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7 Mind-Dissecting Questions to Help Others Get to the Root of Any Problem
People ask us for help all of the time – maybe you’re a therapist helping a patient, or a manager dealing with a coworker, or a teacher aiding a student.
When put in these types of positions, your goal is to get to the root of what another person needs from you and to address that problem as clearly and effectively as possible.
To get to the root of what someone needs from you, you need to know how to ask the right questions. The right question can often cut through any distractions or muddiness and bring you to the core of a situation or problem.
In the new book The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More, & Change the Way You Lead Forever, Michael Bungay Stanier shares his top seven questions for becoming a better leader and coach. He teaches you helpful techniques on how to accomplish more in your daily conversations by saying less.
The key to any good leadership (or any type of communication) isn’t to give elongated speeches filled with wondrous advice and insights, but to instead ask “mind-dissecting” questions that help you uncover exactly what it is someone needs from you and how you can provide that.
Throughout this article, I will share these 7 simple questions mentioned in the book and why they can be so effective no matter what type of leader you are. In fact, these aren’t just good questions for becoming a better coach, they are actually good questions to improve any type of conversation that is centered around fixing a problem.
The Kickstart Question: “What’s on your mind?”
The first question is simply, “What’s on your mind?”
This question can be powerful because often whatever is on our mind in any given moment is what is taking up the most mental energy in our lives. By bringing someone’s attention to what is happening in the present moment, you give them an opportunity to reflect on what is currently bogging them down.
We often can’t move to the next stage in our lives until we’ve addressed what is sitting right in front of us. By asking, “What’s on your mind?” you open the door to address whatever seems to be most important to them within that particular moment.
Once you address this question, you free up a person’s mental resources for other avenues of conversation. But until you do this, whatever is swarming in their mind will continue to linger and distract their mental energy. This is why it’s so important to start a conversation with this simple question.
The Awe Question: “And what else?”
The next question is to continue the conversation by asking, “And what else?”
Often the first thing that comes to our minds isn’t always the most important thing. Instead, it takes several reiterations of a question before you can get to the root cause of what’s really bothering a person.
This is a big idea behind the Five Whys Exercise, which states that we need to ask ourselves “Why?” approximately five times before we can discover the root cause of any issue in our lives.
By asking, “And what else?” we encourage a person to dig deeper into their minds and search for other possible topics that may need addressing. We rarely know what is the true problem right from the beginning. Instead, a bit of further introspection is often needed before we discover something that hits the core of what we want.
Keep in mind, you can ask “And what else?” more than once if you feel there is still more to explore on any given topic.
The Focus Question: “What’s the real challenge here for you?”
Once you’ve done some digging, a great question to ask is “What’s the real challenge for you here?”
The Kickstart and Awe questions mentioned above are important for encouraging reflection and introspection, but now it’s time to focus on what can be done.
By asking, “What’s the real challenge for you here?” we put the focus on the person and the problem they are currently experiencing. It forces them to now identify what they want to work on or improve.
We can spend infinite amount of time talking about problems and letting our minds wander, but the goal of the Focus question is to begin to narrow the scope of the conversation and get to the root of the problem that needs addressing.
This is a particularly important question to ask if a conversation appears to be going on forever with no end-goal in sight. It’s time to buckle up and find what needs to be focused on in the present moment!
The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More, & Change the Way You Lead Forever is a very useful guide for any type of leader, coach, teacher, manager, or therapist. It teaches you how to accomplish more by saying less through the power of asking important “mind-dissecting” questions. It’s also great wisdom for just improving your conversations in general, such as when a friend or family member is asking for your guidance.
The Foundation Question: “What do you want?”
Now that we’ve identified the problem, it’s time to search for a solution.
The Foundation Question gets to the root of what the other person needs by directly asking them, “What do you want?”
Often people have a hard time asking for what they want. They may leave subtle hints or clues, but coming out boldly and saying “This is what I want” can often feel like you’re coming across as selfish or rude.
However, by asking the other person this question, you give them the opportunity to state their demands without feeling selfish or guilty.
Good communication comes when we know what everyone wants and then try our best to find a solution that satisfies those wants. Bad communication comes when we don’t know what someone wants or assume what they want without finding out directly.
This question help takes the pressure off of everyone by opening the doors to clearer communication.
The Lazy Question: “How can I help?”
Once we know what the person wants, the next logical question is “How can I help?”
It’s not always in your power to give people everything they want, but if they came to you for help then there must be something they believe you could do to bring them closer to their goals.
Maybe the person is having trouble with a coworker and they would like you to talk to them, or maybe the person is having trouble finishing a project on time so they would like you to help them or push the deadline back.
Michael Stanier warns us to watch out for the “Advice Monster.” Often when listening to others talk about their problems, we assume we know the best way to help them and we quickly jump to giving them advice.
By directly asking the person “How can I help?” we avoid this creeping Advice Monster and find out exactly what the other person expects from us before jumping to conclusions.
The Strategic Question: “If you’re saying yes to this, what are you saying no to?”
One of the most important questions mentioned in the book is The Strategic Question. This question asks, “If you’re saying yes to this, what are you saying no to?”
At its heart, this question is about the economic concept known as opportunity cost. For every decision we make, there comes costs. For example, by choosing to go to one college you also choose not to go to a bunch of other colleges.
We have many different options throughout our lives and it’s physically impossible to say “yes” to everything due to limited time, effort, and resources.
So to improve your decision-making process, it’s crucial that you understand what your alternatives are and what you’d be saying “no” to by saying “yes” to something else.
By focusing on your alternatives, you can get a clearer idea of whether something is the right choice for you. Can you live without X, Y, and Z? Okay, then this choice can work. But if your choice requires you to say “no” to something that you can’t imagine living without, then maybe you need to search for a new choice.
If I told you that you can have a job where you make a million dollars a year but you’ll only have one day of the year to spend with family or friends, is that something you could live with? Are you willing to say “yes” to the million dollar job if it means “no” to family and friends?
Ultimately, what you say “yes” to should be aligned with your other priorities and values.
The Learning Question: “What was the most useful for you?”
A great question to end the conversation off with is the Learning Question which asks, “What was the most useful for you?”
Instead of you telling the person what you most want them to remember from the interaction, this question allows the person to identify a major takeaway for themselves. This is very important for any leader, manager, or therapist as it allows the conversation to end off on a positive and productive note.
It also helps to ask this question to better your own leadership ability. Maybe you thought something else was a major takeaway from the conversation, but by allowing the individual to decide for themselves you can improve your own communication skills by paying attention to what they personally found most insightful and useful.
Studies in psychology show that people remember more when they re-create what they learn in their own words. For example, a student who asked to give a presentation to a class is more likely to remember the material than if they were to just study on their own.
By asking a person to tell you what they found most useful in the interaction, you reinforce what they’ve learned in a much more effective way than simply reminding them what they’ve learned. That’s what makes this question a great way to end any coaching session.
Conclusion
Altogether these 7 “mind-dissecting” questions are great to keep in your repertoire. They will allow you to engage in more rewarding conversation, while at the same time not needing to say too much.
By asking questions, you allow the other person to work through their problems and discover solutions in their own way. It’s not just giving a speech or lecturing someone, by giving them the power and opportunity to find answers on their own.
The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More, & Change the Way You Lead Forever is a very useful guide for any type of leader, teacher, manager, or therapist. It’s also great wisdom for just improving your conversations when a friend or family member is asking for your guidance.
If you enjoyed this article, I highly recommend you check out the book.
Stay updated on new articles and resources in psychology and self improvement: |
As I wrote in the first part of my 11-part series evaluating the Texans, the team’s top priority will be to re-sign outside linebacker Mario Williams.
They also want to sign running back Arian Foster, who’ll be a restricted free agent, to a long-term deal.
Remember, the Texans spent about $20 million more than the $120 million salary cap. Estimates are that it won’t increase to more than $124 million. That means the Texans will have to get under the cap by March 13, and then they won’t have a lot of room to operate.
Who would you rather keep? Arian Foster
Mario Williams View Results
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General manager Rick Smith and director of football administration Chris Olsen are going to have to become magicians to make cap space appear.
Magic maneuvering
Tough decisions will have to be made. Some players won’t be back. Others will have their contracts redone, including some taking pay cuts. Others will be asked to restructure, and they’ll gladly do it because they’ll receive up-front money.
Williams will be unrestricted if the Texans are unable to re-sign him. Williams’ original six-year, $54 million contract expires in March. The Texans aren’t likely to franchise him because he would cost them $22.9 million. He made $18 million this season.
The Texans can’t afford to carry Williams at $22.9 million for one year. They can’t trade him because you can’t trade a player who’s not under contract.
They could franchise him and hope he’d agree later to a long-term deal, but he’d be holding all the cards knowing they couldn’t keep him at $22.9 million.
Williams wants to stay, but once he’s on the open market, a team with a lot of cap space and an owner willing to spend millions might offer agent Ben Dogra $40 million to $50 million for him.
But before we count Williams as gone, remember that Smith, coach Gary Kubiak and owner Bob McNair have said they want to re-sign him. But they have only so much they can offer.
Now let’s look at Foster. He earned $525,000 last year and was voted to the Pro Bowl for the second consecutive season. The Texans want to sign him to a long-term deal.
Last week, I gave some inaccurate information. I said if they tender Foster at the maximum, they’d receive first- and third-round picks as compensation if they didn’t match another team’s offer sheet.
That was under the previous collective bargaining agreement. Under the new CBA, the maximum tender is a first-round pick.
Breaking the bank
The Texans are fortunate that Foster is happy here. A team with a lot of cap space could front-load a deal that would make it almost impossible for the Texans to match it because they just won’t have the room. And the compensation would be only a first-round pick.
The Texans also want to re-sign free agents like center Chris Myers, guard Mike Brisiel, tight end Joel Dreessen and kicker Neil Rackers, but they won’t break the bank.
Williams and Foster will, and it’s difficult to imagine the Texans being able to re-sign both without one giving what amounts to a hometown discount.
john.mcclain@chron.com
twitter.com/mcclain_on_nfl |
A UK hacker behind bars for computer fraud hacked into his prison's computer system during an IT lesson.
Nicholas Webber, 21, of Southsea, Hampshire, was able to access the network after being allowed to join the jail's technology classes.
Webber was sent down for five years in May 2011 for masterminding the infamous GhostMarket.net cybercrime marketplace. Fraudsters used his website to trade stolen credit-card details. GhostMarket, one of the biggest underground bazaars of its type with 8,500 members, even offered tutorials on identity theft for inexperienced and wannabe criminals.
GhostMarket's treasure trove of information was used to steal £15m from 65,000 bank accounts worldwide, according to some estimates.
Webber, GhostMarket's founder, used his website's profits to buy computers, video games, iPhones and iPods worth £40,000. But it was his taste in luxury hotels that proved his undoing: Webber was arrested for using fraudulent credit card details to pay for a penthouse suite at the Hilton Hotel in Park Lane, London, in October 2009.
He was subsequently prosecuted for computer fraud offences, convicted and eventually sent to HM Prison Isis, a category-C young offender institution for males, in southeast London. The hacker managed to sign up for the prison's IT class before infiltrating part of the institute's computer system, The Daily Mail reported.
A prison service spokesman confirmed that Webber was involved in a hack on the prison's systems while downplaying the significance of the compromise.
"At the time of this incident in 2011 the educational computer system at HMP Isis was a closed network. No access to personal information or wider access to the internet or other prison systems would have been possible," the spokesman told The Reg.
News of the hack emerged during an unfair dismissal case brought to an employment tribunal by Michael Fox, the prison's IT teacher. Fox, who was employed by Kensington and Chelsea College, gave lessons at HMP Isis, but this ended after he was blamed for the hack and excluded from the prison. College bosses failed to find Fox alternative work even though he was cleared of any wrongdoing at a disciplinary hearing last March.
Fox said he was not aware of Webber's crimes when the hacker joined the prison's IT class. Fox also maintained that it wasn't his decision to admit the lad to the course, which aims to give young offenders skills that will give them a better chance of finding gainful employment once they leave prison.
Fox’s tribunal hearing, which was held in Croydon on Friday, was adjourned until April, according to the Mail. During the proceedings, Fox reportedly said: "The perceived problem [at the college] was there was a tutor who had been excluded by the prison and charged with allowing a hacking expert to hack into the prison’s mainframe."
Commentary on the security implications of the computer compromise can be found in a post on Sophos's Naked Security blog here. ® |
Bitcoiners like to compare the nascent technology to the internet in the early 90s. The public at large knows it’s out there, but they don’t know why it’s useful...yet. Take for example this video from the time period where Bryant Gumbel defiantly asks “what is the internet anyways?”
Trough of Disillusionment?
Watching that gives me flashbacks to every bar conversation I’ve ever had with someone about Bitcoin. The comparison is summed up by Marc Andreessen in this interview when he says:
“We're quite confident that when we're sitting here in 20 years, we'll be talking about Bitcoin the way we talk about the Internet today.”
I used to like this analogy, but lately I’ve heard a good argument against it. Back in 1994, people were excited to use the Internet. They wanted to get on this new network that they had heard so much about and do some “surfing.” In contrast, 2014 hasn’t seen the same kind of enthusiasm for Bitcoin.
The price has been in decline since reaching US$1,000 in November/December of last year, currently hovering around US$500 with no sign of breaking up anytime soon. This signals a lack of demand. At this time, most people are not interested in buying Bitcoin and experimenting with what it has to offer.
Is this invention not so revolutionary after all?
I don’t think so. I believe Mr. Andreessen when he says that Bitcoin “is the distributed trust network that the Internet always needed and never had.” But, as aforementioned argument suggests, I also suspect that many people in the community might be jumping the gun on where Bitcoin is currently at in its life cycle compared to where the Internet was in the early 90s.
While I would love to solve this argument, I must admit that I know far too little about the history of the internet to give you a confident answer about where Bitcoin is in its development phase relative to its predecessor. So what can I offer?
The BTC Experiment
I decided to put some of my own hard-earned BTC on the line for a completely unscientific test of the general public’s impression of Bitcoin and enthusiasm to try it. For this experiment I gave US$10 worth away to four different people with the only stipulation being that they figure out how to buy something online with it. My test subjects were: my Dad, my girlfriend, a friend, and a “random” redditor.
Again, I stress the unscientific nature of this experiment for a number of reasons. To start, in no way was the experimentation process standardized. I had to walk my Dad through much of the process and I was there to help my girlfriend with making the payment, while my friend and the redditor were on their own.
As well, four people are too small of a sample size to ever use when making a judgment about the public at large. And I’m sure people in the comment section will poke plenty of other holes in this investigation.
Even so, I found my results to be an interesting look at Bitcoin’s strengths and weaknesses and how they are perceived by people outside of the community.
The Dad
I’ve been talking to my Dad about Bitcoin for as long as I have been into it myself (October of 2013). Despite many enthusiastic lectures during that time period, he had always maintained a level of distrust toward the idea of a cryptocurrency. A proud environmentalist - deregulated “free markets” and technologies promising to boost them have never been his cup of tea. Still, he holds a strong distaste towards the big banks so Bitcoin’s decentralization and promise to “get away from Federal Reserve control” piqued his interest.
When I approached him about doing the experiment he was hesitant. Computers have never been his favorite thing (despite his affection for posting liberal memes on his freshly minted Facebook account). As he matter-of-factly states “I’m not from the digital age.” But after some arm-twisting and the promise that he could buy a USB keyboard to use on his laptop that refuses to register the letters “s” and “w”, he relented.
After helping him set up a web wallet and transferring him the coin, we went searching for a keyboard on Overstock. A little browsing and one excellent YouTube review later, he settled on a Klear Keys XL and proceeded to the checkout. This is where we ran into his first complaint that “using small increments of bitcoin can be confusing.”
While many in the Bitcoin community have advocated the switch to mBTC as a way of counteracting the problems associated with prices being listed as “0.1584223” – this is what my Dad ran into when checking out on Overstock. While they do offer Coinbase integration that nullifies the payment issue, he was using GreenAddress.it. This meant typing in seven digits and a worried comment about the dangers of messing up a decimal place. Luckily we made it through without wasting a single satoshi and the keyboard was on its way. Or so we thought.
A couple days later my Dad forwarded me an email from Overstock regarding the purchase. They explained that “after the order was processed there was a system connection error and our system cancelled the order because it thought we had not been paid.”
The email was actually the first of three, with the third notifying that since he had not responded to the first two (his email doesn’t get checked very often) a refund had been issued to the Coinbase account registered under his email. He wasn’t sure what to do, because as far as he knew he had no Coinbase account.
This is when I remembered making an account for him in December when I was home for the holidays, trying to convince him that sub-1000 was “cheap coin” territory (he replied it’d be back at $500 in a few months...smart man). A little bit of inbox searching later and he recovered the Coinbase password and was able to redo his purchase, this time on his own.
Verdict
When I asked my Dad to describe his experience using Bitcoin the word he kept coming back to was “cumbersome.” He complained about how he “Had to have three accounts open for an online transaction: Coinbase, Overstock and my E-mail account” and that “sometimes, because of tech reasons, it just doesn’t work.”
Finally when I asked whether he would prefer to use a debit card or Bitcoin for online purchases after this trial, he selected the former without hesitating. However despite these worries, his opinion towards Bitcoin has improved enough since the trial that he finally relented to my lectures and purchased himself a full coin for cold storage (at his target price of $500, of course).
The Girlfriend
My girlfriend is awesome for many reasons, one being her willingness to put up with me talking about cryptocurrencies 24/7. Despite this exposure she still hadn’t used BTC on her own, so when I asked her to take US$10 worth online for some shopping she was happy to help out; simply for the educational experience, of course.
She started off by setting up a wallet on GreenAddress.it so I could transfer the coins. After receiving them she went browsing on NewEgg and found a phone case she liked within five minutes. Everything seemed to be going great until she got to the checkout screen and saw no option to pay with Bitcoin…strange.
I took over and tried to figure things out, but I couldn’t see what the problem was. After a bit of searching I found out that Newegg doesn’t accept Bitcoin payments for their Marketplace section which the phone case was listed under. This is because they split the profit with a third party seller. Apparently work is under way to include these items as well, but at the time she was out of luck.
The set back at Newegg sent her shopping trip to Overstock, where my girlfriend criticized the options available for purchase. She found the selection limited compared to her usual online shopping destination, Amazon, and every time she did find a promising item in the $10 price range it seemed to have bad reviews. Nonetheless after 45 minutes of browsing she found a parer knife to her liking. It came out to a little more than $10 after tax, but I had sent a little more just in case (again, I stress the unscientific nature of this experiment).
She pulled up the checkout and was ready to send the money when we realized GreenAddress charged a 0.1 mBTC fee for sending coin, leaving us .03 cents short of the final sale price. I quickly sent some more coin her way, but this meant a ten minute wait before it could be spent on Overstock. Thankfully the market price didn’t drop out during this time and the payment went flawlessly once she had enough. Less than a week later we had a new addition to the kitchen.
Verdict:
When I asked her to sum up the experience my girlfriend was disappointed in the transaction fees GreenAddress charged for sending her payment. She also didn’t like the confusion over which products she could buy with Bitcoin on Newegg. However the overall experience was still a positive one because, while she was “skeptical at first, the wallet was relatively easy to use, and (she) had no trouble placing and receiving (her) order.”
Interestingly enough, the payment failure at Newegg gave her an insight to Bitcoin’s utility. When I asked whether she would prefer to use a debit card or crypto for future payments she said “probably traditional because there are more options, but I would use Bitcoin again because of security. There was a phone case I wanted on Newegg but did not feel comfortable using a debit card because the dealer seemed sketchy. With Bitcoin it would've been fine.”
The Friend
To find my next participant I opened up the experiment’s scope and asked for volunteers from my group of 500 Facebook friends. This was the status:
Writing an article about the difficulty for an average person to make a purchase with bitcoin. If anyone wants to help, I'll give you $10 worth to make a purchase online. You just need to fill out a questionnaire for me after whatever you buy arrives. Any takers? You've gotta figure out how to make a wallet for yourself as well.
I received three responses to give it a try, but only one person (my High School friend Josh) went through the trouble of setting up a wallet. Josh had heard about Bitcoin before but his “knowledge of Bitcoin before the trial was only a tiny bit from reading about it on magazines and brief bits from television news. (He) knew a little about the mining process and how people build special computers to mine Bitcoins” but he had never delved too deeply beyond that saying it was “super interesting but super confusing.” He used CoinPocket for iPhone as his wallet.
Josh, like my girlfriend, ended up spending his Bitcoin on Overstock after a failed Newegg experience. The problem was that he got stuck trying to figure out a way to pay partly with Bitcoin and partly with a debit card (something Newegg does not allow). Once he made it to Overstock he found a cologne sample for under $10 and was able to figure out the payment process and his order arrived a few days later without a hitch.
Verdict:
Josh was not impressed with Bitcoin as a payment option. When I asked for a list of criticisms he said:
“I did not like that I was unable to purchase an item for more Bitcoins than I had in my wallet such as using all my Bitcoin and then covering the rest of the cost with debit/credit/ or Paypal. I did not enjoy that when I submitted my order, it took a few minutes to process and I was unsure if I did it correctly. And one of the more important things I did not like was websites that accept Bitcoin do not display how much goods cost in Bitcoin until well into the checkout process.”
When I asked whether he would prefer to use Bitcoin or a traditional debit card for online purchases his response was “traditional card every time” concluding that “the process to use Bitcoin is far from being ready for everyday consumer use.”
The only positive comments he had were that he enjoyed the learning experience of trying a new technology, saying “it was a fun process, but being too difficult to use makes me aware that I will stay away from it with future purchases until stores create a more user friendly experience.”
The Skeptic
To find the final volunteer I took to my local city’s subreddit, /r/Bellingham. I posted this thread to the ~2,800 person sub and six interested users replied. The first lead I contacted never responded to my request for an address, but my second inquiry (to user HorrendousRex) was successful. I was excited to help Rex give Bitcoin a shot because in his initial response he said
“I’ve done a lot of research on Bitcoin and I'm highly skeptical of it, but I've been curious to give it a try.”
While my previous three subjects hadn’t known much about cryptocurrency, it was clear from the beginning that Rex had done his homework. This was the first message I received in regards to him setting up a wallet:
“I decided to go with the ‘Bitcoin Core’ wallet, which is produced by the people that maintain the Bitcoin public code repository, and is considered to be the 'reference implementation' of all Bitcoin software. I chose Bitcoin Core over an online wallet for two reasons: There have been a few incidents where popular online bitcoin wallet companies have been hacked and people have lost a lot of money. On /r/bitcoin the general response to this happening was "serves them right for not having their own encrypted wallets. Using an online wallet eliminates one of the qualities of bitcoin that I find most attractive. Bitcoin allows purchasers and buyers to be in full control of monetary transactions without any central intervention, electronically. Credit cards and debit cards don't have this feature as you need to pay a credit card processor or place your money in a bank. When you use an online wallet, you are once again placing trust in a central authority - and this one is not regulated! I downloaded the software and installed it at 12:05 AM today (8/4/2014) and immediately asked the software to encrypt my wallet. I did this because there is a long-standing ‘bug’ where the wallet is not encrypted by default, and if you make backups - even if those backups were unintentionally created, like from an automated computer backup - then your unencrypted wallet will be backed up with all of its secrets, rendering your wallet insecure even if you secure it later. This process was easy but I only knew to do it because I had read about it - there was no warning or suggestion to do this. As of 12:16 AM, my wallet is still "Synchronizing with network". There is something like 5 years and 25 weeks of transactions that need to be downloaded before your wallet is in synch and you can safely make purchases. This was what stopped me from using Bitcoin last time, as it takes a long time to create this wallet. Not very user friendly! The counter is now at ‘4 years and 1 week behind,’ although I will say that it does seem to be speeding up.
As some of you can guess, Rex was in for a wait. Downloading the entire Blockchain history (which clocks in at >20GB and is necessary for running BitcoinQT) can take days to weeks depending on your internet connection. I suggested a “lightweight” wallet like Electrum as well as the option of downloading the bootstrap.dat file available on Bitcoin.org, but Rex was committed to his decision. On day two of downloading he did concede saying: “I chose... poorly.”
I nonetheless applaud his commitment, because on day 4 I received the long awaited response that his wallet was synced and ready to use. I sent the coin and quickly received confirmation from Rex of its arrival. Three days later it looked like we were good to go when I received a message that he was preparing to gild a comment on Reddit with Bitcoin. I waited to hear how it went but there were no further messages. Four days later, I got some bad news:
Hey, just wanted to let you know what's up. The last time I messaged you, I wanted to gild a comment (see last message for that comment). Coinbase accepted my payment but a web error meant that the transaction was invalidated - I believe that I waited too long. Here's the breakdown:
Click "give gold" on reddit, select "Bitcoin" as payment. Get directed to CoinBase page. Click link on coinbase to pay, launch bitcoin app. Wallet is <1 day behind, begin resyncing. Coinbase payment expires without my knowing (10 minute expiry) Wallet finished syncing about 30 minutes later. Through wallet app, send funds to gild comment ($3.99 worth). Click back to Coinbase, get error message that claims that my transaction expired and which persists even if I re-initiate gilding through reddit.com Transfer on bitcoin finalizes, but comment remains ungilded.
So basically, reddit (or Coinbase) stole $4 [from] me and I have no obvious recourse. Personally I'm just chalking this up to a bitcoin failure, but if you'd like me to follow up I'd be happy to.
I'm trying to guild another comment now with a synced wallet, will report back if successful.
Not exactly a confidence building experience for a new Bitcoin user, especially because it happened on a day (August 14th) that saw Bitcoin prices drop from $520 to $480. This was on top of a price drop that had already happened. When I first sent the coin (August 7th) the price was hovering around $585.
Once again, I applaud Rex’s commitment to the experiment. He denied my offer to send more coin to make up the difference in value (interestingly enough, he never complained about the volatility) and three days later I saw the message I’d been waiting for: “Gilding finally worked today! I re-synced my wallet, clicked ‘Give Gold / pay with bitcoin’, it launched my wallet. I clicked 'send', and a few seconds later I got a message from reddit that my gilding had succeeded.”
Verdict
Obviously Rex had some complaints. He pointed out the “inconvenience of Bitcoin in terms of needing to constantly re-sync and wait for confirmation and hope that your order isn't swallowed by 'web demons.'” He also added that “Getting everything set up took WAY too long.
When a transfer went badly, there was no obvious way to recover funds - although to be fair I never asked reddit for a refund. My wallet took up 23 gigabytes on my hard disk, which is pretty darn big considering I only have two 256 GB SSD's (I like to live dangerously).
However he was also reasonable with the criticism, remarking:
“A lot of the fault is on me for dragging my feet. I think if Bitcoin was a bigger part of my life, something I used on a daily basis, the whole operation would have barely taken any more time than getting my credit card out of my wallet.”
So what was his lasting impression? I was surprised to find out that despite the fact he came into the experiment a skeptic and experienced a number of technical issues, Rex concluded “I’m much more impressed with it than I was before I started.”
He marveled at the overall payment process saying “the purchase flow was SO fast and easy. I clicked two buttons and then my Bitcoin wallet opened up and asked for my wallet password to complete the transfer. It was easier than using a credit card, and far more secure...honestly, and I find myself shocked to say this as I went in to this a skeptic, I would use Bitcoin again in an instant.”
In conclusion he added:
“All in all, I think there are still concerns BUT I think I might keep this wallet around for future purposes. I'm really optimistic about the future of cryptocurrencies, I'm just not sold that the current Bitcoin system is going to be adoptable by the general public...I think there are major issues to be solved with Bitcoin...before widespread adoption can occur, but I'm much more impressed with it than I was before I started.”
Conclusion:
This experiment set out to judge public perception of Bitcoin, but I admit it is flawed in many ways. For one, my sampling was not random. I personally knew three of the subjects and that undoubtedly influenced their impartialness. The sample size was also far too small to draw any statistically significant conclusions.
Despite these shortcomings, I think this exercise presented a number of insights concerning Bitcoin’s perceived strengths and weaknesses to potential consumers. While many in the Bitcoin community like to label Bitcoin payments as the best way to pay for goods online, the examples above show that getting started can be “cumbersome” to say the least.
Of course, Rex brought up a good point when he said that if Bitcoin was a “bigger part of (his) life” the experience would’ve been easier. The general public is already used to online credit card payments, which gives the legacy system a leg up on the new experience that is paying with Bitcoin.
I also must comment on what I perceive as a general lack of enthusiasm to try Bitcoin. While $10 isn’t very much money, I was surprised that more people did not jump at the opportunity to have some online shopping paid for. Out of a combined potential audience of 3,300 for my two public posts (Facebook and Reddit), only nine people expressed interest. That tells me the idea of Bitcoin being the next Internet might be slightly overblown, at least concerning public interest in taking the new technology for a test run.
It would be nice to run this experiment on a larger scale with a more rigorous scientific method, but unfortunately I have neither the time nor the resources to undertake such a project. Despite the limited scale though, it was fun to gift people some magical internet money to try out something new. I highly encourage anyone who has some coins to spare and knows a curious friend or acquaintance to consider trying it for themselves.
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Coin HR - the best way to find a perfect bitcoin job or an applicant for your vacancy. We connect talent with opportunity! |
Thanks to your support, we have secured the funds necessary for capturing interviews this coming January! Hitting our first stretch goal of $30,000 will allow us to improve the quality of the production, extending our time in the field by an additional week!
$45,000: Covers a production visit to Australia to interview Apollo alumni from the Honeysuckle Creek Tracking Station.
Covers a production visit to Australia to interview Apollo alumni from the Honeysuckle Creek Tracking Station. $75,000: Allows us to work on the film full-time through the end of production.
Allows us to work on the film full-time through the end of production. $150,000: Covers all costs for production and post production.
Covers all costs for production and post production. $200,000: Secures the entire budget, allowing us to work on the film full-time and uninterrupted through completion of the project.
We know the stories of the astronauts who went to the moon and the figureheads who inspired us to go. But what about the rest of Project Apollo's workforce––the 400,000 men and women who spent the better part of a decade to get us to our planetary neighbor and back? When We Were Apollo shares their story.
STORY
July 20, 1969, 10:30 EDT: With one small step, humanity slips the heavenly bonds of earth and first sets foot upon the moon. But, for the everyday men and women of the Apollo Space Program, the first moon landing represents the culmination of a decade-long effort of such awesome scope and scale––of such tireless work and relentless sacrifice––it would forever impact their lives and the communities they called home.
NASA Engineer, Al Koller, and Apollo IBM Contractor, Martha LeMasters
On the eve of the 50th anniversary of the first moon landing, we explore the legacy of the moonshot years through the lives and experiences of several extraordinary (and until now unheard from) everyday heroes: individuals like NASA engineers Al Koller and Larry Junker, and IBM contractor Martha LeMasters. Through them, we uncover the human component of Apollo: an intimate and approachable window into the lunar program that reveals what it was like to work on the moonshot, while appreciating its profound and lasting impact as the largest operation in peacetime the world has ever known.
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Meet Larry Junker, Apollo structural engineer. He and several other behind-the-scenes men and women from Apollo will help form the backbone of our story.
CROWD-SOURCED HISTORY
Producing a feature-length documentary is part of our larger effort to ensure that as many histories from Project Apollo are captured and preserved while there is still time. To encourage Apollo alumni, their family and friends to record their experiences, we have created a special portal on the When We Were Apollo website for uploading stories and photographs. This is a remarkable way of preserving Apollo history we can all participate in. Because the journeys to the moon and the amazing efforts that made them possible are our history, we are making this service and collection completely free to the public. So pull out your old photographs, interview a relative and help preserve this invaluable piece of our collective past. For more information on how to view and/or contribute to this effort, please click here.
Grumman Aircraft workers pose in front of their creation: the Apollo Lunar Module
WHY APOLLO MATTERS
Great strides in science, medicine, engineering and technology are often the strongest engines for human advancement–––not just in their outcomes but in the way they galvanize our collective spirit. The story of how we got to the moon is the perfect example: an undertaking so ambitious, it required the combined forces of government, academia and private industry to succeed.
Apollo builders install the final beam at the top of the Vehicle Assembly Building.
Our film is a recognition that working to accomplish ambitious goals like going to the moon brings out the best qualities we as humans share. By focusing on never-before-heard stories from Project Apollo's everyday workers, we can see firsthand that we succeed in doing big things when we make the choice to come together––our efforts in turn becoming bigger than the sum of their parts, setting us on a course to turn the impossibilities of today into the realities of tomorrow.
ACCESSIBILITY
Recognizing there is no way we could include every interview and piece of material we capture into a two-hour film, we will be donating our footage and research materials upon completion of the project to institutions like the University of Alabama at Huntsville and the Viking Preservation Project to ensure they will be preserved and made accessible for present and future generations. For more information on this partnership, please click here.
DISTRIBUTION
We aim to complete When We Were Apollo in time for the 50th anniversary of the first moon landing in 2019. In addition to appearing on the festival circuit, When We Were Apollo has attracted the attention of the PBS member stations above which have agreed to broadcast the film provided it is delivered in accordance with their specifications. We encourage you to share the film with your local PBS member station to increase the chances it makes an appearance on your outlet!
FUNDING
All research, development and early production efforts for When We Were Apollo have been entirely self-funded. This past May, we spent a week at the Kennedy Space Center researching, filming and interviewing potential subjects for our story. In early December, we travel to Huntsville to conduct archival research at the University of Alabama as well as to conduct outreach and preliminary interviews at NASA's Marshall Flight Center and the surrounding community.
Our cinematographer, Kyle McConaghy, shooting amidst the ruins of Launch Complex 34, May 2017.
The funds we seek through Kickstarter will help fund a two week road trip for capturing our principal interviews in January of 2018. Every dollar you contribute will go directly into the project. We will begin editing these interviews in February, producing a first assembly of the film and a 2-3 minute trailer to aid with additional fundraising efforts in 2018. The following is a breakdown of how our Kickstarter funds will be used:
$15,386: Production costs (including airfare, hotels, camera equipment and a small per diem for a crew of four)
$3,079: Kickstarter Backer Gifts
$1,477: Kickstarter and credit card processing fees
REWARDS
WHO WE ARE
Zachary Weil: Writer / Director
Growing up in Florida during the Space Shuttle era, Zack feels a deep and strong connection to spaceflight and its history. The owner and operator of Contact Light Films in Los Angeles, Zack’s mission is to share stories that inspire and motivate younger generations towards positions of public service and leadership. His resume includes hundreds of short-form programs highlighting the philanthropic efforts of Fortune 500 companies like Toyota and Target, to Telly Award winning campaigns for nationally recognized non-profits like the 20MM Foundation and Hispanic Scholarship Fund.
Giovanna Aguilar: Producer
A multimedia professional, Giovanna is the executive producer of Vivir del Cuento, a transmedia project highlighting the oral storytelling traditions of Ecuadorian communities displaced by the 2016 earthquake. She is also the producer of the award-winning feature-length documentary, Dreamtown, following Anibal Chala, an Afro-Ecuadorian player who, for six years, strives against all odds to make it to the professional league. A multi-grant awarded film—HBO/NALIP Documentary Filmmaker Award, NALAC, NYWIFT—Dreamtown can be seen in short form on PBS’s Frontline World Rough Cut.
John Filson: Producer
John came to filmmaking through his background in international conflict resolution. He lived for years in the Middle East and Latin America, supporting local communities struggling to prevent war and exploitation. He also led peace-building advocacy programs in Washington, D.C. for many years. John sees filmmaking as a transmitter of perspective across cultural boundaries. His web series currently in production, Fate We Make, follows an amazing Iraqi refugee family in the U.S. who John lived with as a relief worker in Iraq.
OUR PARTNERS AT THE HUMAN EXPANSION CO.
David G. Stone & Jason Cochard
Dave is on a mission to photograph every unchartered corner of the world in his spare time. He doubles as a creative director and film director in real life. Prior to founding The Human Expansion Co., Dave traversed the advertising and public relations landscape from Chicago to DC to LA, ultimately leading film creative and production for Ogilvy & Mather in the US West as a creative director and Head of Film. His work has been recognized by the Emmy Awards, Addy Awards, Webby Awards, Telly Awards, W3 Awards, North American Excellence Awards, the Brand Film Festival and more.
Jason hails from Southern California, where he has lensed award-winning feature films and television shows for more than 14 years as a cinematographer. His work has been featured internationally. Prior to founding The Human Expansion Co., Jason ran a content production company, producing award-winning work for brands and other clients. With an aesthetic that embraces authenticity and rejects artifice, Jason’s quest is to explore and expand the human experience with a contemplative, honest storytelling voice which resonates with viewers. |
Cecil Beaton: about the Exhibition
8 February - 22 April 2012
The photographs of the British royal family by Sir Cecil Beaton (1904-1980) were central to shaping the monarchy's public image in the mid-20th century. Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II was still a young princess when she first sat for Beaton in 1942. Over the next three decades he would be invited to photograph the Queen on many significant occasions, including her Coronation Day in 1953.
The most memorable of Beaton's images combine the splendour of historic royal portrait painting with an intimacy that only photography and film can convey. His detailed diary accounts reveal the complexities of each sitting, from the intense planning and excitement beforehand to the pressures of achieving the perfect shot.
Beaton bequeathed his archive of royal portraits to his devoted secretary Eileen Hose. In 1987 she, in turn, bequeathed the archive to the V&A. Photographs, diaries, personal letters and press cuttings combine to tell the fascinating story of a magnificent collaboration between crown and camera.
A premier portrait photographer
Cecil Beaton by Curtis Moffat, Gelatin silver print, about 1930. Museum no. E.1557-2007, © Victoria and Albert Museum, London/Estate of Curtis Moffa Cecil Beaton began to pursue photography at a very early age. As a teenager he spent many hours attempting to recreate the look of glamorous society portraits using his sisters, Nancy and Baba, as models. His career took off in the mid 1920s, when he began to contribute photographs and illustrations to Vogue magazine. His first solo exhibition in London in 1927 established him as one of the leading fashion photographers and portraitists of his generation. Beaton became sought-after on both sides of the Atlantic, photographing famous faces from Hollywood, the theatre world and society. From the 1950s his set designs for theatre and films, such as My Fair Lady (1956), defined the glamorous look of the era. Candid snapshots and studio portraits of Beaton by his contemporaries display his sense of style, his charm, vanity and vivacious personality.
Princess Elizabeth and the portrait tradition
Princess Elizabeth by Cecil Beaton, Gelatin silver print, Buckingham Palace, March 1945. Museum no. E.1361-2010, © Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Cecil Beaton's diary, July 1939
The opportunity to photograph Queen Elizabeth, Queen Consort of King George VI, was the high point of Beaton's career to date. Published two months after the outbreak of the Second World War, his images presented a sense of continuity with a magnificent pre-war Britain. Several wartime sittings of the Queen and her family would reinforce his vision of a seemingly unshakable monarchy and witness the transformation of her daughter Princess Elizabeth from girl to young woman.
The flowers that appear in many of Beaton's portraits were often picked from his own garden. Cascading arrangements of roses, carnations, lilies and hydrangeas filled the space between a photographic backdrop and the sitter, and were an essential prop in the creation of his idealised Arcadian scenes.
The Coronation
Queen Elizabeth II by Cecil Beaton, 2 June 1953. Museum no. PH.311-1987, © Victoria and Albert Museum, London
On the morning of 2 June 1953, three million people lined the streets between Buckingham Palace and Westminster Abbey to witness the process of the Gold State Coach. Millions more crowded around newly bought television sets to watch the investiture of Britain's youngest sovereign since Queen Victoria. For many, the Coronation represented the beginning of a new age. It was a time for optimism and innovation that the press termed 'the new Elizabethan era'.
Cecil Beaton attended the ceremony, along with 8,000 other guests. He sat in a balcony close to the pipes of the great organ, recording his impression of the glorious pageant in animated prose and black ink sketches. After the ceremony he returned to the Palace to make final preparations for the official portrait sitting.
In this glittering portrait, the Queen wears the imperial state crown, a replica of that made for Queen Victoria's Coronation. The Queen holds the sceptre with the cross in her right hand, balanced by the orb in her left. On her right hand she wears the coronation ring, a symbol that the sovereign is 'wedded' to the state. On both wrists are the armills, golden bracelets signifying sincerity and wisdom.
The next generation
Princess Elizabeth and Prince Charles by Cecil Beaton, Gelatin silver print, December 1948, Buckingham Palace. Museum no. PH.218-1987, © Victoria and Albert Museum, London
On 14 November 1948 Princess Elizabeth gave birth to her first child, Prince Charles Philip Arthur George. At her mother’s suggestion, the Princess chose Beaton to photograph her newborn son. Beaton would go on to take photographs commemorating the births of her other children: Princess Anne in 1950, Prince Andrew in 1960 and Prince Edward in 1964.Beaton’s tender portraits depicted the Queen as a figure to whom any parent could relate. In contrast to the splendid Coronation images, these photographs capture a more intimate and relaxed side of family life.
In the decade between the births of Princess Anne and Prince Andrew, Beaton’s approach to royal portraiture changed dramatically. All attention was now focused on the sitters, a stark white background replacing the elaborate Rococo-inspired backdrops of earlier years.
Beaton photographed Prince Charles on 13 December 1948, two days before the Prince's christening. He commissioned a new backdrop for the occasion, which his assistants installed in the gold and ivory-coloured Music Room at Buckingham Palace. Beaton used a large 8 x 10 inch and smaller Rolleiflex cameras. He recalled that, 'his mother sat by the cot and, holding his hand, watched his movements with curiosity, pride and amusement'.
The 1968 sitting
Queen Elizabeth II by Cecil Beaton, Gelatin silver print, Buckingham Palace, 1968. Museum no. PH.318-1987, © Victoria and Albert Museum, London
In the summer of 1968, Beaton photographed the Queen in anticipation of his forthcoming exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery. He felt anxious before the sitting, writing in his diary: ‘The difficulties are great. Our points of view, our tastes are so different. The result is a compromise between two people and the fates play a large part.’Beaton selected plain white and blue backgrounds, resolving to be ‘stark and clear and bold’. The portraits were a triumph. They were the last photographs Beaton made of Elizabeth II, although he continued to photograph other members of the family until 1979.
Several photographers shared with Beaton the honour of being invited to photograph Elizabeth II, yet few had such an enduring relationship with the monarchy over such a long and transformative period.
The photograph of the Queen wearing the Admiral's Boat Cloak against a blue backdrop was powerful in its simplicity. it was one of the highlights of over 500 photographs by Beaton exhibited at the National Portrait Gallery in 1968. Beaton eliminated the magnificent regalia and sparkling gowns seen in other portraits to produce a contemplative and timeless image of the monarch.
Video: Queen Elizabeth II by Cecil Beaton
This film features interviews with curator Susanna Brown, Robin Muir of Vogue and a very special discussion with two of Beaton’s Coronation Day assistants, John Drysdale and Ray Harwood – together again for the first time in 60 years.
View transcript of video
Susanna Brown: The British royal family, from the very earliest years of photography, understood the important role that this young medium could play in sending their image throughout the world, throughout the Empire, as it was then. Victoria and Albert were definitely great patrons of photography and I think from those very earliest years, the royal family has continued to work with photographers to produce their image for the public. Certainly, Beaton’s pictures were very much intended to be seen by the public. The primary purpose of Beaton’s photographs was to be reproduced in the press, not only the British press, but also across the commonwealth and around the world. Robin Muir: Cecil Beaton had a very long and distinguished career with Vogue. By the 1950s he was one of the great fashion photographers that Vogue has, probably its greatest fashion photographer at that time and really he does call the shots. So a lot of the day-to-day fashion photography is done by what one might call the ‘minor stars’, leaving Beaton free for these rather wonderful special assignments. If you had to think of who the greatest living British photographer at that time was, you know Cecil Beaton would be there. He has all the right attributes – he’s already on very good terms with the royal family since 1939 and his first photographs, he has a huge range of social connections, he is tremendously confident. In short, he’s the kind of man that you would expect to do such a big occasion as the coronation. I’d be hard pressed to think of anybody else that would do it so well, so readily and so effectively. Susanna Brown: The archive of Beaton’s royal photographs was acquired in 1987. The whole archive was bequeathed to the museum by Cecil Beaton’s secretary, Eileen Hove. In total, there are about 18,000 objects in the Beaton collection – it is huge – but that includes not only the photographs, but also negatives, transparencies and 45 huge volumes of Beaton’s press cuttings which he kept from his teenage years throughout his life, right up until his death in 1980. We are really pleased to be including in the exhibition some of Beaton’s contact sheets which haven’t been exhibited before. They really show the subtle movements within each pose – often he’s giving very particular directions to the Queen or the other royal sitters. The contact sheets reveal his directions and they’re really fantastic objects in themselves to show. For us they also serve as a record of the un re-touched records. The final images, which visitors will see in the exhibition, Have all been very heavily retouched and this is a really important stage in the process of the creation of a royal portrait. Often Beaton would advise his re-touchers to slim the waistlines of the sitters or perhaps remove a double chin. These details were very important in constructing and idealised image. These aren’t documentary shots, they’re a much more romantic style of portraiture in which no hair is out of place and every detail is perfect. Beaton never worked alone at his royal portrait sittings. They were very elaborate events that required a crew of people to assist. For us, as historians researching Beaton’s work, it has been really useful to be able to interview some of the assistants who are still alive. In particular John Drysdale and Ray Harwood, who both worked with Beaton on the day of the coronation sitting at Buckingham Palace. Both Ray and John were assistants at Vogue studios, so they worked with a number of different photographers there, primarily on fashion and portrait sittings. Ray Harwood: Beaton was Beaton and he was very much in control. At the coronation he desperately needed us because there was a lot of work to be done and the preparation for it took two days. On the third day the Queen came in and sat down into a prepared set. We had to do a dummy run with the lighting and know – you didn’t stand there and wait for the Queen to pose and then read the lighting. By God, no chance! John Drysdale: I think we’d exposed film that had previously been developed to make sure we got the right exposure. Beaton came in and after a very short time they started processing through all these people. We were taking pictures as fast as you could take them, piling the slides up and getting them out of the way, then the next lot in … Ray Horwood: Remember that we’d done it before. John had been on several royal shoots and so had I, so it wasn’t a question of being awed by the fact that the Queen was in the same room as you, you were very aware of the fact … John Drysdale: We had been to Buckiingham Palace before. We hardly had time to look at her. She was there, we put the film in, exposed it, as many as we could get and then the time came that she moved off and the next one moved in. Ray Horwood: It was fine, it worked out very well. You’ve got to realise that John and I haven’t met for 60 years, would you say? 60 years ago we worked together on the coronation. He went his way and I went mine and we haven’t met until this afternoon, isn’t that something?
Video: Cecil Beaton's Visitors' Book
Cecil Beaton’s visitors’ book is a who’s who of the 20th century, and contained the signatures of Greta Garbo, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Dali and the Queen Mother, among many others.
Beaton’s family have kindly allowed us to take a look inside the book, and view the signatures and sketches of visiting luminaries from the 1930s up to the late 1970s.
