qaeda’s branch in Syria long after Daesh (ISIS) renounced its allegiance to the group in 2014. It was first placed on the U.S. and Canadian terror watchlists in 2012.
Simply by changing its name to Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the group is no longer on terror watchlists in the U.S. or Canada, allowing citizens of those countries to donate money to the group, travel to fight with them and disseminate the group’s propaganda without incident.
In response, Nicole Thompson of the U.S. State Department told CBC News last Monday that while “we believe these actions are an al-Qaeda play to bring as much of the Syrian opposition under its operational control as possible, […] we are still studying the issue carefully.”
But the State Department is likely hesitant to label HTS a terror group, even despite the group’s link to al-Qaeda, as the U.S. government has directly funded and armed the Zenki brigade, a group that joined forces with al-Nusra under the HTS banner, with sophisticated weaponry, said MPN.
CBC reported, “For the U.S. to designate HTS now would mean acknowledging that it supplied sophisticated weapons, including TOW anti-tank missiles, to ‘terrorists,’ and draw attention to the fact that the U.S. continues to arm Islamist militias in Syria.”
This is just the latest attempt by al-Nusra to rebrand itself as a “moderate” group, as it has used its commitment to being “anti-ISIS” and “anti-Assad” in order to convince the U.S. and its allies to arm them. Al-Nusra has been described by mainstream media as a “moderate opposition” group fighting against the embattled government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
MPN reported on the rebranding of the terrorist group:
The U.S. government has accepted the rebranding of al-Nusra in recent years. The U.S. effort to do so began in earnest when former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper stated in 2015 that “moderate rebels” were “anyone who is not affiliated with ISIS [Daesh, ISIL].”
Since then, al-Nusra’s top commanders have asserted that they have received U.S.-made weapons, such as TOW missiles and tanks, directly from foreign governments supported by the U.S. In a 2016interview with the newspaper Koelner Stadt-Anzeiger, al-Nusra unit commander Abu Al Ezz stated that when al-Nusra was “besieged, we had officers from Turkey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Israel and America here…Experts in the use of satellites, rockets, reconnaissance and thermal security cameras.”
When asked specifically if US officers were present, Al Ezz replied: “The Americans are on our side.” This assertion has been bolstered by evidence that the U.S.-led coalition’s airstrikes in Syria intentionally avoided al-Nusra positions.
With al-Nusra now officially removed from Western terror watchlists, foreign governments that oppose the Assad government are free to fund and arm al-Qaeda. |
As a Senate candidate in 2003, Barack Obama called the PATRIOT Act “shoddy and dangerous.” Once safely in power, Obama started demonstrating his remarkable capacity for “growing in office” — expanding federal powers while piously moralizing about their potential abuse.
As a senator, he voted to reauthorize the surveillance law in 2006; and as president, signed another PATRIOT renewal from Europe via presidential autopen in 2011.
Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., has long warned of a “secret PATRIOT Act” — a classified interpretation of the law that allows the administration to undertake massive data collection on American citizens.
Last week, we got a glimpse of what he meant, when a National Security Agency contractor revealed that the agency has assembled a database of at least seven years’ worth of Verizon customers’ call records — a practice that apparently extends to other carriers.
We needn’t resort to hyperbolic examples like the East German Stasi to understand the dangers here — there’s a relevant comparison much closer to home.
“Nobody is listening to your calls,” the peevish president said last week; they’re “sifting through this so-called metadata,” trying to identify potential leads.
About that “metadata”: It allows the government secretly to track who a target communicates with and where he’s physically located. That knowledge can be used to unearth who’s leaking to reporters, when and where political opponents are meeting — even who’s sleeping with whom.
The NSA’s massive call-records database is thus a potential treasure trove for bad-faith political actors — it can be used to ferret out the sort of information that governments have historically used to blackmail and control dissenters.
We needn’t resort to hyperbolic examples like the East German Stasi to understand the dangers here — there’s a relevant comparison much closer to home. A series of congressional investigations in the 1970s taught Americans shocking lessons about Cold War-era surveillance abuses.
In 1974, the House Judiciary Committee tasked Deputy Attorney General Laurence Silberman with reviewing former FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover’s secret files.
Silberman was revolted by what he found: Hoover had let the bureau “be used by presidents for nakedly political purposes” and engaged in “subtle blackmail to ensure his and the bureau’s power.”
In his book The Secrets of the FBI, Ronald Kessler quotes one of the FBI director’s former top lieutenants: “The moment [Hoover] would get something on a senator,” he’d send an emissary to the Hill to “advise the senator that ‘we’re in the course of an investigation, and we by chance happened to come up with this data on your daughter. … Well, Jesus, what does that tell the senator? From that time on, the senator’s right in his pocket.”
Another congressional investigation by Sen. Frank Church’s Select Committee on Intelligence showed massive privacy violations by the NSA.
Under “Project Minaret,” from the early 1960s until 1973, the NSA compiled watch lists of potentially subversive Americans, monitored their overseas calls and telegrams, sharing the results with other federal agencies.
Watch-listed Americans “ranged from members of radical political groups, to celebrities, to ordinary citizens involved in protests.” Under Project Shamrock, the NSA collected all telegraphic data entering or leaving the United States, “probably the largest government interception program affecting Americans ever undertaken.”
In 1976, Church warned that the NSA’s technological prowess “at any time could be turned around on the American people … such is the capability to monitor everything — telephone conversations, telegrams, it doesn’t matter. There would be no place to hide.”
Given the state of technology at the time, Church’s anxiety seems almost quaint: telegrams? In the surveillance state’s infancy, domestic spying was a comparatively low-tech affair; today, with the federal government er, Hoovering up transactional data on millions of Americans, the possibilities are staggering, as is the potential for abuse.
We shouldn’t be too sure it “can’t happen here” — after all, it already did. |
Alberta's government is pouring $50-million back into its universities and colleges, a sharp mid-year reversal of course after it cut $147-million from postsecondary education in March's provincial budget.
The province announced the cash infusion to presidents of the schools in a phone call on Wednesday, having signalled for some time that help might be on the way before the next budget, but emphasizing it should be used to increase enrolments and support student access.
Although schools welcomed the about-face, it is unlikely to reverse many of the cuts they made in recent months, including layoffs, buyouts, cancelled courses and suspended enrolments for some programs. It may help prevent further hardship, however. In late August, University of Alberta president Indira Samarasekera warned that budget cutbacks would get worse in 2014-15. In an interview on Thursday, she said the reinvestment will "take the edge off" the cutbacks.
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The money will be divided among the 20 institutions whose funding was slashed earlier this year, with the U of A receiving $14.4-million, the University of Calgary $10.6-million, and the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology $3.7-million.
Dr. Samarasekera said the restored funding shows the government "felt the pressure from all the commentary around the postsecondary cuts," and particularly program closings that resulted. But she also conceded the province's turbulent austerity agenda has had some positive effects on universities.
"I hate to say this: I think the 7.3-per-cent cut, while a shock to the system, forced us all to wake up and think deeply about how we are doing business, not just now but for the long term," she said.
Alberta's Advanced Education Minister, Thomas Lukaszuk, said he promised schools he would look for extra money, "and I delivered," finding the funds from Treasury Board. He also confirmed the $50-million will be part of their base grants in future.
Opposition parties chided the government for what they called chaotic management.
"We're already partially into the school year," Wildrose Leader Danielle Smith said. "If you've suspended programs, how do you then restart that process?"
With a report from The Canadian Press |
China has seen the enemy, and that enemy is golf.
Yes. Golf. That seemingly most Western of sports is a unique prism on modern China. Many Chinese want to play, but the Communist Party doesn't like the game. And today, Communist Party officials officially barred its 88 million members from belonging to a golf club.
But the ban is part of Chinese President Xi Jinping's drive to root out extravagance and corruption. For golf has played a role in recent high-profile corruption cases in China.
"This has been a historically bad year for golf in China and that's really saying a lot," says Dan Washburn, author of "The Forbidden Game: Golf and the Chinese Dream." "The game has never really been welcomed with open arms by the country."
Golf was a target of Mao.
"Before he came to power, golf did thrive amongst a certain population," says Washburn. "They were mostly foreign, mostly elite. And when the communists came to power, the sport was in effect, banned, and the existing courses were dug up or repurposed."
So why did the Communists hate golf?
"It was a symbol for everything that Mao was standing against," he says.
Picture a wealthy guy in an argyle sweater and you get the idea. But this changed as China opened itself up to the world. Golf came back as a way to attract foreign investment. "The first modern golf course was opened in 1984 and it was designed by Arnold Palmer."
Today, about less than 1 percent of the population in China plays golf. Since the number is so low will it actually have any impact on rooting out corruption?
"I think as far as golf goes, party members and public officials will definitely think twice before teeing it up," he says. "But a lot of the results of this will be largely symbolic." |
Dwayne De Rosario, until recently of DC United, was named the 2013 TheCup.us Player of the Tournament. He played in all but 23 minutes of the tournament for United, leading the club to their third Lamar Hunt US Open Cup title, and his first as a player.
The Player of the Tournament award is voted on by staff at TheCup.us and a select panel from the North American Soccer Reporters. De Rosario won the vote by an overwhelming majority.
Others receiving votes were DC teammate Joe Willis, Portland Timbers forward Frederic Piquionne, who made history in the Third Round with four goals in one half and finished tied with De Rosario for leading goalscorer with five, and Javier Morales, who led Real Salt Lake to the title game.
De Rosario made his mark immediately on the tournament, playing all 120 minutes in DC’s opening game against the Richmond Kickers. After a scoreless draw, he scored in the penalty kick shootout to help United advance. In Round 4, De Rosario scored all three goals in a 3-1 victory over the visiting Philadelphia Union. He became the first Canadian to score a hat trick in the Open Cup in the Modern Professional Era (1995-present) and earned Player of the Round honors for his effort.
He followed that performance with two game-winning goals in the next two rounds. He scored the game winner in the quarterfinals against the New England Revolution in the 69th minute. DC went on to win 3-1. He also scored the deciding goal against the Chicago Fire in the Semifinals. United’s 2-0 win in Chicago marked the first time the Fire had ever lost at home in Open Cup play.
DC United won the cup against Real Salt Lake, with De Rosario playing 75 minutes in the 1-0 victory. The MLS side’s run through the US Open Cup was extraordinary considering the team’s league form. DC had more victories in the Open Cup (4) than it did in MLS play (3). United also had plenty of success winning Player of the Round, taking the award in three of the five rounds in which they played: De Rosario in the Fourth Round, Joe Willis in the Semifinals, and Bill Hamid in the Final.
De Rosario’s successful cup form was not enough to impress DC United management, however. This week, the club decided not to exercise the option in his contract, meaning De Rosario will be wearing the uniform of another team next season.
2013 TheCup.us Player of the Round Honors
Player of the Tournament (Overall): Dwayne De Rosario (DC United)
Player of the Tournament (Lower Division): Ty Shipalane (Carolina RailHawks)
Final: Bill Hamid (DC United)
Semifinals: Joe Willis (DC United)
Quarterfinals: Darlington Nagbe (Portland Timbers)
Fourth Round: Dwayne De Rosario (DC United)
Third Round: Frederic Piquionne (Portland Timbers)
Second Round: Brandon Fricke (Des Moines Menace)
First Round: David Geno (Seattle Sounders U23)
Preliminary Round: Gustavo Villalobos (FC Hasental) |
A couple weeks ago I spent a large amount of time with the nice people from NVIDIA at their SIGGRAPH booth. They were kind enough to indulge me in answering a couple of questions about their Tesla technology and a bit about what they have in store for the future.
Tesla is essentially a high-end workstation GPU with all of its video ports and drawing responsibilities stripped off of it. This might sound a little odd, but unhooking the card from its drawing responsibilities gives you nearly 500 cores with nothing to do but crunch numbers. These cores are then multi-threaded out to equal nearly 5000 cores. Hook that to their top-end workstation GPU, the NVIDIA Quadro 6000, and what you have is extremely precise computational potential at a blazing hot speed.
Tesla specs
Tesla C2070 Tesla C2050 Peak double precision floating point performance 515 Gigaflops 515 Gigaflops Peak single precision floating point performance 1030 Gigaflops 1030 Gigaflops CUDA cores 448 448 Memory size (GDDR5) 6 GigaBytes 3 GigaBytes Memory bandwidth *(ECC off) 144 GBytes/sec 144 GBytes/sec Display support Dual-link DVI-I
Max display resolution @ 60 Hz: 2560×1600
Why would you want this, though? This is not a setup for everyday computer users and gamers, that’s for certain. In gaming, things are happening so fast, you only need an overall sense of “pretty.” By pretty, I mean as long as everything looks alright on your monitor, everything is going well. If your GPU is botching a pixel here or there, no big deal. You can still get the frag.
However, when working with extremely precise dynamic particles or biochemistry simulations, you can’t settle for “pretty.” Everything has to be dead-on accurate. This is where a Tesla and Quadro solution can really shine—particularly if you need to be working in real time.
The question of multiple monitors
Tactfully, mind you, I also asked the following: “What if I would like a three monitor setup?” The response was that NVIDIA has found that, for most people, workflow is optimized with a two-monitor setup. At any given point one tends to be ignoring the third monitor. They did, however, hint they have a multi-monitor graphic solution in the works that blows anything existing out of the water.
For more on the Tesla, you can read up at NVIDIA. |
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!!! UPDATE: Read the Europol Press Release here !!!
– Estimated 5 billion euros in damage for European taxpayers
– Massive fraud involving criminal networks / Middle East
Hat tip Reader Dirk H.
Here’s more proof that trading of CO2 emission certificates is fraught with fraud and attracts seedy criminal organizations – all costing the consumers and taxpayers billions.
Worse yet, it has spread out of control and appears that the authorities can’t keep up.
The Austrian online Kleine Zeitung here reports that Europol have raided an elaborate CO2 emissions scam in Italy and have arrested more than 100 persons.
The Kleine Zeitung writes: “The damage runs in the billions of euros”.
According to Europol, the Italian tax authorities, directed by the Milan Prosecutor’s Office, have raided 150 companies in Italy. The fraud involves evasion of value added tax with CO2 emission certificates. More than 100 have been arrested and are suspected of being involved in organised crime.
The Kleiner Zeitung reports that the Italian Electric Utilities trading markets had earlier halted entire trading with emissions certificates “because a high number of abnormal transactions”. The loss in tax revenue just from VAT (MTIC (Missing Trader IntraCommunity Fraud) alone is estimated to be 500 million euros, the online Kleine Zeitung writes.
The fraud is widespread
According to reports, it’s been known since June of last year that criminal organizations have been using CO2-emissions trading for defrauding governments of value added tax.
This is not the first time that police raids of this scale have taken place. It’s the latest in a series of raids that have been carried out all over Europe this year, all involving the trading of CO2 emission certificates. It seems the authorities just can’t keep up with the multitudes of swindlers out there.
Norway, Switzerland and the EU countries Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Latvia, the Netherlands, Slovak Republic and Portugal are all among the countries trying to identify the network of criminals behind this massive fraud – a fraud with links to criminal networks operating outside the EU and in other continents, like the Middle East.
2500 investigators – trying to identify. That’s means they haven’t yet. That’s a lot of fraud. The fraud has spread from science to finance. Expect a meltdown – sooner than later.
UPDATE 2: Recall this Danish fraud: http://climaterealists.com/index.php?id=6790 |
The owner of a Plano diner has been arrested by the Collin County Sheriff's Office and charged with possession of child pornography, according to the department and various media outlets. Richard Butterly is one of 15 men arrested as part of Operation Medusa, "a weeklong multi-agency investigation into the online sexual exploitation of children," according to the sheriff's office.
Butterly has been charged with possession of child pornography. In an interview with D Magazine, a manager at the restaurant confirmed Butterly's arrest.
I reached the restaurant’s manager, James Wells, this morning. He said the arrest took place last week. “I didn’t know about it until yesterday when it hit the Collin County Facebook page,” Wells says. “I talked to him last night, and he admitted he’d been arrested and said it was a mistake. He has an attorney, and the attorney said it was a mistake, and they are going to get it all cleared up.” |
This male Crepidual has unfortunately stumbled across a pack of ravenous spear prods. You can learn more about those guys in a old post I did called “spear prods”
Crepidual are Protandrous Hermaphrodites. Born asexual. As they develop their first stage in life is male. Once large enough they will become female. Females are nearly twice the size of their male counterparts.
Do to the size disparity male are unable to mount their behemoth brides. The Horn like protuberance, though used for defense in females, actually houses the genitalia of the Crepidual during the male stage of life. The fan like genitalia can extend twice the length of his body to reach his mate’s gonopore at the base of her abdomen. As he develops into a female, the male genitalia will begin to shrink and keratin will turn the once hollow genital capsule into a thick strong horn. |
Update 4/19/17: It looks like this feature is now rolling out more widely.
Yesterday we got our first look at a Play Store design tweak currently rolling out to some that changes the look of search results. In addition to that change, it appears that Google is now slowly rolling out a design update that looks similar to what we saw in a leaked “dogfood” version of the Play Store last month…
Amazon Kindle Paperwhite
The screenshots seen below, taken by @YTSecurity, appears to show a finalized version of the My Apps section redesign. The outgoing version currently has three tabs: installed, all, and beta. The new version has now separated apps that have updates available into their own tab, has kept the installed tab, all has now been changed to library, and there is still the tab that lists all of the apps that you are testing beta versions of.
Best of all, there is now the option to sort apps within the installed and library tabs by alphabetical order, last updated, last used, and by size.
If you aren’t seeing this update just yet, don’t worry. Much like most of Google’s updates, this appears to be a staged rollout that is taking place server-side. The user who took these screenshots tells me that they’re using version 7.06.08.N-all[0] [PR] 149245622 of the Play Store on a Nexus 6P running Android 7.1.2. This is the same version that I currently have installed but I haven’t received any changes yet.
Hopefully, we will see this reach more devices over the coming weeks. |
The Essential Guide to Motorcycle Travel Reading time: about 1 minute. American
Books
Safety
The Essential Guide to Motorcycle Travel is a highly acclaimed motorcycle touring guide book by Dale Coyner, it comes widely recommended and I’d strongly suggest grabbing a copy if you have any plans to spend some of your summer going cross country on two wheels.
The book is divided into four main sections:
Section 1: Planning Your Trip
Section 2: Preparing Yourself
Section 3: Outfitting Your Bike
Section 4: On The Road
Each section covers everything you need to know to avoid making rookie mistakes and the book is written in an approachable, engaging style. You can grab a paperback edition of the book for somewhere in the region of $25 USD, making it a cheap investment if you’d like to ensure that your trip isn’t a disaster.
Grab your copy here
Official Blurb
This book is written to help motorcyclists prepare themselves and their motorcycles for traveling long distances over extended periods. Whether you are getting ready for a weekend trip beyond your home turf or for a transcontinental odyssey lasting several years, Coyner’s book details the fundamentals for riding in comfort, safety, and convenience. In three major sections, the book covers trip planning, rider preparation, and outfitting the motorcycle. An appropriate level of planning for a long motorcycle trip can help maximize enjoyment and minimize irritating annoyances on the road. Coyner lays out the steps for planning a worry-free, fun trip. Over 250 full-color photographs illustrate riding gear, accessories, and modifications that will make any motorcycle adventure the trip of a lifetime. |
The judgment of senior Twickenham officials is under fresh scrutiny after Mike Tindall had his ejection from England's elite squad dismissed on appeal. Tindall had his fine for his behaviour in Queenstown during the World Cup reduced from £25,000 to £15,000. The decision further erodes Rob Andrew's position as the Rugby Football Union's elite rugby director.
Tindall's contract is due to finish at the end of next month and he is unlikely to be included in the Six Nations squad but this verdict is considerably less draconian than the original. The Rugby Players Association, which supported Tindall's appeal, described the original sanction as "extraordinary" and "unprecedented".
The decision handed down by Martyn Thomas, the acting RFU chief executive, did not exonerate the Gloucester centre but indicated that the punishment delivered by Andrew, following an investigation by Karena Vleck, the union's legal and governance director, had been flawed.
"We accept there were mitigating factors which do not appear to have been taken into account to the extent that they might otherwise have been," said Thomas. "Mike did not intentionally mislead the RFU team management when he stated he could not remember where he was on the night of 11 September and that he was relying on other people's versions of events which were relayed to him."
Thomas also said Tindall had been reprimanded for excessive drinking. He said: "There was no evidence of any suggestion of sexual impropriety of any nature with the woman in question and we accept the fact she is a family friend whom he has known for a long time."
Thomas also took into account Tindall's expression of "deep regret" during the appeal, as well as the apology he issued to Martin Johnson and the team "for the events which unfolded as a consequence". His good off-field record during his Test career also counted in his favour, although the 33-year-old was not spared from criticism. "It is important to stress that we believe Mike's behaviour fell way below that to be expected of somebody of his calibre and experience," said Thomas. "He exposed himself to a very compromising position and exposed the rest of the team to damaging publicity."
Tindall's conduct may yet be taken into account when it comes to selection for the Six Nations squad. "We wish to make it clear that this decision does not prevent those deciding the composition of the EPS squad from taking into account this incident when making that decision," said Thomas, who spent the weekend considering his verdict.
Andrew said Tindall's conduct deserved serious censure and described his behaviour as "unacceptable" in his original statement. "We have considered all the evidence carefully and interviewed the players at length. These actions have not been taken lightly but we believe that in all these cases the sanctions are commensurate with the level of seriousness of what occurred," he said this month. Others argued that Tindall was a scapegoat.
Whether or not the player extends his 75-cap career, during which he has scored 14 tries and earned an MBE for the 2003 World Cup triumph, the reduced sanction looks certain to heap further pressure on Andrew. The RFU management board meets on Tuesday to discuss leaks from the three reviews conducted into England's World Cup failure. Andrew has made clear he does not consider himself entirely responsible for on-field problems but the management's failure to deal adequately with the Queenstown fall-out and an incident involving a hotel chambermaid in Dunedin had significant effects.
With Johnson and the backs coach, Brian Smith, having resigned and Thomas set to leave the union next month, Andrew's supporters argue that someone needs to stay to put in place short-term plans for the Six Nations. There is no question, however, that Tindall's reinstatement further undermines the RFU's battered credibility. |
Story highlights Mark Bauerlein: NY Times reflexively mis-characterized Justice Dept.'s affirmative action initiative as discrimination against whites
He says liberals uncomfortable facing 'Asian factor' in college admissions and with Trump administration transgressing progressive sacred principle
Mark Bauerlein is a professor of English at Emory University, senior editor of the journal "First Things" and author of "The Dumbest Generation: How the Digital Age Stupefies Young Americans and Jeopardizes Our Future; Or, Don't Trust Anyone Under 30." The opinions expressed in this commentary are his own.
(CNN) If you doubt that affirmative action policies in college admissions need a bright dose of sunlight, just read the first sentence of The New York Times story that purported to reveal a new Justice Department initiative to examine those policies. The story, which the administration has disputed, asserts that the aim of the Trump administration is to investigate and sue schools over actions that "discriminate against white applicants."
Mark Bauerlein
Do you see the problem? It's a common one in liberal defenses of affirmative action. We realize it in an admission a few sentences later in the story. The Justice Department document that The Times has obtained, you see, says nothing about white people. In fact, the document doesn't identify any specific victim of affirmative action, only the procedures of "intentional race-based discrimination."
Now, most people assume, as the Times reporter does, that white applicants are the ones who suffer when schools lower the bar for minority students. When the Supreme Court decided against Abigail Fisher in her challenge to affirmative action policies at the University of Texas, the interim president of the University of Houston Downtown predicted that while "moral order has been restored in the universe, there will be more aggrieved whites." A journalist for The Root cast threats to affirmative action as the restoration of "white-collar white supremacy."
JUST WATCHED Late night airs white discrimination PSA spoof Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Late night airs white discrimination PSA spoof 01:21
When we look at affirmative action policies at selective institutions, though, it isn't whites who will benefit the most if they are restricted. It is, potentially, Asians. In 2004, a Princeton University study of 124,000 applications to elite selective institutions, looked at SAT scores and found that "Asians experience the greatest disadvantage in admissions vis-à-vis other comparable racial/ethnic groups." The researchers claimed that being Asian is "comparable to a loss of 50 SAT points."
The big surprise in the study was that Asians had to score significantly higher than whites, as well as blacks and Hispanics. Despite having a higher average SAT score, Asians have lower odds of admission than do "comparable whites."
Read More |
Hugo Lloris has hailed Tottenham Hotspur’s performance in their 2-0 victory over Manchester City and said hard work is behind the London’s club’s excellent start to the season.
Tottenham are the only unbeaten side in the Premier League after the opening seven fixtures following their triumph over City at White Hart Lane. The hosts fully deserved the three points on the back of a high-energy and fully-committed display and go into the international break just one point behind Pep Guardiola’s side, although Lloris believes they can still improve.
Pochettino outwits Guardiola by pressing Eriksen into Spurs midfield role Read more
“Following last season, I think we are still learning, we are a young team, we have a lot of talent,” he said.
“We have some strong basics which help us to get confident in this type of game and I think we were rewarded because we worked so hard. Every day this gives us enjoyment.
“Of course it is easier to speak after a good performance and a good win but it is too early to speak about this season. There is still a lot of games to play and we are just focusing on the start which has been very good and after the international break we need to keep going, to keep working in the same way and we will see after half the season where we will be and what our ambitions are.”
Having finished last season with the best defence in the league, Tottenham have yet to concede a goal from open play and Lloris believes that is a testament to their organisation under Mauricio Pochettino. “It is our basics, to be strong at the back. It does not mean we are a defensive team,” he said.
“We try a lot and we take a lot of risks and we try to play as high as possible on the pitch. We try to put pressure on teams, especially in the first half – this is our football style. We try to have options, to sometimes play deeper and to counter attack. Football is always about spirit, about the team performance and this was perfect.
“As long as we keep the same mentality and spirit – we have ambition. In football you need respect for your opponents and that is why you need to keep working hard every day. We have a young team with a lot of talent but we need to make sure every day we are not changing our minds but are being the same. We are enjoying our time here.” |
Charlie Bostwick can’t build houses fast enough.
Every speculative home he’s started in the past two years has sold before he’s finished building it. “There’s more demand than product right now,” said Bostwick, one of the owners of Brightwater Homes in Sandy Springs.
Though the numbers are still down substantially from the boom, new housing starts in metro Atlanta are on the rise — particularly in certain areas. More residential construction is going on in Buckhead, Brookhaven, East Cobb, South Forsyth, North Fulton and parts of Gwinnett than in the past five years .
In 2012, 8,288 new homes were started in metro Atlanta, a 53 percent increase over 2011, according to Eugene James at Metrostudy. But the trend is even better. In the last three months of 2012, housing starts were up 91.2 percent over the last three months of 2011.
Experts say existing homes that were in foreclosure or in desirable areas have been snapped up.
“We had an oversupply a long time ago, and it caused building to subside. We had to get rid of extra houses, and we’ve done that,” James said. “Builders had absolutely no choice but to start building again.”
Despite the uptick, the landscape has changed for builders: The region’s housing market is being recalibrated to provide fewer new homes overall. The metro area churned out 60,000 new homes a year during the housing boom, but analysts say the region will be lucky to have an economy that sustains 25,000 new homes a year in the years ahead.
Even with the lower number, new home construction benefits the metro region, including those who aren’t in the market to buy.
In addition to the jobs that new construction brings to the area, it can kick-start the area economy as builders buy supplies and new homeowners buy insurance, take out loans and buy new furniture. The spending ripples throughout the region.
New homes in an area also can help to raise the prices of existing homes — as long as the houses that are built are constructed at a higher price-point than existing homes.
Of course, that isn’t always the case. In the Marseille community in southwest Forsyth, homes were originally built to sell between $500,000 and $600,000, said Caroline Simmel, the director of marketing for Edward Andrews Homes. New construction is priced lower — an average of $390,000.
“It’s a correction,” she said. “It’s about being more accessible to the market.”
Edward Andrews Homes has been buying lots in existing, unfinished developments, Simmel said. Even if the price point of a home is lower than its neighbors, it can still help a community by building in an area filled with empty lots.
In many areas of Atlanta, building is still slow or nonexistent — and will likely stay that way.
The new construction recovery has been slower in the outer-ring suburbs and areas south of the city. In areas where there is still a large, affordable supply of homes, there is less incentive to build new.
The aftermath of the Great Recession lingers, but at least there’s been improvement, said David Ellis, executive vice president of the Greater Atlanta Home Builders Association.
“If you haven’t eaten for a while, anything you eat tastes pretty good,” he said. “It’s probably better, but we’re still not close to using terms like ‘healthy.’”
Ellis said many home buyers want new construction, so they can pick out details like colors and cabinets. But when people are nervous about their job stability, they are less likely to go out and buy a new house. As people have become more confident, he said, they have been more willing to make a big investment, whether it is a first-time buyer moving out of an apartment, or a family moving into a larger home.
While the construction that is happening is primarily taking place in specific areas, where schools are good and there’s a strong sense of community, Ellis said he expects it to spread. Builders say the supply of available lots in coveted areas is dwindling.
“As the super-attractive areas are built out, there’s still going to be a need for housing,” Ellis said.
If metro Atlantans were to continue to buy homes at the same rate, the region would run out of available houses in three months. It’s the lowest supply of homes on the market since the 1990s, said John Hunt, a senior analyst with Smart Numbers. Builders also say it’s still hard to get loans for speculative construction.
Builders like Stephen Palmer, the chief financial officer of Home South Communities, said his company is starting to look at undeveloped land, where there’s no existing infrastructure, as available lots are sold off.
Eventually, a new normal might be 25,000 housing starts a year, said James from Metrostudy. It might take as many as five years to reach that pace, he said, but it will happen.
“We’ve seen a very steady, progressive upward trend,” said Ellis. “We’ve got our feet under us. Things are going in the right direction.” |
Sports fans rate White Sox the best Chicago-area experience
hello
The Chicago White Sox has eclipsed the Chicago Fire in giving fans the best experience, according to a J.D. Power survey. Associated Press, 2016
The White Sox ranked No. 1 in fan satisfaction among Chicago-area professional sports teams, knocking the Chicago Fire down a spot from last year's rankings, in a recent J.D. Power survey.
Throughout the past year, California-based data analysis group J.D. Power questioned 9,276 sports fans about their overall experience through seven factors, J.D. Power Senior Director of Sports Research Greg Truex said.
Fan satisfaction was evaluated, in order of importance, on seating area and game experience, security and ushers, leaving the game, arriving at the game, food and beverage, ticket purchase, and souvenirs and merchandise.
In Chicago after the White Sox, the Fire, Blackhawks, Bulls, Cubs and lastly Bears followed.
