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The average American woman weighs 166.2 pounds, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. As reddit recently pointed out, that's almost exactly as much as the average American man weighed in the early 1960s.
Men, you're not looking too hot in this scenario either. Over the same time period you gained nearly 30 pounds, from 166.3 in the 60s to 195.5 today. Doing the same comparison as above, today's American man weighs almost as much as 1.5 American women from the 1960s. At 195.5 pounds, put five American guys in a room and you've gathered roughly half a ton of manhood.
Overall weight gain since 1960 is slightly greater for women (18.5 percent) than for men (17.6 percent). And both sexes have gained roughly an inch in height over the same period, which accounts for some of that weight gain.
But story is mostly one of growing girth, and it basically boils down to three factors: we're eating less healthy food, we're eating more of it, and we're not moving around as much. According to a study published in 2012 in the journal BMC Public Health, Americans are now the world's third-heaviest people, behind only the Pacific island nations of Tonga and Micronesia.
The average American is 33 pounds heavier than the average Frenchman, 40 pounds heavier than the average Japanese citizen, and a whopping 70 pounds heavier than the average citizen of Bangladesh. To add up to one ton of total mass, it takes 20 Bangladeshis but only 12.2 Americans.
Together, the world's adult human beings added up to 287 million tons of biomass in 2005, according to the BMC Public Health study. But if every country had the same weight distribution as the U.S., the world would be 58 million tons fatter, an increase of 20 percent.
The study concludes that "tackling population fatness may be critical to world food security and ecological sustainability." And as with so many of the world's problems, the solutions start at home -- on the bathroom scale in this case. But boy, those donuts sure do look delicious. ||||| Atlanta, Ga. (CBS ATLANTA) — The average American woman now weighs as much as the average American man weighed in 1960.
Both U.S. men and women have been packing on the pounds since 1960, with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showing that the average American woman now weighs 166.2 pounds – nearly identical to what American men weighed in the 1960s. And U.S. men have expanded greatly in the same time period, having gained nearly 30 pounds from the 1960s to 2010 – 166.3 pounds to 195.5 pounds today.
The CDC data shows that both sexes have gained almost an inch in height from the 1960s, which factors into some of the overall weight gain. But women have seen an 18.5 percent increase in weight gain from 1960 and men have shown a 17.6 percent increase in overall weight gain.
Today’s American male weighs nearly as much as 1.5 American females from the 1960s, with today’s U.S. male weighing an average 195.5 pounds and having a nearly 40-inch waist circumference (39.7 inches).
American women today have an average waist circumference of 37.5 inches and weigh in at 166.2 pounds, up from about 140 pounds in 1960.
The CDC data shows that more than one-third (35.1 percent) of U.S. adults over the age of 20 are considered obese. And 69 percent of American adults over the age of 20 are either overweight or obese.
More than 1-in-5 U.S. children between the ages of 12-19 are considered obese, with 17.7 percent of kids ages 6-11 also weighing in at obesity levels.
A 2012 study published in the journal MBC Public Health finds that Americans are now the world’s third-heaviest people, trailing only the Pacific Island countries of Tonga and Micronesia. The average U.S. adult is 33 pounds heavier than the average Frenchman and 70 pounds heavier than the average Bangladeshi citizen. To compile a ton of total mass, it would require only 12.2 Americans in a room versus 20 average citizens of Bangladesh.
A 2005 BMC Public Health study revealed that the world’s adult human beings make up 287 million tons of biomass, but if every country was as large as the U.S., Earth would be 58 million tons fatter.
— Benjamin Fearnow | – Picture the average American couple in the 1960s. Now picture the average American couple today. Something more than questionable fashion should stand out, according to new data from the CDC, which finds the average weight of a US woman is now 166.2 pounds—about the same weight as the average man in the 1960s—up from about 140 pounds during that time, reports the Washington Post. That's an increase of 18.5%. Men, who weighed 166.3 pounds in the 1960s, now tip the scales at an average of 195.5 pounds, for a 17.6% gain. Is it as bad as it seems? Essentially, yes, though the typical height of men and women has grown by an inch, which at least accounts for something. But the main reasons for our growing bellies are no surprise: Americans are eating more food, but less health food, and are exercising less. The data shows 35% of Americans over 20 are considered obese, while 69% of adults are either overweight or obese, reports CBS Atlanta. As for children, one in five between 12 and 19 and 18% between 6 and 11 are obese. A 2012 study found Americans were the third-heaviest people on the planet behind residents of Tonga and Micronesia. The average American was 33 pounds heavier than a Frenchman, 40 pounds heavier than a citizen of Japan, and 70 pounds heavier than a person in Bangladesh, adds the Post. Dying to get back to that 1960s frame? It's actually more important to watch what you eat rather than exercise constantly, though exercising and eating healthy together is obviously beneficial. The New York Times notes that 30 minutes of jogging achieves the same calorie reduction as cutting back on two 16-ounce sodas. (Click to read why we weigh less on Fridays.) |
Local photographer Muhammad Malik was coming out of the subway when he happened upon the immediate aftermath of this morning's deadly shooting near the Empire State Building. He promptly uploaded a photo of one victim, bleeding on the pavement, to Instagram, complete with a crass caption quoting the rapper Nas: " " On Facebook, he added, "MAN DOWN! SHOTS FIRED!"
Soon after, the news organizations came calling for permission to run the picture. "OMG, reporters are calling me from all over the country!" he wrote. "Making major deals! #chaching." But when reached by Daily Intel to ask about his rate, Malik was more subdued. "Actually to be honest, it's free — I don't even care," he said. "That happened this morning, at this point it's just too much for me." He also insisted he wasn't being offensive. ||||| Notice
You must log in to continue. | – One of the more widely used images from today's shooting spree near the Empire State Building shows a wounded man on the street being being tended to by a woman. Turns out it was shot by local photographer Muhammad Malik, who immediately uploaded it to Instagram with this not-so-sensitive caption, a play off of lyrics by Nas: "They shoot, aw made you look! No really tho. Dude got popped!" That drew plenty of online criticism, as did his Facebook boasts (complete with hashtag #chaching) about cashing in on the photo. "Let's be clear everyone, I didn't shoot anyone, I just took a photo, don't hate me, hate the actions that caused me to get a picture like that," he wrote in response. "It's cameras that allow all of us to see what's going on in parts that we would never venture into or otherwise wouldn't think twice about." When Daily Intel caught up with him, a "more subdued" Malik said he would "probably not" make any money from the image. "I don't think it was insensitive," he said. "It's New York, I just took a photo." As for that caption, "it was just a comment." |
The American Cancer Society’s estimates for melanoma skin cancer in the United States for 2015 are:
About 73,870 new cases of melanoma
About 9,940 deaths from melanoma
Skin cancer is the most common of all cancers. Melanoma accounts for less than 2% of skin cancers. But it causes most skin cancer deaths.
The number of new cases of melanoma in the United States has been rising for at least 30 years.
Overall, the lifetime risk of getting melanoma is about 1 in 40 for whites, 1 in 1,000 for blacks, and 1 in 200 for Hispanics. But each person’s risk is also affected by other factors.
Unlike many other common cancers, melanoma occurs in both younger and older people. But the risk goes up with age. ||||| Researchers at King's College London have investigated a new method that could be used by GPs to quickly determine the number of moles on the entire body by counting the number found on a smaller 'proxy' body area, such as an arm.
Naevus (mole) count is one of the most important markers of risk for skin cancer despite only 20 to 40 per cent of melanoma arising from pre-existing moles. The risk is thought to increase by two to four per cent per additional mole on the body, but counting the total number on the entire body can be time consuming in a primary care setting.
Previous studies on a smaller scale have attempted to identify mole count on certain body sites as a proxy to accurately estimate the number on the body as a whole and found that the arm was the most predictive.
This study, funded by the Wellcome Trust, used a much larger sample of participants to identify the most useful 'proxy' site for a full body mole count as well as the 'cut off' number of moles that can be used to predict those at the highest risk of developing skin cancer.
The researchers used data from 3594 female Caucasian twins between January 1995 and December 2003 as part of the TwinsUK study protocol. Twins underwent a skin examination including recording skin type, hair and eye colour and freckles as well as mole count on 17 body sites performed by trained nurses. This was then replicated in a wider sample of male and female participants from a UK melanoma case control study published previously.
Scientists found that the count of moles on the right arm was most predictive of the total number on the whole body. Females with more than seven moles on their right arm had nine times the risk of having more than 50 on the whole body and those with more than 11 on their right arm were more likely to have over 100 on their body in total, meaning they were at a higher risk of developing a melanoma.
These findings could help GPs to more easily identify those at the highest risk of developing a melanoma (skin cancer).
Scientists also found that the area above the right elbow was particularly predictive of the total body count of moles. The legs were also strongly associated with the total count as well as the back area in males.
Lead author, Simone Ribero of the Department of Twin Research & Genetic Epidemiology said: 'This study follows on from previous work to identify the best proxy site for measuring the number of moles on the body as a whole. The difference here is that it has been done on a much larger scale in a healthy Caucasian population without any selection bias and subsequently replicated in a case control study from a similar healthy UK population, making the results more useful and relevant for GPs.
'The findings could have a significant impact for primary care, allowing GPs to more accurately estimate the total number of moles in a patient extremely quickly via an easily accessible body part. This would mean that more patients at risk of melanoma can be identified and monitored.'
### ||||| Skin Cancer Facts
What does the skin do?
The skin is the largest organ of the body. It does many things, such as:
Covers your internal organs and protects them from injury
Serves as a barrier to germs
Keeps you from losing too much water and other fluids
Helps control your body temperature
Protects the rest of your body from ultraviolet (UV) rays
Helps your body make vitamin D
How common is skin cancer?
Skin cancer is the most common cancer. About 5.4 million basal and squamous cell skin cancers are diagnosed each year. (These are found in about 3.3 million Americans; some people have more than one.) Melanoma, the most deadly type of skin cancer, will account for about 76,380 cases of skin cancer in 2016.
Types of skin cancers
Skin cancer is by far the most common type of cancer. If you have skin cancer, it’s important to know which type you have because it affects your treatment options and your outlook (prognosis).
Basal and squamous cell skin cancers
These types of skin cancers start in the basal cells or squamous cells of the skin, which is how they get their names. These cells are in the outer layer of your skin.
Most basal and squamous cell cancers develop on sun-exposed areas of your skin, like the face, ears, neck, lips, and the backs of your hands.
Basal cell cancers tend to grow slowly and rarely spread to other parts of the body. Squamous cell cancers are more likely to grow into deeper layers of skin and spread, but this is not common.
Both basal cell and squamous cell skin cancers can be cured if found and treated early – when they are small and have not spread. But either type can cause problems if left untreated.
You can learn more about these skin cancers at Skin Cancer: Basal and Squamous Cell.
Melanoma skin cancer
Melanoma is a cancer that starts in melanocytes – the cells that make the brown skin pigment known as melanin, which gives skin its color. Melanin helps protect the deeper layers of the skin from sun damage.
Melanoma can start on nearly any part of the skin, even in places that aren’t normally exposed to the sun, like the genital or anal areas. Melanoma most often affects the skin (including under the nails), but it can also start in other parts of the body, such as in the eyes or mouth.
Melanoma is almost always curable when it’s found in very early stages. Melanoma accounts for only a small percentage of skin cancers, but it’s much more likely to grow and spread to other parts of the body, where it can be hard to treat. Because of this, melanoma causes most skin cancer deaths, accounting for more than 10,000 of the more than 13,650 skin cancer deaths each year.
You can learn more at Melanoma Skin Cancer.
Other types of skin cancer
There are many other types of skin cancer, such as Merkel cell carcinoma, skin lymphoma, Kaposi sarcoma, skin adnexal tumors, and sarcomas. These are all much less common than basal or squamous cell cancers or melanomas.
Skin cancer risk factors
Risk factors for skin cancer include:
Too much exposure to ultraviolet (UV) radiation (from sunlight or tanning beds and lamps)
Pale skin (easily sunburned, doesn’t tan much or at all, natural red or blond hair)
Exposure to large amounts of coal tar, paraffin, arsenic compounds, or certain types of oil
You or members of your family have had skin cancers
Multiple or unusual moles
Severe sunburns in the past
Weakened immune system
Older age (although melanomas are also found in younger people)
Signs and symptoms of skin cancer
Skin cancer can be found early, and you and your health care providers play key roles in finding skin cancer. Learn how to examine your skin for changes. If you have any of these symptoms, see a provider:
Any change on your skin, especially in the size or color of a mole, growth, or spot, or a new growth (even if it has no color)
Scaliness, roughness, oozing, bleeding, or a change in the way an area of skin looks
A sore that doesn’t heal
The spread of pigment (color) beyond its border, such as dark coloring that spreads past the edge of a mole or mark
A change in sensation, such as itchiness, tenderness, or pain
To see some examples of different types of skin cancers, see our Skin Cancer Image Gallery.
Can skin cancer be prevented?
The best ways to help lower your risk of skin cancer is to stay out of intense sunlight and practice sun safety. You can still exercise and enjoy the outdoors while practicing sun safety at the same time. Here are some ways to be sun safe: ||||| People who have 11 or more moles on one of their arms could have a higher risk of the deadly skin cancer melanoma, according to a new study.
Researchers counted the number of moles that study participants had on 17 sites on the skin of their bodies — such as the left leg, the chest and the back — and found that the arms were the site that was the best indicator of the total number of moles on the whole body.
For example, women with at least seven moles on an arm were nine times more likely to have at least 50 moles on their entire body than those who had fewer than seven moles on their right arm. And those with at least 11 moles on an arm were more likely to have at least 100 moles on their whole body — a sign of a drastically increased risk of skin cancer.
The findings suggest that the arm could be the best place to look to estimate the number of moles on the whole body. "Many different body sites were predictive of total body mole count, but at the end, the strongest one was the arm," said lead study author Simone Ribero, a research fellow at King's College London, adding that the right or left arm work as a good indicator of the total number of moles on the whole body. [5 Things You Must Know About Skin Cancer ]
There will be an estimated 74,000 new cases of melanoma in the United States in 2015, and 10,000 of those people will die of the disease this year, according to the National Cancer Institute.
The total number of moles a person has is an important marker that can help determine their risk of skin cancer, according to the researchers.
In the new study, the researchers looked at data from 3,694 female Caucasian twins who were taking part in a long-running study of twins in the United Kingdom, called the TwinsUK study. Between January 1995 and December 2003, the participants underwent a skin examination in which researchers recorded their skin type, eye color and freckles, hair color and moles.
The researchers also confirmed the link they found between total mole count and the number of moles on the right arm using data from another study, which included male and female participants.
Two other body sites — the area above the right elbow, and the legs — were also found to be particularly predictive of a person's total body mole count. In men, the number of moles on the back was a good indicator of total mole count as well, the researchers said.
A person's melanoma risk is thought to increase by 2 to 4 percent with each additional mole on the body, the researchers said. However, determining the total number of moles on the whole body can be difficult and time-consuming.
"Every dermatologist and physician in general knows that the risk of melanoma increases with the total body number of moles, but counting moles is a very long procedure," Riberosaid. "We hope that this technique will be helpful for this."
However, there are other factors that may better determine a person's risk of melanoma, said Dr. Hooman Khorasani, chief of dermatologic and cosmetic surgery at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York, who was not involved in the study.
"Genetic composition is way more important, as well as how the moles look," Khorasani said. For example, moles that doctors call "dysplastic nevi," which are unusual, benign moles butthat resemble moles that indicate the presence of melanoma are essential to distinguish from other moles because they signal an increased cancer risk.
According to the American Cancer Society, people with greater exposure to ultraviolet (UV) light, and those with fair skin, freckles, light hair or a family history of melanoma face an increased risk of melanoma.
"It's more important that you look at a person's risk factors than count the number of moles on their arm," Khorasani said.
The study was published Monday (Oct. 19) in the British Journal of Dermatology.
Follow Live Science @livescience, Facebook & Google+. Originally published on Live Science. | – This year will see almost 10,000 deaths in the US from melanoma, with nearly 74,000 new cases diagnosed. But most skin cancers, including melanoma, are curable if caught and treated early, which is why doctors are anxious to ID them ASAP. Researchers at King's College London say they've found a way to simplify counting one of the disease's prime markers—moles on the body—by using a "proxy site" that would allow physicians to more quickly pinpoint individuals who might need follow-up. Instead of going through the laborious process of counting moles on the entire body, doctors can count moles on the right arm, then use that figure to extrapolate to the number of moles on the body overall, per a press release. And there's a specific number that could serve as a warning sign: Find more than 11 moles on that arm, and your risk of melanoma could be higher. Researchers looked at data from nearly 4,000 female Caucasian twins who were studied between 1995 and 2003. They counted the number of moles on 17 body sites and found women who had at least seven moles on their right arm were nine times more likely to have at least 50 moles all over their body, and that when they had more than 11 moles on their right arm, they were likely to have more than 100 moles—signifying "a drastically increased risk of skin cancer," per Live Science. The scientists then replicated the link between arm mole count and total body mole count using another study that included both males and females. "The findings could have a significant impact for primary care, allowing GPs to more accurately estimate the total number of moles in a patient extremely quickly via an easily accessible body part," the study's lead author says. Two other proxy sites that may prompt a doctor visit: above the right elbow and the legs. (Downing a few cups of joe may help fend off malignant melanoma.) |
President Trump recently asked his lawyers for their advice on the possibility of pardoning Paul Manafort and other aides accused of crimes, his lawyer said Thursday.
The subject of pardoning Manafort came as Trump’s former campaign chairman faced multiple charges of bank fraud and tax evasion in an Alexandria criminal case, Trump attorney Rudolph W. Giuliani said in an interview.
Trump’s lawyers counseled the president against the idea of pardoning anyone linked to the investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, according to Giuliani, saying Trump should at least wait until special counsel Robert S. Mueller III has concluded his probe. Giuliani said the president agreed and did not push the issue further.
“He said yes,” Giuliani said. “He agreed with us.”
Giuliani said Trump was seeking advice in the wake of a spate of pardons he granted earlier this summer, including for a woman whom Kim Kardashian had lobbied the White House to release. Giuliani said he and fellow personal attorney Jay Sekulow had advised waiting to see whether Mueller delivers a damning report that accuses the president of trying to block a federal probe of his campaign’s contacts with Russians.
White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders told reporters Wednesday that she “wasn’t aware” of any discussions of Trump pardoning Manafort and that the topic was “not something that’s been up for discussion.”
On Thursday, in the wake of Giuliani’s comment, Sanders said the pardon topic is not under active consideration “in the White House.”
“This pardon is not something being discussed in the White House and the president has not made a decision on pardoning Paul Manafort or anyone else,” she said in a statement.
The exact timing and nature of the pardon discussion is unclear.
A senior administration official said the president discussed the pros and cons of granting pardons to Manafort and others linked to a probe of his campaign “a few weeks ago.”
Giuliani initially said he and Trump had the conversation “three to five weeks ago” but later corrected his statement to say he believed they discussed it several weeks earlier, in June. Giuliani clarified in a follow-up call to The Post that his conversation with Trump was a general discussion about potential pardons for a range of people under investigation, including but not limited to Manafort.
Some experts have argued Trump could expose himself to more legal danger if he were to pardon aides who are witnesses in the Mueller probe, because Mueller is examining the president’s own conduct and whether he sought to obstruct justice.
Giuliani acknowledged that risk.
“We sat him down and said you’re not considering these other pardons with anybody involved in the investigation. He said yes, absolutely, I understand,” Giuliani said. “The real concern is whether Mueller would turn any pardon into an obstruction charge.”
Other Trump associates who have pleaded guilty as part of Mueller’s investigation include former national security adviser Michael Flynn, former campaign adviser George Papadopoulos and Trump campaign aide Rick Gates.
Mueller’s findings are supposed to be provided in a report to Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein, who would then decide whether any evidence of wrongdoing was serious enough that it should be presented to Congress to consider for impeachment proceedings.
Trump has repeatedly decried the government’s treatment of Manafort — who a jury found guilty Tuesday on eight counts of tax- and bank-fraud charges. Manafort refused to cooperate with Mueller investigators seeking his information about the Trump campaign and instead took his chances at trial.
On Tuesday, the president told reporters that Manafort was a “good man” and that he felt sorry for him.
Trump tweeted his support of Manafort on Wednesday while criticizing Michael Cohen, his former personal lawyer, who pleaded guilty Tuesday to five counts of tax evasion, one count of making a false statement to a bank and two campaign finance violations: willfully causing an illegal corporate contribution and making an excessive campaign contribution.
“I feel very badly for Paul Manafort and his wonderful family,” Trump tweeted. “ ‘Justice’ took a 12 year old tax case, among other things, applied tremendous pressure on him and, unlike Michael Cohen, he refused to ‘break’ — make up stories in order to get a ‘deal.’ Such respect for a brave man!”
Inside the West Wing, the prospect of a Manafort pardon is met with near universal opposition. Chief of Staff John F. Kelly, White House counsel Donald F. McGahn and attorney Emmet T. Flood are all opposed. Aides are trying to keep Trump from even discussing the matter. After Ainsley Earhardt, the Fox News anchor, said Wednesday night that Trump discussed a pardon while appearing on Fox News, Sanders asked her to clarify her comments that she did not hear Trump say that, according to a person familiar with the matter. Officials are increasingly frustrated with Giuliani inside the West Wing.
Trump has admiringly talked about how Manafort did not “flip” on him and was ebullient when Judge T.S. Ellis said that the prosecution only wanted to go after Manafort to get him. Asked about a pardon, one senior White House official said: “What does it accomplish? You pardon him, it doesn’t get rid of the Mueller probe, it causes you more headaches, he still has another trial, you have more Republicans coming after you.”
“Legally he’s entitled to pardon Manafort,” said Alan Dershowitz, a Harvard professor that Trump likes to watch on TV. “My advice to the president is don’t tweet, don’t pardon, don’t testify, don’t fire.”
That was a major shift for Trump, who in April called it a “national disgrace” when federal investigators raided Cohen’s home and office as part of an investigation into his efforts during the campaign to squelch embarrassing stories about Trump.
Cohen implicated Trump directly in some of his acts when he pleaded guilty Tuesday, saying he arranged to pay off two women to keep their stories of alleged affairs with Trump from becoming public before Election Day — in coordination with the then-candidate.
Trump has repeatedly expressed his anger at how federal prosecutors had “beat up” and mistreated Manafort. The president’s critics argue that Trump’s public tweets are a thinly-veiled message to Manafort, that he supports his refusal to cooperate with Mueller and is willing to pardon him in the future.
Giuliani said Trump’s concern for Manafort is what motivates him to consider a pardon.
“He feels Manafort has been mistreated. Nobody in a case like this gets raided in the middle of the night, put in solitary confinement,” Giuliani said. “They tried to crack him and it didn’t work. Over the last two to three weeks, he’s expressed anger and frustration about how he’s been treated.”
This story has been updated.
Rosalind S. Helderman contributed to this report. ||||| On Wednesday, several aides dismissed the news about Mr. Cohen as just another bad headline lacking the silver bullet that they say the special counsel would need to prove that the president conspired with Russian officials.
Mr. Trump spent the early hours of Wednesday tweeting — he called the convicted Mr. Manafort a “brave man” who, unlike Mr. Cohen, “refused to ‘break’” or “make up stories in order to get a ‘deal.’’’ He also monitored headlines, as he did after his news conference with Mr. Putin. In the interview with Fox News, he asserted that money for the payments to the women had come not from his campaign, but from his own accounts.
“I don’t know if you know,” Mr. Trump said during the interview, “but I tweeted about the payments. But they didn’t come out of the campaign.” Campaign finance laws still prohibit Mr. Trump from making unreported payments related to the campaign, regardless of where they came from. Neither payment was disclosed to the Federal Election Commission.
On Air Force One on Tuesday night on the way back from a rally in West Virginia, Mr. Trump repeatedly minimized the news, telling aides that the legal developments were not about him, but about Mr. Manafort and Mr. Cohen. He also groused over the optics of the rally, telling a person close to him that the crowd seemed flat and that some chairs were empty.
By Wednesday, Mr. Trump’s lawyers were arguing privately that Mr. Cohen’s admission and guilty plea to violating campaign finance laws was a punch but not a knockout blow, and were assessing what options they had for fighting back. They stressed that Mr. Cohen had said repeatedly in previous accounts that Mr. Trump was not aware of his payment to Ms. Clifford, known as Stormy Daniels. | – President Trump has discussed the political fallout of a potential pardon for Paul Manafort, whom he believes "has been horribly treated"—and understands a pardon is off the table, at least for now, according to Rudy Giuliani. The president's personal lawyer made the comments to the New York Times on Wednesday before elaborating to the Washington Post. Claiming the conversation occurred "three to five weeks ago" then correcting that timeline to June, Giuliani said Trump had brought up the possibility of a pardon but both Giuliani and fellow attorney Jay Sekulow advised against it, at least before the conclusion of special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation. "We sat him down and said you're not considering these other pardons with anybody involved in the investigation," Giuliani said. That would ostensibly include former national security adviser Michael Flynn, former campaign adviser George Papadopoulos, and campaign aide Rick Gates, all of whom have pleaded guilty as part of the Mueller probe. "He said yes, absolutely, I understand," Giuliani continued. "The real concern is whether Mueller would turn any pardon into an obstruction charge." Still, the president has been publicly praising Manafort since his Tuesday conviction on eight counts of financial fraud. "Some of the charges they threw against him, every consultant, every lobbyist in Washington probably does," Trump told Fox News on Thursday, a day after he took to Twitter to praise Manafort for refusing to "break" for prosecutors. "Such respect for a brave man!" he wrote. |
WASHINGTON (AP) — Both sides in the gay marriage debate agree on one thing: It's time for the Supreme Court to settle the matter.
FILE- In this June 26, 2013 file photo, gay rights advocate Vin Testa waves a rainbow flag in front of the Supreme Court in Washington. Both sides in the gay marriage debate agree on one thing: It’s time... (Associated Press)
Even a justice recently said she thinks so, too.
The emerging consensus makes it likely that the justices soon will agree to take up the question of whether the Constitution forbids states from defining marriage as the union of a man and a woman. A final ruling isn't likely before June 2015, but a decision to get involved could come as soon as the end of this month.
"I don't see a lot of reasons for them to wait," says Dale Carpenter, a gay rights expert at the University of Minnesota law school. "You have almost no one at this point opposed to certiorari," the legal term for high court review.
Officials in five states in which marriage bans were struck down by federal courts have rushed their appeals to the Supreme Court, in time for consideration by the justices when they meet in private on Sept. 29. Moving at breakneck speed, at least for the legal system, Indiana and Wisconsin filed appeals on Tuesday, just five days after the federal appeals court in Chicago struck down their state bans. The Chicago decision itself came just nine days after judges heard arguments, extremely fast for a process that usually is measured in months. Officials in Oklahoma, Utah and Virginia also have appealed to the Supreme Court.
Adding to the momentum, the winners in all those cases — who typically want to preserve their lower court victories and would normally oppose Supreme Court review — want the justices to weigh in. As expected, so do the losers.
In all, 36 states, encompassing both those that allow same-sex marriage and those that don't, want the justices to join the fray. Thirty businesses, including Alcoa, Amazon, eBay, General Electric, Intel, NIKE, Pfizer and Target, say the Supreme Court should extend same-sex marriage nationwide because the "current patchwork of state laws causes employees justifiable uncertainty about how their employers and governments will treat their familial relationships."
The range of cases seems to meet the standard set by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg when she predicted in an interview with The Associated Press in July that the court would not look for ways to avoid ruling on same-sex marriage, as it did for many years on interracial marriage bans.
"I think the court will not do what they did in the old days when they continually ducked the issue of miscegenation," Ginsburg said. "If a case is properly before the court, they will take it."
The speed at which gay marriage has moved through the courts stems from the Supreme Court's decision less than 15 months ago in U.S. v. Windsor to strike down a provision of the federal Defense of Marriage Act that denied a range of tax, health and veterans benefits to legally married gay couples.
Since that decision, nearly two dozen judges have relied on Justice Anthony Kennedy's opinion for the court to extend the Windsor decision to strike down state same-sex marriage bans in every region of the country. Only one federal trial judge, Martin Feldman in Louisiana, has upheld a state anti-gay marriage law. Elsewhere, two appellate judges have dissented from rulings in favor of same-sex marriage.
"We all know this is going to be decided one step up," attorney Monte Stewart said Monday in his court presentation in support of gay marriage bans in Idaho and Nevada.
"And we all know by whom," said appellate Judge Stephen Reinhardt.
Reinhardt was referring to Kennedy, the deciding vote in the Windsor case and the author of all three major gay rights decisions at the Supreme Court stretching back to 1996.
"Justice Kennedy has built himself quite a legacy on gay rights issues," said the University of Minnesota's Carpenter, doubting that Kennedy would repudiate that legacy by casting a likely decisive vote against the right to marry.
The Windsor decision expressly left open the question of whether states could limit marriage to a man and a woman, yet "courts are all looking to the Supreme Court's Windsor precedent as the rule of decision for challenges to state marriage laws," Colorado and 16 other states that do not allow same-sex marriage told the court in support of the state appeals.
Gay and lesbian couples can now get married in 19 states and the District of Columbia. Judges in an additional 14 states have struck down prohibitions but put the rulings on hold pending appeals. The federal appeals court in Cincinnati could issue a decision at any time affecting Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio and Tennessee. Appellate judges in San Francisco heard arguments Monday over bans in Idaho and Nevada.
The situation is strikingly different from the last time a state's same-sex marriage ban came to the Supreme Court — and that was only two years ago. Same-sex marriage then was legal in just six states.
"Talk about a journey. It's a movement that took a long time to get going, but it has really snowballed in the last two years," said James Esseks of the American Civil Liberties Union, which represents gay couples seeking to marry in Indiana, Virginia and Wisconsin.
Then, supporters and opponents of gay marriage squared off over whether the justices should even hear the case. Opponents urged Supreme Court review, while supporters pleaded with the justices to stay out of it. After all, they had won what they wanted in the lower courts, the invalidation of California's Proposition 8.
The court eventually agreed to hear the California case as well as the federal Defense of Marriage Act case. The justices issued a technical ruling in the California case that eliminated Prop 8 but left for another day whether same-sex couples elsewhere have a constitutional right to marry.
The prevailing view is that day will soon arrive.
___
Follow Mark Sherman on Twitter at: http://www.twitter.com/shermancourt ||||| Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
On Monday morning, the Supreme Court declined to review seven gay marriage decisions out of five different states. In each case, an appeals court had ruled that state-level gay marriage bans are unconstitutional. The Supreme Court's refusal to hear every case means that gay marriages can begin immediately in Indiana, Oklahoma, Utah, Virginia, and Wisconsin.
The move is unexpected and somewhat bizarre. Most court-watchers, including me, assumed the justices would wait to make a move on gay marriage until a circuit court ruled that state-level marriage bans were constitutional, swimming against the tide. At that point, the Supreme Court would be presented with a circuit split, essentially forcing it to wade in. And since the 6th Circuit seems poised to rule in favor of anti-gay-marriage laws, the justices probably would not have had to wait long.
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It appears, however, that the justices were not eager to keep gay couples in legal limbo while they awaited the 6th Circuit’s ruling. Instead, their move on Monday allows thousands of gay couples in five different states to wed legally. Should the 6th Circuit still rule against gay marriage, of course, the Supreme Court could take the case then. For now, however, the justices have rid themselves of the issue. ||||| That doesn’t mean, of course, that the court refused to hear those cases altogether. It simply means that the justices haven’t decided which, if any, of the cases they’d like to review. Conventional wisdom suggests that the court is waiting for a circuit court to rule against gay marriage before revisiting the topic; at that point, the circuits would be split on the issue, and the court would be more or less forced to intervene. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg recently suggested as much, noting that, until a circuit court found gay marriage bans to be constitutional, there would be “no need for us to rush.” ||||| Justice The Supreme Court Just Quietly Made Marriage Equality The Law Of The Land In Many States CREDIT: AP Photo/Richard Vogel
In a surprising anti-climax to one of the most important legal battles of the last several decades, the Supreme Court announced today that it would not hear several cases where federal appeals courts held that the Constitution guarantees same-sex couples the same marriage rights as straight couples. The announcement listed these marriage equality cases as part of a lengthy order listing the cases where the Court had denied review. The justices offered no explanation for their decision.
As a practical matter, however, this decision not to hear these cases is an earthquake for gay rights. The United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, which covers Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina, refused to issue a stay halting its order favoring marriage equality. Although the Supreme Court later stepped in with its own stay order, that order provides that the Supreme Court’s stay will “terminate automatically” if the Supreme Court denies review of the case. Now that the justices have done so, there should be no further legal barriers preventing marriages from beginning in those five states — although it is possible that there may be some delay before marriages may begin due to procedural steps that need to be taken by the judiciary.
The Court also denied review in cases arising out of the Seventh Circuit, which covers Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin, and in the Tenth Circuit, which covers Colorado, Kansas, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Utah and Wyoming. It is likely that marriages will be able to begin quickly in those states as well — although it may be necessary for plaintiffs in some of those states to seek an order from a federal court requiring states that oppose marriage equality to comply with their obligations under the Constitution.
One thing that should be noted is that there are still marriage equality cases pending before conservative circuits that could rule against equality. Nevertheless, the fact that marriages are likely to begin very shortly in the states currently subject to court orders will make it very difficult for the Supreme Court to reverse course — and retroactively invalidate those marriages — in a subsequent opinion. ||||| These crawls are part of an effort to archive pages as they are created and archive the pages that they refer to. That way, as the pages that are referenced are changed or taken from the web, a link to the version that was live when the page was written will be preserved.Then the Internet Archive hopes that references to these archived pages will be put in place of a link that would be otherwise be broken, or a companion link to allow people to see what was originally intended by a page's authors.The goal is to fix all broken links on the web . Crawls of supported "No More 404" sites. ||||| The Supreme Court was asked to consider petitions for certiorari in seven separate cases challenging state laws barring legal recognition of same-sex marriage. On Monday morning, SCOTUSBlog reported, the Supreme Court denied all seven petitions.
Most commentators have assumed the Supreme Court would take one or more of these cases and (perhaps) conclusively determine whether the federal Constitution bars states from refusing to recognize same-sex marriages under state law. Yet all seven cases below had come out the same way. In all seven, lower courts struck down the challenged state laws, so there was no circuit split.
Given the lack of a split, I do not think it is at all surprising that the court denied these petitions. (Indeed, coincidentally, I was planning on writing a post raising doubts about when and whether the court would take on a same-sex marriage case.) There are several more cases pending in lower courts, including some in which there are reasons to suspect the states will prevail. If so, the court will have a split to resolve, making a grant a sure thing. If not, and same-sex marriage advocates run the table, the court can avoid resolving the issue.
Of course, on this issue, the real question is what Justice Anthony Kennedy thinks. Is he ready and willing to hold that the Constitution guarantees a right to same-sex marriage? Or is he still conflicted given his federalist sympathies? This may ultimately determine when or whether the court takes a case challenging a state prohibition on same-sex marriage and how such a case is resolved.
UPDATE: Roberts Barnes reports for the Post here. How Appealing rounds up more news coverage.
SECOND UPDATE: It’s worth remembering that Justice Ginsburg remarked last month that there was “no urgency” to taking a same-sex marriage case. At the time she noted that some circuits, such as the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, had yet to rule. As Dale Carpenter reported here, there is some reason to think the Sixth Circuit might well uphold the challenged state laws barring recognition of same-sex marriages, even if on particularly narrow grounds. That case was argued in August, and an opinion is likely in the next several weeks.
STILL MORE: Lyle Denniston explains here why most observers expected the Court to grant at least one of the petitions. | – The Supreme Court made a surprise decision this morning by refusing to hear appeals from five states trying to ban same-sex marriage, kick-starting a flurry of "What does this mean?" and "What happens next?" speculation. Some reaction: Under the headline "The Supreme Court Just Quietly Made Marriage Equality The Law Of The Land In Many States," Ian Millhiser writes at ThinkProgress that the "anti-climax" of a decision is, nevertheless, "an earthquake for gay rights" practically speaking. Though Millhiser notes there may be a waiting period and logistical obstacles for same-sex couples, he writes that looming marriages "will make it very difficult for the Supreme Court to reverse course—and retroactively invalidate those marriages—in a subsequent opinion." Over at Slate, Mark Joseph Stern calls the court's move "unexpected and somewhat bizarre," citing his own Slate piece last week in which he noted Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's recent comments that there was "no need for [the Supreme Court] to rush" until circuit courts found same-sex marriage bans to be constitutional. He brings up one other interesting point: "If no circuit court ever rules against gay marriage, the gay marriage question will be effectively settled, and the Supreme Court will never have to wade in again." Agreeing that "almost no one expected that to happen," Lyle Denniston writes at SCOTUSblog that the decision was so surprising because: the Supreme Court had actually been asked to review all seven state cases ("a rare thing … that almost never fails to assure review"); that the court appeared to have given recent indications it was ready "to confront the basic issue"; and that today's decision doesn't exactly sync up with last year's ruling in United States v. Windsor, which struck a major blow to the Defense of Marriage Act, as per the AP. Jonathan H. Adler at the Washington Post, however, wasn't terribly surprised, mainly because all petitions before the Supreme Court had already been nixed by lower circuit courts. Instead, Adler wants to know—especially since the decision came with zero comment from the judges—"is what Justice Anthony Kennedy thinks. … Is he ready and willing to hold that the Constitution guarantees a right to same-sex marriage? Or is he still conflicted given his federalist sympathies?" |
Laquanda Moultrie, holding a stuffed bear she hopes to leave at Emanuel AME Church, stands with Surreace Cox near the police barrier. (Matthew Fortner/Staff)
After a night of fear and grief in downtown Charleston, authorities in North Carolina arrested a young white man on charges that he gunned down nine people at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, ending a vast search but leaving the city and the nation reeling.
Video To see a video of the Rev. Clementa Pinckney’s opening prayer at the Charleston YWCA’s April 24 “Requiem on Racism 2015,” go to https://vimeo.com/126710749
The Holy City struggled to comprehend why the gunman police identified as 21-year-old Dylann Storm Roof would sit down for an hour at a Bible study in the historic black church on Calhoun Street and then open fire, wiping out most of the clergy. The U.S. Justice Department is investigating the killings as a hate crime.
The victims The nine people fatally shot at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church: Clementa Pinckney, 41, the primary pastor who also served as a state senator. Cynthia Hurd, 54, St. Andrews regional branch manager for the Charleston County Public Library system. Sharonda Coleman-Singleton, 45, a church pastor, speech therapist and coach of the girls’ track and field team at Goose Creek High School. Tywanza Sanders, 26, who had a degree in business administration from Allen University, where Pinckney also attended. Ethel Lance, 70, a retired Gailliard Center employee who has worked recently as a church janitor. Susie Jackson, 87, Lance’s cousin who was a longtime church member. DePayne Middleton-Doctor, 49, a retired director of the local Community Development Block Grant Program who joined the church in March as a pastor. Myra Thompson, 59, a pastor at the church. Daniel Simmons Sr., 74, a pastor, who died in a hospital operating room.
To President Barack Obama, the shooting stirred up “a dark part” of American history when racially motivated violence was more prevalent. U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch declared that such acts have “no place in a civilized society.”
The emotional weight of the ordeal also brought local activists, Charleston’s police chief and South Carolina’s governor to tears as they fought to find words to ease community members who fear further violence in a city with a long and complicated history involving race.
“We woke up today, and the heart and soul of South Carolina was broken,” Gov. Nikki Haley said, her voice trembling. “We have some grieving to do. ... Parents are having to explain to their kids how they can go to church and feel safe. That’s not something we ever thought we’d deal with.”
After a massive manhunt, Roof, who has shown interest in racial segregation and the Confederacy, was caught during a traffic stop Thursday morning in Shelby, N.C., 250 miles north of Charleston. A motorist there recognized Roof’s 15-year-old Hyundai from wanted posters distributed by police.
A resident of Eastover, a rural town near Columbia, Roof smiled at television cameras Thursday afternoon as Shelby officers led him to a waiting cruiser, his mop of blond hair hanging in his eyes and a ballistic vest covering his torso. He waived extradition, and South Carolina flew him back to Charleston County to face charges in what has been called one of worst hate crimes the United States has seen in decades.
Meanwhile, the community mourned and searched for answers, with hundreds packing prayer vigils in a show of solidarity and support for the fallen and the families they left behind.
In all, six women and three men died after gunfire sprayed through Emanuel’s basement. Among the dead were a state senator who served as the church’s primary pastor, a beloved county librarian, a dedicated girl’s track and field coach and a young college graduate. The victims ranged in age from 26 to 87.
Their deaths marked the second fatal shooting in the past three months that has drawn the nation’s eyes to the Charleston area, roiling racial tensions and prompting federal investigations. The FBI has been examining potential civil rights violations in the April 4 killing of Walter Scott, a black man shot in the back by a white North Charleston police officer. FBI agents also are looking into what motivated Wednesday’s bloody attack in Emanuel AME Church, Columbia-based spokeswoman Denise Taiste confirmed.
The tragedy also renewed politicians’ focus on reform of the nation’s gun laws. Obama said Thursday during a press briefing in Washington that the Charleston shooting should spark national introspection about the availability of guns.
“I’ve had to make statements like this too many times,” Obama said. “Communities like this have had to endure tragedies like this too many times. Once again, innocent people were killed because someone who wanted to inflict harm had no trouble getting their hands on a gun.”
The shooting
The tragedy unfolded on a hot, steamy night after about a dozen clergy and church members gathered for a regular Bible study and prayer service. They met in the basement, a ground-level floor beneath the sanctuary that housed the pastor’s office and other rooms.
They studied Mark 4 16:20. “Others, like seed sown on rocky places, hear the word and at once receive it with joy ...”
A young white man, not part of the congregation, came in around 8:15 p.m. and sat down quietly. He stayed for 40 to 50 minutes as the session continued.
“But since they have no root, they last only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away ...”
Suddenly, the young man rose, uttered remarks that betrayed his contempt for blacks and opened fire with a gun.
A female trustee, who hid under a table, was among the survivors. The gunman told her he would let her live so that she could tell the story of what happened. Two other survivors, including a young girl, played dead, church members said.
The search
The gunman slipped out of the church as dozens of police officers descended on the area armed with military-style rifles, teams of police dogs and helicopters that circled overhead.
Area residents locked the doors and bolted their gates, fearful after news spread that a gunman was on the loose. Activists from local black communities expressed fear of being targeted next.
James Johnson, South Carolina president of the National Action Network, stood in the middle of Calhoun Street, where city leaders had announced the death toll moments earlier Thursday morning, and cried.
Johnson has spoken out for years about civil rights concerns in Charleston-area policing. He had recently joined Clementa Pinckney, the slain AME church pastor, for a summit about the Scott shooting in North Charleston.
But Johnson had never coped with anything like this, he said, and he worried that it would discourage people from talking about racially charged problems.
“We feel that we’re not safe,” he said. “They could do the same thing when we speak out against this injustice. We must be mindful.”
As Johnson and others grappled with such thoughts, the gunman, who had slipped out of Charleston, put distance between himself and the carnage he’d left behind.
Investigators soon broadened their hunt, deploying local and statewide police agencies and top agents from the FBI and the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. They also circulated surveillance camera images of a young man with a bowl haircut who appeared to be the gunman they were looking for. A bulletin included pictures of the gunman’s 2000 Hyundai Elantra and a telephone tip line for people to call if they saw the car or its driver.
Tips started rolling in soon after the bulletin went out. By mid-morning, investigators named Roof as the suspected gunman and a call went out for his arrest. Shortly after 11 a.m., authorities announced he had been nabbed in North Carolina.
“We had a number of tips that were coming in,” Mullen, the police chief, later said. “It was amazing. Whenever we got a lead ... we sent out teams. It was a tremendous effort. ... I am so pleased that we were able to resolve this case quickly ... so that nobody else is harmed by this individual.”
A picture soon emerged of a troubled young high school dropout who had talked about blacks in racially inflammatory terms and had been arrested in recent months on drug and trespassing charges.
He had been banned from a Columbia mall in February after employees of two stores alerted police that Roof, dressed in all black clothing, was asking odd questions about their operations and when workers left for the night, an incident report stated. He was arrested on a trespassing charge in April after returning to the mall, records show.
Friends said something seemed to be bothering him, but he stayed out of trouble until he walked into Emanuel AME Church Wednesday night.
The aftermath
Obama and Vice President Joe Biden called Charleston Mayor Joe Riley on Thursday to relay their condolences. They praised the efforts to track down the suspect, Riley said.
“It’s a wonderful sign that we don’t let these people get away with these dastardly deeds,” he said.
But further rattling people as they mourned the losses, someone called in bomb threats to another downtown AME church where residents and leaders had gathered for a vigil and to the office building where Charleston County’s coroner announced the names of those who were slain.
Emotions already were raw this week from the anniversary of another tragedy that also claimed nine lives. The shooting occurred on the eve of the eighth remembrance of the June 18, 2007, Sofa Super Store blaze in West Ashley that killed Charleston firefighters.
County Coroner Rae Wooten said the anniversary made her team’s response to the shooting more difficult.
“It all came back,” she said. “It was somewhat disbelief that we could ever face something that horrific again.”
But people from local leaders to the president expressed resolve to overcome the latest carnage.
U.S. Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., called it “absolutely despicable” for such violence to occur in a place where people come together to “laugh, love and rejoice in God’s name.”
Obama said Emanuel AME and its congregation have risen before from flames, an earthquake and other dark times to give hope to Charleston, “and with our prayers and love and buoyancy, it will rise now as a place of peace.”
“Acts like this have no place in our country and no place in a civilized society,” Lynch, the attorney general, added during a Thursday morning news conference in Washington. “I want everyone in Charleston and everyone who has been affected by this tragedy to know that we will do everything in our power to help heal this community and make it whole again.”
Christina Elmore, Glenn Smith, Robert Behre, Melissa Boughton, Tony Bartelme, Schuyler Kropf and Jennifer Berry Hawes contributed to this report. ||||| The Rev. Clementa Pinckney stands inside Emanuel AME Church shortly after he was named its new pastor in 2010. Pinckney also serves as a state senator. Staff/file
Beyond the squad cars blocking roads and news trucks jamming downtown sidewalks, Emanuel AME Church sits a white sentry of faith in the heart of historic Charleston, roped off by police tape to all who are watching her.
State Rep. Bakari Sellers stands in a dapper suit under sweltering heat before national TV cameras aimed at the historic church. He tries not to glance at his cell phone clock.
The son of civil rights activist Cleveland Sellers, he wants to speak, to remind, to mourn with the nation.
But the news crew is running late, and he needs to dash to a prayer vigil a few blocks away at Morris Brown AME, daughter church of “Mother Emanuel,” as the devastated congregation affectionately is known.
The historic Charleston congregation, founded in 1818, was the first African Methodist Episcopal church in the South. It remains the oldest.
However, its story really begins closer to 1816 when Morris Brown, a free shoemaker and devout Christian, walked out of a white, segregated Methodist Church in Charleston, an AME Church website states.
He formed Emanuel AME which, like other black churches, became defenders of freedom to worship — and became deeply interwoven with freedom to do so much else.
One of its founding members was Denmark Vesey.
Almost to this precise day 193 years ago, Vesey plotted a failed slave rebellion from the very church where so much blood spilled Wednesday as worshippers gathered to study God’s word.
Vesey’s rebellion might have charted a new course in the lives of enslaved black residents, had someone not tipped off authorities. But someone did. And the 1822 plot was discovered, bringing harsh reprisals to the area’s black residents.
Vesey, a former slave but then a free carpenter, died with 34 others by the hangman’s noose. Emanuel AME was burned and its members driven underground to worship for decades. All-black churches were outlawed.
The ensuing investigation forced its pastor, the Rev. Morris Brown, to flee north to Philadelphia, the seat of the AME Church. The church was burned.
Mother Emanuel went underground. But rose again.
In 1865, at the close of the Civil War, the congregation adopted the name Emanuel. It means, “God with us.”
Despite what officials are calling a horrendous hate crime, enough has changed in the ensuing 150 years that the nation elected its first black president. Now he too is left to mourn.
President and Mrs. Obama knew Rev. Clementa Pinckney, the church’s pastor who is among the dead.
“Emanuel AME opened its doors to strangers who sought healing. It’s risen before from flames, earthquakes and other dark times,” President Obama said in a televised addressed to a shocked nation.
Pinckney took the helm of Mother Emanuel in 2010.
That year, he told a Post and Courier reporter, “Loving God is never separate from loving our brothers and sisters. It’s always the same.”
Reach Jennifer Hawes at 937-5563, follow her on Twitter at @JenBerryHawes or subscribe to her at facebook.com/jennifer.b.hawes. ||||| CHARLESTON, S.C. (AP) — A white man opened fire during a prayer meeting inside a historic black church in downtown Charleston on Wednesday night, killing nine people in an assault that authorities described as a hate crime. The shooter was still at large.
Worshippers gather to pray in a hotel parking lot across the street from the Emanuel AME Church following a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (AP Photo/David Goldman) (Associated Press)
Police stand outside the Emanuel AME Church following a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (AP Photo/David Goldman) (Associated Press)
Police close off a section of Calhoun Street near the Emanuel AME Church following a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (AP Photo/David Goldman) (Associated Press)
Worshippers embrace following a group prayer across the street from the scene of a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (AP Photo/David Goldman) (Associated Press)
A police officer uses a flashlight while searching the area following a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (AP Photo/David Goldman) (Associated Press)
Police talk to a man outside the Emanuel AME Church following a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (Wade Spees/The Post And Courier via AP) (Associated Press)
A man kneels across the street from where police gather outside the Emanuel AME Church following a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (Wade Spees/The Post And Courier via AP) (Associated Press)
Police walk down the street from the Emanuel AME Church following a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (AP Photo/David Goldman) (Associated Press)
A distraught man is comforted as a group of concerned people arrive inquiring about a shooting across the street Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (AP Photo/David Goldman) (Associated Press)
Police talk to a man outside the Emanuel AME Church following a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (Wade Spees/The Post And Courier via AP) (Associated Press)
An armed police officer moves up Calhoun Street following a shooting in Charleston, S.C., Wednesday, June 17, 2015. (Wade Spees/The Post And Courier via AP) (Associated Press)
Police stand outside the Emanuel AME Church following a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (AP Photo/David Goldman) (Associated Press)
An FBI agent walks across the street from the Emanuel AME Church following a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (AP Photo/David Goldman) (Associated Press)
Police stand outside the Emanuel AME Church following a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (Wade Spees/The Post And Courier via AP) (Associated Press)
Worshippers gather to pray in a hotel parking lot across the street from the scene of a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (AP Photo/David Goldman) (Associated Press)
A man kneels across the street from where police gather outside the Emanuel AME Church following a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (Wade Spees/The Post And Courier via AP) (Associated Press)
Police stand outside the Emanuel AME Church following a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (AP Photo/David Goldman) (Associated Press)
A man looks on as a group of people arrive inquiring about a shooting across the street Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (AP Photo/David Goldman) (Associated Press)
The shooting took place at the Emanuel AME Church, Police Chief Greg Mullen said. He said there were survivors, but would not say how many, or how many were inside at the time of the shooting. He also would not confirm whether the pastor, state Sen. Clementa Pinckney, was one of the victims.
Mullen described the suspect as a white male in his early 20s. He said he believed it was a hate crime, but would not elaborate.
"The only reason that someone could walk into a church and shoot people praying is out of hate," said Charleston Mayor Joseph P. Riley. "It is the most dastardly act that one could possibly imagine, and we will bring that person to justice. ... This is one hateful person."
As police and the city's mayor updated the news media, a group of pastors huddled together praying in a circle across the street.
Police moved members of the news media back away from the site due to what they called an "imminent" threat. They did not release any details.
The campaign of GOP presidential hopeful Jeb Bush sent out an email saying that due to the shooting, the candidate had canceled an event planned in the city Thursday.
The Emmanuel AME church is a historic African-American church that traces its roots to 1816, when several churches split from Charleston's Methodist Episcopal church.
One of its founders, Denmark Vesey, tried to organize a slave revolt in 1822. He was caught, and white landowners had his church burned in revenge. Parishioners worshipped underground until after the Civil War.
The shooting happened the day before the eighth anniversary of a fire at a furniture store that killed nine Charleston firefighters. ||||| Worshippers embrace following a group prayer across the street from the scene of a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (AP Photo/David Goldman) (Associated Press)
This image has been provided by the Charleston Police Department, Thursday, June 18, 2015. A man opened fire during a prayer meeting inside a historic black church in downtown Charleston, S.C., Wednesday... (Associated Press)
A man kneels across the street from where police gather outside the Emanuel AME Church following a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (Wade Spees/The Post And Courier via AP) (Associated Press)
The steeple of Emanuel AME Church is visible as police close off a section of Calhoun Street early Thursday, June 18, 2015 following a shooting Wednesday night in Charleston, S.C. (AP Photo/David Goldman) (Associated Press)
Police stand outside the Emanuel AME Church following a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (AP Photo/David Goldman) (Associated Press)
Worshippers gather to pray down the street from the Emanuel AME Church following a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (AP Photo/David Goldman) (Associated Press)
Police close off a section of Calhoun Street near the Emanuel AME Church following a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C. (AP Photo/David Goldman) (Associated Press)
Charleston Police Chief Greg Mullen says the suspect in a shooting that killed nine people was at a historic black church attending a meeting and stayed for almost an hour before gunfire erupted.
Charleston Police Chief Greg Mullen gave the details at a Thursday morning news conference. He didn't elaborate. At the news conference, he also identified the victims of the Wednesday church night shooting as six females and three males. He says names won't be released until families are notified.
The suspect is described as a white man thought to be in his early 20s. Mullen says the suspect is a "very dangerous individual."
Earlier, Mullen said he had no reason to think the suspect has left the Charleston area, but is distributing information about him and the vehicle around the country.
7:05 a.m.
___
Charleston Police Chief Greg Mullen says the victims of a shooting at a historic black church were six females and three males.
At a news conference Thursday, Mullen did not give other details about the victims. He says names will not be released until families are notified.
The Wednesday night shooting is being called a hate crime. The suspect is described as a white man thought to be in his early 20s. Mullen says the suspect is a "very dangerous individual." Mullen urged people to call police about the suspect and not pursue him or his vehicle on their own.
Earlier, Mullen said he had no reason to think the suspect has left the Charleston area, but is distributing information about the suspect and the vehicle around the country.
___
6:10 a.m.
Police say they have surveillance video of a possible suspect and vehicle in the shooting deaths of nine people at a historic black church in downtown Charleston that's being called a hate crime.
Police Chief Greg Mullen met with reporters early Thursday to distribute the video. Mullen said he couldn't give a specific make and model of the vehicle because they could not be certain from the video.
The suspect is described as a white man thought to be in his early 20s. Mullen said he had no reason to think the suspect has left the Charleston area, but is distributing information about the suspect and the vehicle around the country.
Mullen said police consider the shooting a hate crime. The FBI and state police are helping in the search.
___
3:35 a.m. (EDT)
Charleston Police Chief Greg Mullen says the FBI will be involved in the investigation of a shooting at a historic black church that killed nine and is being called a hate crime.
Mullen said the FBI would aid the investigation while speaking at a news conference that was also attended by FBI Special Agent in Charge David A. Thomas.
House Minority Leader Todd Rutherford says that among those killed at Emanuel AME Church was the church's pastor, state Sen. Clementa Pinckney.
Authorities are still searching for the shooter, who's described as a white male in his early 20s.
___
3 a.m. (EDT)
A South Carolina legislative leader says the church's pastor, state Sen. Clementa Pinckney, is among those killed in a shooting at a historic black church in downtown Charleston that authorities are calling a hate crime.
House Minority Leader Todd Rutherford says Pinckney was killed along with eight others in the Wednesday night shooting at Emanuel AME Church.
Authorities are still searching for the shooter, who's described as a white male in his early 20s.
___
1 a.m. (EDT)
Charleston police say nine people have been killed in a shooting at a historic black church in what authorities intend to investigate as a hate crime.
Police Chief Greg Mullen says eight people were found dead Wednesday at Emanuel AME Church and another person died later at the hospital.
Mullen says a prayer meeting was going on at the church at the time of the shooting.
The shooter, described as a white male, was not yet in custody.
___
12:45 a.m. (EDT)
Mayor Joseph P. Riley has confirmed to The Associated Press that police have told him nine are dead in a shooting at a historic black church in downtown Charleston, South Carolina.
Riley said he will release more details shortly at a news conference with Charleston police.
Police were still looking for the suspect in the Wednesday night shooting at Emanuel AME Church.
__
12:30 a.m. (EDT)
South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley has responded to the shooting in downtown Charleston.
"While we do not yet know all of the details, we do know that we'll never understand what motivates anyone to enter one of our places of worship and take the life of another," she said in a statement early Thursday morning.
Police were still searching for a white male suspect.
___
12:09 a.m. (EDT)
The Post and Courier newspaper reports that Mayor Joe Riley has confirmed there are fatalities in a shooting that occurred at the site of a church in downtown Charleston, South Carolina.
Riley called the Wednesday night shooting "an unspeakable and heartbreaking tragedy."
An Associated Press reporter on the scene said police were moving members of the media on the site back because of an "imminent" threat.
GOP presidential hopeful Jeb Bush has canceled Thursday events in the area because of the shooting. ||||| Crawl of outlinks from wikipedia.org started March, 2016. These files are currently not publicly accessible. Properties of this collection. It has been several years since the last time we did this. For this collection, several things were done: 1. Turned off duplicate detection. This collection will be complete, as there is a good chance we will share the data, and sharing data with pointers to random other collections, is a complex problem. 2. For the first time, did all the different wikis. The original runs were just against the enwiki. This one, the seed list was built from all 865 collections. | – "This is a tragedy that no community should have to experience," Charleston Police Chief Greg Mullen told reporters after a mass shooting at a historic black church left nine people dead. "I do believe this was a hate crime," he says of the attack, which is believed to have been carried out by a young white man who is still at large. The president of the Charleston NAACP tells the Post and Courier that a survivor says the gunman briefly sat down in the Emanuel AME Church before opening fire on a prayer meeting, but at a news conference this morning, Mullen said the shooter stuck around for almost an hour before the shooting began, the AP reports. Mullen also distributed a surveillance video of a possible suspect and vehicle, and added that the victims were six females and three males. The NAACP chief says the gunman told one woman he was letting her live so she could tell others what happened. "It is unfathomable that somebody in today's society would walk into a church when people are having a prayer meeting and take their lives," Mullen told reporters. "I can assure you that we're going to do everything in our power to find this individual, to lock him up and to make sure he doesn't hurt anyone else." Mayor Joe Riley called the suspect "one hateful person," describing the shooting as "the most dastardly act that one could possibly imagine." In other developments: Helicopters are circling Charleston in the search for the suspect, who's described as a white male, around 21 years old, slender, clean-shaven, and wearing a gray sweatshirt, blue jeans, and Timberland boots, the Guardian reports. Police say he is "obviously extremely dangerous." State Sen. Clementa Pinckney, the church's pastor, was in the church at the time of the attack, and State House Minority leader Todd Rutherford tells the AP that the lawmaker was among those killed. The 41-year-old "never had anything bad to say about anybody, even when I thought he should," Rutherford says. "He was always out doing work either for his parishioners or his constituents. He touched everybody." The Post and Courier has more on the history of the church, which it calls the "spiritual home to one of the oldest and largest black congregations south of Baltimore," and which many in the city call "Mother Emanuel." Its roots go back to 1816, and it was burned after one of its founders tried to organize a slave revolt in 1822. Members went underground until after the Civil War, when the church adopted the name "Emanuel." Jeb Bush has canceled a Charleston campaign appearance scheduled for today, the New York Times reports. A campaign aide for Hillary Clinton says she was in the city yesterday but left before the shooting. |
TRENTON — The Republican field for the White House is growing larger by the day, and that could be a problem for Gov. Chris Christie.
With former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush jumping in last week, the formally declared Republican candidates for the White House stands at a dozen, including five former or current U.S. Senators and four current or former governors. There hasn't been a presidential field approaching this size since 1860, when Abraham Lincoln was elected.
Christie, who is expected to add his name to the big list in the coming weeks, is already part of a mad scramble of Republicans trying to win national attention and gain the favor of GOP voters responding to presidential polls. That's because Fox News Channel has decided that only the top 10 GOP candidates in the polls will be allowed into its televised Aug. 6 debate (CNN has the same rule for its mid-September debate, although it will hold another one for also-rans in the polls).
Christie's well-known rhetorical skills would be on full display in such a forum – but only if he makes the cut. Earlier this month, a Washington Post/ABC News poll illustrated just how slender the difference is between first and last in the crowded field: Only five percentage points divide Christie, in eighth place, from the first place candidates U.S. Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker. And he was just four percentage points from 12th place.
"You're already seeing the party struggling with who gets invited (to the debate) and who doesn't," said Thomas F. Schaller, a professor of political science at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County and the author of the new book "The Stronghold: How the How Republicans Captured Congress but Surrendered the White House."
Schaller said that to gain traction in the media and improve poll numbers, Christie and his rivals will likely start playing nastier faster than ever.
"The things that break though are the really big stories and really big gaffes," he said, "which really puts a premium on earned media and being really critical. ... Big attacks draw media attention."
Christie, who specializes in full-contact politics, is already employing a plan of attack.
On Friday, he once again took aim at 2016 contender Paul for recently leading the effort to let parts of the Patriot Act, which allowed U.S. officials to collect Americans' phone data, expire.
"What Paul has done has made us weaker and more vulnerable," Christie told an audience in Philadelphia. "It's disgraceful. It's made our country a more dangerous place."
On Thursday at an ersatz campaign stop in New Hampshire, Christie chided Bush for being "late to the party" with his newly announced economic plan aiming for 4 percent economic growth.
"This is one of these areas where I'm really flattered that Jeb Bush is copying me because I spoke three, four weeks ago in New Hampshire about a five-step plan to get to four percent growth," Christie said. "Then I heard Jeb announce on Monday that he's for four percent growth too — that's good. I welcome him to the party. He's a little bit late, but I welcome him."
The size of the field and its closely competitive rankings means a different approach to early campaigning is needed, experts say.
"As we move into the phase of the campaign where they are debating, the candidates who are shaping the discussion are going to get more (media) attention," said Steve Schmidt, who ran the day-to-day operations of Sen. John McCain's 2008 White House bid, "And so, at a personal level, candidates need to stake out territory, because it's the meat on the bones of why are you running: Do you just want the big house, plane and helicopter, or do you want to get something done for the country?"
Christie has followed this roadmap as well, proposing detailed plans for reforms to federal entitlement programs, immigration policy, taxes and education. In a normal race, offering up such specificity early on might cost a candidate some voters, but in such an unusually large field, Schmidt says Christie has a clear advantage by defining his positions.
"There's a tendency sometimes among candidates to take what I call a 'preventative defense' that's organized around the principle of not making mistakes or not putting information out there," Schmidt said. "I think it's not a winning strategy. As a candidate, you need to be an 'advocate for' and not a 'hedger against.' He's doing that, and he's also indicating a style of leadership which he'll articulate in the White House: 'I'm not going to be afraid to take on the tough problems, and I'm going to talk truthfully.'"
Getting enough attention to make the cut for the GOP debates could be complicated by the summer months, when TV audiences are about 10 percent less than in the winter months, according to Dounia Turrill, a senior vice-president at Nielsen, the TV ratings company.
And the large field of candidates makes it even tougher, experts say.
"Historically, we've never had so many people who are seriously running for the presidency and who have become part of the daily news cycle," said Joseph Ellis, author of the Pulitzer prize-winning presidential history, "Founding Brothers."
Julian Zelizer, a presidential historian at Princeton University, said as a result, "We're going to see more of them and less of them at the same time. There'll be more debates but at the same time, in terms of the major media outlets, each one will have less time and space to be heard."
In first primary state New Hampshire, where Christie has spent much of his late spring, lifelong Republican Leonore Moniz, 82, of Manchester, articulated a refrain common to scores of GOP voters interviewed by NJ Advance Media in the Granite State in recent weeks: "There's too many of them."
Finding a way to the front of the pack as soon as possible is especially important because top GOP strategists and presidential historians agree that the 2016 campaign could last longer than any in recent memory.
Thanks to the 2012 Citizens United U.S. Supreme Court ruling, which allows unlimited amounts of cash to back presidential candidates, much of the field may stay in the race far longer than usual if hopefuls can find even a single billionaire to champion them.
"There's an excellent chance this all goes to May or June of next year," said Ellis.
If that happens, it could put in play a state that rarely has a say in presidential primaries: New Jersey, which holds its primary June 7 next year.
Richard Davis, who served as the campaign manager for Sen. John McCain's 2008 White House bid, said it could last even longer than that.
"The combination of big outside money, a condensed primary timetable and 15 candidates will result in a prolonged nominating process and could result in a brokered convention since no candidate will get to the 1,100 delegates needed," said Davis.
"In 2008, McCain wrapped up the nomination by March. In 2012 it took Romney to May. In 2016 it will go to the convention in July. Not only are there a lot more candidates but with the outside money widely distributed there is no incentive to winnow the field," he said.
Claude Brodesser-Akner may be reached at cbrodesser@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @claudebrodesser. Find NJ.com Politics on Facebook.
||||| Chris Christie: No teleprompter for launch
Gov. Chris Christie’s launch rally at his high school in New Jersey on Tuesday will include friends who remember his years as class president — but no teleprompter, in an effort to live up to Christie’s campaign slogan, “Telling it like it is.”
With the independent-minded voters of New Hampshire the key to his come-from-behind strategy, Christie will spend five straight days in the Granite State, beginning the evening of his announcement day. Plunging into the hand-to-hand campaigning that First Staters relish, he’ll hold at least three town halls and attend a Fourth of July celebration, plus various house and diner stops.
Story Continued Below
Offering himself as a pragmatic, results-oriented conservative, Christie will signal his willingness to take on tough issues that others duck, notably entitlements. Another key part of Christie’s message will be his ability to win and govern in a blue state, where he did well in his reelection race with women, Hispanics and even Democrats.
A top adviser said the announcement tour is meant to showcase a Christie strength: “Communicating to bring people to his side — even people who don’t agree on every issue.”
Christie’s wife, Mary Pat, and the rest of his family, along with longtime supporters and friends, will jam the gym at Livingston High School, where he was president for three years, for the 11 a.m. bash. The invocation will be by Joe Carter, pastor of New Hope Baptist Church in Newark, who has been a key voice for Christie in the African-American community.
The adviser said the audience “will see a lot of who he is as a person,” including the middle-class upbringing that shaped him: the influence of his late mother, his Irish father working at the Breyers ice cream plant in Newark to put himself through Rutgers, a grandmother who was a Sicilian immigrant and a single mother.
A preview video shows Christie at a town hall, saying that his loud candor has its roots in his loving, trusting family.
The adviser said Christie welcomes the discussion about the bridge closing and subsequent investigation at this point.
“To get past it, there has to be a little discussion,” the adviser said. “People can see now that everything he said was true. That doesn’t mean that the damage is undone. But people and donors are moving past it for the first time. For the most part, people will be looking to the future, not the past.”
After the announcement speech, Christie will fly to New Hampshire for a 6 p.m. Tuesday town hall in Sandown. On Wednesday, he has an endorsement announcement at Mary Ann’s Diner in Derry, then an afternoon house party in Bridgewater, followed by a town hall at the American Legion hall in Ashland, in Grafton County.
On Thursday, he has a town hall in Rochester, and he stops by the Pink Cadillac Diner. Then it’s on to a luncheon in Portsmouth, followed by an endorsement announcement and a house party. He’ll remain in New Hampshire on Friday, with events to be announced, and on Saturday will celebrate the Fourth of July with his new best friends in the Granite State.
Mike DuHaime, Christie’s longtime strategist, will advise the campaign from the outside. Close adviser Maria Comella has moved to his PAC. Samantha Smith, the PAC’s communications director, and James Garcia, the PAC’s political director, are expected to play similar roles from the campaign, which will be based in northern New Jersey.
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Authors: | – And then there were 14 ... on the GOP side only, a presidential field that NJ.com reports was last this big when Abraham Lincoln won in 1860. Chris Christie today threw his hat into the ring by way of an announcement made at Livingston High School, his alma mater and the town where "everything started ... for me." Politico reported that Christie's announcement would be made telepromter-free, as befitting his "Telling it like it is" campaign slogan. He kicked things off with stories of his roots—hard work, not much money—and what his mother told him: "God's given you so many gifts. If you just work hard enough, you can be anything." Ten standout lines from there: "Both parties have failed our country." "I wake up every morning knowing I have the opportunity to do something great. That's why this job is a great job, and why president of the United States is an even greater job." "America is tired of weakness in the Oval Office ... and that is why today I'm proud to announce my candidacy." "The lying and stealing has already happened. The horse is out of the barn. We've got to get it back in and you can only do it by force." "After seven years I heard the president say the other day that the world respects" America more "because of his leadership. This is confirmation that Obama lives in his own world, not ours." "We better not turn [this world] over to his second mate Hillary Clinton." "I am not running for president of the United States as a surrogate for being prom king of America. I mean what I say and I say what I mean and that's what America needs right now." "And unlike some people who will offer themselves for the presidency, you're not going to have to wonder if I can do it or not." He promised a campaign "without focus-group-tested answers. A campaign when I'm asked a question I'm going to give an answer to the question that's asked, not the answer my political consultants told me to give backstage." "We are going to tell it like it is today ... the truth will set us free, everybody." |
If “Meet the Press” moderator David Gregory were a guest on his own show, he knows the kinds of questions he’d be asked.
Why have your ratings been falling? Is the show in trouble? Is your job in trouble?
“I get it,” says Gregory, the face of the longest-running TV program in American history (founded: 1947). “Do I want to be number one in the ratings? Every week I want to be number one, and we fight like hell to get there. And it’s tough right now. It’s a fight.”
He adds, “I’m not just trying to sell you — well, I am trying to sell you — but I’m not going to B.S. you, either. Yeah, it’s hard. I see what our challenges are. But we’re going to fix our problems.”
The main problem: The great-granddaddy of Sunday-morning Beltway blabfests isn’t just not No. 1. It’s No. 3 and in the midst of a three-year slide. During the first three months of this year, the NBC program finished behind perennial rivals “Face the Nation” on CBS and “This Week With George Stephanopoulos” on ABC, despite being helped by two weeks of Winter Olympics hoopla. In the final quarter of last year, viewing among people ages 25 to 54, the preferred group for TV news advertisers, fell to its lowest level ever.
Bad enough. But fairly or not, Gregory’s “Meet the Press” still gets measured against the lofty peaks scaled by Tim Russert, his predecessor. Russert, the folksy inquisitor, ruled the ratings for more than a decade until his death in June 2008. He often attracted an audience 40 percent larger than his rivals, an unheard-of margin in television.
But now — to paraphrase Russert’s famous sign-off — if it’s Sunday, it’s not necessarily “Meet the Press” that Americans are watching.
These days, the leader is “Face the Nation,” hosted by Bob Schieffer, the grandfatherly 77-year-old newsman. Schieffer not only attracts the largest overall audience (a weekly average of 3.35 million during the first three months of 2014, 5 percent more than “This Week,” 8 percent more than “MTP” and 61 percent more than “Fox News Sunday”) but the largest audience among the coveted 25-to-54 set, too. (Schieffer’s competitors are quick to point out that comparisons aren’t quite fair since “FTN’s” ratings are based on its first half-hour, not the standard full hour; the program’s second half-hour isn’t broadcast by CBS stations in many cities).
The Sunday shows — which comprise what Schieffer calls “the smartest morning on TV” — are more than just prestige projects for the networks; the relatively large and affluent audiences they attract make them magnets for corporate image advertisers that pay premium prices for airtime. Russert’s dominating position helped NBC earn a reported $60 million from “Meet the Press” in 2007.
Thus, “MTP’s” meltdown has sounded alarm bells inside NBC News and attracted the attention of its new president, Deborah Turness, who arrived from Britain’s ITV News in August. Gregory’s job does not appear to be in any immediate jeopardy, but there are plenty of signs of concern.
Last year, the network undertook an unusual assessment of the 43-year-old journalist, commissioning a psychological consultant to interview his friends and even his wife. The idea, according to a network spokeswoman, Meghan Pianta, was “to get perspective and insight from people who know him best.” But the research project struck some at NBC as odd, given that Gregory has been employed there for nearly 20 years.
Around the same time, the network appointed a new executive producer at “MTP,” Rob Yarin, a veteran media consultant. Yarin, who had worked with Gregory on an MSNBC show, “Race for the White House,” during the 2008 campaign, succeeded Betsy Fischer Martin, who reigned over “MTP” for 11 years. Fischer Martin had helped Russert soar to glory, but had disagreed with Gregory over matters of style and substance (she was promoted to oversee all of NBC’s political coverage).
In interviews, Yarin and Gregory say they are tinkering with the show to keep it abreast of a changing media environment. They’ve made the program’s pacing faster, with shorter interview segments. The range of topics and interview subjects has been opened up, too. Last month, for example, Gregory interviewed NCAA President Mark Emmert about proposals to unionize student-athletes — stealing a little thunder, he notes, from CBS, which was televising the NCAA basketball tournament at the time.
The overall effect is that the program now bears only a vague resemblance to the one over which Russert presided. Whereas Russert would spend multiple segments grilling a single newsmaker, Gregory now barely goes more than six or seven minutes on any interview or topic.
The changes were readily apparent on Sunday’s program, recorded at NBC’s studios in Northwest Washington. After opening with Gregory’s taped interview with Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk, the host moved swiftly to live dual-screen chats with Senate Foreign Relations Committee members Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) and Chris Murphy (D-Conn.). Then it was on to the journalists’ roundtable discussion, followed by an interview with Democratic National Committee chair Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) about health care and the midterm elections.
Then, still more segments: A new recorded feature called “Meeting America” in which reporter Kevin Tibbles looks at something happening outside Washington (in this case, a debate in Kentucky over the building of a Biblical theme park using tax subsidies); more roundtable discussion; and a photos-of-the-week feature called “Images to Remember.” The program closed with a short interview with New York Times reporter Jo Becker about her new book about gay marriage, “Forcing the Spring.”
Gregory says the new look “delivers on the core of what ‘Meet the Press’ is” but “widens the aperture . . . I’m dedicated to building something that says we’re not just thinking about politics. We’re thinking about who the real influencers are in this country.”
“This Week,” which is anchored irregularly by Stephanopoulos (he also hosts the daily “Good Morning America”), says it’s shaking things up, too.
The ABC program has a new executive producer, Jonathan Greenberger, a 30-year-old Stephanopoulos protege. Greenberger started at ABC News out of college at 22, and climbed so fast that the network waited for him to finish Stanford Law School before handing him the executive producer job at “This Week” last year.
Greenberger describes a program that is more ensemble in nature and more of a magazine than a traditional newsmaker-interview show. On a recent program, Stephanopoulos chatted with an ABC reporter in Ukraine about the latest news, then segued to a discussion with correspondent (and sometime fill-in host) Martha Raddatz about the unfolding diplomacy, followed by an interview with Samantha Power, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.
“A few years ago, we wouldn’t have moved so fast to integrate all of those elements into the program,” says Greenberger. “We’d have the vice chairman and chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee on to have a debate.”
Like “Meet the Press,” “This Week” has to be wary of changing too much. The ABC program is still recovering from its attempt to build itself around former CNN correspondent Christiane Amanpour, whose strength is foreign affairs, not domestic politics. Amanpour lasted about 18 months as host before going back to CNN in 2011.
Schieffer, meanwhile, says “Face the Nation” isn’t planning to change. “There’s no bells and whistles here,” says the host, who’s been “Face’s” face since 1991. “We just try to move the stories of the week forward.”
The good news for all three shows is that they remain among the most durable on TV, if perhaps less influential than they once were. Even as everything else on TV has lost viewers over time, the Big Three have held steady and even gained viewers. Collectively, about 9.6 million people watched them each week during the first three months of this year, about the same number that watched Russert in 2005. This doesn’t count the audience for innumerable Sunday-morning competitors, from Fox News Sunday (hosted by former “Meet the Press” moderator Chris Wallace) to “Al Punto” on Univision.
The shows can occasionally make news, too, if the interview subject is big enough. Conservatives are still raising questions about then-United Nations ambassador Susan Rice’s comments on the Sunday shows in 2012 about the attack on a U.S. facility in Benghazi, Libya that left four Americans dead. Gregory, meanwhile, mentions his “Meet the Press” interview with Vice President Biden in 2012, in which Biden expressed support for same-sex marriage, prompting President Obama to become the first sitting president to declare his support a few days later (in an interview with ABC).
Gregory himself has sparked controversy for what he’s said and done on the air. Conservatives called for the moderator’s prosecution after he held up a high-capacity ammunition magazine in an interview with National Rifle Association chief executive Wayne LaPierre in late 2012 (possession of such armaments is illegal in the District; Gregory wasn’t charged). Last June, the Twittersphere exploded with outrage when Gregory asked journalist Glenn Greenwald about having “aided and abetted” NSA secrets leaker Edward Snowden, insinuating that Greenwald was complicit in espionage.
The impossible burden for Gregory, of course, has been to follow the beloved Russert. As one NBC colleague describes it, Russert is a “ghost” who still haunts Gregory’s tenure at “MTP” six years into his run.
“I am fully aware that there are a lot of people who believe Tim Russert will never be replaced, and I’ve never tried to replace Tim Russert," he says. “I have nothing but respect and admiration for Tim and his legacy. And I’m doing my own thing, just like Tim did.”
But he also adds, a little more defensively, “I’ve covered the White House, I’ve covered 9/11, the road to war, constitutional crises, and honestly, I wouldn’t be able to focus on this job if I was going to let that stuff get to me. I knew it would be there going in and I’m just focused on being David Gregory and taking the show to the next level.”
Some Gregory supporters think he has the best hand to play over the long haul. Stephanopoulos has already pulled back from moderating “This Week” and may be in line to succeed 68-year-old Diane Sawyer as the anchor of “ABC World News Tonight” some day. Although Schieffer says he hasn’t set his retirement date, it may be not be very far way — “another year or so,” as he put it.
Which means both CBS and ABC would have to retool their Sunday-morning shows with new moderators.
“Time is on David’s side,” says Bloomberg View columnist Jeffrey Goldberg, a semi-regular “MTP” panelist. “It’s semi-inevitable. He just has to keep doing what he’s doing, and continue to break new ground on the big stories of the week. In five to 10 years, we’ll be talking about him as the grand old man of Sunday morning.” ||||| NBC News last year hired a "psychological consultant" to interview David Gregory's friends and family, part of an effort to get greater insight into the "Meet the Press" host's personality, according to a new report.
The point of hiring the consultant, NBC spokeswoman Meghan Pianta said, was to "to get perspective and insight from people who know him best."
That nugget is part of a new report from The Washington Post's Paul Farhi looking at the problems that have bedeviled "Meet the Press" in recent years. The show, which recently spent 15 years in first place, is now in third and suffering a three-year decline.
"Gregory’s job does not appear to be in any immediate jeopardy, but there are plenty of signs of concern,” Farhi wrote.
The Sunday show ratings race has been fiercely competitive since 2013, when CBS ended NBC's run as the undisputed king of Sunday morning. In 2014, "Meet" has finished first in total viewers only twice.
Despite the failing ratings, Gregory renewed his contract in 2013 and network executives said as recently as March that they are committed to improving the show with him as host.
UPDATE (11:17 a.m.): In an email, Pianta challenged Farhi's reporting, saying that the network brought in a "brand consultant" not a psychological one as Farhi reported:
Last year Meet the Press brought in a brand consultant — not, as reported, a psychological one — to better understand how its anchor connects. This is certainly not unusual for any television program, especially one that’s driven so heavily by one person.
UPDATE (11:25 a.m.): Farhi said he checked with NBC twice on Sunday about the term "psychological" and that they had no objections at the time.
"I checked it twice with them yesterday. No objections then," he wrote in an email.
UPDATE (1:05p.m.): The company that did the consulting for NBC was Elastic Strategy out of New York, Pianta said.
Read more about: NBC, Meet The Press, David Gregory ||||| NBC News has issued a statement, which it emailed to Poynter, about a report in The Washington Post that it hired a “psychological consultant” to talk to David Gregory’s friends and family about the declining ratings of “Meet the Press,” which he hosts.
“Last year Meet the Press brought in a brand consultant—not, as reported, a psychological one—to better understand how its anchor connects,” NBC News says. “This is certainly not unusual for any television program, especially one that’s driven so heavily by one person.”
Politico’s Hadas Gold writes Paul Farhi, who wrote the Post story, told her he “checked with NBC twice on Sunday about the term ‘psychological’ and that they had no objections at the time.” Reached by email, Farhi tells Poynter those conversations were via telephone. | – A long Washington Post article on David Gregory and the troubles he faces as moderator of NBC's Meet the Press has quite a few people wondering what's going on at the show. As the Post explains, the longest-running television program has been declining in the ratings for three years, and is currently the No. 3 Sunday talk show. Last year, the network brought in a psychological consultant to talk to friends and family members of Gregory, who took over the gig after Tim Russert's death in 2008. As the Post puts it, that seems "odd" to some, considering Gregory has been at NBC almost two decades. Multiple blogs picked up on that tidbit, and NBC quickly gave Poynter a statement insisting it actually hired "a brand consultant," not a psychological one, "to better understand how its anchor connects." The network also says the move is "not unusual." But the article's writer tells Politico he checked the term "psychological" with the network twice, and it had "no objections then"—and it remains in the Post story as of this writing. As for Gregory's job, Post reporter Paul Farhi writes that it "does not appear to be in any immediate jeopardy, but there are plenty of signs of concern." |
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A grandad whose dog discovered an abandoned baby in a Birmingham park spoke about the amazing pet rescue and said: “We were just in the right place at the right time.”
Roger Wilday, 68, was walking German Shepherd Jade in Stechford when she inexplicably raced to bushes, then lay down next to what looked like a discarded carrier bag – and refused to return to him.
As the pensioner moved closer he realised what the loyal family pet had discovered: a newborn baby, who has now been named after her four-legged rescuer.
Roger said: ‘‘I walked over and saw a carrier bag – then I saw it move. I thought it was a bag of kittens, but then I saw her little arms and a head, and the baby started to cry.’’
Here's the first video released of baby Jade
The dramatic discovery took place in Marlborough House Community Park on Thursday afternoon.
Dad-of-four Roger raced to a friend’s nearby house and dialled 999, then rushed back to pick up the infant.
He said: “I thought I’m not going to touch anything because if I start messing and they come for forensics... I just didn’t want to hinder their job.
"The police told me they were on their way and asked me to pick her up and take her out of the park.’’
Moments later seven police cars and an ambulance arrived at the scene, off Stuart’s Road.
Roger, from Yardley, said: “They took the baby off me and put her straight into the ambulance. I then had to show police officers where I found her.’’
The little girl was taken to Heartlands Hospital where staff named her after hero pet Jade.
Here's a later video showing more of her time in hospital
On Friday pictures and video were released of the six-pound baby , who was said to be “alert, happy and contented” as she continues to recover.
Faithful nine-year-old Jade is now receiving extra special fuss from Roger and wife Catherine, who have five grandkids, including Eliza, who was born just over two weeks ago.
Catherine, 65, said: “Jade’s never found anything before. She must have heard the baby crying as these dogs have very good hearing, plus she’s very keen on our grandchildren.
"Whenever she hears their names she whimpers. She just loves kids.’’
She added: “I’m really pleased that the nurses named the baby after Jade, it makes me so proud of her.
‘‘It’s not a typical thing to find a baby, but that’s just the kind of thing that would happen to Roger. He’s that type of person. He cares about everyone.”
Jade is being monitored around the clock by paediatricians while police continue the search for her mother.
Roger and his wife are also hoping for a future reunion with the little girl. ‘‘We are waiting to hear from police if we can see her,’’ he said.
Chief Inspector Ian Green, of West Midlands Police, said the consequences of Jade not discovering the baby could have been serious.
“The baby was lucky to be found when she was as even just a few more hours exposed to the elements could have had fatal consequences,’’ he said.
“Thankfully, we now know she’s safe and well – and our priority is very much on finding her mum to ensure her safety.
"We’re still keen to hear from witnesses – especially anyone who saw somebody with a carrier bag from The Entertainer toy shop – or anyone who could have information that will lead us to identify the mother.”
Anyone with information is urged to call police on 101.
Video: The moment Wolves' training ground was daubed in West Bromwich Albion graffiti
Video: Birmingham Airport people smuggling operation caught on camera
Video: Midland university in 'is this the worst ever YouTube video' viral hit ||||| VIEW GALLERY
These are the first heartbreaking pictures of a newborn baby who was found abandoned in a park.
The healthy tot - who is barely a few days old - was discovered by dog-walker Roger Wilday wrapped in a towel in a plastic carrier bag by his German Shepherd on Thursday afternoon.
Hospital staff have named the baby in honour of Jade - the dog who may well have saved her life.
Medics say Jade - who weighs six pounds - is "alert, happy and contented" as she continues her recovery.
West Midlands Police have released a picture of the baby and say they urgently want to reunite her with her mother.
Baby Jade was discovered by Mr Wilday at around 3pm on Thursday in Stechford Park, the West Midlands.
Mr Wilday, 68, said of his dog: "She headed to the bushes. She wouldn't come back so I had to go over and I saw the bag and then I heard a baby cry.
"I reached down to look at the bag closer and I saw a baby in a blue blanket, I was so shocked.
"I dialled 999 and picked the baby up. She was warm so I don't think she had been there long."
He added: "Jade has grown up with children around her, she loves babies, she's a hero, if it wasn't for her that baby could have died."
Chief Inspector Ian Green, said: "It is fantastic news that baby Jade is recovering well in hospital - I’m told she’s very alert and a contented happy baby.
"She’s doing well and should make a full recovery over the next couple of days – but of course what she really needs is to be in her mother’s arms.
"I’d urge Jade’s mum to make contact with us on the 101 police number so we can reunite them and get her medical attention and emotional support."
Officers are continuing the search today for the baby’s mother.
Extensive house-to-house enquiries have been carried out around the park and checks made with regional hospitals, medical centres and care homes.
The towel baby jade was wrapped in, along with the carrier bag, have been sent away for fast-track forensics whilst it’s hoped DNA samples taken from the tot will help identify her parents.
Chief Insp Green, added: "Paediatricians have confirmed the baby was lucky to be found when she was as even just a few more hours exposed to the elements could have had fatal consequences.
"Thankfully, we now know she’s safe and well – and our priority is very much on finding her mum to ensure her safety and to provide whatever support she needs.
"We’re still keen to hear from witnesses who were in the park yesterday – especially anyone who saw somebody with a carrier bag from The Entertainer toy shop – or anyone who believes they could have information that will lead us to identify the mother." | – A 68-year-old British man was walking his dog in a Birmingham park last week when the German shepherd suddenly ran over to the bushes and refused to return. Owner Roger Wilday walked over to find her lying down next to what looked like trash ... but as he got closer, he realized it was actually a newborn infant. "I saw it move," Wilday tells the Birmingham Mail. "I thought it was a bag of kittens, but then I saw her little arms and a head, and the baby started to cry." The six-pound baby girl was brought to the hospital and named Jade, after the dog. She's "alert, happy, and contented" while recovering, and police are looking for her mother. Canine Jade "must have heard the baby crying as these dogs have very good hearing, plus she’s very keen on our grandchildren," Wilday says. "Whenever she hears their names she whimpers. She just loves kids." He and his wife are hoping they'll be allowed to see the little girl, who, police say, could have died had she been left outside even a few more hours. She was just a few days old when found, the Mirror notes. |
"They were doing this to sell and, you know, we don't know whether it is relevant or not, but at this point, everything is relevant," said DeWine. ||||| Four relatives were arrested in connection with the deaths of eight relatives (Photo: Provided)
"There was an obsession with control of the children," Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine said at a Tuesday news conference announcing the long-awaited arrests in the massacre of an entire Pike County family.
Arrested and charged with murder and a slew of other charges were Angela Wagner, 48, her husband George "Billy" Wagner, 47, and their two sons, George Wagner IV, 27, and Edward "Jake" Wagner, 26.
Pike County Sheriff Charlie Reader talks about how the four members of the Wagner family were apprehended at a press conference in Waverly, Ohio, on Tuesday, November 13, 2018. (Photo: Robert McGraw/Gazette)
At the center of the case is Sophia Wagner, 4, the daughter of Jake Wagner and Hanna Rhoden.
Christopher Rhoden Sr., 40; his older brother, Kenneth Rhoden, 44; Christopher's former wife, Dana Manley Rhoden, 38; their three children, Clarence "Frankie" Rhoden, 20; Hanna Rhoden, 19, and Chris Rhoden, Jr., 16; and a cousin Gary Rhoden, 38, and Hannah Gilley, 20, were all killed in their homes April 22, 2016. Most were asleep while the Wagners allegedly executed a meticulously planned attack to wipe out the family, DeWine said Tuesday.
Two others have been arrested in connection with a cover-up of the crimes: Rita Newcomb and Fredericka Wagner, mothers of Angela Wagner and George "Billy" Wagner are accused of forging custody documents.
Pike County Sheriff Charlie Reader talks about how the four members of the Wagner family were apprehended at a press conference in Waverly, Ohio, on Tuesday, November 13, 2018. (Photo: Robert McGraw/Gazette)
Authorities said Billy Wagner was arrested in Fayette County, Kentucky. Angela Wagner was arrested at her home in Scioto County. Jake and George Wagner were arrested in Ross County. Fredricka was arrested at the family's Flying W farm in Lucasville, which had been previously raided. Rita Newcomb was arrested at her home in South Webster, Ohio.
"They did this quickly, coldly, calmly and very carefully – but not carefully enough," said. Pike County Sheriff Charles Reader.
Prosecutors allege Angela Wagner purchased several items in the months leading up to the deaths of the Rhoden family and Hannah Gilley.
"...specific shoes from Walmart, 'brass catcher(s),' items with which to build 'brass catchers,' ammunition, a magazine clip, a 'bug' detector, and or items with which to build a 'silencer(s),' and/or various other items in preparation for these crimes," the indictment states.
Brass catchers are used to collect discharged bullet casings.
Prosecutors also say members of the family forged custody documents in their efforts to keep Sophia Wagner.
The attorney for the Wagners, John Kearson Clark, in a statement said his clients were innocent and looked forward to their trials. Clark said the family hopes the true culprits were brought to justice.
"They are hopeful for a thorough vetting of the facts," Clark said.
Authorities have repeatedly said the killers worked to cover their tracks, adding complexity to what is the largest homicide investigation in Ohio history. DeWine reiterated that point Tuesday saying authorities estimate that they conducted tens of thousands of hours of investigative work, followed more than 1,100 tips from the public and conducted 550 interviews.
More: Pike County residents remain uneasy even after Tuesday's arrests and charges
More: Pike County: What we know about the arrests made in the Rhoden family massacre
More: Pike County: Custody battle plays role in Rhoden family massacre
Dismissed by DeWine and Reader was the theory that the slain Rhoden family members had a soured marijuana business relationship.
They also said they don't believe anyone else is involved.
The Wagners moved to Kenai, Alaska, from Adams County, Ohio, in June 2017, telling The Enquirer the speculation of their involvement in the Rhoden deaths drove them to move 4,107 miles.
“Really the point to moving up here was to basically get into a better environment so they wouldn’t talk about us. Sophia is getting older, so she wouldn’t hear it,” Jake Wagner told The Enquirer in July 2017, standing on the family’s front porch in Kenai. “And then it followed us here.”
DeWine said the family moved back to the area in the spring of 2018.
What's next?
While the trial is planned to be held in Pike County Common Pleas Court, Pike County Prosecutor Rob Junk did acknowledge the possibility of a defense attorney asking a judge to move the trial out of the county due to the publicity of the case.
Further complicating and delaying the case is the complexity of it being a capital punishment case, meaning the defense attorneys would need a special qualification to represent the Wagners.
There wasn't a schedule for arraignment for the family Tuesday evening, however each person charged was in custody at various jails in Ohio and Kentucky.
The Wagners are also facing a series of additional charges including: conspiracy, engaging in a pattern of corrupt activity, tampering with evidence, unlawful possession of a dangerous ordinance, forgery, unauthorized use of property, interception of wire, oral, or electronic communications, obstructing justice, and aggravated burglary.
Reached for comment Tuesday afternoon, Leonard Manley, father of Dana Rhoden Manley, declined to comment on the Wagners' arrest.
Two other people were also arrested today in connection with the alleged cover-up of the #PikeCounty homicides. Anglea Wagner's mother, Rita Newcomb, and Billy Wagner's mother, Fredericka Wager. pic.twitter.com/WRuagVXMAB — Ohio AG Mike DeWine (@OhioAG) November 13, 2018
More: Pike County: Death in the foothills
More: Pike County: What we know about the arrests made in the Rhoden family massacre
More: Rhoden family massacre: Autopsy reports indicate one victim was awake when fatally shot
More: On the second anniversary of the Rhoden family massacre: 'I still got a lot of hate'
More: Pike County: Death in the foothills
Comprehensive coverage
►: Pike County: Wagner family arrested in the Rhoden family massacre
►: Rhoden family massacre: Autopsy reports indicate one victim was awake when fatally shot
►: On the second anniversary of the Rhoden family massacre: 'I still got a lot of hate'
►: 2 years since Pike County slayings, surviving child lives with fear. 'He's trapped by it'
►: Warrant: Investigators put GPS tracker on truck of Rhoden victim's brother
►: Rhoden family massacre: Wagner family tries to create new home in Alaska amid rumors
►: Police spokesman wrongly says SWAT present at Pike County raid for 'suspects'
►: Lawyer: Mike DeWine is harassing family in Rhoden case that moved to Alaska
►: Pike County: Death in the foothills
Read or Share this story: https://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/crime/crime-and-courts/2018/11/13/pike-county-massacre-wagner-family-arrested-rhoden-family-homicides/1373456002/ ||||| This undated images released by the Ohio Attorney General's office, shows Angela Wagner, one of four family members that has been arrested in the slayings of eight members of one family in rural Ohio... (Associated Press)
This undated images released by the Ohio Attorney General's office, shows Angela Wagner, one of four family members that has been arrested in the slayings of eight members of one family in rural Ohio two years ago, authorities announced Tuesday, Nov. 13, 2018. (Ohio Attorney General's office via AP) (Associated Press)
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — A family of four arrested Tuesday in the gruesome slayings of eight people from another family in rural Ohio two years ago carefully planned the killings for months in a crime prosecutors vaguely explained as a custody dispute, authorities said.
Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine said a grand jury indicted the four on aggravated murder charges and that could be sentenced to death if convicted.
DeWine gave scant detail about why they were killed, but did say the custody of young child played a role.
Arrested were four members of the Wagner family, who lived near the scenes of the killing about 60 miles (97 kilometers) south of Columbus.
One of those arrested was Edward "Jake" Wagner, 26, who was a long-time former boyfriend of 19-year-old Hanna Rhoden, one of the eight victims, and shared custody of their daughter at the time of the massacre.
The others arrested were Wagner's father, George "Billy" Wagner III, 47; his wife, 48-year-old Angela Wagner; and George Wagner, 27.
The Wagners had moved to Alaska, but authorities said three were arrested in Ohio.
Police in Kentucky say the FBI tracked "Billy" Wagner to Lexington, where he was arrested without incident at around 12:30 p.m. Tuesday. Lexington police weren't sure if he had been living in the area.
Authorities said Wagner was arrested in a horse trailer that was pulled over.
It's the culmination of a massive investigative effort since seven adults and a teenage boy were found shot in the head at four homes in April 2016.
Investigators scrambling to determine who targeted the Rhoden family and why had conducted over 130 interviews and processed over 100 pieces of evidence and 550 tips, while getting assistance from more than 20 law enforcement agencies.
Dewine said the case involved an "obsession with the custody and control of children" and called it one of the most bizarre situations he has seen.
He also said the Wagner family knew the victims well and spent months studying their routines and the layouts of their homes. "They had thought about it, a lot" he said.
Authorities in June of 2017 announced they were seeking information about the Wagners, including details on personal or business interactions and conversations that people may have had with the four.
None was named a suspect at the time. Investigators also said they had searched property in southern Ohio sold by the Wagners.
Both Jake Wagner and Angela Wagner told the Cincinnati Enquirer they were not involved in the April 2016 killings.
Angela Wagner said in an email to the newspaper that what happened was devastating and Hanna Rhoden was like a daughter to her.
Wagner also told The Enquirer that her husband, Billy, and Christopher Rhoden Sr. were more like brothers than friends.
John Clark, a lawyer who has been representing the Wagners, said a year ago that four of the Wagner family members had provided laptops, phones and DNA samples to investigators, and agreed to be interviewed about the slayings.
Clark said Tuesday the family will be vindicated.
"We look forward to the day when the true culprits will be discovered and brought to justice for this terrible tragedy," Clark said in a statement. He added: "The Wagners are also very hopeful that in the ensuing months there will be a thorough vetting of all the facts."
The Wagner family has lived in Peebles, Ohio, at the time of the killings but later moved to Alaska.
Clark told The Cincinnati Enquirer that the family was being "harassed while the real killer or killers are out there."
A coroner said all but one of the victims was shot more than once, including two people shot five times and one shot nine times. Some also had bruising, consistent with the first 911 caller's description of two victims appearing to have been beaten. The coroner's report didn't specify which victims had which wounds.
Authorities said marijuana growing operations were found at three of the four crime scenes. That's not uncommon in this corner of Appalachia but stoked rumors that the slayings were related to drugs, one of many theories on possible motives that percolated in public locally.
The victims were identified as 40-year-old Christopher Rhoden; his ex-wife, 37-year-old Dana Rhoden; their three children, 20-year-old Clarence "Frankie" Rhoden, 16-year-old Christopher Jr., and 19-year-old Hanna; Frankie Rhoden's fiancée, 20-year-old Hannah Gilley; Christopher Rhoden Sr.'s brother, 44-year-old Kenneth Rhoden; and a cousin, 38-year-old Gary Rhoden. Hanna Rhoden's days-old baby girl, another baby and a young child were unharmed.
It appeared some of them were killed as they slept, including Hanna Rhoden, who was in bed with her newborn nearby, authorities said. The child, Hannah Gilley's 6-month-old baby and another small child weren't hurt.
Three funerals were held for the victims.
___
Associated Press Writers John Seewer in Toledo and Dylan T. Lovan in Louisville, Kentucky, contributed to this report. ||||| The father of a surviving Rhoden child started a Gofundme account to help with legal bills he acquired to gain custody of his toddler-aged daughter.
Jake Wagner, the father of Sophia Wagner, created a GoFundMe account to help defray attorney costs related to his custody battle. Sophia is the daughter of Hanna Rhoden, who was killed with seven other members of her family April 22. (Photo: Provided)
Jake Wagner still can't quite bring himself to tell his 2 1/2-year-old daughter that her mommy is dead.
It's the finality of that word that stops him. He worries about the tow-headed toddler's unpredictable reaction. There will be, he knows, so many questions. He is concerned, too, she may become frightened.
He knows there will come a day when he will tell Sophia that her mom, Hanna Rhoden, was shot and killed with seven of her extended family members on April 22. He knows another day will arrive when he and she will make the trip to the cemetery where her mom is buried alongside two of her uncles and her maternal grandparents.
"I've told her that mommy is with Jesus and we will see her again later,'' Wagner said. "I don't know if she knows Hanna isn't coming back.
"I don't know if she understands."
How could she?
In addition to her mom, also killed were: her grandparents, Christopher Rhoden, 40, and Dana Rhoden, 37; her uncles, Clarence "Frankie" Rhoden, 20, and Christopher Rhoden Jr., 16; a great uncle, Kenneth Rhoden, 44; and a cousin, Gary Rhoden, 38. Also killed was Frankie Rhoden's fiancee Hannah Gilley, 20.
Two of her cousins, Ruger Rhoden, then 6 months, and Brentley Rhoden, 3, along with her newborn sister, Kylie, were found alive and physically unhurt in the trailers they shared with their parents.
The investigation is now in its fourth month with no stated motive nor suspects and no arrests. And as the criminal case is moving along, so is the business of custody and estates. Neither is easy.
A memorial at Ohio 32 and Union Hill Road in Pike County, where some of the eight victims were killed. Top left: Chris Rhoden, Frankie Rhoden and his fianceé, Hannah Gilley, Bottom left: Hanna Rhoden and her mom, Dana Rhoden. (Photo: Liz Dufour)
'Hate seeing my daughter cry'
This is Wagner's new reality: Full-time, single dad with mounting legal bills with a new job that pays half what he was making to ensure he is close to Sophia. But close still means the 23-year-old makes a daily commute from Peebles to Cincinnati, a 2 1/2-hour daily drive.
Wagner won custody of his little girl last month in Pike County, he said. And while the ruling was not unexpected, the legal bills were. This week Wagner set up a GoFundMe account in an effort to defray the legal bills and other unexpected but associated costs. He didn't know about the website until his mother mentioned it to him. He said he didn't want to draw attention to himself or to his daughter, but also didn't see a way out of the debt he has incurred since the homicide.
"These were not expenses I was supposed to have. I was just supposed to be able to spend time with her and give her a happy childhood, she is only 2 1/2 years old,'' Wagner wrote on the page of the crowd-fundraising site. "Sophia and I are just asking for enough to settle the fees that we acquired due to the horrific tragedy to her mommy.
"We want to get our lives back,'' he wrote. "I hate seeing my daughter cry."
Wagner set a fundraising goal of $20,000, but said his legal bills were not quite that high. But, he added, his legal bills were four times more than what he expected. The former over-the-road truck driver and trained mechanic has maxed out his credit cards. He said he is paying his lawyer in what is left over after he pays his other bills every month. It hardly makes a dent.
Hanna Rhoden and Wagner shared custody of Sophia, who was supposed to be with her mom that fateful Friday evening, he said. But Wagner picked her up a day earlier than normal: "I reckon we missed it by just hours."
Hanna Rhoden after giving birth to her daughter Kylie on April 17. (Photo: Provided)
Sophia's 5-day-old baby sister, Kylie, was nuzzled next their mom when she was killed. The baby remains in the protective custody of the county as officials have been working to establish her paternity. Wagner declined to publicly discuss the paternity case on Thursday, but has said that he and at least one other young man could be her father.
Neither court nor county officials will discuss the custody issues surrounding Kylie and Ruger. The Pike County Children Services Board filed a motion asking the county's juvenile court to seal those records and related court proceedings in the case. The Enquirer believes the proceedings are public under Ohio law. A court hearing on the issue is set for Aug. 4.
It's unclear if any family members have been able to see either Ruger or Kylie. Wagner knows that Sophia hasn't seen them since April 21.
But he has taken her to play with her cousin Brentley at a playground. She was at a family wedding this past weekend. She recently visited her great-grandmother Geneva Rhoden, which put a rare smile on the 73-year-old's matriarch's face.
Dad and daughter are working to find a sense of normalcy and routine. There are the four-wheeler rides he takes her on, to a nearby creek. She helps him in the barn with the animals. There are tea parties, nail polishing sessions and Disney videos.
On the nights he makes it home before she drifts off to sleep, they read books together -- "Finding Nemo" is her current favorite.
When they are all done, she interlocks her little fingers and she prays.
"And I have her talk to her mom."
Chris Graves is the Enquirer's local columnist. She has been writing about the Rhoden family massacre since April. You can email her at cgraves@enquirer.com or follow her on Twitter @chrisgraves.
Reward offered
Anyone with information related to the case is asked to call Southern Ohio Crime Stoppers at 740-773-TIPS. Anonymous tips are still being taken at the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation at 855-BCI-OHIO (224-6446) or the Pike County Sheriff's Office at 740-947-2111.
A $10,000 Crime Stoppers reward would be paid for any information that leads to apprehension of suspects and a conviction in the case.
Read or Share this story: http://cin.ci/2ahbLfZ | – Two and a half years after the execution-style slayings of eight members of the Rhoden family in Ohio, another family has been arrested. Four members of the Wagner family were arrested Tuesday, and authorities say a custody dispute played a role in the murders, the AP reports. Edward "Jake" Wagner, now 26, was the ex-boyfriend of Hanna Rhoden, 19, who was killed while lying in bed with her 4-day-old baby girl. Wagner was not the newborn's father, but shared custody of another daughter, Sophia, now 5, with Rhoden. Sophia was not with her mother when she was murdered; the newborn as well as two of her young cousins who were present were not hurt. (This chart shows how all the victims were related.) Also arrested, per Cincinnati.com: Wagner's parents George "Billy" Wagner III, 47, and Angela Wagner, 48, and his brother George Wagner IV, 27. All four have been charged with eight counts of aggravated murder and also face a slew of other charges. The mothers of both elder Wagners were also arrested and accused of forging custody documents in an alleged cover-up of the crimes. Citing a "fixation" and "obsession" the Wagner family allegedly had with the custody situation, Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine said Tuesday the situation is "the most bizarre story I've ever seen. It's just amazing." Authorities say the Wagners knew the Rhodens well and spent months studying their routines and the layouts of their homes. But the Wagners have long denied involvement and insisted they were close friends with the Rhodens; they moved to Alaska after the killings due, they said, to intense speculation over their possible involvement in the case. "Sophia is getting older," Jake Wagner (who also set up a GoFundMe for custody-related legal bills in the wake of the massacre) said at the time, so they moved "so she wouldn’t hear it." They were arrested, however, in Ohio and Kentucky. (See all our previous coverage of the massacre.) |
Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords is in critical condition after being shot in the head on Saturday morning. "I am very optimistic about her recovery," said a doctor at the University Medical Center in Tucson, while acknowledging that the bullet went through her brain. In 2007, Michelle Tsai explained how one might survive a gunshot to the head. The article is reprinted below.
A sheriff's deputy in Wisconsin killed his ex-girlfriend and five others at a house party on Sunday, then fled. When he was caught hours later, he used his .40-caliber Glock pistol to commit suicide—shooting himself twice from under the chin, and then once through the right side of his head. How'd he manage to shoot himself in the head three times?
He kept missing the brain. A gunshot to the head isn't always fatal; when the gun is aimed upward from the chin, the recoil can angle the muzzle toward the face. In this case, the bullet travels through the mouth and nose instead of back into the head, where the brain lies. The victim of such a wound would suffer serious injuries to the face; he might also suffocate if the bullet hit part of his nose, or if bits of flesh block the breathing pathway. But the pain isn't necessarily excruciating; survivors say it's like being punched or kicked in the face. A victim might even remain alert enough to use his hands, or, in the case of the sheriff's deputy, to reposition his gun and try again.
The severity of a self-inflicted bullet wound to the head depends on a few factors. The larger the bullet, the more damage, since the projectile destroys any tissue in its path. Hollow-point bullets that shatter are especially dangerous, as the fragments can spread into a larger swath of brain tissue.
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But where the bullet goes is most important: the farther from the center of the brain, the greater the chance of survival. If a bullet grazes the tip of one of the lobes of the brain, the patient will probably live with proper medical treatment. If a bullet enters just one hemisphere, it's still possible to make a reasonable recovery. Someone who took a shot just to the front of the brain might suffer personality changes, like Phineas Gage, the 19th-century railroad worker who became obstinate and profane after an accident. A patient with a wound to the side of the head usually arrives at the hospital unconscious but breathing.
The gravest bullet trajectories cross from one side of the head to the other, striking the center of the brain along the way. Here lie the brain stem, the diencephalon, and other structures that together govern basic life functions such as breathing, the heart rate, blood pressure, and temperature. A bullet through the mouth, Hitler-style, can kill immediately if it strikes the brain stem.
Whatever the angle, gunshot wounds to the head are usually fatal. According to unpublished data from the University of Maryland, of 264 such victims from 2000, all but 29 died on the spot. Of the 27 who were accounted for, only 18 made it into an operating room. Eight survived with significant disabilities; 10 had a good recovery.
Got a question about today's news? Ask the Explainer .
Explainer thanks Bizhan Aarabi of the University of Maryland Medical Center, Robert Levine of the University of Texas School of Medicine at Houston, and Dave Ross of Penrose Hospital in Colorado Springs, Colo.
Like Slate and the Explainer on Facebook. Follow us on Twitter.
Like This Story ||||| Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords remains in intensive care following surgery at the University of Arizona Hospital for a gunshot wound to the head at close range.
Dr. Manny Alvarez, senior managing health editor of FoxNews.com, said surviving a gunshot wound to the head is rare, but not unheard of – and Giffords is in for a long fight.
Alvarez said the survival rate of a gunshot wound to the head is about 5 percent – and 3 percent of those who do survive will always have a neurological deficiency, such as memory loss or a lack or motor skills.
“It all depends on where the bullet goes,” he said. “Your best chance of survival is from front to back, if you get shot side to side, the survival rate is less, and it all depends on the damage the brain has.”
Giffords’ friend, state Sen. Linda Lopez, confirmed the bullet entered Giffords’ head at her temple and exited through her forehead. Lopez said Giffords was responding to commands before surgery but is not sure what Giffords' long-term prognosis is.
“If the bullet goes through both hemispheres and leans toward the base of skull, that is where most of the vascular tissues are, and that can be a deadly result,” Alvarez said. “If the bullet goes through both hemispheres, but there is a clean exit wound, the patient can be lucky and there might not be any significant damage. Of course, the best prognosis is when the bullet affects only one hemisphere. Nonetheless, any gunshot wound to the head is going to leave residual side effects.”
Alvarez said the next three to four days is considered the most critical for Giffords, and recovery could take years to achieve.
“Doctors carefully opened the skull and looked for any type of bleeding and then cauterized blood vessels,” Alvarez said. “Patients are kept under anesthesia for three to four days to monitor brain swelling, which is one of the complications of this surgery."
Alvarez pointed to the story of a British soldier who survived a gunshot wound to the brain but learned to walk and talk again and in October 2010 was quoted in the The Sun as saying, “They say I’m a walking miracle.”
The soldier, Liam Brentley, was shot near the ear, and the bullet came out the other side of his head, pinging a wall, according to the U.K. newspaper.
Brentley is deaf in one ear and has some memory loss. | – The survival rate of a gunshot wound to the head, as Arizona Rep Gabrielle Giffords suffered yesterday, is about 5%, and 3% of those who do survive carry lasting neurological deficiencies, such as loss of memory loss or motor skills, reports Fox News. The next three to four days are most critical, says a Fox News doctor. Doctors first open the skull, look for bleeding, and cauterize blood vessels. "Patients are kept under anesthesia for three to four days to monitor brain swelling, which is one of the complications of this surgery," explains the expert. If the bullet grazes the tip of one of the brain lobes, the victim has the greatest chance for survival, and a bullet through one hemisphere still offers a reasonable chance. "[T]he farther from the center of the brain, the greater the chance of survival," reported Slate in a 2007 article about a slaying in Wisconsin. "The gravest bullet trajectories cross from one side of the head to the other, striking the center of the brain along the way." Doctors said yesterday they were "optimistic" about Giffords' chances for recovery. |
"They're trying to profit off of it, and I think it's disgusting," Lori Alhadeff, whose daughter, Alyssa, was killed after being shot 10 times at Marjory Stoneman Douglas, said on Tuesday. "We are trying to prevent this from happening again, and they are encouraging it. It is despicable. It is vile."
The computer game was going to be released via the digital marketplace Steam, and was developed by Revived Games, which marketed it as a "dynamic SWAT simulator." It offered the option to play either the shooter or a SWAT team member.
Acid, the publisher of the game, addressed the controversy in a confusing blog post last week on Steam's forums, writing: "After receiving such high amount of critics and hate, I will more likely remove the shooters [sic] role in this game by the release, unless if it can be kept as it is right now."
The post is attributed to a developer named Arthur Belkin, who lists the Russian Federation as his home country.
But on Tuesday night, Valve Corporation, the owner of Steam, announced it had removed the game after an investigation, and found that the developer and publisher was actually "a person calling himself Ata Berdiyev, who had previously been removed last fall."
"Ata is a troll, with a history of customer abuse, publishing copyrighted material, and user review manipulation," Valve said. "His subsequent return under new business names was a fact that came to light as we investigated the controversy around his upcoming title. We are not going to do business with people who act like this towards our customers or Valve."
Many had called for the game to be pulled, including anti-gun activist Fred Guttenberg, whose 14-year-old daughter, Jaime, was killed in the Parkland shooting.
"Wow, this is amazing news!!!" he tweeted after learning it had been removed.
A disclaimer at the beginning of the game's demo had said it did not intend to glamorize violence.
The game's description also said players should "not take any of this seriously" and urged them to get help if they feel like hurting anyone.
But many critics had said that was not enough — including Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., who called the game "inexcusable" and tweeted, "Any company that develops a game like this in wake of such a horrific tragedy should be ashamed of itself."
This isn't the first video game to create such controversy. In 2011, another game, "School Shooter," which portrayed the Columbine school shooting that took place in 1999 in Colorado, was pulled after public outcry. ||||| A video game that let players simulate a school shooting was set to come out on Steam, the PC’s biggest platform for buying and selling games. But Valve Corporation, which runs Steam, has taken it down.
Active Shooter, from developer Revived Games and publisher ACID, was set to release next week on Steam. But it drew a lot of negative attention, including from outlets like BuzzFeed and Kotaku, as well as the survivors of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in Parkland, Florida. Parkland activist Emma Gonzalez tweeted, “Valve Corp shut down this shovelware immediately please.” (Shovelware is software that does nothing new and is a quick cash grab.) Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL) called the game “inexcusable.”
On Tuesday, a Valve spokesperson told Deadline that the company is removing the game from its online storefront:
We have removed the developer Revived Games and publisher ACID from Steam. This developer and publisher is, in fact, a person calling himself Ata Berdiyev, who had previously been removed last fall when he was operating as “[bc]Interactive” and “Elusive Team”. Ata is a troll, with a history of customer abuse, publishing copyrighted material, and user review manipulation. His subsequent return under new business names was a fact that came to light as we investigated the controversy around his upcoming title. We are not going to do business with people who act like this towards our customers or Valve. The broader conversation about Steam’s content policies is one that we’ll be addressing soon.
The ill-advised game, based on a video posted on Steam, would let you play either as a SWAT team member focused on stopping the school shooting or as the actual shooter. The game’s developer, it seems, saw this as a selling point — with the developer pointing out on Steam that “[o]nly in ‘Active Shooter’, you will be able to pick the role of an Elite S.W.A.T [sic] member or the actual shooter.”
The video showed a shooter running through school hallways and classrooms while killing — with firearms and grenades — police officers and civilians. Through a score counter, the game tracked “civ killed” and “cops killed.”
The developer responded to the outrage last week, saying that it “will more likely remove the shooters [sic] role in this game by the release, unless if [sic] it can be kept as it is right now.” But it also defended the game, arguing that there are worse games out there (“Hatred, Postal, Carmageddon and etc.”) and that it “does not promote any sort of violence, especially any soft [sic] of a mass shooting.”
For more on America’s gun violence problem, read Vox’s explainer. ||||| Valve Corporation of Bellevue is planning to launch a video game on June 6 that is a school shooting simulator. This is horrific.
The company is taking the stand that this game is legal because of free speech and everything else that tech billionaires hide behind when they are doing something the public knows is absolutely, morally corrupt but legally fine - but we cannot stand for this.
How can anyone sleep at night knowing that they are profiting from turning deadly school shootings into entertainment?
Please sign this petition asking Valve to not launch this game. ||||| Environment & Future Plans
Hello everybody!!
First of all, I wanted to thank each of you who left any soft of feedback and support for our game and what I do. I really appreciate it!!
Now, I wanted to talk more about game's enviroment and future plans. For now, there is only one in-game location where you could exprecience active shooter simulations. This is not where I am stopping. I am planning on adding extra enviroments to the game; Those will include "Shopping Stores", "Gas Stations" and enviroments in this sort. I have to say though, majority of them will depend on active S.W.A.T play rather than the shooter himself, but we will see.
Updates with more enviroments will be out for free and within a first month of release. I will definitely try to have at least an extra location available on the day of the release. Other than that, game will continue its course of development and improvement throghout the year.
Multiplayer will mostly include 2 teams against each other sort of play. In Co-Op you will be able to choose sides and play as you would normally play in the Single-Player.
Hopefully this will clarify a few things for each of you. If there are any questions, feel free to ask them in F.A.Q thread in game's discussion forums.
Thanks a lot guys!! | – More than 120,000 people so far have signed a petition calling for a game that simulates a mass shooting inside a school to be pulled from release. Active Shooter allows players to play as either the shooter or a SWAT responder and is due out June 6 on digital platform Steam, although after outcry erupted, its creator insisted in a blog post it is meant to be a "SWAT simulator" and said he might remove the ability to play as the shooter due to the controversy. Many have spoken out against the game, from politicians to activists to survivors of shootings in Parkland, Fla., and elsewhere, NBC News reports. Vox notes that a screenshot of the game shows that when playing as the shooter, stats are kept on the number of police officers killed as well as the number of civilians killed. |
Image copyright Posti Image caption Postal workers have volunteered to take part in the lawn-mowing initiative
Finland's postal service will be doing more than just delivering letters and parcels this summer - its workers will be mowing lawns, too.
The state-owned Posti company is offering a weekly grass cutting service, with customers able to choose either 30 minutes or 60 minutes of lawn-mowing time, the national broadcaster Yle reports. It will only be available on Tuesdays, though, as the volume of post tends to be lighter than on other days, and customers will have to provide their own lawnmower. They'll also have to be willing to pay 65 euro (£51; $73) a month for the half-hour sessions.
Posti has been looking for ways to tackle a falling demand for its mail services in recent years. Earlier this month it announced that delivery times would be extended into the evenings when people are usually at home.
According to Anu Punola, a manager at the company, venturing into the world of gardening was a grassroots idea which came from postal workers themselves. "We have genuinely tried to find services that would make people's lives easier," she says, adding that staff have volunteered to take part in the initiative. It will be available nationwide between May and August.
At least one organisation isn't happy about the plan, though. The Real Estate Employers group, which represents property maintenance companies, says it's concerned that postal workers don't have the right skills. "Using power-driven machinery and equipment requires a certain expertise," says managing director Pia Gramen. "It is hard to believe that just anyone can start to cut lawns."
Next story: Norway minister's Med stunt backfires
Use #NewsfromElsewhere to stay up-to-date with our reports via Twitter. ||||| Posti offers its new home services to the South Karelia Social and Health Care District
11.02.2016
Posti has launched the first municipal cooperation within Posti's new home services with the South Karelia Social and Health Care District Eksote. During the 12-month pilot, Posti's employees will help Eksote's home care clients as well as clients using services for the disabled in their daily lives as part of meal or mail delivery. Eksote's aim in combining home care with Posti's services is to improve its clients' ability to function and quality of life at home.
Eksote wants to make the support its clients need for coping at home as easily and flexibly available as possible. Posti's network of professionals reaches both densely and sparsely populated areas every weekday, which helps municipalities to provide support in the client's home.
- All our clients have their individual needs and ways of life, which means that the services must be customizable. Receiving help from Posti's employee for daily tasks to complement home care will mean stronger support networks for our clients. The feedback from our clients has been positive. Many of our clients already know Posti's employees from meal and mail delivery, says Taina Jaako, Director of Care at Eksote.
- Posti's task is to help clients with their daily chores during the visit, to talk to them, and to notify Eksote of any exceptions. Combining home services with Posti's other operations - meal deliveries or mail delivery - is a natural choice. Posti can arrange even short visits cost-effectively, Tiina Tapionlinna, Project Director at Posti says.
Posti helps with daily chores, Eksote provides care
Posti's employees will perform specific, predefined tasks. Depending on the client's needs, these could include warming up meals, assisting in eating, and other forms of support for everyday life. Eksote's employees are responsible for health care and other tasks that require competence in social or health care.
- In the care for the elderly, helping the clients with their everyday chores is a major part of the work of home care providers, and the contract with Posti will give us more resources for this. The aging of the population will increase the need for services provided in homes. For Eksote's clients in services for the disabled, Posti creates added value through an improved sense of security, by having someone visit the clients between the visits by our professionals, Merja Heinonen, Service Manager at Eksote says.
Posti's home services are available for clients selected by Eksote in Ylämaa, Savitaipale and Rautjärvi. Posti has years of experience in cooperation with municipal home care in the form of meal deliveries.
Posti's employees are always near
As digitalization is decreasing the volume of traditional mail, Posti is investing in developing its business in services related to care, security, housekeeping, and property management. Posti's network of professionals and our transport fleet cover the entire country, and they can be used for the benefit of companies, cities and consumer customers in many ways in addition to the delivery of mail and meals. Posti reaches 2.8 million households every weekday.
Posti has launched a trial with Securitas on alarm and security services in Muhos and Ylivieska. The trial will last for this spring. In Oulu, Posti has launched a pilot project, during which Posti's mail deliverers visit the homes of elderly clients. The deliverer meets the elderly client and informs their family member of how the person was feeling that day. In addition, Posti is planning to extend its services to housekeeping and property management.
Posti Group is your first choice in postal, logistics, and e-commerce services. We manage the flow of commerce and everyday life in nine countries. Our net sales in 2014 amounted to EUR 1.859 billion. We employ approximately 23,000 professionals who serve our customers in Finland under the name Posti and in other countries under the name Itella. All of our services in Finland are carbon neutral. www.posti.com.
South Karelia Social and Health Care District (Eksote) provides health, family, social, and elderly services that promote people's health, well-being, and ability to function. Eksote makes service agreements with the municipalities, based on the service need of the population. Eksote is a joint municipal authority that comprises nine municipalities: Imatra, Lappeenranta, Lemi, Luumäki, Parikkala, Rautjärvi, Ruokolahti, Savitaipale, and Taipalsaari. The population served by Eksote is approximately 133,000. The services produced by Eksote include outpatient care, oral health care, mental health care and substance abuse services, laboratory and imaging examination services, medicinal care, rehabilitation services, hospital services, family services, social services for adults, special services for the disabled, and flexible services for the elderly that are adaptable to the needs and age structure of the population. Eksote includes the South Karelia health care district and the South Karelia special care district. ||||| Starting in 1996, Alexa Internet has been donating their crawl data to the Internet Archive. Flowing in every day, these data are added to the Wayback Machine after an embargo period.
Starting in 1996, Alexa Internet has been donating their crawl data to the Internet Archive. Flowing in every day, these data are added to the Wayback Machine after an embargo period.
This summer, Posti will mow your lawn for you
21.04.2016
Posti's online shop will soon accept orders for a new lawn mowing service. The service will be performed in conjunction with mail delivery on Tuesdays and it will be available in one-month packages. The first date the service can be performed is May 17, and the service will be available until the end of August.
Posti has developed new home-delivered services to add more work to mail delivery operations. Traditional mail volumes are falling, but mail routes nevertheless reach some 2.8 households on every weekday. Posti's new home services will see it transform increasingly into a service company.
"Lawn mowing is the first home service that consumers can order from Posti. We will pilot the service this summer throughout the country. The idea for the lawn mowing service came from mail delivery employees. We believe many customers will be happy to outsource lawn mowing when we make it convenient for them to do so," says Anu Punola, Director at Posti.
Orders for lawn mowing services will be taken into account in the planning of mail delivery routes. The service will be offered on Tuesdays due to the lower volume of advertisements and publications distributed on that day. The service will be performed using the customer's lawn mower and within the time estimated by the customer. In the event of rain on the day of intended service delivery, the lawn will be mowed at another time.
"Posti hopes Finland will see great weather this summer and that our customers enjoy the hottest time of the year. This summer, we invite you to rely on our nationwide network of professionals to help you maintain your lawn," Punola adds.
Mail delivery employees are close to customers
The work of mail delivery employees has become increasingly diverse. With extensive experience of meal delivery, Posti currently delivers some two million meals to Finnish homes annually. As part of the development of new home services, Posti is also partnering with the South Karelia Social and Health Care District Eksote in the provision of home care and services for people with disabilities by assisting customers with eating and daily chores. Posti is also partnering with Securitas to perform security services in a pilot being conducted in the Finnish towns of Muhos and Ylivieska.
Lawn mowing service is tax-deductible for domestic costs
Orders for lawn mowing services can be placed via Posti's online shop at posti.fi/ruohonleikkaus. The payment methods accepted by the online shop are online banking and credit cards. Customers should also note that the service is tax-deductible for domestic costs.
Service prices:
30 minutes every Tuesday, EUR 65/month
60 minutes every Tuesday, EUR 130/month
Posti's lawn mowing service can be ordered in May for the last two weeks of the month. The price will be half of the monthly price. Orders for the lawn mowing service must be placed no later than one week before the start of the next calendar month. Customers will receive an e-mail confirmation of their order and a reminder message on the day before the lawn mowing service is performed. ||||| Image: Posti
Starting in May, Finnish residents will no longer receive garden variety mail services, as the postal delivery company Posti moves to introduce a new grass cutting service.
In a statement released Thursday, Posti said that customers will be able to order the service from next week, although postal workers won’t begin tending lawns until May.
The lawn maintenance service will be available with mail delivery on Tuesdays. The company explained the choice of service time by noting that mail volumes on Tuesday are typically lower than on other days. Customers will be able to order the weekly half-hour trim for a monthly fee of 65 euros.
Posti: Idea came from the ground up
The idea for the grassroots service came from Posti mail carriers, according to director Anu Punola. She pointed out that Posti is in a period of transition caused by falling mail volumes. The firm also field-tested the idea on consumers.
"We have genuinely tried to find services that would make people’s lives easier," she added.
Punola noted that mail carriers can volunteer to tend customers’ lawns and added that supervisors have determined which employees are willing to pitch in.
"We have been able to find volunteers," Punola commented and said other services are in the works. She would not reveal what the company has up its sleeve, but said the ideas must be competitive.
Consumers will be able to purchase the new service for one-month periods and mail carriers will actually begin tackling lawns from May 17. The service will close at the end of August.
Postal workers won’t carry lawnmowers on the job, so customers must have one on hand. In the event of rain, the service will be postponed. | – The USPS isn't the only woebegone postal service. Things are bad enough in Finland that the state-owned Posti is getting into ... lawn care. Under the new program, which begins next month, postal workers will mow residents' lawns each Tuesday, when mail volumes are typically lower, broadcaster Yle reports. Interested Finns can go online to order the service, which will run from May 17 through August. A weekly 30-minute cut will cost about $74 a month, and homeowners must provide the mower. In a press release, Posti head Anu Punola says she anticipates that people will be "happy to outsource lawn mowing," adding that the idea came from the mail carriers themselves. Last year, Posti reported losses of about $85 million, per the Atlantic, with delivery volumes down to 1960s levels. Nonetheless, Posti says, mail service is provided to 2.8 million households and "new home services will see it transform increasingly into a service company." Indeed, the Atlantic notes Posti launched a 12-month pilot program in February where, in partnership with a health-services company, postal workers will visit the homes of people with disabilities and do light chores, like warming up meals and helping with eating. "Posti's network of professionals reaches both densely and sparsely populated areas every weekday," points out a press release. As for the mowing, some are grumbling. The BBC reports a group that represents property maintenance companies is concerned postal workers don't have the "expertise" to operate lawnmowers, adding, "It is hard to believe that just anyone can start to cut lawns." |
The information was posted during an extraordinary hearing in which Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh and Christine Blasey Ford testified in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee. | John Shinkle/POLITICO Ex-Democratic staffer charged with posting senators’ private info
A man accused of "doxing" several GOP senators was caught on Tuesday night inside the office of Sen. Maggie Hassan by a Hassan staffer, who then called the police on the man, according to a person familiar with the matter.
The U.S. Capitol Police on Wednesday arrested Jackson A. Cosko, 27, for posting addresses and private information of senators, according to the police department. A former Hassan (D-N.H.) staffer, Cosko made an unauthorized entry into her Capitol Hill office on Tuesday evening which led to his arrest, the person familiar with the matter said.
Story Continued Below
Hassan's office declined to comment. Cosko most recently worked for Hassan as a “legislative correspondent/systems administrator,” according to Legistorm. Cosko left Hassan’s office in May. Cosko is due in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on Thursday.
The department reported that it arrested Cosko for allegedly posting “private, identifying information (doxing) about one or more United States senators to the Internet.” Cosko has been working as an intern in the office of Democratic Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee of Texas and has been fired, according to her chief of staff, Glenn Rushing.
“We’re just cooperating with law enforcement right now,” Rushing said in an interview.
Cosko graduated from The George Washington University in 2014 and previously worked for Hassan and California Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer, who has since retired.
Last week, the Wikipedia pages of Sens. Mike Lee of Utah, Orrin Hatch of Utah and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina were altered to show their addresses, phone numbers and email address. The information was posted during an extraordinary hearing in which Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh and Christine Blasey Ford testified about Ford’s accusation that Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her in 1982. All three are GOP senators who are supportive of Kavanaugh.
Cosko has been charged with making public restricted personal information, witness tampering, threats in interstate communications, unauthorized access of a government computer, identity theft, second-degree burglary and unlawful entry. A bot that tracks edits to Wikipedia pages found that the changes were made from a computer on Capitol Hill on the House side.
“The investigation will continue and additional charges may be forthcoming,” the police said.
Cosko remained in custody Wednesday evening and was due to appear before Judge Deborah A. Robinson in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on Thursday. ||||| U.S. Capitol Police announced late Wednesday that a former junior Senate Democratic staffer has been arrested for allegedly posting private information about Republican senators on the Wikipedia Internet website.
Jackson A. Cosko, 27, of the District, faces five federal counts including making public restricted personal information, making threats in interstate communications, identity theft, witness tampering and unauthorized access of a government computer, police said.
Cosko also faces District charges of second degree burglary and unlawful entry, police said. He is set to appear before U.S. Magistrate Deborah A. Robinson of the District on Thursday afternoon, the U.S. attorney’s office for the District said.
“The investigation will continue and additional charges may be forthcoming,” Capitol Police spokeswoman Eva Malecki said.
Cosko could not immediately be reached for comment.
A brief police statement did not give details, but a U.S. official said the arrest was tied to the investigation into the posting of personal information about Republican senators on the Wikipedia site as they held a hearing Sept. 27 on sexual assault allegations against Supreme Court nominee Brett M. Kavanaugh.
At the time, Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) rejected accusations that a member of her staff was responsible, calling them “lies, lies, and more despicable lies.”
The information posted purportedly included phone numbers and home addresses for three Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee at the hearing: Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (S.C.), Sen. Mike Lee (Utah) and Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (Utah).
[‘Despicable lies’: Rep. Maxine Waters denies her staff doxed Republicans on Wikipedia]
They were doxed — or had private or identifying information made public on the internet — when an anonymous Wikipedia user edited their pages. The information was quickly removed after the doxing was discovered and aides contacted authorities.
Edits to the online encyclopedia were traced to IP addresses of computer devices assigned to the U.S. Capitol. Waters in her statement last week said Capitol Police and internal computer specialists determined that an IP address cited online did not belong to her office or anyone on her staff.
According to the Legistorm website of congressional disclosures, Cosko was employed as a low-level aide from January 2017 to May 2018 with the office of U.S. Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.), and earlier with former senator Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.).
Hassan spokesman Aaron Jacobs said he could not comment on an ongoing investigation.
Cosko was paid $23,000 over six months ending March 31, according to Legistorm.
A LinkedIn website to a Jackson Cosko lists work from Jan. 2016 to May 2018 as an intern, press assistant and legislative correspondent/systems administrator assisting senior Senate staff on matters before the commerce and homeland security committees, including cyber security issues.
It could not be immediately determined if Cosko had any past connection to Waters’ office. The office did not immediately respond to a request for comment late Wednesday. ||||| Personal information of Republican Sens. Lindsey Graham, Mike Lee and Orrin Hatch were posted by an unknown person located in the House of Representatives on Thursday during the hearing of Supreme Court Nominee Judge Brett Kavanaugh.
The information, which supposedly included home addresses and phone numbers, was posted - or doxxed - on the senators’ respective Wikipedia pages, where users are allowed to update the information at any time. The information has since been removed.
All three targeted senators were members of the Senate Judiciary Committee who questioned both Dr. Christine Blasey Ford and Kavanaugh regarding Ford’s allegations that he sexually assaulted her over 36 years ago. The leaking of information occurred sometime after the three lawmakers questioned Kavanaugh.
KAVANAUGH VOTE LIVE BLOG - SENATE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE WEIGHS IN ON RECOMMENDING NOMINEE
But while the home addresses of the senators appear to be correct, the phone numbers weren’t entirely accurate, with most either disconnected or going to voicemail.
A “home” phone number listed for Graham appears to direct the callers to Sexual Minority Youth Assistance League (SMYAL), a Washington D.C.-based advocacy group. A receptionist told Fox News that they didn’t receive many calls, despite their number being listed as the senator’s home number.
LINDSEY GRAHAM'S KAVANAUGH MOMENT EARNS CONSERVATIVE PRAISE
“It’s shocking that someone would post Senator Hatch and other Judiciary Committee Republican’s home addresses online, putting their families at risk,” Hatch’s spokesman, Matt Whitlock told the Washington Post.
“That it happened as they were asking questions in a Supreme Court confirmation hearing is just another indication of how broken this process has become".
White House spokesman Raj Shah wrote on Twitter that the leake information was "outrageous".
The intentional publication of the information was first caught by a Twitter bot that automatically tracks any changes made to Wikipedia entries from anyone located in the U.S. Congress and publicizes them on the social media site.
SEN. JEFF FLAKE SAYS HE WILL VOTE TO CONFIRM KAVANAUGH
The tracking account has since deleted the tweets because they revealed the personal information. Fox News confirmed the changes were made to the senators’ pages. The Wikipedia appears to have removed the changes.
Due to the anonymity of the edits, it remains improbable that a person or persons responsible for the stunt could be caught. It remains unclear whether the publication of such information was done to intimidate the senators following the dramatic hearings on Thursday.
Graham stood out during the hearings, giving perhaps one of the most impassioned speeches in defense of Kavanaugh, accusing the Democrats of trying to destroy the Supreme Court nominee with the “the most unethical sham since I've been in politics.”
“What you want to do is destroy this guy’s life, hold this seat open, and hope you win in 2020,” Graham told Senate Judiciary Democrats. “Boy, y’all want power and I hope you don’t get it.”
Other senators also defended Kavanaugh, including Hatch, who said: “What we have are uncorroborated, unsubstantiated claims from his teenage years” and that Kavanaugh has been treated unfairly. | – A former member of Democratic Sen. Maggie Hassan's staff was caught inside Hassan's Capitol Hill office Tuesday night and ultimately arrested Wednesday on charges that he "doxxed" GOP senators. Jackson A. Cosko, 27, is accused of posting "private, identifying information," including addresses, online, Politico reports. A current Hassan staffer allegedly caught him in the office and called police; he had allegedly made an unauthorized entry. Cosko, a George Washington University graduate who also worked for Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer, had most recently been working as an intern for Democratic Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee; he has since been fired. A US official tells the Washington Post the arrest relates to information posted on Wikipedia during Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh's Senate Judiciary Committee hearing; during that hearing, the Wikipedia pages of Republican Sens. Mike Lee, Orrin Hatch, and Lindsey Graham were edited to include addresses, phone numbers, and email addresses, and the changes were found to be made from a Capitol Hill computer. All three are members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Fox News reports. Cosko is charged with making public restricted personal information, witness tampering, making threats in interstate communications, unauthorized access of a government computer, identity theft, second-degree burglary, and unlawful entry. |
Replying to @PatBlanchfield he learned about it when he was under fire in iraq ||||| Tweet with a location
You can add location information to your Tweets, such as your city or precise location, from the web and via third-party applications. You always have the option to delete your Tweet location history. Learn more ||||| Tweet with a location
You can add location information to your Tweets, such as your city or precise location, from the web and via third-party applications. You always have the option to delete your Tweet location history. Learn more ||||| Libertarian-minded Republicans like Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky blasted Trump's decision to launch strikes. | AP Photo Trump's Syria strikes divide Congress — but not along partisan lines
President Donald Trump’s missile attacks against the Syrian government on Thursday night split Congress into several camps, winning bipartisan backing from some senior lawmakers while also sparking a coalition of those on the left and right who raised constitutional concerns.
Congressional leaders in both parties largely signaled their support. House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) called Trump’s strikes “appropriate and just" and said he looks "forward to the administration further engaging Congress in this effort."
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Top Democrats, like House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) also offered their support, but both made clear they believed any escalation would require the approval of Congress.
“Tonight’s strike in Syria appears to be a proportional response to the regime’s use of chemical weapons," Pelosi said, but added, “The crisis in Syria will not be resolved by one night of airstrikes." Durbin said “any further action will require close scrutiny by Congress, and any escalation beyond airstrikes or missile strikes will require engaging the American people in that decision."
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said, “Making sure Assad knows that when he commits such despicable atrocities he will pay a price is the right thing to do.” The New York Democrat added, though, that “it is incumbent on the Trump administration to come up with a strategy and consult with Congress before implementing it.”
Meanwhile, libertarian-minded Republicans like Sens. Mike Lee of Utah and Rand Paul of Kentucky blasted Trump's decision to launch strikes without first getting approval by Congress.
“The President needs congressional authorization for military action as required by the Constitution,” Paul said in a Tweet.
They were joined by liberal Democrats, including Sen. Brian Schatz of Hawaii and Rep. Ted Lieu of California, who also argued the use of force requires congressional approval under the Constitution.
Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.), who was the lone member of Congress to vote against the 2001 war authorization against Al Qaeda, called the strikes an “act of war” and said Congress needs to come back into session and debate the matter. Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) called Trump's failure to seek congressional authorization "unlawful."
On the other side were Republican defense hawks, who offered full-throated praise for Trump’s decision — including Sens. John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, two of Trump’s fiercest GOP critics on other issues.
“Unlike the previous administration, President Trump confronted a pivotal moment in Syria and took action,” McCain and Graham said in a joint statement. “For that, he deserves the support of the American people.”
Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, another GOP defense hawk who has sometimes been critical of Trump, also issued a statement of support.
“By acting decisively against the very facility from which Assad launched his murderous chemical weapons attack, President Trump has made it clear to Assad and those who empower him that the days of committing war crimes with impunity are over,” Rubio said.
Congress and the White House have long been at odds over the president’s constitutional war powers.
Both the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were authorized by Congress. But President Barack Obama did not seek congressional authorization for the 2011 military intervention in Libya.
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Obama did seek authorization in 2013 for strikes against the Assad regime in Syria, though he maintained he had the power to order strikes without such an authorization.
Ultimately, Congress never acted on a resolution against the Syrian government amid significant opposition, and Obama did not launch strikes, instead pursuing diplomatic avenues for removing chemical weapons from Syria.
Many Republicans may find themselves in an awkward spot Friday as they justify their support for Trump's missile strike after suggesting similar actions by the Obama administration would be unconstitutional.
U.S. launches airstrikes in Syria poster="http://v.politico.com/images/1155968404/201704/149/1155968404_5388955029001_5388944110001-vs.jpg?pubId=1155968404" true
Stalwart Trump ally Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), along with more than 100 colleagues, signed a 2013 letter that sharply warned Obama against a unilateral attack. "Engaging our military in Syria when no direct threat to the United States exists and without prior congressional authorization would violate the separation of powers that is clearly delineated in the Constitution," they wrote.
Other GOP signatories included Rep. Lynn Jenkins of Kansas, who applauded Trump as "decisive," and Rep. Joe Wilson of South Carolina, who commended Trump for his "swift action." A slew of other Republicans who praised Trump — including Don Young of Alaska, Martha Roby of Alabama, Roger Williams of Texas — opposed or leaned heavily against Obama's request to authorize the use of force in Syria while heaping praise on Trump Thursday night.
The Congressional Research Service addressed the issue of war powers in a report last month, noting that “in the post-Cold War world, presidents have continued to commit U.S. armed forces into potential hostilities, sometimes without a specific authorization from Congress.”
“It is generally agreed that the Commander-in-Chief role gives the President power to utilize the armed forces to repel attacks against the United States,” CRS said in its report. “But there has long been controversy over whether he is constitutionally authorized to send forces into hostile situations abroad without a declaration of war or other congressional authorization.”
The U.S. military has been conducting airstrikes in Syria since 2014, but these have been aimed at the Islamic State. The Obama and Trump administrations have cited as their legal justification for these strikes the authorization for use of military force passed by Congress after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
Thursday’s strike was the first U.S. military action targeting the Bashar Assad regime in Syria, which Trump cast as retaliation for Assad’s most recent chemical attack on his own people.
“Tonight I ordered a targeted military strike on the airfield in Syria from where the chemical attack was launched,” Trump said Thursday. “It is in this vital national security interest of the United States to prevent and deter the spread and use of deadly chemical weapons.”
Elana Schor, Seung Min Kim and Heather Caygle contributed to this report.
Members of Congress react to air strikes against Assad forces in Syria The United States launched air strikes against the Syrian regime of Bashar Assad on Thursday. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Minority Leader Chuck Schemer, Sen. Marco Rubio, Sen. Tim Kaine, and Sen. John McCain react to the U.S. missile strike. poster="http://v.politico.com/images/1155968404/201704/685/1155968404_5389764671001_5389647039001-vs.jpg?pubId=1155968404" ||||| MSNBC’s breaking news anchor and 11th Hour host Brian Williams is facing criticism from the Twittersphere for comments he made during the network’s live coverage of the missile launch attack on a Syrian air base. The strikes were carried out following a chemical weapon attack supposedly ordered by the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
“I am tempted to quote the great Leonard Cohen: ‘I am guided by the beauty of our weapons,’” Williams said during an interview with U.S. intelligence expert Malcolm Nance. “They are beautiful pictures of fearsome armaments making what is for them what is a brief flight over to this airfield.”
The comments were made while video provided by the Pentagon of Tomahawk missiles launched by U.S. warships towards the Syrian air base was being shown.
Some people deemed the comments as insensitive or perhaps as a bit too cavalier given the circumstances.
Jesus Christ — Brian Williams: “I’m guided by the beauty of our weapons” – You can support airstrike without glamorizing it. https://t.co/77tefLFt9g — Yashar (@yashar) April 7, 2017
This is truly a surreal segment. Brian Williams: “I am guided by the beauty of our weapons.” https://t.co/85TNZxkNa8 — Matt Pearce (@mattdpearce) April 7, 2017
The saddest thing here is Brian Williams is probably not lying this time. He likely thinks missile strikes are beautiful. https://t.co/11XnE4EbjO — jeremy scahill (@jeremyscahill) April 7, 2017
Nance, on the other hand, defended Williams’s comments:
I personally love @BWilliams. He has an extremely calming effect in serious crises. His statement was a quote of poetry which I have adopted https://t.co/M1AYotR1h9 — Malcolm Nance (@MalcolmNance) April 7, 2017
Comments ||||| Brian Williams has come under fire for his seemingly euphoric reaction to Thursday night’s U.S. missile strike on Syria.
During his “11th hour” MSNBC show, the anchor began to wax poetic at the sight of the Pentagon-released video that showed three missiles launching into the night sky on their way to a Syrian airfield
“We see these beautiful pictures at night from the decks of these two U.S. Navy vessels in the Mediterranean,” Williams said.
The veteran newsman said the images tempted him to quote the late singer/songwriter Leonard Cohen.
And that’s what he did. “I am guided by the beauty of our weapons,” Williams said, a lyric from Cohen’s 1988 song “First We Take Manhattan.” He added, “They are beautiful pictures of fearsome armaments making a brief flight.”
Watch Williams’ segment below.
Twitter quickly pounced on his comments, calling them insensitive to the horrors of war.
“You can support airstrike without glamorizing it,” one critic tweeted.
Jesus Christ — Brian Williams: "I'm guided by the beauty of our weapons" – You can support airstrike without glamorizing it. https://t.co/77tefLFt9g — Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yashar) April 7, 2017
Some commented on how Williams seem to enjoy the imagery of war.
thoroughly unsurprised by brian williams obscene enjoyment of the jouissance of US military technology — Patrick Blanchfield (@PatBlanchfield) April 7, 2017
Brian Williams opens his wallet and out spill dozens of pictures of missile strikes with hearts drawn on them. — J.D. Altman (@NicCageMatch) April 7, 2017
Others brought up Williams’ six-month suspension from NBC without pay in 2015 for misrepresenting events that occurred while he was covering the Iraq War in 2003, in addition to other stories.
Brian Williams is under fire for calling the US strike beautiful. However that story might not be true as it was reported by Brian Williams. — Will Presti (@WillPresti) April 7, 2017
“It’s time for Brian Williams to get fired again,” another tweeted.
I think it's time for Brian Williams to get fired again. — Sean Burns (@SeanMBurns) April 7, 2017
Neither MSNBC or Williams have yet to respond to the criticism. | – It's been awhile since "Brian Williams" and "controversy" have been uttered in the same sentence, but might as well take a crack at it again now that we're solidly in 2017. The MSNBC newscaster was among those providing commentary Thursday night after the US launched dozens of Tomahawk missiles at a Syrian airfield, and while responses to the strike ran the gamut from "decisive" to "unlawful," Williams used a descriptor that few (if any others) did, per Adweek. "I am tempted to quote the great Leonard Cohen: 'I am guided by the beauty of our weapons,'" Williams waxed poetic (Variety notes it's a line from Cohen's "First We Take Manhattan"), as a video in the background showed the missiles hurtling from the US warships toward land. "They are beautiful pictures of fearsome armaments making what is for them what is a brief flight over to this airfield," he continued. But instead of swooning over his lyrical analysis, most of the internet came down on Williams for what appeared to be a glamorization of a wartime maneuver. One commenter called it "obscene enjoyment," while Matt Pearce of the Los Angeles Times called the segment "surreal." Others called Williams a "dope" or said he should be fired again. One person who didn't seem to mind Williams' take: Malcolm Nance, the intel expert who was on air with Williams during his soliloquy-like sermon. "He has an extremely calming effect in serious crises," tweeted Nance. (Congress members are split on how they feel about the strike.) |
Weld County Commissioner Sean Conway, center, with other elected officials address a group of supporters of the 51st State Initiative during an election result watch party at the Historic Fort Lupton Fort, November 5, 2013. (RJ Sangosti, The Denver Post)
Weld County Commissioner Sean Conway said the 51st state movement is halted — at least in his county — but there were positive benefits from the secession campaign.
"Weld County voters said this is an option we shouldn't pursue and we won't pursue it," Conway said Tuesday night. "But we will continue to look at the problems of the urban and rural divide in this state."
Weld County voters Tuesday soundly rejected the 51st State Initiative 58 percent to 42 percent.
But in five of the 11 counties where the secession question appeared on the ballot, the measure passed by strong margins.
In Kit Carson County, 52 percent of voters directed county commissioners to explore secession and 48 percent voted against. In Washington County, 58 percent were for the initiative and 42 percent against.
Phillips County went 62 percent for and 38 against; Sedgwick went 57 percent against and 42.9 percent for; Cheyenne County voters cast 62 percent of ballots for and 37.7 against; and in Yuma County, 59 percent of the vote went for the breakaway and 41 percent against.
In Moffat County, the question failed, with 54.8 percent voting against secession. In Elbert County, 74 percent of voters said "no" to the idea of breaking away. In Lincoln County, 55.5 percent voted against.
The ballot question, intended as a straw poll, asked residents whether their county commissioners should takes steps to secede from the Centennial State.
Fort Lupton Mayor Tommy Holton said Tuesday night that secession probably would not succeed. But he said the publicity would shed light on rural Colorado's grievances.
"We not only want to be at the table," he said, "but we want a voice at the table as well."
Proponents say they have become alienated from the more urbanized Front Range and are unhappy with laws passed during this year's legislative session, including stricter gun laws and new renewable-energy standards.
"The heart of the 51st State Initiative is simple: We just want to be left alone to live our lives without heavy-handed restrictions from the state Capitol," said 51st state advocate Jeffrey Hare.
A yard sign is seen along Main Street in Akron on Election Day, November 05, 2013. (RJ Sangosti, The Denver Post)
Secession is a difficult process. It would require a vote of the state electorate or legislature, and then the U.S. Congress. The last time a state consented to the loss of territory was when Maine split from Massachusetts in 1820. ||||| FORT LUPTON, Colo. - The largely symbolic effort to form a 51st state called North Colorado has fizzled.
Voters in 6 of the 11 rural counties that were voting on whether to ask their commissioners to pursue creating a new state have said no.
The movement is fueled by supporters' frustration with state government's focus on growing urban areas.
Voters in several northeast and eastern Colorado counties were not asked if they want to secede, but rather if they want their county commissioners to pursue the idea. Voters in Moffat County, on the Western Slope, are also voting on the idea.
The question on the ballot read: "Shall the Board of County Commissioners of ___ County, in concert with the county commissioners of other Colorado counties, pursue becoming the 51st state of the United States of America?"
As of 9 p.m. Tuesday, voters in Elbert, Lincoln, Logan, Weld, Sedgwick and Moffat counties were voting against pursuing secession. Kit Carson, Washington, Yuma, Phillips and Cheyenne counties voted to ask their commissioners to seek joining a new state.
The solid "No" vote in Weld County -- 30,562 to 22,313 -- was a sharp rebuke of commissioners in the most populous of the counties weighing secession. Weld County commissioners led the charge to secede, saying they were pursuing the idea because they felt agriculture, oil and gas exploration are under attack in the State Legislature, and the needs of rural Colorado counties were being ignored.
While the 51st state proposal failed to win broad support Tuesday night, organizers say their grassroots crusade will have a lasting legacy.
They are already backing a new initiative. They want to model the State Senate after the United States Senate, where counties would be given equal representation -- regardless of population size.
They also hope to find statewide candidates who understand and support rural issues.
"Certainly, in the 2014 election cycle, people running for office -- urban and rural -- must have good information about the urban vs. rural divide," said 51st state spokesman Jeff Hare.
"To your critics, some who may even be your own constituents, who say this was a waste of time, a publicity stunt, what do you have to say?" asked 7NEWS Reporter Marc Stewart.
"I'd say that can't be farther from the truth," said Weld County commissioner Barbara Kirkmeyer. "I don't think it's ever a waste of time to listen to the citizens and that's what we did."
The results as of 9:40 p.m.
Cheyenne -- No: 37.7% Yes: 62.2%
Elbert -- No: 58% Yes: 42%
Lincoln -- No: 55% Yes: 45%
Logan -- No: 58% Yes: 42%
Kit Carson -- No: 48% Yes: 52%
Phillips -- No: 37.7% Yes: 62.2%
Sedgwick -- No: 57% Yes: 43%
Washington -- No: 42% Yes: 58%
Weld -- No: 58%. Yes: 42%.
Yuma -- No: 18.5% Yes: 81.4%
Moffat -- No: 54.7% Yes: 42.2% ||||| Starting in 1996, Alexa Internet has been donating their crawl data to the Internet Archive. Flowing in every day, these data are added to the Wayback Machine after an embargo period. | – Of 11 Colorado counties voting on the question, six—Cheyenne, Kit Carson, Phillips, Sedgwick, Washington, and Yuma—voted "yes" to consider becoming the 51st state. The ballot measure asked whether county commissioners should "pursue becoming the 51st state of the United States of America." The most populous county addressing the issue turned the idea down, 58% to 42%, in what ABC 7 calls "a sharp rebuke of commissioners" at the forefront of the effort. "Weld County voters said this is an option we shouldn't pursue, and we won't pursue it," said one. "But we will continue to look at the problems of the urban and rural divide in this state." The issue centers on that divide, the Denver Post notes, with new laws—including tougher gun and renewable energy measures—frustrating some in the 51st state movement. "The heart of the 51st State Initiative is simple: We just want to be left alone to live our lives without heavy-handed restrictions from the state Capitol," says backer Jeff Hare. But it's a long shot, requiring state and US congressional approval. Still, Hare says the movement has left a mark: Next year, "people running for office ... must have good information about the urban vs. rural divide." |
For Republicans, the path to this moment has been long and transparently paved — the House in particular has signaled the Republican policy vision through bills it has been passing for years. But many of those measures have gathered dust in the Senate or been doused in veto ink.
The cleft between the two chambers recalls the situation faced by the insurgent House Republican majority in the mid-1990s. Speaker Newt Gingrich took control with a determined agenda, only to be stymied by the Senate majority leader, Bob Dole, who stacked conservative House bills like so many fire logs in the back of the Senate chamber.
“They’ve been given a golden opportunity here,” said Trent Lott, the former Republican Senate majority leader. “But I have watched over the years when one party has had control of the White House and the Senate and the House, and the danger is overplaying your hand.
“If you go too far, like what happened with Obamacare, and you get no support at all from the other side, you have a problem,” Mr. Lott continued. “You have to find a way to work with people across the aisle who will work with you.”
The tax overhaul and an infrastructure bill may be two opportunities for bipartisan cooperation; the Senate Finance Committee is already moving in that direction. Still, both of those issues are expected to remain on the back burner, despite promises to the contrary from Mr. Trump’s chief of staff, Reince Priebus.
The Senate may be narrowly divided, but among the 48 senators in the Democratic caucus are 10 who will stand for re-election in two years in states that voted for Mr. Trump. Republicans are counting on their support, at least some of the time.
But on many issues, Senate Democrats — including their new leader, Chuck Schumer of New York — are expected to pivot from postelection carping to active thwarting, using complex Senate procedures and political messaging to slow or perhaps block elements of Mr. Trump’s agenda.
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“After campaigning on a promise to help the middle class, President-elect Trump’s postelection actions suggest he intends to do the exact opposite after he’s sworn in,” said Senator Patty Murray, Democrat of Washington. “Democrats will do everything we can to fight back if he continues to pursue an agenda prioritizing billionaires and big corporations while devastating middle-class families and the economy.”
Republicans have chafed for years at a host of rules, many business-related, that President Obama has issued through the regulatory process, and they have been advising the Trump team on which ones should be undone.
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“I hear probably more about the strangulation of regulations on business and their growth and their development than probably anything else,” the House speaker, Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin, said at a recent forum. “I think if we can provide regulatory relief right away, that can breathe a sigh of relief into the economy.”
In late December, the Obama administration rolled out a major new environmental regulation intended to rein in mountaintop-removal mining. That regulation, one of dozens that Mr. Trump is expected to reverse, is meant to go into effect one day before his inauguration.
But Congress is likely to block it, using the obscure Congressional Review Act, which permits lawmakers to undo new regulations with only 51 Senate votes within the first 60 legislative days of the rules’ completion.
Given time constraints on the Senate floor, members will have to pick some priorities. They are expected to train their sights on a rule that requires oil and gas producers to reduce methane gases, another that requires mining and fossil fuel companies to disclose payments they have made to foreign governments to extract natural resources, and still others that restrict pesticide use.
Republicans will also move quickly to repeal the Affordable Care Act. They plan to pass a truncated budget resolution for the remainder of the fiscal year — already a quarter over — that includes special instructions ensuring that the final repeal legislation could circumvent any Democratic filibuster. But Republican leaders have not settled on a health care plan to replace Mr. Obama’s, and they may delay the repeal measure’s effective date for years.
The Senate must also consider Mr. Trump’s cabinet picks, and Senate Democrats are already trying to slow the process. However, they cannot do much more than that, because when they were in charge, they changed the rules so that presidential nominees other than Supreme Court picks need only 51 votes to be confirmed. Previously, such nominations could face a filibuster, which required 60 votes to overcome.
Democratic leaders have encouraged members to avoid meeting with Mr. Trump’s nominees until they have turned over their tax returns and made other disclosures. Republicans have been particularly upset that Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama, whom Mr. Trump picked quickly to be attorney general, has either not gotten meetings with Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee or had meetings canceled.
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Senator Dianne Feinstein of California postponed her meeting with Mr. Sessions until January because, she said, her schedule got too busy. “The senator doesn’t want to rush,” said her spokesman, Tom Mentzer.
One reason that Democrats are in no hurry is their bitterness over Mr. McConnell’s refusal last year to hold a hearing on the Supreme Court nomination of Judge Merrick B. Garland.
Lingering in the background is the specter of Russia. Democrats — and some Republicans, who are at odds with Mr. Trump on the issue and may at times be a brake on him — want a vigorous investigation of its efforts to disrupt the election. The Obama administration, which took sweeping steps last week to punish the Russians over election hacking, will release a report this month that is likely to serve as a turning point in those discussions.
While Republicans may have a rare chance to open the flow of legislation, the party’s leaders are acutely aware of the punishment that Americans have historically delivered in midterm elections when things have not gone well.
“This is no time for hubris,” Mr. McConnell said. “You have to perform.” ||||| WASHINGTON — On Tuesday at noon, with plenty of pomp and pageantry, members of the 115th Congress will be sworn in, with an emboldened GOP intent on unraveling eight years of President Obama’s Democratic agenda and targeting massive legacy programs from Franklin D. Roosevelt and Lyndon B. Johnson such as Social Security and Medicare.
In the election, Republicans kept their tight grip on the House and outmaneuvered the Democrats for a slim majority in the Senate. In less than three weeks, on the West Front of the Capitol, Chief Justice John Roberts will administer the presidential oath to Donald Trump, the GOP’s newfound ally.
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First up for Republicans is repeal and delay of the health care law, expediting the process for scrapping Obama’s major overhaul but holding off on some changes for up to four years. The tax code is in the cross-hairs. Conservatives want to scuttle rules on the environment and undo financial regulations created in the aftermath of the 2008 economic meltdown, arguing they are too onerous for businesses to thrive.
The only obstacle to the far-reaching conservative agenda will be Senate Democrats who hold the power to filibuster legislation, but even that has its political limitations. Twenty-three Democrats are up for re-election in 2018, including 10 from states Trump won, and they could break ranks and side with the GOP.
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Here are a few things to know about Congress:
By the numbers
Vice President Joe Biden, in one of his final official acts, will administer the oath to 27 returning senators and seven new ones. Republicans will have a 52-48 advantage in the Senate, which remains predominantly a bastion of white men.
There will be 21 women, of whom 16 are Democrats and five, Republicans; three African Americans, including California’s new Democratic senator Kamala Harris, and four Hispanics, including Nevada’s new Democratic senator Catherine Cortez Masto.
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Across the Capitol, the House is expected to re-elect Representative Paul Ryan as Speaker, with all the campaign-season recriminations involving the Wisconsin Republican and Trump largely erased by GOP wins. Once sworn in, Ryan will then administer the oath to the House members.
The GOP will hold a hefty 241-194 majority in the House, including 52 freshmen — 27 Republicans, including Wyoming’s Liz Cheney, daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney, and 25 Democrats.
Confirming the Cabinet
The Senate will exercise its advice and consent role and consider nominations of 15 department secretaries and six people tapped by Trump to lead agencies or serve in roles with Cabinet-level status, such as the EPA and UN ambassador.
Democrats won’t make it easy.
Several in the party have been highly critical of several of Trump’s choices, from Rick Perry, who forgot during the 2012 presidential campaign that the Energy Department was the one he wanted to eliminate, to Treasury pick Steve Mnuchin, the former Goldman Sachs executive whom Democrats have dubbed the ‘‘foreclosure king’’ for his stake in OneWest Bank that profited from the foreclosure crisis.
Others nominees, such as retired Marine General James Mattis for defense secretary, should easily win confirmation. First, though, Congress must pass a law allowing the former military man to serve in a civilian post.
There is a limit to what Democrats can do. Rules changes in 2013 allow some nominees, including Cabinet picks, to be confirmed with a simple majority, preventing Democrats from demanding 60 votes to move forward.
Supreme Court vacancy
Adding to the drama of the new Congress will be high-profile confirmation hearings for Trump’s nominee for the Supreme Court.
Justice Antonin Scalia died last February and Republicans refused to consider Obama’s nominee, Merrick Garland, insisting that the next president should fill the high court vacancy that’s now lasted more than 10 months.
Trump released a list of potential choices during the campaign that included Senator Mike Lee of Utah, who clerked for Justice Samuel Alito. Since the election, the president-elect also has met with Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, who clerked for former Chief Justice William Rehnquist, prompting talk about a possible nomination for the onetime presidential rival.
Trump has said he wants to nominate a justice who would help overturn Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that legalized abortion. Cruz and Lee would fulfill that pledge.
New face in leadership
The point man for Senate Democrats is Brooklyn-born Chuck Schumer, who will be a chief antagonist to fellow New Yorker Trump.
Schumer succeeds Nevada’s Harry Reid, who retired after five terms, and joins Congress’ top leaders — Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat, and Speaker Ryan — in what is certain to be tough negotiations next year on spending and policies.
Russian hacking
The first public hearing on the intelligence community’s assessment that Russia interfered in the US election is Thursday in the Senate Armed Services Committee, with James Clapper, the director of national intelligence, set to testify. Expect individual panels to investigate, but not a special, high-profile select committee. McConnell has rejected that bipartisan call. ||||| Energised Republicans are set to begin dismantling eight years of achievements by Barack Obama as they take complete control of Washington and bring out the wrecking balls.
The 115th Congress will sit for the first time on Tuesday, and even before President-elect Donald Trump assumes office, Republicans on Capitol Hill are anxious to start work. Their priorities include repealing the Affordable Care Act, better known as Obamacare, a tax overhaul, the repeal of environmental regulations, a large transportation bill to create jobs, and the confirmation of a new Supreme Court justice.
“Buckle up,” Vice President-elect Mike Pence told his former colleagues in the House last year, after meeting with them to discuss legislative plans.
Donald Trump and Mitch McConnell do not agree on everything (AP)
“I’m very confident that as we move towards inauguration, bring together a great team, work in concert with leaders in the House and Senate, and we’re going to move an agenda that’s going to rebuild our military, revive our economy, and — in a word — make America great again.”
Indeed, with the Republicans controlling both the executive and legislative branches of government, work is likely to begin shortly after the Congress’s 59 new members — seven senators and fifty-two House members — are sworn in.
CNN said that the Republicans will want to begin dismantling Obamacare, which they have identified as a priority since it was passed into law in 2010.
Happy new year! 2017 is going to be a big year for our nation. — Paul Ryan (@SpeakerRyan) January 1, 2017
They also plan a major tax overhaul and the the reversal of a number of Obama-era environmental regulations.
“It’s a big job to actually have responsibility and produce results,” Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, told The New York Times. “And we intend to do it.”
“I hear probably more about the strangulation of regulations on business and their growth and their development than probably anything else,” the House speaker, Paul Ryan, said recently, “I think if we can provide regulatory relief right away, that can breathe a sigh of relief into the economy.”
Trump's advisor suggests Obama's sanctions against Russia are to 'box in' the incoming President
At the same time, such legislative efforts will have to share time with Senate confirmation hearings for Mr Trump’s cabinet picks in the days and months that follow the President-elect’s swearing-in.
It should be easier for Republicans to move nominations after the Democrats changed the Senate's filibuster rules in 2013. Still, Democrats have pledged to fight many of the nominations, highlighting what they call the hypocrisy of Mr Trump’s populist message.
In truth, the Democrats, weakened in all areas of government since last November’s election, have little ammunition with which to fire back.
But Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi will likely try and stop changes to welfare programmes such as Medicare and Medicaid.
Mr Obama is himself scheduled to visit congressional Democrats on Wednesday to discuss ways to try and save his signature legislation.
There is much that remains unclear. And there are a number of issues on which Republicans on Capitol Hill are at odds with Mr Trump. They do not agree on his wish to scrap trade deals such as Nafta, and they also do not see eye to eye with him over controversies such as the alleged Russian cyber-meddling in the election.
While Mr Trump has said he thinks the country needs to move on to “more important” issues, Republican senators Lindsey Graham and John McCain have called for hearings on the issue and proposed sanctions beyond those announced by Mr Obama last week. ||||| WASHINGTON (AP) - An aggressive campaign by Republicans to dismantle eight years of President Barack Obama's Democratic policies is ready for launch.
Members of the 115th Congress will be sworn in at noon Tuesday, setting off the GOP's pursuit of a conservative agenda.
One of the most immediate targets is Obama's health care law. Republicans have long sought to gut the statute and have blamed the law as a primary cause for a lackluster economic recovery.
But decades-old programs, such as Social Security and Medicare, also will be in the crosshairs as Republicans aim to shrink both the size of the federal budget and the bureaucracy in Washington.
Democrats will try to block the GOP's agenda by swaying public opinion and using the power they have in the Senate to filibuster legislation. ||||| A Republican-controlled Congress opens Tuesday with the most sweeping conservative agenda in decades, providing Donald Trump ample room to gut the Affordable Care Act, slash corporate tax rates and undo Obama-era environmental regulations.
The House is almost certain to reelect Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) as its first order of business, dispensing with the messy political infighting that has hobbled Republicans in the past.
And the Senate will swiftly begin vetting the president-elect’s most controversial Cabinet picks, ready to confirm some when Trump is inaugurated as president on Jan. 20.
Yet Republicans remain at odds on some high-profile issues — such as how aggressively to investigate Russian hacking in the 2016 election — and how to fulfill other big-ticket promises, such as replacing Obamacare.
Despite firm Republican control of both the White House and Congress, the internal disputes have left them without a clear plan yet for Trump’s first 100 days, or an endgame for the two years of the 115th Congress.
Trump’s often shifting views on major issues will test relations with GOP’s leaders on Capitol Hill, and his willingness to skirt ideological rigidity gives incoming Senate Democratic leader Charles Schumer of New York and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco an opening to influence and shape the president’s evolving agenda.
President Obama will visit Capitol Hill on Wednesday to meet with Democrats bracing for their new role, not just as the minority party, but as the main roadblock preventing Trump from dismantling the healthcare law and other parts of the Obama agenda.
Republicans will also assemble behind closed doors. Vice President-elect Mike Pence, who was a popular conservative congressman before he was elected governor of Indiana, is likely to serve as a crucial link between the Trump administration and its allies in Congress.
Given Trump’s inexperience in government, Pence is expected to play an enhanced role, perhaps like the one former Vice President Richard Cheney held under President George W. Bush.
At a minimum, Pence could provide a vital conduit between the untested new president and his more ideological party members in Congress, especially as Ryan’s own relationship with Trump has been strained.
Ryan flip-flopped over Trump — first withholding his endorsement, then ultimately campaigning for him — but the speaker insists he and the president-elect have let bygones pass as they talk almost daily on their plans for fulfilling Republican promises to voters.
“Very soon after the race, Donald and I said: ‘Look, this is fantastic. We have so much to do. Let's forget about, you know, any differences in the past and let's get working on this agenda,’” Ryan said recently on Fox News. “And that's exactly what we've been doing from -- that day on.”
Once Trump takes office, Republicans will face enormous pressure to score some legislative wins after six years of trying to block most of Obama’s initiatives.
Lawmakers will vote this week on low-hanging fruit -- a popular GOP measure to rein in the executive branch by requiring congressional approval for new federal regulations with an economic impact of more than $100 million.
The measure, which passed the Republican House three times since 2011, is a GOP priority. Its supporters say it would have prevented nearly all the climate and employment rule changes of the Obama era.
Republicans are also expected to punish Democrats for last year’s gun control sit-in, led by civil rights icon Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.), by imposing new rules that would slap up to $2,500 fines on lawmakers who film such floor protests from smartphones or other devices.
Whether that would pass judicial review is less clear. Opponents say the proposed ban is clearly unconstitutional.
But the GOP’s top promise — to end Obamacare — remains a tough haul.
Votes are expected in coming days on legislation to begin repealing the Affordable Care Act. But these first steps will be largely symbolic while lawmakers debate the details of dismantling the healthcare law.
With 20 million Americans now benefiting from Obamacare, the GOP’s gutting of it comes with an asterisk.
Republicans are also likely to postpone fully dismantling the healthcare law until they can sort out their own ideas for a yet-to-be-determined alternative.
That could push a full Obamacare repeal and replace until 2018 or 2019, after the midterm elections.
“Repeal and delay, it doesn’t even have alliteration,” Pelosi scoffed on a conference call Monday with reporters. “It’s an admission that it’s a lot for them to lose politically.”
Similarly, Republicans are still working out the details of tax reform beyond the lower rates proposed in the House GOP’s “Better Way” blueprint agenda for the new year.
Ryan will almost certainly reemerge as speaker in Tuesday’s floor vote. But his leadership remains constrained by the same internal party divisions that hobbled his predecessor, John A. Boehner (R-Ohio), and that have prevented Republicans from making gains on a cohesive agenda.
Those divisions surfaced late Monday when Republicans split during a closed-door session over a proposal to gut a congressional ethics office at a time when Trump has promised to come to Washington and “drain the swamp.” Approval of the proposal signaled a rocky start to the new session. ||||| Early morning traffic rolls toward the U.S. Capitol on Dec. 14, 2016. (Photo: J. David Ake, AP)
WASHINGTON — Bills to block or roll back federal regulations, initially conceived by Republicans as a check on President Obama’s power, are high on the agenda when the House returns to Washington this week and the changes could become reality shortly after the inauguration of President-elect Donald Trump.
The 115th Congress begins Tuesday with a Republican majority in the House and Senate preparing for the arrival of a Republican president for the first time in eight years.
The House is expected to take up two bills — the Midnight Rules Act and the REINS Act (which stands for Regulations from the Executive in Need of Scrutiny) — that passed on largely party-line votes in the 114th, 113th and 112th congressional sessions, but died in the Senate. The REINS Act would require that before any new major regulation could take effect, the House and Senate would have to pass a resolution of approval. The Midnight Rules Act would let Congress invalidate rules in bulk that passed in the final year of a presidential term.
The House is also expected to consider a nonbinding resolution disapproving the Dec. 23 United Nations Security Council vote that called on Israel to stop building settlements in the West Bank. The United States abstained in that vote, allowing the measure to pass.
Regulations are adopted by the executive branch to implement laws passed by Congress and signed by the president. Congress already has the power to repeal laws by passing a new bill and getting the president to sign it. And under the 1996 Congressional Review Act, Congress can pass a resolution of disapproval to block a rule if it acts within 60 days of notification from an agency.
The new legislation would further expand congressional power by preventing an administration from implementing rules without another vote. Under the REINS act, a proposed regulation would be deemed rejected if Congress was in session for 70 days and took no action. The bill allows for a major rule to take effect for a single 90-day period if the president determined it was necessary because of an imminent threat to health or safety or other emergency.
“Our federal agencies are out of control, and Congress is partly to blame for that,” the bill’s sponsor, Republican Rep. Doug Collins of Georgia, said in a release last week. “We’ve ceded our legislative responsibility to agencies that were never intended to make laws, and the result has been redundant, counterproductive rules that have massive impacts on our economy.”
Read more:
When the House considered the Midnight Rules Act in November, the White House said it would recommend that Obama veto it. Trump, however, has taken a page from the conservative playbook and blamed government regulations for holding down economic growth and job creation. He has pledged to eliminate two regulations for every new one adopted during his presidency.
The REINS Act and Midnight Rules Act are aimed at major rules. An April 2015 analysis by the Congressional Budget Office said are those that meet one of these conditions: an economic impact of more than $100 million; cause significant price increases for consumers, industries, geographic regions or state or local governments; or have significant adverse effects on competition, employment, investment, productivity or foreign competition.
The CBO said that over the past five years, 82 major rules have been adopted each year, on average. Blocking such regulations in the future would have “a significant effect on direct spending,” but CBO could not predict whether the effect would be positive or negative because it could not say whether Congress would block regulations to increase or decrease spending.
Before the House voted on the final REINS Act in 2015, Democrats unsuccessfully tried to include amendments that would exempt rules that affected veterans health care, nuclear reactor safety, transportation of hazardous materials, and the safety of products used or consumed by children under the age of 2. Each attempt was rejected in a largely party-line vote.
Critics say the changes would endanger the public and worsen gridlock in government.
“Regulations are public protections that are intended to safeguard regular citizens from dealing with unclean air and water, financial crises and unsafe products,” said Lisa Gilbert, director of the CongressWatch program at Public Citizen. “They are intended to protect us, and to do away with them wholesale is an extremely problematic approach.”
Gilbert said that while no one would argue every regulation is perfect, the changes Congress seeks to make would effectively stymie future rulemaking and allow Congress to erase actions the Obama administration took since the summer. She said she hoped there would be enough votes in the Senate to sustain a filibuster on the Midnight Rules bill, but on the REINS Act, “it’s possible there could be a path” for it to pass.
Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/2hKrOZv ||||| House Speaker Paul Ryan with Melania and Donald Trump at the U.S. Capitol after the election.
The Washington, D.C. beat in 2017 is going to revolve around covering a Republican Party that holds the White House and both chambers of Congress for the first time since 2006.
In those 10 years, Republicans have amassed a wish list of things they’d like to get done. Now’s their chance to tackle that list, and the story of 2017 in Washington will be how much progress they make toward those goals, and how effective Democrats will be in blocking them.
The Senate will be the site of most contention over the GOP’s agenda, because Democrats have the procedural tools (like the filibuster) and numbers required to fight back. Republicans will hold 52 seats to Democrats’ 46, with Vice President-elect Mike Pence as the tie-breaker.
In the House of Representatives, the GOP will retain a comfortable majority, holding 241 seats to Democrats’ 194. That chamber has more scheduled days of legislative work than any year since 2010 — a reflection of how productive a Congress leaders are imagining next year.
Democrats have said they’ll work with President-elect Donald Trump and congressional Republicans where they can, but expect more partisan fireworks than friendly cooperation next year.
Also, don’t expect Trump and Republicans in Congress — many of whom kept him at arm’s length or openly criticized him during the campaign — to always agree, either.
Here are five big GOP agenda items I’ll be watching closely:
1. Obamacare
It’s the big one, the top of the GOP wish list since 2010, the one thing that Republicans believe they must do in the 115th Congress: dismantling the Affordable Care Act.
Congressional Republicans have been champing at the bit to get rid of President Obama’s signature achievement since its passage, voting numerous times on symbolic repeal measures in the House of Representatives.
Angry protest votes were easy enough. Now, with control of the necessary levers of power, comes the hard part for the GOP: figuring out a way to not just repeal Obamacare, but replace it with something else.
The repeal part is relatively simple. GOP leaders forecast a vote to repeal Obamacare as soon as February, which would easily clear the House. In the Senate, Republican leaders will likely use budget reconciliation — the same tactic Democrats used to pass the law in the first place — to ensure a repeal only needs a simple majority of the Senate, not a 60-vote majority.
The replacement will be much harder, in policy and logistics. Earlier this year, Speaker Paul Ryan outlined a plan aiming to make health coverage more affordable through expanding health savings accounts and allowing the purchase of coverage across state lines, among other things.
There is disagreement in the party about whether a repeal should be pursued before a replacement is hammered out. But key leaders are coalescing around a plan that would repeal Obamacare soon and then allow two to four years to figure out a replacement, setting up a potential deadline down the road. (D.C.’s already calling it the “health care cliff.”)
Minnesota’s Republican representatives all want to see the law gone. Incoming Rep. Jason Lewis made opposition to Obamacare a key plank of his winning campaign in the 2nd District. Rep. Tom Emmer said he expects Obamacare will be toast by February, but said the party needs to proceed with caution in its replacement plans.
How Republicans address Obamacare will be the story not just of 2017, but probably 2018 and 2019, too.
2. Tax reform
Republicans and Democrats have been talking about working on comprehensive tax reform for years. In 2017, those proposals will take on a decidedly more conservative tack.
Broadly, GOP leaders want to lower individual and corporate income tax rates, with a strong focus on the latter: the Ways and Means Committee, which sets taxation policy, has already drawn up a proposal to reduce corporate tax rates from 35 percent to 20 percent.
On other tax issues, Republicans are going to reach for long-held goals. They likely will take aim at the estate tax, which Trump, Ryan, and other GOP leaders want to get rid of. Most Democrats are loath to drop the tax, which would cost about $200 billion over a decade. In a vote in the House last year, only seven Democrats joined Republicans to repeal it.
It’s possible Democrats may not be able to put up much resistance to any of these measures. The budget reconciliation tactic is typically meant to reconcile tax legislation with budget legislation, and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has said that he expects that is how tax reform bills will move in the next Congress.
The member to watch on tax issues will be GOP Rep. Erik Paulsen: the only Minnesotan to serve on Ways and Means, Paulsen has floated an array of tax and health care policy tweaks over the years.
3. Entitlement reform
Any movement from the GOP on Medicare, Medicaid, or Social Security could bring some of the messiest politics of 2017.
It is no secret that Republicans would like to “restructure” Medicare, the government’s program to cover seniors’ health care, and Medicaid, which covers low-income people, in order to reduce the programs’ costs. Medicare and Medicaid cost over $1 trillion in 2016 and cover more than 120 million people.
The GOP has long wanted to give states money for Medicaid in the form of block grants; they’ve also pushed varying degrees of privatization for Medicare. Trump’s nomination of Georgia GOP Rep. Tom Price, a very conservative voice on health care, as Secretary of Health and Human Services has only added to speculation.
In November, Price suggested that a long-desired Medicare reform — a voucher program to let patients use government money to participate in a private plan instead of Medicare — could be included as a rider on a budget bill.
On Social Security, the Republican chair of the Ways and Means Social Security subcommittee floated a bill that would restructure the program. It includes a raise of the retirement age, an idea favored by many conservatives.
Perhaps more than any others, entitlement issues are political third rails in Congress. They will not be as far up on the agenda as Obamacare, but Paul Ryan and others have been itching to take a crack at them for years. They now have the chance.
But this is a fight Democrats relish, and talking points they’re deeply comfortable with. Setting the battle lines for 2017, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has already declared a GOP “war on seniors.”
In entitlement debates, watch Democratic Reps. Rick Nolan and Keith Ellison, two of the most vocal opponents to GOP policy in either chamber.
4. Wall Street reform rollback
Trump’s populist appeal was bolstered by his calls to take on Wall Street. But Republicans in Congress see an opportunity to pass long-awaited measure to deregulate the financial sector, particularly a rollback of the 2010 Dodd-Frank Wall Street reform package.
A repeal of the entire law, which is 2,300 pages and incredibly complex, probably won’t happen this Congress.
But Republicans could chip away at pillars of Dodd-Frank, like the so-called “Volcker rule,” which prevents big banks from making certain kinds of risky investments. They also will likely target the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, defanging it by replacing its director with a board and by giving Congress control over its budget.
Emmer, a vocal critic of Dodd-Frank, is on the House Financial Services panel, and could play a role in this debate. Ellison, a staunch defender of the CFPB and Wall Street regulation, is also on that committee, and could figure prominently into the debate as well, if he retains his congressional seat.
5. Energy and environmental deregulation
Among most congressional Republicans, Obama’s actions to tackle climate change were anathema. With a man friendly to the fossil fuels industry and skeptical of climate science moving into the White House, Republicans are now eyeing a few areas where they might be able to roll back Obama’s environmental policies in Congress.
Since Trump’s election, the Obama administration has been working frantically to complete 11th hour regulations on climate and environmental protection. Under the Congressional Review Act, Congress has 60 days to disapprove a regulation from the executive branch — so the 115th Congress could get to work undoing those rules, if it acts swiftly.
That process would take some work, but it’s feasible. Potential targets of a GOP effort include a rule from the Department of the Interior to reduce methane emissions on public lands, or even the recent rule to block Twin Metals from its leases to copper and nickel deposits near Minnesota’s Boundary Waters.
Environmentalists worry that Congress could act to make big amendments to existing law like the Clean Air Act, such as excluding carbon dioxide as a regulated pollutant.
Democratic Rep. Betty McCollum, the ranking member on the Appropriations subcommittee that deals with interior issues, is one to watch on these issues. | – The 115th Congress will be sworn in at noon Tuesday, per WXYZ, which anticipates "an aggressive campaign" by Republicans to take down eight years' worth of President Obama's policies. The station adds that Democrats are ready to fight back by "swaying public opinion" and using their filibuster in the Senate. What else to look for Tuesday: Both the Los Angeles Times and the Boston Globe predict an easy re-election of Paul Ryan as speaker of the House. Once Ryan retakes the helm, he'll oversee the oath administration to House members. The vetting process will begin in the Senate for some of President-elect Trump's more eyebrow-raising administration picks, including "foreclosure king" Steve Mnuchin, tapped as Treasury chief, and Rex Tillerson, the ExxonMobil CEO with questionable ties to Russia in line to be secretary of state. One confirmation expected to sail through: retired Gen. James Mattis for defense secretary. The biggest hunk on the legislative chopping block: ObamaCare. But the Times notes any immediate moves against the health care law would be "largely symbolic" as the GOP scrambles to work out the details and come up with their own alternative—which means a full repeal might not happen until after midterm elections. Blocking or pulling back on regulations will be another priority of the Congress, per USA Today, with a bill expected that would give the GOP-controlled Congress approval power over any new federal regulations, as well as a "Midnight Rules Act" that would give Congress sway to nullify in bulk any rules passed during a president's final year in office. Citizens are nervously watching the outcome for Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security, with MinnPost noting that "any movement from the GOP" in terms of entitlement reform "could bring some of the messiest politics of 2017." Also on deck: a major tax revamp, the dismantling of Obama-placed environmental regulations, and the nomination of a Supreme Court justice to replace the late Antonin Scalia, per the Independent. "It's a big job to actually have responsibility and produce results," Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Sunday, per the New York Times. "And we intend to do it." Not that the Republicans' hold on Congress guarantees a unified GOP front: The Times notes "internal disputes" have resulted in no "clear plan yet for Trump's first 100 days, or an endgame for the two years of the 115th Congress." Also complicating matters for the GOP: the president-elect's "often shifting views" on big issues and a "willingness to skirt ideological rigidity." (Also on the Congress itinerary for Tuesday: a vote on a proposal to "effectively kill" the Office of Congressional Ethics.) |
Shoes tied to a power line hang near a street after winds from Hurricane Harvey brought down a power pole in Corpus Christi, Texas, on Friday, Aug. 25, 2017. Hurricane Harvey smashed into Texas late Friday,... (Associated Press)
CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas (AP) — The Latest on Hurricane Harvey (all times local):
9:40 a.m.
Hurricane Harvey has knocked out power to nearly 300,000 customers along the Texas coast and has dumped nearly 20 inches (half a meter) of rain in some places.
The Electric Reliability Council of Texas, which manages about 90 percent of the state's electric grid, says there were 211,000 outages in the few hours after Harvey made landfall Friday night as a Category 4 hurricane.
That figure rose to 293,000 on Saturday, when the hurricane was downgraded to Category 1.
In addition to loss of power, emergency personnel in the communities northeast of Corpus Christi where Harvey made landfall are reporting loss of cellphone service and other forms of communication.
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9 a.m.
The rain was so torrential along Interstate 45 coming out of Galveston as Hurricane Harvey settled over southeast Texas that motorists had to stop under bridges to avoid driving in whiteout conditions.
The downpour on Saturday has also caused minor street flooding along a highway in Dickinson, about 25 miles northwest of Galveston.
Harvey, the fiercest hurricane to hit the U.S. in more than a decade, made landfall Friday night about 30 miles (48 kilometers) northeast of Corpus Christi as a Category 4 storm with 130 mph (209 kph) winds.
It gradually weakened over the next several hours and the National Hurricane Center said that by 5 a.m. Saturday Harvey was downgraded to a Category 1.
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8:30 a.m.
A Texas mayor says Hurricane Harvey hit his coastal community "right on the nose" and left "widespread devastation."
Rockport Mayor Charles "C.J." Wax told The Weather Channel on Saturday that some homes and businesses were heavily damaged or even completely destroyed. Schools were also damaged.
He says emergency response system for the city of about 10,000 people has been hampered by the loss of cellphone service and other forms of communication.
Harvey made landfall Friday evening as a Category 4 hurricane but has since been downgraded to a Category 1. The National Hurricane Center says the threat in coming days is sustained rains that could unleash "catastrophic" flooding.
The city of Victoria, about 60 miles (96 kilometers) north of Rockport, had received more than 16 inches of rain by Saturday morning.
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8:15 a.m.
Daybreak has revealed some of the damage caused when Hurricane Harvey came ashore overnight, including downed lamp posts and tree limbs in Corpus Christi and roof tiles torn off buildings.
Harvey came ashore along Texas' Gulf Coast on Friday night as the most powerful hurricane to hit the U.S. in more than a decade. It has since been downgraded from a Category 4 to a Category 1 hurricane, but the storm is expected to hover in the region for days and to dump as much as 40 inches (1 meter) of rain in places.
Corpus Christi's marina has been left nearly unscathed, save an awning ripped from a restaurant entrance and a wooden garbage bin uprooted and thrown.
An old white sport fishing boat was partially submerged and several boats' sails came unfurled and were ripped and whipping in wind gusts of more than 50 mph.
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7:45 a.m.
President Donald Trump has commended the head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency for his handling of the hurricane now hitting the Texas Gulf Coast.
In a tweet Saturday morning addressed to FEMA head Brock Long, Trump said: "You are doing a great job - the world is watching! Be safe."
Hurricane Harvey, the fiercest to hit the U.S. in more than a decade, is posing the first major emergency management test of Trump's administration.
In a separate tweet, Trump said he is monitoring the hurricane closely from Camp David and "We are leaving nothing to chance. City, State and Federal Govs. working great together!"
He also tweeted that "We have fantastic people on the ground, got there long before #Harvey. So far, so good!"
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5:45 a.m.
Harvey has been further downgraded to a Category 1 hurricane as it churns slowly inland from the Texas Gulf Coast, already depositing more than 9 inches of rain in South Texas.
Harvey made landfall about 10 p.m. Friday east-northeast of Corpus Christi as a Category 4, with winds in excess of 130 mph (210 kph).
But wind speeds quickly weakened and by early Saturday Harvey was downgraded. It continues to produce gusts of up to 120 mph (193 kph) and sustained winds of 90 mph (144 kph). The National Hurricane Center warns of "catastrophic flooding" over the next few days.
Emergency personnel in coastal communities like Rockport, just northeast of Corpus Christi, say there's broad damage to buildings. But Rockport Volunteer Fire Department Chief Steve Sims said early Saturday that firefighters were hunkered down at the city's fire station waiting for conditions to improve to assess the damage.
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4:22 a.m.
Hurricane Harvey has settled over southeast Texas, dumping rain and lashing the state's Gulf Coast with damaging winds.
The storm made landfall Friday night as a Category 4 with 130 mph (209 kph) winds. It gradually weakened over the next several hours and by early Saturday, the National Hurricane Center said it back to a Category 2 — still sustaining winds of 110 mph (185 kph) as of 3 a.m.
Early damage reports from Gulf Coast cities included collapsed roofs and walls. One community transported multiple people from a senior living home to the county jail for treatment after a roof caved in.
But officials remained largely unable to assess the damage before daylight.
The storm is expected to slow further and flood the area with rain through the middle of next week. The center warned that Harvey could produce life-threatening storm surges along a coastal area of more than 400 miles (643 kilometers). ||||| HOUSTON -- Hurricane Harvey settled over southern Texas on Saturday, causing widespread destruction and dumping rain that will drench the southern part of the state for days.
The storm made landfall late Friday night as a Category 4 storm, with sustained winds of 130 mph that whipped coastal communities throughout the night. Winds slowed throughout the day Saturday as Harvey lost strength, becoming a tropical storm by Saturday afternoon.
But the relenting winds are little relief for residents stuck in the storm's path. Harvey's movement slowed to a crawl, and the system will continue to dump up to 40 inches of rain in some places. Officials warned of "torrential rains" that will cause "catastrophic damage" as the storm continues to pull moisture off warm waters in the Gulf of Mexico.
The storm was the first Category 4 hurricane to hit the continental United States in over a decade, and the first to make landfall in Texas since 1961. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said Harvey is "probably the biggest storm in [Texas] history."
Follow along below for live updates on the storm. All times are Eastern unless otherwise noted.
1:50 a.m.: Fatality is confirmed from flooding in Houston
A motorist died Saturday after being stranded in the floodwaters from Harvey, County Judge Ed Emmett told CBS affiliate KHOU.
KHOU reports the woman tried to get out of her car but didn't make it. A neighbor found her body.
NICK OXFORD / REUTERS
Several major Houston roadways are underwater.
Houston mayor Sylvester Turner said the streets are "treacherous."
11:35 p.m.: Flash flood emergency declared in Houston's Harris County
A flash flood emergency is in effect for Harris County, meaning life-threatening flooding is possible, CBS affiliate KHOU reports.
"We're seeing just incredible rainfall rights right now in the heart of Houston," said Jeff Lindner with the Harris County Flood Control District.
The Harris County Sheriff's office tweeted that a man had been rescued from his car in three feet of rushing water.
HCSO deputies rescued one male driver in 3 feet of rushing water in west Harris County — Saums Rd. & Park View Dr. pic.twitter.com/i51U6jcT42 — HCSOTexas (@HCSOTexas) August 27, 2017
Most areas have seen more than 2 inches in the last hour, according to KHOU.
They've had more than 4 inches in the last hour in the Meyerland area and there is a threat of water in homes there, Lindner said.
The Houston Office of Emergency Management tweeted that the Red Cross shelter is closing due to high water. The METRO Houston has suspended all bus and rail service.
The Fort Bend County Sheriff's Office is also reporting tornado sightings in Stafford, Missouri City and near US 90 and the Texas Parkway.
Tornados have already caused damage in Cypress, Sienna Plantation, Katy, Richmond and Atascocita.
9:40 p.m.: Coast Guard launches helicopter rescue
The Coast Guard said Saturday that it was responding to a call of seven distressed people in Aransas Pass, Texas.
The Coast Guard said it received the call at about 7 p.m. central time of seven people, one of which is reportedly on oxygen and had run out, in need of assistance.
The Coast Guard said its Air Station Corpus Christi aircrews rescued in total 20 people and a dog after they received reports from watchstanders at Coast Guard Sector Corpus Christi Saturday morning and afternoon.
7:50 p.m.: "Biggest concern" is the 20-30 inches of rain, Texas Gov. says
More than a foot-and-a-half of rain fell in just 24 hours in Victoria, Texas -- and by the time the storm is over, the city could get in only days the amount of rain it sees in one year, CBS News' Manuel Bojorquez reports.
"Our biggest concern is the possibility of between 20 and 30 inches of rain in areas ranging from Corpus Christi over to Houston," said Texas Gov. Greg Abbott. "Because of the flooding, one of the top focal points that we are concerned about is ongoing rescue and recovery."
Angela and Mario Manzano are checking on the home they recently purchased.
"It's devastating because like I said, we're barely purchasing the home, we're still paying it off, to lose it now, it's going to be hard," Angela said.
Their home is in a low-lying area prone to flooding.
"If it was just the two of us, it would be different, but having our kids, that why we took, we just took the most important things -- our important documents and pictures that can't be replaced and that stuff," Angela said.
7:30 p.m.: Inside Rockport, the city in the eye of Harvey
Ferocious winds and floodwater have left this quaint city on the gulf a disaster zone, CBS News' David Begnaud reports. Parts of the high school were torn to shreds. Harvey showed no mercy on the local First Baptist church. Some homes have collapsed into the water.
"We went upstairs and looked out the window and down the road here it was a sheer wall of water, like 100 mph it was crazy," said Tim Freiburger. His garage was lifted up and jammed against the side of the house.
"It was insane all you could do was just feel stuff pounding the house," he said.
Residents of this senior living complex were stranded when portions of its roof torn away and emergency workers were unable to respond at the height of the storm.
Nearly every police car in town has been damaged, but still officers were out Saturday, banging on doors, making sure no one was trapped.
When the hurricane made landfall here late Friday night, the city was under a mandatory evacuation.
"I'll take a while to get it all straightened backup," said Randy Bonnett, who has been through Texas hurricanes before but he says he will not forget Harvey.
"You got three hours of hell and then an hour lull and then three hours hell," Bonnett said.
7:10 p.m.: Millions in danger of potentially catastrophic flooding
Harvey is still going and it's not going anywhere for awhile, CBS News' DeMarco Morgan reports. There are over 1,000 people assigned to search and rescue operations. Near Corpus Christi on Saturday, the Coast Guard rescued 17 people whose vessels were in distress. The governor of Texas has issued a disaster declaration for 50 counties. Saturday morning, Galveston got pounded.
With the storm stalling out, now millions are in danger of potentially catastrophic flooding. More than three feet of rain could fall in some places.
"We are just getting into this so people need to understand that the longevity of this is gonna go thru the weekend and even into the early part of next week," said Jeff Linder with the Harris County Flood Control in Houston.
Nearly 300,000 power outages have been reported and Corpus Christi is under a boil water order. Incredibly, no fatalities have been reported yet. In Rockport, where the storm took a direct hit, ten people were injured when the roof of a senior housing complex collapsed, according to local media reports. Hundreds of people were evacuated from a hotel there last night:
5:34 p.m.: White House releases photos of President Trump on teleconference call earlier Saturday
The White House said President Trump was briefed on the response to Harvey at Camp David, where he's spending the weekend.
Official White House Photo by Shealah Craighead
Official White House Photo by Shealah Craighead
4:11 p.m.: Coast Guard rescues 17 people
The Coast Guard says it has rescued 15 people onboard vessels near Port Aransas, Texas. Two Coast Guard helicopters were dispatched to help the ships earlier Saturday after receiving distress calls.
The Coast Guard said in a release that seven people were rescued from the tugboat Sabine; four people from the Signet Enterprise; and four from the vessel Sandy Point.
A man and a woman were also rescued in Houston, along with their dog. Read the full story here.
3:47 p.m.: President Trump thanks volunteers
THANK YOU to all of the great volunteers helping out with #HurricaneHarvey relief in Texas! https://t.co/Ds95oSgo8f — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 26, 2017
3:31 p.m.: Harvey shuts down one-fifth of U.S. oil production
About one-third of the America's refining capacity reside in low-lying areas on the coast from Corpus Christi, Texas, to Lake Charles, Louisiana, the Associated Press reports.
The Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement said Friday that workers were evacuated from 86 of 737 manned oil production platforms where oil and gas are pumped from the Gulf of Mexico.
The agency estimated that approximately 21.55 percent of oil production had been shut down along with 23.24 percent of natural gas production.
The AP reports, citing FlightAware, that nearly 1,200 flights were cancelled on Friday and Saturday, and an additional 485 flights for Sunday were cancelled.
2:27 p.m. President Trump receives update from cabinet officials
President Trump and Vice President Mike Pence met with cabinet members and senior administration officials via video teleconference Saturday about the hurricane, according to a White House readout of the meeting. Mr. Trump expressed that all departments and agencies involved should stay focused on saving lives, the White House said.
Mr. Trump, who had been receiving updates from his chief of staff John Kelly Friday night and Saturday morning, directed his team to support the governors of Texas and Louisiana. Mr. Trump on Friday night signed a disaster declaration for the state of Texas at Gov. Greg Abbott's request. The declaration frees up federal resources to alleviate affected localities.
2:18 p.m.: Texas governor: No confirmation of fatalities; 338,000 without power
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said he could not confirm any fatalities from now-Tropical Storm Harvey. He says 338,000 customers are without power and service might not be restored for several days.
