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Webster Hall Is Returning With Its Old Grit (and New Bathrooms) When the doors open in April at the renovated Webster Hall the East Village club, once known as the Ritz, that was renowned for its mix of rock shows and raucous dance parties music fans will find a revamped entryway and lounge, new bathrooms and upgraded acoustics. But the most important change may simply be the arrival of an elevator. Webster Hall, housed in an 1886 building, part of which has been declared a landmark, is a rabbit warren of staircases and anterooms that surround a grand ballroom. But without an elevator, handicapped patrons had to be carried inside and loading equipment was a daily ordeal. "On a regular tour, whatever city they were in, they'd have two or four loaders," said Jim Glancy of the concert promotion company the Bowery Presents, which is one of the new owners. "At Webster Hall, the minimum would be 12 people." The new elevator is one of a number of subtle changes meant to bring the club, just off Union Square, up to contemporary standards, reintroducing it to fans and to an industry that has been hungry for a room of its size the ballroom holds 1,400 people in a central part of Manhattan. "This room has been needed we felt its absence," said Marty Diamond of Paradigm Talent Agency, who booked the club in its 1980s iteration as the Ritz. After an opening night in late April, to be announced, the initial lineup will include Patti Smith on May 1; the D.J. TroyBoi on May 3; Sharon Van Etten on May 4; Broken Social Scene on May 16 and 17; and MGMT from May 22 to 24. Webster Hall, long an independently owned space, was bought two years ago by BSE Global, the parent company of Barclays Center, and the Bowery Presents, which is partly owned by the concert giant AEG, for a price estimated at about 35 million. When the club shut down in August 2017 for renovations, there was an outcry from fans who worried that Webster Hall's history as a dance mecca and a center of gay night life in New York would be lost. The new owners say they are committed to preserving that tradition, but are still deciding how. "It was a very democratic club that was all about variety, and we intend to bring that variety back when we reopen," said Keith Sheldon, BSE Global's executive vice president of programming. Three doors were added to its entrance on East 11th Street a concession by the Landmarks Preservation Commission to get people in and out more quickly. On the first floor, the Marlin Room, a former venue within a venue, has been turned into a sleek lounge. Upstairs in the ballroom, acoustic treatments have been added to the walls and ceiling, and some remnants of the dance party past have been removed, like a monstrous lighting rig that John Moore, one of the Bowery Presents principals, likened to Battlestar Galactica. "It would come down, it would move around; it was very '80s," Mr. Moore said, adding that it would be replaced with a more conventional mirror ball. But much of the idiosyncratic grandeur of the room was untouched, like its scalloped balconies, Art Deco wall designs and, above the stage, an old canvas painting of falling balloons. "The vision has always been to maintain the soul, the grit, the history of the venue," said Brett Yormark, the chief executive of BSE Global. "For fans, they are going to feel like they're coming home again." The preserved details are reminders of the remarkable history of Webster Hall, which started as a community social club but, by Prohibition, became known for wild parties. In 1953, it was bought by RCA, which used it as a recording studio for Harry Belafonte, Perry Como and classical giants like Sviatoslav Richter. When the Ritz opened in 1980, it became a center for new wave music, hosting the American debuts of bands like U2 and Depeche Mode. In 1989, the Ritz moved to the former Studio 54 space on West 54th Street, and in 1992, under the new ownership of the Ballinger family, Webster Hall reopened as a club under its own name. When the new partners bought the club, Jay Marciano, the chairman of AEG Presents, the company's music division, said he expected renovations to cost 10 million. In an interview this week, he laughed at that estimate. "I won't give a specific number, but it was a multiple of that," Mr. Marciano said. "Nothing gets done cheaply in New York City."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Music
SHIVERING in the chilly nighttime desert air of Chile in late 2010, I was among the throng of reporters and locals who felt relief and elation as the Phoenix capsule lifted the first of the 33 trapped miners to safety. The two month long saga was a roller coaster of raw and elemental emotions hope, fear, courage and ingenuity to overcome the cruel dangers of sending men to work nearly a half mile underground. With my foreign posting over, I've recently returned to New York to cover high end real estate. And although no lives are at stake (that I know of, anyway), it is a world where the emotions of buyers, sellers and brokers can seem just as raw. How else to explain the juggernaut of reality TV shows about high end brokers, whose lives will be on full display next month in a third show? The newest, Bravo's "Million Dollar Listing New York," chronicles three high end brokers in Manhattan. The original "Million Dollar Listing," which follows the lives of three agents in Los Angeles, is entering its fifth season. It averaged 1.2 million viewers a week last year, its highest rated season, and is now licensed in 150 countries. There's also "Selling New York," the HGTV series that follows agents from three real estate companies, now in its fourth season. I was in my teens when "Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous" made its host, Robin Leach, a household name. The "Million Dollar Listing" shows give viewers the same voyeuristic pleasure of peeking inside spectacular homes and letting them imagine, "What if that were me?" But there is something more emotionally charged about the buying and selling of real estate especially in the stratospherically priced Manhattan market that goes far beyond simple video tours of palatial homes. The heat of the deal can bring out the worst in people. And compared with a lot of the reality shows that feel less than real, the sight of people digging in their heels on deals can often make for don't touch that remote television. "We are so emotionally invested in our homes that to show the looking and the actual negotiating and transaction process felt like you were sort of digging into a vein," said Shari Levine, the senior vice president for production at Bravo. In Episode 2, Mr. Eklund reaches an impasse with a client when she stubbornly refuses to drop the price of her converted textile factory to under 7 million. "It is worth that and every penny more because of the detail that we have put into this," she says. "I am not being thick headed." Another agent, Michael Lorber of Prudential Douglas Elliman, loses a deal for an eager Newport socialite when he waits too long over the weekend to submit her offer. She is shaking and visibly upset with him. The show's third broker, Ryan Serhant of Nest Seekers, charms an Asian heiress into hiring a professional organizer to deal with a bedroom stuffed with 800 pairs of shoes and dozens of high priced jackets and gowns (the room is locked so that only she can enter by using a thumb print entry pad). She is crestfallen when he explains that buyers are unimpressed by the white Carrera marble and hidden plasma television, and that the price needs to be dropped from the original 4.4 million listing. In a later episode, Mr. Serhant told me, he copes with a buyer looking for a home for him and his pet wallaby. "Some people might think that was too weird," Mr. Serhant said. "But I strapped that wallaby to my chest and figured out how I could make it work." Bravo's production team searched high and low and found three agents who are young, single and all seemingly on the rise (certainly they will be after their star turns). Mr. Eklund is a 34 year old Swede who starred as Tag Eriksson in gay adult films back home before becoming an agent. On the show he calls himself "the closer, and the listing machine." He has a friendly rivalry with Mr. Serhant, a former hand model and short lived soap star whose character on "As the World Turns" was a biochemist gone bad. They are tall, perfectly groomed and dressed in pricey tailored suits, and there are plenty of shirtless scenes where Mr. Eklund and Mr. Serhant show off their lean bodies. They lead a fast paced life. Mr. Eklund and Mr. Serhant are up at 5 a.m. and in the gym by 5:30. Mr. Eklund can't put down his BlackBerry, even in the whirlpool. None Testing the Limits: Only three of New York's 25 tallest residential buildings have completed safety tasks required by the city. The Downside to Life in a Supertall: 432 Park faces some significant design problems, and other luxury high rises may share its fate. Luxury Developers' Loophole: Soaring towers are able to push high into the sky because of a loophole in the city's labyrinthine zoning laws. An Evolving Skyline: The high rise building boom has transformed the city's skyline in recent years. Its impact will echo for years to come. Hidden Feats: Our critic looks at some supertall N.Y.C. buildings and how the ingenuity of engineers helped build landmarks. Mr. Serhant shaves his arms in the shower and brags about a recent conquest to his unimpressed female assistant. "I have very little time," he tells one blonde date, "so the drunker I get you the faster, the better it is for me and you and the end game." She smiles and stirs her martini. There are confrontations, like when Mr. Eklund tries to steal a potential client from Mr. Serhant at a restaurant. Mr. Serhant snipes that Mr. Eklund "has done gay porn." The woman, unfazed, says she is impressed by Mr. Serhant's claim that he did 100 million in sales in a year. "Oh really? I did a billion," Mr. Eklund fires back. There are moments intended to balance the ruthless dealmaking. The camera crew followed Mr. Eklund to Stockholm, where he owns a real estate agency. He gives his mother money and his father tells his son he needs more life balance. Mr. Lorber searches for ways to earn the respect of his powerful father, who is also his boss. Compared to the other two agents, he is refreshingly nerdy, accumulating inane factoids like the importance of white marble in Namibian culture. He gets Botox injections in his armpits to treat his excessive sweating.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Real Estate
The word "evil" gets thrown around a lot in reference to Roy Cohn, the notoriously rapacious lawyer and "fixer" whose client list included Joseph McCarthy, several mafia bosses and New York elites like George Steinbrenner and Donald Trump, a Cohn protege. And it comes up often in the new HBO documentary "Bully. Coward. Victim. The Story of Roy Cohn," debuting Thursday, a profile that weighs his influence and legacy against the contradictory details of his private life. If anyone is entitled to use the word, it's the film's director, Ivy Meeropol. As a young attorney in 1951, Cohn pushed for the execution of Meeropol's grandparents Julius and Ethel Rosenberg on espionage charges. Key to the prosecution's case was testimony by Ethel's brother, David Greenglass, who claimed that the Rosenbergs had passed atomic secrets to the Soviet Union. Greenglass later confessed to lying under oath, but Cohn never wavered in his pride over the verdict, despite evidence of legal improprieties. (Evidence made public in the decades after the execution appeared to confirm that Julius Rosenberg was a spy, which Meeropol's film acknowledges, and that Ethel, while aware of her husband's espionage, was not involved.) Meeropol had wrestled with her grandparents's story before in her debut film, "Heir to an Execution" (2004), but here the Rosenbergs are only a piece of a much larger puzzle. Meeropol's documentary attempts to understand a lawyer who gamed the system on behalf of powerful, often arch conservative figures but who lived as a closeted gay man, publicly denying his AIDS diagnosis until the day he died from AIDS related complications in 1986. "It's not like Roy Cohn just comes up from hell and is this evil being, and that's how he's able to operate," Meeropol said by phone on Monday. "It's like saying that Trump is just so evil and then if we get rid of him, everything will be fine. We know that's not true." Throughout the documentary, Meeropol intersperses footage from the 2018 Broadway revival of Tony Kushner's "Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes," which has Nathan Lane playing Cohn as a frail and rage filled power broker haunted by Ethel Rosenberg's ghost. In a brief phone interview, Kushner said he considered it his job as a playwright "to understand why people do the things they do and how they see themselves and how they explain themselves to themselves." But Kushner, who offers commentary in the film, draws a sharp distinction between Cohn and his most notable client. "I feel strongly that Roy Cohn is an infinitely more interesting human being than Donald Trump," Kushner said. Trump's "vocabulary, his repertoire and his worldview," he added, "is shockingly constricted and impoverished." The connection between Cohn and Trump and Cohn ism and Trump ism is a running theme in "Bully. Coward. Victim.," which doesn't divorce them from the corruption and hypocrisy of the New York City ecosystem in which they thrived. Speaking from her father's home in Cold Spring, N.Y., Meeropol talked about why she returned to this painful chapter in her family history, how Cohn could be called a "victim" and what can be done to keep more Roy Cohns from gaining power. These are edited excerpts from the conversation. What inspired you to return to your grandparents' story now and consider Roy Cohn through a broader lens? The simple answer is Donald Trump. I did not relish returning to my family story, and in fact I never thought I would. Maybe in some other form, but not in a documentary. I really thought after "Heir to an Execution," that was it. That film took almost five years of buildup and then production and then a whole year of my life, and it was an exhausting and emotionally draining process. I always felt that Roy Cohn was a very interesting figure to look at and would make a great film subject. I really hoped that someone else would do it. He's such a rich and important and complex subject and it just didn't happen, except for fictional narrative treatments of him. So after Trump was elected, I felt that it was something I had to do. It was that similar feeling I had when I embarked on "Heir to an Execution." I felt compelled. You're obviously so close to this story. Was journalistic objectivity important to you going in? To what extent did you feel like it was even possible to get any distance from him? I was absolutely focused on having journalistic integrity in this film, of course, and I had to actively work against my own preconceived notions and feelings about Cohn. I did a similar thing when I made a film about Indian Point, the nuclear power plant north of New York City where I grew up. I try in everything I do to work against those feelings, and this one was particularly hard. I knew right off the bat that I did not want this to be what many people would assume it would be, like a Rosenberg revenge film. And there's certainly some element of wanting to expose Cohn. But it was more in the service of wanting to expose where we are now and understand more about how Donald Trump and Cohn operated similarly. What compelled you to try to understand Cohn's humanity as much as you do here? I was always fascinated by the fact that he was gay and that he lived, on one hand, so deeply in the closet, but also so openly in a way, too. He was able to amass this kind of power and scare people enough, I think, and have people in his debt so much that he could behave in a way where he's just very open without fear of being exposed. I found it poignant to see how different he looked in those photos of Cohn vacationing in Provincetown as compared to how he looked so miserable in other contexts . And people say, like, "He looks like he's just so unhappy." Right? But then you see the photos in Provincetown and you hear the stories of how he lived there, and he looked happy and he looked more relaxed. And it's painful but important for us to recognize that yes, he did it to himself in some ways, and he made choices, but I know how hard it was to be openly gay at the time. In an interview you gave years ago, you talked about "Angels in America" as a play about forgiveness and how that wasn't easy for you or your family. Where do you stand on that now? Let's put it this way: I don't even know if I would say any more that the message of "Angels in America" is that you forgive Roy Cohn. You don't have to forgive someone, but you can try to understand. You can still hold both feelings. You can empathize with how they became who they are or what they had to suffer through so that the rest of us can grow. We can understand and change things. I don't want anyone to have to live in the closet and be ashamed and terrified that they're going to be found out for being gay. So if understanding what Roy Cohn had to go through helps that greater process of overcoming all that, that's great. But that doesn't mean I forgive him. Cohn's patch on the AIDS Memorial Quilt informs the title and the film's vision of him. The "bully" and "coward" parts are well understood. But in what ways was he a victim? I think anyone who has to suffer in the closet the way he did or the way anybody has to is a victim. He's certainly a victim because he died of AIDS. And I think he's a victim of his own ideas of what it meant to be a man and what it meant to be tough. But taking that title also has to do with my own coming to terms with him and the moment that I learned for the first time that the guy who had pushed for the execution of my grandparents was also gay and had died of AIDS. So it's a nod to that moment in my life. But there's something bigger at work here. I want people to see him as this horrific example of a person who helped shape the person in the White House, who I feel is also so destructive and dangerous and hateful. It doesn't serve us. We're not going to learn anything or get past it if we just think of these people as coming out of nowhere as fully formed evildoers who were just dropped into our society to do harm. So it's not forgiveness. It's more like recognition and not letting society off the hook. How do you build a justice system or even a social system to keep more Roy Cohn types from thriving? What have we learned from four years under a Cohn protege? Going back to McCarthy, Communist Russia wasn't necessarily planning to overthrow our country and take over. What he and Cohn were talking about is the threat to their way of life. A threat to their ability to amass incredible amounts of wealth, and undermine the rest of society's ability to thrive and prosper. Because it works against our own interests. The way to avoid having more Cohns and more Trumps is if we look at our history and look at what actually is happening and the disconnect between the language that's used and the promises that are made, and the actual policies. This film is not a profile of Roy Cohn in an exclusive sense. It's about a whole system. Has Cohn become a convenient scapegoat for the New York power elites, celebrities of his day? If there were no Roy Cohn would we have had to invent him? I think the problem is that so many of the elite and Frank Rich covered this in his New York magazine cover story about Cohn are people who you would think would have run the other way from Cohn, but they were his colleagues, his friends, and his clients. They worked with him, supported him, went to his parties. Like Andy Warhol. So I think that idea that now to say, "Oh, well, he was so bad," is a way of distancing themselves from any participation in the larger and the greater problems, the structural problems. There's a photo of Senator Schumer in the film. You see him in a tux at a Cohn party. Cohn was a lifelong Democrat. Judge Irving Kaufman of the Rosenberg trial was a Democrat. It's not Republican versus Democrat. It's bigger than that. It's a systemic problem that we're facing. And I think that we have to remember if you have the power and the money, you are going to do whatever you can to hang on to it. Cohn was just more ruthless about that.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Television
Do You Need to Work to Recover From an Injury? Welcome to the Running newsletter! Every Saturday morning, we email runners with news, advice and some motivation to help you get up and running. Sign up here to get it in your inbox. opens her new book, "Good to Go: What the Athlete in All of Us Can Learn from the Strange Science of Recovery," with the fact that the word "recovery" has gone from a noun to a verb. I was floored. It so perfectly captured not only what has been pitched to me for years as all the ways that runners can actively make their bodies heal from long workouts, but also the unsolicited advice I've been getting on how to help my stress fracture heal faster. I recently chatted with Ms. Aschwanden about the meaning of recovery, the placebo effect, compression socks, and the weirdest thing she did while researching her book. Who ever thought someone would try to turn the pain of stepping on a Lego brick into a form of recovery? Answers have been lightly edited. JAM: How did the word "recovery" become a verb? CA: I was a pretty serious elite athlete back in the '90s and early 2000s. Then, recovery was the state of being that you hoped to attain. Now it's something that people feel like they have to actively do. We've let go of this idea that we just wait for recovery. It's no longer the waiting period between workouts. There's a sense that if you're waiting, you're not trying hard enough. Underlying all of this is the idea that there's this optimal you waiting to come out, and there's one weird trick to be that way. This whole recovery industry really capitalizes on that. JAM: I've been getting a lot of suggestions on how I can make my stress fracture heal faster when I'm pretty sure the thing it needs most is rest. CA: There's an unwillingness to accept that some of this stuff takes time, and some of this is stuff that can't necessarily be expedited. It's like taking a cold remedy. By the time that you take it, you've hit the maximum, most miserableness of that cold. You're not going to get any worse, but something seems like it makes you feel better when it's really just the natural course of things that's making you well. So many of these recovery modalities I looked into were very much like that. JAM: You make a case that the placebo effect isn't necessarily a bad thing. CA: I like to think of this as the "expectation effect." If you expect to feel less sore, then you probably will feel less sore. I think that we too often dismiss placebo as being all in your head, but your head is an important part of your body, and your perceptions are an important part of how these things feel. If you are doing something and you expect it to make you feel more recovered, you probably will. And that's O.K. in most cases, as long as you're not throwing away tons of money on it.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Well
El Espace is a column dedicated to news and culture relevant to Latinx communities. Expect politics, arts, analysis, personal essays and more. ?Lo mejor? It'll be in Spanish and English, so you can forward it to your tia, your primo Lalo or anyone else (read: everyone). "I feel like La Virgen de Guadalupe is my drag mom," said Valentina, the 27 year old Latinx queen of Season 9 of "RuPaul's Drag Race," before kissing a botanica candle dedicated to the Mexican patron saint. This was one of the many moments in which she invoked her Mexican heritage on the show, sprinkling references to Maria Felix, mariachis and Catholic bodas throughout the season. Valentina's longevity in the competition made her a Latinx fan favorite (she's not the first Latinx queen to compete, but she had one of the most successful runs on the show), and many were disappointed to see her eliminated after she forgot the words during a lip sync battle. But good news! She's back this time, in the next season of "RuPaul's Drag Race All Stars," which premieres Dec. 14 on VH1. The performer, whose real name is James Leyva, also landed the role of Angel in "Rent: Live," which will air on Fox on Jan. 27. During a rehearsal break, she talked with me about the challenges of being a Latinx drag queen, the "real tea" behind her elimination and the energy she brought to "All Stars." This interview has been edited and condensed. How did you get started in drag? I've always kind of been doing drag. When I was little and I would be taking a bath, I would drape the towel over my body in ways that played with gender without me really knowing it making it a gown or a train or a hat or a shoulder piece or a cape. In college, I started to study dance, music and theater, and play with makeup. Then, having watched "Drag Race" and really loving the idea of putting an outfit together, thrift store shopping, getting a wig and thinking of a drag name got me really excited about it. Before my "Drag Race" season, I had been doing drag for roughly a year. Were your parents supportive? I feel like there's still a lot of stigma in the Latin American community when it comes to drag or men taking on traditionally feminine traits. I do remember my dad correcting my feminine behavior, whether it be too emotional or too soft or just too flamboyant. When I finally decided to come out, it was a shock to my parents that I was gay, which is really odd to me, because I was studying the performing arts, and when I was in middle school I loved Britney Spears. I loved watching telenovelas with my babysitters. I loved glamour, and I would always hang out with my mom when she was getting ready. They've come around, but it took some time. Sometimes we want to have the support of our parents right away, but for someone like me, who is Chicano, first generation, we have to have patience with our parents. Sometimes they are coming from really closed minded religious backgrounds or from a different country with laws that didn't protect them. We have to not be so judgmental. Sometimes it takes them a while to turn around and see the bigger picture: that we are happy, that we are deserving of love, that we are just like anybody else. Last year, a lot of fans were disappointed by your elimination. You were doing really well and were a favorite to win. But then during a lip sync for your life, you forgot the words. What happened there? And what did you learn from that experience? There is this notion like "Maybe she refused to learn it," or "She was lazy," or "She didn't care," but no. It was some other song, and then it was switched the day before. That night, I had to go home and memorize Ariana Grande's "Greedy." I didn't have the lyrics sheet with me, so I had to learn it by ear, and write down the lyrics as I went. I stayed up until like 3:30, and I had to be up at 6. I tried to learn the song. Before I went to sleep, I knew the song. By the time I woke up, I didn't know the song. People don't acknowledge the fact that we are busy working the entire time. We are not just sitting there learning songs in our free time, because there is no free time. And so by the time it came time to perform, I was in such a state of shock and I freaked out. That is the real tea! It was very difficult for me to process all that at the time. But once I calmed down, I was able to realize that all of the drama and all of my trauma aside, this is an iconic moment in reality TV. People are going to remember me for that and good. It's a problem when they don't remember you, baby. You made it a point during your season to showcase your Mexican heritage. Should we expect the same during "All Stars"? I can never deny my culture. Even if I give you a simple black dress with some simple hair, I am imagining Maria Felix walking down a long hallway in my mind. On my season, I made it a plot to reference things that maybe people didn't know. I was name dropping people and things that I found so beautiful, like Mariachi Plaza in Los Angeles and Maria Felix and the bridal look with my mom. My upbringing, coming from a Latin family and being first generation that is a really big part of everything. I just got to work with the Latina goddess, my childhood icon, Thalia, who I grew up watching on "Marimar" and "Maria Mercedes" and "Maria la del Barrio" and "Rosalinda." I worked with Gloria Trevi. These are people I grew up idolizing. It is such a blessing, because what I am aiming for with my art is to be part of Latin excellence. The reason I am coming back for "All Stars" is for my fans. Because they missed me, and they wanted to see me. They want a brown person to go in, and they want them to take the crown, and they want to feel applauded and not dragged down like we've been politically. They want to feel proud and happy and glamorous and beautiful and free. I want to give that to them, and I hope they know that when I do this, it is for them. Here are more stories to read this week. In Alfonso Cuaron's new film, "Roma," he tells the story of his upbringing in Mexico through the eyes of the domestic worker who raised him. The "Gravity" director said he wanted to make "a kind of spiritual X ray of my family, with its wounds and its sores." Our critic A.O. Scott wrote that Yalitza Aparicio, who plays the domestic worker in the film, is "perhaps the screen discovery of 2018." A couple of weeks ago, the Times published an investigation into T.M. Landry, a private school in a small town in Louisiana whose administrators doctored college applications and lied about students' hardships to get them into college. It was a disturbing story that showed the ways in which racial stereotypes influence college admissions and how pervasive the idea of survivorship bias, or the tendency to focus on successful outliers, is. The deception took a toll on the students. Casey Gerald, whose lyric memoir "There Will Be No Miracles Here" traces his journey from an underprivileged upbringing to the Ivy League, wrote about how people like him (and me, and many of my friends) who "made it" become human collateral in the myth of American meritocracy. "We 'success stories' are driven from elementary school on to be perfect. To ignore whatever hardships we've endured, whatever loneliness or pain we feel in the new worlds we're sent off to," he wrote. "It's time to break the silence." Do you have suggestions for El Espace? Want to receive it as a newsletter? Let me know: elespace nytimes.com	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Style
's intimate and affecting new novel, "One Part Woman," takes place in a small village in India during the colonial era, at a time of tremendous stigma against childlessness. For years, Kali and Ponna have been trying, unsuccessfully, to have a baby. As a result, Kali is regularly subjected to jokes about his supposed impotence while Ponna is ostracized from some of the village's social events. After consulting with astrologers and holy men, they are told there is a curse on Kali's lineage. They perform elaborate rituals in the temples of different deities, hoping for a miracle each time. Yet each time they are disappointed: "Their hearts swung between faith and resignation." The plot of "One Part Woman" doesn't move forward so much as circle around. Although readers learn from the outset that Kali and Ponna have been childless for 12 years, Murugan introduces numerous flashbacks that chronicle the couple's increasingly desperate efforts, a narrative technique that produces rising suspense. Hope arrives, as it often will, in an unlikely form. After conferring with each other, Kali's mother and mother in law suggest that Ponna visit the festival of Maadhorubaagan, a deity who has given the left part of his body to his female consort, thus becoming the "one part woman" of the title. What makes this particular festival unusual is that on its 18th night a carnival takes place in which consensual sex between men and women is permitted: "All rules were relaxed," Murugan writes. "The night bore witness to that." Tradition forbids unmarried women from attending, but older and childless women are allowed to enjoy sex with any consenting man, who is considered, for the duration of that night, a god. The transgressive nature of the sexual act, Kali's mother assures him, isn't a problem. "Who knows which god comes with what face? It is in the nature of gods not to reveal their faces."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Books
As Netflix lures top producers like Ryan Murphy, cable viewers and not the cord cutters are the ones missing out, more and more, on television's biggest shows. Each Friday, Farhad Manjoo, technology columnist at The New York Times, reviews the week's news, offering analysis and maybe a joke or two about the most important developments in the tech industry. Want this newsletter in your inbox? Sign up here. Netflix's big deal and the end of cable Netflix signed Ryan Murphy, the hitmaking producer behind "Glee" and the "American Crime Story" and "American Horror Story" anthology series, to a huge deal. An absolutely gigantic one, to be exact roughly 300 million over five years, besting even the 100 million deal that Netflix made with Shonda Rhimes last year. Also, YouTube announced an expansion of its streaming TV service, adding several networks from Turner networks but also increasing its price. Now you can get its full lineup of channels streamed online for 40 per month, up from 35; that brings it to price parity with other streaming TV services, including Hulu's. All this got me wondering: What's the point of cable TV anymore? For a time, cutting the cord was one of those hipster affectations that came with sacrifices. A kind of asceticism was implied in the name. The cord, the familiar cable bundle of yore, required paying a whole lot for a bunch of bad TV you'd never watch, just so you could have very convenient access to the handful of shows you sometimes did watch. Then along came DVDs and the internet, and now you could unbundle you'd pay a lot less for just the things you really wanted to see, provided you were O.K. hazarding some minor inconveniences. But as Netflix keeps driving trucks of money to TV's top producers it plans to spend 8 billion on new content this year the script has flipped. More and more, it's the people who haven't cut the cord who are missing out. Today, if you subscribe just to regular TV and don't bother with Netflix, Amazon, Hulu and other online services, you're missing some of TV's biggest and most acclaimed shows. Plus, you're paying more. Cable subscriptions have been declining for years, and last year the decline accelerated. But the YouTube expansion shows that cutting the cord keeps getting easier, and the Netflix deal shows how non cable services keep getting more attractive. This suggests an even faster pace of decline for cable. The bottom is going to fall out of the market, probably very soon. Google argues that over all, the internet ad business has been great for the economy and society, but that a few bad apples are ruining it all. Google, then, wants to "maintain a balance," because "if left unchecked, disruptive ads have the potential to derail the entire system," the company said in a blog post this week. (In a recent column, I took a different view, arguing that the digital ad business is at the root of most of the internet's problems.) So Google's new ad blocker is designed to block some ads, not all of them. The software will eliminate a dozen types of ads that the company deems intrusive or disruptive. But most ads, including most from Google, would skate through just fine. But how does Google decide which ads are too disruptive? The company says it relied on input from an ad industry group, the Coalition for Better Ads. But as the The Wall Street Journal reported, the group's membership and its research were heavily influenced by Google. This has led to recriminations in the industry, with rivals charging that Google is using the veil of self regulation to diminish its competitors. It's an interesting fight, but it may also be an irrelevant one. What's unclear is whether Google's limited ad blocker will stem the rising popularity of more restrictive ad blockers. For many people who hate online ads, it could already be too late for half measures. Which tech stories would you like to read? The New York Times's tech reporting team is gathering in San Francisco this week for a team building offsite. I'm looking forward to forgetting to catch Mike Isaac in a trust fall. We'll also be talking about some of the major themes we're aiming to cover in the tech world this year artificial intelligence, crypto and the responsibility of tech companies, for example. But enough about us. What would you like to read more about? Which technologies, people and ideas in the tech world do you think deserve more scrutiny, investigation or wider notice? Send your thoughts but, please, not pitches for your company to bits newsletter nytimes.com. Farhad Manjoo writes a weekly technology column called State of the Art. You can follow him on Twitter here: fmanjoo.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Technology
STRATFORD UPON AVON, England Have you ever wanted to step into the shoes of a great Shakespearean actor? Over the weekend, shoppers here in Shakespeare's birthplace, which is also the home of the Royal Shakespeare Company, had a chance to walk away with a piece of theatrical history, as the legendary company held a sale of 15,000 costumes and other items. By the time the sale opened at 9 a.m. Saturday, a line snaked down the street; the first fans had arrived at 5 p.m. the previous day, camping out to secure a spot. Such patience was rewarded, and customers emerged clutching treasures, from the sublime period ball gowns, lace ruffs, fairy wings to the ridiculous gold lame lion tails and grotesque pig suits. The Royal Shakespeare Company has the largest costume department in British theater, and it employs 30 members of staff, including experts in armor and millinery. The sale was raising money for the company's Stitch in Time campaign, to renovate its costume workshop and to finance specialist apprenticeships. Around a third of its stock items too worn or too specific to be reused was on sale at bargain prices: from 50 pence, or 67 cents, for a fan to 30 pounds, or roughly 40, for a velvet cloak. The life span of Royal Shakespeare Company costumes, recycled across productions and for up to 100 performances, is among what makes them special, and every item has a sewn in label identifying the actor who wore it last, and in which show. Beady eyed rummagers could pick up Anita Dobson's grubby underskirt from "The Merry Wives of Windsor," or Joanna Vanderham's silver gown from "Othello." One happy shopper claimed to have found a dress worn by Jane Asher. It can be bittersweet, however. "What makes this so emotional for someone like me I put on my first R.S.C. costume in 1966 are the name tags," said the British actor Patrick Stewart, who fronted the Stitch in Time campaign. "I already found one item worn by a dear friend of mine, long gone." Indeed, among the armor, I came across a breastplate with "Tim Pigott Smith" written on a label; the British actor died in April. Even stars of Mr. Stewart's caliber are not immune to feeling awe when taking on the mantle (at times literally) of acting giants. "I was once given a jacket which I did not really like," Mr. Stewart said, adding that he had then seen from the label that it had been worn by Paul Scofield, a British actor who died in 2008. "So of course I wore it," he said. "Although it had to be cut down, because Paul was a much taller actor than I was, in every sense." Performers often highlight how vital costumes are, and by trying on a vast crinoline (used in the "Tempest") and an absurdly heavy cloak ("Henry VIII"), I can understand why: They completely change the way you move and hold yourself. "There were times when the costume had a significant impact on the work I would do on that character," Mr. Stewart said, recalling the transformative effect of a luxurious pale gray three piece suit worn for a modern dress "Merchant of Venice" in 2011 "which I should have stolen because it fitted me so well." I unearthed a kitsch, frothy wedding dress from the same production, worn by Susannah Fielding as Portia. Indeed, a whole rail of wedding dresses were available to make wedding days extra special once they've had a good clean, at least. Outside, members of the public emerged enchanted with their hauls. Jenkin Van Zyl, whose parents drove up from London so that he could fill their car, went on quite a spree: "I only wear theater costumes," he said. "So I just came to top up, but I didn't realize how cheap and amazing the sale was going to be. I spent PS800." Shelley Bolderson from Cambridge, England, also wears costumes in her daily life. She said she had been delighted to find a coat made from pages of a book, created for the dancing satyrs in the 2009 production of "The Winter's Tale." "I just hope it won't dissolve in the rain," she said. The sale is also a godsend for amateur theater groups. Miriam Davies, from Stamford, England, is a costume designer for a company specializing in Shakespeare. "You can't really miss something like this," she said. "Having R.S.C. costumes is a special thing it's history."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Theater
After clustering around 57th Street for the last several years, super tall condominiums, which are coveted by buyers for their views and scorned by some others for their bulk, are turning up in other neighborhoods. Among the latest is 180 East 88th Street, a 48 unit high rise on the Upper East Side built by DDG and Global Holdings that will stretch to 521 feet. While that elevation is dwarfed by buildings that soar beyond 1,000 feet along the so called Billionaires' Row around 57th Street, it is significant in an area where only about three dozen buildings are 400 feet or higher, according to the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat, a group that certifies building heights. "The height is a major selling point, because it offers 360 degree views that are mostly unobstructed," said Joseph A. McMillan Jr., DDG's chief executive. Still, "this was not about building the tallest building we could possibly build," said Mr. McMillan, adding that zoning at its site at Third Avenue would have permitted a larger tower, possibly by up to 100 more feet. "This is about building the best tower we can build in this location." Ignoring the trend toward glassy exteriors, DDG has opted for a facade of Kolumba bricks, which are longer and thinner than the standard ones, and in this case, have a bluish gray hue. The condo will require 593,987 of them, the developers said. The lobby is also unusual. Wishbone shaped arches, inspired by the Spanish architect Antoni Gaudi, swoop from floor to ceiling. Similar arches also ring a "sky garden" on the 13th and 14th levels, and a duplex penthouse at the top of the tower is framed by them as well. Amenities are mostly spread across six contiguous floors, starting at the second floor, which includes a half basketball court, playrooms for children, and a wine room, where bottles can be stored. No. 180 will have higher than average prices for a condo, but does not compete with some of the pricier buildings at the high end. Two bedrooms start at 3.2 million, three bedrooms at 4.7 million and four bedrooms at 6.6 million; average asking prices are 3,000 a square foot, Mr. McMillan said. The Corcoran Sunshine Marketing Group is handling sales at the building, whose sales office is expected to open the week of Jan. 17. In contrast, the average sale price for new development apartments in Manhattan was 2,142 per square foot in the fourth quarter of 2015, according to the Corcoran Group brokerage. If Midtown residential skyscrapers have sparked controversy, their Upper East Side counterparts seem to have met with less of an outcry so far. Community officials say this may be because most of the planned tall towers are rising at the edges of the neighborhood, whose borders are traditionally considered to run from East 59th to East 96th Streets. For instance, 520 Park Avenue, which will rise to 781 feet, is at East 60th Street, close to Midtown. And 1214 Fifth Avenue, a rental office hybrid measuring 513 feet that opened in 2012, is at East 102nd Street, far to the north. These buildings aren't the first lofty high rises in the neighborhood. Trump Palace at 200 East 69th Street, which has been around since the early 1990s, is one of the Upper East Side's highest. The tall buildings council puts it at 623 feet. James G. Clynes, the chairman of Manhattan Community Board 8, which represents the area, said he had not received complaints about No. 180, which is not in a historic district and did not require city approvals for its size. But others are sounding the alarm about what might lie ahead, like the Friends of the Upper East Side Historic Districts, an advocacy group that has called for a height limit of 210 feet along neighborhood avenues. "We should do something to preserve our light and air," Mr. Clynes said, "for those people who don't live high in the sky."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Real Estate
It could have been a human resources nightmare. Instead, it was a match made in office romance heaven. Or, more accurately, a dozen matches. A small department at the tech company LivingSocial, which provides discounts for activities and travel in cities across the country, proved to be the perfect setting for a group of outgoing 20 somethings to, ahem, live socially. By one former employee's count, there have been 12 serious relationships from a 50 person department. Seven are married, three are engaged and two couples have been in long term relationships. There are even a few babies on the way. "We had shared values, ambition and gregarious personalities," said Jeremy Hirschhorn, who met his wife, Laura Becker, while working at LivingSocial Adventures, which existed from 2010 13. "We were outgoing people who really enjoyed making the most of trying new things and being together and having fun." The department focused on bringing the company offline by curating events for their customers, so it was their business to be social and outgoing. (LivingSocial was eventually sold to its competitor Groupon in 2016.) The relationships started largely in secret, or at the very least went unmentioned in public. Working long hours together fostered strong friendships among the group. "The culture was such that we were constantly working events, constantly working as a team," Ms. Becker said. The group became so close that they spent much of their free time together on the weekends. Ms. Becker and Mr. Hirschhorn were hatching one of those group weekend plans when Mr. Hirschhorn had a different idea. "Jeremy and I decided to go bike riding from the East Village to Coney Island," Ms. Becker recalled. "We were G Chatting at work, and I asked him if we should invite the others, and he said no. That was the first time I was like, oh." Most couples say their goodbyes in the morning, have their work lives and have something to share when they come home at the end of the day. But for these couples, there was no leaving their work at the office. "We knew each other's days, we sat three seats from each other at one point," Ms. Becker said. "It was a 24 hours a day relationship." Watching Ms. Becker work was one of the things that attracted Mr. Hirschhorn to his future wife. The couple married in December and live in New York. "She was a boss," Mr. Hirschorn said. "She was exceptional at her job and it seemed very natural to her. She was very independent, had a strong personality, confident. I loved all of those things. It just added to the allure." The same was true for Jessie Sunday, who took notice of Michael Seiler while they were managing a large festival in Washington, where LivingSocial was based. Thousands of people were there, but the permits weren't in place. Ms. Sunday watched as Mr. Seiler got to work. "That's the amazing thing, if you can watch someone in their most vulnerable and stressful moments, when do you really get to see that when you go on a first date?" Ms. Sunday said. "And that's when I started realizing this person is amazing, and that I kind of want him to be my person." None of the couples were under direct management of their partners, but it was still a delicate dance. Mr. Seiler said he was "very conscious" about not mixing work with personal life. Sitting next to each other didn't help. So he was hesitant to make his move. In fact, he didn't until the night before Ms. Sunday was scheduled to move back to San Francisco. Two weeks after her cross country move, Ms. Sunday was back in Washington to visit him. They were married Oct. 15, 2016 at a summer camp in Connecticut, and now live in San Francisco. So was any of this a surprise to the people who hired this group? "It wasn't intentional but it's not surprising when those people gravitate to each other," said Bram Levy, a hiring manager for the team and the officiant at one of the couple's weddings. "We found a diverse group of people who were unified by their passion for adventure. When you put those people in a room together, it brings everything to life."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Fashion & Style
For once, Vladimir Putin followed in the path of his American counterpart, President Trump, and with similar results a greater risk of catastrophe that might have been avoided. VILNIUS, Lithuania "I was stuck at home for too long, had to go for a ride," a friend from Moscow shouted into his phone several weeks ago, trying to outyell the noise around him on a trip, it turned out, to St. Petersburg. "We're going to hit a bar here and get some drinks, will call." He then disappeared from the video chat, in which I could see people behind him, walking along a familiar St. Petersburg street. I get very different dispatches from friends who live in a small town in Italy. There they stay home and tell me about relentless police raids against wanderers in the streets. A friend in Berlin says it is OK to go out, but not to gather in groups of more than two. The coronavirus pandemic caught me in Vilnius, Lithuania, a city where the streets are deserted, the bars are dead, and all flights have stopped. Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine seeing in a European democracy a police enforced order that limits personal freedoms contrasted by scenes of boisterous social merriment in Moscow, my normally order obsessed and state controlled hometown. As I write this, Russia is catching up. Still, the inversion between East and West of attitudes toward individual freedoms during the Covid 19 disaster is startling. There is certainly no shortage of police in Moscow. But the Kremlin has been late in introducing consistent quarantine measures, because it is undecided. It evokes the confusion now engulfing the United States, where President Trump's late and muddled start has contributed to disaster. President Vladimir Putin did no planning for a coronavirus coming in from abroad. Now it has interfered with his politics which in his view should always take precedence over everything else. As a result, his country will face a far more destructive outcome than might have been avoided had he started earlier. On March 28, Russians were shown pictures of Mr. Putin wearing a bright yellow hazmat suit and a breathing mask. He visited a hospital housing Covid 19 patients and inspected a construction site for an emergency hospital near Moscow. Mr. Putin was transitioning from an it's a foreign threat stage to accepting the reality of an infectious threat to the population. But like President Trump, Mr. Putin seems uncomfortable with recognizing the virus's biological, nonpolitical nature a "Chinese" virus, they call it, as if that explains its ferocity. The default mode of laying blame, in which both leaders' politics and popularity are paramount, is apparently hard to reconcile with a reality that can't be manipulated. In times of natural calamities, hard truths suddenly take command. And if you live in a world where everything and everyone is either for you or against you, the whole virus thing sounds politically suspicious. That is why, for the past several weeks, some of Russia's state run media and security agencies have been preoccupied with silencing those who spread "panic among the population." And Russia's tabloid style press has been filled with conspiracy theories that the virus is a biological weapon or a hoax. Much of that has been translated abroad through Russia's influence media, an internal European Union report said recently. The Kremlin has seemed confused. On March 25, in a surprise address to the nation, President Putin postponed indefinitely an April 22 vote about constitutional amendments that include allowing him to run for president again in 2024. (He had already signed the changes into law, making the vote meaningless.) He then declared last week a nationwide paid holiday, but his spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, later said it was not meant to be a holiday for people working remotely. On Thursday, Mr. Putin extended the holiday until the end of April, effectively placing the burden of supporting a failing economy squarely on the shoulders of businesses and other employers. The paid holiday move puzzles many. With time, it became clear that announcing a holiday was a typical Putin ruse, deployed to prevent him from being associated with "negative" decisions. He refuses to use words like "emergency," "restrictions" or "quarantines." In response, Moscow's mayor, Sergey Sobyanin, has taken the lead in quarantine policymaking. He has issued additional "regional" restrictions on businesses and movements around town. He has imposed a self isolation regime and is seeking an app that would allow the mayor's office to police the compliance. Now, with no coherent nationwide policy announced, other regional and municipal authorities have been making their own decisions, which is unusual, considering Russia's normally hypercentralized decision making process. After Mr. Putin's address to the nation, the number of Covid 19 cases started to grow. On Sunday, Russia confirmed more than 670 new coronavirus infections in a day, bringing the official total to almost 5,400. But most people in Russia are unsure what to believe: 24 percent of those polled by the nongovernmental Levada Center say they distrust official information on the pandemic; 35 percent say they trust it only "in part." That leaves many Russians thinking the authorities have been whitewashing the threat by preventing doctors from diagnosing Covid 19. Indeed, in January, Russia registered a spike in pneumonia of 37 percent more cases than a year ago, according to Russia's statistical agency. Many think that most of the pneumonias could in fact have been Covid 19 cases. In a country of 144 million people, with a long border with China and, until recently, busy connections with Italy, the official tally seems incredibly low. The true scale of the virus spread in Russia is unknowable for all those reasons, and more. Russia's tests for the coronavirus are much less sensitive than those used in other countries. As of March 21, Russia had carried out 133,100 tests with 306 returning positive. At 0.21 percent, the ratio of tests to positive cases is startlingly low, when compared with most other countries' results. Amid the current confusion, a grim alternative explanation for Russia's lax response has been circulating: that it is a deliberate policy of letting the virus spread to as many people as possible, in expectation that they will become immune to the new pathogen, assuming they live. That's a rumor, of course, too gruesome to discuss publicly because of the obvious human cost such a policy would risk. So what can Russia do? China and Germany provide opposing alternatives. China's leaders, after hesitation, unleashed the full power of an authoritarian state against the outbreak. It worked, but the aggressive quarantine efforts and extensive use of human tracking technologies will attract criticism for a long time.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Opinion
A cigarette break in New York City's Chinatown. The city's health department is aiming an ad campaign at Chinese men who smoke cigarettes to combat soaring rates of lung cancer. Reflecting a global trend, Chinese men in New York City smoke at much higher rates than men or women in any other ethnic group and deaths from lung cancer among them have soared. As a result, the city's health department launched a public service ad campaign this month aimed specifically at Chinese men. In its video, various men pose with their children, or in the arms of wives or girlfriends. Then, slowly, the men fade away into wisps of gray smoke. "Every cigarette puff reduces your years shared with your loved ones," the announcer says in Mandarin. "Stop wasting your precious life, and quit smoking now." Lung cancer deaths among Asian men in the city have increased 70 percent in the last 15 years, and smoking rates among them have risen even as they have declined among other ethnic groups, the health department said. A department study of the health of Asian New Yorkers released in March found that 23 percent of local Asians smoked, versus 18 percent of whites, 17 percent of Hispanics and 14 percent of blacks. But breakdowns by ethnicity and sex tell a more complex story. Korean and Chinese people smoke at higher rates than average, while South Asians and Filipinos smoke less often. At 27 percent, Chinese men are the city's heaviest smokers, while only 4 percent of Asian women smoke. Two factors push up smoking rates among Chinese men in New York, said Regina F. Lee, who chairs the Asian American Smoke Free Community Partnership. Cultural norms from China persist in the city because many Chinese residents are foreign born, she said: "Sixty percent of men there smoke, while there is a stigma to women smoking." Also, it has long been hard for Chinese speakers to get the help the city offers to smokers, including free nicotine patches and gum. Anyone calling the quit smoking hotline usually got an English speaker and had to wait while a translator was found. "So we were delighted when the health department proposed this," Ms. Lee said. The hotline mentioned in the ad (1 800 838 8917) is part of the national Asian Smokers' Quitline, which is funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and offers help in Mandarin, Cantonese, Korean and Vietnamese. A 2015 study published in the Lancet found that Chinese men smoke a third of all the cigarettes in the world, and that by the year 2050, three million of them will die each year of smoking related causes. But antismoking efforts in China face a delicate political situation. More than 7 percent of the government's revenue comes from its monopoly ownership of the Chinese National Tobacco Corporation. In New York, recent antismoking ads in English and Spanish have been much grimmer, showing people dying in misery or with amputated fingers. "The health department did focus groups and decided to start with a slightly softer approach," Ms. Lee said. "No one knows how the community will react."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Health
Recognizing what it called "the troubling reality" that electronic cigarettes have become "wildly popular with kids," the Food and Drug Administration on Tuesday announced a major crackdown on the vaping industry, particularly on the trendy Juul devices, aimed at curbing sales to young people. The agency said it had started an undercover sting operation this month targeting retailers of Juuls, including gas stations, convenience stores and online retailers like eBay. So far, the F.D.A. has issued warning letters to 40 that it says violated the law preventing sales of vaping devices to anyone under 21. The agency also demanded that Juul Labs turn over company documents about the marketing and research behind its products, including reports on focus groups and toxicology, to determine whether Juul is intentionally appealing to the youth market despite its statements to the contrary and despite knowing its addictive potential. It said it planned to issue similar letters to other manufacturers of popular vaping products as well. "We don't yet fully understand why these products are so popular among youth," the agency's commissioner, Dr. Scott Gottlieb, said in a statement. "But it's imperative that we figure it out, and fast. These documents may help us get there." Schools across the country say they were blindsided by the number of students turning up with Juuls last fall. Nicknamed the iPhone of e cigarettes, Juuls resemble thumb drives, produce little plume, and smell like fruit or other flavorings, making them so concealable that students can vape in class. Students who would never think to smoke a cigarette post videos of themselves doing tricks with vaping devices on social media. Schools, fearing students are becoming addicted to nicotine, are suspending students as young as middle school for vaping. In an emailed statement, Juul Labs said it agreed with the F.D.A. "that illegal sales of our product to minors is unacceptable." "We already have in place programs to identify and act upon these violations at retail and online marketplaces, and we will have more aggressive plans to announce in the coming days," the company's statement said. "We are working with the F.D.A., lawmakers, parents and community leaders to combat underage use, and we will continue working with all interested parties to keep our product away from youth." The vaping industry has long challenged the argument that the devices are addictive and that flavorings appeal to youth, saying the evidence does not support this. But on Tuesday, the F.D.A. came down firmly about the risks. "The nicotine in these products can rewire an adolescent's brain, leading to years of addiction," Dr. Gottlieb said in his statement. He acknowledged that e cigarettes "may offer a potentially lower risk alternative for individual adult smokers," he added. "But the viability of these products is severely undermined if those products entice youth to start using tobacco and nicotine." Dr. Gottlieb said Tuesday's announcement was the first of several steps the agency would be taking as part of a new Youth Tobacco Prevention Plan to get manufacturers to stop marketing e cigarettes to young people. It has already convinced eBay to stop listing the products. It also asked Juul to turn over documents related to promotional games and contests, as well as anything related to product design and the appeal or addictive potential for youth. But while the moves pleased some public health advocates and school administrators concerned about the popularity of "Juuling" among adolescents, other groups say they do not make up for the tremendous break Dr. Gottlieb cut the e cigarette industry last July, when he allowed manufacturers a five year extension on a rule that would have required them to prove that their products are a safe alternative to traditional cigarettes. The vaping industry had lobbied hard against the rule, arguing that the cost of complying with such regulations would have deterred manufacturers from introducing new products that help adults to quit smoking. Schools and public health advocates contend that the vaping industry is the latest incarnation of Big Tobacco, developing and promoting its products to create new markets for a younger generation. Juul comes in kid friendly flavors like mango and creme brulee. The labels on other e cigarette flavorings resemble popular candy brands like Jolly Rancher and Blow Pops. The e cigarette industry's political clout has grown as the tobacco giants have taken over the business, which was once limited to small shops and manufacturers. Altria, British American Tobacco, Imperial Tobacco, Philip Morris International and Reynolds American all produce e cigarettes now. In 2017, according to The Center for Responsive Politics, which tracks federal disclosure reports, the tobacco industry spent nearly 22 million on lobbying. Juul, which was started by Pax Labs in 2015 and spun off into an independent company last year, is one of the biggest players, increasing its revenue by nearly 700 percent in 2017 to 224.6 million, according to a November report from Nielsen/Wells Fargo. The total e cigarette market grew by 40 percent last year, to 1.16 billion. Juul Labs told CNBC in October that while it was producing 20 million devices and flavored pods, it could not keep up with demand. Late last year, it raised more than 110 million in private funding, and hired a new chief executive officer from Chobani, manufacturer of the popular Greek yogurt. According to Monitoring the Future, an annual survey done for the National Institute on Drug Abuse, part of the National Institutes of Health, in 2017, 19 percent of 12th graders, 16 percent of 10th graders and 8 percent of 8th graders reported vaping nicotine in the past year. Juul has come under increasing pressure over the last several weeks as parents and schools have become alarmed over how prevalent the devices are. A coalition of medical and public health advocacy groups led by the Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids sued to reverse the F.D.A.'s July extension of the regulations for e cigarette companies. A group of United States senators led by Dick Durbin, an Illinois Democrat, sent a letter to Juul last week asking questions about marketing and ingredients for the devices and asking the company to do more to prevent minors from buying the devices. On Tuesday, the health advocacy groups and lawmakers commended the F.D.A.'s moves, but said the agency must go further and require e cigarette companies to eliminate flavorings that clearly appeal to youth. They also pushed the F.D.A. again to reverse its July decision. According to the Juul website, the devices create an aerosol rather than using a flame to activate the ingredients. The company says the product produces a level of nicotine similar to a traditional cigarette in order to satisfy cigarette smokers who switch to vaping. Medical researchers say this makes the Juul more addictive for youth. "This is the definition of a double edged sword," said Michael Siegel of Boston University, who studies tobacco use. Because Juul delivers nicotine in a more effective manner, it is appealing for adult smokers who are trying to give up tobacco cigarettes, he said. "The first time they use it, they feel the nicotine, they're more likely to stick with it." But for teenagers, "it's a bad thing because it really does create the addiction potential that you don't have with normal electronic cigarettes." "What we used to see is kids would vape together in social settings, it was showing off who could blow the biggest rings," he said. "Now we're starting to see kids who literally are showing signs of addiction: They're using it alone, we're seeing kids who have to sneak off to the bathroom during the day." School health officials say students do not realize how much they are smoking because they "microdose" all day. And many do not realize the chemicals in the devices. "They think of it as being just not that big a deal," said Timothy Hayes, the assistant superintendent for student services at New Trier, the large public high school in the Chicago suburbs. "It's not smoke, I'm not inhaling, it's just water vapor, that's their thinking." The F.D.A. crackdown, he said, could help make the risks clearer. "It makes public, and makes Juul be public, about the health consequences."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Health