View transcript of video
One of the most fascinating objects that we’re showing in the V&A exhibition is Cecil Beaton’s own visitors book which he began to use in 1930 when he moved to Ashcombe House in Wiltshire. The book spans the 30s, the 40s, all the way up to 1979 to Beaton’s home in the village of Broad Chalke. In the book we find the names not only of Beaton’s family and closest friends, but also of great stars of the century. People such as the Sitwell siblings, Greta Garbo the great screen actress, Beaton’s friend, Diana Vreeland, the editor of Vogue and also great poets, for example, one of the best loved poet laureates of the 20th century, Sir John Betjeman. Many of Beaton’s visitors were his fellow artists and photographers. The visitors book doesn’t just include the signatures of Beaton’s famous friends and family, it also includes beautiful drawings and illustrations and handwritten messages. This is a beautiful drawing by the artist Francis Rose of the house. Some of the most famous artists that visited him at Reddish were Salvador Dalí who produced this sketch. On the top of this page is the signature of the choreographer Frederick Ashton, founding choreographer of the Royal Ballet in London. Certainly the most famous visitor to Beaton’s house Reddish in the village of Broad Chalke was Queen Elizabeth. At the time of her visit she was Elizabeth the Queen Mother and her signature is seen here with the date November 19th 1955. This extraordinary book really serves as a ‘who’s who’ of the mid-20th century and it’s a fantastic record of Beaton’s huge circle of friends and colleagues throughout his long career.
Queen Elizabeth II by Cecil Beaton: A Diamond Jubilee Celebration was kindly sponsored by Garrard. |
Here’s the thing about Mitt Romney: He’s a Republican candidate for president in the unenviable bind of not being able to run on any sort of record at all. He’s tried to run on his record as a businessman, but that’s been no good. The Democrats have done a pretty effective job painting him as a robber baron lighting cigars with the pensions of little old ladies, whose companies Bain & Company just liquidated for the LOLs. He can’t run on his record as a governor, because then the GOP base has its face rubbed in the fact that Romney gave socialized medicine to gay people who could get married, and that just won’t do. He can’t go out there and articulate his economic plan, bolted on as it is by the good graces of his Vice Presidential candidate Paul Ryan, because Ryan’s economic plan is frankly insane, the sort of plan you make when you apparently think that the oliganarchy of the Russian 1990s is something to aim for, not run away from.
Constrained as he is, he’s got nothing he can actually use to make a case for himself but himself — Mitt Romney, with that genial smile that doesn’t quite reach his eyes, that head of hair strategically left to gray at the temples, and that paternal aura of competence that says, hey, trust me, put me in the job and we’ll deal with all those silly fiddly details later. And you know what? With the economy still farting about and Obama still being as cuddly as a prickly pear, and Romney having a bunch of SuperPACs willing to shovel money until there’s not a swing state that’s not carpetbombed with ads, this had a reasonably good chance of working. But ultimately it only works if you actually trust Romney — or alternately, have no reason to distrust Romney — to make sane, responsible and intelligent decisions.
Which is why Romney blew up his chance to be president this week: He showed, manifestly, that he’s indeed capable of making horrible, awful, very bad, no good, terrible choices. First, by deciding that a foreign crisis, generally considered to be off-limits for bald, obvious politicking, would be an excellent time to engage in some bald, obvious politicking. Second, by making a statement slamming the president while the crisis was still in the process of developing and getting worse. Third, by blaming the president for an action he had no hand in (the press release from the under siege embassy) and which his administration had disavowed. Fourth, when after the facts of the events became clear, and it became clear that Romney’s statement had some serious factual holes in it, for doubling down at a press conference on assertions everyone knew by that time weren’t correct.
How appalling was Romney’s decision-making process in attacking Obama on the embassy attacks? So appalling that it took three whole days for the GOP to find a way to get its messaging to support Romney’s position (sort of). And in the meantime, everyone in the world was treated to diplomats, politicians and commentators on both sides of the aisle saying the somewhat more articulate equivalent of “What is this I don’t even” to Romney’s antics.
Was there a legitimate criticism to be made of the administration’s handling of the embassy attacks? Sure, although it would have been smarter not to release it on September 11. Did Romney make it? No. When presented with a fine opportunity to recraft and restate his criticism, did Romney take advantage of it? Quite the opposite, in fact. Has Romney’s refusal to walk back his initial screw-up compromised legitimate criticism about how the embassy attacks have been handled? Oh, my, yes. It’s amazing, actually. It’s as if at every turn in the crisis Romney had an opportunity to do something that wouldn’t make him look like a cat with a bag on its head navigating through a room full of bar stool legs, and chose instead the opposing course. It’s impressive in its way, but it’s a not a good way to be impressive.
What Romney has done here is in fact similar to something his predecessor John McCain did in 2008: Seize a moment in a crisis to take a bold step, without checking to see if one is in fact stepping into the abyss. McCain’s moment came when the economy started collapsing in on itself, and McCain decided to suspend his campaign, postpone the debates and generally attempt to make it look like he was already president already. This didn’t go over particularly well, as you may recall. It certainly puzzled me. For me it signaled the point at which Obama began pulling away with the election, because it made McCain look panicky and befuddled rather than decisive and in charge. As I wrote at the time:
I wish that this sudden, overwhelming concern wasn’t such a transparent attempt to continue to McCain presidential strategy of attempting to win the White House without being required to articulate coherently to the public or the press why he’s presidential material. McCain has missed more Senate votes this year than any senator not recovering from a massive stroke, so an active presence in the Senate is not something he’s put much of a premium on since beginning his campaign. He isn’t rushing to Washington to help, he’s running away from everything else. He is the Sir Robin of 2008 presidential election.
Fast-forward to 2012. Here is another crisis, of a different sort. Here’s another candidate, attempting to look bold and decisive, ending up looking like he has no idea what he’s doing and in the process stripping away the one item he has to base his campaign on: The illusion that he can be trusted to do the right thing. Here’s another place where there’s an excellent chance we’ll one day look back and say: This is where the GOP lost the presidency this time around.
Romney went Full McCain on this one. We see how well it worked for McCain. I suspect it’ll work just as well for Romney. |
The lawyer who represented the 'DC Madam' has released the names of 174 groups whose employees allegedly called her escort service.
Montgomery Blair Sibley listed the entities that include government agencies, embassies and huge companies that he says phoned Deborah Jeane Palfrey for call girls between 2000 and 2006.
Among those named were the FBI, IRS, the State Department, the Department of Commerce, the Embassy of Japan, Lockheed Martin and PriceWaterhouseCoopers.
In an email to Daily Mail Online, Sibley said he obtained the information from cell phone numbers dug up in a subpoena conducted by Verizon.
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Montgomery Blair Sibley (left), the lawyer who represented the 'DC Madam' Deborah Jeane Palfrey (right) has released the names of 174 groups whose employees allegedly used her escort service between 2000 and 2006. They are pictured following a court hearing in 2007 while she faced prostitution charges
They are said to be included in a black book of clients that Palfrey left in Sibley's possession before she killed herself in 2008, before she could be sentenced for prostitution and racketeering.
Despite naming the organizations, Sibley is still barred from naming any of the supposed 815 clients who are said to have hired escorts.
Sibley represented Deborah Jeane Palfrey in 2008 when she was convicted of federal racketeering and various prostitution charges.
The scandal of her arrest rocked the nation's capital as some of the city's biggest power players, including father-of-four Senator David Vitter, were outed.
Palfrey hanged herself in 2008 before she was set to be sentenced for her crimes and left the book containing details of her clients behind.
The information inside the book was sealed by a judge, but Sibley has continued to battle with the authorities to try and get the names released.
He has been trying to side-step a retraining order that means he must keep the names under wraps.
On Monday he filed another motion, which included the names of 174 organizations in Exhibit B.
He said in the email: 'Back in February I had filed a lawsuit against Former Judge Roberts and the Clerk of the District Court in D.C. Superior Court -- the "state" court for the District of Columbia. Last week, the U.S. Attorney in her infinite wisdom removed that case to U.S. District Court which left me one last federal judicial opening.
'So today I jumped through that opening and filed with U.S. District Court Judge Walton both my First Amended Complaint and "Emergency Motion for Pre-trial Conference to Schedule Expedited Disposition of Sibley’s Third Claim".
'Exhibit "B" to that Emergency Motion lists the names of some 174 companies and government agencies whose cellphone numbers appear in the Verizon Wireless subpoena return that I have in my possession.
'And no, I am not releasing any individual names . . . yet.'
The attorney has hit headlines in the past. He filed a failed lawsuit claiming Barack Obama isn't a natural-born citizen and also ran for president in 2012 as a write-in candidate
News of Palfrey's death in 2008 followed reports she handed a list of telephone numbers of 15,000 clients to a U.S. television network
She had vowed to identify as many well-known figures as possible to subpoena them as defense witnesses.
Palfrey had insisted her company, Pamela Martin and Associates, was a legal enterprise that provided 'high-end' clients with nude dancing and massage, but not sex and initially considered selling her phone records in order to raise money for her defense.
When she later released her phone records for free, they ended up shedding little further light on her clientele.
Palfrey hanged herself in 2008 before she was set to be sentenced for her crimes and left the book containing details of her 815 clients behind. Even though their names have not been revealed, the list of entities whos members used the services includes the FBI, IRS, the State Department and the Department of Commerce
In what could be the biggest sex scandal in the U.S. capital for more than a decade, Ms Palfrey caused the resignation of married 65-year-old Randall Tobias, a deputy to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
The list also thrust another official, Pentagon adviser Harlan Ullman, into the heart of the scandal.
However Senator David Vitter was one of the biggest victims. He admitted to being on Palfrey's 'list' and was forced into a grovelling apology.
He suffered months of attack ads and recently addressed the scandal in a campaign video.
The 30-second commercial released in November shows Vitter sitting at a kitchen table as he talks to the camera, saying: 'Fifteen years ago, I failed my family but found forgiveness and love.'
'I learned that our falls aren't what define us but rather how we get up, accept responsibility and earn redemption,' Vitter says, as the ad next shows him eating dinner with his family.
However, Vitter never directly refers to his involvement in a prostitution ring in Washington D.C., which was discovered in 2007 - seven years after he began using the service, according to his own words. |
Getty Images
Every once in a while, a reminder emerges that, in the NFL, a deal isn’t done until the deal is done. Sometimes, however, a deal that isn’t done becomes undone in a way that pisses people off.
Ian Rapoport of NFL Media explains that the intention of receiver Emmanuel Sanders to sign a contract with the Broncos on Sunday occurred after his agent, Steve Weinberg, accepted a deal in principle with the Chiefs. Weinberg is specifically accused of “shopping the Chiefs offer” to the Buccaneers, without explaining that he’d told the Chiefs the terms had been accepted. Thereafter, Weinberg agreed to terms with the Broncos.
Per Rapoport, the 49ers also are upset because Weinberg agreed to send Sanders to San Francisco for a visit before “blowing it off.” (That’s hardly uncommon, though.)
“When a man gives you his words and pulls out then gives another team your word and pulls out, then gives another team his word. . . . Not proper,” an unnamed executive told NFL Media.
That quote creates the impression Weinberg agreed to terms with two other teams before agreeing to terms with the Broncos. It’s unclear, however, whether an agreement in principle was reached with the Buccaneers.
“This was one of the worst situations in modern football negotiations,” an unnamed executive from an unnamed team involved in the situation told NFL Media. “Totally wrong. This needs to be stopped.”
(Actually, it’s probably much worse for a team to agree to terms with a player, to tell him that he passed his physical, and then to decide that he failed his physical.)
There’s an easy way to stop it. Teams who get burned by agents who engage in allegedly unscrupulous practices should simply refuse to do business with those agents. While Weinberg and Sanders had every right to renege on agreements that were not legally binding — and they’re not legally binding until the paperwork is signed (which perhaps should make the Broncos a little nervous) — there’s an unwritten code in every industry that allows business to be transacted efficiently and reliably.
Those who violate that code have a harder time transacting business in the future. But instead of merely deciding quietly to put Weinberg on an internal list of agents who can’t be trusted (it’s likely not a short list), someone has opted to smear Weinberg broadly by complaining publicly (but anonymously, of course) about Weinberg and apparently by pointing out to NFL Media the details of Weinberg’s decertification by the NFLPA that occurred more than a decade ago, for reasons unrelated to negotiation tactics or practices.
So the obvious goal of the Chiefs or whoever has complained via off-the-record quotes about Weinberg is to make it harder for him to do business in the future with the Chiefs or any other teams.
Of course, it’s safe to say that the Broncos currently have no problems with Weinberg. Unless, of course, Sanders doesn’t sign his contract. |
An entirely pro-Europe BBC panel will have free rein to discuss the EU referendum just eight weeks before voters across the UK go to the polls, despite impartiality guidelines that require balanced coverage.
BBC Scotland is due to host two leaders debates ahead of May's Scottish election, including one on 1 May in which all five panellists will be campaigning for the UK to stay within the EU. The only Scottish party leader backing a Leave vote, UKIP's David Coburn, has not been invited.
The debate falls within the official 10-week campaign period for June's referendum on EU membership – which begins on 14 April and runs all the way through to voting day on 23 June – during which time the BBC is required to produce impartial coverage between the Leave and Remain sides of the argument.
The BBC Trust's guidelines for the Holyrood election state: "If the election period overlaps with the referendum period on EU membership, content producers must also take account of the referendum guidelines and ensure due impartiality is achieved with regard to both votes."
However, BBC Scotland has confirmed that the five pro-EU leaders in Scotland – SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon, the Conservatives' Ruth Davidson, Labour's Kezia Dugdale, Lib Dem Willie Rennie, and Green co-convener Patrick Harvie – will be free to discuss Europe when they meet on 1 May. |
Coming Soon
Huck
Huck uses his special gifts to do good deeds, but when his secret is revealed, he winds up on a life-changing adventure. Based on Mark Millar's comics.
Green Eggs and Ham
Opposites Guy and Sam take a road trip to save an endangered animal, learning to try new things like hope, friendship, and a certain delectable dish.
Tiffany Haddish Stand Up Special
Tiffany Haddish brings her brash, barrier-breaking brand of comedy to Netflix with an exclusive one-hour stand-up special.
Wine Country
When a group of longtime girlfriends goes to Napa for the weekend to celebrate their friend's 50th birthday, tensions from the past boil over.
The Ghost Bride
In 1890s Malacca, a young woman finds herself in the afterlife and becomes mired in a murder mystery connected to the deceased son of a wealthy family.
Love Alarm
A software developer creates an app that alerts users if anyone nearby harbors romantic feelings for them. Adapted from the popular web cartoon.
The Stranded
When a tsunami strands dozens of teens on an island at their private school, they soon realize no rescuers are coming and they must save themselves.
The Perfect Date
No beau? No problem! To earn money for college, a high schooler creates a dating app that lets him act as a stand-in boyfriend. Noah Centineo stars. |
IKEA’s wireless charging furniture coming to the US in Spring
Everybody loves devices, but nobody loves cords. That seems to be the growing sentiment lately. The growing number of mobile devices at home means there might also be a jungle of wires and cables, all competing for the wall socket. And sometimes they might even compete with home appliances. In an attempt to bring peace to the world, at least the world inside the home, IKEA has come out with a couple of wireless charging solutions that bring both utility and beauty to your house. And the good news is that they’re finally arriving in the US too.
There are actually three tiers of IKEA’s wireless charging products. The first tier is all about actual furniture or appliances that have built in wireless charging components. These include nightstands like the SELJE and the NORDLI, or lamps like the VARV and the RIGGAD. Since these are actual finished products, they can range from $60 to $120 a piece.
For those without specific furniture in mind, IKEA also offers NORDMÄRKE, wireless charging pads with single or triple active areas. Unlike other wireless charging stations, these pads bear the trademark IKEA aesthetic and wouldn’t be ashamed to sit beside your more sophisticated furniture. The pads also have USB ports for charging other devices simultaneously. They are also cheaper, at $28 for the single pad and $65 for the triple one.
Lastly, IKEA offers a sort of DIY option for those who have ideas of their own. The cylindrical JYSSEN can fit snuggly inside the cord management hole of IKEA’s own desks. But fear not if you have none of those, as IKEA also sells a hole saw to let you drill the right hole in any furniture or surface you wish. The JYSSEN itself costs $30 while the saw is a measly $5 for a 5-piece set.
IKEA’s portfolio of wireless charging furniture and accessories will be arriving in the US late Spring this year.
SOURCE: IKEA |
‘Labour is not only a party of protest, It is a party of government’. John McDonnell wasn’t being sentimental when he said that during his State of the Economy speech – he was pointing out that this is a reality.
Nationally, Labour have been out of power for over six years but locally it’s a different picture. In cities and regions, in towns, counties and in districts, Labour is in government and for the first time ever, Labour are in control of all cities and regions in the country. Collectively, Labour mayors and councillors have been voted in by and to represent millions of people living and working in Britain.
Labour-run councils are building more affordable homes for our residents at a time when Government housebuilding has reached its lowest level since the war. We are providing thousands of fairly paid jobs, when official figures show that more people are receiving in-work tax credits to top up their pay than ever before.
Labour councils are shaping the future for thousands of children by forcing the Tories to U-turn over their ill thought out plans to force local schools to become academies, against the wishes of teachers and parents. We are holding the Government to account for their reckless policy agenda time and time again.
We’re proud of the work we do, but Labour in local government want to go even further, we want to build more council houses, keep calling for fairer funding and provide our communities with even more services.
Jeremy Corbyn was right when he talked about the importance of local public ownership. His own Labour-run local authority provides cheaper heating to hundreds of homes in the borough having built their own renewable power station that uses recycled heat from tube lines. This sounds like an idea from Dragon’s Den, yet it has come from our locally elected community voices, who now act as the real innovators for Labour.
This is happening up and down the country. It is more remarkable when you consider the fact that our councillors are in the front line against austerity, standing up for communities being damaged by the compound effects of public sector cuts and welfare reform.
DCLG has had the biggest cut of any Government department – and has passed it on directly to councils. Councils have been seriously disadvantaged by a Government which has abandoned any pretence of fairness in the way it distributes Revenue Support Grant and much of the Government’s policy agenda – the Housing and Planning Bill, forced academisation, the localisation of business rates- seem designed to punish areas where Labour is strongest.
We’ve fought the Government over this and much more, but we’ve also had a job to do – protect our residents from the worst of these cuts, whilst simultaneously delivering sustainable services.
Jeremy Corbyn recognised this when, at the launch of the local election campaign in Harlow in April, he stressed that Labour local government is a defence against the worst effects of austerity – praising Labour councils for the work that we are doing to protect the most vulnerable.
A Labour government needs to recognise how vital effective local governance is, if we are to achieve a radical and lasting reform. So it is welcome news from John McDonnell that a Labour government would give councils more powers to do more for their cities, towns and communities. He has talked about a National Investment Bank, which could supply the investment needed for big infrastructure projects, such as high speed rail, that will connect our cities and help us bring in economic growth and opportunity to our areas.
This idea will also help local and regional institutions provide financing for our small businesses, who are still finding it hard to get money from the big banks; bringing huge benefit to thousands of small business owners, their employees and their local economy. It will see local councils generate income that they can re-invest in local projects and services and it is a practical way to achieve the “radical decentralisation of economic power and authority back to working people and local communities”.
Perhaps most importantly, Labour has to acknowledge people’s desire to own a place of their own. But people can’t do this when they are being crippled by sky high rents and booming house prices.
That’s why giving local authorities the powers to impose rent regulation to secure fair rents where these are needed is something Labour has committed itself to once more, as well as further powers to allow councils to free up land and build more genuinely affordable houses – funded from savings in the Housing Benefit Bill.
Labour in local government support all of these calls and will continue to work with our front bench to ensure there is a clear Labour vision, delivered for what we want to achieve in each of these areas.
Real transformation begins at a local level. By the time of the next election, we will have been out of power nationally for a decade – so much of our experience in governing must be learned from the work of Labour councils – and there is much still to be done.
Nick Forbes is leader of Newcastle City Council and head of the Labour group on the LGA. |
Jonathan Coachman and Will Cain debate if LeBron James was the correct choice to win AP Male Athlete of the Year honors. (2:11)
CLEVELAND -- LeBron James was jolted forward when the massive crowd swelled from the sidewalks and into Cleveland's streets, surrounding the convertible that he and his family were riding in. This wasn't supposed to happen.
James looked at his wife, Savannah, their baby daughter and two sons and feared for their safety.
2016 Male Athlete of the Year Voting Athlete Points LeBron James 24 Michael Phelps 16 Usain Bolt 9 Kris Bryant 3 Stephen Curry 3 Cristiano Ronaldo 1 Von Miller 1 Andy Murray 1 Matt Centrowitz 1 -- The Associated Press
"We were kind of afraid for a second," James said.
Then relieved.
Scanning the crowd, James spotted people dangling from lamp posts and traffic lights, even a few straddling window ledges to get a glimpse of the champion Cavaliers, who were being honored with a once-in-a-generation downtown parade after their comeback in the NBA Finals. James was awe-struck, and any concerns quickly melted away when he looked at the spectators' faces and saw only smiles, laughter and tears of joy.
"Everybody was just rejoicing in grace and happiness," James said, fondly reflecting on the picture-perfect day in June when Cleveland was transformed into a giant block party. "It was more than I could have ever imagined. It was unforgettable, unbelievable."
And he had made it possible.
James, who ended 52 years of sports heartache by bringing Cleveland a championship and used his superstar platform to address social causes, was chosen as The Associated Press 2016 Male Athlete of the Year, an award he won previously in 2013.
Results of the vote by 59 editors from AP member newspapers and customers were announced Tuesday.
LeBron James brought Cleveland a long-awaited championship. Ronald Martinez/Getty Images
James collected 24 first-place votes, beating out a pair of Olympic legends: Michael Phelps (16) and Usain Bolt (9), the fastest men in water and on land, respectively, who are not accustomed to finishing behind anyone.
Chicago Cubs third baseman Kris Bryant, the National League MVP who led his team to its first World Series title since 1908, tied for fourth with Golden State star guard Stephen Curry, last year's winner. Cristiano Ronaldo, Von Miller and Andy Murray also received votes.
James joined Michael Jordan as the only NBA players to win twice. Jordan won it three straight years from 1991 to 1994.
U.S. Olympic gymnast Simone Biles was named AP's top female athlete Monday.
A rabid sports fan, James was flattered to be in the same class with Phelps, the 23-time gold medalist who added five more to his record collection at the Rio Olympics.
"To be that dominant in your respective sport, to see what he's been able to do over the years, what he does in that water, man, it's tremendous and very inspiring," James said. "When you have that type of tenure to be able to dominate, when you know that the entire competition is gearing up to beat you -- and only you -- and you're still able to come away No. 1 or always be at the top of the food chain, that's very inspiring."
That James received the honor in an Olympic year underscores the weight of his accomplishments.
His third NBA crown was for Cleveland, delivering on a promise James made to a city that hadn't celebrated a major championship since 1964 and had endured many torturous sports moments since.
James, whose game shows no signs of aging as he approaches his 32nd birthday in a few days, came up short in 2015, leading an injury-depleted Cleveland team to the finals where they lost to the Warriors. And although James posted the best statistical series of any player in history, his critics were quick to point out his 2-4 record in the finals compared to Jordan's 6-0.
The Cavs got a rematch with the record-setting, 73-win Warriors. Led by Curry, the league's unanimous MVP choice, Golden State was being talked about as potentially the best team ever, an argument that gained steam when it took a 3-1 lead.
James, though, wasn't going to be denied again. He scored 41 points in Games 5 and 6 and posted a triple-double in an epic Game 7 that will be remembered for his chase-down block of Andre Iguodala in the closing minutes -- a defensive gem that stands as the signature play of his magnificent career.
After the final horn, James collapsed on the floor and when asked moments later about his emotions, the Ohio native who proudly says he's "just a kid from Akron," screamed at the TV camera: "Cleveland, this for you!"
"At that moment," James said, "I felt fulfilled. To know the history of our sports here and how heartbreaking at times it was for all those years that our fans had to go through, and the circumstances that we came back from, it was so fulfilling."
James' journey to his greatest triumph coincided with the passing of another great -- the greatest of all -- as Muhammad Ali died on June 4. During the playoffs, James watched tapes of Ali's fights for motivation. It was in the spirit of the boxing legend and global ambassador that James stood on stage with close friends Dwyane Wade, Chris Paul and Carmelo Anthony at the ESPYS in July to decry violence against unarmed black men and encourage fellow athletes to do more to support local police and improve communities.
James later donated $2.5 million for a Smithsonian exhibit honoring Ali, and he's producing a documentary on the champ.
"He's definitely a person I'm inspired to be like, to have a social conscience about things," James said. "What I always saw in Ali was that he was always educated about everything he was speaking about. He was never just talking to be talking. There was a method to the madness.
"Ali definitely showed me the way." |
Australia can increase its exports of food and minerals to the world without destroying its natural resource base, new CSIRO research has found.
So you still get the energy you want without the emissions, you still get the food you want without land clearing and you still get the water you want without water stress.
Steve Hatfield-Dodds, CSIRO
Modelling by CSIRO shows it is possible for the country to grow its economy while protecting its environment, including limiting greenhouse emissions to stop global warming beyond 2 degrees, researchers said.
In particular, they found Australia could reduce its per capita emissions to below the global average by 2050, down from five times the average in 1990, while maintaining strong economic growth.
"You can certainly have a lot of cake and eat it too," lead researcher Dr Steve Hatfield-Dodds of CSIRO said.
"We certainly don't have to reject economic growth and we don't have to reject, in a sense, consumerism."
The findings are published today in the journal Nature and in a report released on CSIRO's website.
Dr Hatfield-Dodds said the report has developed the most comprehensive model to date of the impact of our energy, water and food needs on the environment.
Australia could service world demand for basics
The researchers explored over 20 potential scenarios for Australia's future by modelling the effects of different policy and technology choices.
The model includes the agricultural, mining and energy production sectors of the economy — which account for three quarters of resource use and about one quarter of jobs in Australia.
The great misunderstanding about economic growth is that the assumption that it must automatically lead to environmental degradation Peter Cosier, Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists
Three of these scenarios resulted in an increase in Australian incomes and living standards, even while greenhouse gas emissions fell, native habitat increased and water stress on systems like the Murray-Darling Basin stabilised or decreased.
These "win-win" scenarios see Australia servicing the world's growing demand for food, minerals and energy, Dr Hatfield-Dodds said.
"You've got a growing population globally and it's getting wealthier," he said.
"Those people still want stuff and Australia is still good at producing stuff."
But the researchers said there would need to be a switch from coal to renewable energy, including biofuels and carbon sequestration.
While the three scenarios assume the viability of geosequestration, Dr Hatfield-Dodds said previous research had shown the same "decarbonisation" of the economy could occur using other approaches.
Blueprint for a green economy: policy choices are key
These CSIRO blueprints for a green economy see increasing agricultural productivity boosting the amount of food produced and increased payments to farmers to plant trees on less productive lands, which would both sequester carbon and restore native habitat and biodiversity.
The green economy would require an increase in water recycling, desalination, and careful controls on extraction of water from river basins, to meet the expected doubling in water demand by 2050, the researchers said.
We're actually smart enough to live with nature, with good jobs and comfortable houses if we choose to. But we need a plan.
Jonathan La Nauze, Australian Conservation Foundation
The common concept underlying these measures was "decoupling" or breaking the links between economic growth and environmental pressure, Dr Hatfield-Dodds said.
"So you still get the energy you want without the emissions, you still get the food you want without land clearing, and you still get the water you want without water stress," he said.
The CSIRO model looked at the effect of "individual" and "collective" action on the future to see which had the biggest impact.
They found that while individual action — such as choosing energy efficient devices — was important in shaping the future, it was actually the government policy that made the most difference because it affected the choices available to individuals.
Findings welcomed by scientific and environment groups
Mr Peter Cosier from the Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists said the research was "a very important piece of work".
"The great misunderstanding about economic growth is that the assumption that it must automatically lead to environmental degradation," he said.
"It's not how much of a resource you use, it's the way you use that resource.
"We've created an economic system that is extraordinarily successful at promoting economic growth, but it hasn't integrated into that success the conservation of the natural capital that underpins all that growth."
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Mr Cosier said the CSIRO research showed it was feasible to make policy choices to change this.
Mr Jonathan La Nauze, campaign director for the Australian Conservation Foundation, also welcomed the report, saying it showed it was possible to reverse damage to water, wildlife and soils.
"We're actually smart enough to live with nature, with good jobs and comfortable houses if we choose to. But we need a plan," he said.
"It's about choosing scenarios that don't trade off one important element of our environment against another."
Mr La Nauze agreed with the findings that government policy helped shape individual decisions on such things as whether to use the car or train to get the work, and whether to use renewables rather than coal for home energy.
"The choices made by our political leaders shape the choices available to everyday Australians," he said. |
Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) said today that Americans need to stand up to "a deliberate plan by the president of the United States" to collapse the nation's law enforcement system regarding illegal immigration.
In a Senate speech, Sessions said:
"Our law enforcement system is in a state of collapse, and it's a deliberate plan by the president of the United States, and it's wrong. And, people need to be aware of it and need to stand up to it and I believe the American people are beginning to do so."
Sen. Sessions rebuked U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and Vice President Joe Biden for their pro-amnesty efforts:
"So, you come into the country illegally and the attorney general of the United States declares that these individuals have a civil right to amnesty. How can this possibly be: the chief law enforcement officer in America?
"Vice President Biden recently said, quote: 'You know, 11million people live in the shadows; I believe they're already American citizens.' Eleven million undocumented aliens are already Americans? Goodness. The vice president of the United States would make such a statement. It's stunning beyond belief." |
On Hardball Monday, MSNBC contributor Michelle Bernard said the U.S. is on the verge of experiencing a “genocide” of young black men.
Bernard was on the program with the Washington Post’s Eugene Robinson to discuss the ongoing unrest in Ferguson, Mo., following the police shooting of 18-year-old Michael Brown. Bernard, who is black, said her 11-year-old son had asked her recently if someone was going to shoot him, as was the case with Brown.
“I don’t have an answer that is palatable to be able to look my children in the face and say there are people in this country who– not only do not like African-Americans, but they despise black men,” Bernard said. “There is a war on black boys in this country. In my opinion, there is a war on African-American men.”
Host Chris Matthews wrapped up the segment, saying he wished that other Americans would listen to Bernard and Robinson, who had said both racial and economic elements are at play in the Ferguson turmoil.
“I hope so,” Bernard said, “because this is, it’s going to turn into a genocide if it doesn’t stop.”
[h/t NewsBusters]
[Image via MSNBC/screen grab]
— —
>> Follow Eddie Scarry (@eScarry) on Twitter
Have a tip we should know? tips@mediaite.com |
California, Maine, Massachusetts and Nevada recently passed laws legalizing the recreational use of marijuana. Arkansas, Florida and North Dakota enacted medical marijuana initiatives, bringing the total of states (and the District of Columbia) that allow some form of marijuana use to 33.
What does this trend mean for entrepreneurs thinking of entering the cannabis industry?
National prohibitions against interstate cannabis commerce and federal banking and drug laws are keeping big companies at bay, which opens the door for small businesses and startups to establish dispensaries, retail stores, cultivators, processing, manufacturing and testing facilities.
Marijuana Business Laws By State
To prosper, entrepreneurs must know the laws that govern their state’s use of the substance. To be safe, they should also confer with an attorney to ensure they are in compliance with the law.
Here is a state-by-state breakdown showing which states have passed laws governing some form of marijuana use and, where applicable, what businesses are allowed to do regarding its growth, production and sale.
States that Allow Medical Marijuana Use
Alaska
Alaska was one of the earliest states to pass a ballot initiative allowing medical use of marijuana. Voters approved Measure 8 in 1998. The law went into effect the following year.
Its passage removed criminal penalties for the use, possession and cultivation of marijuana by patients who possess written documentation from their physician advising that they “might benefit from the medical use of marijuana.”
Alaska’s online application for a marijuana business license became available on February 24, 2016. On January 22, 2016, the State adopted final cannabis industry regulations, which began enforcement on February 21, 2016.
Arizona
Arizona passed Proposition 203 in 2010 by the slim margin of 50.13 percent of voters. It allows registered qualifying patients to obtain marijuana from a registered nonprofit dispensary and to possess and use medical marijuana to treat the condition.
Patients must have a physician’s written certification that they have been diagnosed with a debilitating condition and that they would likely receive benefit from marijuana.
The Arizona Department of Health Services recently awarded 31 new medical cannabis licenses for dispensaries. Currently, there are 94 operating in the state, along with another five that have received licenses but are not yet up and running, bringing the total of licensed dispensaries to 130.
Arkansas
Arkansas enacted a measure, Issue 6, on November 8, 2016, that allows seriously ill patients to use and obtain medical marijuana with their doctors’ approval.
The amendment will establish between four and eight cultivation facility licenses and up to 40 dispensaries, all of which it will regulate under the auspices of the Alcoholic Beverage Control Division. The law prohibits cultivation.
As of now, the state has 120 days to adopt rules concerning the licensing and regulation of dispensaries and cultivation facilities and will begin accepting applications on June 1, 2017.
California
On November 5, 1996, California became the first state in the United States to legalize medical marijuana when the voters passed Proposition 215 by 56 percent.
Governor Jerry Brown signed the Medical Marijuana Regulation and Safety Act (MMRSA) into law on October 9, 2015. It establishes a framework for future medical marijuana regulations and a statewide licensing program for growing, manufacturing, transportation, distribution, testing and retail dispensing of medical marijuana. State licenses are not currently available.
State licenses are not currently available.
Colorado
On November 7, 2000, Colorado voters approved Amendment 20, which amended the State Constitution to allow the use of marijuana in the state for approved patients with written medical consent. (See Colorado’s entry under recreational use to view business opportunities.)
Connecticut
In June 2012, Governor Daniel Malloy signed into law a medical marijuana program for his state, following a 21-13 vote in the Senate.
Connecticut has nine medical marijuana dispensaries. The state is not accepting new applications at this time.
Delaware
In May 2011, Governor Jack Markell signed legislation allowing patients 18 and older with “certain serious or debilitating conditions” to use cannabis, and possess up to six ounces
The state has one dispensary (called a “Compassion Center”), in Wilmington, but is not currently accepting applications for new businesses.
Florida
On November 8, 2016, Florida passed legislation allowing residents to apply to open Medical Marijuana Treatment Centers (MMTC). These entities can acquire, cultivate, process and distribute or administer marijuana and related products, such as food, aerosols and ointments.
It remains to be determined whether or not regulators will allow stand-alone, specialized businesses for retailing, cultivation, delivery services, edibles or topicals.
Hawaii
In 2000, Hawaii passed SB 862 HD1, making it the first state to legalize medical cannabis via the legislature, as opposed to a voter initiative.
The legislature amended the law in 2013 with two bills that took effect in January 2015, House Bill 668 and Senate Bill 642. HB 668 moves the medical marijuana program from the Department of Public Safety to the Department of Health and establishes a Medical Marijuana Registry special fund.
Registered medical cannabis patients and caregivers may possess up to three ounces of usable cannabis and cultivate up to seven plants (three mature, four immature).
The bills made no provision for the commercial sale of marijuana, however.
Illinois
In 2013, The Compassionate Use of Medical Cannabis Pilot Program Act (HB 1) was enacted to create a temporary statewide distribution program for qualifying patients.
HB 1 allows patients to obtain up to 2.5 ounces of cannabis every two weeks from one of the 60 dispensing organizations that will be supplied by 22 cultivation centers.
The state closed the licensing period in September 2014 for opening a medical marijuana dispensary and growing or cultivating medical marijuana legally. Cultivators are allowed to create medical marijuana/cannabis edibles and extractions and other marijuana-infused products.
Iowa
In 2014, the Iowa legislature passed SF 2360, the “Medical Cannabidiol Act,” which allows licensed neurologists to certify patients with intractable epilepsy to use cannabidiol (CBD) products with three percent or less THC content.
The law does not allow other types of physicians to write qualifying recommendations, nor does it allow for patients with any other conditions to obtain legal protections or marijuana businesses to be licensed to operate.
No plans are currently in place to license commercial dispensaries.
Louisiana
Although there is an approved legislation (SB 271) that allows 10 pharmacies to distribute medical cannabis and only one cultivation center to exist, they aren’t viable options for would-be business owners due to the severe limitations imposed by the regulations.
Maine
On November 2, 1999, Maine legalized medical marijuana when 62 percent of the population voted yes on Question 2. (See the provisions for starting a business under Maine’s listing regarding recreational use.)
Maryland
Maryland closed medical marijuana business applications on November 6, 2015, but continues to move toward licensing cultivators and dispensaries.
Senate Bill 923 and House Bill 881, signed into law by Governor Martin O’Malley on April 14, 2014, changed the medical marijuana program being implemented by the Natalie M. LaPrade Medical Marijuana Commission.
The new regulations have provisions now for how to:
Open a medical marijuana dispensary;
Start a marijuana cultivation business and grow medical marijuana legally;
Start a processing facility.
Massachusetts
In 2012, Massachusetts legalized medical marijuana when voters passed Question 3 by 60 percent. (See the state’s entry under the recreational use category to learn about business opportunities.)
Michigan
Under the new regulations (HB 4209, HB 4210, HB 4287), signed by Gov. Rick Snyder on September 20, 2016, Michigan will be open for medical marijuana businesses soon.
The regulations contain stipulations for dispensaries, cultivators, processors, testing facilities and transporters.
The state has 360 days from the effective date until prospective businesses can begin applying, which is no later than September 15, 2017.
Minnesota
On May 29, 2014, Gov. Mark Dayton signed a bipartisan medical marijuana proposal that was crafted by a House and Senate conference committee, making Minnesota the 22nd state to exempt some of the very sick and their caregivers from penalties for using marijuana with a doctor’s certification.
No provisions were made to license commercial dispensaries.
Missouri
Missouri passed HB 2238 in 2014, which creates a legal right for certain patients to obtain, possess and use “hemp extracts” in limited circumstances.
Only patients with a seizure disorder and a recommendation from a neurologist are eligible to get a “hemp registration card,” which entitles them to access and legal protections.
Qualified patients can purchase hemp extracts from two state-regulated “Cannabidiol oil care centers.”
The law also allows the Department of Agriculture to license and regulate growers of cannabis plants to produce the oil to make sure they conform to the CBD and THC stipulations.
Montana
Under the new regulations, enacted as of November 8, 2016, Montana is currently open for medical marijuana businesses.
The regulations of this measure have provisions for medical marijuana dispensaries, manufacturers, cultivators and testing facilities.
Nevada
Nevada legalized medical marijuana on November 7, 2000, when 65 percent of the populace voted yes on Question 9. (See the state’s listing under recreational use to view business opportunities.)
New Jersey
New Jersey signed the medical marijuana program into law in 2010, but implementation has been slow. Currently, it serves little more than 5,000 patients through five operational treatment centers.
The state is not actively licensing any medical marijuana businesses at this time.
New Mexico
When the state reopens it’s program to applicants, it will have provisions for medical marijuana dispensaries, cultivators, product manufacturers, delivery services and testing facilities.
Currently, the state is not issuing marijuana business licenses.
New York
On July 5, 2014, Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed a limited medical marijuana bill into law.
The bill gives the state and Department of Health 18 months to enact regulations and install a patient and business infrastructure to allow the cultivation and sale of medical marijuana to qualifying patients.
Registered organizations (RO) are companies — either for- or not-for-profit agencies — that the state will license to produce and dispense medical marijuana.
The state will permit no more than five ROs, which can operate four dispensaries each.
North Dakota
On November 8, 2016, the state legalized medical marijuana when voters passed Measure 5 by 64 percent.
The regulations of this measure have provisions for nonprofit dispensaries (also known as “Compassionate Care Centers”), which will cultivate a limited amount of medical cannabis and dispense it to enrolled patients.
Applicants will pay a $5,000 non-refundable application fee and if approved, a $25,000 licensing fee.
Ohio
Under new regulations, enacted as of September 8, 2016, Ohio is ready to welcome medical marijuana businesses.
The regulations of this measure have provisions for dispensaries, cultivation facilities, processors and testing facilities.
At present, the state has not indicated when it will open the application period to entrepreneurs.
Oregon
Oregon established the Medical Marijuana Act by Ballot Measure 67, a citizens’ initiative, in November 1998. It modified state law to allow the cultivation, possession and use of marijuana by prescription for patients with certain medical conditions.
In 2013, Oregon House Bill 3460 became law, allowing registered medical marijuana dispensaries. The legislation went into effect on March 1, 2014.
Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania enacted regulations on April 17, 2016, that include provisions for dispensaries, cultivators and product manufacturers.
The state will open applications beginning January 17, 2017. All permit applications will be accepted from February 20, 2017, until March 20, 2017.
There will be a capital requirement for each type of business. An applicant for a grower/processor permit must provide an affidavit that the applicant has at least $2 million in capital, $500,000 of which must be on deposit with one or more financial institutions.
An applicant for a dispensary permit shall provide an affidavit that the applicant has at least $150,000 on deposit with one or more financial institutions.
Rhode Island
Under emergency regulations, enacted as of October 25, 2016, Rhode Island will accept applications for medical marijuana cultivation businesses until April 30, 2017.
Under the Act (R.I. Gen. Laws § 42-35-2.10), the Department of Business Regulations (DBR) will be responsible for licensing would be entrepreneurs.
There will be a $5,000 non-refundable fee at the time of application. License fees range from $20,000 to $80,000 depending on the class of license issued.
Vermont
When the state reopens it’s program to applicants, it will have provisions for medical marijuana dispensaries, which may acquire, possess, cultivate, transport, sell and dispense marijuana and related products and supplies to enrolled patients and their caregivers.
Currently, the state is not issuing marijuana business licenses.
Virginia
On February 26, 2015, Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe signed HB 1445 into law. This measure will provide an affirmative defense to patients who have intractable epilepsy (and, for minors, their parents or legal guardians) for the possession of marijuana extracts that contain at least 15 percent of either cannabidiol (CBD) or THC-A and no more than 5 percent THC.
By merely providing an affirmative defense, the law has no provisions for any marijuana business.
Washington
The Cannabis Patient Protection Act — SB 5052 integrates the medical market with the regulated recreational market.
Under the act, the Department of Health adopted rules for a medical marijuana authorization database, training and certification of medical marijuana stores, consultants and product compliance.
Washington D.C.
Washington D.C. licensed a very limited number of dispensaries and cultivation centers in 2013 and 2014. There is no system presently in place to permit the issuance of additional licenses.
Wisconsin
Gov. Scott Walker signed a very limited medical cannabis bill (A.B. 726) into law. It exempts a distinct class of individuals from criminal penalties for the use and possession of cannabidiol “in a form without a psychoactive effect.”
There are no stipulations for any businesses to open around this very limited law.
States that Allow Recreational Marijuana Use
Alaska
On November 4, 2014, Alaskans passed Measure 2, which institutes a system to tax and regulate marijuana like alcohol through the Alcoholic Beverage Control Board.
Adults age 21 and older may possess up to one ounce of marijuana and grow up to six plants (with no more than three being mature) for personal use.
The measure also includes provisions for businesses to grow, test and sell marijuana and paraphernalia to persons over age 21.
California
Proposition 64, also known as the Adult Use of Marijuana Act, passed on November 8, 2016, legalized the sale and distribution of cannabis by individuals and commercial businesses. Licenses will be issued for cultivation and business establishment beginning in 2018.
The regulations of this measure have provisions for retail marijuana stores, product manufacturers, cultivators, testing facilities and distributors.
Colorado
Colorado Amendment 64 legalized the sale and possession of marijuana for non-medical uses on November 6, 2012, including private cultivation of up to six marijuana plants, with no more than three being mature. The state also lets business owners open a medical or retail marijuana dispensary.
Business owners must be current residents living in the state for at least two years before applying for a license.
Maine
Under the new regulations, enacted as of November 8, 2016, Maine will be opening its doors to recreational marijuana businesses.
The regulations of this measure have provisions for marijuana stores, social clubs and cultivation, product manufacturing and testing facilities.
As of right now, the state has yet to establish an application process.
Massachusetts
Under the new regulations, enacted as of November 8, 2016, Massachusetts became the first state on the east coast to be open to recreational marijuana businesses.
The rules of this measure, which went into effect December 15, 2016, have provisions for marijuana stores, product manufacturers, cultivators and testing facilities.
The state has yet to establish an application process but is mandated to begin accepting applications no later than October 1, 2017.
Nevada
Under the new regulations, enacted as of November 8, 2016, Nevada will be open for recreational marijuana businesses.
The tenants of this measure, which will become effective January 1, 2017, have provisions for retail stores, product manufacturers, cultivators, testing facilities and distributors.
The state has yet to indicate when it will open the licensing period but is required to establish the rules and licensing procedures by January 1, 2018.
Also, under the new law, only businesses that already have medical marijuana certificates will be allowed to apply for recreational licenses for the first 18 months the program is open.
Oregon
On July 1, 2015, Measure 91 legalized the possession and cultivation of marijuana by adults 21 and older for recreational use.
The Oregon Liquor Control Commission allows dispensaries, retail stores, cultivators and manufacturing businesses to operate legally within the state.
There will be a $250 non-refundable fee at the time of application. The initial license fee is $4,750.
Washington
Marijuana was legalized by Washington Initiative 502 in 2012. The law requires state licenses from all sellers, distributors, cultivators and producers of marijuana.
States with No Medical or Recreational Marijuana Use Laws
States that currently prohibit marijuana use include:
Alabama
Georgia
Idaho
Indiana
Kansas
Kentucky
Mississippi
Nebraska
New Hampshire
North Carolina
Oklahoma
South Carolina
South Dakota
Tennessee
Texas
Utah
West Virginia
Wyoming
Information used in preparing this guide came from the following sources: |
Postmedia Network Canada Corp. posted a $25-million loss in the second quarter as it continued to work to rein in costs in the face of declining revenues.
The Toronto-based newspaper company said Thursday that sales dropped by 9.1% to $162.5-million in the period.
Postmedia did get its operating expenses down 8.7% to $140.4-million for the quarter, but restructuring and depreciation costs were up, leading to the net loss of $25.3-million, a wider loss than the $15.8-million in the same period last year.
The company, which owns Canada’s largest chain of English-language dailies, including the National Post, said revenue from print advertising was down 14.7% to $89.9-million.
Print circulation sales fell 0.7% to $47.6-million and digital sales also dropped 0.7% in the period to $21.1-million.
“We are seeing similar effects on print advertising revenues as our industry peers,” chief executive Paul Godfrey said in a memo to employees Thursday. “Our strategy is focused on developing new products and reengineering the way we produce and distribute content.”
Eight of Postmedia’s 10 daily newspapers will launch redesigned versions of their print, web, tablet and mobile products later this spring.
Mr. Godfrey said he believes the initiative “will set us on a new course,” by improving offerings for both readers and advertisers.
Last May, Postmedia launched a digital paywall for all of its newspapers’ websites and Mr. Godfrey said Thursday that subscribers now total more than 140,000.
