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Welcome To myACFCU! Appalachian Community Federal Credit Union is an award-winning, socially responsible financial cooperative. In partnership with the Human / Economic Appalachian Development (HEAD) organization, ACFCU helps families, individuals and businesses across a three-state area achieve financial independence by offering expert guidance and solutions. We seek to strengthen low-income and rural communities throughout our region by giving individuals access to fair and affordable credit and promoting employment opportunities through small business lending. This is just one of the many ways we continue fulfilling our purpose of... “Building Financial Relationships One Member at a Time!" Routing #264279321 Become a Member Today We offer the best in mobile and online financial services, so creating and managing an account has never been easier. Sign Up Get Financially Fit Learn more about credit scores, debt management, budgeting and more. Learn More
Amman, Jordan - Jordanian authorities have released Salafi leader Assem Barqawi, better known as Abu Mohammad al-Maqdesi, after having served a five-year prison sentence on allegations of jeopardising state security and recruiting jihadists to fight in Afghanistan. His release came as a surprise to some after the escalating war in Syria has presented big security challenges to neighbouring Jordan, especially amid an increasing number of Jordanians joining jihadist groups inside the war-torn country. "We did not expect his release. We thought he would be interrogated and held further," Mohammad Shalabi, better known as Abu Sayyaf, head of the Jordanian Jihadi Salafist Movement told Al Jazeera in a phone interview. Maqdesi is a supporter of al-Nusra front which, unlike ISIL, does not have any ambitions to take over the region. -Hasan Abu Hanya, expert on jihadist movements Experts and Salafists, however, say that releasing Maqdesi, who has been very critical of violence committed by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), serves Jordan's interest as the movement has achieved gains in neighbouring Iraq recently and added to Jordan's security woes. "Maqdesi is a supporter of al-Nusra front, one of the fighting groups in Syria, which unlike ISIL, does not have any ambitions to take over the region," said Hasan Abu Hanya, an expert on jihadist movements. "He is the mentor and father of our curriculum," Abu Sayyaf told Al Jazeera. "There is a pressing need for a mentor like him at this time of bloodshed. He is very concerned about the blood of Muslims being shed and their souls and honour," Abu Sayyaf added. In a recent statement published to his website, Tawheed, the leader condemned ISIL and called it "deviant" and called on jihadists to follow "the right [path] and stop the bloodshed". According to Abu Hanyah, there are more than 2,000 supporters of ISIL in Jordan - an alarming number for the Jordanian authorities. "If some 4,000 ISIL members turned Mosul upside down, it is very dangerous for Jordan to have such numbers of supporters, given how violent and experienced the movement is," he said. Jordanian officials' concern has been exacerbated after Iraq reportedly pulled out its forces from the Jordanian border on Sunday. During a meeting with parliamentarians dedicated to discussing the challenges following the situation in Iraq, Jordanian Interior Minister Hussein Majali said that Jordan had built-up its military presence near the Iraq border by sending gendarmerie forces and additional security forces. Maqdesi arrived at his house in Rusaifa town in northern Jordan, which is home to the Salfist movement, yesterday. He refused to give media interviews, but will soon issue a statement, according to Abu Sayyaf. His lawyer, Majid Liftawi, believes his client is not guilty of any terror charges. "It was all because of his political beliefs and writings," he said.
The event 'hosts' included a lobbyist that represented bank associations and accounting firms on the Troubled Asset Relief Program, a program to which Pawlenty has expressed opposition. Pawlenty lunches with lobbyists Minnesota GOP Gov. Tim Pawlenty made a stop for cash in Washington on Monday, holding a fundraiser at a downtown law firm with a handful of insiders and lobbyists. Tickets for the lunch started at $500 with those identified as “co-hosts” of the event having to give or raise $2,500 for Pawlenty’s political action committee, Freedom First PAC, according to an invitation obtained by POLITICO. Story Continued Below Representatives of other PACs invited to the event were encouraged to donate $1,000. Among the 10 named “hosts” of the event was Sam Geduldig, a lobbyist for Clark Lytle & Geduldig who lobbied on the Troubled Asset Relief Program on behalf of banking associations and several accounting firms, though did not help firms acquire funds. Pawlenty has expressed opposition to the program. Six of the other “hosts” are also registered lobbyists, according to the Senate database, working for industries ranging from biodiesel to subprime mortgages. Brian Brooks, another one of the fundraisers’ “hosts,” is not a registered lobbyist, but boasts of having “four of the largest subprime mortgage lenders and servicers in state attorney general investigations and litigation, and in nationwide class actions” on the website of O’Melveny & Myers, a law firm with offices around the world. A spokesman for the Minnesota governor, a likely contender for the GOP presidential nomination, declined to comment on the event, noting its private nature — the fundraiser was not announced by Pawlenty's PAC. The spokesman also declined to provide details on who else attended the fundraiser or how much Pawlenty was able to haul from the event. Prior to the fundraising lunch, Pawlenty sat down with members of the Washington press corps for a breakfast sponsored by the Christian Science Monitor. In his remarks, Pawlenty said he hopes GOP wins this fall could create a new generation of talent that refutes the idea that Republicans are “a bunch of country-club elitists.” CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story incorrectly characterized the Sam Geduldig’s work with respect to the Troubled Asset Relief Program. He lobbied on the TARP bill for banking associations and accounting firms but did help firms acquire funds.
New Delhi: Concerned over the quality of air in the national capital, the Aam Aadmi Party government has directed city schools to install air purifiers so as to ensure students don't face health hazards due to air pollution. The Director of Education (DoE) has also asked schools to create awareness among students about adverse impact of indiscriminate burning of firecrackers on public health. "The ambient air quality of Delhi needs to be improved. In view of the gravity of harm to human health due to inferior ambient air quality, schools should take action to install air filters as per need," a communication sent to schools on Friday reads. It also asks schools to take "proper steps" to educate students on the need for improvement of air quality. "The cooperation of the young generation should be encouraged through co-curricular activities," it adds. The DoE communication further asks schools to create awareness about the disadvantage and adverse impact "on public health of indiscriminate burning of crackers on different festive occasions". The schools have been asked to submit a compliance report within 15 days. The Delhi government had last year announced a three-tier air treatment system which includes setting up of wind purification units, mist fountains and virtual chimney at five major traffic intersections on trial basis to deal with rising air pollution level.
The whereabouts of the family of a 72-year-old elderly woman who died of apparent food poisoning at the Gelvan Park Frail Care Centre in Port Elizabeth are unknown. Nomatshyina Violet died on Monday night when 59 people were rushed to hospital after falling ill last night. Nelson Mandela Bay Deputy Mayor, Mongameli Bobani, led a team of senior officials from the Municipality's Environmental Health Sub-directorate to inspect the facility on Tuesday. He said according to information from the Frail Care Manager, Make Faszanai, the outbreak may have been caused by left over chicken from Saturday that was reheated and fed to the residents for lunch on Sunday. Bobani said besides Violet's case, the municipality also discovered that there were bogus home addresses on the forms of 63 of the 98 residents, while those residents have also not received any visitors since being admitted to the facility, many several years ago. Bobani said the municipality has requested the Environmental Heath Department to work with social workers to find the families of the residents. "We have to find the families, we have actually requested our Environmental Department to look at the application forms and also to work with social workers in order to ensure that we find them. We are appealing to the community to also come and find their families. This is the problem that we have right now and it must be fixed" he said. Bobani also requested the public to assist in identifying Violet's family before the facility can proceed with her burial arrangements. (Refer to the deceased's identity document photo) The municipality has also launched an investigation to find out the cause of the incident and have also ordered it's public health directorate to check if there were any compliance issues.
The leopard seal (Hydrurga leptonyx) is one of Antarctica’s top predators. It kills penguins and smaller seals by biting them with sharp canine teeth and repeatedly smashing them against the ocean surface to flay and dismember them. But it now seems that this seal is also equipped to tackle smaller prey. David Hocking from Monash University in Melbourne, Australia, and his colleagues have shown that the leopard seal eats krill like a whale, by sucking them into its mouth and sieving them through special teeth. Other scientists had predicted this behaviour from the shape and arrangement of the seal’s teeth, but this is the first time that it has been observed and filmed. The researchers' results are published in Polar Biology1. By switching between two feeding styles, the leopard seal can dine from both the top and bottom of the Southern Ocean’s food web. “This is equivalent to a lion hunting down zebras, but also regularly feasting on ants or termites,” says Erich Fitzgerald from Museum Victoria, Melbourne, who was involved in the study. “You’d expect that leopard seals would sacrifice something in not specializing on either large or small prey, but the authors persuasively argue that it is a dual specialist,” says Alexander Werth, a biologist from Hampden-Sydney College in Virginia. “This helps to explain why leopard seals are so successful.” From whale to seal Hocking, Fitzgerald and Alistair Evans from Monash University studied leopard seals because the animals' trident-shaped postcanine teeth are similar to those of ancient fossil whales, such as Janjucetus, and the researchers were interested in the feeding habits of these whales. Because the seals were thought to use their postcanine teeth to strain krill from the water, it seemed possible that prehistoric whales did too. But as Hocking searched the literature to confirm this, “it became apparent that nobody had ever actually observed leopard seals underwater [while they fed] on small prey like krill.” To do that, Hocking travelled to Taronga Zoo in Sydney, Australia, the only institution in the world that houses leopard seals. Once there, he presented the resident seals, Casey and Sabine, with four small fish sticking headfirst out of a plastic box. At her very first go, Sabine sucked a fish out and expelled the excess water through the sides of her mouth. Hocking called up his team: “Yep, they do it, all right!” Casey and Sabine repeatedly used the same technique. Their thick lips allowed them to create suction, and their interlocking trident-shaped teeth imprisoned ingested fish or krill when the animals blew out the ingested water. California sea lions lack such complex teeth — when the same fish-primed box was presented to them, they often blew their prey out of the sides of their mouth along with the water. There is indirect evidence that wild leopard seals behave in the same way as the two captive seals. The team examined the skulls of 26 wild-caught adults and found that, whereas their gripping canines were often worn down, the postcanines showed fewer signs of wear, consistent with their role as sieves. Although the team saw the captive seals sucking only one fish at a time, it seems likely that the animals could ingest krill en masse by using their flexible necks to strike at the heart of a shoal. Krill can constitute up to 83% of a leopard seal's diet in regions in which larger prey are in short supply. One individual that was dissected was found to have more than 10,000 freshly caught krill in its stomach. “That’s a lot of krill to catch one at a time!” says Fitzgerald. The researchers now plan to observe the same behaviour in wild leopard seals. “A trip down to the ice is in order,” says Hocking.
Why did we lose in Afghanistan? That’s easy: We failed to execute the basics By Lt. Col. Jeremy Kotkin, U.S. Army Best Defense debater in the Gourley challenge “Why did we lose in Afghanistan?” In hindsight this seems like an easy enough charge to answer: FM 3-24 was a cherry-picked collection of flawed logic and history; the Pakistani government enabled the very enemy we were fighting against and we never seriously dealt with the safe haven across the Durand Line; the US DoD was ill-prepared to fill all the socio-political and economic requirements of nation-building; NATO never fully signed on to the fight; the civilian surge fizzled out after never really materializing; we overemphasized the “human terrain” in relation to warfighting, etc. These answers are all true, to some extent. Many more excuses exist with varying levels of veracity or relevance. But the honest answer is simple enough. We didn’t understand ourselves. While saying ‘we didn’t understand ourselves,’ the reader must also acknowledge that a lot of other misunderstandings spawn from that, each going off in different directions, chipping away at the effectiveness of ISAF’s chosen lines of operation, our larger strategy, or even our fundamental comprehension about war and policy. But it all starts with us; our image of ourselves, our role in the world, the yes-men and sycophants to power in our military who refuse to acknowledge critical thought, and how our liberal, 21st-century Western minds see the messy world of geopolitics. With these problem factors in tow there was no way we could “win” Afghanistan. No COIN strategy, no better synchronized civil-military operations, no “better war” to save us. From the moment our war changed in 2001/2002 from a punitive expedition to exact justice and topple a regime to a large-scale and long-term nation building effort while never really settling the valid causes of the insurgency, we were doomed to fail. No amount of warrior-scholars who bought into the “graduate level of warfare” drivel could have saved that. We failed because we forgot the basics. Matching strategy to policy. Letting the DoD run with a course of action, if not directly at odds with, than at least over and above civilian intent. Mirror imaging and assuming the Afghans wanted solutions as we would want them. Not dealing with the causes of the insurgency and instead chasing its symptoms and its tail. Assuming our geopolitical hypocrisy while dealing with states generating the ideological cause of the insurgency, i.e. Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, would not come back to bite us in the end. Forgetting the entire determination and definition of what are vital national interests. These are all issues at the highest levels of understanding war and politics that we wholesale forgot from 2002 to the present. To wit, even the incoming SECDEF says we can still win if we just stick it out a little longer. America at one time understood effective policy. We understood war making to achieve clear and definable objectives. We used to understand international relations for vital interests. We understood strategy development, coalition warfare, labeling true friends and real enemies, and being true to our traditions. We also used to win wars. LTC Jeremy Kotkin is an Army strategist who, as an Afghan hand, was deployed twice to Afghanistan at the strategic level, once embedded in the Afghan National Security Council and once negotiating non-military aspects of the ISAF OPLAN with the Afghan government and international community ahead of ISAF’s end of mission. He currently serves on HQ Army Staff. This article contains his personal opinions, which are not necessarily those of the Army, the Defense Department, or the U.S. government. Image credit: U.S. Army
We are all going to die. I’m not trying to spread doom and gloom, but we are going to be buried and mostly forgotten. Someone will replace us. The songs we sing so passionately today will be sung by someone else just as passionately when we are gone. The sermons we preach so zealously today will be preached by another with just as much zeal. Eventually no one will remember or care how much time we put into serving the church, how many hours we spent writing songs or crafting sermons. We are not as important as we think we are—as we wish we were. Deep down we realize this fate and fight it with all we are. We constantly struggle for significance in our hearts, and every day we wield a new tool to measure our value. “How many people are attending our church?” we ask. Not content, we dream of asking, “How many people, across how many services, across how many campuses are attending our church?” The higher the number, the more value we have. And these systems of worth-measurement have gone global. “How many people from how many countries are listening to our podcast? How many YouTube views does our latest sermon have? What number did our latest record get to on iTunes? What conference have we preached at or led worship for lately?” We tell ourselves it’s all for the glory of God, because numbers represent people, and people matter. These statements are true, yet our true motivations are revealed by our disappointment in the measurable fruit of our labor. We inflate numbers as we talk about the size of our church. We generously estimate our audience. In reality, most of us just aren’t cutting it. Our numbers don’t measure up. We can’t even come close to comparing with the big-conference-preaching, best-selling-book-writing, mega-mega-mega-church pastors. We will never have that Grammy-award-winning, Billboard top 100, fill-an-arena-for-a-worship-concert kind of success. So we compare ourselves into a pit of despair and depression. This form of ministry is meaningless. This measure of worth is worthless. Greater Reward Jesus, the most faithful servant of God, seems to have spent much time trying to remain in obscurity. He was not looking for a horde of fans to tell him how great he was. He wasn’t doing anything to be seen by men in order to gain some kind of reward here on earth. He had a greater reward in mind. Jesus had no void to fill. He was the definition of filled-to-overflowing. So when he came to this earth, he wasn’t looking for people to help him find his meaning and worth. He didn’t use them so that he could feel good about himself. He knew who he was—the Son of God, and God himself—and that deep, intimate knowledge enabled him not to be served, but to serve with no ulterior motives. The same cannot be said of us. We have been created by an infinite God with an infinite gap inside of our souls that only he can fill. He fully intends to give us all of himself to fill that hole. Yet even in ministry, our wayward hearts want to use people, rather than love them, to take all these tiny little things—applause, affirmation, acceptance, affluence, authority—and keep shoveling them into the void, hoping they will eventually fill it. All the while, there is a greater treasure than we could ever get from men here on Earth. Better than all the retweets, “likes,” book sales, record sales, and YouTube views. Better than boasting that 10,000 people attended your 28 Christmas Eve services and 4,272 people were baptized in your church last year. Better than bragging that your church’s sermon podcast has been streamed more than 7 million times in 148 countries and at a space station near Jupiter. Better than packing out 52 arenas in 12 countries, after winning 4 Grammys. I am not suggesting you shouldn’t post your sermons online, write books, record albums, or host 28 Christmas Eve services. That may be what faithfulness looks like for you to bring a return on the investment that he made in you. Don’t be a “wicked and lazy servant.” Work hard. Be faithful. And then trust God with the results. Because the void in our hearts can only be filled-to-overflowing with the joy of an unending, all-satisfying God who approves of us. Until we find deep rootedness in Christ, we will continually use the people we are called to serve in order to find our own validation. And they will let us down. They will fail to give us the meaning our hearts long for. All the accolades and attaboys we continue to seek could not even come close to comparing to the joy of our Master as heaven’s great reward, to be told by our Maker and Savior, “Well done, good and faithful servant.” We all want to succeed. We all want our efforts to mean something in the end, to be worth it when all is said and done. But when death comes knocking, I would hate to find I received my entire reward here on earth. True success looks like laying crowns at the feet of the only one whose name will be praised for all eternity. And here’s a hint: it’s not the one on my driver’s license. Or yours. It is the name above all names who will not share his glory with another. His name is Jesus. And he is all the meaning we need.
Last year, Opportunity arrived at a 14-mile-wide crater named Endeavour, where NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has spotted clays from above. Clays generally form in the presence of water. The clay signal pointed to a hill, which the scientists named after Jacob Matijevic, an engineer on the rover team who died this year. As Opportunity approached, “We started seeing things that looked really, really different,” Dr. Squyres said. The most common rock there was light-colored, fine-grained, very soft, and nothing like any that Opportunity had come across before. “It is right in the sweet spot of where the clay signature is present,” Dr. Squyres said. “It has got to be the clay-bearing stuff.” Photo But when the rover looked at the elements in the rock, it was the same mix of elements in a typical Martian rock. “What’s unusual is that it’s not unusual,” Dr. Squyres said. “This puzzled us at first. I was expecting something dramatic and instead what you see here kind of looks like average Mars.” Another instrument could have identified minerals in the rock, but the radioactive cobalt it relies on has long decayed away. If Curiosity were at the Endeavour crater, its instruments could directly look for the carbon-based molecules known as organics that are the building blocks of life. But Curiosity, which landed in August, is more than 5,000 miles away exploring a different crater where clays have also been spotted from orbit — and it is still months away from reaching there. Newsletter Sign Up Continue reading the main story Please verify you're not a robot by clicking the box. Invalid email address. Please re-enter. You must select a newsletter to subscribe to. Sign Up You will receive emails containing news content , updates and promotions from The New York Times. You may opt-out at any time. You agree to receive occasional updates and special offers for The New York Times's products and services. Thank you for subscribing. An error has occurred. Please try again later. View all New York Times newsletters. In its nearly nine years on Mars, Opportunity has driven more than 22 miles, crossing a Martian plain and stopping by several smaller craters. During its travels, it came across minerals that pointed to flowing water in Mars’ past, but these minerals formed in highly acidic conditions. “ Battery acid kind of numbers,” Dr. Squyres said. “And that’s a challenging place for life.” Advertisement Continue reading the main story Clays only form in more benign conditions. “The thing that’s different here is that these clay minerals point towards a neutral chemistry — water you can drink,” Dr. Squyres said. “And that’s a different story, a different world.” These rocks appear to date to the early warm and wet era of Mars, perhaps when the planet was more hospitable to life. Then Opportunity took a look at another outcrop on Matijevic Hill made of darker, harder minerals. Close up, it saw tiny spheres embedded in the rocks, similar in appearance to iron-rich spheres nicknamed “blueberries” that the rover had observed earlier. Except these did not contain much iron. “These are something totally different,” Dr. Squyres said. “I’ve been calling them newberries, because there’s something new.” Even though Opportunity cannot find organics, Dr. Squyres said there were many questions that it would be able to answer that would tell scientists what this part of early Mars was like. What are the newberries made of? How did they form? Did wind or water shape the rocks of Matijevic Hill? Opportunity will spend several months at Matijevic Hill to try to unravel as many of these puzzles as it can, using its remaining instruments. “What we have stumbled upon here at Matijevic Hill, drawn here by that clay signature, is what’s turning out to be one of the most delightful geologic puzzles that we have ever found with this rover on Mars,” Dr. Squyres said. “It’s fascinating. It’s a work in progress.”
A Carrie Fisher return? It is official. Carrie Fisher has said she is returning to the Star Wars franchise for the J.J. Abrams’ directed Star Wars: Episode VII. We already reported that Harrison Ford was in talks to return as Han Solo and Mark Hamill talked about how he would like to return as Luke Skywalker, but Fisher is the first person to confirm they are returning. Princess Leia is coming back. The confirmation came in an interview with the Palm Beach Illustrated. The reporter asked straight up if Carrie Fisher was coming back, and she said “Yes.” It makes me wonder if the other two guys have already signed on as well, but haven’t spilled the beans yet. Hamill is almost a lock, but Harrison Ford is the tricky one. According to Hamill, Star Wars Episode VII is supposed to deal with the kids of these classic characters, so having them return as parents, mentors, and maybe tragic figures is important to launching this new direction for the series. The Carrie Fisher return is just the start. On a side note, I really hope they offer roles to the “non-face” actors like Peter Mayhew (Chewbacca), Kenny Baker (R2D2) and Anthony Daniels (C2PO) as just a show of respect. Source: Collider
An Israeli teenager has been sentenced to 14 days in jail, his eighth term in the past six months. He’s served more than 100 days for refusing to serve in the IDF and “participate in a cynical game,” referring to the Israeli occupation of Palestine. On Tuesday, conscientious objector Nathan Blanc came to the IDF Recruitment Bureau for the eighth time since November. There, at a military base near Tel Aviv, as with the previous seven times, he informed the army that he refuses to undertake the duty every Israeli teenager is required to perform. In accordance with Israeli law, following his refusal to enlist, Blanc was arrested. The sentence requires between 10 and 20 days in Military Prison Number 6. Blanc belongs to a tiny minority of those who refuse to serve on grounds of principle. Out of the 300-400 prisoners housed in the prison, he has been the only conscientious objector since November. So far, in total he has spent 116 days in jail, of which 11 were taken off for good behavior, Haaretz reports. Blanc first declared his refusal in November 2012. Military service in Israel is required upon graduation from high school, and lasts three years for boys and two for girls. It has become synonymous with carrying out one’s duties as an Israeli citizen, refusal is not an option. “It was a very hard decision, it took me a long time to get to it," the Guardian quoted Nathan. The 19-year old says he seriously considered refusal to serve during Operation Cast Lead in 2009, which took the lives of around 1,400 Palestinians. He now blames the Israeli government for "not being interested in finding a solution to the existing situation [conflict at the West Bank]” and says he has “a moral duty to refuse to participate in this cynical game." Blanc has been offered an alternative service. In February the IDF "unsuitability committee," recommended Nathan fulfil his obligation by serving in a civilian hospital. However, three days later the committee rejected his request to avoid military conscription, Haaretz says. Unlike many others, claiming a medical condition to avoid military service is not an option for Blanc. "I didn't want to lie. This is a point of principle," he told the Guardian. He also refuses to defame himself as a pacifist and evade IDF on the grounds of pacifism. "The army has a narrow definition of pacifism – someone who would never apply force in any circumstances,” he explained to the newspaper. "The [IDF's] conscience committee asks tough questions, and I would not be able to say never. I think force should be used rarely, but it can't be completely ruled out." Blanc has come up with his own alternative – participating in the national service instead of in the compulsory army. However, the military has denied him the option. On March 25, Amnesty International called on the Israeli authorities to accept Blanc’s beliefs and stop jailing him. The NGO suggested Israel "establish a fully independent and impartial body to assess claims of conscientious objection in a fair and transparent manner."
Professor Nouriel Roubini said half of the estimated losses would come from banks and broker-dealers, placing further pressures on an already heavily-laden system. "It means the US banking system is effectively insolvent because it starts with a capital of $1,400bn. This is a systemic banking crisis," he said. To date, global losses and write-downs as a result of the crisis, which was triggered by the collapse of the US sub-prime mortgage sector, total about $1 trillion. The New York University professor's comments were in part responsible for pushing banking shares lower on Tuesday. Citigroup fell 11pc and Bank of America lost 15pc. Banks were also impacted by news of heavy losses at institutional money manager State Street's commercial paper and investment arm, sending its' shares down as much as 50pc, its worst one-day slump in 24 years. Speaking in Dubai, Professor Roubini said: "The problems of Citi, Bank of America and others suggest the system is bankrupt. In Europe, it's the same thing." His warning comes just a day after the UK's second phase in its own banking bail-out, and after Bank of America, Merrill Lynch and Citi last week reported almost $26bn of fourth-quarter losses. "We have got a crippled financial sector, not only in the US but across the globe," said Keith Wirtz, chief investment officer of Fifth Third Asset Management.
Next year, Andrew W.K. will release his first new album since 2009. Today, he’s revealed the record’s title: You’re Not Alone. It arrives March 2 via RED/Sony. W.K. has also shared the tracklist and cover art, which was painted by Boris Vallejo and Julie Bell. Check those out below, and watch W.K., Vallejo, and Bell discuss the painting here. This past September, W.K. said of the album: “I’m going for the sound of pure, unadulterated power; every emotion, every thought, every experience, every sensation, every fear, every joy, every clarity, every confusion, every up, every down... all extruded and concentrated into one thick syrup of super life-force feeling, and then psychically amplified by the celebratory spirit of glorious partying.” You’re Not Alone: 01 The Power of Partying 02 Music Is Worth Living For 03 Ever Again 04 I Don’t Know Anything 05 The Feeling of Being Alive 06 Party Mindset 07 The Party Never Dies 08 Give Up on You 09 Keep on Going 10 In Your Darkest Moments 11 The Devil’s on Your Side 12 Break the Curse 13 Total Freedom 14 Beyond Oblivion 15 Confusion and Clarity 16 You’re Not Alone
The European parliament has overcome attempts to sideline it from the Brexit negotiations and will become a “very difficult partner” during the talks, the leader of its biggest party has revealed. MEPs in the EU’s 28 member states were furious when the European council last month announced a plan that would have diminished their role during the two years of negotiations. Under the plan, the former French minister Michel Barnier and the president of the European council, Donald Tusk, were to sit at the negotiating table, leaving the parliament on the periphery. However, German MEP Manfred Weber, who chairs the centre-right European People’s party, said that following a “good dialogue” with the European commission president, Jean-Claude Juncker, he feels there is now no question of the parliament not being centrally involved. 'Straightforward' Brexit bill to be published within days, says Davis Read more Weber told the Guardian: “At the end, the European parliament is the parliament of consent. There are only two parliaments that will say yes: the British and the European parliament. That is why we are in the same position as the British parliament in that colleagues are asking for their positions to be taken on board in the negotiations. “We are already in a good dialogue with Jean-Claude Juncker on this … We, the European parliament, think that in the next two years we have to be informed and updated on the state of play and that means parliament has to sit on the table as negotiations are going on. That is our expectation. “I had some phone calls during the Christmas break, with Jean-Claude Juncker I don’t see big problems. It is a matter of fixing the practical arrangements of the involvement for the European parliament now, that is all.” In a sign of how the European parliament now intends to flex its muscles, Weber has proposed that its newly elected president, Antonio Tajani, invites Theresa May to a debate in the chamber following the triggering of Article 50. A letter sent by Weber to the president of the European parliament seen by The Guardian reads: “In light of the declarations made by Prime Minister May, I would like to suggest inviting the British prime minister to hold a debate with the European parliament at the April plenary session in Strasbourg. “I trust you share my view that the European parliament will play a crucial role in defending the interests of the European people in the Brexit negotiations.” The development came as the UK’s supreme court ruled by a majority of eight to three that the government cannot trigger article 50 without an act of the Westminster parliament, opening the government’s negotiating stance to greater parliamentary scrutiny at home. Facebook Twitter Pinterest Manfred Weber suggested the European parliament would not embrace Theresa May’s vision of a free trade agreement. Photograph: Stephanie Lecocq/EPA In an ominous warning to Britain, Weber said that while member states might have potentially been able to craft a deal around their individual interests, the European parliament would also now be keen to heavily scrutinise every aspect of the ongoing negotiation and would have “the bigger picture” in mind. British cabinet ministers have repeatedly suggested that member states, such as Germany, would find it in their interest to agree to free trade in sectors such as the car industry. The foreign secretary, Boris Johnson, was ridiculed when he suggested that Italy would have to offer tariff-free trade in order to sell its prosecco in the UK. Weber said: “I can imagine the council side is not 100% happy because parliament will be a very independent party of the interests of 440 million west Europeans. That is our job, that we have to do. “We are not looking first of all for national interests. You can make deals between British and German interests, on an economic basis, and so on, but we have the full picture in mind and it is not an easy task to find and organise a majority. “That is for sure what the council has understood: that parliament will not be an easy partner in these negotiations. But those are the rules that are in the treaty, those are the rules.” Weber, an MEP for Bavaria with the Christian Social Union, also insisted Theresa May should recognise that the European parliament has the same right as the Westminster parliament to scrutinise the deal as it is formed. “She knows from the British tradition what an independent and a strong parliament means,” he said. “That is a British tradition. Since 2009 we have an independent and powerful parliament. We will do our job.” It is understood the European parliament is drafting its red lines for the talks that will be launched following the triggering of article 50 by the British government. They are expected to be announced within weeks. On Tuesday, the European commission’s chief spokesman, Margaritis Schinas, hinted that any discussion of a free trade deal would only be conducted after Britain had agreed to pay its liabilities, including unpaid budget commitments, pension liabilities, loan guarantees and spending on UK-based projects, leaving a bill of up to €60bn (£52bn). “If one wants to divorce but remain friends ... first one needs to agree on the terms of an orderly separation,” he said. Schinas added that an orderly separation would be where both sides complied with their obligations. Weber suggested that parliament would not embrace Theresa May’s vision of a free trade agreement, as outlined in her speech earlier this month. “I have even after this speech not a clear picture,” Weber said. “She wants to leave the single market but on the other hand she wants a free trade agreement. That’s only another wording [for the same thing]. “Some call it single market membership, some call it a free trade agreement. It has the same result at the end for our economies. That will not happen, that will not happen.” Weber added: “I met David Davis [the secretary of state for exiting the European Union] in Strasbourg and he tells me the partnership of universities is great. We have to have a research agreement. He has an interest in an exchange of information in the fight against terror; Schengen and all these things. No one wants to risk any lack of security. “I listen to them and I ask myself: what is Brexit? You tell people you want to stay in all those fields and you tell people Brexit is Brexit? Parliament will be a very difficult partner for the British side.”
(WSB photo, added 9:45 pm) 9:15 PM: One person has been taken to the hospital after a motorcycle crash at West Marginal Way South/South Holden, by the entrance to northbound Highway 99 (north of the South Transfer Station; map), commonly used if you head down the Highland Park Way hill toward 99. It appeared on the 911 log as a medic response about an hour ago but wasn’t on our radar until Megan tipped us that it was snarling traffic; police have since reopened most of the road, but if you’re heading that way and can wait a bit, that might be a good idea. Police tell us at the scene they’re still trying to find out what happened; no word on the rider’s condition. SUNDAY MORNING UPDATE: Police say the rider does not have life-threatening injuries. But they are trying to find the reported hit-run driver who caused the crash. Just added to SPD Blotter:
Obsoleted by: 8439 INFORMATIONAL Errata Exist Internet Research Task Force (IRTF) Y. Nir Request for Comments: 7539 Check Point Category: Informational A. Langley ISSN: 2070-1721 Google, Inc. May 2015 ChaCha20 and Poly1305 for IETF Protocols Abstract This document defines the ChaCha20 stream cipher as well as the use of the Poly1305 authenticator, both as stand-alone algorithms and as a "combined mode", or Authenticated Encryption with Associated Data (AEAD) algorithm. This document does not introduce any new crypto, but is meant to serve as a stable reference and an implementation guide. It is a product of the Crypto Forum Research Group (CFRG). Status of This Memo This document is not an Internet Standards Track specification; it is published for informational purposes. This document is a product of the Internet Research Task Force (IRTF). The IRTF publishes the results of Internet-related research and development activities. These results might not be suitable for deployment. This RFC represents the consensus of the Crypto Forum Research Group of the Internet Research Task Force (IRTF). Documents approved for publication by the IRSG are not a candidate for any level of Internet Standard; see Section 2 of RFC 5741. Information about the current status of this document, any errata, and how to provide feedback on it may be obtained at http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc7539. Copyright Notice Copyright (c) 2015 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the document authors. All rights reserved. This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal Provisions Relating to IETF Documents (http://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of publication of this document. Please review these documents carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect to this document. Nir & Langley Informational [Page 1] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 1 . Introduction FIPS-197]) has become the gold standard in encryption. Its efficient design, widespread implementation, and hardware support allow for high performance in many areas. On most modern platforms, AES is anywhere from four to ten times as fast as the previous most-used cipher, Triple Data Encryption Standard (3DES -- [SP800-67]), which makes it not only the best choice, but the only practical choice. There are several problems with this. If future advances in cryptanalysis reveal a weakness in AES, users will be in an unenviable position. With the only other widely supported cipher being the much slower 3DES, it is not feasible to reconfigure deployments to use 3DES. [Standby-Cipher] describes this issue and the need for a standby cipher in greater detail. Another problem is that while AES is very fast on dedicated hardware, its performance on platforms that lack such hardware is considerably lower. Yet another problem is that many AES implementations are vulnerable to cache- collision timing attacks ([Cache-Collisions]). This document provides a definition and implementation guide for three algorithms: 1. The ChaCha20 cipher. This is a high-speed cipher first described in [ChaCha]. It is considerably faster than AES in software-only implementations, making it around three times as fast on platforms that lack specialized AES hardware. See Appendix B for some hard numbers. ChaCha20 is also not sensitive to timing attacks (see the security considerations in Section 4). This algorithm is described in Section 2.4 2. The Poly1305 authenticator. This is a high-speed message authentication code. Implementation is also straightforward and easy to get right. The algorithm is described in Section 2.5. 3. The CHACHA20-POLY1305 Authenticated Encryption with Associated Data (AEAD) construction, described in Section 2.8. This document does not introduce these new algorithms for the first time. They have been defined in scientific papers by D. J. Bernstein, which are referenced by this document. The purpose of this document is to serve as a stable reference for IETF documents making use of these algorithms. These algorithms have undergone rigorous analysis. Several papers discuss the security of Salsa and ChaCha ([LatinDances], [LatinDances2], [Zhenqing2012]). Nir & Langley Informational [Page 3] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 1.1 . Conventions Used in This Document RFC2119]. The description of the ChaCha algorithm will at various time refer to the ChaCha state as a "vector" or as a "matrix". This follows the use of these terms in Professor Bernstein's paper. The matrix notation is more visually convenient and gives a better notion as to why some rounds are called "column rounds" while others are called "diagonal rounds". Here's a diagram of how the matrices relate to vectors (using the C language convention of zero being the index origin). 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 The elements in this vector or matrix are 32-bit unsigned integers. The algorithm name is "ChaCha". "ChaCha20" is a specific instance where 20 "rounds" (or 80 quarter rounds -- see Section 2.1) are used. Other variations are defined, with 8 or 12 rounds, but in this document we only describe the 20-round ChaCha, so the names "ChaCha" and "ChaCha20" will be used interchangeably. 2 . The Algorithms 2.1 . The ChaCha Quarter Round Nir & Langley Informational [Page 4] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 2.1.1 . Test Vector for the ChaCha Quarter Round 2.2 . A Quarter Round on the ChaCha State Nir & Langley Informational [Page 5] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 2.2.1 . Test Vector for the Quarter Round on the ChaCha State 2.3 . The ChaCha20 Block Function Nir & Langley Informational [Page 6] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 Section 3.2 of [RFC5116]. This limits the use of a single (key,nonce) combination to 2^32 blocks, or 256 GB, but that is enough for most uses. In cases where a single key is used by multiple senders, it is important to make sure that they don't use the same nonces. This can be assured by partitioning the nonce space so that the first 32 bits are unique per sender, while the other 64 bits come from a counter. The ChaCha20 state is initialized as follows: o The first four words (0-3) are constants: 0x61707865, 0x3320646e, 0x79622d32, 0x6b206574. o The next eight words (4-11) are taken from the 256-bit key by reading the bytes in little-endian order, in 4-byte chunks. o Word 12 is a block counter. Since each block is 64-byte, a 32-bit word is enough for 256 gigabytes of data. o Words 13-15 are a nonce, which should not be repeated for the same key. The 13th word is the first 32 bits of the input nonce taken as a little-endian integer, while the 15th word is the last 32 bits. cccccccc cccccccc cccccccc cccccccc kkkkkkkk kkkkkkkk kkkkkkkk kkkkkkkk kkkkkkkk kkkkkkkk kkkkkkkk kkkkkkkk bbbbbbbb nnnnnnnn nnnnnnnn nnnnnnnn c=constant k=key b=blockcount n=nonce ChaCha20 runs 20 rounds, alternating between "column rounds" and "diagonal rounds". Each round consists of four quarter-rounds, and they are run as follows. Quarter rounds 1-4 are part of a "column" round, while 5-8 are part of a "diagonal" round: 1. QUARTERROUND ( 0, 4, 8,12) 2. QUARTERROUND ( 1, 5, 9,13) 3. QUARTERROUND ( 2, 6,10,14) 4. QUARTERROUND ( 3, 7,11,15) 5. QUARTERROUND ( 0, 5,10,15) Nir & Langley Informational [Page 7] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 2.3.1 . The ChaCha20 Block Function in Pseudocode Nir & Langley Informational [Page 8] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 2.3.2 . Test Vector for the ChaCha20 Block Function Nir & Langley Informational [Page 9] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 2.4 . The ChaCha20 Encryption Algorithm Nir & Langley Informational [Page 10] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 2.4.1 . The ChaCha20 Encryption Algorithm in Pseudocode 2.4.2 . Example and Test Vector for the ChaCha20 Cipher Nir & Langley Informational [Page 11] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 Nir & Langley Informational [Page 12] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 080 52 bc 51 4d 16 cc f8 06 81 8c e9 1a b7 79 37 36 R.QM.........y76 096 5a f9 0b bf 74 a3 5b e6 b4 0b 8e ed f2 78 5e 42 Z...t.[......x^B 112 87 4d .M 2.5 . The Poly1305 Algorithm Poly1305]) is titled "The Poly1305-AES message-authentication code", and the MAC function there requires a 128-bit AES key, a 128-bit "additional key", and a 128-bit (non- secret) nonce. AES is used there for encrypting the nonce, so as to get a unique (and secret) 128-bit string, but as the paper states, "There is nothing special about AES here. One can replace AES with an arbitrary keyed function from an arbitrary set of nonces to 16-byte strings." Regardless of how the key is generated, the key is partitioned into two parts, called "r" and "s". The pair (r,s) should be unique, and MUST be unpredictable for each invocation (that is why it was originally obtained by encrypting a nonce), while "r" MAY be constant, but needs to be modified as follows before being used: ("r" is treated as a 16-octet little-endian number): o r[3], r[7], r[11], and r[15] are required to have their top four bits clear (be smaller than 16) o r[4], r[8], and r[12] are required to have their bottom two bits clear (be divisible by 4) Nir & Langley Informational [Page 13] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 Section 2.6) is also acceptable. The inputs to Poly1305 are: o A 256-bit one-time key o An arbitrary length message The output is a 128-bit tag. First, the "r" value should be clamped. Next, set the constant prime "P" be 2^130-5: 3fffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffb. Also set a variable "accumulator" to zero. Next, divide the message into 16-byte blocks. The last one might be shorter: o Read the block as a little-endian number. Nir & Langley Informational [Page 14] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 2.5.1 . The Poly1305 Algorithms in Pseudocode 2.5.2 . Poly1305 Example and Test Vector Nir & Langley Informational [Page 15] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 Nir & Langley Informational [Page 16] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 2.6 . Generating the Poly1305 Key Using ChaCha20 Section 2.5, it is acceptable to generate the one-time Poly1305 pseudorandomly. This section defines such a method. To generate such a key pair (r,s), we will use the ChaCha20 block function described in Section 2.3. This assumes that we have a 256-bit session key for the Message Authentication Code (MAC) function, such as SK_ai and SK_ar in Internet Key Exchange Protocol version 2 (IKEv2) ([RFC7296]), the integrity key in the Encapsulating Security Payload (ESP) and Authentication Header (AH), or the client_write_MAC_key and server_write_MAC_key in TLS. Any document that specifies the use of Poly1305 as a MAC algorithm for some protocol must specify that 256 bits are allocated for the integrity key. Note that in the AEAD construction defined in Section 2.8, the same key is used for encryption and key generation, so the use of SK_a* or _write_MAC_key is only for stand-alone Poly1305. The method is to call the block function with the following parameters: o The 256-bit session integrity key is used as the ChaCha20 key. o The block counter is set to zero. o The protocol will specify a 96-bit or 64-bit nonce. This MUST be unique per invocation with the same key, so it MUST NOT be randomly generated. A counter is a good way to implement this, but other methods, such as a Linear Feedback Shift Register (LFSR) are also acceptable. ChaCha20 as specified here requires a 96-bit nonce. So if the provided nonce is only 64-bit, then the first 32 bits of the nonce will be set to a constant number. This will usually be zero, but for protocols with multiple senders it may be different for each sender, but should be the same for all invocations of the function with the same key by a particular sender. After running the block function, we have a 512-bit state. We take the first 256 bits or the serialized state, and use those as the one- time Poly1305 key: the first 128 bits are clamped and form "r", while the next 128 bits become "s". The other 256 bits are discarded. Nir & Langley Informational [Page 17] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 2.6.1 . Poly1305 Key Generation in Pseudocode 2.6.2 . Poly1305 Key Generation Test Vector 2.7 . A Pseudorandom Function for Crypto Suites based on ChaCha/Poly1305 RFC7296]), require a Pseudorandom Function (PRF), mostly for key derivation. In the IKEv2 definition, a PRF is a function that accepts a variable-length key and a Nir & Langley Informational [Page 18] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 Nir & Langley Informational [Page 20] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 Procter]. Here is a list of the parameters for this construction as defined in Section 4 of RFC 5116: o K_LEN (key length) is 32 octets. o P_MAX (maximum size of the plaintext) is 247,877,906,880 bytes, or nearly 256 GB. o A_MAX (maximum size of the associated data) is set to 2^64-1 octets by the length field for associated data. o N_MIN = N_MAX = 12 octets. o C_MAX = P_MAX + tag length = 247,877,906,896 octets. Distinct AAD inputs (as described in Section 3.3 of RFC 5116) shall be concatenated into a single input to AEAD_CHACHA20_POLY1305. It is up to the application to create a structure in the AAD input if it is needed. 2.8.1 . Pseudocode for the AEAD Construction Nir & Langley Informational [Page 21] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 2.8.2 . Example and Test Vector for AEAD_CHACHA20_POLY1305 Nir & Langley Informational [Page 22] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 048 1a 71 de 0a 9e 06 0b 29 05 d6 a5 b6 7e cd 3b 36 .q.....)....~.;6 064 92 dd bd 7f 2d 77 8b 8c 98 03 ae e3 28 09 1b 58 ....-w......(..X 080 fa b3 24 e4 fa d6 75 94 55 85 80 8b 48 31 d7 bc ..