"We know teams with winning records generally do not have problems filling seats, but this study is about finding out which teams are giving their fans the best experience for their dollar," Truex said. "Whether a team is a perennial champion, a contender or is accumulating draft picks to build for the future, they all need to find ways to get people through the turnstiles. The teams at the top of their markets understand what it takes to keep fans coming back for more, as well as recommending the experience to friends and family, regardless of the standings."
The White Sox scored highest in game arrival, ticket purchase, food and beverage, and fans' experience leaving the game.
Findings in Chicago indicated that despite the Cubs' storybook season in 2016, Wrigley Field still isn't living up to fan expectations, particularly when it comes to the food and beverages, according to the release.
The Bears fell to the bottom of the rankings, with the lowest scores across the board.
Treux said he hopes teams will use this information to create a better experience for the fans who are volunteering their time and money to support their favorite professional teams.
"Consumers like myself and yourself, we have a choice when it comes to our entertainment dollars," he said.
"Top performers in this study show that they really understand what it's like to give a world-class experience to their fans," Truex said. "These results have to make NFL teams sit up and take notice -- particularly when coupled with their sagging TV ratings. The league needs to learn what is influencing their low scores and how they can be improved so that pro football is able to retain its overwhelming popularity."
Katiesmithdh@gmail.com |
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Congressional Democrats were in an understandably celebratory mood after the shutdown schemes of Ted Cruz and the Tea Party went so awry that conservative stalwarts like Representative Sean Duffy were admitting, “Big picture: I think this was a horrible strategy.” What was horrible in the eyes of the Grand Old Partisans wasn’t the damage done to public services, the economy or confidence in the “full faith and credit” of the United States. It was the political cost: by the time Republicans allowed the government to reopen, the party’s favorability rating had fallen ten points—to 28 percent, the lowest level recorded for a major party since Gallup began asking the question in 1992. Ad Policy
Those self-inflicted wounds could be severe. Democrats like Virginia gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe are experiencing immediate benefits, and others could come out ahead in 2014. Republicans once presumed that election cycle would hand them control of the Senate, where twenty-one Democratic seats are up for election, versus just fourteen GOP seats. Now, however, Democratic senators who were seen as vulnerable are ahead in the polls and open-seat races in states like Iowa and Michigan are trending Democratic. In House races, likely voters—turned off not just by the shutdown but by broader patterns of GOP obstruction and extremism—say by wide margins that they prefer Democratic control. No wonder Senator John McCain was saying, even before the collapse of the shutdown strategy, “Republicans have to understand, we have lost this battle.”
But McCain said “battle,” not war. The 2014 election is a long way off, and Democrats have an uphill fight in many districts because of GOP gerrymandering. More generally, while Democrats have an opening, theirs is still a party with a rare talent for snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. That’s what Paul Ryan is counting on. The House Budget Committee chair, who let Cruz and others grab the limelight (and the blame) during the shutdown, is now back at center stage as the essential Republican on the conference committee created as part of the agreement to end the shutdown. That committee is supposed to reach a deal by mid-December, just in time to avert another shutdown. Ryan is already restating his oft-rejected proposals for “reforms to entitlement programs”—and he’s not being laughed out of the room by the Democrats. President Obama and Senate Budget Committee chair Patty Murray have been too willing to find “common ground” with the GOP, as Murray put it. In the search for that common ground, Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid could be undermined.
This is precisely what Republicans are angling for. They don’t need much to get back in the game. Ryan would be more than happy to settle for an agreement that opens the way for partial privatization of those programs, as well as some movement toward vouchers, means testing and an increase in the retirement age.
Democrats should be capitalizing on their stronger position by demanding a budget that fits the needs of the moment: one that ends the painful cuts caused by sequestration, invests in infrastructure and job creation, and provides desperately needed resources to state and local governments. Democrats and their allies must recognize that their current advantage is not guaranteed or permanent, and it is not so fail-safe that the party can abandon principle in the shaping of a budget deal. They now have an opportunity to redefine the debate fundamentally, away from the absurd focus on deficit-cutting—the deficit is actually plummeting—and toward the real crisis of our time: high unemployment and record inequality.
Last week, the editors wrote about the GOP's shutdown strategy. |
SpaceX CEO Elon Musk speaks after unveiling the Dragon V2 spacecraft in Hawthorne, California May 29, 2014. (REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni)
If you're in the space launch business, the U.S. military is a very juicy client. The Pentagon regularly needs to deliver satellites into orbit, and has the budget to pay handsomely for the service. But as it stands now, the contract for most launches is locked up by United Launch Alliance, or ULA, a joint venture between mega-contractors Boeing and Lockheed Martin. ULA was the only entity certified to compete for a contract to supply 36 rockets it was selected for in December of last year.
Elon Musk's SpaceX doesn't like that status quo. In fact, it's so frustrated it sued the Air Force this spring, arguing it could provide rockets for launch at a better price and should be considered as an option. "We just think the law of the land is competition," Musk said about the suit at a press event in June. “There’s no legitimate reason why there shouldn’t be competition."
Even as the suit continues, SpaceX is in the certification process and says it expects it to be complete by the end of the year, but government officials say that timeline represents the most optimistic scenario. The certification process was implemented in 2011, and is a multi-step endeavor including the successful completion of prior launches and evaluations of the rocket's design, safety systems, manufacturing and engineering processes, as well as launch facilities.
But there's reason to believe things aren't going as smoothly as SpaceX might hope: The Air Force is currently examining several anomalies that occurred in the company's three civilian space flights, according to Bloomberg report earlier this week -- including "unacceptable fuel reserves" at some point during one launch and a fire on an engine structure during a December flight.
The launches were still certified as successful even with the anomalies, but the Air Force's focus on "mission assurance" means it places a lot of scrutiny on the engineering practices of suppliers. To understand why, a brief history lesson is in order -- one that will take us all the way back to the late 1990's, when the U.S. space industry suffered a string of major launch failures.
"Between '97 to '99 we had significant failures both on the military and on the commercial side," Air Force Space Commander William Shelton explained to a Senate Armed Services subcommittee last week during a hearing on maintaining U.S. access to space. That disastrous string included three failed military launches that lost payloads totaling over $3 billion and two civilian launch failures.
In response, President Clinton asked for an inquiry into the sources of the issue, which was carried out by former Air Force chief of staff General Larry Welch. The resulting broad area review reports blamed much of the problem on mishaps related to contractor work, saying "factory-introduced engineering and workmanship errors predominate."
The review recommended the government tighten its oversight of the U.S. launch industry, enhancing partnerships and establishing clear accountability for mission success going forward.
"We had adjusted our approach to mission assurance from what has traditionally been deep oversight into just insight," Shelton explained in the recent hearing. "We pretty much just gave it over to the contractors to provide their own mission assurance -- and we found out that just didn't work well for us." After adjusting course, the military has managed to significantly improve its trackrecord -- now claiming 72 straight successes.
SpaceX rockets have delivered payloads for the International Space station and completed other successful civilian launches. But while most launches require significant and financial resources, government officials argue that military launches require the utmost scrutiny because of the potential national security fall out of a failure.
Military satellites has "significantly different and generally more stringent launch vehicle requirements than” civilian payloads, according to the Air Force paper on its examination of anomalies in SpaceX civilian launches. "The loss of even one national security payload both in terms of financial loss and operational impact would make our mission assurance costs look like very cheap insurance," Shelton told the subcommittee last week.
However, there's also a sense of urgency to introduce additional avenues for launch into the military pipeline. The engine for ULA's Atlas 5 rocket, which is used in many military launches, is built in Russia -- and U.S.-Russian space relations have become increasingly strained as tensions mount in eastern Ukraine.
In May, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin announced the country would no longer supply engines for use by the U.S. military. A Pentagon spokesperson at the time told reporters that ULA had enough rockets for scheduled launches over the next two years, enough to cover the transition to the Delta rocket which uses a U.S. produced engine.
But the situation still concerns some members of Congress, who raised alarms about the potential of a worst case scenario were diplomatic relations with Russia were to entirely deteriorate at last week's subcommittee. "We simply cannot rely on the vicissitudes of a foreign supplier in a foreign nation for our national security, therefore we must do what it takes to reduce our reliance on foreign engines," Sen. Ted Cruz (R, Tex.) declared during the hearing.
Cruz encouraged the government to consider "expediting" introducing more competition into the military launch process. But the timeline for when SpaceX would be part of that process remains in flux -- much to the consternation of Musk.
“I don’t understand what’s taking so long,” he said in June. “The Falcon 9 obviously works. It’s not as though the Air Force is changing the design of the rocket. They’re really just learning about it. That’s what the certification process is."
But the failures of the late '90s likely weigh heavy on the minds of Pentagon officials charged with the certification process. While SpaceX president Gwynne Shotwell earlier expressed hope that the certification process for the Falcon 9 would be completed by the end of the year, recent reports say Air Force officials believe a spring or summer 2015 timeline is more likely.
"Having additional certified competitors in the marketplace will help lower the costs to delivery payloads into space and, of course, drive innovation." Sen. Mark Udall (D-Colo.) said in last week's hearing. "We must also ensure those providers though are able to meet the technical requirements necessary to ensure mission assurance." |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - In a setback to the U.S. government’s long-running policy of converting abandoned railroads into public trails, the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday ruled for a Wyoming property owner who objected to a plan to extend a pathway across his land.
In a decision that could affect similar cases across the United States, the court ruled on an 8-1 vote that the right-of-way across Marvin Brandt’s land that was established by a railroad was extinguished when the railroad was later abandoned.
As a result, the U.S. Forest Service cannot build a public trail along a half-mile stretch of the railroad that crosses Brandt’s land in Fox Park. The land is in the Medicine Bow National Forest, about 40 miles west of Laramie, Wyoming.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in her dissenting opinion that the decision “undermines the legality of thousands of miles of former rights of way that the public now enjoys as means of transportation and recreation.”
She said the court’s decision could lead to more expensive litigation over other trails, including compensation claims filed by landowners.
The railroad in question, the Laramie, Hahn’s Peak and Pacific Railroad Co, was 66 miles long, running from Laramie to the Colorado border. The line was formally abandoned in 2004, prompting the U.S. government to seek title so it could transform the land into a trail, as it has done to former railroads throughout the country since the 1980s.
There is currently a 21-mile (34-km) trail that includes a detour around Brandt’s property.
The Rails to Trails Conservancy, which backed the government in the case, had previously said a ruling for Brandt could affect popular trails, including the George S. Mickelson Trail in South Dakota and the Rio Grande Trail in Colorado.
There are currently about 20,000 miles of so-called rail trails, according to the conservancy. Some, including those that run through federally-owned land, would not be affected by the decision.
But Kevin Mills, the group’s senior vice president of policy and trail development, said the ruling would make certain trail projects “more vulnerable to litigation from adjoining landowners.”
Writing for the majority, Chief Justice John Roberts rejected the government’s claim that the right of way reverted to the government once the railroad ceased operating.
He said that the terms of the agreement that allowed Brandt to assume ownership of his land from the federal government in 1976 largely determined the outcome. The contract made no mention of the right-of-way switching to the government, Roberts said.
The case is Brandt v. United States, U.S. Supreme Court, 12-1173. |
Too Much Money The biggest heist in the history of St. Louis started out as a slick caper—and fell into comedy.
SECURITY GUARDS ARE TRAINED TO NOTICE THINGS, and a car blasting rap with heavy bass at 5:20 a.m., parked across from the ATM Solutions building on Grandel Square, was hard to miss. Still, it was more annoying than ominous. Michael Smith reached into his pocket for the building keys, bullets for his Smith & Wesson clutched in his other fist. He lived in Illinois, so he never loaded until he reached work.
As he walked toward the door, he heard a scuffle of feet, moving fast. When he turned, two men in black masks and clothes were running across the parking lot, straight at him.
Smith hurled his bullets and keys at them and ran. If he could make it around the building to the shadows in back…
They reached him first. One of them shoulder-checked him into the concrete building, took his gun from his pocket, and struck him across the cheek with the butt of a dull silver semiautomatic pistol.
When he opened his eyes, there were four men, not two. All armed. The shortest waving an AR-15 military-style rifle.
It wasn’t hard to pick out the leader. He didn’t cuss or use slang the way the others did. He had a sense of self-assurance.
And he wanted the vault opened.
“It’s on a timer—you need two people to enter different codes,” Smith said.
“Bullshit!” one of the men yelled, and they began arguing.
“No, we can wait,” the leader said. “Take the tape out of the security camera.”
There was no tape; it was a DVR. They saw a disc inside and broke it—not realizing that the footage was intact.
At 5:50 a.m., the second guard, Alan Knarr—older, a nice guy, just months from retirement—came in the door as usual, and a man in what he later called “a ninja costume” shoved a long-barreled gun in his face. Knarr looked over and saw Smith, his hands crossed in front of him and secured with duct tape.
Knarr slowly punched in his code, and the vault door swung open.
There was too much money.
Bundles of mainly $20 bills, bagged in clear plastic and stacked high on carts. Fifty or sixty bags full—way more money than they could squeeze into their Grand Prix getaway car. They’d just had its windows tinted, too. Now what? They’d have to steal one of ATM Solutions’ armored vans.
Load the money, they told Knarr, and start the ignition. “Be cool, old man,” the leader added, “and you won’t be hurt.” A manager would be there by 6 a.m., Knarr warned, and the leader yelled at the others to hurry. The minute the cash was loaded, he slid behind the wheel and revved the engine.
Another vehicle was in the way. He tried to back out but banged into the door frame, tried again and ran into a push cart, pulled forward a third time and zoomed out—whacking the side mirror off the van.
Ripping the tape from his hands, Smith ran to the landline in the vault room. He was calling 911 when the branch manager walked in.
They assessed the damage. Five million had already been packaged and counted the previous Friday, the manager said—plus there was a second bin with money picked up Friday and not yet counted. In time, they’d calculate the grand total: $6.6 million. In weight, about 1,000 pounds of money. All of it gone.
Four masked men—the press would literally refer to them as “bandits”—had just committed the biggest heist in the history of St. Louis.
SMITH WAS RIGHT when he decided that the guy with the smooth diction and shaved head was the leader.
John Wesley Jones, also known as “Face,” was 35 years old at the time of the robbery—August 2, 2010. He stood well over 6 feet tall, and a tattoo ran down the side of his face, heading toward his thick-muscled neck. Just two weeks earlier, he’d been released from parole. He’d done time for burglary, robbery, and possession of marijuana and a loaded handgun, and he’d made a name for himself in a Kentucky prison by trying to escape (switching his ID armband with another prisoner’s).
Jones grew up rough and talked smooth; he was capable of violence and practiced at intimidation, but he could charm a woman into just about anything, and he enjoyed the role of mentor. (A manager at the Amanda Luckett Murphy Hopewell Center was about to regret calling him an “inspiration to young men” who needed a role model.) He tended to hang out at places—a hair salon, a car-detailing place—the way other people go to a day job. Beefy and imposing, he was handy to have around; one glance in his direction, and customers weren’t going to complain too loudly. But he wanted to do more than stand guard. A childhood friend would tell police that Face was always “looking for a lick,” restless to steal something.
Face had plotted this one with a 23-year-old who stayed across the street from him on Fair Avenue, Myron “Pie” Kimble. They talked to a former ATM Solutions employee, and she told them how things worked. After following a few ATM vans on routes, they decided that it made more sense to hit the vault.
But just before the heist, they argued. Kimble wanted to go home and be with his girlfriend, who’d said in coy, honeyed tones that she was missing him. Jones wanted him to stay put so they could wait together like soldiers before a military op.
So Kimble went AWOL and Jones paired up with Ryechine Money (yep, that’s his legal surname).
Each man brought along a protegé. For Jones, it was 19-year-old Larry Romel Newman. His nickname was sweet—“Li’l Larry”—but he had “head” tattooed on one forearm and “busta” on the other to cut the sugar. “He and Face were tight,” Kimble says, “almost father-son tight.”
For Money, whose nickname was “Wicked” but who was a little chubby, loved music, and had a pretty benign reputation, the young ’un was Aaron Hassan “Laron” Johnson.
Pumped with adrenaline and exhilaration, the four sped away from ATM Solutions, heading for a house on Page Avenue where Face’s new girlfriend lived.
FACE STEERED THE VAN into Latunya Wright’s small alley garage, scraping the door frame and knocking off the other side-view mirror. When the van’s engine stopped, everybody jumped out, relieved and excited and—“Who’s got the keys?”
They’d locked themselves out of the van and had to smash a window to get back inside. Quickly, they unloaded the money. Then Jones had the young’uns drive the van several blocks away, to Evans Avenue, and ditch it.
By now, Kimble had learned that the heist he’d helped orchestrate was going down without him, so he showed up at the Page house, too. “Man, she didn’t say there was going to be this much!” he said, taking in the stacks of cash.
“Bro, we didn’t even get all of it,” Face told him.
They tore off the purple and white currency bands, bundle by bundle. Started counting. Stopped.
That afternoon, they drove to Prime Sole on New Halls Ferry and celebrated by buying four pairs of Air Jordans—and a wee pair of Nike Dunks for Johnson’s new baby.
Back at the house on Page, the multi-millionaires ate Imo’s pizza and fried chicken and made their plans. They’d need to stay low. Wicked started cutting off his dreadlocks. “Don’t worry about that now,” Face said. “Wait till we get to Miami.”
They’d take a little money with them, maybe $200,000. They’d be chauffeured by two strippers Jones and Money knew. They already had a place to stay.
Except for the shock of all that money, everything was rolling according to plan.
BACK ON THE RIGHT SIDE OF THE LAW, FBI agents and city detectives had teamed up, and they had a few good leads to follow.
Around 7:15 a.m., a woman had been driving to her mother’s house to drop off her toddler. She was talking to her mom on the phone when she heard a police helicopter. Just as her mother said chattily, “There was a big robbery at ATM Solutions,” a damaged ATM Solutions van came out of an alley and pulled in front of her car. A black Dodge Charger pulled out behind her, went around, and slid into place behind the van. Both ran a red light at Page, and she saw the Charger’s driver motioning to the van to turn left on Evans.
She called 911.
What she’d seen, no doubt, was the young’uns on their way to ditch the armored van. Around 7:30 a.m., it was found on Evans, locked but with its engine running. Scrapes suggested that it had been rammed into a small garage.
Later that morning, the getaway Grand Prix was found in front of a detailing shop on Dr. Martin Luther King Drive, also locked and with its engine running.
That night, the city fire department was called to two alley fires near the Page house. They found charred stamps (part of the ATM loot), currency bands, clothing, bits of shiny computer disc, a flip phone in four parts, and an ATM cartridge melted enough for Salvador Dalí.
At 8 the next morning, the air was already thick with heat; the temp would shoot to 102 degrees by midafternoon. Clad in jeans and bulletproof vests, detectives Roger Murphey and William Briddell canvassed the area around the bonfires, looking for a black Dodge Charger. They paused to compare notes.
A black Dodge Charger and a gold Hyundai Sonata pulled out of a driveway and sped from the alley.
The detectives took off, Murphey driving, Briddell on the radio. The driver of the Charger—though they didn’t know it yet—was John Wesley Jones.
“He went southbound in the northbound lanes of Vandeventer,” Murphey recalls, “then east on McPherson and ran a red light where it T’s into Lindell and continued to violate every light going east on Lindell. We threw the dash light up and put the siren on.” Anybody with a vested interest in such things would know that their boring silver Chevy Impala was a police car, but innocent citizens might not notice the flashing light in sunshine, so they took it easy. The Charger was weaving—other cars were skidding out of the way—and the detectives didn’t want to add to a pileup.
On Olive at Compton, the Charger clipped the front of an elderly woman’s car and kept going. At 3100 Olive, Jones took the curb like he was riding in a steeple-
chase. The Charger bobbled across a grass lot toward an alley and stopped at the fence. Jones got out, jumped onto the roof, and went over the fence.
The officers drove down Olive, cut over, and saw him running from the alley. Briddell jumped out and chased him. “Finally, he just turned around and gave up,” says Murphey. “He was out of breath.” He didn’t seem angry, though. “More…nonchalant.”
They cuffed and shackled him and opened the Charger’s trunk, and when they unzipped the black duffel bag and wheeled suitcase, money spilled out.
“Where did that come from?” Jones asked, straight-faced.
He had another $4,995 in his pocket, and a .40 caliber Sig Sauer semiautomatic pistol lay beneath a backpack on the floor of the passenger seat. The gun’s chamber was empty, but there were 10 cartridges in the magazine. Murphey and Briddell were just glad he hadn’t resisted: prison build, very buff, muscular, versus two out-of-shape 50-year-olds …
For now, they had to drop off their suspect and get back to the Page house the Charger had come from, secure it until the FBI showed up. It was easy to find, a skid of burned rubber making a path. When they reached the garage, they spotted fresh damage, like somebody had tried to pull in a vehicle too big to fit. The ATM van?
They wondered, when it was found that morning, whether they were dealing with terrorists and might find three or four dead guys locked in the van. Street robbers didn’t do million-dollar takeovers.
But they still weren’t sure they’d collared the right guy. So they waited—it took hours for the FBI to show up—and worried. It was so damned hot, it felt like their shoes were melting, fusing to the pavement. They stripped off their vests.
“This guy is going to be nothing to do with it,” Murphey thought, “and we’re in trouble. He crashed into an elderly lady!”
They waited some more. Murphey had quit smoking, but he lit up anyway.
Then his cell rang: “You guys got him!”
“Yeah, right,” Murphey said, adding a few other choice words.
“No, seriously. There was more than a million dollars in that trunk.”
WHEN THE FBI BANGED ON THE DOOR of the Page house, they got no response. Assuming it was occupied, they treated the situation as a standoff.
In came an armored tank with a helmeted rifleman poking out of its top hatch. On a bullhorn, a hostage negotiator urged anyone inside to surrender. The FBI SWAT team and city SWAT team lobbed tear gas inside, smashed windows, sent in a robot, set off flash-bangs for distraction…
Latunya Wright, on her way home, spotted all the commotion and made a quick U-turn.
Her neighbors weren’t so lucky: They were stuck inside watching the five-hour operation, sweltering behind closed windows because the power had browned out.
Dripping with sweat, agents and police officers gathered money bands and stamps, a money counter, and $250,000 they pried from under the attic insulation. There were bullets under the stove and on the living room floor.
But there wasn’t a single clue to identify the other three masked men.
Clutching leads like threads strung through a labyrinth, the investigators moved forward a step at a time. The Grand Prix traced back to Heavy Hitters, a custom-car business in Hazelwood. When investigators paid a call, they found Latunya Wright and her brother (both of whom worked, informally, for Heavy Hitters) in intense conversation with another employee. They refused to say what they’d been talking about.
Meanwhile, behind the shop where the Grand Prix was found, a barbecue smoker held more half-burned evidence: a black ski mask, two black T-shirts and a hoodie, a radio/scanner... Police were told that an officer had come earlier and retrieved a Taurus .45 caliber pistol—but he hadn’t opened the smoker’s lid.
Other tips flew in, naming people who’d been flashing money or sharing it around (and not with the tipsters). On September 7, John Wesley Jones’ sorta-estranged wife, Tameka Jones, told detectives that his girlfriend, Latunya, had brought her money to pay for a lawyer. Latunya said she’d only told law enforcement “what they needed to hear,” Tameka reported. Latunya and a few friends she called her “Girl Scouts” had put cash into vacuum-sealed bags and hidden it in a storage locker rented in the name of “a Christian person.” She was, she told Tameka, having a hard time trying to hide all the money.
AFTER JONES’ ARREST, the other three masked men scattered.
Ryechine Money took some money and Jewel Dorsey (“The Stripper”) to Texas.
Aaron Johnson stayed with women in Kansas and Arkansas, then went to Houston, staying with someone called Big Homie. They burned through phones every three days or so. When Johnson bought a new phone, he’d text the new number but alter it by subtracting Big Homie’s address.
Johnson came home for the birth of his son, then hurried back to Houston.
Meanwhile, there were enough accomplices running around St. Louis to cast a reality show.
On August 20, police spotted co-conspirator Myron Kimble—they were seeking him for an unrelated offense—and chased him through Forest Park. His Cadillac Escalade sailed right into the water.
“I didn’t know it was a lake!” he’d say later. “I can’t swim! I’m seein’ ripples in the ground and thinking, ‘That’s got to be water.’ So I got out. I’m hangin’ on the door, holding on. And then I did a little doggie paddle, and then I felt the bottom.”
Kimble had lost the police or FBI—he wasn’t sure which—but he knew he couldn’t linger. “I ran through some bushes on the train tracks to a bus station and paid somebody $20 for his Arby’s work shirt. All my money was wet. He said, ‘You want this?’ ‘Yeah.’ So I put it on. He told me I had little stickybugs all in my hair.”
AND WHERE WAS THE MONEY from the largest heist in St. Louis history?
A little of it was divvied up among parents, girlfriends, and anyone who’d help hide it. Bills were paid off, shopping sprees conducted.
The feds had the money found in the Page attic and the $1.25 million seized from Jones’ Charger.
A lot more was stashed in a bunch of suitcases Latunya bought at Walmart the night of the robbery—paying with money peeled off a big roll of bills.
Why not buy them earlier? “Because we didn’t know there’d be so much money,” groaned one of the conspirators, adding that she was supposed to buy duffel bags. Who buys that many suitcases at once?
John Wesley Jones had been the leader; now he was in jail, and Latunya was his deputy. She had the chutzpah: Styling herself MzBiz, she’d built a tiny empire buying and selling cars, cash only. One of her neighbors described her as “a hustler.”
Slinging the money-stuffed suitcases into her Lexus, Latunya drove over to a girlfriend’s house. Her idea was that the reluctant friend, Yolanda Willis, would take the vehicle and its treasure cargo to a storage space for safekeeping. Meanwhile, they left the Lexus there and went shopping.
“You left it parked in her driveway, unattended?” investigators asked, incredulous.
Yep.
Gradually, the circle widened to friends of friends and friends’ relatives. The detectives would struggle to keep them straight, what with Tasha and Posha, Candi and Suggar, Bright Eyes and The Stripper… Hiding places shifted. Johnson’s girlfriend’s sister overheard him saying there’d been too much money even to count—which spiraled his suspicion that he wasn’t going to get his share.
A sizable chunk was taken to a storage space in Bellefontaine Neighbors. But two days later, while Latunya was being interviewed by the FBI, she stepped out and made a phone call, asking Willis to go back to the storage space, cut the padlock, smash the Lexus’ window, and retrieve all the money except maybe one bag. Willis enlisted two of her uncles, whom she later accused of pocketing some of the money. “What could I do,” she’d exclaim, “tell the police they stole my stolen money?!”
One of the uncles, Robert Oliphant, would later talk about the caper, according to a cellmate. Supposedly he, too, muttered that there was “too much money” and said he’d taken as much for himself as he could fit into a saddlebag. From that stash, he gave $21,000 to someone to buy him a house—but the friend then told him the money got stolen.
The same thing happened to Latunya’s brother’s girlfriend—her stolen money got stolen.
Police found the storage unit in North County, but their bolt cutters wouldn’t slice through the padlock, so they had to call the Riverview Fire Department. When they finally got inside, the rear hatch window was shattered and there were three bags of money—one big, two small—remaining.
And the rest of the money? A big stereo speaker box was custom-made with a secret compartment that would hold $700,000. A great deal of cash was vacuum-sealed, driven to Texas, and buried beneath an outdoor bench in somebody’s former girlfriend’s back yard. Then it was dug up, hidden in a Hummer, and driven into a storage space in Atlanta.
Latunya’s brother, James Wright III, got involved. When investigators asked Yolanda Willis, she insisted that James was a “good person” with no connection to the money-hiding. They pointed to more than 25 calls between her and James August 4–6. She said she’d kept his dog for a while; the calls must’ve been about the pup.
When Face tried for a plea bargain, he said James (who seemed to grate on his nerves) was in contact with someone he called Osama in Milwaukee. Osama had offered inside information on ATM Solutions because he needed the money to fund three terrorist attacks—in Chicago, in Indianapolis, and in St. Louis.
The ATM investigation screeched to a temporary halt, and the joint terrorism task force took over. An expert in terrorist threats went in to talk to Jones.
“He very quickly came out,” recalls FBI Supervisory Special Agent Daniel Netemeyer, “and said, ‘These dots aren’t even connected.’ The best we can figure, John Jones realized that his chances for freedom were rapidly dwindling, so he came up with a story that he thought would get our attention. He was going to talk about this whole thing starting as a terrorist plot and how he was forced into it.”
Jones’ new version implicated the owner of Heavy Hitters, Sufian “Sam” Rahman, and one of his employees, Hussein “Vinny” Odeh, both of whom are from Jordan.
Heavy Hitters was, you’ll remember, the custom-car business where the getaway car was prepped, Latunya made car deals, James did occasional work, and Jones hung out. It is true that Odeh took about $20,000 of the ATM loot to Milwaukee in a shoebox. On the drive up, police stopped the vehicle because his friend was driving too slowly. Odeh told them he was bringing money to a friend in Milwaukee. They searched, found the money, and waved the men on their way with no citations.
The hollow speaker box was also reportedly driven to Milwaukee, and nobody knows—or, at least, is saying—where that money wound up. When the ATM investigation heated up, Rahman fled to Jordan. Mention was made of a plan to hide the money under an airplane wheel well, so who knows? The cash may have made it all the way to the Middle East.
JONES IS AN INVENTIVE GUY. When he was caught, he had a story ready: He’d run into a guy at a bar who asked whether he was interested in “moving some packages” for $50,000. He said yes and was met by two guys in a black Monte Carlo. They loaded the currency into his Charger and gave him $4,000 or $5,000, which he put in his pocket. Once he got downtown, the vehicle he was to meet would honk twice and flash its lights twice. He said the only reason he agreed was that he was behind on his car and house payments—and he’d only brought a gun for his own protection. Because he didn’t want to get robbed.
After hours of interviews, the feds were developing a grudging admiration for this guy. “If you looked through the crime, looked at the person, he was a decent guy,” says Netemeyer. “Of course, he was a hardened criminal, but to the core, there was some decency there. A vibrant personality. If you met him in a bar, you’d have had a conversation with him.”
“It would have been a conversation of content,” chimes in Assistant U.S. Attorney Tom Mehan. Had Jones chosen a lawful path, he adds, “I could see him as a logistics guy, solving problems. He had a Svengali approach to people.”
And he had a Houdini approach to incarceration.
While Jones was being held in the Ste. Genevieve jail, the FBI got a tip that he was plotting another escape. (He’d tried once before, in Kentucky, but fingerprints had foiled his plan.) Now he was swiftly moved to a more secure facility: the jail in Lincoln County.