Postmedia said it has now cut $98-million out of its annual costs since launching a cost transformation program in July 2012. However, it is still grappling with $484-million in long-term debt.
When asked about any possible divestitures of its assets by analysts on a conference call Thursday, Mr. Godfrey said “we always look, we have got to think of the best interest of brands. We do not have a ‘for sale’ sign on any major brands that we have.”
“We are approached from time to time, with respect to if we are interested in selling certain properties,” Mr. Godfrey added. “We have declined even discussing it with people. I guess we never shut the door completely. But over the long-term, who knows what is going to happen.”
With files from Armina Ligaya |
Will the AFL's luxury tax level the playing field?
Posted
Financial advantages aren't everything in the AFL, but they still threaten to do more damage to the game than even a mad sports scientist could, writes Jack Kerr.
In late September 2012 - days out from their appearance in the AFL's showpiece event, and just months before the dawning of the "blackest day in Australian sport" - Hawthorn was reported to be spearheading a pioneering new injections regime.
"Hawks set the pace in injection science", read the headline in The Age. In the article, Dr Paul Marks described a program which on the surface might have looked like a form of blood doping, but was actually, in his words, "performance-enabling" rather than performance-enhancing.
While unapproved by the US Food and Drug Administration, the injections were becoming increasingly popular with AFL players battling soft tissue injuries, and the boys from Glenferrie were said to be leading the charge.
It wasn't the first time the Hawks had been on the bleeding edge like this. Their 2008 premiership, their first in almost two decades, was aided by "ultrasound-guided injections on match days", something no other club was believed to be doing.
Irrespective of the legitimacy or appropriateness of this program, a sceptic might, in the wake of the Essendon doping scandal, look back now and wonder if these sorts of medical and technological advantages were behind the Hawks' subsequent, equalisation-defying, triple-premiership run.
Hawthorn might not have access to human growth hormones and EPO, but they have something far more powerful: oodles and oodles of cash.
"The first thing you notice is that there is generally a positive relationship between spending and wins," wrote Andrew Leigh in his 2014 analysis of AFL clubs.
Leigh - the federal Labor MP - checked half a decade's worth of results against each club's off-field spending in those years (2008-2012).
He found that "on average, teams win one more game for every additional $1.1 million they spend". That period's five premierships went to four of the six biggest-spending clubs.
While clubs have to live within the salary cap, it's in other areas - such as the latest medical developments, as used by Hawthorn - where the big spenders were able to pick up advantages.
Which is why the AFL has moved to control the distorting nature of such inequality, and its "luxury tax" on off-field spending will begin to take greater effect this season.
Based on a model used in the US, the "luxury tax" doesn't stop clubs from spending on their high-performance programs. But it tries to put the breaks on it, by charging them a fee - up to 75 per cent - on any spending over a certain cap.
That money is then redistributed to the poorer clubs, though the hope is that there won't be much money to collect: part of the AFL's motivation for the tax is to stop the so-called arms race between clubs as they try to outspend each other off the field.
It ought to mean all teams come to the table with a similar amount of chips at round one, shifting advantage from the big-spending clubs towards the ones who can spend wisely.
Of course, money isn't everything. The low-spending Crows finished second in 2012, and were a kick away from making the grand final; the Western Bulldogs made three preliminary finals.
But it's telling that that's as far as either team could go.
Collingwood, by contrast, seemed to pay overs for their premiership - if such a thing isn't considered priceless; Geelong won two flags with a budget that was around 10 per cent smaller. For a few million less, St Kilda - mid-range in spending - just got a whole lot of heartbreak.
Leigh calls Geelong the "moneyball" team of his study. That is, they managed to win more games than their spending would suggest they should, and did so by the judicious use of their resources.
It's a tempting analogy to make, but it's worth remembering that the original "moneyball" team (as described in the bestseller) were a side that kept on failing when the heat was on.
The Oakland Athletics' clever re-interpretation of how to use sports analytics helped a poor team punch above its weight, and revolutionised the way many sports work these days.
But for four consecutive "moneyball" years, the A's were knocked out of the Major League Baseball play-offs at the first hurdle.
And after that, as deep-pocketed clubs developed analytics of their own, the A's cut-price advantage was gone.
In the decade after Moneyball became a book and hit the stands, the wealthy Boston Red Sox buried the Curse of the Bambino by winning three World Series titles.
"Oakland is unable to compete with clubs that caught up to it intellectually and blow it away financially," wrote Sports Illustrated's Tom Verducci in 2011.
"Intellectual firepower is ... no guarantee of success now that the game's financial giants have cracked the code."
Which may provide little comfort to a team like the Western Bulldogs.
They are, wrote Fairfax's Konrad Marshall late last season, "the newest and truest - perhaps one and only - local version of the Moneyball methodology". (The regular over-achievers at North Melbourne might have something to say about that.)
The key to the Dogs' strategy - which lifted them back into the finals last season - has been the targeted recruitment of "ball-winning terriers with lowly latter draft picks". It goes against the grain of trying to pick the next Nat Fyfe.
It remains to be seen just how effective the approach will be, but should it take off, the Dogs can expect their rivals to follow suit. Which, like the original moneyball team, would leave the Dogs back at square one. Or, more likely, knocked out of yet another preliminary final.
As for Hawthorn's tilt at a fourth straight premiership, well, not even a luxury tax might stand in the way of that.
There are, naturally, other ingredients that go into a successful season, not just finances. Leigh found that money accounted for just "one-fifth of the variation between teams" in the AFL.
But in a game of one-percenters, one-fifth is massive leg up, and threatens to do more damage to the game than even a mad sports scientist could.
Jack Kerr is a journalist and documentary maker. He tweets @jckkrr.
Topics: australian-football-league |
I'm currently looking for a way to generate LaTeX inference-rules (horizontal line style) from inductive definitions in some dependently typed language, probably Coq.
I've found this package, but it seems pretty fragile, doesn't have a lot of recent updates, and fails silently whenever it hits unicode.
What I'm wondering is, could I abuse Coq's ability to write Tactics in OCaml to inspect an Inductive definition, and format it to LaTeX? Obviously I'd write the formatting code myself, but I'm wondering how to get at an AST representation
There are some plugin intro tutorials here and here, but they only give basics, and I haven't found true documentation of the plugins API, so I'm not sure how to get at an OCaml representation of the inductive type from, for example, the name of the type, or a goal of that type.
Has this been done? Are there existing tools that do this, or something similar, that I could use as an example? |
For good or ill, Deadmau5 is responsible for introducing the gossip pages to electronic dance music. That is, above and beyond the panicked “rave culture is killing our youth” theme experiencing a popular media resurgence alongside North America’s delayed embrace of the machine-made sounds now referred to as “EDM.”
Joel Zimmerman's character as Deadmau5 a the 54th annual Grammy Awards in 2012. ( REUTERS / Danny Moloshok ) Joel Zimmerman, better known as Canadian electronic dance musician deadmau5, poses without his usual over-sized mouse head costume in Toronto on July 22. ( MICHELLE SIU / THE CANADIAN PRESS )
Deadmau5 — one of the lynchpins of dance music’s current commercial boom — has managed to boldly go where pop-courting electronic forebears like Daft Punk, the Chemical Brothers and Moby, and such au courant EDM contemporaries as Skrillex and the shamelessly crowd-pleasing Tiesto have never gone before, occasionally barging into the tabloid/TMZ orbit historically reserved for the Britneys and Beyoncés and Katy Perrys and Justin Timberlakes of the world. That’s a bit of a coup, all things considered, for a skinny studio rat from blue-collar Niagara Falls much more likely to be recognized while wearing one of the signature “Mau5-head” masks he typically dons during performance than he would be without the high-tech disguise. Granted, Joel Zimmerman — the blunt-spoken, 32-year-old producer behind the Deadmau5 phenomenon — owes a great deal of his celebrity currency to a whirlwind romance with reality-TV star and tattoo icon Kat Von D (née Drachenberg), which played out a bit like a serial social-media soap opera until it came to an abrupt end last month.
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Deadmau5 proposed to his Kat in December via Twitter, while news of the engagement’s end in June came with a Twitter pronouncement from Von D that, “I hate to have to admit, that this relationship is indeed over.” Zimmerman then took to his Facebook page to clarify the “issues” involved in the break-up and to challenge Von D’s accusations of infidelity, concluding that he didn’t “expect to comment further, but I do believe that those who have expressed concern deserve a more complete understanding of what transpired.” Even without all that drama, however, Zimmerman is uncommonly skilled at keeping himself a topic of conversation. He’s trash-talked such fellow dance producers as David Guetta, Afrojack and Skrillex in various publications, for instance, while his hot-tempered Twitter feed has led him to public feuds with everyone from Jersey Shore’s Pauly D to Madonna, whom he took to task last year for making a rather lame reference to “Molly” (ie. MDMA) at the Ultra Music Festival in Miami. These flare-ups have probably got more to do with a pathological inability to self-censor than actively chasing trouble, but they have earned Zimmerman a combative reputation. And he’s fine with it. He’s been taking hits for years, many of them from critics and techno-purists who — rather unfairly — sneer at Deadmau5 for being a manufacturer of by-the-numbers big-room floor-fillers. “Sure, but that’s the entertainment industry,” shrugs Zimmerman. “You know what I mean? It’s not like they’ve got, like, the ‘Top 100 Dental Surgeons Awards’ this year, the ‘Dental Arts Awards,’ where they’re all buying votes to get in and they’ve gotta play the game. If it doesn’t exist, it should. Give everyone a taste. ‘Top 100 Spelling-Bee Champions.’ It’s just the nature of the entertainment thing, whether you’re in film or music or comedy. . . . But it would be interesting to have a national holiday where everyone’s profession turns into a public s--- show. “What can you do? Well, you can sit there and f---in’ bitch about it, but people get tired of that after a while and so do you, even if you’re one of those guys. And I’m not exempting myself from being ‘the guy who complains.’ But, yeah, it gets tired and then you get over it and you ultimately fall back on what it is you wanna do, anyway.”
Right now, what Zimmerman wants to do — in between cranking out new tunes with a relentless 9-to-5 work ethic almost daily through Twitter and Soundcloud — is build a bigger, shinier version of the elaborate touring set-up he brought out on the road through 2011 and 2012, an LED-lit technological monstrosity that had him performing inside a levitating Rubik’s Cube spaceship. Deadmau5’s headlining slot at the second annual VELD Music Festival at Downsview Park on Sunday, Aug. 4, is thus a rare opportunity to catch the man’s eye- and eardrum-popping stage show in action. Work on the next incarnation of the Deadmau5 road show has lately meant a clampdown on touring but for an ongoing residency (complete with robots!) in Las Vegas at the MGM Hotel’s Hakkasan club while he and his tech team get their act together.
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“I’m building a new tour,” confirms Zimmerman. “For much later, 2014. And of course it will have to manage to trump the ‘Cube’ show. I could absolutely just slap the Cube back together and ball it up, but I’m in that mentality where I want to keep one-upping the show. So obviously, the bigger the production, the more time you have to sit down with the team and iron it all out technically and financially and all these kinda things. So it’s, like, a ‘lay low, make some new music and do your residency to pay the hydro bills’ kinda thing.” This is Deadmau5’s second year headlining VELD and his presence was undoubtedly a large factor in the start-up electronic-music gathering’s success last year. VELD drew 46,000 people to Downsview over the August long weekend in 2012. This year, ticket sales are so strong that producer Talal Farisi of INK Entertainment, the local promotion company behind the festival, is confidently predicting he’ll see between 65,000 and 70,000 people come through the gates. This pleases Zimmerman greatly, as he’s been on an unapologetic mission to bring electronic music to ever larger and larger masses from the beginning. It’s been a successful one, at that; Deadmau5 was the first Canadian act ever to sell out the Rogers Centre in November 2011, playing to more than 20,000 delirious hometown fans for the boffo close of his Meowington’s Hax Tour of artists signed to his record label. VELD is “the hometown gig, kinda the unofficial (version of) what we did at the Rogers Centre,” he says. Since “you can’t rent out the f---ing Rogers Centre every week,” he’s content to let VELD “throw everyone in a f---ing field with speakers and have a free-for-all,” and become an annual fixture on the Deadmau5 touring itinerary. Some gripe about Deadmau5 and his ilk commercializing rave culture, but Zimmerman is coming at it from a pure place: he can wax as nostalgic as anyone else about Toronto’s 1990s rave heyday. “After a 10-year hiatus from the anti-rave movement, I’m so glad we’re commercially viable now,” he quips. “I mean, we’ll never get that back, but Nitrous at the Science Centre was just, like, the most amazing electronic-music experience I’ve had in Toronto. “We’re not, like, old guys on our porches with shotguns f---ing talking about the old days because it’s a totally different climate now, for sure. But I remember (with) some of the parties I used to go to, we would make the road trip all the way up to the Big Smoke to go to the thing and, dude, it was honestly like we were in Hamilton and wondering on the way up if this thing was gonna get shut down by the time we got there. So it is good to see it coming back in a more organized way, you know what I mean?” |
In this episode of The MMQB Podcast with Peter King, I sat down for a discussion with Baltimore Ravens wide receiver Steve Smith Sr. and former NFL quarterback and ESPN analyst Ron Jaworski.
I met up with Smith at the Ravens facility in Owings Mills, Maryland. A renowned trash-talker, Smith opens up about his reputation as a player people love to hate. Every hero needs a villain, and he’s just fine with playing that role. Now in his 16th season, Smith explains how he’s lasted so long in the NFL. His oldest son has just begun his freshman year at DePaul where he is a soccer player. I mean, how many other active players can say they have a son playing college sports? Smith also discusses how he developed his aggressive and physical playing style and his decision to return for another year after previously announcing he would retire following the 2015 season.
Jaworski, a former Philadelphia quarterback himself, discusses Eagles rookie Carson Wentz’ toughness and explains why he is just the type of quarterback Eagles fans want. Jaworski reflects on Wentz’ pro day at North Dakota State and what he saw from the young quarterback that day that made him believe in his NFL potential. Jaworksi also compares the mechanics of Wentz and veteran Bears quarterback Jay Cutler, pointing out that Wentz outperformed Cutler in Chicago during Week 2 Monday Night Football.
2:30: Smith on the physicality of his game.
4:15: On growing up playing a variety of sports in Los Angeles.
5:15: On picking Utah for college football.
7:30: Smith describes his draft experience.
9:20: Smith tells the story of scoring a touchdown on his first NFL play.
11:30: Smith on being the guy opponents love to hate.
14:00: Smith explains why he embraces playing the role of the villain.
16:00: How playing angry helps Smith's game.
18:20: On playing against Troy Polamalu.
20:38: How Smith has lasted 16 years in the league so far.
23:10: Smith on the dangers of the sport.
25:30: Smith on how his body will feel when he's retired.
27:16: Why Smith came back for another year after announcing his retirement.
29:20: On his son who plays college soccer at DePaul.
31:35: Smith on his legacy.
Subscribe to the show on iTunes. |
A village council in Uttar Pradesh let off an alleged rapist after he touched his victim's feet, according to a report in the Times of India. The charade in the name of instant justice was carried out right in front of the local police.
A 30-year-old woman, working at a levelling project under the MNREGA at a forested area in Meergunj, was alone during the lunch hour on January 28 when the 32-year-old accused, Rohtash, allegedly dragged her to an isolated spot and raped her, the report said. The accused threatened to kill her if she raised an alarm.
When she went to the Meergunj police station to lodge a complaint, police officials refused to take her seriously. They called up the village head instead, who called for a panchayat or council outside the police station. The accused, Rohtash, was asked to touch her feet and ask for forgiveness.
When he did, the panchayat declared him absolved of his guilt and even asked the survivor to stay mum on the crime. When the rape survivor called the superintendent of police, Brijesh Srivastava, he directed the Meergunj police to lodge a complaint. |
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Sevilla will be chasing their third straight Europa League title after Fernando Llorente scored against his former club Juventus to secure a 1-0 win for the Spanish side in Champions League Group D on Tuesday.
Juve and Manchester City were already assured of a place in the last 16 and the English club's 4-2 win over Borussia Moenchengladbach meant Sevilla finished third, clinching a spot in Europe's second-tier club competition.
Former Spain striker Llorente, who joined Sevilla from Juve in the close season, headed past goalkeeper Gianluigi Buffon in the 65th minute at the Sanchez Pizjuan while the Serie A champions failed to make a host of first-half chances count.
"We knew that for us it was a final and we started the game in a fantastic way," Llorente told Spanish television.
"We have shown the level of this side and we are happy to go into the Europa League."
City topped the group with 12 points from six games with Juve in second place on 11.
Sevilla, who qualified for the continent's elite club competition by winning a second consecutive Europa League title last season, ended with six points and Gladbach finished bottom on five.
"Now we no longer have the disappointment of not being able to continue in the Champions League," said Sevilla coach Unai Emery.
"We have the excitement of going into the Europa League which is an environment where the team feels comfortable." |
400 Turks killed in ranks of jihadists in Syria, Iraq, Turkish official says
Ali Kayalar – ISTANBUL
Reuters Photo
Some 400 Turks who joined the ranks of jihadist fighting in Syria and Iraq have been killed so far, as 900 more were still with the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), a foreign ministry official told Hürriyet Daily News during a meeting on Sept. 17.In addition to the 900, some 200 to 300 joined al-Nusra, a jihadist group in Syria linked to al-Qaeda.“Currently, we believe that there are about 900 in ISIL, and close to 300 hundred with al-Nusra,” the official said, while responding to a question on the number of Turks among foreign fighters in neighboring Syria and Iraq.“We suspect there might be more people going and coming back. We do not know if any of them are opportunistic money-mongers, fixers, radicals or how many of them are there for curiosity. But our tendency is not to believe them when they say they were just a cook there,” the official said, adding the ministry is demanding more international coordination in its efforts to block the movement of foreign fighters.Commenting on recently escalating attacks by the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), the official said more than half of the 120 fallen police officers and soldiers were killed in Body-Borne Improvised Explosive Device (BBIED) and Improvised Explosive Device (IED) attacks rather than direct clashes.Many of the 16 soldiers killed the in the roadside bomb attack in southeastern Hakkari’s Dağlıca on Sept. 6 were not a part of the personnel involved in the direct fight but responsible for detecting road bombs.“There have been only one or two clashes in the sense of a ‘real’ clash,” the official said, adding the PKK has chosen instead to attack with bombs.“This is going to be a long effort,” the official said, on the efforts to cut the PKK’s resources.The official also said the act of going to a place and receiving terrorism training should be criminalized, as many young people who receive training usually return after three months with knowledge which makes them a risk to society. |
Chupacabras at the Alamo? Horrors!
Heaven knows, the Alamo is no stranger to silly treatment by Hollywood.
Back in 1969, the comedy “Viva Max!” had Peter Ustinov chewing the hallowed scenery as a clownish Mexican general bent on re-occupying the Alamo. In 1985, “Pee-wee's Big Adventure” featured Pee-wee Herman on a quest to retrieve his stolen bicycle from the basement of the Shrine of Texas Liberty, only to discover that it had no basement. Why, as recently as last year, Pee-wee (Paul Reubens) revisited the Alamo in a rambunctious “Top Chef” challenge for the Texas-set season.
Even with such entertainment precedents, however, the outrageous use of the Alamo by an upcoming TV horror movie may be in a class all its own. “Chupacabra vs. the Alamo” stars Erik Estrada as a DEA agent making a kind of last stand at the Alamo against an invading pack of those mythical blood-sucking creatures known as Chupacabras. In the movie, these dog-like monsters with long ears, large snouts and sharp teeth have made it all the way to San Antonio from Mexico via drug-smuggling tunnels, and they aim to feed on any human who crosses their path.
It debuts at 8 p.m. Saturday on the Syfy channel.
Ah well, such stuff is all just gory nonsense that can't be taken seriously, right? Maybe to you, me and producer Jeffrey Schenck, who said he hopes folks will laugh and shiver to “Chupacabra vs. the Alamo,” a popcorn adventure reminiscent of monster flicks of the 1950s.
However, the head of the Daughters of the Republic of Texas — who run the Alamo's daily operation under a state contract after serving as its custodians for more than a century — is anything but amused. Told of the creature feature, Karen Thompson, president general of the DRT, blasted this latest treatment of the historical landmark as not only “patently ridiculous,” but “obscene.”
“We work very hard to be sure the history of the Alamo and the fact that it's a shrine to 189 men who died there to fight for liberty is not something you make fun of or use in some sort of horror, comedy, sci-fi or any sort of movie other than a historical documentary,” she said.
During my phone interview with Schenck, he stressed that he certainly didn't intend the movie to be disrespectful.
“I completely respect what they do,” he said of the DRT. “I'm a huge proponent of anyone who champions a cause that's historical.”
But, he added, movies frequently play with history and historic locations. After all, he said, didn't “Independence Day” feature aliens attacking the White House?
Besides, if anything, “Chupacabra vs. the Alamo” could be taken as an homage to the Alamo, he said. “You can mess with anybody, but if you're in Texas and at the Alamo, it stops. Remember the Alamo.”
Uh-huh ... right. Unfortunately, this particular movie can't be taken as a tribute to anything. Granted, it uses some actual footage of San Antonio and the real Alamo, which was shot last summer for the movie. But it primarily was filmed far away in Vancouver — specifically at Fort Langley, a historic trading post that was shot to look like the Alamo.
Even if the stone work of the buildings appear similar, the inclusion of a buffoonish caretaker in a coonskin cap and scenes that have Estrada and his motley band of Alamo defenders smashing open cases of historic weapons will strike anyone familiar with the real Alamo as nothing but absurd.
As for the Chupacabras, which Schenck said come to us via a mix of CGI, clay models and footage of real dogs, they're kind of puny for monsters. I found them more comical than scary. And “ChiPs” veteran Estrada? Fans of the actor may enjoy seeing him once again as a law enforcement official atop a motorcycle. On the other hand, scenes that have him “green-screened” into San Antonio look preposterous.
That said, if you go in expecting a few grins and the brand of cheap horror that these original Syfy movies are known for, “Chupacabra vs. the Alamo” just may provide the kind of amusement you're looking for on a slow Saturday night.
Jeanne Jakle's column appears Wednesdays and Sundays in mySA, and she blogs at Jakle's Jacuzzi on mySa.com. Email her at jjakle@express-news.net. |
"Vatnik" redirects here. For the slang and internet meme, see Vatnik (slang)
Telogreika (Russian: телогре́йка, IPA: [tʲɪlɐˈgrʲejkə]; lit. "body warmer") or vatnik (Russian: ватник, IPA: [vˈatnʲɪk]) is a Russian kind of warm cotton wool-padded jacket. It was also a part of winter uniform first issued by the Red Army during World War II.[citation needed] Telogreikas continued to be issued until the late 1960s.[citation needed]
Variations [ edit ]
Red Army winter uniform consisting of telogreika and ushanka
The basic cut the uniform followed was that of a quilted jacket and quilted trousers. The trousers had a button fly and tied at the bottom of the legs. There were usually pockets on the hips of telogreika trousers and a button pocket on the front of the trouser leg.
Telogreika jackets buttoned up the front, and the jacket sleeves buttoned closed. Early issue variants had high collars, though these were absent later on. Telogreika jackets usually had a single pocket on the front of the jacket.
The clothing was usually khaki in colour, although black uniforms were issued to tank crews and some grey variants can be seen, sewn of cotton (and later polyester-blend) fabric with a cotton wool batting inside.
The jacket and trousers usually had a ribbed design with the quilting, although this feature was absent on many of the non-Soviet issue uniforms.
Effectiveness [ edit ]
The telogreika was particularly effective at keeping the wearer warm in the harsh Russian Winter. When worn with valenki and an ushanka a wearer can comfortably remain warm in sub-zero temperatures for long periods. This made it the perfect uniform not just for the Red Army, but for both prisoners and guards of the Gulags.
Issue [ edit ]
In contrast to the usual shortages in the Red Army[citation needed], soldiers received regular issues of winter clothing, as their combat effectiveness could be hampered in cold conditions otherwise.[citation needed] The Wehrmacht also regularly made use of captured Red Army winter uniforms, often taking them from the deceased, due to the ineffectiveness of their own winter uniforms.[citation needed] Similarly in the Winter War, due to a poor preparation and lack of materiel, Finnish rank-and-file troops were not issued uniforms, and had to survive with whatever of their own clothing they could bring (facetiously malli Cajander (model Cajander) after Prime Minister Aimo Cajander), or resort to capturing them from dead Red Army soldiers.[citation needed]
The Telogreika faded from military issue in the early 1960s, being largely replaced by the return to the old woollen shinel greatcoat and the bushlat pea coat. In the early 1980s the introduction of the Afghanka field uniform marked the dawn of a new era in the Soviet Army. Today, the Telogreika is still used in Russia and many Soviet Bloc countries by private citizens. In Russia it is particularly popular amongst night watchmen and workers in the construction industry.
Sources [ edit ] |
An investigation into the shooting of a dog in Louisa County is underway. It's an incident that pits animal rights against property rights, and the dog's owner says he wants to see the shooter held accountable.
"I think he should be in jail," said Jay Perez, whose dog, Chief, was shot and nearly killed on Monday after escaping with another dog from Perez's mother's property on Hanback Road near Gordonsville.
"They were running around behind the carport, and I called their names," said Perez. "Then they looked at me and took off running."
Perez set off after the dogs through wooded property, catching sight of them several times.
"I wasn't 50 yards behind them," he said. "And I was screaming their names the whole time from here to that guy's house."
He said he saw Chief one last time at the edge of the neighbor's property, near the road.
"That's when I heard him shoot my dog," said Perez.
He heard Chief's cries and encountered the neighbor, who CBS19 is not naming since he has not been charged with a crime. A reporter's efforts to reach the neighbor were unsuccessful.
"I saw him standing on the porch with his gun," said Perez. "All [he said] was he was sorry, he had chickens that had been going missing."
Perez said he never saw or heard any chickens, and he said Chief is frequently around chickens at his mother's house and has never chased them.
"He doesn't bother anyone," he said. "He loves everybody."
Major Donald Lowe of the Louisa county Sheriff's Office said the neighbor made the same claim to officers who responded to Perez's call. He said Virginia state law allows anyone who owns poultry or agricultural animals to shoot a dog if it has killed or is chasing them.
"We have to determine all the facts and what we can and can't prove," said Lowe.
Perez is relieved Chief survived, but he's concerned about the investigation. After his initial call to report the shooting, he said he hasn't been interviewed about the incident again.
He said he was close to the dog when the shot was fired, and the chickens on the property were nowhere near where his dog was shot. He said the vet told him they found no evidence of feathers on the dog.
After being shot, Chief ran back to Perez's mother's home, where Perez's grandfather wrapped the dog tightly to stop heavy bleeding from the wound caused by the bullet that came close to striking his spine.
The family took the dog to the emergency vet in Charlottesville, where he underwent surgery that saved his life but cost the family more than $2,000.
And while Chief is recuperating physically, Perez is still coping with the emotional trauma of seeing his beloved pet grievously injured and suffering.
"I almost lost my best friend," he said.
See the Related Links box for information on the fundraiser for Chief's vet bills. |
GTspirit was recently invited to one of the most historic celebrations in Berlin. Twenty six years ago, the German Democratic Republic and the Federal Republic of Germany formed the nation of Germany and Berlin was reunited into a single city.
Today, Berlin is one of the most interesting and coolest places in central Europe. Famous for its culture and nightlife, Berlin is definitely a popular tourist hotspot! But we didn’t come to Berlin to only celebrate the German Unity Day, we also came to visit one of most luxurious hotels in town and enjoy a suitable car for this occasion.
We were hosted by the hotel “Das Stue” in Berlin Tiergarten – a five star boutique hotel in the center of Berlin. The neoclassicist building was built from 1938 to 1940 and designed by architect Emil Schaudt who was also responsible for the famous KaDeWe – the largest department store in continental Europe. Originally, the building was Berlin’s Royal Danish Embassy and is located at the west side of Berlin’s Embassy district.
In 2009, the building was renovated and later redesigned to start as hotel “Das Stue” in December 2012. “Stue” is danish for “living room”. The building’s public areas such as the entrance, bar and restaurant were designed by Patricia Urquiola. LVG Arquitectura put their hands on the 78 rooms and suites, whose size ranges from 27 square meters up to 110 square meters. Culinary guests can enjoy Mediterranean flair by Michelin Star owner Paco Pérez. His gourmet restaurants “cinco” and “The Casual” will serve you the finest food. In addition to all that, Das Stue has a spa and library for all your relaxation needs.
We were located at the magnificent “Bel Etage Suite”, which is the largest suite in the hotel. With its 110 square meters, the guest has a separate living and sleeping area and two bathrooms. We had a nice stay at our suite and enjoyed the cozy atmosphere while relaxing on our huge balcony that features a direct view of the Berlin Zoo where we could see antelopes.
The “Bel Etage Suite” comes with another unique offering for all the petrolheads. Guests who reside in this suite receive a high class Audi model during their stay and we were lucky to receive keys to the new Audi R8 V10 Plus! This is the result of an exclusive partnership between Das Stue and the Audi City Berlin. Of course we had to take a look at the Audi City and say hello with our ride for the weekend.
“Audi City Berlin” is a virtual showroom at the famous Kurfürstendamm. It’s the third of its kind after London and Beijing and was opened in February 2014. Instead of a conventional dealership, the Audi City is a futuristic showroom and sales-place for the inner city. It’s a lot smaller than a dealership and has only two to four cars displayed, but it brings you a complete different experience of Audi cars.
You can configure every Audi on one of the six 32” Multipoint touch monitors and have a 360 degrees look at your car scaled 1:1 on one of the six Powerwalls. The Powerwalls are wall mounted monitors that are connected to each other, measuring a total size of 87 square meters! You can enjoy your configured car and move it by gesture control, or let it drive through virtual landscapes and get an experience of the car’s sound note.
On the first floor is the Audi ultra Powerwall, which consists of 18 3D monitors with a 12k resolution in total. At seven meters wide and two meters high we experienced the newest Audi models with the help of latest entertainment technologies. We loved the architecture of the building whose interior integrates perfectly with the surrounding environment that hosts premium shops and designer boutiques. The German Design Award 2016 for Retail Architecture is justified.
Parked in front of the hotel, a lot of people recognize the Audi R8 V10 Plus. The car looks much wider and lower than its previous model. With the taillights enabled, the rear looks stunning and powerful. The front looks more aggressive, but it could have even been more. It will possibly look more menacing with a special edition like the R8 GT as its life-cycle evolves.
The rear wing of the new Audi R8 V10 fits perfectly to the car’s shape and we were happy to drive the Plus model. The interior is completely different from its predecessor too. A driver focused Audi Virtual Cockpit means that there is a huge display behind the steering wheel that provides all the information via Audi’s MMI.
The center console was cleaned up and only features the MMI controller, gear lever and climate control. The latter is in a non typical design. You can love it or hate it. The best looking part in the interior is definitely the steering wheel. It comes with a three spoke design and contains buttons for the Audi MMI, Start/ Stop and three selectors for driving modes, race mode and the sports exhaust. It’s finished in a nice aluminum trim. We then took a seat and started the engine – wow! What a growl.
The people around us seemed to share the same feeling by smiling at the car. The V10 growls deep and loud, especially when the engine is cold. You can select either a quiet exhaust or a loud one and between several damper setups such as comfort or individual. We started in comfort mode for the first km. The streets of Berlin are quite bad and the comfort mode was still very stiff, so we decided to switch to individual to get a better response from the car.
The exhaust was on sports mode at all times – the V10 sounds just too great to silence it. Driving an Audi R8 in the city is not the greatest idea but it was inevitable so we tried to make the best out of it. The Engine with its 610 bhp is extremely powerful. It has enough power in all rpm stages, even overtaking at 50kph in 7th gear was quicker than with any normal car in a lower gear.
The sound while accelerating to the allowed speed in the city was awesome. Such a deep powerful noise coming from the rear. The fuel consumption, well, we had a quick look and saw about 31 liters per 100km. “Whatever – did you hear the noise from the V10?”. We knew it would become even better at high rpm, so we took our way out of the city to find some country roads where we could go faster.
One negative thing that we noticed on our way out of Berlin was that the car took ages for the oil and engine to heat up. As a responsible driver I don’t like pushing cold engines, but given this was a brand new car the situation was bound to change once it acquired significant miles. Out of Berlin we felt the potential of this car more and more. 2nd gear, full throttle and opened windows – Vroooom! The R8 V10 Plus goes, goes and goes.
Third gear, fourth gear and the power chain doesn’t stop, complemented by the magnificent sound of the V10 engine. Driving on a curvy country road one could feel how well balanced the new R8 V10 Plus is. The steering is very precise and the setup feels home on those roads. The car’s balance and sports car aspect increased a lot compared to the old R8 and doesn’t need to hide behind competition from Italy and Zuffenhausen.
Back in Berlin, we cruised around in the city. The car attracts attention everywhere. We saw young carspotters that almost jumped in front of the car to take a picture (be careful kids!), and met visitors from Hamburg in another powerful Audi, who had been following us for a while and interested in having a closer look at our ride.
The overall feedback from the people was very positive, which is obvious if you’re driving in an expensive sports car. Even an old grandma who at first was frightened by the loud exhaust, liked it eventually. But our favorite spot in the center of Berlin was a non crowded area – the Tiergarten tunnel. It’s simply the best place in town to enjoy the V10 sound!
Sadly, we had to leave the hotel and return the Audi R8 V10 Plus at the end of the weekend. Needless to say, we enjoyed it a lot! |
A second multi-millionaire investment banker is set to be appointed to head a major UK bank after a dramatic boardroom struggle that appears to have ended Mike Geoghegan's 37-year career at HSBC.
The HSBC chief executive is understood to have lost out in a brutal power struggle for control of the bank caused by the decision of the chairman, Stephen Green, to join the government.
Geoghegan is to be replaced by the head of the investment bank, Stuart Gulliver, who was paid £10m last year, while the chairman's slot is to be filled by the highly regarded finance director, Douglas Flint.
The boardroom upheaval is unprecedented and follows days of speculation about the machinations inside an organisation that has traditionally prided itself on seamless management succession.
Banks rarely replace two such crucial boardroom posts at the same time for fear of sparking concerns about instability. Even during the financial crisis banking groups tried to avoid such upheaval.
The 18 members of HSBC's board are not due to assemble in Shanghai until Wednesday to ratify the new management team, put together by Sir Simon Robertson, the former Goldman Sachs banker responsible for finding Green's successor.
But after days of speculation the boardroom changes leaked last night – even though the board had not met to consider them – suggest the board was riddled with differences about who should succeed Green. An HSBC spokesman was adamant last night that no decision had been made.
The appointment of Gulliver as chief executive is likely to infuriate the Liberal Democrats, who criticised Barclays when it promoted its investment banking head, Bob Diamond, to chief executive this month. Gulliver is another "casino banker" and was the highest paid banker at HSBC last year, with a package of more than £10m. The Lib Dems are concerned that by appointing investment bankers to the helm of banks, the industry is not taking seriously its concerns about reducing the risk in banks.
Ordinarily, Geoghegan would have expected the chairman's role to be his because the bank traditionally hands the job to its chief executive, although this contravenes corporate governance guidelines.
But shareholders lobbied the board not to elevate Geoghegan and it had considered whether it could break even further with tradition by appointing a non-executive director, John Thornton, another former Goldman banker, as chairman.
It was the prospect of this break with the past that forced Geoghegan into a denial that he had threatened to resign if he was not given the chairman's role.
Investors are now likely to ask questions about the way Robertson handled the succession process.
Despite the denial, Geoghegan's career had appeared to be in the balance as City sources said that the board was in an impossible position: if it appointed him to the highest profile role in banking, it might appear that the chief executive had been holding the board to ransom.
City sources said Gulliver had been agitating for promotion for some time and he is now expected to move to Hong Kong, where the bank has decided the office of the chief executive should be based.
It is almost unheard of for a finance director to leapfrog the role of chief executive and be installed as chairman. While shareholders will be reassured that the new chairman will have a firm grip on the business, they will also want a new finance director to be named quickly.
Flint is the longest serving HSBC director, and is held in high regard with just one blot in his career: the disastrous takeover of the sub-prime lender Household Bank in the US, which caused the bank's first ever profits warning. Flint and Gulliver were being groomed for promotion along with the Asian head, Sandy Flockhart.
The pairing of Flint and Gulliver will be a popular choice inside HSBC although few had believed that the hot-headed Geoghegan would be forced out after just four years as chief executive.
While the City awaits confirmation of the changes at HSBC, management upheaval is also underway at other major UK banks. At Barclays Bob Diamond will replace John Varley as chief executive next year and at Lloyds Banking Group a search is on to find a new chief executive to replace Eric Daniels who this week said he is to retire next year. |
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This horrific footage shows the sickening moment a cyclist collided with a car at high speed at a busy junction in west London.
Myles Gatherer, 29, suffered a fractured hand and acute back pain when he was involved in a collision on New Kings Road, near Parsons Green.
Footage captured from a camera attached to his helmet shows Mr Gatherer cycle around two pedestrians at a set of traffic lights before he is involved in a collision with an oncoming car.
Mr Gatherer, a civil engineer from Surbiton, said he had cycled in London for seven years but feels the roads are unsafe, suggesting some arterial routes should be closed to cars.
He has been unable to use his bike since he suffered the injuries on October 14.
He told the Standard: "I was approaching a set of traffic lights on New Kings Road at approximately 20mph.
"When approaching the green lights two pedestrians crossed in front of me.
"I took the decision to manoeuvre around the pedestrians, after I cleared the pedestrians I entered the junction.
"When I entered the junction it became clear that a vehicle located at the oncoming side of the road intended to move across my trajectory.
Mr Gatherer said following the collision he has been unable to quantify the damage to his bike because it is still being assessed.
He remains in talks with the driver involved. Police were called to the scene but the road was not closed. |
Attorney General Bob Ferguson says he will propose legislation to ban military-style assault weapons and high-capacity magazines.
Spurred by the recent killings of three teenagers in Mukilteo, state Attorney General Bob Ferguson will propose legislation next year to ban the sale of assault-style weapons and high-capacity magazines in Washington.
Ferguson announced his proposal Wednesday, flanked by the parents of a fourth Mukilteo victim, who was seriously injured, as well as dozens of Democratic legislators and officials.
The legislation, which has not yet been written, would ban semi-automatic assault-style weapons — like the AR-15 rifle that police say was used by the 19-year-old accused gunman in Mukilteo in July — as well as any magazine that holds more than 10 rounds of ammunition.
“Military-style weapons are designed for killing people,” Ferguson said. “These weapons have no place in civilian use.”
Ferguson and other speakers noted repeatedly that the accused Mukilteo shooter bought the rifle legally but wasn’t old enough to buy a beer.
Ferguson, who is up for re-election this fall, acknowledged that an assault-weapons ban would be difficult to pass. Several other recent gun-control measures have failed in the Legislature.
“I do not propose bills that I do not think I can pass,” he said. “Will this be hard? You bet. Will the gun lobby engage on this issue? Absolutely.”
Dr. Liz Raemont, whose 18-year-old son Will Kramer was seriously injured in the Mukilteo shooting, spending 17 days in the hospital, called it a “disgrace and insanity” that assault-style weapons are legal.
“They are weapons of choice for our country’s mass-murderers. These guns are not used in self-defense,” Raemont said.
Similar weapons were used in high-profile mass shootings in Newtown, Conn.; Aurora, Colo.; San Bernardino, Calif., Dallas and Orlando, among others.
Dave Workman, senior editor of The Gun Mag, a publication of the Bellevue-based Second Amendment Foundation, said that rifles of any kind are used in a very small percentage of homicides — fewer than 4 percent in Washington in 2014, according to FBI data.
“We’re talking about one 19-year-old kid who is now charged with that crime and thousands and tens of thousands of people who own these guns in Washington state who haven’t hurt anybody,” Workman said.
Seattle Police Chief Kathleen O’Toole urged the Legislature to act.
“Individuals should not have easy access to assault weapons,” O’Toole said. “This would be a wonderful prevention tool.”
Congress passed a nationwide ban on assault weapons in 1994, but it expired in 2004. Currently, seven states and the District of Columbia have some form of assault-weapon ban, according to the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence.
Jaime Smith, spokeswoman for Gov. Jay Inslee, said the governor, who voted for the 1994 assault-weapons ban while in Congress, supported Ferguson’s proposal in concept.
“The governor has a record of supporting this type of thing,” Smith said. “The attorney general’s proposal is one of many things that we should all be looking at to reduce gun violence.”
Bill Bryant, Inslee’s Republican challenger, said he would have to wait to see how “assault weapon” is defined before saying if he would support a ban. He said the state needed to focus on its mental-health system and noted there is already a ban on automatic weapons.
In a June interview with The Seattle Times, Bryant said he did not support bringing back the federal ban on assault weapons.
“We have strong protections in Washington state,” Bryant said in June. “We have strong background checks. I’m comfortable where we are right now.”
Recent efforts to strengthen gun laws in the Legislature have stalled.
A push for universal background checks on gun sales failed in 2013, before passing by ballot initiative the next year. A proposal to take guns from people deemed a danger to themselves or others — following a court hearing — got nowhere in the Legislature, but is on the ballot this year as Initiative 1491.
Senate Majority Leader Mark Schoesler, R-Ritzville, accused Ferguson of “using state resources to promote himself in an election year.”
Schoesler said the definition of “military style” was too vague and would prove unworkable, and said the focus should be on enforcing existing gun laws.
State Sen. David Frockt, a Seattle Democrat who will work with Ferguson to write the legislation, said they would look to other states that have passed similar laws when drafting the bill to ensure its constitutionality. Five of the seven states that ban assault weapons do so by explicitly listing names and types of banned guns.
In June, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to review challenges to assault weapons bans in New York and Connecticut, allowing the bans to stand. The court had previously allowed an assault-weapons ban in a Chicago suburb to stand.
Frockt emphasized that assault weapons owned prior to a bill’s passage would be grandfathered in, but could not be sold or transferred. |
Omar Alshogre is shown in the left image in July 2015 and in the right image in January 2017, one month after he got out of Syria’s Saydnaya prison. (Omar Alshogre /via Associated Press)
AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL calls it the “human slaughterhouse”: a Syrian military prison where thousands of civilians have been killed “after being repeatedly tortured and systematically deprived of food, water, medicine and medical care.” Allegations of atrocities against civilians are nothing new for the regime of Bashar al-Assad, which has subjected entire towns to starvation sieges, dropped barrel bombs full of nails or chlorine on hospitals, supermarkets and schools and pulverized a U.N. aid convoy during the recent siege of Aleppo. But the story of the Saydnaya military prison deserves attention, if only because it shows the regime’s calculated sadism and cold determination to exterminate all who oppose it.
Amnesty’s report, based on a year of research and 84 interviews with former Saydnaya prisoners, guards, judges, doctors and others, estimates that between 5,000 and 13,000 civilians were extrajudicially executed at the facility outside of Damascus between September 2011 and December 2015 — and there is no reason to believe the killings have stopped since then. These were not rebel fighters, but civilians perceived to oppose the government in some way: participants in demonstrations, dissidents, human rights advocates, journalists.
The victims were mostly abducted by security forces, tortured into confessions and rushed through “trials” that often lasted only two or three minutes, according to Amnesty. They were secretly executed in groups of 20 to 50: First blindfolded and then badly beaten, they were told only at the last moment that they were to be hanged, when a noose was slipped around their necks. Many died before execution from the horrific conditions in the prison, including starvation and rape. Amnesty said it had concluded that the detainees had been subjected to a policy of “extermination,” defined in international law as measures “calculated to bring about the destruction of part of a population.” Their bodies were dumped in mass graves.
Amnesty said it collected information on officials who sat on the execution panels and others involved in the executions, which it described as crimes against humanity. That gives reason for hope that some will eventually be brought to justice; in other parts of the world such atrocities have been successfully prosecuted decades after they occurred. In the meantime, the Saydnaya report should be considered by all those who believe that the Syrian civil war — with its endless carnage, breeding of terrorism and waves of refugees — can be brought to an end while the Assad regime remains in power.
The horrific abuses inflicted by the regime on tens of thousands of Syrians ensure that it will never be tolerated by the vast majority of the population. Its barbaric practices render it unable to compromise with people it has attempted to murder en masse. A decision by the Trump administration to tolerate or even support the butchers of Damascus will only result in more warfare, more recruits for the Islamic State and al-Qaeda, and more unconscionable murders at Saydnaya prison. |
Director Kenji Kamiyama revealed a new anime film project titled Hirune Hime ~Shiranai Watashi no Monogatari~ (Napping Princess: The Story of the Unknown Me) on Monday. The film is slated to open in Japanese theaters in 2017. The project will be the first film that Kamiyama has helmed in five years since 009 Re:Cyborg in 2012. The film's website revealed two character designs — one for the main character, a girl named Kokone Morikawa, and the other for as a sidecar that transforms into a robot named Hearts. The website also posted a background painting.
The film will be set in Okayama prefecture in 2020, just before the Tokyo Olympics. Kamiyama describes the story as one of a father and daughter that is close to his personal feelings.
I.G Port's new anime studio subsidiary Signal.MD (Tantei Team KZ Jiken Note, Anime Tamago's "Colorful Ninja Iromaki" short) will animate the film as its first anime film project. Kamiyama ( Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex , Moribito - Guardian of the Spirit , Eden of the East ) is directing the film, as well as penning the script. Satoko Morikawa ( The Cat Returns , Eden of the East , Xi Avant ) will design the characters, and Shigeto Koyama ( Michiko & Hatchin , Moribito - Guardian of the Spirit , Heroman ) is in charge of mechanical design. Animator Christophe Ferreira confirmed that he is working on the film's concept art, storyboards, and animation. Warner Bros. will distribute the film.
Source: Anime! Anime! |
Snakes in the families Boidae and Pythonidae constitute some of the most spectacular reptiles and comprise an enormous diversity of morphology, behavior, and ecology. While many species of boas and pythons are familiar, taxonomy and evolutionary relationships within these families remain contentious and fluid. A major effort in evolutionary and conservation biology is to assemble a comprehensive Tree-of-Life, or a macro-scale phylogenetic hypothesis, for all known life on Earth. No previously published study has produced a species-level molecular phylogeny for more than 61% of boa species or 65% of python species. Using both novel and previously published sequence data, we have produced a species-level phylogeny for 84.5% of boid species and 82.5% of pythonid species, contextualized within a larger phylogeny of henophidian snakes. We obtained new sequence data for three boid, one pythonid, and two tropidophiid taxa which have never previously been included in a molecular study, in addition to generating novel sequences for seven genes across an additional 12 taxa. We compiled an 11-gene dataset for 127 taxa, consisting of the mitochondrial genes CYTB, 12S, and 16S, and the nuclear genes bdnf, bmp2, c-mos, gpr35, rag1, ntf3, odc, and slc30a1, totaling up to 7561 base pairs per taxon. We analyzed this dataset using both maximum likelihood and Bayesian inference and recovered a well-supported phylogeny for these species. We found significant evidence of discordance between taxonomy and evolutionary relationships in the genera Tropidophis, Morelia, Liasis, and Leiopython, and we found support for elevating two previously suggested boid species. We suggest a revised taxonomy for the boas (13 genera, 58 species) and pythons (8 genera, 40 species), review relationships between our study and the many other molecular phylogenetic studies of henophidian snakes, and present a taxonomic database and alignment which may be easily used and built upon by other researchers. |
About
Baykok is an original horror film written by Noah Greenberg, Marcus Satory, Christopher Pierce, and Elizabeth Cronin. We are a group of senior high school students in La Crosse, WI. We began writing in February and with the four of us it has gone quite quickly. We play the main characters besides myself, I have a small role. We purchased a boom and lighting equipment, but other then that we just need a quality camera before we can begin shooting. The shooting will take two months, after that we will release it on various websites and petition it at local venues. It has been a month of long hours at Java Vino, but we finally completed a feature length screenplay and are now onto the next stage of producing this film.
