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Your Europe, Your Say! (YEYS) lived up to all expectations, as young people from the EU-28 and candidate countries shook things up with their enthusiasm and fresh ideas to help integrate migrants into European societies – the theme of this year’s event. The refugee crisis has brought European citizens together in acts of incredible kindness, but it has also stretched European solidarity to its limits, exposing divisions among Member States and troublesome signs of discrimination and discontent. The European Economic and Social Committee (EESC) invited a group of outspoken 16 and 17 year-olds from all over Europe to debate what is clearly one of the hottest topics on the political agenda right now… migration and integration! The debate took place in Brussels back to back with the EESC’s plenary session, which included a high-level discussion with Federica Mogherini, the EU’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security, and Dimitris Avramopoulos, the Commissioner for Home Affairs and Citizenship. The youngsters explored a range of integration issues, from the role of schools, sporting clubs and cultural outreach in countering discrimination, to the way information about the refugee crisis is communicated, the role of the media and the importance of a well-defined, humane way of handling integration. After an open and lively debate on ten different proposals, the youth delegates then agreed on three overarching proposals to better integrate migrants, especially children, into European societies: 1) Media and migrants, media reform using investment from the EU: ideas to impose stricter guidelines for reporting on migrant issues and other measures to raise awareness and reduce discrimination 2) Revision of Dublin agreement: hotspots, faster processing of asylum applications and language and cultural training before allocating refugees across the EU 3) Education plan, no grading at first, exchange of culture, adjusting at own pace: easing refugees into the education system, recognising the importance of education for integration Voice of reason The youngsters showed no signs of being intimidated by the spotlights of the EU political scene. After an introduction to the role of organised civil society in dealing with the migration crisis, the floor was opened up to the visiting teenagers. “As the voice of civil society, we are eager to ensure that the views, experiences and ideas of Europe’s younger generation on this vital issue are heard,” remarked Vice-President Gonçalo Lobo Xavier in charge of communication at the EESC. “We want to see a unified and humanitarian approach to immigration and asylum. Refugees have rights but they also have obligations to respect EU values and social responsibilities,” he added. This sentiment was echoed in contributions from the young people during the YEYS debate. Members and EU policy-makers were struck by the young ambassadors’ thought-provoking ideas and practical suggestions to promote a more integrated response to the migration crisis. A UK junior delegate said the EU should make an effort to put together teams of celebrities to promote tolerance of other cultures. His colleague in the winning ‘media and migrants’ proposal said: “Why not import TV dramas from around the world so Europeans can be more culturally aware, so we don’t just see them as war zones, and we can appreciate the places, feel a loss and be moved to effect actual change and greater respect for the migrants fleeing these countries?” A Hungarian delegate said we need open-minded and open-hearted policies to establish sustainable solutions for Europe based on “democracy and dignity but also on our system of order: order with heart”. A Slovakian student said it is very important to integrate teenage refugees because they will be the future generation; “the workers or geniuses, so we don’t want to deter them”. “Education is crucial for future employment but also for peer interaction and integration in society,” said a Croatian delegate. Offering a concrete education plan for young refugees, the speaker proposed the idea of integration days for new arrivals so they can “talk about their culture, cuisine and other customs in their country”. One Danish speaker said shared interests are key to getting young refugees involved in local clubs, who can take them under their wings and invite them to occasions. “It’s a chance for society to welcome refugees and get them more engaged in the community,” she said, to “integrate through interests.” On a proposal to revise the Dublin agreement, which a Maltese delegate called “limiting”, an idea to create “hotspots” to respond quickly to the refugees’ needs came out of the debate: “This is a crisis people… so deal with it now!” she said, adding that Europe is in one Union and should share the responsibility fairly. A Serbian speaker felt Europe is not making best use of the migrants’ skills and qualifications and that its recognition of qualification needs revising, to be fairer. “Refugees could be interns in companies and be assigned a mentor with experience to help them integrate, empower them,” she said. First-hand experience Some 33 schools – each representing a Member State or candidate country – were chosen randomly and invited to attend this unique annual youth initiative that simulates the work done by members of the EESC. In addition to experiencing the inner workings of the Committee, and witnessing first-hand how it represents civil society, the youngsters also had the chance to put their thought-provoking questions to political leaders. “You are the envoys and champions of the refugees in your communities. We need you as active citizens to take part in the debate and demystify the myths about migrants and refugees,” said Pavel Trantina, President of the SOC Section. “We had 28 Member States and five candidate country students and observers from Japan here at YEYS. Thanks for a great job. Believe me, we could not have done it better than you,” said EESC member Eve Päärendson in summing up the day’s events. EESC member Jose Antonio Moreno Diaz said he was impressed by the proposed solutions to some hard questions, “even for adults and politicians to answer”, and he applauded the common sense on display. “You are the spirit of Europe,” he concluded. For more information, please contact: Daniela Marangoni, EESC Press service Email: //press eesc [dot] europa [dot] eu">press eesc [dot] europa [dot] eu Tel: +32 2 546 8422 |
For 400 days, Chicago withheld video of an officer fatally shooting 17-year-old Laquan McDonald until a Cook County judge ordered its release. Public support for police body-worn cameras has grown in the wake of several high-profile shooting deaths, including McDonald’s. But whether cameras will improve police accountability and transparency, as supporters expect, depends heavily on how and when they’re used and whether the footage is released. These details are governed by state laws and local policies that are still very much up for debate. “A lot hangs in those details,” said Nancy La Vigne, director of Urban Institute’s Justice Policy Center. “Those policies and practices can make the technology more or less powerful in its intended impact. And there’s a high degree of variation among states and localities.” While the footage in McDonald’s case came from dashboard cameras and not body-worn cameras, questions about when—or whether—to release the videos touch on the same issues. Illinois state law says that police can withhold footage from public records requests to protect active investigations—what Chicago argued it was doing and had always done. But McDonald’s case has prompted the city to take another look at its video-release policy. Chicago is not alone in grappling with the policies surrounding police cameras. Several cities are deploying body-worn cameras even as legislation governing their use is being written, which can lead to confusion when department policies bump up against state wiretapping and public records laws already on the books. “In one Pennsylvania jurisdiction, the state statutes around eavesdropping were inhibiting their ability to use the cameras the way they had envisioned,” La Vigne said. “You can imagine law enforcement wondering how useful these cameras are if they need to ask permission to record. How does that apply if you’re in a high-speed chase?” Several states have passed or are considering legislation specific to body-worn cameras, sometimes amending existing laws in an effort to balance privacy and transparency. And individual police departments—in some cases, without specific state laws to guide them—are developing their own policies for when to turn cameras on and off, how long to store footage, and when to release videos to the public. “Right now, until a state policy comes into effect, every city or municipality has free rein on how they want to create their own policy,” said Kerry Condon, president of the Anaheim Police Association, who helped develop his city’s body-worn camera policy: “It’s one of the most important policies that I’ve dealt with in 25 years of law enforcement.” When and where can body-worn cameras be used? Nine states have passed legislation specifying when and where cameras can be used, while similar bills are pending in 16 states. In Pennsylvania, the state’s wiretap law prevents police from recording inside a person’s home without permission. Pennsylvania is one of 37 states as of January 1 that restricts recordings where privacy is expected, but state legislators are seeking to amend that law for police officers. Some law enforcement officials are concerned that officers will be distracted if they have to turn the camera on and off during a chase or accidentally violate the law in the rush to respond. Pittsburgh Police Lieutenant Ed Trapp, project manager of the department’s body-worn camera program, said that he sees the camera as a reporting tool—one that is even more critical in a person’s home to ensure accountability and transparency for the resident and the police officer. “Going into a house is one of the most intrusive things government does,” Trapp said. “Why would that be the one time you’d want to turn the cameras off?” Until the state law is changed, Pittsburgh police officers have been instructed to shut off their cameras as soon as they are dispatched to a private residence. In Tennessee, lawmakers are considering bills that would require police to wear body-worn cameras “at all times when the officer is on duty” and record footage of “all the officer’s activities.” Other states’ laws are less prescriptive, so it’s up to department policies to clarify the issue. Will the public get to see police camera footage? Supporters of body-worn cameras may assume that the public will have access to the footage, but that’s not always the case. Nearly every state has exemptions to the public records laws for law enforcement, and those exemptions can stand in the way of realizing greater transparency through body-worn cameras. “There are certain states whose public records laws are very broad and basically make all the video releasable, and we think that could be a real privacy problem,” said Jay Stanley, senior policy analyst at the ACLU. “But there are other states and departments where the police are trying to release nothing, and that is also not the right balance.” Washington State’s strong open-government laws require public agencies to comply with public records requests, with only narrow exceptions. In response, the Seattle Police Department launched its own YouTube channel of body-camera videos in early 2015. But the redacted videos are so blurred out, it’s hard to make out what’s being filmed. In Pittsburgh, the police department’s current policy is not to release any footage, Trapp said. The department is waiting to see if the legislature will address how public records requests apply to police body-camera videos. How should states proceed? While support for body-worn cameras is high, La Vigne cautions that deployment may be speeding ahead of policy development and evaluation. To help advance that conversation, the Urban Institute is identifying best practices for how officers tell people that they are being recorded and studying how differences in body-worn camera policies affect police use of force, citizen complaints, and police-community relations. “It’s a challenging public policy balancing act,” La Vigne said. “On one hand, it’s important to safeguard the privacy of people captured on camera, including children, witnesses, and bystanders. On the other hand, the main purpose of body cameras is to enhance transparency. The good news is that state legislators are quickly refining the legal framework surrounding body-worn cameras, hopefully in a way that serves both interests.” |
Image caption Eight people have had to leave their homes A block of terraced housing in east London is to be demolished after a member of the public noticed cracks. Part of the Gibbons Building in Amhurst Road, Hackney, which contains seven homes, will be pulled down after being deemed "an immediate risk to public safety". Eight people have been forced to leave their homes. The building also contains two restaurants. Hackney Council said the demolition could take all weekend. The cracks were reported to the London Fire Brigade on Friday night. Image caption The crack can be seen in the building A Hackney Council spokesperson said contractors will pull down number 1 and assess numbers 3 and 5 to see if they can still be saved. "Hackney Council has arranged for the urgent controlled demolition of 1-5 Amhurst Road following reports that the building has become structurally unsound and posed an immediate risk to public safety," he said. "We are trying to shore up two-thirds of the building before demolition can begin. "The process of demolishing the building could take all weekend, perhaps even several days." 'RIP Rawduck' The Gibbons Building survived a fire which destroyed the property next to it several years ago. The end block will be pulled down before the rest of the terrace will be assessed to see what damage has been done, she said. Councillor Vincent Stops, chairman of Hackney Council's planning committee, tweeted: "Saddened by the news that 1-5 Amhurst Road AKA the Gibbons Building is to be demolished for structural safety reasons. Really sad." Half of the eight people who left their homes will be housed in hotels and the other four are staying with friends or relatives. A Travelodge hotel is currently being built in the adjacent car park. The ground floor of the terrace includes the Cirrik and RawDuck restaurants. The owners of the RawDuck tweeted: "We're so so sad to say that the building we are in cannot be saved and the council are demolishing it today. This is a sad day. RIP Rawduck." Amhurst Road is closed between Mare Street and Pembury Junction and will remain shut on Sunday. And access to Hackney Central Overground station has also been restricted to pedestrians via the northern entrance. |
Photos of “Yugoslav space age monuments” have been all over the internet in recent years, entirely decontextualized from both their original and evolving meanings. Susanna Bitters takes a closer look. Walking up the steps of Tjentište, the monument disappears before it reappears again. The sloping hills that compose the careful site lines concocted by an unknown artist hide the monument for a moment, nestled in the ascent. You can almost forget it’s there. This magic trick is not just limited to the physical. In the Internet age, Partisan monuments, or spomenik, have become as scattered across websites as they have across the Balkans. The presentation of these “space age” marvels depict only their futuresque and crumbling qualities. The bloody memento mori of their origins have become omitted, if they were even known in the first place. The spomenik have effectively receded from the landscape as markers of the Partisan socialist struggle, only to emerge again as beacons of a Brutalist, overreaching, and unrealized future. At the end of WWII, thousands of spomenik were erected. A majority of them were situated on battle sites, creating a consciously constructed constellation of Partisan struggles across the landscape. They remain scattered across the region, some as simple as a plaque with the names of those killed. You can find them still, tucked onto hilltops and occasionally marked from the road by brown government signs. The early sculptures were representative and, quite frankly, exceedingly dull, telling a careful story in stone and iron. They showed the pores of a postwar world. The subject matter was severe, the construct depressing. Metal men seemed to sag and fray under the sheer weight of time and death and loss. But when Tito turned from Stalin and cast his gaze on the west, so did the Yugoslavian spomenik. Within the length of the Informbiro Period began the rise of what was later termed “socialist modernism,” in which the horrors of war became an abstraction. The long, laconic, and notionally weary faces looming above the elevated platform at Tjentište, discernible only to the practiced eye. The rapidly shifting sun when ensconced at Kozara, vacillating wildly from dark to light as if to depict the mercurial nature of humanity. The spomenik began to depict not war and conflict, but the struggle for self-determination and the optimistic energy therein. Yugoslavia sought to find its own political, cultural, and aesthetic identity distinct from that of the Soviet Union, and the spomenik that rose from the concrete bones of this period embodied an inclination for universalism, liberalism, inclusionism, and the utopian possibilities of a modernist future. This new ideological system became closely linked to the concepts of abstract modernism, juxtaposed against the discarded socialist realism. The monuments spanned the space of ideology and art, incorporating a sweeping universality that reflected the political discourse of the day. What emerged from the remnants of the Yugoslav socialist world was, as Susan Buck-Morss described it, a “socialist dreamworld.” That dreamworld was the foundation upon which Yugoslavia was built. The constructed memory of the Yugoslav Communist Party was perched upon tenets of modernism, industrialization, and the dream of the utopian socialist future. Each spomenik served to join the promises of the socialist revolution to the memory of WWII, while denying the social and historical context. The dream was buffeted throughout the 1980s, however, having failed to account for or address the economic insecurities, nationalism, and assassinations of the era. And so it was those very same wounds, never fully healed and long ignored by the Communist Party, that ruptured once again in the cataclysm of the 1990s civil war. |
Image copyright Reuters Image caption Led Zeppelin guitarist Page (right) and lead singer Plant say they wrote Stairway to Heaven in a remote cottage in Wales Members of the rock band Led Zeppelin have appeared in court to deny borrowing from another song for their 1971 classic Stairway To Heaven. Guitarist Jimmy Page and singer Robert Plant are expected to give evidence at the civil case in Los Angeles. They are accused of lifting the song's opening notes from Taurus, a 1967 track by the band Spirit. Page, 72, and Plant, 67, are being sued by a trust acting for a founding member of Spirit who died in 1997. The case began with the jury being played various performances of both songs, including part of Led Zeppelin's recording of Stairway to Heaven. In his opening statement, the plaintiff's lawyer, Francis Malofiy, said the case could be summed up in six words, "give credit where credit is due". Page and Plant were both "incredible performers, incredible musicians but they covered other people's music and tried to make it their own," he alleged. The band's lawyer Robert Anderson insisted that the two men "created Stairway to Heaven independently without resort to Taurus or without copying anything in Taurus". There was no proof that they had even heard Taurus until decades after creating Stairway to Heaven, said Mr Anderson. Mr Anderson also claimed that the part of the song at issue - a sequence of notes in the opening bars - was a "descending chromatic line…something that appears in all kinds of songs". Such a "commonplace" musical device which "goes back centuries," was, he claimed, not protected by copyright which in any case, he argued, was not actually owned by the plaintiff. At the scene: James Cook, BBC News Smartly dressed in sober suits and ties, two of rock's biggest stars arrived early in Courtroom 850 to defend themselves against accusations of plagiarism. As the room filled with the familiar strains of Stairway to Heaven, Jimmy Page leaned back and closed his eyes, his head nodding gently as he listened to his own performance and to the vocals of his bandmate Robert Plant, seated beside him at the front of the court. With their hair pulled back in ponytails the two men looked relaxed and attentive, at one point pulling on their spectacles as they leaned towards each other to discuss a concert bill which had been produced in evidence. The Beatles, Elvis Presley and The Sound of Music were all invoked in the opening statements of a trial which is scheduled to last four or five days. Just before it began, a member of the plaintiff's legal team hovered at the back, behind the ranks of reporters, clutching a guitar in a case. "It's a prop," he explained. In the corridor, long-haired fans of Led Zeppelin lined up to be sure of a seat. One of them, Byron Taylor, 57, a retired teacher from San Bernardino, California, proudly clutched a signed copy of Stairway to Heaven. He was here, he said, to witness "a bit of history". At an earlier hearing, US district judge Gary Klausner had ruled that the two pieces of music were similar enough to let a jury decide whether Page and Plant had infringed copyright. Taurus, a two minute and 37 second instrumental with a distinct plucked guitar line, was released by Spirit in January 1968. The copyright infringement action is being taken by a trust set up to manage the legacy of the late guitarist Randy Wolfe, also known as Randy California, a founding member of Spirit who played on the same bill as Led Zeppelin later that year. He died in 1997 while saving his son from drowning. Lawyers for Wolfe say Page and Plant wrote Stairway To Heaven after hearing their client play Taurus, and that he should be given a writing credit. Page and Plant say the song was their masterpiece, written in a remote cottage in Wales. The plaintiff is reportedly seeking royalties and other compensation of around $40m (£28m). According to Bloomberg Businessweek, Stairway To Heaven had earned $562m (£334m) as of 2008. |
