text stringlengths 0 100k |
|---|
BlockMason’s Credit Protocol Token Sale Opens to Public at Long Last Blockmason Blocked Unblock Follow Following Oct 7, 2017 It’s been a long week for the many customers interested in participating in BlockMason’s much anticipated Credit Protocol token sale. While the sale opened on Oct. 1, the first week of purchases was reserved for those who signed up for the token sale whitelist and reserved and early purchase slot. After a strong first week, selling roughly $2 million of Credit Protocol tokens, our sale will open on Oct. 8 at UTC 1600 the general public. As you know, in recent weeks, BlockMason has drawn significant attention in the Ethereum community with a series of high profile announcements, including the addition of Anthony Di Iorio, founder of Jaxx and cofounder of Ethereum, to our advisory team. We are particularly excited for our U.S. customers as BlockMason is one of the few companies to make their ICO available to American purchasers after the SEC released their report on the DAO. BlockMason has pioneered legal research into the deployment of securities-law-compliant digital token sales, paving the way for other companies in the future to mimic the product-use token model with which we have been so successful. We are one of the few token sales to launch with a working product, Friend in Debt, which is built atop our Credit Protocol. We are also proud that our innovative product and unique approach to launching a token sale has drawn the eyes of numerous industry leaders, including Andrew Levine, Communication Liaison for Steemit.com Andrew recently interviewed BlockMason cofounder Tim Galebach for a documentary series about innovative minds in blockchain. While the interview is yet to be released in full, a portion about the Credit Protocol has already been posted by BlockMason on YouTube. Galebach and partner Jared Bowie were also recently featured in an episode of The Bitcoin Podcast. You can learn more about BlockMason and the Credit Protocol token sale at www.creditprotocol.com, or watch this short video. |
Scottish club that lost right to host Open championship after refusing to allow women to join will run second ballot The first vote was certainly conclusive, but the consequences so devastating that those with an eye on the broader interests of unity and equality have decided to hold a second ballot. Beleaguered supporters of Britain remaining in the EU must take heart this morning from the actions of Muirfield golf course, which has announced it is to hold another vote on allowing female members to join the clubonly weeks after members rejected the proposal. In May, a postal ballot of members of the Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers, which runs the course, one of Scotland’s last remaining men-only clubs, returned 64% for and 36% against widening the membership, falling just short of the two-thirds majority required for the club to alter its constitution. The decision attracted worldwide condemnation and resulted in Muirfield, a favoured retreat of Edinburgh’s judiciary, forfeiting its right to hold the prestigious Open championship. The club announced on Monday morning it was “seeking a fresh ballot of its membership on admitting women as members of the club”. The club’s committee had supported allowing female members and will propose another postal ballot before the end of 2016 at a special general meeting of members. The club’s captain, Henry Fairweather, said approving female members would repair the serious damage to the club’s reputation. He said: “A substantial majority of our members voted for change and many have voiced their disappointment with the ballot result and with subsequent events. The club committee believes that a clear and decisive vote in favour of admitting women as members is required to enable us to begin the task of restoring the reputation of the club that has been damaged by the earlier ballot outcome.” Politicians and leading golfers criticised the club’s decision in May and urged another ballot. The Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers was founded in 1744 and is said to be the oldest recorded golf club in the world. It set down the original rules of golf in 1744 and has hosted the Open 16 times. The course last hosted the prestigious tournament in 2013 but will be unable to do so again until it changes its membership rules. Nicola Sturgeon, the first female first minister of Scotland, described the vote to continue excluding women members as indefensible. At the time of the first ballot, she encouraged the club to revisit the issue, saying: “I understand and accept that, as a private club, it is for Muirfield to decide on its membership – but at a time when Scotland is a country where women can get to the top in politics, law, business and other fields, this sends the wrong signal.” |
Scanning the DNA of nearly 5,000 tumor samples, a team led by scientists at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and the Broad Institute has identified 140 regions of scrambled genetic code believed to contain many undiscovered cancer genes. The researchers said the mapping of the abnormal regions gives cancer scientists a starting point from which to search for as-yet undiscovered oncogenes and broken tumor-suppressor genes, which allow cells to divide and grow uncontrollably. Published in the October issue of Nature Genetics, the results are part of an ongoing international research effort to define the landscape of DNA mutations and other genetic changes that fuel the development of cancer. The authors said it is the largest analysis to date of the role of DNA "copy number alterations" across several types of cancer. Normal cells carry two copies of the 20,000 genes that make up the genome. The genomes of cancer cells typically are riddled with areas where genetic sequences are duplicated or deleted; in fact, copy number alterations affect more of the genome than any other DNA abnormality in cancer. The study's goal was to identify patterns of copy number alterations and determine how they promote cancer. In the survey of 4,934 cancers of 11 types, "we found that cancers often undergo doubling of the entire genomes, followed by large numbers of smaller copy number alteration events," said Rameen Beroukhim, MD, PhD, assistant professor of Medicine at Dana-Farber and an associate member of the Broad Institute. "We also saw a propensity of copy number changes to occur at telomeres [the tips of chromosomes] and they exhibit features indicating they arise from different mechanisms than copy number changes of regions within chromosomes." Beroukhim is co-senior author of the report along with Matthew Meyerson, MD, PhD, of Dana-Farber and the Broad, and Gad Getz, PhD, of Massachusetts General Hospital and the Broad. The analysis also revealed 70 regions of the cancer genome that undergo duplications -also known as amplifications - more often than would be expected by chance and 70 regions that contain deletions more often than would be expected by chance. "We expect these 140 regions to contain a number of as-yet unknown oncogenes and tumor suppressor genes," Beroukhim said. On average, these 140 regions included three to four genes. However, only 35 of the regions contained known oncogenes or tumor suppressor genes previously linked to cancer. "So there is a lot left to discover in the cancer genome," Beroukhim said. "These regions provide the research community a starting point to evaluate possible novel oncogenes and tumor suppressor genes." The results have been made available in a publicly accessible website, http://www.broadinstitute.org/tcga. He added that further study of the copy number variation database generated by the researchers "will help us understand better how cancers arise and what are the genes involved. And when we understand that, we can develop diagnostics and therapeutics that counteract those genes." |
Image caption Clashes broke out as Buddhists marched into Muslim populated areas The Sri Lankan authorities have imposed a curfew on two southern towns to quell clashes between a hardline Buddhist group and Muslims. The latest violence began after a Buddhist rally in Aluthgama. Several people are reported to have been injured, shops burned and stones thrown at Buddhist marchers there. The curfew was later extended to include mainly Muslim Beruwala. Muslims make up around 10% of Sri Lanka's predominantly Buddhist population. Eyewitness accounts tell of Muslims being pulled off local buses and beaten. There are also reports of looting. Image caption The rally by the Buddhist BBS took place in Aluthgama The clashes are said to have begun after the rally held by the BBS, the Bodu Bala Sena, or Buddhist Brigade. The gathering came three days after a smaller clash between Muslim youths and a Buddhist monk's driver. 'Act in restraint' After its rally, the BBS marched into Muslim areas chanting anti-Muslim slogans, reports say, and the police used tear gas to quell the violence. Unconfirmed reports say security forces also used gunfire. Witnesses say Muslim homes and a mosque were stoned. The situation is confusing and there is an air of danger as violence has spread to several areas, a BBC reporter in Aluthgama says. Image caption Some pro-Buddhist organisations oppose what they see as undue minority influence on government Sri Lankan media appear to have decided not to report the violence, with sources saying outlets have received "orders from above". President Mahinda Rajapaksa has announced an investigation. "The government will not allow anyone to take the law into their own hands. I urge all parties concerned to act in restraint," he tweeted. Correspondents say tension has recently been high between the two sides, with Muslims calling on the government to protect them from Buddhist-inspired hate attacks, and Buddhist accusing minorities of enjoying too much influence. |
Report: Planned Parenthood Rider Issue Resolved, Money Now The Only Issue Doug Mataconis · · 3 comments NBC White House correspondent Chuck Todd reports via Twitter: WH and GOP aides involved in the talks are now on same page: the remaining issues are money. The rider issue has been resolved. Assuming this is the case, it would seem that a deal can be reached, although it may take a one or two day Continuing Resolution to give them the time to hammer out the details. Additionally, by “resolved” I can only assume that the Planned Parenthood rider is going to be taken out of the package since President Obama made clear today that he would veto any bill that included it. Update: National Journal reports that the Planned Parenthood rider was traded for another $1,000,000,000 in spending cuts: Numerous GOP and Democratic sources on and off Capitol Hill tell National Journal that the outline of the deal is as follows: up to $39 billion in cuts from the 2010 budget, $514 billion in spending for the defense budget covering the remainder of this fiscal year, a GOP agreement to abandon controversial policy riders dealing with Planned Parenthood and the EPA, and an agreement to pass a “bridge” continuing resolution late Friday night to keep the government operating while the deal is written in bill form. The original number was $38,000,000,000. |
The premier of New Brunswick says he's finally feeling better, more than two months after suffering a concussion while playing hockey. Brian Gallant says he was injured when he fell during a practice with the Saint John Sea Dogs of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League on May 3. He was invited to skate with the team at the qplex in Quispmasis prior to the President Cup final series between Saint John and Blainville-Boisbrand Armada. The premier said he had headaches after the fall, which would recur when he attended public events. Initially, he trimmed down his schedule and avoided looking at screens, but it wasn't enough. He said he scaled back his work significantly to allow time to recover. Gallant was not present at a number of recent celebrations across the province, including Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's visits in Fredericton and Grand Bay-Westfield on June 29. Gallant said he has been symptom-free for the last few days and is gradually adding more events to his schedule. "I have learned valuable insight from this incident," he wrote in a statement. "Take care of your health and don't try to keep up with highly skilled 20-year-old hockey players." The premier is set to meet with officials in Washington on Wednesday to discuss softwood lumber and free trade. |
Daily Headlines PROFILED IN MY FRONT YARD (Source:Creative Loafing Atlanta) More News Select a State See Map Alabama Alaska Arizona Arkansas California Colorado Connecticut Delaware District of Columbia FEDERAL Florida Georgia Guam Hawaii Idaho Illinois Indiana Iowa Kansas Kentucky Louisiana Maine Maryland Massachusetts Michigan Minnesota Mississippi Missouri Montana Nebraska Nevada New Hampshire New Jersey New Mexico New York North Carolina North Dakota Ohio Oklahoma Oregon Pennsylvania Puerto Rico Rhode Island South Carolina South Dakota Tennessee Texas Utah Vermont Virgin Islands Virginia Washington West Virginia Wisconsin Wyoming Check State Laws Share This Article Georgia ------- All That Police Work For Such A Small Amount Of Weed Earlier this year, I got arrested for a half gram of marijuana - not even a joint's worth. All I wanted was some McDonald's, but I never even made it to the car. My friend and I were standing in my front yard on Moreland Avenue in East Atlanta. I was two steps away from my driveway. Before I even knew what was happening, my friend and I had a spotlight on us and were being ordered not to move. Two more units were on the way. My friend and I were both handcuffed and, by my estimation, illegally searched. ( My friend told the officer that he couldn't search us without probable cause, but no luck. ) I admit, I had some weed on me. We were all saddled up and ready to go to jail when a crackhead walked up to the patrol car and told the officer there were outstanding warrants for his arrest and he'd like to be placed into custody. The officer demanded that he back away. He then stepped out of the car, took the guy's I.D. and called it in. Dispatch confirmed multiple warrants. The officer gave the man his I.D. back and drove off. At that moment, I was thinking, "Why take us in and leave a man with warrants?" The only thing I could come up with was the money. How would the crackhead pay his fines? Who would bail him out of jail? I then came to the conclusion that not only was I racially profiled in my own front yard =AD depressing enough news on its own =AD but that my friend and I had just been shaken down by the city of Atlanta. The verdict: a $750 fine and $250 for D.U.I. school ( even though we weren't in a vehicle ). We also got a year of probation. All this police work for such a tiny amount of pot =AD while people like Atlanta musician Billy Fields get shot in the face. Thankfully, he is alive to tell the story. I also know of someone else who was raped in a home invasion a few weeks back. The suspects are still at large. Is Atlanta's police department here to protect and serve, or merely to intimidate and collect revenue from us? Is its presence meant for our own good, or does the department merely exist for the benefit of city government? I always thought jail was a place for serious and violent offenses. The truth is, you can go to jail for almost anything - including being a minority hanging out in your front yard. I'm not claiming all cops are here to screw you, but some initiatives and protocols really should be revised. Time and resources spent on petty infractions should be diverted to the hunt for those who do serious harm. Good guys - even ones with a little weed in their pocket - don't belong behind bars. MAP posted-by: Keith Brilhart Share This Article Pubdate: Thu, 16 Dec 2010 Source: Creative Loafing Atlanta (GA) Copyright: 2010, Creative Loafing Contact: letters.atl@creativeloafing.com Website: http://www.atlanta.creativeloafing.com Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1507 Author: Phillip Morris |
Redis Masterclass - Part 1, Configuration I’ve been using Redis for the past couple of years, we use it extensively at Bugsnag (app-error monitoring service) and I’ve grown to love it. It is the datastore I trust by far the most, with very good reliability and performance characteristics. Some good tips on configuring and using Redis are available on the Redis website. If you are using Redis in production or are thinking about it then I recommend looking through the Redis site, as it has very good documentation. Here is a selection of the things I think are most important (your use case may vary). Limit Redis Memory Usage Redis is an in memory datastore. If we let its memory usage go unchecked, we could run out of memory on the machine and the out of memory process killer could kill the Redis process, causing downtime. I’ve seen this happen at scale, and it takes an agonising amount of time for redis to restart and reload its data from disk, so we should avoid this at all costs! You can set the maximum amount of memory an instance of Redis should use by setting the maxmemory configuration setting. From the docs If this limit is reached Redis will start to reply with an error to write commands (but will continue to accept read-only commands), or you can configure it to evict keys when the max memory limit is reached in the case you are using Redis for caching. To configure it to evict keys you can set the maxmemory-policy. There are a lot of different algorithms for selecting a key to evict that you can choose from. Some will suit a Redis instance that is used as an LRU cache, while others are better for instances that have a mix of cached values. Enable Overcommit Memory You should ensure that overcommit memory is set to 1 in linux. This ensures that malloc will allow more memory than the machine has available to be allocated, under the assumption that not all allocated memory will be written to. This is the case when a process forks, like Redis, due to Copy-on-write. I’ve seen this disabled by mistake on a running Redis instance and all background saves of the Redis dataset started failing, so this is really important. This meant we were running without any backups for data stored in Redis, so there were a few hours of panic diagnosing the issue! Ensure Configuration Consistency To configure Redis, you can use the redis.conf config file or you can use the CONFIG SET command to adjust the configuration of a running Redis instance without restarting it. When a Redis instance first starts, it reads its config from the redis.conf file. If you use the CONFIG SET command to change the running configuration of the instance, the redis.conf file remains the same. Which means that any future restart of the Redis instance will read the old configuration file. I have seen this cause downtime in production environments more than once, and at Heyzap we had monitoring installed to verify that the running configuration was the same as the redis.conf file. If you want to monitor this yourself, you can check the output of the CONFIG GET command. Enable Swap Configure swap. This will at least prevent the OOM killer from killing Redis. If you spill in to swap, you get some breathing room to come up with a strategy to fix it, rather than trying to start a Redis instance that won’t fit into RAM when it starts. From the docs, Make sure to setup some swap in your system (we suggest as much as swap as memory). If Linux does not have swap and your Redis instance accidentally consumes too much memory, either Redis will crash for out of memory or the Linux kernel OOM killer will kill the Redis process. WARNING: When using swap on a Redis instance be sure to monitor that the swap is not used by Redis. Your server will dramatically slow down if reading keys stored in swap. Use Sharding Use multiple instances of Redis from the start, even if initially only on a single machine. There are many advantages to sharding, and very little in the way of reasons not too. There is a useful discussion of sharding Redis here, but here’s my take. Advantages Of Sharding Quickly Move Instances Moving an instance of Redis from one machine to another will immediately help alleviate memory issues you have on one of your Redis machines. If you have a single Redis instance, this can take much longer and will involve more application code changes, rather than just simply updating the IP address of the instance in question. Faster Fork Times In order to save the data in the Redis database to disk for persistence, Redis will fork to persist the data to disk while the original process continues serving requests. The action of forking a new process will block the original process, which means that requests are not being processed until the fork has completed. Forking is a non trivial operation, and the fork time is proportional to the memory usage of the process being forked. Fork times can be hundreds of milliseconds per GB, depending on the system you are running on. Having more instances, each with a smaller data size, will help with this issue. Greater Parallelism Redis is single-threaded by design. This means that each instance of Redis can only execute one command at a time. This is useful for atomic updates, and simplifies a lot of client code and transactions. This also means that when a command being run on a Redis instance is slow, it will block all other commands from running. If you have many instances of Redis however, this is less of an issue as your other instances of Redis will be unaffected by the slow command. Some people may think that Redis’ support of multiple databases are a good approximation to sharding, but unfortunately all databases run in the single thread. Meaning that a blocking command on one database in an instance blocks all other databases from having commands run against them. More Configuration Flexibility If you use multiple instances, say one is a pure LRU cache and another has persistent application data in. You can configure each instance of Redis to deal with hitting its maxmemory limit differently. In an LRU cache, removing the LRU key when hitting the maxmemory limit would be sensible. However in an instance with persistent application data in, you may want writes to be denied, but reads to continue. Having multiple instances allows you to have this configuration flexibility. Disadvantages Of Sharding The disadvantages of sharding are fairly weak in my opinion, but included here for completeness. More Initial Effort Having more Redis instances means you have to configure multiple Redis instances, even if initially you don’t need them. Monitoring those instances will also be more effort as well. Greater Memory Usage Each instance of Redis comes with its own memory overhead. An instance of Redis running without any keys uses under 1 MB of memory. Sharding Strategies When sharding your Redis instances you need a way of splitting the keys between different instances. At Bugsnag and Heyzap keys are sharded predictably on the client, so we can still SUNION two sets in the same instance where we need to. This means we generally shard by feature. For example, grouping all sets of users following other users in the same redis allows us to quickly find the common followers for two users. This has the added advantage of being able to see how much Redis memory is being used by a given feature. There are a lot of ways of sharding Redis keys, but be aware that if two keys are on different instances of Redis, you can’t atomically update both simultaneously. You can read about sharding strategies in the Redis documentation. Part Two - Monitoring Check out Part Two of the series, which covers how to monitor your Redis instances. |
European researchers last week launched a global Internet for robots called Rapyutaan online database of information designed "to help them cope" with the confusing world of humans, according to BBC News. Rapyuta is the work of the European RoboEarth Project, which describes its mission as the development of "a giant network and database repository where robots can share information and learn from each other about their behavior and their environment." Last week's launch of Rapyuta represents the first phase of a project that aims to build a large-scale, cloud-based resource for robots of all kinds which would serve as both an informational database and a calculating engine for jacked-in androids. Such a network of information would give massively more useful information to robots which currently rely on their own onboard memory banks and processing power to deal with real-world situations on an individual basis, project researchers said. "[T]he goal of RoboEarth is to allow robotic systems to benefit from the experience of other robots, paving the way for rapid advances in machine cognition and behavior, and ultimately, for more subtle and sophisticated human-machine interaction," the RoboEarth Web site states. The use of Rapyuta could also make it far cheaper to produce more mobile robots, since they wouldn't require as much onboard storage and processing power, Dr. Heico Sandee, Robo Earth program manager at the Dutch University of Technology in Eindhoven, told BBC News. "On-board computation reduces mobility and increases cost," he said, adding that as the network evolves "more robotic thinking could be offloaded to the Web. The wirelessly accessible database currently serves as a fount of information for "software components, maps for navigation (e.g., object locations, world models), task knowledge (e.g., action recipes, manipulation strategies), and object recognition models (e.g., images, object models)," according to researchers. Information in the database comes from both robots and humans and is presented in a machine-readable format in a "Cloud Robotics infrastructure which includes everything needed to close the loop from robot to the cloud and back to the robot." |
Abortion decriminalisation bills set to fail in Queensland due to objections from LNP Updated A push to decriminalise abortion in Queensland is set to fail, with the state's LNP Opposition vowing to block the move because it says the proposed reforms are deeply flawed. Key points: Independent Rob Pyne wants to decriminalise abortion in Queensland Bills likely to fail due to lack of Parliament support Pyne determined to continue campaign Independent Rob Pyne's two bills to legalise abortion will be debated on Wednesday. Labor is allowing its MPs a conscience vote, meaning members are not locked into adopting the same stance as party colleagues. LNP MPs have also been offered a conscience vote on the bills, but Opposition Leader Tim Nicholls said his members would not back either. "After this discussion every single member of the LNP party room indicated that, in good conscience, they cannot support these bills," Mr Nicholls said in a statement. Because not all Labor MPs will support abortion, at least some LNP MPs need to vote in favour of it for the reforms to succeed in Queensland's tightly-balanced Parliament. The bills were introduced months apart — the first sought to remove abortion criminal code, but does not put any restrictions on when in a pregnancy an abortion may be performed. At the time, Mr Pyne said that was deliberate as he wanted MPs to decide on a cut-off in a later stage of the debate. Months later he introduced a second bill which included regulations around who can perform a termination, and allowed for doctors to conscientiously object. It also allowed abortions to be performed when a woman is more than 24 weeks pregnant, but only if two doctors agree continuing the pregnancy is a greater risk to the woman's physical or mental health than if it were terminated. Laws could create 'further risk and uncertainty': LNP Abortion has been on Queensland's Criminal Code since 1899, and women and doctors can be prosecuted for accessing or performing a termination. However in 1986, a court ruled that abortion is lawful if there is serious danger to the mother's life or her physical or mental health. Mr Pyne believes his changes would destigmatise abortion, but his method of reforming the law has been criticised. Queensland Parliament's Health Committee said the initial bill's push to decriminalise abortion without suggesting regulations showed a "lack of rigour and foresight in policy development". It also raised the possibility one bill could pass, but the other fail. Professor Lindy Willmott from the Australian Centre for Health Law Research told the committee that would create uncertainty. "It would have the effect that it would be more difficult in Queensland for a person in the first 24 weeks gestation period to obtain a termination than after 24 weeks," she said. Mr Nicholls singled out the "the failure to properly and holistically deal with such an important issue" as the reason his MPs could not support the bills. "The second bill attempts to correct the failures of the first bill but falls well short," Mr Nicholls said. "It creates further risk and uncertainty as shown in the Parliamentary Committee report — this doesn't help anyone. "The most recent Parliamentary Committee report makes it very clear that if a woman in Queensland wants or needs an abortion she can obtain one safely through her doctor." Pyne determined to push reforms through Mr Pyne said he would be "ceaseless" in his pursuit to change the state's laws on abortion, even if his attempt this week failed. He criticised the LNP for its decision to block his bills, but said he was pleased Labor would allow its members a conscience vote. "While some of the extremist groups are very vocal, about one in four Queensland women have had this procedure at some point. "They're not going to forget when they go to vote at the ballot box if people and members of Parliament want to classify them as criminals." Deputy Premier Jackie Trad hit out at Mr Nicholls and the LNP, saying they would have put forward amendments if they wanted the bills passed instead of vetoing them. "This is Tim Nicholls at his weakest best," she said. Topics: abortion, state-parliament, laws, womens-health, alp, liberal-national-party, activism-and-lobbying, qld, brisbane-4000 First posted |