$...u.U...H1.. 096 3f f4 de f0 8e 4b 7a 9d e5 76 d2 65 86 ce c6 4b ?....Kz..v.e...K 112 61 16 a. AEAD Construction for Poly1305: 000 50 51 52 53 c0 c1 c2 c3 c4 c5 c6 c7 00 00 00 00 PQRS............ 016 d3 1a 8d 34 64 8e 60 db 7b 86 af bc 53 ef 7e c2 ...4d.`.{...S.~. 032 a4 ad ed 51 29 6e 08 fe a9 e2 b5 a7 36 ee 62 d6 ...Q)n......6.b. 048 3d be a4 5e 8c a9 67 12 82 fa fb 69 da 92 72 8b =..^..g....i..r. 064 1a 71 de 0a 9e 06 0b 29 05 d6 a5 b6 7e cd 3b 36 .q.....)....~.;6 080 92 dd bd 7f 2d 77 8b 8c 98 03 ae e3 28 09 1b 58 ....-w......(..X 096 fa b3 24 e4 fa d6 75 94 55 85 80 8b 48 31 d7 bc ..$...u.U...H1.. 112 3f f4 de f0 8e 4b 7a 9d e5 76 d2 65 86 ce c6 4b ?....Kz..v.e...K 128 61 16 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 a............... 144 0c 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 72 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ........r....... Note the four zero bytes in line 000 and the 14 zero bytes in line 128 Nir & Langley Informational [Page 23] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 3 . Implementation Advice Section 2.3 describes the ChaCha block function as "adding the original input words". This implies that before starting the rounds on the ChaCha state, we copy it aside, only to add it in later. This is correct, but we can save a few operations if we instead copy the state and do the work on the copy. This way, for the next block you don't need to recreate the state, but only to increment the block counter. This saves approximately 5.5% of the cycles. It is not recommended to use a generic big number library such as the one in OpenSSL for the arithmetic operations in Poly1305. Such libraries use dynamic allocation to be able to handle an integer of any size, but that flexibility comes at the expense of performance as well as side-channel security. More efficient implementations that run in constant time are available, one of them in D. J. Bernstein's own library, NaCl ([NaCl]). A constant-time but not optimal approach would be to naively implement the arithmetic operations for 288-bit integers, because even a naive implementation will not exceed 2^288 in the multiplication of (acc+block) and r. An efficient constant- time implementation can be found in the public domain library poly1305-donna ([Poly1305_Donna]). 4 . Security Considerations AE]. Proving the security of either of these is beyond the scope of this document. Such proofs are available in the referenced academic papers ([ChaCha], [Poly1305], [LatinDances], [LatinDances2], and [Zhenqing2012]). The most important security consideration in implementing this document is the uniqueness of the nonce used in ChaCha20. Counters and LFSRs are both acceptable ways of generating unique nonces, as is Nir & Langley Informational [Page 24] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 Nir & Langley Informational [Page 25] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 Standby-Cipher] McGrew, D., Grieco, A., and Y. Sheffer, "Selection of Future Cryptographic Standards", Work in Progress, draft-mcgrew-standby-cipher-00, January 2013. [Zhenqing2012] Zhenqing, S., Bin, Z., Dengguo, F., and W. Wenling, "Improved Key Recovery Attacks on Reduced-Round Salsa20 and ChaCha", 2012. Nir & Langley Informational [Page 28] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 Appendix A . Additional Test Vectors Section 2. A.1 . The ChaCha20 Block Functions 032 da 41 59 7c 51 57 48 8d 77 24 e0 3f b8 d8 4a 37 .AY\|QWH.w$.?..J7 048 6a 43 b8 f4 15 18 a1 1c c3 87 b6 69 b2 ee 65 86 jC.........i..e. Nir & Langley Informational [Page 29] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 Nir & Langley Informational [Page 30] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 000 72 d5 4d fb f1 2e c4 4b 36 26 92 df 94 13 7f 32 r.M....K6&.....2 016 8f ea 8d a7 39 90 26 5e c1 bb be a1 ae 9a f0 ca ....9.&^........ 032 13 b2 5a a2 6c b4 a6 48 cb 9b 9d 1b e6 5b 2c 09 ..Z.l..H.....[,. 048 24 a6 6c 54 d5 45 ec 1b 73 74 f4 87 2e 99 f0 96 $.lT.E..st...... Test Vector #5: ============== Key: 000 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ................ 016 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ................ Nonce: 000 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 02 ............ Block Counter = 0 ChaCha state at the end 374dc6c2 3736d58c b904e24a cd3f93ef 88228b1a 96a4dfb3 5b76ab72 c727ee54 0e0e978a f3145c95 1b748ea8 f786c297 99c28f5f 628314e8 398a19fa 6ded1b53 Keystream: 000 c2 c6 4d 37 8c d5 36 37 4a e2 04 b9 ef 93 3f cd ..M7..67J.....?. 016 1a 8b 22 88 b3 df a4 96 72 ab 76 5b 54 ee 27 c7 ..".....r.v[T.'. 032 8a 97 0e 0e 95 5c 14 f3 a8 8e 74 1b 97 c2 86 f7 .....\....t..... 048 5f 8f c2 99 e8 14 83 62 fa 19 8a 39 53 1b ed 6d _......b...9S..m Nir & Langley Informational [Page 31] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 A.2 . ChaCha20 Encryption 032 da 41 59 7c 51 57 48 8d 77 24 e0 3f b8 d8 4a 37 .AY\|QWH.w$.?..J7 048 6a 43 b8 f4 15 18 a1 1c c3 87 b6 69 b2 ee 65 86 jC.........i..e. Test Vector #2: ============== Key: 000 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ................ 016 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 01 ................ Nonce: 000 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 02 ............ Initial Block Counter = 1 Plaintext: 000 41 6e 79 20 73 75 62 6d 69 73 73 69 6f 6e 20 74 Any submission t 016 6f 20 74 68 65 20 49 45 54 46 20 69 6e 74 65 6e o the IETF inten 032 64 65 64 20 62 79 20 74 68 65 20 43 6f 6e 74 72 ded by the Contr 048 69 62 75 74 6f 72 20 66 6f 72 20 70 75 62 6c 69 ibutor for publi 064 63 61 74 69 6f 6e 20 61 73 20 61 6c 6c 20 6f 72 cation as all or 080 20 70 61 72 74 20 6f 66 20 61 6e 20 49 45 54 46 part of an IETF 096 20 49 6e 74 65 72 6e 65 74 2d 44 72 61 66 74 20 Internet-Draft 112 6f 72 20 52 46 43 20 61 6e 64 20 61 6e 79 20 73 or RFC and any s 128 74 61 74 65 6d 65 6e 74 20 6d 61 64 65 20 77 69 tatement made wi Nir & Langley Informational [Page 32] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 Nir & Langley Informational [Page 33] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 A.3 . Poly1305 Message Authentication Code Nir & Langley Informational [Page 34] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 Nir & Langley Informational [Page 35] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 Nir & Langley Informational [Page 36] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 Nir & Langley Informational [Page 37] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 Nir & Langley Informational [Page 38] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 Nir & Langley Informational [Page 39] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 A.4 . Poly1305 Key Generation Using ChaCha20 Nir & Langley Informational [Page 40] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 v 016 06 cb 33 06 6c 44 7b 87 bc 26 66 dd e3 fb b7 39 ..3.lD{..&f....9 Test Vector #3: ============== The key: 000 1c 92 40 a5 eb 55 d3 8a f3 33 88 86 04 f6 b5 f0 ..@..U...3...... 016 47 39 17 c1 40 2b 80 09 9d ca 5c bc 20 70 75 c0 G9..@+....\. pu. The nonce: 000 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 02 ............ Poly1305 one-time key: 000 96 5e 3b c6 f9 ec 7e d9 56 08 08 f4 d2 29 f9 4b .^;...~.V....).K 016 13 7f f2 75 ca 9b 3f cb dd 59 de aa d2 33 10 ae ...u..?..Y...3.. A.5 . ChaCha20-Poly1305 AEAD Decryption Nir & Langley Informational [Page 41] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 096 97 97 a0 6e f4 f0 ef 61 c1 86 32 4e 2b 35 06 38 ...n...a..2N+5.8 112 36 06 90 7b 6a 7c 02 b0 f9 f6 15 7b 53 c8 67 e4 6..{j\|.....{S.g. 128 b9 16 6c 76 7b 80 4d 46 a5 9b 52 16 cd e7 a4 e9 ..lv{.MF..R..... 144 90 40 c5 a4 04 33 22 5e e2 82 a1 b0 a0 6c 52 3e .@...3"^.....lR> 160 af 45 34 d7 f8 3f a1 15 5b 00 47 71 8c bc 54 6a .E4..?..[.Gq..Tj 176 0d 07 2b 04 b3 56 4e ea 1b 42 22 73 f5 48 27 1a ..+..VN..B"s.H'. 192 0b b2 31 60 53 fa 76 99 19 55 eb d6 31 59 43 4e ..1`S.v..U..1YCN 208 ce bb 4e 46 6d ae 5a 10 73 a6 72 76 27 09 7a 10 ..NFm.Z.s.rv'.z. 224 49 e6 17 d9 1d 36 10 94 fa 68 f0 ff 77 98 71 30 I....6...h..w.q0 240 30 5b ea ba 2e da 04 df 99 7b 71 4d 6c 6f 2c 29 0[.......{qMlo,) 256 a6 ad 5c b4 02 2b 02 70 9b ..\..+.p. The nonce: 000 00 00 00 00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 ............ The AAD: 000 f3 33 88 86 00 00 00 00 00 00 4e 91 .3........N. Received Tag: 000 ee ad 9d 67 89 0c bb 22 39 23 36 fe a1 85 1f 38 ...g..."9#6....8 Nir & Langley Informational [Page 42] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 112 97 97 a0 6e f4 f0 ef 61 c1 86 32 4e 2b 35 06 38 ...n...a..2N+5.8 128 36 06 90 7b 6a 7c 02 b0 f9 f6 15 7b 53 c8 67 e4 6..{j\|.....{S.g. 144 b9 16 6c 76 7b 80 4d 46 a5 9b 52 16 cd e7 a4 e9 ..lv{.MF..R..... 160 90 40 c5 a4 04 33 22 5e e2 82 a1 b0 a0 6c 52 3e .@...3"^.....lR> 176 af 45 34 d7 f8 3f a1 15 5b 00 47 71 8c bc 54 6a .E4..?..[.Gq..Tj 192 0d 07 2b 04 b3 56 4e ea 1b 42 22 73 f5 48 27 1a ..+..VN..B"s.H'. 208 0b b2 31 60 53 fa 76 99 19 55 eb d6 31 59 43 4e ..1`S.v..U..1YCN 224 ce bb 4e 46 6d ae 5a 10 73 a6 72 76 27 09 7a 10 ..NFm.Z.s.rv'.z. 240 49 e6 17 d9 1d 36 10 94 fa 68 f0 ff 77 98 71 30 I....6...h..w.q0 256 30 5b ea ba 2e da 04 df 99 7b 71 4d 6c 6f 2c 29 0[.......{qMlo,) 272 a6 ad 5c b4 02 2b 02 70 9b 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ..\..+.p........ 288 0c 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 09 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 ................ Nir & Langley Informational [Page 43] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 000 ee ad 9d 67 89 0c bb 22 39 23 36 fe a1 85 1f 38 ...g..."9#6....8 Finally, we decrypt the ciphertext Plaintext:: 000 49 6e 74 65 72 6e 65 74 2d 44 72 61 66 74 73 20 Internet-Drafts 016 61 72 65 20 64 72 61 66 74 20 64 6f 63 75 6d 65 are draft docume 032 6e 74 73 20 76 61 6c 69 64 20 66 6f 72 20 61 20 nts valid for a 048 6d 61 78 69 6d 75 6d 20 6f 66 20 73 69 78 20 6d maximum of six m 064 6f 6e 74 68 73 20 61 6e 64 20 6d 61 79 20 62 65 onths and may be 080 20 75 70 64 61 74 65 64 2c 20 72 65 70 6c 61 63 updated, replac 096 65 64 2c 20 6f 72 20 6f 62 73 6f 6c 65 74 65 64 ed, or obsoleted 112 20 62 79 20 6f 74 68 65 72 20 64 6f 63 75 6d 65 by other docume 128 6e 74 73 20 61 74 20 61 6e 79 20 74 69 6d 65 2e nts at any time. 144 20 49 74 20 69 73 20 69 6e 61 70 70 72 6f 70 72 It is inappropr 160 69 61 74 65 20 74 6f 20 75 73 65 20 49 6e 74 65 iate to use Inte 176 72 6e 65 74 2d 44 72 61 66 74 73 20 61 73 20 72 rnet-Drafts as r 192 65 66 65 72 65 6e 63 65 20 6d 61 74 65 72 69 61 eference materia 208 6c 20 6f 72 20 74 6f 20 63 69 74 65 20 74 68 65 l or to cite the 224 6d 20 6f 74 68 65 72 20 74 68 61 6e 20 61 73 20 m other than as 240 2f e2 80 9c 77 6f 72 6b 20 69 6e 20 70 72 6f 67 /...work in prog 256 72 65 73 73 2e 2f e2 80 9d ress./... Appendix B . Performance Measurements of ChaCha20 https://www.imperialviolet.org/2014/02/27/tlssymmetriccrypto.html>. +----------------------------+-------------+-------------------+ \| Chip \| AES-128-GCM \| ChaCha20-Poly1305 \| +----------------------------+-------------+-------------------+ \| OMAP 4460 \| 24.1 MB/s \| 75.3 MB/s \| \| Snapdragon S4 Pro \| 41.5 MB/s \| 130.9 MB/s \| \| Sandy Bridge Xeon (AES-NI) \| 900 MB/s \| 500 MB/s \| +----------------------------+-------------+-------------------+ Table 1: Speed Comparison Nir & Langley Informational [Page 44] RFC 7539 ChaCha20 & Poly1305 May 2015 Procter]. Authors' Addresses Yoav Nir Check Point Software Technologies, Ltd. 5 Hasolelim St. Tel Aviv 6789735 Israel EMail: ynir.ietf@gmail.com Adam Langley Google, Inc. EMail: agl@google.com Nir & Langley Informational [Page 45]
Background Edit Before any official announcement, reports began running during April 1965 within the automotive press that Chevrolet was preparing a competitor to the Ford Mustang, code-named Panther.[6] On June 21, 1966, around 200 automotive journalists received a telegram from General Motors stating, "...please save noon of June 28 for important SEPAW meeting. Hope you can be on hand to help scratch a cat. Details will follow...(signed) John L. Cutter – Chevrolet public relations – SEPAW secretary." The following day, the same journalists received another General Motors telegram stating, "Society for the Eradication of Panthers from the Automotive World will hold first and last meeting on June 28...(signed) John L. Cutter – Chevrolet public relations SEPAW secretary." These telegrams puzzled the automotive journalists.[6] On June 28, 1966, General Motors held a live press conference in Detroit’s Statler-Hilton Hotel. It was the first time that 14 cities were connected in real time for a press conference via telephone lines.[6] Chevrolet general manager Pete Estes started the news conference stating that all attendees of the conference were charter members of the Society for the Elimination of Panthers from the Automotive World and that this would be the first and last meeting of SEPAW. Estes then announced a new car line, project designation XP-836, with a name that Chevrolet chose in keeping with other car names beginning with the letter C such as the Corvair, Chevelle, Chevy II, and Corvette. He claimed the name, suggests the comradeship of good friends as a personal car should be to its owner and that to us, the name means just what we think the car will do... go. The Camaro name was then unveiled.[6] Automotive press asked Chevrolet product managers, what is a Camaro? and were told it was a small, vicious animal that eats Mustangs.[7] According to the book The Complete Book of Camaro: Every Model Since 1967, the name Camaro was conceived by Chevrolet merchandising manager Bob Lund and General Motors vice president Ed Rollett, while they were reading the book Heath's French and English Dictionary by James Boïelle and by de V. Payen-Payne printed in 1936. In the book The Complete Book of Camaro, it states that Mr. Lund and Mr. Rollett found the word camaro in the French-English dictionary was slang, to mean friend, pal, or comrade. The article further repeated Estes's statement of what the word camaro was meant to imply, that the car's name "suggests the comradeship of good friends, as a personal car should be to its owner".[8] In fact, the actual French word that has that meaning is "camarade", from which the English word "comrade" is derived,[9] and not "camaro"; "camaro" is not a recognized word in the French language.[10] The Camaro was first shown at a press preview in Detroit on September 12, 1966, and later in Los Angeles, on September 19, 1966. Public introduction of the new model was on September 26, 1966.[11] The Camaro officially went on sale in dealerships on September 29, 1966, for the 1967 model year.[12] First generation (1967–1969) Edit Main article: Chevrolet Camaro (first generation) First-generation Camaro The first-generation Camaro debuted in September 1966, for the 1967 model year, up to 1969 on a new rear-wheel drive GM F-body platform and was available as a two-door coupé or convertible with 2+2 seating, and a choice of 230 cu in (3.8 L), 250 cu in (4.1 L) inline-6 or 302 cu in (4.9 L), 307 cu in (5.0 L), 327 cu in (5.4 L), 350 cu in (5.7 L), and 396 cu in (6.5 L) V8 powerplants. Concerned with the runaway success of the Ford Mustang, Chevrolet executives realized that their compact sporty car, the Corvair, would not be able to generate the sales volume of the Mustang due to its rear-engine design, as well as declining sales, partly due to the negative publicity from Ralph Nader's book, Unsafe at Any Speed. Therefore, the Camaro was touted as having the same conventional rear-drive, front-engine configuration as the Mustang and Chevy II Nova. In addition, the Camaro was designed to fit a variety of power plants in the engine bay. The first-generation Camaro lasted until the 1969 model year and eventually inspired the design of the new retro fifth-generation Camaro. The first-generation offered a standard, Super Sport, and Rally Sport editions. In 1967, the Z/28 model was added featuring stripes on the hood and trunk, styled rally road wheels, and a 302 cu in (4.9 L) V8 engine. In the Rally Sport edition it was more the style of the car itself. Placed with the hideaway headlights, wing windows, and the more rounded out rear fender. Once they brought out the 1968 year they introduced the use of side marker lights. With the 1969 Camaro they did not have the wing windows as placed on the 1967 as well as having a more flat drawn out rear fender. Second generation (1970 - 1981) Edit Main article: Chevrolet Camaro (second generation) Second-generation Camaro (1971 SS model shown) Introduced in February 1970, the second-generation Camaro was produced through the 1981 model year, with cosmetic changes made in 1974 and 1978 model years. The car was heavily restyled and became somewhat larger and wider with the new styling. Still based on the F-body platform, the new Camaro was similar to its predecessor, with a unibody structure, front subframe, an A-arm front suspension, and leaf springs to control the solid rear axle. Road & Track picked the 1971 SS350 as one of the 10 best cars in the world in August 1971. RS (shown to the right), SS package was dropped in 1972 and reintroduced in 1996. The 1980 and 1981 Z28 models included an air induction hood scoop with an intake door that opened under full throttle. Third generation (1982–1992) Edit Main article: Chevrolet Camaro (third generation) Third-generation Camaro (1983 Z/28-E model shown) The third-generation Camaro was produced from 1981 (for the 1982 model year) to 1992. These were the first Camaros to offer modern fuel injection, Turbo-Hydramatic 700R4 four-speed automatic transmissions, five-speed manual transmissions, 14,15- or 16-inch wheels, a standard OHV 4-cylinder engine,[13] and hatchback bodies. The cars were nearly 500 pounds (227 kg) lighter than the second generation model. The IROC-Z was introduced in 1985 and continued through 1990. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) Regulations required a CHMSL (Center High Mounted Stop Lamp) starting with the 1986 model year. For 1986, the new brake light was located on the exterior of the upper center area of the back hatch glass. Additionally, the 2.5 L Iron Duke pushrod 4-cylinder engine was dropped, and all base models now came with the 2.8 L V6 (OHV). For 1987 and later, the CHMSL was either mounted inside the upper hatch glass, or integrated into a rear spoiler (if equipped). In 1985, the 305 cu in (5.0 L) small block V8 was available with indirect injection called "tuned port injection" (TPI). In 1987 the L98 350 cu in (5.7 L) V8 engine became a regular option on the IROC-Z, paired with an automatic transmission only. The convertible body style returned in 1987 (absent since 1969) and all came with a special "20th Anniversary Commemorative Edition" leather map pocket. 1992 offered a "25th Anniversary Heritage Package" that included stripes and a unique spoiler plaque. Beginning in 1988, the 1LE performance package was introduced, optional on street models and for showroom stock racing in the U.S. and Canada. The B4C or "police" package was made available beginning in 1991. This created a Z28 in more subtle RS styling. Fourth generation (1993–2002) Edit Main article: Chevrolet Camaro (fourth generation) Fourth-generation Camaro (1997 Z/28 model shown) The fourth-generation Camaro debuted in 1993 on an updated F-body platform. It retained the same characteristics since its introduction in 1967: a coupé body style with 2+2 seating (with an optional T-top roof) or convertible (reintroduced in 1994), rear-wheel drive, pushrod 6-cylinder and V8 engines. The standard powerplant from 1993-1995 was a 3.4 L V6, then a 3.8 L V6 was introduced in 1995. A 350 MPFI (LT1) Small Block V-8 engine, which was introduced in the Corvette in 1992, was standard in the Z28. Optional equipment included all-speed traction control and a new six-speed T-56 manual transmission; the 4L60E 4-speed automatic transmission was standard on the Z28, yet optional on the V6 models which came with a 5-speed manual as standard. Anti-lock brakes were standard equipment on all Camaros. A limited quantity of the SS version (1996-1997) came with the 330 HP LT4 small block engine from the Corvette, although most were equipped with the 275 hp LT1. The 1997 model year included a revised interior, and the 1998 models included exterior styling changes, and a switch to GM's aluminium block LS1 used in the Corvette C5. In 1998, the 5.7 L LS1 was the first all-aluminum engine offered in a Camaro since the 1969 ZL-1 and carried a 305-horsepower rating.[14] The SS versions (1998-2002) received slightly improved exhaust and intake systems, bigger wheels and tires, a slightly revised suspension for improved handling and grip while retaining ride comfort, an arc-shaped rear wing for downforce, and different gearing ratios for faster acceleration, over the Z28 models. Chevrolet offered a 35th anniversary edition for the 2002 model year. Production of the F-Body platform was discontinued due to slowing sales, a deteriorating market for sports coupés, and plant overcapacity, but an entirely new platform went on sale in 2009. The B4C Special Service Package for police agencies was carried over from the 3rd generation & sold between 1993-2002.[15][16] Fifth generation (2010–2015) Edit Sixth generation (2016–present) Edit Main article: Chevrolet Camaro (sixth generation) Sixth-generation Camaro On May 16, 2015, Chevrolet introduced the sixth generation Camaro at Belle Isle park in Detroit. The launch, complete with previous generation Camaros on display, coincided with the vehicle's upcoming 50th birthday.[30] The sixth generation Camaro[31] sales began in late 2015 and offered in LT and SS models built on the GM Alpha platform at Lansing Grand River Assembly in Michigan.[32] The Alpha platform is currently used by the Cadillac ATS. The 2016 Camaro weighs 200 lb (91 kg) less than its predecessor. Over 70% of the sixth generation's architectural components are unique to the car and are not shared with any other current GM product.[33] Motor Trend named the 2016 Camaro its "Car of the Year.[34] Early production have three engine versions: a 2.0 L turbo-charged inline-four producing 275 hp (205 kW; 279 PS), a new 3.6 L V6 making 335 hp (250 kW; 340 PS), while the SS model features the 6.2 L LT1 V8 with 455 hp (339 kW; 461 PS); the ZL1 model will use a supercharged 650 hp (485 kW; 659 PS) LT4 based on the Corvette Z06,[35] and the transmissions are either a six-speed manual or an eight-speed automatic (the 2017 ZL1 will share the six-speed manual but has an optional ten-speed automatic).[32] The 2016 Camaro[36] will come equipped with both Apple CarPlay and Android Auto Capability features. For the 2017 model year, the 1LE performance package returns to the Camaro. The package builds off the success of the previous-generation 1LE, offering increased handling and track performance. In response to customer demand, Chevrolet offers two distinct 1LE packages, for both V6 and V8 models, each visually distinguished with a satin black hood, specific wheels and more.[37] The 2017 ZL1 Camaro has a top speed of 205 mph, and a Nürburgring Nordschleife lap time of 7:16.4.[38] The 2017 ZL1 edition is also one of the first cars with a 10-speed automatic transmission, making it the most unique one in its form. For the 2018 model year, Chevrolet introduced the ZL1 1LE package for the Camaro. The new package tested to be three seconds faster around General Motors' Milford Road Course than the next-fastest ZL1 Camaro. The ZL1 1LE performance package introduces improved aerodynamics, a new racing-inspired adjustable suspension, and new lightweight forged aluminum wheels with Goodyear Eagle F1 Supercar 3R tires created especially for the ZL1 1LE. Overall the new performance package reduces the car's weight by 60 lb (27 kg) over the ZL1. The ZL1 1LE shares the ZL1's supercharged 650 hp (485 kW; 659 PS) LT4 engine paired with a six-speed manual transmission with Active Rev Match.[39] Racing Edit Sales Edit Model year US sales[44] 1967 220,906 1968 235,147 1969 243,085 1970 124,901 1971 114,630 1972 68,651 1973 96,571 1974 151,008 1975 145,770 1976 182,959 1977 218,853 1978 272,631 1979 282,571 1980 152,005 1981 126,139 1982 189,747 1983 154,381 1984 261,591 1985 180,018 1986 192,219 1987 137,760 1988 96,275 1989 110,739 1990 34,986 1991 100,838 1992 70,007 1993 39,103 1994 119,799 1995 122,738 1996 61,362 1997 60,202 1998 54,026 1999 42,098 2000 45,461 2001 29,009 2002 41,776 Camaro ceases production until 2009 2010 81,299[45] 2011 88,249[45] 2012 84,391[46] 2013 80,567[47] 2014 86,297[48] 2015 77,502[49] 2016 72,705[50] 2017 67,940[51] 2018 50,963[52] In popular culture Edit
1. Reflects a severe lack of creative quality “Why isn’t Wes Hoolahan playing? He should be playing from the start and for as long as he’s fit. We’re carrying Glenn Whelan. I love Wes Hoolahan like my own child” Not exactly verbatim but along the lines of what Eamonn Dunphy has said plenty of times in the past. Even Liam Brady seems to have joined the ‘Wes Hoolohan’ fan club recently. All it took was a night of ‘anti-football’ in Georgia to convince him. While it’s clear Hoolohan is comfortable on the ball, it’s a sad state of affairs when you’re relying on a 35-year-old who can’t get a game for a Norwich team stuck at the bottom of the Championship. 2. No kids coming through We previously wrote about young Irish players that could make a break through soon. However, they’re perhaps a couple of years away from making their Irish debut. Martin O’Neill has not blooded many kids during his time in charge. It’s a worrying state of affairs. Glenn Whelan (32) is normally the Irish captain, Meyler is 28, while even baby-faced McGeady is 31. McClean is probably still considered one of our younger talents at 28. O’Neill and Keane aren’t exactly putting a plan in place for the future. Hoolahan will continue to be our go-to guy when some creativity is needed. At Euro 2020, he’s going to be 38 years old. 3. Managerial conservatism We were unlucky in our defeat to Serbia but the damage was done in Georgia. Starting with Whelan and Artur in midfield was O’Neill’s conservative side coming through. They didn’t stand a chance against a technically gifted, but limited Georgian side. Why would you not play a creative midfielder like Hoolahan in that case? Meyler, who is a great passer of the ball, didn’t even get on the pitch. While Conor Hourihane, a player who should be starting more games in green, also didn’t get a sniff. Main Image: Norwich City FC
Hardcore Mode by KawaiiSpider Hardcore Dungeons and Dragons is the most fun you can have with a D20. It ups the stakes and makes every hit count. I present the following changes to the rules of DnD to make your players fear every encounter, take great joy in every kill and feel great accomplishment at every day survived. Changes to Hit Points The most drastic change in this mode is the reduced number of Hit Points the players have. This leads to very tense encounters where every critical hit has the potential to down a character and extended encounters can be deadly for the entire party. A player gains Hit Points as normal at first level but then only gains additional Hit Points and Hit Dice at levels 4, 8, 12, 16 and 20. When rolling for gained Hit Points the player may roll 2 dice and take the highest number to add to their Hit Point total. Any abilities that increase hit points every level such as the Tough feat or the Sorcerer Draconic Bloodline ability only increase Hit Points at the above levels as well. Changes to Dropping to 0 When you drop to 0 hit points, you either die outright or fall unconscious, as explained in the following sections. Instant Death Massive damage can kill you instantly. When damage reduces you to 0 hit points and there is damage remaining, you die if the remaining damage equals or exceeds your hit point maximum. For example, a cleric with a maximum of 12 hit points currently has 6 hit points. If she takes 18 damage from an attack, she is reduced to 0 hit points, but 12 damage remains. Because the remaining damage equals her hit point maximum, the cleric dies. Falling Unconscious If damage reduces you to 0 hit points and fails to kill you, you fall unconscious (see appendix A of the player’s handbook). This unconsciousness ends if you regain any hit points. Death Saving Throws Whenever you start your turn with 0 hit points, you must make constitution saving throw, called a death saving throw, to determine whether you creep closer to death or hang onto life. The DC of this save is 10 + the difference between the damage taken and your Hit Points prior to taking that damage. A success or failure has no effect by itself. On your third success, you become stable (see below). On your third failure, you die. The successes and failures don't need to be consecutive; keep track of both until you collect three of a kind. The number of both is reset to zero when you regain any hit points or become stable. Rolling 1 or 20. When you make a death saving throw and roll a 1 on the d20, it counts as two failures. If you roll a 20 on the d20, you may choose one of the following effects: You regain 1 Hit Point for one round in which you have advantage on all rolls. At the end of the turn you suffer a death saving throw failure. You become stable. Damage at 0 Hit Points. If you take any damage while you have 0 hit points, you suffer two death saving throw failures. If the damage is from a critical hit, or the damage equals or exceeds your hit point maximum, you suffer instant death. Optional Rule: Temporary Hit Points Temporary Hit Points represent a surge of adrenaline that allows a character to ignore wounds that would otherwise kill them. A character that has temporary Hit Points can remain conscious while below 0 Hit Points up to a negative value equal to the number of temporary hit points. A character who is still on negative hit points when combat ends remains conscious for 1d4 rounds before falling unconscious and begins making death saves as normal. Balance Note Some classes, mainly warlocks, rely heavily on temporary hit points. make sure you ask your players before you implement this rule. Medicine The best way to save a creature with 0 hit points is to heal it. If healing is unavailable, the creature can at least be helped so that it has less of a chance of being killed by a failed death saving throw. You can use your action to administer first aid to an unconscious creature and attempt to help it, which requires a successful (Medicine) check. The DC of this check is the same as the DC for the Death Save above. On a success, the creature gains one Death Save success and has advantage on its next Death Saving throw. On a failure, the creature has disadvantage on its next Death Saving throw. On a natural 20 the creature is stabilised, on a natural 1 the creature suffers a death saving throw failure. Stability A stable creature doesn’t make death saving throws, even though it has 0 hit points, but it does remain unconscious. The creature stops being stable, and must start making death saving throws again, if it takes any damage. A stable creature that isn’t healed regains 1 hit point after 3d4 hours.
‘the feedback from Linux users has been very positive’ Looking for a free REST client for the Linux desktop? Don’t lose sleep: get Insomnia. The app is cross-platform and works on Linux, macOS and Windows. Its developer, Gregory Schier, told us that he created the app “to help developers communicate with REST APIs.” He also told that Insomnia already has around 10,000 active users — 9% of which are on Linux. “So far, the feedback from Linux users has been very positive because similar applications (not nice ones anyway) aren’t usually available for Linux.” Insomnia aims to ‘speed up your API testing workflow’, by letting you organise, run and debug HTTP requests through a cleanly designed interface. The app also includes advanced features like cookie management, global environments, SSL validation, and code snippet generation. As I am not a developer I can’t evaluate this app first-hand, nor tell you why it rocks or highlight any major feature deficiencies. But I thought I’d bring the app to your attention and let you decide for yourself. If you’ve been hunting for a slickly designed GUI alternative to command-line tools like HTTPie, it might be well worth giving it a whirl. Download Insomnia 3.0 for Linux Insomnia 3.0 (not to be confused with Insomnia v2.0 which is only available on Chrome) is available to download for Windows, macOS and Linux. Download Insomnia 3.0 An installer is available for Ubuntu 14.04 LTS and up, as is a cross-distro AppImage: Download Insomnia 3.0 (.AppImage) If you want to keep pace with development of the app you can follow Insomnia on Twitter.
Researchers at IBM have spotted a new banking malware dubbed IcedID has capabilities similar to other financial threats like Gozi, Zeus, and Dridex. banking malware dubbed IcedID has capabilities similar to other financial threats like Gozi, Malware researchers at IBM X-Force have spotted a new strain of Zeus , and Dridex . IcedID does not borrow code from other banking malware, but it implements comparable features. “Overall, this is similar to other banking Trojans, but that’s also where I see the problem,” says Limor Kessem, executive security advisor for IBM Security. The banking Trojan was first observed in September in campaigns aimed at banks, payment card providers, mobile service providers, payroll, Webmail, and e-commerce sites in the United States and Canada. The malware also targeted two major banks in the United Kingdom. The experts highlighted the distribution technique adopted by IcedID that leverages on the Emotet Trojan. Emotet is delivered via spam emails, usually disguised in productivity files containing malicious macros, and remains stealth to be used by operators to distribute other payloads, such as IcedID. IcedID implements the ability to propagate over a network, a circumstance that suggests authors developed it to target large businesses. “IcedID can propagate over a network. It monitors the victim’s online activity by setting up a local proxy for traffic tunneling, which is a concept reminiscent of the GootKit Trojan. Its attack tactics include both webinjection attacks and sophisticated redirection attacks similar to the scheme used by Dridex and TrickBot.” reads the analysis published by IBM. The redirection scheme implemented by IcedID is designed to appear as seamless as possible to the victim. It includes displaying the legitimate bank’s URL in the address bar and the bank’s correct SSL certificate by keeping a live connection with the actual bank’s site. The malware listens for the target URL and when it encounters a trigger, executes a Web injection. Victims are redirected to fake banking websites, used by crooks to trick victims into submitting their credentials. The attacker controls the victim’s session and uses social engineering to trick victims into sharing transaction authorization data. The level of sophistication of the IcedID malware suggests the attackers belong to a well-structured group. The analysis of comments in IcedID code indicates the attackers are from Russian-speaking regions. Experts believe the threat could evolve in the next future, for example by implementing advanced anti-virtual machine or anti-research techniques along with techniques to evade sandboxes. Further technical details on the malware, including the Indicators of Compromise, are available in the blog post published by IBM. Pierluigi Paganini (Security Affairs – banking, malware) Share this... Linkedin Reddit Pinterest Share On
World leaders are failing in their pledge to cut the rate at which wildlife lose their homes, according to the the first ever progress report on targets to slow biodiversity loss by the end of the decade. Conservationist called the lack of action a “troubling sign” and a “reality check”. Governments agreed on a set of targets in 2010 to stem the destruction of species’ habitats, increase the number of nature reserves and stop overfishing, but an international team of more than 30 scientists say in a report that, almost halfway towards the 2020 deadline, the Aichi targets are unlikely to be met. Writing in the journal Science, in the same week that a major report by WWF suggested the world had lost half its animals over the past four decades, the scientists say that the state of biodiversity and the pressures on it are getting worse, not better. A pledge to halve the loss of natural habitats by 2020 will be missed, as will an attempt to reduce fishing to sustainable levels, and a target of having 10% of the world’s seas made into protected areas. Dr Richard Gregory, one of the paper’s authors and head of species monitoring and research at the RSPB, said: “World leaders are currently grappling with many crises affecting our future. But this study shows there is a collective failure to address the loss of biodiversity, which is arguably one of the greatest crises facing humanity. “The natural environment provides us with food, clean water and other natural resources we need for survival, and much more besides to feed our souls and inspire us.” He called the lack of progress a “a troubling sign for us all.” If the 2020 targets are missed, it will not be the first time targets to halt the decline in the richness and abundance of wildlife and the natural world have been overshot. An assessment of goals set in 2002 to cut the rate of biodiversity loss by 2010 showed governments had failed to deliver on the commitments they made. Mike Hoffmann, a senior scientist on species survival commission at the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, told the Guardian that “this is a reality check halfway to 2020.” “We’re in serious danger of being in the same position as we were back in 2010 of not having made the progress we need to make to lead to a better society and a better world. “It’s not to say we’re not having successes. We don’t do enough to champion the conservation successes, without which we’d be in a much worse situation.” But, he said: “The bottom line is we’re not doing enough and we’re going to have to do much much more to change things in the next five things.” The new analysis of progress on the 2020 targets did say that society’s awareness of the problem had improved and efforts to raise funds to tackle the problem were accelerating but not significantly enough. The team looked at 55 indicators to measure the health of biodiversity worldwide, to measure progress on 16 of the 20 Aichi targets agreed in 2010. “The benefits of maintaining biodiversity are well known,” the report concludes, “... efforts need to be redoubled to positively affect trajectories of change and enable global biodiversity goals to be met by the end of the current decade.” Officials from nearly a nearly 200 countries are to meet in Pyeongchang, South Korea, over the next fortnight, to discuss how to tackle the problem.
RENO, NV - Reno police are still investigating the deaths of two children and a man after a shooting in northwest Reno. The shooting happened about 4:30PM Saturday, November 8, 2014 on Stone Valley Drive near Westergard Elementary School. Police and the Washoe coroner's office confirmed late Monday the victims were 7-year-old Jacob and 2-year-old Austin Deane, and that their father, 36-year-old Rob Deane, was also found dead in the house. Police are still working on figuring out the timeline regarding specifically what happened, but they say the situation is contained and no one in the neighborhood is in further danger. They are not looking for anyone in connection with the shooting. Social media reports also indicate the mother was out of town when the shooting took place. The Reno Police Department is asking for help from anyone who may have information about this shootings to contact the Reno Police Department at 334-2188, or Secret Witness at 322-4900 or www.secretwitness.com, or you can text tips to 847411 (TIP 411) keyword – SW. The children's mother's Facebook page indicates funeral services will be noon Saturday, November 15 at South Reno Baptist Church. Child's Play Daycare is allowing parents who want to attend to drop off their children at no cost. The same situation is in place for parents who want to attend a candlelight vigil in the childrens' honor being held Sunday November 16th at 6PM at 8521 White Fir.
On Oct. 7, 1916, one of the strongest teams in the South took to Grant Field for a game widely recognized for what it was – a glorified scrimmage against a clearly outclassed team. The roughly 1,000 fans who paid their $1 to watch Georgia Tech play Cumberland most certainly didn’t realize they were watching history, not that warm Atlanta afternoon and perhaps not for a long time to come. But, improbably, the Yellow Jackets’ 222-0 win over Cumberland has held fast its place in school and college football history. Perhaps no final score of any game before or since remains as indelible as that, at once both outrageous and memorable. The architect of that blowout, Tech coach John Heisman, ultimately led a career so successful that one of sport’s most cherished awards is named in his honor. Yet, the one fact that is perhaps most associated with him is his role in a game that, in the context of that season and perhaps even his career, was probably the least meaningful and most predictable. A look back at 222-0. Why it was played As would be the case a century later, money was at the heart of college athletics and in this game particularly. Cumberland didn’t want to play the game; it had given up football after the 1915 season in part because the school was enduring a financial crisis. However, the school had failed to properly notify Tech that it was discontinuing its team, and Heisman wouldn’t let Cumberland out of the game contract, even threatening to sue for $3,000 for breach of contract. To avoid that possibility, a Cumberland student manager assembled a ragtag team, mostly fraternity brothers, to take to Atlanta. According to the book “Heisman’s First Trophy,” a novelized account of the game, the decision to play Tech may have saved Cumberland from bankruptcy. Why Tech didn’t relent The most recognized motivation for Heisman to hold Cumberland to its contract was to gain revenge for a 22-0 win by its baseball team over Tech in the previous spring, an outcome influenced by Cumberland’s use of several ringers. However, Heisman had another purpose to pile up the points that Tech’s present-day coach might approve of – to tweak sports writers. According to “Heisman: The Man Behind the Trophy” (co-written by a descendant of Heisman’s and ESPN’s Mark Schlabach, formerly of the AJC), Heisman took issue with writers who heavily valued points scored when comparing teams. Wrote Heisman, “So, finding that folks are determined to take the crazy thing into consideration, we at Tech determined this year, at the start of the season, to show folks that it was no very difficult thing to run up a score in one easy game, from which it might perhaps be seen that it could be done in other easy games as well.” Also making headlines The game was not the biggest sports news of the day. It shared top billing with the opening game of the World Series between the Boston Red Sox and Brooklyn Dodgers and Atlantan Alexa Stirling’s victory at the U.S. Women’s Amateur golf championship. The Oct. 8 Journal had no less than nine headlines devoted to Stirling, a childhood friend of Bobby Jones who became the youngest U.S. Women’s Amateur champion at the age of 19. One was a poem and another was a short biography that included a story about her making a violin out of a cigar box at the age of six. The poem’s author, Morgan Blake, is credited with giving Tech one of its early nicknames, the Golden Tornado, as well as proposing Bulldogs as the nickname for Georgia. Blake had a busy day; besides composing his 16-line poem, he also covered the Tech game. Inside the numbers The statistics from the game, as kept by the Journal: Tech gained 528 yards, all on the ground. Cumberland was credited with 32 yards of offense, 20 by run and 12 by pass. Neither team gained a first down, as the Jackets reached the end zone on each possessionbefore it could gain a first down. The Bulldogs never made it 10 yards in a possession. Tech also never punted. Wrote the Constitution, “Cumberland was totally unable to stop the Jackets, who were not thrown for a loss or even held or one.” Observers of the game recognized it for what it was, a high-powered team imposing its will against an unorganized collection of students. While the score was a record breaker, the outcome was unsurprising, the result of a well-trained college team playing against the equivalent of an intramural team. Wrote the Journal’s Blake, “The Lebanon boys were minus any apparent football virtues.” Once a football powerhouse Cumberland has played football off and on since that point. It was once a powerhouse, finishing the 1903 season with a 6-1-1 record. That included a stunning six-day stretch in which it beat Alabama, LSU and Tulane by a combined 113-0. The one tie was against Clemson in the championship game of the Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association (a forerunner of both the SEC and ACC) played only a week after the Tulane game. Clemson’s coach was none other than Heisman, a hot commodity after another strong season. According to “Heisman,” written from the coach’s extensive personal documents, Clemson’s train to the game in Montgomery, Ala., happened to delay in Atlanta for three hours. That fateful stop provided boosters from a rival school the chance to offer him their job. The following day, as Cumberland and Clemson tied 11-11, Tech announced that Heisman was coming to Atlanta to coach in 1904. As Tech coach, Heisman and Cumberland would meet three times more, the last in 1916. The program was brought back the most recent time in 1990 and now plays in NAIA. The team is coached by Donnie Suber, who is quite familiar with Tech coach Paul Johnson. Suber was a freshman defensive back at Georgia Southern in 1986, Johnson’s final year in Statesboro as the Eagles’ offensive coordinator. In fact, Suber’s defensive back that year was Tech offensive line coach Mike Sewak. May have happened A perhaps apocryphal story from the game: A Cumberland player was sitting on the Tech bench late in the game. Heisman noticed him and told him he needed to return to the Cumberland side. The young man responded, “No, sir, Mr. Heisman, this is the right bench. If I go over there, they’ll put me back in the game!” The story goes that Heisman had mercy on the player and gave him a blanket to hide under for the rest of the game. Jackets’ star vs. Cumberland The best player on Tech’s team was one of its greatest of all-time. Halfback Everett Strupper led the Jackets in the game with six touchdowns. In 1917, Strupper was named an All-American, only the second player from the Southeast to earn that distinction. It represented growing recognition from the game’s power brokers of the ability of teams and players outside the Northeast. Strupper was posthumously inducted in the College Football Hall of Fame in 1972. Strupper had another unrelated contribution to the game. In 1930, as a writer for the Atlanta Journal, he covered an Alabama-Ole Miss game and made reference to the Tide team as “elephants.” Strupper and other writers began to refer to Alabama linemen as “Red Elephants,” the source of the school’s adoption of that animal as its mascot. Talented roster The 1916 team had two more College Football Hall of Famers on the roster, not including Heisman. End Bill Fincher was a freshman backup and halfback Joe Guyon sat out the year as a transfer. Guyon is also in the Pro Football Hall of Fame, the only Tech player in both halls, although Calvin Johnson’s day likely is coming. Guyon and Strupper were part of one of the greatest backfields of all-time, along with quarterback Albert Hill and fullback Judy Harlan. In 1917, the year after the Cumberland game, they were the driving force behind Tech’s undefeated season, which gave the Jackets the claim on their first national championship. Fincher, who had a glass or porcelain eye, was said to surreptitiously remove the prosthetic after the first few plays of a game and then show his face to an opposing lineman and growl, “So that’s the way you wanna play, huh?”
There’s something deeply wrong at Creech Air Force Base, the notorious home of America’s drone program, where pilots remotely order US Reaper and Predator drones to unleash destructive missile strikes on unsuspecting villagers in Yemen, Libya, Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan and other war zones. Less than a week after the Department of Homeland Security advised all federal agencies using anti-virus software created by Kaspersky Labs to remove the programs from their systems immediately, Ars Technica reports that two weeks ago the Defense Information Systems Agency detected mysterious spyware embedded in the drone “cockpits” – the control stations that pilots use to control the deadly machines. Investigators have been unable to determine the virus’s provenance, or even if it was intentionally introduced to the drone systems, or the result of an accidental infection. But perhaps the virus’s most perplexing feature is its passivity. Instead of hastening away reams of classified information, it has simply logged keystrokes. More curious still, the virus has resisted all attempts to remove it from the Air Force’s systems. The virus, first detected nearly two weeks ago by the military’s Host-Based Security System, has not prevented pilots at Creech Air Force Base in Nevada from flying their missions overseas. Nor have there been any confirmed incidents of classified information being lost or sent to an outside source. But the virus has resisted multiple efforts to remove it from Creech’s computers, network security specialists say. And the infection underscores the ongoing security risks in what has become the US military’s most important weapons system. “We keep wiping it off, and it keeps coming back,” says a source familiar with the network infection, one of three that told Danger Room about the virus. “We think it’s benign. But we just don’t know.” Military network security specialists aren’t sure whether the virus and its so-called “keylogger” payload were introduced intentionally or by accident; it may be a common piece of malware that just happened to make its way into these sensitive networks. The specialists don’t know exactly how far the virus has spread. But they’re sure that the infection has hit both classified and unclassified machines at Creech. That raises the possibility, at least, that secret data may have been captured by the keylogger, and then transmitted over the public internet to someone outside the military chain of command. As Ars notes, drones have become America’s weapon of choice for waging stealth warfare across the Middle East and Africa, a fact that was underlined by the killing of four US green berets in Niger earlier this week. The military advisers were serving at a waystation for American drones that were used to carry out attacks on nearby Al Qaeda affiliates. Drones have become America’s tool of choice in both its conventional and shadow wars, allowing US forces to attack targets and spy on its foes without risking American lives. Since President Obama assumed office, a fleet of approximately 30 CIA-directed drones have hit targets in Pakistan more than 230 times; all told, these drones have killed more than 2,000 suspected militants and civilians, according to the Washington Post. More than 150 additional Predator and Reaper drones, under US Air Force control, watch over the fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq. American military drones struck 92 times in Libya between mid-April and late August. And late last month, an American drone killed top terrorist Anwar al-Awlaki — part of an escalating unmanned air assault in the Horn of Africa and southern Arabian peninsula. And while they represent America’s most sophisticated weaponry in the never-ending war on terror, the drone program has well-known security flaws. Last fall, the US Air Force investigated a secure network outage in early September at Creech. Around the time of the outage, there were three incidences of drones striking three unintended targets. The Air Force said it was just a coincidence. But despite their widespread use, the drone systems are known to have security flaws. Many Reapers and Predators don’t encrypt the video they transmit to American troops on the ground. In the summer of 2009, US forces discovered “days and days and hours and hours” of the drone footage on the laptops of Iraqi insurgents. A $26 piece of software allowed the militants to capture the video. Authorities believe the virus was spread by the use of remote drives used by technicians to upload maps and other data to the drone piloting systems, which are “air gapped” from the rest of the Air Force’s systems. Use of the drives is now severely restricted throughout the military. But the base at Creech was one of the exceptions, until the virus hit. Predator and Reaper crews use removable hard drives to load map updates and transport mission videos from one computer to another. The virus is believed to have spread through these removable drives. Drone units at other Air Force bases worldwide have now been ordered to stop their use. But given the hysteria surrounding Kaspersky’s software allegedly being used as a tool for espionage by the Russian government, how long until this breach is connected with a broader narrative about Russian hackers trying to destabilize American society? Or, worse – how much longer until a malicious actor manages to seize control of America’s drone program and harness its destructive capabilities for its own ends?
