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When the National Institutes of Health convened a panel of independent experts this past April on how to prevent Alzheimer’s disease, the conclusions were pretty grim. The panel determined that “no evidence of even moderate scientific quality” links anything—from herbal or nutritional supplements to prescription medications to social, economic or environmental conditions—with the slightest decrease in the risk of developing Alzheimer’s. Furthermore, the committee argued, there is little credible evidence that you can do anything to delay the kinds of memory problems that are often associated with aging. The researchers’ conclusions made headlines around the world and struck a blow at the many purveyors of “brain boosters,” “memory enhancers” and “cognitive-training software” that advertise their wares on the Web and on television. One of the panel experts later told reporters in a conference call that the group wanted to “dissuade folks from spending extraordinary amounts of money on stuff that doesn’t work.” But did the panel overstate its case? Some memory and cognition researchers privately grumbled that the conclusions were too negative—particularly with respect to the potential benefits of not smoking, treating high blood pressure and engaging in physical activity. In late September the British Journal of Sports Medicine published a few of these criticisms. As a longtime science journalist, I suspected that this is the kind of instructive controversy—with top-level people taking opposing positions—that often occurs at the leading edge of research. As I spoke with various researchers, I realized that the disagreements signaled newly emerging views of how the brain ages. Investigators are exploring whether they need to look beyond the brain to the heart to understand what happens to nerve cells over the course of decades. In the process, they are uncovering new roles for the cardiovascular system, including ones that go beyond supplying the brain with plenty of oxygen-rich blood. The findings could suggest useful avenues for delaying dementia or less severe memory problems. Dementia, of course, is a complex biological phenomenon. Although Alzheimer’s is the most common cause of dementia in older adults, it is not the only cause. Other conditions can contribute to dementia as well, says Eric B. Larson, executive director of the Group Health Research Institute in Seattle. For example, physicians have long known that suffering a stroke, in which blood flow to the brain has been interrupted by a clot or a hemorrhage, can lead to dementia. But research over the past few years has documented the importance of very tiny strokes—strokes so small they can be detected only under a microscope after death—as another possible cause for dementia. Studies at autopsy of people who had dementia have detected many of these so-called microvascular infarcts either by themselves or along with the plaques and tangles more typical of Alzheimer’s in the brains of people with dementia. These findings suggest that most dementias, even those caused by Alzheimer’s, are triggered by multiple pathological processes and will require more than one treatment. Proving that cardiovascular treatment is one of those approaches will take some doing. Just because microinfarcts may make dementia worse does not mean that preventing them will delay the brain’s overall deterioration. Maybe severe dementia makes people more vulnerable to microinfarcts. And just because better control of high blood pressure and increased physical activity seem to decrease a person’s risk of stroke, that does not necessarily mean they are less likely to suffer microinfarcts. Correlation, after all, does not necessarily imply causation. That scientific truism was the problem that kept bothering the panel of outside experts put together by the NIH. Thus, the expert panel concluded, with one exception, that “all existing evidence suggests that antihypertensive treatment results in no cognitive benefit.” Data showing the benefits of boosting physical activity in folks with confirmed memory problems were “preliminary.” The controversy boils down to semantics, says Martha L. Daviglus, chair of the consensus panel and a preventive cardiology researcher at Northwestern University’s School of Medicine. “Obviously, smoking and hypertension are risk factors for cardiovascular disease,” she says. “And they may turn out to be risk factors for Alzheimer’s disease as well,” she says. But after reviewing all the evidence, Daviglus and her fellow panelists concluded that it “failed to provide convincing evidence” of the link, whereas other researchers see “some evidence” of a link. Getting better data may be a problem, however. One of the best ways scientists have to prove cause and effect in medicine is to conduct a randomized controlled trial, in which study subjects are randomly assigned to two groups. One group—the so-called control group—receives the usual standard of care. The other group—the so-called experimental group—gets whichever intervention is being tested. The simplest way to prove that treating high blood pressure helps to delay the onset of dementia would be to treat one group for hypertension and leave the other group deliberately untreated for the sake of the experiment. No ethical physician would participate in such a study. One way out of this dilemma, Daviglus notes, is to design a study in which patients suffering from hypertension get treatment, and doctors analyze the results based on how well the patients’ blood pressure was controlled. If the amount by which blood pressure dropped closely paralleled the decrease in dementia risk, that would be powerful evidence of a beneficial link. Such a so-called dose-response study has not been done yet—it is a complex and expensive undertaking—but there is reason to believe it could be worth the investment. Observational studies, which follow people as they get older without directly intervening in their treatment, have uncovered some suggestive trends. Larson and others have shown that people who have good control of their blood pressure from age 65 to 80 are less likely to develop dementia. After age 85, controlling blood pressure does not have much effect on dementia risk. That doesn’t mean anyone older than 85 should stop taking blood pressure medication. Lowering high blood pressure still prevents congestive heart failure and promotes kidney health. But these studies suggest that doctors do not have to take aggressive measures when treating patients older than 85 for hypertension. As for physical activity, the best evidence in favor of its benefits for the brain comes from Australia. Two years ago researchers there published the results of a randomized controlled trial of physical activity in 170 older adults who had started showing greater memory problems than their peers and were thus at increased risk of developing dementia. Study participants averaged an extra 20 minutes a day of physical activity over six months. The study was so rigorously designed that individuals undertook the extra exercise by themselves at home to preclude the possibility that the true benefit had come from socializing with other people during group activities. The benefits of extra exercise were obvious and lasted—albeit at a diminishing level—for 12 months after the exercise program ended. Not only did the experimental group score better on tests of their cognition compared with the control group, but the improvement was twice as great as the one that had previously been shown for the antidementia drug donepezil (brand name Aricept). This was the first time that anyone had proved in a randomized controlled trial that exercise could improve mental functioning in people with some cognitive problems. No one understands on a biochemical level why physical activity might help the brain. The best explanation so far, says Henrietta van Praag, a neurobiologist at the National Institute on Aging, is that exercising the heart somehow stimulates growth factors to produce new nerve cells in the brain. In 1999 van Praag showed that more new nerves formed in the hippocampus—one of the key centers in the brain for memory and learning—in physically active mice than in inactive ones. (She was working at the time as a postdoctoral researcher in Fred Gage’s laboratory at the Salk Institute.) She has since shown that the new cell growth is associated with a marked improvement in learning and memory. The new nerves also show qualitative differences from their older counterparts. The younger cells are better at establishing new connections with other cells. The effect is somewhat temporary. After a couple of months, the new cells start acting like the older cells, although they do not die off. Maybe 10 or 15 years in the future, we will know for sure whether quitting smoking and exercising regularly help to delay dementia. That leaves the rest of us—who may have seen the devastating effects of dementia on older family and friends and cannot afford to wait for a definitive scientific answer on how we might avoid a similar fate—in an uncomfortable state of ignorance. Even if these steps never end up helping your brain, however, they will do your heart a world of good. Editor's note: This article was published in the print issue with the title, "The Heart-Brain Connection".
By activating a neuron in the prefrontal cortex of a mouse's brain, scientists are able to make the mouse eat more. But what could this mean for humans? The influence that different areas of the brain may have over eating behaviors is a contentious debate in neurobiology. "Researchers tend to be either in a camp that believes the control of eating is all regulated from the top down, or from the bottom up," says Ralph DiLeone, senior author of the paper, referring to whether it is "higher" decision-making areas of the brain or more "primitive" brain functions that regulate eating behaviors. "Both are important and this paper brings a little more neurobiological clarity to the question," DiLeone claims. In 2012, Medical News Today reported on a study suggesting that fructose increases activity in the hypothalamus, insula and striatum - areas of the brain responsible for processing motivation and reward. Fructose prevented certain brain cells that instruct us to eat from telling us we are full, and so seemed to increase "food-seeking behavior." Another 2012 study suggested that a brain receptor called Gpr17 has a role in controlling appetite, and that this could form the basis of potential new anti-obesity medications. The new study, published in the journal Nature Neuroscience, focuses on the prefrontal cortex - a decision-making area of the brain, which some scientists had suspected may play a role in the eating behaviors of mammals. Scientists have so far been unable to account for how this relationship between the prefrontal cortex and appetite regulation might work, though. Switching off neurons prompted mice to eat less Dopamine, the neurotransmitter that controls the reward and pleasure centers of the brain, is also known to have an important function in food intake. Activating the D1 dopamine-receptor neurons caused the mice to eat more. Activating the D1 dopamine-receptor neurons caused the mice to eat more. Dopamine allows our brain to perceive rewards and to take steps to move toward them. When animals have low levels of dopamine in their brain, they stop eating and eventually die from starvation. The researchers activated the D1 dopamine-receptor neurons in the prefrontal cortex of mice. They found that this caused the mice to eat more, while inhibiting - or "switching off" - the same neurons caused the mice to eat less. The dopamine pathway toggled on and off by the scientists in this study also intersects with areas of the brain, such as the amygdala, which process emotional responses. The researchers think that this could mean eating behavior is regulated at the junction between the decision-making and more primitive emotion centers of the brain. The authors think that this region of brain circuitry could provide the key to new medication for regulating eating behavior:
If you’re reading this, that means that all of our super lucky listeners get to hear the latest episode of Utah Outcasts! This week the panel of X, and Kyle go over our usual segments with one new surprise. We were able to keep Geoff around for a little bit until he had to bail over a cat that had disasters coming out of both ends. So without any further ado, here’s what we talked about this week: News You Missed – Jason Chaffetz and James Comey might have broken the Hatch Act, Westboro supporters shoot up The Equality House, Negan is the Old Testament God, Strap in because God’s Not Dead 3 is in the works, David Barton is a goddamned liar about voter turnout percentages, Mormon and Gay launches and offends just about everyone, The Oregon militants at Malheur were all found NOT GUILTY?!? The Decalogue – This month on the Decalogue we decided to have a bit of fun with the reasons that atheists decide to stay in Utah even though it’s chock full of mormons. Fun With Real Audio – Alex Jones declares Trump as the winner of the election, Jerry Boykin rewrites the red-scare scripts, Jim Bakker says nuclear war is coming soon, and finally Tamara Scott goes full Godwin by calling politicians “a Hitler”. Time for Rants – X brings you the replacement segment to our Highs and Lows for the week with “Time for Rants” where we come to the show with a canned rant for us to talk about and through, this week it’s one of X’s as he talks about the people wanting to go back to the good ol’ days. Email: Mailbag@UtahOutcasts.com Voicemail/SMS line: 347-669-3377 Facebook: Click Here Twitter: Click Here YouTube: Click Here KEEP IN MIND THAT WE WILL USE YOUR EMAILS/TEXTS/VOICEMAILS ON THE SHOW FOR ENTERTAINMENT PURPOSES. http://audio.voxnest.com/stream/f3a8b07f17d6483bb9aa9ff509f0937b/podhell.com/episodes/UO/UTOC20161030.mp3 Right Click to Download OPENING SONG – Courtesy of Teknoaxe used with permission CLOSING SONG – Tokyo Ska Paradise Orchestra “Pride of Lions” Subscribe via iTunes Subscribe via Stitcher Support us via Patreon Support us via PayPal Buy some Merch!
Ongoing tensions between Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and the Hamas government in the Gaza Strip are picking up pace considerably today, with Abbas having announced he will fully defund all electricity to everybody in Gaza. The move is seen as an attempt by Abbas to pressure Hamas to fully cede control over the strip to him. The Palestinian Authority lost control of the Gaza Strip in the 2006 election, which Abbas lost and then chose to ignore, leading to an outright split with Hamas. With the international community mostly letting Abbas do whatever he wants to try to exert control over Gaza, Israel will likely cut off all electricity exports to the strip outright in very short order, leaving the strip almost entirely in darkness for the foreseeable future. Gaza is almost entirely dependent on electricity imports, as their lone power plant is unable to keep up with demand even in the best of times, and Israel’s blockade preventing a steady supply of fuel and necessary repairs to keep it running at anywhere near peak production. Hamas warned against the move, saying that Abbas would not be able to win Gazans’ loyalty by force, and that the strip is potentially explosive, with such moves by the PA risking leading to an explosion in all directions. Last 5 posts by Jason Ditz
Phil Kessel has always been a little bit misunderstood. So perhaps it should only stand to reason that his tenure with the Toronto Maple Leafs, now very much in question, would come to be viewed that way as well. There will be no asterisk needed when assessing his contributions in Toronto and pronouncing him one of the best players in franchise history. For six seasons here, Kessel has been a star — an electrifying pure goal-scorer in an era where the goals dried up around the NHL. Yet, much too often, the conversation around Phil has focused solely on what he doesn’t do: Be it his reluctance to speak with the media, or the fact he doesn’t score high enough in fitness testing, or that he doesn’t come across as a leader of men. While those are all valid concerns when trying to evaluate exactly who and what Kessel is as a hockey player, they shouldn’t trump the on-ice results. Kessel has played 420 consecutive games since making his Maple Leafs debut in November 2009. He has been the team’s top goal-scorer and point producer for five seasons running, and carried largely poor Toronto squads to a 95-38-17 record in games where he scores at least one goal. What’s more, he has finished inside the top-10 in NHL scoring for three straight years and could become the first Leaf since Harvey “Busher” Jackson in the 1930’s to make it four in a row with a strong run down the stretch. It’s quite a resume. The biggest question it raises to me has nothing to do with fitness and character, but rather: Why have the Leafs failed to surround him with teammates good enough to maximize those prime performing years? Kessel is 27 now, an age where offensive players have historically already had their most productive NHL season. With Toronto set to get started on a full tear-down and rebuild, it makes sense to see what trade options are out there. But should they find a willing partner prepared to offer up an adequate return — no easy task for an $8-million player in a salary-cap system — the trade will represent an opportunity lost, rather than something gained. For the entirety of his tenure in Toronto, Kessel has been asked to shoulder too much of the load. Just as Mats Sundin never seemed to have the proper wingers before him, Kessel hasn’t lined up beside a true No. 1 centreman. And yet, despite that obvious disadvantage, he wracked up a whole whack of even-strength points while becoming one of the NHL’s most productive players. Perhaps it is simply the nature of the beast in Toronto, where there are so many voices with so many opinions, that Kessel’s brilliance would so routinely be overlooked. This is the kind of market where stars like Jonathan Toews (who has just one career 70-point season) and Drew Doughty (who has five goals this season) would probably be questioned as much as celebrated if they played here. It’s unfortunate, really. Kessel is far from perfect and currently in an awful slump, with just four goals in his last 25 games. Criticism pertaining to that lack of production and its impact on the team is more than fair. However, the conversation instead turns to whether he is a “coach killer” — an awfully harsh conclusion to be drawn about any one player. No wonder Kessel didn’t sound all that upset about the possibility of being traded when he spoke with reporters in Long Island on Thursday night. To find a proper appreciation for his talents all you have to do is walk into a NHL dressing room — any one of them — and speak to his peers. At some point last year, I asked then-San Jose Sharks forward Adam Burish about Kessel. They both hail from Madison, Wisconsin, and while Burish didn’t play against the Leafs star as a kid, they had crossed paths during some scrimmages over the summer. In fact, Burish remembered the first time they were on the ice together. He recalled how unassuming Kessel looked and briefly wondered “what’s the big deal with this guy?” — just long enough for Kessel to blow right by him with his deceptive speed. “I honestly don’t know how he does it,” said Burish. The lesson was obvious: Kessel should be taken for granted only at your own peril. It’s something the dissenters in Toronto might come to understand if the winger is dealt away — be it before the March 2 deadline or more likely in the off-season. Perhaps Kessel will eventually land with a contender and get a chance to chase the Stanley Cup, an achievement that would no doubt change perceptions. In reality, all he has to be is himself: Because that’s been plenty good enough, even if it hasn’t always been portrayed that way.
(JTA) — A European Parliament member and 17 prominent French intellectuals protested the omission of anti-Semitism from a draft indictment of a Muslim for the murder of his Jewish neighbor. During a speech in parliament, Frédérique Ries, a lawmaker from Belgium, on Thursday criticized French authorities’ handling of the investigation into the April 4 incident, in which 66-year-old Sarah Halimi was tortured and thrown out of her third-story apartment to her death, allegedly by 27-year-old Kobili Traore, who lived in her building. “French authorities have treated her murder with icy silence,” Ries, who is Jewish, said in reference to the fact that Traore, who had no history of mental illness, was placed at a psychiatric institution and has not been charged with a hate crime, despite evidence suggesting he killed Halimi because she was Jewish. “No national mobilization for Sarah, she died as the media remained quasi-indifferent,” she said. Last week, 17 French intellectuals, including the historian Georges Bensoussan and the philosopher Alain Finkielkraut, published a scathing criticism of the handling of the incident by French authorities and the media. The omission of hate crime charges from a draft indictment being prepared by the Paris Prosector’s Office for voluntary manslaughter against Traore has angered many French Jews, who cited a recording of the incident made by another neighbor. In it, according to the Tribune Juive weekly, Traore is heard shouting “Allah hu akbar,” “Allah is the greatest” in Arabic. He is heard calling Sarah “Satan” and then praying after her killing. “Everything about this crime suggests there is an ongoing denial of reality” by authorities, the intellectuals wrote, also citing testimonies of neighbors who said Traore had called Halimi a “dirty Jew” to her face. “We demand all the truth be brought to light in the murder of Sarah Halimi,” the intellectuals wrote. The incident occurred month before France’s general election, in which the French political establishment was bracing for unprecedented gains for the far-right National Front party, which opposes immigration to France from Muslim countries and seeks to limit public expressions of that faith. Marine Le Pen, the party’s president, received a historic third of the vote in the final round of the presidential elections, which she lost to the centrist candidate Emmanuel Macron. Many French Jews believe authorities covered up Halimi’s alleged murder to prevent it from becoming fodder for Le Pen’s divisive campaign.
Let me speak to you about dumbness because that is what schools teach best. Old-fashioned dumbness used to be simple ignorance: you didn't know something, but there were ways to find out if you wanted to. Government-controlled schooling didn't eliminate dumbness - in fact, we now know that people read more fluently before we had forced schooling - but dumbness was transformed. Now dumb people aren't just ignorant; they're the victims of the non-thought of secondhand ideas. Dumb people are now well-informed about the opinions of Time magazine and CBS, The New York Times and the President; their job is to choose which pre-thought thoughts, which received opinions, they like best. The élite in this new empire of ignorance are those who know the most pre-thought thoughts. Mass dumbness is vital to modern society. The dumb person is wonderfully flexible clay for psychological shaping by market research, government policymakers; public-opinion leaders, and any other interest group. The more pre-thought thoughts a person has memorized, the easier it is to predict what choices he or she will make. What dumb people cannot do is think for themselves or ever be alone for very long without feeling crazy. That is the whole point of national forced schooling; we aren't supposed to be able to think for ourselves because independent thinking gets in the way of "professional" think-ing, which is believed to follow rules of scientific precision. Modern scientific stupidity masquerades as intellectual knowledge - which it is not. Real knowledge has to be earned by hard and painful thinking; it can't be generated in group discussions or group therapies but only in lonely sessions with yourself. Real knowledge is earned only by ceaseless questioning of yourself and others, and by the labor of independent verification; you can't buy it from a government agent, a social worker, a psychologist, a licensed specialist, or a schoolteacher. There isn't a public school in this country set up to allow the discovery of real knowledge - not even the best ones - although here and there individual teachers, like guerrilla fighters, sabotage the system and work toward this ideal. But since schools are set up to classify people rather than to see them as unique, even the best schoolteachers are strictly limited in the amount of questioning they can tolerate. The new dumbness - the non thought of received ideas - is much more dangerous than simple ignorance, because it's really about thought control. In school, a washing away of the innate power of individual mind takes place, a "cleansing" so comprehensive that original thinking becomes difficult. If you don't believe this development was part of the intentional design of schooling, you should read William Torrey Harris's The Philosophy of Education. Harris was the U.S. Commissioner of Education at the turn of the century and the man most influential in standardizing our schools. Listen to the man. "Ninety-nine [students] out of a hundred," writes Harris, "are automata, careful to walk in prescribed paths, careful to follow the prescribed custom." This is not all accident, Harris explains, but the "result of substantial education, which, scientifically defined, is the subsumption of the individual." Scientific education subsumes the individual until his or her behavior becomes robotic. Those are the thoughts of the most influential U.S. Commissioner of Education we've had so far. The great theological scholar Dietrich Bonhoeffer raised this issue of the new dumbness in his brilliant analysis of Nazism, in which he sought to comprehend how the best-schooled nation in the world, Germany, could fall under its sway. He concluded that Nazism could be understood only as the psychological product of good schooling. The sheer weight of received ideas, pre-thought thoughts, was so overwhelming that individuals gave up trying to assess things for themselves. Why struggle- to invent a map of the world or of the human conscience when schools and media offer thousands of ready-made maps, pre-thought thoughts? The new dumbness is particularly deadly to middle and upper-middle-class people, who have already been made shallow by the multiple requirements to conform. Too many people, uneasily convinced that they must know something because of a degree, diploma, or license, remain so convinced until a brutal divorce, alienation from their children, loss of employment, or periodic fits of meaninglessness manage to tip the precarious mental balance of their incomplete humanity, their stillborn adult lives. Listen to William Harris again, the dark genius of American schooling, the man who gave you scientifically age-graded classrooms: The great purposes of school can be realized better in dark, airless, ugly places than in beautiful halls. It is to master the physical self, to transcend the beauty of nature. School should develop the power to withdraw from the external world. Harris thought, a hundred years ago, that self-alienation was the key to a successful society. Filling the young mind with the thoughts of others and surrounding it with ugliness - that was the passport to self-alienation. Who can say that he was wrong? II I want to give you a yardstick, a gold standard, by which to measure good schooling. The Shelter Institute in Bath, Maine will teach you how to build a three thousand square-foot, multi-level Cape Cod home in three weeks' time, whatever your age. If you stay another week, it will show you how to make your own posts and beams; you'll actually cut them out and set them up. You'll learn wiring, plumbing, insulation, the works. Twenty thousand people have learned how to build a house there for about the cost of one month's tuition in public school. (Call Patsy Hennon at 207/442-7938, and she'll get you started on building your own home.) For just about the same money you can walk down the street in Bath to the Apprentice Shop at the Maine Maritime Museum [now in Rockport - ed.] and sign on for a one-year course (no vacations, forty hours a week) in traditional wooden boat building. The whole tuition is eight hundred dollars, but there's a catch: they won't accept you as a student until you volunteer for two weeks, so they can get to know you and you can judge what it is you're getting into. Now you've invested thirteen months and fifteen hundred dollars and you have a house and a boat. What else would you like to know? How to grow food, make clothes, repair a car, build furni-ture, sing? Those of you with a historical imagination will recognize Thomas Jefferson's prayer for schooling - that it would teach useful knowledge. Some places do: the best schooling in the United States today is coming out of museums, libraries, and private institutes. If anyone wants to school your kids, hold them to the standard of the Shelter Institute and you'll do fine. As long as we're questioning public schooling, we should question whether there really is an abstraction called "the public" at all, except in the ominous calculations of social engineers. As a boy from the banks of the Monongahela River in western Pennsylvania, I find the term insulting, a cartoon of social reality. If an institution that robs people of their right to self-determination can call itself "public", if being "public" means it can turn families into agents of the state, making parents spy on and harass their sons and daughters because a schoolteacher tells them to; if the state can steal your home because you can't pay its "public" school taxes, and state courts can break up your family if you refuse to allow the state to tell your children what to think - then the word public is a label for garbage and for people who allow themselves to be treated like slaves. A few weeks is all that the Shelter Institute asks for to give you a beautiful Cape Cod home; a few months is all Maine Maritime asks for to teach you boat-building and rope-making, lobstering and sail-making, fishing and naval architecture. We have too much schooling, not too little. Hong Kong, with its short school year, whips Japan in every scientific or mathematical competition. Israel, with its long school year, can't keep up with Flemish Belgium, which has the shortest school year in the world. Somebody's been lying to you. Sweden, a rich, healthy, and beautiful country, with a spectacular reputation for quality in everything, won't allow children to enter school before they're seven years old. The total length of Swedish schooling is nine years, not twelve, after which the average Swede runs circles around the over-schooled American. Why don't you know these things? To whose advantage is it that you don't? When students enroll in a Swedish school, the authorities ask three questions: (l) Why do you want to go to this school? (2) What do you want to gain from the experience? (3) What are you interested in? And they listen to the answers. Can you build a house or a boat? Can you grow food, make clothing, dig a well, sing a song (your own song, that is), make your own children happy, weave a whole life from the everyday world around you? No, you say, you can't? Then listen to me&emdash;you have no business with my kid. In my own life, with my own children, I'm sorry I lacked the courage to say what Hester Prynne, the wearer of the scarlet letter, said to the Puritan elders when they tried to take away her daughter. Alone and friendless, dirt poor, ringed about by enemies, she said, "Over my dead body." A few weeks ago a young woman called me from Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania to tell me the state had just insisted she stop home-schooling her little girl, Chrissie. The state was going to force her to send Chrissie to school. She said she was going to fight, first with the law, although she didn't know where the money would come from, and then by any means she had. If I had to bet on this young, single mother or the State of Pennsylvania to win, I'd bet on the lady because what l was really hearing her say was, "Over my dead body." I wish I'd been able to say that when the state came to take my own children. I didn't. But if I'm born again I promise you that's what I will say. A few days ago I got a call from a newspaper that wanted some advice for parents about how to launch their children into school. All the reporter wanted was a sound byte from a former New York State Teacher of the Year. What I said was this: Don't cooperate with your children's school unless the school has come to you in person to work out a meeting of the minds - on your turf, not theirs. Only a desperado would blindly trust his children to a collection of untested strangers and hope for the best. Parents and school personnel are just plain natural adversaries. One group is trying to make a living; the other is trying to make a work of art called a family. If you allow yourself to be co-opted by flattery, seduced with worthless payoffs such as special classes or programs, intimidated by Alice in Wonderland titles and degrees, you will become the enemy within, the extension of state schooling into your own home. Shame on you if you allow that. Your job is to educate, the schoolteacher's is to school; you work for love, the teacher for money. The interests are radically different, one an individual thing, the other a collective. You can make your own son or daughter one of a kind if you have the time and will to do so; school can only make them part of a hive, a herd, or an anthill. III How did I survive for nearly thirty years in a system for which I feel such disgust and loathing? I want to make a confession in the hope it will suggest strategy to other teachers: I did it by becoming an active saboteur, in small ways and large. What I did resolutely was to teach kids what I'm saying here - that schooling is bad business unless it teaches you how to build a boat or a house; that giving strangers intimate information about yourself is certainly to their advantage, but seldom to your own. On a daily basis I consciously practiced sabotage, breaking laws regularly, forcing the fixed times and spaces of schooling to become elastic, falsifying records so the rigid curricula of those places could be what individual children needed. I threw sand in the gears by encouraging new teachers to think dialectically so that they wouldn't fit into the pyramid of administration. I exploited the weakness of the school's punitive mechanism, which depends on fear to be effective, by challenging it in visible ways, showing I did not fear it, setting administrators against each other to prevent the juggernaut from crushing me. When that didn't work I recruited community forces to challenge the school - businessmen, politicians, parents, and journalists - so I would be given a wide berth. Once, under heavy assault, I asked my wife to run for school board. She got elected, fired the superintendent, and then punished his cronies in a host of imaginative ways. But what I am most proud of is this: I undermined the confidence of the young in the school institution and replaced it with confidence in their own minds and hearts. I thumbed my nose at William Torrey Harris and gave to my children (although I was well into manhood before I shook off the effects of my own schooling) what had been given to me by the green river Monongahela and the steel city of Pittsburgh: love of family, friends, culture, and neighborhood, and a cup overflowing with self-respect. I taught my kids how to cheat destiny so successfully that they created a record of astonishing success that deserves a book someday. Some of my kids left school to go up the Amazon and live with Indian tribes to study on their own the effects of government dam-building on traditional family life; some went to Nicaragua and joined combat teams to study the amazing hold of poetry on the lives of common people in that land; some made award-winning movies; some became comedians; some succeeded at love, some failed. All learned to argue with Fate in the form of social engineering. IV I hope you saw the news story a while back about a national milk price-rigging scheme in schools from Florida to Utah. Fifty-six arrests have already been made in a caper that's existed most of this century. Schools pay more for milk than any other bulk buyer. Does that surprise you? Ask your own school administrator what unit price he pays for school milk and he'll look at you like your marbles are gone. How should he know, why should he care? An assistant principal once said to me, "It's not your money. What are you getting excited about?" What if I told you that he was the second best school administrator I met in thirty years? He was. That's the standard we've established. The waste in schools is staggering. People are hired and titles created for jobs nobody needs. There's waste in services, waste in precious time spent moving herds of children back and forth through corridors at the sound of a horn. In my experience, poor schools waste much more than rich schools, and rich schools waste more than you could believe. The only public aspect of these places is that they function as a jobs project, although large numbers of these jobs are set aside as political patronage. Public schools can't understand how the average private school can make profit on a per-seat cost less than half the "free" public charge; they can't understand how the average religious school makes do on even less. Homeschooling is the biggest puzzle of all. A principal once said to me, "Those people must be sick to spend so much time with children and not get paid for it!" Consider the fantasy of teacher certification. Teachers are licensed and paid as though they are specialists, but they rarely are. For example, a science teacher is almost never actually a scientist - a man or woman who thinks about the secrets of nature as a private passion and pursues this interest on personal time. How many science classes in this country actually make any serious attempt to discover anything or to add to human knowledge? They are orderly ways of killing time, nothing more. Kids are set to memorizing science vocabulary, repeating well-worn procedures certain to work, chanting formulas exactly as they have been indoctrinated to chant commercials from TV. The science teacher is a publicist for political truths set down in state-approved science textbooks. Anyone who thinks school science is the inevitable precursor of real science is very innocent, indeed; of a piece, I think, with those poor, intelligent souls who, aware that television destroys the power to think by providing pre-seen sights, pre-thought thoughts, and unwholesome fantasies, still believe somehow that PBS television must be an exception to the rule. If you would like to know how scientists are really made, pick up a wonderful book called Discovering, published in 1989 by Harvard University Press. In it you'll learn from a prominent scientist himself that not one major scientific discovery of this century, including exotica like superconductivity, came from an academic laboratory; or a corporate or govemment laboratory, or a school laboratory. You could have guessed the last, but I surprised you with the others, didn't I? All came from garages, attics, and basements; all were managed with cheap, simple equipment and eccentric, personalized procedures of investigation. School is a perfect place to turn science into a religion, but it's the wrong place to learn science, for sure. HARRIS THOUGHT, A HUNDRED YEARS AGO, THAT SELF-ALIENATION WAS THE KEY TO A SUCCESSFUL SOCIETY. WHO CAN SAY THAT HE WAS WRONG? The specialists in English, math, social studies, and the rest of the rainbow of progressive subjects are only marginally more competent, if at all. If three million teachers were actually the specialists their licenses claim, they would be a major voice in national life and policy-making; if we are honest, we must wonder how it is possible for an army so large to be so silent, of such little consequence, in spite of the new hokum being retailed about "schoolbased management." Don't misunderstand me: teachers are frequently good people, intelligent people, talented people who work very hard. But regardless of how bright they are, how gracefully they "schoolteach," or how well they control children's behavior (which is, after all, what they are hired to do; if they can't do that, they are fired, but if they can, little else really matters) - the net result of their efforts and our expense is surely very little or even nothing indeed, often it leaves children worse off in terms of mental development and character formation than they were before being "taught." Schools that seem to be successful almost always are made to appear so by selective enrollment of self-motivated children. The best way into the strange world of compulsory schooling is through books. I always knew real books and schoolbooks were different, but I didn't become conscious of the particulars until I got weary one day of New York City's brainless English curriculum and decided to teach Moby Dick to mainstream eighth-grade English classes. I discovered that the White Whale is too big for the forty-five-minute bell breaks of a junior high school. I couldn't make it "fit." But the editors of the school edition of Moby Dick had provided a package of prefabricated questions and nearly a hundred interpretations of their own. Every chapter began and ended with a barrage of these interventions. I came to see that the school edition wasn't a real book at all but a disguised indoctrination. The book had been rendered teacher-proof and student-proof. VI This jigsaw fragmentation, designed to make the job site safe from its employees, is usually credited to Frederick Taylor's work of sinister genius, Scientific Management, written at the turn of this century. But that is wrong. The system was really devised before the American Revolution, in eighteenth-century Prussia, by Frederick the Great, and honed to perfection in early nineteenth-century Prussia after its humiliating defeat by Napoleon in 1806. A new system of schooling was the instrument out of which Prussian vengeance was shaped, a system that reduced human beings during their malleable years to reliable machine parts, human machinery dependent upon the state for its mission and purpose. When Blucher's Death's Head Hussars destroyed Napoleon at Waterloo, the value of Prussian schooling was confined. By 1819, Prussian philosophy had given the world its first laboratory of compulsory schooling. That same year Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein, the story of a German intellectual who fabricated a monster out of the parts of dead bodies: compulsory schooling was the monster she had in mind, emblemized in the lurching destruction caused by a homeless, synthetic creature seeking its maker, a creature with the infinite inner pain that ambiguous family brings. In the nineteenth century, ties between Prussia and the United States were exceedingly close, a fact unknown these days because it became embarrassing to us during the World Wars and so was removed from history books. American scholarship during the nineteenth century was almost exclusively German at its highest levels, another fact conveniently absent from popular history. From 1814 to 1900, more than fifty thousand young men from prominent American families made the pilgrimage to Prussia and other parts of Germany to study under its new system of higher education based on research instead of "teaching." Ten thousand brought back Ph.D.'s to a then-uncredentialed United States, preempting most of the available intellectual and technical work. Prussian education was the national obsession among American political leaders, industrialists, clergy, and university people. In 1845, the Prussian emperor was even asked to adjudicate the boundary between Canada and the United States! Virtually every founding father of American compulsory schooling went to Prussia to study its clockwork schoolrooms flrsthand. Horace Mann's Seventh Report To The Boston School Committee of 1844 was substantially devoted to glowing praise of Prussian accomplishments and how they should become our own. Victor Cousin's book on Prussian schooling was the talk of our country about the same time. When, only a quarter-century later, Prussia crushed France in a brief war and performed the miracle of unifying Germany, it seemed clear that the way to unify our immigrant classes - which we so desperately sought to do - was through Prussian schooling. By 1905, Prussian trained Americans, or Americans like John Dewey who apprenticed at Prussian-trained hands, were in command of every one of our new institutions of scientific teacher training: Columbia Teacher's College, the University of Chicago, Johns Hopkins, the University of Wisconsin, Stanford. The domination of Prussian vision, and the general domination of German philosophy and pedagogy, was a fait accompli among the leadership of American schooling. You should care about this for the compelling reason that German practices were used here to justify removal of intellectual material from the curriculum; it may explain why your own children cannot think. That was the Prussian way - to train only a leadership cadre to think. Of all the men whose vision excited the architects of the new Prussianized American school machine, the most exciting were a German philosopher named Hegel and a German doctor named Wilhelm Wundt. In Wundt's laboratory the techniques of psychophysics (what today we might call "experimental psychology") were refined. Thanks to his work, it took only a little imagination to see an awesome new world emerging - for Wundt had demonstrated convincingly to his American students that people were only complex machines! Man a machine? The implications were exhilarating, promising liberation from the ancient shackles of tradition, culture, morality, and religion. Adjustment became the watchword of schools and social welfare offices. G. Stanley Hall, one of Wundt's personal protégés (who as a professor at Johns Hopkins had inoculated his star pupil, John Dewey, with the German virus), now joined with Thorndike, his German-trained colleague at Columbia Teacher's College, to beat the drum for national standardized testing. Hall shrewdly sponsored and promoted an American tour for the Austrian doctor Sigmund Freud so that Freud might popularize his theory that parents and family were the cause of virtually all maladjustment - all the more reason to remove their little machines to the safety of schools. In the minds of disciples of German educational thought, scientific education was primarily a way of forcing people to fit. With such a "technical" goal in mind, the future course of American schooling was determined, and with massive financial support from the foundations - especially those of the Rockefeller and Carnegie families - new scientific colleges to share teachers were established. In Prussia these were aptly called "teacher seminaries," but here secular religionists were more discreet: a priesthood of trained professionals would guard the new school-church and write its canonical text into state law. Thus the Torah of twentieth century compulsory schooling was in its Ark by 1895, one third of the way through the reign of William Torrey Harris as U.S. Commissioner of Education. Teacher training in Prussia was founded on three premises, which the United States subsequently borrowed. The first of these is that the state is sovereign, the only true parent of children. Its corollary is that biological parents are the enemies of their offspring. When Germany's Froebel invented Kindergarten, it was not a garden for children he had in mind but a garden of children, in which state-appointed teachers were the gardeners of the children. Kindergarten is meant to protect children from their own mothers. The second premise of Prussian schooling is that intellectual training is not the purpose of state schooling - obedience and subordination are. In fact, intellectual training will invariably subvert obedience unless it is rigidly controlled and doled out as a reward for obedience. If the will could be broken all else would follow. Keep in mind that will-breaking was the central logic of child-rearing among our own Puritan colonists, and you will see the natural affinity that exists between Prussian seeds and Puritan soil - from which agriculture our compulsory schooling law springs. The best-known device to break the will of the young, practiced for centuries among English and German upper classes, was the separation of parent and child at an early age. Here now was an institution backed by the police power of the state to guarantee that separation. But it was not enough to compel obedience by intimidation. The child must be brought to love its synthetic parent. When George Orwell's protagonist in 1984 realizes that he loves Big Brother after betraying his lover to the state, we have a dramatic embodiment of the sexual destination of Prussian-type schooling; it creates a willingness to sell out your own family, friends, culture, and religion for your new lover, the state. Twelve years of arbitrary punishment and reward in the confinement of a classroom is ample time to condition any child to believe that he who wields red pen-power is the true parent, and they who control the buzzers must be gods. The third premise of Prussian training is that the schoolroom and the workplace shall be dumbed down into simplified fragments that anyone, however dumb, can memorize and operate. This solves the historical dilemma of leadership: a disobedient work force could be replaced quickly, without damage to production, if the workers required only habit, not mind, to function properly. This strategy paid off recently during the national strike of air traffic controllers, when the entire force of these supposed "experts" was replaced overnight by management personnel and hastily trained fill-ins. There was no increase in accidents across the system! If anyone can do any particular job there's no reason to pay them very much except to guarantee employee loyalty and dependency - a form of love which bad parents often extort from their young in the same way. In the training ground of the classroom, everything is reduced to bits under close management control. This allows progress to be quantified into precise rankings to track students throughout their careers - the great irony being that it's not intellectual growth that grades and reports really measure, but obedience to authority. That's why regular disclosures about the lack of correlation between standardized test scores and performance do not end the use of these surveillance mechanisms. What they actually measure is the tractability of the student, and this they do quite accurately. Is it of value to know who is docile and who may not be? You tell me. Finally, if workers or students have little or no idea how their own part fits into the whole, if they are unable to make decisions, grow food, build a home or boat, or even entertain themselves, then political and economic stability will reign because only a carefully screened and seasoned leadership will know how things work. Uninitiated citizens will not even know what questions should be asked, let alone where the answers might be found. This is sophisticated pedagogy indeed, if far from what mother and father expect when they send Junior to school. This is what the religious Right is talking about when it claims that schooling is a secular religion. If you can think independently of pre-thought thoughts and received wisdom, you must certainly arrive at the same conclusion, whatever your private theology. Schooling is our official state religion; in no way is it a neutral vehicle for learning. The sheer craziness of what we do to our children should have been sufficient cause to stop it once the lunacy was manifest in increased social pathology, but a crucial development forestalled corrective action: schooling became the biggest business of all. Suddenly there were jobs, titles, careers, prestige, and contracts to protect. As a country we've never had the luxury of a political or a religious or a cultural consensus. As a synthetic state, we've had only economic consensus: unity is achieved by making everyone want to get rich, or making them envy those who are. Once a splendid economic machine like schooling was rolling, only a madman would try to stop it or to climb off its golden ascent. True, its jobs didn't seem to pay much (although its contractors did and do make fortunes), but upon closer inspection they paid more than most. And the security for the obedient was matchless because the institution provided the best insurance that a disturbing social mobility (characteristic of a frontier society) could finally be checked. Horace Mann, Henry Barnard, William Harris, Edward Thorndike, William James, John Dewey, Stanley Hall, Charles Judd, Ellwood Cubberly, James Russell - all the great schoolmen of American history - made endless promises to industrialists and old-line American families of prominence that if the new Prussian scheme were given support, prospects of a revolution here would vanish. (What a great irony that in a revolutionary nation the most effective motivator of leadership was the guarantee that another one could be prevented!) Schools would be the insurance policy for a new industrial order which, as an unfortunate by-product of its operations, would destroy the American family, the small farmer, the landscape, the air, the water, the religious base of community life, the time-honored covenant that Americans could rise and fall by their own efforts. This industrial order would destroy democracy itself, and the promise held out to common men and women that if they were ever backed into a corner by their leaders, they might change things overnight at the ballot box. I hope you can see now that this Prussian theory of workplaces and schools isn't just some historical oddity, but is necessary to explain customary textbook structure and classroom procedures, which fly in the face of how people actually learn. It explains the inordinate interest the foundations of Rockefeller and Camegie took in shaping early compulsory schooling around a standardized factory model, and it sheds light on many mysterious aspects of modem American culture: for instance, why, in a democracy, can't citizens be automatically registered at birth to vote, once and for all? Compulsory schooling has been, from the beginning, a scheme of indoctrination into the new concept of mass man, an important part of which was the creation of a proletariat. According to Auguste Comte (surely the godfather of scientific schooling), you could create a useful proletariat class by breaking connections between children and their families, their communities, their God, and themselves. Remember William Harris's belief that self-alienation was the key to successful schooling! Of course it is. These connections have to be broken to create a dependable citizenry because, if left alive, the loyalties they foster are unpredictable and unmanageable. People who maintain such relationships often say, "Over my dead body." How can states operate that way? Think of govemment schooling as a vast behavior clinic designed to create a harmless proletariat, the most important part of which is a professional proletariat of lawyers, doctors, engineers, managers, government people, and schoolteachers. This professional proletariat, more homeless than the poor and the sub-poor, is held hostage by its addiction to luxury and security, and by its fear that the licensing monopoly might be changed by any change in governance. The main service it renders - advice - is contaminated by self interest. We are all dying from it, the professional proletariat faster than anyone. It is their children who commit literal suicide with such regularity, not the children of the poor. ... VII Printing questions at the end of chapters is a deliberate way of dumbing down a text to make it teacher-proof. We've done it so long that nobody examines the premises under the practice or sees the permanent reduction in mental sovereignty it causes. Just as science teachers were never supposed to be actual scientists, literature teachers weren't supposed to be original thinkers who brought original questions to the text. In 1926, Bertrand Russell said casually that the United States was the first nation in human history to deliberately deny its children the tools of critical thinking; actually Prussia was first, we were second. The school edition of Moby Dick asked all the right questions, so I had to throw it away. Real books don't do that. They let readers actively participate with their own questions. Books that show you the best questions to ask aren't just stupid, they hurt the intellect under the guise of helping it, just as standardized tests do. Well-schooled people, like schoolbooks, are very much alike. Propagandists have known for a century that school-educated people are easier to lead than ignorant people - as Dietrich Bonhoeffer confirmed in his studies of Nazism. It's very useful for some people that our form of schooling tells children what to think about, how to think about it, and when to think about it. It's very useful to some groups that children are trained to be dependent on experts, to react to titles instead of judging the real men and women who hide behind the titles. It isn't very healthy for families and neighborhoods, cultures and religions. But then school was never about those things any-way: that's why we don't have them around anymore. You can thank govemment schooling for that. VIII I think it would be fair to say that the overwhelming majority of people who make schools work today are unaware why they fail to give us successful human beings, no matter how much money is spent or how much good will is expended on reform efforts. This explains the inevitable temptation to find villains and to cast blame - on bad teaching, bad parents, bad children, or penurious taxpayers. The thought that school may be a brilliantly conceived social engine that works exactly as it was designed to work and produces exactly the human products it was designed to produce establishes a different relation to the usual demonologies. Seeing school as a triumph of human ingenuity, as a glorious success, forces us to consider whether we want this kind of success, and if not, to envision something of value in its place. And it forces us to challenge whether there is a "we," a national consensus sufficient to justify looking for one right way rather than dozens or even hundreds of right ways. I don't think there is. IX Museums and institutes of useful knowledge travel a different road than schools. Consider the difference between librarians and schoolteachers. Librarians are custodians of real books and real readers; schoolteachers are custodians of schoolbooks and indentured readers. Somewhere in the difference is the Rosetta Stone that reveals how education is one thing, schooling another. Begin with the setting and social arrangement of a library. The ones I've visited all over the country invariably are comfortable and quiet, places where you can read rather than just pretend to read. How important this silence is. Schools are never silent. People of all ages work side by side in libraries, not just a pack of age-segregated kids. For some reason, libraries do not segregate by age nor do they presume to segregate readers by questionable tests of reading ability. Just as the people who decoded the secrets of farming or of the forests and oceans were not segregated by age or test scores, the library seems to have intuited that common human judgment is adequate to most learning decisions. The librarian doesn't tell me what to read, doesn't tell me the sequence of reading I have to follow, doesn't grade my reading. Librarians act as if they trust their customers. The librarian lets me ask my own questions and helps me when I need help, not when the library decides I need it. If I feel like reading in the same place all day long, that seems to be OK with the library. It doesn't tell me to stop reading at regular intervals by ringing a bell in my ear. The library keeps its nose out of my home, too. It doesn't send letters to my mother reporting on my library behavior; it doesn't make recommendations or issue orders on how I should use my time spent outside of the library. The library doesn't have a tracking system. Everyone is mixed together there, and no private files exist detailing my past victories and defeats as a patron. If the books I want are available, I get them by requesting them - even if that deprives some more gifted reader, who comes a minute later. The library doesn't presume to determine which of us is more qualified to read that book; it doesn't play favorites. It is a very class-blind, talent-blind place, appropriately reflecting our historic political ideals in a way that puts schools to shame. The public library isn't into public humiliation the way schools seem to be. It never posts ranked lists of good and bad readers for all to see. Presumably it considers good reading its own reward, not requiring additional accolades, and it has resisted the temptation to hold up good reading as a moral goad to bad readers. One of the strangest differences between libraries and schools, in New York City at least, is that you almost never see a kid behaving badly in a library or waving a gun there - even though bad kids have exactly the same access to libraries as good kids do. Bad kids seem to respect libraries, a curious phenomenon which may well be an unconscious response to the automatic respect libraries bestow blindly on everyone. Even people who don't like to read like libraries from time to time; in fact, they are such generally wonderful places I wonder why we haven't made them compulsory - and all alike, of course, too. Here's another angle to consider: the library never makes predictions about my general future based on my past reading habits, nor does it hint that my days will be happier if I read Shakespeare rather than Barbara Cartland. The library tolerates eccentric reading habits because it realizes that free men and women are often very eccentric. And finally, the library has real books, not schoolbooks. Its volumes are not written by collective pens or picked by politically correct screening committees. Real books conform only to the private curriculum of each writer, not to the invisible curriculum of some German collective agenda. The one exception to this is children's books - but no sensible child ever reads those things, so the damage from them is minimal. Real books are deeply subversive of collectivization. They are the best known way to escape herd behavior, because they are vehicles transporting their reader into deep caverns of absolute solitude where nobody else can visit: No two people ever read the same great book. Real books disgust the totalitarian mind because they generate uncontrollable mental growth - and it cannot be monitored! Television has entered the classroom because it is a collective mechanism and, as such, much superior to textbooks; similarly, slides, audio tapes, group games, and so on meet the need to collectivize, which is a central purpose of mass schooling. This is the famous "socialization" that schools do so well. Schoolbooks, on the other hand, are paper tools that reinforce school routines of close-order drill, public mythology, endless surveillance, global ranking, and constant intimidation. That's what the questions at the end of chapters are designed to do, to bring you back to a reality in which you are subordinate. Nobody really expects you to answer those questions, not even the teacher; they work their harm solely by being there. That is their genius. Schoolbooks are a crowd-control device. Only the very innocent and well-schooled see any difference between good ones and bad ones; both kinds do the same work. In that respect they are much like television programming, the function of which, as a plug in narcotic, is infinitely more powerful than any trivial differences between good programs and bad. Real books educate, schoolbooks school, and thus libraries and library policies are a major clue to the reform of American schooling. When you take the free will and solitude out of education it becomes schooling. You can't have it both ways. [This is the text of a speech Gatto delivered several years ago at the University of Texas in Austin.] Twenty-six years of award-winning teaching have led John Gatto to some troubling conclusions about the public schools. A seventh-grade teacher, Gatto has been named New York City Teacher of the Year and New York State Teacher of the Year. Praised by leaders as diverse as Ronald Reagan and Mario Cuomo, he's a political maverick whose views defy easy categorization. Gatto is also a local legend on Manhattan's Upper West Side, where he grows garlic, plays chess, writes songs - and once won a Citizen of the Week Award for coming to the aid of a woman who had been robbed. A collection of his essays - Dumbing Us Down: The Hidden Curriculum Of Compulsory Schooling - was published earlier this year by New Society Publishers. 26 August 2005
Macros: 123g Protein, 63g Carbs, 10g Fat, 834 calories I highly recommend this cheesecake from http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showthread.php?t=141848361&page=1 Not only does it have awesome macros but it also tastes heavenly (we are talking about multiple foodgasms, no lie). 12oz - Fat Free Philadelphia Cream Cheese 10oz - Fage 0% Fat Free Greek Yogurt 2 whole eggs ¾ Cup - Granulated Splenda ¼ Cup - 1% Milk 1.25 Scoop - Trutein Vanilla Protein (42.5g) 1 tsp - Vanilla Extract ¼ tsp - Kosher salt I added: 2 tablespoons espresso powder OR substitute ¼ cup strong coffee for the milk in the recipe Walden Farms Caramel Sauce for the topping Directions: All ingredients at room temperature. 1. Preheat Oven to 325 - Prepare 6" cake pan with non-stick spray and parchment paper in the bottom. 2. Cream Cheese in mixer - mix on medium until creamy - scrape sides of bowl down. 3. Add splenda - mix on medium until incorporated - scrape sides of bowl down. 4. Add eggs one at a time while on medium. Again…scrape. 5. Add the rest of the ingredients - mix on medium for 3 minutes. 6. Pour in pan - extra batter in mouth - yum. 7. Bake at 325 for 30 minutes. Turn oven to 200 for 50min - 1 hour. Remove and let cool on the counter. Wrap and refrigerate overnight. When the cheesecake is chilled, spread the caramel sauce evenly on the top* Macros for whole cake: Protein 123g Carbs 63g Fat 10g Calories 834
In the strange politics of 2012, the strangest wrinkle may be the growing convergence between high-powered establishment financiers and Occupy Wall Street. Earlier this week there was a convocation of bankers, lawyers, academics and financial leaders in the august halls of a major Manhattan law firm. Its central purpose was to examine federal regulatory responses to the Great Financial Meltdown. What emerged was a cri de coeur about the future of the American economy. Its central thesis was that the concentration of wealth and power in the hands of the top 1% (of banks) was a danger to the other 99% (of banks), to our economy, our liberty and our democratic values. I expected to hear this at Zuccotti Park. It was a genuine surprise to hear it on 5th Avenue. The group that met was made up of very smart people, with a variety of social and political views. Among of string of piercing presentations, two stood out. First, Henry Kaufman, the storied of years past, who made an international reputation predicting interest rate shifts and the economic realities behind them. He laid out how mega-banks: Restrict capital from getting to small business Encourage market manipulation and rapid shifts on interest rates by decreasing the number of market participants Concentrate political power as well as wealth, and provoke government into massive and unworkable regulatory schemes In the end, Kaufman described these banks as "public utilities" with government entwined in daily operations as the only regulator capable of controlling their excesses. Next, Ira Millstein, the diffident gray-eminence of anti-trust law and corporate governance who has engineered reforms at places like General Motors and New York's MTA, subtly skewered Dodd-Frank and increasing federal regulation of banks. His skepticism comes not from the scripted anti-government perspective of the Tea Party and Mitt Romney, but because such regulation is doomed to fail. The answer: An anti-tust analysis of the mega-financial conglomerates. Without ever saying so, both Kaufman and Millstein were calling for a reinstatement of Glass-Steagall, the New Deal restriction against financial conglomerates repealed by Bill Clinton. Repealing Glass-Steagall created mega conglomerates which include insurance, investment banking and related functions, and which decreased competition in the banking sector. Breaking up these mega conglomerates allows a market-based solution that restricts the power of the huge players who currently control our financial lives. Both were skeptical that it would ever happen. Having spent considerable time around and about Occupy Wall Street, the ironies of the Kaufman's and Millstein's concerns struck me as considerable. While the social perspectives and life experiences could not be more divergent, their conclusions were precisely the same as OWS. The great danger to American prosperity, to American values, to average people is the result of the huge concentration of money and power that have been the "hallmark of the American economy" for over thirty years.