The most crucial equipment that needs to be added to our list of equipment is a high quality camera with two audio inputs. We need a camera with adjustable lighting capabilities to ensure that the it is appropriate for the scene or kept constant throughout the sequences. If we could purchase, rent, or use multiple cameras the filming would go faster as well. We only have one tripod as of now too, so we might be able to use more if you can provide us with such.
Examples:
http://www.amazon.com/Canon-XA10-Professional-Camcorder-Internal/dp/B004HW7DY8/ref=lp_172421_1_18?s=photo&ie=UTF8&qid=1395790027&sr=1-18
We are also in need of a steady cam. It would immensely improve our shot capabilities on set and allow us to shoot scary scenes involving running while still creating a watchable motion picture. A steady camera can add enormous value, especially in horror flicks.
Examples:
http://www.amazon.com/Opteka-SteadyVid-SV-HD-Stabilizer-Release/dp/B00DRGQETA/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1395789491&sr=8-5&keywords=steadycam
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=&sku=552480&gclid=CPii6N3trr0CFe5aMgodm3EADw&Q=&is=REG&A=details
Our goal for this Kickstarter project is to raise enough money for a camera, any extra would be greatly appreciated and allow us to buy a steady cam or improve our equipment. Donate $250 and become an official sponsor mentioned in the credits!
Here is a video with the major characters:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2034311980/baykok-a-horror-film?ref=live |
NEW YORK – Columbus Blue Jackets goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky, Toronto Maple Leafs right wing Phil Kessel and Dallas Stars goaltender Richard Bachman have been named the NHL's "Three Stars" for the week ending April 14.
FIRST STAR – SERGEI BOBROVSKY, G, COLUMBUS BLUE JACKETS
PLAYOFF PRIMER For a complete look at the current playoff matchups and breakdown of remaining games, click here.
Join the Twitter conversation: #StanleyCup
Bobrovsky went 3-0-0 with a 0.97 goals-against average, .971 save percentage and one shutout in three games, stopping 100 of 103 shots he faced in 185 minutes of play. He opened the week by making 30 saves in a 4-0 victory over the San Jose Sharks April 9, his fourth shutout in the last month. Bobrovsky then picked up a pair of weekend wins, denying 31 shots in a 4-1 triumph over the St. Louis Blues April 12 and 39 shots, plus another two in the shootout, in a 3-2 victory over the Minnesota Wild April 13. The 24-year-old Novokuznetsk, Russia, native has allowed two or fewer goals in 16 of his last 20 appearances, including one goal or fewer in 13 of those contests. In 32 total games this season, Bobrovsky is 16-10-6 and ranks second in the League with a .932 save percentage and sixth with a 2.01 goals-against average.
SECOND STAR – PHIL KESSEL, RW, TORONTO MAPLE LEAFS
Kessel led the NHL with five goals and tied for the League lead with seven points in three games. He scored two goals, including the game-winner, and added an assist in a 4-3 triumph over the New York Rangers April 8. Kessel then recorded both of Toronto's goals in a 3-2 shootout loss to the Rangers April 10. He capped the week by posting his 13th multi-point game of the season (1-1—2) in a 5-1 victory over the Montreal Canadiens April 13. The 25-year-old Madison, Wis., native has played in 41 games this season and leads the Maple Leafs with 27 assists and 42 points.
Richard Bachman Goalie - DAL RECORD: 6-3-0
GAA: 3.18 | SVP: 0.884
Bachman posted a 3-0-0 record with a 1.08 goals-against average and .963 save percentage to help the Stars continue their push for a playoff berth. He stopped all 22 shots he faced in relief of an injured Kari Lehtonen in Dallas' 5-1 win over the Los Angeles Kings April 9. Bachman then made back-to-back weekend starts, recording 26 saves in a 5-2 victory over the Nashville Predators April 12 and 31 saves in a 2-1 win over the San Jose Sharks April 13. The 25-year-old Salt Lake City, Utah, native has played in 11 games this season, going 6-3-0 with a 3.18 goals-against average and .884 save percentage. |
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I've driven over 15k battles in beta and release combined. During all this time playing the game I've learned a few basic things. Simple rules to keep in mind, that make you a better teamplayer, a more effective player and that make you not suck.
Rule the first: Shoot the red tanks. The green ones aren't ripe yet. Under no circumstances is it ok to shoot a green tank. It doesn't matter how often he shot you, what he said about your mother, what crap day you had at work or how many entitlement issues you have: do NOT shoot green tanks. There are plenty of red ones (and a few blue ones every now and then) to go around.
Rule the second: Never block someone from backing up. This means giving people space. It doesn't matter what tank you're in and what tank he's in, he got to that spot first and as such you don't have a claim on it. He might need to back up to save his bacon, give him the room to do so.
Rule the third: Don't all commit to the same side of the map. You have a minimap for a reason. If you're in a group of 12 tanks heading to the east side of the map, it might be a good idea to stop, turn around and go west instead.
Rule the fourth: Be polite. Someone saves your sorry ass? Tell him thank you. You accidentally hit a friendly tank without meaning to? Tell him sorry. You see someone almost dead while you still have full health? Take a shot for him, allow him to get to safety. Two guns at 40% will do twice as much damage as one gun at 100%. Don't call people noob, or whatever your favorite insult is.
Rule the fifth: Kill or Cap is all the same. There is no super secret mega special bonus for killing all tanks or winning by cap. Only a tiny one for wiping out all tanks, but this one is too small to worry about and not worth the extra risk and time. There is only individual XP for killing or capping, but it all evens out in the end. The swift win is always, Always, ALWAYS preferable to the risky, drawn out hunt.
Rule the sixth: Know your job. If you're the small fish in a big pond, your job is not to charge the enemy's big fish. Your job is either find the enemy's big fish without him seeing you, annoying the enemy's big fish by taking pot shots at his tracks while your big fish is drawing his attention, or keeping the enemy's small fish off of your team's big fish's back. All these jobs award XP and credits, and all these jobs help your team win.
Rule the seventh: Driving straight into the enemy base at match start isn't scouting. This is known as suicide scouting, and in most cases is completely useless. All you'll do is tell your team where the enemy tanks are at match start, but we already know where they are: at their spawn. What we need to know is where they're at, 2 minutes after match start. The quick-and-dirty 'rule' for scouting is, creep forward through bushes until you light something up, then back off. People whine about invisible tanks? BE the invisible tank.
Rule the eight: It's a game. This should be rule the first. Way too many people forget about this simple but oh-so-important rule. World of Tanks is a GAME. It's not serious business. It's internet tanks. The price of gas won't go up when you have a bad match. Your girlfriend won't leave you if you die early on with 0 kills. Children in africa won't go less hungry if you have a good round. It's a game, nothing more.
Rule the ninth: Use the camoflage / spotting system to your advantage. Sit behind bushes, not inside them. Sit near bushes, not too far away from them. The more bushes between you and the enemy, the more difficulty he will have to spot you.
Rule the tenth: Remember that it's a team game. Not a singleplayer game. There's nothing wrong with dying if it helps your team closer to the win. There is nothing wrong with sacrificing yourself to block that enemy heavy from defending his cap. There is nothing wrong with taking a few shots to protect your teammates. If it helps achieve a better strategic position for your team, if it helps your team win, do it.
Rule the eleventh: Just because someone has 0 kills doens't mean that he's useless. Someone who knocks 99% health off of 15 tanks will have 0 kills, but be far, far from useless. Kills matter, but damage done matters just as much.
Rule the twelfth: There is no such thing as killstealing. To 'steal' something implies ownership in the first place. Ok, so, you did 99% damage to that tank when someone else finished him off. This is a GOOD thing. It means one less enemy tank, it means you get 99% of the XP for that tank's demise, and it means you don't have to wait yet another reload cycle before engaging the next enemy tank. It's a win-win for all. If I've knocked 99% off of that big mean enemy king tiger and you have a shot at him? Take the shot. By all means, kill that tank. I want you to.
Rule the thirteenth: Focus your fire. Don't spread your fire out. Five tanks at 20% will do five times the damage that one tank at 100% will do. If four tanks are fighting four tanks, the team that focuses their fire on the same target before moving to the next will always, Always win.
Rule the fourteenth: Know your tank. Don't try to hold a flank in a paper armored vehicle. Don't try to rush in a slow vehicle. Don't try to scout in a big-ass vehicle without camo. Don't sit and snipe with an inaccurate gun. Know where your tank sits in the 'holy triumvirate' of mobility, armor and firepower. Play according to your tank's strengths, while guarding for it's weaknesses. You've got a lot of armor? Spearhead the assault. You're tiny but fast? Run interference and scout. You're highly accurate with good pen, but low armor? Sit back and support. Know what guns your armor can deflect, and what armor your gun can defeat. (Thanks to anna_tankgirl and KFAJ)
Rule the fifteenth: Don't be the easy target. If you sit in the open, you die. If you drive in a straight line at a constant speed, you die. If the enemy has two tanks to shoot at: your teammate playing peek-a-boo behind cover and you next to him in the open, you die. Don't be the easy target. Make yourself as hard to hit as possible, at the very least harder than the guy near you. There is no shame in using cover, there is no shame in sitting back and sniping, there is no shame in backing up after taking your shot. Real men fight in the open, but smart men live long enough to destroy the tank that killed the 'real' man and win the match.
I hope this thread helps. |
Swedish prosecutors have begun to lay out the case against filesharing site The Pirate Bay, in one of the highest-profile copyright cases in years
One of most high-profile trials over copyright infringement in years began today in Sweden. Four men behind The Pirate Bay website – which enables people to find others willing to share audio, video, games and other files with them – appeared in court in Stockholm to answer the charge that they had assisted in copyright infringement.
The film, music and games industries are saying that the defendants not only encouraged copyright infringement but also profited from it, while the defendants argue that they hosted no shared files and therefore are not responsible for infringement.
The Pirate Bay is a "torrent" tracker, which uses the peer-to-peer file sharing technology called BitTorrent. Trackers don't host the music, video or software files themselves, but allow users to search for and download "torrent" files. Those in turn allow users to find other people who have the file they want, and to share the files amongst themselves. Each BitTorrent user with a copy of the file contributes a piece to others who are downloading it.
BitTorrent filesharing has been enormously popular: some internet service providers reckon that around 80% of the data traffic passing over their networks uses the service.
This morning, prosecutor Håkan Roswall outlined his case, accusing the four men of profiting from promoting copyright infringement via one of the largest filesharing services on the internet. An estimated 22 million people have used The Pirate Bay site.
Roswall said in court that the defendants were aware that Swedish law was changed in 2005, incorporating an EU directive that makes it illegal to download copyright protected files from the internet.
The defendants include three of the website's co-founders, Fredik Neij, Gottfrid Svartholm Warg and Peter Sunde Kolmisoppi. Prosecutors also charged one of the site's donors, Swedish dotcom millionaire Carl Lundström.
Lundström has donated money to the organisation, and the prosecution says that in 2004 he helped the other defendents configure larger numbers of computers to host the site.
If convicted, the men face two years in prison and a fine of 1.2m kronor (£98,000).
Lundström's lawyer said: "To supply a service that can be used illegally or legally is not illegal."
The first day of the trial was such an event that Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter's media blog reported that tickets to get into the courtroom were selling on the black market for 500 Swedish kronor (£41).
However, the intense interest and festival atmosphere outside of the court was not matched by high courtroom drama. Most of the day was taken up by the prosecutor showing various screenshots of The Pirate Bay site demonstrating how to download from the site. As Snild Dolkow who is translating Swedish coverage of the trial into English put it:
On the first day of trial, the prosecutor gave to me..
one screenshot of a torrent download,
another screenshot of a torrent download,
another screenshot of a torrent download,
another screenshot of a torrent download,
another screenshot of a torrent download,
another screenshot of a torrent download,
another screenshot of a torrent download,
.... and so on.
While BitTorrent is used to share copyrighted files, the technology is also commonly used to distribute software such as the open-source operating system Linux because it lessens the bandwidth costs for distributors of the software: everyone with a copy of the file contributes a piece to the overall download.
Plaintiffs in the case include Warner Bros, MGM, Colombia Pictures Industries, 20th Century Fox, Sony BMG, Universal and EMI.
Led by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, the plaintiffs are calling for damages of 120 million kronor (£9.8m). The chairman of the IFPI, John Kennedy, said: "The evidence in this case will show that The Pirate Bay is a commercial business which made substantial amounts of money for its operators, despite their claim to be only interested in spreading culture for free."
The prosecution will rely on expert witnesses, emails between the defendents and invoices sent to advertisers.
Pirate Bay held a press conference on Sunday, bringing in supporters on buses painted with pirate ship. The supporters carried banners with "ctrl+c,ctrl+v", the keyboard shortcuts for copying and pasting text, images or files.
At the press conference, defendant Gottfrid Svartholm Warg said the music and movie industry "are welcome to send me a bill". If he does get one, he said he will frame it and hang it on his wall.
Follow the coverage online via the Technology blog. |
Following the likes of Amsterdam and Madrid, the city of Ghent, Belgium is the newest Bitcoincity, a commerce center where a variety of merchants accept the cryptocurrency as payment.
To celebrate the good news and further their outreach efforts, the Ghent Bitcoincity team have decided to host a crypto crawl on April 18.
Ghent Bitcoincity team member Andreas Wauters writes that the crawl's attendees will “get an explanation about how Bitcoin works, how they can use the currency, and where in Ghent they can spend it. Using a map, they will then go out to explore the city.”
And just how many merchants will have a “B” next to their location on Ghent's map? Wauters says:
“While at the start of the year no more than three businesses accepted the digital currency in the capital of East-Flanders, that number has since grown to around 20.”
Most of the merchants on the crawl are using Bitkassa to accept crypto payments, which converts the digital money to euros and then makes a bank deposit for them (similar to BitPay). The crawl area also offers a BTM (Bitcoin Teller Machine) stationed inside Outpost Gamecenter.
But the icing on the cake is free beer—Belgian beer. Wauters continues:
“The first one hundred attendees will receive a starter kit with a pint’s worth of free bitcoins provided by Anycoin Direct, and a Bitcoin guide with exclusive discounts and some educational material and gadgets.”
Joining Wauters on the Ghent Bitcoincity team are Robbert Coeckelbergh, Roeland Creve, Wouter Glorieux, Mike Rosseel and Filip Roose, pictured below.
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By Geeta Pandey
BBC News, Bangalore
Evidence of the unpaid bill is clear for all to see Former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill still owes the exclusive Bangalore Club in southern India 13 rupees in unpaid bills. An entry in the ledger book of the club from June 1899 has "Lt WLS Churchill" named as one of 17 defaulters. Churchill arrived in Bangalore in 1896 as a young army officer and left three years later to fight in the North-West Frontier - now in Pakistan. The Bangalore club was formed in 1868 by a group of British officers. Today, it is one of India's most elite clubs, retaining much of its late 19th- and early 20th-Century splendour. 'Rarest of the rare' "He was just another young officer, no-one thought he would one day become the prime minister of Britain," club Secretary Col Krishnan Dakshina Murthy told the BBC. It is seldom that the prime minister of a country would be owing something to a club in another country
Col Krishnan Dakshina Murthy "It is seldom that the prime minister of a country would be owing something to a club in another country. It's the rarest of the rare case," he says. The ledger book with handwritten entries of bill defaulters is displayed in the main club building which is more than 150 years old. A framed photograph of a strapping young Churchill with fellow officers adorns the wall above the display. The entry in the ledger is clear and concise. It is dated 1 June 1899. "The sub committee approved the following unrecovered sums being written off," it reads. Churchill's is the 12th name from the top in a list of 17 names. His debt to the club was discovered posthumously and, after it became public, many visiting British citizens have offered to clear the dues. Col Murthy says in the last three years that he has been the club secretary, many Britons have approached him. "We tell them that history is history, it can't be rewritten," he says. Sleepy cantonment The club has no historical records of Churchill in Bangalore. Churchill (standing on extreme left) did not enjoy his time in Bangalore "We have only the old ledgers and the minutes of club meetings documented there," Col Murthy says. In the days Churchill made Bangalore his home, it was not a bustling city with bright lights. Historians say it was then a sleepy cantonment town with little to offer in the way of amusement to young soldiers. And Churchill, by his own account, found the city boring. He spent most of his time reading and collecting butterflies. In his memoir, My Early Life, he describes Bangalore as a "third rate watering place" with "lots of routine work" to do and "without society or good sport". In such circumstances, it is assumed that Churchill spent many an evening in the Bangalore club, drinking whisky which cost seven annas (less than 50 paise, or half a rupee) for a large drink and four annas (25 paise) for a small peg, or measure, of whisky. And perhaps that is how he accumulated the debt of 13 rupees - a considerable sum in those days.
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Posted on 05th December 2016
Here are the most commonly used Mongo Shell commands with example usage.
Basic Commands To do this Run this command Example Connect to local host on default port 27017 mongo mongo Connect to remote host on specified port mongo --host <hostname or ip address> --port <port no>> mongo --host 10.121.65.23 --port 23020 Connect to a database mongo <host>/<database> mongo 10.121.65.58/mydb Show current database db db Select or switch database [1] use <database name> use mydb Execute a JavaScript file load(<filename>) load (myscript.js) Display help help help Display help on DB methods db.help() db.help() Display help on Collection db.mycol.help() db.mycol.help() Show Commands Show all databases show dbs show dbs Show all collections in current database show collections show collections Show all users on current database show users show users Show all roles on current database show roles show roles CRUD Operations Insert a new document in a collection [2] db.collection.insert( <document> ) db.books.insert({"isbn": 9780060859749, "title": "After Alice: A Novel", "author": "Gregory Maguire", "category": "Fiction", "year":2016}) Insert multiple documents into a collection db.collection.insertMany([ <document1>, <document2>, ... ]) -or- db.collection.insert([ <document1>, <document2>, ... ]) db.books.insertMany( [{"isbn": 9780198321668, "title": "Romeo and Juliet", "author": "William Shakespeare", "category": "Tragedy", "year": 2008}, {"isbn": 9781505297409, "title": "Treasure Island", "author": "Robert Louis Stevenson", "category": "Fiction", "year":2014}]) -or- db.books.insert([{ "isbn":"9781853260001", "title": "Pride and Prejudice", "author": "Jane Austen", "category": "Fiction"}, {"isbn": "9780743273565", "title": "The Great Gatsby", "author": "F. Scott Fitzgerald"} ]) Show all documents in the collection db.collection.find() db.books.find() Filter documents by field value condition db.collection.find(<query>) db.books.find({"title":"Treasure Island"}) Show only some fields of matching documents db.collection.find(<query>, <projection>) db.books.find({"title":"Treasure Island"}, {title:true, category:true, _id:false}) Show the first document that matches the query condition db.collection.findOne(<query>, <projection>) db.books.findOne({}, {_id:false}) Update specific fields of a single document that match the query condition db.collection.update(<query>, <update> ) db.books.update({title : "Treasure Island"}, {$set : {category :"Adventure Fiction"}}) Remove certain fields of a single document the query condition db.collection.update(<query>, <update>) db.books.update({title : "Treasure Island"}, {$unset : {category:""}}) Remove certain fields of all documents that match the query condition db.collection.update(<query>, <update>, {multi:true} ) db.books.update({category : "Fiction"}, {$unset : {category:""}}, {multi:true}) Delete a single document that match the query condition db.collection.remove(<query>, {justOne:true}) db.books.remove({title :"Treasure Island"}, {justOne:true}) Delete all documents matching a query condition db.collection.remove(<query>) db.books.remove({"category" :"Fiction"}) Delete all documents in a collection db.collection.remove({}) db.books.remove({}) Index Create an index db.collection.createIndex( {indexField:type} )
Type 1 means ascending; -1 means descending db.books.createIndex({title:1}) Create a unique index db.collection.createIndex( {indexField:type}, {unique:true} ) db.books.createIndex( {isbn:1},{unique:true} ) Create a index on multiple fields (compound index) db.collection.createIndex({indexField1:type1, indexField2:type2, ...}) db.books.createIndex({title:1, author:-1}) Show all indexes in a collection db.collection.getIndexes() db.books.getIndexes() Drop an index db.collection.dropIndex( {indexField:type} ) db.books.dropIndex({author:-1}) Show index statistics db.collection.stats() db.books.stats() Cursor Methods Show number of documents in the collection cursor.count() db.books.find().count() Limit the number of documents to return cursor.limit(<n>) db.books.find().limit(2) Return the result set after skipping the first n number of documents cursor.skip(<n>) db.books.find().skip(2) Sort the documents in a result set in ascending or descending order of field values cursor.sort( <{field : value}> )
value = 1 for ascending, -1 for descending db.books.find().sort( {title : 1} ) Display formatted (more readable) result cursor.pretty() db.books.find({}).pretty() Comparison Operators equals to {<field>: { $eq: <value> }} db.books.find({year: {$eq: 2016}}) less than {<field>: { $lt: <value> }} db.books.find({year: {$lt: 2010}}) less than or equal to {<field>: { $lte: <value> }} db.books.find({year: {$lte: 2008}}) greater than {<field>: { $gt: <value> }} db.books.find({year: {$gt: 2014}}) greater than or equal to {<field>: { $gte: <value> }} db.books.find({year: {$gte: 2008}}) not equal to {<field>: { $ne: <value> }} db.books.find({year: {$ne: 2008}}) value in {<field>: { $in: [ <value1>, <value2>, ... }} db.books.find({year: {$in: [2008, 2016]}}) value not in {<field>: { $nin: [ <value1>, <value2>, ... }} db.books.find({year: {$nin: [2008, 2016]}}) Logical Operators OR { $or: [<expression1>, <expression2>,...]} db.books.find( { $or: [{year: {$lte: 2008}}, {year: {$eq: 2016}}]} ) AND { $and: [<expression1>, <expression2>,...]} db.books.find( { $and: [{year: {$eq: 2008}}, {category: {$eq: "Fiction"}}]} ) NOT { $not: {<expression>}} db.books.find( {$not: {year: {$eq: 2016} }}) NOR { $nor: [<expression1>, <expression2>,...]} db.books.find( { $nor: [{year: {$lte: 2008}}, {year: {$eq: 2016}}]} ) Element Operators Match documents that contains that specified field {<field>: {$exists:true}} db.books.find( {category: {$exists: true }}) Match documents whose field value is of the specified BSON data type {<field>: {$type:value}} db.books.find( {category: {$type: 2 }})
[1] Databases are created on the fly and will actually be created when you insert something into it.
[2] Collections are created on the fly when you insert first document into it. |
"I'll try to give you something a little bit more than I said before: we're focused on the characters we announced today."
Marvel's Peter Phillips, the company's head of digital entertainment, is humoring me. I'm asking the questions Marvel fans want to know the answers to after Disney's unveiling yesterday of Disney Infinity Marvel Superheroes, and we both know he's not free to answer them. I try every strategy I know: hypotheticals, generalities, roundabout re-phrasings—"Are there licensing issues like in the film world or could the X-Men potentially appear?" "Is there a sense that characters like Deadpool and The Punisher can't be included because it's a family game?" etc. Phillips isn't budging, but he seems to sympathize.
"There's really no limit to the conversations we want to keep having," he says. "There's always more to come, and this game is very broad, for fans of all ages. So you can sort of broaden that to think there's no limit. We can do anything!"
Disney Infinity sold gangbusters last year, moving 3 million starter packs and accruing an estimated $500 million in global sales, which Disney was all too happy to brag about before its big reveal yesterday at the storied Cinerama Dome theater in Hollywood. For a first-year franchise, Disney Interactive President James Pitaro pointed out during the company's presentation, that's pretty impressive.
Naturally Disney went all out for this announcement, including trotting out Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. star Clark Gregg to introduce "Agent Pitaro" and, later, to share banter with Marvel Chief Creative Officer Joe Quesada. Gregg good-naturedly complained of his character Agent Coulson's absence from Thor: The Dark World and Captain America: The Winter Soldier, but confessed, "The one thing I'm not in that I would like to be in is Dancing With the Stars." Quesada replied that the ABC reality show has already been infiltrated by agents of Hydra.
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It was funny, but it made me think about how Disney Infinity itself is about to be invaded by Marvel die-hards. Disney is no stranger to dealing with the fervor of dedicated Marvel fans, and Disney Infinity already has its own worshippers. But in addition to the six Avengers—The Hulk, Captain American, Thor, Black Widow, Hawkeye, and Iron Man—revealed yesterday, there are at least a dozen more Marvel characters coming. And people desperately want to hear that their favorites are being included.
Samuel L. Jackson's Nick Fury and Guardians of the Galaxy's Rocket Raccoon and Groot made appearances in game footage and trailers, among many others, including Marvel villains Loki and MODOK. Even Spider-Man appeared briefly. Disney Infinity is not a film, so the licensing troubles that have kept Spidey, the X-Men and others from appearing in Marvel's well-received silver screen soirees don't apply. Peter Parker's presence in Infinity 2.0 proves that; so might Wolverine, Magneto and co. appear too?
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Phillips and Avalanche Software Vice President and General Manager John Blackburn dodged the question, so naturally I asked about Star Wars next.
Will next year's inevitable Disney Infinity 3 sport a subtitle like "Jedi Knights" or "Heroes of the Force"? To borrow a notion from Kotaku commenter WFROSE , is there a game in the works at Avalanche Software in which Nick Fury could fight side-by-side with Mace Windu in a strange meta-convergence of Sam Jacksons?
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Is there a game in the works at Avalanche Software in which Nick Fury could fight side-by-side with Mace Windu in a strange meta-convergence of Sam Jacksons?
"We got the question a few times today," Blackburn said, finally opening up a bit. "Last year at this time, when we were [announcing Disney Infinity], the question was, 'Hey when's Marvel going to be in here?' Right? You know, I think it's this whole thing of last year we were working on this and I couldn't tell anybody about it. I was dying to be like, 'Oh god!' I'd love for everybody to know, right? But I think at the end of the day we're here to focus on [Marvel]. This is a big deal for us."
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But the Windu-Fury showdown "would be awesome," he admitted, laughing.
Marvel was the focus, yes, but Blackburn and his Avalanche cohort John Vignocchi spent some time on stage talking about Infinity 2.0's new features as well. Chief among them are new gameplay scenarios that embrace elements from genres like tower defense and dungeon-crawling, with more to come. I asked Blackburn and Phillips if they consider Disney Infinity to be "every game in one," or in other words, the only game a family needs; will it ultimately embody every genre and play style?
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Blackburn, who oversees development of Infinity, said they see it simply as a platform that's always growing and will ultimately have something for everyone. "I think about it more from the point of view of this is a platform, and it is going to be an expanding platform for us," he said. "If we're covering a lot of different content that the company has to offer, there's always something that is hopefully going to be interesting to somebody." And if it replaces ten other games in the process, all the better, obviously.
In addition Infinity 2.0 includes more robust creation tools, with detailed interiors and new mission-building features, and new additions like procedurally generative "brushes" and charming little automated "builders" make it easy for kids to be proud of their creations. On stage during the event Blackburn told a story about his five-year-old nephew, who preened over an adorable but pitifully sparse level he'd created. "That was a great moment," Blackburn said. But his nephew and other kids will find the creation tools in 2.0 much more enabling.
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Still, the new characters were front and foremost. They all have special movement systems unique to their powers, including flight, super jumps and "wall-crawling." They have special combat skills as well, and players will customize them through brand new skill trees.
"We're a brand that has over 8,000 characters, so there's no shortage of ideas."
In addition this sequel won't only feature Marvel characters; it wasn't exactly clear during the presentation, but Blackburn and Phillips confirmed that more general Disney-themed characters will be announced as well, likely during or after E3 in June. "We're a brand that has over 8,000 characters, so there's no shortage of ideas," Phillips said.
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They also confirmed that everything will carry over from the first game, and Blackburn explained that there will be new reasons to pick up old characters again—they get access to the skill and stat trees new to Disney Infinity 2.0, albeit in truncated form.
So where does it end? Some players have wondered why Marvel is holding back; why not please everyone by including every niche character imaginable? Sticking to well-loved characters ensures the most resonance with Marvel and Disney's massive fanbases. And with the retail limitations inherent to the game's reliance on physical figurines, they can't exactly churn out hundreds of characters overnight if they want them to fly off shelves.
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That also helps explain why more game makers aren't getting into the genre dominated (and solely inhabited by) Infinity and Activision's Skylanders. "Having walked the walk for the past couple years—it's hard!" Blackburn said, laughing. Phillips added, "This is not a slam dunk. It's hard to do it and do it well."
Arguably the other biggest news, though not exactly unexpected, was that Disney Infinity 2.0 will be available on Xbox One and PS4 as well as Xbox 360, PS3, Wii U, iOS, and PC. The current-gen versions will have superior graphics, of course, but Blackburn confirmed that the Xbox One and PS4's more powerful hardware will also enable those versions of the game to support more complex Toy Boxes than their last-gen counterparts. That means more toys, of course, and likely other enhancements, though the exact details aren't nailed down yet, Blackburn shared.
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There are plenty of questions left to ask about Disney Infinity Marvel Superheroes. Sam Jackson appeared on video as S.H.I.E.L.D. Director Nick Fury at the beginning and end of the event to discuss the importance of "Project Infinity," but his closing remarks were cut off—just as he was about to reveal more of the incoming Marvel characters—with some static and a message about E3.
Until then all we can do is speculate, so have at it: what Marvel heroes and villains do you want to see in Infinity 2.0? Considering Black Widow is the only female character in the spotlight so far, I'd love to see Gamora, which seems likely, given the probability of prominent Guardians tie-in content. What about you? |
Yet the intent of Congress in passing the law, as laid out in the House Judiciary Committee Report to Congress, is hard to ignore. Noted Kagan: "We have a whole series of cases which suggest the following ... that when Congress targets a group that is not everybody's favorite group in the world, that we look at those cases with some -- even if they're not suspect -- with some rigor to say, do we really think that Congress was doing this for uniformity reasons, or do we think that Congress's judgment was infected by dislike, by fear, by animus, and so forth? I guess the question that this statute raises, this statute that does something that's really never been done before, is whether that sends up a pretty good red flag that that's what was going on."
What was going on, precisely, in 1996? Let's take a look at the section of the report in question, explaining a rationale for DOMA (I've italicized the red flags I see):
H. R. 3396 ADVANCES THE GOVERNMENT'S INTEREST IN DEFENDING TRADITIONAL NOTIONS OF MORALITY There are, then, significant practical reasons why government affords preferential status to the institution of heterosexual marriage. These reasons -- procreation and child-rearing -- are in accord with nature and hence have a moral component. But they are not -- or at least are not necessarily -- moral or religious in nature. For many Americans, there is to this issue of marriage an overtly moral or religious aspect that cannot be divorced from the practicalities. It is true, of course, that the civil act of marriage is separate from the recognition and blessing of that act by a religious institution. But the fact that there are distinct religious and civil components of marriage does not mean that the two do not intersect. Civil laws that permit only heterosexual marriage reflect and honor a collective moral judgment about human sexuality. This judgment entails both moral disapproval of homosexuality, moral conviction that heterosexuality better comports with traditional (especially Judeo-Christian) morality. As Representative Henry Hyde, the Chairman of the Judiciary Committee, stated during the Subcommittee markup of H.R. 3396: ''[S]ame-sex marriage, if sanctified by the law, if approved by the law, legitimates a public union, a legal status that most people...feel ought to be illegitimate.... And in so doing it trivializes the legitimate status of marriage and demeans it by putting a stamp of approval...on a union that many people...think is immoral.'' It is both inevitable and entirely appropriate that the law should reflect such moral judgments. H.R. 3396 serves the government's legitimate interest in protecting the traditional moral teachings reflected in heterosexual-only marriage laws.
That is one heck of a statement of congressional intent -- and one made even more notable by Salon's revelation during the Lewinsky scandal in 1998 that Hyde had, as a married man in the 1960s, had an extramarital affair. That story? "This hypocrite broke up my family," a j'accuse against Hyde by the husband of the woman Hyde had had an affair with, Fred Snodgrass. In the piece, Snodgrass's daughter also relays her mother's opinions, observing of Hyde, "She knows she wasn't his first [mistress] and she wasn't his last." |
The Conservative government has announced further sanctions against Ukrainian rebels and an array of Russian arms, financial and energy companies thought to be assisting them.
Eight Ukrainians in leadership positions in the rebel-held Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine are the targets of the new sanctions, as are armed separatist groups known as the Donetsk People's Republic and the Luhansk People's Republic.
Russian arms, financial and energy companies are also facing further Canadian sanctions.
"The measures we are announcing today include sanctions against a broad range of entities from Russia’s arms industry, as well as from its financial and energy sectors. Our unequivocal aim is to further increase economic and political pressure on the Putin regime," Prime Minister Stephen Harper said in a written statement.
Canada has imposed sanctions on two Ukrainian groups: the Donetsk People’s Republic and the Luhansk People’s Republic.
Harper said "the armed separatist groups... with direct support from Russia, have engaged in egregious acts against the armed forces of Ukraine, international monitors deployed to the area, and the civilian population."
“As we have seen with the downing of Malaysian Airlines Flight MH17 last week, the Putin regime’s failure to end its support to armed separatist groups constitutes a very real threat to international peace and security.
"We are ready for further actions if the Putin regime’s military aggression continues," Harper said.
Here is a list of today's sanctions by the Canadian government:
Ukrainian individuals
Vladimir Antyufeyev, so-called deputy prime minister of the Donetsk People’s Republic.
Marat Bashirov, so-called prime minister of the council of ministers of the Luhansk People’s Republic.
Alexandr Yurivich Borodai, so-called prime minister of the Donetsk People’s Republic.
Yuriy Ivakin, so-called minister of internal affairs of the Luhansk People’s Republic.
Alexandr Alexsandrovich Kalyussky, so-called deputy prime minister for social affairs of the Donetsk People’s Republic.
Aleksey Karyakin, so-called supreme council chair of the Luhansk People’s Republic.
Alexandr Khryakov, so-called information and mass communications minister of the Donetsk People’s Republic.
Vasyl Nikitin, so-called vice prime minister of the council of ministers of the Luhansk People’s Republic.
Russian companies
Almaz-Antey
Federal State Unitary Enterprise State Research and Production Enterprise Bazalt
Gazprombank OAO
JSC Concern Radio-Electronic Technologies
JSC Concern Sozvezdie
JSC MIC NPO Mashinostroyenia
Kalashnikov Concern
KBP Instrument Design Bureau
Novatek
Vnesheconombank
Ukrainian groups
Donetsk People’s Republic
Luhansk People’s Republic
Canadian aid to Ukraine
Ukraine's ambassador to Canada, meantime, appeared to dial back published reports of comments he made complaining that Canada has failed to deliver millions in financial aid that it's promised to the eastern European country.
Vadym Prystaiko was quoted as saying that he was "at the end of my patience" with Canada.
But on Thursday, his office issued a statement saying he was "grateful for Canada's commitment, the support Canada has provided and Prime Minister Harper's strong stand which has led the international response to the crisis facing Ukraine."
Canada had pledged Ukraine more than $200 million in loans and loan guarantees, as well as communications devices, medical supplies and military equipment that includes body armour.
Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird, who is currently on an official visit to Mongolia, said on Monday Canada was ready to level more sanctions against Russia in the wake of the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 in Eastern Ukraine.
While Baird didn’t directly blame Russia for shooting down the plane, he said it must take some responsibility. “The Kremlin may not have pulled the trigger, but it certainly loaded the gun and put it in the murderer’s hand,” he said.
Baird told reporters new sanctions would be introduced against individuals and entities, as well as entire sectors of the Russian economy.
He said they would be similar to those already imposed by the U.S. |
The overthrow of former President Mohammad Mursi by the Egyptian army is worse than destroying Islam’s holiest shrine, the Kaaba, Muslim Brotherhood’s Supreme Leader Mohammad Badie said Thursday.
“I swear by God that what [Gen. Abdel-Fattah] al-Sissi did in Egypt is more criminal than if he had carried an ax and demolished the holy Kaaba, stone by stone,” Badie said.
Badie’s analogy compares the popularly-backed military overthrow of Mursi on July 3 to a hypothetical destruction of the Kaaba, the cube-shaped shrine in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, which is faced by Muslims worldwide in their daily prayers.
His statement appeared to channel religious sentiments against a call by military chief for a popular mandate to quash “violence and terrorism.”
The Muslim Brotherhood fear that Sisi is planning a possible bloody crackdown against them and that he is calling for mass rallies to grant him popular cover for that.
The statement by the Brotherhood’s leader takes to a new level the enmity between the camp of Islamists led by the Brotherhood and their opponents, including liberals, moderate Muslim and secular Egyptians and minority Christians.
Badie, who has an arrest warrant against him for allegedly inciting violence, also called Sissi a “traitor” and urged him to repent.
Islamists also planned pro-Mursi rallies on Friday, raising fears of more street battles.
(With the Associated Press)
Last Update: Friday, 26 July 2013 KSA 00:17 - GMT 21:17 |
Protests were held across Canada against the government's proposed anti-terrorism legislation, which would give police much broader powers and allow them to detain terror suspects, and give new powers to Canada's spy agency.
NDP leader Tom Mulcair joined hundreds in Montreal in a march through the city. One protester held up a poster saying "C-51 is an act of terror," while others carried red "Stop Harper" signs.
The protest planned to end in front of the riding office of Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau. Trudeau has said his caucus will vote in favour of the bill.
NDP MPs Craig Scott and Linda Duncan were part of the crowd gathered outside Canada Place in downtown Edmonton. Some placards called the bill "criminalization of dissent" and warned "big brother is watching you."
Protesters said they are worried the bill will be used to harass or silence critics of the government's environmental and aboriginal policies.
It's just so much ambiguity. It leaves people open [and] vulnerable. - Edmonton protester Holley Kofluk
Protester Holley Kofluk said the bill was too vague and "lacked specificity."
"That’s what missing. It’s just so much ambiguity. It leaves people open [and] vulnerable."
Dubbed "Defend our Freedom," organizers say Bil C-51 is dangerous, reckless and unacceptable.
In a statement to CBC News on Saturday afternoon, a spokesman for Public Safety Minister Steven Blaney said the government "rejects the argument that every time we talk about security, our freedoms are threatened."
"Canadians understand that their freedom and security go hand in hand [and] expect us to protect both, and there are safeguards in this legislation to do exactly that," said Jeremy Laurin.
In Toronto, hundreds gathered at city hall to speak out against the proposed legislation, with many holding signs, chanting and drumming in protest of the bill.
"I'm really worried about democracy. This country is going in a really bad direction. [Prime Minister Stephen] Harper's taking it in a really bad direction," said protester Stuart Basden .
A young boy demonstrates to protest on a national day of action against Bill C-51, the government's proposed anti-terrorism legislation, in Montreal. (Graham Hughes/Canadian Press)
"Freedom to speak out against the government is probably at jeopardy ... Even if you're just posting stuff online you could be targeted. So it's a really terrifying bill."
According to StopC51.ca, more than 55 "non-partisan" events were slated to take place over the weekend, with protests outside the riding offices of 13 Conservative MPs, including Industry Minister James Moore and Ontario Progressive Conservative leadership candidate Patrick Brown.
Critics of the bill will also gather outside the downtown Ottawa office block that houses the Prime Minister's Office.
A media advisory issued on Friday stated that more than 30 "leading digital rights, pro-democracy and civil liberties organizations" are backing the movement, including OpenMedia, LeadNow, Amnesty International Canada, the BC Freedom of Information and Privacy Association, Canadian Journalists for Free Expression, the Council for Canadians, Tunnelbear and Women Against Stephen Harper.
CSIS power boost, privacy concerns fuel protests
According to the website, the key concerns driving Saturday's protests are the additional powers to be given to the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), the potential violations of charter rights and provisions to increase the sharing of information among federal departments and agencies, as well as law enforcement.
"This bill disproportionately targets indigenous communities, environmental activists, dissidents, and Muslims, many of whom are already subjected to questionable and overreaching powers by security officials, [and] will make it easier and ostensibly lawful for government to continue infringing upon the rights of peaceful people," the website states.
'Day of Action' online
There's a major online component to the campaign as well, including multiple petitions, specially designed anti-C-51 avatars for Facebook and Twitter and an embeddable video produced by LeadNow.ca.
A letter-to-the-editor generator will automatically send your message to local media outlets based on your postal code.
Although the app doesn't actually fill in the text field, it does include "key points to consider," as well as a "pro tip" that "mentioning the name of your local MP or senator in your letter makes it far more likely they'll take notice and respond."
Justice Minsiter Peter MacKay (left), Public Safety Minister Steven Blaney, CSIS director Michel Coulombe and RCMP Commissioner Bob Paulson fielded questions on the proposed anti-terror bill during a joint appearance before the House public safety committee on Tuesday. (Adrian Wyld/Canadian Press)
The planned rallies were a topic in the House during question period on Friday.
"We have had 12 witnesses appear before the standing committee on public safety and national security this week — witnesses from a wide variety of backgrounds and perspectives," noted New Democrat public safety critic Randall Garrison.
"Every single one of them has highlighted serious problems with Bill C-51," he said. "The bill is so bad that Canadians in over 50 towns and cities across the country will be rallying against it this Saturday."
He called on Blaney, Justice Minister Peter MacKay "or anyone over there" on the government side of the chamber to "start listening to Canadians and pull back on the bill."
Information sharing defended
In response, Blaney's parliamentary secretary, Roxanne James, said she was "very pleased" to respond to concerns raised by one of the committee witnesses — Assembly of First Nations National Chief Perry Bellegarde — who told the committee he believed the expanded definition of terrorism could result in First Nations people being put under state surveillance.
"Most people across Canada believe that if one branch of government comes across information pertinent to the national security of this country and the safety and security of our citizens, then that branch of government should be able to relay that information to our national security agencies," she said.
Hearings are expected to continue when the House reopens for business on March 23. (Jennifer Choi/ CBC)
"That is precisely what Bill C-51 would do, and I was pleased to be able to answer those concerns."
The House public safety committee, which began its review of the bill on Tuesday, has already heard from several of the bill's most outspoken critics.
In addition to Bellegarde, MPs have been briefed on potential problems with the bill by Ron Atkey, a former chair of the Security Intelligence Review Committee, which is charged with keeping an eye on CSIS, as well as professors Kent Roach and Craig Forcese, who are conducting a "real time" legal analysis of the bill.
Hearings are expected to continue when the House reopens for business on March 23. |
Enlarge Image Joe Raedle/Getty Images
Silicon Valley investor Peter Thiel is a contrarian no longer.
The only tech angel to publicly sing the praises of Donald Trump during the presidential campaign, Thiel is set to reap big dividends for his views. Thiel told The New York Times on Wednesday that he will have the president-elect's ear on matters of technology and innovation at least as an informal adviser.
Trump's win on Election Day surprised both presidential campaigns and the country as a whole. The vast majority of polls and predictions showed Clinton easily winning the presidency. Silicon Valley and many of its top executives were vocal supporters of Clinton, who aligned with business and social issues generally backed by Silicon Valley as a whole.
Thiel was one of the few in the tech industry to defy the trend and support Trump, including with a $1.25 million pledge to the campaign.
Now playing: Watch this: Peter Thiel touts Trump's accomplishments at RNC
Thiel, a billionaire, Facebook board member and PayPal co-founder, made his fortune backing internet staples such as Facebook when those companies were mere startups with big dreams.
His support of Trump earned him a prime speaking slot at the Republican National Convention, where he said Trump would be the right person to bring Silicon Valley's level of success to the US as a whole. In that speech, Thiel conjured up a golden age when innovation and opportunity existed throughout the United States and not just in a West Coast tech hub, an era when the US was preparing to send a man to the moon and "the future felt limitless."
Thiel also gave a pro-Trump speech October 31, reiterating his support for the Republican presidential candidate and arguing the nominee had tapped into a wellspring of discontent across the country.
"What Trump represents isn't crazy," Thiel during that speech. "It isn't going away."
He did not immediately return CNET's request for comment.
First published November 10, 8:23 a.m. PT.
Update, 10:45 a.m. PT: Background added. |
European
Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker spelled it all out for President
Petro Poroshenko very clearly in a letter on Nov. 5. He reminded the Ukrainian
president that there were certain prerequisites for approval of a visa-free
regime with the EU: namely anti-corruption reforms and the adoption of
legislation to prohibit discrimination in the work place on the basis of sexual
orientation.
Far from
being seen as a beacon of human rights victories, Ukraine has long struggled
with a stigma against homosexuals, and the most recent gay rights protest over
the summer ended in violence and bloodshed after homophobes attacked the march.
The attack
was a stark reminder of the Soviet Union’s imprint on Ukraine. Homosexuality
was a criminal offense in the USSR, and even after its collapse, “archaic”
takes on the issue have maintained a tight grip on large portions of society,
as the publicist and commentator Vitaly Portnikov said. The EU’s encouragement
to change the Labor Code was a way to shed that skin and move closer to
European norms.
The anti-discrimination
bill submitted to parliament was prescribed in the EU-Ukraine Action Plan on
visa liberalization. Not only did the legislation lay out protections for
homosexuals; it also prohibited discrimination on the basis of skin color and
religious belief.
But with a
suspiciously large number of lawmakers absent during the vote and many
abstentions, the bill failed to pass, with a mere 117 votes out of the required
226.
Political
consultant Taras Beresovets said that even liberal lawmakers voted against,
fearing that homophobic sentiment among voters might hurt their support.
Some
lawmakers cited “Christian” or “conservative” values for their reluctance to
vote for the anti-discrimination amendment to the Labor Code. Some argued that
approval of the bill would lead to the legalization of gay marriage – a claim
that drew indignation from gay rights and human rights activists.
“Lawmakers
chose homophobia over a visa-free regime,” said Bogdan Globa, an activist and
aide to the head of the parliament’s committee on human rights.
While
he was not surprised by the decision, Globa said, he was “shocked by the level
of deceit and manipulation” in lawmakers’ arguments.
“When
they explained their votes against, they said that the bill could lead to legalization
of gay marriages. Yet this anti-discrimination norm is part of the Labor Code,
it’s in an entirely different sphere,” he said.
“We’ve
really (wasted) our chance of a visa-free regime, because it would be
impossible to adopt a new Labor Code now, over such a short period of time,” he
told the Kyiv Post.