Like this article? rabble is reader-supported journalism. Chip in to keep stories like these coming. After fighting off pressures to dismantle their community for over a year, Super InTent City residents in Victoria, B.C. have been told they must leave by August 8. The ruling was made last week in B.C.'s Supreme Court by Chief Justice Christopher Hinkson who cited greater than anticipated costs, deterioration of health, violence and criminal activity as some of the reasons for shutting it down. "I have come to the conclusion that the Encampment is unsafe for those living there and for the neighbouring residents and businesses and cannot be permitted to continue," he said in his decision, released on July 5. "The residents of the Encampment can no longer remain where they are pending the trial of the plaintiffs’ action against them, and the Encampment must be closed." As part of his decision, alternative housing options must be made available for the tent city's residents which has put pressure on the Province to complete its conversion of the Central Care Home on Johnson Street into 140 units of supportive housing by August 8. "I think the tent city was really effective at putting pressure on the provincial government," Victoria City Councillor Ben Isitt told rabble. "We now have 300 new units of interim and permanent housing and we also have a provincial commitment to match the regional contribution of $30 million for new housing with supports so I think we're closer to eliminating homelessness in the capital region than we've been for some time." According to Michele Biss, Legal Education and Outreach Coordinator at Canada Without Poverty, this increase in housing is a victory that is a testament to the hard work of the residents of Super InTent City. "There's a real human reality to this…the individuals we're talking about, they're people with dignity with families and lives and stories of their own. They're people who deserve their rights to be recognized," she told rabble over the phone. "In terms of the individuals who have been working so hard, living in the camp, who have been there almost a year, the fact that housing has been proposed by the government is really a testament to the resilience and strength of the individuals there. In that sense, it is a pretty huge victory." While there was a significant increase in housing options in Victoria over the past year as a result of Super InTent City, housing activists say there is still an overwhelming need in the region. "Unfortunately, these new and long overdue efforts will not solve the problem in Victoria, where the depth of homelessness is far-reaching, affecting more than 1,400 people and their families," said a Together Against Poverty Society -- a legal advocacy group in Victoria -- in a statement. "This is why we cannot rest until we have homes for all." In fact, Biss says Super InTent City highlights the need for housing across Canada, particularly with a human rights based approach. "The government needs to move to a place where they recognize that they're responsible for human rights obligations to those individuals," she said. "When you look at this from a much larger perspective, there's a lot going on here. What happened at Super InTent is a small piece of a much larger picture…When we look at homelessness in Canada, it is a crisis. It is an emergency. We need actions, we need human rights actions." Biss also pointed out that the connection between health, the right to life and homelessness -- one that was implied in Justice Hinkson's stated concern for health and safety conditions in the camp -- is important to consider at a national level. "There's a much bigger piece about how the right to life fits in with our understanding of homelessness in Canada. In British Columbia alone, there has been an increase of 70 per cent in homeless deaths between 2013 and 2014. Forty-six homeless people died in B.C. in 2014, many of which were preventable," she said. "It needs to be understood that homelessness is a life or death issue. It's a crisis and it's something that we need to act on immediately." Two separate tent city spaces have popped up in B.C. On July 9, 30 people established a tent city in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside to draw attention to displacement and the lack of affordable housing in Vancouver. The group agreed to meet with Mayor Gregor Robertson at City Hall. Also on July 9, Alliance Against Displacement began occupying a building in Burnaby, B.C. that had been slated for demolition after all residents were evicted. The group is calling on the city to end the demolition of buildings in the area. Alyse Kotyk is a Vancouver-based writer and editor with a passion for social justice and storytelling. She studied English Literature and Global Development at Queen's University and is excited by media that digs deep, asks questions and shares narratives. Alyse was the Editor of Servants Quarters and has written for the Queen's News Centre, Quietly Media and the Vancouver Observer. She was rabble's 2015-16 news intern. Photo: flickr/Mike Gabelmann |
MSNBC host Rachel Maddow will moderate a Democratic candidates’ forum in South Carolina next month. The South Carolina Democratic Party made the announcement today, saying Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders and Martin O’Malley will participate. Vice President Joe Biden will be invited to take part, should he declare his candidacy. Last week, during a panel at Advertising Week, Maddow thought Biden would stay out of the race. “As the place for politics, we at MSNBC are looking forward to bringing this forum to a national audience,” said MSNBC president Phil Griffin in a statement. “And, with Rachel Maddow leading the night, it’s guaranteed to be a lively and insightful conversation with each candidate.” The forum, dubbed the “First in the South Presidential Candidates Forum,” will be held at Winthrop University in Rock Hill, S.C., and will air on MSNBC on Nov. 6. The Democrats will have a sanctioned debate in South Carolina in January–NBC will host. Comments |
Designed by: Tim Puls Published by: Lookout Games Players: 2-4 Review copy provided free of charge by Esdevium games. At the start of the year I made a resolution to review some heavier, deeper boardgames during 2017. Having played through all four eras of The Colonists in a single sitting, though, I’m beginning to regret that decision. This is no small game; in comes in a sizable box that doesn’t have any form of insert, just a whole lot of cardboard tokens and a pile of plastic bags to store it all in. The whole thing weighs over 3KG, takes up most of an average kitchen table and playing through the entire game can take up to eight hours. And oh man does it make my head hurt. Yup. Let’s talk about The Colonists. As its name suggests you’re put in charge of developing a thriving colony across a total of four eras, which can in fact take anything up to about eight hours to complete if you want to go through all of them, although naturally once you become familiar with the systems that time can drop to around six hours. It’s the only boardgame I’ve ever played where the rulebook suggests a save system that lets you pick back up later on. Indeed, I’d say that most people will likely use the rulebooks suggestions for starting off in an era of your choice and then play for an era or two before stopping. If nothing else do it for your damn sanity! The game kicks off with a bunch of basic starting hex tiles arranged around two markets, areas you can jump back to as a move whenever you like but we’ll come back to those later on. These various hexes are the places where you can take actions like getting wood or clay, or turning that wood and clay into planks and bricks. They are also where you’ll build the various things that make up your own player board colony, like farms, hunting lodges, pubs, factories, ore mines and much, much more. The key to this hex board is that you don’t just place your worker (a steward) wherever you like to take an action, rather the steward must be moved around, with each move costing one of your three “turns”. At the The key to this hex board is that you don’t just place your worker (a steward) wherever you like to take an action, rather the steward must be moved around, with each move costing one of your three “turns”. At the start your steward can only move one space at a time, and whatever space you land on that action MUST be performed. That means if you move to a construction hex for a farm, for example, you have to pay the resources and put a farm on your board. If you don’t have the needed resources you simply can’t move to that space/ It’s a fascinating twist on the standard worker-placement mechanic, turning it into a case of worker-movement that forces you to think numerous turns in advance, planning out the various paths needed to pick up resources and get to the tile you want. I found it fascinating trying to plan out my long-term strategies on this board, especially when wanting to place something like a flat which is an upgrade of existing farm so you need to pick up the resources for the farm first, build it, get the next batch of resources and upgrade to the flat. At the start the board isn’t huge so navigating around and figuring out a plan isn’t too taxing on the ‘ol brain, but throughout each era twelve new hexes will be added to the board, massively expanding the available options and creating the elaborate maze you see above. By the time you get to end of the game the board is a huge thing that offers up loads and loads of choices. The biggest problem The Colonists will likely ever face is the dreaded disease known as Analysis Paralysis, a rare and potentially deadly condition that leaves players paralyzed due to their brain going into overdrive to figure out the most efficient moves possible. The game is split into a series of eras, which are in turn split into years which are then split into half years. Each half year consists of players doing their three turns before shifting the marker to the next half year and repeating the process, meaning you have six turns across a year. At the end of every year your colony will produce any goods it can based upon what buildings you have and the citizens currently employed in them, but more importantly you also need to feed the various workers. Now, at first this isn’t even an issue because you’ll be working primarily with farmers who sustain themselves, but as you progress you’ll start using the yellow citizens as well who require feeding if they are put to work, and eventually the red merchants will become useful as well and they need even more food than citizens, plus clothing too because they’re just greedy. The end of a year also signifies that it’s time to add three new hexes to the board, with the whoever has the first player token getting to choose where they are placed. Placement is vital because as we’ve already discussed you need to be able to move around these hexes, so sticking a bunch of construction spaces in a group can be dangerous as it could come very close to locking you out of a specific building until you can move your steward more than one hex at a time or until you have enough resources to throw at building stuff you may not even need. You’ll also need to reveal a new market card at the end of the year which dictates what you can do on those spaces. As mentioned before you can teleport straight to any market square you wish on your turn. Furthermore, market tiles are the only ones which ignore the rule stating that you cannot end on the same tile you began on. You’ll be able to trade in resources for points on these markets, grab some free stuff like wood or clothing or something else, or build. The point is regardless of the choices you have at the market there is always something you can do, even if it’s just grabbing the free resource and then discarding them. This creates a safe space for you to leap back to whenever, ensuring that it’s impossible for a player to ever get stuck in the hex maze. Being able to leap back to a market is also important for avoiding the fee. You see, it’s perfectly valid to enter a hex occupied by another player to take the corresponding action, but doing so means you have to pay that person a fee in resources as dictated by the current era. This can be strategically important, especially early on with a smaller board and a player who has unlocked a second steward. A well-placed steward can make an opponent hesitate when taking an action, either forcing them to change plans or to pay you. Either way it’s a win for you in what is one of the game’s very few moments of actual player interaction. Yes, one of the game’s potential pitfalls depending on the type of person you are is the lack of meaningful interaction between players. Since you’re all constructing your own personal colony and no action can be truly blocked like in Agricola or other worker-placement games there can be a powerful sense of isolation with The Colonists. Sure, you can glance across the table to see what everyone is up to but ultimately their plans don’t affect your own. Even if you’re both doing the same thing there’s no reason to switch strategies. Sometimes when playing with my entirely imaginary girlfriend we’d look up after hours of playing and reach across the table, but never quite make it…we’d just quietly go back to building our little colonies, accepting our new lives of loneliness. Other things that need to be considered while playing are the improvement cards that can be picked up via a special hex or through a few other words. These need to be played by visiting the developer, but can offer up a lot of things like a stack of resources, a slightly cheaper building option or even permanent improvements to your colony that not only offer handy abilities but are worth a few extra points, too. I did note, though, that improvements became less useful as the game went on, their value diminishing as you move through the first few eras. Then there are other colonies that you can set up diplomatic relationships with by building and upgrading embassies. Four of these colony cards will be picked at random at the start of the game with a fifth being introduced later on, and each of them grant special bonuses for being friendly toward, like a second steward, the ability to swap resources or special pawns that get added to the board and that can be moved around by either player. They can be surprisingly important, and picking one or two early on to focus on can really help lay the foundations for your future plans. I was particularly fond of one that let me ignore any hex’s action in favor of taking a resource, making it much easier to move around to where I needed to be. Once you’ve progressed through five years the era changes, which means introducing a new stack of hexes offering up newer, more advanced options for building and converting resources. Many of these new buildings replace existing ones. New improvements and market cards also get added into the mix. In other words this already sizable and thoughtful game becomes even bigger and more liable to make parts of your brain turn into a strange ooze. The early game is all about getting basic production of goods set up for the later eras so that you don’t constantly have to waste time picking them up from the hexes. Once you’ve Storage is also incredibly important since you begin with a measly four spaces to store things, which isn’t anywhere near enough for what you’ll be needing to pack away. A little leeway is provided by the fact that production buildings have a buffer, which is to say they can store one batch of produced goods, although to actually use them you first need to move them into storage. Without playing through the later eras or possibly even the entirety of the game at least once or twice, though, it’s obviously difficult to build towards what you need correctly, so there’s certainly a bit of a learning curve that stems from figuring out what resources will be most required in the later eras. In short The Colonists does come down to raw effeciency, sometimes at the cost of actual strategic thinking. It’s a game best played, then, by two people who are quite experienced with it. I say two people because with more the downtime can become quite tiresome. Once the later eras arrive it feels as though the game is hitting its stride proper as your early foundations let you begin focusing your strategy a tad more. I think it’s fair to say that, at least in my experience, most people are doing the same thing in era one and two, establishing more storage and getting basic production needs sorted out. Of course playing a shorter version of the the game changes this as obviously the decreased time means you’ve got to begin pushing for points much faster. So that’s all fine and dandy, but how do you actually win the damn game? Well, money, because as we all know money is truly the goal of existence (sarcasm alert.) Interestingly, though, cash is purely for keeping track of points and is never spent, a slight thematic drop when you’re building a colony and visiting markets. I would have quite liked to have been able to spend money to do certain things, with the tradeoff obviously being that you’re giving up points to do it. At the end of the game it’s simply a case of taking the hard-earned dollars on your board and adding them to the value of your buildings and any currently employed workers. Whoever has the most moolah wins. Simple. A small problem is that in early eras buildings that produce cash – namely the pub and theater – feel too powerful. In later eras their usefulness isn’t quite so pronounced over some of the expensive buildings that are worth a lot of points, but even then having a couple is almost a requirement for staying competitive. Over the course of a long game their production can provide a substantial boost to your end-game score. The Colonists is a difficult game for me to render a definitive opinion on because I find myself quite unsure about it. On the one hand I love the turn-to-turn puzzle that moving the stewards around creates, and I do enjoy building an effective engine that can pump out the resources needed to win. The problem for me lies within the game’s length and the fact that I can’t seem to find a solid starting point. To play through all four eras is a hugely time-consuming process and one I’m no hurry to do again as the gameplay just doesn’t hold my attention for that long. It claims to be an epic strategy game, but it doesn’t feel very epic as you’re just doing the same thing for six to eight hours. For The problem for me lies within the game’s length and the fact that I can’t seem to find a solid starting point. To play through all four eras is a hugely time-consuming process and one I’m no hurry to do again as the gameplay just doesn’t hold my attention for that long. It claims to be an epic strategy game, but it doesn’t feel very epic as you’re just doing the same thing for six to eight hours. For some this will be the game’s biggest appeal, but for me it’s a weakness. Meanwhile opting to start in the first era and play through to the end of the second one or even the third feels like the game ends just as your engine is just getting into its stride proper. Begin in a later era and the sense of progression isn’t quite there. My eventual sweet spot was playing era two and three with two players as this kept the playtime reasonable while still having space to build up and get our engines ticking over semi-properly. So how can I bring all of this together into a semi-comprehensible opinion? I like it. I don’t love it, but I like it. It’s going to appeal to a very specific audience and I can’t say I’m necessarily in that audience, as when it comes to my friends two hours or maybe three at most is the limit. I really enjoy figuring out the best paths to take, both in terms of overall strategy and just finding my way around the board. And yet I struggle to see myself coming back to this again in a hurry. [twitter-follow screen_name=’wolfsgamingblog’ show_count=’yes’] Advertisements Share this: Twitter Reddit Facebook Tumblr Pinterest Pocket Like this: Like Loading... |
The first tourist flight into space is scheduled for next year, and it's cheaper than you'd think. But is this the final frontier for luxury travel, or a highly dangerous sport? At the west end of Pall Mall, among London's most venerable and old-fashioned gentlemen's clubs, a smart new office opened its doors to the public earlier this year. Its front window proclaims, in large letters, the simple motto: "Space is Virgin Territory". Here, amid the trappings of the past, is travel's future. Inside the office, young men and women are busy working at computers and telephones while decorators put finishing touches to plush, glass-partitioned rooms. These are the new UK headquarters of Virgin Galactic, which Richard Branson hopes will create an entirely new tourism market – in outer space. In one room, a photograph of the Earth covers two walls. In another, there are huge pictures of the company's spacecraft taking off and landing at its launch base in New Mexico. "Things are going incredibly well," says Stephen Attenborough, Virgin Galactic's commercial director. "These are computer graphics images, but next year we hope to replace them with photographs of the real thing: our first commercial flights into outer space." It has cost Branson more than £162m to design and build a fleet of WhiteKnightTwo motherships and smaller SpaceShipTwo planes, which will whisk customers more than 100km above the Earth's surface, where our planet's atmosphere ends and space begins. The technology is striking and innovative. Strapped to the belly of a jet-powered mothership, each spaceplane – carrying two pilots and six passengers – will take off from a runway, ascending until it reaches an altitude of 15km. There will be a stomach-churning lurch as the spaceplane is released; its rocket engine will ignite; and passengers will be rammed back in their seats as the craft soars upwards at a speed of more than 4,000km/h. Outside, the blue sky will turn black as the craft hurtles out of the atmosphere. After 90 seconds, the pilot will cut the engine and passengers will coast in weightless silence as their spaceplane glides into space. More than 100km below, the curve of the Earth will be clearly visible against the dark background of space. Passengers will have six or seven minutes to float round the cabin and indulge in an ecstasy of camera-clicking before their ship starts to arc downwards. Its stubby wings will then be pointed upwards to turn the craft into a giant shuttlecock that will "flutter" back to Earth. Back down at an altitude of around 15km, its wings will be returned to their original configuration and the craft will glide to an airport landing. The day of the space tourist will have arrived. Among those booked on Virgin Galactic's first mission are Branson, his son Sam and daughter Holly. Angelina Jolie is scheduled for an early flight, as is her partner, Brad Pitt. Others booking the £125,000 journey include Ashton Kutcher, Formula 1 drivers Rubens Barrichello and Niki Lauda, and scientists James Lovelock and Stephen Hawking; Princess Beatrice and Paris Hilton also make appearances on early flight schedules. Virgin Galactic – which Branson describes as "by far and away my boldest venture" – has so far received more than £64m in deposits from 520 customers who want to escape the surly bonds of Earth, albeit for a very short period of time. First flights are scheduled for the end of 2013, a date that puts Virgin Galactic in pole position in the race to commercialise space. But Branson is not without competition, as will be apparent this week in London when delegates gather for the third European conference on space tourism. The event will reveal the startling progress that has been made in an industry that only existed in science-fiction writers' minds a couple of decades ago. For example, Andrew Nelson, CEO of the aerospace consortium XCOR, based in Mojave, California, is billed to report on the progress of his Lynx spacecraft. It is designed to take off and land like a plane. In terms of scale it is a relative minnow compared with Virgin Galactic's craft: Lynx has room for just a pilot and one passenger. On the other hand, its order book, filled with £34m-worth of flights, is every bit as impressive. Trials are set to start this year with commercial launches in 2014. "We remain focused on delivering the coolest rocket plane on the planet," Nelson said earlier this year when he announced the raising of funding for the final stages of Lynx's development. Others touting for space tourism business include Armadillo Aerospace, based in Texas, which is developing a vertical take-off rocket to carry customers on sub-orbital and, later on, full orbital flights. The Russian company Orbital Technologies made headlines last year when it revealed plans to construct a Hotel in the Heavens. In this orbiting, four-room guest house, customers will be able to cavort in zero gravity for several days – though at a price: £500,000 for a seat on the Soyuz rocket to take them into orbit and a further £100,000 for a five-night stay. Food will be microwaved, there will be no alcohol and the water will be recycled. On the other hand, the views will be out of this world. A key common factor for these projects is the price-tag: steep but not prohibitive. It costs around £30,000 to £75,000 to make an attempt to climb Mount Everest, for example, and it is no coincidence that flights by Virgin Galactic and XCOR are priced only slightly higher – to capture the high-adventure tourism market dominated by the man and woman with the Breitling watch and the six-figure salary. This is scarcely bringing spaceflight to the masses, of course, but it will make it more available than has previously been the case. To date only seven people, all billionaires, have bought their way into space for a week's stay at the International Space Station (ISS). The most recent of these was Guy Laliberté, the Canadian founder of Cirque du Soleil, who paid £22m for a flight in which he gave interviews from the ISS about the world's impending freshwater crisis before donning a clown's red nose for his descent to Earth in a Soyuz capsule. We have lift off: Sir Richard Branson and designer Burt Rutan hold a model of the WhiteKnightTwo carrier aircraft unveiled at a Virgin Galactic which will ferry paying passengers into space on a regular schedule. Photograph: Lisa Carpenter for the Observer Richard Branson, Andrew Nelson and other entrepreneurs are at least bringing the cost of travelling outside the atmosphere within the means of a far greater number of potential customers. Indeed, the idea of space tourism is already becoming commonplace, says one of the organisers of this week's conference, Pat Norris of Logica. "We had our first conference in 2006. It had a very speculative feel. This was a new industry, after all. Three years later, major investments had been made and we really felt we were going places. Now we are moving on from issues of engineering and are concentrating on sales and revenues. We are open for business." One delegate – Erick Morazin of Allianz Global Assistance – will even outline how those who want to be blasted into space might get travel insurance for their journey. There is a real feeling of change. "We are aiming to transform an activity that has been in the sole control of governments for more than 50 years, which has been incredibly expensive and relatively dangerous," says Stephen Attenborough. "There is a big gap between what has been done before and what we are going to do." This revolution has certainly been a long time coming. In the late 60s, during the Apollo programme, getting into orbit looked as though it would become part of life in only a few years. But the dream died as governments struggled to balance the slackening need to put humans in space with the soaring costs of doing so safely. Now it is being rejuvenated by private enterprise. But what has changed? What transforming events have occurred recently to bring us to the dawn of mass space travel? Analysts point to several factors, a key being US entrepreneur Peter Diamandis establishing in 1996 the $10m Ansari X-Prize, which was offered to the builders of the first privately financed spacecraft to make sub-orbital flights. "I got the idea from reading Charles Lindbergh's story of how he flew across the Atlantic in the Spirit of St Louis in 1927," Diamandis says. "Lindbergh made his epic flight to win a $25,000 competition and in doing so opened up the skies to international flight." It was time to do the same for space, says Diamandis, who decreed that a spacecraft could only win if it was piloted by a human, could carry three astronauts and was flown twice within the space of 14 days. Within months, scores of inventors and designers had announced their plans. Trials took place over the next few years until, in 2004, the prize was won by US aircraft designer Burt Rutan. On 29 September, his SpaceShipOne – powered by burning nitrous oxide and solid rubber – was flown to an altitude of more than 100km above the Mojave desert. A few days later, the craft repeated the trick. Rutan scooped the pot with his design: a small spaceplane is carried to high altitude by a jet-powered mothership before it is dropped and then burns a solid-fuel rocket engine to blast itself into space. The technology was snapped up by Branson, who had already created the name Virgin Galactic and was looking for the right system to democratise space travel. "Essentially, we will use a version of Rutan's design, expanded to accommodate eight, rather than three people," says Attenborough. There has been another critical factor involved in bringing private space travel to fruition, however: the rise of the billionaire technocrat. Many of today's wealthiest individuals come from the computer or dotcom industries and virtually all the companies jostling to dominate the space tourism market have been backed, in some way, by men who have made their fortunes this way. The development of Burt Rutan's spaceships was backed by Microsoft's cofounder, Paul Allen, for example. Similarly, John Carmack, who made his fortune writing computer games, including Doom and Quake, has put his money into Armadillo Aerospace, which hopes to make manned flights in the near future. And then there is Elon Musk, who sold the PayPal internet payments company to eBay for £1bn and has set up SpaceX, his own LA rocket company. Last month, SpaceX became the first private space outfit to send a capsule to the International Space Station. The robot spacecraft, Dragon, was carrying 1,000lb of cargo, for the station's crew. "You had to have some kind of pre-boom to supply the capital to get the rocket boom going, and that only happened with personal computers and the internet," he explains. Thus it has been the geeks with the bucks who have opened up travel to outer space. It remains to be seen how successful their endeavours will be – and how risky. Certainly safety remains a controversial topic with some critics, including the astronomer royal, Martin Rees, who objects to these ventures being dubbed "space tourism". "The phrase lulls people into believing that such ventures are routine and low-risk," says Rees. "And if that's the perception, the inevitable accidents will be as traumatic as those of the Space Shuttle. Instead, these cut-price ventures must be regarded as dangerous sports." This point is rejected by Virgin Galactic's Stephen Attenborough. "Part of the problem with manned spaceships in the past has been that they have been too complex," he says. "We have a very limited number of critical systems on which the safety of our craft depend, so it is not hard to build in redundancy. And the test flight programmes will have been exhaustive by the time we are ready for our first launches next year. "On the other hand, we've never said this is going to be risk free. But what in life is?" The third European Space Tourism Conference will be held on 19 June at the Royal Aeronautical Society, Hamilton Place, London W1 (aerosociety.com) The sky is not the limit: is is space travel a bargain? A return ticket to space for £125,000 may sound pricey, but compare it to these lifechanging experiences that will cost you the same - without even leaving earth… Climb Everest with Kenton Cool If anyone's going to get you to the top, it's Kenton Cool, who has summited Everest more times than any other mountain guide. For the price of one ticket to outer space you could get two of you to the highest place on earth. Cruise the world Your budget won't keep you on board the luxury liner Silver Whisper for the length of its four-month, 28-country cruise, which sets sail next January. But at around £8,000 a day, you're good for a fortnight or so. Live forever with cryonics Being cooled in liquid nitrogen until technology is able to revivify you is, understandably, not cheap. But £125,000 is enough for the first downpayment, and a shot at eternal life. Have Rihanna sing for you Splurge on the ultimate barmitzvah. Rihanna recently charged £300,000 for an hour's private gig so you could afford about half an hour. Bargain. Toast yourself in style In 1985, a bottle of Château Lafite 1787 – from Thomas Jefferson's cellar – became the most expensive bottle of wine ever sold at £110,000. So you'd even have change for an (actually drinkable) 1943 La Tache. Get married on Necker Island Experience the Branson magic without blasting off. For £125,000 you could take over Sir Richard's private Caribbean island for a long weekend and enjoy a wedding with all the trimmings. Or… We found a packet of glow-in-the-dark stars on the internet for about a fiver. Knock yourself out and buy 25,000 packets. |