A Tale of Two Cities An Epoch of Belief and Incredulity By Everett Quinton Synetic Theater, Arlington, Virginia Friday, May 15, 2015, C-105&106 (center stalls) Directed by Serge Seiden Jerry (Alex Mills, right) shows Baby (Vato Tsikurishvili) pictures on his cell phone in Synetic's production of A Tale of Two Cities. Below, Jerry acts out one of the characters in the novel as an elaborate attempt to get Baby to fall asleep so that Jerry can get to his drag queen show. Photos by Koko Lanham, Synetic Theater. Jerry (Alex Mills, right) shows Baby (Vato Tsikurishvili) pictures on his cell phone in Synetic's production of A Tale of Two Cities. Below, Jerry acts out one of the characters in the novel as an elaborate attempt to get Baby to fall asleep so that Jerry can get to his drag queen show. Photos by Koko Lanham, Synetic Theater. The premise seems a head scratcher. A drag queen named Jerry finds an abandoned baby on his apartment doorstep. To get the baby to sleep so that he can get to his show that evening, Jerry acts out Charles Dickens' A Tale of Two Cities in its entirety (actually, he bases his interpretation on the 1935 film starring Ronald Colman). The play was created by Everett Quinton of New York's Ridiculous Theatrical Company as an Off-Broadway piece in 1988. The promise is more enticing: seeing Alex Mills as Jerry. This young actor and dancer is a budding star in the D.C. theater scene, from his poetic physicality that leaves Synetic Theater audiences breathless in that company's Silent Shakespeare productions to the more traditional acting abilities he showcased in Signature's production of Shakespeare's R&J. We had no idea what we were in for, but we figured a one-man show of Mills dancing and miming A Tale of Two Cities was a sure thing. Well, it was and it wasn't. Except for a striptease in the middle and his burlesque act at the end, Mills does no dancing. He acts out the novel, pirouetting from character to character as he speaks their lines. Nor is it a one-man show. The baby is real—or, more accurately, the baby is human. That, it turns out, is the best of times. As Jerry carries the bassinette into his apartment—"What the gay hell?" he says—we hear crying that certainly sounds live. Then, in a bit of unexpected stagecraft requiring a spoiler alert (click here for details), Synetic's leading clown, Vato Tsikurishvili, has appeared as Baby (his given name is Dorian, but "oh, Baby" becomes Jerry's nervous catchphrase). The next 10 minutes of Mills' Jerry interacting with Tsikurishvili's Baby is one of the funniest passages of time I've spent in a theater. I can only recall three Bottoms that made me laugh as loud. And speaking of bottoms, we get a full look at what supposedly comes out of this Baby's bottom before the clueless Jerry tosses the offending diaper out the window and we hear an offended passerby screech on the street below. Baby sucks his own thumb, then sucks Jerry's thumb, then tries to eat Jerry's thumb, and nervously watches Jerry prepare him a real dinner. While Jerry is speaking on the phone, he gives Baby his keys to play with to keep him from crying, and when Baby tosses the keys, Jerry hands him another item from his pocket, a cigarette lighter, which Baby promptly puts in his mouth. Having never even heard of the show before Synetic announced it as a last-minute replacement for its final installment in the 2014–2015 season, I have no idea how much of the staging originated with Quinton and how much with Serge Seiden, who directed this production (he also served as stage manager for a 1991 production at Studio Theater in Washington, D.C.). The original Off-Broadway version received rave reviews and awards, mainly due to Quinton's ballsy premise. There is much wisdom in all this seeming foolishness as Dickens' tale becomes intertwined with that of a drag queen surviving in 1980s New York (a tale of two cities in its own way, a gay community existing in the shadows of a straight community). But no other performer—i.e., no visible Baby—is mentioned as participating in that first show. Tellingly, Mills is alone in Synetic's advance publicity of its production, so we don't learn of Tsikurishvili's playing Baby until we open our program and see the cast list and bios. Even then, his appearance is a complete surprise. Adding the baby, and Tsikurishvili's performance of Baby, puts this production over the top—literally and figuratively speaking. Seiden fills out the play with a number of humorous bits, such as Jerry sticking a feather in an empty Cheerios box to use as the hat of the snobbish aristocrat Marquis St. Evrémonde. "Work with me," Mills says as he reshapes the cereal box for its new purpose. Key details are in the apartment designed by Luciana Stecconi, featuring a purple couch, a pink bathtub, a kitchenette, and a desk that serves as Jerry's makeup table with a lace shawl draped over the front. Posters of A Tale of Two Cities, Ronald Colman, and Breakfast at Tiffany's adorn the wall; video cassettes of A Tale of Two Cities and The Birds lie on the cushion-topped coffee table; mannequins stand about wearing boas; and we see at least 10 wigs of various colors, representing Jerry's other vocation as a wigmaker. Props to Props Master Amy Kellett. That Baby has access to a knife and a pistol is a bit weird, but it's funny nonetheless. Baby also completely disappears during the more dramatic moments of Jerry's re-creation of Dickens' tale. This is perhaps intended to ensure that the audience's attention stays focused on Mills playing Jerry playing everybody in Two Cities, but not only does that indicate the power of Tsikurishvili's performance as Baby, the fact we notice he's missing in these moments is notable in itself. When Jerry is talking on the phone with friends and interacting with Baby, Mills is a hoot. He does direct address with the audience, and at times he seems to slip into improvisation; whether it's rehearsed or not it gives the show a bit more sense of in-the-moment intimacy and theatrical danger. When Jerry is acting out Two Cities, Mills is strained beyond the current limit of his talents. He makes a game effort at pulling off the near impossible, playing every character in Dickens' book as distinctively as possible, all while fixing dinner, undressing (in a dance that will thrill anybody of any gender and sexual orientation), bathing (using shaving cream as part of his act, much to Baby's consternation), and then putting on his makeup and costume for his show. However, it's not so much a tour de force performance as a trip into the future showcase. Mills has the stuff to be as great an actor as he is a dancer (I rank him a notch below Baryshnikov and Nureyev among theatrical dancers I've seen in person), but his talent hasn't yet developed to a point where he makes each of Dickens' characters fully engaging. That he doesn't might be purposeful—that it's not Mills but Jerry playing all these parts—but the result is the same: The play drags during the longer Dickensonian passages. It's not just us that grow weary with Jerry: Baby finally goes to sleep. But the show goes on (it clocks in at about 100 minutes with no intermission) as we are treated to Jerry's drag queen show in full costume choreographed by Synetic's co-founder Irina Tsikurishvili. It's fun but traditional, not the cutting-edge stuff we normally see her chart out for Synetic's Silent Shakespeare productions or, for that matter Jerry stripping down for his bath in this production. Oh, Baby! Hope, of course, springs eternal. This show is a step on a path to certain greatness for Mills. Meanwhile, Vato Tsikurishvili, in his infancy, reaches a new peak in his Synetic repertoire. And that's something to see. Eric Minton May 22, 2015 |
States, however, have increasingly latched onto the idea of hiking the gas tax—or “user fee” in more politically friendly parlance—to cover their transportation coffers. Each state already puts its own gas tax on top of the federal one (although some use excise taxes or sales taxes rather than a straight per-gallon fee), and given perilously low funding levels, seven states in the 2013-2014 election cycle passed gas-tax increases on ballots or through legislatures, with more looking at it this year. And it’s a trend highlighted by red states. Iowa, led by Republican Gov. Terry Branstad, in February raised its gas and diesel tax by 10 cents a gallon. Republican-led Utah raised its tax by 5 cents, which is set to take effect in July, and Idaho’s legislature passed a 7-cent increase, with Republican lawmakers even seeking more. And legislatures in Louisiana, Nebraska, South Carolina, Missouri, and others are all weighing options to raise their fuel taxes. Georgia even restructured its tax system and tacked on a $5-per-night fee on hotel and motel stays to fund transportation. A complex transportation-funding ballot measure in Michigan failed last week, but the tax increases wouldn’t have been solely for transportation, turning some voters off. “This should be a wake-up call for legislators at the federal level that states aren’t waiting and they’re getting out in front of this,” said Matt Jeanneret, a spokesman for the American Road and Transportation Builders Association. ARTBA planned to release an analysis Tuesday showing that 96 percent of Republican state legislators and 88 percent of Democrats were reelected after voting for a gas-tax hike, indicating that there may be little political blowback for the move. There’s been some tepid interest on the Hill for a gas-tax increase—GOP Rep. Jim Renacci of Ohio has introduced a bipartisan bill indexing the federal rate to inflation. But the bill seems likely to see the same fate as other gas-tax bills, which have not gained traction. Democratic Rep. Earl Blumenauer of Oregon, who supports the bill, said that the progress in the states shows that the public can get behind highway funding tied to taxes. “There is huge public support when people decide, ‘OK, we’re going to make a decision; it may not be the most popular with everybody,’” Blumenauer said, adding that state legislators faced little blowback for gas-tax increases. “It’s a case of will and action.” |
If you want change, don’t risk your vote. All polls show a majority of Canadians want to use their vote to defeat Stephen Harper. But with parties so close in opinion polls, many voters don’t know which opposition leader to support to get the job done. Let’s look at this two ways, starting with electoral math. There are 338 riding elections across the country. Tom Mulcair starts with almost 100 incumbents, Mr. Trudeau only about 35. Advantage NDP. And the NDP vote is more efficient. Based on current levels, Tom Mulcair’s NDP will win 60 or so seats in Quebec and another 20 or 25 in BC. This regional concentration explains why riding projections consistently show the NDP leading in seats even at similar levels of national support. Again, advantage NDP. So based on electoral math, Tom Mulcair is the closest to defeating Stephen Harper. But there’s another critical problem with voting Liberal to defeat Stephen Harper. At current support levels, no party is winning a majority. Tom Mulcair has been clear his goal is to defeat Stephen Harper – with an NDP majority if voters give it to him, but by working with the Liberals if necessary. NDP voters are assured their vote will never be used to prop up a Stephen Harper minority. Liberals voters can’t be sure. The Trudeau Liberals may well prop up a Stephen Harper minority. If you don’t think he’d do it, remember he’s done it before. Justin Trudeau’s Liberals propped up Stephen Harper’s minority after the 2008 election. Mr. Trudeau voted for Harper’s budgets and the cuts Trudeau says he’s against now. And unlike Tom Mulcair, Mr. Trudeau won’t commit to working together to defeat Stephen Harper. A Liberal vote is a risk we can’t take if we want to defeat Stephen Harper and bring change to Ottawa. Truth is, given all of Mr. Trudeau’s reversals, it really is impossible to know what Mr. Trudeau would do after the election. Mr. Trudeau broke a promise to his party members to hold open nominations. What followed were Trudeau-preferred candidates, meddling and lawsuits. Then this spring Mr. Trudeau voted with Stephen Harper on Bill C51 – even through Mr. Trudeau himself could not say if the bill violates Canada’s Charters of Rights and Freedoms. Mr. Trudeau now campaigns against raising the federal minimum wage to $15, even though he voted for it in the Commons. He broke his promise to over 100,000 of the lowest-paid workers in Canada. Mr. Trudeau promised a fully-costed campaign platform, then tried to say he’d already given it and now — under pressure from journalists — he says he’ll provide the cost details. Mr. Trudeau now opposes a childcare plan. More broken promises—this time to young moms and dads who want help with everyday affordability. And then the strangest reversal. Until recently, Mr. Trudeau professed faith in balanced budgets as a core Liberal value. But then he had a sudden conversion – now deficits would be a core Liberal value! At one moment in last week’s debate — between his constant interruptions –Mr. Trudeau said he was being honest. Well, Mr. Trudeau, on open nominations, C51, childcare, costed platforms, minimum wage and balanced budgets — were you being honest when you supported them? Or when you opposed them? Pick one, it can’t be both. For the 70% of Canadians who want to defeat Stephen Harper and bring change to Ottawa, Tom Mulcair is a reliable choice. Mr. Trudeau – not so much. – Parkin is a frequent NDP media commentator. |
Class-action suit accuses police of discrimination at bus terminal, saying they have falsely arrested people as they seek to increase arrest figures Police have been accused of targeting gay men who use the restrooms at New York City’s main bus terminal. A class-action lawsuit, filed Monday in Manhattan federal court, accuses Port Authority of New York and New Jersey police of engaging in discrimination by falsely arresting men perceived as gay at the Port Authority bus terminal on baseless charges including public lewdness and exposure. The complaint accuses officers of making targeted arrests on the discriminatory basis of actual or perceived sexual orientation and to boost quality-of-life arrest statistics. “The PAPD have continued to make such targeted arrests knowing or believing that most of those arrested will ultimately be forced to plead to lesser charges to avoid public embarrassment and humiliation, costly legal fees, and jail sentences, as well as reputational and professional harm associated with the false charges,” the suit said. The suit was filed by Winston & Strawn LLP and the Legal Aid Society. The plaintiffs are seeking a stop to the practice, as well as compensatory and punitive damages. “The use of police assets and resources in this unconstitutional and unconscionable way is particularly stunning in light of the world in which we live,” said Thomas Patrick Lane, partner with Winston & Strawn. The Port Authority declined to comment. |
Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption The BBC's Steve Knibbs went to the forest when film crews were there in July A thank you note apparently written by the new Star Wars film's producers and sent to the cast and crew confirms that part of the movie was shot in Gloucestershire. The letter was written to mark the final day of shooting on Episode VII. It thanks the "extraordinary" cast and crew for working "from the deserts of Abu Dhabi, to the Forest of Dean, to the stages of Pinewood". Star Wars Episode VII is scheduled for release on 18 December 2015. The BBC went to Puzzlewood in the Forest of Dean in July where film crews were assembling, although nobody would confirm that it was for Star Wars. Film and TV productions shot on location in Puzzlewood include Doctor Who, Merlin, Jack the Giant Slayer and Atlantis. |
The applicants clustered on Kissena Boulevard, clutching documents from around the world, trading familiar stories with strangers in a driving rain outside the Queens Library in Flushing. There were the police encounters, the school visits, the fraught hospital trips — all negotiated without the bureaucratic lubricant of local identification. “We feel naked,” said Mauricio Peña, 34, who is originally from Honduras. “We feel like we don’t exist.” At his side, a peer, who immigrated from Malaysia 17 years ago, nodded beneath his umbrella. Such was the scene at enrollment sites across New York City on Monday, with crowds gathering by the hundreds as the de Blasio administration introduced the country’s largest municipal identification program. The card is intended to help immigrants, undocumented or otherwise; homeless people; and others who struggle to navigate city services and institutions. Officials have also sought to entice New Yorkers with a package of benefits for those who enroll this year: prescription drug discounts, free memberships for a year to zoos, museums and other city institutions, and library access, among other perks. |
Following a solid Gold cup tournament outing produced by Canadian international Samuel Piette, many Impact fans have been clamoring for a transfer involving the French Canadian. Due to his resounding performances in the 2017 CONCACAF Gold Cup, an abundance of teams from Europe and North America alike have tabled offers to the defensive midfielder. The Montreal Impact are among the teams in the hunt for the ‘Bulldog’. After plenty of strenuous speculation about the future of Samuel Piette, it seems to be the case that he will come back to his birthplace, Quebec. Montreal's most recent acquisition will benefit this organization exceedingly acknowledging what the Bulldog can bring to the table. Piette may be diminutive in stature, but his feistiness on the pitch will assuredly prove doubters wrong as they'll instantly latch their eyes on the youngster. Also, Piette can efficiently strip the ball away from his opponents with ease. The Repentigny, Quebec native is an excellent signing considering that he can perhaps bode well with the team's current formation of 4-2-3-1. As I speak, our current defensive midfielders are Calum Mallace, who has not received the playing time to prove his worth, Italian Marco Donadel and the incumbent defensive midfielder. Samuel Piette would determine to be a fabulous addition to this team knowing that Marco Donadel and Patrice Bernier are at the tail end of their career at the ages of 34 and 37 respectively. Also, it's imperative to acknowledge the fact that Calum Mallace will most likely be unable to fill in the void considering his inconsistency. Without the likes of Donadel and Bernier, our defensive midfield position is obviously quite shallow, to say the least. Nevertheless, if we were to bring him into the fold, the French Canadian's flamboyance would certainly attract the eyes of many. What makes such acquisition even more commendable is that his style of play is identical to that of fellow Quebecor, Patrice Bernier. The two respected players show a defensive steadiness and the ability to intercept the ball. Due to the skillset of Samuel Piette, he can easily fill the void when Patrice Bernier inevitably retires. Knowing the fact that Montreal concedes plenty of goals on a weekly basis, the Bulldog can certainly aid the team's defensive woes. Even now, Samuel Piette's ability on the pitch alone will catapult him to the upper echelon in terms of depth on defensive midfielders, Samuel Piette Player Profile: Position: Defensive midfielder Height: 5'6'' Weight: 160 lbs Birthdate and birthplace: November 12, 1994, in Repentigny, Canada Citizenship: Canadian Last club: CD Izarra |
KIEV, Ukraine (JTA) — The explosion that ripped through Vadim Rabinovich’s luxury SUV in central Kiev was strong enough to send a shock wave from the parking lot up to his third-floor office in the heart of the Ukrainian capital. “It was a shock for a day or two,” Rabinovich said, “and then I moved on.” The 60-year-old media mogul and Jewish philanthropist views the March 4 explosion as an attack on his life. He has accused Andrey Derkach, a businessman and former politician, of being responsible, telling the Ukrainian media that Derkach had tried to bully him into selling JN1, the Kiev-based television station specializing in Jewish news that Rabinovich launched a couple of years ago. Get The Times of Israel's Daily Edition by email and never miss our top stories Free Sign Up Derkach has denied the accusation and threatened to sue for libel. The police are still investigating. “Now I have an armored car,” Rabinovich said. “And that’s the only thing that has changed.” If a brush with death isn’t enough to cow Rabinovich, it’s hard to see what will. Over the years, the feisty oligarch has battled Ukrainian authorities, business rivals and Jewish community leaders, some of whom have expressed resentment about his ongoing efforts to challenge the old guard of European Jewish institutional life. But the relentless criticism, like the explosion, has not had its intended effect. “You can’t please everyone,” Rabinovich said. “That’s life.” In an interview with JTA this month, he was clad in his typical uniform of jeans and sneakers, a get-up he has been known to wear to occasions where everyone else is in business attire. Rabinovich has a limited appreciation for formalities and, as he puts it, “little patience for nonsense.” In the 1980s, Rabinovich was arrested and sentenced to 14 years in prison for black market ventures, but wound up serving only seven years, according to Korrespondent, a Ukrainian weekly. Rabinovich says he was jailed on “trumped-up charges,” but the United States to this day has barred his entry as a result, he confirmed to JTA. ‘In Ukraine, they say I am Mossad agent, if you find this kind of nonsense interesting’ “You will find accusations against me in the U.S. In Israel, some say I am connected to the mafia. In Ukraine, they say I am Mossad agent, if you find this kind of nonsense interesting,” Rabinovich said. “I don’t.” Following his release in 1991, Rabinovich began to amass a fortune as a metals dealer operating in the economic free-for-all after the collapse of the Soviet Union. By 1995, he began pouring millions into Jewish causes. “After I turned 40, I made a discovery that there is such a thing called Torah,” he said. “It led me in all kinds of new directions.” Rabinovich says he puts on tefillin and prays every morning. He also hosts friends at his house every Friday, where he leads a discussion on the weekly Torah portion. In 1997 he founded the All-Ukrainian Jewish Congress, which has an annual budget of $3 million, and still serves as its president. He has sponsored Limmud Jewish learning conferences, provided security services to Jewish schools in Ukraine and started JN1, the world’s first 24-hour Jewish news network. In 2010, Rabinovich and Igor Kolomoisky, a friend and business partner, tried to take over the helm of a long-running Jewish organization, the European Council of Jewish Communities, but were stymied when board members staged a walkout after Kolomoisky was appointed president outside traditional nominating procedures. Detractors said Rabinovich played a key role in what they described as a “hostile takeover” of the organization. The group’s initial nominees included celebrities such as actor Sacha Baron Cohen — who didn’t even know they were candidates So Rabinovich started his own organization the following year, calling it the European Jewish Parliament and setting up offices in Kiev and Brussels and a board of 120 members. Critics laughed it off as a farce, noting that the group’s initial nominees included celebrities such as soccer star David Beckham, filmmaker Roman Polanski and actor Sacha Baron Cohen — who didn’t even know they were candidates. “Clearly, the principle of representation is lacking from this organization — which, like other groups, is no more than a vehicle for the ego of its creator,” Edwin Shuker, the London-based vice president of the European Jewish Congress, told JTA. But Rabinovich, whose organization has lobbied European governments on Jewish issues, is unfazed by such criticism. In fact, he doles it out just as readily. Rabinovich on Moshe Kantor, the European Jewish Congress president: He “just sits behind a desk and does nothing and will do everything the Kremlin tells him.” On Yaakov Dov Bleich, the U.S.-born chief rabbi of Ukraine: “Speaks no Russian and comes to Ukraine twice a year.” And of American Jewish organizational leaders, Rabinovich says they “only want to be interviewed on television.” Bleich told JTA he spends most of his time in Ukraine. A spokesperson for Kantor’s European Jewish Congress told JTA that Rabinovich’s statements are “unfounded and spurious allegations unworthy of comment.” “This is a desperate attempt by Rabinovich to remain on the agenda one last time before his organization ceases to exist in the same way as many other fleeting organizations which come and go, causing confusion and embarrassment to the Jewish community and its relationship with European leaders,” the spokesperson said. ‘This is a desperate attempt by Rabinovich to remain on the agenda one last time’ Joel Rubinfeld, a former leader of Belgian Jewry and current co-chair of the European Jewish Parliament, counts some successes of Rabinovich’s organization, notably securing the construction of Montenegro’s first modern synagogue and co-organizing the first European Jewish choir festival in Vienna. Rubinfeld says Rabinovich’s contributions, his prickly style notwithstanding, are deeply appreciated by Jewish communities, particularly in locales with limited resources that had suffered for decades under communist rule. “Vadim is both a builder and a bulldozer,” Rubinfeld said, “and as such I think he sees life in a rather geometric manner. He always takes the shortest distance between two points. Some cherish him for it, others resent him.” |
In a stunning interview on The Alex Jones Show, famed FBI whistleblower Sibel Edmonds completely destroyed special counsel Robert Mueller, laying out a series of facts that paint Mueller as a deep state operative who in the past has actively covered up Islamic terror networks and is now conducting a sort of “new McCarthyism” in his sham investigation into supposed ties between President Trump and Russia. Edmonds noted her background dealing with Mueller and it is not pretty. Not only did he help suppress evidence in her case he also issued a gag orders to silence the truth. “Imagine my shock when I saw that Robert Mueller was appointed as the special counsel in this case, the same Robert Mueller, who in my case, put gag orders together with attorney general Ashcroft,” Edmonds noted. “There were FBI agents, not only in the Washington field office, but also in the Chicago and Patterson field offices, who were blowing the whistle on Mueller internally, saying hes squashing our investigations [into terror networks].” Edmonds then goes on to discuss her shock that Mueller would be brought on as an “impartial” prosecutor in the Trump-Russia probe when he himself has a history of corruption. (Not to mention his close friendship with Comey and the deep state in general) “I was the one who stepped outside of the FBI, went to Congress, went to IG, it was a game. This same Mueller, who invoked the state secrets privilege, placed gag orders to protect, to protect, this terrorist network,” Edmonds stunningly revealed. “So imagine my shock when I see, low and behold, its Robert Mueller [investigating Trump] and he dug and could not find a single thing on General Flynn linking him in anyway to any nefarious activities with the Russians so he expanded this sham investigation.” In another segment of the show, Edmonds notes that it is a slam dunk case that Robert Mueller cannot preside as the special counsel in the Russia probe. She also notes how disappointing it is that lawyers for Flynn and others under investigation are not going on the offensive. Finally, Edmonds directly states that there are agents within the FBI who would testify that Mueller is not an impartial special counselor. This would give President Trump all he needs to fire him before he can ruin any other lives in his endless new McCarthyism like witch hunt. “I know of several veteran, highly decorated FBI agents, if subpoenaed, would testify that how Robert Mueller, due to what he was doing as the director of the FBI, can not preside as the special counsel in this case,” Edmonds continued. “Its a slam dunk case, its documented.” In other video, this time on her own website, Edmonds discusses all the conflicts of interest Mueller has in going after decorated General Michael Flynn. “FBI whistleblower Sibel Edmonds exposes Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s conflict of interest in pursuing General Michael Flynn’s case due to his direct involvement as former FBI Director and his role in covering up and protecting Gulen Networks’ criminal operations within the United States, and demands that he steps down.” At this point it is shockingly obvious that Robert Mueller is part of a deep state run, mainstream media pushed, operation to take out the rightfully elected president. Make no mistake, regardless whether or not you support Trump or his policies, this is a direct attack on American democracy. Delivered by The Daily Sheeple We encourage you to share and republish our reports, analyses, breaking news and videos (Click for details). Contributed by Alex Thomas of The Daily Sheeple. Alex Thomas is a staff writer and reporter for The Daily Sheeple. Wake the flock up – follow Alex’s work at our Facebook or Twitter. |