The past seven days have brought more grist for the NFL officiating debate than any similar time period in recent memory. Three high-profile mistakes on Monday Night Football, all of which the league eventually acknowledged, sparked a barrage of controversy that continued through the fourth quarter of Sunday Night Football. Bracketed by an inadvertent whistle and an excess timeout, this spell crystallized the public's sense -- as well as some within the game -- that officiating is worsening as scrutiny intensifies. It included an intriguing explanation from a retired NFL executive, which I'll get to in a moment, and a half-dozen instances that alone would have amounted to little but viewed collectively create a damaging image. Holder Pat McAfee was hit during this Adam Vinatieri field goal attempt. AP Photo/AJ Mast Among them: Whenever officiating questions arise, it's crucial to incorporate the human element into any conclusions. Mistakes will happen. We also must take into account the complexity of the NFL rulebook. Who knew, before Sunday night, that the clock would restart after an injury timeout with less than two minutes remaining? (Kudos to referee Tony Corrente's crew for getting that one correct late in the fourth quarter at Sports Authority Field, an accomplishment that NFL vice president of officiating Dean Blandino felt compelled to note late Sunday night on NFL Network.) Officiating roster by experience Experience Number First year 10 Second year 13 Third year 1 Fourth year 0 Fifth year 1 6-9 years 21 10-15 years 38 16-20 years 27 21-27 years 10 Source: NFL But there seems little doubt that the frequency and impact of mistakes are in a crescendo as the final month of the regular season approaches. Speaking Sunday morning on Fox, former NFL vice president of officiating Mike Pereira attributed the situation to the significant personnel turnover among officials during Blandino's tenure -- a trend I noted last spring. The chart, based on the NFL's public roster of officials, shows that there are 23 with two or fewer years of experience in the NFL -- about 19 percent of the full staff. It was believed to be the largest period of officiating turnover in at least 13 years, and has created two segments of officials: Those with high levels of experience and those with little. Pereira noted that the NFL requires five years of experience for Super Bowl assignments, a benchmark for what it takes to reach high-level performance, and alluded to Blandino's emphasis on physical fitness for officials in today's faster-paced game. "You wanted younger officials," Pereira said, "and you got them." The smoking gun of Pereira's theory is second-year head linesman Ed Walker, who incorrectly wound the clock on the final play last week of Monday Night Football. (Buffalo Bills receiver Sammy Watkins was not touched and fell out of bounds, meaning the clock should have stopped.) But the theory can't be connected directly to other high-profile mistakes this season. Side judge Rob Vernatchi, who was suspended after missing the clock runoff in Week 5, is a 12-year veteran. Back judge Greg Wilson, who missed an illegal bat call in Week 4, has eight years of experience. Head linesman Ed Camp, the closest official to the uncalled false start in Week 10, has been with the NFL for 16 years. The line judge responsible for the inadvertent whistle last week, Gary Arthur, has been with the NFL for 19 seasons. It's possible that a trickle-down effect of inexperience is causing some veterans to overextend themselves, as can happen among NFL players. An alternative view suggests that officiating needed the kind of accountability that this turnover has brought and that its rewards must be viewed in a longer horizon. But the short-term impact seems undeniable. A craft that comes with unavoidable mistakes is under unprecedented scrutiny and is struggling to perform. Unfortunately, there are no quick fixes or obvious solutions. The NFL and its officiating department have little choice this season but to ride out the ebb and flow.
Story highlights Julie Burton, Michelle Kinsey Bruns: Men, women seem to disagree on comic's rape joke They say many men don't seem to get the joke reflected extreme end of rape culture They say threat of rape used to define boundaries for women's behavior; joke did this, too Men see rape in jokes as an abstraction, but it's real for women, writers say When the comedian Daniel Tosh reportedly singled out a woman in his audience and suggested, according to a blog post that recounted the incident, it would be "funny" if she "got raped by, like, five guys, right now," the online reaction was swift, heated and often split down gender lines. Many men wanted to explain free speech or heckling etiquette. Many women (and virtually all feminists) said these topics were distractions, at best, from the sheer offensiveness of Tosh's attack. As we at the Women's Media Center watched hundreds of users comment on our Facebook post about the incident, we saw the same disconnect. Quite a few of the women who shared our post said they were doing so in hopes that a husband or boyfriend would "finally understand why I won't watch Tosh's show with him." Some even tagged their husbands or boyfriends, to be sure the message would reach its destination. In the aggregate, these comments gave us a glimpse into the ongoing, low-grade conflicts between women who have been trying to articulate their discomfort with Tosh's lazy, cruel and misogynistic humor, and the men who share their lives but just don't get it. At the center of these disagreements is the rape-joke empathy gap. Julie Burton Michelle Kinsey Bruns The problem isn't a failure of men to see rape as horrific. It's that many of them do not perceive that rape itself lies on the far end of a broad spectrum of ways in which the idea of rape, the invocation of rape or the threat of rape is used to intimidate women or to regulate their behavior. When women are told that they shouldn't drink too much or walk alone at night or wear a revealing top, they are being given a guided tour of the boundaries of acceptable female conduct. Women are supposed to understand that these boundaries are policed by rapists. We cross the line at our own risk. And if we are caught, the brutal punishment is one we have earned. A comedian who shoots down an audience member who objects to his rape jokes by joking about her being gang-raped on the spot isn't being funny. He's using rape to shut up a woman who crossed a boundary by speaking out of turn. That is unacceptable. Tosh was free to say what he said, of course. But that doesn't mean it wasn't morally repugnant. It was. What about rape jokes with less vicious punch lines? Here is the gray area where the empathy gap thrives best. There is absolutely room in both comedy and in feminism for discussions about rape jokes that highlight rape as a social ill vs. those that perpetuate that injustice. That's why we joined with other feminist media critics and activists to produce a YouTube "supercut" of rape jokes -- some insightful and some far less so. Still, the presence of rape in women's lives is too real and pervasive for many to laugh at all the same jokes that many men can. It's not that women never enjoy crude humor -- a lesbian journalist friend recently confided in us her amazement that her wife is a fan of Tosh's show, if not some of its more brutal misogyny. And it's not that no man knows with terrible certainty what it's like to be a rape victim -- one in five females and one in 71 males in the United States are the victims of rape, to say nothing of atrocities around the world such as those described in our new report on rape as a weapon of war in Syria. Nonetheless, the significant overlap between the gender divide and the rape-joke empathy gap is real, and it seems inevitable when media coverage of rape so often focuses on what a victim should have done differently to try harder not to get raped. Such shoddy framing creates a fictional image that there's a certain type of woman who gets raped. Women know that's a lie, because they live the truth, but men may never have occasion to question that image, and so when they laugh at rape jokes, they're laughing at an abstraction that's all too real for many women. Tosh and all those with the privilege to hold a microphone have a responsibility to shine a light on the reality behind the abstraction -- not to perpetuate it, and certainly not to silence those who bear its burden.
Four-door sports sedan version of Toyota's smash-hit 86 coupe in the pipeline It’s no exaggeration to say the 86, Australia’s top-selling sports car, has single-handedly succeeded in injecting some sparkle into Toyota’s lacklustre line-up. And, according to a source close to Toyota, there’s plenty more where that came from. That’s right folks, the 86 family is about to grow — and in a big way. When the 86 landed in showrooms last year, we were told of other iterations including a soft-top, a sedan and a shooting brake (sports wagon). Chief engineer Tetsuya Tada even mentioned as much in his blog. Well, although the 86 convertible concept has apparently stalled, our insider now tells us the green light has been given for an 86-based sedan. The soft-top 86 roadster concept was unveiled at the Geneva motor show in March, but there is still no word from Toyota — or our insider, for that matter — as to when we might see that car on the road. What we can tell you is that an 86-based sedan, similar to the one rendered here by Japan’s Holiday Auto magazine, is on the way and may even beat the soft-top into showrooms. According to our source, the new sports sedan will target 40-something buyers who honed their driving skills in cars like the rear-wheel drive Corolla AE86, Nissan Silvia (180SX and 200SX), Mazda RX-8 or Honda S2000. Employing a wheelbase that’s 100mm longer than that of the current 86, the new sedan will feature what Toyota calls a “keen-look” grille design that appears to replicate the shape of a Japanese ‘katana’ Samurai sword. In addition to the base model’s Subaru-sourced 147kW 2.0-litre boxer powertrain, the as-yet-unnamed 86 sedan will also offer a next-generation hybrid system. Strategically differentiated from the Toyota’s current Hybrid Synergy Drive system, the new ‘Hybrid R’ sports hybrid system will incorporate a one-motor parallel drive set-up that generates up to 200kW while achieving 10-15 per cent better fuel economy. While Hybrid R details are still sketchy, our insider suggests the new system – as revealed in the 300kW Yaris Hybrid-R concept at Frankfurt — will employ F1-style KERS (Kinetic Energy Recovery System) technology that can recover the car’s kinetic energy under braking. While we will not see this concept at next month’s Tokyo motor show, we hear strong rumours that it will make an appearance at next year’s Geneva show. Expect to see Toyota’s all-new rear-drive compact sports sedan hit showrooms from late 2015 through to early 2016, priced not far from the sub-$30K 86. Unfortunately, our sources tell us we won’t get a look at the jointly developed Toyota-BMW sports car at the Tokyo show either, with the Geneva show in March 2014 now looking more likely. Illustration: Holiday auto magazine Read the latest news and reviews on your mobile, iPhone or PDA at carsales’ mobile site… Don’t forget to register to comment on this article.
(Keystone) Swimming's governing body, Fina, has called on Swiss scientists to conduct tests on controversial high-tech drag-reducing swimsuits. Experts at Lausanne's Federal Institute of Technology (EPFL) have been helping Fina try to end the controversy over a new generation of swimsuits that are thought to have helped smash most of swimming's records in the past 16 months. Critics of the hi-tech suits argue their lack of "viscous drag" – around 25 per cent of the total retarding force on a swimmer - and the buoyancy they create amounts to "technological doping". Since Speedo's LZR Racer suit was made available in February 2008 some 126 world records have been set. Other manufacturers have followed Speedo with their own high-tech suits. Alarmed by the results, Fina called on the services of EPFL professor Jan-Anders Manson, a composite materials specialist who has worked on the Alinghi America's Cup and Solar Impulse aeroplane projects, and advises international sports federations on technology issues. Manson and his team tested 348 swimsuit designs for buoyancy and thickness at their Lausanne laboratories last month. "Now that swimmers have started to cover their bodies [more] it has changed a lots of things," Manson told journalists on Thursday in Lausanne. "Technology cannot be stopped but you can decide what you want." Manson explained that swimming had constantly witnessed a gain on the clock of 0.75-1 per cent across each four-year Olympic cycle in the past, compared with around two per cent in 2008 and 2009. "Of course, it is possible for swimming to test for all things, to use lasers and body scanners before and after races - but is that really where swimming wants to go. I think not. But that is not for me to decide," said the professor. Fina appointed a special commission to sift through the EPFL results and last Wednesday published a list of 202 approved swimsuits for competition in 2009. Restore credibility The tests and list follow a meeting in March in Dubai where Fina adopted new rules to try to "restore credibility" to the sport before the world championships in Rome, from July 19 to August 2, and for the rest of the year. As well as new rules on the thickness and buoyancy of the material, swimsuits must not cover the neck or extend past the shoulders and ankles. Fina says it wants a level playing field in Rome so that no racer has an advantage based on what they wear, and approved swimsuits should be available to all swimmers. "We are interfering as the community needs to know that technology needs to be controlled; sport needs to be first - and not the technology," Fina Executive Director Cornel Marculescu said on Thursday. But 2009 was an interim period before Fina created tougher suit regulations for next year, he added. "We can't ban all high-tech suits just like that, as the industry and racers would be affected too much," he told journalists. "This is a transitional period. We will do the right thing for swimming. Rome will be part of the process, but if the suits are still being written about in January next year as they are now, then you can shoot us." "We need to control this technology," Marculescu said. "We need to do it by scientific proof. There is no scientific evidence today to say one swimsuit is better than another swimsuit." Permeability tests At the heart of the controversy are new suits totally covered with polyurethane to aid buoyancy. The old suits only had polyurethane plates. Fina rejected ten suits for not passing the tests of buoyancy and/or thickness. It said 136 other swimsuits needed to be modified to meet the requirement that "swimsuit material shall not be constructed to include elements/systems which create air/water trapping effects during use". Firms have 30 days to resubmit modified designs. This second group included the Arena X-Glide worn by Olympic Champion Alain Bernard when breaking the 100 metres men's freestyle world record last month. It also contained the Jaked 01 model worn by Frederick Bousquet when he broke the 50m freestyle world record in April. There was speculation on Thursday that both models could be approved without making any kind of modifications for air trapping, as Fina does not have the means to test the phenomenon when a swimmer wears it. Manson's team will conduct more detailed permeability tests on all swimsuits later this year so that Fina can settle on an approved list for 2010 onward. The swimming body has already ruled that next year's suits can have no more than 50 per cent non-permeable material to be legal. "Fully permeable suits is the right direction to go," said the EPFL professor. Simon Bradley in Lausanne, swissinfo.ch Swimsuit controversy High-tech swimsuits were introduced in 2000. In 2005 the armoured suit entered the pool and a rule had to be introduced to force manufacturers to create costumes with a flat surface and suits that followed the body contour. The technology race started to heat up when the Speedo LZR suit arrived in February 2008. At the Olympics in Beijing, LZR swimmers, most notably American Michael Phelps, won 94 per cent of the golds on offer and broke 23 of the 25 records set there. The combined effects of the LZR both compressing the body and trapping air for buoyancy led to many competitors who used the LZR wearing two or more suits for an increased effect. This led to some claiming that the LZR was in effect "technological doping". Following the December 2008 European Short Course Championships in Croatia, where 17 world records fell, it was felt there was a need to modify the rules surrounding swimsuits. Since February 2008 racers competing in the high-tech suits have set 126 new records. New polyurethane models, such as the Jaked suits and Arena's X-Glide, were introduced to compete with the LZR. At their meeting in Dubai in March 2009, Fina stipulated that swimsuits should not cover the neck, must not extend past the shoulders and ankles, and also limited the suits' thickness and buoyancy. On May 20 it drew up a list of 220 approved suits for 2009. Fina plans to introduce tougher suit regulations in 2010. A full suit costs around $300–$600, limiting their use to highly competitive and professional sportspeople. However, in recent years technological advances have meant that basic high-technology swimwear can be purchased for approximately $100. end of infobox Neuer Inhalt Horizontal Line SWI swissinfo.ch on Instagram SWI swissinfo.ch on Instagram
Photo Credit: ICJ In cooperation with the Israeli government, an Israeli NGO, Shurat Hadin – The Israel Law Center, is preparing the infrastructure for taking senior members of the Palestinian Authority to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for their role and participation in terror attacks, according to a report in Makor Rishon. The claims will be submitted to the court if Palestinian Authority president, Abu Mazen, decides to launch a lawfare attack against Israel at the ICJ. The Palestinian Authority has been threatening to take Israel to the Hague since its status was upgraded in the UN. Advertisement Israel has begun taking multiple retaliatory steps in response to the Palestinian Authority breaching the peace talks agreement by taking unilateral actions by applying to various UN groups, and refusing to extend the talks. Shurat HaDin, an Israeli NGO that defends the legal rights of terror victims, initiated the idea. Various Israeli government offices will be assisting Shurat HaDin in preparing the lawsuits against senior Palestinian Authority officials in the ICJ. Last year Shurat HaDin began a series of high profile lawsuits in the U.S. against the PA and others involved in terrorism against Israelis. A few of the cases resulted in judgement with high payouts to the victims. Nitzana Dershan-Leitner, who founded and runs Shurat HaDin, says the purpose of preparing these lawsuits is to discourage the PA from filing any lawsuits in the Hague. Dershan-Leitner said that as soon as the ICJ Criminal Court recognizes the Palestinian Authority and allows them to sue Israel, it then creates a two-way street, and which allows the PA and its officials to be sued in return, in the same court. The [terrorist] crimes the PA and its officials have committed is far worse than anything they are claiming against Israel. Dershan-Leitner added that Shurat HaDin has clear documentation in its possession as to who committed and who is behind each terror attack
Titus Young turns 28 years old today. But he won’t be celebrating his birthday with family. The former Lion wide receiver is behind bars in a prison in southern California, only a few miles from where he was once a star player in high school. In April, Young was sentenced to four years in prison for an assault during a fight on the streets in Los Angeles in 2016. It was the latest in a string of disturbing behavior by Young, once a promising receiver for Detroit. There are some, including members of his family and mental health professionals, who insist that Young is not a violent criminal, but rather is suffering from a mental health issue, perhaps the effects of head injuries suffered on the playing field. The bizarre pattern of his behavior since his entry into the NFL in 2011 does demonstrate a young man who seemed to be morphing into a different person. One that his family, friends, and teammates did not recognize and ultimately could not get through to. College years at Boise State Though he was undersized, Young was highly recruited out of University High School (LA). College recruiters were impressed with his speed, route-running, and his hands. He was a fine leaper and had great instincts for the football. Also notable was his willingness to run across the middle of the football field, where receivers are frequently met by much larger defensive backs. Young did not shy away from the violent hits that are part of higher levels of football. He chose Boise State University and arrived on campus as a freshman in 2007. Boise State belongs to the Mountain West Conference, a group of smaller schools that plays in the shadow of the much more popular Pac-10. But when Young joined the program, Boise State was making national headlines with their impressive play in recent seasons, including a 13-0 record in 2006. Long a powerhouse in their conference, the Broncos were looking to move into national prominence under head coach Chris Petersen. Young had disciplinary troubles in his first season college, drawing team reprimands for undisclosed behavior and sitting out a portion of a Bowl game due to violations of team rules. Yet, Young was able to curb those problems and forge a fantastic career for the Broncos, setting team records for receptions, yards, and touchdowns by a receiver in his four-year career. The team went 48-5 in his career at Boise state, and Young helped the Broncos to two Bowl game victories and a #4 college football ranking in 2009. However, in his sophomore year Young played only three games before he the university suspended him for the remainder of the season. Teammates started reporting that Young’s personality was changing, that he was becoming more isolated. Offensive rookie of the year for Detroit To say that the Lions had bad luck drafting wide receivers in the early 2000s would be an understatement. Under the inept leadership of general manager Matt Millen, Detroit picked Charles Rogers and Michael Williams only to see them fizzle at the NFL level. By 2011 the front office was under more sensible leadership and picked defensive tackle Nick Fairley in the first round of the NFL Draft. In the second round, with the 44th overall pick, the Lions selected Young. A few draft experts had the Boise State receiver listed among the top two or three pass catchers in the draft, but his disciplinary problems in college scared many teams away. One report stated that an NFL team asked Young to leave a pre-draft workout. His stock was suspect, if not free-falling. But the Lions liked his skills and felt they had made a great steal by getting Young in the second round. Their faith was rewarded initially when the wide receiver had a trouble-free rookie season. Young made his first start in the Lions’ second game of the season, snagging five passes for 89 yards. On October 30 in Denver, he caught his first touchdown pass in a 45-10 Detroit victory. He either started or stayed in the receiving rotation for the rest of the season. Young finished his rookie season with 607 yards on 48 catches with six touchdowns. His coaches praised his attitude and commitment to becoming a good NFL receiver. He was named the Lions Offensive Rookie of the Year. However, as the season wore on, Young changed noticeably. Some teammates complained that Young wouldn’t respond to them when they tried to talk, simply staring away. He drew an unsportsmanlike penalty in Week 13 when he inexplicably shoved Malcolm Jenkins of the Saints well after a play had ended. He was kept out of the remainder of the game. Suspension and Tweets The Titus Young who played for the Lions in 2012 was a different person. “I don’t recognize him,” one teammate said during the tumultuous season. Things started badly in training camp when Young punched teammate Louis Delmas. He was sent home after that incident. But he was in uniform for the first game of the season, catching one pass for 14 yards in Detroit’s win over the Rams at Ford Field. But his inability (or unwillingness) to engage his teammates and coaches kept him at a distance from the team. The Lions kept dressing him, hoping he’d snap out of it, but Young’s psyche spiraled as the season wore on. In one team meeting he turned his chair the opposite way of the team. In practices he mumbled to coaches and refused to interact with teammates. His family was desperately trying to figure out what was happening, but Young pushed everyone away. Even his close friends, and entourage he’s created from his first season in the NFL, was cast aside. In a Week Ten game against the Packers, Young exhibited bizarre behavior throughout the contest. One one play he lined up in the wrong position and when his coaches screamed at him to adjust, he ignored them. Moments later after a heated exchange with a coach, Young trotted back out to the huddle. When the huddle broke, he ran to the wrong side of the field and lined up in the wrong slot again. This time he looked straight ahead and did not acknowledge the shouts from the sidelines. The team sent him home and deactivated him for the next game. Young never played for the Lions again. Exiled from the game, the 23-year old lashed out through social media. He published several tweets that criticized the team and his role on the Lions. “If I can’t get the ball I don’t want to play.” He tweeted. Family members claim that Young briefly spent time in a Detroit mental facility or mental health clinic during this period, though his stay may have been very brief. His father pointed to a concussion suffered at University High and reportedly several concussions at Boise State. He also felt that his son had suffered “at least one concussion” in his rookie season with the Lions. Refusal for help and legal problems With their young wide receiver deteriorating by the day, the Lions sought help from the NFL. League officials offered counseling options, and the players’ union tried to reach out to give assistance. Young rebuffed them. Family and friends could not get through to him. Family members continued to insist that Young had suffered a concussion and was not healthy. In February of 2013, the Lions released Young, having never tested him for a concussion. A day after the Lions let him go, the Rams claimed Young and invited him to meet with team officials. Ten days later they released him, stating that they wanted to “go in a different direction.” Reportedly, Young had acted strangely during interviews with head coach Jeff Fisher. At this time his father was able to convince his son to check in to a mental health facility in Los Angeles. Severed completely from the NFL and without any structure in his life, Young quickly spiraled out of control. He was arrested for drunk driving, attempted car theft, and assault on a police officer. During the ensuing legal proceedings Young was checked in to at least one mental health facility, though it’s not clear if that was voluntary or part of his pre-sentencing conditions. During this period he lashed out and “attacked” his own attorney when he was told he could not voluntarily leave the mental health facility. More troubles followed when he failed to appear for a court hearing and a warrant was issued for his arrest. Armed with recommendations from medical specialists, Young’s legal team was able to convince the court that Young was not criminally dangerous but actually suffering from post-concussion injuries. In 2015 he was sentenced to one year of inpatient treatment and five years of probation. Violent criminal or mentally ill? Only a few months after being sentenced, Young bolted from his treatment facility and went to his home in Los Angeles. He apparently started drinking and became embroiled in an argument with a neighbor. He picked up a baseball bat (or a heavy stick, it’s unclear based on reports) and beat the neighbor in the street. He has been behind bars ever since. Is Titus Young a violent man? A habitual criminal? Or is he suffering from the after-effects of serious trauma to his brain? If the latter is the case that means the system failed him. Admittedly, the only people who support the theory that Young’s brain is damaged are those close to him. In addition, Young has exhibited obstinate behavior since his high school years. On the other side of the argument, studies show the severe damage football can inflict on the brain. The consistent pounding and the violent collisions rattle the brain. One of the most dangerous aspects of being a receiver are the plays where they lead with your helmet. Since he was a young teenager (at least), Young has been taught to play a violent game. He’s been involved in countless hits, reaching the highest level in his sport, going across the middle facing 250-pound linebackers and defensive backs with blazing speed who are trained to knock him out. On at least one occasion, in high school, his bell was rung. In spite of obvious signs that he was not mentally healthy, Young continued to pursue a playing career and was able to shun most efforts to help him, and ultimately he did something so violent off the football field that he know finds himself locked up. I’m not sure if Young is a victim or violent. If he’s suffering from playing a game or suffering because of the results of his own actions. But what if he’s sick? He’s now sitting in a jail cell where he may or may not be getting some treatment, but probably not the quality of treatment he deserves. How terrible that must be. We know that there are many (if not millions) of mentally ill people in prison at this very moment. It’s a result of many things, including the closing of thousands of mental hospitals across the country over the last few decades. The stigma of mental illness contributes as well: there’s much we don’t understand about the brain, and there’s much about human behavior that confuses and scares us. Mental health is a difficult subject for most people. Young will be eligible for parole about two years into his four-year sentence. Whether his can be changed remains to be seen. But one thing is certain: he deserves a chance, and if he is sick, he should get the help he needs as soon as possible. Comments comments
(OrganicJar) Hemp Seeds, are the most nutritionally complete food source in the world! Hemp has been eaten for thousands of years in different parts of the world. It's the seed that we eat, and it's beneficial in terms of protein and essential fatty acids. There's evidence that goes back thousands of years that it was beingeaten in China and in different places around the world for their health benefits. Hemp seeds have an astonishing balanced nutritional make-up. It is one of the plant kingdom's most concentrated, complete and balanced sources of all 10 essential amino acids (EAA's) and essential fatty acids (EFA's) which are necessary to maintain healthy human life. You can divide it roughly into three components. First: There are the essential fatty acids in the oil -- omega-6, omega-3, omega-9 -- and also minor fatty acids like gamma linolenic acid (GLA) and stearidonic acid, which is biosynthesized from the alpha-linolenic acid (ALA). GLA and ALA cannot be made by the human body and must be obtained through the diet, so they are called essential fatty acids (EFA). GLA and ALA are the most important fatty acids in human nutrition and health. They are involved in producing life energy from food and the movement of that energy throughout the body. EFAs govern growth, vitality and state of mind. Still, much is unknown about their functioning in the body. This oil comprises 35% of the total seed weight and has the lowest amount of saturated fatty acids at 8%, and the highest amount of the polyunsaturated essential fatty acids at 80%. Flax seed oil comes in second at 72% combined total essential fatty acids. Second: 35% consists mostly of fiber, both soluble and insoluble. Insoluble fiber possesses passive water-attracting properties that help to increase bulk, soften stool and shorten transit time through the intestinal tract. Soluble fiber undergoes metabolic processing via fermentation, yielding end-products with broad, significant health effects. Thirdly: 25% consists of a complete and highly-digestible protein, 65% high-quality edestin protein, the most potent protein of any plant source, 35% albumin protein and glutamic acid. The globulin edestin in hemp seed closely resembles the globulin in blood plasma, and is compatible with the human digestive system. It is vital to the maintance of a healthy immune system and is also used to manufacture antibodies. Albumin is a protein manufactured by the liver that is supportive of liver and kidney health. Its high quality amino acid composition is closer to "complete" sources of proteins (meat, milk, eggs) than all other oil seeds except quinoa and soy. Hemp seeds are also high in essential nutrients including chlorophyll, magnesium, potassium, sulfur, phytosterols, ascorbic acid, beta-carotene, calcium, fiber, histidine, iron, potassium, phosphorus, riboflavin, niacin and thiamin. A variety of studies have documented the importance of the ratio of Omega 3 to Omega 6 consumption. Hemp seed oil is the closest to this optimum ratio of any naturally occurring oil. Hemp seed oil has a ratio of at least one-to-three, Omega 3 to Omega 6. Oils with unbalanced ratios have been shown to have detrimental physiological effects. I love hemp seeds and my favorite product is 'Organic Shelled Hemp Seeds' from Nutiva . Hemp seeds have a great nutty flavor with a variety of uses. Nutiva uses the finest certified organic ingredients, their organic seeds are grown without any chemical pesticides, herbicides or chemical fertilizers and their not genetically modified--safer for you and the planet. Their products are certified by Quality Assurance International(QAI)-which is a USDA authorized organic certifier. Nutiva Hemp Seeds Nutrition Chart Another great way to get the health benefits of hemp seeds is to purchase, 'Cold-Pressed Hemp Seed Oil', which is nutritionally superior to olive or flax oil, and so, makes a great alternative in salads, smoothies, and other non-frying uses. It should be noted that you can also purchase 'whole hemp seeds' that are not 'hulled' (outer shell removed). They are a bit harder to find at your local grocery store, but there are lots of places on the internet where you can buy them. Whole hemp seeds are an excellent source of minerals and much more stable out in the air then hulled seed. However Nutiva takes great care in processing and packaging their 'hulled' hemp seeds creating maximum nutritional potential. I have recently ordered 'whole hemp seeds' from several manufactures and will be writing a future article on the best place to find them. On a separate note: I highly recommend everyone reading this, to watch a documentary called: Emperor of Hemp by Jack Herer. You will be amazed at how hemp fiber could revolutionize the world we live in, but as always the harvesting of hemp is outlawed to protect 'Big Corporation' from massive profit loss. All of which is truly at the expense of our planet.Incorporating hemp seeds in your diet is so easy. You can purchase whole hemp seeds, hulled hemp seeds, hemp seed protein powder, and hemp seed oil. Simply just eat them raw, add them to a salad, replace olive oil with hemp seed oil, etc. I add 2 tbs of Hemp Seeds everyday to my ‘health shake’. Post a comment below and tell us how you use hemp seeds! Remember it's best to keep hemp seeds refrigerated and air tight. If you purchase a bulk 5-pound bag, consider adding a pound to a container for daily use, and seal up the 5-pound bag and place it in the freezer. This will help protect the seed and the nourishing Omega-3s which are sensitive to heat and oxygen.You can buy them at Whole Foods and many grocery and health stores, there usually located in the vitamin department. I personally buy them online at www.Nutiva.com . Some grocery and health food stores have hemp seeds in the 'dry bin' section. The only reservation I have about this, is hemp seeds should be stored in a dark, sealed, air tight container and then kept at a cool temperature to preserve the nourishing Omega-3s which are sensitive to heat and oxygen, With the 'dry bins' you don't know where the hemp seeds came from, how long they have been there and they’re usually not sealed, in a cool place or certified organic.
Where can I send suggestions for games? We appreciate the time and energy people put into making suggestions for our current and future games. Our company policy, however, prevents us from accepting for review any unsolicited ideas. Often in our industry, an idea being submitted will be identical or similar to one already used by other companies, or already being independently developed by or for a company. Therefore, Blizzard Entertainment® has adopted the unalterable policy of refusing to accept or look at any unsolicited submissions or ideas. You can post your suggestions under the appropriate category in the most relevant game forum: Legacy, StarCraft II, or Diablo III, Hearthstone, Heroes of the Storm, World of Warcraft. What is Blizzard Entertainment's® copyright/trademark policy for the Internet, specifically for fansites? Can I use Blizzard Entertainment's® images, text or sound on my web page? Is it ok if I use screenshots I take in-game on my web page? Yes, within certain limits. We asked our legal department to provide some guidelines for you, and here is what they said: Blizzard Entertainment® hereby grants you a personal, non-exclusive, non-transferable and non- assignable license to use and display, for home, noncommercial and personal use only, one copy of any material and/or software that you may download from this site, including, but not limited to, any files, codes, audio or images incorporated in or generated by the software (collectively the "Downloaded Content") provided, however, that you must include or maintain all copyright and other notices contained or associated with such Downloaded Content. You acknowledge and agree that you may not sublicense, assign or otherwise transfer this license or the Downloaded Content and that no title to the Downloaded Content has been or will be transferred to you from Blizzard Entertainment® or anyone else. You also agree that you will not alter, disassemble, decompile, reverse engineer or otherwise modify the Downloaded Content. Also, we reserve the right to revoke this limited use license at any time, for any reason, and at the sole discretion of Blizzard Entertainment®. You may not use our materials on sites that feature defamatory pornographic, or inflammatory content, including, but not limited to, hacks and cheats for any of our games or any other content that Blizzard Entertainment® find objectionable or unlawful. Are there any legal notices and disclaimers that I need to have on my site when talking about your products? Yes. You must include all copyright, trademark and other notices as appropriate. Appropriate notices can be acquired from here. Can I register a domain names containing some portion of your product names such as "star-craft.com" or "war-craft.com?" No. We are concerned that such use could cause confusion for our customers who may assume that the domain is associated with Blizzard Entertainment®. Can I put your patches and demos on my web site for download? Yes. We allow non-commercial mirroring of our patches and demos, so long as you do not alter the patches or demos in any way, and all files included with the original patch or demo are present and intact. Blizzard Entertainment® reserves the right to refuse permission to host or distribute our patches and demos to anyone, for any reason, at any time. Can I put my own "home-made" maps on my web site for download? Yes, we encourage players to create maps and trade them on the Internet so long as they are not for sale or profit, nor any other commercial purpose as defined solely by Blizzard Entertainment®. Can I put your "Maps of the Week" on my web site for download? No. These maps are created as a service to our customers, and are available exclusively from classic.battle.net. Can I translate your site into another language if no such site exists? No. Aside from the confusion it might cause our customers, we would have no control over the quality, accuracy or content of such translated sites. Can I make add-ons or expansions for Blizzard Entertainment® games? Can I sell them? We do not allow add-ons or expansions for Diablo®. You may make and distribute StarCraft® and Warcraft® maps and campaigns that you have created yourself, so long as it is for personal, non- commercial purposes. Any such maps or campaigns would also be subject to the other terms outlined in our End User License Agreements included with those products. Can I sell or charge for a CD or other media containing maps, add-ons or campaigns found on the Internet?
Henrikh Mkhitaryan has made a significant impact at Manchester United since joining the club from Borussia Dortmund on 6 July 2016, according to a report on the club’s official website. The midfield Armenian reached double figures for goals during his debut campaign and won the club’s Goal of the Season award with his stunning scorpion kick against Sunderland. He also made history by scoring in five European games away from Old Trafford, including the Europa League final. Ahead of the first anniversary of his arrival, the report looks back at Micki’s story so far, month by month… JULY 2016 (3 GAMES, 1 GOAL) “This move is a dream come true for me,” said Mkhitaryan on joining United and it wasn’t long before fans got a first glimpse of him in action. Superb in his first pre-season outing away to Wigan, he later scored against his former employers Borussia Dortmund in Shanghai. AUGUST 2016 (4 GAMES, 0 GOALS) Mkhitaryan’s first United medal arrived on 7 August, after the Community Shield win over Leicester City in which he came on for Juan Mata. A week later, he became the first-ever Armenian to play in England’s top flight when making his Premier League bow as a substitute against Bournemouth. Although Jose Mourinho opted to ease Henrikh into his new surroundings, the boss continued to predict big things from the midfielder, saying: “Mkhitaryan is a super football player and will give us a lot during the season.” SEPTEMBER 2016 (1 GAME, 0 GOALS) This was a frustrating month for Mkhitaryan, largely due to a thigh injury picked up during the international break. He appeared to aggravate the problem during his first Premier League start – in the Manchester derby at Old Trafford – and a long absence from the side began. OCTOBER 2016 (0 GAMES, 0 GOALS) The midfielder was excused from Armenia duty in October, in order to continue his rehabilitation in Manchester. “Micki needs time to become the top player he knows he can be,” said Mourinho later in the month, after confirming Henrikh had returned to full training. “In his case, the process was interrupted by injury, which does not help the process of evolution.” NOVEMEBER 2016 (4 GAMES, 0 GOALS) Mkhitaryan was handed his second start for the club during United’s 4-0 win over Feyenoord in the Europa League, a game which sparked his Reds career into life. He was given a standing ovation at Old Trafford following a Man-of-the-Match display, and he was the star performer again during a 4-1 win over West Ham in the EFL Cup. When asked if the Feyenoord game could represent a new beginning for him, he replied: “I hope so, let’s see…” DECEMBER 2016 (5 GAMES, 3 GOALS) Micki was back to his brilliant best before and around Christmas as he quickly followed up his first goal for the club with two more memorable strikes. Henrikh opened his United account with a fine run and finish against Zorya Luhansk, before scoring the only goal as the Reds beat eventual Premier League runners-up Tottenham at Old Trafford just three days later. His third, a perfectly-executed scorpion kick against Sunderland, was a joy to behold. “It was the best goal I’ve ever scored!” he exclaimed afterwards. JANUARY 2017 (5 GAMES, 1 GOAL) Mkhitaryan’s eye-catching form continued into the new year, as he started five of United’s seven games in January. Henrikh scored a superb goal during the Reds’ 4-0 victory over Wigan in the FA Cup fourth round, which would later earn him a second consecutive Goal of the Month award, but perhaps his most important contribution came in another cup competition, as his assist for Juan Mata helped Mourinho’s men build an advantage over Hull in the EFL Cup semi-final. FEBRUARY 2017 (5 GAMES, 2 GOALS) The Armenian again proved too hot to handle for defenders at home and abroad. While goals against Leicester and Saint-Etienne respectively meant he continued to make a mark in attack, his willingness to track back brought plenty of praise from players and pundits. In fact, with Mkhitaryan in the side, the Reds conceded just once in February, but still went on to beat Blackburn Rovers 2-1 in the FA Cup. “It’s not always about scoring goals, it’s about what you give to the team,” he said. Although injury meant he missed the EFL Cup final, this was another positive month. MARCH 2017 (3 GAMES, 1 GOAL) It was a case of new month, same Mkhitaryan just two weeks later, as Henrikh netted yet another vital away goal in Europe, this time against FC Rostov. It was one of three appearances in March for the fit-again attacker, as he signed off for the international break in fine form. He told MUTV: “We’re having a good time now, we’re having good games, we have a good squad and we can reach the maximum that we want.” APRIL 2017 (8 GAMES, 3 GOALS) Mkhitaryan missed just one game in April, and netted in the 3-0 Premier League win at Sunderland, as well as in both legs of United’s Europa League quarter-final against Anderlecht. The first of those strikes, another excellent solo run and finish, would later win him a fourth Goal of the Month prize in just five months. Not bad! MAY 2017 (6 GAMES, 1 GOAL) After helping the Reds overcome Celta Vigo to reach the Europa League final, Micki’s most telling contribution came in the very last game of the campaign, the Stockholm showdown itself. His acrobatic effort gave United an unassailable 2-0 lead and, you guessed it, earned him yet another Goal of the Month award. It was the perfect ending to the Armenian’s memorable first season with the Reds.
Withania somnifera is commonly used as a rejuvenator, whereas Centella asiatica is well known for its anxiolytic and nootropic effects. The present study aims at investigating the effect of crude extracts and principal phytoconstituents of both the medicinal plants with CYP3A4 and CYP2D6 enzyme activity in human liver microsomes (HLM). Phytoconstituents were quantified in the crude extracts of both the medicinal plants using reverse phase HPLC. Crude extracts and phytoconstituents of W. somnifera showed no significant interaction with both CYP3A4 and CYP2D6 enzymes in HLM. Of the crude extracts of C. asiatica screened in vitro, methanolic extract showed potent noncompetitive inhibition of only CYP3A4 enzyme (Ki-64.36 ± 1.82 µg/mL), whereas ethanol solution extract showed potent noncompetitive inhibition of only CYP2D6 enzyme (Ki-36.3 ± 0.44 µg/mL). The flavonoids, quercetin, and kaempferol showed potent (IC50 values less than 100 μM) inhibition of CYP3A4 activity, whereas quercetin alone showed potent inhibition of CYP2D6 activity in HLM. Because methanolic extract of C. asiatica showed a relatively high percentage content of quercetin and kaempferol than ethanol solution extract, the inhibitory effect of methanolic extract on CYP3A4 enzyme activity could be attributed to the flavonoids. Thus, co-administration of the alcoholic extracts of C. asiatica with drugs that are substrates of CYP3A4 and CYP2D6 enzymes may lead to undesirable herb-drug interactions in humans. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
While there are many ways to promote your blog articles through social networks, I have noticed an increase in messages via emails, groups, and forums formatted with options to push an article via a variety of sites.Â They go beyond “here’s my latest article about this topic, hope you like it” to being well constructed messages with direct links to the articles on networks that the blog author would like their article to be promoted. These messages help the blogger target the networks where they know their article will most likely be well received, beyond the major networks like Twitter and Digg. For example, a financial article is best placed on the Tip’d community, and a design article on DesignFloat. Plus it gives the potential promoter their choice of networks to use, as not everyone may feel a certain article will “fit” their audience on every network. By providing an easy, direct link to the networks of your choosing for promotion, you stand a higher shot that people will promote it on those networks than if you just rely on them to visit the article and then initiate the social submission process themselves. Of course, good articles will always get promoted, but sometimes people who would normally promote something may pass it by because they are too busy to go through multiple steps, vs. having all their options neatly laid out for them. As an example, here is how I will promote this article in a number of ways, including direct email, forum posting, and group bulletins. Here is my latest article on how to make social promotion of your articles and webpages easy to use. If you find it useful, please share it on your preferred networks. Main Article: https://kikolani.com/how-to-make-social-promotion-easy.html Stumble: http://www.stumbleupon.com/url/kikolani.com/how-to-make-social-promotion-easy.html – Direct link to main article for those with a Stumble toolbar to easily thumb up, and/or direct link to article on the Stumble site for a review (because reviews count more than just thumbs up Stumbles). Digg: http://digg.com/design/How_to_Make_Social_Promotion_Easy – Direct link to article on Digg once it has been submitted. You can get it by clicking on the number of Diggs by the story, or by clicking on the article link which will take you to the article with a Diggbar at the top. I have heard mixed reviews about Diggbar, so I still go with the first option. Reddit: http://www.reddit.com/r/WTF/comments/8hsco/how_to_make_social_promotion_easy_kikolani/ – Direct link to article on Reddit once submitted. You can get it by clicking on the comment link under the article. Mixx: http://www.mixx.com/stories/5102739/how_to_make_social_promotion_easy – Direct link to article on Mixx once submitted. You can get it by going to the submitter’s profile and clicking on the link to the article under their submissions. Twitter: How to make social promotion of your articles easy > http://bit.ly/WtoFB via @kikolani – Include the message you would like others to tweet, plus the shortened URL to the article. I use bit.ly for tracking purposes. Also, be sure to test your message so that it is under 140 characters. There are ways on some networks (like Reddit and Mixx) to get the link to the article with a parameter at the end to automatically add a vote, but this does not always work, and people will assume they have already voted it, even though they didn’t. It’s always better to let someone do the vote themselves instead of forcing them to with the link. Please note that the people and places you send this message to must accept these kinds of messages. People who have sent similar messages to you in the past for promotion of their articles, and forums or groups for social promotion and traffic exchanges are great places to start with this approach. Also remember to take time to review articles sent to you as well, as social media is a two way exchange. And of course, if you do not want to push your articles this way, be sure to make it easy for people to find social network promotion links on each of your articles. Here are the plug-ins and buttons used for most of my articles: Damn Sexy Bookmarks, which creates the social network buttons under “Sharing is Caring” (or “Sharing is Sexy” if you prefer). Sociable, another great social bookmarking icons plug-in. The TweetMeme buttons which you can integrate into your theme, or plug-in if you prefer to make it easy for others to re-tweet your articles on Twitter and show how many times the article has been tweeted. Integrated Digg buttons – I use the compact style at the beginning of articles I would like Dugg. If you would like to exchange social promotion emails, please contact me on Twitter, Facebook, or through the contact form with your email address so we can share and promote great articles! And if you belong to any social promotion communities, groups, forums, etc. that you would like everyone to know about, or have other easy social promotional tips, please share them in the comments below.