“I can’t believe anybody would be that stupid,” said Education Minister Jeff Johnson, upon hearing that the CBE has approved a big pile of cash for executive raises. Obviously, he doesn’t know our Calgary Board of Education all that well. The board was foolish enough to reject the pay-freezing teachers deal, and make a big noise about it, while also approving more than $1 million in raises for officials, and not bothering to announce that. Shortly after the Herald’s Richard Cuthbertson broke the story Friday morning, steam blew out the legislature doors. By Friday afternoon, Johnson’s news secretary, Kim Capstick, said education officials will be in Calgary next Monday to talk to the CBE about the teachers deal — and now they want a word about the pay thing as well. “We would encourage them very strongly to ensure that no one gets it (the money),” Capstick adds. The province, already angry about the board’s stand on the teachers agreement, make the obvious point; what public agency would be oblivious enough to approve raises while everybody else is taking freezes or cuts? “I’m speechless ... speechless,” said MLA Sandra Jansen, chair of the Calgary PC caucus. She really was. Unlike most people who say they’re speechless and immediately keep talking, Jansen was stone silent for a good 20 seconds. Then she said: “There’s a desperate need for schools all over this province, and when there’s a deferred maintenance bill ... climbing toward $1 billion, using resources in a budget toward administration salaries, it sets a bad tone.” After the storm broke, CBE chair Pat Cochrane submitted a defence you’ll find on today’s editorial pages. She says the money was approved in last May’s budget, and employees are only “eligible” for the extra money. But trustee Sheila Taylor, often the only one who stands up to the mute majority, has a very different version. “Never once before this were details around compensation for exempt staff discussed by the board — never once,” she says. “There is only one time per year when we approve those exempt staff raises and it is now. “It came before us this week in this fiscal environment — and we made the choice to increase pay ... We made the wrong choice.” Taylor also said she’d never heard a word about Cochrane’s promise of a “freeze” on executive pay — to start in September — until Friday. When the vote on raises came, Taylor and Carol Bazinet were the only trustees who said no. The other five approved. The way this happened is almost as bad as the result. No details are supposed to escape these secret meetings, but I hear that trustees were given a report with no notice and had only a short time to consider it. They did, and then they voted — with several officials eligible for raises still in the room, watching and listening. That practice is universally condemned by governance experts. The seal on that meeting room door seems to work two ways; nothing is supposed to get out, and no hint of the larger provincial environment ever seeps in. Out here in the real world, teachers will take no raises for three years. Doctors are facing $275 million in fee cuts. Alberta Health Services will trim $35 million from management pay. Executive pay is being frozen at the University of Calgary, and within the government, too. Yet the CBE secretly approves money for raises, while issuing this opinion of the teachers agreement: “We are concerned that the proposed agreement includes significant hidden costs.” Really, minister, stupid is too mild a word. Don Braid’s column appears regularly in the Heralddbraid@calgaryherald.com |
The hardman's life could have been very different. Statham said: "It's a bit of a sore point I never got to the Olympics." Hollywood's loss would have been international sports' gain. Or something like that. To be fair, the tough guy actually did pretty well in tiny trunks and made the national team way back in 1990, as you can see from the video above. YOUTUBE Jason Statham at the 1990 Commonwealth Games The actor actually represented England in Auckland at the 1990 Commonwealth Games in New Zealand. Sadly, as you can see from the video, he didn't win a medal in any of the three competitions he took part in. Statham reckons he would have done better if he started earlier or tried someting else. He said: "I started too late. It probably wasn't my thing. I should have done a different sport." Olympics 2016: Team GB Winners Mon, August 22, 2016 The Team GB Olympic medal winners so far from Rio 2016 Play slideshow EPA 1 of 74 Mo Farah's triumphed in a staggering 10,000m gold medal run that even included a stumble Sadly the multi-talented almost-Olympian doesn't reveal what else he might have turned his hand to, but he has nothing but praise for the current efforts of Rio bronze medallists Daley and Dan Goodfellow, not to mention gold medallists Jack Laugher and Chris Mears Statham said: "I just heard they got seven million or something for the diving per year. They deserve it. The divers we've got now are just terrific." The actor's past is littered with more tiny pants. Statham starred in a leopard-print thong in the 1990s video for The Shamen's Comin' On. YOUTUBE No Shame(n): Jason Statham in The Shamen's video |
REUTERS/Jason Reed Four new slides detailing more of the top-secret NSA program known as PRISM were released Saturday by The Washington Post. The slides — given to the Post by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden— show more detail of the flow of information from private companies to the NSA, how the information was analyzed, and how many people were targeted by the PRISM program. The new slides show more details of NSA's possible "direct access" into private companies servers — appearing to show surveillance gear installed on-site by the FBI. The first slide shows the targeting process of an NSA analyst, with supervisor and FBI oversight to ensure that American citizens are not being targeted. On the second slide, a flow chart is shown, with private companies — such as Yahoo or Google — first providing data to the FBI, then on to the NSA or other agencies for processing upon request. As Joe Pollicino points out at Engadget, live monitoring of voice, text, and instant messages — "[watching] your ideas form as you type" as Edward Snowden mentioned — is indeed possible. From The Guardian: The data is intercepted by the FBI's "Data Intercept Technology Unit", the new slides suggest. From there it can be analysed by the FBI itself, or can be passed to the CIA "upon request". It also automatically passes to various monitoring sections within the NSA. These include, the annotated slides suggest, databases where intercepted content and data is stored: Nucleon for voice, Pinwale for video, Mainway for call records and Marina for internet records. Perhaps the most interesting slide is the fourth, which says there were 117,675 active surveillance targets in the Prism database, as of April 5. The Prism program, first revealed on June 6, reportedly allows the NSA to gain access to a number of major internet companies, including Google, Facebook, and Skype. All the companies named have strongly denied any involvement and James Clapper, the Director of National Intelligence, has stressed that the program is lawful. The original four slides were first published on June 6. Snowden gave The Guardian and The Washington Post a presentation that included 41 slides, which has not yet been revealed in full. |
Greetings Soldiers, Since the patch with the addition of the community cape I thought it would be a good idea to have an official sticky thread where you could go to nominate players for the prestigious Community Cape. The Helldivers Community Cape is given as a reward to outstanding individuals who have participated in - or helped out - the Helldivers community in various ways. Whether that be reporting bugs, guiding new recruits, winning competitions or actively participating and engaging in forum discussions, these individuals can be distinguished from other recruits. You will be able to see who a recipient of a community cape is by a small green Libertea symbol appearing in their icon image. It is similar to the developer cog icon which you see on the Arrowhead devs’ accounts. Here are some examples of why someone could be nominated: Actively contributes and participates in discussions in the community above and beyond the average player Helpful and welcoming to new players, passing on knowledge or teaching them Reported bugs in a constructive and useful way, leading to solutions Helps to troubleshoot other user problems and responds with good advice Long term dedicated supporter of Helldivers, eg. moderating and curating unofficial communities Has won a Helldivers competition Nomination Rules: You may not nominate yourself. Being nominated does not guarantee a cape - we look at each individual case. All nominations need to have a description or motivation of why the person is being nominated. We will not consider a nomination without getting a detailed reason why. We want to keep this topic strictly for nominations. Discussion of nominations is of course promoted and encouraged, but we will not tolerate any flaming, trolling or begging. If we think a post breaks this rule we will remove it. Click the summary below to see the list of recipients! |
HALLANDALE (CBSMiami) – An upside cross that lights up in red as a symbol for “Satanology” sits outside Hallandale Beach City Hall, put there by a South Florida man protesting religious symbols on government property. Chaz Stevens applied for the cross permit and invented Satanology after a manger and menorah were put up during the holidays. Stevens put up his Satanology cross on Tuesday, which reads “In Chaz We Trust. All Others Pay Cash.” By Wednesday, Deacon Hubert Jackson of Higher Vision Ministries erected another six-foot tall cross right next to Stevens, countering his message. That cross had yellow placards all over with short bible passages written on them. Stevens describes himself as an atheist, an activist and a media personality. His point erecting the cross: keep church and state separate. That means no religious symbols of any kind on government property. “We are just trying to use the script as we understand it, equal access tactics,” Stevens told CBS4. “Fair is fair.” Hallandale Beach Mayor Joy Cooper was also pushing for a banner reading “In God We Trust” to hang behind the dais in commission chambers. Meanwhile, the city put up cardboard signs next to Stevens’ satanic cross that clarified it is a privately installed display that does not represent city administration. “I do understand his point about keeping church and state separated,” Deacon Jackson told Reporter Donna Rapado. “I also I would agree with him to this point that if one religion can have their symbols than another one should also. But what I do not disagree with is the satanic worship.” But Stevens explained worshipping Satan is not the point. “It’s not like I practice evil,” he told Rapado. “We do not believe in Satan. We are atheists. However, we’ll believe in Satan, in Jesus, we’ll believe in whatever if it furthers our cause of Satanology which is promotion of our civic activism to further a discussion of our civil rights, of separation of church and state. And how we’re doing that is we’re using the hobgoblins of Christianity against themselves.” The crosses are permitted to stay up a few days until Friday. Stevens planned to take this fight to other cities, including Doral, Fort Lauderdale and Boca Raton. Meanwhile, Mayor Cooper told Rapado, by phone from Washington D.C., that plans to put the request for the “In God We Trust Banner” on next Wednesday’s commission meeting agenda. |
There is no justification for a claim that Christianity must oppose the assisted death of a person who has made their own decision to die, provided that such a person can convince others that their desire to die is fully considered. I will make this argument given two conditions: first that the person is capable of making an educated decision, and second that their end-of-life experience includes full access to both pastoral and medical care. The most common faith-based complaint is that life must be preserved at all costs because it is sacred. However, not many would dispute a right to self defence which may sometimes require lethal force. Furthermore, our social structures are designed to allow for life to be lost as an unfortunate but unavoidable consequence. It is clear that no functional transport system, for example, could be made entirely safe. If life were irreducibly sacred, all of these points would be of great concern; that they are not seems to provide evidence that life fails to be sacred in the sense that would allow it to be used as an indefeasible trump against assisted dying. More specifically, one familiar position from those with a faith-based opposition to assisted dying is that when a patient is undergoing medical treatment, even if such patients no longer want to live, they must be made to stay alive for as long as possible because God alone can decide when one may die. I'll accept a claim that God's will is decisive. Having done so, I cannot then understand how God's decisive will can consistently approve of medical intervention to sustain life against a natural end, but not approve intervention so that a patient can find death when that patient no longer wants to be kept alive by medical intervention. The God in whom I believe is nothing if not consistent; a good God must be, by definition. On the topic of God's nature, my next reason for believing that God is in favour of the possibility of assisted dying is based in God being both loving and perfect. I am unlikely to accept as "loving" the sort of god that demands that we suffer unnecessarily. I do not say that it is possible to always avoid all suffering. I do say that I find it incompatible with my conception of God that a patient be effectively tortured by being kept alive with no hope of anything but pain and deterioration. God would not want that to happen to me; he thinks more of me than that. Having been created in God's image, my third reason here for supporting self-aware assisted death, is the most telling. My faith, based on my understanding of the life and works of Christ, tells me that I will have to account for the choices that I make. The teaching of Christ is all about refusing to accept conventional religious wisdom, which would be easy but thoughtless, and instead steadfastly making one's own moral choices. Jesus chose to die rather than compromise this point. The gift that God has given to me is not life, but choices. There are no reductivist solutions to human ethics. Each choice is hard, and I expect to work hard to fathom out what seems to me to be good. I expect to be personally responsible for my choices. I expect you to be responsible for yours too, even if I disagree with what you decide. So, the most reprehensible insult to God in my view is paternalism; the taking away of my God-given gift to make my own moral decisions and be responsible for them. No one else can decide the value of my life for me, when it has no further use, I will end it – with or without assistance. I will expect to have to explain myself to God. In my view, of course, those who do prevent moral choice are actually making moral choices for which they themselves will have to account. There is no reason from Christianity why the law should prevent assisted dying, at least so far as those wanting to die are self-aware and sane. The presence of such law would allow a dignified end to those wanting to have one, without requiring others to die against their wishes. |
The Arena Football League (AFL) is a professional indoor American football league in the United States. It was founded in 1987 by Jim Foster, making it the third longest-running professional football league in North America, after the Canadian Football League (CFL) and the National Football League (NFL). The AFL plays a proprietary code known as arena football, a form of indoor American football played on a 66-by-28 yard field (about a quarter of the surface area of an NFL field), with rules encouraging offensive performance, resulting in a faster-paced and higher-scoring game. The sport was invented in the early 1980s and patented by Foster, a former executive of the United States Football League (USFL) and the NFL. From 2000 to 2009, the AFL had its own developmental league, the af2. The AFL played 22 seasons from 1987 to 2008; internal issues caused the league to cancel its 2009 season, though the af2 did play. Later that year both the AFL and af2 were dissolved and reorganized as a new corporation comprising teams from both leagues, and the AFL returned in 2010. The league's average game attendance since returning in 2010 has been approximately 9,500. The league has historically had a nationwide footprint, and has been recognized as the most prominent professional indoor football league in North America, offering higher payment, more widespread media exposure, and a longer history than competing leagues. From a high of 19 teams in 2007, the league contracted to a low of four teams in 2018, all in the northeastern United States. Six teams are announced for the 2019 season. History [ edit ] Creation [ edit ] Jim Foster, a promotions manager with the National Football League, conceived of indoor football while watching an indoor soccer match at Madison Square Garden in 1981. While at the game, he wrote his idea on a 9 x 12 envelope, with sketches of the field and notes on gameplay. He presented the idea to a few friends at the NFL offices, where he received praise and encouragement for his concept. After solidifying the rules and a business plan, and supplemented with sketches by a professional artist, Foster presented his idea to various television networks. He reached an agreement with NBC for a "test game".[1] Plans for arena football were put on hold in 1982 as the United States Football League was launched. Foster left the NFL to accept a position in the USFL. He eventually became executive vice-president with the Chicago Blitz, where he returned to his concept of arena football. In 1983, he began organizing the test game in his spare time from his job with the Blitz. By 1985, the USFL had ceased football operations and he began devoting all his time to arena football, and on April 27, 1986, his concept was realized when the test game was played.[1][2] Test game [ edit ] The test game was played in Rockford, Illinois on April 27, 1986[3] at the Rockford MetroCentre.[4] Sponsors were secured, and players and coaches from local colleges were recruited to volunteer to play for the teams, the Chicago Politicians and Rockford Metros, with the guarantee of a tryout should the league take off. Interest was high enough following the initial test game that Foster decided to put on a second, "showcase" game. The second game was held on February 27, 1987 at the Rosemont Horizon in Chicago with a budget of $20,000, quadruple the $4,000 in the test game. Foster also invited ESPN to send a film crew to the game; a highlights package aired on SportsCenter.[1] Inaugural season [ edit ] Following the successes of his trial-run games, Foster moved ahead with his idea for arena football. He founded the Arena Football League with four teams: the Pittsburgh Gladiators, Denver Dynamite, Washington Commandos, and Chicago Bruisers.[4] Foster appointed legendary Darrel "Mouse" Davis, godfather of the "run and shoot" and modern pro offenses, as executive director of football operations. Davis hired the original coaches and was the architect of the league's original wide-open offensive playbooks.[5] The first game in Arena Football League history was played on June 19, 1987, between the Gladiators and Commandos at Pittsburgh Civic Arena in front of 12,117 fans.[6] The game was deliberately not televised so that it could be analyzed and any follies and failures would not be subject to national public scrutiny. Following the inaugural game, tweaks and adjustments were made, and the first season continued.[1] The Dynamite and Bruisers played in the first-ever televised AFL game the next night, on June 20, 1987, at the Rosemont Horizon in suburban Chicago on ESPN with Bob Rathbun and Lee Corso calling the play-by-play. The broadcast showed a short clip of the Commandos-Gladiators game.[7] Each team played six games, two against each other team. The top two teams, Denver and Pittsburgh, then competed in the first-ever AFL championship game, ArenaBowl I. On September 30, 1987, Foster filed an application with the United States Patent and Trademark Office to patent his invented sport. The patent application covered the rules of the game, specifically detailing the goalposts and rebound netting and their impact on gameplay. Foster's application was granted on March 27, 1990.[8] The patent expired in 2007. Early years (1987–1999) [ edit ] From its inception, the AFL operated in a state of semi-obscurity; many Americans had heard the term "arena football" but knew little to nothing about the league itself. From the 1987 season until the late 1990s, the most exposure the league would receive was on ESPN, which aired tape-delayed games, often well after midnight, and often edited to match the allotted time slot. The league received its first taste of wide exposure in 1998, when Arena Bowl XII was televised nationally as part of ABC's old Wide World of Sports.[citation needed] On Saturday, July 23, 1989, much of America learned of the AFL for an unintended reason, when the Pittsburgh Gladiators' head coach, Joe Haering, made football history by punching commissioner Jim Foster during a game with the Chicago Bruisers.[9] The national media ran with the story, including a photo in USA Today. The game was played between the two teams in Sacramento's ARCO Arena, as part of the AFL's 'Barnstorming America' tour. Foster had walked onto the field of play to mediate an altercation between the two teams when Haering, a former NFL assistant, punched him in the jaw. Haering was suspended without pay.[9] One of the league's early success stories was the Detroit Drive. A primary team for some of the AFL's most highly regarded players, including George LaFrance and Gary and Alvin Rettig, as well as being a second career chance for quarterback Art Schlichter, the Drive regularly played before sold out crowds at Joe Louis Arena, and went to the ArenaBowl every year of their existence (1988–1993). The AFL's first dynasty came to an end when their owner, Mike Ilitch (who also owned Little Caesars Pizza and the Detroit Red Wings) bought the Detroit Tigers and sold the AFL team. Although the Drive moved to Massachusetts, becoming the Massachusetts Marauders for the 1994 season, the AFL had a number of other teams which it considered "dynasties" between 1994 and 2016. The most successful of these were the Tampa Bay Storm and their arch-rival the Orlando Predators, as well as the San Jose SaberCats and their rivals, the Arizona Rattlers. Among those four teams, they won 14 of 22 ArenaBowls in that time span and appeared in all but two.[citation needed] In 1993, the league staged its first All-Star Game in Des Moines, Iowa, the future home of the long-running Iowa Barnstormers, as a fundraiser for flood victims in the area. The National Conference defeated the American Conference 64–40 in front of a crowd of 7,189. The second All-Star event was in October 2013, with two games, the first in Honolulu, Hawai'i, the second being in Beijing, China.[citation needed] While some teams have enjoyed considerable on-field and even financial success, many teams in the history of the league have enjoyed little success either on or off of the field of play. There were a number of franchises which existed in the form of a series of largely-unrelated teams with little to no continuity of either coaching staffs or players under numerous management groups until they folded. One example of several which could be cited is the New York CityHawks, whose owners transferred the team from New York City to Hartford to become the New England Sea Wolves after two seasons, then after another two seasons were sold and became the Toronto Phantoms, which lasted another two seasons until folding. There are a number of reasons why these teams failed, including financially weak ownership groups, lack of deep financial support from some owners otherwise capable of providing it, lack of media exposure, and the host city's evident lack of interest in its team or the sport as a whole.[citation needed] The new millennium (2000–2008) [ edit ] The year 2000 brought heightened interest in the AFL. Then-St. Louis Rams quarterback Kurt Warner, who was MVP of Super Bowl XXXIV, was first noticed because he played quarterback for the AFL's Iowa Barnstormers. While many sports commentators and fans continued to ridicule the league, Warner's story gave the league positive exposure, and it brought the league a new television deal with TNN, which, unlike ESPN, televised regular season games live. While it was not financially lucrative, it helped set the stage for what the league would become in the new millennium. Also, the year also brought a spin-off league, the af2, intended to be a developmental league, comparable to the National Football League's NFL Europe. There was a lot of expansion in the 2000s. Expansion teams included the Austin Wranglers, Carolina Cobras, Los Angeles Avengers, Chicago Rush, Detroit Fury, Dallas Desperados, Colorado Crush, New Orleans VooDoo, Philadelphia Soul, Nashville Kats, Kansas City Brigade, New York Dragons and Utah Blaze. Some of these teams, including the Crush, Desperados, Kats, and VooDoo, were owned for at least part of their existence by the same group which owned the NFL teams in their host cities. The NFL purchased, but never exercised, an option to buy a major interest the AFL. Of all of these teams, only the Philadelphia Soul survives. In 2003, the season expanded to 16 games. There were also several rule changes in this period. In 2005, players were no longer allowed to run out of bounds. The only way for a player to go out of bounds presently is if he is tackled into or deliberately contacts the side boards. This was also the first year the ArenaBowl was played at a neutral site. In 2007, free substitution was allowed, ending the "iron man" era of one-platoon football; also, games ending in ties were abolished. And in 2008, the "jack" linebacker was allowed to go sideboard to sideboard without being penalized for "illegal defense".[10] Decline (2008–2009) [ edit ] After 12 years as commissioner of the AFL, David Baker retired unexpectedly on July 25, 2008, just two days before ArenaBowl XXII; deputy commissioner Ed Policy was named interim commissioner until Baker's replacement was found. Baker explained, "When I took over as commissioner, I thought it would be for one year. It turned into 12. But now it's time."[11] In October 2008, Tom Benson announced that the New Orleans VooDoo were ceasing operations and folding "based on circumstances currently affecting the league and the team".[12] Shortly thereafter, an article in Sports Business Journal announced that the AFL had a tentative agreement to sell a $100 million stake in the league to Platinum Equity; in exchange, Platinum Equity would create a centralized, single-entity business model that would streamline league and team operations and allow the league to be more profitable. Benson's move to shut down the VooDoo came during the Platinum Equity conference call, leading to speculation that he had folded because of the deal.[13] Because of the sudden loss of the New Orleans franchise, the league announced in October that the beginning of the free agency period would be delayed in order to accommodate a dispersal draft. Dates were eventually announced as December 2 for the dispersal draft and December 4 for free agency, but shortly before the draft the league issued a press release announcing the draft had been postponed one day to December 3. Shortly thereafter, another press release announced that the draft would be held on December 9 and free agency would commence on December 11.[14] However, the draft still never took place, and instead another press release was issued stating that both the draft and free agency had been postponed indefinitely.[15] Rumors began circulating that the league was in trouble and on the verge of folding, but owners denied those claims. It was soon revealed the players' union had agreed to cut the salary cap for the 2009 season to prevent a total cessation of operations.[16] However, the announced Platinum Equity investment never materialized. Canceling the 2009 season [ edit ] Although the af2 played its tenth season in 2009, a conference call in December 2008 resulted in enough votes from owners and cooperation from the AFLPA for the AFL to suspend the entire 2009 season in order to create "a long-term plan to improve its economic model."[17] In doing so, the AFL became the second sports league to cancel an entire season, after the National Hockey League cancelled the 2004–05 season because of a lockout. The AFL also became the third sports league to lose its postseason (the first being Major League Baseball, which lost its postseason in 1994 because of a strike). Efforts to reformat the league's business model were placed under the leadership of Columbus Destroyers owner Jim Renacci and interim commissioner Policy.[18] High hopes for the AFL waned when interim commissioner Ed Policy announced his resignation, citing the obsolescence of his position in the reformatted league.[19] Two weeks later, the Los Angeles Avengers announced that they were formally folding the franchise. One month later, the league missed the deadline to formally ratify the new collective bargaining agreement and announced that it was eliminating health insurance for the players.[20] Progress on the return stalled, and no announcements were made regarding the future of the league. On July 20, 2009, Sports Business Journal reported that the AFL owed approximately $14 million to its creditors and was considering filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.[21] In early August 2009, numerous media outlets began reporting that the AFL was folding permanently and would file for Chapter 7 bankruptcy. The league released a statement on August 4 to the effect that while the league was not folding, it was suspending league operations indefinitely. Despite this, several of the league's creditors filed papers to force a Chapter 7 liquidation if the league did not do so voluntarily.[22] This request was granted on August 7, though converted to a Chapter 11 reorganization on August 26.[23] Relaunch and rock star owners (2010–2014) [ edit ] Following the suspension of the AFL's 2009 season, league officials and owners of af2 (which had played its season as scheduled) began discussing the future of arena football and the two leagues. With its 50.1 percent ownership of af2, the AFL's bankruptcy and dissolution prompted the dissolution of af2 as well.[citation needed] That league was formally considered disbanded on September 8, 2009, when no owner committed his or her team to the league's eleventh season by that deadline.[citation needed] For legal reasons, af2 league officials and owners agreed to form a new legal entity, Arena Football 1 (AF1), with former AFL teams the Arizona Rattlers and Orlando Predators joining the former af2.[24][25] All assets of the Arena Football League were put up for auction.[26] On November 11, 2009, the new league announced its intention to purchase the entire assets of the former AFL; the assets included the team names and logos of all but one of the former AFL and af2 teams.[27] The lone exception was that of the Dallas Desperados; Desperados owner Jerry Jones had purposely designed the Desperados' properties around those of the Dallas Cowboys, making the two inseparable. The auction occurred on November 25, 2009.[26] The assets were awarded to Arena Football 1 on December 7, 2009, with a winning bid of $6.1 million.[28] On February 17, 2010, AF1 announced it would use the "Arena Football League" name. The league announced plans for the upcoming season and details of its contract with NFL Network to broadcast AFL games in 2010.[29] AF1 teams were given the option of restoring historical names to their teams. In addition to the historical teams, the league added two new expansion franchises, the Dallas Vigilantes and the Jacksonville Sharks. For the 2011 season, the Philadelphia Soul, Kansas City Brigade, San Jose SaberCats, New Orleans VooDoo, and the Georgia Force returned to the AFL after having last played in 2008. However, the Grand Rapids Rampage, Colorado Crush, Columbus Destroyers, Los Angeles Avengers, and the New York Dragons did not return. The league added one expansion team, the Pittsburgh Power. Former Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver Lynn Swann was one of the team's owners. It was the first time the AFL returned to Pittsburgh since the Pittsburgh Gladiators were an original franchise in 1987 before becoming the Tampa Bay Storm. The Brigade changed its name to the Command, becoming the Kansas City Command.[30][31] Even though they were returning teams, the Bossier–Shreveport Battle Wings moved to New Orleans as the Voodoo, the identity formerly owned by New Orleans Saints owner Tom Benson. The Alabama Vipers moved to Duluth, Georgia, to become the new Georgia Force (the earlier franchise of that name having been a continuation of the first Nashville Kats franchise).[32] On October 25, 2010, lt was announced that the Oklahoma City Yard Dawgz would not return.[citation needed] The Milwaukee Iron also changed names to the Milwaukee Mustangs, the name of Milwaukee's original AFL team that had existed from 1994 to 2001. In 2012, the AFL celebrated its silver anniversary for its 25th season of operations. The season kicked off on March 9, 2012. The Tulsa Talons moved to San Antonio, Texas, and Jeffrey Vinik became owner of the Tampa Bay Storm.[33] The Dallas Vigilantes were left off the schedule for the 2012 season with no announcement from the management, and the team was subsequently quietly folded with no formal announcement ever being released. Like the National Football League, the AFL postponed the free agency period to October 31 due to Hurricane Sandy.