Another year, another Valentine’s Day. One of the most divisive holidays in America is coming up again in less than a month – but even if you don’t have a bae to celebrate with, fret not. If you’re in Dallas this coming February, you’ll be able to participate as C3 Presents & Insomniac Events host a very special Crush Texas, with Yellow Claw, Keys N Krates, Graves and more! (And if you do have a partner, all the better to celebrate with.) We caught up with Yellow Claw who are slated to play the Crush event in Dallas, Texas on February 11. Check it out below, and be sure to purchase tickets here. You’ve notably become a duo very recently. How has the loss of MC Bizzy, as a part of the group, affected your sound, if at all? No not really, behind the scenes he was never that involved in the music part. Our sound is however evolving and growing as it has been doin for the past 4 years now. You mentioned in an interview with Fuse last August that you were already working on your second album. How has that been coming? It’s done already. 14 songs. Also pretty recently, the absolutely massive remix pack for “Ocho Cinco” came out. Were you involved in picking the artists at all? What was your favorite remix of the bunch? Yeah we were! And we really love the Mike Cervello remix. When you’re booked for a festival like Crush, that has a pretty clear theme going (Valentine’s, in this case), do you try to incorporate that into your set? Absolutely. Good thing we have a lot of love songs. Last week, you guys posted some really dope Dutch hip hop on your Facebook page. What other music are you listening to when you’re not working? Everything from Miles Davis to Young Thug to be honest. If you had to curate your own festival, what kind of theme would it have? Who would play it? The theme should be FAMILY. And all artist that have released on Barong Family should play. And people would have to dress up as famous families. We would prob dress up as the Olsen twins. |
Hands on hips, shoulders back, head raised proudly, Christina Lewis poses for photos on her style blog. Here she is in a body-con miniskirt, with faux fur cape, and deep, vampish red lipstick. Here, again, in a tight Topshop dress, black biker jacket and ferocious, feathered collar. Then, once more, in a PVC dress, a studded waistcoat, and heavy Jil Sander shoes that look capable of breaking a breeze block with a single swing. She is tough, strong, beautiful. As cool and cutting-edge as they come. Lewis is also a US size 24 (UK 26), and her style blog, Musings of a Fatshionista, has been building a strong following in recent months. On her site she describes herself as "fat and fancy as it gets", before writing that, "when your options are seemingly limited, how do you stand out and be as fabulous as everyone else? By not being afraid to take risks". A 24-year-old graphic designer from Takoma Park, Maryland, Lewis began developing her sense of style while at art school in Philadelphia. Since then, she tells me, "I'm never afraid to put myself out there with what I wear. I always tell people I don't dress to look slim, I dress to look amazing!" Lewis's site is one of a wave of new style blogs by women who are defying their marginalisation by the fashion world. So, for instance, there's Young, Fat and Fabulous, run by Gabi Gregg, a 23-year-old teacher from Michigan, who says she started it because other sites "didn't know what was going on on the streets". Bloggers in the US are also behind Fatshionable and the Manfattan Project; there are plus-size bloggers in France, Australia, Germany and Poland. In Britain, Diane Dennis, a 34-year-old fashion designer from Birmingham, runs Fat Girls Like Nice Clothes Too. I ask whether she paused before using the word "fat" in her blog title, and she says: "No, not really. I wanted to be direct, to stick my fingers up at fashion, and say 'Yes, I am fat. So what?'" The sites vary, but most feature photographs of favourite outfits, reviews of plus-size fashion lines, as well as images of some of the women who inspire them, such as singer Beth Ditto, and model Kelli Jean Drinkwater. Most recently, many have featured Gabourey Sidibe, star of surprise hit movie Precious, who has been transforming perceptions of beauty and body image these past few weeks, striding the red carpet in dress after couture dress. These sites represent the point where two internet trends collide. The first is the growth of a loose collection of blogs affectionately known as the "fat-o-sphere". On sites such as the highly popular Shapely Prose, writers and readers discuss issues surrounding body image and fat acceptance (the idea that people should accept their weight, give up dieting, and commit themselves to being healthy at their current size.) At the same time, following the enormous success of The Sartorialist blog – where Scott Schuman posts photographs of stylish people he encounters in the streets – style blogs have become more varied, and more focused. Thirteen-year-old fashion writer Tavi Gevinson has caused a sensation, and Ari Seth Cohen's Advanced Style site has been capturing "New York's most stylish and creative older folks". Style blogs are democratising fashion, offering much more diverse images than we're used to. Fat people are perhaps the least visible group of all in fashion terms, a status that plays out in two related ways. First is the paucity of clothes available to anyone over a certain size, a source of sadness for many fat style bloggers. "I think people underestimate how difficult it is to stay current, because the options are very limited", says Gregg. It is also a source of inspiration. Lilli Hingee, 31, who works in publishing in Melbourne, began her site, Frocks and Frou Frou, partly because "the plus-size market in Australia is really, really dreadful", and partly as a result of seeing other women struggle with what was available. Hingee is a self-described "curvy girl" – neither fat nor thin – and on her site she documents items in larger sizes available from international fashion lines. In the last months of 2009, she posted a picture of herself in a different dress each day, for a project she called "frockapalooza". The other way in which fat women – indeed, almost all women – are marginalised, is in terms of fashion imagery, with an insistence on extremely thin, young, and generally white women in magazines and on catwalks. In the past few months there have been small signs that attitudes are changing. Last year US Glamour magazine ran an image of plus-size model Lizzie Miller, sitting naked and unperturbed by her small, soft belly, which provoked a huge response. Glamour editor Cindi Leive, was then inspired to run another photoshoot with plus-size models – again, all posed naked. This month, high fashion magazine V ran its size issue, featuring a photoshoot by fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld, which pictured burlesque star Miss Dirty Martini in an array of bras, nipple tassels and suspenders. Both Glamour and V have also run images of plus-size models in clothes, but it's interesting to note how many shoots depict them either half or fully naked. The images seem intent on fetishising big women, depicting them as intensely sexual beings, creatures of great appetites – not an unusual theme on the internet, where fat fetishist sites abound. Kate Harding, the writer behind Shapely Prose, points out that "they put them naked, and it's supposed to be this revolution, and in fact it's just like 'Great! You objectified someone a little bigger!'" Compare these images to those available on the mother of all fat style blogs: Fatshionista. This began as an online forum in 2004, and has since gone from strength to strength. Described as "a heady mixture of social politics, fat-girl memoir, and popular culture", it now centres around a personal blog run by Lesley Kinzel, and still includes a forum where readers discuss "plus-size clothes swaps", or where to get a sports bra. But perhaps the site's most mesmerizing feature is its Flickr gallery, where anyone US size 14 (UK 16) and over can post photographs of themselves in their favourite outfits. So you have a stunning woman in a red dress, a tattoo spreading rapturously across her chest. There's another tattooed lady in a peacock tunic, her bright yellow sandals echoing her bright yellow hair. There's a woman in a pink and green flowered mod dress with pink tights. There are women in satin cocktail dresses with lace gloves; cartoon print tunics with cowboy boots; hotpants with a jumper and beret; in swimsuits, bikinis, and tight, tight T-shirts. Thousands of women staring defiantly at the camera, daring someone to suggest they're not gorgeous. Clicking through these photos, you get a sense of just how easy it might actually be to change our visual culture. Dodai Stewart, deputy editor of popular women's website Jezebel, has written of her first encounter with Fatshionista that "while scrolling through the images, it was startling, at first, to see picture after picture of 'fat', plus-size, or heavy women. Not because of their bodies, or their clothes – they look fantastic – but because I just wasn't used to it". I ask feminist and psychoanalyst Susie Orbach, author of Bodies, whether she thinks these sites could shift our cultural outlook, expand our notions of beauty. "There's no doubt that they could," she says, before explaining the way we respond to images. "How do we get from a trend for straight-legged jeans to wide jeans? At first we find the new image foreign and horrible, and then it becomes very present, and we start to feel there's something wrong with us because we don't conform to it, and we want to catch up. It's the same with body image". Because we constantly see photographs of very thin women, many of them Photoshopped, we spend our lives trying to fit that impossible ideal – a relentless, often futile quest. "If we were seeing images, not just of fat women, but of all sizes, we wouldn't be continually having to catch up in terms of our own body size," says Orbach, "so we wouldn't be wanting to change it. We might feel that we were represented, and then we could focus on other aspects of our lives". Some claim that the sites promote obesity, that by showing stylish, proud fat women, they may encourage others to put on weight. Orbach disagrees. "I think thinness is what promotes obesity, because it promotes dieting, and dieting is one of the biggest causes of disturbed eating." Her one concern is that some of the photographs could be considered objectifying, "I'd much rather see women doing something, rather than just staring at the camera", she says. Stewart offers another take on this. "Fashion can be great," she says, "but the women we see in magazines, and on catwalks, often seem like a kind of clone army. They all look the same, and they're reduced to the status of coat hangers: the ultimate objects. Then you look at women on sites like Fatshionista, and the photographs are as much about their individual personalities as they are about the clothes. You see the style and the person combined." In fashion terms then, these women appear the ultimate subjects. Orbach feels the sites are "trying to transform aspects of visual culture, which will be very helpful to people. I wish they were in the mainstream". Others also hope – and suspect – that this might happen. Kinzel suggests "it's inevitable that not just fat fashion blogs, but all fashion blogging, will have an impact. It's hard for fashion magazines to compete when you have amazing free blogs like The Sartorialist and Advanced Style. Fashion has always existed as a place that people look to, aspire to, and admire from afar, but never feel part of. That's changing. The sudden use of more plus-size models in fashion magazines is absolutely influenced, however vaguely, by fashion blogs that show a diversity of people". There are certainly signs that these sites are having an affect on individual women. Ragini Nag Rao, a student from Kolkata, India, first started posting pictures of herself on Fatshionista in 2008, after struggling with her body image. "For the first time in my life," she says, "I was seeing these people who were my size, and larger, and who all looked great, and I thought 'If they can do it, why can't I?'" Nag Rao recently started her own blog, Forays in Fatshion, and when I ask whether this has improved her self-confidence, she says, "Yes, radically. It's transformed me, really". Many of these bloggers see what they're doing as a political statement, as well as an enjoyable pursuit. "Being fat and comfortable with yourself, and calling yourself fashionable, is in itself political," says Gregg. "It runs against what the mainstream considers possible". Nag Rao agrees. "Putting pictures of myself up on the internet is my small act of fat activism. When I upload my pictures, I always tag them with the words 'obesity epidemic' and '200lbs' because this is what the obesity epidemic looks like. It's not the huge, headless fatty that you see in the newspapers. This is it." |
The website iFixit got its hands on a brand-new iPhone 5 Friday morning as soon as the device went on sale in Australia. As expected, the inquisitive crew immediately dissected it to assess its hackability – and to give us some delicious gadget pr0n. Apple's new phone gets a very reasonable 7 out of 10 repairability rating, scoring just above last year's iPhone 4S, which earned a 6 out of 10. But for home repair aficionados, there are still a number of integrated components that can make repair costs add up quickly. Unsurprisingly, Apple still uses those fancy pentalobe screws to keep the iPhone's exterior intact. But once those are removed, the display portion is easily accessible, and more so than on the iPhone 4 or 4S. This is welcome news for the DIY-minded – not to mention the clumsy among us, since shattered display glass is one of the most common iPhone injuries. However, the front glass, digitizer, and LCD are combined into a single unit, so screen replacement will still be costly. After taking the screen off, the iFixit team consulted a high-precision scale and found the weight difference between the 4S and 5 to be stunning. "The entire rear case of the iPhone 5 weighs only slightly more than just the glass rear panel of the 4S," they say. Inside, it's got a 3.8V, 5.45Wh, 1434mAh battery that uses a different battery chemistry than that of the 4S. It's supposed to provide 25 more hours of standby time while providing the same amount of general usage levels (8 hours of 3G). The battery can be removed and replaced with "a little bit of prying," according to iFixit. The logic board and iSight camera innards of the iPhone 5. Image: iFixit The home button now features a built-in metal support bracket. This should help it last longer and make it easier to replace. At the other end of the device, it's also fairly pain-free to pop the speaker off of the display assembly. For 4G connectivity, the phone uses a Qualcomm MDM9615M chip, which handles multi-mode, multi-spectrum LTE. Apple sources other chips from Broadcom (the touchscreen controller), Texas Instruments (the touchscreen system-on-a-chip), and STMicroelectronics (the three-axis accelerometer). Interestingly, the iPhone 5 uses the same type of vibrating motor – a rotational motor with a counterweight – found in the iPhone 4 and earlier iPhones, and not the quieter linear-oscillating vibrator used in the iPhone 4S. For the complete teardown, head on over to iFixit. |
A mobile phone database for dairy farmers and a strain of sweet potato that can help fight child blindness. These are just two of the imaginative new ideas that are tackling Africa's old problems 1 HIPPO WATER ROLLER Idea: The Hippo water roller is a drum that can be rolled on the ground, making it easier for those without access to taps to haul larger amounts of water faster. Problem: Two out of every five people in Africa have no nearby water facilities and are forced to walk long distances to reach water sources. Traditional methods of balancing heavy loads of water on the head limit the amount people can carry, and cause long-term spinal injuries. Women and children usually carry out these time-consuming tasks, missing out on educational and economic opportunities. In extreme cases, they can be at increased risks of assault or rape when travelling long distances. Method: The Hippo roller can be filled with water which is then pushed or pulled using a handle. The weight of the water is spread evenly so a full drum carries almost five times more than traditional containers, but weighs in at half the usual 20kg, allowing it to be transported faster. A steel handle has been designed to allow two pushers for steeper hills. "Essentially it alleviates the suffering people endure just to collect water and take it home. Boreholes or wells can dry out but people can still use the same roller [in other wells]. One roller will typically serve a household of seven for five to seven years," said project manager Grant Gibbs. Verdict: Around 42,000 Hippo rollers have been sold in 21 African countries and demand exceeds supply. Costing $125 each, they are distributed through NGOs. A mobile manufacturing unit is set to begin making them in Tanzania. Nelson Mandela has made a "personal appeal" for supporting for the project, saying it "will positively change the lives of millions of our fellow South Africans". Monica Mark 2 THE iCOW APP Idea: To harness the power of mobile phones to encourage best practice for dairy farmers and increase milk production. Problem: Small-scale dairy farmers often living in remote areas don't have access to valuable information about latest prices of milk or cattle, and they may not keep accurate records of important details such as their cows' gestation periods or their livestock's lineage – often resulting in inbreeding and disease. Method: Created by Kenyan farmer Su Kahumbu, iCow is an app that works on the type of basic mobile phones farmers own. Each animal is registered with the service, which then sends SMS reminders to the farmer about milking schedules, immunisation dates and tips about nutrition and breeding or information about local vets or artificial insemination providers. UK-based foundation the Indigo Trust helped fund iCow's development. Its executive Loren Treisman says: "It's exciting to see a technology-driven project targeting such an unexpected constituency. Farmers have been empowered to improve their own lives through accessing critical agricultural information as opposed to depending on aid. What particularly excited us is that as a social enterprise, the iCow team have a sustainable business model which will enable them to expand rapidly and maximise their reach and impact without dependence on ongoing funding." Verdict: "The wonderful thing with iCow is that by the time you have used the app and adhered to all the instructions, your cows end up healthier, bigger and stronger. They can easily fetch you more money in the marketplace. Every smart farmer will use iCow," a small-scale farmer based in the cental highlands of Kenya told Forbes magazine. Ian Tucker 3 FARMER MANAGED NATURAL REGENERATION Idea: Farmer managed natural regeneration (FMNR), which restores existing trees on drought-stricken land, to improve Senegal's dwindling harvests. Problem: Senegal is suffering its third drought of the decade, resulting in reduced crops and inflated food prices. The World Food Programme assisted more than 9 million people in the Sahel region of West Africa this year, including 800,000 in Senegal. Method: Attempts to tackle the resulting problem of soil fertility have largely flopped so far. Trees planted as part of reforestation schemes have seen only a 5% success rate and fallowing is not an option, with 80% of African farmers owning under two hectares of land, which need to be utilised year in, year out. This puts the emphasis on reinvigorating the stumps of nitrogen-fixing trees, which were formerly cleared to maximise crop space. Farmers are thus encouraged to prune the stems and branches of trees like Faidherbia albida, giving new life to the vegetation already there. Verdict: FMNR is an inexpensive way for farmers to make improvements with the resources they already have, increasing millet harvests from 430kg to 750kg a hectare, and saving money on fertilisers, with restored trees producing leaf litter (forming humus) and giving shade to livestock (for manure). It gives the ecosystem a holistic boost, encouraging wildlife like bush pigeons and rabbits to return, and providing welcome human benefits such as wood cuttings for cooking and new food sources such as tamarind. Mina Holland 4 PORTABLE WATER PUMPS Idea: Portable irrigation technology helping sub-Saharan smallholder farmers grow crops out of season. Problem: When it comes to food supply, Africa faces enormous instability due to unpredictable climate and poor resources. Only 6% of Africa's cultivated land is irrigated, limiting the volume of crops that can be grown out of season, but increased access to irrigation systems stands to increase food productivity by up to 50%. Method: Kick Start, a not-for-profit organisation that specialises in irrigation technology, is making portable water pumps accessible to farming communities across Africa – most significantly in Kenya, Tanzania and Mali. These cost anything from $35 to $95 but, putting the emphasis on entrepreneurship, Kick Start are selling the pumps to farmers rather than giving them away. Solution: Kick Start told The Atlantic that, since 1991, their pumps have lifted 667,000 people out of poverty, helping to "create an entrepreneurial middle class, starting with the family farm". They have pumped new revenues equivalent to 0.6% of the GDP in Kenya alone. MH 5 THE CARDIOPAD Idea: A computer tablet diagnoses heart disease in rural households with limited access to medical services. Problem: Cardiovascular diseases kill some 17 million worldwide annually. In many African countries, those at risk often have to spend huge amounts of money and travel hundreds of miles to reach heart specialists concentrated in main urban centres. The Cameroon Heart Foundation has noted a "sharp spike" in heart disease among its 20 million-strong population, which is served by fewer than 40 heart specialists. Method: A program on the Cardiopad, designed by 24-year-old Cameroonian engineer Arthur Zang, collects signals generated by the rhythmic contraction and expansion of a patient's heart. Electrodes are fixed near the patient's heart. Africa's first fully touch-screen medical tablet then produces a moving graphical depiction of the cardiac cycle, which is wirelessly transmitted over GSM networks to a cardiologist for interpretation and diagnosis. "I designed the Cardiopad to resolve a pressing problem. If a cardiac exam is prescribed for a patient in Garoua in the north of the country, they are obliged to travel a distance of over 900km to Yaoundé or Douala," Zang says. Verdict: At the Laquintinie, one of the country's biggest hospitals, cardiologist Dr Daniel Lemogoum said that, in a recent survey, three in every five persons who uses the Cardiopad has been diagnosed as hypertensive, or at risk of heart diseases. "These are people who would not necessarily have been aware they are hypertensive. It means sudden deaths might be preventable." MM 6 NIGERIAN COMPUTER TABLET Idea: The Inye computer tablet that can connect to the internet via a dongle surmounts the price and infrastructure barriers in one go. Problem: Tech-savvy youths, who make up the bulk of the continent's population, face being left behind by a growing "digital divide". While much of Africa has skipped the desktop internet era and gone straight to mobile tech, big name brands retail in price ranges that remain out of reach for a majority in sub-Saharan Africa. Infrastructure is also straining under rapid population growth, and wireless and broadband technology is not yet widely available in many public places. Method: Co-founders Saheed Adepoju and Anibe Agamah, aimed to plug a gap in affordable mobile devices with the Inye tablet in Nigeria. They say its strongest selling point is its price – currently around £200. Run on Android systems, it can be connected to the internet via widely used dongles rather than wirelessly. IT provider Encipher also offers add-on bundles from games to specifically tailored apps. Local developers are designing apps that address issues such as HIV, water and sanitation and education. Verdict: The group is now retailing its Inye 2 model to popular demand. Long-term, there are plans to expand beyond Africa's most populous country. MM 7 ETHANOL COOKING OIL PLANT Idea: Refining locally sourced cassava into ethanol fuel to provide cleaner cooking fuel. Problem: Forests in Africa are being cut down at a rate of 4m hectares a year, more than twice the worldwide average rate. Some of this is fuelled by demand for wood and charcoal, which the UN estimates is still used in almost 80% of African homes as a cheaper option to gas. The smoke from cooking using these solid fuels also triggers respiratory problems that cause nearly 2 million deaths in the developing world each year. Method: CleanStar Mozambique, a partnership between CleanStar and Danish industrial enzymes producer Novozymes, has opened the world's first sustainable cooking-fuel plant in Mozambique. CleanStar has steered clear of monoculture crops in favour of sustainable farming methods. One-sixth of the final yield comes from locally harvested cassava, which requires farmers to plant in rotation with other edible crops to keep the soil fertile. A Sofala Province-based plant transforms the products into ethanol, which is sold on the local market along with adapted cooking stoves also produced by the company. Verdict: "City women are tired of watching charcoal prices rise, carrying dirty fuel, and waiting for