Julie Kroll, of The Wrap, asks a fairly good question: “Why do they always blame the Jews?” Have you noticed how celebrities who seem to reach a crisis moment in their lives lately bring up the Holocaust or engage in anti-Semitic wordplay during their outbursts — most notably Mel Gibson, John Galliano and Lars von Trier. Two were drunk, one is known for his unpredictable behavior, but still: Why blame the Jewish people?… She goes on to give some examples of celebrities, and their relatives, making anti-Jewish comments or claiming to be Nazis. Some of them were drunk, some senile and some apparently taken out of context. But, for our purposes, we can assume that they were expressing their sincere opinions. After all, we know that many people really do dislike Jews. This much is not in question. I knew, from the start, that Kroll would not even try to give an honest answer. Instead, this is what we get: I read an article one of my good friends sent me from Aish.com. Historians and sociologists have come up with numerous theories to explain anti-Semitism. We will examine these one by one, and discuss the validity of each. Economic: Jews are hated because they possess too much wealth and power. Chosen People: Jews are hated because they arrogantly claim they are chosen by God. Scapegoat: Jews are a convenient group to single out for blame. Deicide: Jews are hated because they killed Jesus. Outsiders: Jews are hated because they are different than the rest of society. Racial Theory: Jews are hated because they are an inferior race. Let’s examine these six frequently given reasons… After briefly examining only the first of these reasons, economic envy, Kroll apparently ran out of space and concluded, essentially, by saying “don’t be an anti-semite”. Not once does it even occur to her that there might be some sort of behavior, or attitude, common among Jews, behind the dislike called “anti-semitism”. It’s really very simple. If it is acceptable to announce that one likes Jews, or “people of color” or gays, then this must refer to certain traits. Otherwise, such a statement is meaningless. If a person can like certain traits, then it follows that he can also dislike those, or other, traits. I’ve never heard of anybody getting in trouble for saying he “likes Jews” or “likes gays” for example. But the implication would be that, relatively speaking, he dislikes gentiles or straight people. But this is not considered a problem. If that same person were to announce that he “likes gentiles” or “likes straight people”, there is little doubt that there would be vocal objections. As of this writing, there are only 9 comments to Kroll’s article. That is to say, there are only 9 approved comments. Here is my comment, which I doubt will be approved: Perhaps it’s because anti-white organizations and individuals, such as the SPLC, appear to be composed largely of Jews. Here is a short piece I wrote addressing this very issue: https://jewamongyou.wordpress.com/2011/03/13/a-disgusting-spectacle/ Here is a good synopsis how we know the SPLC is anti-white: http://unamusementpark.com/2011/08/the-splcs-crusade-against-white-rights-no-state-fair-there/
News For California’s “Berniecrats,” the fire’s not out yet. Nearly a year after propelling Sen. Bernie Sanders to a close second finish against Hillary Clinton in California’s presidential primary, some of his most ardent supporters are still organizing – this time within the state Democratic Party itself. At stake is the party chairmanship held by the departing John Burton, a liberal icon, a longtime lawmaker and former Senate leader who became chair in 2009. They surprised insiders by dominating the obscure process — electing a third of the delegates for the state convention, scheduled for May 19-21 in Sacramento. Vying to replace Burton are L.A. County Democratic Party leader Eric Bauman, currently the state party’s vice chair and a major power in California labor politics. Facing him is activist Kimberly Ellis, the director of Emerge California, which seeks to have more women and people of color elected to public office. Rather than fading into the sunset with their defeated standard-bearer, Sanders’ activists emerged from November both irked and emboldened. They have joined forces with other some other progressives to support Ellis and take over the party’s leadership, promote a more left-leaning policy agenda and diminish the clout of corporations and business-friendly moderates. “We’re hoping to get Kimberly Ellis elected, that’s probably the primary goal, but the other is to get Bernie people involved in local government,” said Alexis Edelstein, founder and CEO of the 300-member Berniecrats of California. They surprised insiders by dominating the obscure process — electing a third of the delegates for the state convention, scheduled for May 19-21 in Sacramento. They believe they have turned the once-sleepy race for a new party chair into a serious contest with Bauman, long viewed as the front-runner. “We see our biggest opportunity as the party,” Edelstein said. “We want to make a concerted effort. If we can change California, we can change the rest of the country.” “They do understand that while this may be mind-numbing and uninteresting to most people, this is the thing you need to do to effect change.” — Fred Keeley It’s not unusual for dedicated supporters to emerge from a defeat determined to fight on. What is unusual is for that sentiment to last much past Election Day. “By about Wednesday or Thursday, that stuff usually disappears,” said former Assemblymember Fred Keeley, who represented Santa Cruz County – a hotbed of Sanders’ support. “That’s the interesting piece of this. We’ve had weeks of activity, and they’re the beating heart of all of it.” Keeley said the continued organizing and activism by Sanders backers is rooted in their long-term agenda. “The organization has continued on because it wasn’t a personality cult or anything close to it,” he said. “These folks by and large are relatively sophisticated players. They do understand that while this may be mind-numbing and uninteresting to most people, this is the thing you need to do to effect change.” Once the dust settled from November, California’s Berniecrats focused on the weekend party meetings held in January to elect state party delegates from each Assembly district. They partnered with other progressives to build slates of candidates and then used Hustle – a texting application used extensively in the Sanders campaign – to turn supporters out. “I’ve been a single-payer healthcare advocate for 30 years. When they engage with me, when they talk with me, the conversation changes.” — Eric Bauman The effort brought surprising crowds to the usually sparsely attended meetings at union halls and recreation centers scattered across the state. “In some places, the voter turnout quadrupled,” Edelstein said. “We managed to get about 60 percent of the seats. It was a huge win.” Both Ellis and Bauman were Clinton supporters. But some Berniecrats came out against Bauman after a consulting firm in which he is a partner received $78,000 from the pharmaceutical industry-sponsored committee opposed to Proposition 61, which Sanders supported, as did the California Nurses Association. Bauman said others in his firm did the work opposing the measure, which ended long before Proposition 61 was defeated. While campaigning for state chair, Bauman, a nurse, said he’s had to explain to Sanders supporters his own record supporting universal health care. “I’ve been a single-payer healthcare advocate for 30 years,” Bauman said. “When they engage with me, when they talk with me, the conversation changes.” Berniecrats also see their mission within the party is to drive riving out the influence of corporations. “We have to get away from the corporate money. The corporate money is the one percent,” said Norma Alcala, a Sanders delegate to last year’s national convention who’s now running for vice chair of the state party. “We want to get back to what the party stood for.” “These events generally occur after we have a big loss. It’s part of the natural ebb and flow of political parties – just as the Tea Party was a reaction to Obama.” — David Townsend Alcala said she’s tired of seeing candidates elected as Democrats in the Assembly and state Senate vote against progressive legislation. “You may have a Democrat who’s not a true Democrat. Someone has to have a backbone,” she said. “This is a wonderful opportunity to reactivate the party, re-energize it and redefine it for the 21st Century.” For all their high-minded principles and progressive policy goals, many Berniecrats also express lingering resentment over how they – and their candidate – were treated during last year’s campaign. “I have a real problem with annointings,” Acala said. “The party never gave Bernie a chance. It was an uphill battle.” Keeley said addressing those concerns should be a priority for Democrats if they want to build a winning coalition four years from now. “I don’t have some horrible feeling about the party, but I do think it is essential –not important — I think it is absolutely essential if we are going to do something in 2020 that we recognize the most egregious sin on the part of Democrats in 2016 was the party apparatus putting its thumb on the scale in the primary,” he said. David Townsend, though a longtime consultant to moderate Democrats in the Legislature, sees no cause for concern the spike in progressive activism among Sanders supporters. And despite the success Berniecrats enjoyed in January, it’s not clear how much sway they will hold over the other two-thirds of state convention delegates. “These events generally occur after we have a big loss,” Townsend said. “It’s part of the natural ebb and flow of political parties – just as the Tea Party was a reaction to Obama. It’s a natural part of what happens in a political party when you lose.” Townsend said it’s healthy for the party to debate big ideas and to generate renewed enthusiasm among activists. But he doesn’t see the Berniecrats having much success at the ballot box in California, where the top two primary finishers move on to the general election, regardless of party affiliation. “What are they going to do? They’re not going to win legislative seats,” Townsend said. “With a top-two runoff, the far left won’t win any more than the far right.” Nor does Townsend put much stock in the Berniecrats’ drive to reject corporate support. “If you want to choose as a candidate to take no corporate money, then you’ll be a very short-term candidate,” he said. And despite the success Berniecrats enjoyed in January, it’s not clear how much sway they will hold over the other two-thirds of state convention delegates, which will be made up of county central committee members and delegates appointed by state office holders. “This is all part of the churn of ideas,” Townsend said. “We have to go through the process of self-immolation before we get back to reality.”
Home Daily News Iran-Contra prosecutor and former ABA president… Obituaries Iran-Contra prosecutor and former ABA president Lawrence Walsh is dead at 102 Lawrence E. Walsh, a former prosecutor, federal judge and BigLaw partner who served as president of both the American Bar Association and the New York State Bar Association during an achievement-filled career, has died at the age of 102. Perhaps best known for his work as a court-appointed independent counsel investigating the administration of President Ronald Reagan concerning what became known as the Iran-Contra scandal, Walsh also served as counsel to Gov. Thomas E. Dewey of New York, deputy attorney general in the administration of President Dwight D. Eisenhower and a Paris peace talks negotiator during the Vietnam War, reports the New York Times (reg. req.). A profile by the American Law Institute (PDF), of which Walsh was a longtime member, provides additional details. Born in Canada, Walsh grew up in the New York City borough of Queens. His father died when Walsh was 14 years old, and the attorney-to-be earned money to pay tuition for both a bachelor’s degree and a law degree from Columbia University by working as a merchant seaman over the summers, the ALI profile recounts. After graduating from Columbia Law School in 1935, Walsh began his legal career working as an assistant prosecutor in the office of then-Manhattan District Attorney Thomas Dewey. Following stints as assistant counsel and counsel to Dewey after Dewey became governor, Walsh was a federal judge in the Southern District of New York and deputy attorney general in the Eisenhower administration. In 1961, he joined Davis Polk & Wardwell as a senior partner. Before retiring in 1982 he headed both the New York State Bar Association in the 1960s and the ABA in the 1970s. In 1986, he came out of retirement in his mid-70s to head the Iran-Contra investigation. It continued for nearly seven years at a cost of some $37 million, but it was not, for a variety of reasons, considered a resounding success. Himself a Republican, Walsh came under fire by party leaders for his aggressive handling of the probe. He said in his 1997 book, Firewall: The Iran-Contra Conspiracy and Cover-up that he had considered indicting Reagan in 1992. However, Walsh didn’t do so, lacking proof the president was lying when he said he didn’t know about money being provided to the Nicaraguan Contras. This happened in connection with a plan to violate an embargo and sell arms to Iran in exchange for help obtaining the release of U.S. hostages in Lebanon, recounts a Bloomberg article. Although some lesser players were charged and convicted, Walsh said a congressional grant of immunity to key figures in the Iran-Contra affair undermined his ability to hold those at the top accountable. “Walsh was an honorable prosecutor who lost his way during a harrowing odyssey frustrated by Reagan’s forgetfulness, [national security adviser John] Poindexter’s code of silence and the congressional grants of immunity,” wrote journalist Lou Cannon a biography of Reagan published in 2001. Relocating in his wife’s hometown of Oklahoma City in his later years, Walsh became counsel to Crowe & Dunlevy there. He is survived by five children, four grandchildren and two great-grandchildren, according to the ALI profile. His wife of 47 years predeceased him in late 2012. A funeral will be held in Oklahoma City next week, and a memorial service is planned for a later date in New York City.
Cover for SPACE CASE #1 Hi, we're Drew and Hazen. We just finished creating an original comic book, SPACE CASE! It's a 36-page journey that's action-packed, heartwarming, and full of laughs. The first issue sets in motion an ongoing, all-ages adventure that will take you to the farthest ends of the universe! We're creating the comic book of our dreams and we want to get it into your hands... so YOU can be a part of our story! The hero of our series is a young boy named Ronnie, a kid who grew up on Mars! He's the son of a butt-kicking, intergalactic space hero; a crusader for peace and justice in a treacherous universe. In our first issue, when Ronnie's mom is kidnapped by his father's greatest foe, an evil alien mastermind, it falls to Ronnie to become the hero and save the day! Over the course of our series, we will go to many new worlds, meet many different types of creatures (some friendly, some not), and ultimately see if Ronnie can live up to his father's storied legacy. With guidance from unlikely allies, like a strange robot named NAN0 (who you see on our cover), Ronnie must learn to adjust to his new, dangerous reality. Our goal with this Kickstarter is to raise the necessary funds to print several hundred copies of issue #1. With the cost of printing so high, it is challenging to self-fund both the production and distribution of the book. With your help, we can handle the cost of printing and make our comic available at an affordable price in our online store, at conventions, and at select retailers. Ronnie hopes to LAUNCH a successful kickstarter! While the bulk of our projected goal will go toward the printing cost, a small portion will also fund shipping costs, the Kickstarter fee, and our fantastic rewards. Any excess funds will go towards the making of issue #2, which we are illustrating at this very moment! Drew Dorenfest (Writer/Creator) + Hazen Becker (Illustrator/Colorist) at Comic Con 2016! Drew Dorenfest (Writer/Creator) is a film editor in Los Angeles, CA. He edits movie trailers and commercials, which is fun and challenging! He's been a lifelong fan of comics and graphic novels, so creating Space Case from start to finish was truly a dream come true. This project marks the beginning of what he hopes to be a long-running series that continues to expand and develop into a vivid, imaginative universe. Hazen Becker (Illustrator/Colorist) is multi-talented artist in San Diego, CA who designs for J!NX apparel. He’s been into comic books for most of his existence, so he couldn’t pass up the awesome opportunity to help bring one to life. Together with Drew, he’s helping to create something special, which he hopes will inspire a new generation of artists and creatives alike. Oh boy, we have some super cool rewards for our Kickstarter backers! We truly appreciate any amount you can pledge. These rewards were designed with the goal of building a fanbase and getting our colorful comic brand out there. We hope you love what we have to offer! Sneak Peek: Page 1 Sneak Peek: Page 2 Sneak Peek: Page 3
Unpaid technician positions are common within the field of wildlife ecology and conservation, and are detrimental to the diversity of our field. At the same time, technician positions are vital to the careers of biologists because they need to continue to develop their skills as part of their own professional development. If we, as a community, are truly dedicated to diversity in wildlife ecology, employers should compensate technician positions with appropriate pay (Lopez and Brown 2011). Not paying for their work undermines our professionalism, and scientists’ ethical standing. We recognize that funding is limited, but limited funding is not an excuse for not paying someone for their work. We are not the first ones to have recognized these problems, but 12 years after Whitaker (2003) made the same points, little has changed. From the technicians’ perspective, unpaid technician positions could be attractive because they give valuable professional experience, and might offer a “foot in the door” for future paid employment (though frequently it does not, especially for minorities; Slade et al. 2013). Unpaid positions in exotic locations can also fulfill a sense of wanderlust prevalent in the conservation community (Lynch 2012). But these justifications can lead to exploitation, and hamper diversity in our profession. When we talk about unpaid internships and technician positions, we are not talking about volunteering for a weekend or the critical role that citizen scientists play in many projects (Silvertown 2009). We are talking about weeks or months of full‐time unpaid work, often for so many hours or in such a remote area that taking on a concurrent paying job is impossible. The question of when unpaid work becomes exploitative is not clear‐cut and we recognize the immense roll that nonexploitative volunteering has on conservation (e.g., citizen scientists). Students frequently take on field or lab work for credit as part of a degree program which, providing it fulfills the academic goals of the placement and is confined to a reasonable period of time (e.g., equivalent to n classes), is not an exploitative volunteer position, but rather is a degree component. “Compensation” in the form of housing, transportation, and/or food, in lieu of salary, is exploitative because these are benefits (or in some cases, requirements, of the field site), and the technician remains unpaid. How is someone—often with student debt, no outside financial support, a child, a sick parent, an expensive medical condition, any kind of regular life expense, or no family to buy a plane ticket for them—supposed to take these positions? We systematically examined 4 months of job postings on the Ornithological Societies of North America Bird‐Jobs list (https://www.osnabirds.org/Jobs.aspx) and 4 pages of the Texas A&M Job Board (http://wfscjobs.tamu.edu/job-board/), and categorized the jobs as either 1) paid (>US$300/month), 2) unpaid (<US$300/month), 3) pay to work, or 4) pay status unclear. We only examined field‐technician positions, excluding full‐time permanent positions and positions that required more than an undergraduate degree. Of the 96 positions surveyed, 38% were either unpaid or pay to work, demonstrating that these positions are common (Table 1). We used US$300/month as our threshold because we did not feel that positions that paid <US$300/month were truly paid positions. A US$300/month position (with housing) in many places would be similar to minimum wage, though there are clearly regional differences. Table 1. Classification of 96 contract or term positions in wildlife ecology and conservation from the Bird‐Jobs and Texas A&M job boards in 2015 by degree of compensation. Type of position Frequency Percentage Paid (>US$300/month) 52 54 Unpaid (<US$300/month) 28 30 Pay to work 8 8 Unclear 8 8 There are 3 main rationalizations for hiring unpaid technicians, none of which we feel are valid. The first rationalization is financial; it is simply too expensive to hire n field technicians at $x/hr to accomplish the required work. Conversely, though, if there is not money to collect the data correctly, handle the animals ethically, or pay the analytical lab to run the samples, these tasks are not completed. It therefore follows if there is no money for technicians’ salary, then the project will not have technicians. The second rationalization is precedent. Tradition is not an excuse for bad behavior of any kind. Traditionally, scientists have eschewed ethical considerations of research (Rollin 2006, Crozier et al. 2015), purposefully excluded women and minorities (Lariviere et al. 2013, Cho et al. 2014), and neglected basic field safety (Sasse 2003, Gochfeld et al. 2006); yet, we recognize that these practices are no longer appropriate. Failing to provide an adequate wage for project technicians may have been prevalent in the past, but is hardly justification for continuing to do so. The third rationalization is “it could be worse.” Pointing at others’ technicians who are worse off is not an excuse for treating one's own technicians poorly. In the most extreme cases, prospective technicians must pay to work. That is not how employment should work, it takes advantage of young scientists, and it prevents many of them from even considering the opportunity offered (Cranford et al. 2003). Pay‐to‐work positions represent the most extreme end of a broken system that begins with wages below legislated minima, and progresses to labor provided with no compensation, or at a loss. The system is clearly broken, and requires a concerted and united effort by the entire community to fix it. Unpaid technician positions create a sharp class divide, do not promote diversity, and disproportionately affect minorities because only the already privileged are able to be unpaid for lengths of time (Gregory 1998, Cranford et al. 2003, Curiale 2010, Lightman and Gingrich 2012, Fink 2013). These class divides affect minorities (Girard and Smith 2013), women (Menéndez et al. 2007), parents (Girard 2010), and other groups who do not have the means to go unpaid for lengths of time (e.g., Shuey and Jovic 2013). These are precisely the groups whose perspectives we need in wildlife ecology and conservation biology, and whose importance we frequently discuss (Lopez and Brown 2011). The ability to go unpaid bears no relationship to the technician's abilities or dedication, or skills required of a scientist (Gregory 1998). If we value diversity and professionalism in wildlife and conservation biology, we have to back it up with paid technician positions. As U.S. Vice President Joe Biden has often remarked: “Don't tell me what you value. Show me your budget, and I'll tell you what you value” (New York Times 2008). We are shooting ourselves in the foot by excluding these groups of people from getting into science. The challenges we face now, and the ones that will arise in the future, will require creativity and diverse perspectives to solve; and we should act to ensure that we include everyone as part of our professional community. The first step in addressing this problem is a change of mindset. When designing a new project, one must budget for staff. These technicians should be paid, and their salaries must be included in grant applications. This may require a change in perspective from some funding agencies, some of which do not fund salaries. This lack of willingness to fund technicians is part of the problem, and more flexibility by funding agencies in what costs are allowable is needed. We recognize that similar to many issues in wildlife ecology and conservation, the underlying problem is financial. Our reliance, as a community, on full‐time underpaid labor should be thought about and discussed, and we need more scientists to make a commitment to stop the cycle. When we create unpaid full‐time positions, we exclude the very people we are trying to recruit into science. We are creating a sharper class divide within our field and excluding minorities when we do not pay our technicians. Unpaid technician positions are bad for science. They are bad for the conservation of our natural world. They are bad for society. In a field that desperately requires greater diversity of gender, race, sexual orientation, and economic status, we cannot afford to not pay our technicians if we want things to change.
Like a good neighbor, Chris Paul is there … in Houston! This State Farm ad finds the NBA superstar exploring his new city, where he runs into a pair of his big-time baller friends. Naturally, they wind up driving around and singing along to the Backstreet Boys. Doesn’t that sound like fun? For the 2017-18 hoop season, Paul moved from the Los Angeles Clippers to the Houston Rockets. That shift formed the basis of “Going Away Party,” the nine-time All Star’s previous commercial for the insurer that dropped last last month. It featured Paul yukking it up with State Farm agent Cole Perez, played by Oscar Nunez from The Office. Now there’s a sequel, which breaks widely on Christmas Day, and opens with the agent taking Paul on a “Grand Tour” that includes bowling, barbecue and “I Want It That Way” blasting on the car radio. Soon, they encounter two of Paul’s new Rockets teammates. Could one of them be James Harden, by any chance? Of course it’s James Harden! (Hey, Trevor Ariza, nice harmonies, but have you considered growing out your beard?) “As we thought about different ways to illustrate what it feels like when someone really gets you, we immediately thought about potential similarities between Cole and Chris,” says John Norman, creative chief at Translation, which developed the campaign. “From an identical food order to a favorite pastime of bowling to the same guilty-pleasure song, we wanted to use examples that people can identify with within their own personal relationships.” What State Farm agents actually do for Paul—or anyone who makes a big move—is kind of vague. They bowl and sing with you? Cool. As for the so-awful-it’s-awesome song selection, Norman says “I Want It That Way” turned out to be the perfect choice, in no small part because “the talent knew all the words.” Everyone seems to have fun, and client advertising director Patty Morris says the bromance between Paul and his State Farm agent “is carried throughout the rest of the campaign.” An unnamed former Rocket—Norman calls him “an NBA legend”—will join Paul and Co. in future ads. Could it be Charles Barkley? The Round Mound has gnarly car-ayoke skills, so he’d fit right in. CREDITS Brand/Client: State Farm Campaign Title: Sixth Sense Spot Title: “Grand Tour” (:60/:30L/:15L/:15L) First Air Date: December 25th, 2017 Agency: Translation, LLC Chief Executive Officer & Founder: Steve Stoute President: Patrick Lafferty Chief Creative Officer: John Norman Group Creative Director: Eric Steele Group Creative Director: Lance Ferguson Creative Director: Tucker Loosbrock Creative Director: Stephen Petronis Director of Content Production: Miriam Franklin Director of Business Affairs: Thalia Tsouros Executive Content Producer: Colleen Miller Integrated/Digital Content Producer: Sara Tunstall Associate Producer: Ruganzu Howard Copywriter: Andrew Kim Art Director: Dan Koo Group Account Director: Susanna Swartley Account Director: Julia Farber Account Director: Zach Dioneda Account Executive: Chloe Williams Group Strategy Director: John McBride Strategy Director: Geoff McHenry Social Strategy Director: John Petty Social Strategist: Netta Dobbins Senior Project Manager: Meredith Volpe Production Company: World War Seven Director: David Shafei Director of Photography: Bryan Newman Executive Producer: Josh Ferrazzano Line Producer: Bo Clancey Editorial Company: Arcade Edit NYC Editor: Dave Anderson Assistant Editor: Joseph Petruccio Post Executive Producer: Sila Soyer Senior Post Producer: Fanny Cruz VFX Company: Framestore NYC Executive Producer: Nick Fraser VFX Senior Producer: Lily Tilton Shoot Supervisor: Maura Hurley VFX Supervisor: Martin Lazaro Design/Matte Painting Team: 3D TEAM: CG Lead: Charlotte Bae, Steven Johnson 2D TEAM: Compositing Supervisor: Martin Lazaro Composite Team: Greg Cutler, Liz Yang, Elaina Brillantes, Xuechu Chang, Philip Rambowski Color Grade Company: Company 3 Colorist: Tim Masick Producer: Colleen Valentino Audio Post: Heard City Mixer: Phil Loeb Executive Producer: Sasha Awn Music: Ring The Alarm Partners: Brent Nichols & Daron Hollowell Executive Creative Director: Brent Nichols Executive Producer: Daron Hollowell Producer: Dylan Marder Backstreet Boys “I Want It That Way”
Observation and Imagination Our cartoon artists spend a lot of time observing the world around them whether it is people, nature, species or things. They even observe the color, texture, contrast, and emotion. Through their observations, they set their imagination free. At times, these artists look relax and gaze into empty space but their mind might actually be working. Creating a sketch After spending a lot of time on observation and imagination, a carton artist then starts off with a sketch. An Important Message Through Arts “Art is not what you see, but what you make others see.” - Edgar Degas, the famous 19th century French Artist. All artists, including cartoon artists, possess a deep understanding of a true nature. The arts can express from joy and love to anger and frustration. Our cartoon artists hope to keep coming up with the arts that would be simple, cute, and yet meaningful. Baby Jen and all the animal characters from Endanzoo are drawn based on real life characters. Through these one-of-a-kind arts on the children’s clothing, we hope to inspire the future generations to connect to endangered species and convey an important message: SAVE SPECIES FROM EXTINCTION.
CIA Director John Brennan claims that the 2014 search of the US Senate files by the Central Intelligence Agency was an acceptable action. WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — The 2014 search of the US Senate files by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) was acceptable action, CIA Director John Brennan stated during a hearing at the US Senate Select Committee on Intelligence on Tuesday. "The actions of the CIA were reasonable given the very unclear and unspecific understanding between the Committee and CIA at the time," Brennan stated. In May 2015, several US Senators requested an apology from CIA for spying on the Senate Intelligence Committee. The Senators argued that in January 2014, the CIA conducted an unauthorized and unprecedented search of Senate files, including the e-mails of Senate investigators who examined the CIA’s past use of torture. During the Committee hearing, Brennan stated that the CIA did not spy on Senate computers. © AFP 2018 / Jewel Samad US Senators Urge CIA Director to Apologize for Spying on Senate However, the US Office of the Inspector General acknowledged in July 2014 that the CIA had accessed the files. The CIA accessing the Senate files took place at the conclusion of a multiple year Intelligence Committee investigation into CIA’s practice of torture during the War on Terror. The Intelligence Committee produced a 6,000 page final report on the CIA use of torture, and released a shorter, heavily redacted executive summary in December 2014. Brennan opposed the release of the Senate report and denounced its findings as flawed.
Tuesday, June 27, 2017 [Tweets] [Favorites] The iOS transition to APFS seems to have gone very smoothly except for some Unicode normalization issues. Apple never really explained to developers how they could make their code work properly, most were not aware that there were issues at all, and the necessary app modifications were difficult to develop and fully test. In my view, pushing this responsibility onto apps was a recipe for endless obscure bugs and poor performance. At WWDC 2017, Apple essentially admitted that they had made a mistake and told us how they are going to fix it. There is a short-term fix and also a long-term fix that will require another file system conversion. This is not yet documented in the APFS Guide, but here’s a summary of the different cases: The default for macOS 10.13 will be case-insensitive APFS. It is normalization-preserving (unlike HFS+) but not normalization-sensitive. I expect this to be highly compatible with existing Mac apps. The main difference is that when you read filenames they are no longer necessarily in Form D, but you shouldn’t have been relying on that, anyway. macOS 10.13 will also support case-sensitive APFS, which will use native normalization. This is new in the developer beta. The filenames are still stored in the same way as prior APFS (not normalized like with HFS+), but APFS now uses normalization-insensitive hashes so that it can quickly and transparently find files without knowing their normalizations. If your code worked with case-sensitive HFS+ and works with case-insensitive APFS, there’s likely nothing new that you have to do for this case. iOS 10.3 through 10.3.2 use the problematic version of APFS that is case-sensitive, normalization-preserving, and normalization-sensitive. You can write a lot of app code to make everything work, but anyone who hasn’t done this already probably won’t. iOS 10.3.3 and iOS 11 will also be case-sensitive, normalization-preserving, and normalization-sensitive, but they will add runtime normalization. If you try to read a file but don’t have the right normalization in your path, the file system APIs will transparently look for the file using other normalizations. This should give the correct behavior but at a performance cost. If you get a new device or erase and restore, iOS 11 will use case-sensitive APFS with native normalization. This is what Apple should have done from the start. It should have basically the same user experience as with HFS+ but with better performance. An unspecified future update will convert iOS devices using the “bad” APFS to case-sensitive with native normalization, thus completing the fix. Update (2017-12-14): Despite the native normalization, I’m seeing problems with Git and accented filenames on macOS 10.13.2. If I edit a file with such a name, Git sees it as a new file, and therefore sees two files whose names differ only in normalization. It’s somewhat tricky to then remove the original entry. Stay up-to-date by subscribing to the Comments RSS Feed for this post.
At eBay, we monitor our rates, and periodically make adjustments to them. The following updates will take effect on November 6, 2014: Fee update for sellers without an eBay Stores subscription. The maximum standard final value fee—the maximum fee sellers without an eBay Stores subscription will pay per sold item—will be raised from $250 to $750. This change only affects items that sell for more than $2,500. Note: The current $250 maximum final value fee for sellers with an eBay Stores subscription is not changing. eBay will be making the following updates to the free automatic relist feature, currently available to some sellers: Starting November 6, items relisted via the automatic relist feature available to some sellers will count towards your monthly allotment of free listings. Once a seller’s allotment of free listings is used up—or if the relisted item does not qualify for a free listing—the standard insertion fee of 30¢ per listing will apply, as well as any optional feature fees. Starting later this year, the automatic relist feature will no longer be available for 1- and 3-day duration listings. The automatic relist feature currently relists an unsold item once. Starting November 6, if you are opted-in to this feature, your item will automatically be relisted up to two times. Note: Sellers will be credited—either via their free listings allotment or on their invoice— for insertion fees for the automatic relisted items where the free automatic relist feature was selected prior to November 6. The manual relisting policy will still apply. When listing an item, be sure that the automatic relist option is either checked or unchecked, depending on your preference. Note that before choosing this option, you may want to check the Selling section of My eBay for any personalized recommendations to improve your listings. Considering the changes above—and the fact that eBay’s new global brand campaign will inspire buyers, now and through the high-volume holiday season—it’s a good time to review the benefits that come with an eBay Stores subscription . Starting as low as $15.95 a month, subscriptions offer: More free listings—up to 2,500 a month with an Anchor-level subscription Final value fees as low as 4%, capped at $250 per item Access to powerful promotional tools that can help you sell more Your own dedicated eBay.com home page Exclusive, subscriber-only promotions As always, thank you for selling on eBay.* Pay no insertion fees for your allotted free listings per calendar month. Final value fees and optional fees, including advanced listing upgrades and supplemental service fees, still apply. Learn more
[cue the music] There’re moments in life in which appreciation simply cannot be thwarted, try as Life might. Today has been the Greater Boston area’s first real taste of fall, a forty-degree recess that seems to cool not just the sweltering landscape, but burning souls as well. That stack of work piling ever higher? Crack open the office window and laugh as the breeze pushes papers across your desk. Stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic, a nameless worker-bee in the mass exodus from the hive? Take a look beyond the overpass at the trees, all showing off their summer’s-end sunburns of red and yellow and orange. Finally home and having trouble sloughing off the day’s worth of stress? Just crack open a Harvest Pumpkin Ale. Autumnal awesomeness will follow. Harvest Pumpkin Ale is a limited edition seasonal from Samuel Adams, my all-time favorite brewery. The ale is making its second brief appearance, having first been brewed in 2010 and only made available in September/October. Perhaps because of this brevity of availability, I previously thought that Harvest Pumpkin Ale was only available in those clunky “seasonal mixer” twelve-packs that often include four beers I don’t want to drink. As such, I was ecstatic when my trip to the liquor saw me staring down a complete sixer of this pumpkin-potable. Since I expected Harvest Pumpkin Ale to be bright orange in hue (just like its namesake-squash), I was a bit surprised when my glass was filled with a dark orange, dense-honey lookin’ liquid. But, had I actually read the bottleneck’s label before pouring, my preconceived notions could’ve been dispelled: A perennial favorite at our Brewery Halloween party, this reddish amber ale is perfect for the fall. Reddish. Amber. Ale. Got it! Now intrigued by the notion that maybe, just maybe the brewery can tell me something of value about the ale, I hit up the Sam Adams website. The site is actually very informative, giving prospective drinkers insight into the general profiles, histories, and brewing facts of their beers. Of all the new facts thrust at my brain-bone, my favorite is definitely this historical tidbit: Pumpkin Ale is one of the oldest beer styles that originated in America. Early colonists lacked some of the classic beer ingredients, so in place of malt other fermentable sugars such as molasses or pumpkin were used. Pumpkin beers were not as popular at first since the pumpkin was used for its sugar alone rather than its flavor. That’s right, getting pumpkin-drunk is a tradition as old as America itself. I can just picture Giles Corey tossing back a stein of pumpkin ale, wiping the froth from his face, and then walking into Salem Village to get pressed to death. He knows that he’s not a fucking witch, but he’s not going to give those dogmatic shitwads the satisfaction of a denial, nor the futile attempt at self-preservation to be found in a false confession. He’s lived a life. He’s had his pumpkin mead. He’s ready to die. Anyways, Harvest Pumpkin Ale has a beautiful aroma, balancing roasted notes and spicy hints and even a floral quality. I’m heading to a relaxed soiree tonight, and I think I’m going to dab a little bit of the ale behind each of my ears. We’ll see if I’m not the most chatted-up former patient at the Von Erbe Insane Asylum’s fifth annual reunion! Most importantly, Harvest Pumpkin Ale tastes good. Damn good. Overall, I’d say that the brew is sweet, but with just enough of a bitter kick to simultaneously reward beer-lovers and dissuade the Zima-freaks. For seasoned drinkers (alcoholic is no longer the preferred nomenclature, fyi), the seasonal will taste like pumpkin-buzz-soda pop. The flavors are bountiful, each bottle touting the powers of pumpkin, toasted spices, and smooth caramel. In short, Sam Adams has done it once again. Although I still think their Octoberfest is my fall drink of choice, Harvest Pumpkin Ale is a formidable contender. With the breeze lapping at my heels, the harvest moon on the horizon, and the Octoberfeast whispers beginning to make their way throughout the courtyard, Harvest Pumpkin Ale more than hits the spot. The verdict: A-
TORONTO - Ontario passed legislation Wednesday to create a provincial pension plan for more than three million people who do not have a workplace pension, despite critics' warnings it amounts to a job-killing payroll tax. Workers will be required to contribute 1.9 per cent of their pay to the Ontario Retirement Pension Plan, to a maximum of $1,643 a year, which employers have to match for every employee. "Over $3.5 billion will be invested in the fund each year," said Associate Finance Minister Mitzie Hunter. "Members of the plan will be able to have an income stream for life when they retire." The mandatory contributions will be phased in over two years, starting with larger companies Jan. 1, 2017 before moving to smaller operations like convenience stores and dry cleaners. Ontario wants to mirror the Canada Pension Plan as much as possible, and Hunter said the province still would prefer to enhance the CPP instead of creating its own plan. Contributions would be ''locked-in'' just like CPP contributions, prohibiting people from cashing them out before retirement. However, Hunter could not say when retirees could expect to start receiving benefit payments from the provincial pension plan. "We're still actually developing details of the plan," she said. "So people will be making contributions to the plan, and that's the beginning." Premier Kathleen Wynne has said the province had to create its own retirement plan for the more than two-thirds of Ontario workers who don't have a pension at work because the federal government refuses to enhance the Canada Pension Plan. Business groups including the Canadian Federation of Independent Businesses and the Ontario Chamber of Commerce warned that forcing workers and employers to contribute to a provincial pension will drive up costs and result in fewer jobs. "Only 26 per cent of businesses in Ontario believe they can shoulder the financial burden that would result from the ORPP," said the Chamber of Commerce. "If faced with mandatory increased contributions, 44 per cent of surveyed businesses indicate they would reduce their current payroll or hire fewer employees in the future." The Progressive Conservatives also said the provincial pension will end up killing jobs as businesses try to absorb the additional costs for each worker. "The government's ORPP is a wide-reaching payroll tax that will negatively affect businesses across Ontario and drive jobs out of the province," said PC finance critic Vic Fedeli. Hunter said the introduction of the ORPP on Jan. 1 2017 coincides with an expected reduction in Employment Insurance premiums by the federal government. The New Democrats said a provincial pension plan is the "best option" for workers until the federal government can be convinced to increase CPP benefits for retirees. "The ORPP has to be structured very precisely so that some day it can be folded into the Canada Pension Plan so that people can have substantial, secure retirement income," said NDP finance critic Peter Tabuns. "If we want to have pensions that are secure, protected and aren't going to be raided by corporations that have financial troubles, we need a centrally-run, publicly-owned pension plan." Follow @CPnewsboy on Twitter Also on HuffPost
I mentioned earlier this week that the folks behind the Creation Museum were working on “Ark Encounter,” a Noah’s Ark-based theme park, and the Kentucky Tourism Development Finance Authority just gave preliminary approval for tax incentives that could be worth more than $18,000,000: The incentive program’s rules say that if preliminary approval is granted, the authority would then select a consultant — at Ark Encounter’s expense — to study the project to see if it meets the program’s criteria, including that the project get at least 25 percent of its visitors from out of state after four years and having an overall positive impact on the state budget. After the consultant’s analysis is complete — a process that takes six to eight weeks — the authority would meet to consider final approval. Because this is a religious project with the intent of proselytizing, groups like Americans United for Separation of Church and State are threatening a lawsuit if final approval is given. This week, even Kentucky’s House Speaker Greg Stumbo expressed that this just sounds like a problem waiting to happen: Stumbo said he understands that Grant County needs more economic development but that the use of state incentives is unconstitutional “because it erects a monument with the help of state money theoretically that is recognized by a majority religion in this country.” He quickly added that he believes in that religion. “But there is separation of church and state,” and the state cannot pick one religion over another, Stumbo said. we’ll end up losing the lawsuit as a state, and we will have to pay legal fees to ACLU or whoever it is.“ It’s worth noting that Gov. Steve Beshear is also a Democrat like Stumbo, but he supports the Ark Park. Stumbo’s political opponents are already denouncing his comments: State Rep. Brian Linder, R-Dry Ridge, expressed disappointment Thursday over House Speaker Greg Stumbo’s comments this week that the state should not provide tax incentives for a Noah’s Ark theme park in Grant County. … “While Kentucky continues to lose jobs to places like Ohio, Indiana, Tennessee and Texas, Speaker Stumbo chooses to attack an economic development project in my community by encouraging lawsuits on tax incentives,” Linder said. … Linder called Stumbo’s comments about the park and religion disingenuous. “While the speaker has an issue with a religious theme park receiving tax incentives to provide jobs, he apparently has no problem occupying a chair in the House chambers that has, in large letters, the motto ‘In God We Trust’ behind it,” he said. Linder is just talking out of his ass. Stumbo isn’t encouraging a lawsuit. He’s warning state officials that that’s what could happen if they make a foolish decision. Linder, on the other hand, seems to not care about what the Constitution says if a ministry could bring in money to the state. (Thanks to Brian for the link)
December 10, 2010 The holidays will be tough times for millions and millions of people suffering the effects of the Great Recession--but as Alan Maass reports, Wall Street has a lot to celebrate. HE'S NUMBER 69 on the latest Forbes 400 list of richest Americans and head of Blackstone Group, the world's largest private equity firm specializing in corporate takeovers. He lives in a 35-room triplex on Park Avenue in Manhattan, with second "homes"--mansions, really--in the Hamptons, Palm Beach and Jamaica. His private chef regularly spends $3,000 for a weekend's feasting for him and his wife, including those stone crabs he loves at $400 each. Which works out to $40 a claw. But comfortable as his life is, Stephen Schwarzman isn't the kind of guy to allow tyranny to go unopposed. "It's a war," he declared in July at the board meeting of a nonprofit organization, according to Newsweek. "It's like when Hitler invaded Poland in 1939." And what cruel injustice was Schwarzman standing against? Turns out it's all those people who want to tax him to death. Schwarzman was talking about a widely supported Democratic proposal--now abandoned, naturally--to close a loophole that allows private equity firms like Blackstone to pay taxes at less than half the rate of normal corporations. A party at the Waldorf Astoria to celebrate the life's work of an investment banker Which, when you think about it, is not really in any way like the Nazi blitzkrieg that killed hundreds of thousands of Poles in a country that would become the site of the extermination camps for Jews, Roma, socialists, communists and others. And yet Schwarzman's out-of-control ranting isn't so out of the ordinary for Corporate America these days. Big business seems to have adopted a motto from the Marine Corps: The few, the proud, the filthy rich--and the rest of you can go to hell. The profits of U.S. businesses hit another record in the third quarter of 2010, clocking in at $1.659 trillion at an annual rate, according to the Commerce Department--the highest figure in non-inflation-adjusted dollars since the government started keeping track more than 60 years ago. This was the seventh straight quarter of rising profits, and at one of the fastest clips in recent history. Meanwhile, unemployment has hung on stubbornly at twice its pre-crisis level, and one in six Americans--including one in four children--is at risk of hunger, according to the latest government statistics. But don't expect any humility from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. The business federation is spoiling for a new fight--against a "regulatory tsunami of unprecedented force" allegedly coming from the Obama administration. The Chamber's Chief Executive Thomas Donahue says the White House is plotting "thousands of new and questionable regulatory rulemakings." Any bets on the outcome of that one? On Wall Street, the top three dozen publicly held banks, hedge funds and investment firms plan to pay $144 billion in compensation and benefits this year, according to the Wall Street Journal's survey--the second-straight record-setting year. But ask any banker, and they'll tell you sums like that aren't much comfort when people are just...so...mean. "We've been ostracized," one unnamed executive told the Observer newspaper. "I went to jury duty about a year ago, and when I said I'm in investment banking, the people in the jury room were making ugh sounds. And I'm like, fuck you. I'm proud of what I do. And I think this firm did a lot to get the recovery going. Ranked somewhere below a pimp and an oil well operator isn't right." Corporate America is snarling--rather than laughing--all the way to bank. The Wall Street parasites who set off the crisis with their gambling are swimming in money again, while businesses turn the screws tighter and tighter--throwing people out of work, slashing government programs that the poor depend on, and forcing those who still have a job to work harder for less. And all the while acting like they are the persecuted ones. THE GOT-it-flaunt-it rule is back for the super-rich after a few difficult years of cash flow problems. At Christie's and other New York auction houses that peddle art to the highest bidder, the first two weeks of November were among the most lucrative in history. Dr. Francesca Fusco reports that her Manhattan cosmetic surgery business is booming again--"Wall Street is back spending as much if not more than before," she gushes. And the bidding action for rentals next summer in the posh Hamptons on Long Island is "hotter and heavier" than ever, says Dolly Lenz of Prudential Douglas Elliman. She has three people ready to pony up more than $400,000 to put a roof over their heads for a few weeks next year. It isn't just New York City, of course. The vast gap between rich and poor has grown even larger during the Great Recession. Today, the richest 1 percent of Americans takes nearly 24 percent of overall income--nearly tripling their share since 1976 and the most extreme level of inequality since statistics started being kept. One reason for this, of course, is that the U.S. financial system is up to its old tricks--as if the cataclysmic crisis of 2008 never happened. In the first nine months of the year, the big six banks in the U.S.--Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley--cleared $35 billion in profits. Thanks to the way the bankers reward themselves, a lot of that money will end up being paid out as bonuses. And it's mostly on the government's dime, to boot. Not only did the federal government save them with a multibillion-dollar rescue when the crisis hit, but the bankers are still taking advantage of the Federal Reserve Bank's policy of pumping money into the economy by lending to financial institutions at effective 0 percent interest rates. Some of that free cash is fueling a revival in the market for speculative investments known as derivatives--the very thing that set off the Wall Street crash of 2008. But a healthy portion is being lent back to the government through the purchase of Treasury bills at 3 percent interest. It's a guaranteed profit for the banks, without the bother and risk of making loans for something that might be productive for the rest of society. The financial sector of the economy accounts for more than a quarter of the profits of U.S. businesses, up from around one-seventh 25 years ago. As Paul Wooley, a veteran of the British financial system-turned-critic of the banks, said, "It's like a cancer that is growing to infinite size, until it takes over the entire body. But then again, Corporate America as a whole isn't acting any differently from the banks. Business profits as an overall dollar amount hit a new record in the third quarter. Calculated as a percentage of the gross domestic product--the total production of goods and services in the economy--profits reached 11.2 percent, close to the high point of the 2000s boom. In other words, for every $9 produced in the U.S. economy today, the ruling class is pocketing $1. But the corporate profit boom isn't leading to an investment boom, at least not investment in the U.S. Earlier this year, the Federal Reserve estimated that non-financial corporations were sitting on $1.8 trillion in cash and other so-called liquid assets, up 26 percent from the year before, the fastest increase for cash on hand since records started being kept in 1952. This is the reason for the anemic jobs reports issued each month by the government. In most months this year, private-sector employment crept upward, though it was offset several times by job losses in the public sector. But in any case, the increases are too small to keep up with the rise in the working-age population, much less replace the jobs lost during the recession. Since December 2007, the U.S. economy has lost 5.4 percent of non-farm payroll jobs--roughly one lost out of every 19. And with Corporate America banking its profits, there's no sign of that collapse being made up soon. At the same time as profits for the third quarter jumped 28 percent over the year before, business spending on compensation for employees rose only 7.6 percent, or about one-quarter as fast. That statistic reveals the old-fashioned secret of the profit boom--corporations are making workers work harder for less. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the output of the U.S. economy rose 4.1 percent in the third quarter compared to the year before, the number of hours worked increased by 1.6 percent, and unit labor costs fell by nearly 2 percent. It doesn't take a genius to figure out that big business is going to be plenty happy as long as profits roll in without making new investments in jobs and higher wages--something the Federal Reserve recognized when it revised its prediction last month to project official unemployment staying above 9 percent throughout 2011 and above 8 percent for the election year that follows. AND STILL Corporate America's filthy rich few play the victim--like Schwarzman with his outbursts against "big government" and the terrible injustice of being made to pay taxes at something closer to the rate that working people do. Only...it turns out that Stephen Schwarzman isn't opposed to all "big government." The Blackstone Group's last big deal before the Wall Street crash in 2008 was the takeover of the Hilton Hotel chain. Blackstone and a group of investors agreed to pay $26 billion for the company. They put in $5.6 billion of their own money and borrowed over $20 billion from a group of seven banks. That's how buyout firms work: They finance their massive purchases with huge loans, they then cut costs ruthlessly--meaning they lay off workers and close factories--and they sell what's left as quickly as possible, leaving the takeover target saddled with the debts. In the case of Hilton, though, the recession made it difficult to find a buyer for the restructured company or to refinance the massive loans from the 2007 purchase. Only this year was Blackstone able to reach a deal with banks that reduced its debt load by about $4 billion--by extending some of the loans and paying for others at a steep discount over what they had been worth. But one of the lenders in the Blackstone deal for Hilton was under slightly different management. The investment bank Bear Stearns had contributed about $4 billion in loans for the Hilton takeover. Less than a year later, when Bear was careening toward bankruptcy, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York took over those Hilton debts--at full value--in order to entice JPMorgan Chase to buy the collapsing Bear. So when Schwarzman and Co. wanted to refinance, they were negotiating in part with the federal government, in the form of the New York Fed. Which graciously agreed to sell back $320 million of the total Hilton debt at a cost to Blackstone of $142 million. In other words, Blackstone and Hilton got a gift of $178 million from their friends at the Fed--the equivalent of 10 percent of Blackstone's revenue in all of 2009. Not that they were hurting, mind you. "We were in good shape before," Hilton CEO Chris Nassetta said of the effect of the debt deal, "and we're in exceptionally good shape now." Workers at Hilton, on the other hand, aren't in such "exceptionally good shape." Almost a year and a half after the union contract expired, the Blackstone-owned chain is demanding that workers represented by UNITE HERE accept concessions--$200 a month toward their health care plan, and a freeze on pension contributions. "They got all this money from the federal government, and yet they won't give us a contract," said Gloria King, who was among four dozen workers picketing outside a Hilton in the posh shopping district near Chicago's downtown during a three-day strike by UNITE HERE in October. The workers carried signs reading "Taxpayers on Strike." Probably the worst among Hilton/Blackstone's demands is the speedup--management wants housekeepers to clean 20 rooms a day, a 40 percent increase in work that is already physically exhausting. That's why Xiomara Cruz is worrying not about the invasion of Poland, but Hilton's war on her health. As the room cleaner in San Francisco told SocialistWorker.org's Ragina Johnson in October: I have numbness in my fingers, shoulder and back problems. Everyone has back and shoulder pain and numbness in their fingers. We are supposed to have two breaks and a dinner break. I am not taking time for dinner and breaks because there's too much work, but we have to sign off on the sheet saying we took our breaks, even when we didn't. It's a crime that union workers like Cruz are being told that they have to work harder for less because Hilton doesn't have the money--at the same time as its owners at Blackstone are proudly predicting a 50 percent increase in revenues for 2010. But for the filthy rich in Corporate America, crimes like that pay--very, very well.