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton on Tuesday said she opposed the Keystone XL pipeline, taking a position after years of declining to answer questions about whether she supported it. In answer to a question at a campaign event in Iowa, Clinton said, "I think it is imperative that we look at the Keystone Pipeline as what I believe it is: a distraction from important work we have to do on climate change. And unfortunately from my perspective, one that interferes with our ability to move forward with all the other issues. Therefore I oppose it." She justified her earlier silence on the issue by saying, "I was in a unique position as secretary of state at the start of this process, and not wanting to interfere with ongoing decision-making that the president and Secretary Kerry have to do in order to make whatever final decisions they need. So, I thought this would be decided by now, and therefore I could tell you whether I agree or disagree, but it hasn't been decided, and I feel now I've got a responsibility to you and voters who ask me about this." As recently as Thursday, Clinton did not answer a question about whether she supported construction of the pipeline, but for the first time indicated that she would have an answer in short order. "I am putting the White House on notice," she said to reporters. "I'm going to tell you what I think soon." She had also put the onus on the White House to move, saying, "I have been waiting for the administration to make a decision. I thought I owed them that." Analysis: Will Hillary Clinton become the next president? The Keystone pipeline project, which has been pending for more than six years now, would connect the tar sands fields of northern Alberta, Canada to oil refineries on the Texas Gulf Coast. The State Department needs to sign off on the project, since it crosses international lines. And Clinton, as the president's first secretary of state, had started the Keystone review. Bernie Sanders explains why he’s different from Hillary Clinton Clinton has taken some heat from the left for taking so long to comment. Earlier this year, her 2016 primary opponent Sen. Bernie Sanders said on CBS' Face the Nation that his forceful opposition to the pipeline made him a better Democratic presidential nominee. After Clinton's remarks Tuesday, Sanders said in a statement, "As a senator who has vigorously opposed the Keystone pipeline from the beginning, I am glad that Secretary Clinton finally has made a decision and I welcome her opposition to the pipeline. Clearly it would be absurd to encourage the extraction and transportation of some of the dirtiest fossil fuel on the planet." Over the years, the Keystone pipeline has become a symbol of the conflict between liberals and conservatives over energy policy. The project has been left simmering on the back burner while Mr. Obama has touted investments in alternative energy, and Republicans have lambasted the administration's new regulations over fossil fuels. Earlier this year, the Republican-led Congress to a largely symbolic vote to force the approval of the pipeline, but Mr. Obama -- as expected -- vetoed the bill. While the bill was up for debate, CBS News reviewed the impact the pipeline would have on jobs, gas prices, energy independence and the environment. Even though the president vetoed the bill to force its approval, his administration could still approve the project -- the veto simply proved that Mr. Obama didn't want Congress to force his hand. CBS News' Hannah Fraser-Chanpong and Nancy Cordes contributed to this report
WASHINGTON — The Obama administration on Wednesday pressed the nation’s schools to abandon what it described as overly zealous discipline policies that send students to court instead of the principal’s office. Even before the announcement, school districts around the country have been taking action to adjust the policies that disproportionately affect minority students. Attorney General Eric Holder said problems often stem from well-intentioned “zero-tolerance” policies that can inject the criminal justice system into school matters. “A routine school disciplinary infraction should land a student in the principal’s office, not in a police precinct,” Holder said. But it’s about race, too, the government said in a letter accompanying the new guidelines it issued Wednesday. “In our investigations, we have found cases where African-American students were disciplined more harshly and more frequently because of their race than similarly situated white students,” the Justice Department and Education Department said in the letter to school districts. “In short, racial discrimination in school discipline is a real problem.” The guidelines are not the first administration action regarding tough-on-crime laws or policies of the 1980s and ’90s that have lost support more broadly since then. Holder announced last summer that he was instructing federal prosecutors to stop charging nonviolent drug offenders with crimes that carry mandatory minimum sentences, a change affecting crack cocaine sentences that have disproportionately affected minorities. And just before Christmas, President Barack Obama commuted the sentences of eight people serving long drug sentences. Advice nonbinding The federal school discipline recommendations are nonbinding. They encourage schools to ensure that all school personnel are trained in classroom management, conflict resolution and approaches to de-escalate classroom disruptions — and understand that they are responsible for administering routine student discipline instead of security or police officers. Still, Education Secretary Arne Duncan has acknowledged the challenge is finding the proper balance to keep schools safe and orderly. The administration said that it would attempt to work out voluntary settlements if school disciplinary policies are found to violate federal civil rights laws. That happened in Meridian, Miss., where the Justice Department spearheaded a settlement with the school district to end discriminatory disciplinary practices. The black students in the district were facing harsher punishment than white students for similar misbehavior. Absent a voluntary agreement, the department could go to court to provide relief for individual students, among other things. Zero-tolerance policies became popular in the 1990s and often have been accompanied by a greater police presence in schools. The policies often spell out uniform and swift punishment for offenses such as truancy, smoking or carrying a weapon. Violators can lose classroom time or even end up with a criminal record. Disparity In many parts of the country, there already has been a shift toward recognizing that school discipline polices can be discriminatory, said Judith Browne Dianis, co-director of the Advancement Project, a think tank that specializes in social issues affecting minority communities. Associations representing teachers, principals, school superintendents and school board members agreed that a disparity exists. “Numbers don’t lie. They are there,” said Beverly Hutton, a former high school principal in New Jersey who is director of professional development at the National Association of Secondary School Principals. Texas study Hutton said a Council of State Governments study of 1 million Texas students was a turning point in the debate. It found that nearly 6 of 10 public school students were suspended or expelled at least once in the middle school or high school years. It also found that black students had a 31 percent higher likelihood of a school discretionary discipline action compared with white and Hispanic students. In American schools, black students without disabilities were more than three times as likely as whites to be expelled or suspended, according to government civil rights data from 2011 to 2012. Although black students made up 15 percent of students in the data collection, they made up more than a third of students suspended once, 44 percent of those suspended more than once and more than a third of students expelled. More than half of students involved in school-related arrests or referred to law enforcement were Hispanic or black. “Superintendents recognize that out-of-school suspension is outdated and not in line with 21st-century education,” said Daniel Domenech, executive director of the School Superintendents Association. But, he said, federal funding for programs that address school discipline issues has been scarce. Kimberly Hefling, The Associated Press AT A GLANCE: Recommendations Ensure that school personnel understand that they, not security or police officers, are responsible for administering routine student discipline. Draw clear distinctions about the responsibilities of school security personnel. Provide opportunities for school security officers to develop relationships with students and parents.
From Kancolle Wiki Introduction The following interview comes from within the Weekly Gaming Magazine "Famitsu Weekly (April 27th Edition)" which was released on April 27th, 2017. Within the interview, the Editor has an interview with Kancolle's main producer, Kensuke Tanaka. Within the article, Takana discusses about details regarding his involvement with KanColle's development for 4 years, the collaborations he's been working on with KanColle, additional details regarding the Full Scale Zuiun Project, and finally hints regarding the event including key notes about it's location, the Taiyo-class Escort Carrier, and the new Foreign Battleship. Ask the Producer Pages from the Ask the Producer Page from Famitsu Magazine Our editor-in-chief asked KanColle HQ Naval District's Producer Tanaka about the latest news and developments. We also discuss retrospectives on management and development! Last but certainly not least in our Kancolle special is an interview with the man who commands the Kancolle Management Base, producer and director Keisuke Tanaka. While looking back on the work of the fourth year, we asked him about the upcoming spring event as well as the latest developments and collaborations. (Interviewer: 2 minutes walk from north exit / article management editor) Thank you for all of your hard work! Kancolle has finally reached its fourth anniversary. Congratulations! Kensuke Tanaka (hereafter Tanaka): Likewise, thank you for having me. I'm very happy to see such a large special to commemorate our fourth anniversary. Even so, it's now the fifth year of Kancolle, isn't it. Tanaka: Indeed. After somewhat overcoming initial difficulties, we'd initially given it 3 years and 8 months. However, last December, we achieved that milestone. It is thanks to all of the admirals and everyone who supported us that we were able to exceed expectations and last as long as we have. I am truly grateful. I hope that in the future, we can continue to move forward in our own Kancolle way. In addition to new systems, we also have real-life events such as the Naval Reviews, as well as the concerts in Tokyo and Osaka, the start of Kancolle Arcade, and the opening of the Kancolle movie. Tanaka: Yes. We were relieve to see the movie open without a hitch. Personally, preparations for last year's in-game Saury Festival and the real-life outdoors Saury Festival at Yokohama were very stressful, but I'm very happy that we pulled them off successfully. I was surprised at the real-life Saury Festival! Tanaka: Let's enjoy freshly cooked saury while watching the sea! This was the idea behind the event. The voice actresses who cooked the saury, grated the daikon for the topping, and danced the ondo with the teitokus...[1] That really is Kancolle-like, isn't it. It's true with the Mitsukoshi collaboration as well, but it's really unique, forging new paths that have never been tried before. Tanaka: Sorry...I mean, thanks, yeah. Last year, the saury catch was abnormally low and good saury were expensive, so we had some trouble with that, but we worked it out somehow, so that was good (earnestly). This year, as far as off-screen developments go, first is the real-life jet airliner collaboration. Then there's the 1:1 full size Zuiun model plan. ....what? Fu-full size, you say!? Tanaka: A 1:1 Zuiun, that multi-role seaplane scout that comes to mind as a representative of Kancolle, and the experience of seeing it made real is what I want people to feel. ...when will we be able to see it!? Tanaka: We'll make another progress report in May, and we hope to have it ready for public viewing before this summer. This full size Zuiun is pretty big. ...we're looking forward to it! We're really excited! Tanaka: In the team's words,for the spring event, we are putting our best effort into this. [2] This spring, there will be three normal maps and two extra maps, for a "somewhat large mid-sized event". ....We have heard it will be an operation on the northern front. Tanaka: Yes. It will be in the north, but not AL. The song that's already in Kancolle, “Protection of the Shikon”. It will not be a battle of ships, but about the people who struggled in the northern defense force after the fighting that day. This defensive battle is landed as the motif of this event.[3] Northern? Not ships, but a defensive battle? i must do research! Tanaka: Yes, it is the battle where the Type 97 torpedo bomber fought its last, harsh battle... Ah, right. Speaking of new shipgirls, one will appear whose name originates in this area. ...hmmm...who could it be...isn't it about time to open a new operational area? Tanaka: That's right. This is not related to the name of the ship we talked about earlier, but we're also preparing a new large ship, battleship type. Her name changed in a revolution, but was then changed back. A battleship! And, revolution! Tanaka: We're also beginning to prepare to implement kaiboukan [4]. Also, shipgirls born as a cargo and passenger ships, converted to carriers, with a tragic fate. The name ship of that class is currently slated to be implemented. Tai- ....is that the ship!? Tanaka: Yes, it's that ship. She had been personified well before Kancolle and the current subculture, one of a beautiful set of three sisters. Ships...are truly wonderful existences. I guess it's inevitable in some way. Tanaka: At first, she will be weak, but if you equip and raise her well, it will be possible to use her as a powerful ASW carrier. So she's an escort carrier. I'll look forward to her! Now then, to finish this, a message to all the admirals who're reading this, if you don't mind. Tanaka: Kancolle was able to see its fifth year this spring thanks to the support of all of our teitokus. When we started, I could have never forseen this. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. Time really does fly. It seems like only yesterday that Shibafu-san, who graciously drew the cover picture for the fourth anniversary, was fretting over how to draw Fubuki, the first of the shipgirls. I hope to continue moving forward, step by step, in a Kancolle-like approach. Pleae enjoy Kancolle and the shipgirls for a fifth year. Thank you, everyone at the Famitsu editing group! Bottom Section Kancolle's fifth year will be KanConnect! We'll be following in the Kai-ni corner! [5] Reference ↑ Saki Fujita, Tanibe Yumi, Uchida Shuu, and Yamada Yuki attended the festival and put on a performance of doing various activities over at the festival as noted by Tanaka. ↑ In the original context, the translation is of an old Japanese motto, "every day is a decisive battle!" Every day is a hard fight!" Which is a wording used to descibe how they are putting thier best effort in the work. ↑ Tanaka is hinting at the the nickname of the 11th Tank battalion, who participated in the battle of Shumshu cause 十一 (11) form the word 士. ↑ coastal defense ships, often called destroyer escorts (hull class DE) in US parlance. ↑ The following pages in the book cover the history of all the second remodel releases in the game Bonus: A message from cover illustrator Shibafu-sensei Shirayuki, 4th Anniversary Illustration by Shibafu for Famitsu Weekly Magazine, featuring Fubuki Miyuki , and Hatsuyuki . The First 4 Destroyers which Shibafu drew for KanColle. In the bottom left corner of the interview is a small message by KanColle's Artist, Shibafu who was resposible for designing the majority of the Fubuki-class, some Ayanami-class members,1st and 2nd Carrier Division and so forth. "I'm Shibafu, who drew the cover illustration. With the fourth anniversary, I choose to do a picture of four Special Type Destroyers. The Special Types were the first shipgirls, both for me and for Kancolle, so I have a lot of memories of trial and error with their designs. Please continue to enjoy Kancolle and the shipgirls!" Special Thanks to BauxiteKing, Mikado, and KonoeYume for translations and Lte7 for helping decipher some of the very hard to read text size of the page provided.
Trigger warning: frozen Buddhist This is an ex-monk. He has ceased to be. Bereft of life, he rests in peace. He has joined the choir invisible: According to the BBC News, this monk’s body (his robes are beside him in the photo) was found frozen and preserved in Mongolia. There’s no telling how long he’s been dead, but the Mongolian climate probably freeze-dried the body, explaining the remarkable preservation. The thing is, though, that some Buddhists think he’s alive! But Dr Barry Kerzin, a physician to Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama, told the Siberian Times that the monk was in a rare state of meditation called “tukdam”. “If the meditator can continue to stay in this meditative state, he can become a Buddha,” Dr Kerzin said. The monk was discovered after being stolen by a man hoping to sell him on the black market. Mongolian police have arrested the culprit and the monk is now being guarded at the National Centre of Forensic Expertise. The Siberian Times piece adds this: Dr Barry Kerzin, a famous Buddhist monk and a physician to the Dalai Lama, said: ‘I had the privilege to take care of some meditators who were in a tukdam state. ‘If the person is able to remain in this state for more than three weeks – which rarely happens – his body gradually shrinks, and in the end all that remains from the person is his hair, nails, and clothes. Usually in this case, people who live next to the monk see a rainbow that glows in the sky for several days. This means that he has found a ‘rainbow body’. This is the highest state close to the state of Buddha’. He added: ‘If the meditator can continue to stay in this meditative state, he can become a Buddha. Reaching such a high spiritual level the meditator will also help others, and all the people around will feel a deep sense of joy’. Now perhaps you can be dead and still be in a “meditative state,” but I don’t know how that works, nor have I heard anything about that in my fragmentary readings about Buddhism. Regardless, though, this nonsense shows that not all Buddhists are rationalists. Buddhism is often praised for not having the supernatural beliefs that cast doubt on other faiths, but even the Dalai Lama (often praised for being science-friendly) believes in reincarnation and karma—unevidenced spiritual doctrines. In the meantime, although the doctor says that this monk is just resting and pining for the Potala, he is in fact a late monk, one who’s expired and gone to meet his maker. He’s a stiff. UPDATE: I just received this email, which I won’t dignify with a reply save to say that here we have a fruitcake with extra brandy: you cant leave anyone alone can you.you are absolutely sure that no form whatsoever of reincarnation takes place what is it when a ray of sunlight hits a leaf you don’t know what 90 per cent of the universe is,but you arrogantly assure the unwashed what it isn’t.pure hubris h/t:Barry
Photo via Caps Instagram Washington Capitals Captain Alex Ovechkin is 28 year old. Over the years, he’s had his critics: no Stanley Cup, no Olympic gold, he keeps trying the same move, why isn’t Brooks Laich the captain already? But if you look at how Ovechkin stacks up against others, he’s already one of the greatest to ever play the game. He seems destined to be a first-ballot hockey hall-of-famer. Fun fact: did you know that with his masterful two goal performance on Thursday, Ovi surpassed Eric Lindros in goals? He entered the game with 372 regular-season tallies, the same as Lindros had at the end of his injury-plagued 13-season NHL career. Ovechkin is two games into his ninth season. Ovechkin is 109th in the NHL’s all-time goal scorers list, 11th among active players. He’s one goal behind Patrik Elias, Milan Hejduk, Trevor Linden, and Butch Goring; two behind Ray Whitney and Ryan Smyth, five behind Claude Lemieux and Ted Lindsay. Kind of big names. Among active players, Ovechkin trails Vincent Lecavalier by just nine goals. Next time you catch a whiff of the old Ovechkin-hate, point the critics here. Other notable numbers on a very young season: The Caps have used 19 players so far this season. 20 of the team’s 23 points (87%) come from just five players: Ovechkin, Grabovski, Backstrom, Green, and Johansson. The Caps have used 19 players so far this season. 20 of the team’s 23 points (87%) come from just five players: Ovechkin, Grabovski, Backstrom, Green, and Johansson. Troy Brouwer is without a point in 38 minutes of ice time despite being on the ice for 5:23 of the Capitals’ 9:24 of power play time. is without a point in 38 minutes of ice time despite being on the ice for 5:23 of the Capitals’ 9:24 of power play time. The Capitals have scored 5 goals in 9 power play opportunities, a blistering 55.6% conversion rate. Advertisements Share this story: Facebook Twitter Reddit Tumblr Pinterest
Too much of a good thing for one Upper Haight eatery. Follow @nbcbayarea The bacon smell smelled so much of bacon that now, the bacon must go. A San Francisco bacon restaurant — called Bacon Bacon — must shut its doors after neighbors' complaints about the smell of bacon revealed a fatal permitting issue, according to the San Francisco Examiner. Bacon Bacon, at 250A Frederick Street, will close its doors at the end of service Friday after its owner "failed" to negotiate with neighbors who took offense to the pork restaurant's smell. Things Made From Bacon Bacon Bacon! MORE: Reprieve for SF Bacon Restaurant Facing Closure The smell led to the revelation that the restaurant lacked "proper health permits" last summer. The restaurant may be able to secure a permit but the first time a hearing can be held is July. So the restaurant must close. Bacontini San Francisco's Newest Hip Cocktail Neighbors claimed that the "porcine aroma" was overpowering and that grease was illegally disposed of in the sewers. Neighbors also say that they offered to buy the restaurant owner a new air filter — but he declined. Owner Jim Angelus says he'll revive the restaurant's food truck — when he can find an approved kitchen location in which to prepare meals. More Local Stories: Copyright NBC Owned Television Stations
The former UN and Arab League envoy to Syria says the conflict 'could have been solved in 2012'. This month marks five years since protests against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad began, evolving into a conflict that has led to more than 250,000 deaths. Last month, the United States and Russia brokered a ceasefire, and, despite numerous violations, the partial truce has led to a 90 percent drop in the average number of civilian deaths each day. With peace talks due to resume next week, will the ceasefire hold? In this week's Headliner, we ask Lakhdar Brahimi, the former United Nations and Arab League envoy to Syria, about the current state of Syria and whether the world has ignored the plight of the Syrian people. Brahimi tells Mehdi Hasan, "there were no good guys in the Syrian tragedy", placing blame on all parties involved. He says the conflict could have been resolved in 2012 had there been a better understanding of the situation, adding that none of the countries involved in the conflict or negotiations "had the interest of the Syrian people as their first priority." Follow UpFront on Twitter @AJUpFront and Facebook. Source: Al Jazeera
After less than a year of planning the first Cass tiny home was recently completed on Elmhurst Street on Detroit’s west side. Today, we got to tour it. Tiny homes for everyone! Ok, that might be an exaggeration, and Oprah wasn’t in town. But in all seriousness, the plan is to have 25 tiny homes for people who qualify for the program. Reverend Faith Fowler came up with the idea to build tiny homes in the area by the Cass Community campus near Elmhurst and the Lodge freeway to give people the opportunity to rent a home and after seven years they could own it outright. The project is estimated to cost $1.5 million to complete the 25 tiny homes. They have raised roughly $700,000 to date. This includes $400,000 from the Ford Fund. “This project is really a game changer, not only for people who are living in these homes. Most of whom I’m willing to bet have never been able to say ‘I live in my own home.’ That sounds pretty simple to say, because most of us probably live in our own homes,” said Jim Vella, Ford Fund President. The homes will range from 250 square feet up to 400 square feet. The home we toured today was 300 square feet. Each home will be completely unique from each other. Being unique was something that Rev. Fowler felt was extremely important. “I believe that by having a different house, a unique house, a distinctive house that you will have pride in it. In a way you won’t if everyone lives in the same rectangle and you can tell where everyone’s sofa is and bathroom is. We really wanted it to be unique. And it will be the only place in the United States where 25 different houses will be on two blocks.” said Fowler. Each home takes between five to seven weeks to build, so the goal is to have the first seven people moved into their homes by the end of October or the beginning of November. So what about the people who qualify to live in this tiny community? The residents of these homes will be low to moderate income. They do need to have some income coming in, and this could include SSI (disability benefits). “This is a program about aspirations. This isn’t just a housing program. This program is ready for people who are ready. They have to have some income, they can’t have no income. It could be SSI income, $750 a month is enough to rent a small house and then in seven years you could own that house.” said Rev. Fowler. These homes are targeted towards formerly homeless men and women, students, seniors, and Cass staff members. Their goal is to have at least half of the homes occupied by someone who used to be homeless. There is a pretty in-depth application process to be considered for the tiny homes. There is an extensive background check (including criminal history), applicants must meet HUD guidelines, be U.S. Citizens, and they also have an interview. Rent for the homes is based off the square footage of each home. If someone is living in a 400 square foot home, their rent will be $400 (or one dollar per square foot). The only other bill that the residents will have for the house is electricity. The heating in the house is electric. They estimate that the electric bill including heat in February should be around $30 a month. Below, a future tiny house is being laid out. Cass still has a lot of money to raise in order finish Rev. Fowler’s vision of 25 tiny homes, however no amount is too small. Rev. Fowler spoke about a young girl who donated $25 from her lemonade stand, because everyone deserves to have a home. Cass will also take any home building materials that you are not using. Supporters donated stones, granite countertops, shingles and roofing materials, and landscaping services which were all used in the first house. If you are interested in donating money or materials you can contact Cass Community Services.
About 15 miles from downtown Birmingham, north on Alabama Highway 79, you enter Turkey Creek Nature Preserve – one of those rare places on Earth where a shift in the space-time continuum seems highly probable. I drove into the preserve and, for a time ephemeral, I suspected I was in the Smokies. His devotion to endangered Alabama fish makes Roald Hazelhoff a Bright Light from Alabama NewsCenter on Vimeo. The preserve is stunning, with a huge creek running through longleaf pine trees and snowflake hydrangeas gorgeous with blue and white blooms. Several endangered bat species exist there, including the grey, the long-eared and the free-tailed bats. “You are looking at the jewel of Jefferson County,” said Roald Hazelhoff, director of the Southern Environmental Center at Birmingham-Southern College. “It is a Forever Wild property that is absolutely an unpolished gem. The 466-acre property is state-owned, but we manage it.” Hazelhoff heads a program that provides IMAX-type movies of the outdoors in Alabama. In addition, he oversees the maintenance and use of what he calls “our state’s outdoor jewels.” On this day at the TCNP, he documented a little fish named the vermilion darter. Filming the elusive critter with a Go Pro camera was tricky. As you can tell by the name, the fish darts when sensing danger. We did see a couple, but only for a short time. Because of its unique geologic features, TCNP is the only place on Earth where the vermilion darter is known to exist. The creek is also home to two other endangered species of fish, the watercress darter and the rush darter. Hazelhoff’s passion for the outdoors is easy to spot. He walked me over a hanging bridge and told me what the park provides. “This park has one of the prettiest swimming spots in the entire state. It also includes seven miles of hiking trails, picnic areas, waterfalls, educational opportunities and much more,” Hazelhoff said. Roald Hazelhoff, director of the Southern Environmental Center at Birmingham-Southern College, is instrumental in keeping the wonders of Turkey Creek Nature Preserve available for the people of Alabama to enjoy. (Karim Shamsi-Basha) Turkey Creek Nature Preserve off Alabama Highway 79 in Jefferson County is a treasure trove of natural beauty and ecological diversity. (Karim Shamsi-Basha) The Southern Environmental Center crew films the rare vermilion darter at Turkey Creek Nature Preserve. (Karim Shamsi-Basha) Turkey Creek Nature Preserve off Alabama Highway 79 in Jefferson County is a treasure trove of natural beauty and ecological diversity. (Karim Shamsi-Basha) Turkey Creek Nature Preserve off Alabama Highway 79 in Jefferson County is a treasure trove of natural beauty and ecological diversity. (Karim Shamsi-Basha) Through the Southern Environmental Center, Hazelhoff has been able to carry on the mission of the largest educational facility of its kind in Alabama. The center, situated on the Birmingham-Southern campus, includes an interactive museum and the Hugh Kaul Ecoscape Garden. The nationally recognized program also targets water quality, smog and sprawl, among other urban initiatives. Standing on the bridge and watching Hazelhoff film the tiny fish darting for cover, I couldn’t help being thankful. My children will enjoy places like the Turkey Creek Nature Preserve because of his efforts. “This precious preserve provides so much joy for thousands in Alabama, and it is our responsibility to take care of it. We have a piece of territory that is surrounded by a rapidly growing Jefferson County,” Hazelhoff said. “As humans, we need green space, we need parks and places where we can go hiking or just sit and listen to the water.” A shift in time and space? I think not. The Turkey Creek Nature Preserve is 15 miles north of Birmingham, and people like Roald Hazelhoff make sure it will endure for generations to come. This Sunday is Darter Festival 2016 at Good People Brewing Company in Birmingham from noon to 4 p.m., with proceeds benefiting Turkey Creek Nature Preserve. For information visit, https://turkeycreeknp.com/events-calendar/ To learn more about the Southern Environmental Center, visit http://www.bsc.edu/sec/ Alabama Bright Lights captures the stories, through words, pictures and video, of some of our state’s brightest lights who are working to make Alabama an even better place to live, work and play. Award-winning photojournalist Karim Shamsi-Basha tells their inspiring stories. Email him comments, as well as suggestions on people to profile, at [email protected]
CTV Ottawa Fashionistas in the capital looking for designer deals have a new shop to frequent: Saks OFF 5th. Saks Fifth Avenue's lower priced company celebrated its grand opening at Kanata's Tanger Outlets on Thursday, exactly one week after two stores opened in Toronto. The shop promises prices of up to 60% off more than 800 designers from Prada to Valentino and Yves Saint Laurent. "This is bringing some more options to Ottawa and bringing Ottawa's fashion up, which I'm happy with," said Ashley Chabot, an excited shopper. The Tanger Outlets location is part of the company's expansion into the Canadian retail industry. Up to 25 stores are expected to open by 2019; four are already open. "I think it's fantastic," said Lorna DiFiore. "I love Saks and I used to have to drive to the States and I don't have to do that anymore." But high-end retail stores haven't always had success in Ottawa. In January 2015 Holt Renfrew closed its Ottawa location to focus on its larger stores in Montreal and Toronto. Saks OFF 5th, owned by the Hudson's Bay Company, also faces competition from the U.S. retail giant Nordstrom and soon to open Nordstrom Rack. Saks OFF 5th is scheduled to open at the Rideau Centre this Fall.
Dear Reader, As you can imagine, more people are reading The Jerusalem Post than ever before. Nevertheless, traditional business models are no longer sustainable and high-quality publications, like ours, are being forced to look for new ways to keep going. Unlike many other news organizations, we have not put up a paywall. We want to keep our journalism open and accessible and be able to keep providing you with news and analysis from the frontlines of Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish World. In the opening episode of the iconic series Boardwalk Empire, Nucky Thompson, Atlantic City’s bootlegging strongman, tells a group of pro-prohibition women activists a gutwrenching story about his abject childhood, ravaged by the vagaries of alcoholism. Asked by his driver, a young aspiring gangster, about the story’s veracity, Thompson retorts: “The first law of politics is to never let the truth get in the way of a good story.” This episode comes to mind upon reading Mahmoud Abbas’s recent New York Times op-ed. Turning the saga of Israel’s birth upside down, the “moderate” PLO chairman and president of the Palestinian National Authority says not a word of the Jewish acceptance of Palestinian Arab statehood, as part of the UN partition resolution of November 1947, let alone the violent Palestinian response to the resolution. Instead he reminisces on his childhood in an attempt to turn aggressors into hapless victims and vice versa. The writer is research professor of Middle East and Mediterranean studies at King’s College London, incoming director of the Middle East Forum (Philadelphia) and author, most recently, of “Sixty-three years ago, a 13-year-old Palestinian boy was forced to leave his home in the Galilean city of Safed and flee with his family to Syria,” Abbas writes. “He took up shelter in a canvas tent provided to all the arriving refugees. Though he and his family wished for decades to return to their home and homeland, they were denied that most basic of human rights. That child’s story, like that of so many other Palestinians, is mine.”But was he expelled? Hardly. Not only did Abbas reveal a couple of years ago, in an Arabic interview, that his family had not been forcefully expelled and that his father was affluent enough to provide for them for a year after their flight (so no canvas tent), but none of the 170,000- 180,000 Palestinian Arabs fleeing urban centers, in the five-and-a-half months from the passing of the UN resolution to Israel’s proclamation on May 14, 1948, were expelled by the Jews.Quite the reverse in fact, huge numbers of these refugees were driven from their homes by their own leaders and/or by Arab military forces which had entered the country to fight the Jews, whether out of military considerations or to prevent them from becoming citizens of the prospective Jewish state.In the largest and best-known example, tens of thousands of Arabs were ordered or bullied into leaving the city of Haifa (on April 21-22) on the instructions of the Arab Higher Committee, the effective “government” of the Palestinian Arabs, despite strenuous Jewish efforts to persuade them to stay. Only days earlier, Tiberias’s 6,000- strong Arab community had been similarly forced out by its own leaders, against local Jewish wishes. In Jaffa, Palestine’s largest Arab city, the municipality organized the transfer of thousands of residents by land and sea; in Jerusalem, the Arab Higher Committee ordered the transfer of women and children, and local gang leaders pushed out residents of several neighborhoods.And what about Safed? Having declined an offer by Gen. Hugh Stockwell, commander of the British forces in northern Palestine, to mediate a truce, the Arabs responded to the British evacuation of the city with a heavy assault on the tiny Jewish community, less than a quarter their size. “Upon the British evacuation on April 16, we occupied all the city’s strategic positions: the Citadel, the Government House, and the police post on Mount Canaan,” recalled a local Arab fighter.“We were the majority, and the feeling among us was that we would defeat the Jews with sticks and rocks.”What this prognosis failed to consider was the tenacity of the Jewish resolve to hold on to Safed, awarded by the partition resolution to the prospective Jewish state, on the one hand, and the intensity of Arab flight psychosis, on the other. As tens of thousands of Arabs streamed out of Tiberias and Haifa within days of the British evacuation of Safed, members of the city’s leading families and ordinary residents alike decided that now was the time to escape – which is probably when Abbas’s affluent family fled. In the words of a British intelligence report, “Such is their state of fear [that] Arabs are beginning to evacuate Safed although the Jews have not yet attacked them.”In a desperate bid to save the day, a delegation of local notables traveled to Damascus, only to be reprimanded as cowards fleeing the battlefield and ordered to keep on fighting. A subsequent visit by mayor Zaki Qadura to the royal court in Amman was far more affable yet equally inconclusive. While King Abdullah was evidently moved by the mayor’s pleas, he argued that there was nothing he could do before the termination of the mandate on May 15 and that Qadura had better return to Damascus and put his case to president Shukri Quwatly. The mayor dutifully complied, and following his visit to Damascus some 130 pan-Arab fighters (of the so-called Arab Liberation Army) were sent to Safed, arriving in the city on May 9.This was too little, too late. As fighting intensified, the trickle of escapees turned into a hemorrhage.On May 2, following the bombing of the Arab quarter by the deafening albeit highly ineffective home-made “David’s mortar,” scores of Arabs fled Safed en route to the Jordan Valley, accompanied by a substantial number of Arab Liberation Army fighters. Four days later, the ALA’s regional commander reported that “the majority of the inhabitants have left [Safed’s neighboring] villages.Their morale has collapsed completely.”Heavy artillery bombardments of Jewish neighborhoods failed to do the trick, and as the final battle for the city was joined on the night of May 9 a mass flight ensued. By the time fighting was over the next morning, Safed’s entire Arab population had taken to the road; a day later, Hagana patrols reported that “the [Arab] quarter had emptied to a man,” with evacuees leaving behind “a huge quantity of weapons and ammunition.”Such were the circumstances of the fall of Safed. There was no act of Jewish expulsion, as there were none in other cities that were rapidly emptying of their Arab residents at the time.Rather it was fear that acted as the foremost catalyst of the rapid unraveling of Palestinian Arab society, reinforced by the local Palestinians’ disillusionment with their own leadership, the role taken by that leadership in forcing widespread evacuations, and, above all, a lack of communal cohesion or of a willingness, especially at the highest levels, to subordinate personal interest to the general good.But why let the truth get in the way of a good story?Palestine Betrayed. 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The hit internet spoof video Newport State Of Mind which parodies Jay-Z has been removed from YouTube due to a "copyright claim" by EMI Publishing. The clip had been viewed hundreds of thousands of times since last month. A statement from EMI said: "When a song is created based wholly on any of our writers' works, those writers need to grant their permission. "If that permission isn't granted, then we ask the service in question to remove the song." The video, which parodies Jay-Z and Alicia Keys' Empire State Of Mind using the backdrop of the south Wales city, was directed by filmmaker M-J Delaney. Made for less than £100, it also featured rapper Alex Warren and singer Terema Wainwright. Whilst viewers are blocked from seeing it on YouTube the video is still available on other websites. EMI Publishing represents four of the seven people credited with writing the original Empire State Of Mind: Jay-Z, Alicia Keys, Angela Hunte and Janet Sewell. Meanwhile, Newport rap collective Goldie Lookin Chain have released their own version of the song attacking M-J Delaney's creation. Their version, which has already been viewed thousands of times online, features the line: "You ripped off my style/but to be honest it made me smile." Elsewhere on Newsbeat: American Idol winner takes overdose The Wombats ready new material Libertines confirm pre-festival gig
Cal Poly officials said more than 100 officers from seven law enforcement agencies were brought to the campus Tuesday to provide security in case a massive crowd of unruly protesters showed up during a speech by controversial right-wing agitator Milo Yiannopoulos. As it turned out, about 150 protesters rallied peacefully at the campus during Yiannopoulos’ appearance, which was a stop on his “Dangerous Faggot” tour to colleges across the country. SHARE COPY LINK Right-wing provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos spoke at Spanos Theatre at Cal Poly on Tuesday, January 31, 2017, launching into his “No More Dead Babies” talk in front of a full house. Warning: Video contains adult language. Sign Up and Save Get six months of free digital access to The Tribune The tour has sparked large demonstrations and some arrests at other campuses. On Wednesday, his appearance at UC Berkeley was canceled amid a violent protest and at least one fire. About half the demonstrators at Cal Poly came for a protest unrelated to the visit by Yiannopoulos, an editor at the right-wing Breitbart website. They marched through campus to protest President Donald Trump’s executive orders since taking office. Another cluster of protesters loudly chanted outside Spanos Theatre, where Yiannopoulos spoke, burning a Confederate flag and Nazi flag and carrying signs proclaiming “No Trump, no Milo” and “Alt-right = Nazis.” The 109 officers on campus for the event — some in riot gear and some positioned on rooftops — included 19 Cal Poly police officers, 40 California State University officers, 28 state Department of Corrections officers, 12 San Luis Obispo County Regional SWAT team officers, four San Luis Obispo Police Department bicycle officers, three California Highway Patrol officers and three K-9 officers from State Parks, Cal Poly spokesman Matt Lazier said. The San Luis Obispo City Fire Department also had four people on hand. Lazier said the University Police Department was still tallying the security costs Wednesday. The university will cover those costs and not charge the Cal Poly College Republicans, which sponsored Yiannopoulos’ appearance, Lazier said, because Cal Poly is responsible for maintaining campus safety and security at large gatherings. I am especially proud of those who participated in the Unite Cal Poly event and those who chose to ignore Mr. Yiannopoulos’ speech and divisive language. Cal Poly President Jeffrey Armstrong Lazier said about 45 officers who were working behind the scenes or were on standby were not needed because the evening’s events “were relatively peaceful.” A fence separated waiting ticket holders from the demonstrators at Spanos Theatre before the doors opened. Yiannopoulos spoke to a full house in the 496-seat auditorium, and police escorted attendees out of the building after the talk. SHARE COPY LINK At its height, about 150 people came to protest the Milo Yiannopoulos' show at Cal Poly in San Luis Obispo on Tuesday, January 31, 2017. They carried signs proclaiming “No Trump, No Milo,” and “Good Night, Alt-Right.” Next door, an event called Unite Cal Poly nearly filled the 1,289-seat Christopher Cohan Center as comedian W. Kamau Bell discussed race, politics and identity. That event was sponsored by the Cal Poly Office of University Diversity and Inclusivity as an alternative to Yiannopoulos. On Wednesday, Cal Poly President Jeffrey Armstrong said the campus demonstrated how differing opinions can be expressed in a “healthy and constructive manner.” “While we must support freedom of speech, I reject any language intended to hurt or create a sense of unease among our campus community members, divide our university or undermine our ideals,” Armstrong said in a statement to the campus community Wednesday. “For those who were hurt by the language and actions last night and leading up to the event, please know that I support you and value you as members of our university.” Armstrong added: “I am proud of our campus community for engaging in these events in a relatively peaceful and respectful manner. I am especially proud of those who participated in the Unite Cal Poly event and those who chose to ignore Mr. Yiannopoulos’ speech and divisive language. We demonstrated well how differing thoughts and ideas can be expressed, considered and even opposed in a healthy and constructive manner.”