Jay Janner / AP
2:15 p.m.: Hotel taxes suspended for evacuees
Evacuees from areas affected by Harvey as well as first responders will be able to stay in hotels tax-free, Abbott says. He said he has waived the state's surcharge in a proclamation.
Abbott said about 1,500 evacuees are currently staying at Texas state park facilities. Nearly 1,500 more are staying in 21 Red Cross shelters and 42 more shelters are standing by to accept more evacuees. More than 200 buses have been deployed to transport residents, Abbott said.
2:13 p.m. 1,000 people involved in search and rescue operations
Abbott says 1,000 workers are focused on search and rescue operations, which he said "will be one of the foremost tasks that we take in the coming days."
Search and rescue "will be one of the foremost tasks that we take in the coming days," Gov. Abbott says https://t.co/8YHzAJZ5CQ pic.twitter.com/xh7822hmG8 — CBS News (@CBSNews) August 26, 2017
2:10 p.m.: 1,800 service members to assist in recovery in Texas
Abbott says 1,300 Texas service members are already assisting in recovery and search and rescue efforts, with another 500 to be activated soon.
2:06 p.m.: Abbott says state concerned about 20 to 30 more inches of rain
"Turn around. Don't drown," the governor said. He says flooding is still a major concern.
"Now that the hurricane has come on shore our primary concern remains dramatic flooding," Abbott said. Abbott said about 20 inches of rain has already fallen in Corpus Christi and about 16 inches in Houston.
2:05 p.m.: Texas governor gives update on Harvey
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott is providing an update on Harvey from Austin, Texas. You can watch on CBSN at the top of this post.
1:50 p.m. Harvey downgraded to tropical storm
Harvey is now a tropical storm, the National Hurricane Center (NHC) says in its latest release.
Winds have slowed to 70 mph, down from a peak of 130 mph when Harvey made landfall late Friday. The storm is now located 45 miles north-northwest of Victoria, Texas, and moving at 2 mph.
But Texas isn't out of the woods yet. The NHC adds that an "extremely serious flooding event is unfolding" as the storm continues to drench the area in rain. Some areas have seen rainfall of up to 3 inches per hour at times. The threat of storm surge continues to threaten low-lying areas, as well.
1:39 p.m.: Texas attorney general warns against price gouging
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton joined CBSN to discuss Harvey, and warned potential price gougers from taking advantage of residents as flooding continues.
"Under Texas law, you're not allowed to massively increase your prices by more than 10 percent, [that's] the approximate number, when there's some type of crisis or catastrophe," Paxton said. "There's significant fines for that, up to $20,000 per incident. If you're doing that to somebody over 65, it could be up to $250,000."
Paxton said his office has received over 200 calls about potential price gouging. He said investigators have looked into instances of alleged price gougers charging nearly $100 for a case of water.
12:45 p.m.: Texas evacuates prisoners threatened by flooding
The Texas Department of Criminal Justice announced Saturday three prisons would be evacuated in Brazoria County, just south of Houston, as rainfall from Hurricane Harvey slams the area.
In a news release, the department said approximately 4,500 inmates will be evacuated beginning Saturday morning.
"These evacuated offenders will not be available for visits at the designated receiving units, but will have the ability to use the offender telephone system," the statement said. "Additional food and water has been delivered to the prisons receiving the displaced inmates."11:59 a.m.: Texas Gov. Greg Abbott warns of "ongoing danger" from flooding
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott on Saturday said ongoing flooding in the wake of Harvey poses the greatest danger in the days ahead, as rescue efforts are already underway in the southeast part of the state.
The Republican governor told CBSN that the hurricane, which made landfall late Friday night as a Category 4 storm but has since been downgraded to Category 1, has caused "great devastation." As it moves slowly and unleashes devastating amounts of rain on the Texas coastline, Abbott says flooding is the greatest concern. Read the full story here.
11:32 a.m.: Mayor of Rockport, Texas, details "widespread damage"
The mayor of Rockport, Texas, says the town has suffered "widespread damage" from Hurricane Harvey as the storm continues to dump rain across southeast Texas. Mayor Charlie Wax joined CBSN to discuss the situation in Rockport, one of the towns hardest hit by the storm.
"Our high school is damaged. One of our learning centers is also damaged. We have businesses that are destroyed, we have homes that have been destroyed, and at the very least lives are disrupted," Wax said.
The mayor said, as of Saturday morning, there were no confirmation of any deaths, but said it was likely because the response teams haven't been able to survey the town completely.
He also warned residents to "stay in place," adding that it wasn't safe to return home.
"Stay in place, protect yourself. If you did evacuate, do not even attempt to go back," he said. "Stay away, let the first responders do their job."
10:55 a.m.: Harvey expected to weaken to tropical storm this afternoon
The National Hurricane Center says Harvey remains a Category 1 hurricane as wind speeds remain at 75 mph. The threat for serious flooding will continue for several days as the storm continues to move slowly over inland Texas.
In its latest advisory, the NHC says "torrential rains will continue for a few more days." The center says Harvey should become a tropical storm sometime Saturday afternoon.
Harvey made landfall late Friday night as a Category 4 hurricane with sustained wind speeds of 130 mph. It has slowed overnight but will continue to pull in moisture from the Gulf of Mexico, and could still move back out over water.
10:28 a.m.: NASA animation of satellite data shows rainfall upon making land
@NASA's GPM satellite analyzed Hurricane Harvey's rainfall as it made landfall in Texas: https://t.co/OGW4LLZvd5 pic.twitter.com/eWF3cHVL1N — CBS News (@CBSNews) August 26, 2017
10:25 a.m.: Houston airport lifts ground stop on incoming flights
Flights are beginning to land again at Houston's George Bush Intercontinental Airport following an earlier ground stop on incoming flights. The airport said 225 flights have been canceled so far.
IB ground stop has been lifted, and aircraft are now beginning to land. Get the latest at https://t.co/9gZJSkXIjn #fly2houston — Houston Bush Airport (@iah) August 26, 2017
10:11 a.m.: Coast Guard responds to mayday calls
The Coast Guard says it is responding to tugboats in distress near Port Aransas, Texas.
In a statement, the Coast Guard says its Corpus Christi sector received mayday calls from the boats Belle Chase, Sandy Point and Sabine Pass near the Lydia Ann Channel. It has dispatched two MH-65 Dolphin helicopter crews to the scene.
10:05 a.m.: Wind speeds slow to 75 mph
The National Hurricane Center says in an advisory that sustained wind speeds have decreased slightly to 75 mph. The storm remains a Category 1 hurricane.
Harvey's center is now about 25 miles west of Victoria, Texas, moving at 6 mph.
9:20 a.m.: More than 16 inches of rain have fallen in Victoria, Texas
CBS News correspondent Manuel Bojorquez joined CBSN from Victoria, Texas, with an update from the heart of the storm. Speaking from his hotel as Harvey's eyewall whipped palm trees in the background, Bojorquez reports Victoria has received more than 16 inches of rain in the past 24 hours.
His hotel began swaying in the wind early Saturday morning. The roof of a car dealership behind the hotel began flapping in the heavy winds, indicating the likelihood of extensive structural damage as Harvey swirls over Texas.
"The big concern is not only all this wind, but of course all of this rain," Bojorquez reports. "They're not expecting just inches of rain here. They are expecting to get up to 2.5 feet. And so the major flooding that will happen as a result of this hurricane is something that they will deal with for days to come here."
9:12 a.m.: Michio Kaku says "agony has just begun"
CBS News science contributor Michio Kaku joined "CBS This Morning: Saturday" to discuss the science behind Harvey and why it will continue to cause damage for days.
"First of all, if it lingers over the land, it could cause massive flooding. And then, watch out," he said. "If it goes back into the Gulf, it could get reenergized and create a second, even a third landfall. And so the agony has just begun with this hurricane of the decade."
8:55 a.m.: Power outages now affect more than 255,000 customers in Texas
More than a quarter-million customers are without power in Texas early Saturday after Hurricane Harvey made landfall. Utilities are reporting outages affecting more than 255,000 customers.
AEP reported more than 192,000 customers without power as of early Saturday. CenterPoint Energy reported nearly 58,000 customers without power.
Outages were also reported by Austin Energy, CPS, Entergy and Oncor. Read the full story here.
8:35 a.m.: Latest forecast as Harvey settles over Texas
Texans are facing days of rain as Hurricane Harvey settles in. Meteorologist Megan Glaros joined "CBS This Morning: Saturday" with the latest forecast at the top of the hour.
The system continues to weaken in terms of wind speed, but it continues to pull in moisture from warm waters in the Gulf of Mexico. Winds have decreased to 80 mph and the storm continues to move at a sluggish 6 mph, which will continue for the next few days.
In Victoria, Texas, more than 16 inches of rain has fallen. McFaddin and Austwell have received just under 12 inches, and Edna and Sugar Land about 9 inches. Total rainfall could total more than 40 inches in places over the coming days.
7:25 a.m.: President Trump says he is "closely monitoring" storm, FEMA director doing "great job"
Closely monitoring #HurricaneHarvey from Camp David. We are leaving nothing to chance. City, State and Federal Govs. working great together! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 26, 2017
You are doing a great job - the world is watching! Be safe. https://t.co/PJLdxy3hD9 — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 26, 2017
6:15 a.m.: Category 1, with maximum winds near 90 mph
Hurricane Harvey became a Category 1 storm with top wind speeds near 90 mph, the National Hurricane Center reported. Tide gauges near Port Lavaca, Texas, recorded water levels more than 6.5 feet higher than normal.
STAFF / REUTERS
5:00 a.m.: From Category 3 to Category 2
The National Hurricane Center downgraded Hurricane Harvey to a Category 2 storm, with maximum sustained winds near 100 mph. Harvey is likely to become a tropical storm later today as it moves further inland, predicted NHC forecasters who also warned of "catastrophic flooding over the next few days due to heavy rainfall." .
4:30 a.m.: Emergency crews in limbo
Many emergency crews were unable to make rescues early Saturday because of Harvey's strong winds. Melissa Munguia, the deputy emergency management coordinator in Nueces County, which includes Corpus Christi, said early Saturday that it could be several more hours before crews could fully assess the damage in coastal communities.
ADREES LATIF / REUTERS
3:40 a.m.: More than 211,000 homes and businesses lose power
More than 211,000 customers were without power on the Texas Gulf Coast due to effects from Hurricane Harvey, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas reported. The storm was downgraded to a Category 3 hurricane early Saturday morning, as Harvey's maximum sustained winds decreased to nearly 125 mph. Additional weakening is forecast during the next 48 hours while the center of Harvey is over southeastern Texas.
2:30 a.m.: Homeowner shoots intruder, cops say
A homeowner shot an alleged intruder in Corpus Christi just as Hurricane Harvey was making landfall late Friday night, Corpus Christi police said. Read the full story here on CBSNews.com.
The victim was taken to a local hospital, and was coherent when police arrived on scene, Corpus Christi police tweeted. According to the Corpus Christi Caller-Times, the victim was shot in the head.
Update on shooting @ 7100 Ficus Ct. homeowner shot intruder. Victim @ Hosp. with gunshot wound was coherent when medics took him. PIO Pace — Corpus Christi PD (@CorpusChristiPD) August 26, 2017
1:45 a.m.: "Boil water," Corpus Christi residents told
In Corpus Christi, the major city closest to the center of the storm, wind whipped palm trees and stinging sheets of horizontal rain slapped against hotels and office buildings along the city's seawall as the storm made landfall. Boats bobbed violently in the marina. It was too dark to tell whether any boats had broken their moorings.
City officials notified residents to "boil their water prior to consumption (e.g., washing hands/face, brushing teeth, drinking, etc)" to kill all potentially harmful bacteria and other microbes. "Water for drinking, cooking and ice making should be boiled and cooled prior to use for drinking water or human consumption purposes. The water should be brought to a vigorous rolling boil and then boiled for two minutes."
1:15 a.m.: Early details emerge from Rockport
Rockport, Texas, a coastal city of about 10,000 people some 30 miles northeast of Corpus Christi, was directly in the path of Harvey when it came ashore. The city had peak wind surges of more than 125 mph, according to the National Weather Service.
Volunteer Fire Department Chief Steve Sims said there were about 15 firefighters at the city's fire station waiting for conditions to improve enough for their vehicles to safely respond to pleas for help. "There's nothing we can do at this moment. We are anxious to get out there and make assessments, but we're hunkered down for now," Sims said, according to an Associated Press report.
Fire Department spokeswoman Gillian Cox told the Corpus Christi Caller-Times that the roof of Rockport's high school has partially caved in. But Cox says social media posts that the school has "disappeared" are inaccurate.
Rockport City Manager Kevin Carruth told the newspaper that the courthouse also sustained major damage. Carruth said a cargo trailer was halfway in the building.
Earlier Friday, Rockport Mayor Pro Tem Patrick Rios offered ominous advice, telling a local TV station that those who chose to stay put "should make some type of preparation to mark their arm with a Sharpie pen," implying doing so would make it easier for rescuers to identify them.
When I reported people in Rockport, TX were being told to write their social security # on their arms, people tweeted me it was ridiculous. https://t.co/BkVhUJsGz6 — David Begnaud (@DavidBegnaud) August 26, 2017
12:30 a.m.: Facebook activates "Safety Check" feature
Facebook has activated its Safety Check feature for Hurricane Harvey, allowing Facebook users to inform friends and family of their whereabouts during the weather emergency.
Facebook users can also find the feature on their smartphone apps. As CBSNews.com sibling site CNET explains: "Safety Check is now integrated into the mobile apps, meaning you can manually notify friends of your status as well as follow crises worldwide and even offer support. The only trick is finding it. When Facebook does a server-side activation, you'll usually see a notification right at the top of the app. But if you want to access the feature yourself, it requires a bit of menu-diving."
Here's a primer from CNET on how to find the feature on Android devices and iPhones.
12:00 a.m.: Roof collapses at senior housing complex
Several residents are trapped inside a senior housing complex in Rockport, Texas, where a roof collapsed, a city manager confirmed to CBS News.
City manager in Rockport, TX tells CBS News people trapped inside of senior housing complex where roof collapsed; rescuers unable to get in — David Begnaud (@DavidBegnaud) August 26, 2017
A couple is trapped in a mobile home in Rockport after a tree fell on it, according to Rockport City Manager Kevin Carruth.
More than 32,000 homes and businesses have lost power in Corpus Christi, CBS affiliate KZTV reports. The city of Corpus Christi has issued a precautionary water boil advisory.
The City of Corpus Christi.. yeah, I'd say we lost some power. #hurricaneharvey 🙏🏻 pic.twitter.com/CAO8hy3oCl — Marisol Gonzalez (@MarisolKZTV) August 26, 2017
Large shipping boats in Port Aransas have broken away from their moorings, leading to significant damage, KZTV reports.
Storm surges up to 13 feet are predicted in some places with up to 40 inches of rain over several days. The National Weather Service warns some residents may not be able to return to their homes for weeks or months.
Friday
11:05 p.m.: Harvey makes landfall
The eye of Harvey made landfall just after 11 p.m. between Port Aransas and Port O'Connor as a Category 4 storm with 130 mph winds, the National Weather Service said.
#Harvey made landfall at 10 PM CDT as a category 4 hurricane near Rockport, Texas, with max winds of 130 mph and min pressure of 938 mb. pic.twitter.com/98y5wpKmBw — NHC Atlantic Ops (@NHC_Atlantic) August 26, 2017
9:51 p.m.: President Trump signs disaster proclamation
President Trump tweeted shortly before 10 p.m. that he had signed a disaster proclamation, which Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said earlier Friday he had requested. The disaster proclamation will allow federal funds to flow into state and local relief efforts.
According to the National Hurricane Center, the storm is expected to make landfall "very soon."
Eye of Category 4 #Harvey almost onshore in Texas. Hurricane force winds reported at many observing stations. Landfall expected very soon. pic.twitter.com/JZ4tE1Bvbx — NHC Atlantic Ops (@NHC_Atlantic) August 26, 2017
8:20 p.m.: Evacuees seek refuge in San Antonio
Hundreds of evacuees seeking shelter from Hurricane Harvey arrived in San Antonio on Friday, CBS affiliate KENS-TV reports.
Two shelters opened their doors Friday morning, and city officials announced they would make room for at least 6,000 evacuees.
"I get deep anxiety when it comes to stuff like this," Justine Vela of Corpus Christi told the station. Vela packed up her four children and left for San Antonio.
"My kids don't kinda know what's going on because they are little," she said. "I'm trying to keep them calm and safe. This is the best place for us to be right now."
7:45 p.m.: Trump prepares to face first major natural disaster as president
Hurricane Harvey will be the first major natural disaster of President Trump's administration. The White House is saying FEMA has changed since the organization's dismal response to Hurricane Katrina in 2005, CBS News' chief White House correspondent Major Garrett reports.
The failures of Katrina haunt emergency planners to this day, so much so, White House Homeland Security Adviser Tom Bossert felt compelled to say "now is not the time to lose faith in your government institutions."
"All the mayors and governors saw what happened at Katrina and they're not gonna let that happen," says David Paulison, who headed FEMA after Katrina and until 2009. He says that Katrina changed management procedures.
"Before we waited for the local community to become overwhelmed before the state stepped in, and waited for the state to become overwhelmed before the federal government stepped in," Paulison tells Garrett.
7:40 p.m.: FEMA urges residents to follow future orders
Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) officials are encouraging residents and visitors in Hurricane Harvey's path to follow directions from local and state officials.
"I encourage residents who will be affected to follow directions from their local officials," Administrator Brock Long said in a statement. "Know your threats, heed the warnings, and if you're in the path of the storm, ensure your family is prepared for possible prolonged disruptions to normal services."
The agency has set up bases near Seguin, Texas, and areas closer to the storm's path to store supplies including more than 96,000 liters of water, 306,000 meals and 4,500 tarps and blankets, the Associated Press reports. State and local officials will be responsible for distributing the materials as needed.
7:20 p.m.: 20-30 inches of rain expected in Victoria, Texas
Victoria, Texas, is about 20 miles from the coast, but the distance is not expected to shield it from the worst impacts of Hurricane Harvey. Aside from winds up to 105 miles per hour, the biggest threat is the rain, CBS News' Manuel Bojorquez reports.
Victoria is in the bull's eye of Hurricane Harvey's rain, with 20-30 inches expected over the next 72 hours. that's a year's worth of rain for this city.
The flooding is expected to be worse than Victoria's 1998 disaster.
"We've never seen a forecast for that kind of localized rain, and I've been working hurricanes and emergencies here for several years. It's the most dangerous forecast we've ever seen," said O.C. Garza the Victoria Office of Emergency Management.
7:15 p.m.: Corpus Christi police stop responding to emergency calls
Corpus Christi police are not responding to calls for emergency service because of the current weather conditions. If you live in the area and you want to get out, the free bus rides are over and the city has discontinued the service, CBS News correspondent David Begnaud reports.
The National Weather Service says winds could leave homes uninhabitable for weeks or even months. Storm surge could reach 12 feet -- that's strong enough to wash away vehicles, Begnaud reports.
Fears of a power outage forced the sickest babies at a children's hospital to be moved out of the hurricane's path. Others are heeding the warnings and evacuating on their own.
7:02 p.m.: Hurricane Harvey upgraded to Category 4 storm
The National Hurricane Center has upgraded Hurricane Harvey to a Category 4 storm with maximum sustained winds of 130 mph and is moving northwest at a speed of 8 miles an hour. The storm is about 45 miles outside of Corpus Christi.
NEW: #Harvey continues to intensify and is now a category 4 #hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 130 mph. https://t.co/tW4KeGdBFb pic.twitter.com/7CkJkuafTb — NHC Atlantic Ops (@NHC_Atlantic) August 25, 2017
6:09 p.m.: Houston officials resist calls for evacuation
Houston is bracing for dozens of inches of rain, but officials are urging residents to stay put.
Judge Ed Emmett, Harris County's top official, said "no mass evacuations" would be called because the hurricane would not "directly" hit the area.
"Always say run from water, hide from wind, we mean storm surge, not rain. [It's] not the kind of water we would ask people to evacuation from," Emmett said.
Mayor Sylvester Turner also urged residents to stay off roads and in their homes. Turner said there might be "greater danger" in having residents who don't need to be evacuated onto roads that could possibly flood, the Associated Press reports.
6:13 p.m.: NWS issues "EXTREME WIND WARNING"
The National Weather Service in Corpus Christi has issued a warning for southwestern Calhoun County in south Texas, urging residents to "TAKE COVER NOW!"
"Widespread destructive winds of 115 to 145 mph will spread across Calhoun County, Aransas County, Nueces County, San Patricio County, Refugio County, producing swaths of tornado-like damage," the advisory says. "TAKE COVER NOW! Treat these imminent extreme winds as if a tornado was approaching and move immediately to the safe room in your shelter. Take action now to protect your life!"
5:08 p.m.: Wind speeds reach 125 mph, officials warn of "catastrophic flooding"
The National Hurricane Center (NHC) says in an update that Harvey now has wind speeds of 125 mph. It's now about 60 miles southeast of Corpus Christi.
The NHC also says some areas of Texas could get 40 inches of rain and cause "catastrophic flooding." The storm surge is expected to be between 6 to 12 feet along parts of the coast.
5:06 p.m.: Feds won't question families about immigration status at shelters
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) issued a joint statement Friday saying they won't question the immigration status of families arriving to hurricane shelters in Texas and Louisiana.
The agencies said their "highest priorities are to promote life-saving and life-sustaining activities, the safe evacuation of people who are leaving the impacted area, the maintenance of public order, the prevention of the loss of property to the extent possible, and the speedy recovery of the region."
The joint statement said that routine "non-criminal immigration enforcement operations" would not be conducted at evacuation sites or assistance centers such as shelters or food banks.
It also warned that immigration laws would not be suspended, and the agencies would "be vigilant against any effort by criminals to exploit disruptions caused by the storm."
5:03 p.m.: President Trump arrives at Camp David
The president has arrived at Camp David, where he will be monitoring the storm over the weekend:
Just arrived at Camp David where I am closely watching the path and doings of Hurricane Harvey, as it strengthens to a Category 3. BE SAFE! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 25, 2017
4:50 p.m.: National Weather Service director: "The impacts will be extreme"
National Weather Service Director Louis Uccellini issued a warning to Louisiana and Texas residents on Friday, calling the impact of Hurricane Harvey "extreme" and "devastating."
"Catastrophic inland flooding due to incredible rainfall amounts and damaging wind will also be associated with this storm," Uccellini said in a statement Friday. "The flooding will be catastrophic and life threatening. The economic impact will likely be devastating."
4:46 p.m.: NASA posts photos of storm from space
NASA posted new photos of Harvey from the International Space Station taken by astronaut Jack Fischer:
.@Astro2fish orbited over Hurricane #Harvey2017 and photographed the storm bearing down on the Texas coast. pic.twitter.com/eBzNc7NlMZ — Intl. Space Station (@Space_Station) August 25, 2017
4:38 p.m.: Coast Guard rescues 12
The U.S. Coast Guard says it has rescued 12 people from the storm near Corpus Christi.
Breaking News: @USCG Air Station Corpus Christi rescued 12 as #HurricaneHarvey nears. Updates to follow soon at https://t.co/AJyH7tl8P9. pic.twitter.com/WRA8KzFQdy — USCG Heartland (@USCGHeartland) August 25, 2017
4:30 p.m.: Corpus Christi mayor: "You can't force people to leave"
Corpus Christi Mayor Joe McComb told CBSN that he hadn't issued a mandatory evacuation order citywide because "you can't force people to leave and send police out there and drag them out."
He added, "you can highly recommend it, and we've done that, and say they need to get out of low-lying areas."
McComb said he'd received a positive response of residents who were seeking higher grounds. "Many people have gone to San Antonio and points beyond," he said Friday.
4:15 p.m.: Tornado threats in Louisiana and Texas
The National Weather Service has issued a tornado watch for for parts of Louisiana and Texas lasting until 3:00 a.m. on Saturday.
A tornado watch has been issued for parts of Louisiana and Texas until 2 AM CDT pic.twitter.com/WjHxXSSDFt — NWS Houston (@NWSHouston) August 25, 2017
4:00 p.m.: Vice President Pence halts travel
Vice President Mike Pence will remain in Washington D.C. during the storm, his spokesman Marc Lotter announced on Twitter. Pence will coordinate with President Trump as he visits Camp David with first lady Melania Trump on Friday.
The White House said Marine One landed at Camp David at 3:46 p.m. on Friday, according to the pool report.
Due to #HurricaneHarvey, @VP Pence will remain in DC this wknd, coordinating with @POTUS Trump at Camp David, monitoring storm & response. — Marc Lotter (@VPPressSec) August 25, 2017
3:18 p.m.: President Trump tweets about Harvey
President Trump addressed the threat of Hurricane Harvey on Friday, urging residents to follow the advice of local and state officials.
I encourage everyone in the path of #HurricaneHarvey to heed the advice & orders of their local and state officials. https://t.co/N6uEWCZUrv — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 25, 2017
3:15 p.m.: Texas governor requests disaster declaration
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott held an afternoon news conference warning residents that Harvey is going to be a "very major disaster." Abbott said Friday that he's asked President Trump for a federal disaster declaration.
Abbott warned residents in coastal areas to evacuate their homes, even if local officials hadn't issued an official warning.
"Even if an evacuation order has not been issued by your local official," Abbott said, "if you are in areas between Corpus Christi and Houston, and maybe even some other areas, especially low lying areas, you need to strongly consider evacuating."
He added, "You don't want to put yourself in a situation where you could be subject to a search and rescue."
3:00 p.m.: Hurricane Harvey reaches Category 3
Harvey became a Category 3 hurricane Friday afternoon, with sustained winds of 120 miles per hour, the National Hurricane Center said in an advisory. ||||| (Adds whereabouts of two more ships, comments from port director)
HOUSTON, Aug 25 (Reuters) - Cruise ships carrying thousands of passengers were stranded in the Gulf on Friday as Hurricane Harvey, a Category 4 storm, came ashore in the middle of the Texas coast, closing the Port of Galveston.
Carnival Corp said that three of its ships were unable to return Galveston as scheduled and that two of them would be forced to divert instead to New Orleans, where they would pick up fresh supplies.
The cruise line said passengers could get off those two ships in New Orleans but advised against that in a statement posted on its Facebook page.
“Given the severity and projected path of the storm along with potential challenges guests may encounter attempting to travel back to Galveston independently, we are strongly encouraging them to remain on board as we intend to return the ships to Galveston as soon as feasible,” Carnival said .
A third ship, the Carnival Breeze, will extend its stay in Cozumel, Mexico, and begin sailing back to Galveston this weekend, the company said.
The next scheduled cruises on all three ships will be shortened and customers will receive refunds, the company said.
“We will continue to remain in close contact with port officials regarding their plans to re-open once the storm has passed,” spokeswoman Christine de la Huerta said.
Royal Caribbean International said that its Liberty of the Seas cruise ship had departed Cozumel, Mexico on time on Friday and was still scheduled to return to Galveston on Sunday.
“However, we will return to Galveston only when it is safe to do so,” Royal Caribbean spokesman Owen Torres said.
The port’s interim director, Peter Simons, told the Houston Chronicle newspaper that officials there were still trying to determine if ships could safely return on Sunday.
“We’re working with the cruise lines, the Coast Guard and the pilots to see what can be done to bring the cruise ships in as quickly but as safely as possible,” Simons told the paper.
The Chronicle reported that a total of 1.73 million passengers left on cruises in 2016 from the port at Galveston, where an expanded cruise terminal opened last year. (Reporting by Ernest Scheyder in Houston; Additional reporting by Dan Whitcomb in Los Angeles; Editing by Lisa Shumaker and Sandra Maler) | – The immediate effects of Hurricane Harvey on Texas are starting to show. The AP reports nearly 300,000 people lost power as some areas of the state received nearly 20 inches of rain. Some communities near the coast where Harvey made landfall Friday night are reporting damaged or destroyed homes, businesses, and schools and loss of cell service. Coast Guard helicopters were sent to rescue the crews of three tugboats that were in distress near Port Aransas on Saturday morning. And multiple cruise ships with thousands of passengers are currently stranded in the Gulf, unable to return to Galveston, according to Reuters. Two Carnival cruise ships were rerouted to New Orleans for additional supplies. Hurricane Harvey was downgraded to a Category 1 on Saturday morning, and CBS News reports it was expected to weaken to a tropical storm by the afternoon. But that doesn't mean the danger has passed. Some areas of Texas are expected to receive up to 30 inches of rain by Wednesday, and "catastrophic" flooding is still a possibility in the coming days. It's also possible Harvey moves back out to sea and gains strength before hitting Texas a second time. |
LONDONDERRY, Vt. (AP) — Vermont State Police say a 5-year-old boy has died two days after his grandmother died while trying to save him from drowning.
Authorities say Jaxon Lawrence was pronounced dead at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center Sunday.
Police say Jaxon fell off a toy flotation device in the water of Lowell Lake in Londonderry on Friday. His 55-year-old grandmother, Julie Lawrence, tried to save him, but she also started to struggle.
Rescuers and officers found Julie Lawrence and Jaxon unresponsive in the water and tried to resuscitate both. Julie Lawrence was pronounced dead at the scene.
Jaxon's 9-year-old brother also tried to rescue him. Police say the boy swam for help and is in good health.
___
This story has been corrected to show the spelling of the young victim's name is Jaxon, not Jackson. ||||| MILFORD, N.Y. (AP) — Authorities say a 3-year-old boy who went missing from a home in upstate New York has drowned in the Susquehanna River.
New York State Police say the family reported Andrew Durkin missing a little before 3 p.m. Sunday from their seasonal residence in the Otsego County town of Milford, 60 miles (96 kilometers) southwest of Albany.
State troopers and the Otsego County Sheriff's Office conducted a search, alongside firefighters, emergency responders and civilians.
The boy was located by a state police underwater recovery team about 17 feet from a dock around 4:30 p.m. Troopers say resuscitation was attempted, but Andrew was later pronounced dead at a hospital.
Police on Monday ruled his death an accidental drowning.
Andrew, who has a twin brother, was from Gilboa in neighboring Delaware County.
___
This story has been corrected to say that drowning was in the Susquehanna River, not a lake. | – Vermont State Police say a 5-year-old boy has died two days after his grandmother died while trying to save him from drowning, the AP reports. Authorities say Jaxon Lawrence was pronounced dead at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center Sunday. Police say Jaxon fell off a toy flotation device in the water of Lowell Lake in Londonderry on Friday. His 55-year-old grandmother, Julie Lawrence, tried to save him, but she also started to struggle. Rescuers and officers found Julie Lawrence and Jaxon unresponsive in the water and tried to resuscitate both. Julie Lawrence was pronounced dead at the scene. Jaxon's 9-year-old brother also tried to rescue him. Police say the boy swam for help and is in good health. (In upstate New York, a 3-year-old boy went missing from his family's home Sunday afternoon and drowned in the Susquehanna River.) |
Octomom You Can Date Me ... If You PAY Me
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These crawls are part of an effort to archive pages as they are created and archive the pages that they refer to. That way, as the pages that are referenced are changed or taken from the web, a link to the version that was live when the page was written will be preserved.Then the Internet Archive hopes that references to these archived pages will be put in place of a link that would be otherwise be broken, or a companion link to allow people to see what was originally intended by a page's authors.The goal is to fix all broken links on the web . Crawls of supported "No More 404" sites. ||||| Wedding bells are in the near future for Abby Wambach and Christian mom blogger Glennon Doyle Melton.
Melton, 40, was first to share news that the couple got engaged on Facebook with a black and white photo of herself holding hands with the United States soccer player, both donning large rings.
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“Abby and I decided to hold hands forever,” she captioned the image on Saturday. “First, fiercely, and forever.”
Wambach, 36, posted the same photo for her 490,000 Instagram followers on Sunday.
“Happy,” the athlete wrote, adding the hashtag #iseethemoonnow.
The Christian author announced she had found love with Wambach just three months after she announced her divorce from husband Craig Melton, and two months after Wambach announced that she and her wife of three years, Sarah Huffman, would be divorcing following an April DUI arrest that forced the soccer star to confront her struggles with substance abuse.
“Feels like the world could use all the love it can get right now,” Melton captioned a selfie with the soccer star posted in November. “So today, I’m going to share with you my new love.”
RELATED VIDEO: Christian Mom Blogger Reveals Relationship With Soccer Star Abby Wambach
Since then, they’ve been regularly featured on each other’s social media pages.
On Saturday, Wambach shared a smiling selfie with the blogger.
“I actually don’t mind traveling when I’m with my girl,” she captioned the snap. “I am so lucky. Like for reals. That’s all.”
Melton also shared a heartfelt message to her now-fiancée in honor of Valentine’s Day earlier this week.
“And then one day it all makes sense. Every bit of it. And you can finally see your past as one long, blessed road leading you home. And you understand that every bit of it was necessary and that every bit of it was holy,” she said. “Thank you for being my home @abbywambach . I love us.”
Melton has long been an outspoken advocate for same-sex marriage.
“Figuring out my stance on homosexuality felt like a life and death decision,” she wrote in a 2013 post on her blog Momastery. “I know my Jesus, I love Him, and I think if he needed me to believe that homosexuality was a sin, He would have mentioned it.”
She added that she hoped that her coming out would help her three children, son Chase and daughters Tish and Amma, feel emboldened to be truthful with themselves and others.
“When Craig and I sat them down to tell them about Abby I started by saying: ‘In our family, we live and tell the truth about who we are no matter what, and then love each other through it — and I’m about to show you how that’s done,’ ” she wrote.
Melton’s coming out announcement follows a similar revelation by Eat, Pray, Love author Elizabeth Gilbert, who revealed she had found love with her female best friend in a September Facebook post. Melton wrote about meeting Gilbert, whom she now calls a friend, in a blog post last September. ||||| I’m staring at this blank page and thinking: This is one of the most important things you’ll ever write. Be kind and brave, Glennon. Steady. Clear. Shameless. Gentle. True.
Pretend it’s just the two of us here in my kitchen. I’m making us chamomile tea. I pass a mug to you and ask you to sit down on the couch with me. You follow me into my family room and and we sit down and I look at you. I can see that you’re nervous because you’ve figured out I’m about to tell you something important. I quickly say: It’s okay. Everyone is healthy. All is well. We are all okay.
We are. And yet.
Craig and I are separating.
What happened? I am still looking for the words. While I am smack dab in the middle of the unfolding, here is my best explanation: As you’ll read in Love Warrior, Craig and I endured serious trauma a few years ago. We suffered. My God, we suffered. I was broken, just completely shattered. And then we healed. It was beautiful.
And this is what I learned: You can be shattered and then you can put yourself back together piece by piece.
But what can happen over time is this: You wake up one day and realize that you have put yourself back together completely differently. That you are whole, finally, and strong – but you are now a different shape, a different size. This sort of change — the change that occurs when you sit inside your own pain — it’s revolutionary. When you let yourself die, there is suddenly one day: new life. You are Different. New. And no matter how hard you try, you simply cannot fit into your old life anymore. You are like a snake trying to fit into old, dead skin, or a butterfly trying to crawl back into the cocoon, or new wine trying to pour itself back into an old wineskin. This new you is equal parts undeniable and terrifying.
Because you just do not fit. And suddenly you know that. And you have become a woman who doesn’t ignore her knowing. Who doesn’t pretend she doesn’t know. Because pretending makes you sick. And because you never promised yourself an easy life, but you did promise yourself a true one. You did promise – back when you were putting yourself back together – that you’d never betray you again.
And so one day you sit down with your beloved, wonderful, kind, brave, warrior husband and you look at him and you say: Honey. We have worked so hard, for so long. We have been warriors for each other and for our children and for this marriage. And yet. I don’t fit here anymore.
And your husband looks at you and, eventually through his tears, he says: Four years ago you gave me the most selfless love I’ve ever received. It healed me. And now I’m going to return that kind of love to you. The kind of love that only wants truth and wholeness and peace for each other.
For the next several weeks, you do nothing but cry and talk. Sometimes it feels like that’s all you ever do—because, it turns out, you have been grieving your marriage for years. But still, you cry and talk more. You close the bedroom door and sit on that bed and you talk. You talk about how hard you’ve worked together, how you stayed on your mats and didn’t run from each other. Since you didn’t run, you discovered together that fight or flight aren’t the only options. There is a third way: heal.
You talk about how broken you each were when you met, and how whole each of you is now. You say to him: You’ve been my healing partner. He says: And you have been mine. You talk about how you can forgive someone and love someone and at the very same time know that you cannot be with them anymore. You get more honest than you have ever, ever been before. You talk about how hard, how very brutal it’s all been for the two of you. Since day one. And you talk about how beautiful it’s been for the two of you. Since day one. There is a moment in every conversation when one of you says: My God, the kids – and neither of you can go on. That’s the black hole. Still is. I can’t write more about that right now. Someday. Not today.
You sit in a therapist’s waiting room to discuss how to handle this with as much peace as possible for the kids.
You sit with your children and you create a new family mission statement:
Then you help your soon-to-be-ex-husband-forever-life-partner move into a rented house a few doors down. You have family dinners, plan your family summer vacation together, and you look at each other and realize you’ve never loved each other more, bigger, truer.
And then you tell your team. You tell the people who are invested in your career. And hot damn, this is bad timing. There is fear and panic. Because you are about to launch the biggest project of your career, the book you finished a year ago, and so many have been working so hard for its release. And it’s all about your marriage. And the advice from many is: Wait, G. Just wait till after the book has launched to reveal this. This is a MARRIAGE book – you can’t break up before it even comes out! Glennon – it will affect sales. It will affect your career, your success.
And you will listen to this advice. And you will decide: No.
Like Mama T said: I was not called to be successful. I was called to be faithful.
I was called to be faithful to truth and vulnerability and to YOU. I never promised anybody I’d get it all right; I promised I’d keep showing up forever. Today. Whether I’m in the valley or on the mountaintop.
Please come close when I say this next part, it’s important: This next step is not a departure from the path of the Love Warrior. This next step is the fulfillment of it – for me, for my particular journey. Love Warrior is a book about self-trust. It’s a book about a woman who has painstakingly learned that there is a still, small voice guiding her through this brutiful life one next right thing at a time. And that the only thing she cannot do – not ever again – is betray that voice. Self-betrayal is allowing the fear voices to drown out the still, small voice that knows what to do and is always leading us home to ourselves and to truth and to love. Love is the boss of me, not fear, and certainly not “success.”
And by the way, success to me is not staying in a marriage — it’s staying in my own peace. At all costs. And so, even when it’s highly inconvenient – even when it feels CRAZY – I will listen to the voice, and I will obey it. And I will be messy and complicated – and I will show up anyway. Because I’ve fought too hard for my sobriety, sanity, integrity—and for your trust—to give it up now.
So I said to the team: We tell our people now.
And they said: Okay. Should we clear your schedule then? Revealing yourself in your writing about this is one thing, but do you want to be on stages with it? Won’t that feel too vulnerable?
And I thought about that for a while. Lord have mercy, cancelling the tour sounded good.
And I decided: No.
My family is here, now in two houses. But my family is also you.
I will not hide from you, not now. I will show up in your cities, in your churches and theaters and on stages and I will say: HERE I AM. A little busted up, but not destroyed. I will be at my weakest, but when we are weak, then we are strong. If I’m this weak, can you imagine how strong I’ll be? Damn.
Listen: Love is not a victory march. It’s a cold and it’s a broken hallelujah. So I might be cold and I might be broken but I am still gonna scream HALLELUJAH all over this country. I am going to stand in front of you with my medicated little head held high and I am going to be so busted up and broken that the light is going to pour out of me like stained glass. I know this.
Here’s what else I know: Some loves are perennials—they survive the winter and bloom again. Other loves are annuals—beautiful and lush and full for a season and then back to the earth to die and create richer soil for new life to grow. The eventual result of both types of plants is New Life.
New life. Nothing wasted. No failure. Love never fails. Never, never. Love is messy and beautiful and brutal – and Love is the whole point. So, I am not afraid, I was born to do this.
I’m asking you, please love me through this. Be my people. The world will have opinions and I need this Love Warrior Army. Please stay close.
Sister On, my beloveds. We can do hard things. We belong to each other. And LOVE WINS.
G
P.S. Since I publicly announced the trauma in my marriage four years ago, I have become a soft place to land for women in marriage trauma. I have listened to what kind of responses from people are helpful and which are hurtful. So many of us want to say and do the loving and supportive thing, but we sometimes don’t know what that looks like. So, with humility, love (and a healthy dose of defensiveness on behalf of my heart and the hearts of my warrior sisters), I offer the following thoughts:
If I don’t mention something, it’s not because I forgot to. It’s because I desperately have to find the balance here between honesty and a tell-all. Between transparency and responsibility. What I owe you and what I owe myself. There will be parts of this story I (try to) keep for myself and Craig and the kids. If you can, please resist assumptions, gossip, or asking for details I haven’t provided. I can tell you this: I feel defensive of Craig here. No one could have worked harder. There is no better father or man on earth. Craig is a hero. He is a Love Warrior. I am fiercely proud of him.
Try to avoid lamenting how sad it is that people “throw away their marriages these days.” Try not to generalize. I have met hundreds of divorced women who didn’t throw their marriages away. Most of us fight like hell for our marriages until we realize that we can either save our marriages or save our souls. So please, I’m not looking for advice. Just love and support.
Please don’t pretend to know what God thinks of us. Please think deeply about the chasm-wide difference between leaving a man and leaving God. Please remember that when a woman leaves, she just brings God with her. Nothing separates a woman or a family from God’s love. Not death, and certainly not divorce. Jesus taught us that sometimes death is necessary for there to be new life. And that God loves us far more than any institution God made for us. When someone suggests otherwise, it brings shame to us. But we won’t let that in. We are women who have become far too wise to believe in shame.
Sometimes, when people make decisions about marriage, it evokes strong feelings in others. If my news does that to you today, please look inside and get curious about whether those feelings have more to do with you and your life than they do about me and mine.
I will repeat this last one: Please stay close. I need you more than I’ve ever needed you.
||||| This is heavy on my mind this week, so I thought I’d throw all my energy and love in the Supreme Court’s direction….
If you haven’t read the original Mountain post, please start here.
I’m not a smart man. But I know what Love Is. – Forrest Gump
Several years ago at church, Craig and I sat through a sermon condemning homosexuality. As I listened to the sermon, which was based upon two lines of scripture in the New Testament, every fiber in my body rejected the message. My palms sweated, my heart pounded, and I started to feel queasy. I left the church building that day on fire and didn’t get a good night’s sleep for a month.
Instead of sleeping, I spent my nights scouring scripture, researching the positions of different denominations, and praying and praying and praying some more. I wrote this to several ministers: “I am a Christian and a seeker and I’m trying desperately to reconcile God’s commandment to love my neighbor without judgment and the church’s stance on homosexuality. Would you discuss this with me?” Not one minister wrote back. Every morning when the sun finally came up, I’d call Sister at work. She’d answer her phone with: “We’re gonna talk about the gays again, aren’t we, Sister?” Yes, Sister. Yes, we are. Clear your schedule.
Figuring out my stance on homosexuality felt like a life and death decision. When I described the intensity of my concern to other Christians, most would say, “but, why? You don’t even have a gay family member.” This response was very confusing to me. Isn’t the whole point of Christianity that we are all family? That we should love our neighbors as ourselves? That if any of us is hungry, we are all hungry? That if any of us is oppressed, we are all oppressed? According to the Jesus I read about in the Gospels, these people who were being persecuted for their sexuality WERE my family. The children who were killing themselves because the world (and the church in particular) would not accept them WERE my children. And I thought that being a Christian required me to love them, to ache for them, to fight for them with the same urgency I would have if I were fighting for myself. The fact that I had never met them before was completely inconsequential, according to Jesus.
I have these new friends named Laura and Jaime…they’re gay and married. They love each other very much. I recently looked through their photos and noticed that their wedding looked a lot like mine. Actually, their lives look a lot like mine, except that their son, Simon, is very sick with a heart condition. So I’m not sure they really give a rat’s ass right now if Christians “accept” them or call their love for each other “sinful” or not because they are quite busy caring for each other and Simon and running between hospitals and home and having a brutiful life together. But I’m glad they slowed down enough to know me, because my life is better with them in it. I love them, and I love Simon.
The following exerpt is based on one of my favorite passages from Huckleberry Finn, and I think it sums up the decision I’ve made about Laura and Jaime’s family.
“Whenever I think of the word “empathy,” I think of a small boy named Huckleberry Finn contemplating his friend and runaway slave, Jim. Huck asks himself whether he should give Jim up or not. Huck was told in Sunday school that people who let slaves go free go to everlasting fire.” But then, Huck says he imagines he and Jim in “the day and nighttime, sometimes moonlight, sometimes storms, and we a-floating along, talking and singing and laughing.” Huck remembers Jim and their friendship and warmth. He imagines Jim not as a slave but as a human being and he decided that, “alright, then, I’ll go to hell.” – This I Believe, 172
When I say things like this my Christian friends get very alarmed. They say to me: Aren’t you afraid of saying and writing these things? Aren’t you afraid of God?
Well, yes. But when I consider discussing all of these things over with Jesus one day, when I imagine telling Him what I thought I heard Him saying to me, when I explain how my heart understood His message, I realize that I’d be much more afraid to stand in front of Him if I didn’t write these things. I know my Jesus, I love Him, and I think if he needed me to believe that homosexuality was a sin, He would have mentioned it. He didn’t. When Jesus said that marriage was between a man and a woman, he was responding to a question about divorce, not sexuality.* And even the Gospels… well, even though they are gospel to me, I accept that they are also interpretations of what Jesus said and did and meant -we don’t have a single written word directly from Jesus. He could have left us something – he could have left another list of rights and wrongs when He came to Earth, but he chose not to. The only words he ever wrote were in the sand. . . words that He knew would disappear almost immediately. Why? I don’t know. Maybe He wanted us to know him well enough to make our decisions about Him based on our relationship with Him. Maybe He wanted us to wrestle with Him, to work out our own faith with fear and trembling. That’s what I think, anyway. I think I’m starting to recognize His still, small voice. And I’m betting everything on my belief in our relationship, on my understanding of His character and love. Aren’t we all? And if I’m wrong, and I very well could be . . . I don’t really think He’ll send me to hell for it. I think He knows I’m doing the best I can down here. I know He knows that. I believe.
And while we’re at it . . . that still, small voice suggests to me often that He’d appreciate if Christians picked up a couple more issues other than homosexuality and abortion to address. You know, maybe a couple He actually mentioned…like care for the poor and sick and lonely and hungry and imprisoned and widowed and orphaned and recently immigrated. Maybe we should all be required to pick an issue that requires US to change and not OTHERS to change. I think that’d be good.
I just think that if we are going to call ourselves pro-life, we must also agree that starvation and poverty and disease and immigration and health care for all and war and peace and the environment are also pro-life issues. And maybe in the meantime we could have a new pro-life bumper sticker made that says: “We are all Confused Hypocrites. But God Loves Us anyway, which is Good News. So out of Gratitude, We are Trying to Remember That We Belong To Each Other.” I’d buy that one.
My point is that this gay ship has sailed, I think. We’re gonna have to sponsor another revolution because for the gays, the times, they are a’ changing already. Gay people wrote to me by the hundreds to tell me that they read the post again and again, pretending that the letter was from their own parents. Therapists requested my permission to use the letter with their gay and straight clients to teach them about unconditional love. Churches from all over the country asked to use the post in their weekly bulletins. A student at UC Berkley told me that her professor of religious studies distributed the letter to all of his students. I felt very humble about this, which is why I only wear my homemade “THE RELIGIOUS STUDIES PROFESSOR AT UC BERKLEY DISTRIBUTED MY POST TO ALL HIS STUDENTS” T-shirt to bed. And sometimes to the grocery store, when I’m having an insecure day.
But I also received challenging responses to my post. None were mean-spirited, none were offensive. People are better than we give them credit for.
Many people said that they agree that people are born gay, but that it is still a sin to act on it. These people suggested that homosexuals should remain celibate.
But my understanding is that celibacy is a sacred calling, not a hiding place or a consequence. Celibacy is like…it’s like we all have the same capacity to love inside of us, the same amount of light to shine……and most of use that light, that love, like a laser…it’s all concentrated and focused on one partner. But the celibate hears a call to use his light, his love, more like a flood light. He knows that if he’s not required to shine a laser on one person, that his light can be dispersed to many more….maybe not burning a hole into another heart, but lighting up entire rooms. He can reach more people with his love through celibacy because it’s not all focused on one person. Ghandi felt called to be a flood light instead of a laser…and heeded the call to celibacy while he was married. His wife accepted this as the way he was being called to serve his God and his people. And so celibacy…it’s a sacred calling to love. And I fear that when we suggest that homosexuals save themselves by choosing celibacy, that we insult both the gays and the celibates. Celibacy is not a Plan B.
Other Monkees have explained that they believe that homosexuality is a sin, but no more of a sin than pride and anger and selfishness. And since we are all sinners too, we shouldn’t judge the gays. Hate the sin, love the sinner type thing. I don’t know. I guess I have just always accepted the fact that we are put on this Earth to love. To Love God and love our neighbors. And those sins, pride, anger, and selfishness…those sins get in the way of loving God and loving our neighbors. So we should fight them tooth and nail. We should fight them to the death. But homosexuality…I can’t see how a woman sharing her God given light with another woman interferes with her Loving Her God and Loving Her Neighbor.
Unless we come back to: because it says so in the Bible. And we have faith that our understanding of the Bible is infallible. We believe that our human minds can grasp the meaning of all scripture perfectly and so we have faith that homosexuality is a sin.
But you know what the Bible also says? The Bible says “And these three remain. Hope, Faith, and Love. And the greatest of these is love.” ***
There will come a point when hope and faith cease to exist. When the next world is revealed, we will know . . . we won’t need hope or faith anymore. Those two are temporary. Hope and faith exist only to help us make it though this life.
But LOVE. Love is eternal. Love never ends. The love we offer and receive in this world we’ll carry with us into the next. The greatest of these is love. When in doubt, I choose love above any particular ideas offered to me about faith.
And that means that I love my gay friends, without agenda. And I love my friends who believe that homosexuality is a sin, without agenda. And I love my friends who are terrified for my soul when I write this way, without agenda.
Because listen – here’s the thing. After my wrestling match with God, I wasn’t really exhausted enough. I still came up swinging. For a little while, I felt angry. Angry at anyone who had a different understanding of scripture than I did. Angry at people who taught that God disapproved of homosexuality. Prideful about my position, really. And then one day God sat my butt down with the Bible again.
And he said something to me like, “Wait a minute, Lovie. Yes, I love those gays, but I love the ones picketing against them every bit as much. That’s the point.”
And There’s the rub. There’s Christianity. It’s not deciding that one group shouldn’t be judged and then turning around and judging the other group. That is not being a peacemaker. Peacemakers resist categorizing people. They find the light, the good, in each and every person. They don’t try to change people, except by example. They know everyone has something important to teach. They are humble about their ideas and their opinions. They try to find common ground, always.
I now have friends who are gay and friends who preach against homosexuality. I have friends who are ministers and friends who are atheists. Listen, I even have a new friend who is a Dallas Cowboys fan. With God, all things are possible.
The point is – if you’re hungry – you are all welcome at my table. None of you is less welcome than the other. This place is a banquet table for gays and straights and prudes and hoochies and cheerleaders and tuba players and pharisees and alpha moms and slacker moms and tax collectors and fishermen and choir girls and heathens. It’s a banquet table where people who are different can come together and share a meal and maybe not change each other’s minds, but possibly soften each other’s hearts.
Oh, yes…we can do that. We already have.
You do not have to agree with me to love me.
So at this table, this Momastery table . . . we talk to each other in soft voices, and we smile and we say, “pass the wine, please,” and we ask about each other’s children. Sometimes we even pass around some pictures. We share our families with each other. And we also share some of those magical laughs when we can’t speak and the tears are rolling and we’re gasping for breath and our stomachs hurt like we just did a hundred crunches. Maybe we even pee a little. And maybe in the middle of all that, we start knowing each other as people instead of categories. And we accept that we are different, and we understand that each person’s choices are her own, and so we don’t have to be angry with each other. We are free to love each other.
She told me that once she forgot herself and her heart opened up like a door with a loose latch and everything fell out and she tried for days to put it all back in the proper order, but she finally gave up and left if there in a pile and loved everything equally.- Brian Andreas
Love,
G
*Mark 10, **John 8, ***1 Corinthians 13
| – "Happy," is how soccer star Abby Wambach put it on Instagram, tacking on an #iseethemoonnow." The photo was one posted a day earlier on Facebook by prominent Christian mommy blogger Glennon Doyle Melton, who wrote "Abby and I decided to hold hands forever. Love wins." The image shows two hands, each featuring a diamond ring. The engagement announcement came just three months after Melton went public with her relationship with the 36-year-old, which came about three months after she announced she was separating from husband Craig Melton in a lengthy post on her Momastery blog. Wambach's own marriage unraveled following an April DUI arrest. People describes Melton as a long-time same-sex marriage supporter, and cites this 2013 post: "Figuring out my stance on homosexuality felt like a life and death decision. I know my Jesus, I love Him, and I think if he needed me to believe that homosexuality was a sin, He would have mentioned it." Melton has three kids—son Chase and daughters Tish and Amma—and People quotes her speaking on her own same-sex relationship. "When Craig and I sat them down to tell them about Abby I started by saying: 'In our family, we live and tell the truth about who we are no matter what, and then love each other through it—and I'm about to show you how that’s done.'" |
TUSCALOOSA, Ala. (AP) — The parents of a Texas woman who said she was raped while attending the University of Alabama have sued the alleged attacker, school officials and others, claiming the episode led to her suicide last year.
A federal wrongful death lawsuit filed over the weekend by Michael and Cynthia Rondini of Austin, Texas, claims the alleged assault and officials' subsequent mishandling of the allegations prompted Megan Rondini to kill herself.
The lawsuit says Rondini, then a 20-year-old junior who planned to go to medical school, met a man at a popular Tuscaloosa bar in July 2015. She was later sexually assaulted at his home, possibly after being drugged, the suit contends.
Police investigating the sexual assault were sympathetic toward the man and wrongly focused on Rondini's actions, which including taking a handgun and $3 for cab fare from his home, the lawsuit claims.
"Megan ultimately was treated as a crime suspect and her status as a victim of a sex crime was completely disregarded," the suit said. The young woman withdrew from Alabama and returned home to Texas, where her mental condition deteriorated, according to the complaint.
The man wasn't charged, and the lawsuit claims investigators and university officials mishandled her allegations. The suit contends Rondini afterward suffered depression, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder, which her parents say led to her suicide.
The lawsuit names the man, but The Associated Press is not using his name since he was not charged with a crime. It also names Beth Howard, Title IX coordinator at Alabama; Cara Blake of the school's Women and Gender Resource Center; Tuscaloosa County Sheriff Ron Abernathy; and two county officers, investigator Adam Jones and deputy Joshua Hastings.
In a statement, the university declined comment on specifics of the lawsuit but said school officials were "deeply saddened" by Rondini's death and are trying to raise community awareness and support victims of sexual assault.
A lawyer for the man named in the lawsuit denied that he had sexually assaulted her.
"The allegations against my client as set forth in this baseless lawsuit are simply false," the statement said.
Abernathy said the case was referred to a grand jury, which declined to issue an indictment. Letting grand jurors consider evidence rather than filing immediate charges is standard practice in cases with "very conflicting statements," Abernathy said.
The lawsuit was assigned to a federal magistrate judge Monday, but no hearing date was set.
The complaint doesn't seek a specific amount of money. It asks for a court order requiring the sheriff's office to provide better training to officers and "to provide safe conditions to citizens around criminal investigations." ||||| A lawsuit accuses law enforcement and university officials of failing to give Megan Rondini, the subject of a BuzzFeed News story, the help she needed after she reported being assaulted by a wealthy man in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.
The parents of a young woman who killed herself after alleging she’d been raped by a wealthy Alabama man have sued the accused attacker, law enforcement officers, and a university Title IX official, alleging their “faulty practices” and “mishandling” of the case drove their daughter to hang herself. The story of Megan Rondini, who was a student at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa when the alleged rape occurred, was detailed in a recent BuzzFeed News story. The 25-page wrongful death suit filed Sunday by Rondini’s parents, Michael and Cynthia Rondini, charges that Tuscaloosa Sheriff's Department deputies were intentionally dismissive when Rondini reported in July 2015 that she was raped by T.J. Bunn, Jr., one of six defendants named in the suit. It accuses investigator Adam Jones and deputy Joshua Hastings of the Tuscaloosa Sheriff’s Department of conducting sloppy investigations. Also named in the suit is Tuscaloosa Sheriff Ronald Abernathy, for allegedly failing to properly train his department in how to handle sexual assault reports. In addition, the Rondinis are suing Beth Howard, the University of Alabama’s Title IX coordinator, who also held that position when their daughter reported she had been raped; and Cara Blakes, who was a graduate student working as a therapist at the school’s Women and Gender Resource Center. All of the defendants “negligently, recklessly, wantonly, and/or wrongfully acted or failed to act in response to Megan’s reported sexual assault,” the lawsuit alleges. As a result, it says, Megan Rondini suffered “extreme depression, anxiety, PTSD, fear, panic attacks, decline of cognitive functions and general well-being, weight loss, and feelings of worthlessness and hopelessness, all of which directly led to Megan’s loss of life.”
W. Ivey Gilmore, Jr., an attorney for Bunn, said in a statement Monday that the accusations against his client in the suit are false. "It is, perhaps, natural to want to find someone to blame when a young woman takes her life," Gilmore said. "But accusing law enforcement and those who counseled this young woman for her actions is misguided. Unfortunately, bringing this matter before the courts in this civil action will only prolong grief without changing the reality." No one else named in the suit immediately responded to a request for comment. The suit, filed by Birmingham-based attorney Leroy Maxwell Jr., seeks an unspecified amount of damages. Megan Rondini’s death came to light in the BuzzFeed News report, which used law enforcement interrogation videos, text messages, and other documentation to show her growing frustration after she told Tuscaloosa law enforcement that she’d been raped after a night out with friends. Rondini accused T.J. Bunn Jr. in the assault, but Bunn said they had consensual sex. Tuscaloosa officers questioned why Rondini didn't kick or hit Bunn and concluded the incident did not meet Alabama’s legal requirements for rape. They also questioned Rondini about crimes she had allegedly committed, including taking money and a gun from Bunn’s car as she fled his home after the alleged assault. Rondini ultimately dropped the case, left the University of Alabama, and moved back to her native Texas, where she hanged herself in February 2016. Bunn was never charged with a crime. The article led to outrage in Congress. Last Wednesday, Rep. Ted Poe, a Republican from Texas, described Rondini's case and said "she got the death penalty” after reporting she’d been sexually assaulted. Poe criticized Tuscaloosa investigators, saying they treated Rondini “with disdain and disbelief." "It’s easy to second guess what someone should or should not have done after emotional trauma of sexual assault, but Megan believes she did everything a rape victim is supposed to do," Poe said on the House floor.
The lawsuit says Tuscaloosa officers failed to test Rondini's rape kit, failed to interview witnesses, and failed to record all of the interviews they did conduct. Their behavior “was intentional and due to Megan Rondini’s female gender,” the suit alleges.
“Megan ultimately was treated as a crime suspect and her status as a victim of a sex crime was completely disregarded,” the lawsuit alleges. "The only conclusive evidence gathered from the investigation was that Megan tested positive for a sexually transmitted disease that she contracted from non-consensual sex with Defendant Bunn," the suit states. Bunn's family is well-known in the Tuscaloosa area. His father and uncle own S.T. Bunn Construction, which took down its website following the BuzzFeed News story as people online directed outraged readers to their contact page. In a statement released shortly after the story appeared, Bunn's family called the article "an intentional distortion of facts in a tragic case," and said Rondini's family had previously sought to sue "various parties who are the targets of these unfounded accusations."
"It is tragic that this young woman took her own life, but defaming an entire city, its leaders, its institutions and a prominent family brings no honor to this tragedy and no justice for anyone," the Bunn family said in its statement. The University of Alabama has said the BuzzFeed News story "ignored some significant facts," including that it gave Rondini information about services available to her on campus. It also noted that it referred Rondini to another counselor because the first one she met with after the alleged assault knew the Bunn family and recused herself from the case. However, the Rondini family claims in the lawsuit that the second counselor Rondini was referred to, Cara Blakes, "inexplicably denied Megan counseling services" until she began taking anti-anxiety medication. The lawsuit alleges this was a violation of Rondini's rights under the Americans with Disabilities Act. The suit also says that Beth Howard, the University of Alabama's Title IX coordinator, ignored calls and messages from Rondini's family requesting help for their daughter. The suit was filed in US District Court in Alabama. Anna Voremberg, a board member of End Rape on Campus, an advocacy group that has assisted Rondini's parents, accused investigators of appearing more sympathetic to Bunn in videotaped interviews than to Rondini, who was the one reporting a violent crime. "Why would someone come forward to report any violence at all? It was just like a good ol' boys club in there," Voremberg told BuzzFeed News. "Megan is just one example of many in which law enforcement officers truly fail survivors of sexual violence and their community." Katie J.M. Baker contributed reporting.
Tyler Kingkade is a national reporter for BuzzFeed News and is based in New York City. Contact Tyler Kingkade at tyler.kingkade@buzzfeed.com. Got a confidential tip? Submit it here.
News moves fast. Keep up with the BuzzFeed News daily email! Sign up Great! You're almost there! Check your inbox and confirm your subscription now! ||||| The parents of Megan Rondini, the University of Alabama student who killed herself after alleging that she had been raped by a Tuscaloosa man, filed a federal wrongful death lawsuit Sunday against her alleged rapist, two university employees, the Tuscaloosa County sheriff, a sheriff's deputy, and a sheriff's office investigator.
The lawsuit by Michael and Cynthia Rondini alleges that the school and law enforcement failed their daughter. It claims the sheriff's office inadequately pursued the investigation and did not take Megan's claims seriously, and the university did not give her adequate psychological treatment and support after the alleged rape.
Leroy Maxwell Jr., the Rondinis' attorney, said the lawsuit was filed with the hope that it would prevent cases similar to Megan's.
"There was a mediation with the Rondini family and the university, the details of which are confidential. The Rondini family is not in this for the money, they are only interested in shining a bright light on a tragic yet preventable situation," he said in a statement sent to AL.com. "The court will determine if this case rises to the level of punitive damages."
Meanwhile, the school, DCH Regional Medical Center, victim advocates, the Tuscaloosa District Attorney's office and law enforcement are establishing two sexual assault programs that care for sexual assault victims.
"While this long-term solution is being implemented, DCH is training its staff in the SANE [Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner] course curriculum," the groups said Friday in a joint press release.
Terry Bunn Jr., Rondini's alleged rapist, could not immediately be reached for comment. The lawsuit identifies him as being part of a family that is "well connected and powerful in the Tuscaloosa community, and were major financial supporters of UA." Bunn works at ST Bunn Construction Company, which is across the street from the Innisfree Pub, where Megan was allegedly drunk or drugged before being raped for 30 minutes in July 2015.
His lawyer, W. Ivey Gillmore, said in a statement to AL.com that the lawsuit is "baseless and "simply false."
"Law enforcement investigated this matter; the district attorney's office reviewed the evidence; the evidence was even presented to a grand jury that found there was no justification for charges against my client. It is, perhaps, natural to want to find someone to blame when a young woman takes her life," Gillmore said. "But accusing law enforcement and those who counseled this young woman for her actions is misguided. Unfortunately, bringing this matter before the courts in this civil action will only prolong grief without changing the reality."
The filing goes on to claim that authorities sided with Bunn's version of events and did not thoroughly follow-up on Megan's story, and that an investigating officer was more interested in finding out whether Megan committed any crimes on the night of the rape.
The university allegedly "deliberately and repeatedly denied services and mishandled accommodations with hostility toward" Megan, the suit goes on to say. The lawsuit claims Megan confided in a UA counselor who told her she could no longer give her therapy because she was a family friend of the Bunns, and that a second counselor would not see Megan unless she first took anxiety medication.
The lawsuit claimed UA did not accommodate Megan after the rape, alleging that she saw Bunn's car outside her apartment and saw her alleged rapist on the Tuscaloosa campus.
Prior to the lawsuit, the university had issued this statement:
"The University of Alabama has been deeply saddened by the death of Megan Rondini, and we continue to offer our sympathy to her friends and family. Information published by news outlets this week has unfortunately ignored some significant facts," UA said. "When Megan went to the hospital, a university advocate met her at the hospital to provide support and stayed with her throughout the examination process. Megan also received information from university representatives regarding services available to her on campus, including counseling through the university's Women & Gender Resource Center. When she sought counseling and her first therapist identified a potential conflict as defined by her professional obligations, Megan was immediately introduced to another therapist, who provided care and support. Additionally, the UA Title IX Office was in contact with Megan, including offering academic accommodations and helping to streamline her withdrawal when Megan elected to return to Texas."
Megan returned home to Austin, Texas, where the trauma from the rape and the response from law enforcement and the university caused her to kill herself, the lawsuit claims.
"The combined trauma due to Megan's treatment by the Tuscaloosa Sheriff's Department, the reporting process with UA, the additional anxiety of trying and failing to receive counseling as a result of her rape, and the influential position of her assailant in the community ultimately made Megan feel unsafe on campus and that she could no longer remain at UA," the lawsuit stated.
Megan hung herself on February 26, 2016. Two days before, she sent a text that read: "When all is said and done, I wonder what I could've accomplished if one man didn't completely rip everything away from me."
A copy of the lawsuit is posted below:
Rondini Lawsuit by hkoplowitz on Scribd
Updated at 6:30 p.m. to include a statement from Bunn's attorney. | – Former University of Alabama student Megan Rondini would still be alive if not for the "mishandling" of her alleged rape, her parents say. In a wrongful death lawsuit filed Sunday, Rondini's parents accuse the university, school officials, sheriff's deputies, and Rondini's alleged rapist of enabling her suicide in February 2016. Rondini had been a 20-year-old student at the University of Alabama in July 2015 when she alleged she was raped by local businessman TJ Bunn Jr. But authorities "wrongfully acted or failed to act in response," the lawsuit alleges, per Buzzfeed. It adds deputies—who found the case didn't meet Alabama's legal definition for rape—didn't test Rondini's rape kit or interview witnesses, an "intentional" behavior that was due to Rondini's gender. Rondini—who allegedly stole $3 and a gun from Bunn—was "treated as a crime suspect," not a victim, the suit continues, per the AP, also alleging a school counselor refused to see Rondini unless she took anxiety medication. Rondini later dropped out of school, moved back to Texas, and suffered "extreme depression, anxiety, PTSD, fear, panic attacks, decline of cognitive functions and general well-being … all of which directly led to Megan's loss of life," the suit states. Per AL.com, two days before her suicide, she sent a text reading, "I wonder what I could've accomplished if one man didn't completely rip everything away from me." Bunn, who claimed the sex was consensual, was never charged with a crime. His lawyer tells AL.com that the lawsuit is "baseless" and "simply false." |
If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, Mike Huckabee clearly holds Arianna Huffington in high esteem.
The former — and possibly future — presidential candidate will launch a website called the Huckabee Post, according to multiple reports. Mediaite found a Craigslist post listing openings for reporters at the new venture, touting it as "a new and exciting online news publication covering news on politics, U.S., international, media, sports and other general news."
Huckabee served as governor of Arkansas from 1996 to 2007 and briefly led the race for the Republican nomination during the 2008 presidential election before John McCain secured the nomination. His campaign featured one of the more tongue-in-cheek advertisements: an endorsement from Chuck Norris. Huckabee has also recently indicated that he is considering another run for the presidency in 2016.
Conservative personalities have found success leveraging their personal popularity into media brands, most notably with subscription service. Glenn Beck started TheBlaze in 2011 and Andrew Sullivan launched The Dish earlier this year.
Representatives for the Huckabee Post did not immediately respond to an email in response to its Craigslist ad.
Have something to add to this story? Share it in the comments.
Image: Getty/Brendan Smialowski ||||| Mike Huckabee‘s radio show is ending, but could he be taking a stab at the written word next?
An ad has popped up on Craigslist seeking reporters for a new venture called Huckabee Post, that already boasts offices in both New York City and Washington D.C. Rumors about a “Huckabee Post” surfaced after his first presidential run in 2008, but perhaps now it’s coming to fruition?
In the Craigslist ad, the Huckabee Post is described as “a new and exciting online news publication covering news on politics, US, international, media, sports and other general news.”
In the New York Times Friday morning, Huckabee is quoted as saying he’s keeping the door open to a 2016 presidential run, but no mention of any potential media ventures.
Mediaite has reached out to Huckabee for comment, but we have not heard back yet. We will update.
[Photo via screengrab]
— —
Follow Josh Feldman on Twitter: @feldmaniac ||||| Could Fox News be spawning another candidate for president?
Judging by the noises that Mike Huckabee is suddenly making, that’s a strong possibility.
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The host of a Saturday night show on FNC, Huckabee made a bid for the White House in 2008 and flirted with the idea in 2012. But nobody had been talking about him for 2016, and he has quite deliberately set out to change that with a string of interviews.
“I didn’t want any misinformation that I’ve told people I’m running—that’s not the case,” Huckabee told me yesterday. “I wanted to be honest and say, sure I’m looking at it.”
Once Huckabee started having meetings with potential donors and supporters, including some who haven’t backed him before, talking to the press was “just a matter of trying to shoot straight with people,” he says.
A major question for the former Arkansas governor is whether to give up his lucrative Fox perch—a decision that loomed large as he agonized about whether to jump into the last campaign—along with his radio commentaries.
Huckabee would have to leave the Fox payroll if he started taking serious steps toward the Republican primaries, such as forming an exploratory committee and raising money. That’s what happened with Fox contributors Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum in the 2012 cycle.
He is very mindful of the prospect of having “zero income,” Huckabee told me, “unlike Senate candidates who continue to get a paycheck even if they’re not showing up for work. I emptied out the treasury when I ran in 2008 and cashed in everything I could cash in.”
The other overriding question hanging over a Huckabee candidacy is the same one he wrestled with last time: could he raise enough money to be competitive? Huckabee ran a shoestring campaign in ’08, when he was initially written off by the press until winning the Iowa caucus, and doesn’t want to be the poverty candidate again.
In a coordinated effort to raise his potential presidential profile, Huckabee granted three interviews at week’s end to show the media that he should be in the mix.
With Jonathan Martin in the New York Times:
“Former Gov. Mike Huckabee of Arkansas has not been among the Republicans frequently named as a potential 2016 presidential candidate, but he would like that to change. ‘I’m keeping the door open,’ Mr. Huckabee said in an interview here Thursday night about the possibility of seeking his party’s nomination again.”
With Karen Tumulty in the Washington Post:
“Add another name to the list of potential GOP presidential contenders for 2016. Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee — the winner of the 2008 Iowa caucuses, who took a pass on the 2012 presidential race — says he might be willing to give it another try. In an interview Thursday night, Huckabee said he is receiving encouragement to run ‘from places where I never got it before.’”
With CBN’s David Brody:
“In an exclusive backstage television interview with The Brody File, former governor Mike Huckabee says, ‘there’s a new openness now’ for a run at the presidency in 2016. Huckabee says he’s been encouraged to run by top evangelical and financial figures that did not back him in 2008.”
Huckabee’s social conservatism with a smile, his blue-collar appeal and his background as a minister—not to mention running a state for a decade—give him a singular appeal. Indeed, he is brandishing polling that shows him leading in Iowa and South Carolina.
But Huckabee noticed that all the chatter is about Chris Christie and Rand Paul and Jeb Bush and Scott Walker and others, and wants to keep his name in the mix to preserve his options.
Does his Fox platform help keep him in the public eye? Of course. The same was true of Gingrich and Santorum, and Sarah Palin when she pondered a run.
But if he can’t raise many millions of dollars, he will run out of gas after the early contests, as he did against John McCain.
Huckabee is a guy who doesn’t have to be president, and he was reluctant to give up his Fox salary as he weighed the race in 2011.
As he told me then, “I’m not a megalomaniac. I don’t think I’m the only person who can save America. I wouldn’t vote for someone who was that full of themselves. It’s a dangerous thing to have someone in a public office who believes he is not a public servant, he is the messiah.”
For now, Huckabee is candid in saying that yakking in front of a microphone is far easier than actually governing. And that viewers aren’t the same as voters.
“A lot of people like Jay Leno,” he says. “I don’t see a Leno-for-president campaign going on.”
An Iowa Poll Now?
An absurdly early Des Moines Register poll out yesterday backs up Huckabee’s point.
Paul Ryan (now under fire on the right for the bipartisan budget deal he brokered with Patty Murray) has a 73 percent approval rating among Iowa Republicans, the survey says. Huckabee in second with 66 percent. Chris Christie, less well matched to the state’s conservative GOP electorate, is at 51 percent.
Oh, and Hillary Clinton? She clocks in among Iowa Democrats at 89 percent.
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Howard Kurtz is a Fox News analyst and the host of "MediaBuzz" (Sundays 11 a.m. and 5 p.m. ET). He is the author of five books and is based in Washington. Follow him at @HowardKurtz. | – Read it into what you will, 2016 prognosticators: Mike Huckabee appears to be launching a news website called the "Huckabee Post," reports Mashable. The development actually surfaced a few days ago when Mediaite spotted this Craigslist ad seeking reporters for “a new and exciting online news publication covering news on politics, US, international, media, sports and other general news.” What's more, Huckabee has given a slew of interviews to big-name media outlets of late to say he's at least considering a run. “I didn’t want any misinformation that I’ve told people I’m running—that’s not the case,” Huckabee tells Howard Kurtz at Fox News. “I wanted to be honest and say, sure I’m looking at it.” Besides, it may be December 2013, but that hasn't stopped the Des Moines Register from publishing a poll of Iowa voters this week, and Huckabee finished second (66%) in favorability ratings to Paul Ryan (73%). For the record, Hillary Clinton trumped them both with her 89% rating among state Democrats. Joe Biden trailed her at 71%. |
"Giving permission to shoot a strongly protected animal without a clear potential threat is a criminal offence,” Chris Heinrich, a WWF board member said in a statement which explained why they decided to file charges against the head of a public order office in Brandenburg.
“After more than 250 years a wild bison had been spotted again in Germany and all the authorities could think to do is shoot it.”
A man had spotted the European bison next to the river Oder near the town of Lebus on Wednesday and alerted the authorities, according to police.
The head of the local public order office decided that the bison needed to be killed in order to protect the population and instructed two local hunters to kill the beast on Thursday.
According to Polish authorities, the animal was probably a bull which had been running around the Ujście Warty National Park on the German-Polish border for some time before wandering into the Bundesrepublik.
The European bison is Europe’s largest land mammal and has not been seen in the wild in Germany for over 250 years. They are considered “vulnerable” by conservation bodies internationally and are on the list of Germany’s “strongly protected animals”.
The bison are not known to be dangerous, Brandenburg's Environment Minister Jörg Vogelsänger told Der Tagesspiegel. If they were, then “half of Poland, where the animal is a national symbol, would have to be declared a danger zone,” as they roam freely there, he said.
A spokesperson for the Environment Ministry also suggested that a tranquiliser dart could have been used to neutralise any danger to nearby citizens, which could have been provided by any country vet.
Heinrich blamed a “lack of professionally trained staff in the area”. he added that "the state of Brandenburg has proven itself to be less than professional in its treatment of wild animals in the past, as shown by how it deals with wolves and elk." ||||| A video showing a rare confrontation between a pack of wolves and a heard of bison has been released by Poland’s forest service.
Shot by a fixed camera in the snow-covered Bialowieza forest, which straddles the Polish-Belarusian border, the night-time footage first shows startled bison fleeing as wolves break from the cover of the trees to launch an attack.
Then, perhaps remembering they are Europe’s largest land animal, the bison stand their ground before mounting a slow charge that sends the wolves scurrying back into the safety of the forest.
Weighing up to 2,200lb, an adult European bison has no natural predator so it is probable the wolves were hoping to isolate and kill a calf. A couple of calves appear in the video, protected a by a phalanx of adults.
Both bison and wolves have enjoyed a renaissance in Europe in recent decades after years of suffering at the hands of hunters.
Bison were hunted to the edge to extinction in Europe in the early 20th Century with the last wild bison shot in Poland in 1921, leaving only 50 in zoos scattered across the continent.
Since the end of the Second World War successful conservation programmes, especially in Poland, have led to bison numbers growing to over 4,600 worldwide.
They have also been slowly re-introduced to the wild, with Poland now boasting 1,212 free-ranging animals.
Anti-hunting laws have led to a surge in wolf numbers across Europe and wolves returning to countries, such as Germany, where they once eradicated.
Estimates of wolf numbers in Poland now range from 800-900. ||||| Hello Poland, where the European bison has been brought back from the brink of extinction after the last one in the wild was shot in 1919 in the Bialowieza Forest. This remnant of Europe's primeval forest is now a refuge for bison, bears, wolves and lynx, as well as countless other species, but can nature thrive without our help?
Somewhere in the depths of Poland’s Bialowieza Forest I have taken the wrong path. I thought I was retracing my footsteps to a road, but it suddenly dawns on me that this stretch of trees, underbrush and wild flowers doesn’t look at all familiar.
With a sudden surge of panic I cast around for a recognizable landmark. All I see are huge oaks, elegant beeches, crumbling, moss-enveloped stumps and patches of long grass. A sudden gust of wind stirs the branches and a few leaves drift slowly down to earth. A magpie lets out a mocking chuckle, then silence settles. I fight the urge to go rushing off blindly and try to think where I could have gone astray. After a moment spent composing myself, I decide on a route back through the trees, finally arriving at a wider path after ten minutes.
This seems more hopeful and soon the distant sound of a fast-moving car tells me the road must be somewhere near. Speeding up in anticipation, I don’t notice the three men until I have almost bumped into them. Silently they emerge from a copse of birch trees and one of them raises a hand for me to stop. From their camouflaged jackets and caps – not to mention their holsters and ammunition pouches – I presume they must be border guards.
Here, on the northeastern edge of Poland, we are just a few kilometers from the boundary fence with Belarus and it is not unknown for people to try to slip into the European Union through Bialowieza. The four-hour drive from Warsaw has taken me through villages where head-scarved women herd cows along the main road, where freshly picked mushrooms are sold in lay-bys and where village elders sit on benches watching lorries clatter past on their way to all parts east and west.
Good luck. They hide well.
But that is not at the forefront of my mind as I give an apologetic smile and try out my best Londoner’s Polish. “Dzien dobry. Szukam droga Bialowieza? (Hello. Which way is Bialowieza?)” The leader inclines his head and replies in English: “Over there. Left on the road.” He looks me up and down. “English?” I nod. “Birdwatching?” I shake my head: “I’m hoping to see Zubr (bison).” He nods: “Good luck. They hide well.”
He is right, but the task is made easier if you enlist the help of an expert. The next day I return to the forest, this time in the company of Tomasz Kaminski, a biologist at Poland’s Mammal Research Institute. Guided by Tomasz’s compass, map and seemingly limitless forest knowledge, we move further and further into the thick trees and undergrowth of this long-standing national park in search of survivors of an age when giant mammals roamed the continent. Tomasz, an expert in bison behavior, is weighed down by a heavy-looking, hand-held aerial that is receiving signals from one of a few individuals that has been fitted with a radio collar. Thanks to this we are gradually homing in on our quarry.
As we push on, Tomasz describes his job. “I spend a lot of time gathering data about the bison – so I’m out in the forest most days. They’re the largest terrestrial animals in Europe and they’re absolutely fascinating creatures, especially as – even somewhere like this – they’re living in a place that’s heavily influenced by people and is a mixture of forest and farmland.”
Suddenly, he stops. “Bison… Bison,” he whispers, pointing towards a stand of sun-dappled beech and maple trees. Even through binoculars I cannot see anything but foliage, tree trunks and shadows. Then something moves. One of the shadows has a tail. A group of five or six bison is grazing among the trees. Despite their massive size, standing at least two meters at the shoulder, measuring around three meters long and weighing around 800kg, they are almost silent and their dusty grey flanks provide near-perfect camouflage among the trunks.
Every time I see them I’m amazed
We watch in rapt silence for more than ten minutes as the bison gradually move down a gentle slope, before slowly disappearing once again into the forest.” Every time I see them I’m amazed,” says Tomasz reverently. “They were saved from extinction and now they live in freedom in a large European country like Poland. It just shows how flexible they are as a species.”
There are now around 800 bison in the forests here, around 480 on the Polish side of the border and more than 300 on the Belarusian. Things could have been very different, though. The bison came within a whisker of extinction in eastern Europe in the 20th century. Bialowieza was once a royal hunting ground – its name harks back to the ‘white tower’ of a local hunting lodge – and it was a popular venue for the kings of Poland and, later, the Russian tsars.
Those crowned heads viewed the bison as a most desirable quarry and that somewhat dubious honor ensured the species survived for centuries – albeit at a cost that today seems a high one. An aged, grey obelisk on the outskirts of the forest provides a reminder of those times. In swirling, ornate script it records the day in 1752 when a hunt led by King Augustus III of Poland accounted for 42 bison (including six calves), 13 elk and two roe deer.
Tsar Nicholas II was another who enjoyed the thrill of the chase here. He had tracks created that would allow him to speed unheard through the forest aboard a troika, letting him take up a position from which to bring down the unsuspecting wildlife. World War I, however, not only proved fatal for the tsar, it was disastrous for the bison of Bialowieza – which were hunted to extinction by hungry soldiers and civilians alike.
Descended from just seven ancestors
By the early 1920s there were just 54 European bison left in the world. A select few from European zoos were introduced into the national park and their descendants have been here ever since, even managing to survive throughout World War II. But there is an enduring issue that is hard to overcome – a shallow gene pool. The bison here are descended from just seven ancestors.
Returning from my modern version of a hunt, I find out more about the realities of reintroduction from naturalist Dr Krzysztof Niedzialkowski, whom I meet at the quiet, modern headquarters of the Mammal Research Institute in Bialowieza village. “That low genetic diversity could have a negative effect,” he says, “so we have to monitor the situation regularly and try to diversify the population as much as we can.”
One way of doing that may be by expanding the bisons’ range so that, instead of one big population, there are a number of separate groups. Such a move helps guard against disease, an outbreak of which could be disastrous among such a genetically similar population. “In winter, the bison are fed with hay at various places in the forest – it’s a tradition that dates back around 300 years,” says Krzysztof. “It helps ensure the animals eat well in winter, but we end up with large concentrations of bison that provide potential for the spread of parasites and disease. It can also contribute to more aggressive behavior.”
As many as 50 animals are shot each year
And there is another controversial issue associated with feeding the animals in winter. It makes survival easier and that can lead to an excess of numbers. Rare as the European bison is, the park authorities feel they have to enforce a cull – and that means as many as 50 animals are shot each year, a practice that is strongly questioned by many, outside the park authorities. After all, it is an animal more rare than the black rhino. Those carcasses are then used for meat and fur, but, argue some ecologists, the forest ecosystem would benefit if nature was allowed to take its course, not only in selecting which animals should die, but also in leaving their bodies to sustain other species – foxes, wolves and others – especially during the winter months.
To gain some more insights on the issue I talk to Staffan Widstrand, award-winning photographer and a founder and managing director of the mass communication initiative, Wild Wonders of Europe. Staffan is focusing increasingly on re-wilding initiatives and how these can be successfully achieved. “As human beings we’re obsessed with the management of nature; thinking that if we don’t manage it things will go terribly wrong. But we should be treating nature more like an adult, not like a sick child.”
“For an example, you need only look at the exclusion zone around the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine and Belarus. There are an amazing number of large herbivores there now; nature seems to be doing quite OK on its own without any management from people.”
And Chernobyl is not the only place in the region where human tragedy has brought an unexpected benefit for nature. Some 470km south of Bialowieza, on the border with Ukraine and Slovakia, Poland’s Bieszczady National Park owes its origins to the forced resettlement of many of its ethnic Ruthenian inhabitants by the Soviet authorities in the years immediately after World War II. In 1973 the area was officially designated a national park and today measures around 30,000 ha, with a further 30,000 ha of managed forest on its borders.
“It’s pretty much the only place in Europe with the full range of species – if you exclude the two that are extinct – the aurochs [wild cattle] and the tarpan [wild horse],” says Staffan. “The wildlife is incredible: wolf, lynx, bear, bison, moose, red deer and roe deer all live there.”
Legal hunting and poaching is a problem
For all its diversity, though, the current situation at Bieszczady also raises some issues regarding the wider possibility of rewilding in Europe. The park borders on to national parks in Ukraine and Slovakia and in both of these legal hunting and poaching is a problem. On the Polish side – as at Bialowieza – there is also officially sanctioned hunting to limit populations of herbivores. Staffan says: “What typically happens is that in winter the animals move down from the higher altitude national park area to the managed forests where it isn’t as cold. Then they run a high risk of being shot as part of a policy to keep down numbers.”
For ecologists such as Staffan such a philosophy seems ill-founded at best. “Forestry managers at Bieszczady say they have the ‘optimum’ number of animals in their forests. They’ve decided that’s four deer per hectare – if there are more than that they start eating the young trees and if there are more than 10 they start eating bark – which can kill fully-grown trees. But perhaps their ecological role is exactly that – to kill trees and to create a more open, less wooded landscape.
“It’s part of a wider problem in Europe generally. Many national parks are managed by state forestry companies so many of the people involved have a forestry background. To them, protecting a forest means protecting trees. For an ecologist a forest is an eco-system that includes animals and dead trees. If the animals bring down trees ultimately to create a mosaic of woodland and grassland then that’s fine.”
The bison, for example, though now associated with dense forest, has only been forced into such areas to escape the activities of mankind. Says Staffan: “These animals are serious grass eaters and there is not much of that within an old-growth forest, so they go out into neighboring farmland in search of it and that doesn’t make the farmers very happy.”
The challenge is to find such places in Europe
In a bid to avoid such issues, the national park authorities at Bialowieza have considered corridors of habitat complete with feeding stations that lure the bison to alternative areas of forest. But in the end, the only real solution may be to create large, open, wild grassland areas in which large herbivores can live in extensive social herds. The challenge is where to find such places in Europe. Bialowieza ecologist Krzysztof Niedzialkowski says: ‘“Bison aren’t always seen positively by neighboring communities and occasionally there are problems. We have had cases of individual animals moving into inhabited areas and becoming more and more accustomed to people.”
One bison, he adds, began approaching cows in farmers’ fields and was responsible for some minor attacks. Ultimately, the animal had to be shot. Environmentalists such as Krzysztof would like to see the area of Bialowieza national park increased, to allow for more wildlife-friendly management and boost the area’s tourism potential. Such ideas, however, may not be well received by local communities who believe their access to the forest might be reduced and forestry jobs may be lost.
Both Polish and Belarusian forests are part of the same Unesco World Heritage site and the long-term hope is that a larger, zoned park could be created with separate areas primarily dedicated to wildlife, commercial forestry and recreation. That still leaves one problem, however. Currently, the border fence that divides Poland – not to mention the rest of the EU – from Belarus runs straight through the forest, splitting it in two and separating two populations of bison that, combined, would have more genetic diversity. That fence is unlikely to come down any time soon.
For now, the way to enter Belarus – provided your paperwork is in order – is via a pedestrian crossing manned by serious-looking soldiers with red stars on their berets. A few hundred meters away from the gate there is little to suggest I have changed countries or political systems. The forest is every bit as impressive as on the other side of the border; huge fungi sprout from fallen tree trunks and ferns grow in abundance around pools colored an almost psychedelic green by algae and moss. During World War II, this area became a base for Polish and Soviet partisans, who would attack German army supply lines and then disappear among the trees. A merciless war was fought here and occasional memorials to its victims provide a reminder that the area was not always as tranquil as it is today.
Bialowieza is popular with bird watchers
Entering a clearing I disturb a family of wild boar, the adults a surprising shade of black, the piglets a lighter, dappled brown. With a remarkable turn of speed they are gone almost before I have time to register their presence. Overlooking the scene is a tall wooden tower that offers a useful vantage point. In this perch it is easy to see why Bialowieza is so popular with bird watchers. A group of goldfinches, with yellow flashes on their wings and bright red faces, chatter noisily in a nearby ash tree; pink and black long-tailed tits bob through the lower branches and a duo of buzzards circle away to the west.
Up here it is hard to imagine that the vast majority of the forest has been actively managed for at least 100 years. But there is an exception to this rule. One strictly protected area on the Polish side, though, measuring 4,747 hectares, has remained virtually untouched throughout the centuries. This fragment is perhaps all that remains of the primeval lowland forest that once covered vast tracts of Europe. It has an ecosystem to match, with wolves, red deer, lynx, elk and beaver all present – as well as numerous smaller creatures.
Back in Poland some hours later, and comfortably positioned in the restaurant of the modern Hotel Bialowieski, I meet Mateusz Szymura, a national park ranger. As we each demolish a steaming bowl of solyanka – a traditional soup made with salted ham, sausage, cabbage and carrots and garnished with sour cream and dill – he explains more about this primeval survivor. “The forest has existed here for 10,000 years – since the last Ice Age,” he says. “Then, in the medieval period, when many areas were being cleared for farming – this place became a royal hunting ground. The bison was declared a species that only kings could hunt. In those days, the kings of Poland also controlled Lithuania and this area was a good stopping off point between their courts in Krakow and Vilnius.”
After a second course of pierogi (small dumplings stuffed with minced pork) and a Zubr beer – its green, white and gold label adorned by the image of a bison – we take a hike from the village, past meadows that are rapidly transforming into birch woods, towards the immense trees that mark the tract of truly ancient forest. Inside, it is easy to imagine the age of some of the trees by the sheer size of their trunks, while the thick canopy brings with it a crepuscular shade and thick, moss-cloaked branches, slowly rotting, sprawl across the ground. “People are often surprised by how untidy the forest looks,” says Mateusz, “but a fallen tree is home to perhaps 1,000 species. When it was living that same tree housed maybe 100. So you shouldn’t really call it dead wood, it’s still living.”
The forest is far from impenetrable
Full of life and darkly mysterious it may be, but the forest is far from impenetrable. The ground cover is nowhere near as thick as I expected – and for obvious reasons: deer and wild boar eat seedlings and shrubs, and the spreading leaves of those giant trees cuts off sunlight from reaching the ground. The only time the canopy is breached is when one of the giants falls. And therein lies a subject for discussion, adds Mateusz. The strictly protected area where we are standing forms but a tiny fragment of the larger national park that lies within an overall tract of forest covering 150,000 hectares – 62,500 in Poland, 87,500 in Belarus. Commercial foresters often have a different understanding of what constitutes good practice than national park wardens.
This debate has in recent years surfaced in the shape of what to do with a creature called the bark beetle, Dendroctonus micans, which, while it may look insignificant, can over time bring down a 50m-high spruce tree. Conventional forestry wisdom involves either felling infected trees and quarantining areas of forest or introducing a predatory beetle called Rhizophagus grandis to provide a biological solution to the problem. If you are preserving a forest as a primeval relic untouched by humanity, however, you cannot offer up solutions that involve chainsaws and alien species. “The bark beetles are part of the natural process,” says Mateusz. “Yes, they will kill some trees, but they won’t kill them all – that’s not in their interest. Also – and very importantly – when an old tree falls, it opens up a big gap where young trees can flourish – ultimately helping the forest regenerate. The beetles are part of nature – there’s no such thing as a pest here.”
The afternoon sun is painting the foliage a mellow, golden hue and all is quiet in the forest, the silence broken only by the sound of faintly rustling branches. Suddenly, not very far away, a red deer begins to roar out a challenge – a deep, throaty growl that sounds as if it could belong to some sort of fierce primeval creature.
I am glad my friend knows these paths and trees so well – it might not be a good idea to lose your way.
Sharing is caring | – Conservationists are expressing outrage after an official in Germany ordered hunters to shoot the first wild bison seen in the country in more than two centuries. Calling the killing a criminal offense, the World Wildlife Fund says it will file charges against the official who gave the order, the Local reports. “After more than 250 years a wild bison had been spotted again in Germany and all the authorities could think to do is shoot it," says Chris Heinrich, a WWF board member. The bison was seen by the river Oder near the eastern town of Lebus on Wednesday. Thinking the beast was a threat to public safety, a local official sent a pair of hunters to take care of it. It was unclear if any of them knew the European bison is classed as a "vulnerable" species and on Germany’s list of "strongly protected animals." The victim was likely a bull that had wandered across the border from Poland from its home in a national park. While they may be the continent's largest land mammals, weighing up to 2,200 pounds, the bison are not considered dangerous. If they were, says the local environmental minister, then "half of Poland, where the animal is a national symbol, would have to be declared a danger zone." Hunted to near extinction in Europe in the early 20th century, the bison are making a comeback thanks to conservationists, with more than 1,200 now roaming around Poland, per the Telegraph, which published a video showing bison fleeing, then standing up to, a pack of wolves. (The US bison is the country's first national mammal.) |
[+] Enlarge Frederick Breedon/Getty Images Brek Shea and the U.S. took a one-goal lead into stoppage time. But El Salvador equalized to end the match at 3-3, eliminating the Americans from Olympic qualifying.
Despite being a heavy favorite to emerge from the CONCACAF qualifying tournament with a ticket to the 2012 Olympics in London this summer in hand, the U.S. Under-23 national team was eliminated in a 3-3 tie to El Salvador Monday night.
Needing a win to advance from Group A after suffering a 2-0 upset to Canada on Saturday, the U.S. went ahead before a minute was up, surrendered its lead, went behind, equalized, went ahead again and allowed the game-tying goal in the very last minute of extra time.
A first-minute goal got the U.S. off to a flying start. Brek Shea broke through on the left and sent a cross into Terrence Boyd, who volleyed the ball into the net from close range.
But the Americans had trouble establishing their usual possession-dominating rhythm in the first half, discovering quickly that they were facing the strongest opponent in the tournament thus far. El Salvador competed for the ball and clogged the spaces well. This forced the U.S. to lump long balls to Shea and Boyd. And although Boyd did his best to be a handful in the box -- winning the ball in the 11th and putting himself through on goal before giving up possession -- this tactic was largely ineffective.
Crucially, keeper Bill Hamid tweaked his left ankle in the 31st minute. Within six minutes, El Salvador would twice punish his refusal to come off, or coach Caleb Porter's failure to substitute him. Undoubtedly, this will be picked apart in the coming weeks. In the 35th minute, Hamid failed to impose himself, or even move, on a corner to his near post. Lester Blanco rose over Kofi Sarkodi and headed in to equalize. In the 37th, Perry Kitchen and Jorge Villafana stood and watched as a low, straightforward cross into the box rolled toward the post, where Andres Flores beat the stumbling Hamid to the ball and slipped it underneath him and into the net. Shell-shocked and panicked, the U.S. barreled forward for the remainder of the half but produced little of consequence.
In the second half, El Salvador set about running down the clock, nibbling away the minutes with a series of time-wasting tactics. Mostly, El Salvador frustrated the U.S. by inviting the Americans into its own half before crashing the spaces and clearing the ball to send its opponent back to square one. Throughout the game, the U.S.'s midfield trio failed to secure enough of the ball to settle into a rhythm and provide service to the forwards. All the U.S. could muster, then, for 20 minutes, was a dangerous shot by Freddy Adu.
In the 64th minute, a flagging El Salvadoran defense slipped up. Boyd brought down a long punt from Sean Johnson (who had replaced the injured Hamid), whereupon Adu slipped Boyd a ball through the back line. Boyd finished cleanly, making it 2-2. Four minutes later, Joe Corona, anonymous throughout the game, found himself on the end of a rare dangerous cross from Adu at the second post and was allowed to head in the liberating goal. With the deficit overturned, the U.S. was seemingly on its way to the decisive semifinal game.
It had now fallen to the U.S. to ride out the game. But it fell into the same trap as El Salvador had. The Americans allowed themselves to be put under pressure and cede the initiative to their irked opponents, who grew increasingly aggressive. The Yanks appeared to be getting away with it, too. But in the fourth and final minute of extra time, Amobi Okugo lost track of playmaker Jaime Alas, who ran through the center of the U.S.'s defense and hit a bouncing shot that skipped awkwardly. Johnson punched the ball skyward, only to see it skip into the U.S. goal.
The U.S. had been unable to stamp its authority on a second consecutive game, allowing El Salvador entry points into the game time and again by failing to maintain possession. Brimming with talent, this U.S. team's failure to qualify for the Summer Games will be remembered as both a stain on a federation that failed to send a U-20 team to the 2011 World Cup and a blight on the resume of coaching prodigy Porter.
But given its performances, it's hard to argue that the U.S. deserved much better. Here are our player grades (10=best)
GK -- Bill Hamid, 3: Was convincing in the early going but should have indicated that he was in no condition to proceed after taking a knock in the 30th minute. El Salvador's first two goals could have been avoided by prompter interventions from Hamid (or the coach) before he came off in the 39th minute.
D -- Kofi Sarkodie, 4.5: Simply beaten in the air on the 1-1, Sarkodie was once again better going forward than he was defensively.
D -- Ike Opara, 4: Looked sharper than he had against Canada, but he failed to step out on Alas on the dooming 3-3.
D -- Perry Kitchen, 4: Kitchen was steady enough throughout the game, but he should have been more alert as the eventual 2-1 rolled past him.
D -- Jorge Villafana, 4.5: Impressive early on, Villafana just let Flores run by him undisturbed to make it 2-1.
M -- Amobi Okugo, 5.5: A seventh-minute yellow card took the sting out of his game but he nevertheless had a strong night plugging holes and shielding the defense. And then he let Alas run away from him to score the 3-3.
M -- Mix Diskerud, 5: Not a banner night for him, but not his worst either. He tried his best to distribute but was sometimes sloppy and didn't find enough of the ball to go around.
M -- Joe Corona, 4.5: Scored the goal that should have sent the U.S. through but was otherwise invisible. Like he had against Canada, Corona appeared completely lost.
F -- Freddy Adu, 7: Played out on the right again, a position where he never looked comfortable, Adu was most effective on set pieces and when he drifted inside. His two assists were incisive, however, and should have made the difference.
F -- Terrence Boyd, 7: Active and mobile, Boyd replaced Agudelo capably by providing a good target and getting teammates involved. He converted two of four big chances and should have been the hero of the night.
F -- Brek Shea, 6: Did good work disturbing the back line and picked up an assist. But his crossing often let him down.
Subs:
GK -- Sean Johnson, 4.5: Confidently stepped in for Hamid in the 39th minute and made a handful of crucial saves. But that bouncing shot that sent the U.S. crashing out may haunt him for years, as he probably should have dealt with it.
M -- Michael Stephens, Incomplete: An 88th minute substitute for Corona, Stephens had little impact.
F -- Joe Gyau, Incomplete: A 93rd minute time-wasting substitution.
Leander Schaerlaeckens is a soccer writer for ESPN.com. He can be reached at leander.espn@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @LeanderESPN. ||||| The Americans had only a handful of seconds left to run out the clock and advance a step closer to the Olympics. With the pressure building with each tick, the victory slipped right through their hands.
El Salvador's Lester Blanco (17) celebrates with Andres Flores (20) after Blanco scored a goal against the United States in the first half of a CONCACAF Olympic qualifying soccer match on Monday, March... (Associated Press)
El Salvador's Lester Blanco (17) slides on the grass to his teammates after scoring a goal against the United States in the first half of a CONCACAF Olympic qualifying soccer match on Monday, March 26,... (Associated Press)
El Salvador's Richard Menjivar (16) chases down the ball with United State's Mix Diskerud (8) in the first half of a CONCACAF Olympic qualifying soccer match on Monday, March 26, 2012, in Nashville, Tenn.... (Associated Press)
El Salvador's Jaime Alas (10) falls as he chases the ball with United States' Freddy Adu (7) nd Kofi Sarkodie, right, in the first half of a CONCACAF Olympic qualifying soccer match on Monday, March 26,... (Associated Press)
The United States, known for producing top goalkeepers such as Brad Friedel, Kasey Keller and Tim Howard, found itself done in Monday night when substitute Sean Johnson couldn't handle a long shot from Jaime Alas of El Salvador in stoppage time.
The ball bounced off his hands, up over him and into the net, and El Salvador ousted the United States from Olympic qualifying with a 3-3 tie.
The stunned Americans missed the Olympics for the second time since 1976 and second time in three games.
"This is probably the worst feeling I've ever felt in my life so far as a pro athlete," U.S. captain Freddy Adu said. "This is going to be hard to get over. But at the end of the day things like this happen. For me, I never want to feel this way again, and I'm going to do whatever it takes to never feel this way again."
The Americans had to win to reach Saturday's semifinals in Kansas City, Kan., and they led 3-2 on Joe Corona's goal in the 68th minute. Officials added 4 minutes of stoppage time onto the game, and U.S. coach Caleb Porter said they were "seconds away" from closing out the win and taking the top spot in Group A. A television clock showed the ball going in 4 minutes, 14 seconds into stoppage time.
What happened is something U.S. midfielder Mix Diskerud said no one wants to experience in life, something he couldn't believe.
"The last 20 minutes after our third goal, all those minutes felt like very, very long hours. But I thought we were going to make it. Everybody thought we were going to make it.," Diskerud said.
"One shot."
Several Americans dropped to the field in exhaustion and disbelief after Alas' score, and Porter had to rally them back to their feet for one last gasp chance that didn't materialize. Porter said he hugged Johnson after the game. The 6-foot-4 keeper did not speak with reporters.
"He feels like he's let everybody down, let his teammates down, and I told him he didn't," Porter said.
El Salvador reached the semifinals, putting it a win away from its first Olympic berth since 1968. Canada, which tied Cuba 1-1 earlier, finished second. Lester Blanco and Andres Flores also scored for El Salvador, a team coach Mauricio Alfaro pointed out had less than two weeks to prepare for this tournament and didn't have the whole roster together until late.
"It was just incredible," Alfaro said of the win, speaking through an interpreter.
But Alfaro also said he had told his players to shoot more in the second half to try to pressure Johnson and the El Salvador coach said he did feel Johnson made a mistake on Alas' kick.
"The shot didn't have much power," Alfaro said.
Terrence Boyd scored twice for the U.S., and Johnson replaced keeper Bill Hamid in the 39th minute.
After a 2-0 loss to Canada in the second of this three-game, round-robin tournament, the Americans needed to win to advance.
So did El Salvador, and the crowd of 7,889 was about evenly split between the countries keeping the U.S. from a true home-field advantage at LP Field, home of the NFL's Tennessee Titans. El Salvador survived a physical game with plenty of yellow cards on each side.
Boyd went to the sideline with blood on the front of his shirt late in the game. Diskerud said both he and Adu were bitten and showed reporters marks as proof.
"Part of the game, I guess," Diskerud said.
The U.S. had a little bit of time left to try and go ahead but couldn't get anything going before the game ended. The result leaves the Americans adding 2012 to 2004 and 1976 as years they failed to qualify for the Olympics, missing out on a 15th appearance overall.
Boyd got his first start in this round-robin tournament with Juan Agudelo recovering from surgery in New York to fix torn cartilage in his left knee, and Boyd gave the Americans the scoring boost they missed against Canada on Saturday night. The Americans attacked from the start, Boyd scored 61 seconds into the game. Brek Shea dribbled out of three defenders and sent a cross over to Boyd who scored off a left-footed volley.
And Boyd nearly scored twice more. His header went over the crossbar in the 10th minute, and he had a breakaway chance in the 11th only to see keeper Yimy Cuellar come out to break up the play.
Hamid rolled covering up a ball and appeared to hurt his ankle midway through the first half.
El Salvador took advantage by scoring two goals in two minutes to grab the lead and the momentum. Blanco scored on a header off a corner kick over Hamid's hands in the 35th minute, and Flores beat Hamid in the 37th minute off what had been a weak shot by Alas that turned into a cross. Porter pulled Hamid in the 39th minute, putting in 6-4 Johnson for his first appearance in the tournament.
Boyd tied it up with his second goal off a pass from Adu in the 65th minute. Corona, whose mother is a native of El Salvador, scored off a header just inside the left post off a pass from Adu.
Johnson smothered one strong kick from Isidro Gutierrez, but couldn't stop the ball when it mattered at the end. | – The US won't be competing in men's soccer at the Olympics, thanks to a heartbreaking goal that came literally at the last minute. El Salvador battled the US to a 3-3 draw last night, the AP reports; the US, which had been heavily favored to win its group in CONCACAF qualifying, needed a win after being upset by Canada 2-0. It was a back-and-forth affair, with the US scoring in the first minute, then falling behind, and finally coming back to lead 3-2. But in stoppage time El Salvador's Jaime Alas bounced a ball off the hands of substitute keeper Sean Johnson and into the net. Starting keeper Bill Hamid had been injured in the 31st minute, but, in a move ESPN suspects will be much-criticized, he wasn't pulled out immediately. El Salvador scored two goals against him in six minutes.“This is probably the worst feeling I've ever felt in my life,” says captain Freddy Adu. “This is going to be hard to get over.” |
Halle to Gabriel You're Trying to Make Our Daughter White!
Halle Berry to Gabriel Aubry -- You're Trying to Make Our Kid White!
EXCLUSIVE
just tookto court ... claiming he's trying to make their 6-year-old daughter white.Halle was furious Gabriel was straightening Nahla's naturally-curly hair, lightening it with highlights and she is convinced it's because he does not want the girl to appear to be African American.Halle didn't show in court Monday morning, but her lawyer Steve Kolodny did, along with Gabriel and after a lot of arguing the judge ruled NEITHER Halle nor Gabriel could change Nahla's look from its natural state.So the judge is allowing Nahla's hair to grow back naturally.Score one for Berry. ||||| A lot of mothers don't want just anyone touching their kids' hair. And when it comes to Halle Berry, that includes her kid's father.
Attorneys for the Oscar winner and her ex, model Gabriel Aubry, were in court Monday morning to settle a disagreement over their 6-year-old daughter Nahla's hair, E! News confirms.
Apparently Berry objected to Aubry to having the child's hair straightened and highlighted when she's in his care, charging that the French-Canadian model, who is white, was trying to make Nahla appear less African-American. (Berry herself is the daughter of a white mother and a black father.) ||||| Halle Berry has reportedly made a move aimed at decreasing her child-support payments to ex-boyfriend Gabriel Aubry, the father of her daughter Nahla, and motivating him to get a job.
The "X-Men: Days of Future Past" actress is claiming that her ex has been living entirely off her $16,000-a-month child-support payments and has asked a judge to reduce her obligation to just over $3,000 a month, according to TMZ, which cited confidential court documents.
The Oscar winner is alleging that the French model has stopped working, despite being capable of getting a job, and is abusing the system by living off the payments meant to support their 6-year-old daughter. The parents have joint custody.
Aubry, 39, and Berry, 48, dated for two years before Nahla was born in 2008. They broke up in 2010 and have been embroiled in a custody dispute since then. In 2012, a judge blocked Berry from moving Nahla to France with her and Olivier Martinez, who would become her third husband in July 2013. (Berry and Martinez welcomed their first child together, son Maceo, in October 2013.)
The former couple reached a settlement in May that outlined the nearly $200,000 a year the "Extant" star would pay in child support, in addition to paying for Nahla's tuition until she turns 19 or graduates from high school. She and Aubry must split her healthcare expenses.
Photos The extreme things celebrities do to be good parents: the good, the bad and the ugly. By Nardine Saad, Los Angeles Times
Berry's attorneys did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
I'd consider sitting pretty for $16,000 a month. Follow me on Twitter @NardineSaad. ||||| Their 6-year-old's hair is the latest point of contention in Halle Berry and Gabriel Aubry's contentious shared custody arrangement.
The Oscar-winning actress took ex-boyfriend Aubry, the father of her daughter Nahla, back to court Monday because he allegedly had the child's hair straightened and colored, TMZ and E! News reported.
Though Berry didn't appear in court, her attorney accused the French-Canadian model of straightening Nahla's curly mane and lightening it with highlights in an attempt to make her appear less African American, the reports said.
The "X-Men: Days of Future Past" star, now married to French actor Olivier Martinez, had lawyer Steve Kolodny appear in court to argue her case, TMZ said, and a judge decided that neither parent could alter Nahla's hair color or texture and ruled that her hair be allowed grow back naturally.
Berry, 48, and Aubry, 39, who dated for two years before splitting in 2010, have joint custody of Nahla and have been embroiled in bitter court and physical battles over her care since then. In November 2012, Aubry was arrested after getting into a fistfight with Berry's then-fiance, Martinez, and just last month, Berry reportedly moved to reduce her child-support payments to the unemployed model from $16,000 a month to less than $4,000 to motivate him to get a job.
Halle Berry and Gabriel Aubrey in 2009 Alberto E. Rodriguez / Getty Images Gabriel Aubry and Halle Berry arrive at the 2009 Vanity Fair Oscar Party on Feb. 22, 2009 in West Hollywood. They're no longer a couple but they have a child together, Nahla. Gabriel Aubry and Halle Berry arrive at the 2009 Vanity Fair Oscar Party on Feb. 22, 2009 in West Hollywood. They're no longer a couple but they have a child together, Nahla. (Alberto E. Rodriguez / Getty Images)
Back in 2011, at the height of their custudy dispute, the mixed-race actress told Ebony magazine (via E!) that she wanted her daughter to choose how she's identified but considered Nahla to be black. Aubry is white.
"I think, largely, that will be based on how the world identifies her. That's how I identified myself," Berry said at the time. "But I feel like she's black. I'm black and I'm her mother, and I believe in the one-drop theory."
The actress was referring to the controversial legal and sociological notion of the "one-drop rule," pre-dating the civil rights movement, by which any person with even "one drop" of blood from a black ancestor was deemed to be black.
"If you're of multiple races, you have a different challenge, a unique challenge of embracing all of who you are but still finding a way to identify yourself, and I think that's often hard for us to do," she continued. "I identify as a black woman, but I've always had to embrace my mother and the white side of who I am too.
"By choosing, I've often [wondered], 'Well, would that make her feel like I'm invalidating her by choosing to identify more with the black side of myself?'"
Berry's attorney did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
For more celebrity news, follow me on Twitter @NardineSaad. | – Halle Berry and Gabriel Aubry have long stood as models of how not to treat the person with whom you're co-parenting a child (see: brawl, citizen's arrest, insane child support), but they've taken their bickering over daughter Nahla to a new low: As TMZ reports, Berry hauled Aubry back into court on Monday, and the subject of contention was Nahla's hair, which Berry claims Aubry has been straightening and lightening in an apparent attempt to make the 6-year-old look less African American. (Aubry is white and Berry is biracial, notes E! Online). The judge ruled that neither parent can alter Nahla's hair. Berry identifies both herself and her daughter as black, notes the LA Times, saying in a 2011 interview that "I feel like she's black. I'm black and I'm her mother." Berry last month sought to reduce her child support payments to Aubry, adds the Times; she currently pays $16,000 a month and reportedly wants it cut to less than $4,000 to prompt the unemployed model to get a job. |
Charlotta Turner, professor in Analytical Chemistry, received a text message from her student Firas Jumaah in 2014 telling her to to assume he would not finish his thesis if he had not returned within a week.
He and his family were, he told her, hiding out in a disused bleach factory, with the sounds of gunshots from Isis warriors roaming the town reverberating around them. Jumaah, who is from Iraq, is a member of the ethno-religious group Yazidi hated by Isis.
"I had no hope then at all," Jumaah told Lund's University Magazine LUM . "I was desperate. I just wanted to tell my supervisor what was happening. I had no idea that a professor would be able to do anything for us."
Jumaah had voluntarily entered the war zone after his wife had rung him to say that Isis fighters had taken over the next-door village, killing all the men and taking the women into slavery.
"My wife was totally panicking. Everyone was shocked at how IS were behaving," he said. "I took the first plane there to be with them. What sort of life would I have if anything had happened to them there?"
But Turner was not willing to leave her student to die without trying to do something.
"What was happening was completely unacceptable," she told LUM. "I got so angry that IS was pushing itself into our world, exposing my doctoral student and his family to this, and disrupting the research."
She contacted the university's then security chief Per Gustafson.
"It was almost as if he'd been waiting for this kind of mission," Turner said. "Per Gustafson said that we had a transport and security deal which stretched over the whole world."
Over a few days of intense activity, Gustafson hired a security company which then arranged the rescue operation. A few days later two Landcruisers carrying four heavily-armed mercenaries roared into the area where Jumaah was hiding, and sped him away to Erbil Airport together with his wife and two small children. "I have never felt so privileged, so VIP," Jumaah told LUM. "But at the same time I felt like a coward as I left my mother and sisters behind me."
Firas Jumaah and his former PHD supervisor Charlotta Turner. Photo: Kennet Ruona
Luckily the rest of his family survived Isis occupation, while Jumaah back in Sweden completed his PhD and now works for a pharmaceuticals company in Malmö. The family has almost finished paying the university back for the rescue operation.
"It was a unique event. As far as I know no other university has ever been involved in anything like it," Gustafson said. ||||| Breaking News Emails Get breaking news alerts and special reports. The news and stories that matter, delivered weekday mornings.
By Yuliya Talmazan
On an August day four years ago, Swedish chemistry professor Charlotta Turner received a surprising text message that would change the life of one of her graduate students.
Firas Jumaah had returned to his native Iraq days earlier, fearing for the safety of his wife and two children who had traveled there for a family wedding. He had initially stayed behind to complete his lab work at Lund University in southern Sweden.
While with his family in Iraq, Jumaah sent his supervisor a text message asking her to remove him from the doctoral program if he wasn’t back in Sweden within a week.
Firas Jumaah Charlotta Turner
Surprised by the message, Turner, 48, called Jumaah. It was then that she found out that his family was facing a life-and-death situation.
“He was very sad and crying,” Turner told NBC News. “I could hear that the situation was hopeless and they had to flee.”
Jumaah's family had returned to visit their home country of Iraq before violence began. But while he was there the so-called Islamic State conducted a deadly offensive in northern Iraq.
On Aug. 3, ISIS attacked the city of Sinjar near to where Jumaah’s family was, massacring and enslaving thousands of Yazidis — a religious minority to which Jumaah and his family belong.
“He realized one day that things were getting really serious there,” Turner said. “He was very worried and he just left.”
Jumaah’s plan was to go in and bring his family back to Sweden, but when he arrived, most borders were closed because of a mass exodus of refugees. He also couldn’t go back to the airport. So they waited.
But the situation only grew worse because ISIS kept advancing — and, at one point, came within 12 miles of their house.
Over the phone, Jumaah told Turner that he and his family were preparing to go into hiding in Iraq’s northern mountains. She told him not to give up and started looking for ways to rescue the family.
“It was very spontaneous,” she said. “For me, it was obvious that I should help and bring them home.”
She approached the university’s security chief at the time, who found a company that could go in with armed men and rescue Jumaah and his family. | – Four years ago, a chemistry professor got a text from her grad student: If I'm not back in a week, cut me from the doctoral program. Charlotta Turner called him right away: "He was very sad and crying,” the 48-year-old prof at Lund University in Sweden tells NBC News. "I could hear that the situation was hopeless and they had to flee." The student, Firas Jumaah, was visiting his native Iraq to help family members during a brutal 2014 ISIS attack targeting Yazidis—a religious minority that includes his family. The terror group had just enslaved and massacred Yazidis by the thousand in nearby Sinjar. Now Jumaah and family were planning to flee to the mountains. "I had no hope at all," says Jumaah, per the Local. "I was desperate." But Turner took action. She spoke to Lund University's then-security chief, who contacted a company that sent mercenaries into northern Iraq. Only days later, four armed mercs on two Landcruisers blazed into the place where Jumaah was hiding, and rushed him to Erbil Airport with his wife and two young kids. "I have never felt so privileged, so VIP," he says. "But at the same time I felt like a coward as I left my mother and sisters behind me." Seeing his colleagues back in Sweden, he was speechless: "I just cried," he says. Yet Jumaah finished his PhD and found work at a Malmo pharmaceuticals company, and his family survived. The bill: roughly 60,000 kroner ($6,613), which his family has nearly finished paying. “If they told me to pay 200,000 kronor, I would,” says Jumaah. (The UN is finding fresh ISIS horrors.) |
The developing agreement on the DNA database would be part of a series of pacts that would resolve many of the key outstanding issues in the legislative session this year, including the state’s budget for the next year, new political districts for state legislators and a new pension plan that would reduce retirement benefits for future public employees.
“We have the parameters of a deal,” Assemblyman Joseph R. Lentol, a Democrat from Brooklyn , said of the DNA bill that he is sponsoring.
Negotiations are moving at an unusually brisk pace in the capital, as Mr. Cuomo and lawmakers face two sets of deadlines: a federal court has demanded an update on the Legislature’s redistricting progress by Thursday, and the governor and legislators are required by law to have a new budget in place by April 1.
New York’s DNA database was created in the mid-1990s but applied only to those convicted of a limited number of crimes; the data collection has been expanded three times since then by the Legislature, most recently in 2006. Currently, DNA samples can be collected from people convicted of fewer than half of the crimes codified in state law, including all felonies and some misdemeanors. The measure would expand that to require that a DNA sample be submitted by all convicted criminals.
The Manhattan district attorney, Cyrus R. Vance Jr. , an advocate for expanding the database, wrote in a recent opinion article that taking DNA samples from those convicted of low-level crimes had proved to be effective. He said that since the state allowed prosecutors to collect DNA from individuals convicted of petty larceny, investigators had been able to identify people linked to 48 murders and 220 sexual assaults statewide.
In one case prosecuted by Mr. Vance’s office, DNA from the butt of a cigarette smoked by Lerio Guerrero while he was being questioned for trespassing in Brooklyn last year linked him to a 1998 rape. Mr. Guerrero had been arrested several times in the interim, but none of his convictions were for crimes serious enough to warrant that he give a DNA sample.
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Prosecutors also argue that the database could be used to exonerate the wrongfully convicted by matching DNA in their cases to someone else. But the defense bar has argued that courts sometimes place onerous restrictions on gaining access to evidence after a conviction and has, therefore, urged the Legislature to make it easier for defense lawyers to get evidence and run tests against the database.
“New York has a demonstrated problem with eyewitness misidentification and false confessions leading to wrongful convictions,” said Stephen Saloom, the policy director of the Innocence Project. “Any legislation that ignores the recommendations of those who’ve studied these issues is ignoring the heart of wrongful conviction reform needed in New York State .”
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The Assembly speaker, Sheldon Silver , a Manhattan Democrat, has pushed to allow defendants access to the database. “We need to see fairness in terms of discovery, in terms of a defendant or a, quote-unquote, wrongfully convicted person,” he said.
The Senate majority leader, Dean G. Skelos , a Long Island Republican, said he was not opposed to access provisions, as long as it was “done in a very tight and controlled way.” Senator Skelos did say he was against including broader so-called wrongful conviction protections in the bill, like videotaping interrogations.
Some in the Assembly, led by Hakeem Jeffries of Brooklyn, have been pushing to include as part of the DNA bill a measure that would make it a violation, rather than a crime, to possess very small amounts of marijuana in public view, but it was not clear whether that provision would make it into the final language.
“There’s absolutely no justification for expanding the database and simultaneously including illegitimate misdemeanor marijuana arrest convictions that are racially biased and fatally flawed,” he said.
The discussions over the DNA database are running alongside quickening budget negotiations. As part of his spending plan, the governor is proposing to give newly hired public workers across the state, including in New York City , the choice between a less generous pension plan than is available to current employees or a defined contribution plan, which is similar to a 401(k).
But the senior administration official said the governor was now prepared to drop the 401(k) option, which has been a lightning rod for criticism from labor unions, so long as legislative leaders agreed to his proposal to create a new pension tier that would provide reduced retirement benefits for future workers. ||||| Bennett Barbour was convicted in 1978 of a rape he didn’t commit. At trial, he had an alibi supported by several witnesses. He didn’t match the victim’s description of her attacker. Barbour suffers from a severe bone disease that would have made it nearly impossible for him to be the assailant. Police found no physical evidence connecting him to the crime, beyond the eyewitness identification by his alleged victim. Barbour was handed an 18-year sentence and paroled after nearly five years.
He tells me his time in prison was “a nightmare.” He has cancer now, “all over my body,” and travels regularly to Richmond for treatment. In prison, he says, “everything is taken away. Your pride ...” as his voice trails off. Jonathan Sheldon, a lawyer familiar with his case says, “People think, ‘Oh, he only got five years.’ But in that five years he lost his six-month-old marriage, and scarred his relationship with his daughter. That five years broke him.”
The Commonwealth of Virginia learned that Bennett Barbour was innocent nearly two years ago, when DNA testing cleared him of the crime. Virginia authorities, however, never informed Barbour of his innocence. (State officials claim to have mailed a letter with the test results to Barbour’s last four known addresses, but none of those letters ever reached him.) Barbour learned of the DNA tests that proved his innocence only last month, on Feb. 5, when he received a phone call from Sheldon. “I was with my nephew playing cards, and Mr. Sheldon called my mother’s house looking for me,” says Barbour. “He said the authorities stopped looking for me because they couldn’t find me. But Sheldon found me in two days using the Internet.”
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Actually, that’s not true. It only took Sheldon a few hours.
Dahlia Lithwick Dahlia Lithwick writes about the courts and the law for Slate and hosts the podcast Amicus.
Bennett Barbour is one of the fortunate ones. He, unlike what may ultimately amount to dozens of other men wrongly convicted and incarcerated by the state of Virginia, knows that his innocence can be conclusively proved. His lawyers at the University of Virginia’s Innocence Project filed paperwork last week to have the state formally declare him innocent. The trouble is that Barbour is one of only a handful who have enjoyed this vindication. Years ago, Virginia authorities realized they were likely convicting innocent men. The state’s officials know their criminal justice system is riddled with errors. As they investigated the depth of the problem, they have found that indeed many more men—at least dozens, maybe more—might be exonerated using DNA tests. But the state’s authorities did not move quickly to suspend these sentences or contact the individuals or families involved. They did not publicize their findings. Indeed, they denied Freedom of Information Act requests that would have shed light on the problem. Rather, Virginia state officials appears to have devised a system of notifying current and former convicts that is almost guaranteed to lead to the fewest number of exonerations.
How was it that Bennett Barbour’s DNA came to be tested several decades after the alleged rape? In September 2004, Mark Warner, then Virginia’s governor, ordered a random audit of 31 old criminal cases after a vast trove of biological evidence was discovered lying around in old case files saved by state forensic serologists. The testing of those 31 samples led to the exonerations of two convicted rapists. Warner, embarrassed by the revelations, then ordered in late 2005 that every sample obtained between 1973 and 1988 be rechecked. It amounted to thousands of files.
It was a project intended to take 18 months at a cost of $1.4 million dollars. Now in its seventh year, the cost of the project hovers at $5 million. Nobody has any idea exactly how the Virginia Department of Forensics has conducted its work. Indeed, no one knows much about the specifics of the crime lab’s work at all. According to the Richmond Times Dispatch, the state located approximately 800 biological samples of DNA that could be tested. Of those, only 214 were in sufficient condition to yield accurate results. Among these, more than 70 people—one commonly cited figure is 79—appear to have been excluded as the perpetrators of a crime.
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University of Virginia law school professor Brandon Garrett (who has contributed to Slate) is an expert on wrongful convictions and DNA exoneration. His landmark study, Convicting the Innocent, scrutinized the cases of the first 250 people to be exonerated nation-wide by DNA testing. To hear him tell it, Virginia’s statewide audit is a mystery wrapped in obfuscation. “This DNA testing program began two Governors ago,” he says, “but its operation has remained shrouded in secrecy. We do not know how the authorities chose to test the cases that they have tested. We do not know how long the authorities have known about the many dozens of cases where DNA has excluded the individuals. We do not know what local prosecutors plan to do about the cases where DNA may prove innocence.”
At the time Virginia’s audit began, Barry Scheck, co-founder of the Innocence Project, which has used DNA testing to exonerate hundreds of prisoners across the country, noted in astonishment that “a random sample of convicted felons and we're getting a 7 percent exoneration rate" in Virginia. But it appears that a 7 percent exoneration rate may be grossly understating the problem. UVA’s Garrett suspects that the error rate may actually be as high as 17 percent. As he discovered in his own research, Barbour’s conviction, based on the testimony of a single eyewitness, reflects the reality that of the first 250 people exonerated by DNA testing, a whopping 76 percent were misidentified by eyewitnesses.
Whatever the percentage of error on the part of Virginia’s criminal justice system, one thing is certain: Only a handful of the falsely convicted have received the exonerations they deserve. Since DNA retesting began in Virginia, two people have been formally exonerated and another, who is dead, was cleared of a rape he didn’t commit. When Barbour’s paperwork is processed, he will be only the fourth person to be exonerated, despite the fact that the state is aware of scores of others who may be innocent. Even now Barbour remains skeptical. “They can do anything now to trick it up like they did 34 years ago,” he says. “I’m not going to be excited ’til it all comes out. I’m innocent. I’m here. But I don’t trust the justice system. Period.”
After all, Virginia authorities never did successfully contact Barbour to acknowledge his innocence. It was Jonathan Sheldon, a private-practice attorney in Fairfax, Va. who took it upon himself to contact Barbour and many of the other 70-some men who have been convicted of crimes, excluded by DNA testing, and never advised of that fact. As of today, the state has given him only 32 names and Sheldon says he has already located most of them. Some are dead. Some are dying. Some suffer from mental illnesses that make it impossible for them to even understand why he is calling. As the Richmond-Times Dispatch’s Frank Green, who first reported on Barbour’s exclusion by DNA testing, wrote last month: “The Virginia Department of Forensic Science has issued reports that exclude at least 76 felons as the source of biological evidence in their cases.” Yet as of last month, 29 of those felons had not been notified that the new DNA reports existed.
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Sheldon launched this crusade to notify as many innocent men as possible because, in his view, neither Virginia’s crime lab nor its prosecutors’ office is taking that task seriously. How the Commonwealth of Virginia managed to put the crime lab and prosecutors’ office in charge of retesting DNA and notifying the prosecutors of the state’s own errors is one of the mysteries here. It would appear to be a program destined to end in confusion, obstruction, or worse. And it has.
I spoke to Pete Marone, director of the Virginia Department of Forensic Science. Marone argues that the state’s crime lab should not be making legal determinations about the meaning of these DNA tests. “At what point does the lab’s responsibility end?” he asks. “We’re a lab. We do analysis. We don’t determine what the meaning is.” He says that the crime lab’s policy is to turn over their results to the police department and prosecutors, who are in a better position “to ascribe value to those numbers.”
Initially, Virginia’s state authorities had no plans to notify the convicts that their DNA was being tested. Then, in 2008, the state legislature ordered them to notify those same convicts that their samples had been found and might be examined. If a convict failed to return the paperwork, the sample was tested nonetheless. Despite Marone’s claim that the Department of Forensic Science only conducts lab work, it alone is responsible for informing state prosecutors and police that former convicts have been cleared by DNA tests.
The department put out a call to pro bono lawyers around the state, who were asked to hand-deliver notifications that the accused might now be subject to DNA retesting. But there was a condition: Those lawyers were required to sign confidentiality agreements indicating that they were barred from explaining the content of the letters to the accused or from representing them in court. Marone explains the rationale for constraining these volunteer lawyers: “The General Assembly said to send pro bono attorneys,” he says. “They can’t go blabbing all over the place. They can’t have the person they are notifying be their client.” He adds that this was done, in part, to protect the pro bono lawyers: “If you send a young, new attorney to a bad neighborhood, bad things could happen.”
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The letters themselves were mainly legal jargon, and most of the recipients had no idea why the state was contacting them. Here is a copy of one of the state’s notification letters:
According to Deirdre Enright of the Innocence Project at the University of Virginia Law School (and one of Barbour’s lawyers), most of the recipients were simply terrified that the commonwealth was re-examining their alleged crimes at all. The volunteer lawyers who delivered these letters were reduced, more or less, to being carrier pigeons, unable to explain the crucial significance of these letters’ content for the lives of these men and their families. The net effect was simply to frighten most of the convicts who received them, who knew only that the justice system was spontaneously taking another look at them decades later.
Marone sees it differently. “This is the criminal justice system,” he says. “The answer is not to release all the criminal records to the newspapers. Lots of these folks hear about the testing and say ‘I did my time. I’ll tell you what to do with your report.’ We couldn’t go searching the streets for people.”
The lawyers at the UVA Innocence Project believe that’s wrongheaded. Those who have been convicted of a crime they did not commit want to know that they could now be proven innocent. They also quickly realized that the worst possible agency to be notifying individuals—the prosecutors and state crime lab—had taken the sole authority to help them. Matthew Engle, legal director of the Innocence Project Clinic, tells me that those agencies are “not in the business of exonerating people, they’re in the business of convicting people.”
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Enter Jonathan Sheldon. A successful Northern Virginia attorney, Sheldon has long been involved in death row cases and has worked for years to try to end the death penalty in the commonwealth. Indeed, he was one of the lawyers for John Allen Muhammad, the D.C. sniper. As he learned of the pro bono lawyers fanning out across the state, Sheldon grew infuriated that Virginia was unwilling to release the names of the more than 70 people who DNA testing suggested were innocent. “Why ask for volunteer lawyers to find people and tell them about DNA testing that might be meaningless?” he asks. “Why was the state trying to eliminate all these lawyers from representing all these people?”
Sheldon submitted a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request and investigated further. He looked at the sample letter being mailed out. “These are not well-educated people,” he says, of most of the accused. “I thought, ‘If you send that letter to someone they are going to think the government is after them again.’ ” Sheldon also realized that despite all the testing going on, it appeared that not a single prosecutor had notified anyone that they had been found innocent. “At some point,” he says, “we were poking and prodding them and filing FOIA requests and they just broke and offered to winnow out the 70-something names that had been excluded.” As with the pro bono lawyers before him, state authorities made Sheldon promise not to help those who could be exonerated sue the Department of Forensic Science or take any action on their behalf. Instead, beginning in January, he began making what he calls “oblique” phone calls to men who couldn’t always understand what he was trying to tell them about the state, their DNA, and the justice system.
And so, while the commonwealth was unable to track down Bennett Barbour for two years, Sheldon did it in a few hours. (Barbour’s lawyer Deirdre Enright says she was able to find Barbour’s correct address in an hour using WhitePages.com.) Nate Green, the Williamsburg Commonwealth's Attorney, told the Richmond Times Dispatch that when he received the 2010 report in Barbour’s case, he sent letters out to the four addresses Barbour had occupied over the last 15 years and received no response. Sheldon says Green “is a good guy and meant well,” but you can’t hand a lab report to the police and tell them to go find a guy. “It’s just not his job to go find old cases and it’s not the police’s job,” he says. Sheldon made it his job.
In yet another case that recently emerged, the family of a deceased man seeking information on his DNA test results learned that their letter had been misplaced as well. When Sheldon asked the Virginia crime lab for those records, he was told that the department had “not, as part of the project's process, intentionally sent notification letters or certificates of analysis to family members of deceased suspects.” In other words, DNA tests that could potentially exclude deceased offenders may not be released at all. Marone claims the forensics department called the prosecutors immediately in this instance, but the “paperwork was put aside.” He cautions that critics of the system should “keep in mind that until last year, we weren’t allowed to give those reports to anyone but a law enforcement agency. That information is private and personal, and maybe that individual doesn’t want his family members to have a copy of the report. We have to protect the sensitivity and privacy of those individuals.”
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Marone acknowledges that the system is “not perfect and it’s not timely.” But he rejects the idea that anyone is to blame. Marone claims the crime lab is doing its job, albeit slowly, and that it is the responsibility of the prosecutors and police to notify those who have been excluded by the testing. Sheldon, for his part, rejects the idea that the forensics lab is merely a passive, impartial observer. “[The Department of Forensic Science] thinks of themselves as this holy, unbiased, scientific branch of government,” he says. “But they are an organization with political sensibilities that are strongly pro-prosecution. That’s not surprising since prosecutors and the police are its main constituents.”
It’s hard to tell whether all this represents mere incompetence on the part of the commonwealth, or some more pernicious effort to cover up past error, intimidate potential exonerees, and disqualify dozens of pro bono attorneys who likely could have represented them. The fact that vitally important information seems to fall into a black hole between the forensics lab, the prosecutors’ offices, and the convicts and their lawyers, suggests that intentional or not, the net effect is that injustices are not being brought to light.
It remains to be seen whether there will be any repercussions for the state for its failure to notify what may be dozens of men that they were imprisoned for crimes they didn’t commit. The editorial board of the Richmond Times Dispatch recently advocated “making prosecutors and police chiefs personally liable for the failure to inform innocent men in a timely manner of evidence exonerating them.” Sheldon says that it may certainly be the case that someone will have a claim against the state as these convicts learn of Virginia’s errors and delays, particularly if someone is still in prison and has not been notified. At the very least, there is a strong push from Innocence Project branches and defense lawyers around the state to allow someone other than Department of Forensic Science and the prosecutors’ offices to take responsibility for notifications.
Sheldon did learn recently that the forensics department may be taking action of a different sort. According to someone at the Mid-Atlantic Innocence Project, the crime lab initiated an inquiry into whether Sheldon breached his confidentiality agreement because of the press coverage of Barbour's story. Marone denies that this is so. | – New York is poised to become the first state in the nation to require people convicted of any crime, no matter how minor, to provide DNA samples for a database. The state's lawmakers are putting the finishing touches on the measure, which would double the size of New York's DNA database, reports the New York Times. Supporters—including all 62 of the state's district attorneys—say the move will catch more violent offenders and exonerate more innocent people. "Every single time we’ve expanded the DNA database, we have shown how effective it is in convicting people who commit crimes, and we’ve also shown that it can be used to exonerate the innocent,” the chief of the Citizens Crime Commission says. The legislation would allow both prosecutors and defense lawyers to access the database. Some lawmakers are seeking to add a measure to the bill that would make it a violation, not a crime, to possess very small amounts of marijuana in public. Click for more on a state with a serious wrongful-conviction problem. |
Starting in 1996, Alexa Internet has been donating their crawl data to the Internet Archive. Flowing in every day, these data are added to the Wayback Machine after an embargo period. ||||| Starting in 1996, Alexa Internet has been donating their crawl data to the Internet Archive. Flowing in every day, these data are added to the Wayback Machine after an embargo period. | – A month after stunning Hollywood and sparking questions about her mental stability with the news of her retirement, Amanda Bynes wants a do-over. "I've unretired," the 24-year-old on-again-off-again actress tweeted. She's a co-star of the buzzed-about high school comedy Easy A, notes People—and within minutes of "unretiring," Bynes was tweeting about the trailer. |
HOTEL worker Jason Garnett is recovering from a medical problem that left him squirming with pain – and embarrassment.
The 23-year-old ended up in hospital where his penis had to be drained of two pints of blood – after suffering from an erection lasting 17 hours.
Doctors at his local hospital in Harrogate found he was suffering from a condition known as priapism – a condition that is regarded as a medical emergency.
Jason first woke up with the condition last Friday morning and initially didn’t worry about it.
However by lunchtime he was beginning to get concerned and tried to address the situation by taking an ice bath and then going for a jog.
He went to the hospital where his condition was diagnosed and doctors drew off two pints of blood to try and reduce the pressure. They also had to inject medication 24 times to restrict the blood flow.
If untreated such a problem can cause serious problems but all is now well with Jason, who described the pain of his treatment as “ten out of ten.”
“It is completely normal now,” he added, “apart from the fact that it looks like it’s been through a war. It’s all a bit black and blue.” ||||| Facebook
Jason Garnett will always remember last Friday.
Garnett, 23, woke up that morning with an erection that refused to go down. In fact, Garnett's penis stood at rapt attention for more than 17 hours, the Northern Echo newspaper reports.
At first, Garnett wasn't worried much about it, and went to his job at a hotel in Harrogate, U.K.
But around lunchtime he became concerned. When taking an ice bath and going for a jog didn't alter the situation, he realized something was up.
Eight hours after waking up, Garnett told his roommate about his problem.
“You should have seen the look on his face when I told him what was wrong,” Garnett told The Sun. “He was in hysterics at first, but then he realized how serious the situation was.”
Garnett was taken to a hospital and was diagnosed with priapism, a rare condition where erections do not subside. It is not caused by sexual desire or stimulation, but, untreated, it can permanently damage the penis, News.com.au reports.
Doctors had to drain two pints of blood from his penis to reduce the pressure on his organ, HuffPost UK reports. When that didn’t work, they were forced to inject him with 24 rounds of medication before things settled down.
“Seeing them stab my penis with a needle was a horrible experience, like something out of a horror film," Garnett told the Sun. "The pain was 10 out of 10.”
He said it's completely normal now "apart from the fact that it looks like it's been through a war," according to UPI.com.
Also on HuffPost: Bad Sex Bad Sex
1 of 17 Not Good Enough Michigan woman Sadie Bell was convicted in April, 2014 of shooting her lover because he didn't 'produce enough ejaculate' when they had sex. Share this slide:
Oakland County ||||| HARROGATE, England, Oct. 6 (UPI) -- A British man who woke up with an erection that wouldn't go away said doctors drained more than 2 pints of blood from his member.
Jason Garnett, 23, a hotel worker in Harrogate, England, said he woke up Friday morning after having sex the previous night and found he had an erection that would not go away.
Garnett said he tried an ice bath, jogging and other arousal-defeating techniques, but nothing was able to make his penis go flaccid.
The man said he sought advice from his roommate after eight hours of unsuccessful erection-stopping attempts and Garnett was taken to a hospital, where doctors said the condition is known as priapism. The condition can permanently damage the penis if it is not immediately treated.
Garnett said doctors drained more than 2 pints of blood from his penis and injected it with medication 24 times to make the unwanted erection go away.
"Seeing them stab my penis with a needle was a horrible experience -- like something out of a horror film. The pain was a 10 out of 10," Garnett told The Sun.
He said his penis was finally tamed after 17 hours of rigidity.
"It is completely normal now, apart from the fact that it looks like it's been through a war. It's all a bit black and blue," he said. ||||| Video
Image What's in a sex tape? 3:17 Play video Sydney Confidential's Jonathon Moran explains the big business of sex tapes and celebrity.
A HOTEL worker has described “probably the most embarrassing day of my life” of going to hospital with an erection that has lasted 17 hours.
Jason Garnett, a 23-year-old hotel worker from the spa town of Harrogate in North Yorkshire, UK, said he woke up with “morning glory” at 9am last Friday after sex with a friend, The Sun reported.
SEVEN WEEK ERECTION: Man treated for unwanted condition
BANNED: The ‘herbal’ energy drink that gives an erection
He thought nothing of it and had previous erections lasting for an hour. But by lunchtime he began to get concerned. He thought an ice bath would work — it didn’t. Then he went for an uncomfortable jog — it too failed.
Eight hours after waking up, he told a flatmate of his situation.
“You should have seen the look on his face when I told him what was wrong,” jason told The Sun.
“He was in hysterics at first, but then he realised how serious the situation was.”
Jason was taken to hospital where he was found to be suffering from priapism, a rare condition that is not caused by sexual desire or sexual stimulation. Untreated, it can permanently damage the penis.
Doctors drained more than 1.1 litres (two pints) of blood from his manhood and injected his penis 24 times with medication to try to restrict blood flow.
“Seeing them stab my penis with a needle was a horrible experience — like something out of a horror film. The pain was a 10 out of 10,” Jason said.
After 17 hours Jason’s erection was no more and he says everything is working as normal.
“It is completely normal now, apart from the fact that it looks like it’s been through a war. It’s all a bit black and blue,” he said. | – Last Friday, Jason Garnett greeted a new day, as many men do, with an erection. But 17 hours later, doctors were stabbing the British man's penis with needles in order to end his member's persistent salute, UPI reports. The 23-year-old North Yorkshire man didn't worry when his erection stuck around the morning after a night of love-making, reports Northern Echo. He changed his tune around lunch time and tried to tame it with an ice bath and a jog, but after a stiff eight hours, he finally asked his roommate for help. "You should have seen the look on his face … he was in hysterics at first, but then he realized how serious the situation was," Garnett says, according to Huffington Post. Garnett's erection wasn't a blessing, but a serious medical condition called priapism. The rare malady has nothing to do with arousal or desire and can cause permanent damage if left untreated, reports News.com.au. The "most embarrassing day" of Garnett's life got worse when doctors drew two pints of blood from his penis and injected it 24 times with erection-reducing meds. "Seeing them stab my penis with a needle was … like something out of a horror film. The pain was a 10 out of 10," he says. Garnett says his penis now "looks like it's been through a war. It's all a bit black and blue." (Read about a woman whose medication caused "unwelcome" orgasms.) |
Justin Timberlake: 'I Haven't Spoken to Britney Spears in a Decade'
Email This Talk about love 'em and leave 'em,
"We were two birds of the same feather -- small-town kids, doing the same thing," Timberlake told Vanity Fair. "But then you become adults, and the way you were as kids doesn't make any sense. I won't speak on her, but at least for me, I was a totally different person. I just don't think we were normal; there was nothing normal about our existence. We spent way too much time being the biggest thing for teenyboppers."
As part of the Mouseketeers -- which also included Spears, Talk about love 'em and leave 'em, Justin Timberlake told Vanity Fair that he hasn't spoken to ex, Britney Spears , in "nine or 10 years." Why the stalemate? Timberlake believes that their status as arguably the most famous couple of a generation was fueled by just that, but then they both grew up."We were two birds of the same feather -- small-town kids, doing the same thing," Timberlake told Vanity Fair. "But then you become adults, and the way you were as kids doesn't make any sense. I won't speak on her, but at least for me, I was a totally different person. I just don't think we were normal; there was nothing normal about our existence. We spent way too much time being the biggest thing for teenyboppers."As part of the Mouseketeers -- which also included Spears, Christina Aguilera and Ryan Gosling -- Timberlake's world was larger than life. But unlike today's generation of young Hollywood, who outgrow their adolescence by the time they're 15, Timberlake and the gang were "little kids with big toys. You do the math -- that's not going to last."
http://xml.channel.aol.com/xmlpublisher/fetch.v2.xml?option=expand_relative_urls&dataUrlNodes=uiConfig,feedConfig,entry&id=691977&pid=691976&uts=1273167996 http://www.popeater.com/mm_track/popeater/music/?s_channel=us.musicpop&s_account=aolpopeater,aolsvc&omni=1&ke=1 http://cdn.channel.aol.com/cs_feed_v1_6/csfeedwrapper.swf PopScene: Week's Hottest Pics Gabourey Sidibe attends The American Cancer Society's Choose You luncheon on May 5th in New York City. Amy Sussman, Getty Images Amy Sussman, Getty Images PopScene: Weeks Hottest Pics
But Timberlake did eventually grow up and with his maturity came a more mature love along with it's ugly stepsister, heartbreak."She is the single-handedly most significant person in my life," Timberlake said of his ex-girlfriend, Jessica Biel . "In my 30 years, she is the most special person, O.K.? ... I don't want to say much more, because I have to protect things that are dear to me -- for instance, her."We are all too familiar with the headlines of Hollywood heartbreak, so why double the media scrutiny by dating a fellow celebrity? As Timberlake puts it, a partner who is familiar with fame is the only option."Why do you think we wind up dating each other, and feeling more comfortable around each other?" Timberlake pontificates. "We understand what it's like. 'Oh, thank God -- finally, somebody who knows how I feel. It's refuge."And Timberlake is looking for that refuge now more than ever -- the actor, singer and newfound comedian wants to have a family someday. But happily ever after seems further away than someday for the singer who brought 'Sexy Back.'"I think the mistake is that people commit to who that person is right then and not the person they're going to become. That's the art of staying together, is changing together. When you say it like that, it seems damn near impossible, right?Impossible? Maybe. But not for a lack of trying, Timberlake has recently been linked to Hollywood beauties like 'Friends with Benefits' co-star, Mila Kunis , and the similarly newly single, Olivia Wilde ||||| Photo by Norman Jean Roy. Styled by Jessica Diehl.
“She is the single-handedly most significant person in my life,” Justin Timberlake tells Vanity Fair contributing editor Vanessa Grigoriadis of recent ex-girlfriend Jessica Biel. “In my 30 years, she is the most special person, O.K.? I don’t want to say much more, because I have to protect things that are dear to me—for instance, her.”
Timberlake reveals that he wants a family some day, but that “as little as six months ago I wouldn’t have even thought about that, but now it feels like a closer planet orbiting around.” Of marriage, the musician turned actor explains what he feels is an uphill battle: “I think the mistake is that people commit to who that person is right then and not the person they’re going to become. That’s the art of staying together, is changing together,” he says. “When you say it like that, it seems damn near impossible, right?”
“Why do you think we all like each other?” Timberlake asks of why celebrities—him included—so often date other celebrities. “Why do you think we wind up dating each other, and feeling more comfortable around each other? We understand what it’s like. ‘Oh, thank God—finally, somebody who knows how I feel.’ It’s refuge.”
Of his arguably most famous ex-girlfriend, Britney Spears, Timberlake tells Grigoriadis, “I wish her the best—that goes without saying. We haven’t spoken in 9 or 10 years.” The former child star says that most of his and Spears’s relationship was based on circumstance, but had no chance for the long term. “We were two birds of the same feather—small-town kids, doing the same thing. But then you become adults, and the way you were as kids doesn’t make any sense. I won’t speak on her, but at least for me, I was a totally different person,” he says. “I just don’t think we were normal; there was nothing normal about our existence. We spent way too much time being the biggest thing for teenyboppers.”
“It was exciting that we were having so much success and we could do whatever we wanted. And I mean that about everybody: Backstreet Boys, ’NSync, Britney, Christina,” Timberlake says of his early years as a pop idol. “At that time, we could literally go, ‘Oh, man, let’s go to Bali,’ and we’d be on a plane to Bali. We were little kids with big toys. You do the math—that’s not going to last.” Some very big toys, indeed, as Timberlake recalls that on the set of The All-New Mickey Mouse Club, “Ryan [Gosling] and I used to steal golf carts and go driving in the middle of the park to get milk shakes, and we never got in trouble for it. We thought we were big shit.”
Timberlake says that while he has no new plans for music on the horizon (“I wouldn’t say I’m not going to put out another [album]. I would say that would be a bad bet, if you were betting. But I could see myself only doing one more big tour”), he does have a spate of new movies coming out, including Friends with Benefits with co-star Mila Kunis.
As for the sex scene in the film, Kunis says when given the choice, she and Timberlake decided to film it at the last possible moment. “We figured that by then we’d really, hopefully, be friends, which is what happened,” says Kunis. “It’s always uncomfortable to do those scenes You have to be in these crazy positions for 12 to 16 hours. I’ll never forget when Justin had to be on top of me with his right hand on my left pasty and his left hand on my right pasty—my feet were getting numb, and I think his hands were giving out on him. It was a workout.”
Of her co-star’s nudity in Benefits, Kunis says, “The men never have to do anything, and we’re always seeing the boobies of the ladies. So for this one, [director] Will [Gluck] said, ‘O.K., Justin can show himself off,’ which I thought was great.” “It was fun,” Timberlake agrees, “but I can’t say I’m going to be butt-naked in a movie again. I only did it because I’m young now, and everything’s where it’s supposed to be. I figured this is the time, before gravity gets the best of me.”
The July issue of Vanity Fair hits newsstands in New York and L.A. on Thursday, June 2, and nationally and on the iPad on Tuesday, June 7.
RELATED: “Mad About the Boys” (November 2007) | – Justin Timberlake's recent Vanity Fair article was a downright ex-girlfriend bonanza. Of recent ex Jessica Biel, he says, “She is the single-handedly most significant person in my life. In my 30 years, she is the most special person, OK? … I don’t want to say much more, because I have to protect things that are dear to me—for instance, her.” But, you say, what of childhood sweetheart Britney Spears? Oh, he talks about her, too: “I wish her the best—that goes without saying. We haven’t spoken in nine or 10 years. ... We were two birds of the same feather—small-town kids, doing the same thing. But then you become adults, and the way you were as kids doesn’t make any sense. I won’t speak on her, but at least for me, I was a totally different person." Click for much more from the interview, including his thoughts on other fellow Mouseketeers, whether he wants a family, and why celebrities always date other celebrities. |
Facing criticism about its overwhelmingly older, male, and white membership and increasingly vocal concerns about the film industry’s ongoing diversity problem, the Academy Of Motion Pictures Arts And Science, the honorary organization responsible for awarding the Oscars, has responded by… well, trying to add seemingly goddamn everyone it had, for one reason or another, forgotten to invite into its membership. As part of a major overhaul, the Academy sent out an unprecedented 683 membership invitations today to film industry professionals, almost half of them women, and 41% of them people of color.
The invitation list is a who’s who of Hollywood mainstays who were inexplicably not Academy members, international heavyweights, and big-deal up-and-comers. A large part of the push seems to have come on the director front, a seemingly endless scroll of invited directors that includes Catherine Breillat, Park Chan-wook, Lucrecia Martel, Julia Loktev, Abbas Kiarostami, Hou Hsiao-Hsien, Karyn Kusama, Kiyoshi Kurosawa, Mary Harron, Mia Hansen-Løve, Lynne Ramsay, the Wachowskis, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, James Wan, Maren Ade, Nuri Bilge Ceylan, Souleymane Cissé, Patty Jenkins, So Yong Kim, Ryan Coogler, Ramin Bahrani, and a whole lot of other people who aren’t older white dudes. (Ken Loach was also invited.)
The list of acting invitees includes Luis Guzmán, Adam Beach, Kate Beckinsale, Morris Chestnut, Idris Elba, Bruce Greenwood, Oscar Isaac, James Hong, Tessa Thompson, Greta Gerwig, Alicia Vikander, Michelle Rodriguez, Tom Hiddleston, Michael B. Jordan, Regina King, Eva Mendes, Vivica A. Fox, and Ice Cube. The whole mind-bogglingly long list can be read here, and includes three Wayans brothers.
Submit your Newswire tips here. ||||| The Hollywood buzzword of the moment has been “diversity,” thanks in large part to the hashtag #OscarsSoWhite and its creator April Reign. The former attorney and managing editor of BroadwayBlack.com first began using the hashtag on Twitter following the 2015 announcement of an all-white slate of acting Oscar nominees, and again when the same occurred earlier this year. When the likes of Spike Lee and Jada Pinkett Smith indirectly joined the #OscarsSoWhite movement, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Science was prompted to react, making a commitment to diversify its ranks by doubling the number of women and people of color by 2020. Wednesday became the first chance for the organization to work toward its goal with the release of their latest list of invitees, and it’s the largest and most diverse class to date. | – Apparently still smarting from some of Chris Rock's Oscars barbs, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences invited 683 people—many of them women and minorities—to join in an unprecedented move Wednesday, Reuters reports. The voting group behind the Oscars is largely old, white, and male and was lambasted this year with the hashtag #OscarsSoWhite after two years in a row of all-white acting nominees. In response, the academy is attempting to—as the AV Club puts it—" add seemingly goddamn everyone it had, for one reason or another, forgotten to invite into its membership.” The actors, directors, and others invited Wednesday include Idris Elba, Eva Mendes, Oscar Isaac, John Boyega, Ice Cube, Greta Gerqig, Michael B. Jordan, Vivica A. Fox, the Wachowskis, James Wan, Luis Guzmán, Kate Beckinsale, Park Chan-wook, James Hong, Michelle Rodriguez, and not one, not two, but three Wayans brothers. Of the new invitees, 46% are women and 41% are people of color. If all 683 accept their invite, women would account for 27% of the more than 7,000 academy members (up from 25%) and minorities would total 11% (up from 8%). “I'm especially happy to be part of such a diverse group. I actually want to hang out and watch movies with most of the people on this list," Arab-German director Lexi Alexander tells the Los Angeles Times. “To be honest, I cried a few tears when I started to get congratulation tweets in Arabic.” Other invitees took to Twitter to share similar sentiments. “Excited to use my vote to nominate talent that reflects the real world we live in—DIVERSITY," tweets Brie Larson, who won best actress at this year's Oscars. |
Teacher Bonuses Don’t Increase Test Scores, Study Says
Written By Daniel Adair on Wednesday, September 22nd, 2010
A new three-year study released on Tuesday reveals that even significant bonuses to teachers for raising student test scores fails to yield significant results.
The discovery, conducted by Vanderbilt University’s National Center on Performance Incentives in the metropolitan Nashville school system, compromises the view that merit pay for teachers is a viable method of increasing student performance in the classroom. The study examined about three hundred teachers of fifth to eighth-grade math teachers and the results their students received on the Tennessee standardized exams.
Matthew Springer, lead researcher on the study, discusses the results: “I think most people agree today that the current way in which we compensate teachers is broken. But we don’t know what the better way is yet.”
The results are a blow against the Obama administration’s new focus on linking teacher salary and tenure to their students’ performance. The Department of Education was critical of the study, claiming it “only looked at the narrow question of whether more pay motivates teachers to try harder,” whereas the goal of the DoE is to “change the culture of teaching,” only one part of which is rewarding high-performing teachers in difficult to staff schools.
The American Federation of Teachers, on the other hand, praised the study, using it to emphasize their points that teachers need better training and more support administrators to better do their jobs. Merit pay is currently effectively illegal in many states, with only a handful of districts currently employing such a system. Part of the Obama administration’s goal with its “Race to the Top” grant competition is to get more states to pass merit pay laws.
Other stories that readers found helpful: ||||| Offering big bonuses to teachers failed to raise students' test scores in a three-year study released Tuesday that calls into question the Obama administration's push for merit pay to improve education.
The study, conducted in the metropolitan Nashville school system by Vanderbilt University's National Center on Performance Incentives, was described by the researchers as the nation's first scientifically rigorous look at merit pay for teachers.
It found that students whose teachers were offered bonuses of up to $15,000 a year for improved test scores registered the same gains on standardized exams as those whose teachers were given no such incentives.
"I think most people agree today that the current way in which we compensate teachers is broken," said Matthew Springer, executive director of the Vanderbilt center and lead researcher on the study. "But we don't know what the better way is yet."
The study comes as the Obama administration encourages school systems to link teacher pay and tenure to how students perform on tests and other measures of achievement.
The researchers looked at fifth- through eighth-grade math teachers from 2007 to 2009. A group of about 300 teachers started out in the study; half were eligible for the bonuses, the other half were not.
The bonuses were given out based on improvements in scores on Tennessee's standardized exam, which is used by the state as part of the federal No Child Left Behind requirements.
Springer was quick to point out that his study looked only at individual bonuses, not extra pay doled out to teams of teachers or an entire school. He said more research is needed.
"Some people were initially disappointed when they saw the results, but quickly turned around and said, 'Well, at least we finally have an answer,'" he said. "It means pay can't do it alone."
The U.S. Education Department called the study too narrowly focused.
"It only looked at the narrow question of whether more pay motivates teachers to try harder," said spokeswoman Sandra Abrevaya. "What we are trying to do is change the culture of teaching by giving all educators the feedback they need to get better while rewarding and incentivizing the best to teach in high-need schools, hard-to-staff subjects."
The American Federation of Teachers praised the study and argued that teachers need other resources, including better training and more supportive administrators.
"Merit pay is not the panacea that some would like it to be. There are no quick fixes in education," said union president Randi Weingarten. "Providing individual bonuses for teachers standing alone does not work."
Teachers unions have historically opposed merit pay, arguing that test scores are not an accurate measure of student achievement, that financial rewards could pit teachers against each other, and that administrators could use bonuses to reward favorites and punish others.
Jennifer Conboy, a high school social studies teacher in Miami, called merit pay a "baseless fad."
"Merit pay is an excuse to resist the attempt of teachers to get fair pay in the first place," the 37-year-old Conboy said. "On a personal level, merit pay would do nothing to me. I took this job because I think education is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and if I cared about democracy _ which I do _ then I had a responsibility to do whatever I could to strengthen education."
Only a few schools and districts across the country have merit pay, and in some states the idea is effectively illegal. The Obama White House hoped to encourage more states to pass merit pay laws with its $4.35 billion "Race to the Top" grant competition.
Some states tried to enact merit bonuses for teachers, but most, like Georgia, were unable to get the necessary laws passed. Colorado passed a controversial law that ties teacher pay to student performance and allows the state to strip tenure from low-performing instructors, but the state did not win the Race to the Top grant money it was counting on to help carry out the law.
Only about half of the 300 teachers originally in the Nashville study were left at the end of the three years because some retired, moved to other schools or stopped teaching math. About 40 teachers got bonuses each year. Overall, the researchers said, test scores rose modestly for both groups of students during the three-year study, suggesting that the financial incentives made no difference.
"It's not enough to say, 'I'll pay you more if you do better.' You've got to help people know how to do better," said Amy Wilkins, vice president of the Education Trust, a Washington think tank. "Absolutely we should reward them once they do better, but to think merit pay alone will get them there is insane."
(This version CORRECTS amount of Race to the Top program.) | – The way to increase test scores is not to give bonuses to teachers, say researchers at Vanderbilt University. A three-year study found that offers of bonuses as high as $15,000 did little to change results. The report leaves open the question of what will increase test scores, but it casts doubt on the notion of merit pay, one of the solutions being pushed by the Obama administration. “I think most people agree today that the current way in which we compensate teachers is broken," says the lead researcher. "But we don’t know what the better way is yet.” The American Federation of Teachers agrees with the study and says training is one of the key factors that needs to be improved. Story here and from AP here. |
Story highlights Chance of a ticket winning a Powerball jackpot is 1 in 175,223,510
You have a better chance of hitting two straight holes in one
A record $550 million Powerball jackpot is up for grabs Wednesday
Last March, when the people of America were drooling at the thought of winning a record $656 million Mega Millions jackpot, we poured an icy bucket of mathematical reality over your head: You weren't going to win.
Now, with a record $550 million Powerball jackpot up for grabs Wednesday, we figured it was a great time to, once again, dash your dreams. We know, we know -- someone will win at least a share of the prize, if not Wednesday, then in some subsequent drawing. But it won't be you.
JUST WATCHED Lottery winners' lives ruined Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Lottery winners' lives ruined 02:20
The chance of a ticket winning a Powerball jackpot is 1 in 175,223,510 (slightly better than the chance of winning a Mega Millions jackpot, which is 1 in 175,711,536). Here are a few unlikely scenarios that, we're sorry to say, are much more likely than you taking home this jackpot.
-- Dying from a bee sting: 1 in 6.1 million.
-- Dying from a lightning strike: 1 in 3 million.
From U.S. Hole in One , which insures golf prizes for holes in one:
-- An amateur golfer making a hole in one on a par-3 hole: 1 in 12,500.
-- A golfer hitting a hole in one on consecutive par-3 holes: 1 in about 156 million.
From a 2011 State Farm study on collisions between vehicles and deer:
-- Hitting a deer with a vehicle in Hawaii, the state where State Farm says deer-vehicle collisions are least likely: 1 in 6,267.
-- Being struck by lightning over an 80-year lifetime: 1 in 10,000.
From the Florida Museum of Natural History , based on U.S. beach injury statistics:
-- Drowning and other beach-related fatalities: 1 in 2 million.
-- Being attacked by a shark: 1 in 11.5 million.
What do you think about your chances of winning on Wednesday? Weigh in below, or on Twitter using #whataretheodds. ||||| Starting in 1996, Alexa Internet has been donating their crawl data to the Internet Archive. Flowing in every day, these data are added to the Wayback Machine after an embargo period. ||||| Life after a Powerball win: What to expect if you strike it rich
Why Hollywood is in love with the end of the world
Why Hollywood is in love with the end of the ...
(CBS News) Lottery players around the country are hoping to strike it rich Wednesday. The biggest Powerball drawing in history now stands at half a billion dollars, the biggest Powerball prize ever -- and the second-largest lottery jackpot in history.
And that pot could get even sweeter by the time they pick the numbers.
With no Powerball winner since October 6, lottery officials estimate that 105,000 tickets are being sold every minute nationwide. And the more tickets people buy, the more that jackpot will go up.
Powerball at $500 million: What to do if you win
The odds of winning the jackpot are just one in 175,000,000.
But that isn't stopping players from trying their luck. From New York to Arizona, people stood in line Tuesday after the jackpot soared to $500 million.
The historic prize is part of a plan lottery officials put in place earlier this year, including doubling the ticket price to $2 in order to boost jackpots faster. By the time of the drawing, lottery officials estimate that Americans will have purchased more than $1 billion in Powerball tickets. There is a 60 percent chance the winning combinations will have been sold.
Asked if that means there will be a winner, Mary Newbauer, a lottery official told CBS News, "I don't know. We'll have to wait and see, but that's not really a high number when it comes to drawings like this."
Mary and Brian Lohse know what it's like to hit it big. The couple won $202 million in Powerball just two months ago.
Mary Lohse said they didn't think they could actually win. Brian Lohse added, "The fact that it was a single winner I think was -- it even makes it more astounding and mind-boggling for us."
It's mind-boggling because Mary Lohse only bought that ticket as an afterthought at a local gas station one day. Before that, she and her husband were just trying to make ends meet for their three children.
Brian Lohse said, "We've faced the foreclosure. We've gotten the letter about them picking up the car and, frankly, right before we won the lottery."
The couple immediately got a lawyer and financial advisers. Then something happened that they didn't expect -- they got dozens of letters from complete strangers asking for help. One letter they received said, "If you could make an individual donation via check for an amount of $500,000 that would be very generous."
The couple hasn't answered the letters, but they have shared their fortune with their community, planning to help the local high school build a new football stadium.
For now, the family is still just trying to get over the shock of going from middle-class to millionaires. Mary Lohse said, "I think we both, at some point in the middle of the night have woken up and going, 'Brian, did it really happen? And he says, 'Yes,' and then I go back to sleep."
And if you're wondering whether the Lohses still play the the lottery the answer also is yes. Since winning Powerball, they've purchased a ticket every week, including one for tonight.
If there is a single winner in tonight's drawing, that person could take a cash option of $327 million before taxes.
For Manuel Bojorquez's full report on Powerball and the Lohses' life after their win, watch the video above.
But if you do win the big prize, what should you do?
Watch CBS News legal analyst Jack Ford's advice on "CBS This Morning" in the video below.
You should get a team of financial advisers and lawyers to help you manage your financial future, Ford advised on "CTM." He said, "At this point, guys, can you afford to bring in some people who can provide you with some good advice. Just because somebody says, 'My next door neighbor's brother-in-law is a lawyer you should talk to him.' Make sure you find yourself a good lawyer, good financial analyst and take their advice very early on."
Also, wait to claim your money, according to Ford. "It's a good idea," he said. "You got to do a couple of things. First thing do you is sign the ticket. ... The reason is it's the ticket that's the winner. You want to make sure that there's no question. There's a lot of people that would love to get their hands on that ticket. Sign it, put it in a safe place. The safe place is not a shoe box in your closet. Get to your local bank. ...Take some time to settle in, get your team in place, make sure you know what's going on here, get the advice. You don't have to run out and tell everybody because what you'll get, everybody in the world will be after you saying, 'Hey why don't you share some of your wealth with us?' Take some time and get things sorted out with the team." | – If you're hoping to win that $500 million Powerball jackpot tonight, we have bad and less-than-surprising news for you: It ain't gonna happen. But one person ultimately has to defy the stacked-way-against-you odds, and if that happens to be you, do this: Get yourself some good lawyers and financial advisers, one analyst tells CBS News. Actually listen to them. Sign that winning ticket and put it somewhere safe. Take note: "The safe place is not a shoebox in your closet." Keep quiet, and hold your horses. There's no reason to claim your prize immediately, and it's best to get your "team" set up before you come forward. Because once you do, you can expect to be inundated with appeals from cash-seeking strangers. Remember the winning ticket may not be the answer to your prayers. Time lists jackpot winners who would have been better off burning their ticket. Here's one: William Post III won $16.2 million. Three months after his first payout he was $500,000 in debt (buying an airplane and a restaurant may have been a mistake); his brother allegedly hired a hit man to kill him; and Post himself faced jail time after shooting at a bill collector. But that fate won't be yours ... because as CNN sagely points out, you're not freaking winning this thing: You're vastly more likely to get struck by lightning, be attacked by a shark, or die from a bee sting. On the odd chance that you do win (that chance being one in 175,223,510), here are some quirky ways to contextualize your winnings, compliments of HLN: If you counted one dollar per second, it would take you 16 years to finish. Or you could give a buck to every single person in North America and still walk away with a cool $40 million. |
Story highlights Senate committee Chairman Lieberman asks whether there's a pattern of misconduct
House committee Chairman King asks for minute-by-minute timeline
The actions of a few should not denigrate the many professionals, Axelrod says
Collins and Maloney suggest more female agents could help avoid such a scandal
A Senate committee will expand its probe into the U.S. Secret Service this week following a scandal involving prostitutes in Colombia in advance of a recent trip by the president.
The Homeland Security Committee will send the Secret Service "some questions this week, as the beginning of our broader investigation, asking whether... this was an exception, or is there anything in the records that show this is a pattern of misconduct that has gone on elsewhere by Secret Service agents on assignment, but off-duty?" Sen. Joe Lieberman, the committee chairman, told "Fox News Sunday."
"Why wasn't it noticed if that was the case? What's the Secret Service going to do to make sure it never happens again?"
Some Secret Service members and agents allegedly brought back several prostitutes to a hotel in Cartagena, according to sources familiar with the U.S. government's investigation.
The Secret Service says 12 members of the agency have been implicated in the incident.
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Across the Sunday political talk shows, officials expressed confidence in Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan, saying they believe he has handled the scandal well and will get answers.
"History is full of cases where enemies have compromised" people with security or intelligence information through sex, said Lieberman, I-Connecticut. He added that based on what he has been told so far, "there is no evidence that information was compromised" in this case.
Down the road, the committee will hold a public hearing on the matter -- perhaps more than one, Lieberman said.
"Anyone who's found to be guilty" will lose his job, Rep. Peter King, Chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, told NBC's "Meet the Press."
King told CNN last week that four investigators were assigned to his committee's probe.
One person who was "partially exonerated" will instead likely face administrative action, King said.
In a letter sent to Sullivan on Friday, King listed a series of questions, including how many employees were aware of the alleged incident and how many total employees were in Cartagena in support of President Obama's trip to the Summit of the Americas when the incident occurred earlier this month.
"Please provide a comprehensive, minute-by-minute timeline of all known actions, locations, and possible violations of U.S. or Colombia law," codes of conduct, and directives, King wrote in the letter.
But King and other officials are quick to emphasize that those allegedly involved in cavorting with prostitutes at a hotel in Cartagena are the exceptions.
"In any organization things can go wrong," President Obama's chief campaign strategist David Axelrod told CNN's "State of the Union" Sunday. "I must say that in my experience the Secret Service has been completely professional, so impressive. I always felt like they were ... willing to do anything to protect the president and the people around the president. And so this was really disappointing.
"Obviously we have to get to the bottom of it, but those problems should not denigrate the efforts of so many who do such a good job."
Sen. Susan Collins, ranking member on the Homeland Security Committee, and Rep. Carolyn Maloney of the House Oversight Committee suggested having more female agents could help avoid such scandals.
"I can't help but wonder if there'd been more women as part of that detail if this ever would have happened," Collins told ABC's "This Week."
Maloney agreed, and added that she was told 11% of agents in the Secret Service are women. The agency did not immediately confirm the figure to CNN Sunday.
"We probably need to diversify the Secret Service and have more minorities and more women," she said.
Six Secret Service members have left their jobs in the wake of the incident in Cartagena, Colombia, which came while they were on a security detail in advance of President Obama's trip for the Summit of the Americas.
One employee "has been cleared of serious misconduct, but will face administrative action," the Secret Service said.
Five employees are on administrative leave and have had their security clearances temporarily revoked.
In addition, the U.S. military is investigating 11 of its own troops for possible heavy drinking and consorting with prostitutes.
White House staff have not been implicated in the controversy.
After the scandal broke, President Obama called for a "thorough" and "rigorous" invsetigation. "If it turns out that some of the allegations that have been made in the press are confirmed, then of course I'll be angry," he said. ||||| The chairman of a House committee investigating an alleged Secret Service prostitution scandal predicted more firings as key lawmakers and a top adviser to President Barack Obama expressed confidence Sunday that the agency will effectively deal with the incident.
People walk past Hotel El Caribe in Cartagena, Colombia, late Thursday, April 19, 2012. Eleven Secret Service employees are accused of misconduct in connection with a prostitution scandal at the hotel... (Associated Press)
"Every possible lead is being examined," said Rep. Peter King, who heads the House Homeland Security Committee. King, R-N.Y., said he expected that in the "near future, several other" members of the Secret Service will leave.
"What they were thinking is beyond me," King told NBC's "Meet the Press."
So far, the scandal includes 12 Secret Service employees and 11 military members.
Six of the Secret Service members have lost their jobs. One has been cleared and five remain on administrative leave. The main incident occurred shortly before Obama arrived for a meeting of regional presidents last weekend.
A Secret Service official confirmed Sunday that one of the 12 implicated in the scandal was staying at a different hotel than the others.
He was staying at the Hilton, where Obama eventually would stay, said the official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the official was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly. The agent is being investigated for improprieties in a separate incident that may have happened on April 9, days before the president arrived and while the hotel was still open to the general public.
Sen. Joe Lieberman, chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee, also mentioned the 12th agent under investigation in an appearance on CBS's "Face the Nation."
"Now we don't know at this point what that 12th agent is being charged with and why he's been put on administrative leave. But now you're into the hotel where the president of the United States was going to stay. And it just gets more troubling," Lieberman said.
Lieberman told Fox News Sunday there is "no evidence that information was compromised" in the incidents. Those involved "were not acting like Secret Service agents. They were acting like a bunch of college students away on a spring student weekend," Lieberman said.
King, Lieberman and other leaders of congressional committees examining the scandal made the rounds on Sunday news shows. Generally, they said the scandal was being closely scrutinized on Capitol Hill and voiced support for Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan's handling of the matter.
Obama campaign adviser David Axelrod said the allegations are disturbing, but that the misdeeds of a few individuals should not tarnish the overall work and reputation of the service.
Axelrod told CNN's "State of the Union" that he always felt the agents were willing to go to great lengths to protect the president and the people around him. He called the conduct in Colombia "really disappointing."
"I think we will get to the bottom of it," said Axelrod, who worked at the White House before leaving last year to work full time in Obama's re-election campaign office in Chicago.
He later told NBC that "on the whole, the Secret Service does heroic work. This is quite disturbing. We have to get to the bottom of this, and I'm sure we will."
Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., a frequent critic of the president, declined to fault the White House's response. "You know, I'm not critical of what the administration has done thus far," he told CBS. "I think what we're seeing is an aberration."
Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, the senior Republican on the Homeland Security Committee, and Rep. Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., both said that more female Secret Service agents might help guard against such incidents from happening again.
"I can't help but wonder if there had been more women as part of that detail, if this ever would have happened," Collins said on ABC's "This Week."
Maloney told the same program that only 11 percent of the Secret Service's agents are women.
"I can't help but keeping asking this question: Where are the women? We probably need to diversify the service and have more minorities and more women," Maloney said.
Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, told NBC that the episode was "something the Secret Service can fix. We have confidence that it will be fixed."
"The most important thing is that this never happens again," Issa said.
Ralph Basham, a former Secret Service Director, told CBS the behavior of those implicated in the scandal "could have compromised the trip and the safety of the president." | – Heads probably haven't finished rolling at the Secret Service over its prostitution scandal, Rep. Peter King said today on Meet the Press, saying he expected "several" members to depart in the "near future." The House Homeland Security chair promised a thorough investigation, and has already sent a letter to the agency demanding answers to 50 questions, like whether agents used their expense accounts to pay their paramours, Fox News reports. He's not alone; the Senate will be expanding its investigation too, Joe Lieberman said today, according to CNN. Secret Service officials also confirmed today that one of the 12 agents implicated in the scandal so far was staying at a different hotel than the other 11—the same hotel that President Obama would eventually stay in, the AP reports. "It just gets more troubling," Lieberman said, though he cautioned that, "We don't know at this point what that 12th agent is being charged with." Lieberman and King weren't the only lawmakers discussing the scandal either; click for more from our Sunday talk show roundup. |
Water from the Mt. Tabor Reservoir system tested clean of urine-related toxins Thursday, news that came as no surprise to Water Bureau administrators yet also did not change their decision to dump 38 million gallons after a man peed in the Southeast Portland storage pool a day earlier.
City leaders said they were going ahead with plans to drain the water in Reservoir 5 to ensure no health risks to Portland water customers. The decision to empty and clean the reservoir has drawn mention of Portland -- much of it disbelieving or out-and-out derisive -- by national and international news media.
The chief point of contention: Reservoir 5 can hold up to 50 million gallons of water. The typical adult human bladder can hold two or so cups of urine. So the possibility someone getting sick because of Wednesday morning’s incident is, as Water Bureau officials acknowledge, slight at best.
“From a public health protection standpoint, it’s not necessary to get rid of the water,” said Anna Harding, co-director of the School of Biological and Population Health Sciences at Oregon State University. “The urine, which has very few microorganisms to begin with, would be very, very, very, very diluted.”
Still, city officials say, any risk is too much.
“The professionals told me this is the way to go. I’m following their advice. We’ve got plenty of water, so we will go ahead and take the safest course,” said City Commissioner Nick Fish, who oversees the utility. “People can feel free to second guess, but this is not a debate. This is the best public health decision.”
The second-guessing came from far and wide Thursday, including the leading advocate of a May ballot measure to switch control of the city’s water away from the City Council to an independently elected water district board.
Kent Craford, a former lobbyist for large industrial water customers and co-petitioner of the ballot measure, said he thinks flushing 38 million gallons is a bad idea.
“It’s a public relations decision," he said. "I wouldn’t waste all that water, all that money.”
Craford would not speculate whether the water board he’s proposing would feel the same.
“That would be up to the board, up to the managers,” he said. “Our belief is that a water district board will make better decisions than the City Council, and that they would ensure better management than what we have right now.”
The debate about dumping or keeping the water is uniquely Portland with roots in the city’s multi-year battle against new federal mandates on open-air reservoirs. Portland leaders opted to stop fighting last year, and Mt. Tabor’s open reservoir system must be disconnected from the city water system by the end of 2015. The open-air reservoir at Washington Park must go offline by the end of 2016.
“Politics had no impact on our decision in this case,” Fish said. “But this is Mt. Tabor and the reservoirs, and everything that happens up there is evaluated through a political prism. I know people are going to second guess. That’s their right.”
-- Anna Griffin
||||| Update: Kavanaugh and Vocativ are now reporting that the paperwork on this case lists an incorrect last name for the man accused of urinating in the reservoir. His name is Dallas Swonger.
Dallas Delynn says he didn’t urinate in Portland’s drinking supply, but rather on a wall next to it.
The 18-year-old caught on video hanging around the Mt. Tabor Reservoir system early Wednesday morning has granted his first interview to the online news magazine Vocativ.
In the free-flowing, profanity-laced conversation with former Oregonian reporter Shane Dixon Kavanaugh, Delynn said he did not urinate in the water:
“Everybody thinks it’s funny and a joke and I’m going to be on the news,” he says, flicking the cigarette butt into a nearby bush. “It’s no … joke, dude. I don’t want people thinkin’ that Dallas is dumb ass because he pissed in the … water. In our drinking water. Yeah, that’s … awesome. I mean, wouldn’t you be pissed about that?”
Instead, Delynn said he urinated on the wall next to Reservoir 5.
Delynn and two friends were given written citations for trespassing – Delynn also was written up for urinating somewhere other than a park bathroom – and barred from Mt. Tabor for 30 days. Portland Water Bureau officials are working with the Multnomah County District Attorney to determine whether there are criminal charges to be filed.
Delynn also told Kavanaugh he thinks it's silly to flush 38 million gallons of water:
"Like, how they can do that?” says Delynn. “How can they be like, ‘Yeah, we’re gonna flush all that water.’ Dude, I’ve seen dead birds in there. During the summer time I’ve see hella dead animals in there. ... I mean, really, dude?”
|||||
Dallas Swonger wants the world to just know one thing.
“I didn’t piss in the fucking water,” he says, pulling a drag off a Newport cigarette.
Dallas Swonger
The Portland teen is in the hot seat after surveillance video supposedly captured him taking a leak in a city reservoir early Wednesday morning, prompting officials to flush 38 million gallons of drinking water down the drain.
For those more visually inclined, that’s enough H20 to fill about 57 Olympic-size swimming pools. Or 304 million tallboy cans of Pabst Blue Ribbon.
“Yeah, it’s fucking retarded dude,” Swonger says.
In an exclusive, expletive-filled interview with Vocativ outside his mother’s home Thursday, the 18-year-old insisted that his piss never trickled into Portland’s drinking supply. He also lamented the looming reality that this story will make him a national (and international) laughing stock.
“Everybody thinks it’s funny and a joke and I’m going to be on the news,” he says, flicking the cigarette butt into a nearby bush. “It’s no fuckin’ joke, dude. I don’t want people thinkin’ that Dallas is a dumb ass because he pissed in the fuckin’ water. In our drinking water. Yeah, that’s fucking awesome. I mean, wouldn’t you be pissed about that?”
The night that launched the whiz-seen-round-the-world had started off on a more feel-good note for Swonger. He says he had moved back to town that very day from St. Helens, which is 30 miles north of Portland, where he had been living with his dad. Eager to shred with some friends, he and two buddies went to skateboard at Mount Tabor Park after hours, which is home to three of the city’s five uncovered drinking water reservoirs – and a handful of excellent hill runs. After bombing down the park’s western slope, nature began to call Swonger. It was around 1 a.m. and the three friends, along with two other people they met in the park, were near one of the reservoirs.
“I was like, ‘Dudes I have to piss so bad,’” he says. “So I just went over to the wall [of the reservoir].”
“I leaned up against the wall and pissed on it,” he says. “Right there on the wall, dude. I don’t know else how to describe it.”
Water Bureau officials, however, insist Swonger took a leek in the drink. “When you see the video, he’s leaning right up because he has to get his little wee wee right up to the iron bars,” bureau administrator Davd Shaff told the Oregonian. “There’s really no doubt what he’s doing.”
Water Bureau security and Portland Police officers later stopped Swonger and his two friends, identified as Trey McDaniel and Daniel McDonald, and cited all three with trespassing. Swonger was also cited for public urination.
While human pee is not a health hazard – and scores of animals piss, shit and die in Mount Tabor’s reservoirs every year – the city says it will dump a total of 38 million gallons of water, even though test results on Thursday showed no signs of water contamination.
“Like, how they can do that?” says Swonger. “How can they be like, ‘Yeah, we’re gonna flush all that water.’ Dude, I’ve seen dead birds in there. During the summer time I’ve see hella dead animals in there. Like dead squirrels and shit. I mean, really, dude?”
Yes, really. In 2011, city officials flushed 7.8 million gallons of reservoir water from Mount Tabor after another man decided to unzip and rip. The Water Bureau also says that it intends to pursue additional charges against Swonger.
Mount Tabor Reservoir: The city is flushing 38 million gallons of drinking water down the drain because it says Dallas peed in the open reservoir. REUTERS/Steve Dipaola
The whole ordeal has Swonger pretty rattled. “Dallas is really bummed out about all of it,” says his skateboard buddy McDonald, who we reached by phone on Thursday. “He’s a really good guy at heart. He just doesn’t make the best decisions. Honestly, he has the potential to do really good.”
As Swonger stood outside his family’s yellow, single-story house talking to a reporter, his mother suddenly opened the front door. “Dallas, don’t do anything stupid,” she says, ushering him indoors. She adds: “I’m sorry, he just graduated from high school. He’s trying to get his stuff together.”
Swonger stops at the front door and turns around. “Sorry, dude,” he says. “I don’t know, dude. I don’t know what’s going on.” | – The Portland teen accused of peeing in a city reservoir on Wednesday insists he didn't do it—in a relatively NSFW defense. "Yeah, it's f---ing retarded, dude," 18-year-old Dallas Swonger tells Vocativ in what the site calls an "expletive-filled interview" given as Swonger smoked a Newport cigarette. "I didn't piss in the f---ing water." He explains that he did urinate, after a night of skateboarding at Mount Tabor Park, but he did so against the wall of the reservoir, not into the reservoir. "I was like, 'Dudes I have to piss so bad.' So I just went over to the wall. I leaned up against the wall and pissed on it. Right there on the wall, dude. I don’t know else how to describe it." Officials beg to differ (a Water Bureau official got very specific about it, saying that surveillance video showed Swonger making sure "to get his little wee wee right up to the iron bars"), and thus decided to dump 38 million gallons of water, but Swonger notes that even if his urine had made it into the water, he doesn't see what the big deal is. "Dude, I’ve seen dead birds in there. During the summer time I've see hella dead animals in there. Like dead squirrels and s---. I mean, really, dude?" Vocativ also got amusing quotes from Swonger's mom ("I’m sorry, he just graduated from high school. He’s trying to get his stuff together") and one of the friends skateboarding with him that night ("He just doesn’t make the best decisions. Honestly, he has the potential to do really good"). Possible criminal charges are still pending, the Oregonian notes. The paper also reports that the water tested clean of urine-related toxins, but all 38 million gallons will still be dumped. |
Library of VirginiaArchive-It Partner Since: Sep, 2005Organization Type: State Archives & LibrariesOrganization URL: http://www.lva.virginia.gov The Library of Virginia serves as the Commonwealth's archival agency, the reference library at the seat of government, and as one of the nation's premier research institutions for Virginia history, politics and culture. The library holdings attract researchers from across the country and worldwide to their Richmond location and to their digital resources available on the web. ||||| . . . millions are being spent SMS messaging campaigns. Mobile marketing is becoming increasingly integral advertising tool for small businesses to find new and exciting ways to reach current and potential customers. ||||| Tweet with a location
You can add location information to your Tweets, such as your city or precise location, from the web and via third-party applications. You always have the option to delete your Tweet location history. Learn more | – "They just ran me over, bro." Those words are echoing across social media today after a Border Patrol vehicle was caught on video apparently striking a Native American man and driving away, the New York Times reports. Shot by the man on his phone, the video shows him approaching the SUV on a dirt road in Tohono O'odham Nation, roughly 60 miles southwest of Tucson, Arizona. Instead of slowing or stopping, the vehicle knocks him over. Paulo Remes says he was bruised and taken to hospital, the Arizona Daily Star reports. "I'm doing all right, I'm just a little sore, really," he says. The 34-year-old says he noticed the SUV and walked onto the road, figuring he knew what would happen. "I ran into the dirt road in front of my house, because I know they’ll try and hit me," says Remes. "I think he saw me on the landline and didn’t think I was recording." The FBI, the US Attorney's Office, and the tribe's police department are now investigating. And Indivisible Tohono, an organization that sheds light on border policies, is posting the video on Facebook and Twitter. "This is an example of the fear O’odham have to face everyday because BP ravage our communities & are careless with our lives," the group says in a tweet. Tensions have risen since tribal leaders opposed letting President Trump build a border wall there, and the land became a transit hub for drug traffickers and illegal immigrants. |
The device was unintentionally detonated by a bomb squad robot
The backpack was found in a garbage can in a nearby restaurant
FBI agents are reviewing surveillance footage
After a suspension, transit service has resumed
Explosion follows 2 other nearby weekend incidents
FBI questioning 5 people about N.Y. explosion Saturday
And Elizabeth man named as suspect in N.Y. case taken into custody
ELIZABETH -- An improvised explosive device in a backpack detonated near the Elizabeth train station early Monday as authorities were using a bomb robot to examine the item, officials said.
The blast occurred around 12:40 a.m. near Morris Avenue and Julian Place. The explosion was not a controlled blast, but happened unintentionally as the robot was cutting the device, according to Mayor Christian Bollwage. No one was injured in the blast, Bollwage said.
Authorities found five devices inside a single backpack near the train station, including one that was detonated. After the explosion, press and bystanders were moved back because the four other explosive devices inside of the backpack were still believed to be live, Bollwage said.
No other explosions were heard as of 5 a.m.
On Twitter, the FBI's Newark division described the devices as "multiple improvised explosive devices."
Earlier Sunday night, the FBI detained five people in Brooklyn for questioning related to the Saturday night explosion in Manhattan that injured more than two dozen people.
The Elizabeth incident unfolded after two men found the backpack in a waste basket on North Broad Street and Julian Place around 8 p.m. Sunday, the mayor said.
The men took the backpack "because they thought it was of some value," walked for a bit, then saw wires and a pipe, dropped the package and notified Elizabeth police, he said.
Bollwage told reporters the explosives were originally found in the trash can about 300 feet from the door of Willy's Place near the train station in the city of about 125,000, which is also the Union County seat.
"If that pub was crowded and there was a lot of people there, it could have severely injured, killed and maimed many, many people," Bollwage told reporters.
Bollwage said the Elizabeth devices did not contain a cell phone or any other electronic detonators.
After the items were found, Union County's Bomb Squad was called in and used a drone to examine the backpack, the mayor said.
"The drone indicated it could be suspicious and it could be a live bomb," Bollwage said.
When asked if he ever thought Elizabeth would be the target of such an attack, Bollwage said he was not sure the city was the intended target and that the devices could have instead been dumped by a person who realized he or she was being investigated.
"I'm not willing to admit Elizabeth is a terror target," Bollwage said. "Because of the location, it's very possible someone was trying to get rid of package as opposed to set it off."
Bollwage said FBI agents are reviewing surveillance footage from the restaurant near the trash can where the backpack was first found by the two men.
Reached after midnight on Monday morning, a spokesman for the FBI in Newark, Special Agent Michael Whitaker, said only that his agency had responded to the scene, and declined to provide any details of the investigation.
The FBI asked anyone with information to call 1-800-CALL-FBI.
Police cordoned off the station and many streets surrounding it. The investigation halted train service on the busy Northeast Corridor and North Jersey Coastline commuter rail lines. Later, officials said service would resume at 5:30 Monday, with delays expected.
Tickets and passes on both rail lines are being cross-honored on PATH along with NJ Transit and private buses, according to the transit agency.
Amtrak service was also suspended near Elizabeth, spokesman Craig Schulz said in a statement.
"We apologize to our customers for the inconvenience and will resume service as soon as it is safe to do so," the spokesman said.
Approximately 2,400 Amtrak passengers were impacted by the service suspension, the spokesman said.
"Robust security measures are in place at stations, on trains and along the tracks and Amtrak Police remain in close contact with local, state and federal partner agencies to coordinate and share intelligence information," the statement said. "At this time there are no specific or credible threats against Amtrak."
It was not immediately clear if the Elizabeth incident was linked to a bombing Saturday night in New York City that injured 29 people or another pipe-bomb style device that went off near a military charity race in Seaside Park also on Saturday.
BREAKING PHOTO: blast near Elizabeth NJ train station as bomb techs try to disarm device. Video soon. @PIX11News pic.twitter.com/doX6PgktXw -- Anthony DiLorenzo (@ADiLorenzoTV) September 19, 2016
Bomb techs from the FBI, Union County, & the New Jersey State Police have arrived on the scene and are now rendering the area safe -- FBI Newark (@FBINewark) September 19, 2016
This post will be updated as more information becomes available.
Steve Strunsky and Tom Haydon contributed to this report.
Jessica Remo may be reached at jremo@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @JessicaRemoNJ. Find NJ.com on Facebook.
Noah Cohen may be reached at ncohen@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @noahyc. Find NJ.com on Facebook. ||||| NEW YORK - New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said Sunday that residents of the city would see an expanded presence of police as officials investigate a bombing in Chelsea that injured 29, while guarding the United Nations General Assembly, which draws leaders from around the world to New York each year.
“You will see a very substantial NYPD presence this week, bigger than ever,” de Blasio said during a press conference just after noon Sunday.
De Blasio said all 29 victims of the explosion, which rocked a crowded and popular Manhattan neighborhood, have been released from area hospitals. Another possibly-explosive device discovered blocks away was safely removed early Sunday.
Sources told CBS New York Sunday evening that the FBI made a car stop on the Belt Parkway near the Verrzano Bridge. There are several people in custody. It’s unknown the reasons for the car stop or whether its in regards to Chelsea.
The FBI said in a statement that at 8:45 p.m., the FBI and NYPD conducted a traffic stop of a vehicle of interest in the investigation into Saturday’s bombing in Manhattan. No one has been charged with any crime. The investigation is continuing.
Officials said there’s no evidence currently linking the explosion to terrorism, and said the incident appeared to be unrelated to a pipe bomb explosion earlier Saturday in Seaside Park, New Jersey near the start line of a charity run.
“We know from everything we’ve seen so far that this was an intentional act. Again we do not know the nature of it, we do not know the motivation,” de Blasio said.
At a press conference earlier on Sunday morning, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said he had spoken with New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, and so far the explosives did not appear to be similar.
Atlhough Cuomo on Sunday referred to the explosion as an act of “terrorism,” NYPD, FBI and other NYC officials were hesitant to use the phrase until a suspect or motive could be established.
In an appearance on CBS’ “Face the Nation,” Rep. Peter King, R- N.Y., said it could still well turnout to be a terrorist act.
“We had the Times Square bombing back in New York in 2011,” King said. “It took several days before we realized that that was coming out of the Taliban and Pakistan.”
Roselyn Olivares, who lives on 23rd Street between Sixth and Seventh avenues, said the blast did damage to her fourth floor apartment.
“My bedroom window was blown out,” she told 1010 WINS Radio. “We didn’t know what it was.”
During the U.N. General Assembly, New York typically increases police presence, but officials said Sunday law enforcement would be on particularly high alert in the city this week, as a result of the explosion.
Cuomo said 1,000 additional law enforcement officers were being deployed after the Saturday night blast in Chelsea, a primarily residential neighborhood on Manhattan’s west side that’s known for its art galleries and large gay population.
Stephane Dujarric, Spokesman for the U.N. Secretary General, told CBS News’ Pamela Falk that more than 14,000 passes have been issued for dignitaries, their aides, and additional press for the U.N. General Assembly this year.
“Security inside the United Nations is being assessed on a constant basis. Outside of the UN, security is the responsibility of the host country. We receive great cooperation and appreciate the support from the federal authorities and the NYPD throughout the year, and especially during the General Assembly to keep staff, delegates and visitors safe,” Dujarric said.
It was unclear who was behind the blasts in New York and New Jersey, and what motivated them. A law enforcement source tells CBS News senior investigative producer Pat Milton that while no suspect nor motive has been established, terrorism has not definitively been ruled out as a possibility.
The second device that officers investigated four blocks from the Chelsea scene was a pressure cooker with a cellphone and wires attached, and was found in a plastic bag. The device was removed with a robot and taken to a department firing range in the Bronx.
An NYPD official tells CBS News they were successfully able to pull the device apart. They did not have to blow it up.
Two law enforcement sources tell CBS News the device that exploded appears to also have been a pressure cooker bomb. One source said officials believe it was set off with a cellphone signal.
New York Police Commissioner James O’Neill said at Sunday afternoon press conference that a bomb squad was still investigating the device.
Authorities have one person on surveillance video seen planting at least one of bombs in Manhattan, CBS News learned Sunday night. This individual has not been identified. Authorities stress that he may or may not be the person who did this, but it is a solid lead.
A source tells CBS News that they have not yet definitively made the connection between the blast in Chelsea, and the blast in Seaside. However, the source says both the Chelsea bombs and the Seaside Park bombs use cellphones as triggers.
The New York Times reports the second device appeared to be similar to the devices used in the Boston Marathon bombing.
Homemade pressure cooker bombs were used in the Boston Marathon attacks in 2013 that killed three people and injured more than 260.
The explosion that rocked a bustling Chelsea neighborhood appeared to have come from a construction toolbox in front of a building. Photos from the scene show a twisted and crumpled black metal box.
“This is a very dense area, the whole block is restaurants and residences and this area on a warm Saturday night is an area swarming with people,” New York City Councilman Cory Johnson told CBS New York.
The blast happened on West 23rd Street, in front of a residence for the blind, near a major thoroughfare with many restaurants and a Trader Joe’s supermarket. Witnesses said the explosion at about 8:30 p.m. blew out the windows of businesses and scattered debris in the area. Officials said no evacuations were necessary.
On Sunday, a team of five FBI agents searched an Uber driver’s vehicle that had been damaged in the Manhattan blast, ripping off the door panels inside as they examined it for evidence.
The driver, MD Alam, of Brooklyn, had just picked up three passengers and was driving along 23rd Street when the explosion occurred, shattering the car’s windows and leaving gaping holes in the rear passenger-side door.
“It was so loud,” the 32-year-old Alam said. “I was so scared. There was a loud boom and then smoke and I just drove away.”
Alam said he hit the gas and tried to take his passengers to their destination in Queens, but pulled over along Madison Avenue and 39th Street. He went to a local police precinct to file a report for his insurance company and police contacted the FBI.
New York City subway routes were affected by the explosion, which rattled some New Yorkers and visitors on the heels of the 15th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks. Cuomo said mass transit in the area would resume as early as Monday.
In Los Angeles, Police Chief Charlie Beck asked Emmys attendees to remain vigilant in the wake of explosions in New York City and New Jersey. Beck said there were no known credible threats to security in Los Angeles, but those attending Sunday’s Emmys in downtown Los Angeles were asked to report any suspicious activity. ||||| ELIZABETH, N.J. (AP) — A suspicious device found in a trash can near a New Jersey train station exploded early Monday as a bomb squad was attempting to disarm it with a robot, officials said.
Elizabeth Mayor Christian Bollwage said that the FBI was working to disarm one of five devices found in the same bag, which was discovered in a trash can by two men around 8:30 p.m. Sunday, near the Elizabeth train station on New Jersey Transit's Northeast Corridor rail line. The men had reported seeing wires and a pipe coming out of the package, Bollwage said.
There was no immediate report of injuries or damage. A message left with the FBI wasn't immediately returned. The mayor warned that other explosions were expected.
NJ Transit service was suspended early Monday between Newark Liberty Airport and Elizabeth, and New Jersey-bound Amtrak trains were being held at New York Penn Station, officials said, while New York-bound Amtrak trains were being held in Trenton.
Train passengers reported being stuck on Amtrak and NJ Transit trains for hours Sunday night, while some trains moved in reverse to let passengers off at other stations. Amtrak said 2,400 passengers were affected and that trains were being brought into other stations for people to get other transportation. It wasn't clear when the Elizabeth station would be open, a threat to cause major issues on the Monday morning commute into New York.
The discovery of the suspicious package comes a day after an explosion in Manhattan injured 29 people, and an unexploded pressure-cooker device was found four blocks away. Also Saturday, a pipe bomb exploded about an hour from the Elizabeth train station in Seaside Park, New Jersey, forcing the cancellation of a military charity 5K run. Officials said it didn't appear that those two incidents were connected, though they weren't ruling anything out.