On CNN's The Situation Room, Jeanne Moos reported on why presidential candidates point when addressing crowds and stated, "[S]ince we usually can't see who the candidates are pointing at, we'll just have to use our imagination." Moments later, the report showed footage of Sen. Barack Obama pointing, followed by a still image of Osama bin Laden. On the February 11 edition of CNN's The Situation Room, in a report about presidential candidates' "body language" and "why ... they point" when addressing crowds, national news correspondent Jeanne Moos said, "[S]ince we usually can't see who the candidates are pointing at, we'll just have to use our imagination." Moments later, as noted on the website blip.tv, video of Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) pointing was followed by a zoomed-in still of Osama bin Laden. Moos also suggested that Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) was pointing to Monica Lewinsky and that Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) was pointing to right-wing pundit Ann Coulter. As Media Matters for America noted, on the December 11, 2006, edition of The Situation Room, Moos said that "[o]nly one little consonant differentiates" Obama and Osama. She then added, "[A]s if that similarity weren't enough. How about sharing the name of a former dictator? You know his middle name, Hussein." Additionally, on the December 11, 2006, edition of The Situation Room, then CNN senior political analyst Jeff Greenfield compared the similarity of Obama's "business casual" clothing to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's "jacket-and-no-tie look." Greenfield concluded the segment by saying: "Now, it is one thing to have a last name that sounds like Osama and a middle name, Hussein, that is probably less than helpful. But an outfit that reminds people of a charter member of the axis of evil, why, this could leave his presidential hopes hanging by a thread." He later explained on the CNN website that he was making "a joke." A December 19, 2007, post on The New York Times' Caucus blog, headlined "CNN's Obama/Osama Habit" noted several instances in 2007 in which CNN personalities or on-screen text "confused" Obama with bin Laden: The Democratic presidential candidate's name has been confused with the terrorist leader Osama bin Laden and even Omaha, Neb., in separate occasions on CNN recently. Glenn Beck, the host of shows on radio and CNN Headline News, was the latest to make the mistake in an interview on ABC's "Good Morning America" on Monday, catching himself mid-word when he started to say "Osama" in a discussion of presidential candidates. "Unfortunate name," Mr. Beck remarked. Alina Cho, a CNN anchor, made a similar mistake the same day on CNN's "American Morning" newscast. "Senator Barack Obama's campaign has been dogged with false rumors, among them that Osama is a Muslim," Ms. Cho said, immediately correcting herself. A number of conservative blogs immediately picked up on the slip-up. In January, CNN was ridiculed for an on-screen graphic that said "Where Is Obama?" in front of footage of bin Laden. Anchor Wolf Blitzer said he would call Mr. Obama personally to apologize. Earlier this month the network apologized for an on-screen graphic that accidentally read "Obama, Nebraska." A link to the video of Moos' segment on candidates' pointing was on the front page of CNN's website under the headline "Candidates' gestures: So, what's the point?" on the morning of February 12. The headline on the front page of CNN.com was subsequently changed to "Comedians poke fun at pointing candidates." During the segment, a clip of Clinton pointing was followed by video of former White House intern Monica Lewinsky. Additionally, video of McCain giving a thumbs-up was followed by footage of right-wing pundit Ann Coulter, who, on the February 1 edition of Fox News' Hannity & Colmes, said of McCain possibly becoming the Republican nominee: "[I]f you're looking at substance rather than whether it's an R or D after his name, manifestly, if he's our candidate then Hillary's going to be our girl, Sean, because she's more conservative than he is. ... I will campaign for her if it's McCain." Coulter has repeatedly attacked McCain, including in a February 7 column in which she wrote: "If McCain is elected president, we'll have a four-year disaster." From the February 11 edition of CNN's The Situation Room:
Margaret Thatcher secretly tried to press ahead with a politically toxic plan to dismantle the welfare state even after a “cabinet riot” and her famous declaration that the “NHS is safe with us”, newly released Treasury documents show. The plan commissioned by Thatcher and her chancellor Sir Geoffrey Howe included proposals to charge for state schooling, introduce compulsory private health insurance and a system of private medical facilities that “would, of course, mean the end of the National Health Service”. Some of her cabinet ministers believed they had buried the plan, drawn up by a seconded Treasury official, Alan Bailey, from the Central Policy Review Staff (CPRS), at a special cabinet meeting on 9 September 1982. Nigel Lawson in his memoirs said the paper of “long-term public spending options” had been buried after what he described as “the nearest thing to a cabinet riot in the history of the Thatcher administration”. In her own memoirs, Thatcher claimed to have been “horrified” by the CPRS paper and insisted that she and her ministers had never seriously considered it. The CPRS paper had been partially leaked and she was only able to quell the subsequent furore by famously pledging the “NHS is safe with us” at the October 1982 Tory party conference. Downing Street briefed that the toxic plan had been “shelved”. But Howe’s Treasury private office papers released by the National Archives on Friday confirm that not only had that special cabinet meeting taken place to discuss the plan but that two months later, far from being buried, Thatcher was still secretly trying to press ahead with it. The Treasury papers show that once a clutch of tricky byelections were out of the way she was keen to keep pushing the plan and held a series of meetings in December to “to soften up the big three spenders” under her chairmanship “to resolve any immediate political anxieties”. The papers also show after the 9 September cabinet showdown Howe rejected an approach from the Adam Smith Institute, the rightwing libertarian thinktank, to back their “slightly oddly-named Omega Project” despite it being personally endorsed by Thatcher’s own economic adviser, Sir Alan Walters. The Omega Project papers said the plans were modelled on research by a rightwing US thinktank for the incoming Ronald Reagan administration. It also argued for many state services to be replaced by “more efficient alternatives from the private sector”. Facebook Twitter Pinterest Photograph: HM Treasury Howe rejected the approach in a note on 29 September not because he objected to their proposals to dismantle the welfare state but because he feared its “ill-researched proposals, which will be portrayed as strongly resembling our own, might prove an embarrassment”. The then chancellor added: “Every proposal will be seized on and hung (round) our necks. Cf CPRS Report. I see v. (underlined twice) great harm.” The Treasury papers show that “no real action” was taken on the CPRS “radical right manifesto” until November 1982. “The prime minister (we understand privately) did not want to stir this up before the cabinet discussions on the 1982 survey, nor risk any adverse publicity while the last two byelections were pending. The leaks of the CPRS report did not help,” a senior Treasury official, Peter Mountfield, told Howe in a confidential note entitled “Follow-up of cabinet discussion on long-term public expenditure”. Facebook Twitter Pinterest Margaret Thatcher secretly continued to pursue the politically explosive plans even after ministers thought they had been killed off by a cabinet revolt. Photograph: PA “The prime minister has arranged a series of meetings with the main spending ministers to discuss the follow-up to the discussion in cabinet on 9 September. The ministers involved are Sir Keith Joseph (7 Dec, 11 am), Mr Fowler and Mr Nott (14 Dec, 9.30 and 15 Dec 5.30.). You and the chief secretary will be invited to each meeting.” Joseph was education secretary, Norman Fowler was health secretary and John Nott was defence secretary. The CPRS paper proposed to cancel Trident and halt the growth in defence spending. “The only paper formally before the meetings will be the original interdepartmental report on long-term trends in public expenditure ... The CPRS paper on options is technically a non-paper, but will be in everyone’s minds (and no doubt in their briefing folders too),” Mountfield told Howe. The chancellor was told the objective of the meetings was “designed to soften up the three big spenders. Without their support the operation will not work. Your main aim, I suggest, should be to ensure that no sacred cows are prematurely identified. Given the prime minister’s concern about the NHS, this may be difficult. But we want to make sure that the ministers concerned do not close off any options at this stage, and, if possible, put their personal weight behind the exercise.’’ Facebook Twitter Pinterest Photograph: HM Treasury These papers flatly contradict Thatcher’s claim that the CPRS proposals were never seriously considered by ministers. The Treasury files released on Friday do not record what happened at the meetings with the big three spenders. But a Treasury official’s note on 28 October 1982 to the then chief secretary to the Treasury, Leon Brittan, gave an indication of the depth of internal opposition Howe and Thatcher faced. “DHSS (health and social security) officials say there is no chance that Mr Fowler would agree to a further study of this idea. I imagine in the circumstances, and especially given the prime minister’s speech at Brighton it is difficult to press them.” In his memoirs, Howe reflects that although the row had postponed the “fundamental debate” he had hoped to start, until after the 1983 general election, “nothing from the Treasury’s point of view is ever as quite as bad as it seems”. He reported that the impact of what he called the “CPRS furore” had ensured ministers made no new spending pledges and had “set the pace for our forthcoming 1983 manifesto”.
First the good news: There are far fewer near Earth asteroids than NASA previously thought and it knows now where 90% of them are. The bad news, if you will is that there are still 19,500 mid-sized asteroids floating around out there. In the past NASA had estimated there were about 35,000 mid-sized, near-Earth asteroids which are defined as objects between 330 and 3,300-feet wide. Such objects could destroy a metropolitan area if they were to hit in the wrong place. NASA said there was also a small drop in the number of large near-Earth asteroids, which are 3,300 feet and larger and said that 93% of that estimated population have been found. More on space: Gigantic changes keep space technology hot "Large asteroids are about the size of a small mountain and would have global consequences if they were to strike Earth. The new data revise their total numbers from about 1,000 down to 981, of which 911 already have been found. None of them represents a threat to Earth in the next few centuries. It is believed that all near-Earth asteroids approximately 6 miles across, as big as the one thought to have wiped out the dinosaurs, have been found," NASA stated. The new numbers come from asteroid observations released today by NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE satellite which looked at the objects that orbit within 120 million miles of the of the sun into Earth's orbital vicinity, NASA said. WISE scanned the entire celestial sky twice in infrared light between January 2010 and February 2011, continuously snapping pictures of everything from distant galaxies to near-Earth asteroids and comets, NASA stated. The survey project, called NEOWISE, is the asteroid-hunting portion of the WISE mission and it observed more than 100 thousand asteroids in the main belt between Mars and Jupiter, in addition to at least 585 near Earth, NASA noted. More on satellites: NASA telescopes watch cosmic violence, mysteries unravel NASA added that the WISE observation fulfill a congressional mandate that the space agency identify at least 90% of near Earth objects by 2020. NASA detects and tracks asteroids and comets passing close to Earth through its Near Earth-Object Observations Program or "Spaceguard." The program has been in the news lately as NASA responded to the inordinate amount of doomsday reports that comet Elenin which will pass by Earth October 16 has generated. "The risk of a really large asteroid impacting the Earth before we could find and warn of it has been substantially reduced," said Tim Spahr, the director of the Minor Planet Center at the Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Mass., in a statement. Follow Michael Cooney on Twitter: nwwlayer8 Layer 8 Extra Check out these other hot stories: Robotic cockroach crawls out of the lab into real world Science and religion can and do mix, mostly Romance scams plague UK: 200,000 victims? Big problem in US too OnStar feels the burn, reverses privacy changes Borders' customers will have to opt-out after Barnes & Noble agrees to acquire database NASA warns of geomagnetic storm after behemoth solar flare Top 10 banned books of 2010 Military tracking 6.5 ton piece of NASA space junk tumbling toward Earth Privacy stink erupts over Borders bankruptcy dealings Prototype system promises 54% smartphone battery life boost NASA unbolts open source space applications challenge US Energy Dept. finds myriad challenges to building culture of network security
Registration for the 2015 Boston Marathon closed September 17, but it’s still possible to gain entry into the race as a charity runner. If you’re thinking about running for a charity in 2015, here are the answers to some questions about how the charity program works. If I want to run the 2015 Boston Marathon for a charity, where should I start? The Boston Athletic Association (B.A.A.) and sponsor John Hancock both operate charity programs. The charities in those programs are considered the “official charities” of the race. We recommend going to the B.A.A. and John Hancock charity pages and looking for connections or causes about which you are passionate, and going to individual charities' pages to learn about the application process. (When this article was published, the Hancock page listed its 2014 non-profit partners.) How many charity bibs are available? 2,585 bibs are distributed among all of the official Boston Marathon charities. When is the application deadline? Application deadlines vary. Some charities have already opened their application processes, while others plan to do so soon. The B.A.A. recommends that charities try to have their teams selected and committed to training by mid November or early December. If you want to apply to run for a charity, start looking now. For a minority of organizations, it’s already too late to apply. Some organizations make their decisions on a rolling basis, and could therefore fill all of their slots before their official deadlines. Some of the charities charge a non-refundable application fee. How much money will I need to raise? According to the B.A.A., all runners running for charities, who don’t already have an allocated slot in the race, must raise $5,000. (Some charities are still quoting a $4,000 minimum, apparently because they haven't updated all of their information for the 2015 race yet.) Some charities choose to set their minimums higher, but most stick with $5,000. What happens if I can’t meet my fundraising minimum? Most charities secure runners’ entries with a credit card and a signed contract. The credit card is then charged if a runner fails to meet his or her minimum—providing powerful motivation to make sure that minimums are met! What are charities looking for when they select their runners? This varies, depending on the charity, but all charities want to make sure that their runners can successfully meet their fundraising minimums. Some like to see their runners commit to raising more than $5,000, so the ability to fundraise is an important quality. Some charities begin their outreach by contacting people in their own networks. “They want to show some loyalty to people who’ve shown loyalty to them,” says B.A.A. Executive Director Tom Grilk. They also look for natural connections between their organizations and the runners they are selecting. Do I need to be from the Boston area to run for a charity? While most who run for charities are from New England, it varies from charity to charity, and some cast their nets far and wide. How many runners apply to run for charities and get turned away? It varies from charity to charity. Some turn away dozens, while others turn away hundreds. Do any charities have trouble meeting their runner quotas? Usually not. From time to time, there are gaps, but with unprecedented demand in 2014, B.A.A. officials aren’t aware of any charities that were unable to meet their quotas this year. If there are official charities, are there also unofficial charities? The vast majority of the charity runners at the Boston Marathon each year are running for official charities. However, there are also some race numbers allocated to groups that choose to use the bibs to attract runners who will run for causes. For example, each of the towns and cities through which the race runs are allocated entries. Many of the towns opt to use some of those entries to have runners run for causes that benefit their towns. The race also has partnerships with the American Medical Athletic Association, some veteran and active military groups, and others that fall outside of the official charity program. How many charities raise money at the Boston Marathon each year? Between the B.A.A. and John Hancock charity programs, there are approximately 146 official charities. What determines how many bibs each charity gets? It depends. Some of the charities have had long-term relationships with the B.A.A. and the number of bibs they receive tends to remain constant from year to year. The B.A.A. also adopted a rotating charity program that organizations can apply to be a part of for a three-year period. Those charities tend to receive 15 bibs per charity. Because there are so many charities in the John Hancock non-profit program sharing a smaller number of available bibs, the number of runners per charity is lower. How much money is raised for charity at the Boston Marathon? In 2014, runners raised a record $38.4 million for the official charities. That figure is an outlier, however, because more charity bibs were made available in response to the 2013 marathon bombings. The previous fundraising record was $20 million in 2013. If I have already secured a bib for the 2015 race, can I still run for a charity? Absolutely, and most charities have a significantly lower minimum fundraising requirement for runners who are already registered for the race, often in the $1,000 to $2,000 range. Will there be changes to the Boston Marathon charity program in the coming years? The Boston Marathon charity program, which began in 1989, is constantly evolving. Moving forward, the B.A.A. is looking to work with charities that align with its mission of promoting health and fitness, particularly through running. Their main focus is on charities that are locally based and will have a positive impact in Greater Boston and New England, Grilk says.
Head Coach Jason Kreis is very pleased with the progress that his team is making in his first few weeks as head coach. After training on Wednesday, Kreis spoke about the development of the team and the tactics they want to build moving forward. “We’re gonna look to improve day by day,” Kreis said. Despite Orlando City’s strong performance on Sunday, Kreis knows that he has to analyze and improve upon the team’s mistakes if they want to move forward. “When you lose matches, you tend to be very critical and think about the things you can improve upon,” Kreis said. “When you win matches, often times we walk away happy and think everything was great. We’re not gonna do that.” Kreis also noted that getting more time to work with the team will be a big factor in pushing them towards success. Last week was Kreis’ first week with the team, which was choppy due to a friendly match against Premier League’s Stoke City in Melbourne on Wednesday night. Now, Kreis looks to Sunday’s match against a recently shaken Seattle Sounders. But more importantly, he looks to develop the depth and the skill of his team. “We’re still trying to improve the tactics,” Kreis said after training. “We’re still trying to get the players to see what our vision is and put it into practice.” Tickets \| Orlando City vs. Seattle Sounders - Sunday 7:00pm Buy Now While being thrown into the middle of a season can be a difficult for a new head coach, Kreis believes that implementing his style and preparing the team for the next game are essentially intertwined. “They go hand in hand,” Kreis said. Kreis and his team will be back in action this Sunday, August 7th as Orlando City takes on the Seattle Sounders at 7:00pm at Camping World Stadium.
The Destruction of Ethnic Germans and German Prisoners of War in Yugoslavia, 1945-1953 Tomislav Sunic From the European and American media, one can often get the impression that World War II needs to be periodically resurrected to give credibility to financial demands of one specific ethnic group, at the expense of others. The civilian deaths of the war's losing side are, for the most part, glossed over. Standard historiography of World War II is routinely based on a sharp and polemical distinction between the "ugly" fascists who lost, and the "good" anti-fascists who won, and few scholars are willing to inquire into the gray ambiguity in between. Even as the events of that war become more distant in time, they seemingly become more politically useful and timely as myths. German military and civilian losses during and especially after World War II are still shrouded by a veil of silence, at least in the mass media, even though an impressive body of scholarly literature exists on that topic. The reasons for this silence, due in large part to academic negligence, are deep rooted and deserve further scholarly inquiry. Why, for instance, are German civilian losses, and particularly the staggering number of postwar losses among ethnic Germans, dealt with so sketchily, if at all, in school history courses? The mass media -- television, newspapers, film and magazines -- rarely, if ever, look at the fate of the millions of German civilians in central and eastern Europe during and following World War II. [1] The treatment of civilian ethnic Germans -- or Volksdeutsche -- in Yugoslavia may be regarded as a classic case of "ethnic cleansing" on a grand scale. [2] A close look at these mass killings presents a myriad of historical and legal problems, especially when considering modern international law, including the Hague War Crimes Tribunal that has been dealing with war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Balkan wars of 1991-1995. Yet the plight of Yugoslavia's ethnic Germans during and after World War II should be of no lesser concern to historians, not least because an understanding of this chapter of history throws a significant light on the violent breakup of Communist Yugoslavia 45 years later. A better understanding of the fate of Yugoslavia's ethnic Germans should encourage skepticism of just how fairly and justly international law is applied in practice. Why are the sufferings and victimhood of some nations or ethnic groups ignored, while the sufferings of other nations and groups receive fulsome and sympathetic attention from the media and politicians? At the outbreak of World War II in 1939, more than one and a half million ethnic Germans were living in southeastern Europe, that is, in Yugoslavia, Hungary, and Romania. Because they lived mostly near and along the Danube river, these people were popularly known "Danube Swabians" or Donauschwaben. Most were descendants of settlers who came to this fertile region in the 17th and 18th centuries following the liberation of Hungary from Turkish rule. For centuries the Holy Roman Empire and then the Habsburg Empire struggled against Turkish rule in the Balkans, and resisted the "Islamization" of Europe. In this struggle the Danube Germans were viewed as a rampart of Western civilization, and were held in high esteem in the Austrian (and later, Austro-Hungarian) empire for their agricultural productivity and military prowess. Both the Holy Roman and Habsburg empires were multicultural and multinational entities, in which diverse ethnic groups lived for centuries in relative harmony. After the end of World War I, in 1918, which brought the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Habsburg empire, and the imposed Versailles Treaty of 1919, the juridical status of the Donauschwaben Germans was in flux. When the National Socialist regime was established in Germany in 1933, the Donauschwaben were among the more than twelve million ethnic Germans who lived in central and eastern Europe outside the borders of the German Reich. Many of these people were brought into the Reich with the incorporation of Austria in 1938, of the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia in 1939, and of portions of Poland in late 1939. The "German question," that is, the struggle for self-determination of ethnic Germans outside the borders of the German Reich, was a major factor leading to the outbreak of World War II. Even after 1939, more than three million ethnic Germans remained outside the borders of the expanded Reich, notably in Romania, Yugoslavia, Hungary and the Soviet Union. In the first Yugoslavia -- a monarchical state created in 1919 largely as a result of efforts of the victorious Allied powers -- most of the country's ethnic Germans were concentrated in eastern Croatia and northern Serbia (notably in the Vojvodina region), with some German towns and villages in Slovenia. Other ethnic Germans lived in western Romania and south-eastern Hungary. This first multiethnic Yugoslav state of 1919-1941 had a population of some 14 million people of diverse cultures and religions. On the eve of World War II it included nearly six million Serbs, about three million Croats, more than a million Slovenes, some two million Bosnian Muslims and ethnic Albanians, approximately half a million ethnic Germans, and another half million ethnic Hungarians. Following the breakup of Yugoslavia in April 1941, accelerated by a rapid German military advance, approximately 200,000 ethnic Germans became citizens of the newly established Independent State of Croatia, a country whose military and civil authorities remained loyally allied with Third Reich Germany until the final week of the war in Europe. [3] Most of the remaining ethnic Germans of former Yugoslavia -- approximately 300,000 in the Vojvodina region -- came under the jurisdiction of Hungary, which during the war incorporated the region. (After 1945 this region was reattached to the Serbian portion of Yugoslavia.) The plight of the ethnic Germans became dire during the final months of World War II, and especially after the founding of the second Yugoslavia, a multiethnic Communist state headed by Marshal Josip Broz Tito. In late October 1944, Tito's guerilla forces, aided by the advancing Soviets and lavishly assisted by Western air supplies, took control of Belgrade, the Serb capital that also served as the capital of Yugoslavia . One of the first legal acts of the new regime was the decree of November 21, 1944, on "The decision regarding the transfer of the enemy's property into the property of the state." It declared citizens of German origin as "enemies of the people," and stripped them of civic rights. The decree also ordered the government confiscation of all property, without compensation, of Yugoslavia's ethnic Germans. [4] An additional law, promulgated in Belgrade on February 6, 1945, canceled the Yugoslav citizenship of the country's ethnic Germans. [5] By late 1944 -- when Communist forces had seized control of the eastern Balkans, that is, of Bulgaria, Serbia and Macedonia -- the German-allied state of Croatia still held firm. However, in early 1945, German troops, together with Croatian troops and civilians, began retreating toward southern Austria. During the war's final months, the majority of Yugoslavia's ethnic German civilians also joined this great trek. The refugees' fears of torture and death at Communist hands were well founded, given the horrific treatment by Soviet forces of Germans and others in East Prussia and other parts of eastern Europe. By the end of the war in May 1945, German authorities had evacuated 220,000 ethnic Germans from Yugoslavia to Germany and Austria. Yet many remained in their war-ravaged ancestral homelands, most likely awaiting a miracle. After the end of fighting in Europe on May 8, 1945, more than 200,000 ethnic Germans who had remained behind in Yugoslavia effectively became captives of the new Communist regime. Some 63,635 Yugoslav ethnic German civilians (women, men and children) perished under Communist rule between 1945 and 1950 -- that is, some 18 percent of the ethnic German civilian population still remaining in the new Yugoslavia. Most died as a result of exhaustion as slave laborers, in "ethnic cleansing," or from disease and malnutrition. [6] Much of the credit for the widely-praised "economic miracle" of Titoist Yugoslavia, it should be noted, must go to the tens of thousands of German slave laborers who, during the late 1940s, helped to build the impoverished country. Property of ethnic Germans in Yugoslavia confiscated in the aftermath of World War II amounted to 97,490 small businesses, factories, shops, farms and diverse trades. The confiscated real estate and farmland of Yugoslavia's ethnic Germans came to 637,939 hectares (or about one million acres), and became state-owned property. According to a 1982 calculation, the value of the property confiscated from ethnic Germans in Yugoslavia amounted to 15 billion German marks, or about seven billion US dollars. Taking inflation into account, this would today correspond to twelve billion US dollars. From 1948 to 1985, more than 87,000 ethnic Germans who were still residing in Yugoslavia moved to Germany and automatically became German citizens. [7] All this constitutes a "final solution of the German question" in Yugoslavia. Numerous survivors have provided detailed and graphic accounts of the grim fate of the ethnic German civilians, particularly women and children, who were held in Communist Yugoslav captivity. One noteworthy witness is the late Father Wendelin Gruber, who served as a chaplain and spiritual leader to many fellow captives. [8] These numerous survivor accounts of torture and death inflicted on German civilians and captured soldiers by Yugoslav authorities adds to the chronicle of Communist oppression worldwide. [9] Of the one and a half million ethnic Germans who lived in the Danube basin in 1939-1941, some 93,000 served during World War II in the armed forces of Hungary, Croatia and Romania – Axis countries that were allied with Germany – or in the regular German armed forces. The ethnic Germans of Hungary, Croatia and Romania who served in the military formations of those countries remained citizens of those respective states. [10] In addition, many ethnic Germans of the Danubian region served in the "Prinz Eugen" Waffen SS division, which totaled some 10,000 men throughout its existence during the war. (This formation was named in honor of Prince Eugene of Savoy, who had won great victories against Turkish forces in the late 17th and early 18th centuries.) [11] Enlisting in the "Prinz Eugen" division automatically conferred German citizenship on the recruit. Of the 26,000 ethnic Danubian ethnic Germans serving in various military formations who lost their lives, half perished after the end of the war in Yugoslav camps. Particularly high were the losses of the "Prinz Eugen" division, most of whom surrendered after May 8, 1945. Some 1,700 of these prisoners were killed in the village of Brezice near the Croat-Slovenian border, while the remaining half was worked to death in Yugoslav zinc mines near the town of Bor, in Serbia. [12] In addition to the "ethnic cleansing" of Danube German civilians and soldiers, some 70,000 Germans who had served in regular Wehrmacht forces perished in Yugoslav captivity. Most of these died as a result of reprisals, or as slave laborers in mines, road construction, shipyards, and so forth. These were mostly troops of "Army Group E" who had surrendered to British military authorities in southern Austria at the time of the armistice of May 8, 1945. British authorities turned over about 150,000 of these German prisoners of war to Communist Yugoslav partisans under pretext of later repatriation to Germany. Most of these former regular Wehrmacht troops perished in postwar Yugoslavia in three stages: During the first stage more than 7,000 captured German troops died in Communist-organized "atonement marches" (Suhnemärsche) stretching 800 miles from the southern border of Austria to the northern border of Greece. During the second phase, in late summer 1945, many German soldiers in captivity were summarily executed or thrown alive into large karst pits along the Dalmatian coast of Croatia. In the third stage, 1945-1955, an additional 50,000 perished as forced laborers due to malnutrition and exhaustion. [13] The total number of German losses in Yugoslav captivity after the end of the war -- including ethnic "Danube German" civilians and soldiers, as well as "Reich" Germans -- may therefore be conservatively estimated at 120,000 killed, starved, worked to death, or missing. What is the importance of these figures? What lessons can be drawn in assessing these postwar German losses? It is important to stress that the plight of German civilians in the Balkans is only a small portion of the Allied topography of death. Seven to eight million Germans -- both military personnel and civilians -- died during and after World War II. Half of those perished during the final months of the war, or after Germany's unconditional surrender on May 8, 1945. German casualties, both civilian and military, were arguably higher in "peace" than in "war." In the months before and after the end of World War II, ethnic Germans were killed, tortured and dispossessed throughout eastern and central Europe, notably in Silesia, East Prussia, Pomerania, the Sudetenland, and the "Wartheland" region. Altogether 12-15 million Germans fled or were driven from their homes in what is perhaps the greatest "ethnic cleansing" in history. Of this number, more than two million were killed or otherwise lost their lives. [14] The grim events in postwar Yugoslavia are rarely dealt with in the media of the countries that emerged on the ruins of communist Yugoslavia, even though, remarkably, there is today greater freedom of expression and historical research there than in such western European countries as Germany and France. The elites of Croatia, Serbia and Bosnia, largely made up of former Communists, seem to share a common interest in repressing their sometimes murky and criminal past with regard to the postwar treatment of German civilians. The breakup of Yugoslavia in 1990-91, the events leading to it, and the war and atrocities that followed, can only be understood within a larger historical framework. As already noted, "ethnic cleansing" is nothing new. Even if one regards the former Serb-Yugoslav leader Slobodan Milosevic and the other defendants being tried by the International War Crimes Tribunal in The Hague as wicked criminals, their crimes are trivial compared to those of Communist Yugoslavia's founder, Josip Broz Tito. Tito carried out "ethnic cleansing" and mass killings on a far greater scale, against Croats, Germans and Serbs, and with the sanction of the British and American governments. His rule in Yugoslavia (1945-1980), which coincided with the "Cold War" era, was generally supported by the Western powers, who regarded his regime as a factor of stability in this often unstable region of Europe. [15] The wartime and postwar plight of Germans in the Balkans also provides lessons about the fate of multiethnic and multicultural states. The fate of the two Yugoslavias -- 1919-1941 and 1944-1991 -- underscores the inherent weakness of multiethnic states. Twice in the 20th century, multicultural Yugoslavia fell apart amid needless carnage and a spiral of hatreds among its constituent ethnic groups. One can argue, therefore, that it is better for diverse nations and cultures, let alone different races, to live apart, separated by walls, than to pretend to live in a feigned unity that hides animosities waiting to explode, and leaving behind lasting resentments. Few could foresee the savage inter-ethnic hatred and killings that swept the Balkans following the collapse of Yugoslavia in 1991, and this among peoples of relatively similar anthropological origins, albeit different cultural backgrounds. One can only speculate with foreboding about the future of the United States and western Europe, where growing interracial tensions between the native populations and masses of Third World immigrants portend disaster with far bloodier consequences. Multicultural Yugoslavia, in both its first and second incarnations, was above all the creation of, respectively, the French, British and American leaders who crafted the Versailles settlement of 1919, and the British, Soviet Russian and American leaders who met at Yalta and Potsdam in 1945. The political figures who created Yugoslavia did not represent the nations in the region, and understood little of the self-perceptions or ethnic-cultural affinities of the region's various peoples. Although the deaths, suffering and dispossession of the ethnic Germans of the Balkans during and after World War II are well documented by both German authorities and independent scholars, they continue to be largely ignored in the major media of the United States and Europe. Why? One could speculate that if those German losses were more widely discussed and better known, they would likely stimulate an alternative perspective on World War II, and indeed of 20th century history. A greater and more widespread awareness of German civilian losses during and after World War II might well encourage a deeper discussion of the dynamics of contemporary societies. This, in turn, could significantly affect the self-perception of millions of people, forcing many to discard ideas and myths that have fashionably prevailed for more than half a century. An open debate about the causes and consequences of World War II would also tarnish the reputations of many scholars and opinion makers in the United States and Europe. Arguably, a greater awareness of the sufferings of German civilians during and after World War II, and the implications of that, could fundamentally change the policies of the United States and other major powers. Notes 1. Mads Ole Balling, Von Reval bis Bukarest (Copenhagen: Hermann-Niermann-Stiftung, 1991), vol. I and vol. II. 2. L. Barwich, F. Binder, M. Eisele, F. Hoffmann, F. Kühbauch, E. Lung, V. Oberkersch, J. Pertschi, H. Rakusch, M. Reinsprecht, I. Senz, H. Sonnleitner, G. Tscherny, R. Vetter, G. Wildmann, and others, Weissbuch der Deutschen aus Jugoslawien: Erlebnisberichte 1944-48 (Munich: Universitäts Verlag, Donauschwäbische Kulturstiftung, 1992, 1993), vol. I, vol. II. 3. On Croatia's armed forces during World War II, and its destruction after 1945 by the Yugoslav Communists, see, Christophe Dolbeau, Les Forces armées croates, 1941-1945 (Lyon [BP 5005, 69245 Lyon cedex 05, France]: 2002). On the often critical attitude of German military and diplomatic officials toward the allied Ustasha regime of the Independent State of Croatia ("NDH"), see Klaus Schmider, Partisanenkrieg in Jugoslawien 1941-1944 (Hamburg: Verlag E.S. Mittler & Sohn, 2002). This book includes an impressive bibliography, and cites hitherto unpublished German documents. Unfortunately, the author does not provide precise data as to the number of German troops (including Croat civilians and troops) who surrendered to British forces in southern Austria, and who were subsequently handed over to the Yugoslav Communist authorities. The number of Croat captives who perished after 1945 in Communist Yugoslavia remains an emotion-laden topic in Croatia, with important implications for the country's domestic and foreign policy. 4. Anton Scherer, Manfred Straka, Kratka povijest podunavskih Nijemaca/ Abriss zur Geschichte der Donauschwaben (Graz: Leopold Stocker Verlag/ Zagreb: Pan Liber, 1999), esp. p. 131; Georg Wildmann, and others, Genocide of the Ethnic Germans in Yugoslavia 1944-1948 (Santa Ana, Calif.: Danube Swabian Association of the USA, 2001), p. 31. 5. A. Scherer, M. Straka, Kratka povijest podunavskih Nijemaca/ Abriss zur Geschichte der Donauschwaben (1999), pp. 132-140. 6. Georg Wildmann, and others, Verbrechen an den Deutschen in Jugoslawien, 1944-48 (Munich: Donauschwäbische Kulturstiftung, 1998), esp. pp. 312-313. Based on this is the English-language work: Georg Wildmann, and others, Genocide of the Ethnic Germans in Yugoslavia 1944-1948 ( Santa Ana, Calif.: Danube Swabian Association of the USA, 2001). 7. G. Wildmann, and others, Verbrechen an den Deutschen in Jugoslawien, 1944-48, esp. p. 274. 8. Wendelin Gruber, In the Claws of the Red Dragon: Ten Years Under Tito's Heel (Toronto: St. Michaelswerk, 1988). Translated from German by Frank Schmidt. In 1993 the ailing Fr. Gruber returned to Croatia from exile in Paraguay, to spend his final years in a Jesuit monastery in Zagreb. I spoke with him shortly before his death on August 14, 2002, at the age of 89. 9. Stéphane Courtois, and others, The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression (Cambridge: Harvard Univ. Press, 1999). 10. G. Wildmann, and others, Verbrechen an den Deutschen in Jugoslawien (cited above), p. 22. 11. Armin Preuss, Prinz Eugen: Der edle Ritter (Berlin: Grundlagen Verlag, 1996). 12. Otto Kumm, Geschichte der 7. SS-Freiwilligen Gebirgs-Division "Prinz Eugen" (Coburg: Nation Europa, 1995). 13. Roland Kaltenegger, Titos Kriegsgefangene: Folterlager, Hungermärsche und Schauprozesse ( Graz : Leopold Stocker Verlag, 2001). 14. Alfred-Maurice de Zayas, Nemesis at Potsdam: The Expulsion of the Germans From the East. (Lincoln: Univ. of Nebraska, 1989 [3rd rev. ed.]); Alfred-Maurice de Zayas, The German Expellees: Victims in War and Peace (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1993); Alfred-Maurice de Zayas, A Terrible Revenge: The "Ethnic Cleansing" of the East European Germans, 1944-1950 (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1994); Ralph F. Keeling, Gruesome Harvest: The Allies' Postwar War Against the German People (Institute for Historical Review, 1992). 15. Tomislav Sunic, Titoism and Dissidence: Studies in the History and Dissolution of Communist Yugoslavia (Frankfurt, New York: Peter Lang, 1995) Tomislav Sunic holds a doctorate in political science from the University of California, Santa Barbara. He is an author, translator and former professor of political science in the USA. Tom Sunic currently lives with his family in Croatia. An interview with him, "Reexamining Assumptions," appeared in the March-April 2002 Journal of Historical Review (http://www.ihr.org/jhr/v21/v21n2p15_sunic.html). His most recent book is Homo americanus: Child of the Postmodern Age (2007), which can be obtained through Amazon books (http://www.amazon.com/Homo-americanus-Child-Postmodern-Age/dp/1419659847). For more by and about him, see his website (http://www.tomsunic.com/). This article is adapted from Dr. Sunic's address on June 22, 2002, at the 14th IHR Conference, in Irvine, California.
Google has stuck with open source for its newly-announced operating system Chrome. Not only will it be based on the Linux kernel, with code going public later this year, Chrome will initially be designed for netbooks - a target for Linux OS distributions, such as Ubuntu's Remix. So is the Chrome OS good news for open source, or bad news for rival Linux distros? Linux the 'clear winner' Jim Zemlin, the head of the Linux Foundation, isn't worried, saying Linux is the "clear winner" in the announcement. Indeed, despite most describing the battle as a clash of the titans between Google and Microsoft, Zemlin has other ideas. "While this is a great story, I prefer to frame it as David versus Goliath with the little OS that could, Linux, as the foundation of this announcement, as well as the other operating systems challenging Windows," he wrote on his blog. He added it confirms that Microsoft's pricing model simply doesn't work. "It’s been reported that Windows 7 Starter will be priced around $45 - $55. In a $200 netbook with already razor thin margins that pricing doesn’t work," Zemlin explained. "When PC makers threaten to use another operating system if they don’t get Windows 7 at a lower price they will not be bluffing; Google Chrome, Moblin, and desktop Linux will be free." Because of this, he said consumers will be the winners in the netbook market, as they'll finally have choice. "The more companies and manufacturers base their products on Linux, the stronger Linux becomes. Say goodbye to monopoly pricing," he said. But will other Linux systems take a hit? On the other hand, while Google is clearly proud of its open source roots and Linux kernel, it could push other Linux distributions further out of the limelight. Netbooks were seen as a great opportunity for Linux systems, for many of the reasons Zemlin noted - they're flexible and they're cheap. But after a few initial successes, Linux systems were wiped off the shelves of at least one retailer, with Windows dominating the market. Forrester analyst Paul Jackson told IT PRO that Chrome will become the primary open source alternative. “It won’t be branded as a Linux OS, but it will be the open source option,” Jackson said. While Google could again put Linux-based netbooks on store shelves, it could squeeze out smaller systems, according to Gartner analyst Annette Jump. "If Google Chrome succeeds, the first victims will be other Linux distributions shipped on netbooks," she said, adding their current five to 10 per cent market share will disappear first. But Jump told IT PRO that the Google name won't be enough to convince consumers or retailers. "I don't think the brand name will be enough," she said. "The user interface Linux had wasn't good enough... nor was hardware compatibility good enough." "Unless they get those two things right, the same thing will happen to [Google] as Linux," she warned.
When trying to understand why some people have trouble living within their means, we tend to blame factors such as high interest rates and irresponsible spending. Now researchers have found another possible culprit to add to the list: a gene linked to credit-card debt. Earlier work has shown that genetics plays a role in how we handle money. But a recent study was the first to show that a particular gene affects financial behavior outside the lab. Researchers at the University of California, San Diego, and the London School of Economics looked at genetic data and questionnaires already collected from more than 2,000 young adults aged 18 to 26 as part of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health. In particular, they looked at whether these young adults said they had any credit-card debt and what version of the MAOA gene they had. Monoamine oxidase A (MAOA) is an enzyme that breaks down neurotransmitters (signaling chemicals) in the brain. Previous studies have linked the low-efficiency versions of the MAOA gene—the variants that cause less MAOA to be produced by brain cells—to impulsiveness. In the new study, people with one “low” MAOA gene and one “high” MAOA gene reported having credit-card debt 7.8 percent more often than did people with two “high” versions, the researchers found, even when they controlled for factors such as education and socioeconomic status. For people with two “low” versions of the gene, that number jumped to 15.9 percent. The researchers were surprised by the magnitude of the difference. “The effect is almost as big as financial literacy,” meaning people’s ability to digest complicated financial information, says Jan-Emmanuel de Neve, an author of the study. But, de Neve cautions, an individual’s version of the MAOA gene does not predict whether he or she is carrying debt. The gene affects credit-card debt the way other genes have been found to play a role in breast cancer: a particular version of the gene increases risk, but many other genetic and environmental factors are important, too.
South Carolina Governer Nikki Haley announced Friday that, "This is not a good day for South Carolina." The bad news was having to admit a massive security breach in the State's Department of Revenue that resulted in the theft of 3.6 million social security numbers and 387,000 credit/debit card numbers (only 16,000 of which, it is believed, were unencrypted,) This incident affects more than three-quarters of South Carolina's 4.6 million population. Haley characterized this as an "attack by an international hacker," but no details have been released about the identity of the perpetrator while their investigation is under way. The State became aware of the breach on October 10 but could not close it until ten days later. Haley said she wants the hacker, "slammed to the wall," and certainly she must feel slammed as well. Was it just the luck of the draw, or are South Carolina's cyber defenses particularly weak? This will be a question that the other 49 states will have to answer. This incident will also place cyber security on the table for the presidential candidates as well. Even more than climate change, cyber security is a big complex issue that does not translate well into soundbites, 30-second spots or talking points. It is scandalous, but unsurprising, that this issue came up only fleetingly in the last presidential debate. Cyber security will someday be seen as right up there with Social Security, health insurance and national defense as key measures of our well-being. This attack makes it clear that not only are individuals incapable of adequately protecting themselves through consumer grade solutions, and not only do the vulnerabilities of business place consumers at risk, but government itself is not up to the task of vouchsafing its citizen's identity. "We want to make sure everybody understands that our State will respond with a big, large-scale plan that is somewhat unprecedented to take care of this problem," Haley said, in an attempt to make it clear that she understands the magnitude of the issue. But her garbled prose raises concern that the states are out of their depth when it comes to global issues like this. What is needed is a national standard for cyber security that the government and business will adhere to in order to provide protection for our citizens. And like any tech standard, this will be an evolving entity. It must be built in a way that is responsive to the growth of the threat. South Carolina has said it will provide affected taxpayers with a year of Experian credit monitoring and identity theft protection service. "Anyone who has filed a South Carolina tax return since 1998 is urged to visit protectmyid.com/scdor or call 1- 866-578-5422 to determine if their information is affected," the Department of Revenue advises. "The cost is also going to be enormous, given that South Carolina may be required to pay for identity theft protection services for anyone who has paid taxes in South Carolina since 1998," Stephen Cobb, from security firm ESET told Computerworld yesterday. "Encryption of the data may slow down the process by which the stolen records are converted into cash through identity theft and fraudulent accounts, although that will also depend on the strength of the encryption." How strong is the South Carolina's encryption? How vulnerable to attack are the agencies of other states? What share of the nation's Social Security numbers would have to get hacked to compromise the whole system? The costs of failure are great, and state governments, stressed by years of budget cuts, may be our weak point. This breach should put cyber security on the national agenda. – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – - To keep up with Quantum of Content, please subscribe to my updates on Facebook or follow me on Twitter.