U.S., Japanese and Australian attack aircraft fly off the coast of Guam during a training exercise in February. (Staff Sgt. Aaron Richardson/U.S. Air Force) Public safety officials in Guam have distributed a two-page pamphlet advising island residents how to prepare and react should North Korea follow through on threats to launch a nuclear strike against the U.S. territory. The document includes several ominous warnings, the first being: “Do not look at the flash or fireball — It can blind you.” It also highlights steps for determining what shelters are “safe” — and for removing radioactive material that may accumulate on people's clothes, skin and hair. (Do use shampoo, it says. Don't use conditioner, as it will bind the toxins to your hair.) The fact sheet's title: “In Case of Emergency — Preparing for Imminent Missile Threat.” Distributed by Guam's Homeland Security Department, the guidance comes as President Trump trades increasingly hostile and alarming statements with the regime in Pyongyang, which has said it's developing plans to attack the Western Pacific atoll. Amid escalating tensions, Trump tweeted Friday: “Military solutions are now fully in place, locked and loaded, should North Korea act unwisely.” [Military is ‘locked and loaded,’ Trump says in latest warning to North Korea] The government fact sheet would seem a jarring departure from an announcement from Guam Gov. Eddie Baza Calvo, who sought Wednesday to reassure the island's 160,000 citizens, saying in a video address: “I know we woke up to media reports of North Korea’s talk of revenge on the United States and this so-called newfound technology that allows them to target Guam. I'm working with Homeland Security, the rear admiral and the United States to ensure our safety, and I want to reassure the people of Guam that currently there is no threat to our island or the Marianas.” The governor of Guam, Eddie Baza Calvo, said on Aug. 9 that there has been "no change in the threat level to Guam," after North Korea and President Trump traded threats. (Eddie Baza Calvo) Calvo said Wednesday that “there is no change in the threat level resulting from North Korea events” and that “there are several levels of defense, all strategically placed to protect our island and our nation.” Though officials on the island are clearly mindful of the heated back-and-forth between Washington and Pyongyang, the guidance issued to residents Friday is simply an extension of long-standing public safety practices designed for typhoons and other natural disasters that menace the region. “Our office hasn't received too many concerned calls,” Jenna Gaminde, a spokeswoman for Guam Homeland Security, told The Washington Post on Friday about the U.S.-North Korean rhetoric. “We've had a few here and there, [but] our lines blow up when there's a natural event. People are calm. We try to assure them there are defense capabilities in place, and people are putting their faith in them.” [Why North Korea threatened Guam, the tiny U.S. territory with big military power] Approximately 2,200 miles from North Korea, the island houses about 7,000 U.S. troops, including special operations forces, spread between Andersen Air Force Base and Naval Base Guam. It's a launching point for the strategic bombers that make routine show-of-force flights over the Korean peninsula, and for nuclear submarines home ported there. Local public safety officials have maintained constant communication between base commanders and the governor's office, Gaminde said. The fact sheet, first reported Friday by the Pacific Daily News, explains that brick or concrete structures are the safest places to shelter from nuclear fallout, and that those with thick walls and roofs best absorb radioactive particles. Plan to remain inside for at least 24 hours, it says. Those who can't get indoors or behind some type of protections should simply lie down and cover their heads. “If the explosion is some distance away,” the fact sheet says, “it could take 30 seconds or more for the blast wave to hit.” To prevent radioactive material from spreading, people should remove their outer clothing, seal it in a plastic bag and get as far away as possible, the fact sheet says. If possible, shower with soap and water — no conditioner! — but be careful not to scratch the skin. Blow your nose, and wipe out your ears and eyelids, it says. Officials say the fact sheet was created during a period of similar tension four years ago and dusted off now with hopes that it would encourage residents to plan. Still, Dee Cruz, a senior watch officer with Guam Homeland Security, concedes that “folks here are concerned because there's a lot of talk about it” — alluding to extensive media coverage of the public statements made by Trump and his counterpart in North Korea, Kim Jong Un. The island remains on alert, she said, but its government and its people have steeled themselves for the worst. “Our island has been a target since 2013, and even before that,” Cruz told The Post. “We're ready, and prepared, as much as possible.” Read more: Gen. MacArthur witnessed Trump-style ‘fire and fury’ in Korea, and it sickened him Gaming out the North Korea crisis: How the conflict might escalate If Trump wants a nuclear attack against North Korea, his military advisers have few other options
• At least 30,000 Britons on unemployment benefit in EU, Guardian research shows • Unemployed Britons in richer EU states outnumber claimants from those countries in UK • Helen Pidd searches for the only Briton in Poland claiming benefits Unemployed Britons in Europe are drawing much more in benefits and allowances in the wealthier EU countries than their nationals are claiming in the UK, despite the British government’s arguments about migrants flocking in to the country to secure better welfare payments. At least 30,000 British nationals are claiming unemployment benefit in countries around the EU, research by the Guardian has found, based on responses from 23 of the 27 other EU countries. The research shows more than four times as many Britons obtain unemployment benefits in Germany as Germans do in the UK, while the number of jobless Britons receiving benefits in Ireland exceeds their Irish counterparts in the UK by a rate of five to one. There are not only far more Britons drawing benefits in these countries than vice versa, but frequently the benefits elsewhere in Europe are much more generous than in the UK. A Briton in France receives more than three times as much as a jobless French person in the UK. The research is being published after the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, visited London this month for talks with the prime minister, David Cameron, who is campaigning to “reform” EU freedom of movement as part of his attempt to rewrite the terms of Britain’s EU membership before putting the issue to a referendum in 2017, if he is still in power. In Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, Austria, France and Ireland the number of Britons banking unemployment cheques is almost three times as high as the nationals of those countries receiving parallel UK benefits – 23,011 Britons to 8,720 nationals of those nine countries in the UK. The findings highlight a more nuanced and complex picture across Europe than the simplistic version painted by anti-immigration and anti-EU campaigners led by Ukip and elements in the Conservative party. About 2.5% of Britons in other EU countries are claiming unemployment benefits – the same level as the roughly 65,000 EU nationals claiming jobseeker’s allowance in the UK. Dr Roxana Barbulescu, researcher on international migration at the University of Sheffield, said the numbers claiming unemployment benefits were minuscule. “Thirty thousand people, or 2.5% of all British nationals, in other EU member states means that the overwhelming majority of Brits abroad as well as European citizens in Britain are not an undue burden for the countries in which they live.” The data shows an east-west split in the pattern of Britons benefiting from often more generous unemployment payments, as well as a north-south divide. The picture is quite different for the poorer east European countries which have joined the EU over the past decade, with hardly any Britons drawing unemployment benefits in those countries. In search of the only Briton in Poland claiming benefits Read more The figures for nationals of those 10 east European countries drawing jobseeker’s allowance in the UK remain modest, despite the periodical outcries about “benefits tourism”. There are only about 1,000 Romanians and 500 Bulgarians, for example, drawing jobseeker’s allowance in Britain, according to the Department for Work and Pensions. Of the almost 30,000 Britons on unemployment benefits in other EU countries, only 62 are in the 10 countries that have joined since 2004. The pattern of Britons being treated generously in Scandinavia and northern Europe goes into reverse around the poorer south, with Italians, Spanish and Portuguese out of work in the UK outnumbering the unemployed Britons in those countries by 13,580 to 5,670. But, with the number of Britons in Spain three times that of Spaniards in Britain, and given the demographic differences between these two groups of migrants, the pressure on Spain’s finances is most likely to be on its health service. The data appears to belie British complaints amplified in the PM’s speech on immigration in November in which he demanded curbs on freedom of movement in the EU and new measures discriminating between natives and EU citizens in low-paid work, adding that the UK was getting a raw deal from the EU system of citizenship rights and reciprocal social security arrangements. Jean-Claude Juncker, the European commission president, told the Guardian in December that Cameron could tinker with British law on social security and migrant rights, but that enshrining discrimination in EU law was a no-go area. British officials concede that the government may have run up against the limits of what it can accomplish with domestic legislation and would need changes at EU level. Merkel, the most powerful politician in the EU, has made plain to Cameron what senior diplomats in Brussels describe as her “red lines” – the untouchability of freedom of movement. “It’s going to be a very, very hard act [for Cameron] to pull off,” said a diplomat. “The Germans have set their red lines. Others are saying: ‘We’re not changing things just to suit [Britain].’” Mediation of the British issue will fall to Donald Tusk, who chairs EU summits. The former Polish prime minister will be less than keen to agree concessions affecting the many Poles in Britain – at 15,000, the biggest single EU nationality drawing UK jobseeker’s allowance, against just two Britons recorded as receiving Polish unemployment benefit. The task will get harder in 2015 if, as many predict, Jarosław Kaczyński – a chippy, bristling rightwing nationalist – becomes Poland’s prime minister. Commenting on the Guardian findings, the EU commissioner for justice, consumers and gender equality, Vĕra Jourová, said: “Free movement of our citizens is essential to the European Union. It is a fundamental right and an asset to our union. Free movement of people – to work, live and travel in other EU countries – is at the core of having a strong single market and it benefits our economy and society. Abuse weakens free movement. Therefore, member states need to tackle abuse decisively where it happens and EU rules provide the tools to do this.” The data on those receiving unemployment benefit across the EU is just one small snapshot of the immigration and free movement issue. The different countries’ welfare systems vary hugely, complicating efforts at comparison. The payouts offer an approximate equivalent enabling rough comparisons. According to government figures, there are 2.7 million EU nationals in Britain and 1.3 million UK citizens living elsewhere in the EU. Tied up in German red tape Peter Chivers is one of the thousands of Britons who have claimed unemployment benefit in Germany, where he received a higher level of support than he would have got in the UK. I found it a very demeaning experience, but then that may have been the point Peter Chivers, from Bradford The 41-year-old, from Bradford, received €450 a month (£350) plus additional housing benefit, which worked out to at least £60 more than the sum he would have been eligible for in the UK. Some 6,022 Britons are currently claiming unemployment benefit in Germany, compared with 1,470 German nationals doing the same in the UK. Like many of these British nationals, Chivers had moved to Berlin – a popular destination partly because of its exciting cultural scene – and found the local job market difficult to access. He also found it challenging to sign on for German unemployment benefit. Chivers, who speaks fluent German and has a language degree, said: “At the jobcentre, they said to me: ‘You must have learned a trade?’ I told them that an apprenticeship wasn’t crucial to start a job in the UK – you could get a job just with a degree. But they struggled with that concept,” he said. When Chivers asked if it could assist with job training, the jobcentre refused. “To be honest, I found the authorities incredibly obstructive … They put every obstacle in my way that they could.” Facebook Twitter Pinterest David Cameron and Angela Merkel. Germany supports Britain’s call for a crackdown on ‘benefits tourism’, but says changes to the principle of free movement of people in the EU are non-negotiable. Photograph: Andy Rain/EPA Since then, he has managed to find a job and no longer needs to battle with the system. If he were forced to go through the application process again, he said, he would seriously consider moving back to Britain instead. His experience with benefit claims stood in stark contrast to that in Britain: “When I had to apply for benefit in the UK, I just turned up at the benefit office and had to fill out one form. Later, someone came around to check whether I really lived at my address. That was it. “In Germany, I needed to certify everything from what kind of car I drove down to how I heated my flat. At times it felt like I was doing paperwork for paperwork’s sake. I found it a very demeaning experience, but then that may have been the point.” British nationals in Germany without a job usually draw one of either two types of benefits: unemployment insurance, which is contributory, ie relative to their employment history and previous income, or the non-contributory unemployment assistance payment, which after reforms in the early noughties is usually referred to as Hartz IV. To qualify for the first category, you need to have held down a job for at least 12 months in the two years before the claim, thus having paid into the employment insurance scheme. In return, you get paid around 60% of your previous income, or higher if you have children, to help you while looking for your next job. Depending on the age of claimants and how long they were in full employment, benefits can be paid for up to two years. If they are still out of work afterwards, they have to switch to the means-tested unemployment assistance benefit, which is considerably lower. Single people currently get €391 a month and a further subsidy of between €229 and €296 for every child, depending on their age. To receive the payments, one has to agree to a contract, which obliges those on benefit to accept certain jobs offered to them. Philip Oltermann in Berlin Claiming in Spain during austerity In Spain, where the UK government estimates that as many as 800,000 Britons live for at last part of the year, dozens of online forums offer expats advice and tips on how to access Spanish social services. I felt as though I were robbing a crumbling government of money that could’ve been earned by working in a summer camp Josh Taylor, from Stockport When he had a three-month break between his contracts for teaching English as a foreign language in June 2011, it was a friend who suggested to Josh Taylor that he should claim unemployment benefit. “I had never actually considered it. In the UK, it’s barely worth it,” said Taylor, originally from Stockport and now living in Granada. With teaching academies closed for the summer and little other work available, he felt he only had two options: stay in Spain and claim unemployment benefit until his next contract began or go home and work. He wrestled with whether or not to claim the money. “I have the right to claim, I work, I pay my taxes, I contribute.” He chronicled the debate on his blog: “In one respect I did feel as though I were robbing a crumbling government of money that could’ve been otherwise earned by working in another, god-awful summer camp, but frankly the thought of a summer filled with free time was too tempting.” Facebook Twitter Pinterest Josh Taylor at the Alhambra in Spain. Photograph: Josh Taylor “Why, after all, would I want to slave away after hundreds of unruly, silver-spoon-fed teenagers for six weeks when there was this alternative? And I was entitled to it, wasn’t I?” The benefit worked out to about 60-70% of what he had been earning as a teacher, netting him around €700 a month in benefits. “It’s a fairly generous benefit system and very helpful,” he said. Faced with the same stretch of downtime in 2012, he claimed unemployment benefit for a second time. But in the following years, he decided he was better off going home and working during the summer break. “Although it was essentially money for nothing, I didn’t have enough to enjoy myself and I got rather bored,” he said. The demographics of British expats in Spain suggest that, as a group, they are more likely to make use of the country’s healthcare system than stand in unemployment queues. Between 2000 and 2010, the number of British residents over the age of 60 in the country increased 400%. Spanish authorities estimate that as many as half of British expats in Spain are over the age of 50. In 2008 and 2009, Helena Legido-Quigley, a lecturer at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, interviewed British pensioners about their experiences in the Spanish healthcare system. She was surprised to hear how positive their experiences had been. “They reported that they had very good experiences and it was mainly to do with the fact that healthcare professionals were making great efforts to communicate with them and provide them with relevant services,” she said. The pensioners she spoke to praised the access to specialists, quality of machinery and infrastructure in Spain’s public health care system. The cost Spain bears to provide this care is difficult to ascertain, she said. While the UK transfers a monthly sum to compensate for every UK pensioner legally residing in Spain, this only applies to those who have registered with local authorities. Whether it is due to ignorance, taxation concerns or a desire to keep ties with Britain, many expats do not register, she said, causing the number of Britons in Spain to be grossly underestimated. Ashifa Kassam in Madrid How the Danes do it … voluntarily When Ken Rushe moved to Copenhagen in 2004 to take up a teaching job at an international school, he immediately joined the union and a Danish unemployment insurance fund. Since then he has encouraged his colleagues – from Britain and abroad – to do the same. I think it’s a fair system, it’s well-organised and it’s a system that most Danes believe in Ken Rushe, from London Denmark is renowned for having one of the most generous welfare systems in Europe, but unemployment insurance is voluntary. In order to be eligible for benefits you need to sign up with an unemployment insurance fund – known as A-kasse – for which you pay a monthly fee of about £50. “Expats who come here appreciate it as a good system to pay into,” said Rushe, who was born in Galway, Ireland, and lived in London for 18 years before moving to Denmark. He has been working full-time since he arrived but happily contributes the insurance fund fee. “I think it’s a fair system, it’s well-organised and it’s a system that most Danes believe in.” Facebook Twitter Pinterest People bike to work in Copenhagen, Denmark. Photograph: Slim Allagui/AFP/Getty Images People insured with an A-kasse can receive up to 90% of their previous income, with a maximum rate of 4,135 Danish kroner per week (£435) before tax in 2015. Benefits are paid for up to two years; until 2010 they were paid for up to four years. To qualify for unemployment benefit, you need to have been a member of an insurance fund for at least one year and have worked a minimum of 52 weeks within the previous three years. However, employment and insurance periods earned in other EU countries can be included. The question of EU migration and social benefit has been a hotly contested issue in Denmark, with the government campaigning to keep an additional rule that prevents immigrants from claiming unemployment benefit as soon as they arrive. Migrant workers must have worked in Denmark for at least 296 hours within three months if they want to be insured full-time. A similar requirement for migrant workers in Finland has come under fire from the European commission, and the Danish prime minister, Helle Thorning-Schmidt, has supported the Finns in a bid to keep the countries’ special rules. “It’s obvious that EU citizens should use the freedom of movement to travel where they can find work,” Thorning-Schmidt said last year. “They shouldn’t use it to travel where they can receive the best welfare benefit.” Lars Eriksen in Copenhagen
Occupy Oakland members sue city, county Occupy Oakland Eight Occupy Oakland protesters have filed a federal lawsuit against the city of Oakland and Alameda County, saying their civil rights were violated when they were held in jail for hours but never charged with a crime. The suit, filed Monday in U.S. District Court in San Francisco, said 409 people were unlawfully arrested Jan. 28, 2012, after law-enforcement officers surrounded them outside the YMCA on Broadway. Among those taken into custody were protesters, reporters, medics, legal observers and bystanders who were corralled by officers who didn't give a dispersal order, the suit said. Arrestees were held for as long as 85 hours, said the suit, filed by Berkeley attorney Yolanda Huang and Dan Siegel, a former adviser to Oakland Mayor Jean Quan. Huang also represents defendants who fought Oakland's gang injunctions. The attorneys are asking a judge to give the lawsuit class-action status, which would broaden the number of plaintiffs to others arrested during the protest. "Rather than cite and release, class members were incarcerated for long periods in overcrowded and inhumane conditions, including unheated or deliberately chilled cells, with limited seating, no sleeping facilities, sometimes standing room only, no toilet facilities, no feminine hygiene and no food, water or medical care," the suit said. The mass arrest outside the YMCA happened hours after protesters tried to take over the vacant Henry J. Kaiser Convention Center several blocks away. Among the plaintiffs is Sri Louise Coles, who suffered a golf-ball-size welt to her jaw from a bag of lead shot fired by Oakland police during a 2003 antiwar demonstration at the Port of Oakland. She sued the city, which settled for $210,000. The suit seeks unspecified damages and an order sealing and destroying records associated with the arrests, including fingerprints, photos and biological samples. Oakland Police Chief Howard Jordan has said he is seeking to fire two officers, demote a third and suspend 15 others for their treatment of protesters at unspecified Occupy demonstrations. He has also pledged that his officers will engage in "constitutional policing." "We are seeking to have OPD do what they've already promised to do, which is basic, good policing," Huang said. "These mass arrests must stop." The defendants, which include the city of Oakland, Jordan, Alameda County, Sheriff Greg Ahern and other law-enforcement officials, haven't responded to the suit in court.
Peoria, AZ – November 10, 2017 Michael Chavis, 3B, Boston Red Sox MLB.com 92/100 and 2nd overall in the Red Sox organization Chavis came into 2017 with 25 professional HR, slugging .396, in 873 at bats. I asked him if he had many any swing changes or adjustments that lead to a monster 2017 season that saw him swat 31 long balls and slugging .563, earning a promotion to AA. Chavis told me that he did not make any adjustments but attributed his breakout season to being healthy and essentially maturing as a hitter. Chavis hit a walk off HR the day before. He is currently slashing .260/.329/.452 Austin Riley, 3B, Atlanta Braves MLB.com 10th ranked prospect in the Braves organization Riley’s professional career is off to a nice start with back to back 20 HR seasons and a promotion to AA in Mississippi. He has also shown to be a torrid second half hitter. In 2016 at single A Rome, he posted a .617 OPS in the first half and as the weather improved, so did his bat, posting a .929 OPS in the second half. 2017 saw the same trend. At High A Florida, Riley’s OPS was .709 in the first half. Despite the slow start, Riley was promoted to AA where he blew up to the tune of a .900 OPS and 8 HR in 48 games. I asked him if there was anything to it, and he told me that he had no idea why but he hoped to figure it out in 2018. Riley is currently leading the Arizona Fall League in HR with 6 while slashing .333/.397/.772 Alex Jackson, C, Atlanta Braves MLB.com 16th ranked player in the Braves organization Jackson was considered one of the top hitters in the 2014 draft out of high school. He was taken 6th overall by Seattle and converted to OF. While he displayed some good pop at times, he swatted only 21 HR from 14-16. The Braves acquired him for 2 pitchers and converted him back to catcher. Jackson responded with 14 HR in the Florida State League before earning a promotion to AA and hitting 5 more HR. I asked Jackson if his success was tied to a switch of organizations and positions. He stated that his success had nothing to do with switching organizations and hinted that a return to catching has helped him by allowing him to see more pitches while on defense. According to him, the biggest reason for his success in 2017 was just going out and having fun. “How can you not have fun doing this everyday!” Jackson is currently tied for 2nd in the AFL with 5 HR and is slashing .281/.333/.563 Advertisements
Former Rep. Aaron Schock (R-IL), best known as the “Downton Abbey” congressman, is charging that federal investigators broke the law in using a staffer in his Peoria, Illinois office as an informant to bring a federal corruption case against him. The former congressman’s lawyers alleged in a Tuesday court filing that FBI investigators had the staffer make secret recordings, in addition to stealing documents and receipts from Schock’s office. Schock was indicted by a grand jury in November on 24 counts, including improperly using campaign and government funds and falsifying documents. He resigned from Congress in 2015 amid a swirl of questions about his lavish “Downton Abbey”-inspired office decor and jet-setting lifestyle. But his lawyers may seek to dismiss the case by accusing federal investigators of turning Schock’s staffer into an informant and using that staffer to retrieve information the investigators could not obtain themselves. The lawyers wrote that it’s unclear “the full extent to which the prosecutor and the investigating agents directed the CI to engage in illegal/or improper activities, and what use the government made of the ill-gotten fruits of the CI’s efforts.” But they argued that investigators may have exceeded their authority in the way they used the informant. “The government, however, cannot run away from what was produced: a trail of improper — if not outright illegal — acts by the CI that remain not fully known to the defense in this case,” the lawyers wrote.
Introduction GOP strategists Karl Rove and Ed Gillespie, co-founders of super PAC American Crossroads and nonprofit group Crossroads GPS. Lawrence Jackson/AP Revenue at Crossroads GPS, one of the nation’s largest politically active nonprofits, crashed from nearly $180 million in 2012 to about $3.4 million in 2013 — a non-election year, according to new tax filings reviewed by the Center for Public Integrity. Crossroads GPS reported spending slightly more than $4 million in 2013. The bulk of the money it raised in 2013 – more than $2.6 million – came from 17 contributors giving $5,000 or more, including four who gave $500,000 each, the largest listed amount. The rest, $706,605, was attributed to vendor refunds, according to the tax filings. In 2012, the group reported 291 contributions of $5,000 or more and donations of $1 million or more made up 83 percent of its funding. Its largest donation that year was $22.5 million. Crossroads GPS told the IRS it spent no money on political activities in 2013, another contrast with 2012, when it reported spending more than $74 million. As a “social welfare” nonprofit organized under section 501(c)(4) of the U.S. tax code, Crossroads GPS is not required to disclose the identities of its donors. By law, it may not have a “primary purpose” of engaging in political activity. The group is among the most prominent nonprofits to face scrutiny by federal regulators over its political activity in the wake of the Supreme Court’s 2010 decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. It is also a frequent target of campaign finance reformers who argue it should register as a political committee and reveal its donors. Crossroads GPS, co-founded by Republican political operative Karl Rove and strategist Ed Gillespie, has maintained it adheres to federal laws governing nonprofits. It reported making a single grant in 2013 to an outside organization — $7,612 to the Conservative Policy Project, another group organized as a social welfare organization. The purpose of the grant is described as “social welfare.” Paul Lindsay, a spokesman for Crossroads GPS, said the group was newly established at the time and “received a grant from us for administration expenses. The organization has since been terminated.” Its largest grant in 2012, $26.4 million, went to Americans for Tax Reform, an anti-tax group run by Grover Norquist that in 2013 made a large contribution to a nonprofit group that advocates for Republican candidates. Crossroads GPS and its sister super PAC, American Crossroads, reported spending a combined $176.4 million on the 2012 elections, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Roughly $70 million of that was spent by Crossroads GPS. The groups’ money was spent in support of Republican candidates. Crossroads GPS ended 2013 with $2.23 million in assets, according to its tax return. During the 2014 election cycle, the Crossroads groups spent a combined $47.7 million on federal elections, with about $26 million of that coming from Crossroads GPS. Crossroads GPS sponsored more U.S. Senate-focused television ads this election cycle — more than 30,000 — than any other single organization that primarily supported Republicans. It ranked second overall to Democrat-backing super PAC Senate Majority PAC. Such spending by Crossroads GPS is an indication that the organization was able to raise tens of millions of dollars during 2014 — although firm numbers won’t likely be known for another year, when the group files its next tax return. The Wall Street Journal in October quoted Lindsay as saying the group had raised $75 million.
He indicated on the ABC's Insiders program that he viewed the ground war as being a "counterinsurgency" - the firmest acknowledgement yet that it could involve a difficult and drawn-out fight marked by guerrilla-style tactics in urban areas. "The counterinsurgency service of the Iraqi security forces is very capable and very good and we'll be working with them more than likely," he said. "We are optimistic that we can put them up in a position where they can resecure many of these towns." It is understood this could mean the Australian special forces work with Iraq's elite Special Operations Forces - the counter-terrorism commando brigade set up by the Western coalition in the wake of the 2003 overthrow of Saddam Hussein. As well as 400 RAAF personnel, the Abbott government has deployed 200 special forces commandos to the Middle East where they are awaiting final orders to enter Iraq and begin an "advise and assist" role with local forces. Iraq has an army of about 270,000 soldiers but by Washington's estimate only about half of the 50 brigades are remotely reliable. Tens of thousands of Iraqi troops fled in the face of attacks by much smaller Islamic State forces in June and July, largely because of weak leadership, with commanders often abandoning their troops. Experts say that restoring the confidence of Iraqi troops - many of whom are well-equipped and trained - is pivotal to building them up to a force that can drive the militants out of the towns and cities they have seized in recent months. "It's not so much training them in military skills," said Peter Jennings, executive director of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute. "It's more a psychological thing that they can go on the battlefield and prevail. I think it will take at least several months to equip them with that level of confidence." But that also means the Australian special forces will need to be close to the Iraqis when it comes to fighting, said James Brown, a former Australian army officer now with the Lowy Institute. The government has maintained that the Australian advisers will not be on the frontline. But Mr Brown said they would need to be closely involved to be effective. "You can't get the trust of the Iraqis if you can't get in there with them," he said. "Whatever language the government uses, Australians will be exposed to combat danger." The former chief of army, Peter Leahy, meanwhile took issue with Senator Johnston's assessment and cast doubt on whether the Iraqi government was ready to put the full resources into winning a counterinsurgency campaign, which typically involves a large amount of civil work to win "hearts and minds". Loading "Rather than the Minister talking about counterinsurgency, I'd rather he talk about the re-establishment of Iraqi political legitimacy and restoration of sovereignty over its territory," said Professor Leahy, who now heads the University of Canberra's National Security Institute. "That's a task for the Iraqi government, supported by regional countries. The question is, are they up to it? The Iraqis have to win the allegiance of their own people."
Snoop Dogg thinks Game of Thrones is based on real events Snoop Dogg has revealed that he’s a huge Game of Thrones fan, because who isn’t? The show, which features dragons, giants and monsters from the unknown, is the best show on TV without fail but for Snoop Dogg it’s more than just gritty entertainment – it’s a history lesson. The 43-year-old rapper has revealed that he believes the HBO series to be historically accurate and loves turning the gory fantasy drama to learn about our past, which was supposedly significantly more magical than we’d have imagined. “I watch it for historic reasons, to try to understand what this world was based on before I got here,” he genuinely explained to the New York Post. “I like to know how we got from there to here and the similarities between then and now.” We haven’t come across many parallels between Westeros and anywhere in the real world, but according to Snoop there’s one glaring similarity that’s passed us by: “That kings still rule and a bitch f??ked everything up, in every situation!” The hip-hop legend, who will be returning to the UK later this summer for a headlining set at Lovebox Festival, was asked to produce music for the series five mixtape of the show, which he says was a real privilege. “When they asked me to do the track, I was more than honoured because I’m truly a fan of the show. I would have done it for free but they gave me some money on top of it, so I was like, ‘Fk it, let’s do it’.” The rapper recently riled up Game of Thrones fanatics with a picture of himself smoking on a replica Iron Throne. Calling the singer, who releases his 12th studio album Bush later this month, “disrespectful” fans demanded an apology. Unsurprisingly, they didn’t get one. Hopefully his latest quote and his GoT mixtape will more than make up for it.
For days, the faithful have been coming. Hundreds have walked the steps to suite 315 of Evergreen Apartments in Surrey, wanting to see for themselves the miracle. To the non-believer, it might appear that an oily substance is dripping from an interior wall. But to Sanaan Alyais, it is evidence of a visit from the Virgin Mary. “She says, ‘somebody touched me here,'” said Sandy Alyais, Sanaan’s daughter. “She said somebody touched her here, and said ‘just look on the wall’. After she looked on the wall…the oil came.” The Alyais have lived in the apartment for three years, and say this has never happened before. Word has spread across Metro Vancouver, with several people entering the apartment to collect the oil and pray while Global News spoke to the Alyais family today. READ MORE: Why some people encounter the ‘Jesus in toast’ phenomenon Around the world, these types of instances have taken place. So far, the Surrey oil hasn’t been tested, and have been told to leave it alone by the Virgin Mary. Global News called the Roman Catholic Diocese of Vancouver, and they say they’re treating the matter as a personal matter until they’re formally notified. The property manager for Evergreen Apartment did not respond to our request for comment.
Though ISIS territory is centered around Iraq and Syria, the group’s massive success has brought it some support elsewhere, with groups everywhere from Libya to Pakistan pledging loyalty. Yemen might be the next nation to see a surge of ISIS support, as Yemeni officials say that they are presenting “real competition” for al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), the local faction which traditionally dominates. While AQAP is one of the biggest and most effective al-Qaeda auxiliaries, ISIS has something they don’t: money. As the richest jihadist group on the planet, ISIS can bankroll fighters in ways al-Qaeda simply can’t, and that’s attracting a lot of interest from other factions. Though AQAP is still the dominant group in Yemen by sheer numbers, ISIS’ sudden interest is attracting a lot of recruits, and they could quickly make inroads in another nation in the middle of sectarian clashes. Last 5 posts by Jason Ditz
What is the Universe? To me, it is that huge wonderful thing out there with lots of galaxies, stars and unsolved mysteries asking to be solved. But most people live like they are on a sheet of paper - All that exists is on their front, back and sides. People forget to look up. I will list the reasons why most people don’t usually take some of their time to think about up there: 1— Big numbers indeed People aren’t familiar with the measures of distance or quantity of space. The closest big galaxy to us is Andromeda and it is more than 2 million light years away. The problem is that we can’t put that in any meaningful perspective. We can say that light, which travels about 300,000 kilometers every second (a velocity out of our experience), would take two million years to get there, but that really doesn’t mean much to most of us. What can we do about that? We could scale everything down to Earth. However, it still won’t be much helpful because we won’t be able to get rid of the big numbers. For example, we can say that if the Earth was the size of a basketball, the Moon would be 30 feet away, that Mars would be a mile away etc. Good, but the numbers will get much bigger. Saturn would be 16 miles away. The nearest star, Proxima Centauri, would be 522000 miles away (which is more than 2x the distance of the Moon). Now it is starting to get confusing, isn’t it? The center of the Milky Way would be 3.6 billion miles away. Well — we should stop here. 2 — Space isn’t familiar So far, only about 540 people have been in space. That is 0.0000077% of the current world’s population and 0.0000005% of all the people who have ever existed. So… we need to send more people out of the planet. Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic is doing a great job on that. People will be able to book a trip and fly out of the atmosphere and experience a few minutes of weightlessness. However, a seat will cost you $250,000. Celebrities like Justin Bieber and Ashton Kutcher have bought the ticket and it will definitely be the start of a new age. Due to the fact that famous people will be there first, it will motivate others to do the same or at least to have more interest in space. Also, I’m pretty sure the prices will drop after some months or years, so it will be affordable for more people. Get ready for #space #selfie #yolo 3 — It doesn’t directly benefit us The Curiosity Rover got lots of media attention, mainly because of the rather peculiar way it landed on Mars. Some people liked the mission, others were indifferent and others complained: “Why are they spending billions of dollars to send a robot to Mars when we have so many problems here on Earth and even in the USA?”, “This is the third rover they are sending to Mars in less than a decade”, etc. Well, I understand those people. In fact, nobody’s life is going to be better or more comfortable because a robot is in another planet. Some people can admire the knowledge and the science the rover is returning, but unfortunately they are a minority. I think that the space agencies should focus more on the public. A reality show on Mars would be awesome, wouldn’t it? It is a shame it would be so expensive. However, the money that would be made with the show could compensate the money spent… right? I like to think that it could. 4 — Astronomy education could be better Astronomy is usually taught in the first years of school when kids are too young to have a good understanding about the subject. First of all, Astronomy and Physics go together. You can’t study the first without the second. For example, if a kid asks the teacher why the planets don’t slow down and fall in the Sun, the teacher will have to explain the Newton’s laws of motion and inertia. It isn’t easy for a kid to get their heads around that idea. If they ask why the stars shine, will the teacher have to explain what nuclear fusion is? It is not easy to simplify the explanation. Astronomy really deserves more attention in the classroom. 5 — Light pollution Considering that most people live in urban zones, they never get to see what the sky really looks like in a cloudless and moonless night. They just see random dots here and there and have no clue that you can see the Milky Way galaxy, thousands of more stars, other galaxies, etc. That’s sad, I know.
House Republicans and their minions in the right-wing media have been clamoring for a fix to the "invasion" and "crisis" on our nation's southern border. But actually doing something before summer recess to help was a bridge too far. See update at the bottom of this report. After yesterday's Senate vote passing President Barack Obama's request for $3.7 billion to help resolve the "crisis" at the nation's border, House Republicans this afternoon just pulled and effectively killed a bill that would have helped to address the issue they have been calling an "invasion." That $659 million bill, a mere fraction of the multi-billion dollar bill the Senate passed, was too caustic for the Tea Party which blocked the vote -- thanks in part to Senator Ted Cruz's actions. The New York Times calls the move "a major embarrassment to the new leadership team" of Republican Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy and Majority Whip Steve Scalise. House Republicans, who have long called for strengthening security at the nation's southern border, are now forced to head home for the five-week August recess with nothing to show for their efforts â€” something many Republicans fear will be an enormous political liability. "This situation shows the intense concern within our conference â€” and among the American people â€” about the need to ensure the security of our borders and the president's refusal to faithfully execute our laws," House Republican leaders said in a statement. "There are numerous steps the president can and should be taking right now, without the need for congressional action, to secure our borders and ensure these children are returned swiftly and safely to their countries." Because they wrongly are blaming President Obama for the 50,000 or so migrant children and a few hundred thousand adults who have reportedly entered the country without documentation, the GOP would rather now see the problem continue so they can tell their base in town halls this summer, "Blame Obama." Michele Bachmann recently claimed that some of the migrant children are infected with Ebola, a deadly flesh-eating disease ravaging parts of Africa -- but not found in Central America. "People from Yemen, Iran, Iraq and other terrorist nations are making their way up through America's southern border because they see that it's a green light, they can easily get in," Bachmann warned. "Not only people with potentially terrorist activities, but also very dangerous weapons are going to cross our border in addition to very dangerous drugs, and also life-threatening diseases, potentially including Ebola and other diseases like that." She also claimed that the President was planning on performing medical experiments on these children. "Now President Obama is trying to bring all of those foreign nationals, those illegal aliens to the country and he has said that he will put them in the foster care system," Bachmann said. "That's more kids that you can see how - we can't imagine doing this, but if you have a hospital and they are going to get millions of dollars in government grants if they can conduct medical research on somebody, and a Ward of the state can't say 'no,' a little kid can't say 'no' if they're a Ward of the state; so here you could have this institution getting millions of dollars from our government to do medical experimentation and a kid can't even say 'no.' It's sick." House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi today told reporters, "Today to follow up on their tirade against the poor children they have a bill that is so bad but it's not bad enough for some of their outside groups to whom they pander. And so in order to sweeten the pie for them, and intensify the harm for the children, they've added another bill tool the supplemental that they have on the floor. The supplemental does not track humanitarian assistance, due process, assistance to repatriate these children back to their own countries in a safe way. It only tracks more on the border without helping to resolve the humanitarian challenge that we have. "And again, if that bill were not bad enough, they're saying to their members, unless you vote for this terrible bill, even though you don't think it's terrible enough, you're not going to get a chance to tie the president's hands when it comes to using his discretion and executive authority to improve the situation." Meanwhile, tens of thousands of migrant children are alone -- or in prison, or without their families -- and hungry, and scared, not able to see a positive future in their own country, or in the one they are standing in. UPDATE: The GOP has delayed the House's summer recess by one day, will meet Friday morning to discuss the situation on the border and presumably decide if they want to vote on their border bill, which is not related to the Senate's bill. Should the House vote for and pass their border bill, there's no way of knowing if the Senate will stay in session nor any way of knowing if they would pass the House version. Finally, on the chance the House and Senate come to an agreement, given how different the House version is from President Barack Obama's $3.7 billion bill, he might veto the House version. This is a developing story -- stay tuned. Image by House GOP via Flickr See a mistake? Email corrections to: [email protected]
BLACKSBURG, Va. - Lawyers representing Frank Theatres CineBowl & Grille will file an emergency petition for an injunction to force the reopening of the theater under its ownership Thursday, WSLS 10's Dawn Jefferies has learned. Under the court order, Frank Theatres alleges it was not given proper notice and Blacksburg APF Properties didn't have the right to close it, the document says. Attorneys will ask a Montgomery County judge to immediately reopen the cinema under Frank Theatres' control. The document also alleges that the lease requires five days written notice of payments being behind. In addition, lawyers will argue a separate agreement between the company and property owners and a third party, Elm Park Capital Management, requires the landlord to give Elm Park 30 days notice prior to the termination of the lease. Property owners locked the doors to the theater Tuesday, saying Frank Theatres failed to meet the obligations under its lease and had numerous opportunities to do so. Blacksburg Partner APF announced Wednesday, a new company, Cinergy Entertainment would take over the theater. The complaint will be heard in court Thursday at 2 p.m. Copyright 2017 by WSLS 10 - All rights reserved.