the day that they can afford a safe gas stove and a reliable supply of imported cylinders," CleanStar marketing director Thelma Venichand said. "They are ready to buy a modern cooking device that uses clean, locally made fuel, performs well and saves them time and money." The plant aims to produce 2m litres of fuel annually, and reach 120,000 households within three years. MM 8 REFUGEES UNITED Idea: Danish brothers David and Christopher Mikkelsen founded Refugees United in 2008 after they helped a young Afghan refugee in Copenhagen search for lost family members. Realising the futile paper trail that many refugees were faced with when looking for missing relatives, the brothers wanted to find an easier way that refugees could trace their families. Problem: There are 43 million forcibly displaced people worldwide with hundreds of thousands of refugee families scattered across the globe. Before 2008 all family tracing was done by refugee agencies, which still rely on paper forms and postal systems to try to locate people. There was no online global data bank that could be accessed or used by refugees themselves. Technique: Refugees United is an online search tool, where refugees can create a free profile and start their search for family via an online database using the internet or a mobile phone. It works through an open-source model, partnering with not-for-profit refugee organisations including the Red Cross and the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) as well as corporate tech partners such as Erickson and Google. Verdict: More than 100,000 people are registered on the Refugees United family tracing platform. It is available in dozens of different languages and contains searchable information on refugees from more than 82 countries. It is currently helping 15,000 people trace family in the Kakuma refugee camp, home to 80,000 refugees and asylum-seekers, in Kenya. The main challenge is actually reaching the refugees, often the poorest of the poor, who don't have ready access to computers or mobile phones. Annie Kelly 9 DIY AID SUPPLIES Idea: To make Africa self-sufficient in emergency relief supplies. Problem: For a continent so in need of quick, affordable emergency relief, not to mention so riddled with unemployment, there's a cruel irony about the provenance of emergency supplies. Smaller African manufacturers have traditionally been unable to compete with Chinese prices, or to meet the vast demand for emergency goods within Africa. As a result, aid agencies such as Unicef have forged links with foreign producers better able to produce these supplies at the scale, cost and quality required. Yet this inevitably requires longer lead times and higher transportation costs than sourcing goods locally – and Africans lose out on the work. Method: Advance Aid is an organisation that wants to make aid destined for Africa available within Africa, from blankets and mosquito nets to basic cooking equipment and hygiene kits. The organisation acts as an intermediary between large aid agencies and African producers, putting together packages of aid supplies sourced locally. This has been very effective in Kenya, where Advance Aid have supplied 5,000 locally sourced emergency kits to World Vision and another 14,000 jerry cans to Catholic Relief Services, who distributed them in Dadaab, the refugee camp near the Somalian border. Founder David Dickie says: "Aid is not working. I'm trying to turn the market on its head by creating jobs in Africa. Building this capacity in Africa will make a real difference to agencies, to the beneficiaries of the aid and to local businesses… [It] is a very efficient way of bringing together the development and humanitarian agendas." Verdict: Advance Aid's work in Kenya in 2011 marks the first time that emergency relief goods produced in Africa have been provided for an African emergency, with 80% of goods sourced within the country. It put $1.5bn into the Kenyan economy and brought orders to 12 local manufacturers. MH 10 SICKLE CELL DISEASE RESEARCH Idea: To carry out scientific research on sickle cell disease (SCD) and show that large-scale, cutting-edge genomic studies are possible in Africa. Problem: Every year, 300,000 children worldwide are born with SCD, a genetic blood disorder that can result in severe anaemia. Seventy percent of these children, or 210,000, are born in Africa. Tanzania has one of the highest annual birth rates of SCD in the world and without treatment up to 90% of these children will die in early childhood. However, many of these deaths could be prevented by early diagnosis and treatment. A better understanding of the genetic and environmental mechanisms of the disease will lead to improved diagnosis and therapies. Method: Dr Julie Makani from Muhimbili University in Tanzania is working with the Wellcome Trust to conduct a genome-wide association study (GWAS) in order to better understand the genetic and environmental factors affecting SCD. The Muhimbili Wellcome Programme originally aimed to follow 400 children but is now following 2,500, making it one of the largest, biomedical SCD resources in the world. Dr Makani says that the work "provides validation that it is possible to conduct genomic research in Africa". Verdict: Professor Lorna Casselton from the Royal Society says: "SCD has a severe toll on Africa, and high-quality research to lessen the burden is much needed. Dr Makani stands as a role model for other young African scientists wishing to make a difference." Olivia Honigsbaum 11 M-PEPEA Idea: To offer emergency credit through mobile phones to people who don't have access to credit cards or bank loans. Problem: Credit cards are still rarely available to Kenyans and bank loans are only authorised for large amounts of cash or as investments for buying homes or starting businesses. Often the only source of emergency cash is loan sharks, increasingly big business in Kenya, with borrowers signing ambiguous photocopied contracts and tying themselves into interest rates of 50% or more. M-Pepea was launched to try to bridge this gap. Method: M-Pepea, set up in late 2010, provides its customers with emergency funds within a few hours. It partners with Kenyan businesses, with employees then able to use M-Pepea to get immediate loans of up to 20% of their monthly salary. The money is accessed through their mobile phones, with M-Pepea sending a special pin code to be used in cash machines. Money can also be collected at branches of Safaricom, one of Kenya's largest mobile phone operators, and then deducted from the borrower's pay packet at the end of the month. M-Pepea charges around 10% interest rates on the loans, which are paid in full at the end of the month. Verdict: M-Pepea has currently partnered with 20 businesses and has around 300 subscribers, and is hoping to have increased this to 20,000 by the end of 2013. Its partnership with Safaricom is encouraging but the company has run into problems with businesses defaulting. "We're still in our initial phase, but we've seen how positively people have responded to the service," says David Munga, M-Pepea's 33-year-old founder. "If, like many Kenyans, you've found yourself at the side of the road with a broken car, no credit card and no money in the bank, it's a way of getting yourself that money without having to get into trouble." AK 12 THE TUTU VAN Idea: The brightly coloured "Tutu Tester" van is a mobile clinic that incorporates screening for tuberculosis (TB) and HIV into a general health check-up in order to overcome the stigma associated with these diseases. Problem: South Africa is at the centre of an epidemic of TB/HIV co-infections. An estimated 5.7 million people are infected with HIV and, fuelled by HIV, the country's rate of TB has increased over the last 20 years to the point where it now has the third highest TB burden in the world. In the case of HIV, voluntary counselling and testing (VCT) is vital for preventing and treating the disease. However, data from the Desmond Tutu HIV Foundation conducted in communities most affected by HIV shows that VCT is often inaccessible or inadequately performed. This results in missed opportunities for prevention and increased morbidity and mortality – hence the need for new control strategies to keep the epidemic in check. Method: The Tutu Tester is a mobile clinic that takes sophisticated testing equipment and trained staff (including a nurse, a counsellor and an educator) into areas without adequate health facilities. By framing TB and HIV screening within a battery of other healthy living tests, including pregnancy, diabetes and hypertension, people are encouraged to get tested for the diseases. Dr Linda-Gail Bekker, a leading scientist working with the foundation, says that data from these screens shows that "the increase in TB has quite clearly tracked the increase in HIV rates". Further, the introduction of Antiretroviral therapy (ART) for HIV has also led to a decline in the incidence of TB. This suggests that ART programs, if sufficiently implemented, may greatly assist in reducing TB mortality. Verdict: There is still a stigma attached to HIV and TB. But as Liz Thebus, a healthcare worker at the Tutu Tester says: "The outside world does not know whether someone wants to be screened for HIV or diabetes. They are in that respect much more anonymous." OH 13 ORANGE SWEET POTATO Idea: Breeding sweet potatoes to contain betacarotene, to help in the fight against childhood blindness. Problem: More than 3 million children in Africa suffer from blindness caused by vitamin A deficiency; in Uganda it is estimated that 28% of children are deficient. Currently aid agencies combat this problem by giving children vitamin A supplements, but addressing this issue with a locally grown food would be more sustainable. Method: A new strain of sweet potato was conventionally bred which contains between four and six times as much betacarotene as a regular sweet potato – betacarotene is converted by the body into vitamin A. The OSP (orange sweet potato) was distributed to 10,000 farming households in Uganda; at the end of the two-year study vitamin A deficiency in non-breastfeeding children aged between 12 and 35 months fell from nearly 50% to 12%. Dr Christine Holz from the International Food Policy Research Institute who led the project said: "Overall, these results add to the growing evidence base that OSP provides large amounts of vitamin A in the diet." Verdict: Similar results were obtained from a sister project in Mozambique; now the scheme is being scaled up to reach 225,000 households by 2016. IT 14 SPEAKING BOOKS Idea: A range of easy-to-use audio books designed to get potentially life-saving health messages out to millions of isolated people struggling with depression and mental health problems. Problem: In 2003, Zane Wilson, the founder of the South African Depression & Anxiety Group (Sadag), the country's largest mental health initiative, was horrified at how suicide rates among young South Africans were spiking. Mental health carries a huge social stigma across Africa and information booklets designed to help people with depression or mental health problems simply weren't working, especially in remote communities with high illiteracy rates. People weren't getting the help they needed – a 2009 study showed that only a quarter of the 16.5% of South Africans suffering from mental health problems had received any kind of treatment. Method: Speaking Books created a range of free books with simple audio buttons talking the user through each page. The first Speaking Book, voiced by South African actress and celebrity Lillian Dube, was called Suicide Shouldn't Be a Secret and focused on how depression is a real and treatable illness, encouraging people to get help when they need it. Verdict: Speaking Books have now produced 48 titles in 24 different languages and are now used in 20 African countries across the continent. The books now tackle a number of critical healthcare issues outside of suicide prevention such as HIV and Aids, malaria, maternal health and clinical trials. Speaking Books has also expanded to China, India and South America. "The situation we face in rural South Africa is the same in any other African country – low literacy compounded by lack of access to services and affordable healthcare," says Wilson. "This means that patients are often not able to get help for many health problems. We believe that this interactive, durable, high-quality, hardcover book engages the user or patient, and allows them to build self-confidence and skills with a simple action plan". AK 15 NARRATIVE EXPOSURE THERAPY Idea: Narrative exposure therapy (NET) for Uganda's former child soldiers, encouraging storytelling to help come to terms with their experiences. Problem: Abducted and forced into conscription by the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), over 25,000 Ugandan children were pushed into violent atrocities during a civil war that lasted 22 years, often killing their own families. The majority were left with severe post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) – with symptoms including depression, flashbacks and suicidal thoughts. Moreover, hostility from their former communities has left countless child soldiers alienated, making PTSD a longer, lonelier battle. Method: NET was introduced to Ugandan child soldiers as a means of making conscious their deeply repressed traumas. The technique highlights the importance of story, creating a kind of fiction from real-life experience as a vehicle for coming to terms with it. Nick Taussig, co-founder of the Mtaala Foundation – a charity that sets up educational communities in Uganda, empowering Ugandans to help their own youth – says that narrative exposure, though not a new concept, appeals to Ugandan culture, "There's a strong oral tradition in Uganda, and these treatments build on that by committing the children's stories to paper, investing them with added meaning." Verdict: A study of 85 former child soldiers conducted by Bielefeld University, Germany, demonstrated that 80% of those who underwent NET showed clinical improvements. MH |
Tribes Newbloods is a Tribes: Ascend tournament by Newbloods, for Newbloods. Many of us have watched the Gameshrine tournament and other big-money events unfold as the best of the best show the pinnacle of skill at this new game we call Tribes: Ascend. The giants of the sport have competed and earned their glory, now it’s time for the Newbloods to step up! Teams will compete in a Swiss format. Matches will consist of 3 games. Each game a team wins will net it a tournament point, draws earn a half point, and losses earn no tournament points. These tournament points will be used to seat teams in subsequent rounds such that teams with similar tournament scores will play eachother. Every team plays in every round, and should we have an odd number of teams, a team that gets a by will play in a showmatch against an available non-Newbloods team and receive three tournament points and a firm pat on the back regardless of the outcome. |
Not too long ago I reviewed Winterhymn’s latest release Blood & Shadow. From Winterhymn Warg, Sieven and Ulfr left to form Siegelord in 2013 adding Therod on guitar. Even though the band has ties to Winterhymn the music differs quite a bit (my guess is that may even have been the reason they left to form Siegelord). Whereas Winterhymn plays folk metal mixed with black, death and power metal Siegelord is more towards melodic death metal with hints of black metal. Epic battles and mythology awaits the listener as Siegelord grants you a battlefield filled with bloodshed. Think of bands like Ex Deo, Amon Amarth and Dissection then you know which direction Siegelord are going. While listening to Ascent of the Fallen I can’t help but draw a lot of parallels to the latest offering from Amon Amarth, Jomsviking. A melodic death metal concept album has been done before of course but this album has more in common with Jomsviking than anything else I’ve heard. The groovy riffs, harsh vocals and tales of war and battle simply makes me think of Amon Amarth. Like when I hear A Grim Destiny which then leads to Unkillable I can’t help but think of the opening track of Jomsviking, First Kill. This isn’t anything negative as I had Jomsviking set as my favorite album last year and if you also enjoyed it then you will also have a great time with Ascent of the Fallen. Siegelord delivers a dark fantasy world that even Tolkien would deem worthy. Looking for a tale of epic proportions? A tale that involves war, betrayal and the birth to a new dark conqueror. If you are then Siegelord’s debut album Ascent of the Fallen will keep you more than occupied. A great debut and the future is bright for the Siegelords. Definitely an album that didn’t get the attention it deserved during 2016. Ascent of the Fallen is out now as an independent release. Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/Siegelord Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/siegelord For fans of: Ex Deo and Amon Amarth Favorite song: Totem Advertisements |
Danney Williams Wishes His Father Bill Clinton Happy Fathers Day with Epic Tweets THE LIBERAL US MEDIA WORKED OVERTIME TO PROTECT SCANDAL-PLAGUED HILLARY CLINTON LAST YEAR– In October Danney Williams made the headline on The Drudge Report— Danney claims he is Bill Clinton’s illegitimate son. The 27-year-old black man from Arkansas put new pressure on the former President and his wife Hillary. Danney’s mother, a prostitute who lived in Arkansas in the mid-1980s, claimed she had sex with the the Arkansas governor at the time. In her interview, Bobbie said that Clinton rubbed her belly and said, “Girl, that can’t be my baby.” But I knew it was. I just had this kind of woman’s feeling that this was his child”. (Photo: Twitter) The liberal media ignored or attacked Danney Williams during the election. They did not want this story reported. Yesterday Danney Williams wished his father Bill Clinton Happy Father’s Day on Twitter. Via American Mirror: I'm not looking for sympathy nor welfare, I just wish you didn't forget about me @billclinton. #BillClintonSon #ClintonKid pic.twitter.com/txNFjfMB5f — Danney Williams (@danney_williams) June 18, 2017 Even though you abandoned me and only took care of Chelsea, I still want to thank you for giving me life. Happy Father's Day @billclinton. pic.twitter.com/EMKla9lPM1 — Danney Williams (@danney_williams) June 18, 2017 Happy Father’s Day! |
The 38-year-old man arrested by FBI agents at his West Odessa home Thursday was a former Odessa police officer, and the charges leveled against him relate to a conspiracy to sell methamphetamine, according to a federal criminal complaint made public on Friday. Jackie Lynn Thompson, 2900 N. Torrance Ave., was a member of the Odessa Police Department from April 7, 2003, to July 15, 2007, when he voluntarily resigned as a patrol officer, said Andrea Goodson, a spokesperson for the department. At about 9:30 a.m. Thursday morning, troopers with the Texas Department of Public Safety pulled Thompson over as he was driving a black Ford F-350 because he reportedly rolled through a stop sign at 42nd Street and Guernsey Road, the complaint affidavit states. DPS troopers reported arresting him after they found Thompson with a handgun and a small amount of what troopers believed to be meth. At the DPS office in Odessa, agents told Thompson they had a search warrant for his home. The affidavit states he admitted he distributed about five pounds of meth with a group of other people since October 2012. The affidavit does not name any co-conspirators. Inside Thompson’s home, agents reported finding 27 guns, a small amount of meth and steroids. The OPD’s SWAT team assisted with the search. Authorities with the DEA and Homeland security also assisted. Goodson said late Friday afternoon she had not viewed Thompson’s personnel file and did not have information about his conduct during his tenure as an officer. On Thursday, before the federal complaint was released, Sheriff Mark Donaldson said he knew of no Jackie Thompson in his employ, saying at most he might be a reservist. Donaldson said he knew of the Jackie Thompson that was in the OPD. |
Here's part two of our countdown.... 25. MAKE A CHIP The ZX Spectrum+ game bundled with a six pack of software at first, that included Chequered Flag (overrated but ambitious), Scrabble (hilarious, once you worked out it'd take any made up word. 'Bamfrilly' on triple word remains a highlight) and word processor Tasword Two. The oddity, and the attempt to make the pack educational, was Make A Chip. I hated it at first, clearly just wanting to play the games. But I kept getting drawn back to it, not least because I couldn't afford too many games. And while I can't sit here and tell you I had a blast with it, I'm still thinking about it nearly three decades later. Make A Chip was basically the program, not even vaguely convincingly disguised as a game, that demonstrated remarkably clearly how chips worked, and how they fitted into circuit design. Billed as a tool to teach you how computer logic worked, it was, in hindsight, the one title in that pack of six that still works perfectly well today. Even if there's a bit of you that'd rather be playing Technician Ted (not included in this list, incidentally, because I've read lots and lots of pieces on how much people love it). 24. SHOCKWAY RIDER A large sprinkle of science fiction overhangs the concept to Shockway Rider, where instead of walking around on pavements, the people of the future travel along moving Shockways. Sadly, so do nasty people, along with numerous grannies, and thus riding them is a dangerous game. It's a good job weapons are at hand. It did all get a little samey by the time you got near the end, but I wanted to include Shockway Rider because for the first hour, it was amazing. There's a drop of Frogger to it as you jump between the Shockways moving at different speeds, and the surprisingly good graphics serve the game well. But I think I also just loved the idea. As did, seemingly, the planners of every airport constructed since... 23. MY NAME IS UNCLE GROUCHO, YOU WIN A FAT CIGAR Publisher Automata routinely got on my nerves for making you reload a game at the end of each turn. Fortunately, each turn lasted a while. My Name Is Uncle Groucho, You Win A Fat Cigar was a bumbling title, based around, er, Groucho Marx (Charlie Chaplin would get his own computer game too in time, a beat 'em up disguised as a movie making simulator). It was a brash text adventure, that rewarded outright madness if you wanted to make your way through it. For a whole generation, it was their first introduction to the Marx brothers. Me included. 22. AUF WIEDERSEHEN, MONTY Some gaming series I never fully warmed to on the Spectrum, which is why there are none of the Wally games here. And truthfully, I struggled a bit with some of the Monty Mole titles. I did love Wanted: Monty Mole a lot though. I do appreciate that Monty Mole is pretty well known, but the reason I've mentioned it here is that it's the controversy that attracts a lot of the attention (due to purported links with the miner's strike of the 1980s), yet it's the game that was brilliant. Auf Wiedersehen Monty was the best one for me though (hence its listing here). It was where every idea seemingly got crammed into the game, as the Speccy's favourite mole traversed Europe with a verve rarely seen since Trashman went globe trotting. Impossamole was a mess, though, and a sad swansong... 21. TRAP DOOR Don Priestley will forever be credited with bringing big, colourful chunky graphics to the ZX Spectrum. Had I played it, his take on Minder may well have made this list. I also had a soft spot for Flunky, where your job was to wait on royalty (bloody hard though). But Trap Door was special. For starters, the TV series that it's based on was excellent. But the way the game captured the characters and wit of it, and wrapped it into a fun puzzler remains impressive. The sequel, Through The Trap Door, was faster and more efficient. Trap Door felt like a tighter game though, and a real breakthrough. It deserves more love that it seems to get. 20. KRAKOUT It seems bizarre that the Spectrum's best Breakout clone appeared in the end on a magazine covertape and never got a full price release (that'd be Batty). The two Arkanoid titles were strong too, although level three of Arkanoid could rightly be described as 'a bit of a bastard'. Krakout remains the forgotten one though, but it was just as devilishly addicted. It felt a little different too, given that it pretty much literally turned the game on its side. There are lots of bonuses, lots of levels, and, truthfully, far too many elements thrown into the mix. But it always was a bit underrated, and I always appreciated the fact that it was trying something just a little different with something oh-so-familiar. 19. MATCH POINT The best tennis game on the ZX Spectrum was, if I've got my dates right, the first. Sure, the likes of Passing Shot came along later, with much fancier visuals, but Match Point got the mechanics of the game itself bang on. It's a pity a sequel never came along to expand upon that core gamplay, but it wasn't until Sega unleashed Virtua Tennis in the 90s that, for my money, Match Point was beaten. 18. BATMAN: THE CAPED CRUSADER Is this the forgotten Batman game? The Spectrum played host to the wonderful isometric puzzle Batman (which until Arkham Asylum and Arkham City came along, was the best videogame version of the iconic character for me. Ryan wrote about it here, in his look at how DC characters had fared in videogames. In that same feature, he mentioned Batman: The Caped Crusader, a comic-book feel action adventure, that boasted devious puzzles and a wonderful visual style. It had two stories to work through, and it eschewed the action that's prevalent in most Batman games for a heavy focus on the character's detective origins. That said, when the Batman: The Movie game came along, it seemed to be forgotten about again. A shame. 