The Rabinal Achí is a Maya theatrical play written in the K'iche' language[1] and performed annually in Rabinal, Baja Verapaz, Guatemala. Its original name is Xajoj Tun, meaning "Dance of the Trumpet".[2] This is one of the few surviving performance pieces from before colonization. It takes place every year on January 25th and involves the entire community of Rabinal. A combination of movement, song, and instrumentation meld the piece together. This performance has been a part of Rabinal history for centuries, and continues to be a part of the culture today. The story of the Rabinal Achí centers on a historical feud between Rabinal and K'iche', two neighboring cities.[3] Colorful costumes and wooden masks are used to differentiate the characters as they play out their roles in the song-dance-drama.[4] Rabinal Achi depends on the use of such masks in all performances. Guatemalan masks on display. Thedepends on the use of such masks in all performances. Origins [ edit ] The Rabinal Achí is a Maya song-dance-drama from the fifteenth century that uses vibrant costumes and wooden masks to tell the story of the community and its history through myths of origin while also addressing popular and political subjects concerning the inhabitants of the region of Rabinal, expressed through masked dance, theatre, and music. The instrumentation used is a wooden slit-drum and two trumpets or shawms. Throughout its history, various instruments have been used to create various other effects such as gourds for percussion[3]. The Rabinal Achí has been around since the 1600s, and is traditionally performed on the 25th of January to honor Saint Paul[5], the patron saint of Rabinal[4]. Early recording [ edit ] Though Rabinal Achí has been around since the 16th century, it was not formally recorded until much later. The original narrative is by an anonymous author[6], but Charles-Étienne Brasseur de Bourbourg, a French clergyman, translated the original text into French from an Achi narration that the cofrade Bartolo Sis gave him in 1856, though he would not publish this text for ten more years. Bartolo Sis had transcribed the dialogue of the performance six years before. Many texts were lost from the pre-Columbian era, after the land was conquered and the new Spanish culture was imposed, but this text still remains. Performance [ edit ] The story is told through song and dance by a cast of characters. These characters stand as representations for various Maya communities and villages, and the narrative covers a variety of topics such as Maya nobility and diplomacy, battles between various cities, and the feud that took place between the Rabinaleb and K'iche' people.[7] Plot [ edit ] The plot of the Rabinal Achí is that of a real conflict that took place between the Rabinaleb and the K'iche' people. The main action of the play explains that four cities were destroyed by K'iche' Achí, the Prince of K'iche', who then tries to kidnap the children of Rabinaleb. Because it is such a serious crime, K'iche' is caught, at which time Rabinaleb reminds K'iche' of all of his feats, both bad and good[8]. K'iche' is tried, and it is ultimately decided that he should be sacrificed. He is reminisces about his native land, but submits to being executed, bringing justice back to Rabinal. [9] Characters [ edit ] The Rabinal Achí, prince of Rabinal The K'iche Achí, prince of the K'iche'. The king of Rabinaleb' Job'Toj Achij Mun (his servant) Ixoq Mun, who has both male and female traits The Green-Feathered Mother Uchuch Q'uq' Uchuch Raxon Thirteen eagles and jaguars, warriors of the fortress of Kajyub', the principal town in Rabinal. While the cast is large, only five of these characters speak.[3] The movement for the piece is primarily cyclical, which represents the cycle of life and death that K'iche' Achí faces during the drama. The dancers move in a circle while the two princes face off against each other in the middle.[10] The dialogue is likewise repetitive to perpetuate this notion[11]. The performers are called out into the playing area by the beating of the drum. This drum is played by a community member who has been trained on how to play the sacred drum from a young age. Tradition and present day Rabinal Achí [ edit ] The Rabinal Achí is still performed today every year on January 25th in Rabinal. [12] The cofradías, local brotherhoods, of which Bartolo Sis was part, are in charge of this event. This is a way for the community to remain in touch with their ancestry and to celebrate.[12] For the Achis of modern-day Rabinal, the Rabinal Achí continues to be performed once a year during the celebration of Saint Paul. The Rabinal Achí was performed in 1955 by the Dirección General de Bellas Artes. Performers had to abstain from sexual acts for the thirty days prior to and after the performance. They also underwent twenty days of spiritual preparation and were required to request permission from the Mayan gods in order to perform by dancing and offering gifts. [13] For this production, the jaguars and eagles were each represented by one performer as opposed to the usual thirteen.[14] In 2005, the dance drama from Rabinal was declared one of the Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO. Notes [ edit ] References [ edit ] Further reading [ edit ]
The battle for our right to vape freely has begun. California has launched its crusade of ignorance against the vape industry. We are now in the cross-hairs of government, who aim to severely debilitate the vapor industry on behalf of their big tobacco and big pharma overlords. But unfortunately, we have to accept part of the blame, as our behavior and conduct hasn’t exactly helped create the most positive image for the vape community. Vapers scream bloody murder, and are mobilizing to “rage against the machine” as California and other state legislators move at an alarming pace to implement fatal regulations. We need to also be honest and admit to ourselves, we did commit a bit of self sabotage. Every cloud contest, every photo shoot of nearly naked women, every cloud trick video, every glorification of “blowing clouds”, will now serve as ammunition for politicians and regulators that want to showcase us as appealing to minors. The truth of the matter is, we drew way too much attention to the vape culture and ourselves. As a community we over did it, look to social media if you disagree. Millions of photos, glorifying vaping as a fun new hobby. The companies in our industry were willing participants as well. Sexualizing and romanticizing vaping, promoting the social nature of it, making it a popularity contest for vapers. The question is, what did we expect would happen? From a marketing perspective, it is as if e-liquid makers and other related companies were using Big Tobacco’s playbook from the 70’s and 80’s. We might as well created our own versions of the Marlboro Man and Joe Camel. We purposely drew attention to ourselves; just think of the countless vapers who walk around in public everyday blowing huge clouds. Are the proposed laws against vaping unfair? Are politicians corrupt and ignorant? Is the propaganda against vaping full of lies and misinformation? Absolutely, without a doubt the answer is yes. But, the vaper community should also take a break from painting itself as the innocent victim of evil corporations and corrupt government. Take a look in the mirror and accept part of the blame for how we represented ourselves.
Thursday’s Fox News GOP debate may have been the surge in momentum that Rand Paul’s campaign desperately needed before the Iowa caucus on Monday. After being relegated to the undercard debate a few weeks ago (and refusing to participate), Paul returned to the main stage last night and stood out as a clear winner. While he has struggled to make his voice heard above the noise in previous debates, this time the senator was given much more time to discuss his unique positions on criminal justice reform and national security. Criminal justice reform, in particular, is an issue that has not been discussed in previous Republican debates. “I’ve been to Ferguson, I’ve been trying to look for solutions to our criminal justice problem,” Paul said. “I think something has to change. I think it’s a big thing that our party needs to be part of, and I’ve been a leader in Congress on trying to bring about criminal justice reform.” On national security and terrorism, issues that have been heavily discussed in previous debates, Paul was able to explain his views, which differ substantially from the other candidates. Paul said it’s a “really, really bad idea” to be bombing both sides of the war in Syria. “I’ve said for several years that arming the allies of ISIS will make the situation worse, that what we really need to do is defeat ISIS. But if you defeat Assad, what you will wind up with is a larger and more powerful ISIS that occupies that space. You might — you may well see an ISIS that takes over all of Syria,” he said. He received enthusiastic support from the audience in Des Moines, as well as the national audience on Twitter. He was declared social media’s favorite candidate of the night by Brandwatch React, which found he had received the most positive sentiment with the online audience. Paul also came out on top of the National Republican Senatorial Committee’s online debate poll with 26.9 percent support, although when all was said and done, “I miss Donald Trump” had more votes than any one candidate. Others took to Twitter to remark about the enthusiasm of the crowd towards Rand, and their support for many of his statements. By FAR biggest support & cheers in Republican debate going to @RandPaul so far. May surprise many as @FoxNews doesn't mention him much. — SCOTT JONES (@FOX59SJONES) January 29, 2016 @RandPaul is having his best debate by far -- and talking stuff no one else has -- black folks, poverty, civil forefeiture. — Glenn Thrush (@GlennThrush) January 29, 2016 .@RandPaul is so solid on justice reform only candidate on stage who went & met with #Ferguson community #GOPDebate pic.twitter.com/BtBDsc1ZRn — SalenaZito (@SalenaZitoTrib) January 29, 2016 .@RandPaul asks a solid question: "Should we be bombing both sides of the war?" ISIS and Asad. #GOPDebate — Dawn Chmielewski (@DawnC331) January 29, 2016 Paul said he is very confident that he will get the “liberty vote” in Iowa over front-runner Ted Cruz, and was able to hit Cruz for not showing up to vote on his “audit the Federal Reserve” legislation that fell short in the Senate this month. In his closing statement Paul made a plea to Iowa Republicans calling himself the “only true fiscal conservative” in the race. Latest Videos
Facebook has announced two changes to the way it enforces its real-name policy: the first is meant to ensure that fewer people are asked to prove they’re using the same name online that they use in real life; the second to make the verification process easier on the users who will still be required to confirm their identities. The changes follow months of criticism from people endangered by Facebook’s real-name policy, such as activists or victims of domestic violence, and people whose names are unusual or who identify with a name other than the one they were given at birth. (Specific examples of these problems here, here, and here.) Advertisement These complaints led to the creation of the “Nameless Coalition,” which advocated for Facebook to change its real-name policy to accommodate people who might need to use a “fake” name for their own protection or who identify with another name. Dozens of organizations and individuals supported the coalition’s goals. Facebook’s Chris Cox previously apologized for the real-name policy’s failings and explained that it’s enforced because it’s “part of what made Facebook special in the first place” and it’s the “primary mechanism we have to protect millions of people every day, all around the world, from real harm,” as he wrote at the time. Now, the company will require people to provide additional context when they report someone for using a fake name. “In the past, people were able to simply report a ‘fake name’ but now they will be required to go through several new steps that provide us more specifics about the report,” Facebook said today. “This additional context will help our review teams better understand why someone is reporting a name,” product manager Todd Gage and vice president of global operations Justin Osofsky wrote in the announcement, “giving them more information about a specific situation.” And that’s not the only fix being made. Facebook will also ask people to explain their situations when they’re reported for using a fake name. “People can let us know they have a special circumstance, and then give us more information about their unique situation,” Gage and Osofsky wrote. Facebook will consider this info when responding to the issue. These changes still put the ultimate decision on a person’s identity in Facebook’s hands. The company has no intention of getting rid of the real-name policy, as it’s core to many Facebook services, and the fact remains that the social network will have the power to kick someone out if it thinks their identity isn’t authentic. Still, better to make incremental changes that could help some people than to maintain the status quo because it refuses to nix the real-name policy. Facebook is still learning — there will doubtless be people who abuse the reporting tool to harass others, or who are erroneously flagged — and likely will be for some time.
The Financial Times’ attack on Thomas Piketty 27 May 2014 In a series of articles over the past several days, and in a major editorial published on Monday, the Financial Times has launched a scurrilous attack on Thomas Piketty and his book, Capital in the Twenty-First Century. The newspaper claims to have discovered serious flaws in data that undermine one of the book’s central themes—that wealth concentration is growing throughout the world, and in the United States and Europe in particular. A front-page article published over the weekend, provocatively headlined, “Thomas Piketty’s exhaustive inequality data turn out to be flawed,” asserts that the authors have found “unexplained data entries and errors in the figures underlying some of the book’s key charts.” Before taking into account Piketty’s reply to these criticisms, the newspaper concludes that they are “sufficiently serious to undermine Prof. Piketty’s claim that the share of wealth owned by the richest in society has been rising and [quoting Piketty] ‘the reason why wealth today is not as unequally distributed as in the past is simply that not enough time has passed since 1945.’” The World Socialist Web Site has basic theoretical and political differences with Professor Piketty, an opponent of Marxism who believes that social inequality can be addressed entirely through various reform measures. These criticisms will be treated in a separate review of his book and the response to it. However, the target of the FT’s attack is not these limitations, but the main strength of the book and Piketty’s work as a whole—the detailed examination of the growth of income and wealth inequality over the past fifty years. The actual content of the allegations by the FT (focused on only one chapter in the book) bears no relationship to the sweeping conclusions that the newspaper attempts to draw from them. Among the flaws cited by the newspaper are apparent mistakes in data transcription and other minor issues that have no real significance. It also cites what it considers to be unexplained adjustments to data made as part of Piketty’s efforts to provide a unified portrait of wealth distribution over time. Such adjustments and assumptions are inevitable in assembling data from disparate sources, accumulated in different ways and in very different time periods—a fact that Piketty himself acknowledges. Replying to the FT criticisms, Piketty noted that in the effort to be as transparent as possible, he made all his data available online and subject to public examination. Several assumptions that the professor made actually tend to underestimate, rather than overestimate, the level of wealth concentration. He notes, for example, that his estimates of wealth possessed by the rich do not “fully take into account offshore wealth, and are likely to err on the low side.” The driving force behind the FT’s criticisms is transparently political in character. In its editorial on the subject, “Big questions hang over Piketty’s work,” the newspaper editors insist that the supposed problems in Piketty’s data “undermine his thesis that capitalism has a natural tendency for wealth to become ever more concentrated in the hands of the rich.” Incredibly, the newspaper asserts that because of the flaws in the data, there are “grounds to question the finding that the holding of wealth by the rich in Europe has increased since 1980. Without that result, there cannot be an iron law of capitalism that leads to ever rising inequality.” Despite Piketty’s repeated assurances that he does not oppose the capitalist system (and does not, in fact, propose an “iron law” of inequality) the material he has gathered and presented in coherent form has clearly made the FT, and those for whom the newspaper speaks, very nervous. While they never mention the word, it is socialism that is on their minds. In its attack on Piketty, the Financial Times is speaking for powerful sections of the financial aristocracy that sense the immense social tensions building up in Europe, the United States and internationally. They are well aware that they preside over an economic system that has lost credibility in the eyes of millions of people. Any acknowledgment of the illegitimacy of the vast wealth that has been accumulated by a tiny layer of the population is, from their standpoint, dangerous. Inequality is not really a serious problem, they insist. To the extent that it exists, it is very likely justified. “There is a gulf of a difference between wealth derived from entrepreneurial skills and inheritance,” the editors write. What “entrepreneurial skills” are responsible for the wealth of the modern-day aristocracy? For decades, the ruling class—led by the financial institutions in London and on Wall Street—have engaged in a massive orgy of speculation, ripping up entire industries to funnel money into the stock markets. Gigantic fortunes have been amassed through financial manipulation and semi-criminal or outright criminal activities. Since the 2008 crash, central banks have opened the taps to flood the financial system with cash at near-zero interest rates, re-inflating the speculative bubbles that produced the crisis. The product of these policies is amply demonstrated—by Piketty and, as the author noted in his defense, many other sources as well. Most recently, the British Sunday Times published its annual rich list revealing that the richest 1,000 people in Britain have a combined wealth of £519 billion, an increase of 15.4 percent since last year and twice what it was in 2008. The wealth of these 1,000 individuals is now equivalent to a third of the entire country’s gross domestic product. The 85 richest people in the world now control as much wealth as the bottom 50 percent. And the world’s 1,645 billionaires, according to Forbes, possess a combined net worth of $6.4 trillion, an increase of $1 trillion over 2013. In the United States, the richest 400 people increased their wealth in 2013 to $2 trillion, up 17 percent from the year before. As for income inequality, the FT does not even address the exhaustive data accumulated by Piketty and his collaborators showing that an ever greater proportion of the world’s income is going to the top one and 0.1 percent, particularly in the United States and Europe. In the United States, the top one percent in 2012 monopolized 22.46 percent of all income, up from 19.65 percent a year before. The FT attack on Piketty is an attempt to deal with the growth of class antagonisms by denying the significance of social inequality. Yet the facts remain—as do their explosive social and political consequences. 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It’s been almost 24 years since “Mighty Morphin Power Rangers” premiered on FOX in 1993 — and needless to say, the TV industry has changed quite a lot since then. With Lionsgate’s new film in theaters, and the show producing continuously ever since on one network or another, it’s clear “MMPR” isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. And while the show’s longevity — in all its various iterations — has proven impressive, I’d like to walk you through my own experience, working on a short-lived “Power Rangers” spinoff series called “V.R. Troopers.” The “Power Rangers” phenomenon took off almost immediately in 1993, showing just how brilliant Haim Saban and Shuki Levy were in banking on the simple formula of putting an American spin on Japan’s “Super Sentai” series. A year after its premiere, Saban Entertainment went into expansion mode: Doing their best to bank on this very profitable TV formula. “V.R. Troopers” was the first sister show to head into production. This is where I come into the story… For those who may not remember, “V.R. Troopers” followed three heroes: Ryan Steele (Brad Hawkins), J.B. Reese (Michael Hollander) and Kaitlyn Starr (Sarah Brown) as they jumped into the world of Virtual Reality to fight off Grimlord and his evil henchmen — continuing to keep our world safe from their constant meddling. RELATED: 13 TV stars who got their start on ‘Power Rangers’ Just at the beginnings of my acting career, I was sent to Magic Movie Studios in Valencia, California — right across the freeway from Six Flags Magic Mountain. The role I was auditioning for was “Bradley Rooney,” the mayor’s obnoxiously nerdy nephew. For those who recall the show, the name of my character soon changed to “Percy.” The evolution of the audition process In 1994, the whole audition process was a different beast than it is today. Sure, actors are still given sides, or a portion of a script, to study and perform — but the way an actor’s representation submits their talent to casting has changed completely. These were the components of the audition process back then: A hard-copy headshot A mailed-in or faxed submission That glorious moment casting calls you in Membership in the Screen Actors Guild (*maybe) This is how I got in the door to read for “V.R. Troopers.” (“Maybe,” regarding SAG membership, because at the time “Power Rangers” and its inevitable sister shows — “Masked Rider,” “Big Bad Beetle Borgs,” etc. — were all non-union.) RELATED: Bryan Cranston explains ‘Power Rangers’ to Larry King … and fails I wish I could say things are just as simplistic now, but the Internet, social media and union politics have made breaking into the business a whole different challenge altogether. Those changes have indeed impacted the way the business works now: Hard-copy headshots are a thing of the past. Actors must have a website and social media presence, and all submissions are done electronically. Because casting no longer views hard-copy headshot submissions, an actor’s face is limited to a simple thumbnail on a computer screen — which obviously makes it a lot tougher to stand out. Saban shows being non-union meant not adhering to SAG rules meant paying his cast and crew on the cheap — which he did, and which in turn led to a boycott by SAG, and ultimately, “Power Rangers” became a union series after 1998. This didn’t effect any of the “V.R. Troopers” cast, but a few years after our show wrapped, I was able to join the union. To put things into perspective: In 1996, the fee to join the Screen Actor’s Guild was about $1200 dollars. In 2017, that price is $3,000. Nerds are totally cool now In 1994, nerds on television were not at all cool. I can speak on this first hand — Percy was the epitome of everything a ’90s TV nerd could be. Consider him a cross between Steve Urkel (Jaleel White) and Screech (Dustin Diamond) with a little bit of “Ace Ventura: Pet Detective” thrown in. Throughout the first season of “V.R. Troopers,” Percy was merely the comedic foil on the show: Getting attacked by a xerox machine, falling down a flight of stairs head first, almost drowning in a lake, being literally waterboarded… You name it, and it probably happened to me. RELATED: Elizabeth Banks is a fierce Rita Repulsa and other things we know about the ‘Power Rangers’ movie Going out in public, though, a trend began to form: Kids couldn’t separate my on screen performance from the real me. Honestly, I lost count at the number of times a crowd of kids ran up and kicked me below the belt for the sake of comedy. It’s a funny visual, to be sure, but the network quickly recognized the messaging the show was delivering: If it was okay for the heroes to bully Percy, then that justified how kids treated their unpopular peers at school. That was just not okay. Needless to say, all that was toned down in Season 2. It took a while, but the perception of nerds on television has changed. The extreme success of CBS’s “The Big Bang Theory” is a sign of this cultural shift. With the rise of comic-book entertainment and the surge in superhero TV shows, the nerd — in all his/her quirky glory — finally rose to the occasion and pop culture will never be the same. It only took 20 years, but somewhere Percy is cheering. Movie stars changed the whole TV dynamic Up until the early 2000s, movie stars didn’t show up on television that much. TV and film were two completely different entertainment worlds: The big screen was where the glitz and glamour were, leading most big name celebrities to avoid slumming it on television. An evolution started to happen around the turn of the century which found people like Brad Pitt guest starring in “Friends.” This profoundly affected the way television shows were cast, changing the hierarchy in roles available for everyday actors looking for their big break. Before the shift took place, the available roles for episodic projects looked like this: Series regulars: The main leads of the show. Recurring guest stars: Supporting players, appearing in a multiple episode arc. Guest stars: Supporting players, featured mainly in one episode. Co-Stars: Roles featured in just one episode of a series, usually with minimal lines. For shows like “Power Rangers” and “V.R. Troopers,” unknown actors were given a quick shot at stardom. Yet once the business saw how successful a show like “Friends” got, with Brad Pitt making the jump to television, networks began shifting their business model and soon, only big name celebrities were being considered for that recurring guest-star spot on a show, which then led to people normally seen for those roles being bumped down to guest stars, and so on. Ultimately, this effect made it even tougher for struggling actors to get their foot in the door and be seen. The evolution of superhero television If you would’ve told me a decade ago that Marvel and DC properties would reign supreme on the small screen, I’d have probably laughed. Yet here we are. Shows like “The Flash,” “Arrow,” “Daredevil” and “Legion” have changed the TV game — leading me to believe that “V.R. Troopers” could enjoy renewed success if Saban thought a revival was in order. Television entertainment has come a long way, though. With the increasing budgets being thrown at CW’s superhero shows and the like, action sequences are more realistic and the audience respects the story for it. In 1995, “V.R. Troopers” was canceled simply because we ran out of footage to use. “Jikuu Senshi Spielban,” “Shaider” and “Metalder” were the three Japanese shows our show pulled from — and there was an obvious limit to the number of times each of our 92 episodes could re-use the same exact scene. With “The Power Rangers” movie hitting it big in theaters — and six more films in the works — it’s clear that these heroes will be around for quite some time. Since virtual reality has made a resurgence in recent years, is it possible for “V.R. Troopers” to get a reboot? Probably not. Still, as the TV industry has continued to push forward with every new trope and trend, the Saban series has proven its staying power. And no matter how silly the genre has seemed at times, that longevity is quite commendable.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. economy appears destined for several years of weak growth and high unemployment that leave it vulnerable to a recession relapse after the massive dose of government stimulus wears off. A worker walks through the service area at Balzekas Chrysler dealership in Chicago, Illinois May 14, 2009. REUTERS/Frank Polich While tepid growth looks likely to resume late this year and build modestly into 2010, the credit bust has left households and businesses unable or unwilling to borrow and spend as freely as they did before the crisis. The U.S. government has stepped in as lender and spender of last resort, but its deep pockets are not bottomless. Waning political and investor appetite for taking on more debt could stand in the way of any additional big spending plans. “When you remove the government stimulus, what the private sector can generate in terms of growth feels like a recession,” said Jeffrey Rosenberg, head of global credit strategy at Banc of America Securities Merrill Lynch in New York. Rosenberg thinks the U.S. economy may trudge along at a sluggish growth rate somewhere in the range of 0.5 percent to 1.5 percent while banks recover from the credit crisis, which could take another three years. “If that’s what you’re able to generate, that economy is not generating the job growth required to bring the unemployment rate down,” Rosenberg said. This is a much darker outlook than the one put forward by President Barack Obama’s administration in its latest budget projections, which show economic growth bouncing back to 3.2 percent next year and hitting 4.6 percent by 2012. It also calls into question the staying power of a recent stock market rally. The Standard & Poor’s 500 is up more than 30 percent from an early March low. The gloomier scenario assumes that banks take years to recover from losses that some economists think could reach $4 trillion; consumers curb borrowing and spending as they repair the $11.2 trillion hole blown through their savings last year; and the explosion in government debt drives up interest rates. If the forecast proves accurate, it would leave the economy susceptible to a shock, such as a big jump in oil prices, and could force the United States to issue even more debt than investors expect. That would likely increase borrowing costs, both for the government and the private sector. NEVER SAY NEVER Typically, deep recessions are followed by powerful recoveries because when demand finally returns, companies quickly ramp up production. That helps explain why Wall Street has been feeling optimistic about recovery prospects. However, recessions caused by financial crises have a history of being long, deep and difficult to fully escape. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said on Thursday that the current crisis was “caused in large part by too much borrowing and too much lending. And the adjustment process of that will be difficult.” How difficult that adjustment will be depends to a large degree on how dramatically consumers alter their behavior. The saying, “Never bet against the U.S. consumer” has been a profitable one for many years. But if this crisis has permanently altered consumer attitudes toward debt, it would put a considerable drag on growth because consumer spending accounts for more than two-thirds of U.S. economic activity. The other anchor is interest rates. Christian Broda, an economist with Barclays Capital, said higher borrowing costs “are an inescapable feature of the post-recovery world” as public deficits and spending grow. Already, huge government debt issuance is raising questions about long-term U.S. fiscal stability. Concerns grew last week that the country could be stripped of its top-tier AAA credit rating after Standard & Poor’s said it was considering downgrading Britain’s sovereign rating. This week marks a big test of investor appetite for U.S. debt. The government plans to issue a massive $101 billion in notes and bonds, matching the weekly record set in April. Broda thinks the yield on 10-year U.S. government paper may reach 6 percent by 2011, compared with 3.4 percent now. Because so many other loans are based on that rate, that could make it costlier to buy a house or expand a business. NO WAY OUT It all adds up to a sluggish economy with less cushion to cope with a shock. What form that shock might take remains to be seen, but a jump in oil prices is one likely suspect. Oil has nearly doubled since the start of the year, topping $60 per barrel on Tuesday, and futures prices suggest it will edge higher at least through the peak summer driving season. “You start firing up demand and guess which price goes up first? Oil,” said James Galbraith, an economist who teaches at the University of Texas’ LBJ School of Public Affairs. “If I were in a position to be talking strategy to the (Obama) administration, I would be saying you’ve got to take the energy business seriously. You’re going to end up in a stagflation trap.” If the economy climbs out of one recession and into another, it wouldn’t be the first time. It happened most recently in the early 1980s, when the United States endured two recessions in less than three years. Regardless of what triggers a relapse, the Obama administration won’t stand idly by, Banc of America’s Rosenberg said. There will be pressure for even more stimulus spending, particularly if the economy is faltering when midterm congressional elections approach in 2010. “The problem is whether or not (stimulus) can work without itself creating other problems,” Rosenberg said. “The most likely ‘other problem’ is a rise in interest rates. “What one hand giveth, the other hand taketh away.”
By Raoul Davis One of the single hardest issues that entrepreneurs who invent a new product face is a lack of optics. Regardless of whether you have created the world's greatest widget or have even found a miraculous cure, if no one ever sees your innovation, it was all for naught. Unfortunately, most (if not all) independent inventors aren't recognizable, which means they can't open doors to distribution or boardrooms where products are pitched. As a result, too many ideas to die on the vine. Getting stuck in a developmental stage with no extended resources, no channels to pursue and no market reach is part of the reason only 1 in 5,000 inventions have a successful product launch. So how can the nameless inventor successfully get through the right doors -- or at least be seen by the right people? Build Your Audience If you alone are unable to opens those doors or open the lines of communication, align yourself or your product with those who can. A company looking to procure new products or develop new ideas is less likely to lend an audience to a single, nameless inventor than to multiple, trustworthy people. They are more likely to take the path of least resistance that leads to many potential products at any given time. This path-of-least-resistance mentality is the reason inventors have spent countless dollars and traveled great distances to do annual, semi-annual or industry specific trade shows for years. They hope that being in the same building as people they want to connect with will allow them to finally open those lines of communication. For some, this has proven quite successful. For others, it has only sealed their fate in a quicker fashion because these types of events are a hard and fast drain on what are normally scarce resources. While there are many entrepreneurs who are still actively adopting this old-school approach to connecting, its cost-restrictive nature is leading others to online innovation portals and a strong social media presence. This is surely a sign of the times and a time and energy saver. Advantages of social media are obvious and well-documented, so most inventors turn their attention to these first. Getting a page or multiple pages on various social media sites will give you fast access to potential customers and show validity to your product through unsolicited testimonials posted to those sites. Let Your Product Pitch Itself Online innovation portals are the next step. These have low or no fees and allow inventors to pitch their products based on their own merits (through descriptions, pictures and videos that highlight the product features). Most importantly, they often offer great opportunities to become instantly visible to companies that are utilizing that portal as an aggregate for product procurement at a fraction of the cost. Mega Mind Ideas is one such example. They are heavily invested in securing companies so inventors and entrepreneurs can be seen. It is co-owned by current NFL player Bernard Pollard. CEOs Brian Vickers and Pollard both saw a need to provide inventors like themselves a way to get their inventions in front of large companies and investors. Another example is Efactor.com, the largest social network of entrepreneurs in the world. While not as focused on inventors, Efactor has around 20,000 accredited investors as a part of its platform in addition to entrepreneurs. Registering on web sites like Mega Mind Ideas and Efactor.com creates an additional -- and often more viable -- avenue to potential companies or investors. As this type of online property is relatively new, do your due diligence and select the one that not only offers the best value, but best fits with your product. (Hint: Find out which companies in your niche are currently utilizing a particular innovation portal and go from there.) Before you get started, here are some tips to keep in mind: Prepare pages that showcase your product through various social media platforms (it's free and reaches a vast number of potential customers) Do your due diligence on which online innovation portal(s) offer you the best opportunity to reach the right companies for you and your product Promote your product through online innovation portal(s) using clear descriptions, plenty of illustrations or pictures, video and testimonials Maintain these presences -- if your social media looks too dated, or if your product page isn't up to date, you may get overlooked. No inventor wants to fail. Using cost effective, wide-reaching techniques definitely helps level the playing field. Raoul Davis, partner at Ascendant Group, specializes in helping CEOs increase their visibility, revenues, and industry leadership status through a proprietary CEO branding model.
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. Adv.-Staff-Sgt.-Maj. Yosef Kirma, 29, a Special Patrol officer, and Levana Malichi, 60, a former Knesset employee, were shot and killed, and six others were wounded during a drive-by attack in the capital on Sunday. The terrorist attack began near Israel Police headquarters across the street from the Ammunition Hill light rail stop in northeastern Jerusalem and ended in nearby Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood. The terrorist, a 39-yearold resident of the Silwan neighborhood, just south of the Old City, was shot dead during an exchange of gunfire with police. The attacker’s identity is under a gag order despite being widely reported in Palestinian media.Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, during comments before the cameras at the opening of Sunday morning’s weekly cabinet meeting, briefly referenced the attack, saying the details of what happened were still being clarified.After sending wishes for a speedy recovery to the wounded, he praised the police for quick and determined action in killing the terrorist.The shooting began at approximately 10:30 a.m., when the terrorist, who was driving a white car, opened fire on a male and female civilian near the Ammunition Hill light rail stop, across the street from police headquarters.“The terrorist opened fire on two people, and one woman in her 60s was critically wounded, and a man was moderately-to-seriously wounded,” police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said.The woman, later identified as Malichi, died of her wounds a short time later at Hadassah-University Medical Center in Mount Scopus, Rosenfeld said.“After shooting the two civilians, the suspect continued driving his vehicle into the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood, where two officers on motorcycles from the Special Patrol Unit chased him. Shots were fired at our officers, who returned fire, and the terrorist was shot and killed at the scene.”Rosenfeld said Kirma, who was shot in the head at close range, died at the same hospital, while the second officer was treated for a light gun wound to his leg.Kirma was buried a few hours later at the National Military and Police Cemetery, in a funeral attended by his wife, parents, two brothers, extended family, and hundreds of fellow officers and friends.During the gun battle in Sheikh Jarrah, the terrorist also shot a woman whose identity has not been released, Rosenfeld said. She is in moderate- to-serious condition.“Police immediately closed off the area and bomb disposal experts arrived at the scene within minutes and examined the vehicle to ensure there were no explosives,” he said. “A forensics team then collected evidence.”Police Commissioner Insp.- Gen. Roni Alsheich, who also rushed to the scene, called on the members of the public to remain alert, but not to change their daily routines as the High Holy Days continue.“It is not surprising that there are people who are attempting to shatter the tranquility of the holidays and hurt Israeli morale,” he said.“However, the people of Jerusalem are strong and will not be deterred by such attacks.”Alsheich added that despite the violence, there is “no change in the security assessment, and no need to change behavior,” and that those planning to visit Jerusalem for the holidays should not alter their plans.While Alsheich said nearly 4,000 police officers remain on watch in the capital, he conceded that Sunday’s attack may embolden other would-be attackers.ZAKA rescue and recovery organization chairman Yehuda Meshi-Zahav said the organization will remain “on high alert at this time, not only in Jerusalem but also throughout the country.”“They were able to give an immediate response to the injured at the scene,” said Meshi-Zahav.During a brief press conference at the scene of the attack, Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan said no intelligence was received beforehand, noting that the terrorist had an Israeli identification card.While Erdan said he could not divulge details about the investigation, he emphasized that because thousands of police reinforcements have been deployed in Jerusalem for the holidays, further bloodshed was prevented.The minister added that incitement on social media continues to contribute to the ongoing rash of “lone-wolf” terrorist attacks that have taken place throughout the country over the past year. He cited Facebook specifically, saying that the social network has a responsibility to end all forms of incitement to murder.The security cabinet convened on Sunday evening for a regularly scheduled meeting, during which security officials briefed the ministers about the attack.The US State Department said it condemned “in the strongest possible terms the terrorist attack that took place today in Jerusalem, which resulted in the death of two Israelis and injured several others.”The statement added that “there is absolutely no justification for the taking of innocent lives. We also condemn the statements glorifying this reprehensible and cowardly attack.”Hamas praised the “heroic Jerusalem operation,” and said it considers the attack a “natural response to the occupation’s crimes and violations at the expense of our people and holy sites.”The terrorist organization’s spokesman Fawzi Barhoum said the murders are “confirmation of the continuation of the intifada,” adding that “all of the occupation’s attempts to break and liquidate it will fail.”Herb Keinon, Adam Rasgon and Jerusalem Post staff contributed to this report. Join Jerusalem Post Premium Plus now for just $5 and upgrade your experience with an ads-free website and exclusive content. Click here>>
poke alleges: "Being able to create relevant hypotheses is an important skill and one a scientist spends a great deal of his or her time developing. It may not be part of the traditional description of science but that doesn't mean it's not included in the actual social institution of science that produces actual real science here in the real world; it's your description and not science that is faulty." I know I've been calling my younger self "stupid" but that is a figure of speech; "unskillfully wielding high intelligence" would be more precise. Eliezer 18 was not in the habit of making obvious mistakes—it's just that his "obvious" wasn't my "obvious". No, I did not go through the traditional apprenticeship. But when I look back, and see what Eliezer 18 did wrong, I see plenty of modern scientists making the same mistakes. I cannot detect any sign that they were better warned than myself. Sir Roger Penrose—a world-class physicist—still thinks that consciousness is caused by quantum gravity. I expect that no one ever warned him against mysterious answers to mysterious questions—only told him his hypotheses needed to be falsifiable and have empirical consequences. Just like Eliezer 18 . "Consciousness is caused by quantum gravity" has testable implications: It implies that you should be able to look at neurons and discover a coherent quantum superposition (whose collapse?) contributes to information-processing, and that you won't ever be able to reproduce a neuron's input-output behavior using a computable microanatomical simulation... ...but even after you say "Consciousness is caused by quantum gravity", you don't anticipate anything about how your brain thinks "I think therefore I am!" or the mysterious redness of red, that you did not anticipate before, even though you feel like you know a cause of it. This is a tremendous danger sign, I now realize, but it's not the danger sign that I was warned against, and I doubt that Penrose was ever told of it by his thesis advisor. For that matter, I doubt that Niels Bohr was ever warned against it when it came time to formulate the Copenhagen Interpretation. As far as I can tell, the reason Eliezer 18 and Sir Roger Penrose and Niels Bohr were not warned, is that no standard warning exists. I did not generalize the concept of "mysterious answers to mysterious questions", in that many words, until I was writing a Bayesian analysis of what distinguishes technical, nontechnical and semitechnical scientific explanations. Now, the final output of that analysis, can be phrased nontechnically in terms of four danger signs: First, the explanation acts as a curiosity-stopper rather than an anticipation-controller. Second, the hypothesis has no moving parts—the secret sauce is not a specific complex mechanism, but a blankly solid substance or force. Third, those who proffer the explanation cherish their ignorance; they speak proudly of how the phenomenon defeats ordinary science or is unlike merely mundane phenomena. Fourth, even after the answer is given, the phenomenon is still a mystery and possesses the same quality of wonderful inexplicability that it had at the start. In principle, all this could have been said in the immediate aftermath of vitalism. Just like elementary probability theory could have been invented by Archimedes, or the ancient Greeks could have theorized natural selection. But in fact no one ever warned me against any of these four dangers, in those terms—the closest being the warning that hypotheses should have testable consequences. And I didn't conceptualize the warning signs explicitly until I was trying to think of the whole affair in terms of probability distributions—some degree of overkill was required. I simply have no reason to believe that these warnings are passed down in scientific apprenticeships—certainly not to a majority of scientists. Among other things, it is advice for handling situations of confusion and despair, scientific chaos. When would the average scientist or average mentor have an opportunity to use that kind of technique? We just got through discussing the single-world fiasco in physics. Clearly, no one told them about the formal definition of Occam's Razor, in whispered apprenticeship or otherwise. There is a known effect where great scientists have multiple great students. This may well be due to the mentors passing on skills that they can't describe. But I don't think that counts as part of standard science. And if the great mentors haven't been able to put their guidance into words and publish it generally, that's not a good sign for how well these things are understood. Reasoning in the absence of definite evidence without going instantaneously completely wrong is really really hard. When you're learning in school, you can miss one point, and then be taught fifty other points that happen to be correct. When you're reasoning out new knowledge in the absence of crushingly overwhelming guidance, you can miss one point and wake up in Outer Mongolia fifty steps later. I am pretty sure that scientists who switch off their brains and relax with some comfortable nonsense as soon as they leave their own specialties, do not realize that minds are engines and that there is a causal story behind every trustworthy belief. Nor, I suspect, were they ever told that there is an exact rational probability given a state of evidence, which has no room for whims; even if you can't calculate the answer, and even if you don't hear any authoritative command for what to believe. I doubt that scientists who are asked to pontificate on the future by the media, who sketch amazingly detailed pictures of Life in 2050, were ever taught about the conjunction fallacy. Or how the representativeness heuristic can make more detailed stories seem more plausible, even as each extra detail drags down the probability. The notion of every added detail needing its own support—of not being able to make up big detailed stories that sound just like the detailed stories you were taught in science or history class—is absolutely vital to precise thinking in the absence of definite evidence. But how would a notion like that get into the standard scientific apprenticeship? The cognitive bias was uncovered only a few decades ago, and not popularized until very recently. Then there's affective death spirals around notions like "emergence" or "complexity" which are sufficiently vaguely defined that you can say lots of nice things about them. There's whole academic subfields built around the kind of mistakes that Eliezer 18 used to make! (Though I never fell for the "emergence" thing.) I sometimes say that the goal of science is to amass such an enormous mountain of evidence that not even scientists can ignore it: and that this is the distinguishing feature of a scientist, a non-scientist will ignore it anyway. If there can exist some amount of evidence so crushing that you finally despair, stop making excuses and just give up—drop the old theory and never mention it again—then this is all it takes to let the ratchet of Science turn forward over time, and raise up a technological civilization. Contrast to religion. Books by Carl Sagan and Martin Gardner and the other veins of Traditional Rationality are meant to accomplish this difference: to transform someone from a non-scientist into a potential scientist, and guard them from experimentally disproven madness. What further training does a professional scientist get? Some frequentist stats classes on how to calculate statistical significance. Training in standard techniques that will let them churn out papers within a solidly established paradigm. If Science demanded more than this from the average scientist, I don't think it would be possible for Science to get done. We have problems enough from people who sneak in without the drop-dead-basic qualifications. Nick Tarleton summarized the resulting problem very well—better than I did, in fact: If you come up with a bizarre-seeming hypothesis not yet ruled out by the evidence, and try to test it experimentally, Science doesn't call you a bad person. Science doesn't trust its elders to decide which hypotheses "aren't worth testing". But this is a carefully lax social standard, and if you try to translate it into a standard of individual epistemic rationality, it lets you believe far too much. Dropping back into the analogy with pragmatic-distrust-based-libertarianism, it's the difference between "Cigarettes shouldn't be illegal" and "Go smoke a Marlboro". Do you remember ever being warned against that mistake, in so many words? Then why wouldn't people make exactly that error? How many people will spontaneously go an extra mile and be even stricter with themselves? Some, but not many. Many scientists will believe all manner of ridiculous things outside the laboratory, so long as they can convince themselves it hasn't been definitely disproven, or so long as they manage not to ask. Is there some standard lecture that grad students get, of which people see this folly, and ask, "Were they absent from class that day?" No, as far as I can tell. Maybe if you're super lucky and get a famous mentor, they'll tell you rare personal secrets like "Ask yourself which are the important problems in your field, and then work on one of those, instead of falling into something easy and trivial" or "Be more careful than the journal editors demand; look for new ways to guard your expectations from influencing the experiment, even if it's not standard." But I really don't think there's a huge secret standard scientific tradition of precision-grade rational reasoning on sparse evidence. Half of all the scientists out there still believe they believe in God! The more difficult skills are not standard!
Alexis Ohanian is thinking a lot about the past these days. This June will mark 10 years since he and his University of Virginia roommate Steve Huffman co-founded the social news site Reddit after moving into a two-bedroom apartment in Medford, Massachusetts, where they started coding what would eventually come to be known as “the front page of the internet”. After a few years of charity work, Ohanian returned to Reddit in November as chairman. His two-bedroom startup has come a long way. Last month the site had almost 170 million unique visitors and over half a million communities (“subreddits”) covering almost every conceivable subject. But life has changed since Reddit was founded and, like peers such as Twitter and Facebook, it is coping with ever-changing user habits and the responsiblity that comes with being a durable web property. Reddit is having to grow up. Since his return, Ohanian has turned his immediate thoughts to things like the Reddit mobile experience and the launch of new community tools. “In a way, I’d never really left Reddit. I was still an adviser and never emotionally left it, because it was such a fundamental and formative part of my life. I eventually saw a chance to really help in a way I couldn’t have earlier,” he says. “It feels good to be back, because there’s so much more we want to do.” Part of the task confronting the site, he says, involves continuing to lead the charge when it comes to issues involving privacy and the open internet. In January, Reddit published its first transparency report, covering requests in 2014 from governments and law enforcement agencies. The Electronic Frontier Foundation quickly found a lot to like in it. But it has other issues to deal with. A few weeks after releasing that report Reddit announced it was clamping down on revenge porn following the leaking of nude photos of celebrities, many of which made it on to the site. The new policy went into effect in March and encourages anyone who believes that photos, videos or digital images of them “in a state of nudity or engaged in any act of sexual conduct” are being circulated on Reddit without their consent to contact the site so that they can be taken down. “This was a decision we made at our first big company-wide meeting about two months after I got back,” Ohanian says. “In 2005, there were no smartphones. Online data storage didn’t really exist. So we wanted to update our privacy policy to reflect that change. “Reddit was created for people to speak freely and authentically and also for us to protect and value privacy. We’re sort of the anti-Facebook in that regard. All you need is a username and password. We don’t even need your email.We’ve got work to do, don’t get me wrong, but the invasion of privacy policy we stood for as a company – it was so heartening to see the support from the Reddit community and to see Twitter and Facebook to a certain extent following suit within a few weeks.” Reddit is growing up in other ways. The company’s CEO Ellen Pao – who initially joined on an interim basis around the time Ohanian came back – recently made news for banning salary negotiations in the hiring process to tackle the pay gap between men and women. She also talks to potential hires about their ideas on workplace diversity. Ohanian declined to speak about Pao, who recently lost a closely watched gender bias case against her former employer, venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. But those are among the kinds of moves he says we should expect to see Reddit lead the way on more. Among other recent milestones in Reddit’s transformation is President Barack Obama personally thanking the site and its users in a handwritten note in February. “Wish I could upvote every one of you for helping keep the internet open and free,” Obama wrote, using the site’s own terminology, about their activism around net neutrality. Ohanian was especially happy to see that, not least because he’s long been an opponent of moves to route some internet traffic through a so-called “fast lane” – pushing, instead, to keep a level playing field for all users. “This fight will never be over,” he says. “The internet is too transformative for incumbents to not want to try to stifle or curb it – incumbents in the sense of multinational corporations, governments, take your pick. We got a huge win with net neutrality, and seeing the Obama letter just blew me away. That was the work of thousands of websites that came together, not just Reddit, and motivated people to pick up phones. The biggest threat to the internet is, frankly, always going to be complacency. I want to see more and more of us activated and people thinking of themselves as defenders of it. The way we stay vigilant is anytime something comes up, we’re OK picking up the phone and making that call and being engaged so that anyone who holds office knows they have to be on Team Internet.” It’s against this backdrop that Ohanian, who returned to the company a month after it raised new funding ($50m) from investors including Jared Leto and Snoop Dogg, is considering fresh ideas for expanding the site and its influence. Inspiration may be found in Reddit’s origin story. Ohanian was already thinking about the product that would become Reddit as a college student studying overseas, even if he didn’t realise it at the time. In early 2003, while taking a few college classes a week as a sophomore living in London, the future entrepreneur would head over to Speakers’ Corner in Hyde Park on Sundays. “It was people ranting about whatever they cared about,” he recalls. “Some of them were crazy. Some were very earnest. Crowds would form and people would debate. It was a transformative experience for me. Before that, I’d always understood speech abstractly. But when you see people standing old-school on a box – it was a very clear indication to me of what could happen if you could just distribute that a little better. And make it accessible to anyone with an internet connection.” Reddit: can anyone clean up the mess behind 'the front page of the internet'? Read more Reddit is as good an example as any that when enough people are given a microphone, the darker side of human nature tends to manifest itself. Ohanian acknowledges that Reddit has wrestled with that reality for much of its existence, and the issue has appeared particularly acute lately with the Gamergate controversy, trolling and offensive content. In a blog about a month ago, post he and other Reddit leaders conceded that, as revenge porn multiplied “we missed a chance to be a leader in social media when it comes to protecting your privacy”. There’s also the question of offensive content in general. Even a cursory examination of lists of subreddits can turn up particularly dark content, like the subreddit /r/picsofdeadkids. Ohanian cites his Speakers’ Corner experience in arguing such voices are not representative, and will eventually be drowned out by saner ones: “They’re actually in the minority. It’s important for us to make sure we’re creating an environment where enough speech is possible. I’m a real believer in counter-speech when it comes to crazy stuff we don’t like.” Reddit will always have to deal with the unusual as long as it remains popular. Ohanian’s focus now is to make sure the company starts to put more of its own content in the spotlight. Earlier this year he announced the launch of Reddit’s podcast Upvoted, which has already surpassed 600,000 downloads. The goal is to use it to dive deep into the site’s content and learn more about which items are most resonating with users and why. In recent days, Reddit announced that it’s expanding its podcast via an opt-in, weekly newsletter called Upvoted Weekly. It’s a human-curated collection of the best of Reddit from the previous week.The site also recently rolled out the capability for embeddable ability to embed comments from public subreddits. “We’re also going to be making inroads in mobile, finally,” Ohanian says. “We started in the pre-smartphone era, and we’ll be refreshing the mobile web experience, as well as mobile apps. The podcast was our first go at editorial content. It’s essentially us looking at things that bubble up across any of the Reddit communities and seeing if there’s another story there. It’s us saying we have this amazing newsroom, so to speak, that has content creators all over the world, and our job is to figure out the best way to deliver all that great stuff. “Bottom line: We’re very cognizant of the fact as large as Reddit is, we want to grow even more.” Curriculum vitae Age 32 Education University of Virginia Career 2005 co-founder, reddit.com 2007 launches breadpig 2009 microfinance as a Kiva fellow in Yerevan, Armenia 2010 helps launch travel site hipmunk 2014 executive chair, Reddit
Why your boring job is a great opportunity ObserverJoe Blocked Unblock Follow Following Aug 24, 2017 A few years back, right after university, I got a boring job. I was working in a big corporation with older, slower, less motivated people. I wanted to work in a startup, a young, dynamic environment with highly competent and motivated people. At first, I felt unlucky for getting this boring job, while some of my friends were working in inspiring and popular startups. Looking back, I realize how that boring job was probably one of the best things that ever happened to me. It made me look at my situation and tell myself “This is not acceptable. You gotta do something to fix this problem”. It made me realize that enjoying life is about overcoming challenges and getting stronger. I changed my mindset from “What did I do to deserve this boring job?” to “What can I do to fix this situation?”, and my mind started flocking with new ideas and inspirations. I felt empowered, the most empowered I had ever felt in my life. Taking full responsibility for my circumstances had given me the strength to deal with my problems, instead of blaming others. You guys who consider your job as boring are extremely lucky. You have a challenge in front of you that is an amazing opportunity for personal growth.