Two months after the ATM Solutions heist, on November 15, 2010, Jones and a new friend, inmate Corey Durand Cross, waited for the 3 a.m. head count. When the deputies had moved on to another pod, Jones climbed onto a metal railing and through the drop ceiling in their cell block. Pushing aside the ceiling tile, he grabbed a pipe for the sprinkler system, pulled himself into a 3-foot crawl space, and waited for Cross to follow. Tearing off part of a ventilation duct, they crept along for 10 feet, reached a huge exhaust fan, used a broom handle to break its bolts loose, and emerged on the roof. They made it 5 miles on foot, then stole a truck at a gas station in Moscow Mills.
Two days later, U.S. marshals searched the Swansea home of one of Jones’ acquaintances. Netemeyer and Mehan were listening from the marshals’ St. Louis office. They heard, “Oops, we got him! He just fell through the ceiling!”
C’mon, Mehan thought. Enough with the jokes.
But John Wesley Jones had just fallen through the ceiling from the attic. He was on the floor, covered in insulation and drywall dust.
Once again, the game was up.
FOUR DAYS AFTER JONES WAS RECAPTURED, at 4 p.m. on a Sunday, two teenage girls, Latunya’s daughter and her cousin, were pulled into a car outside their grandmother’s house.
Li’l Larry Newman, 19, had been paid $50,000 for the heist, with a promise of more to come. He’d begun to think he’d been screwed. So his pal Pie, Myron Kimble, came out of hiding to help him, and they devised a plan to kidnap the girls.
“We didn’t know how young they were!” Kimble says. “We spoiled ’em. Went to Walgreens and bought one a whole new jogging outfit and panties” (she’d wet her pants in fear). “I said, ‘We’re not gonna hurt you!’”
But the FBI had no way of knowing that. The kidnappers used one of the girls’ cell phones to call the girls’ grandmother. They were asking for $50,000, delivered by Latunya’s brother, James. When the ransom dropped to $15,000, the feds realized that all they really wanted was a way to pressure James for robbery money. “I think we could have talked them down to a Cabela’s gift card,” Mehan says dryly.
He’d already been working tightly with the investigators, interceding with judges and finessing legal details so nothing would jeopardize the case. Now he was pulling all-nighters at the FBI office on Market.
“We knew from the beginning Latunya was lying to us,” he says. “That Sunday, I got a call from her lawyer, who said she’d gotten a call from James, who’d gotten a call that the girls had been kidnapped. I asked the lawyer, ‘Where are you right now?’ and he said, ‘I’m on my way home.’ I said, ‘Your client’s daughter and niece were kidnapped, and you’re going home?’ We had an ongoing pen register [dialed number recorder] on James Wright’s phone, and we could establish that yes, he did just receive a phone call like this. He came up from Florida the next day, met with an FBI agent at the airport, came to the FBI office, and started negotiating with the kidnappers.”
Mehan and Netemeyer were downing vats of caffeine and vying for the Snickers bars in the vending machine, quick energy to keep them going. “When a child goes missing, everything goes out the window,” says Netemeyer, who was glad to have Mehan there to frame the delicate legal negotiations with James.
“The girls were 14 and 16,” Mehan says. “You give up what you can to get them back.”
The kidnappers had taken the girls to a Budget Inn overnight, and they kept driving back and forth between Missouri and Illinois. “Never sat in one place long enough to allow us to catch up with them,” Netemeyer says. But on Monday, the 14-year-old was released near South Kingshighway and Manchester. “We think they thought she’d call James, and they waited to see if he came to pick her up.”
The official deal, though, was that the other girl would be exchanged for the money that James brought to a Schnucks parking lot in Bellefontaine Neighbors.
Kimble pulled up with the girl, saw another car drive near the planned location, panicked, and raced away—driving smack into an oncoming FBI car. He took off running—and once again, he got away.The girl was safe, but she refused to get into the agents’ car until they showed her ID. The team arrested James (who squawked in outrage) and turned to the manhunt.
Kimble, meanwhile, burst into an apartment in Spanish Lake and held its occupants at gunpoint for a few hours. He says he told them, “‘I’m not trying to hurt you—I’m just trying to get away from somebody.’ I made up a story about a shootout with somebody I had to get away from, which is not something that happens so much in that part of town, but it does happen.”
Finally two of the women offered to drive him someplace, just to get rid of him. He had a brainstorm: “Give me your clothes.” He changed—and three “women” walked out of the apartment. They drove to a gas station at I-70 and North Grand.
“Why you dressed like a fairy?” yelped Lawanda Carraway, the girlfriend he’d called to pick him up. He was wearing a red-and-white jacket embellished with a heart, skinny blue jeans, and black boots with fur. The pink hoodie under the jacket was pulled up over his head.
“They dressed me up,” Kimble said, adding faintly, “You really don’t wanna know what’s going on.”
One of the women came up to Carraway’s car and demanded her boots back.
“I felt really gay,” he recalls. “The crazy part was, when I was leaving I asked the girls to give me a full-length mirror, so I could make sure I was walking right. ‘Am I swishin’ too hard?’ ‘No, you perfect.’ ‘Well, let’s go, then!’ There was police
everywhere.”
He even thought to borrow a bag so he could stuff all his clothes inside. Carraway just shook her head. It was her Escalade he’d drowned in Forest Park. Afterward he’d told her that he was in a high-speed chase but swore he left the truck in good shape; the police must have put it in the lake.
KIMBLE MANAGED TO STAY FREE for another eight days, until the law caught up with him at St. Clair Square. They collared him—in the women’s room.
He swears it was just coincidence.
“Before I could even close the door, they were ramming the door open. They said, ‘You are not getting away this time.’”
Investigators had plenty of questions for Kimble. But when they got to the kidnapping, he furrowed his brow in puzzlement and asked what kidnapping they were referring to—was it the one he’d seen on TV?
Yeah. It was. And they now had Kimble and three of the four masked men in custody.
Texas authorities had picked up Ryechine Money back in November, using a warrant from a June 2009 case in Splendora. The charge? Alleged possession of 205 grams of cocaine and 41 pounds of marijuana, compressed into a single block that was swathed in plastic and dryer sheets inside a big cardboard box.
“A guy that was arrested in Oklahoma bringing dope to St. Louis couldn’t wait to tell what he knew,” explains Netemeyer. “He’d bragged about the robbery.” The courier remembered the street where the dealer lived and a basketball hoop in the driveway, so the feds took him on a quick street-view tour on Google Earth, and he identified the house.
Money had a bit of the ATM loot; he was reportedly planning to invest it in marijuana, a clothing store, and a cathouse in Houston. Instead he found himself agreeing to plead guilty to robbery and firearms offenses. The police had his fingerprints on cigarette butts in the Dodge Charger and his DNA on a charred black shirt from the barbecue smoker, plus there was footage of him on a local business’s surveillance camera climbing over a fence and dumping stuff in the smoker.
So he pleaded guilty—then changed his mind. He appealed, saying his sentence was unreasonable, the court had erred by refusing to let him withdraw his guilty plea, and he shouldn’t be characterized as a career offender.
The court was unmoved.
LATUNYA WRIGHT PLEADED GUILTY in April 2011 to conspiracy and transporting stolen property. “There’s a lot I’d like to state, but I’m at a loss for words,” she told U.S. District Judge Jean Hamilton, who remembered her from a 1999 federal fraud conviction. Latunya still hadn’t finished paying the $31K restitution in that case.
Latunya said what she needed to say to get out of any situation. “We’d look at her and say, ‘Latunya! Stop lying to us!’” Mehan recalls, laughing.
“I don’t know that she knows the truth,” Netemeyer remarks.
She’d been on Judge Joe Brown’s TV show about six months before the heist, arguing over a vehicle she’d sold. Her dream was to snag a spot on the reality show Bad Girls Club. She was already writing a book about the ATM case.
“That’s how I’m getting paid,” she told a friend. “I said I wanted to be on TV, but not this way. I was trying to get on a reality show. And this [is] reality, but damn, I can’t get paid for it. Not yet, anyway.”
Instead, she was ordered to repay the missing $3.6 million in ATM money and sentenced to 51 months in prison.
Jones’ sentencing was one month later, on May 12, 2011. He seemed restless, shifting his weight from one foot to the other and jangling the chains that bound his wrists and ankles. Finally U.S. District Judge Carol Jackson snapped at him to stop. His attorney, Joel Schwartz, relayed his statement, saying, “It would be disingenuous for him to apologize or say he’s sorry or a similar cliché, because he’s not.” Later, Schwartz told the press, “He’s probably truly sorry—that he was caught.”
In the courtroom that day was a young man who also lived on Fair Avenue—where Jones and Kimble had met. He’d come to watch. And though you’d think a 32-year sentence would read as a warning, it seems to have inspired him.
Mario Darnell Smith began sending emails, purportedly from Ameren, seeking to arrange an armored car pickup of about $180,000 from Ameren’s account at U.S. Bank in Chicago. Alerted, the FBI traced the email form to Bigdaddyallday—Smith’s tag on YouTube. Agents arrested him at a Quiznos and slid his laptop and four cell phones into a protective bag so they couldn’t be wiped remotely.
The FBI had thwarted Smith’s hopeful little heist, but they had yet to recover a sizable chunk of the ATM booty that might have fed his imagination. And one of the masked men was still at large.
“We’d been told that the day of the robbery, when they all bought tennis shoes, Aaron Johnson bought some booties for his new baby,” says Netemeyer. “We thought it was nonsense. Then we found receipts for four pairs of tennis shoes and one pair of booties. A year later, we realized the baby was about to turn 1. We set up surveillance at the girlfriend’s house, and here comes Aaron Johnson down the street, holding a gift bag. The last thing I said to him was, ‘Happy Birthday to your son.’ He said, ‘How do you know that?’ I said, ‘How do you think we caught you?’ And he’s saying, ‘Shit. Shit.’”
After a 54-week manhunt, the fourth masked man was in custody.
Each of the other three robbers had said, at some point, that there was just “too much money.” The phrase came up so often, it was a running joke for the investigators. So there they sat, listening to the interview with Johnson, waiting, waiting...
And then he said it: “Too much money.”
Late that month, the law enforcement team found a Hummer in a storage unit in Atlanta. They lifted the hood and saw…
Piles of vacuum-sealed bags of money blanketing the engine.
THERE WAS ABOUT $660,000 in the Hummer (which was probably bought with ATM money). Also a pink Disney blanket that matched a blue one from Latunya’s house on Page.
Something spooked her, and she went to Atlanta to check on the storage locker. Her car and all the money were gone.
Furious, she showed up at Mehan’s office with her attorney. Ceremoniously, Mehan presented her with a photo of money stacked on the hood of the Hummer.
“She looked at the photo,” Mehan recalls, “and said, ‘Wait a minute! The money wasn’t stacked up on the hood! You got my money!’”
He grinned and said it nice and slow: “No, Latunya, we got our money.”
IN SEPTEMBER 2013, when Jones was brought from federal prison to the Justice Center downtown to await a different trial, he unlocked his handcuffs.
He’d sweet-talked a nurse he’d met years earlier, when he was in the St. Charles County jail, into providing a key. (Also a gun.) Hands freed, Jones unhinged the toilet and sink in his cell and started hacking at the plumbing space behind the wall. Justice Center staff found a bundle of clothes and sheets hidden there.
John Wesley Jones now lives behind locked doors at Hazelton, a high-security federal prison for men in West Virginia. His release date is October 4, 2038—unless he manages to get out sooner.
Ryechine Money is in Oklahoma City, scheduled for release in April 2028.
Aaron Johnson is serving a 15-year sentence in Bonne Terre for an unrelated robbery; when that ends, his federal sentence will begin.
“His grandma’s still calling me,” Mehan says. “He said, ‘I’ll tell you where some of the money is if you cut my sentence down.’ I said, ‘Aaron, you’re not a very good poker player.”
Li’l Larry Newman is at the Beaumont penitentiary in Texas, scheduled for release in 2032.
The four masked men have all been ordered to pay back $3.6 million. So have most of their accomplices, who’ve served varying prison terms. So far, only James Wright has made any restitution; he paid $2,625. And Ryechine Money forfeited $5,250 when he was arrested.
Mehan says Rahman’s been in touch—he doesn’t like it in Jordan, and he wants to come back. “I said we would recall the warrant so he could fly back and meet an FBI agent in New York who’d bring him down here. But he never called me back.”
The only accomplices still in prison are two who took part in the kidnapping. One is Kimble, who’s serving a 26-year sentence at Jefferson City Correctional Center. I drove there to talk to him.
“It don’t hurt no more, but it used to drive me crazy,” he says. “I wouldn’t be here if they wouldn’t’ve—I was gone. I dropped off the face of the Earth. Moved my daughter and my baby’s mother right up there with me.” Wherever that was, he transformed himself: “I’m wearing glasses, I’m wearing polo shirts, I’m not saggin’. Sometimes I tucked my shirt in!” He sighs. “But I got back in that mode.”
When he was captured at St. Clair Square, he says an officer asked him the same question that was running through his mind: “Why’d you come back?’”
He says he got tired of wiring Li’l Larry money and came back to help him get his share.
“And now everything I had accumulated is in disarray, ’cause I gotta come back and put my feet in this muddy water.” He looks around the gray visiting room, scooching his plastic chair back, then forward. Mainly because there’s not much else he can do.
“I’ve never been to prison before,” he says. “The control thing, I can’t get used to it.” Above all, he misses his two baby girls. The older daughter has just sent a letter: “She said, ‘I’m bad sometimes, Daddy, but I still love you.’ I said, ‘Listen, you gotta get rid of that being bad sometimes, cause that’s going to hold you back.’”
Kidnapping, armed criminal action, facilitating a felony… “I wasn’t plannin’ on hurtin’ nobody,” he insists. “It was just scare tactics.” He’s leery of talking to me—they all agreed not to talk, and he has loved ones he worries about. At the same time, he’s lonely and frustrated. “I could apologize,” he says halfheartedly, “but a lot of people wouldn’t understand the mindset of a person that’s on the other side of that wall. People would be saying, ‘Well, you could have went to school.’ Well, that’s the future. Right now I’m hungry as f—k. So we gonna starve to death trying to make it to the future?”
Yet Kimble does think in future terms. He’s less impulsive than many criminals, more canny and thoughtful. He talks about a time he wanted to shoot someone who was cheating him, did a quick count of how many others he’d have to kill to get away with shooting one, and lowered the gun.
Like Jones, Money, and several of the others, he grew up rough—and more resourceful than a lot of prep-school kids. These guys weren’t interested in violence, except as a threat—but it was a threat they might have carried out at any point, a matter-of-fact weighing of the odds in a world where violence is routine.
I ask Kimble how he learned to strategize. “I just pay attention to everything,” he says, “I guess from looking at how irresponsible my mom was. This is back when food stamps used to come in the mail. She’d get them, and they would all be gone the next day, so today we eat good, but tomorrow we be looking stupid.”
I ask what he’d do if he had the missing money. “I’d be in Ireland,” he says instantly. Then he glances down at his forearm and laughs. “Nah, that wouldn’t work. I’d better go to Cuba!”
When I mention the comment that keeps cropping up in interview transcripts, he laughs. “You can never have too much money. I don’t understand how they figured that was the problem.”
At an award presentation for the agents who worked the case and one of the citizens who offered a useful tip, Mehan held up one of the $20 bills they’d seized. “$6.4 million taken,” he said wryly, “and this is what we’ve got.”
The bill now hangs on his wall, in an evidence bag. A permanent reminder of the $3.6 million that’s still out there somewhere—maybe spent or scattered, maybe buried, maybe (though the feds doubt it) squirreled away in the Middle East.
“We continue to get tips,” Netemeyer says. “Nothing valid.” As the robbers are released, will the feds keep tabs?
“We are going to be open to any tactics or techniques that will lead us,” he promises. “This case isn’t over.”
Illustration by Ryan Inzana |
Anna Kroup (Photo courtesy of Waterford Police Department) Anna Kroup (Photo courtesy of Waterford Police Department) Image 1 of / 3 Caption Close Body of missing woman found 1 / 3 Back to Gallery
Green Island
The body of a Waterford woman who had been missing since February and was known for her local theater and singing performances was found Monday in the Hudson River.
Workers at the Green Island hydroelectric plant found the body of Anna Kroup, Albany County Sheriff Craig Apple said.
Kroup, 24, had been missing since around midnight Feb. 18, when she left a note at her Second Street residence and was not seen again.
Apple said Kroup's body was found by a construction crew cleaning out a portion of the river at the plant.
He said tattoos on Kroup's body helped Waterford police identify her.
An autopsy will be conducted Tuesday morning at Albany Medical Center Hospital.
In the days after Kroup's disappearance, State Police dive teams searched the river and shorelines near where she lived. Kroup's body was found about four miles from her home.
Investigators said there were no signs of foul play found.
Kroup was the lead singer in a local band, the Pop Junkies, and had been in local theater productions.
More Information
The Pop Junkies Facebook page described Kroup as "a vibrant front person with a phenomenal vocal skill. Her background in a cappella is evident in her unmatched tone and intonation."
In 2012, according to news archives, Kroup won an award from the Theatre Association of New York and was part of a production of Tom Stoppard's "The Real Thing" at the Schenectady Civic Players.
Monday afternoon, minutes after Apple announced that Kroup's body had been found, condolences started pouring in on Kroup's personal Facebook page and another page set up in an effort to find her shortly after she went missing.
"I have no words. Rest in peace sweet Anna," read one post.
"It's no wonder that I felt inconsolably sad and out of it when I woke up today. You will be missed Anna, you will be remembered," read another.
Another said, "While she grew to be a beautiful young woman, Anna will always be that whimsical little girl to me. Her old soul was just too great for this world."
Kroup, an honor student at Waterford-Halfmoon High School who attended the University of Rochester afterward, was quoted in a 2006 article in the Troy Record when students went to the WAMC radio station to voice their opinions on affirmative action.
"If anything, I want to go to college to learn more about diversity," Kroup said. "I want to open my mind from the homogeneous society that I was brought up in. I think we need more diversity in all our communities. That would help each community thrive and grow."
bfitzgerald@timesunion.com • 518-454-5414 • @BFitzgeraldTU |
The Los Angeles Lakers are currently looking to rebuild their once-great franchise, to lay a foundation that they can build a winner on. They have several young, talented players that could develop into something special, but none have arrived with as much fanfare as second overall pick Lonzo Ball.
This young man has a mountain of expectations being placed on him, but he has found an ally in second-year forward Brandon Ingram. Ingram shares a draft position with Ball, being selected second in the 2016 NBA Draft. His rookie campaign got off to a slow start, but by the end of the season, he was showing flashes of the potential that caused everyone to be so high on him at draft time.
Despite only being about seven weeks older than Ball, the experience that Ingram gained last season has given him a bit of wisdom that he can share, via Mark Medina of the Southern California News Group:
“Just with the year I have in this league, I can help him a little bit and tell him what to expect and how to go about the game,” Ingram said of Ball. “Now I have information I can give back with the opportunity to try to lead some of these guys, and put them in the right positions on the basketball floor and off the basketball floor.”
Ball, who will presumably be the Lakers starting point guard next season, will have a lot to learn, and on a team that is currently light on veterans, it could be an uphill battle. Having teammates like Ingram, however, can somewhat mitigate those concerns, even if Ingram doesn’t have anywhere near the experience to call upon that a true veteran mentor would.
There will be growing pains, but for a Lakers team that badly wants to attract an established star or two in free agency next summer, it will be important for Ball to adapt quickly to the NBA game. |
There are governors, rulers and leaders that systematically loot countries and nations. People get sick of their rules and revolution happens. Surrealistic sculptures that once were praised are now banned. Condemned. Within time people will realize what happened to their beloved country. That’s a routine process for thousands of years.
Does it take so much time for people to know what happened to them?
Of course.
Things have changed. With emerge of WikiLeaks and Edward Snowden it all became much easier for people to deepen their sight on breaking news.
Snowden evolution was a reaction to the worldwide-spying NSA which was and still is gathering enormous amount of data from literally every location in the world. Consequently, it perked everyone’s ears and highlighted the forgotten privacy.
Four years ago, a teenage, John Brook, initiated the work on coding a program that efficiently encrypts IMs using Tor hidden networks to mask the route of communication. This self-taught programmer started this project long before Snowden and public awareness of NSA’s bulk booking of Metadata. So all of a sudden, Brook found himself capable of solving the problem that countries like Germany rushed to fix this hole. The concept of the program, dubbed as Ricochet, is based on TorChat which had a similar pattern in transmitting messages throughout hidden Tor services. Alas, Torchat was vastly abandoned by users and developers. Based on TorChat spirit, Brook heavily redesigned and recoded the program in his spare time. Surprise!
In our days, normally encrypted emails and IMs would safe-guard content of communications but Metadata would allow NSA to map the relationships between sender and receiver. Also, spy agencies can track the communicants by unmasking their IPs and the fluctuate traffic in between. Ricochet seems to blow these problems away. Unlike other IM services that distribute messages through central servers which could be vulnerable to breaches, each Ricochet client works as a self-sufficient Tor service, providing a 16 character ID for authentication that then establishes a secure channel for users to communicate even without installing Tor. All the process is done with just a single click.
Communication between Ricochet users follows a certain process that takes anonymity to extreme levels. First, their clients approach Tor network to arrange a specific rendezvous point. Anonymously, the client first connects via three hops to a Tor relay that, of course, doesn’t recognize the source connection. Afterwards, the relay investigates the other person’s Ricochet ID and searches the available relays that can properly connect to. All the enlisted relays change every 24 hours so it can randomize and anonymize the communication. Also, each user reaches another via three relays, as a result, at any time clients will shift relays so they won’t communicate directly.
“At no point do you ever contact anyone directly”. Brook adds “There is no way you could find my IP address or anything about who I am or where I am.”
Apparently, this is the brightest solution to bounce harmful Metadata collection in bulk from NSA as a group of Australian security journalists formed by Patrick Gray is joining the project citing “He [Brook] writes incredible code”.
That raise a question that if Tor network is a robust safe one? Absolutely.
Simply because Russian federal governments are willing to pay a whopping 111,000 $ if anyone can de-anonymize Tor users and learn every technical bit of that system. So to date, Tor is a serious in-your-face to spy agencies.
Now, the apple of this article’s eye is that the brain behind Ricochet, John Brook, has been working with Jolla and now lives in Utah. It’s no drama to think a person with this background should’ve worked with Jolla to ensure Sailfish security which Sailors stressed on it before.
Ricochet is available to download as a binary, for now. It’s yet to enter Mobile platforms but a tweet from John ensures Jolla users to get this app first among other platforms if Ricochet makes it way to mobiles.
There are tens of Brooks at Jolla. It’s safe to say that Jolla is eyeing on brains to promote Sailfish OS and the related ecosystem. We’ve previously covered the massive axe of Nokia workers from Microsoft. From that perspective, I e-mailed Tech-department head-honcho, Stefano Mosconi and asked him if there are talented people to join Jolla after this tragedy.
“As for the chance for these guys to be hired by Jolla we are keeping our eyes and ears open for exceptional talent and everything will go through our normal hiring process.”
Do you care about how safe your IM app is? Let us know below.
Source |
One New York City Uber driver made his tax filings public Monday and claimed the popular ride-sharing company is ripping him off. Rana Novini reports. (Published Monday, April 18, 2016)
NYC Uber Driver Shares Tax Docs, Says He Only Took Home $10K in 2015
One New York City Uber driver made his tax filings public Monday and claimed the popular ride-sharing company is ripping him off.
"I don't think Uber cares," said Antonio Pacheco. "I don't think Uber cares if we drop dead to be honest with you."
Pacheco, who has been driving for the service for three years, said he was stunned to find that he only took home about 16 percent of his income after taxes -- just $10,000 off of more than $60,000 in fares.
"You're putting in for the car payment, the insurance, the gas, the sales tax and after all that, this is what you're left with," he said.
Pacheco's tax preparer, Hamid Kechar, works with other drivers, too. He told NBC 4 New York that each case is different and largely depends on the driver's individual expenses.
But Kechar said that it's not unusual for drivers he does taxes for to walk away with about 30 percent of their earnings.
"It could be an exception. It could be normal. It has to do with what kind of deductions they have," Kechar said.
Uber said in a statement that it was planning to reach out to Pacheco because of "a number of factors that could be contributing to his high expenses."
The company says that normally, drivers should take away about 65 percent of their fares, but if they rent their car or drive for other services it could affect earnings.
"Drivers are our customers and we work hard to ensure that Uber is a flexible way to earn an income," the company said.
Pacheco said on Monday that he hopes his story can be a cautionary one for new drivers, and that it will spur Uber to make it easier for drivers to take home more of their earnings.
"If they really care and call us partners they'd say, 'Let's see what would be a living standard,'" he said. |
About
Fencing is an under-represented sport in the media, in part because the way it is currently photographed. The athletes are shot primarily in an action-sport context, which does a great job of capturing the raw emotions present in the competition, but often obscures the identity of the athletes. I would like to change that means of representation.
What I would like to do:
I would like to photograph the US Olympic and National Fencing teams in a way that very few other photographers can accomplish. My goal is to create images that will invoke a lasting impression for these athletes in order to help them obtain sponsorships, while working towards the creation of an art photo book that will showcase images of the Olympic and National team fencers.
I come from a portrait, fashion, and beauty photography background, which gives me an understanding of how to best represent people using light, composition, and posing. I also spent 10 years involved in the sport of fencing, as a competitor, referee, and coach. This combination of experiences has given me the unique set of tools, knowledge, and connections necessary to photograph the athletes in such a way that they will be shown at their very best.
To realize this vision, I will need your help. The costs associated with producing these photo-shoots would be prohibitive if not for a platform like Kickstarter.
Here is a breakdown of the costs:
The cost of bringing in a makeup artist, wardrobe stylist, and hair stylist is expensive- in total it will cost about $900 to hire in a full team for an 8 hour day. The cost of renting a studio with the right lighting equipment is also expensive as well: it costs about $1000 to rent for the studio for the day with adequate lighting equipment. I will also need 2 assistants on shoot days, which will cost $400 per 8 hour day of shooting. A behind the scenes video will cost $250/ day of shooting. Finally food for the shoots will cost an additional $300/day. All of these costs add up to make the cost of shooting about $2850/day of photography.
The plan is to photograph 5 teams if it is a possibility, over the course of 5 days. That comes out to about $15,000 of fees on the production end of things.
Then, there is the cost of flying in the athletes to New York that do not live here- which will cost a minimum of $400 per athlete. I will need to find them lodging for the days that they are here, which will cost a minimum of $150 a night. The total estimated cost for this is about $4,200
Finally, producing the rewards for this kickstarter can be done for about $1500 which combined with Kickstarter's fees round everything out to about $21,000.
Here are some photos that I was able to make, financing the shoots out of pocket and some of them were made with the help of one of the sponsors: Leon Paul.
Please note that not all of these athletes were sponsored by Leon Paul. Also note that these are examples of my work, and the images are not being used commercially.
Daryl Homer, 2012 Olympian
Soren Thompson: 2004 & 2012 Olympian
2012 World Champion Ben Bratton
Nicole Ross: 2012 Olympian
2012 Olympian Nzingha Prescod
Foil Olympian Nzingha Prescod
Foil Fencing Olympian Nzingha Prescod
Saber Olympian Daryl Homer
Saber Olympian Daryl Homer
Cody Mattern 2012 World Champion
Video: Holly Buechel
Makeup/Male grooming was done by both Mirna Jose and Harry Jefferson
Hair: Mirna Jose
Wardrobe was done by Sneed & Djara |
LAS VEGAS – Rogue, Las Vegas’ professional eSports organization, has broken up its championship Overwatch team after being denied a spot in Season One of Activision/Blizzard’s Overwatch League.
“We are disappointed to announce that Rogue has broken up our current Overwatch roster, so that our players can pursue options to play in Season One in the Overwatch League,” said Frank Villarreal, Rogue owner and co-founder. “These players have represented Rogue in outstanding fashion and as a consequence have become the most accomplished Overwatch team in the game’s history. We wish them the best of luck competing in the inaugural season of the league and look forward to building another squad that will make Rogue a formidable competitor in Season Two.”
Some of the players’ contracts have already been bought out and they have joined the rosters of other teams that will compete in Season One of Overwatch League. Others are in open talks with Overwatch League and Contender teams so that they can continue their careers as professional eSports players.
This dissolution comes after the announcement that Rogue did not make the final cut for Season One, despite having secured the required buy-in fee, meeting all league requirements and completing the full application process.
As a group, Rogue’s Overwatch team has won 13 championships and had significant first place finishes to its credit this year, including wins at the BEAT Invitational, Overwatch PIT Championship and Takeover 2. They depart Rogue boasting an unprecedented 125-34 record.
“While we are disappointed with Blizzard’s decision to pass on our team for Season One, we’re incredibly confident that this won’t be the last Rogue Overwatch team,” said Steve Aoki, Rogue co-owner and world-renowned producer/DJ.
Rogue partnered with eSports infrastructure company ReKTGlobal to broker the buyouts and trade deals for the players. ReKTGlobal also helped Rogue secure the league buy-in funds during the application process.
“It’s unfortunate to lose these players, but we haven’t lost focus,” said Derek Nelson, Rogue CEO and co-founder. “We’re in discussions with professional sports teams and you can count on us going after a Season Two slot.”
###
About Rogue
Founded in 2016, Rogue is a professional Las Vegas-based esports organization with teams in, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Call of Duty, H1Z1, Vainglory, Rocket League, PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds, Rainbow 6 Siege and Injustice 2. Since Rogue’s inception, they have become a globally recognized group with countless championship wins. Their extensive list of accolades including the number one Overwatch team in the world, facing off in the most watched Overwatch match of all time and winning the largest Overwatch prize pool of all-time. The organization is owned and operated by eSports veteran Franklin Villarreal, Derek Nelson, Carson Knuth, and world-renowned musician and DJ Steve Aoki. For more information, please visit rogue.gg and follow on Facebook and Twitter.
Media contact
Blaire Ritter
blaire@one7communications.com
626.372.0725
Anthony DeFelice
anthony@one7communications.com
702.588.4449
About ReKTGlobal, Inc.
ReKTGlobal, Inc. is an esports infrastructure company that bridges the gap between traditional sports and esports, providing solutions for the entire ecosystem. It is the parent company of several subsidiaries including: ReKTVenues, ReKTLive, ReKTAgency, ReKTJobs, and ReKTUniversity. The ReKTGlobal executive team brings decades of experience from Startups, Venture Capital/Private Equity, Sports, Media, Entertainment and Sports Marketing/Sponsorship, Real Estate, Ownership, Financing, Construction and Development. The company has offices in New York City, San Francisco and Charlotte and has welcomed partners from the sports, media and entertainment industries.