17. WRIGGLER Confession: I actually eventually wore my copy of Wriggler out, so never got to see the end of it. Published by the gloriously-named Romantic Robot (mainly known for its Multiface devices), Wriggler is a game about four maggots going for a race. You played one of those maggots and, bluntly, your chances of seeing the end of the game were negligible, irrespective of whether you wore the tape out. The need to constant find food, while avoiding the many nasties on the race route, was tough enough. The fact that the other maggots were near-impossible to beat didn't help either. I've since read that the game featured 256 screens to navigate. I'd be amazed if I saw half of them. Still, this is comfortably computing's best ever maggot simulator. Put that on the box. 16. JUMPING JACK If you were old enough to have a Dragon 32, then you might remember Jumping Jack under the guise of Leggit on that machine. For the Spectrum though, it was Jumping Jack, a simple game that just required you to jump to the top of the screen. Naturally enough, this was easier sid than done, with gaps appearing to jump through, and then, as they made their way down the screen, appearing under you feet. Think of it as a moving version of snakes and ladders. With, er, no snakes, and no ladders. Very, very addictive though. 15. JOE BLADE III Players built up quite a reputation for compelling, well-presented budget games, with Colin Swinbourne's Joe Blade proving to be a real breakthrough for the firm. It was Joe Blade II that proved the massive critical and commercial success though, but for my money, it's comfortably the weakest of the trilogy. Way too easy, Joe Blade II wasn't bad, but the game that followed, Joe Blade III, was genuinely excellent. For some reason, it never really took off, but it expanded on the game mechanic in a far better way, and got the balance right between challenge and polish. One of the best budget games every to grace the Spectrum. 14. TRACK SUIT MANAGER Football management titles proved to be a welcome source of business for many 8-bit publishers (I could have easily gone for The Double here, or Professional Soccer). They also fuelled a lively self-publishing business for some companies, and Goliath Games was one of those. Its game, Track Suit Manager, went up against Football Manager 2, and while it may not have won the box office battle, it certainly proved to be a hugely ambitious game. Its key gimmick, which had more substance to it than you might first think, was running text commentary. It worked well too. And while Track Suit Manager was focused on international football management only, it was one of the best of its ilk on the Spectrum. 13. KNIGHT TYME The Magic Knight series of games deserve to go down in folklore, as evidence as to just how exciting and interesting the budget software scene was on the ZX Spectrum. Finders Keepers and Spellbound were both strong, but Knight Tyme was the best for me. It was far more adventure driven than Finders Keepers, and marked the peak of the series, before Stormbringer finished the Magic Knight games off. To be fair, any four of the Magic Knight titles are still worth trying. The Dizzy games were good, but it's surely Magic Knight that's the best budget series of all time on the Speccy. 12. ERIC AND THE FLOATERS I've lost way too much time of late to the massively multiplayer online take on Bomberman, Bombermine. We wrote about it here. But the roots of Bomberman lie in Hudson Soft's earlier piece of work, Eric And The Floaters. Crucially, it got the core dynamic in place and working from the off too, in that you lay bombs to blow other people up, while getting out of the way yourself. Plus, let's face it, Eric And The Floaters is an extraordinarily brilliant name for a computer game. Nobody can ever convince me otherwise. 11. THUNDERBIRDS The Spectrum had two excellent Thunderbirds games. The later one, from Grand Slam, tends to be the most remembered (and remains strong). But the earlier Firebird published version (that came in a chunky cassette box) kept me busy for hours. It was a game that used the ships of Thunderbirds and turned them into a puzzle game, as you worked out which craft you needed for which job. It was terrible to look at, but a real time gobbler to play. 10. SPLIT PERSONALITIES Originally published as Splitting Images before some lawyers wrote a couple of letters, Split Personalities was a computerised version of sliding square puzzle games. Fortunately, quirks were introduced, and they transformed the game into one of the Spectrum's very best puzzle games. The simple use of bombs and a constant countdown to battle against, along with some familiar, characterised faces to put together, made Split Personalities an absolute blast. Surely ripe for an iOS and Android version too... 9. SOFTWARE STAR The finest beard of the ZX Spectrum era belonged to Kevin Toms, who's best known for the Football Manager series. Toms also wrote a political strategy game, President, but his forgotten gem was Software Star. It was always going to be a title with niche appeal (although D&H put out Software House, on its Cult label, many years later), as the idea was to put together a successful games publisher. Key decisions, which are played out in the industry on a day to day basis, include whether to hype a game up or keep it honest. And should you release a game early, or put in some extra development hours? Simple decisions maybe, but the tension when it came time to release a new title was palpable. Game Dev Story, for the iPhone, is the only game to really capture the spirit of Software Star since. 8. BEHIND CLOSED DOORS Tools such as the The Quill, Graphic Adventure Creator (GAC) and the Professional Adventure Writer (PAW) saw a resurgence in the text adventure towards the end of the Spectrum's active life. And for me, it was the Behind Closed Doors games from Zenobi Software that marked the peak. The Spectrum has plenty of acclaimed, humorous text adventures - The Boggit and Bored Of The Rings stand alone - but Behind Closed Doors deserves recognition for both its comedy and its imagination. It's, basically, a hugely entertaining collection of games about being locked in the toilet. You'd never see that on a PlayStation... 7. TURBO ESPRIT And you thought it was Grand Theft Auto that introducing the whole driving wherever you like around a city mechanic. Durrell Software published games that were notoriously rock hard, but that shouldn't cloud some of the firm's technical achievements. Turbo Esprit was a game where you could ignore the plot if you wanted, and just go for a drive around a seemingly living city (complete with traffic lights to, er, obey). Four free-roaming cities were included in the game to explore, and while the main game was arguably less interesting than the technical breakthroughs here, it was long before Rockstar struck gold in learning that there's a lot of fun to be had going off piste. 6. GHOULS 'N' GHOSTS I maintain that, outside of perhaps Rainbow Islands and Ping Pong, Ghouls & Ghosts - particularly on the 128k - was about as good a coin-op conversion as the Spectrum ever got. It was nothing special to look at, in truth, but it built on the already-impressive Ghosts 'N' Goblins, and with some style. Any game that reduces you to underwear when the undead get to you has to earn some credit from the off. As it turned out, Ghouls 'N' Ghosts had an excellent platform game underneath all the humour. The last level's a killer, though. 5. TRAVEL WITH TRASHMAN A controversial release, this one. The original Trashman made much entertainment out of collecting people's dustbins (in theory, a game about picking up rubbish was a gift for critics looking for a lazy headline. Fortunately, Trashman was excellent). Travel With Trashman sent the title character on a litter-collecting adventure around the world. Thus, you had to choose which job you could afford to take, and make sure you collected enough rubbish before your money ran out. The controversy arose with a part of the game which required you to collect tissues dropped at the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem. To my knowledge, no videogame game before it or since has asked you to do the same. Travel With Trashman was, being blunt, brutally difficult, as the clock barely ever stopped ticking. But it was damn addictive too, and had circumstances prevailed, then a third game would have followed. However, while it was started, Trashman Through Time was ultimately abandoned. Author Malcolm Evans was also responsible for 3D Monster Maze on the ZX81, incidentally. That one had no rubbish in it. 4. PIPPO Two quid they asked for Pippo. Two measly pounds. For one of the most criminally addictive Spectrum games I think I ever played. The core concept, of jumping from square to square to change the colour of them, had of course been done before (hello, Q*Bert!). Pippo executed it really, really well though, before then adding in creatures, pick-ups, and a big blob of a creature at the heart of it all. In more litigation-prolific times, the author of Pippo may well have been sent a letter. As it stood, they took someone else's already strong idea, added some quirks, and made it even better. Comfortably, for me, one of the ten most addictive games to ever grace the Speccy. 3. M.O.V.I.E. The finest isometric adventures on the Spectrum would have to be Jon Ritman's duo, Batman and Head Over Heels. But Imagine's M.O.V.I.E. was quite brilliant too. I'm going to talk about another game shortly that was draped in the clothes of Hollywood detective noirs, but M.O.V.I.E. was rooted in them from the off (not for nothing is it said to have influenced L.A. Noire). Inevitably slow moving, M.O.V.I.E. was and is utterly engrossing, and it was just a shame that its pseudo follow-up, Phantom Club, never worked anywhere near as well. M.O.V.I.E. though is a treat. 2. CONTACT SAM CRUISE You think Microsphere, and the games that instantly spring to mind are the rightly-regarded Skool Daze and Back To Skool. Both of them are the kind of games that either wouldn't get past a pitch meeting now, or would be subverted into something 'edgier', along the lines of Bully. There is a sort-of forgotten Microsphere title, built around the same technology that powered the Skool games, and the glorious detective yarn, Contact Sam Cruise. Written by David Reidy, with Keith Warrington providing the distinctive graphics, Sam Cruise is a private detective who could have been pulled out of any number of noir movies of old. The scope and scale remains impressive today, and the underlying humour is just one example of the attention to detail at work. The only thing that lets the side down slightly is the catapulting over bullets being aimed at you. Which was and is a bit of a sod. More than anything though, Contact Sam Cruise was and is a blast to play. Tragically, it would prove to be the last game David Reidy would write. Disillusioned with the poor sales for Contact Sam Cruise, and finding his old fashioned way of designing games (pen and paper beat assemblers, apparently) difficult to continue with, Reidy elected not to jump aboard the 16-bit bandwagon, and went on to become an electrical engineer. There's a lovely interview with him here. Contact Sam Cruise, then, remains his final game. It's a flat-out classic, not without its problems, but a delight that videogame history should not forget. 1. DYNAMITE DAN 1 & 2 The ZX Spectrum had no shortage of quality platform games in truth, but it's generally Manic Miner and Jet Set Willy, both grounded in wonderful insanity, that tend to be the most fondly remembered. However, history should not forgot the gloriously addictive Dynamite Dan games. Pushing the Spectrum hard on both the audio and visual fronts, the goal of Dynamite Dan was simple: collect stick of dynamite. Objects were in different places each time you played, and assorted power-ups were available. The goal was to defeat the evil Dr Blitzen, and there were umpteen foes and obstacles in your way. Using the word 'addictive' barely comes close to covering Dynamite Dan though. And even though the best I ever managed was seven of the sticks of dynamite required, Dynamite Dan was my go-to game for a good two to three years. It was the loyal puppy of the Spectrum years, always by your side, and never failing to entertain. The sequel expanded the already broad scale of Dynamite Dan, and crucially managed to keep the focus and what made the first game so wildly entertaining, in fact. It's a shame that Dan's adventures stopped after two outings, but both of them are most certainly worth tracking down. They might not be the best ever games to grace the Spectrum, but they deserve to be showered with a lot, lot more love than they usually are. Great music, too... Honourable mentions: The Rocky Horror Show (not a very good game, but bizarrely intriguing. The Time Warp through a Spectrum sound system is something to behold). Sweevo's World/Hydrofool. Both brilliant, but just I figured they were reasonably well known, if not always as appreciated as they should be. Jack The Nipper In Coconut Capers. The original Jack The Nipper is rightly lauded, but the second deserves mention. The new environment never felt quite right, but the mischief making was still priceless. Green Beret: Kids! Knife the bad guys! Good job the Daily Mail didn't have a Spectrum. Corking arcade conversion, though. Rick Dangerous. Just to say that I hated it. The most unfair videogame I think I've ever played. Hewson: I just wanted to highlight a pair of Hewson titles that often get overlooked. Eliminator is one, but Maze Mania was a lot, lot better than people gave it credit for. Minder: I never played it, but lots of people tell me it's great. Thought I'd better mention it. Hammerfist, too. Brewery: My parents bought me a pack of seemingly home-grown management simulations once upon a time, and, worryingly, the one I got hooked on was Brewery, where you basically had to make and sell your own beer. It was pretty crude, save for the graphic of all the unsold beer being poured away. Was I the only person on the planet to play this one? Leave your own suggestions below... World Of Spectrum Follow our Twitter feed for faster news and bad jokes right here. And be our Facebook chum here. |
After nearly 12 hours of marathon negotiations on Friday, the two Koreas agreed to hold reunions for separated families at the end of next month in Mount Geumgang."We agreed to hold face-to-face reunions from September 25th to the 30th to coincide with Korean Thanksgivings holiday at Mount Geumgang with 1-hundred family members from each Koreas."At issue was the location and the scale of reunion.Initially, Seoul had proposed to hold the reunion in either Seoul or Pyongyang to reunite as many family members as possible.The ideal number of participants for the South was about 2-hundred from each side.But while Seoul seems to have given into North Korea's proposal, the two sides agreed to hold another round of reunions sometime in November this year and to meet for further discussions on the issue immediately after the first reunion next month.The two sides will also hold video reunions for two days -- from October 22nd to 23rd -- with 40 families from each side.In preparation for next month's reunion, the Koreas will begin conducting check-ups on the surviving family members starting from August 29th.The family members have been separated since the Korean War in the 1950s, so most of them are now over the age of 70.The final lists of participants will be exchanged on September 16th.The two Koreas agreed to work towards holding reunions on a regular basis as well as allowing them to exchange letters as part of efforts towards a fundamental solution to the issue of divided families.Meanwhile, the issue of resuming South Korean tours to the Mount Geumgang resort was not brought up at Friday's talks.Hwang Sung-hee, Arirang News. |
Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker may be engaged in a high-stakes political battle with Democrats and state workers, but he’s playing with fire by clashing with the Green Bay Packers, warn two Democratic members of the state’s delegation in the U.S. House. In a match-up between Walker and the Packers, Rep. Ron Kind (D-WI), a popular former county prosecutor in the state, says his money is on his Superbowl champions. “I wouldn’t want to be going up against the Packers right now,” he said. “Yeah, I like those odds,” remarked Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI).Seven current and former Packers signed a letter in support of the AFL-CIO’s efforts to derail Walker’s plans. Those who signed include: Curtis Fuller, Chris Jackie, Charles Jordan, Bob Long, Steve Okoniewski, Brady Poppinga and Jason Spitz. Less than two weeks ago, when the the Packers won the Superbowl and toted the Lombardi trophy back to Wisconsin, Walker had nothing but praise for the “people’s team” — and basked in their triumph. But Packers players are members of the National Football League Players Association, and some current and former Packers have teamed up with the state workers to mount a serious defense of collective bargaining rights. Baldwin and Kind are stuck in Washington dealing with the national budget and GOP attempts to grapple with the spiraling deficit and slash this year’s federal government spending. But both are in regular contact with their state Democratic counterparts who Thursday fled the Capitol to prevent Walker and Republicans from reaching a quorum and passing a budget that would deny state workers bargaining rights. Kind is standing squarely behind his Democratic friends in the state Senate and sent a letter to Walker Thursday asking him to withdraw his budget. The reason state workers are so outraged by Walker’s actions, Kind said, is because they spent all last year negotiating and making $100 million in concessions with then-Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle only to have Republicans state legislators kill that bill then have a new governor come in and deny their negotiating rights. “[Walker] didn’t even come back and sit down with them,” Kind told TPM. “Public employees are willing to contribute their pound of flesh. He wasn’t even willing to talk to the teacher unions despite 17 separate requests from them for meetings with him.” Baldwin, who said she had been talking to Democratic state legislators throughout the last week, would not say exactly where all the lawmakers are holing up, or how long they plan to be there. “They are committed to staying as long as they have to and doing what they have to do to slow this process down and protect the rights of state workers,” she said. |
You want to be unpopular at an Australian barbecue? Just tell people that their property obsession is nuts. Want to get lots of hate mail? Do it in an article for a national masthead. Maybe I'm a glutton for punishment, but my conscience won't let the property boom continue unchecked without me speaking up to tell those contemplating an investment property that they're probably about to make a mistake. And let's get this out of the way - I'm a shares guy, I work for a company that sells memberships for advice on shares. Does that make me conflicted? Maybe. Does that mean I'm wrong about property? I doubt it. And I'm on record as doubting plenty of ASX-listed companies, too - so I'm not here to say that all shares are better than all property. But feel free to take what comes next with a grain of salt - I reckon it's still a pretty strong case. Before I get to the heart of the problem, though, let me say clearly that I'm not in the property "bubble" camp. A bubble, by definition, ends with a bang. It's not impossible that happens with Australian housing, but I don't expect it. |
Music, Composition and Theory Rowy van Hest What to Do and what Not to do These are the do's and do not's for music composers. It is not a complete course in music composition. You will not find much music theory here. All I offer you is some sound advice. --- Download this page as a clean pdf: Music Composer Do and Do not a. Use a contrary movement if possible. Although similar movements can sound good, don't use them all the time. When possible, have one line descent if the other ascends. The more lines there are, the more you should use contrary movements. example b. Do not be afraid to use dissonances. Some people think dissonances were invented in the 20th century, but they're not. They were already around in the Renaissance. If you only write consonant intervals, your composition will be a bore. c. Do not be afraid to use consonances. Some people think consonances are not done in the 21st century, but they are. If you only write dissonant intervals, your composition will be a bore. Besides, consonances are natural survivors. d. Beware of parallel fifths and octaves. They can sound nice, but beginners tend to use them by accident, especially when they are writing chords. That's one of the reasons why you should use contrary movements, to help you avoid those parallels. example e. In general it's best to keep the most exciting part of your composition towards the end. Don't give it all away in the beginning. f. Write the music you would like to hear yourself. Never ever write music you think someone else would like to hear, especially not critics. Trying to be modern is so old fashioned. g. Do not work too long on a composition. Take some distance every now and then. Go out for a walk, read a book or go to bed. h. It takes a brave composer to write in the key of C Major. You can't use a lot of flats and sharps to hide a lack of ideas. i. Write music on a regular basis. Do not think you always have to feel inspired. Play some classical music first, if you have no idea what to write. j. It is not the task of a performer to make something beautiful out of a pile of rubbish. Do your best on the score and do not rely on a miracle. k. Do not think you can get away with a bad music score by calling it an abstract or funny work. You're only going to fool yourself. Make sure you know what you're doing. l. You have to be alone, when you compose music. Being a composer is a lonely profession. If you can't stand to be alone, you should take up another profession or hobby. m. Do not write music in a hurry. You have to feel relaxed. Don't write music at work in your coffee break. Take your time. n. Be in contact with your inner self when you write music. It will make your music special to others. o. If you're in need of some honest advice, then don't ask your loved ones. Go find someone who is a qualified teacher or composer. If necessary, pay for an advice. In the end you will save money. p. Do not think that your work always has to be original. New ideas derive from old ones. Learn to master old techniques, practice them and develop yourself as a composer. q. Don't get angry, if no one wants to play your work. Perhaps you need more study and experience. r. If you always get stuck after a few measures, you should write small parts first. Write four measures, then take a walk. Write the next four measures. Read a newspaper. Again, write four measures. And so on, until you think you can write more music in one go. s. Never throw an old composition away. Cherish everything you've made, but don't share it all with people other than your loved ones. t. A long composition isn't always better than a short one. A symphony isn't always more interesting than a work for solo. You're not going to impress trained musicians by making quantity instead of quality. Write a string quartet, if you want to show off. u. Don't be afraid your work will resemble the work of a known composer. It will always resemble someone's work. v. Being an artist doesn't mean you have to act like a clown. You're not going to write better music by wearing a strange hat. You don't have to look like a French peasant either. w. A good title is important, but don't overdo it. A long title for a short composition might give the audience the impression that you're trying to be funny. x. If you really studied music theory and composition, and you know it all, then try to forget the things you've learned, otherwise you won't be able to write music. y. You must believe that you are gifted. If you think you probably will never be any good at writing music, you should take up another hobby. z. If you never play your own music, nor ever want to hear someone else play it, then you're not being honest with yourself. |
ARGENTINA CENTRE JERONIMO de la Fuente insisted the South Americans are not underestimating Australia following their quarter-final performance. The Wallabies were not at their best against Scotland last week, requiring a controversial last-gasp penalty to claim a 35-34 win at Twickenham. Australia captain Stephen Moore was quick to demand an improvement following the quarter-final scare but Argentina, who stunned Ireland 43-20, will not be treating the Wallabies any differently heading into Sunday’s semi-final. “They may have had a bad day, but we cannot base our preparations on that match,” De La Fuente told reporters. “Australia are a great team and have the ability to attack in the last minute thanks to the quality of the players they have. “Still I hope we play as well as Scotland did.” De La Fuente added: “We must hold on to the ball well because that is what we did in the last match. “It will be a major battle, regardless of who is winning and it gives the scrum-half cleaner ball to attack with.” |