A new documentary from VICE showcases Sweden’s introduction of government-funded gender-neutral kindergartens and a set of parents who are raising their children “without gender.” A new VICE documentary, which was published on Tuesday follows the story of intersex parent Del LaGrace Volcano, an American photographer, who is raising children outside of the confines of gender stereotypes. In Sweden, state-funded gender-neutral kindergartens are on the rise. According to the documentary, a gender-neutral personal identifier, “hen,” is commonly used throughout Swedish society. Del’s child, Mika, who was born a biological male, wears dresses and has long hair, which is often styled with braids that are dyed pink. During a portion of the documentary in which Del takes Mika and Nico out shopping, they run into a family they know with a young child who is also being raised without a gender. A biological male, Cory wears dresses and ties his hair back in a pony tail. “Now he has started to see that he’s a girl. The other day he’s a boy and sometimes he’s a cat,” Cory’s mother says. “It’s good for him. It’s a part of his childhood.” She goes on to say something quite significant: “He can be whoever he wants or dress however he wants for that short time because society will have its toll on him anyway.” There is an implicit suggestion that social conditioning almost exclusively defines gender. Later, Cory tells the VICE reporter that his favorite piece of clothing is his Spiderman costume. In the absence of a complete hormonal transition, the most radical form of gender expression possible is gender dissidence, meaning a comprehensive personal rejection of the aspects of gender that are truly social. These aspects may include fashion and hair style, personal pronouns, hobbies and interests, etc. But research that was recently published in Stanford University’s Magazine on Medicine reminds us that nature limits our ability to act creatively with our gender expression. In an article on the difference in the male and female brain, author Bruce Goldman highlights the innate biological differences that lead to the development of recognizable behavior patterns in males and females. Goldman points to research on rhesus monkeys, which revealed that to a significant degree that there are real differences in the wiring of male and female brains. In the study, male monkeys strongly preferred toys with wheels, while female monkeys gravitated towards soft, plush, toys. Goldman argues that because these monkeys weren’t molded by their parents or simian society to enjoy specific toys, their interests were shaped, in part, by the gendered nature of their brains. Then, Goldman details the ideological transition that Diane Halpern, the former President of the American Psychological Association, underwent after initially believing that male and female brains were relatively similar. After “reviewing a pile of journal articles that stood several feet high and numerous books and book chapters that dwarfed the stack of journal articles” she changed her mind. Halpern was largely swayed by the research on the rhesus monkeys and another study on boys and girls, which conclusively revealed them to have “differences in their preference for stereotypically male versus stereotypically female toys” at the infant stages of 9 to 17 months of age, when they had obviously yet to achieve a socialized understanding of gender. https://twitter.com/GodDoesnt/status/881194684433006595 On Tuesday, Breitbart News reported on a new program at Princeton University that seeks to curb unhealthy expressions of masculinity. Although it is possible that some negative aspects of masculinity arise from social conditioning, there are simple biological explanations for issues such as male aggression and violence. While men can produce up to eight mg of testosterone naturally each day, women only produce 0.5 mg. Research studies such as one in the International Journal of Endocrinology & Metabolism reveal that “testosterone plays a significant role in the arousal of these behavioral manifestations in the brain centers involved in aggression and on the development of the muscular system that enables their realization.” In addition, a 1997 study from the Center for the Advancement of Health revealed that, amongst women in prison, those with higher levels of testosterone were much more likely to commit violent acts. Clearly, gender expression is shaped in part by biology. The most important question that even the most respected gender studies theorists often refuse to ask is put best by Ph.D. and author James Lindsay: “What proportion of gender arises from biological sex?” The documentary, which is a little under 30 minutes in length, is available to watch for free on VICE’s YouTube channel. Tom Ciccotta is a libertarian who writes about economics and higher education for Breitbart News. You can follow him on Twitter @tciccotta or email him at tciccotta@breitbart.com
Just 8 days after being released from prison for another crime, a man brutally butchered a woman with a machete before dousing her in gasoline and setting her on fire. After miraculously surviving the attack, the mutilated victim explained to police that the horrific murder attempt was all because she asked him one simple question. Despite the left’s claim that “extremists” only make up a small minority in Islam, the vast majority of Muslims support the implementation of the barbaric and oppressive Sharia law. Of course, few actually admit just how misogynistic this religious legislation really is, especially in its inhumane treatment of women. Tragically, the women who refuse to conform to Islam’s sexist fundamentals are often subjected to the ideology’s most severe punishments. Just 8 days after walking out of a German prison, 41-year-old Turkish Muslim Haci Ahmet U., whose identity remains withheld under Turkish censorship laws, resumed his crime spree in the worst possible way. The migrant took a machete from beneath his bed and gruesomely hacked his Moroccan wife, 39-year-old Nabila, before pouring petrol all over her bleeding body and setting her alight. Although Nabila was severely burned over 60 percent of her body, she miraculously survived the grisly murder attempt to testify against her husband. According to Express, Nabila explained that Haci tried to kill her because she requested a divorce. Haci was subsequently sentenced in a court in Darmstadt to 14 and a half years in prison for attempted murder, which is only 6 months less than the maximum sentence, according to Daily Star. Disturbingly, Nabila had suspected that her life was in danger moments before the attack and texted a friend on September 20, 2016. “I do not know what he needs a jerry can with fuel for, maybe he wants me to kill,” Nabila wrote. Minutes after their 4 children left for school, Haci launched his premeditated attack, chopping at Nabila’s body with a machete. Nabila desperately pleaded for mercy, prompting Haci to strangle her twice until she fell unconscious. The second time that Nabila awoke, Haci was dousing her in fuel and ordering her to set herself on fire. When she refused, he lit her himself and locked her in the bedroom. It was only after Haci returned and stamped out the fire with a blanket that Nabila was taken to the hospital for life-saving surgery. Nabila was in a coma for nearly 2 months and has since had 24 operations to treat her horrific wounds. The scars are so severe and disfiguring that Nabila has opted to wear the burqa and veil, not for religious devotion but because she is ashamed of her appearance. Luckily, Nabila had no trouble getting a divorce from her abusive husband in Germany. However, she didn’t dare file on her own while he was out of prison as it is against Sharia law. Unlike their male counterparts, women aren’t allowed the choice of divorce without gaining permission from the Sharia courts, which rarely afford them. In fact, even domestic abuse isn’t grounds for divorce under Sharia law since Quran 4:34 explicitly commands men to beat their wives if they even fear disobedience from them. Expectedly, the media makes no mention of “honor killing,” despite the fact that it fits the definition and 91 percent of them worldwide are committed by Muslims. Disturbingly, this too is condoned by Sharia law which commonly sees Muslim murderers acquitted of murder charges for killing their own wives, children, and grandchildren. In reality, quite a few Muslim countries have legalized murder in cases of dishonor or allow the family members of the victim to pardon the killer. Of course, when the family supports the killer’s attempt to cleanse them of dishonor, it’s no wonder they’d excuse them of their crimes. Nabila is one of the countless women who doesn’t want to live under Islamic oppression yet has no other choice, proving that Islam is just as dangerous for those living in it as it is for non-Muslims.
An employee of Montreal's La Ronde amusement park who strayed into a restricted area while doing repairs was killed Friday by a passing roller-coaster train. Ambulance workers treated numerous clients of the ride and employees for shock after the incident. The 67-year-old employee was declared dead immediately and there were no efforts to revive him because of the obvious extent of his injuries. Story continues below advertisement La Ronde said the ride will be closed indefinitely pending an investigation. A spokesman for the amusement park said investigators want to know why the employee was in the tightly controlled area while he worked. The park said preliminary findings show the ride was operating properly, the area where the employee was found was secure and the man did not notify the ride operator of his movements. "Our thoughts and prayers go out to our team member's family," the park said in a statement.
A grim milestone appears to be passing, as both U.S. and Japanese intelligence analysts believe North Korea has developed the technology to miniaturize nuclear warheads and fit them inside long-range missiles, years ahead of schedule. Japan’s annual defense review, released on Tuesday morning, described the threat from North Korea’s nuclear missile program as “acute.” “It is conceivable that North Korea’s nuclear weapons program has already considerably advanced and it is possible that North Korea has already achieved the miniaturization of nuclear weapons and has acquired nuclear warheads,” the white paper warned. “Since last year, when it forcibly implemented two nuclear tests and more than 20 ballistic missile launches, the security threats have entered a new stage.” Accordingly, the BBC reported that Japan has begun its first civilian air-raid drills since the end of World War II, evidently stepping up a program revealed earlier this year which taught civilians in certain towns how to deal with an errant North Korean test missile (or perhaps a weapon fired at American military installations in Japan) falling in a populated area. “We’re told to hit the ground or hide behind the wall, but will that really help? Will that really protect us if a missile really falls here, I wonder?” asked one Japanese citizen interviewed by the BBC. The Washington Post reported on Tuesday afternoon that U.S. analysts at the Defense Intelligence Agency reached similar conclusions about North Korea’s capabilities in a confidential assessment prepared last month. The DIA report also raised the official estimate of North Korea’s nuclear inventory considerably, from the handful of bombs hypothesized by most earlier analyses to almost 60 nuclear devices. The report’s authors believe some of these devices are small enough to be delivered by intercontinental ballistic missile. As the Washington Post notes, North Korea claims it has successfully tested such miniaturized devices, although their claims were greeted with widespread skepticism at the time. The missing piece of the ICBM puzzle for North Korea would appear to be reliable heat shielding to protect the warheads from re-entry, a technology Pyongyang is clearly working hard to develop. A new poll from the Chicago Council on Global Affairs released on Monday found 90 percent of Americans “reject the idea that North Korea should be allowed to produce nuclear weapons,” 75 percent see the North Korean nuclear program as a “critical threat facing the United States,” and 62 percent would support using American troops to defend South Korea from a North Korean attack.
Looking for news you can trust? Subscribe to our free newsletters. Yonas Fikre, an American Muslim who claims that he was tortured in the United Arab Emirates at the behest of the US government, sued the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the State Department on Thursday. Fikre, whose story was first reported by Mother Jones in April 2012, claims he was abused by local authorities in the UAE after refusing to become an informant for the FBI. As Mother Jones reported in 2011, the US government has acknowledged that the information it shares with foreign governments about American terrorism suspects sometimes results in the arrest, detention, and interrogation of those suspects. The FBI has also acknowledged that FBI agents occasionally “interview or witness an interview” of American terrorism suspects detained abroad. Fikre’s lawsuit contends that he was a victim of this practice, commonly known as proxy detention, and seeks $30 million in damages as well as injunctions to prevent the government from treating anyone else the way he claims he was treated. Fikre’s claims are not unique—indeed, they are remarkably similar to the accounts of other American Muslims who say they were detained and interrogated by foreign security forces at the behest of the US government. Fikre’s story echoes those of Naji Hamdan, Amir Meshal, Sharif Mobley, Gulet Mohamed, and Yusuf and Yahya Wehelie. All are American Muslim men who claim that, while traveling abroad, they were detained, interrogated, and in some cases abused by local security forces; the US government, they say, used this process to circumvent their legal rights as American citizens. Several FBI officials have confirmed to me (on the condition that they not be named) that the bureau has for years used some of its elite international agents—known as legal attachés, or “legats”—to coordinate the detention of American and foreign terrorism suspects at the hands of American allies. And although the FBI maintains that foreign governments that detain American terrorism suspects are told not to abuse them, many of the countries in question have long histories of abusive detentions. Fikre’s lawsuit also seeks injunctions that would end the practice of proxy detention for good. There are complications, however. Fikre is currently in Sweden, seeking political asylum. He is on the no-fly list, and would likely have problems returning to the United States even if he wished to do so. He also has legal problems: Two weeks after he went public with his story, federal prosecutors charged him and two others with violating federal laws regarding the transfer of large amounts of money over international borders. Fikre denies the charges; in his lawsuit, he alleges they were filed in retaliation for his decision to go public. Even if the suit moves forward, the government holds a trump card: the state secrets privilege, a rule that allows the feds to quash a case when they claim that it might infringe on national security. The privilege has been invoked by both the George W. Bush and Barack Obama administrations in cases that involve the government spying on Americans, or in which America’s relationships with foreign governments that torture people might have been revealed. You can read the lawsuit here:
"Feminism is still a dirty word here, and now with the conservative turn, it's again become a very dangerous thing to declare yourself a feminist." Kartika Jahja, an activist and musician in Jakarta, is pushing back against what she sees as a growing tide against women's rights and sexuality in her country. The chill on talking about sexuality and feminism is both social — "In Indonesia we like to think that people don't have sex before marriage when we actually do" — and a question of political power and oppression. In the province of Aceh, women are caned in public for kissing and hugging outside of marriage. Recently one of Jahja's events in Jakarta was recently raided by "fundamentalist religious organizations." See more of Kartika Jahja's story and more artists using art to defy norms in Interrupt This Program: Jakarta this Friday at 8:30pm. Watch the season premiere from Mexico now. (CBC Arts) By writing the zine I just want to offer an alternative point of view because that's what we lack here — the diversity of perspectives. - Kartika Jahja Facing this, these women and their collective's zines such as Swipe Right — a zine about Tinder — are a radical political act as well as a fun educational tool. Jahja says that she "didn't learn about sexuality and gender issues and feminism in the classroom" but instead learned it from the feminist punk movement Riot Grrrl and the zines her friends wrote. (CBC Arts) Kartika Jahja is an activist and singer with the group Tika and The Dissidents. Much of her work is related to issues of gender and sexuality. In 2016, the band released a video Tubuhku Otoritasku (My Body My Authority) that sparked controversy for tackling issues like slut-shamming, body positivity and women's issues. Art as political protest, as a means of survival, as an agent of change, as a display of courage and delight. Interrupt This Program explores art in cities under pressure and airs Fridays at 8:30pm.
Copyright by WFLA - All rights reserved Former Tampa Bay Lightning right winger Martin St. Louis waves as he walks by some of his awards during a jersey retirement ceremony before an NHL hockey game between the Lightning and the Columbus Blue Jackets on Friday, Jan. 13, 2017, in Tampa,... Copyright by WFLA - All rights reserved Former Tampa Bay Lightning right winger Martin St. Louis waves as he walks by some of his awards during a jersey retirement ceremony before an NHL hockey game between the Lightning and the Columbus Blue Jackets on Friday, Jan. 13, 2017, in Tampa,... TAMPA, Fla. (WFLA) - His legendary dad's jersey might hang from the rafters at Amalie Arena, but Martin St. Louis' son has another favorite Tampa Bay Lightning player. "There are many costumes and plenty of NHL stars to pick from," St. Louis said on Twitter on Friday. "He went with @RealStamkos91!!" St. Louis used #hisfavplayer and #rolemodel. https://twitter.com/mstlouis_26/status/924078524943818752
Although evidence of an earlier plot does not itself demonstrate any links between those identified as plotters then and those accused now, it does suggest that the idea of bombing this particular Federal building could have been a subject of discussion among small extremist groups for more than a decade. The only links between Mr. McVeigh and people identified as the earlier conspirators are extremely tenuous. Mr. McVeigh once got a traffic ticket in the Fort Smith, Ark., area, where some of them lived, and several months ago his sister Jennifer subscribed to The Patriot Report, a newsletter published there. The details of the 1983 plan came from James D. Ellison, the founder of the Covenant, the Sword and the Arm of the Lord, an anti-Semitic paramilitary group that now appears to be defunct but once flourished in northern Arkansas. Mr. Ellison's account first came to light when Mr. Snyder, an assistant United States attorney in Fort Smith, interviewed him in preparation for his role as the principal prosecution witness against 14 other white supremacists, including 10 charged with plotting to overthrow the Government by force. The trial was held in 1988, and all the defendants were acquitted. In addition to Mr. Snell, who was already on death row, the defendants included Richard Girnt Butler, chief of the Aryan Nations, a neo-Nazi umbrella organization for white supremacist groups that is based in Hayden Lake, Idaho; Robert E. Miles, a former Ku Klux Klansman who headed the Mountain Church of Jesus Christ the Saviour in Cohoctah, Mich., and Louis Ray Beam Jr., former grand dragon of the Texas Ku Klux Klan and "ambassador at large" of the Aryan Nations. According to notes Mr. Snyder took before the trial, Mr. Ellison said he attended a meeting of extremist groups in Hayden Lake in July 1983 and told them of the death of Gordon Kahl, a member of yet another right-wing group, the Posse Comitatus. Mr. Kahl was a tax protester who fled North Dakota in early 1983 after a shootout with Federal agents and was subsequently shot to death in a gun battle with agents in Smithville, Ark. "Kahl was the catalyst that made everyone come forth and change the organizations from thinkers to doers," Mr. Ellison said, according to Mr. Snyder's notes. Advertisement Continue reading the main story In late-night meetings, Mr. Ellison told Mr. Snyder, the leaders at Hayden Lake discussed how to topple the Government, using as a sourcebook "The Turner Diaries," an extremist novel that envisions the Government's overthrow by rightists who then systematically kill Jews and blacks. Mr. Ellison told Mr. Snyder that he himself had volunteered to assassinate Federal officials in Arkansas. According to Mr. Snyder's notes, Mr. Ellison told him that the Ellison organization had discussed plans to bomb Federal buildings and the Dallas office of a Jewish organization. At the 1988 trial of the 14 white supremacists, Mr. Ellison testified that in October 1983, Mr. Snell and Steve Scott, an associate, "asked me to design a rocket launcher that could be used to destroy these buildings from a distance." "On one of the trips when I was with Wayne," Mr. Ellison said of Mr. Snell, "he took me to some of the buildings and asked me to go in the building and check the building out. This kind of thing." And before the trial, Mr. Ellison told the prosecutor that at Mr. Snell's request he had entered the Federal Building in Oklahoma City to gauge what it would take to damage or destroy it. Afterward, he testified in court, he made preliminary sketches and drawings. Rocket launchers were to be "placed in a trailer or a van so that it could be driven up to a given spot, parked there, and a timed detonating device could be triggered so that the driver could walk away and leave the vehicle set in position, and he would have time to clear the area before any of the rockets launched." Newsletter Sign Up Continue reading the main story Please verify you're not a robot by clicking the box. Invalid email address. Please re-enter. You must select a newsletter to subscribe to. Sign Up You will receive emails containing news content , updates and promotions from The New York Times. You may opt-out at any time. You agree to receive occasional updates and special offers for The New York Times's products and services. Thank you for subscribing. An error has occurred. Please try again later. View all New York Times newsletters. "And I was asked to make it so it would fit in either a trailer or a van or a panel truck," Mr. Ellison continued. "Ellison," Mr. Snyder recalled, "said that Snell was bitter toward the Government because of the I.R.S. And I think these were agents from the Oklahoma City office, and they had taken him to court, and his property had been seized by the F.B.I. and other agents in a raid. But you can't be sure about any of this, because a Federal raid, to a lot of these people, is any time the postman brings the mail." In 1984, a black state trooper stopped Mr. Snell for a traffic violation near De Queen, Ark. Mr. Snell shot the trooper, Louis Bryant, as he approached the vehicle, then shot him again as he lay on the ground, killing him. Mr. Snell always contended afterward that he had killed the officer in self-defense. Advertisement Continue reading the main story Mr. Snell fled and was chased to Broken Bow, Okla., where he was wounded in a gun battle with the authorities before he was subdued. In his car, the police found a gun that had been used the previous year in the robbery and murder of William Stumpp, a Texarkana pawnbroker. Mr. Snell was convicted of both murders and sentenced to death in the Stumpp case. Mr. Snell always denied that murder, but Mr. Ellison said at the sedition trial that Mr. Snell had killed Mr. Stumpp because he believed -- wrongly, as it turned out -- that Mr. Stumpp was Jewish. Mr. Ellison himself became a Government witness after plenty of trouble with the law. On April 19, 1985 -- 10 years to the day before the Oklahoma City bombing -- a heavily armed force of 200 state and Federal officers surrounded his remote mountain compound on the shores of Bull Shoals Lake in northern Arkansas. A four-day siege ended when he was persuaded to surrender by Robert G. Millar, who is still the spiritual leader of an armed apocalypic sect in Elohim City, a rural compound near Muldrow, Okla. Three months later, on July 17, Mr. Ellison was convicted of racketeering charges. And two months after that, he was sentenced to 20 years in prison. The following year, he agreed to become a Government witness. The defense at the sedition trial contended that Mr. Ellison had farbricated the conspiracy. Having listened for seven weeks, an all-white jury acquitted all the defendants. Afterward, one juror announced that she had fallen in love with one of the defendants and planned to marry him. After the trial, Mr. Ellison went to prison, entered the Federal witness protection program and eventually ended up living on parole in Jasper, Fla., midway between Tallahassee and Jacksonville. He later left the witness program, finished his parole on April 21, two days after the Oklahoma City bombing, and was last seen that day in Jasper with two women, driving a car with Oklahoma plates. From his prison cell in Varner, Ark., Mr. Snell began publishing a periodic newsletter, The Seekers, which told of the "war to establish righteousness," a war in which he considered himself a P.O.W. The Militia of Montana, which rallied to Mr. Snell's cause in the March issue of its publication, Taking Aim, reminded its readers that his execution was set for April 19. Advertisement Continue reading the main story "If this date does not ring a bell for you then maybe this will jog your memory," the newsletter said. "1. April 19, 1775: Lexington burned; 2. April 19, 1943: Warsaw burned; 3. April 19, 1992: The fed's attempted to raid Randy Weaver, but had their plans thwarted when concerned citizens arrived on the scene with supplies for the Weaver family totally unaware of what was to take place; 4. April 19, 1993: The Branch Davidians burned; 5. April 19, 1995: Richard Snell will be executed -- unless we act now!!!" The action suggested in a note written by Mary Snell, his wife, and published by the newsletter, was to flood the Arkansas Governor's office with letters. As his execution approached, Mr. Snell was frequently visited by Mr. Millar, who shared Mr. Snell's final hours, witnessed his execution and took his body to Elohim City the next day for burial. Mr. Snell watched televised reports of the Oklahoma City bombing on the very day he died, Mr. Millar said, and was appalled by what he saw. Mr. Snell's last words, however, were threatening. He addressed them to Gov. Jim Guy Tucker just as he was strapped to a gurney for execution by lethal injection. "Governor Tucker, look over your shoulder," witnesses quote him as saying. "Justice is coming. I wouldn't trade places with you or any of your cronies. Hail the victory. I am at peace."
After talking about suing the NSA for weeks, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) After talking about suing the NSA for weeks, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) followed through on his rhetoric yesterday. But if the goal was to help start a conversation and generate some attention, the senator may not be entirely pleased by the direction of the discussion thus far. Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul is going after the National Security Agency – in court this time. “I am filing a lawsuit against President Barack Obama because he has publicly refused to stop a clear and continuing violation of the 4th Amendment,” Paul said in a statement Tuesday announcing his filing of a class-action lawsuit against the NSA. “The Bill of Rights protects all citizens from general warrants. I expect this case to go all the way to the Supreme Court and I predict the American people will win.” Paul is teaming up with former Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli and the conservative advocacy group Freedomworks in filing the suit against the NSA over its collection of phone records from American telecommunications companies. At the outset, there are some relevant questions surrounding the senator’s new lawsuit. For example, if there’s already a pending federal case, filed months ago by conservative provocateur Larry Klayman, raising the identical concerns, isn’t Rand Paul’s lawsuit redundant? For that matter, why did Paul wait so long between saying he’d file the suit and actually going to court? Why did the Kentucky Republican run this entre effort through his campaign operation instead of his Senate office? But by last night, an unexpected question had emerged: was the text of Paul’s lawsuit stolen from someone else? [Updated below.] A few months ago, the GOP senator found himself in the middle of a humiliating plagiarism scandal . As we documented in detail at the time, Paul presented others’ work as his own, on a wide variety of occasions, and in several types of media (speeches, op-eds, and books). After presenting a series of odd and unpersuasive defenses, Paul eventually acknowledged that he and his staff had “made mistakes” – but he was still a victim of journalists who accurately reported on his missteps. The controversy eventually faded, but the Washington Post’s Dana Milbank reports that Paul, already caught plagiarizing late last year, is now being accused of stealing his NSA lawsuit from its author. Since December, the libertarian lawmaker, a tea party favorite, had been working with former Reagan administration lawyer Bruce Fein to draft a class-action suit seeking to have the National Security Agency’s surveillance of telephone data declared unconstitutional; the two men appeared together as early as last June to denounce the NSA’s activities. But when Paul filed his suit at the U.S. District Court in Washington on Wednesday morning, Fein’s name had been replaced with that of Ken Cuccinelli, the failed Republican gubernatorial candidate in Virginia who until last month had been the state’s attorney general. Cuccinelli has never argued a case in that courthouse, and he isn’t even a member of the D.C. bar (he also filed a motion Wednesday seeking an exception to allow him to argue this case in D.C.). But he is, like Paul, a tea party darling. Fein, a well-known D.C. constitutional lawyer, especially prominent in Republican circles, was reportedly supposed to be paid by Rand Paul’s political action committee, but according to Milbank’s reporting, he has not yet been fully compensated for his work. That Fein’s name was apparently removed from the lawsuit that Fein wrote only adds insult to injury. Milbank has seen both documents and told readers, “[A] Jan. 15 draft of the complaint written by Fein has long passages that are nearly identical to those in the complaint Cuccinelli filed Wednesday. Except for some cuts and minor wording changes, they are clearly the same documents.” The senator was supposed to have a conference call with reporters yesterday afternoon to talk about his new lawsuit. That call was later canceled. Update: The executive director of Paul’s PAC was paid for work on this matter.” What’s more, while Milbank quotes Fein’s ex-wife as the attorney’s spokesperson, Paul’s group produced an email from Fein saying she does not speak for him. : The executive director of Paul’s PAC insists Fein “ Second Update: Bruce Fein : Bruce Fein confirmed to msnbc this morning that the concerns raised by his spokesperson “did not represent” his views.
P O S Yes today is Thursday, and NOT Sunday... But since I missed out the last two weekend rants and there is indeed so much happening around our sick world that I feel I need to put in my two cents worth, I figured it would be time for a "special" rant....What can I say that has not already been said by everyone with two brain cells to rub together about the most evil and wicked person on planet Earth, Hillary "Killary" Rodham Clinton that has not already been said? This crypto Jewish freak of nature is now the US Democratic Party candidate to become the next President of the United States, and may God, if there is one, have mercy on the American people if they are actually STUPID ENOUGH to vote for this sick demonic freak! Yes, the so called Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia that just ended (thank goodness) last night was a sham and a farce...It was so surprising to witness that other Jew, Bernie Sanders, throw in the towel and throw his support behind the freak Killary considering everyone knew that the US primaries were fixed and Killary was a long time ago selected to be the next President by the Jewish Elitist pigs that run America....Yes, Killary will most definitely be the next US President for the simple fact that the Jew spew media will LIE their asses off for the next few months leading up to the November vote stating that the "election" will be "too close to call" and that will signal the criminals that run the Diebold voting machines to switch over as many votes as possible to give Killary a "narrow" victory over Donald Drumpf.... It is a fact that most Americans are too brain dead now to actually do anything about it, and the fixed and stolen elections for this November will signal the beginning of a new Clinton crime family era in the White House with Killary in control as the new Empress of America... And again may any God (if there actually is one..) have mercy on the failure called the United States of America....I have watched and listened while on vacation as the Jew spew media has done their utmost to try to criminalize everything possible against Donald Drumpf who of course should be able to win the vote this November to be the next US President barring the Diebold voting machine fix.... I do agree with Buelahman's assessment of Drumpf as absolutely not the answer for America by a long shot... Drumpf is of course almost as much controlled by the Jewish elite as Killary with one exception.. Drumpf will not have the US launching World War III as quickly as Killary wants, and Drumpf will possibly actually try talking to the Russian Federation and the Iranians rather than Killary's want for war..... But of course again the fix is in and Drumpf will go down to defeat this November by outright cheating and the American people will once again be too stupid to do anything about it....Yes the two party system in America is a farce and sadly there is no third party candidate with an actual conscience to take America away from the criminal Jewish control and grip... And it does sadden me to watch and listen to the laughable rhetoric between the Democrats and Republicans knowing full well that they are just two sides of the same coin.... The criminal Jews will continue to maintain their control and sadly the only chance for Americans to break their evil grip is outright revolution....OK, I was right about the Nice France false flag attack being a fraud, and more and more the evidence is crystal clear that NOBODY died in that event and it was indeed a set up... I also saw the report while on vacation where the French government had the nerve to demand that all CCTV videos that may have captured what really happened during that "event" be destroyed! Honestly, that should have raised a red flag immediately that the whole thing was a farce due to the fact that the French government itself was in on the charade and wanted to have evidence of the fakery destroyed....Then we have the case of the Mossad agent masquerading as a "reporter" named Richard Gutjahr who was at BOTH the Nice "trucking incident" as well as the more recent Munich "Mcshooting"... Honestly, that was a dead giveaway that BOTH incidents were indeed conceived and run by the Israeli Mossad to try to strike fear in the German and French public so that they would stupidly surrender their rights for the fraud of more "security".... I am also surprised that even the Midgetman from Idaho who runs the Ugly Troll website has picked up on this, considering that troll has blindly and stupidly called most of the other shooting false flag incidents in the past as being real... Honestly, if this fool cannot put two and two together and realize that ALL so called "shootings" and "bombings" and even "truck ramming" that we have seen over the last decade are absolutely false flags and phoney, then the fool is an idiot and should never be in this fight....Yes, the Munich "shooting" was absolutely 100% phoney and a set up... It involved a "hit squad" of at least 3 Mossad agents and of course the Mossad agent Gutjahr there to "film the event" (Yes, the Jews love to film their actions which again shows their sickness...).... But the shocking thing is that the German people are truly that stupid and are willing now to surrender their rights and freedoms for the fraud of "security" much like the French.... Honestly, are the Europeans now as gullible as the Americans and Canadians?Please do not get me started about the most recent "incident" in France where an agent of the Israeli Secret Intelligence Service, or "ISIS" for short went out and "beheaded" a frail 84 year old priest in Normandy... The moment I heard that "ISIS" claimed responsibility for that fiasco, I knew it was another false flag to further stir up anger in the French... And of course thanks to the French Jew spew media whipping up the anger in the French due to this attack, it has worked like a charm with the French government calling for an "all out war" against ISIS..... How gullible indeed are the French?I have been very pleased to see the news in Syria get better and better by the day... Right now the good guys, the Syrian army and their allies, have the US financed mercenaries and killers aka the "rebels" all holed up in Aleppo with no escape routes left.. The good guys are now giving these mass murdering criminals a chance to surrender or else be slaughtered.. And with the reconquering of Aleppo by Assad's forces, the war to free Syria from the US/Israel/NATO criminal cabal will have turned fully in favour of the good guys and any more talk of demanding Assad to leave will have been defeated... Yes, the fall of Aleppo could indeed signal the beginning of the end of the sick Israeli dream of having Syria cut up into small pieces to allow its sick dream of a greater Israel be demolished....When I heard that the US was indeed behind the "coup" attempt in Turkey, I thought to myself "what else is new?"... The criminal US government has for decades now stuck its nose in the affairs of other nations and has been behind dozens of coups in nations worldwide.... Now that the truth has surfaced, it is time for President Erdogan of Turkey to take his nation out of the American/Israeli sphere of influence and turn towards the Russian Federation for an alliance..... It would be also in Turkey's best interests to get the hell out of NATO and demand the US get the hell off their territory immediately... Lets face it, for the failed coup in Turkey has once again shown the criminality of the United States and should be a wake up call for all nations that they are better off by not being a patsy for the American empire....Greencrow, ( www.greencrowasthecrowflies.blogspot.com ) a great fellow Canadian truth seeker put out in this week's "Caw Rant" the astonishing fact that Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has indeed "surrendered" to the criminals at Lougheed Martin and is willing to fork over billions of dollars now for the most useless F35 fighter POS (Stands forieceh*t for those who have been wondering...) plane, due to the fact that Lougheed Martin did exactly as I predicted before and "threatened" to pull some 10000 jobs out of Canada if Canada did not accept their POS fighter! Yes, this is indeed BLACKMAIL, and I am so surprised that Trudeau turned his back on the Canadian people and his own ethics (and of course his own election promise..) and agreed to surrender to Lougheed Martin! Honestly, Trudeau should have let the Canadian public know exactly what Lougheed Martin was up to and pulled the F35 contract immediately... Considering the fact that the Canadian government is about to spend upwards of 100 BILLION dollars for the useless F35 "fighter", it would have been better that Canada pull out of the contract and take that 100 BILLION DOLLARS and use it to find work for those 10000 people that would have been out of a job once Lougheed Martin pulled out of Canada... Considering the much better F18 Super Hornet was a better fighter and much cheaper than the F35 POS, that 100 BILLION would have not only been able to give Canada easily several hundred F18's and still have plenty left over to find the best jobs for the people thrown out of work by Lougheed Martin as well! And we could also consider the fact that Boeing, the company behind the F18 Super Hornet would have indeed with a Canadian contract be willing to give jobs to many of the people thrown out of work by Lougheed Martin as well..... Honestly, Justin Trudeau is an idiot for accepting blackmail and I am so surprised that the Jew spew media here in Canada has absolutely NOT reported at all on this fiasco.....I saw last week reports about this being the second anniversary of the MH17 fiasco over Ukraine that the US is still stupidly trying to blame the Russian Federation for their arrogant false flag attack.... And these reports are still calling the MH17 a "mystery" when it is no mystery at all... For those who still do not get it, the fateful flight of MH17 was in fact that final flight of the long "missing" MH370 that was flown out of Malaysia and secretly flown directly to the US military base at Diego Garcia.... From Diego Garcia, the now repainted and relabeled MH370 Boeing 777ER was flown with other military aircraft to the United States where it was decided to have it sent as a flying bomb to destroy the delegation gathered in March 2014 in The Hague Netherlands to discuss the Iranian "crisis" situation... Luckily the Dutch did indeed intercept this flying missile and it was diverted to a base in Europe. It was then decided by the Jewish power elite that the MH370 aircraft would be used as a false flag attack to blame Russia and it was conveniently flown out as MH17 with the long dead bodies from the original MH370 flight taken out of cold storage and reloaded into the aircraft... But everything went awry with the MH17 flight and even after the Ukrainian airforce on cue blew this robotic aircraft out of the sky over Ukraine, every shred of evidence gathered from the wreckage including the already rotting bodies on board showed that it was indeed the last flight of MH370! How anyone cannot see the link between MH370 and MH17 is beyond me..... There is no riddle at all, for MH17 does indeed equal MH370!Well, there you have it... I have indeed tried to cover as much of what I have missed over the last 11 days as possible... And for those issues that I may have not covered in full, I will touch on them here in what I usually call my "last minute tidbits"..... What the hell is the US trying to pull now in the South China Sea? Poking China to try to get a nice little war going over some small islands that they have no business in what so ever, and now I see that even the French are getting involved? Yes, the US is desperately trying to get a war going just to save itself from economic disaster.... I saw a report today that a US spy surveillance aircraft had to make an "emergency landing" in the Russian Federation? Honestly, I do not know what Barry Soetoro is trying to do now, but this "landing" in Russia stinks to high heaven.....The daughter of Mossad agent Richard Gutjahr was ALSO in Munich during that phoney "Mac attack"? How convenient is that? And again is glaring evidence that this attack as well as Nice were indeed conceived and run by the Mossad.......Israel is now wanting to further seize more territory in southern Syria under the lie that they need it for "security"? Bad enough they have illegally seized the Golan Heights, but it is so obvious now that since Assad is winning his war to gain his country back, Israel will now try to create their "Greater Israel" by other methods......Not sure about the "attack" in Japan, but that looks and stinks like a set up like all the other false flag attacks. And yes these false flag events will continue until either the people stupidly surrender their guns and their freedoms or they wake the hell up!..... Let me get this straight: A busker and activist living in Jasper Alberta, Monika Shaefer, is being attacked by the Jewish pricks that control Canada for questioning their so called "Holocaust"? I have many questions for these pricks including their numbers of deaths and their claims of "gassings" during that so called "Holocaust", but that could take up most of this rant, and I have not the time for their arrogance and stupidity. Honestly, anyone with any logic can see the flaws in the "Holocaust" religion, but as usual Canadians are muzzled from questioning and even research thanks to the draconian and fraudulent "hate crimes" here. Yes, truth never needs laws to support itself, only lies do........For those that want to know, Banff and Lake Louise are not cheap and most activities were absolutely ridiculously expensive. Yes, I did go up the Sulfur Mountain Gondola ride in Banff, but that was $44 Canadian per person for the round trip ride to the top of the mountain! A rip off by all accounts, but considering how many people in Banff were willing to fork over their money so willingly for the experience, I do wonder...... Someone asked if I saw any wild animals at all in Banff National Park, and honestly I saw NONE. But again that makes sense when you consider that most wild animals will stay clear of any humans (they can smell us for miles...), and there were thousands of tourists everywhere I went in that park.....I see the criminal Rothschild empire private army called "NATO"'s build up in eastern Europe is still going on at a rapid pace. It still shocks me that people are gullibly believing their government's and of course the Jew spew media's outright lies that the Russian Federation is somehow a "threat" and could "invade Poland" in an instant without actually looking at the facts. The facts are simple in that Russia is not threatening anyone and the real pricks here are NATO themselves that are wanting this war with Russia for their Jewish masters to avoid economic disaster and the people turning on them. It is my hope that people do wake up in time and stop this madness before World War III and the end of the world that we know it becomes a reality........ NO need here to put up anything about the Kardashians in this rant for Killary the Kackling, Killer, Kommie Kanckled, Krazy, Kooky, Kike, Kunt, Klinton, has done enough this week to make everyone with any intelligence sick to their stomachs. The hard part to swallow is that there are still some 10% of the American people still gullible enough to actually vote for this satanic demonic creature?It is good to be back....... Too bad the world is as fucked up as ever.....More to comeNTS
Unreal Engine 4 launches today. What we’re releasing is both simple and radical: everything. Epic’s goal is to put the engine within reach of everyone interested in building games and 3D content, from indies to large triple-A development teams, and Minecraft creators as well. For $19/month you can have access to everything, including the Unreal Editor in ready-to-run form, and the engine’s complete C++ source code hosted on GitHub for collaborative development. This is the complete technology we at Epic use when building our own games, forged by years of experience shipping games like Gears of War for Xbox and Infinity Blade for iOS, and now reinvented for a new generation. Having the full C++ source provides the ultimate flexibility and puts developers in control of their schedules and destinies: Whatever you require to build and ship your game, you can find it in UE4, source it in the GitHub community, or build it yourself – and then share it with others. Develop in the Unreal Ecosystem Beyond the tools and source, Unreal Engine 4 provides an entire ecosystem. Chat in the forums, add to the wiki, participate in the AnswerHub Q&A, and join collaborative development projects via GitHub. To help you get started, we’re shipping lots of ready-made content, samples, and game templates. You’ll find it in the Marketplace in the Unreal Editor. Right now, it simply hosts free stuff from Epic, but its resemblance to the App Store is no coincidence: It will grow into a complete ecosystem for sharing community-created content, paid and free, and open for everyone’s participation! Ship Games with Unreal We’re working to build a company that succeeds when UE4 developers succeed. Anyone can ship a commercial product with UE4 by paying 5% of gross revenue resulting from sales to users. If your game makes $1,000,000, then we make $50,000. We realize that’s a lot to ask, and that it would be a crazy proposition unless UE4 enables you to build way better games way more productively than otherwise! So, will this effort succeed? That’s up to you and your judgment of the engine’s value. Unreal Engine 4 has been built by a team of over 100 engineers, artists and designers around the world, and this launch represents all of our hopes and dreams of how major software can be developed and distributed in the future. We find this future very exciting. It’s no longer dominated by giant publishers and marketing campaigns, but by a simple and honest proposition: Gamers pay for great games, and anybody who can valuably contribute to building those games can succeed, from indie developers, to large triple-A teams, and to individual programmers and content creators, too. A New Beginning This first release of Unreal Engine 4 is just the beginning. In the C++ code, you can see many new initiatives underway, for example to support Oculus VR, Linux, Valve’s Steamworks and Steam Box efforts, and deployment of games to web browsers via HTML5. It’s all right there, in plain view, on day one of many years of exciting and open development ahead! We have enjoyed building Unreal Engine 4 so far and hope you will join us on this journey as a contributor to the future of Unreal! Tim Sweeney Founder, Epic Games
Image copyright DHA Image caption Those affected were treated at the scene but could not be saved Three children and two adults who tried to rescue them have been electrocuted in a water park in north-western Turkey, local media say. The incident happened in the town of Akyazi, in Sakarya province, 100km (62 miles) east of Istanbul. The park manager and his son dived in to help the three children. The five, believed to be all Turkish, were taken to hospital but could not be saved. It was unclear how the pool had become electrified. Rescuers and park personnel flushed the pool's water away as others turned off electricity in the facility. One other person was injured in the incident and taken to hospital. An investigation has already begun. The Hurriyet newspaper named the park manager as Mehmet Kaya, 58, and his son as Kadir Kaya, 30. The children were aged 12, 15 and 17, Turkish media said.
Jeremy Taylor & Friends // Reggae Interpretation of Kind of Blue (Recorded in 1981. Released in 2009) Jeremy Taylor, a music professor at NYU and jazz musician himself had this to say in his 1979 book, “A Space Between:” My first trip to Jamaica (May 1977) was the most eye-opening musical experience of my life. I met so many incredible players who had been brushed off by the snobby musical establishment…..I had to find a way to showcase their unparalleled talent in a different medium and this was the spark that lit the fire to create this reggae tribute to Miles Davis’ best selling jazz album of all time. Now, I normally regard albums like this as throw-away camp but in this case it’s truly a great album and it really showcases the talent these Jamaican musicians had and still have. So, for those Jazz fans completely unfamiliar to Reggae this is a perfect place to start. *Note: The heavy vinyl crackle passes after about 30 seconds Beat Under Control // The Introduction // 2003 Less a Dub album than an album that explores Dub themes mixing all kinds of other genres including, at times, Drum N’ Bass. The horns are always spectacular and very chilled out like Miles Davis’ In A Silent Way with a touch of Bitches Brew at wilder moments, over a Trip Hop beat and Dub bass lines. The 14 minute Speechless even has some Krautrock sounds sneaking in. Quite a nice trip that would suit a dimly lit party where smoke hangs in the air like honey would drip from a spoon. Beer is out of the question, this music calls for something like an Old Fashioned, a dry martini or red wine from Spain. The 14 minute Speechless, which does a great job at showcasing all the low grumbles, ambient horns and beaty goodness the album offers. http://rd.io/i/QVWLmDcBFm0 Dub Guerilla // Dub Guerilla // 2005 I wish I could enjoy Dub Guerilla, a band that literally combines Dub with Jazz, a little more. The band features 3 trombonists playing over Dub rhythms. To my ears and soul only a few tracks are good on this album. Which, in many ways, is a testament to their love of Dub as there are a plethora of Dub albums out there (even by the greats) that only have a few key tracks on an album worth mentioning while the others, be it good, not great. That said, due to the content and purpose of this list, here is a fantastic track from their well received self titled album Tomorrow we’ll take a look at some of the legends of Dub.