Zoryan
Kis of Amnesty International Ukraine agreed that parliament’s decision would
likely prove detrimental to the visa-free regime.
“This was one of the simplest tasks to fulfill (in the
action plan from the EU). It wasn’t hurting somebody’s corrupt interests or
providing biometric passports, all it required was that lawmakers vote for this
one bill. It was so easy. And yet they couldn’t do it because of their own fear,” Kis said.
According
to him, the bill’s rejection was not just a sign of homophobia among lawmakers,
but also of a lingering Soviet mentality.
The
European Union had set requirements for Ukraine as far back as 2010, years
before the EuroMaidan Revolution and subsequent war with Russia that turned the
country’s economy upside down. But the amendments had taken on new importance
in light of Ukraine’s determination to move closer to the EU.
There was
resistance to the bill from the get-go, however, with some lawmakers having
asked the EU in September 2013 to waive the anti-discrimination requirement.
For Kis of
Amnesty International, the bill’s rejection was a painful reminder that even
after ordinary Ukrainians gave their lives to forge a new country during the
EuroMaidan Revolution, the legacy of the former Kremlin-backed government was
still deciding the fate of the next generation.
“The authorities
did everything they could to not adopt this law. Just like the previous
government, they are using various methods to block the adoption of such norms,”
he said.
Worse yet,
he said, the argument made by current lawmakers against the amendment was the
same one used by Yanukovych ally and former Prime Minister Mykola Azarov during
his time in office – a sign that not much has changed with the new government.
David
Stulik, a spokesperson for the EU in Kyiv, told the Kyiv Post that the
recommendations for Kyiv had been very “clear” in the action plan, hinting that
the bill’s rejection could jeopardize visa-free regime plans.
Stulik
stopped short of offering any definite prognosis, however.
Portnikov
said the anti-discrimination amendment, even if passed, wouldn’t really signal
an end to discrimination.
“To
really reject discrimination against sexual minorities, we need society to
discriminate against homophobia itself, and to introduce criminal liability for
homophobia,” Portnikov wrote.
He was
skeptical that the anti-discrimination requirement by the EU was meant to eradicate
stigma. Portnikov, who is openly gay, argued on his Facebook page that the
anti-discrimination requirement could be seen as an attempt to prevent gay
asylum seekers to the EU citing a lack of anti-discrimination legislation.
Regardless, activists agreed that the bill’s
rejection would only damage Ukraine’s reputation.
“Ukraine agreed to this plan itself, and now it’s
behaving like a bad student who, after not doing their homework, says, ‘Oops, I
didn’t know we were supposed to do this task as well,’” Kis said.
Break down of the parliament’s vote on the anti-discrimination norm
Parliament factions Votes for Votes against + abstain Yes vote in percent of present MPs Petro Poroshenko Bloc 78 40 66% People’s Front 22 45 33% Batkivshchyna 7 5 58% Samopomich 4 13 24% Radical Party 0 17 0% Former Party of Regions factions 0 68 0%
Petro Poroshenko’s Bloc’s and Batkivshchyna of the former Prime Minister
Yulia Tymoshenko were providing most votes for the anti-discrimination bill,
followed by the other government coalition partners. Samopomich MP Olena Sotnyk told the Kyiv Post that the low support provided by her faction was a protest against the norm being presented in breach of procedure. Opposition parties didn’t provide
any votes for the bill.
Staff writer Allison Quinn can be
reached at a.caseyquinn@gmail.com
Staff writer Johannes Wamberg Andersen can be reached at johannes.wa@gmail.com |
CLEVELAND, Ohio — All of Fox News’ primetime lineup is willing to walk out of the network with chief executive and chairman Roger Ailes if he is pushed out by Rupert Murdoch and his family, Breitbart News has confirmed.
Bill O’Reilly, Sean Hannity, Greta Van Susteren, Shepard Smith, Bret Baier, Eric Bolling, Neil Cavuto, Kimberly Guilfoyle, Laura Ingraham, Geraldo Rivera, Juan Williams, Jeanine Pirro, Bo Dietl, Monica Crowley, all of the Fox and Friends hosts, and at least 50 Fox News contributors are willing to depart the network if Ailes is ousted, and leave with him to form a new network, one of the network’s anchors told Breitbart News late Tuesday.
All of them stand against Megyn Kelly, and all of them stand with Roger Ailes.
This development, which has been confirmed to Breitbart News by multiple network sources, effectively boxes in those who want to remove Ailes. Either they can throw all in behind Megyn Kelly—in which case they would have to forfeit most of the rest of the network—or they can stand with the hardworking anchors and news personalities at Fox News.
“If Fox wants to become the ‘all about Megyn Network,’ that’s fine,” one top Fox News host said. “We stand with Roger. And real anger has emerged that the so-called Megyn incident happened 10 years ago. The consensus among the hosts and contributors is: ‘Why didn’t she say anything then? Really, the same woman that posed half naked in GQ? The same woman on Howard Stern saying what?’”
A second top Fox News Channel host told Breitbart News: “If Megyn Kelly wants to leave, we are fine with that. Good riddance.”
The fact that nearly the entire network is willing to walk out over this, and support Ailes over Kelly is significant in that they have banded together to show their strength. It will harder than ever now for the Murdochs to side with Kelly over Ailes, especially with the lack of any evidence of her allegations–and the fact that Kelly waited 10 years to say anything about this evidence-less supposed incident.
Most people at the Fox News Channel are extraordinarily offended that Kelly made Tuesday—the day Donald J. Trump because the official Republican nominee—all about herself. Multiple sources can’t believe she did this today of all days.
Other network sources say that this all about Megyn Kelly’s plans to get a Hillary Clinton interview, but she has already lost out on that front as both Baier and O’Reilly have gotten such interviews ahead of her–and both of theirs were better than she could ever do.
Trump, the billionaire real estate developer who has shaken the political world’s grounding in the United States for over a year now, has officially won the Republican nomination. But what is the biggest story in American politics, as Trump went from presumptive to actual GOP presidential nominee on Tuesday night? That one of America’s two major political parties has officially selected a businessman who has never held elected office before as its official presidential nominee, an earth-shattering development in American politics? No, it’s Megyn Kelly, who has yet again found a way to worm her way to the top of the news cycle ahead of the potential next President of the United States of America.
Kelly has for a year battled with Trump, throughout the Republican primaries and since then. She came at him with roundly criticized gotcha questions in the first GOP presidential debate here last August. She touted reports falsely accusing him of raping his ex-wife, and then didn’t back down from them. She regularly sparred with Trump over the ensuing next several months, and used her show to promote the so-called “Never Trump” collective—something that as shown here at the GOP convention as Trump easily wrapped up the nomination never amounted to an actual “movement.”
Trump skipped a debate in Iowa over Fox News’ decision to keep her on as an anchor. And she pushed the now widely discredited narrative that Corey Lewandowski, Trump’s now former campaign manager, somehow assaulted Michelle Fields. Police even wasted taxpayer resources to investigate the matter.
So, sure enough, as Trump wins the nomination, Kelly finds a way to commandeer the news cycle to put herself not just in the middle of the story—but to make all the news about her. Over the past few weeks, unsubstantiated allegations have emerged from Gretchen Carlson—a now former Fox News anchor—that Roger Ailes, the network’s chief executive and chairman, allegedly made sexual advances against her.
The news cycle on that matter seemed to fizzle away heading into the GOP convention here, though, as Carlson provided no evidence to back up her thus far unsubstantiated allegations while evidence of anti-Fox News and political biases from her attorney did surface. Carlson’s attorney, as Breitbart News uncovered, made tens of thousands of dollars in political donations to progressive Democrats with a penchant for publicly criticizing Fox News and Ailes. Meanwhile, a bevy of current and former Fox News anchors and contributors of their own volition began publicly speaking out in defense of Ailes ranging from Greta Van Susteren to Maria Bartiromo to Kimberly Guilfoyle and many more.
As Ailes seemed to be out of the woods, and the story seemed to be dying down, one question lingered as 15,000 mainstream media reporters—all of whom despise the Fox News Channel and Ailes—descended on Cleveland: Why hadn’t Megyn Kelly said anything?
Then, all of a sudden, Kelly dropped the bomb.
In comments to the outside firm investigating the matter, according to New York Magazine’s Gabriel Sherman—an anti-Ailes agitator in the mainstream media—Kelly alleged that Ailes sexually harassed her. She and her attorneys have, sources say, manipulated her way in a manner that rival Claire Underwood of the hit Netflix drama House of Cards. “Even her haircut looks like Robin Wright [the actress who plays the ruthless First Lady in the series],” said one source in Cleveland. “She’s a woman who not just will do anything for power, but anything to make it all about her.” |
If you open Twitter on the desktop right now you may get a notification that the company is updating is privacy policy.
The notification reads: We're updating our privacy policy to bring you a more personalized Twitter experience. We'll soon be making Twitter more relevant by using your visits to sites with Twitter content. And we've given you even more control over your data".
The prompt has a big "sounds good" button, and a smaller "review settings" link. The latter links directly to the "Personalization and Data" section of the Twitter settings.
Time to check your Twitter settings
It may be a good time to check those settings, and others right now. The personalization and data page on Twitter is all about advertisement and tracking.
The following options are available on the page:
Personalize ads -- You won't see fewer ads if you disable that, but the ads may be less relevant.
Personalize based on your apps -- Personalizes the experience based on apps you use on your devices.
Personalize across all your devices -- Enables personalization on all devices you sign in.
Personalize based on the places you've been -- Uses location information for personalization.
Track where you see Twitter content across the web -- May use sites you visit for personalization.
Share data through select partnerships -- If enabled, has Twitter share data "through selected partnerships".
You can use the disable all button at the top to turn them all off, or uncheck some only.
What is probably more pressing right now is that some users reported on Twitter that the company has enabled location tagging without asking.
You can verify if that is the case by going to the Safety settings on Twitter to look up the status of the Tweet location preference. If it is checked, a location is added to your tweets automatically.
I checked the preference, and it was not enabled by default on my system. Some users stated that this is being rolled out, and that it takes time to land on all user devices.
I don't really know whether that is the case or not, but you may want to check the setting just to make sure that you don't share your location with your tweets unknowingly.
You may want to go through the settings there as well, just to make sure that all are configured the way you want them to be.
Closing Words
If Twitter really turned on location tagging without user permission, that would be a big no-no and could backfire. The company did show a prompt on my device to inform me of personalization changes, but did not change the location tagging preference on the device. It is best to check the preference anyway just to be on the safe side.
Now You: Was location tagging enabled on your devices? What about the personalization settings?
Summary Article Name Time to check your Twitter settings Description If you open Twitter on the desktop right now you may get a notification that the company is updating is privacy policy. Author Martin Brinkmann Publisher Ghacks Technology News Logo
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It is with a heavy heart that I announce the sudden passing of Julian Bogel.
It is with a heavy heart and great sadness that I announce the sudden and unexpected passing of Julian Bogel, the VP of Business Development at N3RDFUSION. Julian came to N3RDFUSION in November of 2015 and has been one of the most influential and important people to the company's success. His tireless work ethic and constant motivation serves as an inspiration to us all and he was nothing but a pleasure to work with. Julian's commitment to not just N3RDFUSION, but to our entire industry will stay with us forever as a constant reminder of doing good work responsibly and ethically. He is forever part of the story of our company and our industry, and his legacy will always live on.
Personally, I want to thank you Julian for your unyielding guidance into aspects of our business that I had little experience in before. You taught me more than I even understand yet and I will keep those teachings with me forever. I created a culture at N3RDFUSION of our people being the most important thing to the company and you instilled that sentiment in us every day. Every decision you made was with that idea in mind and I will be forever grateful. Finally, your passion for the birth of this new industry was unparalleled and I will always look to you as an inspiration to drive me ever-onward. I know that the number one thing you would want me to do is to push forward, harder and with more passion than ever before - and I plan to do just that. Thank you for your friendship and teachings Jules, you are deeply missed.
Please feel free to share your sentiments, thoughts, and favorite stories of Julian. We extend our sincerest condolences to his family and friends during this difficult time.
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DNS, Web Reconnaissance Hacking Tutorial-3
DNS, Web Reconnaissance Hacking Tutorial-3
Domain Name System
Domain name and how it work
DNS and HACKING
Domain Name.
DNS, Web Reconnaissance Hacking Tutorial-3
Open your command prompt and type
nslookup and than after Domain Name
DNS, Web Reconnaissance Hacking Tutorial-3
set type=mx
here type domain name
DNS servers
set type=ns
here type domain name
If you have any problem than inbox on facebook
to join our facebook page. Or you can also comment me here. And read my article
HACKING EASY OR HARD
to know basic things to learn ethical hacking. Cybertroubleshooot start group on Telegram whare i give you short note about hacking.
THANKS
Hy friends , i hope you all well. In previous topic we discuss about information gathering and i hope you all understand. And now time to move on next topic, web reconnaissance. DNS (). soo today we talk about. Friends DNS is part of information gathering. But in this topic we talk how to collect information of domain name . soo lets start....Friends DNS(Domain Name System) is important part of internet withoutis nothing. And we also say that DNS is act like phonebook . First we talk about how domain Name work. Friends when we type Domain name on our url box in browser and click go than first Domain name converted into IP address and search in data base of search engine which page is asingn with this ip adress tham we got real page on our scrennn. Think what happen if DNS is not we have to rember all ip adress of page and its soo hard.If you think What relation betweenthan. Now i clear that. when domain name converted into ip adress than ip address goes throught many server and goes to many ip adress too just like chain if we trace all the route of Domain Name than its soo easy to hack.and now the question is how we trace. Friends their are many tools which trace i told you in previous topic about tools. And later i go through tool but not that time. For now i give you some easy method to know some basic information about Domain name.Follow these steps to to know basic things about domain name and after some days i tell advance level method.Thats all for DNS. If i forget some point than comment me. i well clear that.. |
Kraft’s Jell-O Pudding brand is looking to turn your Twitter frowns upside down.
The brand this week unveiled the Jell-O Pudding Face Mood Meter, which detects smile and frown emoticons on Twitter. The website shows a guy who is either frowning or smiling based on the mood of the country.
On average, there are 800 frowns and 1,200 smiles a minute. When the mood deviates from that norm, Kraft sends recent frowners a redemption link for free Jell-O Pudding. When those consumers click the link, Kraft encourages them to use the :D "pudding face" emoticon. Those count as smiles, in theory bringing the total count up.
In addition, there's a Twitter feed for the campaign, @Jell-OMoodMeter, which so far has only 100 or so followers. But the brand hopes to spread the word by name-checking frowners in the feed and giving them pudding. For instance, Twitter user @jonheller used the frown symbol regarding Apple’s Lion OS X release. “What’d they do with spaces :(,” he asked, and got a callout from the Mood Meter: “Woah there, Leroy Frown. We saw that :( and we’re not happy about it. Have some FREE pudding.” A URL then leads to a site where he can get pudding if he verifies his identity.
The work is the latest attention-getting stunt from ad agency Crispin, Porter + Bogusky, which broke some innovative Twitter campaigns for Jell-O sister brand Kraft Macaroni & Cheese earlier this year and is now doing some interesting outdoor work for Vitaminwater.
This isn't the first attempt to gauge the country's mood via social media. Facebook examines the same issue in a less tongue-in-cheek manner with its USA Gross National Happiness Index.
What do you think of the Mood Meter? Did it make you smile or frown? Let us know in the comments. |
NEWARK – A Hudson County man was arrested on Friday and charged with violating a defendant’s civil rights by using excessive force during an arrest that took place in Bayonne, as well as falsifying records in an attempt to conceal the alleged crime, U.S. Attorney Paul J. Fishman announced.
Police Officer Domenico Lillo, 44, of Bayonne, was arrested by federal agents Friday morning and after a federal grand jury in Newark returned an indictment charging him with the deprivation of civil rights under color of law and falsification of records. Lillo had his initial appearance and arraignment before U.S. Magistrate Judge James B. Clark III in Newark federal court. He was released on $100,000 unsecured bond.
According to documents filed in this case and statements made in court:
On the early evening of Dec. 27, 2013, Lillo and other police officers from the Bayonne Police Department went to an address in Bayonne to execute a Sussex County arrest warrant.
Lillo allegedly struck the subject of the warrant with a flashlight while the individual was handcuffed and not resisting arrest, which resulted in bodily injury. Lillo allegedly falsified a Bayonne Police Department Use of Force Report related to the arrest with the intent to impede an investigation into the case.
The use of excessive force count with which Lillo is charged carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison. The charge of falsifying records carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison. |
The Swedish Pirate Party failed to repeat the success of last year's European Parliament elections, receiving fewer than 1.4 percent of the votes in the Swedish general elections on Sunday.
Swedish election officials categorize the Pirate Party in a group of "other" political parties that collectively received about 1.4 percent of the votes. All of the votes have not been counted, however, so it is unknown exactly how many it received. An exit poll put the Pirate Party's tally at about 0.7 percent of the total vote. In Sweden, at least 4 percent of the votes are needed to gain seats in the parliament.
The Pirate Party campaigned on issues such as reforming copyright law, getting rid of the patent system and ensuring that citizens' rights to privacy are respected.
The result wasn't what it had what expected, party officials wrote in a blog post on Monday. In the European Parliament elections, the party garnered 7.1 percent of the votes, helped by the attention the Pirate Bay trial garnered. But this time around the other parties did their best to not talk about issues such as privacy, the blog post said.
The Pirate Party did its best to drum up interest around its core issues by agreeing with WikiLeaks to host its servers and provide the site bandwidth for free. It also provided the infamous file-sharing site The Pirate Bay with bandwidth. But in the end that wasn't enough.
The Pirate Party isn't giving up and still plans to take part in the general elections and the next European Parliament elections in 2014. Party officials also plan to attend an appeals hearing on Sept. 28 for the four men convicted in the Pirate Bay trial, according to the blog post.
Send news tips and comments to mikael_ricknas@idg.com |
BY:
A Transportation Security Administration (TSA) agent was arrested Friday for conspiring to smuggle illegal aliens into the country.
Immigrations and Customs Enforcement officers arrested David Alexander Díaz-Torres in Orlando, Fla., according to the Justice Department.
Díaz-Torres and five others were charged in a 13-count indictment for bringing, transporting, harboring, and shielding illegal aliens within the United States.
According to a Justice Department press release, a group of Brazilian nationals were smuggled through the Luis Muñoz Marín International Airport in San Juan, Puerto Rico.
Díaz-Torres allegedly allowed the Brazilians through a TSA security checkpoint without questioning them.
The group then flew to New York, Boston, and Philadelphia on commercial flights.
"It is very troubling when law enforcement authorities have to arrest a corrupt federal employee who is alleged to have undermined our nation’s security, our overall safety, and the public trust and confidence we place in those chosen to protect and serve," A U.S. attorney said in a statement.
"The Justice Department’s commitment to preventing human smuggling, bringing smugglers to justice and assisting victims has never been stronger." |
The beautiful Church of the Ascension, on Fifth Avenue and 10th Street, has a long history in New York. It started in 1829 in a Canal Street building, where the city’s growing Evangelical population gathered.
After the original church was destroyed by fire a decade later, the parish moved to a Gothic Revival cathedral designed by Richard Upjohn in 1841 in what was then the outskirts of town.
In 1844, it earned fame as the site of a small wedding for a very prominent groom: United States President John Tyler.
And amazingly, the entire ceremony was pulled off without the press or public finding out until after the couple said their vows.
Tyler (of “Tippecanoe and Tyler Too” fame) had ascended to the White House when his Whig party running mate, William Henry Harrison, died one month after taking office.
After meeting her at a Washington reception, Tyler fell hard for Julia Gardiner, a beautiful 24-year-old from a wealthy New York family.
Following the death of Tyler’s first wife in 1842, the president was determined to win Julia’s hand.
The independent-minded Julia (who shocked society when she posed on the arm of a man who was not related to her in a store ad) eventually accepted.
The wedding was set for June 26, and the goal was to keep the press from finding out—and making a big to-do about the short time between Tyler’s first wife’s death and his second marriage, as well as the couple’s 30-year age difference.
“Tyler was so concerned about secrecy that he did not discuss his plans with his other children until after the wedding,” stated one source.
Tyler, 54, did tell his son John Tyler, Jr., who arrived in New York for the wedding with his father. They stayed at Howard’s Hotel on Lower Broadway, where the staff were kept on lockdown so no one would find about about the famous guest.
The secret ceremony was pulled off successfully, with only one newspaper reporting the nuptials. “The bride is a very beautiful and elegantly formed woman of apparently 20 years of age,” wrote The New York Morning Express.
“She was robed simply in white, with a gauze veil depending from a circlet of white flowers wreathed in her hair.” Less than 10 people attended, and afterward “the party departed for the residence of the bride in Lafayette Place (below)…the wedding cortege consisted of five carriages.”
After a wedding dinner, the couple boarded a steamer. Apparently Tyler was recognized, because people on passing ships “cheered most heartily” and presidential salutes were fired from “various ships of war.”
Julia was only First Lady for a short time. After Tyler’s term ended, he moved back to his Virginia plantation.
There, the couple had seven kids—in addition to the seven Tyler fathered with his first wife.
On another note, incredibly, two of Tyler’s grandchildren—children born of a son Tyler had with Julia—are still alive today.
[Top photo: Wikipedia; fourth image: Church of the Ascension; fifth image: NYPL Digital Gallery]
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Tags: Church of the Ascension NYC, Fifth Avenue church, John Tyler Julia Gardiner wedding, John Tyler married New York City, New York City presidents, New York in the 1840s, secret weddings New York City |
1,000 Hikers Heading NoBo on the Appalachian Trail in March?
Home About the Trail 1,000 Hikers Heading NoBo on the Appalachian Trail in March?
Once upon a time there was a pretty path in the woods that hardly anybody knew about. If you were a big, strong outdoors man (or an old lady with a shower curtain and Keds) you might have been one of the people who walked on this almost-secret trail.
Every year, right around the first day of spring, these really tough men and average girls would set out, all alone, to walk in the spooky, lonely wilderness.
The trail began in Georgia and went all the way north for more than 2,000 miles -- way longer than it takes to go to Gramma's house -- and it ended up on the highest mountain in the State of Maine. That's where moose live and where people drive things called "snow machines" instead of motorcycles for most of the year.
Today, that path is known as the Appalachian Trail. It still begins on Springer Mountain in Georgia and ends atop Katahdin in Maine's Baxter State Park.
The trickle of hikers who used to hit the Trail in springtime has grown into an insane horde. As of 11 AM, March 24, 2016, our pal Devon at the Visitor Center at Amicalola Falls State Park (AFSP) told us 980 hikers heading NoBo have signed The Thru-Hiker Book this year. Back on March 1st, there were already 300 hopefuls logged in. There will be WAY over 1,000 signed in by the time you read this.
Purists will tell you The Thru-Hiker Book at AFSP is primarily for hikers who take the approach trail and climb El Stairso de Muerte -- 600+ stairs aside a lovely waterfall that will make you question how you can reach the top of the falls, let alone travel 2,000 additional miles, should you survive. There's another log book tucked under a rock at Springer Mountain (would I lie to you?) that folks who skip the approach trail sign.
We don't have the exact number -- no one does -- but we can say with certainty that thru-hikers can abandon all hope of piddling or pooping without an audience for the next six months. And be careful where you step while seeking such solitude.
If you'll be hitting the Trail soon, please wait your turn in line and merge onto it carefully.
Ain't the wilderness great!!!
Tags: Attractions, Tourism, Appalachian Trail, Hiking, News, Robert Sutherland Travel Writer, Conservation, Hikers, Information, appalachian trail hikers, thru-hikers appalachian trail, and number of hikers appalachian trail |
The Attack on Titan exhibition took over Tokyo in 2014, followed by stops in Oita, Osaka, and Taipei. The exhibit is currently running in Sapporo until May 25 with exhibits unique to the location.
Outside is a smaller-sized, but still grotesque, titan to greet visitors.
Inside, among the standard displays, is a model of the Colossal Titan attacking a snowy city. A larger version made of snow was first shown at the Sapporo Snow Festival in February.
A wood carving of a Titan with a mouth full of fish titled "Salmon Titan" mixed the manga with one of the area's major exports.
A giant display of pages from Hajime Isayama's manga replaces the dialogue with Hokkaido dialect.
The Attack on Titan Exhibition will move on from Sapporo and beyond Japan and head to Italy in July.
[Via Nijimen] |
Could the next French rifle be Croatian? Anything is possible, it seems, as Croatian firm HS Produkt has submitted its new VHS-2 rifle to the French government for testing. Unfortunately, machine translation of Croatian to English is significantly ambiguous. Altair.com.pl reports:
Przetarg na dostawę nowej broni strzeleckiej, określonej mianem AIF (Arme Individuelle Future) został ogłoszony w maju 2014. Agencja zamówień obronnych DGA (Direction Generale de l’Armement) chce w jego ramach kupić, tylko w pierwszej fazie, po 45 tys. subkarabinków (AIF courte) i karabinków (AIF standard) do amunicji 5,56 mm x 45 oraz 8 tys. granatników podwieszanych do naboju 40 mm x 46SR. W ramach tego samego kontraktu Francja zamierza pozyskać 38 mln nabojów 5,56 mm x 45 NATO oraz 92 tys. granatów 40 mm x 46SR. Nowe konstrukcje mają zastąpić wysłużone karabinki FAMAS F1 i G2, przyjęte do uzbrojenia pod koniec lat 1970. (Zmarł twórca karabinka FA MAS, 2014-11-16). Francuzi dopuścili do przetargu jedynie podmioty z Unii Europejskiej lub Europejskiego Obszaru Gospodarczego, zastrzegając że muszą tam powstawać albo całe konstrukcje albo ich najważniejsze elementy (lufy, komory zamkowe). Chętni muszą być zdolni do wytwarzania i dostarczania 16 tys. sztuk broni rocznie. W warunkach przetargu DGA zastrzegła, że do dalszych testów zostanie wybranych do 5 zgłoszonych konstrukcji. Francuzi zdecydowali się dopuścić do prób: niemieckie karabinki HK416A5, dostarczone przez Heckler & Koch (HK416A5 dla Francuzów, 2012-10-13); belgijskie SCAR-L, wytwarzane przez FN Herstal; chorwackie VHS-K2 i VHS-D2 oferowane przez HS Produkt (Rośnie chorwacki eksport, 2015-02-05; Nowy VHS-2 na ASDA, 2013-04-24); szwajcarsko-amerykańskie MCX (ich premiera miała miejsce na tegorocznym SHOT Show) produkowane przez SIG Sauer; oraz włoskie ARX 160A1 (Fińskie ARX 160?, 2014-11-29; Rozpoczęły się próby karabinków w Indiach, 2014-10-02). Każdy z podmiotów ma dostarczyć na swój koszt po 15 konstrukcji strzeleckich w odmianie subkarabinka i karabinka, granatniki, niezbędne akcesoria oraz próbki amunicji. Próby potrwają przynajmniej dwa lata. DGA szacuje termin podpisania umowy na grudzień 2016, a pierwsze dostawy mają rozpocząć się w 2017. Szacuje się, że całkowite zastąpienie obecnie używanych karabinków FAMAS F1 i G2 zajmie 15 lat, a całkowita wartość umowy wyniesie 300 mln euro (1,25 mld zł).
Tender for the supply of a new arms referred to as AIF (Arme Individuelle Future) was announced in May 2014. The defense procurement agency DGA (Direction Générale de l’Armement) under it wants to buy, but in the first phase, 45 thousand. subkarabinków (AIF courte) and rifles (AIF standard) to 5.56 mm ammunition x 45 and 8 thousand. grenade cartridge-mounted 40 mm x 46SR. As part of the same contract France intends to acquire 38 million rounds of 5.56 mm x 45 NATO and 92 thousand. grenades, 40 mm x 46SR.New designs are to replace worn-out rifles FAMAS F1 and G2, admitted to arming the late 1970s ( the creator died FA MAS rifle , 2014-11-16). The French have committed to tender only when the European Union or the European Economic Area, stipulating that there must arise either whole structures or their major components (barrel, chamber castle). Volunteers must be able to produce and deliver 16 thousand. weapons per year. In the conditions of the tender DGA claimed that further testing will be selected for the 5 reported structure. The French decided to allow the trial: German rifles HK416A5 provided by Heckler & Koch ( HK416A5 for the French , 2012-10-13); Belgian SCAR-L, manufactured by FN Herstal; Croatian VHS and VHS-K2-D2 offered by HS Product ( Croatian exports is growing , 2015-02-05, New VHS-2 for ASDA , 2013-04-24); Swiss-American MCX (its premiere at this year’s SHOT Show) manufactured by SIG Sauer; and the Italian ARX 160A1 ( Finnish ARX 160? , 2014-11-29, began rehearsals rifles in India , 2014-10-02). Each entity is expected to provide at its expense structure of 15 shooting in a variety subkarabinka and rifle, grenade launchers, the necessary accessories and samples of ammunition. Trials will take at least two years. DGA is estimated on the date of signing of the contract in December 2016, and the first deliveries are expected to begin in 2017. It is estimated that the total replacement of the currently used rifles FAMAS F1 and G2 will take 15 years, and the total value of the contract will be 300 million euros (1.25 billion zł) .
The VHS-2 is the improved version of HS Produkt’s VHS rifle. The VHS-2 has already been ordered by Croatia, but reportedly the first shipments will actually go to the Iraqi government. The effect of ISIS’s occupation of central Iraq on this order is unclear. From Obramba.com:
Pred nedavnim smo na naši spletni strani povzeli zapis s hrvaškega spletnega portala OBRIS o podpisu dogovora Ministrstva za obrambo Republike Hrvaške s podjetji hrvaške vojaške industrije. Na svečanosti ob podpisi pogodbe je bilo veliko govora tudi o nadaljevanju opremljanja Hrvaške vojske z hrvaškim ognjenim orožjem – predvsem iz zelo uspešnega obrata karlovškega podjetja HS Produkt, so tokrat zapisali na spletni strani OBRIS. Ob tem je minister za obrambo Hrvaške Kotromanović novinarjem pojasnil, da bodo dobave puške VHS-2 (kaliber 5.56x45mm NATO) uskladili z izvoznimi načrti proizvajalca iz Karlovca in dali pred Hrvaško vojsko prednost neki drugi državi. Navedel je tudi količino naročila za Hrvaško vojsko: 20.000 pušk VHS-2 (Višenamjenska Hrvatska Strojnica 2). Hrvaška vojska ima trenutno približno 7000 kosov prvotnih izvedenk domače juriške puške VHS-1, si jih bodo pa prizadevali zamenjati z novejšim modelom VHS-2. Ob tem je omenil nekaj časovnih okvirov, na katere pa bodo vplivali izvozni posli hrvaške vojaške industrije. Časovne meje nimajo, dogovorili jo bodo kasneje. Željko Pavlin direktor HS Produkta iz Karlovca pa je poudaril, da so puško VHS-2 dali na trg šele pred nedavnim. Pa ne gre le za izboljšano VHS-1, saj je toliko novosti, da gre skorajda za novo puško, ki bo svetu ponudila precej novosti v segmentu jurišnih (avtomatskih) pušk. Člani so skupaj z obrambnim ministrstvom Hrvaške opravili vrsto testiranj, najprej prototipnih orožij, zatem so začeli s serijsko proizvodnjo, potem pa nadaljevali testiranja še s serijskimi puškami. Kot je poudaril Pavlin, je naročilo Hrvaške vojske zanje zelo pomembno. Vzporedno s tem je HS Produkt z MORH preizkušal VHS-2 tudi v tujini in lani jim je uspelo podpisati pogodbo za prodajo 10.000 pušk tujemu kupci. Kot je v razgovoru kasneje navedel Željko Pavlin, naj bi bil to Irak. Z VHS-2 bodo prisotni še ne nekaj natečajih za avtomatsko puško v državah v Evropi in izven. Kot je še poudaril, so se na konstrukciji VHS-1 zelo veliko naučili. Tako so velikemu izvoznemu uspehu s serijo pištol HS dodali še puško VHS-2.
We recently on our website summarized record of the Croatian web portal contours of the signing of the agreement, the Ministry of Defence of the Republic of Croatia with businesses Croatian military industry. At the ceremony marking the signing of the Treaty has been much discussion on the continuation of equipping the Croatian Army with the Croatian firearms – mainly from the highly successful plant Karlovac company HS product, this time written on the website of the contours. At the same time, the Minister of Defence of Croatia Kotromanović reporters explained that the supply of guns VHS-2 (caliber 5.56x45mm NATO) in line with the manufacturer’s export plans from Karlovac and placed before the Croatian army advantage of another country. He also stated amount of orders for Croatia army: 20,000 rifles VHS-2 (Hrvatska Višenamjenska Engine 2). Croatian Army currently has about 7,000 pieces of original versions of the domestic juriške guns VHS-1, we will endeavor to replace it with a newer model VHS-second It is mentioned several time frames, which will affect export transactions of the Croatian military industry. Temporal boundaries do not, agreed by the later. Željko Pavlin Director HS product from Karlovac, he pointed out that the gun VHS-2 placed on the market only recently. However, it is not only for improved VHS-1, because there are so many new features, it is hardly a new rifle that will offer the world a number of innovations in the segment of assault (automatic) rifle. Members, together with the Ministry of Defence of Croatia conducted a series of tests first prototype weapons, and then they started to mass produce, and then continue testing even with serial rifles. As pointed out by Pavlin, the order of the Croatian Army very important to them. Parallel to this, the HS product with MORH tested VHS-2 also abroad, and last year they managed to sign a contract for the sale of 10,000 rifles to foreign buyers.As stated in an interview later Željko Pavlin, would be to Iraq. The VHS-2 will be felt not some automatic rifle competitions in countries in Europe and beyond. He also stressed that the construction of VHS-1 a very learned a lot. Thus, the major export success with a series of pistols HS add rifle VHS-second
One thing to note is that the French request for tender stipulates that the rifles must be produced inside the European Union, and that the factory must be capable of producing 16,000 rifles per year. It seems obvious that the most attractive option to the French government would for the rifles to be produced within France.
It’s unclear whether the VHS being a bullpup gives it an advantage over its competitors, most of which are conventionally-laid out. The decision to submit the VHS-2, though, is a good one. French testing has historically been some of the most strenuous and trying that a rifle could undergo. That reputation is probably still deserved.
Thanks to Hrachya for the tip. |
I knew my package was coming today so the last few days have really dragged out. I went to the post office immediately after work to get my presents!
Santa sent 4 gifts, each individually wrapped. Also a card.
The card was really cute, and explained that there was a little something for everyone. The gifts were labeled, for me, for the pups, and for the new little one - my daughter that will be born in April.
Puppies first: They got a really cool pizza toy. It's 100% natural and eco friendly. Very cool dog toy! Beesly already loves it.
Next, for the baby: I opened the first gift for her and found an adorable little monkey outfit with a onesie, a bib, and some pants. Seriously too stinking cute! The other present for the baby had 5 more onesies!
Lastly, the gift for me! It's a heavy book filled with the best pictures from National Geographics Instagram. I had expressed my love for photography and travel. This book is so awesome. Really great pictures!
Thanks so much, Santa. I really enjoyed opening each gift. I'm stoked about the book and thr monkey outfit! You're awesome and you did a really great job. :) |
Plano’s $3 billion Legacy West is driving big business and thousands of new jobs to the growing city.
But that growth -- as it's doing in much of the rest of Collin County -- is also steering more traffic to Plano as well. Lots more.
In an effort to ease congestion around the mixed-used development that is now home to companies such as Toyota, Liberty Mutual and JPMorgan Chase, Plano city officials are looking for ways to get residents out of their cars.
Last month the city wrapped up a traffic study that took officials more than a year to complete.
“That area historically has been very low-density,” said Matt Tilke, the city’s senior traffic engineer. “Before we turn into gridlock, which we don’t want to have happen, the study is intended to look at the pieces and what causes congestion and look at ways to mitigate that and prevent it.”
The number of people living in the Legacy West corridor at build out, which city officials expect to happen in the next 10 years, is expected to be somewhere between 6,000 to 8,000 residents.
And while widening the roadway may be an an option to relieve congestion, there’s only so much that can be done because right-of-way space is limited. So the city is also turning to the businesses to work together to encourage employees to pursue alternate transit options.
“When we think about solving transportation, we think about what are the things we can do. More roads? More buses? Mass transit? All the things we can physically do, but I think it really comes down to behavioral [changes] and the question was how do we get people out of their cars? That was pretty striking to me," Mayor Harry LaRosiliere said earlier this month. “Our message will be talking about changing that mindset of getting out of cars and it means a lot of different things." |
Deposits of above Rs 5,000 in banned banknotes can be made only once till December 30, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) said on Monday, the latest in a series of banking restrictions after the government recalled high-value bills.
Such deposits will be accepted only after two bank officials satisfy themselves on why the deposits were not made earlier. The accounts must also be compliant with customer information details, called KYC, otherwise deposits can be restricted to Rs 50,000, the RBI said.
“The (depositor’s) explanation should be kept on record to facilitate an audit trail at a later stage,” the central bank said in a notification.
The government pulled out 500-and 1,000-rupee bills on November 8, in an effort to fight a parallel ‘black economy’, and has since announced near-daily changes to banking rules to manage the transition. The banned notes can be deposited in banks till December 30 and thereafter at select RBI counters till March 31.
But the shock move has led to a severe cash crunch. Cash withdrawals from banks have been restricted to Rs 24,000 per account per week, although most banks are unable to provide even that. The government has said it will replenish most of the withdrawn cash – about 86% of the money in circulation -- with new 2000-and 500-rupee notes.
Read: Demonetisation’s ever-changing rules: a complete history
Withdrawal of Legal Tender Character of existing ₹ 500/- and ₹ 1000/- Bank Notes (Specified Bank Notes) - Deposit...https://t.co/eTDuFizbP6 — ReserveBankOfIndia (@RBI) December 19, 2016
Late in the evening, finance minister Arun Jaitley said no questions would be asked junked currency was deposited in one go but repeat deposits might raise queries. “If they are going to go everyday and deposit some currency, same person, that gives rise to suspicion. In that event, a person may have something to worry about. Therefore everyone is advised whatever old currency you have, please go and deposit it now.”
Union law minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said the government would come up with a “structured response” on the new norms. “They have issued something, the government will come with structured response on that,” he said after meeting with heads of banks.
Monday’s changes also stipulated that even for deposits below Rs 5000, made in one go or cumulatively till December 30, customers could be questioned should the banks feel the need.
Read | D for Demonetisation. W for Why?
At the time of demonetising the high-value bills, the government had said people should not panic and crowd banks, and that they had enough time to deposit or exchange their money.
“Many people could not deposit money as they were waiting for the queues to end. This shows the ill-intent and mismanagement of the Modi government,” Congress chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said.
The decision is seen aimed at discouraging a late surge in deposits of unaccounted-for money in regular bank accounts. The government has said it had come across instances of the corrupt using bank accounts of the poor to make deposits of banned notes.
The RBI’s November 11 press release that asked people to exchange notes at their convenience.
Read | Demonetisation woes: HT’s photo of old man crying in a bank touches a raw nerve
The RBI notification said the banking new restrictions were placed to encourage people to make deposits under the Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Yojana, 2016, a new window to declare unaccounted for wealth.
But the principle opposition party wasn’t convinced and questioned the decision to depute bank officials to quiz people. “Banks are meant to serve people. Don’t turn them into police stations. This actually exhibits a criminal mind,” Surjewala said.
Read | India after demonetisation: Full coverage
First Published: Dec 19, 2016 13:11 IST |
Obama administration complicit in war crime?
Paul Joseph Watson
Infowars.com
January 28, 2013
UPDATE: Britam has admitted that it was hacked but denied that the emails released by the hacker were genuine. Click here for a statement by a Britam spokesman.
Alleged hacked emails from defense contractor Britam reveal a plan “approved by Washington” and funded by Qatar to stage a chemical weapons attack in Syria and blame it on the Assad regime, fulfilling what the Obama administration has made clear is a “red line” that would mandate US military intervention.
The leaked emails, obtained by a hacker in Germany, feature an exchange (click here for screenshot) between Britam Defence’s Business Development Director David Goulding and the company’s founder Philip Doughty;
Phil We’ve got a new offer. It’s about Syria again. Qataris propose an attractive deal and swear that the idea is approved by Washington. We’ll have to deliver a CW to Homs, a Soviet origin g-shell from Libya similar to those that Assad should have. They want us to deploy our Ukrainian personnel that should speak Russian and make a video record. Frankly, I don’t think it’s a good idea but the sums proposed are enormous. Your opinion? Kind regards
David
The fact that the plan involves delivering a CW (chemical weapon) that is “similar to those Assad should have,” clearly suggests that the idea is to stage a false flag chemical weapons attack that could be blamed on Assad by Gulf states like Qatar and NATO powers.
If the claim that such as plot was “approved by Washington” can be verified, then the Obama administration is complicit in a war crime.
According to Cyber War News, which details the process of how the emails were hacked and includes screenshots of the leaked documents, the hack also uncovered, “extremely personal information,” including copies of passports of Britam employees, some of whom appeared to be mercenaries.
A full list of all the hacked documents can be found here. One software systems administrator who analyzed the ‘header’ details from the email in question concluded, “I have to admit that the email does indeed look genuine….all these facts check out. So with Mythbusters objectivity I have to call this one plausible.”
Online business profiles confirm that both David Goulding and Philip Doughty work for Britam Defence.
Last year, reports began to circulate that that US-backed rebel fighters in Syria had been given gas masks and were willing to stage a chemical weapons attack which would then be blamed on the Assad regime to grease the skids for NATO military intervention.
Soon after in August, President Barack Obama warned that the use or even transportation of chemical weapons by the Assad regime would represent a “red line” that would precipitate military intervention. French President Francois Hollande followed suit, stating that the use of such weapons “Would be a legitimate reason for direct intervention.”
At around the same time, a source told Syrian news channel Addounia that a Saudi company had fitted 1400 ambulance vehicles with anti-gas & anti-chemical filtering systems at a cost of $97,000 dollars each, in preparation for a chemical weapons attack carried out by FSA rebels using mortar rounds. A further 400 vehicles were prepared as troop carriers.
The attack would be blamed on the Syrian Army and exploited as an excuse for a military assault. A March 2012 Brookings Institution report entitled Saving Syria: Assessing Options For Regime Change outlined this very scenario – where a manufactured humanitarian crisis would be cited as justification for an attack.
Yesterday, Israel’s vice premier Silvan Shalom told reporters that if Syrian rebels obtained chemical weapons from stockpiles belonging to the Assad regime, such a development would force Israel to resort to “preventive operations,” in other words – a military strike on Syria.
In December, a shocking video emerged of Syrian rebels testing what appeared to be a form of nerve gas on rabbits, bolstering claims that the rebels had already obtained chemical weapons.
As Tony Cartalucci also highlights, “Mention of acquiring chemical weapons from Libya is particularly troubling. Libya’s arsenal had fallen into the hands of sectarian extremists with NATO assistance in 2011 in the culmination of efforts to overthrow the North African nation . Since then, Libya’s militants led by commanders of Al Qaeda’s Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) have armed sectarian extremists across the Arab World, from as far West as Mali, to as far East as Syria.”
Last month, 29 different US-backed Syrian opposition groups pledged their allegiance to Al Nusra, an Al-Qaeda-affiliated group which, as the New York Times reported, “killed numerous American troops in Iraq.
Numerous reports confirm that Al Nusra is the leading front line fighting force in Syria and is commanding other rebel groups. Given their prominent role, allied with the fact that the terror group has been responsible for numerous bloody attacks in Syria, the notion that the Obama administration would approve a plot that could see chemical weapons fall into the hands of Al-Qaeda terrorists could represent a foreign policy scandal even bigger than Benghazi-Gate.
In a related story, the Syrian Electronic Army, a separate hacktivist group, continues to release hacked files and emails from numerous sensitive foreign ministry and military websites belonging to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey, including emails sent between these countries.
*********************
Paul Joseph Watson is the editor and writer for Infowars.com and Prison Planet.com. He is the author of Order Out Of Chaos. Watson is also a host for Infowars Nightly News.
This article was posted: Monday, January 28, 2013 at 6:01 am
Tags: foreign affairs, terrorism, war
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The death of King Edward VII on May 6, 1910, marked the proper end of Edwardian era. Society marched gaily on until the summer of 1914, but no longer was there a charismatic, pleasure-loving, and cosmopolitan monarch to look to for amusement, fashion, sport, and manners. Though most of the king’s set were just as middle-aged and elderly as he was, Edward VII’s appetites still set the tone, and King George V and Queen Mary’s firm adherence to the quiet life sent ripples on unease throughout high society. The splintering of cliques that had begun well into Edward’s reign now bore fruit since the new king and queen were alleged to detest Americans, to despise the raffish crowd the dead king collected around him, the bed-hopping, and the indiscriminate mingling of wealth with blue blood. According to The Edwardian Daughter, the memoir written by Sonia Cubitt (née Keppel–and HRH the Duchess of Cornwall’s grandmother), Mrs. George Keppel lost no time in packing up the family for a long trip away from England now that her lover was dead. Court mourning was instituted, and though many hesitated to throw themselves back into the London Season the king’s death so abruptly interrupted, the smart set commemorated their deceased king and social leader with the infamous “black Ascot.”
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PhD student, public historian, and author of historical fiction that complicates the past by night! Follow me on Twitter @edwardian_era PhD student, public historian, and author of historical fiction that complicates the past by night! Follow me on Twitter @edwardian_era |
UPDATE: 'Black Lives Matter' protesters continue to block I-93 traffic in Milton, arms locked in 1,200-pound cement filled barrels
MILTON - Protesters have chained themselves to barrels in the middle of Interstate 93 northbound, blocking every lane of traffic during Thursday's morning commute.
Massachusetts State Police said the road is shut down at East Milton Square, along with the HOV lane on I-93 southbound at Mystic Avenue in Medford.
Troopers and local police are working to remove the protesters, and traffic is "severely delayed," state police said on Twitter, adding that the barrels weigh 1,200 pounds.
The protest is in support of the "black lives matter" movement, aimed at calling attention to and reducing the number of people of color killed by police officers.
The Associated Press quotes a statement sent by the protesters, saying the demonstration was meant "to confront white complacency in the systemic oppression of black people in Boston."
ABC affiliate WCVB quotes an activist named Katie Sietz: "Today, our nonviolent direct action is meant to expose the reality that Boston is a city where white commuters and students use the city and leave, while Black and Brown communities are targeted by police, exploited, and displaced."
This is a developing story. It will be updated as more information becomes available.