For more information about ReKTGlobal and its subsidiaries, visit www.rektglobal.com.
Media Contact
Christian Cooper
christiancooper@maxborgesagency.com
305.374.4404×164 |
IRELAND HAS agreed to accept two Uzbek detainees at the US military prison at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba for resettlement in Ireland.
Minister for Foreign Affairs Micheál Martin said the Government had told US authorities that it would accept two detainees, and two Uzbek nationals had been identified by the US for patriation to Ireland.
“The US authorities have identified two people from Uzbek who have been in Guantánamo for some time. There has been a campaign in relation to one of them, his advocates believe he was completely wrongly brought to Guantánamo and we are currently examining those,” said Mr Martin.
A spokesman for the Department of Foreign Affairs could not name the individuals or say when they might arrive other than to say he expected they would be transported here “when the prison closes or when they are released”.
Amnesty International welcomed the announcement but also could not provide information about who the two were.
A spokesman however said it was thought one may be Oybek Jabbarov (31).
“He is one we suggested to the Department of Foreign Affairs and whose case they would certainly be very thoroughly aware of. He has also expressed a preference for Ireland as he comes from a rural background and speaks fluent English,” said the spokesman.
In testimony given to the US House of Representatives’ House Committee on Foreign Affairs; Subcommittee on International Organisations, Human Rights, and Oversight on May 6th, 2008, Mr Jabbarov’s lawyer said his client had been living with his elderly mother and pregnant wife with other Uzbek refugees in northern Afghanistan in 2001 when fighting broke out between the Taliban and the Northern Alliance.
He had not been involved in the conflict, according to the testimony.
“He accepted a ride from a group of Northern Alliance soldiers he met at a roadside teahouse who said they would give him a ride to Mazar-e-Sharif.
“Unfortunately, instead of driving him to Mazar-e-Sharif, the soldiers took Oybek to Bagram air base where they handed him over to US forces, undoubtedly in exchange for a sizeable bounty.”
Mr Jabbarov was transferred to Guantánamo and has spent eight years there.
Executive director of Amnesty International, Ireland, Colm O’Gorman, has called on the department to allow Mr Jabbarov come to Ireland after his release and for his wife and two children to be allowed to join him. |
The Jaquar Group, established in 1960, is a bathroom fixtures company present in more than 45 countries. It sells showers, shower enclosures, sanitary ware, flushing systems, wellness products, concealed cisterns, water heaters, and lighting solutions.[2][3][4]
The group expects to end 2017/18 with revenues of Rs 3,200 crore and Rs 3900 crore by 2018-19. It employs over 8,500 people including 1200 service technicians and runs six manufacturing facilities, including one in South Korea. Currently, it manufactures 26 million bath fittings every year for nearly 1.9 million bathrooms every year. The company is expected to touch a billion dollars in revenue over the next four years, [5] Jaquar Group has a global headquarter (a Platinum LEED Certified Net Zero Energy Building by USGBC[6]) at Manesar, Haryana, India and presently operates in over 45+ countries in Europe, Middle East, South East Asia, Africa and SAARC region.[7]
History [ edit ]
In 1986, Rajesh Mehra along with brothers Ajay Mehra and Krishan Mehra launched the Jaquar brand: named after Jai Kaur, the grandmother of the Mehra brothers in India. Mehras were in this business since the ’60s, when Rajesh’s late father NL Mehra started the bath fittings company and brand Essco.[8]
2016-present: recent history [ edit ]
The Group aims to achieve $1 billion turnover by 2022 and open 15 stores globally.[9]
Jaquar Group is the first Indian bathing brand to mark its presence at global bathing fair at ISH Messe Frankfurt in 2013, 2015, 2017 and will be participating in the 11-15th March 2019.
Jaquar Group recently won the award for "National Best Employer Brand" for 2018-19 at World HRD Congress.
On 19 July 2016, Jaquar Group acquired a 51% majority stake in Joeyforlife—a South Korea-based luxury shower maker—in a deal worth US$1.2 million.[10][11]
The company has also entered lighting industry and has launched a manufacturing unit for the same in Manesar.[12] [13]
The Jaquar Group’s manufacturing units are spread over 270,000 sq. m, across 6 plants in India & 1 plant in South Korea In May 2017. [14] The company acquired one of the sanitary ware manufacturing plants of Euro Ceramics Ltd. located in Bhachau, Gujarat for Rs 100 crore in an effort to expand its manufacturing facilities.[15][16]Jaquar expanded its manufacturing facility in Bhiwadi, Rajasthan by 30,000 square meters by investing 150 crore in new faucets manufacturing plant which will help to achieve the production to 100,000, currently its 85000 faucets a day.[17]
In July 2018, the Group announced the skill development and training of over 300 plumbers on World Youth Skill Day [18] as a part of Skill India, an initiative by Government of India. The training will be imparted to the plumbers through 10 specialized training centres spread across India. The centres will train unemployed youth in specialized skill sets and develop them as trained plumbers.[19]
Products [ edit ]
Jaquar Group targets its products to various socio-economic segments, such as brand Artize (luxury category), brand Jaquar (Premium category) and brand Essco (value category).[20][21][22]
Artize [ edit ]
Artize is a luxury bath brand from Jaquar Group. In July 2018, the Tailwater faucet, manufactured by the Jaquar Group’s luxury brand Artize, and designed by the London-based product design consultancy DanelonMeroni Design Studio received Red Dot Design Award for 2018 for product design.[23] Jaquar Group’s Luxury Bath Brand Artize has won the Red Dot design award 2018 for Tailwater, some of the other awards and recognitions received by Artize for its products include the iF award, Plus X award, and the Good Design Mark, Japan for Linea; the Good Design, Chicago, and the India Design Mark for Confluence; and the Plus X, Good Design, Chicago, and the Elle Décor awards for Tiaara, designed by Michael Foley.[24]
Jaquar Lighting [ edit ]
The group is investing Rs 150 crore in a new lighting manufacturing facility where many of lighting components would be produced in-house. Jaquar's capacity to make LED drivers is about 1.2 million a month. It currently produces around 750,000. The company first invested into lighting 15 years back when it identified a vacuum in good quality lighting. Since then, it has focussed on designer lighting such as chandeliers. The company also manufacturers bulbs and tube lights - it has automated bulbs assembly at its factory in Manesar. [25] Jaquar Group announced the Indian film actress Deepika Padukone as the brand ambassador of their lighting segment.[26]
At Light India 2018 Exhibition, held on 11-13th October 2018 at Pragati Maidan, New Delhi, India featured intelligent lighting technology and applications with Jaquar Lighting Dazzled with Magnanimous Chandeliers and Lamps[27]
Design Confab [ edit ]
This is a knowledge sharing platform for Industries best Architect’s, Builders & Interior Designers, it is an event that celebrates design by Jaquar group. Jaquar group is working on a white paper on smart living spaces. [28]
The topic for the first Jaquar Group Design Confab was ‘Best Practices for Smart, High-performance Indian Buildings’.[29] |
Some are saying that SWTOR is not selling as well as it was first expected. There has been a bit of an outcry over this in the industry but one analyst group doesn’t think the concerns are that big of a deal. According to Gamasutra:
Analyst group Macquarie Securities has released a new report which states that, while there are clearly concerns in the industry that Electronic Arts and BioWare’s recently released Star Wars: The Old Republic isn’t selling as well as first hoped, these outcries are “overdone.”
The story goes on to explain that while SWTOR releases last month and passed 1 million paid subs in three days (a record for MMOs), EA has still seen a drop in stock price of 3%.
This analyst group thinks that many of the issues that are being brought up about SWTOR are actually based on conjecture and says that just because EA has not yet releases sales figures for SWTOR doesn’t mean the numbers are bad.
They say the concerns over sales might be overdone. Really, this makes sense. With game as big as this one, it’s only expected that rumors will be just as big as the game itself. There are many who want to see it fall and may jump to conclusions before anything has been confirmed.
Gamasutra goes on to say:
The analyst group, which also gives EA an “Outperform” rating, adds, “EA will generate significant operating profits from Star Wars in both [fiscal 2012 and 2013 (ending March)], and will generate considerable revenue growth year-over-year.”
Read more at Gamasutra
(Visited 46 times, 1 visits today) |
Thieves cleaned out the storage locker of the South Bay Clean Creeks Coalition, making off with $500-$600 worth of assorted tools, food, packs and even an air compressor.
The theft took place over the June 17-18 weekend, according to coalition founder Steve Holmes.
“My intern went over and noticed that we had a shed inside the storage area and someone busted the lock off,” Holmes said in an interview. “They just picked through all of our stuff.”
Several pairs of bolt cutters and an air compressor used to fill cart tires were among the items stolen, as well as team leader packs filled with first-aid kits and food items handed out to volunteers at creek cleanups.
“They took the packs to put all the stuff in so they could climb back out,” Holmes said, adding that the thieves probably got in by scaling over a fence.
He said the storage area also was vandalized with graffiti.
Besides the challenge of replacing the stolen tools with a limited budget, Holmes said he’s worried they can be used for criminal activity.
“One of the things that’s scary for the community is they probably stole four sets of the bolt cutters, and we had a pretty robust pair in there,” he added. “These guys are thieves, and the last thing they need are those sort of tools in their hands. That’s not good for the community.”
With so much of the coalition’s equipment gone, fewer local waterways will be cleaned until replacement tools can be obtained.
“This is a setback, and we’re trying to ramp up,” Holmes said. “And at the time we’re trying to ramp up, we’re getting hit with something that impacts our ability to be at multiple sites.”
As a result, only two sites are planned for the group’s next cleanup in July, but “hopefully in September we’ll be back online with multiple sites beyond two,” he added.
He said the donations already coming in from the public to buy new tools should help.
“We’ve been running this on a shoestring budget,” Holmes said. “When people come in and hit you up like this, we’re not going to have a huge war chest of money to replace those things, so it was nice to see a couple of people contribute.”
Holmes said a police report was filed, but no leads have been reported so far.
To donate to South Bay Clean Creeks Coalition, visit sbcleancreeks.myevent.com. |
A Philadelphia dry cleaner is taking freshly laundered clothes to new heights by using a drone to deliver the cleaning to customers. (Published Wednesday, July 10, 2013)
A freshly laundered shirt, covered in plastic, flaps in the wind as it takes flight from in front of Manayunk Cleaners in Philadelphia.
It wasn’t picked up by a breeze, though, rather a remote-controlled drone, which ferries the shirt across the sky on a delivery run to a nearby customer.
“I’m all about technology and I see a lot of these cleaners, it’s so old school. You come in…and you just pick it up. I needed to spice things up,” says Manayunk Cleaners owner Harout Vartanian.
The 24-year-old, who’s trying to attract a young clientele at his Main Street shop that opened last September, converted a four-bladed DJI Phantom quadracopter, designed for taking aerial photography, into a dry cleaning delivery machine.
“We fly it to your house, it makes a noise, you pick it up and that’s that,” Vartanian says. “We posted a video to YouTube and it went viral. And ever since then, people have been asking ‘Hey, can you deliver my clothes by drone?’”
It takes two people -- a spotter and pilot -- to complete a delivery. The drone is launched from the sidewalk and once airborne, the clothes are attached to a makeshift hanging clip. Then, with clothes securely attached, the drone heads for its destination. But since the drone is small, it’s limited in how far it can go and much can be delivered in one trip.
“Right now, this particular model can only carry one to two pounds,” Vartanian said. He says that equates to a shirt or two. “There’s a higher-end model that we haven’t purchased yet, but obviously in the future that’s what we’re going to use. It carries around 5-10 pounds.”
So far they’ve focused the drone deliveries on customers from nearby businesses to log some flight hours, according to Vartanian.
Tim Nedzwecky had clean towels for his dog grooming business, The Groom Room, flown over. He calls the service “awesome.” Asked whether he’s concerned the towels might get dirty on their flight, Nedzwecky says no.
“I think that if something happens, they’ll fix it,” Nedzwecky said.
Next, Vartanian says they’ll randomly select one customer a month to have their clothes delivered by air for free. Then he hopes to expand the program and deploy a fleet of drones to deliver clothes to all customers.
While the drone deliveries are not exactly practical, they do get attention.
People often stop to look at the device flying high over Main Street, sometimes nearly a dozen at a time.
“It’s pretty crazy. I’ve never seen anything like it. I was wondering what the hell that was, to be honest,” said Trish Pasquarello. The 24-year-old said she’d try drone delivery because it would be easier than having to carry her clothes.
“It’s just something fun to watch,” says Bruce Cook. The contractor, who’s working on a project across the street from the cleaners, said he’s been watching the drone test flights for some time.
“It’s a novelty, it’s pretty cool, it’s cute, all that, but it’s not practical,” he said. “What would have been better, would have been if there had been a tractor-trailer coming down and met it.”
The use of drones in the American skies has been a hot topic of debate, as of late. Currently, drone use by commercial operators falls into a grey area. The Federal Aviation Administration bars people or businesses for operating a drone – or as they call them, Unmanned Aircraft Systems -- for compensation or hire.
The FAA also requires operators to obtain an airworthiness certificate to operate a drone. But that may change. Congress has required the FAA to develop guidelines for commercial drone use by 2015. The guidelines would give businesses a way to use drones for profit.
Vartanian doesn't think his drone falls under the FAA guidelines. He insists it's “just a toy” and is being used as a way to promote his business.
“It’s amazing. It’s something new, it’s definitely a step towards the future," he said. "[Customers] have never seen anything like this and hopefully they’ll get used to it because that's what we’ll plan on doing.”
Contact Vince Lattanzio at 610.668.5532, vince.lattanzio@nbcuni.com or follow @VinceLattanzio on Twitter. |
Lauri Heiskari – Full Part – Cooking With Gas
In 2003 a little kid out of Finland, who nobody had heard of, surprised the snowboarding world with a jaw dropping, opening part in the highly anticipated Forum movie Video Gangs. Since then Lauri Heiskari has been producing amazing video parts every year. He is known for his style and always having fun on his board. The past few years Lauri has teamed up with fellow Fin, Eero Etella, in the web series Cooking With Gas. The two have been destroying every urban feature in Finland as well as traveling the world in search of epic powder. Lauri is just now releasing this unseen full part from Season 3 of CWG. He is currently living in Helsinki and recently married Finish pop-star Anna Abreu!
Download your favorite snowboard movies here! |
Comedian Chelsea Handler has come under fire for saying First Lady Melania Trump “can barely speak English.”
Handler, who has been openly critical of President Trump and helped lead a women’s march in Utah after his inauguration, made the remark during a recent interview with Variety. When asked if she would ever invite the new leader of the free world on her show, Handler said she wouldn’t. Asked whether she would ever interview his wife, the comedian said: “To talk about what? She can barely speak English.”
“I don’t respect either one of those people,” Handler added.
The First Lady was born in Slovenia, according to her White House biography. She can speak five languages, including Slovenian, English, French, Serbian and German, CBS News has previously reported.
Many Trump supporters on social media rushed to point out Melania Trump’s multi-lingual skills while slamming Handler.
Contact us at editors@time.com. |
September 2015
<<August September October>>
Ponder This Challenge:
IBM decided to give an award for technical excellence to exactly N people.
Several teams submitted their nominations.
Many of them are single-person teams, but 8 are multi-person teams of more than 1 member.
It so happens that the size of the teams is such that awards can be given to any number of teams, from 1 to N, while keeping the total number of people exactly N.
Find the sizes of the 8 teams that enable the maximal N.
There is a better solution (N > 6) for 4 teams, but a possible answer to the same question with 4 multi-person teams and N=6 is: 2,3,3,6; since you can award a single team (6); 2 teams (3,3); 3 teams (1,2,3); 4 teams (1,1,1,3); 5 teams (1,1,1,1,2); and 6 teams (1,1,1,1,1,1).
Update (3/9):
You can do better than 56.
We will post the names of those who submit a correct, original solution! If you don't want your name posted then please include such a statement in your submission!
We invite visitors to our website to submit an elegant solution. Send your submission to the ponder@il.ibm.com.
If you have any problems you think we might enjoy, please send them in. All replies should be sent to: ponder@il.ibm.com |
If the print heads on your HP printer become clogged, the documents you print may come out smudged or smeared. They will definitely be low quality. Luckily, it's easy to clean HP print heads. HP printers even have a way to clean the print heads electronically. Once the print heads are clean, you can enjoy higher performance from your HP printer.
HP recommends trying to clean the print heads from the control panel before attempting to clean them manually.
Press and hold in the "Power" button on your HP printer. While pressing the "Power" button, press the "Resume" button six times before letting go of the "Power" button. This will prompt the cleaning process.
If you need to try the manual cleaning option, open the top cover of your HP printer. Notice that the print cartridge moves to the left when the cover is open.
Turn off your HP printer and unplug it from its power source before continuing.
Remove the print head from its slot inside the printer. This may involve lifting the print head latch.
Use a clean, lint-free cloth to wipe any dirt or debris from the print head contact pads. Be sure no fibres are left behind. Do not touch the print head nozzles, which are located on the underside of the print head. |
We’re here at last: the final challenge in The Hammer Cup 2017. We tried to make it a special challenge, and you get an extra two weeks to build and polish this map – 33 days, with 5 full weekends.
Theme Details
For this challenge we want you to pick 3 themes from the 2016 and 2017 Hammer Cup challenges, and creatively combine those themes into your perfect fusion map.
So for FusionVille, we want to you pick 3 of the following 8 themes (we’re not including AnyVilleVille in this) from all the Hammer Cup challenges and mash them together in your map:
Chasm
Liberation
Backtrack
Trap
Defend
Toxic
Bridge
Teleport
The Themes in FusionVille
Below are details for each theme and summaries of how the themes apply to FusionVille:
Chasm: a chasm (a.k.a. canyon, gorge, abyss, rift) must feature in the map
Liberation: the player must liberate something (person or people, item, whatever you can think of)
Backtrack: the player must play through an area, then later retrace their steps through that same area, but the area must have changed somehow (an invasion, explosion, earthquake, time travel, etc.)
Trap: the map must contain at least one trap that the player sets, has to avoid, or of course gets caught in. This can be a simple ambush but we’d love to see more creative and elaborate traps too.
Defend: the map must have a major defense sequence where the player has to defend a location from attack. This should not be the only event or sequence in the map, as there will be two other themes to feature. DefendVilleTwo’s 5- minute preparation time and manual start option are NOT required in this challenge; but the defense sequence must be a key part of the map.
Toxic: the classic HL2 yellow/green toxic sludge must play a critical part in the map
Bridge: the map must feature a bridge of some type, and the player must cross the bridge at some point
Teleport: teleportation (of the player, NPCs, or physics objects) must play a major role in the gameplay of the map
Deadline
The deadline for submitting maps is:
Monday 11th December 2017 at 23:59 CET
CET is Central European Time. Phillip’s Time.
Make sure you check your local time conversion.
IF YOUR ENTRY IS LATE IT WILL BE INCLUDED IN THE MOD BUT WILL NOT RECEIVE ANY POINTS.
That’s 33 days, with 5 full weekends.
The Hammer Cup 2017
The Hammer Cup 2017 consists of five mapping challenges, each with a different theme.
Entrants will receive points for each challenge they enter.
At the end of the event, the best 3 points totals from the challenges they entered will be added together for each entrant.
These totals will decide who wins the Grand Prizes.
This means that entrants do NOT have to enter each and every contest to win the grand prize but they will need to have entered at least 3 challenges to have a chance of winning the grand prizes.
Full details can currently be found here: The Hammer Cup Overview.
General Advice
DO NOT GET OVERLY AMBITIOUS. If you can’t build it in about 3 weekends then think smaller.
Something is bound to delay your progress. Leave time for testing, bug fixing and polishing!
Testing
We highly recommend getting your map beta tested by somebody you trust.
Do this early in its development if you can.
Judging Criteria
Each entry will be judged on Design, Sound, Visuals and Gameplay. The judges also collectively rank the top 3 maps. A Community Vote will be held that rewards points equal to the judges’ ranking points for the top 3 voted maps.
The judges are looking for interesting, unique, cool, and fun mixtures of the past Hammer Cup challenge themes.
Official THC2017 Discord Channel
If you are a Discord user and want to chat about the event then please feel free to join the official RTSL Mapping Challenges channel over on the Source Modding Community Discord server and get chatting.
General Rules
Please end your map with a point_clientcommand firing this exact command: disconnect; startupmenu
Maximum two maps per mapper per entry.
The map must be original and not have been released publicly before.
The map must run in system with only Ep2 installed
By entering the competition you grant PlanetPhillip.Com and RunThinkShootLive.Com the right to release the map as part of the RTSL-THC2017-C5-FusionVille Mod.
Maps must not appear on ANY other website before the release and for one month after the release of the mod.
No assets from retail games other than HL2, HL2: Ep1 or HL2: Ep2 are allowed.
Other assets are allowed with written permission from their original authors, which MUST be included in the entry.
All files submitted MUST be in lowercase and any custom assets must have unique names, both folder AND files.
Phillip’s decision is final and no correspondence will be entered into about it.
The map MUST have a proper name.
The map MUST have a proper filename: mapname_thc17_c5.bsp
All entries must be sent to: runthinkshootlive@gmail.com no later than the deadline.
no later than the deadline. If you do not receive a confirmation email without 24 hours of sending an entry, contact Phillip IMMEDIATELY.
Submission Email Format
SUBJECT: THC2017-c5-MAPNAME (Not filename)
BODY:
1. THC2017-c5-Mapname (Not filename)
2. The name you want used for credit. For example Phillip Marlowe AKA PlanetPhillip
3. Link to compressed file (or attach it to the email)
4. Notes you want included in the readme.txt
NOTE: I encourage all users to include a proper readme-mapname.txt file but it is not compulsory.
Submitting a chapter image with your entry
For this challenge, I will allow entrants to submit their own chapter image.
All I need is the image – you do not need to create the VTF, I will do that.
It’s not compulsory but it will be appreciated.
This can be done up to 3 days after the deadline.
RULES:
1. Image should be 16:9 ratio.
2. JPG or PNG is best.
3. Weapons and HUD MUST be removed.
4. Neither too bright nor too dark.
5. The FOV can be changed. I use between 75 and 90.
6. Visual effects can be added but be sensible.
7. No text must be added.
THINGS TO CONSIDER:
1. The chapter images are small. Some images look great full screen but look meh when small.
2. Don’t spoil the map for the player. I find something near the beginning is better, but not always.
3. Don’t spend hours trying to get it perfect. Often people use it for reference only.
4. But, if you can find the right angle and lighting, a good chapter image can get players excited. Do not neglect the promotion of your work.
4. Funky, weird or strange generally don’t work. Keep it simple.
Final Thoughts
With this challenge, we intended to give mappers some more freedom while still focusing the main concepts for the maps. Perhaps past entrants had an idea they didn’t fully explore during the original challenges? Now’s the time to flesh it out!
We hope mappers find interesting ways to combine the given themes and as always we look forward to playing the results!
If you have ANY questions, please don’t hesitate to ask, either here in the comments or by email if you prefer a private answer. |
“We’re happy to be updating many customers today with the news that their Apple Watch will arrive sooner than expected,” an Apple spokeswoman told BuzzFeed News. “Our team is working to fill orders as quickly as possible based on the available supply and the order in which they were received. We know many customers are still facing long lead times and we appreciate their patience.”
Earlier today, a number of Apple Watch pre-orders with delivery estimates of 4-6 weeks or later started changing from "Processing Items" to "Preparing for Shipment" on the Apple Online Store. Apple also began charging some credit and debit cards of customers with orders showing extended shipping times.Apple has since confirmed to John Paczkowski at BuzzFeed that many customers will receive their Apple Watch pre-orders sooner than expected. The company says it is working hard to fulfill orders as quickly as possible based on the order in which they were received, and does note that some customers are still in for a long wait.Apple Watch pre-order deliveries will begin on April 24 as scheduled, although exactly how many customers will receive theirs on day one remains to be seen. Ahead of the launch, customers in the United States have started receiving UPS shipment notifications confirming their upcoming Apple Watch delivery. Pre-orders became available on April 10 at 12:01 AM Pacific and sold out in less than six hours, with a combination of strong demand and limited supply quickly pushing back shipping estimates.MacRumors reported earlier this month that Apple Watch pre-orders could arrive sooner than expected , based on an email exchange with an executive relations spokesperson that said extended shipping times were set deliberately to avoid disappointment. |
President Obama held a press conference on Friday at the White House, where he did something rare: He took questions from all female reporters.
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Obama didn't offer an explanation for the decision, only to say at the start of the press conference that White House press secretary Josh Earnest made him a "naughty and nice" list.
Obama took questions from mostly print reporters, including McClatchy's Lesley Clark, BNA's Cheryl Bolen, Politico's Carrie Budoff Brown, and The Wall Street Journal's Colleen Nelson. The president also took one question from a radio reporter, April Ryan. None of the major TV networks was called upon for a question.
It is unclear if this was the first time a president called on all women during a press conference, but longtime White House reporters were declaring it a historic occasion.
At the end of the press conference, hours before Obama leaves for his Christmas vacation in Hawaii, a male reporter tried to fire off a question about Hillary Clinton Hillary Diane Rodham ClintonSanders: 'I fully expect' fair treatment by DNC in 2020 after 'not quite even handed' 2016 primary Sanders: 'Damn right' I'll make the large corporations pay 'fair share of taxes' Former Sanders campaign spokesman: Clinton staff are 'biggest a--holes in American politics' MORE, Obama's former secretary of State and the 2016 Democratic front-runner for president if she runs.
But Obama left the briefing room.
White House officials could not confirm whether an all-women presser had ever been done before. But they did recognize what Earnest called a "unique opportunity."
“The fact is, there are many women from a variety of news organizations who day-in and day-out do the hard work of covering the President of the United States," Earnest said in a statement. "As the questioner list started to come together, we realized that we had a unique opportunity to highlight that fact at the President’s closely watched, end of the year news conference.”
White House officials say they informed the the television networks prior to the news conference that they were not likely to be included on the President’s list because each of them has asked the President questions at least twice since last month’s election.
The officials say most of the network reporters have had exclusive presidential interviews during that timeframe. So, the officials decided to call on reporters who have not questioned the president since the election.
This post was updated at 3:57 p.m. |
By Kenny Lomas
Two ‘smelly’ Stockport County fans have been told to ‘have a good wash and change your clothes,’ in a letter found stuck to a seat at Edgeley Park ground yesterday.
It’s not known who the letter is referring to, but the writer claims to represent a number of Stockport County season ticket holders.
The letter begins: “To: The two guys in black leather jackets who have recently started sitting in some of these seats.
“Sorry. There’s no way to put this without hurting your feelings, but one or both of you stinks and it is ruining the experience of those around you.”
Nick Shepherd, an employee for CGC Catering who caters for Stockport County, claims to have found the letter in the main stand of the ground: “I was going to do a stock take on Monday morning. I was opening up and I seen it stuck to a seat, so I thought I’d just re-tweet it.
“I’m not a football fan myself so I can’t really comment on whether these accusations are true.”
THE COLD, HARD TRUTH: Letter found on some seats left by Stockport fans
The letter caused quite a stir with fellow Tweeters, and Nick was quite surprised by the reaction: “I was massively surprised. I was especially surprised to see the amount of re-tweets I got and the amount of re-tweets those who are re-posting it are getting.
Speaking on Twitter, @MartAtHome wrote: “@Nick_Sheps found about some rather pungent fans... Full marks to whoever wrote it.”
While Nick sees the funny side, he admits that the letter is a tad insensitive, although he does sympathise with the fans who wrote it.
“I think it was a bit harsh but it’s fair enough because I wouldn’t like to be in the fans situation having to put up with that,” he said. We reached out to Stockport County to find out their hygiene policy but have yet to hear back."
MM are waiting to hear back from Stockport County to see if they have a hygiene policy.
For more on this story and many others, follow Mancunian Matters on Twitter and Facebook. |
The United Nations secretary-general has used a speech ahead of the Winter Olympics in Sochi to condemn attacks on the LGBT community, amid growing criticism of Russia's so-called "gay propaganda" laws.
Ban Ki-moon, addressing the IOC before Friday's opening ceremony, highlighted the fact that the theme of the UN's human rights day last December was "sport comes out against homophobia".
"Many professional athletes, gay and straight, are speaking out against prejudice. We must all raise our voices against attacks on lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or intersex people," he said. "We must oppose the arrests, imprisonments and discriminatory restrictions they face."
"The United Nations stands strongly behind our own 'free and equal' campaign, and I look forward to working with the IOC, governments and other partners around the world to build societies of equality and tolerance. Hatred of any kind must have no place in the 21st century."
It emerged last week that more than 50 current and former Olympians have called on the IOC to uphold principle six of its charter, which forbids discrimination of any kind, and this week more than 200 writers added their voice to the protest against the new laws in a letter to the Guardian.
Ban did not refer specifically to Russia's new laws, which ban the promotion of "non-traditional" sexual relations to under-18s, but his words carry strong symbolic weight.
Speaking to reporters after his address, Ban, who is due to carry the Olympic torch and meet Putin in Sochi on Thursday, added: "I know there has been some controversy over this issue. At the same time I appreciate the assurances of President Putin that there will be no discrimination and that people with different sexual orientation are welcome to compete and enjoy this Olympic Games."
Asked about the new laws, the Russian deputy prime minister Dmitry Kozak insisted that there was no discrimination against anyone based on their "religion or their sexuality or their nationality". He said the new laws were to protect children.
"We are all grown up and every adult has his or her right to understand their sexual activity. Please, do not touch kids. That's the only thing. That's prohibited by law in all countries whether you are gay or straight."
Kozak also appeared to highlight an apparent inconsistency between the IOC and the Russian organisers over the issue. The IOC president, Thomas Bach, has said athletes should not protest against the issue on the medal podium but are free to speak out in press conferences.
But Kozak said: "Political propaganda is prohibited during the sporting event. It is prohibited by the Olympic charter not by Russian law."
He also referred to renewed security concerns sparked by reports that US homeland security sources had warned that terrorists might try to smuggle explosives aboard flights bound for Sochi in toothpaste tubes.
The department said later in a statement that it was not aware of any specific threat.
Kozak said the security threat in Sochi, which is protected by a "ring of steel" of 40,000 troops, police and security personnel, was no more serious than any major American city.
"I'm sure the security risk in Sochi is no more than in New York, Washington or Boston," he said, adding that the Russian security services were working with colleagues in the US and western Europe.
In December, suicide bombers killed 34 people in the Russian city of Volgograd, 400 miles north-east of Sochi. The attacks raised fears of further attacks during the Games.