The Most Diverse Fashion Season Ever on the Runway, but Not the Front Row Of all the things that have stuck with me in the week since I returned from the fashion shows, reintegrating myself to real life, one of the most lingering was the diversity that was apparent on the runways. This was, by anecdotal observation and actual data, the most inclusive season ever, especially in New York, where models of almost every color, as well as many sizes, ages and gender identities, were represented. Gone was the feeling I have had so many times in the past, that what I was seeing was merely gestural a nod to a trend, or political pressure, soon to be forgotten when fashion turned its focus somewhere else. This wasn't Joan Smalls and Adwoa Aboah on every single runway; it wasn't tokenism. There were multiple women of multiple shades on multiple runways. We had reached a point of genuine change. "Spring 2019 was the most racially diverse season ever," said Jennifer Davidson, the editor in chief of The Fashion Spot, an online editorial platform that has been tracking runway diversity counts on race since September 2014, and on size, gender identification and age since September 2015. This was true in every city, with models of color in New York reaching almost 50 percent. Overall, preliminary numbers show that out of 229 shows and 7,432 models, 36.1 percent were models of color compared with 30.02 percent the same time a year ago and 17 percent when the tally began. But all of these visuals also served to highlight another reality: What was true on the runway was not, necessarily, true behind it. The contrast between the diversity of the models and the uniformity of the people watching them was striking. Not in terms of celebrity guests Amandla Stenberg and Spike Lee were popular invites but in terms of the industry power structure itself: the editors, retailers and decision makers. The runway may have become the front line of diversity, but it definitely is not the end. "It's something I think about when I go to work every day," said Samira Nasr, the executive fashion director of Vanity Fair, and one of the few women of color in the front row. (She is of Trinidadian and Lebanese descent.) In a career that in the last two decades has included stints at Vogue, InStyle and Elle, Ms. Nasr has often found herself among only a handful of fashion editors of color in her offices. "This is a starting point," said Edward Enninful, who became the first black editor of any Vogue (and, for that matter, any major fashion glossy) when he was named to the top spot at British Vogue in 2017. "But there's still a long way to go." For years it was Andre Leon Talley, the onetime creative director of American Vogue, who was, as a New Yorker article famously called him in 1994, "the Only One" the only black man in the front row of most fashion shows. More than 20 years later, Mr. Talley celebrated Mr. Enninful's appointment but noted, in an interview with The New York Times earlier this year, that he still finds himself in fashion rooms where he asks, "Where are the black people?" For more coverage of race, sign up here to have our Race/Related newsletter delivered weekly to your inbox. And this is true not only for glossy magazines. Design houses are still notably lacking in racial diversity at the top. Hence the brouhaha over Virgil Abloh being named artistic director for Louis Vuitton men's wear earlier this year. Along with Olivier Rousteing, the creative director of Balmain, he is one of the few designers of color at the head of a French heritage house. (At the end of Mr. Abloh's first Vuitton show, in the gardens of the Palais Royal, which was attended by his former creative collaborator Kanye West, both men were overcome by emotion.) In June, for the first time, the Council of Fashion Designers of America awards ceremony was hosted by a woman of color, Issa Rae. "Which is crazy," she said. Most of the attention on diversity in fashion has been focused on the way its image is communicated to the outside world hence the obsessive tracking of models. Ms. Davidson, of The Fashion Spot, said that the site had decided to do the diversity reports to "look at it through a consumer's eye, and focus on how brands represent themselves and who they choose to represent. If I'm a consumer, do I see myself on this runway?" There is no question that that matters. But it's also dangerous, because it can lead to complacency; to the sense the issue is solved, or has been addressed. It looks so much better! "Looks" being the operative word. Now, according to Mr. Enninful, it is time for behind the scenes change. "It's the next step," he said. "We need more internships. Youth programs. The way people get into the industry needs to be widened." Mr. Enninful added that he felt a responsibility to be a visible representation of what was possible, and a public figure for the next generation, whether on social media or in the front row. "It's about letting people who have never been included in this industry know that it exists," Ms. Nasr said. "I am very aware that I, as a brown woman, have this incredible platform." Though it may be a natural conclusion that once you change the top, the bottom will follow that there will be a trickle down effect Ms. Davidson cautions against any such assumption. "There were Asian designers in New York who had the least diverse runways," she said. "You'd think being in a minority would make you more sensitive to representing the breadth of the population, but our data does not support that." Nevertheless, Ms. Nasr believes that simply by attrition, if not intent, things are changing. That a new generation is on the rise that looks more like the population they serve, like Tyler Mitchell, the young black photographer who became the first African American to shoot a cover of Vogue in the magazine's 125 year history when he shot Beyonce for the September issue. Or Shaniqwa Jarvis, who has photographed ad campaigns for Liberty of London, Supreme and Nike; or Nikki Ogunnaike, the style director of Elle.com; or Lacy Redway, a hairstylist who works with Ruth Negga and Priyanka Chopra, among others. Ms. Nasr is "really hopeful" about the future. Indeed, on Wednesday Conde Nast announced that Lindsay Peoples Wagner would become the editor in chief of Teen Vogue, a title previously held by Elaine Welteroth who, when she was named to the post in 2016, was only the second African American editor of a Conde Nast magazine in the United States. (Keija Minor of Brides was the first; Ms. Peoples Wagner is the third.) Formerly the fashion editor of New York magazine, she is the author of a widely read article published earlier this year, "Everywhere and Nowhere," which explored "what it's really like to be black and work in fashion."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Fashion & Style
Every Friday, pop critics for The New York Times weigh in on the week's most notable new songs and videos. Just want the music? Listen to the Playlist on Spotify here (or find our profile: nytimes). Like what you hear? Let us know at theplaylist nytimes.com and sign up for our Louder newsletter, a once a week blast of our pop music coverage. An event record that transcends the event itself, the first collaboration between Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion is a meeting of the (dirty) minds. Riding on a sample of Frank Ski's proto Baltimore club classic "Whores in This House," "WAP" luxuriates in raunch. In their verses, both Cardi and Megan are exuberant, sharp and extremely, extremely vividly detailed. And the David LaChappelle esque video matches the excess of the rhymes, including cameos from Normani, Rosalia, Kylie Jenner and more. JON CARAMANICA The latest single off "In a Dream," the upcoming EP from the 25 year old Australian pop crooner Troye Sivan, is a sparse, sweetly yearning ode to days semi recently gone by. "Hey, my lil rager teenager, tryna figure it out," he sings atop a gently warping synth track. But the mood evoked by the music video low concept but somehow arresting, anchored by Sivan's ex YouTuber charisma rings particularly true right now: Sivan lounging by himself, looking bored in a dingy bathtub, wishing he were somewhere better lit and more densely populated. "I just wanna sing loud," he pines, "I just wanna lose myself in a crowd." Who can relate? LINDSAY ZOLADZ Finally, the trap surrealists and the art soul eccentrics have come to a territory sharing treaty. They've been moving toward each other for several years now, and this chirp off is perhaps their first proper collision. 645AR squeals about devotion, and FKA twigs coolly peeps back over an unerringly pretty 1990s soul esque arrangement that makes them sound like lovebirds lost in a reverie, not just wild experimenters landing a neat trick. CARAMANICA Each song on the Chicago singer songwriter Jamila Woods's excellent 2019 album "Legacy! Legacy!" was named for an artist of color who had inspired Woods' creative development: "Zora," "Eartha," "Baldwin." On Aug. 5, the one year anniversary of Toni Morrison's death, Woods released "Sula (Paperback)," named for the first Morrison novel she ever read. ("It reminded me to embrace my tenderness, my sensitivities, my ways of being in my body," Woods wrote in a statement.) The song itself is luminous, its quiet power emanating from the guitarist Justin Canavan's nimble arpeggios and Woods's melodic incantation, "I'm better, I'm better, I'm better, I'm better." Its beauty unfurls slowly, like a time lapse glimpse of a blooming lily. ZOLADZ Mary Chapin Carpenter, 'Between the Dirt and the Stars' Mary Chapin Carpenter recorded her new album, "The Dirt and the Stars," live in the studio with her band, capturing pristine performances that mirror the pensive intimacy of her mature, weathered but still hopeful songs. "Years will pass before we learn what time denies to everyone," she sings in the title song, contemplating memories and the enduring resonance of a song on the radio: "Wild, wild horses/Everything we'll ever know is in the choruses." The band takes over for the last three minutes, cresting and easing off, proving the power of music alone. JON PARELES The Filipino born British musician Beatrice Laus, who records as beabadoobee, manages to find a fresh, earnest perspective on '90s nostalgia, simply because brace yourself she was born in the year 2000. (Last year's ode to the patron saint of '90s slackerdom, "I Wish I Was Stephen Malkmus," prompted him to declare, "we stan.") "Sorry," the second single from her forthcoming full length debut "Fake It Flowers," begins as a brooding, string assisted ballad that, midway through, cracks open into something more epic. "It hurts me," Laus sings over her signature waves of guitar fuzz, "that you could be the one that deserved this even more." ZOLADZ Jamaican Drake is back! Or had he ever left? He makes two appearances on the dancehall star Popcaan's new release "Fixtape," his second mixtape for Drake's OVO Sound label. The slow, smeary "All I Need" finds Popcaan working in Drake's brooding register; better still is the up tempo "Twist Turn," which makes obvious the influence Popcaan has had on some of Drake's later hits. "Listen, you've been missing since 2016," Drake croons at the top of the track. Could he be talking about the fabled Popcaan verse that didn't make the album cut of the "Views" song "Controlla"? Probably not, but I will pretend anyway. ZOLADZ Anyone trying to tune into the present moment in jazz could do a lot worse than starting with Immanuel Wilkins, an alto saxophonist whose playing is at once dazzlingly solid and perfectly lithe. "Omega," the debut album by Wilkins and his quartet, arrives as one of the more anticipated jazz releases of this year, thanks to the quietly ubiquitous presence he's established on the New York scene, despite only being in his early 20s. (It also helps that Jason Moran, the MacArthur winning pianist, produced it.) As an improviser, Wilkins bores in constantly, interrogating his options, sounding his way toward a maximum emotional outcome. That's especially clear on "Ferguson An American Tradition," a devastating lament of the country's legacy of anti Black violence, with a neatly stitched lead melody that feeds into a tone curdling saxophone solo. GIOVANNI RUSSONELLO There's a spirit of wily misdirection guiding "Transformacion del Arcoiris," a short but spellbinding new album that the Cuban born pianist and composer David Virelles created during quarantine. Nominally, Virelles is joined by a percussion ensemble called Los Seres ("The Beings"), but in reality it's all just him, doubling and tripling and quadrupling himself on hand drums, piano, analog synthesizer and sampler. Sometimes, Virelles veers toward musique concrete: The instrumentals mingle with the sound of birds chirping, or a tape deck being loaded. Elsewhere, all you hear is the wraithlike swirl of a Juno 6 synth. Throughout, there is a feeling of lines evaporating between musical performance and everyday life, between conceptualism and folklore, between togetherness and solitude. RUSSONELLO	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Music
It's World Cup time again time for those remaining Americans who do not yet dress their children in FC Barcelona jerseys to become overnight experts on a subject that will sneak its way into even the least athletic conversations in the coming month. For a crash course on the crazy haircuts, celebrity girlfriends and, yes, actual soccer, for this World Cup, which begins in Russia on June 14, we spoke to Roger Bennett, the Liverpool bred New Yorker who is a host, along with Michael Davies, of Men in Blazers, the irreverent soccer site, podcast and TV show that has become a go to for Americans who are obsessed with the sport and appreciate sardonic British wit served up by the Imperial pint. Just in time for this quadrennial global carnival, the men of Men in Blazers just published a soccer primer, "Encyclopedia Blazertannica," and are embarking on a road show throughout the World Cup. Mr. Bennett's 12 part podcast on the rise and fall of the American World Cup team in the 1990s, "American Fiasco," is currently riding high on iTunes. That the United States team failed to qualify for the first time since 1986 is unlikely to dampen enthusiasm, Mr. Bennett said: "Americans love a circus, and they love having an excuse to cut work and daytime drink en masse." The World Cup is the ultimate stage for an emergent global superstar. Who is this year's most likely candidate? The game's breakout star is the young Egyptian Mohamed Salah, who plays the game with the ebullience of an Ewok. The Liverpool striker has just been anointed the Premier League's player of the year, and the public displays of his Muslim faith that he brings to the field have transcended football. He has become an icon throughout the Middle East, and a one man bulwark against rising European Islamophobia. His race to return from a dislocated shoulder has the continent of Africa on tenterhooks. They will need the man for whom Liverpool fans have composed the following anthem, to greet every goal he scores: "If he's good enough for you, he's good enough for me, if he scores another few, then I'll be Muslim too." Players like David Beckham and Cristiano Ronaldo have leveraged World Cup exposure to establish themselves as sex symbols. Who's this year's hunk? There is only one Ronaldo, a supremely gifted player, yet one so self obsessed that he only seems to score so he can take his shirt off and expose his eight pack to the world. A more nuanced hypebeast is Antoine Griezmann. He is a French striker who catches the eye with dashing streetwear and goal celebrations that echo Drake dance moves, not to mention his chameleonic looks, which flick between "clean cut" to "dyed blonde Justin Bieber on three day bender." Even for viewers with a middling interest in soccer, the World Cup is a great fashion show. Which squad has this year's most runway ready uniforms? World Cup uniforms are among the most lucrative billboards in all of sports. Adidas reported that the German jersey propelled their soccer category to a record 2.7 billion after their 2014 victory. This year, three stand out. Peru's team has a clean diagonal red sash across the chest, a trick which every catwalk designer knows creates that coveted longer, thinner appearance. Nigeria's zigzag inspired home kit, which has become a global sensation, selling over three million copies before a ball has been kicked, would not have looked out of place at an early '90s rave. And then there is Japan's jersey, which echoes the traditional Sashiko stitching technique. To echo the words of the Roman bard Horace, it is poetry without words. Hairstyles are always a part of the fun, too. Who is this year's breakout tonsorial star? The current champion is France's Paul Pogba. He uses his hair to express his mood, shaving in a new design and unfurling a new hair color every game to guarantee he will rack up even more likes on social media than goals and assists on the field. Even so, I am a firm believer that here are only six kinds of soccer haircuts, and David Beckham has already invented all of them. A number of prominent teams failed to qualify. Who will be missed the most? Chile will be missed, if only for the sheer number of creative neck tattoos they bring to the party. The Netherlands stunning orange jerseys are irreplaceable. Above all, I rue Italy having a rare damp squib of a World Cup qualification campaign. A World Cup without them feels like "The Office" once Steve Carell quit. Which perennial power is most likely to disappoint? Argentina is packed with elite talent, with Lionel Messi their crown jewel. The 5 foot 7 Barcelona star may look like he has just wandered out of Supercuts on Las Ramblas, but his superhuman touch and acceleration have made him one of the greatest ever to play the game. Messi is Argentina's greatest strength, but Messi overreliance is their biggest weakness. Their biggest players defer to Lionel like Cavaliers players seeking comfort in LeBron James' shadow. It is no wonder that Argentina's last three big tournaments have ended with Messi walking off in tears. Is this the year that the ever talented England squad finally avoids humiliation? Ah, England. Every four years, they arrive at the World Cup hoping for "Land of Hope and Glory," only to limp away, painfully aware of the fall of their Empire. This time round, they have tried to mix things up. They are taking a squad to whose average age is bar mitzvah, and they are approaching the World Cup with radical ideas like going to Russia and having fun. The problem is, the one thing our nation remains world class at is tabloid media, who live to vent and scapegoat. As a result, English players are guaranteed to play with fear. Uruguayan or Egyptian players run through walls when they pull on their national team jerseys. The English shrink, as if those jerseys are made of chain mail. Who is this year's most exciting squad? Belgium, that flat land of wonder, home to such avant garde minds as Adolphe Sax, inventor of the saxophone. Somehow that nation of 11 million people has produced a golden generation of elite, attacking footballers. It is a murderers' row of Premier League talent, and if they can take advantage of their many guns, they might be the most victorious Belgians since Jean Claude Van Damme won a Golden Raspberry for his role in "Double Team." Which country has the most boring team? Germany. The defending champions are boring only because they rob football of its beauty, which is its unpredictability. When Germany take the field, they are ruthless, consistent, and always glorious like Meryl Streep at the Oscars. In years past, Victoria Beckham seemed to get as much attention as her husband. Should we be on the lookout for any celebrity wives or girlfriends in the stands this year? The England team will arrive with a crew of reality TV stars and lingerie models, but in terms of star power, they are dust in comparison to Spanish defender Gerard Pique's partner, Shakira. The World Cup actually brought the couple together. Pique made a cameo appearance in the video for Shakira's video for the official 2010 World Cup anthem, "Waka Waka." Who said romance is dead?	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Style
This nine bedroom property sits on Galu Beach, just south of the Diani Beach resort area and 18 miles from Mombasa, on the South Coast of Kenya. The 2.2 acre lot is off the main coastal road, through two gates. It includes a single story, three bedroom main house with a castle like crenelated parapet, a contemporary two bedroom beach bungalow and two additional dwellings. The main house and bungalow are separated by a large swimming pool and a garden looking out on the Indian Ocean. A long driveway stretches past a new three car carport and a separate three bedroom staff quarters, and leads to the 4,844 square foot main house, built in 2005. The double door entry has carved Lamu style frames with Swahili and Arabic influences, said Joe Hildemann, who bought the property three years ago with his wife, Kathrin, renovating the house and building the beach bungalow. Inside, a set of carved Lamu doors opens to an open air atrium, where there is a reflecting pool with water lilies and nesting weaver birds. To the right of the pool is an en suite bedroom and a family room; to the left is storage, an auxiliary kitchen, a powder room and an office. Floors throughout the home are Galana stone, which resembles slate, and ceilings are 11 feet high, with stained whitewood beams in the living areas. The house is being sold furnished. Beyond the atrium, an open galley kitchen with a white concrete counter anchors the great room. "You can cook and look out on the ocean," Mr. Hildemann said. The kitchen in the main house is one of five on the property. An oven is in the auxiliary kitchen, near the atrium, while a fully equipped staff kitchen with concrete counters and areas for dining and resting is in a covered outdoor courtyard. The bungalow also has a well outfitted kitchen. A water tower, which stores water pumped from a well, has a one bedroom staff cottage attached. On each side of the great room is an air conditioned en suite bedroom with mosquito netting draping the beds and screened windows. Double doors open to a terrace with steps to the pool area. The three en suite bathrooms are similarly finished, with light turquoise stucco walls, concrete sinks, brass fixtures and walk in showers. Beyond the great room's dining area, more Lamu doors open to a covered terrace with ceiling fans and a trio of archways overlooking the backyard. Stairs lead down to the pool and a garden landscaped with indigenous palm trees and regional flora. At the shoreline, the bungalow's two en suite bedrooms mirror those in the main house, separated by a full kitchen. A covered wood deck has a built in splash pool. "Life happens outside," Mr. Hildemann said of the property. The compound is within walking distance of resorts and restaurants, and a 10 minute drive from the center of Diani Beach, a resort area with high end restaurants, hotels, supermarkets and shopping centers. Popular with kite surfers and windsurfers, the 10.5 mile beach has been named Africa's leading beach destination by World Travel Awards every year since 2014. Mwaluganje Elephant Sanctuary and Shimba Hills National Reserve, home to the endangered sable antelope and a marine park, are an hour northwest. The house is a 10 minute drive from Diani Airport, with hourlong flights to Nairobi, the country's capital. Moi International Airport, in Mombasa, is 90 minutes away (a trip that includes a five minute ride on the Likoni car ferry). Single family homes in coastal areas preferred by second home buyers currently start at around 500,000 and can go as high as 5 million for a 10 bedroom villa with an attached guesthouse and a pool, said Anthony Havelock, the head of agency for Knight Frank Kenya, which has the listing for this property. (While properties are typically listed in Kenyan shillings, Mr. Havelock gave the prices in American dollars.) But at the moment, the housing market in Kenya is "quite depressed," Mr. Havelock said. Following a "huge growth period" that began around 2009, when land and house values rose by as much as 400 percent, he noted, "the bubble burst" in 2016. A bitter national dispute over the results of the presidential election in 2017 added to "a bit of a perfect storm," he said, with demand and property values dropping and an oversupply of inventory in the domestic and luxury markets: "International investment has been curbed by political uncertainty and terrorism incidents." Neil McRae, the director of Langata Link Real Estate, which specializes in coastal vacation homes, described that market as "rather stagnant." When it comes to sales and short term rentals, he said, "what we are seeing is that the second home industry has taken a bit of a nose dive." Because of the "tough" economy, he added, buyers "are being careful where they are spending their money" especially on the coast and in areas around Mount Kenya, "where people in the past liked to have their holiday homes." Traditionally, second home buyers have also favored Maasai Mara, an area close to the game reserve near the border of Tanzania. On the coast, popular places include Diani Beach, Malindi, Kilifi, Mombasa, Msambweni, Watamu (the most exclusive area) and areas on and around the golf courses in Vipingo, said Sansi Dietz, a property consultant at Pam Golding Properties Kenya. But many homeowners trying to sell for the past couple of years haven't had much luck, with prices down 30 to 50 percent in some areas. Mr. Havelock cited one seller in Kilifi who listed a house a few years ago for more than 3 million and eventually accepted an offer of less than 1.5 million. "It is very much a buyer's market," he said. As for buyers, mortgage interest rates of 13 to 14 percent make it "difficult for people to invest in a property either as an end user or an investor," Ms. Dietz said. Plans to upgrade the infrastructure, with highways along the coast from Diani Beach 100 miles north to Malindi, as well as a new high speed rail line from Nairobi, may improve the coastal market, Mr. McRae said. Foreign buyers on the coast north of the port city of Mombasa are predominantly Italian and British, Mr. McRae said. South of there, foreign buyers tend to be French, Swiss and German. In Lamu, a historic Swahili town near the border of Somalia, ultra high end homes and properties are popular with people in the film industry and other wealthy buyers, he said.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Real Estate
Last year, Adam Sandler earned some of his best reviews and raised blood pressures as Howard Ratner, the motormouthed, compulsive gambler protagonist of "Uncut Gems." Hubie Dubois, Sandler's character in the Netflix movie "Hubie Halloween," is Howard's inverse: Mr. Responsibility, a dorky deli counter worker who takes it as his unappointed mission to look out for his fellow Salem, Mass., residents. He turns up, for example, at a school cafeteria to present a lecture on Halloween safety that takes the place of recess. He is at once a thoughtful neighbor and the town narc, a position that has made him the target of ridicule. Except that this Halloween, Salem simultaneously faced with a possible werewolf (Steve Buscemi) and a Michael Myers like psychopath really does need someone on high alert, even if Hubie alternates between flashes of brilliance and utter obliviousness. Sandler has always been a repository of goofy voices, but what he thought was funny about the mannered muttering he does here is unclear.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Movies
Our Monday morning air travel digest, with deals, tips and anything else that travelers may want to know. LAN AND TAM GET A NEW NAME As part of their merger, the South American airlines LAN and TAM are changing their name to Latam. The unified airline expects to spend the next three years rolling out its new identity in aircraft, airports, offices, website and uniforms, beginning in the first half of 2016. Latam will unite passenger and cargo airlines for LAN Airlines and its affiliates in Peru, Argentina, Colombia and Ecuador and TAM Linhas Aereas of Brazil. The company says it is the largest airline in Latin America with more than 1,500 flights per day. The Latam affiliate still known as LAN Peru has introduced new Peruvian dishes on flights from Lima to Los Angeles, Madrid, Miami and New York. Entrees, which include chicken with rice and pastas like ricotta stuffed cannelloni, are distinguished by their use of salsas, citrus and chiles, and desserts include South American favorites like flan. The new meal service is being tested indefinitely and may or may not expand, depending on flier feedback. Northern snow birds can get to the Caribbean more directly next winter. United Airlines has announced new high season service to two Caribbean destinations. Beginning Dec. 19, United will fly nonstop from Newark to St. Kitts. Weekly round trips will take place on Saturdays and run through April 30, 2016. Also scheduled Dec. 19 through April 9, the airline will begin weekly Saturday service from Chicago to St. Lucia. United already operates year round between Newark and St. Lucia on Saturdays and will double departures from the airport with a new seasonal round trip added on Sundays between Dec. 20 and May 1.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Travel
New York City has a history of reinventing industrial neighborhoods as luxury enclaves. But the north side of Greenpoint, Brooklyn which once cranked out ships, boilers, sheet metal, vinyl siding, pencils, rope and refined oil may have the most work cut out for it. Shrugging off a legacy of pollution and overlooking the area's scruffiness, developers in recent years have focused their efforts in the area, which nuzzles up against Newtown Creek and the East River at the northwest tip of Brooklyn. The latest apartment building to arrive is One Blue Slip, a 30 story, high end rental from the developer Brookfield Property Partners, in partnership with Park Tower Group. Part of Greenpoint Landing, a 22 acre, 1 billion mixed use waterfront project that plans 10 buildings and 5,500 units over a decade, One Blue Slip is the first market rate apartment building to rise at the site. With 359 apartments, it's also one of the biggest wagers yet on a turnaround for a long neglected area that could appeal to renters squeezed out of another once rundown waterfront neighborhood: Williamsburg. "It's a neighborhood with a unique blend of grit and charm," said Gary E. Handel, the founding partner of Handel Architects, which designed One Blue Slip and other Greenpoint Landing residences; he also created the project's master plan, about a decade ago. "And that character has been generated by an industrial past." More so than some sleek high rises nearby, One Blue Slip appears to have absorbed that history. Its facade, with red brick and segmented windows, recalls a factory, a look it shares with Greenpoint Landing's other completed buildings 33 Eagle Street, Five Blue Slip and Seven Blue Slip. Built by L M Development Partners and Park Tower, the buildings, which opened over the last two years, offer only below market rate units. The exterior walls of One Blue Slip slope in and out, like a cupcake wrapper. Positioning the units that way helped ensure that 90 percent of them had water views, even the ones closer to inland Commercial Street, Mr. Handel said. Skylights specifically the kind that have angular shapes and are found in rows on factory roofs provided inspiration, he added. One Blue Slip's apartments, which range from studios averaging 520 square feet to three bedrooms averaging 1,350 square feet, have quartz counters, stainless steel appliances and washers and dryers. Some units in the building, whose interiors were styled by Gachot Studios, also have walk in closets. The building's amenities include a co working lounge, a yoga terrace and gym, and a 1.5 acre, lawn lined waterfront public park slated to open later in August. Eventually, Greenpoint Landing plans to add four acres' worth of new parks, which, combined with new and improved local public spaces, are meant to allow people to promenade from Manhattan Avenue to Green Street. One bedrooms at One Blue Slip, which began leasing this month , are priced from 3,225, and Brookfield is offering a free month's rent with some of the apartments. As of Aug. 1, new one bedrooms in the neighborhood averaged 2,900 a month, according to Streeteasy.com. But older one bedrooms could be had for 2,000 a month. While northern Greenpoint is dotted with stylish new multifamily projects others include Eleven33, a seven story rental on Manhattan Avenue, and the Greenpoint, a riverfront condo rental on India Street a commercial vibe still permeates the area. Indeed, parts of Greenpoint Landing's site remain active parking lots, with trucks and cranes tucked inside on a recent afternoon. Some industries left scars on the neighborhood. The waters of Newtown Creek, which separates Brooklyn and Queens, are so heavily polluted from oil spills through the decades up to 30 million gallons, by some estimates that in 2010, the waterway was named a federal Superfund site. But the bulk of the refineries blamed for those spills are on the opposite side of the neighborhood from One Blue Slip. While Exxon Mobil continues to mop up the spills, city and environmental groups are also working to clean the waterway. Similarly, a factory complex across from Greenpoint Landing on Dupont Street, which once made vinyl siding, is listed as a state Superfund site. But proximity to pollution does not always deter developers, as has been evident at Brooklyn's Gowanus Canal. Despite the fact that it, too, has been designated a Superfund site since 2010, the canal has welcomed new apartment buildings, such as 365 Bond Street. "Pollution was not really a concern for us," said Ric Clark, the chairman of Brookfield Property Partners, who previously built the Eugene in the Hudson Yards section of Manhattan but has never before constructed apartment buildings in Brooklyn. He added that the East River, which embraces most of Greenpoint Landing, is in good shape, and anyway, the city's industrial age seems to be drawing to a close. "I don't really expect a resurgence," Mr. Clark said, "and it would be a shame, because I don't think industrial is an ideal use of a waterfront." For weekly email updates on residential real estate news, sign up here. Follow us on Twitter: nytrealestate.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Real Estate
If you're a fan of the television subgenre that pairs a gifted, impulsive, often childlike male civilian with a tough, straight arrow, lonely female cop, then you were probably a fan of "Castle," one of the most successful shows of the type. (Other recent or current examples: "The Mentalist," "Perception," "Forever," "A.P.B.," "Lucifer.") You're also in luck. Maybe. Because not one but two new examples of the genre are debuting soon. "Deception" on ABC, arriving Sunday, pairs a magician and an F.B.I. agent. "Instinct" on CBS, which has its premiere on March 18, pairs a professor and a New York police detective. "Deception," with its bad boy hero, has shades of "The Mentalist," and the academic aspects of "Instinct" recall "Perception." But both owe a primary debt to "Castle." Since they're essentially the same show harmless case of the week fluff hewing closely to a particular formula we can assess them based on said formula: Which is more like "Castle"? The hero, Part 2: Mr. Cumming's Prof. Dylan Reinhart is also a former C.I.A. agent who quit spying to please his husband. Mr. Cutmore Scott's Cameron Black is a pure civilian, like Castle, and more humor is milked from the contrast between him and his gung ho partner. Advantage: "Deception." The heroine: A tough call, because not much differentiates them. Ilfenesh Hadera's Kay Daniels in "Deception" and Bojana Novakovic's Lizzie Needham in "Instinct" are both standard issue brusque, uptight, damaged cops and straight women to their more theatrical partners. (These roles are not gifts for actresses.) Ms. Novakovic is ethnically Serbian, like Stana Katic of "Castle." But the name Kay Daniels is closer to Ms. Katic's Kate Beckett. We'll call it on back story: Lizzie lost a former partner and fiance, while Kay lost a sister like Kate, who also lost a family member, her mother. Advantage: "Deception." The supporting players: "Deception" has a full "Castle" style crew: Laila Robins as the suspicious but supportive senior officer; Amaury Nolasco as the junior officer who befriends the new guy; and Vinnie Jones, Justin Chon and the always amusing Lenora Crichlow as Cameron's magic crew, who take the place of Castle's family. "Instinct" has Sharon Leal as the boss cop; Whoopi Goldberg as Dylan's editor; Daniel Ings as his husband; and the always suave Naveen Andrews as a former spy colleague. It's a less "Castle" like bunch. Advantage: "Deception." The city: "Castle" did a decent job of using Los Angeles locations to achieve a sense of its New York setting. Both of the new shows are set and at least partly shot in New York, but through three episodes of each show, "Instinct" has more Gotham flavor. Extra points for the Burger Warrior food truck. Advantage: "Instinct." The cases: "Deception" has to come up with situations that call for the large scale, theatrical illusions that are the specialty of Cameron and his crew, like escaping from a bomb rigged museum gallery under video surveillance. "Instinct" can do more intimate, character based mysteries that play off Dylan's knowledge of abnormal psychology like "Castle," it's kinky killer of the week. Advantage: "Instinct." The actors: "Castle" ran for eight seasons on ABC because of Nathan Fillion's charm as Richard Castle and the comfort and humor, if not outright chemistry, between him and Ms. Katic. "Deception" may be more of a surface clone of its ABC predecessor, and given that Dylan in "Instinct" is gay more likely to develop a "Castle" like romance between its partners. But in the performances and teamwork of Mr. Cumming (more restrained than usual) and Ms. Novakovic, "Instinct" has more of what made "Castle" a hit. Advantage: "Instinct."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Television
The tremors are over. When major league players stick their cleats into the dirt for training camp next week, the ground below them will be still. The invisible threat to their season the coronavirus is still out there, of course. But the game is coming back in an unprecedented form. It will be a 60 game dash to October, not the usual cross country, 162 game slog. "If you said in spring training: 'We're going to have every team tied for first on July 24,' you'd be like, 'Sign me up for that pennant race,'" said Jim Duquette, the former Mets general manager. "Basically, that's what we have. We're starting a week before the normal trade deadline and saying, 'OK, here you go, guys, last 60 games, go get 'em!' That has a chance to be really exciting." For fans, that may be the best way to approach the new season: Erase the recent past, embrace the next few months and, by all means, don't look too far ahead. After all, Commissioner Rob Manfred finally imposed the schedule which begins on July 23 on the players' union this week after the sides had failed to reach a negotiated agreement over three months of unrealistic proposals and harsh public statements. Manfred's decision meant the league avoided the unseemliness of losing a season to economic squabbling amid a pandemic, but the unilateral resolution reflected much deeper problems for the sport. Few of those issues can be resolved without repairing a deep chasm between the union and ownership, a schism that could soon swallow up the sport. "I've never seen anything like what we've experienced, in any baseball labor negotiation," said Fred Claire, the general manager of the Los Angeles Dodgers from 1987 to 1998. "With the letters that went back and forth, with the language that was used, with the total display of lack of trust it was terrible. "We've got to learn from that, because there's a big hurdle coming, and it can't be denied." That hurdle is negotiations over a new collective bargaining agreement after the current one expires in December 2021. The current C.B.A. is a clear victory for the owners, who have managed to keep the average salary virtually stagnant around 4.4 million since it was ratified in December 2016, despite rising industry revenue. That dynamic has increasingly loomed over the major leagues for the last few seasons. It explains why the union was wary of giving any ground even amid a pandemic and why many observers fear the end of the current C.B.A. could bring the first work stoppage since the strike that canceled the 1994 World Series and devastated the sport's momentum for years. Manfred and his deputy, Dan Halem, have struggled to forge a productive relationship with Tony Clark, the executive director of the players' union, and Bruce Meyer, his top negotiator who was hired in 2018. Manfred, whose reputation suffered over his handling of the Houston Astros' cheating scandal this winter, further strained his credibility this month with contradictory tactics guaranteeing a season on June 10 and threatening cancellation five days later. Clark fired back in a statement, saying the players were "disgusted." None Everyone Loves Ohtani: The Angels' two way star was a unanimous pick for A.L. M.V.P. and his superfans redefine devotion. Phillie Phavorite: Bryce Harper truly committed to Philadelphia and now he's back on top of baseball, winning the N.L. M.V.P. Cy Young Winners: Milwaukee's Corbin Burnes and Toronto's Robbie Ray had hit rock bottom before they worked their way up to stardom. Baseball Is Stuck in Neutral: The potential of a lockout has a star studded group of free agents waiting for the dust to settle. Free Agency Tracker: Get the latest updates on signings, contract extensions and trades. The root of the disagreement was a March deal, formed soon after the virus hit North America, in which the players agreed to take prorated salaries this season as long as they got service time for canceled games. Had they authorized further pay cuts, the owners would have agreed to a longer schedule. When Manfred flew to Arizona last week to meet with Clark, a former All Star first baseman, it produced yet another disagreement: Manfred announced that he and Clark had jointly developed the framework for a deal, but union officials insisted it was merely a proposal. The players, who had initially wanted 114 games, responded with an offer of 70, which the league refused to consider. The players, in turn, roundly rejected Manfred's final offer, a move that forced him to implement his schedule and sunk baseball's hope for a lucrative expanded playoff format which the union still holds as a bargaining chip. The rejection also means that the union retains its right to file a grievance accusing M.L.B. of negotiating in bad faith. The union's hard line stance irritated some current players, like the Cincinnati Reds' Trevor Bauer, and some retirees, like the former pitcher Mike Stanton, the Yankees' union representative during C.B.A. negotiations in 2002, when the sides narrowly avoided a strike. "When I was in the room and I was a player, man, I was all in: 'We've got to fight for everything, we've got to do what's right not just for us, but for the players in the past and the future,'" Stanton said. "But I look at it differently now. I never really thought all that much about the other people the stadium workers, the parking attendants, the concession stand people. It was all about what was going on between the two sides and slugging it out. "But this was a different situation, you know? This shouldn't have been a C.B.A. negotiation. It turned into it, but it shouldn't have been. And all the fans that I've talked with, that's what ticked everybody off." How much should the game change? The impact of those emotions will be harder to quantify than usual this season, because nearly every team will be prohibited from selling tickets, at least initially. M.L.B.'s average per game attendance dropped for the fourth year in a row in 2019, to to 28,198. But that figure is still higher than any season before 1993, and with so many more games to sell, M.L.B. at 68.4 million fans last season still dwarfs the N.F.L., N.B.A. and N.H.L. in overall attendance. The fans are clearly out there: regional sports networks that broadcast local games ranked No. 1 in prime time cable ratings in nearly every market last season. This quickie season may appeal as a novelty with each game counting 2.7 times more than normal but it will hardly resemble the way fans usually consume the game. "Baseball takes a lot of time, and I say that in a positive sense," said Andy Dolich, a sports consultant who has worked in the front offices of teams in M.L.B., the N.F.L. and the N.B.A. "The season, the number of games, the games itself it's a soap opera: 'We're in it, we're out of it, we just won 10, we just lost three.' It is what has attracted people for such a long time." But fans' tastes are changing, Dolich warned, and baseball has work to do to stabilize its popularity in the future. While M.L.B. said that its AtBat app increased in use by 18 percent from 2018 to 2019, baseball's audience is notorious for skewing older than the other major U.S. team sports. The Sports Business Journal reported in 2017 that the average age of an M.L.B. viewer was 57 years old 15 years older than the average N.B.A. viewer. And the popularity of e sports, especially among younger fans, has grown substantially since then. "With the absolute tidal wave of gaming and digital devices and instantaneous decision making, baseball has not stayed current," Dolich said. The league added a wild card play in game in 2012, and expanded instant replay two years later, and has continually tweaked the format of the Home Run Derby, the appetizer for its marquee summer event, the All Star Game. But there is only so much baseball can do to change, because of the sport's built in structural quirks. The best hitters still come to bat only four or five times per game. Top starting pitchers appear in fewer than 35 games per season. There is no game clock. Many feel that straying from the game's essence would not only be inauthentic, but impractical. "If they're going to really change the game, they'd have to blow it up seven innings, ties, three balls for a walk, two strikes for a strikeout. I don't want to see that." Indeed, if baseball does not tread carefully as it charts a new course, it risks alienating its most loyal customers. This season will include several rule changes: every pitcher must face at least three batters (or finish an inning); the designated hitter will be used in both leagues; and extra innings will begin with a runner on second base, to reduce the likelihood of marathon games. The latter two measures are intended to protect players' health for this season only, but they could become fixtures that might unsettle longtime followers. "I'm certainly classified as a traditionalist, but when you start talking about a pitcher needing to face three hitters or starting an inning with a man on second, I don't know what game you're talking about and I have no interest in that game," said Claire, 84. "What concerns me is that I don't want to see an overreaction to all of this." A more appealing innovation that players had endorsed was also tabled: broadcast enhancements that would have given fans a closer look at players' personalities. The best baseball players do not resonate nationally like their counterparts in the N.F.L. and the N.B.A., and creating crossover stars outside of local markets remains a chronic problem. "They need to continue to market the high profile players, and they need better cooperation with those guys to take advantage of their social media platform," said Duquette, now an analyst for SiriusXM and SNY. "It's underutilized on both sides." Baseball did get extensive national publicity in the months before the pandemic for the Astros' cheating scandal, in which they used an illegal sign stealing scheme on their way to winning the 2017 World Series. Manfred was roundly criticized for disciplining no players, but he suspended Manager A.J. Hinch and General Manager Jeff Luhnow, who were then fired by the Astros' owner, Jim Crane. Luhnow did not orchestrate the cheating, but some viewed his downfall as an indictment of the team's analytically driven culture that has spread throughout the game. With so many teams relying heavily on data and video for any marginal advantage, perhaps it was inevitable that some would be tacitly encouraged to cross ethical boundaries. "I think that's true," Minnesota Twins chief baseball officer Derek Falvey said this spring, when asked about that theory. "We're all competitive at heart and looking for an edge, I guess. Maybe I'm naive; I try and be who I am with our group, and they're going to interpret it how they want." As teams have increasingly interpreted the numbers to find bargains and avoid costly mistakes, that has undercut the earning power of veterans; their production, in theory, could be replaced by younger, cheaper players. That trend dismays many players, though most have responded to the analytics wave by giving executives what they want: power pitchers who hunt for strikeouts and disciplined hitters who wait for pitches to drive in the air. It has had a clear effect on the game itself. M.L.B. set a record for home runs last year but also for pitches per game. The average number of pitches per plate appearance has risen in each of the last four seasons, to 3.93 last year, the most of the 21 seasons tracked by baseball reference.com. Accordingly, games lasted an average of 3 hours 10 minutes in 2019, the longest ever. "They have to do something on the pace of the game," Duquette said. "It's absurd. We're going in the wrong direction, and all of the data suggests that the new fan base talks about how the game is too long." Manfred has talked for years about that topic, but has mostly made only minor adjustments; the three batter minimum rule, for example, is designed to reduce the many pitching changes that slow down games. Manfred also had the authority to implement a pitch clock before last season, but backed off when players resisted. This month, though, Manfred had a much more critical decision that involved defying the players. When they dared him to implement a 60 game season over their objections, he did. The potential for a legal fight, a depressed free agent market and another contentious labor negotiation all loom large in the distance. But for now, almost in spite of itself, baseball is back. Enjoy it while it lasts.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Sports
That morning, the door of the testing room was propped open, allowing for sunlight and a line of students and parents to snake inside from out on the sidewalk. We were waiting for the results of the math placement test that would let us know how our child's high school career would begin. It felt as if so much was riding on it. Would my daughter be at the bottom of the pile, or at top in Advanced Placement classes that could confer college credit, reducing future college workloads, allowing for jobs while in school, internships, or a shorter time in college? I had home schooled her for the past two years, so the test also felt like a final exam for me: Her score was also my teaching evaluation. Like the other kids in line, my daughter seemed nervous, her eyes wide and pupils small and fixed in the distance as we moved an inch at a time toward the front. "Are you O.K.?" I asked. "You look sick. Take my sweater," I said, and I untied it from my waist. She didn't want it. She didn't feel positive about how she'd done on the exam. As if in some automated response, I told her not to worry, she was smart as a whip and she'd nailed it. I didn't know. I said this even though we'd gotten through only about half of the high school algebra assignments. I figured she knew enough to unravel the rest of the exam. So I requested that the proctor give her the most advanced test, and not the grade appropriate one. Math was always easy for her in home school. When the proctor read her score aloud my heart sank. I was embarrassed. We both were, we later told each other, and I wondered if the other parents could hear. As the proctor wrote her score on a sheet of paper, my baby stood next to me, unmoving, her eyes now drowning and brimming with tears. But she didn't blink. When he held out the paper to her, I took it from his hand and said thank you. As we walked away, I said, "Baby Girl, you scored 100 percent on the math I taught you. And I'm sorry we only got about half the way through." A few years earlier, a placement test given to elementary school graduates showed my daughter was off track. Based on her scores, she would have been placed in classes that wouldn't challenge her, and I feared she'd be stuck in that stream for the rest of her school career. I am a college professor who has taught around the world. When my daughter was failing just down the street from where I was, I was receiving high marks in teaching. I felt guilty. If I could teach other people's children, how much more did my daughter deserve from me? So I pulled her out and started home schooling her. I didn't want her sitting in front of a computer to use a prepared home school curriculum. So I created a curriculum as I would for any class I taught. I applied teaching techniques that I used with students at the college level. In home school, we covered everything from law to politics, the presidency, Supreme Court judges, constitutional law and criminal law. I wondered how public school districts were navigating current events that read like pornography. And rape. Would they talk about the moral implications of allowing a person to move on from past indiscretions, mistakes and indefensible crimes? Should they be able to? Does it matter how long ago the wrong happened? Is time passing a cure? So, during our home school class on the issue, I asked my daughter what her hope was for the future of our country's laws and then paused and asked if this would change the way she'd navigate the world as she grew into a woman. She shrugged her shoulders and said, "I don't know who I'll have to be." At 4 years old, she could count to 1,000, but by the end of traditional kindergarten, at 5, she was struggling to count to 20 without losing interest. She could say the alphabet forward and backward at 3, she knew colors and sight words, some Spanish and German, and soon it all fell away too. She wasn't behind for her age group, but we knew she was behind for her abilities. Disinterested. My husband and I had weighed the options then and considered home schooling, but we also felt that she needed the social aspect of traditional school. Who can make it in the world without being socialized properly? We kept sending her to school. Later, when we made the plunge to start home schooling, people would often ask, How does she socialize with other children? And we'd explain that she was in Girl Scouts and activities with other home schooled children. The thing about home school is you don't have to wait till the end of the semester and take a final exam to find deficiencies that need to be corrected, areas that can be shaped. Often in public school, you move on at the end and the holes are never filled. I thought that in home schooling, I was filling holes as they came up. At a cafe later that morning after the exam, my baby and I commiserated over the placement test, and reflected on the last two years. I asked her what she would remember most of our time together. Physics, I hoped she'd say, since we got to go to the amusement park and figure out what type of energy every roller coaster required before we rode it. Or, the plays and musicals. But it was none of those things. "I remember you teaching me that I shouldn't crack my knuckles," she said. We both laughed like old friends. She said she enjoyed meeting the writers I knew, waking up late, creating her own graphic novel subtitled in Japanese, dissecting the human eye model and speed assembling Brenda, our transgender non anatomical anatomy doll, for whom my daughter made a purple wig. Then I asked her, "What do you miss most about being in public school?" The two years we spent in home schooling let my daughter work at an accelerated pace. She not only filled those below average academic holes but advanced to honors and college A.P. classes. She gained the confidence, the tools and a holistic foundation to succeed in traditional school as a creative and critical thinker, and also an ethical one. I want all my students, including my daughter, to have the best education I can give them while they are in front of me. There are many ways to home school and I was lucky to be able to do it this way. In the end I could appreciate advantages of traditional school and I am confident that my daughter's education has prepared her to succeed in the larger world. A valuable aspect of being in a community of your peers is the opportunity to see how your knowledge and worldview stack up against others. I truly had expected her to sail triumphantly back into the traditional system. When she did poorly on that math entrance exam, we both felt like failures. Of all the students to fail, I'd failed her. But now, well into her first semester of high school, she's an all A student. She's taking geometry, honors and A.P. classes and is a student athlete. And already, she has friends. But the day of that entrance exam last spring, everything felt up in the air and I was full of regret. The placement test is an amusing memory to us, but only because we are now on the other side of it and she's living her comeback story. Natashia Deon is an NAACP Image Award nominee and the author of the novel "Grace."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Well
Sean Hannity Is Still Upset Ted Koppel Said He Was 'Bad for America' The Fox News host Sean Hannity has been very upset. Mr. Hannity is often very upset, at things like the past friendships of President Barack Obama; the suspected political leanings of his former colleague Megyn Kelly; the resignation of Michael T. Flynn, President Trump's former national security adviser; and the tweets of media reporters from rival news organizations. But the primary target of his anger in recent days has been Ted Koppel, a veteran news anchor and contributor to "CBS Sunday Morning," which last weekend broadcast a clip from an interview with Mr. Hannity that the Fox star did not like at all. The interview was conducted by Mr. Koppel roughly three weeks ago, Mr. Hannity said on his show Monday night, and had been presented to him as an opportunity to discuss the political polarization in American life. But only a minute or so of the full interview was used. And it looks as though it may have been the part that Mr. Hannity found the most insulting. The night before the segment aired, CBS News posted online a part of the interview in which Mr. Hannity described his upbringing, which he said shaped his views. But in the televised footage, he was shown complaining about socialism, liberalism and "angry snowflakes," right wing slang for liberals that conservatives see as easily upset. Then he led with his chin: Mr. Hannity asked if Mr. Koppel, an elder statesman of broadcast news who hosted the ABC show "Nightline" for 25 years, thought he and his show were "bad for America." Mr. Koppel responded, "Yeah." "Really?" Mr. Hannity responded, his voice rising an octave or two. "That's sad, Ted. That's sad." Why did Mr. Koppel think Mr. Hannity's show was bad for America? "You have attracted people who have determined that ideology is more important than facts," Mr. Koppel said. He also told Mr. Hannity, an enthusiastic on air supporter of President Trump, "You are very good at what you do." What Mr. Hannity has done for the last two nights is use his show to put his anger on full display. He has directly addressed Mr. Koppel ("Ted, you show in this clip, you are not a journalist," he said on Monday's show.) He has denounced the segment as "edited fake news." He has compared Mr. Koppel to Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton perhaps the worst insult a Fox News host can throw at you. He has also demanded that CBS release the full tape of his interview, which he called "a very good, substantive give and take." Bill O'Reilly, another Fox host, and Brit Hume, a political analyst at the network, repeated that call on Monday night. Retail earnings and Black Friday: the week in business. Elizabeth Holmes will resume her testimony in her fraud trial. So did the conservative commentator Michelle Malkin, who called the 77 year old Mr. Koppel "ancient" and a "walking dead decrepit media elitist." On Tuesday's broadcast, the conservative radio host Laura Ingraham told Mr. Hannity that he was Mr. Koppel's "victim" and said CBS treated him unfairly as a way to protect "the worldview of the left." "They want to delegitimize you," she said. Mr. Koppel has not responded to Mr. Hannity. A spokesman for CBS News said the network would not respond, either, and also would not release the unedited footage of the interview, which was part of a 10 minute segment that was not a profile devoted to Mr. Hannity. Mr. Hannity has turned the slight into a dispute over the intelligence of "the American people," which he accused Mr. Koppel of underestimating. He said people were smart enough to know the difference between what he does and a news broadcast. So what does he do? On Monday, Mr. Hannity described himself as "a talk show host" and "an advocacy journalist" who covers stories like President Obama's ties to "black liberation theology," he said in one example that CBS would not touch. But he also used the word "news" to describe the service he provides his viewers, asking Mr. Koppel, "How can I be bad for America when I am offering the American people news and information nightly that your own network will not touch because they have an agenda?"	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Media