Total arrests from this morning's protest total 29. They caused serious risk to public safety. More info to be released at 11:30. — Mass State Police (@MassStatePolice) January 15, 2015
Protestors with arms chained together inside barrel on Rte 83 Milton pic.twitter.com/ORaUqQ7les — Tim Alben (@TimAlben) January 15, 2015
Arrests will be ongoing at any and all locations where individuals have obstructed traffic. — Tim Alben (@TimAlben) January 15, 2015
RIGHT NOW: Two lanes of traffic getting by. Protestors still on 93 north near East Milton Square. @NECN pic.twitter.com/wBRnMDaAXm — Jeff Saperstone (@JeffSaperstone) January 15, 2015
Protestors arrested on 93 in Somerville #7news pic.twitter.com/rQMXv1mXyq — Steve Cooper (@scooperon7) January 15, 2015
Hmm. MT @OnlyInBOS: ALERT: I-93 NB in Milton protesters are sitting on the highway. pic.twitter.com/oMN4U8Mnae — Dustin Fitch (@DustinGFitch) January 15, 2015
Going 2 #BOSTON? 93NB jammed in #QUINCY w/ reports of protesters "chained to barrels" blocking hwy nr Furnace Brook pic.twitter.com/XXgdulAeBz — Heidi Voight (@HeidiVoight) January 15, 2015 |
Church Youth Volunteer Accused of Sexually Abusing a Dozen Male Students
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Close to a dozen males have come forward to accuse a West Virginia man and former church youth volunteer of sexually abusing them as minors.
While the West Virginia State Police has not disclosed the man's name, Westminster Presbyterian Church has confirmed that the suspect "has volunteered in various capacities for the church, including with youth trips that required chaperones."
The church's senior pastor, Jonathan Rockness, also claimed that while the Bluefield's church had alerted authorities at the beginning of the year, the police initially did not find enough information to prosecute him.
"In June, the police reported back to us that they would not be pursuing the case, as the behavior we reported was inappropriate, but not actionable," Rockness said in a statement shared with WOAY Television. "Even though the legal authorities declined to pursue the case any further, the leadership of the church was not satisfied that we had gotten to the bottom of the situation."
Following the police's decision, the church subsequently suspended the suspect from church-related activities beyond attending services and launched their own investigation. Over the course of its inquiry, authorities have confirmed that around 12 males came forward to accuse the volunteer of sexual abuse, starting as early as 1986.
The victims' ages at the time of the alleged sexual abuses ranged from pre-teens to teenagers.
After concluding its own report, the church reported this information back to the police who decided they now had enough information to pursue it further.
While the current suspect has not yet been charged, WVNSTV reported that he could be accused of "sexual abuse, sexual assault and sexual abuse by a custodian."
The church reiterated that it has "been fully cooperative with the authorities and will continue to be, as we are committed to uncovering the truth and seeing justice met."
"We also hope and pray for healing and wholeness for any potential victims in this situation. We are devastated for them and their families," Rockness wrote. |
Toronto's Hospital for Sick Children has launched a billion dollar fundraiser to rebuild its home on University Avenue.
The building was erected in 1949. Sick Kids moved in two years later. In launching its fundraising push, the hospital says 21st century medicine shouldn't be held back by a building's age.
SickKids is looking to raise $1.3 billion, much of which will go to the makeover.
Already, $570 million in donations and pledges has been secured.
It is expected to take 10 years to complete. "We're committed to continuing to provide services on our site. That is one of the reasons why this is a very complicated project that will take a decade to complete. We do not expect to close any services over that time frame or move patients to other care centres," say SickKids CEO Dr. Mike Apkon.
To donate to SickKids, go to their website. |
CELEBRITY chef apps, online how-to videos and recipe-sharing websites have all joined traditional cookbooks as guides for the amateur epicurean. But wouldn’t it be nice if your kitchen could help you prepare a meal?
Computer scientist Yu Suzuki and colleagues at Kyoto Sangyo University in Japan kitted out a kitchen with ceiling-mounted cameras and projectors that overlay cooking instructions on the ingredients. This lets you concentrate on slicing and dicing without having to look up at a book or a screen. “Cooks can easily and visually understand how to prepare an ingredient for a recipe even if they have no cooking experience,” says Suzuki.
Suppose you want to fillet a fish. Lay it down on a chopping board and the cameras will detect its outline and orientation so the projectors can overlay a virtual knife on the fish with a line indicating where to cut. Speech bubbles even appear to sprout from the fish’s mouth, guiding you through each step (see picture).
If that is not enough, the kitchen also comes equipped with a small robot assistant named Phyno that sits on the countertop. When its cameras detect the chef has stopped touching the ingredients, Phyno asks whether that particular step in the recipe is complete. Users can answer “yes” to move on to the next step or “no” to have the robot repeat the instructions.
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“A small robot assistant called Phyno sits on the countertop and guides you through the recipe”
There are some limitations, however. “Currently we have to develop a system based on a manual analysis of real cooking processes,” says Suzuki, so for now the system can only help you prepare fish and slice onions. “In the future, we will automate the analysis process.” He will present the work at the Asia Pacific Conference on Computer Human Interaction in Matsue, Japan, later this month.
“It’s a great idea,” says Thomas Ploetz at Newcastle University, UK, who has built a smart kitchen himself (“Mastering the art of French by cooking“).
Meanwhile, Jinna Lei at the University of Washington has also installed cameras in the kitchen to watch over novice chefs. Lei and colleagues used Kinect-like depth-sensing cameras capable of recording both the shape and appearance of kitchen objects, allowing them to track cooking actions, such as whether a particular ingredient has been added to a bowl.
The system uses both object and action-recognition to keep track of what the cook is doing. Each object, such as a bowl or apple, has a number of actions related to it. For example, bowls are generally used for mixing, while apples can’t be mixed but can be chopped. Tracking is about 80 per cent accurate and Lei is investigating ways to improve this, such as adding a thermal camera to better identify the user’s hands by their body heat. She will present the work at the UbiComp conference in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, next month.
Eventually, Lei hopes the system will be able to prompt chefs when they make a mistake. “For example, if the system detects sugar pouring into a bowl containing eggs, and the recipe does not call for sugar, it could log the aberration,” says Lei. She tested it on a cake-baking video containing seven objects and 17 actions and it identified the start and end points of actions to within a third of a second in over 90 per cent of cases.
Ploetz suggests that Lei’s research could complement Suzuki’s by helping to automate recognition of new ingredients, while adding his own work to the mix could make your kitchen even smarter. “All of them together would be a nice combination.”
Mastering the art of French by cooking Smart kitchens could help you learn another language as you hone your cookery skills. Thomas Ploetz and colleagues at Newcastle University, UK, put accelerometers in a variety of kitchen equipment as a way to record users as they perform culinary tasks. A computer gives cooking instructions in French and can sense if users have picked up the right equipment to carry out the recipe. If not, the system will rephrase again in French before finally giving an English translation. Ploetz also has plans to create equipment that can score your cooking skills, based on how well you execute each task. “The next step would be gamification,” he says. “You could compete with Jamie Oliver.” |
Edward Snowden has left a cryptic tweet sparking concern among the masses that his safety is in question.
The whistleblower recently tweeted a 64-character hex code that was traced to a bitcoin transaction amounting to 0.000911, leading many to question whether or not this was a dead man’s switch, which is an automatic message that is set to release if the user of an account does not check-in consistently.
In Snowden’s case, if he has been captured or killed, it would prompt journalists and friends to release encrypted files.
According to Sputnik News, Edward Snowden’s girlfriend thinks that he has been killed while others believe that the tweet was, in fact, a signal by Snowden, ahead of a major document release.
The tweet, which was shortly erased, followed a previous message from Edward Snowden and only said, “it’s time,” which came a few days earlier.
Of course, while some have come forward to say that Snowden is okay, mystery still surrounds him considering that his Twitter account has been inactive for an extended period, according to Sputnik News.
One user who tested Edward Snowden’s message as a private key hash on the bitcoin blockchain said that the amount 0.000911 could have been a distress call from the whistleblower; however, others are saying that it may have been an unintentional hash in a bitcoin transaction.
For now, we remain in the dark as to whether or not Edward Snowden’s safety is in question or not.
Featured image from GongTo via Shutterstock. |
Zedd, Ellie Goulding and twenty one pilots will also perform at the show, kicking off Sunday at 9 p.m.
Before Eminem and Rihanna hit the road for their Monster Tour this summer, the powerhouse duo will be bringing their hit to the 2014 MTV Movie Awards.
It was announced on Tuesday morning (April 8) that Em and Rih Rih will be gracing the stage this Sunday during the annual event. This will be their first performance of "The Monster," the hit single from November's The Marshall Mathers LP 2. It reached #1 on the Billboard Hot 100.
The duo join previously announced performers twenty one pilots with their new single "Car Radio" and Ellie Goulding and Zedd, who will join forces to perform "Beating Heart" and "Find You."
Last week, Em released a behind-the-scenes clip of the song's music video. In it, the Rap God revisits scenes some of the music videos from earlier in his career, though he said that they didn't transport him to those days. "Redoing this scene actually brings back no memories for me because I don't remember it," he joked to the camera (with a straight face).
Another Slim video is on the way. Over the weekend, he posted an Instagram of him and Spike Lee, along with the caption, "Spike came out to The D for the 'Headlights' video...Coming soon."
The 2014 MTV Movie Awards will be hosted by Conan O'Brien. Make sure to tune in at 9 p.m. ET/PT this Sunday, April 13, when they air from Los Angeles' Nokia Theater. |
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Prime Minister of Armenia Karen Karapetyan announced the reduction of tariffs for Moscow-Yerevan railway and ferry transportation, the PM said on Facebook.
He stated that previously the transportation of goods via Georgia and Russia was carried out at high prices which affected both the cargo transportation process and the pricing policy.
Presenting the steps taken, the PM said Armenia-Georgia-Russia trilateral talks were held aimed at reducing the tariffs for the cargo transportation at abovementioned routes.
The agreement reached with the Georgian side as a result of talks and the new reducing tariffs came into force from February 22, 2017, whereas the discounted tariffs provided by the Russian side from March 13.
Thus, the tariffs for Moscow-Yerevan railway and ferry transportation decreased by 32-35%, whereas at the opposite Yerevan-Moscow direction, the tariffs decreased by up to 52-54% depending on the cargo type. |
Adam Ward, CTV Barrie
More than $100,000 found in an old television at a Barrie recycling centre has been returned to its rightful owner.
Employees at GEEP Industries were dismantling the television last month when a cash box and banking records were found inside the TV. The television had been sitting on the property for more than a year.
“I was like ‘whoa!’ There was like four stacks of $50 bills and I knew it was a large amount of money,” says general manager Rick Deschamps.
The items were ultimately handed over to police. Officers were able to use the banking records to locate the owner.
“There were some bank documents and legal documents inside so we were able to track down him in that capacity,” says Barrie police Const. Nicole Rodgers.
The owner, a 68-year-old man from Bolsover, Ont., which is located near Kawartha Lakes, told police that he had put the inheritance money in the television for safe keeping.
“One of those safe spots that he thought he'd never forget, but apparently he did and it got passed on to a family friend many years later,” says Rodgers.
That family friend eventually brought it to the recycling centre.
“Hopefully he's put it in a savings account now and his family will be able to use the inheritance the way they wish.” |
When Jeff Lamb contacted us about his ‘MZ Special,’ we thought we’d just stumbled upon a new shop, specializing in vintage, racing-inspired customs. But we were dead wrong.
It turns out that Jeff’s just a regular bloke: “I’m a 41-year-old hopeless motorcycle enthusiast, now amateur bike builder, from Brisbane, Australia. A self-employed father of two boys, husband of a great woman and owner of some tools.”
A couple of years ago Jeff met the Ellaspede crew at a moto expo. By the end of the conversation, Jeff knew he wanted a cafe racer. All he needed was a suitable donor, and that’s where the bizarre—and surprisingly capable—MZ Skorpion comes in.
Launched in 1994, the Skorpion featured a British chassis, Italian brakes and suspension, and a Japanese engine and electrics—borrowed from the Yamaha XT660. Everything was assembled at MZ’s home base in Germany.
It sounds like the world’s worst parts-bin special, but the press at the time praised it for being affordable and light, with heaps of torque and good handling. It also became a popular choice for club racing, even if it was a curious-looking machine.
“The large-diameter-tube perimeter frame was a real standout—I hadn’t seen anything like it before,” says Jeff. “It reminded me of the frames of 1960s Puch scooters and mopeds.”
Sold on the idea, Jeff snapped up a 99-model Skorpion Tour, “with no shortage of Blu-Tack, touch up paint, electrical tape, cable ties, hope and WD-40.”
There was just one problem: despite having a ton of ideas originally, Jeff hit a creative wall. After countless sketches and false starts, he finally stripped the bike down out of sheer desperation.
“I now had hundreds of parts, more ideas, a bike that wasn’t usable, a mess and more builder’s block. This didn’t really help.”
Jeff threw in the towel, loaded up a trailer with all the parts and made his way to Ellaspede’s workshop. Ideas were exchanged, sketches made and emails sent back and forth. A clear brief was soon on the table.
“They costed the job based on my dreams,” says Jeff, “and that’s when I learned what it costs to have a pro shop take a concept through to reality. I paid the guys for the work to date, picked up my trailer full of bits and licked my wounds.”
“The gap between my ideas and the reality of a full custom build was a mix of shock and disappointment—not in Ellaspede, but in myself for thinking this sort of thing can be done for a small amount of money.”
At least Jeff now had a clear direction. So he decided to do as much as he could himself, outsource whatever was beyond his means—and bring Ellaspede back in near the end.
First on the agenda was sorting out the fairing. An Avon-style fairing was key to what Jeff had in mind, so he contacted a well-known classic fiberglass manufacturer who claimed to have the right molds.
“But when it came to me offering an order and an up-front payment,” explains Jeff, “it became a trail of unanswered phone calls and emails. Eventually the internet coughed one up, and this one made its way, ironically, from Germany.”
Next up was the one-piece fuel tank, seat unit and rear oil tank. Jeff shaped the whole unit out of foam, before handing it over to a local fabricator. More hiccups ensued…
“He thought he could do it, but couldn’t bring himself to tell me (or himself) he couldn’t,” says Jeff. “For seven months the mold and frame were with him, and it took me fronting him to come clean to get the gear back.”
“In a twist, a friend randomly suggested I try a place he drives past regularly, which brought me to a chap called John Allen, fabricator extraordinaire. His story is fascinating on its own: ex-Honda Factory rider form the 80s and early 90s, former room-mate of Kevin Schwantz and current racer of a TZ750 two-stroke missile at post-classic racing meets. And a just nice, modest bloke.”
John knocked it out the park, fabricating everything to Jeff’s spec while adding all the reinforcing needed to make it work properly. “To think his life and incredible motorcycle experience brought that tank unit to my bike, is actually humbling.”
In the meantime, Jeff had been busy with smaller details. Every part was cleaned, refreshed, painted, polished or replaced, right down to the last bolt. “Wynnum Bearings and Bolts were invaluable help,” says Jeff.
He also built the seat pan—by heating 10mm thick commercial grade kitchen cutting board in the oven, and fitting it to the bodywork. Once it was perfect, he sent it off for some professional upholstery.
The finish on the new levers is equally homemade. Jeff wrapped them in leather, dipped them in epoxy, then refined the shape with an angle grinder before a final dip. “The end result feels good, offers nice grip and was good fun!”
Off-the-shelf parts include CNC’ed clip-ons, minimal Posh switches and a lobster-tail exhaust. The forks are stock Paioli units that Jeff sent to Rad Hard Chroming to rebuild and re-chrome. They even carry new, vintage Paioli stickers, tucked safely under a clear coat.
There’s a new, adjustable Wilbers shock out back too. John helped relocate the rear brake reservoir with a new frame mount. The ignition was relocated, so Jeff sourced an MZ clock to fill the hole left in the triple clamp. “It worked… once.”
The belly pan took three goes, finally working when Jeff got an early 2000s Yamaha part to fit as intended. The paint saw Jeff cycling through vendors again, until Roberto’s Custom Powder Coating hit the mark.
Then Ellaspede re-entered the picture. “I had some ideas for the gauges that I couldn’t make happen and Ellaspede came to the rescue with a neat and functional Acewell gauge. It was good to know the team were still on board when I needed them.”
Ellaspede finished Jeff’s electrical work for him—including making a new wiring harness—sorted out a few issues, handled some additional fabrication and even sorted out a breather issue with the relocated oil tank.
They also tackled the final fire-up, test and tune, finally helping Jeff and his ‘MZ Special’ over the finish line.
Jeff admits that, in the end, he probably didn’t save any money going this route. But he learnt a hell of a lot along the way.
“People like John Allen and Ellaspede are an example of the depth of skill that exists out there in motorcycle land,” he says. “But for every John Allen there seem to be a few dreamers who take on jobs they are not up to.”
“Advice in some of the custom Facebook groups is brilliant, even if just for inspiration or motivation. Members of the FB groups Brisbane Café Racers and Sydney Café Racers have contributed, without probably even knowing it.”
He adds that he owes a debt of gratitude to his long-suffering wife, Kendell, and to his brother, Chris, for his motivation.
But what we really want to know, is would he do it again? “Yes, and I’ve already started on a super rare Honda MVX250—a two stroke V3.”
Here’s hoping things go a little more smoothly next time.
Images by AJ Moller. |
This is…not what embattled "Louisiana" Democrat Sen. Mary Landrieu wanted to read in the Washington Post -- which, as it turns out, is her hometown paper:
In Washington, Sen. Mary Landrieu lives in a stately, $2.5 million brick manse she and her husband built on Capitol Hill. Here in Louisiana, however, the Democrat does not have a home of her own. She is registered to vote at a large bungalow in New Orleans that her parents have lived in for many decades, according to a Washington Post review of Landrieu’s federal financial disclosures and local property and voting records. On a statement of candidacy Landrieu filed with the Federal Election Commission in January, she listed her Capitol Hill home as her address. But when qualifying for the ballot in Louisiana last week, she listed the family’s raised-basement home here on South Prieur Street. The New Orleans house, which Landrieu claims as her primary residence, is a new flash point in one of the most closely contested Senate races in the country. Republicans are considering taking legal action to question Landrieu’s residency in the state, arguing that since winning her seat in 1996 she has become a creature of Washington. For Landrieu, there are hazardous parallels to other recent cases in which residency questions have dogged incumbents. Former senator Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) lost reelection in 2012 after reports that he stayed in hotels when he returned to Indiana, while Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) is drawing flack this year for not having a home of his own in Kansas and listing a donor’s house as his voting address.
Lugar was dumped by primary voters last cycle (before the GOP frittered away the seat he vacated), and Roberts is only leading by high single digits in the ruby red state of Kansas. Landrieu is one of the most endangered Senate Democrats in the country, representing a state -- from afar -- that Barack Obama lost by 17 points in 2012. Landrieu has gone 'full Beltway.' She lives in her multimillion-dollar DC mansion (remember this tax-related flap?), not in the state she ostensibly serves. The Senator claims that she lives at her parents' house when she's in town, but neighbors, including some of her supporters, aren't so sure:
“I don’t think she lives there,” said Fontaine Wells, 65, pointing at the Landrieu home. “She might come visit, but come on now — she lives in D.C. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her.” … Michael Fitzgerald, 61, has lived around the corner from the Landrieus for three decades. He said he sees Moon and Verna Landrieu regularly, as well as Mitch Landrieu, Mary’s younger brother and the city’s current mayor, who lives in a home he owns nearby. “On Election Day, [Mary] is seen at our polling place accompanying her parents.” He added, “I have not seen her lately... She’s been in the Senate for — I’ve lost count — 16 years? 18 years?”
Landrieu votes with Barack Obama 97 percent of the time, according to Congressional Quarterly. The president and his signature legislative item, Obamacare, are hugely unpopular in Louisiana. Landrieu cast the deciding vote for that law, attacking critics for "lying" about its now-evident effects. At the time, she pledged to take '100 percent' responsibility for Obamacare's outcomes. Like these ones. Whether or not the incumbent Senator faces any serious eligibility issues remains to be seen, but the optics are bad. The "out of touch" attacks will only intensify, especially in light of the recent revelation that Landrieu inappropriately used taxpayer dollars to fund private jet trips for campaign events. To that end, I'll leave you with this clever bit of in-person trolling from a Republican group last week: |
Fresh doubt could be cast over Michael Stone's conviction for the notorious murders of mum Lin Russell and her daughter Megan, aged six following the confessions of a brutal killer.
Stone, 56, from Gillingham, has served 19 years of a life sentence for the savage hammer attack of the mother of daughter in Chillenden, near Canterbury in July 1996 - but he has consistently protested his innocence.
Now, Levi Bellfield - who is serving a full life term for the murder of Milly Dowler - has finally admitted that he did kill the schoolgirl after abducting and raping her.
Levi Bellfield
Bellfield has this week revealed that he was also behind a string of other brutal attacks.
Although there has been no official confirmation, there has been speculation that these could include the case of the Russells, who died in a frenzied hammer attack in a country lane with their dog Lucy.
Mrs Russell's other daughter Josie, nine, was seriously injured, but has made a full recovery.
Former heroin addict Stone who used to live in Skinner Street, has always insisted that he did not carry out the murders and has said that detectives should question Bellfield about it.
Stone was convicted at two trials and also lost an appeal.
Michael Stone was found guilty at Maidstone Crown Court Friday October 23, 1998
But no forensic evidence linked him to the scene of the crime and his conviction relied largely on the so-called cell confession evidence of a fellow prisoner, Damien Daley.
Daley, also a former drug addict who admitted in court to be an accomplished liar, has himself since been jailed for murder.
Because Stone is still proclaiming he did not do it, he will have to serve the full 25 years of his sentence unless new evidence comes to light.
If it emerges that Bellfield has confessed to the Russell case, Stone's conviction would have to reviewed.
In addition to the murder of Milly Dowler in 2002, Bellfield is also serving life terms for killing Marsha McDonnell and Amelie Delagrange.
Bellfield's dramatic revelations have sparked new investigations which could involve police forces across the country.
A spokesman for Kent Police would not confirm if they had been contacted by the Metropolitan Police, which is leading and coordinating the liaison between forces. |
The product featured in this post was provided for review at my request by Jolse. To learn more about my rules for accepting and reviewing press samples, please check out my sponsorship policy. A list of this blog’s current sponsors is here.
Water! Often it seems like the most basic, boring, bland and banal resource, but we sure do need it. When we don’t have enough, we suffer. And when our skin lacks water, it suffers, too.
That’s why I’m attracted to products that actually feature water as their star ingredient. Just about any skincare product will provide some hydration, so when a product’s claim to fame is hydration, that suggests that its powers of hydration are out of the ordinary. One such product is the Scinic Aqua All In One Ampoule. It promises to drench your skin in not just regular old water water, but also sea water and glacier water. By the way, yes, I’ve gotten over my snotty old aversion to “magic special water” and am now willing to admit that mayyyyyybe waters from different sources may provide different mineral and micronutrient contents and benefits, okay? Maybe.
But first, for those of you unfamiliar with this product category, let’s take a look at what the Scinic Aqua All In One Ampoule is!
What is an All In One Ampoule?
The All In One (AIO) Ampoule category is a pretty limited one for the moment (by the end of the week, I’m pretty sure I’ll be the proud owner of six of the seven AIO Ampoules on the market), but one that claims to do a lot. AIO Ampoules are capable of standing in for any step of a skincare routine. They’re typically weightless and fast-absorbing enough to substitute for hydrating toners, but they offer enough additional beneficial ingredients to qualify as essences. In fact, they contain so many skin-friendly ingredients that they actually deserve the “ampoule” name. If you apply them thickly enough, they can even work nicely as sleeping packs. Versatility is the name of the AIO Ampoule game.
Of course, I’ve made my feelings about all-purpose products clear before, and Korean AIO Ampoules aren’t off the hook. How well does the Scinic Aqua AIO actually do the things it’s supposed to do?
Review: Scinic Aqua All In One Ampoule
When Jolse approached me about sending over some products for me to review, I was really pleased. Not just because I like Jolse a lot, but because they didn’t push any particular product on me. Instead, they asked me to pick what I wanted out of their extensive selection. I’d already noticed the addition of the Scinic Aqua AIO to their new arrivals section, so I jumped on that.
Purpose: Scinic Aqua All In One Ampoule claims to provide deep hydration and intense moisturization in a product that can take the place of “skin + lotion + essence” (toner, hydrator, and essence) in a daily skincare routine. It contains ingredients that target whitening and wrinkle care concerns.
Best suited for: Dehydrated/oily, oily, and combination skin types, but also works for normal and dry skin types.
Do not use if: You are sensitive to glycols, plant extracts, triethanolamine, or anything else in the ingredients list.
When and how to use: At any stage after cleansing and before emulsion or cream, use the included spatula to scoop out a moderate amount of product and spread over face, neck, and upper chest. Pat in until absorbed. Continue with the rest of your normal skincare routine if desired.
Scinic Aqua All In One Ampoule ingredients: Water, sea water, glycerin, glycereth-26, butylene glycol, niacinamide, adenosine, glacier water, zea mays (corn) starch, microcystalline cellulose, mannitol, sucrose, CI 77007, tocopheryl acetate, hydrolyzed collagen, laminaria japonica extract, codium fragile extract, gelidium cartilagineum extract, undaria pinnatifida extract, hamamelis virginiana (witch hazel) extract, salvia officinalis (sage) leaf extract, centella asiatica extract, polygonum cuspidatum root extract, scutellaria baicalensis root extract, camellia sinensis leaf extract, glycyrrhiza glabra (licorice) root extract, chamomilla recutita (matricaria) flower extract, rosmarinus officinalis (rosemary) leaf extract, hordeum vulgare (barley) seed extract, cucumis sativus (cucumber) seed extract, nelumbo nucifera seed extract, panax ginseng seed extract, punica granatum seed extract, borago officinalis seed oil, prunus amygdalus dulcis (sweet almond) oil, macadamia integrifolia seed oil, helianthus annuus (sunflower) seed oil, brassica campestris (rapeseed) seed oil, decylene glycol, ethylhexylglycerin, hexylene glycol, totarol, sclerotium gum, betaine, allantoin, sodium hyaluronate, carbomer, PPG-26-buteth-26, PEG-40 hydrogenated castor oil, triethanolamine, phenoxyethanol, fragrance, CI 42090
CosDNA analysis turns up surprisingly clean for a product with such an extensive ingredients list, but as always, patch testing and slowly introducing the product into your routine is advised.
Notable ingredients: Holy snails would you look at those extracts.
The thing is, more isn’t always better when it comes to ingredients. In fact, it often isn’t. There’s only so much room in any given product for ingredients, and if that room is split between a million different things, the chances are good that you won’t be getting very much of any given one. With that being said, some extracts and ingredients are quite potent even at low quantities. The cumulative effect may be quite powerful even if the individual effect of particular ingredients is not.
Also, the Scinic Aqua All In One really boasts an impressive ingredients list, not just thanks to the niacinamide and adenosine near the top, but also thanks to that litany of botanical extracts and oils. Many of you already know how much I like seaweed in my skincare. The Scinic Aqua AIO boasts a whopping four antioxidant, moisturizing, brightening, and skin-softening seaweed extracts in its formulation, and nearer the top than the bottom of the list at that: laminaria japonica extract, codium fragile extract, gelidium cartilagineum extract, and undaria pinnatifida extract. Those are in addition to the rest of the extracts. The focus of this formulation appears to be on moisturizing, calming, and brightening skin. Many of the anti-inflammatory, anti-irritation extracts are also known antioxidants. It’s a pretty intoxicating blend, if your tastes are anything like mine.
Performance
Before we go any further, just a quick note: I tested this product for three weeks before reviewing it. I couldn’t decide whether to put it through my four-week process for serums, ampoules, and actives, or through my two-week process for hydrating toners and moisturizing products, so I compromised. As you’ll see down below, I was able to evaluate its effects well even in the slightly shorter (or longer, depending on how you look at it) testing timeframe.
Scinic Aqua All In One Ampoule is a smooth, liquidy pale blue gel with tiny little blue marine collagen capsules suspended and quivering in the product. It has a fresh, clean, generic but pleasant “blue water” fragrance that dissipates quickly upon application.
And it feels just as good chilled as you’d imagine, although refrigeration does turn the smoothly flowing gel into a jiggly jelly.
Over the past month, the cooling and refreshing qualities of this product really saved me. My part of SoCal has been absolutely withering in an August heat wave, making me shrink from long routines heavy on the moisturizing layers and also making me crave anything that can quench my skin when it feels like it’s about to crumble right off my face. I’ve used Scinic Aqua All In One Ampoule in just about every way I could think of, just to find more ways to put it on my face (and elsewhere). Here’s what I’ve found:
As an all-in-one product that combines toner, hydrator, and essence, Scinic Aqua AIO excels at softening and hydrating my skin. According to my digital skin analyzer, an application of this product raises my skin’s hydration levels by about 20%, which is stellar compared to many other serum and ampoule products in my arsenal. Even more surprisingly, that hydration remains steady over about an 8-hour period, indicating that despite its watery texture, the Scinic Aqua All In One Ampoule is able to not only add hydration to my skin, but help retain it. It smooths on easily and absorbs quickly. I have noticed, however, that it doesn’t play well with silicone-heavy sunscreens like my Biore UV Aqua Rich Watery Essence unless you add an extra moisturizer on top. Without an intervening layer between the Aqua AIO and the sunscreen, sunscreen and makeup tend to pill up and flake off.
that combines toner, hydrator, and essence, Scinic Aqua AIO excels at softening and hydrating my skin. According to my digital skin analyzer, an application of this product raises my skin’s hydration levels by about 20%, which is stellar compared to many other serum and ampoule products in my arsenal. Even more surprisingly, that hydration remains steady over about an 8-hour period, indicating that despite its watery texture, the Scinic Aqua All In One Ampoule is able to not only add hydration to my skin, but help retain it. It smooths on easily and absorbs quickly. I have noticed, however, that it doesn’t play well with silicone-heavy sunscreens like my Biore UV Aqua Rich Watery Essence unless you add an extra moisturizer on top. Without an intervening layer between the Aqua AIO and the sunscreen, sunscreen and makeup tend to pill up and flake off. As a standalone essence/serum/ampoule step , Scinic Aqua AIO provides a moderate brightening effect. My lengthy facial care routine makes it impossible to test products in isolation on my face, so I used this product on the top of my left foot as well. I don’t regularly use any other products besides sunscreen on my feet, and they sport some pretty stubborn flip-flop tan lines. They’re a great testing ground for products that claim to brighten and whiten. Over the last three weeks, the flip-flop tan lines on my left foot have faded noticeably.
, Scinic Aqua AIO provides a moderate brightening effect. My lengthy facial care routine makes it impossible to test products in isolation on my face, so I used this product on the top of my left foot as well. I don’t regularly use any other products besides sunscreen on my feet, and they sport some pretty stubborn flip-flop tan lines. They’re a great testing ground for products that claim to brighten and whiten. Over the last three weeks, the flip-flop tan lines on my left foot have faded noticeably. As a body moisturizer , Scinic Aqua All In One Ampoule may be my favorite thing ever. I hate putting body lotion on at the best of times, and in the summer it’s torture to smear a slimy layer of lotion all over myself and immediately start sweating. This product comes in such a big jar that I have no qualms about using it literally everywhere. It makes my skin soft and smooth without a trace of slimy or oily residue. Perfection.
, Scinic Aqua All In One Ampoule may be my favorite thing ever. I hate putting body lotion on at the best of times, and in the summer it’s torture to smear a slimy layer of lotion all over myself and immediately start sweating. This product comes in such a big jar that I have no qualms about using it literally everywhere. It makes my skin soft and smooth without a trace of slimy or oily residue. Perfection. As a sheet mask booster applied immediately before a sheet mask, the Scinic Aqua AIO works nicely to help sheet mask essence absorb thoroughly. My skin always looks especially plumped and hydrated afterwards.
applied immediately before a sheet mask, the Scinic Aqua AIO works nicely to help sheet mask essence absorb thoroughly. My skin always looks especially plumped and hydrated afterwards. As a sleeping pack, Scinic Aqua AIO is nice–if used correctly. Because it is primarily a humectant product with only some emollient ingredients, it won’t work well as a conventional sleeping pack. That is to say, you shouldn’t layer it over a bunch of thicker products and expect it to really seal anything in. But it’s a lifesaver on nights when you’re just too tired to deal with a full routine, yet don’t want to dry out like a SoCal lawn while you sleep. Spread a thick layer over a cleansed face. Overnight, your skin will slowly drink in the product, allowing you to wake up to bouncy and happy morning skin.
I’m about halfway through my jar after three weeks, which is pretty incredible considering how much I use this stuff.
Conclusion: While the Scinic Aqua AIO doesn’t provide any single effect powerful enough to qualify it as a holy grail, it’s a really excellent multipurpose product indeed. I’ve used it a number of different ways and been happy enough by what it does to keep looking for even more ways to slot it into my routine. It’s saved me on late mornings and lazy evenings. Perhaps best of all, the product’s reasonable price and generous size make it a very economical choice if you’re looking for a quenching new addition to your routine.
Rating: 4/5
Rating scale:
1 – This should be taken off the market. 2 – Caused me some problems; would not buy again. 3 – Meh. Neither great nor bad. 4 – Pretty good. Would buy again unless I find something better. 5 – I’ll never be in the market for a replacement unless this one is discontinued.
Where can I buy Scinic Aqua All In One Ampoule?
I was given my jar of Scinic Aqua All In One Ampoule by Jolse, which sells the 250 ml product for $18.46.
As a final note, I now also own the Shara Shara Aqua Bomb, Honey Bomb, and Berry Bomb All In One Ampoules and have the Scinic Snail and Honey All In One Ampoules on the way. Can you tell I love this product category? More reviews and comparisons coming soon!
Are you interested in the All In One Ampoule concept? Why or why not? |
Fast internet is becoming a reality in SA. (Duncan Alfreds, Fin24)
Cape Town - Accessible fibre broadband will be rolled out in high density areas if residents demand it, says a provider.
Fibre broadband provider 123Net is rolling out internet access on a demand basis where you can pay R3 600 once-off for an internet service.
"We require at least 300 - 350 non-binding signups submitted on our website in order to start investigating and then planning a potential roll-out in any one area," Kalin Bogatzevski, chief executive officer of 123Net told Fin24.
He said that the company had no specific game plan for Johannesburg suburbs yet as it has to date targeted areas in Durban.
"We have several requests from different areas in Johannesburg including Paulshof, Bryanston and Sandton. However, as of yet, we are still not planning any specific area for the roll out, since our network is currently built based on the demand."
However, Cape Town residents will soon be able to access fibre to the home service from 123Net, said Bogatzevski.
"We have just been granted our Icasa licenses for Cape Town. Our engineers are already working to find the best way to start rolling out in the area. Hopefully, we can start in the next couple of months."
To lobby for inclusion in the broadband rollout, residents have to register on the website.
Fibre expansion
A number of providers have initiated fibre to the home plans, but most of these are restricted to higher income neighbourhoods where there is a strong business case for services.
However, the local fibre broadband market is burgeoning as Telkom group chief executive Sipho Maseko said earlier this month that there are about 25 players in this space.
READ MORE: Telkom CEO: It's game on in SA fibre market
"Gated communities, high-density suburbs; cluster complexes. There has definitely been a focus on some affluent suburbs from the providers. I believe it is all based on ROI (return on investment) for the providers and prevalence of suitable fibre routes," said Mark McCallum, chief technology officer at Orange Business Services.
Gated communities are high priority areas for fibre to the home broadband services. (Duncan Alfreds, Fin24)
123Net's broadband services are expanding in Umhlanga, Durban.
"The growth is due to the price decreases applied by the incumbents recently (after many years of higher costs since the market deregulated) which is being amplified by many new players entering the market with very competitive offers, which have been made possible predominantly due to the delay in the costs being decreased by the incumbents," said Edward Lawrence, director of Business Development at Workonline Communications which has partnered with 123Net.
- Follow Duncan on Twitter |
© AP Rosie O'Donnell says her daughter had been found.
“chelsea has been found and is safe in police custody,” the comedian and talk show host tweeted. “thank u all for the help and light #missingchildren."
O’Donnell had spent much of the day soliciting help to find the missing 17-year-old daughter.
There were no further details, but in a statement, a rep for O’Donnell thanked both the Nyack and Barneget Light, NJ police departments.
Chelsea O'Donnell had last been seen at their South Nyack home a week ago, and her mother tweeted earlier on Tuesday that she “may be in NYC.”
The teenager had stopped taking her prescription medication and needed medical attention, the desperate O'Donnell wrote on her website.
"Chelsea, like millions of people, lives with mental illness," said O'Donnell's spokeswoman, Cindi Berger. "It has been a difficult road for Chelsea and her family and they just want her back safe."
The teen had no phone or computer with her when she left, said Sgt. Daniel Wilson of the South Nyack-Grand View Police Department.
Chelsea left home with her 6-month-old therapy dog, Bear, on Aug. 11, her family said.
Chelsea wasn’t reported missing until Sunday. Wilson said he didn’t know why the family waited to report the disappearance, but that they cooperated fully.
He said there was no fight that preceded her leaving home.
“It was not an argument or any type of heat of the moment situation that resulted in Chelsea leaving,” Wilson said, but noted that she and her mom have a complicated relationship.
“I know that it was a relationship that Rosie worked hard on with Chelsea,” he said. “Some bumps in the road happen as a course of life.”
He said they had been investigating whether the teen might have been trying to go see her birth mother in Wisconsin.
The mom, Deanna Micoley, told Radar Online she last spoke to Chelsea on Aug. 8.
“She asked me where I was living, because she was going to come see me,” Micoley said - but she hasn’t heard from her since.
“I wasn’t aware” she was missing, she told Radar. “I don’t know where she would have gone. Don’t know who she’s with or who her friends are. I’m very worried. Extremely worried.”
O’Donnell and her first wife, Kelli Carpenter, adopted Chelsea in 1997, when she was two months old. They had three other children, and O’Donnell has since had another with now estranged wife Michelle Rounds.
O'Donnell, 53, stepped down as co-host of "The View" back in February, saying she was putting "family first."
"Rosie has teens and an infant at home that need her attention," Berger said then.
O'Donnell soon afterward filed for divorce from her wife of three years, Michelle Rounds, and became enmeshed in a fight with Chelsea's birth mother that went public earlier this year, when Micoley vented about her to the National Enquirer.
The Enquirer reported that Chelsea had tracked Micoley down in November.
"It was the moment I'd been waiting and praying for the last 17 years: I had found my precious daughter!" Micoley, 37, told the tabloid in May.
Micoley said she and Chelsea communicated via texts and Facebook messages, but O'Donnell tried to come between them.
She also accused the "A League of Their Own" star of having "stolen" the girl she’d named Kayla because she was on drugs when she gave her up to an adoption agency in 1997.
"I believe Rosie O'Donnell knew that I was in no condition to sign away my parental rights to my daughter," Micoley told the Enquirer.
The moms battled over the allegations, with O'Donnell texting Micoley at one point that, "It was all legal. Like it or not. Now stop," the Enquirer reported.
Berger told the Enquirer in May the TV talker "encouraged and supported Chelsea's desire to communicate with her birth mother," and found it "disappointing" that she was going public with their differences.
Micoley, now a mother of four living in Wisconsin, could not be reached Tuesday. |
'This place is open to all Jews. Those who try to ruin it can never be forgiven and are banned from our synagogue.'
The rabbi of a haredi synagogue in Beit Shemesh has banned anti-Zionist extremists from praying in his house of worship, following a string of incidents in Beit Shemesh and Jerusalem on Purim.
During the Purim holiday Sunday and Monday, members of the Eida Haharedit organization hanged haredi soldiers in effigy in Beit Shemesh and Jerusalem, dressing up dummies in faux IDF uniforms.
The displays are just the latest in a campaign of harassment and incitement against haredi IDF service members, who have been targeted by radical anti-Zionists.
On Monday, Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit okayed the first-ever police investigation incitement by the so-called “Hardak” campaign, which spreads material maligning haredi soldiers.
Now, a local haredi leader, Rabbi Shimon Tversky, has gone public with a scathing criticism of those responsible for incitement against religious soldiers, banning them from entering his synagogue.
“This place is meant for every Jew,” he wrote in a letter to congregants. “No one has the right to post or write words that incite or insults on the walls in any way shape or form.”
Last week, vandals working on behalf of the “Hardak” campaign spray-painted slogans condemning haredi soldiers on one of the synagogue’s walls.
Rabbi Tversky added that those responsible for vandalism or spreading hatred against religious soldiers were not welcome in the synagogue.
“Anyone who vandalizes cannot be forgiven, and he may never enter this synagogue.” |
The Dallas Cowboys were looking for a defensive end in the late portion of the 2017 NFL Draft, a part of a nine-pick draft that would see seven selections used on defense. Prior to the start of the Draft, the team had expressed plans to sit still at the 28th overall selection, allowing the draft board to come to them, expecting some of the top defensive ends, and their top picks, to be there when they were selecting.
That is not really what happened, however, according to a report from the Fort Worth Star Telegram. The Cowboys actually had conversations with the Baltimore Ravens to move from the 28th position to the 16th slot, but the price for such a jump was too much for Dallas. Their target? Missouri defensive end Charles Harris.
The Miami Dolphins selected Harris with the 22nd overall pick, grabbing a player that the front office and coaching staff had targeted fairly early in the pre-draft process. Miami coveted Harris so much, they actually avoided having contact with him outside of the 15-minute NFL Scouting Combine interview they held in an effort to prevent other teams - like the Cowboys - from knowing which prospect they were actually looking to select.
The report did not indicate if the Cowboys had discussions with any other team before the Dolphins’ pick to try to move up and grab Harris.
The Dolphins will look to Harris to provide a pass-rush specialist type of role this year, working him into the defensive line when they need to get pressure on the quarterback. He will likely be the top reserve behind Pro Bowl defensive end Cameron Wake and the recently re-signed Andre Branch, though Miami could be looking to use packages where all three players are on the field at the same time.
Dallas also was interested in UCLA defensive end Takkarist McKinley, according to the report, but he was selected by the Atlanta Falcons with the 26th overall pick after the Georgia franchise jumped ahead of the Cowboys with a trade.
In the end, the Cowboys ended up sitting in their original draft spot and waiting for the draft board to fall to them, and picked up a defensive end in the process. Dallas selected Michigan defensive end Taco Charlton with the 28th overall selection.
It appears, however, their top choice will be wearing aqua and orange next year, rather than blue and silver. |
When Jozef Metelka gets up in the morning, one of his first decisions is which leg he’ll be wearing that day. After losing his right leg in a motorbike accident in 2009, the keen athlete has built up a collection of 12 specialist prosthetics designed to do everything from mountain biking to snowboarding.
Metelka’s first prosthetic leg was a basic model from the UK’s National Health Service, which allowed him to stand and walk, but was “nothing special”. Then he met with specialists at Pace Rehabilitation in the UK, and his collection began to grow. The prostheticists at Pace began designing a suite of limbs to get him up and running – and skiing, and biking, and rollerblading. Each time Metelka suggested a new sport, the team designed a corresponding leg.
Creating a prosthetic that performs in all situations with the skill and flexibility of a human limb is, at the moment, not possible. Instead, prosthetics are created with specific goals in mind. Each of Metelka’s legs arrives with a particular design challenge. Weight, strength and durability must all be balanced, as well as considerations about the environment: water, mud, and ice. For downhill mountain biking, the engineers designed a leg that could pivot at the ankle and included a robust shock absorber that could endure the heavy drops down steep hillsides. By contrast, Metelka’s road racing leg is a streamlined flute made from a single piece of carbon fibre, lightweight and very stiff. It was even tested in a wind tunnel.
Metelka is not the only person to covet tailor-made prosthetics. In recent years, an abundance of specialised limbs have emerged, each as individual as the person using them. Farmer David Blum created a special hard-wearing prosthetic leg that could meet the demands of his job, for example, and when motorsport champion Mike Shultz realised his prosthesis wouldn’t stand up to the rigours of racing, he built his own leg out of bike parts.
Designing something that performs on par with a living leg is no mean feat. While on a skiing trip, the freezing conditions caused the titanium bolt in Metelka’s prosthetic to seize, and it had to be cut in two to release the socket and allow a different leg to be attached. But the challenge of building specialist limbs also comes with a certain freedom. Unlike natural limbs, there is no need to compromise for general use. While we can’t build an all-purpose prosthetic as good as a regular limb, it’s very possible to create specialised prosthetics that outperform flesh and blood in their particular category.
“You can’t do everything to the high level as a regular leg can,” says Metelka. But for specialised legs, he admits that “we are on the verge of building prosthetics that can outcompete natural limbs”. Ahead of the 2012 Olympics, for example, sport governing bodies and biomechanists debated whether the prosthetic legs worn by sprinter Oscar Pistorius gave him an unfair advantage against able-bodied athletes. Studies suggested they didn’t, but in five years time, says Metelka, we might even see the emergence of particular sports where able-bodied athletes can no longer hold their own against those who can wear – and can afford – high tech prosthesis.
Out on a limb
Paul Carter is another multiple prosthesis user, albeit with a more modest collection. Born without arms or legs, he owns three pairs of artificial legs, including a set of running blades, the kind made famous by Pistorius. “My blades are designed for a very specific use: running. They are brilliant for what they are, but they’re not practical to wear every day,” he says. The carbon fibre blades act like springs, which means it’s almost impossible to stand still while wearing them. He jokes that the continual hopping from one foot to another makes him look like he needs the toilet.
When he was young, hospital staff and occupation therapists gave Carter a dizzying array of different prosthetics, each designed for a particular task. “I had a tool for everything you can imagine, undoing buttons, putting on trousers, eating, for everything. But as I grew up and got independent, it’s another thing to carry them around. It was like being Robin Hood, having to carry around a quiver of various sticks and rods.” Eventually, Carter decided that he’d rather learn to do things himself than have to rely on a multitude of arms. Both he and Metelka talk about the need to plan ahead to ensure you have the right legs with you for whatever the day holds.
The advent of improved materials such as titanium, carbon fibre and silicone rubber has opened up the world of prosthetics, allowing them to be made lighter, stronger, and better fitting. As well as specialising prosthetics for particular uses, it’s also increasingly popular to customise general-use limbs: from ultra-realistic skins that include hair and tattoos, to more abstract forms. “People tend to go two ways,” says Carter, “some want very realistic limbs, but many more are embracing the fact that they look different, and want to accentuate that fact.”
The undisputed queen of personalised prosthetics is Sophie de Oliveira Barata, who runs the Alternative Limb Project. Her studio has produced some of the most unique and eye-catching designs in the world, incorporating scales, magnifying glasses, laser pointers, and ultra-realistic features such as freckles (see gallery). For the closing ceremony of the Paralympics, she crafted model Viktoria Modesta a baroque, jewelled leg decked with crystals and mirrors. Even fashion designers are getting in the act – Alexander McQueen designer a pair of intricately carved wooden legs for Paralympic athlete Aimee Mullins. Made without any joints, there weren’t very practical – but that’s hardly an unusual criticism for catwalk creations.
No prosthetic comes cheap. Currently running blades demand a cool $4,000 apiece, while Metelka’s most hi-tech leg – a motorised walking foot – is an eye-watering $90,000. This high cost is the major issue for those wanting to specialise their limbs, says Carter. “If money wasn’t an issue I’d get all the legs I could have,” he laughs. “I’d be the Imelda Marcos of prosthetics.”