For Italians, denying the Holocaust now could result in some time behind bars. Italy has adopted a law banning incitement of racial hatred, including denying the historical existence of the Holocaust, in which as many as 6 million European Jews were systematically murdered by Nazi Germany and its World War II allies, such as Italy. The law comes in the wake of two recent incidents involving other countries grappling with past atrocities. “By approving this law, Parliament intends to tackle the most subtle forms of racial defamation, xenophobia, anti-Semitism and incitement to hatred,” said Chiara Gribaudo, the Democratic Party vice president of the Italian House, the Local reported. The lower house of Parliament Wednesday passed the bill, which would punish offenses with as long as six years in prison. Italy joins other European Union nations France, Germany and Belgium in outlawing Holocaust denial. More than 1,000 Italian Jews were killed in the mass genocide. Two other major international powers just faced crossroads in determining how to handle dark chapters of history. Last week the German Parliament overwhelmingly approved a resolution to recognize the mass killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks during World War I as a genocide. The resolution, which acknowledged Germany’s “complicity” in the atrocity, was met with indignation from Turkey, which maintains the genocide has been exaggerated and the war was the cause of most of the deaths. “Without this admission there cannot be forgiveness and reconciliation. Suffering does not know temporary boundaries,” said Albert Weiler, a member of Germany’s Christian Democratic Union party. “Genocide will never remain in the past. By recognizing the genocide, it will force the Turkish government to take a brave step and look into its own history.” In May, President Barack Obama walked a fine line when he went to Hiroshima, Japan, and became the first sitting American leader to visit the site where the U.S. dropped an atomic bomb on Aug. 6, 1945, in the final days of World War II. Obama was tasked with acknowledging the grave significance of the bomb, which killed an estimated 140,000 people, but the president opted not to formally apologize for the action. Many conservative pundits had criticized Obama for even visiting Hiroshima as symbolic of an alleged “apology tour” for the country. They argued the bomb helped end the war. “Why did we come to this place, to Hiroshima? We come to ponder a terrible force unleashed in the not-so-distant past. We come to mourn the dead,” Obama said during his visit. “Their souls speak to us, they ask us to look inward, take stock of who we are.”
I have a friend who is a Nerdfighter who is also fighting cancer. It's expensive! Some of the funds raised will go to help her. The rest of the funds raised will go to support TSWGO, which has a waiting list for the first time in their history! Shirts will be delivered approximately 2 weeks after the campaign closes. A Nerdfighter friend of mine has been fighting cancer (Hodgkin's Lymphoma) off and on for over a decade. Through this whole time, her support has been very limited. Currently, she is unable to work and struggling with medical bills (on top of insurance) of about $200 per month. I'd like for this campaign to support her for at least the next 2 months. She has no idea that I'm doing this and I would like it to stay that way, hence not using her name. As a nerdfighter, I also support "This Star Won't Go Out," the organization founded in honor of Nerdfighter Esther Earl, as their mission is to support people like my friend who do all they can, but still struggle to pay everything that piles up during cancer treatment. This amazing organization has a waiting list of families who need help fighting cancer for the first time in their history! I would like to donate some of the funds raised by these t-shirts to go to them as well. How much depends a little on how many shirts we sell. So, if we sell 50 shirts, TSWGO gets 25% of the proceeds. 100 shirts and it will jump to 50%. Anything over 150 shirts and I will tack on an extra 5% to the jump so that TSWGO gets 80% of the proceeds, yet my friend still can be supported and not have to freak out over finances for at least the next 2 months. The campaign will end JUST in time to get shirts by Christmas, on December 9th. That doesn't give us a ton of time to promote, but I believe in your power to decrease suck, Nerdfighters! Thank you all for your support and for sharing this campaign with your friends, family members, and other nerdfighters. DFTBA! Day One Update: I am totally blown away by the support shown today and have decided that maybe 100 shirts isn't as lofty a goal as I thought! I know there are some international Nerdfighters who would like to purchase shirts--please message me and we'll try to work something out to get you a shirt since there is no international shipping. Also, I've decided that if we blow the goal out of the water and sell 200 shirts or more, we'll go up to 90% to TSWGO. After that, we'll just be glad to have more than 2 months for my friend and blown away by the large number of shirts! Thank you again to all those who've supported! Day 2 Update: I am still totally mind-blown by the support shown. THANK YOU! There are about a half-dozen of you who's personal thank you e-mails came back to me for some reason or another, so if you didn't get one, know that I do not appreciate you any less! You are all awesome and I cannot thank you enough!! Update: My friend has suffered some set-backs this week, so being able to show her how close we're getting to our goal has been absolutely wonderful. Thank you again to all who've supported by buying shirts, sharing the link, telling your friends, and any other way you've done so. You're all made of awesome! UPDATE: With about a week left to go, we've met our goal. I'm blown away by this, but also kind of saddened by the fact that my inbox has been devoid of "congratulations, so-and-so bought a shirt" e-mails for a couple of days. PLEASE continue to share the link and encourage further worldsuck decreasing. Imagine the good that could be done if all of the 3000+ Facebook supporters of this campaign bought shirts! Massive thank yous to those of you who have already done so! FINAL UPDATE: Okay, people, this thing ends tomorrow and we have met our goal of 100 shirts already, which is pretty incredible. But I still think we can do more! I'd love to see a last-minute blitz, so if you'd all share this one last time, I'd sure appreciate it. Thank you all for being so made of awesome! Should have said this from the beginning--Thank you to the awesome Sarah for the help on the artwork!
Toronto's Ryerson University student union has double standards when approving clubs. Many pro-choice groups have been approved, but this pro-life group was denied. Marissa Semkiw talks with Carter Grant, the vice-president of Students for Life at Ryerson. He tells her the criteria under which his group was denied official recognition: The Ryerson Students' Union officially "opposes … groups, meetings, or events that promote misogynist views towards woman and ideologies that promote gender inequity, challenges women’s right to bodily autonomy, or justifies sexual assault." Of course, sexual assault is a crime, while choosing not to abort -- or simply meeting to talk about that option -- is not. Yet the Students' Union's policies seem to equate a peaceful pro-life group with some kind of imaginary, horrific (and unthinkable) "campus rape club." GET INVOLVED in our exciting crowdfunding project, so TheRebel.media can keep bringing you more stories like this one. (You can also get some cool perks when you donate!) JOIN ForCanada.ca and fight for the rights of Christian students in Canada.
Local Grief spreads far and wide for hunting guide killed in accident near Faribault Travis Pineur, who traveled the world in pursuit of big game, was fatally injured near his home. Local BNSF plans $95 million in rail upgrades across Minnesota Rail giant BNSF Railway Co. plans to spend about $95 million to improve its freight network in Minnesota this year. Most of the money will… St. Paul Authorities investigate social media post against St. Paul middle school Extra police will be on hand at Highland Park Middle School on Tuesday, the district said. Local Charges: Night of drinking ends with northern Minnesota man fatally attacking his wife The mother of five was left severely injured on a snowy road, according to authorities. Local World record for longest ice hockey pass is set in the State of Hockey The pass was made on a mirror-smooth Lake of the Isles in Minneapolis late last fall and involved a Stanley Cup winner on the receiving end. Don't Miss Oh no-go zones: Minnesota survives an unwelcome weekend invasion Columnist Jennifer Brooks: This weekend, a group of people whose names aren't worth the ink it would take to print their names rolled into Minnesota and cast lie after lie. Local They tried to beat the blizzard, landed at the Owatonna Armory More than 180 people crowded the armory, with another 60 taking shelter in a Lutheran church. The American Red Cross, the Salvation Army, the Minnesota National Guard and local government agencies jumped into action to tend to the stranded travelers. Local Daring rescue plucks 4 anglers from northern Minnesota lake in blizzard conditions One of the anglers suffered "advanced hypothermia, frostbite and dehydration" and was stabilized on the way back to shore.
SALT LAKE CITY — A West Jordan attorney and his Arizona-based client are suing for $130 million over an adoption that they say was unlawful, citing a federal act typically used to prosecute gang members and others involved in organized crime. In the complaint filed Friday, attorney Wesley Hutchins and his client, Jake Strickland, accuse a Utah woman who had Strickland's child, LDS Family Services, an LDS Family Services employee, the child's adoptive parents and attorneys from the law firm Kirton McKonkie who aided in the adoption of "racketeering" and "kidnapping." They also allege that the parties are guilty of wire fraud, human trafficking and selling a child. Hutchins admits the allegations are attention-grabbing and the suit is intended, in part, to bring attention to the rights of birth fathers. But a lawmaker familiar with the case says the lawsuit is unnecessary. The lawsuit hinges on the story of Strickland, who claims the woman with whom he fathered a child lied to him about her plans for the child until the day before the boy was born. But Hutchins said he pointed to other cases of alleged fraud in the lawsuit as well to demonstrate that the birth mother's fraud was part of what he claims is a larger pattern found among adoption agencies and attorneys in the state. "It's really an issue of accountability," Hutchins said. "With these fraudulent adoption schemes you find that they are fraudulent, there are co-conspirators involved — most notably adoption attorneys, adoption agencies and adoptive mothers that are engaged in an enterprise," he said. "We've cited those other cases as a necessary element to RICO (Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act) to show a pattern of unlawful conduct." Strickland fathered a child with a woman who was married but estranged from her husband. The woman said she was considering an adoption, but Strickland stated numerous times that he wanted the child and would care for it by himself if necessary, the lawsuit states. The baby was born, unbeknownst to Strickland, on Dec. 29, 2010. Just over 24 hours later, the birth mother signed documents relinquishing her parental rights. Strickland had been told by the birth mother that the baby would be delivered by C-section on Jan. 12, 2010. But on Jan. 5, 2010, the birth mother told Strickland in a cellphone conversation that she had placed the baby with an adoptive couple, according to the lawsuit. Strickland initiated a paternity claim the following day. He had not, however, registered with Utah's putative father registry during the pregnancy. Strickland later learned that the woman was not legally divorced from her husband, according to press reports. Under the state Judicial Code, a married woman's husband is presumed to be the father of her child. According to the lawsuit, a social worker pressured the woman's husband to relinquish his parental rights and allow the adoption to proceed. Hutchins said she even threatened the man after he mentioned Strickland, telling him that if he didn't keep quiet he would be stuck with child support payments. He also alleges that attorneys David Hardy and Larry Jenkins failed to inform the adoption court about a stipulation in a paternity case recognizing Strickland as the biological father and left the man in the dark about proceedings as they "rushed" the adoption. He said he and Strickland are seeking $30 million for what Strickland lost in being able to raise and enjoy his child. The $100 million is "an amount specifically designed to serve as a deterrent to this kind of conduct," Hutchins said. "Under the Utah Adoption Act you can commit fraud and it is not a basis to overturn an otherwise illegal adoption, you can sue for damages. So you can't get your child back if there's a fraudulent adoption, but you can get money." The attorneys in the suit with Kirton McKonkie declined to comment, as did LDS Family Services. But Sen. Todd Weiler, R-Woods Cross, said Strickland had an attorney who told him to follow Utah law and register as the father. Weiler said he knows of the Strickland family and is sympathetic. He has heard Strickland's mother testify at the Utah Legislature and has met with her. "It's a tragic story and she feels that she lost her grandchild and my heart goes out to her, but the protections there in the law were there and they weren't followed," Weiler said, emphasizing the ease of registering for paternity in the state. "His rights would have been protected if he would have just followed the advice of his own attorney," Weiler said. "The lawsuit takes a shotgun approach against a lot of good people and a lot of good entities that are doing lot of good. It appears to me that they're trying to blame everyone except for the responsible party." He said he is aware of pending lawsuits alleging injustices for unwed fathers in Utah, but said they don't justify a serious change in the law. He noted that he is an attorney who has personally handled more than 100 adoptions. "I'm not convinced that a dramatic change needs to take place, because when we make a change it affects tens of thousands of adoptions and what we're looking at in this lawsuit and a few other high-profile lawsuits are one or two bad examples out of 10,000," he said. "I don't think it's good policy for the state to look at one or two exceptions and say, 'Let's change the laws for everyone.'" Contributing: Carole Mikita Twitter: DNewsCrimeTeam
Your daily dose of news and tidbits from the world of money in politics: CONGRESSMEN DUMPED TRANSOCEAN STOCK IN OIL SPILL AFTERMATH: Several congressmen were eager to sever all ties with the companies responsible for one of the biggest environmental disasters in the nation’s history. OpenSecrets Blog previously reported that high-ranking members of congress dumped their BP assets in the aftermath of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill last year. And another analysis of personal financial disclosure documents released last week shows that many also divested their stocks for Transocean, the company that owned the Deepwater Horizon oil platform that BP operated. At least five congressmen who in 2009 reported owning Transocean stock sold all of their Transocean assets in 2010, the Center for Responsive Politics’s analysis indicates. Rep. David Phillip Roe (R-Tenn.), who in 2009 had more than $32,000 invested in Transocean, sold all of his Transocean stock during several transactions last year. Reps. Jim McDermott (D-Wash.), Mary Bono Mack (R-Calif.), Connie Mack (R-Fla.) and Michael Turner (R-Ohio) are others who no longer have the Transocean assets they reported in 2009. Another three members of Congress, Sen. Kay Hagan (D-N.C.), and Reps. Kenny Marchant (R-Texas) and Michael McCaul (R-Texas), who owned Transocean assets in 2009, have filed extensions for disclosing their finances. Whether they sold or kept their Transocean assets won’t be known until later in the summer. Rep. Gary Miller (R-Calif.), however, who was among those lawmakers with the most significant investments in the company in 2009, kept all of his Transocean assets. These holdings are are valued between $15,001 and $50,000. (Members of Congress are only required to disclose the values of their assets in broad ranges.) Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Kansas) and Rep. Stephen Cohen (D-Tenn.), who owned less significant investments, held on to their Transocean assets as well. ALEC BALDWIN — A POTENTIAL WEINER REPLACEMENT? Rep. Anthony Weiner’s scandal may have warmed up New York’s 9th Congressional District for some more time in the spotlight. Media outlets, including the New York Times, have jokingly suggested that 30 Rock star Alec Baldwin, known for also being a big contributor to Democrat candidates, should run for the seat in the upcoming special election. Based on his past contributions, however, it’s clear that Baldwin’s involvement in politics is no joke. The actor-comedian said earlier this year that he was “very interested” in a political run. Since the 1992 election cycle, Baldwin has contributed nearly $152,000 to federal-level political candidates or committees, the Center for Responsive Politics’ research indicates. All together, Baldwin has donated $500 or more to 30 different federal-level candidates, and doled out $30,500 to the Democratic Party of New York, $22,500 to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and $20,100 to the Democratic National Committee, OpenSecrets Blog previously reported. Baldwin is well known for his political activism and support for the Democratic Party. Earlier this year, he was rumored to replace Keith Olbermann on MSNBC’s “Countdown,” although no such move occurred. 60 PLUS ASSOCATION LAUNCHES NEW CAMPAIGN: A conservative senior citizen advocacy group is spending $1.4 million on a new national ad campaign in support of a Medicare reform proposal by Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.). The 30-second ad was scheduled to air June 17 on national cable channels. It will also run in broadcast markets in Florida and Ohio. “The Democrats and Obama are destroying Medicare,” said Jim Martin, chairman of the 60 Plus Association in a press release. “It’s time to put an end to their ‘mediscare’ tactics. The reality is that Medicare in its current form is going to bankrupt our nation — we must either reform the program or watch it die.” During the 2010 election cycle, the 60 Plus Association spent about $6.7 million in federal-level independent expenditures, the Center calculates. These ads expressly advocated against federal Democratic candidates ahead of the November midterm election. An additional $397,800 was spent on advertisements legally known as “electioneering communications,” which did not expressly advocate for candidates but rather mentioned federal candidates in the context of issue ads. Have a news tip or link to pass along? We want to hear from you! Email us at [email protected]
Unconcerned about the open wound on his leg, an elderly patient only has one thought on his mind – alcohol. “Is there any wheat beer?” he asks staff. But despite being just a stone's throw away from Oktoberfest, there is no beer in Munich's University Hospital. The closest patients get to alcohol in the hospital on this Saturday night are the paper beer mugs on Oktoberfest-themed bunting, put up by doctors for the world's largest folk festival. It is not just the victims of beery brawls arriving at accident and emergency. A red-haired girl in her mid-twenties has to be carried onto a bed after drinking three litres of beer. A handkerchief lies in a bag next to the bed smelling strongly of vomit. And when the unit gets full, drunks are laid out in two extra rooms. The mattresses are placed on the floor so that they do not fall out of bed. Downtown in a separate site, further away from Oktoberfest, things are slightly calmer. “Last Thursday was the last time we used the [extra] rooms,” said head of accident and emergency Markus Wörnle. Many of the cases are dealt with at the Oktoberfest's medical tent. Only the worst ones come to the hospitals as alcohol only rarely puts a patient in life-and-death situation, says Wörnle. In the hospitals though, staff do have to watch out that the alcohol does not lead to anything worse, like a heart attack. At reception there is a handwritten list of the blood alcohol content of the Oktoberfest patients. Staff do not enjoy welcoming drunks. Not only because they throw up a lot, and on occasion enjoy urinating in the cubicles, but because they take up beds which are needed for real emergencies. Salt, glucose and an injection against nausea is the standard treatment at the Oktoberfest's medical tent. Two doctors and four carers man the Oktoberfest tent along with six security guards who protect them from aggressive patients. Back at the hospital thinks are more peaceful. It is midnight and new patients have arrived. On the bed a man with a brown moustache wearing a Bavarian jacket snores, two beds down a diabetes patient in a pink dirndl moans. Nurses have little to laugh about – their night is long, with the last Oktoberfest patients tending to arrive at 6.30am. READ MORE: Taxi driver molests US tourist at Oktoberfest DPA/The Local/tsb Follow us on Twitter @thelocalgermany Like The Local Germany on Facebook
Date: June 13, 2017 Contact: Interior_Press@ios.doi.gov WASHINGTON – U.S. Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke today announced $1.1 billion in annual funding for state wildlife agencies from revenues generated by the Pittman-Robertson Wildlife Restoration and Dingell-Johnson Sport Fish Restoration acts. State-by-state listings of the final Fiscal year 2017 apportionments of Wildlife Restoration Program fund can be found here and the Sport Fish Restoration Program fund here. The announcement was made during day one of a four-day trip across the Northeast where Secretary Zinke met with New Hampshire Fish and Game Executive Director Glenn Normandeau, whose state will receive $8,146,960 through the acts. The meeting was part of a Pittman-Robertson Dingell-Johnson Grants Roundtable that focused on recreation and partnerships between New Hampshire and the Department. “For nearly eight decades, the nation’s hunters and anglers have generated billions of dollars to protect wildlife and habitat simply by purchasing items that help them engage in the outdoor activities they enjoy,” Zinke said. “Their support has helped state wildlife agencies protect our country’s environmental legacy for future generations of hunters, fishers, recreationalists, and conservationists.” The funds, which are distributed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, support critical state conservation and outdoor recreation projects. They are derived from excise taxes paid by the hunting, shooting, boating and angling industries on firearms, bows and ammunition and sport fishing tackle, some boat engines, and small engine fuel. Allocations of the funds are authorized by Congress. To date, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has distributed more than $19 billion in apportionments for state conservation and recreation projects. “The conservation and outdoor recreation gains made possible by this funding mechanism, which is unique to the United States, serves as the bedrock of wildlife conservation in our country,” said U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Acting Director Jim Kurth. The recipient state wildlife agencies have matched these funds with approximately $6 billion throughout the years, primarily through hunting and fishing license revenues. State funding in the Northeast includes: New Hampshire- The state will receive $3,494,429 through the Sport Fish Restoration Fund and $4,652,531 through the Wildlife Restoration Fund, giving the state a total amount of $8,146,960. Massachusetts- The state will receive $3,494,429 through the Sport Fish Restoration Fund and $7,664,947 through the Wildlife Restoration Fund, giving the state a total amount of $11,159,376. Vermont- The state will receive $3,494,429 through the Sport Fish Restoration Fund and $4,652,531 through the Wildlife Restoration Fund, giving the state a total amount of $8,146,960. Connecticut- The state will receive $3,494,429 through the Sport Fish Restoration Fund and $5,702,335 through the Wildlife Restoration Fund, giving the state a total amount of $9,196,764. Rhode Island- The state will receive $3,494,429 through the Sport Fish Restoration Fund and $4,652,531 through the Wildlife Restoration Fund, giving the state a total amount of $8,146,96 For more information about the WSFR program visit http://wsfrprograms.fws.gov/.
Washington tribal members encourage resistance against a North Dakota fossil-fuel project as a similar threat to developments they have opposed on their own ancestral lands. They came by plane, bus and car, bringing food, songs and their finest regalia. Tribes from across Washington and the Northwest have journeyed to remote Cannon Ball, N.D., to join the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe in a peaceful occupation of ancestral lands where the tribe seeks an injunction to stop construction of an oil pipeline until its waters and cultural resources are protected. At least eight tribes from Washington state — some have been through or are still engaged in similar battles of their own to block fossil-fuel projects on their own ancestral lands — have traveled to join the occupation. They are Yakama Nation, Swinomish Indian Tribal Community, Lummi Nation, Puyallup Tribe, Nisqually Indian Tribe, Suquamish Tribe, Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe and Hoh Tribe. More than 1,500 people from 150 tribes and their supporters from around the country have gathered at the confluence of the Cannonball and Missouri rivers, staging a nonviolent protest at what they call a spirit camp. Native Americans from reservations hundreds of miles around have joined the growing protest against the Dakota Access Pipeline, causing the company to temporarily halt construction. The Standing Rock Sioux have sued federal regulators for approving the pipeline, which will take crude oil from the Bakken oil fields in North Dakota to Illinois and cross the Missouri River just upstream of the reservation. The pipeline will pass through Iowa, Illinois, North Dakota and South Dakota. The tribe argues that the pipeline would impact drinking water and sacred sites on its 2.3-million-acre reservation straddling the North Dakota-South Dakota border, harming thousands of residents on the reservation, and the millions of people who rely on clean drinking water downstream. The tribe seeks an injunction from a federal judge — a ruling on which could come as soon as early September — to block further construction. Most recently in the Northwest, the Lummi Nation defeated the proposed Pacific Gateway bulk terminal on its ancestral village site and burial grounds at Cherry Point in Whatcom County after the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers denied permits for the project on the basis of its threat to treaty-protected fishing rights. “We have seen the success our friends from Washington state have had in their battles to protect treaty rights against the transport of fossil fuels,” David Archambault II, chairman of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, said in a prepared statement this week. “Their support is crucial in the protection of land, water and cultural resources as well as all of our sovereign rights … words can’t express how thankful we are.” In traditional white buckskin regalia, and standing with a heap of fresh, fragrant cedar from Washington, JoDe Goudy, chairman of the Yakama Nation, in a welcome ceremony at the camp Tuesday said: “We, along with people of all walks of life, are observing a peaceful and prayerful gathering to move an entire country. … One voice, one heart, and one spirit to speak for those things that cannot speak for themselves.” Tim Ballew II, chairman of the Lummi Indian Business Council, said in a phone interview from the camp that for his people, the protest is an opportunity to join forces in a common cause felt not only by Indian people but all people concerned for the well-being of the Earth. “We hope to show a sign of solidarity for their efforts, to protect their sacred sites,” Ballew said of the Standing Rock Sioux. He noted that support from other tribes and the broader community helped the Lummi succeed in their own efforts to protect their ancestral village site. “We couldn’t have come as far as we did without the help and support from our neighboring native nations, and all the support from throughout Indian Country. We thought it would be good to come out and pay the same respect.” The United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues is calling on the U.S. government to allow the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe to have a say regarding a $3.8 billion oil pipeline that it says could disturb sacred sites and impact drinking water for 8,000 tribal members. In a statement issued Wednesday, the forum’s chairman, Alvaro Pop Ac, called for a “fair, independent, impartial, open and transparent process to resolve this serious issue and to avoid escalation into violence and further human rights abuses.” The forum provides U.N. representation to indigenous people around the globe. Seattle Mayor Ed Murray wrote Chairman Archambault on Aug. 26 “on behalf of the City of Seattle to express our solidarity in opposition to the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline across your territory.” Lummi carvers also arrived at the camp this week with a totem pole, part of a journey undertaken by Lummi tribal members and supporters across Indian lands to protest fossil-fuel transport projects. Photos and videos of the journey are posted regularly on Facebook. Their journey began Aug. 23, as the House of Tears Carvers of the Lummi Nation began a 5,000-mile trip across the Western United States and Canada with a 22-foot totem pole strapped in a pickup truck. The journey is intended to bring attention to proposed fossil-fuel terminals, oil trains, coal trains and oil pipelines, and to the tribes and local communities in their paths. The journey, including the arrival of the totem pole in the spirit camp, is chronicled online on the project’s website. At the camp Tuesday, Brian Cladoosby, chairman of the Swinomish Tribe and president of the National Congress of American Indians, said in a prepared statement: “The clean water, salmon, buffalo, roots and berries, all that make up the places that First People have inhabited since time immemorial, bind tribes together. “We are a place-based society. We live where our ancestors are buried. Our culture, laws and values are tied to all that surrounds us, the place where our children’s future will be for years to come. We cannot ruin where our ancestors are buried, and where our children will call home.”
In Texas, some of the state's abortion clinics have to close, at least for now: a federal appeals court overturned a decision earlier this week, allowing new abortion restrictions to go into effect. The new law requires doctors who perform abortions to have admitting privileges in a nearby hospital. NBC's Janet Shamlian reports. New restrictions on abortions in Texas went into effect Thursday night after a federal appeals court lifted an order that would have blocked them. One provision requires any doctor performing abortions to have admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles of the clinic. On Monday, a federal district court judge in Austin said the requirement places an undue burden on a woman seeking a legal abortion and adds no medical value. The women's groups challenging the law said it would force about a third of the 36 abortion clinics in Texas to shut down. The judge blocked the law the day before it was going to take effect. Read the ruling here (PDF) The state immediately appealed, and late Thursday a three-judge panel of the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals reversed that order, allowing the restriction to go into effect. The panel said the provision does have a valid medical purpose – helping to ensure that the credentials of doctors who perform abortions are current. The law, the court said, acts as another layer of protection for patient safety. It's not an undue burden, the panel said, even though it may make it harder or more expensive for women in Texas to get access to an abortion clinic. The state, it said, has a legitimate interest in protecting the integrity of the medical profession. The appeals panel also partly revived another part of the Texas law that was put on hold Monday, one that restricts the availability of medicinal, or non-surgical, abortions using a two-pill system. Thursday’s ruling, freeing the state to enforce the new restrictions, will remain in effect until January, when the appeals court hears oral argument on the heart of the case – whether the new Texas abortion law is unconstitutional. The law got a national airing when state Sen. Wendy Davis staged a dramatic 13-hour filibuster in an attempt to prevent its passage in June. She succeeded then, but Gov. Rick Perry ordered a second special legislative session to pass the law in the Republican-dominated Legislature. Pete Williams is NBC News' justice correspondent. Related:
Every July 4, Americans celebrate the day America declared, not won, independence. Rather than selecting the day the war started in Lexington, the day it ended with the Treaties of Versailles, or the once-popular Evacuation Day, which commemorated the departure of the British from New York Harbor, we Americans choose to celebrate the day when we first boldly decided to chase the goal of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. This bold, progressive goal is the defining quality of America. And Americans should be proud to be part of it, not because in 1776 America reached that goal, but because Americans, today and as long as Old Glory flies, will be part of a quest to reach that goal and build the "perfect union." The United States was not perfect when it began, and it is still far from perfect today. However, if one constantly writes off America because of its failings in the past or present, then one misses the general point: America was born a nation to perpetually move forward. Americans have always been on the physical quest of "Manifest Destiny," which led us west and today leads us farther into the stars. And even more importantly, Americans across all generations have been on a "rights" quest, continually extending rights, progressing prosperity, and increasing free expression. The declaration even states that we should always be on a quest to continually change things. The document reads, "It is the Right of the People ... to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness." The message of Thomas Jefferson and company was more or less this: If things aren't good enough, make them better. America is meant to be an ever-progressive nation. America has the goal to be better. But it is not just any goal to be a little better; it is a "stretch goal" to be the greatest. A stretch goal is an extremely high goal we set to motivate ourselves. When properly used, in an organizational setting, this type of goal has been shown to be incredibly motivating (though notably with some exceptions). The American goal also acts not as a single goal but as a "goal ladder," such that each time we reach a new level of equality or propensity, we are not satisfied. Instead we look up the ladder and continue to strive for higher and higher levels. For instance, just because women's rights have improved doesn't mean we should stop progressing women's rights. Instead, we need to keep climbing up that goal ladder and shatter that glass ceiling until men and women truly stand equally on that roof and breathe in the free air. The fact that we are not satisfied with the quality of equality and prosperity in the United States is a testament to the resolve of Americans to never settle. It is a testament to the way many Americans resist the tempting urge to say the status quo is OK. In the 1700s, colonialism was not completely terrible, but Americans declared that it wasn't good enough. The declaration stated that current conditions were not free enough. Just because things were OK for the American colonists didn't mean they were satisfied with them. So America declared independence and fought a war to level up the goal ladder. The way the American ideal is both a "stretch goal" and a "goal ladder" is a testament to how the American ideal makes sense with the most successful aspects of humans' goal-striving capabilities. A wealth of research shows that people reach higher and higher levels of goals and happiness by following these two goal principles. People are happiest when they "broaden and build" over and over again. That is when people A) broaden their goal strivings, and then B) build to make those goals a reality. After they achieve those goals they broaden once again. This leads to both higher levels of success and higher levels of personal satisfaction. In summary, Americans should be proud of their boldness and at times even their naïveté to stretch for the impossible idea of a "more perfect union." Zack Synder, the director of Man of Steel, recently stated that Superman must be an American because of his naïveté and his unshakable devotion to hope and a better tomorrow. This proposes that what is core to Superman and America is this undying conviction to Superman's creed: "truth, justice, and the American way." Americans should take pride in the boldness and hopeful stupidity of the Americans who in 1776 challenged the largest empire in the world. But Americans should celebrate more than just one war. Americans should celebrate how this country has made good on many of the ideals set down in 1776 and how, across the generations, Americans have actively improved upon the execution of those ideals just as many of the founders would have wanted -- at least on an abstract, intellectual level. And we should be proud of ourselves. We should be proud to chase the American ideal, and we should attempt when possible to actually chase it through our actions and words. Like a Christian who chases the ideals of Jesus but knows he will never completely reach those ideals, or the atheist particle physicist who chases the underlying structure of subatomic particles but knows she will die before she knows it all, Americans should, and luckily often do, strive to reach those vague but wonderful ideals of equality, rights, and happiness.
Bassel Mcleash came to Canada by way of railroad. Not on a real train, but an underground one called the Rainbow Railroad. The 29-year-old is gay, which is illegal in his home country of Syria. "Most of the people who get arrested for the first time, after getting out of the jail, they just disappear," said Mcleash. He said in Damascus there was a safe circle of LGBT people, but they still had to hide their true selves. He said if people were caught they would lose many of their rights, including getting married, getting a passport or working for the government. "At the same time if someone kills you, you are the same as a bug or an ant," he said. "You're an ant who has a name." 'Akin to the underground railroad' Mcleash will be in Winnipeg on Dec. 10 to share his story of survival at a fundraiser for Rainbow Railroad. "They call themselves the ambulance," said Carmyn Aleshka, who is organizing the fundraiser through her non-profit, called Upside Down Tree. "There is a crisis, they come, they help." Kimahli Powell is the newly appointed executive director of Rainbow Railroad. (Supplied) Rainbow Railroad received its charitable status in 2013. In 2015 it received 235 requests for help. The charity was able to provide 29 people with emergency travel and assisted one more with resettlement in Canada. "Our mandate is akin to the underground railroad," said Railroad executive director Kimahli Powell. On average the charity spends $8,000 to $10,000 on flights and documents to get a LGBT person out of their home country. Once there, they they are connected with resettlement organizations, which help them start their new life. "We recently found safe haven for someone from Uganda to Argentina," said Powell. Rainbow Railroad is mostly volunteer-run, except for two employees, and relies on donations. Aleshka said the 2015 event raised $400,000. The fundraiser on Dec. 10 will feature a dramatization of the Railroad's efforts. "Five actors will portray five stories of lives we are trying to save," said Aleshka. Other entertainment includes a cabaret singer from New York, an artist from Montreal who is commissioned to do a piece for auction at the event and guest speakers, including Mcleash. Carmyn Aleshka at the 2015 Rainbow Railway fundraiser, which raised $400,000. (Upside Down Tree) Finding safety Work took Mcleash to Egypt in 2012, where he was able to be out because it is not illegal to be gay. However, when the regime changed, things took a turn for the worse. "When they started 'cleaning the country,' they started with the LGBT community," he said, adding there were raids at parties, houses and cafes. He said his home became a gathering place for the LGBT community. "I got some information that even my place was under surveillance after a while," said Mcleash. "I moved out immediately." In 2014, he found out he was HIV positive and his work permit was cancelled by the government. He said he knew it was time to get out and he couldn't go back to war-torn Syria. That is when he found Rainbow Railroad. He arrived in Toronto as a permanent resident in May. "I just want to be in peace and enjoy my life and that is what the Canadian government and society is offering, which is amazing," he said. Five weeks after arriving he marched in his first Pride parade alongside Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
Search for Daisy Kwok uncovers Shanghai's lost history of Chinese-Australians Updated In the aftermath of Federation, many Chinese-Australians fled discriminatory Australian laws to start new lives in Shanghai. Daisy Kwok was one of them. If the White Australia Policy has an afterlife, I came face-to-face with it in 1996. Flicking through Tess Johnston's book, A Last Look: Western Architecture in Old Shanghai, I saw an image of Daisy Kwok outside her family's now decrepit mansion in the Jingnan district of Shanghai. Standing on cracked cement next to a clothesline, she wore a black velvet dress and white pearls. She must have been at least in her 70s. The caption on the photograph told me that Daisy had been born in Australia but came to Shanghai in 1917 and that she identified as an "Australian in Shanghai". This struck me as unusual. I had spent seven years of my adolescence in the Australian embassy in Beijing and, having studied at a Chinese university, and I knew that Australia had not established formal diplomatic ties with China until the 1970s. Most of what I had read about this history of re-engagement centred around images of banquets and handshakes, leadership meetings and Australian politicians standing on the Great Wall. Nowhere in the visual canon of Sino-Australian relations had I encountered anyone like Daisy Kwok. Twenty years on, I now know that Daisy was a second generation Australian of Chinese descent who spent her childhood in the Sydney suburb of Petersham before her father, George Kwok Bew, took the family to China. Fleeing Australian racism and White Australia on the one hand and embracing Shanghai's famed modernity on the other, in China George Kwok Bew helped open the Wing On department store, now an iconic Shanghai institution. His daughter Daisy was just one of many Chinese-Australians who made lives in Shanghai in the 1920s and 1930s. Their homes, workplaces, religious headquarters, nightclubs and dance halls are hard to find now, and any trace of an Australian connection has been long forgotten. Yet these were places that teemed with international life. In the period between the world wars, Shanghai was Europe's premiere treaty port in Asia, with a "French town" modelled on Paris and a Bund lined with the old headquarters of the British elite — clubhouses, banks and hotels. When I first travelled there in my teens I was in awe of the Art Deco grandeur of the Peace Hotel, where every room was themed to differing national tastes (the Japanese room, the India room, the British room) and where an ageing jazz band from the 30s still played in the bar. Leading off the Bund is Nanjing Shopping St. It was on this street that returned Chinese-Australians such as Daisy's father built decadent department stores: Sincere, Wing On and Sun Sun among them. These were the so-called four great companies, the harbingers of consumer capitalism to Chinese shores after WWI. As a teenager in the 1990s I was blind to this surprising Australian heritage at the heart of Shanghai's capitalist history. But in my 20s I learnt of the fate of the Chinese-Australian families who had sunk their money into the city at the height of its jazz era buzz. They lost their wealth, they went into exile in America, or they stayed on in the changed city where many suffered terribly under communist rule. Some survived and ended up assisting Australian diplomats when they arrived in China after "reform and opening" began, acting as cultural liaison officers. They are testimony to the history of China-Australia relations that reaches back to the period before the cutting of ties in the 1950s. Daisy herself was swallowed by Chinese history. She stayed in Shanghai after the communists came to power in 1949 and was persecuted and impoverished during the political campaigns of the 60s. The image that so captivated me in A Last Look was taken in the 1980s when economic reforms in China had inspired nostalgia for Shanghai's capitalist past and new respect for the men and women who remembered it. Daisy began assisting staff at the Australian consulate when it reopened in Shanghai in 1987; translating documents, teaching Chinese language, and acting as a repository of a longer history of China-Australia connections. In a ceremony in 1990, a few years before she died, Daisy was given the Australia citizenship she had long been denied. In the Australia of her birth, "Asiatics" were undesirables, out of place in Australia's vision of itself as a white fortress in the British Empire. Overseas Chinese in other settler colonies faced the same laws. This was a global history of racial exclusion. Chinese immigration restriction acts were in force in the Australian colonies from 1855 and subsequent iterations of these acts gradually denied Chinese arriving in Australia property rights and, after Federation in 1901, citizenship, voting rights or rights to welfare. Daisy, the descendent of gold-rush era migrants, was one of many Australian born Chinese who looked to Shanghai for a better future, seeking opportunities not afforded them in the southernmost dominion of the British imperial world. What did it mean to identify as an Australian in China? Daisy gives us a version of Australian history from a Chinese perspective. Her life provokes a series of historical memories often forgotten in much of the future-focused rhetoric about Sino-Australian relations in the 21st century. In between the gold rushes of the 1850s and the reengagement of the 1970s are the remarkable lives of people like Daisy: living embodiments of a long history of movement and cultural exchange between Australia and Asia. We are very preoccupied by our future in this region, but that future will grow out of this long history of engagement. Topics: multiculturalism, history, asian, china First posted
On June 12, 2014 three Israeli teens hitchhiked their way home to Talmon, an illegal settlement, they were kidnapped in the West Bank near Hebron. The boys were found dead on Monday. This kidnapping and murder is extremely unfortunate and my condolences go out to the families of the boys. Children are the first victims of hostilities and as we have seen time and again both sides are guilty of robbing children in their innocence, Israel has done so more actively so but I’ll get into that in a moment. Let me begin with the situation at hand, three Israeli teens were kidnapped, and they can be named in one sentence. If I were to name all of the Palestinian children who have been kidnapped by Israel throughout history you’d be reading this article for a couple of hours. In an attempt to find the boys, Israeli forces did everything in their power to rescue them. As of Thursday, Israel has unlawfully kidnapped 600+ Palestinians, raising the number of Palestinian currently in Israeli prisons to over 255 – which, under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child is illegal. They have unjustly raided and assaulted over thousands of households, which led to the death of an elderly woman. They have also killed 13 other Palestinians including a 7-year old, a 15-year-old, and a mentally ill man. Along with many other human rights violations, but this is just how Israel conducts standard searches. In response to the death of the boys, Israel has carried out 34 airstrikes on the Gaza Strip and promoted ‘revenge attacks’ which has launched Israeli mobs on a spree to lynch Palestinians. These mobs have been responsible for attack Arabs working in McDonalds, standing in parking lots, and ultimately kidnapped and killed a 16-year-old boy from the West Bank. Because murder justifies more murder. Why isn’t any of this headline news? Well last time I checked the majority of news and media outlets are still owned by big time Zionists, the same ones that pour money into promoting Israeli propaganda on college campuses and the media industry. The Palestinian perspective is almost always misrepresented, disregarded or painted minimal as to portray Israel as the victim in headlines and eradicate their presence. America’s will come out and condemn both Israel and Palestine for barbaric behavior and lecture them on peace. Allow me to clarify; there is a massive difference between verbally condemning Israel and actually taking actions to penalize Israel. The international community has periodically gone to the UN with human rights violations committed by Israel on the daily. Needless to say, Israel hasn’t faced any real consequences. Despite any offenses Israel may carry out, they will still get their annual direct foreign allowance of $3 billion, courtesy of American taxpayers. So it’s pretty hard to say that Israel is being condemned simply because headlines aren’t screaming, “poor Israel!” Pro-Israelis will point out how scary it is being the only “democracy” surrounded by other barbaric Arab nations. Not a particularly well known fact about Israel is when they’re not busy oppressing Palestinians they find time to oppress others, such as African immigrants for “not being Jewish enough.” Most notably I’d like to draw your attention to a recent scandal in which Israel conducted a mass sterilization of migrant African women without their knowledge. Before I begin the most heated subject of all I’d like to be clear that I do not condone any type of violence, from either side. In 2008, Israel launched Operation Cast Lead, a 3 week non-stop attack on the Gaza Strip and in which Israel was as so kind as to drop leaflets on the region to warn citizens that they were going to be attacked. Keep in mind that the Gaza Strip is a bit smaller than Seattle with more than twice its population, so even if citizens wanted to hide where the hell were they going to go? Schools, hospitals, religious places of worship, they were all targets at the time, Israel claiming that Hamas had control of the institutions. Israel even managed to bomb the UN headquarters. But back to rockets – Hamas has launched rockets, homemade rockets that rarely hit their target. You could say Israel was a bit more equipped, throughout Cast Lead; they had dropped white phosphorus bombs on Gaza’s residents. White phosphorus is a chemical weapon, which is (once again) illegal under international law. Were they condemned? No but you can imagine the mothers of the children that were burned alive aren’t really putting much faith in pointless ‘peace negotiations’. I can’t help but wonder if Israelis would be as terrified for their safety if she were living as a Palestinians. It may not be so tangible but let me give you a little glimpse inside the current living conditions of Palestinians. Firstly, you don’t live in your own home because it was stolen; foreigners literally barged into your home and at gunpoint you were told to take your family and get the eff out. The men in your family including young boys, like the ones that were kidnapped, have been, are in, or will be imprisoned despite no evidence to even accuse them of crimes. You live by candlelight because the occupying power shuts off electricity when they’re bored. Your water supply is contaminated and scarce. If you’re not home by the curfew imposed by the occupier you could get hit by a sniper. You have to go through checkpoints to go 5 miles away where you are subject to being stripped, beaten and humiliated, just so you can get to work – and after hours of waiting they may not even let you pass. I’m just skimming the surface but I think you get the idea; essentially you are prisoner in your own country. Three teen boys kidnapped and murdered, this is the everyday Palestinian reality.