A poll published by the Levada Centre, an independent Russian research organisation, this week found that 53% of those surveyed thought Russia was right to host the Olympics, 26% said the country should not have tried to do so and 21% were undecided. When asked what they saw as the main reason behind authorities' desire to hold the games, 38% said it was "opportunity for graft" and only 23% said it was important for national pride and to serve for the development of sport.
About half of respondents put the record price tag of the Sochi games down to corruption.
When asked about the survey during the press conference, Kozak said there was no evidence of "any large-scale corruption or theft" during the run-up to the Games, and that to say otherwise would "violate the democratic principle of presumption of innocence". |
Australia will deploy a fleet of drones to patrol its shores for sharks next month, as part of an effort to enhance beach safety. As Reuters reports, the drones are equipped with AI-powered software that can distinguish sharks from sharks, boats, and other marine life in real-time. The so-called “Little Ripper” drones were first used in a trial program last year.
Nabin Sharma, a research associate at the University of Technology Sydney’s School of Software, tells Reuters that the system aims to improve the accuracy of aerial shark detection, adding that humans are only able to identify sharks with 20 to 30 percent accuracy when analyzing aerial imagery. The drone-based system can detect sharks with 90 percent accuracy, Sharma said.
Researchers trained the system to identify sharks using publicly available aerial photos and video. If a shark is detected, the drones will alert swimmers through a megaphone, and could also deploy a life raft and emergency beacon for people in danger. Little Ripper Group, the company that developed the drones, is also working on an “electronic shark repellent,” company co-founder Paul Scully-Power tells Reuters.
Earlier this year, Australia began installing protective nets to protect swimmers from sharks, following a series of attacks. (Australia ranks second behind the US in unprovoked shark incidents.) But some researchers have questioned the effectiveness of underwater nets, and environmental advocates say they could harm other wildlife. |
The world is changing around the alliance; here's what its leaders must do to keep up.
Two years ago, Russia annexed Crimea — and demonstrated why NATO still matters. This week, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin surprised the world again by calling most of his troops home from Syria, leaving us to wonder what his next move might be. Will he focus on Ukraine again, or will he get involved somewhere else in Europe’s south? No matter where he goes, the Alliance needs to make sure it has a credible response. Here are four things NATO needs to do when its leaders gather at their Warsaw Summit in July.
First, place two brigades on its Eastern flank. As it is postured today, NATO is unable to easily defend its most vulnerable allies. In a conflict, Russian anti-access and area-denial capabilities in Kaliningrad could block allied air support while Moscow pours superior forces through Poland’s Suwalki Gap to cut off the Baltics. This kind of large-scale land attack is a low-probability, but extremely high-impact scenario. And Russia means business, as it has shown with the annexation of Crimea, the war in Eastern Ukraine, and its intervention in Syria. So the Warsaw Summit must shift Alliance strategy from small, mobile reinforcement to a larger, more autonomous forward presence with key capabilities in air defense, intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, and electronic warfare. Considering the overwhelming Russian military force ratio in the region, rotating a force the size of an Allied brigade, one in the Baltics and one in Poland, would be a good start.
Second, develop a clear strategy toward the South. The Mediterranean and the Levant remain sources of durable chaos that affect the security of NATO allies – witness the terrorist attacks in Paris and Ankara. Even if Russia’s withdrawal persuades Assad to compromise during the Syrian peace negotiations, it’s not going to solve the broader meltdown of the state system in MENA, which will continue to be a source of angst for the Alliance in the years to come. In Warsaw, Allies can approve a number of steps to strengthen their posture in the region. First, improve warning, surveillance, and response against trafficking in the eastern and central Mediterranean by flying Global Hawk UAVs from Sicily’s Sigonella Naval Air Station. Next, create initiatives to deter threats to Turkey’s security and territorial integrity, including the Russian military presence in the region. Although Moscow is withdrawing most forces from Syria, it sustains a strong footprint in the Eastern Med through its naval base in Latakia and airfield in Tartus. Finally, increase political support and resources to NATO’s Mediterranean Dialogue and the Istanbul Cooperation Initiative, which can draw upon substantial — and often unrecognized — openness and willingness in the Arab region for greater cooperation with the Alliance.
Third, focus on hybrid threats. Today, Russia represents mainly a conventional threat, but it and others are wading further into cyber and info warfare. NATO cannot present a united front if certain allies feel inadequately protected in this domain. The Warsaw Summit can set the Alliance on the right path by increasing human capital and financial resources for NATO’s various civil and military intelligence units, by granting the Supreme Allied Commander Europe more powers to authorize some of the preparatory response procedures, and above all, by working more closely with the European Union, such as seeking a NATO-EU Memorandum of Understanding on hybrid warfare.
Fourth, update its nuclear policy. The doctrine and conditions for crisis management enshrined in the 2012 Deterrence and Defense Posture Review are no longer valid. Russia considers nuclear weapons to be an integral part of its military power and increasingly uses its nuclear posture for messaging. The settlement with Iran may have brought a compromise with Teheran, but the agreement further permits the enrichment of nuclear material and thereby keeps the option of clandestine weapons grade material open. As for North Korea, it is pursuing its nuclear weapons program despite international sanctions. At the Warsaw Summit, the allies should therefore agree on wording that highlights the need for nuclear deterrence against any threat to NATO territory. After the Summit, NATO should launch a more comprehensive debate on its nuclear forces, akin to the process that led to the 2012 Deterrence and Defense Posture Review.
This is an ambitious agenda, but small, incremental changes will not answer the new security landscape in which the Allies find themselves. And this list is just a beginning. For more thoughts, see our new report, “NATO in A World of Disorder: Making the Alliance Ready for Warsaw.” |
Confirmed evidence from the Trump/Russia dossier was sufficient to convince a FISA court to grant a warrant to monitor Donald Trump's campaign adviser Carter Page. Will it be enough to prove the collusion alleged within the dossier?
The shocking British dossier about Donald Trump’s ties with Russia was used by the FBI to obtain a surveillance warrant of the Trump campaign’s foreign policy adviser, Carter Page, according to a new CNN report.
The FBI corroborated certain elements of the report prepared by former spy Christopher Steele to obtain the secret warrant, under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). FISA warrants allow federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies to conduct covert surveillance of people suspected of committing espionage on behalf of a foreign country within the United States — in this case, Carter Page.
The dossier includes allegations that Page acted as a liaison between the Trump campaign and the Russian government, discussing “quid pro quo” deals with Russian officials, in which a future Trump administration would lift U.S. sanctions against Russia in exchange for Russia’s deliberate interference to sway the presidential election for Trump.
Those allegations are central to proving actual collusion between the Trump team and the Russian government.
This latest news adds to the growing body of evidence that much the dossier was factually accurate, despite Trump’s continued claims that such evidence about his ties to Russia are “fake news”:
Russia talk is FAKE NEWS put out by the Dems, and played up by the media, in order to mask the big election defeat and the illegal leaks! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 26, 2017
During an interview in March, former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper declined to refute the dossier’s contents, which included listing a number of potential Russian sources for the dossier who were murdered on or following Election Day.
That the corroborating information about the allegations against Page contained in the dossier were sufficient to grant a FISA warrant is further evidence that the Trump campaign might have colluded with the Russian government to win the White House. |
WHISTLER – The greatest player in the history of Croatian hockey was playing poker with his friends in Zagreb when he hit the jackpot and signed with the Vancouver Canucks.
All Borna Rendulic has to do now is actually make the National Hockey League team. The Canucks appear to be giving him a fair chance, playing the 24-year-old winger at training camp alongside Sven Baertschi and Bo Horvat.
Granted, the Croat may only be keeping those core NHL players company until Canuck Jannik Hansen returns from the World Cup. But Rendulic has gone through a lot to have this chance and does not plan to go meekly to the Utica Comets, which is likely where he is headed.
Croatia has only 562 registered players among its population of nearly 4.5 million, so Rendulic left home at age 15 to play junior hockey in Finland.
“Hockey in Croatia is pretty bad,” he said before Sunday’s scrimmage here. “Two indoor rinks in the whole country. My age, when I was younger, there was only one team. So it was pretty tough to make it and I knew I wanted to do this, so I moved to Finland when I was 15 years old and spent seven years there. I did all junior, then signed as pro, then signed with Colorado.
“It’s been really hard. When you come from a different country, you are like the import. You’ve got to get used to the life and the language and all the things around you. I was really lucky to have good people who taught me how to play hockey.”
He signed his first NHL deal two years ago with the Colorado Avalanche, for which Rendulic played three games. But last season he had 16 goals and 38 points in the American Hockey League with San Antonio, and when the Avalanche chose not to qualify Rendulic and he became a free agent on July 1, the Canucks signed him to a two-way deal that includes a healthy $200,000 if he plays in the AHL this season.
He is 6-foot-2 and fast, and plays a straight north-south game.
“My agent called me one night,” Rendulic said. “I was playing poker with my friends; it was like 11 p.m. He said: ‘Are you interested in playing for the Canucks?’ I said: ‘Yeah, what’s the deal?’ After 10 minutes, I called him back and said ‘Yeah, I’ll sign with the Canucks.’”
Goran Bezina is believed to be the first Croatian to play in the NHL when he logged three games with the Phoenix Coyotes in 2003-04. But Bezina grew up in Switzerland, and Rendulic said he is the first player born and raised in Croatia to play in the NHL.
“In the hockey world there, I’m kind of famous,” he said. “But it’s not like I’m famous in the country.”
Maybe he’ll be famous in this one.
twitter.com/imacvansun
imacintyre@postmedia.com |
Robert St. Estephe–Gonzo Historian–is dedicated to uncovering the forgotten past of marginalizing men. “Gonzo journalism” is characterized as tending “to favor style over fact to achieve accuracy.” Yet history – especially “social history” – is written by ideologues who distort and bury facts in order to achieve an agenda. “Gonzo” writing is seen as unorthodox and surprising. Yet, in the 21st century subjectivity, distortion and outright lying in non-fiction writing is the norm. Fraud is the new orthodoxy. Consequently, integrity is the new “transgressive.”
Welcome to the disruptive world of facts, the world of Gonzo History.
•?•
Acid throwing is in the news these days due to the prevalence of this crime in South Central Asia. Reported statistics show victims to be about 80% female. Statistics on the sex of the perpetrator are much harder to find (and have not been located by UHoM yet). The epidemic of acid attacks started, we are told, in the 1980s. These crimes are, every reasonable person would agree, are of the most cruel kind and are deserving of the most extreme condemnation. Yet the specialists who make an effort to publicize this horrible crime epidemic are classifying it as a “gender issue.” The term “gender” when used in such a way universally connotes “women,” specifically in the sense of “victimization of women by men.” Perhaps this classification accurately represents the proportion of each sex in the victim category, but it does not accurately disclose the fact that a huge number of the perpetrators are women, women who choose to commit atrocious crimes on other individuals.
Let us try to overcome the confusion caused by the distorting lens of “gender” rhetoric by looking at a few cases remote in both place and time from those which are currently being, correctly, publicized.
Acid attacks were in the past a common crime in the US and occurred in Europe as well.
Since female criminality has been severely under-served by researchers ever since the beginning of criminology it is worthwhile to examine a sampling of such cases. The most overlooked category of criminal violence in terms of sex of perpetrator and sex of victim is, of course, female against female.
The three cases of female acid attackers presented here, all occurring in the same city in the same year are each quite different: one perpetrator threw acid on another woman, one threw acid on a man and another who threw acid on herself and then falsely accused someone else (an example combining self-mutilation and relational aggression). Studying long-forgotten cases such as these will assist those who wish to understand what the historical record reveals about the veracity of VAWA architects and their fallacious “belief in the inherent non-violence of women” (Barbara Hart, 1986).
For additional cases, see Acid Queens, a summary of over 70 cases dating from 1865 to the present, on The Unknown History of MISANDRY. It should be noted that large share of acid attacks by women involve what nowadays we call “stalking” another hot topic which is deceptively labeled as a “gender (connoting male against female) issue.”
•?•
FULL TEXT (Article 1 of 3): Made desperate by the complaint of her neglected daughter, Mrs. Kate Hayden, whose address is unknown, went to the home of Mrs. Ruth Murphy, at No. 615 East Eighty-first street, and attempted to destroy her beauty by throwing acid upon her face and neck. Mrs. Hayden is a fugitive from justice.
Her daughter Is Mrs. Joseph Cawfold, of No. 322 East Thirty-fifth street. She is delicate and subject to melancholy. When Mrs. Hayden went to see her last Tuesday night she was crying. She said tier husband had not been home all day, and she feared he, might have gone to the home of Mrs. Murphy with his brother Nicholas, who is engaged to be married to Mrs. Murphy’s sister. This story and the suspicion that her daughter was being slighted by Mr. Cawfold made the mother angry. Leaving the house in a rage, she bought a bottle of carbolic acid.
Mrs. Murphy and her unmarried sister live with Mrs. Catherine Manning, another sister. The women are refined and educated. They were school teachers in Dublin till they came to America four years ago. One is a music teacher and another has written magazine articles. The sisters say that Cawfold has called on them only three times and has never shown any attention to Mrs. Murphy. But the fact that his wife is plain, while all of the sisters are beautiful, made his mother-in-law suspicious.
“The vague complainings of her daughter seem to have turned her head,” said Mrs. Murphy yesterday, “for she came in here demanding, that I return her son-in-law. My husband is not at home. He is a bookkeeper at Ward’s Island. Nicholas was here sitting on the sofa with my sister. Mrs. Hayden burst in the door and exclaimed: ‘I’ll teach you to steal another’s husband. I’ll disfigure you for life!’ She threw the acid from the bottle at me. It burned my neck and back.
“Nicholas sprang to save me and was burned on the face. My sister’s little children clung to the woman’s skirts, but she followed me through the flat trying to hit my face with the acid. Then she fled.”
When Nicholas Cawfold and Mrs. Murphy went to a corner drug store to have their burns dressed Mrs. Hayden rushed in and risked if they were so badly burned they would be marked for life. Then she disappeared and the police have been hunting for her since. She has always been passionately jealous of her son-in-law’s attentions to other women than her daughter.
[“Jealous Mother-In-Law Threw Acid At Beauty.” The World (New York, N.Y.) Aug. 8, 1901, p. 12]
•?• FULL TEXT: (Article 2 of 3): Mamie Sheehan, of No. 206 Baltic street, Brooklyn, and Patrick Lane, of No. 55 Van Brunt street, were at a dance last night in the Brooklyn Dancing Academy, in Fulton street, opposite the Borough Hall. They has formerly been sweethearts, but during the evening Lane did not dance with her. After midnight, when the dance broke up, Lane went out on the street and met the girl, who then threw acid in his face. Then she ran away.
The other girl was with Lane when the acid was thrown, and when the Sheehan girl ran away she followed. Opposite the Municipal Building she caught up to her, and there was a fierce struggle between the two, the blond girl yelling for the police all the while. Roundsman O’Brien heard her cries and placed Mamie Sheehan under arrest.
Meanwhile Lane’s friends wiped the acid from his face and took him to a near-by drug store At first he denied that he knew who threw the acid, and in a careless way asked those around him to have some soda water. He was firm in his denial about the girl when the roundsman brought her in. It was only after long persuasion that he agreed to make the complaint. His eye sight will probably be saved.
When taken to the police station the girl admitted her guilt.
“He threw me over for another girl,” she said, “so why should I not disfigure him? I do not remember throwing the acid, though. I seem to have been some other person.
“I saw Patsy dancing with a blond girl, who was smiling at him. He should have been dancing with me. I had never done anything to deserve such treatment, and the sight of Patsy dancing with the other girl made me crazy.
“I am not sorry for what I did, and it is right that he should suffer as he made me suffer.
The girl, who is twenty-one years old and pretty, was arraigned in the Adams Street Court this morning, but for some hours Lane did not show up to make a complaint.
When Miss Sheehan was arraigned was arraigned in the Adams Street Police Court, Mr. Lane appeared as a witness. His face was badly burned and he was wearing smoked glasses.
Magistrate Steers asked if he could identify Miss Sheehan as his assailant. He said that he could not.
“There were twenty persons in the crowd,” he said, “and I do not know who threw the acid.”
“Do you think we should hold this girl longer?”
“Well, I she should be held until I can get witnesses.”
The policeman who had made the arrest said that he had no complaint to make, so the Magistrate dismissed Miss Sheehan, saying:
“I do not see why she was arrested.”
Before leaving the court-room Miss Sheehan, who is twenty-one, small, black-haired and pretty, admitted having thrown the acid, and said that she did it because she could not bear to see Lane with another girl.
Miss Sheehan left the court-room in company with her mother and sister. After consultation with his friends Lane returned to the police station and asked Magistrate Steers to issue a warrant for the arrest of Miss Sheehan.
[“Jealous, She Threw Acid On Former Sweetheart.- Lane, However, Was Unable to Identify Mamie Sheehan, and the Magistrate Released Her.” The World (New York, N.Y.), Oct. 30, 1901, p. 3]
•?•
FULL TEXT (Article 3 of 3): After being foiled in an attempt to rob her aunt for the benefit, the police say, of her lover, and after disfiguring herself for life with carbolic acid in trying to bolster up a false story of robbery, pretty Amelia Fleming, of No. 642 Evergreen avenue, Williamsburg, has left her home for parts unknown after making a full confession of her duplicity to the police.
The girl is only twenty-one years old and very good looking and bright. She has worked as a governess for some good families in Brooklyn, but when she lost her last position, a few months ago, went to live with her aunt, Mrs. Louisa Siebel, at the address given.
Ten days ago Mrs. Siebel missed a dollar bill and found that somebody had ransacked her bureau. She questioned her niece, but the girl denied taking the money and suggested burglars.
Mrs. Siebel, however, feared for the safety of a roll of about $500 that she kept in her trunk, and put it in the bank without the girl’s knowledge.
~ Burned With Acid. ~
Last Thursday Miss Fleming was found in the hallway of her aunt’s home by Hilda Schubert, a neighbor, badly burned with carbolic acid about the neck, face and hands, and apparently in an exhausted condition. She said a masked woman had entered the house and thrown the acid on her when she tried to prevent her from breaking open her aunt’s trunk. She said the woman had ransacked the place and stolen from her a gold watch, which had been a gift from her mother. She showed a mask which, she said,
~ Confesses to Police. ~
The police concluded that the girl’s whole story is false and last night Sergt. Relfcucider, of the Ralph avenue station, went to the house with Detective Mitchell and received a full confession from the girl.
The girl said she had lost her watch and $15 dollars a week ago, and fearing to tell her aunt had thrown the acid on herself and feigned the assault of the masked woman. She admitted that she alone had ransacked her aunt’s rooms.
At Mrs. Siebel’s home this morning, an Evening World reporter was told that Miss Fleming had gone.
“Is that the man she is engaged to?” was asked.
“I don’t know anything about it,” said Mrs. Siebel. Then she said she did not know where her niece was and refused to give any further details of the queer story.
[“Acid-Burned Girl Confesses And Flees. – Amelia Fleming, Who Disfigured Herself to Cover Up Theft, Disappears.” The World (New York, N. Y.), Nov. 5, 1901, p. 10]
•?•
Acid Queens, a summary of over 70 cases dating from 1865 to the present, on The Unknown History of MISANDRY.
•?• |
Bernie Sanders is scheduled to meet Wednesday with President Barack Obama in the White House for only the second time Ahead of their White House meeting, a look at the Obama-Sanders dynamic, by Juliet Eilperin and Paul Kane, Washington Post, January 26 2016. This signifies the Sanders campaign’s unexpected strength—but also the Vermont Senator’s record of remoteness from the racial identity politics that now dominate the Democratic Party, as personified by Obama.
Recently, Hillary Clinton unleashed her attack dog, Media Matters’ David Brock, to accuse Sanders of racism, saying Sanders’s latest ad paints a “bizarre” portrait of America. Brock argued that the ad was a “slight to the Democratic base" and that “it seems black lives don't matter much to Bernie Sanders.” [Clinton ally: Black lives 'don't matter much' to Sanders, by Jesse Byrnes, The Hill, January 21, 2016]
Had Bernie Sanders resurrected Leni Riefenstahl to produce his ads? Not exactly.
With Simon and Garfunkel’s song America playing in the background (though it cuts the line “So we bought a pack of cigarettes”), Sanders’s ad showed vignettes of Americans, interspersed with crowds at Bernie Sanders rallies [Art Garfunkel Explains Why He Approved Bernie Sanders’ Use of ‘America,’ by Ted Johnson, Variety, January 22, 2016]. Although the ad went out of its way to include images of minority Sanders supporters, it did not hide the fact the vast majority were white. The bulk of the vignettes evoked Norman Rockwell/New Deal style imagery featuring farmers, families, and small towns, with some SWPL’s and their laptops at coffee shops thrown in as an afterthought.
A decade ago, no one would have batted an eye. In 2004, John Kerry ran an ad criticizing George Bush’s outsourcing policies. It showed half a dozen clips of Kerry meeting with groups of American workers, every single one of whom was white.
In 1996, Bill Clinton ran an ad called “America Back,” which listed his accomplishments while showing videos of Americans. Of the 17 vignettes, only four featured minorities, usually as tokens in a group of whites.
I did not see a single Asian or Hispanic person. Almost all the whites gave off the “bizarre” gestalt that triggered David Brock. The majority of women and children had blonde hair. The ads also twice featured police officers—while Clinton bragged about strengthening capital punishment.
Of course, Clinton’s actions in office did not match this “white bread” vision of America. He later expressly celebrated white America’s demographic decline. However, it’s notable that he still projected this implicitly white image to the voters when he was looking for voters.
Things are far different today. Hillary Clinton doesn’t even bother pretending she wants to preserve the Old America. The Democratic Party is simply what Steve Sailer calls the “coalition of the fringes” against the core. And white families and workers are now “bizarre.”
What does Clinton view as “normal” America? Her first ad featured vignettes of 11 groups of various Americans who are “Getting Started” with new phases of their life. Of the eleven, five were non-white and one was an interracial couple. Of the five groups of whites, one was a gay couple, one was a single mother.
There were only three “core” white Americans, one female retiree, a middle aged woman planting tomatoes, and a gardener. Not one of them was blonde, none of the white women (except the single mother) had long hair—and there was not one image of a white heterosexual couple or of a white father.
Why haven’t Bernie’s advertising people received the memo about the new Democratic Party? Probably part of the explanation: Sanders is an old style Leftist from one of the whitest states in the country. Thus, he was free to occasionally take heterodox positions in the past. Though Sanders marched with Martin Luther King and was arrested for protesting segregation, his Congressional career focused on economic and foreign policy issues rather than race.
However, as the nomination campaign has progressed, especially after Black Lives Matters targeted him, Sanders has emphasized his Establishment Left-wing positions on racial issues.
The sole exception: immigration, where Sanders has in the past opposed massive increases in legal immigration and seems to understand that supply and demand affected immigration.
Sanders told Ezra Klein that open borders is “a Koch brothers proposal . . .What right-wing people in this country would love is an open-border policy. Bring in all kinds of people, work for $2 or $3 an hour, that would be great for them. I don't believe in that."
Sanders later doubled down, telling MSNBC that if "anybody can come into the United States of America . . .there is no question in my mind that that was substantially lower wages in this country." [Bernie Sanders criticizes ‘open borders’ at Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, by Dave Weigel, Washington Post, July 30, 2015].
Nonetheless, Sanders is no immigration patriot. Though he voted against the 2007 Amnesty/Immigration Surge bill, he voted for the Gang of 8 atrocity, the DREAM Act, and wants to expand DAPA. By the time of the first Democratic candidates’ debate, when it became unmistakeable that the party did not intend to compete with Trump for the working class vote, that his collapse into Cultural Marxist identity-politics pandering was complete.
But it is doing him no good. While most polls show him close or leading in Iowa and with a comfortable lead in New Hampshire, these are amongst the whitest states in the Union. In contrast, in South Carolina over half of the Democratic primary voters are black. And there Clinton enjoys a 71% margin among black voters and 34% lead over Sanders.
Nationwide polls show Sanders and Clinton neck and neck among whites, but Clinton has a consistent 40-50 point lead among non-white voters. [The one problem Bernie Sanders has to fix — and hasn’t, by Philip Bump, Washington Post, December 19, 2015]
Non-whites dominate the Democratic primaries in states that have high non-white populations and GOP dominance amongst white voters. These states include the Deep South, Texas, and Arizona. And the four states with the most delegates, including Texas, Florida, New York, and California have a high enough non-white population that it’s impossible for Sanders to win with his pitiful non-white share. [Here’s what Hillary Clinton’s nonwhite firewall looks like, by Philip Bump, Washington Post, January 18, 2015]
Many commentators have wondered what Sanders could do to increase his non-white share. But I can see few options beyond what he’s already done. Most non-whites are extremely Left wing on economic issues and would probably prefer Sanders to Clinton on the issues—if issues were what counted. With the arguable exception of immigration, Sanders has already taken completely standard Leftist positions on these issues—and I doubt immigration has much to do with his lagging support among the black community.
The real reason Sanders is flagging among non-whites: supporting a grassroots candidate and attending political rallies requires some level of civic engagement. The Main Stream Media may not like to admit it but numerous studies have found non-whites are much less civically involved than whites.
As the black political scientist J Foster Bey noted: “There are strong differences in civic engagement by race, ethnicity and citizenship status. Whites are much more likely than blacks, Hispanics or Asians to be civically engaged using any of the four measures. Asians and Hispanics consistently appear to have low rates of civic engagement” measured by volunteering, political participation and community activity. “They also appear to be much less actively engaged in their communities as compared to either whites or blacks” [Do Race, Ethnicity, Citizenship and Socio-economic Status Determine Civic-Engagement?, Tufts University, Tisch College of Citizenship and Public Service (2008)]
Blacks may show up to protest/riot over a police shooting and the Democratic Party can bus them to the voting booth, but by and large they are far less likely to get involved in political campaigns.
Indeed, a Google image search of Hillary Clinton campaign rallies or campaign volunteers brings up images that are just as white as a Tea Party rally or Bernie Sanders ad.
Clinton, however, is the default Democratic candidate, and unless there is a Jesse Jackson or Barack Obama to vote for, blacks and most other non-whites will vote for the default candidate. If Sanders wins Iowa and New Hampshire, he could very well be seen as a serious candidate and some non-whites will follow him, but it would not be because they are attracted to his message or movement.
I have spent a good deal of time in Vermont, and am always stuck that many of the things the Left loves about it are precisely those things which would disappear if it became “diverse.” For example, I visited a public lake with an honor system for you to pay 5 dollars to visit, which you put into an unlocked jar. Suffice to say that in Detroit or Atlanta, locals would skip the fee, trash the lake, and thieves would steal the money that any people gullible enough to play by the rules would have given.
While I am no fan of Bernie Sanders, his political career is a product of a white high-trust society and his unexpected success comes from dedicated and civically involved white Americans.
Unfortunately, neither he nor his supporters recognize that Vermont-style politics is only compatible with the demographics of Vermont.
Ellison Lodge (email him) works on Capitol Hill. |
There is something extremely depressing about the passage of time, especially for those of us that feel we have had more days behind us than ahead. We make choices that are seemingly for the better at the time and find in the end they have greater negative consequences than we had anticipated. What we find out in Black Hammer #7 is that consequences sometimes trap us and even heroes bear the onus of their decisions.
We find the group of former heroes locked in a rural farming town, unable to go past a certain point, and ultimately we read that moving further than a boundary will cost them their lives. In this issue, we find that Black Hammer paid the ultimate price to relay this information to the other remaining heroes. That tragedy is felt all the more, when years later, his daughter stumbles into the farming town to find her father. Only now she is trapped in the same world as they are, with no way to escape their confines.
Writer Jeff Lemire references the sacrifices that a father makes for his children, and the things given up to make it happen. Many older comic book readers will approach this title and appreciate the deeper story of how time has taken away from the heroes, and is seen as an enemy to their better interests. We discover that there are sacrifices of time, effort, and energy that a father takes to raise his children. Contrasted to that are the greater duties that a man has to uphold, but sometimes neglects because he sees the duties at home and the relationships he has with his nearest and dearest greater than even saving the world.
More from Bounding Into Comics
Needless to say, I felt emotionally moved by this. I saw myself in the shoes of the protagonists, locked in the consequences of my decisions, thinking that at the time, I was making a better choice for my future, and for the futures of those who would come after me. Ultimately, I would find myself in a space of inability to move further beyond the situation that I found myself in. The rut that we put ourselves through because the price we paid for decisions made was too great, and now the debt we have to pay back is more than we can bear. Then we find the effects of our decisions not only have harmed us, but have harmed and will continue to harm those that come after us.
Dean Ormston’s art style takes us on a trip through some of the golden age style of comics and contrasts it with a more modern approach. He really captures the golden age style when its comes to the hero outfits and the characters’ suits. He captures the fantastical and elaborate as well as outlandish and almost impractical look of the Golden age. This art style emphasizes just how much time has passed for the characters and how their style has not kept up.
How Ormston managed to seemingly switch styles to fit the time periods astounds me. In a flashback, it looks like I was viewing a Jack Kirby art style, or maybe an old school Joe Kubert style with the proportions of the bodies, the framing of the scene, accentuated by costuming of many of the characters of that time period. The coloring style of Dave Stewart also does much to highlight that time period, where the colors are vibrant and do their best to catch the eye of the reader along with the costume designs. It was like seeing Luke Cage in his old yellow shirt and chain belt with metal bracers.
Yet the transition Ormston takes to reflect the characters as they are in the present day along with Stewart is stark. We see a more contemporary art style with angles and framing of scenes that reflects the rule of thirds more strictly, while exploring more aspects of over-the-shoulder framing while subduing colors, giving the scene a darker and more melancholy tone. The contrast between what the characters experienced ten years prior and the hopelessness of their situation now is explained in their dialogue, from the frustrated tone of Golden Gail, to the tired and almost apathetic demeanor of Abraham Slam. This hopelessness is also reflected in the art style in how their lives used to be and how life is now.
There is a lot more to be said concerning Black Hammer #7 as one who has, as a kid, seen a swath of colorful comic titles in the early 90’s, and now being a grown-up and seeing all these comics continue as if locked in that time period. I guess this is what Lemire wanted to address as a main issue with many of the comic titles today- a refusal to allow characters to age, to move on, and ultimately to die, and for new blood to take their place. And as someone who is now seeing some of the earlier comic book titles coming to the big screen, and the comic books trying to revive the characters to follow in the footsteps of the movie successes, Black Hammer explores a new concept of jettisoning some would-be throwaway comic book heroes into the present day, allowing them, when put in the right setting and given the proper character development, to be amazing in their own right.