The judge presiding over perhaps the longest running art restitution dispute had not been born when the family of Baron Mor Lipot Herzog, one of Hungary's most prominent bankers, filed a claim in Budapest in 1945 for a collection of 2,500 artworks, Renaissance furniture and tapestries. After 75 years, the case files from the still unresolved claim hold hundreds of thousands of pages in English, Hungarian, Russian, Polish, French, Italian, German, Spanish, Portuguese and Dutch. There have been 11 court decisions, five appeals and 15 claims by roughly 30 lawyers in the United States, Hungary, Russia, Poland, France, Germany and Switzerland. The vast majority of works from a collection that once included 10 El Grecos and paintings by Goya, Velazquez, Hals, Courbet, Van Dyck, Corot, Renoir, Monet and Gauguin, are still missing and the Herzog family believes that many are in Russia, Poland, France and many other countries where works are thought to have traveled in the chaos of World War II and its aftermath. "It's the third generation and fourth generation who is actively pursuing the quest to restitute the memory of the Herzog family, to right the provenance of the looted artworks," said Agnes Peresztegi, a lawyer who has represented members of the family for 20 years. Over the years, the dispute has drawn in all kinds of participants. The United States ambassador to Hungary tried to negotiate a settlement in 1997. Seven United States senators including Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York and Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts expressed their views on the case in behalf of the heirs. But Hungary has argued that the Herzog heirs no longer own the art, citing among other rationales that compensation had been paid in 1973 and resolved any claims made by United States citizens against Hungary, a position the heirs dispute. Thaddeus J. Stauber, a lawyer who represents the government of Hungary in the current suit, said, "Hungary owns the artworks at issue through lawful purchase, gift, and the uniform application of property laws." Herzog's collection, known as one of the finest in Europe, became so impressive and expansive because his "appetite for collecting was insatiable," said Konstantin Akinsha, an art historian and a leading expert on World War II looted art. "His home had no space for the family and they moved into other homes. All the walls in Herzog's study were covered by El Greco paintings." When Herzog died in 1934, his collection was inherited by his wife, Janka, and then, after she died in 1940, his three children Erzsebet, Istvan and Andras. It was then hidden by the family in various locations in Hungary, including bank vaults in Budapest. Hungarian and Nazi officials found most of the hiding places and took the artworks to the Majestic Hotel in Budapest, the headquarters of Adolf Eichmann, who went to Hungary in 1944 to help carry out Hitler's extermination of the Jews. When Soviet troops approached the city, Eichmann and Hungarian officials sent works to Germany. Other works were left behind in Budapest's Museum of Fine Arts. After the war, when the Allies repatriated looted art that was recovered, some Herzog works were returned to Hungary in anticipation that they would eventually be given back to the rightful owners. But many ended up in state museums where, Herzog family members say, they once bore labels that said "From the Herzog Collection." The heirs began to make claims in Hungary within a few months after the end of World War II. For nearly two decades, Erzsebet's husband, Alfonz Weiss de Csepel, wrote to officials in Germany, Austria, Switzerland and the United States. The National Archives in Washington has copies of 350 pages from his letters. Donald Blinken, who was United States ambassador to Hungary between 1994 and 1997, said in an interview that he worked with Erzsebet's daughter, Martha Nierenberg, to negotiate an agreement with the Hungarian minister of culture under which works would be returned to the family which, in acknowledgment, would give several back to Hungary. "We thought we had a deal but a year later we found out that they had reneged," Mr. Blinken said, referring to Hungary. In 1999, Mrs. Nierenberg filed suit in Budapest asking for 12 works and won in a lower court, but Hungary's Supreme Court overturned the judgment in 2002. Three years later, the lower court ruled she was entitled to only one painting. She appealed and lost in 2008. In 2010, the legal battle shifted to the United States when three Herzog heirs filed a suit in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. The suit was partly funded by the Commission for Art Recovery, which was founded by Ronald Lauder in 1997 to help governments and museums restitute art stolen during the Nazi era. "We are asking for the return of works or to be compensated for the heirs' interest in the works," said Alycia Benenati, a lawyer for the heirs who has been on the case for 10 years. Hungary's efforts to restitute looted art have been the subject of some criticism, most notably from Stuart E. Eizenstat, an adviser to the State Department and an expert on Holocaust era looted art. He negotiated the Washington Principles in 1998 in which 44 nations agreed to making best efforts to return the art. But at a conference in Berlin in 2018 he was especially critical of Hungary, which he said possesses "major works of art looted on its territory" during World War II and has "not restituted them" despite "being repeatedly asked" to address the matter. But in May, Judge Ellen Huvelle of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia dismissed the Hungarian government from the case on jurisdictional grounds. She did allow the case to go forward against the Museum of Fine Arts, the National Gallery and the Museum of Applied Arts, and the University of Technology and Economics in Budapest. In July, Judge Huvelle granted Hungary's request to have the District Court of Appeals review whether the case against the museums and the university in Hungary should also be dismissed. No date has been set for the court hearing. Though much of the case has revolved around legal technicalities, one of the Herzog heir lawyers said she hoped it could ultimately become a litigation based on the merits of the family's claim. Ms. Peresztegi said: "Last year, the French Supreme Court held that as a matter principle no lawful purchase and no application of property law can override the fact that a property was taken as a result of Nazi persecution. I expect that the United States courts will reach the same moral and just conclusion."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Art & Design
SLAVE OLD MAN By Translated by Linda Coverdale 151 pp. The New Press. 19.99. The myth of Daphne and Apollo has an entrancing New World counterpart in 's "Slave Old Man," the tale of a plantation fugitive who disappears into the "forestine soul" of colonial Martinique. One fluid action sustains its plot: The old man runs. Pursued by a vicious dog, he finds rejuvenation in nature's wonders after a lifetime of mute obedience. The world of slavery disintegrates in the elemental confrontations of the chase. Imagine Walt Whitman adapting "Apocalypto" and you might approximate the awe and adrenaline of Chamoiseau's action pastoral. The old man braves a nocturnal phantasmagoria of three hooved horses, zombies with leafy heads, a demoness toting souls in an oxcart. He battles a venomous serpent and a swarm of mangrove crabs, but also revels in the delicate beauty of a rare fern flower, the fresh taste of soil and the miracle of trees gathering their "phantasmal contraband" of light. After nearly drowning in an ancient spring, he seamlessly assumes the novel's narration, reborn in Adamic first person. Before escaping, the old man is barely distinct from the sugar vats on a plantation where he goes by the name "Old Syrup." Neither his master nor his fellow slaves detect his dormant spirit, which erupts only after he locks eyes with the mastiff that will hunt him down. His exhilarating flight evokes the shock of freedom with tactile immediacy. "The world was born without any veil of modesty," he marvels. "Buds and rotting spots, seeds and broken blossoms, earthly night solar light bound themselves together in one momentum." If the runaways of American literature seek autonomy and self ownership, Chamoiseau's maroon enters a "Great Woods" where distinctions between past and present, human and animal, Old World and New dissolve. Deep time makes a mockery of the plantations' blinkered order; under the ancient canopy, the master's stride falters and the voices of African hunters and Amerindian priests resound from the depths of unrecorded millenniums.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Books
The Kilauea volcano on the Big Island of Hawaii has been setting off small earthquakes, creating gas emitting fissures and releasing flows of lava this month that have destroyed dozens of homes and forced the evacuation of at least 2,000 people. But some scientists look at the basalt rich lava fields around Kilauea, which could yet produce more explosions in coming days, and see something else: a portal to Mars, whose surface is mostly composed of basaltic rocks. A team of biologists, volcanologists, astronauts and other specialists has periodically conducted fieldwork in the Kilauea fields since 2015 as part of a four year, NASA led research project. Among the questions they are investigating is how any life on ancient Mars, if it did exist, may have developed. Basaltic terrain can host a diverse range of microorganisms, leading scientists in Hawaii to focus on the bacteria and other organisms living there, and the factors that enable them to survive. "The reason why there continue to be questions, and programs like ours that go out and try to answer the questions Was Mars habitable? Is it currently habitable? is that nobody really knows," said Darlene Lim, a geobiologist at the NASA Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley and the project's principal investigator. Dr. Lim's team is also testing gear and operational systems that astronauts could use during potential future missions to the red planet's surface: Dr. Lim said an open question is how astronauts exploring Mars should communicate their findings back to earth despite a one way communications delay what she called "planetary latency" that can be anywhere from four to 22 minutes. "You can't have an infinite amount of data pumped between both planets," she added. "It's very expensive." Scientists with the project which is officially called Biologic Analog Science Associated with Lava Terrains, or Basalt say that some of their research for the project will be published later this year in the scientific journal Astrobiology. The project is one of several continuing ones in and around Hawaii's volcanoes that have potential interstellar applications. Another is a NASA funded behavioral research study in which teams of people live in isolation for months at a "Mars like" site on the slope of the Mauna Loa volcano, down the road from Kilauea. The study was partly designed to gauge how humans deal with boredom. "They have to pretend that they can't go outside without donning rather cumbersome suits," Scott Rowland, a geologist at the University of Hawaii at Manoa who helps run a separate "planetary volcano analog workshop" for graduate students, said of the study's participants. Dr. Rowland said that while no Martian (or, for that matter, lunar) volcanoes are active, Hawaii's volcanoes are useful to scientists because they have newly formed faults, craters, calderas and other features that can be studied up close. This month, Kilauea has been generating steam, volcanic gas, ash clouds and lava, some of which is flowing into the Pacific Ocean and setting off a chemical reaction that produces clouds of acid and fine glass. The activity prompted the authorities to evacuate Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, where all of the Basalt project's Hawaii fieldwork has taken place. (It has other research sites in Idaho.) Dr. Lim said her team was not affected by the recent activity because its fieldwork in the park ended last November. But she plans to return to Hawaii's Big Island this summer, she said, for a project in which researchers will use a robotic vehicle to explore an underwater seamount, also known as an underwater volcano. The project, which is expected to run through at least 2020, is run partly by NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. NASA says the seamount, known as Lo ihi, may be an analog to the hydrothermal systems on one of Saturn's moons, Enceladus, which has an ocean of liquid water beneath its icy crust. Scientists have wondered if Enceladus and other icy moons in the outer solar system could be home to microbes or other forms of alien life. The seamount is an "incredible alien environment," Dr. Lim said. "If you will."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Science
My whole life, I think to myself , "You're too tall. You can't do that." Just always feeling like I don't do something the right way, or being obsessed with "Do I do it this way or that way?" I get mad at myself more than I get mad at anybody else. So I can immediately pretend that I'm talking to some part of me that I don't like. I've always had a very harsh critic in my head. I use it when I need to bring that out. But I'm kinder to myself these days than I have been in the past. Does the bird have a name? What kind of bird was it? I won't remember; I'm not a bird person. I love animals, but I was a little nervous about working with a bird, because birds peck, and I just don't know what they do. I got to audition three birds for the role. The woman gave me one, I put it on my shoulder, and one of them kept crawling in my hair. And I was, like, "Next." The other one was very talkative. And then Little Man I think that was his name just sat there and was so sweet. I walked around with him and he just continued to sit there like he could chill out with me all day. I fell in love with him. Cut to filming, there's a lot of distraction. In the last minute I decided to give LaVona emphysema, because the bird lady didn't want us to smoke around the bird. I was, like, "Oh, thank God I don't have to smoke in this scene." So I had an oxygen tube and oxygen tank. Then that bird, Little Man, got on my shoulder and became fascinated with my oxygen tank thing and my ear, and just kept poking at me. I was determined to not let anything stop me from telling my side of the story. And this bird was, like, "I'm going to make this as challenging for you as possible ." He was kind of great though, because as an actor you sometimes get in your head, and he stopped that. I was either telling my story or dealing with him. He helped me focus in this weird way. So you always knew there was, to use this terrible term, a casting couch, but have you ever had to deal with it? I never ever had to deal with the casting couch. I'm really grateful, but I also think that was probably because I started working in my late 30s and I'm 6 feet tall. I probably wasn't someone that seemed approachable in that way. Fortunately for me, that's where my height and age helped out. But how wonderful to think of a time when no actress will have to ever deal with that. It's something we have to talk about as a culture, and get through it and move beyond it. When women and men are paid equally, then I think the conversation will change, too. Maybe that abuse won't happen as much if we are all on the same playing field, which is shocking. Sad, too.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Movies
The former Echo Bay Marina on Lake Mead, near Las Vegas, last week. The lake is at its lowest level since the Hoover Dam was filled in the 1930s. The Winter Was Wet, but California Could Get Thirsty Again When California officials announced an end to restrictions on urban water use, they cited the recent wet winter as one reason. El Nino, the climate pattern that brought a succession of storms to Northern California, had given the state a reprieve from its water woes, they said. Those storms left a mountain snowpack that, while ordinary by historical standards, far exceeded the meager accumulations of 2015. The healthy snowpack which will provide about one third of the state's water as it melts this spring and successful efforts to sharply reduce water use gave officials enough confidence to suspend the restrictions that had been imposed last April. The odds of that happening would appear to be strong, as signaled by two announcements that occurred around the same time as California's decision to lift the water restrictions. One, the news that the water level at Lake Mead, the huge reservoir on the Colorado River, has reached a historical low, suggested that long term problems for the water supply in California related to a warming climate have not changed. The other suggested that there is a potential short term challenge ahead, in the form of La Nina. This month, forecasters with the federal Climate Prediction Center and the International Research Institute for Climate and Society issued their latest seasonal outlook, saying that El Nino was coming to an end and that the odds now favored the development of La Nina by the fall. El Nino and La Nina are two sides of the same story, one that involves atmospheric pressure, prevailing winds and sea surface temperatures in the equatorial Pacific. When average water temperatures in the eastern Pacific rise by a certain amount above normal, forecasters declare an El Nino. Eventually, though, the water begins to cool, which is what is happening now. Mr. Halpert and his colleagues say as of now there is a 75 percent possibility that water temperatures will fall far enough by the end of summer to result in La Nina. As with El Nino, the jet streams that circle the planet would be affected, though in different ways. That in turn would affect weather in North America and around the world. Just as with El Nino, because there are many other variables that affect the weather, there are no certainties of specific La Nina related effects in specific locales. But typically, Mr. Halpert said, La Nina brings wet weather to the Pacific Northwest and Ohio Valley and drier than average conditions across the southern part of the country. (Forecasters are making no predictions about effects in the Northeast.) For California, Mr. Halpert said, La Nina could mean another dry winter in the south, while the far northern part of the state could be slightly wetter than normal. Because winter is when California gets nearly all of its precipitation, that could put more pressure on water supplies. On the day of California's announcement, the federal Bureau of Reclamation reported that the level of Lake Mead, which stretches across the Nevada desert behind Hoover Dam, was slightly more than 1,074 feet above sea level. That is the lowest level since the dam was filled in the 1930s, and is 150 feet below the level when the reservoir was last full, in 1983. Put another way, Lake Mead, part of the Colorado River system that supplies water to California and six other Western states, is now at 37 percent of capacity. The lake level is something of an arbitrary milestone it can and will be raised later this year by increasing releases from Lake Powell, upstream on the Colorado. That will help avoid triggering reductions in the amount of water allotted to Arizona and Nevada. But the historic low is another symbol of the devastating drought that has affected the Rocky Mountain basin for a decade and a half, said Jonathan Overpeck, a director of the Institute for the Environment at the University of Arizona. The Rocky Mountain basin has been through droughts before, Dr. Overpeck said, but this one is different. Previous droughts were marked by lower than normal precipitation, he said, but with this one, "the precipitation hasn't been that low." "But it's been much warmer than normal," he said. "This is what I like to call a hot drought, or a climate change drought. And there's going to be more and more of them in the future." Warmer temperatures have the same effect in the Rockies as they do in the Sierra Nevada. They reduce snowpack because more precipitation falls as rain rather than snow, and snow accumulates at higher elevations than before, meaning less terrain is covered. Warmer spring temperatures can also make the snowpack melt faster, which in extreme circumstances can force water managers to dump water out of reservoirs to protect against flooding. (Although the Sierra snowpack has been melting fairly fast this spring, a representative of the California Department of Water Resources said that the reservoirs had not been affected.) Dr. Overpeck said that the upper basin of the Colorado mostly parts of Utah, Wyoming and Colorado was warming as quickly as anywhere in the continental United States.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Science
The Toyota Corolla isn't much different from a Nissan Sentra that looks like a Volkswagen Jetta or a Chevy Cruze and might as well be a Hyundai Elantra. Compact car buyers are obsessed with value, dependability and economy. Style? Not so much. Into this sea of sameness, Dodge dropped its chic Dart sedan two years ago, and it has not made much of a splash. It's rakish and sleek with curves where much of the competition has creases, fancy LED taillights and an interior that's distractingly self conscious. It's new enough to be based on a post Chrysler merger platform from Fiat the same bones underpin the Alfa Romeo Giulietta that's not sold in the United States but is built in a Belvidere, Ill., plant that has churned out Chrysler vehicles since 1965. The Dart is attractive and distinctive, but no one seems to care. For each one of the 7,202 Darts that Dodge sold in October, Honda sold 3.4 of its robotic Civics. Chevy, Ford, Honda, Hyundai and Toyota all have cars in this mass market class that regularly sell at rates of 15,000 to 20,000 or more, month in and month out. Italian heritage or not, the front drive Dart is mechanically similar to virtually all the cars in its class. The structure is a steel unitized body with MacPherson strut front and multilink independent rear suspension and a 4 cylinder engine mounted crosswise in the nose. In the base 17,490 SE, the engine is the aluminum 2 liter Tigershark with dual overhead cams and variable timing on its 16 valves to produce 160 horsepower on regular grade fuel. A step up is the 20,990 Aero, with a turbocharged 1.4 liter MultiAir engine that also makes 160 horsepower, albeit while burning premium. With a few aerodynamic tricks like a shuttered grille and a weight saving reduction in fuel capacity, the Aero achieves an E.P.A. rating of 41 m.p.g. on the highway when equipped with the standard 6 speed manual transmission. But let's not get carried away: This isn't a Challenger or a Viper. It is, however, a big improvement over previous wimpy small Dodges like the Omni, Shadow and misbegotten Caliber. This is particularly true at the GT's tail, where the "racetrack" taillamps that run around the rear are complemented by dual exhaust outlets. Matching the exterior's exuberance is an interior that features well shaped front bucket seats. The dash itself has an illuminated red trim line that encircles the instrumentation and visually alludes to the taillights. The circular speedometer and tachometer exist alongside each other on a 7 inch digital display, making them easy to scan in default mode. And if default isn't your style, the display can be reconfigured. If that's not enough digital distraction, the UConnect control system operates from an 8.4 inch display of its own in the center of the dash. With sweet details like black chrome air vents and red accents on the door panels, there's inspired design almost everywhere inside and outside the Dart GT. Where the car disappoints is the driving. There's no spirit, no exhaust note and no joy in the engine's operation. The automatic transmission shifts indifferently, the electric power steering never seems directly connected to the tires and the ride is stiff without the compensation of great road adhesion. It's just not fun, particularly in comparison with the more powerful and supple Volkswagen GTI and Ford Focus ST. In testing by Motor Trend magazine, a 2014 Dart GT much like the one I drove was clocked at a languid 8.7 seconds from 0 to 60 m.p.h. With the automatic, the GT is rated at 22 m.p.g. in the city and 31 on the highway. In mostly city traffic, I averaged 22.2 m.p.g. Luxury car buyers shopping in the six figure ether can afford to put style ahead of practical considerations. But most compact car buyers can't afford to buy on style alone. They're stretching to buy these cars, and high quality brands like Toyota and Honda offer reassurance, while the Koreans come with 10 year warranties. That's the competition for the Dart, which carries a five year, 100,000 mile drivetrain warranty and three year, 36,000 mile bumper to bumper coverage. In 1963 76, the original compact Dart, alongside its near twin, the Plymouth Valiant, was the go to car for high value shoppers. That's why the Dart name has resonance today. But resonance only takes you so far, and this new Dart still has a way to go.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Automobiles
Every Friday, pop critics for The New York Times weigh in on the week's most notable new songs and videos and anything else that strikes them as intriguing. Just want the music? Listen to the Playlist on Spotify here (or find our profile: nytimes). Like what you hear? Let us know at theplaylist nytimes.com and sign up for our Louder newsletter, a once a week blast of our pop music coverage. Assertiveness, not her usual melancholy introspection, marks "Comeback Kid," which previews Sharon Van Etten's first album since 2014, "Remind Me Tomorrow," scheduled for January. (In between, she has been acting, writing soundtracks and becoming a mother.) A blustery, marchlike (but shifty) beat and pealing organ chords orchestrate an encounter between a "runaway" and a "comeback kid" or maybe it's an internal debate for someone re entering the pop fray. "I'm not a runaway," she insists. "It just feels that way." JON PARELES The frenetic beat that starts "Mogambo" comes from a dhol, a two headed South Asian drum, as Riz MC also known as the Pakistani British actor Riz Ahmed and a member of the Swet Shop Boys barks rhymes about post colonial, bicultural pugnaciousness and pride: "They put their boots in our ground/I put my roots in their ground/And I put my truth in this sound/I spit my truth and it's Brown ." "Mogambo," named after a Bollywood movie villain, is a two part track that slows down to a drone, a mixture of dhol and trap sounds and a lower, more glowering vocal delivery, with a stark refrain: "They wanna kill us all." PARELES Oh, the ingratitude. In "Without Me," the long suffering Halsey lovingly rescues someone only to be cast aside when no longer needed. "Put you right back on your feet/Just so you could take advantage of me," she sings, both accusatory and forlorn. With freeze dried percussion sounds and Auto Tuned vocals, the production may suit radio programmers but dehumanizes the song. Perhaps that leaves room for the inevitable amateur YouTube covers to reveal the song's heartbreak. PARELES Welcome to Mariah Carey, the demo years. Which is to say, Ms. Carey was once a singer who thrilled with filigree both in the ornate nature of her vocals, and also, in the middle of her career especially, with the density of her productions. But she is not a reliable hitmaker anymore, and she has endured some very public performance shortfalls in recent years. Given that, a return to basics is promising. "With You" is barely distracting it moves slowly, gently, casually. Ms. Carey coos with authority, and pushes her voice just enough, but not too much. It feels like the template for a busier, more ambitious song, but for Ms. Carey, who still sings with authority, it is plenty. JON CARAMANICA A chipper and curiously sweet assessment of a toxic relationship by Alessia Cara. Over a production with extremely light flickers of rocksteady, Ms. Cara tsk tsks the person who dragged her down: "Go get your praise from someone else/You did a number on my health." Ms. Cara excels at rendering unsteady feeling smoothly, and this song, which on the surface seems to effortlessly bop and swing, is working hard to obscure the darkness within. CARAMANICA The final song on "Mudboy," the debut album by the "Mo Bamba" shouter Sheck Wes, is "Vetements Socks," which begins tonally opposite from his breakout hit. The beat is soothing and languorous, and Sheck Wes raps with deliberate calm (in pace, not subject matter). But just when it begins to lull, or feel like a valedictory, he transitions into a double time flow, and then into a yell. He's not retreating. CARAMANICA By official count, "The Prophet Speaks," due Dec. 7, will be Van Morrison's 40th studio album. Like his other recent releases, its track list is full of old blues, soul and jazz songs. He's backed, as he was on "You're Driving Me Crazy" (released earlier this year), by the jazz keyboardist Joey DeFrancesco and his group. The title song, written by Mr. Morrison, is a minor key blues with a rumba undercurrent, and he sings it with improvisatory aplomb. But it doesn't just revisit his formative era. The lyrics ponder spiritual matters, while the arrangement elusive acoustic guitar and Mr. DeFrancesco providing not only vaporous keyboard but also a muted, Miles Davis tinged trumpet beckons toward, if not into, the mystic. PARELES Maxwell takes his time. The trilogy of albums that he began in 2009 with "BLACKsummers'night" and belatedly continued in 2016 with "blackSUMMERS'night" is supposed to conclude, early in 2019, with "blacksummers'NIGHT." It includes "Shame," a pleading come on full of apologies and second thoughts. The verses circle through three chords, rising and receding; Maxwell's vocals echo to make the beat blurry and uncertain. And the words recall past misunderstandings and suspicions, desperately hoping that, "Maybe one day we'll be more than we were way, way back when," and longing, in the chorus, to "Feel no shame." PARELES Residente has been on the defensive lately, blasting out answer songs at other Latin American rappers who bait or criticize him. His latest boast cum manifesto is "Rap Bruto" "Raw Rap" and it gives equal time to Nach, who has been recording hip hop in Spain since the 1990s. (There are also background vocals from the Puerto Rican rapper Ivy Queen.) "Lots of jungle, few tigers," the chorus taunts. Nach and then Residente proclaim their anti commercial bona fides and their status as leaders, not followers: "All my lines are curves, I always break the rules," Residente insists. Each rapper accelerates to hyperspeed for his final rhymes, while the music, by Trooko, cannily cranks up the tension and variation. PARELES About halfway through "Mild," Jakob Bro's thick plumed electric guitar playing starts to surround itself. Through delay pedals and atmospheric effects, his lone plucks echo and hang in the air, merging with Thomas Morgan's tawny acoustic bass and Joey Baron's lightly ricocheting cymbals. Added to an otherwise pristine delivery, the cloudy interference forces you to work a little harder at sorting and making sense of all this casual beauty. "Mild" is the opening track from the Danish guitarist's new trio album, "Bay of Rainbows," his fourth effort for ECM. GIOVANNI RUSSONELLO	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Music
Welcome to Best of Late Night, a rundown of the previous night's highlights that lets you sleep and lets us get paid to watch comedy. If you're interested in hearing from The Times regularly about great TV, sign up for our Watching newsletter and get recommendations straight to your inbox. 'There Is No Plan to Make a Plan' After briefly trying to revive the push to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, President Trump agreed on Monday to put aside the idea until after the 2020 elections. Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority leader, had told Trump firmly that Congress would not be willing to take up any such legislation before then. Stephen Colbert crowed about the news, reminding viewers that Republicans have repeatedly been unable to come up with a successful plan to replace the health care bill that they spent years criticizing under President Barack Obama. "Remember 'repeal and replace'? 'We're going to repeal and replace'? Well, after nine years, they still haven't gotten around to the 'replace' part. They have no plan. In fact, not only do they not have a plan, there is no plan to make a plan. So they may not have a plan to make a plan, but they are working hard on a plan for you to never find out that they will never have had a plan." STEPHEN COLBERT, referring to an article in The Washington Post	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Television
Employers continue to lay workers off while states struggle through a backlog of unemployment claims, a sign of the persistent strain the economy faces from the coronavirus pandemic even as businesses begin to reopen. The Labor Department reported Thursday that nearly 1.9 million Americans filed new claims for state unemployment benefits last week, continuing the decline from the more than six million who submitted applications in a single week in March but still a remarkably high level. In addition, there were 623,000 new claims for Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, the federal program intended to help the self employed and others not normally eligible for state jobless benefits. The overall number collecting state benefits increased by almost 650,000 to a seasonally adjusted total of 21.5 million, showing that even as some businesses reopen and workers come off the rolls, others are being newly laid off or belatedly starting to receive benefits. Ian Shepherdson, chief economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics, said the weekly claims "are not falling as fast as I'd like them to fall or thought they would be falling." "Let's not kid ourselves," he added. "This is still an astonishing rate of layoffs." Since mid March, 42.6 million jobless workers have applied for state aid, marking the worst period for unemployment since the Great Depression. The seasonally adjusted data does not include those who have applied under the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program. The government count also leaves out people who were stymied in their attempts to receive the benefits or were too disheartened or confused to try. Mistakes, delays in reporting and possible double counting in some areas also complicate efforts to arrive at a precise total. Some people out of work have gone months without government assistance as states grapple with technical glitches and a flood of claims. Payments have abruptly evaporated for some workers, who have struggled to reach overwhelmed unemployment administrators for an explanation. Bogus sites that mimic government unemployment portals, and fraudulent claims submitted using stolen personal data, have prompted many states to impose security measures that complicate the approval process. Diane Swonk, chief economist at the accounting firm Grant Thornton, said the recent looting and vandalism in many cities further clouded the employment outlook. "The unrest adds insult to injury in an economy already struggling to reopen," she said. "It could delay workers being called back or cause people to be laid off again." For many jobless workers, stability remains a distant prospect. On Friday, the Labor Department will report the unemployment rate in May, which many economists say could approach or exceed 20 percent, up from 14.7 percent in April. The layoffs have grown from the restaurant workers and hotel employees who lost their jobs early in the pandemic to people in management positions, economists said. And state unemployment offices are wading through a backlog of claims, processing older applications that may only now be appearing in official counts. The economic rebound will probably unfurl in two phases, said Gregory Daco, chief U.S. economist at Oxford Economics. The first will happen quickly, as companies call back certain employees to help reopen restaurants, retailers and other operations. The second step will drag on for months, as lingering fears of infection and the disruption in earnings weigh on spending and affect the ability of businesses, especially small ones, to return to normal. Mr. Daco said it was encouraging that initial applications for state benefits and for the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program declined last week, but added that the volume was still stunning and likely to remain elevated. "We're witnessing a gradual evolution from temporary to persistent labor market damage," he said. The pandemic has gone on so long that some workers are reaching the end of their allotment of benefits and some could face more delays as states try to carry out a federal program that offers an extra 13 weeks of aid. Ford and Rivian no longer plan to work jointly on electric vehicles. Elizabeth Holmes took the stand in her trial. Follow along with our reporters. Ken Griffin, head of Citadel, bid highest for a copy of the Constitution. "There might be a series of income cliffs coming up as benefits fade out, and tranches of the population that may have helped spur a rebound in spending may drop off," Mr. Daco said. Unemployed workers in most of the country are eligible for 26 weeks of regular state benefits, which would give someone laid off in mid March a cushion until September. States like Michigan and Kansas, which usually offer fewer weeks of payments, recently raised their maximum allowances to 26 weeks. But Florida and North Carolina cap their unemployment payouts at 12 weeks. The federal extension program, known as Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation, could give workers a lifeline into December. Some states may offer additional extended benefits. But Diana Terlingo, 55, has yet to receive any payment. Ms. Terlingo, who was furloughed in mid April from her job approving travel expenses for a retail chain, said work petered out after employees stopped going on business trips. She began working again two weeks ago, operating out of her home in Pembroke Pines, Fla. In the six weeks she was unemployed, she received none of the 5,000 she believes she is owed in state and federal aid. Her husband, who runs a family business selling modular office furniture that has had no customers for weeks, secured a 16,000 loan through the federal Paycheck Protection Program but did not seek benefits through the state. Their son Sean O'Reilly, 31, was furloughed in mid March from a hotel restaurant and would be on the verge of exhausting his unemployment payments from Florida if the money had ever arrived. For now, the family has avoided disaster, having saved diligently for years and arranged flexibility with creditors. "We're in a better position than some people," Ms. Terlingo said. "We're not the starving ones." As businesses reopen, jobless workers are starting to seek in person help. At job fairs around the country, hospitals are seeking nurses and school districts are looking for bus drivers. CareerSource Florida, a state agency helping job seekers, recently began offering on site assistance by appointment. Last month, the Alabama Department of Labor set up stations around Montgomery to help people with their claims, but limited the number of visitors and suggested that they bring lawn chairs and snacks to pass the time in line. The increased activity has led to optimism that the job market has started "crawling out of the hole," said Torsten Slok, chief economist at Deutsche Bank Securities. "We do have the worst behind us." Eric Latham, a 26 year old restaurant worker living in Fayette, spent days calling the Alabama agency after nearly 1,600 in benefits failed to show up in his account. While updating his unemployment claim one week, he noted that he had briefly worked for his employer for one day during his furlough, a detail that seemed to cut off his payments. "That was two weeks of very little income that set me back," he said. "I need it. I have bills. But I'll probably just have to eat it." Mr. Latham returned to work on Thursday, despite reservations about the coronavirus. Reopening efforts are proceeding slowly, as government officials and business owners try to stave off more infections. Donald Franklin III, 21, was furloughed in March from his manufacturing job in Aliquippa, Pa., 20 miles northwest of Pittsburgh near the Ohio border. He received one unemployment check and has tried in vain to reach the Pennsylvania unemployment office to inquire after the rest of his benefits. Now home in Ohio, he is worried about having enough money to pay his bills. He received some family money, scaled back his spending and asked for an extension on his internet bill. Eager to get back to work, he is hoping for a call from his employer, which has begun restoring shifts. But because Mr. Franklin works nights, he is concerned that rioting could lead to curfews that keep him from traveling to his job. He is also nervous that if the stores that carry his company's products are looted, demand might tumble. Mr. Franklin, who is of mixed race, sympathizes with protesters demonstrating against police violence. "There definitely needs to be a change in the world right now," he said. "I can definitely see where everyone is coming from. I totally understand all the perspectives. I'm just worried about my livelihood."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Economy
STORM LAKE, Iowa When Dan Smith first went to work at the pork processing plant in Storm Lake in 1980, pretty much the only way to nab that kind of union job was to have a father, an uncle or a brother already there. The pay, he recalled, was 16 an hour, with benefits enough to own a home, a couple of cars, a camper and a boat, while your wife stayed home with the children. "It was the best paying job you could get, 100 percent, if you were unskilled," said Mr. Smith, now 66, who followed his father through the plant gates. After nearly four decades at the plant, most of them as a forklift driver, Mr. Smith is retiring this month. The forces that have helped transform this snug lakeside town in northwestern Iowa and others like it during Mr. Smith's working life have created a complex swirl of economic successes and hardships, optimism and unease. Fierce global competition, agricultural automation and plant closures have left many rural towns struggling for survival. In areas stripped of the farm and union jobs that paid middle class wages and tempted the next generation to stay put and raise a family, young people are more likely to move on to college or urban centers like Des Moines. Left behind are an aging population, abandoned storefronts and shrinking economic prospects. Yet Storm Lake, hustled along by the relentless drive of manufacturers to cut labor costs and by the town's grit to survive, is still growing. However clumsily at times, this four square mile patch has absorbed successive waves of immigrants and refugees from Asia, from Mexico and Central America, and from Africa. They fill most of the grueling, low paid jobs at the pork, egg and turkey plants; they spend money at local shops, and open restaurants and grocery stores; they fill church pews and home team benches. While more than 88 percent of the state's population is non Hispanic white, less than half of Storm Lake's is. Walk through the halls of the public schools and you can hear as many as 18 languages. But if the newcomers have brought some of the economic dynamism that President Trump promised to restore to the struggling Midwest and South, they have also fed some of the anxieties and resentments that he stirred. Steve King, the Republican congressman for this predominantly white, conservative district, blames immigrants and refugees for pushing down wages, bringing unwelcome cultural diversity and burdening public services. While Mr. King's nativist comments have been labeled racist by critics, his fervent animosity to immigration has done little over the years to dent his electoral popularity in most of the 39 counties he represents. Storm Lake, with a population of roughly 11,000, is in no way immune to the strains and tensions that an influx of poor, low skilled and non English speaking immigrants and refugees can bring. But after decades of living and working together, the residents recognize that their future is a shared one. "Other communities our size are shrinking and consolidating school districts," said Mark Prosser, the police chief. "We have schools bulging at the seams. There are expensive challenges, but which one do you want: a dying community or one that has growth?" Less than a half mile from the police station, the shelves at Valentina's Meat Market offer a still life version of the town's inhabitants. A kaleidoscope of packages, jars and produce from nearly every continent is jammed in side by side are purple yams from Laos, green plantains from Ecuador, mahogany brown cassava from Nigeria, tan egg roll wrappers from Vietnam. Silvino Morelos, the Mexican born owner, has lived in Storm Lake for more than 20 years. He came after his grocery business in Los Angeles was looted and burned during the racially charged 1992 riots that followed the acquittal of four white police officers accused of beating a black motorist, Rodney King. Here, he said, he has always felt welcome and secure. "A lot of different communities are living together," said Mr. Morelos, who aims to feed them all. Shared ambitions and a willingness to work hard command respect across cultures here. Mr. Smith, looking back on his decades at the plant, acknowledges that a supply of immigrants makes it easier for employers to pay less, but he doesn't begrudge them the work. "I harbor no ill feelings for anybody who's trying to make a better life for themselves," he said, settling on the living room couch in his home, a corner house next to the railroad tracks, which he shares with his girlfriend. "They're just trying to make a buck for their family, like I am." Mr. Smith remembers that it wasn't the arrival of foreign workers that initially drove down wages, but the plant owners. First was Hygrade Food Products Corporation, an old style meatpacking house that introduced Ball Park Franks to the Detroit Tigers' stadium in 1957 and operated the Storm Lake plant when Mr. Smith went to work there. Faced with competition from new companies that had developed a faster, more efficient method of boxing beef and selling it to supermarket chains and fast food outlets, Hygrade in 1981 asked its workers to take a pay cut of 3 an hour. When they refused, the plant closed. With vigorous support from town leaders, the upstart Iowa Beef Processors (later known as IBP) bought and reopened it a few months later slashing wages by more than half and shunning the union. At that point, Mr. Smith returned to do night cleanup, earning 5.50 an hour with no benefits, but a vast majority of his former co workers were turned away, he said, because the new owner did not want to hire union supporters. Instead, the company began actively recruiting in Mexico and in immigrant communities in Texas and California. Retail earnings and Black Friday: the week in business. Elizabeth Holmes will resume her testimony in her fraud trial. "They learned real fast to keep a sharp knife and didn't complain if they had a sore arm," Mr. Smith said. Most of the 2,200 workers now at the pork plant are primarily of Hispanic descent, said Caroline Ahn, a spokeswoman for Tyson. Asians make up the second largest group, followed by Caucasians. Men slightly outnumber women. She would not specify the turnover rate, but several employees said the company was engaged in a never ending hiring campaign. In Buena Vista County, which includes Storm Lake, the jobless rate has dropped to 2.7 percent, and both small and large businesses complain that they cannot find enough workers. The competitive squeeze is expected to only worsen when two new pork plants open in nearby Sioux City and Eagle Grove. But Mr. Swenson at Iowa State is skeptical of employer complaints about labor shortages. For an industry that needs to be where the animals are, he said, the only answer is to "pay workers enough to retain them or attract them." Art Cullen, the Pulitzer Prize winning editor of his family run newspaper, The Storm Lake Times, acknowledges that processing plant work is tough. Yet for a refugee or an immigrant without English or skills, butchering livestock at that wage, he said, is a "first rung on the American ladder to success." That was the way it worked for Abel Saengchanpheng, who came to Storm Lake from Northern California in 1997, when he was 16, after relatives talked up the job opportunities there. Born in a Thai refugee camp after his family escaped from Laos, Mr. Saengchanpheng, now 36 and an American citizen, joined his parents at the plant after he finished high school. He has been there ever since, working his way up to general foreman in 2013, and he now oversees 300 production workers. With earnings that place him comfortably in Storm Lake's upper middle class, he owns two cars, a Subaru and a Honda, and a home. "I was so blessed to get into Tyson," he said, sipping coffee at Grand Central Coffee Station. "I remember looking at the first paycheck and thinking, 'There is free money going around.'" The work, though, can feed drudgery as well as dreams. Blanca Martinez, who came from El Salvador with her husband (a naturalized citizen who lived in Storm Lake) and their daughter, now 5, has been at the turkey plant for two years. She earns 15.70 an hour cutting bone six days a week on the 6 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. shift. "It's very hard," Ms. Martinez, 37, a permanent resident, said in Spanish through an interpreter. "I'm still not used to the cold." At work, she wears three gloves on her left hand and two on her right giving her cutting hand a little more flexibility. Speaking English would widen her options, Ms. Martinez said, but she has had no time for lessons since her husband received a diagnosis of cancer. 'This Is Who We Are Now' The contrast between Storm Lake and many neighboring towns is both by accident and by design. Refugees from Southeast Asia made their way to the area more than 40 years ago, when Iowa became the first state to offer resettlement assistance at the end of the Vietnam War. "That was a proactive choice on the part of community leaders," said the Rev. Charles Valenti Hein, the pastor at Lakeside Presbyterian Church, which sponsored the first group. Making room for other immigrants, he said, was "an extension of that initial act of hospitality, something we've chosen." Graciela Vrieze, a Spanish speaking civilian community service officer with the local police department, said her 13 year old son, an Iowa born citizen, had come home from school asking if they were all going to be deported to Mexico. There are few reliable statistics on the number of foreign born residents with fake or no documents; estimates run to the thousands. Several with documents also said they were postponing trips abroad, however, because of the fear that they may not be allowed to return. The drive among refugees and immigrants to remain in or return to Storm Lake stands out in a state where more than two thirds of the counties are shrinking in population. "I love my town," Mr. Smith said, but all three of his children and both of his girlfriend's have moved elsewhere. Most of the farm boys and farmers' daughters have left, said Mr. Cullen of The Storm Lake Times. "Second generation immigrants want to stay with their families," he said from the cozy one room newsroom. He jumped up from his chair to hunt among the stacks of newspapers for a recent edition that featured a scholarship student from El Salvador returning from college to Storm Lake to start a house painting business. "Those kids are our future." Immigrant parents who labor on the production lines say they want their children to go to college instead of taking their places at the plant. But the expectation is that those children will return home after graduating. Ms. Martinez, the worker at the turkey plant, does not have time to take English classes herself, but the future she envisions for her 5 year old includes going to medical school, becoming a doctor and then coming home to work here in Storm Lake.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Economy
Although mightily challenged by a fragmenting retail landscape, and lamentable calendar placement as the caboose on the global men's wear train, New York Fashion Week: Men's was like "The Little Engine that Could," refusing to give in to naysayers perennially pronouncing doom. "Sure, there's no Ralph, no Calvin, no Tom," Steven Kolb, the chief executive of the Council of Fashion Designers of America, said before a polished show by Carlos Campos , referring to Mr. Lauren, Mr. Klein and Mr. Ford. With only the modest but sturdy all American designer Todd Snyder to serve as its tent pole, the men's week may have lacked some of the showbiz pizazz associated with big name designers, as Mr. Kolb conceded. "But it has found its right size," he said. And if no single breakaway star emerged from the roughly 40 shows and presentations rolled out over three days, there was plenty to applaud. Unusual among contemporary designers, Mr. Hart charts his own quirky and erudite course to inspiration, organizing collections around themes as disparate as the Malibu surfers immortalized by the photographer LeRoy Grannis, spaghetti Westerns, Bauhaus photography or the supremely elegant jazz musicians that once recorded on the Blue Note label. This season he trained his eye on, of all things, Woodward and Bernstein and the days of bell bottom trousers, wide lapels, fat ties and polyester a material that once stood as shorthand for sartorial sleaze but that to someone of Mr. Hart's generation reads as "really luxe." "With tailored clothing, we've been with the slim skinny things for so long, it feels like we needed a little excess," Mr. Hart said before a show so off kilter (and off trend) that it may be prophetic of a return to an era in which a shady American president once chose to resign before he could be impeached. We are speaking here in strictly sartorial terms. And, while the fit on some of Mr. Hart's suits had an air of budget prom rental, there was an admirable wackiness in the patterned satin brocades on suits with lapels as outrageous as vintage Cadillac fins; the ruffled shirt fronts and outsize pointed collars; the high waist hopsack trousers worn with, say, a micro daisy print shirt and a paisley foulard; and an overall color palette (brown plaid with pink) that strained the limits of acceptable taste, in the best possible sense. Accessories have figured little in Mr. Hart's past collections, yet here he ornamented almost everything with the embroidered eye brooches created for him by the French artist Celeste Mogador. And he showed two inch Cuban heeled shoes from a fresh collaboration with Christian Louboutin. "I want those shoes, and I want them now!" an exiting guest was heard to say. GUY TREBAY Mr. Aujla is of Indian Canadian extraction his grandfather left India for British Columbia in the 1920s, bringing his family to join him after Indian independence in 1947 and the khadi in the collection is Ms. Bode's tribute to him. With a light touch, Ms. Bode wove together family history and political history: Khadi cloth represents the resurgence of domestic cloth manufacture to India, a cause championed by Gandhi. It lends her pieces, delicately embroidered or printed, in loose, boxy shapes a vintage tinge, a sense of place and time remote from the fractious present. The past, of course, was likewise unruly. But Ms. Bode gives a lovely sense of the way that migrants can inflect and adapt their new cultures to their old, to the enrichment of both. (The rugby outfits, the towel cloth suits: O, Canada!) It was a lovely vision, sensitively executed. Ms. Bode's label is growing, having recently expanded past the bounds of her tiny studio, finding favor at stores and on the backs of men of style. (Donald Glover recently wore it on "Saturday Night Live.") And, just as important, she is more and more able to use antique textiles as inspiration pieces but reproduce them at greater scale. All of which means that, in six months' time, you are likely to see more Bode than you did six months ago. For the moment, suffice it to say that Ms. Bode quietly put on, in this critic's opinion, the week's finest show. MATTHEW SCHNEIER As two middle aged partners one a former scenic painter at Disney, the other an ex model who met through a 12 step program and forged an unlikely future together in the unknown world of fashion, Courtenay Nearburg and Mike Rubin are at home with risk. Driving cross country from Southern California five years ago with all their earthly possessions in a U Haul, they staked their future on the conviction that it was still possible to bootstrap your way to success in New York. "We thought we were crazy because nobody just walks into this business," Ms. Nearburg said before a Krammer Stoudt presentation that justified the industry recognition bestowed on the pair in January, when Fashion Group International presented them with its Rising Star award. "It was New York that said that you can." And, while the show was themed around the couple's first trip to Japan early this year, it was the energy of their adopted city that was showcased in a series of three 45 minute presentations that melded a jagged video montage of Shinto shrines, remixed music from a runaway pop hit with subversive lyrics about school shootings, an improv violinist and a gifted group of local Flex dancers to showcase the designers' singular take on men's wear. To make it in fashion, you need a side hustle. For the California born, New York trained, Copenhagen based designer Willy Chavarria, that means collaborating with, among others, labels like the Danish soccer brand Hummel. To make it through life, you need a position. For Mr. Chavarria, that means a belief that calling oneself a fashion designer is not equivalent to having a hall pass out of politics. In just four seasons of showing here, Mr. Chavarria has presented collections that challenged the constrictions of gender binaries, the homophobia that exists in Hispanic communities (Mr. Chavarria is Mexican American and gay) and, for his spring 2019 collection, the parlous state of current immigration policy. Splitting his show into two parts, he first presented a series of active sports clothes in the XXL proportions that are his stock in trade think super roomy shorts and sweat clothes emblazoned with an inverted AMERICA logo or an upside down American flag. Then there was a separate series of denims and work clothes that paid homage to the wellspring of his creativity: the streets of East Los Angeles and the South Bronx in the last years of the 20th century. The title of the collection combined a Korean slang term for marijuana with a word meaning "scholar." One of his models, a strapping, bare chested hunk in an open cardigan, had the words "STONER" and "SCHOLAR" written across his neck. Sundae School's collections to date have focused on T shirts, hoodies and hats mostly slickly designed, street wear style graphic items with weed puns and traditional Korean illustrations. For spring, Mr. Lim pushed further, with crushed suiting and organza overcoats (inspired by the work of the Korean artist Do Ho Suh), complete with cigarette pockets. There was, of course, a printed sweatshirt, whose tiny motif featured miniature Korean scholars studying the rolling of joints and the ripping of bongs. Mr. Lim does not have the classic pedigree of the provocateur. He graduated from Hotchkiss and Harvard, with a degree in math, and went to work for McKinsey Company before decamping to VF iles, the upstart fashion incubator, showroom and shop, where Sundae School was born. His Korean parents were, initially, less than pleased when the full details were revealed in an article in Vogue Korea. "All hell broke loose," he said. His mother didn't speak to him for days. Eventually, though, she came around. "After I quit my job, she said, 'You have to show me the numbers,'" Mr. Lim said. "Then the numbers checked out." MATTHEW SCHNEIER The incursion of politics into runway fashion makes for some surprising moments. It's not unusual for a garment to look different coming down the runway than it does going back up. Even so, eyebrows were raised at Nihl, the label by Neil Patrick Grotzinger, when one of the guy liner lidded warriors marching down the runway turned around to reveal what you would have to call a full moon view. He was wearing an embroidered, beaded jockstrap. "It is definitely social commentary," Mr. Grotzinger said. He titled the collection Subservient Authorities and described it as "queer empowerment." "It was all about taking this idea of a figure of authority and manipulating it to seem very effeminate." Mr. Grotzinger hand works his way to authority, taking shapes and ideas from sportswear and athletic attire and decorating them to the elaborate hilt. His pieces at the moment, are essentially American made couture: beaded, embroidered or chain linked painstakingly by hand in his New York studio, just a man and a team of interns. He expressed a desire to turn the collection into something more accessible, something readier for commercial production, but for the moment Nihl's greatest asset is its punctiliousness, its commitment to hard labor for the sake of fabulousness. (Mr. Grotzinger first attracted major attention when an earlier collection, of hand beaded wrestling singlets, was shortlisted for the LVMH Prize.) "This overcoat took maybe five days to make," he said backstage, gesturing to one of the collection's showpieces. "I would say maybe 70 hours linking all the rings together? My hands are broken." MATTHEW SCHNEIER Here's an overlooked component of success in fashion: grandiosity. Big wins require big egos and if, at 50, Todd Snyder has yet to attain his early goal of "becoming the next Ralph,'' that may have something to do with his midwestern modesty. He is from Iowa. Mr. Snyder's vision is far from that of Mr. Lauren, whose comprehensive mastery of the narrative fantasias so essential to fashion brought him five decades at the top of the heap and a personal fortune estimated in the billions. Yet, in his own low key way, Mr. Snyder has retailed a particular vision in his designs, one for which he sometimes gets too little credit. Well before European and Japanese designers began minting money off collaborations with heritage brands and makers of athletic gear, Mr. Snyder had paired up with labels like Champion and Timex. He was ahead, too, on the blending of tailored clothing with utility gear like bombers or baseball jackets, combinations that tend to look staid or gimmicky when rendered by Italian designers in luxurious fabrics. And he was early to the repurposing of vintage tailoring styles for a generation that had never worn a suit. Yet, despite his obvious design chops, there was never a clearly identifiable Todd Snyder style. He was a brand and yet not properly branded, or at least not until now. It is not merely that for a fine spring collection Mr. Snyder sent out shirts emblazoned with a jaunty cursive "Snyder's" logo an idea brought to him by Jim Moore, the longtime fashion director of GQ, who styled the show and who had been inspired by a supermarket remembered from his Minneapolis boyhood.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Fashion & Style