We have now resolved the issues we were facing with HDMI video recorders. It turns out that monitors are capable of synchronising to whatever frequency you are supplying them with, making them very tolerant and usable straight out of the box - even with non standard signals. Recorders on the other hand are a lot less flexible when it comes to the frequency of the supplied input signals. It appears that they will stubbornly refuse to do anything unless the supplied input frequency is perfect. Unfortunately, the documentation we've found for this is often in contradiction - some sources define this frequency as standard, whilst others will list a different specification. As a result of this confusion, we've ended up cycling through multiple frequencies, adding a few Hz at a time until an image appeared on the HDMI recording device. the first - not the best one Please note that this footage contains the first basically unprocessed raw (not in original bayer pattern though) image samples ever recorded with the Axiom Alpha prototype. Whilst this is a major milestone, it represents only our first step through the door and into the beginning of the actual tweaking. Also keep in mind that this is TEST footage not captured with the intent to showcase the capabilities of the camera but rather to proof that it is working at all. While we think you can already see some potential in the image quality the video is simply NOT meant to be beautiful yet. As it stands, the video signal output from the Axiom Alpha still carries some flaws. Let's take a look at them in detail: calibrated the colours of the camera calibrated the white/black point (offsets) and linearization, leading to some vertical streak/curtain effects created a Fixed Pattern Noise (FPN) profile (the Alpha prototype already supports this, however we have not yet found the time to actually conduct the required measurements) There are some red lines at the bottom of the image, this is due to unresolved minor incompatibilities between the Axiom Alpha HDMI output and the utilized recorder We have not yet: Due to the limitations of the HDMI encoder chip implemented on the Zedboard, we are currently outputting a rather exotic colour mode: RGB 2:4:2. This has resulted in 1 pixel colour shifts in some situations, visible as red/blue tints around vertical lines. We are currently investigating alternative modes that eliminate this problem. Please also keep in mind that Youtube re-compresses every video that is uploaded, so even when viewing at 1080p, you will still see noticeable compression artifacts irrespective of how crisp the original video upload might be. Since we are still in the process of tweaking and fine-tuning everything, we don't mind these compression artifacts for now. You can rest assured that as soon as we have a greater selection of artistic footage ready to showcase, we will provide access to high quality online video playback / download of these clips. Fixed Pattern Noise Correction We have fixed several bugs in the calibration software and can now measure/calibrate the fixed pattern directly inside the camera. The challenge here is that an accurate calibration requires a fully evenly lit image with all colour channels at equal brightness levels. Any slight deviation from this will result in a sub-optimal calibration profile, meaning the FPN corrections can quickly end up creating more artifacts than they are removing. Under optimal conditions, we've witnessed a 100% elimination of the fixed pattern, however for this we've had to create a special device with RGB LEDs controlled by the camera itself, and which is attached to the camera instead of a lens. We are now considering the production of a 3D printed version of this, which we can use/distribute with far greater ease in the future. As a final note on this topic, the correction of the pattern is already running inside the FPGA with 4K footage in real-time. Smart Dynamic Range Mode For those of you who may not be aware, our image sensor features an HDR mode called "Piecewise Linear Response (PLR) Mode". This essentially means that you can add two knee-points to the response curve already inside the image sensor, achieving a more logarithmic shaped response curve closer to film negative - with a substantially extended dynamic range in the highlights. Adding knee-points to reduce clipping is common in image processing, however the essential difference here is that not only does it alter the image data after it has been captured but also whilst you are capturing it. As we can save the applied knee-points positions / parameters together with the footage, we can fully reconstruct the linear colour data in post production. Here is the first test we have undertaken with this feature (there are many knobs for tweaking - and we've only just started turning them): |
An appellate court in Brazil has cleared U.S. swimmer Ryan Lochte of a charge stemming from an incident last summer at the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. The Criminal Justice Court of the state of Rio de Janeiro dismissed the criminal case against Lochte, who was charged with falsely reporting a crime to police. Lochte, a six-time Olympic gold medalist, was suspended from the sport last summer after he and three other swimmers -- Jimmy Feigen, Jack Conger and Gunnar Bentz -- vandalized a gas station during the Rio Games. In a television interview, Lochte said they had been robbed at gunpoint. Editor's Picks Do you really still hate Ryan Lochte? In consideration of fireworks, massages, Olympic gold, reality TV, marriage, fatherhood -- and that incident in Rio. A three-judge panel voted 2-1 to close the case Thursday, according to court documents. Brazilian network O Globo reported that the judges dropped the charge because Lochte's interview with NBC News the day after the incident did not constitute a false report. "We are pleased that the court has finally dismissed the criminal prosecution against Mr. Lochte, while at the same time, appropriately recognizing that he committed no crime. It has been a long year, but in the end, justice prevailed," said Jeff Ostrow, Lochte's Florida-based attorney, in a statement to USA Today Sports on Friday. Prosecutors have 15 days to decide whether they will challenge the ruling, according to USA Today. Under Brazilian law, the penalty for filing a false crime report is a maximum of 18 months in prison. The scandal, which started Aug. 16 in Rio, overshadowed the final days of the Games, and the ever-changing version of events that Lochte provided cost him major sponsors. Lochte, who apologized for his behavior, returned to the United States two days after the incident. Feigen followed the following day but only after reaching a deal with a judge to make a $10,800 payment. When Bentz and Conger boarded a plane to leave Rio, authorities removed the pair from the jet; police were not satisfied with their account of the robbery-that-wasn't and wanted more information. Bentz and Conger talked with authorities, were whisked through airport security and returned to the U.S. the next day. In a follow-up interview with NBC News a week after the incident, Lochte said he "overexaggerated" what happened that night and acknowledged that it was his "immature behavior" that got him and his teammates into a mess that consumed the final week of the Olympics. Lochte was set to return to USA Swimming competition this week for the first time since his 10-month suspension ended, but he reportedly withdrew from this weekend's L.A. Invitational, citing insufficient training due to the June birth of his son. Information from The Associated Press was used in this report. |
Attacks on special counsel Robert Mueller’s credibility from some of President Donald Trump’s closest allies have again fallen flat with the U.S. Senate, which is in no rush to advance recently proposed legislation that would shield Mueller from presidential interference. Senate Republicans have cautioned Trump en masse against moving to fire Mueller or interfere with the investigation in any way. At the same time, though, many have taken Trump at his word—the president said Sunday he is not considering firing Mueller—and have argued that a legislative backstop is unnecessary. But as the investigation intensifies and top Trump campaign officials are indicted, the pro-Trump voices that often influence the president have stepped up their efforts to impugn the Mueller investigation’s credibility. Questions over whether Trump will interfere with the Mueller probe resurface often, prompting lawmakers to do damage control for the president. Despite the heightened criticisms as of late, senators are still confident that Mueller is up for the job. But legislating the problem away is a bridge too far for some. “Well, as long as he follows through,” Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) quipped to The Daily Beast when asked if he takes Trump at his word. Sen. Jeff Flake (R-AZ), who dedicated his retirement speech on the Senate floor to impugning Trump, said “I don’t know how to answer that.” Still, Flake does not believe a legislative backstop is necessary. “I don’t think it’s needed. I don’t think he’s going to do it,” Flake told The Daily Beast. “I’ve been troubled by the efforts to discredit the investigation, coming from a lot of sources.” Two pieces of legislation were introduced in August, just before Congress left Washington for the summer, ostensibly as a way to put a spotlight on the possibility that Trump moves to fire Mueller while Congress was away. At the time, Trump was floating the idea of firing the special counsel for looking into his personal finances as part of its investigation into Russia’s election meddling and possible collusion between Trump campaign associates and Russian operatives. One of the legislative backstops, proposed by Sens. Chris Coons (D-DE) and Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), would allow a special counsel to challenge his or her firing in front of a panel of three federal judges who would the decide within 14 days whether there was probable cause for the termination. Another, introduced by Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Cory Booker (D-N.J.), would codify a judicial review before a firing can take place. Graham, who has cultivated a close friendship with Trump despite characterizing him as a “kook” and “unfit” to be president during the 2016 campaign, previously suggested to The Daily Beast that his own bill was not necessary “ until you show me a reason that Mr. Mueller is in jeopardy.” On Monday, Graham reiterated that he takes the president at his word that he will not fire Mueller. “We need another special counsel to look at Fusion GPS. But we’re working on a compromise,” Graham told The Daily Beast, referring to Trump’s lawyer’s call for a special counsel investigation into a Justice Department official’s ties to Fusion GPS, the firm responsible for the dossier containing allegations about Trump’s connections to Russia. Because the bills are slightly different, staffers for each lawmaker and the Senate Judiciary Committee have been working to reconcile the two pieces of legislation into one. As of last week, a committee spokesman told The Daily Beast, aides were still working on the effort. But they’re not in any particular rush to hash out a solution. “The only thing I saw was the president saying he didn’t have any intentions at all, so we’re still having the discussion but it’s not driven by any current events,” Tillis, the other GOP co-sponsor, told The Daily Beast. Trump’s allies outside the White House have long questioned the credibility of Mueller’s probe, characterizing it as a “witch hunt.” But in recent days, those same allies—notably, hosts and commentators on Fox News, which Trump watches regularly—have ramped up their attacks against the investigation, which they believe is rampant with anti-Trump biases. Trump has shown throughout his presidency to be heavily influenced by Fox News, which he tunes into regularly. The network has parroted a barrage of attacks against the Mueller investigation, spurred as of late by the revelation that Peter Strzok, an FBI agent working on the Mueller probe, sent anti-Trump text messages in 2016. Mueller removed Strzok from the investigation after the messages were discovered. ( The Wall Street Journal recently revealed that Strzok also bashed prominent liberals including Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), former Attorney General Eric Holder, and Chelsea Clinton.) But the accusations of bias on the Mueller team’s part from Fox News personalities began long before Strzok’s messages were publicized. Fox News legal analyst Gregg Jarrett has accused Mueller of weaponizing the FBI, comparing the agency to Russia’s KGB. On Saturday, host Jesse Watters said Trump might be the victim of a “coup” because “the investigation was weaponized to destroy his presidency for partisan political purposes and to disenfranchise millions of American voters.” Top White House adviser Kellyanne Conway told Watters that Mueller’s investigators “can’t possibly be seen as objective or transparent or evenhanded or fair.” Another pro-Trump host on the network, Jeanine Pirro, argued on Saturday that the special counsel probe aims to invalidate the 2016 election results. While Senate Republicans have largely dismissed those suggestions, some pro-Trump House members have gone as far as to call for a second special counsel to investigate the integrity of the Mueller investigation. One of those lawmakers, Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL), who has called for Mueller’s firing, traveled with Trump to a rally in Pensacola, Florida, on Air Force One earlier this month. For his part, Trump has said as recently as Sunday that he is not considering firing Mueller. He hasn’t gone as far as Watters and Pirro, but he has tweeted that the FBI is “tainted” and in “tatters.” On Capitol Hill, Democrats have raised concerns about the president’s whims. Over the weekend, Rep. Jackie Speier (D-CA) suggested that a Mueller firing is imminent. Trump cannot technically fire Mueller. But he can direct Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein—who oversees the special counsel investigation—to do so. As recently as last week at a House Judiciary Committee hearing, Rosenstein has stood by Mueller, whom he appointed, and has maintained that there is no “good cause” to fire him or disband the investigation. For now, Congress is taking Rosenstein and Trump at their word, save for the few lawmakers still pushing for a legislative backstop. “I think there is urgency to getting to consensus on re-introducing a revised bill. We’ve got language. Getting all four members to actually agree is our current challenge,” Coons, one of the Democratic co-sponsors, told The Daily Beast. “I think it is in the country’s best interest, I think it is in the president’s best interest, I think it is in the best interest of the rule of law, President Trump should not fire Robert Mueller. That would be disastrous.” |
Fans that saw the recently released trailer for Marvel’s new sci-fi/superhero epic, The Guardians of the Galaxy, may or may not have noticed a familiar face. Yup, Doctor Who fans may have noticed an appearance by Amy Pond herself in tons of blue makeup! People unfamiliar with somewhat obscure Marvel Comics characters may have no clue as to who Karen Gillan is actually playing, the significance of said character, and whether she is good or bad. My goal today is to be a little help! Well, she’s definitely a bad guy, perhaps really bad depending on how the script lays her character out! Before we get rolling, here’s that trailer, just in case anybody has been under a rock all week: This character is named Nebula, and she is a feared space pirate that has destroyed entire planets in her various battles throughout many of the more “space-themed” comics Marvel has churned out over the years. At various points, she has claimed to be none other than the very granddaughter of Thanos. Wait, Thanos? Who’s that? Remember that guy at the end of the Avengers that smiled at the camera? That’s Thanos. One thing many non-comic fans may be missing is that all of these Marvel Cinematic Universe films are leading up to what I can only assume is a film depicting the famous comic story The Infinity Gauntlet, where big ol’ Mr. T. up there manages to collect a series of gems that give him unlimited power. As of the end of Thor: The Dark World, Thanos has access, through his various minions, to TWO of these six gems. One can only assume that Nebula has been sent to secure the third. I have no idea if they plan on hyping up the possible granddaughter-grandfather relationship between the two, but it would be an interesting way to sneak more info to casual fans about “who that purple dude was”. Seeing as Benicio Del Toro (The Collector) also appears in TGotG, she may just be a random assassin type character working for him. I tried to find a video of some sort to show what Nebula has been like in other media, and sadly all I could find was an episode of this mid-90’s Silver Surfer cartoon that coincidentally also stars Drax The Destroyer, a character that also features in TGotG. You can skip to around 3 minutes in to see her. So there we have it! Nebula could be a VERY big role for Karen Gillan, as playing someone that could feature in more movies might make her a big Hollywood action star. Then again they could kill her off in mere seconds for all I know. That’s what makes speculation fun! Related articles |
Attacking Rahul Gandhi on his home turf, Union Minister Smriti Irani on Sunday questioned the alleged sale of land meant for a bicycle factory here to a trust run by his family. Irani alleged that 60 acres of land allotted during Rajiv Gandhi’s tenure in Amethi for setting up a cycle manufacturing company is now taken over by a trust run by Congress president Sonia Gandhi. The Congress dismissed her "land grab" allegation as "wild and baseless". Smriti accused Rahul Gandhi of “ignoring” real issues affecting people of Amethi. Referring to Rahul’s “pyjama” and “suit-boot ki sarkar” remarks, Smriti –who was addressing a meeting in Rahul’s constituency- asked the Congress leader not to cross the limits. Irani, who unsuccessfully contested the 2014 elections against Rahul at Amethi, scoffed at the Congress’ leader’s speech in Lok Sabha during the “Lalitgate debate”. “Rahul reads from notes even when he has to speak for one and a half minute,” she said, adding that Prime Minister Narendra Modi could speak for one and a half hour extempore. She challenging Rahul for a debate on issues confronting the nation. On the occasion, Irani also announced insurance for 25000 women -5000 each from five Assembly segments of Amethi provided at an annual premium of Rs 12. She also announced that the Centre would release funds to convert Amethi-Raebareli and Amethi-Unchahar railway lines into double lines. Irani, seen handing over cash to a few women she met, vowed to return to the constituency until the people’s problems are addressed. Her visit comes days after Rahul Gandhi’s two-day trip, when he attacked Modi government for shielding former IPL commissioner Lalit Modi. |
Reports made the rounds last week that a swarm of biting, flying insects had descended on the arid planes of Black Rock Desert, Nevada, where Burning Man begins this weekend—but guess what? Even a plague-style swarm of coriander-scented winged beetles with a taste for human blood couldn't dampen the spirits of the dedicated Burners setting up camp. And why would it? Burning Man is glorious! Burning Man is hot passion! Burning Man is a place to let go! Burning Man is a Mad Max–style dune of scrap-metal bricolage-built caravans, concertgoers who hold umbrellas when it’s not even raining, and people who wear bizarre costumes—or people who don’t wear anything at all. It’s a sand-strewn, welcoming oasis for self-expression through art, music, and events like “Polesaw jousting” and endless EDM-centered events lit only by the blur of Day-Glo body paint. Don’t think you’ve got the guts to be a Burner, to break out of your 9-to-5, shake off that back-to-school stress for one last hurrah, and wear your bandana as underwear? Please, anyone does! Maybe there are finance Burners who can’t get their thrills from watching the Dow rise, and instead opt for scaling a wooden statue in a soda can–crafted skirt! Or those tightly wound Preppy Burners who skip the Sunday rowing club for a shwaggy lesson in Laughter Yoga? Burning Man is a hot plexus of oddities, a breeding ground for flesh-revealing openness and boiling hormones. You should embrace it—maybe even hug it. So what to wear to the badlands of bizarre? Let your skin breathe—and be comfortable in it. No one really cares what you look like at Burning Man: You could literally be wearing one pastie—anywhere—and that would be okay. So dress for you, and try to break out of your comfort zone. Think about that knit bikini with matching knit sandals that you were too scared to wear in the Hamptons: Hell, accessorize it with a mask! Haven’t found an occasion to wear that bodysuit? Go bare on the bottom and slap on some sky-high heels. Save the covering up for the flight back home. Until then, burn on, you crazy diamond. |
China has always shown aggressive attitude towards the border issue. Im from Arunachal Pradesh, an independent state before it was merged with India after the British Colonizers left. But, since the merger with India, we people have considered ourselves indian and never thought otherwise.But the lackluster attitude of the Indian Govt. towards my state of Arunachal and Chinese aggression round the year, our beautifull state has been neglected for over half a century. India doesnt wanna develop our state terming it as highly volatile region and thus have no proper road connectivity. Whereas on the Chinese side, there's a whole armada waiting for one sign from their government.[img] 3.bp.blogspot.com/-k13D0RvWBdU/UK-K7Z7R-xI/AAAAAAAG8gw/5uZIM [/img]You dont get to hear these stuffs in the mainstream media, but things are bad and only our people know the problems we face.My state is a very beautifull place, and its called the Land of Rising Sun. There are many many many cultures, traditions that exists there and i welcome all of you to come visit my state of Arunachal Pradesh. If you want to know more about us, google is the way to go , but i made this post just so people know whats happening in a place noone knows and the chinese attitude.Thank you |
Episode 12/29 Best Of 2017: Naomi Klein: No Is Not Enough: Resisting Trump’s Shock Politics and Winning the World We Need From August 2017: Best selling author Naomi Klein, author of, No Is Not Enough: Resisting Trump’s Shock Politics and Winning the World We Need, explains the history of modern branding. The formation of the Trump brand. The liberals who helped create the CEO myth of leadership. Why Trump can’t be worked with. Why labor unions should fight Trump on all fronts. Why the climate crisis needs to remain central to our politics. What to learn from Jeremy Corbyn. Why the Left needs to synchronize race, class and gender and what comes next in Left politics. Also, a few conversations on Seb Gorka and Sam has a Gianforte-style meltdown. |
Sledgehammer’s return to World War II ticks the necessary boxes for slick shooting and quicktime events (during which you knee a Nazi in the nuts), but don’t be fooled by the plainness of its Zombies mode. Come the inevitable map packs, and the insanity will truly begin: celebrity cameos, exploding planets, something involving pizza, and zany gadgets more at home inside a clown’s suitcase than a laboratory. You must prepare. You must prepare now. Our Call of Duty: WWII Nazi Zombies beginner’s guide can help. WWII Zombies deviates from the previous perk-style system by introducing class loadouts and map-based powerup passives, but the biggest change is the debut of Jolts, the currency you get when you kill a zombie. To succeed in Zombies, respect the Jolt: it funds character upgrades, gun purchases, opens locked doors, and is the general mark of progress during a round. What’s the best way to get Jolts? Is that really David Tennant? Read on to learn it all. Stay mobile and stay reloaded Most of WWII’s zombies are of the standard shamble strain, but keeping them at arm’s length or farther demands constant attention to where you’re heading and how many groaning obstacles are in your intended path. Zombies can appear in front of you, around the corner, behind, or even from above or below. Check all of your angles, and don’t linger in one spot too long unless you’re prepared to use your class ability or toss out a grenade to avoid being overwhelmed. Keep your gun topped up as much as possible, especially if you’re wielding a boomstick or a bullet-spitter such as heavy machine guns with long reload times. Focus on a specific goal or activity The wave you’re on dictates the ease at which you can accomplish tasks, such as unlocking a new area or exploring for secrets. You can certainly attempt to pack in multiple activities on a single round, but be aware of the heightened difficulty later waves impose on whatever you plan to do—say, unlocking the weapon upgrade machine at wave 10 instead of wave 6. You can certainly beeline to the final boss battle regardless of what wave you’re on, so figure out with your group what your intended round experience will be. Use the shovel early for easy Jolts Whacking that sleepy look off a zombie’s face with a digging tool isn’t just a pleasingly humiliating coup de grace, it’s also the best way to quickly earn the maximum amount of Jolts per kill—130 instead of the 100 gained from normal shooting. You can even dispense with your firearm entirely in the first three waves or so and solely focus on shoveling your way to a fat Jolt wallet useful for funding vital purchases later on. Remember to stay aware of the zombies’ increased health per wave, as it’ll take one extra hit per wave to down an enemy. Strong attacks using right click to focus your swing helps with recovering ammo and grenades, but you’ll be stuck in place for a few vulnerable seconds as you dig your shovel out of your victim’s nostril. Stay on pace with the zombie power curve Each wave bestows deeper health pools to all zombiesl, and your starting pistol will deal spitball-level damage by about wave 5. You’ll need at least a shotgun or SMG by then, and you’ll need to think ahead to the round’s endgame and appropriately upgrade your equipment in preparation for the truly difficult waves later on. If you feel your base weapons aren’t clearing waves effectively enough, get the weapon upgrade station unlocked and start spending Jolts on enhancing your guns. Try your luck with the Command Room’s Mystery Box, as well—you could nab a beefy machine gun or powerful sniper rifle with one or two lucky rolls of the dice. The Blitz machines dotted throughout the village area and Bunker rooms are excellent flourishes to your firepower, increasing your reload speed, melee damage, run speed, and other bonuses for the duration of the round. Make those your priority. Buy cheap ammo for your weapon by returning to its locker If you’re comfortable with your chosen weapon, keep its initial locker location in the back of your mind for a quick loop to resupply. The Jolt cost for reusing the same locker is often in the low hundreds compared to the thousands needed to swap weapons at a different locker or pray to the Mystery Box. Camouflage is the best ability for solo play The class loadouts in WWII Zombies are designed to complement each other when in a squad, and the Medic’s Camouflage is fantastic for swooping in for a safe revive on a downed teammate or to inflict some bonus bleed damage on a heavy boss-type enemy with the Serrated Edge augment. Consider favoring it over the other class picks for solo runs or to familiarize yourself with map layouts, as being able to vanish out of sight and recover safely is a great fallback tool. Be careful if you need to pop it close to a teammate—any surrounding zombies will instantly snap to the nearest visible target! Delay the next wave with the straggler method If you have the necessary Jolts to accomplish an objective or open a gate, you don’t need to blast down an entire wave in seconds. You can delay the deployment of a fresh mob by prolonging the current wave you’re on to explore or gorge on upgrades before pushing forward. An oft-used tactic is to whittle down a wave until one or two straggling zombies remain, keeping them close by as you complete errands. Proper distance is key—too close, and you’ll get swiped; too far, and the game will either despawn your pursuers and force them to reappear closer to you (often right in your face in a jumpscare) or cause them to break out in a loping sprint directly towards you. The characters that aren't Tennant are funny too Yes, that’s David Tennant voicing and lending his face to the art-appreciating Drostan Hynd, but the remaining cast of celebrity-alikes are just as effective at swearing in a panic as everyone’s favorite high-pitched Scotsman. Ving Rhames’ Jefferson Potts or Elodie Yung’s Olivia Durant are typical top picks in a full lobby. |