Stating that Pakistan is not an architect of present crisis in Kashmir, former Chief Minister Omar Abdullah today said India was unwilling to own people of Kashmir inspite of stating that Kashmir is integral part of India. "When you say Kashmir is an integral part of India, you are talking about the land, not the people. You need to own the people with the land. It is not good enough to say Kashmir is part of India, what about Kashmiris then. Please own the people, not just the land. If you are unwilling to address the anger, then you are unwilling to own the people," Abdullah said while addressing reporters after chairing meeting of all opposition parties. The opposition parties are going to present a memorandum to the President to urge the Centre to take steps to address present crisis in the Valley. "DIALOGUE IS THE ONLY WAY FORWARD" Omar Abdullah strongly pitched that a dialogue is the only way forward. "We are supporters of a dialogue, whether it be National Conference, Congress, CPI(M) or any other smaller group. We believe dialogue is the only way forward. Both India and Pakistan should take requisite steps to improve the environment so that a dialogue is possible," said Omar. He said separatist and mainstream parties in Kashmir remain relevant whether Kashmir was undergoing peace or crisis. Citing example of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's response to agitation in Gujarat early this year, Abdullah said, "It is mind-boggling that far lesser agitation in Gujarat had no lesser the person in India than the prime minister addressing that state in Gujarati from Delhi because he owned the people, he owned the state. Why is it that we don't get owned, why is that our anger doesn't get owned, why is it that our sentiment doesn't get owned, why is it that we get the feeling that you have to be forced to recognize the problem." OMAR APPEALS TO THE CENTRE "We are appealing to the Centre that it should recognise that there is problem. Please recognise that there is anger and this anger is not created by Pakistan. Yes, they may, as is past practice of fishing in troubled waters but they are not the architects of this problem and they are not the ones to keep it alive. It is our inability to recognise anger in Kashmir and inability to address this anger. We need to first recognise it and accept it and then we can hope this anger dies down," Abdullah said. Abdullah while comparing present protests in the Valley with uprising of 2010 when he was Chief Minister of the State, said that New Delhi's refusal to recognise the problem is complicated. "If the Valley erupted in 2008 against the economic blockade of Kashmir, it was addressed by opening of Srinagar-Muzafferabad trade route," he said. "Today both the Centre and State are turning a blind eye to the situation. If you don't recognise the anger, if you don't seek to address the root cause of the anger, how will the anger die away," Abdullah asked. "Kashmir crisis was only taken into note as the Parliament was in session. Twice the opposition brought this issue for discussion in the Rajya Sabha and once in the Lok Sabha," said Abdullah. He said unlike 2010 when the PDP actively lobbied for dismissal of his government, he has not sought dismissal of Mehbooba Mufti government. "This is not battle for chairs. This is not about pulling Mehbooba Mufti down so that one of us can get on that chair. This is about safeguarding future generation of Jammu and Kashmir," he said. Also read: India will talk to Pakistan only on cross-border terrorism, not Kashmir India ready for talks with Pakistan but only on 'relevant issues', says MEA
Avery Island, the birthplace of Tabasco Brand Products including TABASCO® pepper sauce, has been owned for over 180 years by the interrelated Marsh, Avery and McIlhenny families. Lush subtropical flora and venerable live oaks draped with wild muscadine and swags of barbe espagnole, or Spanish moss, cover this geological oddity, which is one of five "islands" rising above south Louisiana’s flat coastal marshes. The 2,200-acre tract sits atop a deposit of solid rock salt thought to be deeper than Mount Everest is high. Geologists believe this deposit is the remnant of a buried ancient seabed, pushed to the surface by the sheer weight of surrounding alluvial sediments. Although covered with a layer of fertile soil, salt springs may have attracted prehistoric settlers to the island as early as 12,000 years ago. Fossils suggest that early inhabitants shared the land with mastodons and mammoths, giant sloths, saber-toothed tigers and three-toed horses. A salt production industry dates back to about 1000 AD, judging from recovered basket fragments, polished stone implements, and shards of pottery left by American Indians. Although these early dwellers remained on the Island at least as late as the 1600s, they had mysteriously disappeared by the time white settlers first discovered the briny springs at the end of the next century. After the Civil War, former New Orleans banker E. McIlhenny met a traveler recently arrived from Mexico who gave McIlhenny a handful of pepper pods, advising him to season his meals with them. McIlhenny saved some of the pods and planted them in his in-laws’ garden on Avery Island; he delighted in the peppers’ piquant flavor, which added excitement to the monotonous food of the Reconstruction-era South. Around 1866 McIlhenny experimented with making a hot sauce from these peppers, hitting upon a formula that called for crushing the reddest, ripest peppers, stirring in Avery Island salt, and aging the concoction he then added French white wine vinegar, hand-stirring it regularly to blend the flavors. After straining, he transferred the sauce to small cologne-type bottles, which he corked and sealed in green wax. "That Famous Sauce Mr. McIlhenny Makes" proved so popular with family and friends that McIlhenny decided to market it, growing his first commercial crop in 1868. The next year he sent out 658 bottles of sauce at one dollar per bottle wholesale to grocers around the Gulf Coast, particularly in New Orleans. The public responded positively and soon McIlhenny had introduced Tabasco sauce to consumers in major markets across the United States. By the end of the 1870s McIlhenny was exporting Tabasco sauce to Europe. So began the fiery condiment that is now a global cultural and culinary icon. Today, Avery Island remains the home of the Tabasco Factory, as well as Jungle Gardens and its Bird City waterfowl refuge. The Tabasco factory and the gardens are open to the public. For more information, visit the Tabasco website.
Patna: A violent clash broke out between the police and the locals in Vaishali district of Bihar when the police was in the middle of demolishing a temple yesterday in which several cops were injured. Sub-Inspector of Police Sanjay Kumar’s rifle was snatched and he was severely beaten. The injured are being treated in a hospital here. The police had gone to demolish a temple following the court’s order. Earlier also, the police had gone with the district magistrate to demolish the temple, but failed to do so due to the locals’ anger against the administration. The locals included both Hindus and Muslims who unitedly objected to demolition of the temple. The High Court had ordered to demolish the Vasudev temple. The locals raised slogans against the administration and claimed that the real situation was not being revealed to the court. According to them, it is a private land but the administration is claiming it to be government’s property.
So I watched Z for Zachariah… I was quite eager to see this movie. The post-apocalyptic theme is one that isn’t exactly original in today’s day and age but the idea of it being told with characters that aren’t teenagers immune from some unknown virus is (yes, I’m looking at you Maze Runner and Divergent). The cast also comprised of some of my favourite actors in Hollywood so I couldn’t resist. Okay, basic plot: After a nuclear apocalypse wipes out the majority of civilisation, Ann (Margot Robbie) leads a solitary lifestyle out in a valley which was unaffected by the radiation from the nuclear fallout. Ann begins to think that she may be the last remaining survivor on Earth until one day she meets John Loomis (Chiwetel Ejiofor) – an engineer who had been camped out in a nuclear bunker. The two find comfort in each other with Ann providing John a home and food, and John using his skills to improve life in the valley. Their new found peace is disrupted when another survivor – Caleb (Chris Pine) – turns up. John is distrusting of Caleb and fears his intentions may be sinister, especially those aimed at Ann’s heart. There’s no shortage of post-apocalyptic films out there at the moment but very few of them are as focused on the humanity of the survivors as this one. This film reminded me a lot of Ex_Machina – both films are a thought experiment about the nature of humanity and what definition it takes in the most extreme of consequences. This film doesn’t focus on the conditions but rather on how the characters in the film react to these conditions and what each of them is willing to do in order to survive. I enjoyed this because it depicts the world such an environment would create with great authenticity and heart. It does fall into the trap of setting up a love triangle which is a feature of post-apocalyptic films that has been overused to the point of being tedious cliche. However, Z for Zachariah does set itself apart by handling the conflict with more maturity and complexity than seen in YA dramas. I know Margot Robbie has already established herself in Hollywood but I think this is her breakout role. Not to besmirch her earlier work but I think this is the first time I’ve seen her cast in a role where she’s actually required to act and not just look sexy naked or in a bathtub. Her beauty is downplayed and she’s allowed to show us that she’s more than just a pretty face. She puts on a convincing Southern accent and is this film’s emotional linchpin. Chiwetel Ejiofor and Chris Pine also put in stirring and emotionally rousing performances but this film is the Margot Robbie show and she deservedly steals the limelight in every scene. The problem that comes with movies being so grounded in reality and authenticity is that they’re often devoid of much needed drama. This leads to the film feeling like it’s dragging and adds length to the runtime that isn’t really there. There are several moments in the script – written by Nissar Modi – where you feel like drama should have been injected that are left far too plain. The film trudges along when it should be galloping and this leaves you hoping for the ending to come soon. I did enjoy the ending of the film though which was left open to interpretation and is a perfect example of how good or bad humans can be when no one is watching. Overall, Z for Zachariah is a film that has a great idea but lacks the substance to execute it. The cast – in particular Margot Robbie – do a fantastic job and are the main reason you should see it. It’s worth watching but not worth a trip to the cinema. 6/10
The following is excerpted from the new book Saban: The Making of a Coach, by Monte Burke. Advertisement Nick Saban left LSU and took the job as the head coach of the Miami Dolphins on Christmas Day in 2004. The NFL had changed in the decade he’d been away. Free agency, in its infancy during Saban’s time as the defensive coordinator with the Browns, had grown into full maturity. The players were now empowered, and they weren’t afraid to show it. The college game was—and remains today—about the cult of the coach. In the pros, the players now reigned. In the 2005 off-season, Saban discovered quickly—and rudely—just how different things had become. At the Miami Dolphins’ annual rookie talent show, Matt Roth and Channing Crowder—the second- and third-round draft picks, respectively, that year—decided to team up for their act. Instead of trying to sing or dance or tell jokes, they opted to go with something a bit bolder. With the coaches, players, and staff gathered in an auditorium at the Dolphins’ headquarters, Crowder called the rookie head coach up to the stage, which had, as a prop, a single chair. “I looked out into the crowd and said, ‘Hey, Coach, we just appreciate you giving us the chance to play in the NFL, and we want to show you some love,’ ” says Crowder. With that, he pointed to the chair and invited Saban to sit down. Saban, somewhat reluctantly, obliged. He sat facing Crowder and Roth. At that moment, Kay-Jay Harris, an undrafted free agent who had been signed by the team, was supposed to start playing some loud club music over the speakers, but he couldn’t figure out how to get the CD player to work. The “surprise” that Crowder and Roth had in store for Saban didn’t wait for her cue, however. From behind him, a stripper—dressed in high heels, a very small bikini, and a Jason Taylor Dolphins jersey—pranced out of a door and onto the stage. She touched Saban’s back. He flinched. When she walked around to face Saban, he shot straight up in his chair. Harris still couldn’t get the music going. The auditorium was instead filled with shouts and catcalls coming from the seats. The stripper moved in front of Saban and began to dance provocatively. He sat completely still for one more moment, then abruptly stood up, walked off the stage, and hustled up the stairs. The room went silent. “There were like 30 stairs,” says Crowder. “All you could hear was the click, click, click of his shoes, then the door creaking open and the boom when it shut behind him.” The room exploded in delirious peals of laughter. “It was pretty immature on our part to include Saban in the skit,” says Crowder. “But that’s why we did it.” Advertisement In “organized team activities” (OTAs) that spring, Saban had the entire team line up for sprints. He blew his whistle, and everyone took off ... except for Keith Traylor, a nose tackle who weighed at least 350 pounds. According to some of his teammates, Traylor—then a 14-year NFL veteran and winner of three Super Bowls—had a clause in his contract that relieved him of conditioning duties. So, instead of sprinting with the rest of the team, Traylor set off on a leisurely jog. When he realized that Saban was eyeing him, Traylor began to taunt him, yelling, “Hey, Nick! Hey, Nick!” Traylor knew, as the rest of his teammates did, that Saban hated being called “Nick” by his players. He wanted them to address him as “Coach” or “Coach Saban,” just as his college players always had. Zach Thomas and Nick Saban in 2005. Photo via Getty Traylor kept yelling, “Hey, Nick!” Finally, Saban snapped and told him to shut the hell up and run. Advertisement Traylor responded: “Who the fuck do you think you’re talking to?” and ambled over to the sideline and stood and watched as his teammates ran their sprints. Later that off-season, during an intra-team scrimmage, Zach Thomas, a hard-nosed and, at times, crusty nine-year NFL vet, got into a shouting match with one of the Dolphins’ assistant coaches. Thomas, because of his experience and talent, was a leader on the defense. He got a kick out of occasionally switching a Saban-called play in the defensive huddle, something his coach had begun to notice. Saban’s face contorted into rage when he heard Thomas yelling. He stopped practice and ran over to Thomas and told him to “shut the fuck up.” Thomas told Saban to “shut the fuck up” right back, then yelled, “I’m a grown-ass man!” As the two men went at it face-to-face, Thomas’s teammates sensed that the linebacker’s fury was placing him on the verge of doing something he would later regret, so they grabbed him by the shoulders and dragged him away as he continued to shout and point a finger at his head coach. Though Saban didn’t much like this treatment, his players didn’t take it too seriously. Thomas was an intense player, and his run-ins with his coaches were just seen as part of his mien, and they seemed to fire him up and make him a better player. When Traylor and others started to call Saban “Nick” just to get his goat, their teammates saw it for what it was. “That’s just what millionaire assholes do,” says Crowder. Advertisement
CLOSE The third of five streetcars-each weighing 40 tons, has a length of 77 feet and cost $2.9 million-rolled off a custom trailer down ramps and onto the rails at the north end of Race Street. The 3.6 mile loop is scheduled to open in September, 2016. The Enquirer/Patrick Reddy Buy Photo A recent test run of Cincinnati’s streetcar passed in front of Findlay Market. (Photo: Enquirer file)Buy Photo For once, everything appeared set up for a drama-free streetcar vote. Seemingly everyone at Cincinnati City Hall believed City Council had a veto-proof six votes to rubber-stamp the streetcar operating budget. Everyone except Councilman Kevin Flynn, whose surprise no vote sent the operating budget – and the meeting – into absolute chaos. Wanting to consider Flynn's concerns, Mayor John Cranley threatened to veto the budget. Council members were left frustrated. Staffers were sent scrambling to see if there could be a last-minute fix. In the end, it was another hourslong, circus-like streetcar debate and Council decided to send the budget proposal back to committee. "Kevin is trying to save taxpayers money," Cranley said. "If we had known that before the meeting started, we would've held it and worked out all the issues. Council did the right thing to take it back and make sure the taxpayers are protected. I anticipate all this will get worked out." It's expected to be resolved at a special budget committee meeting next week. Flynn threw everyone for such a loop, that those in Council chambers still were confused after the meeting. "Just to be clear: Today's deviation wasn't about dollar amount, it was about sources" of money, Vice Mayor David Mann said to Flynn before they exited Council chambers. "Yes," Flynn said. Going into Wednesday's meeting, all eyes were on Councilwoman Amy Murray and how she would vote. She abstained from the vote in Monday's budget committee meeting. But it still passed 6-2, including Flynn's approval, to move it to a full vote of Council. On Tuesday, Murray told The Enquirer she abstained because the administration inserted an additional $550,000 from the general fund just in case ridership projections fall short in the first year of operations. In the interview with The Enquirer, she didn't say exactly how she would vote on Wednesday, but indicated she would vote no. "I'm uncomfortable voting for this expenditure of money," Murray said. Meanwhile, Flynn began to question his vote on Tuesday afternoon, he said. That's when Councilman Chris Seelbach hinted during the transportation committee meeting that the streetcar should be free for a brief period of time after it opens to the public in September. NEWSLETTERS Get the News Alerts newsletter delivered to your inbox We're sorry, but something went wrong Be the first to be informed of important news as it happens in Greater Cincinnati. Please try again soon, or contact Customer Service at 1-800-876-4500. Delivery: Varies Invalid email address Thank you! You're almost signed up for News Alerts Keep an eye out for an email to confirm your newsletter registration. More newsletters Then on Tuesday night, Flynn read the story about Murray's stance on Cincinnati.com, he said, causing him to change his mind. It surprised Flynn, who had worked closely with Murray to put the budget together. Flynn said he was up until midnight fretting his vote. "I only told my wife," he said. So when Council kicked off the conversation about the streetcar budget, Flynn's position became apparent immediately. He started by saying that he agreed with Murray and then began to question a previous decision that the $1.1 million being used to test the streetcar is coming out of parking money. Instead, Flynn wants the start-up costs to come from the leftover money in the construction budget's rainy-day fund. Flynn is trying to protect parking revenue that has been set aside for running the streetcar. Additional parking money may be needed to help run the streetcar in the first and second years of operations. If that cushion is not there, Council may have to later dip into taxpayer money in the general fund. Flynn's change-of-heart underscores the concern he and others at City Hall have about how much money fares, advertising and sponsorships will bring in to help cover the $4.2 million annual budget. In addition to the nearly $677,000 needed to be generated from fares in the first year, the city projects advertising and sponsorships to bring in $450,000. But the city has only sold advertising to one company, Four Entertainment Group, which owns several bars and restaurants in the city. That deal is worth $4,000 in the first year, Flynn told The Enquirer. "Obviously, we now have to proceed with the streetcar, but I'm always looking to save as many taxpayer dollars as possible," Cranley said. "Let's get it right." How council voted: • On the streetcar operating budget: Yes: David Mann, P.G. Sittenfeld, Wendell Young, Chris Seelbach, Yvette Simpson No: Amy Murray, Christopher Smitherman, Charlie Winburn, Kevin Flynn • To send the budget back to committee: Yes: Yvette Simpson, Wendell Young, Kevin Flynn, Christopher Smitherman, Charlie Winburn, Amy Murray No: Chris Seelbach, P.G. Sittenfeld, David Mann In other council news: • Based on a motion made by Councilman Chris Seelbach, Council unanimously ordered the administration to repair barriers along Eden Park Drive that are missing or damaged, creating a safety hazard. “This formalizes the city’s intent, orders the administration to figure out which office is responsible and get it fixed,” Seelbach said. City Manager Harry Black said the matter is being treated as an “emergency public safety item.” It will be fixed out of the current operating budget, instead of using money approved for road paving and new vehicles as the motion suggested. • Council, in a 7-2 vote, banned all unnecessary to travel to North Carolina and Mississippi, after those states passed laws that many believe discriminate against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. Seelbach proposed the idea and defended it when Councilman Charlie Winburn asked what he hoped to accomplish. “Anti-gay legislation will not be tolerated by the City of Cincinnati,” Seelbach said. Read or Share this story: http://cin.ci/1N8WgYL
NEWS RELEASE GREYHOUND CANADA *********************** Greyhound agency to relocate in Sault Ste. Marie, ON BURLINGTON, ON - Greyhound Canada is pleased to announce that on Monday, October 15, it will begin operating from its new agency location at the Howard Johnson Hotel, 503 Trunk Road. From this new location, Greyhound will continue to provide four daily schedules, connecting passengers to some of the areas most popular travel destinations, including Sudbury, Toronto, Thunder Bay, and all other destinations within its North American network. In addition to passenger services, Greyhound Canada will also continue to provide Greyhound Courier Express (GCX) from this new location. GCX is Greyhound Canada’s package shipping service, which provides customers affordable prices and flexible shipping times throughout the year. “We are pleased to begin operating from our new location and continuing to provide customers with easy travel connectivity in and out of the city,” said Peter Hamel, Regional Manager, Greyhound Canada. “We look forward to a great start at this location and continuing to be the city’s choice for safe, reliable and affordable travel service.” The agency is open seven days a week from 6:30 a.m. to 8 p.m. and 11 p.m. to 12 a.m. For Greyhound ticket information in Sault Ste. Marie, call 705-541-9305 or visit us online at www.greyhound.ca. About Greyhound Greyhound is the largest North American provider of intercity bus transportation, serving more than 3,800 destinations across the continent. The company also provides Greyhound Courier Express (GCX) and charter services. For fare and schedule information and to buy tickets call 1-800-661- TRIPS (8747) or visit the Web site at www.greyhound.com. Follow Greyhound on Twitter for the latest news and travel deals, http://twitter.com/GreyhoundBus. ***********************
A 17-year-old Roseville boy was arrested Wednesday after witnesses saw him light a grass fire and run into a nearby apartment complex, police say. Authorities responded to the fire, on the north side of South Cirby and Piedmont ways, around 8:30 p.m., according to a Roseville Police Department crime log. Firefighters were able to put out the fire within 10 minutes, and the 17-year-old was arrested soon after. Police say he's suspected of setting only this fire, but think there may be a connection with other recent grass fires in Roseville, including the massive Maidu Park fire that burned 30 acres last month. "[Police investigators are] continuing to investigate the possible connection between this incident, the Maidu Park fire and other recent suspicious grass fires in east Roseville," the crime log states. "Investigators believe there are other juveniles involved, and ask that anyone with any information about these arson fires give us a call." Here's how police ask residents to submit tips: You can submit a crime tip online by visiting the Roseville Police Department's website at www.roseville.ca.us/police and selecting "Submit a Tip" from the menu on the left. You'll be redirected to TipSoft's website. Wireless phone users can text a tip to 274637 ("CRIMES"). Start your tip with the word "ROSEVILLE". You can also call Roseville Crime Stoppers at 916-783-STOP with information about crimes. -- Stay Patched in! Follow Roseville Patch on Twitter \| Like Roseville Patch on Facebook \| Sign up for the daily email with links to the latest news.
There has been a dramatic 61 per cent increase in anti-Semitic hate crime in the UK capital over the past 12 months according to the latest statistics released by London’s Metropolitan Police. A total of 483 anti-Semitic crimes were committed up until November 2015, up from 299 crimes in the same period in 2014. Breitbart London has reported on rising anti-Semitic attacks in London during 2015 but this is the first time figures have been released to back what various media outlets once dismissed as a minor problem compared to so-called Islamophobia. The London anti-Semitism experience also mirrors events in other capitals across Europe. Hotspots included Westminster in the heart of London where there was a 178 per cent rise, the inner Borough of Hackney where there were 122 crimes, Tower Hamlets which had a 100 per cent rise and Lambeth which had a 200 per cent increase. Speaking to the Jewish News, the Met police reaffirmed they are “committed to tackling hate crime in all its forms”, adding that they “take positive action to investigate all hate crime allegations, support victims and their families and bring perpetrators to justice.” Reflecting on the figures, they said “there has been a rise in faith/religious hate crime, however the MPS believes these increases are down to a range of factors, including the improvements in crime recording, a growing willingness of victims to report hate crime; and an improved awareness of MPS staff to identify these offences. Work continues to reassure the Jewish community that action is being taken, according to the Met: “We continue to speak regularly with local synagogues, and also work closely with organisations representing different faiths regarding hate crime issues, such as the Community Security Trust [CST] for anti-Semitic hate crime.” Jonathan Sacerdoti, Director of Communications at Campaign Against Antisemitism said: “Since our inception we have pushed for zero tolerance of antisemitism under the law. It is vital that people report all incidents whether they are witnesses or victims. “The rise in recorded antisemitic crimes is worrying, but by better highlighting these crimes, we have encouraged the authorities to take firmer action than they have in the past, in cases from that of Nazi sympathising school teacher Mahmudul Choudhury, who was convicted and then banned from teaching for life in proceedings we instigated, to the sentencing of antisemitic propagandist Joshua Bonehill-Paine to more than three years following our prevention of the ‘Anti-Jewification’ rally in Golders Green that he inspired.”
Glen Johnson: Set for talks over a new deal Rodgers is a huge fan of the 29-year-old, who he describes as "one of the best full-backs in the world". Johnson will have just one year left on his current contract once the season has finished, and Rodgers does not want to risk losing the former Chelsea, West Ham and Portsmouth defender. "It's important for me with how we play that the full-backs can get up, join in and make runs in behind. We are seeing now the player we all know Liverpool had - which is one of the best full-backs in the world," Rodgers told the Liverpool Echo. "We want to keep Glen here, there is no question about that, especially now he's in this form. He's 29 and we feel that he has still got good years ahead of him. "No contracts will be looked at until the summer but his will be a priority for us, especially if he continues in the form that he's in. "The beauty of this is we want to keep Glen and Glen loves it here. We just need to find a solution which is good for both. "If we can do that then the club will have a very good player for years to come. "We have other players like young Jon Flanagan who only has one year left, while Jordan Henderson only has two years left. They have been great and we want to look at those contracts. "That's something that will be for the summer. The players can do themselves no harm by continuing to play in the form they are in. The club will then take a close look at it." Committed Johnson has battled back to full fitness from a number of injury problems, but Rodgers believes that his commitment has never been in doubt. "It's been really difficult for Glen because he has wanted to give so much more," Rodgers said. "He has wanted to put himself out on the training pitch every day and play games but he was nowhere near 100% right. Of course when you put yourself out there you are getting judged. "That is why we had to give him that time out. There was no timeline on it. I just knew there was so much more to come from him. "We needed to come together to find a way to get him back to his best. That meant taking him out in order for him to get back to that level. "Now he's feeling fresh and playing for the first time in ages without any injuries. Now you see that mobility and running power that he has."
Police chief Mark Saunders has met with a family after two Toronto police officers were caught on dash camera video mocking their daughter. 29-year-old Francie Munoz was born with Down Syndrome. The family says she was one of three women in a car that was pulled over last November, suspected of running a red light. They decided to fight the ticket. "After six months we received disclosure which included the video," Francie's mother, Pamela, told NEWSTALK 1010's Moore in the Morning. "Unbeknownst to the officers (the video) had audio describing our daughter in derogatory and demeaning and insulting terms." Carlos Munoz/Facebook The voices of two men can be heard in the video. One of them is heard using the word, "disfigured." "My immediate response was enraged. I couldn't believe that officers would do this," Pamela says. Chief Saunders visited the Munoz family home Monday afternoon to "connect" with them. Francie's father Carlos says the family is satisfied with the chief and an investigation underway. The family is still waiting for an apology from the two officers. Toronto police assocation president Mike McCormack says the officers are very concerned and apologetic about their comments, and that what they said does not reflect how they have been known to conduct themselves.
Mississippi Legal Ages Laws Parents are always wondering if their children are growing up too fast. Meanwhile, their children would probably respond that they’re not growing up fast enough. While children and their parents are left to argue about when they’ll finally be grown-ups, how does the legal system in the Magnolia State distinguish between minors and adults? Here is a brief overview of legal age laws in Mississippi. Age of Majority in Mississippi State minor laws set out what is known as the "age of majority," or the age at which a citizen is considered an adult in the eyes of the law. Mississippi’s age of majority is older than most states, at 21 years old. However, minors do have some legal rights and responsibilities. For example, under Mississippi law, 18-year olds can enter into contracts and settle personal injury lawsuits. Mississippi Age Statutes Mississippi’s legal age statutes are listed in the table below. Age of Majority 21 (Mississippi Code 1-3-27) Eligibility for Emancipation By petition, no minimum age specified (Mississippi Code 93-19-3) Contracts by Minors 18 for personal property; ratification must be signed in writing (Mississippi Code 15-3-11) Minors' Ability to Sue 18 to settle personal injury claims; married minor may file in marital matters; court appoints guardian ad litem (Mississippi Code 11-21-3) Minors' Consent to Medical Treatment Not specified Emancipation and the Legal Responsibilities of Minors Mississippi, along with many other states, has for a legal process by which a person under the age of 21 can apply to become an adult in the eyes of the law. The process is referred to as the “emancipation of a minor,” (or in Mississippi as the “Removal of Disability of Minority”) and can allow for a minor to become responsible for his or her own decisions regarding education, health care, residence, and other matters. Mississippi statutes do not provide a minimum age for emancipation, and courts will decide emancipation cases in the best interest of the minor. For the most part, until they turn 21 (or they are emancipated) minors will be treated as such in criminal cases, including age and status offenses. Mississippi Legal Ages Laws: Related Resources State laws regarding the age of majority may cover a variety of topics. You can consult with a Mississippi family law attorney if you would like legal assistance regarding a juvenile case or a family law matter. You can also find more resources and information on this topic by visiting FindLaw’s section on Family Law. Learn More About Mississippi Legal Ages Laws by Speaking to a Lawyer All states have age restrictions for certain activities and legal processes, such as purchasing cigarettes or getting a driver's license. Also, your age will determine whether you are charged for criminal acts as an adult or a juvenile. If you need help with an age-related legal matter, contact a family law attorney in Mississippi today.
I love Daft Punk and when I first heard the remix version was on youtube from an audiophile named Kennrick Sound in Japan. This audio group takes high end JBL speakers and modifies the magnets, coils, and electronic components of the crossovers to make the speakers sound exceptionally better than they come out of the factory. The speakers sells for minimum $10k U.S. and quickly skyrockets depending on model and so forth. Anyhow, I had to get this single so I can play it on my audio setup at home. It sounds great out of my AR speakers! It even sounds great through my Beyerdynamic earphones as well using a mid 70's solid-state Sansui receiver. Best to use a good quality cartridge to really enjoy this record. I recommend at least an elliptical stylus or higher quality. If you can, play it on a Shibata stylus and it will sound superb! I use a Denon DL-160 MC high output cart and it sounds very good.
Get the biggest What's On 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 It’s been a busy week for bar and restaurant launches in Manchester as operators race to open in time for Christmas. The city has welcomed a flurry of new venues over the past few days with even more set to join them this weekend. Thursday alone saw the launch of three new places - a cheesy Christmas pop-up bar, a European beer hall and a stylish new Spinningfields cocktail bar. Two old favourites are also settling into new homes, while the city has also welcomed a couple of completely new names - including a Japanese joint from London and a new Northern Quarter bar and music venue launched by members of indie band One Night Only. Here's everything you need to know about this week's new arrivals. Make sure you keep an eye on our food and drink section for all the latest restaurant and bar news and reviews. Shoryu Ramen (Image: Carl Sukonik) The Japanese ramen bar has been bedding in to its new home in Piccadilly Gardens for a few weeks now but Tuesday marked its official launch - held to coincide with the full moon. The occasion was celebrated with lashings of sake after a ceremonial breaking open of the barrel by Lord Mayor of Manchester Carl Austin-Behan. The menu is underpinned by Tonkotsu ramen - a 12-hour pork broth brimming with char siu barbecue pork belly, kikurage mushrooms, spring onion, sesame, ginger and nori seaweed, and topped with nitamago egg - with other dishes including yakitori skewered meats, steamed buns and gyoza. V Revolution (Image: Dominic Salter) After outgrowing its original home on Oldham Street, vegan diner V Rev has upped sticks to a bigger, better site on Edge Street. Opened this week, the new restaurant serves an even wider range of animal-friendly fast food than ever before, from burgers and mac and 'cheese' to buffalo fried 'chicken'. There's also a huge selection of dairy-free shakes and vegan cocktails, wines, spirits and craft beers, plus sweet treats from Tender Vegan Bakery. Cooper Hall This cavernous basement beer hall opened on Thursday on the site of the former Copacabana club in the Northern Quarter. Owned by the team behind NoHo and Dusk til Pawn, it serves a vast array of European beers including Pilsner Urquell straight from the tank. There's a stage for live music and DJs playing several nights a week, and plans are also in the pipeline for street food takeovers. The Laundrette (Image: Joel Goodman) Making the jump up from Chorlton to the city centre, The Laundrette spins into First Street this weekend for a string of private preview dinners before opening to the public on Monday December 5. It's bringing with it its signature whirl of 'cocktails and carbs', including mini bathtubs full of gin and pizzas fired in a clay oven. The Refinery (Image: Carl Sukonik \| The Vain Photography) The first of two new bars from London operators Drake and Morgan, The Refinery threw open its doors for a lavish launch party in Spinningfields on Thursday. Based inside the newly-built XYZ building, the stylish all-day drinking and dining venue is a lively addition to the Leftbank area. Cocktails are its forte, with a lengthy list divided between timeless classics, like the gimlet, negroni and old fashioned, to Drake and Morgan’s own concoctions. There's also a wide range of wines and draught and bottled beers from the likes of Runaway, while the food menu offers “classic British casual dining” from breakfast through to lunch and dinner. Jimmys NQ (Image: Vincent Cole) One Night Only bandmates and brothers George and Jimmy Craig are the team behind this new Northern Quarter bar and gig venue. Promising 'good beer, good music, good times', it's got pretty much everything you could want from a night out. Down the stairs from the main bar area is a dark and dingy den, with a stage that will host an eclectic programme of live music, comedy and spoken word. Launching this weekend with some private preview parties, it opens to the public next week. Miracle on Edge Street (Image: The Vain Photography \| Carl Sukonik) Embracing all that's naff about Christmas, this gloriously gaudy festive pop-up bar from the team behind The Pen and Pencil opened on Edge Street on Thursday. Fairylights, tinsel and foil garlands galore have transformed the ground floor of creative agency MadLab into a Santa's grotto for grown-ups, with a Christmassy cocktail menu It will be open again tonight before reopening from December 7 to 10, 14 to 17, and 20 to 23. Opening hours are from 4pm until late each day, and there’ll be DJs spinning disco tunes on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays.
Parents of newborns are saving their infants’ umbilical cords and moulding them into timeless “keepsakes”. (Instagram) Because there clearly aren't enough ways to show a mother’s love, parents of newborns are saving their infants’ umbilical cords and moulding them into timeless “keepsakes”. The new social media trend captures both the gruesome and surprisingly less gruesome artworks created using afterbirth excrement. SBS Life is sure to shield you from the less savoury images out there. But of course, if you’ve got a strong stomach, you’re more than welcome to check the more gory snaps of #umbilicalcordkeepsakes here on Instagram. A fascination with afterbirth isn’t new. In recent years, eating a mother’s placenta was a popular health trend. Some claim placenta to be a high source of protein, have key nutrients for mothers, and could even deter post-partum depression. The trend even saw dried placenta powder being sold as supplement pills. This time round, no one’s eating it. Instead, parents mould the fresh umbilical cord into their desired shape, before baking it at low heat in the oven to set dry. Though heart shapes and the word “Love” appear to be the most popular creations, many parents have really gone all out, channelling their creativity to make some rather innovative art pieces.
One season after winning the 2014 Stanley Cup, the Los Angeles Kings missed the playoffs. Off-Season Game Plan looks at a team that still has a championship core, but is looking at hard financial decisions this summer as they endeavour to get back to the playoffs next season. The Kings were good enough to be a playoff team in 2014-2015, but despite having league-best possession stats, they were just 3-15 in overtime and shootout games. That there was some letdown following their Stanley Cup win wasn't any great surprise, but they were practically chasing the season once defenceman Slava Voynov was suspended early in the year and never quite got the results they needed. Now, with Justin Williams and Jarret Stoll headed for unrestricted free agency, while Tyler Toffoli and Martin Jones are restricted free agents with appeal to other teams, the Kings are going to have to make tough calls to stay under the cap and maintain a team that still has legitimate Stanley Cup aspirations. Trades, buyouts and free agent decisions figure to make for an interesting summer in Southern California. HOCKEY OPS/COACH Dean Lombardi/Darryl Sutter RETURNING FORWARDS NAME GP G A PTS SAT% SPSV% SCF% SAT%Rel OZS% '15-16 CAP Anze Kopitar 79 16 48 64 59.2 98.5 56.9 5.2 52.8 $6.8M Jeff Carter 82 28 34 62 56.7 101.0 56.0 1.8 56.5 $5.273M Marian Gaborik 69 27 20 47 59.5 100.0 57.1 5.1 55.6 $4.875M Dustin Brown 82 11 16 27 54.5 97.5 52.3 -1.2 52.9 $6.0M Dwight King 81 13 13 26 54.5 99.6 50.2 -1.2 53.1 $1.95M Trevor Lewis 73 9 16 25 56.7 100.4 53.4 1.1 58.8 $1.525M Tanner Pearson 42 12 4 16 55.9 103.9 56.8 1.6 55.0 $736K Mike Richards 53 5 11 16 51.6 97.8 49.0 -4.1 52.5 $5.75M Kyle Clifford 80 6 9 15 54.3 100.3 50.3 -1.0 55.4 $1.15M Jordan Nolan 60 6 3 9 48.8 98.5 44.7 -8.4 52.6 $700K Andy Andreoff 18 2 1 3 47.5 100.5 41.3 -7.5 59.4 $550K FREE AGENT FORWARDS NAME GP G A PTS SAT% SPSV% SCF% SAT%Rel OZS% '14-15 CAP STATUS Tyler Toffoli 76 23 26 49 57.3 102.7 57.2 2.4 54.6 $717K RFA Justin Williams 81 18 23 41 57.3 100.8 55.1 2.6 55.0 $3.65M UFA Jarret Stoll 73 6 11 17 51.1 100.2 48.5 -5.8 54.0 $3.25M UFA Nick Shore 34 1 6 7 52.7 100.2 49.4 -3.7 59.0 $925K RFA It was a bit of a strange season for Anze Kopitar in 2014-2015. His point production was down a little, to the second-lowest rate (0.81 ppg) of his career, and he played 19:23 per game - the lowest average time on ice for his career and 90 seconds fewer than the year before. As always, Kopitar was a dominant possession player, who could handle tough minutes, yet generated a career-low 1.70 shots per game. He's still a premier player at the age of 27, but there are a couple of red flags raised by last season's production. Jeff Carter's 28 goals and 62 points were his highest totals since 2010-2011, and he has been a valuable addition since arriving in Los Angeles. He's usually anchoring the second line, with young wingers on his flank, but for a Kings team that runs into offensive problems from time to time, a nine-time 20-goal scorer like Carter is a crucial component. Staying reasonably healthy, Marian Gaborik scored 27 goals but his offensive production is steadily declining at this stage of his career. His last point-per-game season was 2009-2010 and since then he's managed 180 points in 239 games (0.75 ppg), sliding to 0.67 points per game last season. A 33-year-old with declining production shouldn't come as a shock, but Gaborik is signed through 2021, so the Kings need that production to at least level off for the next few seasons. In the early years of his career, captain Dustin Brown was a veritable bargain, providing inexpensive production, but now that he's signed a lucrative extension, his production - 26 goals and 54 points in 161 games over the past two seasons - isn't near what it needs to be in order to provide value. If the Kings are looking to maximize their salary cap flexibility, trading Brown would be a great place to start, though it will likely be challenging to find teams willing to invest long-term money in Brown's third-line productivity. Dwight King's size and physical presence make him a useful bottom-six forward, but the Kings have occasionally pressed him into a top-six role and he's not suited to that situation long-term. A veteran who tends to play a solid defensive game, Trevor Lewis did hit for a career-high 25 points last season, but he is still one of the least-productive forwards over the past five seasons. Craig Adams and Scott Gomez are the only other forwards to play more than 4,000 minutes in that time and score fewer than Lewis' 26 goals. Tanner Pearson burst out of the gate last season, with seven goals in the first eight games, then scored five in the next 34 games before suffering a broken leg that prematurely ended his season. At this point, the 22-year-old is a complementary winger with upside, some of which was on display during the Kings' run to the 2014 Stanley Cup. There may not be a more difficult situation for the Kings than how they will deal with Mike Richards. GM Dean Lombardi elected not to use a compliance buyout on Richards last summer and Richards responded with the worst year of his career, getting demoted to the AHL at one point. It's not as though he can't possibly play in the NHL, it's whether a team can afford a $5.75-million cap hit for a third or even fourth-line centre. When it's not your money, it's easy to say the Kings should buy out Richards and move on, and maybe that is where this has to be headed but, with $22-million left on his contract, no general manager's ideal scenario involves paying nearly $15-million for someone not to play hockey for your team (if they would like, I will not play for them for far less!), especially when that means dead money sitting on your cap for the next decade. For a team facing tight financial decisions this summer, it's almost inconceivable that they would commit long-term money to a fourth-line winger, but that's what the Kings did with Kyle Clifford, signing him to a five-year, $8-million deal. Clifford's a big bruiser who fits well on the Kings' fourth line, and he scored a career-high 15 points last season, but the Kings might not notice much difference playing some random free agent at half that price. Another big, physical winger that toils on the Kings' fourth line, Jordan Nolan was also rewarded with a three-year contract extension. His price is more reasonable, but a winger with 29 points in 194 career games ought to come at a reasonable price. A gritty winger trying to crack the NHL lineup, Andy Andreoff might have a better shot elsewhere, considering the commitments that the Kings have made on the low end of their depth chart. Coming off a season in which he tallied 23 goals and 49 points, leading the league with five shorthanded goals, Tyler Toffoli is up for a new contract as a restricted free agent. Considering the Kings' financial situation, they could be vulnerable to an offer sheet, because there's lots to like about a 23-year-old who has shown he can score in limited ice time, but the Kings can most likely figure out a way to keep Toffoli in the fold. Called up midway through the year, when the Kings had finally had enough of Mike Richards, Nick Shore was a solid player in his rookie season, though managed just one goal in 34 games. He had 42 points (20 G, 22 A) in 38 AHL games, so he has some untapped offensive potential, but the 22-year-old needs to get stronger if he's going to take full advantage of his skills. How the Kings fill out their forward lines will depend, to some degree, on what they do with Richards. If they keep him, they can mix and match with prospects and inexpensive free agent veterans while likely bidding farewell to unrestricted free agents Justin Williams and Jarret Stoll. If the Kings buy out Richards, maybe they have a little more room to be aggressive. RETURNING DEFENCE NAME GP G A PTS SAT% SPSV% SCF% SAT%Rel OZS% '15-16 CAP Drew Doughty 82 7 39 46 56.4 99.3 54.0 2.0 53.6 $7.0M Jake Muzzin 76 10 31 41 58.1 97.8 56.0 3.5 57.1 $1.0M Brayden McNabb 71 2 22 24 57.1 101.1 53.8 2.8 60.3 $650K Alec Martinez 56 6 16 22 53.0 102.5 49.1 -3.5 50.0 $1.1M Matt Greene 82 3 6 9 54.3 99.0 53.8 -1.4 57.8 $2.5M Slava Voynov 6 0 2 2 44.2 102.4 45.1 -5.3 39.1 $4.167M Jeff Schultz 9 0 1 1 57.0 100.0 57.9 -1.6 52.4 $850K FREE AGENT DEFENCE NAME GP G A PTS SAT% SPSV% SCF% SAT%Rel OZS% '14-15 CAP STATUS Andrej Sekera 73 3 20 23 54.2 98.2 51.4 3.2 49.7 $2.75M UFA Robyn Regehr 67 3 10 13 51.2 101.6 48.9 -5.8 47.6 $3.0M UFA Jamie McBain 26 3 6 9 53.4 102.5 50.2 -2.8 69.4 $550K UFA In many circles, Drew Doughty is considered the best defenceman in the league, and when it comes to big games - like the Olympics or Stanley Cup Playoffs - he's right at the forefront of that discussion. This isn't to say that Doughty isn't excellent, he is, and he played a career-high 28 minutes per game last season, but he doesn't dominate the regular season to the same degree that he has when the Kings have won the Stanley Cup. This is nitpicking, obviously, but is also fair comment to explain why a defenceman of his calibre is still seeking his first Norris Trophy. Jake Muzzin has worked his way up the Kings depth chart in short order, from a rookie playing third-pair protected minutes in 2012-2013 to logging 22:42 per game and scoring 41 points last season, all the while facing more difficult matchups. Picked up in a trade with Buffalo during the 2013-2014 season, Brayden McNabb earned a full-time role with the Kings last season, getting more ice time late in the year. The 24-year-old plays a physical game, but is also good enough with the puck to handle a role on the power play. Coming off his Stanley Cup-winning goal in 2014, Alec Martinez moved into a bigger role for the Kings last season, playing a career-high 19:56 per game. He also missed 26 games due to a finger injury and a concussion, so he didn't have the same impact that he might have in a full season, but Martinez has the chance to play top-four minutes for the Kings. Veteran punishing defender Matt Greene had more than 200 hits and 125 blocked shots while playing for the league's best possession team. He's a third pairing guy, but his rough and rugged style fits the Kings' mold. Part of the reason that last season went awry was that uncertain status of defenceman Slava Voynov, a good defenceman who was suspended indefinitely following a domestic violence arrest. That case continues to proceed through the legal system and how it's resolved will determine how the Kings proceed with plans for next season. If Voynov is cleared to play, then presumably the Kings will find a place for him and hope that he can return to the form he showed prior to last season. If he's not allowed to play, whether through legal and/or immigration issues, then the Kings will have to seek out an alternative like they did last season when they eventually traded for Andrej Sekera. Re-signing Sekera would be a fine way to go, but Voynov's status (and contract) will determine how feasible that may be, because Sekera will be one of the most sought-after free agent defencemen. Jeff Schultz toiled most of the year in the AHL, but on a one-way contract. He's okay as a seventh defenceman at the NHL level, but may be on the same primarily-AHL plan next season. RETURNING GOALTENDER NAME GP W L T SV% EV SV% ADJ SV% '15-16 CAP Jonathan Quick 72 36 22 13 0.918 0.928 0.916 $5.8M FREE AGENT GOALTENDER NAME GP W L T SV% EV SV% ADJ SV% '14-15 CAP STATUS Martin Jones 15 4 5 2 0.906 0.916 0.907 $550K RFA Jonathan Quick has been an above-average goaltender whose reputation has been inflated by playoff performances, so while last season's .918 save percentage in a 72-game workload was good, and better than the two seasons that preceded it, Quick needs to perform at a high level to justify the Kings' long-term investment. 25-year-old goalie Martin Jones has a .923 save percentage in 34 career NHL games and while he was only .906 in 15 games last season, the restricted free agent is promising enough that he will attract attention if the Kings are interested in moving him. At the same time, if the Kings can play contract hardball with Jones, they should have a backup at reasonable cost if they want to keep him. TOP PROSPECTS PLAYER POS. GP G A PTS +/- TEAM (LEAGUE) Adrian Kempe RW 50 5 12 17 -8 Modo (SHL) Valentin Zykov RW 42 21 25 46 +4 Gatineau (QMJHL) Jordan Weal C 73 20 49 69 +11 Manchester (AHL) Colin Miller D 70 19 33 52 +11 Manchester (AHL) Derek Forbort D 67 4 11 15 +23 Manchester (AHL) Justin Auger RW 70 13 16 29 +15 Manchester (AHL) Alex Lintuniemi D 58 7 29 36 -5 Ottawa (OHL) Jean-Francois Berube G 52 0.913 Manchester (AHL) Michael Mersch LW 76 22 23 45 +20 Manchester (AHL) Kevin Gravel D 58 6 9 15 +15 Manchester (AHL) DRAFT 13th - Timo Meier, Nick Merkley, Zach Werenski, Travis Konecny FREE AGENCY The Kings have approximately $58.4M committed to the 2015-2016 salary cap for 19 players NEEDS One top-six forward, depth forwards, depth defencemen WHAT I SAID THE KINGS NEEDED LAST YEAR One top-six winger, one top-four defenceman, another defenceman THEY ADDED Brayden McNabb TRADE MARKET Mike Richards, Dustin Brown, Martin Jones, prospects POSSIBLE 2015-2016 LOS ANGELES KINGS DEPTH CHART LEFT WING CENTRE RIGHT WING Marian Gaborik Anze Kopitar Tyler Toffoli Tanner Pearson Jeff Carter Dustin Brown Dwight King Nick Shore Trevor Lewis Kyle Clifford Mike Richards Jordan Nolan Andy Andreoff Jordan Weal Scottie Upshall Michael Mersch Jonny Brodzinski Adrian Kempe LEFT DEFENCE RIGHT DEFENCE GOALTENDER Jake Muzzin Drew Doughty Jonathan Quick Alec Martinez Slava Voynov Martin Jones Brayden McNabb Matt Greene Jean-Francois Berube Derek Forbort Jeff Schultz Kevin Gravel Colin Miller Enhanced stats via www.war-on-ice.com. (SAT% - shot attempt percentage; SAT%Rel - shot attempt percentage, relative to team when off the ice; SPSV% - combined on-ice shooting and save percentage; OZS% - percentage of faceoffs to start shift in the offensive zone vs. defensive zone) Scott Cullen can be reached at scott.cullen@bellmedia.ca

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