Investigators didn't immediately comment on whether they thought the Elizabeth incident was connected to either of the two blasts.
Bollwage said that he wasn't willing to say that Elizabeth had become a target, and that it was possible that someone worried about the authorities was trying to get rid of the package.
"I'm extremely concerned for the residents of the community, but more importantly extremely concerned for everyone in the state and country where someone can just go and drop a backpack into a garbage can that has multiple explosives in it with no timers and then you have to wonder how many people could have been hurt," Bollwage said.
___
This story has been corrected to show that the bag was found around 8:30 p.m., not 9:30 p.m. ||||| The discovery of a bag containing explosive devices near a train station in Elizabeth was causing big headaches for commuters. NJ Transit service was partially suspended and Amtrak trains weren't able to travel from New York Penn Station to Newark Penn Station. Checkey Beckford reports. (Published Monday, Sept. 19, 2016)
What to Know Five people were taken into custody by the FBI Sunday for questioning after a traffic stop on the Verrazano Bridge
As that was happening, a suspicious package was discovered at the Elizabeth train station in New Jersey
Trains were halted between EWR and Elizabeth, halting traffic on the busy North East Corridor ahead of the morning rush
Commuting will be a struggle Monday for thousands of NJ Transit and Amtrak commuters as authorities continue their investigations into a series of explosions and incendiary devices in New York City and New Jersey over the weekend.
New Jersey Transit warned trains on multiple lines were subject to delays of up to an hour amid the ongoing police investigation.
Service on all Northeast Corridor and North Jersey Coast lines resumed Monday morning. It had been suspended in both directions late Sunday night after a device found inside a bag near the NJ Transit station in Elizabeth, New Jersey, exploded.
NJ Transit said commuters should expect residual delays and service changes as the investigation in Elizabeth continues.
All New Jersey-bound Amtrak trains were also held at New York Penn Station after the bag was discovered in Elizabeth, hampering travel on the busy North East Corridor. Trains began moving out of New York Penn around 5:30 a.m.
Amtrak said that Acela Express, Northeast Regional and other services will operate Monday with some schedule modifications. The railroad service said that passengers should expect cancellations and delays throughout the day.
In Manhattan, West 23rd Street between Sixth and Seventh avenues reopened by 9 p.m. Monday after police spent the weekend investigating the blast there. Other roads that were initially closed for the investigation -- including parts of Sixth Avenue, Seventh Avenue, and West 14th to West 23rd streets -- were reopened earlier.
PATH trains are skipping 23rd Street in Manhattan. PATH will cross-honor NJT passengers at NWK, HOB, WTC and 33rd Street stations.
The 1 train has resumed making normal stops at its 23rd and 28th street stations, though the northeast stairway at the 23rd Street station remains closed, according to @NYCTSubway. The E and F trains are also stopping again at 23rd Street stations.
Due to the 23rd Street closure, MTA buses M5, M7, M23 and X1 are detoured in both directions.
The news of the suspicious bag at the Elizabeth station in New Jersey was first reported late Sunday night, around the same time that the FBI said it had taken five people from Elizabeth, New Jersey into custody for questioning after a traffic stop on the Verrazano Bridge.
The FBI confirmed that the 8:45 p.m. Verrazano traffic stop was part of an investigation into Saturday's bombing in Manhattan that injured 29 people. None of them have been charged with a crime and the investigation is ongoing.
The devices in Elizabeth apparently looked similar to what detonated in Seaside Park, New Jersey, on Saturday morning ahead of a race. No one was injured in the Seaside Park explosion.
Hunt for Clues in 'Intentional' Chelsea Explosion ||||| NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. authorities on Wednesday were looking into whether an Afghan-born American citizen charged with carrying out bombings in New York and New Jersey acted alone or had help as the city’s top federal public defender sought access to the suspect.
Police in New York City said they had not yet been permitted by doctors to speak to Ahmad Khan Rahami, 28, who was arrested on Monday after being wounded in a gunfight with police in Linden, New Jersey.
Rahami has been charged with wounding 31 people in a bombing in New York on Saturday that authorities called a “terrorist act.”
The Federal Bureau of Investigation released a photo of two men who found a second, unexploded pressure cooker device they say Rahami left in a piece of luggage in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood on Saturday night.
The two men, who took the bag but left the improvised bomb on the street are not suspects, officials said, but investigators want to interview them as witnesses.
“As far as whether he’s a lone actor, that’s still the path we are following, but we are keeping all the options open,” William Sweeney, the FBI’s assistant director in New York, told reporters.
Rahami is also charged with planting a bomb that exploded in Seaside Park, New Jersey, but did not injure anyone and planting explosive devices in his hometown of Elizabeth, New Jersey, which did not detonate. He faces charges from federal prosecutors in both states.
Federal prosecutors portray Rahami, who came to the United States at age 7 and became a naturalized citizen, as embracing militant Islamic views, begging for martyrdom and expressing outrage at the U.S. “slaughter” of Muslim fighters in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and Palestine.
Investigators were also probing Rahami’s history of travel to Afghanistan and Pakistan, and looking for evidence that he may have picked up radical views or trained in bomb-making.
Both government and pro-Taliban sources in Pakistan on Wednesday said they had no knowledge of Rahami having met with prominent people connected to the Taliban or other religious groups.
Prosecutors plan to move Rahami to New York from the New Jersey hospital where he is being treated as soon as his medical condition allows, said Preet Bharara, the U.S. attorney in Manhattan.
Policemen place in an ambulance a man they identified as Ahmad Khan Rahami, who is wanted for questioning in connection with an explosion in New York City, in Linden, New Jersey, in this still image taken from video September 19, 2016. REUTERS/Anthony Genaro
DEFENSE LAWYER DEMANDS COURT APPEARANCE
Rahami’s wife met with U.S. law enforcement officials while in the United Arab Emirates and voluntarily gave a statement, a law enforcement official said on Wednesday. She was not in custody.
A New Jersey U.S. congressman previously said Rahami had emailed his office in 2014 for help in getting her a visa to enter the United States from Pakistan when she was pregnant.
Rahami’s defense attorney, David Patton, on Wednesday demanded that his first court appearance to be scheduled as soon as possible, even if it occurs in his hospital bed, saying that the defendant had a constitutional right to a lawyer and a court appearance within two days of his arrest.
New York Police Commissioner James O’Neill told a news conference that investigators had not yet received doctors’ clearance to interview Rahami, adding, “That may happen in the next 24 hours, pending the doctors’ approval.”
Federal prosecutors in New York noted that while they had filed charges against Rahami, he remained in the custody of state officials in New Jersey, who initially arrested him after Monday’s gunfight. They said that makes Patton’s request for access premature.
Patton, in a subsequent filing, shot back that such delays were unacceptable.
“Mr. Rahami was arrested more than 48 hours ago. His bail in New Jersey was set without any appointment of counsel or court appearance. He still has not been provided counsel. He does not have a scheduled court appearance in New Jersey until next week,” Patton said.
Slideshow (21 Images)
The attacks in New York and New Jersey were the latest in a series in the United States inspired by Islamic militant groups including al Qaeda and Islamic State. A pair of ethnic Chechen brothers killed three people and injured more than 260 at the 2013 Boston Marathon with homemade pressure-cooker bombs similar to those used in this weekend’s attacks.
Rahami, in other parts of a journal that prosecutors said he was carrying when he was arrested, praised “Brother” Osama bin Laden, the al Qaeda leader slain in a 2011 U.S. raid in Pakistan; Anwar al-Awlaki, an American-born Muslim cleric and leading al Qaeda propagandist who was killed in a 2011 U.S. drone strike in Yemen; and Nidal Hasan, the U.S. Army psychiatrist who shot dead 13 people and wounded 32 at Fort Hood, Texas, in 2009.
Republican Rep. Michael McCaul, house Homeland Security Committee chairman, told CNN that Rahami’s writings in a journal showed that his actions had been inspired by Islamic State as “his guidance came from the lead ISIS spokesman.”
“What that tells me as a counterterrorism expert that now we can definitively say this was an ISIS-inspired terrorist attack.” ||||| (CNN) Three attacks in 12 hours -- explosions on New York and New Jersey streets and a stabbing spree in a Minnesota mall -- combined for tumultuous weekend, afflicting injury and moments of alarm and leaving investigators scrambling for answers.
As Monday's sunrise approached, New York City ramped up security not only because of the bombing that injured 29 people in Manhattan and the discovery of a mysterious device blocks away, but also because world leaders are gathering at the United Nations for debate at the General Assembly.
Questions abounded about Saturday's incidents, including: What, exactly, were the motives?
There were hints in the Minnesota attack, with ISIS claiming that a man who injured nine people in stabbings in St. Cloud before an off-duty police officer killed him was a "soldier of the Islamic State," though there was no immediate evidence he'd had contact with the terror group.
A recap of the three incidents, all of which authorities said were being investigated as possible terror acts:
• Around 9:30 a.m. in Seaside Park, New Jersey, one of three pipe-bomb-type devices that were wired together detonated in a garbage can, tearing apart the container but injuring no one; the other two didn't explode, federal law enforcement officials said.
Officials said the blast probably was timed to disrupt a Marine Corps charity run, but no one was near the blast because registration problems delayed the race. Officials said the device had a cell phone as a timer; no one has claimed responsibility.
• Around 8:30 p.m. in Manhattan's Chelsea neighborhood, an explosion rocked 23rd Street and 6th Avenue, injuring 29 people and sending panicked people scrambling for cover. A law enforcement source said it came from a device planted in or near a dumpster.
Investigators found an intact pressure cooker blocks away. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said the pressure cooker and the exploded device in Chelsea were similar, and other officials said both devices had cell phones as apparent timers. No one has claimed responsibility. Investigators found similarities between the explosives used in both states, according to multiple law enforcement officials, but authorities said they have not concluded the incidents are linked.
• About 9 p.m. ET (8 p.m. CT) in St. Cloud, Minnesota, a man wearing a security uniform entered Crossroads mall, made a reference to Allah and stabbed nine people before an off-duty police officer shot him dead, police said. He asked at least one person whether he or she was a Muslim before he attacked, witnesses said.
JUST WATCHED Mayor: Off-duty officer who shot attacker a hero Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Mayor: Off-duty officer who shot attacker a hero 01:18
Police did not immediately release the attacker's name, and CNN hasn't independently verified ISIS' claim that he was linked to the group. St. Cloud's police chief said investigators were "trying to get to the bottom of his motivations." No official has suggested ties between the mall attack and the explosions in New Jersey and New York.
NYC police presence 'bigger than ever'
New Yorkers already were going to see a big police presence in the city because of the 71st session of the UN General Assembly, about a 2-mile drive from the Chelsea blast site.
An explosion in New York City injured 29.
But Saturday's explosion means the police presence will be even more intense, Mayor Bill de Blasio said Sunday.
"You should know you will see a very substantial NYPD presence this week -- bigger than ever," he said
And Cuomo said 1,000 additional New York State Police officers and National Guard troops will be deployed to patrol bus terminals, airports and subway stations.
'This is a new era'
Saturday's incidents follow a few other mass attacks that happened on US soil in the past year, including the deadly December shootings in San Bernardino, California, and the deadly June shootings at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida. In both of those incidents, the attackers claimed an affinity for ISIS.
Threat of Islamist attacks alone has kept federal investigators busy -- the FBI has said that it is mounting 900 investigations of suspected Islamist militants in all 50 states. FBI Director James Comey said in July that ISIS terrorists may be dispersed in the West as the terror group loses territory in Iraq and Syria.
But Comey isn't worried just about Islamist terror threats.
"Our focus now is on a much more disparate threat that's hard to see -- unpredictable, motivated, and driven by people who are just disturbed," he said in an interview posted Friday on the FBI's website.
New York isn't the only metropolis to take notice of Saturday's attacks. On the other coast, Los Angeles' police were gearing up for two high-profile events Sunday: the Emmy Awards and the Los Angeles Rams' first home game since their return from two decades in St. Louis.
"As you wake up this morning to the troubling events in New York and New Jersey, please rest assured we have been monitoring the situation throughout the night," Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck said in a statement released on Twitter. He said police had taken steps to ensure the Emmys and the football game would be safe, and asked people to be vigilant. Both events took place without incident.
US Rep. Charlie Rangel, a Democrat who represents Manhattan, told CNN that Saturday's attacks -- and a level of vigilance needed to combat them -- represent "a new norm."
"This is a new era, and everyone just has to be alert," he said Sunday.
Photos: Explosion in Manhattan New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, right, and New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, second right, look over the mangled remains of a dumpster Sunday, September 18, in New York's Chelsea neighborhood. An explosion injured 29 people there the night before. Hide Caption 1 of 21 Photos: Explosion in Manhattan Authorities believe the blast was caused by an explosive device in or near this dumpster. All 29 victims have been released from hospitals, according to the governor. Hide Caption 2 of 21 Photos: Explosion in Manhattan FBI agents review the scene of the explosion on Sunday morning. Hide Caption 3 of 21 Photos: Explosion in Manhattan Police officers redirect passers-by as investigations continue early on Sunday morning. Hide Caption 4 of 21 Photos: Explosion in Manhattan A fire truck at the scene of the blast on Saturday. Hide Caption 5 of 21 Photos: Explosion in Manhattan The New York Police Department's Counterterrorism Bureau tweeted this image of the crumpled dumpster following the explosion in Chelsea. Hide Caption 6 of 21 Photos: Explosion in Manhattan Just blocks away from the explosion, a suspicious device was found. Officials said the device appeared to be a pressure cooker with dark-colored wiring protruding, connected by silver duct tape to what appeared to be a cell phone. Hide Caption 7 of 21 Photos: Explosion in Manhattan De Blasio, in the blue tie, speaks at a news conference near the scene on Saturday. He was joined by New York Police Commissioner James O'Neill. Hide Caption 8 of 21 Photos: Explosion in Manhattan Police block off a road near the site of the explosion. Hide Caption 9 of 21 Photos: Explosion in Manhattan Firefighters and emergency workers gather at the scene. Hide Caption 10 of 21 Photos: Explosion in Manhattan Police officers and firefighters respond to the scene. Hide Caption 11 of 21 Photos: Explosion in Manhattan A New York police officer and his dog check a garbage can close to the scene of the explosion. Hide Caption 12 of 21 Photos: Explosion in Manhattan Two heavily armed police officers survey the scene. Hide Caption 13 of 21 Photos: Explosion in Manhattan New York police at the scene of the explosion. Hide Caption 14 of 21 Photos: Explosion in Manhattan A bomb squad vehicle arrives at the scene. Hide Caption 15 of 21 Photos: Explosion in Manhattan Police arrive at the scene of the explosion. Hide Caption 16 of 21 Photos: Explosion in Manhattan A street is blocked off nearby. Hide Caption 17 of 21 Photos: Explosion in Manhattan Police and firefighters gather near the scene. Hide Caption 18 of 21 Photos: Explosion in Manhattan A crowd gathers near the site of the explosion. Hide Caption 19 of 21 Photos: Explosion in Manhattan A line of emergency vehicles near the scene of the explosion. Hide Caption 20 of 21 Photos: Explosion in Manhattan Onlookers gather on the street. Hide Caption 21 of 21
The off-duty police officer who killed the Minnesota attacker reflects that kind of alertness, CNN law enforcement analyst Art Roderick said
"No law enforcement officer believes they're ever off duty anymore," Roderick told CNN's Fredricka Whitfield. "I think everybody now just about carries a firearm when they're off duty from their regular law enforcement job."
In Elizabeth, New Jersey, federal and local authorities were called into action Sunday night to investigate the contents of a backpack found in a garbage can near a train trestle, according to Mayor Chris Bollwage. As a precaution, local rail and bus service was suspended.
After two men spotted the suspicious package, which had wires and a pipe but no apparent timing devices, they reported it to authorities. The FBI's bomb squad then deployed a robot to examine the devices. The suspicious package exploded after the bomb robot cut a wire in an effort to disarm the device.
Authorities do not know if the Elizabeth explosion has ties to the Chelsea bombing.
'The entire neighborhood is real scared'
Many in Chelsea were rattled by Saturday's bombing. Danilo Gabrielli, 50, was watching TV at his 23rd Street apartment about a block away from the explosion site when he heard the blast. He rushed to see what had happened and found a chaotic scene.
"We smelled something, like an intense sulfur smell, and saw smoke coming out of this building. I saw pieces of metal -- not large, but not small either. A few friends of mine saw glass there."
Gabrielli said "the entire neighborhood is real scared."
"It's a real quiet neighborhood -- not like the center of the city or the Wall Street area. It's tiny bars, where you go to grab a drink, grab a bite to eat, watch a film. We were worried."
'It's not stalling everybody that lives here'
Ryker Allen, 19, noticed the increased security presence in Manhattan. He woke up Sunday at his home in the Flatiron District, not far from the explosion, and saw "easily 100 police officers" meeting in front of his building.
He said the attack was unnerving, but people still were going about their business.
"I feel like it's something that's kind of hovering over, but it's not stalling everybody that lives here. It's not stopping anybody from getting their tasks done," he said.
Allen wasn't alone in taking it in stride.
For those trying to capitalize on the explosion: People aren't freaking out in Chelsea. People aren't in fear in the City. This in New York! — Ali H. Soufan (@Ali_H_Soufan) September 18, 2016
"For those trying to capitalize on the explosion: People aren't freaking out in Chelsea. People aren't in fear in the City," Ali H. Soufan's Twitter account read Saturday night. | – A bomb squad robot was destroyed and another had its arm blown off when one of five bombs found in a backpack near a New Jersey train station blew up early Monday. The FBI says the other four devices found will be encased in blastproof material and taken to the agency's headquarters for further investigation, the New York Times reports. The devices—which were discovered by two men who found the backpack on top of a garbage can outside a restaurant near the Elizabeth station—will be closely examined for evidence linking them to explosive devices found in New York City and elsewhere in New Jersey over the weekend. A round-up of coverage: Elizabeth Mayor Christian Bollwage says the two men thought the backpack held something of value and carried it some distance before realizing it held explosive devices and calling police, NJ.com. He says in its original location near a pub, the devices could have caused carnage. "If that pub was crowded and there was a lot of people there, it could have severely injured, killed and maimed many, many people," the mayor says. The AP reports that thousands of Amtrak and NJ Transit passengers were affected by the discovery of the device, with some stuck on trains for hours. Service has resumed but passengers in the area have been warned that they can expect delays Monday. NBC New York reports that investigators believe surveillance video shows the same man at two locations where explosive devices were found in Manhattan. Police aren't sure whether there is a link between the New York devices and those found in New Jersey. CNN reports that there is now an increased security presence in New York City not just because of the bombs, but because world leaders are gathering for the United Nations General Assembly. A law enforcement source tells CBS that investigators believe cell phones were used as triggers for both the Manhattan blast—which NY Gov. Andrew Cuomo calls "obviously an act of terrorism"—and the device that exploded before a New Jersey race to benefit Marines and sailors early Saturday. It's not clear whether a trigger was found with the Elizabeth devices. Bollwage says he's not sure his city was targeted. He suspects somebody may have just dumped the devices in Elizabeth, but he is "extremely concerned for everyone in the state and country where someone can just go and drop a backpack into a garbage can that has multiple explosives in it with no timers and then you have to wonder how many people could have been hurt." An official close to the investigation tells Reuters that all the devices involved have been crude and the level of planning appears low—but some investigators fear this was just a test. "That's what worries us," he says. "Was this some kind of test run, not just of the devices, but also of the surveillance in New York and the response?" (The FBI says it is questioning five people found in a "vehicle of interest.") |
The idea of a "sober January" has been around for as long as man has cursed his in-laws at Christmas. And while a month off the booze sounds like a seductive way to make up for all that hard-drinking festive excess, it’s actually a terrible idea, rooted in guilt rather than science. And for some people who actually have a real problem with alcohol, successfully completing a "sober January" can give the dangerous illusion that they don’t have a problem.
I should know. I was one of them. I speak not only as a veteran of many a sober January, but also as someone who was finally forced to admit that yes, they were an alcoholic, and had to stop drinking entirely. I have not had a drink for several years now. I don’t say this to boast, merely to put in context what follows.
I remember one hungover December morning telling a colleague at the magazine where I was working at the time that I was planning to stay off the drink for a month in the new year.
“Why on earth would you do that?” he replied. “A few drinks are the only thing that get you through January, it’s so bloody miserable.”
He wasn’t an addict, so he didn’t understand the allure of a sober January to someone who was – that the idea of getting obliterated over Christmas and New Year and then "white-knuckling" it for a month before picking up where you left off is deeply appealing to the classic all-or-nothing, getting-away-with-it mentality of the addict.
I managed several sober Januarys and they became an important weapon in my armoury of denial. Me, an alcoholic? Hardly! How could I manage to stay off drink for a month if I was?
I find it particularly depressing that this year, the idea of a dry January is being promoted by the UK’s biggest alcohol charity, the always well-intentioned Alcohol Concern. Although the charity is careful to state in small print at the bottom of its webpage that the challenge should "not be attempted by people with an alcohol dependency problem" unfortunately those are exactly the kind of people a promotion like this will attract. Year after year, the only mates that I could persuade to do a sober January with me were the ones who were as bad as or worse than me. The normals, like my co-worker, were never interested. Why would they be?
If you are worried about the amount you have been drinking, the answer is not to swear off drink for a month. The answer is to try and establish whether you do really have a problem. And the best way to do that, ironically enough, is to do some drinking.
This was the course of action recommended by Bill Wilson, the co-founder of the self-help movement Alcoholics Anonymous. Wilson believed that alcoholics suffer a kind of allergic reaction to alcohol, and that once they start drinking they develop an overwhelming craving for more. This craving, he thought, is only made worse by subsequent attempts to satisfy it with more drink, like an itch that gets worse the more you scratch it.
Wilson’s alcoholism test is remarkably simple, and does not involve any boxes to tick or medical examinations or liver function tests; it just requires a modicum of honesty.
“We do not like to pronounce any individual as alcoholic, but you can quickly diagnose yourself,” he wrote. “Step over to the nearest barroom and try some controlled drinking. Try to drink and stop abruptly. Try more than once. It will not take long for you to decide, if you are honest with yourself about it.”
So - unless your sole aim is to save cash - don't challenge yourself to a sober January. Anyone can do that. Try having a pint every night – but just one – if you really want to prove you don’t have a problem.
As my friend said all those years ago, January sucks - just look at the weather outside - and you normals should have all the help you can to get through it. ||||| Create an account for free access to:
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By joining you're accepting our terms and conditions. Please read our privacy policy and cookie policy. Once you have joined, you can update your communications preferences at any time. | – Thinking of giving up booze for the month after a hedonistic holiday season? Well, you might be an alcoholic making a big mistake, writes Tom Sykes at the Telegraph. As a recovering alcoholic, Sykes should know. "I managed several sober Januaries, and they became an important weapon in my armory of denial," he writes. A real alcoholic, after all, couldn't make it, he reasoned. But the truth is the ritual appeals deeply "to the classic all-or-nothing, getting-away-with-it mentality of the addict," while "normals" have no use for it. He advises instead trying to have just one drink a night—if stopping after one is difficult, you'll know you have a problem. But if you actually are a "normal," it turns out there might be some merit in the month-long detox. The staff at the New Scientist ran a small-scale test on themselves, and got some pretty astonishing results. Ten staffers laid off booze for five weeks, and saw their liver fat, blood glucose, and blood cholesterol levels all fall significantly—reducing their risk for liver disease, diabetes, and heart disease—while four staffers who kept drinking saw no changes. But it was a fairly limited experiment, offering no clue how long those effects will last. Heather Timmons at Quartz argues that such "detoxes" are "useless" in the long-term, since the body regularly clears out toxins all on its own. So instead, she recommends taking two or three consecutive days off from drinking each week, since it takes the liver a full day to recover from heavy drinking—plus, over the course of a year, that ensures as many as 150 alcohol-free days. |
The BBC's State Department Correspondent Kim Ghattas gets behind-the-scenes access to Hillary Clinton on a recent diplomatic trip overseas.
For Assignment the BBC's State Department Correspondent Kim Ghattas has gained rare behind-the-scenes access to one of Hillary Clinton's recent overseas trips.
Join her on "special air mission 883" as it heads from the US to the Middle East and Africa.
Expect surprising insights and unguarded moments with aides, officials and the special protection team as they try - and sometimes fail - to control the messy world around them.
Get up close and personal with the American Secretary of State in this week's Assignment. ||||| QUESTION: I know it’s a strange question, but may I ask you to start by introducing yourself to BBC listeners?
SECRETARY CLINTON: I am Hillary Rodham Clinton. I’m the 67th Secretary of State for the United States of America, serving in the Administration of President Barack Obama.
QUESTION: Okay. We’re in Dubai because we had a little problem with your plane.
SECRETARY CLINTON: Yes.
QUESTION: Now, what does that say – (laughter) – about American power, because it’s not the first time your plane breaks down?
SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, I think it says that we prioritize. So the President’s plane, Air Force One, is absolutely impeccable. Our fighter jets are the best in the world. Others of our Air Force are first-rate. But I think there’s a long line ahead of the plane that I’m in, which I share with the Vice President and other high officials. So we’ve had our ups and downs, as you might say, with this airplane.
QUESTION: On the other hand, you actually have an airplane that you can commandeer to go wherever you want when needed.
SECRETARY CLINTON: That’s exactly right. So I have no complaints. And if we were to just chart the hundreds of thousands of miles that I have traveled, the mechanical problems, or in the case of volcanic ash clouds or rocks on runways, have been relatively few.
QUESTION: Does the plane feel like a home away from home, an office with wings?
SECRETARY CLINTON: It feels like an office, not a home, because it is an office. It has secure communications, it has a very able civilian and military team, we get a lot of work done on the plane, but it’s a little challenging jet lag-wise, mileage, dehydration, all of the problems that come with spending a lot of time in the air. So I am always happy to be home once we finally land.
QUESTION: How do you handle jet lag? I mean, I travel with – I’ve traveled with you quite a bit, and at the end of the trips, I’m exhausted and I take a few days off. You go back to the office the next day. How do you do it? Do you do yoga, a special diet, what’s the secret?
SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, I sleep a lot on the plane. I know that some people think you should stay up for a certain period of time and not sleep on certain legs, but since I am perpetually tired, I figure make up for the lost hours of sleep while flying. Also, I know very simple things – drink a lot of water, deep breathing, try to get a little bit of sunshine if you can every day. But I don’t know that there’s any magic formula. Because I, too, often am tired; there’s no doubt about it. But I’m exhilarated at the same time. I love what we’re doing, I’m honored to represent our country everywhere we go, and I feel like we are making a difference. So that is enough to keep me going.
QUESTION: I want to take you back to our stop in Shannon when we were on our way here. You took me outside to talk to those two Irish guys. Tell me about them. You seemed to have a very nice conversation with them. Are they always there to welcome you when you land?
SECRETARY CLINTON: They work at the airport, so they and a few others are usually always there. They’re combination security and welcoming, and I have gotten to talk with them over the years, stopping, going from Shannon. And I love Ireland, so it was great because we were there while it was still light out, and actually, I had slept till about five minutes before we were going to take off again. So I wanted to get a little air and a little bit of sun, and they kindly accommodated me.
QUESTION: When we travel with you, we are in what is known apparently as the bubble. How would you describe the bubble?
SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, I don’t think of it so much as a bubble. I think of it as more of a caravan going from place to place, and sometimes the dogs bark, but we still move on. And it is for me a moveable adventure. No day is the same, in part because the places, the issues, the leaders, the people, the food are enough different still in our increasingly interconnected world that there’s always something new to see or hear about or discover. But it is true that when we’re traveling, we are focused on where we have been, are, and intend to go. So a lot of what happens back in the United States has to take second priority to what we are actually focused on. But there is no escaping the constant stream of paper, which is never ending. And I keep up with that on the road. So I don’t feel like I’m cut off in any way. I assume it would have been quite challenging, but such different times you would not maybe have noticed, 50 or 100 years ago when travel was much slower, communication was either so slow or nonexistent. So we live in this 24/7 media environment. So I’m always kept up to date, but I try to keep my attention on what we’re doing.
QUESTION: But do you ever wish you could break free of the caravan and go explore on your own? Where would you go?
SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, I do wish that, and I’ve been fortunate because I’ve traveled before this current job where I had the opportunity to explore, wander, walk anonymously, and even in –
QUESTION: Anonymously?
SECRETARY CLINTON: Anonymously in those days. (Laughter.) That was a long time ago. So I would have felt very sad if I hadn’t had that experience before I – before my husband was president, certainly before I was a first lady, a senator, or a secretary. I went to a lot of places, and that gave me a familiarity. But even on these trips in the last two and a half years or so, every once in a while I will go for a walk and just get away. I remember when we were in Wellington, New Zealand and we were on the water, and there was a great walkway. I walked for probably an hour, and it’s just so rejuvenating to me. It’s my favorite thing to do. So I don’t get enough time to do that, but I try to fit it in.
QUESTION: If I’m not mistaken, your Secret Service code when you were first lady was Evergreen, and it’s stayed. And in hindsight, it’s quite a fitting name – (laughter) – because you’ve renewed yourself, reinvented yourself so often and so well.
SECRETARY CLINTON: Apparently – well, apparently so. I had no choice. I was just given the name. My husband was Eagle. My daughter was Energy. And I think those are all fitting code names. But I have been lucky. I’ve been so fortunate to have been given these opportunities in my life over the course of a long time now. And I never take it for granted. I’m never complacent about it. I’m always energized by it because I think it’s important. I think the work that we’re trying to do, especially in this time of such tumultuous change, is going to set the template for the rest of this century.
QUESTION: It is a very tumultuous time in the Arab world and in many other places, and you have to meet a lot of leaders around the world. Some of them you like; some of them perhaps you like a little bit less. What is it like to have to shake hands with an autocrat, with somebody whose values you don’t really share? It can’t be easy to smile for the cameras all the time.
SECRETARY CLINTON: It isn’t, and I have had to do it quite a bit over the course of the last 20 years. But I try to remember why I’m there and why I’m doing it. The United States has relationships with every country just about. There are a few exceptions that we don’t, obviously, but we are everywhere in the world, and we have a great mission to protect our security and advance our interests and promote our values. We see that very clearly. So with some you can work on all three, and some you can work on two or one of the three, and we’re always looking for those moments. I also try to be sensitive to the historical, experiential, cultural, religious, social differences that exist that make life so intriguing on this planet we share. But there have been times when I have left a meeting or an encounter, and it’s been very difficult to smile for the cameras, as you say. But some of what you do you do because of the goal that you are trying to achieve. And you cannot get from point A to point B without working with leaders and regimes that you don’t have much in common with or, frankly, who you disagree rather significantly with.
QUESTION: When a foreign minister travels to a foreign country, they’re usually – they usually only get to meet their direct counterparts, the foreign minister of that country. When an American secretary of state travels, when you travel, you get to meet with presidents and kings. Why is that? What does it say about America?
SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, I think it says a lot about America and about our great reach and the relationships that we have. I also know many of these people from my prior incarnations, so I have personal relationships with them, which I have certainly called upon in this role. So I find it very helpful to meet with, as you say, kings, presidents, and prime ministers.
QUESTION: But they also open the doors to you.
SECRETARY CLINTON: Yes, they do.
QUESTION: They wouldn’t do that for the foreign minister of another country, for example.
SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, I can’t speak to that, but I know that because of my prior relationships, which are often on a long-standing personal basis, they would see me under any circumstances. They saw me when I was a senator, they saw me when I was a First Lady, so they continue to see me in my current role, and then I do think that as Secretary of State of the United States, there is a lot of business to be done, and some of that business is not only in the foreign ministry.
QUESTION: What’s your favorite story from your time – (laughter) – as a secretary of state?
SECRETARY CLINTON: Oh, my gosh, Kim. I have too many. I’ll probably save them for my next book if I ever get around to writing it, but there have been wonderful moments, and then there have been moments of high comedy and even some quite difficult times. But the few times when I really feel like we’re making a difference are the best times because for me it’s mostly about the work when I travel. I mean, I don’t try to think too much about what else is happening, and I haven’t had too many difficult experiences. So I’m not looking back on it and rolling my eyes or anything, but I think I’ll probably wait until I can really think that through. Certainly, the last time I was in South Africa, getting to see Nelson Mandela, which for me has always been important personally, was very gratifying because he’s an international treasure. But there’s too many stories to tell.
QUESTION: And what was your biggest challenge or your worst moment? I mean, we’ve been on some very interesting trips.
SECRETARY CLINTON: Yes, you have. I think that first trip to Asia was maybe one of the most consequential because there was a feeling in Asia that the United States had abandoned its role as a Pacific power, and that’s why I decided to go, but we did not know what would await us. And I heard a lot from the leaders there about our economic crisis, the global recession, whether the United States was going to remain a player in the region. So that very first trip for me was a real baptism by fire, so to speak.
QUESTION: You were practically mobbed by adoring fans, and you were greeted like a rock star everywhere. Two and a half years into your job, do you think people still look at you as a rock star, a celebrity, or do they see you more as part of the Obama Administration?
SECRETARY CLINTON: That’s a great question. I actually think it’s both. I mean, I was just walking through the mall here and had some young women come up and shout at me and tell me how much they appreciated me. And I think for young women and not so young women, there is a connection. They know that I’ve spent a lot of time working on women’s issues and they care about what I’m doing and what it might mean for them. So I still encounter that a lot. And so that’s kind of my independent role. But also as someone who ran against Barack Obama, and you’ve heard me say, ran very hard and didn’t make it, but then supported him and much to my amazement was asked to be Secretary of State. That is a very powerful story around the world.
I started telling that story on that first trip to Asia, and I could see people just nodding, little light bulbs of thinking and recognition going off about, oh yeah, that did happen there, and we have politics where basically we try to kill each other. And so people do see me connected with the Obama Administration. I often encounter very positive personal responses in the town halls, the townterviews kind of programs that we do, and then an interviewer or an audience member will mention President Obama’s name and people will break into applause. So I think there’s still a very good feeling about what the President and what this Administration are trying to do.
QUESTION: Do you ever wake up in the morning think, oh, I’m too tired to go to work today?
SECRETARY CLINTON: I really don’t. I wake up and say I’m tired so I better get up and get going. But no, every day is fascinating to me because I really don’t know what’s going to happen during the day. I am very aware of how much energy this takes because, clearly, it’s a nonstop marathon. But let me knock on wood here, I have been lucky with health, stamina, and all that goes with it. So no, I won’t lie to you. I’m tired. My friends call and email saying, “Oh, my gosh, I saw you on television. You looked so tired.” (Laughter.) Which I send back saying, “Gee, thanks a lot.” But I know, because if you work around the clock like we do, that’s just inevitable. So I do try to take some time, long weekends, take some deep breathing. I do exercise, yoga, those kinds of things. But no, I’m never tired about the work. It’s just the physical challenge.
QUESTION: You have an incredible amount of people you know around the world. You must have the biggest Rolodex in town. (Laughter.) How many contacts do you have in your Blackberry that you can just call up like that?
SECRETARY CLINTON: Oh, thousands. Really, thousands. And it’s the right kind of contacts, because they are people who have some connection with me.
QUESTION: Somebody’s calling you right now. (Laughter.)
SECRETARY CLINTON: Somebody’s calling me right now, so if somebody else will, I hope, answer it and see what they want. But that – you timed that question. Is that one of your colleagues calling and saying, “Oh, my goodness”?
I’m lucky. I know a lot of people. Now, they’re not close friends, but I have become friends with a number of the leaders with whom I do work. And I have found over this 20 years of high-wire American and international activity, people do not end up in the positions they hold by accident. There is a reason. Even in authoritarian, dictatorial systems, there is something that has set them apart. And it’s always fascinating for me to figure it out. Because from afar, you can say how did that person end up as prime minister, president, whatever? But then you work with them and you – and there’s an intelligence there, there’s a savvyness, there’s a sense of survival. It’s really, for me, not just diplomatic. It’s political, psychological.
I remember very well when – on my first trip to Africa and I went to Kenya, and it was shortly after they’d had this terrible violence after their prior election, and I delivered a really tough message. And they were taken aback by it, but I felt strongly that here was a country that had so much going for it. And we slowly saw some changes. I had very open, honest conversations with some of the leaders there. The President followed up because, of course, his deep interest in Kenya, with his father. And then two years later, we were at a democracy conference in Poland, and Kenya had been invited. They had taken some rather significant steps, including reforming their constitution. And the spokesman who came from the government started off by saying to me – I was in the audience – that you came and you really spoke very truthfully to us, and we have tried very hard to change. And that’s worth it to me. That’s worth all the travel.
I have no illusions about how hard this is to create strong democracies, to build free market economies, to stand against a culture of corruption, and all of the things that I talk about endlessly. But when I see progress being made against the odds, I say okay, this is really worth it, because we’ve been at independence for 235 years this year. We’ve had our own ups and downs and our own difficulties, including a civil war and so much else. But it’s the intention and it’s the direction. And when I see positive intentions matched with a commitment to a path that could lead in a positive direction, I just am going to stand up and say hooray, and the United States will be with you, we’ll support you, we’ll do everything we can to help you.
QUESTION: You are still very popular, both in the United States and abroad. In fact, I think you’re skyrocketing in polls. But some of your critics say that they can’t quite put their finger on what it is that you are trying to achieve as a Secretary of State. What is the issue that you are trying to get your hands on and bring to fruition? Is it Middle East peace? Is it Afghanistan? Is it Pakistan? What is – what do you want to be remembered for as Secretary of State?
SECRETARY CLINTON: I don’t see it that way, especially at this time. I think there are so many converging challenges that are interconnected in ways that we could not have imagined 25, 50 years ago, that what we’re trying to do is restore America’s leadership in the world, because I fervently believe American leadership is essential for the promotion of human rights and dignity, freedom, economic opportunity.
And I am well aware that for the years prior to this Administration, there were a lot of questions about what we were doing. And of course, there are those who say, well, history will look back and see Iraq as a great success, and I hope that’s the case. But I think much of what we did was because we were attacked on 9/11, and I think we made fiscal and budgetary decisions that undermined America’s strength at home and abroad.
So what we’re trying to do, and what I am personally am committed to doing, is moving on a very steady path toward restoring America’s influence and leadership. That’s why going to Asia was important. That’s why continuing to pay attention to Latin America and Africa, working with regional institutions that can espouse the same values that we think are the best way to live and for societies to flourish.
Now, when I took this job, people said, well, you can either try to do that or you can pick one or two or three things. I don’t think this is a time to pick one or two or three things. And I’m well aware of – others might well choose a different perspective, but that’s how I see what I’m doing.
QUESTION: Do you think you are on the right track in terms of restoring American leadership? Some people argue that, in the Middle East, America is becoming irrelevant.
SECRETARY CLINTON: I just don’t believe that for a minute. I think that it’s nothing we can take for granted. We can’t be complacent and we certainly can’t walk away. I have fought hard within the Administration for a significant economic program for both Egypt and Tunisia, because I think that the revolution of expectations in both countries was as much economic as political, because it wasn’t only the freedom to vote or the freedom to speak, but the freedom to work and to increase your standard of living and to see your life improve.
And I think that we are still looked to, sometimes begrudgingly and critically, but there is no doubt in my mind that people still care very much what the United States says and does. And what I worry about is the contrary, that it’s not what people around the world think about our role, but at home people who rightly are concerned about our own domestic economic situation, our own federal budget deficit, who are saying enough with the foreign involvements; let’s just do nothing but stay right here and tend to our own garden. That would be, in my view, a great mistake.
So part of what I’m trying to do is speak and work on behalf of America’s influence and leadership in a way that my own country understands, so that people who are unemployed auto workers in Michigan or struggling small businesspeople in California can say, “Yeah, I really want the President, the government, to pay attention to me, but I get it. I know why we’re working to make sure Egypt and Tunisia turn out well. I know why we still put money into developing agriculture and fighting HIV/AIDS in Africa, and all the other things that we are working on.”
QUESTION: And a final question, to wrap up on a lighter note. Tell us something about yourself that BBC listeners don’t know. (Laughter.)
SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, I sometimes think I’m the best-known unknown person. I’m always amazed when people – and sometimes interviewers but sometimes just citizens around the world – will say something to me about me that I think, well, no, I didn’t do that or I didn’t say that or I don’t like that. So I’m always amused by that. But there’s – look, I don’t think anybody in the public eye can ever be totally known. That’s a misnomer, even though people are constantly in the press and therefore, you think you know them.
But I think that I am a pretty normal, average person, despite all of the hype. And I am very interested in spending time with my friends and my family and not being on the merry-go-round all the time, which is one of the reasons why I have decided that I will move on and return to private life at the end of what will be a very intense period of activity and work in the next 18 months. But I just – I believe what I say and I work to try to see life improve, particularly for women and girls, and I love what I’m doing.
QUESTION: I think one thing that people don’t know about you is that you have a great sense of humor. (Laughter.) You (inaudible) I think.
SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, you’ve got to have a little bit of fun doing these kinds of jobs, Kim, as you know. And thank you for all of your good work.
QUESTION: Thank you. | – After decades of living in the public eye, Hillary Clinton tells the BBC she is ready to get off the "merry-go-round" at the end of President Obama's first term and enjoy her private life, reports Politico (which has a link to the full transcript.) “I think that I am a pretty normal, average person, despite all of the hype,” Clinton said. “And I am very interested in spending time with my friends and my family." While Clinton has said before that she is ready to take a break or retire, these comments came unprompted from Clinton herself, not in response to a specific question about stepping down, notes Jennifer Epstein. “I do wake up and say I’m tired so I better get up and get going,” said Clinton, calling her job a "nonstop marathon." "It is for me a moveable adventure." You can hear the full audio at the BBC. |
Pathological gambling, hypersexuality and compulsive shopping are some of the abnormal behaviors that are linked to the use of certain drugs commonly used to treat Parkinson's disease, according to a new study.
The findings are important because they mean that doctors and patients should be wary of the drugs' side effects, according to the study authors. But they also give researchers a better understanding of how abnormal behaviors develop in general, and how such behaviors may be related to the brain receptor that is targeted by the drug, the authors said.
"In our view, these medications should be used less frequently and with great caution, paying close attention to possible untoward effects on behavior and impulse control," said Dr. Howard D. Weiss of Sinai Hospital of Baltimore and Dr. Gregory M. Pontone of Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, Maryland, writing in an editorial about the new study.
In the study, the researchers examined 1,580 reports of people in the United States and 21 other countries experiencing pathological gambling, hypersexuality, compulsive shopping or other abnormal behaviors after taking medication between 2003 and 2012. They found that 710 of the cases occurred in people taking drugs called dopamine receptor agonists, which are used to treat Parkinson's disease, whereas the other 870 cases occurred in people taking all of the other types of drugs combined.
The researchers determined that the proportion of such reports was 277.6 times higher for people taking dopamine agonist receptor drugs than those taking other drugs. [7 Bizarre Drug Side Effects]
Dopamine is a neurotransmitter in the brain that normally helps regulate movement, emotions and the feelings of pleasure. In people with Parkinson's disease, the brain cells that make dopamine die over time. Dopamine receptor agonists are used to mimic the function of the neurotransmitter.
The important step to take after the new findings is to introduce warnings about the potential side effects of those drugs so that doctors who prescribe them are aware of them, said study author Thomas J. Moore, a senior scientist at the Institute for Safe Medication Practices in Alexandria, Virginia.
"They [doctors and caregivers of Parkinson's patients] need to be on the lookout for this kind of behavior" and understand it may be linked to the use of medication, Moore told Live Science.
Of all the cases of abnormal behavior that were observed in the people taking the drugs for Parkinson's disease, the majority (410 cases) occurred in those who had been taking a dopamine receptor agonist drug called pramipexole, which affects a receptor called dopamine D3 receptor. And the drug that was second-most commonly linked to such behaviors was ropinirole, which also has a significant effect on the D3 receptor, according to the study, published today (Oct. 20) in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine
The researchers noted that in some cases, the people taking these drugs had restless leg syndrome (not Parkinson's disease).
The new research may allow researchers to better understand how abnormal behaviors develop, and how they may be related to the D3 receptor, Moore said. The D3 receptor has also been investigated as a possible target for treatments for people with addictions, the researchers wrote in the study.
In another study, published in July 2011 in the journal Physiology & Behavior, other researchers also found a link between behaviors such as hypersexuality or excessive gambling and the use of the two drugs that Moore found to be the most closely related to abnormal behaviors in the new study.
Drugs for Parkinson's have been down this road before. In the 1960s, the introduction of the Parkinson's drug levodopa enabled Parkinson's patients to “regain function and return to the mainstream of life," Weiss and Pontone wrote.
Levodopa gets converted into dopamine in the brain, said Weiss and Pontone, who were not involved with the new research.
However, enthusiasm for that treatment was tempered when patients taking it developed involuntary muscle movements, similar to tics, and in rare cases also developing abnormal behaviors such as hypersexuality, they wrote.
The newer class of Parkinson's drugs — the dopamine receptor agonist drugs — act differently in the brain, Weiss and Pontone wrote. Levodopa gets converted into dopamine in the brain, the dopamine receptor agonist drugs just mimic the neurotransmitter's effects.
It was known that the dopamine receptor agonist drugs caused side effects such as hallucinations, psychosis and excessive daytime sleepiness. But despite these effects, the drugs remain widely used, and it is only recently that doctors started recognizing a link between the use of those drugs and the occurrence of impulse control disorders with symptoms such as pathological gambling, hypersexuality and uncontrollable spending, Weiss and Pontone wrote.
It is not surprising that it took a while for doctors to start recognizing the link between the two, they wrote, as they did not routinely inquire about the potentially behavior-altering effects of the drugs.
"During an office visit, a patient is unlikely to spontaneously mention, 'By the way, doctor, I lost $250,000 in casinos last year, and I purchase $500 of lottery tickets every week' or 'I spend all night on Internet pornography sites and am soliciting prostitutes,'" Weiss and Pontone noted.
"In summary, physicians have overestimated the benefit and underestimated the risks associated with the use of dopamine receptor agonist drugs in patients with Parkinson disease," they wrote.
Follow Live Science @livescience, Facebook & Google+. Originally published on Live Science. ||||| Treatments
Parkinson's Drugs Can Be A Gateway To Sin
i itoggle caption ImageZoo/Corbis ImageZoo/Corbis
Drugs that are commonly prescribed to help people cope with Parkinson's disease have been linked to bizarre changes in behavior that patients and doctors should be on guard against, researchers say.
The disturbing side effects include compulsive gambling, uncontrollable shopping and a sudden obsession with sex.
The problems with the drugs, called dopamine agonists, are serious enough that the researchers say the Food and Drug Administration should require the medicines to carry what's called a black-box warning, one of the most prominent and serious cautions used for prescriptions drugs.
Some of the drugs are also prescribed for restless leg syndrome and hyperprolactinemia, a hormonal condition that can trigger milk production.
While the problems with the dopamine agonists have been noted in the past, the recommendation for a more prominent warning comes come after researchers sifted through 2.7 million reports of drug reactions submitted to an FDA database between 2003 and 2012.
The researchers from the Institute for Safe Medicine Practices, Harvard and the University of Ottawa found 1,580 adverse drug events involving impulse control disorders. A little less than half, or 710 reports, were associated with dopamine receptor agonist drugs.
The link was strongest for pramipexole, brand name Mirapex, and ropinirole, brand name Requip. The instructions for doctors who are thinking about prescribing Mirapex already carry a warning that says patients taking the medicine "may experience compulsive behaviors and other intense urges." Requip, a treatment for restless leg syndrome.
The results were published online Monday by JAMA Internal Medicine.
Back in 2005, doctors from the Mayo Clinic reported 11 cases of patients who became compulsive gamblers after taking dopamine agonists. A 52-year-old man lost $100,000 in casinos after previously gambling only once in his life. He also became fixated on pornography and obsessed with sex, carrying on extramarital affairs. A month after stopping the drug, he was his old self.
Doctors and patients may have overlooked the problems. In a commentary accompanying the latest findings, two Johns Hopkins doctors wrote that nausea, dizziness and other physical side effects are more typical parts of the conversations between doctors and patients about drugs. "During an office visit, a patient is unlikely to spontaneously mention, 'By the way, doctor I lost $250,000 in casinos last week' or 'I spend all night on Internet pornography sites and am soliciting prostitutes,' " they wrote.
Neurologist Howard Weiss, a co-author of the commentary, tells Shots that these drug-related compulsive behaviors haven't gotten the attention in the medical community that they deserve. A heightened warning in the drugs' instructions could help make the risk clearer, Weiss says. The behavioral problems, he says, "are more important than 99 percent of the other side effects that are being listed."
Weiss says he's had at least three patients who have lost their homes because of bankruptcy after taking the drugs.
When he asked an elderly patients taking one of the drugs if she ever gambled, she replied, "Gambling is the work of the devil." But it turned out she had been buying hundreds of dollars' worth of lottery tickets a week, a habit she didn't consider to be gambling.
Weiss says the behavioral problems usually go away after patients stop taking the medicines. He also says the drug combination carbidopa-levodopa, another Parkinson's treatment, works better and doesn't increase the risk for impulsive behavior. ||||| Importance Severe impulse control disorders involving pathological gambling, hypersexuality, and compulsive shopping have been reported in association with the use of dopamine receptor agonist drugs in case series and retrospective patient surveys. These agents are used to treat Parkinson disease, restless leg syndrome, and hyperprolactinemia.
Objectives To analyze serious adverse drug event reports about these impulse control disorders received by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and to assess the relationship of these case reports with the 6 FDA-approved dopamine receptor agonist drugs.
Design, Setting, and Participants We conducted a retrospective disproportionality analysis based on the 2.7 million serious domestic and foreign adverse drug event reports from 2003 to 2012 extracted from the FDA Adverse Event Reporting System.
Main Outcomes and Measures Cases were selected if they contained any of 10 preferred terms in the Medical Dictionary for Regulatory Activities (MedDRA) that described the abnormal behaviors. We used the proportional reporting ratio (PRR) to compare the proportion of target events to all serious events for the study drugs with a similar proportion for all other drugs.
Results We identified 1580 events indicating impulse control disorders from the United States and 21 other countries:710 fordopamine receptor agonist drugs and 870 for other drugs. The dopamine receptor agonist drugs had a strong signal associated with these impulse control disorders (n = 710; PRR = 277.6, P < .001). The association was strongest for the dopamine agonists pramipexole (n = 410; PRR = 455.9, P < .001) and ropinirole (n = 188; PRR = 152.5, P < .001), with preferential affinity for the dopamine D 3 receptor. A signal was also seen for aripiprazole, an antipsychotic classified as a partial agonist of the D 3 receptor (n = 37; PRR = 8.6, P < .001).
Conclusions and Relevance Our findings confirm and extend the evidence that dopamine receptor agonist drugs are associated with these specific impulse control disorders. At present, none of the dopamine receptor agonist drugs approved by the FDA have boxed warnings as part of their prescribing information. Our data, and data from prior studies, show the need for more prominent warnings. | – Parkinson's drugs are known for a range of side effects, including hallucinations, psychosis, and extreme drowsiness. But researchers say there's also a clear link between the use of some of these drugs and impulse control issues that result in hypersexuality, compulsive gambling, and uncontrollable spending, reports LiveScience. Looking at 1,580 reports of people in 22 countries, including the US, who'd experienced these abnormal behaviors after taking meds between 2003 and 2012, they identified 710 cases that involve dopamine receptor agonists, drugs often used to treat Parkinson's disease. (The other 870 cases accounted for all other types of drugs combined.) "Physicians have overestimated the benefit and underestimated the risks associated with the use of dopamine receptor agonist drugs in patients with [Parkinson's] disease," the researchers write in JAMA Internal Medicine. One of the writers says three of his patients have lost their homes because they went bankrupt after taking the drugs, reports NPR. The link was strongest for pramipexole (brand name Mirapex) and ropinirole (Requip). Because people taking this type of drug were 277 times more likely to report these impulsive behaviors than those taking other drugs, the researchers are calling for black-box warnings—reserved for the most extreme cautions—detailing the risks involved. (One woman has even reported her Parkinson's meds give her three to five unwanted orgasms daily.) |
Pete Evans' co-authored paleo diet cookbook for babies under investigation
Updated
A cookbook that recommends feeding infants bone broth as a baby formula is being investigated by the Federal Health Department and leading health groups say some of the book's recipes are potentially risky for babies.
The controversial paleo cookbook, Bubba Yum Yum: The Paleo Way For New Mums, Babies and Toddlers, was due to be released this week, but the publishers have had to put it on hold.
It was co-authored by Australian chef Pete Evans, nutritionist Helen Padarin and blogger Charlotte Carr.
Publisher Pan Macmillan Australia said the book had not been recalled, simply delayed for release. It would not comment further, and neither would the authors.
What is the Paleo or Stone Age diet? The Paleo diet is based on the idea that we should eat what we did when humans were hunter gatherers.
Foods included are lean meat, vegetables, fruit, eggs, and seafood. Those on a Paleo diet are encouraged to exclude grains, legumes, dairy products, refined sugar, salt and processed foods.
Although the Paleolithic or Stone Age diet first appeared in the 1970s, it has received renewed interest over the past few years.
It is claimed the diet reduces body weight and helps prevent conditions such as diabetes, high blood cholesterol, stroke, osteoporosis and inflammatory disease.
Most dietitians don't recommend the diet because it encourages high meat consumption, which has been linked to an increased risk of bowel cancer, and because it encourages people to cut out whole food groups (grains and dairy). Source: ABC Health and Wellbeing
Evans is a longtime advocate of the paleo diet, as is Carr. Her website said paleo healed what she wrote was her young son's "compromised immune system, reverse toxicity and illness".
One of her recipes for a "homemade formula" for infants up to six months of age is called the "Baby Building Broth". It is made using chicken bones, chicken feet and apple cider vinegar.
Professor Heather Yeatman from the Public Health Association said some of the recipes were potentially dangerous for infants.
"There appears to be recommendations not to use either breast milk or an approved infant formula, but to provide other foods to infants under six months of age and that really is a big health risk," Professor Yeatman said.
"There's been discussion about a beef broth with mashed up liver as part of a recipe. Now something like that might be appropriate for an older child, but under six months of age, really the best option [is] breast milk."
Rebecca Naylor from the Australian Breastfeeding Association said parents should follow tested feeding guidelines for their children.
"All of the experts that you will speak to would say that feeding your baby anything other than infant formula or breast milk under six months as their primary source of nutrition is extremely dangerous," Ms Naylor said.
The Federal Health Department said it is "aware of this publication and has concerns about the inadequate nutritional value of some of the recipes, in particular the infant formula".
It said it would "continue to investigate".
For personal trainer Drew Slater and his brother Ben, becoming paleo has transformed their lives for the better.
"It's a reasonably low carbohydrate diet and moderate fats and high protein for those who understand macros, but it's really just a real food diet," Mr Slater said.
They are standing by the paleo lifestyle.
"I don't believe in knocking something until you've tried it and my brother and I have tried a lot of different diets and fads and we really believe that this is the best solution for us," he said.
Mr Slater does not have children, but he said if he did, he would put them on a paleo diet.
"Kids these days are eating such high processed sugars and heavily refined carbohydrates," he said.
"It's really bad for their intestinal health and I think it's forming bad habits. My kids will definitely be eating a bone broth. I like to start my mornings with a bone broth."
Topics: diet-and-nutrition, health, babies, community-and-society, australia
First posted ||||| Off the table: Publisher dumps Pete Evans' baby and toddler cookbook. Photo: Supplied
The publication of a paleo baby cookbook, co-authored by celebrity chef Pete Evans, has been delayed, amid calls by leading health officials that its recipes could be potentially fatal to children.
Friday's release of Bubba Yum Yum: The Paleo Way has been postponed by publishers Pan Macmillan after concerns about the book's "bone broth" baby formula were raised with the federal Department of Health, The Australian Women's Weekly reported online.
Pete Evans will self-publish his paleo book for children after Pan Macmillan pulled out of its publication. Photo: Supplied
The recipe, called the "DIY baby milk formula", is a chicken liver based concoction containing no milk products, which the book claims "mimics the nutrient profile of breast milk". The recipe is marketed as a "wonderful alternative" to breast milk and the "next best thing" when breast milk is not an option.
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The claim has been slammed as "false and misleading" by Julie Smith, a health and economics expert at the Australian National University.
"I think the ACCC should be looking very hard at this particular claim. The commercial publisher aims to make money out of this book and I suspect they would have to consider very carefully the investigation that would ensue if they published it."
Dr Smith said evidence backed by the World Health Organisation clearly showed that expressed breast milk was the "next best thing" for the baby when breast-feeding was not an option. Failing that, commercial baby formula should be used, she said.
The DIY formula recipe potentially exposed babies to dangerous levels of vitamin A and inadequate levels of other nutrients, The Australian Women's Weekly reported.
Michael Moore, chief executive of the Public Health Association of Australia, said his organisation was among a consortium of health groups that had approached the book's publishers with their concerns.
"We hope they will look at the evidence instead of putting babies at risk," he said.
Mr Moore echoed the concerns raised by the Public Health Association's president, Professor Heather Yeatman, who said in an interview with The Australian Women's Weekly "there's a very real possibility that a baby may die if this book goes ahead".
"Especially if [the DIY formula] was the only food a parent was feeding their infant, it's a very real risk. And [I consider that] the baby's growth and development could be impaired."
Adherents of the paleo diet restrict their food intake to the types of unprocessed foods presumed to have been eaten by early humans, such as meat, fish, vegetables and fruit.
Milk products, along with all grains and pulses, are banned.
A spokeswoman for federal Health Minister Sussan Ley confirmed the department "has been closely scrutinising this diet and book".
"The department is concerned about the inadequate nutritional values of some of the foods, in particular for infants, and is investigating further," a spokeswoman said.
Co-authored by My Kitchen Rules judge and paleo advocate Evans, actress and baby food blogger Charlotte Carr and naturopath Helen Padarin, the book features a range of other recipes based on the paleo diet that health officials have deemed unsafe or inappropriate for children. Among them are recipes that include runny eggs and added salt, which health experts claim contravene national health guidelines for babies.
Professor Yeatman said children "may be seriously affected" as a result of parents limiting their diets to the ascribed paleo doctrine.
"That's the really troubling thing: the infant is totally at the whim of their parents when it comes to feeding."
The book includes a disclaimer that states: "Although we in good faith believe that the information provided will help you live a healthier life, relying on the information contained in this publication may not give you the results you desire or may cause negative health consequences."
When contacted by Fairfax Media, Pan Macmillian would not confirm whether a revised publication date had been set or whether bookstores offering pre-ordered copies of the book had been advised to cease doing so.
On Thursday, Evans' The Paleo Way official website had crashed or had been taken down.
Evans, who has acquired the moniker "Paleo Pete", has encountered numerous controversies in his religious promotion and defence of the diet.
Last year, he launched a broadside attack on his Facebook page against the Heart Foundation and the Dietitians Association of Australia (DAA) over the merits of the paleo diet and urged his half a million Facebook followers to sign a petition to "boycott" the Heart Foundation's tick.
In December, he was photographed wearing a "Fluoride Free" T-shirt, after reportedly attending a meeting with the controversial Perth-based anti-fluoride group. ||||| A Paleo diet baby cookbook co-authored by celebrity chef Pete Evans has been put on hold after public health officials warned its recipes could potentially result in infants dying.
The Weekly online has learned publishers Pan Macmillan have held back release of Bubba Yum Yum: The Paleo Way – following intervention by a consortium of health organisations that expressed grave concerns over the book's DIY baby milk formula, based on liver and bone broth.
"In my view, there's a very real possibility that a baby may die if this book goes ahead," Professor Heather Yeatman, president of the Public Health Association of Australia, has told The Weekly online.
"Especially if [the DIY formula] was the only food a parent was feeding their infant, it's a very real risk. And [I consider that] the baby’s growth and development could be impaired."
So grave are health officials' fears over the potential health ramifications of the DIY formula that the Federal Government's Department of Health has been alerted to it.
Experts warn it contains more than ten times the safe maximum daily intake of vitamin A for babies and inadequate levels of other nutrients.
"The Department of Health has been closely scrutinizing this diet and book," a spokeswoman said.
The department is "concerned about the inadequate nutritional values of some of the foods, in particular for infants, and is investigating further."
The cookbook is co-authored by influential Channel 7 My Kitchen Rules judge and Paleo advocate Pete Evans, baby recipe blogger Charlotte Carr and naturopath Helen Padarin. None have medical qualifications.
The book was due to be published by Pan MacMillan this Friday (March 13).
But health officials claim that it would be negligent of the publishers to release the book, which they say also flouts national health guidelines by including runny eggs and added salt in recipes for young babies.
They are concerned that celebrity endorsement may give the DIY baby formula extra credibility in the eyes of new mums.
Pan MacMillan stands to take a big financial hit if the book is pulped. Pete Evans is currently one of its best-selling authors, with previous titles Family Food and Healthy Every Day reaching number one in the Australian book charts.
Under the Paleo diet, all grains, dairy and pulses are banned. While adults can choose to follow such a diet, Prof Yeatman says it isn't fair to subject a baby to what she characterises as an unproven set of beliefs.
"That's the really troubling thing: the infant is totally at the whim of their parents when it comes to feeding," she says. "If the wrong decision is made, they may be seriously affected."
Paleo advocate Pete Evans has more than 780,000 Likes on his Facebook page, which includes many personal testimonials from fans. He describes his current national speaking tour as "spreading the medicine".
In his foreword to the book, he implies that the Paleo diet may help prevent autism, birth defects, behavioural disorders, digestive disorders, rashes and asthma.
According to the World Health Organisation, the only safe alternative to breast milk for young babies is commercial formula.
Health officials warn the recipe for baby bone broth formula, which also includes oils and a probiotic supplement, could potentiallycause a vitamin A overdose in infants, the symptoms of which include loss of appetite, dry skin, hair loss, bone pain, fissures in the corners of the mouth and failure to thrive.
A disclaimer in the back of Bubba Yum Yum: The Paleo Way states, "Although we in good faith believe that the information provided will help you live a healthier life, relying on the information contained in this publication may not give you the results you desire or may cause negative health consequences."
Co-author Charlotte Carr used the DIY baby milk formula recipe on recommendation of a naturopath with her own son in response to his health problems, including sensory processing issues and a compromised gut and immune system. She didn't want to use commercial formula because of worries about ingredients.
Comment is being sought from Pan Macmillan and the book's authors.
*To read our full investigation into Pete Evans’s transformation from celebrity pizza chef to Paleo warrior, see the current March issue of The Weekly on stands now.
Related:
Health bodies warn Paleo is not a cure
The questions Pete Evans refused to answer | – You're never too young, it seems, for a trendy diet. The release of an Australian paleo diet cookbook has been delayed amid concerns over its recipes for babies, Australia's ABC News reports. Officials are investigating Bubba Yum Yum: The Paleo Way For New Mums, Babies and Toddlers, which includes a recipe for a "homemade formula" for infants younger than six months. To make the bone broth, parents will need chicken bones, chicken feet, and vinegar. Australia's health department says it "has concerns about the inadequate nutritional value of some of the recipes, in particular the infant formula"—which, the Sydney Morning Herald reports, is touted in the book as the "next best thing" after breast milk. "All of the experts that you will speak to would say that feeding your baby anything other than infant formula or breast milk under six months as their primary source of nutrition is extremely dangerous," says a breastfeeding expert. In the Australian Women's Weekly, a public health advocate puts it even more starkly: "In my view, there's a very real possibility that a baby may die if this book goes ahead." The book is the work of chef and bestselling author Pete Evans along with a nutritionist and a blogger, Charlotte Carr, who says the paleo diet fixed her son's health issues. (The founder of PayPal, who embraces a paleo-style diet, is aiming to live to be 120.) |
If you've always wanted a high-tech suit of armor that will make you nearly invincible — à la Tony Stark of "Iron Man" — your long wait may soon be over.
Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the U.S. Army Research, Development and Engineering Command (RDECOM) and other groups from business and academia are joining forces to create a Tactical Assault Light Operator Suit, or TALOS, that "promises to provide superhuman strength with greater ballistic protection," according to a statement released by the U.S. Army.
The most amazing features of the suit include integrated 360-degree cameras not unlike Google Glass (but with night vision capabilities), sensors that can detect injuries and apply a wound-sealing foam, and — get ready for this — a bulletproof exoskeleton made of magnetorheological fluids that can change from liquid to solid in milliseconds when a magnetic field or electrical current is applied. [Bionic Humans: Top 10 Technologies]
If it all reminds you of the liquid-metal shapeshifter T-1000 from "Terminator" or some other sci-fi character, you're not alone. "It sounds exactly like 'Iron Man,'" Gareth McKinley, a professor at MIT, told NPR. "The other kind of things that you see in the movies I think that would be more realistic at the moment would be the kind of external suit that Sigourney Weaver wears in 'Aliens,' where it's a large robot that amplifies the motions and lifting capability of a human."
The developers from RDECOM, MIT and elsewhere are researching "every aspect making up this combat armor suit," Lt. Col. Karl Borjes, a RDECOM science adviser, said in the U.S. Army statement. "It's advanced armor. It's communications, antennas. It's cognitive performance. It's sensors, miniature-type circuits. That's all going to fit in here, too."
Not everyone, however, is enamored with the super-advanced gizmos being proposed for the soldiers of tomorrow. "My sense is it is an up-armored Pinocchio," Scott Neil, a retired special forces master sergeant and Silver Star recipient, told the Tampa Tribune. "Now the commander can shove a monkey in a suit and ask us to survive a machine gun, IED [improvised explosive device] and poor intelligence all on the same objective. And when you die in it, as it melds to your body, you can bury them in it."
Even believers in the TALOS suit acknowledge its limitations. "The acronym TALOS was chosen deliberately," McKinley said. "It's the name of the bronze armored giant from 'Jason and the Argonauts.' Like all good superheroes, Talos has one weakness. For the Army's TALOS, the weak spot is either the need to carry around a heavy pump for a hydraulic system, or lots of heavy batteries. We don't have Iron Man's power source yet."
For would-be sci-fi superheroes who are ready for their very own TALOS, the wait may prove excruciating: Though various components of the suit are currently in development, the Army hopes to have a prototype ready next year, and an advanced model won't be developed until at least two years after that.
Follow Marc Lallanilla on Twitter and Google+. Follow us @livescience, Facebook & Google+. Original article on LiveScience. ||||| Special Ops Envisions 'Iron Man'-Like Suit To Protect Troops
i itoggle caption Raytheon via YouTube Raytheon via YouTube
In the Iron Man movie series, Robert Downey Jr. plays a billionaire working with his trusty robot to build a protective suit that will help him battle evil.
Now, the U.S. Special Operations Command is teaming up with industry, universities and laboratories to see if such a suit can be created for the real world of combat.
Adm. Bill McRaven, who unveiled the idea at a conference in May, says it was inspired by the death of one of his troops in Afghanistan.
"One of our folks going through the door was killed by the Taliban on the other side in an attempt to rescue a hostage," McRaven, the command's top officer, says.
So McRaven challenged those at the conference to come up with better body armor. And he posed this question: "Why haven't we put effort into ensuring particularly that guy going through the door ... is protected to the maximum capability that we can provide him, as a nation?"
That effort is now underway. The Special Operations Command held something of a science fair last month in Tampa, says Jim Geurts, who buys high-tech equipment for the command. At the conference, dozens of technologies were shown off, he says, including "advanced body armor, advance power supply, practical exoskeletons ... [and] different display technologies."
It's all just a concept now, Geurts says. But it's a concept with a name: TALOS, short for tactical assault light operator suit. It will take a year to even select which technologies to use.
"We're not at the Iron Man flying suit, you know, flying at 50,000 feet level," he says.
So, a flying suit is not part of the plan. But the first challenge is to come up with stronger body armor so a commando can survive once he kicks in a door.
Norman Wagner, a professor of chemical engineering at the University of Delaware, is working the problem. He's looking to nanotechnology to create a solution that contains particles smaller than a single red blood cell.
"We're starting with the material that's almost a liquid ceramic," he says.
A liquid that can be dipped in Kevlar fabric — the current building block of body armor and helmets — and make it even tougher, literally the moment a bullet strikes.
"It transitions when you hit it hard," Wagner says. "These particles organize themselves quickly, locally in a way that they can't flow anymore and they become like a solid."
So a liquid becomes a solid to make better armor protection. But the military wants to do more. It wants to make the soldier faster and stronger.
Gareth McKinley, a professor at MIT, works on liquid armor, among other things. He says the suit could include attachable frames on the arms and legs that use hydraulics to greatly increase strength and speed.
"They typically consist of an external skeleton that's attached or bolted onto the human's either upper torso or lower torso," McKinley says.
Sounds a bit like Iron Man, doesn't it?
"It sounds exactly like Iron Man," McKinley says. "The other kind of things that you see in the movies I think that would be more realistic at the moment would be the kind of external suit that Sigourney Weaver wears in Aliens, where it's a large robot that amplifies the motions and lifting capability of a human."
Another function: The commandos need a more complete picture of the battlefield.
So, the suit will likely include a wearable computer, like Google Glass, says Geurts of the Special Operations Command. Instead of a handheld display, commandos could simply look into the corner of their glasses and get updates on things like the location of enemy forces.
But, Geurts cautions people not to expect any of this anytime soon,
"The hope is that we would have some working full-up prototypes in the two- to three-year time frame," he says.
In the meantime, that kind of suit can only be seen at a theater near you. | – If you've ever dreamed of being a superhero, there may soon be reason to join the Army. It's developing a "revolutionary" armor that "promises to provide superhuman strength with greater ballistic protection," LiveScience reports. The Tactical Assault Light Operator Suit would include a bulletproof exoskeleton frame; sensors to monitor heart rate and hydration, detect injuries, and even apply foam to seal wounds; and a computer that includes 360-degree night-vision cameras. The Army is calling on multiple industries, government labs, and research organizations to make it happen, reports the BBC. If it sounds to you like the stuff of movies, or perhaps comic books, you're not alone. "It sounds exactly like Iron Man," a professor at MIT told NPR for an earlier story, noting the use of hydraulics on the arms and legs to increase strength and speed. Like most superheroes, however, TALOS has a weakness. "For the Army's TALOS, the weak spot is either the need to carry around a heavy pump for a hydraulic system, or lots of heavy batteries," says the prof. "We don't have Iron Man's power source yet." The Army hopes a prototype will be ready by next year, though an advanced model could be a few years off. |
This afternoon a Mountain View Police Department traffic officer noticed traffic backing up behind a slow moving car traveling in the eastbound #3 lane on El Camino Real, near Rengstorff Ave. The car was traveling at 24 mph in a 35 mph zone. As the officer approached the slow moving car he realized it was a Google Autonomous Vehicle. The officer stopped the car and made contact with the operators to learn more about how the car was choosing speeds along certain roadways and to educate the operators about impeding traffic per 22400(a) of the California Vehicle Code. The Google self-driving cars operate under the Neighborhood Electric Vehicle Definition per 385.5 of the California Vehicle Code and can only be operated on roadways with speed limits at or under 35 mph. In this case, it was lawful for the car to be traveling on the street as El Camino Real is rated at 35 mph.
The Mountain View Police Department meets regularly with Google to ensure that their vehicles operate safely in our community.
Media inquiries can be directed to policepio@mountainview.gov ||||| MOUNTAIN VIEW -- When one of Google's self-driving vehicles is pulled over, who gets the ticket? The passenger or the car?
The question was asked across the Internet on Thursday, after a police officer stopped one of the gumball-machine-shaped vehicles around noon on El Camino Real.
In a blog post, the Mountain View Police Department said the officer noticed traffic backing up behind a slow-moving car in the eastbound No. 3 lane, near Rengstorff Avenue.
The vehicle was traveling at 24 mph in a 35 mph zone.
"As the officer approached the slow-moving car he realized it was a Google Autonomous Vehicle," the post said.
Zandr Milewski photo A Mountain View police officer pulled over one of Google's self-driving cars on El Camino Real, near Rengstorff Avenue, on Thursday. The vehicle attracted the officer's attention because it was backing up traffic. No ticket, however, was issued. (Zandr Milewski)
"The officer stopped the car," the post continued, "and made contact with the operators to learn more about how the car was choosing speeds along certain roadways and to educate the operators about impeding traffic."
The vehicle didn't stop itself; a passenger took control and pulled over for the officer, according to police.
In a Google Plus post, the Google Self-Driving Car Project appeared to appreciate the humor of the situation.
"Driving too slowly?" the post asked. "Bet humans don't get pulled over for that too often."
"We've capped the speed of our prototype vehicles at 25 mph for safety reasons," the post explained. "We want them to feel friendly and approachable, rather than zooming scarily through neighborhood streets."
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As it turns out, the cars are considered "neighborhood electric vehicles" under the California Vehicle Code, and can be operated on roadways with speed limits at or under 35 mph, according to the police department's blog post.
"In this case," the post continued, "it was lawful for the car to be traveling on the street, as El Camino Real is rated at 35 mph."
So, no ticket, and the question of who would get it remains unanswered.
"Like this officer, people sometimes flag us down when they want to know more about our project," the Google Self-Driving Car Project said in its post. "After 1.2 million miles of autonomous driving (that's the human equivalent of 90 years of driving experience), we're proud to say we've never been ticketed!"
Zandr Milewski photographed the car stop from an office building at 5150 El Camino Real in Los Altos. He was working on a project in a conference room when a colleague wandered in with news of what was transpiring outside.
"We all immediately dropped what we were doing to go look," Milewski said. "It's not something you see every day."
Email Jason Green at jgreen@dailynewsgroup.com or call him at 650-391-1337; follow him at twitter.com/jgreendailynews. | – Apparently Google's self-driving cars have yet to learn how to evade cops. One of its bubble-shaped autonomous vehicles was pulled over during a traffic stop in Mountain View, Calif., on Thursday, though it managed to avoid a ticket, reports NBC News. An officer spotted the vehicle traveling 24mph in a 35mph zone, with traffic backed up behind it, police say, per the San Jose Mercury News. "The officer stopped the car and made contact with the operators to learn more about how the car was choosing speeds along certain roadways," authorities say in a blog post, noting "it was lawful for the car to be traveling on the street." According to the California Vehicle Code, the cars can operate on roads with speed limits of 35mph or under. However, "we've capped the speed of our prototype vehicles at 25mph for safety reasons," Google Self-Driving Car Project explains. "We want them to feel friendly and approachable, rather than zooming scarily through neighborhood streets." The project notes "people sometimes flag us down when they want to know more about our project," but "after 1.2 million miles of autonomous driving (that's the human equivalent of 90 years of driving experience), we're proud to say we've never been ticketed!" (Apple is working on its own self-driving cars.) |
Mantecore, the tiger responsible — but never blamed — for a near-fatal injury to Roy Horn of Siegfried & Roy in 2003, died on March 19.
The white tiger was 17 and died “after a short illness,” according to a press release. Zoologists say 17 is within the lower-end parameter of a normal life expectancy for a tiger.
The tiger (his name usually spelled “Montecore” in press reports) was reported as seven years old the night he bit Horn on the neck during a show at The Mirage. Though Horn suffered significant blood loss from the bite, it was a stroke and brain-swelling which followed the injury that left Horn partially paralyzed, ending the entertainer’s stage career.
Mantecore was quarantined for 10 days following the Oct. 3 injury, but was then returned to exhibit at The Mirage’s Secret Garden of Siegfried & Roy attraction after no signs of disease or abnormal behavior were found. He spent most of his remaining years alternating between the Secret Garden attraction and Horn’s estate.
Even during the early days of his recovery, Horn was adamant in his wishes the tiger be spared, and has always argued with reports that he was “attacked” by the tiger. Siegfried & Roy have long contended Horn suffered a stroke onstage, and that the tiger punctured his neck while dragging him backstage as a protective response.
As recently as his 69th birthday party last October, Horn chided Review-Journal columnist Norm Clarke for his word choice in a column recounting the incident. “It was not an attack,” Horn said in a scolding tone and repeated it.
Horn released a statement today:
“The world has lost one of its most majestic creatures and I have lost a brother. I will forever believe it was his concern for my safety and well-being that caused him to act as he did on that night long ago. We spent many hours together and he never failed to bring me great joy and wonderment. It was my great honor to be beside him at the end. He is now playing with his siblings in White Tiger heaven.”
Horn added, “His contribution to the avalanche of awareness for conservation and preservation has made him unforgettable. His spirit will live forever with Siegfried & Roy and his multitude of fans.”
Contact reporter Mike Weatherford at mweatherford@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0288. ||||| Siegfried & Roy are in mourning.
The Las Vegas-based entertainers famous for incorporating white tigers into their elaborate, illusion-packed stage shows announced today the death of Mantecore, one of their prized pets and former costars.
And yes, the name is particularly familiar because it's the same big cat that nearly mauled Roy Horn to death onstage during a performance on Oct. 3, 2003.
According to a rep for the longtime couple (both onstage and off), Mantecore passed away on March 19 after a short illness at the age of 17. He had been living at the Siegfried & Roy Secret Garden and Dolphin Habitat at the Mirage hotel in Vegas. | – The tiger that nearly killed Roy Horn of Siegfried & Roy in 2003 has died at age 17, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reports. The tiger, Mantecore, bit Horn on the neck during a show at the Mirage. Following the incident, Horn suffered a stroke and brain swelling that left him partially paralyzed and ended his stage career. But he never blamed Mantecore, refuted reports that the tiger "attacked" him, and allowed the tiger to spend the rest of his days between his own estate and the Mirage's Secret Garden of Siegfried & Roy. After the incident, Horn's only stage appearance has been at a benefit in 2009 that actually featured Mantecore, E! notes. In fact, Horn and entertainment partner Siegfried Fischbacher insist Horn actually suffered the stroke first, and Mantecore was simply trying to drag Horn backstage to protect him. The tiger died last week "after a short illness," according to a press release. Says Horn in a statement, "The world has lost one of its most majestic creatures and I have lost a brother. I will forever believe it was his concern for my safety and well-being that caused him to act as he did on that night long ago." He adds on Facebook, "My lifesaver, 'Mantecore,' ... was the one responsible for pulling me to safety where the Paramedics could help me after my high blood pressure made me dizzy on stage." |
Marketers and manufacturers that promote their products as Made in USA must meet the “all or virtually all” standard. This publication offers practical guidance on Made in USA claims.
Introduction
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is charged with preventing deception and unfairness in the marketplace. The FTC Act gives the Commission the power to bring law enforcement actions against false or misleading claims that a product is of U.S. origin. Traditionally, the Commission has required that a product advertised as Made in USA be "all or virtually all" made in the U.S. After a comprehensive review of Made in USA and other U.S. origin claims in product advertising and labeling, the Commission announced in December 1997 that it would retain the "all or virtually all" standard. The Commission also issued an Enforcement Policy Statement on U.S. Origin Claims to provide guidance to marketers who want to make an unqualified Made in USA claim under the "all or virtually all" standard and those who want to make a qualified Made in USA claim.
This publication provides additional guidance about how to comply with the "all or virtually all" standard. It also offers some general information about the U.S. Customs Service’s requirement that all products of foreign origin imported into the U.S. be marked with the name of the country of origin.
This publication is the Federal Trade Commission staff’s view of the law’s requirements. It is not binding on the Commission. The Enforcement Policy Statement issued by the FTC is at the end of the publication.
Basic Information About Made In USA Claims
Must U.S. content be disclosed on products sold in the U.S.?
U.S. content must be disclosed on automobiles and textile, wool, and fur products. There’s no law that requires most other products sold in the U.S. to be marked or labeled Made in USA or have any other disclosure about their amount of U.S. content. However, manufacturers and marketers who choose to make claims about the amount of U.S. content in their products must comply with the FTC’s Made in USA policy.
What products does the FTC’s Made in USA policy apply to?
The policy applies to all products advertised or sold in the U.S., except for those specifically subject to country-of-origin labeling by other laws. Other countries may have their own country-of-origin marking requirements. As a result, exporters should determine whether the country to which they are exporting imposes such requirements.
What kinds of claims does the Enforcement Policy Statement apply to?
The Enforcement Policy Statement applies to U.S. origin claims that appear on products and labeling, advertising, and other promotional materials. It also applies to all other forms of marketing, including marketing through digital or electronic mechanisms, such as Internet or e-mail.
A Made in USA claim can be express or implied.
Examples of express claims: Made in USA. "Our products are American-made." "USA."
In identifying implied claims, the Commission focuses on the overall impression of the advertising, label, or promotional material. Depending on the context, U.S. symbols or geographic references (for example, U.S. flags, outlines of U.S. maps, or references to U.S. locations of headquarters or factories) may convey a claim of U.S. origin either by themselves, or in conjunction with other phrases or images.
Example: A company promotes its product in an ad that features a manager describing the "true American quality" of the work produced at the company’s American factory. Although there is no express representation that the company’s product is made in the U.S., the overall — or net — impression the ad is likely to convey to consumers is that the product is of U.S. origin.
Brand names and trademarks
Ordinarily, the Commission will not consider a manufacturer or marketer’s use of an American brand name or trademark by itself as a U.S. origin claim. Similarly, the Commission is not likely to interpret the mere listing of a company’s U.S. address on a package label in a non-prominent way as a claim of U.S. origin.
Example: A product is manufactured abroad by a well-known U.S. company. The fact that the company is headquartered in the U.S. also is widely known. Company pamphlets for its foreign-made product prominently feature its brand name. Assuming that the brand name does not specifically denote U.S. origin (that is, the brand name is not "Made in America, Inc."), using the brand name by itself does not constitute a claim of U.S. origin.
Representations about entire product lines
Manufacturers and marketers should not indicate, either expressly or implicitly, that a whole product line is of U.S. origin ("Our products are made in USA") when only some products in the product line are made in the U.S. according to the "all or virtually all" standard.
Does the FTC pre-approve Made in USA claims?
The Commission does not pre-approve advertising or labeling claims. A company doesn’t need approval from the Commission before making a Made in USA claim. As with most other advertising claims, a manufacturer or marketer may make any claim as long as it is truthful and substantiated.
The Standard For Unqualified Made In USA Claims
What is the standard for a product to be called Made in USA without qualification?
For a product to be called Made in USA, or claimed to be of domestic origin without qualifications or limits on the claim, the product must be "all or virtually all" made in the U.S. The term "United States," as referred to in the Enforcement Policy Statement, includes the 50 states, the District of Columbia, and the U.S. territories and possessions.
What does "all or virtually all" mean?
"All or virtually all" means that all significant parts and processing that go into the product must be of U.S. origin. That is, the product should contain no — or negligible — foreign content.
What substantiation is required for a Made in USA claim?
When a manufacturer or marketer makes an unqualified claim that a product is Made in USA, it should have — and rely on — a "reasonable basis" to support the claim at the time it is made. This means a manufacturer or marketer needs competent and reliable evidence to back up the claim that its product is "all or virtually all" made in the U.S.
What factors does the Commission consider to determine whether a product is "all or virtually all" made in the U.S.?
The product’s final assembly or processing must take place in the U.S. The Commission then considers other factors, including how much of the product’s total manufacturing costs can be assigned to U.S. parts and processing, and how far removed any foreign content is from the finished product. In some instances, only a small portion of the total manufacturing costs are attributable to foreign processing, but that processing represents a significant amount of the product’s overall processing. The same could be true for some foreign parts. In these cases, the foreign content (processing or parts) is more than negligible, and, as a result, unqualified claims are inappropriate.
Example: A company produces propane barbecue grills at a plant in Nevada. The product’s major components include the gas valve, burner and aluminum housing, each of which is made in the U.S. The grill’s knobs and tubing are imported from Mexico. An unqualified Made in USA claim is not likely to be deceptive because the knobs and tubing make up a negligible portion of the product’s total manufacturing costs and are insignificant parts of the final product. Example: A table lamp is assembled in the U.S. from American-made brass, an American-made Tiffany-style lampshade, and an imported base. The base accounts for a small percent of the total cost of making the lamp. An unqualified Made in USA claim is deceptive for two reasons: The base is not far enough removed in the manufacturing process from the finished product to be of little consequence and it is a significant part of the final product.
What items should manufacturers and marketers include in analyzing the percentage of domestic content in a particular product?
Manufacturers and marketers should use the cost of goods sold or inventory costs of finished goods in their analysis. Such costs generally are limited to the total cost of all manufacturing materials, direct manufacturing labor, and manufacturing overhead.
Should manufacturers and marketers rely on information from American suppliers about the amount of domestic content in the parts, components, and other elements they buy and use for their final products?
If given in good faith, manufacturers and marketers can rely on information from suppliers about the domestic content in the parts, components, and other elements they produce. Rather than assume that the input is 100 percent U.S.-made, however, manufacturers and marketers would be wise to ask the supplier for specific information about the percentage of U.S. content before they make a U.S. origin claim.
Example: A company manufactures food processors in its U.S. plant, making most of the parts, including the housing and blade, from U.S. materials. The motor, which constitutes 50 percent of the food processor’s total manufacturing costs, is bought from a U.S. supplier. The food processor manufacturer knows that the motor is assembled in a U.S. factory. Even though most of the parts of the food processor are of U.S. origin, the final assembly is in the U.S., and the motor is assembled in the U.S., the food processor is not considered "all or virtually all" American-made if the motor itself is made of imported parts that constitute a significant percentage of the appliance’s total manufacturing cost. Before claiming the product is Made in USA, this manufacturer should look to its motor supplier for more specific information about the motor’s origin. Example: On its purchase order, a company states: "Our company requires that suppliers certify the percentage of U.S. content in products supplied to us. If you are unable or unwilling to make such certification, we will not purchase from you." Appearing under this statement is the sentence, "We certify that our ___ have at least ___% U.S. content," with space for the supplier to fill in the name of the product and its percentage of U.S. content. The company generally could rely on a certification like this to determine the appropriate country-of-origin designation for its product.
How far back in the manufacturing process should manufacturers and marketers look?
To determine the percentage of U.S. content, manufacturers and marketers should look back far enough in the manufacturing process to be reasonably sure that any significant foreign content has been included in their assessment of foreign costs. Foreign content incorporated early in the manufacturing process often will be less significant to consumers than content that is a direct part of the finished product or the parts or components produced by the immediate supplier.
Example: The steel used to make a single component of a complex product (for example, the steel used in the case of a computer’s floppy drive) is an early input into the computer’s manufacture, and is likely to constitute a very small portion of the final product’s total cost. On the other hand, the steel in a product like a pipe or a wrench is a direct and significant input. Whether the steel in a pipe or wrench is imported would be a significant factor in evaluating whether the finished product is "all or virtually all" made in the U.S.
Are raw materials included in the evaluation of whether a product is "all or virtually all" made in the U.S.?
It depends on how much of the product’s cost the raw materials make up and how far removed from the finished product they are.
Example: If the gold in a gold ring is imported, an unqualified Made in USA claim for the ring is deceptive. That’s because of the significant value the gold is likely to represent relative to the finished product, and because the gold — an integral component — is only one step back from the finished article. By contrast, consider the plastic in the plastic case of a clock radio otherwise made in the U.S. of U.S.-made components. If the plastic case was made from imported petroleum, a Made in USA claim is likely to be appropriate because the petroleum is far enough removed from the finished product, and is an insignificant part of it as well.
Qualified Claims
What is a qualified Made in USA claim?
A qualified Made in USA claim describes the extent, amount or type of a product’s domestic content or processing; it indicates that the product isn’t entirely of domestic origin.
Example: "60% U.S. content." "Made in USA of U.S. and imported parts." "Couch assembled in USA from Italian Leather and Mexican Frame."
When is a qualified Made in USA claim appropriate?
A qualified Made in USA claim is appropriate for products that include U.S. content or processing but don’t meet the criteria for making an unqualified Made in USA claim. Because even qualified claims may imply more domestic content than exists, manufacturers or marketers must exercise care when making these claims. That is, avoid qualified claims unless the product has a significant amount of U.S. content or U.S. processing. A qualified Made in USA claim, like an unqualified claim, must be truthful and substantiated.
Example: An exercise treadmill is assembled in the U.S. The assembly represents significant work and constitutes a "substantial transformation" (a term used by the U.S. Customs Service). All of the treadmill’s major parts, including the motor, frame, and electronic display, are imported. A few of its incidental parts, such as the handle bar covers, the plastic on/off power key, and the treadmill mat, are manufactured in the U.S. Together, these parts account for approximately three percent of the total cost of all the parts. Because the value of the U.S.-made parts is negligible compared to the value of all the parts, a claim on the treadmill that it is "Made in USA of U.S. and Imported Parts" is deceptive. A claim like "Made in U.S. from Imported Parts" or "Assembled in U.S.A." would not be deceptive.
U.S. origin claims for specific processes or parts
Claims that a particular manufacturing or other process was performed in the U.S. or that a particular part was manufactured in the U.S. must be truthful, substantiated, and clearly refer to the specific process or part, not to the general manufacture of the product, to avoid implying more U.S. content than exists.
Manufacturers and marketers should be cautious about using general terms, such as "produced," "created" or "manufactured" in the U.S. Words like these are unlikely to convey a message limited to a particular process. Additional qualification probably is necessary to describe a product that is not "all or virtually all" made in the U.S.
In addition, if a product is of foreign origin (that is, it has been substantially transformed abroad), manufacturers and marketers also should make sure they satisfy Customs’ markings statute and regulations that require such products to be marked with a foreign country of origin. Further, Customs requires the foreign country of origin to be preceded by "Made in," "Product of," or words of similar meaning when any city or location that is not the country of origin appears on the product.
Example: A company designs a product in New York City and sends the blueprint to a factory in Finland for manufacturing. It labels the product "Designed in USA — Made in Finland." Such a specific processing claim would not lead a reasonable consumer to believe that the whole product was made in the U.S. The Customs Service requires the product to be marked "Made in," or "Product of" Finland since the product is of Finnish origin and the claim refers to the U.S. Examples of other specific processing claims are: "Bound in U.S. — Printed in Turkey." "Hand carved in U.S. — Wood from Philippines." "Software written in U.S. — Disk made in India." "Painted and fired in USA. Blanks made in (foreign country of origin)." Example: A company advertises its product, which was invented in Seattle and manufactured in Bangladesh, as "Created in USA." This claim is deceptive because consumers are likely to interpret the term "Created" as Made in USA — an unqualified U.S. origin claim. Example: A computer imported from Korea is packaged in the U.S. in an American-made corrugated paperboard box containing only domestic materials and domestically produced expanded rigid polystyrene plastic packing. Stating Made in USA on the package would deceive consumers about the origin of the product inside. But the company could legitimately make a qualified claim, such as "Computer Made in Korea — Packaging Made in USA." Example: The Acme Camera Company assembles its cameras in the U.S. The camera lenses are manufactured in the U.S., but most of the remaining parts are imported. A magazine ad for the camera is headlined "Beware of Imported Imitations" and states "Other high-end camera makers use imported parts made with cheap foreign labor. But at Acme Camera, we want only the highest quality parts for our cameras and we believe in employing American workers. That’s why we make all of our lenses right here in the U.S." This ad is likely to convey that more than a specific product part (the lens) is of U.S. origin. The marketer should be prepared to substantiate the broader U.S. origin claim conveyed to consumers viewing the ad.
Comparative Claims
Comparative claims should be truthful and substantiated, and presented in a way that makes the basis for comparison clear (for example, whether the comparison is to another leading brand or to a previous version of the same product). They should truthfully describe the U.S. content of the product and be based on a meaningful difference in U.S. content between the compared products.
Example: An ad for cellular phones states "We use more U.S. content than any other cellular phone manufacturer." The manufacturer assembles the phones in the U.S. from American and imported components and can substantiate that the difference between the U.S. content of its phones and that of the other manufacturers’ phones is significant. This comparative claim is not deceptive. Example: A product is advertised as having "twice as much U.S. content as before." The U.S. content in the product has been increased from 2 percent in the previous version to 4 percent in the current version. This comparative claim is deceptive because the difference between the U.S. content in the current and previous version of the product are insignificant.
Assembled in USA Claims
A product that includes foreign components may be called "Assembled in USA" without qualification when its principal assembly takes place in the U.S. and the assembly is substantial. For the "assembly" claim to be valid, the product’s last "substantial transformation" also should have occurred in the U.S. That’s why a "screwdriver" assembly in the U.S. of foreign components into a final product at the end of the manufacturing process doesn’t usually qualify for the "Assembled in USA" claim.
Example: A lawn mower, composed of all domestic parts except for the cable sheathing, flywheel, wheel rims and air filter (15 to 20 percent foreign content) is assembled in the U.S. An "Assembled in USA" claim is appropriate. Example: All the major components of a computer, including the motherboard and hard drive, are imported. The computer’s components then are put together in a simple "screwdriver" operation in the U.S., are not substantially transformed under the Customs Standard, and must be marked with a foreign country of origin. An "Assembled in U.S." claim without further qualification is deceptive.
The FTC and The Customs Service
What is the U.S. Customs Service’s jurisdiction over country-of-origin claims?
The Tariff Act gives Customs and the Secretary of the Treasury the power to administer the requirement that imported goods be marked with a foreign country of origin (for example, "Made in Japan").
When an imported product incorporates materials and/or processing from more than one country, Customs considers the country of origin to be the last country in which a "substantial transformation" took place. Customs defines "substantial transformation" as a manufacturing process that results in a new and different product with a new name, character, and use that is different from that which existed before the change. Customs makes country-of-origin determinations using the "substantial transformation" test on a case-by-case basis. In some instances, Customs uses a "tariff shift" analysis, comparable to "substantial transformation," to determine a product’s country of origin.
What is the interaction between the FTC and Customs regarding country-of-origin claims?
Even if Customs determines that an imported product does not need a foreign country-of-origin mark, it is not necessarily permissible to promote that product as Made in USA. The FTC considers additional factors to decide whether a product can be advertised or labeled as Made in USA.
Manufacturers and marketers should check with Customs to see if they need to mark their products with the foreign country of origin. If they don’t, they should look at the FTC’s standard to check if they can properly make a Made in USA claim.
The FTC has jurisdiction over foreign origin claims on products and in packaging that are beyond the disclosures required by Customs (for example, claims that supplement a required foreign origin marking to indicate where additional processing or finishing of a product occurred).
The FTC also has jurisdiction over foreign origin claims in advertising and other promotional materials. Unqualified U.S. origin claims in ads or other promotional materials for products that Customs requires a foreign country-of-origin mark may mislead or confuse consumers about the product’s origin. To avoid misleading consumers, marketers should clearly disclose the foreign manufacture of a product.
Example: A television set assembled in Korea using an American-made picture tube is shipped to the U.S. The Customs Service requires the television set to be marked "Made in Korea" because that’s where the television set was last "substantially transformed." The company’s World Wide Web page states "Although our televisions are made abroad, they always contain U.S.-made picture tubes." This statement is not deceptive. However, making the statement "All our picture tubes are made in the USA" — without disclosing the foreign origin of the television’s manufacture — might imply a broader claim (for example, that the television set is largely made in the U.S.) than could be substantiated. That is, if the statement and the entire ad imply that any foreign content or processing is negligible, the advertiser must substantiate that claim or net impression. The advertiser in this scenario would not be able to substantiate the implied Made in USA claim because the product was "substantially transformed" in Korea.
Other Statutes
What are the requirements of other federal statutes relating to country-of-origin determinations?
Textile Fiber Products Identification Act and Wool Products Labeling Act — Require a Made in USA label on most clothing and other textile or wool household products if the final product is manufactured in the U.S. of fabric that is manufactured in the U.S., regardless of where materials earlier in the manufacturing process (for example, the yarn and fiber) came from. Textile products that are imported must be labeled as required by the Customs Service. A textile or wool product partially manufactured in the U.S. and partially manufactured in another country must be labeled to show both foreign and domestic processing.
On a garment with a neck, the country of origin must be disclosed on the front of a label attached to the inside center of the neck — either midway between the shoulder seams or very near another label attached to the inside center of the neck. On a garment without a neck, and on other kinds of textile products, the country of origin must appear on a conspicuous and readily accessible label on the inside or outside of the product.
Catalogs and other mail order promotional materials for textile and wool products, including those disseminated on the Internet, must disclose whether a product is made in the U.S., imported or both.
The Fur Products Labeling Act requires the country of origin of imported furs to be disclosed on all labels and in all advertising. For copies of the Textile, Wool or Fur Rules and Regulations, or the new business education guide on labeling requirements, call the FTC’s Consumer Response Center
(202-382-4357). Or visit the FTC online at www.ftc.gov. Click on Consumer Protection.
American Automobile Labeling Act — Requires that each automobile manufactured on or after October 1, 1994, for sale in the U.S. bear a label disclosing where the car was assembled, the percentage of equipment that originated in the U.S. and Canada, and the country of origin of the engine and transmission. Any representation that a car marketer makes that is required by the AALA is exempt from the Commission’s policy. When a company makes claims in advertising or promotional materials that go beyond the AALA requirements, it will be held to the Commission’s standard. For more information, call the Consumer Programs Division of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (202-366-0846).
Buy American Act — Requires that a product be manufactured in the U.S. of more than 50 percent U.S. parts to be considered Made in USA for government procurement purposes. For more information, review the Buy American Act at 41 U.S.C. §§ 10a-10c, the Federal Acquisition Regulations at 48 C.F.R. Part 25, and the Trade Agreements Act at 19 U.S.C. §§ 2501-2582.
What To Do About Violations
What if I suspect noncompliance with the FTC’s Made in USA standard or other country-of-origin mislabeling?
Information about possible illegal activity helps law enforcement officials target companies whose practices warrant scrutiny. If you suspect noncompliance, contact the Division of Enforcement, Bureau of Consumer Protection, Federal Trade Commission, Washington, DC 20580; (202) 326-2996 or send an e-mail to MUSA@ftc.gov. If you know about import or export fraud, call Customs’ toll-free Commercial Fraud Hotline, 1-800-ITS-FAKE. Examples of fraudulent practices involving imports include removing a required foreign origin label before the product is delivered to the ultimate purchaser (with or without the improper substitution of a Made in USA label) and failing to label a product with a required country of origin.
You also can contact your state Attorney General and your local Better Business Bureau to report a company. Or you can refer your complaint to the National Advertising Division (NAD) of the Council of Better Business Bureaus by calling (212) 754-1320. NAD handles complaints about the truth and accuracy of national advertising. You can reach the Council of Better Business Bureaus on the web at adweb.com/adassoc17.html.
Finally, the Lanham Act gives any person (such as a competitor) who is damaged by a false designation of origin the right to sue the party making the false claim. Consult a lawyer to see if this private right of action is an appropriate course of action for you.
For More Information
The FTC works for the consumer to prevent fraudulent, deceptive, and unfair business practices in the marketplace and to provide information to help consumers spot, stop, and avoid them. To file a complaint or to get free information on consumer issues, visit ftc.gov or call toll-free, 1-877-FTC-HELP (1-877-382-4357); TTY: 1-866-653-4261. The FTC enters consumer complaints into the Consumer Sentinel Network, a secure online database and investigative tool used by hundreds of civil and criminal law enforcement agencies in the U.S. and abroad. ||||| Perhaps Walmart’s products aren’t as patriotic as they claim
According to a report recently released by the advertising watchdog group, Truth in Advertising, over 100 products labeled on Walmart’s website as “Made in the USA” are, in fact, imported from other countries.
The report found that both Walmart’s store brand products, such as Equate makeup sponges and tooth whitening strips, as well as other brands, such as Almay eyeliner, were falsely labeled as made in the United States.
Some products clearly displayed contrary information, such as a red, white, and blue “made in the USA” logo on the front, with the words “Made in China” displayed on the back. Other products were stamped with the patriotic logo while the product specifications listed the item as imported.
Walmart had an excuse, but the labels are magically gone
While there is no official certification process for labeling a product “made in the USA,” a company can still be sued for false advertising if they misuse the label. However, rather than taking legal action, Truth in Advertising simply sent a letter to Walmart CEO, Doug McMillon, causing the retail chain some embarrassment, but sparing them the court room drama.
Walmart responded by saying that some manufacturing of its store brands had recently moved to the United States, but the website hadn’t been update yet. However, many Made in USA labels were removed from the website after Truth in Advertising’s letter went public. As for other brands, Walmart claims that the country of origin information comes from the supplier.
Great reminder to stay honest
Unimpressed by these excuses, executive direction of Truth in Advertising, Bonnie Patten, says that the “largest retailer in the world should have made sure its American-made claims were accurate before affixing made in USA labels on the products. Until Walmart cleans up this mess, consumers cannot rely on Walmart with regard to where a product is really made when shopping on the site.”
The report also argues that the website’s labels for “Made in USA” and “Assembled in USA,” with their tiny fonts and identical color schemes, are too similar to distinguish on the website, even though the Federal Trade Commission makes a clear differentiation between these two labels.
All of this is an important reminder for businesses to stay honest in advertising. All it takes is a watchdog with an internet connection and keen eye to uncover false claims. ||||| While there is no official review process required for labeling a product as “Made in the U.S.A.,” a company can get into legal trouble for misusing that label, as doing so may constitute false advertising. A new report from an advertising watchdog group claims that Walmart’s website has more than 100 examples of products incorrectly marketed as made in America.
According to a letter [PDF] recently sent by the group Truth In Advertising to Walmart CEO Doug McMillon, “Walmart’s website is mired in USA labeling errors.”
Among the items singled out in the letter are Walmart’s Equate store-brand makeup sponges in the image at the top of this story. TINA says these were given the Made in the U.S.A. label on Walmart.com even though the product’s own packaging clearly states that they were “Made in China.”
Another Equate-brand product called out by TINA are these teeth-whitening strips that the company simultaneously lists as made in America while declaring in the product details that they are imported form outside the country:
In response to the TINA letter, Walmart told the group that manufacturing for both of these products was recently moved to the U.S. but that some stores may still contain versions made overseas and not all the information on the website is correct. Regardless, both items no longer carry the patriotic marketing message.
It wasn’t just store-brand items that got the false “Made in U.S.A.” labels, according to the report. TINA’s letter gives the example of an Almay eyeliner that states the product is made and assembled here in the U.S., even though the packaging declares that it is “Made in Germany.” Walmart says that the country of origin information comes from the supplier.
“False made in USA labeling on Walmart’s website has misled consumers looking to purchase American-made products,’’ said TINA.org Executive Director Bonnie Patten. “The largest retailer in the world should have made sure its American-made claims were accurate before affixing made in USA labels on the products. Until Walmart cleans up this mess, consumers cannot rely on Walmart with regard to where a product is really made when shopping on the site.”
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UPDATE: When reached for comment, a rep for Walmart provided the following statement to Consumerist —
“We are continually working to improve our website listings and information. We are undertaking a more extensive quality assurance review to help eliminate these coding errors. Based on our initial internal review, we believe these errors are limited to a small percentage of items and we are confident in the overall integrity of the information on our website.”
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A more detailed report [PDF] commissioned by TINA looked at the actual “Made in the U.S.A.” labeling on Walmart.com and found a number of issues.
This report noted that Walmart does little to differentiate its “Made in the U.S.A.” label from its “Assembled in the U.S.A.” label, even though the two labels have very different standards in the eyes of the Federal Trade Commission.
“The legibility of the text at the top of the label, which can be either ‘Made in the’ or ‘Assembled in the’, is marginal even for people with excellent or corrected vision, due both to the text’s small size and the low contrast of light blue text on a white background,” writes the report’s author, Dr. Jeff Johnson, who notes that the problem is exacerbated for farsighted people or those looking at the site on a small-format screen. “If such people have not seen it earlier in larger format (e.g., on a product page), they would be unable to determine what it says. Even consumers who have seen that text already in larger format would, in search results, have trouble distinguishing ‘Made in the USA’ from ‘Assembled in the USA’.” | – An advertising watchdog group warns you to beware of patriotic "Made in the USA" labels on some Walmart products, saying the company uses them far too liberally. The group Truth In Advertising sent Walmart CEO Doug McMillon a letter last week saying that "Walmart's website is mired in USA labeling errors," and ran down a few examples, per the Consumerist: The company's store brand Equate Beauty Wedge Applicator Sponges, formerly labeled "Made in the USA" on the website, "are made in China according to the product packaging," the letter says. Some "USA" labels conflict with the product information on the same Web page, according to the letter—including Equate 7 Day Dental Whitening System Advanced Whitening Wraps (imported) and Almay Intense I-color Liquid Eye Liner (made in Germany). Some USA labels ignore the fact that the product is only partly made, or is assembled rather than made, in the US, the letter adds. "False made in USA labeling on Walmart’s website has misled consumers looking to purchase American-made products," says TINA.org Executive Director Bonnie Patten. In response, Walmart says the two Equate products only recently located in the US—yet the "Made in the USA" label on them is now gone, the Consumerist notes. Walmart adds that it's undertaking "a more extensive quality assurance review" of its website. While there's no official standard for "Made in the USA" labeling, companies can get sued over it for false advertising, AGBeat reports. Click to see a more extensive TINA review of Walmart's "USA" labeling. |
Add a location to your Tweets
When you tweet with a location, Twitter stores that location. You can switch location on/off before each Tweet and always have the option to delete your location history. Learn more ||||| This is one dance party 106-year-old Virginia McLaurin will never forget. #BlackHistoryMonth https://t.co/CAPi3heOMT
Some people wait a lifetime! A 106-year-old woman named Virginia McLaurin danced with joy while meeting President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle this weekend in the White House.
A sweet video from the encounter shows McLaurin vivaciously walking into the room to meet with the couple. She then squeals and laughs with delight. "It's an honor, it's an honor," she tells President Obama, who then brings over his grinning wife.
"She's 106!” the president proclaims of his adorable guest.
"No, you are not!" yells Michelle, who gives McLaurin a hug and holds her hand affectionately. "Oh, my goodness! I want to be like you when I grow up."
The Obamas then dance with her in the middle of the Blue Room, and the three roar with laughter. "I thought I would never live to get in the White House," says McLaurin, who was there for Black History Month. "And I tell you. I am so happy: A black president."
Watch the sweet video above.
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| – Even 106-year-olds dance for joy. Need proof? You've got it thanks to a White House video shared on Twitter on Sunday. It shows centenarian Virginia McLaurin busting a move while meeting President and Michelle Obama at the White House for Black History Month, reports Us Weekly. "It's an honor, it's an honor," she told the president, before rushing across the Blue Room to meet Michelle Obama, forcing the president to tell her to "slow down." "I want to be like you when I grow up," the first lady joked to McLaurin, before joining her for an impromtu dance party. The first lady held McLaurin's hand while the president held her cane. |
GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney leads President Obama by 3 points nationally, according to the closely watched Gallup daily tracking poll.
Romney takes 50 percent to Obama's 47 in the poll of likely voters, released Thursday. That’s unchanged from Wednesday’s daily tracking poll.
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Obama, meanwhile, retained his 1-point advantage over Romney among registered voters in the survey, 48-47.
The survey is a rolling seven-day average through Oct. 24, so it completely encapsulates polling data since the second presidential debate last Tuesday night, Oct. 16, in Hempstead, N.Y., but includes only two days of reaction to Monday night’s foreign-policy debate in Boca Raton, Fla.
Gallup has received a lot of attention, as Romney’s lead among likely voters had been outsized in comparison to other polls. For most of the last week, Romney led Obama by between 5 and 7 points in the poll.
According to the RealClearPolitics average of national polls, Romney leads Obama by less than 1 percentage point, 47.7 to 47.1
An Associated Press-GfK poll released Thursday shows Romney edging Obama, 47-45.
But battleground polls show many states remain a toss-up.
In Ohio, a key state for both campaigns, a Time poll released Wednesday showed Obama up 5, with a 49-44 advantage, while a SurveyUSA poll showed the president topping Romney by 3.
A poll from conservative outlet Rasmussen put the two candidates tied in the Buckeye State, with 48 percent support apiece among likely voters.
The Gallup daily tracking poll has a margin of error of 2 percentage points. ||||| Our Services
We empower you to use data for real transformation. Through analytics and advice, we provide leaders with a road map for understanding and unlocking the full potential of individuals, teams and organizations. ||||| The term “momentum” is used very often in political coverage — but reporters and analysts seldom pause to consider what it means.
Let me tell you what I think it ought to mean: that a body in motion tends to stay in motion. That is, it ought to imply that a candidate is gaining ground in the race — and, furthermore, that he is likely to continue to gain ground.
As a thesis or prediction about how polls behave, this notion is a bit dubious, especially in general elections. In races for the United States Senate, for instance, my research suggests that a candidate who gains ground in the polls in one month (say, from August to September) is no more likely to do so during the next one (from September to October). If anything, the candidate who gains ground in the polls in one month may be more likely to lose ground the next time around.
(Where might there be clearer evidence for momentum, as I’ve defined it? In primaries, especially when there are multiple candidates in the race and voters are behaving tactically in choosing among them. But there is little evidence of it in general elections.)
The way the term “momentum” is applied in practice by the news media, however, it usually refers only to the first part of the clause — meaning simply that a candidate has been gaining ground in the polls, whether or not he might continue to do so. (I’ve used this phrasing plenty of times myself, so I have no real basis to complain about it.)
But there are other times when the notion of momentum is behind the curve — as it probably now is if applied to Mitt Romney’s polling.
Mr. Romney clearly gained ground in the polls in the week or two after the Denver debate, putting himself in a much stronger overall position in the race. However, it seems that he is no longer doing so.
Take Wednesday’s national tracking polls, for instance. (There are now eight of them published each day.) Mr. Romney gained ground in just one of the polls, an online poll conducted for Reuters by the polling organization Ipsos. He lost ground in five others, with President Obama improving his standing instead in those surveys. On average, Mr. Obama gained about one point between the eight polls.
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This is the closest that we’ve come in a week or so to one candidate clearly having “won” the day in the tracking polls — and it was Mr. Obama.
The trend could also be spurious. If the race is steady, it’s not that hard for one candidate to gain ground in five of six polls (excluding the two that showed no movement on Wednesday) just based on chance alone.
What isn’t very likely, however, is for one candidate to lose ground in five of six polls if the race is still moving toward him. In other words, we can debate whether Mr. Obama has a pinch of momentum or whether the race is instead flat, but it’s improbable that Mr. Romney would have a day like this if he still had momentum.
The FiveThirtyEight model looks at a broader array of polls — including state polls — in order to gauge the overall trend in the race.
Our “now-cast” also finds a slightly favorable trend for Mr. Obama over the course of the past 10 days or so. Mr. Romney’s position peaked in the “now-cast” on Friday, Oct. 12, at which point it estimated a virtual tie in the popular vote (Mr. Obama was the projected “winner” by 0.3 percentage points). As of Wednesday, however, Mr. Obama was 1.4 percentage points ahead in the “now-cast,” meaning that he may have regained about 1 percentage point of the 4 points or so that he lost after Denver. Mr. Obama’s chances of winning the Electoral College were up in the FiveThirtyEight forecast to 71 percent on Wednesday from 68.1 percent on Tuesday.
It’s not yet clear how much of this, if any, has to do with the final presidential debate in Florida this Monday, which instant polls regarded Mr. Obama as having won. Instead, it’s been more of a slow and unsteady trajectory for him, with Mr. Obama often taking two steps forward but then one step back. It’s also not out of the question that the apparent trend just represents statistical noise.
At the same time, there is more reason to take a potential change in the polls seriously if it is precipitated by a news event like the debate. The tracking polls that were released on Wednesday contained only one full day of interviews that postdated the Florida debate. If the debate moved the needle toward Mr. Obama, it should become more apparent in the coming days.
The battleground state polls that came in on Wednesday were generally very close to our model’s current projections. For instance, there were three Ohio polls published on Wednesday; one showed a tied race there, while the other two showed Mr. Obama ahead by margins of two and five points.That’s pretty much what you’d expect to see out of a trio of Ohio polls if Mr. Obama’s lead there were about two points, which is where our model now has it.
Some of the polls, especially the Time magazine poll which had Mr. Obama five points ahead in Ohio, seemed to set off a lot of discussion on Twitter, as though people were surprised that Mr. Obama still held the lead there.
But these polls are really nothing new. Since the Denver debate, Mr. Obama has held the lead in 16 Ohio polls against 6 for Mr. Romney. In Nevada, Mr. Obama has had the lead in 11 polls, to Mr. Romney’s 1. Mr. Obama has led in all polls of Wisconsin since the Denver debate, and he has had five poll leads in Iowa to one for Mr. Romney.
Part of the confusion (and part of the reason behind the perception that Mr. Romney is still gaining ground in the race) may be because of the headlines that accompany polls.
We’re still getting some polls trickling in where the most recent comparison is to a poll conducted before the Denver debate. We should expect Mr. Romney to gain ground relative to a poll conducted before Denver. (Mr. Romney may have lost a point or so off his bounce, but he has clearly not lost all of it). But it isn’t news when he does; Mr. Romney’s Denver gains had long ago become apparent, and priced into the various polling averages and forecast models.
The question, rather, is whether Mr. Romney is gaining ground relative to the post-Denver polls — or if, as Wednesday’s polls seemed to imply, the race instead may have ticked back slightly toward Mr. Obama. | – Mitt Romney's lead over President Obama stands at 3 points in today's Gallup tracking poll, and among registered voters Obama actually leads 48-47. The poll is noteworthy, the Hill explains, because Gallup has lately been much higher on Romney than all the other polls; he was ahead by 3 yesterday, too, but for most of last week, he was up between 5 and 7 points. The results back up a trend Nate Silver has been seeing: It appears Romney's rise has stalled. Yesterday he lost ground in five out of six daily polls. "This is the closest we've come in a week or so to one candidate clearly having 'won' the day … and it was Mr. Obama," Silver writes. "It's improbable that Mr. Romney would have a day like this if he still had momentum." Romney still has a slight edge in RealClearPolitics' polling average, but Silver's prediction model still has Obama as a 71% favorite to win. |
Festival goers leave the venue of the Rock am Ring music festival on June 2, 2017 in Nuerburg following an evcuation alert (AFP Photo/Thomas Frey)
Berlin (AFP) - Germany's biggest rock festival will resume after being disrupted by fears of a possible "terrorist threat" which have proved to be unfounded, the organisers said Saturday.
Police told AFP searches at the three-day "Rock am Ring," held near the southwestern city of Koblenz were over. Live music will resume at 1:30 pm (1130 GMT).
Some 90,000 people are expected to attend the event which ends on Sunday.
"After a series of intensive searches across the site the fears of an imminent danger were not confirmed," the organisers said.
"The police gave the go-ahead" for the festival to restart, they said.
The festival was evacuated on Friday evening after Koblenz police said they were in possession of "concrete elements, in the light of which a possible terrorist threat cannot be ruled out".
Police said three people suspected of being members of a Salafist group in the neighbouring state of Hesse were detained but released on Saturday.
"One person who is not of German origin and is known to the police as having links to the Islamist terror network had access to" backstage areas, police spokesman Wolfgang Fromm said.
The three had been hired to set up security barriers at the venue.
Security for the festival had already been stepped up, with an additional 1,200 staff, in response to the May 22 Manchester bombing which occurred after a concert by US singer Ariana Grande.
The region's interior minister Roger Lewentz defended the decision to evacuate the festival, saying: "We cannot take risks."
Last year's Rock am Ring programme was curtailed by violent storms in which dozens of people were injured by lightning.
The country remains on high alert after a jihadist attack on a Christmas market in Berlin on December 19.
Anis Amri, a 24-year-old Tunisian, hijacked a truck, killed its Polish driver and ploughed the vehicle through the market, claiming 11 more lives and wounding dozens. ||||| A rock festival in Germany has been closed down for the day after police received information on a suspected terror threat. Thousands of people were evacuated from the Rock am Ring, at the Nürburgring in the north-west of the country on Friday.
Police said they were investigating after getting “concrete indications” that meant they could not “exclude a possible terrorist threat”. Festival organisers said they had been asked by police to shut down the festival “due to a terrorist threat”.
The incident comes less than a fortnight after a terrorist killed 22 people at a concert in Manchester.
It was not immediately clear how many fans were in attendance, but about 90,000 were expected by the end of the weekend at the annual three-day event.
The German band Rammstein were Friday night’s headliners, but had not started playing. The festival’s organisers said they hoped to be able to go ahead on Saturday.
“As safety is paramount, and it is necessary to exclude a threat to festival visitors in any case as far as possible, it was decided to suspend the festival for this day,” police said.
Police said they had changed their security plans in the light of the Manchester attack and had increased their forces to 1,200 officers.
“After a threat could not be ruled out, all necessary measures were taken immediately. This led to the event being interrupted today for security reasons.”
Rock am Ring’s organisers said: “We ask all the festival visitors to leave the site in a calm and controlled manner towards the exits and camping grounds. We have to support the police investigations.” | – A "possible terrorist threat" shut down Rock am Ring, one of Germany's biggest music festivals, Friday near Nuerburg, AFP reports. Police say they have "concrete elements, in the light of which a possible terrorist threat cannot be ruled out." But no other details were released. According to the Guardian, thousands of people were asked to leave the festival calmly "in order to help police investigations." It's unclear how many people were in attendance Friday, but about 90,000 were expected over the three-day festival. Organizers hoped the festival would resume Saturday. Rock am Ring had already increased security, adding 1,200 additional staff, after the recent Manchester bombing at an Ariana Grande concert. (Rock am Ring was also suspended last year after dozens were injured by lightning.) |
Story highlights Driver provides his account of Boston-area carjacking
He details behavior of the Tsarnaev brothers
Older brother asked Danny about his heritage
Incident followed Boston Marathon bombings
During the 90-minute ride of terror, Tamerlan Tsarnaev kept talking.
He barked out orders, detailed his hatred of Americans and asked his carjacking victim to remain calm.
Tsarnaev kept asking about the 26-year-old driver's heritage and family.
"If you cooperate, I won't kill you," said Tsarnaev, who, along with his younger brother, was a suspect in the Boston Marathon bombings and the killing of a police officer.
The Massachusetts driver, whom CNN is identifying only as Danny because of privacy and safety concerns, gave his account of the April 18 incident and described the very different behavior of Tsarnaev and his younger brother, Dzhokhar.
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While the talkative Tamerlan was the ringleader during the carjacking, the quiet Dzhokhar responded to multiple orders, such as getting money from an ATM.
The only question Dzhokhar asked was how much Danny paid for his Mercedes SUV.
After the Chinese entrepreneur eventually escaped, police caught up with the brothers and engaged in a gun battle that left Tamerlan Tsarnaev dead.
From fear to cheers: The final 24 hours that paralyzed Boston
Dzhokhar, wounded, was found later and is in police custody.
Hours after authorities released images of the two bombing suspects, the brothers spontaneously decided to go to New York's Times Square to blow up their six remaining explosives, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev told investigators. His account was outlined by New York's police commissioner.
Before forcing their way into Danny's vehicle three days after the bombings, the brothers fatally shot a campus police officer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, police said.
Tamerlan Tsarnaev said right after he got in the vehicle that he was responsible for the bombings and the officer's death, according to Danny.
"This is like something you see in a movie, isn't it?" Tamerlan Tsarnaev said at one point during the carjacking.
Danny, who first spoke with The Boston Globe, gave CNN this account of the carjacking in a more than hourlong conversation off-camera.
-- Danny had stopped his vehicle to send a text when Tamerlan walked up and tapped on the window. The suspect, allegedly carrying a handgun, opened the door and got into the passenger seat.
-- Dzhokhar followed in another vehicle.
-- Under questioning by Tamerlan, Danny played up being Chinese and tried to humanize himself by talking about cell phones and family. Danny told CNN he felt being Chinese helped save his life.
-- Eventually, Dzhokhar abandoned his vehicle and the three rode in Danny's SUV. Tamerlan started driving, using back streets in the Boston area, trying to avoid police and searching for an open gas station.
-- Danny heard the word "Manhattan" at one point and thought the brothers were going to drive to New York, kill him on the way and dump his body under the bridge.
-- When they stopped to refuel at a Shell gas station, Danny managed to slip away. He could feel Tamerlan grab him and heard him yell an expletive. Danny ran to a Mobil gas station, where he told an employee there what happened.
Danny told CNN the fact that his car was low on gas helped save his life.
During the carjacking, Danny thought about a girl in New York whom he really liked.
He thought he'd never see her again. ||||| Boston suspects' carjacking victim describes terrifying night
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(CBS News) You are about to hear, for the first time, from a man who got caught up in the terror in Boston two weeks ago and helped bring it to an end.
An immigrant from China, he was carjacked by the suspects, but escaped and tipped off the police.
This 26-year-old Chinese entrepreneur, who calls himself "Danny," had just pulled over in his new Mercedes on a Boston street to send a text message when a man jumped in.
(At left, watch "Danny" describe how the incident began)
In his first television interview, he tells his story. At his request, CBS News is concealing his identity and has altered his voice.
"I thought it was just a robbery, you know?" Danny said. "He took out his gun, pointed to me. He told me that 'You know I am serious. Don't be stupid.'"
But Danny quickly learned it was more than just a robbery.
"He asked me a question, like, 'Do you know the Boston explosion on Monday?' I said, 'yes.' He said, you know, 'I did that. And I just killed a policeman in Cambridge.'"
(At left, "Danny" gives a detailed account of what happened in the car after the suspects took control.)
The gunman was Tamerlan Tsarneav. His younger brother, Dzhokhar, was trailing behind in another car. When they pulled over, the two suspects loaded the remaining bombs into the back of Danny's car. Tamerlan and his brother spoke to each other in Russian.
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Danny said he didn't understand much of their conversation.
"I only heard one word. It's Manhattan," he said.
"It seemed like they were going to New York because they asked me a lot of questions."
En route to a gas station, Danny's phone rang. It was his roommate, who wondered why he wasn't at home. Tamerlan pulled a gun out.
"If you don't want me to pick up the phone, I won't pick it up. I won't say anything," Danny remembers telling Tamerlan. "He told me that you have to answer the phone. But if you use any single world in Chinese, I will kill you."
When Danny's roommate heard him speaking in English, he responded in Chinese, saying "Why are you speaking in English? Are you okay?"
(At left, "Danny" describes how the Tsarnaev brothers threatened to kill him if he spoke Chinese on a phone call with his roommate.)
"I just told him I'm going to sleep over at a friend's place tonight," Danny said. "So after, I hang up the phone. Tamerlan was very happy. He said, 'Good job. Good boy.'"
Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev
At some point, he started thinking about his exit strategy. "I have a lot of things to do," he said he remembered thinking. "I have to unlock the door. I have to unfasten my seatbelt. I have to pull the handle on the door."
Finally, at a gas station Dzhokhar left the car to pay inside. Tamerlan was fiddling with the GPS. Danny knew this might be his last chance.
"I was counting," Danny said. "I was counting. I was just, 'one two, three, four.' And I just do it. And I did it. I can feel Tamerlan trying to grab me ... I was just running as fast as I can and I never look back."
(At left, "Danny" describes how he managed to get away.)
He ran across the street to a Mobil gas station, pleading with the clerk on duty to call 911.
"Car-jacking occurred at Rich & Shell, 1-0-0-1 Cambridge Street," the police scanner said. "The victim fled the car at the Mobil on Memorial Drive."
Danny said he doesn't think he's a hero.
"What I was doing was trying to save myself. The police, they are the hero. They exchange gunfire with the bad guys. I think they are the heroes."
Danny felt lucky to get out of it alive and in one piece. His car, the 2013 Mercedes SUV was not so lucky. Police used its GPS to track it to where they cornered the Tsarnaev brothers in the shootout. It sustained 32 bullet holes, so the Daimler Leasing Company says a month-and-a-half into the deal, Danny's car is a total loss.
You know what? He's okay with that. | – As the Boston carjacking victim known only as "Danny" continues to recount his story of what happened during his encounter with the Tsarnaev brothers, CNN has what might be the strangest detail of all. Danny says that while Tamerlan made threats, blustered about his hatred of Americans, and generally acted as ringleader, Dzhokhar asked only one question the whole time: He wanted to know how much Danny paid for the Mercedes SUV they were riding in. At another point, the Chinese immigrant tells CBS that his phone rang. "If you don't want me to pick up the phone, I won't pick it up," he told Tamerlan. "I won't say anything." Tamerlan "told me that you have to answer the phone. But if you use any single word in Chinese, I will kill you." Danny complied, and when he hung up Tamerlan said, "Good job. Good boy." |
NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--21st Century Fox today issued the following statement announcing it has settled Gretchen Carlson’s lawsuit.
“21st Century Fox is pleased to announce that it has settled Gretchen Carlson’s lawsuit. During her tenure at Fox News, Gretchen exhibited the highest standards of journalism and professionalism. She developed a loyal audience and was a daily source of information for many Americans. We are proud that she was part of the Fox News team. We sincerely regret and apologize for the fact that Gretchen was not treated with the respect and dignity that she and all of our colleagues deserve.”
Ms. Carlson issued the following statement:
“I am gratified that 21st Century Fox took decisive action after I filed my Complaint. I’m ready to move on to the next chapter of my life in which I will redouble my efforts to empower women in the workplace. I want to thank all the brave women who came forward to tell their own stories and the many people across the country who embraced and supported me in their #StandWithGretchen. All women deserve a dignified and respectful workplace in which talent, hard work and loyalty are recognized, revered and rewarded.”
About 21st Century Fox
21st Century Fox is the world's premier portfolio of cable, broadcast, film, pay TV and satellite assets spanning six continents across the globe. Reaching more than 1.8 billion subscribers in approximately 50 local languages every day, 21st Century Fox is home to a global portfolio of cable and broadcasting networks and properties, including FOX, FX, FXX, FXM, FS1, Fox News Channel, Fox Business Network, FOX Sports, Fox Sports Network, National Geographic Channels, STAR India, 28 local television stations in the U.S. and more than 300 international channels; film studio Twentieth Century Fox Film; and television production studios Twentieth Century Fox Television and a 50% ownership interest in Endemol Shine Group. The Company also holds a 39.1% ownership interest in Sky, Europe’s leading entertainment company, which serves 22 million customers across five countries. For more information about 21st Century Fox, please visit www.21CF.com. ||||| Gretchen Carlson | Getty Fox settles with Gretchen Carlson over sexual harassment claims Company will pay $20 million to settle suit
21st Century Fox is settling a lawsuit brought by former Fox News anchor Gretchen Carlson, the company confirmed Tuesday morning. Terms of the settlement were not public, but Vanity Fair reported that it is for $20 million.
"21st Century Fox is pleased to announce that it has settled Gretchen Carlson's lawsuit," a statement from the company said. "During her tenure at Fox News, Gretchen exhibited the highest standards of journalism and professionalism. She developed a loyal audience and was a daily source of information for many Americans. We are proud that she was part of the Fox News team. We sincerely regret and apologize for the fact that Gretchen was not treated with the respect that she & all our colleagues deserve."
Story Continued Below
"I am gratified that 21st Century Fox took decisive action after I filed my Complaint," Carlson said in a statement. "I'm ready to move on to the next chapter of my life in which I will redouble my efforts to empower women in the workplace. I want to thank all the brave women who came forward to tell their own stories and the many people across the country who embraced and supported me in their #StandWithGretchen. All women deserve a dignified and respectful workplace."
The former Fox News host sued former Fox News chairman and CEO Roger Ailes in July, alleging that he sexually harassed her and terminated her contract in retaliation. Ailes has denied the allegations, though after 21st Century Fox launched an investigation into the claims by Carlson and several other women, Ailes resigned from the company with a reported $40 million parachute.
Now Fox News is settling the suit on Ailes' behalf, even though the company was not named as a defendant in the case. It isn't clear whether Ailes will be paying a portion of it.
According to Vanity Fair, the settlement will come with a public apology to Carlson on behalf of Fox, which is also reportedly in talks with two other women for their own settlements.
Though a settlement was never off the table, Carlson and her team indicated early on that that wasn't their ultimate goal.
"We haven’t discussed a settlement with our client or anything because no one has raised it. This is about more than money. Gretchen is standing up for something really important to her, it’s something that’s been a hallmark of her career,” Carlson's lawyer, Nancy Erika Smith told POLITICO in July, noting Carlson's work with victims of domestic violence, on sexual harassment and women empowerment. "It’s important for her to stand up for women right now.”
Allan Ripp, a spokesman for Carlson and her legal team said they had no comment in response to the settlement report or to questions as to why Carlson would agree to settle.
||||| Fox Host Greta Van Susteren Defends Fox News CEO Roger Ailes, Says Gretchen Carlson's Sexual Harassment Allegations Don't 'Have Any Ring of Truth'
RELATED VIDEO: Fox News Anchor Gretchen Carlson Sues CEO Roger Ailes for Alleged Sexual Harassment and Retaliation
Fox News host Greta Van Susteren is surprised by her former colleague Gretchen Carlson 's sexual harassment allegations against Fox News CEO Roger Ailes Speaking to PEOPLE about the situation, Van Susteren, who has been at the network for 15 years, admits she's never had an inappropriate encounter with Ailes and originally considered Carlson's allegations as those of a bitter employee."Of course, the first thing that occurred to me is that, unfortunately, we have a disgruntled employee, a colleague," she says. "I read that her show wasn't being renewed and , being a lawyer, I thought she got angry. I deal with Roger Ailes often. I've often been alone with Roger Ailes in his office over the course of 15 years and I've never seen anything like what I'm reading about in the papers and the magazine."Although Van Susteren's relationship with Carlson was limited to co-reporting on Prince William and Princess Kate's 2011 wedding, a few appearances on The Real Story and "a cup of coffee or a drink or something," Van Susteren believes that sexual harassment claims would have traveled throughout the company."People come to me because I've been there so long," she says. "That's why this doesn't have any ring of truth to me. I would have heard it. People don't keep things silent."Regarding the claims that Ailes sabotaged Carlson's career because she refused sexual advances and complained about sever and pervasive sexual harassment, Van Susteren says that she found them odd considering Ailes "was first to put a woman in primetime," meaning Catherine Crier.Van Susteren adds that "most people, man or woman, would give anything to have had the air time [Carlson] had on Fox & Friends", and would have viewed her move to the 2 p.m. time slot as a "huge promotion" since it provided Carlson with her own hour, her own name-brand show and the freedom to "produce and do what she wanted."Van Susteren also described Ailes as "the king of cable," adding that although it's not always a perfect, she's enjoyed a "very professional and very successful" working relationship with her boss."If Roger Ailes were how he's described, there's no way I would've stuck around. I don't feel like putting up with that stuff and I wouldn't," she says. "Even if he weren't doing it to me, I wouldn't want to work in that environment. I sort of feel bad for Gretchen Carlson because it's sort of a weird thing that she's done. What she's alleging is something that is alien to me. I've never heard it."On Wednesday, Carlson filed a lawsuit against Ailes, alleging that he "has unlawfully retaliated against Carlson and sabotaged her career because she refused sexual advances and complained about severe pervasive sexual harassment."The lawsuit includes Carlson's Fox & Friends co-host Steve Doocy, whom she claims "regularly treat[ed] her in a sexist and condescending way" when they worked together.Ailes responded to the allegations in a statement – obtained by PEOPLE – in which he calls the claims "retaliatory.""Gretchen Carlson's allegations are false. This is a retaliatory suit for the network's decision not to renew her contract, which was due to the fact that her disappointingly low ratings were dragging down the afternoon lineup," the statement reads. "When Fox News did not commence any negotiations to renew her contract, Ms. Carlson became aware that her career with the network was likely over and conveniently began to pursue a lawsuit."The statement continued: "Ironically, FOX News provided her with more on-air opportunities over her 11-year tenure than any other employer in the industry, for which she thanked me in her recent book. This defamatory lawsuit is not only offensive, it is wholly without merit and will be defended vigorously." ||||| It took 15 days to end the mighty 20-year reign of Roger Ailes at Fox News, one of the most storied runs in media and political history. Ailes built not just a conservative cable news channel but something like a fourth branch of government; a propaganda arm for the GOP; an organization that determined Republican presidential candidates, sold wars, and decided the issues of the day for 2 million viewers. That the place turned out to be rife with grotesque abuses of power has left even its liberal critics stunned. More than two dozen women have come forward to accuse Ailes of sexual harassment, and what they have exposed is both a culture of misogyny and one of corruption and surveillance, smear campaigns and hush money, with implications reaching far wider than one disturbed man at the top.
It began, of course, with a lawsuit. Of all the people who might have brought down Ailes, the former Fox & Friends anchor Gretchen Carlson was among the least likely. A 50-year-old former Miss America, she was the archetypal Fox anchor: blonde, right-wing, proudly anti-intellectual. A memorable Daily Show clip showed Carlson saying she needed to Google the words czar and ignoramus. But television is a deceptive medium. Off-camera, Carlson is a Stanford- and Oxford-educated feminist who chafed at the culture of Fox News. When Ailes made harassing comments to her about her legs and suggested she wear tight-fitting outfits after she joined the network in 2005, she tried to ignore him. But eventually he pushed her too far. When Carlson complained to her supervisor in 2009 about her co-host Steve Doocy, who she said condescended to her on and off the air, Ailes responded that she was “a man hater” and a “killer” who “needed to get along with the boys.” After this conversation, Carlson says, her role on the show diminished. In September 2013, Ailes demoted her from the morning show Fox & Friends to the lower-rated 2 p.m. time slot.
Carlson knew her situation was far from unique: It was common knowledge at Fox that Ailes frequently made inappropriate comments to women in private meetings and asked them to twirl around so he could examine their figures; and there were persistent rumors that Ailes propositioned female employees for sexual favors. The culture of fear at Fox was such that no one would dare come forward. Ailes was notoriously paranoid and secretive — he built a multiroom security bunker under his home and kept a gun in his Fox office, according to Vanity Fair — and he demanded absolute loyalty from those who worked for him. He was known for monitoring employee emails and phone conversations and hiring private investigators. “Watch out for the enemy within,” he told Fox’s staff during one companywide meeting.
Taking on Ailes was dangerous, but Carlson was determined to fight back. She settled on a simple strategy: She would turn the tables on his surveillance. Beginning in 2014, according to a person familiar with the lawsuit, Carlson brought her iPhone to meetings in Ailes’s office and secretly recorded him saying the kinds of things he’d been saying to her all along. “I think you and I should have had a sexual relationship a long time ago, and then you’d be good and better and I’d be good and better. Sometimes problems are easier to solve” that way, he said in one conversation. “I’m sure you can do sweet nothings when you want to,” he said another time.
After more than a year of taping, she had captured numerous incidents of sexual harassment. Carlson’s husband, sports agent Casey Close, put her in touch with his lawyer Martin Hyman, who introduced her to employment attorney Nancy Erika Smith. Smith had won a sexual-harassment settlement in 2008 for a woman who sued former New Jersey acting governor Donald DiFranceso. “I hate bullies,” Smith told me. “I became a lawyer to fight bullies.” But this was riskier than any case she’d tried. Carlson’s Fox contract had a clause that mandated that employment disputes be resolved in private arbitration—which meant Carlson’s case could be thrown out and Smith herself could be sued for millions for filing.
Carlson’s team decided to circumvent the clause by suing Ailes personally rather than Fox News. They hoped that with the element of surprise, they would be able to prevent Fox from launching a preemptive suit that forced them into arbitration. The plan was to file in September 2016 in New Jersey Superior Court (Ailes owns a home in Cresskill, New Jersey). But their timetable was pushed up when, on the afternoon of June 23, Carlson was called into a meeting with Fox general counsel Dianne Brandi and senior executive VP Bill Shine, and fired the day her contract expired.* Smith, bedridden following surgery for a severed hamstring, raced to get the suit ready. Over the Fourth of July weekend, Smith instructed an IT technician to install software on her firm’s network and Carlson’s electronic devices to prevent the use of spyware by Fox. “We didn’t want to be hacked,” Smith said. They filed their lawsuit on July 6.
Carlson and Smith were well aware that suing Ailes for sexual harassment would be big news in a post-Cosby media culture that had become more sensitive to women claiming harassment; still, they were anxious about going up against such a powerful adversary. What they couldn’t have known was that Ailes’s position at Fox was already much more precarious than ever before.
When Carlson filed her suit, 21st Century Fox executive chairman Rupert Murdoch and his sons, James and Lachlan, were in Sun Valley, Idaho, attending the annual Allen & Company media conference. James and Lachlan, who were not fans of Ailes’s, had been taking on bigger and bigger roles in the company in recent years (technically, and much to his irritation, Ailes has reported to them since June 2015), and they were quick to recognize the suit as both a big problem — and an opportunity. Within hours, the Murdoch heirs persuaded their 85-year-old father, who historically has been loath to undercut Ailes publicly, to release a statement saying, “We take these matters seriously.” They also persuaded Rupert to hire the law firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison to conduct an internal investigation into the matter. Making things look worse for Ailes, three days after Carlson’s suit was filed, New York published the accounts of six other women who claimed to have been harassed by Ailes over the course of three decades.
A few hours after the New York report, Ailes held an emergency meeting with longtime friend Rudy Giuliani and lawyer Marc Mukasey at his home in Garrison, New York, according to a high-level Fox source. Ailes vehemently denied the allegations. The next morning, Ailes and his wife, Elizabeth, turned his second-floor office at Fox News into a war room. “It’s all bullshit! We have to get in front of this,” he said to executives. “This is not about money. This is about his legacy,” said Elizabeth, according to a Fox source. As part of his counteroffensive, Ailes rallied Fox News employees to defend him in the press. Fox & Friends host Ainsley Earhardt called Ailes a “family man”; Fox Business anchor Neil Cavuto wrote, reportedly of his own volition, an op-ed labeling Ailes’s accusers “sick.” Ailes’s legal team attempted to intimidate a former Fox correspondent named Rudi Bakhtiar who spoke to New York about her harassment.
Ailes told executives that he was being persecuted by the liberal media and by the Murdoch sons. According to a high-level source inside the company, Ailes complained to 21st Century Fox general counsel Gerson Zweifach that James, whose wife had worked for the Clinton Foundation, was trying to get rid of him in order to help elect Hillary Clinton. At one point, Ailes threatened to fly to France, where Rupert was vacationing with his wife, Jerry Hall, in an effort to save his job. Perhaps Murdoch told him not to bother, because the trip never happened.
According to a person close to the Murdochs, Rupert’s first instinct was to protect Ailes, who had worked for him for two decades. The elder Murdoch can be extremely loyal to executives who run his companies, even when they cross the line. (The most famous example of this is Sun editor Rebekah Brooks, whom he kept in the fold after the U.K. phone-hacking scandal.) Also, Ailes has made the Murdochs a lot of money — Fox News generates more than $1 billion annually, which accounts for 20 percent of 21st Century Fox’s profits — and Rupert worried that perhaps only Ailes could run the network so successfully. “Rupert is in the clouds; he didn’t appreciate how toxic an environment it was that Ailes created,” a person close to the Murdochs said. “If the money hadn’t been so good, then maybe they would have asked questions.”
Beyond the James and Lachlan factor, the relationship between Murdoch and Ailes was becoming strained: Murdoch didn’t like that Ailes was putting Fox so squarely behind the candidacy of Donald Trump. And he had begun to worry less about whether Fox could endure without its creator. (In recent years, Ailes had taken extended health leaves from Fox and the ratings held.) Now Ailes had made himself a true liability: More than two dozen Fox News women told the Paul, Weiss lawyers about their harassment in graphic terms. The most significant of the accusers was Megyn Kelly, who is in contract negotiations with Fox and is considered by the Murdochs to be the future of the network. So important to Fox is Kelly that Lachlan personally approved her reported $6 million book advance from Murdoch-controlled publisher HarperCollins, according to two sources.
As the inevitability of an ouster became clear, chaos engulfed Ailes’s team. After news broke on the afternoon of July 19 that Kelly had come forward, Ailes’s lawyer Susan Estrich tried to send Ailes’s denial to Drudge but mistakenly emailed a draft of Ailes’s proposed severance deal, which Drudge, briefly, published instead. Also that day, Ailes’s allies claimed to conservative news site Breitbart that 50 of Fox’s biggest personalities were prepared to quit if Ailes was removed, though in reality there was no such pact. That evening, Murdoch used one of his own press organs to fire back, with the New York Post tweeting the cover of the next day’s paper featuring Ailes’s picture and news that “the end is near for Roger Ailes.”
Indeed, that evening Ailes was banned from Fox News headquarters, his company email and phone shut off. On the afternoon of July 21, a few hours before Trump was to accept the Republican nomination in Cleveland, Murdoch summoned Ailes to his New York penthouse to work out a severance deal. James had wanted Ailes to be fired for cause, according to a person close to the Murdochs, but after reviewing his contract, Rupert decided to pay him $40 million and retain him as an “adviser.” Ailes, in turn, agreed to a multiyear noncompete clause that prevents him from going to a rival network (but, notably, not to a political campaign). Murdoch assured Ailes that, as acting CEO of Fox News, he would protect the channel’s conservative voice. “I’m here, and I’m in charge,” Murdoch told Fox staffers later that afternoon with Lachlan at his side (James had gone to Europe on a business trip). That night, Rupert and Lachlan discussed the extraordinary turn of events over drinks at Eleven Madison Park.
The Murdochs must have hoped that by acting swiftly to remove Ailes, they had averted a bigger crisis. But over the coming days, harassment allegations from more women would make it clear that the problem was not limited to Ailes but included those who enabled him — both the loyal deputies who surrounded him at Fox News and those at 21st Century Fox who turned a blind eye. “Fox News masquerades as a defender of traditional family values,” claimed the lawsuit of Fox anchor Andrea Tantaros, who says she was demoted and smeared in the press after she rebuffed sexual advances from Ailes, “but behind the scenes, it operates like a sex-fueled, Playboy Mansion–like cult, steeped in intimidation, indecency and misogyny.”
Gretchen Carlson.
Murdoch knew Ailes was a risky hire when he brought him in to start Fox News in 1996. Ailes had just been forced out as president of CNBC under circumstances that would foreshadow his problems at Fox.
While his volcanic temper, paranoia, and ruthlessness were part of what made Ailes among the best television producers and political operatives of his generation, those same attributes prevented him from functioning in a corporate environment. He hadn’t lasted in a job for more than a few years. “I have been through about 12 train wrecks in my career. Somehow, I always walk away,” he told an NBC executive.
By all accounts, Ailes had been a management disaster from the moment he arrived at NBC in 1993. But by 1995, things had reached a breaking point. In October of that year, NBC hired the law firm Proskauer Rose to conduct an internal investigation after then–NBC executive David Zaslav told human resources that Ailes had called him a “little fucking Jew prick” in front of a witness.
Zaslav told Proskauer investigators he feared for his safety. “I view Ailes as a very, very dangerous man. I take his threats to do physical harm to me very, very seriously … I feel endangered both at work and at home,” he said, according to NBC documents, which I first published in my 2014 biography of Ailes. CNBC executive Andy Friendly also filed complaints. “I along with several of my most talented colleagues have and continue to feel emotional and even physical fear dealing with this man every day,” he wrote. The Proskauer report chronicled Ailes’s “history of abusive, offensive, and intimidating statements/threats and personal attacks.” Ailes left NBC less than three months later.
What NBC considered fireable offenses, Murdoch saw as competitive advantages. He hired Ailes to help achieve a goal that had eluded Murdoch for a decade: busting CNN’s cable news monopoly. Back in the mid-’90s, no one thought it could be done. “I’m looking forward to squishing Rupert like a bug,” CNN founder Ted Turner boasted at an industry conference. But Ailes recognized how key wedge issues — race, religion, class — could turn conservative voters into loyal viewers. By January 2002, Fox News had surpassed CNN as the highest-rated cable news channel. But Ailes’s success went beyond ratings: The rise of Fox News provided Murdoch with the political influence in the United States that he already wielded in Australia and the United Kingdom. And by merging news, politics, and entertainment in such an overt way, Ailes was able to personally shape the national conversation and political fortunes as no one ever had before. It is not a stretch to argue that Ailes is largely responsible for, among other things, the selling of the Iraq War, the Swift-boating of John Kerry, the rise of the tea party, the sticking power of a host of Clinton scandals, and the purported illegitimacy of Barack Obama’s presidency.
Ailes became untouchable. At News Corp., he behaved just as he had at NBC, but Murdoch tolerated Ailes’s abusiveness because he was pleased with the results.
Ailes used Fox’s payroll as a patronage tool, doling out jobs to Republican politicians, friends, and political operatives. He made his personal lawyer, Peter Johnson Jr., a regular guest on Fox shows, despite producers’ misgivings about Johnson’s on-air performance. (They nicknamed Johnson “The Must-Do.”) Manny Alvarez, whose daughter went to school with Ailes’s son, became a medical commentator.
Ailes also positioned his former secretaries in key departments where he could make use of their loyalty to him. One, Nikole King, went to the finance department, where she handled Ailes’s personal expenses, a Fox executive said. Another, Brigette Boyle, went to human resources, where she was “tasked with hiring the ‘right’ people,” a former executive recalled.
But most striking is the extent to which Ailes ruled Fox News like a surveillance state. According to executives, he instructed Fox’s head of engineering, Warren Vandeveer, to install a CCTV system that allowed Ailes to monitor Fox offices, studios, greenrooms, the back entrance, and his homes. When Ailes spotted James Murdoch on the monitor smoking a cigarette outside the office, he remarked to his deputy Bill Shine, “Tell me that mouth hasn’t sucked a cock,” according to an executive who was in the room; Shine laughed. (A Fox spokesperson said Shine did not recall this.) Fox’s IT department also monitored employee email, according to sources. When I asked Fox’s director of IT, Deborah Sadusingh, about email searches, she said, “I can’t remember all the searches I’ve done.”
When Ailes uncovered something he didn’t like, he had various means of retaliation and increased surveillance. Fox’s notorious PR department, which for years was directed by Brian Lewis and is now overseen by Irena Briganti, was known for leaking negative stories about errant employees to journalists. Fox contributor Jim Pinkerton wrote an anonymous blog called the Cable Game that attacked Ailes-selected targets, two Fox executives confirmed. Fox contributor Bo Dietl did private-investigation work for Ailes, including following former Fox producer Andrea Mackris after she sued Bill O’Reilly for sexual harassment, a Fox source said. Ailes turned these same tactics on his enemies outside the company, including journalists. CNN’s Brian Stelter recently reported on Fox’s 400-page opposition-research file on me.
Fox News also obtained the phone records of journalists, by legally questionable means. According to two sources with direct knowledge of the incident, Brandi, Fox’s general counsel, hired a private investigator in late 2010 to obtain the personal home- and cell-phone records of Joe Strupp, a reporter for the liberal watchdog group Media Matters. (Through a spokesperson, Brandi denied this.) In the fall of that year, Strupp had written several articles quoting anonymous Fox sources, and the network wanted to determine who was talking to him. “This was the culture. Getting phone records doesn’t make anybody blink,” one Fox executive told me.
What makes this practice all the more brazen is that the Guardian was already publishing articles about phone-hacking at Murdoch’s British newspaper division. About that scandal, Murdoch said, “I do not accept ultimate responsibility. I hold responsible the people that I trusted to run it and the people they trusted.” In this case, of course, the person he trusted, inexplicably, was Ailes, and Murdoch does not seem to have wanted to know how Ailes chose to spend company funds. Every year, Murdoch approved Ailes’s budgets without question. “When you have an organization making that much money, we didn’t go line by line through people’s budgets,” a former News Corp. executive said.
Megyn Kelly.
Ailes was born in May 1940 in Warren, Ohio, then a booming industrial town. His father, a factory foreman, abused his wife and two sons. “He did like to beat the shit out of you with that belt … It was a pretty routine fixture of childhood,” Ailes’s brother Robert told me when I was reporting my book. His parents divorced in 1960. In court papers, Ailes’s mother alleged that her husband “threatened her life and to do her physical harm.”
Perhaps as an escape, Ailes lost himself in television. He suffered from hemophilia and was often homebound from school, so he spent hours on the living-room couch watching variety shows and Westerns. “He analyzed it, and he figured it out,” his brother told me of Ailes’s fascination with TV.
After graduating from Ohio University in 1962, Ailes landed a job as a gofer on The Mike Douglas Show, a daytime variety program that at the time was broadcast from Cleveland. Within four years, he had muscled aside the show’s creator and more seasoned colleagues to become the executive producer. Ailes’s mentor at The Mike Douglas Show, Chet Collier, who would later serve as his deputy at Fox, drilled into him the notion that television is a visual medium. “I’m not hiring talent for their brainpower,” Collier would say.
Though Ailes had married his college girlfriend, he used his growing power to take advantage of the parade of beautiful women coming through his office hoping to be cast on the show. Over the past two months, I interviewed 18 women who shared accounts of Ailes’s offering them job opportunities if they would agree to perform sexual favors for him and for his friends. In some cases, he threatened to release tapes of the encounters to prevent the women from reporting him. “The feeling I got in the interview was repulsion, power-hungriness, contempt, violence, and the need to subjugate and humiliate,” says a woman who auditioned for Ailes in 1968 when she was a college student.
In August 1968, Ailes left The Mike Douglas Show to join Richard Nixon’s presidential campaign as a media strategist. Ailes’s success in reinventing the candidate for television helped propel Nixon to the White House and made Ailes a media star (he was the anti-hero of Joe McGinniss’s landmark book The Selling of the President). But even back then, Ailes’s recklessness put his thriving career at risk. A former model told me that her parents called the police on Ailes after she told them he assaulted her in a Cincinnati hotel room in 1969. “I remember Ailes sweet-talking my parents out of pressing charges,” she says.
One prominent Republican told me that it was Ailes’s well-known reputation for awful behavior toward women that prevented him from being invited to work in the Nixon White House (or, later, in the administration of Bush 41). So after the ’68 election, he moved to New York, where he continued to use his power to demand sex from women seeking career opportunities. During this time Ailes divorced, remarried, and divorced again. A former television producer described an interview with Ailes in 1975, in which he said: “If you want to make it in New York City in the TV business, you’re going to have to fuck me, and you’re going to do that with anyone I tell you to.” While running media strategy on Rudy Giuliani’s 1989 mayoral campaign, Ailes propositioned an employee of his political-consulting firm: He name-dropped his friend Barry Diller and said that if she’d have sex with him he’d ask Diller to get her a part on Beverly Hills 90210. (Diller said he never received such a request.)
In 1998, two years after launching Fox, Ailes got married for the third time, to a woman named Elizabeth Tilson, a 37-year-old producer who had worked for him at CNBC. Two years later, when Ailes was 59, the couple had a son. But neither a new marriage nor parenthood changed his predatory behavior toward the women who worked for him.
According to interviews with Fox News women, Ailes would often begin by offering to mentor a young employee. He then asked a series of personal questions to expose potential vulnerabilities. “He asked, ‘Am I in a relationship? What are my familial ties?’ It was all to see how stable or unstable I was,” said a former employee. Megyn Kelly told lawyers at Paul, Weiss that Ailes made an unwanted sexual advance toward her in 2006 when she was going through a divorce. A lawyer for former anchor Laurie Dhue told me that Ailes harassed her around 2006; at the time, she was struggling with alcoholism.
Ailes’s longtime executive assistant Judy Laterza — who became one of his top lieutenants, earning more than $2 million a year, according to a Fox executive — seemed to function as a recruiter of sorts. According to Carlson’s attorney, in 2002, Laterza remarked to a college intern she saw on the elevator about how pretty she was and invited her to meet Ailes. After that meeting, Ailes arranged for the young woman to transfer to his staff. Her first assignment was to go down to the newsstand and fetch him the latest issue of Maxim. When she returned with the magazine, Ailes asked her to stay with him in his office. He flipped through the pages. The woman told the Washington Post that Ailes said, “You look like the women in here. You have great legs. If you sleep with me, you could be a model or a newscaster.” She cut short her internship. (Laterza did not respond to a request for comment.)
I spoke with another Fox News administrative assistant who said Laterza invited her to meet Ailes in 2004. The woman, then 25, told Ailes that her ambition was to do commercials. Ailes offered to pay for voice lessons (she declined) and helped her land an agent at William Morris. A few months later, Ailes summoned her to his office for an update. She told him how excited she was about the opportunities, and Ailes invited her for a drink. She suggested happy hour, but he demurred. “For a man in my position, it would have to be alone at a hotel,” she recalls him saying. “Do you know how to play the game?” She tried to get out of the situation as tactfully as possible. “I don’t feel comfortable doing this,” she said. “I respect your family; what about your son?” She remembers Ailes’s reply: “I’m a multifaceted man. That’s one side of me.” As she left the office, she says, Ailes tried to kiss her. “I was holding a binder full of voice-over auditions that I put between us. I was terrified.” She says she never heard from the William Morris agent again.
The fact that these incidents of harassment were so common may have contributed to why no one at Fox came forward or filed a lawsuit until now. Ailes’s attitudes about women permeated the very air of the network, from the exclusive hiring of attractive women to the strictly enforced skirts-and-heels dress code to the “leg cam” that lingers on female panelists’ crossed legs on air. It was hard to complain about something that was so normalized. Other senior executives harassed women, too. “Anyone who claimed there was a hostile work environment was seen as a complainer,” says a former Fox employee who says Ailes harassed her. “Or that they can’t take a joke.”
Lachlan, Rupert, and James Murdoch in 2014. Photo: Dan Steinberg/Invision/AP Photo
It is unfathomable to think, given Ailes’s reputation, given the number of women he propositioned and harassed and assaulted over decades, that senior management at Fox News was unaware of what was happening. What is more likely is that their very jobs included enabling, abetting, protecting, and covering up for their boss. “No one said no to Roger,” a Fox executive said.
The story of Laurie Luhn, which I reported in July, is an example of how Ailes used Fox’s public-relations, legal, and finance departments to facilitate his behavior. Ailes met Luhn on the 1988 George H.W. Bush campaign, and soon thereafter he put her on a $500 monthly retainer with his political-consulting firm to be his “spy” in Washington, though really her job was to meet him in hotel rooms. (During their first encounter, Luhn says, Ailes videotaped her in a garter belt and told her: “I am going to put [the tape] in a safe-deposit box just so we understand each other.”) Ailes recruited Luhn to Fox in 1996, before the network even launched. Collier, then his deputy, offered her a job in guest relations in the Washington bureau.
Laterza, Shine, and Shine’s deputy Suzanne Scott would take turns summoning Luhn for “meetings” in New York. (A Fox spokesperson said executives were not aware Ailes was sexually involved with Luhn.) Ailes and Luhn would meet in the afternoons, Luhn said, at hotels near Times Square, and Ailes paid her cash for sexual favors. She was also on the payroll at Fox — at her peak, she earned $250,000 a year as an event planner for the channel; multiple sources confirmed that she was a “Friend of Roger,” with special protection within the company. But the arrangement required her to do many things that now cause her anguish, including luring young female Fox employees into one-on-one meetings with Ailes that Luhn knew would likely result in harassment. “You’re going to find me ‘Roger’s Angels,’ ” he reportedly told her. One of Luhn’s employees received a six-figure settlement after filing a harassment claim against Ailes.
By the fall of 2006, Luhn says, Ailes was worried that she might go public with her story or cause a scene of some kind. That’s when the Fox machine really kicked into gear. According to Luhn, Fox PR tried to spread a rumor to the New York Daily News that Luhn had had an affair with Lee Atwater (which she denies), a story designed to make Luhn seem promiscuous so that her credibility would be damaged. When Luhn had an emotional breakdown en route to a vacation in Mexico, it was Shine’s job to arrange to bring her home. Scott picked her up at the airport and drove her to the Warwick Hotel on Sixth Avenue, where Luhn recalls that Scott checked her in under Scott’s name. (Scott denies this.)
Luhn later moved into a Fox corporate apartment in Chelsea, during which time, she says, Laterza and Shine monitored her email. (Shine denies this.) Luhn’s father says that Shine called him several times to check up on Luhn after she moved to California while still on the Fox payroll. Eventually, Shine even recommended a psychiatrist, who medicated and hospitalized her. At one point, Luhn attempted suicide. Through a spokesperson, Shine says he “was only trying to help.”
In late 2010 or early 2011, Luhn wrote a letter to Brandi, the Fox lawyer, saying she had been sexually harassed by Ailes for 20 years. According to a source, Brandi asked Ailes about the allegations, which he denied. Brandi then worked out a settlement at Ailes’s request. On June 15, 2011, Luhn signed a $3.15 million settlement agreement with extensive nondisclosure provisions. The payment was approved by Fox News CFO Mark Kranz. The check, which I viewed, was signed by David E. Miller, a treasurer for Fox Television Stations, Inc., a division run by current Fox co-president Jack Abernethy. “I have no idea how my name ended up on the check,” says Miller, citing standard company practice of signing checks and not asking questions. The settlement documents, which Luhn also showed me, were signed by Ailes, Brandi, and Shine.
After Luhn left Fox, Ailes took additional measures to conceal his harassment of employees. In 2011, he installed a floor-to-ceiling wooden door outside his executive suite. Only his assistants could see who entered his office. According to a former Fox producer, Laterza entered fake names into Ailes’s datebook when women went into his office: “If you got ahold of his ledger, you would not know who visited him.”
Still, the whispers about Ailes and women were growing louder. Karem Alsina, a former Fox makeup artist, told me she grew suspicious when Fox anchors came to see her before private meetings with Ailes to have their makeup done. “They would say, ‘I’m going to see Roger, gotta look beautiful!’ ” she recalled. “One of them came back down after a meeting, and the makeup on her nose and chin was gone.”
In 2012, after I had been reporting my Ailes biography for a year, Megyn Kelly became so concerned about the rumors that she went to Ailes’s then–PR chief, Brian Lewis, and attempted an intervention, according to a person close to Kelly. She told Lewis that Ailes was being reckless and that I might include his behavior in my book. (I did report the stories of two women who claimed Ailes had harassed them earlier in his career, and though I heard rumors of Ailes and Fox News women, I could not confirm them at the time.) Lewis, according to the source, asked Laterza to tell Ailes to stop because he thought Ailes might listen to his longtime assistant. Instead, according to the source, Laterza told Ailes that his PR chief was being disloyal. Less than a year later, Ailes fired Lewis.
Megyn Kelly was not a household name when she started at Fox News in 2004. A former corporate lawyer, she landed at Fox when former Special Report anchor Brit Hume recommended her to Ailes. She still wasn’t well known in 2006, when she got divorced and Ailes tried to take advantage of her perceived vulnerability. She may not have been any more powerful, at the time, than the other women he preyed on, but she was one of the lucky ones: She managed to rebuff his sexual overtures in a way that didn’t alienate her boss. “She was able to navigate the relationship to a professional place,” a person close to Kelly told me. In fact, Kelly’s career flourished after this. In 2010, Ailes gave her a two-hour midday show, on which she enthusiastically fanned his right-wing agenda — for instance, hyping stories about the New Black Panthers that many thought were racist. In October 2013, Ailes promoted Kelly to Sean Hannity’s 9 p.m. prime-time slot, where she memorably declared that Jesus and Santa are “white.” When asked by a fan on Twitter to name her biggest influence, she responded, “Roger Ailes.”
By 2015, although her show was still reliably right-wing, Kelly’s brand was evolving. After several high-profile clashes with Republican men, including Dick Cheney, she was developing something of a reputation as a feminist. As she entered the final two years of her contract, she started to think about a future outside of Fox, meeting with CNN chief Jeff Zucker in 2013.
Then came Donald Trump. Kelly’s feud with the GOP nominee was one of the dominant story lines of the presidential election; it also exploded the fragile balance of relationships at the top of Fox News.
According to Fox sources, Murdoch blamed Ailes for laying the groundwork for Trump’s candidacy. Ailes had given Trump, his longtime friend, a weekly call-in segment on Fox & Friends to sound off on political issues. (Trump used Fox News to mainstream the birther conspiracy theory.) Ailes also had lunch with Trump days before he launched his presidential campaign and continued to feed him political advice throughout the primaries, according to sources close to Trump and Ailes. (And in the days after Carlson filed her lawsuit, Trump advised Ailes on navigating the crisis, even recommending a lawyer.)
Murdoch was not a fan of Trump’s and especially did not like his stance on immigration. (The antipathy was mutual: “Murdoch’s been very bad to me,” Trump told me in March.) A few days before the first GOP debate on Fox in August 2015, Murdoch called Ailes at home. “This has gone on long enough,” Murdoch said, according to a person briefed on the conversation. Murdoch told Ailes he wanted Fox’s debate moderators — Kelly, Bret Baier, and Chris Wallace — to hammer Trump on a variety of issues. Ailes, understanding the GOP electorate better than most at that point, likely thought it was a bad idea. “Donald Trump is going to be the Republican nominee,” Ailes told a colleague around this time. But he didn’t fight Murdoch on the debate directive.
On the night of August 6, in front of 24 million people, the Fox moderators peppered Trump with harder-hitting questions. But it was Kelly’s question regarding Trump’s history of crude comments about women that created a media sensation. He seemed personally wounded by her suggestion that this spoke to a temperament that might not be suited for the presidency. “I’ve been very nice to you, though I could probably maybe not be based on the way you have treated me,” he said pointedly.
After the debate, Trump called Ailes and screamed about Kelly. “How could you do this?” he said, according to a person briefed on the call. Ailes was caught between his friend Trump, his boss Murdoch, and his star Kelly. “Roger lost control of Megyn and Trump,” a Fox anchor said.
The parties only became more entrenched when Trump launched a series of attacks against Kelly, including suggesting that her menstrual cycle had influenced her debate question. Problematically for Ailes, Fox’s audience took Trump’s side in the fight; Kelly received death threats from viewers, according to a person close to her. Kelly had even begun to speculate, according to one Fox source, that Trump might have been responsible for her getting violently ill before the debate last summer. Could he have paid someone to slip something into her coffee that morning in Cleveland? she wondered to colleagues.
While Ailes released a statement defending Kelly, he privately blamed her for creating the crisis. “It was an unfair question,” he told a Fox anchor. Kelly felt betrayed, both by Ailes and by colleagues like O’Reilly and Baier when they didn’t defend her, sources who spoke with her said. “She felt she put herself out there,” a colleague said.
Frustrated at Fox, Kelly hired a powerhouse agent at CAA and began auditioning in earnest, and in public, for a job at another network. In interviews, she said her ambition was to become the next Barbara Walters and to host prime-time specials. She wanted to prove to the industry she could land a “big get” — and the biggest get of all was Trump. So Kelly went to Trump Tower to lobby the candidate for an interview. It worked — even Trump couldn’t resist the spectacle of a rematch — but in the end the show failed: The ratings were terrible and reviewers panned her generally sycophantic questions. Worse for Kelly, it eroded her burgeoning status as a tough journalist who stood up to Trump. Afterward, her relationship with Ailes further deteriorated. According to Fox sources, they barely spoke in recent months.
Kelly and Gretchen Carlson were not friends or allies, but Carlson’s lawsuit presented an opportunity. Kelly could bust up the boys’ club at Fox, put herself on the right side of a snowballing media story, and rid herself of a boss who was no longer supportive of her — all while maximizing her leverage in a contract negotiation. She also had allies in the Murdoch sons. According to a source, Kelly told James Murdoch that Ailes had made harassing comments and inappropriately hugged her in his office. James and Lachlan both encouraged her to speak to the Paul, Weiss lawyers about it. Kelly was only the third or fourth woman to speak to the lawyers, according to a source briefed on the inquiry, but she was by far the most important. After she spoke with investigators, and made calls to current and former Fox colleagues to encourage them to speak to Paul, Weiss as well, many more women came forward.
Ailes was furious with Kelly for not defending him publicly. According to a Fox source, Ailes’s wife Elizabeth wanted Fox PR to release racy photos of Kelly published years ago in GQ as a way of discrediting her. The PR department, in this instance, refused. (Elizabeth is said to be taking all of the revelations especially hard, according to four sources close to the family. Giuliani, who officiated their wedding, told Murdoch she would likely divorce Ailes, according to two sources: “This marriage won’t last,” he said.)
Two days after New York reported that Kelly had told her story to Paul, Weiss attorneys, Ailes was gone. And Kelly had made herself more important to the network than ever.
Ailes’s ouster has created a leadership vacuum at Fox News. Several staffers have described feeling like being part of a totalitarian regime whose dictator has just been toppled. “No one knows what to do. No one knows who to report to. It’s just mayhem,” said a Fox host. As details of the Paul, Weiss investigation have filtered through the offices, staffers are expressing a mixture of shock and disgust. The scope of Ailes’s alleged abuse far exceeds what employees could have imagined. “People are so devastated,” one senior executive said. Those I spoke with have also been unnerved by Shine and Brandi’s roles in covering up Ailes’s behavior.
Despite revelations of how Ailes’s management team enabled his harassment, Murdoch has so far rejected calls — including from James, according to sources — to conduct a wholesale housecleaning. On August 12, Murdoch promoted Shine and another Ailes loyalist, Jack Abernethy, to become co-presidents of Fox News. He named Scott executive vice-president and kept Brandi and Briganti in their jobs. Fox News’s chief financial officer, Mark Kranz, is the only senior executive to have been pushed out (officially he retired), along with Laterza and a handful of assistants, contributors, and consultants. “Of course, they are trying to isolate this to just a few bad actors,” a 21st Century Fox executive told me.
Many people I spoke with believe that the current management arrangement is just a stopgap until the election. “As of November 9, there will be a bloodbath at Fox,” predicts one host. “After the election, the prime-time lineup could be eviscerated. O’Reilly’s been talking about retirement. Megyn could go to another network. And Hannity will go to Trump TV.”
The prospect of Trump TV is a source of real anxiety for some inside Fox. The candidate took the wedge issues that Ailes used to build a loyal audience at Fox News — especially race and class — and used them to stoke barely containable outrage among a downtrodden faction of conservatives. Where that outrage is channeled after the election — assuming, as polls now suggest, Trump doesn’t make it to the White House — is a big question for the Republican Party and for Fox News. Trump had a complicated relationship with Fox even when his good friend Ailes was in charge; without Ailes, it’s plausible that he will try to monetize the movement he has galvanized in competition with the network rather than in concert with it. Trump’s appointment of Steve Bannon, chairman of Breitbart, the digital-media upstart that has by some measures already surpassed Fox News as the locus of conservative energy, to run his campaign suggests a new right-wing news network of some kind is a real possibility. One prominent media executive told me that if Trump loses, Fox will need to try to damage him in the eyes of its viewers by blaming him for the defeat.
Meanwhile, the Murdochs are looking for a permanent CEO to navigate these post-Ailes, Trump-roiled waters. According to sources, James’s preferred candidates include CBS president David Rhodes (though he is under contract with CBS through 2019); Jesse Angelo, the New York Post publisher and James’s Harvard roommate; and perhaps a television executive from London. Sources say Lachlan, who politically is more conservative than James, wants to bring in an outsider. Rupert was seen giving Rebekah Brooks a tour of the Fox offices several months ago, creating speculation that she could be brought in to run Fox. Another contender is Newsmax CEO Chris Ruddy.
As for the women who collectively brought an end to the era of Roger Ailes, their fortunes are mixed. Megyn Kelly is in a strong position in her contract talks, and sources say Gretchen Carlson will soon announce an eight-figure settlement. But because New York has a three-year statute of limitations on sexual harassment, so far just two women in addition to Carlson are said to be receiving settlements from 21st Century Fox. The many others who left or were forced out of the company before the investigation came away with far less — in some cases nothing at all.
It’s hard to say that justice has been served. But the story isn’t over: Last week, the shareholder law firm Scott & Scott announced it was investigating 21st Century Fox to “determine whether Fox’s Officers and Directors have breached their fiduciary duties.” Meanwhile, Ailes is walking away from his biggest career train wreck yet, seeking relevance and renewed power through the one person in the country who doesn’t see him as political kryptonite, the candidate he created: Donald J. Trump. Ailes may be trying to sell us another president, but now we know the truth about the salesman.
*This sentence has been updated to reflect Shine’s presence at the meeting, a detail that was confirmed after publication.
*This article appears in the September 5, 2016 issue of New York Magazine.
*An earlier version of the article inaccurately stated Manny Alvarez is Elizabeth Ailes’s doctor. ||||| It has been exactly two months since Gretchen Carlson, a former Fox News anchor, sued her old boss, Roger Ailes, for sexual harassment. The suit inaugurated a frenetic series of events, not only within Fox News’s subterranean newsroom—where staffers feared for their jobs and, in one case, even the network’s future—but also throughout the media, as other women came forward to share their own stories of harassment. It all resulted in Ailes’s dramatic, and nearly mind-boggling, ouster from the news network that he co-founded 20 years ago. (Ailes has repeatedly, and fervently, denied all allegations of sexual harassment.)
On Friday, Ailes biographer and New York writer Gabriel Sherman, who has broken key elements of the story, published a lengthy cover article detailing Ailes’s downfall. As I have reported, Ailes’s own apparent paranoia increased around the time that Sherman began reporting his unauthorized biography, which was published in early 2014. According to a person close to Ailes, he hung a wooden door, now dismantled, that obscured any view into his office suite; according to numerous people, he also recorded anyone who entered. Ailes kept guns in the office (a Glock and Smith & Wesson were discovered by 21st Century Fox after his ouster). Carlson and others, including former Fox News booker Laurie Luhn, also detailed Ailes’s alleged harassment, much of it outlined by Sherman in his coverage.
In the early days of the Ailes saga, many applauded how 21st Century Fox was handling the crisis. Rather than defending Ailes, C.E.O. James Murdoch and Executive Chairman Lachlan Murdoch heralded a new era at the media empire by investigating him. Their swift decision to launch an internal investigation into the allegations, handled by the top-flight law firm Paul, Weiss, signaled that the younger Murdochs were prepared to adopt a different tack than their laissez–faire father, Rupert Murdoch, who is famously loyal to his deputies and whose relationship with Ailes went back decades. In doing so, they seemed determined to leave the seamiest aspects of Fox News’s culture behind for good.
But there was always a tension between cleaning things up and preserving Fox News, which makes $1 billion in annual profit. The Murdochs appear intent on putting the Ailes saga behind them as they move into the last stretches of an election and an attempt to corral crucial anchors, such as Megyn Kelly, to re-sign with the network. Now the company has agreed, on behalf of Ailes, to settle Carlson’s suit for a stunning $20 million, according to three people familiar with the settlement. To reinforce their seriousness about creating a new culture in a post-Ailes world, the company offered Carlson a public apology as part of the settlement. "We sincerely regret and apologize for the fact that Gretchen was not treated with the respect and dignity that she and all of our colleagues deserve,” the statement noted. (The company, according to two people familiar with the discussions, has also reached settlement agreements with two other women.)
Though Carlson’s case is against Ailes personally, Fox is essentially his insurer for any settlement, according to two people familiar with the arrangement, and discussions between Ailes’s legal team and 21st Century Fox’s legal team became very tense regarding how much Ailes might pay in a settlement. (At press time, it was unclear how much Ailes was personally on the hook for.) As part of the language at the end of the settlement, numerous people with knowledge of the deal told me, Carlson has agreed not to bring any further legal action against other executives at Fox News, or against the company itself.
The settlement punctuates an important chapter in the Ailes scandal. While the Paul, Weiss investigation interviewed more than 20 women, according to two sources familiar with the process, it never officially expanded to examine the broader culture of Fox News. The firm, according to numerous people familiar with the process, was apparently never ordered to scour the company’s hard drives for all evidence of sexual harassment or bawdy culture. In some ways, according to one person familiar with the process, the Paul, Weiss investigation simply got a revenue machine back on track. ||||| Acting on behalf of deposed Fox News honcho Roger Ailes and wife Elizabeth, attorney Charles Harder — Hulk Hogan’s libel lawyer — has requested that New York magazine and writer Gabriel Sherman preserve all documents pertaining to Ailes, a not-so-subtle threat of possible legal action in response to the magazine’s damning article about sexual harassment at the network.
Magazine spokeswoman Lauren Starke confirmed today that New York and Sherman — the magazine’s national affairs editor — have been contacted by Harder, as first reported by The Financial Times. “New York Media and Gabriel Sherman were contacted by Charles Harder on behalf of Roger and Elizabeth Ailes, asking that we preserve documents related to the Ailes, for a possible defamation claim.” a spokeswoman for the magazine said Monday.
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Harder’s letter “was not informative” as to specific objections to the magazine’s cover story “The Revenge of Roger’s Angels.”
Harder might have a hard time choosing just one objection. As Deadline recently reported about the article, Sherman’s details “the 15 days it took to end the 20-year reign” of Ailes at Fox News after former FNC host Gretchen Carlson filed her sex harassment lawsuit. Among the charges: Carlson used her smartphone to record conversations to support her claims of ongoing harassment by Ailes.
Associated Press
If Harder follows through with legal action — a big assumption based solely on the contact confirmed by the magazine today — it would be the attorney’s third high-profile media case in recent memory: He represented Hogan in the former wrestler’s highly successful suit against Gawker, and was retained by Melania Trump in a defamation suit against The Daily Mail and blog Tarpley.
Still, the tactic of a legal threat by the Ailes’ attorney is by now chillingly familiar: After sending correspondence of intent to the Daily Mail in response to allegations that Melania Trump was once an escort, the Mail quickly retracted the tale. A similar response from NY Mag is unlikely.
Deadline’s Dominic Patten contributed to this report | – Gretchen Carlson will take $20 million off Fox News' hands, settling on Roger Ailes' behalf in response to Carlson's sexual harassment and wrongful termination lawsuit, reports Vanity Fair. Included with the settlement is what the magazine calls an "unprecedented" public apology for Carlson, an apparent effort by Fox to show its commitment to cleaning up the unpalatable culture allegedly rampant under Ailes' reign. "21st Century Fox is pleased to announce that it has settled Gretchen Carlson's lawsuit," a Fox statement read, per Politico. "We sincerely regret and apologize for the fact that Gretchen was not treated with the respect that she & all our colleagues deserve." Vanity Fair notes that while Carlson's lawsuit was technically against Ailes, Fox serves as his insurer, and conversations between the Fox and Ailes camps about how much Ailes will have to pony up himself were said to be "tense" (there's no official word yet on what that figure will be). Sources tell Vanity Fair that two other women were also granted settlements, and that as part of Carlson's settlement, she's agreed not to take any more legal action against Fox or its execs. Carlson issued a statement saying she's "gratified" the company has taken "decisive action" regarding her suit. In related news: Ailes defender Greta Van Susteren abruptly left the network Tuesday, per Politico. No official word on why, though a source tells Politico it was for financial reasons. Meanwhile, Ailes' legal team has been threatening legal action against New York magazine and reporter Gabriel Sherman for what Deadline calls a "damning" article about Fox's sexual harassment issues. |
Will Gibb says he didn't realize it was a cougar that had caught his beloved pet husky by the neck until after he pummelled the wild animal in the head.
"I wasn't really analyzing it too much at the time," Gibb said. "All that was going through my mind is that I had to protect my dog.
"It was just very instinctual. My dogs are like my children."
The Red Deer man was meeting a friend for coffee at the Whitecourt Tim Hortons on Dec. 26, when he let his two dogs Sasha and Mongo out into the parking lot for a short run.
Will Gibb and his dog Sasha are recovering at home and coping with a lot of media attention 4:01
Within seconds, he said he heard Sasha, the female of the pair, start yelping.
A cougar had emerged from the woods nearby and pounced, he said.
"She (Sasha) was crying out in pain and distress so I went running," said Gibb, a 31-year-old technician. "And I saw something wrapped around her so I ran up and punched it in the side of the head.
"At that point I realized it was a cougar."
Gibb said he charged into the woods after the cougar but turned around to tend to his injured dog, which was whimpering and bleeding on the pavement.
'It was pawing at me and I was throwing punches'
"I was swinging but I looked back and I saw that Sasha was on the ground kind of twitching," Gibb recalled. "So I went back and tried to scoop her up with my left arm."
But the dog, alarmed from the attack, latched onto Gibb's hand and started biting, just as the cougar re-emerged from the woods and charged a second time.
In all the excitement, Sasha bit his left hand, something Gibb suggests was because the dog may have been "thinking I was the cougar."
He added: "She was fighting for her life, and I was trying to keep the cougar at bay with my right, and it was pawing at me and I was throwing punches at it."
Sasha sustained bite wounds to her neck and belly and under her legs. She was released from the veterinary clinic on Wednesday. (Travis McEwan/CBC )
While the dog unlatched her teeth from his hand and ran off, the cougar was not deterred by Gibb's punches. As Sasha ran across the parking lot, the cougar fixed its eyes on Mongo, who was sniffing around at the edge of the nearby trees.
"I could see the cougar going for him, so I got between him and the cougar and started swinging and screaming at it, and called for my brother and friend to come give a hand," Gibb said. "And then I reached down for the closest, biggest stick that I could find and I ran back into the trees to go fight the cougar."
Within minutes, both dogs were back in the safety of Gibb's truck, and the cat disappeared into the bush.
"I was surprised to hear that the owner took the quick action and it's probably what saved the dog's life in this case," said Sgt. Jack Poitras, who said the cougar was located in the woods nearby and killed.
"I wouldn't recommend everybody wrassle with a cougar, but in this case it worked for the best."
'She had bite wounds around her neck'
The dog was taken immediately to the Hilltop Veterinary Clinic, which is about a block from the attack.
Veterinary staff said Wednesday the dog has been released from care.
"She had bite wounds around her neck and claw tears on her belly, under her armpits," said Jordan Bremmekamp, the veterinarian who treated the husky. "I had to sew up some of her wounds. They tore into her muscle. It's a pretty painful situation she's in, but she's doing fine."
The man was left with deep claw marks on his arms.
Police consulted Whitecourt fish and wildlife officials before killing the cougar.
"The wildlife does come into town once in a while," Poitras said. "Dogs are easy prey."
Poitras had this advice for mountain wilderness-area visitors, particularly when accompanied by pets: "If you're out in the wilderness near the mountains, be aware that cougars and other predators are out there. Just be mindful of that, when you're out and about with your pets." ||||| CALGARY, Alberta (Reuters) - A Canadian man punched a cougar in the face to stop it attacking his dog in a wooded area near a fast food store in Whitecourt, central Alberta, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) said on Wednesday.
William Gibb, 31, from Red Deer, Alberta, had stopped at a Tim Hortons outlet, a popular Canadian restaurant chain while driving 600-kilometre (372-miles) to Grand Prairie on Monday evening and let his dog out for a walk, Whitecourt RCMP Sergeant Tom Kalis said.
Shortly after, Gibb heard his 80-pound (36-kg) female Husky called Sasha whimpering in pain and found a cougar pinning her to the ground.
“I could see something wrapped around her and wasn’t sure what it was. I ran over and punched it in what I thought was the head, and it backed off and I realized it was a cougar,” Gibb, an electrician, told Reuters.
“I stepped over Sasha and charged at it swinging and screaming and calling for my brother and buddy to give a hand,” he added.
Gibb kept the cougar at bay, which he said swiped at him a few times, as he tended to his injured dog and called the police, before getting Sasha into his truck and driving her away for medical attention.
He said the police arrived five or 10 minutes later and, after consulting with fish and wildlife officers, killed the cougar because of the risk it could attack another dog or even humans.
Gibb himself was not seriously injured, although Sasha bit him on the hand as he was trying to rescue her.
Kalis said cougar sightings were not uncommon around Whitecourt because the town is surrounded by forests, but it is unusual for them to attack dogs. | – Sometimes dogs save humans, sometimes humans save dogs. The latter was the case in Canada last week when a man punched a cougar that had a death grip on his 80-pound husky's neck, reports Reuters. Will Gibb, a 31-year-old technician from Red Deer, had pulled up to a Tim Hortons for coffee and let his dogs Sasha and Mongo out of his truck for a quick run around the parking lot, according to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. When he heard Sasha yelping in pain seconds later, he "went running" to save her, he tells the CBC. But it wasn't until he "punched it in the side of the head" that he saw the animal was a cougar. (Sightings are common but attacks rare, says an RCMP deputy.) The cat ran into the woods, but the punch proved insufficient. As Gibb tried to pick up Sasha's twitching body, the apparently confused dog bit him and the cougar reemerged, so he had to throw punches with his right arm while trying to protect his dog and his hurt left arm. "She was fighting for her life," Gibb says of Sasha, who ran to safety. When the cougar went for Mongo, Gibb grabbed a big stick and got in its way before chasing it off into the woods again. With a vet clinic just a block away, Sasha was tended to quickly, while local police found and killed the cougar. The vet says Sasha had to be sewn up in her chest and had deep bites around her neck, but she survived thanks to her owner. (And you thought the guy who punched a kangaroo was brave.) |
The mogul reveals plans for international speaking engagements, more scripted shows and why she's passing on Broadway production ' 'night, Mother.'
Oprah Winfrey and her collection of shows are settling in Hollywood.
By year’s end, Winfrey’s Chicago-based Harpo Studios will close its doors, with the 26-year-old company's productions transitioning to OWN headquarters in Los Angeles. The news, which Winfrey delivered in person to her Harpo staff on Tuesday morning, comes two months after her burgeoning cable network moved into a new space in West Hollywood. Though the Chicago lease continues through April 2016, Winfrey and her key executives intend to stop the back-and-forth routine they've been balancing for nearly half a decade sooner than that.
In a phone interview from the Harpo offices in Chicago, Winfrey acknowledges a mix of excitement and nostalgia. "[Chicago has] been everything for me. I've spent more hours in this building than I have any other building on Earth. ... We were here when there was nothing but hoes and rats on the street, and now it's one of the hottest neighborhoods [in Chicago]," she says, noting that OWN will stop shooting shows there as of Tuesday. "The time had come to downsize this part of the business and to move forward. It will be sad to say goodbye, but I look ahead with such a knowing that what the future holds is even more than I can see."
Winfrey, 61, along with OWN and Harpo presidents Sheri Salata and Erik Logan, emphasize the significance of having their team all under one roof, particularly when the 4-year-old network is still in an early growth stage, expanding both its offerings and its reach. Though it's narrower than many top cable offerings, OWN, co-owned by Winfrey and Discovery Communications, has posted three consecutive years of growth and, in February, ranked as the No. 20 ad-supported cable network among women. It fares even better among its African-American core audience, with ratings up 12 percent year-over-year in that demo. The closure of Harpo, which had produced more than 800 hours of original programming exclusively for OWN, will impact roughly 200 employees, who will remain employed through December.
While running OWN will remain a primary focus for Winfrey going forward, she has and will continue to pursue interests outside of the executive suite, too, including a cadre of film projects (she acted in Lee Daniels’ The Butler and Selma, which she also produced) and this past fall’s eight-city "Oprah's The Life You Want" arena tour. More recently, Winfrey announced that she'd be moving in front of the camera at her eponymous network, with a recurring role in Queen Sugar, from Selma’s Ava DuVernay. “That’s been my goal,” she says of making her OWN acting debut, calling the drama opportunity a “seminal moment.”
See more The Resurgence of Oprah Winfrey
In fact, the high-end DuVernay drama, inspired by Natalie Baszile's acclaimed novel of the same name, is key to Winfrey's ongoing scripted push at OWN. DuVernay is set to deliver a pilot draft script to Winfrey in the coming days, having spent her post-Oscar week at Winfrey’s Maui writers’ cottage pulling it together. The drama will chronicle a spirited woman who leaves her upscale Los Angeles lifestyle behind to claim an inheritance from her recently departed father — an 800-acre sugarcane farm in the heart of Louisiana.
Once a shooting schedule for Queen is set, Winfrey will be able to figure out what more she can — and cannot — do as an actor. Despite recent reports of her circling the upcoming Broadway revival of 'night, Mother, in which she would have played a mother struggling to prevent her daughter from killing herself, she says she has opted against it. “I just didn’t want to be in the space of suicide every night for six months,” she explains, adding: “I’d like something with a happier ending.”
Without rattling off titles, Winfrey reveals that she will be heading to New York in the next couple of weeks to take a closer look at two other potential plays. Additionally, she’s set to reunite with Daniels for his upcoming biopic, Pryor, in which she’ll portray Richard Pryor’s grandmother Marie Carter. (Her own Los Angeles-based Harpo Films will remain active, too, with a development slate that includes Henrietta Lacks at HBO and Oprah's Book Club 2.0 picks Ruby and The Invention of Wings.) And though she says she has "no plans" to embark on another weekend fan experience tour — an experience she calls "spectacularly rewarding" — she does intend to do international speaking engagements.
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Among the other things still on her to-do list: more scripted programming at the network. “For all of those years on the Oprah Show, we were able to encapsulate the stories that connected to our audience in a way that nobody else could,” says Winfrey. “I love telling the real stories of peoples’ lives, and now we get to create them, make them up, and I get to be part of them as an actor and producer.”
At OWN, Queen Sugar will join a quartet of Tyler Perry-scripted series — all of which recently secured additional episode orders — as well as the upcoming two-night Octavia Spencer-led miniseries, Tulsa, already in development. The latter, the network's first in the genre, centers on the story of the largest race riot in U.S. history, in which more than 300 people are believed to have been murdered. OWN will continue to develop projects in other areas, too, including a seven-part event series, Belief, which will explore humankind’s ongoing search to connect with something greater than ourselves when it bows this fall. The remainder of Winfrey's lineup, including Master Class and Iyanla Fix My Life, will now be produced within Los Angeles-based OWN.
The Harpo move comes nearly a year after real estate developer Sterling Bay Cos. closed a deal for the production company's four building facility, reportedly paying a combined $30.5 million. At that time, Sterling agreed to lease the space back to Harpo for two years. "We have been fortunate to have this spectacular city of Chicago as our home for over 25 years," said Logan and Salata in a joint statement, "and are thankful to everybody who has been a part of this great company.”
A small group of the Chicago-based Harpo staffers will join the approximately 140 OWN employees who have moved into the network's newly constructed three-floor space at West Hollywood's The Lot. The latter not only offers sound-stages and post-production studios, which OWN's previous Miracle Mile location did not, but also a rich Hollywood history: “The idea of being on the lot where Natalie Wood filmed West Side Story or Marilyn Monroe did Some Like it Hot,” says Winfrey, “you automatically feel like you’re part of a community that’s larger than you.” ||||| It's a wrap for Harpo Studios in Chicago.
The facility, which Oprah Winfrey opened in 1990 to house her talk show empire, helped turn Chicago into a bustling television center and the West Loop into a resurgent urban neighborhood. But on Tuesday, she came to Chicago to tell employees that Harpo was closing for good.
Production is migrating to the West Coast, four years behind Winfrey, who left town to start her own cable network, OWN, in 2011. The work, which had dwindled to mostly postproduction editing on a handful of shows, is expected to wind down in phases, leaving about 200 staffers out of a job and Chicago's place in the television industry diminished.
The lease on the space, where Winfrey's eponymous show was recorded for decades, runs until April 2016. The last day of production will be Dec. 11, sources said.
Oprah Winfrey is leaving Chicago...and 200 employees behind Oprah Winfrey is bidding her longtime home, Chicago, adieu, now that her Windy City-based Harpo studios are transitioning full-time to their new location in West Hollywood. (Inform) Oprah Winfrey is bidding her longtime home, Chicago, adieu, now that her Windy City-based Harpo studios are transitioning full-time to their new location in West Hollywood. (Inform) See more videos
Harpo Studios had been at the center of Winfrey's broadcast universe since it opened, hosting her syndicated daily talk show through its finale in 2011. Chicago-based real estate developer Sterling Bay Cos. bought the four-building Near West Side facility in 2014, paying a combined $30.5 million for about 170,000 square feet of space.
Executives with the Oprah Winfrey Network and Harpo Studios said the Chicago studios will be moved to network facilities in West Hollywood, Calif., by December.
About 200 people are employed by Harpo Studios in Chicago, doing production work for OWN cable shows such as "Super Soul Sunday," "Oprah's Master Class," "Oprah: Where Are They Now," "Oprah Prime" and "Iyanla: Fix My Life." That work will continue in Chicago for now, but most of those jobs will be phased out as production on the shows transitions to OWN, a Harpo spokeswoman said Tuesday.
Active filming on the Chicago studio lot, minimal in recent years, ended as of Tuesday, a Harpo spokeswoman said.
A small group of Harpo employees from Chicago have been offered jobs with OWN in Los Angeles, according to sources. Others may have the opportunity to continue working on the shows on a freelance basis. But by December, only a skeleton crew will remain in Chicago, charged with shutting down Harpo Studios.
Harpo had about 580 employees and full-time contractors when Winfrey wrapped up her daily talk show, according to studio executives.
"We have been fortunate to have this spectacular city of Chicago as our home for over 25 years and are thankful to everybody who has been a part of this great company," Erik Logan and Sheri Salata, presidents of OWN and Harpo Studios, said in a statement.
Winfrey held an emotional meeting at Harpo Studios at 9 a.m. Tuesday, sources said. The agenda was not announced, but it was expected by some employees, especially those who had seen production wane from the studio's heyday, when "The Oprah Winfrey Show" was the hottest ticket in town and the envy of both coasts.
Returning to announce the closing of the home that launched her television empire, Winfrey addressed the remaining staffers, thanking them and telling them the decision did not come lightly. She reminisced about 25 years in the building but said that from a business standpoint, it made more sense to consolidate everything under one roof in Los Angeles.
"It was kind of surreal for a lot of people," said a 10-year production veteran, who asked that his name not be used. "We all knew it was coming, but we were holding out hope that there would be a smaller crew remaining here, but that's not going to be the case moving forward."
The exodus of Harpo Studios may be a tipping point for TV production in Chicago, which has seen both wins and losses in recent years. "The Jerry Springer Show" moved from Chicago to Connecticut in 2009, but comedian Steve Harvey began recording his syndicated daytime talk show in Chicago in 2012. Prime time shows like NBC's "Chicago Fire" and "Chicago P.D." also will help keep the city on the TV production map. But staffers are doubtful that there will be enough jobs in Chicago to handle the influx of Harpo veterans.
"There's going to be a lot of talent on the streets in Chicago. I'm not sure there's enough open positions to absorb everybody here," the staffer said. "I think there's going to have to be a lot of people that are going to have to look to moving out to the coasts, New York or LA, where most of the production is still being done."
In a statement, Winfrey said: "Harpo Studios in Chicago was not just my home but also my life for nearly 30 years. I've spent more time there than anywhere else. I am so proud of what we created. It has been a blessing in my life and I thank everyone who has been a part of this great run. I am now looking ahead to inhabiting the new space on The Lot in California and carrying on the legacy of Harpo Studios with OWN programming."
OWN, a venture between Winfrey and Discovery Communications, struggled initially after its launch in January 2011. It has since gained traction, posting double-digit ratings increases for three consecutive years, executives said. OWN is available in 85 million homes.
Although Winfrey moved West with OWN, Harpo Studios was integral to the cable network's launch. It also was home to OWN's most prominent year-one flameout, "The Rosie Show," a talk show hosted by O'Donnell and filmed in Chicago. Winfrey pulled the plug on "Rosie" in March 2012 after five months of tweaking and downsizing failed to boost anemic ratings. That led to staffing reductions and a lesser role for Harpo Studios, culminating in Tuesday's announced closing.
Harpo is leasing two of the four buildings on the campus. Sterling Bay remains in discussions with potential tenants and redevelopment partners. A decision about the future of the property has not been made, the West Loop-based real estate developer said.
Beyond her television legacy, Winfrey leaves behind a monument to the "Oprah Effect" in the form of the massive facility she built, and the West Loop neighborhood she helped revive.
A large part of her former complex is occupied by 120 Sports, an over-the-top streaming national sports network that employs 150 people and has major backers, including Time Inc., and Bulls and White Sox Chairman Jerry Reinsdorf. It is leasing a sprawling 17,000-square-foot space once occupied by O'Donnell's short-lived talk show.
While the neighborhood surrounding the studio may feel an economic pinch from the loss of Harpo jobs, boosters are hopeful it will continue to thrive.
Roger Romanelli, executive director of the Randolph/Fulton Market Association, a community organization, said Harpo had "brought so much bounty" to the West Loop. It drew tourists, made people feel safer walking around day and night, and its employees shopped at local businesses. | – Chicago is losing a big piece of its broadcasting history—and around 200 jobs—with the closure of Oprah Winfrey's Harpo Studios. Winfrey came to Chicago yesterday to tell staff in person that production work for Oprah Winfrey Network shows like Super Soul Sunday and Oprah's Master Class is being shifted to OWN headquarters in West Hollywood and that the Chicago facility will be completely shut down by December, reports the Chicago Tribune. The West Loop facility hosted Winfrey's talk show from 1990 until it finished in 2011. Chicago has "been everything for me," Winfrey tells the Hollywood Reporter. "I've spent more hours in this building than I have any other building on Earth. We were here when there was nothing but hoes and rats on the street, and now it's one of the hottest neighborhoods" in the city she says, adding that it "will be sad to say goodbye, but I look ahead with such a knowing that what the future holds is even more than I can see." Staffers say there might not be enough TV jobs in Chicago for people affected by the closure and some people are going to have to seek work in New York or Los Angeles, the Tribune reports. |
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By clicking Submit, I agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy | – Katy Perry is dismissing rumors that she is getting sued for using part of the Beach Boys' "California Girls" in her song "California Gurls". "No one is suing anyone," Perry tweeted, calling the reports "once again" an example of the media's tendency to "fabricate & exaggerate stories to get hits or sell papers." Although she isn't getting sued, Beach Boys published Rondor Music isn't too happy about "California Gurls," Billboard reports. "Using the words or melody in a new song taken from an original work is not appropriate under any circumstances, particularly from one as well known and iconic as 'California Girls,'" a Rondor rep says. The company is not planning to sue Perry, but it has has filed a warning in the form of a diminutive claim. "It is up to the six writers and various publishers of 'California Gurls' to decide whether they honor the claim or not," the rep continues. Check out the video—which features Snoop Dogg, who's the one actually paraphrasing the Beach Boys—on YouTube. |
Sen. Marco Rubio (R., Fla.) suggested that any decisions about whether to run again for his seat would not come until the weekend at the earliest. Earlier this week, Mr. Rubio opened the door to another run, saying that the shooting massacre in Orlando on Sunday had led him to consider how he might best […] ||||| Friends for 20 years, Marco Rubio and Florida Lt. Gov. Carlos Lopez-Cantera were at the scene of the Orlando massacre on Sunday when they had an unusually frank conversation about their political futures.
“You should reconsider running for your seat,” Lopez-Cantera told Rubio as they sat in the senator’s pickup truck about an hour before sunset, after witnessing the aftermath of the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history.
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Rubio was caught off guard. After all, Lopez-Cantera has been running for his Senate seat in a crowded GOP primary for more than a year — with Rubio’s encouragement.
Lopez-Cantera made clear he was still fully committed to running, even as he initiated a gut-check moment for both of them. Until then, Rubio had resisted the entreaties of Senate leaders and donors to rethink retiring from the Senate. Lopez-Cantera’s conversation removed one of the biggest obstacles to Rubio running again: a longtime friendship that he wouldn’t want to ruin due to political ambition.
“I don’t want you to feel like you have to say that because of outside pressure,” Rubio responded.