Literary critic Adam Kirsch is reading a page of Talmud a day, along with Jews around the world. One of the challenging things about the reading the Talmud is the way it combines the most painstaking rationality with the most florid superstition. Both of these qualities were on display in last week’s Daf Yomi reading, which encompassed chapters 6 and 7 of Tractate Gittin. Most of the text was occupied with technical questions about how a husband or wife can appoint an agent to deliver or receive a bill of divorce. But then the rabbis shift to telling tall tales about Ashmedai the king of the demons and his duel of wits with King Solomon. “There were three hundred types of demons in Shichin,” says Rabbi Yochanan, even as he acknowledges that “I do not know what a demon itself is.” If he had never seen a demon, why was Yochanan so sure they existed? How could the same mind be so exacting and so credulous at the same time? But perhaps the contradiction is only apparent. Clearly, what seems strange to us was perfectly natural for the rabbis themselves. The root of their knowledge of the universe was a text, the Bible, which itself combines legalism and magic. The same Moses who delivered the law on Sinai also transformed sticks into snakes and turned the Nile into blood. We are accustomed today to thinking of the universe as governed by law; but for the sages, it was the Jewish people who were law-bound, not natural phenomena. Perhaps the Law seemed all the more sacred and protective because it represented an island of rationality in an ocean of magic and madness. Or perhaps, in a deeper sense, the Law itself is magical. So much of rabbinic Judaism is about performing exactly the right actions and saying the right formulas in order to win God’s approval; as we saw much earlier in the Talmud, the rabbis even prescribe a particular sequence of prayers and fasts in order to provoke rainfall. The primary argument in Tractate Gittin, from the beginning, has been about the use of agents to deliver a bill of divorce, a get. In the first five chapters, we learned that a husband can use an agent to send his wife a get, but only under certain circumstances: The get must be properly written, its delivery must be certified by two witnesses, and the husband has the right to revoke it before it is actually handed over to the wife’s possession. Now, in chapter 6, we learn that there is also a second kind of agency involved in divorce. Not only can the husband appoint an agent to deliver the get, but the wife can also appoint an agent to receive the get. And this opens up a whole new range of possible complications. Ordinarily, if a woman appoints an agent for receipt, the divorce goes into effect immediately once the agent takes possession of the get. But a husband, we learn in Gittin 62b, has the power to nullify the wife’s agency and replace it with his own. Thus, if a woman appoints an agent for receipt, the husband can instruct him instead to act as an agent for delivery. In that case, the divorce does not go into effect when the agent takes the get, but only once he hands it over to the wife in person. Moreover, there are precise verbal formulas that must be used if the process is to work. If a woman says to her agent, “Bring my bill of divorce to me,” but then the agent encounters the husband and tells him, “Your wife said receive my bill of divorce for me,” which is he really—an agent for receipt or an agent for delivery? In this case, because the agent effectively misrepresented his powers, the rabbis rule that “even if the bill of divorce reached her possession, she is not divorced.” Agency can be subject to other qualifications as well. Can a principal instruct an agent not just what to do, but how specifically to do it? What if a woman tells her agent to receive her get in one particular place—say, a certain city—but he meets the husband somewhere else and takes possession of the get? Was the woman’s instruction definitive or should it simply be considered a preference or a piece of advice? Here again, the difference between delivery and receipt becomes important. If a woman appoints an agent for receipt, she has the power to instruct him where to receive the get. If, however, he is an agent for delivery, then it doesn’t matter where he finds the get, only that he brings it to the woman in the end. These questions of agency ramify widely in Jewish law, and the Gemara brings in parallels with the laws of eruv to establish the extent of an agent’s powers. A significant subset of divorce law has to do with deathbed divorces. Ordinarily, if a husband orders a scribe to write a bill of divorce but does not further order him to deliver it to the wife, there is no divorce. “A healthy man who said: Write a bill of divorce for my wife,” but doesn’t order it to be delivered, “sought to mock her,” the mishna instructs. If, however, a man who is about to be executed, or who is dying of illness, orders a get to be written, the legal presumption is that he also wants it to be delivered, and bystanders are authorized to do so. Even if a man has fallen into a pit so that he can’t be seen, only heard, bystanders are supposed to follow his verbal instructions to write out a get. This leads to the interesting question of how we know the man in the pit is who he claims to be. What if, the Gemara asks in Gittin 66a, the voice is actually that of a demon trying to make mischief? You can tell the difference between a man and a demon, Rav Yehuda explains, because a man casts a shadow and a demon doesn’t. The question of demons returns in Gittin 67b, where the mishna asks what is to be done if a man tries to divorce his wife while he is temporarily insane. In such a case, his orders are to be disregarded, since he doesn’t know what he really wants. And what causes temporary insanity? Shmuel says that it is drinking new wine, but another opinion is that insanity is caused by demonic possession: “The name of the demon is Kordeyakos,” a name derived from the Greek word for “heart.” To cure the possession, the sufferer should wear an amulet in which the demon’s name is written. This leads the Gemara to relate, starting in Gittin 68a, a long story about King Solomon’s encounter with Ashmedai, the king of the demons. Interestingly, though Ashmedai is a malevolent figure, he is also pious in his own way: “Every day he ascends to heaven and studies in the heavenly study hall and he descends to the earth and studies in the earthly study hall.” The idea that the king of demons is also a talmid hacham is fascinating. In a strange way it manages to domesticate the supernatural, bringing even demons under the wing of Jewish law. We have read earlier in the Talmud about the shamir, the magical worm that has the power to bore through the hardest substance. The shamir was Jewish mythology’s answer to a dilemma regarding the building of the First Temple. According to the Bible, the stones of the Temple were so sacred that they could not be cut with iron, since iron is associated with weapons and thus with violence. But then how were the stones cut? The answer is that the shamir hewed them into shape. And how did Solomon get his hands on the shamir? We learn from the Gemara that he did so by kidnapping Ashmedai: Solomon tricked the demon into drinking wine, and when he got drunk the king subdued him with a magic chain that bore the name of God. Ashmedai revealed that the shamir was in the possession of a wild rooster, who used it to hew cracks in stony mountains. To capture the rooster, Solomon used a clever trick: He covered the rooster’s nest in glass, so that when the rooster came back and tried to get in, he produced the shamir to cut through the glass. Then Solomon’s servant grabbed the shamir and made off with it, leaving the rooster to commit suicide out of disgrace. The king kept Ashmedai in chains until he was done building the Temple; but then Solomon fatally let his guard down. He removed Ashmedai’s chain, in order to get the demon to prove how strong he was; whereupon Ashmedai hurled Solomon 400 parasangs away, assumed his shape, and stole the throne. Only when it was observed that the king had started wearing socks in the harem, to hide his cloven hoofs, did people realize what had happened. In the end, Solomon got another magic ring and chain and managed to banish Ashmedai once and for all. It is a great story, full of imaginative detail, and I was left wondering who originally came up with it. At least one of the sages must have had the soul of a poet. *** To read Tablet’s complete archive of Daf Yomi Talmud study, click here. Adam Kirsch is a poet and literary critic, whose books include The People and the Books: 18 Classics of Jewish Literature.
How goes the Raiders’ possible move to Las Vegas? First of all, let’s note the news from Wednesday’s meeting of the NFL finance and stadium committees. The league heard a presentation/update from the Raiders on their proposed move to Las Vegas, and reportedly it went well. NFL official Eric Grubman said the Raiders have made “impressive” progress on the deal. Even before the meeting, Patriots owner Robert Kraft said, according to the Los Angeles Daily News, “I think it’s a good possibility” that the NFL will be on board with the move when it comes to a vote. All signs point to a move to the desert, then? Not so fast ... The Raiders’ Bay Area fans should not give up hope, because owner Mark Davis still needs more financing. Everything seems in place for a move. Nevada has voted to kick in $750 million, Davis and the NFL will toss in $500 million or so, and that leaves the project about $650 million short. That missing chunk of money is supposed to come from casino mogul Sheldon Adelson. But unless the Raiders and Adelson are keeping it a secret, they have not reached an agreement over what Adelson would expect in return for his generous contribution. I reached out to the Raiders on Tuesday with a list of questions on what’s up with the Adelson-Raiders talks. Are the two sides actively negotiating? Why no updates for the fans on this important matter? The Raiders politely declined to make any comment. This leads me to think there is no agreement. There have been reports that negotiations are stuck because Adelson is demanding terms that would give him, up front or potentially down the line, an ownership stake in the team, even a controlling interest. Can you imagine Davis risking being stripped of his control of the Raiders? Al Davis sold a percentage of the team several years ago, and Mark desperately wants to cling to the family’s stake, reportedly 47 percent. Al Davis is rolling over in his grave right now and phoning his lawyers. “The Raiders are looking at the potential of doing (the deal) without Mr. Adelson if it comes down to that,” Steelers owner Art Rooney II told Sports Business Journal on Wednesday. Which suggests that wandering somewhere in the Nevada desert is an investor, or group of investors, ready to provide $650 million. In return for the money, this person/these persons will get no significant shares of Raiders stock, while going all-in on a stadium that is not guaranteed to succeed? What if potential seat-license purchasers, heeding the sad buyer’s remorse of fans at Levi’s Stadium, don’t storm the sales office? What if other income sources don’t measure up to expectations/projections? Potential investors will consider that the NFL is experiencing non-growing pains, in the form of sagging TV ratings, for the first time ever. What if the money folks decide they can’t count on a continued steep rise in the value of NFL franchises? And this might be wild Las Vegas talk, but there is a buzz that Adelson is such a powerful and tyrannical presence in Las Vegas that other casino people are afraid to cross him by entering into talks with Davis. Until someone steps up with that $650 million, the Raiders’ Las Vegas stadium is a mirage. For now, the Raiders are stuck in Oakland, and could be there for a long time. Eventually, the A’s might strike a deal to build a new ballpark on the Coliseum land, and that could put the Raiders on the street, but that’s another deal that grinds along like a glacier in low gear. Mark Davis really wants a new stadium, but he might not be willing to risk losing his ownership stake on a roll of the dice in Vegas, when he could stay in the cruddy Coliseum, seated in the owner’s box. These are tough times if you’re a Raiders fans. Your fate rests on the back-room wheeling-dealing of rich, eccentric guys trying to get richer at your expense. But right now, you are not yet rushing out to buy your road map to Las Vegas. You wait and you hope. Scott Ostler is a San Francisco Chronicle columnist. Email: sostler@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @scottostler
Wow. That’s the word I kept thinking to myself when I played LawBreakers. Cliff Bleszinski’s new game from his studio, Boss Key Productions, is a delight. It’s like Overwatch turned up to 11. Prior to launching the beta for the game, I had little interest in the game. I figured it was going to be another shooter with some gimmick around character based classes and it would fall the way of Battleborn or something by not making a big splash. Upon reaching the main menu, I could feel myself swallowing my doubts just by simply listening to the awesome score that just made my eardrums melt in satisfaction. After loading up a match, selecting one of many characters, you’re thrust into the thick of it. The modes are pretty basic, one involves capturing a ball at the center of the map and take it to the opposing team’s goal to score. Simple enough! When the player runs towards the middle and boosts towards a hollowed out globe-like statue in the center to get the ball inside of it, they’ll found themselves floating… Gravity shifts and if you let yourself get distracted, you’ll be riddled with bullets. The big focus in LawBreakers aside from its wide variety of character is its movement. Each character has a unique way to quickly move throughout the map and once they reach the center, gravity flips for them and they’re frantically trying to dodge bullets from players on the ground while having plane-less dogfights in the air. It changes everything and adds a new layer of combat, one might think it would get boring as time goes on but it’s actually one of the best parts ever. I felt myself being pulled toward the center which is ironic since there’s basically no gravity once you get there, I just always wanted to be floating around and using my boosters to quickly move around and take out enemies in the air and on the ground. The combat is incredibly satisfying, while I didn’t get a good taste of every class in the game during the beta due to the amount of time I had to play and what I was actually good with, it’s incredibly fun regardless. Whether it’s simply filling someone with holes with an AR, using a special ability to shoot someone with a horde of rockets, slicing someone up with sharp edged blades, or just boosting towards someone floating around like Neil Armstrong so you can deliver a nice, swift kick to their face, LawBreakers kept me thoroughly entertained. It’s like the best spin-off/sequel to Overwatch you can possibly imagine. The game also has this feeling of nostalgia because it has an old-school FPS feel to it. You don’t aim down your sights, you have to pick up health packs, and it has that general feeling of the multiplayer of something like Quake or Unreal Tournament. It’s quick, you’re constantly strafing and dodging rockets and bullets, and you’re playing around in these maps that feel like they actual levels in a video game and not boring open maps that have no personality to them. You’ll find yourself memorizing certain points on the map so you can stage my battles around them in case you need to retreat to a health pack, you’ll be looking at where enemies are spawning from and noting their routes, it doesn’t feel like you’re just moving around looking for people to kill – there’s a level of strategy to it. LawBreakers manages to stand out due to the fact it appears to be a game that doesn’t have any weapons or classes locked to certain levels. While this is nothing new, it’s certainly welcomed. Anyone can jump into LawBreakers and not fear a level 100 player with the best gun in the game, everyone is on an even playing field in terms of what they’re equipped with. As long as the player is willing to learn and find a class that plays to their strength, they can quickly get in on the action and hold their own against players. On my first match, I got absolutely destroyed but in my second match, I got 47 kills and was the best player in the match. The fact that there’s so much to gawk at in the beta alone shows immense promise for LawBreakers. Shooter fans are going to both love and hate the second half of 2017 simply because there’s so many great FPSs for them to enjoy in the form of Destiny 2, Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus, Call of Duty: WWII, and now LawBreakers. If you’re looking for a satisfying new shooter to get hooked on, LawBreakers is for you. LawBreakers releases for PS4 and PC on August 8th, 2017.
A conservative Liberal backbencher opposed to same-sex marriage has warned cabinet not to "steamroll" the coalition partyroom and deny taxpayer dollars for both sides in a plebiscite on the issue. Eric Abetz is outraged over suggestions there may not be government funding for the yes and no cases and says it would breach the arrangements agreed to last year. "This idea that you can have a proper plebiscite without funding for the yes and no cases would not be the sort of plebiscite that was envisaged by the partyroom," he told ABC Radio. The federal government is expected to reveal details of its same-sex marriage plebiscite this week as church leaders say they were promised campaign funding. Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull is expected to reveal details of the planned plebiscite to his party room on Tuesday. He's likely to come under pressure from churches if those plans don't include public funding for the "no" and "yes" cases. RELATED READING Same sex marriage debate is about real people, says Wong One of the country's most senior Anglican leaders, Archbishop of Sydney Glenn Davies, says Mr Turnbull promised him in February taxpayer money would be forthcoming, News Corp reports. A month later, Archbishop Davies reportedly met with Attorney-General George Brandis, who asked how much money would be appropriate. Mr Turnbull said he was not about to debate the contents of a private meeting and discussion. "Any public funding, whatever the nature or terms may be, will be scrupulously equal as ... between the 'yes' case and the 'no' case as you would expect," Mr Turnbull told reporters in Canberra on Sunday. It could be more than $10 million for each side, on top of the estimated $160 million cost of running the national vote. Senator Brandis said there had been a thorough process of consultation with all sides. "What those stakeholders have been told on all occasions is that in arranging or designing the architecture of this plebiscite, both points of view ... will be treated by the government with strict equality," he told reporters in Brisbane. He acknowledged the plebiscite would be an expensive exercise and said the government was seeking to keep costs as low as possible. Australian Christian Lobby boss Lyle Shelton tweeted that he was at the February meeting and the archbishop's recollection was correct. "We can't let foreign donations buy our vote, like Ireland's," Mr Shelton wrote. Labor frontbencher Terri Butler said the latest debate showed the plebiscite plan was going from bad to worse. "Either (Mr Turnbull) has lied to church leaders or he is now lying to the Australian people," she told reporters in Brisbane. Labor and lower house crossbenchers will put separate bills legalising same-sex marriage to parliament on Monday and the latter group has written to Opposition Leader Bill Shorten urging him to ditch Labor's bill and get on board with theirs. They say only legislation that is not "owned" by any one political party has a chance of attracting Liberal support. Meanwhile, John Howard has defended opponents of same-sex marriage, saying it's absurd to say their stance makes them homophobes. "Sure there are homophobic people in our community, course there are, just as there are some racists," the former prime minister told Sky News on Sunday. "(But) the implication from many on the progressive side of politics is that if you don't support same-sex marriage you are a homophobe, that's absurd." Mr Howard's government explicitly defined marriage in 2004 as being between a man and a woman.
FILE PHOTO: Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) arrives for a Senate health care vote on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., July 27, 2017. REUTERS/Yuri Gripas WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A quest by Republicans to open Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Reserve was slowed after a nonpartisan Senate official ruled late on Wednesday that the exploration was subject to environmental assessments by the Interior Department. Senator Lisa Murkowski, a Republican from Alaska and the head of the Senate energy panel, has been pushing a measure in the U.S. tax bill that would open a portion of the refuge on the coastal plain to two lease sales in 10 years for drilling. But the nonpartisan senate official took issue with the energy committee measure as it did not fully consider requirements under a national environmental law. The official ruled that oil exploration in the refuge is not exempt to an environmental law requiring the Interior Department to commission an assessment, a Democratic aide said. Such environmental assessments can take months or years to complete. “This is good news for us because it could slow down or prevent drilling,” the Democratic aide said. Republicans offered new language to the bill after the move and said that the drilling would still advance if the tax bill passes. “There was a little hiccup, but they fixed it in the amendment they just filed tonight, so full steam ahead,” a Republican Senate aide said. Murkowski said she was not concerned about procedural questions and that the issues would be fully resolved. The Arctic reserve, protected by the federal government since 1960, is home to wildlife populations including caribou, polar bears and millions of birds that migrate to six of the seven continents. The U.S. Geological Survey estimates the area Republicans want to drill in has up to 12 billion barrels of recoverable crude.
Mr Perminov said Roscosmos' science council would hold a 'closed meeting' The head of Russia's federal space agency has said it will work to divert an asteroid which will make several passes near the Earth from 2029. Anatoly Perminov told the Voice of Russia radio service that the agency's science council would hold a closed meeting to discuss the issue. Any eventual plan is likely to be an international collaboration, he said. The US space agency said in October that there is a one-in-250,000 chance of Apophis hitting Earth in 2036. That announcement was a significant reduction in the probability of an impact, based on previous calculations that put the chances at about one-in-45,000. The asteroid is estimated to pass within about 30,000 km of the Earth in 2029. Mr Perminov, who is the chief of Roscosmos, gave little detail of any plans that the agency has, but was quoted by Interfax news agency as saying that the solution would not entail the use of nuclear weapons. Other schemes that have been put forth in the past for diverting asteroids from collision courses include spacecraft that nudge the space rocks out of their trajectory through force, or diverting them with "solar sails" that use the wind of particles ejected from the Sun. "People's lives are at stake," Mr Perminov reportedly told the radio service Golos Rossii (Voice of Russia). "We should pay several hundred million dollars and build a system that would allow us to prevent a collision, rather than sit and wait for it to happen and kill hundreds of thousands of people." Bookmark with: Delicious Digg reddit Facebook StumbleUpon What are these? E-mail this to a friend Printable version
Health In many cases, meat is stored for upto 10 days, sometimes even two weeks. When officials from the Health Department of the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) descended on the locally famous Green Bawarchi restaurant in Mirjalguda in Secunderabad, they found enough reasons to impose penalty. Officials found meat that was stored in unhygienic conditions for more than a week, while the ideal norm is one day storage. Following the raid, officials have reportedly served them a notice, along with a penalty of Rs 10,000. This is not the first incident revealing the grossly unhygienic conditions of eateries in the city, especially in the Secunderabad area. In January, the Secunderabad Cantonment Board (SCB) sealed five outlets in a single day, with one of them even allegedly serving rotten fruit juice and cheese with fungus. During a surprise raid on some reputed eateries in the Cantonment area, the sanitary wing officials of the SCB found that the customers were being served stale food. This included Friends Corner at Marredpally, which was serving six different varieties of juices to customers, all allegedly using rotten fruits and Stop N Go, near AOC, which was serving a pre-prepared dish with rotten mutton. In Best Bakery, the official found that the owner was preparing food in a temporary kitchen constructed on an open nala. Punjab Kurries and Dosa Corner in Marredpally were also sealed for questionable hygiene standards. There are several departments that deal with the issue of hygiene and sanitation of eateries. The GHMC's health department is one of those, mainly dealing with kitchen hygiene. This involves things like flooring, painting, utensils being used, storage, personal hygiene of workers etc, according to Dr B Palavan Kumar, the GHMC's Health Wing in-charge of Secunderabad, Malkajgiri and Begumpet. Talking about hotel Taj Mahal in Secunderabad, which was fined last year, Kumar says that hygiene is a grave concern. "Even when we visit posh five star and three star hotels, I have observed that they do not give a lot of importance to the personal hygiene of their workers. The workers' nails are often not cut, and they work in a dirty atmosphere," he says. "Sometimes, even in the big hotels in Secunderabad, the flooring is damaged or water is stagnating," he adds. Meanwhile, organisations like the SCB and its sanitation wing, deal with the conditions of the kitchen and the food itself. Speaking about the raids conducted last month, Devender, Superintendent of the SCB's Sanitation Department, says, "In some kitchens, we saw rats, cockroaches and other insects. The floor was not proper or the roof was leaking. Even the storage system was unhygienic." There are three main things to consider, according to Devender -- Vegetables, meat and dairy products. "Vegetables are cheap and easy to dispose. Though there are exceptions, most eateries use fresh fruits and vegetables while cooking. However, dairy products in many cases, are either not stored properly, or are past the expiry date, which makes them unfit for consumption," Devender adds. Devender also states that a lot of biryani joints were found violating rules. "Many times, biryani outlets are the main offenders. Meat in some hotels, which included the meat used for chicken biriyani and Mutton biryani was stale and old," he says. Referring to the case of Green Bawarchi, he says, "Ideally, they should buy it the same day and cook it. Even if it is one or two days old, we can give them a warning, as they may not have been able to clear the previous day's stock." "However, when we checked the bills of the meat from slaughterhouses, we found that some were as old as one week or 10 days. In one earlier case, it was almost two weeks old," he adds. Devender also adds that some kitchens had bathrooms attached, meant for employees. "It is a continuous process and we will always conduct raids and checking, to ensure that they don't violate rules. As far as the consumer goes, you can always ask that you at least get a look at the kitchen. You can also demand to see a receipt of the slaughterhouse, if the meat smells stale or looks rotten," Devender adds. Often, officials levy a heavy penalty on the eateries, or in some cases, shut them down until they are willing to refurnish the premises. Many traders and shop owners however, have cried foul, alleging that the officials were making it hard for them to do business. Justifying the large fine, Kumar says, "We have to charge a heavy penalty, to create a sense of fear. Unlike a court, where even a small fine goes on record, our fines are paid and forgotten." "We also video record the entire raid, as evidence. We don't seek to trouble the traders, we just want them to understand that they cannot violate the norms and get away with it by paying a small fine. That's why a bigger penalty is advisable," he adds. "We are working for public safety, and if someone dies tomorrow, then who will be at fault? This is why we are always calling for stricter rules where food safety is concerned and not just some routine norm," he concludes. "When we shut them down, we do see some permanent change. Many eateries that we closed, have reopened, but after ensuring that all the rules are being followed," says Devender.
Home » Church » Pre and Postmarital sex – an Anglican perspective I have several friends and clients who because of my Anglican seminary training ask me about the religious or church“rules” concerning sex. Specifically what are the religious “rules” as regards to unmarried sex as a widow or divorced person who is north of fifty. The marriage vows say, “till death do us part”… well for many, it has! In the Anglican tradition this is a bit of a moving target. Prior to the Marriage Act 1753, British couples could live together and have sex after their betrothal or “the spousals”. Until the mid-1700s, it was normal and acceptable for the bride to be pregnant at the nuptials, the later church public ceremony for the marriage. Indeed, in the 1170s in Wales “it was common practice for ordinary couples to co-habit before marriage and for cousins to marry one another” despite the disapproval of clerics sent to Britain by the Paris-based “Reform Church” movement, a Catholic faction that attempted to refocus society’s moral compass with a particular emphasis on sex and marriage With the Act in force after 1753, for the first time in British history, all marriages in England and Wales had to take place in their parish church. (The law also applied to Catholics, but Jews and Quakers were exempt.) I would point out that this was an act of Parliament and bore only a figleaf of theological thought. The Act combined the spousals and nuptials and, by the start of the 19th century, social convention prescribed that brides be virgins at marriage. Illegitimacy became more socially discouraged, with first pregnancies outside of marriage declining from 40% to 20% during the Victorian era but returning to 40% by the start of the 21st century. (As an aside, the occurrence of virgin births in the United States sits at about 1 in 100. With the rise of the Evangelical Religious Right in the USA (the so called “Moral Majority”) and the rise in abstinence only education in the States it is becoming a common practice for teens to remain virgins by enjoying anal intercourse!) The last Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, in keeping with modern church understandings of sexuality was tolerant of premarital sex (or postmarital sex) but strongly endorsed marriage as “a necessary commitment for a long-term relations and made clear he does not believe the Church should have sanctions against those who have sex outside marriage. By contrast, in 2013 the new Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby stated that “My understanding of sexual ethics has been that, regardless of whether it’s gay or straight, sex outside marriage is wrong.” He reiterated this belief again later in 2013, further noting that “To abandon the ideal simply because it’s difficult to achieve is ridiculous.” After Welby made his first statement, a Sunday Times poll found that “A majority of adults (69%, including 76% of those professing no faith) believe Justin Welby to be wrong in condemning sex outside marriage, while 17% think he is right (including 30% of Anglicans), and 13% are unsure.” Needless to say, I disagree with Archbishop Welby. So what does Jesus say? Matthew 5:27-28 condemns feelings of lust experienced by a man towards a woman. In the King James version, Jesus is recorded as saying: “Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not commit adultery: But I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart.” I would note that every reference to adultery in the entire Bible concerns sexual intercourse between a married or betrothed woman and a man other than the one to whom she is married or betrothed.” If adultery is limited by definition to activity between a man and another man’s wife or near wife, then “adultery in ones heart” could also be assumed to refer only to lust directed at another man’s wife or betrothed woman. This passage is actually describing a man coveting one of his neighbor’s possessions — a wife. He is violating the Tenth commandment of Exodus 20:17: “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour’s.” Let me point out, the Greek word translated as “lust” here, epithumeo does not merely mean ‘to have a desire.’ It is a word which actually indicated a strong, even consuming, desire, most often for something which, for whatever reason, is not lawful for one to possess. This is the way in which the word is used at many points in the New Testament … it seems quite obvious that Jesus is describing, per the connotation of the word being used, looking upon a woman with an intense desire. Not a mere glance, not a general sort of attraction that may be normal to any heterosexual man, but an intense desire, with an idea towards POSSESSING the desired object. What Jesus is talking about here is looking upon a woman in such a way as to desire to take her for yourself, even if it is not lawful for you to have her, in this specific example because she is another man’s wife. Clearly Jesus is attaching the particular “sin” connotation to epithumeo, and applying it to the sort of ogling that a man might do which would lead him to then think about and develop a strong desire for the woman who it would be unlawful for him to pursue. From all this, it is apparent that Jesus exposition in Matthew 5:28 is not talking about normal male heterosexuality. It is not talking about never being attracted to a woman who you might like to marry one day. It is talking about abstaining from a strong and persistent desire to possess or take, even in the temporariness of adultery, a woman who is not your wife, and who in fact is probably the wife of another man. I really think looking at John 8 might help here. “while Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. Early in the morning he came again to the temple. All the people came to him and he sat down and began to teach them. The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery; and making her stand before all of them, they said to him, ‘Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery. Now in the law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?’ They said this to test him, so that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, ‘Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.’ And once again he bent down and wrote on the ground. When they heard it, they went away, one by one, beginning with the elders; and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. Jesus straightened up and said to her, ‘Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?’ She said, ‘No one, sir.’ And Jesus said, ‘Neither do I condemn you. Go your way, and from now on do not sin again.’ Jesus said, “neither do I condemn you.” That is what I would hold on to… Jesus has come primarily to change lives, to write his words on the hearts of his followers. Following in those footsteps, the apostle Paul would later say to the Corinthians, “You yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts, known and read by everybody.” I understand that you might be afraid that others might judge you. I would point out what Our Lord and Saviour (OL&S) would say “Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” Love, as it was understood by Jesus and his contemporaries, is threefold: Eros (sexual love), Agape (the covenant love of God for humans, as well as the human reciprocal love for God; the term necessarily extends to the love of one’s fellow man), and Philia (brotherly love). This threefold love is what I pray that anyone in an intimate relationship is experiencing with your partner. Catholic Philosophers Daniel Dombrowski and Robert Deltete of the Jesuit Seattle University write: “A rich spiritual life is not necessarily hindered by, and may actually be enhanced by, premarital (or post marital) sexual relations,” if those relationships “exhibit mutual consent and mutual agape-ic respect.” They add “to loosen the connection between moral sexual relations and marriage does not imply abandonment of a sacramental view of marriage wherein the best sex is that which enriches a lifelong agape-ic commitment between two individuals.” That is the “best” but not the only good way of expressing love sexually! Unsurprisingly, the physical actions of sex aptly symbolize what sex tends to do psychologically. There is not just physical nakedness; there is emotional nakedness. We trust our partner with full exposure of our passions and needs. We shed our emotional clothes and societal masks and present ourselves as we are. Sex is a huge act of trust, a hopeful abandonment of our normal defenses. It takes many delightful forms and may involve various kinds of penetration and envelopment; this symbolizes the emotional interweaving that occurs in sexually charged friendship. The lover may remain only an experience, but she or he tends to become a way of life. Sex bonds, and bonds powerfully. Our human sexuality is a gift from God. And I don’t believe in a God who would give is such a tool for pleasure and intimacy and connection an then forbid it to us. That is a God who is setting his creatures up for failure…A cruel teasing God. Not the God that is and of Love. As are we… made by Love for Love. I would like to think that OL&S speaking today about sex might paraphrase the words of a character in a book I read recently:
JUST like computer-savvy teenagers, young smooth-coated otters are quicker to master new technology than the older generation, scientists have found. They also help each other solve problems – albeit without the assistance of social media. In a series of tests otters were given containers of food that could only be reached by overcoming technological obstacles such as clip-on, pull-off or unscrew lids. The problem-solving strategies they employed displayed a high level of social learning that was much more apparent in young animals. Dr Neeltje Boogert, from the Centre for Ecology and Conservation at the University of Exeter’s Penryn Campus in Cornwall, said: “Our results suggest smooth-coated otters adopt a ‘copy when young’ strategy. “The offspring in our study learned how to solve these puzzles much quicker than their parents – more than six times faster. “The order in which the young otters solved the puzzles followed the strength of their social ties. “This indicates that the juveniles copied those siblings they spent most time with.” The containers contained irresistible treats such as peanuts or fish heads. For the otters, the most difficult task was accessing a block of frozen shrimp attached to a bamboo cane that had to be moved upwards and to the right. Fewer than half the animals managed to obtain this reward. The otters were studied at a number of zoos and wildlife parks in the UK. Another species of otter, the Asian short-clawed otter, did not share the same copying ability, said the researchers, whose findings appear in the Royal Society journal Open Science. Dr Boogert said: “Asian short-clawed otters are not known to forage in groups, and their natural diet consists mainly of prey such as shellfish and crabs that do not require group-hunting strategies. “As a result, they may have less of a tendency to turn to each other to see how to solve a puzzle such as how to extract food from a new source. “In the wild, smooth-coated otters show co-ordinated group-hunting strategies such as V-shaped swimming formations to catch fish, so it makes sense that they would be naturally inclined to watch each other for foraging information.”
A Facebook post by Aboriginal social rights campaigner Celeste Liddle has left people in hysterics today, after discovering the true meaning behind the name of a Melbourne winery, writes @MadelineHayman. Scrolling through her Facebook feed, Celeste came across an ad for Sunbury’s Goona Warra Vineyard, which she screenshot and posted it to her page to give her friends a laugh. “I had driven past it in Sunbury and I saw the name and it amused me and so when I did come across it [on Facebook], well you know, I knew what ‘goona’ means,” Celeste said, still laughing. For those who don’t know, ‘goona’ means ‘poo’ or ‘shit’ across many Aboriginal language dialects, and ‘warra’ means ‘crazy’. “I sort of said, what does ‘warra’ mean around Victoria, you lot? And pretty much confirmed what I thought has happened, which you know, some blackfulla probably told them some fibs many years ago about name origins,” Celeste said. One of Celeste’s friends said that in their language, ‘worra’ means ‘no good’ or ‘scary’. It was established in 1863, but it’s unclear how long the winery has held the name Goona Warra. Their website claims that the words mean ‘black swan’ in the local Aboriginal dialect – Wurundjeri. NITV’s enquires to the Wurundjeri Tribe Land Council confirmed that the words Goona Warra do in fact mean what Celeste and her friends thought. “It depends on the way they spell it because we have a word ‘gunuwarry’ which means ‘swan’,” Aunty Gail Smith said. After telling Aunty Gail the story, she did a quick Google search on the vineyard in question. “I just what's-a-named it in on Google and on their picture it’s got the words together. It’s got no space, but I wonder how they got… I might have to ring them and tell them,” she said, after a good chuckle. Goona Warra Estate logo It wouldn’t be the first time blackfullas have played tricks on the European settlers. According to an article by Jane Simpson for Sydney University, the town Goodna in Western Brisbane has also been a victim. “As the white settlers evicted the Aborigines, they asked what they called the area. ‘Goona’ was the reply,” writer Tyson Yunkaporta said. “Only later did the settlers discover ‘goona’ was the Aboriginal word for ‘shit’, forcing maps, signs and deeds to be changed. "The 'founding fathers' decided to insert an extra letter to give the name a new, positive feel, and renamed the area Goodna.” NITV reached out to Goona Warra Vineyard for comment but did not receive a response by time of publication.
Tumblr is asking its iPhone and iPad users to update their applications and change their passwords after admitting it has suffered a security lapse. In a very short post on its staff Tumblr, the company's vice-president of product Derek Gottfrid said that customers who have been using either of its iPhone or iPad apps should update their password on Tumblr and anywhere else that they have used the same one. A spokesperson for the company told ZDNet that it was only notified of the security vulnerability in its iOS app earlier today. "We immediately released an update that repairs the issue, and are notifying affected users. We obviously take these incidents very seriously, and deeply regret this error," the company said. No further details on what information was potentially compromised have been made available. Version 3.4.1 of Tumblr's app has been described by Gottfrid as a "very important security update", and the patch notes on the Apple Store only state that it is a "security fix". The lapse in security does not appear to affect the Android or web-based versions of Tumblr at this point in time.