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EDITORS:
We’re increasingly hearing reports of “suspected” cases of Ebola in the United States and Europe. The AP has exercised caution in reporting these cases and will continue to do so.
Most of these suspected cases turn out to be negative. Our bureaus monitor them, but we have not been moving stories or imagery simply because a doctor suspects Ebola and routine precautions are taken while the patient is tested. To report such a case, we look for a solid source saying Ebola is suspected and some sense the case has caused serious disruption or reaction. Are buildings being closed and substantial numbers of people being evacuated or isolated? Is a plane being diverted? Is the suspected case closely related to another, confirmed Ebola case?
When we do report a suspected case, we will seek to keep our stories brief and in perspective.
The AP |
Dulce Base | One of the most important cities bearing the imprint of the world of mysteries is Dulce. It is just across the United States and Mexico, and at first sight, it seems a forgotten city. However, it became known after the rumors that there were hostages, several aliens.
The small town of Dulce is located in the northwest of New Mexico. The town has a population of 900 people.
He is on the reservation of the Jicarilla Indians.
The military base here has extraterrestrials and government agents.
Paul Bennewitz, president of a scientific company, has given more information about this secret base.
The New Mexico Dulce Base does not have the popularity of Area 51 in the Nevada desert, but it is far more sinister than the famous Area 51.
Even the Hangar 18 from the military base called Wright of the Air Force (now Wright-Patterson), Near Dayton (Ohio), it’s not as sinister as this base.
Phillip Schneider was the first person to speak in public about this base and how he took part in a struggle, along with other soldiers and researchers, and on the other, more aliens, including reptilian well-known.
The story began to take shape in 1979 when the US Armed Forces began the project of building an underground military base.
Philip Schneider, one of the design engineers, has signalled that something dubious is happening underground.
The military base was rising rapidly and in some areas, access was limited. Green Berets and Special Forces kept these areas at the cost of living.
Dulce’s secret underground base would be located 4 km northwest of the city, being a mixed CIA-alien base.
Here, all kinds of experiments such as cloning, human aura studies, advanced mind control applications, the creation of animal-human hybrids, human abduction programs for all sorts of genetic experiments.
These underground bases, tunnel systems, and their technology have been described by former soldiers, slaves of mental control, and characters such as Phil Schneider, who helped build them. Schneider is the son of a World War II German commander, Otto Oscar Schneider.
His father was captured by the Americans and taken to the United States to work for secret government forces.
As in most cases, the children of Illuminati agents are raised to work for the same masters, and Phil Schneider had the task of building sections of many underground complexes in the United States.
Schneider made public a bizarre story that happened just before the project was over. Ever since that time, it has been rumoured that more aliens are being held underground.
One day, when the engineer was in one of the tunnels, he was unlucky to face up to a humanoid, green, extremely tall and bad smell.
At that moment the alarm came, and the American soldiers began shooting after the escaped alien prisoners.
Schneider had the chance to kill two of these creatures, so another one could shoot with some kind of laser balls to him.
His life was saved by a gesture of heroism from a soldier who threw himself in front of him and collected the bullets.
In total, 60 people have lost their lives in that battle against creatures from space.
The incident made Schneider investigate the case in detail.
He learned that there are 1,477 such secret bases all over the world, 129 only in the US.
These bases are ultra-secret and consume about 25% of US GDP each year. It is also said that many aliens, captured in various ways, are used as guinea pigs in various experiments.
The equipment and technology in these secret military bases are state-of-the-art.
In this base, aliens make experiments on humans and animals.
Aliens, based on animal and human DNA, create humanoids.
There are over one hundred secret exits and over 3,000 surveillance cameras that provide security in the area.
The base is run by a Council. The relationship with the CIA is always kept. There are seven floors.
Aliens use levels 5-6 and 7. Everyone who comes in there is completely naked and weighed.
A code is given, and any weight change results in an alarm.
At the fourth level, studies and research are based on human aura, hypnosis, telepathy. At sixth level, there are the experiments laboratories.
According to a researcher who worked in those laboratories, the results of the experiments are frightening.
Three-legged humans, half humans, half octopus, human reptiles, lizards. The sounds that these beings leave are scary.
At seventh level, heads, embryos, human bodies are preserved in various solutions. Dulce aliens are considered to be the first inhabitants of the Earth and claim to be drawn from the cross between Homo Sapiens with a humanoid-reptile species.
This species was created by beings called Draco
After being kidnapped, people are being implanted. Skin, sperm, egg, DNA are taken.
Thanks to the implant, people undergo these experiments, without retaliation.
After the experiment ends, the subject no longer remembers anything.
They still betray the look that they have, and a constant, stupid smile.
Two of the bases where Schneider was present in Area 51 of Nevada and Dulce, New Mexico Dulce is a town of about 1,000 inhabitants, located in the Apache Jicarilla Reserve, at a height of nearly 2000 meters.
From there have been many reports of UFO take-offs and landings, “extraterrestrial” kidnappings, human and animal mutilation.
The same base is the place of the so-called “Dulce wars,” in which reptilians and Grays are said to have fought military and civilians.
There were many casualties in both camps, and Phil Schneider claims he also took part in this shootout.
He says he was hit by a laser weapon and he has a big scar on his chest.
His participation in the battle has been made public in a lecture since 1995, although many other elements appear in it:
“My job was to get into the holes and check the rock samples, recommending the explosive for each type of rock. We were at a time in a big cave full of aliens known as Gray. I shot two of them. We were about 30 people and suddenly there were about 40 aliens who were all killed. I then saw a whole underground base full of aliens. Later I learned that they had been living on this planet for a long time … That explains a lot about the theory of the ancient astronauts. “
Schneider died on January 17, 1996, under very suspicious circumstances, which were made to be suicidal. In fact, he found himself “suicidal with a piano rope strangling.”
He had said, one year before, in a public lecture, that “at the crossing of each calendar year, military technology increases by 44.5 years (compared to the growth rate of” conventional “technology), and why it is easy to understand What in 1943 could be done by using vacuum tube technology to effectively displace a ship from one place to appear in another, “referring to the Philadelphia Experiment, in which an American military ship became invisible and translates into another dimension .
Another underground base where Schneider worked is under Denver International Airport, east of this city.
The construction has raised great problems because of the huge costs – as well as the giant beached by Bechtel as part of the “transport network improvement” in Boston, Massachusetts.
Denver Airport is full of statues of Gargoyle, Masonic and Illuminati symbols.
According to Schneider, there are at least 10 underground levels and a whole underground city with an area of 11 km.
The Denver base is said to include large “isolation camps” and underground spaces for incarceration of “dissidents”.
Workers on the lower levels of the base have seen many terrible scenes they have refused to talk about.
These bases are where millions disappear, yes, millions of children from all over the world.
I know it is hard to believe, but they are used for forced labour and then consumed by reptilians, as the cattle are by humans.
Dulce base workers in New Mexico reported that they saw the grotesque things at the lower levels of the base.
Researchers Bill Hamilton and Tal Levesque (also known as Jason Bishop III) gathered the following information about Dulce, published in a UFO magazine:
“Level 6 is also called the” Nightmare Hall “because of the genetic lab. The reports of workers who have seen bizarre experiments are like, “I saw people with more feet, half a half-octopus, but also reptilian people with hands of people crying like babies. So is a mixture of lizards – humans, fish, seals, birds, and mice, all kept in cages. I also saw winged humanoids, grotesque creatures like bats, one meter to over two meters high, but also gurgling and reptilian beings. “Level 7 is even worse, rows and rows of cold-kept human mixtures. Large storage containers for humanoid embryos at different stages of development. People in cages, usually sedated and drugged, who sometimes scream and beg for help. We have been told that they are incurable fools, following very risky drug tests to cure madness. We were advised not to speak at all. At first, I even believed it all, but by 1978 some workers discovered the truth … “
This discovery led to the “Dulce wars” of 1979, the struggle between humans, on the one hand, and reptilians and reptilian grey, on the other, in which many scholars and soldiers died, a fight in which Phil Schneider claims He was hurt.
A Dulce security officer, Thomas Castello, has described a Dulce-based research in a UFO magazine. His information was named “Dulce Documents”.
Castello has been working for seven years for Rode Corporation, an Illuminati operation in Santa Monica, California, transferred to Dulce in 1977.
He has estimated the number of “greys” from Dulce to over 18,000 but has also seen numerous High humanoid reptiles.
He knew of the existence of seven levels of the base, although he admits there could be more, and aliens were at the last three levels. T
he degree of security increases with the level.
The only sign in English was above the transport station, which was “towards Los Alamos,” another major reptilian underground base in New Mexico.
But most of the Dulce signs are in “alien symbolic language”, a universal system of symbols understood by humans and aliens.
The Illuminati communicate on the surface in symbolic language.
It is supposed that origin, Sumerian, Egyptian and Chinese hieroglyphs were a reptilian or alien language.
Other links to the Dulce tunnel reach the underground complexes of Page, Arizona, Area 51 in Nevada, Taos, Carlsbad and Datil, New Mexico, Colorado Springs and Creede, Colorado.
Castello said there was a vast network of underground transport links under the United States, which extends into the global tunnel and underground system.
Dulce Base is supposed to contain 7 levels:
Level 1 – for various repairs;
Level 2 – for UFOs and other ships;
Level 3 – contains government offices;
Level 4 – Laboratories for human aura research, as well as for manipulation of dreams, hypnosis, and telepathy. For example, you can reduce your heart beats with delta waves, and you can track mind reactions with chips inserted into the brain;
Level 5 – the witnesses described huge pots of liquids, with parts of the human body – as in a horror movie. Here are cages for men, women, and children, kept for experiments;
Level 6 – or “Hall of the Nightmare” – contains genetic laboratories. Every kind of animal and animal crosses are being tried. More humanoid creatures with more than 2 feet and 2 hands would have been genetically produced here;
Level 7 – here would be over 1,000 people kept in cold stores.
References: |
333
5000 Burnet Rd
Austin , TX 78756
(512) 994-8982
If I could give this review more than 5 Stars I would. The people that run this Food Truck are extremely friendly and accommodating and genuinely enjoy what they are doing and have a passion for the food that they provide. I have never had a Hot Dog come close to what I had here and my one regret of moving to Houston was not being able to eat here as often as I'd like. 110% Satisfaction with the Service and Food.
(3.5 star!) FOOD// I had his Hebrew Hot dog and Carne Asada Burrito. I personally enjoyed the food really much, but was not certain for its price. The quality was mediocre personally, but do know I had these take out. For hot dog, the bun was perfectly toasted and blending of all toppings and its hot dog was incredible. The steak on the burrito was well cooked and could be more juicy than how it was. ATMOSPHERE// This is one of 12 5000 Burnet Food Truck area. SERVICE// To be honest, he wasn't going crazy at explaining and stuff as other owners that I visited around the food truck area. I got all my stuff and it was a typical service. SURROUNDINGS// This is one of 12 5000 Burnet Food Truck.
Carnitas French fries are off the hoooook! My boo and I stopped here for lunch and this was the only option that seemed reasonably priced and looked appetizing at the time. We split the fries and a Sonoran hot dog. Beans on a hot dog? Not my thing but I can see why people would love it. The ladies running the truck were friendly and quick, talk about hustle! Make it a point to stop at this food truck while at 5000 Burnet.
There's a reason why this place is 5 stars on Yelp. The people who run the truck are SO friendly; they informed us about everything and were kind and patient. Me and my friend ordered the Con Todo hot dog and the Carne Asada burrito. The guy who runs it wiped down the tables for us because it was raining. Talk about caring for his customers! He brought out the food to us and it looked delicious. He even told us the origin of the name and where they came from. In Arizona, there's plenty of hot dog stands but none in Austin. How cool that he shared that with us. Unfortunately I had to be on the phone for an insurance call, so I'm not sure if the hot dog got a little soggy in the bread. Nonetheless, it was yummy. But the burrito was amazing. I dream about it sometimes. Like, damn! The sauce is fantastic and the limes compliment it so well. If you have to order something, get the carne asada burrito. You won't regret it.
I Person I know took me overt there and I really like the hotdog even when I'm not a fast food person .. I will recommend this place to all of you but the best part are the owner .. super friendly people and you can talk long enough with them .. and they are well know travel
This place has the best hotdogs you'll ever eat and the carne asada fries are really good as well. The guy who cooks the food is really nice and you can tell he cares about the food he serves just by tasting it. If in Austin you should really go try them out.
I don't think I've ever craved a hot dog before, but Jeff M. insisted on starting our Austin eating escapade at T-Loc's Sonora Hot Dogs (TLSHD). I kind of wish that we didn't start with it, since it's such a tough act to follow. TLSHD's Sonoran Hot Dog was stupidly good. I saw pictures of the hot dog and thought, "ehhh, it looks like a hot dog with relish and mayo. It can't be that good." I couldn't be more wrong. The "relish" is a jalapeño sauce that wasn't very spicy at all, but it added a great amount of flavor. My favorite part of the hot dog was the bun! The dog was served on a bolillo (a type of French bread) that they special order from Arizona every week. It had the slightest bit of crisp but was unbelievably soft on the inside. We tried to get the name of the bakery, but their lips were sealed. The dog also comes with a grilled pepper that's slightly salted and grilled. Delicious! The staff was pretty nice too. They came out and explained what was used in the dog, what made the dog a Sonoran Hot Dog, and they told us the proper way to eat the hot dog (take a bite of the dog, then bite the pepper). I can't say enough good things about TLSHD! Everything was delicious and it made me want to get another one right away. Get yourself to TLSHD and get yourself one of these glorious dogs!
There was a time in the summer where I was obsessed with hot dogs. I ate a hot dog every day. I decided to try out this hot dog truck that everyone has been craving about. When I looked into it I was like wait, it has beans in it?? Sounds interesting, I have to try it. My friend is quite the picky eater and was scared about all of the toppings on the hot dog, but she had to try the original one. The man that ran the truck was very accommodating and friendly. He suggested putting a tiny half line of mustard on her dog because she hates mustard. Turns out, the hype was real. Everything went together surprisingly well. The grilled pepper that came with it gave it a kick. It was pretty spicy though, not going to lie. I wish I could eat 5 of these, but I am at a point in my life where a $2 pack of hot dogs is all I can afford right now. #collegeprobs but hot dogs 4 lyfe
Definitely a reason this place has 5 starts and almost 400 reviews. How good can a hot dog get? This place has set the standard. I was a little hesitant seeing a bacon wrapped hot dog thinking the bacon would be messy. But the bacon is wrapped perfectly around the hot dog where it doesn't get in the way. If the toppings on the hot dog worry you, don't be. The flavors work wonderfully together. And the bun... just perfect. Agua fresca is a great addition to drink along with it. Don't skip it. Parking can be a little bit of a hassle on the actual lot, but there are neighboring park lots.
The hot dog is so good!!! Fantastic quality and amazing flavor! I deeply recommend! I got the hot dog with everything, and they make a small one for children.
I can see how a lot of people would miss out on the perfect hot dog by being picky or reluctant to try all of the ingredients. Do yourself a favor and get over it. Try the Sonoran hot dog "con todo." It's perfect. If we lived in Austin, we would be here on the reg. The other items on the menu looked amazing, especially the steak fries. We tried to go back the next day, but they are closed on Sundays.
First time here and this place was the bomb diggity!!!! Had a hard time picking what to get only because everything seemed so good and couldn't decide. Decided to go with the carne asada fries and Sonoran Style Hot Dog. They had ran out the Mexican cream for fries but still decided to get without it and they were delicious. The Mexican cream is will be like an entry to heaven. Will definitely be coming back many more times, but with the intent of getting to hot dogs instead of one. Good find, great food
I hadn't had a Sonoran hot dog in 4 years din r my last trip to Tucson. Upon arriving Miguel welcomed me and let me know these are authentic. The buns are flown in from Tucson and T-Locs actually stands for Tucson Locals. I fell in love with this dog again after first bite. I can't wait to visit again in October. Read more about my experience at https://inthemoodfor.blog/2018/09/01/t-locs/
If your are from Southern California and have been on the hunt for San Diego mexican food then you found the right place for Carne asada burritos and fries! Super nice people and great carne asada.
I saw a review for T-Loc's in a Yelp email for National Hot Dog Month. I worked for a while in the Tucson area and was familiar with the Mexican style hot dogs T-Loc's is famous for. I just happened to be in the neighborhood so I stopped by to check 'em out. Without any reservations, i have to say that Miguel and his partner have not only nailed it, but exceeded the flavor I held in my memory. They were so friendly and informative, talking about their struggles and successes and the love of what they're doing. I am absolutely rooting for team T-Loc ! I went for the best: Their Sonora Dog Con Todo with a Lemonade Ginger Agua Fresca. Everything was exceptional. The bun is like no other and, while slightly crispy on the outside, literally melts in your mouth. I have no idea what kind of bread it is or the dough used, but it is almost like a sopapilla on the inside. They ship in the rolls because he can't find anyone to make it locally to his specifications. The layering of flavorful ingredients and sauces over a perfectly grilled bacon-wrapped hot dog still has my mouth watering. I advise getting it just the way they offer it - with everything - that's what sets it above the rest. I'll be back on a regular basis and, who knows, I might even try the rest of the menu offerings.
A Sonoran hot dog?! What is it? I must eat it! Those were the thoughts going through my head as a saw the food truck. So a Sonoran dog is a hot dog, wrapped in bacon, with beans on it, tomatoes, onion, mustard, ketchup , jalapeño sauce - hold the mayo - on a slightly sweet bun imported from Tucson! The dogs are grilled as you order them & the bun is grilled to a nice crisp. It is one amazing dog! This is a must try food truck. You're going to be in hot dog heaven!
T-Loc's Sonora Hot Dogs are amazing! It will change your life! Before trying their hot dogs, I didn't like anything if it wasn't a plane hot dog with ketchup and mayo (the end.. no more and no less). My hot dog tastes were extremely black and white. I surprised myself since it is unlike me but I love their sonoran hot dogs. Be open minded if you are a picky hot dog eater like me since it has a lot of ingredients, but all the different ingredients play together so well. To me it's not a hot dog, it is a flavor experience! And don't ignore the lightly grilled and salted pepper that comes with it, it greatly adds to the experience! I've tried their other menu items as well and they are all delicious but the hot dog will always be my favorite because I can't get anything like it elsewhere. Also, the owners are very friendly and always a treat to see! I am impressed that Miguel recognizes me every time I come by even after just 1 visit.
We ordered a little bit of everything the service was amazing and so was the food u guys are doing an amazing job! Sincerely, (The Craft burger food truck couple)
What can be said about this place that has not. Owners are friendly , get to know their customers, the hot dogs are fantastic blend of flavors and buns are spot on. I have eaten here at least a dozen times and the quality never fluctuates, even being someone who does not care for mustard it just works. Would suggest trying the premium dogs and carne asada tacos , you can do one and one and get a nice plate that will make you want to walk home. To the review on here complaining about the "hot dog" quality , exactly where have you eaten a Sonora dog off a cart that you questioned the hot dog used...pretty sure I don't want to know most of the times. The trade off here is good quality , good taste , good people and supporting someone that cares about who they are serving. |
Players are to Remain Immersed in Mass Effect Andromeda, Following Subquests or Otherwise
Anyone else play Dragon Age: Inquisition, then start talking to an NPC about a quest; At that point you realized the camera didn’t zoom, but remained panned out, devaluing your engagement. Well it seems we’re getting a totally different approach with Mass Effect Andromeda. None of the same ol’ scavenger/fetch/kill quests.
From the March issue of PC gamer, a BioWare employee spoke specifically about the matter; he claiming this time around the side-quests will be “Meaningful.” Meaningful in what way? you might ask. We learn from their own words:
“We are approaching the completionist aspect very differently because we’ve done and learned a lot from Inquisition. But we’ve also observed what other games have been doing, like The Witcher. And it was very important for us that the quantity of scope doesn’t downgrade the quality of whatever you are doing there.
Side quests are ‘meaningful’.”
And this deep consideration for questing has also led to better environmental storytelling. Apparently, the planets in Mass Effect Andromeda will have more elaborate backstories. As setting is pivotal to immersion, BioWare seeks to add lyrical weight through planetary features and exploration. All they have to do now is say Bloodborne inspired this aspect, and we’d all be in for a treat. All humor aside, here’s what they did say:
“One of the things that was very critical for us early on was this saying that when we develop these planets, each one needs its own story and its own history, its own backstory and its reason for existing.”
“The story is not only about the cast. The story is about settling, the story is about survival, the story is about the locals – and that’s where the loyalties will definitely focus,” added producer Mike Gamble.
Mass Effect Andromeda launches for PC, PS4, and Xbox One on March 21. We’ll keep you updated as more news comes our way, and we expect much more. Happy gaming.
SOURCE, SOURCE |
Shopping malls across America are going to look a whole lot emptier soon. An exodus of giant retailers is beginning with the announcement of hundreds of store closures and thousands of people newly unemployed.
The first of January, I broke with my usual tradition and wrote not about positive resolutions, but about the impending rockslide of the US economy. And “rockslide” is an apt word: as one thing starts rolling down the mountain, it will pick up other things until a veritable avalanche of other businesses and people are affected and rolling pell-mell right alongside.
Last year, we saw announcements of the expected closure of some retail giants. In February of 2013, Michael Snyder wrote on The Economic Collapse Blog that we would see the following:
Best Buy Forecast store closings: 200 to 250 Sears Holding Corp. Forecast store closings: Kmart 175 to 225, Sears 100 to 125 J.C. Penney Forecast store closings: 300 to 350 Office Depot Forecast store closings: 125 to 150 Barnes & Noble Forecast store closings: 190 to 240, per company comments Gamestop Forecast store closings: 500 to 600 OfficeMax Forecast store closings: 150 to 175 RadioShack Forecast store closings: 450 to 550
Unfortunately, it didn’t stop there. This morning, a World News Daily report announced:
Macy’s is closing 14 of its 790 stores across the country. JCPenney is closing 39 of its stores and laying off 2,250 workers. Sears has been around for 122 years, but it, too, is closing 235 under-performing stores. C. Wonder, the preppy retailer, is going out of business, closing all 11 of its U.S. stores in the next few weeks. Wet Seal is closing 338 retail stores while dealing with bankruptcy proceedings. Nearly 3,700 full- and part-time workers will be unemployed. Aeropostale, suffering from declining sales, closed 75 stores during the holiday season, which runs from November through January. And in 2015, they expect to close an additional 50 to 75 stores. RadioShack, which is negotiating with lenders to gain approval to shutter 1,100 stores, said last month that it closed 175 locations in 2014. (source)
Even holiday sales, normally high, plummeted this Christmas.
How does this affect you?
You may not work in retail yourself, but never doubt that the mass closure of these businesses will directly affect you..
Maybe you are wondering how. You aren’t much of a shopper. You aren’t a retail worker. Perhaps you believe you can compartmentalize this information, pack it away, and go on with your life as you always have.
The thing is, it’s not just the patrons and employees of these stores who are affected. This is going to be catastrophic on a variety of levels.
Let’s go a little bit deeper.
Think about the people who worked in these stores. Now, they’re without jobs. There will be more competition for the smaller number of jobs in America, and many people will not be able to find work. They’ll survive by going on assistance, draining the US coffers even more. As formerly employed people search for work that just isn’t there, we’ll see an increase in foreclosures, repossessions, and welfare.
Think about those who provided the inventory for these stores. Yes, I know a lot of it was made in other countries. But, it was imported here and distributed here. Most businesses work on a “Net-30″ basis, meaning the inventory is delivered, and the payment for that inventory is due in 30 days. And guess what? The companies that imported the merchandise aren’t going to get paid. This will ripple through and cause other businesses to go under, which means still more people are unemployed.
Think about those who transport the inventory. Trucking companies and the independent operators who drive the trucks won’t get money owed to them either. As companies struggle to keep trucks on the road, transport costs will go up, which will cause future inventory in stores to be priced higher.
This is how we’ll be affected:
The price of everything is going to go up because wary distributors are going to try to recoup what they’ve lost from these companies that went under, while transporters increase prices to try to cover losses.
Jobs will be even harder to get than they were previously – and looking at the unemployment rates, it was pretty darned difficult before.
When people have no jobs, they spend no money, crushing the manufacturer’s and retailer’s economy even more.
As financial desperation increases, so will crime. And it won’t just be property crime – expect an uptick in violence as property owners fight back.
If you don’t live in an entirely self-sufficient bubble, you can bet you’ll be affected in one way or another.
What can you do about the collapsing economy?
It’s more vital than ever to be aware of what’s going on and to start getting prepared for it on all levels. You need to consider the following:
Create multiple streams of income. We’d all like to feel like we’re reliably employed, but that’s just not true. You need only to look at the numbers above to see that jobs can be ephemeral. You need to be making money from more than one source (multiple streams of income). Start a small business that provides a safety net. Check out this great article on Graywolf Survival for more information on how to do it.
Learn to shop wisely. A couple of years ago, I wrote this article about how shopping wisely can save you a fortune on your regular purchases. Each purchase needs to be thought out carefully because the day may come when your own personal economic collapse occurs in the form of a job loss, an illness, or a catastrophic bill.
Build a pantry. A well-stocked larder can be your lifeline in the event that your personal finances take a hit. Your supply of food, toiletries, and household items can mean the difference between weathering a storm in relative comfort or going under completely. When I got laid off from my job in the automotive industry, it took 4 weeks before the severance pay arrived, and 9 weeks before my unemployment insurance kicked in. We were able to survive in total comfort due to the supplies we had laid in, and the lower amount of money I was receiving was enough to cover things like the mortgage, car payments, and utilities. Check out my book on building a one-year food supply in 3 months. Another option (although not as thrifty) is to stock up on freeze-dried food for your family. The nice thing is, you can put this at the back of your closet until the day you need it. It’s packaged for the long haul in buckets and it keeps for ages.
Learn to do it yourself. Really, the epitome of preparedness is self-sufficiency. Only when you reduce your dependence on the economy can you be truly unaffected by the things going on in retail-land. Grow it, make it, build it. No matter where you live, you can take steps towards personal independence. The last half of this book is all about being as self-reliant as possible – it’s a must-read. Learn to live like there are no stores, and if a day comes when there aren’t, you’ll be just fine. Learn skills like canning, sewing , and homesteading , and figure out how to apply them to your personal situation. Also, don’t just learn them: DO THEM.
Learn to live on less (and enjoy it). When my oldest daughter was a newborn, my husband lost his job. We went through the toughest financial period I ever faced. Quite literally, at one point we had 2 bags of bagels in our freezer, half a jar of peanut butter, and the desperate hope that our vegetable garden would produce enough to get us through until unemployment checks started arriving or a new job was found. I read a book (borrowed from the library and signed out for the maximum allowed number of times) that completely changed my life. If you haven’t read The Complete Tightwad Gazette, I strongly encourage you to read this gigantic bible of frugality from cover to cover. I still hear Amy Dacyzyn’s “voice” in my head sometimes and my own work is strongly influenced by those lessons she taught me back when I was a new mama. Here’s an article to get you in the frugal mindset.
If you can’t protect it, you don’t own it. Lots of people hate this part, but it’s true. You absolutely must have a strategy for protecting your home and family. That means you need weapons. You need to figure out how to harden your property against attacks. You must be mentally and physically prepared for the increase in crime that comes with the increase in desperation. I know in my small, sleeping town, property crimes have been on the rise, and sadly, violent crimes are popping up now when they were so rare as to be an anomaly before. This article talks about hardening your home, and this one tells you how to prepare your home for battle, should things really go awry.
Have you seen evidence of this collapse?
How are things in your neck of the woods? I know that where I live, some of the nearby malls are turning into ghost towns. Crime has been steadily rising for the past six months. I personally know several people who have lost their jobs recently due to the closure of the businesses with whom they were employed. Have you seen evidence of this financial downturn? Let’s compare notes in the comments section below.
Daisy Luther is a freelance writer and editor who lives in a small village in the Pacific Northwestern area of the United States. She is the author of The Pantry Primer: How to Build a One Year Food Supply in Three Months. On her website, The Organic Prepper, Daisy writes about healthy prepping, homesteading adventures, and the pursuit of liberty and food freedom. Daisy is a co-founder of the website Nutritional Anarchy, which focuses on resistance through food self-sufficiency. Daisy’s articles are widely republished throughout alternative media. You can follow her on Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter, and you can email her at daisy@theorganicprepper.ca |
Wales
Championship chief labels Anglo-Welsh league 'scandalous'
ESPN Staff
The make-up of next year's Premiership is still uncertain © Getty Images Enlarge
Championship chairman Geoff Irvine has said the English game 'would go beserk' if the Premiership's mooted 16-team Anglo-Welsh league came into being.
The Welsh Rugby Union (WRU) has been given a new deadline of January 31 by the regions to agree a new participation agreement before they pursue 'other options' - widely interpreted to mean agreeing to merge with the Premiership. Plans for a 16-team league appear to be at an advanced stage, with Welsh sources suggesting a deal would guarantee three of the four regions immunity from relegation.
The proposals have angered England's second tier clubs, who feel they should be granted first refusal in the event of any Premiership expansion. And Irvine has made his feelings perfectly clear on what he feels are 'scandalous' plans, though he admits he doubts the expanded league will become a reality.
"I really cannot see the RFU admitting four Welsh clubs - the English game would go beserk," Irvine told The Rugby Paper.
"What's the point? The whole system that we've developed over English-qualified players seems to be working well. As for agreeing to give Welsh clubs immunity from relegation, they simply can't do that. The regulations over promotion and relegation are governed by the RFU, not Premiership Rugby, and they can't just make the rules up as they go along.
"It's scandalous, but it's just typical of the way this game is at the moment. We [the Championship] ask Premiership Rugby every year if they want to go to 14 teams and every year they tell us they don't. But now all of a sudden, because they're in the mire over Europe, they're talking about going to 16. It's nonsense."
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IN 2014, FRENCH AUTHOR Patrick Modiano was awarded the Nobel Prize in literature “for the art of memory with which he has evoked the most ungraspable human destinies and uncovered the life-world of the occupation.” With the first-year anniversary of his award having just passed, it seemed as if it would be a good time to review a large portion of his fiction and discuss some of the themes that inform his writing, which deserves a wider audience in the United States.
Modiano is a prolific writer. He has written more than 20 works of fiction as well as screenplays (Lacombe, Lucien co-written with Louis Malle) and children’s books and memoirs. He published his first novel, La Place de l’étoile, in 1968, for which he was awarded the Fénéon Prize and Roger Nimier Prize. His most celebrated work, or perhaps the most widely known, Missing Person, won the Prix Goncourt in 1978, the year of its publication. Over the years, Modiano has won many other French literary awards, including the Grand Prix National des Lettres, in 1996, for his work overall.
Generally Modiano writes short, easy-to-read novels (most are around 200 pages long, some shorter) with big themes: memory, loss, identity, seeking. They are easily approachable and satisfying to read. Despite this, he is still not widely read in the United States. At the time he was awarded the Nobel Prize last October, many of his books were unavailable in English translation and, Missing Person, the novel for which he won the Prix Goncourt in 1978, had sold only 2,425 copies in the United States. The availability of his work in English has now been largely solved through the industrious work of several talented translators, and more of his novels are becoming available on an almost monthly basis. [1]
Works discussed in this article include Ring Roads (Les Boulevards de ceinture, 1972), Missing Person (Rue des Boutiques Obscures, 1978), Suspended Sentences (Remise de peine, 1988), Honeymoon (Voyage de noces, 1990), Flowers of Ruin (Fleurs de ruine, 1991), Afterimage (Chien de printemps, 1993), Out of the Dark (Du plus loin de l’oubli, 1995), Dora Bruder (1997), Dans le café de la jeunesse perdue (2007), and Pedigree: A Memoir (Un Pedigree, 2015).
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Modiano achieved literary recognition early in his career, at least in France, but his creation of himself as a writer could not have been easy, given his penurious and precarious early life. He was born in 1945, just outside Paris, but his family had not been in the terroir of France for very long. His mother was Belgian, born in Antwerp. His Jewish father’s family was originally from Greece and came to France by way of Italy. His mother and father met and married during World War II, had two children (Modiano’s younger brother Rudy died of leukemia at age 10), and separated sometime after that. Socioeconomically, the family would classify as petite bourgeoisie and after 1947 they slipped into what Modiano refers to in Pedigree as “splendid poverty.” Suspect because of their outsider and low-class standing, frequently nearly destitute, they were sometimes driven to crime. Modiano himself admits to stealing books from both private individuals and from libraries in order to sell them to second-hand book dealers; his mother was not beyond shoplifting.
His mother was, as he notes in Pedigree, “a pretty girl with an arid heart.” She abandoned the family to pursue a theatrical career, landing bit parts in minor plays throughout Europe, often leaving Modiano in the care of friends or relatives. His father, with whom Modiano never established a bond, continually placed him in schools in and out of Paris whenever he could afford to, and eked out a living through shady deals with disreputable people, some of whom were thought to have been gangsters. Given the petty larceny that mother and son engaged in, and the father’s suspicious illegal dealings, and the paranoia that follows in the wake of criminality, it is understandable that the narrator of Ring Roads (a semi-autobiographical novel about father and son) remarks that in Paris, for people like them, “Menace loomed everywhere.”
It has been claimed that Modiano’s range of work is narrow and repetitive. He himself has said that for over 45 years he has always been writing the same novel (on fait toujours le même roman). But if his works deal with a narrow range of themes and are repetitive, they are so in the way that Ravel’s Boléro is repetitive: a simple melody with insistent, intricate, increasing orchestration that holds our attention from beginning to spectacular end.
The novels reviewed in this article, like most of Modiano’s work, revolve around tragedy while not conforming to the classic structure of tragedy, in which someone who possesses high social position, or great wealth, or intelligence, or power, or beauty suffers a reversal of fortune due to some flaw of character. Rather, his novels are infused with the tragic sense of life, as defined by the philosopher Miguel de Unamuno, who named this state of existence: the sense of tragedy that comes from our being self-conscious creatures who, through the act of living, are brought face to face with our frailty and our limitations, the chief one of which is our mortality.
Modiano’s work is also different from classic tragedy in that, for the most part, the people he writes about are from the lower strata of society — gamblers, drifters, grifters, prostitutes, slumlords, and jockeys. Modiano admits in Ring Roads that:
I know the life stories of these shadows is of no great interest to anyone, but if I didn’t write it down, no one else would do it. It is my duty, since I knew them, to drag them — if only for an instant — from the darkness. It is a duty, but for me it is also a necessary thing.
Commentators and critics have pointed out that the structure of many of Modiano’s novels borrows the format of detective stories. However, while his characters are frequently chasing down clues and coming up with theories about the behavior of the people they are investigating, and imagining what that person could have been doing or thinking at any given point in time, Modiano’s writing is not the stuff typical of the detective genre. In fact, his narrators, who are frequently carrying out some sort of investigation, have more in common with Samuel Beckett’s deracinated, self-reflecting characters (especially in the trilogy Molloy, Malone Dies, and The Unnamable) than they do with Dashiell Hammett’s Sam Spade or Raymond Chandler’s Philip Marlowe — who always get their man. For in Modiano, no villain will be captured, no vengeance wreaked, no one brought to justice.
Also as in Beckett, characters in Modiano’s novels share their mental states, memories (or lack thereof), and describe their physical locations (or lack thereof) with great gusto and enthralling detail. What happened to them, where they are, where they are going, why they are going where they are going, what they have lost, what they have left, are questions with which they struggle. Coincidentally, perhaps, both Modiano’s and Beckett’s protagonists/narrators are writers, or want to be writers, or tell people they are writers. And, they struggle with memory issues. In Malone Dies, Malone writes: “At first I did not write, I just said the thing. Then I forgot what I had said. A minimum of memory is indispensable, if one is to live really.”
Memory occupies an odd place in consciousness, somewhere between reality and dream. This intersection is an area of interest for Modiano, and he is acutely aware of the intermittent interpenetration of these different states of consciousness and how, for example, “the contagion of dreams into reality” affects our existence.
What our memories hold, how we maintain them or find them when they seem to have disappeared, and how we verify that they are correct if we find them, are the very subjects about which Modiano writes. By capturing his memories about people and places and writing them down, in the form of novels and memoirs, he forces himself, and us, to remember them. This is because, as he says in Afterimage, “I refused to accept that people and things could disappear without a trace. How could anyone resign himself to that?”
Other writers have devoted their art to capturing memories, notably Proust, to whom Modiano is often compared. In Proust, however, memories arise from sensations or sensorial impressions, and in Remembrance of Things Past, Marcel, the narrator of the novel, does not question the verisimilitude or reality of his memories. His concern is whether a memory will “ultimately reach the clear surface of my consciousness, this memory, this old dead moment.” [2]
Modiano is not concerned with bringing what he calls a “dead moment” to consciousness, nor with the structure of memory or how it functions, as Proust was. A narrator in a Modiano novel either has a memory of an event: “I remember a car ride, five years later, from Pigalle to the Champs-Elysées”; or, he has no memory of an event. Or, like a character in Beckett’s trilogy, he has no memory even of himself, as the narrator in search of himself in Missing Person, thinks: “I no longer remember if, that evening, my name was Jimmy or Pedro, Stern or McEvory.” Characters in Modiano stories often find themselves in a state in which reality, memory, and dream are becoming conflated, as with the narrator in Out of the Dark: “I was in a dream, and I had to wake up. The ties connecting me to the present were stretching.”
Modiano’s protagonists unearth names, dates, old telephone directories, addresses, pictures, police files and fabricate a past (real or imaginary?) out of the memories they disinter. But Damocles’s sword hangs over them, constantly threatening obliteration. It is Modiano’s work to keep the threat at bay for as long as possible so that he can proceed with his investigation. The exquisite structure and pacing of his storytelling technique allows him to create, like Proust, a hallucinatory world of intense emotional reality.
I will not attempt to convey ways in which his intricate plot lines alone provide pleasure, nor comment on the sheer stylistic beauty of his classic French prose — the clarity, the precision — nor analyze his technique of shifting timeframes, and use of multiple verb tenses, all of which create a unique aesthetic experience while reading him. I will instead discuss the way his themes play out in his art — and since Modiano says he is always writing the same book, it should do to analyze one or two of them. Because Modiano gives away the end in the beginning of most of his stories, I don’t think anything here counts as a spoiler.
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Modiano was awarded the Prix Goncourt for Missing Person more than 30 years ago, but the novel reads as fresh as if it had been written yesterday. It begins portentously with the sentence: I am nothing. This early work is constructed like a detective tale, and the narrator is a detective. Guy Roland, which may or may not be the narrator’s real name, has worked at a detective agency under the direction of his boss, Hutte, for over eight years. Guy is suffering from amnesia and when he went to work at the agency, Hutte provided him with papers to back up his adopted name and identity. It is only after his boss retires, and he is freed from labor, that he can take on the task of finding himself.
Naturally this involves an investigation. At first Guy is led to believe, mistakenly, that he may be a man called Freddie Howard de Luz. However, in time his research leads him to believe his real name may be Jimmy Pedro Stern, and he may have been born in Greece. But some evidence indicates that his real name and identity might be Pedro McEvoy and he might be from the Dominican Republic. If he is Stern, he disappeared in 1940. If he is McEvoy, he left France before the war.
In seeking his past, the narrator rounds up the usual (Modiano) suspects for questioning, and gives us their names, addresses, old photos, and telephone numbers. Missing Person is a slim book of just over 150 pages, in which more characters — no fewer than 22 — make an appearance than in many novels twice the length. Not an insignificant number of them have died or committed suicide.
In his search to discover who he is, Guy works by intuition, premonition, supposition, and dream-like imaginings. He constantly hypothesizes about people’s motives and behavior. The disparate details he uncovers serve as his Ariadne’s thread — one he hopes will lead him to himself. But even when he feels he is making some progress, he acknowledges when he feels stymied and baffled: “Scraps, shreds have come to light as a result of my searches…But then that is perhaps what a life amounts to…Is it really my life I’m tracking down? Or someone else’s into which I have somehow infiltrated myself?”
Guy believes that places hold traces of the lives that have lived there:
I believe that the entrance-halls of buildings still retain the echo of footsteps of those who used to cross them and who have since vanished. Something continues to vibrate after they have gone, fading waves, but which can still be picked up if one listens carefully.
Yet, despite his persistent attempts to raise clues from the locations he visits, physical reality resists his efforts. When Guy discovers that he and his girlfriend at the time, Denise Coudreuse, might have been living in the same building in which the Blue Rider murdered Scouffi, he ponders: “An event as tragic as this must surely have left some trace, if we had lived through it on the floor below.” But, he concedes: “Not a trace of it in my memory.”
Guy follows a number of leads in his search for himself. Early on, the Russian Styoppa de Dzhagorev gives him a red box containing mementos and keepsakes, photographs and newspaper clippings of the past that might be useful in his search. Later on, Guy visits the former villa of Freddie Howard de Luz, whom he thinks may have been a childhood friend. Bob, the groundskeeper he interrogates, gives him useful information, and before he leaves gives him a box of full of Freddie’s keepsakes and mementos. Guy notes, sadly: “It certainly seemed everything ended with old chocolate or biscuit or cigar boxes.”
Finally, his investigation leads him to conclude that he and Denise were probably victims of a double-cross when, in an attempt to cross the Franco-Swiss border in the winter, during the waning days of the war, Denise disappears. He, too, may have disappeared. The trauma of being tricked and abandoned in the mountains in the cold, and left to die, may have been, he decides, the traumatic event that produced his amnesia, but he can never confirm it. Denise’s physical whereabouts remain unknown, but thanks to Guy’s work she now has a name and a history. In the end, Guy is physically present, but despite his efforts he remains a missing person, with no verifiable name or history. He may be Jimmy Pedro Stern or he may be Pedro McEvoy. Or he may be neither. Or, it may be, as he says in the beginning of the novel, that he is nothing.
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Honeymoon (Voyage de noces) is one of Modiano’s novels in which the mystery proposed at the commencement of the book is more or less solved right away. The plot is straightforward: it is told in a series of shifting scenes and time warps that provide a sense of depth that a linear narrative would not be able to accomplish. Jean B, a documentary filmmaker and explorer, is on his way to Paris by train. He has a stopover in Milan. While there, he learns that a Frenchwoman killed herself in his hotel just two days before. Later, he realizes he knew the woman when he was 20, 18 years ago.
Not long after returning to Paris, instead of flying to Rio for work, he abandons his wife and his life and goes to live in the Parisian suburbs in an attempt to piece together the life of the woman who committed suicide: Ingrid Teyrsen. He explains why he is doing this to a friend: “It’s very simple. I just feel tired of my life and my job.” He admits he may attempt to write her biography. [3]
The novel contains two significant newspaper notices. The first Jean B reads in the train on the way to Paris. Printed in the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera, it is the formal report of Ingrid Teyrsen’s suicide. The second notice, we learn later, was given to Jean B by Ingrid herself many years earlier. It is a notice that had been placed in a Paris paper when she was a girl, a notice penned by her father: “Missing: Ingrid Teyrsen, sixteen, 1m60, oval face, grey eyes, brown sports coat, light blue pullover, beige skirt and hat, black casual shoes. All information to M. Teyrsen, 39bis, Boulevard Ornano, Paris.”
Between these two notices, we learn through Jean B some details of Ingrid’s life. She was married to a man named Rigaud, and Jean B met her and her husband purely by chance, in the south of France during the final months of World War II. The couple was hiding out on the Côte d’Azur, telling people they were on honeymoon. They picked Jean B up hitchhiking, took him with them to Saint-Tropez, and insisted that he stay with them for a few days. When he had to go, they paid for his train ticket to Paris, even giving him spending money since his had been stolen.
That is the last he sees of Ingrid until years later, when, once again by chance, he happens upon her in Paris. They have a meal together and a desultory conversation during which Jean B notes:
It does also happen that one evening, because of someone’s attentive gaze, you feel a need to communicate to him not your experience, but quite simply some of the various details connected by an invisible thread, a thread which is in danger of breaking and which is called the course of a life.
And of course the thread is broken. Jean’s detective work uncovers the fact that Ingrid’s father was an Austrian Jew (and that she is therefore half-Jewish) and so couldn’t leave the city after the Germans invaded France. Returning from a dance class one night, Ingrid simply doesn’t go home. For whatever obscure reason, she cannot return. “Why did she feel so discouraged this evening at the prospect of going home to her father?” Perhaps, Jean B suggests: “She had a presentiment that if she went down the boulevard like the other people going home to the eighteenth arrondissement, the frontier would close behind her forever.” So she walks on.
Soon after abandoning her father, she calls to let him know she is okay. But she does not reach him. She calls again and although she is told he is expecting her call, she hangs up before speaking to him. While Modiano does not give us a word about the father’s feelings, one can only imagine his fretting, his worry, his heartbreak at not knowing what happened to his 16-year-old daughter since it was during that time period that Jews were routinely rounded up and shipped to transit camps and then off to concentration camps and certain death. And then, one can picture his anguish and emotional collapse when he is eventually taken away, by “some men,” forever, not knowing what became of his daughter. And then, later, his daughter’s shock and distress when she finally decides to return to her father — only to discover that he has been, in today’s language, disappeared.
Ingrid never sees her father again. That night she does not return home, she takes up with Rigaud, whom she meets in a café. After selling the contents of his mother’s apartment to raise money, he takes her under his protection to the south of France, where they cross paths with the narrator.
In many ways, Ingrid’s plight resembles Dora’s in Modiano’s novel about another missing girl, Dora Bruder. Dora wanders away from the school that was protecting her from the Nazis, also for reasons that remain undiscoverable. Like Ingrid’s father, Dora’s parents place an advertisement in the paper seeking the whereabouts of their daughter. And Dora, like Ingrid’s father, never returns. The last known notice of her occurs in the Tourelles Register for 1942. She had been interned: all the women in Tourelles were transferred to Drancy, and then on to Auschwitz where they were murdered by the Nazis.
Modiano speculates that perhaps Dora experienced “the illusion that the passage of time is suspended,” and that she “need only slip through this breach to escape the trap which is closing around” her. And perhaps Ingrid was under the same illusion when she did not return home to her father that fateful night.
Unlike Dora, Ingrid managed to avoid being rounded up and shipped off to a death camp, and she survived the war. But she could not survive the continual onslaught of her memories: “Circumstances and settings are of no importance. One day this sense of emptiness and remorse submerges you. Then, like a tide, it ebbs and disappears. But in the end it returns in force, and she couldn’t shake it off.”
Out of the Dark is probably the most straightforward of these works in structure: boy meets girl, boy wins girl, girl leaves boy, boy finds girl many years later. The characters in this novel (as in many Modiano novels) are mainly young people, in their early 20s. They are separated from their parents, cut off from history by either necessity or by choice. They are, as they often remind us, aimlessly drifting, trying to figure out their lives, or escape from them. They are lonely, alienated from the society in which they live. It is as if they are living out the lyrics from Bob Dylan’s “Like a Rolling Stone”: without a home, complete unknowns.