CHARLOTTE, NC—Suddenly stopping in his tracks as he boarded the Lynx blue line to go apply for a library card on Tuesday, local man Mark Collier came to the horrifying realization that he was putting down roots in the city of Charlotte, NC. “Wait, hold on a second, am I…am I building a life for myself in Charlotte, North Carolina?” Collier said as it suddenly dawned on him he’d recently renewed his membership at a gym in downtown Charlotte for another year. “No no no, this can’t be right. I’m not settling down and making a go of it in Charlotte. Am I?” Advertisement “Christ, I just bought a bureau for my apartment in Plaza Midwood,” he continued. “What is happening?” Collier, 31, who moved to Charlotte two years ago to take a job at a digital marketing agency, told reporters it just became terrifyingly apparent to him that, if asked, he could now easily give strangers accurate driving directions in or around the Charlotte metro area or offer recommendations on the Queen City’s bars, shopping malls, art galleries, public parks, or concert venues. As it suddenly became clear that the majority of his wardrobe had been purchased at the South End Super Flea, a disturbed Collier realized that he could also consider himself a “regular” at not one, but three Sizzlin’ Saturday food carts, each of which know his name and preferred order. Advertisement In addition, it hit Collier that he actually has strong, informed opinions about the job Patrick Cannon has been doing as mayor so far. “Oh God, I think I’m starting to become an active and engaged member of the Charlotte community,” said Collier, shuddering at the thought of being only seven months from having to get a North Carolina driver’s license. “Over the holidays I went to the annual Holiday Afternoon Tea event at the Ritz-Carlton in Uptown Charlotte and without missing a beat I thought, ‘This should be a new tradition I do every year at Christmas.’” “I’ve actually asked friends to come visit me in Charlotte,” he added, looking straight ahead, dead-eyed. “I’ve said the words, ‘If you’re ever in the Charlotte area, we should meet up.’ And then after that I said, ‘I can show you around the city.’” Advertisement According to Collier, putting down roots in Charlotte “just kind of snuck up on [him].” What started with minor occurrences such as having to change his default mailing address on Amazon quickly grew into something much more involved as he was summoned for jury duty at the Mecklenburg County Courthouse and started considering U.S. Airways his “preferred airline” because it had a hub at CLT. Earlier this fall, he even attended a Charlotte Bobcats game and heard himself say the words “let’s go ’Cats!” while clapping. “If I’m ever getting out of here, time is running out,” said Collier, realizing that he was coming up on two years together with a girl who was born in Charlotte, grew up in Charlotte, and by any reasonable estimation probably wanted to stay in Charlotte. “Unless this is, somehow, actually the city where I want to plant roots and settle down. Is that possible? I don’t see how that can be possible.” Advertisement “Although, that being said, you gotta love Freedom Park in the springtime,” Collier added. “Just gorgeous.” |
Carl Cheffers leads his crew in a Thursday night ESPN game. Three officials will audition for a potential future promotion to the referee position. (Originally, we had this listed for last week, but we are receiving further information that it will occur this week.) All times Eastern. Live games on NFL Network will be blacked out in both teams’ markets. (Games not sold out are also subject to blackouts during NFL Network re-airings if the home team station has not re-aired the game first.) Thursday, Aug. 14 Jaguars at Bears, 8 p.m. ESPN — Carl Cheffers Friday, Aug. 15 Eagles at Patriots, 7:30 p.m. NFLN — John Parry — John Parry Titans at Saints, 8 p.m. — Ron Torbert Chargers at Seahawks, 10 p.m. NFLN (joined in progress) — Pete Morelli (joined in progress) — Pete Morelli Lions at Raiders, 10 p.m. — Bill Vinovich Saturday, Aug. 16 Packers at Rams, 4 p.m. NFLN — John Hussey (with Walt Anderson’s crew) — John Hussey (with Walt Anderson’s crew) Giants at Colts, 7 p.m. — Scott Helverson (with Tony Corrente’s crew) Jets at Bengals, 7 p.m. — Ed Hochuli Ravens at Cowboys, 7 p.m. NFLN — Barry Anderson (with Bill Leavy’s crew) — Barry Anderson (with Bill Leavy’s crew) Bills at Steelers, 7:30 p.m. — Gene Steratore Dolphins at Buccaneers, 7:30 p.m. — Brad Allen Falcons at Texans, 8 p.m. — Jeff Triplette Cardinals at Vikings, 8:30 p.m. — Craig Wrolstad Sunday, Aug. 17 Broncos at 49ers, 4 p.m. — Walt Coleman Chiefs at Panthers, 8 p.m. FOX — Jerome Boger Monday, Aug. 18 |
Is it me, or am I justified in feeling uneasy about the conviction and sentence handed down to former UBS and Citi trader Tom Hayes for rigging Libor? Last week, six brokers were acquitted of conspiracy to fix the interbank rate. Their walking free was described as a severe blow to the Serious Fraud Office that brought the prosecutions. But in his cell at Her Majesty’s Prison Lowdham Grange, Hayes could be forgiven for raging against the iniquity of a system that has seen his life ruined. He was initially sentenced to 14 years, with his term cut to 11 years on appeal. While that is longer than often handed down for killing someone, it was seen as a discouragement to others, a reflection of society’s fury at the cynical disregard of some in the City for the lives of ordinary people. Hayes, portrayed as being at the centre of a web to set a benchmark used for millions of personal loans, was the worst of the worst, an arch-villain who deserved every moment inside. "It did not ring true that Hayes was able to act without anyone at the bank knowing and agreeing." I admit to having had qualms about his case. Hayes, in the banking hierarchy, was a junior. We were supposed to believe that his superiors never condoned what he did. It did not ring true that he was able to act without anyone at the bank knowing and agreeing. That unease increased with details emerging about Hayes and his personality. He seemed to be a bit of a geek, as many are in his area of work, but he also appeared quite open and personable, not terribly sophisticated at keeping something secret. Indeed, that was his defence, that what he did was common, he was encouraged to do what he did and he did not believe he was acting dishonestly. So yes, I would have felt much more reassured if his bosses had joined him in the dock. But the promise of the subsequent trial of his alleged co-conspirators did provide some solace. Then they were acquitted. Hayes said he was delighted with the outcome. He was “thrilled that the brokers can return to their families and their lives” but is “bewildered that he is now in a situation where he has been convicted of conspiring with nobody”. He’s not alone in his view. Originally, there were 22 names on the draft indictment, including the six just found innocent. At Hayes’ trial, most of the evidence presented against him was in relation to the six — hence, presumably, the SFO’s decision to pursue only them. Most of the other names were only ever thought to be peripheral. Hayes says he had never met or even spoken to them; there were some he’d been in touch with via email or other messaging, but just a few times. Apart from the six, the SFO is thought to have interviewed just one of the other names. None of the 16 have been charged. The regulator may claim that quizzing the rest was difficult due to the fact several of them were overseas and the investigator must be mindful of budgetary constraints. Hayes’ line manager at Citi is currently in New York, hardly difficult to get to, but he is understood not to have been seen. This is despite the bank being recognised as co-operating by the prosecution. One of those on the draft indictment is still employed by Citi, but he’s not believed to have been interviewed either. That goes for three more on the draft indictment who reside in the UK — they’re thought not to have been questioned by the SFO. Ahead of Hayes’ trial, the judge, Mr Justice Cooke, decided to separate his hearing from that of the brokers and his alleged co-conspirators. Their statements were not allowed to be submitted in the trial of Hayes. Presumably if they had been, given the jury’s conclusion in their trial, this may have assisted his defence. Critically, his jury was unaware of evidence relating to whether or not an agreement between the co-defendants was ever reached. After their acquittals, David Green, head of the SFO, said: “The key issue in this trial was whether these defendants were party to a dishonest agreement with Tom Hayes. By their verdicts, the jury have said that they could not be sure that this was the case.” It’s a curious form of words from Green. He’s trying to justify the prosecution by saying that in the end the jury could not be certain, so therefore they acquitted. Where, though, does the jury say that? Equally, the jury could surely have been certain there was no agreement — Green simply does not know. In Hayes’ earlier trial, however, without the evidence from his alleged co-conspirators, the jury was certain there was a conspiracy. That does not seem right, or fair somehow. During his closing speech to the jury at Hayes’ trial, Mukul Chawla QC for the prosecution was keen to point out that Hayes was the first but would not be the last. Presumably this was a reference to the six. But look what has happened. I am not saying that Hayes is innocent of manipulating Libor. But I don’t see how anyone can be guilty of conspiring with others when no such conspiracy apparently exists. In the light of the acquittals and the non-submission of the statements from the six in his trial, Hayes deserves another appeal. |
Monsters come in many forms, from the kind that have claws and fangs to those that look just like us; from the overtly supernatural, or unnatural, to those who carry their monstrosity on the inside, a darkness glimpsed only when it shows through the cracks. My latest book, This Savage Song, looks at two kinds of monsters, the literal and the figurative, those who feed on flesh and blood and soul, and those who relish destruction, harm, feeding some dark passenger (as Dexter would put it) within them. As much as I love the classic kind of monster, as a writer and a reader, I’m most fascinated by the monstrous (I even did my Masters in medieval depictions of monstrosity) incarnations of humanity, the darkness that lurks within. Here are five books that deal with monsters of a more subtle nature. The John Cleaver Series by Dan Wells This is a fun series to kick off the list, because it has both incarnations of monstrosity, from the demon John Cleaver hunts down in I Am Not a Serial Killer and those that populate the later books in the series, to his own monstrous alter ego, Mr. Monster. The literal monsters in this series embrace their darkness, while John fights to control his own. Cleaver is a sociopathic teenager working in his family’s morgue and trying not to become a serial killer as opportunity after opportunity presents itself. Instead, he tries to channel his dark urges into catching the murderers plaguing his town. To call him a hero would be a step too far, but his self-awareness and active decision to suppress his own monstrous urges is utterly compelling. The Bill Hodges Trilogy by Stephen King The monster in this series, Brady Hartfield, is entirely human (or at least he starts out that way). Brady is a disturbed young man who plows through a crowd at a job fair, gets away with it, and then, in classic serial killer form, gloats to the now-retired detective who failed to catch him. This cat and mouse game (beginning with Mr. Mercedes) has several strange and captivating twists, but Brady is the love-to-hate kind of monster, the one we long to see defeated. Brady’s fascination with suicide, and his mission to convince his victims to end their lives instead of doing it for them adds an even darker spin to the classic serial killer type, and the relish with which he does it renders him a truly monstrous character. Illuminae by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff Illuminae is on the surface a space thriller, following two teens as they escape a planet, only to find themselves on a ship that’s being hunted down while a plague spreads among the crew. But the most captivating aspect by far isn’t the megacorporation trying to cover its tracks by destroying the vessel, or the plague on board. It’s AIDAN, a piece of AI that has developed a god complex. The most interesting monster at the heart of this space thriller is neither a human nor a supernatural entity, and Illuminae provides a fascinating look at the descent into madness from the perspective of machine instead of man, and the internal logic with which AIDAN justifies his terrible actions. The Death and Life of Zebulon Finch by Dan Kraus And now for something completely different, Zebulon Finch. The monster at the heart of this story isn’t really monstrous at all. But he’s not exactly human either. Zebulon is a teenage thug in the early 1900s who gets murdered, only to… come back. Uncertain of why or how he’s alive again, but trapped in a body that just won’t DIE (though it does take a beating over the century), Zebulon is on the ride (with us in the passenger seat) of a strange, dark, sometimes monstrous adventure through life, war, and immortality. He’s a thoroughly likable, if not entirely living, character, and the exception to my usual preference for very bad people. ;) You by Caroline Kepnes Speaking of very bad people, there’s Joe. The narrator at the heart of Kepnes’ extremely disturbing tale of obsession is one of my favorites, because of his moments of relative likeability. Unlike King’s Brady Hartsfield, there’s an undeniable (and thus extremely disturbing) likeability to Kepnes’s lead character. He’s a horrible person, stalking Gwinevere, slowly insinuating himself into her life, doing away with each and every obstacle, from friends to lovers, with ruthless precision and unnerving levity. We don’t want him to succeed, and yet, there’s an undeniable charisma to his character, a jocular amusement. We are so close to his thoughts that we can see the derangement, and yet, we can also see why, to him, his actions are rational. Where John Cleaver’s sociopathy is purposefully distancing, Joe’s ability to justify each and every thing he does makes him dangerously familiar. Victoria Schwab is the author of The Archived and The Unbound, as well as the acclaimed adult fantasy novels A Darker Shade of Magic and Vicious. When she’s not haunting Paris streets or trudging up English hillsides, she lives in Nashville, Tennessee, and is usually tucked up in the corner of a coffee shop, dreaming up monsters. Her newest novel, This Savage Song, is available now from Greenwillow Books. |
Christopher Plummer and Lily James in The Exception. As he proves yet again as the aged Kaiser Wilhelm II in The Exception, Christopher Plummer can put more shading into fewer syllables than any actor alive. He began his career as a brilliant show-off in the Olivier mode, fell into decadence (boozing, womanizing, taking dull parts in duller epics), and, after age 60, climbed back to respectability, tackling the greatest roles onstage and — beginning with his peerlessly egotistical Mike Wallace in The Insider — achieving a new level of subtlety onscreen. Plummer hasn’t fully shed his cunning or his histrionics (really: Would we want him to?), but he has moved steadily inward, illuminating an interior he once left purposefully opaque. The new movie is one part history to one part fanciful melodrama. It’s set in 1940 in rural Holland, to which Wilhelm was exiled following Germany’s defeat in World War I. In the film as in life, the ex-kaiser mostly chops wood, plays host to illustrious guests, babbles incoherently about Bismarck, and maintains that the war wasn’t his idea. As The Exception begins, the Reich is invading the Netherlands and has assigned an S.S. lieutenant named Brandt (Jai Courtney) to take up residence and keep Wilhelm safe. Although Wilhelm hates Hitler’s brutality (the kaiser disliked Jews but not enough to kill them), he does admire the Führer’s military acumen, and he nurses the hope that his countrymen will come to their senses and bring him home. His younger wife, Hermine, a.k.a. “Hermo” (Janet McTeer), is even more delighted by the prospect of renewed royalty. Courtney’s Brandt is actually the film’s title character, embarking on an affair with a maid named Mieke (Lily James), who might well be a spy or at least have her own agenda. They have barely spoken a word when he tells her to take off her clothes. It’s a mark of her spunkiness that the next time they meet, she demands the same of him. Gradually we learn that Brandt isn’t such a bad fellow. He signed on for a proper war of army against army, not the slaughter of women and children. He’s a patriot but not a monster. Gradually, too, we see that beneath the kaiser’s anti-Semitism, delusional pride, and foolishness is a fundamentally honorable man. The premise was a stretch in Alan Judd’s novel (originally titled The Kaiser’s Last Kiss) and is less plausible in Simon Burke’s screenplay, which adds a kiss-kiss-bang-bang climax. But it’s always nice to be reminded that, even among the worst people on earth, there are gradations of badness — though it’s a mighty steep curve that lets an S.S. officer and the kaiser off the hook. Compounding the nuttiness, Nietzsche’s Beyond Good and Evil is used as a signifier of hope. It must be said that there is offensive ahistorical melodrama and rattlingly good ahistorical melodrama and that The Exception belongs firmly in the latter category. The superb English stage director David Leveaux keeps the pacing taut while creating space for his actors to work their magic. Courtney and James make a credibly riven pair of lovers — headlong, wary, and headlong again. McTeer wrings every drop of complexity from a woman who could be viewed as a dull-witted climber. Eddie Marsan’s frigid Himmler will haunt your dreams. And then there is Plummer, who is smart enough to show the kaiser’s ennoblement side by side with his regret that it took him so long. *This article appears in the May 29, 2017, issue of New York Magazine. |
AI War: Fleet Command – Light of the Spire – what We Think: Arcen Games‘ third expansion for AI War: Fleet Command–Light of the Spire–brings even more ship types, campaign modes, and additional inspired music tracks to this already daunting mix of RTS, 4X and Tower Defense game elements. AI War: Fleet Command – A Brief History of Time I am going to proceed with the assumption that you are new to the universe that is AI: War and not among its small legion of devout converts: AI War drops you in the middle of a near-hopeless situation: two vicious AI races, each in command of its own army of drones and bases. Both seek to wipe the floor with the player’s organic material. They both have technology far superior to anything humanity can crank out. They both have expansion on the brain, and your resistance fleet is parked right where they want to build the petting zoo (figuratively, or course – who pets robot chickens?) They will launch semi-continuous attack waves, steadily getting craftier and more destructive. There is no hope for diplomacy. Survival of the human race depends on the total destruction of the AI. The player’s home world will draw fire as the wicked machines spread out across the galaxy. Players new to the genre can set the AI development at a slow pace, while seasoned vets can ramp up the insanity by taking on a hive-mind that improves at a quicker rate. Whatever the difficulty, the player must strike a balance between defending his territory and building up fleets of fighter craft for invading neighboring planets. Resources are finite, and merely digging in with the hopes of fending off countless waves of attacks will prove ultimately fatal. Developing a squadron of attack ships is crucial, as is defending any wormholes that lead to enemy galaxies. By probing nearby galaxies, the player can explore potential enemy targets. Once a planet is claimed, the resources around it can be safely harvested for use in the creation of more ships and spaceports. Through the scientific development of existing human technology, and the careful acquisition of AI tech, a staggering amount of units become available for construction. Unless the player can keep his fleets on the bleeding edge, he’ll end up under it. All of this has to be done with great caution; players who opt to charge into a neighboring galaxy, cannons a-blazing, will find that the overall AI score will improve at an increased rate in response to any actions considered to be threatening. This will mean more advanced raid swarms on the player’s home base, and if the defense squad is still sporting Mark I units, it won’t be long before the human command center topples. Overtaking certain types of AI technology will allow for the creation of better units, but it has to be done carefully, lest the hive-mind receive news of your battle prowess. Just when the player thinks he has the enemy AI’s playbook mapped out, it changes strategy. The AI works on many levels, from an overall mindset of the race, right down to the actions of individual units, ensuring that the player is always on his toes. The Art of War (Show Your Work) The game requires the use of a great many hotkeys, making for a nasty initial learning curve. Even once these keys are committed to memory, the game demands a slow, methodical approach to development and a quick hand when under attack. Moving too quickly, however, will often result in a brutal trouncing. Knowing what targets to eliminate and how to do this without bringing on too large a retaliation takes finesse and planning. The game also provides a fair sampling of useful tutorials. Here, the concept of “casual” cowers in fear. 2-8 players can enjoy a multiplayer game, though the process of connecting to or hosting a game may require a deeply intimate knowledge of your internet connection. There is no PVP to speak of, so anyone joining the game will also be joined in the task of taking out the enemy AI. Players have the option of selecting the size of the contested galaxy as well. Select a small campaign with 10 worlds, or a massive 80 planet universe. Larger maps will take more time to conquer. Regardless of the size of the game, be prepared to spend several hours on a campaign before achieving victory. ‘Spire to Greatness Staggering in its scope, a player coming at AI War: Fleet Command for the first time may find the latest expansion to be frustratingly difficult. It seems to be designed as an iterative upgrade, with the returning player in mind, and it might be advisable to toggle off the new content while learning the ropes in the tutorial missions. That said, even with the Light of the Spire expansion added, the player is not required to follow either of the two campaign types. All methods of taking on the AI are still on the table, but LotS gives the player some direction, should he choose to take those paths. Collecting and escorting Spire remnants across multiple wormhole leaps may not sound like a good time, but the potential rewards can be well worth it. (In fact it seems Arcen has shown some mercy with this pack, adding the new Defender campaign type that allows for shorter play sessions.) Spire technology is staggeringly powerful, and in large enough numbers, can spell doom for the enemy AI forces. Don’t think they don’t know it! The same rules of generating threat