[34] It was announced on December 12, 2012, that the AFL had reached a partnership agreement with NET10 Wireless to be the first non-motorsports-related professional sports league in the United States to have a title sponsor, renaming it the NET10 Wireless Arena Football League.[35] The redesigned website showed the new logo which incorporated the current AFL logo with the one from NET10 Wireless. The title sponsorship agreement ended in 2014 after a two-year partnership. In 2013, the league expanded with the addition of two new franchises to play in 2014, the Los Angeles Kiss, owned by Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley of the rock band Kiss, and the Portland Thunder. In 2014, the league announced the granting of a new franchise to former Mötley Crüe frontman Vince Neil, previously part-owner of the Jacksonville Sharks. That franchise, the Las Vegas Outlaws, played their home games at the Thomas & Mack Center, previously home to the Las Vegas Sting and Las Vegas Gladiators. After 20 years as a familiar name to the league, an AFL mainstay, the Iowa Barnstormers, departed the league to join the Indoor Football League. The San Antonio Talons folded on October 13, 2014, after the league (which owned the team) failed to find a new owner.[36] On November 16, 2014, despite a successful season record-wise, the Pittsburgh Power became the second team to cease operations after the 2014 season. This resulted from poor attendance.[37] It was later announced by the league that the Power would go dormant for 2015 and were looking for new ownership.[38] No new ownership group ever materialized, however. Contraction (2015–2017) [ edit ] Jerry Kurz also stepped down as commissioner of the AFL as he was promoted to be the AFL's first president. Former Foxwoods CEO Scott Butera was hired as his successor as commissioner.[39][40] On August 9, 2015, ESPN reported that the New Orleans VooDoo and Las Vegas Outlaws had ceased operations.[41] On September 1, 2015, the Spokane Shock officially left the AFL and joined the IFL under the new name Spokane Empire, becoming the fifth active AFL/af2 franchise to leave for the IFL since the 2009 AFL bankruptcy (Iowa Barnstormers, Tri-Cities Fever, Green Bay Blizzard and Arkansas Twisters—now the Texas Revolution—left previously).[42] On November 12, the league announced the defending champion San Jose SaberCats would be ceasing operations due to "reasons unrelated to league operations". A statement from the league indicated that the AFL was working to secure new, long-term owners for the franchise. This left the AFL with eight teams for 2016.[43] On January 6, 2016, the league took over "ownership and operational control" of the Portland Thunder from its previous owners.[44] The AFL stated this move was made after months of trying work out an arrangement "to provide financial and operational support." On February 3, 2016, it was announced that the franchise would start from scratch and no longer be called the "Thunder" as the name and trademarks belong to former franchise owner Terry Emmert (similar to the Jerry Jones move with the Desperados). AFL commissioner Scott Butera announced that a new identity would be announced at a later date.[45] On February 24, 2016, the Thunder were rebranded as the Portland Steel.[46] The league's 2016 schedule, announced on the league's website on December 10, 2015, showed an eight-team league playing a 16-game regular season over 18 weeks, with two bye weeks for each team, one on a rotational basis and the other a "universal bye" for all teams during the Independence Day weekend, the first weekend in July. All teams qualified for the postseason, meaning that the regular season served only to establish seeding.[citation needed] On February 10, 2016, The Washington Post and radio station WTOP-FM first broke the story that Monumental Sports & Entertainment (Ted Leonsis, chairman), which also owns the NHL's Washington Capitals, NBA's Washington Wizards, and WNBA's Washington Mystics, were "close to a deal" in bring a new expansion franchise to the Verizon Center.[47][48] On March 10, 2016, AFL commissioner Scott Butera announced that the deal was finalized and that the new Washington, D.C., team would begin play in 2017. On July 14, 2016, the team name was revealed as the Washington Valor.[50] There was also talk for franchises to return to San Antonio and St. Louis as well as a potential new team for Sacramento.[51] However, when the 2017 schedule was announced, there was no mention of any San Antonio, St. Louis, or Sacramento teams. On October 12, 2016, the Orlando Predators announced they had left the league due to the reduced number of teams and other pending disagreements with the league.[52] Hours later, the Jacksonville Sharks also announced they would be leaving the AFL and later joined the National Arena League.[53] The next day, it was reported that the Arizona Rattlers were in the planning stages to also leave the AFL for the Indoor Football League for 2017. In the same report, it was stated the Los Angeles Kiss and Portland Steel had apparently folded after both teams failed to return calls or respond to inquiries into 2017 season ticket purchases.[54] Later on October 13, the league held a teleconference with the remaining team owners and issued a statement the next morning declaring that the league would continue in the long-term, although the league did not expressly commit to playing in 2017 at that time.[55] On October 14, the AFL held a dispersal draft with the five teams selecting players from the Jacksonville, Los Angeles, Orlando, and Portland rosters.[56] The Rattlers then officially left the AFL for the IFL on October 17, leaving the AFL with four teams. They were the sixth AFL team to leave for the IFL since the 2010 relaunch.[57] On November 14, the AFL announced that it had granted a second franchise to Washington Valor owner Ted Leonsis to be based out of Baltimore for the 2017 season,[58] the Baltimore Brigade, bringing the league up to five teams. On August 23, 2017, the week of ArenaBowl XXX, multiple sources revealed that the AFL planned to expand to Albany, New York, and Newark, New Jersey, for 2018.[59] The Albany Empire was confirmed October 24, with the team owned by Hearst Communications executive George Randolph Hearst III and sharing non-football management with the Philadelphia Soul.[60] There was never another mention of a Newark team in the offseason. On November 28, the Cleveland Gladiators announced that they would have to take a two-year leave of absence while their arena, shared with its primary tenant the NBA's Cleveland Cavaliers, undergoes construction during the basketball offseason.[61] The next month, the longest-tenured AFL team, with franchise roots to the inaugural AFL season, the Tampa Bay Storm, also suspended operations citing financial problems.[62] Reorganization (2018–present) [ edit ] In February 2018, the 2018 season schedule was finalized with only the four remaining teams, matching the size of the league in the original "demonstration season" in 1987. However, the collective bargaining agreement (CBA) between the AFL and Arena Football League Players' Union (AFLPU) had expired after the 2017 season. A new agreement had not been made despite several proposals and supposed ultimatums between the two parties leading to rumors that the season and league's existence were in jeopardy. On March 16, 2018, a new deal on a four-year CBA was reached, nearly doubling player compensation and granting expanded health insurance benefits.[63] On March 27, 2018, the AFL announced that commissioner Scott Butera would be replaced by former AOL counsel Randall Boe prior to the 2018 season.[64] The AFL also partnered with DraftKings to bring back AFL Fantasy Football. The league continued organizational changes for the 2019 season with Philadelphia Soul owner Ron Jaworski taking over as chairman of the executive committee, moving the league's headquarters from Las Vegas to Philadelphia, and naming John Adams as president and chief operating officer.[65] On December 27, 2018, the AFL introduced a new set of logos to be used beginning with the 2019 season.[66][67] The league announced an expansion team in Atlantic City, New Jersey, on January 22, 2019, that is operated by the same ownership group as the Albany Empire.[68][69] On February 7, 2019, the league re-added the Columbus Destroyers as another expansion team to bring the league back to six teams.[70] Teams [ edit ] Albany Atlantic City Baltimore Cleveland Columbus Philadelphia Washington The Arena Football League has teams playing in four U.S. markets, two announced expansion teams, and one franchise on hiatus Season format and ArenaBowl [ edit ] The 2019 season consists of a 13-week schedule during which each team plays 12 games and has one bye week. Each of the six teams plays each opponent at least once. At the end of the regular season, the top four teams participate in the ArenaBowl playoffs, in which the top seed faces the 4th seed while the 2nd seed faces the 3rd seed in a home and home series. The team in each series with the higher aggregate score advances to the ArenaBowl.[71] While the semifinals consists of two games for each pair of teams, ArenaBowl XXXII is still one game.[72] From the league's inception through ArenaBowl XVIII, the championship game was played at the home of the higher-seeded remaining team. The AFL then switched to a neutral-site championship, with ArenaBowls XIX and XX in Las Vegas. New Orleans Arena, home of the New Orleans VooDoo, served as the site of ArenaBowl XXI on July 29, 2007. This was the first professional sports championship to be staged in the city since Hurricane Katrina struck in August 2005.[73] ArenaBowl XXI in New Orleans was deemed a success, and the city was chosen to host ArenaBowl XXII.[74] In 2010, the location returned to being decided by which of the two participating teams was seeded higher. ArenaBowl XXV (2012) returned to a neutral site and was once again played in New Orleans. From 2014 to 2017, the ArenaBowl was played at the venue of the higher-seeded team. With one week remaining in the 2018 season, it was announced that the ArenaBowl would be awarded to the semifinal winner with the higher regular season attendance average. This rule was then not used in 2018 after the Washington Valor's home field, Capital One Arena, already had scheduled renovations starting at the end of the Valor's season; the championship would then be played in Baltimore despite the Valor's higher attendance.[75][76] In 2019, the ArenaBowl is announced to be hosted by the higher seed. Rules [ edit ] An AFL goalpost The field: An indoor padded surface 85 feet (26 m) wide and 50 yards (46 m) long with 8-yard (7.3 m) end zones. Goal posts are 9 feet (2.7 m) wide with a crossbar height of 15 feet (4.6 m) (NFL goalposts are 18.5 feet (5.6 m) wide with the crossbar at 10 feet (3.0 m)). The goalside rebound nets are 30 feet (9.1 m) wide by 32 feet (9.8 m) high. Any ball bouncing off of the nets, whether thrown or kicked, prior to contacting the ground, is live, as are balls off of the nets' supporting systems. The bottom of the nets are 8 feet (2.4 m) above the ground. Sideline barriers are 4 feet (1.2 m) high and made of high density foam rubber. Equipment: the official football is the same size and weight as a National Football League ball, but with proprietary Arena Football insignia. Players and formations: eight players on the field; 21-man active roster; four-man inactive roster Substitutions: free substitution; some players may play both ways either by coach's choice or to step in because of injury. (The free substitution rule was adopted in 2007; prior to this, the AFL mandated a one-platoon system, from which two players on each side of the ball, the "specialists" and the quarterback or kicker, were exempt.) Formation: four offensive players, including a wide receiver, must line up on the line of scrimmage. Of the three interior linemen, one must raise his hand indicating that he is an eligible receiver and hence a tight end, the other lineman being considered a guard. Three defensive players must be down linemen (in a three or four-point stance). Only the "Mac" linebacker may blitz on either side of the center. The "Jack" linebacker is restricted in where he can go prior to the ball crossing the line of scrimmage. Alignment is two or more yards off the line of scrimmage. No stunting or twisting. Offensive motion in the backfield: one receiver may go in a forward motion before the snap. Timing: four 15 minute quarters with a 15-minute halftime (in the ArenaBowl, 30 minutes). The clock stops for out-of-bounds plays and incomplete passes only in the last half-minute of regulation [72] and overtime and when the referee deems it necessary for penalties, injuries or timeouts. Except in the last half-minute of regulation, the clock continues to run after a touchdown is scored until the extra-point conversion has been attempted. Each team is allowed three timeouts per half, and two per overtime period if regulation ends tied. In earlier seasons, the league had clock stoppage rules for the final minute of each half that now are only implemented in the final half-minute of regulation & overtime. Also, a team with the lead and possession of the ball in the last minute had to gain positive yards on a play from scrimmage or the clock was stopped until the next snap, effectively outlawing the "victory formation". The play clock is 30 seconds. and overtime and when the referee deems it necessary for penalties, injuries or timeouts. Except in the last half-minute of regulation, the clock continues to run after a touchdown is scored until the extra-point conversion has been attempted. Each team is allowed three timeouts per half, and two per overtime period if regulation ends tied. In earlier seasons, the league had clock stoppage rules for the final minute of each half that now are only implemented in the final half-minute of regulation & overtime. Also, a team with the lead and possession of the ball in the last minute had to gain positive yards on a play from scrimmage or the clock was stopped until the next snap, effectively outlawing the "victory formation". The play clock is 30 seconds. Movement of the ball and scoring: four downs are allowed to advance the ball ten yards for a first down, or to score. Six points for a touchdown. One point for a conversion by place kick after a touchdown or if a safety is scored off any conversion attempt, two points for a conversion by drop kick or for successful run or pass after a touchdown. Three points for a field goal by placement or fair catch kick or four points for a field goal by drop kick. Two points for a safety and for a defensive turnover on a conversion attempt returned the length of the field (a play which would be a defensive touchdown under any circumstances other than its occurring during a conversion attempt). Kicking: kickoffs are from the goal line, to begin the halves and odd overtimes, or after any score. Kickers may use a one-inch tee. All kicks must be made by either place kick or drop kick; punting is prohibited. The receiving team may field any kick that rebounds off the net or its surrounding framework and lands in the field of play. Any kickoff that goes out of bounds untouched or hits an overhead structure is to be placed at the 20-yard line or the place where it went out of bounds, whichever is more advantageous to the receiving team. If a kickoff goes beyond the end zone and stays in bounds (such as kicking it into the field goal "slack net" or if the ball goes under the net), the ball will come out to the five-yard line. The touchback is not automatic; players must attempt to advance the ball out of their own end zone if it is caught there. The same is true if a missed field goal attempt goes beyond the goal line but is short of the rebound net. If the receiving player chooses not to take the ball out of the end zone (takes a knee) or is tackled in the end zone, the ball is placed on the 2½-yard line (the attempted runback does not result in a safety unless the runner crosses the goal line onto the field of play and then retreats into the end zone under his own impetus and is tackled there). Any field goal or extra point attempted by drop kick is worth one additional point (thus four points for a drop-kicked field goal or two for drop-kicked conversion). Passing: passing rules in arena football are the same as outdoor NCAA football in which receivers must have one foot inbounds. A unique exception involves the rebound nets. A forward pass that rebounds off the end zone net is a live ball and is in play until it touches the playing surface, as is a ball which bounces off of the padding of the sideline boards, provided it has not been touched by a member of the crowd. A player who goes over the boards to catch a ball and maintains possession of the ball to the floor is awarded a catch even if he lands out of bounds. Overtime: overtime periods are now 15 minutes during the regular season and the playoffs. In the first overtime each team gets one possession to score, unless the first team to possess yields a defensive touchdown or a safety, either of which ends the game immediately. Whoever is ahead after one possession for each team wins. If the teams are tied after each has had a possession, whoever scores next by any means wins. Multiple overtime periods will be played if needed in case of a tie and play continues in true sudden death thereafter for both regular-season and postseason games. Coaching challenges: Coaches are allowed two challenges per game; to do so, they must throw the red challenge flag before the next play. If the play stands as called after the play is reviewed, the team loses a timeout; however, if it is reversed they keep their timeout. If a team wins two straight challenges they are granted a third. In lieu of coaching challenges, reviews are automatic in the final half-minute of regulation & in all overtime periods, as they are for all scoring plays and all turnovers. Offsides: Defensive players may not jump offsides twice in any half; they risk ejection for the rest of the half if they do (this penalty is enforced in addition to the yardage penalty). Defensive players called for jumping offsides in overtime risk disqualification. Targeting, such as using the helmet to ram another player is prohibited, and players who do so risk immediate disqualification, plus a 15-yard penalty. Like the NCAA, CFL, and NFL, players are warned once for their first unsportsmanlike conduct penalty, and if they pick up another, they risk immediate disqualification. Growth of the league [ edit ] Season format changes [ edit ] The practice of playing one or two preseason exhibition games by each team before the start of the regular season was discontinued when the NBC contract was initiated, and the regular season was extended from 14 games during the 1996 to 2000 seasons to 16 from 2001 to 2010. From 2011 to 2015, the regular season league expanded to 18 games, with each team having two bye weeks and the option of two preseason games.[77] Since the 2015 season and the decreasing league membership, the season length has also decreased, first to 16 games in 2016, then to 14 games in 2017, and to 12 games in 2018.[71] In August 2012, Ganlan Media International received exclusive rights from the AFL to establish a new Chinese arena football league.[78] The league was eventually named the China Arena Football League (CAFL). The CAFL project is headed up by Martin E. Judge Jr. and Ron Jaworski, who are both part of the Philadelphia Soul's ownership group. The original plans were to establish a six-team league that would play a 10-week schedule that was slated to start in October 2014. The AFL coaches and trainers were to travel to China to help teach the rules of the sport to squads made up of Chinese and American players with the goal of starting an official Chinese arena league.[79] Following delays, the league began its first full season in 2016; however, subsequent play was postponed until 2019.[80] The CAFL is not directly affiliated with the AFL and is instead owned by AFL Global, LLC, an entity that was created by Martin E. Judge Jr.[81] Hall of Fame [ edit ] The AFL has its own Hall of Fame consisting of players, coaches, and contributors who have significantly impacted the league. The AFL Hall of Fame solely exists to honor various AFL affiliates. This is the highest honor for any personnel who have been involved with the AFL. It has no physical location and exists solely as a list of players and contributors maintained by the league itself. The Arena Football Hall of Fame is not affiliated with the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Media [ edit ] Television [ edit ] 2000s [ edit ] Beginning with the 2003 season, the AFL made a deal with NBC to televise league games, which was renewed for another two years in 2005. In conjunction with this, the league moved the beginning of the season from May to February (the week after the NFL's Super Bowl) and scheduled most of its games on Sunday instead of Friday or Saturday as it had in the past. In 2006, because of the XX Winter Olympic Games, the Stanley Cup playoffs and the Daytona 500, NBC scaled back from weekly coverage to scattered coverage during the regular season, but committed to a full playoff schedule ending with the 20th ArenaBowl. NBC and the Arena Football League officially severed ties on June 30, 2006, having failed to reach a new broadcast deal. Las Vegas owner Jim Ferraro stated during a radio interview that the reason efforts to make a deal failed was that ESPN refused to show highlights or scores or even mention Arena football as long as it was being aired on NBC. For the 2006 season only, the AFL added a national cable deal with OLN (now NBC Sports Network) for eleven regular-season games and one playoff game. On December 19, 2006, ESPN announced the purchase of a minority stake in the AFL. This deal included television rights for the ESPN family of networks. ESPN would televise a minimum of 17 regular season games, most on Monday nights, and nine playoff games, including ArenaBowl XXI on ABC.[82] The deal resulted in added exposure on ESPN's SportsCenter. However, after the original AFL filed for bankruptcy, this arrangement did not carry over to the new AFL, which is a separate legal entity. The AFL also had a regional-cable deal with FSN, where FSN regional affiliates in AFL markets carried local team games. 2010s [ edit ] After its return in 2010, the AFL had its national television deal with the NFL Network for a weekly Friday night game.[83][84] All AFL games not on the NFL Network could be seen for free online, provided by Ustream.[citation needed] The NFL Network ceased airing live Arena Football League games partway through the 2012 season as a result of ongoing labor problems within the league. Briefly, the games were broadcast on a tape delay to prevent the embarrassment that would result should the players stage a work stoppage immediately prior to a scheduled broadcast. (In at least once incidence this actually happened, resulting in a non-competitive game being played with replacement players, and further such incidents were threatened.) Once the labor issues were resolved, the NFL Network resumed the practice of broadcasting a live Friday night game. NFL Network dropped the league at the end of the 2012 season. For the 2013 season, the league's new national broadcast partner was the CBS Sports Network. CBSSN would air 19 regular season games[85] and two playoff games. CBS would also air the ArenaBowl, marking the first time since 2008 that the league's finale aired on network television.[86] Regular season CBSSN broadcast games are usually on Saturday nights. As the games are shown live, the start times were not uniform as with most football broadcast packages, but varied with the time zone in which the home team was located. This meant that the AFL may have appeared either prior to or following the CBSSN's featured Major League Lacrosse game. In 2014, ESPN returned to the AFL as broadcast partners, with weekly games being shown on CBS Sports Network, ESPN, ESPN2 and ESPNEWS along with all games being broadcast on ESPN3 for free live on WatchESPN and the ESPN app. ArenaBowl XXVII and XXVIII were also broadcast on ESPN. Most teams also had a local TV station broadcast their games locally and all games were available on local radio.[87][88] In 2016, Univision Deportes began airing select AFL games during the regular season.[89][90] For the 2017 season, one AFL game per week was broadcast live nationally over CBS Sports Network. In 2017, the AFL also began streaming some games on Twitter and AFLNow, the league's streaming service.[91][92] For the 2018 season, the AFL's sole national English language telecast partner was the CBS Sports Network, but all games were streamed free online and Brigade and Valor games were available over their owner Ted Leonsis' Monumental Sports Network. Video games [ edit ] The first video game[93] based on the AFL was Arena Football for the C-64 released in 1988. On May 18, 2000, Kurt Warner's Arena Football Unleashed was released by Midway Games for the PlayStation game console. On February 7, 2006 EA Sports released Arena Football for the PlayStation 2 and Xbox. EA Sports released another AFL video game, titled Arena Football: Road to Glory, on February 21, 2007, for the PlayStation 2.[94] Literature [ edit ] In 2001, Jeff Foley published War on the Floor: An Average Guy Plays in the Arena Football League and Lives to Write About It. The book details a journalist's two preseasons (1999 and 2000) as an offensive specialist/writer with the now-defunct Albany Firebirds. The 5-foot-6 (170 cm), self-described "unathletic writer" played in three preseason games and had one catch for −2 yards. AFL Commissioners [ edit ] League office locations [ edit ] League finances [ edit ] The AFL currently runs as under the single-entity model, with the league owning the rights to the teams, players, and coaches.[97] The single-entity model was adopted in 2010 when the league emerged from bankruptcy. Prior to that, the league followed the franchise model more common in North American professional sports leagues; each team essentially operated as its own business with different owners and the league itself was a separate entity which in exchange for franchise fees paid by the team owners provided rules, officials, scheduling and the other elements of organizational structure.[98] A pool of money is allotted to teams to aid in travel costs.[99] Accusation of mismanagement, ignored reimbursements and unpaid bills [ edit ] In recent years, the AFL's entity ownership, Arena Football One, LLC, has been at the center of much controversy over mismanagement of franchises, unpaid bills and several lawsuits against them.[100] Jerry Kurz lawsuit [ edit ] On July 21, 2016, league co-founder, former commissioner and president Jerry Kurz filed a class action lawsuit against Arena Football One, LLC, and his successor as commissioner, Scott Butera, for what was deemed "breach of contract" after his effective demotion and subsequent firing following the 2015 season. In August of 2018, that lawsuit has thrown out, and Kurz left for the IFL as Fianancial Director.[101] League progression [ edit ] Season Teams Average attendance 1986 (Test season) 2 N/A 1987 4 11,278 1988 6 8,512 1989 5 5,705 1990 6 8,900 1991 8 10,250 1992 12 12,268 1993 10 11,530 1994 11 10,748 1995 13 11,260 1996 15 10,787 1997 14 10,935 1998 14 10,594 1999 15 10,013 2000 16 9,618 2001 19 9,188 2002 16 9,958 2003 16 11,397 2004 19 12,019 2005 17 12,829 2006 18 12,378 2007 19 12,392 2008 17 12,957 2009 (Af2) 29 5,258 2010 15 8,135 2011 18 8,241 2012 17 7,841 2013 14 8,195 2014 14 8,473 2015 12 8,947 2016 8 9,342 2017 5 9,248 2018 4 7,601 Source: ArenaFan Average attendance for AFL games were around 10,000–11,000 per game in the 1990s, though during the recession connected to the dot-com bubble and the September 11, 2001 attacks average attendance dropped below 10,000 for several years. From the start of the 2004 season until the final season of the original league in 2008, average attendance was above 12,000, with 12,392 in 2007.[102] Eleven of the seventeen teams in operation in 2007 had average attendance figures over 13,000. In 2008, the overall attendance average increased to 12,957, with eight teams exceeding 13,000 per game.[103] In 2010, the first year of the reconstituted league following bankruptcy, the overall attendance average decreased to 8,135, with only one team (Tampa Bay) exceeding 13,000 per game.[104] The 2018 average per game attendance of 7,901 was the lowest since 2012, the league's season interrupted by a temporary strike. See also [ edit ] |
Clinton Foreign Policy Spokesperson To Trump: ‘Go F*** Yourself’ ST. LOUIS (CBSNewYork) — Hillary Clinton’s foreign policy spokesperson slammed Donald Trump when talking about a Bronze Star recipient who lost his life during the Iraq War. “First of all, Capt. [Humayun] Khan is an American hero and if I were president at that time, he would be alive today,” Trump said during the presidential debate Sunday night. COMPLETE CAMPAIGN 2016 COVERAGE Khan posthumously received a Bronze Star and a Purple Heart after he was killed by a suicide bomber in Iraq in 2004. His parents, Khizr and Ghazala Khan, gave an emotional speech at the DNC over the summer. Trump said he was “viciously attacked” by the family at the time, and also questioned if their Muslim religion stopped Ghazala Khan from speaking at the DNC. She said in a later interview that she was too emotional at the time to speak. On Twitter, Jesse Lehrich, Clinton’s foreign policy spokesperson, said, “Hey, (at)realDonaldTrump – regarding your claim that Captain Khan would be alive if you were president: go f*** yourself.” Lehrich later apologized for the tweet. “I want to apologize for the clearly inappropriate nature and language of this personal tweet. Sorry all,” Lehrich said. |
× Make your TwitLonger posts ad-free For just £1 a month, you can support TwitLonger directly and remove ads from your posts Click here to make your TwitLonger posts ad-free. Why did the anti-#GamerGate #SJW cross the road? Why did the anti-#GamerGate #SJW cross the road? Anti-GG SJW: "Uh, where is the trigger warning for people who have been hit by a car while crossing the road? I'll have you know that the word 'cross' is problematic, especially when you apply it to movement as Jesus Christ had to carry the cross he was later nailed to. Christians would find this offensive, shitlord. I wouldn't even walk to the other side of the road, I'd be too busy protesting with women against sexist pedestrian crossing signs. Why does the person on the sign have to be male? Our predominantly white CIS male government better check their privilege and make new signs that represent everyone, especially non-binary genders. Now stop harassing me with your questions and die in a fire. Blocked." Reply · Report Post |