Five years ago, Sherif Ashmawy and Stacy Wells moved into a one bedroom condo at Toren, a high rise in Downtown Brooklyn. It cost 370,000, with monthly fees in the mid 600s. The couple, who met 10 years ago as students while working at a Chinese restaurant in Burlington, Vt., knew they couldn't live in a small one bedroom forever. Prices surged. Last winter they decided it was time to sell the condo and buy a two family house. "We would have loved a four family, but could afford only two," Ms. Wells said. Ms. Wells and Mr. Ashmawy, both in their 30s, saw places that were easy to turn down, with dangerously steep staircases or odd layouts. They visited a two family brick house in Jackson Heights, Queens, with a driveway and garage. It was listed for 899,000. Ms. Wells, a native of Louisiana who works in the field of occupational health and safety, found the historic neighborhood charming. Mr. Ashmawy, who grew up in Manhattan and is employed in bank technology, thought Queens was too residential. The house needed work, which "reinforced in his head that he didn't want to move to Queens," Ms. Wells said. Her husband insisted on Brooklyn. "I was bummed," she said. That house sold for 850,000. In Windsor Terrace, Brooklyn, the couple loved a two family for 899,000. It was also in need of work; they weren't even sure it had electricity. But they were excited about its location, just a block from Prospect Park. Their bid of 960,000 was declined, and it sold for 999,000. In nearby Kensington, a two family was listed at 979,000, but the playground next door was a potential source of noise. And there weren't many stores nearby. "It seems like you were going to walk far to get somewhere," Ms. Wells said. They weren't enthusiastic enough to bid on it, and it sold for 1.1 million. Another two family house, in Windsor Terrace, for 899,000, was on a triangular lot, which narrowed "to a focal point someplace in the backyard, so it turns into a pizza pie house," Mr. Ashmawy said. They didn't like the location of the master bedroom, next to the front door. The low ceiling of the finished basement made Mr. Ashmawy hunch. "I am a taller guy, so I was crashing around like Quasimodo," he said. They passed it by; it sold for 900,000. Soon, Ms. Wells saw a listing for a "Spanish Tower Home," one of about 10 such houses built around 1927 in Jackson Heights. The price was 959,000. Mr. Ashmawy, despite his aversion to Queens, agreed to at least see it. "Castle, fine, we can go with a castle," he said. Besides, by now, "it became apparent that Brooklyn wasn't going to happen." This viewing was different from the crowded open houses they were used to. The listing agent, Daniel Karatzas of the Beaudoin Realty Group, the author of the 1990 book "Jackson Heights: A Garden in the City," preferred scheduled showings of half an hour. Ms. Wells booked the last appointment on a weekend. The two family house retained many original details in addition to its tower, Mr. Karatzas said, including the original lighting fixtures and black and white tiled bathrooms. The house had a lot going for it besides a little history a three bedroom unit topped by a two bedroom, a fireplace, a partly finished basement, a driveway and garage shared with the house next door.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Real Estate
"Obviously this is not our usual business." With that, Coach Mike Tomlin of the Pittsburgh Steelers opened a season ending news conference on Wednesday in which he addressed his team's late season collapse and the drama surrounding the superstar receiver Antonio Brown, all the while struggling to mask his discomfort. "Extremely disappointed," Tomlin said in summation of the season. "I think that's a succinct assessment of it. The fact that we're actually standing in this room says it all." The Steelers' roller coaster of a season began with a 1 2 1 stretch, followed by a six game winning streak that seemed to quell the early season consternation, and then a collapse that dragged the team out of the playoff picture. But things hit a new low early this week when it became clear that Brown had missed Sunday's win over Cincinnati not because of a knee injury, as the team had said, but rather for disciplinary reasons. Read: The Ravens and the Eagles claw their way to the N.F.L. playoffs Complicating matters was Brown's use of social media this week, in which he seemed to be courting attention from the San Francisco 49ers: He followed the team's Instagram account, posted an Instagram story about Jerry Rice being the greatest wide receiver of all time, and replied to a Twitter post by San Francisco's George Kittle. But Tomlin, closing out his 12th season with Pittsburgh, kept trying to bring the focus back to the team, insisting that no decisions had been made, that no disciplinary actions had been taken, and that Brown, regardless of his social media chatter, had not requested a trade. None Week 11 Takeaways: Here is what we learned this week. N.F.L. Tightens Covid Protocols: As cases rise and Thanksgiving approaches, the league is requiring masks inside team facilities and increasing testing. The Jets Lose Again: Falling to the Miami Dolphins, the Jets' receiver Elijah Moore offered consolation. The Long Path to the Super Bowl: With 18 weeks in the regular season and fewer teams earning byes in the playoffs, the Super Bowl is still a long way off. Playoff Simulator: Explore every team's path to the postseason, updated live. "Distractions and things of that nature are part of the job, particularly in today's N.F.L.," Tomlin said. "I don't run away from it; in fact, I embrace it." The Steelers have had no shortage of distractions in recent years, from the suspensions and contract holdouts of Le'Veon Bell the superstar running back who sat out the entire 2018 season in hopes of negotiating a larger contract to Brown's occasional public disagreements with quarterback Ben Roethlisberger, to the team's bizarre national anthem protest last season in which no one seemed to be on the same page. Tomlin tried to explain the timeline around Brown's absence on Sunday as clearly as possible. He said Brown sat out of the team's practices last week with what was described as a sore knee, then was told on Friday to get an magnetic resonance imaging exam a test Tomlin says was never performed. After Brown failed to communicate with the team on Friday night, Tomlin said, the Steelers made plans to face the Bengals without him. Tomlin said Brown's agent, Drew Rosenhaus, reached out Sunday in hopes of getting Brown onto the field, but Tomlin, who agreed to meet with Brown, said that "playing wasn't on the menu" at that point. When asked if it was the injury or a disciplinary action that kept Brown out on Sunday, Tomlin said, "He was absent due to injury and lack of information." Now the team must decide what to do with a 30 year old wide receiver who is clearly still in his prime but who appears to be at something of an impasse with his coach. Tomlin was asked about Brown's social media usage, and he tried to make light of how much the news media likes to make a big deal of something that is not important to him. But Brown seemed to tweak his coach by posting a message to Twitter during the news conference that could be seen as a response to Tomlin's comments. But in a rare acknowledgment that distractions can sometimes get out of control, Tomlin said Brown's situation could "certainly" get to the point where the receiver was more problematic than useful. The issues with trading Brown are plentiful. There is the cap hit the team would take for moving him (a blow that would be softened by savings in future years), the question of how much value a team could get for an aging wide receiver, and the prospect of going into 2019 with neither Bell nor Brown. But Tomlin said his team would "waddle in it right now," letting this season's failure sink in before making any decisions about next season. And while he intimated that it would be fair to say that Brown quit on the team, Tomlin said he was doing his best to keep some emotional distance from the issue. "There's disappointment, there's no denying that," Tomlin said. "On a personal level, man, I've just learned over the course of time, forget my personal feelings."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Sports
At Colorado, the Thanksgiving meal for football players, a ritual since at least the mid 1990s, will not happen. Ohio State's seniors will miss out on a tradition of Thanksgiving practice. At Virginia, any players who attend a large Thanksgiving gathering could have to quarantine. College football players across the country are accustomed to playing and practicing through Thanksgiving. But as with everything else during this season like no other, the coronavirus pandemic is forcing some teams to make changes large and small to their well honed routines. Public officials are warning this holiday that a potentially lethal combination of widespread travel and large indoor gatherings will rapidly increase the already surging spread of the virus. University administrators are scrambling to offer guidance to students. John Thrasher, the president of Florida State University, is asking students not to return to campus if they leave for the holiday. "Students, if you go home for the Thanksgiving break, please stay there until the start of the spring semester," he wrote in a campuswide email last week. Florida State has two weeks remaining in the semester after Thanksgiving two weeks Thrasher would prefer those students complete from home. But his email does not apply to the Seminoles, Florida State's 2 6 football team, who postponed last weekend's game against Clemson over virus related concerns. They face Virginia on Saturday. "Our team will stay here in Tallahassee and practice before traveling on Friday," a Florida State spokesman, Robert Wilson, said in an email. Practicing during Thanksgiving week is typically one of the nuisances of being a college football player, a sacrifice made each autumn often in service of rivalry games. This season, however, skipping past Thanksgiving might be a saving grace for college football, which has already had more than 90 games canceled or postponed because of the coronavirus. The New York Times contacted all 65 football programs in the Power 5 conferences the Atlantic Coast (which includes Notre Dame this fall), the Big Ten, the Big 12, the Pac 12 and the Southeastern to ask how they were handling Thanksgiving this season. Among the 47 that responded, the answers were quite similar: They are mostly treating this week like any other coronavirus inflected week. The University of Illinois doesn't have classes during Thanksgiving week, but it is an otherwise normal week for the Fighting Illini, who will host the fourth ranked Ohio State Buckeyes on Saturday. Players will be tested for the virus between 6 a.m. and 7 a.m. on Thursday, practice at 8 a.m. and have a team Thanksgiving meal at 11 a.m., according to Kent Brown, an associate athletic director. "The schedule isn't much different than past seasons, although players were able to leave campus to gather for Thanksgiving at a local team member or coach's house for Thanksgiving before reporting back Friday morning," Brown said. "But in the past, players never had to test for Covid every morning." Colorado has had a game the weekend after Thanksgiving every year since 1996, when the Big 8 became the Big 12. There is traditionally a Thanksgiving meal for players and staff members, but it will be scrapped this year, said David Plati, an associate athletic director at Colorado. The team has dispensed with all communal meals this year. "The team hasn't even eaten a meal together everything has been grab and go, even on the one road trip," Plati said. Active players also have not been allowed to go home since training camp began on Oct. 9. At Ohio State, adapting to the pandemic means postponing a beloved Thanksgiving rite. The Buckeyes typically have their final regular season practice on the morning of the holiday. After that weekend's game, at least in an ordinary year, the only games left are the Big Ten championship (if they qualify, which they have in each of the last three seasons) and at least one bowl game. The Thanksgiving practice usually concludes with Senior Tackle, when each senior addresses the team and then hits a blocking sled or tackling dummy one final time. "This year, however, no one will be going home for Thanksgiving and the team will dine together on Thursday," Jerry Emig, an associate athletic director, wrote in an email. "Senior Tackle won't take place until later. We fly to Illinois Friday afternoon." Most schools said they did not give their players any specific guidance for Thanksgiving, relying on the messages they have conveyed for months. That message, as John Bianco, an associate athletic director at Texas, put it: "They're constantly reminded by our team medical personnel and coaches to always wear a mask, wash hands, stay at a safe distance and to not be in any large crowds." One of the few schools that did give players Thanksgiving travel guidance was Virginia, which updated the travel policy sent to all athletes in October, said Jim Daves, an assistant athletic director. If a player has a Thanksgiving meal in a hotel with family members without social distancing? He will have to quarantine. If the gathering is small, with mask wearing and social distancing? No quarantining necessary. If a player visits home for just a day and social distancing is followed? No quarantine. But if he somehow finds enough time to go home for more than one day? Quarantine. Travel and family related peril has been ever present this season. With shorter schedules because of fewer, or no, nonconference games and some leagues starting the season late, as well as unexpected open weekends after games were postponed or canceled, athletic departments have fretted over off days all season long. "Quite frankly, it was more of a concern a few weeks ago when we had an open week and the players had several days off," said Steve Fink, an assistant athletic director at South Carolina. The coronavirus will threaten the season right until the end. The number of cases is spiking nationwide, and the virus has already killed more than 257,000 people in the United States. If the worst fears of public health officials are borne out, those numbers will only accelerate in December, when players are practicing for the extremely lucrative bowl games but also have unusual amounts of free time.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Sports
Micki Grant, in a rehearsal room at New York City Center, became the first woman to write both the music and lyrics to a Broadway musical with "Don't Bother Me, I Can't Cope," in 1972. Several clusters of GET WELL SOON! balloons bobbed slightly in a corner of the ceiling in Micki Grant's Upper West Side living room. They had lost a bit of helium, but not so much as to ground them. Ms. Grant, 77, had recently returned from a two week hospital stay with some respiratory issues. But she had more than enough energy and, judging from several impromptu snippets of song, enough lung power to revisit the Broadway revue that vaulted her from soap opera performer to musical theater pioneer almost a half century ago, in part by confronting the era's heavy subject matter with its own buoyancy. That show, with the ever relevant title "Don't Bother Me, I Can't Cope," used gospel, calypso, spoken word, rock, jazz, soul and even rudimentary hip hop music to discuss everything from slumlords to feminism to numbers rackets. It made history when it reached Broadway in 1972 via stops in Washington, D.C., and Philadelphia: Ms. Grant became the first woman to write both the music and lyrics to a Broadway musical, and her longtime collaborator Vinnette Carroll was the first African American woman to direct on Broadway. "I was just writing about my community about what I saw on the news and on the streets and in the church," Ms. Grant recalled. "And Vinnette said no, she demanded 'People need to hear this.'" The show touched down at several smaller New York theaters before opening on Broadway, which qualifies it for Encores! Off Center, City Center's annual tribute to smaller scale and Off Broadway musicals. It opens July 25, wrapping up a three show summer series that included well received concert stagings of "Songs for a New World" and "Gone Missing." "One of the things we try to do with Off Center is reveal what the legacy is," said Jeanine Tesori, who, along with Anne Kauffman, serves as artistic director of the series. "Micki and Vinnette were inserting hip hop and spoken word into musical theater decades before many other people were." When it opened on Broadway in 1972, the New York Times critic Clive Barnes described it as "a mixture of a block party and a revival meeting," albeit one that found room for references to Sojourner Truth and Archie Bunker. Ms. Grant, who received two Tony Award nominations as well as a Grammy for "Don't Bother Me," said the warmth of the material suited her natural temperament, but was also a tactical move on her part. "There was a lot of angry theater out there at the time, especially in the black community Bullins, Jones," she said, referring to such incendiary playwrights as Ed Bullins and LeRoi Jones, who later became known as Amiri Baraka. "I wanted to come at it with a soft fist. I wanted to open eyes but not turn eyes away." Ms. Grant, who went on to work with Carroll on "Your Arms Too Short to Box With God" in 1976 and several other pieces, can still quote a letter she received decades ago from an audience member: "It made me bleed, but the incision was so clean." Two miles south of Ms. Grant's home, the current "Don't Bother Me" creative team was getting ready to make cuts of another kind. Savion Glover, the revival's director and choreographer, was huddled with two fellow dancers to decide how to reorder the material while remaining true to Ms. Grant's vision. "We're looking to find the story inside these songs, as opposed to just a revue," said Mr. Glover, who was a young boy in Newark, N.J., when his mother and aunts toured the region performing "Don't Bother Me" and other musicals. He still remembers singing along with his siblings to the propulsive "They Keep Coming" as they drove to summer camp. George Faison, who choreographed the original production not long after leaving the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, said he has gained a whole new appreciation of Ms. Grant and her message in the decades since "Don't Bother Me." He quoted from one of the show's better known songs: "It takes a whole lot of human feeling/To make a human being." Mr. Glover agrees with his predecessor. "This show is timeless," he said. "It's our story told through song." Even within the punishingly tight time constraints of Encores! rehearsals, Mr. Glover said he also hopes to re examine the divvying up of material among the production's cast members. Carroll, who died in 2002, originally saved the appearance of Ms. Grant herself for the second half of the show, but that may not remain the case for the performer (or even performers) who end up singing her material. One thing that will stay the same (as it did when the York Theater performed its own concert staging in 2016) is the barrage of torn from the headlines historical references, which range from Operation Breadbasket to Godfrey Cambridge. Encores! has a tradition of being far more faithful to the musical material than to the original books (and often for good reason), but an all sung revue like "Don't Bother Me" doesn't allow for such pruning. Ms. Grant said the show's core elements "who we are, our contributions, what we did" remain as pertinent and as vital as they did nearly 50 years ago. Still, she said she's tempted to take a fresh look at those references. "When it first started, I would change it all the time based on what was going on in the news," she said. "I've got to take a look at it again. If nothing else, I've got to get Obama in there somewhere." The most likely destination? "They Keep Coming," the same song a young Savion Glover chanted in the back seat of his family's car on the way to camp.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Theater
Under normal circumstances, I would have flown to one or both of the Dakotas to write this column, but the whole point is that these aren't normal circumstances. And I don't have a death wish. Too much? Probably. But how else to convey the proper timbre of outrage, the right pitch of grief, over what happened there? Deep into the coronavirus pandemic, when there was no doubt about the damage that Covid 19 could do, the Dakotas scaled their morbid heights, propelled by denial and defiance. They surged to the top of national rankings of state residents per capita who were hospitalized with Covid related symptoms or whose recent deaths were linked to it. As of Friday afternoon, South Dakota led the country in the average daily number of recent Covid associated deaths per capita, with three for every 100,000 people, according to a New York Times database. North Dakota was second, with 1.5. More than 40 percent of South Dakota's 1,033 Covid related deaths to that point occurred in November, according to statistics from the Covid Tracking Project, and the same was true of North Dakota's 983 deaths. The Dakotas are a horror story that didn't have to be, a theater of American disgrace. Want to understand the tendencies pathologies might be the better word that made America's dance with the coronavirus so deadly? Visit the Dakotas. "It's mind boggling," Jamie Smith, the leader of the Democratic minority in South Dakota's House of Representatives, told me. He was referring primarily to how politicized such basic safety measures as social distancing and masks became, but also to many South Dakotans' distrust of science and unshakable belief that the virus wouldn't come for them. "We're dug in," he said when we spoke recently. Of the 10 counties in America with the most Covid related deaths per capita, three are in South Dakota. Lawrence Klemin, a Republican legislator in North Dakota who just finished his two year term as the speaker of its House of Representatives, told me that people in his state "are pretty much independent minded about how they conduct their affairs." "I don't know if maybe some people are stubborn," he added, but the deep sigh in his voice said that he knows full well that many people are. And the most stubborn, he said, have been the loudest. Throughout the pandemic, he said, he was deluged with communications from constituents adamantly opposed to any mask wearing requirement, which North Dakota didn't even have. He heard almost nothing from the other side. But after Gov. Doug Burgum, a Republican, used an executive order on Nov. 13 to institute precisely such a mandate, a poll showed that a significant majority of North Dakotans favored it. Maybe they'd just seen too much dying by then. Or maybe, Klemin conceded, they'd been a silent majority for a while and political leaders underestimated their fellow citizens. Regardless, he said, the state definitely should have taken that step last spring or summer before the number of coronavirus cases skyrocketed, before hospitals were so overrun that sick North Dakotans had to be sent to neighboring states and before his own mother tested positive and died in early October. Until recently, Governor Burgum was loath to exert much pressure on North Dakotans and steered clear of the social distancing orders put in place by so many other states. But he did invest heavily in testing and never merrily shrugged off the threat of the coronavirus the way his Republican counterpart in South Dakota, Gov. Kristi Noem, did. Deaths and hospitalizations have dropped significantly in North Dakota over the past two weeks. On Friday evening, it ranked just ninth among states for the percentage of its residents hospitalized with Covid 19. One month later, Noem played cheerleader for a 10 day motorcycle rally in Sturgis, S.D., that attracted some 460,000 people. In an article in The Times, my colleagues Mark Walker and Jack Healy described it as "a Woodstock of unmasked, uninhibited coronavirus defiance." Just before Thanksgiving, Noem announced the passing of her 98 year old grandmother, one of 13 residents of a South Dakota nursing home who died in a two week period. The home's administrator told The Daily Beast that the other 12 residents, along with many of the nursing home's workers, had tested positive for the coronavirus, but not Noem's grandmother. (Hmmm ...) While Noem publicly mourned her lost family member, she drew no particular attention to Covid 19's rampage among her grandmother's companions. I get the sense that Noem has presidential aspirations (though she has denied that). If she ever presses the accelerator on those, please remember this savage season, and please remember her damning indifference to it. When I said "horror story," I was cribbing. That was a description used in a series of mid November tweets from a South Dakota emergency room nurse, Jodi Doering, that went viral. Doering was reeling from tending to dying Covid 19 patients who continued to insist that the coronavirus was some kind of hoax. They "scream at you for a magic medicine" and warn that Joe Biden will ruin America even as they're "gasping for breath," she wrote. She added: "They call you names and ask why you have to wear all that 'stuff' because they don't have Covid because it's not real." "They stop yelling at you when they get intubated," she wrote. "It's like a horror movie that never ends." I altered that last sentence. Doering put a curse word before "horror," and who can blame her? "To visit Iowa right now is to travel back in time to the early days of the coronavirus pandemic in places such as New York City and Lombardy and Seattle, when the horror was fresh and the sirens never stopped," Godfrey wrote. "The virus has been raging for eight months in this country; Iowa just hasn't been acting like it." Then again, has California? It got educated early, but if the lessons had taken as well as they should have, its governor, Gavin Newsom, might not have had to announce the stringent new lockdown measures that he did on Thursday as the state's intensive care units were stretched almost to the limit. In New York City, meanwhile, the daily rate of positive coronavirus tests exceeded 5 percent for the first time since May, according to city figures. The truth is that the Dakotas are as emblematic as they are exceptional, the American story or at least a strain of it in miniature. In resisting the lockdowns, slowdowns and sacrifices that many other states committed to, they indulged and encouraged a selective (and often warped) reading of scientific evidence, a rebellion against experts and a twisted concept of individual liberty that was obvious all over the country and contributed mightily to our suffering. "North Dakotans will come to each other's aids in a heartbeat, but when asked to give up personal freedom for an amorphous common good that's difficult," Paul Carson, an infectious diseases doctor and a professor of public health at North Dakota State University, told me. Just recently, Carson said, a lawmaker from the western half of the state whose denizens regard its eastern half, where Carson lives, as elitist and too liberal wrote to him to share a famous quotation from Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." For too long, staying safe from the coronavirus was indeed an amorphous mission to many North and South Dakotans, and their false sense of security was surely intensified by what they heard from President Trump, who spoke of disease ridden blue states versus freedom loving red ones and kept promising that this would all blow over. "We maybe believed that our rural nature sheltered us from what cities like yours were experiencing," Carson said. "Then we found out, very brutally, that was wrong." Klemin, the North Dakota legislator, said that his mother, Carol Roaldson, was 99 when she died but had always thrilled to the idea of reaching 100 and was in excellent health before the coronavirus swept in. Her nursing home had to establish a segregated unit for the many residents who were infected in September, he said. He couldn't visit his mother after she was moved there. But when she sank into what were clearly her last days, he was allowed by her bedside in a face mask and shield. "I watched her die," he told me. "That was a very sad day." I invite you to sign up for my free weekly email newsletter. You can follow me on Twitter ( FrankBruni).	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Opinion
Credit... At the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, with travel restrictions in place worldwide, we launched a new series The World Through a Lens in which photojournalists help transport you, virtually, to some of our planet's most beautiful and intriguing places. This week, Caleb Kenna shares a collection of drone photographs from Vermont. Ever since I was young, I've loved gazing out the oval windows of airplanes and daydreaming about the abstract geometric patterns below. Planes transport us from place to place, from country to country, from ground level to a bird's eye view. From the air, familiar landscapes take on conceptual qualities; we gain fresh perspectives by viewing hidden patterns. I have worked as a freelance photographer for more than twenty years, traveling Vermont's back roads, making portraits and capturing the state's iconic landscapes. Perspective alongside light, color and timing is a fundamental building block of photography, and I'm always looking for new ways to alter mine. Until a few years ago, I hired airplanes and hoped for good weather and a helpful pilot to climb skyward and create aerial pictures. Nowadays I use a drone. There are trade offs, of course. Looking down at the ground virtually through a remote controlled lens isn't a substitute, experientially, for actually taking to the skies. But it makes me less reliant on others and is much more environmentally friendly. (It's also a lot more convenient; I can set up and launch my drone, a DJI Mavic 2 Pro, in about five minutes.) I often look to Alfred Stieglitz's "Equivalents" photographs as a source of inspiration. The series of abstract cloud studies shot in the 1920s and 30s transcends representations of the physical world and offers a world of abstraction and metaphor. I'm also influenced by the subsequent work of Minor White, a photographer who adopted and expanded on some of Stieglitz's principles. Most of my drone photographs were made around my home in Vermont's Champlain Valley. (The area is known as the land of milk and honey because of its many farms and apiaries.) But sometimes I venture farther afield. Nor do I always know what my subjects will be. Once, while driving through the Mettawee Valley, a bucolic setting dotted with small towns and dairy farms, I pulled off the road next to a corn field and launched my drone only to spot a beautiful old barn with a slate roof, completely hidden from my view on the ground.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Travel
The archerfish, two to three inches long, hunts for food by shooting down insects with jets of water. But its real claim to a place in the bizarre behavior hall of fame: The fish can apparently distinguish one human face from another. Using a computer monitor above their aquarium, researchers showed pictures of two human faces to four archerfish and trained them to shoot only at the image that produced a food reward. It didn't take long: The smartest fish was adept after only 30 trials. Then the researchers presented the fish with 44 color images of faces they had not seen. The archerfish were up to 89 percent accurate in shooting only at the one that they knew would produce in an insect meal.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Science
Travel and travel planning are being disrupted by the worldwide spread of the coronavirus. For the latest updates, read The New York Times's Covid 19 coverage here. When the protests over George Floyd's killing by police were at their height, the suitcase brand Away posted an Instagram message saying that its team was "doing the work to educate ourselves on becoming actively anti racist," and that the company would donate money to the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund and other organizations. The message made the rounds in Instagram direct messages among black travelers and influencers, and was shared in their group chats and Facebook groups. Tanisha Cherry's response was typical. "When I saw Away's post, I kind of laughed to myself because it seemed really performative," said Ms. Cherry, a culture, beauty and travel blogger based in Calgary, Canada. Away's Instagram feed typically features its sleek, colorful suitcases with built in batteries in various locations around the world. Many travel companies over the past three weeks have joined the corporate rush to issue statements in support of diversity and racial equality on their social media platforms. Some have posted the black square that became a popular symbol of solidarity for racial justice with the hashtag blackouttuesday, while others issued their own videos or posts. Almost all of these travel companies promised to donate to organizations that work to fight racism and racial inequalities. They have gathered on numerous Zoom calls and Facebook Groups to discuss how to respond to an industry that they say sees them as secondary contributors and customers, even though black people spend about 63 billion on travel annually. "The travel industry has constantly just ignored the black travel market and that is to their detriment," said Paula Franklin, co founder of the communications firm Franklin Bailey. "I don't think the exclusion has been intentional, but it is pervasive: From which writers publications have writing about travel, who brands feature on their social media accounts, who is invited to conferences and on panels, to who sits on boards and leads companies." Ms. Cherry was one of many people who commented on Away's post with questions, asking if the company would be working with more black influencers and photographers, or if it would feature more images of black people in its posts long term. "I would love to see you collaborating with more black creators like myself and showing us love on your feed," Ms. Cherry wrote. Brendan Lewis, vice president for communications and corporate affairs at Away, said in an email on Friday that the company in the past has engaged with this group of travelers, using the now popular acronym for black, Indigenous, people of color, for both brand work and its in house magazine. "We have a strong history of working with BIPOC influencers across both the Away brand and Here Magazine, but recognize we can do more with the Black influencer community," he wrote. "We are actively examining every single facet of our business, including the celebrities and influencers we work with, in order to build a brand that is anti racist, inside and out." In response to the protests, Travel Oregon, the state's tourism commission, posted a black square as well as two photos of Black Lives Matter gatherings that had taken place in the cities of Portland and Bend. "The senseless violence and discrimination against Black Americans must stop," a caption said. "As our nation confronts the realities of its deeply rooted racism and institutional bias, we as Oregonians do as well." The caption also called for writers and photographers of color to work with the agency and send ideas. But something about the post stood out to followers: The first photograph in the post was taken by a white photographer. Comments calling out the tourism board were swift. "Did you really just use an image from a white photographer on a call for more 'diverse' content by bipoc? please try harder," wrote Celeste Noche, one commenter. "It's understandable how it could be an afterthought, but the irony is unmistakable," said Joe Whittle, an Indigenous photographer. "Many within racial equity movements consider corporate marketing oriented diversity and inclusion efforts to be the equivalent of 'thoughts and prayers,' and this is why." Jaime Eder, the global communications coordinator for Travel Oregon, said in an email on Thursday that the goal of the images was to "show the magnitude of the movement in Oregon from urban areas to rural areas." "The important point though is that we did see and hear the feedback on our social channels, which we appreciate very much because it takes courage to speak up and the only way we can truly do better in our work is when we understand the impacts when oversights and mistakes are made," Ms. Eder said. Instagram and other marketing materials are significant ways for companies to make money, and these channels support an industry of influencers who are either paid by brands or receive free travel or lodging for posting about their experiences. Opportunities to collaborate with top brands translate to real economic opportunities. Some influencers make hundreds of thousands of dollars through collaborations. The idea of using influencers is a divisive one in the travel world, with some big travel brands saying they will stop using them, and critics saying that the promotions amount to "pay for play." But many brands continue to work with them. In the past few weeks, hotel brands, including The Standard and Kimpton hotels, posted black squares or their own statements about commitments to diversity and promised to educate themselves on how to support the black community. But they were also called out for not having more diverse staffs and for not previously prioritizing diversity on social media. Amar Lalvani, The Standard's chief executive, wrote in an email to staff last week, "I am proud that 49 percent of our corporate senior leadership are women, 37 percent are people of color and 22 percent are LGBTQ . I am ashamed that only one is black. Without representation, it is no surprise that we have failed our black team members." Mr. Lalvani also said that the company created an inclusion and diversity council and would bring back a program, called Standard Votes, that aims to educate people about what's at stake during the presidential election in November. Kimpton Hotels and Restaurants, according to its chief executive, Mike DeFrino, plans to audit its recruiting and hiring practices "with a focus on recruiting, retaining and advancement for current and future BIPOC employees." "We're proud that Black creators and partners are represented in 15 percent of our brand ad campaigns and social media content," Mr. DeFrino wrote in an email. "Moving forward, we pledge over the next two years to increase that number to 25 percent across all Kimpton marketing and advertising channels." When the Hoxton, a hotel group with properties in New York, Los Angeles and other cities, posted a black square on Instagram, and said that it stands "in solidarity with and by the black community," and is committed to "learning, growing and doing our part in the fight to end racism and inequality," one black artist said that the company's words didn't match its behavior. "You've exhibited my work in your London and Paris hotels for close to a year, way, way past what was ever agreed and have repeatedly ignored multiple emails requesting to have my work sent back to me," the artist Mahaneela commented on Instagram. The Hoxton told Mahaneela in a comment to contact them directly. She did so, but she said this week that she has not heard back. The Hoxton did not respond to requests for comment. Several black influencers said that when they call out brands in comments, they are often told to send private messages, but those often go unanswered. In the case of Away and Ms. Cherry, the luggage company suggested that she too send a private message. Mr. Lewis said that the company gets dozens of inquiries from influencers daily, "so there's a tremendous volume to deal with and vet." He said that of 11 issues of the company's magazine with people on the covers, eight of them featured black travelers. "It wasn't as though black people weren't participating in outdoor activities," Ms. Mapp said. "But we didn't have the visual representation of people doing it. There's an embedded affirmation that you belong and are welcome when you see people who look like you doing something. The absence of black people doing these activities, wearing these shoes, doing the activity creates an exclusion." Rue Mapp, chief executive and founder of Outdoor Afro. Ms. Mapp created the organization in 2009, after noticing a lack of representation of black people in outdoor travel marketing. Ms. Mapp said that it is important that in their efforts to diversify, brands not brownwash or make tokens of black people by just featuring them in images. Progress has to include introspection and inclusion of black people in every aspect of a business. Ms. Mapp and Ms. Franklin, the travel publicist, said that they have observed many travel companies taking diversity seriously over the years, and many more so in recent weeks. "I think right now is a different time," Ms. Mapp said. "I've been struck by the candor and the way people are getting it and talking about diversity in the outdoors and in travel like a serious issue. It is a watershed moment." Several influencers and photographers described receiving a flurry of messages from brands wanting to share their images in the past two weeks. Ms. Franklin has heard from editors of travel publications, publicists, writers and people who plan travel conferences and events, all seeking guidance on how to do better. "Before two weeks ago people weren't looking at panels and thinking, 'Why isn't this more diverse?'" Ms. Franklin said. "Now I'm getting calls and emails from white writers and editors saying 'I'm on a panel that's all white people, how can I make this more inclusive?'" On Wednesday, a group of black influencers, writers and photographers launched The Black Travel Alliance, an initiative calling for travel companies to commit to diversifying every aspect of their business in the short and long term. The alliance asked travel brands to share information about diversity in their companies using the hashtag pullupfortravel. In addition to looking at how much companies have contributed to black charities and community groups, the alliance plans to create a score card rating companies on how many black people are on staff and in management positions. Trade shows and conferences will be scored by how many black people are on panels and in other workshops. For paid advertising and marketing, the scorecard will look at the percentage of black people featured in images, in television and radio ads, and on social media channels. The scorecard will also look at how many black writers and photographers were invited on press trips, in which they get free accommodations and travel in return for creating articles, by publications and venues. "Black Travel Alliance was heartened to see that many destinations and travel brands showed support during BlackOutTuesday," said Jeff Jenkins, a travel blogger and one of the founders of the alliance. "However, dismantling systemic racism requires more than social media activism. Destination management organizations and travel brands need to truly become more inclusive in their hiring practices and marketing campaigns." Follow New York Times Travel on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook. And sign up for our weekly Travel Dispatch newsletter to receive expert tips on traveling smarter and inspiration for your next vacation. Dreaming up a future getaway or just armchair traveling? Check out our 52 Places list.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Travel
Stephen Cooper, a San Diego City College student, finds refuge overnight in a safe car park program run by a local nonprofit, Dreams For Change.Credit...John Francis Peters for The New York Times This article is part of our latest Learning special report. We're focusing on Generation Z, which is facing challenges from changing curriculums and new technology to financial aid gaps and homelessness. On a sunny day last April, Anthony White, a 29 year old Marine Corps veteran, told a room of California state legislators how he had survived a semester as a cash strapped student at MiraCosta College: he'd slept in his car. Mr. White parked his Chevy Silverado late at night in warehouse lots, showering at his gym, and he was once kicked out of a Lowe's for brushing his teeth in the bathroom. The experience, he said, was "traumatizing." Homelessness among American college students has become an increasingly visible problem, with those who attend community colleges hit the hardest. Seventeen percent of community college students experienced homelessness in the last year, according to a 2019 survey of close to 167,000 college students by The Hope Center for College, Community, and Justice in Philadelphia. And half reported housing insecurity, paying only part of their rent, skimping on utility bills, or sleeping on friends' couches and sometimes in their cars. To help, Mr. White has become one of their fiercest advocates, pushing community colleges in California to open parking lots at night, so students who spend at least some nights sleeping in their vehicles an estimated 4 percent in California, according to a Hope Center report can get rest, be near bathrooms and avoid illegally parking in unsafe places far from campus. That April afternoon, inside the State Capitol, the plan received overwhelming support from students, social workers, and community college faculty members, who heralded it as "creative" and "moral." Soon after, a bill that codified the plan passed in the State Assembly. Shahera Hyatt, the director of the California Homeless Youth Project, told legislators the state ought to have a "bias towards action" in the face of such a crisis even if that action wasn't a full fledged solution. But as news of the bill spread, controversy did too. Mayors sparred in local newspapers over whether it would help or hurt their towns. A report released by the Community College League of California estimated it would cost the state close to 69 million a year, with security and sanitation costs making up the bulk of the expense. Legislators argued that it sent an insulting message to students about what the state considered "adequate housing." Even some of the nation's most ardent advocates for the homeless said they saw the bill as well meaning, but shortsighted, as it didn't address the needs of students hardest hit by homelessness: the vast majority who don't have cars they can rely on. By September, after the State Senate Appropriations Committee released a watered down version of the bill, its author Marc Berman, an assembly member from Palo Alto, pulled it, citing insufficient support. The story of the "safe parking" bill, as it came to be known in California, no doubt felt like a discouraging defeat for Mr. White and other community college students who have relied on their cars for shelter. But it made national headlines, increasing awareness about a growing higher education problem and raising important questions about what social safety net services community colleges ought to offer and who should pay for them. "Everyone grants that the problem exists," said Larry Galizio, president and chief executive of the Community College League of California, which lobbied against the bill, calling it a "one size fits all" answer to a complex problem. "The question is how do we approach this in a way that is pragmatic and that actually constitutes something that approaches a solution." Advocates for homeless students say the biggest hurdle in addressing the housing needs of community college students in California and across the country stems, in large part, from public confusion over who attends these two year institutions. "Popular perception of the community college student is that he or she lives at home and enjoys family support," said Sara Goldrick Rab, a professor at Temple University and founder of the Hope Center, which conducts surveys and produces policy papers on the economic challenges facing college students. "A more accurate description is that these are people who are very much on their own," she said. "They are working adults with children and they are in college because they are not making enough money and are trying to get ahead." Indeed, advocates like Stephanie Hernandez, a formerly homeless student at Palomar Community College, near San Diego, where Mr. White eventually transferred, said the choices many of her peers are forced to make are heartbreaking. Ms. Hernandez works in her school's food and nutrition center, handing out produce, bread and canned goods, often to friends. "People will say I haven't bought food or paid my bills so I can put gas in my car or buy books or pay rent," she said. To rectify this, most California community college campuses now have food pantries, like the one at Palomar, offering groceries, toiletries and sometimes school supplies and clothes. California law requires community college campuses to provide showers for homeless students. And some offer free laundry service, dinners and snacks during the day. A handful have even instituted their own free car park programs, even though the state fell short, this past summer, of requiring it. But so far, most campuses, even those hardest hit by student homelessness, have failed to provide broad solutions, in part because those solutions are costly, and because there is limited research on what the best fixes actually are. Student advocates have pushed nonprofits to finance pilot programs, to both assist students in a crunch and provide reams of data on what really works. At one program, at Tacoma Community College in Washington, administrators in 2014, partnered with the Tacoma Housing Authority to provide housing to dozens of students. Initial student tracking found 60 percent of the students in the program graduated or remained enrolled, compared with 16 percent of an equally challenged comparison group, who had not been helped. The program is being expanded to assist students at the University of Washington, Tacoma, as well. Another program, overseen by Jovenes Inc. a Los Angeles based housing provider for homeless youth joins Los Angeles County and private foundations to offer housing assistance for students at three East Los Angeles community colleges, by way of rental subsidies, temporary apartments or rooms in the homes of hosts who live near the campuses. The students are also receiving financial planning assistance, academic support and mental health counseling. And last February Massachusetts began a program that connected four community colleges with four year campuses to offer housing, meals and some public assistance to 20 full time students. Preliminary findings from these efforts indicate that some of the least expensive and most efficient programs partner with public welfare agencies like housing authorities and federal nutrition assistance offices that already provide services to the disadvantaged. And they take into account how limited student funds really are. In Tacoma, for example, students sometimes received vouchers for apartment rent, and did not use them because they weren't also given the money needed for security deposits. Officials there began providing that, too, when necessary. Avoiding unnecessary red tape when qualifying students for assistance is also key, according to Russell Lowery Hart, president of Texas Amarillo College in the Texas Panhandle, which has received national recognition for its work helping at risk students. In the meantime, on a recent evening earlier this month, community college students across the state hunkered down in their cars for the night. Some slept beneath underpasses, on residential streets, or on the edges of warehouse lots. One of them was Stephen Cooper, a student at San Diego City College, where this semester, he is taking history and physical science classes, while holding down a part time job as a parking attendant. That night, he was parked in a church lot near campus, as part of a safe car park program hosted by Dreams for Change, a local nonprofit, that assists the homeless. What did it mean to have a place to park? "Security," Mr. Cooper said, before slipping into his Nissan for the night.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Education
From Renter to Owner, and Still Firmly Planted in Harlem For six years, Brooke Ray shared a Harlem two bedroom with a college friend. Most recently, she was paying 900 for her half. Buying a home of her own was a personal goal. She preferred a condominium to a co op. But she was deterred by the fact that co ops composed much of the city's housing stock. "I thought a co op would have too many rules, and I was afraid of that," said Ms. Ray, 33, a University of Southern California graduate who works in online advertising. As she saved for a down payment, she hunted occasionally online and watched prices climb. At a party last summer, Ms. Ray met Michael Chadwick, a licensed salesman at the Bond New York brokerage firm. She told him that she was interested in a two bedroom condo with its own washer dryer and, ideally, a gym in the building. She wanted to remain in her beloved Harlem, and had a budget of up to 600,000. "By the time I got home, I had three or four listings in my inbox," she said. Mr. Chadwick lined up some buildings to see. He urged Ms. Ray to be open minded about co ops. They began at a small, renovated walk up condo building on East 124th Street. A two bedroom there on the top floor had almost 750 square feet and a private rooftop patio. The price was 539,000, with monthly charges of around 800. Ms. Ray travels often for her job, and was daunted by the need to lug her heavy bags upstairs. It later sold for 498,000. She agreed to see a two bedroom co op in a Harlem building that fit her criteria. She liked the layout, with boxy rooms and a small hallway, covering just over 850 square feet. The unit included a stacked washer dryer and the building, clean and well maintained, had a gym. The Central Harlem location, in the West 130s, was ideal. The price was 535,000, with maintenance in the high 800s. The co op was listed under the city's Housing Development Fund Corporation program, and Ms. Ray met the building's income cap. Two bedrooms in her price range were scarce in Harlem, "a smoking hot area where prices are rising," Mr. Chadwick said. So he took Ms. Ray farther north to Washington Heights. "I wanted to give her perspective and comparisons," he said. "You might get more for your budget if you explore another neighborhood." On Fort Washington Avenue, a beautifully renovated corner two bedroom co op with 900 square feet was on the market for 599,000, with maintenance in the mid 800s. Ms. Ray was unhappy with the hilly terrain. Slightly farther north, she saw two apartments in a condo conversion on Bennett Avenue in Hudson Heights. One, with 1,100 square feet, was too costly, at 675,000 with monthly charges of more than 1,000. The other, 800 square feet, was 592,000, with charges of almost 800. The view was of a brick wall. The apartments were nice enough inside, but the building was simply in the wrong neighborhood. "We were losing the flavor and ambience of Harlem," Mr. Chadwick said. So Ms. Ray chose her favorite of the day, the H.D.F.C. co op. It had everything she wanted, and was below budget, to boot. She decided that a co op would do after all. "Little did I know, condos have rules, too," she said. The final price was 525,000; the transaction took five months to complete. The sellers were divorcing and had their own lawyers. "Every time a question was asked, two attorneys had to give their answer," Mr. Chadwick said. Ms. Ray finally arrived in her new home in the winter. "I am super excited," she said. "I feel it was perfect timing. It's been a goal I wanted forever." She is especially glad to be just one subway stop, on the No. 2 and 3 trains, farther north than before. The neighborhood feels much the same to her, though she swapped a block of three family rowhouses for one of midrise buildings.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Real Estate
James Zhang has collected plenty of prestigious stamps on his resume in the nine years since he graduated from high school and pursued a career in high finance. But he's also an immigrant, the grandson of an illiterate rice farmer who did not have indoor plumbing until the late 1990s. So perhaps he was the most likely person to find and then shame the many state pension funds and university endowments that invest, through private equity, in the payday lending industry. It is an industry that has millions of struggling Americans paying sky high interest rates for what are supposed to be small loans. Thanks to his efforts, New Jersey rid itself of a stake in the industry earlier this year. And starting Friday, through a new guide on the website NerdWallet, where he now works, Mr. Zhang hopes to redirect as many people as possible who are seeking these loans. NerdWallet is a natural home for these efforts for one reason in particular: The people who work there are search engine ninjas. The company posts content and guides aimed at attracting people looking for, say, a new credit card. Search for "best rewards credit cards" on Google, and you'll find the company right away, in spots below the ads on the first page of results that would cost piles of money if NerdWallet had to pay for them. The company makes money through referral fees when people sign up for new credit cards and other financial services through its site. Mr. Zhang said he hoped to put the company's anti payday lending efforts in top search engine spots, too, though he landed at NerdWallet almost entirely by chance. His parents, both chemists, brought him to the United States from China when he 2 years old, after a professor at Northwestern University invited them to work and study there. The family eventually moved to Connecticut, where they entered the middle class and then the upper middle class. Mr. Zhang said his father had known as a boy what it meant to go hungry, but his parents' frugality kept him from ever having to go without. Still, he worked as a babysitter and a busboy, while still achieving enough in the classroom to earn acceptance to Yale. After college, Mr. Zhang spent two years at Morgan Stanley on a team that analyzed the firm's own strategy and transactions. He followed that up with two years in private equity, where firms use money from high net worth individuals and others to invest in companies. Eventually, it would try to sell those companies at a profit and put money back in the pockets of the now higher net worth individuals. In early 2015, he got a LinkedIn message from a recruiter at NerdWallet, the first time he'd heard of the company. But when he learned more about it, the move made perfect sense to him. "I spent two years helping the bank make more money and two years helping high net worth people make more," he said. "For the foreseeable future, I could help everyday consumers think smarter about their money." He was hired to help think through the company's approach to student and personal loans. The site already had some information about the perils of payday loans. A representative from the N.A.A.C.P. in Alabama had noted NerdWallet's interest in the topic and invited Mr. Zhang to speak at a conference. Speaking there and meeting people who were up to their ears in such loans radicalized him. It also got him thinking. Somebody had to be investing money in these lenders, given how large they had become. But who were they? "I had lived in that world and was familiar with how deals get done," he said. "Some insecure overachiever tries to find a deal, writes a memo, builds a model, and then a vice president or partner goes and pitches it." His instincts were right: A private equity firm called JLL Partners had put money into ACE Cash Express, a payday lender that had just paid 10 million in refunds and penalties in the wake of a Consumer Financial Protection Bureau enforcement action. And who was investing in JLL? University endowments and state pension funds, including the one in New Jersey, where payday lending is illegal. While the investments themselves didn't violate any rules, Mr. Zhang said he didn't think the financial aid recipients who benefit from endowment earnings and retired state workers would feel good about it. So he and his colleagues passed their findings on to various media organizations. Beverly Brown Ruggia, an organizer with New Jersey Citizen Action, first read about it in Fortune. "I was incredulous," she said. Her organization and several other policy, advocacy and faith based groups banded together and helped persuade the state to get out of the investment. A small, early experiment intended to draw borrowers to the site drew hundreds of clicks from Google each day from people looking for cheap payday loans. Lenders approached NerdWallet with an offer to pay it 60 in commission on a 200 loan, knowing that many borrowers end up repeatedly rolling their loans over into new loans and paying effective annual interest rates well into the three figures. "I asked them whether they would take the 60 and give that discount to the borrower, but they wouldn't," Mr. Zhang said. "Their business model is based on repeat customers, so if someone repays their loan, they don't make money." Eventually, NerdWallet settled on a pro bono effort whereby it would earn no commission and send consumers only to nonprofit lenders with lower interest rates or to governmental organizations that offer short term assistance. It began on Friday, with links to 44 entities in California and Texas. The company plans to add more over time. While NerdWallet will make no money in the short term from its payday lending redirection, it is well aware that people in financial trouble now could be customers next year. "If we do this well, we can rehabilitate people in a tough spot," Mr. Zhang said. "In six months, when she needs a credit card or wants to start investing, she'll come back. That's the best type of bet that we can make." About those credit cards: There's something pretty rich about a company like NerdWallet, which earns commissions from credit card issuers that charge double digit interest rates, channeling those commissions toward keeping other customers away from the triple digit effective interest rates that the payday lenders charge. But hey, at least NerdWallet isn't using that money to push more credit cards. Mr. Zhang understands how this looks. "We wrestle with it every day," he said. To him, the benefits of credit cards outweigh the problems they cause for the many millions of people who use them without getting into years of debt. That's not something, however, that he can say about lending operations that target people who are down on their luck. "There is no instance," he said, "where I'd ever encourage people to get a payday loan."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Your Money