apply, and the AI will start to increase very rapidly to prevent the player from bowling them over. They will fight to prevent the acquiring of Spire tech, and will fight even harder once new tech is constructed. Even a seemingly unstoppable Spire-charged assault team might get tripped up on the way to the AI home worlds. Even without the expansion sets, AI War: Total Command is the type of game one never truly masters. This latest entry brings with it a healthy variety of new content and features, most notably the campaign modes, while staying true to the core experience. With over 180 new ships that include 9 bonus ship classes and even a campaign-within-a-campaign, fans of the game will likely dive right into this additional material to unlock its treasures, but it may leave new players a mite blaster-shy. For $9.99, Light of the Spire offers a lot more than a coat of paint, and is sure to keep players busy for many, many hours. AI Fleet: Fleet Command – Light of the Spire is available at the Arcen Games store for USD $9.99 (main game required to play). Rating: BONUS FEATURE – HELP GUIDE FOR CONNECTIVITY ISSUES WITH AI WAR Because AI War is so worthy of play, and also because it can be a real bitch to connect to a friend you want to play with online, we asked the game’s programmer Chris Park for some tips. Here are answers from the man himself: IGR: Mr. Park, help us out! We love your game but even though we Port Forwarded 32320 on both of our computers, disabled firewalls, closed anti-virus software and seemingly did everything else as asked by the instructions, we still could connect online to play with our friends! What do we do now? Chris Park: If you’re having this trouble with a lot of direct-connection games, there are, to my mind, three possibilities remaining given what you discussed: That the host is not actually port-forwarding too the right address (just FYI, the client doesn’t have to do any port forwarding for most games). When you do ipconfig / all on your windows machine at the command prompt, make sure you’re finding the correct IP address for your machine, as if you have any virtual adapters installed it might be using one of those instead — or you might be seeing an IP for your ethernet port when you are actually using your wireless, for instance. http://ask-leo.com/how_to_find_the_ip_address_of_my_computer.html That there is another (probably software) firewall in play on either the client or the host machine. Usually it would be the windows firewall and then possibly a firewall in one or more antivirus suites, and then standalone firewalls like Zone Alarm, etc. Assuming that the game did actually start transferring any data, as you mentioned you think it might have, then the problem isn’t ports, or firewalls, or anything of that nature — if a connection is established, then you’re through that neck of the woods without issue. In that case, my best bet would be that one of you has a bad network driver, or a bad router firmware. For the network driver, you might be able to get that through windows update as an optional component to install, or more likely through the manufacturer of your motherboard. The fact that Borderlands works is not necessarily conclusive that it isn’t this, because it might be sending notably smaller packets of data or similar. If none of the above works for you, or you don’t feel like fiddling with that sort of thing, there is a simpler alternative that a lot of players go with for games in general: Hamachi, or Comodo, or another point-to-point VPN solution that is free for personal use. Those have the disadvantages of adding a bit of extra network traffic, but they have the advantage of making connnections easier and seamless. They will give you a virtual address of something like 5.x.x.x, and you’ll easily see the one for anyone else in your VPN list, and you just type in the address of the person you want to connect to. If it still has problems, then you’re definitely looking at either a bad driver or router firmware, or an additional rogue software firewall on one of the machines. But it very much takes the port forwarding out of the equation, which is the most common place where people get hung up. IGR: We kinda wish there was a direct big green button that just made it work because this kind of stuff always unfairly files these sorts of multiplayer games (we had similar problems with Jason Rohrer’s Sleepisdeath) away under “Networking guru/hardcore gamer geek” – and it shouldnt be that way. This is too big and good a game to merit that marginalization. Where is the Big Green Connect button? Chris Park: I very much appreciate the kind words there. In terms of the technical task here, it’s rather a complex sort of thing, though. To do the sort of “always connects easily” process you’re describing requires a whole farm of servers just for brokering connections, though. The process is that if you can’t connect directly, then the server brokers the connection for you, and in some cases winds up acting as an intermediary for all traffic while you play. This is the service that Hamachi and similar provide, among other things they do, and it’s also the service that a lot of the Steam servers or Gamespy servers are providing you with a game like borderlands. The problem is, those sorts of servers are either extremely expensive, or require the developer to do something like bundle steam or gamespy into every version of the game sold, period. That tends to piss off other vendors, or players, or both, so we don’t do it. Even in the best of circumstances, that big green button for games like Borderlands is easily thwarted by unexpected software firewalls and the like, which tends to make the resulting easiness rather underwhelming for a lot of players. And that’s with the biggest companies — obviously when Demigod launched with Stardock, that was an amazing disaster for months because their server farm for the brokering wasn’t as large as they expected to need it to be, and a lot of their initial brokering of connections wasn’t working as expected in production, etc. It was a massive engineering problem and took them buckets of money and a huge engineering staff working around the clock for weeks to fix it. And Stardock is… orders of magnitude larger than us, or Jason Rohrer, or similar. 😉 It’s why I’m grateful for things like Hamachi. The core problem, on the PC side anyway, is choice. So many vendors, so many drivers, so many different lines of hardware and software and firewalls, and equipment and so on. And ISPs. All of that works subtly differently, and a lot of it doesn’t play by the central rules. The fact that the Internet works at all is kind of a miracle if you think about all that stuff. Though I’m not fond of the alternative, where everything is locked to just one set of hardware as on, say, a console system. That’s certainly convenient for developers, but it’s not very good for consumers in the long run, or at least not for more general purpose computing. I think that over time things will get easier across the board, as more vendors come out to support ease of use and a common framework for this sort of thing, etc — but right now the market just isn’t quite there. Though it’s much better than what I grew up with, first with modems and all the problems that entailed, and then later with having to choose which networking protocol you’d use to play a game with, what baud rate, etc. 😉 At least everything is using TCPIP these days, though the abundance of software firewalls cause a whole new level of frustration and complexity. |
Irish Water has revealed it expects a range of problems with its first bills when they are sent out from next month. The company says details such as the number of people in a house may be incorrect, more than 2,000 meters will not be read because of technical issues, and up to 150,000 properties with a private well and septic tank will be mistakenly billed. The company said they anticipated "a lot" of calls, and 750 staff will be in place in call centres to handle the queries. "This is the first time we're going to be sending domestic water bills - we're going to send almost 1.7 million bills" she said. "It's not unusual that there would be teething problems when you do something like this on this scale for the firs time". "So we're putting additional resources into our contact centre, so that we can work with customers to resolve any of the information deficits and gaps and errors that we may have." Meanwhile, the Government announced a new deadline for registering for water charges last night. Environment minister Alan Kelly said households will have to register before June 30. If they do not, they will not qualify for the €100 water conservation grant. Minister Kelly told TDs that more details about the grant, and how it would be paid, would be announced next month. "The Department of Social Protection will be communicating separately with households from July onwards (on that issue)," he said. |
Please enable Javascript to watch this video GREENSBORO, N.C. -- Organizations and developers in Greensboro are working to draw young professionals into the area and keep them around. "Bringing in that new talent and new ideas helps grow businesses,” said Hillary Meredith, who works at Action Greensboro, a nonprofit that aims to enhance the city’s quality of life. Unfortunately for groups like Action Greensboro, the number of millennials in the city went down by almost 5 percent between 2010 and 2015, that’s according to the latest growth and development tends from the City of Greensboro. Those statistics aren’t stopping groups from trying to cater to young professionals. Marty Kotis is the CEO of the Kotis Properties. He sees a demand for new spaces for young people to hang out. His group created Red Cinema and it has plans for the new Greenway and Midtown area. "If you don't adapt to millennial taste and what they're looking for coming up, then you will get left behind,” Kotis said. New places also continue to pop up in downtown Greensboro, especially near South Elm Street. On Thursday, a new bar arcade called BoxCar Bar + Arcade is opening up. "We are very excited to have people come in here and start playing some games. It's unlike anything we have in Greensboro,” said Julia Roach, the marketing coordinator at Downtown Greensboro Incorporated. "Businesses here have done a good job of creating a vibe that is exciting, that's where the millennials want to be.” It’s not just businesses catering to the crowd. Organizations like Action Greensboro are helping keep millennials around by creating a sense of community. The organization runs a young professionals group called SynerG that provides members with things to do in the community, ranging from mixers to leadership training. |
No fats, no fems, no PNP, no one over 30, no face=no chat, no BS, NSA, no blacks, no Asians (nothing personal, I just think you guys are trolls). If you act gay, no chat. DDF, non-smoker, HIV-neg as of five minutes ago, into Random Play. If you think you're VGL you're probably not. Mixed here. No chat before you send more photos. No husband no wife, no boyfriend, no phonies. Say more than "hi" if you want me to respond. Find me on Instagram. No F-buddies. I'm not interested in what your dick looks like so don't send pic. Must be hung. Massage therapist here. No leather or role-play. If you like musical theater, I won't like you. Say something to impress me; be cool, be different. No body hair, no shaved pubes, no roids, not into hookups or groups. In Miami next week, NY week after. No top bunk, bottom bunk metaphors. Be yourself. No man-cunt, man-pussy, or man-breeders. Want new friends more than anything. Watersports welcome. Plan to Skype first so I know you're worth my time. Dates preferred. Must have great sense of humor. No liars; I'll know your real age. Latins to the front of the line. No short guys. Personal trainer too! No bars, non-drinkers. If I'm on here, I'm looking, so don't ask if I'm horny. If you're over 40 please be hot. If you've got a swimmer's build, go swimming and go away. Yoga may be great for the soul, but I don't want to f*** your soul. Must be extremely built. Professional, seeks same. Looking for hot buds to hang with 4 long sessions. No Middle Eastern guys--nothing personal, just a preference. Israelis a plus. Straight-acting. No daddies, dilfs, or bears or cubs or otters, NO twinks, no brainless body worshippers, no way. "Toned" = "Fattie," so don't bother. No "slim" dudes. Not into labels. Not into the "scene." Tired of all the games on here. Spiritual. I'm great-looking, muscular, masc. vers. bottom looking for same to fill my sweet hole. Check out my White Party fb page. Discreet and honest and fun. Looking for a LTR and can't host. I'm real. UB2! |
Slow Cooker White Chicken Chili Can you believe it? It’s already 2015! After a holiday season full of decadent goodies and drinking probably a tad too much, I’m ready to kick my health into high gear. So, when Albertsons supermarkets asked me to develop a healthy, fresh recipe using their private label products, I thought the timing couldn’t be more perfect. I’ve wanted to make a White Chicken Chili for some time, and because it uses simple ingredients, it’s a natural for store brand staples. See this recipe used in my weekly meal prep. Slow Cooker White Chicken Chili What’s to love about Slow Cooker White Chicken Chili I whipped up this Slow Cooker White Chicken Chili because it’s full of flavor, has tons of fiber and protein, is low in fat, and contains simple, real ingredients. The best part, though, is that it’s pretty much a “load and press go” recipe. Just combine all the ingredients in your slow cooker, turn the heat on, and when you come back a few hours later it’s all done! It couldn’t get any easier than that. P.S. I scaled this recipe down a little to make it work in smaller slow cookers. You can make this in a 3-4 qt slow cooker, or double it for a 5-7 qt slow cooker and feed a crowd. See This Recipe in Action: Print Recipe 4.8 from 68 votes Slow Cooker White Chicken Chili This healthy and flavorful White Chicken Chili practically makes itself in the slow cooker. Easy, healthy, delicious. Prep Time: 15 mins Cook Time: 4 hrs Total Time: 4 hrs 15 mins Servings: 4 1.5 cups each Ingredients 1 yellow onion ($0.32) 2 cloves garlic ($0.16) 1 jalapeño (optional) ($0.05) 1 boneless skinless chicken breast (about 3/4 lb.) ($2.49) 16 oz jar salsa verde ($2.89) 2 15 oz. cans Essential Everyday™ cannellini beans ($2.00) 1 15 oz. can Essential Everyday™ pinto beans ($1.00) 1 Tbsp ground cumin ($0.30) 1 tsp dried oregano ($0.10) ¼ tsp cayenne pepper ($0.02) ¼ tsp freshly ground black pepper ($0.02) 2 cups Essential Everyday™ chicken broth ($0.85) 4 oz Essential Everyday™ Monterrey Jack cheese shredded ($1.39) Instructions Dice the onion and mince the garlic. Slice the jalapeńo lengthwise, scrape out the seeds with a spoon, then dice. Place the onion, garlic, jalapeño, and chicken breast in the bottom of a slow cooker. Drain and rinse the cannellini beans and pinto beans, then add them to the slow cooker, along with the salsa, cumin, oregano, cayenne, and freshly ground black pepper. Pour two cups of chicken broth over the contents in the cooker and then give everything a brief stir. Place the lid on the slow cooker and cook on high for four hours. After four hours, the chicken should be tender and easily shreddable (if not, replace the lid and cook for one more hour). Carefully remove the chicken breast from the slow cooker and use two forks to shred the meat. Return the meat to the slow cooker. Stir the chili, slightly mashing the beans with the back of the spoon as you stir. Serve the chili hot topped with shredded Monterrey Jack cheese. Other optional toppings include fresh cilantro, diced avocado, freshly squeeze lime, or tortilla chips. Video Tried this recipe? Mention @budgetbytes or tag #budgetbytes on Instagram! Step by Step Photos Dice one onion and mince two cloves of garlic. Slice the jalapeño lengthwise and scrape out the seeds with a spoon. Dice the remaining jalapeño flesh. Add the onion, garlic, jalapeño and chicken breast to the slow cooker. Add one 16oz. jar of salsa verde, two 15oz. cans of cannellini beans, one 15oz. can pinto beans, 1 Tbsp ground cumin, 1 tsp dried oregano, ¼ tsp cayenne pepper, and ¼ tsp freshly cracked pepper to the slow cooker. Add two cups chicken broth to the slow cooker, and give the ingredients a brief stir. Place the lid on the slow cooker, turn the heat onto high, and cook for four hours. After four hours on high, the chicken should be fork tender and easily shreddable (if not, replace the lid and cook for one more hour). Carefully remove the chicken breast from the cooker and use two forks to shred the meat. Return the meat to the slow cooker. Stir the shredded chicken into the chili, using the back of a wooden spoon to slightly mash the beans as you go. The mashed beans will help thicken the chili. Serve the chili hot with your choice of toppings. Creamy Monterrey Jack really brings the chili together, but fresh cilantro, avocado, sour cream, or tortilla chips all make the chili a little extra fun. So yum! And this is one of those recipes where the leftovers just keep getting better… |
Image caption Researchers found that blood sugar levels of all participants had returned to normal in one week. An extreme eight-week diet of 600 calories a day can reverse Type 2 diabetes in people newly diagnosed with the disease, says a Diabetologia study. Newcastle University researchers found the low-calorie diet reduced fat levels in the pancreas and liver, which helped insulin production return to normal. Seven out of 11 people studied were free of diabetes three months later, say findings published in the journal. More research is needed to see whether the reversal is permanent, say experts. Type 2 diabetes affects 2.5m people in the UK. It develops when not enough insulin is produced in the body or the insulin that is made by the body doesn't work properly. When this happens, glucose - a type of sugar - builds up in the blood instead of being broken down into energy or fuel which the body needs. The 11 participants in the study were all diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes within the previous four years. They cut their food intake drastically for two months, eating only liquid diet drinks and non-starchy vegetables. Fat loss After one week of the diet, researchers found that the pre-breakfast blood sugar levels of all participants had returned to normal. MRI scans of their pancreases also revealed that the fat levels in the organ had decreased from around 8% - an elevated level - to a more normal 6%. Three months after the end of the diet, when participants had returned to eating normally and received advice on healthy eating and portion size, most no longer suffered from the condition. It offers great hope for many people with diabetes. Prof Keith Frayn, University of Oxford Professor Roy Taylor, director of Newcastle Magnetic Resonance Centre at Newcastle University and lead study author, said he was not suggesting that people should follow the diet. "This diet was only used to test the hypothesis that if people lose substantial weight they will lose their diabetes. "Although this study involved people diagnosed with diabetes within the last four years, there is potential for people with longer-standing diabetes to turn things around too." Susceptibility question Dr Ee Lin Lim, also from Newcastle University's research team, said that although dietary factors were already known to have an impact on Type 2 diabetes, the research showed that the disease did not have to be a life sentence. "It's easy to take a pill, but harder to change lifestyle for good. Asking people to shift weight does actually work," she said. However, not everyone in the study managed to stay free of diabetes. "It all depends on how much individuals are susceptible to diabetes. We need to find out why some people are more susceptible than others, then target these obese people. We can't know the reasons for that in this study," Dr Lim said. Professor Edwin Gale, a diabetes expert from the University of Bristol, said the study did not reveal anything new. "We have known that starvation is a good cure for diabetes. If we introduced rationing tomorrow, then we could get rid of diabetes in this country. "If you can catch people with diabetes in the early stages while beta cells are still functioning, then you can delay its onset for years, but you will get it sooner or later because it's in the system." But Keith Frayn, professor of human metabolism at the University of Oxford, said the Newcastle study was important. "People who lose large amounts of weight following surgery to alter their stomach size or the plumbing of their intestines often lose their diabetes and no longer need treatment. "This study shows that a period of marked weight loss can produce the same reversal of Type 2 diabetes. "It offers great hope for many people with diabetes, although it must be said that not everyone will find it possible to stick to the extremely low-calorie diet used in this study." Dr Iain Frame, director of research at Diabetes UK, which funded the study, said the diet was not an easy fix. "Such a drastic diet should only be undertaken under medical supervision. Despite being a very small trial, we look forward to future results particularly to see whether the reversal would remain in the long term." |
It was almost destroyed in 1988, due to a bad financial situation and the movement to “update” church architecture. Thankfully, it was saved by a resourceful priest and with the help of Cardinal Francis George. And now St. John Cantius church has been voted “America’s Most Beautiful Church”! Isn’t it amazing how fortunes can change? [See also: If Hobbits Had Churches: The Gorgeous “Turf Churches” of Iceland] [See also: A Mystical Vision Inspired These Old Churches Carved Entirely Out of Rock] The contest was called Church Madness and held on the website Art & Liturgy, which is run by Patrick Murray. It started wth 16 churches, separated out into four sections that met in the middle like the annual NCAA tournament. Each match-up was determined by polls held on the website. As you can see, Chicago’s St. John Cantius parish had some stiff competition. But it managed to barely eke out a win in the championship match-up: with a total of 16,363 votes cast, St. John Cantius won by only 181 votes. If you can visit St. John Cantius parish, we recommend it! But if you can’t, our virtual tour below might be the next best thing. (The stranded pro-life students who sang beautiful chant at their Mass in a motel bar in January 2016 were from St. John Cantius parish.) You can click on any image to view it full size. Enjoy! [See also: Soaring Up to the Heavens: The World’s Top 10 Tallest Churches] [See also: 16 Churches So Beautiful They’ll Take Your Breath Away] |
Story highlights Deputy felt "sense of relief" after making arrest Shervin Lalezary is an Iranian-born lawyer who moonlights as a deputy "This is a lot more exciting than my day job," Lalezary says Reserve officers make just $1 a year A reserve sheriff's deputy who draws a salary of $1 a year was hailed as a hero for arresting the suspect in one of the worst arson sprees in Los Angeles history. "I'll give him a raise of another dollar a year," Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca joked. Shervin Lalezary, an Iranian-born lawyer who moonlights as a deputy, was among hundreds of law enforcement officers who spent four days looking for the person accused of setting a rash of car and building fires across the city. Early Monday, Lalezary pulled over a van in Hollywood driven by a man who resembled the person seen on the surveillance video -- a suspect described as having a pony tail and a receding hairline. With the help of backup officers, Lalezary then arrested the driver, identified as Harry Burkhart. Burkhart, a 24-year-old German national, was charged with one count of arson of an inhabited dwelling. He likely will face additional charges as the investigation moves forward, said Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa. Burkhart lives less than a mile from the site of the traffic stop. JUST WATCHED Reporter: Arson suspect from Germany Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Reporter: Arson suspect from Germany 01:29 JUST WATCHED Arrest in Los Angeles arson spree Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Arrest in Los Angeles arson spree 04:16 A humble Lalezary told reporters Tuesday afternoon he felt "a big sense of relief" for the community after making the arrest. "That whole shift we received so many suspicious person calls. You got the sense everyone on the city was on edge, rightfully so," he said. The reserve deputy declined to give any details about his personal life and focused on the extensive weapons, field and academics training -- about 1,064 hours -- reserve deputies receive. The public, Lalezary noted, expects the same professionalism from reservists as they do from full-time deputies. "This is one of the most significant arrests anyone can make -- regular or reserve -- in the history of law enforcement, " Baca said. "And this will follow him for the rest of his life." The deputy has a law practice in Beverly Hills, according to the State Bar of California, which admitted him in 2008. Lalezary attended the University of Southern California law school. Lalezary on Monday appeared at a post-arrest news conference with his mother and his brothers. One brother is a doctor, the other a law student who is also a reserve deputy. The younger Lalezary said he now has "big shoes to fill." "I'll continue to strive to be as good of a brother and deputy as he is," said Shawn Lalezary. For his part, Lalezary was quick to give credit to his fellow law enforcement officers. "Thank you for coming in to work every day full time, putting your lives on the line every day full time," he said. "I look forward to coming back for my next shift with you guys." |
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