Fat people are often subjected to concern trolling. To me concern trolling is when someone couches their opposition to your ideology and/or their oppressive behavior in concern. Dealing with concern trolling can be complicated, especially since people have a tendency to insist that we accept this kind of behavior graciously (that’s one of the things that makes the tactic popular. People can be inappropriate and then shrug and say “What? I was just expressing concern, why are you being so mean to me?” Charming, no?) The truth is that each person who gets concern trolled gets to choose how to deal with it. I’ve recently had a run-in with a concern troll that made me think a lot about this, and gave me a surprising reminder about compassion along the way. a separate blog recent post I’m currently training for an IROMAN triathlon. (I havefor that so that I can yammer on about my training with being boring, annoying, or triggering to people who come to this blog for Size Acceptance stuff). On a, I got a comment from a concern troll: I find your ethic and ambitions inspiring but concerned puppy needs to consider something else – can you make the 17 hour cutoff? Based on your marathon experience I would say that you cannot. (followed by an exhaustive list of the IM time limits, of which of course I’m already very well aware) my FAQ section That’s so weird, I don’t remember asking for her, or anyone’s, opinion about this, and in fact I covered all of this in Ironman is an expensive proposition so if it isn’t likely you can finish, what’s the point? I can’t believe they don’t make an inspirational poster with this quote in front of a sailboat or something. Do you really want to spend a couple thousand dollars to show the world that you are brave enough to step up? Something to consider. Aaand we have another psychic extensively in the FAQ – she knows why I’m doing this. And apparently she knows better than I do since I covered my reasons prettyand this wasn’t it. She could have at least left me some lottery numbers… I was just dying to know, how does someone become this kind of person, so I sent an e-mail “I’m genuinely curious as to how you stumbled onto my blog, and what made you take the time out of your day to comment with your concerns.” I received a reply: I just did Ironman Canada in July and it took me 16:48 – I had a very hard day. Ironman is hard. Having eaten my bowl of No Shit Sherlock flakes that morning, I already had a grasp on the fact that swimming, biking, and running 140.6 miles in 17 hours is hard. While I congratulate her on finishing, I’m not sure why she’s telling me about her time or experience, since neither has anything to do with me. I could be wrong, but the way that this is phrased makes it seem like she thinks I’ll say “Well, if it was hard for a stranger I know nothing about, I’ll never be able to do it, I quit!” which makes me think that a very exaggerated sense of self-importance may be at work here. But again, I could be wrong. I hate to see you put out this smack down that’s going to cost you $675 for the race and several hundred dollars for accommodations and some more money to ship the bike and something for travel (I didn’t notice where you live). I just thought you should consider the cost given how unlikely it is you can finish in under 17 hours. So I’m to believe that this onslaught of discouragement is actually a benevolent attempt at helping me save money? (Also, IM Arizona is $725, not $625. If the money is so important, I would think she would know the correct figure.) You are setting yourself up for failure and what’s the point in that? Is creating text for motivational posters a real job, because if it is this woman should consider it as a career! It seems like I’ve seen and heard a lot of motivational quotes, songs, and stories about taking risks, setting big goals, and not being so afraid of failure that you don’t try. But maybe I just misheard all of them, and what they were saying was “If you might fail, don’t bother to try.” Hey, there’s another poster right there! Do an Olympic. Do a Half. See what happens. If it works out, move up to IM and show me how wrong I am. I’m okay with that. an entire post about it Well, isn’t she just the sweetest thing, bless her heart. She’s “ok” with me reaching my personal goals. (And can a fatty get some reading comprehension? I mention several times, including, that I’ll do a schedule of races before the IM.) This is a particularly interesting technique of the concern troll wherein they set themselves up to get credit if the subject of their abuse succeeds. When I cross the finish line I won’t be surprised to get an e-mail that says “See, by [acting like a complete ass] I inspired you, you should thank me…” Which makes me wonder, what would she do if I quit based on her comment? “Dear Diary, Today I got a woman to give up her IRONMAN goal! I’m such a good person. Sometimes people don’t notice that about me, but I really am.” So. Fucked. Up. I’m a pragmatist and I’m cheap so that’s why you heard from me. Yes, I’m sure that’s exactly what this is about. And we’ll all swear to that, even if they question us separately. As a person being concern trolled, why someone does it doesn’t change my response. I get to decide how people treat me and so regardless of whether this person really is an altruistic cheapskate traveling the internet helping people choose the fear of losing money over trying to achieve their dreams, or she’s a fatphobic jerk who gets off on discouraging fat athletes, or somewhere in between, the fact remains that her behavior is grossly out of line and completely unacceptable to me. While I was waiting for her response, I did some digging and found her public website. There I found this: “I have profound body image issues in spite of being in phenomenal shape. When I was overweight I was quite certain that everyone hated me simply because I was fat. I’m better now but still have issues and worry way too much about the size of my butt and thighs.” And that’s when the compassion hit me. This world is designed to fuck people, especially women, up when it comes to our body image, and self-esteem. And maybe some people get fucked up in a way that makes them take to the internet to try to discourage people from training for an IRONMAN. Unlike her, I’m not psychic so I’m not pretending to know where this woman is coming from, but her behavior towards me is fucked up and I don’t think it can hurt me to have compassion for how it might have happened. That said, and I cannot be clear enough about this, that does not make it ok. I am not obligated to excuse bad behavior directed at me for any reason. But I can set boundaries and hold compassion at the same time and I think that’s worth doing. So obviously I’ll not be approving her comment, or taking her perspective into consideration. But I also sincerely hope that, if she wants to rid herself of body image issues, she finds a way to do that, and I also hope that if this type of inappropriate behavior is typical of her, nobody else is harmed by her. This whole thing has also really helped me to be grateful for my own journey to body love and everything that it’s done for me. If I hadn’t found Fat Acceptance I might be using my time to mete out discouragement to those who have what I once didn’t think I ever could. The truth is that, when it comes to concern trolling, it’s entirely possible that there but for the grace of Size Acceptance go I. Like this blog? Here’s more cool stuff: Become a Member For ten bucks a month you can support size diversity activism, help keep the blog ad free, and get deals from size positive businesses as a thank you. Click here for details For ten bucks a month you can support size diversity activism, help keep the blog ad free, and get deals from size positive businesses as a thank you. Buy the book: Fat: The Owner’s Manual The E-Book is Name Your Own Price! Click here for details The E-Book is Name Your Own Price! Dance Classes: Buy the Dance Class DVDs or download individual classes – Every Body Dance Now! Click here for details Buy the Dance Class DVDs or download individual classes – Every Body Dance Now! I’m training for an IRONMAN! You can follow my journey at www.IronFat. com Follow the progress on Facebook! A movie about my time as a dancer is in active development (casting, finding investors etc.). |
On June 14, Oasis, Frank Lloyd Wright’s designs for the Arizona Capitol, went on display at the Arizona Capitol Museum. Located on the first floor of the Museum just across from the Arizona Capitol Museum Store, the exhibit contains a model of the design along with sketches, architectural renderings and story boards. The three-dimensional Oasis scale model shows what Wright envisioned for the Arizona Capitol. A story board says that Wright heard a rumor of plans for the renovation of the Arizona State Capitol in 1957. The board says, “Concerns about conservation, energy, space, environment, and climate were in the forefront of Wright’s mind as he designed the building.” Ultimately, budgetary problems kept any plans for improvements from happening until 1974, and Wright’s design never became a reality. The exhibit displays an early sketch of Wright’s design. On other walls, colored architectural renderings of Oasis depict how the project would look with aerial and ground views from different vantage points. Two benches at one end of the exhibit allow visitors to sit and enjoy the exhibit or to look at two different books on Wright’s work. Oasis remains as a long-term exhibit at the Arizona State Capitol Museum. Photos by Janice Semmel Advertisements |
The Theatres Act 1968 abolished censorship of the stage in the United Kingdom, receiving royal assent on 26 July 1968, after passing both Houses of Parliament. [1] Since 1737, scripts had been licensed for performance by the Lord Chamberlain's Office (under the Theatres Act 1843, a continuation of the Licensing Act 1737) a measure initially introduced to protect Robert Walpole's administration from political satire. By the late 19th century the Lord Chamberlain's Office had become the arbiter of moral taste on the stage, and the "Angry Young Men" of the 1950s were in some ways a reaction against the banality of the morally conservative and formally restricted period of theatre that had preceded them. Theatre critic Kenneth Tynan, whilst working with Laurence Olivier as literary manager and Dramaturg of the National Theatre Company had been campaigning for liberalisation for many years. A prosecution had succeeded in 1966 against those responsible for producing Edward Bond's play Saved at the Royal Court and John Osborne's play A Patriot for Me, cut by the censor, was put on at the Royal Court with the theatre turning itself into a private members' club. The strong response to these causes célèbres helped lead to the abolition of theatre censorship in Great Britain. References [ edit ] |
Breaking News Emails Get breaking news alerts and special reports. The news and stories that matter, delivered weekday mornings. July 18, 2017, 12:46 PM GMT / Updated July 18, 2017, 6:50 PM GMT By Tracy Connor Former House Speaker Dennis Hastert, who was sentenced to 15 months in prison in a hush-money case after being accused of sexually abusing boys, is no longer in a federal prison hospital. The Bureau of Prisons confirmed that Hastert, 75, was transferred Monday to the custody of a reentry office in Chicago several weeks ahead of his official release date. The agency did not say if disgraced lawmaker is under home confinement or in a private hospital or a halfway house, but it said he would be released from federal custody Aug. 17. His attorney could not be reached for comment. A woman answering a phone listed in Hastert's name declined to comment, saying only, "I think we're going to be busy today." Hastert was accused of molesting four boys between the ages of 14 and 17 when he was a coach at Yorkville High School in Illinois decades ago, but he was never charged with any sexual crimes because of the statute of limitations. Instead, he was charged making illegal cash withdrawals to pay one of his accusers. He pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 15 months in prison and two years' supervised release by a judge who called him "a serial child molester." During his sentencing hearing, Hastert apologized "to the boys I mistreated when I was their coach" but did not use word abuse. He still faces lawsuits from two accusers, including the man he paid. Hastert has demanded the return of the $1.7 million. "We will now move forward in these cases to the discovery phase, which is the next step towards holding Mr. Hastert accountable and securing justice for our clients," said the plaintiffs' attorney, Kristi Browne. Former House Speaker Dennis Hastert leaves the Dirksen Federal Court House in a wheelchair after his sentencing in Chicago, Ill., on April 27. Hastert was sentenced to 15 months in prison and ordered to pay $250,000 to a victim's fund for breaking banking laws as he sought to pay a man identified only as Individual A, 14-years-old at the time, millions of dollars to keep quiet about past sexual abuse. The abuse occured during Hastert's years as wrestling coach at Yorkville High School decades ago. * / Getty Images The advocacy group SNAP said in a statement it was "shocked" to find Hastert was out of prison, although a slightly early release had been expected. "Unfortunately, Hastert will never stand trial for the crime of sexual abuse. Illinois’ outdated and predator-friendly criminal statutes of limitations for child sex crimes ensure men and women who sexually abuse children get a 'free pass' as long as they can use fear and shame to keep their victims silent," the group said. However, Illinois lawmakers recently passed a bill to repeal the statute of limitations for serious sexual offenses against children, which the governor is expected to sign into law. One champion of the legislation was Scott Cross, who says Hastert molested him in a high-school locker room when he was a teenager. He broke a lifelong silence to testify at the politician's sentencing. "I never looked to be in the spotlight like this," he recently told NBC News. "I don't need 15 minutes of fame but I knew in my gut that I needed to come out and say something, not just for myself, but for any other person who had been victimized by him or others." |
Chicago police violated the Fourth Amendment through a "pattern or practice of use of excessive force," Attorney General Loretta Lynch declared Friday, revealing the results of a wide-ranging investigation that the city's former top cop called biased from the start. THE WEEK IN PICTURES The U.S. Justice Department launched its yearlong review of the 12,000-officer force -- one of the nation's largest -- in December 2015 after the release of a dashcam video showing a white police officer shooting a black teenager, Laquan McDonald, 16 times as he walked away holding a small, folded knife. The video of the 2014 shooting, which the city fought to keep from being released, triggered widespread protests. BALTIMORE POLICE COMMITS TO SWEEPING CHANGES IN JUSTICE DEPT. DEAL Among other findings, the report determined that city police used excessive force and that "this pattern is largely attributable to systemic deficiencies within CPD and the city." It also cited insufficient training and a failure to hold bad officers accountable. "The resulting deficit in trust and accountability is not just bad for residents -- it's also bad for dedicated police officers trying to do their jobs safely and effectively," Lynch told reporters during a news conference in Chicago. VIDEO: 'THIN BLUE LINE' FLAG OUTSHINES ANTI-POLICE PICTURE Former Chicago Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy told Fox News the Justice Department never interviewed him for its report, even though he was on the force until late 2015. Speaking to "America's Newsroom," he suggested it was because "my narrative doesn't fit what they want to say. ... The politics is the strongest pull." Lynch said her department tried reaching out to McCarthy, but "he was unavailable." McCarthy said the actions of police were not to blame for Chicago's skyrocketing violent crime rate. Last year saw nearly 750 killings across the city, a spike of more than 250 from 2015. More than 650 of last year's homicides were shootings. The former superintendent told Fox News last week, "The police are not the problem. The criminals are the problem." Under President Obama, the Justice Department has conducted 25 civil rights investigations of police departments, including those of Cleveland, Baltimore and Seattle. The release of a report is one step in a long process that, in recent years, has typically led to bilateral talks between the department and a city, followed by an agreed-upon police reform plan that's enforceable by a federal judge. Such "consent decrees" could end under the incoming Trump administration, analysts have pointed out. The president-elect's nominee for attorney general, Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., wrote in 2008 that they "have a profound effect on our legal system as they constitute an end run around the democratic process." The scandal over the McDonald video and accusations of a cover-up cost McCarthy his job. The video, which showed Officer Jason Van Dyke continuing to shoot the teen even as he slumped to the ground, unmoving, provoked outrage. It wasn't until the day the video was released, more than a year after the shooting, that Van Dyke was charged with murder. He has pleaded not guilty. The next hearing in his case is set for Feb. 3. In a statement sent minutes before the report was posted online, Fraternal Order of Police President Dean Angelo questioned whether the investigation was compromised because of its timing, with Trump set to take office in one week. Mayor Rahm Emanuel called the findings "sobering to all of us. Police misconduct will not be tolerated anywhere in the City of Chicago." Current Superintendent Eddie Johnson said unconstitutional politicing "has no place" in his department or in the city. The Fourth Amendment protects against unreasonable searches and seizures. The head of the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division, Vanita Gupta, added that investigations into officers' actions were "glacially slow" and that discipline of officers was often "unpredictable and ineffective." Emanuel also addressed the Justice Department's conclusion that officers do not have nearly enough supervision. He pointed to his decision to ramp up the number of lieutenants and other supervisors. FoxNews.com's Perry Chiaramonte, Fox News' Martha MacCallum and The Associated Press contributed to this report. |
If you haven't watched Patrick Mahomes play this year, it's a little tough to describe what he can do with a football in his hands. Statistically, he's one of the best quarterbacks in all of College Football. Before Saturday's game, he threw for a staggering 1,836 yards, 14 touchdowns, and only 5 interceptions. There's only one game where he didn't throw for over 350 yards, and that was against Arkansas. Unfortunately for the Razorbacks, he made his throws count, hitting on 26/30. His accuracy when he's fully healthy can be described as similar to a heat seeking missile. When he isn't fully healthy, he's still unbelievable. He suffered a left knee injury on the first drive of the third game of the year against TCU. For many mobile QBs, having a dent in their dual threat ability means that their downfall is imminent. For Mahomes, it just means that he gets to throw a little more and run a little less. Despite visibly limping the entire game, he nearly led the Red Raiders to an upset of TCU. In the end, the only thing barring him from his ultimate victory was a freak tip drill catch from Heisman contender Trevone Boykin to Heisman contender Josh Doctson to Aaron Green, who probably would be a Heisman contender if he wasn't surrounded by so much talent. Against Baylor in the next week, he was still visibly hobbled. A big road game against Arkansas and a soul-crushing loss the week before at TCU had left the Red Raiders drained. We never really stood a chance against the shock and awe of the Baylor offense, but Mahomes tried anyways. I firmly believe that if he did not play in that game, we would be looking at a 49-7 score at halftime. Those who haven't seen Patrick Mahomes play probably think that that's a certifiably insane line of thought. I'm here to tell you that if you've been watching this kid, it's the only sane line of thought in the midst of the pure chaos that is Texas Tech Football. We can talk about his mind-boggling stats and the breakneck pace of the Red Raider offense, but the true strength of Patrick Mahomes isn't something you can quantify with numbers or even explain with words. He's the best Quarterback in the entire nation at making something out of nothing. Plays like this one that Patrick Mahomes pulled off last Saturday would cause insane celebration for any other team in the country. For those who have been following Mahomes, it's simply par for the course. He's Nightcrawler, if Nightcrawler also had the arm strength of Thor. He's a special ops sniper with the balance of a gymnast. His ability to get out of situations reminds me more of a kid playing NCAA Football on Freshman difficulty, or a scene out of Assassin's Creed. You can't stop him. You simply hope to contain him. No one else in the country does what he does consistently. Other quarterbacks have had highlight reel plays where they get out of trouble and make a huge play, but no one does it week after week after week like Patrick Mahomes. It's more than just doing it constantly. It's the smoothness, the almost casualness that he makes these plays with. It's not how anyone drew it up. It simply happens. That isn't to say that Mahomes can't operate a normal offense, he's proven time and time again that he can. When that original play breaks down though, he doesn't get worse. He gets better. Last Saturday, there were a couple of plays where the Iowa State coverage was pretty good, and Mahomes was forced to scramble and simply be a creator. It's our nature to not be comfortable with these decisions, as the vast majority of the time they don't turn out well. The only exception to this rule is, well, Patrick Mahomes. And there's no one in the nation that can do what he does. |
“He drank too much and smoked too much. He granted too many interviews full of cynical observations about himself and his business. He made too many bad movies and hardly any of the kind that stir critics to rapture or that, taken together, look like a life achievement worthy of official reward. God, some of us are going to miss Robert Mitchum!”—Richard Schickel And he’s still missed, 17 years after his death. No, you sure don’t see movie stars like Robert Mitchum anymore. But we can still appreciate the real thing. In 1983, Robert Ward hung out with the star of Out of the Past, The Night of the Hunter, Cape Fear, and The Friends of Eddie Coyle, and wrote the following profile, “Mr. Bad Taste and Trouble Himself: Robert Mitchum.” It originally appeared in the March 3, 1983 issue of Rolling Stone and is collected in Ward’s terrific anthology, Renegades. It appears here with the author’s permission. —Alex Belth A big, crazy, sexy sixty-five-year-old little boy who can’t get used to the idea that he’s supposed to act like, like Ward Cleaver, you dig? Robert Mitchum is walking down this Kafkaesque hallway, holding his arms straight out in front of him, crossed, as though they’ve been manacled by the CBS production assistant who trucks along in front of him. Mitchum staggers a bit. All he drinks nowadays is tequila—and milk, though not together—and he had his first shot at one thirty in the afternoon, and now it’s ten thirty at night and he’s been through five interviews and a fifth of Cuervo Gold Especial and is fast moving into that strange land between dreams and wakefulness. Things are mightily askew but still manageable until someone notices the glass partitions and the little wooden desks, which look like interrogation booths, and yells, “Bob, look, we’re in Czechoslovakia and they’re going to bring out the fucking guards!” This registers slowly behind Mitchum’s lizard-lidded eyes, and smiling his curling serpent’s smile, he thrusts his hands forward as though they are cuffed and booms in this deep, hilarious voice: “My name is Robert Mitchum. My serial number is 2357982. My rank is private. I have nothing whatsoever to tell you….” Down these endless narrow hallways and out of these little rooms come women of all ages—twenty-three, forty-five, sixty-seven—each of them saying, “Hey, that’s… that’s Robert Mitchum,” and each of them getting this look on her face. The same look. Lust! And helplessness. And yet, completely maternal. And sweet, like, “I’ve got to help that big, crazy, sexy, funky little boy who is sixty-five years old and has never gotten used to the idea that he has to act like a Ward Cleaver brand of grown-up.” Mitchum had drawn a similar response from a group of young businessmen as we’d left the Waldorf Hotel earlier. “There’s Mitchum,” one of them said. “He’s all fucked up again.” And the rest of them laughed and nodded. Thank God somebody is still wild. “Where the hell is the goddamned makeup girl? I want to kiss her, okay?” he says now, as he runs through the halls. Yes, right here at CBS, is Mr. Bad Taste and Trouble himself. Yeah, he’s got himself a pinstripe suit and dark Italian sunglasses like all the rest of those movie stars, but one look will convince you that here is a man acting like a civilized being. In a 1964 Esquire profile, the usually savage Helen Lawrenson said his personality had paralyzed her into wordlessness. D. H. Lawrence described it as the Life Force. But six-foot-one-inch, barrel-chested, ham-fisted, sleepy-eyed, speech-slurred Robert Mitchum gives off something that can’t really be put into words at all….Meanwhile, the makeup woman, a sixty-five-year-old gal herself, is literally buckling at the knees and wiping her brow and saying, “My, oh my, oh my…Robert Mitchum.” The whole place cracks up, and Mitchum sweetly kisses her on the forehead. A few minutes later, a few women and a few thousand feet of corridor later, Mitchum is in the taping room, meeting with the producers of Nightwatch: “Now, Mr. Mitchum, what is it you’d like to do?” Mitchum bobs and weaves, like he may sucker-punch this sap. But says, “Look, son, I’m a storyteller, all right? Just let me tell some stories, how ’bout that?” The guy puts on this shit-eating grin and says, “Well, just what kind of stories do you have in mind, Mr. Mitchum? After all, this is CBS.” “Forget it, man,” Mitchum says. He does that when he’s disappointed, when he’s about to go over the crest, fly out there without the handgrips into the Mighty Tequila Pure Inspiration Good Time Void but is dragged back, as one inevitably is, by the Squares that Surround and Envelop and Enfold and Munch Away. He falls back on old ’50s beat talk, like “This producer cat is some down dude, Jim, you dig?” Mitchum sags against a couch, stares at the lights and waits for the Interviewer—the sixth of the day—to show up. His friends are sitting across from the nifty little set with its green couches and fake bookcases, and out comes the Interviewer, Dapper Dan himself, in a three-piece suit. He sits down and looks warily at Mitchum, and admits that he has not yet had a chance to see That Championship Season, the movie Mitchum is starring in with Bruce Dern, Martin Sheen, Paul Sorvino, and Stacy Keach. “So, since we’re not familiar with it, could you, ah, tell us the plot, Bob?” Mitchum’s pals look at each other in horror. This man is a storyteller, yes sir, but in his current shape, well, the plot might just be a little more than he’s willing, or able, to do. But Mitchum remains cool and manages to tell the tale, which, briefly put, is about a team of high-school basketball players who won the Pennsylvania state championship in 1957 and have gathered to celebrate that one moment of glory twenty-four years later. Mitchum also mentions that he is starring as U.S. Navy officer Victor “Pug” Henry in the ABC dramatization of Herman Wouk’s The Winds of War, an eighteen-hour mini-series for which Mitchum received a cool million. Then he slides back on the couch, crosses his massive arms, and waits. “Now, Mr. Mitchum, you say this is about a group of men, who had one shining moment and then everything else was downhill. Is that how you feel about your own life?” Mitchum squints menacingly through his sunglasses. “No,” he says flatly. “Why would I live like that?” “Oh,” the Interviewer says. “Well, Mr. Mitchum, do you think that you will become a cult star, a cult hero if you will, say, in the 1990s, like Bogart in the 1960s?” Mitchum rolls his eyes and says loudly, “Hey, what year is it now, Jack?” “It’s 1982.” “Well, how would I know, man?” he says. “Well, the 1990s are coming.” “That’s deep,” Mitchum says. “Thanks for telling me.” Mitchum’s cronies are squealing with laughter, and the director is shooting threatening glares in their direction, and finally a technician says, “That’s a wrap.” Mitchum looks around the darkened studio and, ignoring the host, yells at the top of his lungs, “Can I fart now?” Stacy Keach, who plays a junior high school principal who takes orders for his friends and is always destined to be a second banana, is terrific in That Championship Season, but just now he would rather talk about Mitchum: “Bob’s a legend, but he goes out of his way to make you feel completely at home. Not that he’s ever comic, but he has just enough of the rebel in him, where you know there’s a real character under there. And that character, I think, the guy who is at once a star but constantly laughs at it, undercuts it with humor, that’s what comes across to his fans. The reason for all of that probably has to do with the way he was brought up. He came up in tough times. He doesn’t make a big deal out of it. There’s no pretension with Bob, but he had it tough.” Born in Bridegeport, Connecticut, on August 6, 1917, Mitchum never got to know his father, Jim, a railroad man who was “squashed to death” by two boxcars in Charleston, South Carolina, when Robert was eighteen months old, leaving Mitchum’s mother, Ann Gunderson Mitchum, to care for three children—Robert, his older sister, Julie, and his younger brother, John. Mitchum’s mother went to work as a linotype operator and fell in love with and married a newspaperman named Bill Clancy, who apparently had some other interests on the side. “I’m coming down the steps one night,” Mitchum says, a Pall Mall hanging out of the crack that is his mouth, as though he had been born smoking, “and I hear these guys talking. I look around the stairway, and I see Al Capone and another guy sitting in the living room having a beef about ‘receipts.’ I knew enough to go back upstairs.” At fifteen, he went south, riding in boxcars. (“I dug school. Truly. But not enough to hang around.”) In Savannah, Georgia, a yard bull busted him “for being a suspicious character with no visible means of support.” Two days later he was on a road gang and scared shitless. He smiles, puffs the Pall Mall, drinks the tequila. “I figured I was getting too good at that, so one day, when I had my first chance, I split.” He spent the next few months in the Civilian Conservation Corps, digging ditches for a living. He saved thirty dollars and hopped freight trains hobo-style to California. When he first hit LA, he met up with his sister, Julie, and his mother, who now was divorced from Clancy. She had remarried to a man named Hugh Cunningham-Morris and was pregnant with Mitchum’s half sister, Carol. Julie was working in little theater groups, writing and acting. Mitchum, who had always wanted to be a writer like his idol, Thomas Wolfe, tried plays, stories, and acting. From 1934 to 1942, he was a busboy, a dishwasher, a truck driver, and a longshoreman. In 1940 he married Dorothy Spence and soon had two young sons, Jim and Chris, to support. An old foot wound was acting up, and he was unable to work much. After eight long, broke years, the situation was getting close to desperate. When help did arrive, it came from an unlikely source. Years before Mitchum had landed in Hollywood, another young man had come to Tinseltown from Ohio. He was handsome, a good actor, pals with Clark Gable. His name was William Boyd. Unfortunately, before he found the right properties, he found vodka. Boyd drank a quart a day for ten years and was quietly fading into Nathanael West pink-stucco retirement when a producer decided he could get him cheap. Boyd and a crew travelled to Bakersfield, and the Hopalong Cassidy series was born. Mitchum was pals with Boyd, and one day in the early ’40s, he got a call telling him to get a bus up to Bakersfield to be in the movies. The twenty-five-year-old Mitchum could scarcely believe his luck. When he arrived a few hours later, the actors, crew, and directors were sitting on the veranda of the hotel, talking in low, hushed tones. Mitchum introduced himself, tried to look cheerful and ready for work. Boyd glumly told him to go over to makeup, which was housed in a little cabin across the road. When he entered the makeup cabin, Earl Mosher, a friendly prop guy, smiled slightly and gave him a cowboy suit. Chaps, shirt, bandanna, boots and finally, a cowboy hat. “This seems a little sticky,” young Mitchum said. “No problem,” Mosher said. “See, the guy you’re replacing, well, he was doing a stunt today, and he was pulled off his wagon, and the reins were lashed around his wrists, and, well, the wagon kept going back and forth over him, the horses went nuts, you know, when he fell, so what we got here is a little of his head blood in the hat. We’ll take care of that fine, though.” Mosher took out a pen knife and scraped the blood off the hatband. “There,” he said, smiling at the young actor, “that ought to fit just right now.” “That’s how I broke into movies,” Mitchum says now, as he belts down another tequila. “I got a dead guy’s hat. And I’ve been selling horseshit ever since.” After racking up seven Hopalong Cassidy movies, Mitchum got himself an RKO contract for $350. After making three pictures for RKO, he starred in The Story of G.l Joe, for which he was nominated for an Academy Award. Studio executives were talking about this hot new star. The guy had sleepy eyes and sex appeal, and what’s more, under it all, he could really act. Mitchum was thinking about the sweetness of all this one night, sitting on his front porch, just having a drink, looking at the stars, smoking a Pall Mall, when a car stops in front of his house, and a man starts running toward him and shines a light in his face. Mitchum hit the man in the face, breaking his nose. The man was a member of the Los Angeles police force investigating a disturbance at such-and-such and address. He had the wrong address, but Mitchum came down the steps and demanded to be arrested. “Hey,” he shrugs, opening his leathery palms, “if the cops are going to come up to your porch and hassle you, then I wanted them to take it all the way. I mean, what the hell? Let’s go through with it. Right?” Or, as Mitchum’s wife Dorothy puts it, “Robert sometimes has this little problem with authority.” Mitchum admits that leaping into the cop car and screaming, “Let’s go downtown right now, motherfuckers” was probably a strategic error. One cop smashed him in the side with a billy club, breaking two ribs; the other cop—the one Mitchum had cold-cocked—used fists, knees, and his gun butt. By the time Mitchum arrived at headquarters, he was looking a bit like one of the soldiers in G.l Joe. No fun. When the RKO lawyer came prancing onto the scene, he told Mitchum their the trial was a lock. Just plead guilty, take a suspended sentence and a ten-dollar fine. Mitchum went along with the lawyer, only to receive a counteroffer from the judge—180 days in the slammer. At the trial, Mitchum said, “No… no… no way I can make that.” The judge asked him why, and Mitchum said, because he was going into the army. The judge asked him when. Mitchum said, “Ummm, Tuesday.” The judge smiled. He liked patriotic actors. That very afternoon, the same two cops who had given Mitchum the nice ride to the police station took him down to the draft board and let him enlist. Then it was back to jail for the weekend, and on the following Tuesday, America’s hottest young actor was led, handcuffed, to the troop train. Assigned to the medics, it was Mitchum’s job to look up “the asshole of every GI in America. Just what was he supposed to be searching for? “Piles, hemorrhoids, bananas, grapes, dope… you name it.” After a year, Mitchum got out on a hardship case, and went back to making movies, only to discover that he had become something other than an actor. He had become Robert Mitchum. See him raise hell onscreen. Read about him raising hell in real life. Producers threw Mitchum into one forgettable action thriller after another—Till the End of Time, The Locket, Pursued, Undercurrent, Desire Me, Rachel and the Stranger. There were some good pictures as well. Jacques Tourneur’s film noir classic Out of the Past (Kirk Douglas’ second film), with Jane Greer; The Big Steal, with Jane Greer; Blood on the Moon, with Barbara Bel Geddes. But for the most part, Mitchum, like all the other contract stars of the day, had to do what he was told. And he wasn’t in any position to argue or hold out for better films. Mitchum never, never talks about this subject unless he’s very under the weather. The most he usually says is, “I punch in, I punch out. I don’t worry about the film.” But privately he will say, “I would have done other things. But they weren’t offering them to me. First I was unknown, different…. Then two weeks later, they’re saying, ‘Get me a Mitchum type.’ That’s it. The man tells you what to do. Not only that, in those days, the man took most of the money as well.” At the height of his earning power he was making over three thousand dollars a week. But with agents’ fees, taxes, the Life of a Hollywood Star and a family to feed, Mitchum didn’t save a lot of the dough. “Look, I’m not complaining,” he says, over a drink at the Waldorf bar. “I got a great life out of the movies. I’ve been all over the world and met the most fantastic people. I don’t really deserve all that I have gotten. It’s a privileged life, and I know it. I didn’t make what these young guys, the Spielbergs, are making. But I had a hell of a lot of fun. Working with all the great leading ladies of my day. Marilyn Monroe, and Jane Greer. I think she was the most underrated of them all. Working with guys like John Huston and Raoul Walsh. “Hell, the first time I came on the set with Raoul, we did seventeen pages of dialogue in one day. He used to set up and roll cigarettes with his right hand, the side that had the eye patch. Because he couldn’t see them, all the tobacco fell out, and he would immediately roll another one, take a puff or two and wonder how he’d smoked the damned thing so quickly. When he had us all ready, he used to turn his back to the shot and let the cameraman tell him when it was done. The thing was, he trusted us. He wouldn’t have made the picture at all if he didn’t.” It’s the element of spontaneity and camaraderie that Mitchum finds missing in today’s shooting. “I know production values are better, sure, but are the scripts, are the pictures? I was on a set with De Niro, The Last Tycoon, and he takes forty minutes to get ready for a scene in his trailer. Ray Milland was in the movie, and he gets all upset. He asks Gage Kazan how come we didn’t get that much time, and Kazan says, ‘Hey, look, you guys don’t need time like that. Come on, just say your lines, I got enough problems with him.’ The thing is, it’s a hell of a lot more work, and I don’t see overall where the films are any better, really. You tell me.” One gets the feeling that Mitchum misses not only the spontaneity but the fun his generation had. Walsh was a great friend until his death, and John Huston, with whom he made Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison, remains one of Mitchum’s closest buddies, and one of the few living directors he speaks lovingly of. “John was relaxed, but he knows what he’s doing all the time,” Mitchum says now. “You want to do things for directors like that. He wasn’t sitting around trying to create art.’” But there was art to what he was doing? “One hopes. Yeah, sure, but you don’t go out there thinking like that. Where the hell would you be then? Look, take music. You can study it all you want, you can learn about time signatures, and you can know what legato means, and you can read it, and you can appreciate it, but if you haven’t got an ear, if you’re off-pitch, then that’s it. I’ve always had an ear. Hey, it’s like Bogart used to say, ‘Say the lines and don’t stumble over the furniture.’” What he doesn’t say is that he has always had complete dedication, despite the lousy movies he’s had to endure. John Huston recalls in his autobiography, An Open Book, a time when he asked Mitchum to crawl across the grass on his elbows. The scene had to be shot three or four times, and when Mitchum stood up, he was covered with blood. He had been crawling across stinging nettles. When Huston asked him why he had done it, Mitchum only answered, “Because that’s what you wanted.” One gets the sense that Mitchum has a high standard for people. If he trusts and respects you, he crawls through nettles. The same standard applies to Mitchum’s leading ladies. He loves Betty Jane Greer because of her “great sense of the ridiculous.” He loves Marilyn Monroe because she “had the guts of a lion.” Mitchum found out about Monroe’s courage while on the set of River of No Return, a 1954 Preminger film. Monroe and he were about to go down some white water on a raft. When they got to the place where the shoot was to take place, the water was raging, and even the Mad Prussian was against sending Mitchum out. But Mitchum and Monroe thought they could make it. Halfway down the river, as they headed toward the rapids, the security line broke, and they were headed for some rocks. Mitchum signaled for the rescue boat—which started toward them. But Monroe wouldn’t escape unless Mitchum got off at the same time. “She was worried about me,” Mitchum says now. “She kept saying, ‘You’re sick, you shouldn’t even be out here with the flu. I don’t get off until you do.’ I told her, ‘Look, this could be a matter of life and death. In another three minutes, we’re going to be over those rapids and cut into forty pieces.’ But she still wouldn’t leave.” For a supposedly macho male, the two traits he likes best in women are a sense of humor and guts. His wife, Dorothy, has plenty of both. She is funny, and regularly deflates Mitchum when he gets on one of his sentimental, drunken storytelling jags. Mitchum takes her needling in the spirit in which it’s intended and pours her another drink. Robert Mitchum is a man who has made it in the toughest and most uncaring of businesses, and he has survived it all by staying one step out of it and pursuing other interests, like music. In 1939, he assisted Orson Welles, splicing together music for an oratorio for a Jewish refugee fundraiser that was performed at the Hollywood Bowl, which Welles directed and produced. In the ’50s, he wrote the music and story for the film Thunder Road, which was originally supposed to star Elvis Presley. Instead, Mitchum recorded the title song and had a hit record. During the late ’50s and early ’60s, he spent a lot of time with oyster fishermen and the plain-spoken people of Maryland’s Eastern Shore. Drinking, talking, hearing stories. He refused film after film simply because he didn’t want work to become “all there was of me. I think that’s pathetic. “Listen,” he says, “I always tell them, you don’t want me. If you can get somebody better, please, by all means, get him. If you can get somebody cheaper, get him. I don’t want to work much anyway.” One of Mitchum’s most famous movies is Cape Fear. He turned it down at first and agreed to do it only because the producer sent him a case of liquor and some flowers. He called the guy up in the middle of the night and said, “I’ve smelled the flowers, and I’ve drunk the booze. I guess I have to do the picture.” Anyone who has seen Mitchum in Cape Fear will remember his performance. Perhaps the only other role he gave as much to is that of the crazed preacher in The Night of the Hunter. But if you talk to Mitchum about it now, he thinks the director, Charles Laughton, held him back. “I wanted to take it all the way,” he says. “I wanted to scare people to death. The book did that. It was ten times as frightening as the picture. But Charles had such good taste. He kept saying, ‘I make my living reading the Bible. I can’t do this sort of thing.’ As it was, it was pretty good… I guess.” The public, however, probably remembers his pot bust in 1948 better than it remembers most of his films. Mitchum talks about it with a great ironic laugh. “The guy who set me up for that bust was my ex-business manager. I wasn’t even tried, you know, and in 1951 the jury apologized, but all people remember is that photo of me coming out of the cell. What they don’t know is how close I came to killing the son of a bitch. I got a little hot one night, and I was telling a friend of mine that I was going down to the hardware store and I was going to buy a corncob, a can of gasoline and a whip, and then I was going to go over to my ex-friend’s home and stick the corncob up his ass, pour on the gasoline, light it, and whip his burning ass all the way down Sunset Boulevard. My pal said, ‘No… no, you’re not. No way.’ So I had a talk with the police about all the money he was stealing from me, and the guy went up to San Quentin. I don’t mention his name anymore, he has kids and he paid. I had some pals who were in the joint, and I don’t think the bastard got his head above water the whole time he was there. But I’ll tell you what. He was lucky I didn’t turn him over to the Mexicans.” “The Mexicans?” “Yeah, when I was at Paramount there were these Mexican hard guys, gang guys I knew. They’d served as extras in one of my pictures, and after the bust and all the details came out in the papers, they used to meet me at the gate and say, ‘Hey maaan, we know where this basteeeeerd leeeves. You geeve us the word, maaan, and weee go top heeeem for you. You deeeeg, man. We top heeeem!”’ “Top him?” “Cut off his fucking head, Jack,” Mitchum says, looking like the Night of the Hunter preacher. “You know what I mean?” “It’s the mystery of Mitchum as well as his charm,” says actor Paul Sorvino, at a press conference for That Championship Season. “When I met him, I was in awe of him. And I think you’re only in awe of someone who is mysterious, whom you can’t read easily. In fact, we used that awe, all of us, in the movie, because the team members are supposed to have awe for the coach. Naturally, as you get to know Bob, some of that Screen Legend stuff diminishes, but I didn’t want to let it go too easily, because it worked for the movie.” Mitchum himself is propped up against a wall, talking to two journalists. In his hand is a Bloody Mary, and his eyelids hang down his face like two broken blinds in a flophouse. “You know what a Mitchum movie is,” he says, as a woman reporter from Newsweek breaks into that sexual motherly smile. “It starts with a shot of a girl running across a beautiful open field. On the other side she sees this big gorilla. He waves to her. She runs toward him, smiling, with open arms. Then twelve guys come out and beat the gorilla over the head. He collapses on the grass. Scene Two: the girl meets the gorilla in a cabin. He’s locked inside. She tries to get to him, but just as she opens the door, he’s beaten over the head by twenty guys. Scene Three: a castle somewhere. The girl sees the gorilla in a turret. She climbs up, gets there, but again there’re fifty guys beating him over the head. She finally takes his head in her arms and looks directly into the camera and says, ‘He stinks and he’s ugly but I like him.’” Mitchum has told this story, oh, maybe fifty thousand times over the past forty years, but each time he gets a great laugh and a look of worship and admiration from whoever is around. Mitchum is, of course, the gorilla, and in his tale, he’s being saved by the girl, who can’t quite get to him in time. It perfectly illustrates the combination of bravado, real toughness, and a kind of lost-little-boy appeal that he has with women. Every woman who hears the story gets that look in her eyes. “If I were there, I’d save the big, helpless gorilla from the mobsters.” By the same token, it’s quite possible to misconstrue the “sensitive heart within the gorilla body” angle. One evening, Mitchum invites me up to his room at the Waldorf. Both of us are having difficulty maneuvering down the flower-covered hallway, and Mitchum pretends to pick the flowers and eat them as he heads toward his room, laughing and staggering, cursing and picking imaginary flowers all at the same time. When we get into his suite, he collapses on the couch and begins drinking tequila again. “Still haven’t eaten,” he says. “No time to feed the gorilla. He’s been on the chain gang.” “Hey,” I say. “Let’s call room service and get some hamburgers sent up and some milk, okay?” “Nah,” Mitchum says, looking down at his slightly bulging belly. “It’s too late. Hell, I don’t even need to eat.” “Hey,” I say. “You do need it. I’m ordering you some food, for chrissakes.” “You think so?” “Yeah, come on.” This is crazy, I think. Finally, reluctantly, he allows me to call room service and have them send him up a cheeseburger. Meanwhile, I get out my tape recorder and set it up, and Mitchum smiles and talks about the making of The Friends of Eddie Coyle, which is one of his best and least-seen films. “Up in Boston,” he says, “these are some tough motherfuckers. I mean hard guys. You ever meet George Higgins? He and I are having dinner, and he says, ‘Hey, Bob, did you ever think about committing suicide?’ I said, ‘Well, yeah, I guess, once or twice, but not really.’ And he says, ‘No, I mean with the gun in your mouth.’ And I said, ‘Well, yeah, but I always figured it would make too much of a mess for the other guys.’ And Higgins smiles and says to me, ’No, I have that covered. I mean you do it in the shower, see? Then they can just sponge you off the walls.’ Weird. See, I don’t know why it is, but I attract weirdness.” “Maybe you like it.” “Yeah, hey, who the fuck are you, Sigmund Freud?” Mitchum puts down another tequila, and I can feel the mood of the room changing. “There was this guy up there,” he says. “Part of the Boston Mob. Reminded me of the guys who hung out at my father-in-law’s house. Very natty dresser, very polite. He was a hit man for the mob. One night, see, this guy gets carried away just having fun in this Italian restaurant, and he takes out his piece and shoots a hole in the ceiling. You don’t do that, you know? It’s like shitting in the parlor. So he comes over to dinner at our house one day, and he’s really down, and he say, ‘You think you got problems, listen to this. You know what they made me do because of that little hole I blew in the ceiling? They made me go all the way out to San Francisco, get a hotel room, buy new suits, get a girlfriend to cover for me, spend days setting this guy up, and then I got to blow him away. All out of pocket! Can you believe that? I mean, would you consider that a fair thing to do?” Mitchum laughs wildly at the story, as do I… but then the mood changes again. “You getting this shit?” he says. “Yeah… Listen, maybe you don’t need another drink, Bob.” “You’re telling me?” “No.” “That’s good, because guys shouldn’t push the gorilla too far. Sometimes in bars guys come on with stuff, you know. ‘You think you’re tough, or what?’ I do like this…” Mitchum gets up and orders me to do the same. He comes over and stares down at me, his huge hands clamped firmly on my shoulders. “You see, I don’t fight clean. I gouge eyes, I break arms. I say to the guy, ‘Listen, pal, if you really want to do this, you ready to go all the way? ’Cause that’s what it’s going to mean. You dig?’” I feel myself trembling, but with Mitchum you don’t back down. “What if they say, ‘Fuck you, movie star?’” Mitchum’s eyes narrow. “Then I do this!” he says. Suddenly, he throws his whole body backward, still grasping my shoulders, and comes winging back toward me with his huge creased forehead. It’s the old Irish forehead slammer trick and I stay perfectly still and pray that he’s not too drunk to stop himself.” My prayers are answered, and Mitchum stops one millimeter from my head. But he is still glowering at me, and I no longer have any idea whether he’s acting or we’ve gone over into the Twilight Zone. “If they aren’t knocked out by that, I twist them around and break their arms, gouge their eyes. It’s not the Marquis of fucking Queensberry rules, I want to tell you.” And at that moment the doorbell rings. “Room service!” I say moving backward toward the door. “Hey,” Mitchum says, smiling, “I could use some food after all.” At the gala premiere of That Championship Season, surrounded by the Kennedys, Norman Mailer, Bud Schulberg, royalty from Greece, Robin Williams, and about a thousand other rich and famous people, Mitchum comes over to me and asks what I’m doing next. I tell him I am going home, back to work on my novel. “Jesus Christ. You know, that’s what I wanted to do. But I couldn’t make that kind of commitment. Good luck with it. I mean it.” There is such real warmth and such actual concern in his voice that I feel touched, and can’t resist giving him a hug. “Listen,” I say. “It’s been great fun. Good luck and take care of yourself.” Mitchum smiles, looks at the little circle of people who are standing around and yells, “What? Five hundred dollars? You want to go to a motel with me? Jesus Christ, man, what kind of guy do you think I am? Get the hell out of here, kid! Some god-damned nerve!” Then he pounds me on the back of the head with his big open hand and walks just behind his wife out of the room. |
Anti-Trump radicals may be targeting Trump advisers (INTELLIHUB) — Since the moment that Kellyanne Conway took over as a senior adviser to Donald Trump, hard left radicals, with the help of the corporate media, have relentlessly attacked her and now it seems as if someone has taken it a step further. Speaking to Sean Hannity, Conway detailed the fact that she is now receiving secret service protection after suspicious white substances were sent directly to her home! “Because of what the press is doing now to me, I have Secret Service protection,” Conway said. “We have packages delivered to my house with white substances. That is a shame.” As Conway noted, this was most likely done because of intense disinformation orientated attacks on her throughout the corporate media which just can’t seem to grasp that a women is at the height of power within the new Trump Administration. While the culprit could be anyone, it is interesting to note that an actual former terrorist was a key force behind one of the major anti-Trump protest groups that sprung up in the wake of Trumps stunning November victory As I reported in December, “A group of hard left activists planned a massive disruption in Washington D.C. on the day of Donald Trump’s inauguration with the stated goal of shutting it down.” “Calling themselves ‘initiators’ the group includes former Weather Underground terrorist Bill Ayers and founding member of the American communist party Carl Dix.” One has to wonder if a confused young America saw this blatant promotion of a soft coup by the likes of Bill Ayers and, after it failed miserably, then took the next step in attacking those close to the president-elect. ***Visit our new FREE SPEECH community built exclusively for our readers. Click to Join The Deplorables Network Today!*** Whatever the case, one can only hope that the Secret Service agents tasked with protecting Conway after these direct threats are up to the task. Alex Thomas is a reporter and editor for Intellihub News. He was a founding member of what later became Intellihub.com and an integral part of the team that destroyed the mainstream media blockade on Bilderberg in 2012. You can contact him here. |
Overview A multiplayer survival game focused around cooperative civilization building, exploration and looting. Play as an individual within a tribe alongside other players. The game world simulates seasons, summer, autumn, winter, spring. The seasonal changes affect the quantity and production speed of resources as well as the strength and number of enemies. Use the favourable seasons to collect and produce resources like food, wood, metal and stone in order to strengthen your base. It is important that you and your team make good use of every minute to ensure your continued survival through each, increasingly harsh, winter. The Story Before The Ice age turned the world over, people lived relatively well, and largely at peace. There existed six ruling empires that each provided trade and service for each other that benefited everybody. Three lay in the west and three in the east. There were no major power struggles between nations. Largely because Cruxalan produced enough food and supplies to fill any shortcoming in any corner of the world. Cruxalan was the connecting network where the rest of the world could hear about any shortcoming or mishappening that had occurred. It was the Centre of the World. One year a strange Cyan moon replaced the still star in the north. When this happened, Cruxalan saw snow and ice for the first time in memory. The ice age had come. This decreased Cruxalan’s productivity drastically causing panic and struggle all over the world. Some even told tales of attacks and sightings of the dead, walking and attacking the living on Cruxalan. They were always reported to be adorned by the light blue diamonds that are commonly found in Cyandom’s territories. Cruxalan was consequently abandoned. Communications between the Empires in the east and the west continents fell quiet. The world became divided and the harmony was lost. The Cyandom empire seemed to be the least affected by the ice age for their kingdom had been dealing with snow and ice from its foundation. While Cruxalan was abandoned, they took control of the whole land. They built fortresses and strongholds on all of the main routes and passes. During the Ice age, the three empires in the west formed one union out of what was left of their own empires to form the nation of Troika. A whole generation had passed when one year they saw that the waters around Cruxalan had become navigable again, and the ice on Cruxalan had begun to recede. So immediately they set sail for Cruxalan. When they got there they were met by Cyandom forces. They carried a flag with the symbol of that Cyan moon that seemed to bring the Ice Age. They told Troika that they must throw down their own colours and live under the new order of Cyandom if they wished to build and survive on Cruxalan. This was unacceptable. Now it is up to you to take up arms with Troika and liberate Cruxalan from the new Cyandom order and discover the mysteries of the supernatural threat. |
Mindful meditation can help you reach a higher understanding of yourself. If you want to learn how to become more self aware, you must meditate mindfully. Mindfulness is the practice of coming to understand oneself more in order to reach an equilibrium through the power of self awareness. It can help you overcome physical and emotional suffering throughout the sole power of wisdom. But how to become self aware? How can we achieve the perfect mind state that enables us to gain the benefits of meditation? The following steps will show you how to get into mindful meditation and initiate you to a couple of healthy mindfulness techniques. Here we go: 1. Mindful meditation is a kind of meditation that involves focusing on the present. You have to be aware of your actions, and be in a quiet or comfortable place where you can truly be yourself. Start off by sitting on the floor or on a chair with your back straight. 2. Forget about all thoughts that regard the past, and constantly remind yourself that you are living in the present and that none of what you have gone through in your life matters. 3. Become more self aware by listening to your heartbeat and the sound of your breathing. Pay attention to your body. This is the secret to how to become self aware: give yourself attention. 4. Send away all negative thoughts. When thoughts do come to your mind, do not try and suppress them with violence. Let them slide on you like water and wash you. Do not judge them, but return to your silent and profound breathing. 5. When you start feeling like you should end your meditation, start becoming aware of where you are again. Get up slowly and gradually. Do not lose that precious calm you have just generated. We hope you truly did learn to meditate through these mindfulness techniques. Here is some music for meditation to help you through your search of a more profound self awareness. May you experience all the benefits of meditation and of mindful meditation. Namaste. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hsKjj41ormI |
An Israeli safari park is teaming up with a leading German institute to create a DNA bank of endangered animals, in hopes that these animals could be resurrected if they go extinct, Israel's Ynet news site reported on Thursday. The goal of the bank, which will be formed as a partnership by the Ramat Gan Safari in central Israel and "an advanced research institute in Germany," is to preserve the samples in a way that will make them last for about 3,000 years. The DNA from the species in question will be extracted from tissue samples of animals which are sent to the Ramat Gan Safari for medical treatment. The tissue and DNA samples will then be stored in a special on-site facility, being kept at a constant -196 degrees Celsius. Even though there is currently no scientific way to resurrect animals using only their DNA samples, scientists wish to collect tissue samples today with the hope that in the future this would become possible. The project will be headed by Safari Chief veterinarian Dr. Yigal Horowitz, who joined forces with Dr. Susan Holtz and other experts from the German Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research (IZW). Horowitz told Ynet that he hopes the project will soon take on biblical proportions, using the Noah's Arc as a metaphor for his endeavor. “Noah collected the animals and saved them from extinction many years ago. I believe it is now our turn to do this,” he said. “We are lucky that we have 4,000 different animals that receive treatment (in Ramat Gan) every year. We are sure that other zoos will join us and take part (in this initiative)." |