But Lopez-Cantera said he felt “compelled” to continue talking it through. The two of them were shaken by what they saw in Orlando, the bloody sidewalks and the ashen faces of local, state and federal authorities.
“This is bigger than me. And this isn’t about me. And it’s not about you. It’s about our country and this election,” Lopez-Cantera said to Rubio, recounting the conversation for Politico. “It’s deeply consequential. … In the current field, I’m the best candidate in the general election. But I’m not looking at this through rose-colored glasses.”
Bottom line, Lopez-Cantera said in the interview: “Nothing has changed. I’m still running. Marco isn’t.”
The filing deadline for the race is June 24, when Rubio is scheduled to hold a fundraiser for Lopez-Cantera. If Rubio decides to run, Lopez-Cantera won’t file. Right now, longtime friends of both men believe Rubio ultimately won’t run: The lure of a much bigger paycheck and proximity to his family will outweigh another term in the Senate.
But in the next breath, they say no one really knows what Rubio will do, except the senator himself — and even he might still be agonizing over the decision.
“I’ll go home later this week, I’ll have some time with my family,” Rubio told reporters in the Capitol on Wednesday as he headed to a classified briefing on the Orlando attacks. “If there’s been a change in our status, I’ll be sure to let everyone know.”
Polling shows Rubio is the strongest Republican in a potential race against the Democrats’ strongest candidate, Rep. Patrick Murphy, in a contest that could decide control of the Senate.
The Republican Senate race is crowded. And the full-court press to recruit Rubio to run for reelection has frozen fundraising and dampened Republican enthusiasm for all five major GOP candidates for the seat. None is as well known as Rubio.
Some Republican and conservative groups have suggested they won’t spend big in Florida, while more donors will give to oppose Rubio in order to hand him his second defeat in a year and brand him a double loser after his crushing loss in the presidential primary.
As part of the maneuvers to get Rubio to reverse course, Lopez-Cantera and allies of his and Rubio’s say the amount of disinformation spread by party insiders has been somewhere between staggering and absurd.
For weeks, Lopez-Cantera and Rubio had privately mocked the rumors of them striking a deal or hatching some elaborate plot. In one telling, Rubio would run for reelection, win and then resign before the 2020 presidential election cycle, at which point Lopez-Cantera would run for his seat. In another version, Lopez-Cantera agreed with moneyed interests to drop out of the Senate race, endorse Rubio and then run for chief financial officer in 2018.
All of it is false, Lopez-Cantera said.
“There is no deal. There is no plan,” Lopez-Cantera said. “None of it is true. Anyone who says that is lying and doesn’t know what they’re talking about.”
But those who haven’t been privy to the two friends’ talks have been deeply skeptical about what they’re up to. And if Rubio ultimately runs and Lopez-Cantera doesn’t, some of the rumors will appear true.
“You can’t tell me this hasn’t been orchestrated,” said one Republican who supports one of Lopez-Cantera’s rivals in the Senate race said, echoing Democrats. “Marco is running and you can talk about all the friendship stuff you want, but this shows Marco is all about Marco.”
The campaign of one of Lopez-Cantera’s Republican opponents, developer Carlos Beruff, fell for one of the rumor-filled reports and issued a statement Wednesday about Rubio in which the candidate said voters are “sick of career politicians and power brokers in Washington who care about one thing: holding on to power. But the voters of Florida will not obey them. They don’t get to pick our candidates.”
As for the other Republican candidates, U.S. Rep. David Jolly said he’ll announce his plans Friday. He might run for reelection to his Tampa Bay-area 13th Congressional District seat. Defense contractor Todd Wilcox indicated he’ll stay in the race with or without Rubio, and those close to U.S. Rep. Ron DeSantis say he’d give strong consideration to running for reelection in the 6th Congressional District if Rubio runs.
Lopez-Cantera acknowledges that his decision to bring up the race — especially after witnessing the aftermath of the carnage at the Pulse nightclub — put unexpected extra pressure on Rubio.
Rubio’s plans since last spring were to win the White House or return home to West Miami, where he lives less than a half-hour away from Lopez-Cantera’s Coral Gables home. Rubio has hired Washington dealmaker Robert Barnett to field job offers and get the biggest payday possible, without lobbying or working on Wall Street. He also planned to hit the paid-speaker circuit.
After two years, if Hillary Clinton wins this election, Rubio is expected to begin mounting a challenge to her in 2020.
“Marco ran for president as a senator and we saw how that played out,” said one backer. “This is his chance to be at home, spend time with Jeannette [Rubio’s wife] and their kids and make some real money so he can put all four of them through private college in the Northeast if he wants to. People forget he’s the son of blue-collar immigrants. Things like this are more important to him than politics.”
Lopez-Cantera, who is also married and has two children, emphasized the importance of family to Rubio.
“Until I mentioned this, he was really committed to spending time with his kids, being able to be home for more than 10 days without having to go somewhere on the campaign trail or back to Washington. He looked forward to coaching his son’s football team,” Lopez-Cantera said.
Miami-Dade County Commissioner Steve Bovo, whose wife works as a policy adviser for Rubio, said he wasn’t surprised by Lopez-Cantera’s discussion. Bovo served in the Florida House when Lopez-Cantera was majority leader just after Rubio left as Florida House speaker, a post he held in 2007-08.
“Carlos is not only thinking about their friendship but the country,” Bovo said. “We all know each other, go to each others’ kids’ birthday parties. In the difficult business we’re in, we separate the friendship and the politics. But we never do anything to endanger our friendship.”
One Rubio insider said he believes Rubio should run for reelection because, as a senator, he’ll have more ability to affect policy he cares about, raise money and draw attention.
“From a political perspective, this is about having a platform,” the Republican said. “When CNN calls, does the booker want former Sen. Marco Rubio or do they want, say, current Sen. Tom Cotton?”
A member of the Committee on Foreign Relations and Select Committee on Intelligence, Rubio has made foreign policy a specialty. And, friends say, he’ll miss getting classified briefings and being in a position to do something about it.
About 12 hours after Rubio and Lopez-Cantera spoke on Sunday, the senator was interviewed by conservative radio show host Hugh Hewitt, who likes to talk about foreign policy and the threat of terrorism. Hewitt unexpectedly switched gears on Rubio by asking whether the terrorist attack changed “in any way your resolve not to seek reelection.”
Briefly caught flat-footed, Rubio said “I’ve been deeply impacted by it. I think when it visits your home state, and it impacts a community you know well, it really gives you pause to think a little bit about, you know, your service to your country and where you can be most useful to your country.”
“I have a friend of mine who is running for the U.S. Senate,” Rubio said later. “So I want to be fair, Hugh. I haven’t thought about it in that context. I really don’t want to link the two things right now, because I don’t want politics to intrude in all of this.”
By then, though, it was too late.
“I brought this up. It wasn’t mutual,” Lopez-Cantera said. “He is in a position where he will make a decision. We’re friends. We support each other.”
Seung Min Kim contributed to this report.
| – The main obstacle keeping Marco Rubio from seeking re-election to his Senate seat just disappeared. The prospect of Rubio doing so gained traction in the wake of the Orlando shooting, but he continued to insist that he wouldn't run against his friend already in the race, Carlos Lopez-Cantera. Now, however, Lopez-Cantera himself is publicly giving Rubio the all-clear, reports Politico. He says he and Rubio discussed it in recent days, with Lopez-Cantera encouraging him to consider changing his mind. “I don’t want you to feel like you have to say that because of outside pressure,” he quotes Rubio as responding. The incumbent told reporters on Wednesday that he'd go home this week to spend time with his family and consider his next steps. Rumors are swirling that the pair have some sort of plan—perhaps for Rubio to win the seat over a Democrat (Republicans believe he has the best shot), then resign and allow Lopez-Cantera to run before the 2020 presidential campaign. But Lopez-Cantera says that's not the case. "Until I mentioned this, he was really committed to spending time with his kids, being able to be home for more than 10 days without having to go somewhere," he says. As of now, "nothing has changed,” he adds. "I'm still running. Marco isn't." Rubio's decision isn’t expected until the weekend at the earliest, per the Wall Street Journal; he has until June 24 to file for re-election. If he does so, Lopez-Cantera won't run, says Politico. |
The Obamas purchased the Kalorama mansion they’d been renting. (Marvin Joseph/The Washington Post)
Looks like former president Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama are putting down deeper roots in Washington: After renting a Kalorama home for their post-White House stint, the couple have purchased the eight-bedroom, nine-and-a-half-bath home for $8.1 million, according to property records.
The Obamas have said they plan to remain in D.C. while their younger daughter, Sasha, finishes high school at Sidwell Friends. After leaving the executive mansion in January, the family settled into a rental home owned by Bill Clinton press secretary Joe Lockhart and his wife, Giovanna Gray Lockhart, an 8,200-square-foot home that was built in 1921 and renovated in 2011.
The Obamas still own a Georgian-style home in the Hyde Park neighborhood on the South Side of Chicago, the city that will house the Obama presidential library.
Spokesman Kevin Lewis, in a statement, said the purchase just made sense for the family: “Given that President and Mrs. Obama will be in Washington for at least another two and a half years, it made sense for them to buy a home rather than continuing to rent property.”
1 of 8 Full Screen Autoplay Close Skip Ad × A look inside the Obamas’ Kalorama home View Photos The neighborhood also is home to President Trump’s daughter Ivanka and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos. Caption The neighborhood also is home to President Trump’s daughter Ivanka and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos. Former President Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle, are renting the $5.9 million residence that features eight bedrooms and nine-and-a-half bathrooms. The 8,200-square-foot home was built in 1921 and renovated in 2011. Courtesy of the McFadden Group Buy Photo Wait 1 second to continue.
D.C. records show that Lockhart sold the home for $8.1 million to Homefront Holdings LLC, which is controlled by the Obamas. The deed transfer was recorded on Wednesday. Lockhart bought the home in 2014 for $5.295 million, records show.
The $8.1 million purchase price makes the Obamas’ new home the second-most expensive in the Kalorama neighborhood, behind the $23 million that Jeffrey P. Bezos, the Amazon founder and owner of The Washington Post, paid for the former Textile Museum.
The Obamas have called the swanky Washington neighborhood (where neighbors include Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner) their home, but it’s really functioned more like a home base for the globe-trotting family. The former first couple traveled to French Polynesia for an extended vacation after leaving the White House and also vacationed in Tuscany. ||||| The Obama family has officially bought a piece of D.C. property.
Former president Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama purchased the Kalorama home they’ve been renting since they left the White House in January.
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In a statement obtained by PEOPLE, spokesperson Kevin Lewis explained: “Given that President and Mrs. Obama will be in Washington for at least another two and a half years, it made sense for them to buy a home rather than continuing to rent property.”
The Obamas have said they plan to remain in the capital while their 15-year-old daughter Sasha finishes high school at Sidwell Friends in Washington.
RELATED VIDEO: This Is How Much It Would Cost to Paint the White House (And More Crazy Facts)
The couple bought the 8200-square-foot eight-bedroom, 9½-bath mansion for $8.1 million, according to the Washington Post. Photos of the upstairs residence were published in a spread in Architectural Digest last December.
The residence was previously owned by Joe Lockhart, the former White House Press Secretary under President Bill Clinton. (Lockhart moved to New York City last year to take a job with the NFL).
The Obamas will continue to be neighbors with Ivanka Trump and her husband, Jared Kushner, who live a few blocks away. | – It's not the White House, but Barack and Michelle Obama clearly aren't too disappointed with their new Washington, DC, home: After renting it for several months, they've opted to buy it, reports People. The Obamas purchased the 8,200-square-foot home in the Kalorama neighborhood this week for $8.1 million, snatching it up from NFL executive Joe Lockhart, who bought it for $5.3 million in 2014, reports the Washington Post. Since the family plans to stay in Washington until Sasha, 15, finishes high school, "it made sense for them to buy a home rather than continuing to rent property," a rep says. |
Starting in 1996, Alexa Internet has been donating their crawl data to the Internet Archive. Flowing in every day, these data are added to the Wayback Machine after an embargo period. ||||| Cartoon Wars Part I
Cartman and Kyle are at war over the popular cartoon, "Family Guy." When the creators of the show announce that they will show the image of the prophet Muhammad, the network threatens to ban the episode. Cartman sees this as his chance to get "Family Guy" off the air for good. The two boys embark upon a mad chase across the country and the fate of "Family Guy" lies with whichever boy reaches Hollywood first. | – Apparently there are places even South Park fears to tread. After getting a death threat from the jihadist website RevolutionMuslim.com, the show pulled the prophet Mohammed out of this week's episode, bleeping out all mention of his name, putting “censored” banners over parts of the episode and, where necessary, replacing him with Santa Claus in a bear suit, the Huffington Post reports. Here's the deal: last week's episode (which you can see a clip of here) mocked the taboo against showing the prophet Mohammed, having him show up first hidden inside a U-Haul, and then inside a bear costume. This week's episode was to continue that story. It's unclear whether the extra censorship is intended to appease the irony-challenged folks at RevolutionMuslim or mock them. South Park, incidentally, has tackled the issue before, and even depicted Mohammed on screen once with impunity. |
Enrique Peña Nieto repeats his refusal to fund border wall but leaves open the question of contentious 31 January trip to meet new US president
Mexico's president 'will not pay for any wall' – but may still visit Trump
Mexico’s president has once again declared that “Mexico will not pay for any wall” but stopped short of cancelling a visit to Washington after Donald Trump signed executive orders that include building the border barrier.
Enrique Peña Nieto reiterated that Mexico would not put a single peso towards the new US president’s signature project. In a televised address he said: “I regret and reject the decision of the US to build the wall.”
But Peña Nieto did not cancel a trip to Washington – a move many in Mexico had demanded after Trump signed an executive order to start plans for fencing off the frontier.
“I have said time and time again, Mexico will not pay for any wall,” Peña Nieto told the nation in his short video statement on Wednesday night.
“Mexico reaffirms its friendship with the people of the United States and its willingness to reach agreements with its government.”
He left up in the air the question of the 31 January meeting with Trump in the White House – saying his decision would depend on an evaluation by a team already in Washington and officials at home.
Mexicans reacted to the president’s statement with confusion. Many in the political class had called on Peña Nieto to cancel his meeting after Trump signed the executive order.
A senior government official told the Associated Press that the Mexican president was “considering” calling off the visit to Washington, but no decision had been taken.
On Thursday, Trump appeared to be goading his Mexican counterpart into pulling out of the visit, saying on Twitter: “If Mexico is unwilling to pay for the badly needed wall, then it would be better to cancel the upcoming meeting.”
Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas, a leftist former presidential candidate, told an audience in Mexico City: “If a [Mexican] presidential visit is being announced, he will be received there by having the door slammed in his face.
“I think the least we can do in these conditions would be not to show up, cancel the visit to the United States and find a dignified position for Mexico.”
Peña Nieto has encountered sustained criticism for failing to come up with a decisive strategy to deal with Trump’s combative policies.
Trump repeatedly promised a border wall throughout his election campaign but Mexico’s political elite appeared to be hoping that the billionaire-turned-populist politician had been bluffing.
Trump's wall: Mexican construction firms likely to be biggest winners Read more
That hope proved misplaced on Wednesday, when the US president signed the order, proclaiming: “A nation without borders is not a nation.”
Trump claimed that “we’re in the middle of a crisis on our southern border”, citing an “unprecedented surge” of illegal immigrants from Central America that was harming both the US and Mexico.
The likely effectiveness of the planned wall is fiercely disputed. More Mexican immigrants have returned to Mexico from the US than have migrated to the US since the end of the 2007-08 financial crisis, according to the Pew Research Center. Research shows that immigrants are more law-abiding than non-immigrants.
Peña Nieto has consistently rejected Trump’s suggestion that Mexico will pay for the border wall and promised to put Mexico first in any negotiations.
But analysts say the president has few strong options in confronting an American administration considered the most hostile to Mexico since the Mexican-American war of the 1840s – in which Mexico was forced to cede its northern territory.
Peña Nieto – whose personal popularity ratings currently languish at 12% (the lowest in history) – appears to be caught in an impossible situation: paying for the wall would stoke domestic outrage. Not paying could provoke problems with Trump’s team, however.
“The whole thing is lose-lose. The only question is how much,” said Esteban Illades, editor of the Mexican magazine Nexos.
Trump’s executive order to build a wall along the nearly 2,000-mile US-Mexico border came on the same day Mexico’s foreign minister Luis Videgary and economy minister Ildefonso Guajardo met with senior Trump administration officials.
“I would cancel the meeting [with Trump] or postpone it as a message that we’re not going to do what they want, that we’re not going to play their game,” Agustín Basave, ex-leader of the left-leaning Democratic Revolution party, told the newspaper Reforma. “I would start by saying things like we are going to review Mexico’s cooperation in the areas of security and migration.”
Others were even more direct, including ex-president Vicente Fox – who has walloped Trump with profanity-laden tweets for more than a year.
Vicente Fox Quesada (@VicenteFoxQue) Sean Spicer, I've said this to @realDonaldTrump and now I'll tell you: Mexico is not going to pay for that fucking wall. #FuckingWall
Let's raise our voices against this dictator, Donald Trump | Vicente Fox Read more
Mexican officials have expressed hopes of salvaging Nafta, which facilitates more than $500bn annually in cross-border trade, though Guajardo told Mexican TV earlier this week that Mexico would consider walking away from the deal.
Canadian officials have also mused about abandoning Mexico to forge a bilateral deal with the US if necessary, leaving Mexico’s increasingly export-oriented economy in a bind.
“If we’re going for something that is less than what we have now, it doesn’t make sense to stay in,” Guajardo told the Televisa network.
Until recently, such a posture would have been unthinkable as Mexico shifted its economy from one so closed that smuggled candy was sold in itinerant markets to one so open it has more than 40 free-trade deals with countries around the world.
But moving away from the massive US market has proved difficult for Mexico, which sends 80% of its exports north. Peña Nieto told the nation Monday that Mexico would seek stronger ties with countries in the hemisphere, but promptly cancelled his participation in a summit of Latin American and Caribbean countries.
Trump's Mexico bashing may backfire if peso plunge forces poor migrants north Read more
“The cancelation was given in such short notice that it raises suspicions that Peña Nieto would not want to meet with other leaders who would want a strongly worded statement against Trump,” Illades said.
Peña Nieto has promised to impose conditions on any negotiation with the US, including addressing issues such as smuggled guns streaming across the border, arming drug cartels, and Mexico’s efforts to detain and deport migrants who transit its territory in attempts to reach the US.
But the president is playing a weak hand, while his approval rating of just 12% is hampering his attempts at fomenting unity in a time of crisis.
“There is unity; people do not like Trump,” says Rodolfo Soriano-Núñez, a sociologist in Mexico City, “but there is this sense that Trump is not the real problem, rather trust in a presidency ridden with scandals.”
Additional reporting by David Smith ||||| During his presidential campaign, no single promise electrified Donald Trump’s supporters more than the pledge to build a “big, beautiful wall” all along the border with Mexico.
Wednesday, President Trump turned that promise into an executive order, one of two he signed. His directive leaves many questions unanswered about what sort of wall might be built, how much it would cost and how it would be paid for.
The two orders, however, do begin the crackdown on illegal immigration that Trump promised his supporters. In addition to the wall, he would greatly expand deportations and detention of migrants and block federal money for so-called sanctuary cities.
Some of the actions will be felt immediately, some require more cash from Congress, others will only take effect over time.
Here’s a look at what the actions mean and what they don’t.
Border wall
Trump ordered the “immediate construction of a physical wall on the southern border” and gave the Homeland Security department six months to study how to prevent “all unlawful entries” into the U.S. — a goal that is widely considered impossible. But “immediate construction” doesn’t mean a wall will be built all along the 2,000 miles of the Mexican border any time soon. Trump’s order directs Homeland Security to come up with a long-term plan for getting it done.
Cost estimates for walling off the entire border run from $12 billion to $38 billion, and the barriers would cost billions more to maintain over time.
Trump could tap some existing federal funds to begin construction. U.S. Customs and Border Protection already has budgeted $175 million for "procurement, construction and improvements." That wouldn't be nearly enough to finish the job, but it would allow a start.
Trump has famously said Mexico would pay for the wall. Mexican officials say no. Asking Mexico to pay for the wall is “unacceptable,” Mexico’s foreign minister Luis Videgaray has said.
Trump aides have floated the idea of taxing cash that flows back to Mexico from workers in the U.S. or using the wall construction as leverage in negotiations to change the terms of the North American Free Trade Agreement.
Trump promised Wednesday to help Mexico by stopping the flow of illegal cash and guns moving south from the U.S. He is scheduled to meet with Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto next week, but Peña Nieto is under pressure at home to cancel the meeting in the wake of Trump’s announcement.
Currently, about 600 miles of the border have some form of fence, ranging from the imposing barrier along parts of the California border to more traditional fencing elsewhere. Building all that already cost about $7 billion. The government uses walls and fencing in highly trafficked urban areas where border agents have only minutes to apprehend illegal crossers. Cameras and sensors are used in more remote areas.
Border Patrol agents have long said that what they need to reduce illegal border crossings further is more of those cameras, sensors, vehicles and equipment and not more physical barriers. Smuggling cartels often use blow torches to cut holes through existing border walls or dig tunnels under them, they say.
The government has has also increased the size of the Border Patrol from about 10,000 agents in 2004 to 21,000 today. Trump plans to add an additional 5,000 agents.
The increase in security — plus economic changes in both the U.S. and Mexico — has meant fewer people are crossing back and forth over the border. The Pew Research Center estimates that in recent years, more Mexicans have been returning to Mexico than migrating to the U.S.
There has been a dramatic increase in Central American migrants arriving at the border in Texas, but a large share of those people are not trying to evade capture. Instead, they quickly surrender to border agents and make claims for asylum, saying they are fleeing the violence in their home countries.
Deporting more people
Under Trump’s plans, immigration officials will have much more freedom to deport people they find in the country illegally. President Obama tried to focus the deportation force on removing people with criminal records and those who pose a threat to public safety, and deportations from the interior of the country declined during Obama’s second term.
Trump dramatically expanded the list of people considered a priority for removal to include those charged with crimes, even if a trial has not yet been held, and those who have improperly received any welfare benefit. As a result, a lot more people will be unable to win reprieves from deportation even if they have strong family ties in the U.S.
Immigration officials can act on these new priorities immediately. There are about 800,000 people in the U.S. who already have a final order of removal from an immigration judge and have either refused to leave or been allowed to stay temporarily, often because of the hardship their deportation would cause to family in the U.S.
Also, countries that refuse to take back people being deported from the U.S. have been put on notice by the Trump administration that they must accept return of their citizens. About 23 countries currently don’t accept deportations from the U.S., including Afghanistan, Algeria, China, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, and Zimbabwe.
Courts have ruled that people from such countries can’t be held indefinitely, even if they have a violent criminal conviction. As a result, more than 8,000 immigrants with criminal records have been released in the past three years.
Trump also instructed immigration officials to expand the number and size of detention facilities to hold asylum seekers and people awaiting hearings in immigration court. Cases for people held in detention can move more quickly, and they can be deported faster than those released and told to appear in court.
Advocates for immigrants are concerned about the poor conditions in detention facilities, many of which are also local jails and have a track record of substandard medical care. Also, immigrants in detention facilities have a much harder time getting lawyers. | – Tension between President Trump and Mexico over his border wall plans was probably inevitable, though not everybody expected it to flare up before his administration was a week old. After Trump signed an executive order Wednesday and promised to start building the wall within months, Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto told his country in a televised address that Mexico "does not believe in walls" and will not pay for it, no matter what Trump says, the BBC reports. "I regret and condemn the decision of the United States to continue construction of a wall that, for years, has divided us instead of uniting us," he said. In other coverage: Peña Nieto said Mexico still offers its friendship to the US, but he didn't confirm whether he plans to go ahead with his Jan. 31 meeting with Trump at the White House, the Guardian reports. Senior government officials said late Wednesday that the Mexican leader is thinking about calling it off. CNN reports that Peña Nieto said he would wait for an evaluation from Mexican officials in the US before confirming the visit to the US. He also said he had ordered government agencies, including the 50 Mexican consulates in the US, to step up protection for immigrants. The Washington Post looks at five major challenges the wall project will face, including rough terrain and the fact that most land along the border in Texas is privately owned. In Mexico, people are furious and are calling for a stern response to Trump's plans, reports the New York Times. "It's like we are Charlie Brown and they are Lucy with the football," says former foreign minister Jorge Castaneda. "Peña is a weak president in a weak country at a weak moment, but he has to find a way to get some official backbone." Historians say the last president to anger Mexico this much was Calvin Coolidge, who threatened to invade "Soviet Mexico" in the 1920s. The Los Angeles Times looks at the details of the border wall project and other immigration-related actions Trump unveiled Wednesday. His plan to withhold federal grants from "sanctuary cities" like LA is expected to start legal battles that will last for years. |
The statue of Jefferson Davis, once president of the Confederate States, stands just south of the Main Building on UT's campus on June 22, 2015.
Editor's note: This story has been updated throughout.
Just days after an advisory panel recommended the University of Texas at Austin relocate some or all of its statues of Confederate leaders, UT-Austin President Gregory Fenves announced that the statue of Confederate President Jefferson Davis will soon have a new home.
UT is relocating the Davis statue to an exhibit in the Dolph Briscoe Center for American History. Four other statues the panel considered relocating — including ones of Confederate generals Robert E. Lee and Albert Sidney Johnston — will remain on the university’s South Mall, but Fenves will consider adding explanatory plaques to place them in historical context.
“While every historical figure leaves a mixed legacy, I believe Jefferson Davis is in a separate category,” Fenves wrote in a letter to the UT-Austin community, “and that it is not in the university’s best interest to continue commemorating him. Davis had few ties to Texas; he played a unique role in the history of the American South that is best explained and understood through an educational exhibit.”
The statue of former U.S. President Woodrow Wilson will also be relocated to another outdoor location, but for symmetrical reasons: He stands opposite Davis on South Mall. The Davis statue will likely be removed in the next two days, UT-Austin spokesman Gary Susswein said. It will be refurbished and relocated to the Briscoe Center in the next 18 months.
In June, Fenves assembled a 12-member panel of students, professors and alumni to assess the appropriateness of the statues. The panel solicited more than 3,100 opinions from the public and released its recommendations Monday. Its report presented five options, four of which involved moving some or all of the statues to a history center on campus. Another option would have left the statues in place but called for explanatory plaques.
UT-Austin student government President Xavier Rotnofsky and Vice President Rohit Mandalapu made removal of the Davis statue a central part of their platform when running for office. Both served on the advisory panel and said they were happy to see their goal achieved.
"If there is a statue to be relocated it should be Jefferson Davis, the leader of the Confederacy," Mandalapu said. "Now it can be moved to a place where it can be contextualized and studied within the scope of history."
The other Confederate statues of Lee, Johnston and Confederate Postmaster General John Reagan — and one of former Texas Gov. James Hogg — have strong ties to Texas, Fenves said in his letter, noting Lee's legacy "should not be reduced to his role in the Civil War."
Moving the Davis statue, while leaving the other four in place is a respectful decision that still honors the heritage of the United States and the university, Fenves said.
The Davis statue has been the most controversial of the ones commemorating Confederate leaders. In March, the student assembly passed a resolution asking UT to remove the statue of Davis. In April, it was vandalized with the phrase “Davis Must Fall.” A week after June's deadly shooting at a black church in South Carolina, the statues of Davis, Lee and Johnston were tagged with the phrase “Black Lives Matter.”
"Statues have layers of meaning: aesthetic, historical, aspirational and educational. History is not innocent; it is the living foundation for the present," the report said. "The university’s approach to changing and replacing monuments on campus should be conservative but not uncritical."
While applauding UT's decision, state Sens. Rodney Ellis, D-Houston, and Judith Zaffirini, D-Laredo reiterated their call for examination of Confederate monuments on the Capitol grounds.
"We hope the conversation at UT will encourage state leaders to have a similar debate about the numerous Confederate statues that dot the Capitol grounds," they said in a statement. "We renew our previous request — one that's been echoed by many legislators, both Democrat and Republican — to create a task force to begin a serious conversation about how best to honor Texas' past, ensure historical accuracy and celebrate figures who are relevant to our state and worthy of our praise."
Disclosure: The University of Texas at Austin is a corporate sponsor of The Texas Tribune. A complete list of Tribune donors and sponsors can be viewed here. ||||| Updated throughout at 10:21 a.m.
AUSTIN — The University of Texas at Austin will move the statue honoring Jefferson Davis to the Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, President Greg Fenves announced on Twitter Thursday morning.
The other four confederate statues will remain in place.
“James Stephen Hogg, Albert Sidney Johnston, and John Reagan had deep ties to Texas,” Fenves wrote in a letter to the UT community. “Robert E. Lee’s complicated legacy to Texas and the nation should not be reduced to his role in the Civil War.”
Fenves said he will consider placing a plaque on the Littlefield Fountain to explain the context behind the four remaining statues.
“This combination of locating the Jefferson Davis statue in a center devoted to history and keeping the remaining statues along the Main Mall is both respectful of the heritage that is important to many and serves as a poignant display of our nation’s and university’s history,” Fenves wrote.
To preserve symmetry on campus, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson will be moved to another exterior location on campus. Currently Wilson and Davis sit atop the main mall together, overseeing UT’s South Mall lawn.
Earlier this week, a task force formed to study the statues released a report that offered up five solutions for the statues, which have garnered controversy. Just one would have left the statues where they are located, but the task force wrote that this option could prolong the controversy.
Fenves’ decision is the latest in a series of backlashes the Confederate symbol has faced nationwide since Dylann Roof, the white suspect in the fatal shootings at a black church in Charleston. S.C., was shown in a photo with the Confederate battle flag.
This is a developing story — check back later for updates. | – In the midst of a continued backlash against Confederate symbols following the deadly shooting at a black church in South Carolina, the University of Texas at Austin said today it will be relocating a statue of Jefferson Davis, the Dallas Morning News reports. The statue of the Confederate president, which is located on UT's Main Mall, had been defaced in recent months with the phrases "Davis Must Fall" and—following the church massacre—"Black Lives Matter," according to the Texas Tribune. While the statue of Davis will be moved to the Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, four other statues of Confederate leaders, including Robert E. Lee, will remain on the Main Mall because of their relationship to Texas history, the Morning News reports. Earlier this week, the school created an advisory panel of students, professors, and alumni to make recommendations about the statues, of which Davis was the most controversial. After announcing his decision to move Davis, UT's president said it wasn't "in the university's best interest to continue commemorating" him. He is also considering plaques to give historical context for the remaining Confederate statues. The Morning News reports the university is also moving a statue of former President Woodrow Wilson, which had been located across from the statue of Davis, for symmetry purposes. |
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A 61-year-old man from Pittsburgh’s Lincoln Place neighborhood died from injuries he sustained Thursday night when he fell off a balcony in Mt. Lebanon during a break in filming the new movie about legendary children’s television host Fred Rogers, “You Are My Friend,” the Allegheny County Medical Examiner’s Office said.
The office identified the man as James M. Emswiller.
Mt. Lebanon police said Emswiller fell a couple of stories to the ground from the balcony at an apartment building in the 700 block of Shady Drive East. He was taken by medics to UPMC Mercy in critical condition, where he died roughly an hour after the incident, officials said.
Mt. Lebanon police Chief Aaron Lauth said Emswiller may have suffered a medical event prior to falling over the brick wall surrounding the balcony.
The incident happened about 7:30 p.m. No one reported seeing Emswiller fall, but people did hear him hit the ground, the chief said.
“This is a devastating tragedy and the studio is investigating the matter. Our thoughts and prayers are with Jim’s loved ones, friends, and colleagues,” Sony’s TriStar Pictures division said in a statement.
Emswiller was involved in the sound production of the movie, which was shooting a scene Thursday night.
His IMDb page credits him as a sound mixer for an Untitled Mr. Rogers/Tom Hanks Project.
Film star Tom Hanks, who is playing Rogers in the movie, was at the site and later left.
Emswiller’s credits include sound work on the Pittsburgh-filmed movies “Jack Reacher,” “Abduction” and “Concussion.” He won an Emmy Award in 2015 for his work on the TV movie “Bessie,” which told the story of legendary blues performer Bessie Smith, his IMDb page said.
Rogers, a Latrobe native, was known worldwide for his television program, “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood,” which was produced at WQED-TV studios in Pittsburgh and aired from 1968 to 2001. Rogers died in in 2003.
The new movie is about the experience of Tom Junod, a journalist who profiled Rogers in an article for Esquire magazine in 1998. The movie is about the bond that developed between the two men.
The movie being filmed in Pittsburgh is described by TriStar as a “heart-warming story, a cynical journalist begrudgingly accepts an assignment to write a profile piece on the beloved icon and finds his perspective on life transformed.”
Staff writer Madasyn Czebiniak contributed. Bret Gibson and Joe Napsha are a Tribune-Review staff writers. You can contact Bret at bgibson@tribweb.com and Joe at 724-836-5252 or jnapsha@tribweb.com. ||||| Tom Hanks, shown here on the set of his upcoming film, is officially in Mister Rogers' red cardigan. (Photo: LACEY TERRELL)
A man working on the Mister Rogers film starring Tom Hanks has died after an on-set fall in Mount Lebanon, Pennsylvania, located about 20 miles southeast of Pittsburgh.
Police said James Emswiller, 61, a sound mixer, was on a break between scenes around 7:30 p.m. EDT Thursday when he went over a brick wall on the balcony of an apartment building and fell two stories.
Upon arrival, officers, movie crew and a set medic attempted life saving measures, according to a release from Mount Lebanon Police obtained by USA TODAY.
Police Chief Aaron Lauth told WPX-TV that Emswiller, whose fall may have been triggered by some kind of medical issue, was transported to the University of Pittsburgh's medical center. His condition became critical and he died at approximately an hour after his fall.
The Allegheny County Medical Examiner's Office confirmed his death to The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. An autopsy revealed the cause of death was blunt impact injuries to the head and torso. The manner of death was listed as an accident.
The newspaper reported that star Hanks, who plays Fred Rogers, was on the set Thursday, but left after the incident. Filming was canceled for the evening and remains on hold.
“This is a devastating tragedy and the studio is investigating the matter. Our thoughts and prayers are with Jim’s loved ones, friends, and colleagues,” Sony Pictures/Tri-Star Pictures, the studio making the film, said in a statement to USA TODAY.
The film is inspired by a real-life friendship between Rogers and journalist Tom Junod. Junod is depicted as a cynical scribe who begrudgingly accepts an assignment to write an Esquire profile on the iconic Mr. Rogers. He finds his life-perspective transformed in the process.
More: First photo of Tom Hanks as Mister Rogers emerges, red sweater and all
Contributing: The Associated Press
Read or Share this story: https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/movies/2018/10/11/man-critically-injured-set-mr-rogers-movie-tom-hanks/1609347002/ ||||| It’s a sad day on the set of the upcoming Mister Rogers movie.
James Emswiller, a 61-year-old member of the project’s sound production team, died Thursday night after falling two stories from a building where the movie was shooting, according to USA Today and the Associated Press.
Mt. Lebanon Chief of Police Aaron Lauth told PEOPLE hours before Emswiller died that the production member was “taking a break” when he collapsed and fell from the balcony of the building.
“Basically, he appears to have suffered from a medical emergency while on the balcony,” Lauth said at the time. “He was taking a break and smoking a cigarette when he fell.”
“He fell from the second story of the building. Other crew members were inside the building, but not on the balcony. They noticed he wasn’t there and saw him down on the ground,” he continued.
#BREAKING: Mt. Lebanon Police say they think James Emswiller stepped outside for a smoke break when he may have suffered a heart attack and fell from the balcony. The fall happened around 7:28 in Mt. Lebanon. His time of death was 10:36 at the hospital.@KDKA pic.twitter.com/rzvOKy7pSq — Meghan Schiller (@MeghanKDKA) October 12, 2018
Emswiller won an Emmy in 2015 for outstanding sound mixing for a limited series or a movie for HBO’s Bessie.
Tom Hanks, who is playing the beloved TV personality, was on set throughout the day, Lauth said. The AP reported Hanks was also on set at the time of the incident.
A rep for the actor did not immediately respond for PEOPLE’s request for comment. A spokesperson for Big Beach Films, the movie’s production company, also did not immediately respond to PEOPLE’s request for comment.
WATCH: Tom Hanks to Star as Mister Rogers in Upcoming Movie
The Oscar winner made headlines in late September when Sony Pictures released the first photo of the actor in costume as Fred Rogers.
RELATED: Tom Hanks Is Fred Rogers in First Look at Movie About Beloved TV Icon
He was pictured smiling happily at the camera in a bright red sweater pulled over a buttoned-up shirt and tie over khaki pants — the familiar outfit Mr. Rogers is remembered for wearing.
The film will focus on Rogers’ unlikely friendship with award-winning journalist Tom Junod, who got to know the television personality while writing a 1998 profile on the star for Esquire magazine.
The film will hit theaters in October 2019. ||||| Tom Hardy has been on a run since Inception, so it's no surprise he's been offered a bunch of big roles in the past decade. But which blockbusters did he turn down?
See Tom's close casting calls | – Sad news out of Pennsylvania, where a biopic about Fred Rogers (aka "Mister Rogers") is filming. WPXI and the AP report that a 61-year-old crew member for You Are My Friend has died after falling off a second-story balcony at a Mount Lebanon apartment building. Police say James Emswiller, described as a sound mixer on his IMDb page, had gone out onto the balcony for a smoke in between shooting scenes for the film and apparently plummeted over the balcony's brick wall about 7:30pm Thursday. No one saw him fall, but others nearby heard a sound and soon discovered Emswiller on the ground below. "He appears to have suffered from a medical emergency while on the balcony," Mount Lebanon Chief of Police Aaron Lauth tells People. Emswiller was initially listed in serious condition, but he soon deteriorated and was pronounced dead at a local hospital about an hour after the fall. He had previously done work on The Avengers and Jack Reacher, per his IMDb creds; the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review notes he won an Emmy for the TV movie Bessie in 2015. "This is a devastating tragedy and the studio is investigating the matter," Sony Pictures/TriStar Pictures said in a statement to USA Today. Tom Hanks, who stars as Rogers, was reportedly on the set Thursday and left after the incident. |
Fidget spinners are one of the hottest new trends of the year, but ahead of the holiday shopping season, a new report by the U.S. Public Interest Research Group, a consumer advocacy organization, says testing found dangerous levels of lead in some.
The safety group is not aware of any reported cases of kids getting lead poisoning from fidget spinners, but they urge awareness and transparency on the part of the retailers, especially when putting the items in children's toy sections, reports CBS News correspondent Anna Werner.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said there is no safe level of lead when it comes to children. It can cause serious health problems, including brain damage. It's something a mother from Portland learned the hard way, and now she is trying to help other parents.
"You don't know what that means the first time you hear that your kid has lead poisoning," Tamara Rubin said.
CBS News
Rubin said her sons still suffer debilitating effects from lead exposure in their home 12 years ago, when she says contractors used unsafe methods to remove lead paint. Now, the mother of four helps other parents learn more about products that may contain lead.
Her "Lead Safe Mama" Facebook page has more than 15,000 followers. She tests consumer products that concerned parents send to her, including hundreds of fidget spinners. She said many of them had concerning levels of lead.
"It's on the center, it's the part you're interacting with so it's definitely a hazard for children," Rubin said.
Rubin's blog caught the attention of the U.S. Public Interest Research Group. They tested 12 fidget spinners found in children's toy aisles in Target stores across the country.
Two of the products tested with high levels of lead. One contained levels reaching 33,000 parts per million. That's 300 times higher than the legal limit for children's products.
"They should take these toys off the shelves," said Kara Cook Schultz, U.S. PIRG's toxics program director.
"The reason that lead is a large concern – especially in children's products – is that when children are exposed to high levels of lead they can experience things like memory loss, learning disabilities," she said.
Tamara Rubin
When the group contacted Target and asked them to take the product off the shelves, Target declined, saying the two products are not designed for children.
According to the packaging, they are marked for ages 14 and up, and Target says, "They are not defined by the Consumer Product Safety Commission as toys" and as a result "are not required to meet children's product standards."
The toy's manufacturer, Bulls-i-Toy, similarly stated in a letter to the safety group: "The products in question are clearly labeled 'ages 14+'…there are no mandatory CPSC (Consumer Product Safety Commission) requirements for it."
The CPSC says fidget spinners marketed to children under the age of 12 would be subject to federal testing regulations including lead testing, but those marketed for use over age 12 are considered "general use products," which would not be subject to those same tests. U.S. PIRG is pushing to change the guidelines for these popular gadgets.
CBS News reached out to Bulls-i-Toy for comment but has not heard back. ||||| - High levels of lead have been found in one of the more popular gadgets this year: fidget spinners.
In recent lab results, the U.S. PIRG Education Fund found two fidget spinners sold at Target have “extremely high levels of lead.” The advocacy group requested Target and its developer, Bulls i Toys, LLC to recall the products and investigate the how lead seeped into them.
The two fidget spinners containing the lead are, “Fidget Wild Premium Spinner Brass,” and “Fidget Wild Premium Spinner Metal.”
According to the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention, lead's toxicity resulted in its ban in household paints and products marketed to children in 1978. Exposure to children is damaging because it can impact development, and any amount of lead in a child’s blood is unsafe. It can affect nearly every body system.
U.S. PIRG also called on the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) to reclassify fidget spinners as toys, rather than its current category of general use products. The organization argues that the two fidget spinners are marketed towards children. On Target’s website, the “Fidget Wild Premium Spinner Bass” is recommended for ages 14 and over, as well as, 6 and over.
CPSC could hold the products to federal standards for lead if classified as a toy. Children products must not contain more than 100 parts per million (ppm) of total lead in "accessible parts," according to federal requirements.
In the report, the lab results were tested twice to confirm the results. For the "Fidget Wild Premium Spinner Brass," the center circle tested for 33,000 ppm of lead, and the arm tested for 22,000 ppm of lead. The center circle of the "Fidget Wild Premium Spinner Metal" was tested for 1,300 ppm of lead and the arm tested for 520 ppm of lead.
While U.S. PIRG notified the CPSC, the agency held firm that the fidget spinners are not toys.
In the meantime, U.S. PIRG still recommends for adults and children to stop using the fidget spinners. The report did not address whether there have been any injuries after a product purchase.
View the full report here. ||||| These crawls are part of an effort to archive pages as they are created and archive the pages that they refer to. That way, as the pages that are referenced are changed or taken from the web, a link to the version that was live when the page was written will be preserved.Then the Internet Archive hopes that references to these archived pages will be put in place of a link that would be otherwise be broken, or a companion link to allow people to see what was originally intended by a page's authors.The goal is to fix all broken links on the web . Crawls of supported "No More 404" sites. ||||| If you're thinking about buying your kids a fidget spinner this holiday season, you may want to think twice. This inexpensive and addictive little toy is already the topic of choking hazard warnings by the Consumer Product Safety Commission. And Thursday morning the US Public Interest Research Group revealed that some of the spinners sold at Target (TGT) contain dangerously high levels of lead.
The Fidget Wild Premium Spinner Brass tested at 33,000 parts per million for lead -- some 300 times the 100 parts per million allowable for children's toys. The lead level in another model, the Fidget Wild Premium Spinner in Metal, tested at 1,300 parts per million.
The response from Target and the manufacturer: These particular spinners are recommended for consumers over the age of 14. That means CPSC lead restrictions for children don't apply, according to the companies. Products marketed to those over the age of 12 have no specific lead-level prohibitions.
"The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) has reviewed and explicitly defined fidget spinners as 'general use products.' They are not defined by the CPSC as toys," said Target spokesman Lee Henderson in a prepared statement.
Fidget Spinner craze sweeping the nation
Noting that US PIRG had provided Target with its lead testing results, Henderson added that the retailer's product safety team reviewed the consumer advocacy group's data and decided there was no need to pull the products from its shelves or website.
"The two fidget spinners cited in their letter are clearly marked on the package as 'appropriate for customers ages 14 and older,' and are not marketed to children," Henderson said in an email. "As a result, the fidget spinners identified are not regulated as toys or children's products and are not required to meet children's product standards."
The manufacturer, Bulls-I-Toy, said in a letter to US PIRG that because the product packaging says this spinner model is for youngsters who are at least 14-years-old, "There are no mandatory CPSC requirements for it."
Regardless of how the CPSC classifies these spinners, they're marketed as toys for kids, said Kara Cook-Shultz, toxics director at US PIRG. Not only are they sold in the toy aisles, alongside the spinners sold to 6-year-olds, until Thursday, the description of the brass spinner noted that the gadget has an "educational focus" and is appropriate for ages "6 and up," on Target's website.
After publication of this story, Target updated its website to reflect that the toy was appropriate for ages 14 and up, which matches the age range on the product packaging.
"All fidget spinners have play value as children's toys regardless of labeling," said Cook-Schultz. "We can't sit idly by while children play with these toxic toys. And, yes, they are toys."
Lead poisoning is considered most dangerous for young children because their rapidly growing bodies absorb the substance more readily, and they're more likely to put products in their mouths and near their noses, where the lead is most easily ingested. But lead is dangerous for everyone.
In children, lead can lead to hyperactivity, lack of appetite, behavior problems and learning disabilities. In adults, lead poisoning leads to brain and nervous system ailments, stomach and kidney problems, as well as high blood pressure, weakness, muscle problems and headaches, according to WebMD.
Some lead exposure victims facing new threat as adults
Target's spokesman failed to comment about why the retailer would sell a product that could be dangerous for adults. A spokesman for Bulls-I-Toy said the company's products meet CPSC guidelines. When a reporter noted that there are no lead guidelines for adult products, he reiterated: "As a company, we follow the guidelines issued by the CPSC."
Meanwhile, the CPSC has been warning about other spinner hazards.
"As the agency investigates some reported incidents associated with the popular product, fidget spinner users or potential buyers should take some precautions," said CPSC Acting Chairwoman Anne Marie Buerkle in an August statement.
Some of the pieces can break off and create choking hazards, she said. Moreover, light-up spinners often contain lithium coin cell batteries. If swallowed, these batteries can cause severe internal burns. Several reports have also said the devices can catch on fire while charging.
The CPSC noted that the agency classifies most spinners as "general use" products, rather than children's toys. Thus, they're not required to meet a variety of toy safety standards, including those that limit lead or phthalates content.
US PIRG's Cook-Schultz said the debate about whether the lead-laced products are a child's toy or an adult "stress-reliever" is beside the point: "These products are not safe," she said. "Let's get them off the shelves." ||||| By Dev Gowda and Kara Cook-Schultz, U.S. PIRG Education Fund
Introduction
The negative health effects of lead poisoning are well known. Unfortunately, lead remains a problem in our everyday lives. While much attention has been focused on tainted drinking water, such as the lead crisis in Flint, Mich., lead still remains a problem in toys. While lead in toys has become less prevalent in recent years, U.S. PIRG Education Fund tested several models of one of today’s hottest toys, fidget spinners, for the toxic heavy metal. Laboratory results indicated that two fidget spinners purchased at Target and distributed by Bulls i Toy, L.L.C. contained extremely high levels of lead.
U.S. PIRG Education Fund calls on Target and Bulls i Toy to immediately recall these two fidget spinners and investigate how such high levels of lead were found in these toys. Also, we call on the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) to classify these fidget spinners as toys and hold them to federal standards for lead in children’s products.
Background on Lead
Elemental lead is a metal occurring naturally in soils and rocks. It has a variety of commercial uses including in batteries, plastics, and radiation shielding. In the past, lead was also added to gasoline and paint. Because of lead’s toxicity, in 1978 it was banned in household paint, in products marketed to children, and in dishes and cookware in the United States. Lead is not discernible by sight or smell.
Lead exposure is particularly damaging for young children because of its impact on development. Even low levels of lead in blood have been shown to undermine IQ, attentiveness, and academic achievement. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) makes clear that any amount of lead in a child’s blood is unsafe. Moreover, since the effects of lead exposure cannot be reversed, it is especially important to prevent lead exposure to children in the first place.
Unfortunately, toys can pose a risk in part because lead is used in other countries and can be found in imported products. Additionally, lead may be incorporated into plastic. Lead is used to soften plastic and make it more flexible, but when the plastic is exposed to sunlight, air, or detergents, the chemical bond between the lead and plastic breaks down, forming lead dust. Children can inhale or come in contact with this dust when they put toys in or near their mouths.
Federal Standards for Lead
With a few exceptions, federal law requires that all children’s products manufactured after August 2011 contain no more than 100 parts per million (ppm) of total lead content in all accessible parts. The CPSC defines accessible parts as parts that a child could reach through “normal and reasonably foreseeable use and abuse of the product.”
Paint or similar surface coatings on all children’s products are subject to a limit of 90 ppm of total lead. (Household paints are also subject to this rule.)
Exceptions to these standards include metal components of bicycles, which cannot contain more than 300 ppm of lead. Components in electronic devices, inaccessible parts, and other items are exempt from the lead standard.
Note that these limits do not meet the recommendations of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), which recommends that all products intended for use by children contain no more than trace amounts of lead, defined as 40 ppm, the high end of typical lead concentrations in uncontaminated soil.
Lead Found in Fidget Spinners
Several fidget spinners were tested for lead content by a CPSC-accredited laboratory. The fidget spinners were analyzed in accordance with CPSC-CH-E1001-8.3 using Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry (ICP/MS). The toys that tested for high levels of lead were then re-tested a second time to confirm the results. The results of the second test are included in this report.
The lab results showed two fidget spinners contained extremely high levels of lead:
Fidget Wild Premium Spinner Brass:
The center circle tested for 33,000 ppm of lead.
The arm tested for 22,000 ppm of lead.
This fidget spinner was purchased at Target and is distributed by Bulls i Toy, LLC, located in Des Moines, Iowa. Although the box says for ages 14+, the Target.com website where it is available for sale says both that it is for children 6+ and 14+ and specifically states that it is “framed as a toy”. See screenshot from Target.com website below. Moreover, it was found in the toy aisles of numerous Target stores throughout the country and is marketed as a toy. Below is a picture of the Fidget Wild Premium Spinner Brass in the toy aisle of a Target store. Therefore, we believe that this product should be treated as a toy since it’s marketed for use by children under 12 years.
Screenshot from Target.com website.
Fidget spinner in Target store.
Fidget Wild Premium Spinner Metal:
The center circle tested for 1,300 ppm of lead.
The arm tested for 520 ppm of lead.
This fidget spinner was purchased at Target and is distributed by Bulls i Toy, LLC, located in Des Moines, Iowa. Although it says it’s for ages 14+, it was found in the toy aisles of numerous Target stores throughout the country and is marketed as a toy. Therefore, it should be held to federal lead standards for children’s products.
Furthermore, the BullsiToy.com website where Fidget Wild products are found is clearly a website for toys. Below is a screenshot of the Bulls i Toy website. The products they sell are marketed towards children and should, therefore, be classified as toys by the CPSC.
Alarmingly, when U.S. PIRG Education Fund notified the CPSC about the elevated lead levels in the fidget spinners, the CPSC responded in an email (screenshot below) that these fidget spinners are general use products, not toys, so the CPSC will not hold them to federal lead standards. When we alerted Target and the toy's distributor to our findings, they pointed to the same CPSC statement and refused to address the problem. Belying that statement, U.S. PIRG Education Fund staff found these fidget spinners sold in the toy aisle of Target stores and on the Target.com website, which includes a statement that the product is intended for children ages 6 and up. Furthermore, common sense dictates that fidget spinners are meant for kids and therefore should be classified as toys. U.S. PIRG Education Fund calls on the CPSC to classify these fidget spinners as toys and hold them to the federal standard for lead in children’s products.
Recommendations
For consumers:
Adults and children alike should stop using these fidget spinners.
Call on the CPSC to classify all fidget spinners as toys so that they will be held to federal standards for lead in children’s products.
Subscribe to email recall updates from the CPSC and other U.S. government safety agencies available at www.recalls.gov.
For Target, Corp and Bulls I Toy, L.L.C.:
Immediately recall these fidget spinners and remove from store shelves and Target.com website.
Issue a public statement about the recall due to high lead content.
Investigate how these toys came to contain such extremely high levels of lead and make findings public.
Ensure that other fidget spinners sold or manufactured do not contain high levels of lead.
Notify customers who purchased these fidget spinners, where contact information is available, that they should stop using the fidget spinner due to high levels of lead and offer a return for full refund.
For U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission:
Ensure that all fidget spinners are classified as toys and that they must meet federal regulations for children’s products.
Investigate any misleading marketing by Target, Corp. and Bulls i Toy, L.L.C. and take appropriate action. Although the labels on the toy boxes say 14+, they’re clearly being marketed to children under 12 years.
Conduct testing for other fidget spinners, especially those labeled “brass” or “metal”, for lead.
U.S. PIRG Education Fund is a consumer and public health non-profit organization. We work to educate the public about dangers in toys, and for more than 30 years we have published an annual report titled Trouble in Toyland. Our survey of toys has led to more than 150 recalls and other enforcement actions. | – A maker of one of the hottest products of the year has just found itself in a bucket of hot water. According to a consumer advocacy group, two fidget spinners supplied to Target by Iowa-based Bulls-i-Toy contain lead at up to 330 times the federal legal limit for toys. Inspired by a 15,000-strong Facebook group run by a woman who tests consumer products for lead, the US Public Interest Research Group tested 12 fidget spinners sold by Target and found two with unsafe lead levels, reports CBS News. Fidget Wild Premium Spinner Brass was found to contain 33,000 parts per million at its center, while Fidget Wild Premium Spinner Metal contained 1,300 parts per million, reports the Washington Post. Federal laws limit lead in "children's products" to 100 parts per million. The group is now asking Target to remove the products and recall those already sold. But Target isn't complying, arguing the Consumer Product Safety Commission classifies fidget spinners as "general use products" marketed to users 14 and up, making them exempt from regulations on toys. Bulls-i-Toy seconds that, noting the products are "clearly labeled" for ages 14 and up. But FOX 13 notes the fidget spinners sold in Target toy aisles had actually been listed on its website at one point with a manufacturer's recommendation for users "6 years and up." Given that lead exposure can cause learning disabilities in children, among many other issues, US PIRG's toxics director maintains "these products are not safe," per CBS. (They're also a choking hazard.) |
Camp Cloverleaf
Camp Cloverleaf is a traditional camp with modern conveniences, combining a relaxed camp atmosphere with today’s camping desires.
Nestled on the banks of Lake Francis in Highlands County, its private facilities, open spaces and good fishing allow participants to play, learn, and work in a safe and enjoyable environment.
To schedule a tour or check availability, please email Steve Cooper at cloverleaf4-h@ufl.edu or give us a call at (863) 465-4884.
For summer camp information, please contact your local 4-H Extension Agent, or click HERE for more information about our Gator Adventures Camp, open to all youth ages 8-13.
Camp Cloverleaf is open to the public year-round and may be reserved for a variety of uses:
School field trips
Church retreats
Family reunions
Business meetings Teacher In-service training
Civic Organizations
Athletic Groups
Weddings and more….
Camp Cloverleaf can provide a number of opportunities including:
Conference rooms seating 15-125
Overnight accommodations for up to 150 in climate controlled cabins
Dining hall with climate control
Food service by request
Outdoor pavilion with large barbecue grill
Campfire Circle seating 150
Large air-conditioned auditorium stage and seats up to 150
Waterfront facilities with canoes, kayaks, fishing and swimming
Lighted recreational field
Recreational equipment available by request
Audio-Visual equipment by request (projectors, screens, and speaker system)
Wireless Internet
Educational, Business, Family & Church Retreats
Camp Cloverleaf provides the perfect escape from the noise and clutter of the busy world and an opportunity to work in a relaxed atmosphere. Camp Cloverleaf is affordable and tranquil. The private facilities can accommodate group meetings, corporate retreats and team development activities. The Camp’s small meeting rooms are perfect for workshops and demonstrations. Its private beach and 2-boat dock create a safe perimeter for waterfront activities, allowing guests of all ages to enjoy the outdoors of South Central Florida.
Environmental Education
Programs at Camp Cloverleaf bring science to life in this living laboratory. Groups of “campers” observe, explore and interact with nature in an informal setting of experiential learning. The 4-H Environmental Education Curriculum can serve as a guide for your outdoor experiences, or you can design your own.
Resident Director
Steve Cooper
E-mail: cloverleaf4-h@ufl.edu
Phone: (863) 465-4884
Fax: (863) 465-9357
Assistant Resident Director
Bill Tillett
E-mail: Cloverleaf4-Hpd@ufl.edu
Address
126 Cloverleaf Rd.
Lake Placid, FL 33852
Like us on Facebook at 4-H Camp Cloverleaf! ||||| More than two dozen children at a summer camp in Florida fell ill and are being examined, CBS affiliate WTSP-TV reports. Officials in Highlands County say 33 kids and three adults from the Clover Leaf 4-H camp in Lake Placid started to feel nauseous.
Some began vomiting and others suffered headaches. The victims were rushed to at least two local hospitals, according to Highlands County Public Safety Director Marc Bashoor.
He told CBS News Radio that one person passed out, which prompted a 911 call. WTSP-TV writes that none of the cases appear to be serious.
Bashoor explained that some children have been picked up, but about 50 kids remain at the camp.
Final update: 33 children and 3 adults transported to 2 area hospitals. No cause determined at this time, investigation turned over to Health Dept. Last EMS units leaving scene — Highlands County Fire and Rescue (@HighlandsFL_FR) June 22, 2018
Highlands County Fire and Rescue officials wrote that children from Charlotte, Desoto, Sarasota, Palm Beach, Broward and Miami Dade counties are attending the camp.
CBS News has reached out to camp officials, but they didn't immediately provide comment. ||||| At least 33 kids and three adults at Clover Leaf 4-H camp in Lake Placid, Florida, are being examined after falling ill, June 22, 2018. The cause of the disturbance is still unknown. (via Facebook) | – A Florida summer camp ended up falling somewhere between Meatballs and Friday the 13th on Thursday after dozens of kids came down with a mysterious illness. It began with an urgent-sounding tweet shortly after 8pm EDT from Highlands County Fire and Rescue noting a "mass casualty incident" at Lake Placid's Camp Cloverleaf, which belongs to a Florida 4-H group. CBS News and WTSP report that the incident involved 33 kids and three adults falling ill, mainly suffering from nausea, vomiting, and headaches, though one person passing out was deemed concerning enough for a 911 call to be placed, according to Highlands County Public Safety Director Marc Bashoor. The victims were taken to area hospitals to be checked out, though none appeared seriously ill. The fire department says it still doesn't know what caused so many to get sick at once; the health department is looking into it. In the meantime, the area where most of the patients seemed to fall ill has been cordoned off, and although many children were picked up by family, about 50 or so of the 115 attendees remained, per the New York Daily News. The kids at the camp range in age from 8 to 15. |
PHOENIX (AP) — Republican presidential hopeful Donald Trump criticized U.S. immigration and trade policies on Saturday in speeches that veered from accusing Mexico of deliberately sending criminals across the border to professing respect for the Mexican government and love for its people.
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump waves to the crowd as he arrives to speak at a rally before a crowd of 3,500 Saturday, July 11, 2015, in Phoenix. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin) (Associated Press)
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks at FreedomFest, Saturday, July 11, 2015, in Las Vegas. Trump said his comments about immigration have become a movement and has pointed to violence... (Associated Press)
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump waves to supporters as he arrives speaks before a crowd of 3,500 Saturday, July 11, 2015, in Phoenix. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin) (Associated Press)
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump shakes hands prior to speaking at a rally before a crowd of 3,500 Saturday, July 11, 2015, in Phoenix. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin) (Associated Press)
Speaking to a gathering of Libertarians in Las Vegas before headlining an event in Phoenix, Trump repeated his charge that Mexico was sending violent offenders to the U.S. to harm Americans and that U.S. officials were being "dumb" in dealing with immigrants in the country illegally.
"These people wreak havoc on our population," he told a few thousand people attending the Libertarian gathering FreedomFest inside a Planet Hollywood ballroom on the Las Vegas Strip.
In the 4,200-capacity Phoenix convention center packed with flag-waving supporters, Trump took a different view — for a moment — and said: "I love the Mexican people. I love 'em. Many, many people from Mexico are legal. They came in the old-fashioned way. Legally."
He quickly returned to the sharp tone that has brought him scorn as well as praise. "I respect Mexico greatly as a country. But the problem we have is their leaders are much sharper than ours, and they're killing us at the border and they're killing us on trade."
His speeches in both venues were long on insults aimed at critics and short on solutions to the problems he cited. When he called for a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, the audience in Las Vegas groaned.
In a break from the immigration rhetoric that has garnered him condemnation and praise, Trump asserted that he would have more positive results in dealing with China and Russia if he were president and said he could be pals with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Asked by an audience member in Las Vegas about U.S.-Russia relations, Trump said the problem is that Putin doesn't respect Obama.
"I think we would get along very, very well," he said.
Trump has turned to victims of crime to bolster his argument that immigrants in the U.S. illegally have killed and raped. In Las Vegas and Phoenix, he brought on stage Jamiel Shaw Sr., a Southern California man whose 17-year-old son was shot and killed in 2008 by a man in the country illegally. Shaw vividly described how his son was shot — in the head, stomach and hands while trying to block his face — and how he heard the gunshots as he talked to his son on the phone.
Shaw said he trusted Trump, and encouraged the crowds in both cities to do the same.
Trump's speeches were filled with tangents and insults leveled at business partners such as Univision and NBC that have dropped him in the wake of his comments that Mexican immigrants bring drugs and crime to the U.S. and are rapists. He also directed familiar barbs at other presidential contenders, including Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton ("the worst secretary of state in the history of the country"), news media figures ("lyin' Brian Williams") and President Barack Obama ("such a divisive person"). He called journalists "terrible people."
As Trump lambasted Univision for cancelling its broadcast of the Miss USA pageant, one of his many business enterprises, a group of young Latinos unfurled a banner pointed toward the stage and began chanting insults. They were quickly drowned out by the crowd, and nearby Trump supporters began to grab at them, tearing at the banner and pulling and pushing at the protesters. Security staff managed to get to the group and escorted them out as Trump resumed speaking.
"I wonder if the Mexican government sent them over here," he said. "I think so."
Arizona's tough-on-immigration Sheriff Joe Arpaio introduced Trump in Phoenix after outlining the things he and the candidate have in common, including skepticism that Obama was born in the United States. He went on to criticize the federal government for what he called a revolving door for immigrants, saying many of them end up in his jails.
"He's been getting a lot of heat, but you know, there's a silent majority out here," Arpaio said, borrowing from a phrase Richard Nixon popularized during his presidency in a speech about the Vietnam War.
A single protester standing outside the room where Trump spoke in Las Vegas was more concerned about the businessman being tied to the Libertarian Party.
"I've been a Libertarian for 43 years and Trump ain't no Libertarian," said Linda Rawles, who asserted that including Trump in FreedomFest set back the party's movement.
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Pierceall reported from Las Vegas. ||||| Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, whose caustic comments about Mexicans have inflamed the immigration debate, told thousands of cheering supporters here Saturday that “we have to take back the heart of our country.”
In a rambling, defiant speech delivered in this border state that has been the epicenter of the nation’s divisive battle over immigration reform, Trump declared: “These are people that shouldn’t be in our country. They flow in like water.” One man in the crowd of 4,200 shouted back, “Build a wall!”
Basking in polls that show he has risen to the top of the crowded Republican field, Trump took obvious glee in mocking former Florida governor Jeb Bush, the establishment favorite who is setting fundraising records.
“Jeb Bush, let’s say he’s president — Oy, yoy, yoy,” Trump said. He asked the crowd: “How can I be tied with this guy? He’s terrible. Terrible. He’s weak on immigration.”
Trump’s 70-minute address here, which sounded more like a stream-of-consciousness rant than a presidential-style stump speech, put an exclamation point on his bombastic push since his presidential announcement last month to return immigration to the forefront of the national conversation.
Republican Presidential candidate Donald Trump addresses supporters during a political rally in Phoenix on Saturday. (Charlie Leight/Getty Images)
Bush and illegal immigrants were not the only targets of Trump’s scorn: He also criticized Macy’s, NBC, NASCAR, U.S. ambassador to Japan Caroline Kennedy, Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton and, several times, the media.
Republican leaders say they believe the celebrity billionaire has virtually no chance of being their nominee, much less of making it to the White House. And, for now at least, his following seems limited to the far right as opposed to the party’s mainstream.
Yet Trump has reignited a heated debate over an issue, immigration, that the GOP had been determined to settle after it hurt Republicans in the most recent presidential election.
Party leaders increasingly fear that Trump could do damage to more viable candidates, such as Bush, who could lose their own footing on immigration. These candidates confront a familiar challenge: During the primary season, they must deal with the anger and anxiety that many on the right feel about illegal immigration. But they must do it in a way that will not damage their appeal to a broader electorate in November 2016.
Republicans are handling Trump delicately for another reason as well: They fear that he could leave the GOP entirely and wage a well-funded third-party campaign, a possibility that Trump has not ruled out.
[GOP leaders fear damage to party’s image as Donald Trump doubles down]
After Trump repeatedly referred to illegal immigrants in the harshest of terms — calling them, among other things, killers and rapists — Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus called Trump and asked him to tone things down. But that, if anything, has reinvigorated Trump and his vocal supporters.
1 of 9 Full Screen Autoplay Close Skip Ad × Cutting ties with Trump: Who has dumped him and why View Photos The Republican presidential hopeful has faced an avalanche of criticism over his characterization of illegal immigrants as “rapists,” drug dealers and other criminals. Caption The GOP presidential hopeful has faced an avalanche of criticism over his characterization of illegal immigrants. José Andrés, chef Chef José Andrés has backed out of a deal with Trump, saying in a statement, “Donald Trump’s recent statements disparaging immigrants make it impossible for my company and I to move forward with opening a successful Spanish restaurant in Trump International’s upcoming hotel in Washington, D.C.” Sarah L. Voisin/The Washington Post Buy Photo Wait 1 second to continue.
The crowd in Phoenix began lining up outside the convention center before dawn, with many spending hours in temperatures that exceeded 100 degrees. Hundreds of people, who stood in lines snaking down several downtown blocks, did not make it into the ballroom for his speech.
Many of Trump’s supporters blame illegal immigrants for crime and economic problems but also express dismay over cultural changes.
“We don’t recognize our country anymore,” said Jan Drake, 72, who lives in a retirement community outside Phoenix. “If you’re coming into our country, you have got to conform to what we stand for. You speak English. You don’t try to change our country to what your country was.”
After watching Trump on television the past couple of weeks, Drake said that she has become convinced that “he would be a very strong president. He doesn’t kowtow to anybody. The Republican Party will try to squeeze him out because they’re afraid of him. But he can tell them where to go — to pound sand.”
After he walked onto a catwalk stage here like a rock star, Trump basked in his crowd. “The word is getting out that we have to stop illegal immigration,” he said.
While Trump was railing against Spanish-language broadcaster Univision, a handful of protesters in the crowd interrupted. Trump’s security guards arrived to break up the skirmish that followed. His supporters screamed “USA! USA! USA!” in the protesters’ faces as the guards escorted them out of the convention hall.
“I wonder if the Mexican government sent them over here,” Trump said from the stage. He assured the crowd, “Don’t worry, we’ll take our country back.”
Trump also had harsh words for Islamic State terrorists. If he becomes president, Trump said, “They will be in such trouble . . . ISIS, believe me, I would take them out so fast. You have to do it.”
But it was his crusade against illegal immigrants that had Trump’s crowd most enthused. After expressing shock that his immigration message has resonated so strongly with the GOP base, Trump said, “The silent majority is back, and we’re going to take the country back.” He walked off the stage to Twisted Sister’s “We’re Not Gonna Take It.”
Earlier, as his plush Boeing 757 headed from an appearance in Las Vegas to Phoenix, Trump sat in a leather chair, surrounded by binders of articles about him and sipping a Coca-Cola — the full-calorie kind, he noted, because, “Have you ever seen a thin person drinking Diet Coke?”
“Something is happening in America. You may not want to see it, but something big is happening. People are sick and tired of politicians, and I’m here for them,” he said in an interview. “I’m ready to go right at the Mexican government. I’m going to charge them $25,000 per illegal immigrant and, oh, I’ll make them pay.”
(In his Phoenix speech, Trump put the figure at $100,000.)
“Would Bush do that? Would Rubio? I don’t think so,” Trump added, taking aim at two of his more mainstream rivals, Bush and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.).
Polls consistently show that a majority of Americans, including most Republicans, support an overhaul of the law to give millions of undocumented immigrants a means of staying in this country legally. But a passionate fraction of the Republican electorate believe otherwise.
Lou Brudnock, 71, said he is attracted to Trump’s brash “truthfulness” on immigration and his willingness to be politically incorrect.
“This country today is sad, sad, sad,” Brudnock said. “You can’t say anything or they call you ‘a racist.’ It’s like we’re back in Nazi Germany. But look around, man. It’s people here reading and listening to his message.”
Trump, by virtue of his celebrity, has provoked a backlash far more widespread than ever seen toward lesser-known immigration hard-liners, such as former Colorado congressman Tom Tancredo (R). That means he could leave lasting damage to the GOP and whoever turns out to be its 2016 standard-bearer.
All of those cross-pressures were in play Saturday at Trump’s appearances here and in Las Vegas. More mainstream Republicans had anticipated the spectacle and made no secret of their concern.
“I had hoped that we had moved on from some of the coarse rhetoric,” said Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.). “When there’s so many candidates, you can appeal to a very small segment of the population and get news and get elevated.” Flake is a leading proponent of a comprehensive immigration measure that would include a path to citizenship for those who are in the country illegally.
Arizona has been a hotbed of anti-immigration sentiment, having passed a 2010 law that requires law enforcement officials to check the immigration status of people they detain and suspect are in the country illegally.
Maricopa County, Ariz., Sheriff Joe Arpaio — who in some ways is the face of that law, having been the subject of racial-profiling lawsuits — helped warm up the crowd before Trump’s arrival.
“I know that Donald Trump is speaking out,” Arpaio said. “He’s getting a lot of heat. But, you know, there’s a silent majority out here.”
“We’re not silent anymore!” a man in the crowd shouted.
Arpaio brought up the mostly dormant questioning of President Obama’s birth certificate. He and Trump are perhaps the most vocal of the “birthers,” who falsely contend that Obama was not born in the United States.
Immigration also has gained new attention after the June 30 shooting death of a woman along San Francisco’s heavily touristed waterfront, allegedly by an illegal immigrant who had been deported five times from the United States.
Trump — along with much of the rest of the Republican field — has criticized the policies of “sanctuary cities,” where officials cannot detain those they suspect of being in the country illegally unless they have other grounds to do so.
Republican strategists say that it is possible to address anxiety over illegal immigration within the GOP base without alienating the electorate at large. Advisers to Bush and Rubio, for instance, say that their candidates can play a long game on the issue, continuing to make a case for comprehensive changes to the law, while waiting for the Trump boomlet to subside.
“You can give a fuller picture of those types of people who are coming to America who are not documented, who are not legal,” said Peter Wehner, who was a top official in George W. Bush’s White House. “And you can speak about them in a humane and decent and true way.”
Karen Tumulty in Washington contributed to this report. | – As Donald Trump continues to trade volleys with Latinos, he took his unrepentant show to Phoenix last night, where he told an enthusiastic crowd that waited hours in 100-degree temps that "we have to take back the heart of our country" and that he was "ready to go right at the Mexican government. I’m going to charge them $25,000 per illegal immigrant and, oh, I’ll make them pay." Trump used the 70-minute speech, which the Washington Post characterizes as more a "stream-of-consciousness rant than a presidential-style stump speech," which "put an exclamation point on his bombastic push" to focus on immigration. "These are people that shouldn’t be in our country," Trump told the crowd of between 3,500 and 4,200. "They flow in like water." He also took the opportunity to further hammer away at GOP golden boy Jeb Bush, saying, "let's say he's president—oy, yoy, yoy. How can I be tied with this guy? He's terrible. Terrible. He's weak on immigration." Bush wasn't Trump's only whipping boy: Also attracting the candidate's scorn, per the Post, were "Macy’s, NBC, NASCAR, Caroline Kennedy, Hillary Rodham Clinton and, several times, the media." (The candidate avoided attracting Neil Young's wrath again and left the stage to "We're Not Gonna Take It" by Twisted Sister.) Trump spoke earlier in the day to a Libertarian crowd in Las Vegas, notes the AP, striking a slightly more nuanced tone: "I love the Mexican people. I respect Mexico greatly as a country. But the problem we have is their leaders are much sharper than ours, and they're killing us at the border and they're killing us on trade." (Even as Trump spoke, Mexico was having a little trouble keeping a notorious drug lord on lockdown.) |
Now you can get a new kind of buzz from coffee. Researchers have found a way to turn used coffee grounds into an alcoholic beverage. In recent years, the industry of distilled spirits has put out a call for new beverages with different flavors created from unusual raw materials. To answer this call, some scientists examined the potential of used coffee grounds. The scientists first collected this raw material from a Portuguese coffee roasting company and dried it. Then they heated the powder in water at 163°C for 45 minutes, separated out the liquid, and added sugar. Next, the team mixed in yeast cells, let the concoction ferment, and concentrated the sample to get a higher alcohol content. (A similar process is used to produce other distilled beverages such as whiskey and rum from wheat and molasses.) And voilà! Used coffee grounds produced a new alcoholic beverage with 40% ethanol, comparable to other hard liquor such as vodka and tequila, researchers will report in the September issue of LWT - Food Science and Technology. To evaluate the product, eight trained taste testers were brought in and rated the intensity of different smells and flavors in the alcohol. The judges described the drink as smelling like coffee and tasting bitter and pungent. Researchers noted that the taste could be improved with age and concluded that the quality was good enough for consumption. Don’t count on the caffeine to keep you awake, however; most of it disappears in the brewing process. ||||| Whiskey, vodka, gin or rum…or tequila or brandy…made from wheat, barley, corn, potatoes, rye, sugarcane or any number of fruits—whatever the booze, Americans, the dominant drinkers of hard liquor worldwide, will go for it. But America’s love of hootch pales in comparison to its love of another drink: coffee. A new process that ferments liquor from used coffee grounds, then, may be just what the country is after.
Reporting on a new study for Science, Nisha Giridharan details how to make what could soon be your new favorite drink:
The scientists first collected from a Portuguese coffee roasting company and dried it. Then they heated the powder in water at 163°C for 45 minutes, separated out the liquid, and added sugar. Next, the team mixed in yeast cells, let the concoction ferment, and concentrated the sample to get a higher alcohol content. (A similar process is used to produce other distilled beverages such as whiskey and rum from wheat and molasses.) And voilà! Used coffee grounds produced a new alcoholic beverage with 40% ethanol.
Microbrewers often flavor their beers with coffee, and caffeine-liquor mixes, from the classic rum and coke to the infamous Four Loko, are nothing new. But the new booze is different. The scientists say that their new “Spent Coffee Ground spirit” smells and tastes like coffee and “was considered as having features of a pleasant beverage.”
Plus, the potentially dangerous mix of caffeine and alcohol that gives boozy energy drinks a bad rap should be absent here: most of the caffeine, says Giridharan, “disappears in the brewing process.”
More from Smithsonian.com:
In Texas, a Locavore’s Liquor
Booze Cruise: The Best Local Liquors to Try While Traveling
Pick Your Poison: A Diet Mixer Could Make You Get Drunk Faster | – Soon you may no longer have to choose between treating your hangover with coffee or the hair of the dog. Science reports that scientists have successfully spun used coffee grounds into booze, in a process that sounds relatively straightforward. They dried the spent grounds (which, in this case, came from a Portuguese roaster) then added water and cooked the mixture at 163°C for 45 minutes. The liquid was pulled out, dosed with sugar and yeast, and given time to ferment. In order to make it boozier—read, 40% ethanol—the result was concentrated in a process Science likens to that of distilling spirits. But what would such a discovery be without a taste test? The eight "trained" testers who sampled it reported coffee aromas and a bitter taste. They thought age would actually improve it, but ranked it as palatable. (Smithsonian adds that the scientists described it "as having features of a pleasant beverage.") What it's not: Caffeinated. Most is eliminated as the drink is brewed. |
Celebs Elton John admits he cried listening to 'Yellow Brick Road' album again March 31, 2014 at 9:36 AM ET
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Sir Elton John's album "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road," released 40 years ago, was a huge breakthrough for the flamboyant singer/songwriter. The album sold more than 30 million copies — and even today, is powerful enough to bring John to tears.
During the first part of a chat with TODAY's Matt Lauer Monday, John explained that he'd listened to the record in anticipation of doing interviews about it. The experience, he said, "Made me very emotional. I cried a little at it, because it reminded me of a time when I was very innocent."
But "Road's" success was also a gateway into a downward spiral for the then 26-year-old, who began abusing drugs and alcohol after fame swept over him. John has now been sober for more than two decades, and has regrets but no anger.
"I don't blame anything," he said. "I don't blame anybody or anything. It was just me being inquisitive. ... 'I'll join in. I'll be part of the gang.' Bad decision. If I could go back again, I would never do it."
Maybe not the addiction, but John, 67, would still be making music, his "soul mate." He told Lauer music has been with him through "sadness, through laughter, through love."
On Tuesday, the second part of John's interview with TODAY airs, and he'll discuss his upcoming nuptials with partner David Furnish. The pair plan to wed as early as May, now that gay marriage is legal in England.
"We'll do it very quietly," John told Lauer. "But we will do it and it will be a joyous occasion and we will have our children. " They have two kids together , Zachary, 3, and Elijah, 1.
"I'm very proud of Britain and the laws that we've seen come into existence since we've been together , " John said. "Having our civil partnership was an incredible breakthrough for people that have campaigned for a long time — through the '60s and the '50s in England when it was so hard to be gay and hard to be open about it. And it was a criminal act. So for this legislation to come through is joyous, and we should celebrate it. We shouldn't just say, 'Oh, well we have a civil partnership. We're not going to bother to get married.' We will get married."
The pair have been in a civil partnership since 2005, which John said had a "huge impact" on their commitment. "We didn't think it would make much difference to our relationship, but it solidified our relationship."
Meanwhile, John continues to be as involved in his other relationship — making music — as ever.
"I love it as much now as I did," he said. "I don't like the fame part of it, and I don't like the technology part of it so much. But, the thrill of the music will never die for me ... when you hear somebody young, like Lorde, or someone like that, making a record like she did, and you think, 'You're 16,' I am flabbergasted. And it makes you want to write the best song in the world, because you just cannot believe that this music has come out of someone so young, and so brilliant."
Tune in Tuesday on TODAY for the second installment of the two-part interview.
Tweet email ||||| It looks like Elton John and David Furnish will get married in an English registry office in May, with their two kids Elijah and Zachary in tow, plus a few friends.
Furnish told me this news Friday while we sat in a luxurious booth at the Caesars Palace lounge he created, Fizz Las Vegas (the prettiest lounge I’ve ever seen in Vegas, by the way).
Elton and Furnish entered a British civil partnership eight years ago. But today is the first day gay couples can legally wed in England.
“We don’t feel the need to take an extra step legally. But since we’re committed for life, we feel it’s really important to take that step, and take advantage of that amazing change in legislation. We all live by example,” Furnish said.
I told him I was surprised he and Elton don’t want to throw another big wedding party.
“We do like big parties,” Furnish said. “Over eight years ago, we had 650 people on the 21st of December at our house in Windsor.
“But with the kids, everything is different. I think what we’ll do is go to a registry office in England in May, and take the boys with us, and a couple of witnesses.”
Furnish wears large tattoos of the boys’ names on the inside of his forearms in Old Gothic script, “Elijah” on the left arm, “Zachary” on the right. Elton has their names tattooed on his back, Furnish said.
Furnish, 51, said he and Elton entered a civil partnership as a symbolic way to support the movement that so many people had struggled to achieve, and to acknowledge their commitment to each other.
Civil partnership changed them more than they expected.
“After we did it, we felt this amazing sense of commitment and happiness we didn’t anticipate happening. It’s a really nice thing,” Furnish said.
“Initially, the political side of you is like, ‘No, no, we must have equality.’ When you finally get it, it’s like, ‘Oh my god, this feels really nice.’ It’s a lifting thing.”
When Furnish was younger, he never thought he’d get the opportunity to marry.
“I remember trying to come out to my mother and unfortunately going to all the negatives. ‘You’ll never get married. You’ll never have children. You’ll never be accepted by society. You’ll be prejudiced against. You won’t have a future.’
“I resigned myself to having a different life. I found it particularly difficult and challenging, because I came from a wonderful marriage; my parents are madly in love still. They’ve been married over 60 years.
“I wanted what they had. I came from a happy union, and I loved the associations I had from that. I felt very loved and encouraged.”
He was frustrated when he found out marriage between two loved ones was forbidden.
“I found it particularly painful.”
But the world is changing.
“We’re living in extraordinary times. My god, 20 years ago, when I started seeing Elton, if you asked me if I’d be able to get married, if I’d be able to have children, it was unthinkable, literally unimaginable.”
Furnish believes people’s exposure to gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people through our “more media-intensive times” has helped many people reexamine previous biases.
“With access to more information, the barriers come down.”
I said to Furnish I believe we should all send thank-you cards to “Will & Grace” for starting a landslide of public acceptance through that show’s exposure to lovable characters.
“I went to high school with Eric McCormack,” who starred on “Will & Grace,” Furnish said. “We were in the same drama program together.
“It’s funny how life works, coming from the same little conservative suburb of Toronto, but you find yourself years later in a room in L.A., saying, ‘OK, I’m in this super high-profile gay relationship, and you’re in this super high-profile gay TV series. Who’d have thought?’”
Doug Elfman’s column appears on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. Email him at delfman@reviewjournal.com. He blogs at reviewjournal.com/entertainment/reel. | – Mazel tov: Elton John and longtime partner David Furnish are getting hitched in May, Furnish reveals to the Las Vegas Review-Journal. The two have been civil partners for eight years, but now that gay marriage is legal in England, they're planning a wedding at a registry office with just a few friends, plus their two children. "We don’t feel the need to take an extra step legally," Furnish says. "But since we’re committed for life, we feel it’s really important to take that step, and take advantage of that amazing change in legislation. We all live by example." John also discusses the upcoming nuptials in an interview airing Monday and Tuesday on Today. "We'll do it very quietly. But we will do it and it will be a joyous occasion and we will have our children," he says. "I'm very proud of Britain and the laws that we've seen come into existence since we've been together. ... For this legislation to come through is joyous, and we should celebrate it. We shouldn't just say, 'Oh, well we have a civil partnership. We're not going to bother to get married.' We will get married." |
This undated photo provided by Sherri Lyn Miller shows Melvin Johnson, who was shot and killed Tuesday, Dec. 27, 2016, on the east side of the San Francisco Bay Area city. Johnson, who urged an end to... (Associated Press)
This undated photo provided by Sherri Lyn Miller shows Melvin Johnson, who was shot and killed Tuesday, Dec. 27, 2016, on the east side of the San Francisco Bay Area city. Johnson, who urged an end to violence in Oakland after gunfire killed his son and grandson as they slept three years ago became... (Associated Press)
This undated photo provided by Sherri Lyn Miller shows Melvin Johnson, who was shot and killed Tuesday, Dec. 27, 2016, on the east side of the San Francisco Bay Area city. Johnson, who urged an end to violence in Oakland after gunfire killed his son and grandson as they slept three years ago became... (Associated Press) This undated photo provided by Sherri Lyn Miller shows Melvin Johnson, who was shot and killed Tuesday, Dec. 27, 2016, on the east side of the San Francisco Bay Area city. Johnson, who urged an end to... (Associated Press)
OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) — A man who urged an end to violence in Oakland after gunfire killed his son and grandson as they slept three years ago became a victim himself this week as he drove near a street memorial for his slain family.
Melvin Johnson, 39, was shot and killed Tuesday on the east side of the San Francisco Bay Area city, not far from the shrine for his 16-month-old grandson and 20-year-old son, who were fatally shot in August 2013, The East Bay Times reported Thursday (http://bayareane.ws/2ihI1Us ).
Police have made no arrests and released no motive for Johnson's killing. They have not said if the shooting was random or if Johnson was targeted. He died at a hospital.
"In three years and four months, three generations of one family has been lost to gun violence in the streets of Oakland," community activist Sherri-Lyn Miller, a friend of Johnson's, told The Associated Press. "Melvin Johnson was a giant teddy bear, and the loss has not only devastated the Johnson family, but all that knew him."
Johnson had moved his son, Andrew "Drew" Thomas, and grandson, Drew Leon Deon Jackson, to the central California city of Fresno to get them away from Oakland's street violence, but they were slain while in town for a birthday party.
A shooter fired into a relative's home in the middle of the night, killing the sleeping pair. The slayings are still unsolved.
Johnson's mother, Carolyn Smith, spoke of her late son Wednesday as a good person who was committed to his family following a series of tragedies.
Another of his sons, 8-year-old Jahmel Johnson, died last month after a battle with lymphoma.
"(Melvin) helped everybody, he loved everybody," Smith told the newspaper. "He didn't mess with nobody; he was like a big teddy bear. I'm not saying that because I was his mother, but because I know."
Smith said his business, Drewski Designs, which made T-shirts and clothing for picnics, anniversaries, funerals and special events, helped people in the community.
"A lot of people called him, wanting him to make them this and that," Smith said. "He was changing his life, helping others."
Authorities are offering up to $10,000 for tips on who killed Johnson. A reward of up to $30,000 for information leading to an arrest in his son and grandson's killings is still being offered.
In past years, Oakland has seen triple-digit annual homicide rates and been on the FBI's list of the 10 most dangerous cities in the country. Poverty is rampant in some areas, with gangs and drugs linked to as much as 90 percent of the killings.
This year, the mayor said Oakland has seen a double-digit drop in overall shootings. Violent crime also has dipped. But the blue-collar city of about 410,000 that has yet to see the economic boom underway in neighboring San Francisco.
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Information from: Contra Costa Times, http://www.contracostatimes.com ||||| OAKLAND — After his son and 16-month old grandson were fatally shot in August 2013 as they slept at an East Oakland home, Melvin C. Johnson Jr. pleaded for the community to “stop the violence” and “put the guns down.”
On Tuesday, Johnson, 39, also became a victim of deadly violence and gunfire.
Johnson was fatally shot about 1:11 p.m. Tuesday as he drove on 89th Avenue in East Oakland, not far from where a street shrine to his son and grandson had been erected after their deaths at 90th Avenue and MacArthur Boulevard.
Despite his wounds he was able to drive to the 8500 block of MacArthur, where he crashed into some parked cars near Castlemont High School.
Oakland police alerted by ShotSpotter gave him CPR at the scene, but he later died at a hospital. No motive has been released by police for the killing and no arrests made.
Johnson’s son, Andrew “Drew” Thomas, 20, and Thomas’ young son, Drew Leon Deon Jackson, were fatally shot August 7, 2013, by someone who fired into the rear of a Brookfield Village home on Ghormley Avenue at 2:46 a.m.
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Johnson had previously moved his son to Fresno to get him away from Oakland’s street violence, but Thomas and his son were in Oakland at the time for a birthday party and were staying with his aunt when they were killed.
The killings of Thomas and his son have not been solved, and up to $30,000 in reward money remains for information leading to the arrest of their killer.
Johnson’s mother, Carolyn Smith, spoke of her son Wednesday as a good person who redoubled his commitment to family in the face of a series of tragedies.
Smith said the family was still mourning Johnson’s 8-year-old son, Jahmel T. Johnson, who died Nov. 1 at Children’s Hospital Oakland after a battle with lymphoma.
And the memories of what happened to Johnson’s other son and grandson have never faded.
The family, Smith said, is handling the latest tragedy “very hard.”
“He helped everybody, he loved everybody,” Smith said. “He didn’t mess with nobody, he was like a big teddy bear. I’m not saying that because I was his mother, but because I know.”
Smith spoke with pride of Johnson’s Drewski Designs business, which made T-shirts and clothing for picnics, anniversaries, funerals and special events: “A lot of people called him, wanting him to make them this and that. He was changing his life, helping others.”
Smith said she was home in East Oakland on Tuesday when she learned of the shooting.
“Someone called my daughter. She was here, and I saw the expression in her face like something was happening,” Smith said. “Then she said, ‘Mama, let’s go. Melvin’s been shot,’ and we went to the scene, but he wasn’t there. They had taken him to Highland.”
Up to $10,000 in reward money is being offered for information leading to the arrest of Johnson’s killer. Anyone with information about the cases may call police at 510-238-3821 or Crime Stoppers at 510-777-8572. | – A man who urged an end to violence in Oakland after gunfire killed his son and grandson as they slept three years ago became a victim himself this week as he drove near a street memorial for his slain family. Melvin Johnson, 39, was shot and killed Tuesday on the east side of the city, not far from the shrine for his 16-month-old grandson and 20-year-old son, who were fatally shot in August 2013, the East Bay Times reports. Police have made no arrests and released no motive for Johnson's killing. They have not said if the shooting was random or if Johnson was targeted. "In three years and four months, three generations of one family [have] been lost to gun violence in the streets of Oakland," community activist Sherri-Lyn Miller tells the AP. She was a friend of Johnson's. "Melvin Johnson was a giant teddy bear, and the loss has not only devastated the Johnson family, but all that knew him," Miller says. Johnson had moved his son, Andrew "Drew" Thomas, and grandson, Drew Leon Deon Jackson, to the central California city of Fresno to get them away from Oakland's street violence, but they were slain while in town for a birthday party. A shooter fired into a relative's home in the middle of the night, killing the sleeping pair. The slayings are still unsolved. Johnson's mother, Carolyn Smith, spoke of her late son Wednesday as a good person who was committed to his family following a series of tragedies. Another of his sons, 8-year-old Jahmel Johnson, died last month after a battle with lymphoma. Melvin "helped everybody, he loved everybody," his mother said. |
Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Kasturi Munirathinam says she was trying to escape the house when her Saudi employer "chopped off" her arm
India's foreign ministry has complained to the Saudi Arabian authorities following an alleged "brutal" attack on a 58-year-old Indian woman in Riyadh.
Kasturi Munirathinam's right arm was chopped off, allegedly by her employer, when she tried to escape from their house last week, reports say.
Ms Munirathinam was working as a domestic help. She is recovering in hospital.
Her family has alleged that she was being tortured by her Saudi employers.
Saudi authorities have not commented on the incident yet.
'Disturbed'
Indian Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj wrote on Twitter: "This is unacceptable. We have taken this up with Saudi authorities. Our embassy is in touch with the victim."
"Chopping of [arm] of Indian lady - we are very much disturbed over the brutal manner in which Indian lady has been treated in Saudi Arabia," Ms Swaraj added.
The family of Ms Munirathinam in the southern Indian city of Chennai said that her employers had been "angered" after she complained about the "harassment" she was facing at her employer's home, where she had begun working three months ago.
They are asking the government to secure them compensation from the family, and also help pay Ms Munirathinam's medical expenses.
Serious condition
"Ever since she went to work with this family in July, things were not alright. My mother was not even allowed to speak to us over the phone, she was not given proper food and was forced to work long hours," her son S Kumar told BBC Hindi.
"When she tried to escape the harassment and torture, her right arm was chopped off by the woman employer. Now my sister can't even sit and do simple things on her own, as her spinal cord has also been injured," her sister S Vijayakumari added.
Ms Vijayakumari said her sister had been hospitalised in Riyadh and was "in a serious condition", adding that although they were relieved she was getting proper medical attention, they were unable to afford the expenses.
They have asked the Tamil Nadu state government to help them financially and have also sought the Indian government's help in securing Ms Munirathinam's return to India.
The family said that they had come to know of the incident through the "agents" who had hired her to work in Saudi Arabia. They also claim to have received a video message from Ms Munirathinam that has been recorded on a mobile phone.
Indian foreign ministry spokesperson Vikas Swarup told the Indian Express newspaper that India would "continue to seek justice for the victim".
"Our embassy in Riyadh has taken up the matter with the Saudi Foreign Office and asked for strict action in the matter and severe punishment for the sponsor," he said.
He said India had sought an independent probe in the incident and urged that "a case of attempted murder be lodged against the sponsor so that he is punished, if found guilty as per law".
Thousands of men and women from India travel to Arab states every year to seek work as domestic servants and labourers.
Almaz's story
The poor treatment and abuse of maids in the Middle East is a familiar tale. Benjamin Dix and Lindsay Pollock tell the disturbing story of a young Ethiopian woman who took a job as a domestic help in Saudi Arabia but was treated like a slave.
Read Almaz's story ||||| Story highlights A Saudi employer allegedly cut off his Indian maid's arm after she complained to police
New Delhi has complained to Riyadh over the alleged incident, calling for charges
Tensions are high after a Saudi diplomat in New Delhi was accused last month of raping maids
New Delhi (CNN) A Saudi employer chopped off the right arm of an Indian domestic worker after she complained to police that the employer was mistreating her, the woman's sister said Friday.
Kasthuri Munirathinam, 58, was employed by a Saudi household in Riyadh three months ago, her sister S. Vijayakumari told CNN on the phone from the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu.
Vijayakumari said the family was told about the attack on September 30.
According to Vijayakumari, Munirathinam's employer cut off her arm after she told local police that she was being mistreated, not being paid and not given enough food.
The Indian government has complained to Saudi Arabia about the incident.
Read More | – Indian diplomats say they are disturbed by reports that one of their nationals working in Saudi Arabia had her arm cut off by a vengeful employer. The family of 58-year-old Kasturi Munirathinam says that when Saudi officials conducted a routine check of the home where she was working as a maid, she complained of mistreatment, which led the woman of the house to attack her after officials left, the Times of India reports. Indian officials say Munirathinam is recovering in hospital. They have complained to the Saudi government about the "very unfortunate and most condemnable incident" and have asked for the attacker to be severely punished, reports CNN. Munirathinam's son tells the BBC that she had been harassed and "tortured" by her employers. "Ever since she went to work with this family in July, things were not all right. My mother was not even allowed to speak to us over the phone, she was not given proper food, and was forced to work long hours," he says. Her sister tells CNN that Munirathinam, who went to Saudi Arabia after the family faced financial difficulties, had complained to officials about mistreatment and not being paid. The employer has been arrested and Indian officials, who have vowed to pursue justice for the victim, want the Saudis to charge her with attempted murder, the BBC reports. (A Saudi wife who posted footage of her husband sexually harassing their maid could go to jail for "defaming" him.) |
A loyal dog has been waiting patiently at his owner's door step for over two weeks, not realizing he's never coming back."You could just tell that he was a lost dog," said Cassandra Eubanks who lives at an apartment complex near Hobby Airport.Eubanks said every day, she would see the German shepherd at the front gates of the apartment complex, looking and searching for his owner to drive in."He would follow the cars and when he would realize that it was not his owner's car, he would just stand there and look helpless," said Eubanks.Neighbors said they would also see the dog waiting outside of an apartment door. Not long after, they understood why the dog was waiting for so long. His owner, and convenience store clerk was killed this past month during an armed robbery.How do you explain that to a dog?"Of course he's confused because he doesn't know what's going on. He hadn't seen his owner in two weeks," said Eubanks.The dog would not come close to anyone. Residents left behind food and water. Finally, after a plea on social media for help, Maranda Perez responded with her dog."As a German shepherd, he didn't stand a chance," said Perez. "It just broke my heart to hear that the poor animal lost his owner, his best friend."For nearly an hour, Perez slowly gained the dog's trust. The dog ran up three flights of stairs before it finally was able to trust Perez enough to put a leash around his neck."He was still very shaken-up whenever I touched him," added Perez.The next hurdle was putting the dog in her car. It was a struggle, but the pup finally had to let go.Perez said she can keep the dog for a week. The victim's brother said he would like to keep the dog after that. ||||| The bond a man and his best friend shared was put on full display in Houston when a loyal dog waited for weeks for his owner to come home after he was killed while working at a convenience store.
Neighbors saw the German shepherd waiting at the front gate to the apartment complex where he lived with his owner, 54-year-old Hatem Abuharbid, who was killed during a robbery on Feb. 7.
"You could just tell that he was a lost dog," neighbor Cassandra Eubanks, who lives nearby, told ABC-owned station KTRK in Houston.
"He would follow the cars, and when he would realize that it was not his owner's car, he would just stand there and look helpless," Eubanks added.
Abuharbid was shot in the thigh when two men robbed the Kay-B convenience store where he worked in Houston, police said in a press release. The bullet pierced an artery in his leg, and he later died at the hospital.
But there was no way for Abuharbid's German shepherd to know any of this had happened.
"Of course he's confused, because he doesn't know what's going on, Eubanks said. "He hadn't seen his owner in two weeks."
KTRK
Residents at the apartment complex left food and water for the dog, but he wouldn't go near anyone, KTRK reported. It took a good Samaritan and her dog to coax the orphaned pup away from the apartment on Monday.
"It just broke my heart to hear that the poor animal lost his owner, his best friend," Maranda Perez told KTRK.
It took an hour for Perez, who answered a plea for help on social media, to gain the dog's trust. He ran up three flights of stairs before she was able to get close enough to put a leash on him, she said.
"He was still very shaken up whenever I touched him," she said.
Perez will foster the dog for a week, she said, adding that Abuharbid's brother would like to adopt the pup after that.
The investigation into Abuharbid's death is ongoing, police told ABC News. | – Loyalty between dog and man once again has no bounds, this time via a German shepherd who waited two weeks for an owner who'd never come home again. The dog was first spotted at an apartment complex near Houston's Hobby Airport, KTRK reports—sometimes on the steps, sometimes at the complex's front gates, sometimes camped out at one particular apartment's front door. "You could just tell that he was a lost dog," neighbor Cassandra Eubanks says. "He would follow the cars and when he would realize that it was not his owner's car, he would just stand there and look helpless." What the poor pup didn't realize: His owner, 54-year-old Hatem Abuharbid, had been killed in a robbery Feb. 7 at the convenience store where he worked, ABC News reports. "Of course he's confused, because he doesn't know what's going on," Eubanks says. The dog wouldn't approach neighbors who left food and water out for him, but he was eventually rescued by a woman who had heard about his plight on social media. "It just broke my heart to hear that the poor animal lost his owner, his best friend," Maranda Perez tells KTRK. She brought her own dog along and worked patiently for about an hour to make the now-ownerless dog comfortable around her. After following him up three flights of stairs, Perez was finally able to place a leash around his neck and get him, with some resistance, into her car. "He was still very shaken up whenever I touched him," she says. Perez says she'll take care of him for the next week or so before Abuharbid's brother takes the dog in. (This loyal pooch stuck by its owner's body until rescuers found them.) |
Congressman Allen West spoke at a Florida GOP dinner last night, and had some fighting words for Democrats who are trying to mark Florida in the win column this November. He declared it a “battlefield” for citizens to stand on and tell the Democrats that their message is not going to resonate with the citizens of Florida.
West called out not just President Obama, but Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, and fellow Floridian Debbie Wasserman-Schultz.
“Take your message of equality of achievement, take your message of economic dependency, and take your message of enslaving the entrepreneurial will and spirit of the American people somewhere else. You can take it to Europe, you can take it to the bottom of the sea, you can take it to the North Pole, but get the hell out of the United States of America.”
He pledged that he will do everything in his power to stop President Obama from “destroy[ing]” the country. West issued a challenge to Democrats who think they might be able to take him down in this November’s congressional elections: “Bring it on!”
Watch the video below, courtesy of CSPAN:
h/t Breitbart.tv
Have a tip we should know? tips@mediaite.com ||||| The establishment is fighting back, alright.
This has not received a lot of national attention, but the Republican legislature in Florida is about to push through a plan which puts Allen West at serious risk, and the person leading the effort is one of Mitt Romney’s spokemen. As reported by The Shark Tank:
After last night’s [Jan. 26] Republican Presidential debate, the candidates’ respective spinmeisters made their cases to the media as to why their guy won the debate. One of Governor Mitt Romney’s spokesmen was Florida Representative Will Weatherford, and during the course of his remarks in the “Spin Room”, he shed a very dim light on the ongoing redistricting process in the Florida Legislature…. West’s congressional district inexplicably sheds the most out support as compared to all other incumbent Republican and Democrat Congressman. A few weeks back we quoted an unnamed legislator saying that, “Allen West was screwed”, a statement which was originally made about made five months before the purposed maps were made public, leading insiders to believe that the fix was in against Allen West. But in light of Weatherford’s comment, it is increasingly clear that this is a fait accompli. According to Weatherford, those preliminary maps will not change- at the most, any additional changes would be minimal, and those changes would not make any appreciable difference from the preliminary maps. In addition, Weatherford stated that a deal was struck between him, Senate President Mike Haridopolos, and Senator Don Gaetz to finalize these maps and push them through as soon as possible.
Weatherford tried to hide behind a need to comply with [state and] federal law, but that’s obviously a dodge since there could have been many ways to comply yet not sacrifice West:
A website, SaveAllenWest, had been set up, but it appears to be too late.
One of the rising stars of the Tea Party is about to be sacrificed by the Republican establishment in Florida, led by someone spinning for Mitt Romney.
Don’t say you weren’t warned.
Update 1-30-2012: Florida redistricting looking even worse and Dem SuperPAC targeting “Tea Party 10″.
Also, Will Weatherford: The Florida legislature has NOT targeted Allen West
Update No. 2 1-30-2012: Mark Levin interviewed West on January 30. West stated that maps were submitted to the legislature which would have kept his district intact and still been in compliance with state and federal law. Levin said he did not believe the excuses being made that the map had to be drawn the way it was as a matter of law. | – Strong conservative, Tea Party favorite, and rising star Allen West could find his congressional seat gerrymandered Democrat—by none other than the Republican Party. West's "sacrifice" at the hands of his own party smells like the latest example of the establishment fighting back against the Tea Party, according to Legal Insurrection. One Florida legislator, who happens to be working for the Mitt Romney campaign, "tried to hide behind a need to comply with [state and] federal law, but that’s obviously a dodge since there could have been many ways to comply yet not sacrifice West," writes William Jacobson. Never one to avoid controversy, West over the weekend had strong words for President Obama and other top Democrats who have their eye on the Sunshine State come November, telling them to "get the hell out of the United States of America," reports Mediaite. Apparently unfazed by any potential challenge to his seat, West told the Democrats to "bring it on!" |
In a resignation letter, Sebastian Gorka cited "forces" that do not support President Trump's "MAGA promise" as being ascendant in the White House. White House aide Sebastian Gorka ousted from post
Sebastian Gorka, a deputy assistant to the president who was closely aligned with former chief strategist Steve Bannon, was ousted from the White House, officials said Friday.
In a resignation letter, published Friday night by The Federalist and confirmed by POLITICO, Gorka cited “forces” that do not support President Donald Trump’s “MAGA promise” as those that drove him out of the White House.
Story Continued Below
But a White House official indicated in a statement that Gorka had been forced out: "Sebastian Gorka did not resign, but I can confirm he no longer works at the White House," the official said.
In the resignation letter, Gorka wrote: “Regrettably, outside of yourself, the individuals who most embodied and represented the policies that will ‘Make America Great Again,’ have been internally countered, systematically removed, or undermined in recent months,” Gorka wrote.
A second White House aide said Gorka's departure was a continuation of new White House chief of staff John Kelly's effort to shape president's staff. "Questions remain," the aide said, about whether Sebastian Gorka's wife, Katie Gorka, an official at the Department of Homeland Security, would stay on after her husband's White House departure.
Gorka's departure came one week to the day after Bannon was fired from his White House position.
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The latest high-profile resignation from the populist faction of Trump’s ideologically divided West Wing erupted over a major policy disagreement about Afghanistan. Gorka, a White House official said, disagreed with Trump’s decision to dispatch more American troops to Afghanistan, a tortured decision the president outlined in his first national security address, on Tuesday night.
In his resignation letter, Gorka wrote that “the fact that those who drafted and approved the speech removed any mention of Radical Islam or radical Islamic terrorism proves that a crucial element of your presidential campaign has been lost.”
The news of Gorka’s departure was greeted with resignation by Trump loyalists, who believe the president has handed over too much power to military officers and former generals — including his new chief of staff, John Kelly, and national security adviser H.R. McMaster — and is losing any connection to the base that elected him.
“I guess that means the seven-day-in-May crowd is making steady progress and trying to convert the Trump administration to George Soros-style globalism,” said political operative Roger Stone, a longtime Trump adviser and confidant. “The decision over Afghanistan was very disappointing. I’m sorry that Gorka is leaving. He’s one of the few people who actually voted for Trump and understands Trump’s worldview.”
Stone, who helped Trump think through his presidential bid, warned that while he is not yet throwing in the towel on the Trump presidency, “I can find another candidate for 2020 who can win the primary, believe me.”
Gorka was closely aligned with Bannon, and often attended meetings as Bannon’s surrogate and worked with his former Breitbart colleague in his West Wing office.
Internally, Bannon was his biggest defender against skeptics who accused him of holding anti-Semitic views and playing up his intellectual status by insisting on going by “Dr. Sebastian Gorka.” But he was not seen as a power player in the administration other than as an effective television surrogate. That role endeared him to Trump but made him thin-skinned about the media that covered him: He often blocked mainstream-media journalists from following him on Twitter.
It was not clear whether Gorka, like Bannon, would return to Breitbart News, where he previously served as national security editor.
Eliana Johnson and Tim Starks contributed to this report. ||||| A pair of House Democrats unveiled proposals on Friday to cut off the salaries of controversial White House aides Stephen Miller and Sebastian Gorka.
California Democratic Reps. Jared Huffman and Barbara Lee submitted amendments to a government spending package expected on the House floor after Labor Day.
The language of their amendments prohibit the use of federal funds to pay the salaries of Miller and Gorka, specifically naming both aides in the legislative text.
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Miller makes $179,700 annually as an assistant to the president and senior adviser for policy, while Gorka earns $155,000 as a deputy assistant to the president and strategist, according to an official list of White House salaries.
The lawmakers submitted their amendments a week after Stephen Bannon resigned as President Trump’s chief strategist and returned to his post leading Breitbart News, which he once described as “the platform for the alt-right.”
Miller previously worked as communications director for Attorney General Jeff Sessions Jefferson (Jeff) Beauregard SessionsWarren: Trump should have fired Pruitt ‘28 scandals ago’ Judge rejects Trump administration's request to block California sanctuary laws Texas nonprofit helping to reunite migrant families calls Trump an 'incompetent loser' MORE while he was serving in the Senate. Gorka, meanwhile, was a former national security editor at Breitbart.
Huffman and Lee accused Miller and Gorka of encouraging white supremacists, citing Miller’s involvement in Trump’s travel ban on several Muslim-majority countries and Gorka's work at Breitbart.
"The removal of Steve Bannon is an important first step in rooting racism from the White House. But, Sebastian Gorka and Stephen Miller's continued presence in the West Wing ensure that Steve Bannon's sick ideology will persist in this Administration. Now is the time for Congress to take a clear stand against hate and refuse to authorize salaries of White House officials who embrace the views of white supremacists, white nationalists and Neo-Nazis,” Lee said in a statement.
Richard Spencer, a prominent white nationalist, told Vanity Fair that he mentored Miller while they were both at Duke University. But Miller has disputed that account and told Mother Jones in 2016 that “I completely repudiate his views, and his claims are 100 percent false.”
Gorka drew controversy for wearing a medal from a Hungarian order, Vitezi Rend, that was founded by an ally of Adolf Hitler. But he has said he wore the medal to honor his late father, who was awarded it for fighting communism.
The House Rules Committee, which is controlled by the majority party leadership, will meet when Congress returns to Washington after Labor Day to decide if the amendments submitted by Huffman and Lee will get floor votes.
Given GOP leaders’ desire to publicly stay out of Trump’s personnel controversies or stage uncomfortable votes relating to the president, the amendments are unlikely to be granted time on the House floor. ||||| Sebastian Gorka is resigning his post as Deputy Assistant to President Trump, multiple sources familiar with the situation have told The Federalist.
In a blunt resignation letter, the national security and counterterrorism expert expressed dissatisfaction with the current state of the Trump administration. “[G]iven recent events, it is clear to me that forces that do not support the MAGA promise are – for now – ascendant within the White House,” Gorka wrote. “As a result, the best and most effective way I can support you, Mr. President, is from outside the People’s House.”
Gorka’s letter expressed unhappiness with the direction the Trump administration’s foreign policy has taken, as signaled by the president’s recent speech on Afghanistan:
“Regrettably, outside of yourself, the individuals who most embodied and represented the policies that will ‘Make America Great Again,’ have been internally countered, systematically removed, or undermined in recent months. This was made patently obvious as I read the text of your speech on Afghanistan this week…
“The fact that those who drafted and approved the speech removed any mention of Radical Islam or radical Islamic terrorism proves that a crucial element of your presidential campaign has been lost…
“Just as worrying, when discussing our future actions in the region, the speech listed operational objectives without ever defining the strategic victory conditions we are fighting for. This omission should seriously disturb any national security professional, and any American who is unsatisfied with the last 16 years of disastrous policy decisions which have led to thousands of Americans killed and trillions of taxpayer dollars spent in ways that have not brought security or victory.”
During his time in the Trump administration, Gorka focused on issues such as countering the Muslim Brotherhood, the crisis in Qatar, supporting efforts to draft a new long-term national security strategy, and combatting China’s economic warfare. Before coming to the White House, Gorka was the Major General Matthew C. Horner Chair at Marine Corps University and also contributed to Breitbart News.
Gorka’s tenure at the White House was marked by unusually vociferous attacks against him and his family by left-leaning media organizations and the Democratic Party. This includes personal attacks against his wife, mother, and son.
A source close to the White House said of his decision, “This was more or less going to be a done deal when Bannon submitted his resignation. Not because he didn’t have a protector, but because there is no point in having your life ruined every day if you’re not going to get much accomplished.” The same source said that what did change after Bannon left was that anti-Bannon factions began erecting bureaucratic road blocks to undermine Gorka internally.
The Forward has written dozens of attack pieces against Gorka, including several attempting to align him with Nazism. Most recently that publication retracted a story about his son’s schoolwork. Gorka strenuously objected to allegations he had ties to Nazi groups in his family’s home country of Hungary, where he had previously been involved in national politics. Even detractors eventually acknowledged the Nazi accusations were unfair smears.
In his letter, Gorka made clear that he believes in the promise of the Trump presidency despite being concerned about its present direction.
“Your presidency will prove to be one of the most significant events in modern American politics. November the 8th was the result of decades during which the political and media elites felt that they knew better than the people who elect them into office. They do not, and the MAGA platform allowed their voices to be heard,” he wrote, adding, “Millions of people believe in, and have chosen, you and your vision of Making America Great Again. They will help eventually rebalance this temporary reality.”
UPDATE: In response to this story, an anonymous White House official reportedly said, “Sebastian Gorka did not resign, but I can confirm he no longer works at the White House.” | – Will Steven Miller be next? Controversial Trump aide Sebastian Gorka, an ally of Steve Bannon, is out of the White House. He appears to have been ousted as part of chief of staff John Kelly's push to clean house, reports the New York Times. "Sebastian Gorka did not resign, but I can confirm he no longer works at the White House," a White House official tells Politico. Even if the 46-year-old Gorka didn't officially resign, he was clearly preparing to do so—the conservative Federalist ran portions of his resignation letter in which he expressed disappointment over what he sees as the White House's new direction. "It is clear to me that forces that do not support the MAGA promise are—for now—ascendant within the White House,” Gorka wrote. “As a result, the best and most effective way I can support you, Mr. President, is from outside the People’s House.” In the letter, Gorka took particular exception to the new Afghanistan strategy unveiled by the president. Like Bannon, Gorka opposes sending new troops. And “the fact that those who drafted and approved the speech removed any mention of Radical Islam or radical Islamic terrorism proves that a crucial element of your presidential campaign has been lost." Gorka had focused on national security issues in his role as deputy assistant to the president and had plenty of critics. In fact, two House Democrats recently unveiled legislation seeking to bar Gorka and Miller from collecting White House salaries, reports the Hill. The lawmakers accused the pair of encouraging white supremacy. Gorka had been a contributor to Breitbart News before joining the White House, and it wasn't clear whether he would rejoin Bannon there now that he's out. |
You can’t judge a movie by its source material: the much-maligned jukebox musical genre gave us “Rock of Ages,” yes, but it also made “Singin’ in the Rain” possible. And we were all worried about “The Lego Movie” before we saw it. So let us be clear that “The Emoji Movie” is not a soul-crushing disaster simply because its dramatis personae are the range of emotive faces and symbols that live inside your cell phone.
It is a soul-crushing disaster because it lacks humor, wit, ideas, visual style, compelling performances, a point of view or any other distinguishing characteristic that would make it anything but a complete waste of your time, not to mention that of the diligent animators who brought this catastrophe into being.
On a story level, it cobbles together pieces of everything from “The Wizard of Oz” to “Smurfs: The Lost Village” (coincidentally, Sony Pictures Animation’s prior release), and thematically it hits a tediously familiar litany of kid-movie messages: Be yourself. People can be more than one thing. Parents should support their children. Candy Crush is super awesome.
Watch Video: 'The Emoji Movie': First Trailer Reveals Hidden World In Your Smartphone
OK, that last one is a new feature, since the premise of a movie set entirely inside a smartphone has clearly opened up new potentials of product placement, whether its characters are riding boats down the musical streams of Spotify or walking through other people’s photographic memories in Instagram. As with Sony’s “The Angry Birds Movie,” this is a film that’s shameless about its origins as a pocket doodad; it also resembles that previous film by being completely shrill and stupid.
Within the phone of a hapless high-school freshman named Alex (voiced by Jake T. Austin, “The Fosters”), an emoji named Gene (T.J. Miller) excitedly prepares for his first day on the job in Textopolis. The “excitedly” part is a problem, since Gene is supposed to be a jaded “Meh” emoji, but he can’t stop himself from expressing a variety of emotions on his round yellow tennis-ball face.
READ MORE See The Emoji Movie's latest POWER MOVE. PowerRank: 1383
His professionally underwhelmed parents, played by Steven Wright and Jennifer Coolidge, worry that his propensity for feelings will get him into trouble, and they’re right: when Alex clicks on him, the scanner registers Gene making a weird nonsense face, which infuriates the perpetually-cheery Smiler (Maya Rudolph), whose face bears a constant grinning rictus even when she’s calling for “malfunction” Gene to be deleted.
Gene’s only hope is to team up with Hi-5 (James Corden) to find Jailbreak (Anna Faris), a hacker who can get them off the phone and into the cloud. Anti-virus bots are eluded and lessons are learned, but to piece together the film’s dreary plotting is to give it more thought than screenwriters Tony Leondis (who also directed), Eric Siegel and a presumably paycheck-collecting Mike White ever did. (And at least one of them will have to live with the fact that he wrote the dreadful pun, “Holy Delete-o!”)
Also Read: Amazon, Annapurna Team Up for Ben Stiller Comedy 'Brad's Status'
The unanswered questions are legion: Why do the emojis fear the phone reboot, when they’ll presumably return in its new iteration? Are they different from their counterparts in millions of other phones? Why does Gene have parents when most Americans are constantly switching to new and upgraded devices? And are we really to believe that teen boy Alex never uses his eggplant emoji?
Emotionally, we’re supposed to care about Gene and Jailbreak getting together, even though they’re so muddily conceived that we know he’s pursuing something dumb and her desires are merely vague. On top of that, we’re also supposed to be rooting for Alex to win the affections of classmate Addie (Tati Gabrielle, “The 100”), but of course his courtship all boils down to picking the right emoji to text her. Sorry Cyrano de Bergerac and Abelard and Heloise and Cole Porter and anyone else who’s ever used dumb old words to declare love; you’re nothing without a poop symbol.
The one non-dispiriting aspect of the “Emoji Movie” experience was getting to see “Puppy!”, a new animated short set in the world of “Hotel Transylvania.” When Adam Sandler outclasses your high-concept, high-tech functions, it’s time to switch to a flip phone. ||||| The Emoji Movie
Looking back, I’m going to go out on a limb and say that there was a small, flickering reason to believe that The Emoji Movie wouldn’t be a complete travesty. After all, the adorably ubiquitous pictograms that have become a second language for at least two generations are a public-domain entity; their relative recent rise makes us forget that, licensing-wise, this is no bigger a grab than Leaves: The Movie would be. It was pretty much free to do whatever it wanted within the ridiculous, cynical parameters it had set. The Emoji Movie had nothing to sell aside from itself.
But this was naïve of me, because The Emoji Movie is selling something. In the mock tradition of countless superior Pixar films before it, it’s attempting to sell a sense of childlike wonder and fascination with an ordinary, everyday object: your smartphone. And in doing so, it is one of the darkest, most dismaying films I have ever seen, much less one ostensibly made for children.
Let me get briefly more philosophical than this film deserves: Emoji remain a ripe source for humor in our everyday digital parlance, specifically because they are devoid of narrative, or even, ironically, emotion. There is a kind of poetry that has emerged from their use; an emoji is worth maybe not a thousand, but certainly a hundred words, and using one in place of words requires you to momentarily, subconsciously imagine that you are living in a language-free totalitarian state where a cry-laugh symbol is our linguistic Soylent. There’s a similar pathetic humor to the constricted movement and expression of Lego figurines, which The Lego Movie exploited to far greater effect. The Emoji Movie’s first aesthetic mistake is redesigning their titular figures to be the same kind of rubber-faced caricatures you can find in any other shrieking CGI kid-distracter on the market. Not once does this film rise above the level of humor of literally any real-world use of a simple upside-down-face emoji (whose meaning I tend to translate as “Wheeee, life is a horrible hall of mirrors and I am powerless to do anything but smile about it.”)
If only my review of this film could be an upside-down-face emoji. The laboriously literal plot concerns the “Meh” emoji (T.J. Miller, who certainly doesn’t sound like a man who’s banking his career on this film as his game changer), who is “defective” due to his ability to express a kaleidoscope of emotions beyond his regimented role. I think this is the basic principle behind the Divergent films; it could just as easily be about a commercial actor in an existential rut. To fix his defect, he teams up with the lowly high-five emoji (James Corden), who has been replaced by the newer, hipper fist-bump emoji in the hall of favorites (racial subtext abounds). Together they escape the messaging app they call home on a dream-logic mission to find a “hacker” (Anna Faris) who can take them to the “cloud” and fix Meh’s defect. Along the way, they pass through a series of familiar apps while a battalion of anti-virus bots follows them in lukewarm pursuit. At one point, the film grinds to a halt for a game of Candy Crush.
Yes, the actual IP of The Emoji Movie has nothing to do with the emoji themselves, and everything to do with the apps that have prime placement in the Google AdWords–grade narrative. Somewhat relevant to the plot is the fact that it all takes place on the phone of a 14-year-old boy, who is having text-based girl troubles somehow worsened by Meh’s poor performance as an emoji. Apparently this 14-year-old boy not only has the usual suspects on his phone (Facebook, Instagram, and Spotify all make appearances), but also, mystifyingly, the Crackle app, and extra-mystifyingly, a Just Dance mobile app that I wasn’t even aware existed before now and currently has a two-star rating on the Apple store.
There is a mumbled, shorthand moral about staying true to yourself in all this, but it is drowned out by the wall-to-wall cynicism that is The Emoji Movie’s entire reason for existing in the first place. The film runs through its list of corporate and Zeitgeist awareness obligations in dead-eyed lockstep, making sure to get in uses of the words “slay” and “shade” and lifting an entire section of the lyrics to Rihanna’s “Diamonds” to telegraph a would-be important emotional beat (it’s not a joke, I don’t think). In the end, Meh’s embrace of his animated, multifaceted self just comes off as an ad for an Emoji Movie animated-sticker set that’s probably already out there.
This is a film that seems beamed from a near future in which nothing goes right; “words,” as the kids in the film agree, “aren’t cool” anymore; and Patrick Stewart making jokes about soft shits is the new prestige TV. But what do I know? At my screening, which was for both press and a handful of unfortunate families, at the first sighting of her favorite rainbow-colored icon, a little girl behind me cried out, adoringly, “It’s Instagram!” A new age of heroes is born. ||||| Tony Leondis' kid-flick tries to turn text-message punctuation into a colorful adventure.
Here's what you tell yourself when you accept an assignment to review a cartoon about emoji: "Remember what you thought when you heard about The Lego Movie? That it was the most shameless bit of advertising-as-entertainment you could imagine, the nadir of Hollywood's intellectual-property dependence, and couldn't possibly be worth seeing? Remember how incredibly wrong you were?"
You were wrong then. Given the right combination of inspiration, intelligence and gifted artists, any dumb thing can be turned into an enjoyable film. But Tony Leondis' The Emoji Movie, a very, very dumb thing, comes nowhere near that magic combination. It is fast and colorful enough to attract young kids, but offers nearly nothing to their parents. If only this smartphone-centric dud, so happy to hawk real-world apps to its audience, could have done the same in its release strategy — coming out via Snapchat, where it would vanish shortly after arrival. But even that wouldn't be fast enough.
The project's first hurdle is imagining how an emoji icon, which by definition represents only one emotional state (or object), can be a character capable of experiencing a story. Its solution is incoherent. We're told both that "the pressure's always on" for the face-emoji residents of Textopolis to keep their expressions convincing — smiley or smirking, angry or puzzled — and that they have no choice: That weeping guy keeps gushing tears even when he wins the lottery; he's just programmed that way.
The exception is Gene (voiced by T.J. Miller), a youngster preparing to take over for his old man as the face of Meh. (Who could play the elder embodiment of Blah other than Steven Wright?) We learn that free-spirited Gene, thanks to some glitch, is capable of infinite facial expressions. He has a hard time being deadpan on cue.
His first time on the job, in fact, he fails. In the film's weirdly unconvincing vision of how emojis make their way from a phone's inner universe to its screen when the user selects them, the whole process breaks down if one of the actors can't sit still for a face scan. Gene wrecks the app's game show-like stage, and eventually, the program's supervisor (Smiler, a ruthless but always-smiling woman voiced by Maya Rudolph) targets him for deletion, sending a team of mean-looking antivirus bots off to get him.
With the help of a high-five icon (James Corden, taking his position as the story's fount of unrelenting enthusiasm very seriously), Gene sets out to find a hacker who can reprogram him and eliminate unwanted facial expressions. Jailbreak (Anna Faris) says they need to escape the phone entirely to do this, getting past a tricky firewall and out onto The Cloud.
Getting there affords the filmmakers plenty of opportunities for product placement. The characters spend several minutes stuck in Candy Crush (gags about Hi-5's sweet tooth go on about five times longer than they should); they nearly die in a Dance Dance Revolution-style challenge game. At best, these episodes are limp set pieces; at worst, they sound like they were written by ad agencies. When our heroes need to ride streams of music from one place to another, one coos, "Whoa — this is Spotify?!"; when Jailbreak leads Gene into Dropbox, their pursuers can't follow them inside because "this app is secure."
The dialogue is even lamer when the pic's three scribes depict the life of Alex, the high-school kid who owns the phone Gene inhabits. When Alex wonders what to text the girl he has a crush on, his pal scowls "words aren't cool" — in a Manhattan preview where critics were outnumbered by ordinary moviegoers, nearly all of the laughter was directed at this sort of line, where three grown men try and fail to convincingly imagine how kids talk. Hell, they can't even come up with fresh-smelling one-liners about the movie's resident poop icon. (Amusingly, the closing credits identify this slumming actor as "Sir Patrick Stewart.")
Leondis and company don't get much mileage out of the vast variety of emojis they might use for sight gags, but they do well enough with the slapstick adventure of Gene's quest from home to the cloud. If not always imaginative or digestible, the look of the settings and characters should keep kids awake for 86 minutes; and if the trick that eventually saves the day makes very little sense to critical moviegoers, at least it's cutely frantic eye candy. Even so, few adults in the theater will have a hard time maintaining the flatline, unimpressed expression Gene has such difficulty with.
Production company: Sony Pictures Animation
Distributor: Columbia
Cast: T.J. Miller, Anna Faris, James Corden, Patrick Stewart, Maya Rudolph, Steven Wright, Rob Riggle, Jennifer Coolidge, Jake T. Austin, Sofia Vergara, Christina Aguilera
Director: Tony Leondis
Screenwriters: Tony Leondis, Eric Siegel, Mike White
Producer: Michelle Raimo Kouyate
Executive producer: Ben Waisbren
Production designer: Carlos Zaragoza
Editor: William J. Caparella
Composer: Patrick Doyle
Casting director: Mary Hidalgo
Rated PG, 86 minutes ||||| Children should not be allowed to watch The Emoji Movie. Their impressionable brains simply aren’t set up to sift through the thick haze of corporate subterfuge clouding every scene of this sponsored-content post masquerading as a feature film. Adults know enough to snort derisively when, say, an anthropomorphic high-five drops a reference to popular smartphone game Just Dance Now (available for purchase in the App Store, kids!), but young children especially are more innocent and more vulnerable.
The Emoji Movie is a force of insidious evil, a film that feels as if it was dashed off by an uninspired advertising executive. The best commercials have a way of making you forget you’re being pitched at, but director Tony Leondis leaves all the notes received from his brand partners in full view. The core conceit apes Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas, where a spirited misfit hops between self-contained worlds styled in a single recognisable way. Instead of holidays, however, our hero here jumps from app to app, and the ulterior motive of pumping up download numbers drains every last drop of joy from Leondis’s efforts to enchant.
The director wants us to think of Textopolis, the bustling city inside our smartphones, as a world of pure imagination. When a meh-face emoji named Gene (TJ Miller) is banished from his home for daring to express an emotion other than unimpressed nonchalance, Leondis takes his odyssey of self-discovery as an opportunity to imagine fantastical scenery. As a smiley-face emoji (Maya Rudolph) ruling Textopolis with a cheery iron fist tirelessly hunts him down, Gene gapes in awe at such marvels as a supercharged rollercoaster ride through raw data and a pixelated humpback whale that majestically glides over him. But because these glossy images are so nakedly in service of plugs for Dropbox and Spotify, it’s all but impossible to appreciate any incidental beauty they might possess.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest Alex, voiced by Jake T Austin, in The Emoji Movie. Photograph: Sony Pictures/AP
The pervasive falseness extends to the film’s thematic underpinnings, which make a clumsy lunge at vague, be-yourself positivity. The paramount importance of being true to one’s own spirit is made literal in Gene’s silly quandary; he’s forced to hide who he is for the sake of compulsory homogeneity, and only through tapping into his full range of emotions can he achieve his potential. While Leondis, who is gay, has stated he intends this as an allegory for the tribulations faced by the non-heterosexual community, any social commentary is stymied by the execution. The film’s insistent feel-goodery and occasional nods to feminism (delivered by a spunky blue-haired hacker emoji, voiced by Anna Faris) ring false. Product-placement mashups Toy Story and The Lego Movie had the purity of playtime to seal in the sentimentality; somehow it’s not as endearing in a film built around the apps we use to kill time while sat on the toilet.
The ruthless mercenary details take the Emoji Movie beyond simply embarrassing and incompetent into something more manipulative and contemptible. One perplexing scene finds the emoji pals all doing a synchronised dance called “the emoji bop”. In a film so desperate to sell itself, this is clearly a craven bid to go viral, the cinematic equivalent of clickbait. The script practically begs for the approval of the tweens that elevated the lowly emoji to phenomenon status, but has only the slightest notion how they talk or act. Alex (Jake T Austin), the human in possession of the phone housing Gene and the rest of the cast, speaks like an dusty oldster. Alex’s awkward courtship of the cute girl in his class revolves around the deployment of emojis, but demonstrates no workable understanding of how the icons fit into adolescent life. Watching this fogeyish hero angle for edgy relevance is as uncomfortable as reading a fast-food chain’s Twitter account.
However, the most disturbing part of this toxic film is the way it infects audiences with its ugly cynicism. A viewer leaves The Emoji Movie a colder person, not only angry at the film for being unconscionably bad, but resentful of it for making them feel angry. A critic can accept the truth that art and commerce will spend eternity locked in opposition. Nevertheless it’s still startling to see art that cheers commerce on while being stamped in the face by its boots. ||||| This animated comedy takes place in Textopolis, a world inside a smartphone that's inhabited by various emojis. There, an emoji named Gene (voiced by T.J. Miller) is ashamed that he has multiple facial expressions while his colleagues only have one each, and he embarks on a quest to be like everyone else. James Corden, Anna Faris, Jennifer Coolidge, Patrick Stewart, and Maya Rudolph also lend their voices to this film from Sony Pictures Animation. | – With a 3% "fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes, reviews of The Emoji Movie could have consisted of repeated strings of the vomiting emoji, thumbs-down emoji, and poop emoji. Fortunately for fans of brutal critical drubbings, film critics had to use words (despite the film's position that "words aren't cool"). Here are some of the best takedowns of the new animated film: "Children should not be allowed to watch The Emoji Movie," writes Charles Bramesco at the Guardian, calling it a "sponsored-content post masquerading as a feature film" and a "force of insidious evil." It somehow exists to get kids to buy apps without apparently understanding kids and how they actually use emojis. "A viewer leaves The Emoji Movie a colder person," the reviewer concludes. "Hear that? It's the end of the world," writes Johnny Oleksinsk at ithe New York Post after calling The Emoji Movie a "new exercise in soulless branding." At Vulture, Emily Yoshida calls it "one of the darkest, most dismaying films I have ever seen, much less one ostensibly made for children." The Emoji Movie is "a very, very dumb thing" full of moments that "sound like they were written by ad agencies," according to the Hollywood Reporter, which laments that the film wasn't released "via Snapchat, where it would vanish shortly after arrival. But even that wouldn't be fast enough." Finally, Alonso Duralde at the Wrap calls it a "soul-crushing disaster" and "completely shrill and stupid." This "complete waste of your time" is without "humor, wit, ideas, visual style, compelling performances, a point of view, or any other distinguishing characteristic." |
Alzheimer’s disease could be caused by viruses like herpes, a group of renowned dementia experts have warned, as they call for urgent investigation into the link.
The worldwide team of 31 senior scientists and clinicians, which include specialists from Oxford, Cambridge, Edinburgh and Manchester Universities and Imperial College, have written an editorial which suggests that microbes are the major cause of dementia.
The herpes virus - the type which causes cold sores - and chlamydia bacteria are named as the major culprits, as well as a type of corkscrew-shaped bacteria called spirochaete.
“There is incontrovertible evidence that Alzheimer’s Disease has a dormant microbial component. We can’t keep ignoring all of the evidence”
“There is incontrovertible evidence that Alzheimer’s Disease has a dormant microbial component. We can’t keep ignoring all of the evidence” Professor Douglas Kell, Manchester University
Currently most scientists are trying to find treatments which prevent the build of sticky amyloid plaques and misfolded tau proteins in the brain which prevent neurons from communicating with each other, leading to memory loss and cognitive decline.
But in an the editorial in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease, it is suggested that it is a viral or bacterial infection which triggers the plaque build-up in the first place. Targeting them specifically with antimicrobial drugs could halt dementia.
Professor Douglas Kell of the University of Manchester’s School of Chemistry, said “We are saying there is incontrovertible evidence that Alzheimer’s Disease has a dormant microbial component. We can’t keep ignoring all of the evidence.”
There are currently 850,000 people living with dementia in Britain which is due to rise to one million by 2025 and two million by 2050. But despite 412 drugs trials taking place between 2002 and 2012, nothing has been shown to combat the disease.
The authors say that viruses and bacteria are common in the brains of elderly people, and although they are usually dormant, they can ‘wake up’ after stress or if the immune system is compromised. Around two thirds of people will acquire the herpes virus at some point in their lives, and many will not realise they have it.
Photo: ALAMY
The herpes virus in particular is known to damage the central nervous system, and the limbic system in the brain which regulates mood and instinct and is associated with mental decline and personality changes.
They also point to the fact that a gene mutation - APOEe4 - which makes one in five people more susceptible to Alzheimer’s disease, also raises their susceptibility to infectious disease. Viral infections in the brain are already known to cause symptoms similar to Alzheimer’s and the experts say the link has been ‘neglected’ for too long.
“Alzheimer’s disease causes great emotional and physical harm to sufferers and their carers as well as having enormously damaging economic consequences,” they write.
“We write to express our concern that one particular aspect of the disease has been neglected, even though treatment based on it might slow or arrest Alzheimer’s disease progression.
“We refer to the many studies, mainly on humans, implicating specific microbes in the elderly brain, notably herpes simplex virus type 1, chlamydia pneumoniae and several types of spirochatete.
“We propose that further research on the role of infectious agents in Alzheimer’s disease causation, including prospective trials of antimicrobial therapy, is now justified.”
They say new findings could also have implications for the future treatment of Parkinson’s Disease, and other progressive neurological conditions.
Professor Resia Pretorius of the University of Pretoria, who worked with Prof Kell on the editorial, said “The microbial presence in blood may also play a fundamental role as causative agent of systemic inflammation, which is a characteristic of Alzheimer’s disease.
“Furthermore, there is ample evidence that this can cause neuroinflammation and plaque formation.”
Dementia charities said they had noticed that viruses and bacteria were more common in people with Alzheimer's disease.
Dr James Pickett, Head of Research at Alzheimer’s Society said: “A large number of different microbes including viruses, bacteria and fungi have been found in the brains of older people - but there do appear to be more of them in the brains of people who have died with Alzheimer’s disease.
"While these observations are interesting and warrant further research, there is currently insufficient evidence to tell us that microbes are responsible for causing Alzheimer’s disease in the vast majority of cases. We would like to reassure people that there remains no convincing evidence that Alzheimer’s disease is contagious or can be passed from person to person like a virus.
“Given the enormous global impact of dementia, there is intense interest from the research community to understand all the potential contributing factors. We welcome research that explores all possible avenues and have committed £100 million over the next decade to more fully understand the causes of dementia and to improve diagnosis, treatment and prevention of the condition.”
Last year, researchers found that the 'seeds' of Alzheimer's could be passed through blood transfusions and medical accidents.
Prof John Hardy, Professor of Neuroscience, UCL, said: “This is a minority view in Alzheimer research. There had been no convincing proof of infections causing Alzheimer disease. We need always to keep an open mind but this editorial does not reflect what most researchers think about Alzheimer disease.”
Dr Simon Ridley, Director of Research at Alzheimer’s Research UK, said: “There is growing evidence for the role of the immune system in Alzheimer’s and active ongoing research looking at how an inflammatory response might contribute to the disease. There is some evidence to suggest that infections in general could ramp up the immune system and contribute to the progression of Alzheimer’s, but there isn’t conclusive evidence to suggest that a particular infectious agent or microbe could be directly responsible for causing the disease.
"There are many avenues being explored to understand the initial events that trigger the development of Alzheimer’s and this is an important part of the research process for ruling in and out particular hypotheses. There is no evidence that Alzheimer’s can be passed from person to person like a virus. Continued research funding into diseases like Alzheimer’s is important to build a clearer picture of the genetic and lifestyle risk factors for the disease and use this knowledge to develop preventions or treatments.” ||||| A worldwide team of senior scientists and clinicians have come together to produce an editorial which indicates that certain microbes - a specific virus and two specific types of bacteria - are major causes of Alzheimer’s Disease. Their paper, which has been published online in the highly regarded peer-reviewed journal, Journal of Alzheimer's Disease, stresses the urgent need for further research - and more importantly, for clinical trials of anti-microbial and related agents to treat the disease.
This major call for action is based on substantial published evidence into Alzheimer's. The team’s landmark editorial summarises the abundant data implicating these microbes, but until now this work has been largely ignored or dismissed as controversial - despite the absence of evidence to the contrary. Therefore, proposals for the funding of clinical trials have been refused, despite the fact that over 400 unsuccessful clinical trials for Alzheimer's based on other concepts were carried out over a recent 10-year period.
Opposition to the microbial concepts resembles the fierce resistance to studies some years ago which showed that viruses cause certain types of cancer, and that a bacterium causes stomach ulcers. Those concepts were ultimately proved valid, leading to successful clinical trials and the subsequent development of appropriate treatments.
Professor Douglas Kell of The University of Manchester’s School of Chemistry and Manchester Institute of Biotechnology is one of the editorial’s authors. He says that supposedly sterile red blood cells were seen to contain dormant microbes, which also has implications for blood transfusions. ||||| We are researchers and clinicians working on Alzheimer’s disease (AD) or related topics, and we write to express our concern that one particular aspect of the disease has been neglected, even though treatment based on it might slow or arrest AD progression. We refer to the many studies, mainly on humans, implicating specific microbes in the elderly brain, notably herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV1), Chlamydia pneumoniae, and several types of spirochaete, in the etiology of AD [1–4]. Fungal infection of AD brain [5, 6] has also been described, as well as abnormal microbiota in AD patient blood [7]. The first observations of HSV1 in AD brain were reported almost three decades ago [8]. The ever-increasing number of these studies (now about 100 on HSV1 alone) warrants re-evaluation of the infection and AD concept.
AD is associated with neuronal loss and progressive synaptic dysfunction, accompanied by the deposition of amyloid-β (Aβ) peptide, a cleavage product of the amyloid-β protein precursor (AβPP), and abnormal forms of tau protein, markers that have been used as diagnostic criteria for the disease [9, 10]. These constitute the hallmarks of AD, but whether they are causes of AD or consequences is unknown. We suggest that these are indicators of an infectious etiology. In the case of AD, it is often not realized that microbes can cause chronic as well as acute diseases; that some microbes can remain latent in the body with the potential for reactivation, the effects of which might occur years after initial infection; and that people can be infected but not necessarily affected, such that ‘controls’, even if infected, are asymptomatic [2].
EVIDENCE FOR AN INFECTIOUS/IMMUNE COMPONENT (i) Viruses and other microbes are present in the brain of most elderly people [11–13]. Although usually dormant, reactivation can occur after stress and immunosuppression; for example, HSV1 DNA is amplified in the brain of immunosuppressed patients [14].
(ii) Herpes simplex encephalitis (HSE) produces damage in localized regions of the CNS related to the limbic system, which are associated with memory, cognitive and affective processes [15], as well as personality (the same as those affected in AD).
(iii) In brain of AD patients, pathogen signatures (e.g., HSV1 DNA) specifically colocalize with AD pathology [13, 16, 17].
(iv) HSV infection, as revealed by seropositivity, is significantly associated with development of AD [18–21].
(v) AD has long been known to have a prominent inflammatory component characteristic of infection (reviewed in [22, 23]).
(vi) Polymorphisms in the apolipoprotein E gene, APOE , that modulate immune function and susceptibility to infectious disease [24], also govern AD risk (reviewed in [25, 26]). Genome-wide association studies reveal that other immune system components, including virus receptor genes, are further AD risk factors [27–32].
(vii) Features of AD pathology are transmissible by inoculation of AD brain to primates [33, 34] and mice [35, 36].
EVIDENCE FOR CAUSATION (i) In humans, brain infection (e.g., by HIV, herpesvirus, measles) is known to be associated with AD-like pathology [37–42]. Historical evidence shows that the clinical and pathological hallmarks of AD occur also in syphilitic dementia, caused by a spirochaete [4].
(ii) In mice and in cell culture, Aβ deposition and tau abnormalities typical of AD are observed after infection with HSV1 [43–52] or bacteria [16, 53–55]; a direct interaction between AβPP and HSV1 has been reported [56]. Antivirals, including acyclovir, in vitro block HSV1-induced Aβ and tau pathology [57].
(iii) Olfactory dysfunction is an early symptom of AD [58]. The olfactory nerve, which leads to the lateral entorhinal cortex, the initial site from where characteristic AD pathology subsequently spreads through the brain [59, 60], is a likely portal of entry of HSV1 [61] and other viruses [62], as well as Chlamydia pneumoniae, into the brain [63], implicating such agents in damage to this region. Further, brainstem areas that harbor latent HSV directly irrigate these brain regions: brainstem virus reactivation would thus disrupt the same tissues as those affected in AD [64].
GROWING EVIDENCE FOR MECHANISM: ROLE OF Aβ (i) The gene encoding cholesterol 25-hydroxylase (CH25H) is selectively upregulated by virus infection, and its enzymatic product (25-hydroxycholesterol, 25OHC) induces innate antiviral immunity [65, 66].
(ii) Polymorphisms in human CH25 H govern both AD susceptibility and Aβ deposition [67], arguing that Aβ induction is likely to be among the targets of 25OHC, providing a potential mechanistic link between infection and Aβ production [68].
(iii) Aβ is an antimicrobial peptide with potent activity against multiple bacteria and yeast [69]. Aβ also has antiviral activity [70–72].
(iv) Another antimicrobial peptide (β-defensin 1) is upregulated in AD brain [73]. Regarding HSV1, about 100 publications by many groups indicate directly or indirectly that this virus is a major factor in the disease. They include studies suggesting that the virus confers risk of the disease when present in brain of carriers of the ɛ4 allele of APOE [74], an established susceptibility factor for AD (APOE ɛ4 determines susceptibility in several disorders of infectious origin [75], including herpes labialis, caused usually by HSV1). The only opposing reports, two not detecting HSV1 DNA in elderly brains and another not finding an HSV1–APOE association, were published over a decade ago [76–78]. However, despite all the supportive evidence, the topic is often dismissed as ‘controversial’. One recalls the widespread opposition initially to data showing that viruses cause some types of cancer, and that a bacterium causes stomach ulcers. In summary, we propose that infectious agents, including HSV1, Chlamydia pneumonia, and spirochetes, reach the CNS and remain there in latent form. These agents can undergo reactivation in the brain during aging, as the immune system declines, and during different types of stress (which similarly reactivate HSV1 in the periphery). The consequent neuronal damage— caused by direct viral action and by virus-induced inflammation— occurs recurrently, leading to (or acting as a cofactor for) progressive synaptic dysfunction, neuronal loss, and ultimately AD. Such damage includes the induction of Aβ which, initially, appears to be only a defense mechanism. AD causes great emotional and physical harm to sufferers and their carers, as well as having enormously damaging economic consequences. Given the failure of the 413 trials of other types of therapy for AD carried out in the period 2002–2012 [79], antiviral/antimicrobial treatment of AD patients, notably those who are APOE ɛ4 carriers, could rectify the ‘no drug works’ impasse. We propose that further research on the role of infectious agents in AD causation, including prospective trials of antimicrobial therapy, is now justified. | – Roughly two-thirds of American adults have been exposed to the herpes type 1 virus (oral; type 2 is the genital one), and they could be predisposed to developing Alzheimer's disease later in life. So writes a group of 31 international scientists and clinicians in an editorial in the Journal of Alzheimer's Disease, stating that "substantial published evidence" suggests such a link and calling on researchers elsewhere to take action. They claim that some microbes—the virus and two types of bacteria, chlamydia and spirochete—are linked to the progressive neurological disease. "We are saying there is incontrovertible evidence that Alzheimer's disease has a dormant microbial component," writes lead author Douglas Kell in a University of Manchester statement. "We can't keep ignoring all of the evidence." The authors propose that the named microbes "reach the [central nervous system] and remain there in latent form." They can then essentially wake up during the course of aging, under stress, or as the immune system declines. "The consequent neuronal damage ... occurs recurrently, leading to ... ultimately AD," the authors posit. They point to the failure of 413 Alzheimer's drug trials conducted between 2002 and 2012 and "express our concern that one particular aspect of the disease has been neglected," as "antiviral/antimicrobial treatment of AD patients ... could rectify the 'no drug works' impasse." Meanwhile, not all are convinced, with one neuroscience professor framing theirs as a "minority view"; he tells the Telegraph there has "been no convincing proof of infections causing" the disease. (This 38-year-old's form of Alzheimer's is genetic.) |
Sales of pop icon Whitney Houston's records have soared since it was announced that the singer was found dead in a bathtub at Los Angeles' Beverly Hilton Hotel.
Seven of Houston's records are currently in the top 10 on Amazon.com's best sellers in music list, and the legendary singer who died at the age of 48 was only edged out of the top spot by singer Adele, who took home six Grammy awards Sunday night. Houston's compilation "Whitney Houston - The Greatest Hits" comes in at number two.
Fans instantly drove Houston to number one the iTunes charts as well, with her cover of Dolly Parton's "I Will Always Love You" shooting to the top of the site's charts and becoming the number one download. Her 1980s classic "I Wanna Dance With Somebody" is also in the top 10, and a number of the singer's other singles quickly re-entered the iTunes top 100.
Apple has been accused of cashing in on Houston's unexpected death by hiking the price of the download since the news of her death broke. Houston's 2007 Ultimate Collection increased by £3 to £7.99 in the space of just 30 minutes, according to the website Digital Spy.
It is expected that mourning fans will keep the singer's albums and singles at the top of the charts over the next few weeks. ||||| Sony Music has come under fire after it increased the price of a Whitney Houston album on Apple's iTunes Store hours after the singer was found dead.
The music giant is understood to have lifted the wholesale price of Houston's greatest hits album, The Ultimate Collection, at about 4am California time on Sunday. This meant that the iTunes retail price of the album automatically increased from £4.99 to £7.99.
Houston's The Ultimate Collection, originally released in 1997, was the second top-selling album on iTunes on Monday morning. Apple returned the album to its original price late on Sunday.
Music fans described the move as a cynical attempt to capitalise on Houston's in-demand greatest hits records. The price hike came as tributes flooded in for the singer, whose catalogue includes hits such as I Wanna Dance With Somebody and I Will Always Love You. Houston was found dead in her Los Angeles hotel room on Saturday afternoon, local time, at the age of 48.
The change happened when Sony Music, which owns the rights to much of Houston's back catalogue, increased the wholesale price of The Ultimate Collection. This automatically boosted the retail price of the popular album, although Apple is responsible setting the price paid by music fans.
It is understood that the change occurred after Sony Music reviewed Houston's iTunes catalogue after the singer was pronounced dead.
One insider close to the situation said the price hike was not a "cynical" move – but that the wholesale price of Houston's The Ultimate Collection was wrong. The change in wholesale price boosted the album's retail price on iTunes.
Houston's The Ultimate Collection and Whitney – The Greatest Hits were in the top three albums on iTunes at noon on Monday.
Apple and Sony Music declined to comment. | – On Saturday, a Whitney Houston greatest-hits album cost about $8 in the UK iTunes store; but shortly after the singer was found dead, it had jumped to a little more than $12.50. The changed sparked a customer uproar. "It is just a case of iTunes cashing in on the singer's death, which in my opinion is totally parasitic," said one, according to DigitalSpy. But the Guardian reports that it was Sony, not iTunes, that was responsible for the change—which has now been reversed. Sony boosted the wholesale price of Houston's 1997 Ultimate Collection, which iTunes currently says isn't available in its US store. It was the second-bestselling album as of this morning, the Guardian notes. Sony's change wasn't "cynical," said an insider: Sony reviewed Houston's catalog after her death, and found that the wholesale price was simply wrong. Regardless of the controversy, Houston's sales are soaring since her death, ABC News notes, with seven of her records in Amazon's music top 10. (Click to read about an eerie twist in Houston's death, involving her daughter.) |
Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption The BBC's Rory Cellan-Jones explains why the attack is like a "motorway jam", alongside expert David Emm from Kaspersky Lab
The internet around the world has been slowed down in what security experts are describing as the biggest cyber-attack of its kind in history.
A row between a spam-fighting group and hosting firm has sparked retaliation attacks affecting the wider internet.
Experts worry that the row could escalate to affect banking and email systems.
Five national cyber-police-forces are investigating the attacks.
Spamhaus, a group based in both London and Geneva, is a non-profit organisation that aims to help email providers filter out spam and other unwanted content.
To do this, the group maintains a number of blocklists - a database of servers known to be being used for malicious purposes.
Recently, Spamhaus blocked servers maintained by Cyberbunker, a Dutch web host that states it will host anything with the exception of child pornography or terrorism-related material.
Sven Olaf Kamphuis, who claims to be a spokesman for Cyberbunker, said, in a message, that Spamhaus was abusing its position, and should not be allowed to decide "what goes and does not go on the internet".
Spamhaus has alleged that Cyberbunker, in cooperation with "criminal gangs" from Eastern Europe and Russia, is behind the attack.
Cyberbunker has not responded to the BBC's request for comment.
'Immense job'
Steve Linford, chief executive for Spamhaus, told the BBC the scale of the attack was unprecedented.
"We've been under this cyber-attack for well over a week.
'Decapitating the internet' Image caption The DNS ensures that you are sent to the correct site when you enter a web address Writing exactly one year ago for the BBC, Prof Alan Woodward predicted the inherent weaknesses in the web's domain name system. He wrote: "It is essentially the phone book for the internet. If you could prevent access to the phone book then you would effectively render the web useless." Read Prof Woodward's full article
"But we're up - they haven't been able to knock us down. Our engineers are doing an immense job in keeping it up - this sort of attack would take down pretty much anything else."
Mr Linford told the BBC that the attack was being investigated by five different national cyber-police-forces around the world.
He claimed he was unable to disclose more details because the forces were concerned that they too may suffer attacks on their own infrastructure.
The attackers have used a tactic known as Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS), which floods the intended target with large amounts of traffic in an attempt to render it unreachable.
In this case, Spamhaus's Domain Name System (DNS) servers were targeted - the infrastructure that joins domain names, such as bbc.co.uk, the website's numerical internet protocol address.
Mr Linford said the attack's power would be strong enough to take down government internet infrastructure.
"If you aimed this at Downing Street they would be down instantly," he said. "They would be completely off the internet."
He added: "These attacks are peaking at 300 Gbps (gigabits per second).
"Normally when there are attacks against major banks, we're talking about 50 Gbps"
Clogged-up motorway
The knock-on effect is hurting internet services globally, said Prof Alan Woodward, a cybersecurity expert at the University of Surrey.
"If you imagine it as a motorway, attacks try and put enough traffic on there to clog up the on and off ramps," he told the BBC.
"With this attack, there's so much traffic it's clogging up the motorway itself."
Arbor Networks, a firm which specialises in protecting against DDoS attacks, also said it was the biggest such attack they had seen.
"The largest DDoS attack that we have witnessed prior to this was in 2010, which was 100 Gbps. Obviously the jump from 100 to 300 is pretty massive," said Dan Holden, the company's director of security research.
"There's certainly possibility for some collateral damage to other services along the way, depending on what that infrastructure looks like."
Spamhaus said it was able to cope as it has highly distributed infrastructure in a number of countries.
The group is supported by many of the world's largest internet companies who rely on it to filter unwanted material.
Mr Linford told the BBC that several companies, such as Google, had made their resources available to help "absorb all of this traffic".
The attacks typically happened in intermittent bursts of high activity.
"They are targeting every part of the internet infrastructure that they feel can be brought down," Mr Linford said.
"Spamhaus has more than 80 servers around the world. We've built the biggest DNS server around." ||||| When Spamhaus requested aid from CloudFlare, the attackers began to focus their digital ire on the companies that provide data connections for both Spamhaus and CloudFlare.
Questioned about the attacks, Sven Olaf Kamphuis, an Internet activist who said he was a spokesman for the attackers, said in an online message that, “We are aware that this is one of the largest DDoS attacks the world had publicly seen.” Mr. Kamphuis said Cyberbunker was retaliating against Spamhaus for “abusing their influence.”
“Nobody ever deputized Spamhaus to determine what goes and does not go on the Internet,” Mr. Kamphuis said. “They worked themselves into that position by pretending to fight spam.”
A typical denial-of-service attack tends to affect only a small number of networks. But in the case of a Domain Name System flood attack, data packets are aimed at the victim from servers all over the world. Such attacks cannot easily be stopped, experts say, because those servers cannot be shut off without halting the Internet.
“The No. 1 rule of the Internet is that it has to work,” said Dan Kaminsky, a security researcher who years ago pointed out the inherent vulnerabilities of the Domain Name System. “You can’t stop a DNS flood by shutting down those servers because those machines have to be open and public by default. The only way to deal with this problem is to find the people doing it and arrest them.”
The heart of the problem, according to several Internet engineers, is that many large Internet service providers have not set up their networks to make sure that traffic leaving their networks is actually coming from their own users. The potential security flaw has long been known by Internet security specialists, but it has only recently been exploited in a way that threatens the Internet infrastructure.
An engineer at one of the largest Internet communications firms said the attacks in recent days have been as many as five times larger than what was seen recently in attacks against major American banks. He said the attacks were not large enough to saturate the company’s largest routers, but they had overwhelmed important equipment. | – If the Internet seems a little slow to you lately, that's because it's in the midst of what is being called the biggest cyberattack of all time, reports the BBC. The fight is between a spam-fighting group, Spamhaus, and a web-hosting company, Cyberbunker, but it has grown to the point that it's affecting the entire Internet and its infrastructure. Millions of users are experiencing delays while trying to reach websites or while using services like Netflix, and experts fear that if the attacks continue to grow in power, people may not be able to access things like email or online banking. It all started when Spamhaus, which publishes a blacklist that email providers use to weed out spam, put Cyberbunker on its list of spammers. Cyberbunker retaliated, but its attack on Spamhaus ended up having a much larger impact. One architect at a digital content provider likened it to, as the New York Times puts it, using a machine gun in an effort to assassinate one person. The distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks "are essentially like nuclear bombs" that exploit the Internet's Domain Name System (DNS), says an exec at a group that tried to defend against the attacks and ended up becoming a target. "It's so easy to cause so much damage." And, notes the architect, this is "the largest publicly announced DDoS attack in the history of the Internet." Cyberbunker says Spamhaus is a vigilante group "abusing [its] influence," but the architect notes that Cyberbunker is "just mad" that it got caught spamming. One security researcher says the only way to stop the attack is to arrest the people responsible. Five cyber-police forces around the globe are investigating. |
U.S. Backs Away From Offshore Arctic Drilling
Enlarge this image toggle caption Elaine Thompson/AP Elaine Thompson/AP
The U.S. government is backing away from Arctic offshore oil and gas drilling on two fronts.
On Friday, the Department of the Interior announced the cancellation of two potential lease sales off the Alaskan coast in the Beaufort and Chukchi seas. The Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement also denied lease extension requests from two companies, Shell and Statoil, that were exploring the seas for fossil fuels.
The decisions to nix the lease sales, which the statement attributed to "current market conditions and low industry interest," follows Shell's announcement that it will stop exploration in the Chukchi Sea for "the foreseeable future."
"In light of Shell's announcement, the amount of acreage already under lease and current market conditions, it does not make sense to prepare for lease sales in the Arctic in the next year and a half," said Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell.
Lois Epstein, an engineer for the environmental group The Wilderness Society, characterized the government's decision as reasonable, according to a statement.
"Because of Shell's failure to find significant oil in the Chukchi Sea, new Arctic Ocean lease sales — which require extensive government preparation and costs — would likely be unsuccessful," Epstein said.
In explaining why Shell and Statoil were not given permission to retain their leases beyond 10 years, the Interior Department statement said that the companies "did not demonstrate a reasonable schedule of work for exploration and development."
Epstein praised the move, saying, "We applaud Interior's decision not to continue discussing extensions of their existing leases with Shell and other Arctic Ocean leaseholders."
The existing leases in the Beaufort and Chukchi seas will expire in 2017 and 2020, respectively. ||||| Image copyright AP Image caption Shell had leased rigs for the Arctic but said it did not find sufficient amounts of oil and gas
The US government has announced new curbs on oil and gas exploration in Arctic waters off Alaska's northern coast.
It comes after oil giant Royal Dutch Shell last month stopped its Arctic activity citing "disappointing" tests.
The US interior department said it was cancelling two potential Arctic offshore lease sales and would not extend current leases.
The announcement has been welcomed by environmentalists.
Miyoko Sakashita, of the Center for Biological Diversity, said the decision was "great for the Arctic and its polar bears".
"We need to keep all the Arctic oil in the ground," she said.
US government leases are due to expire in the Beaufort Sea in 2017 and in the Chukchi Sea in 2020.
"In light of Shell's announcement, the amount of acreage already under lease and current market conditions, it does not make sense to prepare for lease sales in the Arctic in the next year and a half," Interior Secretary Sally Jewell said in a statement.
Image copyright AP Image caption Environmental activists have long campaigned against offshore drilling in the Arctic
Shell has spent about $7bn (£4.5bn) on Arctic offshore development in the Chukchi and Beaufort seas.
However, last month it announced it had not found sufficient amounts of oil and gas in the region to warrant further exploration.
It said it would end exploration off Alaska "for the foreseeable future".
Correspondents say the Arctic is a risky and expensive place for oil companies to explore, and the current low price of oil makes it even less attractive.
The US Geological Survey estimates that the Arctic holds about 30% of the world's undiscovered natural gas, as well as 13% of its oil.
However, environmental groups say offshore drilling will pollute and damage a natural wilderness.
They also argue that fossil fuels such as oil and gas must be left in the ground if the world is to avoid runaway climate change. ||||| Date: October 16, 2015
Contact: Jessica Kershaw, Interior_Press@ios.doi.gov
WASHINGTON – In light of current market conditions and low industry interest, the U.S. Department of the Interior today announced that it will cancel the two potential Arctic offshore lease sales scheduled under the current five-year offshore oil and gas leasing program for 2012-2017. Today, the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE) also denied requests from Shell and Statoil for lease suspensions, which would have extended the expiration date of the leases.
“In light of Shell’s announcement, the amount of acreage already under lease and current market conditions, it does not make sense to prepare for lease sales in the Arctic in the next year and a half,” said Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell. “I am proud of the performance of Interior’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement, the U.S. Coast Guard and others in ensuring that Shell’s program this past season was conducted in accordance with the highest safety and environmental standards.”
Under the current Five-Year Program, Chukchi Sea Lease Sale 237 was scheduled potentially for 2016. The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) issued a Call for Information and Nominations in September 2013, in response to which industry submitted no specific nominations. Shell recently announced that the results of its exploration well at the Burger J site in the Chukchi Sea did not warrant further exploration in the Burger prospect.
Similarly, Beaufort Sea Lease Sale 242 had been scheduled potentially for the first half of 2017. BOEM published a Call for Information and Nominations in July 2014, but only received one nomination, thereby raising concerns about the competitiveness of any such lease sale at this time.
Today, the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE) also denied requests from Shell and Statoil for lease suspensions, which would have allowed the companies to retain the leases beyond their primary terms of ten years. The leases will expire in 2017 (Beaufort) and 2020 (Chukchi). Among other things, the companies did not demonstrate a reasonable schedule of work for exploration and development under the leases, a regulatory requirement necessary for BSEE to grant a suspension. To view the letters regarding the suspension requests, click here for Statoil and click here for Shell. | – In bad news for the Alaskan economy but good news for polar bears, the US government blocked new offshore drilling in Alaska's Arctic Ocean and refused to extend two existing leases for Arctic drilling on Friday, the New York Times reports. The Interior Department cancelled auctions for drilling rights in the Chukchi and Beaufort seas while declining to extend the Arctic leases of Shell (expires in 2017) and Statoil (expires in 2020), according to NPR. "In light of Shell's announcement, the amount of acreage already under lease, and current market conditions, it does not make sense to prepare for lease sales in the Arctic in the next year and a half," Interior secretary Sally Jewell says in a statement. The Shell announcement Jewell is talking about is the oil giant's decision last month to halt its Arctic drilling after accidents, delays, and $7 billion with nothing to show for it, the Times reports. The moves by the Obama administration Friday basically block drilling in the Alaskan Arctic for two years. It's a decision one Alaskan senator calls "stunning," "destructive," and "shortsighted." But Miyoko Sakashita of the environmental group Center for Biological Diversity tells the BBC it's great news for the Arctic and its wildlife. "We need to keep all the Arctic oil in the ground," she says. The US Geological Survey believes the Arctic holds about 13% of the world's undiscovered oil, but the Times reports offshore Arctic drilling is declining—due to concerns over safety, cost, and the environment—in the US, Canada, and Greenland. |
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Drinking coffee, tea or chocolate does not appear to cause heart palpitations, heart fluttering and other out-of-sync heartbeat patterns, researchers reported Tuesday.
The report challenges a widely held belief that caffeinated drinks cause irregular heart rhythms that can lead to heart failure or dangerous heart rhythm disorders and is another vindication for coffee as a safe drink.
It might be time for doctors to lighten up on coffee, says Dr. Gregory Marcus, a cardiologist at the University of California San Francisco, who led the study.
"Clinical recommendations advising against the regular consumption of caffeinated products to prevent disturbances of the heart's cardiac rhythm should be reconsidered, as we may unnecessarily be discouraging consumption of items like chocolate, coffee and tea that might actually have cardiovascular benefits," Marcus said in a statement.
"We may unnecessarily be discouraging consumption of items like chocolate, coffee and tea that might actually have cardiovascular benefits."
"Given our recent work demonstrating that extra heartbeats can be dangerous, this finding is especially relevant."
It used to be believed that premature cardiac contractions, which usually cause no symptoms or mild symptoms such as heart palpitations, ‘skipped’ beats or fluttering, were harmless. But studies now show they’re associated with heart failure, atrial fibrillation and other dangerous conditions.
And doctors are widely taught that caffeine can cause these heart disturbances.
To check, Marcus and colleagues examined 1,388 people, with an average age of 72, taking part in a larger heart study.
About 60 percent said they drank some sort of caffeinated product every day. The team looked specifically at coffee, tea and chocolate and did not ask about super-caffeinated energy drinks.
They measured instances of premature ventricular contractions and premature atrial contractions.
They could not find any differences in instances of these heart disturbances, no matter how much coffee or tea or chocolate people had.
“Therefore, we are only able to conclude that in general, consuming caffeinated products every day is not associated with having increased ectopy or arrhythmia but cannot specify a particular amount per day,” Marcus and colleagues wrote in the Journal of the American Heart Association.
"Habitual coffee drinkers have lower rates of coronary artery disease."
They said it is possible that people who noticed heart flutters or other symptoms from coffee or tea may have cut back – they did not ask them.
But they also noted that it’s yet another finding in favor of moderate coffee drinking.
“Coffee is among the most commonly consumed beverages in the United States and is the main source of caffeine intake among adults,” they wrote.
“Regular coffee consumption has been associated with a lower risk of type 2 diabetes mellitus and other cardiovascular risk factors such as obesity and depression,” they added.
“Furthermore, large observational studies have found that habitual coffee drinkers have lower rates of coronary artery disease and of cardiovascular and all-cause mortality.”
The cutoff seems to be around five cups a day, and kids shouldn't be drinking too much caffeine.
Higher doses of caffeine can be deadly. The Food and Drug Administration has warned about sales of powdered caffeine, One teaspoon delivers as much caffeine as 28 cups of regular coffee. ||||| SAN FRANCISCO (CBS SF) — A new study indicates that regular caffeine consumption does not contribute to heart palpitations or extra heartbeats, according to UC San Francisco researchers.
The results of the study, appearing in the January 2016 issue of the Journal of the American Heart Association, challenge the widely held clinical belief that caffeine products can lead to extra heartbeats.
The study measured the consumption of caffeinated products over a 12-month period by nearly 1,400 randomly selected patients who were part of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) Cardiovascular Health Study database of nearly 6,000 patients, though that sampling excluded individuals who persistently had extra heartbeats. The subjects were given a baseline food frequency assessment and 24-hour ambulatory electrocardiography monitoring with the frequency of regular consumption of coffee, tea or chocolate determined by a survey.
“Clinical recommendations advising against the regular consumption of caffeinated products to prevent disturbances of the heart’s cardiac rhythm should be reconsidered, as we may unnecessarily be discouraging consumption of items like chocolate, coffee and tea that might actually have cardiovascular benefits,” said the study’s senior author, UCSF Health cardiologist Gregory Marcus, MD, MAS. “Given our recent work demonstrating that extra heartbeats can be dangerous, this finding is especially relevant.”
Of the 1,388 subjects participating in the study, 840 or 61 percent consumed more than one caffeinated product daily.
The researchers found no differences in the number of PACs (premature atrial contractions) or PVCs (premature ventricular contractions) per hour across levels of coffee, tea and chocolate consumption. More frequent consumption of these products was not associated with extra heartbeats.
“This was the first community-based sample to look at the impact of caffeine on extra heartbeats, as previous studies looked at people with known arrhythmias,” said lead author Shalini Dixit, a fourth-year medical student at UCSF. “Whether acute consumption of these caffeinated products affects extra heartbeats requires further study.”
American Heart Association guidelines on the management of premature ventricular contractions state that if a patient’s history is consistent with premature extra heartbeats, potential exacerbating factors such as the use of caffeine, alcohol and nicotine should be eliminated. Other online resources for clinicians offer similar recommendations.
Recent growing evidence indicates the potential benefits of common caffeinated products like coffee, chocolate and tea. The result is clinician uncertainty in counseling patients on consumption of these products, with patients possibly reducing their intake to avoid presumed cardiac issues.
The study is the largest to date to have evaluated dietary patterns in relation to extra heartbeats. ||||| Get daily updates directly to your inbox + Subscribe Thank you for subscribing! Could not subscribe, try again later Invalid Email
Downing lots of coffee doesn't increase the risk of heart attack or stroke after all, according to a new study.
Researchers have found that regular caffeine consumption, contrary to current belief among medics, does not trigger potentially dangerous heart palpitations.
Extra heartbeats, while common, can lead in rare cases to heart or stroke-related deaths - but doctors say there's no such risk attached to downing coffee.
Instead, those behind the study suggest we could be harming ourselves by steering people away from the potential health benefits.
Senior author Dr Gregory Marcus, of the University of California, San Francisco, said: "Clinical recommendations advising against the regular consumption of caffeinated products to prevent disturbances of the heart's cardiac rhythm should be reconsidered, as we may unnecessarily be discouraging consumption of items like chocolate, coffee and tea that might actually have cardiovascular benefits.
"Given our recent work demonstrating that extra heartbeats can be dangerous, this finding is especially relevant."
Read more: World's first 'caffeinated toothpaste' will give that early morning buzz
Excessive premature atrial contractions (PACs) have been shown to result in atrial fibrillation, stroke and death, while excessive premature ventricular contractions (PVCs) may result in heart failure, coronary artery disease and death.
The researchers said both abnormalities have been tied to caffeine consumption through studies and trials, but these studies were performed several decades ago and did not use PACs and PVCs as a primary outcome.
(Photo: Getty)
But health guidelines state that if a patient's history is consistent with premature extra beats, potential exacerbating factors - such as caffeine, alcohol and nicotine - should be eliminated.
Other online medical resources for clinicians offer similar recommendations.
Recent growing evidence indicates the potential cardiovascular benefits of several common caffeinated products such as coffee, chocolate and tea.
(Photo: Getty)
Those findings have resulted in uncertainty among doctors when it comes to counselling patients on consumption of these products, with patients possibly reducing their intake to avoid presumed cardiac issues.
The study, published in the Journal of the American Heart Association, analysed coffee tea and chocolate consumption of 1,388 randomly selected participants, excluding those with persistent extra heartbeats.
Of the total participants, 840 (61%) consumed more than one caffeinated product daily.
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The researchers found no differences in the number of PACs or PVCs per hour across levels of coffee, tea and chocolate consumption.
More frequent consumption of these products was not associated with extra heartbeats.
Lead author Shalini Dixit added: "This was the first community-based sample to look at the impact of caffeine on extra heartbeats, as previous studies looked at people with known arrhythmias.
"Whether acute consumption of these caffeinated products affects extra heartbeats requires further study." | – Add one more study to the "coffee is good for you" file. Contrary to the long-standing belief that caffeine may cause heart palpitations that can lead to heart failure, new research in the Journal of the American Heart Association suggests the claim is, well, rubbish. Researchers surveyed 1,388 people with an average age of 72 about their caffeine consumption, reports NBC News. Some 61% of participants said they consumed some amount of coffee, tea, or chocolate daily. After looking for premature ventricular and atrial contractions in the heart, scientists concluded there was no link between caffeine consumption and heart palpitations, heart fluttering, or other irregular heartbeat patterns, even among those who consumed a lot of caffeine each day. "Clinical recommendations advising against the regular consumption of caffeinated products to prevent disturbances of the heart's cardiac rhythm should be reconsidered, as we may unnecessarily be discouraging consumption of items like chocolate, coffee, and tea that might actually have cardiovascular benefits," says the lead author of the study from the University of California-San Francisco. Current AHA guidelines suggest that a patient with extra heartbeats avoid caffeine, which can worsen the problem, notes CBS San Francisco. Because "this was the first community-based sample to look at the impact of caffeine on extra heartbeats," the researchers say further study is needed, per the Mirror. (There's more good news if you drink three to five cups of coffee per day.) |
Sen. Orrin Hatch won the GOP primary in Utah on Tuesday, handily turning back a challenge from tea party forces hoping to jolt the Republican Party again by defeating an incumbent who occasionally strayed from the movement's focus on shrinking the federal government.
U.S. Senator Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, greets members of his family on a street corner outside his campaign headquarters, Tuesday, June 26, 2012, in Salt Lake City. The 78-year-old, six term senator is facing... (Associated Press)
Former Utah state senator, Dan Liljenquist, right, waves to motorists during last minute campaigning in a primary election against incumbent senator Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, Tuesday, June 26, 2012, in Salt... (Associated Press)
Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., shakes hands with a poll worker as he arrives to vote in the Democratic primary, Tuesday, June 26, 2012 in New York. He faces State Sen. Adriano Espaillat, who would be the... (Associated Press)
U.S. Senator Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, holds his 3-month-old great grandson, Beckham Wilson after arriving at his campaign headquarters to thank his staff and volunteers, Tuesday, June 26, 2012, in Salt Lake... (Associated Press)
U.S. Senator Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, greets members of his family on a street corner outside his campaign headquarters, Tuesday, June 26, 2012, in Salt Lake City. The 78-year-old, six term senator is facing... (Associated Press)
U.S. Senator Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, holds his 3-month-old great grandson, Beckham Wilson, as he greets his great grand daughter, 8-month-old Maggie Jennings, and her mother, Callie Jennings, after arriving... (Associated Press)
Until this summer, Hatch, 78, had not faced a primary challenge since winning office in 1976. Former state Sen. Dan Liljenquist, who survived a 2008 plane crash in Guatemala that killed 11 of 14 on board, won just enough support at the state GOP's nominating convention to advance to the primary.
But Liljenquist faced an overwhelming financial and organizational disadvantage. Hatch, learning from the defeat two years ago of his Senate colleague Robert Bennett, spent about $10 million blanketing the airwaves and building a campaign operation unlike anything Utah had seen before.
Hatch's race was the premier event in Tuesday's primaries. In New York, 82-year-old Rep. Charlie Rangel won the Democratic primary in spite of a House censure 18 months ago for failing to pay all his taxes and for filing misleading financial disclosure statements.
In Oklahoma, Rep. John Sullivan was in a close contest against political newcomer Jim Bridenstine, who ran to Sullivan's right and criticized the incumbent for missing hundreds of House votes in the past decade.
A few months ago, Hatch was considered vulnerable like Bennett and six-term Republican Sen. Richard Lugar, who lost in last month's Indiana GOP primary. But Hatch got a huge endorsement from Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, who said he would need Hatch in the Senate if he wins the presidency.
Romney easily won his final presidential primary Tuesday as GOP voters in Utah relished the chance to show their support for the Brigham Young University graduate.
Hatch seemed to have an answer to every criticism in his quest for a seventh term. For those who said that 36 years in office was enough, he said that he wouldn't be running again if it weren't for the opportunity to serve as chairman of the Senate Finance Committee if the GOP wins control of the Senate. He also announced it would be his last term.
For those who said he wasn't conservative enough, he gravitated to the right with his comments and his votes, scoring a 100 percent rating from the American Conservative Union in 2010 and 2011. His lifetime rating of 89 percent from the ACU would place Hatch among the Senate's most conservative lawmakers, but Hatch at times took stands that didn't sit well with the right. He worked with the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy to establish a health insurance program for poor and moderate-income children. He also voted to establish a prescription drug benefit under Medicare and to rescue financial firms facing bankruptcy without government help.
Liljenquist, 37, a relative newcomer to the Utah political scene, seized on voters' concerns about the growing national debt and tried to make the case that Hatch had been a major contributor to that debt.
Hatch was widely viewed as most vulnerable when about 4,000 GOP stalwarts gathered at the state's nominating convention in April. Delegates at the convention tend to be more conservative than the GOP electorate, and the Hatch campaign team spent months trying to generate a new crop of delegates. That work paid off, with the large majority of delegates being new to the process. In the end, Hatch won 59.2 percent of the delegates, just shy of the 60 percent he needed to avoid a runoff with Liljenquist.
The Hatch campaign included many of the state's top political consultants and strategists. It also hired some of the tea party activists who had helped generate Sen. Mike Lee's victory two years ago.
With the primary victory, Hatch was a huge favorite to win the general election in November against Democratic candidate Scott Howell.
___
Freking reported from Washington. Associated Press writers Beth Fouhy in New York and Anne Gearan in Washington contributed to this report. ||||| NEW YORK – Rep. Charles Rangel survived the toughest reelection fight of his career, overcoming health and ethics troubles to extend his four-decade run in the House with a win in the New York primary Tuesday night.
With nearly 84 percent of precincts reporting, Rangel was ahead of state Sen. Adriano Espaillat by slightly more than 5 percentage points, and the Associated Press declared him the winner. In a statement just before midnight, Espaillat conceded and congratulated Rangel.
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Appearing with supporters at his Harlem victory party Tuesday evening, Rangel, 82, did not address how much longer he plans to serve in the House, only saying that he’s committed to the next two-year term.
“There are just too many people who have put their trust and confidence in me and President Obama in this great country,” said Rangel, who withstood a similar primary challenge in 2010. “We face real challenges.”
The race was the most closely watched House primary of the night, but voters in five states cast ballots. The most surprising result came in Oklahoma, where GOP Rep. John Sullivan lost the seat he has held since 2002 to a little-known, tea party-backed opponent.
In another closely-watched House race in the Empire State, state Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries crushed New York councilman Charles Barron, a former Black Panther with a history of fiery rhetoric whose candidacy spooked the Democratic establishment.
Rangel’s triumph marked his latest display of survival instincts. He was dogged by a bad back and ethics controversy and managed to overcome a redistricting process that forced him to fight for reelection on less friendly political terrain.
But in the campaign’s final weeks, the co-founder of the Congressional Black Caucus, who was first elected in 1970, made it very clear he still had some fight, staring down his opponents and lambasting the press corps for its coverage of him.
His defiance continued through the final hours of the campaign.
Dressed in a crisp blue suit and red tie and pocket square and accompanied by his wife, Alma, Rangel arrived at a Harlem polling station at around 11 a.m. to cast his ballot. He expressed confidence and said he hadn’t given much thought to the idea that he could come up short.
“If I lose tonight I will sleep just like a baby and cry myself to sleep,” Rangel said. “If you have the spirit that’s necessary to overcome these political obstacles, and if you’re fortunate to know that they’re not obstacles that you can’t overcome, then the attitude of ‘What do I do if I lose?’ never reaches that level.”
Rangel’s career was put in jeopardy after a 2010 ethics investigation that culminated in him being censured on the House floor. That year, he easily defeated several primary opponents who sought to exploit his political problems.
Adding to his problems, earlier this year his seat was refashioned to include more Latino voters than blacks. That gave an opening to Rangel’s lead primary opponent, Espaillat, a 57-year-old state senator who is Dominican American. Making matters worse, Rangel had to compete with three lesser known black candidates who threatened to siphon African American votes from him.
And the incumbent was incapacitated for three months this year by health problems, including a bad back and a viral infection. Rangel revealed last week that he had been receiving a daily IV infusion of antibiotics.
But on Tuesday, Rangel said he had shown he’s just fine. | – The Tea Party failed to claim another victim in Utah after Sen. Orrin Hatch easily won the state's Republican primary. Hatch—facing his first primary challenge since taking office in 1976—beat former state Sen. Dan Liljenquist after spending close to $10 million on advertising, and building one of the biggest campaign operations Utah has ever seen, reports AP. Mitt Romney, to nobody's surprise, scored upwards of 90% in Utah's Republican presidential primary, the final primary before the convention. In New York, Rep. Charles Rangel survived a tough re-election fight to win the Democratic primary, despite concerns about his age and ethics, reports Politico. The 82-year-old Harlem politician, who was censured by the House 18 months ago for ethics violations, was more than 5 points ahead of state Sen. Adriano Espaillat with 85% of precincts reporting. In another House race in New York, state lawmaker Hakeem Jeffries scored a resounding win over New York City Councilman Charles Barron, a former Black Panther who received a controversial endorsement from David Duke. |
FILE - In this Sept. 7, 2016 file photo, Joshua Vallum is photographed in the George County Regional Correctional Facility in Lucedale, Miss. A federal judge on Monday, May 15, 2017, sentenced Vallum... (Associated Press)
FILE - In this Sept. 7, 2016 file photo, Joshua Vallum is photographed in the George County Regional Correctional Facility in Lucedale, Miss. A federal judge on Monday, May 15, 2017, sentenced Vallum... (Associated Press)
GULFPORT, Miss. (AP) — A Mississippi man received a 49-year prison sentence Monday for the first-ever conviction on federal hate crime charges arising from the killing of a transgender woman.
In a case watched by the LGBT community nationwide, U.S. District Judge Louis Guirola Jr. sentenced Joshua Vallum in the 2015 killing of 17-year-old Mercedes Williamson. It was the first case prosecuted under the federal Hate Crimes Prevention Act involving a victim targeted because of gender identity.
Prosecutors said Vallum shocked 17-year-old Mercedes Williamson with a stun gun, stabbed her and beat her to death in 2015 to keep fellow Latin Kings gang members from discovering the two were having sex. Gang rules barred homosexual activity and declared it punishable by death.
Guirola could have sentenced Vallum to life in prison, but heeded a lesser sentence suggested in a plea agreement between defense attorneys and prosecutors, citing Vallum's neglected childhood and other issues. Both the judge and defense lawyers said Vallum's history of abuse as a child had to be considered.
"The taking of a human life because a person has a particular gender identity is particularly heinous and cannot be tolerated in an enlightened society," Guirola said in court in Gulfport.
Vallum pleaded guilty to the federal charges in December. He previously pleaded guilty to a state murder charge that led to a separate sentence of life without parole.
On Monday, Vallum begged forgiveness from Williamson's family and friends, though none of them were present — only a few reporters, the judge and Vallum's father and stepmother.
"Every day, I live with the guilt and regret of my actions," Vallum said. "If I could bring back Mercedes by giving up my life, I would gladly do so."
The case, watched nationally amid concerns transgender women are particularly vulnerable to violence, drew comment from U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
"Today's sentencing reflects the importance of holding individuals accountable when they commit violent acts against transgender individuals," Sessions said in a statement. "The Justice Department will continue its efforts to vindicate the rights of those individuals who are affected by bias motivated crimes."
LGBT advocates applauded federal officials' first use of the 2009 hate crimes law to prosecute an offense against a transgender person.
Demoya Gordon, attorney for the Transgender Rights Project of Lambda Legal, called the prosecution "significant" but noted it began under President Barack Obama's administration and added "the cake was already baked" on Vallum's sentencing when Donald Trump became president.
Gordon said her group remains concerned how Trump policies will affect transgender people. She cited the Trump administration's reversal of guidelines that transgender students nationwide should be able to use school bathrooms corresponding to their gender identity — among other steps.
"These actions invite increased discrimination and continued animus against transgender people," Gordon said.
Federal prosecutor Julia Gegenheimer had said at Vallum's plea hearing in December that he began planning to kill Williamson after a friend called him in May 2015 to say he'd discovered Williamson's identity.
Vallum lured Williamson into a car in Alabama and drove her 50 miles (80 kilometers) to his family home near Lucedale, Mississippi, prosecutors said. They added he shocked her with a stun gun and stabbed her with a pocketknife. When Williamson tried to run, they said, Vallum chased her and bashed her head with a hammer.
Public defenders submitted a sealed brief Monday to Guirola outlining Vallum's troubles.
"Mr. Vallum lived through a childhood that was characterized by abandonment and neglect," said public defender Ellen Allred. "It's difficult to image how a mother could lock a two- or three-year-old child in a room for house on end while adults did drugs."
Allred said Vallum first tried to kill himself when he was 7 or 8.
"We can't go back and change Mr. Vallum's childhood, just like Mr. Vallum can't go back and undo what he did to Mercedes," Allred said.
Vallum initially told sheriff's deputies and later told The Sun Herald newspaper that he found out that Williamson had a penis on May 30, 2015 — moments before he killed her. He said he "blacked out" and doesn't remember the crime, a variation of what's known as a "gay panic" or "trans panic" defense.
He declined to speak with The Associated Press in a March letter, citing advice from his lawyers, and didn't address the issue Monday. However, Vallum has never contested testimony and evidence that he long knew Williamson was transgender.
A witness in state court had testified previously that Vallum and Williamson had sex multiple times while the witness was a roommate with Williamson. Williamson had transitioned from male to female before dropping out of high school in Alabama, leaving her parents' home and drifting from place to place.
___
Follow Jeff Amy at: http://twitter.com/jeffamy . Read his work at https://www.apnews.com/search/Jeff_Amy . ||||| Story highlights Joshua Vallum pleaded guilty to killing his ex-girlfriend
Justice Department: He killed because she was transgender
(CNN) A Mississippi man was sentenced to 49 years in prison Monday and fined $20,000 for killing his ex-girlfriend because she was transgender, the US Justice Department said.
Joshua Vallum, 29, of Lucedale is the first person prosecuted for a federal hate crime in which the victim was targeted for being transgender, the Justice Department said in a news release.
Vallum knew Mercedes Williamson was a transgender teenage girl when they began dating, but kept her gender identity secret, prosecutors said.
They broke up in 2014 but Vallum decided to kill her in May 2015 because a friend had discovered she was transgender, the Justice Department said.
Merecedes Williamson
Vallum, a member of the Almighty Latin Kings and Queens Nation crime gang, feared reprisals from gang members if they found out about the relationship, the Justice Department said.
Read More | – A Mississippi man received a 49-year prison sentence Monday for the first-ever conviction on federal hate crime charges arising from the killing of a transgender woman, the AP reports. In a case watched by the LGBT community nationwide, US District Judge Louis Guirola Jr. sentenced Joshua Vallum, 29, in the 2015 killing of 17-year-old Mercedes Williamson. It was the first case prosecuted under the federal Hate Crimes Prevention Act involving a victim targeted because of gender identity. Prosecutors said Vallum shocked Williamson with a stun gun, stabbed her, and beat her to death to keep fellow Latin Kings gang members from discovering the two were having sex. Gang rules barred homosexual activity and declared it punishable by death. The couple had broken up in 2014 but a friend had recently discovered Williamson was transgender, per CNN. Guirola could have sentenced Vallum to life in prison, but heeded a lesser sentence suggested in a plea agreement between defense attorneys and prosecutors, citing Vallum's neglected childhood and other issues. Both the judge and defense lawyers said Vallum's history of abuse as a child had to be considered. Vallum pleaded guilty to the federal charges in December. He previously pleaded guilty to a state murder charge that led to a separate sentence of life without parole. On Monday, Vallum begged forgiveness from Williamson's family and friends, though none of them were present—only a few reporters, the judge, and Vallum's father and stepmother. "Every day, I live with the guilt and regret of my actions," Vallum said. "If I could bring back Mercedes by giving up my life, I would gladly do so." |
The mother of a black child who was featured in a controversial H&M ad for a hoodie that read, “Coolest Monkey in the Jungle,” said that people calling it racially insensitive need to “get over it.”
In a series of since-deleted Facebook posts, the mom, Terry Mango, of Stockholm, Sweden, said she didn’t support the backlash over the ad — which even prompted The Weeknd to end his partnership with the brand.
“Am the mum and this is one of hundreds of outfits my son has modelled,” Mango wrote. “Stop crying wolf all the time, unnecessary issue here … get over it.”
Mango continued: “If I bought that jumper and put it on him and posted it on my pages, would that make me racist? I get pples opinion, but they are not mine.”
In another message, Mango said she had been to all of her son’s modeling shoots and was with him when he modeled the hoodie in question.
“Everyone is entitled to their opinion about this,” Mango wrote. “ … I really don’t understand but not coz am choosing not to but because it’s not my way of thinking, sorry.”
H&M apologized for the ad on Monday.
“We’re deeply sorry that the picture was taken, and we also regret the actual print,” the company said in a statement. “Therefore, we’ve not only removed the image from our channels, but also the garment from our product offering.”
The statement continued: “It’s obvious that our routines haven’t been followed properly. This is without any doubt. We’ll thoroughly investigate why this happened to prevent this type of mistake from happening again.”
NBA megastar LeBron James and Manchester United forward Romelu Lukaku are among the many who spoke out against the ad.
“We as African Americans will always have to break barriers, prove people wrong and work even harder to prove we belong but guess what, that’s what we love because the benefits at the end of the road are so beautiful!” James wrote in a post showing the boy wearing a crown accompanied by the words “King of the World.” ||||| The parents of the young black model who posed in a H&M hoodie with the word “monkey” on it say they don’t believe the photograph was intended to be racist.
The image of five-year-old Liam Mango, a Swedish child model, wearing a green hoodie that reads “Coolest Monkey in the Jungle” went viral last week and caused outrage, with the likes of The Weeknd, Diddy and LeBron James criticizing H&M for the seemingly tone-deaf campaign and social media users deeming it racist. H&M has since apologized for using the photograph.
On Monday, Liam’s parents, Terry Mango and Frank Odhiambo, addressed the controversy on the U.K.’s This Morning program on ITV.
“I wouldn’t see such a connection to anything other than my son modeling a shirt,” said Mrs. Mango, speaking about the racial connotations of the advertisement. “With the furore going on, you look back and wonder, if you had noticed it, what would be my initial response to it?”
Mango went on to say that she doesn’t feel the controversy is an overreaction, however, and supported people speaking out about racism—though she doesn’t necessarily share the same opinion in this instance.
“Everybody should act differently based on their opinions of what racism is,” said the boy’s mother. “I know what racism is—I’ve had racist remarks directed to me. I’ve been called ‘monkey’ on a cruise ship and my reaction is the same as the world is reacting right now.”
But, said Mango, “To put the T-shirt and the word ‘monkey’ with racism, maybe that is not my way of looking at it. I’m just looking at Liam, a black, young boy, modeling a T-shirt that has ‘monkey’ on it. I think everyone should respect different opinions on racism.”
Young Liam’s parents say their son loves modeling and was contracted to the H&M campaign through a modeling agency in Stockholm. Mango or Odhiambo usually accompany Liam to his shoots and told the program they did not recall Liam posing in the hoodie in question until the image surfaced online and caused uproar last week.
Odhiambo said he worried about his family’s safety after the story received worldwide press attention. “It’s very important that people should understand we have a son, we have other children in the home, and we have an obligation to protect our children,” said the boy’s father.
The boy’s mother said young Liam isn’t aware of the racism controversy surrounding the image but understood that he had gained some infamy. “He’s aware he’s a superstar. He’s seen images online. He believes people love him for his modeling job, and he’s cool, and [for] his confidence in his job,” said Mango. ||||| Surely the year of Sociopathic Baby Men, 2017 was also the year of pathetic apologies. From random Jay-Z quotes to omitting the actual words “I’m sorry” and implying sexual harassment is fun, misogynistic men (and their lawyers) demonstrated a profound inability to discern between self-absorption and remorse.
And as 2018 began, it appeared the trend would continue. On Jan. 8, H&M came under fire after a product shot on the Swedish fast-fashion brand’s UK site used a black child to sell a hoodie that says “coolest monkey in the jungle.”
As Marc Bain explained in Quartz, the image was seen as disgracefully racist. Singer and songwriter The Weeknd, who has collaborated with H&M on a fashion line tweeted that he was “shocked and embarrassed” will no longer work with the company. Drummer and producer Questlove used an Instagram post to write, “all this tells me about @HM is that the seats in the boardroom lack something…wanna take a guess?” Others questioned whether the advertisement was an embarrassing instance of cultural ignorance, given how the racial history of Sweden differs from that of the US.
H&M says sorry, round one
Responding to the internet’s rage, H&M swiftly apologized—kind of.
“We sincerely apologize for offending people with this image of a printed hooded top,” H&M’s PR representative said in a statement sent to Bain. “The image has been removed from all online channels and the product will not be for sale in the United States.”
Many people were not satisfied with this apology—with good reason. The hoodie was still being sold on its UK site, Business Insider reported. What’s more, this initial apology commits one of the most egregious apology errors: Instead of sincerely apologizing for creating and promoting an offensive product, H&M apologized for “offending people with this image.” The subtle difference between saying “I’m sorry for what I did” and “I’m sorry if you feel badly” is profound.
As Nicole McCance, a Toronto-based relationship psychologist who works with couples and families, tells Quartz, “Even if they’re well intentioned, saying phrases like ‘I’m sorry if you feel like I was mean’ or ‘I’m sorry if you feel angry,’ will not work because they minimize the other person’s feelings and experience.”
Instead, McCance advises following “I’m sorry” with genuine expressions of remorse, and phrases like “I can imagine you’re so disappointed.” Most important, make sure “I’m sorry” includes clear and specific examples of what, exactly, you are sorry for.
“Saying ‘I’m sorry’ alone is fairly empty. It’s just a hollow statement that doesn’t do much for the giver or the receiver of the apology,” Joanne Lescher, a certified non-violent communication facilitator, tells Quartz. “If you are really sorry, maybe it’s because you regret your actions or words, because you’ve seen how whatever you said or did impacted the other person. So you should continue your apology by saying something like, ‘I regret that I said X because I see how deeply it impacted you, and how hurt you are by my words, and that wasn’t my intention.” Apologizing with your regret is deeper and richer than “I’m sorry,” because it shows that you see how much you hurt the other person, she says.
While removing the hoodie from the US site is a step in the right direction, H&M’s first apology essentially equates to: “Ugh, we’ll take it down, but we don’t regret it.”
H&M says sorry, round two
No statement can reverse H&M’s ill-informed advertisement. However, as public figures and companies continue to issue flailing, seemingly fake remorse, the progress H&M demonstrated in their second apology is worth learning from.
Yesterday (Jan. 10), H&M sent that longer apology to its media list, opening with the stark statement: “Our position is simple and unequivocal—we have got this wrong and we are deeply sorry.” After explaining its full commitment to addressing societal issues such as diversity and environmental protection, H&M admitted “we clearly haven’t come far enough. We agree with all the criticism that this has generated—we have got this wrong and we agree that, even if unintentional, passive or casual racism needs to be eradicated wherever it exists.”
This second pass, which can be read in full below, models the most essential element of an apology: taking full responsibility for your actions, and not attempting to justify the ways in which your wrongs may have been right. “First and foremost, it’s really important to avoid explaining the reasons behind what you did,” McCance tells Quartz. “There are always reasons behind behavior, but laying out these reasons can come across as excuses. If you do this, the other person will feel like you aren’t sincere and don’t get it.”
H&M also put action behind their words, removing the hoodie from sale everywhere and committing to recycling the remaining stock. “If the apology doesn’t have that following piece of ‘what I want to do differently,’ then the person may not ever change their behavior,” Lescher says. “Until you take responsibility for your behavior, and create a plan of action on how to improve, most of us fall back into old patterns.”
H&M’s second apology, in full
To all customers, staff, media, stakeholders, partners, suppliers, friends and critics.
We would like to put on record our position in relation to the image and promotion of a children’s sweater, and the ensuing response and criticism.
Our position is simple and unequivocal—we have got this wrong and we are deeply sorry.
H&M is fully committed to playing its part in addressing society’s issues and problems, whether it’s diversity, working conditions or environmental protection—and many others. Our standards are high and we feel that we have made real progress over the years in playing our part in promoting diversity and inclusion. But we clearly haven’t come far enough.
We agree with all the criticism that this has generated—we have got this wrong and we agree that, even if unintentional, passive or casual racism needs to be eradicated wherever it exists. We appreciate the support of those who have seen that our product and promotion were not intended to cause offence but, as a global brand, we have a responsibility to be aware of and attuned to all racial and cultural sensitivities—and we have not lived up to this responsibility this time.
This incident is accidental in nature, but this doesn’t mean we don’t take it extremely seriously or understand the upset and discomfort it has caused.
We have taken down the image and we have removed the garment in question from sale. It will be recycled.
We will now be doing everything we possibly can to prevent this from happening again in future.
Racism and bias in any shape or form, conscious or unconscious, deliberate or accidental, are simply unacceptable and need to be eradicated from society. In this instance we have not been sensitive enough to this agenda.
Please accept our humble apologies.
Read next: This is how to apologize like you really mean it ||||| The parents of the boy at the centre of the “racist” H&M hoodie storm have spoken out about the huge reaction the clothing brand as well as the family have received.
Liam Mango was pictured in a hoodie on the H&M website which read ‘coolest monkey in the jungle.’
However after the image was posted online, the company faced a huge backlash, with members of the public calling the decision to use a black child to model the hoodie “racist” and “unacceptable.”
H&M swiftly apologised and Liam’s parents have now revealed they never saw the hoodie the same way as many members of the public.
Speaking on This Morning from Stockholm, Sweden, mother Terry and father Frank explained they didn’t even know about the hoodie before the internet erupted.
But Terry said even if she’d seen the slogan before, she doesn’t think that would have rung alarm bells for her.
“I wouldn’t see such a connection to anything other than my son modelling a shirt,” Terry explained.
“Until the controversy now, with the whole furore that is going on, then you kind of look back and wonder if you had noticed it, what would be our, or my, initial response to it.”
But Terry explained she doesn’t believe the furore has necessarily been unjust.
“It is not an overreaction when it comes to racism, everyone should act differently based on their opinions of what racism is,” she said, explaining that she’s faced racism and even been called a ‘monkey’ herself.
“To put the T-shirt and the word ‘monkey’ with racism, maybe that is not my way of looking at it,” Terry added.
“I’m just looking at Liam, a black young boy, modeling a T-shirt that has the word ‘monkey’ on it.
“Everybody should respect different opinions based on racism.”
(This Morning)
The family have had to move out of their home, and Frank explained that they no longer have their “normal family life.”
“As much as people have gotten involved in this, for me it’s very important that people understand that me and Teresa, we have a son, we have other children in the home that we are raising, and we have an obligation to protect our children,” he said.
And the parents added that Liam doesn’t really understand the big fuss around him
“He’s aware he’s a superstar and people love him,” Terry said. ||||| Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Terry Mango: "Does the shirt, to me, speak racism? No it doesn't"
The mother of the five-year-old H&M model caught up in a racism row has told the BBC her family has moved house in Sweden "for security reasons."
Last week, photos of Liam Mango modelling a "coolest monkey in the jungle" hoodie went viral, with social media users accusing H&M of racism.
Many were angered when Liam's mother Terry Mango defended the brand and told people to stop "crying wolf."
In South Africa, protesters vandalised H&M stores over the photos.
Despite the backlash she has faced, Terry Mango still doesn't believe H&M had a racist agenda.