MIAMI Katie Sowers did not come to the Super Bowl to be a token for the N.F.L., for the San Francisco 49ers, or for the news media. She came to coach. Sowers, an offensive assistant with the 49ers, will be the first female coach on the sidelines of a Super Bowl. She will also be the first openly gay coach at a Super Bowl. She will even be represented during commercial breaks on Sunday, featured in one of the many L.G.B.T.Q. inclusive Super Bowl ads this year. She is also one of four full time female coaches who worked in the N.F.L. this season, along with Callie Brownson of the Buffalo Bills, and Lori Locust and Maral Javadifar of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Since 2015, seven full time female coaches and 15 female coaching interns have worked in the league. Sowers was not the first woman to coach in the N.F.L. that was Jen Welter, who joined the Arizona Cardinals in 2015 but in order to reach the league, Sowers needed something usually afforded only to men who have played college football: an opportunity. That ultimately came from a fifth grade basketball court. Sowers was coaching a girls' team in Kansas City, Mo., and became friendly with Scott Pioli or, as she knew him when they first met, Mia's dad. Pioli, whose daughter played on Sowers's team shortly after his tenure as the general manager of the Kansas City Chiefs, saw potential in her. Sowers had played and coached in the Women's Football Alliance and seemed to have a lot of football smarts, especially considering she was not yet 30. He realized that Sowers needed a chance prove herself. "I knew I had a long road ahead of me if I wanted to be an N.F.L. coach," Sowers, 33, told The Washington Post. "I didn't have the opportunity to play on a college team. I didn't have the opportunity to break down film. I didn't have the opportunity to network like a lot of people did. But I was up for the challenge." None Week 11 Predictions: Here are our picks against the spread. N.F.L. Tightens Covid Protocols: As cases rise and Thanksgiving approaches, the league is requiring masks inside team facilities and increasing testing. The Packers' Defense Is Their M.V.P.: Green Bay's oft overlooked defense has kept the team from falling out of the Super Bowl chase. The Long Path to the Super Bowl: With 18 weeks in the regular season and fewer teams earning byes in the playoffs, the Super Bowl is still a long way off. Playoff Simulator: Explore every team's path to the postseason, updated live. Pioli thought of the Bill Walsh Diversity Coaching Fellowship, a program meant to increase the number of minority coaches in the N.F.L. After moving on to become the assistant G.M. in Atlanta, Pioli asked Falcons Coach Dan Quinn to consider Sowers for the 2016 class of the fellowship. Sowers, then a high school athletic director, used vacation days to work with the Falcons at training camp. Her foot was in the door. "Young men always get the opportunity to be around people with the decision making power," Pioli said. "This time, it happened for a woman." Sowers's path was helped by serendipitous connections, said Sam Rapoport, senior director of diversity and inclusion for the N.F.L. Rapoport pointed to another program, the Women's Careers in Football Forum, a two day event held at the league's player scouting combine in Indianapolis each February. "A lot of firsts emerge from the program," Rapoport said. There are now three full time female coaches in college football, Rapoport said, all of whom secured their first opportunity through the forum. In 2019, 55 percent of the participants were women of color. "You don't want to put someone in the position where they feel underqualified or not ready," Rapoport said. "N.F.L. coaches are now asking for female candidates, and we need them." For all the benefits of the fellowship and forum, and for all the talk of opportunity and representation, becoming a coach in professional football or even at a high level of the N.C.A.A. often demands not only financial stability, but additional financial support. Sowers confronted this issue immediately after her fellowship, when she was offered a 10 month N.F.L. internship that paid 10 an hour. She would be allowed to work only 40 hours a week. She was in her late 20s. She had a mortgage and a full time job. She paused to weigh her options. Pioli stepped in, paying her rent in Atlanta so she would be able to afford her mortgage, Sowers said in an interview with NPR in March. "You have to have people believe in you," said Mary Jo Kane, the director of the Tucker Center for Research on Girls and Women in Sport at the University of Minnesota. "Progress in women's sports didn't happen because on the 19th hole at some exclusive country club male athletic directors said, 'Oh, my God, I'm so upset that women don't have 50 percent of sport!' That's not how change happens." Female coaches and athletes, Kane continued, "are saying, 'Just give me the opportunity, and I'll show you what I can do.'" Sowers did not waste time, impressing Kyle Shanahan, then the Atlanta Falcons offensive coordinator, in 2016. The next season, when he became the 49ers head coach, he hired Sowers to join him. "It's important for all to know that dreams are achieved by first finding someone who sees your worth and value, regardless of your gender, and takes the necessary steps to clear a path, even on the path less traveled," Sowers wrote on Facebook in August 2017, thanking Pioli and sharing the news that she was accepting a coaching job in San Francisco. "The most important words you can ever tell someone is 'I believe in you.'" Now Sowers is in headlines around the world as a "first" at the Super Bowl. And as the news media swarm players asking them about their strategy, their plans and their coaching staff, Sowers's gender and sexuality have taken a back seat to her acumen. She's a great coach, they say. "A bulldog," 49ers quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo said.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Sports
A penthouse sale at the Getty, a brand new boutique condominium hugging the High Line in West Chelsea, has set a record for Manhattan's downtown. The sponsor unit, which encompasses the top three floors of the geometric glass building on West 24th Street and 10th Avenue, closed at 59.06 million, according to property records, which also made it the most expensive transaction in New York City for the month of May. The previous record for a single residence downtown was another Chelsea penthouse one at Walker Tower, on West 18th Street that sold for 50.9 million, in January 2014. (That same year the media mogul Rupert Murdoch shelled out a total of 57.9 million for two apartments across four floors at One Madison, the glassy tower at 23 East 22nd Street in Flatiron.) The Getty closing wasn't the only one to surpass the 50 million mark last month. An apartment on the 85th floor of One57, the vitreous skyscraper in Midtown, sold for 53.97 million. Nor was it the only big purchase downtown. A duplex penthouse at 443 Greenwich Street in TriBeCa was acquired for 43.79 million. Elsewhere in the city, there were several other notable May sales. David Geffen, the billionaire record and film executive, sold a Park Avenue co op; the developer Aby J. Rosen sold his Upper East Side townhouse; and the actor Bruce Willis and his wife, Emma Heming Willis, bought a home on the Upper West Side, after selling a duplex on Central Park West a month earlier. And in Brooklyn, a townhouse sale in Brooklyn Heights, at 15.5 million, tied the record for the highest price ever paid for a single residence in the borough. Also, the actors Emily Blunt and John Krasinski sold their townhouse, in Park Slope. The sprawling Getty penthouse, the first residential closing in the building, was actually a combination of two original units: a duplex on the 10th and 11th floors and a full floor apartment on the ninth. The units were joined during the building's construction for a total of roughly 10,000 square feet. The apartment has six bedrooms and seven baths, two great rooms, and two Gaggenau outfitted kitchens. The master suite takes up the entire 11th floor. There is also a private rooftop deck and swimming pool. The 12 story, five unit Getty condominium was developed by the Victor Group and Michael Shvo, a broker turned developer, on the site of a former Getty gas station. It was designed by the architect Peter Marino, who handpicked different finishes for each apartment. The building will also house a Lehmann Maupin gallery and the Art Hill Foundation, a private museum, on the bottom four floors. Adam D. Modlin of the Modlin Group, who is handling sales and marketing of the development with Tal Alexander and Oren Alexander of Douglas Elliman Real Estate, said a strict confidentiality agreement prevented him from commenting on the deal, including reports that the buyer was Robert F. Smith, the billionaire founder of the private equity firm Visa Equity Partners of Austin, Tex. The transaction was done through a limited liability company. The 53.97 million penthouse at One57, at 157 West 57th Street, in the heart of Midtown's Billionaires' Row, sold for well below its original 70 million list price of last October. Its most recent asking price was 59 million. The full floor apartment has 6,240 square feet of space with three bedrooms and four and a half baths, along with a media room/library and a great room, according to the listing. The enormous master suite features a sitting area with a fireplace, two dressing rooms and two bathrooms. At 443 Greenwich, the red brick condominium between Desbrosses and Vestry Streets, the sponsor penthouse that sold recently for 43.79 million also sustained a significant price reduction. It had been listed for as much as 58 million. The 8,569 square foot apartment, on the sixth and seventh floors, contains five bedrooms, six full baths and two half baths, plus a library and an outdoor terrace. On the Upper West Side, Mr. Willis and his wife traded prewar for new development. The couple closed on a 3,055 square foot condominium on the 37th floor of the sculptured glass tower at 1 West End Avenue, between 59th and 60th Streets. The price was 7.34 million. In April, they sold for 17.75 million a duplex co op at 271 Central Park West, at 86th Street. Their new home is smaller than the previous one: 3,055 square feet, according to the listing, with four bedrooms and four and a half baths. But it has floor to ceiling windows that provide striking views of both the city and Hudson River. In Brooklyn Heights, a townhouse at 140 Columbia Heights was sold by Timothy J. Ingrassia, the co chairman of global mergers and acquisitions at Goldman Sachs, and his wife, Stephanie A. Ingrassia. The buyers are believed to be Jennifer Connelly, who won an Academy Award for best supporting actress for "A Beautiful Mind," and Paul Bettany, who stars in "Avengers: Infinity War." The sale was made through the William and Belinda Sheers Trust, with Carolyn Rossip Malcolm, a business manager for Ms. Connelly, acting as trustee. The 15.5 million purchase price rivals a record sale in 2015 of a nearly 27 foot wide townhouse at 177 Pacific Street in Cobble Hill, Brooklyn. The buyer in that transaction was the photographer Jay Maisel. The Ingrassias had purchased the Brooklyn Heights townhouse, which has views of New York Harbor and the Manhattan skyline, in 2006 for 10.75 million. The brick building is 25 feet wide and five stories high with 8,000 square foot of interior space. It features three terraces, including one on the roof. A four story, 20 foot wide townhouse owned by Ms. Blunt and Mr. Krasinski, both of whom starred in the recent movie that he directed, "A Quiet Place," sold for 6.56 million. The home is at 586 Fourth Street in the Park Slope Historic District. The fully restored 1901 French Renaissance Revival, clad in limestone, has seven bedrooms and three and a half baths, according to the listing. Although it has been updated, the house still has many original architectural flourishes, such as crown moldings and millwork, pocket doors, stain and leaded glass windows and many built ins.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Real Estate
Breaking up is hard to do, and the measures some take to get their partners back can be colorful at times. Coral reefs are that way, too, but for them, it's a matter of life and death. When certain species of coral flash a shimmering palette of vibrant pinks, reds, blues, purples and yellows, they aren't simply showing off. This coral is attempting to recover the algae they cannot live without, according to a study published Thursday in the journal Current Biology. Coral depends on a remarkable symbiotic relationship with algae, which lives inside the organism's tissue. When the algae coral partnership is thriving, many coral display a healthy brown hue. Sometimes, after environmental stress, such as a spike in seawater temperature, the algae dies, or the coral expels it. Without that brownish internal photosynthetic factory pumping out meals for the coral, the underlying skeleton shines through the translucent coral flesh as bleach white, and the coral is at risk of starving to death. But the scientists found that in order to get the algae back, some species envelop themselves in bright, sometimes fluorescent colors, which mitigate intense light reflections through the coral and create conditions for the light sensitive algae to return. "They produce their own sunscreen, these colorful pigments," said Jorg Wiedenmann, professor of biological oceanography at Southampton University in England, who led the study. "They do it on a regular basis as a survival technique." As the centerpieces of vast marine ecosystems, coral reefs are a critical component of life on Earth. They are said to account for one third of all biodiversity in the sea, and are the source of food and income for an estimated half billion people. But over the last few decades, and particularly the last several years, scientists say global warming has threatened the reefs' existence through widespread bleaching. If the stress is not too severe or prolonged, the technicolor display known as color bleaching can save some coral, Dr. Wiedenmann's team determined. Some healthy corals display vivid colors, and many experts wondered if the color bleaching process was just a matter of visibility. Perhaps the brownish algae masked other coral's pigments. Or, perhaps the coral and the algae were competing over blue light rays and once the algae were gone, the coral flexed its fluorescent muscles under all the extra blue light. But Dr. Wiedenmann said their study determined that the process is actually an optical feedback loop that helps to restore the symbiotic relationship. In the first stage of this loop, the algae are lost and the coral turns bleach white. That causes more light to reach and bounce off the reflective coral skeleton. Within two or three weeks of the original stress incident a heat wave or some shock to the nutrients available to the coral the extra light triggers genes in the coral to manufacture the color pigments. The more sunlight they take in, the more pigment they produce. The pigments block certain wavelengths of light, making it possible for the algae to safely recolonize the coral. "The optical feedback loop is a beautiful example of how nature regulates processes," Dr. Wiedenmann said. "The corals are changing their physiological setup and are responding to an environmental cue."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Science
Unassuming and unpretentious, mostly professionals in their 30s. On a recent Thursday night, there were a pair of bros in matching button down shirts chatting about their sales jobs on Long Island, and groups of tipsy women laughing about the most recent episode of "The Bachelor." In one corner, a business casual couple were necking in a cozy booth over white wine and small plates of charred swordfish. An incongruous smattering of progressive electronic R B, early Prince, Motown classics and well worn singles from the Weeknd. Guests can enter through a spiral staircase tucked behind the elevator banks, or from the street, down the steps just past the hotel's main entrance. There's been talk of a secret code, but none was required on a recent visit. A bodysuit clad hostess gladly opened the door after one knock.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Style
Every Friday, pop critics for The New York Times weigh in on the week's most notable new songs and videos. Just want the music? Listen to the Playlist on Spotify here (or find our profile: nytimes). Like what you hear? Let us know at theplaylist nytimes.com and sign up for our Louder newsletter, a once a week blast of our pop music coverage. With "Hot Girl Summer," a catchphrase became an inspiration for a song that became an occasion for Megan Thee Stallion to rap alongside one of her idols, Nicki Minaj. The results were mixed, a too timid color by numbers exercise. The remix for her track "Savage" arrives via a similar path the chorus to "Savage," from Megan's recent album "Suga," became a TikTok dance challenge sensation, elevating the song from amusing album cut to legitimate phenomenon. That made it an ideal vehicle for a collaboration with fellow Houstonian Beyonce, a pairing that has been a long time coming. "Savage Remix" is fantastic, far more involved and intricate than most blink and you'll miss it collaborations. Beyonce rises to the challenge, rapping heartily about staying silent even when mad, the kinship of curves ("If you don't jump to put jeans on, baby, you don't feel my pain") and, in a flamboyant demonstration of cultural acuity, the Demon Time series of private Instagram strip clubs that's been a quarantine era distraction for hip hop and sports celebrities. Proceeds from the collaboration go to Bread of Life's coronavirus relief efforts. JON CARAMANICA On the songs Haim has been teasing out from its next album, now due June 26, its three sisters have been turning to less sparkly, more subdued productions than in the past, suiting the misgivings that have always been in the lyrics. "I Know Alone" portrays longtime depression and isolation "Nights turn into days/That turn to gray" while the instrumental intricacies turn inward, like obsessive thoughts. The video clip is a TikTok ready sync dance sequence, with the sisters at a social distance separation and a recurring move that suggests scrolling through social media. JON PARELES In the mid 1990s, Oasis reigned as proud inheritors of a British rock continuum from the Beatles through the Smiths and the Stone Roses. The band split up in the late 2000s over the long running filial conflict between Noel Gallagher the band's songwriter and Liam Gallagher, its lead singer. During pandemic isolation, Noel rediscovered a demo of "Don't Stop...," a song that was previously known to die hard fans from a bootlegged 2005 soundcheck performance. It's a waltz sung by Noel, backed by guitars and a tambourine, saying goodbye and urging a positive spirit: "Take a piece of life/It's all right to hold back the night." It's a kindly postscript from a contentious band; who knows if it's the final one? PARELES "There's some times, so much noise between us/And I wish it could just be quiet for a moment," Raphaelle Standell Preston sings in "Just Let Me," and she gets that quiet. In most Braids songs, the band's busily layered math rock patterns seize the foreground alongside vocals and lyrics. But this song is a moment of analytical clarity in the middle of a lovers' quarrel "Just let me get through to you" is the refrain and that's no time for distractions. PARELES It's surprising that up until the trapcorrido movement of the last couple of years, embodied most vividly in the Rancho Humilde label, the tropes of gangster rap and the aesthetics of regional Mexican music rarely overlapped. "Que Maldicion" feels like an attempt to make up for lost time, or perhaps a genial elder generation retort to the upstarts who are creating this alchemy in real time. The Sinaloan outfit Banda MS has been a force for almost two decades, and Snoop Dogg has been a hip hop icon for a decade longer than that. Their collaboration is tender, low stakes, a little goofy the uncles letting the youngsters know they see what's happening, and that they were cool once, too. CARAMANICA The Tokyo Ska Paradise Orchestra has been playing lighthearted, ska tinged big band music since 1988. Its single for the pandemic moment is a remake of the Japanese song that was renamed "Sukiyaki" and became an international hit in the early 1960s. Now it's a polyglot call for long term optimism, merging the Tokyo Ska Paradise Orchestra with an Argentine ska band, Los Autenticos Decadentes, and featuring the Brazilian rapper singer Emecida calling for "happiness as a mission" and appearances from Angelo Moore of Fishbone and the Puerto Rican singer iLe and her producer Ismael Cancel. Yes, it's one of those grid of musicians multitracking videos, but the networked camaraderie comes through. PARELES Since 2003, the pianist Vijay Iyer and the poet Mike Ladd have collaborated on a series of full length stage performances blending music, words and visuals, and interrogating the lives of people of color in the United States during the "war on terror." The music on each of these suites is a kind of mixed media work of its own: a sound that's also an atmosphere, and a way of pumping blood into the words recited by Ladd and other poets. Their first project together was "In What Language," looking at the experiences of black and brown people in airports after 9/11. It was released as an album in 2003, and now Pi Recordings has put out an all instrumental version. If you ever made the mistake of hearing the music here as secondary to the words, this will set that right. "Three Lotto Stories," which on the original album features the poet Latasha N. Nevada Diggs, represents one of the sharpest musical moments, especially when Ambrose Akinmusire offers a snarling trumpet solo over blustery waves of synthesizer and cello and stippled guitar. GIOVANNI RUSSONELLO The quarantine themed hip hop videos continue: for "Moana," the new collaboration between G Eazy and Jack Harlow, much of the video takes place in split screen fashioned to look like a Zoom call, where the two rappers and the producer Zaytoven enjoy themselves listening to their handiwork. And there are FaceTime cameos from Snoop Dogg, Diddy, Marshawn Lynch and more, as well as a glimpse of DJ Drama's home sauna. But the real surprise here is the welcome return of the bubbly, approachable, flirtatious but not icky approach to rapping that G Eazy has toyed with but never committed to. CARAMANICA There are obvious ways to pay tribute to Dizzy Gillespie. Play some bebop (a genre he helped create) or Latin jazz (another), or just cover a few of his myriad compositions. But on "Dizzy Atmosphere: Dizzy Gillespie at Zero Gravity," the esteemed trumpeter Dave Douglas pays homage through dissection and expansion. By taking elements of Gillespie's compositions but mostly creating fresh works of his own, and centering the rapport with his five bandmates, Douglas has created a loving tribute with its own liftoff. The title of "Con Almazan," and its way of unhurriedly cycling through chords, refers to Gillespie's "Con Alma." But it's also a nod to the band's pianist, Fabian Almazan, who adorns the twin trumpets of Douglas and Dave Adewumi with spiked harmonies, then takes a rambunctious solo, moving up the keyboard in quickening spirals. RUSSONELLO	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Music
Senator Lamar Alexander, who served as secretary of education under President George Bush in the early 1990s, plans to introduce a bill on Tuesday that would give 11 million children from low income families federal money to spend on any kind of schooling their parents choose, as long as it is in an accredited institution. Although the bill is likely to face strong opposition from the Democratic majority in the Senate, it is another sign that Republicans are staking out school choice as a significant rallying point in an election year and promoting it on the day President Obama delivers his State of the Union address. Representative Eric Cantor of Virginia, the majority leader, has spoken out repeatedly about his support for vouchers and an expansion of charter schools. "We have a problem with federal funds today that are supposed to be going to low income families," Mr. Alexander, Republican of Tennessee, said in a telephone interview. "The simplest way for them to get there is just to pin them to the blouse or shirt of a child and let it follow the child to the school they attend." Mr. Alexander's bill would take about 24 billion or about 41 percent of current federal spending on elementary and secondary public schools, and allow states to decide whether to give the lowest income families the money as individual scholarships to pay for private school tuition, or to attend a public school outside the child's traditional neighborhood zone, or a charter school.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Education
Denis O'Hare, left, and Daniel Sunjata in Richard Greenberg's baseball themed "Take Me Out," which several readers felt was overlooked. Readers were impressed and infuriated sometimes both at once by "The Great Work Continues," in which our chief theater critics, Ben Brantley and Jesse Green, along with the critics Laura Collins Hughes, Alexis Soloski and Elisabeth Vincentelli, proposed a list of the 25 best American plays since 1993. Some commenters wanted to recognize plays that did not make the cut, others wanted to cut plays that did. Still others objected to the idea of a list in the first place, noting its intrinsically arbitrary and invidious nature. The 25 Best American Plays Since "Angels in America" Since the purpose of the project was to start a conversation about recent American playwriting, we're happy with all of it. Below, a sampling of the feedback so far, edited and condensed, with titles and writers that hadn't made our earlier lists in bold. "Disgraced" by Ayad Akhtar definitely belongs here. Timely and important articulation of the double bind immigrants find themselves in, and why some in this case the children turn to extremism. CAROLP, Los Angeles This is such a perplexing list to me. "Topdog/Underdog" isn't even Suzan Lori Parks's best play. "Father Comes Home From the Wars" (Parts 1, 2 and 3) is more daring. Branden Jacobs Jenkins's "Everybody" is more affecting than "An Octoroon." "Ruined" is No. 6? "Seven Guitars" is No. 8?! I can't. CHRISTIAN NWACHUKWU With so many glaring omissions, it's hard to take this list seriously. What about Moises Kaufman's "Gross Indecency: The Three Trials of Oscar Wilde," Neil LaBute's "Bash" and "The Shape of Things," Edward Albee's "The Goat," Paula Vogel's "Indecent," Donald Margulies's "Collected Stories," Richard Greenberg's "Take Me Out," John Patrick Shanley's "Doubt" and Noah Haidle's "Mr. Marmalade"? JULES, Los Angeles I'm all for promoting these writers, but this is more like "A New York Guide to The New York Times's Favorite 25 Plays of the Last 25 Years That Were Produced in New York." SEAN DOUGLASS I live in "flyover country," have rarely been to N.Y.C. to see plays, and still I've seen 13 of the 25. That's because I live in St. Louis which has a lively theater scene with more than 20 small professional companies dedicated to bringing us wonderful contemporary plays. I'd add Sarah Treem's "The How and the Why." I loved it when two of our best local actresses, Amy Loui and Sophia Brown, showed us the generation gap between scientists, both in their work and in their personal lives. ST. LOUIS WOMAN, Missouri What a treasure this list is. I've only seen seven and not many more have made it to Australia. Let's see them, companies. JASON WHITTAKER These lists are always great conversation starters! We're glad to see the love for "The Wolves" part of our 2018 19 season among so many wonderful plays. What else would you like to see in New Orleans? southern rep I would have made room for Lisa D'Amour's "Detroit" probably taking "An Octoroon" off. But you know, it's actually a pretty good list, as these things go. Good work, folks! DANIEL PINKERTON, Minneapolis So many wonderful plays on the New York Times list. So many not. I want to examine why Eisa Davis's play "Bulrusher" is not. One of the great reads in my life. Resist the gatekeepers and please buy and read it. PAULA VOGEL, playwright The best play I've seen in the past 25 years is "Red," about the painter Mark Rothko. It should be on your list. MIKI F., North Carolina "The Brother/Sister Plays" by Tarell Alvin McCraney seems to me a glaring absence. PATRICK MALEY By far the best American playwright during this period was Christopher Durang, who had at least three full length plays produced. No wonder I don't take lists such as this seriously. ELSHEMUS, New York I would personally burn the wart of "Clybourne Park" off the list if someone gave me a blowtorch. I would quietly escort the "Apple Plays" off the premises. There's a lot I agree with. But no Samuel D. Hunter feels like a weird gap. NICOLE SERRATORE I've seen or read most of these, and found the vast majority of them flawed at best, dismal, or even downright annoying at worst. If I never see anything as awful as "Mr. Burns" or as incoherent as "Topdog/Underdog" or "The Realistic Joneses" again, I will consider myself a fortunate person. BILL GRABARKEWITZ Pacifica, Calif. A dreary list, a compendium of the mediocre and the overpraised. That serious critics can see these works as the "best" of anything is an indication of the increasing irrelevance of contemporary American drama. BRIAN MCAFEE, New York I won't link to that New York Times list because it did not include a single Sam Hunter or Josh Harmon play and can therefore (expletive) right off. "Mr. Burns" is one of my favorite plays though. j spencer This is so great!!! What a wonderful list I love the high placement of "An Octoroon." I might have swapped in "God's Ear," "Architecting," "Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike" and "10 out of 12." Interesting to note the absence of "Doubt," and (maybe) "Time Stands Still." HARRISON HILL A great list, but I would have included "4000 Miles," by Amy Herzog, the charming story mounted by Lincoln Center Theater about an elderly New Yorker who reluctantly takes in her grandson but is then sorry when it comes time for him to leave. (If you're looking for something to drop to make way, my vote is for "Mr. Burns," but in fairness, I saw a regional production out of state and I just didn't get it.) Can't wait for your list of musicals. I dare you to not put "Hamilton" at the top. ROBERT STONE, New York This is pretty thorough, and I'm glad you included Mee in the also rans. (I'd put "Paradise Park"/Summer Evening in Des Moines" on my personal top 25.) "A Doll's House Part 2" and "Significant Other" are the omissions I would add. Maybe another Annie Baker too. Oh and "Take Me Out." RICHARD LAWSON "An Octoroon" at No. 2! It's No. 1 in my heart, but we can agree to disagree New York Times :) CHRIS MYERS (an actor in the play's original cast)	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Theater
Video Games Are a Waste of Time? Not for Those With E Sports Scholarships Behind a glass partition at the Microsoft store at the Roosevelt Field Mall on Long Island, 10 teenage boys settled into seats in a rectangular formation. Each sat behind a laptop computer, ears warmed by a bulky headset. Parents and grandparents circled the room, peering over shoulders at screens. One mother used her iPhone to live stream to social media. The room had the feel of a sporting event, and it was a group of competitive video gamers on the Bay Shore High School e sports team were competing in a scrimmage and playing their way toward college scholarships. Multiplayer video games played competitively, often with spectators, are known as e sports, and they have become a gateway to college scholarship money. Over the past two years, the National Association of Collegiate Esports, which is engaged with 98 varsity programs across the United States and Canada, has helped to facilitate 16 million in scholarships, according to the executive director, Michael Brooks. In higher education, e sports live in various departments. Sometimes they are part of student affairs; some schools place them within an engineering or design program; and, more rarely, they have their place in athletics. At Robert Morris University Illinois, e sports is part of the athletics department. Team members have access to athletic trainers and are put through light fitness training. Players attend practice Monday through Thursday, from 4:30 to 9 p.m., with an hour break for dinner. They analyze film, participate in team building activities, sit for communication sessions. "The games that are competitively viable in the collegiate sphere have real depth, have deep levels of strategy, and require strategic teamwork and require real mastery to be successful and not just by yourself, within a team environment and through using tactics," said Kurt Melcher, who runs the program at Robert Morris. A few years out of college, Mr. Melcher was the soccer coach and associate athletic director for Robert Morris By 2013, he noticed a college community emerging. Students were organizing themselves, creating their own opportunities for gaming. So he took a proposal to the university administration: What if game play were an athletic endeavor? "If you look at sports, how do you define what is more of a sport? Is football more of a sport than men's tennis or women's tennis, and is golf more or less of a sport than hockey?" he said. Today, almost 90 Robert Morris students play, and about 80 of them receive e sports scholarships, Mr. Melcher said. Varsity level players can receive scholarships that cover up to 70 percent of their tuition; reserve players receive 35 percent tuition coverage. At the University of California Irvine, where e sports fall under student affairs, gamers must try out for a team and scholarship offers come later. There are 23 students on e sports scholarships at U.C.I. this year, on varsity and junior varsity teams, said Mark Deppe, who runs the university's e sports program. E sports players at U.C.I. devote 15 to 20 hours a week to the sport, Mr. Deppe said. Players scrimmage other teams, watch Video on Demand footage to evaluate performance, participate in team meetings, sit for biweekly sessions with a team psychologist and work out once a week with a personal trainer. The physical workout is e sports inspired: aside from general cardio, routines emphasize strengthening core muscles, arms, shoulders and wrists. "There's discipline involved, there's practice involved, there's teamwork and collaboration involved, but also the physical aspect," said Mark Candella, known as Garvey, the director of strategic partnerships for the streaming platform Twitch. "These young people can do up to 360 controlled precise actions per minute. Their fingers and hands and their eyes move so quickly in exact coordination." Organized competitive gaming on both the high school and university levels lives in purposeful defiance of the gamer stereotype: as Mr. Melcher said, "a kid locked in a basement, antisocial, angry, drinks 50 Mountain Dews and doesn't sort of become a valuable person in society." In the educational sphere, game play often brings students out of basements and bedrooms. At Bay Shore High School, Ryan Champlin, a senior, started the team with the help of his father, Chris; younger brother, Kyle; and computer teacher, Mike Masino. The team is part of the school's computer club. The team plays through the High School Esports League, a body that organizes competitive games and serves as a recruiting pipeline for college e sports programs. The league has dozens of recruiters looking for scholarship candidates, said Mason Mullenioux, the organization's chief executive. Unlike traditional sports, e sports recruitment is complicated by the nature of online gaming. Players are identified on leader boards only by user names. Details like age, gender and location are not listed. "You don't know if they're 12 years old or 30 years old," said Mr. Deppe of the University of California. "People have to kind of reveal themselves to schools and groups." Many players create online profiles through universities or organizations like the high school league so that schools might find those students who both meet academic requirements and play the desired positions on their high school teams. "The last thing you want to do is you spend a lot of time talking to a person in game, only to realize that they're a 50 year old doctor in Cambodia," Mr. Brooks said.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Education
After 35 years at the helm of her company, the choreographer Elisa Monte, who began her career as a dancer with Agnes de Mille and Martha Graham, is stepping down. Her troupe's season at Aaron Davis Hall, which closed on Saturday, warmly ushered in a new artistic director, Tiffany Rea Fisher, who joined Elisa Monte Dance in 2004. Saturday's program focused on Ms. Rea Fisher's choreography until the final act, a performance of Ms. Monte's "Shattered" (2000) by alumni of the company. And then there was the surprise coda, a lengthy excerpt from "Pangaea" (2016), Ms. Monte's latest work. Pushing the evening to two long hours, the addendum read as an ardent farewell to her fans while suggesting an unwillingness to let go. Ms. Rae Fisher's aesthetic doesn't stray far from Ms. Monte's, especially in its high strung mode of emotional expression. In two solos "why so curious?" (2015) and "Current" (new this season) as well as a new ensemble work, "Newton's Cradle," her dancers performed states of confusion and longing, grappling with obstacles we couldn't see. In both Ms. Monte's work and Ms. Rae Fisher's, the motivation for these feelings often remains unclear as though we should just accept their intense grasp on the performers a mystery more frustrating than it is alluring. That frustration stems in part from witnessing the dancers' technical excellence. How nice it would be to watch them move without the weight of so much false theatricality. In "why so curious?" the fast and furious Thomas Varvaro, in a formal vest and black briefs, seemed to be at once looking for and running from something, as he slid across the floor on the tip of one toe or furtively glanced behind him while lifting one leg to his head. Miles Mosley's restless score compounded the sense of urgency but didn't illuminate the source. A similar scenario unfolded in "Current," in which the vibrant Alrick Thomas moved as if propelled sometimes paralyzed by a strand of electric shocks.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Dance
LONDON Banksy, the world's favorite artist provocateur, is set to enjoy another moment of auction activism. The Bristol born street artist created a global media sensation last October when one of his iconic "Girl With Balloon" paintings shredded itself moments after selling for one million pounds, or about 1.4 million, at Sotheby's. Almost exactly a year later, on Oct. 3, another notable Banksy painting will be offered in the same London salesroom. With a valuation of PS1.5 million to PS2 million, it is expected to reach a new auction high for the elusive, anonymous artist. The painting, "Devolved Parliament," dating from 2009, is a timely satire on Britain's political establishment, showing an animated debate in the House of Commons, the lower house of Parliament, conducted entirely by chimpanzees. Wittily painted with the dreary realism of the paintings that hang in Britain's Houses of Parliament and measuring more than 14 feet wide, the painting was shown at Bristol Museum Art Gallery in the artist's hometown to coincide with Britain's scheduled departure from the European Union on March 29 this year, a date that was postponed until Oct. 31. "Devolved Parliament" will now be displayed in London just four weeks before the revised Brexit deadline. Demand for Banksy's paintings and prints has surged since last October when Alex Branczik, Sotheby's head of contemporary art in Europe, announced "We've been Banksy ed" at a post sale news conference. The remote controlled shredding mechanism jammed halfway down the canvas, leaving it dangling beneath its elaborate gold frame: Banksy aficionados quickly claimed this "Girl With Balloon" had added value as a unique piece of performance art . Soon after, Sotheby's announced that the buyer, described as a "female European collector," was happy to keep her booby trapped purchase. The painting, now retitled "Love Is in the Bin," has since March been hanging on long term loan at the Staatsgalerie in Stuttgart, Germany. "Presented in the museum context, it has to stand up to key works from the history of art from Rembrandt to Duchamp and from Holbein to Picasso," says the Staatsgalerie's website. The artistic prank of the century, designed to satirize the excesses of the auction world, has now become a highly valued museum piece. This time around, it seems that Banksy himself is not behind the sale. Sotheby's catalog entry for "Devolved Parliament" says the work was "acquired from the artist by the present owner in 2011." Banksy's publicist, Joanna Brooks, said in an email, "The painting in question is being sold by the owner who is in no way associated with the artist Banksy." Regardless of who owns "Devolved Parliament," the artist's view that Britain is ruled by political primates will be spread far and wide by the publicity surrounding the sale and the likely social media reaction. And there could also be quite a lot of money to be made. The market for Banksy's art is still on a high after that 2018 shredding incident. "It had a massive effect," said Ben Cotton, founder of the Hang Up Gallery in London. "There was so much press coverage. Our phones went crazy," said Mr. Cotton, who has been dealing in Banksy's works since 2007. Mr. Cotton said that since last October he had sold about 10 of Banksy's "Girl With Balloon" screen prints at prices ranging from PS50,000 to more than PS100,000. "It's the most coveted print, the most iconic. It's what everyone wants," he added. This surge in interest has encouraged top end auction houses to cash in on Banksy. Christie's and Sotheby's are both holding their first dedicated online sales of the artist's prints. Estimates range from PS5,000 for lesser unsigned images from large editions up to PS250,000 for signed rarities. "Every time there's a stunt in the media it peaks the prices. There's been quite a steady rise over the last two years," said James Baskerville, the head of Christie's 30 lot Banksy sale, which includes a rare 2004 "Girl With Balloon" screen print with the heart shaped balloon in gold. By 8 a.m. in London on Monday, online bidding for the print had reached PS150,000. According to data from the French database Artprice, worldwide auction sales of Banksy increased from 6.7 million in 2017 to 13.7 million in 2018. Mr. Baskerville added that last year's shredding incident had "really revived and refreshed the market. It has encouraged people to sell." But rising prices can encourage unrealistic expectations. This appeared to be the case on Saturday when Bonhams auction house offered a Volvo truck that had been spray painted by Banksy in 1999 as the backdrop for a New Year's warehouse party in Spain. Incongruously included among the Jaguar E Types and Bentley Continentals of Bonhams's annual Goodwood Revival classic car sale, the truck had been commissioned by Mojo Fellner, a co founder of the pyrotechnic performance troupe Turbozone International Circus. The free painted decoration included flying chimpanzees that a decade later would land on the leather benches of "Devolved Parliament," as well as the trademark motto "Laugh now but one day we'll be in charge." But a low estimate of PS1 million proved too ambitious, and the truck was left unsold at PS920,000. "Everyone's asking high prices because of the leverage of the shredding. But the asking price and the closing price can be very different," said Acoris Andipa, a London gallerist who specializes in Banksy paintings and prints. Mr. Andipa and others said that higher prices tended to be paid for Banksy's works through discreet private sales, rather than at public auctions. The current salesroom high for the artist is still the 1.9 million paid back in 2008 at Sotheby's for the 2007 painting "Keep It Spotless."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Art & Design
GENEVA When the German carmaker Audi acquired the Italian motorcycle manufacturer Ducati for about 1 billion in 2012, many in the auto industry wondered how Ducati might fit into Audi's business plans. Perhaps a first indication of that unfolded here Monday evening when a redesigned Ducati Diavel motorcycle was introduced along with Audi's new 4 wheel models at a Geneva Motor Show preview. The original Diavel was still fresh when Audi bought the company; by revising a very successful motorcycle after so little time, it would seem that a statement has been made. Audi, part of the Volkswagen Group, will be moving quickly to develop Ducati's strengths. By comparison, Yamaha waited two decades to overhaul its V Max, the bike generally considered to have pioneered the muscle cruiser genre. Even in its all black Dark Stealth livery, the new Diavel still manages to look red hot. And it still looks like a plumber's garage sale, with exposed pipes, tubing and ductwork threaded through and woven around every inch of it. But there is a bit more integration and sophistication evident; it even appears to be more comfortable and ergonomically friendly to ride. What's not visually evident, however, is how the bike's performance has been re formatted to make it, well, less terrifying to ride. The 1198 c.c. V twin engine delivers 162 horsepower, according to Ducati, and torque has been increased to 96 pound feet. While the new Diavel awaits actual road testing to verify Ducati's enhanced performance claims, the company asserts that the trip to 60 m.p.h. which takes a none too shabby 2.6 seconds and beyond now will be "smoother and more enjoyable." The 90 degree liquid cooled V twin engine has been completely reworked, Ducati says. Peak horsepower from is now reached at 9,250 r.p.m., instead of 9,500. Part of the power burst comes from new pistons and a 12.5:1 compression ratio. But one of the biggest improvements is in how the bike breathes, through revised intake and exhaust ports and improvements to the air box and exhaust system. Three adjustable throttle settings allow for full power for sport riding, maximum power with an added degree of rideability for rider and passenger for touring, and a moderated 100 horsepower mode for urban use and for riding in wet conditions. Despite the huge 240 section rear tire, Ducati promises that along with engine enhancements to make the Diavel accelerate faster with greater smoothness, and stop quicker with improved brakes, it will also handle with more agility. Pricing and availability will be announced at a later time.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Automobiles
The author, most recently, of "An Odyssey: A Father, a Son, and an Epic" doesn't want anyone to write his life story: "I'm a memoirist. I think it's fair to say the job is taken." What books are on your nightstand? There's a bunch, because I've always got books that I'm writing about in addition to books I'm reading for pleasure. For pleasure, I'm reading "The Journals of Denton Welch," the strangely wonderful English novelist and artist who died tragically young in the 1940s. About 10 years ago I read his three autobiographical novels, which are just not like anything else: There's a gossamer delicacy of feeling that teeters on the edge on feyness, but it's never precious, because there's also a steeliness in the writing, a detachment in his willingness to confront real emotional strangeness. I only last month discovered the journals which, apart from very moving material about his life, offers tons of delicious tidbits, from entire scenes (a hilarious lunch with Edith Sitwell, who was his champion) to small moments when the writing itself stops you in your tracks. At one point he compares the sound of a harpsichord "to a large and very beautiful cat unsheathing its claws, pawing the air, mouthing, miawlling." For work, I've got a bunch of books about Virgil's "The Aeneid," a new translation of which I'm writing about, and also the novels and stories of the contemporary German writer Jenny Erpenbeck, which I'm reading in preparation for a piece about her most recent novel, about a retired Berlin classics professor who becomes involved with African refugees. I've loved her previous work, but obviously this one is going to be of special interest to me. What influences your decisions about which books to read? Word of mouth, reviews, a trusted friend? Every now and then a review will make me want to pick something up, if it's by someone I trust; but for me, as for most people, it's word of mouth that gets me interested in something. I always listen to the recommendations of two close friends in particular: Bob Gottlieb, the former Knopf and The New Yorker editor, and the television writer and novelist Richard Kramer. Whenever they tell me to read something, I go right out and get it, and I've never regretted it, because they know me and my taste so well. They're like personal shoppers, but for books. Actually, now I'm thinking, "Wow, what a great idea!" What's the last great book you read? I'll talk about the last "wonderful" book I read, since I've gotten allergic to the word "great" lately everyone's best friend on Twitter is "the great so and so" who has just written a "great" book or article, blah blah. The word means nothing any more. The last wonderful book I read was Sebastian Barry's "Days Without End" a Gottlieb recommendation about a young Irish immigrant who gets mired in the traumas of 19th century American history, not least the extermination of the Native Americans and the Civil War. There's something about the narrator's voice, a combination of utter ingenuousness and deep humane wisdom, that reminds you of "Moby Dick." I'd say this is the great American novel of the decade, but the author happens to be Irish. Which classic novel did you recently read for the first time? Since I'm a nonfiction writer, and always trying to remind people that nonfiction is literature, too, I'll talk about a classic work of nonfiction, ok? I'd read large chunks of Edward Gibbon's "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" in graduate school, inevitably, but a few years ago a friend of mine told me he'd just finished listening to the whole thing on audiobook, and I thought, Yup, now's the time to tackle the whole thing. So I started listening to the marvelous recording by Bernard Mayes and I'm about to finish it after three years of shortish sessions on the elliptical machine. Apart from the history that Gibbon narrates one that should be of interest to Americans right now, I'd say I'm just knocked over by the prose: those fabulous, architectural, Augustan sentences are dazzling. Among other things, it's a lesson in how immaculate syntax is the best delivery vehicle for devastating irony. Which fiction and nonfiction writers playwrights, critics, journalists, poets inspired you most early in your career? And which writers working today do you most admire? Want to keep up with the latest and greatest in books? This is a good place to start. None Learn what you should be reading this fall: Our collection of reviews on books coming out this season includes biographies, novels, memoirs and more. See what's new in October: Among this month's new titles are novels by Jonathan Franzen, a history of Black cinema and a biography by Katie Couric. Nominate a book: The New York Times Book Review has just turned 125. That got us wondering: What is the best book that was published during that time? Listen to our podcast: Featuring conversations with leading figures in the literary world, from Colson Whitehead to Leila Slimani, the Book Review Podcast helps you delve deeper into your favorite books. During the 1970s, when I was a teenager, I avidly followed the critics who were then writing for The New Yorker. There was Andrew Porter on classical music and opera; Helen Vendler on poetry; Whitney Balliett on cabaret and jazz; Pauline Kael on movies; Penelope Gilliatt on books; Arlene Croce on ballet. I lived in the suburbs and had very little access to any of those art forms, but the sheer stylishness of their writing, the total (but lightly worn) authority married to utter accessibility, the confident idiosyncrasies, were very alluring to me purely as a reader, and suggested to me at that early stage that criticism was an interesting and important genre of writing in itself and not merely parasitic. The critics I admire today, unsurprisingly, have those qualities, whether it's Vinson Cunningham raising an eyebrow about "Humans of New York" or the painter David Salle writing about Rei Kawakubo in The New York Review of Books, or Francine Prose being unimpressed by some overhyped new novel. As for fiction, I fell early under the sway of the historical novelist Mary Renault, whose books set in ancient Greece were a major factor in pushing me toward the study of the classics. What kinds of books bring you the most reading pleasure these days? Biographies, letters, journals the records of people's lives, and the traces they themselves leave behind. This may be a middle aged thing: When you're (somewhat) closer to the end of life than to the beginning, it's hard to resist the impulse to start "taking stock" of yourself and what you've done, and so it's interesting to see how the lives of talented or celebrated or important people looked to those people while they were still living those lives. And of course, what the letters and journals show is that most of our lives are mostly a jumble while we're living them, because we're caught up in the day to day for the most part; it's for the biographers to perceive the contours, once it's all over. I find that reassuring. Which genres are you drawn to and which do you avoid? I was long immune to the allure of fantasy literature. Even when I was a kid, I couldn't get into "The Lord of the Rings" and all the rest of it. I'm not sure why, really. It may be that I got hooked on history and biography when I was still very young ancient Egypt, Greek and Roman history, Plantagenet history, Elizabeth I, Mary, Queen of Scots and I just couldn't imagine why anyone would need to invent a whole world or civilization when the ones we already have are so fascinating. But I may be evolving: I hugely enjoyed reading, and very much admired, all of the "Game of Thrones" books, which I tackled a few years ago for a piece I wrote about the TV series. Unsurprisingly, a genre I've always loved is historical fiction. There are a lot of terrible examples out there, but when it works when a deep sense of history (not just the props, but the spirit) is married to an authentic novelistic sensibility, as they are in the novels of Renault or Patrick O'Brian or Hilary Mantel, to name a few of the best it's tremendously satisfying. I find it amusing that this genre is still denigrated by some critics as being a lesser form of the novel. I always want to remind them that "War and Peace" and "Les Miserables" are historical fiction. What's your favorite book to teach to students at Bard? You're fishing! "The Odyssey," of course, is one of the two Homeric epics it's the one that students tend to enjoy more. But I also love teaching Greek tragedy it's at once so formally strange, so stiffly stylized and yet (of course) so eternally relevant in its themes. One of my favorite teaching experiences was when I participated in Bard's Prison Initiative last autumn, teaching Sophocles and Euripides to the inmates at a maximum security facility about an hour from campus. I was blown away by the men's responses to the texts we read by the way in which they brought what they knew about violence and shame and disgrace and guilt to dramas that are, of course, about those very things. As you can imagine, it was very different from what even the smartest 19 year old undergraduates can bring to the seminar table. Do you have a favorite book about writing or about literary criticism? I have a favorite book of literary criticism, which is Edmund Wilson's "Axel's Castle." I think most of us who are professional critics are shadowed by the secret fear that time will prove us wrong the virtues of our enthusiasms will prove to be ephemeral, or the things we panned will turn out to be classics. What's so remarkable to me about Wilson's book, which he published in 1931 and which is contemporary with some of the authors he wrote about Proust, Joyce, Pound, Stein is that he got everything just right. And right away, too: Within 10 years of the publication of Proust's "A la recherche du Temps Perdu" he'd completely grasped everything about it that was important and revolutionary. What book might people be surprised to find on your shelves? I've got piles of books about home decor and haute couture all around my house. I'm currently slavering over the catalog for the Dior exhibition at the Louvre. What's the best book you've ever received as a gift? "A Titanic Hero," the biography of Thomas Andrews, the shipbuilder who designed the Titanic (and went down with it). I was a Titanic groupie when I was a kid I belonged to the Titanic Enthusiasts of America and one day when I was around 12 an old family friend who was visiting presented it to me. It's hardly a great work of biography but it's always been the first book I pack up whenever I've moved. Who is your favorite fictional hero or heroine? Your favorite antihero or villain? Elizabeth Bennet in "Pride and Prejudice": Has there even been a more appealing protagonist? She's every smart person's secret self: clever on the outside, not so clever on the inside, and shocked to learn that the brain can't rule the heart. And her relationship with her father is so, so great. It's always surprising to me that more male writers don't talk about Austen as crucial to their literary identities; she seems absolutely essential. My favorite villain has to be Vautrin in Balzac's "The Human Comedy." Like all truly great writers, Balzac reserves some of his deepest sympathy and his greatest artistry for his most depraved characters. You're organizing a literary dinner party. Which three writers, dead or alive, do you invite? Easy: Voltaire, Jane Austen, Gore Vidal. I'm not sure it would be the most successful dinner party I've ever had, but I'd enjoy it. If you could require the president to read one book, what would it be? I have a Dantesque fantasy, in which he'd be forced to read "The Art of the Deal" over and over again, throughout eternity. Who would you want to write your life story? Well, I'm a memoirist. I think it's fair to say the job is taken. What do you plan to read next? I've just finished a three month long book tour, so pretty much anything that isn't my book would be a huge relief at this point ... No, seriously: I've got an idea for a book about Erich Auerbach, the great (really great!) German literary scholar who fled Hitler and ended up writing his (really!) great study of Western literature, "Mimesis," in ... Istanbul, where he'd taken refuge. I ordered all his books, as well as a number of books about him, while I was on tour, and they've all arrived by now. There's no better feeling than that: knowing that a pile of books connected to some new project is waiting for you.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Books
President Trump last month signed an executive order barring American aid to international organizations that discuss abortion as a family planning option with clients. American law already forbids the use of taxpayer money to fund the procedure itself. In Europe, the president's order brought an unexpected response. Lilianne Ploumen, 54, minister of foreign trade and development cooperation in the Netherlands, established a nongovernmental organization, She Decides, to raise money for aid groups whose funding is threatened under the new order. The Dutch ministry announced a donation of 10 million euros to She Decides, and Belgium and Denmark followed with matching grants. In March, representatives of 19 governments will convene in Brussels to see what else they can do to make up for the shortfall in American funding. I spoke with Ms. Ploumen by Skype last week. Our conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity and space. Q. What was your reaction when you heard about President Trump's order? A. Well, of course, I was very disappointed and a little bit shocked because, you know, this is 2017. You would have expected that in 2017 the rights of women and girls to be the masters of their own bodies and their own sexual lives would be something matter of fact. Did you think, "What can I do to counter this?" Yes. And if you're a minister of foreign trade and development cooperation, one of the good things is that you can do something. That's why I came up with this idea of creating this fund. I talked to my staff about it. They were a little cautious at first. They thought we should do this with other countries and start negotiating with the others. I thought if you start the long process of negotiating, you don't know what happens before we get to a result. I said, "Let's take the initiative and if others follow, yes! If others don't, we'll still have done the right thing." What was the response when you reached out to your counterparts in other countries? Most thought it was an amazing initiative and were pleased. I have to say that my Belgium counterpart, Alexander De Croo, he was the most swift of all. He immediately said, "We're going to help not only to donate money, but we're going to organize and host this conference." By then, we'd had an overwhelming response. For a couple of days, She Decides was my 24 hour task, which was great but I really needed help. The Swedes, the Danes, the Finns, Luxembourg, Canada they've all been supportive. Cape Verde said, "We will support this," which is really great because this is not only about, you know, the Nordics. We want this to be global. When you reached out to counterparts in other countries, did any turn you down? Well, some said, "We support the cause, but we also want to be sensitive to our relations with the United States." It's up to every country, of course, to make their decision. We have nine so far who support the initiative and will speak out for it. There are some 19 countries now interested in attending the March 2 meeting. There are countries that want to talk about reproductive health but are a little hesitant about "reproductive rights." And there are countries that feel that "pro choice" might be difficult for their own public. Some of them need more time, though we hope they will join us in Brussels. Many Americans have called and said, "How can we contribute?" The thing is we want to make sure that this becomes something that stays. Probably around 600 million a year will have to be raised to make up for what is being lost through the gag rule. There are researchers who say that when the rule was in place previously, it had the unintended effect of increasing the abortion rate in parts of the developing world. If that's accurate, could it happen again? Yeah, definitely. Because the organizations that will lose funds deliver a very broad range of services: mother and child medical care, contraceptives, sexual education for young people. If people cannot get low cost condoms or any information on how to protect themselves, this might lead to pregnancies that people really didn't plan for. And that, in turn, might make some people ask for an abortion, which of course in many countries is not done under very safe conditions. That's why we support broad services. I don't think anyone has an abortion because she wants to. There's always a reason she makes that decision. But if you have access to sex education and to birth control, then you often don't have to have an abortion. I just heard from a woman who works in our embassy in Senegal. She got word from her mother and sister who live in a remote village. They told her, "This cannot be. It will mean that women will get pregnant again without wanting to be. It will mean that our girls won't get sex education as they have for the past five years. It will change our community." Have you personally witnessed the impact of these types of services in the developing world? I was in Brazil a few years ago. Abortion is legal only if the pregnancy puts the life of the mother in danger or is the result of a rape. There isn't choice. And so there's a lot of illegal abortion. For the women, the experience is traumatic. First, there is the shock of an unplanned pregnancy, and then you have find someone in a back alley in often very unsafe conditions. One has to say, though, that Brazil is a very strong supporter of women's rights. But it is a very Catholic country. We hope that Brazilian women will continue to have access to services for medical reasons. By the way, I am a Catholic myself. Yes. Some people think that when you're Catholic, you just do as you're told. But being Catholic is basically about forming your own conscience within certain rules and regulations. My mom always taught me that your own conscience is your basic frame of reference. There's an election scheduled in the Netherlands in late March. In advance polling, a right wing populist appears to be making a strong showing. What happens to She Decides if he wins? Well, listen, we always have coalition governments. And that means that whoever is in those governments will need to compromise. I'm a Social Democrat, and I'm confident that we will have a good result in the elections. This 10 million euros goes to She Decides whoever will be in government. We know that it is such a strong movement in the Netherlands that regardless of any party, it will continue.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Health