To begin with, set aside any traditional notions based around twentieth century political norms. Most people will assume that political divisions in the late twentieth and early twenty-first century are based along left/right economic grounds. Toss that now. Or maybe you’d assume that a country known for a fairly fundamentalist religious past – which didn’t legalise divorce until 1995 and which still has no legal abortion – divides its politics along the fault line of socially authoritarian versus libertarian instead. That would also be untrue. Irish politics doesn’t work like that. It works as follows: In 1921 a treaty for independence was negotiated with Britain. It contained a number of unpopular aspects – Northern Ireland, oaths of loyalty to the crown, etc. One side supported the treaty, the other opposed it. This led to Civil War. It also led to the two dominant parties in Irish politics. On one side was Cumann na nGaedheal, who grew up to be Fine Gael. And on the other was Fianna Fail, who grew and evolved to become…. Fianna Fail. Ninety years ago, an emerging western democracy was divided over a treaty. There were some differences between the parties in the early years – in their attitudes to nationalism and republicanism and religion, in their economic views. Its two main parties are still identified according to this ancient divergence. There is a strangely cult-like sense of loyalty to whichever of these two indistinguishable parties an Irish person feels aligned. Political allegiance is passed down in families, and seats in parliament seem to do likewise. But their only differences now lie in the individuals who choose to continue voting for them. These differences cannot be observed or verified by science. I’m not even sure they can be hypothesised. They are both economically centre-right and socially centrist*, with a 10% swing to the left in good time and 10% to the right when times are bad. With appropriate respect to Phil Ochs, this should not lead to any suspicions of liberalism. Two parties? But there are loads of parties….. There are, or have been, three major parties in Ireland for the last forty years – Fianna Fail, Fine Gael and Labour. Two of these have formed every government in the state’s history. Wiki provides a nice table of all Irish governments, right here. You can see that every government since 1923 has been led by either FF or FG (called Cumann na nGaedheal before it merged with fascists to become FG). You can also note that FF have been in government for 20 of the last 23 years. And for 55 of the 88 years of the country’s existence. People assume that I come from a cynical perspective when I say that FF and FG are politically indistinguishable. They assume that such a statement is taken from the ‘Blair is as bad as Thatcher’ or ‘No difference between Labour and the Tories/Democrats and Republicans’ school of rhetoric. This is something I’ll leave others to discuss, but that I personally think requires an element of myopia or despair. And generally speaking when politics divides between a social or economic left and right wing, you can discern, if you try, a difference. Where politics divides along lines that no one understands or remembers, it is genuinely difficult to find that difference. Before you reach for the calendar, I can confirm that it is now 2011. Some would say that it is time for Irish politics to grow the fuck up and stop basing what passes for political identity on a Civil War most people under thirty don’t understand and many have never even studied in school and pretended to understand for the traditional half hour. I’d imagine I could find a few who have never heard of it. So it would make sense for two major centre-right parties to just merge – and perhaps reveal this illusionary nature of their disparateness to the electorate. Or maybe this would only go to show that Ireland has elected the same politics if not the same politicians for 88 years. The Irish Labour Party There is a Labour Party in Ireland. It has been known to get as much as 20% of the vote, or as little as 6.4%. In this election it is running at 22% support. This election, in which the Irish people have chosen to slash and bash the traditional FF ~40% down to a possible 14%, Labour are expected to get 22%. The Irish system has the added benefit of maintaining a spare centre-right party, for those times when the country wants to punish the centre-right party that has just been in power. Thus Fianna Fail can be meted an electoral battering this year but Fine Gael can keep their seats and most of their politics warm for a term or two. Many countries do not keep a spare centre-right party for these sorts of emergencies. This is very poor planning. If you don’t keep a spare centre-right party handy, you might have to vote Labour, and that has never happened in Ireland. Electing the Opposition The important part of an Irish general election is Electing the Opposition. This is based on Fianna Fail as the self-proclaimed ‘natural party of government’ – an impressive title in a multi-party democracy, or really anywhere outside of a banana republic. The result of this is the idea that a general election is the people’s opportunity to appoint the opposition. Government takes care of itself, like the sun rising and setting, and nuclear waste from Sellafield. Due to Single Transferable Vote and multi-candidate constituencies, there is a strong history of forceful Independents – single issue candidates and otherwise – as well as small political parties who may gain 2-10 seats in a given election. Thus the Greens, Sinn Fein, Democratic Left (before joining Labour) and the Progressive Democrats (before coalescing once too often with FF and bearing the brunt of political fallout) can gain a small but significant number of seats. Localism It is impossible to address Irish national politics without dealing with the local nature of it. The party from which a candidate hails may, for example, be viewed as ‘a shower of little bollixes’, however there’s a decent chance that you may know him or her, spoken to them personally, or remember that time when they organised for a cat to be rescued from a tree. Maybe you wouldn’t want to vote for Fianna Fail because you blame them for recently ruining the country, but that nice John Murphy was wonderful when the pub down the road started attracting a very noisy crowd and he got that all sorted out for us. You couldn’t let the fact that he’s standing for a party you currently hate trump that. A party’s policies, even their most abhorrent policies, are often ignored in favour of these anecdotal tales of bonhomie. Charlie Haughey was known for paying constituents’ milk bills as he canvassed. He’d bring the receipt up the door and tell the person ‘Oh, don’t worry about that. I got it.’ This approach to canvassing was very popular with the electorate. Cronyism This leads us to cronyism. Sometimes just known as ‘corruption’. This has been very expensive, because Ireland in the boom years had to fund any number of near-endless national Tribunals to investigate it. The history of the last fifteen years is one of Tribunals. There’s the Mahon Tribunal (Payments for ‘Certain Planning Matters’), the McCracken tribunal (Payments to politicians by a leading Irish businessman) which became the Moriarty Tribunal (same subject, remains ongoing). Out of these Tribunals, spanning two decades, came the endless stream of effluent which runs through Irish politics, and which is usually packaged neatly in brown envelopes. If you want something done, it emerged, pay a politician hard cash. The tribunals are estimated to have cost the tax payer £700 million to date and each of them investigated institutionalised corruption. There is a general feeling – based only on their having dominated national government for the history of the state – that FF win in the cronyism and corruption stakes. This is open to argument, and no one could ever say that FG don’t try their darndest. But the party that has been in power for more of Ireland’s 88 years has more to offer the corrupt and the opportunistic, and so they come out ahead. Much of their current popular damnation is linked to this. There is a seam of genuine admiration running through Irish society for what is colloquially known as the ‘cute hoor’. If you can side-step the spelling and latent misogyny, this term could be roughly translated as ‘smart or canny bastard.’ The politician that everyone knows runs a land rezoning racket; the late alcohol licences that go to friends and well-wishers of particular councillors. The Taoiseach who sternly tells the nation to tighten its collective belt while wearing designer shirts funded by tax-evasion. The other Taoiseach who apparently didn’t own a bank account in his own name for several years. The number of leading politicians who had houses bought or renovated for them by concerned friends, and sometimes friends of friends. These little traditions are often regarded fondly and related almost approvingly – the actions of an adorable child acting the rascal. This admiration is offset by occasional periods of puritanism, in which everyone is shocked – shocked! – to discover that their elected leaders are morally vacuous criminals. Never underestimate the years of therapy that may be required to sort out the national psyche in this regard. And therapy is expensive, so this is unlikely happen in the immediate future. In the meantime, a country facing economic ruin, unprecedented unemployment, and still waiting for a medical system that functions on the most basic level, will be going to the polls to punish a party that they blame for destroying them. They will do this by electing that party’s identikit twin brother, cunningly disguised in a cheap Halloween mask. PS – best of luck to Eygpt. *Well, Bertie Ahern claimed to be a socialist some years ago. This was widely regarded as somewhat disingenuous. It was also widely regarded as really very funny. However, the poor man was later found to be telling the truth, when the country realised his was the first Irish party to nationalise the banks. Unfortunately the banks were, well, bankrupt at the time, and so this single act of socialism is now widely regarded as one that has done more than any other to ruin Ireland. |
When hackers took aim at the internet’s backbone last year, impeding access to websites like Twitter and Spotify, they did so by weaponizing the Internet of Things — a catch-all category of web-connected devices that includes fitness trackers and smart thermostats. The resulting denial-of-service attack was limited and short-lived, in the end, but cybersecurity fears about IoT remain prevalent — and a group of lawmakers in Congress is now getting to work to ensure the U.S. government raises its own digital defenses in response. That’s the aim of a new bill out today by Sen. Mark Warner, a Democrat in Virginia, and Sen. Cory Gardner, a Republican from Colorado. Their measure — called the Internet of Things Cybersecurity Improvement Act of 2017 — is an attempt to force companies that sell wearables, sensors and other web-connected tools to federal agencies to adhere to some new security standards. For example, lawmakers’ new proposal would put into law a requirement that vendors ensure the small, often screenless devices sold to the U.S. government can be patched with security updates. (It sounds like a given, but it’s not.) It also prohibits those tech companies from hard-coding passwords into the firmware of the tools they offer the feds. The passwords, generally kept hidden from users, exist to help manufacturers access the guts of those tools, but hackers have easily exploited them. Using malicious software called Mirai, attackers previously have managed to turn webcams and other devices into a formidable botnet — the likes of which caused the widespread October outage. With cybersecurity, Warner told Recode, “You’ve got to constantly be upgrading your game. And what we’re saying with Internet of Things devices is, if you’ve got hard-coded passwords or they’re not able to be patched, because they’re cheaper or smaller devices, that can’t be standard protocol.” “If we turn around and there are 20 billion [IoT] devices in a couple years, and the federal has ‘x’ million of these devices, and they all have these characteristics,” he continued, “then, you know, I think we’re going to make a big mistake.” On the consumer side, at least, the Internet of Things is a fast-expanding, if nebulous, market category. An estimate by IDC issued in June found that IoT spending around the world could reach as high as $1.4 trillion by 2021. Much as consumers are coming to embrace those tools, the U.S. government is eyeing them as well. The firm Govini, for example, found federal agencies have spent about $4 billion on “sensors and data collectors” between the 2011 and 2015 fiscal years. There are sensors now in federal buildings to track energy use, from simple motion sensors turning off lights to tools that raise or lower blinds depending on the time of day to reduce electricity bills, an analysis by the Information Technology Industry Foundation, a tech-backed think tank, found last year. Meanwhile, the Department of Agriculture has relied heavily on soil sensors to gather data about the nation’s farmlands, according to ITIF. And the Department of Defense is one of the biggest buyers and researchers of web-connected portable devices: The Govini report pointed to the Army, for example, which has explored new wearables that might help service members on dangerous foreign battlefields. For now, Warner admitted to Recode, there’s actually no full, comprehensive accounting of the IoT devices that the U.S. government owns or operates. The Democratic lawmaker said that is all the more reason for Congress to adopt new cybersecurity rules of the road, fearing that some federal agencies are better than others at safeguarding their devices from hackers. With Gardner, their bill clears the way for researchers to investigate the cybersecurity of wearables and other small internet-connected tools. The proposal tasks the feds to put in place guidelines that would allow experts to test the digital defenses of IoT devices, then report them to manufacturers — without fear of liability under two federal laws that generally outlaw such experimentation. On its surface, the bill applies only to tech companies and contractors that are trying to sell their tools to the U.S. government. But Warner hopes that the sheer “purchasing power” of the federal bureaucracy -- which could spend as much as $95 billion on tech next year — might spur similar security improvements in similar IoT devices that companies sell to consumers. Warner, previously, has warned about major security risks in internet-connected toys, another part of the IoT universe. Still others in government have raised cybersecurity fears about the Internet of Things: Terrell McSweeny, a Democratic commissioner at the Federal Trade Commission, for years has warned about threats to smart homes and other, similar tools. |
As the first due dates approach on the Greek government’s novel idea of linking electricity to tax payments, a growing resentment is settling over many parts of this country — one that some local officials believe could even shake its political stability. Already there are pockets of resistance popping up in dozens of areas, including this northern suburb of Athens, where Mayor Iraklis Gotsis has promised to fight the tax bills in court. He has also organized a group of electricians willing to reconnect — illegally — anyone who is cut off. “This thing on top of all the other taxes and salary cuts has made people snap,” Mr. Gotsis said recently. “It is the drop that made the glass full.” Many Greeks consider the new tax, which makes no exceptions for the unemployed or the elderly and is much higher than any real estate tax they have paid before, to be one more sign of the tough austerity measures they are suffering under as a requirement for European aid. European finance ministers will meet Tuesday to decide whether to release the next $10.6 billion allotment to the Greek government. In the past, most Greeks paid real estate taxes when they bought, sold or inherited property. They also paid comparatively small yearly taxes to municipalities. Someone in Mr. Chatzis’s circumstances might have paid less than $133 a year in total. Now he will have to pay an additional $373 this year and the next. In September, under pressure to come up with $2.6 billion to close a budget gap, and losing the battle against tax cheats, Greek officials settled on the idea of linking a new real estate tax to bills from the government-owned power company. The new tax, which they say they will levy again next year, is based on square footage, the age of the building and the average value of a neighborhood, and has nothing to do with the taxpayer’s income. But lately, even the government seems to be having second thoughts about the tax. Last week, the power company announced that it would send out cutoff notices, but said that it would hold back on taking any such measures until the government had considered the circumstances of the affected families. Meanwhile, union workers occupied the power company’s billing center, preventing any new bills from going out. Some Greeks just do not believe that the government will ever have the nerve to cut power to thousands of homes. They say it will be yet another change of course, as is so often the case here. Deadlines are set and then rescinded. Tough tax laws are put forth and then amnesties are offered. Advertisement Continue reading the main story “I honestly don’t believe they will do this,” said Pantelis Ksiridakis, the mayor of a wealthier suburb, who described the policy as a form of blackmail that may work for the rich, but is crushing to the poor. “They are pushing people to the limit with this.” “This is a tax that nobody expected, and they are demanding cash. No structured payments,” he added. In Nea Ionia, Mayor Gotsis has offered to have municipal lawyers defend those who cannot, or will not, pay the tax; about 1,000 residents have come forward so far. Photo Most, he said, fall into the first category. Greece’s creditors, he said, forget that large numbers of Greeks, even if they have evaded taxes at the margins, are not wealthy. About 25 percent of the small stores in Nea Ionia have closed in the last two years, hit hard by the country’s deepening recession and rising unemployment rate. Vangelis Avlonitis is one of the electricians who has volunteered to restore power, if the mayor asks him to. His shop is not far from Town Hall and is decorated these days with the neon signs he made for his customers before their shops went out of business. Mr. Avlonitis says he is barely scraping by himself. But for others it is much worse. One neighbor stopped by last week and told him her pension was $440 a month and her tax bill was $480. Newsletter Sign Up Continue reading the main story Please verify you're not a robot by clicking the box. Invalid email address. Please re-enter. You must select a newsletter to subscribe to. Sign Up You will receive emails containing news content , updates and promotions from The New York Times. You may opt-out at any time. You agree to receive occasional updates and special offers for The New York Times's products and services. Thank you for subscribing. An error has occurred. Please try again later. View all New York Times newsletters. “This is ridiculous,” he said, pointing out a ladder he had bought in case the power company cut the electricity at the poles. Not everyone in this suburb is refusing to pay. Some say they will find the money because they believe their country is in trouble. One man, who declined to give his name, said he, too, had lost his business — a snack shop — last year. But he is surviving on the income from a few properties he owns and will pay the new tax. “We have to help the state,” he said. “The tax is unfair. We are not the first ones who should be paying. The ones who have Swiss bank accounts should be paying. But that is still how things are here.” Advertisement Continue reading the main story The Greek government has struggled to improve tax collection. At first, officials were optimistic that they could capture at least a portion of an estimated $27 billion in unpaid taxes each year. Various experts have put Greece’s shadow economy at about 25 percent of its gross domestic product, compared with less than 8 percent for the United States. But last year, Greek officials collected even less than the year before. Some of the decline in revenues resulted from the decline in the economy. But some new tax collection strategies — incentives to collect receipts so that fewer business could work off the books, for instance — backfired and actually reduced people’s tax bills. And the state seemed to make little progress in getting the scofflaws to pay. Some 70 percent of the tax collected came from salaried employees and retirees, who have little way to hide their income. Meanwhile, 7 out of 10 self-employed workers, including doctors, dentists, engineers, accountants, taxi drivers and small business owners, indicated on their tax forms that they had made less than $16,000 a year, a figure that most experts find laughable. The Greek Public Power Corporation recently announced that of the 86,000 bills that came due recently — a tiny fraction of the 5.5 million households in Greece — 73 percent had been paid. Its press release struck an optimistic tone, suggesting the rate of payment was similar to the usual rate. But critics point out that such a percentage means that the government could be facing the prospect of tens of thousands of shut-offs in the middle of winter. Some of the rebellious pushback has bordered on the humorous. For instance, the Health Ministry in downtown Athens was in the dark for four hours last week, courtesy of the power company’s union workers. Since government ministries owe the power company $180 million, the union argues, why shouldn’t they suffer cutoffs? There are also half a dozen legal protests pending. And a YouTube video describing how to reconnect your electricity if you get cut off has gone viral. Advertisement Continue reading the main story In Nea Ionia recently, Mr. Chatzis, sitting near an electric heater at a friend’s hardware store, was fretting about the tax bill and remembering the years he spent as a prisoner in World War II after resisting the Axis occupation of his country. “Now it seems like the fascists are back again,” he said of the pressure on Greece to raise more revenue and narrow its budget deficit. “What did we fight for?” |
Got a text from my husband letting me know that a small package was delivered for me today. I knew it had to be my 100th as that's all I was still waiting for. My husband always blocks out the customs info (the brat) so I can't see what it is until I open. I was going to work late, but how could I possibly knowing there was something waiting for me? It was tiny and light and felt like jewelry... I love jewelry!! Opened it up quickly and carefully to find the nicest charm bracelet with a Patronus Charm on it! So perfect for me! It looked really familiar and I couldn't figure out why. It took several hours for this lame brain to realize why.... only because I had it on my RedditGifts wish list! Thank you Santa! You're way smarter than I am and I love it!! :D |
I was taken aback this past Sunday (September 29) by Robin Wright’s colorful map of a politically re-divided Middle East in thewhichillustrated her article “Imagining a Remapped Middle East.” The map, entitled “How 5 Could Become 14,” shows a hypothetical future division of Libya, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, and Saudi Arabia into 14 potential new countries along with two additional city-states. I was immediately reminded of Ralph Peters’ troublesome remapping of the same region. As explained in a previous, Peters’ intriguing mental exercise in redrawing national boundaries was widely misinterpreted across the Muslim world as indicating a nefarious plot to enhance US power. As a result, the region’s pronounced anti-Americanism was further inflamed. Wright’s article, however, shows that her purpose is different from that of Peters. Whereas Peters sought to depict a more rationally constituted political map, Wright rather speculates about a map that might be developing on its own, regardless of her personal preferences, much less her country’s geo-strategic designs. In this regard, the map has much to recommend it. Libya, Syria, Yemen, and Iraq could well be in the process of disintegration, splitting into de facto states or state-like entities that might bear some resemblance to the territories depicted by Wright’s map. The likelihood of Iraq and Syria regaining stability as effective states within their internationally recognized boundaries seems remote, given the viciousness of the conflicts currently being waged. As things already stand, the non-country of Iraqi Kurdistan is almost as much of a state as Iraq itself, and arguable more of a nation. Whether Libya and Yemen can politically reintegrate is also an open matter. Mapping how the Middle East appears today, rather than how the international political community thinks it should be configured, is thus an essential task. Thinking about where such processes might lead is equally important. Wright’s thoughts on the subject are generally insightful, and her map has many pertinent and intriguing features. I commend the New York Times for publishing such a provocative piece. But that said, I do have a few quibbles, and a couple of serious misgivings, about the manner in which Wright has remapped the region. To take the minor points first, the Jabal al-Druze could not form a realistic city-state simply because it is too large and too rural (under the French mandate of Syria in the 1920s, the semi-autonomous Druze state was roughly the same size as both Lebanon and the semi-autonomous Alawite state). A second minor issue concerns Wright’s division of Yemen into two rather than three states; the Houthi rebellion among the Zaidi (sometimes mistakenly called “Fiver” Shiites) rebels of northwestern Yemen has as much pertinence as the rebellion that that would revive “South Yemen” in the southern and eastern parts of the country. A final quibble concerns Wright’s “Alawitestan,” which would actually be a minority Alawite state, barring the massive ethnic cleansing of Sunnis and Christians. My serious misgivings concern Wright’s treatment of Saudi Arabia. She realizes that she goes out on a limb here, noting that “The most fantastical ideas involve the Balkanization of Saudi Arabia…” Unlike the other countries that she remaps, Saudi Arabia is a relatively stable state, with no serious challenges to its territorial integrity. Imagining the division of this country thus does not involve speculating about the possible end-points of processes already in motion, as is the case in the other countries considered. It is not at all clear, moreover, why Wright has divided Saudi Arabia as she has, as her article is largely silent here. Presumably, her division is based on the idea that the non-Wahhabi peripheries of the country could detach themselves from the Wahhabi core, potentially resulting in the emergence of the new states of North Arabia, Eastern Arabia, South Arabia, and Western Arabia. As a purely mental exercise, there is nothing wrong with imagining the possible division of a relatively stable country such as Saudi Arabia, even if it will—as Wright herself admits—“infuriate Arabs who suspect foreign plots to divide and weaken them…” Saudi Arabia’s stability, moreover, might not be a solid as it appears. The entire country, after all, is something of an anachronism; as the personal domain and namesake of the Al Saud family, its essence is premodern. The lack of a regular system of succession in an absolute monarchy based on the 15,000-strong House of Saud further clouds the country’s future. (Similar problems exist in neighboring Oman, as explored in a previous GeoCurrents post.) Saudi Arabia’s religions minorities, moreover, are sternly repressed and deeply restive in several peripheral areas. The fact that Saudi Arabia’s main Shiite zone along the Gulf is also the site of its main oilfields is an added complication, one that provokes Saudi fear about Iranian power and political-religious design. The possible future division of Saudi Arabia is thus conceivable if unlikely, but it is a much further stretch to imagine that it would split into the units that Wright has mapped. Detaching the core region of the country, homeland of both the Saud family and the Wahhabi religion establishment, from the peripheries does make a certain amount of sense, but one must wonder whether such a maneuver is based more on rational analysis or wishful thinking. Considering the harsh nature of Wahhabi beliefs and practices, coupled with the fact that Saudi state struggles to spread those beliefs and practices across the Muslim world, it is understandable that an American scholar such as Wright would want to see the territorial reach of the Wahhabi establishment cut down to size. (Note that her map results in a landlocked “Wahhabistan,” unlike that of Peters, which at least gives her hypothetical rump “Saudi Homelands” access to the sea.) But shorn of its oil revenues as well as those stemming from the Hajj, it is highly questionable whether this region could maintain a stable state. Local resources and enterprises would not be nearly large enough to support central Arabia’s current population. A deeper problem stems from the fact that much of Wright’s Wahhabistan is not actually majority Wahhabi, as can be seen in a comparison of her map with that of M. Izady (who idiosyncratically excludes Wahhabism from Sunni Islam). The key area here is Ha’il province, a historically non-Wahhabi area nonetheless ceded by Wright to Wahhabistan. Not only do most of the people of Ha’il practice a more mainstream version of Sunni Islam than those of Riyadh and Al-Qassim, but their province was the historical center of resistance in central Arabia against both the House of Saud and the Wahhabi clerics. Ha’il was the seat of the Rashidis, historical enemies of the Saudis, who were noted for their friendly tolerance of Shiites, a branch of Islam despised by the Wahhabis. Ha’il would thus fit much better with Wright’s “North Arabia” than with her “Wahhabistan.” Nor is it clear why Wright divides her North Arabia from her Western Arabia, as both regions are mostly mainstream Sunni in orientation. Wright’s “South Arabia,” composed of four Saudi provinces and small section of a fifth, is also problematic. This region is indeed distinctive from the rest of Saudi Arabia, and is thus occasionally claimed as part of a would-be “Greater Yemen.” Yet little exists that would potentially hold this region together and provide glue for a new national identity. Most of this region is majority Sunni, but important Zaidi Shia communities are found near the border with Yemen (although Izady’s map might exaggerate their extent). Of all the sects of Shiite Islam, Zaidiyya is closest in form and content to Sunni Islam, but it also has a heritage of political autonomy that has nurtured the protracted rebellion across the border in northern Yemen. In Najran Province in the eastern portion of Wright’s South Arabia, however, a different religious community is demographically dominant: Ismaili Islam. This sect is invisible on Izady’s map, as it also falls into the general category of Shiism. But the Ismaili sect is quite distinctive from other varieties of Shiism, noted globally for its cosmopolitanism, devotion to secular education, and relative liberalism and gender egalitarianism. Not surprisingly, Ismailis in Najran have been deeply persecuted by the Saudi establishment. As noted by Human Rights Watch: |
Car dealers can now disable your vehicle via satellite if you miss a payment. Is that a bad thing? Jonathan Welsh explains the technology in the Wall Street Journal . It consists of a "disabler" wired into your ignition, plus an optional "satellite-based locator" that can help repo men find the car. Don Lavoie, president of a company that markets the devices, says sales were up 25 percent last year and are on track to double this year. William Saletan Will Saletan writes about politics, science, technology, and other stuff for Slate. He’s the author of Bearing Right. Advertisement Sounds like Big Brother, right? Welsh reports that consumer-advocacy groups such as the Consumer Federation of America say the devices represent a disturbing new layer of surveillance. ... John Van Alst, a lawyer with the National Consumer Law Center, calls the practice of remote disabling "electronic repossession" and says it represents a kind of intimidation, as well as creating extra hassles for people who are already financially strapped. "These devices are effective because of the threat they represent," says Mr. Van Alst. Car dealers and disabler makers answer these charges in three ways. First, you owe them money. If you don't pay it, they have the right to deprive you of what you were paying for. Your car should be like your cell phone: If you stop paying, it stops working. I like this argument. It's simple. Cars, like phones, can now be wirelessly connected. Why should they be treated differently? No quid, no quo. Advertisement Second, when a dealer knows he can shut down your car if you don't pay, he's more willing to let you drive the car off the lot. According to Welsh: "In the past, many dealers weren't willing to take the risk of extending credit to certain customers. But Mr. Lavoie and dealers who have installed his company's disabler say more buyers do pay on time when they have the devices in their cars." As a result, the technology "helps a broader range of customers qualify for loans." Lavoie is right. This is what too many civil libertarians fail to appreciate about remote surveillance and control: The ability to exert power from a distance reduces the need to exert it up close. And the ability to exert it in the future reduces the need to exert it now. I can let you drive this car off the lot right now because I know that if you don't pay as promised, I can shut it off. One driver likens her disabler to "those ankle bracelets they put on you when you've done something bad." It's an instructive analogy. GPS ankle bracelets are an alternative to confinement . If we can track you and detain you, we don't have to keep you locked up. The longer the leash, the greater your freedom. Third, the disabler industry says its technology "helps financially strapped customers change their ways for the better." Lavoie calls it "a behavior-modification method." Behavior modification? You're going to put a remote-controlled disabler in my car to make me a better person? |
+1 Pin Share 14 Shares Recently Xiaomi has launched MIUI 7 in India as well as in China. Now MIUI 7 is rolling out from August 24th for the most of the devices of Xiaomi. The user will be notified for the OTA update. MIUI 7 will roll out for Redmi 1S, Redmi 2, Mi 4i, Mi 3, Mi 4, Redmi Note 3G, Redmi Note 4G. According to the MIUI Forum The Mi Note Rom is still in beta version. So Xiaomi will release it officially when the Rom will be more stable. BEta users can test the MIUI7 Rom for Mi Note. MIUI 7 is a big change from MIUI 6 specially in performance, battery life. The UI is redesigned and added so many new features and themes to make it look far more better than MIUI 6. Now you can block notifications for special apps in the notification shade. The icons too have been redesigned. |