The unnamed narrator is befriended by a couple he encounters in a café, Jacqueline and Gérard Van Bever. The narrator makes his living from selling old books, and the Van Bevers appear to make theirs from gambling. The three of them are drifters, living in the shabbier section of Paris. Gérard plays an insignificant role and is poorly delineated; Jacqueline becomes the central figure, but she nevertheless remains an enigma.
Like Jean-Luc Godard’s Nana in Vivre sa vie — Godard’s groundbreaking film that traces the slow and haphazard descent of a young Parisian woman into prostitution — Jacqueline’s motives remain opaque (Godard’s Nana is a reference to the eponymous heroine of Emile Zola’s Nana [1880] in which a prostitute brings wreck and ruin to each of the successive men with whom she is involved — up until the day she dies from smallpox.) Jacqueline, like Godard’s Nana, rarely exhibits emotion. Both women occupy a Paris of coffee bars, pinball machines, and tawdry hotels. Jacqueline leaves Van Bever without too much thought or premeditation, just as Nana abandons her husband and child. Jacqueline dreams of escaping to Majorca; Nana dreams of becoming a movie actress. They live in a circumscribed reality in which there is nothing to do but imagine having money and leaving Paris. Whether Nana decides to become a prostitute or drifts into prostitution to keep body and soul together is unclear. Just as it is unclear why Jacqueline accepts money for sex. Both women appear impassive and dissociated from themselves except for the drive to fulfill their vision of life. The two of them live their lives the best they can.
Jacqueline does so by going from man to man. Before departing on one of his gambling trips, Van Bever leaves Jacqueline under the watch of the narrator. She and the narrator get high on ether and sleep together. Neither of them informs Van Bever of this indiscretion. Shortly thereafter Jacqueline introduces the narrator to a friend of theirs, Pierre Cartaud. As it turns out, he is having sex with Jacqueline from time to time and gives her money for this privilege, of which Van Bever is aware. Learning this does not give the narrator pause, nor stop him from continuing to sleep with her.
One day, Jacqueline suggests that the narrator sneak into Cartaud’s apartment and steal a briefcase full of money so they can escape Paris. Thrilled at the prospect of having Jacqueline to himself, he commits the crime. Afterward, while waiting to meet up with Jacqueline, he fantasizes, writing on pieces of paper the names and places of the people that have become part of his life. This exercise causes him to be overcome by the arbitrary nature of his existence:
So this was my life? So my whole existence at this moment came down to about twenty unconnected names and addresses that had nothing in common but me? And why these rather than others? What did I have to do with these names and places?
For the crime he commits, Jacqueline rewards him by taking him out of Paris, the city in which he was aimlessly adrift, amid a meaningless concatenation of names and addresses.
While some commentators have called this a love story, I’m not inclined to see it that way. The narrator’s happiness (a rare and unusual sentiment in Modiano’s work) has little or nothing to do with his being in love with Jacqueline and, I think, more to do with his escape from “all the gray, uncertain years I had lived up to then.” By taking him with her to London, she frees him from himself. What he feels, he says, is not love but “fleeting euphoria”:
When the taxi turned onto the Mall and that shady, tree-lined avenue opened up before me, the first twenty years of my life fell to dust, like a weight, like hand-cuffs or a harness that I never thought I would be free of. Just like that, nothing remained of all those years. And if happiness was the fleeting euphoria I felt that afternoon, then for the first time in my existence I was happy.
In London, the narrator and Jacqueline are nearly destitute, since it turns out there was very little money in that suitcase. Their life there is the mirror image of what it was in Paris, except this time the narrator and Jacqueline are a couple. They meet a woman in a café, Linda Jacobsen, who introduces them to an older man, Peter Rachman, who “likes young people.” He takes an immediate interest in Jacqueline. Soon she begins accepting money from Rachman, just as she did from Cartaud, and the narrator realizes that she has found a way “to express her gratitude” to Rachman, just as she had with Cartaud. While the narrator begins writing a novel (about two young people), and ignoring the situation, as did Van Bever, Jacqueline begins going out at night with Linda and coming home in the early hours of the morning. One day she vanishes without a trace, leaving the narrator, just as she left Van Bever.
Fifteen years later, back in Paris, the narrator encounters Jacqueline again. He spots her in the street and follows her to a party. He learns she is married and has changed her identity: she is now called Thérèse Caisley. At first she doesn’t acknowledge him, but over the course of the evening, he breaks through to her. They leave the party together and she offers to drive him home. On the way they stop in a nearby park, deserted at that hour. She parks the car under some trees and once again they fall into each other’s arms.
Fifteen years after the interlude at the party, he sees her once again. They are on the metro together. She doesn’t recognize him. He follows her. She looks weary and her face thinner. He had been dreaming about her lately: “I saw her in a little fishing port on the Mediterranean, sitting on the ground, knitting endlessly in the sunlight. Next to her, a saucer where passers-by left coins.” This time he does not engage her and leaves us with a final image of her as a lonely woman standing at a bar, pouring herself a glass of beer. A far better fate than the one that befalls Godard’s Nana or Zola’s.
The number of characters that unaccountably go missing or vanish or who have committed suicide in Modiano’s work is astonishing. In Honeymoon, the narrator abandons his wife, to investigate the suicide of a woman who abandoned her father; in Missing Person, Guy Roland is abandoned by his boss which freed him to search for himself (earlier he had been abandoned in the mountains, in the snow, left to die); in Out of the Dark, Jacqueline abandons Van Bever and then the narrator; in Dora Bruder, Dora abandons her school and family and is murdered by the Nazis; in Ring Roads, the narrator’s father abandons him; in Suspended Sentences, the narrator and his brother are abandoned by their mother; in Afterimage, the photographer Jansen vanishes; in Flowers of Ruin, a young couple commits suicide and Philippe de Pacheco, whose real name turns out to be Charles Lombard, the one man who may be able to help the narrator understand the reasons for the suicide, vanishes; in Dans le café de la jeunesse perdue, Jacqueline Choureau (a different Jacqueline from the one in Out of the Dark), whose maiden name was Delanque but was known as Louki, abandons her husband and disappears without a trace and, ultimately, commits suicide; in Pedigree: A Memoir, Modiano himself tells us he was abandoned, for all intents and purposes, by both his mother and his father, and by his brother Rudy, who died at the age of 10.
Abandonment, people disappearing, with or without cause, is something that Modiano recognizes but doesn’t want to believe in: “I refused to accept that people and things could disappear without a trace,” he has the narrator say in Afterimage, a sentiment echoed by many of his other protagonists. But in novel after novel, people do simply disappear, and not only do they disappear, but, as the concierge in Honeymoon tells the narrator, they “don’t come back any more. Haven’t you noticed that, Monsieur?” In other words, they vanish.
Perhaps the most poetic example of someone disappearing, or vanishing, occurs in Modiano’s Flowers of Ruin. The narrator and a girlfriend are holed up in her room, waiting for her despised lover to leave his lookout outside her apartment: The “old prick,” as she refers to him, is standing in the street in the rain. The narrator watches him out the window:
Little by little, that man melted into the wall. Or else the rain, from falling on him so heavily, had dissolved him, the way water dilutes a fresco that hasn’t had time to dry properly. As hard as I pressed my forehead against the glass and peered at the dark gray wall, no trace of him remained. He had vanished in that sudden way that I’d later notice in other people, like my father, which leaves you so puzzled that you have no choice but to look for proofs and clues to convince yourself these people had really existed.
The act of vanishing is one of the central metaphors in the works under consideration in these novels. The implications — of leaving, of being left, of disappearing — are profound. Abandonment creates a pervasive disequilibrium in one’s life: as one suddenly finds oneself unbalanced, everything seems precarious. It doesn’t matter whether the abandonment is physical or emotional, if it is self-inflicted or other-inflicted. Like any act of abuse, the event leaves a psychic scar that produces restlessness, anxiety, anomie: conditions present in all Modiano’s characters.
Because of this, Modiano’s protagonists exist in a world of perpetual existential emergency in which they are desperate to recapture a state of equilibrium within themselves. They count on their memory and the memory of others to help them do it. That is why Modiano’s narrators are constantly looking through newspaper articles, police files, and phone books, seeking confirmation, evidence, something: “some tangible proof,” the narrator of Suspended Sentences says, “that it wasn’t all in your head.”
The tragedy is that memories are mortal; they degrade over time and disappear, abandoning us just like people. And Modiano suggests that loss, abandonment, and the threat of vanishing is the fate that we all suffer, that every day we, too, are abandoned. Loved ones pass away, children leave home, our significant other leaves us, or we leave them, our memory fails us, our friends unfriend us. His stories, told without sentimentality or emotion (the lack of which some readers find unnerving), portray the struggle in which we are all engaged as we work to keep our lives in balance in the face of these ongoing losses.
The experience of reading Modiano helps us comes to terms with the fact that people and things do simply disappear, that memories fade and die, and that in the end life itself will abandon us; our tacit acknowledgment of this ineluctable outcome is what produces the haunting sense of melancholy that pervades his writing.
At one point in the Flowers of Ruin, the narrator asks himself: “Why bother chasing ghosts and trying to solve insoluble mysteries, when life was there, in all its simplicity, beneath the sun.” It seems that, for Modiano, the answer appears to be: he has to.
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[1] Modiano is served well by his English translators — Daniel Weissbort, Barbara Wright, Mark Polizzotti, Caroline Hillier, and Jordan Stump — who have delivered nuanced and sensitive renderings of the French, capturing the tone and, importantly, the atmosphere of his writing. There is, however, a curious blooper in Honeymoon. In the French, a young man “ouvrit l’une des portières d’une conduit.” It is pretty clear that he opens a car door, and that the word in English text should be sedan, not saloon. But these things happen.
[2] Proust’s investigation into the nature of memory and time brings him to this conclusion which is I think, worth quoting at length for it sheds light on his technique, and the differences between him and Modiano — as well as for its sheer beauty:
But when from a long-distant past nothing subsists, after the people are dead, after the things are broken and scattered, still, alone, more fragile, but with more vitality, more unsubstantial, more persistent, more faithful, the smell and taste of things remain poised a long time, like souls, ready to remind us, waiting and hoping for their moment, amid the ruins of all the rest; and bear unfaltering, in the tiny and almost impalpable drop of their essence, the vast structure of recollection […] Undoubtedly what is thus palpitating in the depths of my being must be the image, the visual memory which, being linked to that taste, has tried to follow it into my conscious mind.
[3] Another story in which a man abandons his life and his wife occurs in Michelangelo Antonioni’s film The Passenger. In this film David Locke (played by Jack Nicholson) is, like the narrator, a documentary filmmaker. We meet him in Africa as he is fruitlessly trying to meet with rebel leaders for an interview. Back at the hotel, he discovers Robertson, another hotel resident to whom he has talked once or twice, has died and with no apparent forethought he assumes the identity of the dead man. While it is evident that he is running away from something, it is never clear what it is. It may be the same reason that Jean B gives his friend: “It’s very simple. I just feel tired of my life and my job.” Locke appears to be suffering from the futility of merely existing as himself; he’s pursued by a free-floating anomie he cannot shake. But no sooner does he take up the dead man’s diary/appointment book and begin living his life, than he finds himself trapped in it and realizes he must flee from Robertson’s life just as he did from his, discovering too late that there is no escape.
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GD Dess is the author of the novel His Vision of Her (Harper & Row). |
Details
Comments from leaders of the Federation for American Immigration Reform:
"As Whites see their power and control over their lives declining, will they simply go quietly into the night? Or will there be an explosion?" — FAIR founder and current board member John Tanton, Oct. 10, 1986.
"I've come to the point of view that for European-American society and culture to persist requires a European-American majority, and a clear one at that." — John Tanton, in a letter to eugenicist and ecology professor Garrett Hardin (now deceased), Dec. 10, 1993.
"Immigrants don't come all church-loving, freedom-loving, God-fearing. ... Many of them hate America, hate everything that the United States stands for. Talk to some of these Central Americans." — FAIR President Dan Stein, interviewed by Tucker Carlson, Oct. 2, 1997.
"I blame 98 percent of responsibility for this country's immigration crisis on Ted Kennedy and his political allies, who decided some time back in 1958, earlier perhaps, that immigration was a great way to retaliate against Anglo-Saxon dominance and hubris, and the immigration laws from the 1920s were just this symbol of that, and it's a form of revengism, or revenge, that these forces continue to push the immigration policy that they know full well are (sic) creating chaos and will continue to create chaos down the line." — FAIR President Dan Stein, "Oral History of the Federation for American Immigration Reform," interview of Dan Stein by John Tanton, August 1994.
"Projections by the U.S. Census Bureau show that midway into the next century, the current European-American majority will become a minority. ... This is unacceptable; we decline to bequeath to our children minority status in their own land." — FAIR founder John Tanton in a March 3, 1993. memo to a FAIR board member.
Source: Southern Poverty Law Center |
DATE: Aug 2, 2012 | BY: David Wharton | Category: Sci-Fi
This being a site dedicated to all things science-y or science fictional, I’m guessing quite a few of our readers snatched up a copy of the Star Trek: The Next Generation first season Blu-ray sets that came out last week. Well, we’ve got some bad news and some good news. The bad news is that they’ve discovered an audio flaw with the surround sound. The good news? CBS and Paramount will provide free replacement copies for the affected discs. Here’s the press release:
Dear Star Trek Fans, We have discovered an anomaly in the English 7.1 DTS Master Audio track in our Star Trek: The Next Generation Season One Blu-ray Box set. There are some episodes that inadvertently had their front channel designations incorrectly mapped, resulting in an undesired playback experience when listening to them in a 7.1 or 5.1 Surround Sound environment.
We are quickly working to remedy the situation. Replacement discs (Disc 1, 3 and 4) will be made available free of charge. Please email phe.stng@bydeluxe.com for details regarding the replacement program. You may also call 877-DELUXE6 (877-335-8936) between 8am to 6pm Pacific, Monday-Friday. We strive to provide our fans the best Blu-ray experience possible and sincerely apologize for this inconvenience.
Products are going to get shipped with mistakes now and then. That’s just the reality of the situation. All a company can do is what CBS and Paramount are doing here. Props for them for getting on top of the situation quickly.
In the mean time, if you were considering picking up a copy of the Next Generation Blu-ray set, it might be worth holding off for a month or so, so they have time to get the flawed copies out of circulation. It is a great set, with tons of goodies to prod the salivary glands of any true Trek fan. You can read our full review of the set right here.
There’s still no official word or dates for when the inevitable season 2 Blu-rays will hit, but it would make sense to get it out before Christmas if possible, as it would make for a nice stocking-stuffer for the die-hard Trekker in your life. Then again, we may have to wait a while considering how much work is being put into upgrading the picture, sound, and effects on these releases. When there’s more news to share, we’ll let you know. |
It has been reported that as part of the viral marketing campaign surrounding the Hunger Games film sequel Catching Fire, a “luxury clothing line” called Capitol Couture will be released this fall. The line will feature 16 pieces from high-end designer Trish Summerville, all of them meant to reflect the outrageous fashion trends of Panem’s rich and privileged.
A luxury clothing line. I’m sorry, what is the Capitol meant to stand for in Suzanne Collins’ trilogy again? Hang on, it’s coming back to me…
Bear with me for some fashion talk. I promise, it’s pretty intriguing stuff.
So far the viral marketing for Catching Fire has been superb, even better than the work that went into the previous film’s campaign. There are websites devoted to couture spreads of each of the Quarter Quell champions, advertising them much in the way that you would expect the Capitol to—treating the former victors as assets in promotion, viewing them as canvases rather than people. It’s frighteningly real, which is why it’s jarring; if the Hunger Games were an activity that the world participated in, it wouldn’t be hard to imagine real ads and websites just like the ones being created for Catching Fire.
Asking actual fashion designers to contribute their visions to the project is inspired. It lends real credibility to the exercise, and it’s plain logical; you can’t ask a marketing department to design clothes and shoes, after all. What’s more, the designers asked to participate in these campaigns run the gamut—there have been world-famous contributors (Alexander McQueen and Dior have been heavily featured) and newer names who have something unique to bring to the party.
However, the Capitol Couture website is a test for those trying to find the line between reality and fiction. Within the profile article about Johanna Mason, actual designer Jan Taminiau gives this quote: “I love creating a fantasy around a woman’s body,” a reference to the tree-like garb he has her swathed in. Is this a true comment from the designer about the process of creating her look for the photoshoots and film, or something slipped in there by the author of the fake article to give the piece authenticity? Isn’t the point that we can’t really tell?
And that is exactly where the problem lies. With this much blurring between the world of the film and our own, I have to ask: How could anyone possibly feel good about shopping the Capitol Couture line? What are we saying if we buy these clothes—aren’t we buying into the very thing that Suzanne Collins’ books are trying to warn us against? It was bad enough last year with the Capitol-inspired nail polish line from the previous film’s release; at least wearing a specific color nail polish doesn’t do much by way of visually supporting the Capitol’s lifestyle. But wearing clothes with designs specifically derived from that society’s ethics and hollow glamor are inclined to make a different sort of visual impression.
Where fashion and fiction intersect is a fascinating subject; often fantasy worlds are populated with clothing that we subliminally recognize according to more recent history. While Star Wars characters are presumably wearing clothes from another galaxy, it is all too easy to look at Luke, Leia, and Han and say, “They look so 70s!” Because with their hair parted at the center and the v-necklines, there are plenty of cues that make it oh-so-clear when the film was made. Doctor Who is another great example of this trend; despite how oddball many of his costumes seem these days, the fashion choices of most Doctors are right in line with the years of their tenure.
Capitol Couture is meant to do something different—to be ahead of the curve, as outrageous as the overfed, over-stimulated, undereducated Capitol citizens are in the novels. And it’s intriguing that designers are partnering with the film as an excuse to push the envelope of what they can do, certainly. It’s also disturbing that this trilogy, which stands firmly against everything the Capitol creates and glorifies, is the inspiration behind such luxury items.
The chief marketing officer of Lionsgate was quoted saying that Capitol Couture “quickly became an out-of-world experience for both fans of the franchise and those obsessed with the future of fashion.” So let’s strip that comment down for examination: the suggestion is that the “future of fashion” might closely mirror what the Capitol hath wrought. That the bombastic consumerism and disregard for human life that they happily engage in is something that we should be fostering in the here and now by committing ourselves wholeheartedly to image over substance. It’s amazing when a creative work fosters so much more creativity in its wake, but there are times when some distance is dearly needed. That no one working to create these clothes is calling that out the irony of what they’re playing into makes the whole ploy more disturbing.
It’s just a harmless bit of fun, surely! we all want to say. Just because the books are doling out the opposite message doesn’t mean that the fans shouldn’t have their jewel-encrusted cake and eat all twelve tiers! I would love to agree with that, and in most cases I would. And no, we’re not sitting at home watching games that pit children against each other to the death, but here’s a question—where are these clothes being made, I wonder? Will they be lovingly sown by people of an appropriate age, who are making a decent living wage? Because clothing manufacture isn’t known to be the most humane business out there. And what about the cost of such “luxury items”? These are meant to be couture clothes. They will likely be expensive, much more than the teens and (mostly) lower-to-middle-class adults who adore the series can afford.
So in effect, this line of clothing is promoting the same disdain for those who have less—or none—that the Capitol citizens show for those occupying the numbered districts of Panem.
People who have zero interest in fashion may scoff at all of this regardless, but it doesn’t change the fact that clothes communicate. The Hunger Games Trilogy itself acknowledges this: Cinna’s designing of Katniss and Peeta are what make them a focal point in the Games, their costuming arguably one of the most important elements in keeping them alive. Fashion is used to exploit the tributes, and the slavish manner that Capitol citizens adhere to its trends show readers and viewers just how far removed they are from their own reality. It’s not surprising that clothing is an integral part of Collins’ world; what you wear tells people a story, it conveys how you want to be perceived, how you feel and what you think.
What are you communicating to the world if you decide to dress up like a denizen from the Capitol of Panem in your day-to-day life? Is being part of the “future of fashion” really worth associating yourself with those ideals?
The answer to that question, I hope, is an obvious one.
Emily Asher-Perrin is only too happy to wear some laser-cut leather… but not if it means buying into Effie Trinket’s lifestyle. You can bug her on Twitter and read more of her work here and elsewhere. |
(Earbuds not shown.) Photos: FilmMagic, WireImage
At Wednesday night’s opening party for 303 Gallery on 21st Street, Kirsten Dunst was uncharacteristically open — perhaps because she wanted to plug her documentary, but also because we asked her about music, a topic she clearly loves to discuss. She’s into My Morning Jacket and Fleet Foxes and told us she uses music to get into character a lot. In her recently wrapped movie All Good Things, for example, she had a scene where she had to go a little bit crazy, so she listened to music to help her out: Arcade Fire. “And Daniel Johnston can make you feel crazy,” she added, referring to the actually crazy cult singer. “He’s great.” We must have seemed dubious, because Dunst dropped a Hollywood bombshell: “But Johnny Depp has music playing in his ear when he acts,” she said. “He has an earbud. That’s why he’s so great.”
Wait, so Captain Jack Sparrow was listening to the Rolling Stones the whole time? “I don’t know if he does it on every project, but I know he does,” Dunst said. What kind of music does Depp listen to? “I have no idea,” Dunst replied, her story kind of losing steam. We asked her how Depp conceals this supposed earbud from the camera: “Maybe his hair’s covering it? I don’t know, but I know he does it,” Dunst persisted. Finally, we asked Dunst to reveal her source. “I’m in the biz,” she said. “Word gets around.” We checked in with Depp’s representatives on this somewhat sketchy-sounding (but almost plausible!) hearsay — earsay? — but she didn’t respond to our e-mails. —Darrell Hartman
Kirsten Dunst Claims Johnny Depp Wears Earbuds While Acting |
For more of Conn Hallinan’s essays visit Dispatches From the Edge. Meanwhile, his novels about the ancient Romans can be found at The Middle Empire Series.
The Congressional harrying of former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton over emails concerning the 2012 death of an American Ambassador and three staff members in Benghazi, Libya, has become a sort of running joke, with Republicans claiming “cover-up” and Democrats dismissing the whole matter as nothing more than election year politics. But there is indeed a story embedded in the emails, one that is deeply damning of American and French actions in the Libyan civil war, from secretly funding the revolt against Muammar Gaddafi, to the willingness to use journalism as a cover for covert action.
The latest round of emails came to light June 22 in a fit of Republican pique over Clinton’s prevarications concerning whether she solicited intelligence from her advisor, journalist and former aide to President Bill Clinton, Sidney Blumenthal. If most newspaper readers rolled their eyes at this point and decided to check out the ball scores, one can hardly blame them.
But that would be a big mistake.
While the emails do raise questions about Hillary Clinton’s veracity, the real story is how French intelligence plotted to overthrow the Libyan leader in order to claim a hefty slice of Libya’s oil production and “favorable consideration” for French businesses.
The courier in this cynical undertaking was journalist and right-wing philosopher Bernard Henri-Levy, a man who has yet to see a civil war that he doesn’t advocate intervening in, from Yugoslavia to Syria. According to Julian Pecquet, the U.S. congressional correspondent for the Turkish publication Al-Monitor, Henri-Levy claims he got French President Nicolas Sarkozy to back the Benghazi-based Libyan Transitional National Council that was quietly being funded by the General Directorate for External Security (DGSE), the French CIA.
According to the memos, in return for money and support, “the DGSE officers indicated that they expected the new government of Libya to favor French firms and national interests, particularly regarding the oil industry in Libya.” The memo says that the two leaders of the Council, Mustafa Abdul Jalil and General Abdul Fatah Younis, “accepted this offer.”
Another May 5 email indicates that French humanitarian flights to Benghazi included officials of the French oil company TOTAL, and representatives of construction firms and defense contractors, who secretly met with Council members and then “discreetly” traveled by road to Egypt, protected by DGSE agents.
Henri-Levy, an inveterate publicity hound, claims to have come up with this quid pro quo, business/regime change scheme, using “his status as a journalist to provide cover for his activities.” Given that journalists are routinely accused of being “foreign agents” in places like Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Syria and Afghanistan, Henri-Levy’s subterfuge endangers other members of the media trying to do their jobs.
All this clandestine maneuvering paid off.
On Feb. 26, 2011, the UN Security Council unanimously passed Resolution 1970 aimed at establishing “peace and security” and protecting the civilian population in the Libyan civil war. Or at least that was how UNR 1970 was sold to countries on the Security Council, like South Africa, Brazil, India, China and Russia, that had initial doubts. However, the French, Americans and British—along with several NATO allies—saw the resolution as an opportunity to overthrow Qaddafi and in France’s case, to get back in the game as a force in the region.
Almost before the ink was dry on the resolution, France, Britain and the U.S. began systematically bombing Qaddafi’s armed forces, ignoring pleas by the African Union to look for a peaceful way to resolve the civil war. According to one memo, President Sarkozy “plans to have France lead the attacks on [Qaddafi] over an extended period of time” and “sees this situation as an opportunity for France to reassert itself as a military power.”
While for France flexing its muscles was an important goal, Al- Monitor says that a September memo also shows that “Sarkozy urged the Libyans to reserve 35 percent of their oil industry for French firms—TOTAL in particular—when he traveled to Tripoli that month.”
In the end, Libya imploded and Paris has actually realized little in the way of oil, but France’s military industrial complex has done extraordinarily well in the aftermath of Qaddafi’s fall.
According to Defense Minister Jean-Yves Lodrian, French arms sales increased 42 percent from 2012, bringing in $7 billion, and are expected to top almost $8 billion in 2014.
Over the past decade, France, the former colonial masters of Lebanon, Syria, and Algeria, has been sidelined by U.S. and British arms sales to the Middle East. But the Libya war has turned that around. Since then, Paris has carefully courted Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates by taking a hard line on the Iran nuclear talks.
The global security analyst group Stratfor noted in 2013, “France could gain financially from the GCC’s [Gulf Cooperation Council, the organization representing the oil monarchies of the Persian Gulf] frustrations over recent U.S. policy in the Middle East. Significant defense contracts worth tens of billions of dollars are up for grabs in the Gulf region, ranging from aircraft to warships to missile systems. France is predominantly competing with Britain and the United States for the contracts and is seeking to position itself as a key ally of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) as it looks to strengthen its defense and industrial ties in the region.”
Sure enough, the French company Thales landed a $3.34 billion Saudi contract to upgrade the kingdom’s missile system and France just sold 24 Rafale fighters to Qatar for $7 billion. Discussions are underway with the UAE concerning the Rafale, and France sold 24 of the fighters to Egypt for $5.8 billion. France has also built a military base in the UAE.
French President Francois Hollande, along with his Foreign and Defense ministers, attended the recent GCC meeting, and, according to Hollande, there are 20 projects worth billions of dollars being discussed with Saudi Arabia. While he was in Qatar, Hollande gave a hard-line talk on Iran and guaranteed “that France is there for its allies when it is called upon.”
True to his word, France has thrown up one obstacle after another during the talks between Iran and the P5 + 1—the permanent members of the Security Council plus Germany.
Paris also supports Saudi Arabia and it allies in their bombing war on Yemen, and strongly backs the Saudi-Turkish led overthrow of the government of Bashar al-Assad in Syria, even though it means that the French are aligning themselves with al-Qaeda linked extremist groups.
France seems to have its finger in every Middle East disaster, although, to be fair, it is hardly alone. Britain and the U.S. also played major roles in the Libya war, and the Obama administration is deep into the ongoing wars in Syria and Yemen. In the latter case, Washington supplies the Saudis with weapons, targeting intelligence, and in-air refueling of its fighter-bombers.
But the collapse of Libya was a particularly catastrophic event, which—as the African Union accurately predicted—sent a flood of arms and unrest into two continents.
The wars in Mali and Niger are a direct repercussion of Qaddafi’s fall, and the extremist Boko Haram in Nigeria appears to have benefited from the plundering of Libyan arms depots. Fighters and weapons from Libya have turned up in the ranks of the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq. And the gunmen who killed 22 museum visitors in Tunisia last March, and 38 tourists on a beach July 3, trained with extremists in Libya before carrying out their deadly attacks.
Clinton was aware of everything the French were up to and apparently had little objection to the cold-blooded cynicism behind Paris’s policies in the region.
The “news” in the Benghazi emails, according to the New York Times, is that, after denying it, Clinton may indeed have solicited advice from Blumenthal. The story ends with a piece of petty gossip: Clinton wanted to take credit for Qaddafi’s fall, but the White House stole the limelight by announcing the Libyan leader’s death first.
That’s all the news that’s fit to print? |
Lazio deny 10-man Sampdoria maximum points in their first game under Sinisa Mihajlovic thanks to a stoppage-time equaliser from Lorik Cana.
Lorik Cana's last-gasp equaliser five minutes into stoppage time has helped Lazio salvage a point at Sampdoria, denying Sinisa Mihajlovic a dream start to life in Genoa.
© Getty Images
Mihajlovic made wholesale changes for his first game in the Samp hotseat and got an immediate response, with Pedro Obiang and Manolo Gabbiadini threatening early on.
Positive early signs were soon forgotten after the interval, though, with Nenad Kristicic sent off for a second bookable offence just moments into the second half.
Lazio used their numerical advantage to threaten as Bryan Perea struck the post, but the Aquile fell behind to 10-man Samp midway through the second period.
Roberto Soriano was the man who broke the deadlock, powering home a header from close range.
© Getty Images
The hosts were unable to hang on for all three points, though, as a wave of late Lazio pressure told deep into injury time, with Cana pouncing on a Sergio Floccari flick to scramble home a dramatic equaliser. |
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Madison — Gov. Scott Walker isn't promising big on tax cuts or reform, not yet, but one year out from his re-election bid he's talking big.
In an interview with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Walker opened the door to a host of potential tax overhauls in his February 2015 budget, from eliminating or flattening the income tax to dropping technical colleges from local property tax rolls. Those changes could involve both outright cuts and shifts of income or property taxes onto the sales tax.
Adding to the tax talk from Republicans, Assembly Speaker Robin Vos of Rochester says he wants lawmakers to consider more modest tax cuts as soon as this spring if state tax revenue comes in strong.
But Walker said he also has learned from the failures of Republican governors pushing massive tax overhauls in Nebraska and Louisiana too quickly without laying the groundwork with voters.
Before making any radical changes, the Republican governor stressed, he's going to engage business leaders and the public using meetings, a website and other tools that he is likely to announce early next year. Until then, Walker said he wasn't committing to a plan or pledging to cut taxes in his next budget by the roughly $650 million in income taxes he cut in this current two-year budget.
"I don't have any preconceived notion on this. It's not like I have one goal. The only goal is I want the overall tax burden to go down every year I'm in office....What we're trying to do is have these early discussions that aren't threatening," Walker said.
Despite that, even a mention of eliminating the income tax — the single-biggest source of money for the state — makes Democrats and some others nervous. The income tax will bring in an estimated $7.65 billion in the second year of the 2013-'15 budget and account for half the money the state spends that year out of its main account.
Poor could be hurt
Advocates for the poor worry that shifting the state's tax collections from the income to the sales tax would benefit the wealthy the most and load more of the burden onto the state's most vulnerable residents.
Dale Knapp, research director for the Wisconsin Taxpayers Alliance, noted that the wealthy pay disproportionately more of the state income tax and that the poor spend more of their earnings than the wealthy do. Both of those facts mean that high-income earners typically fare much better than the poor when the income tax is lowered and the sales tax is raised.
"That will be a big, big issue — regressivity," Knapp said. "If you go this direction, you have to find a way to deal with low-income families and that issue."
Other potential pitfalls in such a tax shift would include how it would affect state businesses such as retailers already struggling to compete with online merchants.
Even for supporters of the change, the practical challenges of eliminating the income tax are daunting.
Only seven states have no income taxes, with two more that have them on only interest and dividend earnings, according to the Federation of Tax Administrators. Those states often have some other source of revenue, such as oil and natural gas revenue in the case of Alaska and Wyoming, and typically offer fewer government services than Wisconsin.
"(It's) literally almost impossible to do unless you have some kind of transfer to the sales tax or something like that," Walker said. "Our goal overall is to reduce the tax burden. You can do that, but you can only go so far unless you have some other change out there."
Shifting isn't simple
Moving income taxes onto the state sales tax could simplify life for state residents and business owners, since it would eliminate the tedious work of filing state income tax returns. But a simple shift to the sales tax is tricky, too:
■ Wisconsin's 5% sales tax will bring in an estimated $4.6 billion a year in fiscal year 2015, meaning the tax would have to more than double to cover the state's current income tax.
■ To cover the state's income tax by simply raising the sales tax, it would have to go from 5% to 13.3% even before any local sales taxes are added, such as the 0.6% in Milwaukee County, according to the nonpartisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau. That would give Wisconsin the highest sales tax rate in the United States — an increase that could prove a large challenge for retailers, especially those near the state's borders.
Adding the state's $990 million corporate tax onto the sales tax as well would bring it to 14.4%, or nearly twice as much as California's 7.5% rate, which currently tops the nation.
■ There is another way to increase the sales tax by billions of dollars a year without raising the rate, by applying it to services and goods that now are exempted from the tax in Wisconsin. The exemptions range from food, electricity and health care to farming equipment, newspapers and a variety of services.
Broadening the sales tax to more services would bring it more in line with a modern economy in which consumers spend more on services than they once did and could provide more future growth to a tax that has seen only modest increases over the last decade. Ongoing efforts to have merchants apply the sales tax automatically to Internet sales could also provide more sales tax growth.
State officials could remove some sales tax exemptions and then combine that approach with a more modest increase in the rate.
But removing some of those exemptions would mean a higher cost for families and businesses for some common purchases even if the exemptions were left in place for basic needs such as food. That raises the issue once again of how the tax shift would affect low- and middle-income families.
The liberal Wisconsin Budget Project and the Institute for Taxation and Economic Policy analyzed the impact of simply transferring Wisconsin's income tax onto the sales tax. The study found that, on average, that the bottom four-fifths of Wisconsin tax filers would pay more in taxes under such a plan.
For instance, the middle income group averaging $47,000 a year in income would pay on average $755 more in taxes. The 1% of tax filers with the highest income — the group paying the most in income taxes — would save on average $44,000, according to the report.
"Simply swapping out the income tax for the sales tax would mean a tax hike for the vast majority of Wisconsinites, without doing anything to boost our economy," said Jon Peacock, director of the budget project.
The analysis assumed that the state would retain its earned income tax credit, which can provide payments to some low-income workers filing a tax return even if they didn't pay any taxes. If the credit were dropped, then the impact on lower-income workers would rise even higher.
Walker spokesman Tom Evenson dismissed the premise of the analysis as false, saying that Walker hadn't actually proposed that. In his interview with the Journal Sentinel, Walker provided a number of potential tax changes, including reducing the state's income tax to a 3% or 4% flat tax without the various income brackets under the existing law.
Vos hopes for tax cuts
Vos, the Assembly speaker, said he appreciated that Walker was considering doing something dramatic with Wisconsin's taxes.
"I like leaders who think big and bold and don't start timid, because you don't get big and bold if you start timid," he said.
He said he saw value in significantly reducing or eliminating the income tax, but added, "I also don't want Wisconsin to have the highest sales tax."
This spring, Vos said he would like to pursue additional tax cuts if the state continues to generate a surplus. Those cuts would be more modest, such as eliminating the state's rarely used alternative minimum tax or creating a sales tax holiday proposed by Rep. Chad Weininger (R-Green Bay), perhaps during the back-to-school season.
Those ideas didn't excite Senate Minority Chris Larson (D-Milwaukee).
"I'd rather see us spend the money on education," said Larson, who felt that better educating potential workers would bring a better benefit to the state's economy.
Assembly Republicans continue to discuss tax cuts, and during the summer's budget deliberations came close to removing technical colleges from the property tax, he said.
Vos said he was open to raising the sales tax to take the property taxing authority away from unelected technical college boards and instead leave it in the hands of legislators.
Walker also raised that idea. The technical colleges receive roughly $800 million a year from local property taxes, an amount that works out to roughly an additional 1 percentage point on the state sales tax. |
Ranocchia has also played for Arezzo and Genoa, plus Bari on loan
Norwich have offered Inter Milan 10m euros (£7.3m) for their Italy international central defender Andrea Ranocchia.
It is understood Norwich have offered Ranocchia a salary in the region of 3m euros per year.
The 27-year-old, who has won 20 caps for Italy, has played over 120 times for Inter and was captain last season.
But he has been relegated to the bench in the current campaign, in which Inter lead the Serie A table going into 2016.
Inter's depth of defenders means they are likely to allow Ranocchia to leave but the centre-half, who made his Inter debut in 2011, is thought to be be undecided about the move.
Norwich are 15th in the Premier League after 19 matches, having won two of their last three fixtures. |
One question that philosophers have sought to answer since the beginning of time is: “What is philosophy, and how can I make a living doing it?”
Philosophy is a Greek word, which means “love of wisdom”. But philosophers, ever argumentative as they are, can’t agree what loving wisdom actually means, so they can only give tentative answers. But it is understood that it is Supremely Important Work. Some of the reasons for this can be found in Wikipedia’s definition of Philosophy:
Philosophy is the discipline concerned with the questions of how one should live (ethics); what sorts of things exist and what are their essential natures (metaphysics); what counts as genuine knowledge (epistemology); and what are the correct principles of reasoning (logic).
In short, philosophy is the on-going quest for meaning and understanding. Originally, philosophy was a popular pastime among the leisure class of the city states of ancient Greece. Indeed, it seems that it was primarily because they didn’t have to worry about making a living (having lots of slaves really help at that) that led them to philosophy. Since then, people generally have had to earn money in order to sustain themselves, and most philosophers do so by teaching and writing books on philosophy. And most of them do so in a university setting, since universities are the only places which offer full-time employment for dedicated philosophers, thereby professionalizing their “love of wisdom”.
But how do you teach philosophy? Is it the same as understanding what other philosophers have thought and said before you, or is it being able to do your own philosophizing? Or is it something in between? Some time ago, I read Robert Pirsig’s book Lila, in which he introduces the distinction between philosophy on the one hand, and what he calls ‘philosophology’ on the other:
He liked the word ‘philosophology.’ It was just right. It had a nice dull, cumbersome, superfluous, appearance that exactly fitted its subject matter, and he had been using it for some time now. Philosophology is to philosophy as musicology is to music, or as art history and art appreciation are to art, or as literary criticism is to creative writing. It’s a derivative, secondary field, a sometimes parasitic growth that likes to think it controls its host by analyzing and intellectualizing its host’s behaviour. Literature people are sometimes puzzled by the hatred many creatice writers have for them. Art historians can’t understand the venom either. He supposed the same was true with musicologists but he didn’t know enough about them. But philosophologists don’t have this problem at all because the philosophers who would normally condemn them are a null-class. They don’t exist. Philosophologists, calling themselves philosophers, are just about all there are. You can imagine the ridiculousness if an art historian taking his students to museums, having them write a thesis on some historical or technical aspect of what they see there, and after a few years of this giving them degrees that say they are accomplished artists. They’ve never held a brush or a mallet and chisel in their hands. All they know is art history. Yet, ridiculous as it sounds, this is exactly what happens in the philosophology that calls itself philosophy. Students aren’t expected to philosophize. Their instructors would hardly know what to say if they did. They’d probably compare the student’s writing to Mill or Kant or somebody like that, find the student’s work grossly inferior, and tell him to abandon it. As a student Phædrus [Pirsig’s alter ego in the book] had been warned that he would ‘come a cropper’ if he got too attached to any philosophical ideas of his own. Literature, musicology, art history, and philosophology thrive in academic institutions because they are easy to teach. You just Xerox something some philosopher has said and make the students discuss it, make them memorize it, and then flunk them at the end of the quarter if they forget it. Actual painting, music composition and creative writing are almost impossible to teach and so they barely get in the academic door. True philosophy doesn’t get in at all. Philosophologists often have an interest in creating philosophy but, as philosophologists, they subordinate it, much as a literary scholar might subordinate his own interest in creative writing. Unless they are exceptional they don’t consider the creation of philosophy their real line of work. As an author, Phædrus had been putting off the philosophology, partly because he didn’t like it, and partly to avoid putting a philosophological cart before the philosophical horse. Philosophologists not only start by putting the cart first; they usually forget the horse entirely. They say first you should read what all the great philosophers of history have said and then you should decide what you want to say. The catch here is that by the time you’ve read all what the great philosophers of history have said you’ll be two hundred years old. A second catch is that these great philosophers are very persuasive people and if you read them innocently you may be carried away by what they say and never see what they missed. Phædrus, in contrast, sometimes forgot the cart but was fascinated by the horse. He thought the best way to examine the contents of various philosophological carts is to first figure out what you believe and then to see what great philosophers agree with you. There will always be a few somewhere. These will be much more interesting to read since you can cheer what they say and boo their enemies, and when you see how their enemies attack them you can kibitz a little a take a real interest in whehter they were right or wrong. With this technique you can approach someone like William James in a much different way than an ordinary philosophologist would. Since you’ve already done your creative thinking before you read James, you don’t just go along with him. You get all kinds of fresh new ideas by contrasting what he’s saying with what you already believe. You’re not limited by any dead-ends of his thought and can often see ways of going around him.
I find this distinction quite interesting, because I expect that a lot of people begin at university thinking that they want to learn to do something, rather than just learn about something. Philosophy being one example. Anthropology, it can be argued, is another – though at least there is some practical exercises involved.
By separating the act of philosophy from the academic comparative contemplation of acts of philosophy, Pirsig underlines that what most philosophers earn their money doing is the latter, and that the former is something that – if done at all – is still done at leisure, as a pastime. While reading William James, Pirsig is surprised to find that James himself does both:
James and a group of friends were on an outing somewhere and one of them chased a squirrel around a tree. The squirrel instinctively clung to the opposite side of the tree and moved so that at as the man circled the tree the squirrel also circled it on the opposite side. After observing this, James and his friends engaged in a philosophical discussion of the question: did the man go around the squirrel or didn’t he? The group broke into two philosophical camps and Phædrus didn’t remember how the argument was resolved. What impressed him was James’ interest in the question. It showed that although James was no doubt an expert philosophologist (certainly he had to be to teach stuff at Harvard) he was also a philosopher in the creative sense. A philosophologist would have been mildly contemptuous of such a discussion because it had no ‘importance,’ that is, no body of philosophical writings existed about it. But to a creative philosopher like James the question was like catnip. It had the smell of what it is that draws real philosophers into philosophy. Did the man go around the squirrel or didn’t he? He was north, south, east and west of the squirrel, so he must have gone around it. Yet at no time had he ever gone to the back or to the side of the squirrel. That squirrel could say with absolute scientific certitude, “That man never got around me.” Who is right? Is there more than one meaning of the word ‘around’? That’s a surprise! That’s like discovering more than one true system of geometry. How many meanings are there and which one is right? It seems as though the squirrel is using the term ‘around’ in a way that is relative to itself but the man is using it in a way that is relative to an absolute point in space outside of the squirrel and himself. But if we drop the squirrel’s relative point of view and we take the absolute fixed point of view, what are we letting ourselves in for? From a fixed point in space every human being on this planet goes around every other human being to the east or west of him once a day. The whole East river does a half-cartwheel over the Hudson each morning and another one under it each evening. Is this what we want to mean by ‘around’? If so, how useful is it? And if the squirrel’s relative point of view is false, how useless is it? What emerges is that the word ‘around’, which seems like one of the most clear and absolute and fixed terms in the universe suddenly turns out to be relative and subjective. What is ‘around’ depends on who you are and what you’re thinking about at the time you use it. The more you tug at it the more things start to unravel. One such philosophic tugger was Albert Einstein, who concluded that all time and space are relative to the observer. We are always in a position of that squirrel. Man is always the measure of all things, even in matters of space and dimension. Persons like James and Einstein, immersed in the spirit of philosophy, do not see things like squirrels circling trees as necessarily trivial, because solving puzzles like that are what they’re in philosophy and science for. Real science and real philosophy are not guided by preconceptions of what subjects are important to consider.
When I read this, I didn’t realize that there are professional philosophers seeking to teach ‘philosophy’ rather than ‘philosophology.’ They argue that it is only once you have found your own philosophical standpoint, rooted in your own personal experiences that you’ll be able to read and argue with the philosophy of others. And they seek to help their students find their own philosophical standpoints encouraging the students’ curiosity and facilitating their philosophical inquiry to allow them to find their own way to love wisdom.
The first philosopher to do so was Socrates, and it is his method which forms the basis of the practical philosophical exercises which these professional philosophers use. This modern form of the Socratic Dialogue was (re)invented by the German philosopher Leonard Nelson, who – much like Pirsig – found that there is a central distinction between what is traditionally meant with the word “philosophy” and the actual activity of philosophizing. It is not a matter of talking about philosophy, it is a matter of doing (performing?) philosophy. You need to experience philosophy in order to be able to understand it.
Nelson argued that the central aspect of philosophy is regressive abstraction – the thinking act of working upwards from your own personal experiences to a general philosophical knowledge – much like William James’ squirrel anecdote above. Thereby relating personal and concrete experiences to the overall ideas and concepts being discussed, without referring to outside authorities – academic or otherwise.
And like Socrates, Nelson argued that the best circumstances under which to perform such regressive abstraction was in the open discussion with other interested people. He founded the Philosophisch-Politische Akademie in 1922 as a forum to host such Socratic discussion. Banned by the Nazis, the PPA was re-founded by Nelson’s pupil Gustav Heckmann in 1949. It has since inspired philosophers in Germany, England, the Netherlands and Denmark where I have come across it in the form of Danish philosopher Finn Thorbjørn Hansen‘s book “Den sokratiske dialoggruppe”.
Along the way, it has matured from Nelson’s neo-Kantian influence, to contain both phenomenological and therapeutic qualities. As Dutch philosopher Dries Boele puts it:
Wisdom is impossible without consulting one’s experience. If philosophy can be considered as an effort to make us feel at home in life, then the socratic dialogue looks for an understanding that is needed for that – not in the construction of an all-embracing metaphysical order in which man has his task (such as Hegel’s system), but in the investigation of experiences by which we sharpen our power of discernment and are able to live attentively in the present.
A good description of the creative and maturing experience of a Socratic dialogue is offered by the leader of a Danish folk high school, who took part in one of Finn Thorbjørn Hansen’s first dialogue groups in Denmark:
Participation in a Socratic dialogue group can best be described as a piece of music. Slowly, through the telling of personal examples relating to the main question, the participants tune in their instruments for a shared investigation. They become a single organism – like the orchestra: a flowing collaboration. A Socratic dialogue contains more music and painting than analytical ability and politics. It is a shared process of creation. And just as you don’t have to be a professional musician to enjoy and experience the world of music – similarly you do not have to have a degree in philosophy to enjoy and experience the world of philosophy. You don’t have to play a perfect tune in order to experience the “eros”, the wonder, which characterizes the good Socratic dialogue.
Hansen supports this characterization of the dialogue and of the philosophical inquiry in general by quoting Wittgenstein, who said: “I believe that I have summed up my approach to philosophy when I said: philosophy is something one should only compose – like poetry.”
To this Hansen solely adds, “philosophy, then, is – at its best – a poetic effort.”
Perhaps that is true of all good intellectual endeavours? |
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