The Verdict
I had to fight back tears reading this. I read that Lemire wanted a bit of humor in this series, but Black Hammer #7 hit on some emotional heartstrings for me that seem to be getting plucked more often nowadays with some recent movies as well as just the personal struggles of getting old, feeling stuck, and looking back on more days than you can count and rethinking your decisions. Having said that, I think it’s amazing what Lemire has done. He took a concept of superheroes that time somehow forgot, and gave them a crisis of character, which is: what do they do in a world that doesn’t need them? That coupled with the art style of Ormston and coloring of Stewart were enough to take me on an emotional roller coaster ride that, as painful as it may be to get on, may be more therapeutic to experience than to not having ridden at all. Needless to say, I will be purchasing the previous issues and look forward to more!
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Thousands of partygoers are planning to attend a beach party on Friday the 13th next week, but police and parks staff say they’ll have to get past their officers first.
The “full moon beach party” Facebook page has logged more than 7,000 “I’m going” hits for a party planned for June 13, the night of a full moon.
The site says it’s organized by DJ Bjorn, a Swedish DJ who now lives in Vancouver and whose website says he parties at his favourite beaches on English Bay, in Kitsilano and on Wreck Beach, wearing a costume and carrying his portable DJ equipment with him on his electric bike.
“Day time is almost always at English Bay and we also set up for after-hours (starting at 3 a.m.), but those locations are kept secret till the very night,” he wrote on his blog.
He didn’t return messages and the Facebook page doesn’t include a location for the full-moon bash, but a number of the entries guessed it to be Wreck Beach, Vancouver’s tolerated clothing-optional beach near the University of B.C.
RCMP’s UBC detachment said they’ll be ready if the thousands who promised to show up arrive at the beach, notorious for open drug and alcohol use.
Police officers and park rangers from Metro Vancouver Parks, which runs the beach, will be positioned at the four marked trails to the beach, which is at the bottom of a steep embankment accessible by 472 steps.
“It is a contravention of a (Metro) Parks bylaw for anyone to access the beach after sunset,” said UBC RCMP spokesman Sgt. Drew Grainger, who said the embankment would be treacherous in the dark.
He said ticketing and arrests are possible but officers would prefer to make a “public service announcement” to anyone attempting to access or remain on the beach after dark.
Damara Smith said she learned of the event from a friend on Facebook. The Richmond woman said she’s never been to anything like the advertised event before, but had imagined it’d be similar to the annual fireworks held at English Bay, “but with more music and not as many people, like a cool outdoor, nice setting.”
“I looked into it and thought it looked like a neat idea, so I said, ‘Yes, I’ll go,’’’ said the 27-year-old.
Vancouver police said their regular beach patrol is always on the lookout for violations of park bylaws and liquor offences.
“In the event that an incident is brought to our attention that is beyond the scope of the beach patrol, our emergency operations and planning section will work to ensure that sufficient resources are available,” said Vancouver police Sgt. Randy Fincham in an email.
UBC RCMP find after-hour partiers on the beach about once a month, as they did about a month ago when they learned about a rave that had been advertised on social media.
“We go down and we ask them to abide by the park closure,” said Grainger.
Smith said she wasn’t too worried about safety concerns such as open liquor consumption and drug use. |
(Marcio Jose Sanchez/AP)
Google has made a reputation for itself in recent years as a major investor in renewable energy. And this morning, the company announced its newest investment: a wind power project in Kenya that, when completed, will be the continent’s biggest wind farm.
The Lake Turkana Wind Power Project, which broke ground in July, is expected to generate 1,400 gigawatt-hours of power per year, or 15 percent of the country’s electricity consumption, according to a fact sheet from Vestas, one of the project’s co-developers. The project will include 365 wind turbines, spread along the shore of Kenya’s Lake Turkana.
Vestas, a global wind energy company, will be in charge of installing the turbines (likely early next year) and will also provide maintenance for the farm for 15 years. Currently, Vestas owns a 12.5 percent stake in the project — and Google’s investment will be to buy this stake once the project goes online, which is planned for 2017.
The project is billed as the largest single private investment in Kenya’s history — and it’s expected to break new ground in other ways as well. According to Vestas, the project will be one of the most efficient wind farms in the world, operating with a capacity factor (its actual energy output, as opposed to its potential energy output) of 60 percent, whereas many other wind farms have a capacity factor of less than 35 percent.
The capacity factors for wind farms tend to be variable because the wind is so unpredictable in many places, picking up and slowing down. Lake Turkana is an ideal location because the wind blows consistently, with speeds topping 24 mph, according to Vestas.
It could be big news for Kenya, as the project is expected to save the country more than $113 million per year in imported fuel costs. Currently, the country relies heavily on hydropower and fossil fuels. According to the International Energy Agency, solar cells produced one gigawatt-hour of power in Kenya in 2012, and wind produced 15 gigawatt-hours. So the new plant will add substantially to the country’s renewable energy production.
As for Google, investment in the plant is just the latest in a string of recent renewable energy investments. In Africa, the company has invested in the Jasper Power Project, a solar plant in South Africa. Other wind investments have included farms in Iowa, Texas, Oklahoma, North Dakota and other parts of the country. And Google also recently launched its Project Sunroof, an online tool that allows users to search their address and find out how much space they have available for solar panels, how many hours of usable sunlight they could generate and how much money they could save by switching to solar. Altogether, the Lake Turkana Wind Power Project makes Google’s 22nd renewable energy investment.
The announcement comes at a time when world leaders are still busy preparing for the UN’s annual climate conference, which will take place in Paris at the beginning of December. At the conference, they’ll attempt to finalize an international accord to combat climate change. Throughout the past year, nations around the world have been releasing their strategies to cut carbon emissions ahead of the conference, and earlier this month, 51 countries unveiled their climate action plans — but experts say it’s still not enough. Climate activists are calling for more aggressive mitigation strategies, and increased investment in renewable energy — designed to accompany a global effort to cut down on the burning of fossil fuels — is one important strategy.
So the announcement is a timely reminder that large-scale investments in wind farms, as well as solar plants and other forms of renewable energy, don’t just benefit the countries they directly serve: They affect the future of the planet as a whole. |
‘Avengers: Infinity War’ Crossover With ‘Defenders’ Improbable
When it was announced that Marvel would be expanding the MCU on Netflix by airing four series based on heroes of New York City, it was hoped that such an expansion would mean that said heroes would appear in the final two Avengers films – soon to be retitled. But finding a way to fit 67 characters into the two films would be problematic and highly unlikely to happen.
But having all the characters from the films and television would be a true comic book movie event of epic proportions. Now that Captain America: Civil War has had its hugely successful opening weekend, writers Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely recently talked about the possibility of the crossover happening in the two upcoming Avengers: Infinity War films once more. Check out what they had to say below.
In an interview with IGN, Markus and McFeely were open to the idea of having such a crossover, but admit that it is just out of their hands.
McFeely: We are open to any of it, although it’s really not our call. Markus: A lot of it is a pace thing in that we have to have this thing done so much ahead of time, that they might get all the way through that Defenders show before we start shooting, certainly before anything comes out. So we don’t know where they’re going to be. It’s very hard logistically to keep even the movie characters synced up. It’s nearly impossible given the speed that TV cranks out the changes.
There in lies the problem. Ever since Kevin Feige assumed power over Marvel Studios, Isaac “Ike” Perlmutter lost his power but still holds control over Marvel Entertainment. Given how nasty that dissolution was, there was likely to be no communication between the two parties, as obviously noted by Feige’s disinterest in whatever is happening on the TV side of things. Marvel Television is simply moving too fast for Marvel Studios to keep up. Writing a film isn’t exactly the same as writing for television. Television progresses very quickly and takes significantly less time to write than it does a film script. Basically, in the time it takes to finish everything needed for a film, so much has already happened to the TV characters that the film’s screenplay already feels outdated.
This isn’t any different from what we have heard from a few months back when Anthony Russo said they were only in control of what happens in Marvel movies:
It’s complicated. When we start to serialize the telling of stories it’s difficult. You have to have a lot of control and focus on the course of history. The films are controlled by a group led by Kevin Feige, so they function as a unit. Other products, even if they are from Marvel, are controlled by others. Then there is the possibility of a crossover, but it’s more complicated. It is a smaller scale version of the problem that exists when remembering that Fox holds the rights to some of Marvel’s most popular characters, as does Sony and others. As storytellers, we only have control over what happens in Marvel movies, but everything is possible, Spider-Man (whose rights were held by Sony) became possible!
Despite that tiny shred of optimism of any crossover happening, at all is what it really amounts to. A shred. For such a crossover to happen would take a miracle and for both parties to show a willingness to cooperate with each other.
We will stick with the current titles until the new ones are announced, but the release dates haven’t changed, so for now, Avengers: Infinity War Part I opens on May 4, 2018, with Avengers: Infinity War Part II opening in theaters on May 3, 2019. |
Ed Orgeron expressed his frustration Wednesday night in LSU's field goal kicking problems.
"We just don't have a field goal kicker," the Tigers head coach said in response to a question during his radio show from TJ Ribs restaurant. "We just don't have one right now. I wish we had one on our roster, but I'm about to go recruit one, and I'm going to get the best one in the country."
LSU (3-2, 0-1 SEC) heads to play No. 21 Florida (3-1, 3-0) on Saturday with its worst field goal kicking problem in more than a decade. The Tigers' two kickers, walk-on sophomore Jack Gonsoulin and redshirt freshman Connor Culp, are a combined 3-for-7 in field goals this season.
That's the worst mark through seven attempts since 2003. LSU's field goal kicking has excelled over the last decade. Tigers kickers made their first seven attempts in each 2013, 2014 and 2015. The four misses through five games is as many as kicker Colby Delahoussaye missed all of last season (11 of 15).
Gonsoulin has missed kicks of 34, 35 and 40 yards, and Culp missed a 47-yarder. Culp made a 49-yard field goal, and Gonsoulin made 29 and 23-yarders in the season opener.
Orgeron re-opened a starting placekicker job that Gonsoulin won during preseason camp. The Catholic High native won the gig again during a kicking competition in camp leading into the third game at Mississippi State. The Tigers did not attempt a field goal in that game or in Game 4 against Syracuse.
Gonsoulin whiffed on a 35-yard field goal against Troy last week in a 24-21 loss. The kick left his foot low, hooking well left of the goal posts.
Orgeron said the kicker was 5-for-5 on field goals during practice last week.
KICKING WOES
LSU kickers, though seven attempts, are off to their worst start since 2003. |
November 14, 2014—According to historian and professor Beverly Gage, an uncensored version of the FBI’s “Suicide Letter” to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. offers “a potent warning” concerning the dangers of mass surveillance. The document illustrates the lengths that intelligence agencies are willing to go, using surveillance as a weapon for harassment and intimidation.
From the New York Times article:
Since then, the so-called “suicide letter” has occupied a unique place in the history of American intelligence — the most notorious and embarrassing example of Hoover’s F.B.I. run amok. For several decades, however, only significantly redacted copies of the letter were available for public scrutiny. This summer, while researching a biography of Hoover, I was surprised to find a full, uncensored version of the letter tucked away in a reprocessed set of his official and confidential files at the National Archives. The uncovered passages contain explicit allegations about King’s sex life, rendered in the racially charged language of the Jim Crow era. Looking past the viciousness of the accusations, the letter offers a potent warning for readers today about the danger of domestic surveillance in an age with less reserved mass media.
Read the entire article here.
How far should we go in reining in mass surveillance to prevent further attacks against liberty? Please share your thoughts and solutions in the comments below.
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One of the most surprising things I’ve ever read about Scala came in the form of a (mostly positive) review article. This article went to some lengths comparing Scala to Java, JRuby on Groovy, discussing many of its advantages and disadvantages relative to those languages. Everyone seems to be writing articles to this effect these days, so the comparison in and of itself was not surprising. What was interesting was an off-hand comment discussing Scala’s “dynamic typing” and how it aids in the development of domain specific languages.
Now this article had just finished a long-winded presentation of type inference and compilation steps, so I’m quite certain that the author was aware of Scala’s type system. The more likely target of the “dynamic typing” remark would be Scala’s implicit conversions mechanism. I have heard this language feature described many times as being a way of “dynamically” adding members to an existing class. While it would be incorrect to say that this feature constitutes a dynamic type system, it is true that it may be used to satisfy many of the same design patterns. Consider the facetious example of a string “reduction” method, one which produces an acronym based on the upper-case characters within the string:
val acronym = "Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer" . reduce println ( acronym ) // MCSE
The immediate problem with this snippet is the fact that string literals are of type java.lang.String , a class which comes pre-defined by the language. The only way to ensure that the above syntax works properly is to “add” the reduce method to the String class separate from its definition. In a language such as Ruby or Groovy which have dynamic type systems, we could simply open the class definition and add a new method at runtime. However, in Scala we have to be a bit more tricky. We can’t actually add methods to an existing class, but we can define a new class which contains the desired method. Once we have that, we can define an implicit conversion from our target class to our new class. The Scala compiler sees this and performs the appropriate magic behind the scenes. In code, it looks like this:
class MyRichString ( str: String ) { def reduce = str. toCharArray . foldLeft ( "" ) { ( t, c ) => t + ( if ( c. isUpperCase ) c. toString else "" ) } } implicit def str2MyRichString ( str: String ) = new MyRichString ( str )
This contrasts quite dramatically with the Ruby implementation of the same concept via open classes (somewhat less-graciously known as “Monkey Patching”):
class String def reduce arr = unpack ( 'c*' ) . select { |c| ( 65 .. 90 ) . include ? c } arr. pack 'c*' end end puts 'HyperText Transfer Protocol' . reduce # HTTP
No visible type conversion is taking place here, all we did is add a method to an existing class and trust that the runtime can figure out the rest. Indeed, for this application, we don’t really need anything else. However, as anyone with experience implementing internal domain-specific languages will tell you, seldom is life as simple as adding a few methods to an existing class. Consider a more complicated scenario where we need to overload the < operator on integers to operate on String values, returning true if the length of the string is less than the integer value, otherwise false . In Scala, we would once again make use of the implicit conversion mechanism, this time with an even more concise syntax:
implicit def lessThanOverload ( i: Int ) = new { def < ( str: String ) = str. length < i }
In fact, we don't even need to go this far. It is possible to create an implicit conversion from String to Int defined on the length of the String . This would allow existing method implementations within the Int class to operate upon String values:
implicit def str2Int ( str: String ) = str. length
As a matter of interest, this particular situation can be managed by one of the most convoluted and verbose languages on the market, C++:
bool operator< ( const int &i, const std:: string &str ) { return str. length ( ) < i; }
Despite the seemingly-dynamic nature of the problem, the statically typed language camp seems well represented in terms of solutions. Ironically, this sort of problem is one which will be exceedingly difficult to solve in a language like Ruby. This is primarily because method overloading is an innately static device. That's not to say that overloading is impossible in a dynamically typed language (Groovy), but it's not easy. To see why, let's consider the most natural implementation of our operator problem in Ruby:
class Fixnum def < ( str ) str. size < self end end
Intuitively, this may seem like the right way to approach the problem, but the results of such an implementation would be disastrous. At the very least, the first time anyone attempted to perform a < comparison targeting an integer, the interpreter will overflow the call stack. In fact, any time any code uses the less-than operator on an instance of Fixnum , the interpreter will crash. The reason for this is the invocation of < upon str.size within our "overloaded" definition. This call creates a very tight recursive loop which will very quickly eat through all available stack frames. We can avoid this problem by reversing the comparison like so:
class Fixnum def < ( str ) self >= str. size end end
Now we don't have to worry about stack overflow, but in the process we have accidentally redefined integer-to-integer comparison in a very strange way:
irb(main):006:0> 123 < 'test' => true irb(main):007:0> 123 < 123 => true
Clearly, more effort is going to be required if we are to put to rest our little dilemma. As it turns out, the final solution is surprisingly ugly and verbose:
class Fixnum alias_method :__old_less_than__ , '<' . to_sym def < ( target ) if target. kind_of ? String __old_less_than__ target. size else __old_less_than__ target end end end
Whatever happened to Ruby as a "more elegant" language? The unfortunate truth is that in order to emulate method overloading based on input type, we must hold onto the old method implementation while we implement a type-sensitive facade in its place. The alias_method invocation literally copies the old less-than operator implementation and provides us with a way of referencing it within our later redefinition. And what happens if someone else happens to monkey patch Fixnum and (for whatever reason) uses the identifier " __old_less_than__ "? Well, then we have problems. It's like the old days of Lisp macros and endless identifier collisions.
It is true that this was an example specifically contrived to make Ruby look bad. I could have implemented the overload using Groovy's meta-classes and been reasonably certain that everything would work out fine, but that's not the point. The point is that there are a surprising number of situations where static typing serves not only to check for errors but also to allow extension patterns which would be otherwise impossible (or very, very difficult). Dynamic typing isn't the panacea of extensibility that its proponents make it out to be, sometimes it isn't quite up to the task.
In fact (and this is where we come to my Digg-friendly point), I would submit that Scala (and to a lesser extent, C++) have created a mechanism for controlled extensibility which is more powerful than Ruby's open classes design. That's not to say that there aren't situations which are easily solved using open classes and entirely intractable using only implicit conversions, but in my experience these scenarios are very rare. In fact, I believe that it is far more common to run against a problem like my contrived overload which is greatly simplified through the use of static typing.
Ironically enough, some of Ruby's greatest pundits are starting to come around to the belief that a more controlled and well-defined model of class extension is required. ParseTree is a Ruby framework which provides mechanisms for dynamically manipulating the AST of an expression prior to evaluation. Conceptually, it is very similar to Lisp's macros and peripherally related to .NET's expression trees (used in LINQ). ParseTree is used by a number of complex Ruby domain-specific languages, including Ambition, a fact which is extremely telling of how great the need is for just such a tool. Having myself attempted a domain-specific language for constructing queries, I can state categorically that to do such a thing solely on the basis of open classes would be nearly impossible. Even if successful, such a framework would be extremely volatile, sensitive to the slightest change in the Ruby core library, either caused by update or by other packages injecting their own meddlesome implementations into runtime classes.
Lex Spoon (co-author of Programming in Scala) once said that any language which seriously targeted domain-specific languages would have to create some sort of implicit conversion mechanism. At the time, I was skeptical, convinced that Ruby (and similar) would always have the upper-hand in the area of class extension due to their dynamic treatment of modules and classes. However, after some serious dabbling in the field of internal domain-specific languages, I'm beginning to come 'round to his point of view. Implicit conversions are far from a weak imitation of Scala's dynamically typed "betters", they are a powerful and controlled way of extending types far beyond anything which can be easily accomplished through open classes. |
Because the Twins are mediocre, and the Dodgers are very good, Minnesota lost to Los Angeles this morning, 6-5, after taking a 5-0 lead.
That’s the First Paragraph. All the pertinent details.
Here, in the third paragraph, allow me to share a deep sense of personal despair at losing to Southern California, yet again. I lived there. Twice. The sheer viciousness, cruelty, and embrace of utter shallowness I encountered kicked my ass so hard it took me a decade to recover. Obviously my experience was subjective, and not an accurate representation of what, I’m sure, are the many fine people in that region.
But it did kick my ass, and in a way no other place has. Betrayal by people I trusted became the norm, always justified by “you need to be more laid back, like us.” As Pauline Kael wrote more than 50 years ago, “Los Angeles dislocates my values, makes me ashamed of not being all the things I’m not and don’t ordinarily care to be. Each time I get on the jet to return [home] it’s like turning the time-machine backward and being restored to an old civilization that I understand.”
Losing to that culture, to that mindset, keeps reaffirming that there’s no point in trying. No point in attempting to have a conscience or ethical code. It’s all against all, baby, and why don’t you tan at the beach more?
Yeah. Onto baseball.
Ervin Santana was solid through the first six innings, giving up only two solo homers. After that second dong, the Twins still led, 5-2. Since the Twins’ bullpen is somewhere beyond the Toxic Zone of Instant Death, Santana came out for the seventh inning and was promptly smacked around. 38-year-old Chase Utley, batting .229, drove in both two-out runs, because this was destined to be. LA: where everyone becomes their destiny. Dream those dreams, dreaming dreamers.
As for that 5-0 lead, you can read how it happened here. I don’t want to talk about it. Zack Granite, Joe Mauer, and Brian Dozier all had RBI hits. Whoop-di-dingle-doo.
Best game moment: With the tying run on second and two out in inning #7, Taylor Rogers got megastar Corey Seager to harmlessly fly out, keeping Minnesota’s lead at 5-4. All kudos to Molitor for bringing in Rogers for a crucial stretch earlier than planned. He’d do the same with Brandon Kintzler subsequently; it would not go as well.
Silliest game moment: Kintzler gave up a game-tying sac fly one inning later. Inexplicably, Zack Granite threw to first, perhaps trying to double off the runner, Enrique Hernandez. NOBODY WAS COVERING FIRST. Hernandez reached third on the brain fart. He didn’t eventually score, but it didn’t matter. You knew it wouldn’t.
Game-winner: RBI base hit by Justin Turner in the ninth, Kintzler’s second inning. Naturally.
Worst game moment: Max Kepler led off the ninth with a double. Molitor elected for Ehire Adrianza to bunt, giving up an out, and leaving the heroics to power-slugging Jason Castro as the Dodgers predictably played infield-in. Castro struck out. Jorge Polanco struck out. LA won soon afterwards. LA, and what it stands for, always does.
Comment of the game: Brandon Brooks, with “Probably not gonna watch baseball again for the rest of my life.” This is not true, nor is my unfair dismissal of all things Southern Californian, but it feels true right now.
Indulgent music to go with indulgent lead paragraph, because I am quite Sad: And here it is.
Robot Roll Call observation about LA: “Los Angeles had drained us, as it always does, like some sort of huge, hairless ape you pay twenty bucks to wrestle and it simply sits on your head until you submit.” — Kevin Murphy, actual co-creator of the Robot Roll Call
TwinkieTown Robot Roll Call: |
Get your long hair looking like the rich and famous.
You might think that rocking long hair isn’t for you, but we’d like to see if we can change your mind! After all, if these inspirational A-listers can sport longer tresses, we think it’s worth taking a second look. Be it filming for their latest movie, or making a red carpet appearance, this round up of noteworthy gents with long locks is bound to make you reconsider.
Whether you’re thinking about growing your hair out, or are already sporting an impressive mane, take a look at our list of celebrities, guaranteed to convince you that men with long hair are some of the finest around.
The A-list fellas with long hair you’ll want to rock
1. Jared Leto
Jared Leto is the poster boy when it comes to long hairstyles for men – and it’s no surprise. His long locks are now a signature in Hollywood and he does a great job of styling them for various occasions.
During formal red carpet events, Leto rocks a sleek and polished man bun, and when he’s off-duty, he chooses to wear his hair down with relaxed waves.
2. James Bay
The British singer and songwriter captivates us with both his music and his hairstyle. So take a leaf out of Bay’s book and accessorise your locks with a hat. It’s a great way of adding personality to your look, and if you’re time-poor, it’ll also a good way to hide your less-than-fresh mane (a win-win!).
3. Orlando Bloom
Okay, Orlando Bloom hasn’t had long hair for a while. However, we still think his previous lengthy ‘dos (on and off screen) definitely warrant a place on our list.
He also scores extra points for rocking cool curls as Will Turner in the Pirates of the Caribbean series and for pulling off a platinum mane as Legolas in The Lord of the Rings trilogy.
Editor’s tip: If your hair is on the curlier side and you want to rock longer lengths, then make sure you reach for the TRESemmé Keratin Smooth Shine Oil to fight frizz, boost shine and tame flyaways.
4. Russell Brand
Russell Brand might not be everyone’s cup of tea, but love him or hate him, the British funny man has lovely long hair that’s worth taking note of. (Just try and forget those early days when he backcombed his mane into oblivion!).
Instead, draw inspiration from his current look that’s more casual and effortless – a positively grown-up take on the long hair trend – especially if you have naturally wavy or curly textures.
5. Harry Styles
The One Direction singer is another great example of how men with long hair can sport wavy tresses. Harry Styles has been quite daring with his locks, trialling man buns, headbands, half-up ‘dos and even half cornrows.
We’ve got to hand it to the pop star, he’s definitely been great at experimenting with tons of hairstyles!
6. Austin Butler
The actor and model has grown out his hair and distanced himself from his sleek, polished image. Why should you consider him as your hair hero? Because Vanessa Hudgens’ beau does a fantastic job of rocking the effortless and cool look of a Californian surfer.
Editor’s tip: For that effortless, fresh-off-the-beach look, make sure to spritz your hair with a texturising spray. For this look we always turn to the TONI&GUY Messy Salt Spray for giving us that surfer look.
7. Chris Hemsworth
Like Orlando Bloom, we have to applaud Chris Hemsworth for being able to sport long hair on and off the screen.
Whether it’s a polished bro bun, Norse-inspired locks or a casual half-up ‘do, there’s no denying the Australian actor’s a natural at rocking sun-kissed long hair.
8. Kit Harington
His alter ego John Snow may have made him a household name, but we think that his dark, long curly locks are worthy of celebrity status in their own right!
Part of his signature look, he’s definitely the poster boy for curly hair. Suave and sultry, we like your style Mr Snow, sorry Kit, we mean Kit! Credit: @kitharingtonn
9. Ben Barnes
When Ben Barnes was filming Dorian Grey he sported longer, messier tresses. While he tends to keep his look a little more styled these days, we actually really dig this look on him. Credit: @benbarnes
10. Christian Bale
In his role as Jesus, Christian Bale rocked wavy, long hair. We imagine there weren’t many barbers back then, so this look was all about natural-looking hair, that had no specific style. Still, we think it rather suits him! Credit: @christianbale_
11. Keanu Reeves
As one of Keanu’s iconic looks, longer locks have done this actor proud. It’s a little bit bad boy, a little bit mysterious and a great look to try if you want to dip your toe into the world of longer hair. Credit: @keanureeves__official
12. Josh Holloway
Channel your inner surfer dude with this messy blond look that’s a favourite with Josh Holloway. Perfect for those who would still like to slick back their tresses to feel like they’ve got shorter hair.
You’ve got movement, texture and length to play with, without having to grow your hair really long. Credit: @officialjoshholloway
13. Leonardo Dicaprio
When filming his Oscar winning movie, Leo grew his hair out to look like the legendary explorer Hugh Glass.
While we want to bet that the frontiersman, cared more about the angry bears then he did his hair, we think that this edgy ‘long hair don’t care’ look is a must try for gents who like adventure. Credit: @leonardodicaprio
14. Brock O’Hurn
If the Vikings taught us one thing, it was that long hair not only made them look fierce, it was also a pretty fierce style statement!
American actor Brock O’Hurn loves to keep his locks long and flowing and we must say, we think he rocks this look. Credit: @brockohurn
15. Brooklyn Beckham
Taking a leaf out of his famous father’s style book, we would expect no less from Brooklyn Beckham, than to rock an achingly cool hairstyle.
Think rebellious boy band member, with outgrown tresses and you’re there. This style has plenty of movement and texture, allowing you to just wake up and go. Credit: @brooklynbeckham
16. David Beckham
This famous footballer father has often led the way in the style stakes and he’s still making waves when it comes to his mane.
Here we see Becks with longer tresses, that are still short enough to sweep back and off his face, with the help of a little gel. We can see why his sons would look to him for style tips! Credit: @davidbeckham
17. Matt Damon
The best thing about having long hair, is that when you’re tired of your flowing locks, you can easily sweep your tresses up into an oh-so stylish low ponytail – or even a man bun – should the mood strike you. We’re not used to seeing Matt Damon with longer hair, but we think he totally rocks this look.
18. Adam Driver
If you’re wondering how long hair can work as an everyday style, Adam Driver is the perfect source of inspiration. His shaggy cut is low-key enough for everyday wear but still scrubs up like a charm for fancier occasions too.
Editor’s tip: To give your mid-long length hair hold without making it feel stiff or hard, try the VO5 Matt Styling Paste. The reworkable formula gives your mane just the right amount of definition and staying power, with a natural-looking matte finish.
19. Timothée Chalamet
Call Me By Your Name star Timothée Chalamet is about as famous for his majestic mane as he is his acting accolades. Wavy and full of texture, if you’re looking for a style that’s totally of the moment, this is the way to go.
20. Justin Bieber
If man buns and monytails (that’s man ponytails, fyi) aren’t really your vibe, Justin Bieber‘s casual cap look is another option for styling out long hairstyles. While they look cool, they’ll also help hide any unfortunate hair days which can only be a good thing. |
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health (IJERPH). All are free.
Three good articles from the open-access). All are free.
Received: 26 June 2012; in revised form: 13 August 2012 / Accepted: 18 August 2012 / Published: 24 August 2012 Download PDF Full-text (235 KB)
Abstract: The Silver Impregnated Porous Pot (SIPP) filter is a product of the Tshwane University of Technology manufactured for the production of safe drinking water at a household (home) level. Two SIPP devices were assessed for the reduction efficiency of chemical contaminants such as calcium, magnesium, iron, arsenic, fluorides and total organic carbon (TOC) as well as microbial contaminants from environmental samples. Turbidity change after filtration, together with correlation between chlorophyll a in the feed water and SIPP’s flow rates were also evaluated in order to give comprehensive guidelines on the quality of intake water that could be filtered through the filter without causing a significant decrease in flow rate. The SIPP filters removed contaminants from environmental water samples as follows: 70% to 92% iron, 36% to 68% calcium, 42% to 82% arsenic, 39% to 98% magnesium, 39% to 95% fluorides, 12% to 35% TOC and 45% to 82% turbidity. The SIPP filters had initial flow rates of 1 L/h to 4 L/h but the flow rates dropped to 0.5 L/h with an increase in cumulative volume of intake water as the filter was used. Turbidity and chemical contaminant reduction rates decreased with accumulating volume of intake water but the filter removed Ca, Fe and Mg to levels that comply with the South African National Standards (SANS 241) and the World Health Organization (WHO) guideline values. However, the SIPP filters cannot produce enough water to satisfy the daily drinking water requirement of a typical household (25 L/p·d). Chlorophyll a was associated with a decrease in the flow rate through the SIPP filters.
Abstract: Irregular precipitation associated with global climate change had been causing various problems in urban regions. Besides the runoff due to rainfall in summer, the snowmelt runoff in early spring could also play an important role in deteriorating the water quality of the receiving waters. Due to global climate change, the snowfall has increased gradually in individual regions, and snowstorms occur more frequently, which leads to an enhancement of snowmelt runoff flow during the melting seasons. What is more, rivers just awaking from freezing cosntitute a frail ecosystem, with poor self-purification capacity, however, the urban snowmelt runoff could carry diverse pollutants accumulated during the winter, such as coal and/or gas combustion products, snowmelting agents, automotive exhaust and so on, which seriously threaten the receiving water quality. Nevertheless, most of the research focused on the rainfall runoff in rainy seasons, and the study on snowmelt runoff is still a neglected field in many countries and regions. In conclusion, due to the considerable water quantity and the worrisome water quality, snowmelt runoff in urban regions with large impervious surface areas should be listed among the important targets in urban nonpoint source pollution management and control.