In the coming days, a small group of Republicans will meet in Washington to try to settle a simple question: Should their revised tax bill eliminate a deduction for medical expenses and take away thousands of dollars each year from many people who are sick and, often, old? The two competing tax bills that will form the basis of an attempt at compromise over the coming weeks, one from the House of Representatives and one from the Senate, answer the question differently. The Senate bill would keep a deduction for medical expenses intact. The House bill would kill it off entirely. The more money that people had to spend this year, the more they would lose next year if the House prevails and the deduction disappears. Meet Medha Godbole, 58, whose 60 year old husband, Sanjay, is paraplegic, nonverbal and incontinent. The Solon, Ohio, couple have about 130,000 in expenses for Mr. Godbole's round the clock, in home care. Loss of the tax break would cost them close to 30,000 annually. Meet Conrad Wagner, 88, who spent his working years at the Veterans Administrationand then teaching at Vanderbilt University. He expects to spend about 200,000 this year on care and expensive equipment for his 87 year old wife, Jane, who has a stomach condition that requires 24/7 help in their Nashville home. Meet Kae Yates, who had to spend over 75,000 this year. Her husband, Reggie, is 77 and lives in an assisted living home in the wake of a stroke. She's 72 and still has all the usual expenses for her own home and daily life in Claremont, Calif. How many more are out there like them? The AARP Public Policy Institute, relying on the latest Internal Revenue Service data from 2015, notes that 8.8 million people take the medical expense deduction each year. Not all of them are older. Many children with special needs, for instance, have so many expenses that their parents end up qualifying for the deduction. Ditto sick or disabled adults with all sorts of maladies. Still, about 55 percent of the taxpayers who claimed the deduction in 2015 were 65 and older, according to AARP. Also, 69 percent have incomes under 75,000. The average amount that people claimed was 9,904, which makes the couples we've met up above outliers. But it stands to reason that people who need long term care will spend some of the highest amounts, given the high cost of nursing homes and similar care. And because 52 percent of people who live beyond 65 will need some kind of extended care before they die, according to federal health data, these outsize expenses are the ones that we ought to focus on when considering which tax breaks we want to persist. In an ideal world, any big new tax bill makes things simpler. Cutting deductions for medical expenses does make the year end chore easier. But is it fair? Imagine two couples, both alike in incomes, in a state without income tax where we lay our scenario. They have 150,000 in income and 100,000 in medical expenses and take no other itemized deductions. Now imagine that one gets a deduction for medical expenses and one does not. Using the 2017 tax brackets and a rule that would not allow medical deductions unless they exceed 10 percent of adjusted gross income, a couple that could access the deduction would end up with 15,547 more at the end of tax season than one that could not deduct and thus paid more in taxes, according to calculations that Ruth A. Sattig Betz, an accountant in Farmingdale, N.Y., ran for me. Locast, a nonprofit streaming service for local TV, is shutting down Capital One's chief executive was fined after being called a 'repeat offender.' Take the income down to 75,000 (where the extra 25,000 for the medical costs to pay the 100,000 in bills would come from sources or savings that are not subject to income tax) and the household with the ability to take the deduction would end the year with 6,826 more. So the medical expenses clearly matter, a lot. "Two households may have identical incomes, but they do not at all have identical capacity to pay taxes," said Cristina Martin Firvida, AARP's director of financial security. "And it's not because of a choice that one of them made." Indeed, to critical observers, it looks like Republican leaders in Congress are using the tax code to punish states with high income taxes. They use the bill to accomplish this by limiting how much of those state income taxes are deductible. That effectively penalizes some of those residents, who did choose to live in those states, with a higher total tax bill. Similarly, the proposal to lower the size of a mortgage that is eligible for interest deductions is akin to removing a subsidy for people who choose to buy bigger homes or live in more expensive areas. Nobody chooses to be sick though, which makes the House's move to strip out the medical expense deduction feel harsh to people who really, truly wish they had not qualified for it in the first place. "This is completely out of our hands," said Dr. Godbole, who is a pathologist. "It's not like sending kids to private school," she added, in a pointed reference to a new tax break that lawmakers hope to add for parents who do just that and could end up being able to do so with money they save in 529 plans, which are currently only for higher education. Moreover, eliminating a deduction probably shouldn't cause a chain reaction that will cost the federal government money. After all, the quicker that sick, older people run out of money because of higher tax bills, the sooner they will need Medicaid to pay for their long term care. And who helps pay for Medicaid? The very same federal government that would no longer permit people to deduct high medical expenses. If the changes comes to pass, Ms. Yates in California figures she and her husband could run out of savings in about five years. I contacted the House Ways and Means Committee to see what its chairman, Kevin Brady, Republican of Texas, thought about the specific impact of the House's proposal on elderly people with high expenses. "Chairman Brady is committed to addressing this issue at the conference committee," said Lauren Blair Aronson, the committee's press secretary. Dr. Godbole, who is still working, can make her household's money last longer than the Yates's savings. But her husband might live for decades, owing to his excellent heart, she said, and their money probably would not last that long. She seeks no pity, she said. She knows many people in the stroke support club they belong to who will be in big financial trouble much sooner if the deduction disappears. But she sees the stories about Congress wanting to cut entitlement programs once they finish yanking the medical deduction, and worries. "It will be a double whammy for us," she said. Professor Wagner said that he understands the zeal to simplify the tax code. He expressed no particular ill will for his elected representatives, though he has written them to outline his situation and concerns. Having worked until just a few years ago, he had hoped for financial certainty and the emotional peace it would have provided, even if he and his wife knew they could not predict their future health. But now, he said, he finds himself constantly checking the news for word on the tax plan's progress. "I worked that long in order to enable myself to prepare for and expect a comfortable retirement," he said. "And it's certainly not comfortable now."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Your Money
AMSTERDAM It was 1937, Vienna, when a Jewish couple named Heinrich and Anna Maria Graf bought a vibrant 18th century oil painting of the Grand Canal in Venice with the Punta Della Dogana in the background. The work held pride of place in their living room, the highlight of their small but treasured art collection. One year later, Germany annexed Austria, and the Grafs and their twin 6 year old daughters, Erika and Eva, had to flee the country. They put their art into storage and left for Italy, then France where Heinrich was held for more than a year in an internment camp for Jews then Spain and Portugal and ultimately New York. By the time they settled in Forest Hills, Queens, it was 1942, and all their possessions had been looted by the Nazis. The prized painting became the focus of a 70 year recovery effort by the Graf family and its heirs and one that is now ending on an ambivalent note. Sotheby's in London is preparing to sell the work, by the artist Michele Marieschi, at an old masters auction in July, following a restitution settlement between the heirs and a trust on behalf of the now deceased owner, whose identity has not been released. The auction house has estimated the painting's value at 650,000 to 905,000. This painful and circuitous history reflects how looted artworks that have been in private hands for decades are coming to market after settlement agreements with the rightful owners, in a way that tries to address their tainted past. These agreements may not result in the return of the paintings to the heirs, but the compromise does provide at least a form of resolution and some compensation to the heirs, and brings the artworks out of hiding. The heirs of the Grafs were not able to recover the painting, "La Punta Della Dogana e San Giorgio Maggiore" (1739 40), because the deceased owner and the trust declined to return the work. Instead, the parties reached an agreement that involves sharing the proceeds of the Sotheby's sale. No one involved would disclose details of the deal. Stephen Tauber, a son in law of the Grafs, said in a telephone interview that the resolution was "bittersweet." His wife, Erika, died in 2012 at 79; her sister, Eva, lives in a retirement community in Canton, Mass. "Our preferred solution would have been to get the painting back for my parents in law during their lifetime, or failing that, to their heirs," he said. "We brokered a compromise, which we signed. It is not really satisfactory, but it is acceptable. It was the best that we could achieve. Ideally, it would have been returned in total to our family. That wasn't possible, so we settled for what we could get." A representative of the trust did not respond to a request for comment. Like many paintings looted during World War II, "La Punta Della Dogana e San Giorgio Maggiore" went through several hands after the Grafs had to leave it behind. Their Vienna storage facility, Schenker, informed the Grafs by letter that the entire contents of their storage locker had been confiscated by the Gestapo on Nov. 16, 1940, according to Andrew Fletcher, head of sales for Sotheby's old masters paintings department in London. The Graf family had been searching for the painting since 1946, when Heinrich Graf filed a claim for the work in Austria. In 1998, the two daughters, assisted by the Art Loss Register, a database of lost and stolen art that also provides search services, posted an advertisement in The Art Newspaper seeking information. Charles Beddington, an old masters painting dealer who had worked as a specialist at Christie's, recognized the artwork, which he had seen in the home of the owner some 15 years earlier. "I knew where it was," Mr. Beddington said in a telephone interview on Tuesday. "But then I thought I'd better ask Christie's if it was O.K. to reveal the client's name, and they said no." The sisters asked a British judge to issue an injunction against Christie's to release the name of the owner; after a favorable ruling, Christie's disclosed the name to the family, according to Mr. Tauber. (He declined to share it.) The Art Loss Register and the Vienna Israelite Community then tried to reach out to the owner on behalf of the sisters, but to no avail: He refused to talk. The owner died in 2013, Mr. Tauber said, and the painting came into the hands of a trust. In 2015, the trust contacted Christopher Marinello at Art Recovery International, which specializes in mediating restitution claims. That is when negotiations with the Graf heirs began. The painting, though prized by the Graf family, is not widely considered to be a major work. Jonathan Green, an owner of the Richard Green Gallery in London, which specializes in old master paintings, said that Sotheby's price estimate for the July auction seems fair. "It's not the best Marieschi I've ever seen, not by a long shot, but it's a fair one," he said. "The price is right, presuming it's in good condition." He placed Marieschi "fourth in the pecking order of 18th century Venetian view paintings," after Canaletto, Guardi and Bellotto. "I've seen about 20 to 30 of his works at auction in the last 20 years, and the exceptional ones can sell for as much as 2 million," he added. The Graf family and the estate reached the restitution agreement in December. Mr. Tauber, 85, and his son, Andrew Tauber, 54, a lawyer in Washington, were able to spend an hour with the painting when it was in the Paris Sotheby's offices last month. "Finally, finally, after decades of hearing about this painting, I was getting to see it with my own eyes," Andrew Tauber said. "Knowing that my grandparents, with whom I was very close, loved this work so much, it was a very emotional experience."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Art & Design
Maserati will recall 63 of its 2014 Quattroporte GTS V8 models because of a possible loss of electrical power and a potential fire risk, according to a report posted on the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration website. Maserati said the wiring harness for the alternator starter motor was defective. The problem could cause an electrical short, loss of power and possibly a fire in the engine compartment. Maserati said it learned of the problem from a consumer complaint overseas and had received no reports of problems in the United States. In another action, N.H.T.S.A. upgraded its investigation into whether almost 253,000 Mercedes Benz C Class cars from the 2008 11 model years should be recalled because a wiring problem could cause taillight failure and, potentially, lead to trunk fires. In a new report posted on the safety agency's website, federal investigators said Mercedes told them that corrosion between two taillight connectors could cause ground wires to overheat. The report says the agency is aware of 402 complaints about the failures, including claims of five fires and one injury. The severity of the injury was not noted. Accordingly, the agency is upgrading the investigation to a more serious engineering analysis. That is more likely but not certain to result in a recall.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Automobiles
Despite the fact that Damon Dickinson and Neil Alpert are Jewish, the couple have celebrated Christmas with Mr. Dickinson's family each of the last four years. "Growing up Catholic, so many of my poignant life moments with my immediate or extended families were Christmas related, so I have a lot of special memories there," said Mr. Dickinson (left), 26, who converted to Judaism after the two began their relationship. "Neil and I don't celebrate Christmas in a religious sense, but in a more family traditional sense," added Mr. Dickinson, the director of operations and special projects at Potomac Management, a financial advisory firm in Washington. Mr. Alpert is the managing director of the firm. He met Mr. Alpert, 42, in March 2013 at a coffee shop in Washington, when Mr. Dickinson was still a student at George Washington University, from which he graduated. The two stayed in touch and in September of that year, Mr. Dickinson began as one of several interns at LaserLock Technologies, the company for which Mr. Alpert was then the chief executive. They got to know each other more through shared volunteer work in Washington after Mr. Dickinson left the company and it was then that their relationship began to take a romantic turn.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Fashion & Style
LOS ANGELES Universal Pictures and a gaggle of foul mouthed 12 year olds proved over the weekend that, even in the Netflix epoch, comedies can still pack a box office punch. "Good Boys," about the R rated misadventures of three preteen buddies, collected an estimated 21 million at theaters in the United States and Canada, according to Comscore. That No. 1 total the largest so far this year for an original comedy exceeded analysts' prerelease expectations by more than 30 percent. "This is a franchise level opening," David A. Gross, a movie consultant, wrote in a Saturday report that noted the movie's modest budget and strong scores from audiences and critics. "Good Boys" cost about 20 million to make. Even rival studios breathed a sigh of relief. Moviegoers in North America have given a cold shoulder to one comedy after another in recent months: "Stuber," "Late Night," "Long Shot," "Booksmart," "Poms," "The Hustle," "Shaft." The carnage has prompted speculation that streaming services have made it easy for audiences looking for laughs to skip theaters. The bar does seem to be higher. "Good Boys" was more than a well crafted film backed by a very aggressive marketing campaign; it got noticed because it pushed taste boundaries. An R rated movie about sixth graders? One of the only other original comedies that has found an audience this year, "Yesterday," released by Universal in June, used an over the top premise and Beatles music to up the ante. Bruce Springsteen's songbook did not help "Blinded by the Light" (Warner Bros.), which went down in flames over the weekend. Despite mostly strong reviews, "Blinded by the Light" took in about 4.5 million, for a ninth place start. It probably struck ticket buyers as too similar to "Yesterday," box office analysts said. Warner paid about 15 million to acquire rights to the film, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January. Two other new movies also fizzled. "Where'd You Go, Bernadette" (United Artists) collected 3.5 million, while "47 Meters Down: Uncaged" (Entertainment Studios) took in roughly 9 million, about 20 percent less than its series predecessor managed during its first weekend in 2017. Faring somewhat better was "The Angry Birds Movie 2" (Sony), which sold 10.5 million in tickets, for a domestic total of 16.2 million since arriving on Tuesday. The first "Angry Birds" collected 45.7 million over its first six days in 2016. Sony noted that the sequel received starkly better reviews than the initial movie and that another major animated film does not arrive until late September. Sony had another good weekend with Quentin Tarantino's "Once Upon a Time ... In Hollywood," which collected 53.7 million in its initial rollout overseas. Ticket sales were particularly strong in Britain and Australia. "Once Upon a Time" took in 7.6 million in North America from Friday to Sunday, for a four week domestic total of 114.3 million.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Movies
She Saved Thousands of Best Friends. Then Covid 19 Killed Her. Valerie Louie saved our beloved Uncle Mort from a life of abuse. Then she became a pandemic casualty. Her death is being mourned by households with four pawed members across San Francisco and the Bay Area. Ms. Louie spent two decades rescuing dogs like Uncle Mort from shelters and finding them homes like ours anxious to have a new best friend. Her specialty was rescuing the truly abandoned and broken pup, the abused, the blind, the deaf and the long in tooth. The day she dropped off the sad eyed mutt I'd identified at one of her shelter events, the little guy promptly deposited a poop on our dining room carpet. "It's just a little one," Ms. Louie said. She had a generous smile and the patience of a member of the clergy. Ms. Louie, who died of Covid 19 on Nov. 25 after two weeks in an intensive care unit, didn't just save rescue dogs. She saved people too. She was a nurse and worked for 32 years at Highland Hospital in Oakland, starting in the emergency department. Her last position was coordinator of advanced life support. She was a single mother. She leaves behind her son, Andrew Louie, 21, who lived with her and also was infected with the coronavirus in late October. He has since recovered. Ms. Louie died at the Mission Bernal campus of California Pacific Medical Center in San Francisco, the city where she was born and raised. She was 60. Her legacy lives. "I cannot fathom how many dogs she saved, probably thousands," her son said, echoing a figure estimated by fellow volunteers. She farmed out the canines to families after retrieving them from shelters, including so called kill shelters in central California where many dogs get bred, adopted and abandoned. Some dogs she kept like Ida, a French bulldog found in the mountains of China in 2012. The person who found the dog, abandoned and blind after it had been used for breeding, discovered Ms. Louie on the internet through an organization called Rocket Dog Rescue that she worked with at the time. Ms. Louie arranged to have the dog flown to San Francisco, her son said. "She was a powerhouse," said Meg McAdam, a close friend who also rescues dogs and works at Oakland Animal Services, "and a San Francisco institution." During the pandemic, Ms. Louie rescued some 80 dogs, finding them at shelters and farming them out to homes, according to Ms. McAdam. Tributes have poured in to a GoFundMe site Ms. McAdam set up to help support Ms. Louie's son. "Valerie gave us our sweet Boomer," one grateful mourner wrote. "I have prayed for her everyday since we heard the news." "She helped us immensely with our Zito." I can testify too. I first saw Uncle Mort, a tortured little soul, in the back of Ms. Louie's Toyota RAV4 in early 2018. It was just another Saturday for Valerie, taking dogs to an adoption event at a mall on the southern edge of San Francisco. I had lurked at the event on the prior two weekends, that must have dog feeling rising inside me. My wife, Meredith, long reticent because of her husband won't take care of dog feeling, had seemed to be softening to the idea. I told her that I would like to give the dog a try but had to do some convincing on the home front. She got it immediately. She had done it hundreds of times the veritable trial run for the family on the fence about bringing in a new member with fur and a troubled past. I signed the papers and, a few days later, Ms. Louie dropped him off and assessed the fit. She looked around approvingly while the dog deposited his opening gambit on our carpet. His given name was Franco. That did not fit. Franco sounded like a Spanish dictator. The weathered soul in our house, while only 3 years old, looked more like an ancient member of the British Parliament. We christened him Uncle Mort. That had been the name of a character in a comic strip I had written for a decade; dog and comic strip character looked strikingly alike. The new name fit all the more when we witnessed his early behavior, which entailed looking nervous when awake but mostly sleeping with an outsize snore that sounded like your great uncle after Thanksgiving dinner, passed out on the couch. We called a dog trainer to come see if Mort might learn to love and be loved. The trainer was dubious. "He'll be a good dog, but don't get your hopes up that he'll be the family dog you imagined. He's had a rough go." We got our hopes up. We were rewarded. Uncle Mort has become the most loving and beloved creature in our house, some days exceeding the children in both respects. My wife is his "person," and when she returns home from an absence, no matter how brief, he goes bananas as if he has just discovered the ocean. Now, Meredith calls Uncle Mort her "forever puppy." Such is the state of Mort's relaxation these days that he regularly lies in various positions of seemingly impossible geometry and vulnerability, all four limbs in the air so that he may be petted around the chest and neck and ears in the manner to which he has become accustomed.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Health
That summer, it felt to David Dein as if he as if English soccer as a whole was under attack. Roman Abramovich, an enigmatic Russian billionaire, had swept into Chelsea in June 2003 and laid waste to the transfer market, lavishing vast sums on what seemed like any and every elite player he could get his hands on. Nobody could compete, and scarcely anyone could resist. Hernan Crespo came in from Inter Milan and Adrian Mutu from Parma; Joe Cole from West Ham and Juan Sebastian Veron from Manchester United arrived on the same day. "Roman Abramovich has parked his Russian tank on our front garden," Dein said at one point, "and is firing PS50 notes at us." At one point, the bid comfortably eclipsed the 77.5 million Real Madrid had paid for Zinedine Zidane a couple of years earlier. If a single Arsenal player was worth so much, Dein reportedly asked his dining partners, "why didn't you just buy the whole club?" It has felt a little like that this summer, too, that same sensation of shock and awe. In the midst of a global pandemic, as the Premier League frets over a possible 908 million shortfall in revenue while stadiums stand empty, and as European soccer circles a 4.5 billion financial black hole, Chelsea has blown the market away. A 51 million deal to sign Hakim Ziyech, the Ajax playmaker, had already been agreed before the coronavirus hit. When Liverpool dallied over the signing of the Germany striker Timo Werner, Chelsea pounced, at a cost of 68 million. Leicester City's Ben Chilwell cost 63 million. Thiago Silva, the vastly experienced Brazil defender, was coaxed away from a contract offer at Fiorentina, while the young center back Malang Sarr came on another free transfer. And, finally, for a fee that may rise as high as 90 million, Chelsea persuaded Bayer Leverkusen to part with the 21 year old forward Kai Havertz. There may yet be more deals to come: the French club Rennes has confirmed it is in talks to sell the goalkeeper Edouard Mendy to Chelsea for around 25 million, and Declan Rice, the West Ham and England midfielder, would cost somewhere in the region of 45 million. As Frank Lampard a Chelsea player when Abramovich arrived and now the coach tasked with turning those expensively assembled parts into a coherent whole said, it has the air of "the beginning of the road" for a new iteration of the club. That was true in 2003, too, of course. But while the desire to paint this as a reprise of the summer when Chelsea shook the world to read into it proof that Abramovich must now be re engaged with the club, with the project, with the sport is understandable, it is the differences between then and now, rather than the similarities, that are instructive. Back then, Dein was right to assert that Chelsea's approach was a little scattergun. Abramovich wanted to make an impact, not just to acquire players but to distort the market sufficiently that nobody could compete an approach adopted, in the summer of 2017, by Paris St. Germain and he wanted not only to win, but to win quickly. That urgency, coupled with an inevitable lack of expertise in the transfer market, gave Chelsea the air of a child in a candy store. English soccer was less concerned, then, with recruitment models and squad profiles and overarching philosophies, but even by contemporary standards, Chelsea's signings were eclectic. There were young players and experienced players, two strikers, three goalkeepers and four central midfielders. With the benefit of hindsight, only Claude Makelele and Damien Duff of that initial intake could be called unqualified successes. The summer of 2020 has, if anything, been the polar opposite. As Jurgen Klopp, Liverpool's manager, has noted, Chelsea's privilege is that its plans were not fundamentally affected by the impact of the pandemic not negatively, at least, since the economic challenges being endured by its rivals certainly served to clear its path. But that does not make it a "spree," at least in the traditional sense. Chelsea's approach to the last several months has been surgical, precise, and several years in the making. Both Werner and Havertz have been keen to highlight the role Lampard played in enticing them to London, in name and in deed. To players in their early 20s, of course, Lampard's reputation went before him part of the appeal for Havertz, in particular, was the chance to learn from a coach who mastered a position similar to his own but it is his personal interventions that seemed to win the day. Lampard remained in constant contact with Werner during negotiations, sending him clips of the sort of style of play he was looking to institute. Later, in a phone call with Havertz, he offered a detailed analysis of how he intended to use him in his team. But while that is an attractive and attractively simple narrative, the reality of modern recruitment is not only more complex, it is much less dramatic. The stirring phone call, the human connection, is the last stage in the deal. Behind that lays years of painstaking groundwork, carried out not by a single, decisive individual but by an assiduous collective. Havertz is a case in point. Most of Europe's elite clubs, the transfer market's apex predators, have been tracking him for more than three years. Chelsea, like Liverpool, had identified him as a must sign sort of player as a teenager, should the opportunity ever arise. A comprehensive dossier, incorporating a suite of scouting reports and a raft of data analysis, had been compiled and filed in Chelsea's bespoke software. Scott McLachlan, the club's head of international scouting, had been a staunch advocate of Havertz's promise. The player, meanwhile, had long earmarked this as the summer in which he would leave Bayer Leverkusen. His representatives had examined his potential suitors, their coaches and their styles of play, to assess which might be the best fit. At least one major club was ruled out because it was determined Havertz would not be able to play in his strongest position. Its hand was strengthened, of course, by the varying effects of the pandemic on its putative rivals it was in the spring that it became clear that Chelsea was by some distance the most viable option but it was no act of opportunism: the club had planned for this. In that sense, this summer has not been a return to the early days of Abramovich's ownership: The money that has transformed the squad has been carefully gathered over the course of several years, the profits of the loan farm first envisioned by Michael Emenalo, the club's former sporting director, and then added to the sales of Eden Hazard and Alvaro Morata. It has been put to use not to sign a phalanx of famous names who may or may not fit, but to acquire specific, long held targets, identified as the best candidates to turn a squad built around a core of youth drawn from Chelsea's best in class academy. It is a recruitment drive marked not by urgency, but by patience. Rather than demonstrating that Chelsea is just the same as it used to be, it illustrates quite how much the club has changed.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Sports
When the designer Azzedine Alaia died unexpectedly last November and his house decided not to name a designer to succeed him, it both made a lot of sense ("There was no one who could do what he did" being the general take) and also seemed like a risk ("But don't houses need creative direction?" coming in practically the next breath). Would the brand lose its way without its residing spirit and creative font? Two seasons in, the contention that Mr. Alaia left enough designs and archival ideas behind to power the studio for decades seems to be holding true in part because, while his stubborn refusal to bow to the idea of seasons and the spinning ever faster fashion cycle might have been irritating to some while it was happening (he would hold shows when he was ready, often long after fashion week had ended, meaning most people couldn't actually see them), it also meant that his clothes exist largely free of identifiable time period or era.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Fashion & Style
The in line 6 cylinder in Ms. Holland's old BMW long the signature power plant of the Bavarian automaker is rated at 18 miles per gallon in the city and 28 on the highway. Her new BMW's turbo engine, with 240 horsepower, is a third smaller, yet it has 10 more horsepower and a huge 60 additional pound feet of torque, giving it faster acceleration. Yet with all this newfound power, she is getting about 32 miles per gallon on the highway. "It drives so much better than the 6 cylinder," she said. "I could never imagine a 4 cylinder engine could go that fast, but it just throws you back in your seat." By any industry standard, the pace of the turbocharger revolution has been breathtaking. In 2011, less than 7 percent of new cars and trucks in America were sold with turbochargers. In just four years, that percentage has tripled to 21 percent. Honeywell forecasts that nearly four in 10 new cars and trucks in America will be turbo powered by 2019, or roughly eight million a year. By 2025, turbocharged engines are expected to be found in a staggering 80 percent of new cars. Edmunds.com, the consumer auto website, says that 49.7 percent of the 350 car and truck models sold in America offer a turbocharged engine, up from 30 percent in 2010. Make that 100 percent at Ford, which has been especially gung ho: For 2015, every Ford and Lincoln car, sport utility vehicle and light duty pickup offers an optional EcoBoost turbo. Seven EcoBoost choices range from a petite 1 liter, 3 cylinder in the Fiesta subcompact smaller than many motorcycle engines to the 2.3 liter, 310 horsepower version in the all new Mustang, the first 4 cylinder in any Mustang since 1986. Atop the power heap is the V6 with 365 horses in the radically redesigned F 150 pickup. Even traditional pickup buyers, notoriously skeptical of rapid technological change, have been won over: Half of Ford's F Series buyers, or well over 350,000 in a typical year, are choosing an EcoBoost powered truck. The F Series with a compact 2.7 liter EcoBoost V6 set a mileage record for full size gasoline pickups at 26 highway m.p.g. Yet this roughly 4,500 pound truck still accelerates faster than some sport sedans, going from stoplight to 60 m.p.h. in about six seconds. Seeing the writing on the wall, several manufacturers have dropped V6 engines entirely from their most popular family sedans, including the Hyundai Sonata, Chevrolet Malibu and Ford Fusion, in favor of turbocharged 4 cylinder engines.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Automobiles
The editorial board is a group of opinion journalists whose views are informed by expertise, research, debate and certain longstanding values . It is separate from the newsroom. Tessa Majors, an 18 year old Barnard College freshman with green hair, loved music, especially punk rock, and singing with her band. On Dec. 11, while she was walking in Morningside Park in Manhattan, she was stabbed to death, apparently during a robbery. The three teenagers charged in Ms. Majors's killing are just 13 and 14 years old, a second tragedy. The two 14 year olds, Rashaun Weaver and Luchiano Lewis, have been charged with second degree murder as adults. Prosecutors say Rashaun stabbed Ms. Majors as Luchiano restrained her. Lawyers at the Neighborhood Defender Service of Harlem, which is representing Rashaun, offered an obvious, yet necessary, observation in a statement Wednesday: "Our client is a 14 year old child," they wrote. Under New York law, children as young as 13 are automatically tried as adults if charged with second degree murder and certain felony sex crimes. So are 14 and 15 year olds charged with a long list of other violent offenses, including rape, robbery, assault in the first degree and arson. That isn't unusual in the United States, where nearly all states have laws allowing minors under 18, some as young as 10, to be tried as adults in certain circumstances. The country has always allowed these prosecutions in some cases. But in the "tough on crime" era of the 1970s, '80s and early '90s, the practice exploded, with states adopting sweeping laws that made it easier to prosecute those under the age of 18 as adults. New York was a leader in the incarceration of children. It began prosecuting young adolescents as adults under a draconian law passed in 1978, in the aftermath of the Willie Bosket case. Mr. Bosket was a 15 year old black boy who fatally shot two men and wounded a third on the subway. He was sentenced to five years in a juvenile facility under the law at time. The city's tabloids responded with outrage over the sentence. Under pressure and facing re election, Gov. Hugh Carey, a Democrat who had once supported criminal justice reforms, reversed course, campaigning hard for legislation that would rebrand him as tough on crime. The result was the law, still on the books, mandating the prosecution as adults of children as young as 13 when they're charged with certain violent crimes. Thousands of adolescents have been tried as adults in New York. From 2014 to 2018 alone, nearly 1,800 children ages 13 to 15 were charged as adults, according to data compiled by the state's Division of Criminal Justice Services. Among the children prosecuted as adults in New York over the years was Korey Wise, one of the teenagers wrongfully convicted in the rape and assault of a woman jogging in Central Park in 1989. Mr. Wise, 16 at the time of his arrest, served about 13 years in prison before he was exonerated. Adolescents tried in adult court are without important protections offered to children in family court. Children tried as adults often receive longer sentences, farther from home, and face mandatory sentencing minimums that would not apply in family courts. Family court judges also have more resources at their disposal to address the complex needs of these children, and can focus on rehabilitation rather than just punishment. The problems with trying children as adults, let along incarcerating them well into adulthood, are many. The research on the matter is overwhelming. It shows that adolescent brains are different than those of adults, making adolescents less likely to exercise impulse control, assess risk or consider long term consequences. Younger offenders are more likely to suffer from mental illness than their peers. Many are readily capable of being rehabilitated. There is also evidence that trying children as adults may make society more dangerous. One study, for instance, found that adolescents tried in adult court were 34 percent more likely to be rearrested than those tried in the juvenile justice system. Another found that those incarcerated as adolescents had poorer physical and mental health as adults. This is why many countries approach justice for minors differently. Spain, Germany, Greece, Switzerland and Italy do not allow any adult prosecutions of children under 18, according to the Campaign for Youth Justice, which supports ending the adult prosecution of minors. It wasn't until 2005 that the U.S. Supreme Court banned the execution of young people who committed murder before they turned 18. In 2012, it banned mandatory life without parole sentences for those who committed crimes when they were 17 or younger. But the United States still has one of the highest juvenile incarceration rates in the industrialized world. Nearly 50,000 adolescents under 18 were in detention or correctional facilities in 2015. Black children made up 44 percent of those under 18 who were incarcerated that year, though they comprised 16 percent of the American population under 18. This bleak reality is grimly unsurprising in the United States, a country that has relied on brutality and prison to control large portions of its citizens from the days of slavery to the era of mass incarceration. With the 1978 law, New York embraced this tradition, even before the "War on Crime" policies of the 1980s and '90s sent incarceration rates soaring. New York has come a long way since then. In 2008, the number of children 15 or under who served time in detention facilities was 9,269. By 2017, it had declined to 3,654. The trend tracks with steep declines in incarceration over all in New York. The city's jail population, for example, which peaked at roughly 22,000 in the early 1990s, is now 5,376. New York's Raise the Age legislation, signed into law in 2017, required that 16 and 17 year olds charged with most misdemeanors be tried in family court. The reforms also gave prosecutors and judges the discretion to remove most felony cases against 16 and 17 year olds to family court, where judges can place adolescents in custody for as long as six years in felony cases. Minors still serving a sentence at 21 serve the remainder in an adult facility. But the Raise the Age legislation didn't roll back the so called Willie Bosket Law, and end the practice of charging 13 , 14 and 15 year olds as adults for serious violent felony charges. If Rashaun Weaver and Luchiano Lewis are convicted, they could face a minimum sentence of seven and a half and five years in prison, respectively, and up to life in prison. New York's police commissioner, Dermot Shea, said of Rashaun Weaver's arrest, "Sadly, it cannot bring back this young woman, this student, this victim." Commissioner Shea was right. Locking up Rashaun and Luchiano for life won't bring Tessa Majors back. This is one more area where New York can reimagine its criminal justice system, breaking with its past as a leader in locking Americans up and throwing away the key to instead become a national model of reform. Legislators should overturn the 1978 law, and rethink what justice can look like for young people like Rashaun Weaver and Luchiano Lewis. The state can use family courts to base criminal justice for adolescents around rehabilitation instead of punishment, even in cases of murder. No one under the age of 18 should face charges as an adult.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Opinion
It's been nearly 40 years since moviegoers saw Boba Fett, the fearsome bounty hunter of the original "Star Wars" saga, take an ill fated tumble into the Great Pit of Carkoon, where he was presumed to have been devoured by the Sarlacc. But death is often just a temporary state in "Star Wars," and after his memorable (if mortifying) demise in "Return of the Jedi," a very much alive Boba Fett has reappeared in subsequent novels, comic books and other media, having survived that seemingly fatal fall. "The Mandalorian," the Disney series set in the "Star Wars" universe, has also been building up to a fuller return of the enigmatic Fett: The character has been shown in cameo in past episodes, and in the most recent installment, "The Tragedy," Fett played a central role when he came after the show's title hero (Pedro Pascal) in search of his missing armor. Morrison, who has also starred in films like "Once Were Warriors," "Moana" and "Aquaman," spoke on Friday about assuming the mantle of Boba Fett and his history with the "Star Wars" franchise. These are edited excerpts from that conversation. How long have you been awaiting your opportunity to return to the "Star Wars" series? There was a lot of stuff online about a possible "Star Wars" bounty hunter film, and then I was watching all the new "Star Wars" movies coming out, wondering if they were ever going to do anything with Jango Fett. My agent and I had a number of discussions when are they going to call me? But then I kept forgetting about it. In this day and age, they have a number of options. They could have called other people to play the part. They can go with a fresh face. They could have called the Rock. I felt so grateful that after all this time, something came to be. What happened when you finally got the call that the series creator Jon Favreau and executive producer Dave Filoni wanted to meet with you? I wasn't even quite sure what "The Mandalorian" was about, but I kind of knew that Jango and Boba had their own Mandalorian history. At the time, I was in Los Angeles, meeting on another film, so I was pleasantly surprised to get the call. I actually got to the meeting quite early I was so excited I got there about two hours early and there were conceptual drawings on the wall. I saw an image that looked like me, and I said, I'm sure that's me. But even then, I didn't want to get too excited. What did you discuss with them in that meeting? I was just listening I wasn't discussing anything. I'm just nodding, going, yes, yes. Obviously they had their ideas about what they wanted to do, and they must have told me that they wanted me to play the role again. But I was so nervous that some of it was just going straight over my head. I was just going: "Wow! This is great." It wasn't until I got back in the car after the meeting that I went, "Is this actually going to happen?" But as you saw, it happened, all right. Did they talk about his being a different, more seasoned Boba Fett than we saw in the early "Star Wars" films? Yes. When we find Boba, he's well worn, and he's been through a lot. He's a survivor, and he's weathered. Now it was time to find out more about what makes Boba tick. Is he more than just a simple man, trying to make his way through the galaxy? Is he tired of all the fighting? Is he tired of all the killing? The one thing I can relate to is, I'm quite a mature man now and things always change. Sometimes you're in Hollywood, in all the magazines and newspapers. And sometimes you end up in the fish and chip shop in New Zealand, where all the old magazines and papers go. You're old news. Laughs. Did your makeup and costume also help you find the character? I was doing that kind of background work what's this guy going to look like? What's he going to sound like? and while they're applying makeup, I'm going, well, here he is. We did quite a number of makeup tests and I worked closely with the makeup artist Brian Sipe. When I saw some of the scars on my face, I thought, well, maybe he does talk a little bit gravelly. Maybe his vocal cords have been affected as well. Then you put the costume on and it gives you a sense of power. The costume makes you feel like Superman. When I put the armor on for the first time, it just felt right. How did you want to incorporate your cultural background into the role? I come from the Maori nation of New Zealand, the Indigenous people we're the Down Under Polynesians and I wanted to bring that kind of spirit and energy, which we call wairua. I've been trained in my cultural dance, which we call the haka. I've also been trained in some of our weapons, so that's how I was able to manipulate some of the weapons in my fight scenes and work with the gaffi stick, which my character has. How were you originally cast in the "Star Wars" prequels? I give praise to George Lucas who made me Jango Fett in the first place. We filmed in Sydney, so he used quite a few actors from New Zealand and Australia. It wasn't long after "Once Were Warriors" that I met with the casting people of "Star Wars," and I feel that's the movie that launched me in Hollywood. It wasn't a big box office movie here in America, but people in the industry saw it, and that opened a few more doors for me, that's for sure. What do you remember about your time on the set of "Attack of the Clones"? I just had so much fun. I think I might have been killing George because I'd be singing on set, playing around with the weapons and wearing the outfits. I think I had too much fun. But I thought, man, if I get another opportunity to do this, I'm going to really get into it and do the best job that I can. Did George Lucas explain to you that you would end up playing all these other characters who were cloned from Jango Fett? Do you often hear from "Star Wars" fans who felt that Jango Fett suffered an unexpectedly abrupt death? Yes, well, I know the feeling. I ended up watching "Attack of the Clones" in Dallas, and I was so excited to watch it with this new Dolby sound at the theater. I was just starting to enjoy myself when I got killed. "Wow, this is good. There I am." pause "But anyway." My journey in "Attack of the Clones" was pretty short lived. But that was a long time ago. Now I'm back again. I'm sorry that you're going to get this question a lot, but "The Tragedy" doesn't address how Boba Fett survived his encounter with the Sarlacc. Has that been explained to you? And do you know how the character stayed alive? Ah, no, I don't. There's quite a bit of loose ends, and I'm not one of those guys that knows too much about the actual history. The fans of "Star Wars," they have better knowledge of, What's happened? How can he still be alive? I thought he was stuck in this place? I can find out more on the internet.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Television
Kelindah Schuster plays a sex doll in "Eat the Devil" the rare play that credits not only a video designer but also cinematographers. On the laboratory floor, a humanoid figure flickers to life. Her name is Mia, and when her artificial intelligence is fully operational, she will be a supremely realistic sex doll, ready for mass production. To get up to speed, she watches hours upon hours of porn. Up in the sky, Redtube Flight 728 slips through a wormhole, which the captain explains to the passengers is part of the new normal. "They're pretty common now that the patriots at Amazon are using them to bend the fabric of the universe to improve delivery times," he says. Soon a vehemently campy flight attendant named George begins to suspect that there's a sex ghost on board. "What the frick is a sex ghost?" his equally dimwitted colleague Tammy asks, reasonably enough. But also: What's all this online hysteria about a virus caused by furries? (That's the subculture of people who dress in animal costumes.) Can it really be traced to a plane that's gone missing, and are George and Tammy on that plane? That's not even close to all there is to keep track of in Nadja Leonhard Hooper and Dan Nuxoll's "Eat the Devil," the gleefully but fatally overloaded satire from One Year Lease Theater Company at the Tank. A sci fi, apocalypse, time travel, airplane disaster movie riff, it's a careening sendup of an out of control American culture mesmerized by screens. There are characters based on famous right wingers (the conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, the political commentator Tomi Lahren, the televangelists Jim and Lori Bakker) piled alongside fictional social outliers: an incel named Ethin Sell, and an out and proud furry called Goatse who, for the record, believes he is "the reincarnated soul of a goat from a 13th century Russian folktale." All of them commune with their public through cameras, and Nick Flint's production makes impressive use of plentiful video. (Some of it is shot live, which occasioned some technical glitches at the performance I saw.) This is the rare stage production that credits not only a video designer (Scott Fetterman) but also cinematographers (Adam Dietrich and Bella Graves). There's a drone here, too its name is Alexa Bezos and it is maybe not such a great idea to have it fly over the spectators' heads. By far the best, most focused parts of the show happen back at the lab, where Kelindah Schuster makes a wondrously sympathetic Mia, and Lexie Braverman lends a vital warmth and ease to her creator, Penny. Rory Spillane is a comic standout as Charles, her awkward young colleague (and is equally fine as Ethin the incel). But at 100 minutes, this fervent experiment drags because it's too convoluted, and because the single philosophical stand it seems to take is for nihilism. It strafes everything in its sights. As the Bakkers prepare their viewers for the dark times they insist are ahead, they hawk a survival kit stocked with many thousands of calories. "Eat the Devil" is a kind of fiesta bucket, too jam packed to overflowing, but its calories are mostly empty.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Theater
We had a long way to go, so I began with a jog. My brother Neil fell in place one stride behind me. The path ahead wound its way around the foot of the mountains. To our right, one of Hong Kong's most beautiful bays, Long Ke Wan, lapped against the orange clay banks. We ran easily, talking about what we always do when we go for runs college and friends, backpacking trips, the run ahead and the runs we'll go on in the future. The air carried that fresh, morning quiet that is present in Hong Kong only during the winter, when the skies are clear and the temperature crisp and pleasant. By summertime, humidity will climb to 99 percent, and the cicadas will be a pulsing roar. As we ran through the stillness Neil echoed my thoughts: "Save the music for later." The MacLehose Trail is 100 kilometers through the mountains along the northern border of Hong Kong. It's divided into 10 stages, beginning with a concrete path leading to spectacular seaside cliffs and white beaches. The trail carves through jungle, and cuts up and over mountain peaks with shrubbery reminiscent of that found in dry regions of Southern Italy. The MacLehose has been named one of the best hikes in the world by National Geographic, and every October, hundreds of ultramarathon runners converge here and compete to finish the entire course in 48 hours. It was winter break, and my brother and I were home from our first semester of college in the United States. We grew up in Hong Kong, and had never been so far from home for so long. In a week, we'd make the 16 hour return trip to school. "Let's do something memorable," I said. "We should run the MacLehose Trail." There are actually three of us. I have two brothers Neil and Russell and we are triplets, born one minute apart. Natural triplets occur in about one of 8,000 births. But as fraternal triplets, we are no more similar to each other than siblings of separate births. My brothers have black hair, mine is brown. I'm 5 foot 4 and Neil is 6 foot 1. And although we shared the same womb, we have completely different interests. Russell taught himself computer science and has a black belt in taekwondo. Neil does physics research and grew up playing baseball. I love biology and creative writing. But Neil and I share a love of running. Throughout middle school and high school, I ran track and cross country, competing in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. For fun, I would run along the reservoir hiking trails outside our home. When baseball season was over, Neil would join me. Soon, I came to love running the most when I was running with Neil. Our runs were more like adventures. Once we found an opening off the main path that led to a hidden sandy enclave off the banks of the reservoir. We called our discovery "The Beach." We would end our runs there, plunging into the crystalline waters to cool off. More often than not, we were reckless one day we swam to the opposite shore and climbed the rock face of a small waterfall. Another time we went bridge jumping off the reservoir dam. The MacLehose Trail was our latest reckless adventure. The night before, we only half prepared for the run, filling a small backpack with a liter of water and a few snacks. As we neared the second stage, the open ocean trail forked into dense jungle. We had been running for a solid two hours. "O.K., the map says this way," said Neil, pointing at the narrow path that disappeared suddenly into a tangle of branches. We ran until the dense underbrush forced us to slow to a walk. The path was now just visible under layers of black, rotting leaves. I crawled between a fallen tree and a web of creepers, and found that I could no longer straighten up. The vines were matted in a close weave above my head. I could just make out an abandoned concrete bunker, probably from World War II, in front of us. It seemed ominous in the dappled light. "Neil, are you sure this is the trail?" He was straddling the trunk of the tree, simultaneously squinting at the map on his phone and untangling his shorts from the thorns of a rogue vine. "It says we're on the trail... O.K., wait..." We soon learned we were using an old map and had veered off the trail. Crawling allowed for only so much progress. Twenty minutes later, it felt like we had moved only about 50 meters. The trees encased us in all directions and the air was still, heavy. I sank to my knees. "We're lost in the jungle." We were silent for a moment. Then, Neil began to laugh. I glanced at him, bewildered, as he pointed to something through the vines. I followed his gaze and squinted. It was a cow. A sleepy, black cow with lolling eyes, chewing cud in the middle of the jungle. I couldn't help it I began to chuckle as well. Soon, the two of us were sitting on the forest floor, roaring with laughter. I imagined what we would look like to a rescue helicopter not that anyone could make us out through the canopy of trees. The two of us, covered in scratches, sitting on an abandoned World War II trail, with nothing but a cow for company. These are the moments I live for. When Neil and I run, we make memories. We find hidden oases, jump off bridges and get lost in the jungle together. When we run, we share more than adventure. Our runs are both an escape from real life and a plunge into the center of it. As we run, we talk. We sort each other out. When I'm with Neil, I let out a breath. Our runs are a time where I can be completely myself. Between us, there are no secrets. He knows my struggles, heartbreaks and triumphs, and I know his. The jungle detour cost us an hour. The feeling when we finally burst into the sunlight, I can only describe as bliss. In the silent trees, we had agreed that we would save music to play at this moment. Now, our speaker blasted the "La La Land" soundtrack. As the trumpets sang and the drums pounded, I looked at Neil, whose face was lit up by a huge grin. "I don't want to leave this again," I said. We had started to run, this time with Neil in the front. "All of this." I meant the trail, the familiar mountains, "The Beach," and our childhood home by the ocean. I meant the time our family had together, the week we had before we left Hong Kong for another half year. "Don't you think about this when we're away?"	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Well
"Think of charm as a verb, not a trait," Gavin de Becker writes in his 1997 best seller, "The Gift of Fear," in a chapter on predators. Charm is an ability, not a passive feature, he writes, and it almost always has a motive. In R. O. Kwon's radiant debut novel, "The Incendiaries," her two central figures are the perpetrators, and victims, of the act of charm. They twist against the barbed wire of human connection in an isolating world. This is a dark, absorbing story of how first love can be as intoxicating and dangerous as religious fundamentalism. Will and Phoebe meet during the still sweaty first days of the college school year. Phoebe is a Korean born, California raised freshman of relative means whose evident sexual confidence ensnares the ex born again, working class Will. Each of their narratives is told in the first person, interspersed with brief chapters about John Leal, a fanatical Christian cult leader whose grip over Phoebe grows in parallel with hers over Will. The novel is about extremism, yes, but it's for anyone who's ever been captivated by another; for anyone who has been on either side of a relationship that clearly has a subject and object of obsession; for anyone who's had a brush with faith, or who's been fully bathed in its teachings; for anyone afraid of his or her own power. Kwon makes real two characters who are, at first, types. Phoebe, in the book's opening pages, commands with her only child, rich girl arrogance, a ponytailed, Korean American version of the familiar manic pixie dream girl. "I ate pain. I swilled tears. If I could take enough in, I'd have no space left to fit my own," Phoebe says. As her story goes on, the reader learns that she once glittered with promise as a piano prodigy, her discipline now replaced by casual self destruction after the grief and guilt of being involved with her mother's death in a car accident. Want to keep up with the latest and greatest in books? This is a good place to start. None Learn what you should be reading this fall: Our collection of reviews on books coming out this season includes biographies, novels, memoirs and more. See what's new in October: Among this month's new titles are novels by Jonathan Franzen, a history of Black cinema and a biography by Katie Couric. Nominate a book: The New York Times Book Review has just turned 125. That got us wondering: What is the best book that was published during that time? Listen to our podcast: Featuring conversations with leading figures in the literary world, from Colson Whitehead to Leila Slimani, the Book Review Podcast helps you delve deeper into your favorite books. Will, waiting tables to pay for pate, lies hopeless next to his girlfriend, consumed. But he, too, transcends his role as the stable, economically beleaguered Eagle Scout, before he falls completely from grace. Power, along with charm, is also an act in this novel. Phoebe mostly holds power over Will, the wounded enchantress who receives his love. As she slips farther into fanaticism and the arms of John Leal, Will is driven desperately and jealously to his own retaliatory exertion of control. Kwon's ornate language adds a creeping anachronism to the chapters. Its metaphors seem accessible at first, but take a bit of parsing: "I lifted Phoebe's hand; I kissed bitten nails that shine, in hindsight, like quartz, spoils I pulled down from the moon." Throughout, objects are vaguely animated, as if someone is recalling the story years later: Frisbees soar, oil drips, bare shoulders roll. Early on, "punch stained red cups split underfoot, opening into plastic petals." From Leal's first appearance, he's a harbinger of chaos. A former student with a shady back story as a prisoner in North Korea, he looms over the narrative, peppering the shifting, unsettling timeline of the love story. As Will and Phoebe picnic with mulled wine, make summer plans, rent a weekend house at the beach, Leal casts an ominous shadow for the reader, his chapters delivering a piecemeal sermon as he slowly and steadily pulls the young couple's strings and lays out, log by log, what will be his final masterpiece: a pyre. As the narrative escalates, the reader goes from a sane friend in a bar, listening impatiently as the storyteller gabs on about a new beau, red flags firing off in her head (Do you not see what's happening?), to a paralyzed spectator of a five car pileup on the TV screen. Each horrible act mounts on the others, as Phoebe's narratives get closer and closer in tone and content to Leal's. On top of his pyre, Phoebe a vessel through which life, or God, has poured trauma, grief, shame, discipline, love, loss of purpose and a desire to please is splayed. It's Will who strikes the match. The action picks up quickly in the final chapters. (Readers may want to skip the jacket description, which contains a giant spoiler.) A wedge has been driven between the young lovers, and Will is left trying to piece together what happened to his grinning, gin doling girlfriend. The details become sketchy and speculative; the narratives become unreliable. This unusual novel, both raw and finely wrought, leaves the reader with very few answers and little to rely on. A love triangle between a young man, a young woman and a higher purpose is torched, with few witnesses to say what happened. Unsettled by all the charming that's gone up in flames, Will and the reader are left alone together holding the ashes, some of the embers still burning to leave scars.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Books
Extraterrestrial events the collision of faraway black holes, a comet slamming into Jupiter evoke wonder on Earth but rarely a sense of local urgency. By and large, what happens in outer space stays in outer space. A study published Wednesday in Science Advances offered a compelling exception to that rule. A team of researchers led by Birger Schmitz, a nuclear physicist at Lund University in Sweden, found that a distant, ancient asteroid collision generated enough dust to cause an ice age long ago on Earth. The study lends new insight to ongoing efforts to address climate change. "We've shown that what happens in the solar system can have a big influence on Earth," said Philipp Heck, a curator of meteorites at the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago and an author of the study. "Extraterrestrial events aren't always destructive. Many people think about meteorites as just dinosaur killers, but we found the opposite. A big collision in the asteroid belt had constructive consequences that led to cooling and biodiversification." Earth is frequently exposed to extraterrestrial matter; 40,000 tons of the stuff settle on the planet every year, enough to fill 1,000 tractor trailers. But 466 million years ago, a 93 mile wide asteroid collided with an unknown, fast moving object between Mars and Jupiter. The crash increased the amount of dust arriving on Earth for the next two million years by a factor of 10,000. Dr. Schmitz, Dr. Heck and their team found that the dust triggered cooling in Earth's atmosphere that led to an ice age.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Science