Weiss blinked as she woke up from a perfect dream. She couldn't remember what it was, although she remembered being very happy. She moved to stretch, and then realized someone had their arms around her. She panicked for a moment, and then realized who it was. Ruby was fast asleep still, a small smile on her cute little face. She had her arms protectively wrapped around Weiss, and was snoring ever so softly. Weiss looked at her face and was caught in a rollercoaster of emotions. At first she wanted to scream at the girl and tell her to get out. Then she just wanted to cuddle closer. Then she just wanted to gently wake her up and ask what was going on. Then Ruby stirred, and Weiss panicked again. But all she did was roll over slightly, pulling Weiss closer to her side as she lay on her back, one arm still around Weiss and one draping over the side of the bed. Weiss inched closer to her face and just looked. Her hair had gotten all in her face overnight, so Weiss gently reached her hand up and slowly brushed the hair out of the way. She got a strange tingly feeling in her hands and chest when she touched Ruby. What was going on with her? She put her head on the pillow next to Ruby and just looked. She wanted to do something, but what? Did she wake her up? Cuddle? …kiss her? Weiss gulped as she realized that's exactly what she wanted to do. Kiss her? My friend? Ruby? But…that'd be so weird! But I want to do it so badly… Weiss turned the idea over and over in her head till she reached a compromise. She slowly moved forward and gently brushed her lips against Ruby's cheek, putting an arm around her as she did so. A hot feeling rushed through her body and settled in her chest as she did so, and she felt very, very happy. Even if it was a bit weird. But it was just a kiss on the cheek right? She had seen Mother do that to her friends all the time, so it must be normal. Right? After a few more minutes of Weiss snuggling up, Ruby slowly stirred and blinked her eyes open to see Weiss pressing herself against her side, cuddling up to Ruby with her arm around her stomach. Ruby blushed and decided to let her know she was awake. She took her other arm and gently stroked Weiss's cheek, which caused her to jerk up in surprise, her face turning very, very red. "Oh! Um, Ruby! You're awake…" Weiss said in a surprised, but not unhappy, voice. "Sorry, I didn't want to wake you…" Ruby smiled and sat up on the bed, pulling Weiss with her and putting her arm around her. "That's okay. Plus, it's like six anyway, and I still can't find my way around this school. You need to guide me to our early class, remember?" Weiss blinked. Although she had made no such promises, she didn't see a problem making one. She smiled a small smile and leaned her head against Ruby's shoulder. "Alright." She said in a soft voice. The two girls sat like that for a few moments, and then Weiss realized what was going on was getting a little…weird. Not in a bad way, per say, but…she wasn't quite sure how to put it. So she stood up. "Can you please leave while I change? And you should probably get dressed if you want to go get breakfast." Ruby blinked. "Breakfast?" Smiling, Weiss poked Ruby on the nose. "Yes you dolt, breakfast. We're going to breakfast. And see if your friend Blake wants to come too. I bet Yang is at the gym, but Blake should still be around, right?" Ruby grinned a very wide grin. Standing up she pulled Weiss into a bear hug and said "Awesome! I'll go get her!" then ran out the door. Weiss giggled, still very red in the face. Having a friend was going to need some adjusting, she reasoned. …. Blake was still sound asleep when Ruby walked in, but a few shakes of her shoulders and she was sitting up on the bed, yawning. "What's up Ruby? Is it time for class?" "No, but Weiss wants to go to breakfast and invited you. So come on, put some clothes on and let's go!" Ruby would have been jumping with happiness had she not been pulling off her slept-in school clothes and pulling on a nice dress. "Do you think this is good enough?" she asked Blake, turning around a little bit. It wasn't anything too fancy. Just a gray-ish dress with a rose pattern on it. Blake smiled. "Ruby Rose, are we trying to impress someone?" Ruby blushed. "I thought so. Well, you look beautiful in that. I'm honestly rather scared to see you in something more formal." Ruby looked at Blake, her eyes wide. "Really? Honest? You mean that?" Blake came up and gave Ruby a hug and a pat on the head. "Of course I mean that you big dummy. You look great. Go give her a nosebleed while I change." Ruby giggled and pulled on some flip-flops. Sneakers would just look weird, and the weather wasn't even cold yet. Walking over and knocking on Weiss's door was harder than she thought it would be. She was nervous. Will she like it? What was up with earlier? Does she like me like I like her? Or does she think we're friends and is acting the way I do around friends? This is so confusing. For once, Ruby regretting acting so huggy-touchy lovey-dovey with all her friends, otherwise this would be a lot easier to figure out. Weiss opened the door and said "Ruby is that-" and stopped. She saw Ruby in a dress, a sleeveless dress cut just above her knees, with no socks on. Just sandals. She stopped speaking and her mouth just kind of hung open for a minute as she stared. "Um, Weiss? You okay?" Ruby asked tensely. Does she not like it? She doesn't like it. Stupid moron, why didn't you just wear normal clothes? Now she's gonna laugh at you and make you change and you're going to look like a fool. "You…ah…" Weiss said, her face turning a small shade of pink. "You look….beautiful." Ruby blushed. Oh. Weiss was wearing her normal white shirt with a nondescript white skirt, with her shoes with elevated heels. She usually felt very pretty, but at the moment she felt rather plain next to Ruby. "Um…" Ruby started. "You…um…you look pretty too." Weiss turned a little redder and instead of saying anything, grabbed Ruby's upper arm and dragged her across the hall to fetch Blake. Ruby giggled a little as Blake opened the door just as Weiss was about to knock. Seeing the two, Blake smiled. "Look at the happy couple. C'mon, let's go. I'll drive. Weiss opened her mouth to protest, but Blake had already walked off. Ruby took care of it though, breaking off from Weiss and running to tackle Blake from behind. The two nearly fell over, but Blake was laughing as she hugged Ruby quick, sending her back to Weiss with a small shove. The two started walking behind Blake at a small distance, not really sure what to say. As they reached the car, Weiss broke the silence. "She, um, didn't mean that? Right? She was joking?" I hope my feelings aren't that obvious…. Ruby nodded. "Yeah. Don't worry." Weiss sighed in relief and her shoulders relaxed a little. She then reached out and grabbed Ruby's hand, much to the redhead's surprise. "Shut up and don't talk about it. Not now. Just roll with it." Weiss muttered as Ruby opened her mouth to say something. Listening for once, Ruby shut up and kept walking, but this time with a noticeable spring in her step. Weiss smiled a little. I don't know what these feelings are, but….all I know is, being with this girl makes me happy. And I don't want to fuck that up. So I'm gonna be quiet for now, and figure it out on my own time. But for now, I'm happy just spending time with her. Once they got in the car, Weiss kept holding onto Ruby's hand, although at the same time she tried, unsuccessfully, to ignore it. Ruby loved it, and was gently tracing circles on Weiss's hand with her thumb. I'm not sure what Weiss means by this, but hell yes I'm going to enjoy it. Maybe she likes me and is figuring it all out, maybe she's just being a friend. Either way, I'm going to keep my feelings under wraps for now. I don't want to screw up what we have… … Lunchtime arrived, and it was the first time the group met up with Yang after last night's incident. The three were sitting at a booth in one of the school's many lounge areas when the blonde walked up, looking somewhat sheepish. Weiss and Ruby were sitting next to each other, although Weiss slowly inched away as Yang showed up and plopped down next to Blake. An awkward silence consumed the group for a few minutes, then Yang spoke. "Weiss…I just want to say, I'm really, really sorry for last night. At this point it's obvious that Ruby has forgiven you for whatever crap you said to her, and apparently likes you quite a bit. I don't want to make her unhappy, so I'm not going to interfere with that. And I'm REALLY sorry. Really. Truly I am." Weiss wasn't really sure what to say. So she just stuck her hand out, and Yang shook it, then spoke again. "We might not be really close like you and Ruby, or Ruby and Blake, or me and Ruby…come to think of it, Ruby, you're really close with a lot of people. Jesus." Blake glared at Yang. "U-uhm, anyway, what I meant to say is, can we just be normal friends? You don't have to love me, you certainly don't have to be all Ruby on me, but can we be cool?" Weiss thought about it for a minute. Then she gave a brusque nod. "Alright. I'll try. But no guarantees." Yang grinned. "All I'm asking for. Now, what are we eating?" As Yang devoured the food the three girls got for her, Weiss noticed that Ruby had inched her way back over to her and had leaned against her, putting her head on her shoulder. Weiss sighed contentedly, putting an arm around Ruby. Today has gone far better than expected. … "Ruby, come on, it isn't that hard." Weiss was saying, trying to be encouraging. "But…I just don't get it. I did the thing, then the other thing, but I still don't get it! What now?" Ruby put her head in her hands and groaned. "This makes no seeeeeense." "Ruby, it makes perfect sense." Weiss said, doing her best to be patient with the girl. "You just have to put all the like terms together. See, here we have 3xy, 4x, and 5xy. So what can you do there?" Ruby looked hard at the numbers Weiss wrote down. "Um…combine….the three and five?" Weiss clapped her hands together. "Yes! Exactly! You take the 3xy and see if its minus or plus the 5xy. It's plus, so you end up with 4x plus 8xy." Ruby blinked. "Oh. That's it?" "That's it. There are going to be bigger problems, obviously, but this is the basic gist of it." Weiss said, rubbing Ruby's back. They had been studying since dinnertime, and Ruby had opted to put on her pajamas. "They're comfy! I can't study unless I'm comfy." Weiss was wearing more casual clothing, but was still rather uncomfortable about wearing her nightie in front of Ruby. "Hey Weiss?" Ruby asked, her voice quiet. "What's up? Another problem?" Weiss said, looking over Ruby's shoulder at her papers. "No, that isn't it…I just wanted to ask a question." "Oh. Alright, go for it. What's on your mind?" Weiss sat next to Ruby and looked at her face. Ruby was obviously fighting to find words, and the right ones. This wasn't like her. "Ruby, you're terrible with words. Just spit it out." Ruby giggled a little, and acquiesced. "I just wanted to know your, ah, opinion on…gay…people." Weiss blinked, a little surprised at such a blunt question. Then again, she had asked for it. "I don't really have a problem with it. They're just people like you and me after all. Why do you ask?" Ruby smiled and pointedly wasn't looking at Weiss. Instead, she developed a sudden intense interest at a small crack on the wall. After a few moments, Weiss got it. "Oh. So you're…" "Yup." "And you wanted to know if I would…what, hate you for it or something?" Ruby blushed. "Kinda. Yeah. There are still people like that, after all…" Weiss smiled and pulled Ruby over to her and sat her on her lap, putting her arms around her. "Ruby. We had this conversation, albeit reversed. I could never hate you. I like you a lot too you know." Ruby put her hands over Weiss's and closed her eyes, happy to just sit there. "Thank you, Weiss." "No problem. Now come on, three more problems. Let's just get them out of the way." "Alright Weiss…" Ruby said, moving back to her chair. Weiss smiled as she watched Ruby struggle with yet another math problem. So…Ruby is…that way. I had a suspicion…but I never thought it was actually true. What do I do now? Do I tell her about my feelings? No, no, no ,no, that would be stupid. Stupid stupid stupid. She just trusted you with a very personal piece of information, don't act like a fool. Ruby groaned as she encountered another roadblock. "Weeeeeeiss. Help meeeeeee….." she said in a very pitiful voice as she gave Weiss puppy-dog eyes. "Don't look at me like that!" Weiss said. "Now what's the problem?" … The next day rolled around, and Weiss was still a little confused on how to proceed. She knew she liked Ruby. But did she like like her? Was she…gay too? The idea was a curious one, to say the least. She had never considered herself a lesbian. Then again, she never liked boys very much. She had seen some cute ones, of course, but had never had any desire to interact with them very much. So was she a lesbian? Or was Ruby some sort of freak exception, like the universe being a big pervert? Weiss wasn't sure, but she sure as hell wasn't getting anywhere arguing with herself. She'd go in circles. She looked next to her at the sleeping form of Yang Xiao Long, the girl who only two days ago she seemed to have nothing but enmity for. Now they were…sort of friends. Could she really talk to her about this? She frowned and decided she didn't really have much to lose. "Hey. Yang. Get up." She said in a rather loud voice, trying to awaken the girl in the bed across from her. "Yang!" she yelled when she didn't respond. Yang jerked up in bed, her fists in the air. "What? Where is he? I'll punch his lights out!" "What? Yang, there isn't anyone here but us." Weiss said, exasperated. Looking around, Yang realized she was right. "Oh. Oops. What's up Weiss?" she said, putting her fists down and trying to play off her rather embarrassing awakening. "I was hoping to talk to you about something." Weiss said hesitantly. Yang blinked. Was Weiss acting…normal? Even a bit…shy? What was this? "Um, sure. Go ahead." "….okay first I have to ask a weird question. Are you straight?" Weiss burst out, not sure if she could go through with that question unless it was right then, and all at once. Yang shook her head. "Not all the way. I'm bisexual. I like chocolate and vanilla, y'know?" Yang smiled. "Why do you ask?" "Um…how did you figure out that you were…bi?" Weiss asked, not sure how to proceed in this kind of conversation, having never had one before. She began twiddling her thumbs as she waited for Yang's answer. "Well…I had always liked boys. I had a boyfriend when I was fifteen. Then after that didn't work out I discovered I was really attracted to this girl at my high school after I had started going. But we didn't talk much and I was always too nervous to tell her." Yang laughed. "What brought these thoughts about? Is there someone who's getting you all hot and bothered?" Yang said the last part with a mischievous smile on her face. Weiss blushed. "Sort of. So…after you realized you liked that girl, you figured out you were bi?" "Not instantly. I had myself convinced that it was my imagination or something. But eventually it got to the point where I couldn't ignore it anymore. I accepted that I liked girls too and tried a few times to ask her out, but it never really worked. I always chickened out." Weiss frowned, deep in thought. "Thanks, Yang. You're…not as bad as I thought." "Coming from you, that means a lot. You're pretty cool too. But can I ask you a question?" Yang got serious all of a sudden. Nodding, Weiss said "Yeah, sure. What is it?" "Is it Ruby?" Weiss blinked. Yang was either sharper than she looked or her and Ruby had been more careless than she thought. Her silence was confirmation enough for Yang, who gave a brusque nod. "Alright. I assume you know Ruby's gay at this point, so I'm just gonna come out and say it: If you want to ask her out, go for it. But don't think I'm going to just sit back and watch. My baby sister is precious to me. So if you start dating her and then decide it's 'just a phase' we're going to have words. Got it?" "Yeah. I got it." Weiss said. As Yang got up and ready to head for the gym, Weiss asked another question. "Yang? Can you…can you keep this a secret for now? Until I'm sure?" Yang smiled. "Course I can. I kept Ruby's secret. Still do, I don't talk about it with anyone unless she's told them. You're the only half-exception because I had a very good guess that she already told you." Weiss confirmed that suspicion and returned to her thoughts. "Thanks Yang." "No problem. But seriously, don't play games with Ruby. I'm cool with you being all cuddly friends and stuff because that's just how Ruby is, but if you take it further than that and then break her heart…well…let's just say I won't be happy." "Understood." "Alright then. See ya later Weiss." Yang walked out the door and left Weiss to her thinking. Weiss pondered over the conversation they had just shared until she heard a rapping on her door. "Weiss! You there? We gotta get going, class starts in an hour! Hurry up!" The voice of Ruby came through the door. "Coming! Hold on!" Weiss called back, throwing on her clothes. As the two of them walked to class, Ruby chattering on and on about something, Weiss smiled. She may not be sure of her deeper feelings yet, but she knew that Ruby made her happy. And on some level, she realized that she made Ruby happy. So she didn't resist as Ruby, without a break in step or concentration, reached out and grasped her hand. The two girls walked this way to class and passed by a blonde and brunette couple walking by the grounds, and although they didn't notice, they were noticed by them. Blake grinned. "Looks like they're getting on really well, huh?" "Yeah. I guess so." Yang said. "Hey Blake?" "Yeah?" "Do you wanna go out sometime?" Blake was at a loss for words. Did…did Yang just ask her out? "A-are you…asking me out?" Blake stuttered out, not sure what to say. "Yeah. I'm not blind you know. I can see the way you look at me, the funny look you get in your eyes. The way you act. I gotta be honest, I like you too. So what do you say? Date? This Saturday? Lunch?" In response, Blake threw her arms around Yang and smiled happily. She hadn't been sure of her feelings until this moment, but as soon as the words 'go out' had come from Yang's mouth, Blake had never been more sure of something. "I'd love to." She said quietly as Yang hugged her back. Author's Note And here we have a chapter full of squee. Lots of focus on White Rose here, with SURPRISE BUMBLEBEE at the end. And yes, Blake was the girl Yang liked in high school. After growing up a bit and seeing Ruby so happy around Weiss, even if they were just friends, she realized what she was missing. So she decided 'Fuck it,' and asked Blake out. We know that Blake was already having feelings towards Yang that she was unsure of, but Yang finally asking her just made it click. I wanted to show a contrast between Ruby/Weiss and Blake/Yang. Ruby loves Weiss, and Weiss loves Ruby. But Weiss really isn't sure how deep those feelings run, and neither is willing to screw up the friendship by doing anything stupid. So they dance around the subject and are unwilling to really dive in. Whereas Yang just flat out doesn't give a FUCK. She doesn't dance around anything; she just punches it into submission and tackles it head-on. Which is what happened here, and Blake is rather similar. Neither of them are fond of playing games, so when Yang gets straight to the point, it opens Blake's eyes and she realizes and accepts her true feelings. One couple is inexperienced, overcautious, and altogether not-ready for a real relationship. And the other couple just clicks. Both of these situations can happen IRL, and I wanted to showcase that. I think I did a pretty good job. Anyway, please remember to review! I thrive on those little tidbits you throw at me, but for this chapter especially since I wrote it specifically to get some squee out of you guys. As always, enjoy Chapter Six, and have a wonderful day. Spike
Winter may just be getting started, but if you’re ready for more sunlight, you won’t have much longer to wait. December 21 is the winter solstice: the shortest day and longest night of the year here in Earth’s northern hemisphere. Starting Friday, the sun will be up for a few seconds longer each day, signaling the start of our slow but steady march toward spring. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Winter is just getting into high gear. Learn more about the solstice and why it’s not the coldest day of the year in our scientific guide below. 1. What happens on the winter solstice? The December solstice marks the exact moment when the sun’s most direct rays reach their southernmost point south of the equator, along the Tropic of Capricorn, at 23.5 degrees south latitude. The time and date of the solstice change slightly each year, but this year’s solstice occurs at 11:28 a.m. Eastern Time on Dec. 21. On the winter solstice, Earth’s northern hemisphere reaches its maximum tilt away from the sun. (NASA) The reason we have a solstice — and seasons — is because the Earth is tilted on its axis of rotation by about 23.5 degrees. This tilt causes each hemisphere to receive different amounts of sunlight throughout the year as our planet orbits the sun. In the Northern Hemisphere, we see the sun take its lowest and shortest path across the southern sky, and at local noon, your shadow will be the longest of the year. The word “solstice” comes from the Latin words sol sistere, which means “sun standing still.” On the December solstice, the sun’s daily southward movement in the sky appears to pause, and we see the sun rise and set at its southernmost points on the horizon before reversing direction. It’s a yearly astronomical turning point that humans have celebrated for millennia (just think Stonehenge or the ancient Maya). 2. How many hours of daylight are there on the winter solstice? The amount of daylight you’ll see on the solstice depends on your latitude, or distance from the equator. The map below, created by Alaska-based climatologist Brian Brettschneider, shows how widely daylight hours vary across North America on the shortest day of the year. In the Lower 48, the sun is up for more than 10 hours across Florida and southern Texas, while states across the northern tier get under nine hours of daylight. Here in Washington, D.C., the sun is up for 9 hours 26 minutes (rising at 7:23 a.m. and setting at 4:49 p.m.). Of course, our long winter night pales in comparison with Alaska, where the sun barely climbs above the horizon for three to four hours in much of the Last Frontier. North of the Arctic Circle — at 66.5 degrees north latitude — the sun never rises, and darkness prevails as the Earth rotates on its axis. 3. When are sunrise and sunset? The exact times of sunrise and sunset depend on two things: your latitude and geographic location within your time zone. Here are two maps that show the time of sunrise and sunset across North America. Both take into account the effect of time zones and latitude, hence the interesting patchwork of colors. The first map shows sunrise times across North America. In most of the country, including the District, sunrise on the winter solstice is after 7 a.m. Golden-colored areas don’t see sunrise until after 7:30 a.m., and in green areas, the sun doesn’t rise until after 8 a.m. [Sunrise and sunset times on the winter solstice] The next map shows the time of sunset. Many parts of the Lower 48 see sunset before 5 p.m. on the winter solstice. In bright green areas, including much of the Pacific Northwest and New England, the sun disappears below the horizon before 4:30 in the afternoon. Parts of Maine even see sunset in the 3 o’clock hour! Only a handful of states, including Florida and Texas, see sunset after 5:30 p.m. on the shortest day of the year. If you’re tired of these dark evenings, the good news is that our earliest sunsets are already behind us. In fact, it’s been gradually getting lighter in the evenings for more than a week now. 4. Wait a minute, the earliest sunset and latest sunrise don’t occur on the solstice? Let’s clear the record: The winter solstice marks the shortest daylight period in the Northern Hemisphere. However, it’s never the day of the latest sunrise or earliest sunset. This astronomical quirk happens because of Earth’s 23.5-degree tilt and our elliptical orbit around the sun (read more). You can see in this next map (and in this table) that most places see their earliest sunset two weeks before the solstice, while the latest sunrise isn’t until early January. So don’t expect brighter mornings anytime soon. Calculated down to the second, the District’s earliest sunset (4:46 p.m.) was on Dec. 7. Meanwhile, the latest sunrise (7:27 a.m.) isn’t until Jan. 5. The closer you move to the North Pole, the closer the earliest sunset and latest sunrise occur to the solstice. 5. Why do the days still get colder after the solstice? “As the days lengthen, the cold strengthens.” It’s an old proverb that certainly has some scientific truth. The Northern Hemisphere receives its least direct sunlight on the winter solstice, but in many places the coldest average temperatures of winter aren’t until January, as shown in this final map: This delay in the arrival of our coldest temperatures is better known as seasonal lag. It happens because the amount of solar energy arriving at the ground is less than the amount leaving the earth for a few more weeks (a bit like a bank account that starts losing money when you make more withdrawals than deposits). Oceans and bodies of water — which take longer than land to heat up and cool down — keep temperatures from rising very fast. Not until the Northern Hemisphere sees a net gain in solar energy (more heat coming in than going out) do average temperatures begin their ascent. The exact timing of the coldest stretch of the year depends on several factors, including how close you live to water, prevailing wind direction and the amount of snow cover (snow is great at reflecting the sun’s heat straight back into space). You’ll notice in the map above that Western states typically see their coldest stretch of winter closer to the solstice, while areas near the Great Lakes and interior New England don’t see their coldest days until late January. If you don’t like the cold, here’s a silver lining: Whatever the rest of winter brings, daylight is once again on the upswing. That’s definitely something to celebrate! Read more: This chart shows why winter should, without question, officially begin Dec. 1
The TSA announced today that they will be accepting payments to give you back your basic rights in airports — if passengers pay to sign up for the TSA Precheck program, they can keep their shoes, belts and jackets on, leave laptops in their cases, and not have to remove liquids and gels from carry-ons. The $85 pizzo also requires fingerprinting, and will be available in 100 airports by the end of the year. The program had previously been limited to frequent flier members from "select airlines". No word on how this new protection plan will affect Hindus, passengers with light sabers, or three-year-olds. Also set to change this year are the FAA draconian policies concerning cell phone use on airplanes. The FAA is set to make a formal decision at the end of September. [image via Shutterstock]
Share. Plus, is the Old Man Logan storyline the basis for the film? Plus, is the Old Man Logan storyline the basis for the film? Patrick Stewart has confirmed that he will return to the big screen as his X-Men character Professor X in Wolverine 3. The actor has previously talked about this potential team-up between Hugh Jackman’s Logan and his Xavier, but now in an interview with Collider, Stewart has provided some insight into the film. “There is a project in development,” he said. “I understand that Professor Xavier will be making more than an appearance, however, and that intrigues me.” Exit Theatre Mode Hmmm. “More than an appearance”? That sounds like this isn’t just a cameo like the one Stewart and Ian McKellen had in The Wolverine. As for what Wolverine 3 will be about, we’re still not sure, though all signs continue to point to an adaptation of the Old Man Logan story from the comics. Stewart even jokes about that in his chat with the site, which you can check out right here. Interestingly, this means that Stewart will have made appearances in all three standalone Wolverine movies. The Wolverine director James Mangold will return for Wolverine 3. But in the meantime, Stewart has his new show Blunt Talk debuting next week on Starz. Talk to Senior Editor Scott Collura on Twitter at @ScottCollura, on IGN at scottcollura and on Facebook.
Welcome to the SSG Christmas Art Exchange! This is an Art Gift Exchange for the Steven Universe Fandom! All Artistic Levels are welcome to join. This exchange is for art of canon or gemsona Steven Universe characters and the people who love them! The SSG group is for all artists, regardless of how talented they are. I want this to be fun, and bring cheer to everyone who joins. It’s about making another SU fan something special, and getting together over something we all love! The 2016 Secret Santa Exchange is opening soon! Enrollment starts on August 1st, 2016! The Deadline for joining is November 1st, 2016 at 9:00 pm PST. EXTENDED TO November 10th, 2016 at 9:00 pm PST Secret Santa Assignments will be… Made on November 10th 2016 ! Changed to November 15th! Which will give everyone over a month to work on their gifts! Deliver your SS gift by… You can start uploading your gift on December 20th, all gifts MUST be delivered by Deember 26th. Secret Steven Helpers! Please contact the admin to join our Secret Steven Helpers list. These are artists who are willing to make an art gift for someone who’s SS didn’t send them a gift, but they sent their gift out. Everyone who participates in the exchange should get a gift, regardless if the person assigned to them fell thru! Secret Santa Wish List Please remember to read the Rules ( All Artistic Levels are welcome to join. This exchange is for art of canon or gemsona Steven Universe characters and the people who love them! The SSG group is for all artists, regardless of how talented they are. I want this to be fun, and bring cheer to everyone who joins. It’s about making another SU fan something special, and getting together over something we all love!Enrollment starts on August 1st, 2016!The Deadline for joining isEXTENDED TO November 10th, 2016 at 9:00 pm PSTMade on! Changed to November 15th! Which will give everyone over a month to work on their gifts!You can start uploading your gift on December 20th, all gifts MUST be delivered by Deember 26th.Please contact the admin to join our Secret Steven Helpers list. These are artists who are willing to make an art gift for someone who’s SS didn’t send them a gift, but they sent their gift out. Everyone who participates in the exchange should get a gift, regardless if the person assigned to them fell thru!Please remember to read the Rules ( fav.me/dabfz8k ) before making your Wish List. All submissions, themes and requests should be appropriate for all ages. This is a Steven Universe Art Exchange! You can select a canon character or your own OC. This is my wishlist for: Username: Character(s): Themes: Special Requests: Extra Info: Once you have joined the group, make a journal entry of your SSG wish list with the title “SSG Wish List” and comment it on This journal ( Once you have joined the group, make a journal entry of your SSG wish list with the title “SSG Wish List” and comment it on This journal ( fav.me/dabfzhk ) list. The admins will then approve your wish list and add it to the official list.
In 1860, an ill-fated Pony Express rider, whose name has been lost to history, was crossing the trackless wastes of Nevada when he vanished, likely killed by Indians. Two years later, in May 1862, the mail pouch from that doomed mission, still containing letters bound for the East, was recovered. Today, only a few remnants from the contents of that saddlebag survive. Among them is an envelope—a rare artifact of the mid-19th-century’s legendary Pony Express mail service, founded 150 years ago. (The letter that was inside has long since disappeared.) The philatelic treasure will reside on long-term loan at the Smithsonian’s National Postal Museum (NPM). Recently, the envelope’s owner, William H. Gross, a passionate stamp collector since childhood, donated funds for a new 12,000-square-foot gallery at the museum, scheduled to open in 2012. The envelope will take pride of place in the new exhibition space. “There are only two pieces of what collectors call ‘interrupted mail’ from the Pony Express known to exist, and they were in that rider’s pouch,” says NPM curator Daniel Piazza. The concept of expedited mail delivery by a relay of single riders on fast horses—a kind of grass-fueled FedEx—echoed the vision that won the West. Established in April 1860, the Pony Express failed to win a major contract from the federal government and was replaced by a stagecoach line after only 18 months. Yet its bravado has colored the mail service ever since. The transcontinental delivery system was marvelous in its simplicity. Across 1,900 miles, at 186 stations between St. Joseph, Missouri, and Sacramento, California, fresh horses awaited carriers who rode at full gallop in 10- to 12-mile segments (judged to be the maximum distance that a good mount could maintain a speedy clip). At each station, the rider leapt off one horse and onto the next, then sped on. The tough, wiry horsemen covered up to 125 miles at a stretch—a punishing pace that commanded a then-substantial salary of $25 per week. William “Buffalo Bill” Cody and James “Wild Bill” Hickok boasted they had earned their spurs as young Express riders. “Or so they claimed,” says Piazza. (There is no evidence that either did so.) The rare 1860 envelope attests that hard riding was not the most daunting aspect of the job. Routes passed through deserted, often forbidding, territory. A note scrawled on the front of the artifact alludes to its tragic backstory: “Recovered from a [sic] mail stolen by the Indians in 1860.” The nameless victim is thought to have been the only Pony Express rider killed, though a few station agents died when Indians attacked their outposts. The letter at last reached its destination—a New York City business recorded only as Fred Probst & Co.—in August 1862. Says Piazza: “So much happened between when the letter was sent and when it arrived—Lincoln’s election, the secession crisis, the beginning of the Civil War.” (In March 1861, the Pony Express set a record for transcontinental delivery—7 days 17 hours—when riders carried Abraham Lincoln’s Inaugural Address to the West Coast.) The envelope bears an oval stamp that reads “The Central Overland California & Pikes Peak Express Company,” the enterprise that administered the Pony Express. It had disbanded nine months before, on October 26, 1861. The envelope also bears a basic 10-cent stamp, which normally would have meant a two-month trip, as the letter traveled from San Francisco by ship down the West Coast, across the isthmus of Panama and by sea up the East Coast to New York City. The additional cost for Pony Express service—guaranteed to reach the East Coast in about 12 days—was $5 (roughly $133 in today’s currency) per half-ounce. Ultimately, says Piazza, even the envelope’s stamp, with its image of George Washington, offers a history lesson. “Although the letter was delivered,” he says, “the 10-cent stamp was no longer valid. At the beginning of the [Civil] War, all existing postal stamps were demonetized so the Confederacy couldn’t use them.” Owen Edwards is a freelance writer and author of the book Elegant Solutions
Now here is a disco-decade toy that Irwin Allen — the cinematic master of disaster — would have likely approved of. Billed as “the world’s largest playset” and standing a whopping five feet tall, the Remco Earthquake Tower was a mash-up of the biggest Hollywood hits of 1974: The Towering Inferno and Earthquake. You had, essentially, the high-rise building from the former and the colossal threat from the latter. Basically, it was a kid’s job to save everyone in the giant playset from a massive earthquake (presumably innocent civilians…), using a plastic rescue squad consisting of 2 rescue trucks and a copter. The authenticity of the make-believe earthquake was enhanced by a “disaster sound record” a “3 minute, 55 second” vinyl recording accentuating “realism.” If you listen to the record, you’ll hear choppers whirring, sirens blaring, explosions, and a soundtrack that doesn’t exactly match John Williams’ work on The Towering Inferno, in terms of suspense and grandeur. Here’s a sample of what that 40 year old record sounds like: When you coupled those sound effects with the toy’s “sway action,” the Earthquake Tower was a full-fledged recreation of the disaster genre. To activate that sway action, kids just had to “press the quake button,” and sit back and watch as the “tower begins to quake.” This Remco toy came complete with 40 pieces (including the cardboard parts to assemble the building…), including 24 toy people, 2 working elevators, and “other accessories for staging disaster and rescue.” I never had this toy as a kid, but one of my friends did. I always considered him lucky because he could stage large-scale disasters at his leisure, any time he pleased, with Remco’s Earthquake Tower and Rescue Playset.
Denver, Colorado, Jan. 28, 2015 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- FutureWorld Corp. (OTC: FWDG), a leading provider of advanced technologies and solutions to the global cannabis industry, announced that CB Scientific, a subsidiary of FutureWorld Corp., has reached a definitive wholesale agreement with American Green (OTC: ERBB). The agreement places CB Scientific's "Product of the Year", PersonalAnalytics THC & CBD Home Test Kits (http://cbscientific.com) in American Green's ZaZZZ network of robotic dispensaries. "We are excited to have these Test Kits available in the ZaZZZ Machines, it holds us to the highest standard of medicine since we're willing to provide people with the means of testing, right on the spot." says Stephen Shearin, American Green president. "As a tech company, I love the test products and I am not surprised to see it won such an award right out of the gate." The agreement with American Green will place PersonalAnalytics THC & CBD Starter test kits in the current network of machines in 5 states. The agreement will also include CB Scientific new "Double Kit" (Test Kits that can run 2 test vs only 1) which we expect to launch in the coming weeks. "We continue to recognize American Green and ZaZZZ as the market leader in this space. Working together allows CB Scientific to extend its product reach into new territories and dispensaries and grow along with the ZaZZZ Network." comments Bill Short, CEO of CB Scientific. CB Scientific's PersonalAnalytics are the first tests for consumers that are available for personal use to test for cannabinoids, including THC and CBD, outside of a lab setting. These affordable and high-quality tests provide results in ten minutes or less, and have numerous uses for recreational and medical purposes, including patients who need to use medical cannabis and hemp-related products such as CBD oil. Both THC and CBD home testing kits are available at multiple outlets in Colorado, California, Washington, Michigan, Alaska and Arizona, specifically: head shops, dispensaries and grow stores. The kits are also available for purchase worldwide online at www.cbscientific.com. The tests have been featured on ABC, CBS, Fox, Telemundo, The Adam Dunn Show, as well as in publications such as High Times, Culture and Forbes Magazine. ABOUT CB SCIENTIFIC CB Scientific (www.cbscientific.com) is a wholly owned company of FutureWorld Corp. based in Denver, Colorado. CB Scientific is continuing to develop new technologies specifically for cannabis analytics. The senior management team are some of the primary men advancing gas chromatography testing in Colorado having pioneered residual solvent testing for medical cannabis and always striving to help patients know exactly what they are buying. CB Scientific believes every product sold to patients as "Medical Quality" should be inspected for health benefits, safety, consistency, purity, potency and packaged properly for distribution. CB Scientific has worked with many of the cannabis industry leaders in Colorado and have also been featured in cannabis industry publications including High Times Magazine, Culture and many trade publications, on-air interviews and panel discussions across the United States. CB Scientific's focus has been the education and safety of consumers combined with innovation to put power into the hands of the patients. Values that FutureWorld is pleased to embrace while ever striving to raise the bar of cannabis analytics even higher. ABOUT AMERICAN GREEN, INC. American Green became the first publicly-traded medical marijuana dispensary brand in the world, back in 2009. The Company now is keenly focused on developing, retailing, branding, and establishing commercial cultivation solutions under its proprietary American Green name along with our partners who are licensed retail medical marijuana dispensaries. American Green believes that the renewal of the legalized cannabis industry in the United States will aid in getting our economy back on its feet through increased employment in all related sectors - retail, real estate, contracting, farming and more. Additional revenues, fueled by taxing cannabis sales, and the decreased cost of housing prisoners who are no longer in prison for possession of cannabis should contribute to the renewal. Hard work and a clear vision propel American Green into the future. The centerpiece of our company is ZaZZZ, our unique automated vending solution designed specifically around American Green's licensed proprietary patent technology. For a complete summary of all American Green products and initiatives, please refer to www.americangreen.com. ABOUT FUTUREWORLD CORP. FutureWorld (Other OTC: FWDG), a Delaware corporation, is a leading provider of advanced technologies and solutions to the global cannabis industry. FutureWorld, together with its subsidiaries, focuses on the identification, acquisition, development, and commercialization of cannabis related products and services, such as industrial Hemp. FutureWorld, through its subsidiaries, provides personal and professional THC and CBD test kits, pharmaceutical grade CBD oil solutions, SafeVape vaporizers, smart sensor technology, communication network, surveillance security, data analysis for smart cultivation and consultation for the industrial hemp and legal medicinal cannabis. Our wireless agricultural smart sensor networks offer precision to the agriculture, irrigation systems, and greenhouses for the global cannabis and hemp industry. FutureWorld and its subsidiaries do not grow, distribute or sell marijuana. To request further information about FutureWorld, please email us at info@futureworldcorp.com, log onto our website at http://www.futureworldcorp.com or visit us at our Facebook page facebook.com/futureworldenergy or on Twitter @futureworldinc. Forward-Looking Statements This press release may contain forward-looking statements covered within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These forward-looking statements relate to, among other things, plans and timing for the introduction or enhancement of our services and products, statements about future market conditions, supply and demand conditions, and other expectations, intentions and plans contained in this press release that are not historical fact and involve risks and uncertainties. Our expectations regarding future revenues depend upon our ability to develop and supply products and services that we may not produce today and that meet defined specifications. When used in this press release, the words "plan," "expect," "believe," and similar expressions generally identify forward-looking statements. These statements reflect our current expectations. They are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties, including, but not limited to, changes in technology and changes in pervasive markets. This release includes forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 27E of the Securities Act of 1934. Statements contained in this release that are not historical facts may be deemed to be forward-looking statements. Investors are cautioned that forward-looking statements are inherently uncertain. 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David Lowery on The One Thing He Needed to Learn and Wish He’d Known Sooner to Better Direct David Lowery is one of the American filmmakers standing out from their new generation’s crowd. After making a jump from a $12,000 first feature to Ain’t Them Bodies Saints, he decided to do a children fantasy big budget pic. And when that was done, realizing he had 2 months off before touring, promoting and starting a new feature, he went on writing a $100k feature he would self-finance and shoot with his friends over two weeks. That micro-budget became A Ghost Story. Of course, it doesn’t hurt that his friends are Rooney Mara and Casey Affleck, or that his resume is solid enough that he had A24 to distribute the film probably without much of a problem. But it doesn’t matter really. How many filmmakers who are friends with Mara and Affleck & Co and have the means to finance a $100k feature are doing it, and doing it well enough so they get screened at Festivals and released internationally in less than a year? You could argue Swanberg or the Duplass Brothers, but what makes Lowery unique at present time is that his lo-fi profile doesn’t prevent him from delivering strong visual pieces, with a poetic cinematography, where silence is a negative space that fills up the story. David Lowery choices might remind you of Steven Soderbergh’s decision to shoot low-budget Bubble after Ocean’s 12. Despite his preference for silence and his mortification post-promoting-interviews, Lowery does his best and do delivers great wisdom for filmmakers following his trail and looking up to him. (Somebody lets him know that). In a short (or cut) interview he gave at BAFTA, Lowery mentioned two points I felt worth archiving and sharing: What David Lowery Wished He Had Known Before Working on His First Big Feature Film “The thing that I wish I knew was that no one knows how to make the movie better than I do. Going into your first bigger film, you’re working with a crew that’s made a lot of movies before, and technicians who know how to adjust the lights more than you do, and camera assistants who know how to put a filter on a camera… Everybody knows their job very well but no one knows the movie. And that’s easy to forget the first time out, that you’re the one who knows the movie. And everyone is counting on you to know that. So even though they may offer suggestions or ideas or assume that the camera is going to be on that corner and they’ll put it there in anticipation of you saying that’s where it needs to be, they’re not directing the movie, you’re directing the movie. That’s something that surprisingly took me a little while to realize. On my first film, I remember the moment I realized it, I was like ‘Wait a second, I don’t think that’s the right decision, why am I letting someone else make that decision, that’s my decision.” And once I started making the decisions myself and ceased to assume that everyone knew what needed to be done, things started to get a lot better. So that’s what I wish I knew.” How Changing Scales in Movies Change the Creative Process (or Not) “The process is always the same, and that’s what I’ve been marveling at on every movie I make. I just wrapped another one two weeks ago and it proved to be true yet again. Regardless of the size of the production, the actual creative process on a day-to-day basis is exactly the same, regardless of scale. My very first feature St-Nick cost $12,000 to make, and making Pete’s Dragon was exactly the same than making that film. Except that there are all these other things like cranes, and 200 people and a crew, but at the end of the day, all that really matters is that you’ve got yourself, you’ve got the actors, you’ve got a camera and a cinematographer, and that core relationship with those individuals never changes. It’s always the same. That’s why you try to work with the same people over and over again because you start to build that common language and it makes everything feel even more the same when you have the same family making the films with you. But it’s remarkable you know, on “A Ghost Story” the whole budget cost probably less than one day of shooting on “Ain’t the Bodies Saints” and who even knows on “Pete’s Dragon” how much each day cost. But on a technical level and on a creative level it’s still exactly the same.”
Edward Snowden has made some dangerous enemies. As the American intelligence community struggles to contain the public damage done by the former National Security Agency contractor's revelations of mass domestic spying, intelligence operators have continued to seethe in very personal terms against the 30-year-old whistle-blower. "In a world where I would not be restricted from killing an American, I personally would go and kill him myself," a current NSA analyst told BuzzFeed. "A lot of people share this sentiment." "I would love to put a bullet in his head," one Pentagon official, a former special forces officer, said bluntly. "I do not take pleasure in taking another human beings life, having to do it in uniform, but he is single-handedly the greatest traitor in American history." That violent hostility lies just beneath the surface of the domestic debate over NSA spying is still ongoing. Some members of Congress have hailed Snowden as a whistle-blower, the New York Times has called for clemency, and pundits regularly defend his actions on Sunday talk shows. In intelligence community circles, Snowden is considered a nothing short of a traitor in wartime. "His name is cursed every day over here," a defense contractor told BuzzFeed, speaking from an overseas intelligence collections base. "Most everyone I talk to says he needs to be tried and hung, forget the trial and just hang him." One Army intelligence officer even offered BuzzFeed a chillingly detailed fantasy. "I think if we had the chance, we would end it very quickly," he said. "Just casually walking on the streets of Moscow, coming back from buying his groceries. Going back to his flat and he is casually poked by a passerby. He thinks nothing of it at the time starts to feel a little woozy and thinks it's a parasite from the local water. He goes home very innocently and next thing you know he dies in the shower." There is no indication that the United States has sought to take vengeance on Snowden, who is living in an undisclosed location in Russia without visible security measures, according to a recent Washington Post interview. And the intelligence operators who spoke to BuzzFeed on the condition of anonymity did not say they expected anyone to act on their desire for revenge. But their mood is widespread, people who regularly work with the intelligence community said. "These guys are emoting how pissed they are," Peter Singer, a cyber-security expert at the Brookings Institute. "Do you think people at the NSA would put a statue of him out front?" The degree to which Snowden's revelations have damaged intelligence operations are also being debated. Shawn Turner, a spokesman for the director of national intelligence, recently called the leaks "unnecessarily and extremely damaging to the United States and the intelligence community's national security efforts," and the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, Dutch Ruppersberger said terrorists have been "changing their methods because of the leaks." Snowden's defenders dismiss those concerns as overblown, and the government has not pointed to specific incidents to bear out the claims. On the ground, intelligence workers certainly say the damage has been done. The NSA officer complained that his sources had become "useless." The Army intelligence officer said the revelations had increased his "blindness." "I do my work in a combat zone so now I have to see the effects of a Snowden in a combat zone. It will not be pretty," he said. And while government officials have a long record of overstating the damage from leaks, some specific consequences seem logical. "By [Snowden] showing who our collections partners were, the terrorists have dropped those carriers and email addresses," the DOD official said. "We can't find them because he released that data. Their electronic signature is gone."
Peter Mayhew with his light saber cane and a group of wookies. (Twitter) Actor Peter Mayhew, best known for his role as Chewbacca, furriest member of the Star Wars gang, harnessed the power of Twitter to get his light saber-shaped cane past airport security. Mayhew, 69, was on his way back home to Texas after attending Denver ComicCon, when the imperious guards of airports, the much hated TSA, decided to give the actor a tough time. But Chewie wasn't about to take this abuse laying down, and turned to his 23,000 Twitter followers for some help. Mayhew posted a photo of the TSA agents, light saber cane in custody. Magic words to TSA are not "please" or "thank you".. It's "Twitter".. cane released to go home.. twitter.com/TheWookieeRoar… — Peter Mayhew (@TheWookieeRoars) June 3, 2013 In the caffufel of the cane, zach left his backpack at security. . Hope he makes it back in time for the flight.. RELATED 1979 murder suspect arrested in Chicago June 3, 2013 Besides, Mayhew pointed out his 7-foot-2-inch frame requires more than just any old cane. Giant man need giant cane.. small cane snap like toothpick.... besides.. my light saber cane is just cool.. I would miss it.. — Peter Mayhew (@TheWookieeRoars) June 3, 2013 The agents eventually gave Mayhew his cane back, and once the actor's flight landed in Dallas, he thanked American Airline staff checked with him. In Dallas. Thank you to @americanair for checking on me. Problem was all @tsa. I'm a million-miler on American and they are a class act. — Peter Mayhew (@TheWookieeRoars) June 3, 2013 Let's hope the TSA learned its lesson.
Yesterday UCLA played their NCAA allowed scrimmage against #18/19 UNLV. Under NCAA rules the score of this scrimmage is not public and no one is allowed to report on details. There was no media and no fans at the game. UCLA is staying silent on the game. The only UCLA report I can find is this from Jordan Adams: Jordan Adams ‏@jordanadams1231 @jerwinlinfield all I can say it was a good day for the bruins (; But UNLV's coach said some more on the game with an intriguing headline: UNLV outgunned by UCLA in Saturday Scrimmage. According to sources, UCLA pulled away in the second half for a fairly comfortable double-digit victory. And though UNLV's frontcourt has been touted as one of the nation's best, they had trouble controlling the inside against the Bruins. This is impressive for a number of reasons, some of which are speculative. UCLA only had 8 scholarship players without Shabazz or Lamb. UCLA was still able to beat a top 20 experienced team. UCLA outgunned and outran UNLV. Howland talked about running and we did. Either the Wears played better, Smith dominated, or maybe both. UCLA dominating inside against UNLV is a very good sign. (Also Anderson played three and could have been a force inside on D.) The season for real starts on Friday and then we shall see for real how good we are on the inside and how much we run. But this is a very good sign. Free Shabazz. Go Bruins!
RICHMOND, Calif. - A Northern California police chief noted for his community policing efforts raised a few eyebrows when he joined a peaceful protest Tuesday, holding a sign with the popular Twitter hashtag of #blacklivesmatter. The Contra Costa Times reported Richmond Police Chief Chris Magnus was part of a group of about demonstrators who lined a busy street, holding signing and listening to recordings of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s speeches. "I spoke with my command staff, and we agreed it would be nice to convey our commitment to peaceful protest and that black and brown lives do matter," Magnus told the newspaper after the protest. "And to help bridge the gap that we understand sometimes exists between police and community around certain issues." "We get the conversation about use of force, we get it," Deputy Chief Allwyn Brown added. "This is an opportunity for all police departments, including ours, to look inward and examine our approaches and get better." The afternoon protest, one of many in the San Francisco Bay Area this week, was organized by a Richmond youth center. Richmond's mayor and several city council members also took part in the demonstration.
After an exceptional opening chapter, Ed Brubaker (w) and Sean Phillips’ (a) Kill or Be Killed released its second issue. Is it good? Kill or Be Killed #2 (Image Comics) Observations Still not sure how I feel about Dylan yet, but he and I are definitely on the same wavelength when it comes to fairy tales. Geez, Dylan’s life is pretty weird even without the whole ‘Demon Keeping You Alive Via Death Pact’ thing. Credit to Brubaker/Phillips for not magically giving their protagonist a gun. Guns may be easy to get in America, but not if you’re trying to find one specifically to murder someone with (and get away with it). Definitely not a fan of killing people in cold blood…but if you’re going to pick a first target, then Dylan’s doing a good job. Is It Good? Part of me was worried that Kill or Be Killed would suffer from the same sophomore slump that many series with great first issues experience. Thankfully, Brubaker and Phillips take their opening set up and expertly build on it with a fantastic second chapter. About the only thing not to like here are the pages with large amounts of texts going down the side accompanied by unlettered art. I love the way Phillips panels things, so it feels like we’re getting cheated out of that sometimes. Otherwise, everything else is great. Dylan is an unreliable narrator, but he’s also painfully authentic. It’s hard to pity him or even be horrified by some of things he does because it’s also very easy to see parts of ourselves in him. The premise of this series is cool enough on its own, but watching things unfold through Dylan’s eyes—along with the rest of his tangled and complicated life—make it even more enjoyable. As expected with anything Brubaker writes, the narrative flows beautifully—even the parts where Dylan has to backtrack and take the reader to a different point in the past. This is aided greatly by Phillips’ aforementioned artwork. The guy gets a lot of praise for how good his pencils look, but not nearly enough credit for how well can sequence a script. He also gets a big assist from Elizabeth Breitweiser, who can somehow render colors that vary greatly in texture while also managing to remain stark and muted. Together, these three are putting together a book that is quickly becoming one of my favorite titles. If you don’t have Kill or Be Killed on your pull list yet, then you have exactly one month to do so. After that, you’re on your own.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A senior Senate Democrat said on Wednesday a planned economic stimulus package will likely include money and tax breaks for doctors and hospitals to buy advanced technology that will make it easier for them to share patient care information. Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, a Montana Democrat, said at a news conference that lawmakers were discussing what should be included in the package of tax breaks and infrastructure spending that President-elect Barack Obama has said will be needed to jump start the faltering economy. Baucus said the package, which some have estimated would be about $500 billion to $700 billion, would also include tax incentives for businesses and alternative energy as well as tax relief for the middle class. As head of the tax-writing Finance Committee, Baucus will have a major say in what goes into the legislation. About half the value of the economic recovery package could be in the form of tax relief, he said. Obama has said he wants an economic package that would include the largest infrastructure investment since the 1950s. That infrastructure investment will likely include grants and tax incentives for health information technology, Baucus said. Businesses and health reform advocates have said harmonizing the electronic standards needed to exchange information about patient care could go a long way toward reducing costs. Lawmakers are working to address privacy concerns with such technology. He declined to give a specific amount for the technology aid. But when asked if it would amount to the $50 billion some have suggested is needed, Baucus said that “might be a little high.” Baucus, who also plans to work with Obama to push for major health-care reform legislation next year, said including information technology in the economic stimulus will help get a jump start on the overall reform. “We have to make a start,” he said. The economic stimulus plan is also likely to include aid to cash-strapped states to help them pay for the Medicaid health care program for the poor. Lawmakers are also discussing whether to include temporarily extending a children’s health care program that expires in March, giving them time to more fully address the issue in a broader health reform.
Manchester United are in talks with Brazilian outfit Internacional over a permanent transfer for Old Trafford outcast Anderson. The 26-year-old midfielder, whose current deal at United ends this summer, has been told he can leave the club by manager Louis van Gaal after failing to impress the Dutchman since his arrival as David Moyes’s successor. And despite a lack of interest in the former Porto player, who cost £26m when signed from Portuguese outfit in May 2007, United have now been approached by Internacional, who are prepared to take Anderson back to his home city of Porto Alegre before Monday’s transfer deadline. Anderson has made just two first-team appearances under Van Gaal this season - the last coming as a substitute in the 0-0 draw at Burnley last August. And with the player proving a flop since his arrival from Porto, United had struggled to offload him following a failed loan spell at Fiorentina last season. United had been prepared to cancel Anderson’s contract in the absence of interested parties this month, but with no fee likely to be involved to take him to Internacional, there is hope at Old Trafford of a positive outcome to talks with the 2006 Fifa World Club champions. Meanwhile, United youngster Andreas Pereira is facing an uncertain future at the club according to his father, Marcos. Pereira is out of contract at United in June, with Paris Saint Germain keen to recruit the Belgian midfielder. "We've heard the PSG rumour, but they haven't contacted us yet,” Marcos Pereira said. “We don't even know if they have had contact with Manchester United. “All I can say is that my son wants to play. At this moment, that's not the case. The transfer window closes in : : : Days Hrs Mins Secs “He plays at Manchester United, one of the biggest clubs in the world, but if the club wants to sell him now, PSG would be a very good club for Andreas. “His contract expires in six months, but all depends on United. Do they want to sell him or don't they? “If Andreas stays at United this winter, we'll try to talk to United again on a contract extension." Did you know Telegraph Sport has a Manchester United Facebook page?