Abstract: Arsenic (As) causes health concerns due to its significant toxicity and worldwide presence in drinking water and groundwater. The major sources of As pollution may be natural process such as dissolution of As-containing minerals and anthropogenic activities such as percolation of water from mines, etc. The maximum contaminant level for total As in potable water has been established as 10 µg/L. Among the countries facing As contamination problems, Bangladesh is the most affected. Up to 77 million people in Bangladesh have been exposed to toxic levels of arsenic from drinking water. Therefore, it has become an urgent need to provide As-free drinking water in rural households throughout Bangladesh. This paper provides a comprehensive overview on the recent data on arsenic contamination status, its sources and reasons of mobilization and the exposure pathways in Bangladesh. Very little literature has focused on the removal of As from groundwaters in developing countries and thus this paper aims to review the As removal technologies and be a useful resource for researchers or policy makers to help identify and investigate useful treatment options. While a number of technological developments in arsenic removal have taken place, we must consider variations in sources and quality characteristics of As polluted water and differences in the socio-economic and literacy conditions of people, and then aim at improving effectiveness in arsenic removal, reducing the cost of the system, making the technology user friendly, overcoming maintenance problems and resolving sludge management issues.
Enjoy!
"Water is insipid, inodorous, colorless and smooth." - Edmund Burke |
HTC is looking to build momentum after a rough year. Their troubles have been well documented and the future of the company would appear to be in doubt. But it’s looking like HTC will forge ahead full steam with new projects. We’re going to see the HTC Vive next year which is a co-venture with Valve on a VR headset and it looks like later this month we’ll be seeing two more HTC flagships.
There’s no concrete info on what the name or specs of these two unnamed devices will be but they may be getting a little brother. There are rumors kicking around that HTC is now working on a smartwatch, codenamed “Halfbeak”. Halfbeak is a type of fish which follows the naming scheme of other Android Wear devices we’ve recently seen. The rumored smartwatch is said to come with a round display that sports a 360 x 360 resolution… and that’s about it. Phandroid is the bringing us the leaks today and they’ve vouched for their source bringing them accurate information in the past but we’re light on details today.
Could a killer smartwatch pull HTC out of the spiral that they’re in? It’s doubtful but we’ll have to see. They’re getting a late start in the smartwatch game compared to competitors Samsung, LG and Motorola but it seems like there haven’t been any killer Android Wear smartwatches out there yet. There’s nothing out there that’s going to make people line up at Best Buy at midnight to pick it up.
Could HTC pull a rabbit out of a hat? Let us know what you think in the comments.
Source: Phandroid |
Fast and easy. That’s how we like it around here, right?
Judging from your response to my 10-minute quinoa fried rice recipe, I’ve realized we have yet another thing in common: the desire to have a tasty, healthy meal ready for us as quickly as humanly possible. Just another reason why we’re friends.
So I’m bringing back the 10-minute goodness, and today it’s comin’ at ya in the form of a dreamy moroccan quinoa salad.
We’re starting with a base of fresh spinach, then adding julienned carrots, chopped carrots, raw cashews, thinly sliced green onions, chickpeas and quinoa of course. It’s a glorious combination of crunch, sweetness and fill-you-up protein.
But quite honestly, it’s the dressing that makes this salad so sensational.
When it comes to dressings, I’m all about creamy. The creamier the better in fact. So typically, that means I like my dressing to have a base of either cashews or tahini. Tahini is my go-to since I love love LOVE the flavor, and I find it pairs nicely with more eclectic and international flavors. <– my fave
This dressing is a simple blend of tahini, lemon juice and apple cider vinegar with a bunch of fun spices added in: coriander, cumin, turmeric, cinnamon and cayenne pepper. The flavor profile is pretty complex, with a lightness from the coriander and cumin, a soothing quality from the turmeric, warmth from the cinnamon and heat from the cayenne. All combined together and they're turned into one kick ass dressing.
I’m totally keeping a bottle of this in my fridge to put on EVERYTHING.
Love this recipe? Share it with your friends!
0 from 0 votes Print 10-Minute Spicy Moroccan Quinoa Salad A dreamy moroccan quinoa salad that only takes 10 minutes to make! Prep Time 10 minutes Total Time 10 minutes Servings 2 large or 4 small servings Calories 621 kcal Author Alyssa Ingredients for the salad: 4 cups chopped spinach
1 large carrot julienned or shredded
4 - 6 medjool dates
2 green onions
1 cup cooked quinoa
1 cup cooked chickpeas drained + rinsed
1/2 cup raw cashew pieces for the dressing 2 tablespoons tahini
2 tablespoons lemon juice
2 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
1/2 teaspoon turmeric
1/4 teaspoon coriander
1/4 teaspoon cumin
1/8 - 1/4 teaspoon cayenne depending on the level of spice you like
Pinch of cinnamon
Salt + pepper to taste
Water as needed Instructions Add the spinach to a large mixing bowl and set aside. Prepare your other ingredients, starting with the carrots. Using a mandolin slicer, julienne peeler or a box grater to get long strips (about 1" long). Add these to the bowl. Next, pit and chop the medjool dates into quarters (or a little smaller) and add them to the bowl. Thinly slice the green onions, using both the white and green parts, and add those to the bowl as well. Finally, add the remaining salad ingredients to the mixing bowl and set aside while you whip up the dressing. Combine all dressing ingredients (minus water) into a bowl. Whisk together until incorporated and smooth. The dressing will be too thick here, so add just enough water so that it's pourable - start with 1/2 teaspoon and add in 1/2 teaspoon increments until you get the desired consistency. Taste and season with salt and pepper. Gently toss the salad ingredients together to combine. Pour dressing over salad and toss again until everything is evenly coated. Transfer to serving dishes, garnish with a few more green onions and enjoy! Recipe Notes Nutritional values are based on 2 large servings Nutrition Facts 10-Minute Spicy Moroccan Quinoa Salad Amount Per Serving Calories 621 Calories from Fat 234 % Daily Value* Total Fat 26g 40% Saturated Fat 4g 20% Sodium 460mg 19% Potassium 1358mg 39% Total Carbohydrates 87g 29% Dietary Fiber 13g 52% Sugars 37g Protein 19g 38% Vitamin A 220.3% Vitamin C 33.1% Calcium 18.6% Iron 43.9% * Percent Daily Values are based on a 2000 calorie diet.
If you make this recipe, make sure to snap a pic and share it on Instagram using #SIMPLYQUINOA – I want to see your own quinoa creations!
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Join us on Reddit! More about this in the show!
Had a special guest on this week for What’s Your Schpiel, the lovely Ixkin joined us, to answer whatever interesting questions Turdhat could come up with. Including…(drum roll) NEW categories!
frogs are croaking away outside Fen’s place, so if you hear those, apologies. Also multiple restaurant stories, and why not some talk about boogers. Turdhat’s kid had a party with a $350 magician, we talked about a special form of healthcare that’s available in Taiwan, and also about the annual Superbowl crackdown on Johns and prostitutes.
All that, plus THIS: Goat screams, the Bulgarian, suspended over a magic ring, NO nasal decongestants, poop news, sword news, PLAID, swearing on TV, Rob Reviews Sponebob Square Pants AND Jupiter Ascending, money tips, living with Deluxa, and more more more!
Links From This Week:
Taiwan Release (NSFW?)
Don’t Get A Hooker During Superbowl
For The Love Of Pete Airborn Martin Wants Me To Tell You His New Album Is Dropping
Sell Your Doo Doo
Sword News
Intro: Redwarf
Outro: YTCracker – I’m Brave
Be sure and join us LIVE, you can listen and chat on the website. We normally record Saturday 9pm Pacific/Midnight Eastern.
If you’d like to help the show hit the “Support The Show” tab on the website and click through our link when you make Amazon purchases, or click the “T-Shirt” tab and buy a shirt. We thank you so much for your support.
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Seven Bel Air High School students have been disciplined for their roles in creating a photo of themselves spelling out a racial slur with oversized letters pinned on or held up to their shirts, according to a Harford County Public Schools spokesperson.
“The incident was thoroughly investigated and disciplinary action has been taken against the seven students involved,” HCPS spokesperson Jillian Lader wrote in an email Thursday.
The seven students included six who posed for the photo, which was taken in the school library, and a seventh who took the picture, according to Lader.
She declined to say what type of discipline the students received, citing school system student confidentiality policies.
“This behavior is not and will not be tolerated in Harford County Public Schools, and is not representative of Bel Air High School students or Harford County Public Schools,” Lader stated in her email.
Erin Fierro, of Belcamp, learned about the incident Wednesday night through the father of her niece, who is a Bel Air student. She said her brother wrote a “scathing” post about the incident on Facebook and Fierro then contacted her niece after seeing the post.
Fierro provided a copy of the photo in an email to The Aegis Thursday. It shows six students in the school library wearing shirts, each bearing a letter that, combined, spell out the n-word. The faces of all six have been scribbled over with black markings to conceal their identities.
Fierro said she contacted administrators at Bel Air High School and at HCPS, called the incident “absolutely unacceptable.”
“I think the public needs to know,” she said. “This is 2017, and this is happening in Bel Air High School.”
Lader said in a follow-up email that “as a school system, we welcome and honor diversity, and are committed to facilitating a safe and secure environment for all of our students and staff.”
Lader wrote in the email that in light of the incident, the Bel Air High student body, staff and administration will work toward creating an “inclusive, supportive and respectful learning environment” with support from the school system’s supervisor of equity and cultural proficiency.
“We will continue to take action to address these issues and to improve inclusivity in our schools,” she continued. “In addition, continued professional development for staff will focus on cultural responsiveness and inclusivity.” |
Well, this didn’t take long – after .Odin, and .Zepto before it, the latest successor to the Locky Ransomware line is here. It has been rather “playfully” named .Shit File Virus by its creators. Apart from the name, there’s nothing to laugh at concerning this newest Ransomware threat.
A rather significant drop in malware activity in the last few weeks has led to a number of people scratching their heads in joyful disbelief and hoping that this trend would last a little longer. Unfortunately, early signs suggest that the unexpected “honeymoon” period might just be over.
According to researchers, .Shit File Virus Ransomware is shaping out to be one of the biggest ones in quite a while. In its early stages, it has affected predominantly users from France, but if the previous Locky alterations are any indication, this will turn out to be a global threat in a hurry.
The similarities are certainly there – just as .Zepto and .Odin, .Shit Ransomware spreads predominantly through spam emails containing infected JS or WS attachments. If the unsuspecting user executes such a malicious script, then trouble is more or less inevitable. A remote C&C server would be contacted and the download of the Ransomware payload file would commence.
It is more or less the same song and dance afterwards – after careful deliberation and selection of your most often used personal files, the ransomware would start encrypting them, eventually turning them into an inaccessible mess with the .shit extension to top it all off.
The encryption is a strong one, utilizing RSA and AES ciphers. Similar to previous Locky versions, the victims are extorted in the amount of 0.5 Bitcoins (roughly $300) for a decryption key.
I will once again urge you not to cave in to the ransomware creators’ demands and not to pay the demanded ransom. Yes, it is infuriating to not be able to access your files but refusal to support the cyber criminals is of paramount importance. This is the only chance for an end user to hinder this increasingly developing “industry.”
I kid you not – by all accounts ransomware creators have been banking millions of dollars and have begun structuring their enterprises much like any big corporation. At the very least, please explore and exhaust all other possibilities before contemplating whether you should part with your hard-earned currency.
You can start by browsing our security news updates for important information regarding your online safety.
Interested in learning more about Ransomware? Click here.
About the Author: Daniel Sadakov has a degree in Information Technology and specializes in web and mobile cyber security. He harbors a strong detestation for anything and everything malicious and has committed his resources and time to battling all manners of web and mobile threats. He has founded MobileSecurityZone.com, a website dedicated to covering the top tech stories and providing useful tips for the everyday user, in an effort to reach and help more people.
Editor’s Note: The opinions expressed in this guest author article are solely those of the contributor, and do not necessarily reflect those of Tripwire, Inc.
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The Iran-backed terror organization Hamas is already broadcasting strong signals that it has no interest in peace and is gearing up for its next war against Israel.
The Izzadin Al-Qassam Brigades tweeted (Arabic link):
We won, and swore by Allah that we will continue to dig (tunnels), and create more (rockets), and recruit thousands more, and develop thousands of weapons and we recharge the mortars and weapons towards the coming devastating battle of liberation.
Senior Hamas official Mahmoud al-Zahar recently emerged from hiding and pledged that the terrorist group, which initially seized power in a bloody 2007 military coup, would continue “arming itself and developing its resistance capacity.”
Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal, who is currently being hosted by the Gulf state of Qatar, praised Iran for its support. Meshaal said ties with Iran were strong, despite a rift that developed when Hamas leaders supported the rebellion against the Iranian-supported dictator, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
An Iranian press report said that Meshaal “stressed that Iran’s financial and military support has played an influential role in the achievements” of Hamas. A few weeks ago, top Iranian officials boasted of the military support they had given Hamas to fight against Israel.
However, veteran Arab affairs analyst Ehud Yaari wrote (Hebrew link) that Hamas was still facing an uphill struggle to return to the same military capacity it had two months ago:
Yesterday they did the inevitable and got people into the streets for a victory celebration. But there weren’t thousands, certainly not tens of thousands. During the past day you saw some of the (Hamas) military commanders, not all of them, beginning to emerge from the bunkers after 50 days. Hamas has no real feeling of achievement. There’s an attempt to manufacture an air of accomplishment, “we did it, we held our own for 50 days, yes,” but when they measure the results of what we see now – they’ll see the slim chances that they’ll achieve their (demands of) crossings, sea port, airport, etc in the round of talks that will start in Cairo – they will say to themselves the it’s the same ceasefire they could have obtained a month ago.
Prof. Beverley Milton-Edwards, a British specialist on Hamas, was quoted saying that “Hamas has a record of engaging in spoiler violence in order to have a negative impact on peace implementation.”
[Photo: Izzadin Al-Qassam website] |
It got cold in our city a few days ago, and the summer doesn’t seem to come back. Anyway some seasonal vegetables and fruits came up and I’m doing my summer routine – go to the market.
I love markets! Advise everybody to love them. Going to the market is a very pleasant activity : you smell, feel, see the seller. Early morning is the best time, and if the weather is fine, you can bike there.
So, coming back to our cold conditions, a soup was born. I had some mix of seafood in the fridge and bought a bunch of fresh spinach on the mart was so good, that you definitely need to make it. The soup is full of protein and will keep you full and delighted for long time.
A few ingredients:
200 grams spinach
1/2 cup water
1/2 cup cream (or milk, os any plant milk of your choice)
2-3 garlic cloves
spices, dried herbs of your choice (anything you like, i advise dried mushrooms as well)
dried garlic
salt, pepper
2 handfuls of seafood (any)
1 tsp butter
Place spinach and water in a saucepan, heat at start boiling the spinach. Add garlic cloves and salt, boil for 5-7 minutes.
Remove from heat and process with a blender until smooth. Add cream, dried garlic and spices. Heat once more and set aside.
Put the seafood in a skillet or saucepan, cook (if frozen – let it melt in the skillet and stew for 5-7 minutes. if fresh – add some water and stew for 5-7 minutes.). In the end add the butter, salt and spices, cook for a few minutes more.
Pour some soup in a bowl and add warm seafood.
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Turkey's education minister has announced details of the country's new curriculum, stating that it will include the concept of jihad as being patriotic, rather than a "holy war." It will also lack any reference to Darwin's theory of evolution.
“Jihad is an element in our religion; it is in our religion…the duty of the Education Ministry is to teach every concept deservedly, in a correct way. It is also our job to correct things that are wrongly perceived, seen or taught,” Education Minister Ismet Yilmaz said during a Tuesday press conference, as quoted by Hurriyet.
"The real meaning of jihad is loving your nation," he said, according to Reuters, adding that the concept will be included in lessons on Islamic law and basic religious sciences.
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"What our Prophet [Muhammad] says is that while returning from a war, we are going from a small jihad to a big jihad. What is this big jihad? It is to serve our society, to increase welfare, to ensure peace in society, to serve the society’s needs. The easiest thing is to wage war, to fight. The skill is the difficult one, which is to ensure peace and tranquility,” he said.
Although the term jihad is often translated as "holy war," Muslim scholars also teach that it refers to a personal struggle against sin.
Information about last year's failed coup attempt - which resulted in a nationwide crackdown by President Erdogan's government - will also be included in the curriculum, according to Yilmaz. The day of the coup attempt, July 15, has been officially named 'Democracy and National Unity Day.'
“When the subject of winning democracy is covered in social sciences classes, we will want the July 15 National Unity Day to be covered, too,” Yılmaz said.
He added that the new curriculum will also include information on the Hizmet movement led by exiled cleric Fethullah Gulen, who Ankara accuses of orchestrating the failed coup attempt. Turkey refers to the Hizmet movement as FETÖ (Fethullahist Terror Organization).
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The Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which Ankara and the US have labeled a terrorist organization, and Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) will also be included in the curriculum.
Yilmaz's comments come after the head of the Turkish Education Ministry's education board, Alpaslan Durmus, announced last month that the new curriculum would also exclude references to Charles Darwin and his theory of evolution.
Addressing the decision to eliminate Darwin from textbooks on Tuesday, Yilmaz said that it is being done "because it is above the students' level and not directly relevant."
Under the new curriculum, Darwin will not be mentioned in Turkish educational institutions until students reach university.
Mehhmet Balik, chairman of the Union of Education and Science Workers (Egitim-Is), has condemned the new curriculum, saying it is an attempt to avoid raising "generations who ask questions," Reuters reported.
“The new policies that ban the teaching of evolution and requiring all schools to have a prayer room, these actions destroy the principle of secularism and the scientific principles of education,” he said.
The new curriculum will be rolled out for first, fifth and ninth graders this school year, and will extend to other classes in the 2018-2019 school year. |
“It was brought to my attention that while ‘gender identity’ is included in many of the city ordinances, there are sections of the code that needed to be updated to make sure that its inclusion was consistent throughout,” City Councilmember Alex Wan, who introduced the legislation, told the GA Voice.
The nondiscrimination policy seeks to ensure employers with more than 10 employees in the city as well as those who provide housing and public accommodations can not, for example, fire someone for being gay or transgender.
Other cities and municipalities with non-discrimination policies include Decatur, East Point, Savannah, Clarkston, Doraville, Athens-Clarke County, DeKalb County and Fulton County, according to Georgia Equality, the state’s largest LGBT advocacy group. Georgia Equality is currently lobbying for passage of a bill sponsored by state Rep. Karla Drenner (D-Avondale Estates) to prohibit discrimination against state employees based on sexual orientation and gender identity. |
I wondered why I was putting on makeup. It wasn’t like anyone else would see me at Mẹ’s burial.
Fr. Hien did a great job with getting me in touch with the cemetery. I didn’t say anything about Axel. I feared that Hien would try to drag Axel into a lifestyle he clearly didn’t want. Not many people understood how great it was to stay inside.
I wished I could. Then Axel would spoil me all day to celebrate Mẹ’s death. But it would haunt me if I didn’t visit her new grave once. After that I could forget about it forever though.
The whole situation was making me sick. I didn’t feel like breakfast, but all that ginger ale would rot my teeth if I kept drinking it. I wanted it to clear up. Then I could have Axel’s eggs and toast again.
I needed him to order some mangoes and olives and more pickled daikons. I wanted oatmeal cookies too. Those were all safe foods for me when I felt ill. It took Andrea and I forever to find it out…
…but we did it just in time.
“That’s…not what this is about.”
It didn’t matter how I felt. Any thought of that pregnancy shocked me. Even the other failed ones were easier to think about. They were sad but I had happy or memorable moments during them.
It wasn’t that I forgot about Jacob. I wasn’t ready to mourn him again that day.
I had to pretend to mourn someone a lot worse.
I never wore a dress above my knees without leggings or opaque tights. I was still scared of being punished or forced into the guidance counselor’s office for all my cuts. But there was one person who never cared about them or why they were there.
So I went without tights. The rest of the subway would have to gawk at them too. But then they’d make me feel a little better and stay away from me.
It was too sunny and cheerful of a day to bury her. I did not want to bury her next to Cha. He wanted it but he didn’t know what was best for him. If he did, then he wouldn’t have stayed with that bitch.
He always said that Mẹ helped take care of him and me and kept him from being lonely but that was a lie. She always left us alone to fend for ourselves. And Andrea helped me face a fact: it was not my fault. Nothing was! I was a stupid child and couldn’t save him even if I tried.
I knelt down on the dirt and some of it got into my fresh cuts. I hoped Mẹ was feeling worse buried under me, though.
“You remember when you said you were sad that I’d die before you?” It seemed like a possibility for a while. Even Andrea worried about it. “I like this.”
“I like this! It’s all I wanted from you! It’s what I wanted and couldn’t say…like…after you forgot my birthday. I was so mad…”
“…damnit, you almost let me commit suicide on my birthday. Because you were never there.”
I got up and kicked the headstone. It wobbled a little because I got the cheapest one for her. It was so cheap that they didn’t anchor it into the ground. I could have bought the most lavish funeral on Earth and didn’t. Mẹ got a wobbly headstone and a poor man’s coffin and I didn’t have them line the hole with concrete. I decided that the worms would get to her faster that way.
Cha was still buried across from her. I wanted more distance but the cemetery didn’t have that many plots.
I crouched down near him, with my knees up. I hadn’t visited Cha in a while either. I never went to cemeteries.
“Hey…I hope you’re proud of me. And I love you…and I still miss you a little every day…”
I grabbed the plush cat out of my hat. I had a lot of room there.
“…I saw this toy last week and made my…my friend order it. Then I thought that you’d like to see it. Like…remember when we both wanted a cat?”
“I’m sorry, Cha. I never got a cat.”
—
I lay down on one of the benches there for what seemed like hours. The sun started to set a little. Not many people came to mourn. And those that did came to mourn someone else, not my Mẹ.
I wanted to celebrate more, but I felt miserable the more I thought about her death. Now both of my parents were dead and I wasn’t even 30. I finally had something in common with the Cote siblings.
They would taunt me about it if I told them. I knew exactly how they felt and they must have been thrilled. I was miserable just like them. I was as not miserable as they were when Andrea died.
They were still wrong, though. They didn’t know that they lost such a wonderful man. And hypocrites for being mad at me keeping his ashes. They stopped bothering me about it and I was happy to never hear their voices again. I even stopped seeing Mike. I stayed home with Axel more and more. I didn’t like being at work. I liked Axel kissing my body and coming inside of me.
“…he was so perfect. We were going to be best friends.”
All the memories were making me sick again. Every time of the year was the worst time for thinking about Jacob, but it was usually winter that was the worst. Now it was spring and dry outside and I should have been nostalgic over my wedding, or something like that. But my thoughts were all Jacob. Not even other babies. Just him and his perfect face and feet.
“Okay, please don’t make me throw up in a cemetery,” I said to myself. “This should have cleared up! It’s not like I’m–”
Nope. It came up my throat and burned worse than anything. It probably would create a dead patch on the grass. This sickness was getting worse ever since I last saw Mẹ. That was weeks ago. Even for me, not much could last that long. I hadn’t felt that sick since…
“…Pictures! I have to tell the whole office, princess. It’s a warning for my retirement plans…”
“Oh my god I’m pregnant.”
A/N: I have an extra special treat for my lovely readers! I’m sure you would all love a week of daily updates, from October 23rd to October 30th. As it turns out, Thu took the perfect amount of time to tell one story…
…and now onto a warning. We all know bits and pieces Jacob’s fate, sad as it is. This is the most detailed arc about it and I know everyone has varying levels of comfort and safety when reading about fictional infant death and the circumstances behind it. You come first, so handle this in whatever way works best for you (especially the chapter on October 28th). |
A major poll of the political outlooks of Asian Americans revealed that neither Democrats nor Republicans are doing much to tap into the voting power of one of the fastest growing ethnic populations in the state of Illinois – and in the country.
The results were part of a national survey organized by the nonpartisan organization Asian Pacific Islander Vote and the Asian American Justice Center.
According to lead pollster David Mermin, who spoke in a news conference call on July 17, they were able to draw some conclusions about the political leanings of Asian American voters. “They are really quite solidly behind the Democratic Party,” he remarked. “In particular, they think that Democrats do better than Republicans at treating all Americans fairly and equally.”
Mermin cautioned, though, that Asian Illinoisans could be more prone to lean toward Republican candidates when it came to Congressional elections. Furthermore, he added, “While Democrats have a clear advantage with these voters, there is a substantial undecided vote as well.” In fact, poll findings showed that nearly one quarter of Asian Americans who took part in the survey would be undecided between a GOP or Democratic candidate if a Congressional election were to be held now.
This could be partially attributed, he suggested, to the lack of outreach to this group. “The Republicans have really fallen short in their effort to communicate with these voters,” said Mermin. “On the Republican side, it’s up to 75 percent [of Asian Illinois residents] not getting contact.” Democrats, too, have fallen behind on making contact with them, Mermin noted.
These facts, said Mermin, “suggest a need to clarify to these voters what the differences are for candidates who want to win their votes.”
The dilemma will worsen over time, too, because, according to APIAVote executive director Christine Chen, 600,000 new Asian Americans have become part of the electorate since 2008, and that number is expected to grow continuously.
The good news for Obama supporters is that, nationwide, 59 percent of Asian Americans would vote for President Obama in the election; that’s an increase of three percent over those who said they would vote for him back in 2008. And that 59 percent is even more uplifting for Obama when compared to just 13 percent of U.S. Asians who intend to vote for Republican Mitt Romney.
The state of Nevada, meanwhile, is a bit of a wild card, the survey found. That’s because there, Asian Americans were found to be highly critical of Obama, and leaned more toward Romney. Mermin noted that four in five Asian Nevada residents said they would vote this year. He underscored the fact, however, that the Democratic Party had contacted only 28 percent of them this year.
Mee Moua, president and executive director of the Asian American Justice Center, commented, “Not only are party leaders not paying attention to those of us who are already in their base, they’re not even fighting for those of us who are independent and waiting to be wooed.”
The general consensus was that more attention would have to be given to this portion of the electorate.
“The political leaders who engage the Asian American communities as part of their core strategy will be rewarded by the margin of victory they deserve,” Moua concluded. “And those who ignore us…do so at their own peril.”
Photo: President Obama shakes hands with Rep. Judy Chu, D.-Calif., at the Asian Pacific American Institute for Congressional Studies dinner. 59 percent of Asian Americans nationwide say they will vote for Obama this year. Carolyn Kaster/AP |
Dallas Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo celebrates his game-winning touchdown to tight end Jason Witten during the final seconds of a 27-26 win over the New York Giants Sunday, September 13, 2015 at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas. (G.J. McCarthy/The Dallas Morning News)
Cowboys fans are going to like what the first projection system, ESPN's Football Outsiders, thinks about the NFC East in 2016.
Projection systems have all the data they need to start making predictions about the 2016 NFL season, so the projections are starting to roll in for next season.
The system predicts the Cowboys to finish first in the NFC East with a record of 10-6. The system also predicts the other three teams in the division to all finish with 6-10 records.
Here's what they have to say about the Cowboys:
Without Tony Romo, the Cowboys finished 31st last year in offensive DVOA, suffering one of the 10 largest year-to-year drops in offensive DVOA since 1989. With Romo back and a healthier Dez Bryant on the field, they're almost guaranteed to rebound in 2016. Meanwhile, the Dallas defense ended just 6.0 percent of opposing drives with takeaways last season. That was dead last in the NFL and the fourth-lowest rate of any team since 1998. There's a lot of year-to-year regression in turnovers, so there's a strong chance that improves in 2016. (In 2014, the lowest teams in this stat were the Jets and Chiefs, who both turned their defenses around significantly in 2015.)
The projections don't like what the rest of the division did this offseason. They especially don't like the Redskins' chances to repeat as division winners. Here's their reasoning:
Washington won a bad division at 9-7, but ranked only 15th in DVOA. That was a big improvement over the previous two seasons, when Washington was 29th (2013) and 28th (2014) in DVOA. But this means they're likely to run into the "Plexiglass Principle," which states that teams that significantly improve one year will tend to decline the next year and vice versa.
With all of this said, projection systems aren't known for being any more accurate than popular opinion or any other strategy for predicting the results of NFL seasons.
As we previously covered, ESPN NFL analyst and former tight end Shannon Sharpe isn't in agreement with these projections:
But you're thinking, because you get Tony Romo... here's a guy who is 34, 35 years of age, coming off his third surgery on a collarbone in the last three years. Last I checked, having played this game before, as you get older you don't get healthier. So you want me to believe and you want all the people that are watching this show today, because they drafted [Ezekiel] Elliott, now all of the sudden they are the beasts of the East?
Click here to read the full projections.
Other Cowboys projections for 2016
Gosselin: After several key additions, the Redskins know the NFC East is theirs in 2016
Skip Bayless: The Giants spent $200 million on what? Cowboys should be East favorites
NFL network analyst: Cowboys are the NFC East favorites; what could knock them down? |
U.S. President Barack Obama shakes hands with audience members following a town hall meeting in Costa Mesa, California on March 18, 2009. (UPI Photo/Phil McCarten) | License Photo
WASHINGTON, March 19 (UPI) -- U.S. President Barack Obama secured a $500,000 advance for a children's book project five days before taking office, a financial disclosure report revealed.
Ken Gross, a former associate general counsel at the Federal Election Commission, said there doesn't appear to be any rules that would bar Obama from signing book deals while in the White House, The Washington Times reported Thursday. Other analysts said they didn't know of a president ever signing a book deal upon entering the White House.
A Senate financial disclosure form filed Tuesday revealed Obama OK'd the advance Jan. 15, five days before he was sworn in as president. The advance is against royalties for an abridged version of "Dreams From My Father" for middle-school-aged children. The contract is with Crown Publishing, a division of Random House.
A White House aide said the deal had been in the pipeline for weeks and that the publisher will condense the book. The aide told the Times the publisher will receive half of the money while Obama will sign off on the final version.
The disclosure also showed Obama amended an existing deal with Crown Publishing to delay writing a non-fiction work until after he leaves office. |
So, for the first time in my life, if we exclude the local Linux Day events, I attended a conference! FOSDEM 2010 has been my first time properly meeting other developers out there. It actually was a bit more travel than just Bruxelles, for me; I actually took a long way to get there. Since I was still afraid of planes, I didn’t want to go up there alone. Add to that, the fact that I’m neither used to Bruxelles area, nor I speak any decent French any more (I studied it in middle-school, so I could at least ask for, and listen to, directions, but in over ten years not using it, it really just went away), so I got there with Luca who lives in Turin (in the other side of Italy).