Rowhouses on Jefferson Place, at left, are among the few residential units in downtown Washington's business district. WASHINGTON In a 43 square block portion of the booming central business district, there are just 23 residential units, condos in a row of four late 19th century townhomes on Jefferson Place, just south of Dupont Circle. It's a minuscule number compared with the 33 million square feet of office space in the same area. With construction cranes for new office buildings dominating the skyline, owners of older buildings may face a choice: Upgrade to current standards to compete an expensive proposition or convert to residential use. The choice has been clear elsewhere, from downtown Manhattan to downtown Los Angeles, where a combined 18.1 million square feet of office space has been converted in the last 10 years. But in the nation's capital, the change is just starting to emerge. In Baltimore, some 38 miles to the north, conversion of 1.9 million square feet of office space since 2013 has reduced office vacancies by 30 percent, according to an analysis by JLL, a real estate services firm. In Philadelphia, vacancies in older "Class B" office buildings, a notch below higher quality "Class A" buildings, have dropped by 40 percent in 20 years because of conversions. In a report released last month, the DowntownDC Business Improvement District said the new market rate residences would be worth 600 a square foot, compared with empty office space valued at 450 a square foot. "Even with worst case assumptions," the report said, the net cost of the program would be no more than 2 million to 3 million a year in forgone tax dollars. But the office of Mayor Muriel E. Bowser, who must sign the bill into law, has some reservations. "I would say, we're listening hard," said Brian T. Kenner, deputy mayor for planning and economic development. "We've got to see what the cost is and how much revenue that can create and be put to affordable housing," a key priority of the Bowser administration. The district requires 8 to 12 percent of housing to be lower cost units. Still to come is an essential statement of the bill's fiscal impact from the city's chief financial officer. An estimated 89,000 people work in the so called Golden Triangle, an area of prime real estate that extends from the White House to Dupont Circle. The hope is that conversions will give it more of a 24 hour neighborhood feel. The only conversion underway involves the renovation of the former Planned Parenthood headquarters, on 16th Street Northwest, four blocks north of the White House. To be known as the Adele, the high end project will have 13 condos ranging from 859,000 to 2.4 million. The situation is not yet dire: Washington's office vacancy rate is lower than the region's, which is 16.3 percent and expected to rise to nearly 17 percent by late 2019, according to Newmark Knight Frank, a New York based real estate services firm. But the fear is, with more office buildings being built, the overall commercial vacancy rates in the district will also climb, leading to lower office rents. Proponents hope that the conversion bill will help both the market and the neighborhood. "We believe this bill will strengthen city's tax base while adding residents and ensuring the longtime economic vitality of our downtown," said Leona Agouridis, executive director of the Golden Triangle Business Improvement District. "It is a policy question: Do we want to have residents in the downtown area? If so, what are we willing to do to help realize it? This is a catalyst." Gerry Widdicombe, a consultant to the DowntownDC Business Improvement District, said the idea behind the legislation was to "educate the market on how this can be done" without hurting the city's tax base or the building owner's bottom line. "It's working in the suburbs because their office markets are really, really weak." Jack Evans, a Democratic member of the Council and the bill's sponsor, said the bill would enable a "Manhattanizing of the District of Columbia," bringing more vitality to the city's core by encouraging an influx of full time residents who could walk to work while patronizing nearby shops and restaurants. "But for the city's involvement, we would not get what they are looking for." In the Golden Triangle, 77 percent of the office buildings were erected from 1960 to 1990. Ms. Agouridis suggested that owners must soon decide whether to demolish and rebuild or renovate them to the higher Class A or premium Trophy building standards. "It's natural in the cycle of buildings," she said. "It's like your home, you get to certain point, you need to replace major systems. But with renovation comes opportunity. From a neighborhood perspective, it makes a lot of sense to get that conversion going." In Washington, some owners have sought to upgrade older buildings to Class A by "re skinning" the facades, giving them a more modern look and reducing energy costs. So far, building owners in Washington continue to favor such cosmetic face lifts over more substantial conversions. Another factor contributing to rising office vacancy rates, according to Mr. Widdicombe, is that some companies, notably law firms, are relocating to newer buildings, where they are leasing less space per employee, a workplace trend known as densification. A new concept in Washington, conversions have been implemented elsewhere. More than 37.5 million square feet of "older office space that has reached functional obsolescence" in the nation has been converted to residential use over the last decade, according to JLL. In Washington's Maryland and Virginia suburbs, for instance, higher office vacancy rates have resulted in more conversions of older buildings without the use of government incentives. In Old Town, a neighborhood in Alexandria, Va., the former offices of the Sheet Metal Workers International Union are now the Oronoco, a 60 unit luxury condominium on the Potomac River waterfront, with prices ranging from 1.3 million to 2.8 million. In Fairfax County, Washington's most populous suburb, the county government recently voted to streamline rezoning for the "repurposing" of commercial buildings. In nearby Silver Spring, Md., a 1964 office building was converted into the 102 unit condo called Octave 1320, without the kind of tax abatement proposed for Washington, and other conversions are scheduled to take place. But in Washington's core, the argument goes, the shift will occur only with government action. "Mixed use neighborhoods create a more livable area, better use of infrastructure and expand the income tax base," said Ms. Agouridis. "It is unlikely residential development in the central business district will occur naturally without the kind of incentive this bill will involve." Thus, proponents say, residential housing will continue to be in great demand but short supply. The three story Jefferson Place townhouses, built originally as single family homes during the Gilded Age, are a notable exception. But they have a mixed zoning history. They long housed commercial tenants, but the buildings were converted in 2006 into condos, ranging from 499,000 for a one bedroom to 2 million for three bedroom units. According to the DC Condo Boutique website, the townhouse row "combines historic details with modern conveniences." A one bedroom, one bath unit there the only residence currently for sale and available for immediate occupancy in the entire Golden Triangle district is on the market for 650,000. "Incredible location," the listing says.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Real Estate
Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, our TV critic Margaret Lyons offers hyper specific viewing recommendations in our Watching newsletter, aimed at your needs, desires and tastes. Read her latest picks below, and sign up for the Watching newsletter here. Watch This If ... Your Favorite Song Is 'The Best' When to watch: Tuesday at 8 p.m. and 8:30 p.m., on Pop TV. Nothing gold can stay, bebes, and thus we bid farewell to our beloved Rose family, et al., with the series finale of "Schitt's Creek." It's David and Patrick's wedding day, and as with all sitcom weddings, things go wackily off course before resolving to something beautiful and poignant. While this is kind of the worst possible time for a hopeful, sustaining comedy to end, I'm still glad to see "Schitt's" bring it in for a gentle landing. Shows end! All we can hope for is that they end well, and this one does. When to watch: Season 4 starts Thursday, on CBS All Access. "The Good Fight" is one of the rare shows that directly addresses our exact political moment, and on the Season 4 premiere, that kicks into hyperdrive when Diane (Christine Baranski) wakes up in a world where Hillary Clinton is president but the MeToo movement has not happened. My favorite thing about "The Good Fight" is that it flexes so many different muscles: Some episodes are zippy legal thrillers, some are quirky character portraits, some are prickly satires, and some, like this one, are clever dream sequences. If you're in the market for a smart drama and a lawyer show that's not a procedural, watch this. When to watch: Now, on PBS Kids, YouTube; select episodes are on Amazon. This series follows Molly, a 10 year old Alaskan Native girl who likes vlogging and exploring the outdoors. She learns about her heritage and also about being a good friend and a conscientious member of society. The show is comfortable talking about big feelings and isn't afraid of real depth, so in addition to its earnest charms, there are also some genuinely compelling narratives. I will warn you, though, that the theme song is very catchy.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Television
Janne doesn't want anyone to worry about her. Not her boyfriend, Piet (Andreas Dohler), who's still smarting from the failure of their shared publishing venture . Not her new boss, Robert (Tilo Nest), who has generously offered her a temp editing job at his own publishing house. Not even the man who raped her, the extremely apologetic Martin (Hans Low). Debuting on Netflix, Eva Trobisch's searing first feature film, "Alles Ist Gut" (literal translation: "All Is Well") , has a title that functions as a mantra for Janne (Aenne Schwarz), whose instinct for self preservation leads her to defuse conflict and redirect the volatile creatures in her orbit. Trobisch has made a drama of tragic accommodation limited not to one woman's sexual assault, but to the everyday interactions that all women must navigate carefully. Trobisch directs in fragmented scenes that always cut a beat or two short of expectation, like little shards of glass, and Schwarz makes Janne's actions comprehensible at every turn as her troubles slowly and inexorably deepen. The rape itself, which takes place after a boozy class reunion, is treated with a deceptive matter of factness. It's a quick and terrible end to a nightcap, and while Janne's initial instinct is to sleep it off, the trauma lingers. Telling anyone is a nonstarter because Martin is her boss's brother in law and a colleague she has to work alongside every day. Martin's need for absolution is another weight she is forced to carry, as if his shame were equivalent to her violation. Trobisch and Schwarz conceive Janne as a determined, courageous soul who's trying to make the best of a bad situation, for everyone. Her knees buckle from the burden. Not rated. In German, with English subtitles. Running time: 1 hour 33 minutes.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Movies
Cowboys backup quarterback Andy Dalton walked off the field after a shoulder to helmet hit gave him a concussion in the third quarter of Sunday's loss to the Washington Football Team. When a team is winning, it is all smiles and agreement in the clubhouse. But when a team loses a lot, the camaraderie gets fractured. The Dallas Cowboys have lost five games, and fingers are pointing in all directions as key players have been shown the door. On Sunday, the Cowboys lost to the Washington Football Team, hardly a worldbeater, by the dispiriting score of 25 3. Dallas (2 5) also lost its quarterback, Andy Dalton, to a concussion after a hit in the third quarter. Dalton had been a replacement for Dak Prescott, who was knocked out for the season earlier this month with a fractured and dislocated ankle. In the days after the loss, Dallas showed its willingness to move players before the Nov. 3 trade deadline, offloading the standout pass rusher Everson Griffen to Detroit for a conditional pick in the 2021 draft on Tuesday and then cutting two other members of the team's defense, tackle Dontari Poe and cornerback Daryl Worley. Coach Mike McCarthy said the moves was meant to create playing time for younger members of the team, not to send a message to a dejected roster. "They know clearly how I feel as far as the process of where the team needs to get to and how we're going to do it," McCarthy told reporters Wednesday. None Week 11 Predictions: Here are our picks against the spread. N.F.L. Tightens Covid Protocols: As cases rise and Thanksgiving approaches, the league is requiring masks inside team facilities and increasing testing. The Packers' Defense Is Their M.V.P.: Green Bay's oft overlooked defense has kept the team from falling out of the Super Bowl chase. The Long Path to the Super Bowl: With 18 weeks in the regular season and fewer teams earning byes in the playoffs, the Super Bowl is still a long way off. Playoff Simulator: Explore every team's path to the postseason, updated live. The Cowboys' owner and general manager, Jerry Jones, offered a less nuanced explanation for the most recent move: He said Poe was cut because of his weight. "When you're 30 pounds overweight and you're not doing anything about what's keeping you from performing well on the field, there is no reason to get into the other stuff," Jones told ESPN. The "other stuff" was believed to be a reference to Poe's status as the only Cowboys player who was kneeling during the national anthem. McCarthy had taken issue with his team's nonreaction after Dalton received what many saw as a dirty shoulder to helmet hit from Washington linebacker Jon Bostic. While several players went to see if Dalton was OK, none confronted Bostic, who was subsequently ejected for the illegal hit. "We speak all the time about playing for one another, protecting one another," McCarthy said, according to The Athletic. "It definitely was not the response you would expect." McCarthy isn't the only member of the organization to have gotten testy about the team's performance. Asked about the team's leaders during a radio interview on Tuesday, Jones snapped at the hosts: "When I go into the locker room, there's no leadership void in my eyes. Now, that's your answer. Let's move on." Cowboys players were also looking for answers. "We need more belief and more high spirits around this team," DeMarcus Lawrence, a defensive end, told USA Today. "And really, more fight. That's really, I feel like, one of our weaknesses. We need to build a stronger backbone, fight and also make sure that we brought everything possible to come out with a victory." Lawrence's remarks followed reports of dissension inside the team in the week leading up to the Washington loss. Players quoted anonymously by the NFL Network were sharply critical of the coaching staff, calling into question their preparation and capability to adjust. Those reported remarks gained enough traction that the players and staff took pains to disavow them in the days leading up to the game against Washington. "I don't deal with all of that anonymous stuff," linebacker Jaylon Smith told reporters. "If you got something to say, just put your name on it. All of that anonymous stuff is really trash to me." Standing up for teammates and having "backbone" is all well and good, but a bigger reason the Cowboys are struggling is no doubt having lost Prescott, who had passed for 450 yards or more in each of the three games before the one in which he was injured. The team's offense took another steep downturn with the loss of Dalton this week, and turned to Ben DiNucci, a rookie from James Madison, to complete the game. Also contributing to the subpar season so far: a team defense that rates dead last in the league and a star running back, Ezekiel Elliott, who is averaging career lows at 4.1 yards per rush and 6.4 yards per catch. But managing only 3 points and 142 total yards against Washington was just another low point. The Cowboys were 3 for 12 on third down conversions and 0 for 1 on fourth down, when they mysteriously called a passing play on fourth and 1. Dalton was pressured and threw it incomplete by a considerable distance. As for DiNucci, it's hard to read much into his cameo, when he went 2 for 3 for 39 passing yards. Dalton is for now listed as questionable for Week 8 with a concussion. The next quarterback on the depth chart beyond DiNucci is Garrett Gilbert, who has played for the Patriots, Rams, Panthers and Browns, throwing a total of six passes in his career. A potential flash point in the misbegotten season is McCarthy, the former Green Bay head coach who many Packers fans still blame for Aaron Rodgers having won only one Super Bowl. Dallas hired him to coach over candidates that included Eric Bieniemy, the offensive coordinator of the Chiefs, who is often cited as a top candidate for a head coaching job. The decision to go with McCarthy was criticized at the time it was made, and the second guessing is likely to increase. But Dallas fans find themselves in a strange situation when it comes to the head coach as scapegoat. For years, anything that went wrong was blamed on Jason Garrett, now the Giants offensive coordinator, and fans celebrated his dismissal. Now they might need to acknowledge that the team's problems are deeper. Even at 2 5 the Cowboys still can win the woeful N.F.C. East. Indeed, they are only half a game behind the Eagles their opponent in the nationally televised Sunday night game in a division which after seven weeks has produced just two wins against teams not in the N.F.C. East. But to do so, the Cowboys will have to find a reasonable answer at quarterback, improve in a number of other areas, and at least mute the internal dissension. It remains to be seen if they can pull off that combination.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Sports
may not have succeeded in his effort to become president, but his campaign to place the cost of college higher up on the national agenda seems to be gaining momentum. In January, he was by Andrew Cuomo's side when the governor proposed that New Yorkers with family income under 125,000 be able to attend state colleges tuition free. Then Rhode Island announced its own proposal, covering two years but open to all in state students no matter their income. At the federal level, with a Republican controlled Congress, prospects for similar legislation are dim. During her confirmation hearing as education secretary, Betsy DeVos told Mr. Sanders: "There's nothing in life that's truly free. Somebody's going to pay for it." Still, the senator from Vermont continues to visit campuses and to push for federal legislation that would make tuition at public colleges free for all. One of President Trump's few statements about higher education finance reflected his desire to bring tuition prices down by cutting what he called administrative bloat and tapping endowments. Do you agree with that approach? We do have to do our best to make sure that colleges and universities are cost effective and that endowments are not used to build 50,000 or 100,000 person football stadiums or for spending a fortune on four star suites. Very often, however, many of the costs associated with colleges don't have a lot to do with education per se, whether it's health care for faculty or energy costs. And those are national problems that we have to address. So should they have to spend more of their endowments and should we restrict how they do spend them? I will certainly look at any legislation that comes up, and if it makes sense to me, I'm happy to support it. But my focus right now is to make public colleges and universities tuition free. I was pleased to see Governor Cuomo carrying the banner. I will be supporting any governor who wants to do this. Right now and for well over 100 years, we've talked about public education in America as being K 12. So we have to change the definition of what free public education means in a changing economy. We used to be No. 1 in the world, in terms of the percentage of people who graduated from college and universities. Today, we are No. 11 among people 35 and under. Do you worry that a focus on covering the tuition costs for students at public schools implicitly encourages those universities to keep raising prices, in effect giving them cover to do so? I don't think so. What you've seen in recent years is significant underfunding. But I think it's incumbent on those state legislatures and governors to make sure they are run cost effectively and hire people who are capable of doing that. President Trump has suggested federal student loan forgiveness for all borrowers after 15 years of payment, instead of the 20 years that is standard in many instances now. Is that something you can get behind? It's a start, though I can't give you a definitive answer. What I proposed during the campaign was to immediately allow all people to refinance loans at the lowest interest rate they can find. That would be an incredible first step. So a family from Burlington, Vt., stops you on the street and asks how to figure out whether private colleges like Middlebury or Champlain are 40,000 a year better than the University of Vermont. What would you have them look at, and should the government demand that schools produce more data on actual value? We need to have as much information as we can about how a school performs, but "value" is a hard word to define. They can say, as they do at Champlain, that 88 percent of graduates are employed in jobs related to their goals, and that's important to know. On the other hand, I have a good friend who teaches poetry at the University of Vermont. There's probably not a great market for poets. But is that to say it's not important? You can't just look at things from a corporate perspective. Teaching poetry is important.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Education
KENT, Wash. The headquarters of Blue Origin, the secretive rocket company in an industrial park here, is anonymous, with not even a sign at the road to announce the occupants. On Tuesday, for the first time, Blue Origin, started by Jeff Bezos, the billionaire founder of Amazon, opened its doors to reporters. "Welcome to Blue," Mr. Bezos said. "Thank you for coming." Blue Origin is part of a shift of the space business from NASA and aerospace behemoths like Lockheed Martin toward private industry, especially smaller entrepreneurial companies. Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX, founded by another Internet entrepreneur, Elon Musk, has been the most visible and most successful of the new generation of rocket companies. Last Friday, it launched another satellite to orbit, but an attempt to land the booster on a floating platform again ended in an explosion. Much more quietly, Blue Origin has also had big space dreams, but until now did not give outsiders a look at what it was doing. For almost four hours, Mr. Bezos, who only occasionally talks to the press, led 11 reporters on a tour of the factory and answered a litany of questions over lunch. He talked garrulously, his speech punctured by loud laughs. "It's my total pleasure. I hope you can sense that I like this," he said. He described an image on a wall in the company's central area, which showed two tortoises holding an hourglass and gazing upward at a stylized image of the planets and cosmos. Below is Blue Origin's motto: "Gradatim ferociter," Latin for "step by step, ferociously" no cutting of corners, but no dillydallying, either. "You can do the steps quickly, but you can't skip any steps," Mr. Bezos said. He also offered updates on progress for his space tourism plans. The reusable New Shepard spacecraft that launched to the outskirts of space in November and then made a return trip in January will launch again soon. Depending on how well the testing goes, paying tourists, six at a time, might start making the short trips, experiencing a few minutes of weightlessness in space as soon as 2018, he said. At times, he told himself to stop talking, and let his engineers make their presentations about a new engine, the BE 4, which is under development with tests of a full version beginning by the end of the year. Mr. Bezos started Blue Origin in 2000, although few people knew about it then. For the next few years, about half a dozen people explored whether there might be a better way to get to space than rockets powered by loud, inefficient chemical combustion. The conclusion: there is not. Mr. Bezos said he had studied and thought about rockets since he was 5 years old. "I never expected to have the resources to start a space company," he said. "I won a lottery ticket called Amazon.com." Mr. Bezos declined to say how much money he had poured into his dream. "Let's just say it's a lot," he said. Around 2005, Mr. Bezos said he began rocket development in earnest. Still, almost no one knew what he was doing. For years, what went on here was mysterious and unknown, like Willy Wonka's chocolate factory in Roald Dahl's children's book. Occasionally news would be tossed out to the outside world an award by NASA, a blog post by Mr. Bezos, a video of a successful launch. Last year, the company made a splashy public announcement at Cape Canaveral, Fla., when Blue Origin announced it would launch rockets into orbit from there. Like Mr. Musk, Mr. Bezos talks about Blue Origin less as a business than as part of a glorious future for humanity, with millions of people living and working off the planet. It is also a path, he asserted, that humanity must pursue if it is to continue to prosper. But there is much energy and raw materials to use elsewhere in the solar system, and eventually, he prophesies, there will be the "great inversion." Instead of factories on Earth manufacturing sophisticated components that go into tiny machines that go into space, the heavy manufacturing will all be done elsewhere, and Earth, he joked, would be zoned for residential and light industrial use, allowing much of Earth to return to a more natural state. "It'll be universities and houses and so on," he said. That is still far in the future. For now, Blue Origin's business plans fall in three categories. The first is space tourism, with short hops launching from West Texas on the New Shepard, a competitor to Virgin Galactic, Richard Branson's space start up. Space tourism is not just a frivolity for the rich, but a necessary steppingstone to develop the expertise in a new technology, Mr. Bezos said, much like the early days of airplanes or how video games spurred the development of more powerful computer chips. Currently, most rocket companies launch, at most, about a dozen times a year. "You never get really great at something you do 10, 12 times a year," Mr. Bezos said. With a small fleet of reusable New Shepard rockets, Blue Origin could be launching dozens of times a year. The other business plans are for selling its rocket engines to other companies like United Launch Alliance, which is planning to use them for the Vulcan, a next generation rocket to replace the Atlas 5 and Delta 4, and for its own larger rocket to lift payloads to orbit. Mr. Bezos said Blue Origin was quiet not necessarily to be secretive, but to avoid overpromising itself. "Space is really easy to overhype," he said. The tour would not be the last time the doors are open. Later this year, Blue Origin will give more details about its designs for the larger rocket that will launch from Cape Canaveral, and Mr. Bezos said there would be an opportunity to watch a test flight of New Shepard in Texas. "We will not be strangers," Mr. Bezos said at the end.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Science
The actress Selma Blair appeared at the Vanity Fair Oscar party on Sunday evening wearing a diaphanous Ralph Russo gown and carrying a custom made cane covered in black patent leather. It was her first public event since she announced in October her diagnosis of multiple sclerosis, a chronic and often disabling disease affecting the central nervous system. In an interview that aired on ABC's "Good Morning America" on Tuesday, Ms. Blair, 46, spoke to the news anchor Robin Roberts about what it was like to live with the disease, which has affected her speech and made it difficult for her to walk unassisted. Ms. Blair, who has appeared in movies including "Cruel Intentions," "Legally Blonde" and "Hellboy," said she had been experiencing symptoms at least since her son was born in 2011. She said she did her best to handle the intense fatigue, emotional distress and loss of physical control. But the disease was not formally diagnosed until August. "I was ashamed and I was doing the best I could and I was a great mother, but it was killing me," she said. "And so when I got the diagnosis, I cried with some relief. Like, 'Oh, good, I'll be able to do something.'" Ms. Blair's voice wavered as she spoke, and she noted that she had spasmodic dysphonia, a condition that makes it hard to control the muscles in the larynx. But for many people who have multiple sclerosis, her words came through loud and clear. Josie Benassi, 47, caught the interview on television on Tuesday at her home in Reading, Mass. She received her diagnosis of M.S. in 2009, and like Ms. Blair, she had experienced symptoms for years before that. It started when she was a teenager and the vision in her left eye suddenly got fuzzy. There were additional small warning signs as the years went on, but things took a serious turn about 10 years ago when she took her children to an ice skating rink and realized she couldn't stay upright on her skates. Sometimes Ms. Benassi got tired. Sometimes she lost her balance. Sometimes her left leg just stopped working. For years, she has been learning to live with the symptoms. She said she was happy to see Ms. Blair talk about the disease with candor. "It's so good that she's out there, just showing people that it's O.K.," Ms. Benassi said. In studies published in the journal Neurology this month, it was estimated that nearly one million people in the United States have multiple sclerosis more than double the earlier estimate. M.S. can cause different symptoms for different people. "The fatigue, speech issues, flares and mobility issues are different for each person, yet they can happen to each of us at any time without warning," said Valerie Taylor, 49, of Pontiac, Ill., who learned she had M.S. in 2012. "Invisible illnesses are not often recognized because we appear to be 'fine,' yet we are anything but," she added. "Awareness is key as well as aggressive research to find a cure." Carol Ann Justice, 45, runs a Facebook group for people with multiple sclerosis and said she received her diagnosis six years ago but felt symptoms long before that. "Selma is definitely correct by saying that doctors don't hear you, and chalk up your symptoms to tiredness or anxiety, especially for a woman," she said. More women than men have had M.S. diagnosed, typically between the ages of 20 and 50, according to the National Multiple Sclerosis Society, a patient advocacy group that funded the studies published in Neurology. Researchers have not been able to pinpoint what exactly triggers the disease. It appears to be partly genetic, but several other factors including low levels of vitamin D, childhood obesity and smoking could also play a role. "There are some things about M.S. that certainly remain a mystery," said Kathy Costello, the associate vice president for health care access at the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. "But a significant amount more is known now, versus 20 or 30 years ago." She added that the disease could be difficult to diagnose early because the symptoms like numbness, tingling or fatigue can have a wide range of causes outside of multiple sclerosis. Most people with the disease have the "relapsing remitting" form of M.S., which means that they experience a cycle of worsening and recovery. Treatment can come in the form of steroids, which help people to recover from relapses, or disease modifying therapies, which come in many forms but generally tend to focus on managing symptoms in the long term. Ms. Costello said that in the race to find a cure, comments like Ms. Blair's were helpful. "It shines a light on M.S.," she said. "It shines a light on what it is and who is affected by it. Raising that level of awareness is important." For Ms. Benassi, one more thing stood out about Ms. Blair's television appearance: the cane. During the interview, the actress pointed out that the walking aid was adorned with a real pink diamond. "How can we make canes chic?" Ms. Blair asked. "When she said that, it really touched me," Ms. Benassi said. "I have my own pink bling cane, which I love."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Health
Cyberpunk 2077, which had already been repeatedly delayed, is an action adventure, role playing game set in a dystopian crime ridden megalopolis. Players take the role of V, a mercenary outlaw on the hunt for an implant that brings immortality. The game also boasts a bit of star power: the "Matrix" actor Keanu Reeves portrays a character in the game. Complaints about the game's performance began not long after it was released on Thursday. Gamers took to social media to voice frustrations over error messages and other performance problems. In its statement, CD Projekt Red pledged to fix the bugs and crashes that have upended play. A round of updates will arrive within the next week, followed by larger patches in January and February, the company said. "Together these should fix the most prominent problems gamers are facing on last gen consoles," the company said, adding that returning the game was also an option. "We would appreciate it if you would give us a chance, but if you are not pleased with the game on your console and don't want to wait for updates, you can opt to refund your copy," the company said.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Technology
TORONTO Game 7s have a magic all their own. They are where memories are made, bringing out the kid in every N.H.L. player who dared to dream about a winner take all moment. "When you do everything as a young kid, playing on the streets, you're playing Game 7," Islanders Coach Barry Trotz said before his team shut out the Philadelphia Flyers, 4 0, on Saturday, advancing to the Eastern Conference finals for the first time in 27 years. "There's going to be a hero tonight, no question." The hero was defenseman Scott Mayfield, along with the entire Islanders defense, which accounted for two goals and limited the Flyers to 16 shots on goal. The Islanders' first two goals took the starch out of the Flyers, who had fought gamely to overcome a three games to one series deficit and force Game 7. The backup goaltender Thomas Greiss also made a heroic stand. He is the second goaltender in franchise history to record a shutout in a Game 7. Glenn Resch did so in the 1975 quarterfinals against the Pittsburgh Penguins. With 6 minutes 55 seconds to go in regulation, the Flyers lifted goalie Carter Hart for an extra attacker, opening the way for the Islanders' Anthony Beauvillier to score in an empty net. The Islanders will meet the Tampa Bay Lightning in a best of seven series that starts Monday in Edmonton, Alberta. Mayfield and the 37 year old defenseman Andy Greene put the Islanders up, 2 0, and forward Brock Nelson gave the Islanders a three goal cushion going into the third period. "Guys work their whole life to get this opportunity,'' Nelson said after the game. "The fan base is passionate and always talks about the wins in the 80s and the guys that won Cups there. And you can see how much it means to them and the community. Those guys are heroes and everybody in the room is striving to be part of history like that." Mayfield's first period goal, on only the Islanders' second shot of the game, was his first career postseason goal in his 26th game. It was also redemption for his bad luck in Game 6, in which the Flyers scored the double overtime winner after Mayfield was left defenseless in his own end without a stick, which had broken moments before. The decision to start Greiss was a calculated risk for Trotz because Greiss had seen action only twice before this postseason. But he had been solid in one relief effort in Game 2 of the second round series and again in a Game 4 victory. The Islanders needed someone to be as dependable as the Flyers' Carter Hart had been at the other end. The Islanders had lost two straight overtime games, squandering a three games to one series lead, and Semyon Varlamov had allowed five goals on only 31 shots in Game 6 for a substandard .839 save percentage. Hart was peppered with 53 shots in Game 6 and allowed only four goals, giving him an outstanding .925 save percentage. But in defense of Varlamov in this series, the Flyers scored a number of goals on shots from the point that deflected in off unpredictable angles. Both the Flyers, who were the top seed in the postseason, and the Islanders entered the game with 10 5 playoff records, with three of the Islanders' losses coming to Philadelphia in overtime. The first goal of the game is important because goaltending and defensive hockey win in the playoffs, when the checking becomes tighter. But until Saturday, the first period had been a dry patch for the Islanders. They had failed to score in the first period through four straight games earlier in the series. A couple of smart cross ice passing plays played a key role for the Islanders. Derick Brassard, who had scored twice in two previous games, sent a perfect cross ice pass to Greene when Hart was caught out of position. Josh Bailey, who has a team leading 14 assists, was the setup man for Nelson on a well executed two on one that put the Islanders up, 3 0. The Islanders were facing adversity for the first time in the postseason, and they also had the weight of history on them. They were trying to match the 1993 Islanders team, coached by the Hall of Famer Al Arbour. That team defeated the two time defending champion Pittsburgh Penguins in Game 7 with David Volek playing the hero, scoring the winner in overtime. The Islanders went on to lose to the Montreal Canadiens in the conference finals, four games to one. This Islanders team is similar to the 1993 Islanders in that neither team was built around individual stars. The Arbour coached team had good shooters in Ray Ferraro, Steve Thomas and Pierre Turgeon, a hard hitting defenseman in Darius Kasparaitis, and adequate goaltending from Glenn Healy. These Islanders play a grinding style and depend on tight defensive structure to wear down opponents. "We are a team," Trotz said. "We don't have a lot of those top end guys. We're built more as a four line team. Everybody has to contribute, or we can't have success."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Sports
YouTube on Wednesday announced changes to how it handles videos about the 2020 presidential election, saying it would remove new videos that mislead people by claiming that widespread fraud or errors influenced the outcome of the election. The company said it was making the change because Tuesday was the so called safe harbor deadline the date by which all state level election challenges, such as recounts and audits, are supposed to be completed. YouTube said that enough states have certified their election results to determine that Joseph R. Biden Jr. is the president elect. Throughout the election cycle, YouTube, which is owned by Google, has allowed videos spreading false claims of widespread election fraud under a policy that permits videos that comment on the outcome of an election. Under the new policy, videos about the election uploaded before the safe harbor deadline would remain on the platform, with YouTube appending an information panel linking to the Office of the Federal Register's election results certification notice. In a blog post on Wednesday, YouTube pushed back on the idea that it had allowed harmful and misleading elections related videos to spread unfettered on its site. The company said that since September, it had shut down over 8,000 channels and "thousands" of election videos that violated its policies. Since Election Day, the company said, it had also shown fact check panels over 200,000 times above relevant election related search results on voter fraud narratives such as "Dominion voting machines" and "Michigan recount."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Technology
NEWARK New Jersey's largest school district will create a special enterprise zone for education in September, bringing together seven low performing schools for an ambitious program of education and social services provided through a coalition of colleges and community groups led by New York University. The Newark schools Central High School and six elementary and middle schools will be part of a Global Village School Zone stretching across a poor, crime ridden swath of the city known as the Central Ward. The zone is modeled after the Harlem Children's Zone, a successful network of charter schools and social service programs, and represents the latest in a growing number of partnerships between urban school districts and colleges. While the Newark zone will remain part of the city's long troubled school system, which has been under state control since 1995, its schools will be largely freed from district regulations and will be allowed to operate like independent charter schools. Decisions about daily operations and policies will be turned over to committees of principals, teachers, parents, college educators and community leaders, and the schools will be allowed to modify their curriculum to address the needs of students. "They're going to be functioning as in district charter schools without calling them that," said Clifford B. Janey, who has been the state appointed Newark superintendent since 2008. "We're going to give them every opportunity to succeed. We're going to get out of the way when necessary and enable leadership to grow and flourish." For the 3,500 students in the zone, that means a longer school day and summer classes for struggling readers. It also means that these children the majority of whom are black or Hispanic and poor will no longer have to cope on their own with hardships that could disrupt their learning. A host of support services will include medical care through health clinics, intensive counseling for boys at risk of dropping out, and even a cultural program with an Afro Caribbean and Latino focus to help develop life skills like setting goals, handling peer pressure, and eating healthfully. Newark's attempt to create a new public school model is the most ambitious reform to be tried here in decades, educators and parents say. If successful, it could convince state leaders that this city is finally ready to take back control of its schools. Despite millions of dollars in additional state financing for remedial and enrichment programs, low test scores and graduation rates have persisted across the 39,000 student district. In recent years, the district has also faced growing competition for students and public money from charter schools, which are independently run but publicly financed. Last year, Newark had 13 of the state's 68 charter schools. "I think it will be all of us working together so all of our children can become A students," said Khadijah Franklin, 30, a home health care aide whose younger daughter, Khadiyah, 9, will attend school in the zone. The Global Village School Zone is the latest example of how urban school districts, under pressure to raise student achievement, have increasingly looked outside their own operations for guidance, support and innovation. This fall, the City of Cleveland will partner with Cleveland State University to start a public school on its campus with 120 students in kindergarten through second grade. In New York City, more than 100 public schools have paid colleges and nonprofit groups including Fordham University, the City University of New York and New Visions to help manage their day to day operations and develop curriculum. The schools, which remain under city oversight, pay fees typically ranging from 30,000 to 60,000 a year, depending on the size of the school. And in upstate New York, the Syracuse schools have collaborated with Syracuse University and Say Yes to Education, a nonprofit foundation, to provide unusually generous benefits to students, including college tuition for qualifying seniors, summer camps and after school programs, and free health and legal services for families. Gerald N. Tirozzi, executive director of the National Association of Secondary School Principals, said that such partnerships could bring tremendous resources to strapped public schools, including access to college professors and outside financing. "It's just nice to see universities getting on the playing field and helping public schools," Dr. Tirozzi said. "They've sat on the sidelines for too long, and if we're serious about having a more cohesive connection between K 12 and higher education, this is a step in the right direction." Pedro Noguera, a New York University professor who helped develop Newark's school zone, said that it brought together reforms that had worked elsewhere: providing social services to students and support for teachers; emphasizing parental and community involvement; and developing career and job opportunities. Educators from Rutgers University, Montclair State University and Bank Street College of Education are also collaborating on the effort. "Newark has so many needs; it's a tough place to do this kind of work," Dr. Noguera said. "But it just cries out: 'This has to be done.' " Newark's efforts have been supported by Gov. Chris Christie and the education commissioner, Bret D. Schundler, both advocates of charter schools. Mr. Schundler has called for creating in district charter schools across the state that would be authorized by school boards and led by teachers, as part of New Jersey's application for federal Race to the Top money. Mayor Cory A. Booker of Newark, who has sought mayoral control of the school system, praised the effort to expand "high quality school options" for families in the Central Ward. "This initiative will empower school leaders and teachers with the autonomy to make critical decisions and will enable them to better serve our students while ensuring there is a clear system of accountability for achieving results," he said. The new school zone has also won the backing of the powerful Newark Teachers Union. Joseph Del Grosso, the union's president, said that such in district charter schools could compete with specialized magnet and charter schools which often select students through tests or lotteries while retaining the public school ideal of taking every student. Mr. Del Grosso said the union planned to recruit teachers for the zone schools who embraced the changes, and to help relocate teachers who did not. "We're really all promoting the same concept," he said. "We have an ardent desire to show that the people of Newark can take care of the Newark public schools. We've shown some progress, but not enough." Mr. Janey, the superintendent, said he hoped to expand the school zone to other parts of the city. The district, which recently laid off more than 700 employees to help close a 70 million budget shortfall, is developing the zone entirely with grants and donations, including a 5 million federal grant for improvements at Central High School, 220,000 from the Ford Foundation and 75,000 from the local Victoria Foundation to hire a social services coordinator. The new zone will be anchored by Central High, with more than 900 students, and include six neighboring schools: Burnet Street School of Science and Technology, Cleveland School of Publishing and Technology, Eighteenth Avenue School of Science and Technology, Newton Street School of Humanities, Quitman Street Community School and Sussex Avenue School of Arts and Sciences. Barbara Ervin, principal of Eighteenth Avenue School, where 92 percent of the 260 students are poor enough to qualify for free or reduced lunches, said the schools had already begun to share ideas and work together to revise math, literacy and science lessons to focus on fewer concepts with more depth. "We're no longer saying, 'These are my kids, those are your kids,' " she said. "All the kids belong to us, and it's a different mind set for success."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Education
It sounded like a 1970s Scorsese film channeling Fellini: a dapper, 39 year old Italian industrial scion claimed he was being held captive in a third floor apartment of a public housing building at 344 East 28th Street in Manhattan, and he had been contacting home to secure a 10,000 ransom. Authorities, however, quickly ordered a rewrite on that script. The Italian visitor, the police said, was apparently at the apartment by choice. Moreover, he is suspected of having been there for two days bingeing on cocaine, marijuana and alcohol, news reports say, with his purported abductor a 29 year old transgender escort. Things took a surreal turn when they reportedly ran out of money for drugs and alcohol, and the well heeled man contacted family in Italy, according to news accounts, in order to arrange a cash drop. "It was not a well thought out plan to get money," said a law enforcement official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to publicly discuss the case. "It kind of fell apart." At 5:50 a.m. last Sunday, the Italian man, who was born in New York, was charged with filing a false report, a misdemeanor, the official said. The arrest report described him as 5 foot 10, 185 pounds, with green eyes, a "blotchy" complexion and short, curly gray hair. That is, to be sure, the least glamorous portrait of Lapo Elkann ever painted. Mr. Elkann, a globe trotting bon vivant and grandson of the Fiat chieftain Gianni Agnelli, is considered as much a prince in Italy as anyone claiming a royal birthright. Leveraging an electric personality and a showman's instinct for spectacle, he created a cult of celebrity, transforming himself into a fashion entrepreneur whose personal brand is rooted in rock star excess: the camouflage painted Ferraris, the Technicolor double breasted suits, the film starlet girlfriends. For good or bad, it seems Mr. Elkann has never been one for half measures. "He is, on one hand, a guy who had an extremely privileged background, and privileged means a family that is not just rich; it's a family that had a lot to do with Italian history and heritage, like the Kennedys here," said Francesco Carrozzini, a Los Angeles based filmmaker, photographer and friend of Mr. Elkann's who is the son of the longtime Italian Vogue editor Franca Sozzani. "But on the other hand, Lapo has an extreme sense of style and creativity," Mr. Carrozzini added. "If you put a turquoise suit on someone else, they would look like a clown. But on him, it's doesn't. It's his personality. It's also not caring about what other people say." In terms of cutting a figure, Mr. Elkann always had a lot to live up to. His maternal grandfather, Mr. Agnelli, who died in 2003, was midcentury Europe's quintessential jet setter and playboy. A cross between Henry Ford and Marcello Mastroianni, he dated the likes of Jacqueline Kennedy and the film star Anita Ekberg, and at one point was said to control 4.4 percent of Italy's gross domestic product. His mother, Margherita Agnelli, is a painter, his father, the American born writer Alain Elkann. Even so, Lapo Elkann was never content to disappear into a life of happy indolence in Capri or Gstaad. "People would laugh if I say I started from ground zero, but the reality is I started my companies from scratch," Mr. Elkann told the journalist Mark Seal in the Vanity Fair profile. "My mind set today and in those days was: 'Think like a self made man. Even though you come from a family who has a humongous heritage, has everything, you need to think like someone who is poor.'" Mr. Elkann's klieg light personality also proved a marketing boon to his budding business empire, which includes the eyewear brand Italia Independent as its centerpiece. Certainly, any scene that Mr. Elkann drops in on transforms into an event. At the Baselworld watch fair in Switzerland last March, Mr. Elkann bounced onstage before the flashing cameras with the triumphant air of Justin Bieber kicking into an encore, as he pumped his latest collaboration with the watch brand Hublot, the 29,400 Big Bang Unico Italia Independent, featuring a camouflage "bespoke" carbon fiber case. After one interview, he slung his arm around the reporter and insisted they take selfies. Mr. Elkann never seemed to be big on boundaries. Seated courtside at a Los Angeles Lakers game in 2010, Mr. Elkann stunned television announcers when he appeared to interfere with the Toronto Raptors' Jose Calderon, who was reaching for a loose ball. After winning a 196,000 auction prize at an amfAR gala in France last May, he took a page from Adrien Brody's Oscars book and planted a passionate and unwelcome kiss on Uma Thurman, the auction host. ("She wasn't complicit in it," her spokeswoman said.) But Mr. Elkann's gestures seem just as grand when employed for good. Just months after the kissing episode, he took the stage in Milan to receive amfAR's Award of Courage in recognition of his generous support of the AIDS charity. "I see many of my Italian brothers in the room, many of you who love your planes and your cars, to go to fashion shows and buy dresses for your wives," he said. "Dig deep, gentleman, and keep giving." As Mr. Elkann took his place among the celebrities and influencers that night, his 2005 overdose seemed like a distant memory. Even so, its details remain indelible. As Mr. Seal wrote in a Vanity Fair profile in 2006, paramedics rushed to a tiny apartment in Turin's red light district around 9 a.m. one October morning and found a 28 year old man unconscious on a bed. "He didn't come to for three days," Mr. Seal wrote, "and by the time he awoke and began responding in three of the five languages in which he is fluent, his family had sped in from their villas." The story, however, had taken a happier turn in recent years. When Mr. Seal revisited the topic a decade later for the magazine, the headline was: "How Lapo Elkann Rebounded From Rock Bottom to Build His Own Business Empire." The article recounted how Mr. Elkann had emerged "creatively more alive" after a rehabilitation stint in Arizona. The timing of that piece made the events of the past week seem even more stunning. And, so far, the next steps are unknown. When Mr. Elkann was charged, he was fingerprinted, photographed and issued a desk appearance ticket that will require his presence in court Jan. 25, the law enforcement official said.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Fashion & Style
From left, Kristin Stokes as Annabeth, Chris McCarrell as Percy and Jorrel Javier as Grover in "The Lightning Thief: The Percy Jackson Musical." The current version, which opened at the Longacre Theater on Wednesday after a seven month national tour earlier this year, has all the charm of a tension headache. To disguise its inaptness for Broadway, the original creative team Joe Tracz (book), Rob Rokicki (music and lyrics) and Stephen Brackett (direction) has doubled its length, added a clutch of unnecessary songs and generally inflated the material so hard that it explodes whatever mild pleasures made the book worth adapting in the first place. The authors have also, significantly if silently, upped the characters' ages. In the book, Percy is 12 when he is brought to Camp Half Blood, a training ground and refuge for young demigods. (They need to acquire skills that will protect them from the jealous monsters of Greek mythology.) In the musical, as in the reviled 2010 movie adaptation, Percy appears to be 16 or so; at any rate, Chris McCarrell, the actor who plays him onstage, is 28. Up a ging allows the authors to attempt social significance by hammering themes of parental neglect and teenage rebellion . At first, this is amusing, as when the opening number explains that, for half bloods, the gods "you learned about / but weren't paying attention to / well, they don't pay attention to you, either." Or when Annabeth (Kristin Stokes) describes her inattentive mother, Athena, in a neat triple rhyme: "She's smart and she's wise / She's sworn off gluten and she's sworn off guys / But if she came to camp it'd be a surprise." That song "The Campfire Song" is one of the few whose music and lyrics hang together long enough to make sharp points. Once the plot requires Percy to go on a picaresque quest to retrieve the titular lightning bolt, with Annabeth and a satyr named Grover (Jorrel Javier) in tow, the storytelling and songwriting become hectic and monotonous. Reduced to highlights and stripped of distinction, Percy's adventures with Furies, oracles, Medusa, Ares and Hades quickly pall. Brilliant staging as in "Harry Potter" or "Hadestown," another mythological mash up might have made up for that. But "The Lightning Thief" is stranded in the contradictions of its ambition. Effects that might have looked crafty and imaginative in the original production look cheesy and anticlimactic in this one. Lee Savage's set consists mostly of marbleized plywood scaffolding; the band, sitting atop that scaffolding, numbers just five. And why is Zeus's lightning bolt, when it finally appears, about as awesome as a fluorescent Shake Weight? It's symptomatic of the illogical workarounds that the scene in which Percy's supernatural powers are first manifested at Camp Half Blood a scene that, in the book, involves an exploding toilet must make do with toilet paper instead, as if he weren't the son of Poseidon but Charmin. Perhaps at this point I should take off my Scrooge glasses and see the show as a family might albeit a family paying as much as 199 per ticket. A child might in fact enjoy the fusillade of toilet paper. Parents might enjoy McCarrell's mostly laid back, tossed off performance; underplaying is definitely the way to stand out in this production. And everyone might root for the cast of unknowns, all but McCarrell making Broadway debuts. It's true that they give it their overamplified all. But glasses back on I have to ask: What do we want musicals for young people and their families to be? Serious and urgent like "Dear Evan Hansen"? Sure, though that show is too exceptional to serve as a viable model. Moral tales sugared with spectacle like anything Disney? I can live with that. (Well, maybe not "Tarzan.") It's the musicals lost somewhere in between I find myself unable to countenance. Not only are they often about whiny teenagers; they seem to be written by them as well . Shows of this ilk not just "The Lightning Thief" but also "Be More Chill," "School of Rock" and, despite its terrific score, "13" normalize the idea that actually quite privileged youngsters are victims of social or parental neglect. They bellow their rebellion in catchy songs; they go on childish quests to claim their maturity. "The Lightning Thief" doubles down on that agenda . Its finale, an anthem called "Bring On the Monsters," would be laughably banal if it weren't so aggressively false. "The battle's just begun!" the characters instruct the audience. What battle? The one with the parents who ponied up the big bucks to bring you to a show featuring flashlights and sock puppets? Better to count your blessings and find another fantasy. Tickets Through Jan. 5, 2020 at the Longacre Theater, Manhattan; 212 239 6200, lightningthiefmusical.com. Running time: 2 hours 15 minutes .	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Theater
There was a time when immigrants fought to get out of the gritty Lower East Side, but some of their descendants are fighting to get back in as the area has been revitalized. That battle is becoming a bit harder as condominium prices start hitting highs comparable to those in pricier Lower Manhattan neighborhoods like SoHo, NoLIta and NoHo. One of the newest condo developments to be marketed on the Lower East Side stretching from Houston Street to the Brooklyn Bridge, and the Bowery to the East River is 50 Clinton. Demolition to make way for the seven story masonry building, which replaces a row of one story shops that included the restaurant WD 50, began in May, with occupancy set for the fourth quarter of 2016, said Daniel Hollander, a managing principal with the New York developer DHA Capital. A roughly 2,000 square foot retail space with about 60 feet of frontage on Clinton Street may become a restaurant or art gallery, said Josh Schuster, a DHA Capital principal. The development sold more than 40 percent of its 37 units after less than three weeks on the market, achieving an average price per square foot of around 2,100, said Fredrik Eklund, the agent with Douglas Elliman Real Estate who is handling sales at 50 Clinton. That is almost twice the 1,167 average price per square foot for Lower East Side condos over the last year, and well over the 705 per square foot average price of co ops, according to data provided by CityRealty, a real estate listings and research service. And two of the four penthouses at 50 Clinton sold for more than 2,900 a square foot, Mr. Eklund said. But 50 Clinton's apartments tend to be smaller than those of nearby new developments, so the prices per unit are only slightly higher than for other apartments on the Lower East Side, where one bedrooms have been averaging 850,000 and two bedrooms 1.75 million over the last year, according to CityRealty data. (There have not been enough sales of three bedrooms to obtain relevant comparable data.)	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Real Estate
This article is part of David Leonhardt's newsletter. You can sign up here to receive it each weekday. Much of red America is finally going on lockdown. After resisting the pleas of public health experts for days, the governors of Florida, Georgia and Mississippi all states won by President Trump in 2016 announced yesterday that they will be ordering their residents to stay home, effective Friday. The turnabout from Florida's governor, Ron DeSantis, was especially stark. DeSantis had previously allowed spring break vacationers to socialize on Florida's beaches, where they likely spread the virus. Florida, of course, also has one of the nation's largest populations of people over 65, who are especially threatened by the virus. The new lockdowns are welcome, because they will help slow the virus. But they're also coming much later than they should have. A big reason that the virus has recently been spreading more rapidly in the United States than in Europe or Asia is the slow response from many American political leaders. Trump spent almost two months falsely claiming the virus was going away, and he continues to send mixed signals. At Wednesday's news briefing, he said that some states "don't have much of a problem." (He's right the caseload is only in the hundreds in some states, but it is growing rapidly nationwide.) Many Republican governors have chosen to echo him. DeSantis, for instance, acted as if he could stop the virus merely by keeping New Yorkers out of his state. Mark Penn and Andrew Stein write that "only a broader course correction to the center will give Democrats a fighting chance in 2022" and beyond. Tory Gavito and Adam Jentleson write that the Virgina loss should "shock Democrats into confronting the powerful role that racially coded attacks play in American politics." Ezra Klein speaks to David Shor, who discusses his fear that Democrats face electoral catastrophe unless they shift their messaging. Ross Douthat writes that the outcome of the Virginia gubernatorial race shows Democrats need a "new way to talk about progressive ideology and education." A newly published analysis by The Times finds that the states where travel declined the least last week were almost all Trump voting states. "I saw people this weekend shaking hands with each other," Lenny Curry, the mayor of Jacksonville, Florida's largest city, told reporters. The pattern isn't perfectly partisan. A few Republican governors, like Mike DeWine in Ohio and Larry Hogan in Maryland, have responded aggressively. A few Democratic politicians, like the New York mayor Bill de Blasio, have reacted too slowly. But the pattern is nonetheless a strong one: The only 13 states that have still not issued stay at home orders, including Texas, were all won by Trump four years ago. Related: Two weeks ago, about 70 students from the University of Texas at Austin ignored doctors' warnings and traveled together to Mexico spring break. At least 44 of those students have now tested positive for the virus, as David Montgomery and Manny Fernandez report from Texas. Anne Marie Slaughter of the think tank New America, in The Times: "If this crisis is highlighting our weaknesses as a nation, it is also bringing out some of our greatest strengths. In the absence of competent national leadership, others are stepping up. Governors and mayors, business owners, university presidents, philanthropists, pastors and nonprofit groups of all kinds have taken the initiative to mobilize, guide and protect those they lead and serve ... Governors are leading the charge." Ed Kilgore, New York magazine: "The general drift of public policy in Republican governed states is in the responsible direction which isn't that surprising given the proliferation of cases across most of the country but GOP pols remain vulnerable to another backflip by Trump. His earlier mutterings aloud about wanting to simply declare the crisis over have led some of his fans to make rebelling against sound medical advice an act of ideological loyalty." Mark Joseph Stern, Slate: DeSantis's "languorous approach to the outbreak allowed the coronavirus to spread silently for weeks in a state with a large population of elderly, vulnerable residents. While DeSantis dragged his feet, another Florida official took the lead in responding to the crisis. Florida Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried's response to the outbreak stands in stark contrast with DeSantis'. A Democrat, Fried is an independently elected member of the Florida Cabinet whose duties go well beyond agriculture ... On March 20, Fried called on DeSantis to shut down Florida by issuing a statewide stay at home order. The governor only granted her request on Wednesday." Bill Scher, Politico: "New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has received the lion's share of attention, as his informative and emotive press conferences have made him an overnight national political star, albeit halfway through his third term. But his record in responding to the crisis is more complicated than the sheen lets on: his coronavirus containment policies were not the most aggressive in the country, and did not prevent catastrophe. He hesitated to close all schools statewide even as other states began to do so, and resisted a statewide stay at home order for a few days before relenting." Larry Hogan (Maryland's governor) and Gretchen Whitmer (Michigan's), writing in The Washington Post: "The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) needs to better coordinate the distribution of supplies based on need. Right now, there is no single authority tracking where every spare ventilator is or where there are shortages. The lack of any centralized coordination is creating a counterproductive competition between states and the federal government to secure limited supplies, driving up prices and exacerbating existing shortages." If you are not a subscriber to this newsletter, you can subscribe here. You can also join me on Twitter ( DLeonhardt) and Facebook. Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter ( NYTopinion) and Instagram.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Opinion