"I respect other people's opinion on the issue. I know racism exists, but does the shirt to me speak racism? No it doesn't," she told BBC Outside Source.
Though Mrs Mango has been a victim of racism and acknowledges it's a huge problem, she's been attacked by other black people for not condemning H&M.
"I [am] a sell out to them, I [am] an embarrassment to the black and African-American people. I sold my son for money," she told BBC Outside Source.
The family have moved out of their house in Stockholm following "security concerns" Mrs Mango added.
Though she did not elaborate on the safety reasons, Mrs Mango said the attacks on H&M stores in and around Johannesburg were one reason for the move.
The protests, which took place on Saturday, were organised by the radical Economic Freedom Fighters' party (EFF).
Video footage showed protesters trashing displays, kicking over clothes rails and shoving mannequins while police used rubber bullets to disperse them.
Theirs was not the only protest.
Amid calls for a global boycott of H&M, musicians The Weeknd and G-Eazy have cut ties with the company, with the former saying the advert made him feel "shocked and embarrassed".
Despite the furore, Liam Mango remains oblivious.
"He has no idea what's going on, he's only five... Liam has not experienced [racism yet]," Mrs Mango said. "I just want him to have innocence." | – Controversy keeps swirling around H&M and an online ad that showed a young black boy in a hoodie with the words "Coolest Monkey in the Jungle." The ad has since been removed, but the family of 5-year-old Liam Mango, the ad's model, now says they had to move out of their home in Sweden for "security reasons," Liam's mom, Terry Mango, tells the BBC. Mango didn't get too much into those reasons for vacating their Stockholm residence, but she did mention violent protests in South African H&M stores as a factor. Mango has come under fire herself for her reaction to the ad: The New York Post reports on a series of now-deleted Facebook posts in which she said she didn't think the ad was racist and told people to stop "crying wolf" over this "unnecessary issue" and to "get over it." She elaborated to the BBC that "I know racism exists, but does the shirt to me speak racism? No it doesn't." Mango and Liam's dad, Frank Odhiambo, appeared on a Swedish morning show this week, where Mango says she was once called a monkey herself on a cruise ship and understands why some might be upset about the ad, per Newsweek. Odhiambo says they had to move because they "have an obligation to protect our children," the Independent reports. The one person kept out of the fray so far: little Liam himself. "He has no idea what's going on, he's only 5," Mango tells the BBC, adding that he "has not experienced [racism yet]." Meanwhile, H&M, which was criticized for its first brief apology, has issued a second, lengthier one, per Quartz. "We agree with all the criticism that this has generated—we have got this wrong and we agree that, even if unintentional, passive or casual racism needs to be eradicated wherever it exists," it reads. |
Rookie is an online magazine and book series for teenagers. Each month, a different editorial theme drives the writing, photography, and artwork that we publish. Learn more about us here , and find out how to submit your work here !
“Whoa, impressive taste for a teen-girl mag!”
This comment, in one form or another, often gets directed at us on Twitter, especially on Friday nights, right after we post our weekly playlists. It’s also something I hear a lot in real life when I tell people—especially grown men—who I write for. “Wow!” they’ll say. “Good work, ladies!” Their surprise might be based on our staff’s working knowledge of punk rock history (yes, we know who the Wipers are) or on the fact that Rookie’s articles are actually thoughtful and well written, but it’s always condescending and insulting, and never itself much of a surprise.
I know I’m coming dangerously close to generalizing about ALL men in the exact same way I’m complaining that SOME men generalize about young women. There are, of course, many male critics who celebrate teen-girl fandom and our voices as cultural consumers and analysts and don’t roll their eyes when we gush about 1D or whatever. Thank you for that, dudes. But because men have more power across the board than women in our culture, they get the message, from birth, that their opinions about things are the Most Important Opinions. Whether they choose to believe this is up to them, but rejecting it is a lot harder than sitting back and enjoying it.
So I can hardly blame the many, many adult males who seem to have this cute assumption that all girls are dying for their approval of our cultural tastes, though we never actually asked for it. And I guess it’s kind of understandable that they might assume we have shitty taste—but I still don’t totally understand their need to vocally criticize us for liking the things we like. When Tavi posted a link to an excerpt of her Taylor Swift piece for The Believer, a highly detailed and laborious work of pure love for Swift’s music, a male cartoonist called her out for liking what sounded to him like “the soundtrack to getting a froyo and then stopping at Target for a new pair of Crocs.” Not that she asked him!
When I wrote a long piece for Buzzfeed about discovering Animal Collective and falling in love with them as a 12-year-old girl, dudes in the comments section made fun of my musical taste! Apparently my enthusiasm and knowledge meant nothing, because this band’s music wasn’t on the sacred list of Music Men Approve Of. And that’s just one example in a long history of criticisms lobbed against me and my apparent TEEN TASTES! Once, I was talking to an older male friend about the brilliance of Mean Girls, and he kept dismissing it as an airheaded comedy “for teens.” Obviously, he hadn’t seen it, because I think we all know that Mean Girls is a classic for people of any age. It wasn’t until I told him that the movie was written by Tina Fey that he seemed willing to reconsider his first reaction. Because 30 Rock is cool, but young women are NOT.
When you applaud or critique a young girl’s taste based on how well or badly it aligns with yours, you are suggesting that your taste = THE RIGHT TASTE, because you are the one IN THE KNOW. I sometimes rate movies on the website Mubi, and I can’t count the number of times an older male cinephile has urged me to rewatch a film I’ve given a low score to, because obviously I “didn’t understand it” the first time around. “How do you even know about this?” they sometimes ask. “You weren’t even born when this movie came out.” Dude: I have the internet.
This kind of cultural superiority complex extends to the makers of culture as well. For evidence, look at almost any piece written by a grown man about a young female artist. Here’s one: When Jody Rosen wrote about T. Swift for New York magazine, rather than ask this funny, smart, world-famous young pop star anything interesting about her work or her views on the world, he pitted her G-rated pop against Beyoncé’s and Rihanna’s more risqué work and let us know that Swift has never “writhed across a stage wearing a negligee, or less.” Rosen found Swift “witty,” “despite her public persona.” Because, what, cute girls can’t be funny? He marveled at the mostly female crowd at her concert for a full paragraph, but was careful to point out that there were “creepy dudes from Oklahoma” among the screaming young females, to illustrate…what? That Swift is so versatile that she appeals to both (a) females and (b) male creeps? The whole piece came across as the work of someone deeply out of their element. I mean, he described the male gaze as an “old feminist bugbear.” Why is this the person who was assigned to the Taylor Swift story?
Following the U.S. premiere of Chris Lilley’s television show Ja’mie: Private School Girl, which has Lilley playing a highly exaggerated mean-girl archetype, several think pieces popped up to criticize not the show itself (even though there was plenty to legitimately criticize, as a few smart writers did), but rather…the sorry state of REAL YOUNG WOMEN in the world. In one such article on The Atlantic’s website, Jake Flanagin took a look at a work of over-the-top campy fiction and posed, in all apparent sincerity, this question (about real people!): “Why are young women turning into monsters?” I repeat: monsters. Ooh, scary! I’m sure we’re a big threat to straight white men who write for magazines like The Atlantic, what with all our dangerous selfies and Snapchats and sexts. Flanagin went on to wonder whether the average viewer was smart enough to tell that the show is satire: “Presumably, Lilley poses this array of amusing insecurities and prejudices as a critical device, not face-value comedy,” he sniffed. “But it’s difficult to say whether the audience can discern the difference.”
As a member of that audience and a teenage girl (aka future monster), I’d like to ease his fears, at least on that last point: Teenage girls know that Ja’mie: Private School Girl is satire; it’s by Chris Lilley, for god’s sake. Have you ever met a teenage girl, Jake? We don’t act like Ja’mie. Just like how you, a guy in his 20s, don’t act like Van Wilder. Or so I assume (insert a thousand winks here).
I know I have a vested interest in this whole thing because I’m an aspiring cultural critic and a current young woman, but I think I speak for all girls and women between the ages of 13 and 19 when I say that grown-up male journalists are probably not the best choice to assign stories about teen-girl culture to (keeping in mind those aforementioned exceptions). What they come up with, too much of the time, is a lot of off-base and frankly clueless speculation about what girls think, what we do, what we want, and what we need.
It’s not these dudes’ fault that they believe they know everything. They were raised that way. But they really don’t know much about us at all. Here’s a tip for them: Next time you’re musing as to what girls are all about, try to shut up and listen. ♦ ||||| High schooler and creator of online magazine Rookie, Tavi Gevinson is busy fashioning a DIY media empire that speaks to teens.
Column One Tavi Gevinson rockets from Rookie to teen pop-culture heights High schooler and creator of online magazine Rookie, Tavi Gevinson is busy fashioning a DIY media empire that speaks to teens.
In her Beatlemania schoolgirl outfit — gray miniskirt, knee-highs and electric-blue suede shoes — Tavi Gevinson looks like any other fashion-obsessed teen as she wanders the crowded aisles of Los Angeles' American Rag Cie.
"I can't afford, like, anything here on my allowance," the 17-year-old says, scanning the store's horizon for any gems she might have missed.
She pulls out her iPhone and responds to a text.
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"My dad, he'll be here in about half an hour to pick me up," she says, heading toward a carousel rack of vintage-image postcards — "the one thing I actually can afford!"
Gevinson is decisive as she plucks out certain moody postcards and quickly discards others. When the wobbly rack catches on the carpet and fails to turn, the petite Gevinson lifts the metal display and firmly plants it a few inches away, where it swirls freely.
"There" she says sweetly. "I'll take these four." After paying, Gevinson tucks the cards away in her floral backpack. "Now, what were we talking about again?"
One can forgive the high school senior for being a bit distracted. After flying in from Chicago, she was up late the night before finishing an essay. But the assignment wasn't for school. It was the editor's letter for Rookie, the online pop-culture magazine she started when she was 15; now she oversees a staff of about 80. There was also a photo shoot this morning, followed by a meeting with her agent and then another whirlwind shopping trip in Hollywood.
She will appear at Skylight Books later to sign copies of "Rookie Yearbook Two," an annual print anthology of Rookie's best online writing paired with original content from the likes of Lena Dunham, Mindy Kaling, Judy Blume and singer-songwriter Grimes. The store expects an adoring mob of teenage fans for Gevinson, called "the future of journalism" by no less than Lady Gaga.
Part Tina Brown, part Dorothy Parker, the quick-witted Gevinson has the ear — and Tumblr accounts — of a new generation of young women. Not to mention the eye of the media, the fashion world and, lately, Hollywood filmmakers.
She was just 11 when she started the Style Rookie fashion blog out of her Oak Park, Ill., bedroom. Soon she was sitting on the front lines of New York's Fashion Week. Fast-forward to 2013: appearances on "Late Night With Jimmy Fallon" and "The Colbert Report," international speaking engagements and a role in the film "Enough Said" opposite Julia Louis-Dreyfus.
With more than 4 million page views a month, Rookie is emerging as a DIY multiplatform media empire of sorts for Girl America.
The goal has become to make people feel included, that they're cool enough or smart enough.” — Tavi Gevinson Share this quote
"I'd felt like there wasn't a publication for teenagers that was respected. Or that I, myself, or my friends could really relate to," Gevinson says, settling into a booth at the cafe next door to American Rag, her creamy skin, crimson lipstick and blond bob giving her something of a "Ghost World"-era Scarlett Johansson quality. She slurps her lemonade.
"One thing I'm very proud of is that Rookie has a lot of legitimacy in publishing and music journalism and fashion. As it's grown, the goal has become more to make people feel included, that they're cool enough or smart enough."
Rookie beginnings
The original Style Rookie blog impressed journalist Anaheed Alani so much she offered unsolicited help.
"She emailed me and said: 'I work at the New York Times, and I will quit my job to help you,'" Gevinson says. "It was clear we were on the same wavelength. She's now second in command and my partner in a lot of ways."
Alani, 43, now Rookie's editorial director, has no issues working for a teenage boss.
"Tavi's one of the best bosses I've had," Alani says. "My rule for bosses and therapists is they have to be smarter than I am — and Tavi completely fits that bill."
An instant success when it launched in late 2011, Rookie now boasts jewelry and makeup ads and hosts in-person Rookie events in cities across the country, such as an Urban Outfitters-sponsored road trip last year that included crown-making workshops — Gevinson feels her now-signature floral crowns show "a pride in one's girliness."
In addition to material from the site, the Rookie yearbooks feature exclusive interviews with major pop cultural figures such as Morrissey, Chris Ware and Emma Watson; they're juxtaposed against personal essays by teens on universal issues such as sex, racism, friendship and feminism.
Boiled down, Gevinson's message might be "embrace yourself" — and it seems to be resonating.
"She's really, really popular with L.A. girls," says 16-year-old Xulani Akel, a sophomore at Los Angeles Center for Enriched Studies. "It's so amazing that she's so young and so successful. I'm worried about getting, like, one B, and she has this whole company thing that she's doing and that she really enjoys. That sets the bar really high!"
Fans at a bookstore
Skylight Books is filling up. The teen girls filter in, some wearing brightly colored floral headbands, others in swingy skirts and glittering prom crowns. Most carry a certain dog-eared book tucked under their arms as they swing between intensely focused and bubbling over with excitement.
Like a religious pilgrimage, many come bearing gifts cradled in their arms for Gevinson, who at the moment sits in the store's office loft, overlooking the main floor. Chitchatting with the two Rookie contributors who will be reading with her tonight, Gevinson looks very much her age.
"This'll be fun. Who wants to go first?" she asks them, as if the event were an impromptu school talent show.
Moments later, however, when Gevinson takes the podium before a now settled-in crowd of about 150 rapt girls, she is preternaturally poised as she faces the crowd. She holds her iPhone out in front of her with two hands, as if it were stiff essay paper, and reads off the screen in an adult, measured tone.
How is she able to ingest so much pop culture daily, interview her heroes, blog prolifically, write essays for Rookie and oversee her staff — all while attending high school? It's simple time management, she says earlier in the day, at the cafe on La Brea Avenue.
Gevinson spends nearly every sliver of downtime listening to podcasts or music — most recently Lorde, Taylor Swift and Kanye West — while walking to school, for example, or watching old episodes of "Freaks and Geeks" and "My So-Called Life" at night. Study hall, she says, is a perfect time to read other books she finds more relevant in the long run, like "Girl Power" by Marisa Meltzer.
Such efficiency, however, is not without sacrifice.
"There are compromises," Gevinson says. "Like there have been times when my grades have suffered or I can't visit my boyfriend when I'd like to because I have a number of interviews that day. But it's worth it."
Still, Gevinson's parents have made sure to keep her life "full of normal teenage stuff," says her father, Steve. She attends the local public high school and recently got an allowance increase. She doesn't yet earn a salary from Rookie — though that may change soon, he says, as the site becomes more profitable — and speaking engagement fees go into her savings. The total sum of her liquid assets from day to day is her allowance: $25 a week.
She left the room and I said, 'I want her.'” — "Enough Said" director Nicole Holofcener Share this quote
"It's a nice little fiction that we're living out because she has this bank account," he says. "But she likes living that way. We like her living that way."
Like many proud "pop culture nerds," Gevinson has a not-so-subtle obsessive streak. She might get up at 3 a.m. to rearrange all her books, she says, and not only journals her life's every happening, from monumental to mundane, but also "curates" her peripheral pop culture experiences to match her moods.
"Sophomore year I had my heart broken by a boy. I loved the feeling of heartbreak with dressing in nightgowns from the '70s, lighting candles and listening to Heart and Carole King," she says. "I documented it all. It's like making a bunch of little movies. It makes me feel like I'm in control and everything has a place in the world."
These days, Gevinson's mood is often a mix of excitement and trepidation. She's awaiting graduation in May and has applied to New York University, Barnard, Brown and Wesleyan — though she'd like to take a year off first to live in New York and focus on Rookie as well as other creative ventures, such as acting.
"Enough Said" director Nicole Holofcener has no trouble envisioning Gevinson as a movie star.
"Tavi walked in [to auditions], this little lovely thing, an angel with red lips and pink cheeks," Holofcener says. "She was maybe more nervous than someone who's been in a million films, but that nervousness was so natural and vulnerable and sweet. She left the room and I said, 'I want her.'"
How does all this high-profile success translate in the halls, on an everyday basis, at school in suburban Illinois?
Stirring the straw in her lemonade, Gevinson plays down her success, insisting that most kids at her school are either unaware of her growing fame or they don't particularly care.
Suddenly, three eager heads poke out of a nearby booth, their hands waving furiously at Gevinson. "Hi, Tavi!" they squeal in unison. "We love you."
Gevinson shrugs and breaks into a little-girl smile herself, giggling at the absurdity. "Oh, I guess they recognize me," she says.
On her way out of the cafe, Gevinson pauses at the door.
"I just hate 'voice of a generation' stuff," she says, balking at the suggestion. "You put someone on a pedestal and of course they can't represent all of feminism or all people their age or whatever."
And with that, Gevinson scurries out to the parking lot to meet her dad, her books and notes for the evening's reading bundled in her arms.
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Follow Deborah Vankin(@debvankin) on Twitter
Follow @latgreatreads on Twitter ||||| Rookie is an online magazine and book series for teenagers. Each month, a different editorial theme drives the writing, photography, and artwork that we publish. Learn more about us here , and find out how to submit your work here !
When the movie Shallow Hal came out in theaters, I didn’t know how to articulate why I didn’t find it as funny as my friends did. Why I, 11 years old in a baggy T-shirt and squeezed into my cinema seat, wanted to hide, while everyone around me guffawed at the onscreen hijinks. But now I know: That was the first time I looked at a movie screen and saw an image that looked like me. And that image fucking sucked.
For those of you who haven’t seen it, let me save you the pain: Shallow Hal is about a guy called Hal who falls in love with Rosemary, a fat woman played by Gwyneth Paltrow in a fat suit. The “joke” is that Hal has been hypnotized to see Rosemary as thin, but everyone else knows her true size. She breaks every chair she sits on and her cannonballs empty a swimming pool (LOLOLOL fat people, amirite? Why do they even bother leaving the house!), but he thinks she’s hot. When Hal finally sees her as she really is, he becomes a better man and learns not to judge people on appearances—because he fell in love with a fat girl he thought was thin and therefore learned that fat people actually have brains and hearts and feelings and personalities! What a hero!
The reactions Gwyneth’s character got from people (aside from Hal) were very familiar to me. I’ve gotten the same reactions all my life: at the pool or at the food court or in the school gym or on a plane when I, too, had the gall to be FIP (fat in public). This movie, though not deep or heartfelt, also touches on something that is very real for a lot of fat girls: the idea that a thin, pretty version of yourself exists underneath your fat, and if you only bothered to excavate her, you might be happy/loved/successful. I call this the “but you’ve got such a pretty face” syndrome, based on comments I’ve heard my entire life—from relatives, from movies, from TV—that say in no uncertain terms, “You’re not good enough now, but with a little work, you could be.”
We (people, women, Rookie) talk a lot about media representations of women and how they affect the lives of real, nonfamous women and girls. We celebrate Beyoncé’s power and her unapologetic, take-no-prisoners attitude (in her life and her art) and the messages these things send to young girls. We talk about the pressure that unrealistic beauty ideals in magazines and other mass media puts on girls, and how that affects their self-esteem. But it’s harder to talk about the way fat women are represented on TV and in film, and how these representations affect fat women (like me) IRL, because there are so few examples of our being seen as anything besides walking, talking truffle-shuffle jokes. It’s hard to work out how to do something properly when it’s so rarely been done at all. And it’s really, really hard to be OK with your body when you’re constantly being reminded that it’s something for other people to laugh at.
The “pretty face” message was stunningly, heartbreakingly brought to the screen in episode two of the British TV series My Mad Fat Diary, one of very few shows on the air ever that have featured an authentic and multidimensional fat female character. In this episode, that character, Rae Earl, a 16-year-old girl, has just been released from a psychiatric hospital following a suicide attempt. We see her get into an argument with her best friend Chloe (who is thin, conventionally beautiful, and outgoing), then we see her weigh herself and hear bits from her diary in voiceover: “I am a body dysmorphic, without the dysmorphic. I am bulimic without the sick. I am fat.” What follows is a dream sequence in which Rae lowers a zipper that runs down her back and sheds her “fat self,” revealing a curvy lingerie model underneath. She drags her flabby shell down the stairs, takes it into the backyard, and sets it on fire.
I followed Rae’s story obsessively throughout the show’s first season, because I saw so many memories in it of my own teenage years. When Rae lies down on the grass near the boy she likes, tugs at her T-shirt, and positions her hands across her stomach in a subtle attempt to hide its size, I replay in my mind scenes of myself doing those exact same things. When Rae struggles to find a swimsuit to wear to a pool party, I’m transported back to tear-filled changing rooms, where I relive my terror at the thought of anyone from school seeing me without my clothes on.
But Rae is more than her insecurities and issues. She loves music and tells jokes. She’s a supportive friend and occasionally acts out as a bratty teenager. To me, Rae is a wonderful fat female character because her weight is important to her back story, but it’s never more important than her obsessive love of Madchester bands or her kind, sensitive personality. She makes us laugh by telling jokes, not by eating, struggling to walk, falling over, breaking chairs, or doing other Fat Person Things. She is Rae first, fat later.
In this, Rae is kind of the inverse of the roles Rebel Wilson has been playing lately. After appearing briefly (but memorably) in Bridesmaids (more on that movie later), Wilson went on to star in the a cappella comedy Pitch Perfect, in the dark comedy Bachelorette, and on her own TV series, Super Fun Night, which is on the air now. In those three roles, Wilson’s weight informs her character. Pitch Perfect’s Fat Amy hates exercise and, in the movie’s uplifting climax, tells the thin girls on her singing team that she loves them because they have “fat hearts.” Becky, Wilson’s character in Bachelorette, is a mope whose friends tread all over her and tear her wedding dress in half when two of them get inside it and express their jealous disbelief that she’s about to marry a handsome guy. Kimmie Boubier, Wilson’s character in Super Fun Night, is the butt of almost every joke (many of them about Spanx—I counted five in the first episode alone).
I wanted to love this show, just like I wanted to love Pitch Perfect (I did love Bachelorette, despite its characters’ awful treatment of Becky, because I find Adam Scott singing “I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles)” irresistible, and I love seeing Kirsten Dunst being a hot mess), but they both just left me feeling shortchanged—especially Super Fun Night. After all the years of crappy role models, I was so psyched to see an actress—who, like me, is a fat Australian girl obsessed with Salt-N-Pepa and improv comedy—make it to the top of the comedy world, where she could’ve pitched any show she wanted to. Imagine my disappointment when I saw her, Super Fun Night’s star and one of its writers and executive producers, telling the world to keep laughing at the miserable fat girl who loses the handsome love interest to her skinny rival. ||||| Rookie is an online magazine and book series for teenagers. Each month, a different editorial theme drives the writing, photography, and artwork that we publish. Learn more about us here , and find out how to submit your work here !
Rookie is no longer publishing new content , but we hope you'll continue to enjoy the archives , or books , and the community you've helped to create. Thank you for seven very special years! ✴
Although she had no music out at this time last year, by now Lorde requires no introduction. Seventeen years old, from New Zealand, with a richly hushed voice that she lays over minimal beats—you’ve heard all this. You’ve probably also heard her portrayed as some kind of alpha-Daria. According to one YouTube commenter (I SWEAR I WASN’T READING YOUTUBE COMMENTS, THIS ONE WAS ALREADY AT THE TOP OF THE PAGE), “She’s like that awkward-ass girl in the back of your class lol.” According to many of the writers who have profiled her, she’s the patron saint of Weird Girls Everywhere.
What these people don’t realize is that her reach goes far beyond a very hip sect on Tumblr. In fact, Lorde’s song “Royals” was #1 on the radio for nine weeks straight. Her debut album, Pure Heroine, got her four Grammy nominations. She is not niche. She is huge. But despite the commercial and critical success of her music, and the fact that she was signed to Universal at the age of 13, Lorde is continually portrayed as an underdog. Adult journalists tend to see only “edgy”-looking outsiders in the backs of classrooms identifying with her music, and totally miss the fact that hordes of snapchatting normies understand her, too, and vice versa. This is not only because they tend to underestimate Lorde’s ability to appeal to the masses. They also underestimate the capacity of “normal” teenagers to appreciate thoughtful, unflashy music.
Sure, Lorde dresses like a witch and drips with sarcasm in interviews. Her best-known song denounces the materialism that other artists show off, and other ones say things like, “I’ll let you in on something big: I’m not a white-teeth teen.” But they also declare, “I’m little, but I’m coming for the crown. I’m little, but I’m coming for the title held by everyone who’s up.” And “We’re bigger than we ever dreamed, and I’m in love with being queen.” And “I’m doing this for the thrill of it, killing it, never not chasing the million things I want. And I am only as young as the minute is, full of it, getting pumped up on the little bright things I bought.” Do not for one second mistake her stoicism for self-deprecation, or think it’s only goth girls who relate.
The album is a delightful cluster of such contradictions: Lorde is content with the world she’s created for herself but eager to make waves in the one outside. Bored by the suburbs but endlessly in love with them. Critical of the other songs on the radio but wondering if she’s any better (follow up a listen to “Royals” with “Still Sane”: “Only bad people live to see their likeness set in stone—what does that make me?”).
It’s also insanely beautiful. A thorough listen feels like driving with shadows shifting across your face, quiet and thoughtful, in a car full of rowdier friends. Lorde elevates her suburban experiences to the level of mythology, becoming an empress surrounded by hounds, marking underpasses as her territory. She fixates on blood and veins as well as on the simple wonder of connecting with someone and wanting to experience everything with them. You can tell by the sound of her haunting voice that she means every word, and that she knows she’s on the edge of erupting, as if to say: I’ve been taking notes and keeping secrets, and I want to share them with you now.
I met Ella (her given name) in October, after we’d both discovered via online interviews and social media that we shared a mutual admiration (she’s a Rookie!), so this interview got pretty conversational, but I liked that we could talk to each other as peers. We gave it a try on the night we met, but we were on a noisy restaurant rooftop and my recorder wasn’t working. (I was also nervous about meeting her and embarrassed when she called me out for humming “Royals” under my breath subconsciously.) (She was nice about it.) (It is a really catchy song.) She was generous enough to agree to a do-over last month, and we talked for over two hours on Skype. She addressed, among other things, the pervasive line that journalists dole out about her: “While I dress and talk somewhat differently from other people whose songs are in the Top 40, I feel like more people dress like me than the media makes out.” Instead of letting a few random sartorial choices narrow our expectations of music and music listeners, let us appreciate what Lorde’s popularity says about all sorts of people, which is the only way to describe her demographic. And let us see what she has to say for herself, right here.
TAVI: How does it feel to be home right now?
LORDE: It feels really good. I’m definitely not on holiday yet—I’ve been writing outlines for what I want to happen onstage for the tour and the next music video and this, like, big TV performance I’ve got coming up. It’s not work, per se, but—yeah, work.
I’m curious, because I love what I do, but it is also a job, and everyone at times doesn’t like their job. What do you do when it starts to feel too much like work?
Often I’m able to work on my own timeline—I’ll give myself enough time that if I don’t feel like doing something, I can wait and do it a few days later or whatever.
That’s good. I want to start out by saying that what I want to do with this is…I’m in a unique position in interviewing you because we’re the same age–
Holla.
And I feel like everything I read about you is like grown men writing—
Oh my god, that tweet you made where you were like, “She laces her Converse…” I was like, “This is so accurate!” There’s a definite viewpoint of the think piece by an adult writing about kids.
"She giggles, lacing her Chuck Taylors. She may be famous, but she's still just a kid." -end of every profile of a well-known young person — Tavi Gevinson (@tavitulle) November 4, 2013
It’s true! The end is always like, “She does [this childlike thing] but she also does [this adultlike thing]. Whoa!”
Mine is “She squeals…”
Yeah! That’s what I’d just read when I wrote that! Or, no, it was a profile of Saoirse Ronan where they were like, “Then she’s just a kid in her Keds…”
[Laughs] Yeah, so terrible.
So I just want this to be, like…a lot of our readers really relate to you, and I want this to be for them. Not music-journalism-y or about “the pop music landscape.”
Aw, yeah, yuck. Well, this is fun! ||||| The Wonder Years (1988–1993, ABC)
This series was set in the 1960s and aired in the 1980s, but I first watched it as reruns in the late ’90s, which I think proves that it is truly timeless. It follows Kevin Arnold, played by Fred Savage, as he navigates the transition from sixth grade to high school. Unlike shows that actually aired in the 1960s, The Wonder Years shows growing up in the suburbs for what it really is: underwhelming, haunting, and hilarious all at the same time. Kevin is obsessed with this girl named Winnie Cooper, who is the ultimate girl-next-door (and is played by the real-life math whiz Danica McKellar). Winnie is friendly and beautiful, yet smart and kinda elusive. Honestly, I wish this the show would have been about Winnie. She is my ultimate style icon (you can catch her sporting short bangs, cat-eye glasses, and overalls in the pilot episode alone). My parents both grew up in the ’60s and would always say really nostalgic stuff when we’d watch this together, and I’d be all, “Ugh, guys, shut up!” But now just thinking about the opening credits to this show makes me want to cry wistful tears. —Gabby
Seven Minutes in Heaven (1985)
In my experience, a lot of the movies you adored as a kid don’t really hold up when you revisit them five or 10 years later. But having recently watched this for the first time since the ’90s, I can say with utmost confidence that Seven Minutes in Heaven is ONE OF THE BEST TEEN MOVIES EVER. It’s a quiet, realistic depiction of the murky entanglements between best friends and first loves. A 15-year-old Jennifer Connelly plays the quiet, studious Natalie, who is smart but is still trying to figure people out. When her dad goes away to a conference, she immediately allows her best male friend, Jeff, to crash at her parentless place after he fights with his own stepdad. Their cohabitation is terribly innocent, though it’s clear that Jeff is hopelessly in love with Natalie. Many mortifying things happen—like when she accidentally walks in on him in the bathroom and realizes what shacking up truly means. Meanwhile, Natalie’s best friend Polly (played by the awesome Maddie Corman) is less interested in love and devotion than good old-fashioned s-e-x, especially after a random encounter with a pro baseball player (and underwear model). The dialogue is so sweet and realistic, with Jennifer Connelly constantly dropping jewels like, “Parents and kids always fight. It’s the way of the world.” I could live inside this movie. —Julianne
This Christmas (2007)
Named after Donny Hathaway’s classic song, This Christmas follows the Whitfield family as they reunite for the holidays for the first time in four years. Ma’Dere’s children return to her quiet home with a whole lot of skeletons jingling noisily in their closets—with the exception of Baby (played by a still sweet-faced Chris Brown). Quentin’s on the run, Claude has two major secrets, Melanie’s got a new boo, and there’s some turbulence between career-driven, single Kelli and married Lisa, whose husband, Malcolm, is rather shady. The Whitfield kids work through the difficulties within and among themselves, and the warm-fuzzies-inducing moral of the story is that the bonds of family, trust, and love are the most important things of all. A part of me watches this movie every year for the epic baby-oil, belt, and shower scene (it’s not what you think!) with Lisa and Malcolm. Another part of me watches for all the eye candy, including Lauren London, who plays Melanie. But mostly, each year I look forward to watching Baby’s golden rendition of Otis Redding’s “Try A Little Tenderness,” which is easily one of the most memorable moments in the film. —Nova
Angel (1999–2004, the WB)
Angel was born out of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Buffy fans know Angel as the vampire with a soul, which was the result of a gypsy curse. He feels crushing guilt for his days as Angelus, one of the most ruthless vampires in Europe, and to help alleviate it, he works with Buffy to fight the big BAD. They also fall in love, and when that relationship ends somewhat disastrously, he heads to demon-filled L.A. and opens Angel Investigations to continue fighting evil. I came to both Buffy and Angel late, checking them both out for the first time just last year. On the advice of my brother, I watched them in tandem, and while you’d probably get the most out of Angel that way because of the character crossover, it totally stands on its own. Two of my favorite characters are wholly original to Angel: Lorne, the demon lounge singer, and Fred, a physicist who was trapped in a demon dimension for five years (played by Amy Acker, one of my favorite actresses ever). All of the characters are multi-faceted—they’re dark and dramatic, as well as comedic. And that’s what I love most about Angel: Its premise, about finding redemption, is serious, but there are a lot of downright hilarious moments. It’s Joss Whedon doing what he does best! I really wish this show could have lasted forever, but at least it has eternal life on Netflix. —Stephanie
Jeux d’enfants (2003)
Jeux d’enfants aka Love Me If You Dare tells the tale of Julien (Guillaume Canet) and Sophie (Marion Cotillard), friends who begin a mischievous game of dares as children (Julien pees in the principal’s office!) that follows them into high school (Sophie wears a bra over a T-shirt during a class presentation!). As they become adults, it finally escalates into a sadistic competition that also is an excuse for them to stay connected to each other—possibly forever. If you’re a fan of unconventional love stories and the whimsy of movies like Amélie, put Jeux d’enfants in your queue immediately! You will either be charmed, irritated, or, hopefully, a little bit of both. Fun fact: Canet and Cotillard actually fell in love while making this movie and are still together today. —Marie
A Christmas Story (1983)
A Christmas Story will always be synonymous with the holidays for me because it’s been a favorite of my parents since they were young. I’ve watched it almost every winter for as far back as I can remember, and because its protagonist, a grade-schooler named Ralphie, is so hilarious, it never gets old. I’d watch as he groans about his father’s questionable taste in home decor (e.g. the iconic fishnet-clad lamp leg that is the center of one the movie’s plot lines), grimly dons a bunny suit gifted to him by a relative that thinks it’s just soooo cute, and, most crucially, pines for a BB gun (the gift he most wishes will appear beneath the tree) regardless of the season—although, of course, it’s best around this time of year. This movie is a perfect portrait of exactly what’s most exasperating AND most wonderful about being part of a family, which is why I love to watch it with my folks so much. See it with someone close to you, and “You’ll shoot your eye out!” will become a phrase that’s much warmer-feeling than it sounds. —Amy Rose
Torchwood (2006–2011, BBC; 2011, Starz)
I first found out about Torchwood while listening to a discussion panel about the show at San Diego Comic-Con. I had never seen an episode of this Doctor Who spin-off (Torchwood is an anagram of Doctor Who), so I didn’t understand what the hell anyone was talking about as storylines and character motives were being dissected by diehard fans and the show’s crew. All I knew was that John Barrowman, the only actor from the cast on the panel, was the most charismatic person I’d ever been in the same room with. Based entirely on this guy’s candor and amazing smile, I bought the two seasons of the show that were available at the time. The gamble paid off because Barrowman’s charm comes across in every scene he’s in. But it’s not just him: This whole sci-fi drama, about a group of people tracking down aliens on Earth, is just incredible. The Torchwood team, including the immortal Captain Jack Harkness (Barrowman) and new recruit Gwen (Eve Myles—who is just as captivating as Barrowman), deal with things like underground alien fight clubs, otherworldly technology that resurrects the dead, and cannibals. You get all of the mystery and adventure that make this genre so much fun, but the show is just as much about humanity and mortality as it is about extraterrestrials and the supernatural. In Torchwood: Miracle Day, the show’s fourth season, human death in the world stops, which causes all kinds of practical and philosophical problems. It’s pretty common these days for sci-fi shows and movies to have some sort of existential theme (you know, like using aliens to make a point about what it means to be human). But when characters on Torchwood confront things like death, which of course can be dramatic and entertaining, it’s done in a way that inspires genuine sympathy and introspection. —Amber
The NeverEnding Story (1984)
Sorry, I can’t see. My eyes are filling with tears…like every time I even think about this goddamn movie! The NeverEnding Story starts with a little boy, Bastian, who is being bullied at school. One day, he’s drawn to a mysterious book in a dark little shop; he swipes it behind the owner’s back, and then his adventure BEGINS. Squirrelled away in his school’s attic, he spends the day reading about a world called Fantasia where the borders are disappearing into a malevolent force called The Nothing. Fantasia’s ruler, the Childlike Empress, is ill because of The Nothing, and she summons the child warrior Atreyu to discover and banish the source of this danger. From the scenes of Bastian skipping school to read a book (MY FANTASY) to the wondrous characters—the beautiful and wise Childlike Empress, Falkor the flying dragon, and a giant bat that continually falls asleep—this film entranced me as a child. Throw in a magical amulet, the idea that every child (and their imagination) is important, and an amazing theme song (Limahl’s ’80s classic “The Neverending Story”), and you’ve got a film that will stick with me for life. —Estelle
Nirvana: MTV Unplugged in New York (1993, MTV; 2007, DVD release)
Most bands in the ’90s that went on MTV’s acoustic performance series, MTV Unplugged, did versions of their greatest hits, but not Nirvana. Aside from “Come As You Are” and “All Apologies,” the band went with their lesser known-material (they opened with “About a Girl,” which Kurt introduced by saying, “This is off our first record, most people don’t own it”) and an incredible selection of largely unknown cover songs (like the Meat Puppets’ “Lake of Fire”). The episode initially aired right around this time of year, and to me, a 14-year-old Nirvana fan, it was like a Christmas present from the band. It proved they could be just as powerful with all the distortion stripped away—and Krist Novoselic playing an accordion! Four months later, when Kurt Cobain committed suicide, MTV played the episode nonstop, and it became the performance that immortalized him. It feels strangely prescient, and the song choices (“Jesus Doesn’t Want Me for a Sunbeam” by the Vaselines, “The Man Who Sold the World” by David Bowie) and white stargazer lilies and black candles decorating the set are all eerie to take in now. But there are so many moments that are pure, beautiful Kurt, like when he forces a smile, chastises himself for screwing up a song, and jokes with his bandmates (“What are they tuning back there? A harp?”). My favorite songs are his solo version of the band’s “Pennyroyal Tea” and the cover of Lead Belly’s “Where Did You Sleep Last Night.” The moment during the last chorus, around 4:46 in this video, when he takes a deep breath and opens his eyes wide is EVERYTHING to me. —Stephanie
Home for the Holidays (1995)
Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday, so it makes sense that my favorite holiday movie is a Thanksgiving movie—one of a genre that clearly needs more love. Home for the Holidays, directed by Jodie Foster, stars Holly Hunter as a big-city art restorer who, yep, goes home to her parents’ house to eat some turkey just as her own life is falling apart: She gets fired from her job, her love life is nonexistent, and her teenage daughter (Claire Danes in full-on My So-Called Life mode) is planning to lose her virginity. Anne Bancroft, one of modern cinema’s sexiest women, plays Hunter’s mother in a chain-smoking, wig-wearing, decidedly unglamorous part. Robert Downey, Jr. is Hunter’s brother, and even though RDJ has said he barely remembers making the movie because he was so high during its filming, I still find his goofiness totally charming. The reason this movie is so good is because it feels wonderfully true to life. Are any of us ever really adults when we’re at our parents’ house? I don’t think so. There’s a romance in there, too, but that part doesn’t even matter—it’s all about being in the kitchen with your siblings at midnight, talking about how crazy your parents are, and gorging on leftovers. —Emma S
The Family Stone (2005)
This is one of my favorite holiday movies and maybe one of my favorite movies, period. It’s Christmas, and the grown Stone children are converging on their parents’ cozily decorated New England home, which you’ll probably wish you could live in or at least snoop around. Some of my favorite actors play the Stones: Diane Keaton is the matriarch, Craig T. Nelson is the dad, Luke Wilson is the slacker brother, Rachel McAdams is the cynical sis, and Dermot Mulroney is Everett, the Good-Looking One. Everett brings his new fiancée Meredith (played by Sarah Jessica Parker) home for the holidays, and let’s just say the Stones aren’t warming up to her. What follows is a story of awkward encounters, clashing ‘tudes, and general mayhem. The Family Stone is better than other films about crazy, family-oriented Christmas antics, though, because of the performances. The snark-levels are high with Wilson, McAdams, and Keaton’s characters, and they make great foils to Parker’s uptight Meredith. Not to mention the family dynamics in the movie are just straight-up real. Those weird political conversations that happen at every fucking holiday gathering? This movie hits that nail right on the head in a particularly cringe-worthy scene in which Meredith explains her feelings regarding homosexuality and what’s “normal” to the family’s gay son Thad and his partner, Patrick. In The Family Stone, Christmas isn’t sugarplums and fairies: it’s children getting older and the strain of family politics. Oh, and Claire Danes makes an appearance as Meredith’s charming younger sister! Just watch it, folks. —Hazel ♦ | – Tavi Gevinson became a fixture in the fashion world at age 11, thanks to her blog Style Rookie. Today, she's 17 and running Rookie, an online magazine delving into everything from pop culture to feminist issues to love to body image to celebrity interviews. Tavi and Rookie have come a long way since the magazine launched in 2011. Tavi now oversees an 80-person staff; the magazine's 43-year-old editorial director quit her job at the New York Times to come work for the teen. "My rule for bosses and therapists is they have to be smarter than I am—and Tavi completely fits that bill," Anaheed Alani tells the Los Angeles Times. Tavi also does book signings (Rookie puts out a print anthology of its best work, plus new content, each year), speaking engagements, and photo shoots; she's been interviewed by Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Fallon; she even had a role in the film Enough Said. But she's also a senior at a public high school in suburban Illinois who has to get by on a $25-a-week allowance. (She's not yet drawing a salary from Rookie, though it gets more than 4 million page views a month and features jewelry and makeup ads; her dad says she may start getting paid soon.) Of the magazine, she says, "The goal has become more to make people feel included, that they're cool enough or smart enough." The Times' full profile is worth a read. |
A judge has resigned over his conduct of a rape trial in the face of a blistering recommendation for his removal from a national disciplinary body.
Federal Court Justice Robin Camp had asked a complainant in a 2014 rape trial why she did not keep her knees together, and mocked the law of consent. At a hearing conducted last fall by a disciplinary panel established by the Canadian Judicial Council, the 19-year-old homeless complainant said Justice Camp’s comment made her hate herself and feel like a slut. After the panel unanimously recommended his removal, Justice Camp went to great lengths to save his job. He publicly apologized to the complainant and his fellow judges.
Justice minister on resignation of 'knees together’ judge (The Canadian Press)
He called his knees-together comment “unforgivable,” and acknowledged that he had perceived the complainant’s fragility. He attended in-depth counselling and education sessions with several feminist scholars, three of whom testified at his disciplinary hearing last fall (attended daily by his wife and daughter) that he was sincerely interested in changing.
Related: Before Justice Camp, these two judges were recommended for removal
Unfounded: Police dismiss 1 in 5 sexual assault claims as baseless, Globe investigation reveals
And he fought for an opportunity to appear in person before the larger body of judicial council members who considered the panel’s recommendation, to explain to them that he had acted out of “ignorance, not animus.”
The council would receive only written submissions from him.
By a vote of 19 to 4, the judicial council said in its ruling released on Thursday that the deep harm Justice Camp had done to public confidence made his dismissal necessary.
“We find that the Judge’s conduct, viewed in its totality and in light of all of its consequences, was so manifestly and profoundly destructive of the concept of impartiality, integrity and independence of the judicial role that public confidence is sufficiently undermined to render the Judge incapable of executing the judicial office,” the council said.
All four dissenters, who found Judge Camp guilty of misconduct but opposed his dismissal, are male, and from the Atlantic provinces (one is Chief Justice of the Tax Court of Canada).
Alice Woolley, the president of the Canadian Association for Legal Ethics and a law professor at the University of Calgary, who, along with three other professors, filed the first complaint against Justice Camp, said she is pleased with the outcome.
“I don’t think anything would have been served by carrying this on any further,” she said. “The denunciation was unequivocal. I think [resigning] was the admirable decision on his part and the right thing to do.”
Constance Backhouse, chair in sexual assault legislation at the University of Ottawa’s law school, said rape myths are still pervasive in the justice system and society.
“Our legal system still remains mired in 19th-century stereotypes about women, who are suspected of duplicity, promiscuity, malice, and false testimony,” she said. “And our legal thinking reflects the wider culture, which shares far too many of these notions. Until we get over the premise that it is women alone who are responsible for protecting themselves from rape, I suspect we will see more such trials and more protests demanding a woman’s right to sexual autonomy.”
The law of consent and the judiciary’s handling of sexual-assault trials continue to create controversy. In Nova Scotia, a judge acquitted a taxi driver last week of sexually assaulting a female passenger, saying “a drunk can consent.” That ruling is under appeal. The woman was so drunk she had urinated on herself and passed out in the back seat.
Recommendations that judges in effect be fired are rare in the Canadian system, which deems judicial independence a cornerstone. Justice Camp is only the third judge whose removal has been recommended since the judicial council was established in 1971. Both of the others also resigned rather than be removed under a provision of the Constitution that requires Parliament to approve dismissing a judge.
Justice Camp’s comments came in the trial of Alexander Wagar in Calgary. The ruling came to light a year later, when the Alberta Court of Appeal overturned it, saying the judge had applied myths and stereotypes about sexual-assault victims. (By then, the Conservative government of Stephen Harper had promoted him from provincial court.) The judicial council received scores of complaints. Alberta Justice Minister Kathleen Ganley asked for the public disciplinary hearing. “On reviewing the transcripts, I felt it was important that victims know this was not an acceptable way to be treated by the justice system,” Ms. Ganley said in an e-mail to The Globe after Justice Camp resigned.
Justice Camp, a father of three, received his law degree in 1975 from Stellenbosch University in South Africa, passed exams in Canada in 1998 and was admitted to the Alberta bar in 1999. In 2012, the Progressive Conservative government of Alison Redford appointed him to the Provincial Court. Before then, he practised business law in Calgary.
Federal Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould brought a motion to the House of Commons in which she declared the government’s intent to support the recommendation for removal. Shortly afterward, Justice Camp issued a brief statement through his lawyer, Frank Addario of Toronto, expressing his “sincere apology to everyone who was hurt by my comments during the Wagar trial.”
With a report from Patrick White
Report Typo/Error ||||| A judge who asked a sexual assault complainant why she couldn't keep her “knees together” confirmed he will resign after the Canadian Judicial Council recommended his removal.
Justice Robin Camp issued a statement Thursday in which he said he will resign from the Federal Court of Canada effective Friday.
“I would like to express my sincere apology to everyone who was hurt by my comments,” Camp’s statement went on.
"I thank everyone who was generous and kind to me and my family in the last 15 months, particularly my legal team."
The Canadian Judicial Council’s report called Camp’s conduct “so manifestly and profoundly destructive of the concept of impartiality, integrity and independence of the judicial role that the judge was rendered incapable of executing the judicial office."
Justice Camp’s lawyer Frank Addario had argued that removal was not necessary to preserve public confidence in this case. Four of the council's 23 members did not support removal.
Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould was in the process of moving forward on the council’s recommendation in Parliament Thursday when she learned of Camp’s resignation.
Wilson-Raybould later told reporters that the extremely rare removal would have been needed “to ensure the integrity and public confidence in the justice system and the judiciary.”
“Sexual assault and gender-based violence is in no form acceptable and we will continue to stand up for victims of sexual assault and gender-based violence,” Wilson-Raybould added.
Norman Sabourin, Executive Director and Senior General Council at the Canadian Judicial Council, told CTV News Channel removals are recommended when the “public has lost confidence in a judge’s ability to discharge the duties of office.”
“The report of the council emphasizes that all judges have to know the law but also have to possess empathy, have to understand that people who come before them are often vulnerable people and they have to treat them with a degree of civility and deference,” Sabourin said.
Camp, who was appointed to the federal court in 2015, faced judicial review after it was revealed that he had stated in a 2014 Alberta provincial court decision that "pain and sex sometimes go together” and asked the complainant why she didn’t just “keep her knees together.” He also said, "Young wom[e]n want to have sex, particularly if they're drunk."
Alexander Wagar was acquitted by Camp.
Alberta’s Appeal Court ordered a new trial and last month Wagar was again acquitted.
The complainant, who was 19 at the time of the first trial, told the disciplinary hearing last year that Camp's comments had made her hate herself. She said she had contemplated suicide as a result of her experience.
After Thursday’s decision, the complainant said "I was feeling so unhopeful and pretty down and not very hopeful about the justice system but it has kind of turned around by this.”
‘Watershed moment’
Alice Woolley, the University of Calgary law professor who complained about Camp’s conduct, said she was pleased with the decision.
“Actors within the legal system can make really terrible decisions and terrible mistakes and in his case engage in real misconduct,” she said.
“But the legal system orients towards progress,” she added. “It tries to get it right in the end.”
Kathleen Mahoney, who is also a law professor at the University of Calgary, told CTV News Channel that she believes the removal is a “watershed moment” in how courts treat sexual assault.
“I think this is a very strong statement from the judges of Canada that the time has come that gender bias in these kinds of decisions will no longer be tolerated,” she said.
Mahoney added that she believes the case highlights the need for mandatory judicial training focusing on gendered issues such sexual assault, domestic violence and sexual harassment.
The Conservatives have introduced legislation that would require better training for judges in handling sexual assault cases. The justice minister agreed Thursday that judges need to be properly trained.
Camp’s decision is not the only recent case to raise questions about how judges handle sexual assault.
In Halifax earlier this month, Justice Gregory Lenehan acquitted a taxi driver accused of sexually assaulting a passenger so intoxicated that she passed out.
Lenehan said in his ruling that “clearly, a drunk can consent.”
With a report from CTV’s Glen McGregor and files from The Canadian Press ||||| Federal Court Justice Robin Camp, dubbed the "knees together judge" for his comments in a sex assault case, has submitted his resignation following a recommendation from Canada's judicial watchdog that he be removed from the bench.
In a ruling announced Thursday afternoon, the Canadian Judicial Council (CJC) said that at a 2014 sexual assault trial he was presiding over, Camp "showed obvious disdain for some of the characteristics of the regime enacted by Parliament in respect of sexual assault issues."
"We find that the judge's conduct, viewed in its totality and in light of all of its consequences, was so manifestly and profoundly destructive of the concept of impartiality, integrity and independence of the judicial role that public confidence is sufficiently undermined to render the judge incapable of executing the judicial office," the council's ruling reads.
In a statement from his lawyer, Camp announced his intention to resign and apologized.
"I have advised Chief Justice Crampton that effective March 10, 2017, I will resign as a member of the Federal Court of Canada," the statement read.
"I would like to express my sincere apology to everyone who was hurt by my comments during the [sex assault] trial. I thank everyone who was generous and kind to me and my family in the last 15 months, particularly my legal team."
Before Camp's statement was issued, Justice Minister and Attorney General Jody Wilson-Raybould rose in the House of Commons seeking unanimous consent for a motion to remove Camp from the bench, but that consent was denied.
Conservative Saskatchewan MP Tom Lukiwksi then rose on a point of order and complained the minister had not ensured she had the unanimous consent of all parties before moving her motion.
Votes in both the House of Commons and the Senate are required to remove a federal judge, a move presumably no longer required with Camp's resignation.
Wilson-Raybould told reporters on Parliament Hill she learned of Camp's decision after she sought support for her motion.
The unexpected move by the federal Justice Minister was stopped by an opposition MP 1:05
Court transcripts from the 2014 sexual assault trial show Camp, who was then a provincial court judge, called the complainant, who was homeless and 19 years old at the time of the alleged assault, "the accused" numerous times — a mistake he repeated at the judicial council hearing before correcting himself.
Camp also told the young woman "pain and sex sometimes go together" and asked why she didn't just keep her "knees together."
'Antithetical' to contemporary values
The judge apologized several times for those comments, underwent counselling and took additional training on Canada's sexual assault laws.
But that wasn't enough for the CJC.
"The statements made by Justice Camp during the trial and in his decision, the values implicit in those statements and the way in which he conducted himself are so antithetical to the contemporary values of our judicial system with respect to the manner in which complainants in sexual assault cases should be treated that, in our view, confidence in the system cannot be maintained unless the system disassociates itself from the image which the judge, by his statements and approach, represents in the mind of a reasonable member of the public," wrote the majority.
Parliament considers training for judges
NDP MP Murray Rankin said that by resigning, Camp took the only course of action available in light of the conclusions of the judicial council.
Rankin added that Camp's case bolsters a private member's bill by interim Conservative leader Rona Ambrose to ensure judges know Canada's sexual assault laws. Parliament voted unanimously this week to send that bill to committee for further study.
Ambrose, in a statement welcoming the council's ruling, said her bill was designed to hold the judiciary responsible for the ongoing training of its judges.
"Unfortunately, there is not enough accountability on the part of the judiciary in ensuring that judges have the updated training Canadians expect them to have. This needs to change," Ambrose said in the statement.
Until Thursday, Camp had fought hard to keep his job.
He asked to speak directly to the 23 chief and associate chief justices who make up the CJC. But the majority said Camp had already "been fully and fairly heard," and declined saying nothing had changed since his public hearing last fall.
Camp then asked the Federal Court to stop the judicial council from deliberating his fate and to review an earlier decision he be dismissed. His lawyer Frank Addario argued the judicial council should consider the fact that Alexander Scott Wager, the man who was accused of sexual assault in the original trial, had once again been acquitted. The judge refused to stall the CJC.
Since the council's creation in 1971, no judge has gone to such lengths to keep his job. There have only been two other cases where the council recommended Parliament remove a judge from the bench and in both cases the men resigned almost immediately.
Just like any other judge facing discipline, Camp's legal battle has been paid for by taxpayers through the Commission for Federal Judicial Affairs, which has refused to say how much it has cost so far.
Four judges dissented from the majority and said Camp should not lose his job because he has rehabilitated himself through counselling and further education. | – A judge who asked a 19-year-old woman why she couldn't have just kept her legs together to prevent being raped has quit rather than be forced out. Justice Robin Camp resigned from the Federal Court of Canada Thursday after members of the country's judicial watchdog voted 19 to 4 in favor of removing him, the CBC reports. In widely condemned remarks during the 2014 rape trial, Camp repeatedly referred to the complainant as "the accused" and wondered why she hadn't done more to fight off the 240-pound defendant. When she testified that the incident had been painful, Camp, who acquitted the defendant, said, "Sex and pain sometimes go together, that's not necessarily a bad thing." Camp, after admitting that his thinking was "infected" with "stereotypical beliefs and discredited myths," fought hard to keep his job, attending counseling classes and publicly apologizing to the defendant, but the Canadian Judicial Council determined that his conduct had undermined public confidence so much that he was "incapable of executing the judicial office," the Globe and Mail reports. "I would like to express my sincere apology to everyone who was hurt by my comments," Camp said, per CTV News. The rape complainant, who told a hearing last year that she hated herself and considered suicide after Camp's comments, said the council's decision made her feel a lot more hopeful about the justice system. |
Angela Lansbury has followed up on her controversial claims about women needing to “sometimes take blame” for sexual harassment, saying she’s “devastated” by the backlash and interpretation of her comments.
“There is no excuse whatsoever for men to harass women in an abusive sexual manner,” she said in a statement released Wednesday evening. “And, I am devastated that anyone should deem me capable of thinking otherwise. Those who have known the quality of my work and the many public statements I have made over the course of my life, must know, that I am a strong supporter of Women’s Rights.”
Speaking to the Radio Times, the 92-year-old actress opined, “We have to own up to the fact that women, since time immemorial, have gone out of their way to make themselves attractive. And unfortunately it has backfired on us — and this is where we are today.” Lansbury did add, “Although it’s awful to say we can’t make ourselves look as attractive as possible without being knocked down and raped.”
She concluded her newly released statement by criticizing the reaction to her remarks in the Times, declaring, “Lastly, I would like to add that I am troubled by how quickly and brutishly some have taken my comments out of context and attempted to blame my generation, my age, or my mindset, without having read the entirety of what I said.” ||||| Actress Angela Lansbury has gotten a taste of online culture in 2017, and she doesn’t seem to have liked it very much. The Beauty And The Beast and Murder, She Wrote star came under fire this week, after people took umbrage at comments she made that stated that women are in some part complicit for making themselves attractive to men who sexually harass or assault them.
Lansbury’s remarks—which included statements like, “We have to own up to the fact that women, since time immemorial, have gone out of their way to make themselves attractive,” and “We must sometimes take blame, women. I really do think that”—were part of a wider conversation in which she also stated that there was no excuse for a man to harm a woman. Caveats aside, though, her comments were still met with a great deal of anger online, including from groups like Rape Crisis England & Wales, which noted that victim-blaming attitudes are only ever harmful to people who have been subject to sexual assault.
Now, Lansbury has responded to the criticism levied against her, clarifying her points, citing her bona fides as a feminist, and expressing no small amount of anger at the feeling that she’s been misinterpreted or taken out of context. Her statement:
There is no excuse whatsoever for men to harass women in an abusive sexual manner. And, I am devastated that anyone should deem me capable of thinking otherwise. Those who have known the quality of my work and the many public statements I have made over the course of my life, must know, that I am a strong supporter of Women’s Rights. Lastly, I would like to add that I am troubled by how quickly and brutishly some have taken my comments out of context and attempted to blame my generation, my age, or my mindset, without having read the entirety of what I said.
Which, uh…Welcome to the internet, Dame Angela. ||||| Angela Lansbury has clarified remarks she made about sexual harassment after she was widely criticized for saying women must sometimes "take blame."
"There is no excuse whatsoever for men to harass women in an abusive sexual manner," the 92-year-old "Murder, She Wrote" star said in a statement to People. "And, I am devastated that anyone should deem me capable of thinking otherwise. Those who have known the quality of my work and the many public statements I have made over the course of my life must know that I am a strong supporter of Women’s Rights."
The actress added that she was "troubled by how quickly and brutishly some have taken my comments out of context and attempted to blame my generation, my age, or my mindset, without having read the entirety of what I said."
Lansbury released the statement after she was criticized for remarks she made about sexual harassment during a recent interview with the Radio Times.
In the interview, Lansbury said "there are two sides to this coin."
"We have to own up to the fact that women, since time immemorial, have gone out of their way to make themselves attractive. And unfortunately, it has backfired on us -- and this is where we are today," Lansbury said.
She went on to say, "We must sometimes take blame, women. I really do think that. Although it's awful to say we can't make ourselves look as attractive as possible without being knocked down and raped."
Lansbury also added that there was "no excuse" for women being harassed.
"Should women be prepared for this? No, they shouldn't have to be," she said. "There's no excuse for that. And I think it will stop now -- it will have to. I think a lot of men must be very worried at this point."
After Lansbury's initial remarks, Rape Crisis England & Wales released a statement saying, "It is a deeply unhelpful myth that rape and other forms of sexual violence are caused or ‘provoked’ by women’s sexuality or ‘attractiveness.'"
Patricia Arquette took Lansbury to task on Twitter. "It doesn't matter how young or old, how beautiful or homely. Rapists rape. End of story," the actress wrote.
It doesn't matter how young or old, how beautiful or homely. Rapists rape. End of story. — Patricia Arquette (@PattyArquette) November 28, 2017
Designer Donna Karan made similar remarks to Lansbury's in the immediate aftermath of the Harvey Weinstein sexual misconduct scandal when she suggested that women were "asking for it" by how they dressed. She later apologized and, in an interview with ABC News' Robin Roberts, said, "What I said is so wrong and not who I am." Weinstein denies all allegations of non-consensual sex. | – After Angela Lansbury said this week that women need to "sometimes take the blame" for sexual misconduct because they make themselves attractive to men, the backlash was fast and forceful. "It is a deeply unhelpful myth that rape and other forms of sexual violence are caused or 'provoked' by women's sexuality or 'attractiveness,'" ABC News quotes Rape Crisis England & Wales as saying. Actress Patricia Arquette added: "It doesn't matter how young or old, how beautiful or homely. Rapists rape. End of story." Lansbury has now responded to her critics. "There is no excuse whatsoever for men to harass women in an abusive sexual manner," Entertainment Weekly quotes the 92-year-old Murder She Wrote star as saying. "And, I am devastated that anyone should deem me capable of thinking otherwise." Lansbury says she's "a strong supporter of women's rights" and is "troubled by how quickly and brutishly some have taken my comments out of context and attempted to blame my generation, my age, or my mindset, without having read the entirety of what I said." To which the AV Club quips: "Welcome to the internet, Dame Angela." |
SCHERTZ, Texas - The Bexar County Sheriff says it appears a deadly deputy-involved shooting that claimed the lives of a suspect and a 6-year-old boy was a "tragic accident."
Six-year-old Kameron Prescott was killed when deputies opened fire on a woman at a mobile home park following a nearly two-hour manhunt. Authorities say the woman was a wanted felon and car-theft suspect.
During a news conference Thursday, Bexar County Sheriff Javier Salazar said authorities were looking for a female suspect in the area of Farm to Market 1518 and Schaefer Road after a vehicle was reported stolen just before 11 a.m. The suspect has been identified as 30-year-old Amanda Lene Jones. Officials said John Aguillon (27 service years), George Herrera (16 years), Jesse Arias (seven years) and reserve deputy Johnny Longoria (two years) were involved in the shooting.
Salazar stated one of the deputies found the suspect in a closet who allegedly told him,"I have a weapon, I'm gonna shoot you." She fled on foot, while the officer pursued her into a wooded area. Salazar said the deputy lost sight of her, so the deputy called for backup. The suspect was found crossing a river, and officers pursued her in "water that was up to their chin."
She was threatening harm to several witnesses, leading them to believe she was armed, Salazar said. Deputies later found the female suspect on a porch, after she had broken into a house. She has several felony warrants in her name, Salazar said.
Salazar said the deputies fired at and killed the woman at the scene because she placed them "in direct fear of their lives." One of the rounds also went into the house, striking Kameron Prescott in the abdomen.
Salazar held a news conference Friday afternoon, providing a chronological breakdown of the events which led up to the shooting and showing a map of the route taken while deputies pursued the suspect into the mobile home park. Salazar said witnesses at the mobile home park also reported seeing the suspect holding an object that may have been a weapon.
Salazar said investigators learned the suspect had physically forced her way inside a home where an adult, a minor female, and 6-year-old Kameron Prescott were staying and made threats, including threatening to take the family's car.
WATCH: Bexar County Sheriff Javier Salazar holds a news conference Friday afternoon to provide an update on the investigation.
He stated that at some point, the suspect stepped out onto the porch of the home, where she was confronted by five deputies. Salazar said she again threatened to shoot the deputies, which he said was confirmed by the family inside the home. He said the deputies saw her holding something in her hand which they believed was a weapon.
Salazar said investigators later found a dark "tubular" object with blood on it below the desk of the home and stated it's likely that she had the object in her hand before the shooting. He said four deputies fired shots. A fifth officer at the scene, a K9 officer, did not fire a weapon.
Officials are still searching for a handgun, which they believe may be in a wooded area. He said they have two types of video, helicopter and body cam, but added that the helicopter did not capture the moment the suspect was pointing the object at the deputies. He said the body cam on one of the deputies captured good audio of the incident but because the officer is left-handed and the body cam was on his left shoulder, his firing arm was covering most of the camera.
Salazar said the video also shows deputies administering first aid to Prescott right after the shooting.
||||| (CNN) Hours after Kameron Prescott's Christmas party at his Texas school, the 6-year-old boy was fatally shot when deputies opened fire on a suspected car thief, the local sheriff said.
Bexar County Sheriff Javier Salazar called Kameron's death Thursday a "tragic accident." No weapon was found after four deputies fired, also killing the suspect, Amanda Lene Jones, 30, whom they believed was armed, Salazar said.
A bullet pierced the wall of the mobile home where Kameron lived and lodged in his abdomen, Salazar told reporters.
Deputies discovered the wounded boy inside the home, carried him out and administered first aid, Salazar said. He was pronounced dead at a hospital.
"The deputies are, of course, understandably shaken up," the sheriff said. "Officer-involved shootings are traumatic enough. Add to this the death of an innocent 6-year-old, and it's that much more troubling."
A dark-colored pipe with Jones' blood on it was found near her body, Salazar said. The deputies, as well as witnesses who encountered the woman that day, said she threatened to shoot them. Investigators were still searching for a weapon.
The killing stunned the small community near San Antonio. First-grade teacher Shanda Ince told CNN affiliate KSAT she couldn't help but wonder how the tragedy might have been averted.
"All I can think about right now is what could I have done differently," she said, "had it not been a half day."
'A tragic accident'
The deputies who opened fire --- identified as John Aguillon, George Herrera, Jesse Arias and Johnny Longoria, a reservist -- have been placed on administrative leave, the sheriff's office said. The local district attorney is investigating.
"Preliminarily, I can tell you it appears as if policies were complied with," Salazar said of the shooting. "Right now, what I'm dealing with is a tragic accident that led to the death of this young man."
Parts of the shooting were captured by a body camera worn by one deputy, Salazar said. But the view was obstructed when the deputy raised his rifle to fire.
"I'll be honest with you," Salazar said, "it's pretty heartbreaking video for us to see."
'Kameron was a ball of energy'
Maria Morales, a counselor at Wiederstein Elementary School, described the slain boy as a kind soul.
"Kameron was a ball of energy, happy, smart and could strike up a conversation with anyone," she said. "He also had a great sense of humor and caring heart. He'll be truly missed."
Ince called Kameron "the kindest-hearted little boy that I have ever had the pleasure of teaching."
"He loved to make everyone laugh," she said in a statement. "He will be missed by all of his classmates and everyone at Wiederstein."
Suspect described as 'desperate, maybe on drugs'
The incident began Thursday morning when a deputy responding to a report of a stolen vehicle spotted Jones with what he thought was a weapon, Salazar said.
Jones, on several occasions, "physically threatened him with that weapon and verbalized to him that she intended to shoot him with that weapon," the sheriff said.
The suspect managed to get away, and deputies did not see her again until a couple of hours later, when she turned up at the mobile home park where Kameron lived, Salazar said.
She forced her way into Kameron's home, threatened to shoot members of his family and said she was taking their vehicle, the sheriff said, adding that Jones had no apparent ties to the boy or his relatives.
When Jones left the home, the deputies were outside, waiting. Salazar said witnesses heard the woman threaten to shoot the law enforcement officers.
"Those deputies all report in their statements that she was holding an object in her hand they believed it to be a weapon at the time," Salazar said.
'He loved everybody'
Jones' criminal history included at least 13 arrests on charges ranging from drug possession to burglary, KSAT reported.
Rhonda Campbell, who also lives in the Pecan Grove Mobile Home Park, told KSAT that Jones' had kicked in her door that morning. She described Jones as "desperate, maybe on drugs."
"She was standing right here, demanding my car keys," Campbell told the station. "Well, it took me almost 30 years to get my dream car. She wasn't about to get it."
Ince, Kameron's teacher, said she wondered what she could have done differently that morning.
"Kameron had the biggest heart of any boy I have ever come across," she told KSAT. "He cared about everybody. He loved everybody. Not one day would go by where he would not hug me and tell me he loved me before he left." ||||| SCHERTZ, Texas - Wiederstein Elementary School in the Schertz-Cibolo-Universal City Independent School District is mourning a first-grader who was killed in a deputy-involved shooting.
Kameron Prescott was killed Thursday by what appeared to be a stray bullet at his family's home, at the Pecan Grove Mobile Home Park on FM 78.
According to Bexar County Sheriff Javier Salazar, four deputies fired shots outside the home when a woman who they believed was armed with a gun appeared to be reaching for the weapon.
The school district's website on Friday reported Kameron's death.
"Kameron was the kindest-hearted little boy that I have ever had the pleasure of teaching," said Shanda Ince, Kameron’s first-grade teacher. “He loved to make everyone laugh. He will be missed by all of his classmates and everyone at Wiederstein.”
School counselor Maria Morales said Kameron was "a kind soul."
“Kameron was a ball of energy, happy, smart and could strike up a conversation with anyone,” she said. “He also had a great sense of humor and caring heart. He’ll be truly missed by his classmates, teachers and the Wiederstein staff.”
"The Schertz-Cibolo-Universal City Independent School District extends its deepest condolences to Kameron’s family, friends, teachers and classmates. We pause to give thanks for his life that ended all too soon, and may we find ways to honor his memory," the article read.
The district said that a fund has been established to assist Kameron’s family with expenses.
Monetary donations can be made at the two Schertz Bank & Trust branches in Schertz, or by mail to:
Kameron Prescott Memorial Fund
c/o Schertz Bank & Trust
P.O. Box 800
Schertz, Texas 78154
Copyright 2017 by KSAT - All rights reserved. | – Sheriff's deputies shot and killed a 6-year-old boy Thursday in Texas, WOAI reports. Bexar County Sheriff Javier Salazar says four deputies opened fire on 30-year-old Amanda Jones, a suspected car thief, after they "cornered" her outside a mobile home occupied by Kameron Prescott and his family in the town of Schertz. One of the bullets went through the mobile home and hit Kameron in the abdomen. According to CNN, Salazar says deputies performed first aid on the boy, but he was pronounced dead at the hospital. Jones was also killed. "The deputies are, of course, understandably shaken up," Salazar says. He says the shooting is under investigation, but in his opinion the boy's death is "a tragic accident." Salazar says one deputy is "adamant" he saw Jones with a gun and that she threatened to shoot him. He says Jones threatened both police and Kameron's family, who didn't know her, just before deputies opened fire. But investigators haven't been able to locate a gun despite the use of a helicopter and dive team. Salazar says they have found a pipe with Jones' blood on it near the scene of the shooting. One deputy at the scene was wearing a body camera, but he blocked it with his rifle during the shooting. Meanwhile, Kameron is being remembered by those who knew him. "Kameron was a ball of energy, happy, smart, and could strike up a conversation with anyone,” school counselor Maria Morales tells KSAT. “He also had a great sense of humor and caring heart." |
It's never easy dining out alone -- but one man has found the perfect, sweetest way to ensure he never feels lonely.
Twitter user Madina Bashizadah posted this heartbreaking picture earlier this week of an older widower having a meal at In-N-Out Burger -- with a photo of his late wife next to him.
Oh my god I just died!!! He has a picture of his wife with him as he eats! I love him I love love 😭😭😭😭😭 pic.twitter.com/c9t0qKJfEi — ℳadi ℬash (@Maaadina) October 22, 2014
"The older gentleman was sitting down enjoying his meal and I noticed that he had a photo with him," Bashizadah told The Huffington Post in an email. "Automatically, I assumed she wasn't here with us and I started tearing up because it was such a beautiful moment but heartbreaking at the same time."
Other diners kept approaching the older man, asking him about the photo and "with everyone who approached he was happy and excited to talk about her."
We found out that she was his sweetheart, his wife who passed away 5 years ago. They met at 17 but the war had kept them apart. He had searched for her for 10 years and one day as he was telling his barber the story, the barber calls his daughter in and it ends up being her. They were married instantly and it lasted for 55 years until she passed. He takes her photo everywhere. On one side of the laminated photo it's him and her sitting on a couch together and on the back it has a photo of him and her side by side when they were young. Goes to show you true love does exist.
A love story for the ages. ||||| Every picture tells a story.
But a photo making the Internet rounds of a man eating at a California In-N-Out Burger alongside a picture of his deceased wife has uncovered a story of true love that will make you squeeze your honey extra hard tonight.
Two weeks ago, imgur.com user "soulrose" posted a picture of a man perched in a red and white booth gazing longingly at a photo, with his walker nearby.
"I saw this elderly gentleman dining by himself, with an old picture of a lady in front of him. I though [sic] maybe I could brighten his day by talking to him,” soulrose writes.
Tearjerker of the day. Elderly man pictured eating with photo of his "soulmate" of 55 years who died 5 years ago. pic.twitter.com/z8RwHfLw73 — Jeff McArthur (@jmacspeaks) October 29, 2014
After talking to the man, the user found out it was indeed his wife, and proceeded to be blown away by the story of how they met and their enduring love.
“They met when they were both 17. They dated briefly, then lost contact when he went to war and her family moved. But he said he thought about her the entire war. After his return, he decided to look for her. He searched for her for 10 years and never dated anyone,” soulrose wrote.
“People told him he was crazy, to which he replied 'I am. Crazy in love.' On a trip to California, he went to a barber shop. He told the barber how he had been searching for a girl for ten years. The barber went to his phone and called his daughter in. It was her! She had also been searching for him and never dated either.”
According to the story, the unnamed man proposed right then and there was married to his wife for 55 years before she died 2009.
Madina Bashizaduah from San Francisco posted a similar image on Twitter on Oct. 22 of the same man—just with a different shirt and new picture. She said he always leaves home with a picture of his sweetheart and recounted the same story of a fateful love for the ages.
Oh my god I just died!!! He has a picture of his wife with him as he eats! I love him I love love ���������� pic.twitter.com/c9t0qKJfEi — ℳadi ℬash (@Maaadina) October 22, 2014
Soulrose said the man had a few nuggets of wisdom, saying: "I was a very rich man. Not with money, but with love" and "Tell your wife that you love her everyday. And be sure to ask her, have I told you that I love you lately?" | – Determined not to forget his true love after her death five years ago, an elderly man has been bringing along a photo of her during his outings to a California burger joint. Multiple patrons have spotted the widower at an In-N-Out Burger, seated with a photo of his deceased wife in front of him. Photos of the loving husband have gone viral, and folks who've approached him say he has been "happy and excited to talk about her." Madina Bashizadah tweeted a photo of the man last week and emailed the Huffington Post that when she saw him, "I started tearing up because it was such a beautiful moment but heartbreaking at the same time." She says that he told diners that he met his wife when they were both 17, lost touch for 10 years, then married "instantly" once they reunited—they were together for 55 years before she died. Imgur user soulrose spotted the man on an earlier outing, Fox News reports, and wanted to try to "brighten his day," but the diner ended up brightening soulrose's day instead by revealing he still celebrates his wife's birthday and their anniversary. Other sweet revelations from their conversation: "I was a very rich man. Not with money, but with love." "I never had a single argument with my wife, but we had lots of debates." "Tell your wife that you love her every day. And be sure to ask her: Have I told you that I love you lately?" (This man dove deep underwater to leave something special for his deceased wife.) |
Tweet with a location
You can add location information to your Tweets, such as your city or precise location, from the web and via third-party applications. You always have the option to delete your Tweet location history. Learn more ||||| A dead goose fell from the sky Thursday and knocked a waterfowl hunter unconscious.
Robert Meilhammer, a 51-year-old resident of Crapo in Dorchester County, was hunting as part of a larger party near the Miles River around 5 p.m. when a flock of geese flew overhead. The group fired on birds.
One goose fell, striking Meilhammer and knocking him out.
“One of the members of the hunting party shot and killed the goose,” said Maryland Natural Resources Police spokeswoman Candy Thomson. “It is unclear which one it was.”
Meilhammer suffered head and facial injuries, and was airlifted to Maryland Shock Trauma, Thomson said.
CAPTION The Saturday morning service recognizes “the first resurrection of our savior and lord Jesus Christ,” Father Constantine Moralis said. It is held before the Orthodox Christians observe Easter Sunday, known as Pascha. The Saturday morning service recognizes “the first resurrection of our savior and lord Jesus Christ,” Father Constantine Moralis said. It is held before the Orthodox Christians observe Easter Sunday, known as Pascha. CAPTION Business and civic leaders attend a breakfast during the release of annual State of Downtown Baltimore report. (Barbara Haddock Taylor, Baltimore Sun video) Business and civic leaders attend a breakfast during the release of annual State of Downtown Baltimore report. (Barbara Haddock Taylor, Baltimore Sun video)
trichman@baltsun.com
twitter.com/TaliRichman | – "This is highly unusual," says a rep for Maryland Natural Resources Police, and that might be putting it lightly. The Maryland NRP has confirmed that a 51-year-old who was hunting geese with a larger group was rendered unconscious when a dead goose fell from the sky and hit him. Robert Meilhammer regained consciousness as emergency officials arrived on the scene just before 5pm Thursday, but Demarva Now reports the Crapo, Maryland, man struggled to answer questions beyond his name and so was flown to a Baltimore hospital. The Baltimore Sun reports it's unclear which hunter shot the goose, which the Washington Post reports typically weighs about 12 pounds and has a wing span of up to six feet. The Post reports Meilhammer's head injury was initially described as "severe," and that two of his teeth were knocked out by the hit. The Maryland NRP tweeted Friday morning that he was in stable condition and awaiting further tests. (As this hunter tracked a lion, he was shot dead.) |
If you’re serious about crafting, then you may have fantasized about ditching the 9-5, picking up the glue gun, and opening an eponymous Etsy shop.
Well, Alicia Shaffer from Three Bird Nest, is living that dream.
Shaffer is one of the most successful sellers on the online craft site, with more than, gulp, an estimated $65,000 a month in sales. But she tells Yahoo DIY that it didn’t all happen, overnight, though.
(Alicia Shaffer and family. All images courtesy Three Bird Nest)
Etsy may seem like a quaint little destination for vintage pendants and handmade birthday cards, but with 30 million registered users, one million sellers and over one billion in total annual transactions, this is not your neighborhood craft fair. This is big e-commerce.
girls posing with boquets More
Where most shops would love to sell 300 items a day, Three Bird Nest is selling over 3,000. (If those numbers don’t make you wanting to quit your day job, then you must really love what you do.)
Three Bird Nest has its own distinctive sensibility, but it’s not breaking the mold with exclusive, rarefied creations. Items similar to her lovely handmade, knitted scarves, wraps, headbands, beanies, boot socks and calf cozies (adorably irresistible) can be found elsewhere. So why is Shaffer cleaning up when others are coasting?
Alicia wearing a homemade purple headband More
One thing that stands out is Shaffer’s passion for her work. “I love textiles, fabric, fashion, designs, and seeing how different colors and fabrics pair together,” she says on her site. When the seller’s passion comes through, the shopper connects with craftsperson.
But Shaffer also loves the business side. She happily absorbs the pressures that come from running her own mini empire. The creative process, from concepting, to production, to getting it in front of people to delivery is a high for her. To have a successful business on Etsy (or anywhere), she advises: you need to eat, sleep and breathe your brand.
Shaffer also designs for a wide range of women, which broadens her potential customer base. “She’s a mom, a student, a daughter, a bride, a woman going on a first date,” she says.
bracelets closeup More
Read More ||||| Form S-1
As filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on March 4, 2015.
Registration No. 333-
UNITED STATES
SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION
Washington, D.C. 20549
FORM S-1
REGISTRATION STATEMENT
UNDER
THE SECURITIES ACT OF 1933
Etsy, Inc.
(Exact Name of Registrant as Specified in its Charter)
Delaware 5961 20-4898921 (State or Other Jurisdiction of Incorporation or Organization) (Primary Standard Industrial Classification Code Number) (I.R.S. Employer Identification Number)
55 Washington Street, Suite 512
Brooklyn, NY 11201
(718) 855-7955
(Address, including zip code, and telephone number, including area code, of registrants principal executive offices)
Kristina Salen
Chief Financial Officer
Etsy, Inc.
55 Washington Street, Suite 512
Brooklyn, NY 11201
(718) 855-7955
(Name, address, including zip code, and telephone number, including area code, of agent for service)
Copies to:
Kenneth R. McVay Richard C. Blake Greg S. Volkmar Gunderson Dettmer Stough
Villeneuve Franklin & Hachigian, LLP
220 West 42nd Street, 17th Floor New York, NY 10036
(212) 730-8133 Jordan J. Breslow General Counsel Etsy, Inc. 55 Washington Street, Suite 512 Brooklyn, NY 11201 (718) 855-7955 Sarah K. Solum Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP 1600 El Camino Real Menlo Park, CA 94025 (650) 752-2000
Approximate date of commencement of proposed sale to the public: As soon as practicable after the effective date of this Registration Statement.
If any of the securities being registered on this Form are to be offered on a delayed or continuous basis pursuant to Rule 415 under the Securities Act of 1933, check the following box. ¨
If this Form is filed to register additional securities for an offering pursuant to Rule 462(b) under the Securities Act, please check the following box and list the Securities Act registration statement number of the earlier effective registration statement for the same offering. ¨
If this Form is a post-effective amendment filed pursuant to Rule 462(c) under the Securities Act, check the following box and list the Securities Act registration statement number of the earlier effective registration statement for the same offering. ¨
If this Form is a post-effective amendment filed pursuant to Rule 462(d) under the Securities Act, check the following box and list the Securities Act registration statement number of the earlier effective registration statement for the same offering. ¨
Indicate by check mark whether the registrant is a large accelerated filer, an accelerated filer, a non-accelerated filer, or a smaller reporting company. See the definitions of large accelerated filer, accelerated filer and smaller reporting company in Rule 12b-2 of the Exchange Act. (Check one):
Large accelerated filer ¨ Accelerated filer ¨ Non-accelerated filer x (Do not check if a smaller reporting company) Smaller reporting company ¨
CALCULATION OF REGISTRATION FEE
Title of Each Class of Securities to be Registered Proposed Maximum Aggregate Offering Price(1)(2) Amount of Registration Fee Common Stock, $0.001 par value $100,000,000 $11,620
(1) Estimated solely for the purpose of calculating the amount of the registration fee in accordance with Rule 457(o) under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended.
(2) Includes the aggregate offering price of additional shares that the underwriters have the option to purchase.
The Registrant hereby amends this Registration Statement on such date or dates as may be necessary to delay its effective date until the Registrant shall file a further amendment which specifically states that this Registration Statement shall thereafter become effective in accordance with Section 8(a) of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, or until the Registration Statement shall become effective on such date as the Securities and Exchange Commission, acting pursuant to such Section 8(a), may determine.
The information in this preliminary prospectus is not complete and may be changed. We and the selling stockholders may not sell these securities until the registration statement filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission is effective. This preliminary prospectus is not an offer to sell nor does it seek an offer to buy these securities in any jurisdiction where the offer or sale is not permitted.
Subject to Completion. Dated March 4, 2015.
Shares
Common Stock
This is an initial public offering of shares of common stock of Etsy, Inc.
Etsy is offering shares of common stock to be sold in the offering. The selling stockholders identified in this prospectus are offering an additional shares of common stock. Etsy will not receive any of the proceeds from the sale of the shares of common stock being sold by the selling stockholders.
Prior to this offering, there has been no public market for the common stock. It is currently estimated that the initial public offering price per share will be between $ and $ . Etsy intends to apply to have the common stock listed on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the symbol ETSY.
Etsy is an emerging growth company as that term is used in the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act of 2012 and, as such, has elected to comply with certain reduced public company reporting requirements.
See Risk Factors beginning on page 15 to read about factors you should consider before buying shares of the common stock.
Neither the Securities and Exchange Commission nor any other regulatory body has approved or disapproved of these securities or passed upon the accuracy or adequacy of this prospectus. Any representation to the contrary is a criminal offense.
Per Share Total Initial public offering price $ $ Underwriting discount(1) $ $ Proceeds, before expenses, to Etsy $ $ Proceeds, before expenses, to the selling stockholders $ $
(1) We have agreed to reimburse the underwriters for certain expenses. See Underwriting.
To the extent that the underwriters sell more than shares of common stock, the underwriters have the option to purchase up to an additional shares from Etsy at the initial public offering price less the underwriting discount.
The underwriters expect to deliver the shares against payment in New York, New York on , 2015.
Goldman, Sachs & Co. Morgan Stanley Allen & Company LLC
Prospectus dated , 2015
Table of Contents
We, the selling stockholders and the underwriters have not authorized anyone to provide any information or to make any representations other than those contained in this prospectus or in any free writing prospectuses prepared by us or on our behalf or to which we have referred you. We take no responsibility for, and can provide no assurance as to the reliability of, any other information that others may give you. This prospectus is an offer to sell only the shares offered hereby, but only under circumstances and in jurisdictions where it is lawful to do so. The information contained in this prospectus is current only as of the date on the front cover of the prospectus. Our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects may have changed since that date.
For investors outside the United States: We, the selling stockholders and the underwriters have not done anything that would permit this offering or possession or distribution of this prospectus in any jurisdiction where action for that purpose is required, other than in the United States. Persons outside the United States who come into possession of this prospectus must inform themselves about, and observe any restrictions relating to, the offering of the shares of our common stock and the distribution of this prospectus outside of the United States.
Through and including , 2015 (the 25th day after the date of this prospectus), all dealers effecting transactions in these securities, whether or not participating in this offering, may be required to deliver a prospectus. This is in addition to a dealers obligation to deliver a prospectus when acting as an underwriter and with respect to an unsold allotment or subscription.
Prospectus Summary This summary highlights information contained in this prospectus and does not contain all of the information that you should consider in making your investment decision. Before investing in our common stock, you should carefully read this entire prospectus, including our consolidated financial statements and the related notes thereto and the information in Risk Factors and Managements Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations. Unless the context otherwise requires, we use the terms Etsy, company, we, us and our in this prospectus to refer to Etsy, Inc. and, where appropriate, our consolidated subsidiaries. See Glossary for the definitions of the following terms: active buyer, active seller, community, ecosystem, global-local, GMS, member, platform and visit. Our Mission Our mission is to reimagine commerce in ways that build a more fulfilling and lasting world. We are building a human, authentic and community-centric global and local marketplace. We are committed to using the power of business to create a better world through our platform, our members, our employees and the communities we serve. These guiding principles are core to our mission: Make it easy to find and buy unique goods from real people every day, on any platform, online and offline, anywhere in the world. Help creative entrepreneurs start, responsibly scale and enjoy their businesses with Etsy. Communicate the power of human connection whenever anyone experiences Etsy. Overview We operate a marketplace where people around the world connect, both online and offline, to make, sell and buy unique goods. Handmade goods are the foundation of our marketplace. Whether crafted by an Etsy seller herself, with the assistance of her team or with an outside manufacturer in small batches, handmade goods spring from the imagination and creativity of an Etsy seller and embody authorship, responsibility and transparency. We believe we are creating a new economy, which we call the Etsy Economy, where creative entrepreneurs find meaningful work and both global and local markets for their goods, and where thoughtful consumers discover and buy unique goods and build relationships with the people who sell them. Etsy was founded in June 2005 in Brooklyn, New York as a marketplace for handmade goods and craft supplies. From those beginnings, we have built an innovative, technology-based platform that, as of
1
December 31, 2014, connected 54.0 million members, including 1.4 million active sellers and 19.8 million active buyers, in nearly every country in the world. In 2014, Etsy sellers generated GMS of $1.93 billion, of which 36.1% came from purchases made on mobile devices and 30.9% came from an Etsy seller or an Etsy buyer outside of the United States. Our community is the heart and soul of Etsy. Our community is made up of creative entrepreneurs who sell on our platform, thoughtful consumers looking to buy unique goods in our marketplace, responsible manufacturers who help Etsy sellers grow their businesses and Etsy employees who maintain our platform and nurture our ecosystem. Our business model is based on shared success: we make money when Etsy sellers make money. Our revenue is diversified, generated from a mix of marketplace activities and the services we provide Etsy sellers to help them create and grow their businesses. Marketplace revenue includes the fee an Etsy seller pays for each completed transaction and the listing fee an Etsy seller pays for each item she lists. Seller Services revenue includes fees an Etsy seller pays for services such as prominent placement in search results via Promoted Listings, payment processing via Direct Checkout and purchases of shipping labels through our platform via Shipping Labels. Other revenue includes the fees we receive from a third-party payment processor. In 2014, Etsy sellers generated GMS of $1.93 billion, up 43.3% over 2013. In 2014, we generated revenue of $195.6 million, up 56.4% over 2013. In 2014, we generated a net loss of $15.2 million and Adjusted EBITDA of $23.1 million compared to a net loss of $0.8 million and Adjusted EBITDA of $16.9 million in 2013. See Selected Consolidated Financial and Other DataNon-GAAP Financial Measures for more information and for a reconciliation of Adjusted EBITDA to net loss, the most directly comparable financial measure calculated and presented in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles in the United States, or GAAP. Our Values We are a mindful, transparent and humane business. We believe that business interests and social and environmental responsibility are interwoven and aligned and that the power of business should be used to strengthen communities and empower people. We plan and build for the long term. We want to build a company that lasts, and we plan to measure our success in years and decades. Etsy sellers in particular depend on us and on our platform to grow their businesses, so we will strive to make decisions that are best for the long-term health of our ecosystem. We value craftsmanship in all we make. Craftsmanship is the marriage of skill and passion. We believe every job at our company should demonstrate our commitment to craft. We are an engineering-driven company, and we think of our code as craft: we are makers of the products and services that our members use, and we approach the work we do with the same care and inspiration as do Etsy sellers.
2
We believe fun should be part of everything we do. Our mission includes fostering a world in which personal fulfillment is a key element of success. We believe that this way of working is connected and joyful. We strive to do excellent work and bring a sense of humor and playfulness to it. We keep it real, always. We have the courage and the will to do business in ways that are unconventional and impactful. We strive to stay genuine, maintaining integrity, humility and sincerity in everything we do. When we feel that we are not being true to our values or our mission, we are not afraid to stop and change course. Our Opportunity We operate at the center of several converging macroeconomic trends in online and mobile commerce, employment, consumption and manufacturing. We believe that in combination these trends will benefit millions of people in our ecosystem around the world: Etsy sellers engaging in their creative passion, working for themselves and defining success on their own terms; Etsy buyers accessing a diverse, global marketplace of goods that have historically been found in highly fragmented markets; and, increasingly, responsible manufacturers using modern tools to craft goods in partnership with Etsy sellers. Trends in Online and Mobile Commerce. Etsy sellers offer goods in dozens of online retail categories, including jewelry, stationery, clothing, home goods, craft supplies and vintage items. Euromonitor, a consumer market research company, estimated that the global online retail market was $695 billion in 2013, up from $280 billion in 2008, representing a compound annual growth rate, or CAGR, of 19.9%. This growth is expected to continue, with the global online retail market becoming a significantly larger portion of the total retail market, reaching $1.5 trillion by 2018, implying a 16.6% CAGR from 2013. Mobile commerce is also increasingly important in online retail. comScore estimated that since the first quarter of 2013, consumers visiting online commerce sites spent more than half of their browsing time on mobile devices; however, online commerce spending via mobile devices represented only 11% of total online commerce dollars in the third quarter of 2014. Trends in Employment. Whether motivated by economic necessity or personal preference, a growing number of people are turning to self-employment for their livelihoods. In a 2012 survey of middle-class households in the United States by the Pew Research Center, 85% said that it was more difficult to maintain their living standards today than it was ten years ago. A study commissioned in July 2014 by the Freelancers Union and Elance-oDesk estimated that 53 million Americans are working as freelancers. Women are also contributing to the trend towards self-employment. World Bank research shows that, in certain developing nations, over half of the women in the labor force are self-employed. We believe that many of these people have creative skills that could provide a foundation for entrepreneurship, but that they often have little or no experience running their own businesses, and they typically lack the marketing resources, the technological expertise and the manufacturing and logistics capabilities to turn their creativity into a business.
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Trends in Consumption. Most large retailers today follow the same formula, emphasizing efficiency and scale and pressuring their suppliers to reduce their costs in order to serve mass-produced goods at the lowest-possible prices. We believe, however, that many consumers want to purchase goods that are unique and that reflect their personality and style, not simply mass-produced, generic goods. Some consumers want their purchases to reflect their values; they want to support retailers and suppliers that have responsible and sustainable policies toward their employees, their communities and the environment. Finding these goods can be difficult, as markets for such goods have historically been highly fragmented across boutiques, consignment stores and other venues and marketplaces. Trends in Manufacturing. Because of advances in manufacturing technologies, individuals and small businesses now have the ability to manufacture goods in their homes and studios using tools such as computer-assisted design, 3D printers, computer-controlled routers and other machines at a fraction of the historical cost. We believe the decrease in the size and the cost of these tools will make it easier for creative entrepreneurs to start new businesses. We also believe that small-batch manufacturers will be able to use these new technologies to provide high-quality manufacturing services so that creative entrepreneurs can scale their own businesses. Our Strengths Our platform connects millions of Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers globally, making it one of the largest online marketplaces in the world. We have achieved our scale because of the following key strengths: Our Authentic, Trusted Marketplace. We have built an authentic, trusted marketplace that embodies our values-based culture, emphasizing respect, direct communication and fun. We have developed a reputation for authenticity as a result of Etsy sellers unique offerings and their adherence to our policies for handmade goods. We establish trust in our marketplace by emphasizing the person behind every transaction. We deepen connections among our members, making a personal relationship central to the member experience. The authenticity of our marketplace and the connections among people in our community are the cornerstones of our business. Our Passionate, Engaged and Loyal Members. Our members are passionate, engaged and loyalnot only to us, but to each otherbuilding a strong community. Our Innovative Technology. Our widely-respected engineering team has built a sophisticated platform that enables millions of Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers to smoothly transact across borders, languages and devices. Our Scaled, Global-Local Marketplace. Our marketplace is global-local, meaning that we focus on building local Etsy communities around the world. Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers in these local
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communities, in turn, have global reach and access through our platform. We believe our global-local marketplace creates strong competitive advantages outside the United States because our success is not dependent on scale in any given country. Our Seller-Aligned Business Model. Etsy sellers are drawn to our platform because we empower them to succeed, and as Etsy sellers succeed, so do we. Our seller-aligned business model creates network effects. The more we invest in our platform, the more we enable Etsy sellers to pursue their craft and grow their businesses and the easier we make it for Etsy buyers to find unique goods. We call this Etsys Empowerment Loop. Our Strategy: The Path Ahead We plan to continue connecting creative entrepreneurs, thoughtful consumers and responsible manufacturers and expanding the impact of our platform through the following key strategies: Make Etsy an Everyday Experience. We emphasize relationships, connecting creative entrepreneurs to thoughtful consumers around the world, and we continually strive to make those connections a daily habit for our members. The everyday experience starts with mobile. Build Local Marketplaces, Globally. Our vision is global and local. We plan to invest in local marketing and content and local payment and shipping solutions in countries around the world. We believe our locally-focused work will broaden the reach of our global platform. Offer High-impact Seller Services. Seller Services help an Etsy seller spend more time on the pleasures of her craft and less time on the administrative aspects of her business. We intend to enhance existing Seller Services, extend their geographic reach and introduce new ones. Expand the Etsy Economy. We intend to fulfill our mission to reimagine commerce by expanding the impact of our platform beyond our community. For example, we intend to further develop our manufacturing program, our strategic partnerships and our public-private endeavors to bring the benefit of the Etsy Economy to more people and more communities. Invest in Marketing. We believe that the rapid growth of our marketplace is a testament to our compelling value proposition for Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers. Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers have been our best marketers, sharing their positive experiences with their own communities. Even so, we plan to increase our marketing spending on traditional and online media to increase awareness of our brand and attract additional members to our ecosystem.
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Risks Associated With Our Business Our business is subject to numerous risks described in Risk Factors immediately following this prospectus summary and elsewhere in this prospectus. Some of the more significant risks are: We have a history of operating losses and we may not achieve or maintain profitability in the future. Our quarterly operating results may fluctuate, which could cause our stock price to decline. Adherence to our values and our focus on long-term sustainability may negatively influence our short- or medium-term financial performance. The authenticity of our marketplace and the connections within our community are important to our success. If we are unable to maintain them, our ability to retain existing members and attract new members could suffer. Further expansion into markets outside of the United States is important to the growth of our business but will subject us to risks associated with operations abroad. We expect to increase our marketing efforts to help grow our business, but those efforts may not be effective at attracting new members and retaining existing members. Our payments system depends on third-party providers and is subject to evolving laws and regulations. Our ability to expand our ecosystem is important to the growth of our business. We must develop new offerings to respond to our members changing needs. If the mobile solutions available to Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers are not effective, the use of our platform could decline. We face intense competition and may not be able to compete effectively. See Risk Factors immediately following this prospectus summary for a more thorough discussion of these and other risks and uncertainties we face. Our Corporate Information Etsy was incorporated in the state of Delaware in February 2006 as Indieco, Inc., and we changed our name to Etsy, Inc. in June 2006. Our headquarters are located at 55 Washington Street, Suite 512, Brooklyn, New York 11201. Our telephone number is (718) 855-7955. Our website address is www.etsy.com. The information contained in, or accessible through, our website is not part of, and is not incorporated into, this prospectus, and investors should not rely on any such information in deciding whether to invest in our common stock.
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We use various trademarks, trade names and design marks in our business, including Etsy®, Code as Craft and Craft Entrepreneurship. This prospectus also contains trademarks and trade names of other businesses that are the property of their respective holders. We do not intend our use or display of other companies trademarks and trade names to imply a relationship with, or endorsement or sponsorship of us by, those other companies. JOBS Act We are an emerging growth company, as defined in the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act of 2012. We will remain an emerging growth company until the earlier of (1) the last day of the fiscal year (a) following the fifth anniversary of the completion of this offering, (b) in which we have total annual gross revenue of at least $1.0 billion or (c) in which we become a large accelerated filer, which means that we have been public for at least 12 months, have filed at least one annual report and the market value of our common stock that is held by non-affiliates exceeds $700 million as of the last day of our then most recently completed second fiscal quarter, and (2) the date on which we have issued more than $1.0 billion in non-convertible debt during the prior three-year period. We refer to the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act of 2012 as the JOBS Act, and references to emerging growth company have the meaning associated with such term in the JOBS Act. In addition, the JOBS Act provides that an emerging growth company can delay adopting new or revised accounting standards until such time as those standards apply to private companies. We have irrevocably elected not to avail ourselves of this exemption and, therefore, we will be subject to the same new or revised accounting standards as other public companies that are not emerging growth companies.
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Glossary The following terms are used throughout this prospectus: Term Definition Active buyer An Etsy buyer is a member who has created an account in our marketplace. An Etsy buyer is identified by a unique e-mail address; a single person can have multiple Etsy buyer accounts. An active buyer is an Etsy buyer who has made at least one purchase in the last 12 months. Active seller An Etsy seller is a member who has created an account and has listed an item in our marketplace. An Etsy seller is identified by a unique e-mail address; a single person can have multiple Etsy seller accounts. An active seller is an Etsy seller who has incurred at least one charge from us in the last 12 months. Charges include transaction fees, listing fees and fees for Direct Checkout, Promoted Listings, Shipping Labels and Wholesale enrollment. Community Our community consists of Etsy sellers, Etsy buyers, manufacturers who work with Etsy sellers and Etsy employees. Ecosystem Our ecosystem consists of Etsy and the people and communities around the world who benefit from our platform. Global-local Global-local refers to our focus on building local Etsy communities around the world. The Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers in these local communities, in turn, have global reach and access through our platform. GMS Gross merchandise sales, or GMS, is the dollar value of items sold in our marketplace within the applicable period, excluding shipping fees and net of refunds associated with cancelled transactions. International GMS is GMS from transactions in which either the billing address for the Etsy seller or the shipping address for the Etsy buyer at the time of sale is outside of the United States. Mobile GMS is GMS from transactions that occur on a mobile device, such as a tablet or a smartphone. Mobile GMS excludes orders initiated on mobile devices but ultimately completed on a desktop. We began tracking mobile GMS in 2013. Member A member is represented by an open member account based on a unique e-mail address; a single person can have multiple member accounts.
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Term Definition Platform Our platform includes our marketplace, our Seller Services, our technology and our community, both online and offline. The core of our platform is our marketplace, which connects people around the world to make, sell and buy unique goods. Visit A visit represents activity from a unique browser or mobile app. A visit ends after 30 minutes of inactivity. A mobile visit is a visit that occurs on a mobile device, such as a tablet or a smartphone. We began tracking mobile visits in 2013.
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The Offering Common stock offered by us shares Common stock offered by the selling stockholders shares Underwriters option to purchase additional shares shares Common stock to be outstanding after this offering shares, or shares if the underwriters exercise their option to purchase additional shares in full Use of proceeds We estimate that our net proceeds from the sale of the common stock that we are offering will be approximately $ million, or approximately $ million if the underwriters exercise their option to purchase additional shares in full, assuming an initial public offering price of $ per share, the midpoint of the offering price range on the cover page of this prospectus, and after deducting estimated underwriting discounts and commissions and estimated offering expenses payable by us. We will not receive any of the proceeds from the sale of shares by the selling stockholders. The principal purposes of this offering are to increase our visibility, create a public market for our common stock and facilitate our future access to the public equity markets. We currently intend to use the net proceeds from this offering for working capital and general corporate purposes, including continued investments in the growth of our business. We also intend to use $300,000 of the proceeds of this offering to partially fund Etsy.org, a Delaware non-profit organization that we formed in January 2015. We may use a portion of the net proceeds to fund the build-out of our new corporate headquarters. In addition, we may use a portion of the net proceeds received by us from this offering for acquisitions of other complementary businesses, technologies or other assets. However, we have no current understandings, agreements or commitments for any specific material acquisitions at this time. See Use of Proceeds. Risk factors Read Risk Factors and other information included in this prospectus for a discussion of factors you should consider before deciding to invest in our common stock. Proposed Nasdaq trading symbol ETSY
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The number of shares of common stock to be outstanding after this offering is based on 195,258,466 shares of common stock (including preferred stock on an as-converted basis) outstanding as of December 31, 2014, and excludes: 376,471 shares of common stock issued to Etsy.org; 23,050,594 shares of common stock issuable upon the exercise of options outstanding as of December 31, 2014 under our 2006 Stock Plan, with a weighted-average exercise price of approximately $2.67 per share; 2,037,490 shares of common stock issuable upon the exercise of options granted after December 31, 2014 under our 2006 Stock Plan, with an exercise price of $8.50 per share; 406,060 shares of common stock issuable upon exercise of warrants outstanding as of December 31, 2014 with a weighted-average exercise price of approximately $0.66 per share; and shares of our common stock reserved for issuance under our equity compensation plans, consisting of shares of common stock that will be reserved for issuance under our 2015 Equity Incentive Plan, 3,036,004 shares of common stock reserved for issuance under our 2006 Stock Plan as of December 31, 2014 and shares of common stock that will be reserved for issuance under our 2015 Employee Stock Purchase Plan. On the date of this prospectus, any remaining shares available for issuance under our 2006 Stock Plan will be added to the shares reserved for issuance under our 2015 Equity Incentive Plan, and we will cease granting awards under our 2006 Stock Plan. Our 2015 Equity Incentive Plan and 2015 Employee Stock Purchase Plan also provide for automatic annual increases in the number of shares reserved thereunder, as more fully described in Executive CompensationEquity Plans. Except as otherwise indicated, all information in this prospectus assumes: the effectiveness of our amended and restated certificate of incorporation and the adoption of our amended and restated bylaws immediately prior to the completion of this offering; the automatic conversion of all outstanding shares of preferred stock into an aggregate of 106,896,493 shares of common stock, the conversion of which will occur immediately prior to the completion of this offering; no exercise of outstanding options or warrants; and no exercise by the underwriters of their option to purchase up to an additional shares of common stock.
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Summary Consolidated Financial and Other Data You should read this summary consolidated financial and other data in conjunction with Managements Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations and Selected Consolidated Financial and Other Data and our consolidated financial statements and related notes included elsewhere in this prospectus. The consolidated statements of operations data for the years ended December 31, 2012, 2013 and 2014, and the consolidated balance sheet data as of December 31, 2014, are derived from our audited consolidated financial statements and related notes included elsewhere in this prospectus. The following tables also show certain operational and non-GAAP financial measures. See the accompanying footnotes and Selected Consolidated Financial and Other DataNon-GAAP Financial Measures below for more information. Our historical results and key metrics are not necessarily indicative of future results, and results for any interim period presented below are not necessarily indicative of the results to be expected for any annual period. The consolidated financial statements for the years ended December 31, 2012 and 2013 have been revised to correct for the understatement of certain non-income tax-related expenses. See Note 15 of the accompanying notes to our consolidated financial statements.
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Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 (in thousands, except share and per share data) Consolidated Statements of Operations Data: Revenue: Marketplace $ 55,330 $ 78,544 $ 108,732 Seller Services 15,863 42,817 82,502 Other 3,409 3,661 4,357 Total revenue 74,602 125,022 195,591 Cost of revenue(1) 24,493 47,779 73,633 Gross profit 50,109 77,243 121,958 Operating expenses: Marketing(1) 10,902 17,850 39,655 Product development(1) 18,653 27,548 36,634 General and administrative(1) 21,909 31,112 51,920 Total operating expenses 51,464 76,510 128,209 (Loss) income from operations (1,355) 733 (6,251) Total other expense (1,175) (675) (4,009) (Loss) income before income taxes (2,530) 58 (10,260) Benefit (provision) for income taxes 145 (854) (4,983) Net loss $ (2,385) $ (796) $ (15,243) Net loss per share of common stockbasic and diluted $ (0.04) $ (0.01) $ (0.19) Weighted average shares of common stock used in computing net loss per sharebasic and diluted 60,563,723 65,334,548 80,493,407 Pro forma net loss per share of common stockbasic and diluted(2) (unaudited) $ (0.08) Weighted average shares of common stock used in computing pro forma net loss per sharebasic and diluted(2) (unaudited) 187,389,900 Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 (in thousands, except percentages) Other Operational and Financial Data(3): GMS $ 895,152 $ 1,347,833 $ 1,931,981 Adjusted EBITDA $ 10,669 $ 16,947 $ 23,081 Active sellers 830 1,074 1,353 Active buyers 9,317 14,032 19,810 Percent mobile visits N/A 41.3 % 53.2 % Percent mobile GMS N/A 29.5 % 36.1 % Percent international GMS 28.4 % 28.4 % 30.9 %
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As of
December 31, 2014 Actual Pro
Forma(4) (in thousands) Consolidated Balance Sheet Data: Cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments $ 88,843 Working capital 88,540 Total assets 249,135 Deferred revenue 3,452 Long-term liabilities 60,382 Convertible preferred stock 80,212 Total stockholders equity 67,088 (1) Includes total stock-based compensation expense as follows: Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 (in thousands) Cost of revenue $ 166 $ 200 $ 1,113 Marketing 57 79 216 Product development 436 785 1,461 General and administrative 3,435 2,770 7,260 Total stock-based compensation expense $ 4,094 $ 3,834 $ 10,050 (2) Pro forma basic and diluted net loss per share have been calculated assuming the conversion of all outstanding shares of convertible preferred stock into 106,896,493 shares of common stock as of the beginning of the applicable period or at the time of issuance, if later. (3) See Glossary for the definitions of the following terms: active buyer, active seller, GMS and visit. See Selected Consolidated Financial and Other DataNon-GAAP Financial Measures below for the definition of Adjusted EBITDA and for a reconciliation of Adjusted EBITDA to net loss, the most directly comparable financial measure calculated in accordance with GAAP. We began tracking mobile visits and mobile GMS in 2013. (4) Reflects the conversion of all outstanding shares of convertible preferred stock into 106,896,493 shares of common stock as of the date reflected and, on a pro forma basis, our sale of shares of common stock that we are offering at the assumed initial public offering price of $ per share, which is the midpoint of the offering price range on the cover page of this prospectus, after deducting estimated underwriting discounts and commissions and estimated offering expenses payable by us. The pro forma balance sheet data is illustrative only and will change based on the actual initial public offering price and other terms of this offering determined at pricing. Each $1.00 increase or decrease in the assumed initial public offering price of $ per share, which is the midpoint of the offering price range on the cover page of this prospectus, would increase or decrease each of cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments, working capital, total assets, deferred revenue, long-term liabilities and total stockholders equity on a pro forma basis by approximately $ , assuming that the number of shares offered by us, as set forth on the cover page of this prospectus, remains the same. We may also increase or decrease the number of shares we are offering. Each increase or decrease by shares in the number of shares offered by us would increase or decrease each of cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments, working capital, total assets, deferred revenue, long-term liabilities and total stockholders equity by approximately $ million, assuming that the assumed initial price to public remains the same, and after deducting estimated underwriting discounts and commissions and estimated offering expenses payable by us.
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Risk Factors
Investing in our common stock involves a high degree of risk. Before deciding whether to purchase shares of our common stock, you should consider carefully the risks and uncertainties described below, our consolidated financial statements and related notes and all of the other information in this prospectus. If any of the following risks actually occurs, our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects could be adversely affected. As a result, the price of our common stock could decline and you could lose part or all of your investment.
Risks Related to Our Business and Industry
We have a history of operating losses and we may not achieve or maintain profitability in the future.
We incurred net losses of $15.2 million, $0.8 million and $2.4 million for the years ended December 31, 2014, 2013 and 2012, respectively. As of December 31, 2014, we had an accumulated deficit of $32.4 million. We may not achieve or maintain profitability in the future. We expect that our operating expenses will increase substantially as we hire additional employees, increase our marketing efforts, expand our operations and continue to invest in the development of our platform, including new services and features for our members. These efforts may be more costly than we expect and our revenue may not increase sufficiently to offset these additional expenses. In addition, as a public company, we will incur significant legal, accounting and other expenses that we did not incur as a private company. Further, our revenue growth may slow or our revenue may decline for a number of reasons, including those described in these Risk Factors.
Our quarterly operating results may fluctuate, which could cause our stock price to decline.
Our quarterly operating results may fluctuate for a variety of reasons, many of which are beyond our control. These reasons include those described in these Risk Factors as well as the following:
fluctuations in revenue generated from Etsy sellers on our platform, including as a result of the seasonality of marketplace transactions and Etsy sellers use Seller Services;
our success in retaining existing members and attracting new members;
the amount and timing of our operating expenses;
the timing and success of new services and features we introduce;
the impact of competitive developments and our response to those developments;
our ability to manage our existing business and future growth;
disruptions or defects in our marketplace, such as privacy or data security breaches; and
economic and market conditions, particularly those affecting our industry.
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Fluctuations in our quarterly operating results may cause those results to fall below the expectations of analysts or investors, which could cause the price of our common stock to decline. Fluctuations in our results could also cause a number of other problems. For example, analysts or investors might change their models for valuing our common stock, we could experience short-term liquidity issues, our ability to retain or attract key personnel may diminish and other unanticipated issues may arise.
In addition, we believe that our quarterly operating results may vary in the future and that period-to-period comparisons of our operating results may not be meaningful. For example, our historical growth may have overshadowed the seasonal effects on our historical operating results. These seasonal effects may become more pronounced over time, which could also cause our operating results to fluctuate. You should not rely on the results of one quarter as an indication of future performance.
Adherence to our values and our focus on long-term sustainability may negatively influence our short- or medium-term financial performance.
Our values are integral to everything we do, and accordingly, we intend to focus on the long-term sustainability of our business and our ecosystem. We may take actions that we believe will benefit our business and our ecosystem and, therefore, our stockholders over a period of time, even if those actions do not maximize short- or medium-term financial results. However, these longer-term benefits may not materialize within the timeframe we expect or at all. For example:
we may choose to prohibit the sale of items in our marketplace that we believe are inconsistent with our values even though we could benefit financially from the sale of those items;
we may choose to revise our policies in ways that we believe will be beneficial to our members and our ecosystem in the long term even though the changes are perceived unfavorably among our existing members; or
we may take actions, such as investing in alternative forms of shipping or locating our servers in low-impact data centers, that reduce our environmental footprint even though these actions may be more costly than other alternatives.
The authenticity of our marketplace and the connections within our community are important to our success. If we are unable to maintain them, our ability to retain existing members and attract new members could suffer.
We have built an authentic, trusted marketplace that embodies our values-based culture, emphasizing respect, direct communication and fun. We have developed a reputation for authenticity as a result of Etsy sellers unique offerings and their adherence to our policies for handmade goods. We establish trust in our marketplace by emphasizing the person behind every transaction. We deepen connections among our members through our direct communication tools, seller stories on our website and our in-person events, making a personal relationship central to the member experience. As part of our community, we also strive to build meaningful connections with our members. For example, each of our employees, including
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management, is expected to perform member support rotations to help foster connections among our community and to help us better understand the needs of our members. The authenticity of our marketplace and the connections among our members are the cornerstones of our business. Many things could undermine these cornerstones, such as:
complaints or negative publicity about us or our platform, even if factually incorrect or based on isolated incidents;
changes to our policies that our members perceive as inconsistent with our values or that are not clearly articulated;
our failure to enforce our policies fairly and transparently, such as by failing to prevent the widespread listing of items in our marketplace that do not comply with our policies;
our failure to respond to feedback from our community; or
our failure to operate our business in a way that is consistent with our values.
If we are unable to maintain the authenticity of our marketplace and encourage connections among members of our community, then our ability to retain existing members and attract new members could be impaired and our reputation and business could be adversely affected.
In addition, our reputation could be harmed if we lose our status as a Certified B Corporation, whether by our choice or by our failure to meet B Labs certification requirements. Likewise, our reputation could be harmed if our publicly reported B Corporation score declines. B Lab, an independent, third-party organization, sets the standards for Certified B Corporation certification and may change those standards over time.
Our growth depends on our ability to attract and retain an active community of Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers.
In order to increase revenue and to achieve and maintain profitability, we must attract new members and retain existing members. We must also encourage Etsy sellers to list items for sale and use our Seller Services and encourage Etsy buyers to purchase items in our marketplace.
We believe that many of our new members find Etsy by word of mouth and other non-paid referrals from existing members. If existing Etsy sellers are dissatisfied with their experience on our platform, they may stop listing items in our marketplace and may stop referring others to us. Likewise, if existing Etsy buyers do not find our platform appealing, whether because of a negative experience, lack of buyer-friendly features, declining interest in the nature of the goods offered by Etsy sellers or other factors, they may make fewer purchases and they may stop referring others to us. Under these circumstances, we may have difficulty attracting new Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers without incurring additional marketing expense.
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Even if we are able to attract new members to replace members we lose, they may not maintain the same level of activity and the revenue generated from new members may not be as high as the revenue generated from the lost members. If we are unable to retain existing members and attract new members who contribute to an active community, our growth prospects would be harmed and our business could be adversely affected.
Further expansion into markets outside of the United States is important to the growth of our business but will subject us to risks associated with operations abroad.
Expanding our community into markets outside of the United States is an important part of our strategy. Although we have a significant number of members outside of the United States, we have limited experience in developing local markets outside the United States. The nature of the goods that Etsy sellers list in our marketplace may not appeal to non-U.S. consumers in the same way as they do to consumers in the United States. Also, visits to our marketplace from Etsy buyers outside the United States may not convert into sales as often as visits from within the United States. Our success in markets outside the United States will be linked to our ability to attract local Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers to our platform. If we are not able to do so, our growth prospects could be harmed.
In addition, competition is likely to intensify in the international markets where we operate and plan to expand our operations. Local companies based in markets outside the United States may have a substantial competitive advantage because of their greater understanding of, and focus on, those local markets. Some of our competitors may also be able to develop and grow in international markets more quickly than we will.
Continued expansion in markets outside of the United States will also require significant financial investment. These investments include marketing to attract and retain new members, developing localized services, forming relationships with third-party service providers, supporting operations in multiple countries and potentially acquiring companies based outside the United States and integrating those companies with our operations.
Doing business in markets outside of the United States also subjects us to increased risks and burdens such as:
complying with different regulatory standards (including those related to the use of personal information, particularly in the European Union);
managing and staffing operations over a broader geographic area with varying cultural norms and customs;
adapting our platform to local cultural norms and customs;
potentially heightened risk of fraudulent transactions;
limitations on the repatriation of funds and fluctuations of foreign exchange rates;
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exposure to liabilities under anti-corruption, anti-money laundering and export control laws, including the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act of 1977, as amended, the UK Bribery Act of 2010, trade controls and sanctions administered by the U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control, and similar laws and regulations in other jurisdictions;
varying levels of Internet, e-commerce and mobile technology adoption and infrastructure;
our ability to enforce contracts and intellectual property rights in jurisdictions outside the United States; and
barriers to international trade, such as tariffs or other taxes.
Etsy sellers face similar risks in conducting their businesses across borders. Even if we are successful in managing the risks of conducting our business across borders, if Etsy sellers are not, our business could be adversely affected.
Finally, operating in markets outside of the United States requires significant management attention. If we invest substantial time and resources to expand our operations outside of the United States and cannot manage these risks effectively, the costs of doing business in those markets may be prohibitive or our expenses may increase disproportionately to the revenue generated in those markets.
We expect to increase our marketing efforts to help grow our business, but those efforts may not be effective at attracting new members and retaining existing members.
Maintaining and promoting awareness of our marketplace and broader platform is important to our ability to retain existing members and to attract new members. We believe that much of the growth in our member base to date has originated from word-of-mouth referrals and other organic means, as our historical marketing efforts and expenditures have been relatively limited. Going forward, we intend to invest more in marketing, with a particular focus on bringing more Etsy buyers to our platform. We anticipate that our marketing initiatives may become increasingly expensive as competition increases, and generating a meaningful return on those initiatives may be difficult. Also, the marketing efforts we implement in the future may not succeed as we have limited marketing experience. Even if we successfully increase revenue as a result of these efforts, that additional revenue may not offset the expenses we incur.
Our marketing efforts currently include search engine marketing and display advertising, as well as search engine optimization, social media usage, mobile push notifications and email. We obtain a significant number of visits via search engines such as Google, Bing and Yahoo!. Search engines frequently change the algorithms that determine the ranking and display of results of a users search, and those changes can negatively affect the placement of links to our marketplace and, therefore, reduce the number of visits to our marketplace. We also obtain a significant number of visits through email advertising. If we are unable to successfully deliver emails to our members or if members do not open our emails, whether out of choice, because those emails are marked as low priority or spam or for other reasons, our business could be adversely affected. Social networking websites, such as Facebook and Pinterest, are another important
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source of visits to our marketplace. As online commerce and social networking continue to evolve, we must maintain a presence within these networks. We may be unable to develop or maintain such a presence.
Our payments system depends on third-party providers and is subject to evolving laws and regulations.
Etsy buyers can pay for purchases using Direct Checkout or PayPal. In the United States and other countries where Direct Checkout is available, Etsy buyers can pay with credit cards, debit cards, bank transfers and Etsy gift cards on our platform rather than being directed to a third-party payment platform. A significant portion of our GMS is processed through Direct Checkout, and a portion of our revenue is derived from Direct Checkout.
We have engaged third-party service providers to perform underlying card processing, currency exchange, identity verification and fraud analysis services. If these service providers do not perform adequately or if our relationships with these service providers were to terminate, Etsy sellers ability to accept orders could be adversely affected and our business would be harmed. In addition, if these providers increase the fees they charge us, our operating expenses could increase. Alternatively, if we respond by increasing the fees we charge to Etsy sellers, some Etsy sellers may stop using Direct Checkout, stop listing new items for sale or even close their accounts altogether.
The laws and regulations related to payments are complex and vary across different jurisdictions in the United States and globally. As a result, we are required to spend significant time and effort to comply with those laws and regulations. Any failure or claim of our failure to comply, or any failure by our third-party service providers to comply, could cost us substantial resources, could result in liabilities, or could force us to stop offering Direct Checkout. As we expand the availability of Direct Checkout or offer new payment methods to our members in the future, we may become subject to additional regulations and compliance requirements.
Further, through our agreement with our third-party credit card processor, we are indirectly subject to payment card association operating rules and certification requirements, including the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard. We are also subject to rules governing electronic funds transfers. Any change in these rules and requirements could make it difficult or impossible for us to comply.
Our ability to expand our ecosystem is important to the growth of our business.
We spend substantial time and resources creating new offerings in order to add new constituents to our ecosystem and to open new sales channels for Etsy sellers. For example, in October 2013, we expanded our ecosystem by allowing Etsy sellers to work with small-batch manufacturers. Additionally, in August 2014, we added traditional retailers to our ecosystem with the launch of our Wholesale offering, which allows Etsy sellers to sell their products to retailers on our platform.
Our efforts to expand our ecosystem could fail for many reasons, including lack of acceptance of our offerings by existing members or new constituents, our failure to market our offerings effectively to new constituents, defects or errors in our new offerings or negative publicity about us or our new offerings.
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Diversifying our offerings and expanding our ecosystem to benefit our community involves significant risk. For example, these initiatives may not drive increases in revenue, may require substantial investment and planning and may bring us more directly into competition with companies that are better established or have greater resources than we do. It will require additional investment of time and resources in the development and training of our personnel and our members. If we are unable to cost-effectively expand our ecosystem, then our growth prospects and competitive position may be harmed.
We must develop new offerings to respond to our members changing needs.
Our industry is characterized by rapidly changing technology, new service and product introductions and changing customer demands. We spend substantial time and resources understanding our members needs and responding to them. For example, we are continually developing additional Seller Services, improving search and discovery functionality and enhancing the member experience. Recently, we have focused on providing additional Seller Services and tools to help Etsy sellers manage and scale their businesses. For example, in August 2014, we launched our Wholesale offering. In addition, we developed a mobile app and expanded Direct Checkout to enable an Etsy seller in the United States to use our Sell on Etsy Reader to accept credit card and debit card payments in person, such as at her store or her booth at a craft fair.
Our members may not be satisfied with our new offerings or perceive that the new offerings respond to their needs. Developing new offerings is complex, and the timetable for commercial release is difficult to predict and may vary from our historical experience. As a result, the introduction of new offerings may occur after anticipated or announced release dates. Our new offerings also may bring us more directly into competition with companies that are better established or have greater resources than we do.
If we do not continue to cost-effectively develop new offerings that satisfy our members, then our competitive position and growth prospects may be harmed. In addition, new offerings may have lower margins than existing offerings and our revenue may not grow enough as a result of the new offerings to offset the cost of developing them.
If the mobile solutions available to Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers are not effective, the use of our platform could decline.
Visits and purchases made on mobile devices by consumers, including Etsy buyers, have increased significantly in recent years. The smaller screen size and reduced functionality associated with some mobile devices may make the use of our platform more difficult or less appealing to members. Visits to our marketplace on mobile devices may not convert into purchases as often as visits made through personal computers, which could result in less revenue for us. Etsy sellers are also increasingly using mobile devices to operate their businesses on our platform. If we are not able to deliver a rewarding experience on mobile devices, Etsy sellers ability to manage and grow their businesses may be harmed and, consequently, our business may suffer. Further, although we strive to provide engaging mobile experiences for both Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers who visit our mobile website using a browser on their mobile device, we depend on Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers downloading our mobile apps to provide them the optimal mobile experience.
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As new mobile devices and mobile platforms are released, we may encounter problems in developing or supporting apps for them. In addition, supporting new devices and mobile device operating systems may require substantial time and resources.
The success of our mobile apps could also be harmed by factors outside our control, such as:
actions taken by providers of mobile operating systems or mobile app download stores;
unfavorable treatment received by our mobile apps, especially as compared to competing apps, such as the placement of our mobile apps in a mobile app download store;
increased costs to distribute or have members use our mobile apps; or
changes in mobile operating systems, such as iOS and Android, that degrade the functionality of our mobile website or mobile apps or that give preferential treatment to competitive products.
If our members encounter difficulty accessing or using our platform on their mobile devices, or if our members choose not to use our platform on their mobile devices, our growth prospects and our business may be adversely affected.
We face intense competition and may not be able to compete effectively.
Our industry is highly competitive and we expect competition to increase in the future. To be successful, we need to attract and retain both Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers. As a result, we face competition from a wide range of online and offline competitors. See BusinessCompetition.
We compete with retailers for Etsy sellers. An Etsy seller can list her goods for sale with online retailers, such as Amazon.com, eBay or Alibaba, or sell her goods through local consignment and vintage stores and other venues or marketplaces. She may also sell wholesale directly to traditional retailers, including large national retailers, who discover her goods in our marketplace or otherwise. We also compete with companies that sell software and services to small businesses, enabling an Etsy seller to sell from her own website or otherwise run her business independently of our platform, such as Square, Intuit and Shopify.
We compete to attract, engage and retain Etsy sellers based on many factors, including:
our brand awareness;
the breadth of our online presence;
the number and engagement of Etsy buyers;
the extent to which our Seller Services can ease the administrative tasks that an Etsy seller might encounter in running her business, including through mobile apps;
our fees;
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the strength of our community; and
our values.
In addition, we compete with retailers for the attention of the Etsy buyer. An Etsy buyer has the choice of shopping with any online or offline retailer, whether large marketplaces, such as Amazon.com, eBay or Alibaba, or national retail chains, such as Pottery Barn or Target, or local consignment and vintage stores or other venues or marketplaces. Many of these competitors offer low-cost or free shipping, fast shipping times, favorable return policies and other features that may be difficult or impossible for Etsy sellers to match.
We compete to attract, engage and retain Etsy buyers based on many factors, including:
the unique goods that Etsy sellers list in our marketplace;
our brand awareness;
the person-to-person commerce experience;
our reputation for authenticity;
our mobile apps;
ease of payment; and
the availability and reliability of our platform.
Many of our competitors and potential competitors have longer operating histories, greater resources, better name recognition or more customers than we do. They may invest more to develop and promote their services than we do, and they may offer lower fees to sellers than we do. Additionally, we believe that it is relatively easy for new businesses to create online commerce offerings or tools or services that enable entrepreneurship.
Local companies or more established companies based in markets where we operate outside of the United States may also have a better understanding of local customs, providing them a competitive advantage. For example, in certain markets outside the United States, we compete with smaller, but similar, local online marketplaces with a focus on unique goods that are attempting to attract sellers and buyers in those markets.
If we are unable to compete successfully, or if competing successfully requires us to expend significant resources in response to our competitors actions, our business could be adversely affected.
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We may expand our business through acquisitions of other businesses, which may divert managements attention and/or prove to be unsuccessful.
We have acquired a number of other businesses in the past and may acquire additional businesses or technologies in the future. For example, in April 2014 we acquired Jarvis Labs, Inc. (d/b/a Grand St.) and in June 2014 we acquired Incubart SAS (d/b/a A Little Market). Acquisitions may divert managements time and focus from operating our business. Acquisitions also may require us to spend a substantial portion of our available cash, incur debt or other liabilities, amortize expenses related to intangible assets or incur write-offs of goodwill or other assets. In addition, integrating an acquired business or technology is risky. Completed and future acquisitions may result in unforeseen operational difficulties and expenditures associated with:
incorporating new businesses and technologies into our infrastructure;
consolidating operational and administrative functions;
coordinating outreach to our community;
maintaining morale and culture and retaining and integrating key employees;
maintaining or developing controls, procedures and policies (including effective internal control over financial reporting and disclosure controls and procedures); and
assuming liabilities related to the activities of the acquired business before the acquisition, including liabilities for violations of laws and regulations, commercial disputes, taxes and other matters.
Moreover, we may not benefit from our acquisitions as we expect, or in the time frame we expect. We also may issue additional equity securities in connection with an acquisition, which could cause dilution to our stockholders. Finally, acquisitions could be viewed negatively by analysts, investors or our members.
Our ability to recruit and retain employees is important to our success.
We strive to attract and motivate employees, from our office administrators to our management team, who share our dedication to our community and our mission.
Some of the challenges we face in attracting and retaining employees include:
preserving our company culture as we grow;
continuing to attract and retain employees who share our values;
promoting existing employees into leadership positions to help sustain and grow our culture;
hiring employees in multiple locations globally;
responding to competitive pressures and changing business conditions in ways that do not divert us from our values; and
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integrating new personnel and businesses from acquisitions.
Our ability to attract, retain and motivate employees, including our management team, is important to our success. In general, our key personnel work for us on an at-will basis. Other companies, including our competitors, may be successful in recruiting and hiring our employees, and it may be difficult for us to find suitable replacements on a timely basis or on competitive terms.
Filling engineering, product management and other technical positions in the New York City area is particularly challenging, especially in light of our distinctive technology philosophy and engineering culture. Qualified individuals are limited and in high demand, and we may incur significant costs to attract, develop and motivate them. Even if we were to offer higher compensation and other benefits, people with suitable technical skills may choose not to join us or to continue to work for us. If we are not able to maintain our engineering culture and broader company culture, then our ability to recruit and retain employees could suffer and our business would be harmed.
The growth of our business may strain our management team and our operational and financial infrastructure.
We have experienced rapid growth in our business, such as in headcount, the number of Etsy sellers and the number of countries in which we have members, and we plan to continue to grow in the future, both in the United States and abroad. For example, our headcount has grown from 251 employees on December 31, 2011 to 685 employees on December 31, 2014, an increase of 172.9%. The growth of our business places significant demands on our management team and pressure to expand our operational and financial infrastructure. As we continue to grow, our operating expenses will increase. If we do not manage our growth effectively, the increases in our operating expenses could outpace any increases in our revenue and our business could be harmed.
Continued growth could also pose other challenges, such as the need to develop and improve our operational, financial and management controls and to enhance our reporting systems and procedures. For example, in 2013 we began implementing a new enterprise resource planning, or ERP, system to enhance a variety of important functions such as invoicing, accounts receivable, accounts payable, foreign currency translation, financial consolidation and internal and external financial and management reporting matters. ERP system implementations are complex, long-term projects that involve substantial expenditures. To fully realize the benefits of the new ERP system we must also make significant changes to our business and financial processes. Our business may be harmed if the ERP system does not function as expected or does not result in the expected benefits.
We rely on Etsy sellers to provide a fulfilling experience to Etsy buyers.
A small portion of Etsy buyers complain to us about their experience with our platform. For example, Etsy buyers may report that they have not received the items that they purchased, that the items received were not as represented by an Etsy seller or that an Etsy seller has not been responsive to their questions.
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Negative publicity and member sentiment generated as a result of these types of complaints could reduce our ability to attract new members or retain our current members or damage our reputation. A perception that our levels of responsiveness and member support are inadequate could have similar results. In some situations, we may choose to reimburse Etsy buyers for their purchases to help avoid harm to our reputation, but we may not be able to recover the funds we expend for those reimbursements.
Anything that disrupts the operations of a substantial number of Etsy sellers, such as interruptions in delivery services, natural disasters, inclement weather, public health crises or political unrest, could also result in negative experiences for a substantial number of Etsy buyers.
Etsy sellers rely on third-party services to deliver their orders.
Etsy sellers work with a number of third-party services such as FedEx, UPS, the United States Postal Service and Canada Post to deliver their products to Etsy buyers. Anything that prevents timely delivery of goods to Etsy buyers could harm Etsy sellers and could negatively affect our reputation. Delays or interruptions may be caused by events that are beyond the control of the delivery services, such as inclement weather, natural disasters, transportation disruptions, terrorism, public health crises or labor unrest. For example, certain delivery services were reported to have been overwhelmed by the volume of shipments during the 2013 holiday season, resulting in significant delays in delivery times. The delivery services could also be affected by industry consolidation, insolvency or government shut-downs. Although we have agreements with certain delivery services that enable us to provide pre-paid shipping labels as a convenience to Etsy sellers, our agreements do not require these providers to offer delivery services to Etsy sellers. Further, our competitors could obtain preferential rates or shipping services, causing Etsy sellers to pay higher shipping costs or find alternative delivery services. If the goods sold in our marketplace are not delivered in proper condition, on a timely basis or at shipping rates that Etsy buyers are willing to pay, our reputation and our business could be adversely affected.
Our reputation may be harmed if members of our community use unethical business practices.
Our emphasis on our values makes our reputation particularly sensitive to allegations of unethical business practices by Etsy sellers or other members of our community. Our policies promote legal and ethical business practices, such as encouraging Etsy sellers to work only with manufacturers who do not use child or involuntary labor, who do not discriminate and who promote sustainability and humane working conditions. However, we do not control Etsy sellers or other members of our community or their business practices and cannot ensure that they comply with our policies. If members of our community engage in illegal or unethical business practices or are perceived to do so, we may receive negative publicity and our reputation may be harmed.
Failure to deal effectively with fraud could harm our business.
Although we have measures in place to detect and reduce the occurrence of fraudulent activity in our marketplace, those measures may not always be effective.
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For example, Etsy sellers occasionally receive orders placed with fraudulent or stolen credit card data. Under current credit card practices, we may be liable for orders placed through Direct Checkout with fraudulent credit card data even if the associated financial institution approved the credit card transaction. Although we attempt to detect or challenge allegedly fraudulent transactions, we may not be able to do so effectively. As a result, our business could be adversely affected. We could also incur significant fines or lose our ability to give members the option of paying with credit cards if we fail to follow payment card industry data security standards or fail to limit fraudulent transactions conducted in our marketplace.
Negative publicity and member sentiment resulting from fraudulent or deceptive conduct by members or the perception that our levels of responsiveness and member support are inadequate could reduce our ability to attract new members or retain existing members and damage our reputation.
If sensitive information about our members is disclosed, or if we or our third-party providers are subject to cyber attacks, our members may curtail use of our platform, we may be exposed to liability and our reputation would suffer.
We collect, transmit and store personal and financial information provided by our members, such as names, email addresses, the details of transactions and credit card and other financial information. Some of our third-party service providers, such as identity verification and payment processing providers, also regularly have access to member data. In an effort to protect sensitive information, we rely on a variety of security measures, including encryption and authentication technology licensed from third parties. However, advances in computer capabilities, increasingly sophisticated tools and methods used by hackers and cyber terrorists, new discoveries in the field of cryptography or other developments may result in our failure or inability to adequately protect sensitive information. The preventive measures we take to address these risks are costly and may become more costly in the future.
Like all online services, our platform is vulnerable to power outages, telecommunications failures and catastrophic events, as well as computer viruses, break-ins, phishing attacks, denial-of-service attacks and other cyber attacks. Any of these incidents could lead to interruptions or shutdowns of our platform, loss of data or unauthorized disclosure of personally identifiable or other sensitive information. Cyber attacks could also result in the theft of our intellectual property. If we gain greater visibility, we may face a higher risk of being targeted by cyber attacks. Advances in computer capabilities, new technological discoveries or other developments may result in cyber attacks becoming more sophisticated and more difficult to detect. We and our third-party service providers may not have the resources or technical sophistication to anticipate or prevent all such cyber attacks. Moreover, techniques used to obtain unauthorized access to systems change frequently and may not be known until launched against us or our third-party service providers. Security breaches can also occur as a result of non-technical issues, including intentional or inadvertent breaches by our employees or employees of our third-party service providers.
We and our third-party service providers regularly experience cyber attacks aimed at disrupting our and our third-party service providers services. If we or our third-party service providers experience security breaches that result in marketplace performance or availability problems or the loss or unauthorized
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disclosure of sensitive information, people may become unwilling to provide us the information necessary to set up member accounts. Existing members may also decrease their purchases or stop listing new items for sale or close their accounts altogether. We could also face potential liability and litigation, which may not be adequately covered by insurance. Any of these results could harm our growth prospects, our business and our reputation.
Our business depends on network and mobile infrastructure provided by third parties and on our ability to maintain and scale the technology underlying our platform.
The reliability of our platform is important to our reputation and our ability to attract and retain members. As our number of members, volume of traffic, number of transactions and the amount of information shared on our platform grow, our need for additional network capacity and computing power will also grow. The operation of the technology underlying our platform is expensive and complex, and we could experience operational failures. If we fail to accurately predict the rate or timing of the growth of our platform, we may be required to incur significant additional costs to maintain reliability.
We also depend on the development and maintenance of the Internet and mobile infrastructure. This includes maintenance of reliable Internet and mobile networks with the necessary speed, data capacity and security, as well as timely development of complementary products.
Third-party providers host much of our technology infrastructure. Any disruption in their services, or any failure of our providers to handle the demands of our marketplace could significantly harm our business. We exercise little control over these providers, which increases our vulnerability to their financial conditions and to problems with the services they provide. If we experience failures in our technology infrastructure or do not expand our technology infrastructure successfully, then our ability to attract and retain members could be adversely affected, which could harm our growth prospects and our business.
Our business depends on continued and unimpeded access to the Internet and mobile networks.
Our members rely on access to the Internet or mobile networks to access our marketplace. Internet service providers may choose to disrupt or degrade our members access to our platform or increase the cost of such access. Mobile network operators or operating system providers could block or place onerous restrictions on our members ability to download and use our mobile apps.
Internet service providers or mobile network operators could also attempt to charge us for providing access to our platform. Although the Federal Communications Commission, or FCC, recently approved new rules that would prohibit Internet service providers from charging content providers higher rates in order to deliver their content over certain fast traffic lanes, these rules will not go into effect until later this year and could be subject to legal challenge or statutory preemption, which could delay or prevent implementation. If the FCCs rules are not implemented, our business could be adversely impacted. Outside of the United States, government regulation of the Internet, including the idea of network neutrality, may be developing or non-existent. As a result, we could face discriminatory or anti-competitive practices that could impede both our and Etsy sellers growth prospects, increase our costs and harm our business.
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Our business is subject to a large number of U.S. and non-U.S. laws, many of which are evolving.
We are subject to a variety of laws and regulations in the United States and around the world, including those relating to traditional businesses, such as employment laws and taxation, and newer laws and regulations focused on the Internet and online commerce, such as payment systems, privacy, anti-spam, data protection, electronic contracts and consumer protection. These laws and regulations are continuously evolving, and compliance is costly and can require changes to our business practices and significant management time and effort. Additionally, it is not always clear how existing laws apply to the Internet as many of these laws do not address the unique issues raised by the Internet or online commerce.
For example, laws relating to online privacy are evolving differently in different jurisdictions. Federal, state and non-U.S. governmental authorities, as well as courts interpreting the laws, continue to evaluate the privacy implications of the use of third-party cookies, web beacons and other methods of online tracking. The United States, the European Union and other governments have enacted or are considering legislation that could significantly restrict the ability of companies and individuals to collect and store user information, such as by regulating the level of consumer notice and consent required before a company can employ cookies or other electronic tracking tools.
Some providers of consumer devices and web browsers have implemented, or have announced plans to implement, ways to block tracking technologies which, if widely adopted, could also result in online tracking methods becoming significantly less effective. Any reduction in our ability to make effective use of such technologies could harm our ability to personalize the experience of Etsy buyers, increase our costs and limit our ability to attract new members and retain existing members on cost-effective terms. As a result, our business could be adversely affected.
In some cases, non-U.S. privacy, data protection, consumer protection and other laws and regulations are more restrictive than those in the United States. For example, the European Union traditionally has imposed stricter obligations under such laws than the United States. Consequently, the expansion of our operations internationally may require changes to the ways we collect and use consumer information.
Existing and future laws and regulations enacted by federal, state or non-U.S. governments could impede the growth or use of the Internet or online commerce. It is also possible that governments of one or more countries may seek to censor content available on our platform or may even attempt to block access to our platform. If we are restricted from operating in one or more countries, our ability to attract or retain members may be adversely affected and we may not be able to grow our business as we anticipate.
We strive to comply with all applicable laws, but they may conflict with each other, and by complying with the laws or regulations of one jurisdiction, we may find that we are violating the laws or regulations of another jurisdiction. Despite our efforts, we may not have fully complied in the past and may not in the future. If we become liable under laws or regulations applicable to us, we could be required to pay significant fines and penalties, and we may be forced to change the way we operate. That could require us to incur significant expenses or to discontinue certain services, which could negatively affect our business.
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Additionally, if third parties with whom we work violate applicable laws or our policies, those violations could result in other liabilities for us and could harm our business.
We may be unable to protect our intellectual property adequately.
Our intellectual property is an essential asset of our business. To establish and protect our intellectual property rights, we rely on a combination of trade secret, copyright, trademark and, to a lesser extent, patent laws, as well as confidentiality procedures and contractual provisions. The efforts we have taken to protect our intellectual property may not be sufficient or effective. We generally do not elect to register our copyrights or the majority of our trademarks, relying instead on the laws protecting unregistered intellectual property, which may not be sufficient. In addition, our copyrights and trademarks, whether or not registered, and patents, may be held invalid or unenforceable if challenged. While we have obtained or applied for patent protection with respect to some of our intellectual property, we generally do not rely on patents as a principal means of protecting intellectual property. To the extent we do seek patent protection, any U.S. or other patents issued to us may not be sufficiently broad to protect our proprietary technologies.
In addition, we may not be effective in policing unauthorized use of our intellectual property. Even if we do detect violations, we may need to engage in litigation to enforce our intellectual property rights. Any enforcement efforts we undertake, including litigation, could be time-consuming and expensive and could divert our managements attention. In addition, our efforts may be met with defenses and counterclaims challenging the validity and enforceability of our intellectual property rights or may result in a court determining that our intellectual property rights are unenforceable. If we are unable to cost-effectively protect our intellectual property rights, then our business could be harmed.
We may be subject to claims that items listed in our marketplace are counterfeit, infringing or illegal.
Although we do not create or take possession of the items listed in our marketplace by Etsy sellers, we frequently receive communications alleging that items listed in our marketplace infringe third-party copyrights, trademarks, patents or other intellectual property rights. We have intellectual property complaint and take-down procedures in place to address these communications, and we believe such procedures are important to promote confidence in our marketplace. We follow these procedures to review complaints and relevant facts to determine whether to take the appropriate action, which may include removal of the item from our marketplace and, in certain cases, closing the shops of Etsy sellers who repeatedly violate our policies.
Our procedures may not effectively reduce or eliminate our liability. In particular, we may be subject to civil or criminal liability for activities carried out by Etsy sellers on our platform, especially outside the United States where we may be less protected under local laws than we are in the United States. Under current U.S. copyright law and the Communications Decency Act, we may benefit from statutory safe harbor provisions that protect us from liability for content posted by our members. However, trademark and patent laws do not include similar statutory provisions, liability for these forms of intellectual property is often
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determined by court decisions. These safe harbors and court rulings may change unfavorably. In that event, we may be held secondarily liable for the intellectual property infringement of Etsy sellers.
Regardless of the validity of any claims made against us, we may incur significant costs and efforts to defend against or settle them. If a governmental authority determines that we have aided and abetted the infringement or sale of counterfeit goods or if legal changes result in us potentially being liable for actions by Etsy sellers on our platform, we could face regulatory, civil or criminal penalties. Successful claims by third-party rights owners could require us to pay substantial damages or refrain from permitting any further listing of the relevant items. These types of claims could force us to modify our business practices, which could lower our revenue, increase our costs or make our platform less user-friendly for our members. Moreover, public perception that counterfeit or other unauthorized items are common in our marketplace, even if factually incorrect, could result in negative publicity and damage to our reputation.
We may be subject to intellectual property claims, which are extremely costly to defend, could require us to pay significant damages and could limit our ability to use certain technologies in the future.
Companies in the Internet and technology industries are frequently subject to litigation based on allegations of infringement or other violations of intellectual property rights. We periodically receive notices that claim we have infringed, misappropriated or misused other parties intellectual property rights. To the extent we gain greater public recognition, we may face a higher risk of being the subject of intellectual property claims. Third-party intellectual property rights may cover significant aspects of our technologies or business methods or block us from expanding our offerings. Any intellectual property claim against us, with or without merit, could be time consuming and expensive to settle or litigate and could divert the attention of our management. Litigation regarding intellectual property rights is inherently uncertain due to the complex issues involved, and we may not be successful in defending ourselves in such matters.
In addition, some of our competitors have extensive portfolios of issued patents. Many potential litigants, including some of our competitors and patent holding companies, have the ability to dedicate substantial resources to enforcing their intellectual property rights. Any claims successfully brought against us could subject us to significant liability for damages and we may be required to stop using technology or other intellectual property alleged to be in violation of a third partys rights. We also might be required to seek a license for third-party intellectual property. Even if a license is available, we could be required to pay significant royalties or submit to unreasonable terms, which would increase our operating expenses. We may also be required to develop alternative non-infringing technology, which could require significant time and expense. If we cannot license or develop technology for any allegedly infringing aspect of our business, we would be forced to limit our service and may be unable to compete effectively. Any of these results could harm our business.
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We may be involved in litigation matters that are expensive and time consuming.
In addition to intellectual property claims, we may become involved in other litigation matters, including class action lawsuits. Any lawsuit to which we are a party, with or without merit, may result in an unfavorable judgment. We also may decide to settle lawsuits on unfavorable terms. Any such negative outcome could result in payments of substantial damages or fines, damage to our reputation or adverse changes to our offerings or business practices. Any of these results could adversely affect our business. In addition, defending claims is costly and can impose a significant burden on our management.
Our software is highly complex and may contain undetected errors.
The software underlying our platform is highly complex and may contain undetected errors or vulnerabilities, some of which may only be discovered after the code has been released. We rely heavily on a software engineering practice known as continuous deployment, meaning that we typically release software code many times per day. This practice may result in the more frequent introduction of errors or vulnerabilities into the software underlying our platform. Any errors or vulnerabilities discovered in our code after release could result in damage to our reputation, loss of members, loss of revenue or liability for damages, any of which could adversely affect our growth prospects and our business.
We are subject to the terms of open source licenses because our platform incorporates open source software.
The software powering our marketplace incorporates software covered by open source licenses. In addition, we regularly contribute source code to open source software projects and release internal software projects under open source licenses, and we anticipate doing so in the future. The terms of many open source licenses have not been interpreted by U.S. courts and there is a risk that the licenses could be construed in a manner that imposes unanticipated conditions or restrictions on our ability to operate our marketplace. Under certain open source licenses, we could be required to publicly release the source code of our software or to make our software available under open source licenses. To avoid the public release of the affected portions of our source code, we could be required to expend substantial time and resources to re-engineer some or all of our software. In addition, use of open source software can lead to greater risks than use of third-party commercial software because open source licensors generally do not provide warranties or controls on the origin of the software. Use of open source software may also present additional security risks because the public availability of such software may make it easier for hackers and other third parties to determine how to compromise our platform. Additionally, because any software source code we contribute to open source projects is publicly available, our ability to protect our intellectual property rights in such software source code may be limited or lost entirely, and we will be unable to prevent our competitors or others from using such contributed software source code. Any of these risks could be difficult to eliminate or manage and, if not addressed, could adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations.
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Our business and our members may be subject to sales and other taxes.
The application of indirect taxes, such as sales and use tax, value-added tax, or VAT, provincial taxes, goods and services tax, business tax and gross receipt tax, to businesses like ours and to our members is a complex and evolving issue. For example, as of January 1, 2015, the European Union imposed an obligation on marketplaces to collect and remit VAT on sales of automatically-downloaded digital items, and we are in the process of implementing such collection and remittance procedures. Significant judgment is required to evaluate applicable tax obligations and as a result amounts recorded are estimates and could change. In many cases, the ultimate tax determination is uncertain because it is not clear how existing statutes apply to our business or to Etsy sellers businesses. One or more states, the federal government or other countries may seek to impose additional reporting, record-keeping or indirect tax collection obligations on businesses like ours that facilitate online commerce. For example, the U.S. Congress is currently considering the Marketplace Fairness Act, which would grant states the authority to require online merchants to collect sales tax on online sales at the time a transaction is completed. New taxes could also require us or Etsy sellers to incur substantial costs to capture data and collect and remit taxes. If such obligations were imposed, the additional costs associated with tax collection, remittance and audit requirements could make selling in our marketplace less attractive and more costly for Etsy sellers, which could adversely affect our business.
We may experience fluctuations in our tax obligations and effective tax rate.
We are subject to taxation in the United States and in numerous other jurisdictions. We record tax expense based on current tax payments and our estimates of future tax payments, which may include reserves for estimates of probable settlements of tax audits. At any one time, multiple tax years could be subject to audit by various taxing jurisdictions. As a result, we expect that throughout the year there could be ongoing variability in our quarterly tax rates as taxable events occur and exposures are re-evaluated. Further, our effective tax rate in a given financial statement period may be adversely impacted by changes in tax laws, changes in the mix of revenue among different jurisdictions, changes to accounting rules and changes to our ownership or capital structure. Fluctuations in our tax obligations and effective tax rate could adversely affect our business.
In January 2015, we implemented a revised corporate structure to more closely align our structure with our global operations and future expansion plans outside of the United States. Our new corporate structure changes how we use our intellectual property and implements certain intercompany arrangements, which we expect may result in a reduction in our overall effective tax rate and other operational efficiencies. The tax laws of the jurisdictions in which we operate are subject to interpretation, and their application may depend on our ability to operate our business in a manner consistent with our corporate structure. Moreover, these tax laws are subject to change. Tax authorities may disagree with our position as to the tax treatment of our transfer of intangible assets or determine that the manner in which we operate our business does not achieve the intended tax consequences. If our new corporate structure does not achieve our expectations for any of these or other reasons, we may be subject to a higher overall effective tax rate and our business may be adversely affected.
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We rely on consumer discretionary spending and may be adversely affected by economic downturns and other macroeconomic conditions or trends.
Macroeconomic conditions may adversely affect our business. If general economic conditions deteriorate in the United States or other markets where we operate, consumer discretionary spending may decline and demand for the goods available in our marketplace may be reduced. This would cause sales in our marketplace to decline and adversely impact our business. Conversely, if recent trends supporting self-employment and the desire for supplemental income were to reverse, the number of Etsy sellers offering their goods in our marketplace could decline and the number of goods listed in our marketplace could decline.
Even without changes in economic conditions, the demand for the goods listed in our marketplace is dependent on consumer preferences. Consumer preferences can change quickly and may differ across generations and cultures. If demand for the goods that Etsy sellers offer in our marketplace declines, our business would be harmed. Trends in socially-conscious consumerism and buying locally could also shift or slow to the detriment of our business. Our growth prospects would also be hampered if the shift to online and mobile commerce does not continue.
The terms of our debt instruments may restrict our ability to pursue our business strategies.
We do not currently have any obligations outstanding under our credit facility. However, our credit facility requires us, and any debt instruments we may enter into in the future may require us, to comply with various covenants that limit our ability to take actions such as:
disposing of assets;
completing mergers or acquisitions;
incurring additional indebtedness;
encumbering our properties or assets;
paying dividends or making other distributions;
making specified investments; and
engaging in transactions with our affiliates.
These restrictions could limit our ability to pursue our business strategies. If we default under our credit facility and if the default is not cured or waived, the lenders could terminate their commitments to lend to us and cause any amounts outstanding to be payable immediately. Such a default could also result in cross defaults under other debt instruments. Our assets and cash flow may not be sufficient to fully repay borrowings under all of our outstanding debt instruments if some or all of these instruments are accelerated upon a default. Moreover, any such default would limit our ability to obtain additional financing, which may have an adverse effect on our cash flow and liquidity.
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We may need additional capital, which may not be available to us on acceptable terms or at all.
We believe that our existing cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments, together with cash generated from operations and available borrowing capacity under our credit facility, will be enough to meet our anticipated cash needs for at least the next 12 months. However, we may require additional cash resources due to changed business conditions or other developments, such as acquisitions or investments we may decide to pursue. If our resources are insufficient to satisfy our cash requirements, we may seek to borrow funds under our credit facility or sell additional equity or debt securities. The sale of additional equity securities could result in dilution to our existing stockholders. Borrowing funds would result in increased debt service obligations and could result in additional operating and financial covenants that would limit our operations. It is also possible that financing may not be available to us in amounts or on terms acceptable to us, if at all.
If our insurance coverage is insufficient or our insurers are unable to meet their obligations, our insurance may not mitigate the risks facing our business.
We contract for insurance to cover a number of risks and potential liabilities. Our insurance policies cover areas such as general liability, errors and omissions liability, employment liability, business interruptions, data breach, crime, product liability and directors and officers liability. For certain types of business risk, we may not be able to, or may choose not to, acquire insurance. In addition, we may not obtain enough insurance to adequately mitigate the risks we face or we may have to pay high premiums and/or deductibles for the coverage we do obtain. Additionally, if any of our insurers becomes insolvent, it would be unable to pay any claims that we make.
We are an emerging growth company and the reduced disclosure requirements applicable to emerging growth companies may make our common stock less attractive to investors.
We are an emerging growth company as defined in the JOBS Act. For as long as we continue to be an emerging growth company, we intend to take advantage of some of the exemptions from the reporting requirements applicable to other public companies. For example, we intend to take advantage of the exemption from the auditor attestation requirements of Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, or the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, the reduced disclosure obligations regarding executive compensation in our periodic reports and proxy statements and the exemptions from the requirements of holding a nonbinding advisory vote on executive compensation and stockholder approval of any golden parachute payments. It is possible that investors will find our common stock less attractive as a result of our reliance on these exemptions. If so, there may be a less active trading market for our common stock and our stock price may be more volatile.
We will remain an emerging growth company until the earlier of (1) the last day of the fiscal year (a) following the fifth anniversary of the completion of this offering, (b) in which we have total annual gross revenue of at least $1.0 billion or (c) in which we become a large accelerated filer, which means that we have been public for at least 12 months, have filed at least one annual report and the market value of our common
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stock that is held by non-affiliates exceeds $700 million as of the last day of our then most recently completed second fiscal quarter, and (2) the date on which we have issued more than $1.0 billion in non-convertible debt during the prior three-year period.
Operating as a public company will require us to incur substantial costs and will require substantial management attention. In addition, our management team has limited experience managing a public company.
As a public company, we will incur substantial legal, accounting and other expenses that we did not incur as a private company. For example, we will be subject to the reporting requirements of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 as amended, or the Exchange Act, the applicable requirements of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act and the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act and the rules and regulations of the Securities and Exchange Commission, or the SEC. The rules and regulations of Nasdaq will also apply to us following this offering. As part of the new requirements, we will need to establish and maintain effective disclosure and financial controls and make changes to our corporate governance practices. We expect that compliance with these requirements will increase our legal and financial compliance costs and will make some activities more time-consuming.
Most of our management and other personnel have little experience managing a public company and preparing public filings. In addition, we expect that our management and other personnel will need to divert attention from other business matters to devote substantial time to the reporting and other requirements of being a public company. In particular, we expect to incur significant expense and devote substantial management effort to complying with the requirements of Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. We will need to hire additional accounting and financial staff with appropriate public company experience and technical accounting knowledge.
Our management will not be required to evaluate the effectiveness of our internal control over financial reporting until the end of the fiscal year for which our second annual report is due. If we are unable to maintain effective internal control over financial reporting, investors may lose confidence in the accuracy of our financial reports.
As a public company, we will be required to maintain internal control over financial reporting and to report any material weaknesses in such internal controls. Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act requires that we evaluate and determine the effectiveness of our internal control over financial reporting. Beginning with our second annual report following this offering, we will be required to provide a management report on internal control over financial reporting. When we are no longer an emerging growth company, our management report on internal control over financial reporting will need to be attested to by our independent registered public accounting firm. We do not expect to have our independent registered public accounting firm attest to our management report on internal control over financial reporting while we are an emerging growth company.
If we have a material weakness in our internal control over financial reporting, we may not detect errors on a timely basis and our financial statements may be materially misstated. In addition, our internal control
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over financial reporting will not prevent or detect all errors and fraud. Because of the inherent limitations in
all control systems, no evaluation of controls can provide absolute assurance that misstatements due to error or fraud will not occur or that all control issues and instances of fraud will be detected.
If there are material weaknesses or failures in our ability to meet any of the requirements related to the maintenance and reporting of our internal controls, investors may lose confidence in the accuracy and completeness of our financial reports and that could cause the price of our common stock to decline. In addition, we could become subject to investigations by Nasdaq, the SEC or other regulatory authorities, which could require additional management attention and which could adversely affect our business.
As described below we currently have two material weaknesses, which we are in the process of remediating.
We currently have identified two material weaknesses in our internal control over financial reporting that, if not corrected, could result in material misstatements of our financial statements.
In connection with the audit of our financial statements as of and for the year ended December 31, 2014, we identified two material weaknesses in our internal control over financial reporting. A material weakness is defined as a deficiency, or a combination of deficiencies, in internal control over financial reporting, such that there is a reasonable possibility that a material misstatement of our financial statements will not be prevented or detected on a timely basis.
First, we determined that we did not have adequate procedures and controls to appropriately account for certain non-income tax-related expenses and comply with the related filing requirements. Second, we determined that we did not have adequate cut-off procedures to ensure the timely recording of certain period-end accruals.
These two material weaknesses resulted in a misstatement of expenses in prior periods that were immaterial to previously issued annual financial statements but in combination were material to certain interim periods. The impact of these material weaknesses resulted in the revision of our consolidated financial statements for the years ended December 31, 2012 and 2013, for the three months ended March 31, 2013, the three and six months ended June 30, 2013, the three and nine months ended September 30, 2013, the three months ended December 31, 2013 and the three months ended September 30, 2014. The impacts of these material weaknesses also resulted in the restatement of our consolidated financial statements for the three months ended March 31, 2014, the three and six months ended June 30, 2014 and the nine months ended September 30, 2014.
Neither we nor our independent registered public accounting firm has performed an evaluation of our internal control over financial reporting in accordance with Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. In light of the material weaknesses that were identified, we believe that it is possible that additional material weaknesses and control deficiencies may have been identified if such an evaluation had been performed.
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We are working to remediate the material weaknesses. We have taken steps to enhance our internal control environment and plan to take additional steps to remediate the material weaknesses. Specifically:
we began building an in-house tax function in early 2014 and have added a global head of tax, senior tax manager of planning and a dedicated senior state tax accountant and plan to add an experienced director of tax accounting. We have also hired additional qualified personnel in our accounts payable function, including an experienced supervisor, and plan to add an additional experienced senior accountant. We will continue to evaluate the structure of the finance organization and add resources as needed;
we are implementing additional internal reporting procedures, including those designed to add depth to our review processes and improve our segregation of duties;
we are updating our systems so that we may collect the necessary information to enable us to more effectively monitor and comply with applicable non-income tax-filing requirements on a timely basis;
we are improving the communication and coordination among our finance departments and our record-keeping procedures and we have expanded cross-functional involvement and input into period-end accruals. We are also planning enhancements in our procure-to-pay process as well as additions to analytical procedures used to assess period-end accruals; and
we are in the process of documenting, assessing and testing our internal control over financial reporting as part of our efforts to comply with Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act.
The actions that we are taking are subject to ongoing senior management review as well as audit committee oversight. Although we plan to complete this remediation process as quickly as possible, we cannot at this time estimate how long it will take, and our efforts may not be successful in remediating these material weaknesses. In addition, we will incur additional costs in improving our internal control over financial reporting. If we are unable to successfully remediate these material weaknesses or if we identify additional material weaknesses, we may not detect errors on a timely basis. This could harm our operating results, cause us to fail to meet our SEC reporting obligations or Nasdaq listing requirements on a timely basis, adversely affect our reputation, cause our stock price to decline or result in inaccurate financial reporting or material misstatements in our annual or interim financial statements.
Our business could be adversely affected by natural disasters, public health crises, political crises or other unexpected events.
Natural disasters and other adverse weather and climate conditions, public health crises, political crises, such as terrorist attacks, war and other political instability, or other unexpected events, could disrupt our operations, Internet or mobile networks, or the operations of one or more of our service providers. For example, when Hurricane Sandy struck New York in October 2012, although our data centers were unaffected, our headquarters in Brooklyn was closed for five days, and we experienced a heavy volume of
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member support requests which required us to devote additional resources to handle those requests. Events of this type could also impact Etsy sellers ability to continue producing goods for sale in our marketplace. In addition, such events could negatively impact consumer spending in the affected regions. If any of these events occurs, our business could be adversely affected.
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Risks Related to This Offering and Ownership of Our Common Stock
The price of our common stock could be volatile and you may not be able to resell your shares at or above our initial public offering price. Declines in the price of common stock could subject us to litigation.
There has not been a public market for our common stock prior to this offering and an active trading market may not develop following this offering. Even if such a market does develop, it may not be sustainable. If trading in our common stock is not active, you may not be able to sell your shares quickly, at the market price or at all. The initial public offering price for the shares was determined by negotiations between us and the representative of the underwriters and may not be indicative of prices that will prevail in the trading market following this offering. In addition, the trading prices of the securities of technology companies have historically been highly volatile. Accordingly, the price of our common stock could be subject to wide fluctuations for many reasons, many of which are beyond our control, including those described in these Risk Factors and others such as:
variations in our operating results and other financial and operational metrics, including the key financial and operating metrics disclosed in this prospectus, as well as how those results and metrics compare to analyst and investor expectations;
speculation about our operating results in the absence of our own financial projections;
failure of analysts to initiate or maintain coverage of our company, changes in their estimates of our operating results or changes in recommendations by analysts that follow our common stock;
announcements of new services or enhancements, strategic alliances or significant agreements or other developments by us or our competitors;
announcements by us or our competitors of mergers or acquisitions or rumors of such transactions involving us or our competitors;
changes in our board of directors, management or other key personnel;
disruptions in our marketplace due to hardware, software or network problems, security breaches or other issues;
the strength of the global economy or the economy in the jurisdictions in which we operate, and market conditions in our industry and those affecting our members;
trading activity by our principal stockholders, including upon the expiration of contractual lock-up agreements;
the performance of the equity markets in general and in our industry;
the operating performance of other similar companies;
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changes in legal requirements relating to our business;
litigation or other claims against us;
the number of shares of our common stock that are available for public trading; and
any other factors discussed in this prospectus.
In addition, if the market for technology stocks or the stock market in general experiences a loss of investor confidence, the price of our common stock could decline for reasons unrelated to our business, results of operations or financial condition. The price of our common stock might also decline in reaction to events that affect other companies, even if those events do not directly affect us. Some companies that have experienced volatility in the trading price of their stock have been the subject of securities class action litigation. If we are the subject of such litigation, it could result in substantial costs and could divert our managements attention and resources, which could adversely affect our business.
We have broad discretion in the use of the net proceeds from this offering and may not use them effectively.
The principal purposes of this offering are to increase our visibility, create a public market for our common stock and facilitate our future access to the public equity markets. We currently intend to use the net proceeds from this offering for working capital and general corporate purposes, including continued investments in the growth of our business. We also intend to use $300,000 of the proceeds of this offering to partially fund Etsy.org, a Delaware non-profit organization that we formed in January 2015. We may use a portion of the net proceeds to fund the build-out of our new corporate headquarters. In addition, we may use a portion of the net proceeds received by us from this offering for acquisitions of other complementary businesses, technologies or other assets. However, we have no current understandings, agreements or commitments for any specific material acquisitions at this time. Except with respect to Etsy.org, we have not yet determined the manner in which we will allocate the net proceeds we receive from this offering. As a result, our management will have broad discretion in the allocation and use of the net proceeds. See Use of Proceeds.
The failure by our management to allocate or use these funds effectively could harm our business. Pending their use, we may invest the net proceeds we receive from this offering in a manner that does not produce income or that loses value. Our ultimate use of the net proceeds from this offering may vary substantially from their currently intended use.
We do not intend to pay dividends on our capital stock, so any returns will be limited to increases in the value of our common stock.
We have never declared or paid any cash dividends on our capital stock. We currently anticipate that we will retain future earnings for the operation and expansion of our business. Accordingly, we do not anticipate declaring or paying any cash dividends for the foreseeable future. In addition, our ability to pay cash dividends on our capital stock is restricted by the terms of our credit facility and is likely to be restricted by
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any future debt financing arrangement we enter into. Any return to stockholders will therefore be limited to increases in the price of our common stock, if any.
Our directors, executive officers and principal stockholders beneficially own a substantial percentage of our stock and will be able to exert significant control over matters subject to stockholder approval.
Our directors, executive officers, greater than 5% stockholders and their respective affiliates will hold in the aggregate approximately % of the voting power of our outstanding capital stock following this offering, assuming no exercise of the underwriters option to purchase additional shares of our common stock in this offering. Therefore, these stockholders will continue to have the ability to influence us through their ownership position, even after this offering. If these stockholders act together, they may be able to determine all matters requiring stockholder approval. For example, these stockholders will be able to control elections of directors, amendments of our charter documents or approval of any merger, sale of assets or other major corporate transaction. This may prevent or discourage unsolicited acquisition proposals or offers for our capital stock that other stockholders may feel are in their best interests.
If you purchase our common stock in this offering, you will incur immediate and substantial dilution.
The initial public offering price is substantially higher than the pro forma net tangible book value per share of our common stock of $ per share as of December 31, 2014. Investors purchasing common stock in this offering will pay a price per share that substantially exceeds the net tangible book value per share. As a result, investors purchasing common stock in this offering will incur immediate dilution of $ per share, based on the initial public offering price of $ per share, the midpoint of the price range on the cover page of this prospectus.
This dilution is due to the substantially lower price paid by our investors who purchased shares prior to this offering as compared to the price offered to the public in this offering. In addition, as of December 31, 2014, there were outstanding options to purchase 23,050,594 shares of our common stock with a weighted average exercise price of approximately $2.67 per share and warrants to purchase 406,060 shares of our common stock (including preferred stock on an as-converted basis) with a weighted average exercise price of approximately $0.66 per share. The exercise of any of these options or warrants would result in additional dilution. As a result of the dilution to investors purchasing shares in this offering, investors may receive less than the purchase price paid in this offering in the event of our liquidation. See Dilution.
Sales of a substantial number of shares of our common stock in the public market by our existing stockholders following this offering could cause the price of our common stock to decline.
Sales of a substantial number of shares of our common stock in the public market, or the perception that these sales might occur, could depress the price of our common stock and could impair our ability to raise capital through the sale of additional equity securities. We cannot predict the effect that sales may have on the prevailing price of our common stock.
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All of our executive officers and directors and the holders of substantially all of our capital stock are subject to lock-up agreements with the underwriters of this offering that restrict the stockholders ability to transfer shares of our common stock for periods of at least 180 days, and for a portion of the shares, 270 and 360 days from the date of this prospectus. The lock-up agreements limit the number of shares of common stock that may be sold immediately following this offering. Subject to certain limitations, approximately shares will become eligible for sale upon expiration of the 180-day lock-up period, approximately shares will become eligible for sale upon expiration of the 270-day lock-up period and approximately shares will become eligible for sale upon expiration of the 360-day lock-up period. In addition, based on our capitalization as of December 31, 2014, shares issuable upon exercise of outstanding options and shares issuable upon exercise of outstanding warrants will also be eligible for sale upon expiration of the 180-day lock-up period. We intend to register all of the shares underlying outstanding options and any shares underlying other equity incentives we may grant in the future for public resale under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, or the Securities Act. Accordingly, these shares will be able to be freely sold in the public market upon issuance to the extent permitted by any applicable vesting requirements and the lock-up agreements described above. Sales of stock by these stockholders could adversely affect the trading price of our common stock.
Certain holders of shares of our common stock have registration rights. See Description of Capital StockRegistration Rights. Registration of these shares under the Securities Act would result in the shares becoming freely tradable without restriction under the Securities Act, except for shares held by our affiliates as defined in Rule 144 under the Securities Act. Sales of securities by any of these stockholders could adversely affect the trading price of our common stock.
Future sales and issuances of our common stock or rights to purchase common stock could result in additional dilution to our stockholders and could cause the price of our common stock to decline.
We may issue additional common stock, convertible securities or other equity following the completion of this offering. We also expect to issue common stock to our employees, directors and other service providers pursuant to our equity incentive plans. Such issuances could be dilutive to investors and could cause the price of our common stock to decline. New investors in such issuances could also receive rights senior to those of holders of our common stock.
If analysts do not publish research about our business or if they publish inaccurate or unfavorable research, our stock price and trading volume could decline.
The trading market for our common stock will depend in part on the research and reports that analysts publish about our business. We do not have any control over these analysts. If one or more of the analysts who cover us downgrade our common stock or publish inaccurate or unfavorable research about our business, the price of our common stock would likely decline. If few analysts cover us, demand for our common stock could decrease and our common stock price and trading volume may decline. Similar results may occur if one or more of these analysts stop covering us in the future or fail to publish reports on us regularly.
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Anti-takeover provisions in our charter documents and under Delaware law could make an acquisition of our company more difficult, could limit attempts to make changes in our management and could depress the price of our common stock.
Provisions in our certificate of incorporation and bylaws may have the effect of delaying or preventing a change in control of our company or limiting changes in our management. Among other things, these provisions:
establish a classified board of directors so that not all members of our board of directors are elected at one time;
permit our board of directors to establish the number of directors and fill any vacancies and newly created directorships;
provide that directors may only be removed for cause;
require super-majority voting to amend some provisions in our certificate of incorporation and bylaws;
authorize the issuance of blank check preferred stock that our board of directors could use to implement a stockholder rights plan;
eliminate the ability of our stockholders to call special meetings of stockholders;
prohibit stockholder action by written consent, which means all stockholder actions must be taken at a meeting of our stockholders;
provide that our board of directors is expressly authorized to amend or repeal any provision of our bylaws;
restrict the forum for certain litigation against us to Delaware; and
establish advance notice requirements for nominations for election to our board of directors or for proposing matters that can be acted upon by stockholders at annual stockholder meetings.
These provisions may delay or prevent attempts by our stockholders to replace members of our management by making it more difficult for stockholders to replace members of our board of directors, which is responsible for appointing the members of our management. In addition, Section 203 of the Delaware General Corporation Law may delay or prevent a change in control of our company. Section 203 imposes certain restrictions on mergers, business combinations and other transactions between us and holders of 15% or more of our common stock. Anti-takeover provisions could depress the price of our common stock by acting to delay or prevent a change in control of our company.
For information regarding these and other provisions, see Description of Capital Stock.
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Our certificate of incorporation will provide that the Court of Chancery of the State of Delaware will be the exclusive forum for substantially all disputes between us and our stockholders, which could limit our stockholders ability to obtain a favorable judicial forum for disputes with us or our directors, officers or employees.
Our certificate of incorporation will provide that the Court of Chancery of the State of Delaware is the exclusive forum for any derivative action or proceeding brought on our behalf, any action asserting a breach of fiduciary duty, any action asserting a claim against us arising pursuant to the Delaware General Corporation Law, our certificate of incorporation or our bylaws or any action asserting a claim against us that is governed by the internal affairs doctrine. This choice of forum provision may limit a stockholders ability to bring a claim in a judicial forum that it finds favorable for disputes with us or our directors, officers or other employees and may discourage these types of lawsuits. Alternatively, if a court were to find the choice of forum provision contained in our certificate of incorporation to be inapplicable or unenforceable in an action, we may incur additional costs associated with resolving such action in other jurisdictions.
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Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements
This prospectus contains forward-looking statements that are based on our beliefs and assumptions and on information currently available to us. The forward-looking statements are contained principally in Prospectus Summary, Risk Factors, Managements Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations, Letter from Chad and Business. Forward-looking statements include information concerning our possible or assumed future results of operations and expenses, business strategies and plans, competitive position, business environment and potential growth opportunities. Forward-looking statements include all statements that are not historical facts. In some cases, forward-looking statements can be identified by terms such as anticipates, believes, could, estimates, expects, intends, may, plans, potential, predicts, projects, seeks, should, will, would or similar expressions and the negatives of those terms.
Forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause our actual results, performance or achievements to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements. Those risks include those described in Risk Factors and elsewhere in this prospectus. Given these uncertainties, you should not place undue reliance on any forward-looking statements in this prospectus. Also, forward-looking statements represent our beliefs and assumptions only as of the date of this prospectus. You should read this prospectus and the documents that we have filed as exhibits to the registration statement, of which this prospectus is a part, and any related free writing prospectus, completely and with the understanding that our actual future results may be materially different from what we expect.
Any forward-looking statement made by us in this prospectus speaks only as of the date on which it is made. Except as required by law, we disclaim any obligation to update these forward-looking statements publicly, or to update the reasons actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in these forward-looking statements, even if new information becomes available in the future. All forward-looking statements are expressly qualified in their entirety by the foregoing cautionary statements.
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Industry and Market Data
We obtained the industry, market and competitive position data in this prospectus from our own internal estimates and research, from industry and general publications and from research, surveys and studies conducted by third parties. This information involves a number of assumptions and limitations, and you are cautioned not to give undue weight to such estimates.
In addition, industry publications, studies and surveys generally state that they have been obtained from sources believed to be reliable, although they do not guarantee the accuracy or completeness of such information. While we believe that each of these studies and publications is reliable, we have not independently verified market and industry data from third parties. Likewise, while we believe our internal company data is reliable and the definitions of these key operating metrics are appropriate, neither such data nor these definitions have been verified by any independent source.
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Use of Proceeds
We estimate that the net proceeds to us from the issuance of our common stock in this offering, after deducting estimated underwriting discounts and commissions and estimated offering expenses payable by us, will be approximately $ million, or approximately $ million if the underwriters exercise their option to purchase additional shares in full, assuming an initial public offering price of $ per share, which is the midpoint of the offering price range on the cover page of this prospectus.
We will not receive any of the proceeds from the sale of shares by the selling stockholders.
Each $1.00 increase (or decrease) in the assumed initial public offering price of $ per share, the midpoint of the offering price range on the cover page of this prospectus, would increase (or decrease) net proceeds to us by $ million, assuming that the number of shares offered by us on the cover page of this prospectus remains the same, and after deducting estimated underwriting discounts and commissions and estimated offering expenses payable by us. Each 1,000,000 increase (or decrease) in the number of shares of common stock offered by us would increase (or decrease) net proceeds to us by approximately $ million, assuming an initial public offering price of $ per share, the midpoint of the price range on the cover page of this prospectus, and after deducting estimated underwriting discounts and commissions and estimated offering expenses payable by us.
The principal purposes of this offering are to increase our visibility, create a public market for our common stock and facilitate our future access to the public equity markets. We currently intend to use the net proceeds from this offering for working capital and general corporate purposes, including continued investments in the growth of our business. Consistent with our values and our mission, we also intend to use $300,000 of the proceeds of this offering to partially fund Etsy.org, a Delaware non-profit organization that we formed in January 2015. Etsy.org will be dedicated to educating women and other under-represented entrepreneurial populations and empowering them to build businesses that regenerate communities and the planet. See BusinessOur Strategy: The Path Ahead for additional information about Etsy.org. We may use a portion of the net proceeds to fund the build-out of our new corporate headquarters. In addition, we may use a portion of the net proceeds received by us from this offering for acquisitions of other complementary businesses, technologies or other assets. However, we have no current understandings, agreements or commitments for any specific material acquisitions at this time. Except with respect to Etsy.org, we have not allocated specific amounts of the net proceeds received by us from this offering for any of these purposes and, as a result, we will have broad discretion in the allocation and use of the net proceeds.
Pending our use of the net proceeds received by us from this offering, we intend to invest the net proceeds in short and intermediate term, interest-bearing obligations, investment grade instruments, certificates of deposit or direct or guaranteed obligations of the U.S. government.
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Dividend Policy
We have never declared or paid cash dividends on our capital stock. We currently intend to retain all available funds and any future earnings for use in the operation of our business and do not anticipate paying any cash dividends in the foreseeable future. Any future decision to declare cash dividends will be made at the discretion of our board of directors, subject to applicable laws, and will depend on a number of factors, including our financial condition, results of operations, capital requirements, contractual restrictions, general business conditions and other factors that our board of directors thinks are relevant. Under Delaware law, we can only pay dividends either out of surplus or out of the current or the immediately preceding years net profits. Surplus is defined as the excess, if any, at any given time, of the total assets of a corporation over its total liabilities and statutory capital. As a result, we may not pay dividends according to our policy or at all if, among other things, we do not have sufficient cash to pay the intended dividends. Our future ability to pay cash dividends on our stock may be limited by the terms of any future debt or preferred securities and is limited by the terms of our Credit Agreement. See Managements Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of OperationsLiquidity and Capital ResourcesSources of Liquidity for further information about our Credit Agreement.
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Capitalization
The following table sets forth our cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments and capitalization as of December 31, 2014:
on an actual basis;
on a pro forma basis to give effect to (i) the automatic conversion of all outstanding shares of our preferred stock into common stock and (ii) the effectiveness of the amendment and restatement of our certificate of incorporation in connection with the completion of this offering; and
on a pro forma as adjusted basis to give effect to the adjustments discussed above and the issuance and sale by us of shares of common stock in this offering, and the receipt of the net proceeds from our sale of these shares at an assumed initial public offering price of the common stock of $ per share, the midpoint of the offering price range on the cover page of this prospectus, after deducting estimated underwriting discounts and commissions and estimated offering expenses payable by us.
The unaudited pro forma and pro forma as adjusted information below is illustrative only, and cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments, total stockholders equity and total capitalization after this offering will be adjusted based on the actual initial public offering price and other terms of this offering determined at pricing. You should read this table in conjunction with Managements Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations and Description of Capital Stock and our consolidated financial statements and related notes included elsewhere in this prospectus.
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As of December 31, 2014 Actual Pro Forma Pro Forma
as Adjusted(1) (unaudited) (in thousands, except share and per share data) Cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments $ 88,843 $ $ Convertible preferred stock: Preferred stock, $0.001 par value; 21,165,473 shares authorized, 21,124,432 shares issued and outstanding, actual; shares authorized, no shares issued and outstanding, pro forma and pro forma as adjusted $ 80,212 $ $ Stockholders equity: Common stock, $0.001 par value; 240,000,000 shares authorized, 88,361,973 shares issued and outstanding, actual; shares authorized, shares issued and outstanding, pro forma and shares issued and outstanding, pro forma as adjusted 88 Additional paid-in capital 103,311 Accumulated deficit (32,377) Accumulated other comprehensive loss (3,934) Total capitalization $ 147,300 $ $
(1) A $1.00 increase (or decrease) in the assumed initial public offering price of $ per share would increase (or decrease) each of cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments, additional paid-in capital and total capitalization by $ million, assuming that the number of shares offered by us on the cover page of this prospectus remains the same, and after deducting estimated underwriting discounts and commissions. If the underwriters option to purchase additional shares is exercised in full, cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments, additional paid-in capital and total capitalization would increase by approximately $ million, after deducting estimated underwriting discounts and commissions and estimated offering expenses payable by us, and we would have shares of our common stock issued and outstanding.
See Prospectus SummaryThe Offering for a description of those shares that are or are not reflected as outstanding shares on a pro forma basis in the table above.
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Dilution
If you invest in our common stock, your investment will be diluted to the extent of the difference between the offering price per share of our common stock and the pro forma as adjusted net tangible book value per share of our common stock immediately after this offering. Dilution results from the fact that the per share offering price of our common stock is substantially higher than the book value per share attributable to our existing stockholders.
Our pro forma net tangible book value as of was $ million, or $ per share of common stock. Our pro forma net tangible book value per share represents the amount of our total tangible assets reduced by the amount of our total liabilities and divided by the total number of shares of our common stock outstanding as of , after giving effect to the automatic conversion of all outstanding shares of our preferred stock into common stock in connection with this offering.
After giving effect to our sale in this offering of shares of common stock at an assumed initial public offering price of $ per share, the midpoint of the offering price range on the cover page of this prospectus, after deducting estimated underwriting discounts and commissions and estimated offering expenses payable by us, our pro forma as adjusted net tangible book value as of would have been approximately $ million, or $ per share of common stock. This represents an immediate pro forma as adjusted dilution of $ per share to investors purchasing shares in this offering.
The following table illustrates this per share dilution.
Assumed initial offering price per share $ Pro forma net tangible book value per share as of $ Increase in pro forma net tangible book value per share attributable to investors purchasing shares in this offering $ Pro forma as adjusted net tangible book value per share after this offering Dilution per share to investors in this offering $
A $1.00 increase (or decrease) in the assumed offering price of $ per share would increase (or decrease) our pro forma as adjusted net tangible book value per share after this offering by $ , assuming that the number of shares offered by us on the cover page of this prospectus remains the same, and after deducting estimated underwriting discounts and commissions payable by us.
If the underwriters exercise their option to purchase additional shares in full, the pro forma as adjusted net tangible book value per share after giving effect to this offering would be approximately $ per share, and the dilution in pro forma net tangible book value per share to investors in this offering would be approximately $ per share.
The following table summarizes, as of , the differences between the number of outstanding shares of our common stock purchased from us, after giving effect to the conversion of our preferred stock into common stock, the total cash consideration paid and the average price per share paid by our existing
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stockholders and by our new investors purchasing shares in this offering at the assumed offering price of the common stock of $ per share, the midpoint of the offering price range on the cover page of this prospectus, before deducting estimated underwriting discounts and commissions and estimated offering expenses payable by us:
Shares Purchased Total Consideration Average
Price Per
Share Number Percent Amount Percent Existing stockholders % $ % $ New investors Total 100 % $ 100 % $
Sales by the selling stockholders in this offering will cause the number of shares held by existing stockholders to be reduced to shares, or % of the total number of shares of our common stock outstanding after this offering, and will increase the number of shares held by new investors to shares, or % of the total number of shares outstanding after this offering.
A $1.00 increase (or decrease) in the assumed initial public offering price of $ per share would increase (or decrease) total consideration paid by new investors by $ million, assuming that the number of shares offered by us on the cover page of this prospectus remains the same, and after deducting estimated underwriting discounts and commissions payable by us.
After giving effect to the sale of shares in this offering by us and the selling stockholders, if the underwriters exercise their option to purchase additional shares in full, our existing stockholders would own % and our new investors would own % of the total number of shares of our common stock outstanding after this offering.
See Prospectus SummaryThe Offering for a description of those shares that are or are not reflected in the foregoing tables or discussion.
To the extent that any outstanding options or warrants are exercised, new investors will experience further dilution.
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Selected Consolidated Financial and Other Data
The following tables show selected consolidated financial data. The selected consolidated statements of operations data for the years ended December 31, 2012, 2013 and 2014, and the selected consolidated balance sheet data as of December 31, 2013 and 2014, are derived from our audited consolidated financial statements and related notes included elsewhere in this prospectus. The following tables also show certain operational and non-GAAP financial measures. See the accompanying footnotes and Non-GAAP Financial Measures below for more information. Our historical results and key metrics are not necessarily indicative of future results, and results for any interim period presented below are not necessarily indicative of the results to be expected for any annual period. Our consolidated financial statements for the years ended December 31, 2012 and 2013 have been revised to correct for the understatement of certain non-income tax related expenses. See Note 15 of the accompanying notes to our consolidated financial statements.
The following selected consolidated financial data and key metrics should be read together with Managements Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations and our consolidated financial statements and related notes included elsewhere in this prospectus.
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Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 (in thousands, except share and per share data) Consolidated Statements of Operations Data: Revenue: Marketplace $ 55,330 $ 78,544 $ 108,732 Seller Services 15,863 42,817 82,502 Other 3,409 3,661 4,357 Total revenue 74,602 125,022 195,591 Cost of revenue(1) 24,493 47,779 73,633 Gross profit 50,109 77,243 121,958 Operating expenses: Marketing(1) 10,902 17,850 39,655 Product development(1) 18,653 27,548 36,634 General and administrative(1) 21,909 31,112 51,920 Total operating expenses 51,464 76,510 128,209 (Loss) income from operations (1,355) 733 (6,251) Total other expense (1,175) (675) (4,009) (Loss) income before income taxes (2,530) 58 (10,260) Benefit (provision) for income taxes(2) 145 (854) (4,983) Net loss $ (2,385) $ (796) $ (15,243) Net loss per share of common stockbasic and diluted $ (0.04) $ (0.01) $ (0.19) Weighted average shares of common stock used in computing net loss per sharebasic and diluted 60,563,723 65,334,548 80,493,407 Pro forma net loss per share of common stockbasic and diluted(3) (unaudited) $ (0.08) Weighted average shares of common stock used in computing pro forma net loss per sharebasic and diluted(3) (unaudited) 187,389,900
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 (in thousands, except percentages) Other Operational and Financial Data(4): GMS $ 895,152 $ 1,347,833 $ 1,931,981 Adjusted EBITDA $ 10,669 $ 16,947 $ 23,081 Active sellers 830 1,074 1,353 Active buyers 9,317 14,032 19,810 Percent mobile visits N/A 41.3 % 53.2 % Percent mobile GMS N/A 29.5 % 36.1 % Percent international GMS 28.4 % 28.4 % 30.9 %
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As of
December 31, 2013 2014 (in thousands) Consolidated Balance Sheet Data: Cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments $ 54,870 $ 88,843 Working capital 57,566 88,540 Total assets 106,159 249,135 Deferred revenue 2,760 3,452 Long-term liabilities 2,725 60,382 Convertible preferred stock 80,212 80,212 Total stockholders equity 4,003 67,088
(1) Includes total stock-based compensation expense as follows:
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 (in thousands) Cost of revenue $ 166 $ 200 $ 1,113 Marketing 57 79 216 Product development 436 785 1,461 General and administrative 3,435 2,770 7,260 Total stock-based compensation expense $ 4,094 $ 3,834 $ 10,050
(2) Includes a valuation allowance against our net deferred tax assets in certain European jurisdictions which was recorded during the year ended December 31, 2014. No tax benefit has been recognized for the applicable losses during this period.
(3) Pro forma basic and diluted net loss per share have been calculated assuming the conversion of all outstanding shares of convertible preferred stock into 106,896,493 shares of common stock as of the beginning of the applicable period or at the time of issuance, if later.
(4) See Prospectus SummaryGlossary for the definitions of the following terms: active buyer, active seller, GMS and visit. See Non-GAAP Financial Measures below for the definition of Adjusted EBITDA and for a reconciliation of Adjusted EBITDA to net (loss) income, the most directly comparable financial measure calculated in accordance with GAAP. We began tracking mobile visits and mobile GMS in 2013.
Non-GAAP Financial Measures
Adjusted EBITDA
In this prospectus, we provide Adjusted EBITDA, a non-GAAP financial measure that represents our net (loss) income before interest expense, net, (benefit) provision for income taxes and depreciation and amortization, adjusted to eliminate stock-based compensation expense, net unrealized loss on warrant and other liabilities, foreign exchange loss and acquisition-related expenses. Below is a reconciliation of Adjusted EBITDA to net (loss) income, the most directly comparable GAAP financial measure.
We have included Adjusted EBITDA in this prospectus because it is a key measure used by our management and board of directors to evaluate our operating performance and trends, allocate internal resources, prepare and approve our annual budget, develop short- and long-term operating plans and assess the health of our business. As our Adjusted EBITDA increases, we are able to invest more in our platform. We believe
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that Adjusted EBITDA can provide a useful measure for period-to-period comparisons of our business as it removes the impact of certain non-cash items and certain variable charges.
Adjusted EBITDA has limitations as an analytical tool, and you should not consider it in isolation or as a substitute for analysis of our results as reported under GAAP. Some of these limitations are:
although depreciation and amortization are non-cash charges, the assets being depreciated and amortized may have to be replaced in the future, and Adjusted EBITDA does not reflect cash capital expenditure requirements for such replacements or for new capital expenditure requirements;
Adjusted EBITDA does not consider the impact of stock-based compensation expense or changes in the fair value of warrants;
Adjusted EBITDA does not reflect tax payments that may represent a reduction in cash available to us;
Adjusted EBITDA does not reflect acquisition-related expenses;
Adjusted EBITDA does not consider the impact of foreign exchange loss;
Adjusted EBITDA, in future periods, will not reflect the impact of our contributions to Etsy.org; and
other companies, including companies in our industry, may calculate Adjusted EBITDA differently, which reduces its usefulness as a comparative measure.
Because of these limitations, you should consider Adjusted EBITDA alongside other financial performance measures, including net (loss) income and our other GAAP results.
The following table reflects the reconciliation of net loss to Adjusted EBITDA for each of the periods indicated:
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 (in thousands) Net loss $ (2,385) $ (796) $ (15,243) Excluding: Interest expense, net 438 256 549 (Benefit) provision for income taxes (145) 854 4,983 Depreciation and amortization 7,930 12,380 17,223 Stock-based compensation expense 4,094 3,834 5,920 Stock-based compensation expenseacquisitions 4,130 Net unrealized loss on warrant and other liabilities 737 419 411 Foreign exchange loss 3,049 Acquisition-related expenses 2,059 Adjusted EBITDA $ 10,669 $ 16,947 $ 23,081
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Managements Discussion and Analysis of Financial
Condition and Results of Operations
You should read the following discussion and analysis of our financial condition and results of operations together with our consolidated financial statements and related notes and other financial information included elsewhere in this prospectus. Some of the information contained in this discussion and analysis or elsewhere in this prospectus, including information with respect to our plans and strategy for our business and our performance and future success, includes forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties. You should review the Risk Factors section of this prospectus for a discussion of important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from the results described in or implied by the forward-looking statements contained in the following discussion and analysis.
Overview
We operate a marketplace where people around the world connect, both online and offline, to make, sell and buy unique goods. Handmade goods are the foundation of our marketplace. Whether crafted by an Etsy seller herself, with the assistance of her team or with an outside manufacturer in small batches, handmade goods spring from the imagination and creativity of an Etsy seller and embody authorship, responsibility and transparency. We believe we are creating a new economy, which we call the Etsy Economy, where creative entrepreneurs find meaningful work and both global and local markets for their goods, and where thoughtful consumers discover and buy unique goods and build relationships with the people who sell them.
Etsy was founded in June 2005 in Brooklyn, New York as a marketplace for handmade goods and craft supplies. From those beginnings, we have built an innovative, technology-based platform that, as of December 31, 2014, connected 54.0 million members, including 1.4 million active sellers and 19.8 million active buyers, in nearly every country in the world. In 2014, Etsy sellers generated GMS of $1.93 billion, of which 36.1% came from purchases made on mobile devices and 30.9% came from an Etsy seller or an Etsy buyer outside of the United States.
Our business has grown in significant ways:
Our GMS was $1.35 billion in 2013, up 50.6% over 2012, and was $1.93 billion in 2014, up 43.3% over 2013.
Our revenue was $125.0 million in 2013, up 67.6% over 2012. In 2013, our Marketplace revenue was $78.5 million, up 42.0% over 2012, and our Seller Services revenue was $42.8 million, up 169.9% over 2012. Our revenue was $195.6 million in 2014, up 56.4% over 2013. In 2014, our Marketplace revenue was $108.7 million, up 38.4% over 2013, and our Seller Services revenue was $82.5 million, up 92.7% over 2013.
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As of December 31, 2013, our number of active sellers was 1.1 million, up 29.4% since December 31, 2012, and our number of active buyers was 14.0 million, up 50.6% since December 31, 2012. As of December 31, 2014, our number of active sellers was 1.4 million, up 26.0% since December 31, 2013, and our number of active buyers was 19.8 million, up 41.2% since December 31, 2013.
Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers have transacted across borders since our first year of business, and our international community continues to grow. International GMS was 28.4% of GMS in 2013 and was 30.9% of GMS in 2014. Currently, Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers are based in nearly every country in the world and our marketplace is available in 10 languages.
We launched our first mobile app in 2011, and we continue to enhance our mobile offerings. Mobile visits represented 41.3% of visits in 2013 and 53.2% of visits in 2014. Mobile GMS represented 29.5% of GMS in 2013 and 36.1% of GMS in 2014.
We have continued to expand our Seller Services. We launched Promoted Listings in 2011, followed by Direct Checkout in 2012, Shipping Labels in 2013 and Wholesale in 2014.
We operate a platform for third-party sellers. Our business model is based on shared success: we make money when Etsy sellers make money. We do not compete with Etsy sellers, hold inventory or sell goods. Our revenue is diversified, generated from a mix of marketplace activities and the services we provide Etsy sellers to help them create and grow their businesses. Marketplace revenue includes the fee an Etsy seller pays for each completed transaction and the listing fee an Etsy seller pays for each item she lists. Seller Services revenue includes fees an Etsy seller pays for services such as prominent placement in search results via Promoted Listings, payment processing via Direct Checkout and purchases of shipping labels through our platform via Shipping Labels. Other revenue includes the fees we receive from a third-party payment processor.
In 2013, Etsy sellers generated GMS of $1.35 billion, up 50.6% over 2012, and in 2014, Etsy sellers generated GMS of $1.93 billion, up 43.3% over 2013. In 2013, we generated revenue of $125.0 million, up 67.6% over 2012, and in 2014, we generated revenue of $195.6 million, up 56.4% over 2013. In 2013, we generated a net loss of $0.8 million and Adjusted EBITDA of $16.9 million compared to a net loss of $2.4 million and Adjusted EBITDA of $10.7 million in 2012. In 2014, we generated a net loss of $15.2 million and Adjusted EBITDA of $23.1 million compared to a net loss of $0.8 million and Adjusted EBITDA of $16.9 million in 2013. See Selected Consolidated Financial and Other DataNon-GAAP Financial Measures for more information and for a reconciliation of Adjusted EBITDA to net loss, the most directly comparable financial measure calculated in accordance with GAAP.
The consolidated financial statements for the years ended December 31, 2012 and 2013 have been revised to correct for the understatement of certain non-income tax-related expenses. See Note 15 of the accompanying notes to our consolidated financial statements.
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Key Operating and Financial Metrics
We collect and analyze operating and financial data to evaluate the health of our ecosystem, allocate our resources (such as capital, time and technology investments) and assess the performance of our business. In addition to revenue, net (loss) income and other results under GAAP, the key operating and financial metrics we use are:
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 (in thousands, except percentages) GMS $ 895,152 $ 1,347,833 $ 1,931,981 Adjusted EBITDA $ 10,669 $ 16,947 $ 23,081 Active sellers 830 1,074 1,353 Active buyers 9,317 14,032 19,810 Percent mobile visits N/A 41.3 % 53.2 % Percent mobile GMS N/A 29.5 % 36.1 % Percent international GMS 28.4 % 28.4 % 30.9 %
GMS
Gross merchandise sales, or GMS, is the dollar value of items sold in our marketplace within the applicable period, excluding shipping fees and net of refunds associated with cancelled transactions. GMS does not represent revenue earned by us. GMS relates only to Marketplace activity and does not reflect Seller Services activity. However, because our revenue and cost of revenue depend significantly on the dollar value of items sold in our marketplace, we believe that GMS is an indicator of the success of Etsy sellers, the satisfaction of Etsy buyers, the health of our ecosystem and the scale and growth of our business.
Adjusted EBITDA
Adjusted EBITDA represents our net (loss) income before interest expense, net, (benefit) provision for income taxes and depreciation and amortization, adjusted to eliminate stock-based compensation expense, net unrealized loss on warrant and other liabilities, foreign exchange loss and acquisition-related expenses. In future periods, we intend to exclude the impact of our contributions to Etsy.org from Adjusted EBITDA. We have included Adjusted EBITDA in this prospectus because it is a key measure used by our management and board of directors to understand and evaluate our operating performance and trends, allocate internal resources, prepare and approve our annual budget, develop short- and long-term operating plans and assess the health of our ecosystem. As our Adjusted EBITDA increases, we are able to invest more resources in our community. We also believe that Adjusted EBITDA provides a useful measure for period-to-period comparisons of our business as it removes the impact of non-cash items and certain variable charges. See Selected Consolidated Financial and Other DataNon-GAAP Financial Measures for information regarding the limitations of using Adjusted EBITDA as a financial measure and for a reconciliation of Adjusted EBITDA to net (loss) income, the most directly comparable financial measure calculated in accordance with GAAP.
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Active Sellers
An active seller is an Etsy seller who has incurred at least one charge from us in the last 12 months. Charges include transaction fees, listing fees and fees for Direct Checkout, Promoted Listings, Shipping Labels and Wholesale enrollment. An Etsy seller is a member who has created an account and has listed an item in our marketplace. An Etsy seller is identified by a unique e-mail address; a single person can have multiple Etsy seller accounts. We succeed when Etsy sellers succeed, so we view the number of active sellers as a key indicator of the awareness of our brand, the reach of our platform, the potential for growth in GMS and revenue and the health of our ecosystem.
Active Buyers
An active buyer is an Etsy buyer who has made at least one purchase in the last 12 months. An Etsy buyer is a member who has created an account in our marketplace. An Etsy buyer is identified by a unique e-mail address; a single person can have multiple Etsy buyer accounts. We succeed when Etsy buyers order items from Etsy sellers, so we view the number of active buyers as a key indicator of our potential for growth in GMS and revenue, the reach of our platform, awareness of our brand, the engagement and loyalty of Etsy buyers and the health of our ecosystem.