The end result looks something like this: I left Mestre (the Venice inland city, which is where I actually live) by train, I changed in Milan, then arrived in Turin; I went to dinner with some friends I only met online before (colleagues and fellow Ultima OnLine players), and slept at Alessandro’s – from lscube – flat. In the morning me and Luca took the plane for Rome, then changed to the one for Bruxelles. Our luggage decided to take a later plane (d’oh!). The same travel (minus the luggage nuisance, fortunately) applied to the way back. This resulted in something like five trains (one from the Bruxelles Airport to the Gare du Nord — we took a cab to go back), and four planes. I think my fear of planes was totally cured this time.
FOSDEM itself was lots fun! I finally met lots of other Gentoo developers (including Luca for the first time), the other FFmpeg guys, some of the VLC guys, and quite a few users who knew me, even though I didn’t know them before, which I have to say has a nice feeling to it. And I even met with a Mono team delegation, and with the one guy that I had a rough start with – Jo Shields, “directhex” – I should report every misunderstanding is cleared. I was also able to (very briefly) meet Lennart, but that was when me and Luca really had to hurry to catch our plane back.
I really would have liked to stay the whole Sunday and leave on Monday, but Luca was actually due to be back in Turin for other reasons, so we had to live early on Sunday to get back to Italy before all planes stopped flying.
Now, during FOSDEM I picked up a few extra tasks other than all the stuff that I’ve had already planned, and this means that the next few days will get me almost no time to breath, to take a break, or to go out with friends. That’s fine, I had four days that relaxed me quite a bit, so this is not too bad to do. Just so I can name some of the tasks that I’m looking forward for, beside the key signing (that was a “cool” party… even though it was maybe too cold), is writing something more about release notifications as it seems like I’m not the only person having a problem with that, trying to write some more about upstreaming patches, and packaging SIP Communicator – a demo of which was available next to the FFmpeg stand in the AW building… looked very promising, and getting an hash table implementation in libavutil for FFmpeg, so that we can use it on feng and libnemesi and thus get a good parser, finally!
Anyway this is enough for today, hope the other people at FOSDEM found it at least as fun, for me is time to hit (finally, my) bed. |
Key consumer debt measure hits record
Net worth boosted by stocks, housing
Consumer credit growth may be slowing in Canada, but the key measure of household debt has hit a record.
That measure, household credit market debt to disposable income, climbed in the third quarter of the year to 163.7 per cent, from a revised 163.1 per cent in the previous three-month period, Statistics Canada said Friday.
At the same time, the net worth of Canadian families rose 2.2 per cent, buoyed by rising stock markets and property values.
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On a per-capita basis, net worth among Canadian households rose in the latest quarter to $211,400, though that masks the income inequality across the country.
"Shares and other equities grew on the basis of the rebound in domestic and foreign equity markets," Statistics Canada said.
"The increase in household net worth was also supported by a 1.5-per-cent gain in the value of household real estate."
The higher debt burden could well spell trouble for some families when interest rates inevitably rise, though the Bank of Canada is believed to be more than a year away from such a move.
Here are some of the highlights from the federal agency's report:
Household net worth rose by 2.2 per cent to $211,000, led by a 3.7-per-cent rise in the stock market.
Real estate values rose by 1.5 per cent.
Consumer credit debt rose by 1 per cent to $505-billion.
The consumer credit debt to disposable income ratio climbed to 163.7 per cent from 163.1 per cent.
Mortgage debts rose by 1.8 per cent to $1.1-trillion, compared with the average quarterly growth of 1.7 per cent over the past five years.
National net worth climbed 2.1 per cent to $7.5-trillion, or, on a per-capita basis, $212,700. That's a slower pace than the second quarter's 3.2-per-cent rise.
Home sales, of course, have rebounded smartly in Canada since the short government-induced slump in the summer of 2012, brought on by new mortgage insurance restrictions aimed at stopping a bubble.
Some of that is deemed to be the result of home buyers jumping in earlier than they otherwise would have because of higher mortgage rates and speculation of further increases.
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Thus, economists believe the debt burden will ease.
"Sustained robust housing market activity and the resulting continued gains in mortgage debt accumulation drove the increase in credit market debt in the quarter," said economist Laura Cooper of Royal Bank of Canada.
"As this likely reflected purchases pulled forward in anticipation of rising mortgage costs, and with timelier data from the Bank of Canada indicating an easing in the pace of debt accumulation in the final quarter, our expectation is that the downward trend in the pace of credit growth that has been in place since 2008 will resume through 2014," she said in a research note.
"The re-emergence of the moderation in credit growth would be a welcome development for Canadian policy makers, particularly as the indebtedness of households was cited as one of the 'most important domestic sources of risk to financial stability' along with imbalances in the housing market in the Bank of Canada's Financial System Review."
The high debt burden, though expected to ease, will have an impact on the economy.
"The debt service ratio continues to fall, suggesting that the average Canadian can cope with their debt levels," said economist Leslie Preston of Toronto-Dominion Bank, referring to a related measure.
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"However, we are still of the view that the need to keep debt accumulation under wraps will likely keep household spending relatively modest over the next few years." |
Find An Event Create Your Event Help UnScene Comedy Lowell Zorba Room
Lowell, MA Share this event: Get Tickets There are no active dates for this event. Thanks for coming out to the show. For info on future shows please send us a message at unscenecomedy@gmail.com indicating that you would like to be added to our newsletter. Not Available
Event UnScene Comedy Lowell Boston Comedians team up with local favorite Nick Giasullo to bring you a night of hilarious stand up comedy.
Ted Pettingell (Limestone Comedy Festival)
Rich Karski (Famous writer of "Dick Picks" and "How to")
Christa Weiss (Chicago's funny women's festival)
Ethan Diamond (Cartoonist - UnScene Comedy, diamondcomedy)
and Shawn Carter (Founder of UnScene Comedy, Boston Comedy Festival, World Series of Comedy, Las Vegas)
Zorba Room
439 Market Street, Lowell MA. 01854
Tickets are $15 at the Door but only $10 if you purchase them online.
Location Zorba Room (View)
439 Market Street
Lowell, MA 01854
United States 439 Market StreetLowell, MA 01854United States
Categories Arts > Performance Comedy > Stand Up
Minimum Age: 21 Kid Friendly: No Dog Friendly: No Non-Smoking: Yes! Contact Owner: Shawn Carter On BPT Since: Mar 31, 2013 Shawn Carter (781)727-4782 scartercomedy@gmail.com www.unscenecomedy.com
Ask a question... Ask! |
A teen invites “Destiny” to the prom using the face of a cliff in Black Cliffs east of Boise. (Patrick Orr/Ada County Sheriff’s Office via AP)
Jay L Zagorsky is an economist at Ohio State University.
Prom season is now upon us, the key social event of most people’s high school experience. My youngest child is preparing to attend her first senior prom and a steady supply of fancy dresses has begun to appear in our house. As my credit card bills climbed ever higher, I began to wonder, how has the price of the prom changed over time?
For teenagers scraping together money from minimum-wage jobs and informal work like babysitting and snow shoveling, the question has immediate relevance because the price determines if they can afford to go. For parents of teens, the question is relevant because the prom is another expensive bill competing with lots of other financial priorities.
Even for people not directly connected to the high school experience, the price of the prom is important. The U.S. is a melting pot of different cultures, religions and ethnic groups. Tying these disparate groups together is a variety of common shared experiences, such as celebrating the 4th of July, eating turkey at Thanksgiving and, for teens, experiencing the prom.
When the prom’s price goes down, more teens can afford to go, and it becomes a more inclusive shared experience. When the price rises, however, the prom becomes a more exclusive social event attended mostly by those with wealthier parents, resulting in fewer common shared experiences.
Cereal and donuts
It is possible to get a sense of the changing price of going to the prom using government data. The Bureau of Labor Statistics provides detailed monthly information on the trend in prices over time for a vast number of items purchased by the typical family.
The government does not care, directly, about the price of the prom – unfortunately it has yet to craft a “prom index.” However, using a subset of the inflation data we can see that proms are actually getting relatively cheaper over time.
The typical 17-year-old going to the prom this year was born in 1998. Since then, the Consumer Price Index, or CPI, has increased 45 percent. That means the average item a family bought for $1 in 1998 now costs $1.45. Each month the CPI releases hundreds of detailed price indexes so that anyone can see, for example, if the price of breakfast cereal is rising faster than, say, donuts over time.
The Prom Price Index
Though the U.S. government has yet to to see the value, I created my own Prom Price Index from 10 of the CPI’s components. Details on creating price indexes are found here.
The CPI directly tracks the price change for many items common to a typical night at the prom, such as “women’s dresses,” “women’s shoes,” “men’s suits,” “men’s shoes,” “photographer fees,” “haircuts and other personal services like manicures” and “beer,” which covers the age-old tradition of sneaking in a drink when the adult chaperones are not looking.
The CPI does not specifically cover limousine rentals, corsages, boutonnières and bouquets but does track “car rentals” and “indoor flowers,” which are pretty close categories. The hardest one to match is the price of prom tickets, which for many attendees is only a small part of the total cost. The closest category the government provides is “full service meals,” even though from the stories I heard from my children, almost no prom attendees actually spend much time eating.
The slow pace of prom inflation
Astonishingly, the vast majority of prom items rose at a slower rate than general consumer prices, and some actually fell.
A man’s suit, for example, cost 16 percent less in March than it did back in 1998. While a pair of women’s shoes has gone up only 6 percent – compared with the CPI’s gain of 45 percent.
Of the 10 categories I included in the Prom Price Index, seven either went down or went up at a slower rate than general consumer prices (flowers, men’s suits, men’s shoes, women’s dresses, women’s shoes, car rental and photographer fees).
Two categories went up at roughly the same rate as overall prices (beer and haircuts and personal services like manicures). Only one category, full-service meals (intended to track the price of a prom ticket), went up faster than overall prices, rising 56 percent.
Combining these 10 categories — based on roughly what my child and friends spent money on last year and this year — showed that, from the time they were born until today, the price of going to the prom went up by 22 percent, which is about half of the 45 percent increase seen in overall prices. Readers who want to calculate the change using the amount of money they or their teenager spent can download an Excel spreadsheet here.
Below is a graph starting in 1998 that shows how $100 spent on items in the general consumer price index (CPI) and the subset Prom Price Index has increased. While the dotted line tracking the general CPI steadily marches upward, the solid line denoting prom prices does not start going up until 2005.
The Prom Price Index shows that the cost of attending the prom has increased at half the pace of overall consumer prices. (Jay Zagorsky/Bureau of Labor Statistics, Author provided)
The change in the CPI is a good indicator of how the price of something has changed over time. This means a high school senior attending prom this year will spend half as much as the pace of inflation would suggest, resulting in savings of 16 cents on the dollar – compared with what the price should be. Of course, that’s only factoring in typical prom paraphernalia, not any novel ways teens are expected to spend money for the big night.
Either way, this should be good news for seniors and parents covering the costs.
Understanding the changing price of proms is important not only for the memories invoked years after the event is over, but also because it is a quintessential American experience. Proms will never be cheap, but it is nice to know that over time the inflation-adjusted cost of attending this rite of passage is falling, enabling more teenagers to attend.
This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article. |
Share. The studio is hoping to "roll out any changes as soon as we're able to." The studio is hoping to "roll out any changes as soon as we're able to."
Developer Ghost Town Games is aware of technical issues players have faced on the Nintendo Switch version of Overcooked and are working to resolve those issues.
"We're currently working on an update to improve the frame rate issues folks have been seeing and hoping to roll out any changes as soon as we're able to," the studio confirmed to IGN.
Exit Theatre Mode
Players have reported running into frame rate and rumble issues in Overcooked: Special Edition, which launched on the Switch several days ago.
IGN encountered these same problems in our review of the Switch port, as we said "it has some framerate and rumble issues that keep it from matching the best versions available."
However, despite the poor frame rate, IGN still praised Overcooked's "perfect blend of strategy and chaos," and named the cooperative cooking game one of the 13 awesome games you might've missed in July.
Alex Gilyadov is a freelance writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter. |
Before this week's gold-winning performance by the U.S. women's team, only one African-American female had ever earned an Olympic gold medal in gymnastics -- Dominique Dawes.
It's a fact that Dawes tearfully recalled after watching 16-year-old Gabby Douglas succeed her in the individual all-around competition Thursday, edging out the other gymnasts with a score of 62.232, and becoming the fourth American woman to ever win gold in the event.
"Us gymnasts are usually so composed," Dawes said, choking back tears in an interview with FOX Sports. "I am so thrilled for Gabby ... I'm so thrilled to change my website and take down the fact that I was the only African American with a gold medal."
Dawes nabbed the most coveted medal as a part of the famous 1996 team, along with bronze for her performance in the individual floor competition the same year.
Her emotion over Douglas's win overflowed on Twitter where she later announced the website change.
My web guy's words "changed the banner on your website from "only African American gymnast…" to read "the first African American gymnast…" — Dominique Dawes (@dominiquedawes) August 3, 2012
Dawes went on to describe the anxiety she felt prior to Thursday's meet, comparing her experience as a spectator to being on the floor back in 1996.
I thought it was emotional making history in 96 but I'm realizing it's just as emotional watching @gabrielledoug make history in her right! — Dominique Dawes (@dominiquedawes) August 2, 2012
When asked what touched her heart the most, Dawes responded that it was the generation of young kids looking up to Douglas in the same way they did with her. "That's what's so touching," she said "As I was able to help Gabby, now she's going to help a whole other generation of young girls and boys, African Americans, Hispanics, other minorities to see the sport of gymnastics as an opportunity for them to excel." |
An urgent action bulletin circulating in the Kremlin today prepared by the Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) states that the “Republican Massacre” that occurred near Washington D.C. yesterday was a not so subtle “birthday gift” to President Donald Trump from George Soros (who considerers himself a “god” and is called “the most evil man in the world”)—one of whose “community organizers”, named James Hodgkinson, attempted to assassinate up to 14 Republican Party lawmakers—but his being thwarted from doing so by the quick action US Capitol Police special agents, and (of course) the known fact that leftist-communist radicals are notorious for being inept assassins.
According to this bulletin, the authority granted to the SVR under Federation laws, rules and regulations to investigate and report on this “Republican Massacre” rests on this foreign intelligence agency being permitted to monitor “activities” relating to US military troop movements—specifically in this case, the “movements and activities” relating to the headquarters of the US Transportation Command located at Scott Air Force Base in St. Clair County, Illinois.
In early March (2017), this bulletin continues, a SVR surveillance report noted that an “independent” housing inspector having access to Scott Air Force Base, named James Hodgkinson, was making “continuous” visits to a radical leftist American political organization named Campaign For America’s Future (CAF) located at 1825 K Street, NW, in Washington D.C.—and that is a long known radical communist entity funded by George Soros.
This Campaign For America’s Future radical organization says it “seeks to delegitimize and dismantle conservatism while advancing progressive agendas vis à vis taxes, the economy, health care, education, social welfare programs, the environment, and energy policy”, this bulletin explains, and James Hodgkinson was determined by SVR analysts to be in “training” to become one its “community organizers” for his home city of Belleville, Illinois—that is the county seat of St. Clair County and located minutes away from Scott Air Force Base.
Important to know why James Hodgkinson would associate himself with a radical communist organization seeking to tax America’s wealthiest citizens and companies, this bulletin details, is due to his home city of Belleville being the most populated city in the Metro-East region of the St. Louis Metropolitan Area that comprises two States, Illinois and Missouri.
Anyone like James Hodgkinson living in a city like Belleville, this bulletin continues, sees on a daily basis the crushing tax disparity between what are called “liberal” and “conservative” States—with James Hodgkinson’s “liberal” Democratic Party ruled State of Illinois having the second highest property tax rate in the United States nearly double the national average, as opposed to the “conservative” Republican Party ruled State of Missouri whose property tax rate is one of lowest in that nation.
Since at least 2012, this bulletin says, James Hodgkinson railed in numerous public letters to his local newspaper against the taxes that were crushing both his professional and personal life—but who instead of slamming the “liberal” Democratic Party who made his State of Illinois an economic disaster that is doomed to collapse, blamed all of his tax woes on the Republican Party.
Belonging to numerous anti-Republican Party groups such as “The Road to Hell is Paved with Republicans”, “Terminate the Republican Party” and “Donald Trump is not my President”, this bulletin notes, James Hodgkinson fit the “exact profile” of radical leftist extremists recruited by the proudly self proclaimed Nazi sympathizer George Soros—and who the day prior to President Trump taking office, stated that this “would-be dictator is going to fail” and is said to be behind the plot to topple Trump from power.
As much as George Soros was enamored with his new “community organizer” political terrorist James Hodgkinson, this bulletin continues, so too was James Hodgkinson enamored with George Soros—so much so, in fact, that after a Change.org petition titled “Federally Indict George Soros For Funding Various Terrorist And Cartel Groups” was posted, James Hodgkinson replied to it in March (2017) by counter posting to Change.org: “Trump is a Traitor. Trump Has Destroyed Our Democracy. It’s Time to Destroy Trump & Co.”.
With George Soros pouring tens-of-millions of dollars into American propaganda radical leftist media organizations to destroy President Trump, this bulletin says, the media incitement to kill Republican Party lawmakers in US has now reached levels not seen since the US Civil War—and though the political terrorist assassin James Hodgkinson (who called for “killing as many Republicans as possible” and said that President Trump is “truly the biggest ass hole we have ever had in the Oval Office”) is now dead, anyone believing that he just “stumbled upon the location” where Republican Party lawmakers were practicing their baseball sport in the early morning hours in a quiet Washington D.C. suburb yesterday would be wise to know how Soros’s communist network really works.
And as exampled, this bulletin concludes, by the “cryptic” 13 June Twitter posting of Gizmodo Media Group’s radical communist leftwing reporter Anna Merlan less than 24 hours prior to James Hodgkinson’s rampage that said “I had a terrible nightmare that a defensive, slightly sweaty Keebler Elf was yelling at Congress and it’s still happening?”—and that she laughingly followed by further posting about James Hodgkinson “If the Deep State is real they definitely gave that man his Twitter account”—and is to be expected of a George Soros reporter who was described as: “Anna Merlan’s been lying her whole life. She’s a Nimrod Class sociopath and attention whore, who uses lies to construct her glowing self-conception. A sane society would shun her kind to the icy wastelands, and never allow her to sully any respectable organization.” |
Microsoft's Xbox leader Phil Spencer says that the company won't force game developers to use the processing power of its upcoming 'Project Scorpio' console to reach 4K resolutions.
The console was first announced at E3 2016 and is due for release in the holiday period of 2017. Microsoft says it will be the most powerful game console ever made, and will allow games to be played natively on 4K TV displays. However, when asked by a fan on Twitter if games would be forced to hit that 4K resolution for "Project Scorpio", Spencer seemed to indicate that was not going to be the case:
@ThatDudeizEric We'll talk more about this later but we never said we'd mandate 4K framebuffer, we won't.
In theory, that means game developers could decide to make a game for "Project Scorpio" but have it run natively at 1080p, but upscale it to 4K. That could allow those games to include some huge upgrades in textures and graphics that would normally not be able to be used in an Xbox One game.
In a live streaming chat on Giant Bomb (via Videogamer), Spencer confirmed that he would "absolutely be open" for games made for "Project Scorpio" to use the hardware other than to hit the 4K resolution barrier: |
Anthony Martial scored the equalising goal in Saturday's Premier League win over Middlesbrough
Manchester United forward Anthony Martial should "listen to me and not his agent", says manager Jose Mourinho.
The Frenchman's agent was reported to have said he is "studying" an option for his client to move to Sevilla.
Martial, 21, was United's top scorer last season with 17 goals, but his equaliser in Saturday's 2-1 Premier League home win over Middlesbrough was just his fifth strike of this season.
"He is a player with amazing conditions to be a top player," said Mourinho.
"Martial played, he created, he scored. He fought. He was very positive. I know he is a top talent."
Media playback is not supported on this device I'm sad because my 'brother' is sad - Mourinho
Martial, who joined the Red Devils from Monaco for £36m in 2015, played a crucial role as his side came from behind to beat Boro on Saturday.
He drilled in a finish on 85 minutes before Paul Pogba headed in the winner a minute later.
Afterwards, Mourinho suggested Martial should follow the example of team-mate Henrikh Mkhitaryan, who was told to "do more" by his manager and has scored three goals in his past four games.
The former Chelsea boss said : "I knew Mkhitaryan is a top talent but I was not playing him. At this moment he even plays left-back when the team is winning and we need to defend and need more balance.
"Martial has to listen to me and not his agent. He has to listen to me in training every day and in every feedback I give to try and improve him.
"The Mkhitaryan process I was having almost every day. His agent was calling me saying, 'Mkhitaryan with you will be a better player, keep going.'
"With Martial every day I read the newspaper, 'Anthony Martial goes to Sevilla, Anthony Martial goes on loan, Anthony Martial is not happy'. Anthony Martial has to listen to me."
Match of the Day analysis
Former United defender Phil Neville: "I think it's pretty simple. He needs to play like that consistently. He has to ask his agent why he's linking him to Sevilla and say, 'I'm at one of the biggest clubs in the world, I want to stay here'."
Ex-England captain Alan Shearer: "Martial was the best player on the park. He played a big part in getting United back into the game. He was positive from the start.
"He went at defenders, got into the box and created chances. The effort from 30 to 35 yards out was a brilliant strike. He should take huge confidence from that display." |
Monday, March 23, 2015
Today, Adnan Syed filed his Brief of Appellant to the Court of Special Appeals of Maryland, seeking a new trial based upon the claim that he received the ineffective assistance of counsel (IAC). When I started writing about this case, the only live IAC claim was Adnan's claim that his trial counsel was ineffective based on failing to ask the State about a possible plea bargain despite his repeated requests. At the time, I gave an interview to vox.com in which I noted that Adnan was almost certain to be unsuccessful on this claim; I then followed up that interview with a blog post in which I went into more detail regarding why I thought this IAC claim would be unsuccessful. Quite simply, the law was not on Adnan's side.
But then, in January, Asia McClain came forward with a new affidavit in which she stated that she stood by her claim that she saw Adnan in the library on January 13, 1999 and that she was dissuaded from testifying at Adnan's PCR hearing by one of the prosecutors at Adnan's initial trial(s). This led to Adnan filing a Supplement to his application for leave to appeal and the resuscitation of Adnan's claim that his trial counsel was ineffective based on her failure to contact Asia McClain as a potential alibi witness. With this claim revived, I now reached the conclusion that Adnan's appeal would be successful. Quite simply, this time, the law was on Adnan's side.
In particular, there was a Court of Appeals of Maryland case, In re Parris W., 770 A.2d 202 (Md. 2001), in which Maryland's highest court found that the constructive failure of an attorney to call alibi witnesses constituted the ineffective assistance of counsel. Moreover, the court in Parris W. cited several cases from across the country, all of which stood for the proposition that failure to contact an alibi witness constituted the ineffective assistance of counsel. Many of these cases are cited in Adnan's appellate brief, including Griffin v. Warden, Maryland Correctional Adjustment Center, 970 F.2d 1355 (4th Cir. 1992), a case involving the same courts that handled Adnan's trial and appeal.
Some further research led me to find 50 cases from around the country in which courts deemed the failure to contact or investigate a potential alibi witness to be unreasonable or potentially unreasonable under circumstances similar to the circumstances in Adnan's case. Conversely, I found no cases in which the opposite conclusion was reached. I am now up to 70 such cases, which are listed below the fold. It will be interesting to see if the State is able to find any cases reaching the opposite conclusion when it files its own brief next month.
1. In re Parris W., 770 A.2d 202 (Md. 2001).
2. Griffin v. Warden, Maryland Correctional Adjustment Center, 970 F.2d 1355 (4th Cir. 1992) (case involving the same courts handling Adnan’s trial and appeal).
3. Grooms v. Solem, 923 F.2d 88 (8th Cir. 1991).
4. Montgomery v. Petersen, 846 F.2d 407 (7th Cir. 1988).
5. Tosh v. Lockhart, 879 F.2d 412 (8th Cir. 1989).
6. Johns v. Perini, 462 F.2d 1308 (6th Cir. 1972).
7. Bryant v. Scott, 28 F.3d 1411 (5th Cir. 1994).
8. Walker v. State, 756 S.E.2d 144 (S.C. 2014).
9. Toney v, Miller, 564 F.Supp.2d 577 (E.D.La. 2008).
10. United States v. Johnson, 970 F.2d 907 (D.C. Cir. 1992).
11. Lopez v. Miller, 915 F.Supp.2d 373 (E.D.N.Y. 2014).
12. Washington v. Smith, 48 F.Supp.2d 1149 (E.D.Wis. 1999).
13. Butler v. McEwan, 2014 WL 2566069 (C.D.Cal. 2014).
14. Francis v. People, 2012 WL 3183823 (D.V.I. 2012).
15. Matthews v. Abramajtys, 319 F.3d 780 (6th Cir. 2003).
16. Matthews v. Abramajtys, 92 F.Supp.2d 615 (E.D.Mich. 2000).
17. United States v. Williams, 2012 WL 38229 (D.Minn. 2012).
18. State v. Glover, 396 S.E.2d 198 (W.Va. 1990).
19. Ballard v. Hurt, 2014 WL 2404302 (W.Va. 2014).
20. State v. Glover, 355 S.E.2d 631 (W.Va. 1987).
21. State v. Sanford, 948 P.2d 1135 (Kan.App. 1997).
22. Montalvo v. Mantello, 233 F.Supp.2d 554 (S.D.N.Y. 2002).
23. Bigelow v. Williams, 367 F.3d 562 (6th Cir. 2004).
24. Lawrence v. Armontrout, 900 F.2d 127 (8th Cir. 1990).
25. Bell v. Georgia, 554 F.2d 1360 (5th Cir. 1977).
26. Avery v. Prelesnik, 524 F.Supp.2d 903 (W.D.Mich. 2007).
27. Stewart v. Wolfenarger, 468 F.3d 338 (6th Cir. 2006).
28. Ramonez v. Berghuis, 490 F.3d 482 (6th Cir. 2007).
29. Gaines v. Commissioner of Correction, 51 A.3d 948 (Conn. 2012).
30. Ellerby v. United States, 187 F.3d 257 (2nd Cir. 1998).
31. Rolan v. Vaughn, 445 F.3d 671 (3rd Cir. 2006).
32. Holmes v. McKune, 59 Fed.Appx. 239 (10th Cir. 2003).
33. Code v. Montgomery, 799 F.2d 1481 (11th Cir. 1986).
34. Brown v. Myers, 137 F.3d 1154 (9th Cir. 1988).
35. Moran v. Vose, 816 F.2d 35 (1st Cir. 1987).
36. Teat v. State, 589 So.2d 815 (Ala.Crim. 1991).
37. Thomas v. State, 639 S.W.2d 353 (Ark. 1982).
38. People v. Shaw, 674 P.2d 759 (Cal. 1984).
39. State v. Allen, 1990 WL 1104263 (Del.Supr. 1990).
40. Jones v. United States, 918 A.2d 389 (D.C. 2007).
41. Cohens v. State, 775 So.2d 336 (Fla.App. 2nd 2000).
42. Tenorio v. State, 583 S.E.2d 269 (Ga.App. 2003).
43. People v. Krankel, 447 N.E.2d 1379 (Ill.App. 4th 1983).
44. Williams v. State, 508 N.E.2d 1264 (Ind. 1987).
45. State v. Cooks, 726 N.W.2d 633 (Wis.App. 2006).
46. Jones v. State, 133 S.W.3d 307 (Tex.App. 2004).
47. Commonwealth v. Bronson, 321 A.2d 645 (Penn. 1974).
48. Lichau v. Baldwin, 39 P.3d 851 (Or. 2002).
49. People v. Bussey, 6 A.D.3d 621 (N.Y.App.2nd 2004).
50. State v. Porter, 80 A.3d 732 (N.J. 2013).
51. State v. Love, 865 P.2d 322 (Nev. 1993).
52. State v. McElveen, 544 P.2d 820 (Mont. 1975).
53. Mullen v. State, 638 S.W.2d 304 (Mo.App. 1982).
54. Johns v. State, 926 So.2d 188 (Miss. 2006).
55. People v. Akram, 2010 WL 3418913 (Mich.App. 2010).
56. Calene v. State, 846 P.2d 679 (Wyo. 19993).
57. Bigelow v. Haviland, 576 F.3d 284 (6th Cir. 2009).
58. Blackburn v. Foltz, 828 F.2d 1177 (6th Cir. 1987).
59. Raygoza v. Hulick, 474 F.3d 958 (7th Cir. 2007).
60. Garcia v. Portuondo, 459 F.Supp.2d 267 (S.D.N.Y. 2006).
61. Miller v. Singetary, 958 F.Supp. 572 (M.D.Fla. 1997).
62. Stubbs v. Thomas, 590 F.Supp. 94 (S.D.N.Y. 1984).
63. Poindexter v. Booker, 301 Fed.Appx. 522 (6th Cir. 2008).
64. Shumway v. State, 293 P.3d 772 (Kan.App. 2013).
65. Black v. State, 2004 WL 2914986 (Alaska App. 2004).
66. State v. Tapia, 725 P.2d 1096 (Ariz. 1986).
67. People v. Herrera, 534 P.2d 1199 (Colo. 1975).
68. Cunningham v. State, 788 P.2d 243 (Idaho App. 1990).
69. Holland v. Commonwealth, 679 S.W.2d 832 (Ky.App. 1984).
70. Lagassee v. State, 655 A.2d 328 (Me. 1995).
https://lawprofessors.typepad.com/evidenceprof/2015/03/today-adnan-syed-filed-hisbrief-of-appellantto-the-court-of-special-appeals-of-maryland-seeking-a-new-trial-based-upon-the.html |
Greece’s last survivor of the World War II Normandy landing, Captain Grigoris Pavlakis, has died. He was 95.
The Crete-born Hellenic Navy officer took part in the biggest allied push against Germany as chief officer of the corvette Kriezis, one of six Greek ships based in Egypt that participated in the campaign.
Over the course of his career, Pavlakis received 15 medals and commendations for bravery and outstanding service, while in 2004 he was awarded France’s Legion of Honor by then president Jacques Chirac.
“Our only hope was the joyful thought that if the operation succeeded, Greece would be freed from the bonds of slavery,” Pavlakis had said of D-Day in an interview with Kathimerini in 2001.
His funeral will take place with full military honors on Wednesday, at 2 p.m., at Athens First Cemetery. |
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