Pedestrians are struck by drivers in St. Paul roughly every other day on average, and the trend has drawn the notice of the disabilities community. Drivers who fail to stop for pedestrians in marked and unmarked St. Paul crosswalks can expect traffic citations. This year there are 60 enforcement events planned as part of the city’s 2017 “Stop for Me” campaign. Launched by St. Paul Smart Trips at select crossings, the public safety campaign grew to become a citywide effort during a heavy spate of pedestrian crashes last year and involves volunteers from community groups crossing busy streets under the supervision of St. Paul Police Department. St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman, St. Paul Police Chief Todd Axtell and Ramsey County Sheriff Jack Serier came together with disability advocates on Monday to emphasize that pedestrians in wheelchairs and walkers –much like the city’s growing senior population — may need extra time to cross. Mark Hughes said he has been hit twice by drivers while trying to cross busy St. Paul streets at crosswalks. “I can’t run and get out of the way,” said Hughes, who uses a wheelchair. “I can’t step up on the curb.” In the 1994 and 2003 incidents, he emerged unscathed. But his experience isn’t uncommon. Most of the members of the St. Paul Mayor’s Committee for People with Disabilities have similar stories to tell. Hughes, who co-chairs the committee, appears in a new public service announcement on the St. Paul Neighborhood Network cable access channel. The spot has also been converted for radio play. “I’ve had cars not stop before the first white line,” said Kari Sheldon, a Rice Street-area resident who uses a wheelchair and appears in the ads. “Sometimes I can’t cross because sometimes they can’t back up.” RAMSEY COUNTY JOINS EFFORTS In addition to the city’s “Stop for Me” effort, Ramsey County and St. Paul Police are launching a distracted driving and pedestrian safety enforcement wave that began Monday and runs through April 23. Funding from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration will pay overtime wages so deputies and officers can work extra shifts to focus on distracted driving and pedestrian safety. It’s illegal in Minnesota for drivers to read or compose text messages, send emails or take photos while in traffic, even when stopped at a stop light. Related Articles Minneapolis implements winter parking restrictions; St. Paul ‘monitoring’ conditions Ordway 2019-20 season has ‘The Color Purple,’ ‘Groundhog Day,’ ‘Once on This Island’ Highland Park Middle School online threat began with argument at school, police say Minnesota United will have company. Here’s what’s up with 5 tenants moving in near Allianz Field. Chai Lee, Kris Fredson among 17 members chosen for Met Council In 2016, 188 pedestrians were hit by drivers on St. Paul streets, and another 54 pedestrians have been struck in 2017, leading to 44 injuries this year. In late February, 35-year-old Scott Spoo was hit and killed crossing Mississippi River Boulevard. St. Paul Police Sgt. Jeremy Ellison, who coordinates the state’s “Toward Zero Deaths” grant for the department, said two-thirds of the city’s 60 “Stop for Me” enforcement events planned this year will take place at high volume roads like Rice Street, Arcade Street and University Avenue. The other third will take place in neighborhoods, including unmarked crosswalks. He said the events help train pedestrians as much as drivers. “We teach pedestrians to get one foot in the crosswalk, make eye contact, and make their intention that they want to cross the street clear,” Ellison said. The police department uses a cone planted by the side of the road to determine if a car has enough room to make a safe stop before reaching the crosswalk. On a 30 mile per hour road, for instance, the cone will be planted 193 feet from the crosswalk, or about two seconds away. If a car is already past the cone when the pedestrian steps into the street, “they won’t even get stopped,” Ellison said. “We’re not trying to be tricking people. If there’s another vehicle blocking their view, we’ll take that into account,” he said. “Research shows that receiving a citation is the best way to change driver behavior.” |
August 13, 2014 – How inept our CIA is. It’s pretty good at spying on us, but it can’t predict what the Islamic State, referred to as ISIS, is going to do. ISIS is a response to our government’s involvement in that country. Inadvertently, or perhaps purposely, we have been involved in the Middle East for too long. This has been going on a long time. And now Obama is sending the bombers back to kill people. What a tragedy we have precipitated, and for what? Much of this has been about oil. It’s hard to be non-interventionist when we created the problem. We took all that time to create a government, then ISIS comes along and it just melts away. The sooner we accept non-intervention, the better. After all, the ISIS fighters were funded by the US to fight Assad in Syria. What are your thoughts on our efforts to stop the Islamic State? Advertisements |
COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Researchers who are working to develop wearable electronics have reached a milestone: They are able to embroider circuits into fabric with 0.1 mm precision -- the perfect size to integrate electronic components such as sensors and computer memory devices into clothing. With this advance, the Ohio State University researchers have taken the next step toward the design of functional textiles -- clothes that gather, store, or transmit digital information. With further development, the technology could lead to shirts that act as antennas for your smart phone or tablet, workout clothes that monitor your fitness level, sports equipment that monitors athletes' performance, a bandage that tells your doctor how well the tissue beneath it is healing -- or even a flexible fabric cap that senses activity in the brain. That last item is one that John Volakis, director of the ElectroScience Laboratory at Ohio State, and research scientist Asimina Kiourti are investigating. The idea is to make brain implants, which are under development to treat conditions from epilepsy to addiction, more comfortable by eliminating the need for external wiring on the patient's body. "A revolution is happening in the textile industry," said Volakis, who is also the Roy & Lois Chope Chair Professor of Electrical Engineering at Ohio State. "We believe that functional textiles are an enabling technology for communications and sensing -- and one day even medical applications like imaging and health monitoring." Recently, he and Kiourti refined their patented fabrication method to create prototype wearables at a fraction of the cost and in half the time as they could only two years ago. With new patents pending, they published the new results in the journal IEEE Antennas and Wireless Propagation Letters. In Volakis' lab, the functional textiles, also called "e-textiles," are created in part on a typical tabletop sewing machine--the kind that fabric artisans and hobbyists might have at home. Like other modern sewing machines, it embroiders thread into fabric automatically based on a pattern loaded via a computer file. The researchers substitute the thread with fine silver metal wires that, once embroidered, feel the same as traditional thread to the touch. "We started with a technology that is very well known--machine embroidery--and we asked, how can we functionalize embroidered shapes? How do we make them transmit signals at useful frequencies, like for cell phones or health sensors?" Volakis said. "Now, for the first time, we've achieved the accuracy of printed metal circuit boards, so our new goal is to take advantage of the precision to incorporate receivers and other electronic components." The shape of the embroidery determines the frequency of operation of the antenna or circuit, explained Kiourti. The shape of one broadband antenna, for instance, consists of more than half a dozen interlocking geometric shapes, each a little bigger than a fingernail, that form an intricate circle a few inches across. Each piece of the circle transmits energy at a different frequency, so that they cover a broad spectrum of energies when working together--hence the "broadband" capability of the antenna for cell phone and internet access. "Shape determines function," she said. "And you never really know what shape you will need from one application to the next. So we wanted to have a technology that could embroider any shape for any application." The researchers' initial goal, Kiourti added, was just to increase the precision of the embroidery as much as possible, which necessitated working with fine silver wire. But that created a problem, in that fine wires couldn't provide as much surface conductivity as thick wires. So they had to find a way to work the fine thread into embroidery densities and shapes that would boost the surface conductivity and, thus, the antenna/sensor performance. Previously, the researchers had used silver-coated polymer thread with a 0.5-mm diameter, each thread made up of 600 even finer filaments twisted together. The new threads have a 0.1-mm diameter, made with only seven filaments. Each filament is copper at the center, enameled with pure silver. They purchase the wire by the spool at a cost of 3 cents per foot; Kiourti estimated that embroidering a single broadband antenna like the one mentioned above consumes about 10 feet of thread, for a material cost of around 30 cents per antenna. That's 24 times less expensive than when Volakis and Kiourti created similar antennas in 2014. In part, the cost savings comes from using less thread per embroidery. The researchers previously had to stack the thicker thread in two layers, one on top of the other, to make the antenna carry a strong enough electrical signal. But by refining the technique that she and Volakis developed, Kiourti was able to create the new, high-precision antennas in only one embroidered layer of the finer thread. So now the process takes half the time: only about 15 minutes for the broadband antenna mentioned above. She's also incorporated some techniques common to microelectronics manufacturing to add parts to embroidered antennas and circuits. One prototype antenna looks like a spiral and can be embroidered into clothing to improve cell phone signal reception. Another prototype, a stretchable antenna with an integrated RFID (radio-frequency identification) chip embedded in rubber, takes the applications for the technology beyond clothing. (The latter object was part of a study done for a tire manufacturer.) Yet another circuit resembles the Ohio State Block "O" logo, with non-conductive scarlet and gray thread embroidered among the silver wires "to demonstrate that e-textiles can be both decorative and functional," Kiourti said. They may be decorative, but the embroidered antennas and circuits actually work. Tests showed that an embroidered spiral antenna measuring approximately six inches across transmitted signals at frequencies of 1 to 5 GHz with near-perfect efficiency. The performance suggests that the spiral would be well-suited to broadband internet and cellular communication. In other words, the shirt on your back could help boost the reception of the smart phone or tablet that you're holding - or send signals to your devices with health or athletic performance data. The work fits well with Ohio State's role as a founding partner of the Advanced Functional Fabrics of America Institute, a national manufacturing resource center for industry and government. The new institute, which joins some 50 universities and industrial partners, was announced earlier this month by U.S. Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter. Syscom Advanced Materials in Columbus provided the threads used in Volakis and Kiourti's initial work. The finer threads used in this study were purchased from Swiss manufacturer Elektrisola. The research is funded by the National Science Foundation, and Ohio State will license the technology for further development. Until then, Volakis is making out a shopping list for the next phase of the project. "We want a bigger sewing machine," he said. ### Contact: John Volakis 614-292-5846 Volakis.1@osu.edu |
Looking for news you can trust? Subscribe to our free newsletters. If you have a good memory, you’ll remember that I’ve written before that the shale oil revolution might be a bit less revolutionary than we think. The reason is that shale oil wells decline really fast, which means that total production could top out at little more than 3-4 million barrels per day and start declining as soon as 2020. Only time will tell. Today brings similar news: the shale gas revolution might also be a bit less revolutionary than we think. A team at the University of Texas has spent the past three years in a minute examination of the four biggest shale gas plays in the US, and they’ve concluded that these fields probably contain less gas than previous estimates from the Energy Information Administration. Mason Inman explains in the current issue of Nature: The main difference between the Texas and EIA forecasts may come down to how fine-grained each assessment is. The EIA breaks up each shale play by county, calculating an average well productivity for that area….The Texas team, by contrast, splits each play into blocks of one square mile (2.6 square kilometres) — a resolution at least 20 times finer than the EIA’s. Resolution matters because each play has sweet spots that yield a lot of gas, and large areas where wells are less productive. Companies try to target the sweet spots first, so wells drilled in the future may be less productive than current ones….The high resolution of the Texas studies allows their model to distinguish the sweet spots from the marginal areas. As a result, says study co-leader Scott Tinker, a geoscientist at the University of Texas at Austin, “we’ve been able to say, better than in the past, what a future well would look like”. So what does this mean? The chart on the right tells the story. If the EIA is right, shale gas production in the Big Four fields will continue rising through 2025 before plateauing at around 300 billion cubic meters. But if the Texas team is right, production will peak in 2020 at around 250 bcm and then start declining rapidly. Obviously we don’t know if the Texas team’s methodology is more accurate than the EIA’s. As they say, more research is needed. For the moment, though, it’s worth keeping an even keel about both shale oil and shale gas. It’s possible that we’ve become a little too giddy about both. |
Every summer, my family and i rent a cottage (camp/cabin/lakehouse), and for the past few years we’ve stopped off at the Lick’s in Barrie on our trip home. Lick’s is a Canadian gourmet burger chain in decline. At its heyday, its flagship store in the Beaches, a wealthy Toronto neighbourhood, served up big, juicy and expensive “homeburgers” to large crowds of customers. The counter was packed with fairly cheery teens who sang from a list of scripted chants and cheers about fast food, many of which were patterned on 60’s doo-wop tunes. The beginning of the end, i think, was when i visited a Pickering location in the mid-90’s. i brought my friend there because i said it was a neat experience, and i really sold him on the fact that the staff sang your order. When we got there, the place was deserted. The fairly cheery teens behind the counter had been replaced with desperately displeased wage slaves, and when i asked why they weren’t singing, the surly kid who took my order said “we only sing when the franchise owner is around. Siddown and eat your burger.” Note: not a Lick’s employee, but the sentiment is the same. Tabling the Motion i regularly suffer from short term memory loss when it comes to bad restaurant experiences, so once or twice a year or so, i would return to Lick’s, including this most recent excursion coming home from the cottage. i politely asked the distinctly uncheery teen behind the counter if she could wipe down the filth-encrusted table by the window where my kids were sitting. She was right in the middle of the apparently more important task of binder-clipping paper liners to trays. At first, she passed the buck and asked one of her managers to clean the table (but he was up to his elbows flipping burgers, and peevishly deflected the duty right back at her). She then took 7 more cutsomers’ orders. i asked her two or three more times to clean the table. Fifteen minutes after i had made my initial request, she finally came out into the dining room to start cleaning tables … and began with not my table. You had one job. The grill crew wasn’t singing, the table was dirty, and the food was expensive and lousy. But it was the restaurant’s answer to the McDonald’s Happy Meal box to store my kids’ food that won the day. i saved it so that i could write this blog post three months later. Designers Work Free on Tuesdays The money that Lick’s saves in hiring its winning employees apparently extends even to its graphic design and marketing personnel. Whichever bright bulb had created the misspelled signs posted around the restaurant was likely behind this abomination, the Lick’s kids meal box: Lick’s – We’d like you to come up with some sort of fun mascot for the kids meal box – some laughy, daffy character that will really delight children and make them plead with their parents to bring them back to Lick’s so they can enjoy time together again. This character will imprint itself on our young customers’ minds, so that when they’re older, they’ll remember the joy they associated with going to Lick’s as a child, and they’ll want to return. Graphic Designer – You’re only paying me minimum wage. Lick’s – Fuck it. Just put a clown on the box. Ooh – and make it pose like a Playboy centrefold. Lick’s – Make it a fun-time, good-natured party clown who plays light-hearted pranks and rallies children to an enjoyable time at the restaurant? Graphic Designer – Minimum wage. Lick’s – Okay. Just use a clown from an early-90’s-era Microsoft Word clip art package. Graphic Designer – Should he be standing upright with his arms spread in jubilation? Lick’s – No. Make him hunched over like he’s masturbating in the shower. You want some Lick’s special Guk™ sauce on that? Lick’s – And we need games and puzzles on the box. Some fun activities that the kids can complete with crayons, to keep them busy while mom and dad enjoy their meal. Maybe even something educational? Can you come up with, maybe, some sort of word puzzle or spot-the-difference picture for the kids to enjoy? Graphic Designer – For $10.25 an hour? i still have a few assignments to complete for class tomorrow. Lick’s – Fine. Do your best. That oughta keep the little bastards busy for fifteen seconds. Lick’s – What else? Maybe you could put, like, a connect-the-dots puzzle on the box? Graphic Designer – I don’t know. I don’t really want to finish this project. I’m not into it. Lick’s – Come on. You’re almost done. Just do the connect-the-dots puzzle. Graphic Designer – I don’t know if I CAN. Can I level with you? I’ve been feeling really depressed lately. Lick’s – Just push past it. We need to finish this box. Graphic Designer – I mean REALLY depressed. Clinical, even. I feel like I can’t go on. Lick’s – Don’t do this. We need you to finish this box. Graphic Designer – I … I’ve even had thoughts of ending it all. I think I want to kill myself. Lick’s – JUST FINISH THE GOD-DAMNED CONNECT-THE-DOTS PUZZLE. Graphic Designer – OKAY, FINE!!! Lick’d The flagship Beaches Lick’s store has shut down in the wake of a condo development. They vowed to build a new location in October, but there’s no sign of it. After leaving the Barrie Lick’s disgusted with my experience, i wrote an angry complaint letter to head office. It’s been three months, and i haven’t heard back. |
Who doesn’t love getting flowers? Select silent movie stars, that’s who! Flowers are a great prop to illustrate romance and subtle seduction; a bit of an old hat, perhaps, but classic for a reason. However, that doesn’t always mean they’ll work as planned. Mack Sennett offers Mabel Normand a flower in Barney Oldfield’s Race for a Life and it’s on the stinky and/or dinky side. I would be remiss if I did not also call everybody’s attention to Mabel’s gloriously goofy flowered hat. Read my review here. Available on DVD. Rudolph Valentino is similarly unmoved by floral overtures in Son of the Sheik, in which he reject Vilma Banky’s love offering quite decisively. Read my review here. Available on DVD and Bluray. Not all flowers are unwelcome. Marion Davies certainly seems to be enjoying hers in The Patsy. Read my review here. Released on DVD. Anna Q. Nilsson has a more traditional reaction to flowers in Regeneration, Raoul Walsh’s 1915 gangster picture. She plays a socialite-turned-social worker who wins hearts in gangland. Read my review here. Available on DVD. Helen Gardner is even more enthusiastic in Cleopatra. She played Cleo, produced the picture and designed her own costumes, so something of a multi-tasker. Read my review here. Available on DVD. *** Like what you’re reading? Please consider sponsoring me on Patreon. All patrons will get early previews of upcoming features, exclusive polls and other goodies. Share the silent movie love! Twitter Google Tumblr Reddit More Pinterest Facebook Like this: Like Loading... |
If Obamacare's stated goal was to broaden the health insurance market, give more options to consumers, and generally lower the cost of health insurance, courtesy of the IRS' flawless execution of yet another unprecedented government expansion, it may be in for a tough time. Because while on paper every statist plan of centrally-planned ambitions looks good, in reality things usually don't work out quite as expected. Case in point the news that Aetna will stop selling health insurance to individual consumers in California at the end of 2013, in advance of Obamacare's complete transformation of the insurance market: a transformation which just incidentally may see most private health insurance firms follow in Aetna's steps and the emergence of a single-payer system along the lines of the British National Health Service. A government-mandated and funded system which, needless to say, crushes private enterprise, and ends up costing far more for all involved than an efficient market based on individual wants, needs and capabilities constantly in flux. But that's ok - there is an administration which is smarter than the entire market, and a Federal Reserve which will monetize any deficit funding, and the only trade off is making the already ridiculous US federal debt ridiculouser. For more irony we go to the WSJ which informs us that that "pullout is likely to draw attention as California has become a focus of national debate over the law's impact. Supporters, including President Barack Obama, who highlighted the state in a recent speech, argue that it has shown the success of the health overhaul in encouraging competition and pushing down prices." If in some parallel socialist universe, the exit of competitors ends up boosting competition, than yes, we agree. In this one, however, things are a little... different. For now, Aetna is just the start. A relatively small start: Aetna said it currently has about 49,000 individual policyholders in California. In 2011, when it had substantially bigger membership, it was the fourth-biggest player in the state's consumer market, with about 5.2% of the plans sold that year, according to a report from Citigroup Inc. Aetna isn't one of the 13 insurers participating in the state's new consumer insurance marketplace set to launch this fall under the federal law. Like several other major national carriers, it has said it would join only a limited number of these exchanges. A carrier can still offer consumer plans without being in the exchange. Aetna said it will continue selling health insurance in California to employers and Medicare beneficiaries, as well as dental and life-insurance products. The insurer said it is "fully committed to serving the needs of our 1.5 million members in the state." A company spokeswoman declined to comment about the reasons for Aetna's individual-business withdrawal. As long as those members aren't on individual insurance: those members will have to find a different provider of insurance. People who currently have Aetna individual health coverage will have to find plans with other carriers by year-end. That might be easier because of the federal health law's requirements that insurers no longer decline coverage or set premiums based on people's health history, but still, "it's going to be confusing" for Aetna policyholders, said Ken Fasola, chief executive of HealthMarkets Inc., parent of insurance agency Insphere Insurance Solutions. His firm plans to send written notice to affected clients, then follow up with calls and, if wanted, visits. Aetna is just the first to crunch the numbers and realize that one indeed has to pass a law first to find out how much money will be lost - by private companies - as a result. The health law is expected to expand the individual insurance business, but the new coverage rules will also mean major changes. Also, in the new exchanges, consumers are expected to focus closely on costs, particularly monthly premiums. Insurers may find it tough to compete if they don't have scale in a particular market, partly because they can't match the prices that competitors win from health-care providers. As for the "model" assumptions behind Obamacare, it is likely too late to clarify that one does not get strong competition in an artificial marketplace in which the service providers are dropping out one by one. The Obama administration has highlighted its expectation that the new health-insurance marketplaces will generally boast strong competition, with around 90% of consumers buying their own plans living in states where there would be products from at least five insurers. But in at least some places, the offerings will be limited. In Washington state, for instance, nine insurers bid to sell plans in the individual market but only one carrier, Kaiser Permanente, bid to sell a small-business plan through the exchange in some counties, forcing Washington officials to cancel plans to run a full small-business exchange for the first year. So instead of "strong competition" the end results was a government-enforced... monopoly. And guess who has all the pricing power in a monopoly. Oh well, such is life under "central-planning" - the end result is always complete disaster, but at least the intentions to promote "fairness" were quite noble. |
(CNN) More than a decade after it first launched, the comet-orbiting spacecraft Rosetta -- already seen as one of the great successes of space exploration -- will be given an extra lease on life. Rather than coming to a close in December as planned, its mission will be extended until the end of September 2016,the European Space Agency said in a statement Tuesday. At that point, the spacecraft will most likely be landed on the surface of Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, which it reached in August -- 10 years after it launched from Earth. Earlier this month, the solar-powered spacecraft delighted project scientists when it re-established contact with the Philae comet lander for the first time since it went into hibernation after running out of power seven months ago. This means Philae, on Comet 67P's surface, can continue with experiments up to and beyond the comet's closest approach to the sun in mid-August -- called perihelion. Philae is expected to run out of power for good in October, but the extension of Rosetta's mission means scientists can continue to observe the comet's progress as it loops away again from the sun. "This is fantastic news for science," Matt Taylor, the European Space Agency's Rosetta project scientist, is quoted as saying in a news release. "We'll be able to monitor the decline in the comet's activity as we move away from the sun again, and we'll have the opportunity to fly closer to the comet to continue collecting more unique data. By comparing detailed 'before and after' data, we'll have a much better understanding of how comets evolve during their lifetimes." Slow spiral to comet's surface By September next year, as the comet recedes ever farther from the sun, there will no longer be enough solar power to run Rosetta's set of scientific instrumentation efficiently, the space agency said. In June 2011, the spacecraft was put into hibernation for 31 months for the most distant leg of its journey out toward the orbit of Jupiter. But now, with too little fuel remaining to repeat that exercise, scientists instead propose sending it on a slow spiral down to the comet's surface. Before the potential touchdown, scientists will try to bring the spacecraft nearer to the comet -- a safer prospect as its activity wanes after perihelion -- for detailed observations that may make it possible definitively to spot Philae on the surface. Rosetta should be able to gather data all the way down to the comet's surface -- a journey that could take three months. But the orbiter's touchdown is likely to mark the end of its groundbreaking mission, the European Space Agency said. 'Quite amazing' Lander system engineer Laurence O'Rourke told CNN that the spacecraft's dwindling supply of propellant meant there was little alternative to ending Rosetta's mission in this way -- and that it would bring the spacecraft closer and closer to the regions where dust has been raised by perihelion. "What we are trying to do is achieve science, " he said. "The science to be achieved at 100 kilometers is entirely different to what can be achieved at 10 kilometers or 5 kilometers." That's not to say there won't be some regrets at Rosetta's demise among the scientists who've directed the spacecraft for so long. "It's a sad day but also to have achieved what we have achieved up to now already is quite amazing," said O'Rourke. "To know that we are going to be getting closer to a comet than we've ever got is also quite amazing. "The fact that we are doing another landing on a comet, not only from Philae but from another spacecraft, is amazing." Philae's bumpy landing Now it's back in touch, Philae can carry out a whole host of experiments intended to shed light on how comets behave as they approach the sun. JUST WATCHED A touchdown 10 years in the making Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH A touchdown 10 years in the making 01:48 It was originally hoped that after it landed in November, Philae would operate until March when the fierce heat of the sun would likely burn out its components. But in what now appears to be a happy accident, the probe, which is about the size of a washing machine, bounced across the comet's surface in the weak gravity after anchor devices failed, and it landed in a sheltered spot -- protecting it from the worst of the solar scorching. O'Rourke said there had been five connections with Philae since its first contact but that each had been too brief for much data to be downloaded. Project scientists are now working to adjust the orbiter's trajectory to enable connections ideally lasting an hour or more, he said. Meanwhile, the lander is working "very well," he said, adding that its internal temperature has increased and its secondary battery may be charging. The team hopes that by the time of perihelion Philae will be fully operational -- giving scientists a ringside seat as the comet reaches its closest point to the sun, with gas and dust explosions at their maximum. "It's going to be an adventure -- and a very nice one at that," said O'Rourke. The European Space Agency, which is leading a consortium that includes NASA to find out more about the composition of comets and how they interact with the sun, has already notched up some notable firsts with the project. It is the first time a mission has successfully orbited a comet, following it on its journey around the sun, and the first time a controlled landing has been made on a comet -- even though Philae encountered a bumpy ride. |
The Chinese-backed investment group that bought technology and assets from Sweden's Saab in 2012 now says it plans to build a $400 million factory and R&D unit for electric cars in Tianjin, northeast China. National Electric Vehicle Sweden (Nevs) held a launching ceremony on Sunday in the Tianjin Binhai Hi-Tech Industrial Development Area, which also happens to be one of the auto maker's new part owners. The other partner unveiled at the same time last month was Beijing State Research Information Technology Company (SRIT). “China is the world’s fastest growing market for electrical cars, but also the most competitive. We are likely to see closures and consolidations going forward,” the company’s CEO Mattias Bergman told me. “But there’s a gap in the market that we can fill.” Electric automobiles are an integral part of Beijing’s plan to reduce air pollution, which prematurely kills hundreds of thousands of citizens every year. Local mayors and provincial leaders are being encouraged to invest in environmentally friendly vehicles and infrastructure. "We have no monopoly just because Tianjin is a shareholder. We still have to make competitive cars," Bergman said. "But of course, it’s a great advantage to have Tianjin as an owner when they buy cars." Total investment for the new factory, with a total capacity of 200,000 cars a year, and the R&D center is estimated to $400 million, Bergman said, plus costs for product development and tools. However, it’s still unclear whether the company can still use the Saab brand name. Last year, Swedish defense group Saab AB revoked Nevs’ right to continue using the name after seeking bankruptcy protection. The auto making side of Saab's business had separated from its aerospace operations back in 1990. Meanwhile, Nevs is said to be developing a new brand for the Chinese market, Bergman said. China’s government has introduced a number of promotions to boost the sales of e-cars, such as tax exemptions and subsidies on vehicle purchases. The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said last week that production of new energy vehicles cars rose almost 300% in the first five months, compared to the same period last year. |
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.