Mobile Visits
A mobile visit is a visit that occurs on a mobile device, such as a tablet or a smartphone. Etsy sellers are increasingly using mobile devices to manage their listings and track their business performance on our platform. In addition, Etsy buyers increasingly use mobile devices to search, browse and purchase items on our platform. We began tracking mobile visits in 2013. We view percent mobile visits as a key indicator of the level of engagement of our members on our mobile website and mobile apps and of our ability to sustain GMS and revenue.
Mobile GMS
Mobile GMS is GMS that occurs on a mobile device, such as a tablet or a smartphone. Mobile GMS excludes orders initiated on mobile devices but ultimately completed on a desktop. We began tracking mobile GMS in 2013. We believe that mobile GMS indicates our success in converting mobile activity into mobile purchases and demonstrates our ability to grow GMS and revenue.
International GMS
International GMS is GMS from transactions where either the billing address for the Etsy seller or the shipping address for the Etsy buyer at the time of sale is outside of the United States. We believe that international GMS shows the level of engagement of our community outside the United States and demonstrates our ability to grow GMS and revenue.
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Key Factors Affecting Our Performance
We believe that our performance and future success depend on a number of factors that present significant opportunities for us but also pose risks and challenges, including those discussed below and in the section titled Risk Factors.
Growth and Retention of Active Sellers and Active Buyers
Our success depends in part on the growth and retention of our active sellers and active buyers. Our revenue is driven by the number of active sellers, seller engagement, the number of active buyers, buyer engagement and our ability to maintain an authentic, trusted marketplace. As of December 31, 2014, our marketplace had grown to 1.4 million active sellers and 19.8 million active buyers, up from 1.1 million active sellers and 14.0 million active buyers as of December 31, 2013. Failure to effectively attract and retain new active sellers and active buyers, to re-engage inactive sellers and inactive buyers and to engage active sellers and active buyers on a cost-effective basis would adversely affect our revenue growth, operating results and the overall health of our ecosystem.
To analyze our retention rates, we measure repeat activity by our members.
Cohort of 2011 Active Sellers
We refer to active sellers as of December 31, 2011 as 2011 Active Sellers. Fifty-three percent of 2011 Active Sellers remained active sellers as of December 31, 2012, 39% of 2011 Active Sellers remained active sellers as of December 31, 2013 and 32% of 2011 Active Sellers remained active sellers as of December 31, 2014. The average annual GMS per 2011 Active Seller in 2012 was nearly three times higher than in 2011, the average annual GMS per 2011 Active Seller in 2013 was four times higher than in 2011 and the average annual GMS per 2011 Active Seller in 2014 was five times higher than in 2011.
Year Ended
December 31, 2011 2012 2013 2014 Percent 2011 Active Sellers 100 % 52.6 % 39.3 % 32.3 % Average GMS per 2011 Active Seller $ 817 $ 2,241 $ 3,314 $ 4,299
Cohort of 2011 Active Buyers
We refer to active buyers as of December 31, 2011 as 2011 Active Buyers. Forty-six percent of 2011 Active Buyers remained active buyers as of December 31, 2012, 45% of 2011 Active Buyers remained active buyers as of December 31, 2013 and 45% of 2011 Active Buyers remained active buyers as of December 31, 2014. The average annual GMS per 2011 Active Buyer in 2012 was 72% higher than in 2011, the average annual GMS per 2011 Active Buyer in 2013 was 81% higher than in 2011 and the average annual GMS per 2011 Active Buyer in 2014 was 89% higher than in 2011.
Year Ended
December 31, 2011 2012 2013 2014 Percent 2011 Active Buyers 100 % 46.2 % 44.7 % 44.7 % Average GMS per 2011 Active Buyer $ 103 $ 177 $ 186 $ 195
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High-Impact Seller Services Growth
Our business model is based on shared success: we make money when Etsy sellers make money. Because of this, we provide services to an Etsy seller to help her start and grow her shop. As of December 31, 2014, 18.2% of active sellers used Promoted Listings, 36.1% of active sellers used Direct Checkout and 21.4% of active sellers in the United States and Canada used Shipping Labels. Our effectiveness in increasing the uptake of our Seller Services, enhancing existing Seller Services and extending their geographic reach and introducing new Seller Services will directly impact the success of Etsy sellers, our revenue growth and our operating results.
International Growth
Our growth will depend in part on international Etsy sellers and international Etsy buyers constituting an increasing portion of our community. International GMS was 28.4% of GMS in 2013 compared to 30.9% in 2014. Currently, Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers are based in nearly every country in the world, and our marketplace is available in 10 languages. Although we promote cross-border transactions, our strategy is to build and deepen local Etsy communities around the world, each with its own ecosystem of Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers. To meet this goal, we plan to invest in local marketing and content and local payment and shipping solutions. An inability to develop these Etsy communities or to otherwise grow our business outside the United States on a cost-effective basis could adversely affect our GMS, revenue and other operating results.
Mobile Growth
We believe continued enhancement of the mobile features of our platform will be critical to attracting and retaining Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers and maintaining the vibrancy of our marketplace. The success of this effort will be increasingly important as shopping on mobile devices displaces shopping on desktops and as Etsy sellers increasingly seek to run their shops via mobile devices.
We launched our first mobile app in 2011 and since then have expanded our mobile offerings for both Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers. Our Sell on Etsy mobile app, which we launched in April 2014, is designed to help an Etsy seller operate her shop, manage orders and access resources. Our Etsy buyer apps and mobile web experience include features designed to keep Etsy buyers engaged and offer an improved shopping experience. As of December 31, 2014, our mobile apps have been downloaded 21.8 million times, and mobile visits represented 53.2% of visits in 2014. In addition, in the same period, mobile GMS was 36.1% of GMS. If we are unable to continue to engage Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers through our mobile offerings, then our GMS and revenue growth and other operating results could be adversely affected.
Investment in Marketing
To date, we have grown largely due to strong brand awareness and word-of-mouth referrals, with the majority of our visits coming from direct and organic channels. In 2013, we spent $17.9 million on marketing expenses, or 14.3% of revenue, compared with 14.6% of revenue in 2012. However, in 2014, we began
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increasing our brand and digital marketing efforts. In 2014, we spent $39.7 million on marketing expenses, or 20.3% of revenue, up 122.2% over 2013. Our growth will depend in part on our continued ability to launch marketing campaigns that resonate with new and existing members and appropriately balance our level of marketing spending with the benefits that may be realized through member and revenue growth.
Investment in Growth
We have made, and will continue to make, significant investments in our platform to attract members and enhance the member experience. In 2013, we spent $27.5 million on product development expenses, or 22.0% of revenue, up 47.7% over 2012, and in 2014, we spent $36.6 million on product development expenses, or 18.7% of revenue, up 33.0% over 2013. We have invested significant resources in our technology platform and infrastructure to date and plan to continue to invest in innovation to address the needs of our members. We also plan to hire additional personnel to address the needs of our community. As part of this growth in headcount, we signed a lease in May 2014 for a new headquarters facility to accommodate our anticipated growth in personnel. The investments we make in our platform are all designed to grow our ecosystem and revenue and to improve our operating results in the long term, but these investments could also delay our ability to achieve profitability or reduce our profitability in the near term.
Components of Our Results of Operations
Revenue
Our revenue consists of Marketplace revenue, Seller Services revenue and Other revenue.
Marketplace revenue. Marketplace revenue consists of the 3.5% fee that an Etsy seller pays for each completed transaction on our platform, exclusive of shipping fees charged. Marketplace revenue also consists of a listing fee of $0.20 per item that she lists (for up to four months) in our marketplace. Although revenue from completed Wholesale transactions is included in Marketplace revenue, revenue from Wholesale enrollment is included in Seller Services revenue.
Seller Services revenue. Seller Services revenue consists of fees an Etsy seller pays us for the Seller Services she uses, including Promoted Listings, Direct Checkout, Shipping Labels and Wholesale.
Revenue from Promoted Listings consists of cost-per-click based fees an Etsy seller pays us for prominent placement of her listings in search results generated by Etsy buyers in our marketplace.
Revenue from Direct Checkout consists of fees an Etsy seller pays us to process credit, debit and Etsy Gift Card payments. Direct Checkout fees vary between 34% of the items total sale price plus a flat fee per order, depending on the country in which her bank account is located. Direct Checkout fees are taken from the items total sale price, including shipping.
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Revenue from Shipping Labels consists of fees an Etsy seller pays us when she purchases shipping labels through our platform, net of the cost we incur in purchasing those shipping labels. We are able to provide our sellers shipping labels from the United States Postal Service and Canada Post at discounted pricing due to the volume of purchases through our platform.
Revenue from Wholesale consists of fees an Etsy seller pays us when she is approved to enroll in our Wholesale program.
Other revenue. Other revenue includes the fees we receive from a third-party payment processor.
Our revenue recognition policies are discussed under Critical Accounting Policies and Significant Judgments and Estimates.
Cost of Revenue
Cost of revenue consists primarily of expenses associated with the operation and maintenance of our platform and data centers, including depreciation and amortization, employee-related costs, including stock-based compensation expense, and energy and bandwidth costs. Cost of revenue also includes the cost of interchange and other fees for credit card processing services, credit card verification service fees and credit card chargebacks to support Direct Checkout revenue, as well as employee-related costs, including stock-based compensation expense, for our member support staff, and costs of refunds made to Etsy buyers that we are not able to collect from Etsy sellers. Our cost of revenue as a percentage of revenue may change over time as our revenue mix changes; for example, to the extent that Direct Checkout revenue increases as a percentage of revenue, there may be a dampening effect on our gross margin.
Operating Expenses
Operating expenses consist of marketing, product development and general and administrative expenses. Direct and indirect employee-related costs, including stock-based compensation expense, are the most significant component of the product development and general and administrative expense categories, and we expect these costs to increase as we continue to hire new employees in order to support our anticipated growth. We include stock-based compensation expense in connection with the grant of stock options in the applicable operating expense category based on the respective equity award recipients function.
Marketing. Marketing expenses consist primarily of targeted online marketing costs, such as search engine marketing and, to a much lesser extent, offline marketing expenses, such as television advertising. Marketing expenses also include employee-related costs, including stock-based compensation expense, for our employees involved in marketing, public relations and communications activities. Marketing expenses are primarily driven by investments to grow and retain members on our platform.
Product development. Product development expenses consist primarily of employee-related costs, including stock-based compensation expense, for our employees involved in product development activities. Additional expenses include consulting costs related to the development, quality assurance and testing of new technology and enhancement of our existing technology.
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General and administrative. General and administrative expenses consist primarily of costs associated with the use of facilities and equipment, including depreciation and amortization, rent, and certain professional services expenses. General and administrative expenses also include employee-related costs, including stock-based compensation expense, for our employees involved in general corporate functions and currency gains or losses. General and administrative expenses are primarily driven by increases in headcount required to support business growth, and, to a lesser extent in the near term, will be driven by expenses incurred to make the transition to being a public company.
Other Expense, net
Other expense, net consists of interest expense, interest income, foreign exchange loss and net unrealized loss on warrant and other liabilities.
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Results of Operations
The following tables show our results of operations for the periods presented and express the relationship of certain line items as a percentage of revenue for those periods. The period-to-period comparison of financial results is not necessarily indicative of future results.
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 (in thousands) Revenue: Marketplace $ 55,330 $ 78,544 $ 108,732 Seller Services 15,863 42,817 82,502 Other 3,409 3,661 4,357 Total revenue 74,602 125,022 195,591 Cost of revenue 24,493 47,779 73,633 Gross profit 50,109 77,243 121,958 Operating expenses: Marketing 10,902 17,850 39,655 Product development 18,653 27,548 36,634 General and administrative 21,909 31,112 51,920 Total operating expenses 51,464 76,510 128,209 (Loss) income from operations (1,355) 733 (6,251) Other expense, net (1,175) (675) (4,009) (Loss) income before income taxes (2,530) 58 (10,260) Benefit (provision) for income taxes 145 (854) (4,983) Net loss $ (2,385) $ (796) $ (15,243) Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 Revenue: Marketplace 74.2% 62.8% 55.6% Seller Services 21.3 34.2 42.2 Other 4.6 2.9 2.2 Total revenue 100.0 100.0 100.0 Cost of revenue 32.8 38.2 37.6 Gross profit 67.2 61.8 62.4 Operating expenses: Marketing 14.6 14.3 20.3 Product development 25.0 22.0 18.7 General and administrative 29.4 24.9 26.5 Total operating expenses 69.0 61.2 65.5 (Loss) income from operations (1.8) 0.6 (3.2) Other expense, net (1.6) (0.5) (2.0) (Loss) income before income taxes (3.4) 0.0 (5.2) Benefit (provision) for income taxes 0.2 (0.7) (2.5) Net loss (3.2) (0.6) (7.8)
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Comparison of Years Ended December 31, 2013 and 2014
Revenue
Year Ended
December 31, Change 2013 2014 $ % (in thousands, except percentages) Revenue: Marketplace $ 78,544 $ 108,732 $ 30,188 38.4 % Percentage of total revenue 62.8 % 55.6 % Seller Services $ 42,817 $ 82,502 $ 39,685 92.7 % Percentage of total revenue 34.2 % 42.2 % Other $ 3,661 $ 4,357 $ 696 19.0 % Percentage of total revenue 2.9 % 2.2 % Total revenue $ 125,022 $ 195,591 $ 70,569 56.4 %
Revenue increased $70.6 million, or 56.4%, to $195.6 million in 2014 compared to 2013, of which 55.6% consisted of Marketplace revenue and 42.2% consisted of Seller Services revenue.
Marketplace revenue increased $30.2 million, or 38.4%, to $108.7 million in 2014 compared to 2013. This growth corresponded with a 43.3% increase in GMS to a total of $1.93 billion for 2014. As our GMS increased, our Marketplace revenue increased, primarily as a result of an increase in the amount of transaction fees received and an increase in listings from new and existing Etsy sellers with a corresponding increase in listing fees received. During 2014, international GMS increased as a percentage of total GMS to 30.9%, up from 28.4% for 2013. During 2014, mobile GMS increased as a percentage of total GMS to 36.1%, up from 29.5% for 2013. Active sellers increased 26.0% to 1.4 million and active buyers increased 41.2% to 19.8 million for 2014 compared to 2013.
Seller Services revenue increased $39.7 million, or 92.7%, to $82.5 million in 2014 compared to 2013. The growth in Seller Services revenue was primarily driven by an increase in revenue from Direct Checkout services, as well as increases in Promoted Listings and Shipping Labels. The increase in Direct Checkout services revenue reflects continued increases in U.S. Direct Checkout revenue, as well as growth in international Direct Checkout services as those services were initiated in the second quarter of 2013. As of December 31, 2014, we offered Direct Checkout in 10 currencies, including the U.S. dollar. The increase in Promoted Listings revenue reflects enhancements made to the service in 2014. The increase in Shipping Label revenue reflects an increase in the number of Etsy sellers using the service and, to a lesser extent, the introduction of Shipping Labels in Canada in 2014.
Other revenue increased $0.7 million, or 19.0%, to $4.4 million in 2014 compared to 2013. Other revenue decreased as a percentage of total revenue, however, as Etsy buyers opted to use Direct Checkout for their purchases rather than a third-party payment processor.
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Cost of Revenue
Year Ended
December 31, Change 2013 2014 $ % (in thousands, except percentages) Cost of revenue $ 47,779 $ 73,633 $ 25,854 54.1 % Percentage of total revenue 38.2 % 37.6 %
Cost of revenue increased $25.9 million, or 54.1%, to $73.6 million in 2014 compared to 2013, primarily as a result of an increase in the cost of supporting Direct Checkout revenue due to the introduction of international Direct Checkout as well as growth in the U.S. Direct Checkout revenue. To a lesser extent, the increase was due to an increase in depreciation and amortization for ongoing maintenance of our technology infrastructure and an increase in employee-related costs resulting from increased headcount in our member support and technical operations teams.
Operating Expenses
Marketing
Year Ended
December 31, Change 2013 2014 $ % (in thousands, except percentages) Marketing $ 17,850 $ 39,655 $ 21,805 122.2 % Percentage of total revenue 14.3 % 20.3 %
Marketing expenses increased $21.8 million, or 122.2%, to $39.7 million in 2014 compared to 2013, primarily as a result of an increase in search engine marketing from Google product listing ads and, to a lesser extent, from an increase in employee-related costs resulting from increased headcount in our marketing team, which includes our public relations and communications teams.
Product development
Year Ended
December 31, Change 2013 2014 $ % (in thousands, except percentages) Product development $ 27,548 $ 36,634 $ 9,086 33.0 % Percentage of total revenue 22.0 % 18.7 %
Product development expenses increased $9.1 million, or 33.0%, to $36.6 million in 2014 compared to 2013, primarily as a result of an increase in employee-related costs resulting from increased headcount in our product and engineering teams.
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General and administrative
Year Ended
December 31, Change 2013 2014 $ % (in thousands, except percentages) General and administrative $ 31,112 $ 51,920 $ 20,808 66.9 % Percentage of total revenue 24.9 % 26.5 %
General and administrative expenses increased $20.8 million, or 66.9%, to $51.9 million in 2014 compared to 2013, primarily as a result of an increase in employee-related costs from headcount growth in general corporate functions and from building out the executive management team and, to a lesser extent, due to increased legal and accounting fees.
Other Expense, net
Year Ended
December 31, Change 2013 2014 $ % (in thousands, except percentages) Other expense, net $ (675) $ (4,009) $ (3,334) 493.9 % Percentage of total revenue (0.5)% (2.0)%
Other expense, net increased $3.3 million, or 493.9%, to $4.0 million in 2014 compared to 2013, primarily as a result of the foreign exchange loss.
Provision for Income Taxes
Year Ended
December 31, Change 2013 2014 $ % (in thousands, except percentages) Provision for income taxes $ (854 ) $ (4,983) $ (4,129) NM Percentage of total revenue (0.7 )% (2.5)%
Our effective tax rate fluctuates from period to period due to changes in the mix of income and losses in jurisdictions with a wide range of tax rates, the amount of stock-based compensation expense and net unrealized loss on warrants, the impact of acquisitions, the change resulting from the amount of recorded valuation allowance, the permanent difference between GAAP and local tax laws and certain one-time items such as tax rate changes. For the year ended December 31, 2014, we determined that the existence of a three-year cumulative loss in a foreign jurisdiction was sufficient negative evidence to warrant the establishment of a valuation allowance against deferred tax assets in that jurisdiction. As a result, we recorded a valuation allowance against certain of our deferred tax assets of $0 as of December 31, 2013 and $2.1 million as of December 31, 2014.
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Comparison of Years Ended December 31, 2012 and 2013
Revenue
Year Ended
December 31, Change 2012 2013 $ % (in thousands, except percentages) Revenue: Marketplace $ 55,330 $ 78,544 $ 23,214 42.0 % Percentage of total revenue 74.2 % 62.8 % Seller Services $ 15,863 $ 42,817 $ 26,954 169.9 % Percentage of total revenue 21.3 % 34.2 % Other $ 3,409 $ 3,661 $ 252 7.4 % Percentage of total revenue 4.6 % 2.9 % Total revenue $ 74,602 $ 125,022 $ 50,420 67.6 %
Revenue increased $50.4 million, or 67.6%, to $125.0 million in 2013 compared to 2012, of which 62.8% consisted of Marketplace revenue and 34.2% consisted of Seller Services revenue.
Marketplace revenue increased $23.2 million, or 42.0%, to $78.5 million in 2013 compared to 2012. This growth corresponded with a 50.6% increase in GMS to a total of $1.35 billion for 2013. As our GMS increased, our Marketplace revenue increased, primarily as a result of an increase in the amount of transaction fees received and an increase in listings from new and existing Etsy sellers with a corresponding increase in listing fees received. During 2013, international GMS as a percentage of total GMS was 28.4%, and mobile GMS as a percentage of total GMS was 29.5%. Active sellers increased 29.4% to 1.1 million and active buyers increased 50.6% to 14.0 million for 2013 compared to 2012.
Seller Services revenue increased $27.0 million, or 169.9%, to $42.8 million in 2013 compared to 2012. The growth in Seller Services revenue was primarily driven by an increase in revenue from Direct Checkout services, as well as increases in Promoted Listings and Shipping Labels. The increase in Direct Checkout services revenue reflects a full year of U.S. Direct Checkout revenue, as the service was first introduced in the United States in the second quarter of 2012, as well as the introduction of international Direct Checkout services starting in the second half of 2013. As of the end of 2013, we offered Direct Checkout in 10 currencies, including the U.S. dollar. The increase in Promoted Listings revenue and the increase in Shipping Label revenue reflect an increase in the number of Etsy sellers using these services.
Other revenue increased $0.3 million, or 7.4%, to $3.7 million in 2013 compared to 2012. Other revenue decreased as a percentage of revenue, however, as Etsy buyers opted to use Direct Checkout for their purchases rather than a third-party payment processor.
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Cost of Revenue
Year Ended
December 31, Change 2012 2013 $ % (in thousands, except percentages) Cost of revenue $ 24,493 $ 47,779 $ 23,286 95.1 % Percentage of total revenue 32.8 % 38.2 %
Cost of revenue increased $23.3 million, or 95.1%, to $47.8 million in 2013 compared to 2012, primarily as a result of an increase in the cost of supporting Direct Checkout revenue due to the introduction of international Direct Checkout as well as growth in the U.S. Direct Checkout revenue. To a lesser extent, the increase was due to an increase in depreciation and amortization for ongoing maintenance of our technology infrastructure and an increase in employee-related costs resulting from increased headcount in our member support and technical operations teams.
Operating Expenses
Marketing
Year Ended
December 31, Change 2012 2013 $ % (in thousands, except percentages) Marketing $ 10,902 $ 17,850 $ 6,948 63.7 % Percentage of total revenue 14.6 % 14.3 %
Marketing expenses increased $6.9 million, or 63.7%, to $17.9 million in 2013 compared to 2012, primarily as a result of an increase in search engine marketing from Google product listing ads and, to a lesser extent, from an increase in employee-related costs resulting from increased headcount in our marketing team, which includes our public relations and communications teams.
Product development
Year Ended
December 31, Change 2012 2013 $ % (in thousands, except percentages) Product development $ 18,653 $ 27,548 $ 8,895 47.7 % Percentage of total revenue 25.0 % 22.0 %
Product development expenses increased $8.9 million, or 47.7%, to $27.5 million in 2013 compared to 2012, primarily as a result of an increase in employee-related costs resulting from increased headcount in our product and engineering teams.
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General and administrative
Year Ended
December 31, Change 2012 2013 $ % (in thousands, except percentages) General and administrative $ 21,909 $ 31,112 $ 9,203 42.0 % Percentage of total revenue 29.4 % 24.9 %
General and administrative expenses increased $9.2 million, or 42.0%, to $31.1 million in 2013 compared to 2012, primarily as a result of an increase in employee-related costs from headcount growth in general corporate functions and from building out the executive management team.
Other Expense, net
Year Ended
December 31, Change 2012 2013 $ % (in thousands, except percentages) Other expense, net $ (1,175) $ (675) $ 500 42.6% Percentage of total revenue (1.6)% (0.5)%
Other expense, net decreased primarily as a result of a smaller unrealized loss in 2013 for our warrant liability and lower interest expense.
Benefit (Provision) for Income Taxes
Year Ended
December 31, Change 2012 2013 $ % (in thousands, except percentages) Benefit (provision) for income taxes $ 145 $ (854) $ (999) NM Percentage of total revenue 0.2 % (0.7 )%
Our effective tax rate fluctuates from period to period due to changes in the mix of income and losses in jurisdictions with a wide range of tax rates, the amount of stock-based compensation expense and net unrealized loss on warrants, the impact of acquisitions, the change resulting from the amount of recorded valuation allowance, the permanent difference between GAAP and local tax laws and certain one-time items such as tax rate changes.
Quarterly Results of Operations
The following tables show selected unaudited quarterly results of operations and other operational and non-GAAP financial data for the eight quarters ended December 31, 2014, as well as the percentage that each line item in the following results of operations data represents of revenue. The results of operations data for each of these quarters has been prepared on the same basis as the audited annual financial statements included elsewhere in this prospectus and includes all adjustments, which include only normal recurring adjustments, necessary for the fair statement of our results of operations for these periods. The results of operations data for the three months ended March 31, 2013, the three and six months ended June 30, 2013,
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the three and nine months ended September 30, 2013, the three months ended December 31, 2013 and the three months ended September 30, 2014 have been revised and the three months ended March 31, 2014, the three and six months ended June 30, 2014 and the nine months ended September 30, 2014 have been restated to correct for the understatement of certain non-income tax-related expenses and the misstatement of expenses due to period-end cutoff errors. See Note 16 of the accompanying notes to our consolidated financial statements. This data should be read in conjunction with our consolidated financial statements and related notes included elsewhere in this prospectus. Our quarterly results of operations and operational and non-GAAP financial data will vary in the future. These quarterly operating results are not necessarily indicative of our operating results for any future quarter or year.
Three Months Ended Mar. 31,
2013 June 30,
2013 Sept. 30,
2013 Dec. 31,
2013 Mar. 31,
2014
Restated June 30,
2014
Restated Sept. 30,
2014 Dec. 31,
2014 (in thousands) Revenue: Marketplace $ 17,152 $ 17,741 $ 19,189 $ 24,462 $ 23,727 $ 24,777 $ 26,917 $ 33,311 Seller Services 8,161 8,768 9,851 16,037 15,833 16,587 19,392 30,690 Other 831 855 917 1,058 976 1,145 1,325 911 Total revenue 26,144 27,364 29,957 41,557 40,536 42,509 47,634 64,912 Cost of revenue 9,581 10,499 11,548 16,151 15,394 17,345 18,115 22,779 Gross profit 16,563 16,865 18,409 25,406 25,142 25,164 29,519 42,133 Operating expenses: Marketing 3,004 3,223 4,148 7,475 7,468 8,766 8,808 14,613 Product development 6,690 6,754 7,056 7,048 8,042 8,792 10,077 9,723 General and administrative 6,619 7,489 7,905 9,099 9,213 11,400 13,686 17,621 Total operating expenses 16,313 17,466 19,109 23,622 24,723 28,958 32,571 41,957 Income (loss) from operations 250 (601) (700) 1,784 419 (3,794) (3,052) 176 Total other (expense) income, net (159) (254) (158) (104) (669) 235 (1,144) (2,431) Income (loss) before income taxes 91 (855) (858) 1,680 (250) (3,559) (4,196) (2,255) (Provision) benefit for income taxes (408) 1,903 1,939 (4,288) (213) 408 (2,075) (3,103) Net (loss) income $ (317) $ 1,048 $ 1,081 $ (2,608) $ (463) $ (3,151) $ (6,271) $ (5,358)
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Three Months Ended Mar. 31,
2013 June 30,
2013 Sept. 30,
2013 Dec. 31,
2013 Mar. 31,
2014
Restated June 30,
2014
Restated Sept. 30,
2014 Dec. 31,
2014 Revenue: Marketplace 65.6% 64.8% 64.1% 58.9% 58.5% 58.3% 56.5% 51.3% Seller Services 31.2 32.0 32.9 38.6 39.1 39.0 40.7 47.3 Other 3.2 3.1 3.1 2.5 2.4 2.7 2.8 1.4 Total revenue 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 Cost of revenue 36.6 38.4 38.5 38.9 38.0 40.8 38.0 35.1 Gross profit 63.4 61.6 61.5 61.1 62.0 59.2 62.0 64.9 Operating expenses: Marketing 11.5 11.8 13.8 18.0 18.4 20.6 18.5 22.5 Product development 25.6 24.7 23.6 17.0 19.8 20.7 21.2 15.0 General and administrative 25.3 27.4 26.4 21.9 22.7 26.8 28.7 27.1 Total operating expenses 62.4 63.8 63.8 56.8 61.0 68.1 68.4 64.6 Income (loss) from operations 1.0 (2.2) (2.3) 4.3 1.0 (8.9) (6.4) 0.3 Total other (expense) income, net (0.6) (0.9) (0.5) (0.3) (1.7) 0.6 (2.4) (3.7) Income (loss) before income taxes 0.3 (3.1) (2.9) 4.0 (0.6) (8.4) (8.8) (3.5) (Provision) benefit for income taxes (1.6) 7.0 6.5 (10.3) (0.5) 1.0 (4.4) (4.8) Net (loss) income (1.2) 3.8 3.6 (6.3) (1.1) (7.4) (13.2) (8.3)
Three Months Ended Mar. 31,
2013 June 30,
2013 Sept. 30,
2013 Dec. 31,
2013 Mar. 31,
2014 June 30,
2014 Sept. 30,
2014 Dec. 31,
2014 (in thousands, except percentages) Other financial and operations data(1): GMS $ 290,295 $ 298,497 $ 319,454 $ 439,587 $ 414,833 $ 438,472 $ 467,202 $ 611,474 Adjusted EBITDA(2) $ 3,813 $ 3,084 $ 3,656 $ 6,394 $ 6,103 $ 3,432 $ 4,248 $ 9,298 Active sellers 891 944 1,012 1,074 1,135 1,191 1,284 1,353 Active buyers 10,591 11,686 12,633 14,032 15,260 16,490 18,102 19,810 Percent mobile visits 37.5 % 37.7 % 42.8 % 46.0 % 50.2 % 52.1 % 54.7 % 55.0 % Percent mobile GMS 27.8 % 28.5 % 30.3 % 30.7 % 35.2 % 35.5 % 36.5 % 37.0 % Percent international GMS 29.0 % 28.4 % 27.9 % 28.4 % 30.6 % 30.9 % 31.6 % 30.6 %
(1) See Prospectus SummaryGlossary for the definitions of the following terms: active buyer, active seller, GMS and visit. See Selected Consolidated Financial and Other DataNon-GAAP Financial Measures for the definition of Adjusted EBITDA.
(2) Adjusted EBITDA has been restated for the three months ended March 31, 2014 and June 30, 2014.
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The following table reflects the reconciliation of net (loss) income to Adjusted EBITDA for each of the periods indicated (in thousands):
Three Months Ended Mar. 31,
2013 June 30,
2013 Sept. 30,
2013 Dec. 31,
2013 Mar. 31,
2014
Restated June 30,
2014
Restated Sept. 30,
2014 Dec. 31,
2014 Net (loss) income $ (317) $ 1,048 $ 1,081 $ (2,608) $ (463) $ (3,151) $ (6,271) $ (5,358) Excluding: Interest expense, net 77 86 39 54 53 107 165 224 Provision (benefit) for income taxes 408 (1,903) (1,939) 4,288 213 (408) 2,075 3,103 Depreciation and amortization 2,626 2,824 3,282 3,648 3,895 4,132 4,465 4,731 Stock-based compensation expense 937 861 1,074 962 1,176 1,737 1,299 1,708 Stock-based compensation expenseacquisitions 348 1,448 2,334 Net unrealized loss (gain) on warrant and other liabilities 82 168 119 50 616 (342) (35) 172 Foreign exchange loss 1,014 2,035 Acquisition-related expenses 613 1,009 88 349 Adjusted EBITDA $ 3,813 $ 3,084 $ 3,656 $ 6,394 $ 6,103 $ 3,432 $ 4,248 $ 9,298
Seasonality and Quarterly Trends
Etsy sellers experience increased sales and use more Seller Services during the fourth-quarter holiday shopping season. This has resulted in increased revenue for us during the fourth quarter of each fiscal year, which can compare to lower revenue in the first quarter of the following fiscal year. For example, revenue in the first quarter of 2014 decreased slightly when compared with revenue in the fourth quarter of 2013. We expect this seasonality to continue in future years. Our operating (loss) income has also been affected by these historical trends because many of our expenses are relatively fixed in the short term. As our growth rates begin to moderate, the impact of these seasonality trends on our results of operations may become more pronounced.
Our quarterly revenue increased sequentially quarter-to-quarter for all periods presented above, other than the first quarter of 2014, corresponding to our GMS performance in the same periods. We cannot assure you that this pattern of sequential revenue growth will continue. We believe that it is generally more meaningful to compare year-over-year results than sequential quarter-over-quarter results.
Our quarterly cost of revenue increased sequentially quarter-to-quarter for substantially all periods presented above, primarily due to increases in visits and to increased usage of Direct Checkout during the period and, to a lesser extent, to an increase in employee-related costs resulting from increased headcount in our member support and technical operations teams.
Marketing expenses increased sequentially quarter-to-quarter for substantially all periods presented above, and significantly increased beginning in the fourth quarter of 2013, primarily due to increased marketing
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programs to attract and retain new Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers on our platform and, to a lesser extent, to an increase in employee-related costs resulting from increased headcount in our marketing team, which includes our public relations and communications teams.
Product development expenses generally remained consistent or increased sequentially quarter-to-quarter for the periods presented above, primarily as a result of an increase in employee-related costs resulting from increased headcount in our product and engineering teams.
General and administrative expenses increased sequentially quarter-to-quarter for substantially all periods presented above, primarily as a result of an increase in employee-related costs from headcount growth in general corporate functions and from building out the executive management team.
Our business is directly affected by the behavior of consumers. Economic conditions and competitive pressures can significantly impact, both positively and negatively, the level of demand by Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers on our platform. Consequently, the results of any prior quarterly or annual periods should not be relied upon as indications of our future operating performance.
Liquidity and Capital Resources
The following tables show our cash and cash equivalents, short-term investments, accounts receivable and working capital as of the dates indicated:
As of
December 31, 2013 2014 (in thousands) Cash and cash equivalents $ 36,795 $ 69,659 Short-term investments 18,075 19,184 Accounts receivable, net 11,102 15,404 Working capital 57,566 88,540
As of December 31, 2014, our cash and cash equivalents, a majority of which were held in cash deposits and money market funds, were held for working capital purposes. We intend to increase our capital expenditures to support the growth in our business and operations, and intend to invest approximately $50.0 million through the middle of 2016 to build out our new Brooklyn, New York headquarters. We believe that our existing cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments, together with cash generated from operations and available borrowing capacity under our Credit Agreement, will be sufficient to meet our anticipated cash needs for at least the next 12 months. However, our liquidity assumptions may prove to be incorrect, and we could exhaust our available financial resources sooner than we currently expect. We may seek to borrow funds under our Credit Agreement or raise additional funds at any time through equity, equity-linked or debt financing arrangements. Our future capital requirements and the adequacy of available funds will depend on many factors, including those described in the section of this prospectus captioned Risk Factors. We may not be able to secure additional financing to meet our operating requirements on acceptable terms, or at all.
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Sources of Liquidity
Since our inception, we have financed our operations and capital expenditures primarily through cash flows generated by operations and through non-registered sales of preferred stock and common stock. Since inception and as of December 31, 2014, we have raised a total of $125.6 million from the sale of preferred stock and common stock (including proceeds from the exercise of stock options), net of costs and expenses associated with such financings and net of repurchases of $0.5 million of capital stock.
Credit Facility
In May 2014, we entered into a $35.0 million senior secured revolving credit facility pursuant to a Revolving Credit and Guaranty Agreement with several lenders, or the Credit Agreement. In March 2015, we amended the Credit Agreement to increase the credit facility to $50.0 million. As amended, the Credit Agreement will mature in May 2019. The amended Credit Agreement includes a letter of credit sublimit of $10.0 million and a swingline loan sublimit of $15.0 million.
Borrowings under the amended Credit Agreement (other than swingline loans) bear interest, at our option, at (i) a base rate equal to the highest of (a) the prime rate, (b) the federal funds rate plus 0.50% and (c) an adjusted LIBOR rate for a one-month interest period plus 1.00%, in each case plus a margin ranging from 0.00% to 0.25% or (ii) an adjusted LIBOR rate plus a margin ranging from 1.00% to 1.25%. Swingline loans under the amended Credit Agreement bear interest at the same base rate (plus the margin applicable to borrowings bearing interest at the base rate). These margins are determined based on the total leverage ratio for the preceding four fiscal quarters. We are also obligated to pay other customary fees for a credit facility of this size and type, including an unused commitment fee and fees associated with letters of credit. As amended, the Credit Agreement also permits us, in certain circumstances, to request an increase in the facility by an additional amount of up to $50.0 million (and in minimum amounts of $10.0 million) at the same maturity, pricing and other terms.
The amended Credit Agreement contains customary representations and warranties applicable to us and our subsidiaries and customary affirmative and negative covenants applicable to us and our restricted subsidiaries. The negative covenants include restrictions on, among other things, indebtedness, liens, investments, mergers, dispositions, transactions with affiliates and dividends and other distributions. These restrictions do not prohibit any of our subsidiaries from making pro rata payments to us or any other person that owns an equity interest in any such subsidiary. The amended Credit Agreement contains a financial covenant that requires us and our subsidiaries to maintain a total leverage ratio (defined as net debt to adjusted EBITDA) not to exceed 3.50 to 1.00.
As amended, the Credit Agreement includes customary events of default, including a change in control and a cross-default on our material indebtedness. Our obligations under the amended Credit Agreement are secured by substantially all of our and our subsidiaries assets, and our obligations under the amended Credit Agreement are guaranteed by certain of our subsidiaries.
As of March 4, 2015, no amounts have been drawn under the credit facility. In January 2015, we implemented a revised corporate structure to more closely align our structure with our global operations
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and future expansion plans outside the United States. The amendment to the Credit Agreement includes a waiver with respect to our compliance with certain restrictions in the Credit Agreement, to the extent that actions taken to implement our revised corporate structure could be construed as breaches or defaults under the Credit Agreement.
Historical Cash Flows
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 (in thousands) Cash (used in) provided by: Operating activities $ 9,684 $ 16,542 $ 12,087 Investing activities (28,877 ) (15,025 ) (20,723 ) Financing activities 42,972 (103 ) 45,237
Net Cash Provided by Operating Activities
Our cash flows from operations are largely dependent on the amount of revenue generated on our platform. Net cash provided by operating activities in each period presented has been influenced by changes in accounts receivable, funds receivable and customer accounts, prepaid expenses and other current assets, accounts payable and accrued liabilities, and funds payable and amounts due to customers.
Net cash provided by operating activities was $12.1 million in 2014, as a result of net loss of $15.2 million, depreciation and amortization expense, stock-based compensation expense and other non-cash charges of $27.1 million and changes in our operating assets and liabilities that provided $0.3 million in cash.
Net cash provided by operating activities was $16.5 million in 2013, as a result of net loss of $0.8 million, depreciation and amortization expense, stock-based compensation expense and other non-cash charges of $19.6 million and changes in our operating assets and liabilities that used $2.2 million in cash.
Net cash provided by operating activities was $9.7 million in 2012 as a result of net loss of $2.4 million, depreciation and amortization expense, stock-based compensation expense and other non-cash charges of $13.5 million and changes in our operating assets and liabilities that used $1.4 million in cash.
Net Cash Used in Investing Activities
Our primary investing activities have consisted of capital expenditures, including investments in website development and internal-use software and purchases of property and equipment to support our overall business growth. Investments in website development and internal-use software and purchases of property and equipment may vary from period to period due to timing of the expansion of our operations. Additionally, we have invested some of our excess cash balances in U.S. Government and agency bills.
Net cash used in investing activities was $20.7 million in 2014. This was primarily attributable to $5.3 million in restricted cash associated with the lease of our new Brooklyn, New York headquarters, $4.7 million in cash paid to acquire businesses, capital expenditures, including $8.3 million for website development and internal-use software and $1.3 million for purchases of property and equipment, and net purchases of marketable securities of $1.1 million.
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Net cash used in investing activities was $15.0 million in 2013. This was primarily attributable to capital expenditures, including $9.3 million for website development and internal-use software and $7.8 million for purchases of property and equipment, offset by sales of marketable securities of $2.8 million.
Net cash used in investing activities was $28.9 million in 2012. This was primarily attributable to purchases of U.S. Government and agency bills of $16.1 million as well as capital expenditures, including $7.4 million for website development and internal-use software and $6.5 million for purchases of property and equipment, offset by sales of marketable securities of $1.4 million.
Net Cash Provided by (Used in) Financing Activities
Net cash provided by financing activities was $45.2 million in 2014. This was primarily attributable to net proceeds from a common stock financing of $35.0 million, proceeds from the exercise of stock options of $8.0 million and the excess tax benefit from the exercise of stock options of $4.9 million, offset by payments related to our public offering of $1.0 million and payments on capitalized lease obligations of $1.5 million.
Net cash used in financing activities was $0.1 million in 2013. This was primarily attributable to payments on capitalized lease obligations of $1.3 million, offset by proceeds from the exercise of stock options of $1.3 million.
Net cash provided by financing activities was $43.0 million in 2012. This was primarily attributable to net proceeds from a preferred stock financing of $39.8 million and proceeds from the exercise of stock options of $4.6 million, offset by payments on capitalized lease obligations of $1.4 million.
Off Balance Sheet Arrangements
We did not have any off balance sheet arrangements, as defined in Item 303(a)(4)(ii) of Regulation S-K, in 2012, 2013 or 2014.
Contractual Obligations
The following table summarizes our future fixed contractual obligations as of December 31, 2014 (in thousands):
Total Less than 1
Year 13
Years 35
Years More than
5 Years Capital lease obligations $ 4,903 $ 1,755 $ 3,148 $ $ Operating lease obligations 21,044 3,870 2,699 3,523 10,952 Long-term debt 547 267 280 Interest payments 892 535 357 Facility financing obligations 90,314 9,684 18,858 61,772 Purchase obligations 9,824 5,154 3,734 936 Total contractual obligations $ 127,524 $ 11,314 $ 19,889 $ 23,597 $ 72,724
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Capital lease obligations consist of obligations under capital leases for computer equipment.
Operating lease obligations consist of obligations under non-cancelable operating leases for our existing and new headquarters (both in Brooklyn, New York) and for our offices in San Francisco, California and Dublin, Ireland.
Long-term debt consists of obligations we assumed in connection with our acquisition of Incubart SAS.
Interest payments consist of interest due in connection with our capital leases.
Facility financing obligations consist of the portion of our obligations for our new headquarters in Brooklyn, New York that is accounted for as a build-to-suit lease.
Purchase obligations consist of commitments for our co-location and other support services. For those agreements with variable terms, we do not estimate what the total obligation may be beyond any minimum quantities and/or pricing.
In addition, we have uncertain tax positions of $0.4 million, which are not reflected in the table as the ultimate resolution and timing are uncertain.
Critical Accounting Policies and Significant Judgments and Estimates
Our managements discussion and analysis of our financial condition and results of operations is based on our consolidated financial statements, which have been prepared in accordance with GAAP. The preparation of these consolidated financial statements requires us to make estimates and assumptions that affect the reported amounts of assets, liabilities, revenue, expenses and related disclosures. We evaluate our estimates and assumptions on an ongoing basis. Our estimates are based on historical experience and various other assumptions that we believe to be reasonable under the circumstances. Our actual results could differ from these estimates.
We believe that the assumptions and estimates associated with revenue recognition, income taxes, internal-use software and website development costs, business combinations, goodwill and intangible assets, leases and stock-based compensation have the greatest potential impact on our consolidated financial statements. Therefore, we consider these to be our critical accounting policies and estimates. For further information on all of our significant accounting policies, see Note 1 of the accompanying notes to our consolidated financial statements.
Revenue Recognition
We operate a platform for third-party sellers. Our business model is based on shared success: we make money when Etsy sellers make money, and we offer services to help Etsy sellers be more successful. We do not compete with Etsy sellers, hold inventory or sell goods. Our revenue is diversified, generated from a mix
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of marketplace activities and the services we provide Etsy sellers to help them create and grow their businesses. Our revenue consists of Marketplace revenue, Seller Services revenue and Other revenue. Our revenue is recorded net of actual and expected refunds. Marketplace revenue includes the fee an Etsy seller pays for each completed transaction and the listing fee an Etsy seller pays for each item she lists. Seller Services revenue includes fees an Etsy seller pays for services such as prominent placement in search results via Promoted Listings, payment processing via Direct Checkout and purchases of shipping labels through our platform via Shipping Labels. We deduct our cost of shipping labels and estimated refunds from gross shipping fees to determine net shipping fees. Other revenue includes the fees we receive from a third-party payment processor.
We recognize revenue when all of the following conditions are satisfied: (1) there is persuasive evidence of an arrangement; (2) the service has been provided to the Etsy seller; (3) the collection of fees is reasonably assured; and (4) the amount of fees to be paid by the Etsy seller is fixed or determinable. We evaluate whether it is appropriate to recognize revenue on a gross or net basis based upon our evaluation of whether we: are the primary obligor in a transaction, have inventory risk and have latitude in establishing pricing and selecting suppliers. Based on our evaluation of these factors, revenue is recorded net of merchandise values associated with the transaction.
Marketplace revenue. Marketplace revenue consists of the 3.5% fee that an Etsy seller pays for each completed transaction on our platform, exclusive of shipping fees charged. Marketplace revenue also consists of a listing fee of $0.20 per item that she lists in our marketplace. Although revenue from completed Wholesale transactions is included in Marketplace revenue, revenue from Wholesale enrollment is included in Seller Services revenue. Transaction fees are recognized when the corresponding transaction is made. Listing fees are recognized ratably over a four-month listing period, unless the item is sold or the seller relists it, at which time any remaining listing fee is recognized.
Seller Services revenue. Seller Services revenue consists of fees an Etsy seller pays us for the Seller Services she uses, including Promoted Listings, Direct Checkout, Shipping Labels and Wholesale.
Revenue from Promoted Listings consists of cost-per-click based fees an Etsy seller pays us for prominent placement of her listings in search results generated by Etsy buyers in our marketplace. Revenue is recognized when the Promoted Listing is clicked.
Revenue from Direct Checkout consists of fees an Etsy seller pays us to process credit, debit and Etsy Gift Card payments. Direct Checkout fees vary between 34% of the items total sale price plus a flat fee per order, depending on the country in which her bank account is located. Direct Checkout fees are taken from the items total sale price, including shipping. Revenue from Direct Checkout is recognized when the corresponding transaction is made. Revenue from breakage on Etsy Gift Cards is recognized when the amount is probable and estimable. Given the lack of historical experience related to gift card activity, there has been no breakage revenue recorded to date.
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Revenue from Shipping Labels consists of fees an Etsy seller pays us when she purchases shipping labels through our platform, net of the cost we incur in purchasing those shipping labels. We are able to provide our sellers shipping labels from the United States Postal Service and Canada Post at a discounted price due to the volume of purchases through our platform. We recognize Shipping Label revenue when an Etsy seller purchases a shipping label. We recognize Shipping Label revenue on a net basis as we are not the primary obligor in the delivery of these services.
Revenue from Wholesale consists of fees an Etsy seller pays us when she is approved to enroll in our Wholesale program. The one-time Wholesale enrollment fee is recognized ratably over the estimated customer life. Revenue from completed Wholesale transactions is included in Marketplace revenue.
Other revenue. Other revenue includes the fees we receive from a third-party payment processor. Other revenue is recognized as the transactions are processed by the third-party payment processor.
Income Taxes
We account for income tax benefit (provision) based on (loss) income before income taxes, and we use the asset and liability method. Deferred tax assets and liabilities are recognized for the future tax consequences attributable to differences between the financial statement carrying amounts of existing assets and liabilities and their respective tax bases, and operating loss and tax credit carryforwards. Deferred tax assets and liabilities are measured using enacted tax rates expected to apply to taxable income in the years in which those temporary differences are expected to be recovered or settled. The effect on deferred tax assets and liabilities of a change in tax rates is recognized in income in the period that includes the enactment date. We assess the need for a valuation allowance on an annual basis to reduce deferred tax assets to the amounts we expect to be realized.
We account for uncertainty in income taxes using a recognition threshold and a measurement attribute for the financial statement recognition and measurement of tax positions taken or expected to be taken in a tax return. For benefits to be recognized, a tax position must be more likely than not to be sustained upon examination by the taxing authorities. The amount recognized is measured as the largest amount of benefit that has a greater than 50% likelihood of being realized upon ultimate audit settlement. We have no unrecognized tax benefits at December 31, 2012 and 2013 and have an unrecognized tax benefit of $0.4 million as of December 31, 2014.
We recognize interest and penalties, if any, associated with tax matters as part of the income tax provision and include accrued interest and penalties with the related tax liability in our consolidated balance sheet.
Website Development and Internal-Use Software
We capitalize certain costs incurred in connection with software developed for our platform and software developed for internal use. In accordance with authoritative accounting guidance, we begin to capitalize our costs to develop software when preliminary development efforts are successfully completed, management has authorized and committed project funding and it is probable that the project will be completed and the
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software will be used as intended. We also capitalize costs related to upgrades and enhancements when it is probable the expenditures will result in additional functionality or will extend the useful life of existing functionality. These costs are amortized over the estimated useful life of the asset, typically three years.
We periodically review these assets to determine whether the projects will be completed, placed in service, removed from service or replaced by other internally-developed or third-party software; if an asset is not expected to provide any future benefit, the asset is retired and any unamortized cost is expensed.
Costs related to the design or maintenance of software developed for our platform and software developed for internal use are expensed as incurred.
Business Combinations, Goodwill and Intangible Assets
We have completed a number of acquisitions of other businesses in the past and may acquire additional businesses or technologies in the future. The results of businesses acquired in a business combination are included in our consolidated financial statements from the date of acquisition. We allocate the purchase price, which is the sum of the consideration provided and may consist of cash, equity or a combination of the two, in a business combination to the identifiable assets and liabilities of the acquired business at their acquisition date fair values. The excess of the purchase price over the amount allocated to the identifiable assets and liabilities, if any, is recorded as goodwill. Determining the fair value of assets acquired and liabilities assumed requires management to use significant judgment and estimates, including the selection of valuation methodologies, estimates of future revenues and cash flows, discount rates and selection of comparable companies.
When we issue stock-based or cash awards to an acquired companys stockholders, we evaluate whether the awards are contingent consideration or compensation for post-acquisition services. The evaluation includes, among other things, whether the vesting of the awards is contingent on the continued employment of the acquired companys stockholder beyond the acquisition date. If continued employment is required for vesting, the awards are treated as compensation for post-acquisition services and recognized as expense over the requisite service period.
We carry intangible assets at cost, and we amortize them on a straight-line basis, which approximates the pattern of the benefits derived, over their estimated useful lives, typically three to five years. When circumstances indicate that the carrying value of these assets may not be recoverable, we review our identifiable amortizable intangible assets for impairment.
Goodwill is not amortized but is tested for impairment annually in the fourth quarter, as well as when events indicate that the carrying amount of this asset may exceed its fair value. The assessment is performed at the reporting unit level using the two-step goodwill impairment test to identify potential goodwill impairment. The first step is to compare the fair value of the reporting unit to the book value including goodwill. If the fair value of the reporting unit exceeds the book value, goodwill is not impaired. If the book value exceeds the fair value, the second step of the process is performed to measure the amount of the impairment. The accounting guidance also allows for a simplified approach to testing for impairment, in
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which a company can assess certain qualitative factors (referred to as step zero) to determine whether it is more likely than not that the fair value of the reporting unit is less than its carrying amount. If that is the case, the entity must perform the quantitative analysis.
No impairment of goodwill was recorded at December 31, 2013 or 2014.
Leases
We lease office space and certain computer equipment in multiple locations under non-cancelable lease agreements. The leases are reviewed for classification as operating or capital leases. For operating leases, rent is recognized on a straight-line basis over the lease period. For capital leases, we record the leased asset with a corresponding liability. Payments are recorded as reductions to the liability with an appropriate interest charge recorded based on their outstanding remaining liability.
We consider the nature of the renovations and our involvement during the construction period of newly-leased office space to determine if we are considered to be the owner of the construction project during the construction period. If we determine that we are the owner of the construction project, we are required to capitalize the fair value of the building as well as the construction costs incurred on our consolidated balance sheet along with a corresponding financing liability (build-to-suit accounting). Upon occupancy for build-to-suit leases, we assess whether the circumstances qualify for sales recognition under the sale-leaseback accounting guidance. If the lease meets the sale-leaseback criteria, we will remove the asset and related financial obligation from the balance sheet and treat the building lease as an operating lease. If upon completion of construction, the project does not meet the sale-leaseback criteria, the leased property will be treated as a capital lease for financial reporting purposes.
Stock-Based Compensation
Stock options awarded to employees, members of our board of directors and non-employee third parties are measured at fair value at each grant date. We consider what we believe to be comparable publicly-traded companies, discounted free cash flows and an analysis of our enterprise value in estimating the fair value of our common stock. Options generally vest over a four-year period with 25% of the shares underlying the options vesting on the date that is 12 months after the vesting commencement date and thereafter 1/48th of the shares vesting each month, subject to continued service with us through each vesting date.
Stock-based compensation cost is measured on the grant date, based on the estimated fair value of the award using a Black-Scholes pricing model and recognized as an expense over the employees or directors requisite service period on a straight-line basis. We expect to continue to grant stock options in the future, and, to the extent that we do, our stock-based compensation expense recognized in future periods will likely increase.
We account for stock-based compensation arrangements with non-employees using a fair value approach. The fair value of these options is measured using the Black-Scholes option-pricing model reflecting the
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same assumptions as applied to employee options in each of the reported periods, other than the expected life, which is assumed to be the contractual life of the option. The compensation costs of these arrangements are subject to remeasurement over the vesting terms as earned.
We account for stock-based compensation arrangements in restricted shares, subject to a put option that allows the holder of the shares to put the shares back to us for cash, as liability-classified stock awards. These awards are re-measured at each reporting period, with changes in fair value being charged to the statement of operations. Compensation expense is recognized using a graded vesting methodology for each separately vesting tranche of the award as though the award were, in substance, multiple awards. Unless the put option is exercised, the restricted shares will be reclassified from a liability to an equity classified award upon the termination of the put option.
Key Assumptions
Our Black-Scholes option-pricing model requires the input of highly subjective assumptions, including the fair value of the underlying common stock, the expected volatility of the price of our common stock, risk-free interest rates, the expected term of the option and the expected dividend yield of our common stock. These estimates involve inherent uncertainties and the application of managements judgment. If factors change and different assumptions are used, our stock-based compensation expense could be materially different in the future.
Fair Value of Our Common Stock. Because our stock is not publicly traded, we must estimate the fair value of our common stock, as discussed in Common Stock Valuations below.
Expected Volatility. As we have not been a public company and do not have a trading history for our common stock, the expected stock price volatility for our common stock is estimated by taking the average historical price volatility for industry peers based on daily price observations over a period equivalent to the expected term of the stock option grants. Industry peers, which we have selected, consist of several public companies in the industry similar in size, stage of life cycle and financial leverage. These industry peers are also used in our common stock valuations. We intend to continue to consistently apply this process using the same or similar public companies until a sufficient amount of historical information regarding the volatility of our own common stock share price becomes available, or unless circumstances change such that the identified companies are no longer similar to us, in which case more suitable companies whose share prices are publicly available would be used in the calculation.
Risk-free Interest Rate. The risk-free interest rate is based on the yields of U.S. Treasury securities with maturities similar to the expected term of the options for each option group.
Expected Term. The expected term represents the period that our stock-based awards are expected to be outstanding. As we do not have sufficient historical experience for determining the expected term of the stock option awards granted, we base our expected term for awards issued to employees or
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members of our board of directors on the simplified method, which represents the average period from vesting to the expiration of the stock option. For grants to non-employees, the expected term is equal to the contractual term, which is generally ten years.
Expected Dividend Yield. We have never declared or paid any cash dividends to common stockholders and do not presently plan to pay cash dividends in the foreseeable future. Consequently, we use an expected dividend yield of zero.
In determining the fair value of stock options granted, the following weighted average assumptions were used in the Black-Scholes option-pricing model for awards granted in the periods indicated:
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 Assumptions: Expected volatility 42.7% 43.9% 45.7% 50.3% 43.0% 49.0% Risk-free interest rate 0.7% 1.1% 0.9% 1.9% 1.7% 2.1% Expected term (in years) 5.12 6.08 5.48 6.08 5.46 6.08 Dividend rate % % %
Common Stock Valuations
The fair value of our common stock underlying stock options has historically been determined by our board of directors, with assistance from management, based upon information available at the time of grant. Given the absence of a public trading market for our common stock and in accordance with the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants Practice Aid, Valuation of Privately Held Company Equity Securities Issued as Compensation, or the Practice Aid, our board of directors has exercised reasonable judgment and considered numerous objective and subjective factors to determine the best estimate of the fair value of our common stock at each grant date. These factors included:
contemporaneous third-party valuations of our common stock;
the prices, rights, preferences and privileges of our preferred stock relative to the common stock;
the prices of preferred stock sold by us to third-party investors in arms-length transactions;
the prices of common stock sold to third-party investors by us and in secondary transactions or repurchased by us in arms-length transactions;
our operating and financial performance;
current business conditions and projections;
the likelihood of achieving a liquidity event for the shares of common stock underlying these stock options, such as an initial public offering or sale of our company, given prevailing market conditions;
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the lack of marketability of our common stock;
the market performance of comparable publicly traded e-commerce and technology companies; and
the U.S. and global economic and capital market conditions and outlook.
The per share estimated fair value of our common stock in the table below represents the determination by our board of directors of the fair value of our common stock as of the date of grant, taking into consideration the various objective and subjective factors described above, including the valuations of our common stock. There is inherent uncertainty in these estimates and, if we had made different assumptions than those described below, the fair value of the underlying common stock and amount of our stock-based compensation expense, net loss and net loss per share amounts would have differed. Following the closing of our initial public offering, the fair value per share of our common stock for purposes of determining stock-based compensation will be the closing price of our common stock as reported on the applicable grant date.
The following table summarizes by grant date the number of shares of common stock subject to stock options granted from January 1, 2013 through the date of this prospectus, as well as the associated per share exercise price and the estimated fair value per share of our common stock on the grant date:
Grant Date Number of Shares
Underlying
Options Granted Exercise
Price
per Share Estimated
Fair Value
per Share January 22, 2013 713,810 $ 2.38 $ 2.38 February 4, 2013 1,521,851 $ 2.38 $ 2.38 May 7, 2013 460,384 $ 2.79 $ 2.79 July 17, 2013 236,465 $ 2.79 $ 2.79 September 20, 2013 157,938 $ 3.01 $ 3.01 October 29, 2013 2,263,295 $ 3.01 $ 3.01 December 11, 2013 798,467 $ 3.11 $ 3.11 February 19, 2014 2,203,970 $ 4.13 $ 4.13 March 13, 2014 121,010 $ 4.13 $ 4.13 April 22, 2014 501,064 $ 5.18 $ 5.18 July 16, 2014 1,442,401 $ 5.23 $ 5.23 November 5, 2014 2,132,990 $ 6.19 $ 6.19 November 12, 2014 12,000 $ 6.19 $ 6.19 January 30, 2015 2,037,490 $ 8.50 $ 8.50
Based on an assumed initial public offering price of $ per share, the midpoint of the offering price range on the cover page of this prospectus, the intrinsic value of stock options outstanding at was $ million, of which $ million and $ million related to stock options that were vested and unvested, respectively, at that date.
In valuing our common stock, our board of directors determined the equity value of our business using the income approach. The income approach estimates the fair value of a company based on the present value of such companys future estimated cash flows and the residual value of such company beyond the forecast period. These future values are discounted to their present values to reflect the risks inherent in such company achieving these estimated cash flows. Significant inputs of the income approach (in addition to
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our estimated future cash flows themselves) include the long-term growth rate assumed in the residual value, discount rate and normalized long-term operating margin. The terminal value was calculated to estimate our value beyond the forecast period by applying valuation metrics to the final year of our forecasted revenue and discounting that value to the present value using the same weighted average cost of capital, or WACC, applied to the forecasted periods.
For valuations through February 10, 2014, the equity value determined was allocated to the common stock using the Option Pricing Method, or OPM. The OPM treats common stock and preferred stock as call options on an equity value, with exercise prices based on the liquidation preference of the preferred stock. Therefore, the common stock has value only if the funds available for distribution to the stockholders exceed the value of the liquidation preference at the time of a liquidity event such as a merger, sale or initial public offering, assuming the enterprise has funds available to make a liquidation preference meaningful and collectible by the stockholders. The common stock is modeled to be a call option with a claim on the enterprise at an exercise price equal to the remaining value immediately after the preferred stock is liquidated. The OPM uses the Black-Scholes option-pricing model to price the call options. The OPM is appropriate to use when the range of possible future outcomes is so difficult to predict that forecasts would be highly speculative.
Beginning with the March 31, 2014 valuation, we changed the methodology for allocating our equity value to our common stock to a probability weighted expected return method, or PWERM. We made this change as greater certainty developed regarding a possible liquidity event. The PWERM methodology relies on a forward-looking analysis to predict the possible future value of a company. Under this method, discrete future outcomes, including initial public offering, non-IPO scenarios and a merger or sale are weighted based on our estimate of the probability of each scenario. We applied a hybrid method of the PWERM where the non-IPO scenario is modeled using an OPM to reflect the full distribution of possible non-IPO outcomes. The hybrid method is useful when certain discrete future outcomes can be predicted, but also accounts for uncertainty regarding the timing or likelihood of specific alternative exit events.
Recent Accounting Pronouncements
Under the JOBS Act, we meet the definition of an emerging growth company. We have irrevocably elected to opt out of the extended transition period for complying with new or revised accounting standards pursuant to Section 107(b) of the JOBS Act.
In March 2013, the Financial Accounting Standards Board, or FASB, issued new accounting guidance clarifying the accounting for the release of cumulative translation adjustment into net income when a company either sells a part or all of its investment in a foreign entity or no longer holds a controlling financial interest in a subsidiary or group of assets that is a nonprofit activity or a business within a foreign entity. The new guidance is effective for fiscal years, and interim periods within those fiscal years, beginning on or after December 15, 2013. The adoption of this guidance did not have an impact on our consolidated financial statements.
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In May 2014, the FASB issued an accounting standards update that will replace existing revenue recognition guidance. Among other things, the updated guidance requires companies to recognize revenue in a way that depicts the transfer of promised goods or services to customers in an amount that reflects the consideration to which the entity expects to be entitled in exchange for those goods or services. The new guidance will be effective for us beginning January 1, 2017. We are currently evaluating the effect the guidance will have on our consolidated financial statements.
In August 2014, the FASB issued an accounting standard update under which management will be required to assess an entitys ability to continue as a going concern and provide related footnote disclosures in certain circumstances. The new guidance is effective for annual periods beginning after December 15, 2016 and for annual and interim periods thereafter. The adoption of this guidance is not expected to have an impact on our financial statements or disclosures.
Quantitative and Qualitative Disclosures about Market Risk
We have operations both within the United States and internationally, and we are exposed to market risks in the ordinary course of our business, including the effects of interest rate changes and foreign currency fluctuations. Information relating to quantitative and qualitative disclosures about these market risks is described below.
Interest Rate Sensitivity
Cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments as of December 31, 2014 were held primarily in cash deposits and money market funds. The fair value of our cash, cash equivalents and short-term investments would not be significantly affected by either an increase or decrease in interest rates due mainly to the short-term nature of these instruments. As of December 31, 2014, no amounts were outstanding under our credit facility. Any future borrowings incurred under the credit facility would accrue interest at a floating rate based on a formula tied to certain market rates at the time of incurrence (as described above). A 10% increase or decrease in our current interest rate would not have a significant impact on our interest expense.
Foreign Currency Risk
Most of our sales are denominated in U.S. dollars, and therefore, our revenue is not currently subject to significant foreign currency risk. Our operating expenses are denominated in the currencies of the countries in which our operations are located, and may be subject to fluctuations due to changes in foreign currency exchange rates, particularly changes in the Pound Sterling and Euro. Fluctuations in foreign currency exchange rates may cause us to recognize transaction gains and losses in our statement of operations. A 10% increase or decrease in current exchange rates could result in additional income or expense of $1.8 million.
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Letter from Chad
The Etsy Economy
Since inception, Etsy has challenged conventional ways of thinking about commerce, business, individuals and communities. I intend to keep our unconventional operating philosophy as we become a public company, and I welcome new investors into our community.
When I joined Etsy almost seven years ago, Etsy was an online marketplace for handmade goods, vintage items and craft supplies that connected sellers and buyers. Even in my early days at Etsy, it was clear to me that the vision for Etsy could extend far beyond the founding idea of the company and have even more potential to impact the world for good.
Vision is just the starting point. I believe Etsy can truly change the world when our vision is met with strong culture, a powerful team and disciplined execution. In my time at Etsy, Ive put my heart and soul into nurturing a culture and building a team and company that match the ambition of our mission. Today our mission is much more expansive than when Etsy began: to reimagine commerce in ways that build a more fulfilling and lasting world.
The reimagination of commerce means transforming every aspect of how goods are made, bought and sold. We believe that Etsy has the long-term potential to transform the world economy into one that is more people-centered and community-focusedone that values and honors designers and makers and one that creates stronger connections among people who make, sell and buy goods. We see an economy that is more sustainable and transparentand one that is more joyful. We believe in an economy that transcends price and convenience, one that emphasizes relationships over transactions and optimizes for authorship and provenance. We call this the Etsy Economy.
Building the Etsy Economy matters more than ever. For decades now, the conventional and dominant retail model has relentlessly focused on delivering goods at the lowest price, valuing products and profits over community, short-changing the future with the instant gratification of today. I do not believe that this race to the bottom is a sustainable, successful model. Our growing community has made it clear that they desire thoughtful alternatives to mass commerce and impersonal retail and products that better reflect their personal style and values. Person by person, sale by sale, we are building a new model to replace the old. With GMS of $1.93 billion in 2014, I see the Etsy Economy emerging.
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Etsys Values
If you want to understand Etsy, youll have to understand our values.
We are a mindful, transparent and humane business.
We plan and build for the long term.
We value craftsmanship in all we make.
We believe fun should be part of everything we do.
We keep it real, always.
Fundamentally, we believe that companies can and should use the power of business to create social good, which is reflected in our status as a Certified B Corporation. Our commitment to using business as a force of good manifests itself in the way we run our business.
People often ask me how I choose between the success of our community and the success of our business. My answer is that I dont have to choose; we have built a business that does well when our community is successful. Making money matters to Etsy because our financial success creates long-term sustainability for our community. The more we invest in our platform, the more we enable Etsy sellers to pursue their craft and grow their businesses and the easier we make it for Etsy buyers to find unique goods. We call this Etsys Empowerment Loop.
Community
At Etsy, we believe that our strength and business success rest in the interdependence among Etsy sellers, Etsy buyers, responsible manufacturers and our employeesin other words, our community.
Etsy sellers represent a diverse mosaic of needs and aspirations. Some sellers are first-time small business owners and benefit greatly from our seller support and education programs. The vast majority of sellers on Etsy are one-person shops, and we continue to embrace and develop new ways to support them. Other sellers have grown and need help scaling with the assistance of responsible manufacturers, creating opportunity for other participants in the Etsy Economy. In all cases, we empower each Etsy seller to succeed on her own terms.
I have heard concerns that by allowing our sellers to partner with responsible manufacturers, we are diluting our handmade ethos. I share our communitys desire to preserve what is special about Etsy. After all, Etsy has always served as an antidote to mass manufacturing. We still do. With our vision of responsible manufacturing, we are promoting a new, people-centered model in which artisans can preserve the spirit of craftsmanship and grow responsibly by collaborating with people at small-batch manufacturers to make their goods. This brings more hands together to build both products and
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more diverse local, living economies. These local, living economies band together into a larger Etsy Economy made up of individuals with diverse roles but all sharing a collective vision of an economy based on community.
When individuals share a collective vision, the power and possibility of community manifest in profound ways. Etsy is, by design, a collection of many small things. As we grow, Etsy becomes a larger collection of individuals and communities, with compounding benefits when they connect with each other. Etsy sellers have self-organized into more than 10,000 groups around the world, known as Etsy Teams. They provide local support to each other and collaborate with Etsy on initiatives, such as teaching entrepreneurship to economically disadvantaged people in their communities, lobbying the government on issues important to Etsy sellers, running local craft fairs and translating Etsys site into other languages.
In 2012, Mayor Larry Morrissey reached out to me on Twitter asking how to build an Etsy Economy in his community of Rockford, Illinois. Rockford is a city that has faced challenges familiar to many cities in America and around the world: loss of manufacturing jobs, high unemployment and a struggling economy. We worked with Mayor Morrissey, members of the local Rockford Etsy Team, the public education system, local arts organizations and the public housing authority to launch the Etsy Craft Entrepreneurship Program. This program teaches people with a craft skill that entrepreneurship and economic opportunity are within reach on our platform. We have extended this program to 10 cities around the world and see it as an inspirational model for even deeper community involvement in the coming years.
Our concept of community includes the cities where we live and work, and we run Etsy in a way that supports our own local economy and ecosystem. At our headquarters in Brooklyn, twice a week we serve a meal that we call Eatsy. Our approach is to foster community and productivity through a meal, designed for employees to eat together on picnic-style benches. This meal allows employees to engage with each other, within and across teams, and increases team-building and work relationships throughout the company. Eatsy also serves as an end point for company-wide meetings, so that employees can continue the conversation on important workplace topics.
In 2014, we sourced food from over 40 local businesses with an emphasis on our health and ecological impact. We eat on compostable plates, and employees sign up to deliver our compost by bike to a local farm in Red Hook, Brooklyn, where it is turned back into the soil that produces the food we enjoy together. In this way, Eatsy goes into the very soil we live and work on. Eatsy is a metaphor for how I think about many aspects of our business and our relationship to the world around us: regenerative, mindful, interdependent, community-based and fun.
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Why Etsy Should be a Public Company
I believe the principles and resources of being a public company align well with the model of shared success that is fundamental to Etsys way of doing business, namely that we make money when our sellers make money. Investing in the growth of our business and increasing Etsys visibility will help elevate Etsy sellers and attract more buyers, which creates more opportunities for everyone.
Accountability / transparency
Etsy has a long history of providing data to the community, everything from key financial metrics, to our gross happiness index, to our carbon footprint data, to our workplace diversity stats. As a public company, we will be able to provide a higher level of transparency and accountability to a broader number of people.
Community participation
Being a private company means that most people dont have an opportunity to invest in Etsy. When Etsy is a public company, anyone will be able to own a piece of Etsy, including our sellers, our buyers and anyone else who shares Etsys values and mission. These shareholders will be valued members of our community.
Long-term sustainability
We want to be a company that spans generations. Eighty-six of the original companies in the S&P 500 index are still publicly traded after 58 years. I view going public as an important step towards providing Etsy with the capital and long-term corporate structure to achieve similar longevity.
Making the world more like Etsy
I believe that Etsy can be a public company that holistically integrates the concerns of people and the planet, the present and the future, profitability and accountability. If we succeed, then other companies might replicate our model. We think the world will be a better place for it.
As a public company, we will continue to concentrate on the long term. Our mission to reimagine commerce is a big goal and it will take time to achieve it; success will be based on strategies that evolve over years and decades, not just quarters. We are more focused on creating long-term results for us and our community than short-term results that lack that promise.
I believe this approach will deliver the most sustainable long-term returns to investors.
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When were public, we do not plan to give quarterly or annual earnings guidance. I think providing quantitative earnings guidance is misaligned with Etsys mission. For example, the pressure to hit a quarterly financial target could incent us too heavily to seek near-term gains, which could diminish our ability to fulfill our larger mission over the long-term.
We will continue to be transparent with our investors. Instead of providing guidance in the traditional sense, I plan to talk frequently with our investors about our progress, challenges and opportunities. I welcome investors who share our long-term, community-oriented philosophy.
Whats Ahead
I am intensely grateful to all of the people who have given so much of themselves to build Etsy, and I am excited to welcome new like-minded shareholders to our community.
We are entering a new era. I believe that successful businesses will be those that combine vision, execution and discipline with values, heart and conviction. That is how I plan to lead Etsy and work with our community to build a more fulfilling and lasting world through commerce. Etsy will be entering its second decade this year, and we look forward to many more in our new form as a public company.
Onward,
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Business
Our Mission
Our mission is to reimagine commerce in ways that build a more fulfilling and lasting world.
We are building a human, authentic and community-centric global and local marketplace. We are committed to using the power of business to create a better world through our platform, our members, our employees and the communities we serve.
Overview
We operate a marketplace where people around the world connect, both online and offline, to make, sell and buy unique goods. Handmade goods are the foundation of our marketplace. Whether crafted by an Etsy seller herself, with the assistance of her team or with an outside manufacturer in small batches, handmade goods spring from the imagination and creativity of an Etsy seller and embody authorship, responsibility and transparency. We believe we are creating a new economy, which we call the Etsy Economy, where creative entrepreneurs find meaningful work and both global and local markets for their goods, and where thoughtful consumers discover and buy unique goods and build relationships with the people who sell them.
Etsy was founded in June 2005 in Brooklyn, New York as a marketplace for handmade goods and craft supplies. From those beginnings, we have built an innovative, technology-based platform that, as of December 31, 2014, connected 54.0 million members, including 1.4 million active sellers and 19.8 million active buyers, in nearly every country in the world. In 2014, Etsy sellers generated GMS of $1.93 billion, of which 36.1% came from purchases made on mobile devices and 30.9% came from an Etsy seller or an Etsy buyer outside of the United States.
Our Community
Our community is the heart and soul of Etsy. Our community is made up of creative entrepreneurs who sell on our platform, thoughtful consumers looking to buy unique goods in our marketplace, responsible manufacturers who help Etsy sellers grow their businesses and Etsy employees who maintain our platform and nurture our ecosystem.
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Our business model is based on shared success: we make money when Etsy sellers make money. Our revenue is diversified, generated from a mix of marketplace activities and the services we provide Etsy sellers to help them create and grow their businesses. Marketplace revenue includes the fee an Etsy seller pays for each completed transaction and the listing fee an Etsy seller pays for each item she lists. Seller Services revenue includes fees an Etsy seller pays for services such as prominent placement in search results via Promoted Listings, payment processing via Direct Checkout and purchases of shipping labels through our platform via Shipping Labels. Other revenue includes the fees we receive from a third-party payment processor.
In 2014, Etsy sellers generated GMS of $1.93 billion, up 43.3% over 2013. In 2014, we generated revenue of $195.6 million, up 56.4% over 2013. In 2014, we generated a net loss of $15.2 million and Adjusted EBITDA of $23.1 million compared to a net loss of $0.8 million and Adjusted EBITDA of $16.9 million in 2013. See Selected Consolidated Financial and Other DataNon-GAAP Financial Measures for more information and for a reconciliation of Adjusted EBITDA to net (loss) income, the most directly comparable financial measure calculated and presented in accordance with GAAP.
Our Values
Our values are integral to everything we do.
We are a mindful, transparent and humane business. We believe that business interests and social and environmental responsibility are interwoven and aligned and that the power of business should be used to strengthen communities and empower people. To demonstrate our commitment, each year we publish a Values & Impact report to monitor and then publicly report our efforts to minimize the harm and maximize the benefit that we have on people and the planet. B Lab, an independent nonprofit organization, has certified us as a B Corporation for our adherence to rigorous social and environmental standards, and Fortune has recognized us as a great place to work in both 2013 and 2014.
We plan and build for the long term. We want to build a company that lasts, and we plan to measure our success in years and decades. Etsy sellers in particular depend on us and on our platform to grow their businesses, so we will strive to make decisions that are best for the long-term health of our ecosystem.
We value craftsmanship in all we make. Craftsmanship is the marriage of skill and passion. We believe every job at our company should demonstrate our commitment to craft. We are an engineering-driven company, and we think of our code as craft: we are makers of the products and services that our members use, and we approach the work we do with the same care and inspiration as do Etsy sellers.
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We believe fun should be part of everything we do. Our mission includes fostering a world in which personal fulfillment is a key element of success. We believe that this way of working is connected and joyful. We strive to do excellent work and bring a sense of humor and playfulness to it.
We keep it real, always. We have the courage and the will to do business in ways that are unconventional and impactful. We strive to stay genuine, maintaining integrity, humility and sincerity in everything we do. When we feel that we are not being true to our values or our mission, we are not afraid to stop and change course.
Our Community
Our community includes Etsy sellers, Etsy buyers, responsible manufacturers and Etsy employees.
Etsy Sellers: Creative Entrepreneurs
Etsy sellers join our community to be part of a vibrant global-local marketplace that allows them to express their creativity and turn their passion into a business while connecting to thoughtful consumers locally and around the world. As of December 31, 2014, there were 1.4 million active sellers on our platform and more than 11% of active sellers as of that date had been selling on Etsy for more than four years.
Etsy Sellers
We support a diverse group of artists, makers, designers and collectors from around the worldfrom the solo artisan to the full-time jewelry maker with staff; from the antique furniture collector to the textile graphic designer partnering with a small-batch manufacturer.
Etsy sellers range from hobbyists to professional merchants, and have a broad range of personal and professional goals. In November 2014, we conducted a survey of U.S. Etsy sellers who made a sale in the preceding 12 months, to which 4,000 sellers responded. The 2014 Seller Survey reveals a unique population of Internet-enabled creative entrepreneurs who are building businesses on their own termsprioritizing flexibility, independence and creativity. Some Etsy sellers are looking for extra pocket money, while others depend on their shops to support themselves and their families. According to our 2014 Seller Survey, among U.S. Etsy sellers:
86% are women;
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95% run their shops from their homes;
90% aspire to grow their sales in the future;
79% started their Etsy shop as an outlet for creativity;
65% started their Etsy shop as a way to supplement income; and
76% consider their Etsy shop to be a business.
Etsy Buyers: Thoughtful Consumers
Etsy buyers visit our marketplace to discover a broad selection of unique goods that are hard to find elsewhere, ranging from a $5 ornament to a $50 hand-knit sweater to a $2,000 custom-made coffee table. We believe many Etsy buyers are motivated by more than simply price and convenience; we believe they also value craftsmanship, artistry, uniqueness, authenticity and sustainability. We find that Etsy buyers want to know how items were made, where they were made and who made them. In our marketplace, Etsy buyers can enjoy a personalized shopping experience and direct interactions with Etsy sellers. Etsy buyers can also purchase customized items or other bespoke goods from Etsy sellers. By buying in our marketplace, Etsy buyers are supporting creative entrepreneurs in their local communities and around the world. As of December 31, 2014, there were 19.8 million active buyers on our platform.
Marketplace Activity
Etsy buyers also include retailers we have selected for our Wholesale offering, which we launched in August 2014. From local boutiques to national chains such as Nordstrom, West Elm and Whole Foods, retailers use our platform to connect with new artists and designers and to add unique and distinctive items to their store offerings. As of December 31, 2014, more than 6,500 local boutiques and three U.S. national retail chains had been invited to join our Wholesale offering.
Responsible Manufacturers
We are committed to helping Etsy sellers who want to work with responsible, small-batch manufacturing partners to increase their production. An Etsy seller might work with a cut-and-sew shop to make clothes she has designed, a casting house that casts her wax models for her jewelry designs or a digital printing
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house that prints her photographs on household items. We ask Etsy sellers to work with manufacturers who adhere to our ethical expectations: humane working conditions, non-discrimination policies, sustainability practices and no child, youth or involuntary labor. As of December 31, 2014, we had approved more than 3,000 Etsy shops for over 5,000 manufacturing partnerships. Much of this production is local: as of December 31, 2014, 86% of manufacturers partnering with Etsy sellers were located in the same country as the Etsy seller.
Etsy Employees
We too are members of our community. Whether crafting our policies, talking with Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers in our online forums or building the tools and services underlying our marketplace, our employees create lasting, authentic connections in our community. Etsy employees emphasize building personal relationships with Etsy sellers, visiting their shops, inviting them to our offices for lunch or celebrating with them at in-person events.
Our Opportunity
We operate at the center of several converging macroeconomic trends in online and mobile commerce, employment, consumption and manufacturing. We believe that in combination these trends will benefit millions of people in our ecosystem around the world: Etsy sellers engaging in their creative passion, working for themselves and defining success on their own terms; Etsy buyers accessing a diverse, global marketplace of goods that have historically been found in highly fragmented markets; and, increasingly, responsible manufacturers using modern tools to craft goods in partnership with Etsy sellers.
Trends in Our Favor
Trends in Online and Mobile Commerce
Etsy sellers offer goods in dozens of online retail categories, including jewelry, stationery, clothing, home goods, craft supplies and vintage items. Euromonitor, a consumer market research company, estimated that the global online retail market was $695 billion in 2013, up from $280 billion in 2008, representing a
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compound annual growth rate, or CAGR, of 19.9%. This growth is expected to continue, with the global online retail market becoming a significantly larger portion of the total retail market, reaching $1.5 trillion by 2018, implying a 16.6% CAGR from 2013.
Mobile commerce is also increasingly important in online retail. comScore estimated that since the first quarter of 2013, consumers visiting online commerce sites spent more than half of their browsing time on mobile devices; however, online commerce spending via mobile devices represented only 11% of total online commerce dollars in the third quarter of 2014.
Trends in Employment
Whether motivated by economic necessity or personal preference, a growing number of people are turning to self-employment for their livelihoods.
In a 2012 survey of middle-class households in the United States by the Pew Research Center, 85% said that it was more difficult to maintain their living standards today than it was ten years ago. The erosion of middle-income jobs is not unique to the United States: we believe middle-class families in many developed countries face similar challenges. Responding to these challenges, many people supplement their incomes and support their families by becoming freelancers, and freelancers are now making significant contributions to their respective economies. A study commissioned in July 2014 by the Freelancers Union and Elance-oDesk, or the Freelancer Study, estimated that 53 million Americans are working as freelancers, or 34% of the U.S. workforce. The same study estimated that this freelance workforce adds $715 billion to the U.S. economy each year.
Brandi Harper, Etsy Shop: purlBknit, Brooklyn, NY
The Freelancer Study also found that millennials (workers under 35) represent a source of growth in the number of Americans working as freelancers. Millennials are more likely to freelance than older workers38% of millennials are freelancing, compared to 32% of workers over 35and many millennials have spent their entire working lives in this freelance era. Millennial freelancers are also more likely to search out work that has a positive impact on the world (62% of millennials vs. 54% of non-millennials) or is exciting (62% of millennials vs. 47% of non-millennials).
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Many other people are motivated by similar personal priorities to start their own businesses. In 2012, a Harvard Business School study found that autonomy was a top motivation in a faculty survey of 2,000 business founders, amongst all age cohorts and for both men and women.
Women are also contributing to the trend towards self-employment. According to an October 2012 analysis by Booz and Company, by 2020, 865 million women worldwide who have not previously been part of the economic mainstream will join as producers, consumers, employees and entrepreneurs. World Bank research shows that, in certain developing nations, over half of the women in the labor force are self-employed.
In combination, these data underscore the importance of tools that help people start and grow their businesses. We believe that many of these freelancers, millennials and women have creative skills that could provide a foundation for entrepreneurship, but that they often have little or no experience running their own businesses, and they typically lack the marketing resources, the technological expertise and the manufacturing and logistics capabilities to turn their creativity into a business.
Trends in Consumption
Most large retailers today follow the same formula, emphasizing efficiency and scale and pressuring their suppliers to reduce their costs in order to serve mass-produced goods at the lowest-possible prices. We believe, however, that many consumers want to purchase goods that are unique and that reflect their personality and style, not simply mass-produced, generic goods. Some consumers want their purchases to reflect their values; they want to support retailers and suppliers that have responsible and sustainable policies toward their employees, their communities and the environment. Finding these goods can be difficult, as markets for such goods have historically been highly fragmented across boutiques, consignment stores and other venues and marketplaces.
Chris and Katie Francis, Lee Goodwin, Olivia Turrell, Etsy Shop: Docksmith, Brunswick, ME
A 2014 Nielsen study reported that global consumers between the ages of 21 and 34 represent 51% of all consumers who are willing to pay extra for sustainable products. The Nielsen study also indicated that 55% of consumers worldwide are willing to pay extra for products and services from companies committed to social impact, a 10% increase from a similar study in 2011, and that 46% of those consumers identified support for small businesses and entrepreneurship as a key cause.
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Still other thoughtful consumers are looking to support their local communities and prefer buying goods that they can trace to an individual person or community. According to a 2014 Havas Worldwide case study, 53% of consumers say that when possible they prefer to buy directly from an individual producer than from a store or shopping center. These consumers prefer to bypass large manufacturers and retailers when possible in favor of buying locally and independently-produced goods.
Trends in Manufacturing
Just as the power of computing, once reserved for government and large businesses, is now available to individuals on their personal computers and mobile devices, individuals and small businesses now have the ability to manufacture goods in their homes and studios using tools such as computer-assisted design, 3D printers, computer-controlled routers and other machines at a fraction of the historical cost. We believe the decrease in the size and the cost of these tools will make it easier for creative entrepreneurs to start new businesses. We also believe that small-batch manufacturers will be able to use these new technologies to provide high-quality manufacturing services to creative entrepreneurs. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, in 2011, approximately 65% of manufacturing establishments had 19 or fewer employees. Manufacturing plants that produce items such as apparel, leather, ornamental metal, furniture, printing materials, cutlery and jewelry tended to have even smaller workforces, as 80% had 19 or fewer employees. We believe that to scale their own businesses, creative entrepreneurs can access this growing number of small-batch manufacturers.
Allison Faunce, Etsy Shop: Little Hero Capes, Somerset, MA
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Our Strengths
Our platform connects millions of Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers globally, making it one of the largest online marketplaces in the world. We have achieved our scale because of the following key strengths:
Our Authentic, Trusted Marketplace. We have built an authentic, trusted marketplace that embodies our values-based culture, emphasizing respect, direct communication and fun. We have developed a reputation for authenticity as a result of Etsy sellers unique offerings and their adherence to our policies for handmade goods embodying the principles of authorship, responsibility and transparency. We establish trust in our marketplace by emphasizing the person behind every transaction. We deepen connections among our members through our direct communication tools, seller stories on our website and apps and in-person events, making a personal relationship central to the member experience. The authenticity of our marketplace and the connections among people in our community are the cornerstones of our business.
Our Passionate, Engaged and Loyal Members. Our members are passionate, engaged and loyalnot only to us, but to each otherbuilding a strong community.
Our active sellers and active buyers remain so for multiple years. For example, 32.3% of active sellers and 44.7% of active buyers as of December 31, 2011 continued to be active sellers and active buyers, respectively, three years later, as of December 31, 2014. In addition, as of December 31, 2014, 11% of active sellers have been selling on Etsy for more than four years. Likewise, as of December 31, 2014, 11% of active buyers have been members for more than four years.
Our members repeat sales and purchases drive GMS growth. In 2014, 78.5% of our GMS resulted from repeat purchases made by Etsy buyers, and 99.3% of our GMS was generated by repeat sales made by Etsy sellers.
Our active sellers and active buyers also log into Etsy frequently. During the fourth quarter of 2014, 78% of active sellers as of December 31, 2014 and 63% of active buyers as of December 31, 2014 logged in to our marketplace.
Our members also spend time with each other. For example, Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers sent 216 million messages on our platform in 2014 using our Conversations tool. As of December 31, 2014, 27.7% of active sellers belong to a self-organized Etsy Team, developing supportive personal relationships with other Etsy sellers as they build their independent creative businesses. Currently, over 10,000 Etsy Teams have formed around the world.
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The passion and loyalty demonstrated by Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers underlies the growth and scale of our platform. See Managements Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of OperationsKey Factors Affecting Our PerformanceGrowth and Retention of Active Sellers and Active Buyers for more information.
GMS Contribution by Purchase Type
Our Innovative Technology. Our widely-respected engineering team has built a sophisticated platform that enables millions of Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers to smoothly transact across borders, languages and devices. Our team is at the forefront of the software engineering practice of continuous deployment. We update our code as often as every 20 minutes, and as many as 70 times per day, with more than 10,000 deploys during the year ended December 31, 2014. To enhance the performance of our platform, we collect and analyze a large volume of data. For example, we currently collect more than 1.8 million discrete metrics, which we expect will increase as we grow. Further, in the field of search relevance and purchase recommendations, we currently collect and analyze more than 1,200 terabytes of data to calculate search and personalization relevance signals in real time to recommend goods to each prospective Etsy buyer from a broad inventory of unique goods.
For the year ended December 31, 2014, 53.2% of our visits and 36.1% of our GMS were generated on a mobile device. We developed our Sell on Etsy mobile app to help the Etsy seller operate her shop and manage orders. Our mobile website and our mobile app for Etsy buyers, which we developed to keep Etsy buyers engaged wherever they are, includes search, discovery, curation, personalization and social shopping features, optimized for the mobile experience.
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Our Scaled, Global-Local Marketplace. Our marketplace is global-local, meaning that we focus on building local Etsy communities around the world. Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers in these local communities, in turn, have global reach and access through our platform. Currently, Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers are based in nearly every country in the world and our marketplace is available in 10 languages. In 2014, 30.9% of our GMS involved an Etsy seller or Etsy buyer outside of the United States. We believe our global-local marketplace creates strong competitive advantages outside the United States because our success is not dependent on scale in any given country; instead, the diverse location of Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers creates the scale, and a concentration of Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers in any given region can give rise to a vibrant local Etsy marketplace.
Our Seller-Aligned Business Model. Etsy sellers are drawn to our platform because we empower them to succeed, and as Etsy sellers succeed, so do we. Our seller-aligned business model creates network effects. The more we invest in our platform, the more we enable Etsy sellers to pursue their craft and grow their businesses and the easier we make it for Etsy buyers to find unique goods. We call this Etsys Empowerment Loop. Some 76% of Etsy sellers consider their Etsy shops to be businesses and 90% want to grow their businesses, as indicated by our 2014 Seller Survey. We focus on offering Seller Services that help an Etsy seller spend more of her time on her creative passion and less of her time on the administrative aspects of running a business. During the year ended December 31, 2014, 46.1% of Etsy sellers used at least one of our Seller Services. Similarly, we have launched our manufacturing and Wholesale offerings in an effort to enable an Etsy seller to grow her business on our platform.
Etsy Empowerment Loop
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Our Strategy: The Path Ahead
Make Etsy an Everyday Experience. The power of human connection is central to the Etsy member experience. We emphasize relationships, connecting creative entrepreneurs to thoughtful consumers around the world, and we continually strive to make those connections a daily habit for our members.
The everyday experience starts with mobile. In 2014, 53.2% of our visits and 36.1% of our GMS were generated on a mobile device:
We will continue to help the Etsy seller manage her shop, connect with Etsy buyers and sell her goods on our platform, all on her mobile device. We plan to bring the Etsy experience to local communities, using mobile technology to highlight Etsy sellers goods in nearby brick-and-mortar stores and crafts fairs.
We will continue to make it easy and fun for Etsy buyers to connect with Etsy sellers and to discover and purchase Etsy sellers unique goods, particularly though mobile devices. We plan to improve Etsy buyers engagement with our community through enhanced content, search and discovery.
Build Local Marketplaces, Globally. Our vision is global and local. In 2014, 28.9% of Etsy sellers were located outside the United States, and 30.9% of our GMS involved an Etsy seller or Etsy buyer outside of the United States. Although we promote cross-border transactions, our strategy is to build and deepen local Etsy communities around the world, each with its own ecosystem of Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers. To meet this goal, we plan to invest in local marketing and content and local payment and shipping solutions in countries around the world. We believe our locally-focused work will broaden the reach of our global platform.
Kamma Spring, Etsy Shop: Lorgie, Fremantle, Australia
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Offer High-impact Seller Services. Seller Services, such as Promoted Listings, Direct Checkout and Shipping Labels, help an Etsy seller spend more time on the pleasures of her craft and less time on the administrative aspects of her business. Seller Services represented $42.8 million, or 34.2%, of our revenue in 2013, a 169.9% increase over 2012, and $82.5 million, or 42.2%, of our revenue in 2014, a 92.7% increase over 2013. According to our 2014 Seller Survey, for every hour that an Etsy seller spends making her products, she spends another hour doing business-related tasks, including inventory management, shipping, customer service, marketing and accounting. We intend to enhance existing Seller Services, extend their geographic reach and introduce new ones to increase the amount of time an Etsy seller can devote to her craft.
How an Etsy Seller Spends Her Time
Expand the Etsy Economy. We intend to fulfill our mission to reimagine commerce by expanding the impact of our platform beyond our community. By further developing our manufacturing program, we believe we will help Etsy sellers who want to grow their businesses connect with skilled partners, while helping to revitalize small-batch manufacturing in local communities. We will also continue to focus on our Wholesale offering, which we launched in August 2014, so that Etsy sellers can sell their products to select retail partners such as Nordstrom, West Elm and Whole Foods. Finally, we plan to focus on strategic partnerships, technological advances and public-private endeavors such as our Craft Entrepreneurship program, which we believe will bring the benefit of the Etsy Economy to more people and more communities.
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Invest in Marketing. We believe that the rapid growth of our marketplace is a testament to our compelling value proposition for Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers. Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers have been our best marketers, and the majority of our visits have come from direct and organic channels. Historically, we have invested relatively small amounts in marketing. We spent only $10.9 million on marketing in 2012 and only $17.9 million in 2013. In 2014, we began increasing our brand and digital marketing efforts and spent $39.7 million in marketing, up 122% from 2013.
We plan to continue to increase our marketing spending on traditional and online media to increase awareness of our brand and attract additional members to our ecosystem.
Visits to Etsy by Channel
Our investment in marketing has shown early signs of success. Beginning in the fourth quarter of 2013, we strategically increased our marketing spending in the United Kingdom, our second largest market in terms of number of active sellers, with a goal of growing the number of Etsy buyers in the United Kingdom. In the following twelve months, we spent five times more on search engine marketing in the United Kingdom during the twelve months ended September 30, 2014 than we did during the same period in the prior year. During the twelve months ended September 30, 2014, the number of active buyers in the United Kingdom grew 112.9% year-over-year, compared to 89.0% year-over-year in the same period in the prior year. Additionally, Etsy buyers in the United Kingdom spent more in our marketplace, with the amount spent increasing by 114.2% year-over-year versus 64.7% year-over-year in the same period in the prior year. Our success in the United Kingdom demonstrates our ability to accelerate growth with marketing improvements and increased marketing spending. We intend to apply the key lessons from our experience in the United Kingdom into growing other local Etsy markets around the globe.
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Our Platform
Our platform is an authentic vehicle for person-to-person commerce, both globally and locally. Our platform includes our marketplace, our Seller Services, our technology and our community, both online and offline. The core of our platform is our marketplace, which connects people around the world to make, sell and buy unique goods.
Connecting People through Our Platform
The Etsy Seller Experience
Our platform makes it easy for an Etsy seller to open an Etsy shop and operate her business. We help the Etsy seller in the following ways:
Seller Services. We offer a variety of services to help Etsy sellers build their personal brands, engage potential customers and complete transactions. These services include:
Promoted Listings. Our Promoted Listings offering enables an Etsy seller to pay a cost-per-click based fee to feature and promote her goods in search results generated by Etsy buyers on our platform. This service allows an Etsy seller to target Etsy buyers who are specifically searching for goods similar to those she offers for sale. As of December 31, 2014, 18.2% of active sellers used Promoted Listings in 2014.
Direct Checkout. Our Direct Checkout offering allows Etsy sellers to accept various forms of payment such as credit cards, debit cards and Etsy gift cards. As of December 31, 2014, Direct Checkout was available in 22 countries and 10 currencies. Once an Etsy buyer makes payment, the Etsy seller receives the funds in her own bank account and in her local currency. In addition, in October 2014, we expanded Direct Checkout to enable an Etsy seller in the United States to use our Sell on Etsy Reader to accept credit card and debit card payments in person, whether at her store or her booth at a craft fair. As of December 31, 2014, 36.1% of active sellers used Direct Checkout in 2014.
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Shipping Labels. Etsy sellers can purchase United States Postal Service and Canada Post shipping labels through our platform with the appropriate amount of postage. The ability to print shipping labels at home reduces the cost and time it takes Etsy sellers to ship goods to Etsy buyers. As of December 31, 2014, 21.4% of active sellers in the United States and Canada purchased shipping labels through our platform in 2014.
Use of Seller Services in 2014
Mobile. We developed our Sell on Etsy mobile app to help Etsy sellers operate their shops and manage orders. Etsy sellers can also access communication and shop management tools and help resources through the Sell on Etsy mobile app. From its launch in April 2014 through December 31, 2014, 21.9% of active sellers used our Sell on Etsy app.
Seller Dashboard. Etsy sellers can analyze visits to their shop and listings, estimate the effectiveness of their spending on Promoted Listings, monitor orders and track sales using our online seller dashboard. Etsy sellers can access the dashboard on our website or on our Sell on Etsy mobile app.
Education. We provide extensive educational resources to teach Etsy sellers how to build and grow their businesses on our platform through blog posts, video tutorials, the Etsy Seller Handbook (available on our website), access to our online forums, and insights from our support teams. In addition to our own educational resources, Etsy sellers connect through Etsy Teams to build personal relationships, collaborate, and educate and support each other.
The Etsy Buyer Experience
To help Etsy buyers discover and purchase items that they love, we provide a number of tools, including:
Communication. We believe human connection is central to Etsy buyers engagement. Etsy buyers and Etsy sellers use the Conversations tool on our platform to communicate, person to person, about their orders, to request custom goods or personalization of goods or simply to have a conversation about the product or the process. In 2014, our members sent 216 million messages on our platform.
Search and discovery. Our platform is engineered to provide a personalized experience to each Etsy buyer that adjusts in real time based on her interactions with our marketplace. An Etsy buyer may search for an item using our search tool bar and filter the results by color, price, location or other characteristics. She may browse through items, creating an activity feed by favoriting items that catch
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her eye and by following shops and tastemakers. In 2014, our members tagged 775 million favorites on our platform. We glean insights from Etsy buyers interactions through our machine-learning algorithms and through traditional information retrieval techniques, such as cookies. We use these insights to personalize the activity feed an Etsy buyer sees when she comes to Etsy, with suggestions of shops or tastemakers to follow and items to buy or favorite. We use the data we collect and the insights we gain to match Etsy sellers goods with Etsy buyers tastes and interests. Our community is large and engaged, with more than 4.3 billion search page views in 2013.
Discovering Unique Goods
Mobile. We strive to keep Etsy buyers engaged wherever they are, by providing the functionality of our website in iOS and Android mobile apps, specifically crafted for Etsy buyers. Our mobile apps for Etsy buyers include search and discovery, curation, personalization and social shopping features similar to those that Etsy buyers enjoy on our desktop site. Our mobile apps have been downloaded 21.8 million times as of December 31, 2014.
Our Policies
Our members rely on us to maintain a marketplace that meets their expectations for authenticity. Our policies are designed to give the Etsy buyer the comfort that she is purchasing unique goods from a small business that adheres to certain principles.
Most fundamentally, we require that goods listed in our marketplace be handmade, vintage or craft supplies. Handmade items begin with the imagination and creativity of the Etsy seller. To conform to our vision of handmade, we ask that the Etsy seller follow these three principles:
Authorship: The Etsy seller should have a meaningful design and creative role in the items she is selling.
Responsibility: The Etsy seller should know how her goods are made and by whom.
Transparency: The Etsy seller should be open and honest about how her goods are made and by whom.
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Etsy buyers enjoy a high degree of insight into Etsy sellers business practices. Our policies encourage Etsy sellers to be transparent about themselves, their businesses and the goods they sell. We enforce our policies through the following:
Integrity team. The job of our Integrity team is to remove items that do not belong in our marketplace. We use a combination of machine learning, automated systems and community-generated queries and flags to review items and shops that may be in violation of our policies.
Trust and Safety team. Our Trust and Safety team uses human review and sophisticated automated tools and algorithms to detect fraud. We cancel transactions if fraud is detected, and we strive to prohibit bad actors from using our platform.
Responsible Seller Growth team. Our Responsible Seller Growth team reviews the application of every Etsy seller who applies to work with an outside manufacturer. We do not review or approve the manufacturer; instead, we look to the Etsy seller to provide evidence of authorship, responsibility and transparency.
Our Case System. Etsy sellers and Etsy buyers communicate via our Case System in instances when items do not arrive or are not as expected. Disputes are often resolved without our involvement. When necessary, we intervene, and when appropriate, we may suspend or terminate the accounts of members who do not adhere to our policies.
Our Unique Engineering Culture and Approach
Etsy engineering is widely known for its thought-leading approaches to software development as well as its unique engineering culture. Our engineering team coined the phrase Code as Craft to describe our love for building software and our melding of engineering discipline and individual craftsmanship. We believe our engineers have the skills, practices and experience needed to embrace the change the future inevitably brings. As of December 31, 2014, our engineering team consisted of 241 employees.
Code as Craft
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Our engineering culture is built on three principles:
A mindful and humane approach. We trust humans and we build for humans. We believe that judgment, mindfulness and intelligence can be found and developed in the people doing the work, and our environment provides continuous opportunities to develop those traits. An organization of engaged, empowered, mindful engineers can adapt to inevitable and unpredictable change.
A spirit of generosity. Our engineers believe that we are part of a larger community of practice and a larger world, and part of each engineers job is improving our team, our company, our industry and the world. Every engineer is expected to contribute to open source software projects and to write or speak publicly. We believe this increases job satisfaction and retention, gives us outsized influence in our industry and eases onboarding as prospective employees can learn about our culture before joining us.
Adaptability and learning. We learn through honest, blameless reflection on lessons and surprises. We believe that traditional root-cause analysis makes learning from mistakes difficult. Our blameless post-mortem process is a widely-cited technique that we believe is becoming best practice among organizations that value innovation. Blameless post-mortems drive a significant percentage of our development as we analyze what about our production environment was less then optimal and rapidly make corresponding adjustments.
Our Work Culture
We pride ourselves on our values-based culture. We emphasize respect, direct communication and fun. We focus on maximizing our employees professional and personal well-being. We evaluate performance not just on traditional business metrics, but also on societal and environmental goals and on adherence to our mission and values.
We believe employee happiness comes from engaging and fulfilling work and from ample personal and professional growth opportunities. We invest heavily in employee development by offering coaching, skills workshops and training. We actively encourage personal education through arts and crafts workshops and employee-taught classes called Etsy School, covering subjects ranging from screen printing to Python programming.
As of December 31, 2014, we had 685 employees worldwide, with 430 in our offices in Brooklyn, New York. Of those employees, we had 153 in member operations, 332 in product and engineering, 89 in marketing and 111 in corporate. Our product development expenses were $18.7 million, $27.5 million and $36.6 million in the years ended December 31, 2012, 2013 and 2014, respectively.
We proactively work and recruit to improve the gender balance at all levels of our company. As of December 31, 2014, 51% of employees identified as female. As of December 31, 2014, women comprised 46% of managers and 28% of product, engineering and technical operations employees.
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Etsy.org
In January 2015, we formed Etsy.org, a Delaware non-profit organization, to focus on building innovative educational programs that reimagine how and to whom business is taught. In particular, Etsy.org will focus on educating women and other under-represented entrepreneurial populations and empowering them to build businesses that regenerate communities and the planet. In January 2015, we issued 376,471 shares of our common stock to Etsy.org, and we expect to use $300,000 of the proceeds of this offering to partially fund Etsy.org.
Competition
We compete with retailers for the Etsy seller. An Etsy seller can list her goods for sale with online retailers or sell her goods through local consignment and vintage stores and other venues and marketplaces. She may also sell wholesale directly to traditional retailers, including large national retailers, who discover her goods in our marketplace or otherwise. We also compete with companies that sell software and services to small businesses, enabling an Etsy seller to sell from her own website or otherwise run her business independently of our platform. We are able to compete for Etsy sellers based on our brand awareness, the breadth of our online presence, the number and engagement of Etsy buyers, our Seller Services, our fees, the strength of our community and our values.
We also compete with retailers for the attention of the Etsy buyer. An Etsy buyer has the choice of shopping with any online or offline retailer, whether large marketplaces or national retail chains or local consignment and vintage stores or other venues or marketplaces. We are able to compete for Etsy buyers based on the unique goods that Etsy sellers list in our marketplace, awareness of our brand, the person-to-person commerce experience, our reputation for authenticity, our mobile apps, ease of payment and the availability and reliability of our platform.
Intellectual Property
Protection of our technology and intellectual property is an important component of our success. We rely on intellectual property laws, primarily including trade secret, copyright and trademark laws in the United States and abroad, and we use confidentiality procedures, non-disclosure agreements, invention assignment agreements and other contractual rights to protect our intellectual property.
While we have obtained or applied for patent protection for some of our intellectual property, we generally do not rely on patents as a principal means of protecting intellectual property. We register domain names, trademarks and service marks in the United States and abroad. We also rely upon common law protection for certain trademarks.
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Circumstances beyond our control could pose a threat to our intellectual property rights. Effective intellectual property protection may not be available in the United States or other countries in which we operate. In addition, the efforts we have taken to protect our intellectual property rights may not be sufficient or effective. Any impairment of our intellectual property rights could harm our business, our ability to compete and our operating results.
Facilities
Our headquarters are located in Brooklyn, New York where we occupy approximately 104,493 square feet under a lease that expires in 2016. We use these facilities for our principal administration, technology and development and engineering activities. Our European headquarters are located in Dublin, Ireland.
In May 2014, we signed a lease for new corporate headquarters, also located in Brooklyn, which we expect to occupy in 2016. The lease covers two buildings totaling approximately 198,635 square feet and will expire approximately ten years from the later to occur of the two buildings lease commencement dates. We expect that our new space will allow us to grow our local staff, will be LEED-certified and will support our efforts to reduce our environmental footprint.
We also maintain offices in Hudson (New York), San Francisco, Berlin, Dublin, London, Paris, Melbourne and Toronto.
We believe that our current facilities are suitable and adequate to meet our ongoing needs and that, if we require additional space, we will be able to obtain additional facilities.
Government Regulation
As with any company operating on the Internet, we grapple with a growing number of local, national and international laws and regulations. These laws are often complex, sometimes contradict other laws, and are frequently still evolving. Laws may be interpreted and enforced in different ways in various locations around the world, posing a significant challenge to our global business. For example, U.S. federal and state laws, EU directives, and other national laws govern the processing of payments, consumer protection and the privacy of consumer information; other laws define and regulate unfair and deceptive trade practices. Still other laws dictate when and how sales or other taxes must be collected. Laws of defamation apply online and vary by country. The growing regulation of e-commerce worldwide could impose additional compliance burdens and costs on us or on Etsy sellers, and could subject us to significant liability for any failure to comply. Additionally, because we operate internationally, we need to comply with various laws associated with doing business outside of the United States, including anti-money laundering, anti-corruption and export control laws.
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Legal Matters
From time to time, we are involved in legal proceedings and subject to claims that arise in the ordinary course of business. Although the results of legal proceedings and claims cannot be predicted with certainty, we believe we are not currently party to any legal proceedings which, if determined adversely to us, would individually or taken together have a material adverse effect on our business, operating results, cash flows or financial condition. There can be no assurances that we will obtain a favorable outcome. Regardless of the outcome, such proceedings can harm us because of defense and settlement costs, diversion of resources and other factors.
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Management
Executive Officers and Directors
Our executive officers and directors, and their ages and positions as of January 31, 2015, are listed below:
Name Age Position(s) Executive Officers: Chad Dickerson 42 President, Chief Executive Officer and Chairman Kristina Salen 43 Chief Financial Officer Jordan Breslow 59 General Counsel and Secretary Kellan Elliott-McCrea 37 Chief Technology Officer and Chief Architect Non-Employee Directors: James W. Breyer 53 Director M. Michele Burns 57 Director Jonathan D. Klein 54 Director Fred Wilson 53 Lead Independent Director
(1) Member of audit committee
(2) Member of compensation committee
(3) Member of nominating and corporate governance committee
The following is a brief biography of each of our executive officers and directors:
Executive Officers
Chad Dickerson has served as our president and chief executive officer since July 2011, as a member of our board of directors since September 2011, and has served as the chairman of our board of directors since October 2014. He previously served as our chief technology officer from September 2008 until July 2011. Prior to Etsy, Mr. Dickerson was the director of the Advanced Products/Brickhouse team at Yahoo! Inc., a multinational Internet company, from December 2007 to August 2008, was the head of the Yahoo! Developer Network from June 2006 to December 2007 and was the director of platform evangelism from August 2005 to May 2006. Prior to Yahoo!, Mr. Dickerson served as chief technology officer at InfoWorld Media Group, Inc., an information technology online media business, from April 2001 to August 2005. Mr. Dickerson worked on early web-based newspapers, including Salon.com from July 1998 to March 2001. Mr. Dickerson holds a B.A. in English literature from Duke University. Mr. Dickerson should serve as a member of our board of directors because he is our chief executive officer and because he has extensive experience in media and technology companies.
Kristina Salen has served as our chief financial officer since January 2013. Prior to Etsy, Ms. Salen led the media, Internet, and telecommunications research group of FMR LLC d/b/a Fidelity Investments, a multinational financial services company, from January 2006 to January 2013. Prior to Fidelity, Ms. Salen worked in various financial and executive roles at several companies, including Oppenheimer Capital LLC,
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an investment firm, from June 2002 to December 2005; Merrill Lynch & Co., Inc., a financial services corporation acquired by Bank of America Corporation in January 2009, from June 1997 to June 2001; Lazard Frere & Co. LLC, a global financial advisory and asset management firm, from April 1996 to June 1997; and SBC Warburg, an investment bank, from December 1994 to April 1996. Ms. Salen has served as a member of the board of directors of Cornerstone OnDemand, Inc., a cloud-based talent management software solution company, since July 2014. Ms. Salen holds a B.A. in Political Science from Vassar College and an M.B.A. in finance from Columbia University.
Jordan Breslow has served as our general counsel since November 2013 and as secretary since September 2014. Prior to Etsy, Mr. Breslow served as general counsel of New Island Capital Management, Inc., an impact investment advisor, from April 2011 to November 2013; as general counsel of Silver Spring Networks, Inc., a provider of smart grid networks, from May 2008 to September 2010; and as general counsel of Opsware, Inc. (formerly called Loudcloud), a provider of data center software, from February 2000 to September 2007. Prior to that, Mr. Breslow was an associate and a partner at several law firms. Mr. Breslow has also served as a Adjunct Professor at the New York University School of Law since February 2015. Mr. Breslow has also lectured at University of California-Berkeley Law School and San Francisco State University. Mr. Breslow holds a B.A. in Anthropology from San Francisco State University and a J.D. from University of California, Hastings College of the Law.
Kellan Elliott-McCrea has served as our chief technology officer and chief architect since July 2011, and previously served as our vice president of engineering from July 2010 to July 2011. Prior to Etsy, Mr. Elliott-McCrea worked as Flickrs architect at Yahoo! from May 2006 to June 2010. Prior to Yahoo!, Mr. Elliott-McCrea served as an engineer at several start-ups. Mr. Elliott-McCrea founded his first Internet startup, Metaevents, Inc., a developer of an online calendar publishing tool, in 1997, which was acquired in 2000 by AnyDay.com, Inc., an online free calendar and scheduling service, shortly before AnyDay.com, Inc. was acquired by Palm, Inc., a mobile product manufacturer, where he served as a principal engineer. Mr. Elliott-McCrea is the author of several well-known open source libraries, including MagpieRSS which is a key component of a large number of open source applications. He is also a co-author of the IETF security standard: OAuth.
Non-Employee Directors
James W. Breyer has served as a member of our board of directors since January 2008. Mr. Breyer has been a partner of Accel Partners, a venture capital firm, since 1987. Mr. Breyer is also the founder and has been the chief executive officer of Breyer Capital, an investment firm, since July 2006. Mr. Breyer has served on the board of directors of Twenty-First Century Fox, Inc., a media company, since June 2013, and also serves on the boards of directors of several privately-held companies. Mr. Breyer has served as a fellow of the Harvard Corporation, a Harvard University Governing Board, since 2013. Previously, Mr. Breyer served as a member of the boards of directors of Brightcove, Inc., an online video and publishing platform, from 2005 to 2013; News Corporation, a mass media company, from 2011 to 2013; Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., a multinational retail company, from 2001 to 2013, Facebook, Inc., a worldwide social network, from 2005 to 2013; Dell Inc., a worldwide merchant of technology products and services, from 2009 to 2013; Model N, Inc., a provider of
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revenue management solutions, from 2000 to 2013; Prosper Marketplace, Inc., a peer-to-peer online credit platform operator from 2005 to 2012; and Marvel Entertainment, Inc., a character-based entertainment company, from 2006 to 2009. Mr. Breyer holds a B.S. in interdisciplinary studies from Stanford University and an M.B.A. from Harvard University. Mr. Breyer should serve as a member of our board of directors due to his extensive experience with retail, media and technology companies, as a venture capitalist and as one of our early investors.
M. Michele Burns has served as a member of our board of directors since March 2014. Ms. Burns has served as the Center Fellow and Strategic Advisor to the Stanford Center on Longevity at Stanford University since August 2012. Ms. Burns served as the chief executive officer of the Retirement Policy Center sponsored by Marsh & McLennan Companies, Inc., an insurance brokerage and consulting firm, from October 2011 to February 2014; as chairman and chief executive officer of Mercer LLC (a subsidiary of Marsh & McLennan Companies, Inc.), a human resources consulting firm, from September 2006 to October 2011; as chief financial officer of Marsh & McLennan Companies, Inc. from March 2006 to September 2006; and as chief financial officer and chief restructuring officer of Mirant Corporation, an energy company, from May 2004 to January 2006. Ms. Burns joined Delta Airlines in January 1999 and served as chief financial officer from August 2000 until April 2004. She began her career at Arthur Andersen in 1981, serving ultimately as the Senior Partner, Southern Region Federal Tax Practice until December 1998. Ms. Burns has served as a member of the boards of directors of Cisco Systems, Inc., a multinational company that designs, manufactures and sells networking equipment, since November 2003; Goldman Sachs Group, Inc., an investment banking firm and affiliate of one of the underwriters of this offering, since October 2011; and Alexion Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a pharmaceutical company, since July 2014. She also serves on the boards of directors of, or as an advisor to, several private companies. She previously served as a member of the board of directors of Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., a multinational retail company, from June 2003 to June 2013. She is a member of the executive board of directors of the Elton John AIDS Foundation, where she also serves as Treasurer. Ms. Burns holds a B.A. in Business Administration from the University of Georgia and a Master of Accountancy from the University of Georgia. Ms. Burns should serve as a member of our board of directors due to her expertise in corporate finance, accounting and strategy, including experience gained as the chief financial officer of public companies. She also brings expertise in global and operational management, including a background in organizational leadership and human resources.
Jonathan D. Klein has served as a member of our board of directors since June 2011. Mr. Klein is co-founder and chief executive officer of Getty Images, Inc., a global digital media company and the premier creator and distributor of still imagery and video worldwide. Mr. Klein has also served as a member of the board of directors of Getty Images, Inc. (and its predecessor company Getty Communications) since March 1995. Mr. Klein has served as a member of the board of directors of Squarespace, Inc., a provider of web publishing products and services, since July 2010 and served as a member of the board of directors of Real Networks, Inc., a provider of Internet streaming media delivery software and services, from January 2003 to November 2011. Mr. Klein also serves as a member of the boards of directors of numerous non-profit organizations, including the Committee to Protect Journalists, the Groton School, where he serves as president, and Friends
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of the Global Fight Against HIV, Tuberculosis and Malaria, where he serves as chairman. Mr. Klein holds an M.A. in law from the University of Cambridge. Mr. Klein should serve as a member of our board of directors due to his extensive experience with communications and media companies.
Fred Wilson has served as a member of our board of directors since June 2007 and has served as our lead independent director since October 2014. Mr. Wilson was a founder and has served as a managing partner of Union Square Ventures, a venture capital firm, since June 2003. Mr. Wilson also serves on the boards of directors of various private companies in connection with his role at Union Square Ventures. Mr. Wilson holds an S.B. in Mechanical Engineering from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and an M.B.A. from The Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. Mr. Wilson should serve as a member of our board of directors due to his extensive experience with social media and technology companies, as a venture capitalist, and as one of our early investors.
Our directors hold office until their successors have been elected and qualified or appointed, or the earlier of their death, resignation or removal. There are no family relationships among any of our directors or executive officers.
Director Independence
We intend to apply to have our common stock listed on the Nasdaq Global Select Market. The listing rules of this stock exchange generally require that a majority of the members of a listed companys board of directors be independent within 12 months following the closing of an initial public offering. Our board of directors has determined that none of our non-employee directors has a relationship that would interfere with the exercise of independent judgment in carrying out the responsibilities of a director and that each of these directors is independent as that term is defined under the rules of Nasdaq. The independent members of our board of directors will hold separate regularly scheduled executive session meetings at which only independent directors are present.
Audit committee members must also satisfy the independence rules in SEC Rule 10A-3 adopted under the Exchange Act. In order to be considered independent for purposes of Rule 10A-3, a member of an audit committee of a public company may not, other than in his or her capacity as a member of the audit committee, the board of directors or any other board committee, accept, directly or indirectly, any consulting, advisory or other compensatory fee from the listed company or any of its subsidiaries or be an affiliated person of the listed company or any of its subsidiaries. Each of qualify as an independent director pursuant to Rule 10A-3.
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Board Composition
Immediately after this offering, our board of directors will be divided into three classes with staggered three-year terms. At each annual meeting of stockholders, the successors to directors whose terms then expire will be elected to serve until the third annual meeting following election. Our directors will be divided among the three classes as follows:
the Class I directors will be , and their terms will expire at our annual meeting of stockholders to be held in 2016;
the Class II directors will be , and their terms will expire at our annual meeting of stockholders to be held in 2017; and
the Class III directors will be , and their terms will expire at our annual meeting of stockholders to be held in 2018.
Directors in a particular class will be elected for three-year terms at our annual meeting of stockholders in the year in which their terms expire. As a result, only one class of directors will be elected at each annual meeting of stockholders, with the other classes continuing for the remainder of their respective three-year terms. Each directors term continues until the election and qualification of his or her successor, or the earlier of his or her death, resignation or removal.
Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation and amended and restated bylaws that will be in effect after this offering provide that only our board of directors can fill vacant directorships, including newly created seats. Any additional directorships resulting from an increase in the authorized number of directors would be distributed among the three classes so that, as nearly as possible, each class would consist of one-third of the authorized number of directors.
The classification of our board of directors may have the effect of delaying or preventing changes in our control or management. See Description of Capital StockAnti-Takeover ProvisionsCertificate of Incorporation and Bylaw Provisions.
Board Oversight of Risk
One of the key functions of our board of directors is informed oversight of our risk management process. In particular, our board of directors is responsible for monitoring and assessing strategic risk exposure, and our executive officers are responsible for the day-to-day management of the material risks we face. Our board of directors administers its oversight function directly as a whole and through its standing committees. For example, our audit committee is responsible for overseeing the management of risks associated with financial reporting, accounting and auditing matters; our compensation committee oversees the management of risks associated with executive compensation policies and programs; and our nominating
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and corporate governance committee oversees the management of risks associated with director independence, conflicts of interest, composition and organization of our board of directors and director succession planning.
Board Committees
Our board of directors has established an audit committee, a compensation committee and a nominating and corporate governance committee, to be effective after this offering. Our board of directors may establish other committees to facilitate the management of our business. Our board of directors and its committees meet throughout the year and may also hold special meetings and act by written consent from time to time, as appropriate. Our board of directors has delegated various responsibilities and authority to its committees as generally described below. The committees will regularly report on their activities and actions to our full board of directors. Each member of each committee of our board of directors qualifies as an independent director in accordance with listing standards. Each committee of our board of directors has a written charter approved by our board of directors, which will be posted on the Investor Relations section of our website at www.etsy.com after this offering. The inclusion of our website address in this prospectus does not include or incorporate by reference the information on our website into this prospectus. Members serve on these committees until their resignation or until otherwise determined by our board of directors.
Audit Committee
The members of our audit committee will be after this offering, each of whom can read and understand fundamental financial statements. are each independent under the rules and regulations of the SEC and the listing standards of Nasdaq applicable to audit committee members. will chair the audit committee. Our board of directors has determined that qualifies as an audit committee financial expert within the meaning of SEC regulations and meets the financial sophistication requirements of Nasdaq.
Our audit committee assists our board of directors oversight of the following: the integrity of our financial statements, our compliance with legal and regulatory requirements, the qualifications, independence and performance of our independent registered public accounting firm, the design and implementation of our internal audit function and risk assessment and risk management. Among other things, our audit committee is responsible for reviewing and discussing with our management the adequacy and effectiveness of our disclosure controls and procedures. The audit committee also discusses with our management and independent registered public accounting firm the annual audit plan and scope of audit activities, scope and timing of the annual audit of our financial statements and the results of the audit, quarterly reviews of our financial statements and, as appropriate, initiates inquiries into other aspects of our financial affairs. Our audit committee is responsible for establishing and overseeing procedures for the receipt, retention and treatment of any complaints reporting accounting, internal accounting controls or auditing matters, as well as for the confidential and anonymous submissions by our employees concerning questionable accounting or auditing matters. In addition, our audit committee has direct responsibility for
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the appointment, compensation, retention and oversight of the work of our independent registered public accounting firm. Our audit committee has sole authority to approve the hiring and discharging of our independent registered public accounting firm, all audit engagement fees and terms and all permissible non-audit engagements with our independent registered public accounting firm. Our audit committee will review and oversee all related person transactions in accordance with our policies and procedures.
Compensation Committee
The members of our compensation committee will be after this offering. will chair the compensation committee. Each member of our compensation committee is independent under the rules and regulations of the SEC and the listing standards of Nasdaq applicable to compensation committee members. Our compensation committee assists our board of directors with its oversight of the forms and amount of compensation for our executive officers, and the administration of our incentive plans for employees and other service providers, including our equity incentive plans, and certain other matters related to our compensation programs.
Nominating and Corporate Governance Committee
The members of our nominating and corporate governance committee will be after this offering. will chair the nominating and corporate governance committee. Our nominating and corporate governance committee assists our board of directors with its oversight of and identification of individuals qualified to become members of our board of directors, consistent with criteria approved by our board of directors, and selects, or recommends that our board of directors select, director nominees; develops and recommends to our board of directors a set of corporate governance guidelines; and oversees the evaluation of our board of directors.
Code of Conduct
Our board of directors has adopted a code of conduct that will be effective after this offering and will apply to all of our employees, officers and directors. We also expect our contractors, consultants, suppliers and agents to follow our code of conduct in connection with their work for us. Our code of conduct represents the standards by which we operate and reflects our values of being a mindful, transparent and humane business. The purpose of our code of conduct is to promote: honesty and integrity, including with respect to actual or apparent conflicts of interest; full, fair, accurate, timely and understandable disclosure in periodic reports to be filed by us; and compliance with all applicable rules and regulations. The code of conduct will be posted on the Investor Relations section of our website at www.etsy.com after this offering. We intend to disclose future amendments to, or waivers of, our code of conduct at the same location on our website. Information contained on our website is not incorporated by reference into this prospectus, and you should not consider information contained on our website to be part of this prospectus or in deciding whether to invest in our common stock.
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Compensation Committee Interlocks and Insider Participation
As noted above, the compensation committee of our board of directors will consist of . During our fiscal year ended December 31, 2014, our compensation committee consisted of Jonathan D. Klein and Fred Wilson. None of our executive officers serves, or served during our fiscal year ended December 31, 2014, as a member of the board of directors or compensation committee of any other entity that has or has had one or more executive officers serving as a member of our board of directors or our compensation committee.
2014 Director Compensation
Prior to this offering, we did not have a formal compensation program for non-employee directors. We have granted stock option awards on an ad hoc basis to members of our board of directors who are not otherwise affiliated with us. In April 2014 we granted an option to purchase 253,294 shares of our common stock to M. Michele Burns in connection with her election to our board of directors. The option vests 25% when Ms. Burns completes 12 months of continuous service with us and then in equal monthly installments over the following 36 months of her service with us. We reimburse directors for their reasonable out-of-pocket expenses incurred in attending board of directors and committee meetings.
For services rendered during the year ended December 31, 2014, our non-employee directors received the following compensation:
Name Option
Awards
($)(1) Total
($) Fred Wilson James W. Breyer M. Michele Burns 629,537 (2) 629,537 Caterina Fake(3) Jonathan D. Klein Daniel Rimer(4)
(1) As of December 31, 2014, Mr. Klein held options to purchase 478,261 shares of Etsy common stock, Ms. Burns held options to purchase 253,294 shares of Etsy common stock and no other non-employee member of our board of directors held Etsy options or stock awards.
(2) The value disclosed is the aggregate grant date fair value of options to purchase 253,294 shares granted to Ms. Burns in 2014 computed in accordance with FASB ASC Topic 718. See Note 9 of the accompanying notes to the consolidated financial statements included elsewhere in this prospectus for a discussion of the assumptions made by us in determining the grant date fair value of our equity awards.
(3) Ms. Fake resigned from our board of directors in July 2014.
(4) Mr. Rimer resigned from our board of directors in March 2015.
In March 2015, we adopted a new non-employee director compensation program that will be effective upon the completion of this offering. Under this program, each new, non-employee director who joins our board of directors will be granted equity compensation (in the form of stock options or restricted stock units) upon the effective date of his or her election to our board of directors with a fair value (calculated in accordance with FASB
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ASC Topic 718) at the time of grant equal to $350,000. Equity awards for new directors will vest in equal annual installments on the first three anniversaries of the grant date if the director has served continuously as a member of our board of directors through the applicable vesting date. In addition, equity awards for new directors will vest in full in the event that we are subject to a change in control or upon certain other events.
Beginning in 2016 on the date of our annual meeting of stockholders, each non-employee director will receive an annual board retainer equity award with a fair value (calculated in accordance with FASB ASC Topic 718) at the time of grant equal to $175,000. At the election of the director, up to 50% of the annual retainer may be paid in cash. Equity awarded as an annual retainer will vest in full on the date of our next annual meeting of stockholders if the director has served continuously as a member of our board of directors through the date of that meeting. In addition, annual retainer equity awards will vest in full in the event that we are subject to a change in control or upon certain other events. A director will not be eligible to receive an annual retainer in the same calendar year in which he or she receives an initial new director equity grant.
In addition to the annual and new director fees described above, non-employee directors will receive the following payments in cash, payable annually:
Role Annual Cash Payments
($) Lead Independent Director 15,000 Audit Committee Chairperson 18,000 Audit Committee Member 9,000 Compensation Committee Chairperson 10,000 Compensation Committee Member 5,000 Nominating and Corporate Governance Committee Chairperson 6,000 Nominating and Corporate Governance Committee Member 3,000
Mr. Breyer and Mr. Wilson have waived their compensation as directors.
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Executive Compensation
Summary Compensation Table
The following table provides information concerning the compensation of our chief executive officer and our two other most highly compensated executive officers, or our named executive officers.
Name and Principal Position Year Salary
($) Bonus
($) Option
Awards
($)(1) Non-equity
Incentive Plan
Compensation
($) All Other
Compensation
($) Total
($) Chad Dickerson 2014 300,000 247,500 547,500 President, Chief Executive Officer and Chairman 2013 300,000 300,000 Kristina Salen 2014 297,917 211,750 70,316 (2) 579,983 Chief Financial Officer 2013 251,202 175,000 1,715,430 192,333 2,333,965 Jordan Breslow 2014 275,000 166,375 441,375 General Counsel and Secretary 2013 38,616 75,000 1,010,468 25,000 1,149,074
(1) The amounts in this column represent the aggregate grant date fair value of stock option awards granted to the officer in the applicable fiscal year computed in accordance with FASB ASC Topic 718 and do not reflect cash compensation actually received by the named executive officer. See Note 9 of the accompanying notes to the consolidated financial statements included elsewhere in this prospectus for a discussion of the assumptions made by us in determining the grant date fair value of our equity awards.
(2) Represents a payment of $43,234 in connection with Ms. Salens relocation to the New York metropolitan area, plus a tax gross-up of $27,082 on the value of the relocation benefits.
Narrative Explanation of Compensation Arrangements with Our Named Executive Officers
In 2014, the compensation of our named executive officers consisted primarily of base salary, annual cash incentive bonuses and long-term equity incentive compensation, in the form of stock options.
Base Salaries
For the year ended December 31, 2014, the annual base salaries for our named executive officers were as follows: Mr. Dickerson$300,000; Ms. Salen$300,000; and Mr. Breslow$275,000. Historically, the base salaries of our executive officers have been reviewed on an ad hoc basis and adjusted only when our board of directors or compensation committee determines an adjustment is appropriate. In February 2014, Ms. Salens salary was increased from her initial base salary of $275,000 to $300,000 in light of her performance in 2013 and her responsibilities.
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Annual Cash Incentive Bonuses
Prior to 2014, we did not have a regular annual cash incentive bonus program for our executive officers. In 2014, our compensation committee approved an annual cash incentive plan in which certain of our employees, including our named executive officers, participated. The bonus plan was funded based upon the satisfaction of company-wide Adjusted EBITDA margin and net revenue goals. Because we exceeded our Adjusted EBITDA margin goal, the bonus plan was funded above target. The target bonuses for our named executive officers for 2014, as a percentage of base salary, were 75% for Mr. Dickerson, 59% for Ms. Salen and 50% for Mr. Breslow, and the actual bonus payouts were 110% of target for Mr. Dickerson and 121% of target for Ms. Salen and Mr. Breslow. The individual bonus payments were approved by our compensation committee and our board of directors with input from Mr. Dickerson for the other named executive officers.
Long-Term Equity Incentive Compensation
We grant stock options to our employees, including our named executive officers, as the long-term equity incentive component of our compensation program. Stock options allow employees to purchase shares of our common stock at a price no less than the fair market value of our common stock on the date of grant and are generally granted to employees in connection with their commencement of employment. Our board of directors or compensation committee from time to time also grants stock options to certain employees who have had a long tenure at Etsy, who have taken on significant new responsibilities or as a reward for superior performance. Employee stock options generally vest 25% when an employee completes 12 months of service with us and then in equal monthly installments over the following 36 months of service with us. None of our named executive officers received stock options in 2014.
In January 2015, we granted an option to purchase 600,000 shares of our common stock to Mr. Dickerson and an option to purchase 290,000 shares of our common stock to Ms. Salen. The options vest 25% upon Mr. Dickersons or Ms. Salens 12 months of continuous service from January 30, 2015 and then in equal monthly installments over his or her following 36 months of service with us.
For information regarding the vesting acceleration provisions applicable to the options held by our named executive officers, see Change in Control Benefits below.
Employee Benefits and Perquisites
Our named executive officers are eligible to participate in our health and welfare plans to the same extent as other full-time employees generally. We generally do not provide our named executive officers with perquisites or other personal benefits. From time to time, however, we provide relocation benefits to new executive officers.
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Outstanding Equity Awards at 2014 Fiscal Year-End
The following table sets forth information regarding unexercised stock options held by each of our named executive officers as of December 31, 2014.
Stock Option Awards Name Number of Securities
Underlying Unexercised
Options Exercisable(#) Number of Securities
Underlying Unexercised
Options Unexercisable(#) Option
Exercise
Price ($) Option
Expiration
Date Chad Dickerson 600,000 350,000 (1) 1.15 7/28/2021 1,713,876 1,521,702 (2) 2.38 7/16/2022 Kristina Salen 697,515 824,336 (3) 2.38 2/3/2023 Jordan Breslow 192,345 517,852 (4) 3.11 12/10/2023
(1) This stock option vested 25% on July 19, 2012, with the remainder vesting in 36 equal monthly installments thereafter if Mr. Dickerson remains continuously employed with us on each vesting date.
(2) This stock option vested 25% on June 11, 2013, with the remainder vesting in 36 equal monthly installments thereafter if Mr. Dickerson remains continuously employed with us on each vesting date.
(3) This stock option vested 25% on February 3, 2014, with the remainder vesting in 36 equal monthly installments thereafter if Ms. Salen remains continuously employed with us on each vesting date.
(4) This stock option vested 25% on November 11, 2014, with the remainder vesting in 36 equal monthly installments thereafter if Mr. Breslow remains continuously employed with us on each vesting date.
For information regarding the vesting acceleration provisions applicable to the options held by our named executive officers, see Change in Control Benefits below.
Employment Agreements
A summary of the material terms of the employment letter agreements with our named executive officers and other arrangements providing benefits in connection with such officers termination of employment or in connection with a change in control is below.
Chad Dickerson
In August 2011, we entered into an employment letter agreement with Mr. Dickerson in connection with his promotion to chief executive officer. Under this agreement, Mr. Dickersons annual salary was set at $300,000 per year and he received an option to purchase 2,400,000 shares of our common stock, as described in more detail above under Outstanding Equity Awards at 2014 Fiscal Year-End. In addition, for information regarding the vesting acceleration provisions applicable to Mr. Dickersons stock options, see Change in Control Benefits below.
If Mr. Dickersons employment is terminated in an involuntary termination, he will be entitled to the severance benefits described below under Severance Benefits or Change in Control Benefits.
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Kristina Salen
In January 2013, we entered into an employment letter agreement with Ms. Salen in connection with her appointment as our chief financial officer. Under this agreement, Ms. Salens annual salary was set at $275,000 and she is eligible to receive a cash incentive bonus for each fiscal year starting in 2014 if the relevant performance measures are satisfied. Ms. Salen also received a signing bonus of $175,000 and was entitled to relocation benefits to assist with her move to the New York metropolitan area.
Pursuant to subsequent letter agreements we entered into with Ms. Salen, she received a temporary living stipend, an additional relocation payment and a gross-up for taxes incurred in connection with her temporary housing and transportation reimbursements in connection with her relocation.
In addition, pursuant to Ms. Salens employment letter agreement, she received an option to purchase 1,521,851 shares of our common stock in 2013, as described in more detail above under Outstanding Equity Awards at 2014 Fiscal Year-End. In addition, for information regarding the vesting acceleration provisions applicable to Ms. Salens stock options, see Change in Control Benefits below.
If Ms. Salens employment is involuntarily terminated, she will be entitled to the severance benefits described below under Severance Benefits or Change in Control Benefits.
Jordan Breslow
In October 2013, we entered into an employment letter agreement with Mr. Breslow in connection with his appointment as our general counsel. Under this agreement, Mr. Breslows annual salary was set at $275,000 and he is eligible to receive a cash incentive bonus for each fiscal year starting in 2014 if the relevant performance measures are satisfied. Mr. Breslow also received a signing bonus of $75,000 and was entitled to relocation benefits of up to $25,000 to assist with his move to the New York metropolitan area.
In addition, pursuant to Mr. Breslows employment letter agreement, he received an option to purchase 710,197 shares of our common stock in 2013, as described in more detail above under Outstanding Equity Awards at 2014 Fiscal-Year End. In addition, for information regarding the vesting acceleration provisions applicable to Mr. Breslows stock options, see Change in Control Benefits below.
If Mr. Breslows employment is involuntarily terminated, he will be entitled to the severance benefits described below under Severance Benefits or Change in Control Benefits.
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Severance and Change in Control Benefits
Prior to the completion of this offering, only Mr. Dickerson was provided severance benefits. In connection with this offering, our board adopted the severance plan and change in control severance plan described below.
Severance Benefits
Severance Plan
In 2015, our board of directors adopted a severance plan for key employees, including our named executive officers, effective upon the completion of this offering. Under the severance plan, if we terminate a named executive officers employment without cause or if a named executive officer terminates employment for good reason other than in the 3 months before or 12 months after a change in control, then, if the named executive officer signs a release of claims, he or she will be entitled to receive continued salary payments for 12 months, in the case of Mr. Dickerson, and 6 months, in the case of Ms. Salen and Mr. Breslow. The named executive officer will also be entitled to receive reimbursement for healthcare continuation coverage for the lesser of the number of months in the severance period or until healthcare continuation coverage ends or the named executive officer becomes eligible for substantially equivalent coverage. This severance plan supersedes Mr. Dickersons prior severance benefits.
Chad Dickerson
Prior to the completion of this offering, Mr. Dickerson was provided severance benefits pursuant to his employment letter agreement. Under this agreement, if we terminated Mr. Dickersons employment without cause or if he resigned for good reason, we would continue to pay his base salary for a period of six months. The salary continuation would be subject to Mr. Dickersons resignation from our board of directors and the boards of directors of any of our subsidiaries and execution of a release of claims.
Change in Control Benefits
Change in Control Severance Plan
In 2015, our board of directors also adopted a change in control severance plan for key employees, including our named executive officers, effective upon the completion of this offering. Under this change in control severance plan, if we terminate a named executive officers employment without cause or if a named executive officer terminates employment for good reason in the 3 months before or 12 months after a change in control, then, if the named executive officer signs a release of claims, he or she will be entitled to receive continued salary payments for 24 months, in the case of Mr. Dickerson, and 12 months, in the case of Ms. Salen and Mr. Breslow. The named executive officer will also be entitled to receive reimbursement for healthcare continuation coverage for the lesser of the number of months in the severance period or until healthcare continuation coverage ends or the executive becomes eligible for substantially equivalent
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coverage. Finally, the named executive officer will be entitled to full vesting of any outstanding equity awards then held by the named executive officer. This change in control severance plan supersedes Mr. Dickersons prior change in control severance benefits.
Chad Dickerson
Prior to the completion of this offering, only Mr. Dickerson was provided severance benefits in connection with a change in control. Pursuant to Mr. Dickersons stock option agreements, in the event that we experienced a change in control and, within 12 months following such change in control, Mr. Dickerson was terminated involuntarily, his stock options would fully vest.
Equity Plans
2015 Equity Incentive Plan
Our board of directors adopted the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan in , and our stockholders approved it in . The 2015 Plan became effective immediately on adoption although no awards will be made under it until the effective date of the registration statement of which this prospectus is a part. Our 2015 Stock Equity Incentive will replace our 2006 Stock Plan described below, and no further grants will be made under our 2006 Stock Plan following completion of this offering. However, awards outstanding under the 2006 Stock Plan will continue to be governed by their existing terms.
Share Reserve. The number of shares of our common stock available for issuance under our 2015 Equity Incentive Plan will equal the sum of (a) shares , (b) the number of shares of our common stock remaining available for issuance under our 2006 Stock Plan as of the effective date of the registration statement of which this prospectus is a part, and (c) the number of shares of our common stock subject to awards under our 2006 Stock Plan that subsequently expire or lapse unexercised and shares issued pursuant to such awards that are forfeited or repurchased by us (such combined number not to exceed shares). The number of shares reserved for issuance under the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan will be increased automatically on the first business day of each of our fiscal years during the term of the plan, commencing in 2016, by a number equal to the smallest of:
shares;
% of the number of shares of common stock outstanding on December 31 of the prior year; and
the number of shares determined by our board of directors.
In general, to the extent that any awards under the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan are forfeited, terminate, expire or lapse without the issuance of shares, or if we repurchase the shares subject to awards granted under the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan, those shares will again become available for issuance under the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan, as will shares applied to pay the exercise or purchase price of an award or to satisfy tax withholding obligations related to any award. All share numbers described in this summary of the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan will automatically adjust in the event of a stock split, a stock dividend, a reverse stock split or similar occurrence.
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Administration. Our compensation committee administers the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan. The compensation committee has complete discretion to make all decisions relating to the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan and outstanding awards, including repricing outstanding options and modifying outstanding awards.
Eligibility. Employees, non-employee directors and consultants are eligible to participate in our 2015 Equity Incentive Plan.
Types of Award. Our 2015 Equity Incentive Plan provides for the following types of awards:
incentive and nonstatutory stock options;
stock appreciation rights;
restricted share awards;
stock unit awards; and
performance cash awards.
Options and Stock Appreciation Rights. The exercise price for options granted under the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan may not be less than 100% of the fair market value of our common stock on the grant date. Optionees may pay the exercise price in cash or, with the consent of the compensation committee and as set forth in the applicable option grant agreement:
with shares of common stock that the optionee already owns;
by an immediate sale of shares through a broker approved by us;
through a net exercise procedure; or
by other methods permitted by applicable law.
An optionee who exercises a stock appreciation right receives the increase in value of our common stock over the exercise price. The exercise price for stock appreciation rights may not be less than 100% of the fair market value of our common stock on the grant date. The settlement value of a stock appreciation right may be paid in cash, shares of our common stock or a combination of these forms of payment.
Options and stock appreciation rights vest as determined by the compensation committee at the time of grant. In most cases, they will vest over a four-year period following the date of grant. Options and stock appreciation rights expire at the time determined by the compensation committee but in no event more than ten years after they are granted. These awards generally expire earlier if the participants service terminates earlier. No participant may be granted stock options and stock appreciation rights covering more than 2,000,000 shares (or stock options and/or stock appreciation rights covering more than 4,000,000 shares for a new hire) in any fiscal year.
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Restricted Shares and Stock Units. Restricted shares and stock units may be awarded under the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan in return for any lawful consideration, and participants who receive restricted shares or stock units generally are not required to pay cash for their awards. In general, these awards will be subject to vesting. Vesting may be based on length of service, the attainment of performance-based goals or a combination of both, as determined by the compensation committee. No participant may be granted restricted share awards and stock units covering more than 1,500,000 shares (or 3,000,000 restricted shares and/or restricted stock units for a new hire) in any fiscal year. This annual limit is in addition to any stock options and stock appreciation rights the participant may receive during a calendar year. Settlement of vested stock units may be made in the form of cash, shares of common stock or a combination of these forms of payment. The permissible performance goals to qualify as performance-based compensation under Section 162(m) of the Internal Revenue Code are listed under Performance Goals.
Performance Cash Awards. Performance cash awards may be granted under the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan that qualify as performance-based compensation that is not subject to the income tax deductibility limitations imposed by Section 162(m) of the Internal Revenue Code, if the award is approved by our compensation committee and the grant or vesting of the award is tied solely to the attainment of performance goals during a designated performance period. The permissible performance goals to qualify as performance-based compensation under Section 162(m) of the Internal Revenue Code are listed under Performance Goals. No participant may be paid more than $1,500,000 in cash (or $3,000,000 for a new hire) in any fiscal year pursuant to a performance cash award granted under the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan.
Performance Goals. Performance goals for the grant or vesting of awards under the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan may be based on any one of, or combination of, the following: budget performance, buyer acquisition, retention and/or growth, cash flow, cash flow return on investment, comparisons with various stock market indices, costs and expenses (including reduction of both), earnings or earnings per share (including earnings before taxes, earnings before interest and taxes, earnings before interest, taxes and depreciation, or earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, including adjusted measures), employee satisfaction and/or retention, free cash flow or free cash flow per share, gross margin, gross profits, headcount, market share, net income (before or after taxes), operating income or EBIT (Earnings before Interest and Taxes) on a GAAP or non-GAAP basis, operating or EBIT margin, return on assets, investment or capital employed, return on equity or average stockholders equity, revenue (gross or net), GMS, seller acquisition, retention and/or growth, member satisfaction, stockholders equity, stock price return relative to market indices and/or peer group, total stockholder return and working capital.
Any of the above metrics may be measured either in absolute terms, compared to any incremental increase or decrease or compared to results of a peer group, to market performance indicators or to market indices.
To the extent a performance award is not intended to comply with Section 162(m) of the Internal Revenue Code, the compensation committee may select other measures of performance.
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Corporate Transactions. In the event we are a party to a merger, consolidation or certain change in control transactions, outstanding awards granted under the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan, and all shares acquired under the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan, will be subject to the terms of the definitive transaction agreement (or, if there is no such agreement, as determined by our compensation committee). Unless an award agreement provides otherwise, such treatment may include any of the following with respect to each outstanding award:
the continuation, assumption or substitution of an award by us or the acquiror or surviving corporation;
the cancellation of the unvested portion of an award without payment of any consideration;
the cancellation of the vested portion of options and stock appreciation rights in exchange for a payment equal to the excess, if any, of the value that a holder of a share of our common stock receives in the transaction over the exercise or purchase price of such award;
the cancellation of outstanding stock units (whether vested or unvested) in exchange for a payment equal to the value that a holder of a share of our common stock receives in such transaction; or
the assignment of any repurchase or reacquisition rights held by us to the surviving or acquiring entity.
The compensation committee is not required to treat all awards, or portions thereof, in the same manner.
The compensation committee has the discretion to provide that an award granted under the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan will vest on an accelerated basis if we are subject to a change in control or if the participant is subject to an involuntary termination, either at the time such award is granted or afterwards.
A change in control includes:
any person acquiring beneficial ownership of more than 50% of our total voting power;
the sale or other disposition of all or substantially all of our assets;
our merger or consolidation after which our voting securities represent 50% or less of the total voting power of the surviving or acquiring entity; or
individuals who are members of our board of directors or individuals who were approved or recommended by members of our board of directors cease to constitute a majority of our board of directors over a 12-month period.
Changes in Capitalization. In the event that there is a specified type of change in the capital structure of our common stock, such as a stock split, reverse stock split or dividend paid in common stock, proportionate adjustments will automatically be made to the kind and maximum number of shares:
reserved for issuance under the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan;
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by which the share reserve may increase automatically each year;
that may be granted to a participant in a year (as established under the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan pursuant to Section 162(m) of the Internal Revenue Code);
that may be issued upon the exercise of incentive stock options; and
covered by each outstanding option, stock appreciation right and stock unit;
as well as the exercise price applicable to each outstanding option and stock appreciation right and the repurchase price, if any, applicable to restricted shares.
In the event that there is a declaration of an extraordinary dividend payable in a form other than our common stock in an amount that has a material effect on the price of our common stock, a recapitalization, a spin-off or a similar occurrence, the compensation committee may make such adjustments as it deems appropriate, in its sole discretion.
Amendments or Termination. Our board of directors may amend or terminate the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan at any time. If our board of directors amends the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan, it does not need to ask for stockholder approval of the amendment unless required by applicable law, regulation or rules. The 2015 Equity Incentive Plan will continue in effect for ten years from the later of its adoption date or the date of approval of the latest share increase, unless our board of directors decides to terminate the plan earlier.
Forfeiture. Awards under the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan are subject to recovery to the extent required by any law, government regulation, stock exchange listing requirement or company policy.
2006 Stock Plan
Our board of directors adopted our 2006 Stock Plan in May 2006, and our stockholders approved it in June 2006. The most recent amendment to the 2006 Stock Plan was adopted by our board of directors in December 2013, and we obtained stockholder approval of that amendment in January 2014. No further awards will be made under our 2006 Stock Plan after this offering. The awards outstanding after this offering under the 2006 Stock Plan will continue to be governed by their existing terms.
Share Reserve. We have reserved 48,505,935 shares of our common stock for issuance under the 2006 Stock Plan, all of which may be issued as incentive stock options. In general, if options or shares awarded under the 2006 Stock Plan are reacquired or repurchased by us or otherwise forfeited by a 2006 Stock Plan participant, then those shares or option shares will again become available for awards under the 2006 Stock Plan.
Administration. Our board of directors administered the 2006 Stock Plan before this offering, and the compensation committee will administer the 2006 Stock Plan after this offering. Before this offering, our board of directors had, and after this offering, our compensation committee will have, complete discretion to make all decisions relating to our 2006 Stock Plan.
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Eligibility. Employees, members of our board of directors who are not employees and consultants are eligible to participate in our 2006 Stock Plan.
Types of Award. Our 2006 Stock Plan provides for the following types of awards:
incentive and nonstatutory stock options; and
direct award or sale of shares of our common stock, including restricted shares (subject to a right of repurchase by us upon the participants termination with respect to unvested shares).
Options and restricted shares vest at the times determined by our board of directors. Both options and restricted shares generally vest over a four-year period following the date of grant. Options expire not more than 10 years after they are granted but generally expire earlier if the participants service terminates earlier.
Options. The exercise price for options granted under the 2006 Stock Plan may not be less than 100% of the fair market value of our common stock on the option grant date. Participants may pay the exercise price of options, or the purchase price of shares, by using cash or cash equivalents. In addition, at the discretion of our board of directors, payment may be made by using:
a full-recourse promissory note, against which the purchased shares are pledged as security for payment of the principal amount of, and interest on, the note;
shares of common stock that the optionee already owns;
an immediate sale of the option shares through a broker designated by us;
in the case of a sale of shares, services rendered to us; or
any other form of payment permitted by applicable law.
Restricted Stock. We may grant or sell restricted stock to participants under the 2006 Stock Plan.
Change in Control. In the event we are a party to a merger or consolidation, outstanding options granted under the 2006 Stock Plan will be subject to the terms of the definitive transaction agreement. Such treatment shall include any of the following:
the continuation, assumption or substitution of the option by us or the acquiror or surviving corporation;
the full exercisability of outstanding options and full vesting of the common shares subject to options, followed by cancellation of such options; or
the cancellation of the outstanding options in exchange for a payment equal to the excess, if any, of the value that a holder of a share of our common stock receives in the transaction over the exercise price of the option.
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Changes in Capitalization. In the event that there is a specified type of change in the capital structure of our common stock, such as a stock split, reverse stock split or dividend paid in common stock, proportionate adjustments will automatically be made to the kind and maximum number of shares:
reserved for issuance under the 2006 Stock Plan;
that may be issued upon the exercise of incentive stock options; and
covered by each outstanding option;
as well as the exercise price applicable to each outstanding option.
In the event that there is a declaration of an extraordinary dividend payable in a form other than our common stock in an amount that has a material effect on the price of our common stock, a recapitalization, a spin-off or a similar occurrence, the compensation committee may make such adjustments as it deems appropriate, in its sole discretion.
Amendments or Termination. Our board of directors may amend or terminate the 2006 Stock Plan at any time. If our board of directors amends the 2006 Stock Plan, it does not need to ask for stockholder approval of the amendment unless the amendment increases the number of shares available for issuance, materially changes the class of persons eligible to receive incentive stock options or is otherwise required by applicable law. The 2006 Stock Plan will continue in effect for ten years from the later of its adoption date or the date of approval of the latest share increase, unless our board of directors decides to terminate the plan earlier.
2015 Employee Stock Purchase Plan
General. Our board of directors adopted our 2015 Employee Stock Purchase Plan, or our ESPP, in , and our stockholders approved it in . The ESPP will become effective as of the effective date of the registration statement of which this prospectus is a part. Our ESPP is intended to qualify under Section 423 of the Internal Revenue Code.
Share Reserve. We have reserved shares of our common stock for issuance under the ESPP. The number of shares reserved for issuance under the ESPP will automatically be increased on the first business day of each of our fiscal years, commencing in 2016, by a number equal to the smallest of:
shares;
% of the shares of common stock outstanding on the last business day of the prior fiscal year; or
the number of shares determined by our board of directors.
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The number of shares reserved under the ESPP will automatically be adjusted in the event of a stock split, stock dividend, extraordinary dividend payable in a form other than our common stock in an amount that has a material effect on the price of our common stock or a reverse stock split (including an adjustment to the per-purchase period share limit).
Administration. The compensation committee will administer the ESPP.
Eligibility. All of our employees are eligible to participate if we employ them for 20 or more hours per week and for more than five months per year. Eligible employees may begin participating in the ESPP at the start of any offering period.
Offering Periods. Each offering period will last a number of months determined by the compensation committee, not to exceed 27 months. A new offering period will begin periodically, as determined by the compensation committee. Offering periods may overlap or may be consecutive. Unless otherwise determined by the compensation committee, two offering periods of six months duration will begin in each year on January 1 and July 1. However, our compensation committee has not yet determined when to commence operation of the ESPP, so we currently do not expect an offering period to commence in July 2015.
Amount of Contributions. Our ESPP permits each eligible employee to purchase common stock through payroll deductions. Each employees payroll deductions may not exceed 15% of the employees cash compensation. Each participant may purchase up to the number of shares determined by the compensation committee on any purchase date, not to exceed shares. The value of the shares purchased in any calendar year may not exceed $25,000. Participants may withdraw their contributions at any time before the date 10 days before stock is purchased.
Purchase Price. The price of each share of common stock purchased under our ESPP will not be less than 85% of the lower of the fair market value per share of common stock on the first day of the applicable offering period or the fair market value per share of common stock on the purchase date.
Other Provisions. Employees may end their participation in the ESPP at any time. Participation ends automatically upon termination of employment with us. If we experience a change in control, our ESPP will end and shares will be purchased with the payroll deductions accumulated to date by participating employees. Our board of directors or our compensation committee may amend or terminate the ESPP at any time. If our board of directors amends the ESPP, it does not need to ask for stockholder approval of the amendment unless the amendment increases the number of shares available for issuance, extends the term of the ESPP or is otherwise required by applicable law. The ESPP will continue in effect for twenty years from its adoption date unless our board of directors decides to terminate the ESPP earlier.
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Management Cash Incentive Plan
Our board of directors adopted the Management Cash Incentive Plan, or the Bonus Plan, in March 2015 and our stockholders approved it in 2015. The Bonus Plan became effective upon adoption by our board of directors.
General. The Bonus Plan is intended to motivate participants to achieve performance goals through cash incentive awards and is intended to permit awards that meet the requirements of the performance-based compensation exemption from Section 162(m) of the Internal Revenue Code to the extent that it is applicable to us and the Bonus Plan.
Administration. Our compensation committee has the authority to administer and interpret the Bonus Plan, including the authority to determine which employees shall be granted awards, the terms and conditions of awards and achievement of performance goals.
Performance Criteria. To the extent Section 162(m) of the Internal Revenue Code is applicable to us and an award under the Bonus Plan is intended to qualify as performance-based compensation under Section 162(m) of the Internal Revenue Code, our compensation committee establishes the performance goal or goals applicable to that award by the 90th day of the performance period (and no later than the date on which 25% of the performance period has lapsed). To the extent Section 162(m) of the Internal Revenue Code is applicable to us and an award under the Bonus Plan is intended to qualify as performance-based compensation under Section 162(m) of the Internal Revenue Code, the performance criteria will be based on any one of, or combination of, the following: budget performance, buyer acquisition, retention and/or growth, cash flow, cash flow return on investment, comparisons with various stock market indices, costs and expenses (including reduction of both), earnings or earnings per share (including earnings before taxes, earnings before interest and taxes, earnings before interest, taxes and depreciation, or earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, including adjusted measures), employee satisfaction and/or retention, free cash flow or free cash flow per share, gross margin, gross profits, headcount, market share, net income (before or after taxes), operating income or EBIT (Earnings before Interest and Taxes) on a GAAP or non-GAAP basis, operating or EBIT margin, return on assets, investment or capital employed, return on equity or average stockholders equity, revenue (gross or net), GMS, seller acquisition, retention and/or growth, member satisfaction, stockholders equity, stock price return relative to market indices and/or peer group, total stockholder return and working capital.
Any of the above metrics may be measured either in absolute terms, compared to any incremental increase or decrease or compared to results of a peer group, to market performance indicators or to market indices.
Our compensation committee can establish other performance goals for any award under the Bonus Plan not intended to qualify as performance-based compensation under Section 162(m) of the Internal Revenue Code.
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Maximum Award; Discretion. The maximum award amount payable under the Bonus Plan is $7,500,000. Our compensation committee has the discretion to reduce awards under the Bonus Plan for any reason or increase awards that are not intended to qualify as performance-based compensation under Section 162(m) of the Internal Revenue Code, up to the maximum award amount. Awards intended to qualify as performance-based compensation under Section 162(m) of the Internal Revenue Code cannot be increased beyond the award achieved based on actual performance.
Forfeiture. Awards under the Bonus Plan are subject to recovery to the extent required by any law, government regulation, stock exchange listing requirement or company policy.
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Certain Relationships and Related Person Transactions
In addition to the compensation arrangements with directors and executive officers described under Executive Compensation and Management and the registration rights described under Description of Capital StockRegistration Rights, the following is a description of each transaction since January 1, 2012 and each currently proposed transaction in which:
we have been or are to be a participant;
the amount involved exceeds or will exceed $120,000; and
any of our directors, executive officers or beneficial holders of more than 5% of our capital stock, or any immediate family member of, or person sharing the household with, any of these individuals (other than tenants or employees), had or will have a direct or indirect material interest.
Equity Financings
Series F Preferred Stock
In May 2012, we sold an aggregate of 11,594,203 shares of our Series F preferred stock at a purchase price of $3.45 per share, for an aggregate purchase price of approximately $40,000,000. The following table summarizes purchases of our Series F preferred stock by beneficial holders of more than 5% of our outstanding capital stock and an entity founded and managed by one of our directors:
Name of Stockholder Shares of Series F
Preferred Stock Total Purchase
Price Entities affiliated with Accel Partners(1)(2) 4,968,944 $ 17,142,856.80 Breyer Capital L.L.C.(3) 552,105 1,904,762.25 Entities affiliated with Index Ventures(4)(5) 3,450,656 11,904,763.20 Union Square Ventures Opportunity Fund, L.P.(6) 1,380,262 4,761,903.90
(1) Affiliates of Accel Partners holding our securities, whose shares are aggregated for purposes of reporting the above share ownership information, are Accel London II L.P., Accel London Investors 2008 L.P., Accel Growth Fund II L.P., Accel Growth Fund II Strategic Partners L.P. and Accel Growth Fund Investors 2012 L.L.C.
(2) James W. Breyer, a member of our board of directors, is a partner at Accel Partners.
(3) Mr. Breyer, a member of our board of directors, is the manager of Breyer Capital L.L.C.
(4) Affiliates of Index Ventures holding our securities, whose shares are aggregated for purposes of reporting the above share ownership, are Index Ventures Growth I (Jersey), L.P., Index Ventures Growth I Parallel Entrepreneur Fund (Jersey), L.P. and Yucca (Jersey) SLP.
(5) Daniel Rimer, a member of our board of directors from April 2012 to March 2015, is a partner at Index Ventures.
(6) Fred Wilson, a member of our board of directors, is a partner at Union Square Ventures.
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Common Stock
On April 1, 2014, we sold an aggregate of 6,603,774 shares of our common stock to Tiger Global Private Investment Partners VII, L.P., or Tiger Global PIP VII, and a principal of Tiger Global PIP VII at a purchase price of $5.30 per share, for an aggregate purchase price of approximately $35,000,000. Tiger Global PIP VII, a beneficial holder of more than 5% of our outstanding capital stock, purchased 6,601,273 shares of such shares for a total purchase price of $34,986,747.
Third-Party Tender Offers
2012 Third-Party Tender Offer
In May 2012, we entered into a letter agreement with certain holders of our capital stock pursuant to which we agreed to waive certain transfer restrictions in connection with, and assist in the administration of, a tender offer that such holders proposed to commence. In May 2012, these holders commenced a tender offer to purchase shares of our capital stock from certain of our securityholders at a price of $3.45 per share, less transaction costs, pursuant to an Offer to Purchase to which we were not a party.
Chad Dickerson and Kellan Elliott-McCrea, each of whom is an executive officer, as well as other Etsy employees, sold shares of our capital stock in the tender offer. In addition, Handmade Partners LLC, an entity controlled by Albert Wenger, who is a partner of Union Square Ventures, a beneficial holder of more than 5% of our outstanding capital stock, also sold shares of our capital stock in the tender offer.
An aggregate of 4,289,778 shares of our capital stock were tendered pursuant to the tender offer, of which entities affiliated with Accel Partners purchased 1,839,027 shares for an aggregate purchase price of $6,280,338, entities affiliated with Index Ventures purchased 1,276,639 shares for an aggregate purchase price of $4,359,765, Union Square Ventures Opportunity Fund, L.P. purchased 510,484 shares for an aggregate purchase price of $1,743,320 and Breyer Capital L.L.C. purchased 204,193 shares for an aggregate purchase price of $697,326. Each of Accel Partners, Index Ventures and Union Square Ventures Opportunity Fund, L.P., together with its respective affiliated entities, is a beneficial holder of more than 5% of our outstanding capital stock. In addition, certain of our directors are affiliated with the purchasers.
2014 Third-Party Tender Offer
In January 2014, we entered into a letter agreement with certain third parties, pursuant to which we agreed to waive certain transfer restrictions in connection with, and assist in the administration of, a tender offer that such parties proposed to commence. In January 2014, these parties commenced a tender offer to purchase shares of our capital stock from certain of our securityholders at a price of $5.30 per share, pursuant to an Offer to Purchase to which we were not a party.
Chad Dickerson and Kellan Elliott-McCrea were among the Etsy employees who participated in selling shares in the tender offer. In addition, Albert Wenger, who is a partner of Union Square Ventures, a beneficial holder of more than 5% of our outstanding capital stock, Handmade Partners LLC, an entity
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controlled by Mr. Wenger, and John Buttrick, who is a partner of Union Square Ventures, also sold shares of our capital stock in the tender offer.
An aggregate of 6,308,440 shares of our capital stock were tendered pursuant to the tender offer.
Investor Rights Agreement
Pursuant to a sixth amended and restated investor rights agreement, dated May 1, 2012 and most recently amended on May 2, 2014, certain holders of our preferred stock, including entities with which certain of our directors are affiliated, are entitled to rights with respect to the registration of their shares, including demand registration rights, following this offering. These registration rights will terminate as to any stockholder at such time as all of such stockholders securities (together with any affiliate of the stockholder with whom such stockholder must aggregate its sales) could be sold pursuant to Rule 144 of the Securities Act, but in any event no later than the five-year anniversary of this offering. For a description of these registration rights, see Description of Capital StockRegistration Rights.
Right of First Refusal
Pursuant to certain of our equity compensation plans and certain agreements with our stockholders, including a third amended and restated first refusal and co-sale agreement dated May 1, 2012 and most recently amended on May 2, 2014, we or our assignees have a right to purchase shares of our capital stock that stockholders propose to sell to other parties. Since January 1, 2012, we have waived or assigned our right of first refusal in connection with the sale of certain shares of our capital stock, resulting in the purchase of such shares by certain holders of more than 5% of our capital stock in a series of transactions. Since January 2014, pursuant to agreements entered into in January 2014, as amended most recently in May 2014, we were obligated to assign all of our contractual rights of first refusal to Tiger Global PIP VII and Tiger Global Private Investment Partners VIII, L.P., or the Tiger Global funds, which funds collectively hold more than 5% of our capital stock, and two principals of the Tiger Global funds until the earlier of December 31, 2014 and such time as certain conditions have been satisfied. Thereafter, we were obligated to assign our contractual rights of first refusal pro rata to entities affiliated with each of Accel Partners, Index Ventures and Union Square Ventures and the Tiger Global funds until the earlier of December 31, 2014 and such time as certain conditions have been satisfied. Our obligation to assign our rights of first refusal to these various funds terminated on December 31, 2014, and our rights of first refusal will terminate upon the completion of this offering.
Agreements to Vote
We are party to a sixth amended and restated voting agreement dated May 1, 2012 and most recently amended on November 5, 2012 under which certain holders of our capital stock, including entities with which certain of our directors are affiliated, have agreed to vote their shares of our capital stock on certain
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matters, including with respect to the election of directors. Upon the completion of this offering, this voting agreement will terminate and none of our stockholders will have any special rights regarding the election or designation of members of our board of directors.
Pursuant to certain stock transfer and other agreements, if our board of directors approves an amendment to our certificate of incorporation specifying that we become a public benefit corporation subject to the requirements of Chapter 1, Subchapter XV of the Delaware General Corporation Law, certain holders of more than 5% of our capital stock have an obligation to vote all voting securities held by such holders, or over which such holders otherwise exercise voting or investment authority, in favor of such amendment. Upon the completion of this offering, the obligation will terminate and none of our stockholders will have any obligation to vote in favor of any such amendment.
Indemnification Agreements
Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation, which will be effective upon the completion of this offering, contains provisions limiting the liability of directors, and our amended and restated bylaws, which will be effective upon the completion of this offering, provide that we will indemnify each of our directors to the fullest extent permitted under Delaware law. Our certificate of incorporation and bylaws also provide our board of directors with discretion to indemnify our officers and employees when determined appropriate by our board of directors.
We also intend to enter into indemnification agreements with each of our directors and officers. The indemnification agreements will provide that we will indemnify each such person against any and all expenses incurred by such person because of his or her status as one of our directors or officers, to the fullest extent permitted by Delaware law, our amended and restated certificate of incorporation and our amended and restated bylaws. In addition, the indemnification agreements will provide that, to the fullest extent permitted by Delaware law, we will advance all expenses incurred by our directors and officers in connection with a legal proceeding involving his or her status as a director or officer.
Policies and Procedures for Related Person Transactions
Our audit committee has the primary responsibility for the review, approval and oversight of any related person transaction, which is any transaction, arrangement or relationship (or series of similar transactions, arrangements or relationships) in which we are, were or will be a participant and the amount involved exceeds $120,000, and in which the related person had, has or will have a direct or indirect material interest. We intend to adopt a written related person transaction policy to be effective upon the completion of this offering. Under our related person transaction policy, our management will be required to submit any related person transaction not previously approved or ratified by our audit committee to our audit committee. In approving or rejecting the proposed transactions, our audit committee will take into account the relevant facts and circumstances and will approve only those transactions that are in, or are not inconsistent with, our best interests and the best interests of our stockholders.
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Although we have not had a written policy prior to this offering for the review and approval of related person transactions, our board of directors has historically reviewed and approved any transaction where a director or officer had a financial interest, including the transactions described above. Prior to approving such a transaction, the material facts as to a directors or officers relationship or interest as to the agreement or transaction were disclosed to our board of directors, which took take this information into account when evaluating the transaction and determining whether such transaction was fair to us and in the best interest of our stockholders.
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Principal and Selling Stockholders
The following table sets forth certain information with respect to the beneficial ownership of our common stock as of January 31, 2015, and as adjusted to reflect the sale of common stock offered by us and the selling stockholders in this offering, for:
each of our named executive officers;
each of our directors;
all of our executive officers and directors as a group;
each stockholder, or group of affiliated persons, known by us to be the beneficial owner of more than 5% of our outstanding shares of common stock; and
each of the selling stockholders.
We have determined beneficial ownership in accordance with the rules of the SEC, which generally define beneficial ownership to include any shares over which a person exercises sole or shared voting or investment power. Such determination is not necessarily indicative of beneficial ownership for any other purpose. Except as indicated by the footnotes below, we believe, based on the information furnished to us, that the persons and entities named in the table below have sole voting and investment power with respect to all shares of common stock that they beneficially own, subject to applicable community property laws.
Applicable percentage ownership is based on 196,381,160 shares of common stock outstanding at January 31, 2015, after giving effect to the conversion of all outstanding shares of preferred stock as of that date into an aggregate of 106,896,493 shares of our common stock, which will occur immediately prior to the completion of this offering. For purposes of computing percentage ownership after this offering, we have assumed the issuance and sale by us of shares of common stock in this offering and that the underwriters will not exercise their option to purchase additional shares. In computing the number of shares of common stock beneficially owned by a person and the percentage ownership of that person, we deemed to be outstanding all shares of common stock subject to options or warrants held by that person or entity that are currently exercisable or that will become exercisable within 60 days of January 31, 2015. We did not deem these shares outstanding, however, for the purpose of computing the percentage ownership of any other person.
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Unless otherwise indicated, the address of each beneficial owner listed in the table below is c/o Etsy, Inc., 55 Washington Street, Suite 512, Brooklyn, New York 11201.
Beneficial
Ownership Prior to
this Offering Shares Being
Offered Beneficial Ownership
After this Offering Name of Beneficial Owner Number Percent Number Percent Named Executive Officers and Directors: Jordan Breslow(1) 236,732 * James W. Breyer(2) 58,871,865 30.0 % M. Michele Burns(3) 63,323 * Chad Dickerson(4) 4,224,206 2.1 % Jonathan D. Klein(5) 535,326 * Kristina Salen(6) 792,630 * Fred Wilson(7) 29,917,245 15.2 % All executive officers and directors as a group (8 persons)(8) 95,059,043 47.4 % 5% Stockholders: Entities affiliated with Accel Partners(9) 52,984,798 27.0 % Entities affiliated with Index Ventures(10) 25,160,628 12.8 % Entities affiliated with Tiger Global Management(11) 14,237,651 7.3 % Entities affiliated with Union Square Ventures(12) 29,917,245 15.2 % Selling Stockholders:
* Less than 1 percent.
(1) Consists of 236,732 shares of common stock issuable pursuant to options exercisable within 60 days of January 31, 2015.
(2) Consists of (i) 52,984,798 shares of common stock held by entities affiliated with Accel Partners, as reflected in footnote 9 below; (ii) 2,347,070 shares of common stock held by Mr. Breyer, Trustee of James W. Breyer 2005 Trust dated March 25, 2005; (iii) 2,333,570 shares of common stock held by Mr. Breyer, Trustee of The James W. Breyer 2011 Annuity Trust 3, dated March 10, 2011; and (iv) 1,206,427 shares of common stock held by Breyer Capital L.L.C. Mr. Breyer, a member of our board of directors, is a partner of Accel Partners, and therefore, may be deemed to share voting and investment power with regard to the shares held directly by Accel Partners. Mr. Breyer is the manager of Breyer Capital L.L.C. and has sole voting and investment power with regard to the shares held directly by this limited liability company. The address for Mr. Breyer is c/o Accel Partners, 428 University Avenue, Palo Alto, California 94301.
(3) Consists of 63,323 shares of common stock issuable pursuant to options exercisable within 60 days of January 31, 2015.
(4) Consists of (i) 1,506,713 shares of common stock held by Mr. Dickerson and Nancy Suess Dickerson as joint tenants with right of survivorship and (ii) 2,717,493 shares of common stock issuable pursuant to options exercisable within 60 days of January 31, 2015.
(5) Consists of (i) 43,479 shares of common stock held by Mr. Klein and Deborah A. Klein; (ii) 43,478 shares of common stock held by the JD Klein Family Settlement Trust; (iii) 428,442 shares of common stock held by Mr. Klein and Deborah A. Klein as community property; and (iv) 19,927 shares of common stock issuable pursuant to options exercisable within 60 days of January 31, 2015. Abacus Trust Co., Ltd. (Abacus) is the trustee of the JD Klein Family Settlement Trust and has sole voting and investment power with respect to the shares held directly by the trust. Eimear Mary Dowling, Stewart Henderson Fleming, Andrew James Cardwell, Martin Heaney, Paul Terence Kneen and John Paul Watterson are the directors of Abacus and, therefore, each may be deemed to share voting and investment power over the securities held by the JD Klein Family Settlement Trust. The address for Mr. Klein is c/o Getty Images, 75 Varick Street, Suite 500, New York, New York 10013.
(6) Consists of 792,630 shares of common stock issuable pursuant to options exercisable within 60 days of January 31, 2015.
(7) Consists of 29,917,245 shares of common stock held by entities affiliated with Union Square Ventures, as reflected in footnote 12 below. Mr. Wilson, a member of our board of directors, is a general partner of Union Square Ventures, and therefore, may be deemed to share voting and investment power with regard to the shares held directly by Union Square Ventures. The address for Mr. Wilson is c/o Union Square Ventures, 915 Broadway, 19th Floor, New York, New York 10010.
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(8) Includes (i) 90,811,222 shares of common stock beneficially owned by our directors and named executive officers; (ii) 3,830,105 shares of common stock issuable to our directors and named executive officers pursuant to options exercisable within 60 days of January 31, 2015; (iii) 100,000 shares of common stock held by an executive officer who is not a named executive officer; and (iv) 317,716 shares of common stock issuable to an executive officer who is not a named executive officer pursuant to options exercisable within 60 days of January 31, 2015.
(9) Consists of (i) 29,756,265 shares of common stock held by Accel X L.P. (A10); (ii) 2,571,895 shares of common stock held by Accel X Strategic Partners L.P. (A10SP); (iii) 3,129,765 shares of common stock held by Accel Investors 2008 L.L.C. (Accel Investors 2008); (iv) 6,442,660 shares of common stock held by Accel Growth Fund II L.P. (AGF); (v) 466,657 shares of common stock held by Accel Growth Fund II Strategic Partners L.P. (AGFSP); (vi) 627,212 shares of common stock held by Accel Growth Fund Investors 2012 L.L.C. (AGF Investors 2012); (vii) 9,663,899 shares of common stock held by Accel London II L.P. (Accel London); and (viii) 326,445 shares of common stock held by Accel London Investors 2008 L.P. (Accel London 2008). Accel X Associates L.L.C. (A10A) is the general partner of A10 and A10SP and has sole voting and investment power over the shares held directly by the limited partnerships. Andrew G. Braccia, Mr. Breyer, Kevin J. Efrusy, Sameer K. Gandhi, Ping Li, Tracy L. Sedlock and Richard P. Wong are the managing members of A10A and Accel Investors 2008 and, therefore, may be deemed to share voting and investment power with regard to the shares held directly by A10, A10SP and Accel Investors 2008. Accel Growth Fund II Associates L.L.C. (AGFA) is the general partner of AGF and AGFSP and has sole voting and investment power with regard to the shares held directly by the limited partnerships. Andrew G. Braccia, Mr. Breyer, Sameer K. Gandhi, Ping Li, Tracy Sedlock, Ryan J. Sweeney and Richard P. Wong are the managing members of AGFA and AGF Investors 2012 and, therefore, may be deemed to share voting and investment power with regard to the shares held directly by AGF, AGFSP and AGF Investors 2012. Accel London II Associates L.L.C. (ALA L.L.C.) is the general partner of Accel London 2008 and Accel London II Associates L.P., which is the general partner of Accel London, and has sole voting and investment power with regard to the shares held directly by Accel London 2008 and Accel London. Jonathan Biggs, Kevin Comolli, Bruce Golden and Hendrik Nelis are the managers of ALA L.L.C. and, therefore, may be deemed to share voting and investment power with regard to the shares held directly by Accel London and Accel London 2008. We refer to A10A, AGFA, Accel Investors 2008, AGF Investors 2012, ALA L.L.C., Accel London 2008 and affiliated entities as Accel Partners. The address for Accel Partners is 428 University Avenue, Palo Alto, California 94301.
(10) Represents (i) 24,190,729 shares of common stock held by Index Ventures Growth I (Jersey), L.P. (Index Growth); (ii) 844,034 shares of common stock held by Index Ventures Growth I Parallel Entrepreneur Fund (Jersey), L.P. (Index Parallel); and (iii) 125,865 shares of common stock held by Yucca (Jersey) SLP (Yucca). Index Venture Growth Associates I Limited is the managing general partner of Index Growth and Index Parallel and is an affiliate of Yucca, and has sole voting and investment power with regard to the shares held directly by the entities. Bernard Dallé, David Hall, Phil Balderson, Ian Henderson, Nigel Greenwood and Sinéad Meehan are the directors of Index Venture Growth Associates I Limited and, therefore, may be deemed to share voting and investment power with regard to the shares held directly by Index Growth, Index Parallel and Yucca. We refer to Index Growth, Index Parallel and Yucca as Index Ventures. The address for Index Growth and Index Parallel is No. 1 Seaton Place, St. Helier, Jersey JE48YJ, Channel Islands and for Yucca is c/o Elian Employee Benefit Services Limited, 44 Esplanade, St. Helier, Jersey JE49WG, Channel Islands.
(11) Represents (i) 13,449,299 shares of common stock held by Tiger Global Private Investment Partners VII, L.P. (Tiger Global PIP VII) and (ii) 788,352 shares of common stock held by Tiger Global Private Investment Partners VIII, L.P. (Tiger Global PIP VIII). Tiger Global PIP VII and Tiger Global PIP VIII are ultimately controlled by Chase Coleman, Lee Fixel and Scott Shleifer. We refer to Tiger Global PIP VII and Tiger Global PIP VIII as Tiger Global Management. The address for Tiger Global Management is 9 West 57th Street, 35th Floor, New York, New York 10019.
(12) Represents (i) 26,491,160 shares of common stock held by Union Square Ventures 2004, L.P. (USV 2004); (ii) 527,710 shares of common stock held by Union Square Principals 2004, L.L.C. (USV Principals); and (iii) 2,898,375 shares of common stock held by Union Square Ventures Opportunity Fund, L.P. (USV OP). Union Square GP 2004, L.L.C. (USV GP) is the general partner of USV 2004 and USV Principals and has sole voting and investment power with regard to the shares held directly by these limited partnerships. Union Square Opportunity Fund GP, L.L.C. (USV OPGP) is the general partner of USV OP and has sole voting and investment power with regard to the shares held directly by the limited partnership. We refer to USV GP, USV OPGP and affiliated entities as Union Square Ventures. Mr. Wilson, Brad Burnham, Albert Wenger, Andy Weissman and John Buttrick are partners at Union Square Ventures and, therefore, may be deemed to share voting and investment power with regard to the shares held directly by Union Square Ventures. The address for Union Square Ventures is 915 Broadway, 19th Floor, New York, New York 10010.
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Description of Capital Stock
This section contains a description of our capital stock and the material provisions of our amended and restated certificate of incorporation and amended and restated bylaws that will be in effect upon the completion of this offering and is qualified by reference to the forms of our amended and restated certificate of incorporation and our amended and restated bylaws filed as exhibits to the registration statement relating to this prospectus, and by the applicable provisions of Delaware law.
General
Upon the completion of this offering, our amended and restated certificate of incorporation will authorize shares of undesignated preferred stock, the rights, preferences and privileges of which may be designated from time to time by our board of directors.
Upon the completion of this offering, our authorized capital stock will consist of shares, all with a par value of $0.001 per share, of which:
shares are designated common stock; and
shares are designated preferred stock.
As of December 31, 2014, and after giving effect to the automatic conversion of all of our outstanding preferred stock into common stock in connection with this offering, there were outstanding:
195,258,466 shares of our common stock held of record by 312 stockholders;
23,050,594 shares of our common stock issuable upon exercise of outstanding stock options; and
406,060 shares of our common stock issuable upon exercise of outstanding warrants.
Additionally, in January 2015, we issued 376,471 shares of common stock to Etsy.org.
Common Stock
Dividend Rights
Subject to preferences that may apply to shares of preferred stock outstanding at the time, the holders of outstanding shares of our common stock are entitled to receive dividends out of funds legally available if our board of directors, in its discretion, determines to issue dividends and only then at the times and in the amounts that our board of directors may determine. Under Delaware law, we can only pay dividends either out of surplus or out of the current or the immediately preceding years net profits. Surplus is defined as the excess, if any, at any given time, of the total assets of a corporation over its total liabilities and statutory
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capital. The value of a corporations assets can be measured in a number of ways and may not necessarily equal their book value. See Dividend Policy for more information.
Voting Rights
The holders of our common stock are entitled to one vote per share. Stockholders do not have the ability to cumulate votes for the election of directors. Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation and amended and restated bylaws that will be in effect upon completion of this offering will provide for a classified board of directors consisting of three classes of approximately equal size, each serving staggered three-year terms. Only one class of directors will be elected at each annual meeting of our stockholders, with the other classes continuing for the remainder of their respective three-year terms.
No Preemptive or Similar Rights
Our common stock is not entitled to preemptive rights and is not subject to conversion, redemption or sinking fund provisions.
Right to Receive Liquidation Distributions
Upon our dissolution, liquidation or winding-up, the assets legally available for distribution to our stockholders are distributable ratably among the holders of our common stock, subject to prior satisfaction of all outstanding debt and liabilities and the preferential rights and payment of liquidation preferences, if any, on any outstanding shares of preferred stock.
Preferred Stock
Upon the completion of this offering, no shares of preferred stock will be outstanding. However, we will be authorized, subject to limitations prescribed by Delaware law, to issue preferred stock in one or more series, to establish from time to time the number of shares to be included in each series, and to fix the designation, powers, preferences and rights of the shares of each series and any of its qualifications, limitations or restrictions. Our board of directors also can increase or decrease the number of shares of any series, but not below the number of shares of that series then outstanding, without any further vote or action by our stockholders. Our board of directors may authorize the issuance of preferred stock with voting or conversion rights that could adversely affect the voting power or other rights of the holders of the common stock. The issuance of preferred stock, while providing flexibility in connection with possible acquisitions and other corporate purposes, could, among other things, have the effect of delaying, deferring or preventing a change in control of our company and may adversely affect the market price of our common stock and the voting and other rights of the holders of common stock. We have no current plan to issue any shares of preferred stock.
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Options
As of December 31, 2014, we had options to purchase 23,050,594 shares of our common stock outstanding under our 2006 Stock Plan. Subsequent to December 31, 2014, we granted options to purchase 2,037,490 shares of our common stock under our 2006 Stock Plan.
Warrants
As of December 31, 2014, we had outstanding immediately exercisable warrants to purchase (i) an aggregate of 11,373 shares of our Series C preferred stock at an exercise price of $2.67 per share, or the Series C warrant, (ii) an aggregate of 24,510 shares of our Series D preferred stock at an exercise price of $6.63 per share, or the Series D warrant, and (iii) an aggregate of 4,723 shares of our Series E preferred stock at an exercise price of $15.88 per share, or the Series E warrant. Immediately following this offering, the Series C warrant will be exercisable for 113,730 shares of our common stock at an exercise price of $0.267 per share, the Series D warrant will be exercisable for 245,100 shares of our common stock at an exercise price of $0.663 per share and the Series E warrant will be exercisable for 47,230 shares of our common stock at an exercise price of $1.588 per share. The Series C warrant expires on November 14, 2017. The Series D warrant expires on the later of May 15, 2015 and five years from the date of this offering. The Series E warrant expires on the later of August 9, 2017 and five years from the date of this offering.
Registration Rights
Following the completion of this offering, holders of an aggregate of shares of our common stock will have registration rights. These shares are referred to as registrable securities. The holders of these registrable securities possess registration rights pursuant to the terms of our sixth amended and restated investor rights agreement dated May 1, 2012, as amended, or investor rights agreement, which terms are described in additional detail below. We originally entered into the investor rights agreement in connection with our Series A-1 preferred stock financing and amended it mostly recently on May 2, 2014.
Demand Registration Rights
Under our investor rights agreement, at any time commencing on the date that is 180 days following the effective date of our first registration statement, upon the written request of the holders of not less than 30% of the registrable securities then outstanding that we file a registration statement under the Securities Act with an anticipated aggregate price to the public of at least $7.5 million, we will be obligated to use our commercially reasonable efforts to register the sale of all registrable securities that holders may request in writing to be registered within 20 days of the mailing of a notice by us to all holders of such registration. We are required to effect no more than two registration statements that are declared or ordered effective, subject to certain exceptions. We may postpone the filing of a registration statement for up to 120 days twice in any 12-month period if in the good faith judgment of our board of directors such registration would
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be seriously detrimental to us, and we are not required to effect the filing of a registration statement during the period beginning 90 days prior to our good faith estimate of the date of the filing of, and ending on a date 180 days following the effective date of, a registration initiated by us.
Piggyback Registration Rights
If we register any of our securities for public sale, we will be obligated to use all commercially reasonable efforts to register all registrable securities that the holders of such securities request in writing be registered within 10 days of mailing of notice by us to all holders of the proposed registration. However, this right does not apply to a registration relating solely to employee benefit plans, a registration relating to the offer and sale of debt securities or a registration relating to a corporate reorganization or other transaction under Rule 145 of the Securities Act. The managing underwriter of any underwritten offering will have the right to limit, due to marketing reasons, the number of shares registered by these holders to 25% of the total shares covered by the registration statement, except for in this offering, in which these holders may be excluded entirely if the underwriters determine that the sale of their shares may jeopardize the success of the offering.
Form S-3 Registration Rights
At any time commencing on the date that is 180 days following the effective date of our first registration statement, the holders of the registrable securities can request that we register all or a portion of their shares on Form S-3 if we are eligible to file a registration statement on Form S-3 and the aggregate price to the public of the shares offered is at least $3 million. We are required to file no more than two registration statements on Form S-3 per 12-month period upon exercise of these rights, subject to certain exceptions. We may postpone the filing of a registration statement for up to 120 days twice in any 12-month period if in the good faith judgment of our board of directors such registration would be seriously detrimental to us, and we are not required to effect the filing of a registration statement during the period beginning 90 days prior to our good faith estimate of the date of the filing of, and ending on a date 180 days following the effective date of, a registration initiated by us.
Registration Expenses
We will pay all expenses (other than underwriting discounts, selling commissions and stock transfer taxes) of the holders incurred in connection with each of the registrations described above. However, we will not pay for any expenses of any demand or Form S-3 registration if the request is subsequently withdrawn at the request of the holders of a majority of the registrable securities to be registered, subject to limited exceptions.
Termination of Registration Rights
The registration rights described above will survive this offering and will terminate as to any stockholder at such time as all of such stockholders securities (together with any affiliate of the stockholder with whom
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such stockholder must aggregate its sales) could be sold pursuant to Rule 144 of the Securities Act, but in any event no later than the five-year anniversary of this offering.
Anti-Takeover Provisions
Section 203 of the Delaware General Corporation Law
Upon the completion of this offering, we will be governed by the provisions of Section 203 of the Delaware General Corporation Law regulating corporate takeovers. This section prevents some Delaware corporations from engaging, under some circumstances, in a business combination. A business combination includes a merger or sale of at least 10% of the corporations assets with any interested stockholder, meaning a stockholder who, together with affiliates and associates, owns or, within three years prior to the determination of interested stockholder status, did own 15% or more of the corporations outstanding voting stock, unless:
the transaction is approved by the board of directors prior to the time that the interested stockholder became an interested stockholder; or
subsequent to such time that the stockholder became an interested stockholder the business combination is approved by the board of directors and authorized at an annual or special meeting of stockholders by at least two-thirds of the outstanding voting stock which is not owned by the interested stockholder.
A Delaware corporation may opt out of these provisions with an express provision in its original certificate of incorporation or an express provision in its certificate of incorporation or amended and restated bylaws resulting from a stockholders amendment approved by a majority of the outstanding voting shares. We have not opted out of these provisions. As a result, mergers or other takeover or change in control attempts of us may be discouraged or prevented.
Certificate of Incorporation and Bylaw Provisions
Upon the completion of this offering, our amended and restated certificate of incorporation and our amended and restated bylaws will include a number of provisions that may have the effect of deterring hostile takeovers or delaying or preventing changes in control of our management team, including the following:
Board of Directors Vacancies. Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation and amended and restated bylaws will authorize only our board of directors to fill vacant directorships. In addition, the number of directors constituting our board of directors will be set only by resolution adopted by a majority vote of our entire board of directors. These provisions will prevent a stockholder from increasing the size of our board of directors and gaining control of our board of directors by filling the resulting vacancies with its own nominees.
Classified Board. Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation and amended and restated bylaws will provide that our board of directors will be classified into three classes of directors, each of whom will hold office for a three-year term. In addition, directors may only be removed from our board of directors for
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cause and only by the approval of our then outstanding shares of our common stock. The existence of a classified board could delay a successful tender offeror from obtaining majority control of our board of directors, and the prospect of that delay might deter a potential offeror.
Stockholder Action; Special Meeting of Stockholders. Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation will provide that stockholders will not be able to take action by written consent, and will only be able to take action at annual or special meetings of our stockholders. Stockholders will not be permitted to cumulate their votes for the election of directors. Our amended and restated bylaws will further provide that special meetings of our stockholders may be called only by a majority vote of our entire board of directors, the chairman of our board of directors or our chief executive officer.
Advance Notice Requirements for Stockholder Proposals and Director Nominations. Our amended and restated bylaws will provide advance notice procedures for stockholders seeking to bring business before our annual meeting of stockholders or to nominate candidates for election as directors at any meeting of stockholders. Our amended and restated bylaws will also specify certain requirements regarding the form and content of a stockholders notice. These provisions may preclude our stockholders from bringing matters before our annual meeting of stockholders or from making nominations for directors at our meetings of stockholders.
Issuance of Undesignated Preferred Stock. Our board of directors will have the authority, without further action by the holders of common stock, to issue up to shares of undesignated preferred stock with rights and preferences, including voting rights, designated from time to time by our board of directors. The existence of authorized but unissued shares of preferred stock will enable our board of directors to render more difficult or to discourage an attempt to obtain control of us by means of a merger, tender offer, proxy contest or otherwise.
Choice of Forum
Upon the completion of this offering, our amended and restated certificate of incorporation will provide that the Court of Chancery of the State of Delaware will be the exclusive forum for any derivative action or proceeding brought on our behalf; any action asserting a breach of fiduciary duty; any action asserting a claim against us arising pursuant to the Delaware General Corporation Law, our amended and restated certificate of incorporation or our amended and restated bylaws; or any action asserting a claim against us that is governed by the internal affairs doctrine. The enforceability of similar choice of forum provisions in other companies certificates of incorporation has been challenged in legal proceedings, and it is possible that a court could find these types of provisions to be inapplicable or unenforceable.
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Transfer Agent and Registrar
Upon the completion of this offering, the transfer agent and registrar for our common stock will be American Stock Transfer & Trust Company, LLC. The transfer agents address is 6201 15th Avenue, Brooklyn, New York 11219, and its telephone number is (800) 937-5449.
Listing
We intend to apply to have our common stock listed on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the symbol ETSY.
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Shares Available for Future Sale
Before this offering, there has not been a public market for shares of our common stock. Future sales of substantial amounts of shares of our common stock, including shares issued upon the exercise of outstanding options, in the public market following this offering or the possibility of these sales occurring could cause the prevailing market price for our common stock to fall or impair our ability to raise equity capital in the future.
Following this offering, we will have outstanding shares of our common stock, based on the number of shares outstanding as of December 31, 2014. Of these outstanding shares, all of the shares of common stock sold in this offering will be freely tradable, except that any shares purchased in this offering by our affiliates, as that term is defined in Rule 144 under the Securities Act, can only be sold in compliance with Rule 144.
The remaining shares of common stock that are not sold in this offering will be restricted securities, as that term is defined in Rule 144 under the Securities Act. These restricted securities are eligible for public sale only if they are registered under the Securities Act or if they qualify for an exemption from registration under Rule 144 or Rule 701 under the Securities Act, which are summarized below.
In addition, all of our executive officers and directors and the holders of substantially all of our capital stock are subject to lock-up agreements with us or the underwriters of this offering that restrict the stockholders ability to transfer shares, subject to specific exceptions, of our common stock for periods of at least 180 days, and for a portion of the shares, 270 and 360 days from the date of this prospectus, as described below. As a result of these agreements and the provisions of our investors rights agreement described above under Description of Capital StockRegistration Rights, subject to the provisions of Rule 144 or Rule 701, shares will be available for sale in the public market as follows:
beginning on the date of this prospectus, the shares sold in this offering will be immediately available for sale in the public market;
beginning 181 days after the date of this prospectus, up to an aggregate of additional shares will become eligible for sale in the public market, of which shares will be held by affiliates and subject to the volume and other restrictions of Rule 144, as described below;
beginning 271 days after the date of this prospectus, up to an aggregate of additional shares will become eligible for sale in the public market, of which shares will be held by affiliates and subject to the volume and other restrictions of Rule 144, as described below;
beginning 361 days after the date of this prospectus, up to an aggregate of additional shares will become eligible for sale in the public market, of which shares will be held by affiliates and subject to the volume and other restrictions of Rule 144, as described below;
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the remainder of the shares will be eligible for sale in the public market from time to time thereafter, subject in some cases to the volume and other restrictions of Rule 144, as described below.
Lock-Up Agreements
Our executive officers, directors and stockholders holding substantially all of our outstanding capital stock are subject to lock-up agreements with the underwriters of this offering that restrict the stockholders ability to transfer shares of our common stock, subject to certain exceptions, for periods of at least 180 days, and for a portion of the shares, 270 and 360 days from the date of this prospectus, except with the prior written consent of Goldman, Sachs & Co. In addition, substantially all other holders of our common stock, options and warrants have previously entered into lock-up agreements with us not to sell or otherwise transfer any of their common stock or securities convertible into or exchangeable for shares of common stock for a period that extends until 181 days after the date of this prospectus.
See Underwriting for a more complete description of the lock-up agreements with the underwriters.
Rule 144
In general, under Rule 144 as currently in effect, a person who has beneficially owned shares of our restricted common stock for at least six months would be entitled to sell their securities provided that such person is not deemed to have been one of our affiliates at the time of, or at any time during the 90 days preceding, a sale, and we are subject to the periodic reporting requirements of the Exchange Act, for at least 90 days before the sale. In addition, under Rule 144, any person who is not an affiliate of ours and has held their shares for at least one year, including the holding period of any prior owner other than one of our affiliates, would be entitled to sell an unlimited number of shares immediately upon the completion of this offering without regard to whether current public information about us is available. Persons who have beneficially owned shares of our restricted common stock for at least six months but who are our affiliates at the time of, or any time during the 90 days preceding, a sale, would be subject to additional restrictions, by which such person would be entitled to sell within any three-month period only a number of securities that does not exceed the greater of either of the following:
1% of the number of common shares then outstanding, which will equal approximately shares immediately after this offering assuming no exercise of the underwriters option to purchase additional shares, based on the number of common shares outstanding as of December 31, 2014; or
the average weekly trading volume of our common shares during the four calendar weeks preceding the filing of a notice on Form 144 with respect to the sale;
provided, in each case, that we are subject to the Exchange Act periodic reporting requirements for at least 90 days before the sale. Such sales both by affiliates and by non-affiliates must also comply with the manner of sale, current public information and notice provisions of Rule 144.
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Rule 701
Any of our service providers who purchased shares under a written compensatory plan or contract prior to this offering may be entitled to rely on the resale provisions of Rule 701. Rule 701, as currently in effect, permits resales of shares, including by affiliates, in reliance upon Rule 144 but without compliance with certain restrictions, including the holding period requirement, of Rule 144. Rule 701 further provides that non-affiliates may sell such shares in reliance on Rule 144 without having to comply with the public information, volume limitation or notice provisions of Rule 144. All holders of Rule 701 shares are required to wait until 90 days after the date of this prospectus before selling such shares if such resale is done under Rule 701. All Rule 701 shares are, however, subject to lock-up agreements and will only become eligible for sale upon the expiration of these lock-up agreements.
Registration Rights
Upon completion of this offering, the holders of shares of our common stock will have registration rights. See Description of Capital StockRegistration Rights. All such shares are covered by lock-up agreements. Following the expiration of the lock-up period, registration of these shares under the Securities Act would result in the shares becoming freely tradable without restriction under the Securities Act immediately upon the effectiveness of the registration, except for shares purchased by our affiliates.
Form S-8 Registration Statements
We intend to file a registration statement on Form S-8 under the Securities Act covering all of the shares of common stock subject to options outstanding, as well as reserved for future issuance, under our stock plans. We expect to file this registration statement as soon as practicable after this offering. However, none of the shares registered on Form S-8 will be eligible for resale until the expiration of the lock-up agreements to which they are subject.