The final result for Hearthstone Arena play in October is in! Due to this month’s Dual-class Arena, we will be counting the best wins per run in 20 consecutive runs for the monthly leaderboard. There will be a separate leaderboard for the dual-class Arena period – look out for that. The players featured below have employed top notch deck building skills, in-the-moment decision making, and unyielding dedication to achieve a most noteworthy feat! Pour a toast, pull up a chair, and join us in recognizing Hearthstone’s top Arena* players in the Americas region! Rank Battletag Average Wins 1 Dell4rpz 9.20 2 MeowEnzo 9.15 3 MajorDingus 8.90 4 spritecan 8.55 5 SomaSeal 8.50 6 臭臭地精 8.50 7 pmmania 8.35 8 Dustiny 8.25 9 DESDESDES 8.20 10 KoheiTime 8.20 11 KingofChem 8.20 12 jellybanana 8.20 13 Talriel 8.15 14 LINSA 8.15 15 hakillha 8.15 16 Titanin 8.15 17 Cheerous 8.10 18 Dylonion 8.05 19 oGURLz 8.05 20 dreads 8.05 21 schwza 8.00 22 sig 8.00 23 Emperor 7.95 24 Hattori 7.90 25 nksk 7.90 26 KellenAbel 7.85 27 BroSlav 7.85 28 oooasa 7.80 29 MushroomGas 7.80 30 DeeRyeUs 7.80 31 bnjy99 7.80 32 Cloudspine 7.80 33 Quillz 7.80 34 maybe 7.80 35 Lancelot 7.80 36 valder 7.80 37 Himura 7.80 38 SuperPanda 7.80 39 Mitchriz 7.75 40 doughboy 7.75 41 Zyst 7.75 42 BrianWong 7.75 43 manth 7.70 44 ArenaMania 7.70 45 Hafu 7.70 46 Charb44 7.70 47 FinalSlayer 7.65 48 Hizashi 7.65 49 Andrew0085 7.65 50 Eatmydog 7.65 51 haoqi 7.65 52 TTEXXX 7.65 53 Mfdust 7.65 54 Perchy 7.65 55 NymStark 7.65 56 davidlomanto 7.60 57 ethnox 7.60 58 Crumpled 7.60 59 Four20Orcit 7.60 60 LazyTitan 7.55 61 Fester 7.55 62 Weaven 7.55 63 Yume 7.50 64 Boca 7.50 65 Near 7.50 66 Happy313 7.50 67 lin 7.50 68 Cross 7.45 69 Axis 7.45 70 Berthen 7.45 71 Grivan 7.45 72 sorin 7.45 73 Tachii 7.45 74 KINGSH1T 7.45 75 Zevron 7.45 76 SweetJack 7.45 77 Souse 7.45 78 Rakisuta 7.45 79 Kyshantry 7.45 80 Polarin 7.45 81 torpedo 7.45 82 WildSheep 7.45 83 maxbaz 7.40 84 Darklink 7.40 85 JYLiu 7.40 86 coldstar 7.40 87 JIRO 7.40 88 Ovieously 7.40 89 NonE 7.40 90 zen 7.40 91 AllMight 7.35 92 cba 7.35 93 Mantis 7.35 94 Boozor 7.35 95 Ice 7.35 96 m0rph1ing 7.35 97 Style 7.35 98 Wabbit 7.35 99 AxemRanger 7.35 100 makgi 7.35 101 FunkyPants 7.35 102 watertommy 7.35 103 Baddan 7.30 104 twlevewins 7.30 105 wqb9r 7.30 106 Kepler 7.30 107 Hodor 7.30 108 Owen 7.30 109 kefan 7.30 110 Celeritas 7.30 111 VISO 7.30 112 kaboomba 7.30 113 LuckyTiger 7.30 114 xVzero 7.30 115 Maelstrom 7.30 116 Varmint54 7.30 117 Sentinel 7.25 118 blackwolf618 7.25 119 Pointdot 7.25 120 CallMeDaddy 7.25 121 Iodo 7.25 122 shoushiroll 7.25 123 Niko 7.25 124 Doublea 7.25 125 PainofMind 7.25 126 Tazza 7.25 127 pokerpro 7.25 128 DRAKE 7.20 129 Ndoilboy 7.20 130 Naslund 7.20 131 IDontKnow 7.20 132 SexyEnvelope 7.20 133 AcesUp 7.20 134 Pyroxs 7.20 135 ZapKanon 7.20 136 MaxieDevine 7.20 137 kbam 7.20 138 ukyoukyo 7.20 139 SuperNinja 7.20 140 moonstar 7.20 141 GoldenPants 7.15 142 Ddcatwdc 7.15 143 Shako 7.15 144 DodoGizmo 7.15 145 Phleetwood 7.15 146 wtybill 7.15 147 Matador 7.15 148 railgun 7.15 149 Zelamin 7.15 150 YiranFantasy 7.15 AsiaEurope *These are last month’s best performing Arena players based on their best wins per run in 20 consecutive runs.
The government announced that initial investigations showed that a hand grenade had caused the blast near the Mahamasina stadium in the capital, Antananarivo, hours after the inauguration there. Internal Security Minister Arsene Rakotondrazaka said the attack killed a 2-year-old child and wounded 33 people, seven of them critically. "The new president had just been sworn in," Rakotondrazaka said at the scene. "We know the political situation. His inauguration may not have pleased everyone. That's perhaps one of the reasons why this happened." Rajaonarimampianina, Madagascar's former finance minister, won the presidential election on December 20, the first since the 2009 coup that plunged Madagascar into a political crisis that has sharply slowed economic growth and deepened poverty. Jean Louis Robinson, whom Rajaonarimampianina narrowly defeated, pledged on Saturday to organize and unite the island state's fractured opposition. 'Disrupting and marching' Robinson, who conceded defeat on Friday and attended Saturday's swearing-in, told reporters that "this time, the opposition will be able to advise the state" instead of "always opposing, disrupting and marching on the streets." The country's former strongman and the leader of the 2009 coup, Andry Rajoelina, had backed Rajaonarimampianina in the election. In his speech, the new president, an accountant educated in Canada, did not mention political rivals like Robinson by name when calling for the country to come together. "I ask you, my political family and friends, help me to promote the great destiny of national unity," Rajaonarimampianina said. "I want you to understand that it is not about us but about Madagascar, our collective future and our place." mkg/slk (Reuters, AFP, dpa, AP)
You can practically smell the blood, the sweat and the fierce actorly commitment rising from Jake Gyllenhaal’s bruised and tattooed body in “Southpaw,” a bluntly conventional melodrama about a champion boxer forced to undergo a grim crucible of physical, emotional and spiritual suffering. Yet the undeniable intensity of Gyllenhaal’s bulked-up, Method-mumbling performance may leave you feeling more pummeled than convinced in this heavy-handed tale of redemption, in which director Antoine Fuqua once more demonstrates his fascination with codes of masculine aggression, extreme violence and not much else. Creakily plotted over the course of its rise-and-fall-and-rise-again trajectory, this partly Chinese-funded production may land enough visceral blows to catch on with audiences on its July 24 release through the Weinstein Co., but seems less likely to attain the prestige-hit status of superior efforts like “Million Dollar Baby” and “The Fighter.” That didn’t stop exec producer Harvey Weinstein from loudly speculating at a recent Cannes sneak-peek screening that Gyllenhaal would receive an Oscar nomination for his arresting transformation here, partly as “revenge” for his perceived snub in the best actor race for last year’s “Nightcrawler.” A master awards strategist like Weinstein certainly knows of what he speaks, though in this case his words tell us less about the quality of Gyllenhaal’s performance than they do about the corruption of a system that favors big, showy stunt acting above all else, and that too often hands out acting awards for reasons that are compensatory rather than merit-based. “Revenge,” meanwhile, is a particularly ironic word choice for this particular story, which puts our hero on a collision course with the man who may have cost him everything, and rather shamelessly stokes his appetite for retribution and ours. More Reviews TV Review: 'The Enemy Within' Starring Jennifer Carpenter Film Review: ‘2019 Oscar Nominated Short Films: Documentary’ A rough-around-the-edges type who emerged from a life of Hell’s Kitchen foster homes and jail cells to achieve major success in the ring, light heavyweight boxing champ Billy “the Great” Hope (Gyllenhaal) seems to have everything, living a life of luxury with a wife he adores, Maureen (a strong Rachel McAdams), and their precocious young daughter, Leila (Oona Laurence). But fame comes with the usual pitfalls, and Maureen wants her husband to take a break, not only so he can spend more time with his family, but also because she fears that his ferocious, no-holds-barred boxing style will get him seriously injured or worse. Naturally, it’s Maureen who will pay the ultimate price for her perceptiveness, succumbing to an accidental gunshot wound after Billy has a violent confrontation with a trash-talking rival, Miguel Escobar (Miguel Gomez). Reeling from this senseless tragedy, Billy quickly descends into a spiral of anger, despair, substance abuse, poverty and violence, and winds up losing his house, his longtime manager (Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson) and, worst of all, Leila, who’s placed in the care of family services. Determined to win back custody of his daughter and gradually revive his boxing career, he takes a menial job cleaning toilets at a rundown boxing gym owned by Tick Willis (Forest Whitaker), who reluctantly agrees to oversee Billy’s training despite his distaste for the world of professional boxing. The sort of tough-love mentor who forbids drinking and swearing in his gym (yet is not immune to either vice), Tick takes a higher-minded view of the sport, giving Billy the sort of athletic education that prioritizes technique, discipline and confidence over anger, retaliation and brute force. Particularly during the film’s first half, Fuqua deploys such a heavy directorial hand that he all but puts a chokehold on the material; he doesn’t seem to be observing Billy’s decline so much as actively trying to break his spirit, as though having the character hit rock bottom numerous times would encourage our empathy rather than leave us feeling crudely manipulated. Fortunately, despite a third-act finale that all too conveniently allows Billy to settle his score with fate, “Southpaw” largely avoids devolving into a sort of pugilistic “Death Wish” (which comes as something of a relief, given the over-the-top Grand Guignol payback in the helmer’s previous outing, “The Equalizer”). The boxing scenes themselves are dynamically lensed and cut (by d.p. Mauro Fiore and editor John Refoua, respectively), and Fuqua (a boxer himself) favors a wide array of camera angles — sometimes adopting the up-close perspective of Billy’s opponent, sometimes taking a ringside seat, yet always seeking to position the viewer in the midst of a gaudy, tawdry, pulse-pounding spectacle. At the same time, the filmmakers seem well aware that nothing they show us can really rival the spectacle of Gyllenhaal himself, who throws himself into the role of Billy Hope with the sort of go-for-broke abandon that makes even his creepy, gollum-like turn in last year’s “Nightcrawler” look like a drama-class exercise by comparison. Having shed 15 pounds (and seemingly a few IQ points) for the part, Gyllenhaal has never looked rougher or tougher onscreen; with his closely cropped hair, his swollen face, his perpetually bloodied left eye, his skin drawn tautly across his muscles, he’s virtually unrecognizable here, which for some will be more than enough to satisfy the expectations of a truly great performance. Strangest of all is the actor’s voice, which sounds as though it’s dropped at least an octave, and his decision to speak in rumbling, inarticulate half-sentences, with almost every other word an expletive. It’s a solid if strenuous piece of acting, one that never lets us forget every ounce of effort that went into achieving it. Gyllenhaal has a handful of sturdy moments with Whitaker, who makes a fine foil in the role of the gruff old trainer, but the star has more difficulty establishing a credible father-daughter rapport with Laurence. As she demonstrated recently in Ross Partridge’s indie drama “Lamb,” Laurence is one of the year’s more remarkable child-acting discoveries, but she has little opportunity to show what she’s capable of here, largely because the movie forces Leila to lash out at her deadbeat dad in ways that feel more dramatically expedient than psychologically persuasive. Perhaps the central failing of this first feature screenplay by Kurt Sutter (“The Shield,” “Sons of Anarchy”) is that it never gets beyond its protagonist’s simplistic worldview, treating Leila more or less as a prop to be brought in and stir up periodic conflict, and likewise reducing the figure of Miguel to a one-dimensional villain. A callous subplot involving an at-risk teenager at Tick’s gym strikes a particularly misguided note. Production designer Derek R. Hill’s sets are convincingly inhabited, and the film makes effective use of Pennsylvania locations to capture the lavish and squalid extremes of Billy’s lifestyle (with boxing-match detours to Madison Square Garden and Caesars Palace in Las Vegas). James Horner’s synth score adds to the film’s brooding tenor, while the soundtrack was produced by Eminem, who was once floated as a possibility to play Billy Hope, and who might well have done more with the role — which is to say, less.
Despite Being Pirated 4.5 Millions Times, 'Witcher 2' Developer Refuses To Annoy Paying Customers With DRM from the there's-more-to-serving-your-customers-than-updating-a-spreadsheet dept I was checking regularly the number of concurrent downloads on torrent aggregating sites, and for the first 6-8 weeks there was around 20-30k ppl downloading it at the same time. Let's take 20k as the average and let's take 6 weeks. The game is 14GB, so let's assume that on an average not-too-fast connection it will be 6 hours of download. 6 weeks is 56 days, which equals to 1344 hours; and with 6h of average download time to get the game it would give us 224 downloads, then let's multiply it by 20k simultaneous downloaders. The result is roughly 4.5 million illegal downloads. This is only an estimation, and I would say that's rather on the optimistic side of things; as of today we have sold over 1M legal copies, so having only 4.5-5 illegal copies for each legal one would be not a bad ratio. The reality is probably way worse. From the very beginning our main competitors on the market were pirates. The question was really not if company x or y had better marketing or better releases, but more like "How can we convince gamers to go and buy the legit version and not to go to a local street vendor and buy a pirated one?" We of course experimented with all available DRM/copy protection, but frankly nothing worked. Whatever we used was cracked within a day or two, massively copied and immediately available on the streets for a fraction of our price. We did not give up, but came up with new strategy: we started offering high value with the product - like enhancing the game with additional collectors' items like soundtracks, making-of DVDs, books, walkthroughs, etc. This, together with a long process of educating local gamers about why it makes sense to actually buy games legally, worked. And today, we have a reasonably healthy games market. DRM does not work and however you would protect it, it will be cracked in no time. Plus, the DRM itself is a pain for your legal gamers - this group of honest people, who decided that your game was worth the 50 USD or Euro and went and bought it. Why would you want to make their lives more difficult? [A]s with every growing business, there are a lot of people coming in who... have no clue about games and could work in any other industry. They are not asking themselves the question "What is the experience of a gamer?" Or "Is this proposition fair?" But rather, they just look to see if the column in Excel adds up well or not, and if they can have a good explanation for their bosses. As funny as this might sound, DRM is the best explanation, the best "I will cover my ass" thing... You are asking, "So why is it taking so long for them to listen?" The answer is very simple: They do not listen, as most of them do not care. As long as the numbers in Excel will add up they will not change anything. As we all have seen demonstrated here at Techdirt, there are several ways to react to piracy. Ubisoft , in particular, has usually found a way to make the worst of it, either through incapacitating DRM or by expressing a firm reluctance to release certain games for the PC.On the other hand, you have companies like Valve , who recognize that not every instance of piracy is simply someone wanting something for nothing, but rather an opportunity for the pirated company to experiment with pricing and convenience options in order to meet the expectations of underserved customers Now you can add CD Projekt, the publisher of Witcher 2, to the growing list of software companies who see piracy as an opportunity, rather than a sinkhole of lost sales. In an interview with PC Gamer, CEO and co-founder Marcin Iwinski came up with some quick math on how many times Witcher 2 was pirated, arriving at a truly jaw-dropping number Despite the fact that the free version was "outselling" the retail version 5-to-1, Iwinsky remains adamant on his company's no-DRM policy, pointing out that CD Projeckt has always had to compete with free:There's your "reason to buy." And now, here's Iwinsky stating the obvious:Of course, this obvious conclusion still escapes many software companies. In their (usually) wasted efforts to deter piracy, they routinely deliver a product that is crippled by its own protection measures. The DRM is a joke to pirates and an insult to paying customers. So, why do these companies continue to punish their paying customers? Iwinsky has a theory:Even with companies like CD Projekt and Valve demonstrating that attempting to punish pirates through DRM or other restrictive measures just makes your customers miserable, others continue to view every pirated copy as a reason to ramp up protection. Iwinsky notes that the "Excel guys" aren't paying attention. The only way to get them to listen is toshow them what a lost sale is: "Vote with your wallet." Filed Under: drm, witcher Companies: cd projekt
There is a winter weather system heading toward Michigan that is safe to call Lower Michigan's first snowstorm, but there are a lot of details still uncertain. So let's figure out what we know and don't know about this storm. The timing of the storm leads to high confidence that we will see precipitation develop in southwest Lower Michigan first, between 2 a.m. and 6 a.m. Saturday. The precipitation will spread across all of Lower Michigan from 6 a.m. to 9 a.m. The precipitation will cover all of Lower Michigan during Saturday afternoon and most of that night. Precipitation will generally be over for Lower Michigan by sunrise Sunday. The exception will be two areas of lake effect snow lingering in southwest Lower and northwest Lower. Precipitation amounts, if looked at as all liquid, should range between .50" and 1.0". That means this is a solid precipitation producer. There will be heavy, wet snow at times. The snow rate should be enough that some part of Lower Michigan will get several inches of snow. Temperatures will be in the 32 degree to 35 degree range during the day Saturday. That's where the dilemma lies on how much snow will accumulate. As I wrote yesterday, , thus cutting snow amounts. While Saturday temperatures are marginal for accumulating snow, after sunset it will get cold enough for any leftover snow to stick to the ground. Roads may also become cold enough to get slick Saturday night. Finally, we know the snow won't stay on the ground long. By Monday we will start our next period of southwest winds and warming temperatures. What we don't know There are still a lot of questions in all meteorologists' minds about exactly how much snow will fall and where. As I read the discussions from all of the National Weather Service offices in Michigan, a common statement is "a high degree of uncertainty." The snow rate in some part of Lower Michigan Saturday should be high enough for snow to accumulate, first on the grass, and then possibly on warmer roads. But we just don't know yet how that will play out. The best I can tell you right now is to be prepared for a possible quick change in road conditions. If you told me you were driving from the Ohio border to the Mackinac Bridge Saturday, I'd tell you that you'll encounter a 50 mile stretch where it could be real sloppy. My guess is that would happen somewhere north of a Midland to Grand Rapids line. My personal feeling is we are going to see the warm air over all the Great Lakes inject a few more degrees of warmth into this system. That should eat away at a lot of the falling snow, or turn it to a rainy snow at times. This is especially possible since the brunt of the storm will be happening during the warmest time of the day. The farther south you are, the more your temperatures will inch toward 35 degrees, a tough temperature to get snow to stick. The snow amount forecast Eventually we have to forecast some snow amounts for you. Later today, or certainly by Friday morning, I'll be ready to make a guess. I use the word "guess" because I want you to know there are a few extra variables compared to a mid-winter, all-snow type storm. I would say whatever early snow forecasts you see will probably be cut in half by melting and the eventual warmth that is not being projected currently by the models. I've seen it the proverbial "hundred times" here in Michigan. The next run of computer models comes in by 2 p.m. today. Those should allow an update, focusing on the trend toward more snow or more warmth and less snow. If you have questions, please ask below. MLive Chief Meteorologist Mark Torregrossa has been forecasting Michigan weather for more than 25 years. He's been chief meteorologist at three television news stations in Michigan, and he's an avid gardener and hunter. Email him at mtorregr@mlive.com and find him on Facebook at facebook.com/mark.torregrossa and Twitter @weathermanmark
TSM’s team work is legendary throughout the League of Legends community. Even among the rest of the pros it stands as the pinnacle of unity. However, such unity is not easily obtained…As Chaox sat in the darkness pondering his thoughts, Xpecial entered the room. “Turn on a light or you’ll strain your eyes and won’t be able to CS for me” Xpecial said with a joking, yet caring voice. “Oh…sorry…haha…” Chaox replied. “What’s wrong?” “…Well, the Oddone and Rainman have been arguing a lot again and I’m a little worried that it can be detrimental to our team synergy.” “Not everyone can be in sync as well as us, we’ve had a little more…practice” Xpecial said with a coy grin on his face. “Oh, that reminds me we haven’t ‘practiced’ in a while…and to be honest, it pains me” Chaox answered. “Sorry, we’ve been so busy scrimming and going to tournaments that my body isn’t ready.” “Don’t worry about the small details so much Xpecial, but then again I guess that’s why you’re the support” Chaox joked as he stared into Xpecial’s soul. “D-Don’t stare like that” Xpecial muttered “you know it makes me….sensitive.” “It’s alright” reassured Chaox as he took off his shirt “I’ll carry you.” Chaox proceeded to take off his pants while Xpecial whispered gently “critical hit” as he saw Chaox’s delicate luggage flop out. Soon both carry and support were sprawled softly on the floor of the dimly room when a disturbance was heard….At the apex of their physical endearments, Chaox and Xpecial looked up to see none other than Rainman and Oddone enter the room arguing about champion viability. They choked on the very words they spoke as they walked onto Chaox and Xpecial choking on a little more than words. “What…what’s going on?” Rainman managed to utter. “Good timing gentlemen” Chaox responded “It’s about time you two learned to work together, as a team.” “What the hell do you mean, you maniacal nutjob” the Oddone retorted. “Nutjob is a good way to put it” chuckled Xpecial “You two are constantly arguing and we believe it’s because there’s unsung tension between each of you.” “I-I don’t know what you’re talking about Xpecial, but Oddone never ganks for me” belted the Rainman. “I always gank for you, fag.” “Prove it then.” “Fine!” squealed Oddone “I’ll gank you right now!” The Oddone then proceeded to disrobe himself in a fashion that can only be described as ‘fascinating’. “W-what is this” blushed Rainman. “I’m ganking you…from behind because I don’t want to disturb that ward in your front bush” Oddone managed to whisper. “O-okay, then at least let me feel the strength of your bottom tower” Rainman replied. He slowly took off each article of clothing and as he stood there an audible gasp could be heard from the Oddone. “I never knew you had a Needlessly Large Rod…” Oddone said as his pale skin turned to a crimson visible even in the twilight covered room. The Oddone’s member dripped, aching for the feel of Rainman’s abyssal depths. “W-welcome to Summoner’s…… HHHNNNNNNNGGGGGG……Rift” Rainman gasped as he convulsed for air as the Oddone filled his great crevice. Chaox leaned over and gently whispered in in Xpecial’s ear “Finally, they’re team mates.” “Yea” Xpecial panted as he felt Chaox’s B.F Sword, “All we need now is our fearless leader.”As if summoned by a queue from the League itself, Reginald entered the room with a god-like demeanor that rivaled even Zeus himself. “I see you’re all practicing without me” Reginald said coldly. “Regi…” Rainman exhaled. Without a moment’s hesitation, Reginald took off his pants to reveal a Black cleaver. “Let me show you guys my aggressive play style” he said slyly. Reginald walked slowly over to where the Oddone was exploring Rainman’s jungle. “Regi” the Oddone panted between heaves “err….Big Daddy…can you show me your explosive AP burst?” “If by AP you mean African-Penis, then yes, I can” Reginald chortled. Reginald licked Rainman’s ear and whispered softly “You’re relieved of your duties, brave soldier. You need more magic resist to handle what’s coming next.” As he slammed his massive fully charged Rod of Ages into Oddone’s fanny, Oddone shrilled at the top of his lungs as he clung to consciousness from both the pain and sweet, sweet, pleasure his precious jungle was experiencing. Reginald was approaching climax quickly from Oddone’s supple hiney. “D-daddy, I knew when I joined TSM that only you could calm my never ending rage” Oddone wheezed. Just as he finished that very sentence, Reginald unleashed his ultimate, which had the force of a thousand white hot suns crashing into Earth. Reginald’s load missed the Oddone, blasting Chaox and Xpecial with such force that they collided with Rainman who was several feet away. “It feels good to finally practice as a team” Xpecial said as he caressed Chaox gently in his arms.As dawn approached TSM’s lodgings and sunlight trickled through the windows, the weary members beamed with a sense of accomplishment and camaraderie. At last, the sun rose into the blistering, endless sky and shone down upon our heroes. With a slight smile forming within the corner of Chaox’s docile mouth he said “I’m glad I streamed this for my marathon.”Source : http://www.solomid.net/forums/index.php?/topic/10792-tsms-godlike-teamwork-story/ TL:DR : It's worth a read.
Maori Party co-leader Tariana Turia says the party will have a "way forward" tomorrow. She and her colleagues needed to talk through what the future of the party was, she said. "I'm very happy, I don't think I've ever been happier," she said of her own decision to stand down. She announced the move late last year but said she would stay on until the election. CAMERON BURNELL/Taranaki Daily News Te Ururoa Flavell. Turia hoped after a few days of talking that the party could "come to an agreement about what's best in the interest of our people". "It's very easy to be very individual, to be in Parliament talking about yourself and what's important to you but in the end it's the people that matter and they will speak." On the possible merger with Mana, Turia said the Maori Party was lead by the people and not by a dictatorship. TARIANA TURIA: Maori Party co-leader. "Somebody who purports to represent our people and to say that hes got to be the leader, no, no that's not how it works in our party. In fact when I read it I thought that Hone had started a comedy show to be frank." Turia was certain that Mana could not win her Te Tai Hauaruru seat. SHARPLES RELAXED Co-leader Pita Sharples said he accepted that Te Ururoa Flavell was challenging his leadership but said the "vibes" would decide. At Ratana Pa this morning, Sharples told reporters he would leave it to the people to decide whether he should stay as leader. He acknowledged that Flavell was keen to lead the party and said it was fine that he was challenge for the position. "But it's not my decision really," Sharples said. "I'm available and I'm available to stand or not to stand, or to be leader or not to be leader, so I'll leave that in the hands of [the party's council]." The Maori Party was expected to discuss its leadership and future plans this afternoon after attending celebrations at Ratana, near Whanganui, and unconfirmed reports suggest Flavell, the party's only other MP, could challenge Sharples for the leadership. Sharples suggested today that even if he was replaced as leader he was likely to remain as Tamaki-Makaurau MP because that was for his own electorate committee to decide. Despite saying recently that he wanted to remain as co-leader, Sharples would not rule out standing aside voluntarily. "It may operate by the vibes of the people, and whichever way the vibe [goes] I will probably take it, because there are good arguments for both people," he said. But for now he was keen to stay on. "It's an interesting one, whether I carry on to keep continuity and my contacts, which are many, or whether I step down now and allow for a new person to come in, they both have benefits I think." But he definitely wanted to stay on as Maori Affairs Minister because he had unfinished business.
That's Daniel Hernandez talking, the 21-year-old intern who helped save Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords's life. Here, Hernandez and two other heroes of the Arizona massacre—one of the men who tackled the gunman and the woman who prevented him from reloading—tell Amy Wallace their gripping stories of that dark and sunny Saturday Daniel Hernandez Jr. (21, junior at the University of Arizona, intern for Representative Giffords): I had thought I wanted to be a physician. Then I volunteered for Hillary Clinton's campaign. I've always been drawn to strong women. They face a double standard, and it's always been a lot harder for them to get half as far, even though they're working twice as hard. The day after Hillary lost the primary, I met Gabby. She had been the youngest woman ever elected to the Arizona state senate. I had an interaction with her at an event, and she just left the biggest impression. After that, my plans changed. It wasn't that I didn't like medicine. I just thought I would be able to serve more people if I went into public service. My internship was supposed to start on January 12, when school begins, but I'd volunteered to start early, because between semesters the office is short-staffed. I've known Gabby for years—I'd worked on her campaigns since I met her in June 2008. She's the kindest, warmest individual you will ever meet. "I don't do handshakes, honey. I do hugs," she always says. Patricia Maisch (61, co-owner with her husband, John, of Oro Valley Heating Cooling): I was there to thank Gabrielle for her work over the last several years. So much is reported about how the stimulus package didn't work, but for our small business, it was incredible. There was a $1,500 federal tax credit if you upgraded your heating-and-cooling system, and we had our best year ever in 2009. I went there to tell her I hoped she would run again in 2012. Bill Badger (74, retired army colonel): I'd never met her, but the congresswoman and I had communicated back and forth on e-mail. Her husband is a captain in the navy, which is equivalent to a colonel in the army. So she's a military spouse, and my wife is a military spouse. Obamacare was one of the issues I e-mailed her about, especially military medical benefits for life. She was exceptionally good at responding. If I had a question, she'd get me an answer. I'm a Republican and she's a Democrat, but she works all the way from the right to the left. I truly admire her. Hernandez: I had gotten up at seven forty-five that day, like I usually do. Gabe Zimmerman, Gabby's community-outreach director, had organized the 10 a.m. "Congress on Your Corner" event, and he asked me to be at the Safeway at the corner of Ina and North Oracle by 9 a.m. to help with setup. When people started arriving, I went to the back of the line with my clipboard, taking down people's information so if we ran out of time, we could send them a letter acknowledging them for coming. That generally didn't happen, because if there was a crowd, Gabby would rarely leave, even if she was late to the next event. But just to be on the safe side, I was registering people. Maisch: I got there early, and I signed in with Daniel—I know that's his name now. I was fourth or fifth in line. I asked him, "Are we going to go in order?" and he said yes. I told him I'd be right back and went into the grocery store and bought a banana and a bottle of water and came back out. Now there are twenty to twenty-five people there. I could have pushed back up to the front, but I thought, you know, "I'm not going to be pushy. I'm just going to go to the end of the line. It's a beautiful day. I can stand in the sun." Badger: When I got there, Giffords had a big banner up with her name on it. I just walked right up and got about ten feet from her, and an aide stepped up and said I had to get in line. So I walked down to the end and registered. It was less than five minutes from the time I parked my car to when I heard the shooting: bang, bang, bang, bang. Hernandez: I had just checked in Bill Badger when I heard what I thought was gunfire. For about half a second, I'm like, "Oh, maybe it's fireworks." And then I heard someone say "Gun!" and it clicked: I remembered some of the things that had happened over the last several months. There was a campaign event where an angry constituent had brought a gun but dropped it. And then the door of her congressional office in Tucson was shot at or smashed last March, after the vote on health care. So I hear the shots, and the first thing I think of is Gabby. Making sure she's okay. I was about thirty to forty feet away from the congresswoman. I heard the shots and ran toward the sound. Maisch: It didn't sound like a car backfiring. It didn't sound like a balloon popping. It had that horrible sound of gunfire. There was this momentary pause, and then it started again in earnest—you know, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop. I thought, "What should I do?" My thought was to run, but in that split second, the gunman was already there, and I thought, "If I run, I'm in his line of fire. He's going to turn from there and shoot at me. I'm going to be a target." Badger: My first reaction was somebody had thrown a pack of firecrackers up where Giffords was talking with the people, just to harass her. But when I turned to look in that direction, I could see an individual shooting. I could see the man standing there with his arm out. He didn't move at first. All he did was turn where he was standing. And he started shooting the people sitting in folding chairs that the campaign had put out for people waiting in line. I knew that soon he was going to be shooting at me. The people on the chairs were hitting the ground. I turned to my left and started to crouch down. When I did, I felt this burning, stinging sensation on the back of my head. I dropped to the ground, and the shooting stopped. Then I stood up, and I was a little bit dazed, because I didn't realize the shooter was walking by right in front of me. Hernandez: I saw people on the ground, some of them clearly injured. The first rule of triage is you treat those you can and move on, so I checked two or three people—neck, wrist, neck, wrist. I was trying to get to the congresswoman. I'm like: I need to stop how I'm feeling, because having a breakdown, crying, trying to protect yourself—while that's a normal reaction—would not be helpful. At that point, all I wanted to do is be helpful. In high school, I'd completed a program called Health Occupations Students of America. I did the certified-nursing-assistant program and also the phlebotomy program, where I learned how to draw blood. So I knew the basics. I knew maybe a tenth of what an EMT knows in terms of what to do. Badger: As the shooter was walking by me, somebody hit him over the back of the head with a folding chair. That's when I realized it was him. And when that happened, he hunched forward, and his left hand came out, and it gave me an opportunity to grab him by the left wrist. I took my right hand and hit the base of his neck. Another individual on the other side did exactly the same thing, and he helped me push him to the ground. I had my left knee on his arm, and with my left hand I got a choke hold on him. The other man got his knee right on the shooter's neck. Every time the shooter would move, I would choke him, and he'd go, "Ow, ow, ow." I said to him, "What in the world would you do something like this for?" He did not answer me. Hernandez: I got to Ron Barber, Gabby's district director, who'd been standing next to Gabby. He was my boss, and he was injured, shot in the leg, but he was still giving me orders. Ron is an amazing person, and he was yelling at me, "Make sure Gabby's okay." So I told someone how to apply pressure to his wounds. Then I became tunnel-visioned on Gabby. I was trying to get people to step back. The last thing you want for anyone in that position, regardless of whether they're a congresswoman or not, is have them in a vulnerable position with people gawking. People were saying, "What can I do to help?" and I would say, "Are you a doctor?" And if they said no, then, "Stay away." Everyone but Gabby kind of ceased to exist. On election day 2010, she and I had had a private conversation. It had been a hard campaign—every election that Gabby's had has been tough—and this one, we didn't find out the results for days. But that night, the main thing she said to me was, no matter what happens, we need to make sure that we continue helping others. Even back in November, she always placed the emphasis on trying to help others. So now I was determined to help her. Maisch: I'm wondering if the bullets are going to ricochet when they hit the concrete and it's going to go in and out of my body. I have all these fast thoughts. But instead of hearing more gunshots, I feel this guy pushed to the ground. He's at an angle right against me. It's the gunman, and his back is to me. He's on his right side. He's touching me. Someone has pushed him down, and people are hollering, "Get the gun, get the gun!" He's got the gun in his right hand, and I'm behind him, so I cannot reach it. But almost at exactly the same time, they're saying, "Get the clip, get the clip!" Well, the clip, he's pulling it out of his left pocket. And he brings it out along with some other items, and he drops it, and in that second I'm able to grab it. Badger: It looked like the shooter was reaching for the gun, so another individual reached down and picked it up—just trying to help. But I said, "Drop it! Quick!" because I was afraid someone would think he was the gunner and shoot him. The man dropped it and stood there with his foot on the gun. Maisch: The gunman had on a stocking cap pulled down low around his eyebrows. He hadn't shaved that morning—he had a little stubble. He was of slight build, but I'm only five foot two, so I moved to sit on his ankles to hold him down. Then I notice that Bill Badger's head is bleeding, and for one second I start to panic. I went, "Oh, my God! Oh, my God, you're bleeding." Then I said to myself, "This is not going to do. You can't panic now." So I said, "Do you want me to get a compress?" and he said, "Yes, please." That clip, I had a grip on it so tight. I mean, I went into Safeway with it. I had a death grip on that thing. I just didn't want to take a chance of it getting close to the gun again. Nobody was going to get it from me. Hernandez: Gabby was slumped down on the ground. The way she had fallen, she was in danger of inhaling her own blood, so I propped her up against my chest to make sure she had a clear airway. Once I had her in my lap, I started checking for wounds. There was a lot of blood coming out of her forehead. I thought: I need to get some pressure on this right away. I didn't have anything. I wanted to take off my shirt or my sweater, but I didn't want to let go of her. So I started applying pressure to her wound directly with my bare hand. She was conscious, and I wanted her to know someone was there. So I said, "You've been shot. There's a few other injured. We're getting you some help. The ambulances are on their way. Do you understand? If you do, squeeze my hand." And she did. When people from Safeway came out to see what had happened, we started yelling, "Grab us rags! Grab us cloth!" and they brought out some of the smocks that the people in the meat department wear, which were clean. I started using those to cover Gabby's wound and apply the pressure. Badger: It took about five minutes until the deputy got there and put the handcuffs on the shooter. I saw dead people and wounded people laying within five feet of where I was standing. It was a terrible scene. I was all bloody, but at first I didn't know it was my blood. I thought it was somebody who'd been shot. But the woman who got the clip from the shooter, she ran into the Safeway store and got paper towels and water, and she came back and treated my wound. I have a lot of respect for that woman. I'm sure the shooter would have killed a lot more people if he'd have got his gun loaded again. Maisch: The other man who helped Bill Badger throw the shooter down, Roger Salzgeber, he was real involved with Gabby's campaign, and he saw her and the little 9-year-old girl get hit. Roger's wife, Faith, was right there, too. And Faith took off her sweatshirt and wrapped it around the lady that had brought the little girl, because she was shot, too. Roger's jacket was full of blood. He had blood on his jeans. I didn't know Roger or Bill before. But now I'm calling them my brothers. You know that old western saying, "If you don't trust your belt, you put on suspenders, too"? Well, those guys were the belt and I was the suspenders. They're my guardian angels. Hernandez: The way that I had crouched down on the ground, both of my legs fell asleep, because I was in such a weird, awkward position. And it was a little bit of time before the paramedics arrived, because the authorities have to make sure the coast is clear. Once the EMTs came in, I tried not to get in their way. They told me, "Hold her in the same position." I did that. They were taking care of her medical needs. I wanted to take care of her emotional needs: "I know you're in a lot of pain, honey, but just stay still. They're trying to help. Do you understand that the police are here? There's not going to be any more shooting. Squeeze my hand. The ambulances are on their way. Do you understand that?" I was trying to keep her calm and informed, because I know Gabby's an inquisitive person, and she would want to know exactly what was going on, because she couldn't open her eyes and see for herself. Originally we were going to be airlifted to University Medical Center. However, I saw that there was an ambulance there. I said, "What's the ETA on the air evac?" They didn't respond, probably because they didn't know. I took that as too long. I said, "She's number one priority. We need to get her out of here—now." They put her on a board. They told me, "We don't want you to go in the ambulance. There's no room." I said, "You'd better make room." On the way, I continued to talk to her. I told her, "I'm on the phone right now trying to get ahold of Mark"—her husband—"and your mom and dad here in Tucson. Do you understand that?" Especially when I mentioned her parents and Mark, she squeezed extra tight. Badger: The EMTs were identifying who was the most seriously hurt, who was alive, who was dead. Eventually they said I would have to go by ambulance to the hospital. They put me on a stretcher and took me down to St. Mary's. The doctor said the first thing we've got to do is an MRI. She read the scan and said there was no damage to the brain or the inside of the skull. The bullet had skimmed the back of my head. I'd only dropped down like six inches when I felt it. I'm sure the shooter aimed directly at my head. I'm the luckiest person going. I really am. Hernandez: I was covered in blood. I had blood all over my clothes, all over my cell phone. But I stayed at the hospital, in those clothes, for hours. My parents came, and my sisters, and they're just bawling their eyes out, and they're like, "Why aren't you crying?" They couldn't understand why I was still trying to keep calm and composed. Some have called me rational. I think that's the nicest way of putting it. To be quite frank, I think some of my friends would fault me for being too detached when I'm trying to handle stressful situations. But I've had this weird policy since I was young. If you're going to show emotion, it needs to be in a place where it's appropriate. Rachel Maddow asked me, "Are you an ice-water-in-your-veins kind of guy?" I'm not—contrary to what some believe—a completely emotionless robot. But sometimes, although I do care, I don't have the ability to express things as well as others. I'm trying to work on it. Maisch: I was sitting in my car in a Jack in the Box parking lot a few days later when I got a voice mail from the office of the president. I hadn't eaten all day, and when I got the message, I got boo-hooey. But then I thought, Well, you'd better get yourself together, girl. So I managed to compose myself, and I called the number, and President Obama got right on the phone. He thanked me for my service, and he said, "I'm hoping to see you in person soon." I hadn't yet heard that he was coming to town. At the memorial, when the president mentioned our names, that brought a couple of tears to my eyes. That's when I reached over to Roger Salzgeber and hugged him. We were seated in the same row. And I reached out to Bill Badger. And I lifted up their hands. Badger: As a commander in the military, I had an open-door policy. I knew all the people who were under my command, and if we had somebody with any problem at all, I was aware, and they would be taken off flight status. We weren't going to have an airplane accident as a result of somebody who had financial or marital problems. Since the shootings, that's been on my mind. There had been red flags raised over the years about this young man. How could an individual who tried to get into the army, and was turned down, purchase a gun and ammunition to do something like this? If somebody had taken the appropriate action, this would not have happened. Hernandez: In the past week, I have gotten 10,000 e-mails. More than 2,000 people have friended me on Facebook. But the most humbling thing was meeting the president and the first lady. I was asked to speak at the memorial, and, well, I have never been known for being a good orator. I'm always more of a blunt speaker. I didn't prepare any remarks. A friend offered to help with writing a speech. But when I was reading it, I realized that if I had something prepared, it would probably seem very stilted. I didn't think it would be appropriate to have anything that was even remotely unemotional. I thought it would be best to come up with it on the spot, and that's exactly what I did. Once I started speaking, I just kept going. I said I saw glimmers of hope in how people have reacted to the killings. I said, "We have all come together to realize that what defines us is not the differences. It is that we are all together. We are all a family. We are all Americans." I said, "The real heroes are the people who have dedicated their life to public service, whether it's direct care in nursing or being a physician or being a great representative like Congresswoman Giffords. They are the people who we should be honoring."
(Reuters) – Apple’s stock extended recent losses on Monday after a warning that iPhone sales could suffer if President-elect Donald Trump follows through on campaign threats to impose new tariffs on China. Apple is among several major technology stocks, including Amazon.com, Facebook and Alphabet, selling off since Tuesday’s election as investors shift funds into financial and public works companies seen benefiting from deregulation and infrastructure spending under President-elect Trump. In a continuation of that trend, the Cupertino, California company’s stock fell 2.5 percent on Monday, bringing its loss since Tuesday’s election to almost 5 percent, compared to the S&P 500’s 1.16 percent advance. Adding to concern for Apple investors, an op-ed published in the China government-backed Global Times on Sunday warned of “tit-for-tat” retaliation should Trump follow through on a campaign pledge to impose 45-percent tariffs on all imports from China. “A batch of Boeing orders will be replaced by Airbus. US auto and iPhone sales in China will suffer a setback, and US soybean and maize imports will be halted,” the op-ed said. China has already become a disappointment for Apple, failing to deliver rapid growth that the company hoped would make up for slower iPhone sales in the United States and other mature markets. Revenue from China slumped 30 percent in Apple’s September quarter, worse than the Americas’ 7 percent decline. Apple’s China sales could be hurt by potential trade conflicts as well as the country’s weakening currency, said Rosenblatt Securities analyst Jun Zhang by email. He said he believes China iPhone sales fell in October, even after fixing supply issues affecting the iPhone 7 Plus. Synovus Trust Company Senior Portfolio Manager Daniel Morgan, who owns $33 million worth of Apple shares, warned not to read too much into Trump’s campaign trail threats against China, at least in the near term. “You just don’t just jump in and start rewriting trade agreements,” Morgan said. (Reporting by Noel Randewich; Editing by Tom Brown)
Breaking News Emails Get breaking news alerts and special reports. The news and stories that matter, delivered weekday mornings. Dec. 5, 2016, 5:41 PM GMT / Updated Dec. 7, 2016, 5:52 AM GMT By Emma Margolin North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory conceded the close gubernatorial race on Monday to his Democratic challenger, Roy Cooper, concluding one of the last outstanding contests of the 2016 election nearly a month after voters cast their ballots. The Republican incumbent had filed for a statewide recount last month, but lost virtually all hope of eking out a reelection victory when Cooper's lead had surpassed 10,000 votes last week -- and the threshold whereby state law allows McCrory to ask for a recount. As of Monday, Cooper was up by 10,563 votes, according to the North Carolina Board of Elections. In a YouTube video released Monday, McCrory said it was "time to celebrate our Democratic process" and respect "the ultimate outcome of the closest North Carolina race in modern history." "Despite continued questions that should be answered regarding the voting process, I personally believe that the majority of our citizens have spoken, and we now should do everything we can to support the 75th governor of North Carolina, Roy Cooper," McCrory said. Cooper released a statement in response, thanking McCrory for his service to the state and noting, "while this was a divisive election season, I know still that there is more that unites us than divides us." The concession marks the end of a drawn-out process that saw McCrory’s campaign and supporters raise multiple questions about the legitimacy of the election results -- accusations his critics saw as an attempt to undermine the will of the voters. McCrory filed complaints in about half of the state’s 100 counties but no evidence of widespread voter fraud ever came to light. All of those complaints were rejected by McCrory’s own Republican appointees serving on local county election boards. Last week, the State Board of Elections -- also Republican-controlled -- ordered a recount in Durham due to a delay in the county’s returns being added to the statewide tally. According to the Raleigh News & Observer, the delay came because election workers entered information from ballot tabulators' paper tapes after they were unable to read data from six memory cards that also came from the tabulators. Experts on the equipment told Durham officials that the paper tapes were reliable, and several political watchers believed the results would be unchanged after a county recount. Durham is one of the strongest Democratic counties in the state, and Cooper won it by a wide margin of 79 percent to 20 percent. Having signed a spate of unpopular legislation that restricted voting, reproductive and LGBTQ rights, McCrory was greeted with a number of cheers following his decision to accept defeat on Monday. “Pat McCrory’s reign of discrimination is finally over," said the Human Rights Campaign president Chad Griffin in a statement. The HRC had aggressively campaigned against House Bill 2, a measure McCrory signed that blocked transgender people from using government building bathrooms in accordance with their gender identities. HB2 sparked a national backlash, with numerous boycotts from businesses, musicians and sports organizations. In one of the biggest repercussions for a state where college sports is almost a religion, the NCAA and ACC earlier this year relocated several championship games out of North Carolina over the discriminatory legislation. "McCrory's stubborn and reckless support of HB2 cost him this election, and his defeat sends a powerful warning to lawmakers across the country that targeting LGBTQ people will not be tolerated,” added Griffin. "We look forward to working with Governor-elect Roy Cooper and fair-minded lawmakers to repeal HB2. It's way past time to repair the harm inflicted on North Carolina’s people, reputation and economy.”