As other journalists are said to cover the police beat or subway beat, I used to say in my pre critic days that I covered the tear beat. For whatever reason, editors felt compelled to send me wherever people were crying. The job was to capture the sadness of, say, a mother mourning her murdered gay son, while also suggesting how that sadness said something about us all. Since becoming a theater critic, I find myself on another tear beat, especially when I get to see plays by Samuel D. Hunter. His version is more localized, almost always set in the Idaho of his upbringing, where the flinty pride of the locals proves no match for the economic and personal disasters of deindustrialization. In "Pocatello," the manager of a restaurant shovels his own pay into the till to keep the doors open, even as his family shuts its doors on him. The characters in "Lewiston/Clarkston," if they have jobs at all, work at Walgreens and Costco, but their emotional lives are as empty as a mall at midnight. It's tough territory for a playwright. When your interest is in "people on the losing end of American life," as Hunter recently said, you can easily wind up truffling for tragedy. That, at least, was my disappointed take on "Greater Clements," his latest play, which opened on Monday at the Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater. Honorable throughout, and streaked with veins that plunge very deep, it is also too obvious in its dramatic intent to support a nearly three hour running time or to offer the convincing indictment of American anomie it clearly wishes it could. The opening gesture is already a bit too pat for that: The citizens of the downtrodden (fictional) town of Clements, a former Idaho mining center whose biggest mine shut down 12 years before the action, have voted to unincorporate. Now its one stoplight will go dark, along with the streetlamps along the main drag. Most of the storefronts there are boarded up anyway, and one of the few that isn't home of the mining tour office and museum run by Maggie Bunker will be soon. She's closing shop. In other ways, Maggie (Judith Ivey) has long since done so. A hollow marriage ended around the time the mine shut down; she has hardly tolerated any companionship since, except in the form of short visits from the fatuous sheriff (Andrew Garman) and a busybody old friend (Nina Hellman) who might as well wear a T shirt reading "plot contrivance." Instead, Maggie's emotional attention has been spent trying to rescue her son, Joe, from the creeping mental illness that long since turned him into a pariah and recently almost destroyed him. Now 27, Joe (Edmund Donovan) lives with Maggie above the museum, trying to be less "weird" but almost resigned to the psychic version of the fate that befell his town: unincorporation. Fate is one of the problems here: The director Davis McCallum's production for Lincoln Center Theater is so doomy that the story almost seems rigged. That's literally the case with Dane Laffrey's impressive but awkward (and view obstructing) bi level set, which rises and descends like a mine shaft elevator, suggesting that, one way or another, people are going to be crushed. Indeed, among the first things we learn is that Maggie's father was killed, along with 80 others, in a mine fire in 1972. It doesn't take a dramaturge to discern what it means when Maggie knocks his pocket watch, which Joe treasures, off its display shelf, cracking its crystal. Despite that leaden symbol, the mother son material is very powerful. Ivey is terrific, and terrifically varied, as a woman whose no nonsense briskness disguises a host of feelings she sees no profit in exploring, including a lifetime's resentment over caring for difficult men. Ivey is one of those actors who seem to turn their nervous systems over to their roles; when Billy, an old beau from high school, drops by the museum earlier than planned, her hand flies to her hair in an unconscious gesture of belated beautification. And when she mimes cutting herself on shattered glass, you wince. It's no small compliment to say that Donovan is her match. Excellent as one of the Costco workers in "Lewiston/Clarkston," he is even better here as a young man who means well but has "the social intelligence of a 15 year old." In a role that could easily tip into incel caricature, Donovan avoids overplaying the quirks, instead making you feel how hard Joe has to swim against the current of his distorted thinking to keep himself afloat. In the play's most heartbreaking moment, he realizes that all his efforts at self improvement have brought him only so far: to the understanding of just how limited any further improvement may be. Maggie realizes it, too, and to the extent "Greater Clements" achieves the tragedy it seeks, it's not in its attempt to connect Joe's disintegration to the town's, or to America's, but in Maggie's simple martyrdom to her son and eventually his to her. Everywhere else, the play's attempts at complexity undermine it. The arrival of Billy (an underpowered Ken Narasaki), along with his 14 year old granddaughter, Kel (Haley Sakamoto), opens a second channel of conflict and raises issues including the imprisonment of Japanese Americans at the Minidoka War Relocation Center nearby that Hunter struggles to pound into alignment with the main story. The role of gentrification in the town's demise is likewise shortchanged in a botched coda when a clueless Californian (Kate MacCluggage) visits the museum. Not that these themes are unimportant or unfit for dramatization. But the attempt to stuff them all into one play, even a long one, overstrains the story. (Two major plot points in the third act one involving an overheard conversation and one a broken phone are not only emotionally unconvincing but mechanical in ways Hunter almost always abjures.) In that sense, perhaps "Greater Clements" isn't too long but too short: It might be better off as a mini series, where its net of ideas could unwind more naturally. As a play, though, it's like that mine elevator: creaky and skeletal but with intermittent access to wonderful things. If you are looking to cry, as I always am, "Greater Clements" will give you more than one reason to do so. Tickets Through Jan. 19 2020 at the Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater, Manhattan; 212 501 3100, lct.org. Running time: 2 hours 50 minutes.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Theater
For his debut as Lanvin's third creative director in three years, Olivier Lapidus (son of Ted, the couturier famed for his unisex fashion) resurrected the raised runway. Eyeing it before the show, Stefano Tonchi, editor of W magazine, said, "I haven't seen a runway like that in 15 years." Turned out the runway was not the only thing Mr. Lapidus brought back. He brought back the logo: plastering the word "Lanvin" all over silk dresses and playsuits (what is it with the onesie this season?). He brought back the wrap tulip skirt and the limp little black dress. He brought back the asymmetric hem (thigh high on one leg; knee or ankle length on the other) and the triple wrap belt (one at the waist, one hugging the hips). He brought back a duty free aesthetic. What he did not bring back: elegance, quality or a clear identity for the brand. It's a tough job to take on a house now routinely referred to as "beleaguered"; to follow not only one of the most beloved designers of recent years, Alber Elbaz, who was unceremoniously fired in late 2015, but also his replacement, Bouchra Jarrar, who lasted only 16 months before being removed from the house. Especially when management itself, which has not changed, seems to be a large part of the issue. And Mr. Lapidus, who most recently introduced an "e couture" (his description) label carrying his name, got the job only in July, so it wasn't as if he had a lot of time to reimagine Lanvin. Which may be why the most original idea on the runway was a flat brogue with a bow on top and the front sliced off to reveal the toe. It was not particularly flattering, but at least the models could walk.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Fashion & Style
FOR a brand that ceased to be bold long ago, Buick is making a rather audacious request with its newest car, the 2012 Verano: would you please consider it the equal of small cars from prestigious brands like Audi and Volvo? Buick has struggled for a couple of decades, helped not a bit by a mishmash of vehicles and marketing strategies that left many car buyers nonplussed. But there are signs that the General Motors division is on the upswing, and the Verano luxury compact is the latest indication that corporate confidence is back, along with a new willingness to take a gamble. Buick's resurgence began with the 2008 Enclave, a seven or eight passenger crossover admired for its competence. Then came well regarded new versions of the midsize LaCrosse and Regal sedans. Memories of less than stellar Buicks like the Skylark, the division's last compact car, have grown dim. The Verano is aimed at cars like the Audi A3 and Volvo C30 that are exploring the question of whether Americans will pay premium prices for upscale compacts. For Audi and Volvo this remains a test without a final grade: combined sales of the A3 and C30 were only 10,500 last year. Buick, which is feeling pretty good about itself, wants to take the exam, too. The Verano starts at 23,470, and a fully optioned model is about 29,000 with leather upholstery, heated steering wheel and front seats, sunroof, navigation system and fancy stereo. A comparably equipped A3 or C30 would easily cost 3,000 or 4,000 more. Buick could not afford to start its experiment with a clean slate design, so the Verano was engineered from the existing Chevrolet Cruze. "The basic structure underneath is similar to the Cruze," said Jim Federico, the G.M. vehicle line executive for global compact cars. But the starting point and the ending point are far apart, Mr. Federico said, because the Verano had to appeal to more upscale customers. There were extensive upgrades and substitutions. Whereas the Chevrolet is assembled in Lordstown, Ohio, the Verano comes from Orion Township, Mich. Production of both cars was halted last week because of a "consumer satisfaction" issue with a part, according to a Buick spokesman, Nick Richards. He said G.M. was working with the supplier to resolve the problem. The Verano's interior includes soft touch materials to foster an upscale look. Contrasting colors provide the best ambiance; darker monotones can be a bit dreary. At a glance, the thick front seats seem plush and welcoming. But on a 400 mile trip along Interstate 80, my wife, Cheryl, and I found the seats uncomfortable after only an hour or two. Given our very different physiques, that suggests a design problem; Mr. Richards, the Buick spokesman, said Buick was still making some last minute adjustments to the seats. There's another downside to those fat front seats. They reduce the knee room for passengers in the back, which has only 33.9 inches of legroom. That makes the rear seats more than ceremonial, but less than accommodating for adults on anything but a brief trip. "We definitely are selling it for the front seat customer," Mr. Federico conceded. In fairness, neither the four door Audi nor the two door Volvo has a roomy back seat, and each offers only about an inch more of rear legroom. In recent years Buick has taken a vow of vehicular silence, having decided that peace and quiet will be a characteristic of its products. Mr. Federico said the engineers put a strong emphasis on eliminating or blocking noise, and indeed the Verano is capable of covering long distances at 75 to 85 m.p.h. in a calm and soothing fashion. While the Cruze offers a choice of two 4 cylinder engines (each rated at 138 horsepower), Buick wanted an engine that was more powerful and more refined. The Verano gets a 2.4 liter 4 cylinder that uses direct injection of fuel and is rated at 180 horsepower. That engine is also used, with a small boost from an electric motor, in the Regal and the LaCrosse. The 6 speed automatic comes from the same transmission family as the one in the Cruze, but has been adjusted to handle more torque. Acceleration is acceptably brisk, and for the most part noise and harshness are kept in the engine bay where they belong. Only around 2,300 r.p.m. was there a vibration, a passing hint of 4 cylinder gruffness that reached the cabin. Next year the Verano will get more power from a turbocharged 2 liter 4 cylinder with either a 6 speed manual or a 6 speed automatic. A spokesman declined to state the horsepower of that engine, but it is rated at 220 in the 2012 Buick Regal. The Environmental Protection Agency's fuel economy estimate is 21 miles per gallon in the city and 32 m.p.g. on the highway. That is less than the 25/36 m.p.g. ratings of the Verano's bigger brother, the LaCrosse, with the electric assist. The Verano's rating beats the Volvo C30 and the Audi A3 with a gasoline engine. A diesel version of the A3 does better at 30/42 m.p.g. In one stretch of almost 370 miles with the trip computer showing an average speed just under 65 m.p.h. I recorded 32.2 m.p.g. The suspension has also been upgraded from the Cruze, with different shock absorbers and bushings. It also has larger 18 inch wheels. The Verano certainly doesn't behave like a sport sedan on a mountain road, but that is not its mandate. Rather, it is a comfortable small car that is responsive enough to be surprisingly rewarding to drive. Such a blend of comfort and performance was exactly what the engineers were aiming for, Mr. Federico said. "We're not after Buicks to be the fastest in the segment or the best fuel economy in the segment," he added. "We're after the Buick to be the best balance. The best balance of smoothness, decent fuel economy and good performance." Americans are becoming more comfortable with smaller cars, Mr. Federico says, but they do not want to give up features and comforts. In that light, the Verano makes sense. But Mr. Federico noted that the car is competing in a small, low volume segment that Buick expects to grow, but slowly. "It could be bringing in empty nesters, it could be bringing in young professionals," he said. "We are not expecting huge volume, and we built our system and business case around it so that I don't think it is that big of a gamble." He declined, ever so nicely, to say how many of the cars Buick expected to sell. With the Verano, G.M. has done a lovely job of knitting together upscale features, ride and handling at a competitive price. The question is to what extent Americans are willing to embrace the concept of "small luxury" and whether status conscious buyers are ready to consider Buick.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Automobiles
In its latest effort to defuse a major public relations problem that might have loomed over Donald J. Trump's presidency, the Trump Organization on Wednesday announced union accords at two major hotel holdings. The agreements resolve labor disputes that could have posed a conflict of interest for the president elect and come on the heels of other similar moves in recent weeks. In November, Mr. Trump paid 25 million to settle a number of lawsuits surrounding fraud allegations at Trump University, his former for profit education business, and this month the Trump Organization extricated itself from the management of a hotel project in Brazil, where the authorities were investigating allegations of corruption. Taken together, the moves suggest that Mr. Trump is sensitive to at least the perception that his business dealings could cast a shadow over his presidency, even if he has yet to detail how he might seek a more comprehensive solution to potential conflicts, such as outright divestment. "On the one hand, I think it's important to acknowledge that this is meaningful, it does matter," Danielle Brian, the executive director of the Project on Government Oversight, a nonpartisan ethics watchdog group, said of Wednesday's agreements. "However, this piecemeal approach to dealing with conflicts is not going to deal with the bigger looming problem." The agreements also provide insight into Mr. Trump's views on workers and labor unions. In contrast to the deal he helped broker at the Carrier plant in Indiana, which recently agreed to preserve about 850 jobs that it had planned to shift to Mexico, and which Mr. Trump was on hand to announce in person, the announcement of Wednesday's deals came by way of a news release featuring statements from the Trump Organization and affiliates of the unions involved. The Trump transition team offered no comment and released no statement. One of the two labor agreements provides a union contract to workers at the Trump International Hotel Las Vegas, whose union the hotel had previously refused to bargain with. The second agreement eases a hurdle to unionization at a recently opened Trump hotel in Washington. The agreements reduce the probability that the National Labor Relations Board, which protects the labor rights of private sector employees, will be called on to adjudicate disputes between workers and the Trump Organization. That possibility raised the prospect of a conflict of interest if Mr. Trump were to retain a stake in his business. As president, Mr. Trump will eventually nominate all five members of the labor board, as well as its general counsel, who typically has the final say on whether to issue formal complaints against employers. The speed of the negotiations at the hotel in Las Vegas suggested that Mr. Trump was eager to put the issue behind him before his inauguration in January, after the hotel resisted workers' efforts to unionize there for most of the past year and a half. The hotel hired consultants who spoke with employees at mandatory meetings about the risks of unionizing, according to earlier statements from the union. In charges filed with the labor board, some workers alleged that they had been fired or suspended from their jobs because of their unionization efforts. After the successful union election last December, the hotel appealed within the labor board structure, arguing that workers had been intimidated into voting for the union. When the full board rejected its final appeal last month, the hotel appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Bethany Khan, a union representative, said the new labor agreement had come together over a few days of negotiation last week and been ratified by union members over the weekend. Under the accord, the workers will join locals for culinary workers and bartenders that are affiliated with Unite Here, a prominent national union that represents hotel workers. The two sides agreed to a contract beginning Jan. 1 and running through May 31, 2021, which follows a relatively standard template for hotels in Las Vegas by providing annual wage increases, pension and health benefits, and job protections. What happened on Day 2 of Elizabeth Holmes's testimony. Kevin Spacey was ordered to pay 31 million to the 'House of Cards' studio after sexual harassment allegations. Under the second accord, the Trump International Hotel Washington D.C. agreed to remain neutral as workers seek to unionize under a card check agreement, enabling workers to simply sign authorization cards indicating that they want to unionize. The hotel will recognize the union if a majority of workers sign cards. The alternative, a secret ballot election, typically occurs when the employer opposes the unionization effort, as was the case at the Las Vegas property. In a statement referring to the agreement in Washington, Eric Danziger, the chief executive of Trump Hotels, said, "We share mutual goals with the union, as we both desire to ensure outstanding jobs for the employees, while also enabling the hotel to operate successfully in a competitive environment." Wednesday's agreements do not eliminate the potential for conflicts of interest involving Mr. Trump and the labor board. The board's general counsel, whose replacement Mr. Trump will probably appoint next year, will be in a position to decide whether to issue complaints about allegations of labor rights violations, but could also leave the decision to career civil servants. Such allegations could include refusing to bargain with the union in the future, or firing or disciplining union stewards for sticking up for fellow members under procedures outlined in the contract. The decision on issuing a complaint is in some sense the critical step of the labor board process. There are typically 20,000 to 25,000 charges of unfair labor practices in a given year, of which only a fraction result in a complaint about 1,270 last year although some are settled beforehand. Any complaint issued by a regional director or the general counsel could then come before the board, at least some of whose members are likely to have been appointed by Mr. Trump. But if the general counsel declines to issue a complaint, the charge is effectively dead and generally cannot be appealed. "It's the gateway into litigation," said Wilma Liebman, a former labor board chairman. There remains an open charge of unfair labor practices against the Trump Organization, which was filed on behalf of a worker advocacy group in September over the contract that employees of the Trump presidential campaign were required to sign. The group alleged the contract's noncompete and confidentiality clauses illegally discouraged employees from exercising their labor rights. Mr. Trump and his organization faced a potentially punishing calculus in deciding to bargain with the union in Las Vegas, aside from the issues of conflict of interest.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Economy
What books are on your nightstand? A galley of Lee Child's upcoming "Past Tense"; "The Death of Democracy: Hitler's Rise to Power and the Downfall of the Weimar Republic," by Benjamin Carter Hett; "The Lost Life of Eva Braun," by Angela Lambert; "Circe," by Madeline Miller; "So Close to Being the Sh t, Y'all Don't Even Know," by Retta; "Less," by Andrew Sean Greer; "Atticus Finch: The Biography," by Joseph Crespino. Describe your ideal reading experience (when, where, what, how). Atlanta is razor hot right now, so I blast the air conditioner in my office for pretend winter, snuggle under a blanket with my cat, Dexter, and make sure the reading lamp is on high, because for some crazy reason the words on the page look tinier without light. Maybe it's because of global warming, because I'm too young for that crap. What's your favorite book of all time? This is complicated because "Gone With the Wind" exists as one of the main pillars of the odious Lost Cause narrative, but it's also one of the pivotal books I read in childhood that helped shape me as a writer. When I came across it in the library, there were not a lot of novels where women were allowed to be confident and commanding without being violently murdered by the end of the story. Which books got you hooked on crime fiction? I discovered Sue Grafton's Kinsey Millhone series in my teens and found them to be inspiring as well as an excellent counterbalance to my headier teen reading: "Flowers in the Attic," by V. C. Andrews, and "Lace," by Shirley Conran. Who's your favorite fictional detective? And the best villain? Sara Paretsky's V. I. Warshawski kicked butt well before it was acceptable for ladies to do that kind of thing. There's an entire generation of women writing strong women because of Sara. For villains, I'd have to say Mayella Ewell from "To Kill a Mockingbird," though with some reservations. On one hand, she was horribly abused by her father; on the other, she contributes to the spurious apologue of the vindictive woman who uses false rape allegations to strike out at a man. Character has to matter as much as plot. If they're not equally strong, then no one really cares what happens. Want to keep up with the latest and greatest in books? This is a good place to start. None Learn what you should be reading this fall: Our collection of reviews on books coming out this season includes biographies, novels, memoirs and more. See what's new in October: Among this month's new titles are novels by Jonathan Franzen, a history of Black cinema and a biography by Katie Couric. Nominate a book: The New York Times Book Review has just turned 125. That got us wondering: What is the best book that was published during that time? Listen to our podcast: Featuring conversations with leading figures in the literary world, from Colson Whitehead to Leila Slimani, the Book Review Podcast helps you delve deeper into your favorite books. What kinds of stories are you drawn to? And what do you steer clear of? I'll read anything nonfiction, true crime, historical fiction. As long as it's well told, I'm there. While I enjoy a lot of science fiction, when it gets into the nitty gritty of the tensile strength of the titanium cables threaded into the wings of the automatovelociraptor, you've lost me. What books might we be surprised to find on your shelves? People are always surprised that I read a lot of history, but I feel that good crime fiction holds a mirror up to society and tells readers what's going on in the world. You can't do that effectively without understanding history. Who is your favorite overlooked or underappreciated writer? Clare Chambers ("Learning to Swim," "The Editor's Wife") is an English author who's fantastic at writing about crazy, eclectic families. What keeps Clare from being the English Anne Tyler is there's always someone who is acutely aware of not quite fitting in. There's something heartbreaking about the fact that most people who are unusual only ever long to be normal. What kind of reader were you as a child? Insatiable though to be honest there were lots of reading contests in my school, and I'm incredibly competitive, so perhaps my early reading passion came from wanting to humiliate my closest reading rivals by volume. I loved Encyclopedia Brown and aspired to be him, which endeared me to exactly no one in my family (he's clearly overeducated for his intelligence). There's been a lot of chatter about Sally Kimball's place in the Brown canon because she was sometimes "allowed" to contribute to the crime solving, but she was arguably a violent bully. Thank God she was also the prettiest girl in school; otherwise, they would have beaten the hell out of her every day. What's the last book you recommended to a member of your family? "Grief Is the Thing With Feathers," by Max Porter. It's part bereavement counselor, part anger management. What's the best book you ever received as a gift? "Slammerkin," by Emma Donoghue, was given to me a few birthdays ago. I was going on and on about "The Crimson Petal and the White," by Michel Faber, and a friend said, "This will knock the breath out of you." He was right. If you could require the president to read one book, what would it be? "The Giving Tree," by Shel Silverstein, about a Low IQ Tree that lets a WEAK kid take Everything starting with all of his big, beautiful Apples and, the tree is so Pathetic, because he used to be the strongest tree but now the World is laughing at him. What book did you feel you were supposed to like, and didn't? Do you remember the last book you put down without finishing? "Orlando," by Virginia Woolf, answers both of those questions. Good God, even two lifetimes is not enough to grit through the pages. If you were to write something besides thrillers, what would you write? The terrific gift about thriller writing today is that the books can exist as hybrids. In some iteration, I've written love stories, polemics, historical novels, family sagas ... The fact that people are murdered and the reader is told why slots me into the thriller category, and I'm absolutely fine with that. I have always loved thrillers you can get away with anything in them. Whom would you choose to write your life story? I want to say Alafair Burke because she would make the truth interesting, but then I know she'd tell the truth. So maybe James Patterson, because I think my life lends itself to short, pacey chapters. If you could meet any writer, dead or alive, who would it be? What would you want to know? Flannery O'Connor has always fascinated me. Growing up in a small town with weird thoughts and being constantly told that it wasn't ladylike to write dark stories and that I'd never make much of myself if I didn't learn how to blend in, it was stunning (and gratifying) to find an example of a woman from a small town with weird thoughts writing dark stories who was celebrated throughout the world. What I'd want to ask her is which stories came from happiness and which came from sadness, because only she would know. What book do you think everybody should read? "Ethan Frome," by Edith Wharton, though any Wharton will do. She embodied the dictum that the difference between a painter and an artist is that an artist knows when to stop painting. What do you plan to read next? "Masterless Men: Poor Whites and Slavery in the Antebellum South," by Keri Leigh Merritt. I read an interview with the author a few months ago and was intrigued by the scope of her work. I've lived in the South my entire life and I love it here, but I am acutely aware that people who think they pulled themselves up by their own bootstraps often forget that someone had to make the boots.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Books
Starting as violently as it plans to continue, Vincent D'Onofrio's "The Kid" drops us into a savage altercation as Rio (Jake Schur), 13, kills his abusive father before slicing the face of his scummy uncle, Grant (Chris Pratt). Primed by the boy's affectless narration (here, when characters aren't practicing brutality, they're talking about it), we intuit that what will follow for Rio and his older sister, Sara (Leila George), is unlikely to be pretty. Set in the American Southwest in 1879, "The Kid" feels less like an actual movie than a table napkin idea for one. A fateful encounter with Billy the Kid (Dane DeHaan) and his nemesis, Sheriff Pat Garrett (Ethan Hawke), lands the siblings in Santa Fe and back in Grant's clutches. For Sara, that means the brothel, where Grant seemingly has a season pass; for Rio, it means deciding which of his two new acquaintances he can trust to rescue her.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Movies
OAKLAND, Calif. Google, facing an advertising slump caused by the pandemic, has rescinded offers to several thousand people who had agreed to work at the company as temporary and contract workers. "We're slowing our pace of hiring and investment, and are not bringing on as many new starters as we had planned at the beginning of the year," Google said in an email to contracting agencies last week that was seen by The New York Times. The company told the firms that it "will not be moving forward to onboard" the people that the agencies had recruited to work at Google. The move affected more than 2,000 people globally who had signed offers with the agencies to be a contract or temp worker, according to three people familiar with the decision, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not allowed to speak publicly on the matter. Google employs more than 130,000 contractors and temp workers, a shadow work force that outnumbers its 123,000 full time employees. Google's full time staff are rewarded with high salaries and generous perks, but temps and contractors often receive less pay, fewer benefits and do not have the same protections, even though they work alongside full timers. The coronavirus crisis has underscored that disparity. Google announced in April that it was extending its employee paid leave policy to 14 weeks from eight weeks for caretakers, including parents looking after children whose schools are closed. For employees working from home, Sundar Pichai, chief executive of Google's parent company Alphabet, said on Tuesday that they could spend 1,000 for equipment and furniture like standing desks and ergonomic chairs. Many of the contract and temp candidates who had agreed to work at Google before the pandemic took hold in the United States were let go without any severance or financial compensation. This came after weeks of uncertainty as Google repeatedly postponed their start dates during which time they were not paid by Google or the staffing agencies. Some of the would be contractors left stable, full time jobs once they received an employment offer at Google and are now searching for work in a difficult labor market. Some, who are Americans, said the rescinded offers have complicated and, in some cases, delayed their ability to receive unemployment benefits because they left their last jobs voluntarily, according to several of the workers facing this quandary. In mid April, Mr. Pichai told employees in a memo that the company planned to "significantly" slow the pace of hiring this year, with the exception of several strategic areas. A company spokeswoman said at the time that Google intended to bring on the people who it had already hired but who had not started. But this did not seem to apply to contractors or temp workers for Google and Alphabet, which has a market capitalization of near 1 trillion dollars. It made 6.8 billion in profit in the first three months of 2020, despite what it called "a significant and sudden slowdown" in advertising. "If these people were promised jobs at Alphabet, which is worth a trillion dollars, it seems like the company has a responsibility to take them on," said Ben Gwin, who works as a data analyst in a Google office for HCL America, a contracting agency. "It's not like Google can't afford it." Mr. Gwin led a unionization effort for contract technical workers at Google's offices in Pittsburgh last year. "As we've publicly indicated, we're slowing our pace of hiring and investment, and as a result are not bringing on as many new people full time and temporary as we'd planned at the beginning of the year," said Alex Krasov, a Google spokeswoman. Ruth Porat, chief financial officer for Alphabet, told analysts last month that the company was cutting expenses by not hiring as many new employees as initially projected. She did not address contract or temp workers. Google has taken some steps to help its temp and contract workers. In March, the company said it would extend the assignments of temp workers whose jobs were scheduled to end from March 20 to May 15 by 60 days. The company also said it would continue to pay contract workers affected by office closures such as people who serve food in the company's cafeterias. And it established a fund to allow contingent workers to take paid sick leave if they exhibit coronavirus symptoms or can't come to work because they're quarantined. Like many technology companies, Google depends on a large number of temps, vendors and contractors to perform a wide variety of jobs, including cafeteria workers, maintenance workers, recruiters, content moderators and software testers. For the company, these workers cost less than full time employees, and Google has no long term obligation to them, making it easy to hire them or eliminate their positions. Last year, 10 Democratic senators called on Google to convert its temporary and contract workers to full time employees, saying the company should stop its "anti worker practices" and treat all of its workers equally. Google pays staffing companies to find the workers and provide them with salaries and benefits as their employer. But Google interviews prospective candidates and signs off on hiring, deciding where they work, what they do and when to fire them. When Google pulled the offers to prospective workers, the company told the staffing companies, which included firms like Accenture, Cognizant and Adecco, that "we'll look to you to have the conversations with the individuals who won't be onboarded." Google said it was "hopeful" that the "agencies will be able to find other assignments" for the candidates. It was not immediately clear which countries were most affected in the decision, but some of the workers are in the United States, India and the Philippines. This was the second wave of rescinded job offers for temps and contract workers. Google had pulled offers for several dozen temp workers in April. Joli Holland was one of the candidates whose job offers was rescinded in mid April. She was working as a lead teller at Wells Fargo when Adecco contacted her about a recruiter position working at Google in Mountain View, Calif. After a few rounds of interviews, she was offered the position with a start date of March 23. She was hopeful that she would get her foot in the door with a temporary job and land a full time position at Google. Before she gave her two week notice to Wells Fargo, she checked with Adecco about whether the job at Google was safe given the growing concerns about the coronavirus. Ms. Holland said she was assured that everything "should be fine." Another candidate whose offer was rescinded expressed similar concerns to another recruiter at Adecco. This person, who asked not to be identified because they still wanted to work at Google and were worried about being blacklisted for speaking out, said the recruiter said "Google always does the right thing, so I wouldn't worry about it."	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Technology
Using the Pandemic as an Opportunity to Lose Weight and Get in Shape It's been somewhat of a running joke in a profoundly unfunny time: endless laments about the "quarantine 15" or "Covid 19," referring to the number of pounds gained during lockdown. According to a June survey of 2,000 American adults by the weight loss program Nutrisystem, 76 percent of respondents gained weight, up to 16 pounds, between mid March and July. And 63 percent said that losing weight was a priority, post quarantine. The difference between losers, gainers and maintainers during the pandemic, experts say, is largely dependent on your mind set: how you approach a new set of circumstances and cope with change. One of the many challenges of Covid was the abrupt change to day to day schedules. People began working from home, if they had work at all, in many cases joined by their kids. Gyms, recreation centers and parks closed, curbing exercise routines. Stress levels skyrocketed for many, with baking, eating and drinking becoming major outlets and means of reward. Indeed, studies show a link between high stress levels and overeating. "When the environment and your routine changes, you can use it as an opportunity to say 'I'll drink at home,' or 'I deserve to treat myself well in those really tough times,'" said Gary D. Foster, chief scientific officer of WW (formerly Weight Watchers). "This is where mind set is so important. It's how you view things, how you position the situation, your sense of self worth, and how you treat yourself." "After that initial period, there was a subset of people who said, 'This is an opportunity to take care of myself," he said. "That different way of thinking about the process is really powerful." Susan Abrams Torney, 62, a dental office manager in Delray Beach, Fla., had an epiphany early on in the pandemic when she realized that she could use the time off from work to make a positive change in her life. Sheltering in place worked in her favor. "It took the 'I don't have time to exercise' excuse out of the equation,'" said Ms. Torney, who has lost 30 pounds since the beginning of the year. She credits her grandchildren with motivating her. "Before I started on the journey, if I sat on the floor I felt like I needed a crane to get me back up again," she said. During lockdown, she finally broke open the Wii video game console her children had given her for her 50th birthday and started playing Wii tennis and also going for "sanity" walks with friends around her community, her only form of in person socialization. It also helped that she was no longer able to go out for meals and had to cook at home, where she prepared healthy meals for herself, like chicken, fish and salads. Rather than vodka on the rocks, her previous cocktail of choice, she diluted her vodka with mineral water and a splash of cranberry juice. "Quarantine gave me time to be creative with the meals I was eating," she said. Another reason many people gained weight is that they stopped planning their meals in advance. Without planning ahead, they would just grab whatever was available. "Before shelter in place they would prep their meals and sort of had a plan," said Dr. Rami Bailony, the co founder and chief executive of Enara Health, a digital membership weight loss clinic. "Once Covid hit they thought they could cook something up that was healthy. But once you're thinking about eating in the moment you tend to go with what's expedient." When the pandemic started, Mindy Bachrach, 58, a home health occupational therapist in Henderson, Nev., soothed herself with sugary and high fat foods. As an essential worker, she was working pretty much all of her waking hours. "I have a weird job, I eat in my car all the time," she said. "If I don't prepare very carefully, I end up getting fast food, which I don't even like." After two weeks, her pants were tighter. As someone who had lost and regained dozens of pounds in her life, she panicked. "I decided I had to do something," she said. "If I didn't, things were going to get out of control." She went on the Whole 30 plan, which eliminates processed foods, sugar and sugar substitutes, alcohol, grains, dairy and most legumes. She also stopped weighing herself. "I wanted the focus to be on how foods made me feel and not weight loss itself," she said. Thirty days later, she stepped on the scale and was down 20 pounds. Randy Garcia, 42, of Dallas, has lost 104 pounds since July, 2019, with the help of Enara, which connects members with a doctor, dietitian and exercise coach and costs 400 a month. Mr. Garcia, who once weighed 400 pounds and works in I.T., said his usual pre Enara ritual included trips to Chick fil A or McDonald's with his wife and three kids. That became impossible as the lockdowns spread, so he began cooking at home. "It's been an experimental process," he said. "You have no options, so you have to do this." Mr. Garcia had tried everything from injections of human chorionic gonadotropin, or HCG, to a Keto diet to lose weight. He would, but it invariably crept back. Finally, he had enough and tried Enara, which his insurance mostly covers. "I needed to do something because my kids look at me as a role model," he said. "I don't want to look in the mirror and keep saying 'I have to do something about this' or go into a store and not being able to find a size that fits me." The lack of options also helped Leeanne Owens, 52, who has lost 18 pounds since the end of May through intermittent fasting and calorie counting. When Covid first hit, she ate whatever she wanted. "I stopped caring and just resolved myself to the fact that I was no longer young, attractive or in shape and somehow that was OK," she said. Then she stepped on the scale, and the higher than ever number made her do an about face. Rather than not care at all, she decided to use the time to start caring the most. "I decided, since I am shut in at home, why not take this time to live the type of lifestyle I have never really been able to tap into the ability to work out over lunch on my Peloton, the ability to stop eating at a certain time for intermittent fasting," Ms. Owens, who works for a technology consultancy firm in Boston, wrote in an email. Without the 40 mile commute each way from her home in a Boston suburb into the city, she had an extra three hours a day to focus on exercising and healthy cooking. Plus, office temptations food laden birthday celebrations and jars of candy resting on colleagues' desks no longer existed. "I started to think of weight loss the effort and ultimately the results as a transformation, changing the traits and toxic thinking anchoring me down, doing the work privately, without judgment, without having to worry about trying to find something healthy at lunch time at the office, without having my appetite triggered by someone bringing lunch to their cube at 11 a.m., without the constant snacks, team drinks, all of that," she said.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Well
Kim Cassford, a former private chef and house manager who co founded the staffing firm Cassford Management, says the most common mistake people make in interviewing candidates is not being thorough. HOUSEKEEPERS have been in the news lately. Look no further than former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger of California, who recently admitted that he had a child more than 10 years ago with his former housekeeper. But this column is for the other people who employ household help housekeepers, nannies, chefs, butlers and estate managers. Their problems are more about being compliant with employment and tax laws and ensuring low turnover. "There is no rocket science in our business," said Travis Dommert, chief operating officer of the Lindquist Group, one of the oldest placement firms for household help in the country. "It's about how you hire, manage and retain good people and not get sued in the process." Yet otherwise smart, wealthy people seem to have a harder time managing their household employees than the people they work with in their day jobs. Here are some tips for people planning to hire household help. NECESSITY VS. LUXURY During the recession, the market for household help was the inverse of other markets: middle and upper middle class consumers kept it afloat, while the wealthiest cut back. "Housekeeping and nanny requests are what kept us going through the recession," said Keith Greenhouse, president of the Pavillion Agency, a 50 year old domestic staffing firm in New York. The reason, said Mr. Greenhouse and others, is that many middle and upper middle class couples need a housekeeper or a nanny so they can work. "For most families with household staff, help is not a luxury but a necessity," said Kathleen English, who has worked with members of the Rockefeller family and now runs the English Household. "Let's look at what we're talking about here. This category encompasses your babysitter, your cleaning lady, the helpmate for your mom, the folks who cut your grass and help keep your house running smoothly while you work." She said many of her clients had tried hard to retain their help during the downturn. Among the wealthiest, though, a full accoutrement of servants is either less appealing or an expense they no longer want. "I think people's lifestyles have changed," Ms. English said. "While Prince Charles employs several hundred staff, William and Kate are more modern, live with less and are more casual in their lifestyles. Household staffing needs are beginning to reflect this modern view." Acknowledging this, Mr. Greenhouse said his firm had added a training school that employers could use to teach their existing household workers different skills and reduce the need to hire additional people. He cited the example of a longtime housekeeper who doesn't have the skills to serve a formal dinner. COMMON MISTAKES Many affluent Americans are apt to skip over the logistical details when they deal with their household employees. They may rush the hiring process, run afoul of labor laws or create an unnecessarily stressful situation. In interviewing candidates, the most common mistake people make is not being thorough. "They overlook qualifications and background checks," said Kim Cassford, a former private chef and house manager who co founded the staffing firm Cassford Management. "You want to look at someone holistically. Check all their references. Are they stable emotionally? What's their credit history? Do they know C.P.R.? Just one isolated incident can ruin a child's life." The best known problems, though, are hiring undocumented workers and not paying household help legally. Staffing firms say that while they make sure the people they place have proper documents, it is not their responsibility to address how the workers are paid. "We offer a payroll service that is geared toward domestic staff," Mr. Greenhouse said. But some clients, he said, do not want to be told how to pay the people they employ. "They want their staff and want to pay them however they want," he said. "We don't advise that. But you can't twist their arms. They want to do it the way they want to do it." It is hard to believe that anyone thinks it is all right to employ illegal household staff or pay them under the table. But the chances of getting caught are low. Timothy F. Geithner's confirmation hearings for Treasury secretary got bogged down in 2009 when it came out that he had employed a housekeeper whose working papers expired while she worked for him. And plenty of people in the wealthier suburbs around New York, where Mr. Geithner lived, blithely ignore the requirement to withhold income taxes for their nannies. But why? "There is a knowledge gap and this perceived hassle factor," said Mr. Dommert of the Lindquist Group. He said he had heard that more employers were caught during the recession because household workers filed for unemployment benefits and governmental agencies found there was no record of their past jobs. The other big problem is with how people treat their employees. The State of New York is leading the way with labor laws intended to give greater protections to domestic workers, including overtime pay and vacation days. But many employers are uncertain how to comply with the laws. "People have been asking me on the client side about the new labor laws," said Steven Laitmon, co founder of the Calendar Group, a placement service based in Westport, Conn. "That's tricky. Yet you need to respect your housekeeper's time as well." Inside the home, the employer often struggles with keeping the professional and the personal relationship separate. After all, these people are caring for your children or cleaning your bedroom. "You should be friendly but not familiar," Ms. Cassford said. "Try to maintain your distance. Your obligation is to pay them a timely wage. Once you open up an invitation to have that relationship that's too friendly, you've started a pattern. You can't go back." DISCUSS THE RULES FIRST Treating someone who works in your house as you would a subordinate at work may be difficult given the more intimate setting, but it is best for everyone involved, experts agreed. The consensus among staffing firms is that a house will function more smoothly when specific expectations are laid out. "Whether it's middle class or ultrahigh net worth, one page of house rules could save your life, your marriage, your family," Mr. Dommert said. "House rules start a dialogue around topics the employees are reluctant to ask: 'Where may I go? Where may I not go? What are topics I can discuss with you? When will I be paid and how will I be paid? Where should I park?'" It is no different from any other workplace, he said. "To hire people, not tell them the rules and expect them to meet your expectations is ludicrous, but that happens every day in people's homes." Once those expectations are laid out, the best way to keep everyone content is to have regular meetings. Assuming that someone will read your mind and intuitively know what needs to be done is a recipe for frustration and disappointment.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Your Money
The pompadour, the pancake, the pantsuits, the pink in style as in music, Little Richard led the way. As he himself would have been the first to say, everything began with Little Richard not just rock 'n' roll but gender bending as showmanship, self mythology as an art form, drag in the middle of Main Street. And while much of what the man born Richard Wayne Penniman in Macon, Ga., laid claim to had roots deep in African American culture, his genius was to position himself like a throw down ball queen decimating the competition as he played the dozens, naming himself the originator, the basis of all the begats. He was too much; no one ever said different. Even his too muchness, though, had its source in a rich and vivid queer identity he alternately skirted, trumpeted and refuted but could never successfully efface. It is there in the music, of course, but also in a personal presentation only marginally less startling and radical today than it would have been in the repressive and homophobic America of the 1950s. Without the man Mick Jagger called the King, there would likely have been no Mr. Jagger himself, made up and prancing onstage in skintight jumpsuits, or any of the other musicians whose assaults on gender did not let's face it come out of nowhere. There would have been no Elton John, queening in front of millions, or David Bowie, who freely credited Little Richard's inspiration. There would be no Madonna who, in appropriating vogueing was also inadvertently paying homage to a lineage of drag and trans and queer people whose otherness could not be wiped off like greasepaint when the curtain came down. The sturdiness of the chain of inspiration Little Richard embodied can still be seen in the transgressive work of performers like Janelle Monae, H.E.R. and Tyler the Creator. Given how improbable it was that the raw and unconstrained talents of a sexually uncategorizable (though essentially queer) black man with one leg shorter and one eye larger than the other would come to be positioned at the center of 20th century culture, what seems miraculous is that Little Richard happened at all. Who could have predicted the mainstream ascent of a sometime drag performer who, before his first hit record, worked as a dishwasher at bus station slop joint in the Jim Crow South? How, in an era when queerness was medicalized, criminalized, stigmatized and largely confined to the shadows, did the comet of Little Richard's gift the visual one as much as the musical blaze its way to visibility? It almost didn't happen. Early publicity material and album covers show the effort record labels made to package Little Richard to accommodate the conservative tastes of the time. He is dressed in sack suits or sweater jackets of a kind favored by superstars like Nat King Cole. In one still from Peacock Records, the processed and marcelled hair that was Little Richard's irrepressible glory has been squashed beneath a calypsonian's straw hat. Yet Little Richard was nobody's crossover act or bumpkin. Appearing as an unlikely nightclub act in the 1956 Hollywood film "The Girl Can't Help It," with Jayne Mansfield and Tom Ewell, Little Richard stands to pound the piano while dressed in a conservative gray sharkskin suit. When the camera pulls back, though, we note that his shoes are two tone, silver on black; the toe caps may even be metal. Even when dressed for masculine realness, Little Richard somehow managed to be subversive. Thus, while the figure in the vintage photograph on the cover of a paperback edition of "The Life and Times of Little Richard," the 1984 Charles White biography, seems innocuous enough when viewed through contemporary eyes powder blue suit, pink shirt, pink tone on tone tie it is worth remembering that, in the benighted 1950s, pink was unambiguously a tell. The suits were abandoned once success was assured. The makeup got heavier: the lipstick more overt, the spackled on foundation and the heffalump eyelashes. The hair became pneumatic enough to recall Little Richard's early days onstage performing as Princess Lavonne. Much has been written about the spectacular vagaries of Little Richard's long career his meteoric success, sad decline, excesses both chemical and sexual, religious conversions, comebacks and his apparent acceptance at last of the self parody ("Family Feud" and "Hollywood Squares") that is so often the Act III denouement of show business careers. The magisterial image I will always retain of Little Richard, though, is derived from the wild physical amalgam that first emerged from the shadow world of Deep South clubs, when he led a band called the Upsetters: face beaten looks swiped from raggedy drag queens, a pompadour adapted from the R B singer Esquerita, piano licks copied from Louis Jordan and vocal ones from Sister Rosetta Tharpe and the gospel singer Marion Williams. The picture I am thinking of is a portrait, possibly painted from a photograph, and created in 2013 by the artist Jack Pierson. Covering the whole of a nine foot canvas, it depicts Little Richard's face in monumental close up, a froth of hair, wild eyes, mouth opened wide to emit a reverberant, eternal hysterical falsetto holler.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Style
The NYC Winter Jazzfest is 15 years old, which is apparently enough time to develop its own version of "the old days." This year it stretched on for nine days, with concert marathons on consecutive weekends and marquee concerts sandwiched in between. Of all this, the best part might have been the evening most reminiscent of what the festival had been like five or 10 years ago. It was the Half Marathon on the event's first Saturday, an extra night of shows organizers added to stay aligned with the Association of Performing Arts Presenters convention, using just six clubs across Lower Manhattan. (The following weekend, a more typical, two day Marathon took over 11 spaces each night.) Fewer people came, so lines were shorter, and rooms were full but not crammed. Almost all the venues were easily walkable from each other, and it felt less like an opportunity to harvest information and more like a chance to sit with the music. In improvised music there's hardly the risk of repeating oneself, and one of the best things about Winter Jazzfest is running across the same artist in multiple contexts in a given night. During the Half Marathon, Joel Ross led a quintet at Subculture, perhaps the festival's finest listening venue, a small underground theater with good sound and plenty of room to move around. Mr. Ross, 23, is the player to watch in New York this year: a vibraphonist who unites a lot of the instrument's jazz history from Los Angeles, Chicago, Philadelphia and New York and understands the vibes as a possible connector between hip hop and West African music. Mr. Ross was among the most hired players at the festival, and it was as a side musician that he shone most brightly. Later that evening, on the drummer and producer Kassa Overall's set at Nublu, he locked into the slinky groove of "Layin' with the Swami," throwing things off every few cycles with a squib outside the scale. Mr. Ross was the M.V.P. sideman in this quartet, but really the honor belonged to him and Brandee Younger in tandem; her harp joined up with his vibraphone to create a single unit, woven and resounding. (They've done this before.) Mr. Overall was recreating the lighthearted but heavy grooving vibe of the Blue After Dark jam sessions at Zinc Bar, which he hosted until recently on behalf of Revive Music (he left to begin a new residency at the Jazz Gallery). The vocalist and multimedia performer Melanie Charles will take over from Mr. Overall, later this month, and on Friday, during the full marathon, she performed at Mercury Lounge, where Revive curated a stage. Ms. Charles sang original music, sometimes from behind a deck of electronics, making a kind of astro hydraulic pastiches in both Haitian Creole and English. Videos projected onto a screen behind her showed grass and city scenes, and when she cued a sample from Aretha Franklin's "Day Dreaming," the iconic singer's image appeared onscreen. It's a tough song to cover, but Ms. Charles's band mostly got it (Revive's other stage, at the Bowery Ballroom, hosted a less successful closing jam session on Saturday, full of special guests like Thundercat and Bilal but frustratingly orchestrated by the drummer Chris Dave, who could never seem to get satisfied with his sound team or his band.) Vocalists at the edges of jazz, R B and spoken word were a recurring theme throughout both weekends. At the Half Marathon, this year's artist in residence, Meshell Ndegeocello who performed in different configurations throughout the festival presented a program titled "No More Water, the Fire Next Time," with a midsize band holding down slow grooves, and the poet Staceyann Chin reading acid verses. Quoting James Baldwin and telling of her own childhood in Brooklyn, she sped past outrage and sorrow, getting straight to a sense of conviction. During the Saturday of the full marathon, the singer Georgia Anne Muldrow joined the drummer Justin Brown's band, Nyeusi. She delivered lines of homely inspiration, sometimes in a casual repartee, elsewhere in a wail. "All this colonization in your brain, you gotta empty it out for the real thing to come in," she said. Behind her, Nyeusi ditched the wavy, synth driven sound of its 2018 album, embracing something crunchier, more savory. Some of the full weekend's purest energy was on display at the SoHo Playhouse, a rustic little theater on Vandam Street. There the booking outfit Search and Restore which has been involved in the festival for about a decade secured a constant flow of boldly inventive musicians across two nights. Many of them, like the bass clarinetist Lea Bertucci and the trumpeter Steph Richards, were horn players testing the limits of their instruments and their listeners. In duo with the drummer Gerald Cleaver on Friday night, the tenor saxophonist Travis Laplante used circular breathing to play repetitive, slowly morphing patterns that were both startling and hypnotic. Your ear echoed differently with every note, so that you ended up experiencing each cluster as a prism of many resonances, more than as a melody or a rhythm. What's new in jazz doesn't always equate to youth, or even any clear stylistic break. At Subculture on Saturday, the tenor saxophonist J.D. Allen, 46, working with a still new trio, welcomed David Murray, a stalwart saxophonist one generation Mr. Allen's senior. As they played Mr. Allen's stern but flexible original tunes, there was a vast difference in their approaches, but they traded ideas easily. The younger player often worked in long and heavy tones, related to John Coltrane; even his quickest lines had a wary darkness. Mr. Murray used a higher center of gravity, often vaulting from cool swing to fish at the end of the line agitation. On the punchy "Graffiti," Murray chewed on his horn, softening the rhythm, and Nic Caccioppo's drums ended up in an open tumble. During the second weekend, Nublu's stage was given over to International Anthem, a four year old independent label in Chicago that is already having an outsize influence on creative music. On Friday at 11:30, I knew I should be seeing what all the fuss was about with Louis Cole, a wunderkind YouTube sensation whose jazz infused, fratty IDM is starting to give Snarky Puppy a run for its money. He was playing at the Sheen Center, a theater across from Subculture. Instead, I stood in the front row for all of Ben LaMar Gay's riveting set a tangle of samba, blues and math rock, bouncing from Bubber Miley to Animal Collective and then stuck around for Joshua Abrams and Natural Information Society, a sextet featuring the bandleader on guimbri, Lisa Alvarado pulling chords out of a sighing harmonium, and Jason Stein playing sharply cut patterns on the bass clarinet. Mr. Stein's funny shapes jutted up against the group's circular, silt over rock flow, creating good tension. Mr. Abrams has been making Afrocentric, droning free jazz like this for a long time. In recent years, that kind of thing has become more commonplace on the avant garde. Still, even if it didn't reveal any blazing new truths, Mr. Abrams makes affecting music; I was glad to have stayed put and taken it in.	N24News: A New Dataset for Multimodal News Classification	Music

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