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Material U.S. Federal Income Tax Considerations for Non-U.S. Holders of Common Stock
The following is a discussion of the material U.S. federal income tax considerations with respect to the ownership and disposition of shares of common stock applicable to non-U.S. holders who acquire such shares in this offering and hold such shares as a capital asset within the meaning of Section 1221 of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended (the Code) (generally, property held for investment). For purposes of this discussion, a non-U.S. holder means a beneficial owner of our common stock (other than an entity or arrangement that is treated as a partnership for U.S. federal income tax purposes) that is not, for U.S. federal income tax purposes, any of the following:
a citizen or resident of the United States;
a corporation (or other entity treated as a corporation for U.S. federal income tax purposes) created or organized in the United States or under the laws of the United States, any state thereof or the District of Columbia, or any other corporation treated as such;
an estate, the income of which is includable in gross income for U.S. federal income tax purposes regardless of its source; or
a trust if (i) a court within the United States is able to exercise primary supervision over the administration of the trust and one or more U.S. persons, as defined under the Code, have the authority to control all substantial decisions of the trust or (ii) such trust has made a valid election to be treated as a U.S. person for U.S. federal income tax purposes.
This discussion is based on current provisions of the Code, Treasury regulations promulgated thereunder, judicial opinions, published positions of the Internal Revenue Service and other applicable authorities, all of which are subject to change (possibly with retroactive effect). This discussion does not address all aspects of U.S. federal income taxation that may be important to a particular non-U.S. holder in light of that non-U.S. holders individual circumstances, nor does it address any aspects of the unearned income Medicare contribution tax pursuant to the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010, any U.S. federal estate and gift taxes, any U.S. alternative minimum taxes or any state, local or non-U.S. taxes. This discussion may not apply, in whole or in part, to particular non-U.S. holders in light of their individual circumstances or to holders subject to special treatment under the U.S. federal income tax laws (such as insurance companies, tax-exempt organizations, financial institutions, brokers or dealers in securities, controlled foreign corporations, passive foreign investment companies, non-U.S. holders that hold our common stock as part of a straddle, hedge, conversion transaction or other integrated investment and certain U.S. expatriates).
If a partnership (or other entity or arrangement treated as a partnership for U.S. federal income tax purposes) holds our common stock, the tax treatment of a partner therein will generally depend on the status of the partner and the activities of the partnership. Partners of a partnership holding our common
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stock should consult their tax advisor as to the particular U.S. federal income tax consequences applicable to them.
THIS SUMMARY IS FOR GENERAL INFORMATION ONLY AND IS NOT INTENDED TO CONSTITUTE A COMPLETE DESCRIPTION OF ALL TAX CONSEQUENCES FOR NON-U.S. HOLDERS RELATING TO THE OWNERSHIP AND DISPOSITION OF OUR COMMON STOCK. PROSPECTIVE HOLDERS OF OUR COMMON STOCK SHOULD CONSULT WITH THEIR TAX ADVISORS REGARDING THE TAX CONSEQUENCES TO THEM (INCLUDING THE APPLICATION AND EFFECT OF ANY STATE, LOCAL, NON-U.S. INCOME AND OTHER TAX LAWS) OF THE OWNERSHIP AND DISPOSITION OF OUR COMMON STOCK.
Dividends
In general, the gross amount of any distribution we make to a non-U.S. holder with respect to its shares of common stock will be subject to U.S. withholding tax at a rate of 30% to the extent the distribution constitutes a dividend for U.S. federal income tax purposes, unless the non-U.S. holder is eligible for a reduced rate of withholding tax under an applicable tax treaty and the non-U.S. holder provides proper certification of its eligibility for such reduced rate (generally an applicable Internal Revenue Service Form W-8). A distribution will constitute a dividend for U.S. federal income tax purposes to the extent of our current or accumulated earnings and profits as determined for U.S. federal income tax purposes. To the extent any distribution does not constitute a dividend, it will be treated first as reducing the adjusted basis in the non-U.S. holders shares of common stock and then, to the extent it exceeds the adjusted basis in the non-U.S. holders shares of common stock, as gain from the sale or exchange of such stock. Any such gain will be subject to the treatment described below under Gain on Sale or Other Disposition of Common Stock.
Dividends we pay to a non-U.S. holder that are effectively connected with its conduct of a trade or business within the United States (and, if required by an applicable tax treaty, are attributable to a U.S. permanent establishment of such non-U.S. holder) will not be subject to U.S. withholding tax, as described above, if the non-U.S. holder complies with applicable certification and disclosure requirements. Instead, such dividends generally will be subject to U.S. federal income tax on a net income basis, at regular U.S. federal income tax rates. Dividends received by a non-U.S. corporation that are effectively connected with its conduct of trade or business within the United States may be subject to an additional branch profits tax at a rate of 30% (or such lower rate as may be specified by an applicable tax treaty).
Gain on Sale or Other Disposition of Common Stock
In general, a non-U.S. holder will not be subject to U.S. federal income tax on any gain realized upon the sale or other disposition of the non-U.S. holders shares of common stock unless:
the gain is effectively connected with a trade or business carried on by the non-U.S. holder within the United States (and, if required by an applicable tax treaty, is attributable to a U.S. permanent establishment of such non-U.S. holder);
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the non-U.S. holder is an individual and is present in the United States for 183 days or more in the taxable year of disposition and certain other conditions are met; or
we are or have been a U.S. real property holding corporation for U.S. federal income tax purposes at any time within the shorter of the five-year period preceding such disposition or such non-U.S. holders holding period of our common stock, and the non-U.S. holder has held, at any time during said period, more than 5% of the class of our stock being sold.
Gain that is effectively connected with the conduct of a trade or business in the United States (or so treated) generally will be subject to U.S. federal income tax on a net income tax basis, at regular U.S. federal income tax rates. If the non-U.S. holder is a non-U.S. corporation, the branch profits tax described above also may apply to such effectively connected gain. An individual non-U.S. holder who is subject to U.S. federal income tax because the non-U.S. holder was present in the United States for 183 days or more during the year of sale or other disposition of our common stock will be subject to a flat 30% tax on the gain derived from such sale or other disposition, which may be offset by U.S. source capital losses. We believe that we are not and we do not anticipate becoming a U.S. real property holding corporation for U.S. federal income tax purposes.
Withholdable Payments to Foreign Financial Institutions and Other Non-U.S. Entities
The Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, or FATCA, will impose a U.S. federal withholding tax of 30% on certain payments to foreign financial institutions, investment funds and certain other non-U.S. persons that fail to comply with certain information reporting and certification requirements pertaining to their direct and indirect U.S. securityholders and/or U.S. accountholders. Such payments would include our dividends and the gross proceeds from the sale or other disposition of our common stock. Under applicable Treasury Regulations, this withholding will apply to payments of dividends on our common stock, and to payments of gross proceeds from a sale or other disposition of our common stock made on or after January 1, 2017. Prospective investors are encouraged to consult with their own tax advisors regarding the possible implications of this legislation on their investment in our common stock.
Backup Withholding, Information Reporting and Other Reporting Requirements
We must report annually to the Internal Revenue Service and to each non-U.S. holder the amount of dividends paid to, and the tax withheld with respect to, each non-U.S. holder. These reporting requirements apply regardless of whether withholding was reduced or eliminated by an applicable tax treaty. Copies of this information reporting may also be made available under the provisions of a specific tax treaty or agreement with the tax authorities in the country in which the non-U.S. holder resides or is established.
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A non-U.S. holder will generally be subject to backup withholding for dividends on our common stock paid to such holder unless such holder certifies under penalties of perjury (generally by providing an applicable Internal Revenue Service form W-8) that, among other things, it is a non-U.S. holder (and the payor does not have actual knowledge or reason to know that such holder is a U.S. person) or otherwise establishes an exemption.
Information reporting and backup withholding generally are not required with respect to the amount of any proceeds from the sale or other disposition of our common stock by a non-U.S. holder outside the United States through an office outside the United States of a non-U.S. broker that does not have certain specified connections to the United States. However, if a non-U.S. holder sells or otherwise disposes of its shares of common stock through a U.S. broker or the U.S. offices of a non-U.S. broker, the broker will generally be required to report the amount of proceeds paid to the non-U.S. holder to the Internal Revenue Service and also backup withhold on that amount unless such non-U.S. holder provides appropriate certification to the broker of its status as a non-U.S. person (and the payor does not have actual knowledge or reason to know that such holder is a U.S. person) or otherwise establishes an exemption. Information reporting will also apply if a non-U.S. holder sells its shares of common stock through a non-U.S. broker deriving more than a specified percentage of its income from U.S. sources or having certain other connections to the United States, unless such broker has documentary evidence in its records that such non-U.S. holder is a non-U.S. person (and the payor does not have actual knowledge or reason to know that such holder is a U.S. person) and certain other conditions are met, or such non-U.S. holder otherwise establishes an exemption.
Backup withholding is not an additional income tax. Any amounts withheld under the backup withholding rules from a payment to a non-U.S. holder generally can be credited against the non-U.S. holders U.S. federal income tax liability, if any, or refunded, provided that the required information is furnished to the Internal Revenue Service in a timely manner. Non-U.S. holders should consult their tax advisors regarding the application of the information reporting and backup withholding rules to them.
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Underwriting
The company, the selling stockholders and the underwriters named below have entered into an underwriting agreement with respect to the shares being offered. Subject to certain conditions, each underwriter has severally agreed to purchase the number of shares indicated in the following table. Goldman, Sachs & Co. is the representative of the underwriters.
Underwriters Number of Shares Goldman, Sachs & Co. Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC Allen & Company LLC Total
The underwriters are committed to take and pay for all of the shares being offered, if any are taken, other than the shares covered by the option described below unless and until this option is exercised.
The underwriters have an option to buy up to an additional shares from the company to cover sales by the underwriters of a greater number of shares than the total number in the table above. They may exercise that option for 30 days. If any shares are purchased pursuant to this option, the underwriters will severally purchase shares in approximately the same proportion as in the table above.
The following tables show the per share and total estimated underwriting discounts and commissions to be paid to the underwriters by the company and the selling stockholders. Such amounts are shown assuming both no exercise and full exercise of the underwriters option to purchase additional shares.
Paid by the Company No Exercise Full Exercise Per Share $ $ Total $ $
Paid by the Selling Stockholders No Exercise Full Exercise Per Share $ $ Total $ $
Shares sold by the underwriters to the public will initially be offered at the initial public offering price on the cover of this prospectus. Any shares sold by the underwriters to securities dealers may be sold at a discount of up to $ per share from the initial public offering price. After the initial offering of the shares, the representative may change the offering price and the other selling terms. The offering of the shares by the underwriters is subject to receipt and acceptance and subject to the underwriters right to reject any order in whole or in part.
The company and its officers, directors and holders of substantially all of the companys capital stock, including the selling stockholders, have agreed with the underwriters, subject to certain exceptions, not to dispose of or hedge any of their common stock or securities convertible into or exchangeable for shares of
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common stock during periods of at least 180 days, and for a portion of the shares, 270 and 360 days from the date of this prospectus, except with the prior written consent of Goldman, Sachs & Co. This agreement does not apply to any existing employee benefit plans. See Shares Available for Future Sale for a discussion of certain transfer restrictions.
Prior to the offering, there has been no public market for the shares. The initial public offering price will be negotiated among the company and the representative. Among the factors to be considered in determining the initial public offering price of the shares, in addition to prevailing market conditions, will be the companys historical performance, estimates of the business potential and earnings prospects of the company, an assessment of the companys management and the consideration of the above factors in relation to market valuation of companies in related businesses.
The company intends to apply to list the common stock on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the symbol ETSY.
In connection with the offering, the underwriters may purchase and sell shares of common stock in the open market. These transactions may include short sales, stabilizing transactions and purchases to cover positions created by short sales. Short sales involve the sale by the underwriters of a greater number of shares than they are required to purchase in the offering, and a short position represents the amount of such sales that have not been covered by subsequent purchases. A covered short position is a short position that is not greater than the amount of additional shares for which the underwriters option described above may be exercised. The underwriters may cover any covered short position by either exercising their option to purchase additional shares or purchasing shares in the open market. In determining the source of shares to cover the covered short position, the underwriters will consider, among other things, the price of shares available for purchase in the open market as compared to the price at which they may purchase additional shares pursuant to the option described above. Naked short sales are any short sales that create a short position greater than the amount of additional shares for which the option described above may be exercised. The underwriters must cover any such naked short position by purchasing shares in the open market. A naked short position is more likely to be created if the underwriters are concerned that there may be downward pressure on the price of the common stock in the open market after pricing that could adversely affect investors who purchase in the offering. Stabilizing transactions consist of various bids for or purchases of common stock made by the underwriters in the open market prior to the completion of the offering.
The underwriters may also impose a penalty bid. This occurs when a particular underwriter repays to the underwriters a portion of the underwriting discount received by it because the representative has repurchased shares sold by or for the account of such underwriter in stabilizing or short covering transactions.
Purchases to cover a short position and stabilizing transactions, as well as other purchases by the underwriters for their own accounts, may have the effect of preventing or retarding a decline in the market price of the companys stock, and together with the imposition of the penalty bid, may stabilize, maintain or
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otherwise affect the market price of the common stock. As a result, the price of the common stock may be higher than the price that otherwise might exist in the open market. The underwriters are not required to engage in these activities and may end any of these activities at any time. These transactions may be effected on , in the over-the-counter market or otherwise.
The underwriters do not expect sales to discretionary accounts to exceed five percent of the total number of shares offered.
The company and the selling stockholders estimate that the total expenses of the offering, including registration, filing and listing fees, printing fees and legal and accounting expenses and the expenses of Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, or FINRA, qualification, but excluding estimated underwriting discounts and commissions, will be approximately $ . We have agreed to reimburse the underwriters for up to $ of expenses relating to clearance of this offering with FINRA.
The company and the selling stockholders have agreed to indemnify the several underwriters against certain liabilities, including liabilities under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended.
The underwriters and their respective affiliates are full service financial institutions engaged in various activities, which may include sales and trading, commercial and investment banking, advisory, investment management, investment research, principal investment, hedging, market making, brokerage and other financial and non-financial activities and services. Certain of the underwriters and their respective affiliates have provided, and may in the future provide, a variety of these services to the issuer and to persons and entities with relationships with the issuer, for which they received or will receive customary fees and expenses. For example, affiliates of Goldman, Sachs & Co. and Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC are lenders under our Credit Agreement.
In the ordinary course of their various business activities, the underwriters and their respective affiliates, officers, directors and employees may purchase, sell or hold a broad array of investments and actively trade securities, derivatives, loans, commodities, currencies, credit default swaps and other financial instruments for their own account and for the accounts of their customers, and such investment and trading activities may involve or relate to assets, securities and/or instruments of the issuer (directly, as collateral securing other obligations or otherwise) and/or persons and entities with relationships with the issuer. The underwriters and their respective affiliates may also communicate independent investment recommendations, market color or trading ideas and/or publish or express independent research views in respect of such assets, securities or instruments and may at any time hold, or recommend to clients that they should acquire, long and/or short positions in such assets, securities and instruments. In addition, M. Michele Burns, a member of the companys board of directors, is also a member of the board of directors of The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc., an affiliate of Goldman, Sachs & Co., an underwriter in this offering.
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IPO Participation Program
At our request, the underwriters have reserved up to 5% of the shares of common stock offered by this prospectus for sale, at the initial public offering price, to individual investors. We call this our IPO Participation Program, or IPP. The purpose of the IPP is to allow our U.S.-based Etsy community and other individual investors to participate in our IPO.
Sales in the IPP will be made at our direction by Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC, an underwriter of this offering, or its affiliates. We do not know if individual investors will choose to purchase all or any portion of these reserved shares, but any purchases they do make will reduce the number of shares available in the overall offering. Any reserved shares not purchased in the IPP will be offered by the underwriters to the general public on the same terms as the other shares of common stock.
Notice to Prospective Investors in the European Economic Area
In relation to each Member State of the European Economic Area which has implemented the Prospectus Directive (each, a Relevant Member State), each underwriter has represented and agreed that with effect from and including the date on which the Prospectus Directive is implemented in that Relevant Member State (the Relevant Implementation Date) it has not made and will not make an offer of shares to the public in that Relevant Member State prior to the publication of a prospectus in relation to the shares which has been approved by the competent authority in that Relevant Member State or, where appropriate, approved in another Relevant Member State and notified to the competent authority in that Relevant Member State, all in accordance with the Prospectus Directive, except that it may, with effect from and including the Relevant Implementation Date, make an offer of shares to the public in that Relevant Member State at any time:
(a) to legal entities which are authorised or regulated to operate in the financial markets or, if not so authorised or regulated, whose corporate purpose is solely to invest in securities;
(b) to any legal entity which has two or more of (1) an average of at least 250 employees during the last financial year; (2) a total balance sheet of more than 43,000,000 and (3) an annual net turnover of more than 50,000,000, as shown in its last annual or consolidated accounts;
(c) to fewer than 100 natural or legal persons (other than qualified investors as defined in the Prospectus Directive) subject to obtaining the prior consent of the representative for any such offer; or
(d) in any other circumstances which do not require the publication by the Issuer of a prospectus pursuant to Article 3 of the Prospectus Directive.
For the purposes of this provision, the expression an offer of shares to the public in relation to any shares in any Relevant Member State means the communication in any form and by any means of sufficient information on the terms of the offer and the shares to be offered so as to enable an investor to decide to
167
purchase or subscribe the shares, as the same may be varied in that Relevant Member State by any measure implementing the Prospectus Directive in that Relevant Member State and the expression Prospectus Directive means Directive 2003/71/EC and includes any relevant implementing measure in each Relevant Member State.
Notice to Prospective Investors in the United Kingdom
Each underwriter has represented and agreed that:
(a) it has only communicated or caused to be communicated and will only communicate or cause to be communicated an invitation or inducement to engage in investment activity (within the meaning of Section 21 of the FSMA) received by it in connection with the issue or sale of the shares in circumstances in which Section 21(1) of the FSMA does not apply to the Issuer; and
(b) it has complied and will comply with all applicable provisions of the FSMA with respect to anything done by it in relation to the shares in, from or otherwise involving the United Kingdom.
Notice to Prospective Investors in Hong Kong
The shares may not be offered or sold by means of any document other than (i) in circumstances which do not constitute an offer to the public within the meaning of the Companies Ordinance (Cap.32, Laws of Hong Kong), or (ii) to professional investors within the meaning of the Securities and Futures Ordinance (Cap.571, Laws of Hong Kong) and any rules made thereunder, or (iii) in other circumstances which do not result in the document being a prospectus within the meaning of the Companies Ordinance (Cap.32, Laws of Hong Kong), and no advertisement, invitation or document relating to the shares may be issued or may be in the possession of any person for the purpose of issue (in each case whether in Hong Kong or elsewhere), which is directed at, or the contents of which are likely to be accessed or read by, the public in Hong Kong (except if permitted to do so under the laws of Hong Kong) other than with respect to shares which are or are intended to be disposed of only to persons outside Hong Kong or only to professional investors within the meaning of the Securities and Futures Ordinance (Cap. 571, Laws of Hong Kong) and any rules made thereunder.
Notice to Prospective Investors in Singapore
This prospectus has not been registered as a prospectus with the Monetary Authority of Singapore. Accordingly, this prospectus and any other document or material in connection with the offer or sale, or invitation for subscription or purchase, of the shares may not be circulated or distributed, nor may the shares be offered or sold, or be made the subject of an invitation for subscription or purchase, whether directly or indirectly, to persons in Singapore other than (i) to an institutional investor under Section 274 of the Securities and Futures Act, Chapter 289 of Singapore (the SFA), (ii) to a relevant person, or any person
168
pursuant to Section 275(1A), and in accordance with the conditions, specified in Section 275 of the SFA or (iii) otherwise pursuant to, and in accordance with the conditions of, any other applicable provision of the SFA.
Where the shares are subscribed or purchased under Section 275 by a relevant person which is: (a) a corporation (which is not an accredited investor) the sole business of which is to hold investments and the entire share capital of which is owned by one or more individuals, each of whom is an accredited investor; or (b) a trust (where the trustee is not an accredited investor) whose sole purpose is to hold investments and each beneficiary is an accredited investor, shares, debentures and units of shares and debentures of that corporation or the beneficiaries rights and interest in that trust shall not be transferable for 6 months after that corporation or that trust has acquired the shares under Section 275 except: (1) to an institutional investor under Section 274 of the SFA or to a relevant person, or any person pursuant to Section 275(1A), and in accordance with the conditions, specified in Section 275 of the SFA; (2) where no consideration is given for the transfer; or (3) by operation of law.
Notice to Prospective Investors in Japan
The securities have not been and will not be registered under the Financial Instruments and Exchange Law of Japan (the Financial Instruments and Exchange Law) and each underwriter has agreed that it will not offer or sell any securities, directly or indirectly, in Japan or to, or for the benefit of, any resident of Japan (which term as used herein means any person resident in Japan, including any corporation or other entity organized under the laws of Japan), or to others for re-offering or resale, directly or indirectly, in Japan or to a resident of Japan, except pursuant to an exemption from the registration requirements of, and otherwise in compliance with, the Financial Instruments and Exchange Law and any other applicable laws, regulations and ministerial guidelines of Japan.
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Legal Matters
The validity of the shares of common stock offered by this prospectus will be passed upon for us by Gunderson Dettmer Stough Villeneuve Franklin & Hachigian, LLP, New York, New York. As of the date of this prospectus, an investment fund associated with Gunderson Dettmer Stough Villeneuve Franklin & Hachigian, LLP beneficially owned less than 0.25% of the outstanding shares of our common stock. The underwriters have been represented by Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP, Menlo Park, California.
Experts
The consolidated financial statements of Etsy, Inc. as of December 31, 2013 and 2014 and for each of the three years in the period ended December 31, 2014 included in this prospectus have been so included in reliance on the report of PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, an independent registered public accounting firm, given on the authority of said firm as experts in auditing and accounting.
The financial statements of Jarvis Labs, Inc. as of December 31, 2012 and 2013, for the period from June 11, 2012 (inception) to December 31, 2012 and for the year ended December 31, 2013 included in this prospectus have been so included in reliance on the report of PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, an independent registered public accounting firm, given on the authority of said firm as experts in auditing and accounting.
The financial statements of Incubart SAS as of December 31, 2012 and 2013 and for each of the two years in the period ended December 31, 2013 included in this prospectus have been so included in reliance of the report of PricewaterhouseCoopers Audit, independent accountants, given on the authority of said firm as experts in auditing and accounting.
Where You Can Find More Information
We have filed with the SEC a registration statement on Form S-1 under the Securities Act with respect to the shares of common stock offered hereby. This prospectus, which constitutes a part of the registration statement, does not contain all of the information set forth in the registration statement or the exhibits filed therewith. For further information about us and the common stock offered hereby, reference is made to the registration statement and the exhibits filed therewith. Statements contained in this prospectus regarding the contents of any contract or any other document that is filed as an exhibit to the registration statement are not necessarily complete, and in each instance we refer you to the copy of such contract or other document filed as an exhibit to the registration statement.
You may inspect a copy of the registration statement and the exhibits and schedules to the registration statement without charge at the offices of the SEC at 100 F Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20549. You may obtain copies of all or any part of the registration statement from the public reference section of the SEC, 100 F Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20549 upon the payment of the prescribed fees. You may obtain
170
information on the operation of the public reference room by calling the SEC at 1-800-SEC-0330. The SEC maintains a website at www.sec.gov that contains reports, proxy and information statements and other information regarding registrants like us that file electronically with the SEC. You can also inspect our registration statement on this website.
Upon the completion of this offering, we will be subject to the information reporting requirements of the Securities Act and we will file reports, proxy statements and other information with the SEC. These reports, proxy statements and other information will be available for inspection and copying at the public reference room and website of the SEC referred to above. We also maintain a website at www.etsy.com, at which you may access these materials free of charge as soon as reasonably practicable after they are electronically filed with, or furnished to, the SEC. Information contained on our website is not incorporated by reference into this prospectus, and you should not consider information contained on our website to be part of this prospectus or in deciding whether to invest in our common stock.
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Index to the Consolidated Financial Statements
F-1
Report of Independent Registered Public Accounting Firm
To the Stockholders and Board of Directors of Etsy, Inc.:
In our opinion, the accompanying consolidated balance sheets and the related consolidated statements of operations, comprehensive (loss) income, changes in convertible preferred stock and stockholders (deficit) equity and cash flows present fairly, in all material respects, the financial position of Etsy, Inc. (the Company) and its subsidiaries at December 31, 2014 and 2013, and the results of their operations and their cash flows for each of the three years in the period ended December 31, 2014 in conformity with accounting principles generally accepted in the United States of America. These financial statements are the responsibility of the Companys management. Our responsibility is to express an opinion on these financial statements based on our audits. We conducted our audits of these statements in accordance with the standards of the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (United States). Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain reasonable assurance about whether the financial statements are free of material misstatement. An audit includes examining, on a test basis, evidence supporting the amounts and disclosures in the financial statements, assessing the accounting principles used and significant estimates made by management, and evaluating the overall financial statement presentation. We believe that our audits provide a reasonable basis for our opinion.
/s/ PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP
New York, New York
March 4, 2015
F-2
Etsy, Inc.
Consolidated Balance Sheets
(In thousands except share and per share data)
As of
December 31,
2013 As of
December 31,
2014 Pro Forma as of
December 31,
2014 (Unaudited) ASSETS Current assets: Cash and cash equivalents $ 36,795 $ 69,659 $ 69,659 Short-term investments 18,075 19,184 19,184 Accounts receivable, net of allowance for doubtful accounts of $1,279 and $1,841 as of December 31, 2013 and 2014, respectively 11,102 15,404 15,404 Prepaid and other current assets 3,721 12,241 12,241 Deferred tax assetscurrent 1,802 2,932 2,932 Funds receivable and seller accounts 5,290 10,573 10,573 Total current assets 76,785 129,993 129,993 Restricted cash 5,341 5,341 Property and equipment, net 23,107 75,538 75,538 Goodwill 5,346 30,831 30,831 Intangible assets, net 493 5,410 5,410 Other assets 428 2,022 2,022 Total assets $ 106,159 $ 249,135 $ 249,135 LIABILITIES, CONVERTIBLE PREFERRED STOCK AND STOCKHOLDERS EQUITY Current liabilities: Accounts payable $ 5,346 $ 8,231 $ 8,231 Accrued expenses and other current liabilities 5,043 17,442 17,442 Capital lease obligationscurrent portion 780 1,755 1,755 Funds payable and amounts due to sellers 5,290 10,573 10,573 Deferred revenue 2,760 3,452 3,452 Total current liabilities 19,219 41,453 41,453 Capital lease obligationsnet of current portion 38 3,148 3,148 Warrant liability 1,428 1,920 Deferred tax liabilities 1,259 3,081 3,081 Facility financing obligation 50,320 50,320 Other liabilities 1,913 1,913 Total liabilities 21,944 101,835 99,915
F-3
Etsy, Inc.
Consolidated Balance Sheets
(In thousands except share and per share data)
As of
December 31,
2013 As of
December 31,
2014 Pro Forma as of
December 31,
2014 (Unaudited) Commitments and contingencies Convertible preferred stock: Series A and A-1 convertible preferred stock ($0.001 par value, 2,363,786 shares authorized; 2,363,786 shares issued and outstanding as of December 31, 2013 and 2014 and no shares issued and outstanding pro forma; $808 aggregate liquidation preference as of December 31, 2013 and 2014) 808 808 Series B convertible preferred stock ($0.001 par value, 1,128,431 shares authorized; 1,128,425 shares issued and outstanding as of December 31, 2013 and 2014 and no shares issued and outstanding pro forma; $903 aggregate liquidation preference as of December 31, 2013 and 2014) 865 865 Series C convertible preferred stock ($0.001 par value, 1,234,084 shares authorized; 1,222,282 shares issued and outstanding as of December 31, 2013 and 2014 and no shares issued and outstanding pro forma; $3,263 aggregate liquidation preference as of December 31, 2013 and 2014) 3,361 3,361 Series D and D-1 convertible preferred stock ($0.001 par value, 4,240,120 shares authorized; 4,215,610 shares issued and outstanding as of December 31, 2013 and 2014 and no shares issued and outstanding pro forma; $27,949 aggregate liquidation preference as of December 31, 2013 and 2014) 27,870 27,870 Series E convertible preferred stock ($0.001 par value, 401,450 shares authorized; 396,727 shares issued and outstanding as of December 31, 2013 and 2014 and no shares issued and outstanding pro forma; $6,300 aggregate liquidation preference as of December 31, 2013 and 2014) 6,201 6,201 Series 1 convertible preferred stock ($0.001 par value, 203,399 shares authorized; 203,399 shares issued and outstanding as of December 31, 2013 and 2014 and no shares issued and outstanding pro forma; $1,312 aggregate liquidation preference as of December 31, 2013 and 2014) 1,322 1,322 Series F convertible preferred stock ($0.001 par value, 11,594,203 shares authorized; 11,594,203 shares issued and outstanding as of December 31, 2013 and 2014 and no shares issued and outstanding pro forma; $40,000 aggregate liquidation preference as of December 31, 2013 and 2014) 39,785 39,785 Total convertible preferred stock 80,212 80,212 Stockholders equity: Common stock ($0.001 par value, 205,000,000 shares authorized as of December 31, 2013 and 240,000,000 shares authorized as of December 31, 2014 and pro forma December 31, 2014; 66,165,965, 88,361,973 and 195,258,466 shares issued and outstanding as of December 31, 2013 and December 31, 2014 and pro forma December 31, 2014, respectively) 66 88 195 Additional paid-in capital 20,911 103,311 185,336 Accumulated deficit (17,134) (32,377) (32,377) Accumulated other comprehensive (loss) income 160 (3,934) (3,934) Total stockholders equity 4,003 67,088 149,220 Total liabilities, convertible preferred stock and stockholders equity $ 106,159 $ 249,135 $ 249,135
The accompanying notes are an integral part of these consolidated financial statements
F-4
Etsy, Inc.
Consolidated Statements of Operations
(In thousands except share and per share data)
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 Revenue $ 74,602 $ 125,022 $ 195,591 Cost of revenue 24,493 47,779 73,633 Gross profit 50,109 77,243 121,958 Operating expenses: Marketing 10,902 17,850 39,655 Product development 18,653 27,548 36,634 General and administrative 21,909 31,112 51,920 Total operating expenses 51,464 76,510 128,209 (Loss) income from operations (1,355) 733 (6,251) Other (expense) income: Interest expense and amortization of deferred financing costs (486) (302) (590) Interest and dividend income 48 46 41 Net unrealized loss on warrant and other liabilities (737) (419) (411) Foreign exchange loss (3,049) Total other expense (1,175) (675) (4,009) (Loss) income before income taxes (2,530) 58 (10,260) Benefit (provision) for income taxes 145 (854) (4,983) Net loss $ (2,385) $ (796) $ (15,243) Deemed dividend to investors in relation to the tender offer (256) Net loss attributable to common stockholdersbasic $ (2,641) $ (796) $ (15,243) Undistributed earnings reallocated from convertible preferred stock Net loss attributable to common stockholdersdiluted $ (2,641) $ (796) $ (15,243) Net loss per share attributable to common stockholders: Basic $ (0.04) $ (0.01) $ (0.19) Diluted $ (0.04) $ (0.01) $ (0.19) Weighted average common shares outstanding: Basic 60,563,723 65,334,548 80,493,407 Diluted 60,563,723 65,334,548 80,493,407 Pro forma net loss per share attributable to common stockholders (unaudited): Basic $ (0.08) Diluted $ (0.08) Pro forma weighted average common shares outstanding (unaudited): Basic 187,389,900 Diluted 187,389,900
The accompanying notes are an integral part of these consolidated financial statements
F-5
Etsy, Inc.
Consolidated Statements of Comprehensive (Loss) Income
(In thousands)
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 Net loss $ (2,385) $ (796) $ (15,243) Other comprehensive (loss) income: Cumulative translation adjustment (26) 221 (4,091) Unrealized losses on marketable securities, net of tax (9) (3) Other comprehensive (loss) income (26) 212 (4,094) Comprehensive loss $ (2,411) $ (584) $ (19,337)
The accompanying notes are an integral part of these consolidated financial statements
F-6
Etsy, Inc.
Consolidated Statements of Changes in Convertible Preferred Stock and Stockholders (Deficit) Equity
(In thousands except share and per share data)
Series A
and A-1
Convertible
Preferred
Stock Series B
Convertible
Preferred
Stock Series C
Convertible
Preferred
Stock Series D
and D-1
Convertible
Preferred
Stock Series E
Convertible
Preferred
Stock Series 1
Convertible
Preferred
Stock Series F
Convertible
Preferred
Stock Common
Stock Treasury
Stock Addi-
tional
Paid-in
Capital Accum-
ulated
Deficit Accumu-
lated
Other
Compre-
hensive
(Loss)
Income Total Shares Amount Shares Amount Shares Amount Shares Amount Shares Amount Shares Amount Shares Amount Shares Amount Shares Amount Balance as of December 31, 2011 2,363,786 $ 808 1,128,431 $ 865 1,217,230 $ 3,207 4,215,610 $ 27,870 396,727 $ 6,201 203,399 $ 1,322 $ 59,571,970 $ 59 (1,277,590) $ (1) $ 6,553 $ (13,697) $ (26) $ (7,112) Stock options expense 4,297 4,297 Exercise of vested options 5,889,452 6 4,628 4,634 Exercise of Convertible Series C Warrants 5,056 Issuance of Series F Preferred Shares at $3.45 per share, net of issuance cost of $215,262 11,594,203 39,785 Repurchase of shares (6) (4) (20,000) (60) (60) Fair value of exercised warrants 154 Deemed dividend on share transaction 256 (256) Other comprehensive loss (26) (26) Net loss (2,385) (2,385) Balance as of December 31, 2012 2,363,786 808 1,128,425 865 1,222,282 3,361 4,215,610 27,870 396,727 6,201 203,399 1,322 11,594,203 39,785 65,461,422 65 (1,297,590) (1) 15,674 (16,338) (52) (652) Stock options expense 4,077 4,077 Exercise of vested options 2,049,133 2 1,326 1,328 Repurchase of shares (47,000) (188) (188) Retirement of repurchased shares (1,344,590) (1) 1,344,590 1 Excess tax benefit from the exercise of stock options 22 22 Other comprehensive
income 212 212 Net loss (796) (796) Balance as of December 31, 2013 2,363,786 808 1,128,425 865 1,222,282 3,361 4,215,610 27,870 396,727 6,201 203,399 1,322 11,594,203 39,785 66,165,965 66 20,911 (17,134) 160 4,003 Stock options expense 6,110 6,110 Exercise of vested options 8,431,282 8 7,948 7,956 Issuance of common stock 6,603,774 7 34,993 35,000 Issuance of stock at acquisition date 7,160,952 7 27,716 27,723 Stock expense-acquisitions 756 756 Excess tax benefit from the exercise of stock options 4,877 4,877 Other comprehensive loss (4,094) (4,094) Net loss (15,243) (15,243) Balance as of December 31, 2014 2,363,786 $ 808 1,128,425 $ 865 1,222,282 $ 3,361 4,215,610 $ 27,870 396,727 $ 6,201 203,399 $ 1,322 11,594,203 $ 39,785 88,361,973 $ 88 $ $ 103,311 $ (32,377) $ (3,934) $ 67,088
The accompanying notes are an integral part of these consolidated financial statements
F-7
Etsy, Inc.
Consolidated Statements of Cash Flows
(In thousands)
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 Cash flows from operating activities Net loss $ (2,385) $ (796) $ (15,243) Adjustments to reconcile net loss to net cash provided by operating activities: Stock-based compensation expense 4,094 3,834 5,920 Stock-based compensation expense-acquisitions 4,130 Depreciation and amortization expense 7,930 12,380 17,223 Bad debt expense 1,295 1,002 1,881 Foreign exchange loss 3,049 Amortization of debt issuance costs 14 8 68 Net unrealized loss on warrant and other liabilities 737 419 411 Loss on disposal of assets 125 677 79 Deferred income taxes (736) 1,282 (817) Excess tax benefit from exercise of stock options (22) (4,877) Changes in operating assets and liabilities, net of acquisitions: Accounts receivable (4,046) (4,832) (6,197) Funds receivable and seller accounts (2,258) (2,907) (3,975) Prepaid expenses and other current assets (426) (1,667) (5,820) Other assets (83) (295) (1,446) Accounts payable 2,340 1,712 1,046 Accrued liabilities 430 1,960 11,463 Funds payable and amounts due to sellers 2,258 2,993 3,880 Deferred revenue 395 794 693 Other liabilities 619 Net cash provided by operating activities 9,684 16,542 12,087 Cash flows from investing activities Acquisition of businesses, net of cash acquired (200) (675) (4,688) Purchases of property and equipment (6,528) (7,762) (1,304) Development of internal-use software (7,418) (9,310) (8,280) Purchase of U.S. Government and agency bills (16,081) (39) (21,698) Sale of marketable securities 1,350 2,761 20,588 Net increase in restricted cash (5,341) Net cash used in investing activities (28,877) (15,025) (20,723) Cash flows from financing activities Proceeds from the issuance of preferred stock 39,785 Repurchase of stock (60) (188) Proceeds from the issuance of common stock 35,000 Proceeds from exercise of stock options 4,634 1,328 7,956 Excess tax benefit from the exercise of stock options 22 4,877 Payments on capitalized lease obligations (1,387) (1,265) (1,480) Deferred payments on acquisition of business (75) Payments relating to public offering (1,041) Net cash provided by (used in) financing activities 42,972 (103) 45,237 Effect of exchange rate changes on cash (27) 446 (3,737) Net increase in cash and cash equivalents 23,752 1,860 32,864 Cash and cash equivalents at beginning of period 11,183 34,935 36,795 Cash and cash equivalents at end of period $ 34,935 $ 36,795 $ 69,659 Supplemental cash flow disclosures: Cash paid for interest $ 431 $ 233 $ 342 Cash paid for income taxes $ 264 $ 206 $ 217
F-8
Etsy, Inc.
Consolidated Statements of Cash Flows
(In thousands)
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 Supplemental non-cash disclosures Equipment acquired under capital lease obligations $ 581 $ $ 5,564 Stock-based compensation capitalized in development of capitalized software $ 203 $ 243 $ 190 Fair value of exercised liability-classified warrants $ 154 $ $ Non-cash additions to development of internal-use software and property and equipment $ 414 $ 398 $ 2,510 Non-cash addition to construction in progress related to build-to-suit lease and facility financing obligation $ $ $ 50,320 Non-cash addition to capitalized public offering costs $ $ $ 1,413 Fair value of common stock issued in acquisition $ $ $ 27,723
The accompanying notes are an integral part of these consolidated financial statements
F-9
Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
Note 1Basis of Presentation and Summary of Significant Accounting Policies
Description of Business
Etsy, Inc. (the Company or Etsy) was incorporated in Delaware in February 2006. Etsy operates a marketplace where people around the world connect, both online and offline, to make, sell and buy unique goods. The Company generates revenue primarily from transaction and listing fees, Promoted Listings, Direct Checkout fees, and Shipping Label sales.
Evaluation of Subsequent Events
The Company has evaluated subsequent events that occurred after December 31, 2014 through March 4, 2015, the date on which the consolidated financial statements for the year ended December 31, 2014 were issued.
Basis of Consolidation
The consolidated financial statements include the accounts of Etsy and its wholly-owned subsidiaries. All intercompany balances and transactions have been eliminated in consolidation. The 2012 and 2013 financial statements have been revised to correct certain errors. See Note 15Revisions to Consolidated Financial Statements.
Unaudited Pro Forma Financial Information
Upon the consummation of the initial public offering contemplated by the Company, all of the outstanding shares of convertible preferred stock will convert into shares of common stock. The December 31, 2014 unaudited pro forma consolidated balance sheet data has been prepared assuming the conversion of the outstanding convertible preferred stock into 106,896,493 shares of common stock.
Use of Estimates
The preparation of the Companys consolidated financial statements in conformity with accounting principles generally accepted in the United States of America (GAAP) requires management to make estimates and judgments that affect the reported amounts of assets and liabilities and disclosure of contingent assets and liabilities at the date of the financial statements and the reported amounts of revenues and expenses during the reporting period. The accounting estimates that require managements most difficult and subjective judgments include revenue recognition, income taxes, website development costs and internal-use software, purchase price allocations for business combinations, valuation of goodwill and intangible assets and stock based compensation. The Company evaluates its estimates and judgments on an ongoing basis and revises them when necessary. Actual results may differ from the original or revised estimates.
F-10
Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
Revenue Recognition
The Company operates a platform for third-party sellers. Its business model is based on shared success: the Company makes money when Etsy sellers make money. The Company does not compete with Etsy sellers, hold inventory or sell goods. The Companys revenue is diversified, generated from a mix of marketplace activities and the services the Company provides Etsy sellers to help them create and grow their businesses. The Companys revenue consists of Marketplace revenue, Seller Services revenue and Other revenue. The Companys revenue is recorded net of actual and expected refunds. Marketplace revenue includes the fee an Etsy seller pays for each completed transaction and the listing fee an Etsy seller pays for each item she lists. Seller Services revenue includes fees an Etsy seller pays for services such as prominent placement in search results via Promoted Listings, payment processing via Direct Checkout and purchases of shipping labels through the Companys platform via Shipping Labels. The Company deducts its cost of shipping labels and estimated refunds from gross shipping fees to determine net shipping fees. Other revenue includes the fees the Company receives from a third-party payment processor.
The Company recognizes revenue when all of the following conditions are satisfied: (1) there is persuasive evidence of an arrangement; (2) the service has been provided to the Etsy seller; (3) the collection of fees is reasonably assured; and (4) the amount of fees to be paid by the Etsy seller is fixed or determinable. The Company evaluates whether it is appropriate to recognize revenue on a gross or net basis based upon its evaluation of whether it is the primary obligor in a transaction, has inventory risk and has latitude in establishing pricing and selecting suppliers. Based on its evaluation of these factors, revenue is recorded net of merchandise values associated with the transaction.
Marketplace revenue. Marketplace revenue consists of the 3.5% fee that an Etsy seller pays for each completed transaction on the Companys platform, exclusive of shipping fees charged. Marketplace revenue also consists of a listing fee of $0.20 per item that she lists in its marketplace. Revenue from completed Wholesale transactions is also included in Marketplace revenue, whereas revenue from Wholesale enrollment is included in Seller Services revenue. Transaction fees are recognized when the corresponding transaction is made. Listing fees are recognized ratably over a four-month listing period, unless the item is sold or the seller relists it, at which time any remaining listing fee is recognized.
Seller Services revenue. Seller Services revenue consists of fees an Etsy seller pays the Company for the Seller Services she uses, including Promoted Listings, Direct Checkout, Shipping Labels and Wholesale enrollment.
Revenue from Promoted Listings consists of cost-per-click based fees an Etsy seller pays the Company for prominent placement of her listings in search results generated by Etsy buyers in its marketplace. Revenue is recognized when the Promoted Listing is clicked.
F-11
Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
Revenue from Direct Checkout consists of fees an Etsy seller pays the Company to process credit, debit and Etsy Gift Card payments. Direct Checkout fees vary between 3-4% of the items total sale price plus a flat fee per order, depending on the country in which her bank account is located. Direct Checkout fees are based on the items total sale price, including shipping. Revenue from Direct Checkout is recognized when the corresponding transaction is made. Revenue from breakage on Etsy Gift Cards is recognized when the amount is probable and estimable. Given the lack of historical experience related to gift card activity, there has been no breakage revenue recorded to date.
Revenue from Shipping Labels consists of fees an Etsy seller pays the Company when she purchases shipping labels directly through its platform, net of the cost it incurs in purchasing those shipping labels. The Company provides its sellers shipping labels from the United States Postal Service and Canada Post at a discounted price due to the volume of purchases through its platform. The Company recognizes Shipping Label revenue when an Etsy seller purchases a shipping label. The Company recognizes Shipping Label revenue on a net basis as it is not the primary obligor in the delivery of these services.
Revenue from Wholesale consists of fees an Etsy seller pays the Company when she is approved to enroll in its Wholesale program. The one-time Wholesale enrollment fee is recognized ratably over the estimated customer life. Revenue from completed Wholesale transactions is included in Marketplace revenue.
Other revenue. Other revenue includes the fees the Company receives from a third-party payment processor. Other revenue is recognized as the transactions are processed by the third-party payment processor.
The following table summarizes revenue by type of service (in thousands):
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 Marketplace $ 55,330 $ 78,544 $ 108,732 Seller Services 15,863 42,817 82,502 Other 3,409 3,661 4,357 Revenue $ 74,602 $ 125,022 $ 195,591
F-12
Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
Cost of Revenue
Cost of revenue consists primarily of expenses associated with the operation and maintenance of the Companys platform and data centers, including depreciation and amortization, employee-related costs, including stock-based compensation expense, and energy and bandwidth costs. Cost of revenue also includes the cost of interchange and other fees for credit card processing services, credit card verification service fees and credit card chargebacks to support Direct Checkout revenue, as well as employee-related costs, including stock-based compensation expense, for our member support staff, and costs of refunds made to Etsy buyers that the Company is not able to collect from Etsy sellers.
Accounts Receivable and Allowance for Doubtful Accounts
The Companys trade accounts receivable are recorded at amounts billed to Etsy sellers and are presented on the consolidated balance sheet net of the allowance for doubtful accounts. The allowance is determined by a number of factors, including age of the receivable, current economic conditions, historical losses and managements assessment of the financial condition of Etsy sellers. Receivables are written off once they are deemed uncollectible, which may arise when Etsy sellers file for bankruptcy or are otherwise deemed unable to repay the amounts owed to the Company. Estimates of uncollectible accounts receivable are recorded to general and administrative expense.
The following table summarizes the allowance activity during the periods indicated (in thousands):
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 Balance as of the beginning of period $ 998 $ 1,357 $ 1,279 Bad debt expense 1,295 1,002 1,881 Write-offs, net of recoveries and other adjustments (936 ) (1,080 ) (1,319 ) Balance as of the end of period $ 1,357 $ 1,279 $ 1,841
Funds Receivable and Seller Accounts and Funds Payable and Amounts due to Sellers
The Company records funds receivable and seller accounts and funds payable and amounts due to sellers as current assets and liabilities, respectively, on the consolidated balance sheet. Funds receivable and seller accounts represent amounts received or expected to be received from Etsy buyers via third-party credit card processors, which flow through an Etsy bank account for payment to Etsy sellers. This cash and related receivable represent the total amount due to sellers, and as such a liability for the same amount is recorded to funds payable and amounts due to Etsy sellers.
F-13
Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
Property and Equipment
Property and equipment, consisting principally of computer equipment and purchased software, are recorded at cost. The Company capitalizes construction in progress for build-to-suit lease agreements where we are the owner, for accounting purposes only, during the construction period. Depreciation and amortization are recognized using the straight-line method in amounts sufficient to relate the cost of depreciable and amortizable assets to operations over their estimated useful lives. Repairs and maintenance are charged to operations as incurred.
Internal-use Software and Website Development Costs
Costs incurred to develop software for internal use and the Companys website are capitalized and amortized over the estimated useful life of the software, generally three years. The Company also capitalizes costs related to upgrades and enhancements when it is probable the expenditures will result in additional functionality or will extend the useful life of existing functionality. Costs related to the design or maintenance of internal-use software and website development are expensed as incurred. The Company periodically reviews internal-use software and website development costs to determine whether the projects will be completed, placed in service, removed from service, or replaced by other internally developed or third-party software. If the asset is not expected to provide any future benefit, the asset is retired and any unamortized cost is expensed.
Depreciable/Amortizable Tangible Long-Lived Assets
When events or changes in circumstances require, the Company assesses the likelihood of recovering the cost of tangible long-lived assets based on its expectations of future profitability, undiscounted cash flows and managements plans with respect to operations to determine if the asset is impaired and subject to write-off. Measurement of any impairment loss is based on the excess of the carrying value of the asset over the fair value.
Leases
The Company leases office space and certain computer equipment in multiple locations under non-cancelable lease agreements. The leases are reviewed for classification as operating or capital leases. For operating leases, rent is recognized on a straight-line basis over the lease period. For capital leases, the Company records the leased asset with a corresponding liability. Payments are recorded as reductions to the liability with an appropriate interest charge recorded based on the then-outstanding remaining liability.
The Company considers the nature of the renovations and the Companys involvement during the construction period of newly leased office space to determine if it is considered to be the owner of the
F-14
Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
construction project during the construction period. If the Company determines that it is the owner of the construction project, it is required to capitalize the fair value of the building as well as the construction costs incurred on its consolidated balance sheet along with a corresponding financing liability (build-to-suit accounting). Upon occupancy for build-to-suit leases, the Company assesses whether the circumstances qualify for sales recognition under the sale-leaseback accounting guidance. If the lease meets the sale-leaseback criteria, the Company will remove the asset and related financial obligation from the balance sheet and treat the building lease as an operating lease. If upon completion of construction, the project does not meet the sale-leaseback criteria, the leased property will be treated as a capital lease for financial reporting purposes.
Business Combinations
The Company has completed a number of acquisitions of other businesses in the past and may acquire additional businesses or technologies in the future. The results of businesses acquired in a business combination are included in the Companys consolidated financial statements from the date of acquisition. The Company allocates the purchase price, which is the sum of the consideration provided and may consist of cash, equity or a combination of the two, in a business combination to the identifiable assets and liabilities of the acquired business at their acquisition date fair values. The excess of the purchase price over the amount allocated to the identifiable assets and liabilities, if any, is recorded as goodwill. Determining the fair value of assets acquired and liabilities assumed requires management to use significant judgment and estimates, including the selection of valuation methodologies, estimates of future revenue and cash flows, discount rates and selection of comparable companies.
When the Company issues stock-based or cash awards to an acquired companys stockholders, the Company evaluates whether the awards are contingent consideration or compensation for post-acquisition services. The evaluation includes, among other things, whether the vesting of the awards is contingent on the continued employment of the acquired companys stockholder beyond the acquisition date. If continued employment is required for vesting, the awards are treated as compensation for post-acquisition services and recognized as expense over the requisite service period.
The Company carries intangible assets at cost, and it amortizes them on a straight-line basis over their estimated useful lives, typically three years. When circumstances indicate that the carrying value of these assets may not be recoverable, the Company reviews its identifiable amortizable intangible assets for impairment.
To date, the assets acquired and liabilities assumed in the Companys business combinations have primarily consisted of goodwill and finite-lived intangible assets, consisting primarily of developed technologies, customer relationships and trademarks. The estimated fair values and useful lives of identifiable intangible
F-15
Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
assets are based on many factors, including estimates and assumptions of future operating performance and cash flows of the acquired business, the nature of the business acquired, and the specific characteristics of the identified intangible assets. The estimates and assumptions used to determine the fair values and useful lives of identified intangible assets could change due to numerous factors, including market conditions, technological developments, economic conditions and competition. In connection with determination of fair values, the Company may engage independent appraisal firms to assist with the valuation of intangible and certain tangible assets acquired and certain assumed obligations.
Acquisition-related transaction costs incurred by the Company are not included as a component of consideration transferred, but are accounted for as an expense in the period in which the costs are incurred.
Goodwill
Goodwill represents the excess of the aggregate fair value of the consideration transferred in a business combination over the fair value of the assets acquired, net of liabilities assumed. Goodwill is not amortized, but is subject to an annual impairment test. Management has determined that the Company has a single reporting unit and performs its annual goodwill impairment test during the fourth quarter or more frequently if events or changes in circumstances indicate that the goodwill may be impaired.
Events or changes in circumstances which could trigger an impairment review include significant changes in the manner of the Companys use of the acquired assets or the strategy for the Companys overall business, significant negative industry or economic trends, significant underperformance relative to historical or projected future results of operations, a significant adverse change in the business climate, an adverse action or assessment by a regulator, unanticipated competition or a loss of key personnel.
The Company has the option to first assess qualitative factors to determine whether the existence of events or circumstances leads to a determination that it is more likely than not that the fair value of the reporting unit is less than its carrying amount. If, after assessing the totality of events or circumstances, an entity determines it is not more likely than not that the fair value of the reporting unit is less than its carrying amount, then additional impairment testing is not required. However, if an entity concludes otherwise, then it is required to perform the first of a two-step impairment test.
The first step involves comparing the estimated fair value of the reporting unit with its respective book value, including goodwill. If the estimated fair value exceeds book value, goodwill is considered not to be impaired and no additional steps are necessary. If, however, the fair value of the reporting unit is less than book value, then a second step is required that compares the carrying amount of the goodwill with its implied fair value. The estimate of implied fair value of goodwill may require valuations of certain
F-16
Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
internally-generated and unrecognized intangible and tangible net assets. If the carrying amount of goodwill exceeds the implied fair value of the goodwill, an impairment loss is recognized in an amount equal to the excess.
The Company completed a Step 1 analysis during the fourth quarter of 2014. No impairment of goodwill was recorded at December 31, 2013 or 2014.
Intangible Assets
Intangible assets are amortized over the estimated useful life of the acquired technology, customer relationships and trademarks, generally three years.
Stock-Based Compensation
For employee stock-based awards, the Company calculates the fair value of the award on the date of grant using the Black-Scholes option-pricing model and the expense is recognized over the service period for awards expected to vest. For non-employee stock-based awards, the Company calculates the fair value of the award on the date of grant in the same manner as employee awards over the contractual term; however, the unvested portion of the awards is revalued at the end of each reporting period until such time as the non-employee award is fully vested.
We account for stock-based compensation arrangements in restricted shares, subject to a put option that allows the holder of the shares to put the shares back to the Company for cash, as liability-classified stock awards. These awards are re-measured at each reporting period, with changes in fair value being charged to the statement of operations. Compensation expense is recognized using a graded vesting methodology for each separately vesting tranche as though the award were, in substance, multiple awards. Unless the put option is exercised, the restricted shares will be reclassified from a liability to an equity classified award upon the termination of the put option.
For the years ended December 31, 2012, 2013 and 2014, the Company recognized expenses of approximately $3.9 million, $3.7 million and $5.9 million for employee stock options, respectively, and $0.2 million, $0.2 million and $0.1 million for non-employee stock options, respectively.
Additionally, the Company recorded $4.1 million in acquisition-related stock-based compensation expense for the year ended December 31, 2014, of which $3.4 million relates to liability-classified awards.
Cash and Cash Equivalents
The Company considers all investments with an original maturity of three months or less at time of purchase to be cash equivalents.
F-17
Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
Concentration of Credit Risk
Financial instruments that potentially subject the Company to concentrations of credit risk consist of cash and cash equivalents. The Company reduces credit risk by placing its cash and cash equivalents with major financial institutions with high credit ratings. At times, such amounts may exceed Federally insured limits.
Fair Value of Financial Instruments
Management believes that the fair value of financial instruments, consisting of cash and cash equivalents, accounts receivable and accounts payable, approximates carrying value due to the immediate or short-term maturity associated with its cash and cash equivalents, accounts receivable and accounts payable.
Income Taxes
Income tax benefit (provision) is based on (loss) income before income taxes and is accounted for under the asset and liability method. Deferred tax assets and liabilities are recognized for the future tax consequences attributable to differences between the financial statement carrying amounts of existing assets and liabilities and their respective tax bases, and operating loss and tax credit carryforwards. Deferred tax assets and liabilities are measured using enacted tax rates expected to apply to taxable income in the years in which those temporary differences are expected to be recovered or settled. The effect on deferred tax assets and liabilities of a change in tax rates is recognized as income in the period that includes the enactment date. Management assesses the need for a valuation allowance on an annual basis to reduce deferred tax assets to the amounts expected to be realized.
The Company accounts for uncertainty in income taxes using a recognition threshold and a measurement attribute for the financial statement recognition and measurement of tax positions taken or expected to be taken in a tax return. For benefits to be recognized, a tax position must be more likely than not to be sustained upon examination by the taxing authorities. The amount recognized is measured as the largest amount of benefit that has a greater than 50% likelihood of being realized upon ultimate audit settlement. The Company has no unrecognized tax benefits at December 31, 2012 and 2013 and has an unrecognized tax benefit of $0.4 million at December 31, 2014.
The Company recognizes interest and penalties, if any, associated with income tax matters as part of the income tax provision and includes accrued interest and penalties with the related income tax liability in the consolidated balance sheet.
F-18
Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
Marketing
Marketing expenses consist primarily of targeted online marketing costs, such as search engine marketing, and offline marketing expenses, such as television advertising. Marketing expenses also include employee-related costs, including stock-based compensation expense, for our employees involved in marketing, public relations and communications activities. Marketing expenses are expensed as incurred.
Net (Loss) Income Per Share
The Company follows the two-class method when computing net (loss) income per share as the Company has issued shares that meet the definition of participating securities. The two-class method determines net (loss) income per share for each class of common stock and participating securities according to dividends declared or accumulated and participation rights in undistributed earnings. The two-class method requires income available to common stockholders for the period to be allocated between common stock and participating securities based upon their respective rights to receive dividends as if all income for the period had been distributed.
The Companys convertible preferred stock contractually entitles the holders of such shares to participate in dividends, but does not contractually require the holders of such shares to participate in losses of the Company. Accordingly, the two-class method does not apply for periods in which the Company reports a net loss or a net loss attributable to common stockholders resulting from dividends, accretion or modifications to its convertible preferred stock.
Basic net (loss) income per share attributable to common stockholders is computed by dividing the net (loss) income attributable to common stockholders by the weighted average number of common shares outstanding for the period. Diluted net (loss) income attributable to common stockholders is computed by adjusting net (loss) income attributable to common stockholders to reallocate undistributed earnings based on the potential impact of dilutive securities, including outstanding common stock options, convertible preferred stock and warrants to purchase common stock and convertible preferred stock.
Diluted net (loss) income per share attributable to common stockholders is computed by dividing the diluted net (loss) income attributable to common stockholders by the weighted average number of common shares, including potential dilutive common shares assuming the dilutive effect of outstanding common stock options, convertible preferred stock and warrants to purchase common stock and convertible preferred stock. For periods in which the Company has reported net losses, diluted net loss per share attributable to common stockholders is the same as basic net loss per share attributable to common stockholders, because dilutive common shares are not assumed to have been issued if their effect is anti-dilutive.
F-19
Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
Segment Data
The Company identifies operating segments as components of an entity for which discrete financial information is available and is regularly reviewed by the chief operating decision maker, or decision-making group, in making decisions regarding resource allocation and performance assessment. The Company defines the term chief operating decision maker to be its chief executive officer. The Company has determined it operates in one operating segment and one reportable segment, as its chief operating decision maker reviews financial information presented on only a consolidated basis for purposes of allocating resources and evaluating financial performance.
Foreign Currency
The Company has determined that the functional currency for each of its foreign operations is the local currency in which the operation is located. All assets and liabilities are translated into U.S. dollars using exchange rates in effect at the balance sheet date. Revenue and expenses are translated using average exchange rates during the period. Foreign currency translation adjustments are reflected in stockholders equity as a component of other comprehensive (loss) income. Transaction gains and losses including intercompany transactions denominated in a currency other than the functional currency of the entity involved are included in foreign exchange loss within other (expense) income in the statement of operations.
Excess Tax Benefits from Exercise of Stock Options
The Company uses the with and without approach in determining the order in which tax attributes are utilized. As a result, the Company recognizes a tax benefit from stock-based awards in additional paid-in capital only if an incremental tax benefit is realized after all other tax attributes currently available to the Company have been utilized. When tax deductions from stock-based awards are less than the cumulative book compensation expense, the tax effect of the resulting difference (shortfall) is charged first to additional paid-in capital, to the extent of the Companys pool of windfall tax benefits, with any remainder recognized in income tax expense. The Company determined that it had a sufficient windfall pool available through December 31, 2014 to absorb any shortfalls.
Recent Accounting Pronouncements
Under the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act (JOBS Act), the Company meets the definition of an emerging growth company. The Company has irrevocably elected to opt out of the extended transition period for complying with new or revised accounting standards pursuant to Section 107(b) of the JOBS Act.
In March 2013, the FASB issued new accounting guidance clarifying the accounting for the release of cumulative translation adjustment into net income when a company either sells a part or all of its
F-20
Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
investment in a foreign entity or no longer holds a controlling financial interest in a subsidiary or group of assets that is a nonprofit activity or a business within a foreign entity. The new guidance is effective for fiscal years, and interim periods within those fiscal years, beginning on or after December 15, 2013. The adoption of this guidance did not have an impact on the Companys consolidated financial statements.
In May 2014, the FASB issued an accounting standards update that replaces existing revenue recognition guidance. Among other things, the updated guidance requires companies to recognize revenue in a way that depicts the transfer of promised goods or services to customers in an amount that reflects the consideration to which the entity expects to be entitled in exchange for those goods or services. The new guidance is effective for the Company beginning January 1, 2017. The Company is currently evaluating the effect the guidance will have on its consolidated financial statements.
In August 2014, the FASB issued an accounting standard update under which management will be required to assess an entitys ability to continue as a going concern and provide related disclosures in certain circumstances. The new guidance is effective for annual periods beginning after December 15, 2016 and for annual and interim periods thereafter. The adoption of this guidance is not expected to have an impact on the Companys financial statements or disclosures.
Note 2Business Combinations
In April 2012, the Company acquired the assets of Trunkt LLC for a purchase price of $200,000, plus two additional contingent payments of $100,000 that were tied to continued employment with the Company and were recognized as post-acquisition compensation expense and paid out by the Company in 2013. Acquired assets consisted of customer information, domain access rights, certain web services and a trademark. The purchase price was allocated to the acquired technology intangible assets in the Companys consolidated financial statements. This acquisition did not have any measureable impact on consolidated revenue or (loss) income from operations.
In January 2013, the Company acquired the assets of The Lascaux Company, Inc., owners of the Mixel iOS mobile application, for a purchase price of $750,000, which consisted of $675,000 paid on the closing date and $75,000 due on the first anniversary of the closing date, subject to indemnification provisions. In connection with the acquisition, the Company granted options to purchase 362,320 shares of common stock to certain key employees of the acquired company. Acquired assets consisted of the Mixel iOS mobile application and related source code and domain name registration. The purchase price was allocated between acquired technology intangible assets and goodwill in the Companys consolidated financial statements. This acquisition did not have any measureable impact on consolidated revenue or (loss) income from operations.
F-21
Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
On April 29, 2014, the Company completed the acquisition of Jarvis Labs, Inc., owners of the Grand St. online technology marketplace. Total consideration for the acquisition was approximately $3.2 million, consisting of $1.0 million in cash and 425,104 shares of the Companys common stock with a fair value of $2.2 million on the acquisition date. Additionally, the Company issued 657,160 shares of common stock, with a fair value of $3.4 million on the acquisition date, which are tied to continued employment with the Company and are being accounted for as post-acquisition stock-based compensation expense over the three-year vesting period. Because the Company is not publicly traded, the Company utilizes equity valuations based on comparable publicly-traded companies, discounted cash flows, an analysis of the Companys enterprise value and any other factors deemed relevant in estimating the fair value of its common stock for purposes of calculating the fair value of the purchase price.
The following table summarizes the components of the Grand St. purchase price and the allocation of the purchase price at fair value (in thousands):
Cash paid $ 1,040 Common shares 2,202 Total purchase consideration $ 3,242 Working capital $ 85 Developed technology 2,000 Customer relationships 600 Trademarks 200 Goodwill 991 Deferred tax liability (634) Net assets acquired $ 3,242
Included in working capital is approximately $0.1 million of cash acquired.
The amounts allocated to developed technology, customer relationships and trademark (the acquired intangible assets) total $2.8 million. The fair value assigned to developed technology was determined primarily using the cost approach, which estimates the cost to reproduce the asset, adjusted for loss due to functional and economic obsolescence. The fair value of the Companys customer relationships was determined primarily using the income approach, which discounts expected future cash flows to present value using estimates and assumptions determined by management. The fair value assigned to trademark was determined using the relief from royalty method, where the owner of the asset realizes a benefit from owning the intangible asset rather than paying a rental or royalty rate for use of the asset. The acquired identifiable intangible assets are being amortized on a straight-line basis over three years, which approximates the pattern in which the assets are utilized. None of the goodwill recorded in the acquisition is deductible for tax purposes.
F-22
Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
On June 18, 2014, the Company completed the acquisition of Incubart SAS, a societe par actions simplifiee organized under the laws of France, which operates the online marketplace A Little Market (ALM). Total consideration for the acquisition was $30.8 million, consisting of $5.3 million in cash, of which $4.2 million was paid on the closing date and $0.3 million is due to be paid on March 31, 2015 and $0.8 million is due to be paid on February 16, 2016, and 4,879,693 shares of the Companys common stock with a fair value of $25.5 million on the acquisition date. Because the Company is not publicly traded, the Company utilizes equity valuations based on comparable publicly-traded companies, discounted cash flows, an analysis of the Companys enterprise value and any other factors deemed relevant in estimating the fair value of its common stock for purposes of calculating the fair value of the purchase price. The terms of the purchase agreement provide for the sale of put options to certain of the former shareholders of ALM. The put options enable the holders of the options to sell up to all of their shares back to the Company, subject to certain vesting and restrictions, at fair value, but not to exceed $4.13 per share and not less than $2.00 per share. The put right terminates with respect to a share on the earlier of one year from when such share is vested or the liquidation date, as defined in the agreement containing the put option. The holders of the options paid an aggregate of $0.1 million cash to the Company at the date of acquisition and the Company recorded a $0.1 million liability for the fair value of the put options at that time. Additionally, the Company issued 1,198,995 shares of common stock, with a fair value of $6.3 million on the acquisition date, which are tied to continued employment with the Company and are being accounted for as post-acquisition stock-based compensation expense over the three-year vesting period. Since the put options relate in part to these shares, these restricted shares will be recorded as liability-classified stock awards as earned.
The following table summarizes the components of the purchase price at fair value and the allocation of the purchase price at fair value (in thousands):
Cash paid $ 5,290 Common shares 25,521 Total purchase consideration $ 30,811 Working capital $ 625 Property and equipment and other assets 95 Developed technology 1,636 Customer relationships 1,693 Trademarks 775 Goodwill 27,309 Deferred tax liability (757) Other long-term liabilities (565) Net assets acquired $ 30,811
Included in working capital is approximately $0.5 million of cash and cash equivalents acquired.
F-23
Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
The amount allocated to developed technology, customer relationships and trademark (the acquired intangible assets) total $4.1 million. The fair value assigned to developed technology was determined primarily by using the cost approach, which estimates the cost to reproduce the asset, adjusted for loss due to functional and economic obsolescence. The fair value of the Companys customer relationships was determined primarily by using the income approach, which discounts expected future cash flows to present value using estimates and assumptions determined by management. The fair value assigned to trademark was determined using the relief from royalty method, where the owner of the asset realizes a benefit from owning the intangible asset rather than paying a rental or royalty rate for use of the asset. The acquired identifiable intangible assets are being amortized on a straight-line basis over three years, which approximates the pattern in which the assets are utilized. Goodwill of $27.3 million, none of which is deductible for tax purposes, was recorded in connection with the ALM acquisition, which is primarily attributed to synergies arising from the acquisition and the value of the acquired workforce.
The Company incurred approximately $2.1 million in acquisition-related costs, included in general and administrative expenses. These acquisitions increased revenue by $1.8 million and contributed $5.7 million to the Companys consolidated net loss in the year ended December 31, 2014. The impact to net loss was primarily due to amortization of intangibles and stock-based compensation associated with the acquisitions.
The following unaudited pro forma financial information presents the combined operating results of the Company, Grand St. and ALM as if each acquisition had occurred as of January 1, 2013. The unaudited pro forma financial information includes the accounting effects of the business combinations, including adjustments to the amortization of intangible assets and professional fees associated with the acquisition. The unaudited pro forma information does not necessarily reflect the actual results that would have been achieved, nor is it necessarily indicative of our future consolidated results.
The unaudited pro forma financial information is presented in the table below for the years ended December 31, 2013 and 2014 (in thousands except per share amounts):
Year Ended
December 31, 2013 2014 Revenue $ 127,838 $ 197,395 Net loss (7,533) (15,403) Basic net loss per share (0.11) (0.19) Diluted net loss per share (0.11) (0.19)
F-24
Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
Note 3Marketable Securities
Short-term investments consist of marketable securities that are available-for-sale. The cost and fair value of available-for-sale securities were as follows as of the dates indicated (in thousands):
Cost Gross
Unrealized
Holding Loss Gross
Unrealized
Holding Gain Fair Value December 31, 2013 U.S. Government and agency bills $ 18,073 $ (1) $ 3 $ 18,075 $ 18,073 $ (1) $ 3 $ 18,075 December 31, 2014 U.S. Government and agency bills $ 19,188 $ (5) $ 1 $ 19,184 $ 19,188 $ (5) $ 1 $ 19,184
The Companys investments in marketable securities consist primarily of investments in Corporate Certificates of Deposit and AAA-rated U.S. Government and agency bills. When evaluating investments for other-than-temporary impairment, the Company reviews factors such as length of time and extent to which fair value has been below cost basis, the financial condition of the issuer and the Companys ability and intent to hold the investment for a period of time, which may be sufficient for anticipated recovery in market value. The Company evaluates fair values for each individual security in the investment portfolio.
Note 4Property and Equipment
Property and equipment consisted of the following as of the dates indicated (in thousands):
As of
December 31, Estimated useful lives 2013 2014 Computer equipment 3 years $ 13,837 $ 16,876 Furniture and equipment 4 years 1,630 1,987 Software 1 - 3 years 2,380 1,146 Leasehold improvements Shorter of life of asset or lease term 2,706 3,134 Construction in progress(1) Not applicable 51,796 Website development 3 years 23,897 31,156 44,450 106,095 Less: Accumulated depreciation and amortization 21,343 30,557 $ 23,107 $ 75,538
(1) The Company capitalizes construction in progress and records a corresponding long-term liability for build-to-suit lease arrangements where it is considered the owner, for accounting purposes, during the construction period.
Depreciation and amortization expense on property and equipment was $7.7 million, $12.1 million and $15.7 million for the years ended December 31, 2012, 2013 and 2014, respectively, which includes amortization expense for equipment acquired under capital leases of $1.5 million, $1.2 million and
F-25
Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
$1.5 million for the years ended December 31, 2012, 2013 and 2014, respectively. The gross balance of leased equipment as of December 31, 2013 and 2014 was $3.3 million and $6.0 million, respectively. The related accumulated amortization of equipment under capital leases was $2.6 million and $1.2 million at December 31, 2013 and 2014, respectively.
The following table summarizes capitalized website development and internal-use software activities during the periods indicated (in thousands):
Year Ended
December 31, 2013 2014 Balance as of the beginning of the period $ 14,993 $ 23,897 Additions to website development, excluding stock-based compensation 9,600 8,281 Additions to website developmentstock-based compensation 243 190 Less: Retirements 939 1,212 23,897 31,156 Less: Accumulated amortization 12,003 18,968 $ 11,894 $ 12,188
For the years ended December 31, 2012, 2013 and 2014, the Company recorded amortization expense relating to capitalized website development and internal-use software of $3.7 million, $6.3 million and $8.1 million, respectively. The loss on write-off for website development and internal-use software assets that were retired during the years ended December 31, 2012, 2013 and 2014 was $0.1 million, $0.7 million and $0.1 million, respectively.
Note 5Goodwill and Intangible Assets
The following table summarizes the changes in the carrying amount of goodwill for the periods indicated (in thousands):
Year Ended
December 31, 2013 2014 Balance as of the beginning of the period $ 5,166 $ 5,346 Acquisitions 180 28,300 Other adjustments(1) (2,815) Balance as of the end of the period $ 5,346 $ 30,831
(1) Primarily includes the effect of foreign currency translation.
The Company did not recognize any goodwill impairments during the years ended December 31, 2012, 2013 and 2014.
F-26
Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
At December 31, 2013 and 2014, the gross book value and accumulated amortization of intangible assets were as follows (in thousands):
As of December 31, 2013 As of December 31, 2014 Gross book
value Accumulated
amortization Net book
value Gross book
value Accumulated
amortization Net book
value Trademarks $ $ $ $ 892 $ (169) $ 723 Technology 1,045 (641) 404 4,505 (1,547) 2,958 Customer relationships 200 (111) 89 2,313 (584) 1,729 Intangible assets, net $ 1,245 $ (752 ) $ 493 $ 7,710 $ (2,300) $ 5,410
Amortization expense for the years ended December 31, 2012, 2013 and 2014 was $0.2 million, $0.3 million and $ 1.5 million, respectively.
Based on amounts recorded at December 31, 2014, the Company will recognize intangible asset amortization expense in each of the years ending December 31 as follows (in thousands):
2015 $ 2,368 2016 2,171 2017 871 2018 Thereafter Total amortization expense $ 5,410
Note 6Warrants
The Company has outstanding warrants to purchase 11,373 shares of its Series C Preferred stock with an exercise price of $2.67 per share, 24,510 shares of its Series D Preferred stock with an exercise price of $6.63 per share, and 4,723 shares of its Series E Preferred stock with an exercise price of $15.88 per share (see Note 8). All of these warrants were originally issued in connection with previous lines of credit and were fair valued on the date of issuance, and the fair value amount was recognized as debt issuance costs and amortized to interest expense over the original life of the line of credit. As these warrants are exercisable into shares of Preferred stock, which include certain redemption rights that are outside of the control the Company, in accordance with ASC Topic 480 Distinguishing Liabilities from Equity, the warrants are accounted for as liabilities and are revalued at each balance sheet date. The warrants were fully vested at issuance.
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
The Company determined the fair value of the convertible preferred stock warrants utilizing the Black-Scholes model with the following weighted-average assumptions:
Series C December 31, 2012 2013 2014 Risk-free interest rate 0.7% 1.3% 1.1% Expected term (in years) 5.0 4.0 3.0 Estimated dividend yield 0% 0% 0% Weighted-average estimated volatility 40.0% 41.0% 43.1% Fair value (in thousands) $ 319 $ 442 $ 579 Series D December 31, 2012 2013 2014 Risk-free interest rate 0.3% 0.3% 0.5% Expected term (in years) 2.5 1.5 0.5 Estimated dividend yield 0% 0% 0% Weighted-average estimated volatility 39.0% 36.0% 38.9% Fair value (in thousands) $ 597 $ 859 $ 1,156 Series E December 31, 2012 2013 2014 Risk-free interest rate 0.7% 1.3% 1.1% Expected term (in years) 5.0 4.0 3.0 Estimated dividend yield 0% 0% 0% Weighted-average estimated volatility 39.0% 41.0% 43.1% Fair value (in thousands) $ 93 $ 127 $ 185
During the years ended December 31, 2012, 2013 and 2014, the Company recorded an unrealized loss of $0.7 million, $0.4 million and $0.5 million, respectively, from the remeasurement of the warrants to fair value.
In June 2012, the Company issued 5,056 shares of Series C preferred stock to convert 5,481 warrants at an exercise price of $2.67 per share. The fair market value of a share of common stock at the time of exercise was $3.45. The warrant holder exercised the right to convert this warrant in a cashless transaction and 425 shares were forfeited to the Company as payment of the exercise price. The Company revalued the warrant at the time of exercise and reclassified approximately $0.2 million in warrant liability to Series C preferred stock.
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
Note 7Debt
Credit Agreement
In May 2014, the Company entered into a $35.0 million senior secured revolving credit facility pursuant to a Revolving Credit and Guaranty Agreement with several lenders (the Credit Agreement). The Credit Agreement will mature in May 2019. The Credit Agreement includes a letter of credit sublimit of $10.0 million and a swingline loan sublimit of $15.0 million.
Borrowings under the Credit Agreement (other than swingline loans) bear interest, at the Companys option, at (i) a base rate equal to the highest of (a) the prime rate, (b) the federal funds rate plus 0.50% and (c) an adjusted LIBOR rate for a one-month interest period plus 1.00%, in each case plus a margin ranging from 0.00% to 0.25% or (ii) an adjusted LIBOR rate plus a margin ranging from 1.00% to 1.25%. Swingline loans under the Credit Agreement bear interest at the same base rate (plus the margin applicable to borrowings bearing interest at the base rate). These margins are determined based on the total leverage ratio for the preceding four fiscal quarter period. The Company is also obligated to pay other customary fees for a credit facility of this size and type, including an unused commitment fee and fees associated with letters of credit. The Credit Agreement also permits the Company, in certain circumstances, to request an increase in the facility by an amount of up to $50.0 million (and in minimum amounts of $10.0 million) at the same maturity, pricing and other terms.
The Credit Agreement contains customary representations and warranties applicable to the Company and its subsidiaries and customary affirmative and negative covenants applicable to the Company and its restricted subsidiaries. The negative covenants include restrictions on, among other things, indebtedness, liens, investments, mergers, dispositions, transactions with affiliates and dividends and other distributions. These restrictions do not prohibit a subsidiary of the Company from making pro rata payments to the Company or any other person that owns an equity interest in such subsidiary. The Credit Agreement contains a financial covenant that requires the Company and its subsidiaries to maintain a total leverage ratio (defined as net debt to adjusted EBITDA) not to exceed 3.50 to 1.00.
The Credit Agreement includes customary events of default, including a change in control and a cross-default on the Companys material indebtedness. The Companys obligations under the Credit Agreement are secured by substantially all of the Company and its subsidiaries assets, and its obligations under the Credit Agreement are guaranteed by certain of the Companys subsidiaries.
At December 31, 2014, the Company did not have any borrowings under the Credit Agreement. In January 2015, the Company implemented a revised corporate structure to more closely align its structure with its global operations and future expansion plans outside the United States. The amendment to the Credit
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
Agreement described below includes a waiver with respect to the Companys compliance with certain restrictions in the Credit Agreement, to the extent that actions taken to implement its revised corporate structure could be construed as breaches or defaults under the Credit Agreement.
Subsequent Event
In March 2015, the Company amended the Credit Agreement (the Amended Credit Agreement) to increase the senior secured revolving credit facility to $50.0 million. The Amended Credit Agreement contains the same pricing covenants and other material terms as the Credit Agreement.
Facility Financing Obligation
As a result of the nature of and the Companys involvement in the renovations during the construction period of the newly leased office space in Brooklyn, NY, it is considered to be the owner, for accounting purposes only, of the construction project and is required to capitalize the fair value of the building as well as the construction costs incurred by the landlord on its consolidated balance sheet (build-to-suit accounting). Under the build-to-suit accounting guidance, through December 31, 2014 the Company has recorded a facility financing obligation of $50.3 million, equal to the fair market value of the assets received from the landlord as of the lease signing date in May 2014 and the estimated fair value of the subsequent construction costs incurred by the landlord through December 31, 2014.
Note 8Stockholders Equity
At December 31, 2013 and 2014, the authorized capital stock of the Company consisted of 205,000,000 and 240,000,000 shares of common stock, respectively, and 21,165,473 shares of convertible preferred stock. The convertible preferred stock, with the exclusion of Series 1 preferred stock, is referred to as senior preferred stock.
Common Stock
At December 31, 2012, there were 65,461,422 and 64,163,832 shares of common stock issued and outstanding, respectively. At December 31, 2013, there were 66,165,965 shares of common stock issued and outstanding. At December 31, 2014, there were 88,361,973 shares of common stock issued and outstanding. Holders of common stock are entitled to one vote per share. Holders of common stock are not entitled to receive dividends unless declared by the board of directors. The voting, dividend and liquidation rights of
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
the holders of common stock are subject to and qualified by the rights and preferences of the holders of convertible preferred stock. No dividends have been declared through December 31, 2014. The common stock has a $0.001 par value.
Convertible Preferred Stock
In May 2012, the Company entered into the Series F Stock Purchase Agreement with several investors to sell 11,594,203 shares of Series F preferred stock at $3.45 per share for an aggregate value of $40.0 million. The Company recorded stock issuance costs of approximately $0.2 million as additional paid-in-capital in connection with the Series F preferred stock financing.
At December 31, 2013 and 2014, the Companys outstanding convertible preferred stock consisted of the following (in thousands, except share data):
Shares
Authorized Shares
Outstanding Carrying
Values Series A and A-1 preferred stock 2,363,786 2,363,786 $ 808 Series B preferred stock 1,128,431 1,128,425 865 Series C preferred stock 1,234,084 1,222,282 3,361 Series D and D-1 preferred stock 4,240,120 4,215,610 27,870 Series E preferred stock 401,450 396,727 6,201 Series 1 preferred stock 203,399 203,399 1,322 Series F preferred stock 11,594,203 11,594,203 39,785 Total convertible preferred stock 21,165,473 21,124,432 $ 80,212
The rights and preferences of the convertible preferred stock are as follows:
Voting Rights. Each holder of convertible preferred stock is entitled to one vote for each share of common stock into which such holders shares of convertible preferred stock are then convertible. Except as provided by law or the Companys Certificate of Incorporation, the holders of the convertible preferred stock and common stock vote together as a single class. The holders of preferred stock are entitled to voting rights for the election of board of director members as follows: Series A-1, Series B and Series C vote together as a single class to elect one director, Series D and Series D-1 vote as a single class to elect one director and Series E votes to elect one director. Additionally, the holders of common stock elect one director. All remaining directors are elected by the holders of preferred stock and common stock voting together as a single class.
Dividends. The holders of the convertible preferred stock are entitled, when, as and if declared by the board of directors, and prior and in preference to common stock, to receive non-cumulative dividends at a rate of 8% of the original purchase price per share (listed in the table below). Payment of any dividends to the holders of the convertible preferred stock shall be made on a pro rata, pari passu basis in proportion to the
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
dividend rates for each series of convertible preferred stock. The right to receive dividends on shares of convertible preferred stock shall not be cumulative, and no right to such dividends shall accrue to holders of cumulative preferred stock by reason of the fact that dividends on said shares are not declared or paid in any calendar year.
Liquidation. In the event of any voluntary or involuntary liquidation, dissolution or winding-up of the Company, the holders of the senior preferred stock shall be entitled to receive, prior and in preference to any distribution to the holders of the Series 1 preferred stock and common stock, an amount per share equal to the sum of the liquidation preference (presented below) and all declared but unpaid dividends (if any). If amounts available to be distributed are insufficient to pay the liquidation preferences of the senior preferred stock in full, then the entire assets of the Company legally available for distribution shall be distributed to the holders of the senior preferred stock ratably in proportion to the preferential amount each holder would have otherwise been entitled to receive. After payment of the liquidation preferences to the senior preferred stock, if assets remain available for distribution to the Companys stockholders, the holders of Series 1 preferred stock shall be entitled to receive, prior and in preference to any distribution to the holders of common stock, an amount per share equal to the sum of the liquidation preference applicable to the Series 1 preferred stock and all declared but unpaid dividends (if any). If the remaining amounts available to be distributed are insufficient to pay the liquidation preferences of the Series 1 preferred stock in full, then the entire assets of the Company legally available for distribution shall be distributed ratably in proportion to the preferential amount each holder would have otherwise been entitled to receive. After payment of the liquidation preferences to the convertible preferred stock, all remaining assets shall be distributed to the holders of the common stock of the Company in proportion to the number of shares of common stock held by them.
The liquidation preference provisions of the convertible preferred stock are considered contingent redemption provisions because there are certain elements that are not solely within the control of the Company, such as a change in control of the Company. Accordingly, the Company has presented the convertible preferred stock within the mezzanine portion of the accompanying consolidated balance sheets.
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
Conversion. Each outstanding share of convertible preferred stock is convertible, at the holders option or automatically upon certain events as described below, into shares of common stock at a conversion rate determined by dividing the original issue price for such share by the then Conversion Price for such share. The original issue price, conversion price and liquidation preference price of each series of preferred stock are as follows:
Price Per Share Original Issue
Price Conversion
Price Liquidation
Preference Series A preferred stock $ 0.2429 $ 0.02429 $ 0.2429 Series A-1 preferred stock 0.3915 0.03915 0.3915 Series B preferred stock 0.80 0.080 0.80 Series C preferred stock 2.67 0.267 2.67 Series D preferred stock 6.63 0.663 6.63 Series D-1 preferred stock 6.63 0.663 6.63 Series E preferred stock 15.88 1.588 15.88 Series 1 preferred stock 6.45 0.645 6.45 Series F preferred stock 3.45 3.45 3.45
The conversion price is subject to adjustment in the event of certain anti-dilutive issuances of shares of common stock. The conversion price per share in the table above reflects the adjustment for the 10-for-1 stock split of the Companys common stock effective in May 2011.
Each share of convertible preferred stock will convert into shares of common stock at its then effective conversion rate upon the earlier of (A) immediately prior to the closing of a firm commitment underwritten initial public offering pursuant to an effective registration statement under the Securities Act of 1933, with gross proceeds to the Company of not less than $30 million, or (B) upon receipt by the Company of a written request for such conversion from the holders of not less than a majority of the convertible preferred stock, voting together as a single class on an as-converted basis. No shares of Series F preferred stock shall be converted into shares of common stock unless either (i) such conversion is in connection with a public offering where the price per share is equal to or greater than $5.18, or (ii) the holders of a majority of the Series F preferred stock, voting as a separate class, otherwise consent to such conversion.
Redemption. The convertible preferred stock is not redeemable at the option of the holder.
Tender Offers
In connection with the May 2012 Series F Preferred Stock financing, the Series F investors participated in a tender offer to purchase up to an aggregate of 12,753,623 shares of common stock and preferred stock (on an as-converted basis) at a price of $3.45 per share (on an as-converted basis) from the Companys employees and existing stockholders with the maximum aggregate offer price of up to $44.0 million. The terms of the tender offer were further limited to a maximum of 30% of a participants fully-vested stock and options and
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
warrants to purchase stock. The tender offer was made on May 15, 2012 and expired on July 6, 2012. At the close of the transaction, the Company recorded approximately $0.9 million as compensation expense related to the excess of the selling price per share paid to the Companys employees and former employees over the fair value of the tendered shares, and approximately $0.3 million as a deemed dividend in relation to the excess of the selling price per share paid to existing investors over the fair value of the shares tendered.
On January 13, 2014, certain investors participated in a tender offer to purchase up to an aggregate of 14,000,000 shares of common stock and preferred stock (on an as-converted basis) at a price of $5.30 per share (on an as-converted basis) from the Companys employees and existing stockholders with the maximum aggregate offer price of up to $74.2 million. The terms of the tender offer were limited to a maximum of one-half of an employees fully-vested stock and options and warrants to purchase stock and a minimum of one-half of a former employees or non-employees fully-vested stock and options and warrants to purchase stock. At the close of the transaction, 6,308,440 shares were tendered for a total price of $33.4 million.
Common Stock Issuances
In April 2014, the Company issued 6,603,774 shares of common stock to certain investors at $5.30 per share for an aggregate value of $35.0 million.
Additionally, the Company issued a total of 7,160,952 shares of common stock in connection with the acquisitions of Grand St. and ALM, of which 5,304,797 shares with an aggregate fair value of $27.7 million on the applicable acquisition dates are included in the Companys purchase price and 1,856,155 shares with an aggregate fair value of $9.7 million on the applicable acquisition dates are tied to continued employment with the Company and are being accounted for as post-acquisition compensation expense.
Stock Repurchases
In 2012, the board of directors authorized the repurchase of 20,000 shares of outstanding common stock at a cost of $0.1 million, 6 shares of outstanding Series B preferred stock at a cost of $297, and 4 shares of outstanding Series C preferred stock at a cost of $126. These repurchased shares were retired and removed from the number of shares issued in the consolidated balance sheet.
In 2013, the board of directors authorized the repurchase and retirement of 47,000 shares of outstanding common stock at a cost of $0.2 million. The repurchased shares were retired and have been removed from both the issued and outstanding number of shares in the consolidated balance sheet and consolidated statement of stockholders equity.
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
Secondary Transactions
In the year ended December 31, 2014, the Company recorded $0.5 million as compensation expense related to the excess of the selling price per share paid to certain of the Companys former employees over the fair value of the shares sold to an investor by these former employees in secondary transactions.
Note 9Stock-based Compensation
The Company maintains the 2006 Stock Plan (the Stock Plan). Under the Stock Plan, incentive and nonqualified stock options or rights to purchase common stock may be granted to eligible participants. Options are generally granted for a term of 10 years. Options granted under the Stock Plan generally vest 25% after the first year of service and ratably each month over the remaining 36-month period contingent on continued employment with the Company on each vesting date. At December 31, 2013 and 2014, 43,432,935 and 48,505,935 shares were authorized under the Stock Plan, respectively, and 3,063,945 and 3,036,004 shares were available for future grant, respectively.
The fair value of each option award is estimated on the date of grant using the Black-Scholes option-pricing model. Since the Company is not publicly traded, the Company utilizes equity valuations based on comparable publicly-traded companies, discounted free cash flows, an analysis of the Companys enterprise value and any other factors deemed relevant in estimating the fair value of its common stock. The risk-free rate for periods within the contractual life of the option is based on the U.S. Treasury yield curve in effect at the time of grant. Expected volatilities are based on implied volatilities from market comparisons of certain publicly traded companies and other factors. The expected term of stock options granted has been determined using the simplified method, which uses the midpoint between the vesting date and the contractual term. The requisite service period is generally four years from the date of grant.
The fair value of options granted in each year using the Black-Scholes pricing model has been based on the following assumptions:
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 Volatility 42.7% - 43.9% 45.7% - 50.3% 43.0% - 49.0% Risk-free interest rate 0.7% - 1.1% 0.9% - 1.9% 1.7% - 2.1% Expected term (in years) 5.12 - 6.08 5.48 - 6.08 5.46 - 6.08 Dividend rate % % %
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
The following table summarizes the activity for the Companys options:
Shares Weighted-Average
Exercise Price Weighted-Average
Remaining Contract
Term (in years) Aggregate
Intrinsic Value Outstanding at January 1, 2012 25,037,740 $ 0.73 Granted 7,717,321 2.33 Exercised (5,889,452) 0.79 Forfeited/Cancelled (2,993,224) 1.15 Outstanding at December 31, 2012 23,872,385 1.18 Granted 6,152,210 2.76 Exercised (2,049,133) 0.65 Forfeited/Cancelled (1,594,527) 1.90 Outstanding at December 31, 2013 26,380,935 1.55 7.42 Granted 6,413,435 5.14 Exercised (8,431,282) 0.94 Forfeited/Cancelled (1,312,494) 3.29 Outstanding at December 31, 2014 23,050,594 2.67 7.57 $ 134,386,069 Total exercisable at December 31, 2014 11,212,671 1.44 6.32 79,212,034 Total vested and expected to vest at December 31, 2014 21,663,138 2.57 7.48 128,508,325
The weighted-average grant date fair value of options granted in the years ended December 31, 2012, 2013 and 2014 was $0.97, $1.30 and $2.43, respectively. The total intrinsic value of options exercised in the years ended December 31, 2012, 2013 and 2014 was $9.0 million, $4.0 million and $24.8 million, respectively, and the total fair value of awards that vested in the years ended December 31, 2012, 2013 and 2014 was $2.5 million, $3.5 million and $4.7 million, respectively. The total unrecognized compensation at December 31, 2014 was $16.6 million, which will be recognized over a weighted-average period of 2.99 years.
Total stock-based compensation expense included in the consolidated statements of operations is as follows (in thousands):
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 Cost of revenue $ 166 $ 200 $ 1,113 Marketing 57 79 216 Product development 436 785 1,461 General and administrative 3,435 2,770 7,260 $ 4,094 $ 3,834 $ 10,050
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
The total stock-based compensation expense in the year ended December 31, 2014 includes $4.1 million in acquisition-related stock-based compensation expense.
Note 10Income Taxes
The following are the domestic and foreign components of the Companys (loss) income before income taxes (in thousands):
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 Domestic $ (2,873) $ (544) $ 6,084 International 343 602 (16,344) (Loss) income before income taxes $ (2,530) $ 58 $ (10,260)
The income tax (benefit) provision is comprised of the following (in thousands):
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 Current: Federal $ 89 $ 91 $ 5,378 State 353 (614) 21 Foreign 149 95 401 Total current 591 (428) 5,800 Deferred: Federal (302) 871 (50) State (434) 411 (186) Foreign (581) Total deferred (736) 1,282 (817) Total income tax (benefit) provision $ (145) $ 854 $ 4,983
The current tax expense listed above does not reflect income tax benefits of $0, $22,000 and $4.9 million for the years ended December 31, 2012, 2013 and 2014, respectively, related to excess tax deductions on share-based compensation because we recorded these benefits directly to additional paid-in capital.
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
A reconciliation of the income tax (benefit) provision at the U.S. federal statutory income tax rate of 34% to the Companys total income tax (benefit) provision is as follows (in thousands):
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 Income tax (benefit) provision at federal statutory rate $ (860) $ 20 $ (3,488) State and local taxes net of federal benefit (67) (135) (109) Foreign income tax rate differential 33 (131) 3,255 Non-deductible stock-based compensation 378 611 1,963 Net unrealized loss on warrant and other liabilities 251 143 140 Non-deductible items 68 114 152 Uncertain tax positions 398 Return to provision adjustment 32 240 36 Non-deductible acquisition costs 582 Change in valuation allowance 2,065 Other 20 (8) (11) Total income tax (benefit) provision $ (145) $ 854 $ 4,983
Deferred income taxes reflect the net tax effect of temporary differences between the carrying amounts of assets and liabilities for financial reporting purposes and the amounts used for income tax purposes. Significant components of the Companys deferred tax assets (liabilities) are as follows (in thousands):
As of December 31, 2013 2014 Deferred tax assets: Net operating loss carryforwards $ 83 $ 3,274 Stock-based compensation expense 1,502 2,222 Accrued VAT liability 573 612 Alternative minimum tax credit 176 163 Allowance for doubtful accounts 420 701 Deferred rent 136 108 Accrued vacation 169 413 Intangible assets 87 Unrealized loss on foreign currency 554 Other, net 504 1,041 Total deferred tax assets 3,650 9,088 Less valuation allowance 1,892 Total net deferred tax asset 3,650 7,196 Deferred tax liabilities: Depreciation (3,107) (5,467) Other liabilities (1,878) Total deferred tax liabilities (3,107) (7,345) Net deferred tax assets (liabilities) $ 543 $ (149)
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
As of December 31, 2013, the Company had approximately $10.6 million and $5.0 million of federal and pre-apportionment New York City net operating loss (NOL) carryforwards, respectively, as well as immaterial amounts of NOLs in other state and local jurisdictions. As of December 31, 2014, the Company had approximately $6.9 million and $4.3 million of federal and preapportionment New York City NOL carryforwards, respectively, as well as immaterial amounts of NOLs in other states. The federal NOLs will begin to expire in 2031 if unused. The New York City NOLs will expire in 2033 if unused. All of the federal NOLs and most of the other NOL carryforwards are attributable to excess tax deductions from stock option exercises. The benefit of these NOLs will be credited to additional paid in capital when the NOLs are utilized.
As of December 31, 2013 and 2014, the Company had approximately $0.2 million of federal alternative minimum tax credits, which may be carried forward indefinitely.
The utilization of the Companys NOL carryforwards is subject to an annual limitation under Section 382 of the Internal Revenue Code due to a change of ownership. However, the Company does not believe such annual limitation will impact its realization of the NOL carryforwards.
The Company assesses the likelihood of its ability to realize the benefit of its deferred tax assets in each jurisdiction by evaluating all relevant positive and negative evidence. To the extent the Company determines that some or all of its deferred tax assets are not more likely than not to be realized, it establishes a valuation allowance. For the year ended December 31, 2014, the Company determined that the existence of a three-year cumulative loss incurred in certain foreign jurisdictions, inclusive of 2014, constituted sufficiently strong negative evidence to warrant the establishment of a valuation allowance. As a result, a valuation allowance of $1.9 million as of December 31, 2014 has been recorded against certain of the Companys deferred tax assets. The amount of the deferred tax assets considered realizable is $7.2 million.
The following table summarizes the valuation allowance activity for the periods indicated (in thousands):
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 Balance as of the beginning of period $ $ $ Additions charged to expense 3,915 Deletions credited to expense (1,850 ) Currency translation (173 ) Balance as of the end of period $ $ $ 1,892
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
The Company has not recorded deferred income taxes with respect to undistributed earnings of foreign subsidiaries as such earnings are expected to remain reinvested indefinitely. Upon distribution as dividends or otherwise, such amounts would be subject to taxation in the U.S. However, U.S. tax liabilities would be offset, in whole or part, by allowable tax credits with respect to income taxes previously paid to foreign jurisdictions. The amount of undistributed earnings of non-U.S. subsidiaries at December 31, 2014, as well as the related deferred income tax, if any, is not material.
As of December 31, 2012 and December 31, 2013, the Company had no unrecognized income tax benefits. As of December 31, 2014 the Company had unrecognized income tax benefits of $0.4 million.
The following table summarizes the unrecognized tax benefit activity for the periods indicated (in thousands):
As of December 31, 2012 2013 2014 Balance as of the beginning of period $ $ $ Additions based on tax positions related to the current year 398 Additions for tax positions of prior years Reductions for tax provisions of prior years Settlements Balance as of the end of period $ $ $ 398
The Company files tax returns in the United States, New York and various other state and foreign jurisdictions.
Generally, tax returns filed for 2011 and later years remain open to examination. To the extent tax attributes generated in earlier, closed years are carried forward into years that are open to examination, they may be subject to adjustment in audit.
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
Note 11Fair Value Measurements
The Company has characterized its investments in marketable securities, based on the priority of the inputs used to value the investments, into a three-level fair value hierarchy. The fair value hierarchy gives the highest priority to quoted prices in active markets for identical assets or liabilities (Level 1), and lowest priority to unobservable inputs (Level 3). If the inputs used to measure the investments fall within different levels of the hierarchy, the categorization is based on the lowest level input that is significant to the fair value measurement of the investment. Investments recorded in the accompanying consolidated balance sheet are categorized based on the inputs to valuation techniques as follows:
Level 1These are investments where values are based on unadjusted quoted prices for identical assets in an active market that the Company has the ability to access.
Level 2These are investments where values are based on quoted market prices in markets that are not active or model derived valuations in which all significant inputs are observable in active markets.
Level 3These are liabilities where values are derived from techniques in which one or more significant inputs are unobservable.
The following are the major categories of assets and liabilities measured at fair value on a recurring basis as of December 31, 2013 and 2014 using quoted prices in active markets for identical assets (Level 1), significant other observable inputs (Level 2) and significant unobservable inputs (Level 3) (in thousands):
As of December 31, 2013 Level 1 Level 2 Level 3 Total Asset Cash equivalents: Money market funds $ 20,285 $ $ $ 20,285 U.S. Government bills 3,534 3,534 23,819 23,819 Short-term investments: U.S. Government and agency bills 18,075 18,075 $ 41,894 $ $ $ 41,894 Liability Warrants classified as liability $ $ $ 1,428 $ 1,428
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
As of December 31, 2014 Level 1 Level 2 Level 3 Total Asset Cash equivalents: Money market funds $ 20,288 $ $ $ 20,288 U.S. Government bills 2,426 2,426 22,714 22,714 Short-term investments: U.S. Government and agency bills 19,184 19,184 $ 41,898 $ $ $ 41,898 Liability Put option classified as liability $ $ $ 16 $ 16 Acquisitionrelated contingent consideration classified as liability 3,374 3,374 Warrants classified as liability 1,920 1,920 $ $ $ 5,310 $ 5,310
Level 1 instruments include money market funds and Corporate Certificates of Deposit and AAA-rated U.S. Government and agency securities, which are valued based on inputs including quotes from broker-dealers or recently executed transactions in the same or similar securities.
The table below provides a reconciliation of the beginning and ending balances for the liabilities measured at fair value using significant unobservable inputs (Level 3) (in thousands):
Year Ended
December 31, 2013 2014 Balance at beginning of period $ 1,009 $ 1,428 Acquired 97 Changes to liability-classified stock awards 3,374 Settled Net increase in fair value 419 411 Balance at end of period $ 1,428 $ 5,310
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
Note 12Net Loss Per Share
The following table presents the calculation of basic and diluted net loss per share for periods presented (in thousands, except share and per share data):
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 Net loss $ (2,385) $ (796) $ (15,243) Deemed dividend on share transaction (256) Net loss attributable to common stockholders (basic) $ (2,641) $ (796) $ (15,243) Dilutive effect of allocated income related to participating preferred stock Net loss attributable to common stockholders (dilutive) $ (2,641) $ (796) $ (15,243) Basic shares: Weighted-average common shares outstanding 60,563,723 65,334,548 80,493,407 Diluted shares: Common equivalent shares from stock options to purchase common stockholders Dilutive effect of assumed conversion of warrants Weighted-average shares used to compute diluted net loss per share 60,563,723 65,334,548 80,493,407 Net loss per share attributable to common stockholders: Basic net loss per share applicable to common stockholders $ (0.04) $ (0.01) $ (0.19) Diluted net loss per share applicable to common stockholders $ (0.04) $ (0.01) $ (0.19)
The following potential common shares were excluded from the calculation of diluted net loss per share attributable to common stockholders because their effect would have been anti-dilutive for the periods presented:
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 Stock options 25,488,714 24,844,659 22,616,546 Warrants 406,060 406,060 406,060 Convertible preferred stock 106,896,493 106,896,493 106,896,493 Total anti-dilutive securities 132,791,267 132,147,212 129,919,099
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
Unaudited Pro Forma Net Loss Per Share
The following table sets forth the computation of the Companys unaudited pro forma basic and diluted net loss per share of common stock (in thousands except share and per share data):
Year Ended
December 31, 2014 (unaudited) Numerator: Net loss for basic and diluted earnings per share $ (15,243) Add: Net unrealized loss on warrants 492 Net loss for pro forma basic and diluted earnings per share $ (14,751) Denominator: Weighted average common stock outstanding (basic) 80,493,407 Add: conversion of convertible preferred stock 106,896,493 Total weighted average shares outstanding used in basic pro forma net loss per share 187,389,900 Dilutive effect of stock options and warrants Total weighted average shares outstanding used in diluted pro forma net loss per share 187,389,900 Pro forma basic net loss per share $ (0.08) Pro forma diluted net loss per share $ (0.08)
The following potential common shares were excluded from the calculation of diluted pro forma net loss per share attributable to common stockholders because their effect would have been anti-dilutive for the periods presented:
Year Ended
December 31, 2014 Stock options 22,616,546 Warrants 406,060 Total anti-dilutive 23,022,606
Note 13Segment and Geographic Information
The Company has determined that it operates in one reportable segment that has been identified based on how the Companys chief operating decision maker manages the Companys business (see Note 1).
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
Revenue by country is based on the current billing address of the seller. The following table summarizes revenue by geographic area (in thousands):
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 2013 2014 United States $ 61,706 $ 103,428 $ 153,866 International 12,896 21,594 41,725 Revenue $ 74,602 $ 125,022 $ 195,591
No individual international countrys revenue exceeds 5% of total revenue. All significant long-lived assets are located in the United States.
Note 14Commitments and Contingencies
Lease Commitments
Capital Leases
The Company entered into a credit agreement with ePlus Group, Inc (ePlus) on January 3, 2014, which provided the Company with a credit line of up to $8.0 million for computer equipment leases (the ePlus Line). The ePlus Line allows the Company to order equipment from any approved vendor. ePlus purchases the equipment on behalf of the Company and leases it back to the Company. The leases have a 36-month term and are payable in equal monthly installments with a buy-out option of $1 or fair market value at the end of the lease term depending on the equipment. As of December 31, 2014, the Company has leased approximately $5.6 million of computer equipment using the ePlus Line.
The Company had a credit agreement with TriplePoint Capital, LLC (TriplePoint), which provided the Company with a credit line of up to $20.0 million for computer equipment leases (the TriplePoint Line). The TriplePoint Line allowed the Company to order equipment from any vendor. TriplePoint purchased the equipment on behalf of the Company and leased it back to the Company. The leases have a 36-month term, interest rate of 8.25%, and are payable in equal monthly installments. The Company stopped buying equipment under the TriplePoint Line in June 2012 and is paying off the remaining lease obligations in accordance with the terms of the credit agreement. At December 31, 2014, the Company had leased approximately $0.4 million of computer equipment using the TriplePoint Line.
In connection with the execution of the TriplePoint Line, the Company issued TriplePoint a warrant to purchase 4,723 shares of Series E Preferred Stock at an exercise price of $15.88 per share (the TriplePoint Series E Warrant). The TriplePoint Series E Warrant was valued at $43,000 on the date of issuance, which
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
the Company recognized as debt issuance cost and amortized over 36 months from the date of issuance. The warrant was fully vested at issuance.
For the years ended December 31, 2012, 2013 and 2014, the accompanying consolidated statement of operations includes charges of approximately $0.4 million, $0.2 million and $0.4 million for interest expense, respectively, related to the equipment leased using the TriplePoint Line and ePlus Lines.
Operating Leases
In 2012, the Company amended its existing lease for office space in Brooklyn, NY to extend its expiration to 2016. The portion of deferred rent liability related to the prior lease of approximately $0.3 million is being amortized and recorded as rent expense over the new lease term. During 2012, the Company also entered into a new lease for office space in San Francisco, CA expiring in 2017. In 2014, the Company entered into a new lease for office space in Dublin, Ireland expiring in 2024. Rent expense for these operating leases is recognized over the term of each respective lease on a straight-line basis. In addition, the Company leases other office facilities under shorter terms and cancellable leases.
Total rent expense for the years ended December 31, 2012, 2013 and 2014 was $1.7 million, $2.4 million and $3.6 million, respectively.
Build-to-Suit Lease
In May 2014, the Company entered into a 10-year lease agreement for approximately 199,000 rentable square feet of office space in Brooklyn, NY for the Companys new headquarters, which lease is expected to commence in 2015. Of the total new office space, approximately 172,000 rentable square feet is being accounted for as a build-to-suit lease and approximately 27,000 rentable square feet located in an adjacent building is being accounted for as an operating lease. In connection with the lease agreement, the Company established a $5.3 million collateral account, reflected in the restricted cash balance on the consolidated balance sheet.
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
The following table represents the Companys commitments under its current capital, operating, and build-to-suit lease agreements as of December 31, 2014 (in thousands):
Capital Lease
Obligations Operating
Leases Build-to-Suit
Lease Periods ending 2015 $ 2,288 $ 3,870 $ 2016 2,250 854 529 2017 1,257 1,845 9,155 2018 1,756 9,394 2019 1,767 9,464 Thereafter 10,952 61,772 Total minimum payments required $ 5,795 $ 21,044 $ 90,314 Amounts representing interest 892 Present value of net minimum payments 4,903 Current maturities 1,755 Long-term payment obligations $ 3,148
Tax Contingencies
The Company had a reserve of $2.5 million and $3.5 million at December 31, 2013 and 2014, respectively, for certain non-income tax obligations, representing managements best estimate of its liability. In addition, the Company could be subject to examination in various jurisdictions related to income and non-income tax matters. The resolution of these types of matters, giving recognition to the recorded reserve, could have an adverse impact on the Companys business.
Legal Proceedings
From time to time in the normal course of business, various claims and litigation have been asserted or commenced against the Company. Due to uncertainties inherent in litigation and other claims, the Company can give no assurance that it will prevail in any such matters, which could subject the Company to significant liability for damages. Any claims or litigation, regardless of their success, could have an adverse effect on the Companys consolidated results of operations or cash flows in the period the claims or litigation are resolved. As of December 31, 2014, the Company does not believe that there are any material litigation exposures.
Note 15Revisions to Consolidated Financial Statements
In the fourth quarter of 2014, the Company determined that its prior years annual consolidated financial statements included an understatement in certain non-income tax-related expenses. This understatement
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
impacts the Companys consolidated statements of operations, comprehensive loss, balance sheets and statements of cash flows. The Company assessed the effect of the errors on prior periods financial statements in accordance with Staff Accounting Bulletin (SAB) No. 99Materiality and SAB No. 108Considering the Effects of Prior Year Misstatements when Quantifying Misstatements in Current Year Financial Statements. Based on quantitative and qualitative factors, the Company determined that the errors were not material to any previously issued annual consolidated financial statements. The Company determined that the correction of the cumulative amounts of the errors would be material to the consolidated financial statements for the three months ended December 31, 2014 and, as such, has revised its previously issued consolidated financial statements for 2012 and 2013. The adjustments related to years prior to 2012 are reflected as a $0.1 million adjustment to beginning accumulated deficit for fiscal year 2012. All financial information contained in the accompanying notes to these financial statements has been revised to reflect the correction of these errors.
The effects of the adjustments on the consolidated statements of operations and comprehensive loss are as follows (in thousands except per share amounts):
Year Ended
December 31, 2012 Year Ended
December 31, 2013 As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Revised As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Revised Revenue $ 74,602 $ $ 74,602 $ 125,022 $ $ 125,022 Cost of revenue 24,408 85 24,493 47,679 100 47,779 Gross profit 50,194 (85) 50,109 77,343 (100) 77,243 Operating expenses Marketing 10,789 113 10,902 17,621 229 17,850 Product development 18,629 24 18,653 27,527 21 27,548 General and administrative 21,867 42 21,909 31,060 52 31,112 Total operating expenses 51,285 179 51,464 76,208 302 76,510 (Loss) income from operations (1,091) (264) (1,355) 1,135 (402) 733 Total other expense (1,140) (35) (1,175) (617) (58) (675) (Loss) income before income taxes (2,231) (299) (2,530) 518 (460) 58 Benefit (provision) for income taxes 32 113 145 (1,029) 175 (854) Net loss $ (2,199) $ (186) $ (2,385) $ (511) $ (285) $ (796) Net loss per sharebasic and diluted $ (0.04) $ $ (0.04) $ (0.01) $ $ (0.01) Net loss $ (2,199) $ (186) $ (2,385) $ (511) $ (285) $ (796) Other comprehensive (loss) income (26) (26) 212 212 Comprehensive loss $ (2,225) $ (186) $ (2,411) $ (299) $ (285) $ (584)
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
The effects of the adjustments on the consolidated balance sheets are as follows (in thousands):
As of
December 31, 2012 As of
December 31, 2013 As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Revised As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Revised Deferred tax assets-current $ 1,379 $ 201 $ 1,580 $ 1,426 $ 376 $ 1,802 Total current assets 68,752 201 68,953 76,409 376 76,785 Total assets 92,635 201 92,836 105,783 376 106,159 Accrued expenses and other current liabilities 1,950 527 2,477 4,055 988 5,043 Total current liabilities 10,929 527 11,456 18,231 988 19,219 Total liabilities 12,748 527 13,275 20,956 988 21,944 Accumulated deficit (16,011) (327) (16,338) (16,522) (612) (17,134) Total stockholders (deficit) equity (325) (327) (652) 4,615 (612) 4,003 Total liabilities, convertible preferred stock and stockholders (deficit) equity 92,635 201 92,836 105,783 376 106,159
The effects of the adjustments on the consolidated statements of cash flow are as follows (in thousands):
As of
December 31, 2012 As of
December 31, 2013 As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Revised As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Revised Net loss $ (2,199) $ (186) $ (2,385) $ (511) $ (285) $ (796) Deferred income taxes (622) (114) (736) 1,458 (176) 1,282 Accrued liabilities 130 300 430 1,499 461 1,960 Net cash provided by operating activities 9,684 9,684 16,542 16,542
Note 16Revisions and Restatements to Quarterly Consolidated Financial Statements (unaudited)
In the fourth quarter of 2014, the Company determined that certain of its 2013 and 2014 interim consolidated financial statements included misstatements of expenses due to period-end cutoff errors. The errors impact the Companys consolidated statements of operations, comprehensive income (loss), balance sheets and statements of cash flows in each period. The Company assessed the effect of the errors on prior periods financial statements in accordance with SAB No. 99Materiality and SAB No. 108Considering the Effects of Prior Year Misstatements when Quantifying Misstatements in Current Year Financial Statements and, based on quantitative and qualitative factors, determined that the errors, in combination with the understatement of non-income tax-related expenses described in Note 15, were material to the consolidated financial statements for the three months ended March 31, 2014, the three and six months ended June 30, 2014 and the nine months ended September 30, 2014. As such, the Company has restated its interim
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
consolidated financial statements for these periods. In addition, the impact of these adjustments to the consolidated financial statements was not material to the three months ended March 31, 2013, the three and six months ended June 30, 2013, the three and nine months ended September 30, 2013, the three months ended December 31, 2013 and the three months ended September 30, 2014 and therefore the Company has revised its interim consolidated financial statements for these periods.
The effects of the adjustments on the consolidated statements of operations are as follows (in thousands):
Quarter Ended March 31, 2013 Quarter Ended June 30, 2013 As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Revised As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Revised Revenue $ 26,144 $ $ 26,144 $ 27,364 $ $ 27,364 Cost of revenue 9,559 22 9,581 10,475 24 10,499 Gross profit 16,585 (22) 16,563 16,889 (24) 16,865 Operating expenses Marketing 2,962 42 3,004 3,180 43 3,223 Product development 6,686 4 6,690 6,750 4 6,754 General and administrative 6,610 9 6,619 7,474 15 7,489 Total operating expenses 16,258 55 16,313 17,404 62 17,466 Income (loss) from operations 327 (77) 250 (515) (86) (601) Total other expense (147) (12) (159) (240) (14) (254) Income (loss) before income taxes 180 (89) 91 (755) (100) (855) (Provision) benefit for income taxes (442) 34 (408) 1,865 38 1,903 Net (loss) income $ (262) $ (55) $ (317) $ 1,110 $ (62) $ 1,048
Quarter Ended September 30, 2013 Quarter Ended December 31, 2013 As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Revised As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Revised Revenue $ 29,957 $ $ 29,957 $ 41,557 $ $ 41,557 Cost of revenue 11,524 24 11,548 16,121 30 16,151 Gross profit 18,433 (24) 18,409 25,436 (30) 25,406 Operating expenses Marketing 4,088 60 4,148 7,391 84 7,475 Product development 7,049 7 7,056 7,042 6 7,048 General and administrative 7,831 74 7,905 9,145 (46) 9,099 Total operating expenses 18,968 141 19,109 23,578 44 23,622 (Loss) income from operations (535) (165) (700) 1,858 (74) 1,784 Total other expense (143) (15) (158) (87) (17) (104) (Loss) income before income taxes (678) (180) (858) 1,771 (91) 1,680 Benefit (provision) for income taxes 1,870 69 1,939 (4,322) 34 (4,288) Net income (loss) $ 1,192 $ (111) $ 1,081 $ (2,551) $ (57) $ (2,608)
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
The effects of the adjustments on the consolidated statements of operations and comprehensive income (loss) for the six months ended June 30, 2013 and the nine months ended September 30, 2013 are as follows (in thousands except per share amounts):
Six Months Ended June 30, 2013 Nine Months Ended September 30, 2013 As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Revised As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Revised Revenue $ 53,508 $ $ 53,508 $ 83,465 $ $ 83,465 Cost of revenue 20,034 46 20,080 31,558 70 31,628 Gross profit 33,474 (46) 33,428 51,907 (70) 51,837 Operating expenses Marketing 6,142 85 6,227 10,230 145 10,375 Product development 13,436 8 13,444 20,485 15 20,500 General and administrative 14,084 24 14,108 21,915 98 22,013 Total operating expenses 33,662 117 33,779 52,630 258 52,888 Loss from operations (188) (163) (351) (723) (328) (1,051) Total other expense (387) (26) (413) (530) (41) (571) Loss before income taxes (575) (189) (764) (1,253) (369) (1,622) Benefit for income taxes 1,423 72 1,495 3,293 141 3,434 Net income (loss) $ 848 $ (117) $ 731 $ 2,040 $ (228) $ 1,812 Net loss per sharebasic and diluted $ $ $ $ $ $ Net income (loss) $ 848 $ (117) $ 731 $ 2,040 $ (228) $ 1,812 Other comprehensive income 84 84 201 201 Comprehensive income (loss) $ 932 $ (117) $ 815 $ 2,241 $ (228) $ 2,013
The effects of the adjustments on the 2014 quarterly consolidated statements of operations are as follows (in thousands):
Quarter Ended March 31, 2014 Quarter Ended June 30, 2014 As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Restated As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Restated Revenue $ 40,536 $ $ 40,536 $ 42,509 $ $ 42,509 Cost of revenue 15,361 33 15,394 17,309 36 17,345 Gross profit 25,175 (33) 25,142 25,200 (36) 25,164 Operating expenses Marketing 7,258 210 7,468 8,804 (38) 8,766 Product development 7,981 61 8,042 8,782 10 8,792 General and administrative 8,768 445 9,213 10,809 591 11,400 Total operating expenses 24,007 716 24,723 28,395 563 28,958 (Loss) income from operations 1,168 (749) 419 (3,195) (599) (3,794) Total other expense (649) (20) (669) 260 (25) 235 (Loss) income before income taxes 519 (769) (250) (2,935) (624) (3,559) (Provision) benefit for income taxes (404) 191 (213) 400 8 408 Net income (loss) $ 115 $ (578) $ (463) $ (2,535) $ (616) $ (3,151)
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Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
Quarter Ended September 30, 2014 As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Revised Revenue $ 47,634 $ $ 47,634 Cost of revenue 18,080 35 18,115 Gross profit 29,554 (35) 29,519 Operating expenses Marketing 8,563 245 8,808 Product development 10,067 10 10,077 General and administrative 13,722 (36) 13,686 Total operating expenses 32,352 219 32,571 Loss from operations (2,798) (254) (3,052) Total other expense (1,116) (28) (1,144) Loss before income taxes (3,914) (282) (4,196) (Provision) benefit for income taxes (2,268) 193 (2,075) Net loss $ (6,182) $ (89) $ (6,271)
The effects of the adjustments on the consolidated statements of operations and comprehensive loss for the six months ended June 30, 2014 and the nine months ended September 30, 2014 are as follows (in thousands except per share amounts):
Six Months Ended June 30, 2014 Nine Months Ended September 30, 2014 As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Restated As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Restated Revenue $ 83,045 $ $ 83,045 $ 130,679 $ $ 130,679 Cost of revenue 32,670 69 32,739 50,750 104 50,854 Gross profit 50,375 (69) 50,306 79,929 (104) 79,825 Operating expenses Marketing 16,062 172 16,234 24,625 417 25,042 Product development 16,763 71 16,834 26,830 81 26,911 General and administrative 19,577 1,036 20,613 33,299 1,000 34,299 Total operating expenses 52,402 1,279 53,681 84,754 1,498 86,252 Loss from operations (2,027) (1,348) (3,375) (4,825) (1,602) (6,427) Total other expense (389) (45) (434) (1,505) (73) (1,578) Loss before income taxes (2,416) (1,393) (3,809) (6,330) (1,675) (8,005) Benefit (provision) for income taxes (4) 199 195 (2,272) 392 (1,880) Net loss $ (2,420) $ (1,194) $ (3,614) $ (8,602) $ (1,283) $ (9,885) Net loss per sharebasic and diluted $ (0.03) $ (0.02) $ (0.05) $ (0.11) $ (0.02) $ (0.13) Net loss $ (2,420) $ (1,194) $ (3,614) $ (8,602) $ (1,283) $ (9,885) Other comprehensive (loss) income (173) (173) (2,756) (2,756) Comprehensive loss $ (2,593) $ (1,194) $ (3,787) $ (11,358) $ (1,283) $ (12,641)
F-52
Etsy, Inc.
Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements
The effects of the adjustments on the consolidated balance sheets as of June 30 and September 30, 2014 are as follows (in thousands):
As of June 30, 2014 As of September 30, 2014 As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Restated As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Restated Deferred tax assetscurrent $ 2,985 $ 504 $ 3,489 $ 2,149 $ 568 $ 2,717 Total current assets 116,949 504 117,453 121,840 568 122,408 Total assets 224,006 504 224,510 237,711 568 238,279 Accrued expenses and other current liabilities 12,018 2,310 14,328 11,459 2,463 13,922 Total current liabilities 24,186 2,310 26,496 31,860 2,463 34,323 Total liabilities 68,653 2,310 70,963 88,371 2,463 90,834 Accumulated deficit (18,942) (1,806) (20,748) (25,124) (1,895) (27,019) Total stockholders (deficit) equity 75,141 (1,806) 73,335 69,128 (1,895) 67,233 Total liabilities, convertible preferred stock and stockholders (deficit) 224,006 504 224,510 237,711 568 238,279
The effects of the adjustments on the consolidated statements of cash flow for the six months ended June 30, 2013 and 2014 and the nine months ended September 30, 2013 and 2014 are as follows (in thousands):
Six Months Ended June 30, 2013 Nine Months Ended September 30, 2013 As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Revised As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Revised Net loss $ 848 $ (117) $ 731 $ 2,040 $ (228) $ 1,812 Deferred income taxes 728 (72) 656 1,092 (117) 975 Accrued liabilities 870 189 1,059 980 345 1,325 Net cash provided by operating activities 6,655 6,655 10,110 10,110
Six Months Ended June 30, 2014 Nine Months Ended September 30, 2014 As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Restated As Originally
Reported Adjustments As
Restated Net loss $ (2,420) $ (1,194) $ (3,614) $ (8,602) $ (1,283) $ (9,885) Deferred income taxes (470) (129) (599) 464 (194) 270 Accrued liabilities 7,302 1,322 8,624 4,901 1,477 6,378 Net cash provided by operating activities 6,914 6,914 11,986 11,986
F-53
Independent Auditors Report
To the Board of Directors and Stockholders of Jarvis Labs, Inc.:
We have audited the accompanying financial statements of Jarvis Labs, Inc., which comprise the balance sheets as of December 31, 2013 and December 31, 2012, and the related statements of operations and comprehensive loss, changes in convertible preferred stock and stockholders deficit and cash flows for the year ended December 31, 2013 and the period from June 11, 2012 (inception) to December 31, 2012.
Managements Responsibility for the Financial Statements
Management is responsible for the preparation and fair presentation of the financial statements in accordance with accounting principles generally accepted in the United States of America; this includes the design, implementation, and maintenance of internal control relevant to the preparation and fair presentation of financial statements that are free from material misstatement, whether due to fraud or error.
Auditors Responsibility
Our responsibility is to express an opinion on the financial statements based on our audits. We conducted our audits in accordance with auditing standards generally accepted in the United States of America. Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain reasonable assurance about whether the financial statements are free from material misstatement.
An audit involves performing procedures to obtain audit evidence about the amounts and disclosures in the financial statements. The procedures selected depend on our judgment, including the assessment of the risks of material misstatement of the financial statements, whether due to fraud or error. In making those risk assessments, we consider internal control relevant to the Companys preparation and fair presentation of the financial statements in order to design audit procedures that are appropriate in the circumstances, but not for the purpose of expressing an opinion on the effectiveness of the Companys internal control. Accordingly, we express no such opinion. An audit also includes evaluating the appropriateness of accounting policies used and the reasonableness of significant accounting estimates made by management, as well as evaluating the overall presentation of the financial statements. We believe that the audit evidence we have obtained is sufficient and appropriate to provide a basis for our audit opinion.
F-54
Opinion
In our opinion, the financial statements referred to above present fairly, in all material respects, the financial position of Jarvis Labs, Inc. at December 31, 2013 and December 31, 2012, and the results of their operations and their cash flows for the year ended December 31, 2013 and for the period from June 11, 2012 (inception) to December 31, 2012 in accordance with accounting principles generally accepted in the United States of America.
/s/ PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP
New York, New York
November 3, 2014
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Jarvis Labs, Inc.
Balance Sheets
As of
December 31,
2012 As of
December 31,
2013 As of
March 31,
2014 (unaudited) Assets Current assets Cash and cash equivalents $ 812,319 $ 591,004 $ 98,662 Accounts receivable 5,213 29,862 27,500 Inventory 13,800 139,672 150,810 Prepaid expenses 37,591 33,000 Total current assets 831,332 798,129 309,972 Property and equipment, net 14,542 39,742 35,520 Total assets $ 845,874 $ 837,871 $ 345,492 Liabilities and Stockholders Deficit Current liabilities Accounts payable $ $ 86,893 $ 48,329 Accrued expenses and other payables 11,028 246,307 74,215 Deferred revenue 1,160 235 Warrant liability 56,844 70,137 Debtcurrent portion 135,908 188,848 Total current liabilities 12,188 526,187 381,529 Debtnet of current portion 334,829 298,625 Total liabilities 12,188 861,016 680,154 Commitments and contingencies Convertible preferred stock Series Seedpar value $0.00001; 4,539,629 shares authorized as of December 31, 2012, and 4,728,155 shares authorized as of December 31, 2013 and March 31, 2014; 3,391,581 shares issued and outstanding as of December 31, 2012, and 4,419,683 shares issued and outstanding as of December 31, 2013 and March 31, 2014 972,577 1,272,577 1,272,577 Total convertible preferred stock 972,577 1,272,577 1,272,577 Stockholders (deficit) equity Common stock, par value $0.00001, 15,500,000 shares authorized as of December 31, 2012 and 15,688,486 shares authorized as of December 31, 2013 and March 31, 2014; 8,700,000 shares issued and outstanding as of December 31, 2012 and 2013, and March 31, 2014. 87 87 87 Additional paid-in capital 936 7,185 11,173 Accumulated deficit (139,914) (1,302,994) (1,618,499) Total stockholders deficit (138,891) (1,295,722) (1,607,239) Total liabilities, convertible preferred stock and stockholders deficit $ 845,874 $ 837,871 $ 345,492
The accompanying notes are an integral part of these financial statements
F-56
Jarvis Labs, Inc.
Statements of Operations and Comprehensive Loss
Period from
June 11, 2012
(inception) to
December 31, Year Ended
December 31, Three Months Ended
March 31, 2012 2013 2013 2014 (unaudited) Revenue $ 15,795 $ 968,249 $ 104,373 $ 274,353 Cost of revenue 12,573 818,930 83,080 230,606 Gross profit 3,222 149,319 21,293 43,747 Operating expenses: Sales and marketing 18,490 284,205 39,255 30,187 Product and technology 96,347 757,178 117,516 234,257 General and administrative 8,629 242,518 53,701 64,780 Total operating expenses 123,466 1,283,901 210,472 329,224 Loss from operations (120,244) (1,134,582) (189,179) (285,477) Other (expense) income: Interest expense and other (19,684) (18,070) (16,735) Unrealized loss on warrant liability (10,746) (13,293) Interest income 14 318 146 Total other expense (19,670) (28,498) 146 (30,028) Net and comprehensive loss $ (139,914) $ (1,163,080) $ (189,033) $ (315,505)
The accompanying notes are an integral part of these financial statements
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Jarvis Labs, Inc.
Statements of Changes in Convertible Preferred Stock and Stockholders Deficit
Redeemable Convertible
Preferred Stock Common Stock Additional
Paid-In
Capital Accumulated
Deficit Total
Stockholders
Deficit Shares Amount Shares Amount Balance at June 11, 2012 (inception) $ $ $ $ $ Issuance of common stock par value $0.00001 8,700,000 87 (87) Issuance of Series Seed preferred stock par value $0.00001 3,391,581 972,577 Stock-based compensation 1,023 1,023 Net loss (139,914) (139,914) Balance at December 31, 2012 3,391,581 972,577 8,700,000 87 936 (139,914) (138,891) Issuance of Series Seed preferred stock par value $0.00001 1,028,102 300,000 Stock-based compensation 6,249 6,249 Net loss (1,163,080) (1,163,080) Balance at December 31, 2013 4,419,683 1,272,577 8,700,000 87 7,185 (1,302,994) (1,295,722) Stock-based compensation 3,988 3,988 Net loss (315,505) (315,505) Balance at March 31, 2014 (unaudited) 4,419,683 $ 1,272,577 8,700,000 $ 87 $ 11,173 $ (1,618,499) $ (1,607,239)
The accompanying notes are an integral part of these financial statements
F-58
Jarvis Labs, Inc.
Statements of Cash Flows
Period from
June 11, 2012
(inception) to
December 31, Year Ended
December 31, Three Months Ended
March 31, 2012 2013 2013 2014 (unaudited) Cash flows from operating activities Net loss $ (139,914) $ (1,163,080) $ (189,033) $ (315,505) Net loss used in operating activities: cash used by operations Depreciation expense 813 12,375 6,585 8,138 Stock based compensation 1,023 6,250 772 3,988 Unrealized loss on Warrant Liability 10,744 13,293 Non-cash interest expense 17,958 16,735 Changes in operating assets and liabilities Increase in accounts receivable (5,213) (24,649) (10,000) 2,361 Increase in inventory (13,800) (125,872) (52,580) (11,138) (Increase) decrease in prepaid expenses and other receivables (37,591) 4,591 Increase (decrease) in accounts payable 86,893 (38,564) Increase (decrease) in accrued expenses and other payables 12,188 234,355 10,008 (172,090) Net cash used in operating activities (144,903) (982,617) (234,248) (488,191) Cash flows from investing activities Purchase of property and equipment (15,355) (37,575) (5,350) (4,151) Net cash used in investing activities (15,355) (37,575) (5,350) (4,151) Cash flows from financing activities Proceeds from issuance of preferred stock, net of issuance cost 972,577 300,000 300,000 Proceeds from Loan and warrant issuance 498,877 Net cash provided by financing activities 972,577 798,877 300,000 Net (decrease) increase in cash and cash equivalents 812,319 (221,315) 60,402 (492,342) Cash and cash equivalents Beginning of year 812,319 812,319 591,004 End of year $ 812,319 $ 591,004 $ 872,721 $ 98,662
The accompanying notes are an integral part of these financial statements
F-59
Jarvis Labs, Inc.
Notes to the Financial Statements
1. Organization
Organization and Nature of Business
Jarvis Labs, Inc. (the Company) was incorporated in the state of Delaware on June 11, 2012 (inception). The Company owns and operates Grandst.com, a website that provides a marketplace for creative new technology and merchandise. The Company generates revenue through direct retail sales. The Company is based in New York, NY and operates in the United States.
Unaudited Interim Financial Information
The accompanying balance sheet as of March 31, 2014, the related statements of operations, comprehensive loss and cash flows for the three months ended March 31, 2013 and 2014, and the statement of changes in convertible preferred stock and stockholders deficit for the three months ended March 31, 2014 are unaudited. The unaudited interim financial statements have been prepared on the same basis as the annual financial statements and, in the opinion of management, reflect all adjustments, which include only normal recurring adjustments necessary to state fairly the Companys financial position as of March 31, 2014 and results of operations and cash flows for the three months ended March 31, 2013 and 2014. The financial data and the other information disclosed in these notes to the financial statements related to these three-month periods are unaudited.
Use of Estimates
The preparation of financial statements in conformity with accounting principles generally accepted in the United States of America requires management to make estimates and assumptions that affect the reported amounts of assets and liabilities and disclosure of contingent assets and liabilities at the date of the financial statements and the reported amounts of revenue and expenses during the reporting periods. The accounting estimates that require managements most difficult and subjective judgments include the useful life and recoverability of fixed assets, the fair value of options issued for services and the fair value of warrants. The Company evaluates its estimates and judgments on an ongoing basis and revises when necessary. Actual results could differ from those estimates.
Revenue Recognition
The Company recognizes revenue from product sales when the following four criteria are met: persuasive evidence of an arrangement exists, delivery has occurred or services have been rendered, the selling price is fixed or determinable and collectability is reasonably assured.
F-60
Jarvis Labs, Inc.
Notes to the Financial Statements
The Company evaluates whether it is appropriate to record the gross amount of product sales and related costs or the net amount earned as commissions. Generally, the Company is the primary obligor in its sales to customers, has latitude in establishing prices and selecting suppliers and maintains inventory risk, and therefore revenue is recorded at the gross sales price.
Product sales represent revenue from the sale of products and related shipping fees. Product sales and shipping revenues, net of promotional discounts, rebates, and return allowances, are recorded when the products are shipped and title passes to customers.
Cost of Sales
Cost of sales consists of the purchase price of products sold, inbound shipping and duty charges and credit card processing fees. Shipping charges to receive products from the Companys suppliers are included in the Companys inventory, and recognized as cost of sales upon sale of products to the Companys customers.
Cash and Cash Equivalents
The Company considers all short-term highly liquid investments with an original maturity of three months or less to be cash equivalents.
Inventory
The Companys inventory is comprised of finished goods and are valued at the lower of average cost or market, and are evaluated periodically for product obsolescence, excess balances and other indications of impairment in value.
Property and Equipment
Property and equipment consisting of office furniture, office and computer equipment and leasehold improvements are recorded at cost. Property and equipment is depreciated using the straight-line method over the shorter of the estimated life of the asset or the lease term.
Fair Value Measurement
The Companys financial instruments are measured and recorded at fair value based on inputs and assumptions that market participants would use in pricing an asset or a liability. ASC Topic 820, Fair Value Measurements and Disclosures, defines fair value as the price that would be received from selling an asset or paid to transfer a liability in an orderly transaction between market participants at the measurement date. When determining fair value, management considers the principal or most advantageous market in which
F-61
Jarvis Labs, Inc.
Notes to the Financial Statements
the Company would transact, and also considers assumptions that market participants would use when pricing the asset or liability, such as inherent risk, transfer restrictions, and risk of non-performance.
ASC Topic 820 further requires disclosures on the amount and reason for transfers in and out of Level 1 and 2 fair value measurements. The standards also require disclosure of activities, including purchases, sales, issuances, and settlements within the Level 3 fair value measurements. The standards also clarify existing disclosure requirements on levels of disaggregation and disclosures about inputs and valuation techniques. This pronouncement requires disclosure regarding the manner in which fair value is determined for assets and liabilities and establishes a three-tiered value hierarchy into which these assets and liabilities are grouped, based upon significant inputs as follows:
Level 1Quoted prices in active markets for identical assets or liabilities.
Level 2Observable inputs, other than Level 1 prices, such as quoted prices in active markets for similar assets and liabilities, quoted prices for identical or similar assets and liabilities in markets that are not active, or other inputs that are observable or can be corroborated by observable market data.
Level 3Unobservable inputs that are supported by little or no market activity and that are significant to the fair value of the assets or liabilities. This includes certain pricing models, discounted cash flow methodologies and similar techniques that use significant unobservable inputs. When a determination is made to classify a financial instrument within Level 3, the determination is based upon the lack of significance of the observable parameters to the overall fair value measurement. However, the fair value determination for Level 3 financial instruments may consider some observable market inputs.
The lowest level of significant input determines the placement of the entire fair value measurement in the hierarchy.
The following table reflects the activity for the Companys major classes of liabilities measured at fair value using Level 3 inputs:
Total Fair
Value at
March 31,
2014 Level 1 Level 2 Level 3 Liabilities: Warrant liabilities $ 70,137 $ $ $ 70,137 Total Liabilities $ 70,137 $ $ $ 70,137
F-62
Jarvis Labs, Inc.
Notes to the Financial Statements
Total Fair
Value at
December 31,
2013 Level 1 Level 2 Level 3 Liabilities: Warrant liabilities $ 56,844 $ $ $ 56,844 Total Liabilities $ 56,844 $ $ $ 56,844
The following table reflects the activity for the Companys major classes of liabilities measured at fair value using Level 3 inputs:
Liabilities: Year Ended
December 31, 2012 Year Ended
December 31, 2013 Three Months Ended
March 31, 2014 (Unaudited) Balance at beginning of period $ $ $ 56,844 Level 3 liabilities acquired 46,098 Level 3 liabilities settled Unrealized loss on warrant liability 10,746 13,293 Included in earnings (unrealized) Balance at end of period $ $ 56,844 $ 70,137
Impairment of Long-lived Assets
The Company continually evaluates whether events and circumstances have occurred that indicate the remaining estimated useful lives of long-lived assets may require revision, or that the remaining balance of long-lived assets may not be recoverable. When factors indicate that long-lived assets should be evaluated for possible impairment, the Company uses an estimate of the related undiscounted future cash flows over the remaining life of the long-lived asset group in measuring whether they are recoverable. If the carrying value of the asset group exceeds the estimated undiscounted future cash flows, a loss is recorded to the extent the asset groups carrying value exceeds its fair value. Fair value would typically be determined based upon the asset groups estimated discounted cash flows. No assets were determined to be impaired in the years ended December 31, 2012 and 2013.
Sales and Marketing
Sales and marketing expenses consist primarily of online and offline advertising costs, marketing materials and market research. Advertising costs are expensed in the period in which they are incurred. The advertising and promotion costs for 2012 and 2013 and for the three months ended March 31, 2013 and 2014 are $14,758, $217,558, $65,832 and $11,618 respectively.
F-63
Jarvis Labs, Inc.
Notes to the Financial Statements
Product and Technology
Product and technology expenses include facilities costs, technology compensation, stock based compensation and employee benefits, website hosting fees, software licensing costs and certain other allocated costs.
General and Administrative
General and administrative expenses include facilities costs, administrative charges, professional services fees and other general overhead costs.
Stock-based Compensation
The stock-based compensation cost is measured at the grant date, based on the fair value of the award, and is amortized over the requisite service period for the award granted.
Calculating stock-based compensation requires the input of highly subjective assumptions, including the expected term of the stock-based awards and stock price volatility. The Company estimates the expected life of stock options granted based on the simplified method, which the Company believes is representative of future behavior. The Company estimates the volatility of the common stock on the date of grant based on the historic volatility of comparable companies in the industry. The Company selected the risk-free interest rate based on yields from United States Treasury zero-coupon issues for a term consistent with the expected life of the awards in effect at the time of grant. The Company estimates the expected forfeiture rate based on historical experience of the stock-based awards that are granted, exercised and canceled.
The Company may, from time to time, grant stock options to non-employees. For non-employee stock options, the Company calculates the fair value of the award on the date of grant in the same manner as employee awards, however the unvested portion of the awards are revalued at the end of each reporting period and the pro-rata compensation expense is adjusted accordingly until such time the non-employee award is fully vested. At the time, the total compensation recognized to date shall equal the fair value of the award as calculated on the measurement date, which is the date at which the award recipients performance is complete.
Concentrations of Credit Risk
Financial instruments that potentially subject the Company to concentrations of credit risk consist primarily of cash and cash equivalents and accounts receivable. At times, such amounts may exceed the limits insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation.
F-64
Jarvis Labs, Inc.
Notes to the Financial Statements
The Companys financial instruments consist of cash and cash equivalents, loans receivable, accounts payable, and loans payable. At December 31, 2012 and 2013 and for the three months ended March 31, 2013 and 2014 the fair values of these instruments approximated their financial statement carrying amounts due to their relatively short-term nature.
Income Taxes
The Company utilizes the asset and liability method of accounting for income taxes. Deferred income taxes reflect the net tax effects of temporary differences between the carrying amounts of assets and liabilities for financial reporting purposes and the amounts used for income tax purposes, as well as operating loss, capital loss and tax credit carryforwards. Deferred tax assets and liabilities are classified as current or noncurrent based on the classification of the related assets or liabilities for financial reporting, or according to the expected reversal dates of the specific temporary differences if not related to an asset or liability for financial reporting. Valuation allowances are established against deferred tax assets if it is more likely than not that they will not be realized.
As of December 31, 2012 and 2013, the Company recorded a full valuation allowance against its deferred tax assets. Consequently, the Company has not recognized deferred income tax assets or liabilities for the future tax consequences attributable to differences between the financial statement carrying amount of existing assets and liabilities and their respective tax bases.
The Companys policy is to recognize interest and penalties expense, if any, related to unrecognized tax benefits as a component of income tax expense. The Companys uncertain tax positions are related to tax years that remain subject to examination by the relevant tax authorities. As of December 31, 2013, the Company did not have any uncertain tax positions.
F-65
Jarvis Labs, Inc.
Notes to the Financial Statements
2. Property and Equipment
Property and equipment at December 31, 2012, 2013 and for the three months ended March 31, 2014 consists of the following:
Estimated
Useful Lives Year Ended
December 31, Three Months Ended
March 31, 2014 2012 2013 (Unaudited) Computer equipment 3 years $ 15,355 $ 24,801 $ 24,801 Furniture and Equipment 4 years 9,046 9,046 Leasehold Improvements Shorter of life
of asset or
lease term 19,083 19,083 Less: Accumulated depreciation (813) (13,188) (17,410) $ 14,542 $ 39,742 $ 35,520
Depreciation and amortization expense related to property and equipment was approximately $813, $12,375, and $4,222 for the years ended December 31, 2012 and 2013 and for the three months ended March 31, 2014, respectively.
3. Accrued Expenses and Other Payables
Accrued expenses and other payables consist of the following:
Year Ended
December 31, Three Months Ended
March 31, 2014 2012 2013 (unaudited) Accruals and Other Payables Accrued Expenses $ 6,476 $ 192,076 $ 55,139 Deferred Rent Liability 4,552 19,911 19,076 Accrued Salary 34,320 $ 11,028 $ 246,307 $ 74,215
4. Loan
In October 2013, the Company entered into a Loan & Security Agreement with Venture Lending & Leasing, which made $500,000 available to the Company, all of which had been drawn down by the Company as of December 31, 2013. The facility is used for working capital purposes and bears interest at the rate of 11%. The agreement also contains restrictive covenants, including financial reporting requirements. The terms and conditions of the loan required repayments to start in April 2014 and shall be repaid in thirty (30) equal monthly payments of principal plus interest. Interest expense related to borrowings under the line of credit
F-66
Jarvis Labs, Inc.
Notes to the Financial Statements
amounted to $13,349 and $12,125 during the year ended December 31, 2013 and the three months ended March 31, 2014, respectively.
In connection with the borrowing, the Company issued warrants to purchase 92,242 and 92,243 shares of Series Seed preferred stock at exercise prices of $0.2918 per share. The warrants expire in October 2023.
At issuance at October 22, 2013, at December 31, 2013 and at March 31, 2014, the warrants were valued at $46,098, $56,844 and $70,137, respectively, using an option pricing model. Key assumptions at October 22, 2013, December 31, 2013 and March 31, 2014 included a remaining term of 10 years, 9.8 years and 9.5 years, respectively, and a volatility of 83.74% based on a group of comparable companies and a risk-free interest rate of 2.54 - 2.98%.
The Company recorded the initial value of the warrants as debt discount of the loan and recorded $4,610 as an expense in 2013 in connection with the debt discount amortization. In addition, $1,123 was incurred as debt issuance costs. As the warrants are exercisable into Series Seed preferred stock, which include certain redemption rights that are considered outside of the control of the Company, in accordance with ASC Topic 480, Distinguishing Liabilities from Equity, the warrants are accounted for as a liability and are revalued at each balance sheet date. The warrants were fully vested at issuance.
The fair value of the loan was not materially different from its carrying value as interest rates have not changed materially since the loan was entered into.
Annual maturities of the loan are as follows:
Year Ending December 31, 2014 $ 135,908 2015 199,476 2016 164,616 500,000 Less : Unamortized discount (42,611) Plus : Interest accrued & unpaid 13,348 470,737 Less : Current maturities (135,908) Long term maturities $ 334,829
5. Capital Stock
As of December 31, 2012, the Company had been authorized to issue 20,039,629 shares of stock, at a par value of $0.00001 per share, consisting of 15,500,000 shares of common stock and 4,539,629 shares of preferred stock. The Company has 3,391,581 shares of preferred stock and 8,700,000 shares of common stock issued and outstanding. As of December 31, 2013 and March 31, 2014, the Company had been
F-67
Jarvis Labs, Inc.
Notes to the Financial Statements
authorized to issue 20,416,641 shares of stock, at a par value of $0.00001 per share, consisting of 15,688,486 shares of common stock and 4,728,155 shares of preferred stock. As of December 31, 2013, the Company has 4,419,683 shares of preferred stock and 8,700,000 shares of common stock issued and outstanding.
Dividend
The holders of shares of preferred stock shall be entitled to receive dividends, out of any assets legally available, prior and in preference to any declaration or payment of any dividend on the common stock of this corporation and at the applicable dividend rate, as declared by the board of directors. Such dividends shall not be cumulative. The holders of the outstanding preferred stock can waive any dividend preference that such holders shall be entitled to receive upon the affirmative vote or written consent of the holders of a majority of the shares of preferred stock then outstanding (voting together as a single class and not as a separate series, and on an as-converted basis). The dividend rate is $0.0233 per annum for each share of the Series Seed preferred stock (as adjusted for any stock splits, stock dividends, combinations, subdivisions, recapitalizations or the like). The Company has not declared or paid any dividends.
Liquidation
Unless the holders of at least a majority of the then outstanding shares of the preferred stock, voting together as a single class and on an as-converted basis, elect otherwise in writing, each of the following transactions shall be deemed a Liquidation Event:
a. A merger or consolidation in which the Company is the constituent party or its subsidiary is the constituent party and the Company issues shares of its capital stock pursuant to such a merger or consolidation, with stipulations;
b. The sale, lease, transfer, exclusive license or other disposition, in one transaction or series of related transactions, by the Company or any subsidiary of the Company of all or substantially all the assets of the Company and its subsidiaries taken as a whole, except where such sale, lease, transfer, exclusive license or other disposition is to a wholly owned subsidiary of the Company;
In the event of any Liquidation Event, the holders of each share of preferred stock then outstanding shall be entitled to be paid, out of the available funds and assets, and prior and in preference to any payment or distribution to the holders of common stock, an amount per share equal to the liquidation amount for each such series of preferred stock plus all declared but unpaid dividends thereon.
F-68
Jarvis Labs, Inc.
Notes to the Financial Statements
Conversion
The holders of the preferred stock have the right to convert at any time and from time to time, and without the payment of additional consideration by the holder thereof, into such number of fully paid and nonassessible shares of common stock as is determined by dividing the original issue price for the preferred stock by the conversion price at the time of the conversion.
The preferred stock will be automatically converted into common stock upon a qualified initial public offering, which will result in at least $30 million of proceeds.
6. Stock-Based Compensation
The Company has a 2012 Stock and Option Grant Plan (the Plan) under which the Company may grant stock options for up to 1,466,488 shares of common stock. Stock options expire either four or ten years from the date of the grant. For initial grants, vesting occurs over either (i) two years, with vesting occurring immediately each month, or (ii) four years, with the first 25% of the awards vesting twelve months after the vesting commencement date and the remaining 75% of the awards vesting monthly over the next thirty-six months. The Companys policy for attributing the value of stock-based compensation is on a straight-line basis over the requisite service period for the entire award.
During 2013 and 2012 no options were exercised. At December 31, 2013, there were 1,116,360 shares available for grant under the Plan.
The fair value for options and share awards granted under the Plan are estimated at the date of grant using the Black-Scholes option pricing model and the following range of assumptions were used for grants during the years ended December 31, 2013 and 2012 and the three months ended March 31, 2014:
Year Ended
December 31, Three Months Ended
March 31, 2014 2012 2013 Risk-free interest rates 0.74% 0.62% 1.91% 0.80% Expected dividend yield 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% Expected term 6.25 years 3.03 5.75 years 3.25 years Volatility 188.8% 144.0% 143%
F-69
Jarvis Labs, Inc.
Notes to the Financial Statements
The impact on recording stock-based compensation expense for the years ended December 31, 2012 and 2013 and the three months ended March 31, 2013 and 2014 was as follows:
Year Ended
December 31, Three Months Ended
March 31, 2012 2013 2013 2014 (Unaudited) Sales and marketing $ $ $ $ Product and technology 1,023 6,249 772 3,988 General and administrative Total stock-based compensation expense, net of tax $ 1,023 $ 6,249 $ 772 $ 3,988
The following table summarizes the stock option activity:
Total
Options
Outstanding Weighted
Average
Exercise
Price Weighted
Average
Remaining
Contractual
Term Outstanding at December 31, 2011 Options granted 100,000 $ 0.0001 Options exercised Options forfeited Outstanding at December 31, 2012 100,000 0.0001 8.68 Options granted 250,128 0.10 Options exercised Options forfeited Outstanding at December 31, 2013 350,128 0.07 5.41 Options granted 110,220 0.10 Options exercised Options forfeited Outstanding at March 31, 2014 460,348 0.08 4.83 Exercisable at December 31, 2013 33,333 $ 0.0001 5.41 Vested and expected to vest at December 31, 2013 350,128 $ 0.07 5.41
The weighted-average grant-date fair value of options granted during the years ended December 31, 2013 and 2012 and the three months ended March 31, 2014 was $25,013, $10,231 and $26,453, respectively.
The stock compensation expense for employee awards was $5,923, $1,023, $3,541 and $772 for the years ended December 31, 2013 and 2012 and three months ended March 31, 2014 and 2013, respectively. The stock compensation expense for non-employee awards was $326, $0, $447 and $0 for the years ended December 31, 2013 and 2012 and three months ended March 31, 2014 and 2013, respectively. As of
F-70
Jarvis Labs, Inc.
Notes to the Financial Statements
December 31, 2013, there was $28,143 of unrecognized stock compensation expense related to non-vested share-based compensation arrangements granted under the Plan. That cost is expected to be recognized over a weighted-average period of 8.68 years. The total fair value of shares vested during the years ended December 31, 2013 and 2012 was $3,333 and $0, respectively.
7. Commitments and Contingencies
In 2013, the Company entered into a new lease for office space in New York, NY expiring in 2016. Rent expense for the operating lease is recognized over the term of the lease on a straight line basis. Total rent for this lease for the years ended December 31, 2013 and 2012 and three months ended March 31, 2014 and 2013 is $80,411, $0, $19,076 and $6,353, respectively.
Operating 2014 $ 134,400 2015 138,559 2016 52,515 2017 2018 Total minimum payments required: $ 325,474
From time to time, the Company is involved in disputes or legal proceedings arising in the ordinary course of business. The Company believes that there is no dispute or litigation pending that could have, individually or in the aggregate, a material adverse effect on its financial position, results of operations or cash flows.
8. Income Taxes
The significant components of the Companys deferred tax assets are as follows:
2012 2013 Net operating loss $ 59,514 $ 479,178 Fixed Assets 139 2,151 Stock based compensation 439 4,098 Other Deferred tax assets before valuation allowance 60,092 485,427 Less: Valuation allowance (60,092) (485,427) Total deferred tax assets $ $
As of December 31, 2012 and 2013, the Company had a net operating loss carry-forward of approximately $140 thousand and $1.1 million available to reduce future taxable income.
F-71
Jarvis Labs, Inc.
Notes to the Financial Statements
The Company follows ASC 740, Accounting for Uncertainty in Income Taxes. As of December 31, 2012 and 2013, there were no uncertain tax positions. As of December 31, 2012 and 2013, the Company was subject to federal and state income tax in the United States. Since the Company is in a loss carry-forward position, the Company is generally subject to U.S. federal and state income tax examinations by tax authorities for all years for which a loss carry-forward is available. It is the Companys policy to record interest and penalties as a component of income tax expense. No amounts of interest or penalties were recognized in the financial statements upon adoption of this guidance as of and for the years ended December 31, 2013 and 2012.
9. Subsequent Events
The Company has performed an evaluation of subsequent events through November 3, 2014, the date of issuance of these financial statements.
In April 2014, the Company was acquired by Etsy, Inc.
F-72
Independent Auditors Report
To the Board of Directors and Stockholders of Incubart SAS:
We have audited the accompanying statements of Incubart SAS which comprise the balance sheets as of December 31, 2013 and 2012, and the related statements of income and cash flows for the years then ended, and the related notes to the financial statements.
Managements Responsibility for the Financial Statements
Management is responsible for the preparation and fair presentation of the financial statements in accordance with accounting principles generally accepted in France; this includes the design, implementation, and maintenance of internal control relevant to the preparation and fair presentation of financial statements that are free from material misstatement, whether due to fraud or error.
Auditors Responsibility
Our responsibility is to express an opinion on the financial statements based on our audits. We conducted our audits in accordance with auditing standards generally accepted in the United States of America. Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain reasonable assurance about whether the financial statements are free from material misstatement.
An audit involves performing procedures to obtain audit evidence about the amounts and disclosures in the financial statements. The procedures selected depend on our judgment, including the assessment of the risks of material misstatement of the financial statements, whether due to fraud or error. In making those risk assessments, we consider internal control relevant to the Companys preparation and fair presentation of the financial statements in order to design audit procedures that are appropriate in the circumstances, but not for the purpose of expressing an opinion on the effectiveness of the Companys internal control. Accordingly, we express no such opinion. An audit also includes evaluating the appropriateness of accounting policies used and the reasonableness of significant accounting estimates made by management, as well as evaluating the overall presentation of the financial statements. We believe that the audit evidence we have obtained is sufficient and appropriate to provide a basis for our audit opinion.
F-73
Opinion
In our opinion, the financial statements referred to above present fairly, in all material respects, the financial position of Incubart SAS at December 31, 2013 and 2012 and the results of its operations and its cash flows for the years then ended in accordance with accounting principles generally accepted in France.
Emphasis of matter
Accounting principles generally accepted in France vary in certain significant respects from accounting principles generally accepted in the United States of America. Information relating to the nature and effect of such differences is presented in Note 12 to the financial statements.
November 3, 2014
/s/ PricewaterhouseCoopers Audit
Neuilly-sur-Seine, France
Pierre Marty
F-74
Incubart SAS
Assets (all amounts in Euros)
As of December 31,
2013 2012 Assets Gross Depr.Prov. Net Gross Depr.Prov. Net LONG TERM ASSETS Intangible assets Goodwill Other intangible assets 63,598 30,033 33,565 41,315 19,229 22,086 Tangible assets 31,016 11,180 19,836 18,468 4,544 13,924 Deposits 74,830 74,830 81,265 81,265 TOTAL(I) 169,444 41,213 128,231 141,048 23,773 117,275 CURRENT ASSETS Stocks and work in progress Debtors Trade debtors 194,943 194,943 8,269 8,269 Other debtors 173,792 173,792 272,792 272,792 Short term investments 670,000 670,000 1,050,000 1,050,000 Cash at bank and in hand 1,451,519 1,451,519 563,421 563,421 Prepaid expenses 353 353 19,279 19,279 TOTAL(II) 2,490,607 0 2,490,607 1,913,761 0 1,913,761 Deferred charges(III) Redemption bond premium(IV) Unrealized exchange losses(V) TOTAL ASSETS(I to V) 2,660,051 41,213 2,618,838 2,054,809 23,773 2,031,036
F-75
Incubart SAS
Equity and Liabilities (all amounts in Euros)
As of December 31,
2013 2012 Equity and Liabilities Net Net CAPITAL AND RESERVES Share capital 65,365 65,365 Share premium account 2,008,797 2,008,797 Revaluation reserve Reserves: - Legal reserve - Statutory reserves - Regulated reserves - Other reserves 115 115 Retained earnings (763,491) (343,309) Loss for the period (466,520) (420,182) Tax regulated provisions TOTAL(I) 844,266 1,310,786 PROVISIONS FOR CONTINGENCIES AND LIABILITIES TOTAL(II) CREDITORS Bank loans and overdrafts 360,000 Other loans and financial liabilities 52,079 Trade creditors 67,382 127,737 Tax and social creditors 231,880 104,741 Other creditors 1,063,231 487,772 TOTAL(III) 1,774,572 720,250 TOTAL EQUITY and LIABILITIES (I to III) 2,618,838 2,031,036
F-76
Incubart SAS
Income Statement (all amounts in Euros)
For the years ended December 31,
2013 2012 Income statement France Export Total Total Operating income Sales of goods Sales of processed goods Sales of services 1,349,602 72,207 1,421,809 719,757 Turnover 1,349,602 72,207 1,421,809 719,757 Change in stocks of finished goods Own work capitalised Operating grants Reversal of provisions and cost recharge 5,688 4,266 Other operating income 36,671 44,161 TOTAL(I) 1,464,168 768,184 Operating expenses Purchase of goods Change in stocks of goods Purchase of raw materials and consumables Change in stocks of raw materials and consumables Other external expenses 789,165 565,557 Taxes 22,514 10,372 Wages and salaries 988,657 611,204 Social contributions 221,727 97,649 Amortization and depreciation on fixed assets 17,440 9,723 Other operating expenses 20,836 109,282 TOTAL(II) 2,060,339 1,403,787 OPERATING LOSS(I II) (596,171) (635,603) Financial income 29,383 30,163 TOTAL(III) 29,383 30,163 Financial expenses 102 21 TOTAL(IV) 102 21 FINANCIAL INCOME(III IV) 29,281 30,142 LOSS BEFORE TAX AND EXTRAORDINARY ITEMS(I II + III IV) (566,890) (605,461)
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Incubart SAS
Income Statement (all amounts in Euros)
For the years ended December 31,
Income statement 2013 2012 Extraordinary income On operating activities On investing activities 98 Reversal of provisions and cost recharge TOTAL(V) 98 Extraordinary expenses On operating activities 3,094 On investing activities 6,435 15 Depreciation and provision expenses TOTAL(VI) 9,529 15 EXTRAORDINARY (EXPENSE) INCOME(V VI) (9,529) 83 Corporation tax(VII) (109,899) (185,196) TOTAL INCOME(I + III + V) 1,493,551 798,445 TOTAL EXPENSES(II + IV + VI + VII) 1,960,071 1,218,627 NET LOSS (466,520) (420,182)
F-78
Incubart SAS
Statements of Cash Flows (all amounts in Euros)
For the years ended December 31,
2013 2012 Cash flows from operating activities Net loss (466,520) (420,182) Adjustments for: Depreciation 17,440 9,723 Investment income (29,383) (30,143) Working capital changes: Increase in trade debtors (186,674) (7,166) Decrease/Increase in other debtors 99,000 (228,305) Decrease/Increase in prepaid expenses 18,926 (19,279) Decrease/Increase in trade creditors (60,355) 84,513 Increase in tax and social creditors 127,139 58,321 Increase in other creditors 575,459 361,092 Net cash from operating activities 95,032 (191,426) Cash flows from investing activities Purchase of property, plant and equipment (28,396) (97,197) Sale of short-term investments 380,000 450,000 Investment income 29,383 30,143 Net cash used in investing activities 380,987 382,946 Cash flows from financing activities Proceeds from long-term borrowings 412,079 Net cash used in financing activities 412,079 Net increase in cash and cash equivalents 888,098 191,520 Cash and cash equivalents at beginning of period 563,421 371,901 Cash and cash equivalents at end of period 1,451,519 563,421
F-79
Incubart SAS
Notes to the Financial Statements
Note 1Basis of Presentation and Summary of Significant Accounting Policies
1. Description of business
Incubart SAS (the Company) was incorporated in Paris in March 2009. Incubart owns and operates among other websites, alittlemarket.com and alittlemercerie.com, websites that provide a marketplace for the purchase and sale of handmade goods and commercial supplies. The Company generates revenue primarily from commissions on sales and seller advertising fees.
The Financial Statements are prepared in accordance with:
PCG 1999, approved by ministerial order on June 22, 1999
Law number 83 353 of April 30, 1983
Decree 83 1020 of November 29, 1983
Accounting standards arising from the Authority de Normes Comptables (ANC)
The financial statements have been prepared on a going-concern basis. The notes and tables below form an integral part of the annual accounts.
2. Significant events
In 2012, the Company launched two new platforms: A Little Maman, dedicated to nursery items and A Little Market in Italy.
In 2013, the Company launched one new platform, A Little Epicerie, dedicated to Food.
With regards to product features, the Company has launched two major features: the multishop basket and the installment payment service.
3. Revenue recognition
Revenue is mainly generated from commissions on sales made by listed sellers and from the sale of advertising on the Companys website.
The main line of revenue is transaction fees, which include commissions on orders placed by purchasers on the Companys websites and payment processing fees charged when the buyer pays with a credit card through the Companys secured system.
F-80
Incubart SAS
Notes to the Financial Statements
In accordance with its terms of business, the Company has no responsibility in the fulfillment of orders placed by buyers and earns a fixed commission per transaction. Based on the aforementioned factors, revenue is recorded net of amounts collected from buyers and remitted to sellers. Seller refunds are recorded as a reduction to gross revenue.
Transaction feesThe Company earns a commission on sales made between the seller and their buyer. Revenue from commissions on sales is recognized when the transaction is successfully completed, which occurs when a buyer purchases the item on the website with their credit card or their e-wallet.
Advertising feesThe Company offers search advertising where sellers can advertise their items based on featured search results. The advertising fees are recognized as revenue when purchased by the sellers.
4. Intangible assets
Intangible assets, consisting principally of website and purchased software, are carried at cost and amortized over their estimated useful lives, generally on a straight-line basis over three years. The Company reviews its identifiable amortizable intangible assets to be held and used for impairment whenever events or changes in circumstances indicate that the carrying value of the assets may not be recoverable. Measurement of any impairment loss is based on the excess of the carrying value of the asset over its fair value.
5. Research and development
From the commencement of financial year 2012, development of software for internal use has been expensed as incurred. Prior to 2012, certain development costs, primarily relating to third party developers, had been capitalized.
6. Property and equipment
Property and equipment, consisting principally of computer equipment and different fittings, are recorded at cost. Depreciation and amortization are recognized using the straight-line method over the estimated useful lives of the assets. Repairs and maintenance are charged to operations as incurred.
The depreciation rate of the main assets are the following:
Website Development Costs: 5 years
Computer Hardware: 3 to 5 years
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Incubart SAS
Notes to the Financial Statements
7. Accounts receivable
The Companys trade accounts receivable are recorded at amounts billed to customers and presented on the balance sheet net of the allowance for doubtful accounts. The allowance is determined by a number of factors, including age of the receivable, current economic conditions, historical losses and managements assessment of the financial condition of customers. Receivables are written off once they are deemed uncollectible, which may arise when customers file for bankruptcy or are otherwise deemed unable to repay the amounts owed to the Company.
8. Provisions
Provisions for liabilities are made in accordance with rule CRC 2000-06.
Provisions for risks and expenses are recorded to take account of probable future sacrifices or outflows of economic benefits arising from present obligations and which result from past transactions.
These provisions are estimated based on consideration of the best available information known to management at the year-end closing date.
9. Purchased gift vouchers
The Company recognizes a liability for gift cards purchased on its websites. Under French generally accepted accounting principles (French GAAP), the Company records cash received against a liability, which is released to the income statement when the voucher expires or is redeemed. When a customer uses the purchased gift vouchers, the related commission is recognized as revenue. If a purchased gift card expires unused, a gain is recognized in the income statement.
As at December 31, 2013, the liability was estimated at EUR 13,947, compared with EUR 11,306 as at December 31, 2012.
10. Free gift vouchers
The Company may decide to grant free gift vouchers to buyers on a discretionary basis as sales incentives. These vouchers are not offered in connection with a current transaction, but rather as an incentive for future purchases. The Company records these as a discount on a future sale at the time of redemption.
11. Cash and cash equivalents
The Company considers all investments with a maturity of three months or less at the time of purchase to be cash equivalents.
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Incubart SAS
Notes to the Financial Statements
Short term investments amount to EUR 670,000 as at December 31, 2013 and EUR 1,050,000 as at December 31, 2012.
12. Restricted cash
When a purchaser pays through the Incubart secured system, the funds are put in an escrow account until remitted to the merchant, after deduction of commission and processing fees. The restricted cash balance of the dedicated bank account is presented within Cash at bank and in hand and amounts to EUR 1,042,491 as at December 31, 2013 (2012 : EUR 476,448).
The corresponding liability towards the listed sellers is recorded under Other creditors in the balance sheet.
13. Accounting policies and changes in accounting estimates
There were no changes in the methods of evaluation during the course of the financial year.
There were no changes in the presentation of the financial statements during the course of the financial year.
14. Pensions
The Companys defined benefit obligation is only the French statutory lump sum payment. The projected benefit obligation is not material for the financial years 2013 and 2012 (EUR 14,043 and EUR 6,447, respectively).
15. Taxes
Deferred taxes are not recognized on the face of the balance sheet in the statutory financial statements.
16. Competitiveness and employment tax credit (CICE)
This tax credit was enacted from January 1, 2013 and amounts to EUR 15,527 at December 31, 2013. This will be collected by the Company in cash independently of its future taxable result.
17. Foreign currency translations
The Companys revenue and expenses are essentially transacted in Euros, and its assets and liabilities are all denominated in Euros, which is the functional currency of the Company.
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Incubart SAS
Notes to the Financial Statements
18. Stock-based compensation
No stock options, warrants or other equity instruments have been issued to any employees, directors, related parties or other third parties.
19. Credit agreements
On October 8, 2012, the Company entered into an interest-free credit agreement with OSEO of EUR 450,000, of which EUR 360,000 had been drawn down as at December 31, 2013 (2012: Nil).
The loan is repayable quarterly, at an average of EUR 28,000 per quarter, beginning December 31, 2016, with a minimum of EUR 160,000 to be repaid. There is a clause in the agreement which allows for a penalty-free early repayment, at any time, of the loan in full.
On July 30, 2012, the Company entered into an interest-free agreement with COFACE. The agreement is intended to finance marketing development initiatives undertaken in foreign markets. As at December 31, 2013, the amount drawn down totaled EUR 52,079. The Company is obliged to pay back either 14% of the turnover generated from foreign sales, or a maximum of the amount of the loan drawn down, whichever is lower, dating 12 months after the export-related project is considered concluded by management and COFACE is informed.
20. Related party transactions
There are no related party transactions for 2012 and 2013.
21. Segment reporting information
The Company operates solely in France and in Italy for 2012 and 2013.
22. Subsequent events
The Company was acquired in full by Etsy, Inc., a U.S.-based company, on June 18, 2014.
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Incubart SAS
Notes to the Financial Statements
Note 2Fixed Assets
Financial Year 2012
(all amounts in Euros)
Gross amount
opening
balance Acquisitions Disposals Gross amount
closing
balance Intangible assets Other intangible assets 32,315 9,000 41,315 TOTAL 32,315 9,000 41,315 Tangible assets Plant, machinery and equipment Other fixtures and fittings 3,880 3,880 Vehicles Office equipment, computer hardware, furniture 5,101 9,487 14,588 TOTAL 5,101 13,367 18,468 Financial assets Deposits 6,435 74,830 81,265 TOTAL 6,435 74,830 81,265 GRAND TOTAL 43,851 97,197 141,048
Financial Year 2013
(all amounts in Euros)
Gross amount
opening
balance Acquisitions Disposals Gross amount
closing
balance Intangible assets Other intangible assets 41,315 22,283 63,598 TOTAL 41,315 22,283 63,598 Tangible assets Plant, machinery and equipment Other fixtures and fittings 3,880 3,880 Vehicles Office equipment, computer hardware, furniture 14,588 12,548 27,136 TOTAL 18,468 12,548 31,016 Financial assets Deposits 81,265 6,435 74,830 TOTAL 81,265 6,435 74,830 GRAND TOTAL 141,048 34,831 6,435 169,444
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Incubart SAS
Notes to the Financial Statements
Note 3Depreciation
Financial Year 2012
(all amounts in Euros)
Opening
balance Additional
allowances Reductions
dispo./Rever. Closing
balance Intangible assets Other intangible assets 12,179 7,050 19,229 TOTAL 12,179 7,050 19,229 Tangible assets Other fixtures and fittings 208 208 Office equipment, computer hardware, furniture 1,871 2,465 4,336 TOTAL 1,871 2,673 4,544 GRAND TOTAL 14,050 9,723 23,773
Financial Year 2013
(all amounts in Euros)
Opening
balance Additional
allowances Reductions
dispo./Rever. Closing
balance Intangible assets Other intangible assets 19,229 10,804 30,033 TOTAL 19,229 10,804 30,033 Tangible assets Other fixtures and fittings 208 776 984 Office equipment, computer hardware, furniture 4,336 5,860 10,196 TOTAL 4,544 6,636 11,180 GRAND TOTAL 23,773 17,440 41,213
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Incubart SAS
Notes to the Financial Statements
Note 4Receivables
Financial Year 2012
(all amounts in Euros)
Receivables Gross amount Liquidity of the asset Within 1 year After 1 year Non Current Assets Amount receivable from subsidiaries Loans Deposits 81,265 81,265 Current Assets Doubtful and in dispute trade debtors Other trade debtors 8,269 8,269 Receivables representing borrowed securities Employees Social contributions 9,478 9,478 Corporation tax 192,890 192,890 Value-added tax 33,999 33,999 Other taxes Sundries Intercompany and current accounts Other debtors 36,425 36,425 Prepaid expenses 19,279 19,279 TOTAL 381,605 300,340 81,265
Financial Year 2013
(all amounts in Euros)
Receivables Gross amount Liquidity of the asset Within 1 year After 1 year Non Current Assets Amount receivable from subsidiaries Loans Deposits 74,830 74,830 Current Assets Doubtful and in dispute trade debtors Other trade debtors 229,892 229,892 Receivables representing borrowed securities Employees Social contributions Corporation tax 94,503 94,503 Value-added tax 22,331 22,331 Other taxes Sundries Intercompany and current accounts Other debtors 22,009 22,009 Prepaid expenses 353 353 TOTAL 443,918 369,088 74,830
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Incubart SAS
Notes to the Financial Statements
Note 5Trade Creditors and Payables
Financial Year 2012
(all amounts in Euros)
Payables Gross amount Within 1 year 1 to 5 years After 5 years Convertible debenture loans / Other debenture loans Bank loans and overdraft - Payable over 1 year - Payable over more than 1 year Other loans and financial liabilities Trade creditors 127,737 127,737 Personnel 27,791 27,791 Social contributions 45,847 45,847 Corporation tax Value-added tax 29,963 29,963 Guaranteed bonds Other taxes 1,140 1,140 Long term creditors Intercompany and current accounts Other creditors(1) 487,772 487,772 Liabilities representing borrowed securities Deferred income TOTAL 720,250 720,250
(1) Other creditors include the liabilities for the sellers for an amount of EUR 476,448 and the balance of the purchased gift vouchers for an amount of EUR 11,306.
Financial Year 2013
(all amounts in Euros)
Payables Gross amount Within 1 year 1 to 5 years After 5 years Convertible debenture loans / Other debenture loans Bank loans and overdraft - Payable over 1 year - Payable over more than 1 year 360,000 249,000 111,000 Other loans and financial liabilities 52,079 52,079 Trade creditors 67,382 67,382 Personnel 53,814 53,814 Social contributions 126,873 126,873 Corporation tax Value-added tax 47,020 47,020 Guaranteed bonds Other taxes 4,173 4,173 Long term creditors Intercompany and current accounts Other creditors(1) 1,063,231 1,063,231 Liabilities representing borrowed securities Deferred income TOTAL 1,774,572 1,362,493 301,079 111,000
(1) Other creditors include the liabilities for the sellers for an amount of EUR 1,042,491 and the balance of the purchased gift vouchers for an amount of EUR 13,947.
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Incubart SAS
Notes to the Financial Statements
Note 6Accrued Payables
(all amounts in Euros)
Accrued payables included in Balance Sheet December 31,
2013 December 31,
2012 Convertible debenture loans Other debenture loans Bank loans and overdrafts Other loans and financial liabilities Trade creditors 28,337 30,378 Social contributions 81,050 45,304 Fixed assets creditors Other creditors TOTAL 109,387 75,682
Note 7Prepayments and Deferred Income
(all amounts in Euros)
Deferred Income December 31,
2013 December 31,
2012 Operating incomes Financial incomes Extraordinary incomes TOTAL
Prepaid Expenses December 31,
2013 December 31,
2012 Operating expenses 353 19,279 Financial expenses Extraordinary expenses TOTAL 353 19,279
Note 8Share Capital
Financial Year 2012
Category of shares Par value Number of shares As at the
beginning of
the period As at the end
of the period As at the
beginning of
the period Issued during
the period Redeemed
during the
period As at the end
of the period Ordinary Shares 1.00 1.00 65,365 65,365
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Incubart SAS
Notes to the Financial Statements
Financial Year 2013
Category of shares Par value Number of shares As at the
beginning of
the period As at the end
of the period As at the
beginning of
the period Issued during
the period Redeemed
during the
period As at the end
of the period Ordinary Shares 1.00 1.00 65,365 65,365
Note 9Statement of Changes in Shareholders Equity
(all amounts in Euros)
Financial Year 2012
INCUBART Statement of changes in equity for the year ended December 31, 2012 Share
Capital Share
Premium Retained
Earnings Other
reserves Revaluation
Surplus Total
Equity Balance at December 31, 2011 65,365 2,008,797 (343,309) 115 0 1,730,968 Changes in equity for the year 2012 Issue of share capital Loss for the year (420,182) (420,182) Revaluation gain Dividends Balance at December 31, 2012 65,365 2,008,797 (763,491) 115 0 1,310,786
Financial Year 2013
INCUBART Statement of changes in equity for the year ended December 31, 2013 Share
Capital Share
Premium Retained
Earnings Other
reserves Revaluation
Surplus Total Equity Balance at December 31, 2012 65,365 2,008,797 (763,491) 115 0 1,310,786 Changes in equity for the year 2013 Issue of share capital Loss for the year (466,520) (466,520) Revaluation gain Dividends Balance at December 31, 2013 65,365 2,008,797 (1,230,011) 115 0 844,266
Note 10Leases
On September 12, 2012, the Company entered into a 9 year lease for office space at 18/20 rue de Faubourg du Temple, with 2 break options at 30 August 2015 and 30 August 2018.
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Incubart SAS
Notes to the Financial Statements
Total rent expense for the years ended December 31, 2012 and December 31, 2013 was EUR 32,516 and EUR 60,796, respectively.
Fiscal Year 2012 (all amounts in Euros)
Future Minimum Lease Payments 2013 49,830 Within 1 year from financial statement date: 49,830 2014 49,830 Greater than 1 year from financial statement date: 382,030 2015 49,830 431,860 2016 49,830
Fiscal Year 2013 (all amounts in Euros)
Future Minimum Lease Payments 2014 49,830 Within 1 year from financial statement date: 49,830 2015 49,830 Greater than 1 year from financial statement date: 332,200 2016 49,830 382,030 2017 49,830
Note 11Taxes
Due to losses incurred since the inception of the Company, no corporate income tax has been due by the Company. However, tax credits have been recorded by the Company as follows:
R&D tax credit 2013: EUR 109,899 and 2012: EUR 185,196
CICE 2013 (Competitiveness and employment tax credit): EUR 15,527
The amounts of accumulated losses carried forward are EUR 973,780 as at December 31, 2012 and EUR 1,547,358 as at December 31, 2013, respectively.
Note 12Reconciliation to United States Generally Accepted Accounting Principles
The Companys financial statements have been prepared in accordance with French accounting standards, which differ in certain material respects from accounting principles generally accepted in the United States (US GAAP). Such differences involve methods for measuring the amounts in the financial statements. The
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Incubart SAS
Notes to the Financial Statements
principal differences between French accounting standards and US GAAP applicable to the Company are quantified and described below:
Reconciliation of net income (French GAAPUS GAAP)
(all amounts in Euros)
Year Ended
December 31, Note 2012 2013 (in thousands) Loss reported under French GAAP (420.2) (466.5) Software and website development costs A 97.2 104.0 Revenue recognition (advertising fees) B (14.9) (22.0) Debt issuance costs C 11.4 Interest free loan D 6.4 Deferred payment terms E (8.0) Deferred tax effect of US GAAP adjustments F Loss reported under US GAAP (337.9) (374.7)
Reconciliation of equity (French GAAPUS GAAP)
(all amounts in Euros)
Year Ended
December 31, Note 2012 2013 (in thousands) Equity reported under French GAAP 1,310.8 844.3 Software and website development costs A 298.7 402.8 Revenue recognition (advertising fees) B (41.7) (63.7) Debt issuance costs C 11.4 Interest-free loan D 6.4 Deferred payment terms E (8.0) Deferred tax effect of US GAAP adjustments F Equity reported under US GAAP 1,567.8 1,193.2
A. Software and website development costs
Software and website development is performed by external service providers as well as the Companys employees. Under French GAAP, the company capitalized only website development fees charged by third-party service providers up until December 31, 2011. Starting in 2012, all software development costs were expensed. US GAAP requires capitalization of certain internal and external costs incurred in the development of websites and software for internal use.
Costs of the preliminary design phase and costs incurred in the operation and maintenance of the software must be expensed as incurred. Costs incurred during the development phase must be capitalized. These
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Incubart SAS
Notes to the Financial Statements
same rules apply to upgrades and enhancements made to the platform, to the extent it is probable that they will result in additional functionalities to the platform.
B. Revenue recognition
The Company recognizes fees charged to listed sellers for more prominently displaying their products. Under French GAAP, the fees are recognized upfront in the income statement.
Under US GAAP, this search advertisement revenue is recognized as impressions (i.e., the number of times that an advertisement appears in pages viewed by users of the Companys website) are delivered.
C. Debt issuance costs
A transaction fee was charged in connection with a financing received in fiscal year 2013. Under French GAAP, the fee is recorded in operating expenses.
Under US GAAP, the fee should be capitalized as debt issuance costs and amortized to the income statement using an effective interest rate method.
D. Government grants in the form of an interest-free loan
In fiscal year 2013, the Company drew down an interest-free loan from a government body. Under French GAAP, the liability is equal to the amount of proceeds received and is not discounted to its net present value.
US GAAP requires the Company to impute interest when the stated interest rate of a note payable or receivable is below market rate in accordance with the substance of the transaction. The substance of this transaction is a government subsidy for an amount equivalent to the difference between proceeds received and fair value of the note (NPV of cash flows using a market interest rate).
E. Deferred payment terms
During fiscal year 2013, the Company began to allow buyers to elect to pay in 3 monthly installments, in which case the Company bears credit risk and charges the buyer an additional fee. Under French GAAP, the fee was recognized upfront in the income statement.
Under US GAAP, the fee is considered, in substance, as interest income and is recognized using an effective interest method over the term of the receivable.
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Incubart SAS
Notes to the Financial Statements
F. Income taxes
Under French GAAP, deferred taxes are not recognized in the statutory financial statements.
Under US GAAP, deferred tax is computed on all temporary differences between the tax bases and book values of assets and liabilities which will result in taxable or tax deductible amounts arising in future years. Deferred taxes are measured at enacted rates. The Company records deferred tax assets, primarily in connection with their net operating losses, up to an amount that is offset by the deferred tax liabilities, primarily associated with the differences between their book and tax basis for capitalized software and website development costs. As a result of the Companys history of losses, a full valuation allowance is applied against any remaining net deferred tax assets, as the realization of the future benefit is not more likely than not.
Net deferred tax assets prior to the valuation allowance under U.S. GAAP were EUR 85,655 for 2012 and EUR 116,290 for 2013.
Reconciliation of operating expenses
The following table presents the disclosure of costs and expenses based on the caption requirements of Rule 5-03 of Regulation S-X of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission. Such costs and expenses have been allocated from the French GAAP presentation, and adjusted for US GAAP reconciliation items accordingly.
2013 2012 (in Euros) Cost of revenue 477,609 269,818 Marketing 530,838 456,961 Product development 543,102 212,645 General and administrative 350,986 318,726 Operating expenses 1,902,535 1,258,150
Reconciliation of operating expenses from French GAAP to US GAAP
2013 2012 (in Euros) Operating expenses - French GAAP 2,060,339 1,403,787 US GAAP adjustments: Other operating expense (1) (42,359) (48,427) Software and website development costs (104,022) (97,210) Debt issuance costs (11,423) Operating expensesUS GAAP 1,902,535 1,258,150
(1) These represent other operating income and reversal of provisions and cost recharges that should be reflected within operating expense under U.S. GAAP, but are included in operating income under French GAAP.
F-94
Unaudited Combined Pro Forma Financial Information
On April 29, 2014, Etsy, Inc. (the Company) completed the acquisition of Jarvis Labs, Inc., owners of the Grand St. online technology marketplace. Total consideration for the acquisition was approximately $3.2 million, consisting of $1.0 million in cash and 425,104 shares of the Companys common stock with a fair value of $2.2 million on the acquisition date. Additionally, the Company issued 657,160 shares of common stock with a fair value of $3.4 million on the acquisition date, which are tied to continued employment with the Company and are being accounted for as post-acquisition stock-based compensation expense over the three-year vesting period.
On June 18, 2014, the Company completed the acquisition of Incubart SAS, a societe par actions simplifiee organized under the laws of France, which operates the online marketplace A Little Market (ALM). Total consideration for the acquisition was $30.8 million, consisting of $5.3 million in cash, of which $4.2 million was paid at closing, $0.3 million will be paid in March 2015 and $0.8 million in February 2016, and 4,879,693 shares of the Companys common stock with a fair value of $25.5 million on the acquisition date. The terms of the purchase agreement provide for the sale of put options to certain of the former shareholders of ALM. The put options enable the holders of the options to sell up to all of their shares back to the Company, subject to certain vesting and restrictions, at fair value, but not to exceed $4.13 per share and not less than $2.00 per share. The put right terminates with respect to a share on the earlier of one year from when such share is vested or the liquidation date, as defined in the agreement containing the put option. The holders of the options paid an aggregate of $0.1 million cash to the Company at the date of acquisition and the Company recorded a $0.1 million liability for the fair value of the put option at the time. Additionally, the Company issued 1,198,995 shares of common stock with a fair value of $6.3 million on the acquisition date, which are tied to continued employment with the Company and are being accounted for as post-acquisition stock-based compensation expense over the three-year vesting period. Since the put options relate in part to these shares, these shares will be recorded as liability-classified stock awards as earned.
The historical financial information for Etsy is derived from the Companys audited consolidated statement of operations for the year ended December 2014 contained in this prospectus. The historical financial information of Grand St. and ALM has been derived from the historical audited financial statements and the unaudited financial statements of Grand St. and ALM for the period from January 1, 2014 through April 29, 2014 and the period from January 1, 2014 through June 18, 2014, respectively. The financial statements for Grand St. were prepared in accordance with the accounting principles generally accepted in the United States (U.S. GAAP). The financial statements for ALM were prepared in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles in France (French GAAP) which is a comprehensive basis of accounting different from U.S. GAAP. The historical ALM French GAAP financial statements have been reconciled to U.S. GAAP and, as a result, the historical financial information of ALM included in the pro forma combined statement of operations is presented in U.S. GAAP.
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The ALM historical EUR denominated financial statement amounts have been translated to U.S. Dollars (USD) using the following exchange rates:
EUR / $ Interim period ended June 18, 2014 Average spot rate 1.3716
The unaudited pro forma combined statements of operations for the year ended December 31, 2014 give effect to the acquisitions as if they had occurred on January 1, 2014.
The unaudited pro forma adjustments have been made for informational purposes. The actual results reported by the combined company in periods following the acquisitions may differ significantly from those reflected in these unaudited pro forma combined statements. As a result, the pro forma combined information is not intended to represent and does not purport to be indicative of what the combined companys financial condition or results of operations would have been had the acquisitions been completed on the applicable dates of this pro forma combined financial information. In addition, the pro forma combined financial information does not purport to project the future financial condition and results of operations of the combined company.
The unaudited pro forma combined financial statements are based on various assumptions, including consideration paid and the allocation thereof to the assets acquired and liabilities assumed from Grand St. and ALM are based on preliminary estimates of fair value. The pro forma assumptions and adjustments are described in the accompanying notes presented on the following pages. Pro forma adjustments are those that are directly attributable to the transactions, are factually supportable and, with respect to the unaudited pro forma combined statements of operations, are expected to have a continuing impact on the consolidated results. The final purchase price and the allocation thereof may differ from that reflected in the pro forma combined financial statements after the final valuation procedures are performed and amounts are finalized.
The unaudited pro forma combined financial information does not reflect any cost savings from operating efficiencies, synergies or other restructuring that could result from the acquisition.
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Unaudited Pro Forma Combined Statement of Operations for the Year Ended
December 31, 2014
(In thousands except share and per share data)
Etsy, Inc. Jarvis Labs, Inc. Incubart SAS Pro Forma
Combined December 31,
2014 April 29,
2014 June 18, 2014 Pro Forma
Adjustments Notes December 31,
2014 REVENUE: Revenue $ 195,591 $ 357 $ 1,447 $ $ 197,395 Cost of revenue 73,633 302 381 606 1 74,922 Gross Profit 121,958 55 1,066 (606) 122,473 OPERATING EXPENSES: Marketing 39,655 63 378 328 1 40,424 Product development 36,634 301 496 37,431 General and administrative 51,920 169 359 (2,059) 2 1,333 5 51,722 Total operating expenses 128,209 533 1,233 (398) 129,577 Income (loss) from operations (6,251) (478) (167) (208) (7,104) OTHER (EXPENSE) INCOME: Interest expense and amortization of deferred financing costs (590) (86) 86 3 (590) Interest and dividend income 41 16 57 Net unrealized loss on warrant and other liabilities (411) (13) 505 6 81 Foreign exchange loss (3,049) (3,049) Total other (expense) income (4,009) (99) 16 591 (3,501) Income (loss) before income taxes (10,260) (577) (151) 383 (10,605) (Provision) benefit for income taxes (4,983) 185 (4,798) Net (loss) income $ (15,243) $ (577) $ 34 $ 383 $ (15,403) Basic net loss per share applicable to common stockholders $ (0.19) $ (0.08) Diluted net loss per share applicable to common stockholders $ (0.19) $ (0.08) Weighted average common stock outstanding (basic) 80,493,407 109,307,822 4 189,801,229 Weighted average common stock outstanding (diluted) 80,493,407 109,307,822 4 189,801,229
F-97
Notes to Unaudited Pro Forma Combined Financial information
Note 1Basis of Presentation
The unaudited pro forma combined financial information was prepared using the acquisition method of accounting and was derived from the audited financial statements of Etsy, Inc. for the year ended December 31, 2014, the unaudited financial statements of Grand St. for the period from January 1, 2014 through April 29, 2014 and the unaudited financial statements of ALM for the period from January 1, 2014 through June 18, 2014.
The unaudited pro forma combined statement of operations for the year ended December 31, 2014 gives effect to the acquisitions as if they each occurred on January 1, 2014.
The Company prepared the unaudited pro forma combined financial information using the acquisition method of accounting under existing U.S. GAAP standards.
The authoritative guidance for fair value defines the term fair value, sets forth the valuation requirements for any asset or liability measured at fair value, expands related disclosure requirements and specifies a hierarchy of valuation techniques based on the nature of inputs used to develop the fair value measures. Fair value is defined in the guidance as the price that would be received to sell an asset or paid to transfer a liability in an orderly transaction between market participants at the measurement date. This is an exit price concept for the valuation of the asset or liability. In addition, market participants are assumed to be buyers and sellers in the principal (or the most advantageous) market for the asset or liability. Fair value measurements for an asset assume the highest and best use by these market participants. Many of these fair value measurements can be highly subjective and it is possible that other professionals, applying reasonable judgment to the same facts and circumstances, could develop and support a range of alternative estimated amounts.
The pro forma adjustments described below have been developed based on assumptions and estimates, including assumptions relating to the consideration paid and the allocation thereof to the assets acquired and liabilities assumed from Grand St. and ALM based on preliminary estimates of fair value. The final purchase price and the allocation thereof may differ from that reflected in the pro forma combined financial statements after final valuation procedures are performed and amounts are finalized. The unaudited pro forma combined financial statements are provided for illustrative purposes only and do not purport to represent what the actual consolidated results of operations would have been had the acquisition occurred on the dates assumed, nor are they necessarily indicative of future consolidated results of operations.
The unaudited pro forma combined financial statements do not reflect any cost savings from operating efficiencies, synergies or other restructurings that could result from the acquisition, as such costs are not currently factually supportable.
F-98
Management performed a review of Grand St.s and ALMs accounting policies, based primarily on available historical financial information, to determine whether any adjustments were necessary to ensure comparability in the pro forma combined financial statements. At this time, the Company is not aware of any differences, other than those stated in either in the unaudited pro forma adjustments or identified in the Grand St. or ALM stand-alone financial statements provided elsewhere in this prospectus, which would have a material impact on the pro forma combined financial statements.
Note 2Purchase Price Allocation
This business combinations resulted in the total purchase price being allocated to the assets acquired and liabilities assumed according to their estimated fair values at the date of acquisitions with the remaining unallocated purchase price recorded as goodwill as follows:
Grand St. (in thousands)
Cash paid $ 1,040 Common shares 2,202 Total purchase consideration $ 3,242 Working capital $ 85 Developed technology 2,000 Customer relationships 600 Trademarks 200 Goodwill 991 Deferred tax liability (634) Net assets acquired $ 3,242
Included in working capital is approximately $0.1 million of cash acquired.
The amounts allocated to developed technology, customer relationships and trademark (the acquired intangible assets) total $2.8 million. The fair value assigned to developed technology was determined primarily using the cost approach, which estimates the cost to reproduce the asset, adjusted for loss due to functional and economic obsolescence. The fair value of Grand St.s customer relationships was determined primarily using the income approach, which discounts expected future cash flows to present value using estimates and assumptions determined by management. The fair value assigned to trademark was determined using the relief from royalty method, where the owner of the asset realizes a benefit from owning the intangible asset rather than paying a rental or royalty rate for use of the asset. The acquired identifiable intangible assets are being amortized on a straight-line basis over three years, which approximates the pattern in which the assets are utilized. None of the goodwill recorded in the acquisition is deductible for tax purposes.
F-99
ALM (in thousands)
Cash paid $ 5,290 Common shares 25,521 Total purchase consideration $ 30,811 Working capital $ 625 Property and equipment and other assets 95 Developed technology 1,636 Customer relationships 1,693 Trademarks 775 Goodwill 27,309 Deferred tax liability (757) Other long-term liabilities (565) Net assets acquired $ 30,811
Included in working capital is approximately $0.5 million of cash and cash equivalents acquired.
The amount allocated to developed technology, customer relationships and trademarks (the acquired intangible assets) total $4.1 million. The fair value assigned to developed technology was determined primarily by using the cost approach, which estimates the cost to reproduce the asset, adjusted for loss due to functional and economic obsolescence. The fair value of ALMs customer relationships was determined primarily by using the income approach, which discounts expected future cash flows to present value using estimates and assumptions determined by management. The fair value assigned to trademark was determined using the relief from royalty method, where the owner of the asset realizes a benefit from owning the intangible asset rather than paying a rental or royalty rate for use of the asset. The acquired identifiable intangible assets are being amortized on a straight-line basis over three years, which approximates the pattern in which the assets are utilized. Goodwill of $27.3 million, none of which is deductible for tax purposes, was recorded in connection with this acquisition, which is primarily attributed to synergies arising from the acquisition and the value of the acquired workforce.
Note 3Unaudited Pro Forma Adjustments
(1) Pro forma adjustment to record additional amortization expense related to Grand St. and ALM acquired identifiable intangible assets, net of historical amortization amounts of $11,000, as if the acquisition occurred on January 1, 2014 and amortization of the acquired assets is recorded on a straight-line basis over three years.
Intangible assets acquired are as follows (in thousands):
Grand St. ALM Developed technology $ 2,000 $ 1,636 Trademarks 200 775 Customer relationships 600 1,693 $ 2,800 $ 4,104
F-100
Amortization of developed technology and trademark is recorded within cost of revenue. Customer relationship amortization is recorded within marketing expense.
(2) Pro forma adjustment to eliminate acquisition costs relating to the purchase of Grand St. and ALM in 2014.
(3) Pro forma adjustment to eliminate interest expense on debt that was not acquired by Etsy.
(4) For purposes of this unaudited combined pro forma financial information, the 425,104 and 4,879,693 shares of non-compensatory common stock issued to Grand St. and ALM shareholders, respectively, was given effect in the computation of basic and diluted net income per share for the years ended December 31, 2013 and 2014 as if the acquisitions had occurred on January 1, 2013.
In addition, the conversion of all outstanding shares of convertible preferred stock into 106,896,493 shares of common stock is assumed to have occurred on January 1, 2013.
(5) Pro forma adjustment to record stock compensation expense in connection with the issuance of 1,198,995 shares of common stock valued at $6.3 million to certain former shareholders of ALM and 657,160 shares of common stock valued at $3.4 million to certain former shareholders of Grand St. that are tied to continuing employment.
(6) Pro forma adjustment to reflect the effect of the assumed conversions of outstanding warrants exercisable for preferred securities of the Company and Grand St. into warrants exercisable for common stock and the corresponding elimination of the expense included in operating results from the change in the fair value of the warrants.
F-101
Part II
Information Not Required in Prospectus
Item 13. Other Expenses of Issuance and Distribution
The following table presents the costs and expenses, other than underwriting discounts and commissions, payable in connection with this offering. All amounts are estimates except the SEC registration fee, the FINRA filing fee and Nasdaq listing fee. Except as otherwise noted, all the expenses below will be paid by us.
SEC registration fee $ * FINRA filing fee * Nasdaq listing fee * Printing and engraving expenses * Legal fees and expenses * Accounting fees and expenses * Transfer agent and registrar fees * Miscellaneous fees and expenses * Total $ *
* To be completed by amendment.
Item 14. Indemnification of Directors and Officers
Section 145 of the Delaware General Corporation Law authorizes a court to award, or a corporations board of directors to grant, indemnity to directors and officers under certain circumstances and subject to certain limitations. The terms of Section 145 of the Delaware General Corporation Law are sufficiently broad to permit indemnification under certain circumstances for liabilities, including reimbursement of expenses incurred, arising under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, or the Securities Act.
As permitted by the Delaware General Corporation Law, upon completion of this offering, our amended and restated certificate of incorporation and amended and restated bylaws will contain provisions relating to the limitation of liability and indemnification of directors and officers. The amended and restated certificate of incorporation will provide that our directors will not be personally liable to us or our stockholders for monetary damages for any breach of fiduciary duty as a director, except for liability:
for any breach of the directors duty of loyalty to us or our stockholders;
for acts or omissions not in good faith or that involve intentional misconduct or a knowing violation of law;
in respect of unlawful payments of dividends or unlawful stock repurchases or redemptions as provided in Section 174 of the Delaware General Corporation Law; or
for any transaction from which the director derives any improper personal benefit.
II-1
Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation will provide that if Delaware law is amended after the approval by our stockholders of the certificate of incorporation to authorize corporate action further eliminating or limiting the personal liability of directors, then the liability of our directors will be eliminated or limited to the fullest extent permitted by Delaware law.
Our amended and restated bylaws will provide that we will indemnify our directors and officers to the fullest extent permitted by Delaware law, as it now exists or may in the future be amended, against all expenses and liabilities reasonably incurred in connection with their service for or on our behalf. Our amended and restated bylaws will provide that we shall advance the expenses incurred by a director or officer in advance of the final disposition of an action or proceeding, and permit us to secure insurance on behalf of any director, officer, employee or other enterprise agent for any liability arising out of his or her action in that capacity, whether or not Delaware law would otherwise permit indemnification.
We intend to enter into indemnification agreements with each of our directors and officers, a form of which is attached as Exhibit 10.1. The form of agreement provides that we will indemnify each of our directors and officers against any and all expenses incurred by that director or officer because of his or her status as one of our directors or officers, to the fullest extent permitted by Delaware law, our amended and restated certificate of incorporation and our amended and restated bylaws. In addition, the form agreement provides that, to the fullest extent permitted by Delaware law, we will advance all expenses incurred by our directors and officers in connection with a legal proceeding.
Reference is made to the underwriting agreement contained in Exhibit 1.1 to this registration statement, indemnifying our directors and officers against limited liabilities. In addition, Section 2(f) of our amended and restated investors rights agreement contained in Exhibit 4.2 to this registration statement provides for indemnification of certain of our stockholders against liabilities described in that agreement.
We currently carry and intend to continue to carry liability insurance for our directors and officers.