WASHINGTON - Workers in some cities and states will be getting a raise next week as annual minimum wage increases go into effect around the country. In states and cities that have passed significant minimum wage increases, some workers will see raises of $1 an hour or more as minimum wages are phased in to $12, $13 or $15 an hour. According to Waiting for the Payoff, research by People's Action Institute, a living wage for a single adult – a wage that actually allows workers to make ends meet – is $17.28 per hour nationally. Yet, in many states, come January 1, minimum wage workers will receive just a nickel or dime more per hour. And in the states that pay workers the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour, there will be no raises – again. The federal minimum wage hasn’t changed since 2009. In every state, according to research by People’s Action Institute, the minimum wage falls far short of an actual living wage. In Alabama, the $7.25 minimum wage is 47 percent of the $15.49 needed to make ends meet there. In California, the $10 minimum wage is about half of the $19.90 it takes for a single adult there to get by. SCROLL TO CONTINUE WITH CONTENT Help Keep Common Dreams Alive Our progressive news model only survives if those informed and inspired by this work support our efforts This table from the report compares the minimum wage in 50 states and D.C. to the living wage for that state. “A $15 minimum wage is a modest demand,” said Allyson Fredericksen, deputy director of research and author of the report. “In urban and rural states across the country, the living wage is consistently far higher than the minimum wage, and higher than most people would guess.” People’s Action institute released Waiting for the Payoff: How Low Wages and Student Debt Keep Prosperity Out of Reach in October. The report calculates how much a single, full-time worker must be paid hourly to make ends meet. There is also a second calculation, adding in monthly student loan payments, to determine how much a worker with student debt needs to be paid to get by. The Job Gap Economic Prosperity Series has been produced since 1999. ###
The Volvo YCC ("Your Concept Car")[1] was a concept car made by Volvo Cars presented at the 2004 Geneva Motor Show, with the stated goal of meeting the particular needs of female drivers. In order to do so, Volvo assembled a design team entirely made up of women, around October 2001. It was a major exercise in ergonomics from the perspective of a female driver. Those who were involved during the several stages of the project were: Maria Widell Christiansen, Eva-Lisa Andersson, Elna Holmberg, Maria Uggla, Camilla Palmertz, Cynthia Charwick, Anna Rosén, Lena Ekelund, and Tatiana Butovitsch Temm. On the outside the car looked, at first glance, like a mildly futuristic four seat coupé. On closer inspection, one could see that there was no hood, that is, no access panel permitting access to the car’s engine. Engine maintenance required taking out the whole front end of the car body, preferably in some establishment with the required space and equipment. This was not supposed to happen often, as the engine was designed to need an oil change only after 50,000 km (31,000 mi) and to automatically send a radio message to a garage a short time before any required maintenance. Filling the windshield washer tank was done by a capless ball valve, right next to the capless gas tank ball valve. Volvo surveys had found (among many other things) that female drivers considered caps to be a major nuisance. The car featured run-flat tires, like those of wheeled armoured vehicles, in order to be able to drive all the way to a garage after a puncture and thus avoid having to change a tire by the side of the road. Entry into the car was by the means of two gull-wing doors on the sides. The concept was a three door, four seat coupe design. It also had an upwards opening hatchback door giving access to the trunk and cargo area. All three doors were motorized for a sensor based “keyless” entry. Pressing on a single button on the keychain automatically opened the nearest door, making it easy for somebody holding bags of groceries or other sundries to get the things in the car without putting anything down. The interior was maximized for easy storage and good looks. All of the textile panels or textile parts such as the seat pads or the door sides could be removed easily to change the color schemes and vary textures. The headrests had indentations to accommodate pony tails. The shifting column and the hand brake were removed from the center console to give the front seat passengers easier access to the large storage compartments located within the dashboard. The rear seat could fold up, making it easy for the driver to get a fairly big item in the car without opening the hatchback. The bumpers and body cladding were made from tough, dent resistant materials. The hybrid engine was economical and powerful.[citation needed] The five cylinder engine produced 215 bhp (160 kW; 218 PS).
Photo by Justin Lubin – © NBCUniversal, Inc. Tonight’s episode of Community is called “Basic Lupine Urology.” Hold that thought. Then consider the new platinum red-and-blue logo for the show. Over it, a voice intones: Greendale Community College is represented by two separate yet equally important groups of people. The goofballs that run around stirring up trouble—and the eggheads that make a big deal out of it. These are their stories. Advertisement Yes, it’s the long-awaited Law & Order episode of Community, a show that, more often than not, makes us very, very happy, and no time more so than with tonight’s episode, in which seemingly every line is a gem. The show’s creator, Dan Harmon, and his writers seem to be on a mission—a mission to what, exactly, we can’t know. But even when the episodes suck they are generally going after something big. Tonight, while this or that Community writer (or maybe even Harmon himself) is sure to protest their affection for Law & Order, make no mistake: This is a full-frontal assault on the most gigantic, most formulaic, and lamest franchise in the history of television. Law & Order’s creator, Dick Wolf, found a usable format—the one-hour cops ’n’ DA’s procedural, with the plot often drawn from recent news events, and with little in the way of ongoing narrative, making it all the easier to syndicate—and ran with it for decades, creating two, three, four offshoots, and garnering untold riches along the way. We waited for the collapse of the franchise for years. Sooner or later, people were just going to get sick of it, right? We wanted to see it go down and take NBC with it, sorta the way ABC nearly destroyed itself by running Who Wants to be a Millionaire four nights a week. But it never happened, and some variation of the show will apparently continue into eternity, along with the various CSI’s, NCIS’s and so forth. But I digress. The title of tonight’s Community is, as noted, “Basic Lupine Urology.” Lupine, of course, relates to the word wolf, and urology has to do with the male urinary system. Advertisement In other words, it’s Wolf piss. And this episode is a finely wrought jewel. From the cold open in which a not-so-terrible crime is discovered to its last-minute plot twist (a Law & Order specialty, of course), from the hilariously consistent hand-held camerawork to the cast of highly clichéd characters doing highly clichéd things, from the dialogue (seriously, virtually every line is a delight) to the plot (rigorous throughout), this is a fine piece of work. There’s even a chase sequence! Indeed, the biggest joke of all is that, even putting aside the writing and acting (we know that Community is bravura in those departments), tonight’s episode, viewed purely as a police procedural, is streets ahead of any Law & Order episode you can give me. It’s better plotted, more engrossing, has better surprises, cuts deeper, and says more about the human condition. All this, when the main victim is a yam. Advertisement The study group’s biology-class yam has been squished on the floor with what seems to have been malice aforethought, and Annie, horrified at the prospect of losing an A in the class (this is the one taught by Michael K. Williams, aka Omar from The Wire), is determined to see the perp in court. (Or class.) She asks Shirley to investigate; the latter turns, delectably, to Abed and Troy for the legwork: “You boys canvass for witnesses, establish a time frame and motive, and bring me a suspect,” she barks, with pitch-perfect intonation. “You’ve got 48 hours before the trail runs cold, so start with the last person to see that yam alive.” Off Troy and Abed go, running through the beloved flotsam and jetsam of the episode: Leonard and Pierce caught in an illegal arm-wrestling gambling den; Magnitude, whose “Pop! Pop!” here conveys volumes; Starburns, louchier and douchier than ever; Todd, the hapless Iraq war vet, brought back to the show to be emotional road kill again; and, finally, Fat Neil, a too-genial office boy with something to hide. Almost every scene of the 22 minutes is an exquisite piece of parody. There’s Britta, wearing glasses, displaying a dimwitted command of computers: When she looks up to say her psych background can help with the investigation, everyone walks away and the show cuts to a commercial. There’s Annie, grilling a witness: “Is that why you hit your wife? Withdrawn! Is that why you smoke pot and pop pills? Withdrawn! Are you a virgin? Withdrawn!” And there’s a brilliant throwaway scene in the school office, with Fat Neil pointlessly moving file folders around as he carelessly delivers his lines—itself a small masterpiece of mimicry. Along the way, no one pretends to be anything but what they are. Says Troy when he captures a suspect: “You have the right to do whatever you want. Nothing you say or do can be used against you by anyone, but we’d really like it if you’d come with us.” The biology teacher, presiding over the yam inquiry in class: “I’d like to remind you that this is not a courtroom.” Advertisement Among the many subtle delights of the show are: Troy and Abed riffing on cop-show tough-talk, with just enough of a beat between each line to show that they’re struggling to come up with new ones; the credits, a moody, Mike-Post-like electric-piano-driven version of the Community theme song; and a street scene that features construction workers, passing traffic, and Garrett selling hot dogs. And the episode’s most fulfilling attribute is just how persuasively plotted the story is. Granted that the victim was a yam and the scene of the crime a school science project, still, the logic of the narrative is unassailable; a key piece of evidence is on display for all to see; the plot twists are rational and genuine; and virtually everyone involved in the case is operating on understandable human motives. Note the guest appearance by actor Michael Ironside, a tough-guy staple from a slew of Abed-friendly movies—and note, too, innumerable clever exchanges and one-liners: Jeff: “She got me here on a very misleading text message.” Advertisement Annie: “Jeff, technically you are about be screwed in the biology room, because our final project has been destroyed.” “He’s the bad cop. I’m the good cop.” The suspect in a chase: “Kiss me, I’ll explain later!” Woman: “Explanation isn’t the issue!” “Walk it off!”
A woman lay dead along the railway tracks with her year-old son clinging to her chest, trying to breastfeed. He cried and shook his mother fitfully, wondering why she won’t wake up. The heartbreaking scene unfolded on Wednesday morning in Madhya Pradesh’s Damoh, nearly 250km from Bhopal. The woman either fell off a train or she was hit by one. The wounds suggest she fell on the back of her head, and the concussion and bleeding killed her, though not immediately. Residents discovered around 6am the woman and the toddler: sucking his mother’s breasts and nibbling on a biscuit alternately. They informed railway police and some of the onlookers shot cell phone videos and posted them on social media. The posts were shared extensively and activated child welfare activists. “She died before people found her … The child wasn’t injured,” railway police officer Anil Marawi said. The mother was probably holding the baby close to her chest when she fell, which saved the child. “She was injured but probably conscious … opened a biscuit packet and gave some to the child. She breastfed her child to ensure he survives,” the officer said. “The child wailed aloud when he was separated from his mother.” His heartrending cries shook Tiwari and the onlookers. “…it shakes you to the core, however hardened you have become over the years,” he said. The tragedy, however, failed to move officials at the town’s government hospital where police took the corpse and the child. The child won’t be admitted because he can’t pay an admission fee of Rs 10. The boy was kept waiting until ward boy Tarun Tiwari came forward with the money to ease the bureaucratic inconvenience. “They kept talking about rules,” said Sudhir Vidyarthi, chairperson of the Damoh child welfare committee. The body was sent for autopsy, while the “orphaned” boy was shifted to a children’s home. “We will publish notices … If his family members come, we will verify their credentials and hand him to them,” Vidyarthi said. Police are trying to identify the woman but the lone lead they have is a purse recovered near the tracks. It bears the name of a Tikamgarh jewellery shop. First Published: May 24, 2017 20:01 IST
Throughout my software development career, I’ve seen my fair share of debates over how databases should be developed. And like most disagreements over technical pedantry, the participants are generally well-intentioned but grossly inexperienced. So much so that it wouldn’t matter if they use foreign keys or not. Though “elegant”, their software will become an unmaintainable mess after a few short years. But regardless, one counter-argument that constantly rears its ugly head goes something like, “but what if we have to change it later?” In other debates, that question can be quickly rebutted with “uh, we just change it then,” but when the discussion is on databases, it actually holds water. It’s as if the database is a marble statue that, once shipped to production, should never be changed... and if it must, there had better be a damn good reason. Let’s keep in mind that the whole point of developing software – that is, spending large sums of money paying developers’ salaries to build and maintain applications – is to have something that can change according to business need. When developers are unable, afraid, or unwilling to change the applications they develop, they make a very compelling case for being replaced by SAP. Databases are Different Databases are indeed different, especially when juxtaposed with what application developers are most familiar with: application code. Generally speaking, application code lives in a source control system and is a set of instructions that tell that tell the machine to do something. Whether it’s compiled or interpreted, or executed on a real or virtual machine, application code does stuff. As a developer, when you’re satisfied that it’s doing the right stuff, the release management process kicks in to promote that code through acceptance testing, quality testing, other testing, and finally production. And all along the way, the code should not change. If a bug is found, then it’s fixed in source control and sent right back through the same process. Databases, on the other hand, live on the production database server. There can certainly be other instances – development, testing, staging – but the only one that really matters is production. And these databases don’t actually do stuff, they’re merely modified and queried by other applications with a Structured Query Language. And unlike application code, databases (or at least, their completely integrated data) do change after deployment – that’s kind of their whole point. Database Changes Done Wrong Unlike application code, you can’t exactly drop a bunch of files in a folder and proclaim that a new version has been successfully deployed. You also can’t just put back an older set of files to rollback your changes. The only way to change a database is by running a SQL script against that database, and once you’ve done that, there’s no going back. You can run another SQL script to change the database again, but the only way to truly rollback changes is by restoring the entire database from back-up. Quite a many developers struggle with this unique change process across multiple environments. I’ve heard some go so far as to say that databases are fundamentally broken, as if gravity is to blame for their inability to fly. But most developers’ reluctance to master this method leads towards a tendency to simultaneously resist change and change things uncontrollably. If those seem contradictory, consider the Entity-Attribute-Value design. It’s one of the worst database development anti-patterns out there, and sadly one that I keep seeing happening in the wild because “what if we have to change it later.” An EAV design is a shining example of the Inner-Platform Effect. The inner-platform effect is the tendency of software architects to create a system so customizable as to become a replica, and often a poor replica, of the software development platform they are using. In fact, it was exactly what I used to initially describe that anti-pattern. For the record, the worst anti-pattern I’ve seen took this concept once step further. The Taxonomy of Database Scripts As databases can really only be accessed through SQL scripts, it’s important to identify the three main categories of scripts as it relates to changes: Query Scripts – no impact on data or database structure, such as simple SELECT statements – no impact on data or database structure, such as simple SELECT statements Object Scripts – alter the database, but only by adding/updating/deleting non-data objects like stored procedures, views, functions, etc. – alter the database, but only by adding/updating/deleting non-data objects like stored procedures, views, functions, etc. Change Scripts –change the structure of or the data stored within tables (ALTER TABLE, INSERT, CREATE INDEX, etc) The first category of scripts fall out of the realm of database changes, which means that we need to concern ourselves with only two types of scripts: Object Scripts and Change Scripts. Object Script Changes Done Right Many applications rely on SQL scripts stored within the database – stored procedures, views, triggers, etc. – for queries they make to the database. These objects are effectively code that your application depends on, and since they’re code, they should be treated just like code. That means they “live” in source control, get labeled when your application code is built, deployed with your application code, the whole nine yards. Doing this is surprisingly easy, and starts by creating an object script for each and every object. Each script should do three things: Since these object scripts simply create objects, they can be run time and time again without any real consequences. Plenty of tools are available to help extract and create these scripts for you, and once you have everything on disk, it’s just a matter of dropping it into source control. Note how I’ve got a prefix before each script. That’s the simplest way to ensure scripts run in the correct order, as all you need is a very simple batch command script to iterate over the files in your source tree. FOR /R . %%f IN (*.sql) DO ( OSQL -E -i "%%f" -n -b -d MyDataBase ) With this technique, your object change scripts can – and should – follow the exact same process that your application code does. After all, it’s just another code layer in the overall application. Database Change Scripts Done Right The thing that makes Database Change Scripts so difficult to work with is that changes are coming from two different directions. Data changes (INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE) are constantly happening in production through the day-to-day use of the application, while data structure changes (ALTER TABLE, etc.) are simultaneously occurring in development and testing environments. Changes in both directions are an absolute requirement: application data must flow directly in to production and development changes must flow through a testing process before going to production. Shortcutting the process leads you right back to the anti-patterns we discussed: resisting change and/or uncontrollable change. But before we look at how to do it right, let’s consider some fundamentals that apply to any database change script, regardless of the database platform or scope of change. The Cardinal Rules of Database Change Scripts Run once and only once – simply put, you can’t add the same column to the same table twice; while you could certainly wrap your change script in a big IF block (discussed later), that doesn’t count as running it twice Impossible to be “un-run” – once you’ve dropped that column, it’s gone forever; you could certainly restore your database from back-up, but that’s not exactly an undo, especially when you lose all the intermediate data There is no getting around these rules. Period. Changes must flow in both directions, and any solution you engineer to try to work-around this fundamental will lead straight back to the aforementioned anti-patterns: resisting change and/or uncontrollable change. Anti-pattern: Re-executable Change Scripts One attempt to circumvent Cardinal Rule #1 is something called the re-executable change script. The idea is to surround a change script in IF block that tests whether the enclosed change script has already been run. It looks something like this: At first glance, it seems like a relatively sane way of developing change scripts. Just batch these like object scripts, and you can run them over and over and over again. A lot of developers – including many of you – swear by this technique and have had little (if any) problems using it. But like all cardinal rules violations, it leads to one of those two anti-patterns, and in this case, it’s uncontrolled changes. In the Sprockets example above, the script is testing for the non-existence of a table named Sprockets table before running the change script. But what if a previous version of the script defined Sprocket_Name as VARCHAR(50) NULL , and that version was run and tested in QA? Multiply that by a dozen other changes in a handful of environments, and the consequences of uncontrolled change quickly become costly and difficult to pinpoint problems. Of course, you could make your testing logic more and more complex by testing each and every conceivable aspect of a table, and then ensuring that the change script would alter or create it in that precise way… but then you’d be falling into yet another anti-pattern. Anti-pattern: Database Syncing There are dozens and dozens of commercial and open-source “database diff” tools that will programmatically inspect the metadata of two different databases and provide a comparison of what’s different. Many of these tools will take it a step further by generating and then executing a change script to “sync” the two databases. Like re-executable change scripts, many developers swear by these tools and herald them as an end to worrying about database changes. And just like re-executable change scripts, they shortcut the cardinal rules and lead to uncontrolled changes. The biggest sin in syncing is that, by its very nature, the process does not allow for the same change script to be tested in each environment. In each release lifecycle, each and every build is promoted to the first environment; many builds are promoted to other pre-production environments; and just one build is promoted to production. As database changes are intricately tied with application code changes, database synchronizations occur in a similar fashion to builds. This funnel is perfectly fine for application code. After all, you’re just replacing an entire set of files with an entire set of new files; the operating system doesn’t care what new functions or classes have been added to the code. But the database sync process not only needs to understand exactly what changed, but generate and then execute a change script. Compared to application code, that’d be like using Reflector (or any other disassembler) to diff functionality and then deploy those diffs while the application is running. To make matters worse, the generated change scripts will be different between each environment because they represent a different set of changes. Worse still, the last and final sync to Production is an amalgam of all syncs before it, making it the riskiest and most uncontrolled change of them all. Following the Cardinal Rules Since you can’t work your way around the Cardinal Rules, you may as well develop a process to work with them. Develop a Change Script – use any tool you’d like, so long as the output is a SQL script; the more human readable, the better, especially if you want to get in to the next step (Optional) Code Review – this is optional, of course, but it’s always nice to have a second set of eyes Execute Script in Test Environment(s) – run the exact same script in each environment as you deploy your application code Execute Script in Production – by this point, you should be pretty confident that a script that’s been run several times before should run fine when it counts ON FAIL, FIX DATABASES AND GO TO 1 – this is perhaps the most important part of the process; if something goes wrong in test, fix the database (restore from backup ideally) and the databases before it, figure out why it failed, write a new script, and start from the beginning; every environment you don’t run the new script in is one less test before production Tools of the Trade A process is only as good as how it’s implemented, and with database change scripts, there are three important tools needed to implement the process. Change Script Library All the change scripts that you write will have to live somewhere, and their home should be a special place. In addition to storing the script itself, the change script library should have: Write-Once – change scripts cannot change throughout the release lifecycle; they are not changed, they are undone (ideally, through a restore) and discarded – change scripts cannot change throughout the release lifecycle; they are not changed, they are undone (ideally, through a restore) and discarded Metadata – in addition to the change script itself, the following attributes are important to track Unique ID (at least, unique within the application) Author Target Application Target Release Number – in addition to the change script itself, the following attributes are important to track Controlled/Auditable Access – ensuring not only that authorized developers maintain change scripts, but that they follow the aforementioned rules Neither file systems nor source control systems meet all of these requirements, but they can work with the aid of a spreadsheet and some well-disciplined developers. There are also some tools specifically designed to solve this problem, including the product I work on (BuildMaster) at the day job (Inedo). Execution Logs Database change scripts will end up being executed multiple times, and knowing the specifics of these executions is as important as knowing who changed which sourcefiles. At a minimum, an execution log should be maintained in production, but it certainly can be helpful to know which scripts were run in which order in the lower environments. The execution log should track the following: Script Unique ID Who executed the script When it was executed Database it was executed against Status of the execution (Fail or Success) Script output log Database Versioning Whereas the Execution Log is an external indicator of which change scripts have been executed against which database, a database versioning system allows the database itself to have a history of its own changes. Database versioning is as simple as maintaining a metadata table with two columns: Unique ID and Execution Date. Before executing a change script, simply check the table to see if the script has been executed already and, if not, run it and stored the script’s unique ID and date. Having a metadata table allows you to easily revert to a back-up of the database and re-run any change scripts that need to be executed. This is particularly useful for restoring the production database in pre-production environments. Maintaining a versioning table isn’t too difficult of a process to automate, and I’ve certainly written my share of scripts to do this over the years. Including the change script management feature within BuildMaster: Another great benefit to database versioning (and a change script library) is the ability spin up a new database environment – including developers’ workstations – with minimal hassle, even if it’s months or years after the system has been live. Wrapping Things Up Database are not just at the center of your applications, but they are the center. Application data will outlive application code by many lifetimes, especially as we become more and more reliant and software and become accustomed to, say, look at what orders we placed just a “few years” ago on Amazon. If you’re afraid of making database changes, or you make so many reckless changes that you’re shamed into never touching a database again, then your legacy will become creating legacy applications that no one wants to — nor can reasonably — maintain.
Get the biggest Arsenal FC stories by email Subscribe Thank you for subscribing We have more newsletters Show me See our privacy notice Could not subscribe, try again later Invalid Email Theo Walcott has given Arsenal a major injury scare just days before the new Premier League season's big kick-off. Walcott hurt an ankle during training with England on Monday, needed to be helped from the pitch and could not complete the session. Arsenal winger Walcott is now a doubt for Wednesday’s international friendly against Scotland - and his club boss Arsene Wenger will be anxious no risks are taken ahead of the Gunners' season-opener against Aston Villa. England boss Roy Hodgson insists Walcott will be fit despite the injury, which came in a tackle after a raft of players from the Three Lions' Under-21 squad, including Everton left-back Luke Garbutt, were drafted into the session with the under-staffed seniors. Hodgson said: “Theo took a slight knock at the end of training, but we believe he’ll be okay. He’s very much still in contention.” The England seniors had a shortage of players on Monday - Manchester United players involved in the Community Shield on Sunday were given extra time to recovery while the Chelsea contingent had only just flown in from the Blues' US pre-season tour. Steven Gerrard, Rickie Lambert, Theo Walcott, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Jack Wilshere, Jermain Defoe, Kyle Walker, James Milner and Glen Johnson were the only other seniors to train on Monday morning. It meant Garbutt, Eric Dier, Tom Thorpe, Jesse Lingaard, Tom Carroll, Michael Keane and Todd Kane were promoted from the Under-21s to make up the numbers.
Caudal's Unsuccessful Guide to EVE, Vol. 3: Fittings Choice (n): a range of possibilities from which one or more may be selected. There's a problem with EVE. It has too damned many CHOICES. Boy howdy does EVE have that in spades. Take, for example, afterburners. Everyone needs a Rifter with a little VROOM VROOM and ZOOM ZOOM and HAHA YOU CAN'T CATCH ME MUAHAHAHAHAHAHA! And afterburners provide that in a nice affordable little package. So you sit down and decide you're going to fit one on your ship. So which one? You in the back there? You shout "MICROWARPDRIVE" one more time and I'm going to slap you silly with a haddock. Okay? Okay. We good? Good. Since we're fitting a Rifter (right? RIGHT?!) that means we're looking at 1MN afterburners, which immediately limits us to only 15 possible choices. ONLY? Good lord, man. So you pop open the market window and do a quick search on "afterburner" and you get back four different types of 1MN afterburner in prices that are from "hey, not bad" to "HOLY CRAP". They're also pretty common drops from level 1 security mission wrecks, so if you're into that kind of that thing you probably have one or two floating around in your Item hanger. So let's pop my Item hanger open and see what we have: Aha! So I've already got me a "Limited 1MN Microwarpdrive I" here... Wait a second. (You BASTARD. You smug, smug bastard. You just stay sitting down in the back row there and don't say another WORD you son of a...) (Never mind.) Okay. So I've got a couple MICROWARPDRIVES here, and the only difference appears to be the name. So how do I tell the difference between a "Limited" and an "Upgraded" microwarpdrive? Here's what you do: 1) Right-click one of the microwarpdrives and open the Info window. 2) Click the Variations tab, then click the Compare button at the bottom of the window. VOILA! Up pops the Compare Tool, which shows EVERY DIFFERENT MICROWARPDRIVE YOU CAN FIND! Isn't that AWESOME? The simplest metric you can use to decide which item to fit is the Meta Level (the higher the number, the better the item.) Check the Meta Level box, sort by the newly exposed column, and you're golden. In this case, contrary to expectation, it turns out that a Limited Microwarpdrive is actually BETTER than the Upgraded Microwarpdrive. Whodathunkit? Not The Caudal, that's for sure! So that works pretty well for comparing microwarpdrives to microwarpdrives. But what if, say, you want to compare Fusion S ammo to Phased Plasma S ammo? Believe it or not, you can DO THAT TOO. Yes indeedy! Here's what you do: 1) Close the Compare Tool. 2) Find the first type of ammo you want to compare. Right click -> get Info -> Variations -> Compare. 3) With the Compare Tool STILL OPEN, repeat step 2 with the other ammo type. VOILA! You can now compare TWO COMPLETELY DIFFERENT AMMO TYPES TO ONE ANOTHER!!! Dude, that's so awesome I can't think of anything more to say. I'm just going to wander off in a pleasant glow. Wow. Many Warm Regards, Caudal PS: I feel bad for not including a 4) somewhere in here. I really really tried! I did! Don't hate me! Caudal, "Ego sum iens morior!"
The Eurasian Economic Commission (EEC) has approved tax-free imports of vehicles equipped with electric engines. This will make buying an electric car in Russia about 15 percent cheaper. Russian engineer Romanov has built and demonstrated a two seated electric car in 1899 in St. Petersburg, Russia pic.twitter.com/6kZtcR3Lkn — English Russia (@EnglishRussia1) May 25, 2015 EEC is the body responsible for implementing decisions taken by the members of the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) that includes Russia, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Kyrgyzstan. The duty on electric cars was cancelled in February 2014, but the exclusion was not extended when it expired earlier this year. The new amendment will come into effect in September and last till the end of August, 2017. The exclusion does not apply to any other cars, including hybrid and plug-in hybrid vehicles. Under the new regulation, customs duties on electric trucks weighing less than five tons have been reduced to five percent from fifteen percent. “Scaling down the duties aims to encourage the use of eco-friendly transport within the boundaries of the Eurasian Economic Union and provide a background for developing the e-vehicle market,” said the EEC Trade Minister Veronika Nikishina. The minister stressed that more electric vehicles on the roads means it's necessary to make more charging stations available. Electric cars in Russia: Only 647 cars registered in total divided into 5 different models. Autostat figures pic.twitter.com/ePoXViD1Gb — Autorussia P-O Egli (@POEgli) April 4, 2016 Developing the domestic e-vehicles market and creating the necessary infrastructure will directly affect the decision to further extend the measure, according to the commission. The grace period won’t be prolonged in case local manufacturing of ‘green’ transport begins. Earlier this month, the government introduced a wide-ranging program to encourage ‘green’ transportation in Russia. The initiative includes introducing reduced tariffs on toll roads, free parking in cities and canceling transport tax. E-car drivers will get the right to use bus lanes with energy providers to be able to build charging stations without bureaucratic hurdles. The program is intended to be implemented by 2025.
Israeli Vandals Write Anti-Christian Graffiti In Jerusalem 2:01 PM [Friday, May 9, 2014] A number of Israeli vandals wrote anti-Christian graffiti, along with other anti-Arab graffiti, near a Roman Church in occupied Jerusalem, and on a wall in the Chains Gate area, in Jerusalem’s Old City.In a statement issued on Friday, the Israeli police said that Price Tag fanatics wrote graffiti, including slurs and insults against Jesus Christ, and Christianity, and fled the scene. The Police added that other graffiti, such as “Death To Arabs”, was found on a wall and on a circuit box, in the Chain Gates area. On Monday, other racist graffiti, including ‘Death to Arabs’, was located on a wall that belongs to the Assembly of Bishops of the Notre Dame Center, in occupied East Jerusalem. The Roman Church in occupied Jerusalem said it is alarmed by the sharp increase in attacks and threats to Christians, especially as the Pope will be visiting Israel and Palestine later this month. In a statement, bishops of the Roman Church said it is alarming that, while such attacks are taking place, and as more attacks indicate lack of security, Israeli political leaders remain unresponsive, adding that such attacks “are likely to escalate if the situation continues”. On Tuesday, [April 29, 2014] In a letter delivered to the Latin Patriarch in the Holy Land, Paul Marcuzzo of Nazareth, an Israeli man, has said that all Christian priests, and Christians in Israel, must leave the country “or else a 100 Christians will be killed every hour of delay”. Israel’s Haaretz newspaper reported that the Israeli security services fear that Jewish radicals might carry out a major hate crime against the Christian population or institutions to drum up media attention during the Pope’s pilgrimage. Police districts, the newspaper said, were ordered to produce security plans to protect Christian sites and gather intelligence on Jewish extremist activities. A police spokesperson declined to comment directly on the report, but said stringent security measures would be in effect for the papal visit. Related: Catholic Church Demands Israel Stop Hate Attacks
PHOTO MYSTERY: Top: The frame before. Bottom: The next frame, with the unexplained figure beside the seated man. Dusk had settled and night was closing in on Beach Cemetery at Hell Spit, on the old Anzac battlefields of Gallipoli, when Fairfax photographer Joe Armao opened the shutter on his last series of pictures for the day - and captured something inexplicable. Only three people were at the cemetery, or anywhere, so far as we were aware, within kilometres: Armao, guide and local author Celal Boz, and me. Celal was standing among the silent graves, the only person - no more than a silhouette in the gloom - in the camera's field of vision. JOE ARMAO/Fairfax Media SIDE BY SIDE: A close up of the frame with the mystery figure. By the time the shutter closed, what appeared to be another ghostly figure had been captured by the camera. The shadowy silhouette of a figure in a wide-brimmed hat appeared in the frame. In the foreground is a flower that grows between the gravestones. The spectral figure appears in only one of a series of three near-identical frames shot by Armao over 40 seconds. The camera angle had changed no more than 15 centimetres over the series of pictures, and the shutter had been set for a 2.5-second exposure because of the gathering dark. Armao saw the unexplained apparition when he checked the frames a few seconds later. He could offer no explanation, but he said the hair stood up on the back of his neck. When he showed Celal and me, we packed up and left the empty cemetery. Armao, a Walkley-award-winning photographer of 25 years' experience, said he had never seen anything remotely like the picture that appeared on his screen. Hours of close and sceptical inspection of the frame, including extreme digital enlargement, comparison with other frames and lively discussion of a number of theories about shadows from the flower, tricks of the light and movement of the camera during the 2.5-second exposure offered no conclusive explanation. It was simply a moment in a darkening graveyard, 99 years since Anzac soldiers stormed ashore at nearby Anzac Cove, captured by a closing shutter. We offer it for your judgment. * Tony Wright is National affairs editor for The Age
David ThorneThursday 21 May 2009 10.16amHelen BaileyPets in the buildingDear Helen,Thankyou for your letter concerning pets in my apartment. I understand that having dogs in the apartment is a violation of the agreement due to the comfort and wellbeing of my neighbours and I am currently soundproofing my apartment with egg cartons as I realise my dogs can cause quite a bit of noise. Especially during feeding time when I release live rabbits.Regards, David.Helen BaileyThursday 21 May 2009 11.18amDavid ThorneRe: Pets in the buildingHello DavidI have received your email and wish to remind you that the strata agreement states that no animals are allowed in the building regardless of if your apartment is soundproof. How many dogs do you have at the premises?HelenDavid ThorneThursday 21 May 2009 1.52pmHelen BaileyRe: Re: Pets in the buildingDear Helen,Currently I only have eight dogs but one is expecting puppies and I am very excited by this. I am hoping for a litter of at least ten as this is the number required to participate in dog sled racing.I have read every Jack London novel in preparation and have constructed my own sled from timber I borrowed from the construction site across the road during the night. I have devised a plan which I feel will ensure me taking first place in the next national dog sled championships. For the first year of the puppies life I intend to say the word mush then chase them violently around the apartment while yelling and hitting saucepan lids together.I have estimated that the soundproofing of my apartment should block out at least sixty percent of the noise and the dogs will learn to associate the word mush with great fear so when I yell it on race day, the panic and released adrenaline will spur them on to being winners. I am so confident of this being a foolproof plan that I intend to sell all my furniture the day before the race and bet the proceeds on coming first place.Regards, David.Helen BaileyFriday 22 May 2009 9.43amDavid ThorneRe: Re: Re: Pets in the buildingDavid, I am unsure what to make of your email. Do you have pets in the apartment or not?HelenDavid ThorneFriday 22 May 2009 11.27amHelen BaileyRe: Re: Re: Re: Pets in the buildingDear Helen,No. I have a goldfish but due to the air conditioner in my apartment being stuck on a constant two degrees celcius, the water in its bowl is iced over and he has not moved for a while so I do not think he is capable of disturbing the neighbours. The ducks in the bathroom are not mine.The noise which my neighbours possibly mistook for a dog in the apartment is just the looping tape I have of dogs barking which I play at high volume while I am at work to deter potential burglars from breaking in and stealing my tupperware. I need it to keep food fresh. Once I ate leftover chinese that had been kept in an unsealed container and I experienced complete awareness. The next night I tried eating it again but only experienced chest pains and diarrhoea.Regards, David.Helen BaileyFriday 22 May 2009 1.46pmDavid ThorneRe: Re: Re: Re: Re: Pets in the buildingHello DavidYou cannot play sounds of dogs or any noise at a volume that disturbs others. I am sure you can appreciate that these rules are for the benefit of all residents of the building. Fish are fine. You cannot have ducks in the apartment though. If it was small birds that would be ok.HelenDavid ThorneFriday 22 May 2009 2.18pmHelen BaileyRe: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Pets in the buildingDear Helen,They are very small ducks.Regards, David.Helen BaileyFriday 22 May 2009 4.06pmDavid ThorneRe: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Pets in the buildingDavid, under section 4 of the strata residency agreement it states that you cannot have pets. You agreed to these rules when you signed the forms. These rules are set out to benefit everyone in the building including yourself. Do you have a telephone number I can call you on to discuss?HelenDavid ThorneFriday 22 May 2009 5.02pmHelen BaileyRe: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Pets in the buildingDear Helen,The ducks will no doubt be flying south for the winter soon so it will not be an issue. It is probably for the best as they are not getting along very well with my seventeen cats anyway.Regards, David.Helen BaileyMonday 25 May 2009 9.22amDavid ThorneRe: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Pets in the buildingDavid, I am just going to write on the forms that we have investigated and you do not have any pets.Helen
While motorsports fans continue to blast TEN over moving Formula One from ONE to TEN, now sponsors are speaking out on the switcheroo. The Australian reports that Mark Behr, executive manager of marketing for Shannon’s Car Insurance said, “We have already passed on the concerns expressed by some enthusiasts directly to Channel TEN and will continue to review the situation, as we do with any sponsorship.” Multivitamins company Swisse said it contacted TEN after receiving a call from the newspaper. “We have been informed that it is only live on the east coast at this stage but that the network is looking at all options,” a spokesperson said. The switch, which also reverses a promise of HD coverage, triggered a backlash on social media. As of last night there were 847 signatures on a petition being hosted at BoycottTENSport.com TEN has reportedly justified the decision as being a commercial move. Last week a spokesperson simply told TV Tonight, “As of this Sunday, April 22, Formula One will be broadcast on TEN at 9.30pm. This allows all Australians to access the Formula One coverage in a consistent time slot every Sunday night.” On the weekend Sebastian Vettel held off Kimi Raikkonen to win an incident-free Grand Prix in Bahrain, following anti-government protests that turned violent in the days before the event. Related
Prime Minister Stephen Harper has retreated further from his pledge to regulate carbon emissions in the oil industry, saying it would be "crazy" to do so at a time of fallen crude prices. In the House of Commons on Tuesday, the Prime Minister rebuffed calls for new measures to deal with the country's fastest growing source of greenhouse gases just a day after an Environment Canada report suggested the country is falling well short of Mr. Harper's international commitment to reduce emissions. "Under the current circumstances of the oil and gas sector, it would be crazy, it would be crazy economic policy to do unilateral penalties on that sector," he said. "We are clearly not going to do it." Story continues below advertisement Mr. Harper promised for years to set emission limits for the industry under his government's "sector-by-sector approach," but in the past year, he has changed his tune, saying Canada cannot move on the issue until similar measures are adopted in the United States, where oil production has soared. President Barack Obama is battling both U.S. states and Republicans in Congress over his proposal to rein in emissions from coal-fired power plants, and he has no immediate plans to regulate greenhouse gases in the oil industry. New Democratic Party environment critic Megan Leslie accused the Prime Minister of breaking his promise to regulate the oil industry, and generally failing to provide leadership on the fight against global warming in the same week that nations are meeting in Peru to set the stage for an international climate agreement. "As countries from around the world act, as the largest emitters act, including China and the U.S., this Prime Minister and that government are letting Canadians down," she said. In a report on Monday, Environment Canada said that, without new action, Canada will miss by a wide margin the pledge to reduce greenhouse gases by 17 per cent from 2005 levels by 2020 that Mr. Harper made at a UN climate summit five years ago. Between 2005 and 2020, emissions from the booming oil sands are expected to grow by 45 megatonnes, almost completely offsetting progress in the electricity sector, where Ontario shut down its coal-fired power plants. Global oil prices have fallen nearly 40 per cent from their peak in June, and energy companies in Alberta are expected to cut their capital spending for 2015, which could result in slower oil sands expansion and lower-than-anticipated greenhouse gas emissions. Economists say proposals to set a limit on carbon emissions for the oil sands would cost producers less than $1 a barrel. On Twitter, University of Alberta economist Andrew Leach said Mr. Harper appears to be suggesting the oils sands "are within $1/[barrel] away from disaster." Alberta Premier Jim Prentice is set to release an update on his government's climate regulations, which impose a levy on oil sands companies of $15 a tonne of carbon dioxide emissions when they exceed a set limit. Mr. Prentice has also called for a continental approach for the gas and oil industry, but is under pressure to raise the $15-a-tonne penalty. Story continues below advertisement Story continues below advertisement At the United Nations climate summit in Peru, Environment Minister Leona Aglukkaq said Ottawa has regulated in areas of coal-fired electricity and transportation and remains committed to achieving emissions reductions. But in a statement to the summit, the Minister offered no new targets – in contrast to the United States and China – and made no promises of specific action other than to regulate a greenhouse gas, hydro fluorocarbon, that represents a tiny portion of Canada's overall emissions. "Canada stands ready to help its international partners, and we will continue to move forward with measures in a way that reduces greenhouse gas emissions while maintaining economic growth," she said. "Our record speaks for itself. We have shown that it is possible to protect the environment while supporting economic growth."
The decision puts water for 17 million people at risk Cannon Ball, N.D. — The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe said today that President Donald Trump’s executive action towards an approval of an easement for the Dakota Access Pipeline risks contaminating tribal and American water supplies while disregarding treaty rights. The Trump administration’s politically motivated decision violates the law and the Tribe will take legal action to fight it. “President Trump is legally required to honor our treaty rights and provide a fair and reasonable pipeline process,” said Dave Archambault II, chairman of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. “Americans know this pipeline was unfairly rerouted towards our nation and without our consent. The existing pipeline route risks infringing on our treaty rights, contaminating our water and the water of 17 million Americans downstream.” The U.S. Army Corp of Engineers rejected DAPL’s request for an easement late last year, finding that the agency had failed to fully consider the impacts of the pipeline on the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. The Department of the Army pledged to conduct a full environmental review of the Missouri River crossing and evaluate alternative sites, which would not put the Tribe at risk of an oil spill. However, that environmental review would be circumvented under today’s Executive Memorandum, allowing the project to immediately resume construction. Trump’s press secretary said on Monday that Trump intended to approve the easement with an aim towards job creation. But tribal leaders note the bulk of pipeline jobs are in pipeline construction. The pipeline only creates a total of 15 permanent jobs in North Dakota. A reroute would protect the Tribe’s water and create hundreds of jobs, Archambault said. Standing Rock said it’s not a matter of if, but when DAPL will leak. Sunoco, one of the American companies operating DAPL, has a poor record on pipeline safety and spill prevention. Data from the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, show operators have reported about 200 crude oil spills per year, on average. More than 176,000 gallons of oil spilled in western North Dakota last month alone. Archambault said Trump’s decision appears to be a political payback. “By granting the easement, Trump is risking our treaty rights and water supply to benefit his wealthy contributors and friends at DAPL,” he said. “We are not opposed to energy independence. We are opposed to reckless and politically motivated development projects, like DAPL, that ignore our treaty rights and risk our water. Creating a second Flint does not make America great again.” # # # Contact: Chelsea Hawkins chawkins@pyramidcommunications.com 206.556.1653 Sue Evans sevans@pyramidcommunications.com 253.592.1590

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