Item 15. Recent Sales of Unregistered Securities
The following sets forth information regarding all unregistered securities sold from January 1, 2012 to January 31, 2015, giving effect to a 10-for-1 forward split of our common stock, which occurred on May 5, 2011.
On May 1, 2012, we issued and sold an aggregate of 11,594,203 shares of our Series F preferred stock to 12 accredited investors at $3.45 per share for an aggregate consideration of approximately $40,000,000.
On June 26, 2012, we issued and sold 5,056 shares of our Series C preferred stock to one accredited investor upon exercise of a warrant issued to such investor on November 15, 2007. Pursuant to the terms of the warrant, the exercise price of $2.67 per share was paid through the cancellation of 425 shares of Series C preferred stock otherwise issuable under the warrant.
II-2
We have granted options to purchase 22,320,456 shares of our common stock to service providers under our 2006 Stock Plan, with per share exercise prices ranging from $1.18 to $8.50.
We have issued and sold an aggregate of 17,216,090 shares of our common stock upon exercise of options issued under our 2006 Stock Plan for aggregate consideration of approximately $14,810,000, with per share exercise prices ranging from $0.01 to $4.13.
On April 1, 2014, we issued and sold an aggregate of 6,603,774 shares of our common stock to two accredited investors at $5.30 per share for an aggregate consideration of approximately $35,000,000.
On January 30, 2015, we issued 376,471 shares of our common stock to Etsy.org for no consideration.
We issued an aggregate of 7,160,952 shares of our common stock in connection with our acquisitions of certain companies or their assets and as consideration to individuals and entities who were former service providers and/or stockholders of such companies.
None of the foregoing transactions involved any underwriters, underwriting discounts or commissions, or any public offering. We believe that the offers, sales and issuances of the above securities were exempt from registration under the Securities Act by virtue of Section 4(a)(2) of the Securities Act or Regulation D promulgated thereunder as transactions by an issuer not involving any public offering, or in reliance on Rule 701 promulgated under Section 3(b) of the Securities Act because the transactions were pursuant to compensatory benefit plans or contracts relating to compensation as provided under Rule 701. The recipients of the securities in each of these transactions represented their intentions to acquire the securities for investment only and not with a view to or for sale in connection with any distribution thereof, and appropriate legends were placed upon the stock certificates issued in these transactions. We believe all recipients had adequate information about us or had adequate access, through their relationships with us, to information about us.
Item 16. Exhibits and Financial Statement Schedules
(a) Exhibits. We have filed the exhibits listed on the accompanying Index to Exhibits, which is incorporated herein by reference.
(b) Financial Statement Schedules. All schedules have been omitted because the information required to be presented in them is not applicable or is shown in the consolidated financial statements or related notes.
Item 17. Undertakings
The undersigned registrant hereby undertakes to provide to the underwriter at the closing specified in the underwriting agreements certificates in such denominations and registered in such names as required by the underwriter to permit prompt delivery to each purchaser.
II-3
Insofar as indemnification for liabilities arising under the Securities Act may be permitted to directors, officers and controlling persons of the registrant pursuant to the foregoing provisions, or otherwise, the registrant has been advised that in the opinion of the Securities and Exchange Commission such indemnification is against public policy as expressed in the Securities Act and is, therefore, unenforceable. In the event that a claim for indemnification against such liabilities (other than the payment by the registrant of expenses incurred or paid by a director, officer or controlling person of the registrant in the successful defense of any action, suit or proceeding) is asserted by such director, officer or controlling person in connection with the securities being registered, the registrant will, unless in the opinion of its counsel the matter has been settled by controlling precedent, submit to a court of appropriate jurisdiction the question whether such indemnification by it is against public policy as expressed in the Securities Act and will be governed by the final adjudication of such issue.
The undersigned registrant hereby undertakes that:
(1) For purposes of determining any liability under the Securities Act, the information omitted from the form of prospectus filed as part of this registration statement in reliance upon Rule 430A and contained in a form of prospectus filed by the registrant pursuant to Rule 424(b)(1) or (4) or 497(h) under the Securities Act shall be deemed to be part of this registration statement as of the time it was declared effective.
(2) For the purpose of determining any liability under the Securities Act, as amended, each post-effective amendment that contains a form of prospectus shall be deemed to be a new registration statement relating to the securities offered therein, and the offering of such securities at that time shall be deemed to be the initial bona fide offering thereof.
(3) In a primary offering of securities of the undersigned registrant pursuant to this registration statement, regardless of the underwriting method used to sell the securities to the purchaser, if the securities are offered or sold to such purchaser by means of any of the following communications, the undersigned registrant will be a seller to the purchaser and will be considered to offer or sell such securities to such purchaser:
(i) Any preliminary prospectus or prospectus of the undersigned registrant relating to the offering required to be filed pursuant to Rule 424;
(ii) Any free writing prospectus relating to the offering prepared by or on behalf of the undersigned registrant or used or referred to by the undersigned registrant;
(iii) The portion of any other free writing prospectus relating to the offering containing material information about the undersigned registrant or its securities provided by or on behalf of the undersigned registrant; and
(iv) Any other communication that is an offer in the offering made by the undersigned registrant to the purchaser.
II-4
Signatures
Pursuant to the requirements of the Securities Act of 1933, the registrant has duly caused this registration statement to be signed on its behalf by the undersigned, thereunto duly authorized, in the City of Brooklyn, State of New York, on this 4th day of March, 2015.
ETSY, INC. /s/ Kristina Salen Kristina Salen Chief Financial Officer
Power of Attorney
KNOW ALL PERSONS BY THESE PRESENTS, that each person whose signature appears below hereby constitutes and appoints Chad Dickerson, Jordan Breslow and Kristina Salen, and each of them, as his or her true and lawful attorney-in-fact and agent with full power of substitution, for him or her in any and all capacities, to sign any and all amendments to this registration statement (including post-effective amendments) and any registration statement related thereto filed pursuant to Rule 462(b) increasing the number of securities for which registration is sought, and to file the same, with all exhibits thereto and other documents in connection therewith, with the Securities and Exchange Commission, granting unto said attorney-in-fact and agent full power and authority to do and perform each and every act and thing requisite and necessary to be done in connection therewith, as fully for all intents and purposes as he or she might or could do in person, hereby ratifying and confirming all that said attorney-in-fact and agent, or his or her substitute, may lawfully do or cause to be done by virtue hereof.
Pursuant to the requirements of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, this registration statement has been signed by the following persons in the capacities and on the dates indicated.
Signature Title Date /s/ Chad Dickerson Chad Dickerson President, Chief Executive Officer and Chairman (Principal Executive Officer) March 4, 2015 /s/ Kristina Salen Kristina Salen Chief Financial Officer (Principal Financial and Accounting Officer) March 4, 2015 /s/ James W. Breyer James W. Breyer Director March 4, 2015 /s/ M. Michele Burns M. Michele Burns Director March 4, 2015 /s/ Jonathan D. Klein Jonathan D. Klein Director March 4, 2015 /s/ Fred Wilson Fred Wilson Director March 4, 2015
II-5
Index to Exhibits
Exhibit
No. Description 1.1* Form of Underwriting Agreement. 3.1 Eighth Restated Certificate of Incorporation of Registrant, as amended, as currently in effect. 3.2* Form of Amended and Restated Certificate of Incorporation of Registrant, to be effective upon completion of this offering. 3.3 Bylaws of Registrant, as currently in effect. 3.4* Form of Amended and Restated Bylaws of Registrant, to be effective upon completion of this offering. 4.1* Form of Registrants common stock certificate. 4.2* Sixth Amended and Restated Investors Rights Agreement, dated May 1, 2012, by and among the Registrant and the other parties thereto, as amended on March 19, 2013, January 13, 2014 and May 2, 2014. 4.3 Warrant to Purchase Stock, dated November 15, 2007, by and among the Registrant and Silicon Valley Bank. 4.4 Plain English Warrant Agreement, dated May 15, 2008, by and among the Registrant and TriplePoint Capital LLC. 4.5 Plain English Warrant Agreement, dated August 9, 2010, by and among the Registrant and TriplePoint Capital LLC. 5.1* Opinion of Gunderson Dettmer Stough Villeneuve Franklin & Hachigian, LLP. 10.1* Form of Indemnification Agreement between the Registrant and each of its directors and executive officers. 10.2.1 2006 Stock Plan, as amended, and forms of agreements thereunder. 10.2.2 Form of Stock Option Agreement under 2006 Stock Plan with Chad Dickerson. 10.3* 2015 Equity Incentive Plan and form of agreement thereunder. 10.4* 2015 Employee Stock Purchase Plan. 10.5 Agreement of Lease, dated April 14, 2009, between Registrant and 55 Washington Street LLC, as amended. 10.6 Agreement of Lease, dated May 12, 2014, among Registrant, 117 Adams Owner LLC and 55 Prospect Owner LLC. 10.7 Revolving Credit and Guaranty Agreement, dated May 16, 2014, between Registrant and the other parties thereto, as amended (conformed copy). 10.8* Employment offer letter between Registrant and Chad Dickerson, dated August 31, 2011. 10.9.1* Employment offer letter between Registrant and Kristina Salen, dated January 12, 2013, as amended. 10.9.2* Relocation letter agreement between Registrant and Kristina Salen, dated June 18, 2013. 10.10* Employment offer letter between Registrant and Jordan Breslow, dated October 20, 2013. 10.11 2014 Executive Bonus Plan. 10.12 Severance Plan and form of Participation Notice thereunder. 10.13 Change in Control Severance Plan and form of Participation Notice thereunder. 10.14 Management Cash Incentive Plan. 10.15 Compensation Program for Non-Employee Directors. 21.1* List of Subsidiaries of Registrant. 23.1 Consent of PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, Independent Registered Public Accounting Firm (Etsy, Inc.). 23.2 Consent of PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, Independent Registered Public Accounting Firm (Jarvis Labs, Inc.). 23.3 Consent of PricewaterhouseCoopers Audit, Independent Accountants (Incubart SAS). 23.4* Consent of Gunderson Dettmer Stough Villeneuve Franklin & Hachigian, LLP (contained in Exhibit 5.1). 24.1 Power of Attorney (contained in the signature page to this registration statement).
* To be filed by amendment.
II-6 ||||| Depending on whom you ask, Alicia Shaffer, owner of the hit Etsy store Three Bird Nest, is a runaway success story — or an emblem of everything that has gone wrong with the fast-growing online marketplace for handmade goods.
With the help of up to 25 local seamstresses and alluring photography, Ms. Shaffer takes in upward of $70,000 a month in revenue selling twee headbands and leg warmers via Etsy. But as her business has grown, she has been harshly criticized online and accused of mass-producing goods, of obtaining wares from China. Detractors consider her a blight on Etsy’s hipster cred.
The dispute over how goods are produced and sold on a site that prides itself on feel-good, handmade authenticity underscores the growing pains transforming Etsy as it moves toward a potentially lucrative initial public offering of stock.
As for Ms. Shaffer, she denies the claims that have dogged her business recently but says she understands why questions have arisen about the volume of goods she produces. She says her store strictly adheres to Etsy’s guidelines, including that all items listed are either handmade or “vintage” secondhand, with some new exceptions that allow for approved outside manufacturing. “We’re a team of dedicated Etsy artisans who have been able to grow a tiny shop into a little machine,” she said. ||||| I shut down my Etsy store in November.
I'd been a seller since April 2006, less than a year after Etsy first went into beta. I was in my first job out of journalism school, and making cards and journals was a creative outlet and a way for me to score some extra money. I'd been selling stuff on the side at craft shows for a few years at that point, part of a larger wave of modern crafters who met online and inspired each other to start businesses.
Etsy debuted at just the right time: Indie craft shows had started popping up around the U.S. in the early 2000s, but running your own online store was a complicated task. (My "store" at the time encouraged buyers to mail me money orders.) Most of the people who joined Etsy in those first few years were like me—independent crafters who were already at least somewhat established IRL—and the quality of the goods on the site was generally high.
Things have changed in the past decade: Indie craft has grown from a close-knit subculture to a giant economy that influences trends in big box stores. And Etsy has grown from a startup built by crafters and for crafters to a juggernaut on the verge of an IPO. The most recent success story of a mom making a million dollars a year isn't what it seems. In practical terms, scaling the handmade economy is an impossibility. So while Etsy maintains a hipster façade, they lost their indie cred years ago.
Grace Dobush About Grace Dobush is a freelance journalist in Cincinnati, where she writes about design, tech, politics and culture. She also organizes an indie craft show and wrote the Crafty Superstar craft business guides. Follow her gracedobushtogo.
I have to acknowledge this: Modern craft would not be as hot as it is without Etsy or something like it. Like book authors who hate Amazon's policies, crafters who hate Etsy find it hard to leave because of the site's immense traffic and generally positive public reputation. Just before the Christmas rush, I finally put my money where my mouth is and shut down my shop. My reasons for leaving the site aren't unique, even though casual shoppers and potential investors have no idea of the drama going on behind the scenes. Here's my beef with Etsy.
A Bigger Market Isn't a Better Market
There are more than 30 million items listed on Etsy right now. That popularity is, of course, great for Etsy. But new hobbyist sellers, desperate for clicks, often price their products so low as to make real profit an impossible dream.
And that popularity isn't good for shoppers, who have to wade through pages of crap to find what they're looking for. Searching for "mermaid" in the wedding gown category of Etsy returns 1,299 results, ranging from a $6,882 gown made by Project Runway's Leanne Marshall to dresses for less than $200, one purportedly handmade lace dress going for $65. (For those who aren't up to date on their fabric prices, the materials to make a wedding dress alone would cost at least $65.) A friend and I recently discovered we both always sort results by highest price when we're searching on Etsy to see only the serious sellers.
What other e-commerce sites can say the same? Etsy needs casual crafters to keep paying the 20-cent listing fees and, if any of the items sell, the 3.5 percent transaction fees and any additional payment processing fees. (See "She's Making Jewelry Now.") Etsy doesn't disclose its finances, but it facilitated $1.35 billion in sales in 2013, which adds up to more than $47 million in transaction fees, not counting listing or payment processing fees.
Resellers Are Rampant
That Etsy began allowing manufacturing partners in 2013 underscored the reseller issue that has plagued the site for years. The Marketplace Integrity, Trust & Safety team—which has the unenviable task of policing sellers for adherence to Etsy rules—is unable or unwilling to weed out sellers of mass-manufactured goods. And having sellers who are able to move nearly a million dollars of product a year is great for Etsy's bottom line.
Sellers have been dissatisfied with Etsy's policing of mass-manufactured items posing as handmade for a long time, but the site hasn't seemed receptive to their concerns. An Etsy staffer I met a few years ago dismissed sellers' questions about Chinese resellers as "kind of racist." The snark site Regretsy (RIP) was one of the few big gathering places where sellers and shoppers could voice their frustrations with the marketplace. Any kind of "calling out" of accused resellers or bad businesspeople on Etsy's forums is usually acknowledged by an admin shutting down the thread with "I'm going to close this up now."
Etsy Has Homogenized Indie Craft
From the beginning, Etsy has pushed the "quit your day job" storyline. The fact is, the majority of the people selling on Etsy aren't running their businesses full-time, and the idea of quitting your day job is a manic pixie fever dream. If you want to make it big on Etsy, you don't necessarily want to make things that fulfill your creative dreams; you just want it to get onto the front page and sell like hand-felted hotcakes.
The Etsy effect on craft trends is striking. At the San Francisco edition of the Renegade Craft Fair in November, I was struck at how most things look like the homepage of Etsy, pinnable, pretty things. (See "Put A Bird On It.") It's so incredibly boring. How many pieces of geometric jewelry with a pop of color can the earth bear? Will we ever see hand-drawn logos without antlers and arrows? How much barn wood must we salvage to atone for our crafty sins?
Successful Businesses Leave Etsy
The biggest secret is this: Makers who have what it takes to succeed—good product, a good marketing plan, a pricing structure that compensates everyone in their supply chain fairly—don't really need Etsy for long.
Etsy is the fifth most-visited marketplace site in the U.S., after Amazon, eBay, Walmart and Best Buy. But for that visibility, sellers have little autonomy in the store's design, and are subject to the site's rules, fees and design. A customer complaint can freeze your payment account. An accusation of copyright violation can freeze your store or shut it down entirely.
For a full-time crafter, that's too much of a risk. Successful makers of a certain size eventually move to e-commerce platforms that give them much more flexibility and control for fewer fees. If you're working in high volume or high price points, using a customizable ecommerce platform such as Big Cartel or Shopify massively reduces your fee obligation, as I outlined in a comparison chart.
I see the recent policy changes Etsy has made—allowing third-party manufacturing partners, entering the wholesale space—as last-ditch efforts to keep super-successful sellers using the site. But successful handmade businesspeople weren't waiting for permission from Etsy to hire help or get into wholesaling. They grew out of the site and took their wares elsewhere.
The David Has Turned Into Goliath
At its outset, Etsy was a powerful tool for makers, by makers. We were a bunch of Davids, fighting back against the big-box Goliaths with artisanal slingshots. Founder Rob Kalin came up through the same online craft forums that me and my crafty cohorts did, and we were making a revolution.
In the past few years it's become apparent that Etsy is the Goliath. Indie craft's whole purpose from the outset was to meet your makers and consume conscientiously. Now, when you ask your friend where they got that cool "Weekend at Bernies" cross stitch sampler, they'll tell you, "I bought it from Etsy"—the maker's identity is secondary, if noted at all.
I'm not pessimistic about handmade culture at large: Maker culture is thriving independently of Etsy, and it's easier than ever for crafters to run independent online stores. I prefer to sell my wares (and buy my presents) at local indie craft markets and in curated bricks-and-mortar shops that reflect the flavor of their communities and encourage real relationships between makers and buyers.
The bottom line is this: Etsy needs crafters more than crafters need Etsy. ||||| Photo Advertisement Continue reading the main story
Etsy was born in 2005 in a Brooklyn loft as a way for one of its co-founders to sell his handmade wooden goods.
Now the company is seeking to go public in what promises to be one of the more closely watched market debuts of the year.
Etsy filed its first prospectus for an initial public offering on Wednesday, disclosing a preliminary fund-raising target of $100 million. But the online bazaar — whose wares range from whimsical knit “beard” hats to vintage jewelry — will most likely seek much more.
With the filing, Etsy is preparing to market itself to prospective investors in as soon as three weeks and could begin trading on the Nasdaq stock market by mid-April under the symbol ETSY.
Unlike some of the other prominent companies that have gone public over the last six months, like the Alibaba Group of China or the online lender Lending Club, Etsy has quirkiness built into its DNA. Its first chief executive and co-founder, Rob Kalin, barely squeaked into college and came up with Etsy as a way to sell his homemade wares. (Its name, Mr. Kalin has said, arose from a misunderstanding of the Italian phrase “eh, sì” from the movie “8 1/2.”)
Photo
“Since inception, Etsy has challenged conventional ways of thinking about commerce, business, individuals and communities,” Chad Dickerson, the company’s chief executive, wrote in a letter included in the prospectus. “I intend to keep our unconventional operating philosophy as we become a public company, and I welcome new investors into our community.”
But its path to an initial offering has been rocky at times. Mr. Kalin stepped down as chief executive in 2011 and was succeeded by Mr. Dickerson, the chief technical officer at the time.
And the company has been criticized for failing to adequately clamp down on the sale of counterfeit goods as well as for letting vendors sell products that come from factories instead of vintage finds or goods solely from artisanal workshops.
Still, in its decade of existence, Etsy has become a significant business. It reported $195.6 million in sales last year, up 56 percent from the previous year. And as of Dec. 31, it had 685 employees, most of whom are still based in the Dumbo neighborhood of Brooklyn.
Like other Internet companies that aim to go public, Etsy presents a measure of earnings that differs from that required by generally accepted accounting principles. Etsy’s own metric, known as adjusted Ebitda, or earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, says that the company made $23 million last year. But it lost $15 million according to standard accounting principles.
Adjusted Ebitda was positive because in addition to excluding taxes, depreciation and amortization, it did not count the cost of paying employees in stock.
While investors often find such nonstandard measures of profits useful, they may be surprised at some of the items Etsy has left out of its particular metric. The company, for instance, also excluded acquisition-related expenses and foreign exchange losses.
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If those two items are included in the calculation, Etsy’s underlying earnings growth would slow considerably. Specifically, the firm’s adjusted Ebitda increased 36 percent in 2014, from $17 million in 2013. But if acquisition and foreign exchange costs were included, growth would have been only 6 percent.
Other items in the filing may give investors pause. Etsy, for instance, said that it had 19.8 million “active buyers” at the end of 2014. An active buyer doesn’t have to be using Etsy frequently, though. The only requirement is to have made one purchase in the previous 12 months, according to the filing.
Though the prospectus did not disclose details like how many of its shares are outstanding, it is possible to estimate market value. EBay trades at about 14 times its Ebitda for 2014. Applying that multiple to Etsy’s adjusted Ebitda would give it a value of about $322 million.
In his letter, Mr. Dickerson said that the company would not give quarterly or annual earnings guidance, numbers used by many public companies to steer analysts’ expectations.
Etsy’s biggest existing shareholders include investment firms like Accel Partners, Index Ventures and Union Square Ventures. Together, the three control more than half of the company. The prospectus did not disclose how many shares any of the firms planned to sell.
As part of the offering, Etsy plans to take about $300,000 of its proceeds from the I.P.O. to finance Etsy.org, a nonprofit it established in January to help train female entrepreneurs.
The offering is being led by Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley. | – When customers order an heirloom pet teepee, Charles Manson necklace, or vinyl Gorillaz wall clock from Etsy, they expect it to be lovingly handmade or authentically vintage, perhaps even customized and made from ecologically sound materials. But critics of the site are claiming that sellers are increasingly taking to mass production or even reselling cheap items from overseas—a move that many see as undermining the crafts giant's authenticity and credibility, the New York Times reports. And although execs from the online marketplace didn't grant interviews with the Times ahead of its potential IPO, Etsy CEO Chad Dickerson notes in the IPO prospectus that there have been complaints about sellers working with outside manufacturers and "diluting our handmade ethos," he notes. "After all, Etsy has always served as an antidote to mass manufacturing. We still do." Etsy used to ban sellers from outsourcing manufacturing or hiring employees to keep up with demand, the Times notes—until Dickerson relaxed the rules in 2013, as long as certain criteria were met. Alicia Shaffer's Etsy shop has been featured on Yahoo and in Fast Company as one of Etsy's biggest success stories; she tells the Times that while she understands why people are skeptical about her high-volume output, she follows all of Etsy's guidelines, hiring a couple dozen local seamstresses to help her out. But Grace Dobush, an ex-Etsy seller, tells the Times that "as Etsy has gotten bigger, it’s gotten more like eBay." In an essay last month for Wired, Dobush notes the "pages of crap" shoppers have to filter through and a seeming disinterest on Etsy's part to purge resellers. "At its outset … we were a bunch of Davids, fighting back against the big-box Goliaths with artisanal slingshots. … In the past few years it's become apparent that Etsy is the Goliath." (Click to read about Etsy's "haunted doll" market.) |
Description and Brand Names
Drug information provided by: Micromedex
US Brand Name
Versed
Canadian Brand Name
Midazolam
Descriptions
Midazolam is used to produce sleepiness or drowsiness and to relieve anxiety before surgery or certain procedures. Midazolam is also given to produce amnesia (loss of memory) so that the patient will not remember any discomfort or undesirable effects that may occur after a surgery or procedure . It is also used to produce loss of consciousness before and during surgery. Midazolam is sometimes used in patients in hospital intensive care units to cause unconsciousness. This may allow the patient to withstand the stress of being in the intensive care unit and help the patient cooperate when a machine must be used to assist with breathing.
Midazolam is given only by or under the immediate supervision of a doctor trained to use this medicine. If you will be receiving midazolam during surgery, your doctor or anesthesiologist will give you the medicine and closely follow your progress.
This product is available in the following dosage forms:
Solution ||||| A man in Italy who was in what doctors call a "minimally conscious state" for nearly two years unexpectedly regained full consciousness and the ability to talk, according to a new report of his case.
The man woke up after he was given a drug normally used as a sedative before surgery and other medical procedures, the case report showed.
The 43-year-old man was admitted to a hospital after a car accident, and was in a coma for 40 days. People who are comatose are completely unconscious — they have no sleep/wake cycles, and do not respond to their surroundings in any way.
The man awoke from the coma but remained in a "minimally conscious state," which means that although he remained largely unable to communicate or move, he was able to voluntarily open and close his eyes, and reach for and touch objects. He also had a sleep-wake cycle.
When he was discharged from the hospital 10 months later, he still did not talk or communicate with other people, nor did he respond to simple commands asking him to, for instance, close his eyes.
Over the next year, the man's cognitive ability started to decline; his movements became abnormally slow; and he began to engage in aimless, repetitive behaviors, such as clapping.
But then, about two years after the accident, the man's doctors wanted to examine his brain using a CT scan. To do the scan, they gave the man a mild sedative called midazolam. [7 Mind-Bending Facts About Dreams]
A few minutes later, the man began to talk and interact with others.
"He talked by cellphone with his aunt and congratulated his brother when he was informed of his graduation; he recognized the road leading to his home," the researchers who treated the man wrote in the case report. However, the man did not remember the accident, and he was not aware of the way it had affected his health, they wrote.
This is the first report of midazolam having an "awakening" effect, the researchers said.
However, the effect wore off after about two hours, and the man returned to his previous state, unresponsive to the environment, according to the study.
To see whether it was indeed the drug that caused the brief improvement in the man's condition, the researchers gave the man midazolam again. Several minutes following the administration, the patient began to interact with his brother and answered questions the researchers asked him. He was also able to calculate simple math problems, such as 100 minus 7, as well as read and understand simple sentences, such as "Close your eyes."
This time around, the researchers scanned the man's brain before, during and after the administration of midazolam, and identified the locations within the brain that were affected by the drug. They found that those regions previously had been linked to the symptoms of catatonia, which is a state of unresponsiveness to stimuli that is often associated with schizophrenia.
Moreover, the researchers noted, patients with catatonia have been reported to respond to midazolam in the past. The symptoms of the man in this report were similar to those of catatonic patients, which may mean that he was indeed catatonic and therefore responded to the drug, according to the study.
However, it is not completely clear whether the patient did indeed suffer from catatonia or whether his condition merely included certain catatonic symptoms, the researchers wrote.
Although midazolam was effective as a short-term method of treating the man's symptoms, the researchers said they could not keep giving it to him. Usually, the drug is given only to people in intensive-care units, where they can be monitored continuously, said Dr. Maria Chiara Carboncini, medical director of the Brain Injury Unit in the University Hospital of Pisa's Department of Neuroscience in Italy, who treated the patient and was a co-author of the report.
The researchers tried treating the man with another drug called lorazepam, which belongs to the same class of drugs as midazolam but can be administered more easily, as the patient does not have to be monitored continuously, Carboncini told Live Science.
However, after several days of therapy with lorazepam, the man became agitated and aggressive. His doctors switched him to carbamazepine, a drug used to treat people with epilepsy. This drug allowed the man to "maintain the improvement of his ability to interact and communicate with people," Carboncini said.
The study was published in the November issue of the journal Restorative Neurology and Neuroscience.
Follow Agata Blaszczak-Boxe on Twitter. Follow Live Science @livescience, Facebook & Google+. Originally published on Live Science. | – A 43-year-old car-crash victim in Italy who fell into a "minimally conscious state" to the point where he could no longer speak suddenly started chatting again after receiving a sedative, LiveScience reports. A study published in November in Restorative Neurology and Neuroscience said it's the first case showing "the 'awakening' effect of midazolam," a drug typically used to induce sleepiness before surgery. The man was in a coma for 40 days after his accident, then a "vegetative state" for four weeks. He was discharged after 10 months, but his condition worsened: Two years after the accident he couldn't say a single word or respond to simple commands and was performing "aimless repetitive behaviors" like clapping. Doctors treated him with various meds to no avail but then gave him midazolam instead of the usual propofol (the same drug that killed Michael Jackson) before a CT scan. The man suddenly "began to interact with the anesthetist," then with others, the study notes. The effect wore off after two hours, but doctors were able to replicate the results during a second midazolam dosage. The study notes that patients with catatonia (a state of unresponsiveness they're not sure this man suffered from) have responded to this drug before. Because midazolam can only be used in a hospital setting, doctors switched the patient over to carbamazepine (an epilepsy drug), which has since helped the man "maintain the improvement of his ability to interact and communicate with people," a study co-author tells LiveScience. Interestingly, zolpidem (often sold under the brand name Ambien) has been "well documented in literature" as evoking response in similar patients, but it didn't work this time, the study notes. (Midazolam has also been cited in botched executions.) |
DeAndre Jordan had a playoff career high of 25 points as the Clips took a 3-2 series lead over the Warriors. Andrew D. Bernstein/Getty Images /Getty Images
LOS ANGELES -- A little before 8 p.m. on Tuesday, Clippers power forward Blake Griffin caught an entry pass on the left block, dribbled to the middle of the key, and was fouled across the arm by Golden State's Draymond Green. There was nothing notable about the play, nothing the least bit memorable, except for the fact that it happened at all.
Had Commissioner Adam Silver not stood before a bank of cameras in midtown Manhattan on Tuesday morning, had he not banished Donald Sterling from the league for life, and had he not vowed that the disgraced owner will be forced to sell the franchise, Griffin never would have made that move to the paint. DeAndre Jordan never would have made that dunk that shook the stanchion. Chris Paul never would have made that pass that froze three defenders. Matt Barnes never would have scuffled with Andre Iguodala, Stephen Curry never would have turned a 2-on-1 fast break into a pull-up three, and Jamal Crawford never would have sank an and-one falling out of bounds .
The Clippers never would have beaten the Warriors in Game 5, 113-103, because the teams never would have played. Those were the stakes for Silver on Tuesday. Either kick Sterling to the side, forever, or watch the Clippers and Warriors walk off the court in protest moments before a nationally televised showdown. "It was a real option," said Warriors coach Mark Jackson. It was more than that. It was a plan. "I'm sure people would have stuck to it," Green said, "if things didn't go well."
MCCANN: Sterling, NBA set for epic legal fight over Clippers
What actually transpired was almost as surreal. Clippers staffers wore all black. Clippers cheerleaders wore all black. Every advertisement in the arena was covered by black fabric. You'd have seen more sponsors at a high-school game. The mood was simultaneously angry and elated, as if Staples Center was hosting a coup, narrated by the Clippers DJ and hostess. Some fans wore T-shirts with pictures of Sterling's face crossed out, over messages such as "Sterling out equality in" and "No room for racism." Signs included "I'm here for Griffin not Sterling"...."Get out Sterling"..."For sale racists need not apply"... "Sterling might own the team for now but they belong to us."
All those images, plus the posters of Magic Johnson and the renderings of Sterling with devils horns, were broadcast on the Jumbotron. Sterling's own organization, from players to coaches to the entertainment staff, turned on him. "We are home!" the fist-pumping DJ bellowed over deep bass. "We are one!" That mantra -- chanted periodically throughout the fourth quarter -- was written in black and white on the LED boards between the suite levels, taking the place of the ads. "It's a great day," said Paul. Oddly, it might have been the best day in the history of the franchise.
Clippers coach Doc Rivers informed his team of Sterling's punishment during a film session at morning shoot-around. "There was nothing in the room," Rivers said. "It was complete silence." It was the sound of satisfaction. "You could be making nothing," Rivers continued. "You want to work for someone who at least shares your values or respects them -- especially when you're working for a company where, when you do your job, you have it on your chest. I get the sense that was very hard for the players. They had to wear it."
MANNIX: Silver did what absolutely needed to be done with ban of Sterling
But on Tuesday, unlike Sunday, they didn't ditch their shooting shirts. They didn't flip anything inside-out. When they took the floor for warm-ups to a standing ovation, they were handed note-cards with the words, "We Love You" and their names. "It was one of the most emotional things I've ever been a part of it," Paul said. "We have a tough locker room and a lot of us are tough. But it almost brought tears to your eyes to feel the support."
They were greeted by Jesse Jackson, lingering in front of Sterling's usual seat, and they also saw Sterling's wife, Shelly, flanked by six bodyguards. Shelly called Rivers on Tuesday and requested permission to attend. "I thought that was a very nice gesture," he said. Shelly asked Rivers to tell the players she loved them.
Fans were initially encouraged to boycott the game, even by Mark Jackson. But Silver brought back players and patrons alike, turning a protest into a rally, and another reminder that sports franchises transcend the suits that purchase them. No one buys a jersey with an owner's name on the back. No one lines up for an owner's autograph. No one hangs an owner's Fathead. Sterling may have defined the Clippers when they had nobody else. Now, they are defined by Griffin, Paul, Jordan, and the dozens of dedicated employees who make the club hum. Many people have worked many years to make the Clipper logo a point of pride instead of embarrassment. They shouldn't have to wear it inside-out. And they certainly shouldn't have to miss a playoff date when there have been so few.
ROSENBERG: Sterling's lifetime ban fits the crime and the man
The Clippers' 138th straight sellout crowd -- termed by Rivers "as good as I've ever seen" -- saw the home team capture a game they controlled from the moment Silver grabbed the microphone in New York. Jordan, who went scoreless in Game 4, texted his coach before Game 5 to say: "That wasn't me. I'll be back." He scored 25 points on 8 of 10 shooting, while Paul pitched in 20 and Crawford 19, plus high fives at the end for courtside fans. The Clippers went from drained to determined, and now they head to Golden State for Game 6 on Thursday, leading the series 3-2 and looking for a win.
They need one. They are one. ||||| V. Stiviano, the woman at the center of the Donald Sterling scandal, said she was “very saddened” by the NBA’s decision to ban him from the sport for life, her attorney said Tuesday.
V. Stiviano “never wanted any harm to Donald,” Calabasas lawyer Mac Nehoray of Calabasas told The Times.
He said the 31-year-old is still reeling from the release of the recordings in which Sterling chastises her for associating with African Americans, including Magic Johnson. He said that “someone released it for money” but it wasn’t Stiviano.
PHOTOS: Who is V. Stiviano?
“My client is devastated that this got out,” he said.
He also insisted that Stiviano and the 80-year-old Clippers owner never had a sexual or romantic relationship and descriptions of her as his mistress in the media and in a lawsuit filed by Sterling’s wife are erroneous.
“It’s nothing like it’s been portrayed,” Nehoray said. “She’s not the type of person everyone says.”
Rochelle Sterling, who has been married to Donald Sterling for more than 50 years, filed suit against Stiviano in March in an effort to reclaim a $1.8-million apartment, luxury autos and cash he gave her.
Stiviano's lawyer said his client was a hard-working young woman who supported herself waitressing and volunteered helping crime victims before signing on to work as an “archivist” for Sterling.
“She had no association with any rich people before this,” he said.
A spokesman for the Los Angeles County district attorney's office confirmed that Stiviano did clerical work and helped explain legal procedures to victims as a volunteer in the agency’s Victim-Witness Assistance Program in 2010 and 2011
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Red Cross assisting homeless residents displaced after shelter fire ||||| Story highlights Warriors coach: Players talked of boycott prior to Sterling decision
NBA bans Clippers owner Donald Sterling for life, fines him $2.5 million for racist remarks
Sterling admitted making reviled comments first heard on TMZ, the NBA commissioner says
Adam Silver urges owners to vote to "force" Sterling to sell his team
The NBA's commissioner came down hard Tuesday on Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling, ordering him out of his team's business and pushing to force him to sell over racist remarks that caused a firestorm since becoming public days ago.
Adam Silver detailed Sterling's punishment of a lifetime ban and $2.5 million fine -- the "maximum amount" allowed per league guidelines -- at a press conference eight hours before Sterling's Clippers were to tip off in the fifth game of a tightly contested first-round playoff series with the Golden State Warriors.
Silver's decision was met with immediate support from NBA owners, players and others connected to the league who have been calling for swift, firm punishment ever since TMZ posted audio featuring the incendiary comments.
"I hope that every bigot in this country sees what happened to Mr. Sterling and recognizes that if he can fall, so can you," Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson, a former NBA All-Star who was tasked with leading the NBA players union's efforts on this matter.
Under the lifetime ban, Sterling is prohibited from attending NBA games or practices, stepping foot inside any Clippers' facility, taking part in business or personnel decisions, or having a role in league activities such as attending NBA Board of Governors meetings.
Silver -- who succeeded longtime NBA leader David Stern in February -- also insisted he will do "everything in my power" to compel the NBA Board of Governors to "force a sale" of the Clippers. The commissioner said "I fully expect" to get the needed three-quarters of the league's owners -- meaning at least 23 -- to back the move, though Sterling could fight any such move in court.
If Sterling does sell the team, he stands to profit considerably: He bought the Clippers for $12 million in 1981, and the team is now worth $575 million, according to Forbes magazine. And he'd likely have plenty of suitors: Among them is Hollywood mogul David Geffen, who spokeswoman Priscila Giraldo says is "interested" in buying the team.
Rather than water cooler discussions of exciting NBA playoff action, people are talking about racist remarks by a team owner, said Gabe Feldman, head of Tulane University's sports law program.
Estimating the team may be worth closer to $1 billion, Feldman added, "He may get a lot of money from the sale, but I think it will allow the NBA to shift their focus."
That's what Clippers coach Doc Rivers said Tuesday night, commending Silver as "fantastic" for making "a decision that really was the right one." While the players aren't rejoicing, they are breathing easier knowing what happened earlier in the day, he said.
"They were just happy that it was a resolution," Rivers said, expressing hope that playing the game will be a "safe haven" for all involved. "... We're all in a better place because of this."
Clippers: 'Now the healing process begins'
The inflammatory sentiments Silver referred to came packaged in a 10-minute recording that TMZ said occurred during an April 9 conversation between Sterling and girlfriend V. Stiviano
On the recording, a man and woman argue about photos posted to Instagram in which she appears with African-Americans. The man says he doesn't want the woman bringing any black people to games with her.
The sports website Deadspin on Sunday posted five additional minutes of what it said was part of the same audio recording.
Neither website has said how it obtained the recordings; Stiviano's lawyer's office said Sunday that she didn't release them to TMZ, while stating they are legitimate.
On Saturday, Clippers President Andy Roeser suggested the audio was aimed at "getting even" with Sterling over a lawsuit.
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Rochelle Sterling filed a lawsuit last month against Stiviano, who she said was having an affair with her husband and accusing Stiviano of going after extremely wealthy older men.
Roeser said that the offensive comments are "not consistent with, nor does it reflect (Sterling's) views, beliefs or feelings." Moreover, he cast doubt as to whether Sterling had made them, stating: "We do not know if it is legitimate or it has been altered."
Silver expressed no such doubts Tuesday, saying the Clippers owner "acknowledged it was his voice on the tape." Asked whether the owner expressed any remorse, the commissioner said, "Mr. Sterling has not expressed those views directly to me."
Moments after Silver's press conference concluded, the Clippers struck a different tone.
"We wholeheartedly support and embrace the decision by the NBA and Commissioner Adam Silver today," the team said. "Now the healing process begins."
Silver says he shares sponsors' 'outrage'
There is no question that Sterling rightfully owns the Clippers. Some observers question how comments, made privately, could serve as grounds for such punishment, including possibly forcing him to sell the team.
Yet while there's no precedent in the NBA, there is in other sports. In the 1990s, Major League Baseball repeatedly suspended Cincinnati Reds owner Marge Schott over racist and other controversial comments, and she ultimately sold the franchise.
Silver said Tuesday he'd "let the lawyers" address specifics, while stating flatly, "We have the authority to act as I've recommended."
Feldman said some owners might be wary of setting a precedent in which anyone can be voted out "just based on something they don't like, whether it was said privately or just said publicly." That view notwithstanding, NBA owners universally backed Silver's judgment in statements Tuesday.
If the owners follow through on the commissioner's recommendation to force him to sell, Sterling could fight back in the courts. But should he file a lawsuit, CNN senior legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin says his chances of success seem "basically zero."
Sterling so far hasn't had found support in the court of public opinion, especially among past and present players.
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Donald Sterling with girlfriend V. Stiviano.
Members of his own team, the Clippers, debated boycotting their playoff game Saturday with the Warriors, according to coach Rivers. They decided against it, instead opting to stage a silent protest by removing their warmup shirts bearing team logos to reveal red T-shirts worn inside out, with the logos hidden.
Silver said he talked to Rivers, Clippers star point guard Chris Paul (who is also the players union president) and other players prior to reaching his decision Tuesday morning.
Dollars talked, too, to ramp up the pressure for Silver to act.
Over a dozen companies -- including State Farm, Virgin America, CarMax and Red Bull -- halted their sponsorships with the Clippers over the remarks, CNN Money reported
Speaking Tuesday, the commissioner said he shares these companies "outrage," adding "it will take some time" to get things right.
"I can understand how upset they are, and I'll do my best to bring them back into the NBA family," Silver said.
For some, his decision to ban Sterling was enough. Both Adidas and Samsung announced later Tuesday that they had renewed their "partnerships" in the wake of the owner's public punishment.
Warriors coach Mark Jackson, who a day earlier urged fans to boycott Tuesday's game and said there was "a real discussion among the players" to do the same so long as Sterling remained in charge, thinks Silver gave everyone enough reason now to come out to a game.
"I thought he was absolutely incredible ... with the way that he took control of the moment," Jackson said of the commissioner before his team's playoff showdown in Los Angeles. "... It was exactly what the doctor ordered."
Magic Johnson: Players are 'very happy and satisfied'
One man thrust into the controversy -- seemingly out of the blue -- was NBA great Magic Johnson. In the TMZ recording, the man seems mad about a photo the woman posted to Instagram with Johnson.
"In your lousy f**ing Instagrams, you don't have to have yourself with -- walking with black people," the man says.
"If it's white people, it's OK?" she responds. "If it was Larry Bird, would it make a difference?"
Bird was Johnson's chief rival when Bird's Boston Celtics and Johnson's Los Angeles Lakers ruled the NBA.
"I've known (Magic Johnson) well, and he should be admired. ... I'm just saying that it's too bad you can't admire him privately," the man on the recording says. "Admire him, bring him here, feed him, f**k him, but don't put (Magic) on an Instagram for the world to have to see so they have to call me. And don't bring him to my games."
After the audio went public, Johnson -- who, since retiring from basketball, has become a successful businessman and part owner of baseball's Los Angeles Dodgers -- expressed dismay and insisted he'd never attend a Clippers game so long as Sterling was the owner.
Johnson offered a very different tune Tuesday, commending Silver for exhibiting "great leadership" in saying he and others "are very happy and satisfied."
"I wish I was in LA, I would be at the Clipper game tonight!" he tweeted. | – "It was almost like everybody wanted to exhale tonight, and it was good," LA Clippers coach Doc Rivers said last night when the team soared to a 113-103 victory over the Golden State Warriors just hours after the NBA banned owner Donald Sterling for life over racist remarks. With the cloud of controversy lifted, the Clippers "played as if on wings, flying around with hustle and heart" before ecstatic fans who gave a standing ovation when two fans wearing T-shirts with Sterling's face crossed out appeared on the video screen, writes Bill Plaschke at the Los Angeles Times. More: If the NBA hadn't chucked Sterling, the game would never have happened, because both teams had planned to walk off the court in protest moments before it was supposed to begin, Sports Illustrated reveals. "It was a real option," says Warriors coach Mark Jackson. V. Stiviano, the woman Sterling was recorded making racist remarks to, is "saddened" by the owner's lifetime ban and is "devastated" that the recording was released, her lawyer tells the Los Angeles Times. He says that his client wasn't Sterling's girlfriend and never had a romantic relationship with him. The lawyer says she was hired as an "archivist"—an archivist who received $1.8 million in gifts from Sterling, according to a lawsuit filed by his wife of more than 50 years. What now for Sterling? NBA Commissioner Adam Silver plans to push him to sell the team, and fellow team owners appear willing to follow the recommendation to force him out. He could fight back in the courts, but his chances of success are "basically zero," a CNN legal analyst says. If he does sell, it will be for a huge profit: He bought the team for $12 million in 1981 and it is now valued at $575 million, though some experts believe it could sell for closer to $1 billion. |
The Salvation Army’s national leadership said it has never received a kettle donation as generous as the $500,000 check that was given over the weekend in Rosemount by donors who want to remain anonymous.
The charities’ Twin Cities division revealed the donation on Monday, saying the check was placed Saturday into one of its signature red kettles at the Cub Foods on County Road 42, just east of Shannon Parkway.
The previous Twin Cities record for a single kettle donation was $25,000. A little perspective: Typically, a kettle takes in about $30 an hour, according to the charity.
The charity confirmed that the check cleared Monday but would not reveal the couple’s identity. “We have been in touch with the donors, but they want to remain anonymous,” Salvation Army spokeswoman Julie Borgen said. “This couple has supported the Army before with large checks in kettles, but never anything close to this level.”
Borgen said the bell ringers at the store, Rosemount firefighters, were oblivious to the big gift. But the Salvation Army’s major-gifts manager was notified of the incoming windfall a day or two in advance, she said, and picked up the kettle himself. The couple have given advance notice for their previous gifts as well, Borgen said, though she didn’t know how many years they’d given.
The couple said they made the gift in hopes of encouraging others to also stretch their generosity and to honor one of their fathers, who served in the trenches in World War I and was grateful to the Salvation Army “doughnut lassies” who brought soldiers free coffee and doughnuts.
The holiday season is underway with the appearance of the Salvation Army donation kettles and bell ringers.
They said they were also inspired by memories from years ago of relying on discarded food from a grocery store to make ends meet.
“You get to a point in life where it’s time to take care of others, the way you were taken care of,” the donors said in a statement issued through the charity.
Maj. Jeff Strickler, the Salvation Army’s commander for the Twin Cities, said, “We are simply stunned and honored to have received such a generous gift. This is a true blessing, and it could not come at a better time for the Salvation Army and the people we serve.”
The $500,000 donation was confirmed Tuesday by the charity’s national headquarters in suburban Washington, D.C., as the largest single kettle donation ever anywhere in the country.
The gift put a charge into the Twin Cities Salvation Army’s goal of raising $11.6 million during its Christmas campaign. The charity has raised about $2.2 million so far, comparable to this time last year.
“We invite everyone to please give what they can,” Strickler said. “Every dollar counts, and we only have 30 days left to meet our goal.”
There is no indication, spokeswoman Borgen said, that the couple are behind the anonymous “St. Grand” donations that red kettles in the Twin Cities have been receiving in roughly $1,000 increments for the past five years.
“We truly don’t know who St. Grand is,” Borgen said.
St. Grand, whether one person or more than one, slipped $1,100 each into two kettles Friday in Roseville, one drop at a Lunds & Byerlys on County Road C and the other at Cub Foods on Larpenteur Avenue, according to the Salvation Army. The scenario repeated itself Saturday: same amounts, same locations. For the math-impaired, that’s $4,400.
The Salvation Army is seeking bell-ringer volunteers to sign up for one of 575 kettle locations online at salvationarmynorth.org. The charity is one of the largest providers of Christmas toys in the metro area, providing gifts for about 15,000 children. The charity also serves 1,200 hot meals every day, shelters nearly 900 people each night and provides groceries for more than 100,000 people annually.
Staff writer Emma Nelson contributed to this report. ||||| (Pioneer Press: Chris Polydoroff)
The Salvation Army is going to need a bigger kettle.
A Minnesota couple on Saturday dropped a check for a whopping $500,000 into the bucket at the Cub Foods in Rosemount.
Not only was it the largest single such gift the organization has received in the Twin Cities, but it also blew the bells off the previous record of $25,000.
The couple asked to remain anonymous but told the Salvation Army they made the gift in hopes of encouraging others to give generously.
The father of one served in the trenches during World War I and was always grateful for Salvation Army doughnut and coffee deliveries, the couple said.
They also said they remember when money was tight and they relied on discarded food from the local grocery store.
"You get to a point in life where it's time to take care of others, the way you were taken care of," the donors said, according to the organization.
The donation came a day after the Salvation Army's annual mystery benefactor or benefactors, "Saint Grand," left $1,100 in cash in two Roseville kettles.
The organization is trying to raise $11.6 million this year.
"We are simply stunned and honored to have received such a generous gift," said Maj. Jeff Strickler, the Salvation Army's Twin Cities commander. "This is a true blessing, and it could not come at a better time for the Salvation Army and the people we serve." ||||| A Minnesota couple who lived on discarded food when they first got married dropped a $500,000 personal check into one of the Salvation Army’s red kettles at a suburban grocery store over the weekend.
“The check did clear and was deposited in the bank,” said spokeswoman Julie Borgen said. “They feel very strongly about the gift being anonymous.”
It was the largest single donation ever to the Salvation Army in the Twin Cities.
The donors told the Salvation Army they had relied on discarded food from a local grocery store as a young couple and could now afford to help others.
They also wanted to honor one of their fathers who served in the first world war and had been grateful for coffee and doughnuts the Salvation Army had provided to soldiers, the group said in a statement.
“You get to a point in life where it’s time to take care of others, the way you were taken care of,” the donors said.
The check was placed in a kettle Saturday at a grocery store in Rosemount, Minnesota. The Salvation Army did not identify the couple or give any details about them. Borgen said only that they were not from Rosemount.
The previous biggest donation to the Twin Cities Salvation Army was $25,000. | – An anonymous couple in Minneapolis just raised the bar in a big way for all those dropping spare change into Salvation Army kettles. They quietly dropped in a check for $500,000 outside a Cub Foods store, reports the Pioneer Press. "The check did clear and was deposited in the bank,” a Salvation Army spokeswoman tells Reuters. “They feel very strongly about the gift being anonymous.” It shatters the previous record for a local kettle donation of $25,000, notes the Minneapolis Star Tribune. No word yet on whether it's a national record as well. “You get to a point in life where it’s time to take care of others, the way you were taken care of,” explain the donors in a statement released by the charity. In it, they spoke of relying on discarded grocery store food in their younger days. Also, one of the pair's fathers served in World War I and spoke fondly of the Salvation Army's delivery of coffee and doughnuts to the troops. "We are simply stunned and honored to have received such a generous gift," says Maj. Jeff Strickler, the charity's commander in the Twin Cities. (A nonprofit for the blind got a surprise $125 million gift from a recluse.) |
The Bin Laden who got away: Was 'Crown Prince of Terror' the son who escaped U.S. special forces raid?
By Daily Mail Reporter
Captured wives tell Pakistani interrogators one of Bin Laden's sons has not been seen since night of raid
President Obama insisted U.S. assault force had to be large enough to fight way out of country if necessary
One of Osama Bin Laden's sons went missing on the night U.S. special forces stormed their squalid hideout and shot the terror mastermind dead, Pakistani security officials have revealed.
They fear he could be Bin Laden's youngest son, 19-year-old Hamza, who has been dubbed the 'Crown Prince of Terror'.
Three of Bin Laden's wives and several of his children were taken into custody by Pakistani intelligence forces after the raid - but now it appears one of his sons may have evaded capture.
The revelation came as fascinating new details emerged of the U.S. assault force dispatched to find Osama Bin Laden, including the president's insistence that it had to be large enough to fight off hostile Pakistani soldiers if need be.
Missing? Osama Bin Laden's youngest son, Hamza, may have escaped during the raid by U.S. forces. He is pictured here aged around 14, in a propaganda video
President Obama's determination to send a large task-force into Pakistan shows he was willing to risk a confrontation with the country, a close ally, if it meant capturing the Al Qaeda mastermind.
News of Hamza's apparent escape emerged during the interrogation of Bin Laden's three wives by Pakistani investigators.
Officials told ABC News the women had revealed one of the terror leader's sons had not been seen since the raid - but the source did not confirm which one.
Another son, 22-year-old Khalid, was confirmed dead by the U.S. military. He is believed to have been one of the men shown in graphic photos taken in the aftermath of the raid and released to Reuters last week.
Hideout: Osama Bin Laden was sharing his squalid lair with several of his children and three of his wives, including Amal al-Sadah, right, the youngest. She was shot in the leg when she charged at U.S. forces
Squalid lair: The compound where Osama Bin Laden was shot dead by U.S. Navy SEALs on May 1. It is believed his youngest son may have escaped
Initially, the White House said Hamza was presumed dead, too, although it was not known for certain whether he was inside the compound when U.S. Navy SEALs struck.
SQUALID LAIR: WHO WAS BIN LADEN HIDING WITH IN ABBOTTABAD?
Bin Laden shared the squalid three-storey compound with two other families:
Sheikh Abu Ahmed, known as Arshad Khan
Khan, Bin Laden's trusted courier, lived there with his wife and children, believed to be aged three and four. Khan was killed in the raid, as was a woman believed to be his wife. 'Tariq'
Little is known about this man, but locals believed he was Khan's brother. He also moved his wife and children into the compound, and was shot in the attack.
The Bin Ladens
Bin Laden shared the top two floors with three of his wives and an unknown number of his younger children. Both he and his son Khalid were shot dead by U.S. special forces.
Pakistani officials say they are holding Bin Laden's three widows, and eight or nine children belonging to all three men.
But according to ABC his mother is among the three widows being held by Pakistan intelligence.
She is thought to be Khairiah Sabar, who married Bin Laden in 1985.
Bin Laden's youngest wife, Yemeni Amal al-Sadah, was shot in the leg as she charged at U.S. forces when they stormed the compound.
All three women are due to be interrogated by U.S. agents soon, after days of wrangling with Pakistani officials who have been interviewing the widows themselves.
Hamza was widely seen as his father's heir. He had been implicated in the murder of Pakistani leader Benazir Bhutto.
Pakistani investigators agreed it appeared someone was missing from the squalid lair where Bin Laden was shot dead on Sunday.
The terror mastermind shared the hideout with three of his five wives and several of his younger children, including his 12-year-old daughter, Safiyah.
According to Pakistani officials, the girl watched her father die and described how she saw his bloody body being hoisted into a U.S. helicopter.
Pakistani authorities say they are holding eight or nine children who were found there after the U.S. commandos left, some of whom were related to Bin Laden's courier, who was also killed in the raid.
Altogether, Pakistani officials say they captured 17 people left behind in the compound after U.S. forces left.
Young terrorist: Hamza Bin Laden appeared in a 2001 propaganda video when he was aged about ten, reading a jihadist poem at his brother's wedding
They are thought to include the wife of 'Tariq', believed to be the brother of Bin Laden's trusted courier, Sheikh Abu Ahmed.
Bin Laden's youngest son, Hamza, has in the past been dubbed as the Crown Prince of Terror and was widely-tipped to succeed his father.
He has made at least two appearances in Bin Laden's propaganda videos.
In one, released in 2001 and made at the wedding of his brother Mohammed, Hamza wore combat dress and read a poem dedicated to his father’s exploits.
One passage went: ‘I’m warning America that its people will face terrible results if they chase my father. Fighting Americans is the basis for faith.’
Home video: Films found at Osama Bin Laden's hideout in Pakistan show the terror leader obsessively watching videos of himself. He shared the specially-built compound with two other families
In 2005, when he was 15, he featured in a jihadist film shot in a Pakistani tribal area on the Afghan border.
He held a semi-automatic assault rifle and was said to have just taken part in a battle against Pakistani security forces.
His voice also appeared in a video released on the third anniversary of London's 7/7 bombings, calling for the destruction of the U.S., Britain, France and Denmark.
He declared: 'Oh God, reward the fighters. God, be pleased with those who want to go for jihad. Grant victory to the Taliban over the gangs of infidels.'
Hamza was also implicated in the murder of Pakistani leader Benazir Bhutto, who had named him as a leader of one of the Al Qaeda-linked groups of assassins planning to kill her.
REVEALED: DETAILS OF CRACK TEAM SENT TO FIND OSAMA BIN LADEN
Experts: A team of U.S. Navy SEALs went into the compound while two groups of specialists were on stand-by to deal with Bin Laden, dead or alive Senior military officials today revealed compelling details of the U.S. special forces team sent into Pakistan to find Osama Bin Laden. The entire assault team was big enough to fight its way out of the country if necessary, on President Obama's orders. There were also two teams of specialists on standby, to deal with Bin Laden dead or alive. The first team was ready to bury the terror leader if he was killed, and the second was made up of interrogators, lawyers and translators in case he was captured. They would have met Bin Laden and U.S. SEALs on board a Navy ship, probably the Carl Vinson in the Arabian Sea.
Speaking anonymously, officials told the New York Times the president reviewed plans for the raid about ten days in advance. He urged commanders to make sure they were taking enough troops to fight their way out if hostile Pakistani forces tried to oppose the operation - showing the lack of trust he placed in a close ally.
Originally, two helicopters were supposed to wait just over the border in Afghanistan in case they were needed - 90 minutes away from the compound. After Mr Obama's intervention, commanders decided to send two extra helicopters with more troops. They followed the two Black Hawk helicopters with the assault team on board. One of the back-up craft was used when one of the first was badly damaged as it landed. One senior officials told the Times: 'The president did not want to leave anything to chance. He wanted extra forces if they were necessary.'
||||| One of Osama bin Laden's sons may have gone missing in the midst of the Navy SEAL raid that took the life of the al Qaeda leader more than a week ago, Pakistani security officials told ABC News today.
The officials said bin Laden's three wives, who are all in Pakistani custody, said that one of bin Laden's sons has not been seen since the raid. The son was not identified, but Pakistani investigators agreed that it appeared someone was missing from the sprawling compound, the officials said.
Later, however, one U.S. official said there was no evidence anyone was missing from the compound and Senator Dianne Feinstein, chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, told CNN that in a recent briefing with the CIA there was no mention of a missing son.
U.S. officials said that one of bin Laden's sons, Khalid, was killed in the raid. It is not known if another son, Hamza, was in the compound at the time of the raid, though his mother is reportedly one of the wives in custody. The U.S. has previously denied the SEALs took anyone from the compound other than bin Laden's body.
The U.S. initially faced resistance from Pakistani authorities when investigators asked for access to bin Laden's widows, but a U.S. official said Monday Pakistani official promised to make the meeting happen sometime soon. One senior Pakistani security official told ABC News there is still no timeframe for that meeting, however.
READ: Pakistan to Give U.S. Access to Bin Laden Widows, Official Says
Bin Laden, who was married five times, is survived by at least 18 children. None of the sons, however, are in line to succeed their father for leadership of al Qaeda.
"Unlike a lot of Arab governments that are dynastic," said former White House counterterrorism advisor Richard Clarke, now an ABC News consultant, "al Qaeda has not been and his sons have never played a real operational role of any significance. They did not appear to be groomed for leadership roles in al Qaeda." ||||| Pakistani security officials believe a member of the bin Laden household has disappeared since the raid, further deepening the confusion about who was killed.
It is understood that three of bin Laden’s widows, currently in Pakistani custody, have told interrogators that one son has not been seen since the operation.
The fresh details raise fears that the al-Qaeda leader’s youngest son and closest confidant, Hamza, may have escaped capture.
The White House initially claimed that Hamza, 20, had been killed at the house in Abbottabad, about 30 miles from Islamabad. Officials later said his 22-year-old brother Khalid had been killed instead.
On Tuesday night an intelligence source in Islamabad told The Daily Telegraph that shifting accounts of what had happened, coupled with the widows’ testimony, left them unable to account for one person who they believe had been living at the house.
“We don’t know if it was his son. Someone, one person may have been in the compound that we now cannot account for if - we believe what we are being told,” he said.
Bin Laden, who was married five times, had as many as 24 children.
No-one knows for certain who was in the compound where bin Laden had lived, hidden in plain sight, for five years.
However, Hamza’s mother is believed to be among the family members in Pakistani custody.
Hamza, thought to be the youngest of the Saudi-born warlord's sons, has been described as the “crown prince of terror”. He featured on an extremist website to mark the third anniversary of the July 7 London bombings in which 52 people died. He read a poem called for “destruction” of America, Britain, France and Denmark.
Intelligence agencies believe he was being groomed as a possible future leader on al-Qaeda.
He was implicated in the assassination of moderate Pakistani leader Benazir Bhutto in 2007. | – One of Osama bin Laden's sons may have escaped the raid by Navy SEALs, according to ABC News and British papers the Telegraph and Daily Mail. It seems more guesswork than anything at this point, though. Bin Laden's three widows have reportedly told Pakistani authorities that one son has not been seen since the raid. The best guess is that they're referring to bin Laden's youngest son, Hamza, thought to be around 19 or 20 and a close confidante of his father. His mother is one of the detained widows. Initial reports had him killed in the raid, but that might have been confusion over the killing of a different son, Khalid. In any event, Pakistani officials agree that someone appears to be missing. “We don’t know if it was his son," an unidentified source tells the Telegraph. "Someone, one person may have been in the compound that we now cannot account for if—we believe what we are being told." |
Caught overnight at Las Vegas' McCarran Airport with practically no one else around, Richard Dunn could have taken a cab back to the strip and partied until his flight in the morning. Instead, he whipped out his iPhone and made this gloriously cheesy music video for Celine Dion's 1996 cover of "All By Myself."
And he really did make it all by himself, with an ingenious repurposing of the airport's escalators and moving walkways.
"I had a person behind a ticket counter give me a roll of luggage tape before she left. I then used a wheel chair that had a tall pole on the back of it and taped my iPhone to that. Then I would put it on the moving walkway for a dolly shot. I also used the extended handle on my computer bag and taped the iPhone to my handle. I would tuck different stuff under the bag to get the right angle. For the escalator shot I had to sprint up the steps after I got my shot so the computer bag didn't hit the top and fall back down. Quite fun!"
That's all pretty clever, but it was recreating the Flashdance scene using a water bottle that really put the video over the top.
Update: Now Celine Dion wants to hang out with him.
[H/T Reddit] ||||| LAS VEGAS, June 10 (UPI) -- A man waiting overnight in Las Vegas' McCarran Airport recorded a cell phone video of himself lip-syncing Celine Dion's 1996 single "All By Myself" while he waited alone for his flight.
Using just his smartphone, a wheelchair and water bottle, Richard Dunn spent the evening shooting himself lip-syncing the ballad around various locations of the nearly deserted airport with no help from other would-be passengers.
"I had a person behind a ticket counter give me a roll of luggage tape before she left," Dunn said on his Vimeo page.
"I then used a wheelchair that had a tall pole on the back of it and taped my iPhone to that. Then I would put it on the moving walkway for a dolly shot. I also used the extended handle on my computer bag and taped the iPhone to my handle. I would tuck different stuff under the bag to get the right angle. For the escalator shot I had to sprint up the steps after I got my shot so the computer bag didn't hit the top and fall back down."
Not content with a single dated pop-culture reference, about four-and-a-half minutes into the video Dunn uses a water bottle to recreate the iconic waterfall silhouette shot from the 1983 film Flashdance.
Uploaded earlier today, the video already has nearly 500,000 views. | – Richard Dunn recently found himself stuck, apparently all alone, overnight at Las Vegas' McCarran Airport—so, naturally, he created an incredible music video of himself lip-syncing to Celine Dion's cover of "All By Myself" in various locations around the terminal. It even includes a shot of Dunn re-creating the iconic waterfall scene from Flashdance using a chair and a water bottle, UPI notes. Dunn explains, per Gawker, that his tools were his iPhone, a wheelchair with a tall pole on the back, a roll of luggage tape, his own computer bag, and the airport's escalators and moving walkways. He taped the iPhone to the pole or the extended handle of his computer bag, sometimes tucking "different stuff under the bag to get the right angle," he says, and then placed it wherever he needed it to be, including the aforementioned escalators and walkways. "For the escalator shot I had to sprint up the steps after I got my shot so the computer bag didn't hit the top and fall back down," he says. "Quite fun!" |
Reynolds American Inc. agreed to acquire Lorillard Inc. in an ambitious and risky $25 billion deal that would reshape the landscape of U.S. tobacco and make Newport menthols an even more formidable rival to Altria Group Inc.'s top-selling Marlboro.
The transaction would add Lorillard's Newport, the No. 2 U.S. cigarette brand, to Reynolds's portfolio, which includes Camel and Pall Mall cigarettes, giving Reynolds a commanding... ||||| Reynolds American Inc. (RAI) agreed to buy rival Lorillard Inc. (LO) for about $25 billion excluding debt, a deal that would leave the 400-year-old U.S. tobacco industry with two competitors controlling 90 percent of the market.
Reynolds, the maker of Camel and Pall Mall cigarettes, will pay cash and stock valuing Lorillard at $68.88 a share, according to a statement. British American Tobacco Plc (BATS) will fund $4.7 billion of the transaction, letting it maintain a 42 percent stake in Reynolds. BAT’s U.K. rival Imperial Tobacco Group Plc (IMT) will acquire brands such as Kool and Blu e-cigarettes for $7.1 billion in a bid to assuage antitrust concerns.
Modernized Cigarette Seeks Respectability
Decades of anti-tobacco health campaigns have hurt demand and put pressure on the industry to consolidate. Acquiring Lorillard, the U.S. industry’s third-largest competitor, would help Reynolds cope with the slowdown and give it the Newport menthol line, which is popular in urban areas. Still, the deal faces challenges, and investors signaled that they’re uncertain it will close in its current form. Lorillard shares slid to $60.17 in New York, 13 percent below the purchase price.
“There’s a lot of risk,” said Owen Bennett, an analyst at Nomura Holdings Inc. in London. “There are a lot of factors involved.”
Photographer: Luke Sharrett/Bloomberg Lorillard Inc. brand Newport cigarettes aa a store in Shelbyville, Kentucky. Close Lorillard Inc. brand Newport cigarettes aa a store in Shelbyville, Kentucky. Close Open Photographer: Luke Sharrett/Bloomberg Lorillard Inc. brand Newport cigarettes aa a store in Shelbyville, Kentucky.
Including debt, the purchase is valued at $27.4 billion. The new company will have annual revenue of more than $11 billion -- almost two-thirds the yearly sales of U.S. market leader Altria (MO) Group Inc. -- and operating income of about $5 billion.
Market Share
Reynolds shares also fell, dropping 6.9 percent to $58.84. Imperial Tobacco declined 3.7 percent to 2,638 pence in London, while BAT fell 1.8 percent to 3,532 pence. Altria dropped 3.7 percent to $41.76.
Reynolds said the combined company will account for almost 33 percent of the U.S. industry. That leaves the U.S. with two competitors -- Reynolds and Altria -- selling nine out of every 10 cigarettes. Imperial said its market share will more than triple to 9.5 percent from 2.5 percent.
The companies will fight for customers in an industry where health concerns and smoking restrictions have eroded sales. Total U.S. cigarette shipments fell by a median of 2.9 percent in the first quarter among the nation’s top tobacco companies, according to data compiled by Bloomberg Industries.
Yet even amid the slump, the companies have remained profitable, with Altria, Reynolds and Lorillard all boosting net income last year.
Lorillard Drops
The deal -- which followed months of intermittent talks -- will have to pass antitrust hurdles. As part of the effort to overcome those challenges, Imperial will acquire well-known brands such as Salem, Winston and Maverick. Getting the Blu lineup also gives Imperial a foothold in the emerging market for e-cigarettes -- battery-powered devices that can deliver nicotine and other substances through vapor.
“The most surprising element is that Imperial is taking the e-cigarette business from Lorillard,” said Philip Gorham, an analyst at Morningstar Inc. in Amsterdam. “It was probably the sweetener that convinced them to buy what is essentially a selection of third-tier brands.”
Including the Blu brand in the deal was needed to get Imperial to the table and reduced antitrust concerns from having the products in the same company as Reynolds’s Vuse e-cigarettes, said a person familiar with the matter.
E-Cig Sales
U.S. e-cig sales were forecast by Euromonitor International to triple last year to $1.5 billion and then double annually through 2018. Still, the products face uncertainty as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration explores how to regulate them while cities and employers debate where they can be used.
Reynolds is “absolutely confident” in the future of its Vuse e-cig brand, Chief Executive Officer Susan Cameron said today in an interview.
Reynolds said cost savings from the deal will be about $800 million and that it will add to earnings in the first year. Cameron will continue as CEO of Reynolds after the acquisition, and the company will remain headquartered in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Murray Kessler, chairman, president and CEO of Greensboro, North Carolina-based Lorillard, will join Reynolds’s board.
Reynolds and BAT also agreed to share next-generation tobacco technology, including heat-not-burn cigarettes and vapor products. Imperial will acquire Lorillard’s manufacturing and research facilities in Greensboro and about 2,900 employees, including a national sales force.
Newport Brand
Lorillard’s biggest product, Newport, will give Reynolds fresh ammunition against Altria, whose brands account for more than half of the U.S. retail cigarette industry. Altria’s Marlboro by itself has market share in the U.S. of about 44 percent, according to the company’s website.
Newport is the second-most-popular brand among all U.S. cigarettes and the leader among menthol smokes, which account for about a third of the $90 billion U.S. cigarette market. The brand was the main selling point for Reynolds, and recent signals that the FDA won’t institute overly onerous regulations on menthols gave the company confidence to move ahead with the purchase, said a person familiar with the situation.
Lazard served as lead financial adviser to Reynolds, which also consulted with JPMorgan Chase & Co., while Centerview Partners and Barclays Plc advised Lorillard. Jones Day LP provided legal counsel to Reynolds, while Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP served as Lorillard’s legal adviser.
Imperial Tobacco, which said it will fund its portion of the transaction entirely through debt, is being advised by Credit Suisse Group AG and Goldman Sachs Group Inc.
Months Talking
Reynolds, Lorillard and London-based BAT have been in talks since last fall to reach an agreement that would satisfy all three parties, people familiar with the matter have said.
Those discussions got a boost when Cameron returned as Reynolds’s CEO in May, Kessler said in an interview.
She was instrumental “in getting this transaction from what was sort of out there and theoretical to a very compelling transaction that our board could support,” Kessler said. “She was extremely helpful in bringing that home.”
The companies made a tentative deadline of July to reach a deal because of an agreement by BAT not to raise its stake in Reynolds without the approval of Reynolds’s board until this month, people familiar have said.
BAT’s agreement keeping it from increasing its stake in Reynolds dates back to the merger of R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Holdings Inc. with Brown & Williamson Tobacco.
Hard Look
The Federal Trade Commission is likely to take a hard look at the latest proposed transaction, according to David Balto, a Washington attorney and former policy director for the FTC who litigated BAT’s merger with Reynolds in 2004.
The FTC allowed that deal to go through because Brown & Williamson was losing market share and Lorillard was still a viable competitor, according to the FTC. The market is more consolidated now, and this deal will face serious scrutiny, Balto said.
Selling off the minor brands to Imperial, and even unloading a bigger name like Camel, may not be enough, he said.
“I wouldn’t put any number on the likelihood of this deal being approved,” Balto said in an interview. “I think it would need to be more substantial than Camel.”
To contact the reporters on this story: Duane D. Stanford in Atlanta at dstanford2@bloomberg.net; David Welch in New York at dwelch12@bloomberg.net; Gabi Thesing in London at gthesing@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Nick Turner at nturner7@bloomberg.net; Mohammed Hadi at mhadi1@bloomberg.net Kevin Orland | – Reynolds American, the maker of Camel and Pall Mall cigarettes, has agreed to buy Lorillard, the maker of Newport menthols, in a deal that will make it a strong second to Marlboro manufacturer Altria in the US tobacco market, the Wall Street Journal reports. Reynolds will pay a combination of cash and stock amounting to about $27.4 billion. It will also sell off its Kool, Salem, Winston, Maverick, and Blu eCigs brands to Imperial Tobacco Group for $7.1 billion, in the hopes of easing antitrust concerns—though analysts say regulators will be taking a hard look at the deal anyway. Altria controls about half of the US cigarette market, while Reynolds and Lorillard controlled 25% and 15%, respectively, before the tie-up. "It’s transformative because it creates a duopoly in the US," one analyst tells Bloomberg, which will help dull the pain of a longstanding downward sales trend. The deal also serves to boost Reynolds' presence in tobacco's fastest-growing product categories, menthols and e-cigarettes, the New York Times points out. |
Kris Humphries to File for Separation – Not Divorce: Sources
Kris Humphries plans to answer Kim Kardashian 's divorce filing by seeking a legal separation, sources tell PEOPLE.The NBA player likely will file the court papers within days, say the sources.Rather than pursue a divorce as Kardashian has, the NBA player's ultimate intent is to annul the marriage, clearing the record of ever being married to the reality star, the sources say.This would be a change of heart for Humphries.Shortly after Kardashian traveled to Minnesota and met with Humphries and the pastor who married them, sources close to Humphries insisted he intended to try and move on and sign the divorce papers Just 72 days after a lavish wedding , Kardashian, 31, filed for divorce from Humphries, 26, on Oct. 31, citing irreconcilable differences.Their troubles flared almost immediately and were on display in the season premiere of Kourtney & Kim Take Manhattan. ||||| Daniel Craig brands the Kardashians 'f***ing idiots' for making careers out of their private lives
They have made millions from living their lives in the public eye thanks to their reality television shows.
But one person who is less than impressed by the Kardashian family is Daniel Craig, who launched an astonishing foul-mouthed rant at the brood, headed by Kim Kardashian, in a new interview with GQ magazine.
The James Bond star labelled the clan 'f***ing idiots' and criticised those who 'sell' themselves and then make demands about their private lives.
Rant: Daniel Craig has labelled the Kardashians 'f*****g idiots' for making a career out of their private lives
Craig, who managed to keep his marriage to Rachel Weisz under wraps in the summer, told the January edition of GQ magazine: 'I think there's a lot to be said for keeping your own counsel.
'It's not about being afraid to be public with your emotions or about who you are and what you stand for. But if you sell it off it's gone.
'You can't buy it back - you can't buy your privacy back. Ooh I want to be alone. F*** you. We've been in your living room. We were at your birth. You filmed it for us and showed us the placenta and now you want some privacy?
Screen stars: Kim, Khloe and Kourtney Kardashian have made millions from their reality television shows, including Keeping Up With The Kardashians and the current Kourtney And Kim Take New York
Referring to the Kardashians, Craig said: 'Look at the Kardashians, they're worth millions. I don't think they were that badly off to begin with but now look at them.
'You see that and you think "what, you mean all I have to do is behave like a f***ing idiot on television and then you'll pay me millions".
'I'm not judging it - well, I am obviously.'
Figuring it out: Craig said he is 'unsatisfied constantly' with his career and always trying to get it right
Loved up: Craig and wife Rachel Weisz managed to keep their wedding entirely secret this summer
Craig also spoke about his wedding to Weisz, and said that while they managed to keep it out of the spotlight, he doesn't feel victorious about the matter.
The full interview appears in the January issue of British GQ magazine
He said: 'We got away with it. We did it privately and I've got a lot of people to thank for that. But that was the point, we did it for private reasons.
'Because we didn't want it f*****d up, because that would be sharing a secret. And the whole point is that it was a secret. A secret is a secret in my mind.'
Refusing to go into any details about the ceremony, Craig added: 'Look, I'm in love. I'm very happy. And that is as far as I'm prepared to go. Life is long, life goes wrong and I don't want to say something now that might be thrown back later.'
The 43-year-old, who is now working on the 23rd Bond film, Skyfall , can soon be seen in the English language remake of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo.
But he says despite his lengthy and successful career, he is still not happy with how things stand.
He said: 'I'm definitely not satisfied about my career. I don't know how you can be, it's the very nature of things.
'I'm always trying to figure it out, and I'm kind of unsatisfied constantly. I always want to get it right and I don't know what the answer to it is.
'But I do know that it's out there and I do know it's worth looking for.' ||||| Get ready for one more member of the extended Kardashian family to keep up with! Kourtney Kardashian and beau Scott Disick are expecting their second child together, they tell the new Us Weekly in an exclusive cover story.
PHOTOS: Adorable snapshots of Mason Dash Disick
The E! reality star, 32, took a pregnancy test about five weeks ago — and woke up Disick, 28 (not a morning person!), around 7.a.m. to tell him the positive results.
"Now I'm nine weeks along," Kardashian tells Us. "You're supposed to wait 12 weeks to tell people, but I feel confident."
PHOTOS: Look back on Kourt's first pregnancy
The son or daughter-to-be will be the second child for the couple of five years, whose son Mason, nearly 2, was a bit of a surprise.
Not so much for baby number two, the happy couple tells Us.
"It wasn't like we weren't trying," Disick, 28, says. "We kind of just said, 'If it's meant to be, it'll be.'"
PHOTOS: Babies of 2011
For much more of our exclusive sit-down with Kourtney and Scott — how they told Khloe, Kim and the rest of the clan, whether she wants a boy or girl, potential wedding plans and much more — pick up the new Us Weekly, on stands Friday.
Sign up now for the Us Weekly newsletter to get breaking celebrity news, hot pics and more delivered straight to your inbox!
Want stories like these delivered straight to your phone? Download the Us Weekly iPhone app now! | – Poor Kim: Not only have her fairy tale dreams been shattered … now she also has to deal with a joyfully pregnant sister while she goes through divorce proceedings. Yep, Kourtney Kardashian and boyfriend Scott Disick are expecting again. "Now I'm nine weeks along. You're supposed to wait 12 weeks to tell people, but I feel confident," says Kourtney, who was apparently confident enough to announce her plans in an Us cover story. The couple already has a son, Mason, who is almost two. "It wasn't like we weren't trying," says Disick, who apparently doesn't have a firm grasp on either the specifics of procreation or double negatives. "We kind of just said, 'If it's meant to be, it'll be.'" Meanwhile, rather than signing the divorce papers, Kris Humphries is seeking a legal separation from Kim Kardashian, People reports. His plan is to get an annulment rather than a divorce. In more fun Kardashian news, the Daily Mail has a spectacular rant against the whole clan from Daniel Craig's recent GQ interview. "Look at the Kardashians, they're worth millions," says the James Bond star. "I don't think they were that badly off to begin with but now look at them. You see that and you think, 'What, you mean all I have to do is behave like a f***ing idiot on television and then you'll pay me millions?'" |
President Donald Trump often uses Twitter to rail against the media. | AP Photo Trump slams 'fake news' for treating son unfairly and 'distorting democracy'
President Donald Trump on Sunday morning tweeted that “fake news” is treating his son unfairly for meeting with a Russian lawyer, adding that the media are “distorting democracy” in America.
“HillaryClinton can illegally get the questions to the Debate & delete 33,000 emails but my son Don is being scorned by the Fake News Media?” the president said in a series of posts. “With all of its phony unnamed sources & highly slanted & even fraudulent reporting, #Fake News is DISTORTING DEMOCRACY in our country!”
Story Continued Below
Also on Twitter, the president thanked former adviser Michael Caputo for defending the administration against accusations of colluding with Russia. In the same vein, he thanked attendees of the U.S. Women’s Open golf tournament “who far out-numbered the protesters.” Trump attended the tournament on his golf course at Bedminster in New Jersey, on Friday. The event continues through Sunday.
Trump often uses Twitter to rail against the media. The president in particular has criticized the media for what he calls unfair and biased coverage.
His son Donald Trump Jr. has come under intense scrutiny since The New York Times last weekend published a story detailing his meeting, along with then-campaign chairman Paul Manafort and adviser Jared Kushner, with a Russian lawyer. ||||| Tweet with a location
You can add location information to your Tweets, such as your city or precise location, from the web and via third-party applications. You always have the option to delete your Tweet location history. Learn more ||||| Tweet with a location
You can add location information to your Tweets, such as your city or precise location, from the web and via third-party applications. You always have the option to delete your Tweet location history. Learn more ||||| (CNN) Michael Caputo, a former top Trump campaign adviser with strong ties to Russia, told CNN in an exclusive interview that he "never once" discussed nor heard anyone else mention Russian involvement in the race to defeat Hillary Clinton.
"No one ever breathed the word 'Russia' to me," Caputo said in the interview, conducted days before he testified to the House intelligence committee Friday.
Caputo, who advised the campaign on communications, is one of several former Trump campaign aides who are being questioned as part of a multi-pronged investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election. In fact, of all of President Donald Trump's campaign workers, Caputo might be the one with the deepest links to Russia: He lived in Moscow for several years in the 1990s, claims to have worked for the Kremlin and continues to try to do business there.
A colorful public relations specialist and fill-in radio talk-show host in Buffalo, New York, Caputo agreed to testify behind closed doors, at the insistence of the Republican and Democratic committee leaders. But he said he wanted his story -- his denial of wrongdoing -- to be made public.
"I heard nothing of the kind," Caputo said, when asked if he ever heard anyone inside the campaign discuss Russian assistance. US intelligence agencies have determined that Russia interfered with the election in order to help Trump win. "In fact, we were so busy just trying to keep up with the sun rising and setting on that campaign that I can't imagine anyone had the time, nor the wherewithal to go out there and even do something like this.
"Anybody who covered the Trump effort knew this was a pell-mell operation from the moment he woke up in the morning until the moment he went to bed," he said. "The idea that somebody at that campaign would have had the forethought and the treachery ... or the resources to go out and do this is laughable."
Still loyal to Trump
Caputo talked to CNN on Monday, the day before Donald Trump Jr. released emails that raised further questions about potential collusion between his father's campaign and the Russian government. According to the emails, Trump's eldest son agreed to meet with a woman described as a "Russian government lawyer" because he was told she had damaging information on Clinton. Jared Kushner, the President's son-in-law and now a senior White House adviser, and then-campaign chairman Paul Manafort also attended the meeting on June 9, 2016.
Less than two weeks later, on June 20, Caputo resigned from the campaign after celebrating the dismissal of campaign manager Corey Lewandowski with a tweet that said, "Ding Dong the witch is dead." Manafort, who brought Caputo into the national campaign in April 2016 after his success with the New York primary, replaced Lewandowski as chairman.
Ding dong the witch is dead! https://t.co/pSqQwmAGz1 pic.twitter.com/5dE7GMeEK6 — That Michael Caputo (@MichaelRCaputo) June 20, 2016
Still loyal to the President, Caputo defended Trump Jr.
"You try to find ways to trip up your opponent. And if somebody comes to you and says, 'I've got, you know, the smoking gun on the ... Clinton campaign,' you have that meeting. You definitely have that meeting. ... If that lawyer had contacted me, I would have recommended she meet with somebody else, but I would have passed it up the chain of command."
Caputo's relationship to Russia
Caputo's history in Russia dates to 1994, when he says the US government sent him there to help the country's young government design election laws.
"I was sent there by the Clinton administration to meddle in their elections," he said, flippantly using language that alludes to the current controversy.
Caputo was forced to resign in 1995 when he bucked the State Department by defending the Russian Election Commission's decision to disqualify a progressive party from an election, according to a Washington Post story at the time.
After losing his job, Caputo opened a public relations firm in Moscow to help Western companies do business there. He also married a Russian woman (whom he later divorced), helped create a program similar to America's "Rock the Vote" and advised then-President Boris Yeltsin on his re-election campaign. He moved back to the US in 2000 after the Russian economy collapsed and Vladimir Putin was elected president.
"And ever since then, I've been involved in the former Soviet Union, and I'm not going to stop now," Caputo told CNN.
Russian links criticized
Caputo is a protégé of Roger Stone , a Trump adviser who has also agreed to be interviewed by the House intelligence committee.
Caputo's name arose as part of the investigation in March, when Rep. Jackie Speier, a committee member and Democrat from California, said he was part of a "tarantula web" of links to Russia. Speier referred to Caputo as "Putin's image consultant," an apparent reference to work he did for Gazprom Media, a subsidiary of the Russian state-owned energy company that took over an independent TV station in 2001. When pro-democracy groups blasted Putin and his government for violating press freedoms, Caputo was brought in to help smooth things over.
"I'm not proud of the work today," Caputo told The Buffalo News in March 2016. "But at the time, Putin wasn't such a bad guy."
In the CNN interview, Caputo denied that he worked to improve Putin's image.
"No. That's absolutely false," he said, criticizing Speier's office for faulty research. "I didn't work on Putin's image. I was trying to help Gazprom Media explain why they took over NTV, a television network. If that somehow down the line helped the Kremlin, that wasn't what I was hired for."
Caputo said he came across Putin twice in the late 1990s, when the future Russian leader was deputy mayor of St. Petersburg, but that the two never had a conversation. He said he didn't realize Putin had been at a reception in Caputo's Moscow home until he saw photos afterward.
Over the years, Caputo has continued to do business with Russians, starting with "business leaders and oligarchs who were trying to come to the United States." In 2004, however, he wrote a column in The Washington Post in which he referred to the oligarchs as "brutal billionaires." Facing death threats, he bought a tugboat and a gun and lived at sea -- with a white parrot -- for most of five years.
Caputo took a break from the boat in 2007 to consult on a parliamentary campaign in Ukraine, where he met his second wife. He has been particularly critical of Putin for Russia's invasion of Crimea in 2014.
Working with 'both the White House and the Kremlin'
In 2015, he re-established an old partnership with Sergey "George" Petrushin, founder of the Zeppelin nightclub in Moscow. Their PR agency has offices in New York, Miami and Moscow.
The firm's website claims that Caputo is "the only executive in history who has worked for both the White House and the Kremlin," a statement that Caputo acknowledged Thursday is not entirely true. In response to a CNN question, Caputo said he worked for then-President George H.W. Bush's losing re-election campaign in 1992, but never for the White House. "I worked on the campaign, not in the building," he said in a text message. "Spent a lot of time in the White House and on the road with the President (Bush) but not WH staff."
Caputo, who first met Trump in 1988, said he never thought the New York businessman could become president. He said he still supports Trump, and downplayed the ongoing investigations by Senate and House committees and a special counsel -- what he calls the "Russia collusion delusion" -- as a "Democratic strategy" to block the President's agenda.
"I've had a couple of very significantly in-depth discussions with Donald Trump about America and about patriotism and about the gifts this country has given him," Caputo said. "And he is not the kind of person who would ever do anything like this."
The testimony
After testifying for three and a half hours before the House intelligence committee Friday -- an hour and a half longer than expected -- Caputo told reporters that in the hearing he denied having knowledge of any alleged contacts between the campaign and Russia.
"I spent my time in front of the committee detailing the fact that I had no contact with Russians, that I never heard of anyone with the Trump campaign talking with Russians, that I was never asked questions about my time in Russia, that I never even spoke to anyone about Russia, that I never heard the word 'Russia,' and we did not use Russian dressing," Caputo told reporters in a press conference after the closed-door testimony. "There was absolutely no discussion of Russia on the Trump campaign 'til the day I left."
Florida Republican Tom Rooney, California Democrat Adam Schiff, California Democrat Eric Swalwell and Washington Democrat Denny Heck attended, Caputo's lawyer, Dennis Vacco, said.
Heck told CNN's Jim Acosta shortly after the hearing that it was "probably the most fascinating three hours of time I've spent in my nearly five years in the United States House of Representatives." | – President Trump was on Twitter Sunday morning defending his eldest son and taking aim at two of his favorite targets: Hillary Clinton and the media. In a series of posts starting around 6am, Trump wrote, "HillaryClinton can illegally get the questions to the Debate & delete 33,000 emails but my son Don is being scorned by the Fake News Media?" And: "With all of its phony unnamed sources & highly slanted & even fraudulent reporting, #Fake News is DISTORTING DEMOCRACY in our country!" Donald Jr. came under scrutiny last week after releasing emails confirming he took a meeting last year with a Russian lawyer promising damaging information about Clinton, Politico reports. That meeting has raised more questions about collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russian government. President Trump also tweeted a "thank you" message to former campaign adviser Michael Caputo "for saying so powerfully that there was no Russian collusion in our winning campaign." On Friday, Caputo told CNN that he "never once" heard anyone in the campaign discuss Russia. "No one ever breathed the word 'Russia' to me," he said. "The idea that somebody at that campaign would have had the forethought and the treachery ... or the resources to go out and do this is laughable." Caputo, who resigned from the Trump campaign last June, has strong ties to Russia, advising then-President Boris Yeltsin's re-election campaign and doing PR work for a media company owned by Vladimir Putin's government. Caputo's interview was conducted before Donald Jr. released his emails. |
Michael Schumacher’s medical files have been stolen and offered for sale to the media, his manager has announced.
The files are thought to have been stolen from his hospital in Grenoble.
The stricken Formula One legend, who sustained life-threatening injuries in a skiing accident six months ago, was moved from Grenoble to University Hospital Lausanne in France last week after it was announced he was no longer in a coma.
His medical files have reportedly been offered for around €50,000 (£40,000) and contained details of surgical procedures.
Sabine Kehm, the seven-time champion’s manager, said that stolen documents and data had been offered for sale for several days
“We cannot judge if these documents are authentic. However, the documents are clearly stolen. The theft has been reported. The authorities are involved,” said Ms Kehm.
“We expressly advise that both the purchase and the publication of such documents and data is forbidden. The contents of any medical files are totally private and confidential and must not made available to the public. “
“We will therefore, in every single case, press for criminal charges and damages against any publication of the content or reference to the medical file.”
The 45-year-old has been in hospital for nearly six months after his accident skiing off-piste on the French Alpine resort of Meribel in December. ||||| Follow us at @WorldSportCNN and like us on Facebook
(CNN) -- Stolen medical files that may be those of Michael Schumacher are being offered for sale, the injured former F1 racing driver's manager said.
Schumacher has been undergoing hospital treatment since a skiing accident last year but is now out of a coma.
Manager Sabine Kehm said the documents had been offered for sale for several days.
She added, "We cannot judge if these documents are authentic. However, the documents are clearly stolen. The theft has been reported. The authorities are involved."
Medical files are confidential, and it is forbidden to buy or publish such data, Kehm said.
"We will therefore, in every single case, press for criminal charges and damages against any publication of the content or reference to the medical file," she said.
Schumacher, 45, suffered severe head trauma in a December 29 skiing accident at the French Alps resort of Meribel.
The champion driver, from Germany, was transferred last week to Switzerland for rehabilitation from a hospital in Grenoble, France, where he was kept in a medically induced coma for more than three months.
The Grenoble hospital's media office said in a statement that Kehm "told us that a person intended to sell to the press a document allegedly issued from the medical records of Michael Schumacher."
"Without knowing the precise nature of the document, the Grenoble Hospital decided to sue for 'theft and breach of medical confidentiality' so that an investigation can be initiated."
A spokesman for the German newspaper Bild, Tobias Frolich, told CNN that the tabloid was among a number of media outlets to be offered Schumacher's alleged medical records, but that "the editorial office decided to reject the offer."
A French prosecutor investigating the accident concluded that speed was not behind the fall suffered by the seven-time world champion, whose F1 career ended in 2012.
Read: Schumacher out of coma and transferred to rehab
Read: Red Bull tycoon re-energizing Formula One
Read: Rosberg heads off Hamilton to extend lead
CNN's Stephanie Halasz, Diana Magnay and Lindsay Isaac contributed to this report. | – Michael Schumacher's medical files have been stolen from a hospital in France and are being offered for sale to the media, the F1 champ's manager warns. The files taken from a hospital in Grenoble where Schumacher spent months in a coma after a skiing accident last December contain details of surgical procedures and are being offered for close to $70,000, according to the Telegraph. The manager says while it's not clear if the documents on offer are authentic, they have clearly been stolen and, since it is illegal to buy or publish confidential medical data, she will "press for criminal charges and damages against any publication of the content or reference to the medical file," CNN reports. The 45-year-old racing legend finally emerged from his coma earlier this month and is now undergoing rehabilitation in Switzerland. |
Legend has it that the infamous Hope diamond brings misfortune to whoever owns it. Well, the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History added the magnificent sky-blue gemstone to its collection 53 years ago today (Nov.10), and the institution has fared just fine so far.
As the museum states on its website, it "appears to have maintained the Hope curse-free."
So what's the evidence that the Hope diamond is cursed?
There are plenty of stories of the stone's owners meeting horrible fates, but scholars tend to believe that many of these tales were cooked up or embellished on, at one time or another, by the gem's various owners, in hopes that an incredible history would fetch the diamond a better price in a sale. The diamond has changed hands many times, and for a few periods in its life, the name of the owner is lost to history.
Here, we'll focus on the people who owned the rock for the most significant chunks of time, and whose fates historians can confirm.
The most commonly accepted origin of the curse dates back to 1653, when a French merchant named Jean Baptiste Tavernier obtained the original 115-carat blue diamond in India. The story goes that Tavernier plucked the gem from one of the eyes of a Hindu idol and, for this sacrilege, was later mauled to death by dogs. In fact, the story is a myth: Tavernier returned to France and sold the gem to King Louis XIV for a pretty penny, after which he retired to Russia and died peacefully there. Scholars even question how Tavernier came upon the gem, as a second diamond never turned up, and no one else ever found the statue in question.
Louis, too, escaped misfortune despite his ownership of the "French Blue," as the Hope was then called. However, one of Louis' descendants who inherited the stone was not as lucky. King Louis XVI and his queen, Marie Antoinette, lost their heads to the guillotine during the French Revolution, and their crown jewels – including the diamond – were ransacked by thieves. [How Are Fake Diamonds Made?]
A cut-down piece of the French Blue resurfaced in London two decades later, and the financier Henry Philip Hope bought it in 1839 (the diamond is now known by the family's name). The stone's "curse" skipped over Henry but came down with a vengeance on a descendant, Lord Francis Hope. After Lord Francis received his inheritance at the age of 21, he married an American showgirl named Mary Yohe and lived so far beyond his means that he was eventually forced to sell the magnificent diamond and declare bankruptcy. The showgirl ran off with one of his rivals and eventually died in poverty.
The Hope diamond exchanged hands a few times before American jeweler Pierre Cartier obtained it, and again the "curse" skipped him. In fact, historians suspect Cartier embellished some of the curse rumors to entice the diamond's next buyer, the glamorous Washington socialite Evalyn Walsh McLean, who became the modern poster child for the stone's curse.
McLean and her husband obtained it in 1912 and proceeded to lead a notably tragic life. Her young son was killed in a car accident, and her daughter committed suicide. Her husband left her for another woman and eventually ended up in an insane asylum. In the words of the Smithsonian, "More than anyone, Evalyn Walsh McLean became the poster child for the Hope diamond's legendary curse."
The jeweler Henry Winston bought the diamond from McLean's estate and avoided its curse, eventually selling it to the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History in 1958. The museum, too, did well — attendance grew and the museum is now home to one of the world's finest gem collections — but James Todd, the postman who delivered it, did indeed meet with misfortune: He was hit by a truck (not fatally), his wife and dog died not long after, and his home caught fire.
Perhaps the museum is lucky to be one of the owners spared the wrath of the Hope diamond. Or perhaps there is no ruinous curse at all. That's what its market value would imply, anyway: Today the sky-blue gem is worth a quarter of a billion dollars.
This article was provided by Life's Little Mysteries, a sister site to LiveScience. Follow us on Twitter @llmysteries, then join us on Facebook. ||||| Every day, thousands of visitors to the Smithsonian Natural History Museum crowd around a glass case on the second floor to gaze at the Hope Diamond, one of the world's most famous jewels. It's been the subject of dozens of books, games, documentaries and scientific inquiries, partly due to persisting legends that it's cursed. Despite all this attention, though, it seems that the inch-wide, 45.52-carat diamond still conceals secrets waiting to be uncovered.
One of these secrets was recently discovered by François Farges, a professor of mineralogy at the National d'Histoire Naturelle in Paris, and Jeffrey Post, the Smithsonian museum's curator of minerals. Using computer modeling, a recently-rediscovered 17th century lead replica and scientific analysis, they've determined that back when the Hope was known as the "French Blue" and part of the personal collection of King Louis XIV of France, during the late 17th century, it was likely placed on a gold background and specially cut to produce an effect reminiscent of a sun at its center. Only after it was stolen in 1792, during the French Revolution—and before it resurfaced in Britain in 1812—was it recut to the familiar, smaller shape we know today.
Their new discovery, described in an article published in the month's Rocks and Minerals magazine, stems from Farges' 2009 discovery of a lead replica of the French Blue in the National d'Histoire Naturelle mineral collections, which provided the exact dimensions of King Louis XIV's French Blue for the first time. Both Post and Farges are mineral scientists, and much of their other work on the Hope is concerned with the science behind its distinctive hue, but they've also used the tools of science to investigate the gem's complex provenance.
And the history of the diamond is a complex one: It was bought somewhere in India in a rougher, less finely-cut shape by Jean-Baptiste Tavernier, a French merchant, and brought to France in 1668. "Unfortunately, Tavernier wrote some really wonderful journals about the trip, but nowhere in them did he say anything about where he actually bought the diamond," Post says. It's believed that the stone was plucked from the Kollur Mine, in what's now the southern state of Andhra Pradesh, but no one knows for sure.
From there, it became part of the French crown jewels, and was cut by Jean Pittan, one of King Louis XIV's court jewelers, sometime between 1669 and 1672, eventually becoming known as the French Blue. That the Hope and the French Blue were the same stone was suggested by diamond experts as far back as 1858, but only proved definitively in 2009, when Farges unearthed the lead replica at the Paris museum. At the time, jewelers made metal replicas for extremely precious stones and used them as placeholders when designing settings.
"They didn't even know they had it. It was in their collection, but filed under lead specimens," Post says. Drawings and descriptions of the French Blue had previously suggested it could have been recut to produce the Hope, but the exact physical dimensions provided by the lead replica allowed Farges to collect digital 3D measurements that would prove it. When they compared these measurements to those of the Hope, "it fit into the French Blue perfectly—you could see exactly how the French Blue was cut to form the Hope," says Post.
The replica, though, also raised a question: Why was the French Blue cut into such an uncommon shape?
Nowadays, when jewelers cut diamonds, they use sharp angles on the back of the stone—always higher than 23 degrees, the critical angle of diamond, so that light that enters the gem reflects inside it several times. The ubiquitous brilliant cut, for instance, is designed to maximize the number of reflections that light entering the diamond encounters, thus maximizing the distance that light travels within the diamond. This heightens the brilliance for the viewer.
But the back of the French Blue had low angles and even an entirely flat culet on its back, allowing some light to travel through and straight out the back of the stone. Compared to the rest of the stone, the material right in front of the culet at the gem's center would have appeared relatively clear and colorless, almost like looking through a glass window.
Farges and Post's intriguing explanation: that the jeweler intended for the center of the stone to serve as a window. Along with the flat culet, the French Blue had a series of star-shaped facets that were also below the critical angle, which would have caused the region in front of them to also appear relatively clear.
A 1691 inventory of the French Crown Jewels notes that the gem was "set into gold and mounted on a stick." If placed in front of a gold sheet, they realized, these unique cuts would have caused a dazzling golden sun to appear at the center of the deep blue stone.
Farges and Post have used computer modeling to produce an image that simulates exactly how this would have appeared, shown above. "King Louis XIV was the 'Sun King,' and so this would have been an emblem representing his power," Post says. "His colors were blue and gold, and so to have a blue diamond with a gold sun in the center—that'd be something that no one else has, something that would almost seem divine."
The researchers are planning on comissioning a cubic zirconia replica, cut and colored to match the French Blue, which would demonstrate this effect and could someday be put on display with the Hope to illustrate the stone's transformation and history. They're also scrutinizing archives of Louis XIV's jewelers from that era to look for conclusive evidence that this design was intentional.
One thing they know for sure is that the sun effect was eradicated around 1749, when the Sun King's great-grandson, King Louis XV, ordered the stone to be lifted from its mounting and incorporated into an elaborate emblem. During the French Revolution, it was stolen along with the rest of the Crown Jewels, and although most of the other gems were recovered by French officials, the famous French Blue disappeared. The slightly smaller Hope Diamond—which we now know was cut from the French Blue—was first documented as being in London in 1812, and became well known when it showed up in the collection catalogue of banker Henry Philip Hope in 1839.
More than a half century after it was donated to the Smithsonian in 1958, the Hope is still one of the Natural History Museum's most-visited and well-known artifacts. "It speaks to the remarkable power of a gemstone. It has generated so much research, interest and curiosity, and it's focused people on a history that might otherwise go untold," Post says. "All due to a gem one inch in diameter."
Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated that Louis XV was the son of Louis XIV. He was the great-grandson of XIV. Many thanks to reader Joshua Stopple for catching the error. ||||| Picture this: You’re on a train that’s traveling fast through the mountains. A man is tied to a chair in front of you. A bear growls from behind a closet door. And everywhere around you are stolen priceless gems, statues and paintings.
Welcome to “Hidden Expedition: Smithsonian Hope Diamond,” the first video game that the Smithsonian Institution has helped create. From a train in India to the hills of Switzerland to the Smithsonian Castle, the game released in December takes you on an adventure around the world.
You are the explorer
Your task is to find pieces of the Hope Diamond before a group of thieves gets to them. As the game unfolds, you realize that you are an explorer working for the Smithsonian, challenged with solving riddles and puzzles in order to get to the next stage of the game. You can’t actually lose, but the faster you piece together what you need to do, the better your score.
Along the way you learn about the real Hope Diamond, a hugely popular attraction at the National Museum of Natural History.
“It never has failed to fascinate me, the draw the diamond has on people . . . no matter what we do with it,” said Jeffrey Post, who is a curator, or overseer, of gems and minerals at the Smithsonian. “It’s valuable, rare and famous. It’s like wanting to see a movie star. The Hope Diamond is a bit of a celebrity.”
Post worked closely with Big Fish Games to make sure the information and images were correct. The game is littered with trivia, such as whose statue is in front of the Smithsonian Castle (Joseph Henry, the first secretary of the Smithsonian).
Hope Diamond legend
It makes sense that the Hope Diamond would play a central role in a video game. The story of the real diamond is full of mystery.
A Frenchman named Jean Baptiste Tavernier was the first known owner of the diamond, but no one is sure how he got it. Legend says that in the 17th century he stole a large stone from a statue of a god in India. Because of that, the diamond is supposedly cursed.
Many people around the globe, including kings, have owned the blue stone, and some have had bad luck. The Hope family, for which the diamond is named, owned it in the 1800s but went into debt and was forced to sell it. A rich Washington woman named Evalyn Walsh McLean bought the jewel in 1911. Her son and daughter died young. Was that because of the diamond’s curse?
Post said it’s possible there are shards of the Hope Diamond, just like those mentioned in the game. (The diamond was recut over the years.) He is working with a French museum to figure out more about where the diamond came from.
Post’s favorite story about the diamond is true. When you shine an ultraviolet light on the diamond in a dark room, it glows bright red. That’s because of a chemical called boron in the diamond that makes it blue in the light but a fiery red in the dark.
“It’s something you don’t expect to see,” Post said. “It’s also one of those secrets of the Hope Diamond. . . . So you can see there’s a lot of different hooks in the Hope Diamond that would create a story.”
Try the game
What: “Hidden Expedition: Smithsonian Hope Diamond”
Platforms: Mac and PC
How old: Best for age 8 and older.
How much: $19.99.
Where to buy: www.bigfishgames.com. Always ask a parent before going online. | – It's legendary, supposedly cursed, admired daily by thousands, and the star of a video game—and yet we don't know all there is to know about the Hope Diamond, or so a recent discovery indicates. The 45.52-carat diamond has given up one of its secrets to French mineral scientist François Farges and Jeffrey Post, the Smithsonian's curator of minerals. Their detective work involved computer modeling and a 17th-century lead replica that Farges found in 2009 among the National d'Histoire Naturelle's collection, and led them to an intriguing conclusion: When King Louis XIV possessed the diamond, it was mounted on a gold background and cut in a way that could cause a sun to appear at the blue stone's center—all too appropriate for the Sun King, whose colors were blue and gold, reports Smithsonian Magazine. Louis XIV bought the originally 112 3/16-carat, crudely cut diamond in 1668 from a French merchant who obtained the jewel somewhere in India. Five years later it was recut to its 67 1/8-carat size, according to the Smithsonian Encyclopedia, at which time it became known as the French Blue. In the years between its theft (in 1792, during the French Revolution) and reappearance (in 1812, in Britain), it was again cut to its current size, obliterating those former dimensions—until Farges uncovered the replica, which would have been used by jewelers in need of a stand-in for the actual diamond while creating settings. But the replica made clear that the French Blue was cut in an unusual way, eschewing the sharp angles that maximize the reflection of light. In exploring the reasoning behind the cut, Farges and Post arrived at their conclusion. Interestingly, it was only with the discovery of the replica that it was conclusively proven that the French Blue and the Hope Diamond were the same stone. (Click for another fascinating story about diamonds.) |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A trade deal fight led by U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders on Saturday failed to fully materialize as rival and presumptive nominee Hillary Clinton announced a compromise to expand mandatory healthcare funding over the next decade.
Democratic U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton speaks to the General Conference of the African Methodist Episcopal Church during their annual convention at the Pennsylvania Convention Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S., July 8, 2016. REUTERS/Charles Mostoller
At a meeting of the Democratic Party draft platform committee in Orlando, Florida, on Saturday, supporters of Sanders were unable to influence the committee to adopt strong language opposing the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade pact, marking a powerful blow to the efforts by the U.S. senator from Vermont to push the party further to the left.
“We did everything we could to win that vote,” said Sanders policy adviser Warren Gunnels. “It was very disappointing.”
Instead of a condemnation specific to the TPP, the committee reached language saying they would oppose “trade agreements that do not support good American jobs.”
Sanders has headed the effort on the U.S. left to oppose the TPP and trade deals like it, which he says are unfair to American workers. Clinton has also come out as opposed to the agreement.
Despite Clinton having already secured the requisite delegates to clinch the party’s nomination at the July 25-28 convention, Sanders remains in the race to be the party’s nominee.
He has indicated that he would hold off on endorsing Clinton for the Nov. 8 general election fight against Republican presumptive nominee Donald Trump until she adopted policies and campaign language that more closely resembled his own more liberal tone.
“I would like to say that while this vote was disappointing, we have won some tremendous victories,” Gunnels said, including securing language in the draft supporting a federal $15 minimum wage, another trademark issue for Sanders.
On the same day, the Clinton campaign announced changes to its healthcare policy proposal, including increasing mandatory healthcare funding under the Affordable Care Act by $40 billion over the next 10 years, highlighting the significant influence Sanders still yields over the party.
“We have more work to do to finish our long fight to provide universal, quality, affordable healthcare to everyone in America,” Clinton said in a statement that included her intention to give Americans the choice of a public-option insurance plan and allow for individuals below Medicare age, beginning at 55, to opt in to the U.S. federal program that pays elderly Americans’ hospital bills.
Sanders has made combating healthcare costs a rallying cry of his campaign and often battled with Clinton during the primary race on how best to reach their shared goal of universal healthcare.
On Saturday, Sanders praised the updates to Clinton’s proposal as a step in the right direction to “save lives and ease suffering,” indicating, along with the more liberal tone in several parts of the 2016 platform draft, a growing compromise between the two camps.
For Clinton, an endorsement from Sanders - seen as a champion of the progressive left - could open the door to many of his supporters who have been reluctant to support the more moderate Clinton.
“The proposal brought forth today by Secretary Clinton, working with our campaign, is an important step forward in expanding healthcare in America - and expanding health insurance and healthcare access to tens of millions of Americans,” he said in a statement.
Slideshow (2 Images)
“I congratulate Secretary Clinton for this extremely important initiative.”
The New York Times reported on Thursday that an endorsement is imminent, and Sanders is expected to officially throw his support behind Clinton, a former U.S. secretary of state, at a campaign stop in New Hampshire early next week.
(This story corrects age at which individuals could opt in to Medicare under Clinton plan in paragraph 10) ||||| Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-V.t, right, speaks as Hillary Clinton listens during the CNN Democratic Presidential Primary Debate at the Brooklyn Navy Yard in New York on April 14, 2016. (Photo: Seth Wenig, AP)
WASHINGTON — Hillary Clinton on Saturday announced her plan to expand investments in community health care centers, the second of two proposals in a week apparently aimed at courting supporters of Sen. Bernie Sanders ahead of his possible endorsement.
The presumptive Democratic nominee's proposal would double funding for primary care services at Federally Qualified Health Centers, which serve populations with limited access to health care. Community health care centers have been a key priority for Sanders, I-Vt., who successfully fought for the inclusion of $11 billion in funding for such centers in the Affordable Care Act of 2010.
Clinton also affirmed her commitment to giving Americans in every state the choice of a "public-option" insurance plan — which she supported during her 2008 presidential campaign and Sanders pushed for during the ACA debate — and allowing people below Medicare age to opt into the programby offering it to those who are 55 and older.
An hour after her health care announcement, Clinton's campaign announced firm details about her Tuesday campaign event in Portsmouth, N.H., where Sanders is expected to endorse his primary campaign rival. The announcement does not mention Sanders.
"We have more work to do to finish our long fight to provide universal, quality, affordable health care to everyone in America," Clinton said in a statement. "Already, the Affordable Care Act has expanded coverage to 20 million Americans. As president, I will make sure Republicans never succeed in their attempts to strip away their care and that the remaining uninsured should be able to get the affordable coverage they need to stay healthy."
Sanders, in a press call timed 15 minutes after Clinton's announcement, said the proposal by Clinton — "working with our campaign" — is an important step forward in expanding access to health care and addressing a crisis in primary health care.
"It will save lives, it will ease suffering, it will improve health care in America and it will cut health care costs," he said. "It is a significant step forward as we advance toward the goal of health care for for all Americans."
The announcement follows a higher education proposal Clinton released Wednesday that Sanders called a “bold initiative” to “revolutionize the funding of higher education in America.” That proposal is designed to eliminate college tuition for working families and reduce debt.
Sanders was asked if he is now in a position to endorse Clinton.
"It’s fair to say that the Clinton campaign and our campaign are coming closer and closer together in trying to address the major issues facing this country, which is what my campaign was all about, and we look forward to continue working with the Clinton campaign and will have more to say in the very near future," he said.
Sanders has long called for a "Medicare-for-all" proposal that would grant all Americans access to health care through a single-payer national program. During the primary campaign, Clinton questioned how he'd pay for his proposal and said she wants to defend and build on the progress made by the Affordable Care Act. She accused him during a debate of wanting to "tear (the ACA) up and start over again," a claim he rejected.
Her proposal Saturday would extend the current mandatory funding for community health centers and expand it by $40 billion over the next 10 years. A Clinton campaign official said the proposal would be fully paid for with savings, innovations and tax reform that closes loopholes and "makes the wealthiest pay their fair share."
Community health centers provide care for about 25 million people in the United States, more than half of whom are Hispanic or African Americans, according to the Clinton campaign. Sanders said the centers offer savings to the overall health care system of $49 billion a year, and access to health care when people need it avoids costly illnesses, hospital stays and trips to the emergency room.
"These are good investments for patients and these are very good investments for taxpayers," he said. He said Clinton's efforts to provide Americans with the choice of a public-option insurance plan and to expand Medicare "will get us closer to the day when everyone in America has access to quality, affordable health care.”
Clinton's announcement came on a day when Democrats in Orlando were finalizing the party platform they will bring to the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia later this month.
The 187-member Platform Committee voted down an amendment by a Sanders supporter that would have blocked a vote in Congress on the controversial Trans-Pacific Partnership, a proposed 12-nation trade pact that Sanders says will hurt U.S. workers and the environment. But they approved an amendment by a Clinton representative that, without explicitly opposing the TPP, says that Democrats will oppose trade agreements that do not support good American jobs, raise wages and improve national security.
Platform language aimed at blocking the TPP was a top priority for Sanders. Warren Gunnels, Sanders' policy director, said the campaign is "very disappointed" that the Sanders-backed amendment failed, but he said it's "good news" that virtually everyone who spoke during the debate made it clear they oppose the TPP.
"Sen. Sanders, Sec. Clinton and the overwhelming majority of Democrats agree: the TPP should not come up for a vote after the election," Gunnels said in a statement. "If Democrats are going to prevail in November we must make clear to the American people that we stand firmly against the TPP. We will continue fighting to protect American jobs and to ensure Congress does not pass this disastrous trade agreement."
Sanders has said he is prepared to bring amendments to the floor of the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia if the party doesn’t take more progressive stances in its platform. A convention floor fight seems unlikely now, given his confirmation that he is preparing to endorse Clinton.
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Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/29qNDpD ||||| Hillary Clinton reaffirmed her support on Saturday for creating a “public option” within Obamacare and allowing people to enroll in Medicare at age 55.
The presumptive Democratic presidential nominee also called for a substantial increase in funding in medical clinics that serve low-income Americans, fully embracing a proposal from Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.).
While Clinton has long supported the creation of new government-run insurance options and reiterated that support several times this year, Saturday’s statement comes three days before she is scheduled to make her first joint campaign appearance with Sanders ― who has championed government-run insurance and federally financed clinics throughout his career and during his own bid for the presidency.
Sanders, who ran a surprisingly strong but ultimately unsuccessful campaign for the Democratic nomination, is expected to endorse Clinton at that Tuesday event. Saturday’s announcement on health policy follows a similar one from Clinton earlier in the week, that she was enhancing her own proposal on college tuition assistance to match the considerably more generous version Sanders had sketched out.
In describing the proposals to The Huffington Post, senior Clinton campaign aides noted that Sanders had championed these ideas ― and, in particular, that the former Secretary of State’s funding proposal for the clinics matched one that the independent senator had made.
Already, the Affordable Care Act has expanded coverage to 20 million Americans. Hillary Clinton
“We have more work to do to finish our long fight to provide universal, quality, affordable health care to everyone in America,” Clinton said in a press release that the campaign circulated late Saturday morning. “Already, the Affordable Care Act has expanded coverage to 20 million Americans. As president, I will make sure Republicans never succeed in their attempts to strip away their care and that the remaining uninsured should be able to get the affordable coverage they need to stay healthy.”
Sanders said in a conference call shortly afterwards that the announcement was the product of discussion between the two campaigns. He praised Clinton’s proposal in strong, unambiguous terms ― describing it as “an extremely important initiative” and predicting that “it will save lives, it will ease suffering, it will improve health care in America, and it will cut health care costs.”
The idea of the public option ― as first sketched out by Jacob Hacker, a Yale political scientist ― is to create a separate, government-run insurance plan that would compete with private insurers offering coverage through the Affordable Care Act’s exchanges. The hope is that this competition can help keep premiums for all the insurance plans low, particularly if the government-run plan has the ability to dictate low reimbursement rates to doctors, hospitals, drugmakers, and other suppliers of medical care.
President Barack Obama and Democratic leaders included versions of the public option in their proposals when they first began working on health care reform in 2009. But they ended up jettisoning the idea in response to protests from more conservative Democrats, who were less enthusiastic about government programs and industry groups, like hospitals and insurance companies, that feared what a public option would do to their income streams.
The idea of a Medicare buy-in has been around for even longer, although it, too, appeared in 2009 when Democrats were drawing up health care legislation. The goal, again, would be to give consumers ― in this case, those older than 55 and at greater risk of becoming sick ― one more insurance option if they can’t get coverage through an employer or an existing government program.
Clinton has expressed support for both ideas during the 2016 campaign, noting that she had called for them previously. (She made a public option part of her campaign proposal to reform health care in 2008.) But campaign aides said Saturday’s announcement is a reminder of how seriously she takes the idea ― and her determination to promote it as president.
Jim Young / Reuters U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s call to increase funding for federally run health clinics is a bit more specific, in that she’s put a dollar figure on it. It would be $40 billion over 10 years.
That might reassure some of the progressive Sanders supporters skeptical of Clinton’s commitment to their values and goals ― and, in some cases, angry at her attacks on Sanders’ proposal to create a single, government-run insurance plan that would provide coverage to all Americans, supplanting private insurance altogether.
Of course, Clinton’s announcement comes with no policy details. She isn’t answering any of the many complicated questions that either proposal would raise ― like exactly how either the Obamacare public option or Medicare buy-in plan would pay the providers of medical services, or exactly who could enroll in either one.
Clinton’s call to increase funding for federally run health clinics is a bit more specific, in that she’s put a dollar figure on it. It would be $40 billion over 10 years. She hasn’t identified new revenue or spending cuts to cover the cost of the proposal, but she has said that she will remain true to her pledge to pay for the price of any proposals ― a pledge that she has largely kept in this campaign, independent budget analysts say.
And while the clinic proposal likely to get a lot less attention than anything Clinton says about the public option of Medicare, the idea, if implemented, could help a great many people get medical care.
The clinics are the backbone of the nation’s health care safety net, providing primary care to millions of Americans who either have no health insurance or whose insurance doesn’t meet their needs ― a group that, even after the implementation of the Affordable Care Act, is large and underserved.
About one in 14 Americans currently gets health care through a federally funded clinic, according to the Department of Health and Human Services. That’s thanks to annual funding of about $5 billion, a big chunk of which comes from a provision in the Affordable Care Act that Sanders championed.
“This would be a substantial infusion of funding,” Larry Levitt, senior vice president of the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, told HuffPost. “More funding for community health centers creates an infrastructure to care for increasing numbers of insured people and also provides resources to reach the remaining uninsured to encourage them to get covered.”
Federal clinics happen to be one of the few government-run healthcare programs with a history of strong bipartisan support. George W. Bush was a big fan during his presidency, for example. So while both a public option and Medicare buy-in would likely run into the same political opposition that stopped them in 2009,more money for clinics would have a chance of becoming law even with Republicans controlling a house of Congress.
This article has been updated to include more specific details on Clinton’s proposal and reactions to it. | – Hillary Clinton proposed making a public option insurance plan available to residents in every state and doubling funding for community health centers in an announcement Saturday, USA Today reports. Reuters calls the move evidence as to how much influence the campaign of Bernie Sanders has had on her positions. Clinton campaign aides tell the Huffington Post both proposals are ones that had been pushed for by Sanders. On the heels of Clinton announcing a college tuition plan similar to that of Sanders, Saturday's announcement is expected to clear the way for Sanders to endorse her Tuesday. "It’s fair to say that the Clinton campaign and our campaign are coming closer and closer together," Sanders said Saturday. "[We] will have more to say in the very near future." Clinton's proposal for a public option would create a government-run insurance plan to go up against private insurance plans available through ObamaCare. She supported a public option when she ran for president in 2008, and Sanders fought for one in 2010. Sanders also won $11 billion in funding for community health centers in 2010. A third proposal from Clinton announced Saturday would allow people to enroll in Medicare at 55. The proposals expand health care funding by $40 billion over the next decade. Sanders says Clinton's healthcare plan “will save lives, it will ease suffering, it will improve health care in America, and it will cut health care costs." He had implied in the past that he wouldn't endorse Clinton until her policies got more liberal. |
Image caption The convoy carrying UN chemical weapons inspectors to the sites was targeted by snipers
Diplomatic pressure on Syria has failed and the UK is considering its response to a suspected chemical attack, Foreign Secretary William Hague says.
He told the BBC it would be possible for the UK and its allies to respond without the UN's unanimous backing.
In Syria, UN inspectors visited the site of the suspected attack after their convoy was shot at by snipers.
The PM is cutting his holiday short and is expected to hold a National Security Council meeting on Wednesday.
Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg has also cancelled a visit to Afghanistan to meet British troops.
Downing Street said a decision on whether to recall Parliament would be made on Tuesday.
The suspected chemical attack took place on Wednesday near the Syrian capital Damascus, and reportedly killed more than 300 people.
Weapons inspectors carried out tests at the scene on Monday after unidentified snipers shot at one of their vehicles, a UN spokesman said.
Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption William Hague: UN Security Council has not shouldered its responsibilities
Mr Hague told BBC Radio 4's Today programme while he could not go into options or a timetable for action, he was not "going to rule anything in or out".
"We, the United States, many other countries including France, are clear that we can't allow the idea in the 21st century that chemical weapons can be used with impunity," he said.
A Downing Street spokesman said Prime Minister David Cameron had called Russia's President Vladimir Putin on Monday afternoon to discuss Syria and that they had reiterated the position that the use of chemical weapons should merit a "serious response" from the international community.
But while Mr Cameron "made clear there was little doubt" the attack was carried out by the Syrian regime, Mr Putin "said they did not have evidence of whether a chemical weapons attack had taken place or who was responsible," the spokesman said.
MPs are due to return to the Commons on 2 September but there have been demands for Parliament to be recalled.
Analysis Whitehall officials say no firm decision is likely to be taken on how Britain will respond to last week's alleged chemical attack in Syria until at least Wednesday. That is when David Cameron will be chairing a session of the National Security Council, attended by military and intelligence chiefs and senior ministers. It follows intense consultations between London and Washington with Downing Street keen to stress the two countries are acting in concert. Any military response, if it's decided on, is most likely to be confined to a one-off or limited guided missile strikes on selected Syrian military targets using Tomahawk cruise missiles fired from US Navy warships stationed hundreds of miles away in the eastern Mediterranean. US vessels there are reported to have about 400 such missiles onboard, while a Royal Navy submarine in the region can also carry cruise missiles. But Russia, Syria and Iran have all issued strong warnings against any western military action.
Labour's shadow foreign secretary Douglas Alexander said he would "expect the prime minister to make his case to Parliament" before a decision was made about UK involvement.
The prime minister also had phone calls with other leaders, including US President Barack Obama, this weekend, where they agreed on the need to take "strong action".
He will return several days early from his holiday in Cornwall with his family so he can chair Wednesday's high-level security briefing of senior ministers and defence and intelligence chiefs.
It is understood the most likely military response would be a one-off or limited guided missile strikes on Syrian military targets fired from US Navy warships, says BBC security correspondent Frank Gardner.
Prof Michael Clarke, of the Royal United Services Institute, said: "Military advice to politicians in the US and the UK is 'don't think you can dabble in this - you have to go in with both feet'".
He told the BBC's PM programme limited air strikes might inconvenience the regime but were no guarantee you could stop it.
Other options - such as a no-fly zone or a safe haven - would have to be led by the US, and at the moment most of the "sabre-rattling" was coming from France and the UK - not the US, he added.
Whitehall officials have told the BBC the next key decisions would probably be taken at Wednesday's National Security Council meeting.
'Humanitarian need'
Mr Hague said diplomatic methods to resolve the civil war in Syria had "failed so far".
Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov: "They [the West] have not been able to come up with any proof but are saying at the same time that the red line has been crossed"
He said the UN Security Council, split over Syria, had not "shouldered its responsibilities".
The council is made up of 15 members including permanent members China, Russia, France, the US and the UK which have the power to veto any resolution.
But any action could be taken "without complete unity on the UN Security Council", he said.
He said a response could be "based on great humanitarian need and distress" and "in accordance with international law".
The foreign secretary said the suspected chemical attack was carried out by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime but it blames rebel forces saying footage of the attack was "fabricated". ||||| WASHINGTON/BEIRUT The United States put Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on notice on Monday that it believes he was responsible for using chemical weapons against civilians last week in what Secretary of State John Kerry called a "moral obscenity."
"President (Barack) Obama believes there must be accountability for those who would use the world's most heinous weapons against the world's most vulnerable people," Kerry said in the most forceful U.S. reaction yet to the August 21 attack.
Speaking after U.N. chemical weapons experts came under sniper fire on their way to investigate the scene of the attack, White House spokesman Jay Carney said the use of chemical weapons was undeniable and "there is very little doubt in our mind that the Syrian regime is culpable."
Kerry said Obama was consulting with allies before he decides on how to respond.
"What we saw in Syria last week should shock the conscience of the world," Kerry told reporters.
"The indiscriminate slaughter of civilians, the killing of women and children and innocent bystanders by chemical weapons is a moral obscenity. By any standard, it is inexcusable. And despite the excuses and equivocations that some have manufactured, it is undeniable."
Military chiefs from the United States and its European and Middle Eastern allies met in Jordan for what could be a council of war, should they decide to punish Assad, who has denied using chemical weapons and blamed rebels for staging such attacks.
Many hundreds of people died in Damascus suburbs in what appears to have been the worst chemical weapons attack since Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein fatally gassed thousands of Kurds in 1988.
U.N. investigators crossed the front line from the center of the capital, which remains under Assad's control, to inspect the Mouadamiya suburb, one of at least four neighborhoods hit by the poison gas before dawn last Wednesday.
The United Nations said one vehicle in its convoy was crippled by gunshots fired by "unidentified snipers." The team continued on after turning back for a replacement car.
Syrian state television blamed rebel "terrorists" for the shooting. The opposition blamed pro-Assad militiamen.
"I am with the team now," a doctor who uses the name Abu Karam told Reuters by telephone from Mouadamiya. "We are in the Rawda mosque and they are meeting with the wounded. Our medics and the inspectors are talking to the patients and taking samples from the victims now."
Wassim al-Ahmad, an opposition activist, said members of the Free Syrian Army umbrella rebel organization and the opposition's Mouadamiya Local Council were accompanying the inspectors on their tour of the suburb.
"The inspectors are now examining victims being treated at a makeshift hospital in Mouadamiya and are taking blood samples from them," Ahmad said.
INTERVIEWING SURVIVORS
Video filmed at the site showed inspectors in black and blue body armor and blue U.N. helmets walking through a street as curious onlookers came up to watch.
They shook hands with men who appeared to be rebels wearing camouflage vests, and were accompanied by doctors and residents. The group descended into the basement of a building where they were told injured survivors were being treated to protect them from more shelling. Another video showed an inspector interviewing a patient and taking notes.
Activists say at least 80 people were killed in Mouadamiya when the district was hit with poison gas. Hundreds of people also were killed in three other rebel-held districts - Irbin, Ain Tarma and Jobar.
An opposition activist said a large crowd of people gathered to air their grievances to the U.N. inspectors, who planned to take samples from corpses.
The inspectors later returned to their hotel and, within an hour, residents reported the shelling of Mouadamiya had resumed.
The decision to proceed with the mission despite coming under attack thwarted an apparent attempt to halt the inspectors' work before it began.
"The first vehicle of the Chemical Weapons Investigation Team was deliberately shot at multiple times by unidentified snipers in the buffer zone area," the United Nations said in a statement. "It has to be stressed again that all sides need to extend their cooperation so that the team can safely carry out their important work."
The inspectors had been stuck in a downtown hotel since the attack, waiting five days for government permission to visit the scene a few miles away. They had arrived three days before the incident, with a mandate to investigate earlier reports of more limited chemical weapons use.
ASSAD TOO LATE
Kerry said Assad's decision to finally allow access was too late to be credible. "That is not the behavior of a government that has nothing to hide," Kerry said, adding that Assad's forces had also destroyed evidence by shelling the area.
"Our sense of basic humanity is offended not only by this cowardly crime, but also by the cynical attempt to cover it up," Kerry said.
He said the U.N. inspectors could at most confirm that chemical weapons were used, not who used them, but that it was Assad's government that has such weapons and the means of delivering them. He said Washington had additional information on the attack that it would make known soon.
Washington and its allies say they worry that the time that has elapsed, and continuous shelling by Assad's forces of the affected areas, could make it impossible for the inspectors to collect evidence. The United Nations said Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon was confident the team could get the data it needs.
Speculation has been mounting that Western countries will order some kind of military response to an incident that took place a year after Obama declared the use of chemical weapons a "red line" that would require strong action.
With his international credibility seen increasingly on the line, Obama could opt for limited measures such as cruise missile strikes to punish Assad and seek to deter further chemical attacks, without dragging Washington deeper into the war. The United States has started a naval buildup in the region to be ready for Obama's decision.
In neighboring Israel, citizens have been queuing up for gas masks in case Assad responds to a Western attack by firing on Israel, as Iraq's Saddam did in 1991.
PHONE CONSULTATIONS
With tensions rising over Syria, British Prime Minister David Cameron cut short a holiday to lead a top-level security meeting. Obama, Cameron and French President Francois Hollande all spoke to each other and other allies in the past few days in a flurry of phone calls. Cameron also called Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday.
Several NATO countries have issued statements pledging a response, although none has been specific about what is planned.
Top military officers of the United States, Britain, France, other NATO allies and the main anti-Assad countries in the region, including Saudi Arabia and Turkey, met in Jordan on Monday to discuss Syria, diplomats there said.
The conference was planned but took on new significance because of the latest events, the diplomats said.
The chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, Martin Dempsey, a co-host of the meeting with his Jordanian counterpart, has been one of the voices in Washington urging caution and emphasizing the costs of a full-scale military intervention in a war in the heart of the Middle East.
Obama, who withdrew U.S. troops from Iraq and is winding down the conflict in Afghanistan, is reluctant to involve the United States in another war. A Reuters/Ipsos poll published on Saturday showed about 60 percent of Americans opposed U.S. military intervention, while only 9 percent thought Obama should act.
ASSAD DEFIANT
Assad denies the accusations that his forces used chemical weapons and said the United States would be defeated if it intervened in his country.
"Would any state use chemicals or any other weapons of mass destruction in a place where its own forces are concentrated? That would go against elementary logic," he told the Russian newspaper Izvestia. "Failure awaits the United States as in all previous wars it has unleashed, starting with Vietnam and up to the present day."
Russia, Assad's main arms supplier and diplomatic defender in the U.N. Security Council, says rebels may have been behind the chemical attack. Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said any intervention in Syria without a Security Council resolution would be a grave violation of international law.
French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius noted that Russia and China would probably veto a U.N. Security Council vote to allow strikes against Syria. But British Foreign Secretary William Hague said it would still be possible to respond to a chemical weapons attack without the Security Council's permission.
There are precedents. In 1999 NATO attacked Serbia, a Russian ally, without a Security Council resolution, arguing that action was needed to protect civilians in Kosovo.
Turkey, a NATO ally and major backer of Syria's opposition, said it would join any international coalition even if a decision for action could not be reached at the United Nations.
(Additional reporting by Mariam Karouny in Beirut, Khaled Yacoub Oweis in Amman, John Irish in Paris, Katya Golubkova in Moscow, Steve Holland and Paul Eckert in Washington.; Writing by Matt Spetalnick and Claudia Parsons; Editing by Bill Trott and Christopher Wilson) ||||| Story highlights Strikes could be just one chapter in a long war, analyst says
U.N. inspectors visit scene of reported poison gas attack
Kerry's remarks indicate a strike is likely, expert says
A vehicle used by U.N. inspectors was shot at multiple times, U.N. says
U.N. experts got to inspect the site of a reported chemical attack on civilians near Syria's capital Monday as the United States accused the Syrian government of trying to cover up the attack.
The U.N. inspectors entered the town of Moadamiyet al-Sham and appeared to be examining the area accompanied by doctors, according to videos posted on social media by Syrian activists. The team had a "very productive" day and will continue its work Tuesday after examining its findings Monday evening, U.N. spokesman Farhan Haq said in New York.
Government and opposition forces have accused each other of unleashing poison gas last week in the suburban Damascus area of Ghouta. Syria's opposition said that as many as 1,300 people were killed, prompting new calls for Western powers to intervene in the country's 2-year-old civil war.
In Washington, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry called the use of chemical weapons a "moral obscenity" that could not go unanswered, and he said Syrian actions are "not the behavior of a government that has nothing to hide."
Kerry stopped short of directly accusing President Bashar al-Assad's government of a massacre. But he said, "We know that the Syrian regime maintains custody of these chemical weapons. We know that the Syrian regime has the capacity to do this with rockets. We know that the regime has been determined to clear the opposition from those very places where the attacks took place."
Photos: Unrest in Syria Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – In this photo provided by the anti-government activist group Aleppo Media Center, Syrian men help survivors out of a building in Aleppo after it was bombed, allegedly by a Syrian regime warplane on Saturday, February 8. The United Nations estimates more than 100,000 people have been killed since the Syrian conflict began in March 2011. Click through to see the most compelling images taken during the conflict, which is now a civil war: Hide Caption 1 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrians gather at a site hit by barrel bombs, allegedly dropped by a regime helicopter on the opposition-controlled Mesekin Hananu district of Aleppo on February 8. Hide Caption 2 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Civilians wave national flags as they take part in a rally in support of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Damascus, in a handout photo released by the official Syrian Arab News Agency on February 8. Hide Caption 3 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A man stands next to debris in the road following a reported airstrike by Syrian government forces in the northern city of Aleppo on February 8. Hide Caption 4 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Medical personnel look for survivors after a reported airstrike in Aleppo, Syria, on Saturday, February 1. Hide Caption 5 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrians carry a dead body following an airstrike on February 1. Hide Caption 6 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A man walks amid debris and dust on January 31. Hide Caption 7 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – An injured man is covered in dust after an airstrike on January 29. Hide Caption 8 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A man tries to fix electrical wires in a neighborhood of Aleppo, Syria, on January 27. Hide Caption 9 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Rebels and civilians check out a crater that activists say resulted from a Syrian government airstrike on an Aleppo bus station on Tuesday, January 21. Hide Caption 10 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Men rush to a site that Syrian government forces reportedly hit in Aleppo on January 21. Hide Caption 11 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Buildings lie in ruins in Aleppo on Sunday, January 19, after reported air raids by Syrian government planes. Hide Caption 12 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian child collects items from a garbage pile on Saturday, January 18, in Douma, northeast of the capital. Hide Caption 13 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A piece of exploded mortar lies in a street in Daraya, a city southwest of Damascus, on Friday, January 17. Hide Caption 14 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Residents search for survivors in Aleppo on Saturday, December 28, 2013, after what activists said were airstrikes by forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Hide Caption 15 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A man appears distraught after an air raid in Aleppo on Monday, December 23. Hide Caption 16 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Free Syrian Army fighters sit in a damaged house in Old Aleppo on Saturday, December 21. Hide Caption 17 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – People search for survivors amid the rubble after an airstrike in Aleppo on Tuesday, December 17. Hide Caption 18 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A man sits on the ground after the airstrike in Aleppo on December 17. Hide Caption 19 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A woman carries children following airstrikes on a rebel area of Aleppo on Sunday, December 15. Hide Caption 20 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrians look at the aftermath of an airstrike on a rebel area of Aleppo on December 15. Hide Caption 21 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrians help a wounded woman following airstrikes in Aleppo on December 15. Hide Caption 22 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrians look at the aftermath of an airstrike on a rebel area of Aleppo on December 15. Hide Caption 23 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrian rebel fighters clash with pro-government forces in Aleppo on Wednesday, December 11. Hide Caption 24 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A woman weeps inside a damaged vehicle after forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad captured the town of Nabak on Monday, December 9. Hide Caption 25 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A rebel fighter takes position during fighting with government forces in Deir Ezzor on Monday, December 2. Hide Caption 26 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Shiite fighters from a group called the Hussein Brigade search for rebels from the Free Syrian Army in Hejeira on Thursday, November 21. Hide Caption 27 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Free Syrian Army rebels battle government forces in Aleppo on Monday, November 18. Hide Caption 28 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A rebel fighter holds his position in a damaged building during clashes with government forces in Deir Ezzor on Monday, November 11. Hide Caption 29 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A rebel fighter fires during clashes with government forces in Deir Ezzor on November 11. Hide Caption 30 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A rebel fighter prepares an improvised mortar shell in Aleppo, Syria, on Saturday, November 9. Hide Caption 31 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Two injured men are transported on a cart in Aleppo, Syria, following shelling as fighting between pro-government forces and rebels continues on Saturday, October 26. Hide Caption 32 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Rebel fighters hold a position in Deir Ezzor, Syria, on Thursday, October 24. Hide Caption 33 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – An opposition fighter stands in the doorway of a building as he smokes a cigarette in Deir Ezzor, Syria, on Tuesday, October 22. Hide Caption 34 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – People use buckets as they try to extinguish a fire that ignited at a fuel station in Aleppo, Syria, on Sunday, October 20. Hide Caption 35 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian opposition fighter aims a catapult toward regime forces in Aleppo, Syria, on Thursday, October 17. Hide Caption 36 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Firefighters extinguish a burning vehicle after two mortar rounds struck the Abu Roumaneh area in Damascus, Syria, on Saturday, October 12. Hide Caption 37 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – An opposition fighter aims as others run for cover while they hold a position behind burning tires in the Salaheddin district of the northern Syrian city of Aleppo on Wednesday, October 9. Hide Caption 38 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – An opposition fighter smokes a cigarette as he takes a break following the injury of his friend in the Salaheddin neighborhood of Aleppo on October 9. Hide Caption 39 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Smoke rises after a mortar shell hit a residential area during fighting between Syrian government forces and rebels in Maaret al-Numan, Syria, on October, 9. Hide Caption 40 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Rebel fighters cover a car in mud for camouflage at an undisclosed location in Syria's northwestern province of Idlib on Tuesday, October 8. Hide Caption 41 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Masked female rebel fighters walk alongside their trainer on a street in the Salaheddin district of Aleppo, Syria, on October 8. Hide Caption 42 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A rebel fighter prays moments before heading into battle in Maaret al-Numan, Syria, on Monday, October 7. Hide Caption 43 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A mother comforts her baby in an area where she and her family have taken shelter after fleeing their village turned battlefield in Syria's Idlib province on Sunday, September 22. Hide Caption 44 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A man checks an AK-47 at his gun shop in Aleppo, Syria, on Saturday, September 21. Hide Caption 45 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Free Syrian Army fighters take cover moments after firing a rocket toward government forces in the Idlib province of northern Syria on Friday, September 20. Hide Caption 46 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Rebel fighters inspect a stairwell amid fighting against Syrian government forces on Thursday, September 19, in the Saif al-Dawla district of Aleppo, Syria. Hide Caption 47 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian child sits in a village in the Idlib province countryside on September 19. Hide Caption 48 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Opposition fighters react after returning from the battlefield in the Idlib province countryside on September 19. Hide Caption 49 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Smoke rises after a bomb was thrown from a helicopter, hitting a rebel position during heavy fighting between troops loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and opposition fighters in the Idlib province on September 19. Hide Caption 50 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Rebel fighters duck behind a barricade from firing in Aleppo on Wednesday, September 18. Hide Caption 51 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – AFP reporter Sammy Ketz hits the ground as a Syrian soldier runs past during sniper fire in Maalula on September 18. Ketz and a photographer were reporting on the ancient Christian Syrian town northeast of Damascus. Hide Caption 52 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian opposition fighter takes a break on a mountain near a rebel camp in Idlib province on September 18. Hide Caption 53 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Free Syrian Army fighter rests inside a cave at a rebel camp in Idlib province on Tuesday, September 17. Hide Caption 54 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Volunteers wear protective gear to show a class how to respond to a chemical attack in Aleppo, Syria, on September 15. For two months, Mohammad Zayed, an Aleppo University student, has been training a group of 26 civilians to respond to a chemical attack. Hide Caption 55 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syria's pro-Assad militia rest near Maalula, Syria, on Friday, September 13. Hide Caption 56 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrian soldiers take aim at rebel fighters positioned in the mountains of the Christian town of Maalula on September 13. Hide Caption 57 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Rebels parade at a former military academy north of Aleppo during a September 13 ceremony to mark an agreement to unite two rebel brigade forces. Hide Caption 58 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A fighter of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine General Command squats next to the covered body of an alleged foreign rebel fighter in the Yarmouk refugee camp in the Syrian capital of Damascus on Thursday, September 12. Hide Caption 59 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – An opposition fighter runs in front of a sniper curtain in the industrial area of Deir Ezzor, Syria, during clashes with regime forces on September 12. Hide Caption 60 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A sheet hangs across an alley way to shield fighters from sniper fire as a fighter of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine General Command walks past destroyed buildings in the Yarmouk refugee camp in Damascus, Syria, on September 12. Hide Caption 61 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Free Syrian Army fighter stands guard inside a damaged house in Aleppo's Qastal al-Harami neighborhood on September 11. Hide Caption 62 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Free Syrian Army fighters climb a flight of stairs to take positions near the Hanano barracks on September 11. Hide Caption 63 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian government tank is seen during clashes with Free Syrian Army fighters in Maaloula, Syria, on September 11. Hide Caption 64 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A funeral is held on September 11 for three Christian Syrians killed during battles with an al Qaeda-linked rebel group that took control of the historic Christian town of Maaloula from regime forces during the weekend. Hide Caption 65 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A man walks through a destroyed residential area of Saraqib, Syria, on Monday, September 9, following repeated airstrikes by government forces. Hide Caption 66 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A soldier wears a picture of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on his chest while at a market in old Damascus on September 8. Hide Caption 67 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Free Syrian Army fighter prays in a trench in the Damascus suburbs on September 8. Hide Caption 68 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Free Syrian Army fighter takes up a shooting position in Aleppo on September 8. Hide Caption 69 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Free Syrian Army fighter runs for cover in Raqqa province on September 8. Hide Caption 70 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Buildings are heavily damaged in the Salah al-Din area of Aleppo on September 8. Hide Caption 71 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A boy named Issa , 10, carries a mortar shell in a weapons factory of the Free Syrian Army in Aleppo on Saturday, September 7. The boy works with his father in the factory. Hide Caption 72 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Issa fixes a mortar launcher in the Aleppo weapons factory on September 7. Hide Caption 73 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A bedroom lies in ruins after clashes between government forces and rebels around Ariha on September 7. Hide Caption 74 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrian forces are seen in the Syrian Christian town of Maaloula on September 7. Hide Caption 75 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian soldier prepares large-caliber bullets for a machine gun in Maaloula on September 7. Hide Caption 76 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A man stands inside a home damaged by heavy shelling in Arbeen, a suburb of Damascus, Syria, on September 7. Hide Caption 77 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Men gather on the remains of a destroyed building after reported airstrikes by Syrian government forces in the rebel-held northwestern Syrian province of Idlib on Thursday, September 5. Hide Caption 78 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Free Syrian Army fighter takes cover as he watches forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad near Hanano barracks in Aleppo on September 3. Hide Caption 79 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Free Syrian Army fighters walk inside a damaged house in Aleppo on September 3. Hide Caption 80 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Free Syrian Army fighters talk inside a burnt house in Aleppo on September 3. Hide Caption 81 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Free Syrian Army fighter peeks through the curtains of a bedroom in Deir ez-Zor, Syria, on Monday, September 2. Hide Caption 82 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Free Syrian Army fighters take their positions behind piled sandbags, as one of them points his weapon, in Deir ez-Zor on September 2. Hide Caption 83 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A rebel fighter points his weapon at Syrian regime forces in Deir ez-Zor on September 2. Hide Caption 84 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrian firefighters try to extinguish a fire after a missile hit a residential building in Damascus, Syria, on September 2. Hide Caption 85 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A U.N. arms expert collects samples during an inspection of a suspected chemical weapons strike site in the Ghouta area outside Damascus on August 29. Hide Caption 86 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – People search for belongings in rubble in Raqqa, Syria, on August 29. Hide Caption 87 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Free Syrian Army fighters launch a rocket toward forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Deir Ezzor on August 29. Hide Caption 88 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian Kurd uses hay to hide another woman in a training session organized by the Kurdish Women's Defense Units on Wednesday, August 28, in a northern Syrian border village. They're preparing if the area comes under attack. Hide Caption 89 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Free Syrian Army fighters escort U.N. vehicles with chemical weapons experts on August 28 through a site of a suspected chemical weapons attack outside Damascus. Hide Caption 90 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Free Syrian Army fighter takes position behind sandbags in the old city of Aleppo, Syria, on Tuesday, August 27. Hide Caption 91 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A U.N. team leaves its Damascus, Syria, hotel in a convoy on Monday, August 26. The team was to investigate an alleged chemical attack that killed hundreds last week in a suburb of the Syrian capital. Sniper fire hit a vehicle used by the U.N. chemical weapons investigation team multiple times Monday, according to the United Nations. Hide Caption 92 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian soldier walks down a street in Damascus on Saturday, August 24. Hide Caption 93 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Pigeons lie dead on the ground on August 24 from after what activists say is the use of chemical weapons by government forces in the Damascus suburb of Arbeen. Hide Caption 94 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Columns of smoke rise in Barzeh after heavy shelling on Friday, August 23. Hide Caption 95 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A young Free Syrian Army fighter is reflected in a mirror as he takes position in a house in Aleppo on Thursday, August 22. Hide Caption 96 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Rebels move around a building in Aleppo on August 22. Hide Caption 97 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrian rebels claim pro-government forces used chemical weapons to kill citizens outside Damascus on Wednesday, August 21. People inspect bodies in this photo released by the Syrian opposition Shaam News Network. Hide Caption 98 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – People search the rubble of a bombed building in Aleppo, Syria, on Friday, August 16. Hide Caption 99 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Men bury the bodies of six members of the same family killed in a bombing in Raqqa on Saturday, August 10. Hide Caption 100 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrian Army soldiers patrol a devastated street in Homs on Wednesday, July 31. Hide Caption 101 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Free Syrian Army fighters move through a hole in a wall in Khan al-Assal on Monday, July 22, after seizing the town. Hide Caption 102 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A rebel fighter walks past swings in a deserted playground in Deir al-Zor, Syria, on Sunday, July 21. Hide Caption 103 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A rebel fighter speaks with a fellow fighter through a hole in a wall in Deir al-Zor on July 21. Hide Caption 104 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Free Syrian Army fighter casts a shadow on a wall as he carries his weapon in a shelter in Deir al-Zor on Thursday, July 18. Hide Caption 105 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Yahya Sweed, 13, is comforted by his father as he lies on a bed in Kfar Nubul on Tuesday, July 16. The boy was injured by shrapnel, resulting in the amputation of his right leg. Hide Caption 106 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A rebel fighter naps in a trench about 300 feet from the Syrian government forces' positions along the highway connecting Idlib with Latakia on Monday, July 15. Hide Caption 107 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A rebel fighter uses a hole in the wall of a destroyed school to aim at Syrian government forces in the Izaa district of Aleppo on Sunday, July 14. Hide Caption 108 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Free Syrian Army fighter uses a mirror to scope out snipers loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Aleppo on Friday, July 12. Hide Caption 109 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Free Syrian Army fighter stands over a boy who was injured during shelling in Al-Bara on Monday, July 8. Hide Caption 110 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Members of the Free Syrian Army fire a homemade rocket toward regime forces in Deir al-Zor on Sunday, June 16. Hide Caption 111 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrian rebels leave their position in the northwestern town of Maaret al-Numan on Thursday, June 13. The White House said that the Syrian government has crossed a "red line" with its use of chemical weapons and announced it would start arming the rebels. Hide Caption 112 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad are seen near Qusayr on Thursday, May 30. Hide Caption 113 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrian rebels take position in a house during clashes with regime forces in the old city of Aleppo on May 22. Hide Caption 114 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrian army soldiers take control of the village of Western Dumayna north of the rebel-held city of Qusayr on Monday, May 13. Syrian troops captured three villages in Homs province, allowing them to cut supply lines to rebels inside Qusayr town, a military officer told AFP. Hide Caption 115 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Rebel fighters fire at government forces in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo on Sunday, May 12. Hide Caption 116 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Searchers use a flashlight as they look for survivors among the rubble created by what activists say was a missile attack from the Syrian regime, in Raqqa province, Syria, on April 25. Hide Caption 117 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Kurdish fighter from the "Popular Protection Units" (YPG) takes position inside a building in the majority-Kurdish Sheikh Maqsood area of Aleppo, on Apri. 21. Hide Caption 118 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – People walk past destroyed houses in the northern Syrian town of Azaz on Sunday, April 21. Hide Caption 119 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Free Syrian Army fighters take positions prior to an offensive against government forces in the Khan al-Assal area, near Aleppo on Saturday, April 20. Hide Caption 120 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Men inspect damage at a house destroyed in an airstrike in Aleppo on April 15. Hide Caption 121 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrian and Kurdish rebel fighters walk in the Sheikh Maqsud district of Aleppo on April 14. Hide Caption 122 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A female rebel monitors the movement of Syrian government forces in Aleppo's Sheikh Maqsud neighborhood on Thursday, April 11. Hide Caption 123 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A rebel runs to avoid sniper fire from Syrian government forces in Aleppo on April 11. Hide Caption 124 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrian rebels observe the movement of Syrian government forces around Al-Kendi hospital in Aleppo on Wednesday, April 10. Hide Caption 125 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Rescue teams and security forces check out the scene of a deadly car bomb explosion in Damascus on April 8. Hide Caption 126 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – The fighting has taken a toll on buildings in Aleppo's Saladin district, seen here on April 8. Hide Caption 127 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian rebel runs for cover in Deir ez-Zor on April 2. Hide Caption 128 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A rebel checks for snipers across the street toward the Citadel in Aleppo, Syria, on Saturday, March 30, in this photo taken by iReporter Lee Harper. Hide Caption 129 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Free Syrian fighter mourns the death of a friend in Aleppo on March 30, in this photo taken by iReporter Lee Harper. Hide Caption 130 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian opposition fighter runs for cover from Syrian army snipers in Aleppo on Wednesday, March 27. Hide Caption 131 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian girl covers her face to protect herself from fumes as a street covered with uncollected garbage is fumigated in Aleppo on Sunday, March 24. Hide Caption 132 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian man and his family drive past damaged buildings in Maarat al-Numan, on Wednesday, March 20. Hide Caption 133 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrians carry the body of a Syrian army soldier during a funeral ceremony in Idlib province on Tuesday, March 19. Hide Caption 134 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrian rebels take position in Aleppo, the largest city in the country, on March 11. Hide Caption 135 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrian men search for their relatives amongst the bodies of civilians executed and dumped in the Quweiq River on March 11. Hide Caption 136 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Free Syrian Army fighter looks back as smoke rises during fighting between rebel fighters and forces loyal to Syria's President Bashar al-Assad on the outskirts of Aleppo on Saturday, March 2. Hide Caption 137 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Residents read Shaam News newspapers published by the Free Syrian Army in Aleppo on March 2. Hide Caption 138 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A member of the Free Syrian Army reacts to the death of a comrade who was killed in fighting, at Bustan al Qasr cemetery in Aleppo on Friday, March 1. Hide Caption 139 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A rebel fighter throws a home-made grenade at Syrian government forces in Aleppo on February 16. Hide Caption 140 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A member of the Free Syrian Army stands with his weapon as he looks at a rainbow in Aleppo on February 16. Hide Caption 141 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian woman looks through a bus window in Aleppo on February 14. Hide Caption 142 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Free Syrian Army fighters walk through a dust-filled stairwell in Damascus on February 7. Hide Caption 143 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian rebel gestures at comrades from inside a broken armored personnel carrier in Al-Yaqubia on February 6. Hide Caption 144 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A rebel fighter throws a hand grenade inside a Syrian Army base in Damascus on February 3. Hide Caption 145 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – People stand in the dust of a building destroyed in an airstrike in Aleppo, Syria on February 3. Hide Caption 146 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Free Syrian Army fighters run as they enter a Syrian Army base during heavy fighting in the Arabeen neighborhood of Damascus on February 3. Hide Caption 147 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – An unexploded mortar shell fired by the Syrian Army sits lodged in the ground in Damascus on January 25. Hide Caption 148 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Fighters from Fateh al Sham unit of the Free Syrian Army fire on Syrian Army soldiers at a check point in Damascus on January 20. Hide Caption 149 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Free Syrian Army fighter walks between buildings damaged during Syrian Air Force strikes in Damascus on January 19. Hide Caption 150 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian rebel fighter tries to locate a government jet fighter in Aleppo on January 18. Hide Caption 151 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrian rebels launch a missile near the Abu Baker brigade in Albab on January 16. Hide Caption 152 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian boy walks near rubbish next to tents at a refugee camp near the northern city of Azaz on the Syria-Turkey border, on January 8. Hide Caption 153 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrians look for survivors amid the rubble of a building targeted by a missile in Aleppo on January 7. Hide Caption 154 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A father reacts after hearing of a shelling by forces loyal to Syria's President Bashar al-Assad in Aleppo on January 3. Hide Caption 155 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A patient smokes a cigarette at Dar Al-Ajaza psychiatric hospital in Aleppo on December 18, 2012. The psychiatric ward, housing around 60 patients, has lacked the means to function properly since fighting broke out there in July. Hide Caption 156 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrians mourn a fallen rebel fighter at a rebel base in the al-Fardos area of Aleppo on December 8, 2012. Hide Caption 157 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Members of Liwa (Brigade) Salahadin, a Kurdish military unit fighting alongside rebel fighters, monitor the area in the besieged district of Karmel al-Jabl in Aleppo on December 6, 2012. Hide Caption 158 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A member of Liwa Salahadin aims at a regime fighter in the besieged district of Karmel al-Jabl in Aleppo on December 6, 2012. Hide Caption 159 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Two young boys sit underneath a washline in a refugee camp on the border between Syria and Turkey near Azaz on December 5, 2012. Hide Caption 160 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Hide Caption 161 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – The bodies of three children, who were allegedly killed in a mortar shell attack that landed close to a bakery in Aleppo, on December 2, 2012, are laid out for identification by family members at a makeshift hospital at an undisclosed location of the city. Hide Caption 162 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Smoke rises in the Hanano and Bustan al-Basha districts in Aleppo on December 1, 2012 as fighting continues through the night. Hide Caption 163 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Damaged houses in Aleppo are seen after an airstrike on November 29, 2012. Hide Caption 164 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian rebel mourns the death of a comrade in Maraat al-Numan on November 20, 2012. Hide Caption 165 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrians protesters stand on Assad's portrait during an anti-regime demonstration in Aleppo on November 16, 2012. Hide Caption 166 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian rebel takes cover during fighting against Syrian government forces in Aleppo on November 15, 2012. Hide Caption 167 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrian opposition fighter Bazel Araj, 19, sleeps next to his pistol in Aleppo on November 11, 2012. Hide Caption 168 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A rebel fighter fires at a Syrian government position in Aleppo on November 6, 2012. Hide Caption 169 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian rebel leaps over debris left in the street while running across a "sniper alley" near the Salahudeen district in Aleppo on November 4, 2012. Hide Caption 170 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Rebels hold their position in the midst of a battle on November 3, 2012 in Aleppo. Hide Caption 171 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A man cries while being treated in a local hospital in a rebel-controlled area of Aleppo on October 31, 2012. Hide Caption 172 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A man is treated for wounds after a government jet attacked the Karm al-Aser neighborhood in eastern Aleppo on October 31, 2012. Hide Caption 173 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian rebel interrogates a handcuffed and blindfolded man suspected of being a pro-regime militiaman in Aleppo on October 26, 2012. Hide Caption 174 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Smoke rises from a fuel station following a mortar attack as Syrian women walk on a rainy day in the Arqub neighborhood of Aleppo on October 25, 2012. Hide Caption 175 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian rebel fires at an army position in the Karm al-Jabal district of Aleppo on October 22, 2012. Hide Caption 176 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A wounded Syrian boy sits on the back of a truck carrying victims and wounded people to a hospital following an attack by regime forces in Aleppo on October 21, 2012. Hide Caption 177 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A man lies on the ground after being shot by a sniper for a second time as he waits to be rescued by members of the Al-Baraa Bin Malek Battalion, part of the Free Syria Army's Al-Fatah brigade, in Aleppo on October 20, 2012. Hide Caption 178 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrian army soldiers run for cover during clashes with rebel fighters at Karam al-Jabal neighborhood of Aleppo on October 20, 2012. Hide Caption 179 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Smoke rises after a Syrian Air Force fighter jet fired missiles at the suburbs of the northern province of Idlib on October 16, 2012. Hide Caption 180 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian opposition fighter stands near a post in Aleppo on October 11, 2012. Hide Caption 181 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian man mourns the death of his father, who was killed during a government attack in Aleppo on October 10, 2012. Hide Caption 182 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A rebel fighter is carried by his friends and laid on a gurney to be treated for gunshot wounds sustained during heavy battles with government forces in Aleppo on October 1, 2012. Hide Caption 183 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrian rebels help a wounded comrade to an Aleppo hospital after he was injured in a Syrian army strike on September 18, 2012. Hide Caption 184 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Free Syria Army fighters are reflected in a mirror they use to see a Syrian Army post only 50 meters away in Aleppo on September 16, 2012. Hide Caption 185 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian man carrying grocery bags tries to dodge sniper fire as he runs through an alley near a checkpoint manned by the Free Syria Army in Aleppo on September 14, 2012. Hide Caption 186 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A woman walks past a destroyed building in Aleppo on September 13, 2012. Hide Caption 187 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Free Syrian Army fighters battle during street fighting against Syrian army soldiers in Aleppo on September 8, 2012. Hide Caption 188 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian man wounded by shelling sits on a chair outside a closed shop in Aleppo on September 4, 2012. Hide Caption 189 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A woman sits in her wheelchair next to her house, damaged by a Syrian air raid, near Homs on August 26, 2012. Hide Caption 190 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Members of the Free Syrian Army clash with Syrian army soliders in Aleppo's Saif al-Dawla district on August 22, 2012. Hide Caption 191 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Hide Caption 192 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A man mourns in front of a field hospital on August 21, 2012 in Aleppo. Hide Caption 193 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Hide Caption 194 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Wounded civilians wait in a field hospital after an air strike on August 21, 2012 in Aleppo. Hide Caption 195 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – People pray during the funeral of a Free Syrian Army fighter, Amar Ali Amero, on August 21, 2012. Hide Caption 196 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A man cries near the graves of his two children killed during a recent Syrian airstrike in Azaz on August 20, 2012. Hide Caption 197 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Hide Caption 198 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian woman holds her dead baby as she screams upon seeing her husband's body being covered following an airstrike by regime forces on the town of Azaz on August 15, 2012. Hide Caption 199 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian rebel runs in a street of Selehattin during an attack on the municipal building on July 23, 2012. Hide Caption 200 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrian rebels hunt for snipers after attacking the municipality building in the city center of Selehattin on July 23, 2012. Hide Caption 201 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Members of the Free Syrian Army's Mugaweer (commandos) Brigade pay their respects in a cemetery on May 12, 2012 in Qusayr. Hide Caption 202 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrian rebels take position near Qusayr on May 10, 2012. Hide Caption 203 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Free Syrian Army member takes cover in underground caves in Sarmin on April 9, 2012. Hide Caption 204 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Rebels prepare to engage government tanks that advanced into Saraquib on April 9, 2012. Hide Caption 205 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Men say prayers during a ceremony in Binnish on April 9, 2012. Hide Caption 206 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A young boy plays with a toy gun in Binnish on April 9, 2012. Hide Caption 207 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Free Syrian Army rebel mounts his horse in the Al-Shatouria village near the Turkish border in northwestern Syria on March 16, 2012, a year after the uprising began. Hide Caption 208 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrian refugees walk across a field before crossing into Turkey on March 14, 2012. Hide Caption 209 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A rebel takes position in Al-Qsair on January 27, 2012. Hide Caption 210 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A protester in Homs throws a tear gas bomb back towards security forces, on December 27, 2011. Hide Caption 211 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A man stands under a giant Syrian flag outside the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus on December 24, 2011. Hide Caption 212 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A member of the Free Syrian Army looks out over a valley in the village of Ain al-Baida on December 15, 2011. Hide Caption 213 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Members of the Free Syrian Army stand in an valley near the village of Ain al-Baida, close to the Turkish border, on December 15, 2011. Hide Caption 214 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Displaced Syrian refugees walk through an orchard adjacent to Syria's northern border with Turkey on June 14, 2011, near Khirbet al-Jouz. Hide Caption 215 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A Syrian man holds up a portrait of President Bashar al-Assad during a rally to show support for the president in Damascus on April 30, 2011. Hide Caption 216 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrians rally to show their support for President Bashar al-Assad in Damascus on April 30, 2011. Hide Caption 217 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A screen grab from YouTube shows thick smoke rising above as Syrian anti-government protesters demonstrate in Moaret Al-Noman on April 29, 2011. Hide Caption 218 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A screen grab from YouTube shows Syrian anti-government protesters run for cover from tear gas fired by security forces in Damascus on April 29, 2011, during the "Day of Rage" demonstrations called by activists to put pressure on al-Assad. Hide Caption 219 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – A woman sits by the hospital bed of a man allegedly injured when an armed group seized rooftops in Latakia on March 27, 2011, and opened fire at passers-by, citizens and security forces personnel according to official sources. Hide Caption 220 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrians wave their national flag and hold portraits of al-Assad during a rally to show their support for their leader in Damascus on March 29, 2011. Hide Caption 221 of 222 Photos: Unrest in Syria Syrian civil war in photos – Syrian protesters chant slogans in support of al-Assad during a rally in Damascus on March 25, 2011. Hide Caption 222 of 222
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Meanwhile, he said that Syria was "systemically destroying evidence" of last week's attack by continuing to shell the area and that the danger the team faced Monday "only further weakens the regime's credibility." The Obama administration is now weighing how to respond in talks with U.S. allies and members of Congress, he said.
"Nothing today is more serious, and nothing is receiving more serious scrutiny," Kerry said.
Monday's examination took place after unidentified snipers shot multiple times at a vehicle used by the U.N. team and after an explosion near the site inspectors planned to visit, the United Nations said. There were no reports of injuries.
U.N. officials did not say who was behind the shooting or the explosion, which witnesses said may have been caused by a mortar shell. The Syrian government accused "terrorists" of firing on the inspectors, Syrian state TV reported.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said inspectors visited hospitals, interviewed witnesses, survivors and doctors and collected some samples. Speaking from Seoul, South Korea, Ban said he has directed the group to register a "strong complaint" to government and opposition forces to make sure the team's safety is guaranteed.
The Syrian government agreed to grant the inspectors full access on Sunday, pledging to cease all hostilities as long as the team was on the ground, the United Nations said. And an umbrella group for the Syrian opposition, the Syrian National Coalition, said rebel forces would ensure the safety of any U.N. personnel in the area.
But the government would not let U.N. inspectors approach the site for days, and the team feared that the chemical evidence may have dissipated.
Attacks could reinforce poison gas 'taboo'
Middle East analyst Richard Haass told CNN's The Lead that Kerry's comments "went far out on a limb" and indicate that a U.S. strike on Syria was in the works, with or without U.N. Security Council backing. Haass, the president of the Council on Foreign Relations, said military action was needed "to underscore the principle, the norm, the taboo that these weapons ought to have."
"No one, Syria or anybody else, now and forevermore, should be able to use such weapons, much less biological or nuclear weapons, with impunity," he said. But he said Washington should limit its intervention in the conflict, "so we don't get enmeshed in what I think could become a quagmire."
"If we want to help the opposition, the best way to do it is through considerable arming of those elements of the opposition with agendas we can support," he said.
But with Syria already seen as a proxy war that has been spilling across its neighbors' borders for months, the prospects for improvement aren't likely to be aided by American airstrikes, said Andrew Tabler, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.
"This is just going to be one chapter in a very long struggle we have in Syria," Tabler told CNN's The Situation Room.
Russia, Syria's leading ally, has raised sharp objections to the possibility of any outside intervention. Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Monday that reports of the use of chemical weapons must be "thoroughly and professionally investigated" and submitted to the U.N. Security Council.
At a news conference Monday, Lavrov said there's no proof yet that the Syrian government was involved in last week's reported attack. And Sunday, a Foreign Ministry statement compared the Western allegations against Syria to the claims that Iraq was hoarding weapons of mass destruction before the U.S. invasion in 2003 -- claims that fell apart once American troops began searching for them.
Charles Duelfer, the former head of U.S. weapons inspection teams in Iraq, said the U.N. experts will be looking to collect evidence from witnesses and survivors of last week's attack, including samples that can be analyzed later.
"They'll be looking for remnants of the munitions, which could be sophisticated munitions that a military would have -- or if it turns out, unexpectedly, to be the case that the insurgents had cobbled together some sort of CW capability, maybe they'll find that," Duelfer said.
Duelfer said he expects the U.S. government has its own sources: "Presumably, the National Security Agency can listen to people besides the United States, so they may have data which the weapons inspectors may not have," he told The Situation Room. But while Washington's evidence may be solid, U.N. inspectors "provide credibility across the board."
"When they say something, presumably all countries will say. 'OK, we can accept that, they don't have a dog in that fight,' " Duelfer said.
U.S. officials have said they have no credible evidence pointing to opposition groups using chemical weapons. And the Obama administration is expected to declassify the intelligence assessment backing up its assertion that the Syrian regime was responsible for last week's attack before any U.S. military action would take place, a senior administration official said Monday.
That evidence "includes but is not limited to" satellite images of activity at Syrian military installations identified as including chemical weapons depots, a senior administration official familiar with the intelligence told CNN.
And Kerry said he had argued to Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem last week that if the government had nothing to hide, "then their response should be immediate: immediate transparency, immediate access, not shelling."
"Failure to permit that, I told him, would tell its own story," he said.
Al-Assad: It wasn't us
The Pentagon has sent four warships armed with cruise missiles to the region, and Obama will be presented with final options regarding actions against Syria in the next few days, a senior administration official said Monday.
But as U.S. muscle plows the waters of the eastern Mediterranean Sea, al-Assad on Monday repeated his government's denial that his army had anything to do with the use of poison gas.
"The area of the claimed attack is in contiguity with the Syrian army positions, so how is it possible that any country would use chemical weapons in an area where its own forces are located?" he asked in an interview with Russian newspaper Izvestia.
Al-Assad accused the United States, Britain and France of exploiting the incident by trying to verify rebel allegations instead of verifying facts.
The use of a large amount of chemical weapons would cross a "red line" and threaten U.S. interests in the region, Obama announced last year. Tabler, who has had extensive contacts with al-Assad, said the Syrian leader may have watched as Washington reacted cautiously to previous reports of chemical warfare and gambled incorrectly that last week's attack would draw a similar response.
"I think he thought that he could push the envelope again and that he could actually show his own people that no one is going to come to their rescue," Tabler said.
Opposition accusations
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Opposition members say rockets with chemical payloads were among the ordnance government troops unleashed at the rebel stronghold of Ghouta early Wednesday. More than 1,300 people died, most of them by gas, according to opposition spokesman Khaled al-Saleh.
The opposition backed up the allegations with gruesome video of rows of dead bodies, including women and children. They had no visible wounds, and some appeared to be bloated. The aid agency Medecins sans Frontieres said three hospitals it supports in Syria's Damascus governorate reported having received about 3,600 patients displaying neurotoxic symptoms on Wednesday morning.
But according to Syrian state-run television's depiction of events, government forces came into contact with a gas attack on Saturday in Jobar, on the edge of Damascus. Several of the soldiers were "suffocating" from exposure to gases as they entered the city, according to state TV.
"It is believed that the terrorists have used chemical weapons in the area," Syrian TV reported, citing an anonymous source. The government uses the term "terrorists" to describe rebel forces.
Broadcast video showed a room containing gas masks, gas canisters and other paraphernalia that could be used in a gas attack. The army said it uncovered the cache in a storage facility in the area.
CNN could not independently confirm the authenticity of video shown by the government or rebels. ||||| Syria agreed Sunday to a U.N. investigation into last week's alleged chemical weapons attack outside Damascus _ a deal a senior White House official dismissed as "too late to be credible," saying the United States has "very little doubt" President Bashar Assad's forces used such weapons.
FILE- This Aug. 21, 2013, file image provided by by Shaam News Network, which has been authenticated based on its contents and other AP reporting, purports to show several bodies being buried during a... (Associated Press)
Black columns of smoke rise from heavy shelling in the Jobar neighborhood, east of Damascus, Syria, Sunday, Aug. 25, 2013. Syria reached an agreement with the United Nations on Sunday to allow a U.N.... (Associated Press)
Black columns of smoke rise from heavy shelling in the Jobar neighborhood, east of Damascus, Syria, Sunday, Aug. 25, 2013. Syria reached an agreement with the United Nations on Sunday to allow a U.N.... (Associated Press)
Syrian Information Minister Omran al-Zoubi speaks during an interview with the Associated Press at his office, in Damascus, Syria, Sunday, Aug. 25, 2013. Al-Zoubi denied Syria has ever used chemical weapons... (Associated Press)
Syrian Information Minister Omran al-Zoubi speaks during an interview with the Associated Press at his office, in Damascus, Syria, Sunday, Aug. 25, 2013. Al-Zoubi denied Syria has ever used chemical weapons... (Associated Press)
In this photo taken on a government organized media tour, Syrian army soldiers are seen deployed in the Jobar neighborhood of Damascus, Syria, Saturday, Aug. 24, 2013. Syrian state media accused rebels... (Associated Press)
Syrians gather in the Marjeh square, in Damascus, Syria, Sunday, Aug. 25, 2013. Syria reached an agreement with the United Nations on Sunday to allow a U.N. team of experts to visit the site of alleged... (Associated Press)
The hardening of the U.S. position came as calls for military action grow. In a sign the U.S. may be a step closer to an armed response, naval forces have already been dispatched toward Syria's coastal waters, although President Barack Obama has cautioned against a hasty decision.
With France, Britain, Israel and some U.S. congressmen urging swift military action against Assad's regime if the use of chemical agents is confirmed, the U.N. team's conclusions could have a dramatic impact on the trajectory of the country's civil war.
The agreement struck in Damascus calls for U.N. experts already in the country to begin an investigation Monday into the suspected chemical attack on rebel-held areas in the capital's eastern suburbs.
Anti-government activists and Doctors Without Borders say that more than 300 people were killed in an artillery barrage by regime forces Wednesday that included the use of toxic gas. The government calls the allegations "absolutely baseless."
The suburbs hit in the suspected chemical strike, collectively known as eastern Ghouta, are under the control of rebel fighters, and regime artillery and warplanes have pounded the area for days. The U.N. inspectors will have to traverse through both government-held and opposition-controlled turf to conduct their probe. Rebels have said they will help facilitate the visit.
Under Sunday's agreement with the U.N., the Syrian government "affirmed that it will provide the necessary cooperation, including the observance of the cessation of hostilities at the locations related to the incident," U.N. spokesman Martin Nesirky said in a statement.
In Washington, a senior administration official said the U.S. has "very little doubt" that regime forces used chemical weapons in Wednesday's attack, an assessment that was "based on the reported number of victims, reported symptoms of those who were killed or injured" as well as witness accounts and facts gathered by the U.S intelligence community.
The official, who insisted on anonymity because of lack of authorization to speak publicly about the developments, was dismissive of the Syrian government's agreement to grant access to the U.N. team, saying it was "too late to be credible."
The regime's continuing shelling of the site would have "significantly corrupted" any available evidence of chemical weapons, the official said.
The U.N. team was in Syria to look into three earlier suspected chemical attacks, with a mandate to determine whether such weapons were used, not who was responsible for unleashing them. There was no indication that the mission's brief had been expanded to assess who was behind Wednesday's attack.
Even as the pressure mounts for a strong international response, there is no guarantee that foreign powers will take action if the U.N. confirms chemical agents were used. But the scale of the attack makes this instance far harder to ignore than previous suspected cases.
A senior State Department official, not authorized to comment publicly by name, said U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry spoke with the top diplomats of Britain, France, Canada and Russia as well as U.N. Secretary Ban Ki-Moon.
The official said Kerry stressed that if the Syrian regime wanted to prove to the world that it had not used chemical weapons in this incident, it would have stopped shelling the area and granted immediate access five days ago.
U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel offered no hints Sunday about likely U.S. responses, telling reporters traveling with him in Malaysia that the Obama administration was still assessing intelligence about Wednesday's attack.
"When we have more information, that answer will become clear," he said when a reporter asked whether it was a matter of when, not if, the U.S. will take military action against Syria.
"There are risks and consequences for any option that would be used or not used _ for action or inaction," he told reporters. "You have to come to the central point of what would be the objective if you are to pursue an action or not pursue an action. So all those assessments are being made."
The U.S. has about a dozen F-16 jets, a Patriot missile battery and as many as 1,000 American troops in Jordan, which all could also be used in any military action. U.S. administration and defense officials in recent days have said the most likely military move would be the launch of Tomahawk missiles off ships in the Mediterranean.
U.S. senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham, who have criticized the Obama administration's hands-off approach to Syria, said in a joint statement that in light of the latest suspected chemical attack, "now is the time for decisive actions."
"The United States must rally our friends and allies to take limited military actions in Syria that can change the balance of power on the ground and create conditions for a negotiated end to the conflict and an end to Assad's rule," the statement said.
In Paris, French President Francois Hollande said a "body of evidence" suggests that chemical weapons were used during last week's attacks, and "everything" leads France to believe that the Assad regime was behind it.
Conveying new urgency about the situation, Hollande's office said he spoke about Syria by telephone Sunday with Obama, as well as prime ministers David Cameron of Britain and Kevin Rudd of Australia. The White House said in a statement the two leaders discussed "possible responses by the international community and agreed to continue to consult closely."
Just over a year ago, Obama called the use of chemical arms in Syria a "red line" that would carry "enormous consequences." Since then, U.S. intelligence believes that such weapons have been used on a small scale several times, but that has precipitated no major shift in American policy or substantial action against the Assad regime.
So far, the U.S. has largely limited its support for the rebels to non-lethal supplies. In June, Washington said it would begin sending weapons to the rebels, although there's no indication that has happened yet.
Russia, a close ally of the Assad regime, welcomed Syria's decision to allow a U.N. probe, and said the U.S. should await the findings and realize that a unilateral use of force would be a mistake.
Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich said Washington and European partners shouldn't take a "gamble" that could have "catastrophic consequences" for Syria and the region as a whole.
In Damascus, Syrian Information Minister Omran al-Zoubi said the United States was using allegations of chemical attacks as an "excuse" to intervene in Syria, accusing Washington and Europe of turning a blind eye while Saudi Arabia and Turkey _ both backers of the anti-Assad rebellion _ provide chemical weapons to foreign jihadi fighters in Syria.
"The materials are coming from Saudi Arabia and Turkey," al-Zoubi said in an interview with The Associated Press in the Syrian capital, adding that foreign fighters were carrying out chemical attacks to implicate the Syrian government in hopes of prompting international military intervention.
"Instead of the Americans searching for the source of these chemical weapons in Saudi Arabia and Turkey, they wait for them to be used to give a pretext to intervene in Syria," he said.
Iran, a close ally of the Assad regime, warned against a possible U.S. military move against Syria. The semi-official Fars news agency quoted Gen. Masoud Jazayeri as warning that "trespassing over the red line in Syria will have severe consequences for the White House." He did not elaborate.
Doctors Without Borders said that three hospitals it supports in the area of the attack reported receiving roughly 3,600 patients with "neurotoxic symptoms" over a three-hour period Wednesday. Of those, 355 died, the Paris-based group said.
That roughly coincided with the death toll given by the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which tallied 322 killed. Casualty figures have varied widely over the alleged attack, from just over 300 to around 1,300 killed.
Rebels on the ground outraged by the images coming out of the Damascus suburbs have also threatened to take forceful action.
On Sunday, the head of an al-Qaida-linked Syrian rebel group vowed to target villages inhabited by members of Assad's minority Alawite sect to avenge the purported chemical weapons attack.
In an audio recording posted on a website frequently used by Islamic extremists, Jabhat al-Nusra leader, Abu Mohammed al-Golani, said: "Revenge for the blood of your children is a debt to be paid back ... 1,000 rockets will be fired at them in revenge for the massacre of Ghouta."
The authenticity of the claim could not be immediately verified.
___
Lucas reported from Beirut. Associated Press writers Jamey Keaten in Paris, Jamal Halaby in Amman, Jordan, and Kimberly Dozier, Lolita C. Baldor and Matthew Lee in Washington contributed to this report. ||||| Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption The BBC's Yolande Knell: "The UN has always said the safety of its team is paramount"
Unidentified snipers have opened fire on a convoy of UN experts investigating suspected chemical weapons attacks in Syria's capital, the UN has said.
One car was shot at "multiple times", forcing the convoy to turn back.
Syrian state media blamed opposition "terrorists" for the attack, though the claim could not be verified.
The UN team later resumed its mission, entering the western district of Muadhamiya to gather evidence, before returning to central Damascus.
Hundreds died in alleged attacks on Wednesday in five districts near Damascus.
The US said there was little doubt that Syrian forces used chemical weapons in the attacks, which reportedly killed more than 300 people in rebel-held areas.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad dismissed the accusation as "an insult to common sense" and warned the US against military intervention.
"If someone is dreaming of making Syria a puppet of the West, then this will not happen," he told the Russian newspaper Izvestiya.
'Intimidation'
The 20-member UN inspection team has been in Syria since 18 August to look into three earlier suspected chemical attacks. They were given permission on Sunday to examine the Damascus locations.
Image caption The UN inspectors have been talking to doctors in Muadhamiya
The experts intend to take soil, blood, urine and tissue samples for laboratory testing but they are unlikely to apportion blame for any of the attacks.
Video footage posted online appears to show UN inspectors in Muadhamiya taking samples and talking to residents.
They went to a Red Crescent centre and spoke to doctors, opposition activists said.
On the video, which the BBC has not been able to fully authenticate, one resident is heard telling an inspector of heavy raids on the district, with "over 600 canister strikes...12 tanks, 100 soldiers".
Shortly after setting out from their hotel in Damascus, the inspectors' cars came under fire "multiple times by unidentified snipers", according to a statement from the UN.
Analysis Whitehall officials say no firm decision is likely to be taken on how Britain will respond to last week's alleged chemical attack in Syria until at least Wednesday. That is when UK PM David Cameron will be chairing a session of the National Security Council, attended by military and intelligence chiefs and senior ministers. It follows intense consultations between London and Washington with Downing Street keen to stress the two countries are acting in concert. Any military response, if it is decided on, is most likely to be confined to a one-off or limited guided missile strikes on selected Syrian military targets using Tomahawk cruise missiles fired from US Navy warships stationed hundreds of miles away in the eastern Mediterranean. US vessels there are reported to have around 400 such missiles onboard, while a Royal Navy submarine in the region can also carry cruise missiles. But Russia, Syria and Iran have all issued strong warnings against any western military action.
The team returned safely back to the government checkpoint before setting out again.
The convoy was "deliberately targeted" and it seemed someone was trying to intimidate the team, the UN Secretary General's spokesman, Farhan Haq, told the BBC.
The inspectors have now returned to their hotel and are expected to resume their work on Tuesday.
Military action
A year ago, US President Barack Obama said the use of chemical weapons by the Syrian government would be "a red line" that could trigger US military action.
Washington has recently bolstered its naval presence in the eastern Mediterranean, and military leaders from the US, UK and their allies are meeting in Jordan.
But the UN Security Council remains divided, with China and Russia appearing unlikely to drop their objection to stricter sanctions on Mr Assad's government.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on Monday that diplomats should be cautious in dealing with the chemical weapons issue, and Moscow warned Western nations not to prejudge the outcome of the inspections.
Western politicians have begun to suggest taking action outside of the UN system.
UK Foreign Secretary William Hague told the BBC that action could be taken without UN approval if there was "great humanitarian need" in Syria.
His French counterpart Laurent Fabius suggested the UN Security Council could be bypassed "in certain circumstances".
Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption William Hague: UN Security Council has not shouldered its responsibilities
But in his latest comments on the crisis, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said any intervention in Syria without a UN mandate would be a "grave violation of international law".
The West, he told a news conference in Moscow, had not been able to come up with any proof of chemical weapons use while "saying at the same time that the red line has been crossed and there can be no delay".
'Neurotoxic symptoms'
Western officials were unimpressed with Syria's decision to allow in the UN experts.
Mr Hague said evidence could have been tampered with, degraded or destroyed in the five days since the attack.
A senior White House official, quoted by AP news agency, dismissed the visit as "too late to be credible".
Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) said on Saturday that three hospitals it supports in the Damascus area had treated about 3,600 patients with "neurotoxic symptoms" on Wednesday morning, of whom 355 had died.
While MSF said it could not "scientifically confirm" the use of chemical weapons, staff at the hospitals described a large number of patients arriving in the space of less than three hours with symptoms including convulsions, pinpoint pupils and breathing problems.
Syria's security forces are widely believed to possess large undeclared stockpiles of mustard gas and sarin nerve agent.
It is one of seven countries that have not joined the 1997 convention banning chemical weapons. ||||| German politicians across the political spectrum are urging extreme caution over proposals by the US and Britain to launch a military offensive in Syria.
The governing Christian Democrats (CDU) of chancellor Angela Merkel insisted that Germany was pressing on in pursuit of a diplomatic solution, but suggested for the first time that it might support an international military response if it is proved that Syrian government troops used chemical weapons to attack its opponents. Merkel's spokesman, Steffen Seibert, said that if UN inspectors confirmed the use of chemical weapons, Syria "must be punished".
He confirmed for the first time the government's belief that there is a "very high probability of a poison gas attack" and while he would not rule out the use of force, he would not speculate on what sort of response might be appropriate. Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said that if the attack was confirmed, "Germany would be among those who consider consequences to be appropriate."
The statements indicate a shift away from the government's hitherto insistence on a political solution to the conflict, with defence minister Thomas de Maiziere declaring just this weekend that: "Outside military intervention in this terrible civil war in Syria is just not something I envisage," while Philipp Missfelder, head foreign policy expert of the CDU insisted: "Germany is rightly continuing to work on a political remedy."
The government's shift could yet turn the Syrian issue into a hotly debated election theme that could even influence the outcome of the poll in a month's time.
Most Germans are against military intervention and the current debate recalls the fallout in 2002 when Germany was divided over the looming intervention in Iraq ahead of that year's general election. Making the war his central election issue, and successfully presenting his party as the party of peace in opposition to the conservatives' candidate Edmund Stoiber and the CDU head Angela Merkel, the SPD's candidate Gerhard Schröder, while accused of opportunism, managed to secure his reelection.
Until now, the issue of war had not featured as an election issue at all with all parties in solid agreement – cementing their pacifist alliance in a Bundestag vote a month ago – that intervention by the west in Syria was to be avoided at all costs. The sense of solidarity is in contrast to the situation in 2011 when German politicians were divided over the UN security council's resolution over intervention in Libya.
But with the German population skeptical about military intervention and weary of its armed forces' less than triumphant experiences in Afghanistan, any party that pushes the call for western involvement, most especially anything which would involve German participation, risks losing voters. Despite widespread predictions that her reelection is a shoo-in, a decision by Merkel to support military intervention could have serious consequences for her future.
Meanwhile, Claudia Roth, the head of the opposition Greens and the strongest political voice of the pacifist movement in the Bundestag, has continued to stress the urgency of coming up with a non-military remedy. "All parties need to come to a political solution as soon as possible," she said. She stressed that China and Russia "have to put pressure on the Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad and to stop delivering weapons to Syria immediately".
The Social Democrats' (SPD) candidate for next month's general election, Peer Steinbrück, urged "restraint regarding the discussions about military intervention".
Most politicians have welcomed the decision by Assad to allow entry to UN weapon inspectors even if only to secure more time in which a political solution might be reached. "This is an important agreement in a dramatic situation," said Westerwelle.
Dirk Niebel of the liberal Free Democrats (FDP) said that Germany should focus its energies on helping the civilian population. "There are more than 100,000 dead and two million refugees and they're the ones we need to help including here in Germany," he said. | – Syria may have given UN inspectors the OK to access the site of last week's alleged chemical weapons attack, but inspections are not off to a great start. A UN rep confirms that one of the team's vehicles was "deliberately shot at multiple times" by unidentified snipers in Damascus; all are safe. The shooting reportedly occurred in the buffer zone between rebel- and government-controlled territory, and the team will head back to the area once it replaces its vehicle, reports the AP. The Syrian government, for its part, has already blamed "terrorists," reports CNN. More: Once they finally reach the site of last week's alleged attack, UN inspectors will spend two days taking soil, blood, urine, and tissue samples, reports the BBC. But Reuters reports that the US and its allies aren't expecting much: They believe the regime's offer to allow inspectors to the site came too late and any remaining evidence has probably been destroyed by heavy shelling. To wit, a senior White House official dismissed the visit as "too late to be credible." Assad, meanwhile, says that any American attempt at military intervention will be doomed to fail. "Failure awaits the United States as in all previous wars it has unleashed, starting with Vietnam and up to the present day," he said in an interview with a Russian newspaper. UN chief Ban Ki-moon warns that "every hour counts" in determining the facts of what was a "major and terrible incident," reports the Guardian. "We cannot allow impunity in what appears to be a grave crime against humanity," he said. But the UN Security Council, which is split on the issue, has already failed to shoulder its responsibilities and the UK and its allies may have to take action without its approval, Britain's foreign minister says. "Is it possible to respond to chemical weapons without complete unity on the UN Security Council?" William Hague tells the BBC. "I would argue yes it is, otherwise it might be impossible to respond to such outrages." |
The reason for such a small showing at this year’s Joint Sea exercise is straightforward, says
Maxim Shepovalenko, a former Russian navy captain and expert at the Moscow-based Center for the Analysis of Strategies and Technologies (CAST), said the small Russian showing was because there was "no need for a large-scale exercise" in the Baltic, "merely a symbolic one".
"I can’t imagine the Russian navy ever holding a large-scale naval drill even by itself. And for the Chinese Navy, this is just a way to get a taste for ‘global reach,’” Mr Shepovalenko said.
The exercise will run the course of a week, and will feature anti-submarine, anti-aircraft, and anti-ship drills. The two sides will also practice anti-piracy as well as search and rescue operations. The joint flotilla is under the command of Russian Vice Admiral Alexander Fedotenkov and Chinese Vice-Admiral Tian Zhong.
The drills are being conducted in Russian, according to the Baltic Fleet’s press service.
China has been expanding its military reach by building up its naval forces and establishing its first overseas military base in the tiny east African nation of Djibouti this year.
The manoeuvres in the Baltic Sea are being seen by Chinese experts as a show of force following joint drills by the United States and Beijing's two key Asian rivals - India and Japan – in the Indian Ocean earlier this month. ||||| BERLIN (Reuters) - U.S. allies in eastern Europe and Ukraine are worried that Russia’s planned war games in September could be a “Trojan horse” aimed at leaving behind military equipment brought into Belarus, the U.S. Army’s top general in Europe said on Thursday.
Russia has sought to reassure NATO that the military exercises will respect international limits on size, but NATO and U.S. official remain wary about their scale and scope.
U.S. Army Lieutenant General Ben Hodges, who heads U.S. Army forces in Europe, told Reuters in an interview that allied officials would keep a close eye on military equipment brought in to Belarus for the Zapad 2017 exercise, and whether it was removed later.
“People are worried, this is a Trojan horse. They say, ‘We’re just doing an exercise,’ and then all of a sudden they’ve moved all these people and capabilities somewhere,” he said.
Hodges said he had no indications that Russia had any such plans, but said greater openness by Moscow about the extent of its war games would help reassure countries in eastern Europe.
A senior Russian diplomat strongly rejected allegations that Moscow could leave military equipment in Belarus.
“This artificial buffoonery over the routine Zapad-2017 exercises is aimed at justifying the sharp intensification of the NATO bloc (activities) along the perimeter of Russian territory,” Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin told the Interfax news agency on Friday.
NATO allies are nervous because previous large-scale Russian exercises employed special forces training, longer-range missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles.
Such tactics were later used in Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014, its support for separatists in eastern Ukraine and in its intervention in Syria, NATO diplomats say.
Hodges said the United States and its allies had been very open about a number of military exercises taking place across eastern Europe this summer involving up to 40,000 troops, but it remained unclear if Moscow would adhere to a Cold War-era treaty known as the Vienna document, which requires observers for large-scale exercises involving more than 13,000 troops.
Some NATO allies believe the Russian exercise could number more than 100,000 troops and involve nuclear weapons training, the biggest such exercise since 2013.
Russia has said it would invite observers if the exercise exceeded 13,000 forces.
U.S Army Europe Commanding General Ben Hodges speaks during the inauguration ceremony of bilateral military training between U.S. and Polish troops in Zagan, Poland, January 30, 2017. REUTERS/Kacper Pempel
Hodges said NATO would maintain normal rotations during the Russian war game, while carrying out previously scheduled exercises in Sweden, Poland and Ukraine.
The only additional action planned during that period was a six-week deployment of three companies of 120 paratroopers each to Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania for “low-level” exercises, Hodges said.
“We want to avoid anything that looks like a provocation. This is not going to be the ‘Sharks’ and the ‘Jets’ out on the streets,” Hodges said in a reference to the gang fights shown in the 1961 film “West Side Story” set in New York City. | – Russia is staging war games in Belarus in September, but US officials and US allies in the area are concerned the country's real aim is to bring military equipment into the country and leave it there. "People are worried this is a Trojan horse. They say, 'We're just doing an exercise,' and then all of a sudden they've moved all these people and capabilities somewhere," the head of US Army forces in Europe tells Reuters. He says NATO officials will be watching the Zapad 2017 exercise closely for that reason. Some allies think the exercise will involve nuclear weapons training and could utilize more than 100,000 troops, which would make it the largest such exercise since 2013, the Guardian reports. The official did note that there are no indications Russia really is planning such a "trojan horse," but called for more transparency from the country as to the size and scope of the war games in order to ease concerns. A senior Russian diplomat says Moscow has no plans to leave military equipment in Belarus, and says the concern from NATO is just "artificial buffoonery" over routine war games that is "aimed at justifying the sharp intensification of the NATO bloc (activities) along the perimeter of Russian territory." NATO is also keeping a close eye on war games in the Baltic Sea taking place July 24-31; Chinese warships were to join the Russian navy there Friday. |
(CNN) The University of Virginia has issued "trespass warnings" that ban white nationalist Richard Spencer and nine other people from the campus for four years because of their involvement in the violent "Unite the Right" demonstrations in August 2017, the school said Friday.
Spencer, a graduate of the university, organized the August 11, 2017, torchlight march across the campus and gave a speech in front of the Thomas Jefferson statue in which he took credit for "defeating" counterprotesters, the university said. He also issued written and video statements in which he said his group surrounded anti-racist protesters and "wouldn't let them out," the school added.
JUST WATCHED Spencer: 'Make white privilege great again' Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Spencer: 'Make white privilege great again' 01:08
The next day, riots broke out during protests, which led to dozens of injuries and the death of counterprotester Heather Heyer, who was struck by a vehicle.
CNN reached out to Spencer for comment, but he did not immediately reply.
Campus police conducted a year-long investigation before issuing the warnings, the university said.
Read More ||||| The University of Virginia on Friday imposed a four-year ban from campus on Richard Spencer and nine other people who participated in a white-supremacist march on the school’s grounds last year.
Spencer, a U-Va. graduate, led the torchlight procession of 150 to 200 marchers chanting “Our blood, our soil” and “Jews will not replace us!” through campus on Aug. 11, 2017. The march culminated with participants surrounding and attacking a much smaller group of counterprotesters who had circled a statue of Thomas Jefferson, the university’s founder.
The following day, Spencer and the others took part in the white-supremacist Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville that led to violent clashes and the death of counterprotester Heather Heyer, who was run over by a car that police say was driven by a man with neo-Nazi ties.
[Charlottesville timeline: Recounting a day of rage, hate, violence and death]
“The trespass warnings issued today reflect our commitment to ensuring the safety of our community while upholding the principles of freedom of speech and assembly,” U-Va. President Jim Ryan said in a statement.
Spencer, in a written response to a request for comment, said: “Ideas have no jurisdiction and ultimately can’t be censored. That said, I have no immediate plans to engage in activism on campus, at U-Va. or anywhere.”
The university announcement of the no-trespass orders followed a year-long investigation by the U-Va. Police Department in coordination with state and federal law enforcement agencies that identified the 10 individuals as “either committing or conspiring with others to carry out acts of violence or other conduct that directly threatened the health and safety of members of the community and other people on Grounds,” Assistant Vice President and Chief of Police Tommye S. Sutton said in a statement. “We have drawn a distinction between free speech and conduct that is aimed to intimidate others and promote violence. Such conduct and intimidation will not be tolerated.”
A violation of the no-trespass order is a criminal trespass offense and violators would be subject to arrest. According to university policy, trespass warnings expire four years after the date the warning is served.
In an interview, Timothy J. Heaphy, U-Va. counsel, reiterated that the decision to ban the men was because they violated policies of conduct, not speech.
“If you cross the line from offensive speech to take action, that goes over the line of protected expression,” Heaphy said.
Heaphy said he hopes to identify more individuals who took part in the march who acted in violation of university policy and add them to the list of banned individuals. Jason Kessler, another organizer of the Unite the Right rally and a U-Va. graduate, was issued a trespass warning in April.
Walter Heinecke, a U-Va. associate professor who rushed to help students injured by the white supremacist marchers, called the university’s decision to ban Spencer and the others “a highly appropriate move.”
“As someone who was at the Rotunda on Aug. 11, I feel grateful the university is finally taking some responsibility and action,” Heinecke said in an interview. “To hear that they’re banning Spencer and Kessler and the others is a positive sign to me that the university is taking seriously its obligation to address white supremacy.”
The university said it was prohibiting Spencer because of his role in organizing the torchlight march and for giving a speech at the statue “in which he took credit for ‘occupying space’ and ‘defeating’ counter protesters that evening.” In its statement, the university said Spencer’s “words and actions at and after the rally provide evidence of his involvement in a conspiracy to commit acts of violence at the Jefferson statue.”
Earlier this week, Spencer was accused by his wife, Nina Koupriianova, of physical, verbal and emotional abuse during their eight-year marriage, according to documents filed as part of their divorce proceedings. Koupriianova submitted emails, text conversations and photographs in a court brief as evidence of her allegations.
Spencer disputed Koupriianova’s charges in an affidavit. “More importantly, none of the allegations of ‘abuse’ have anything to do with my children,” he wrote. “My interactions with my children have only been healthy . . . Petitioner’s behaviors reveal that she simply wants to ‘score points.’ ”
[White nationalist Richard Spencer accused of physically abusing wife throughout their marriage]
In addition to Spencer, the university identified those who were banned as Benjamin Daley of Redondo Beach, Calif.; Antonio Foreman of Thousand Oaks, Calif.; Thomas Gillen of Redondo Beach, Calif.; Elliott Kline of Reading, Pa.; Michael Miselis of Lawndale, Calif.; Vasillious Pistolis of Charlotte; Robert Ray of Frankston, Tex.;, Wil Smith of Nocona, Tex.; and Cole White of Clayton, Calif. Efforts to reach them were unsuccessful.
Four of the men banned Friday — Daley, Miselis, Gillen and White — were arrested by federal agents earlier this month and charged with violating federal laws against rioting for their alleged actions in the Unite the Right rally. Pistolis was dismissed from the Marines this summer after being tried at a court-martial and found guilty. | – If Richard Spencer wants to try to stir up any trouble in Charlottesville, he's going to have to do it anywhere other than the University of Virginia, at least for the next four years. That's because, per the Washington Post, the UVA grad and noted white nationalist has been banned from campus, along with nine others, after they took part in a march of white supremacists on school grounds in August 2017—a weekend that culminated in violence and the death of counterprotester Heather Heyer. "The trespass warnings issued today reflect our commitment to ensuring the safety of our community while upholding the principles of freedom of speech and assembly," UVA President Jim Ryan said in a statement. The ban came down after a yearlong probe by university police, as well as state and federal law-enforcement agencies, into the 2017 rally and those involved. If Spencer or any of the other men banned from campus violate the order, they'll be slapped with a misdemeanor charge of criminal trespassing, CNN notes. "We have drawn a distinction between free speech and conduct that is aimed to intimidate others and promote violence," says Tommye Sutton, the head of campus police. "Such conduct and intimidation will not be tolerated." Spencer's written response to the Post: "Ideas have no jurisdiction and ultimately can't be censored. That said, I have no immediate plans to engage in activism on campus, at UVA or anywhere." (Maybe that's because he's got to deal with his marital and domestic violence problems.) |
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